It doesn't have 3G. It doesn't have true GPS. It doesn't have instant messaging or 3rd party apps or even cut and paste. With all it's current shortcomings, the iPhone is still a worthy "Swiss Army Knife" of smartphones that you can confidently take with you through airport security, on a plane, and throughout your trip as an excellent traveling companion. In fact, I'll boldly exclaim that the iPhone is all that I could ask for in my travels and I really put it through it's paces on a recent trip.
iLounge tells us that Apple has sent out a second note to would be $99-level iPhone SDK developers:
“We have many more requests than we can serve during this initial beta period, so we must limit the Program at this time. We plan to expand it during the beta period, and we will contact you regarding your enrollment status at the appropriate time. We appreciate your patience.”
As part of his piece on the continuing confusion surrounding the $99 iPhone SDK program acceptance/pending/rejection letters, Daring Fireball's John Gruber also dropped this very interesting nugget about the equally continuing and confusing situation surrounding the apparent Apple ban on multitasking and background apps:
We're back on our regularly scheduled, ah, schedule. This week we'll follow the SDK Fallout, Talk a bit more about the iPhone in the enterprise, and look at some other iPhone news. Plus your emails and thoughts from the Phone different iPhone forums!
The Flash drama continues, with more twists and turns than a California highway. It looks as though iPhone may be getting native Flash support after all, if dragged kicking and screaming. Adobe CEO Shantanu Narayen spoke to reporters during a conference call...
GearLive reported Flash for the iPhone was immanent. Adobe retorted that it was all up to Steve Jobs. His Steveness resorted to telling investors that Flash desktop was too big, Flash Lite was too small, and they were missing a product that was juuuusssst right.
Well, Adobe CEO Shantanu Narayen hopes Apple's newly released SDK will help Adobe deliver that middle ground, with or without Jobs' blessing. Speaking to investors, Narayen said (via Apple Insider):
So, while 100% unsubstantiated rumor at the moment, The Financial Times (via Apple Insider) is reporting a "tip off" that says Apple is now considering an unlimited music program similar to Nokia's "Comes With Music".
Apple has released their latest, greatest, fastest, and coolest new browser yet -- Safari 3.1 (big brother to the MobileSafari Touch browser built into the iPhone).
Safari is based on Apple's open-source WebKit (a branch of the Konqueror/KHTML engine), the same foundation Nokia, Google's upcoming Android, and even Adobe's AIR runtime get their render on with.
Engadget honcho Ryan Block got his techie mitts on a pre-release version of the iPhone 2.0 firmware, and here are the highlights (and lowlights!):
Exchange over Wi-Fi is not instantaneous (!). No contact search he could find. New button in Calendar don't do nothing for him yet. App Store error's out. Cisco branded VPN screen. Parental controls are good-to-go. Wi-Fi order can be specified in prefs. Calc has new widescreen scientific mode and icon. And his favorite new feature -- Multi-Select in Mail!
Head on over for a full rundown and gallery o' pics!
