Apple Stores will soon carry stock of the revolutionary Nest learning thermostat. According to sources, the Nest thermostat is being delivered to Apple Stores nationwide and may go on sale as early as next week. The Nest thermostat has already been given its own Apple part number and is set to be sold at the same price as Nest’s online store at $249.99.

Today, a trusted source was able to provide a first hand look at the Nest packaged at an Apple Store today, complete with the part number. Priced at $249.99 (the same as Nest’s price through Nest’s online store), the Nest has a part number of H9279ll/a in Apple’s systems.

According to Nest, the thermostat takes roughly a week to pick up on your energy routines and adjusts your temperature accordingly. A display changes colors to red or blue to distinguish between heating and cooling, and the design is very Apple-like. The greatest part about the Nest Learning Thermostat is the iOS app for your iPhone or iPad, letting your remotely adjust Nest's settings and get all the vital information you need on-the-go.

If you have been thinking about picking up a Nest learning thermostat, you will soon be able to see one in the flesh at your local Apple Store.

Source: 9to5 Mac

A new video has surfaced that gives us an extremely rare look at the iPhone assembly line within a Foxconn factory. Seeing one of these lines in action is a very rare occurrence as Apple is well known for keeping its production processes and products secret. The video is shot in Foxconn’s Zhengzhou plant where over seventy percent of Apple’s iPhones are now made.

The video which is provided by iFeng, shows a Chinese reporter with Foxconn CEO Terry Gou taking a tour around the extensive factory. The tour starts in a helicopter to give an idea on the sheer size of this huge factory. It covers 5.6 square kilometers (2.2 Square miles) with more expansion planned and employs around 115,000 workers.

The factory part of the tour starts off in the iPhone 4S production line where you can see the iPhone 4S frame and motherboard. The motherboard line is 148 meters long and rolls out 10,000 units a day. The tour continues into the camera assembly area which is all done in a clean room environment.

You can watch the video below, the dialogue is all in Chinese and we don't have a translation yet.

Source: TNW via MIC Gadget

VicMan Visage Lab for iPhone is an app that will give your portraits a complete makeover with just the tap of a button. I'm always fairly skeptical of these types of apps because they have the potential to produce results that look very fake and overdone, but not VicMan Visage Lab -- the results are very good!

VicMan Visage Lab includes two sample photos, one of a man and another of a woman. Here's the before and after on the woman model.

Here's the before and after on the male model.

Pretty good, huh?

Using VicMan Visage Lab is extremely easy. Just select the photo you wish to edit and let the software work its magic. When it's done, it'll zoom in on the photo and briefly show the original photo before applying the retouches.

The retouches that VicMan Visage Lab applies are skin makeup, eye makeup, teeth whitening, shine removal, wrinkle smoothing, and color enhancement.

After the retouches are completel you can pinch to zoom in and out of the photo and tap the little snapshot in the bottom left corner to switch between the original and retouched version.

If you are unhappy with the results, you can choose specifically which effects you want to apply. Unfortunately, this doesn't give instant feedback, so you'll have to wait for the retouching to happen again. This also means that there isn't a way to compare between different combinations.

VicMan Visage Lab also includes some effects that you can apply to your photo. A few of them, like Sunny Colors and Glamour Effect, are subtle but have a great impact on portraits. Other effects include Black & White, Retro Sepia, Poster Look, Xmas Bokeh, In the Wave, and Light Bokeh.

Now, I know that seeing great results on photos that were included with the app may not be very impressive, so here's a before and after comparison of a photo of me.

For this photo, I disabled Shine Removal and Wrinkle Smoothing because I felt they made my face look flat and lack dimension. I also applied the Glamour Effect.

The good

• Works surprising well
• Can select between 6 different retouching tools
• Many of the filters are subtle, yet awesome

The bad

• Each time you want to select a different combination of retouching tools, it goes through the entire process over again with no way to compare the different results
• Filters take too long to apply

The conclusion

VicMan Visage Lab is a fantastic app for improving portraits by removing flaws and giving them that extra little oomph. If you're planning to participate in this week's portrait iPhoneography contest, this is probably a great app to pick up!

VicMan Visage Lab comes in three different versions. The free version is ad supported and does not include all of the filter effects. The Pro versions have no adds and includes all the filters. The iPhone only Pro version of VicMan Visage lab is $0.99 and the universal version for iPhone and iPad is $1.99.

Free for iPhone & iPad- Download Now

$0.99 for iPhone - Download Now

$1.99 for iPhone & iPad - Download Now

The Google Search app for iPhone app was recently updated with a complete redesign that makes searching on Google a rather pleasant experience. It features a very stylish and snappy UI that's bound to impress anyone who uses it.

The home page of Google is very clean and Google-esque with barely off-white background and the Google search field directly in the center. Along the top of the screen you'll see what account you're logged into and find access to settings.

On the bottom of the screen you'll see icons for Apps, Voice, and Goggles. The apps section lets you access all the Google Apps on the web: Gmail, Calendar, Docs, Google+, News, Reeder, Photos, YouTube, Translate, Offers, Tasks, and Blogger. You can also find a list of other apps that Google has available in the App Store with direct links to download.

The Voice icon lets you perform a voice search. Just speak what you'd like to search for, and Google Search will type it into the search field for you! It's been extremely accurate in my experience.

Google Goggles is a neat feature that performs a search based on a photo you took. For example, if you want to look up a book, just take a photo of the cover with Goggles and Google will find it for you.

As you type into the search field, Google will automatically display popular search terms. If you see the one you want, just tap it instead of typing it completely out -- it's a huge time saver. When you perform the search, the results will be displayed in a similar fashion as on the web and Mobile Safari. Along the bottom of the screen you choose what kind of search you'd like to perform (web, images, places, news, etc…), but as you scroll down, the controls disappear. Google refers to this as auto full screen. As you scroll up, the controls will reappear. It's very cool.

When you tap on a result, the webpage will open in a tab on top of your results and a very thing blue line will progress underneath the tab while the page loads. Auto full screen works on web pages as well.

When the controls are displayed, you can navigate between pages, refresh the page, open in Safari, share via email, or perform a word search on the page. When doing a search, each appearance of the word will be placed in a yellow box. You can either scroll through the webpage to find each instance of the word, or tap the arrows next to your search to jump to the next/previous time it appears.

Search for images with Google Search is absolutely gorgeous. The photos are displayed as a collage. The collage is separated into distinct rows, but not all the rows are the same height. Each row will contain anywhere between 1 and 3 images in their original crop ratio. I think this is much more interesting than showing each photo cropped as a square.

The good

• Beatuiful design
• Extremely fast
• Voice search is very accurate
• Image searches are stunning
• Web access to all Google Apps
• Universal for iPhone and iPad

The bad

• Can't have more than one tab

The conclusion

I never used to use Google Search for iPhone, but now I find myself using it quite often. The experience is much better than Safari -- and it's super fast!

Free - Download Now

Absinthe 2.0 has launched and it provides support for a fully unthethered jailbreak under iOS 5.1.1 (and only iOS 5.1.1) for the following devices:

• iPad, iPad 2, new iPad (except the 2012 iPad 2, which will come later)
• iPhone 3GS, iPhone 4, iPhone 4S
• iPod touch 3, iPod touch 4

Developed by a collaborative "Dream Team" between Chronic-Dev Team and iPhone Dev Team, Absinthe 2.0 and promises to be so easy, your "grandma could do it." Here are the steps:

1. Make a backup of your device in iTunes by right clicking on your device name under the ‘Devices’ menu and click ‘Back Up’.

2. Once your backup is complete return to your device and go to Settings – General – Reset – Erase all Content and Settings. This will make the jailbreak process much faster.

3. Open Absinthe and be sure you are still connected via USB cable to your computer.

4. Click ‘Jailbreak’ and wait…. just be patient and do not disconnect your device.

5. Once jailbroken return to iTunes and restore your backup from earlier. Right click on your device name under the ‘Devices’ menu in the left panel of iTunes and click ‘Restore from Back Up…’ then select the latest backup you created before. (restoring this backup will return all the content previously on your device ie, apps, photos, etc.)

You can grab the download via the source link below, and if you need any help, jump right into our Jailbreak Forum.

Source: greenpois0n.com

IOS JAILBREAK DREAM TEAM RELEASES ABSINTHE 2.0 – IOS 5.1.1 JAILBREAK AT #HITB2012AMS

AMSTERDAM, THE NETHERLANDS – 25th May 2012 – Today @pod2g and the @ChronicDevTeam announced the highly anticipated release of Absinthe 2.0 at #HITB2012AMS held at the Okura Hotel in Amsterdam.

Known as the “iOS Jailbreak Dream Team”, @p0sixninja, @pod2g, @planetbeing, @pimskeks released the untethered jailbreak for iOS 5.1.1 on the final day of the week-long conference. Echoing Steve Jobs’ trademark WWDC encore of ‘… and one more thing’, the team announced the release of Absinthe 2.0 during the closing minutes of their 2 hours talk at the conference.

Absinthe 2.0 will affect the majority of Apple devices running iOS 5.1.1 including iPad 1,1 – 2,1 – 2,2 – 2,3 – 3,1 – 3,2 – 3,3, the iPhone 2,1 – 3,1 – 3,3 – 4,1 and iPod 3,1 – 4,1. The jailbreak does not support the third generation Apple TV and support for iPad 2,4 will be added at a later date.

The team announced that the new Absinthe 2.0 will be available immediately for download from the official ChronicDevTeam website: http://greenpois0n.com The release announcement came after recent rife speculation spreading through online social networks on the actual release date and scope of Absinthe 2.0. The jailbreak community’s interest was first piqued when the team announced they were scheduled to appear at HITBSecConf2012 – Amsterdam to deliver not one but two talks covering both the Corona (A4) and Absinthe (A5) jailbreaks for Apple devices. On the 20th of May, a tweet from team member @pod2g stating the release of Absinthe 2.0 was ‘in a matter of days’ led to further speculation that the final release would be made at HITBSecConf which ran from 21 – 25 May.

“We want to take this opportunity to thank Hack in the Box for giving us the chance to all get together for the first time, especially in the beautiful city of Amsterdam, it has been a great delight for us to announce our next release at this event. Thank you to all our supporters and keep jailbreaking!! ”

“This was certainly one of the most highly anticipated talks we’ve EVER had at one of our HITB conferences, and we’ve done quite a few of these. The excitement from the Dream Team followers and overall Twitter and online buzz has been terrific!”, said Dhillon Andrew Kannabhiran, Founder and CEO of Hack In The Box.

“It was truly an honor to host the Dream Team in their first ever ‘real world’ meet up and we would like to thank them for taking the time and effort to make the trip over to not only join us at our third European outing, but to help kick-start our celebration of ’10 years of HITB awesomeness’ with the release of Absinthe 2.0!”, he added.

HITBSecConf2012 – Malaysia (#HITB2012KUL) marks our 10th annual event in Asia and runs from October 8th till 11th at the Intercontinental Kuala Lumpur featuring 42 of HITB’s best speakers of the decade in one massive event. Registration is already open: http://conference.hitb.org/hitbsecconf2012kul/

About iOS Jailbreak Dream Team: The group is made up of members from the Chronic-Dev Team and the iPhone Dev Team and consists of @MuscleNerd @pod2g @planetbeing @p0sixninja @pimskeks.

About iOS jailbreaking: iOS jailbreaking, or simply jailbreaking, is the process of removing the limitations imposed by Apple on devices running the iOS operating system through use of custom security exploits. Jailbreaking allows users to gain elevated access to the operating system. Consequently it also allows users to download additional applications, extensions and themes that are unavailable through the official Apple App Store.

Apple has made some minor changes to the layout of the App Store within iTunes; the same changes are reflected on the iPhone, iPad and iPod touch. With such a huge number of apps now available in the App Store finding what you are looking has gone from hit and miss to downright daunting. Apple has been rumored to be completely revamping its iTunes software but in the meantime, they're still tweaking what we have now.

When you visit the App Store you will now see two new features -- Editor’s Choice and App of the Week. Editor’s choice looks to have taken the place of the previous iPhone and iPad App of the Week. This week’s editor’s choices for the UK are The Thames, Air Mail, and Extreme Skater. In the U.S. different apps have been chosen and they are Facebook Camera (fairly fast, given it was only released yesterday...), Sketchbook and again Chillingo’s Air Mail.

The App of the Week for this week is Cut the Rope: Experiments. Apple’s App Store twitter account tweeted the information and included a new hashtag “#FreeAppoftheWeek”. We don’t know if the App of the Week will always be a free app, if it will be a paid app on temporary sale for free, or if -- as we assume -- it won’t always be free and that it will still be any app, paid or free.

These new changes may make things slightly easier to find apps that maybe of  interest to you but the App Store still has a long way to go before it becomes a great experience. Hopefully the rumors of an iTunes redesign will turn out to be true and Apple will use the acquisition of Chomp to offer a better version of the App Store; until then, we will take any improvements we can get.

Source: Touch Arcade

Apple's Apple's Senior Vice President of Design, Jonathan Ive deservedly became Sir Jonathan Ive on Wednesday when he received a knighthood for services to design and enterprise. The Princess Royal was on hand to perform the ceremony which hit news channels around the world. After the knighthood ceremony Sir Jonathan Ive attended another high profile function, the Royal Academy of the Arts alongside the Queen. Ive gave a short interview before going inside, telling of his delight at receiving the honor.

“I have always felt that I am extremely fortunate to have found what I love to do, and that’s essentially to be able to draw and make stuff.”  “So to actually be able to spend all of my time doing that, just that alone is fantastic but to then get some recognition for that is a wonderful affirmation of the craft and profession of design.”

Source: YouTube

iMore is here to help you play God, build cities, and run commercial empires with these top free simulation games for iPhone.

Last week we featured the best free iPad games, but there were a few new categories there that weren't in my original best free iPhone games post. One of those categories is simulation, where your micro-management skills pay the virtual bills. Some of these will look familiar, but others may be new to you. Keep in mind that all of the current picks here are free-to-play, but subsist on in-app payments for various non-essential perks, so if you're not a fan of being nickeled-and-dimed, this list might not be for you. Buckle up hit the jump to see our favourite free simulation games for the iPhone.

Tiny Tower

Tiny Tower is a really simple social management game with 8-bit-style graphics. Your job is to populate a tower with bitizens, assign them jobs relevent to their skills, keep their respective businesses stocked, and build more floors on top of your building. Over time, your bitizens earn you money which can be spent on purchasing new stock for various types of stores, or for putting the next storey onto your tower. You'll need to ferry bitizens from the ground floor with the elevator if you'll ever want to move new people in, plus once in awhile VIPs will provide you extra bonuses, like knocking off a few hours from your restocking time.

Tiny Tower occasionally gives you Towerbucks for handling the elevator, which can be used to hurry restocking, construction, or elevator upgrades. Towerbucks can also be bought through in-app purchases.

• Download now

The Sandbox

The Sandbox is clever mix-and-match game with an 8-bit art style. You take the role of an almighty creator trying to combine various elements in the right order at the right spot in order to complete a puzzle. Those goals can be as simple as evaporating water and as elaborate as discovering electricity. In that sense, there's a definite Doodle God vibe, except this is a lot more fluid. Beyond painting element-infused pixels, you also have control over a wide variety of environment elements, including temperature and weather. The real magic of The Sandbox is that elements all behave as you expect them to - trees catch fire if you turn up the world temperature, dirt falls when you paint it in the sky, and electricity surges through metal and shoots off the ends of wires with sparks. Given, all of that action is in chunky pixels, it's still all very believable. Outside of the puzzles, you can also go freestyle to make your own creations and share them online in the burgeoning pixel art gallery.

Though The Sandbox is free, new elements are unlocked with mana points, which are awarded as you play through missions or bought through in-app purchases. Mana points can also be used to purchase hints for particularly tricky puzzles - luckily the hints aren't too expensive. There's Game Center support here to track achievements, but it's not Universal, so unfortunately no enjoying this one on the big screen.

• Download now

My Country

My Country is a city simulation game where you build businesses, attract residents, and connect with neighboring communities. It's about as close to a full-featured, free version of the premium SimCity game as you'll find. Sure, there are some of the FarmVille trappings of having to tap on buildings to collect revenue, but there's a ton of depth to the resource structure; for example, to run a business, you have to gather up equipment either through other business or upgrading residential units to hire the required professionals. You need to juggle ecology ratings and electrical demands as your city expands from one era to the next. As you complete missions, you gain experience points, level up, and unlock new buildings to propel your metropolis to further heights.

The in-game cash you earn from running businesses within your city (or country, once it gets big enough) is generally what you use to expand and unlock new buildings, but you can also use the premium CountryBucks currency to complete most of the same tasks.

• Download now

Order Up!! To Go

Order Up!! To Go is a cooking and restaurant simulator that tests your time management skills. The gameplay is twofold - for one, you're working on building up the reputation and menu for your restaurant, always with an eye to the next establishment, so there's a fair bit of budgeting involved. The cooking itself is very similar to the Cooking Mama series in you cut tomatoes with downward swipes and flip burgers with curved swipes (though I wouldn't mind some accelerometer control for that). What really keeps the game fun is the variety of other mini-games and the great humor both in the writing an art style. Smaller nuances, like recognizing customers as they come in and using the appropriate spices adds even more depth to the frantic gameplay.

You earn silver coins through regular gameplay, which can be used to buy your ingredients, access new restaurants, and hire extra help, but you can speed up the process with premium gold coins acquired through in-app purchases.

• Download now

The Sims FreePlay

The Sims FreePlay is a classic life simulation game where you tend to a collection of virtual people, each with a variety of needs and colorful spectrum of personality quirks. You do everything from steering their conversations with other Sims, decorating their home, getting them to work, and making sure they bathe regularly. A recent update even added the ability to play as and care for child Sims. As you guide your Sim to accomplish daily tasks, you gain experience points, level up, and unlock new items. Unlike the old Sims games that had a handy fast-forward button, activities in The Sims FreePlay all happen in real-time, so when you put your little people to sleep, they're gone for 8 real hours.

As you play, you earn Lifestyle Points, which can be used to immediately satisfy your Sim's needs and quickly complete tasks. Those can be bought through in-app purchases, alongside the game's currency, Simoleans, which your Sims earn through various kinds of work.

The UI is better-suited for the iPad; on the iPhone, I find gameplay a little cramped, but everything is still there, and in the world of simulation games, there's really no contest. Saved games can be manually synced to the cloud between iPhone and iPad, but that can prove to be a hassle if you switch back and forth a bunch.

• Download now

Your favorite sim games for iPhone?

Facebook is the most popular photo sharing service on the web so it comes as no surprise that they released an app dedicated to the photo aspect of Facebook -- it's called Facebook Camera. With Facebook Camera, you can easily share multiple photos to Facebook, add filters to them, tag your friends, and view a newsfeed restricted just to photos posted by you and your friends. And, of course, you can also leave comments and likes on photos.

The main screen of Facebook Camera is the news feed, except that this news feed only contains photos, not status updates and links like in Facebook for iPhone. You can sort the stream to show photos posted by your friends or just your own photos.

The appearance of the photos in the stream is similar to the new look that was recently implemented into Facebook for iPhone. The photos are full-width and wider than the white background. Each photo is also cropped as a square.

At the bottom of each photo you'll see a thumbs up button to "like" it, a comments button to leave comments, and the number of likes and comments is also displayed. When you tap on the numbers, a popup will appear that shows who liked the photo as well as all the comments. You can also leave a comment of your own. This button actually does the exact same thing as the speech bubble button.

Tapping on the photo will display it on a black background with the caption at the bottom as well as buttons to "like", comment, and tag.

At the top of the feed, you'll see a strip of photos from your Camera Roll and a button to launch the camera. Sliding down on the news feed will slide it off the screen so you can scroll through all the photos in your Camera Roll.

Tapping a photo will display it bigger and allow you to crop, tag, or add filters to it. These filters are remarkably similar to Instagram's filters, but this is to be expected since Facebook recently purchased Instagram. Once you've edited the photo to your liking, you can select it with the checkmark button or share it. If you select it, you'll be taken back to the grid of your Camera Roll photos so that you can repeat the process with more photos.

Once you're ready to share the photos, just tap the share button. This screen looks similar to the photo sharing screen on Facebook for iPhone. It will display small thumbnails of all your selected photos, let you say something about them, add a location, add friends, and adjust privacy settings.

The good

• Beautifully designed
• News feed displays either your friends photos or just your own
• Upload multiple photos at once
• Edit photos by cropping and adding filters
• Tag friends
• Adjust privacy settings before posting
• Leave comments and likes on photos

The bad

• Speech bubble and comment/like count buttons perform the exact same thing

The conclusion

I must say that I'm rather surprised with how much I like this app. I do nothing but complain about Facebook for iPhone, but Facebook appears to have done an outstanding job with Facebook Camera. It's not an Instagram replacement, but it's as great addition to Facebook. Now I'm just curious to see how long before these filters become available on the web version of Facebook.

Free - Download Now

Bump is a very popular iPhone app that people use to share information like photos and contacts by "bumping" their phones together. It used to be restricted to only iPhone users, then it appeared on other mobile platforms, and now you can share photos with your computer.

To share a photo, you must first visit https://bu.mp/ on your computer's browser. You don't even have to connect your iPhone to the same wifi network.

Next, you open Bump on your iPhone, swipe to the right to see your photos, and select which photos you want to share. To "bump" with your computer, you simply tap the spacebar on your keyboard with your iPhone.

The first time you do this, you will be required to accept the bump both on your iPhone and your computer, but this is only for the first time. Although Bump claims you only need to lightly tap your keyboard, you actually need to do it harder than you may have been expecting. Basically, the bump needs be be strong enough to be noticed by the software.

Onc the bump is complete, you'll see the photos appear on the website with options to download them all or download individually. You can also just simply drag the photos to your desktop (or other folder) to quickly save them.

As of right now, only photos can be bumped to a computer. You cannot share contact information, nor can you chat with the Mac. I don't see either of these as a problem, since users will typically be using this feature to share their own photos to their own computer. Most people have contacts synced with their computer and there's no reason to chat with yourself.

Personally, I'm very excited about this update and have bookmarked https://bu.mp/ on both of my computers.

Free - Download Now

GameFly is looking to branch out into mobile gaming but instead of its usual rental model, it is looking to get developers on-board from a much earlier stage. The new initiative would see GameFly becoming the publisher and promoter of a developer’s game. GameFly has set aside a fund for game developers who are already working on their next big game but do not have the resources to publish and promote it; GameFly would take care of that side of the games development

"GameFly is dedicated to giving consumers the best user experience possible, and to be their single destination for console, PC and mobile gaming needs," said Sean Spector, GameFly co-founder and SVP of Business Development and Content. "We plan to be a leading player in mobile games by launching our retail GameStore for Android and helping to fund mobile developers of all sizes to publish, promote and sell their smartphone and tablet games."

Source: PR Newswire

A stolen iPhone is helping its owner close the net on the thief thanks to Apple's iCloud Photo Stream. We assume that Find My iPhone was either not enabled, or was disabled by the thief, but it seems the thief was unaware that Photo Stream was running and cataloging every photograph

Katy McCaffrey had her iPhone stolen on a cruise ship last month. She had lost hope in recovering her smartphone, but then photos started showing up in her Photo Stream. The handy iCloud service automatically uploads photos taken on an iOS device to a feed that can be viewed on other authenticated devices.

Kate has now informed Disney Cruise Line and sent them copies of the photographs; she hopes to get her iPhone returned and maybe some free passes to Disneyland too.

Source: Facebook via Cult of Mac

If you work for IBM, you are welcome to bring your iPhone 4S to work with you but forget about using Apple’s voice driven digital assistant, Siri. IBM has banned the use of Siri on all of its networks due to concerns over privacy. Siri works by sending anything you ask it to a data center in North Carolina; after that, no one really knows exactly what happens with that data once it has been dealt with. Is it deleted once it has been dealt with, is it stored temporarily or is it kept forever?

IBM CIO Jeanette Horan told MIT’s Technology Review this week that her company has banned Siri outright because, according to the magazine, “The company worries that the spoken queries might be stored somewhere.” It turns out that Horan is right to worry. In fact, Apple’s iPhone Software License Agreement spells this out: “When you use Siri or Dictation, the things you say will be recorded and sent to Apple in order to convert what you say into text,” Apple says. Siri collects a bunch of other information — names of people from your address book and other unspecified user data, all to help Siri do a better job.

Siri’s original lead developer Edward Wrenbeck confirms that privacy was always a big concern and the fact that Siri could provide information on your location alone could be enough to violate a non-disclosure agreement. Of course this in no different to many other apps currently available or in fact,  the internet in general.

Do you think IBM is right to be concerned over who can gain access to this information and do you have privacy concerns of your own while using Siri?

Source: Wired

iMore's authoritative guide to the very best, absolutely free educational apps for iPhone and iPod touch

Looking for great educational app for your iPhone or iPod touch? The App Store is home to over half a million apps and games, and a surprising number of them are available for free. Some of the most beneficial free apps are free educational apps.

iTunes U

The free iTunes U app for iPhone gives you access to courses from universities and schools. These courses are completely free and even include assignments. iTunes U and the instructors provide course materials, including audio, video, books, documents & presentations, apps, and books. iTunes U includes over 500,000 free lectures, videos, books, and other resources on thousands of subjects from Algebra to Zoology.

• Download Now

Khan Archiver: KhanAcademy Educational Videos On The Go

Khan Academy is one of the best products of education and the internet, and with the Khan Archiver app for the iPhone, you will have free access videos on topics ranging from kindergarten, advanced science, humanities, history, and more. Even more, you can download the videos to watch offline.

• Download Now

SparkNotes

SparkNotes is one of the most popular study guides for literature, Shakespeare, poetry, philosophy, drama and short stories. With the free SparkNotes for iPhone app you can access 50 pre-installed study guides in your library and hundreds of study guides online. You can also check-in at the place you're studying and indicate what subject your studying which could then result in impromptu study sessions with other SparkNotes users studying the same subject at the same place at the same time.

• Download Now

Quick Graph

If you're a student taking a math class, there's a good chance you could benefit from a graphing calculator. Unfortunately, such devices are very expensive, but the good news is that there are several app solutions for your iPhone -- the best being Quick Graph. It lets you graph multiple equations at the same time, change their color, trace along them, and more. Quick supports both 2D and 3D graphing in rectangular and polar forms.

• Download Now

Flashcards+

With school comes lots of studying. One of the most common studying techniques is to use flashcards. With the free Flashcards+ app for iPhone, you can say goodbye to the stacks and stacks of flashcards that accumulate over the course of a semester and use electronic flashcards on your iPhone instead. The beauty of Flashcards+ is that you have your flash cards with you wherever you go, which means you'll likely squeeze in more mini study lessons throughout your day and end up with better grades as a result!

• Download Now

The Official SAT Question of the Day

The free Official SAT Question of the Day for iPhone app is exactly what its name implies -- an app that gives you a new official SAT question every day. You can also view the questions from the past 7 days. When checking your answer, The Official SAT Question of the Day will give you an explanation as well as give you a statistical breakdown of how many questions you've gotten correct in that category.

• Download Now

More free iPhone apps

For dozens of additional free iPhone apps, including free social networking apps, instant messenger and communications apps, entertainment apps, finance apps, fun and games apps, health and fitness apps, kids apps, music apps, navigation and location apps, news apps, photography apps, productivity apps, reading apps, shopping apps, sports apps, travel apps, and general utility apps, see here:

• Best free iPhone apps
• Best free iPhone games

Rene Ritchie contributed photographs to this article.

Convert photos and drawings into coloring pages that can be printed and colored with real crayons

Printy is a cute little app that will turn anything you take a photo of into a coloring page that can be printed on real paper and colored with real crayons. It's is incredibly easy to use and does an equally incredible job at producing colorable PDFs.

There's literally only four screens included with Printy. The first one let's you choose between taking a photo or choosing one from your Camera Roll. In the next screen, you move and scale your photo to fit in the square. Yes, you must crop your photo to square.

Once you accept your crop, you'll be shown the first draft of your coloring page. There are two sliders you can adjust to make it look better. The first slider controls the thickness of the black lines and the second slider controls the darkness of the image.

Once it looks best, tap the checkmark to generate the final high resolution image. You should notice that the lines smooth out and look better than in the previous screen. You can then choose to print the image to an AirPrint compatible printer or email it has a high resolution PDF. Here's an example of a PDF created by Printy.

My only real complaint is that once you print or email the image, you can't save it anywhere. At the very least, you should be able to save it to our Camera Roll, but even better would be if you could export to a folder in Dropbox dedicated to Printy PDF files.

The good

• Does an amazing job
• Fine tune the image by adjusting the thickness and darkness of lines
• Print to AirPrint compatible printer
• Email high resolution PDF

The bad

• Forces a square crop
• Can't save to camera roll
• Dropbox support would be awesome

The conclusion

I am very impressed with how well Printy works. Now, if you try to take photos of things that aren't flat or that have have too much detail, the results will not be as great. But keeping in mind that the purpose of Printy is to create coloring pages, probably for a child, you wouldn't be taking photos of these types of things anyway. I anticipate that my daughter will want me to take photos of characters in her books when she gets to the coloring age as well as use screenshots from her favorite apps and books on the iPad.

$0.99 - Download Now

Rather than go over all the options again here, I'll point you to Rene's excellent post on the 4-inch iPhone from a few days ago. Give it a look, then come back here and vote on which 4-inch screen option you'd most like Apple to go with? 2:3 at 960x640 stretched? 2:3 at 1920x1280 stretched? 9:5 at 640 x 1136 taller? 2:3 at 1092x728 bigger? 16:9 at 1280x720 bigger and taller? 3:4 at 1024x768 bigger and taller? Or do you deeply, truly still hope Apple sticks with the 3.5-inch iPhone that brought them to the dance in the first place?

Vote up top and tell me why in the comments!

Yet more widescreen iPhone 5 rumors have hit the web this morning, with a whisper that at least one of Apple's multiple iPhone 5 prototypes boasts a 3.9 inch touchscreen with a 1136 x 640 resolution. This by way of 9to5Mac which claims two of the larger-screen devices are code-named N41AP (5,1) and N42AP (5,2), and would have an aspect ratio around 16:9 to accommodate widescreen videos. Supposedly iOS 6, expected to make its debut at WWDC this June, will be fully optimized to make use of the additional screen real estate. For example, they claim we can expect an extra row of icons on the home screen, as illustrated in many mock-ups. 9to5Mac also claims the iPhone 5 will have a smaller size micro dock connector port, a rumor first published by iMore by in February.

iMore has also been told Apple is keeping the Home button, which means an extra long screen can't occupy the same space as that button. So, either the front would have to be moved around to accommodate it, the entire phone would have to be lengthened, or both.

We've already commented at length about a 4-inch iPhone 5, and there are a lot of reasons that make such a change reasonable. Android devices have been ballooning in size over the last year or two, while Apple has kept the iPhone at its original 3.5 inch screen size. Personally, I welcome the extra area, particularly if it's maintaining the same Retina sharpness that we've grown accustomed to since the iPhone 4. I have no doubts that Apple will at the very least maintain its current battery life levels, but that may be a steep challenge if the iPhone 5 comes with a hotter processor as well as a bigger screen. What I worry most about is estranging iOS app developers with increased fragmentation. Given Apple went a long time at the same screen ratio, we've already seen many devs skip optimization for the new iPad's Retina display; would Apple really change the aspect ratio further complicate the lives of app-makers, or do they have much of a choice?

If Apple does go to close to 4 inches with the iPhone, would you prefer a wider screen, 16:9 aspect ratio, or the same 2:3 aspect ration simply stretched larger?

Source: 9to5Mac

Last week, I reviewed the new Facebook Pages Manager for iPhone app, but the secret is that I actually downloaded it from the Canadian App Store because it wasn't yet available in the U.S. Well, I'm happy to report that Facebook Pages Manager is now available in the U.S. App Store. It popped up earlier today, but almost immediately disappeared, but it seems to be here for good this time.

The introduction of Facebook Pages Manager has also brought some new changes to the "normal" Facebook for iPhone app via a stealth update. Now you'll see a message at the top that advertises the new app for Pages and a button that will take you directly to the App Store to download it.

left: Facebook for iPhone - right: Facebook Pages Manager for iPhone

There's also been a few other cosmetic changes in the past weeks that some users haven't seen until today. The most noticeable of these changes is the giant photos and that posts are separated by much more than just a thin line. Images are now wider than the rest of the post and shown at full width. The also have some subtle shadowing that makes it look like the photos are laying on top of the post. Additionally, if a user posts more than one photo at a time, Facebook for iPhone will display them as a collage of two or three photos like you're used to seeing on the web.

Strangly, this new look is not present in the the new Facebook Pages Manager app.

For those who have a Facebook Page, what do you think of the new app? Personally, I think it's a step in the right direction, but it's still missing some key elements like messages and news feeds, but hopefully we'll see those features coming in the future.

What about the new look to Facebook for iPhone? Do you like it? I'm a huge fan of photos and appreciate the new focus that Facebook is trying to place on them, but I do think it could've been done a little better cosmetically.

Free - Download Now

Thanks John

The untethered iOS 5.1.1 jailbreak could be released in a matter of days. Many people have been eagerly awaiting an untethered jailbreak for the latest version of iOS 5.1.1. It has taken a while for it to even look possible never mind become available. Now it appears that the wait may finally be over and it could arrive as early as next week. According to jailbreak developer pod2g.

Thanks to awesome work of @planetbeing and @pimskeks, we're near ready for a release. Now it's a matter of days.

Update: @MuscleNerd has provided some additional information, which he prefaces by saying is tentative and subject to last minute change:

• the initial 5.1.1 plan used a kernel exploit from @westbaer which unfortunately precluded use in iPod3,1 and iPhone2,1
• @planetbeing stepped up and provided a kernel exploit that covers both of those. Those two JBers are the bomb!
• The 5.1.1 A5 JB is very similar to the A5 5.0.1 JB. @pimskeks has done a tremendous job supporting both 5.0.1 and 5.1.1 in absinthe
• Similar to 5.0.1, there will also be a 5.1.1 CLI "cinject" binary and redsn0w version of the 5.1.1 JB+untether. Absinthe, cinject, and redsn0w will all provide the same JB in different fashions.
• timing is indeterminate. Plans are for this week, but a number of factors can influence that.
• For those wishing to donate, we've set up a new 5.1.1 paypal URL: https://www.paypal.com/cgi-bin/webscr?cmd=s-xclick&hostedbutton_id=4U6DQGJ2NRVUN -> Please don't pirate AppStore apps (seriously, please do not).

There is some good news and bad news with this particular jailbreak. First the bad news -- the new jailbreak tool will still not support the latest 1080p Apple TV. The good news however is pod2g believes that it should work with the new iPad; whichever version you have although testing has not been done on the iPad 3 Global version. The new jailbreak tool hasn't been tested yet on the just released iPad 2 R2 either but again it is believed to work.

I personally can't wait for this to arrive just so I can update some apps that must have iOS 5.1 like the latest versions of iMovie, Pages and Numbers.

Anyone else looking forward to the iOS 5.1.1 untethered jailbreak?

Source: @Pod2g, Pod2g's iOS Blog, MuscleNerd.com

Apple has just announced its line up for the annual iTunes Festival. The event which first started in 2007 has been hugely popular as all of the tickets are given away free of charge. The live concerts all take place at London’s The Roundhouse and it all kicks off on September 1^st and goes on until September 30^th.

Every year since 2007, the iTunes Festival has been bringing you a full month of spectacular live music. Many of the world’s biggest stars and the brightest newcomers have graced the festival stage, and this year’s brilliant line-up includes jack White, One Direction, Norah Jones and more. It will all take place in September 2012 at one of the UK’s best live music venues-the Roundhouse in London.

If you can't make the live shows, you can enjoy all the action live on your iPhone, iPad or iPod touch via the iTunes Festival app, as well as on your Mac or PC. The iOS app even supports AirPlay; enabling you to stream the action straight to your Apple TV. Unfortunately, it looks like being exclusively for UK based users as the app is only available in the UK App Store.

Free - Download Now

Source: iTunes Festival

Cuboid is a fun 3D puzzle game for the iPhone and iPad of flipping and rolling a cuboid through a maze-like puzzle placed in the setting of mystic, ancient ruins.

Cuboid is available on the iPhone and iPad as a universal app, but the screenshots in this review will be from an iPhone, only.

For those who may not know, a cuboid a rectangular solid that is in the shape of a box. In this game, if you were to cut the cuboid in half (longways), the result would be two cubes.

The goal of the game is simple, roll the cuboid through the puzzle so that you get it to fall through the square hole. It's possible to roll the cuboid off the board, so be careful!

As you progress through the game, new elements such as buttons and teleports will be introduced to the game. When this happens, Cuboid has you play a simple tutorial level so that you understand how the new addition to the game works.

Once you succeed, you will receive 1-3 stars based on how many moves it took you to reach the goal. If you complete the level in the least number of moves possible, the level will also be marked as "etalon". (An etalon is actually a physics device used to measure wavelengths, so I'm not really sure why this word is used.)

If you're stuck and can't figure out how to beat a level, Cuboid includes a hint button that will quickly show you how to beat the level from the cuboid's current position. You are only given a few hints for free, though. If you want more, you must purchase them from the Cuboid Store.

Which brings me to the parts of Cuboid I do not understand. As you play the game, you earn coins. If you tap the button that says how many coins you have, or you tap the hint icon when you don't have any left, you are taken to the Cuboid Store. I was expecting to be able to purchase hints with the coins I've earned. Nope. My choices are to buy hints or to buy coins… but I can't figure out what I can do with my coins! Why do I want to buy 1500 coins for $4.99? As far as I can tell, these coins don't actually have a purpose.

The other horrible thing about Cuboid is ads. Not so much the ads themselves (all ads are always horrible), but the fact that it's not clear how to get rid of them. I've searched through every menu and there is no obvious method of purchasing an upgrade to remove the ads. However, through some trial and error, I discovered that if you tap the X on an ad, you'll get the offer to remove ads for $0.99. It's well worth the $0.99, in my opinion, but I can't believe how difficult it was to find this in-app purchase.

In general, everything except the actual gameplay is very poorly done. There's no written directions to be found (and that's a shame, because I'd really like to know why HeroCraft is using the word "etalon" when perfectly beating a level). I would also like to know what all the icons mean in Settings. Music, sound, and hints was easy enough to figure out, but I'm not really sure what the movie icon is for. Despite the ample space on the Settings screen, there is no written description for what settings are actually being changed.

When tapping the ribbon on the main menu, you are taken to the ranking section in Game Center for Cuboid, but there doesn't appear to be any way to exit this screen. It turns out that the "Done" button is just invisible. If you tap in the upper righthand corner, it briefly appears and activates.

The good

• Awesome graphics
• Addicting
• Challenging
• Universal for iPhone and iPad

The bad

• No clear, written out directions
• To purchase the upgrade for no ads, you must tap the X when an ad pops up
• Not sure what the movie icon in settings represents. Again, no words to describe what it is
• Game Center ranking page has an invisible Done button. You can't see it, but if you tap in the upper righthand corner, it briefly appears and activates.

The conclusion

Luckily, none of the bugs I experience affect the actual gameplay of Cuboid. Cuboid is a very fun game and I really like how they've added a star value to each level. This allows the game to be played leisurely with the goal of just passing each level, or competitively with the goal of reaching "etalon" status for each level. With that said, HeroCraft does have some serious issues they need to address, mainly the horrible discovery of upgrading to no ads and giving an actual purpose to coins.

Free - Download Now

The Weather Channel for iPhone is the most popular alternative to Apple's built-in Weather app and it recently received a complete makeover. It still has all the great features of the previous design, but the new UI is much more beautiful and user friendly.

The main screen of the Weather Channel displays the location (with zip code) and the temperature in a nice big font. In smaller letters underneath the temperature, you'll find what the temperature "feels like" and the high and lows for the day. If you tap the + sign, you'll find more detailed information for wind, humidity, UV index, dew point, visibility, pressure, and sunrise and sunset times.

The background of the home screen will change depending on the time of day and current weather conditions. You can also customize it with your own photo.

In addition to the current conditions, The Weather Channel also has tabs for the hourly, 36 hour, and 10 day forecasts.

The other sections in The Weather Channel are Map, Video, Social and In Season.

The Map tab lets you layer radar, clouds, radar/clouds, temperature, feels like, 24-hr rainfall, 24-hour snowfall, and UV index over the map. There is a key at the top so you know what the colors on the map represent.

The Video section is filled with must-see, local, and world videos as well as videos that are on TV.

The Social tab lets you read tweets about the weather both nearby and regionally. You can also check out photos taken by other Weather Channel users in the iWitness section.

From the In Season tab, you can check pollen, hurricane, and tide forecasts. The pollen and hurricane forecasts include maps and diagrams and are very informative. The marine section breaks the down sea, waves, wind, and high tide information into a nice, easy-to-read 2-day forecast broken down into separate morning, afternoon, even, and night sections.

The good

• Much better design than before
• Current, hourly, 36-hour, and 10-day forecasts
• View maps of clouds, radar, and more
• Videos
• Read tweets about the weather
• View photos taken of the weather
• Check pollen, hurricane, and tide forecasts

The bad

• Ads are annoying. I would gladly purchase an upgrade that removed them.

The conclusion

The Weather Channel for iPhone was always a good weather app, but now it's a great alternative to Apple's built-in Weather app. The new UI is much better -- both on the eyes and to use.

Free - Download Now

ScreenDIY is an iPhone app that lets you create unique Lock screens and Home screens from a wide variety of designer wallpapers, shelves, frames, icon skins and more.

The home screen gives you 5 different options: App Shelves, Icon Skins, Background, Lock DIY, and Home DIY.

The App Shelves, Icon Skins, and Background sections are simply backgrounds and cannot be customized. ScreenDIY has a good variety of backgrounds including many girly ones.

When viewing a background, you can view it with sample icons to get an idea of what it'll really look like on your Home screen.

In addition to the basic backgrounds, you can also make your own Home and Lock screens from the DIY sections of ScreenDIY.

In the Lock DIY section, you can mix and match backgrounds (excluding ones with skins and shelves) and calendars and frames. You can also choose one of your own photos from your Photo Library to use as the background. When creating your Lock screen, you can preview what it will look like with the time, date, and slide to unlock UI of the iPhone's Lock screen.

Customizing your Home screen is very similar, only instead of calendars and frames, you have icon skins and shelves.

The only real disappointment with the DIY sections is that you have to scroll through the all the choices. There's no option to browse through a gallery of choices like there is in the other sections.

The good

• Lots of backgrounds
• DIY sections allow for my customization
• A good selection of girly choices
• New backgrounds added weekly

The bad

• No iPad support

The conclusion

ScreensDIY is a great app for creating custom Home screens and Lock screens. I like to regularly change my backgrounds and really like the choices that ScreensDIY has to offer. It's also great that the devs are keeping the content fresh by regularly adding new backdrops.

$0.99 - Download Now

It's Wednesday, which means it's time to announce this week's photo contest -- and the winner of last week's black and white photography contest. Before I do, I want to congratulate everyone on their awesome entries. We've got some talented iPhoneographer readers here at iMore and it wasn't an easy decision!

And the winning entry is...

...this intriguing photo by carlos2384! This photo immediately jumped out at me because of the originality, high contrast, and sharp angles. Black and white photos are tricky because not all photos look good in black and white, but carlos2384 nailed it with this photograph! I don't even have a desire to see it in color -- the black and white is perfect.

carlos2384 took the photo with an iPhone 4S and edited it with both Camera+ and Snapseed. Great work carlos2384!

• Camera+, $0.99 - Download Now
• Snapseed, $4.99 - Download Now

This week's contest: Water!

With the end of one photo contest, comes the beginning of new one, and this week's focus in on water! Whether it's a photo of a body of water like above, reflections in a rain puddle, water droplets on a window or flower, or even just an artistic twist to a simple glass of water, we want to see it! Remember, though, creativity and originality is something we're always looking for.

The prize: Life Proof waterproof iPhone case!

In addition to a thumbs up from the iMore crew and all of us yelling about how great of a photo star you are, the winner of this week's photography contest will have their photo converted into an official iMore wallpaper and we'll showcase it on the front page of iMore! But that’s not all! The winner will also receive a Life Proof iPhone case! This awesome case offers protection against water (including submersion), dirt, snow, and shock.

The rules

The rules of entry are very simple. The photo must have been taken with an iPhone or iPad (we'll check the EXIF data of the original file to verify) and any edits must have been done with an iPhone or iPad app. No Photoshop CS6! If you have external lens accessories you are more than welcome to use them. You can submit as many photos as you'd like, but remember, this is a contest, so make sure you submit your best work!

Resources

Now, before you run off to take your photos, remember that it's not technical skill alone that will claim this prize. Even if you're not the best photographer (yet!), a great eye and a great subject can still get you the win. However, a little help can never hurt, so make sure you check out these articles from our iPhone photography series for some tips.

• How to make your iPhone photographs more powerful with negative space
• How to make your iPhone photography more striking with the “rule of thirds”

How to submit

Submitting your photos is easy. Just head over to the iMore Photography Forum and post your photos to the official contest thread. Don't forget to state which apps, if any, you used to edit your photo!

That's it! Now go out and shoot!

ENTER NOW

Photo Credit: The top image was taken by iDUSCRAFT. This photo was the winning image of a previous iMore photo contest.

Verizon's CFO Fran Shammo mentioned at the J.P. Morgan Technology, Media, and Telecom conference recently that anyone migrating from 3G to 4G devices won't be able to grandfather in their old unlimited plan and will have to instead take a data share plan scheduled to launch this summer. That way, not only are you burning through data faster, but you're also splitting it among friends or co-workers. Everybody wants that, right?

Those of you that scrambled to get unlimited data plans on Verizon before they dropped the axe on it will have to carefully consider your next upgrade.

To be fair, this will make it easier to split data between devices, which is a common eventuality for those of us using both an iPad and an iPhone. Still, this sentiment is in direct opposition to Sprint, who has pledged that they'll keep unlimited around even if an LTE iPhone is eventually released. The question is, how long are you going to be willing to hold onto your iPhone 4S with an unlimited plan before being tugged into a limited (but faster) world of LTE? Will Verizon still rip you from the warm embrace of unlimited data even if you stick with a 3G device?

Source: FierceWireless

UPDATE: Verizon recently clarified that no, they won't be forcing people to switch to the shared plan, though new subscribers still won't be able to pick an unlimited plan.

Now you can manage your Facebook business and fan Pages with a dedicated app that lets you view insights

Facebook for iPhone and iPad has a slew of problems, but now poor Pages management can be crossed off that list with the introduction of Facebook Pages Manager for iPhone. It's very similar to the normal Facebook app with the addition of being able to view Insights about your Page and manage admins.

Before Facebook Pages Manager, users would have to use the original Facebook app to view their Pages, but didn't have any access to admin controls. Now when you visit your Page with the Facebook for iPhone, you'll see an announcement at the top announcing the new app with a link to App Store.

As previously mentioned, Facebook Pages Manager is very similar to its older brother with the side-panel design and profile page view. Just like the main Facebook for iPhone app, Facebook Pages Manager also doesn't show the cover photo to your Page.

There is one thing you'll notice missing from Facebook Pages Manger, though -- messages. At the top of the screen you'll find the buttons to see who has recently liked your Page and notifications, but the messages button is absent. This is a shame, especially since Facebook's dedicated Messages app also doesn't support messages for Pages.

When viewing your Page's timeline, you can sort by everyone's posts, posts made by your Page, or hidden posts.

From the side-panel, you can select between the Pages you manage and look at the Insights for the selected Page and manage its Admins.

The Insights screen tells you how many likes you have, the number of people talking about your Page, weekly total reach, and a graph of your trends.

The good

• A dedicated app for Page management is great
• Facebook for iPhone users are already family with it
• View Insights, including graph of trends
• Manage admins

The bad

• No cover photos
• No access to page messages
• Can look up photo albums
• Can't upload photos to a specific photo album
• No iPad support

The conclusion

I'll admit that when I first heard that Facebook released a new app, I let out a little groan. But once I realized it was an app for managing Pages, I actually got a little excited since managing Pages on the main Facebook app is terrible. So far, I'm impressed with Facebook Pages Manager -- just rather surprised that they left out messages. But I guess I'd rather them leave it out then to introduce it with a bunch of bugs. Hopefully Facebook updates it soon.

Facebook Pages Manager is not yet available in the US App Store, but it should be soon. It's available now! Go get it!

Free - Download Now

During their annual shareholders meeting, Sprint CEO Dan Hesse said they're very happy with the iPhone, but admitted that it won't be profitable for the company until 2015. Sounds crazy, but Hesse says they're taking the long view, since offering the iPhone will stem the exodus of users going to other carriers just to get their hands on Apple's smartphone. Plus, iPhone users tend to be heavier data users, so that means bigger plans. (Or in Sprint's case, opting for the unlimited plan.)

Hesse had to take a bonus cut as a concession shareholders upset at the up-front cost of iPhones, but the future does actually look pretty bright. They've confirmed that they'll keep unlimited plans around for the next generation iPhone, even if it has LTE, and recent surveys show that Sprint customer satisfaction is pretty high.

That leaves another two and a half years of paying for their iPhone deal, which reportedly cost them $20 billion. Granted, they didn't have much success with either webOS or Android, despite the lower up-front costs, so it's still difficult to see a basis for the complaints -- other than shortsightedness.

There's also the not-so-small matter of Sprint's initial, WiMax based 4G rollout, which is hard to view as anything other than a failure. They're switching to LTE now, but they're behind AT&T and way behind Verizon, and it will take time and money to catch up, neither of which Sprint has in abundance.

When the next generation iPhone hits, presumably this fall, will unlimited data make up for the lack of Sprint LTE footprint? Or will even more customers go with Verizon or even AT&T's bigger service area?

Bottom line, how healthy is Sprint going to be looking in three years compared to Verizon and AT&T? Will the iPhone gamble pay off? And will they at least still be doing better than... T-Mobile?

Source: AllThingsD

Apple looks set to increase the next generation iPhone’s screen size to at least 4-inches according to information coming from people familiar with the situation. According to the sources, Apple has already placed orders for the larger screens from its Asian suppliers and they are bigger than the screens used on the current iPhone.

Production is set to begin next month for the screens, which measure at least 4 inches diagonally compared with 3.5 inches on the iPhone 4S, the latest phone from Apple, the people said.

The rumor states Apple has ordered the larger screens from multiple suppliers, LG, Sharp and Japan Display Inc. Production of the next iPhone is scheduled to start in June with it becoming available at a similar time to last year; sometime in October. We have already heard that Apple is slowing down production of the iPhone 4S in anticipation of the new model iPhone.

The latest rumor does line up with what we heard at the end of last week, namely that if the screen does indeed increase, it would be to a maximum of 4-inches but no larger. We heard Apple hadn't yet decided on a final design, but given both The Wall Street Journal and Reuters are reporting the 4-inch screen size today, that decision could now have been made.

If accurate, several questions remain. Will Apple reduce the size of the current iPhone bezel to allow for a bigger screen, or increase the size of the phone itself, or a bit of both? There's also nothing in these rumors that suggest an aspect ratio change from the current 2:3 to something closer to 16:9, which some other rumors have suggested. That kind of change would be far more problematic for developers than a simple increase in scale.

It would, however, reduce the density of what Apple's has marketed at the Retina display from 326 ppi of the current iPhone 4S and iPhone 4 to 288, which is only slightly better than the new iPad's 264. Not only would buttons and other touch targets be physically bigger, its possible the pixels would once again be visible as well.

The alternative, to increase the amount of pixels, would force old apps to be letterboxed (like iPhone apps are on the iPad), and open the door for the creation of "bigger" apps that wouldn't really work on older iPhones. That's a level of fragmentation Apple hasn't been willing to allow thus far.

Until more information surfaces, or until Phil Schiller holds one up on an Apple event stage, we'll simply have to wait and see.

What's you preference?

Source: WSJ, Reuters

China Mobile has confirmed that it is in talks with Apple over bringing the iPhone officially to its network. China Mobile’s chairman Xi Guohua told its shareholders about the talks although there is still no news if a deal has been agreed.

“China Mobile and Apple both have the will to strengthen cooperation,” Xi said. “When there is more specific news, we will disclose it.”

Source: Bloomberg, Image: Business Week

Stunt Pear is a physics-based puzzle game where you catapult a cute little pear to smash, bounce, and spin your way through 144 levels. The objective is easy, get the pear in the barrel -- but that's easier said than done with gears, cannons, bubbles, tires, pinball bumpers, skateboards, and shopping carts as obstacles.

Stunt Pear is a universal app for the iPhone and iPad, but all the screenshots shown in this review will be from the iPhone.

Controlling the pear in Stunt Pear is very similar to Angry Birds. Just pull the pear with your finger and stretch out the rope to the desired length and angle, then let go. In every level, there is a bucket somewhere and it's your goal to get the pear in the bucket. Often times, this involves using various obstacles to your advantage or perfectly timing a spin or bounce.

A great feature of Stunt Pear is that as you're adjusting your shot, the power and aim (or angle) is displayed at the top of the screen. If you pay attention to this while you play, it will help in making the appropriate adjustments during your next try.

One of the things that annoys me about Stunt Pear is how it handles zoom. When the level starts, it's zoomed out so you can see the entire level. After a few seconds, it slowly zooms into the pear on the catapult. But by then, you're probably already adjusting your shot and may have been relying on the pulled back zoom to adjust your aim. So then you have to waste time to throw away the shot and reset, then tap the screen to zoom out. It would be much better of Stunt Pear kept the zoom the same, whether that's close or far, and left it up to the player to adjust the zoom, preferably by pinching.

Stunt Pear features 144 levels between 8 courses. As you beat levels, new courses get unlocked, and the good news is that you can unlock all the levels pretty quickly which allows you to skip levels if you get stuck. You can also choose to play a level at random.

The good

• Fun
• Good graphics
• Challenging, but not too hard
• Displays power and aim when setting up shot
• Universal for iPhone and iPad

The bad

• Zooming is annoying. Would prefer a the more standard pinch-to-zoom method.

The conclusion

Stunt Pear is great little game. It's casual and the levels are short, making it easy to pick up and play for just a few minutes. But it's also addicting, so if you want to play for a long period of time, that shouldn't be a problem either. Plus, the little green pear is just adorable!

$0.99 - Download Now

Just in case we needed any more convincing that people love their iPhones, the American Customer Satisfaction Index has found through recent surveys that Apple's smartphones are leaving customers the happiest. The iPhone scored 83 on their system, compared to to Nokia, LG and HTC who are all tied at 75, Motorola at 73, Samsung at 71, and RIM at a sad 69. The ACSI also looked at U.S. service providers. Topping the list were regional carriers like U.S. Cellular with 76, then Sprint with 71, followed by Verizon with 70, and AT&T and T-Mobile tied at 69.

Lots of other studies have consistently backed up customer satisfaction for the iPhone, but it's always interesting to see just how much of a lead Apple has on the competition. The fact that the competition is nearly ten points suggests it will take a whole lot of work to bring Android and the other platforms up to snuff with iOS.

Do these rankings stack up with the sentiment you see among friends? Is Sprint really ahead of the other three major U.S. carriers?

Source: ACSI via Wired

Animal lovers, Cutest Paw for iPhone and iPad is for you! It's a fun app that's filled with thousands of photos of cute animals ranging from the common household pet to exotic animals like tigers, orangutans, pandas, and foxes.

Cutest Paw lets you sort photos by newest, popular, random, or animal type. The photos are organized into 3 columns, but each picture is a scaled down version of the original crop ratio, giving each page a collage feel. It's much more interesting than cropping everything to a square like many apps do.

When you tap on a photo, the photo is displayed nice and big with the caption under it. From here, you can "hug" it (similar to "like"), save it to your camera roll, share on Facebook, or leave a comment (must connect to Facebook first).

I have two complaints with individual photo pages. The first is that in order to go back to the results page, I have to scroll to the bottom and tap Back. I wish there was a back button at the top of the screen or even a gesture (like pinching) that took me back. On a similar note, in order to scroll, you cannot have your finger touching the photo (which often times takes up most of the screen). Instead, Cutest Paw requires you to be touching one of the small areas on the outside of the photo in order to scroll.

If you don't want to go back and select a photo, but want to simply browse through them all, swiping left or right on the photo will move to the last/next photo.

To sort the photos by animal type, you must go to the Search tab. From there, you'll see categories for dogs, cats, user submissions, mice, rabbits, squirrels, birds, monkeys, hedgehogs, tortoises, pigs, ducks, foxes, orangutans, pandas, bears, tigers, otters, ferrets, and deers. You can also type in a custom term to search through Cutest Paw photos.

To share your own photo, head to the upload tab. You must have a free account with Cutest Paw in order to upload. Once you upload your photo, you can view in the "Your Uploaded Photos" section so you can easily check on your photos and how many views and hugs they've received.

The good

• Lots of adorable animal photos
• Sort by newest, popular, random, or animal type
• Share your own photos
• Save photos or share to Facebook
• Universal for iPhone and iPad

The bad

• Can't scroll down with finger on picture, must be on the background
• No landscape support
• Performance could use a little work

The conclusion

Cutest Paw is a must-have app for animal lovers and kids. The quality of photos can be hit or miss from the newest and random sections because these include user submissions, but when viewing specific categories, the photos are generally very good.

Free - Download Now

Clipping and saving coupons is the most classic way of saving money, but in today's digital world, it feels rather archaic. SnipSnap for iPhone lets you say goodbye to physical coupons by taking photos of them to carry with you at all times and store clerks can scan the processed bar code right on your iPhone.

To add a coupon, you simply take a photo of it, or "snip it". SnipSnap will then process the coupon for you by converting the barcode on the photo into one that can be scanned by a store clerk (this process may take a few minutes). SnipSnap will also look at the dates valid and display when the coupon is redeemable or expires on the main Coupons page.

When viewing a coupon, you'll see all the details like minimum spending requirements. You can also look up the important dates, bar code, promo code, offer details, consumer restrictions, and retailer legal. SnipSnap also allows you to mark coupons as a favorite and share to Twitter, Facebook, or email.

When redeeming a coupon with SnipSnap, you have two different options for the clerk. The easiest one is the barcode which can be scanned by a store scanner. If that doesn't work, you can also display the coupon's code in nice, big, easy-to-read text. And if the store clerk is still a little suspicious of your coupon, you can show them the photo you took and allow them to pinch and zoom to see the details.

Another cool feature of SnipSnap is the Discover tab that shows coupons being snipped by other SnipSnap users. You can also use the search field to search for coupons at a specific store. I really like this feature, but sometimes I get coupons that are one-time use only (like on a receipt) and don't want to share it publicly in fear of someone "stealing" it. SnipSnap does allow you to disable sharing snipped coupons to the community pool, but I wish it'd let you do it on an individual basis.

A feature that makes SnipSnap way better than keeping track of physical coupons is that it will remind you when a coupon is about to expire. You can choose the notification to be sent at 1-3 days or 1-2 weeks before expiration. Additionally, when you arrive at a store that you have a coupon for, SnipSnap will send you notification reminding you of your coupon.

The last thing I want to mention is that SnipSnap does not work with "manufacturer coupons". This is not a fault of SnipSnap, however. These coupons require stores to collect coupons and return them to the manufactures. Until manufacturers change their rules about these coupons, I don't expect to see manufacturer coupon support anytime soon.

The good

• Quick and easy to use
• Processing only takes a few minutes
• Reminders when coupon is about to expire
• Location reminders
• Discover coupons being snipped by other SnipSnap users

The bad

• Can't edit sharing options when uploading coupon. Must set a universal setting.
• Not compatible with "manufacturer coupons" (because these types of coupons must be physically collected and turned in to the manufacturer by the store)

The conclusion

Personally, I've never been much of a coupon user unless they come through my email inbox because I can't keep track of them nor remember to bring them. Now that I have SnipSnap for iPhone, I look forward to the savings in my future. But if I'm not careful, I may see myself making unnecessary purchases due to me "not wanting to miss out on a deal" before my coupons expire!

Free - Download Now

Sparrow for iPhone is an email client for iPhone that offers many more features than Apple's built in Mail app such as the ability to add attachments when composing a message, a multi-pane navigation layout, and custom signatures. The main new features in today's update is landscape composing, the ability to edit and create labels/folders, and easier navigation between messages. Unfortunately, the biggest feature that users have been waiting for, push notifications, is still absent from Sparrow.

The folks at Sparrow headquarters have been hard at work to bring push to their users. Sadly, their first attempt used a VoIP process that was entirely inappropriate for push email (it's meant for apps like Skype) and Apple rejected it. So, like instant message apps have been doing for years, Sparrow will have to handle Push Notifications on their end. But here's the catch - push will not be a free upgrade. It won't even be a one-time in-app purchase. Push for Sparrow will be integrated as a yearly subscription.

You were more than 16 000 helping us on our Apple quest to get the VoIP privilege. We can’t thank you enough for your support. Unfortunately, Apple has confirmed that they are not willing to do any exception to the rule and that Sparrow will NOT be granted with the privilege.

This means we’ll have to do Push on our side and that it will be integrated as a yearly subscription into Sparrow’s future update.

There's no word yet on how much the subscription will cost.

How much would you be willing to pay to have push included with Sparrow? Personally, I'll wait to see if Apple has any surprises for the built-in Mail app in iOS 6 before committing to a subscription with Sparrow. But if Apple doesn't address some basic needs like adding attachments and custom signatures, I'll jump ship to Sparrow in a heartbeat -- I already have for Mac.

$2.99 - Download Now

Source: Sparrow

RIM has only just begun previewing BlackBerry 10 and already features like the on-key, gesture-based word prediction are being quickly copied for the iPhone -- at least for jailbreak. Octopus Keyboard is the name of the tweak, and Jeff Benjamin from iDownloadBlog took a look at its current state of development.

As of now the Octopus keyboard can do the following:

• Automatically learns new words as you type them
• Custom completion engine
• Should work for any input language with key input (English, French, Czech, Russian, etc.)

Here are some of the remaining items that he wishes to accomplish before go-live:

• Avoid learning mistakes
• Autocapitalize words in sentences
• Handle , . ! etc at the end of a sentence
• Better handling and display of longer words
• Compatibility with popular tweaks like SwipeSelection

Octopus Keyboard is currently slated for a May 20 release on Cydia. There's no information on pricing yet.

The current iOS keyboard does and forcing you to stop typing and hit a tiny X target to refuse them if they're incorrect. Here's how Kevin Michaluk describes the BlackBerry 10 typing process:

Instead of placing suggested words above the keyboard, which diverts your attention from the keyboard keys while typing, the BlackBerry 10 keyboard layers its suggestions on the frets between the rows, above the key you're about to tap for your next word. From there you can easily swipe a word up or ignore it. Watching the demonstration at BlackBerry World, it really is brilliant. We're excited for it.

The Octopus Keyboard doesn't look like the Blackberry 10 keyboard, but it does implement the words-on-keys concept. It looks a bit odd seeing it on iOS, where the keyboard hasn't changed much in almost 5 years. Kevin also wonders if RIM -- or anyone RIM may be licensing any part of the technology from -- might take action to prevent jailbreak from stealing BlackBerry 10's thunder, given it's still months away from launching.

You can see it all in action in the BlackBerry 10 keyboard hands-on video below, and compare it to the Octopus Keyboard preview immediately thereafter. Check them both out and let us know what you think.

Source: iDownloadBlog

Every week the editors at iMore carefully select some of our favorite, most useful, most extraordinary apps, accessories, gadgets, and websites. This week's selections include a jailbreak app to manage off-device media, a sheet music app, an app for social networking, a video player that lets you watch old-school movies, and a popular virtual pinboarding app.

To see what we picked, and to tell us your pick, follow on after the break!

XBMC for iPad - Chris Oldroyd

This week’s pick is a jailbreak app that I use all the time and is the only reason I keep my iPad jailbroken. When it comes to managing off device media the iPad with App Store apps is just not good enough. Air Video and other similar apps do a decent enough job of letting you access media on a PC or Mac but everything that is in a non Apple approved format needs to be encoded on the fly and it means the process is slow and a little ugly.

With XBMC I can connect to my NAS (Networked Attached Storage) box and access all of my content straight over my network, it plays all sorts of file types like AVI and MKV as well as MP4 and M4V all without any encoding or delay; the picture quality is excellent too. XBMC is a highly customizable app and if you are prepared to invest a little bit of time with the app itself and how you store and name your media on your NAS it can look absolutely stunning with the correct meta data.

XBMC is available as a free download from Cydia and it works on the iPad, iPhone and iPod touch.

Steinway Etude - Gary Mazo

Last week I was in guitar mode, this week I am back in piano mode – my primary instrument. There are lots of apps for purchasing sheet music and others for instruction. What makes Steinway Etude unique is that it combines both functions in one app.

First off, Steinway Etude is a music store where you can purchase sheet music. There is a pretty good selection of music from pretty much every musical category. Most songs are about $3.00 which is not terrible compared to pricier services such as Musicnotes.

Once your music is purchased (and there are some free songs to download as well) you see it on a bookshelf – reminiscent of iBooks. Tap the song you want to play and you have the main screen. Touch the Play arrow and you will hear a midi version of the song play, following along the notes in the song. There is also a small keyboard at the bottom showing you which notes to play.

For beginners, this is a great feature; you can see how to play the song, hear how to play the song and then try to play it on your own. I usually maximize the window to just see the song – but its nice to know that if I ever did get stuck I could listen to parts of the music to help me along.

Options are a plenty in Steinway Etude. You can adjust the tempo, turn on or off the right and left hands on the keyboard below, differentiate the hands with unique colors, change the background and more.

Pages just slide left to right and page turns are quick (which is key for a music apps.) All in all, this is a very useful app with a good library of music to purchase and the ability to learn while you play.

Free - Download Now

Google+ for iPhone - George Lim

So, I’m one of those few people who still uses Google+. I’m also a sucker for gorgeous iOS apps, so when Google recently updated their Google+ app, I was happy.

The app is mainly a significant UI improvements. Its certainly easier for a human to understand, navigate and use, as well as overall being cleaner. Its clearer how you can switch between ‘Circles’ to get the posts you want. Instead of having multiple circles which you change by swiping side to side, you get one stream which is changeable through a simple drop down menu.

While not a new feature, I use Google+ hangouts on the iPhone all the time, and I think, for a 10-way video call it is implemented very well. I have a Google hangout with friends every weekend, with the app, I can join it where ever I am.

There are still some gaping holes in the app; the ability to post YouTube links and getting an embed preview, editing posts and comments, and the fact that your display picture is just a small landscape section on your menu-screen, so it doesn’t show your display picture properly.

However despite all these flaws, I still really like this app. Its certainly better than the Facebook app (even on iPad).

Free - Download Now

Video Time Machine - Seth Clifford

My pick this week is pure joy. Video Time Machine is a sweet little app that allows you to watch all kinds of things from years gone by. One of my favorite activities on YouTube (and the internet in general) is find and watch commercials and shows from my youth. The app allows you to do this with a great interface that makes searching for a time period easy. You just roll the dial back to the year you want, select the type of content you want to see (TV, music, ads, trailers, video games, sports, etc.) and the app serves up the goods. Sharing to Facebook and Twitter is baked in, so you can get your friends in on it quickly too. There's no direct search right now, but that's also what makes it kind of cool - it's kind of like a jukebox on random. And it's a universal app that supports AirPlay, so if you want to throw it up on the big screen, you can do so.

I'm really digging it, and I hope that more content gets added as time goes on. It's the perfect way to kill a few minutes and put a smile on your face.

$2.99 - Download Now

Pinterest - Leanna Lofte

When the Pinterest for iPhone app first released, I hated it. It was terribly buggy and miserable to use. It's had several updates since then and it's now a great app. It's beautiful and runs great. I go through phases with Pinterest, but now that they have a solid iPhone app, there's a good chance I'll use it more regularly. What would seal the deal, though, would be if they updated Pinterest to be universal for the iPad as well. Hopefully soon!

Free - Download Now

Tell us your pick!

Those were our picks, iMore Nation, so now it's your turn! Tell us your pick of the week below. Give us the name of your favorite app, site, or accessory, and tell us why it made your life more productive, more informed, more entertaining, or just plain more fun. Jump into the comments and let us know your pick of the week!

Planning events and get-togethers is never a fun task because it's difficult to find a date and time that works for everyone. Invy removes this stress by doing the hard work for you. All you have to do is create the event with several possible dates and invite your friends. Once everyone responds, choose the date that works for most people.

When you first launch Invy, you are prompted to choose which email you want to be associated with Invy. You can add more emails as well. So if you plan to receive invites from both your personal and work emails, you can add both accounts to Invy so that all your invites are in one place.

The design of Invy is very clean and modern. On the main screen, you'll see all your invites and events. When creating an event, you are prompted to enter a title, location, and select recipients. Then you choose as many possible dates as you want. Obviously, the more dates and times you choose, the better chance you have one of them working for everyone.

Left: invite on the web. Right: invite in Invy for iPhone

When you send the invite, all the invitees will receive an email, and if they use the Invy app, they'll also receive a push notification informing them of the invite. For those who don't use the app, they can just click the link in the email to view the invite on the web. The web is formatted to look exactly like the app. Invitees must then check the boxes for the dates they're available.

If you select a date that conflicts with an event in the built-in Calendar app, Invy will warn you of the conflict. This is super cool, except for the part where Envy considers all-day events, including birthdays and holidays, as a schedule conflict.

Invy also includes a chat room for each event, so that invitees can discuss details (or whatever they want). This can be done both from the iPhone app and the web.

Once everyone has RSVP'd (or it's time to make a decision), you can view the invite to see who has RSVP'd to what dates and tap "choose this date". Once you do so, all the invitees will receive a notification (either by iPhone or by email) informing them that a date has been picked. Invy will also add the event to Calendar for you.

The good

• Pretty and modern UI
• Quick and easy to use
• Invy checks Calendar for schedule conflicts
• When you select the final date for an event, Invy adds it to Calendar
• Chat with invitees

The bad

• Invy considers all day events, including birthdays and holidays, as dates that you already have plans

The conclusion

If I ever have to plan any sort of meetup, even just coffee with a few friends, I'm turning straight to Invy. It's super easy to use and makes it much easier to figure out when everyone is available than speaking to each person individually. In fact, I'm now hoping that I'm given the task of choosing a date for some get-together just so that I have an excuse to use Invy. Is that weird?

$1.99 - Download Now

Despite some rumors to the contrary, according to our sources Apple still hasn't finalized the design of the next generation iPhone 5 (or whatever Apple ends up calling iPhone 5,1). No giant screen. No 16:9 aspect ratio. No metal back.

Apple typically makes extensive use of the prototyping process, which could well be the source of inconsistent rumors (perhaps best seen in the conflicting iPhone rumors last year). Sometimes there are more audacious and more conservative prototypes, with the final choice coming down to component costs and device tests.

Currently, the new, smaller dock connector is being implemented, but no changes to screen size or aspect ratio have been decided on. And yes, it still has a Home button.

Once again we're hearing that if the screen size does change, it won't be by a lot (no larger than 4-inches). We've heard nothing to indicate a planned change in the aspect ratio either way (and such a change still doesn't make much sense to us).

Keeping the Home button also necessitates certain design trade offs (everything has an opportunity cost) when it comes to overall device size and screen layout.

October is still the planned launch period, alongside the 7-inch iPad we reported on yesterday, and Apple is indeed planning to hurt Google with this release by removing their data pipe into (and out of) the Maps app. (Which we, like others, have heard is terrific looking.)

iMore previously heard the iPhone 5 was going to ship with an LTE radio as well.

Earlier today a beta version of iCloud.com accidentally leaked 2 new web apps, Notes and Reminders, presumably coming to iCloud web-portal. These apps make perfect sense to be on iCloud.com, as they already sync over iCloud across iPhone, iPod touch, and iPad devices, and Apple has added them as apps to the upcoming OS X 10.8 Mountain Lion.

The Reminders and Notes web apps weren't functional, nor was the login, and Apple quickly pulled the beta content offline. In other words, we weren't supposed to see this yet.

If we were to guess, WWDC 2012 would be the logical place for Apple to debut new iCloud features. That's where Steve Jobs debuted iCloud itself last year, and now more than ever the WWDC keynote is Apple's biggest software and services stage.

Unfortunately, there's no sign of Photo Stream yet, which would be nice given the impending loss of MobileMe galleries. Nor is there any sign of iTunes in the Cloud or iTunes Match online access yet.

That's when it will start to become really interesting.

Source: Steve Troughton-Smith

Noir Photo is a fantastic iPhone and iPad app for converting your photos into monochromatic images. This includes black and white conversions with the ability to add sepia, silver, blue-gray, or chartreuse tints to further set the mood.

Noir Photo has a very simple and easy to use UI. At the top of the screen, you'll see your photo. On the iPhone, if the photo is portrait, it will rotate to landscape so that you can see the entire image. The bottom half of the screen is where you'll find all the editing tools. Along the top of this section is 6 preset buttons. After choosing the one you think best works for your photo, you can fine tune the inner exposure, outer exposure, and contrast with the dials. You can also use pinch to zoom on the photo to fine-tune the placement and size of the vignette and drag the points to adjust its shape. Lastly, you can choose from the four different tints: sepia (brown-ish), silver, blue-gray, or chartreuse (green-ish).

You can also view your photo in full screen by hiding the editing controls. In full screen mode, you can still adjust the vignetting and choose from the presets. You cannot fine-tune the exposures and contrast, though.

Personally, I would rather have access to the different tints than the presets when in full screen mode. After I've adjusted my photo, I like to switch into full screen mode to get a closer look and see if it looks right. Because the presets are also color coated, I tapped them thinking I could see what my photo looked like with a different tint. To my dismay, all my settings I just finished perfecting got undone in favor of the preset. Noir Photo does not have an undo button, so this is annoying, to say the least.

The good

• Fast
• Easy to use
• 4 different tints
• Adjust outer/inner exposures and contrast
• Adjust the vignetting
• Maximum 2592x2592 output resolution
• Universal for iPhone and iPad

The bad

• No undo button

The conclusion

Noir Photo does a great job at monochromatic and black and white conversions. If you're participating in this week's black and white photography contest, you may want to check this one out.

$2.99 - Download Now

Research firm MMRI has tallied up local mobile sales for 2011 and figured that iPhone has claimed 30% of Japan's smartphone market with 7.3 million units, making it the most popular individual brand of the bunch. In the overall mobile landscape of Japan, iPhone claimed 17% share, which is second only to Fujitsu.

We haven't heard much iPhone news from Japan since the earthquake last year, but the iPhone has been hugely popular there since at least the iPhone 3G days. iOS has managed to do pretty well in the surrounding areas, including Samsung's home turf, Korea. Japan was one of the first international markets to have the new iPad available for sale, and with Apple loyalty like this, it's easy to see why.

Any Japanese iPhone users in the house? How many of your friends are packing an Android handset? Does it line up with the two out of three figure MMRI is suggesting here?

Source: MMRI via Engadget

Svpply offers fun, beautiful, and social way to shop from a a curated collection of products and stores from around the world from your iPhone and iPad. Featuring over 70,000 stores and brands and 1.1 million products, a gorgeous UI, and a way to follow what your friends buy and want, Svpply is a shopper's dream come true.

Svpply is broken down into six categories: men's women's, tech, media, home, art, and other. Selecting one of these categories will break down into even more categories, making it easy to shop for a specific type of item. Selecting a most specific sub-category isn't a requirement, however, so if you just want to browse general categories, you can.

In addition to browsing by category, Svpply also lets you search. I found this to be the only way to could shop for children and baby products, as there is no category for kids.

When viewing an item, a larger version of the photo is displayed, as well as it's price range, name, and which store it's from. You can then choose to mark it as something you want, collect it into a personal collection, or buy. Tapping buy will send you to the vendor's website in the built-in browser. Unfortunately, this is the only way to actually view more photos of the item. I wish Svpply gathered all of the photos from the store's website, not just one.

If you keep scrolling down the items page, you can see which people want it and browse through similar items. If you added the item to a collection, you can also view that collection. Lastly, you can view any comments that have been made about the item and leave a comment of your own.

Once you've marked some items as "want" and created some collections, you can head over to the "You" tab to view these items. There is also a category of things you own, but I cannot figure how to actually add items to this category.

The feed is where you can see the activity of your friends (who have been added by connecting your account with Twitter or Facebook). You can filter your feed by category, gender, and price. As you scroll through your feed, you'll the products that your friends have recently said they want with options to want or collect them yourself.

The good

• Adds a social element to shopping
• Beautiful UI
• Create personal collections
• Lots of categories and sub-categories
• over 70,000 stores and brands
• Universal for iPhone and iPad

The bad

• No kids category
• Must tap buy and visit vendor's website to see more photos
• Can't figure out to mark that you own an item
• Can't connect to both Twitter and Facebook, only one

The conclusion

I really enjoy using Svpply to window shop for anything from clothing, shoes, decorations, and art. I haven't actually purchased anything yet, but Svpply is working as a bookmarking system for me to reference when I'm ready to buy. Creating personal collections reminds of Pinterest -- in a good way.

Free - Download Now

If you're looking to bake some delicious cake, pastries, cookies, or breads, look no further than The Photo Cookbook - Baking for iPhone and iPad. It's packed with gorgeous photos of not only the final product, but also of what each stage of the process should look like.

The Photo Cookbook - Baking is a universal app for iPhone and iPad, but I'm going to be using screenshots from the iPad version. Both versional offer the exact same functionality and content.

On the home screen of The Photo Cookbook - Baking you'll see four different columns, each one representing a different category: cakes & traybakes, pastries, small cakes & cookies, and breads. Each entry is represent by a gorgeous photograph of the delicious product. You can also scroll each column independently. There are 15 recipes in each category, totaling 60 total recipes.

When viewing a recipe, you'll first see a list of all the ingredients followed by a photo of all these ingredients separated into their portions. Tapping on one of the ingredients in the photo will pop up more info about it, including another photo, description, preparation, and designations.

As you scroll down this page, you'll see all the steps in the recipe. With each step, there is a photograph of how your creation should look at this stage of the baking process. Some of the steps are shown side-by-side, while others are shown full-width. At the end of each recipe, a gorgeous photograph will demonstrate what your final baked good should look like. For example, check out these double ginger cupcakes.

Yum!

At the top right of the screen, there are three icons that let you mark the recipe as a favorite, take notes, or email the ingredients list. In a perfect world, The Photo Cookbook - Baking would be able to create a new Reminders list titled "double ginger cupcakes" and list out all the ingredients needed. But, alas, the iOS 5 SDK does not allow this. Maybe in iOS 6?

The good

• Gorgeous photography
• Easy read and follow steps
• Pictures of ingredients in their portions are helpful
• Pictures with each step is helpful
• 60 recipes in 4 categories

The bad

• Would like to see more categories and recipes. No pie?

The conclusion

I feel like The Photo cookbook was designed specifically for me. Although I don't like to cook, I love to bake, and I also refuse to use cookbooks without pictures. I want to know what the final product is supposed to look like, and The Photo Cookbook - Baking takes that idea way farther by showing photos of ingredients and how your creation should look at each stage - and these photos are gorgeous!

Now excuse me. I have some double ginger cupcakes to make.

$4.99 - Download Now

Going to the supermarket has finally reached the 21st Century, thanks to the iPhone and Stop & Shop

If you live in New England, New York or New Jersey and shop at Stop & Shop, now you not only can you bring your own bags, but you can use your iPhone to scan your groceries and then check out of the store. When it works, it is a blast.

Now Shopping apps aren't new –- we highlight some in our recent best free apps post.  The nice thing about shopping apps is that they can really make our lives easier and allow us to see the iPhone for the productivity tool it can be.

I’m usually a pretty agreeable and social guy –- I like to talk and spend time interacting with friends and family; I just don’t enjoy interacting with most people who work at the grocery store or retail stores. When I shop (which I hate to do) I definitely employ the male stereotypical “hunter” mentality. I go in knowing what I want, I find it on my own, I buy it and I leave. Pretty simple.

Grocery shopping used to be a challenge for me – so I would make it a game with my kids. My goal would be to get in and out of the super-market without having forced human interaction with anyone. Usually I failed miserably.

Then, our local Stop & Shop introduced those little Scan it “guns” that you check out with your card, scan your stuff and then check out at a self check out. For the most part, this was a good solution – but you had to walk around with those dumb looking “wands” that inevitably ran out of charge or malfunctioned.

Stop & Shop has introduced the new SCAN IT! mobile app for iPhone and Android. The concept is pretty simple – download the app, input your loyalty card number and then connect to their special WiFi network in the store. Use the phone to scan your stuff and then scan an “exit code” and pay at a self-checkout. Sometimes, however, things in concept work better than they do in reality.

Once the app is downloaded, you will be prompted to input your Stop & Shop loyalty card number so that when you use the app –- it always knows who you are and credits your account with the loyalty points and coupons. Once the app is set up and ready to go, your phone will automatically connect to the Scan It mobile WiFi network in the store – you just need to make sure that you have WiFi turned on and have your phone set to discover available networks. .

Touch the Scan button to begin your shopping trip. Scanned item and any discounts are shown.

Once you are connected, just touch the Scan It icon along the bottom row. The screen changes and a yellow Scan   button appears. Touch the Scan button and simply point your iPhone screen at the bar code of the product you wish to buy. Any in-store promotions are automatically reflected in the price and the item gets scanned and put into your cart automatically. Just let the camera focus on its own on the bar code and it scans it, applies discounts and puts it in your cart – very simple and cool.

One of the more annoying features of the app is that occasionally as you walk by something that is on sale a loud cash register sound is played and a coupon for the sale item shows on the screen. You can always just ignore it – but clearly it tries to get your attention to things on sale and it does a pretty good job of that.

Promotional offers pop up when you walk in front of things that are on sale. Touch the Cart button to check and see what you have already scanned.

You can always touch the Check Cart button to see what you have in your cart, what your running total is and how much you have saved on this trip. There is also a button to tap to remove an item from your cart – just touch that button and scan the item you want to remove – so far, pretty simple and lots of fun.

Achilles was the classic Greek hero – part of the Trojan war and prominent figure in Homer’s the Iliad.  Achilles had that one weak spot, however –- an arrow to his heel did him in. The “Achilles Heel” of using the SCAN IT mobile app is the checkout.

In fairness, I had several successful checkouts using the SCAN IT! app.  There is one flaw in the system, however, and that is that when you scan the “end shopping trip” bar code with your iPhone, you are still then required to produce your physical loyalty card and scan that at the register. It makes much more sense – since they system already knows your card number – to have your final scanning using the phone accomplish that task – but, the extra step, and, thus, the need to still have your plastic loyalty card with you – makes this somewhat cumbersome at checkout.

I can live with all that – but one recent experience at the checkout was absolutely maddening. I scanned the “end shopping” code with my phone and I then got a code displayed on my screen.

The LCD screen on the register said “Assistance Needed” which is code word for the dreaded audit. An employee comes and has to manually scan five or six items to make sure you are not defrauding the system. I get it – but it happens every fourth or fifth trip to the store, which is annoying.

The dreaded secret code for "you have been audited". So much for getting out of the store without talking to any employees.

Using the iPhone and SCAN IT! app, however – the experience shows all the flaws in the system. First and employee came over and said “I don’t know what to do since you used your phone.” So, a second employee came over – now forcing me to interact with yet another grocery store employee – and said:” I need to take your card and go get a scanning wand and come back.” So, the iPhone app, which is supposed to eliminate the need for the card and the scanning wand, now created a situation where the card and the wand were necessary to check out. The employee scanned the requisite number of items with the wand – which is so 2011 – and then I had to rescan my plastic card and then I could check out. Essentially, for that trip, the app on the iPhone was almost useless.

The good

• Very convenient
• Easy to set up and use
• When it works, it makes shopping almost fun

The bad

• The checkout process is not well thought out
• When it works, it makes shopping almost fun

The conclusion

While SCAN IT! mobile shows lots of promise, there are still a few bugs to work out - especially the entire checkout process. This is a very usable app and really shows how stores are quickly understanding how consumers want to use their phones as productivity tools to make the little things in life easier - like grocery shopping.

Free - Download now

Do you use a grocery checkout app for your iPhone? We’d love to hear your experiences in our forums.

Instapaper is the original "read later" service that lets you save web pages for offline reading in a highly optimized, distraction free format. It also syncs them between your iOS devices and the Instapaper web site, so you can catch up on your reading pretty much anywhere. A recent update includes some very nice visuals with iBooks-style page-turning animations and gestures.

For those who don't like page-turning animation because they feel it's too slow, you'll be happy to know that the pagination mode has also been improved to be lightning fast and more accurate.

Some other changes include a new draggable dot bar to replace the scroll bat in pagination mode, new two-finger-swpie gesture to close an article, automatic full-screen switching, the ability to share Drafts and Quotebook apps, and you can now select the Twilight Sepia color tint at any time.

I'm a big fan of Instapaper. It's gorgeous and rock solid, but with other great contenders like Readability and Pocket, you may also want to check out our Instapaper vs Pocket vs Readability: Read later app for iPhone shootout.

$4.99 - Download Now

A new, portable fuel cell charger will be available to buy this year and it claims to be able to recharge your iPhone between 10 and 14 times. The small charging device does not need to be recharged by plugging it in; it works with replaceable fuel cell cartridges which can even be carried on planes.

Fuel cell maker Lilliputian Systems today announced that Brookstone will be the first retailer to carry its portable USB power source, which will be sold under Brookstone's brand. The fuel cell device is about the size of a thick smartphone, and the lighter fluid-filled cartridges are about the same size as a cigarette lighter. It's a big step forward both for Lilliputian Systems, a 10-year-old spin-off from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and for portable fuel cell technology in general. Several fuel cell companies have developed portable power systems, but a number have failed. The new fuel cell will charge any device that has a USB cable.

The charging unit and replacement cartridges will be available to buy online from Brookstone and the cartridges can be fully recycled once depleted. There is no pricing information available at this time however the replacement cartridges are thought to cost no more than a few dollars. The system is being tested with users this year and an announcement on retail availability should follow that.

We've used all sorts of batteries for years, from household brands like Duracell and Energizer to the lithum-ion and lithium-polymer types found in many gadgets. How does the idea of a fuel cell grab you?

Source: Cnet

The Google+ for iPhone app received a major makeover earlier today, and boy is it beautiful! The new Stream shows off large photos and includes many new little animations that really catch the eye.

Each story in your stream is topped with the author's profile photo and name. Behind the name is a dark, transparent bar that also displays a zoomed, horizontal chunk of the user's profile picture. As you scroll through your stream, the photos in these banners will also scroll every so slightly. It's not super obviously, but if you pay attention, you'll see it.

While scrolling, when you reach a new story you haven't seen on your screen, yet, the banner will quickly fade into the screen slightly enlarged, then quickly fall back down to normal size. I think this animation is very cool, but others have complained that all the new movements make them dizzy.

If the stories published on your stream are photos, or links with hero photos, then the pictures will be displayed in full width, front and center. At the top of the photo, you'll see the caption or comment about the story. In the bottom left you'll see a comment button and count, and in the bottom right is the +1 count. Tapping the +1 count will add a +1 on your behalf.

I'm going to pause for moment here to mention something about sharing links. If you share a link to Google+ from the plus.google.com interface, Google+ will grab an image from the article to display with the link. But if you paste a link into the sharing screen with the Google+ app for iPhone, it displays as just a simple, boring hyperlink. (See the screenshot of Rene's status above). Lame.

When sharing a status or photo with your circles, you can choose which circles to include, whether or not to attach your location, and take a photo from within the app, or choose one from your Camera Roll.

From the main menu, you can quickly access you Stream, profile, messenger, photos, and circles. You can also turn on Instant Upload to sync the photos on your phone to a private Google+ album, video chat with up to 9 friends with mobile Hangouts in Messenger, chat with multiple friends at once, and check out Nearby and What's Hot streams.

The Good

• Gorgeous
• Instant Upload syncs photos from your phone to a private Google+ album
• Video chat with up to 9 friends with mobile Hangouts
• Chat with multiple friends at once
• What’s Hot and Nearby streams

The Bad

• Sharing links doesn't include a photo
• No iPad support

The Conclusion

I've very impressed with the new and improved Google+ for iPhone app. It's absolutely stunning and a joy to use. Sure, it has some annoyances like not showing photos when sharing a link, but it's still an improvements over the previous version. My biggest gripe about Google+, however, is the lack of users and activity. If all my friends and family used Google+, I'd be all over it. Unfortunately, they do not. So it looks like I'm stuck with Facebook for now.

Free - Download Now

Getting ready to take the written driving exam to get or renew your license? For many of us, this exam is very stressful and difficult to pass since it always asks questions involving scenarios that we don't regularly encounter. With DMV Genius, you can study for this exam while on the go.

DMV Genius is a free app to download, but restricts you to just one exam from three states. For $2.99, you can unlock four more exams in any state. Each state is a separate purchase.

Each sample test comes with 20 multiple choice questions. These questions are tailored specifically for your state and are very similar to what you would see on the real exam. In fact, many of the questions are identical to questions you'll encounter on the on the actual test.

Each question in DMV Genius has 4 multiple choice options. Simply tap the answer you think is correct. If you're right, it will highlight with green and receive a little checkmark. If you get the question wrong, a pop up will appear telling you you're wrong and an explanation of the correct answer. The selection will also be highlighted with red.

With each question, you can also ask for a hint.

Once you answer all 20 question in DMV Genius, you'll be informed if you failed or passed and the statistical breakdown of your score. Each time you retake a test, the questions get shuffled.

The Good

• Awesome way to prepare for the written driving test
• Questions are real questions that may appear on your test
• Hints and explanations for each question

The Bad

• If a choice is too long, it scrolls

The Conclusion

DMV Genius is a fantastic way to study for that pesky writing driving test, especially for teens or anyone who's taking the test for the first time. And since it's on your iPhone, you can study while experiencing those horrid wait times at DMV right before your test!

Free - Download Now

iOS 5, the iPhone 4S and the new iPad have gotten even more heat -- no pun intended -- about battery life than previous versions of iOS and previous iOS devices. Does iOS 5.1.1 set everything right?

If you're using an older device, like the original iPad or the iPhone 3GS, was there any noticeable improvement in overall performance?

Vote in the poll up top and give the details in the comments below, and please include which device you're using, whether you did an OTA or iTunes install, and if you've had problems previously. If you're still experiencing battery life or performance issues, here's some help:

• How to fix battery life problems with iOS 5
• iPhone 4S battery life help and trouble shooting
• New iPad battery life help and troubles shooting

If you're a student taking a math class, there's a good chance you could benefit from a graphing calculator. Unfortunately, such devices are very expensive, but the good news is that there are several app solutions for your iPhone and iPad -- the best being Quick Graph.

Quick Graph is a fantastic graphing calculator that lets you graph multiple equations at the same time, change their color, and also view the mathematical notation of equations being graphed by nicely formatting fractions and exponents You can toggle equations on and off by tapping the symbol that looks like an eye.

When you add or edit an equation, a keyboard pops up with math symbols, operations, and functions. There are six available variables: x, y, z, r, theta, and phi, depending on if you are graphing 2D or 3D equation in rectangular or polar form.

After adding an equation, you can change its color from the 24 preset colors or from the color wheel. You can also adjust the opacity which is great for graphing inequalities.

In addition to graphing equation, you can also solve them. For example, if you want to solve 2x+5 for x=10, you type "x=5;2x+5" and the answer will appear right below your entry.

To trace a graph, simply hold your finger down on the screen and the points associated with the x value of where your finger is will pop up. If you have more than one equation, points will appear on all of them. The coordinates associated with the points will appear over the points.

You can also interact with the graph by pinching to zoom in and out and scrolling to pan around. If you want to reset the window, just tap the refresh button.

As previously mentioned, you are not limited to just 2-dimensional Cartesian graphs. You can also graph in polar form and 3D. Interacting with 3D graphs is quite awesome. I am impressed with how smooth the Quick Graph runs when rotating the object around.

One of the great (paid) features of Quick Graph for instructors is the support for VGA out. However, when projecting the app, only the graph is shown. This is disappointing because it would be helpful for students to be able to see how equations are entered since it can sometimes be tricky. Seeing which equations are graphed and the colors associated with them is also helpful for students.

Advanced Features

Quick Graph is a free app that includes a lot of features. However, if you want to plot more than six equations at once, graph inequalities and implicit equations, use 2D tracing and independent 2D zoom, and project the app with VGA, you'll need to pick up the $1.99 in-app upgrade. I must say, I am very impressed with how much is included for free and find the $2 purchase to be quite a steal.

The Good

• Rectangular an polar forms
• 2D and 3D graphing
• Dark and light themes
• Includes a very helpful user manual
• Advanced features are only $1.99
• Universal for iPhone and iPad

The Bad

• Does not support iPad Retina display
• VGA out only displays graph. No mirroring option.

The Conclusion

Quick Graph is a fantastic graphing calculator for the iPhone and iPad. It runs super smooth and, as its name implies, is super quick. The biggest disappointment for me is that Quick Graph doesn't yet support the new iPad's Retina display, but I'm sure it's coming, so I still recommend that every math student and instructor pick this one up.

Free - Download Now

Apple has released information on the security updates that were covered in the recent release of iOS 5.1.1. When it was originally released yesterday, all that we knew was that there were various bug fixes. This update actually covers some important security fixes too for Mobile Safari and WebKit based browsers in general.

• Available for: iPhone 3GS, iPhone 4, iPhone 4S, iPod touch (3rd generation) and later, iPad, iPad 2. Impact: A maliciously crafted website may be able to spoof the address in the location bar.
• Available for: iPhone 3GS, iPhone 4, iPhone 4S, iPod touch (3rd generation) and later, iPad, iPad 2. Impact: Visiting a maliciously crafted website may lead to a cross-site scripting attack. Description: Multiple cross-site scripting issues existed in WebKit.
• Available for: iPhone 3GS, iPhone 4, iPhone 4S, iPod touch (3rd generation) and later, iPad, iPad 2 Impact: Visiting a maliciously crafted website may lead to an unexpected application termination or arbitrary code execution. Description: A memory corruption issue existed in WebKit.

Given that, with iOS 5, Apple introduced over-the-air (OTA) updates to the iPhone, iPod touch, and iPad, it's interesting that they're still waiting and bundling security patches into larger software updates. OTA updates are done via bit-differential (delta file), and happen on-device and without the need to backup, re-install, and restore, so they're small and incredibly efficient. Apple could choose to push out security updates far more frequently. It's possible they think more frequent updates could annoy users, or their numbers tell them too many users are still updating over USB with iTunes for it to make sense right now. Hopefully, however, they're moving in that direction.

If you haven't yet updated to iOS 5.1.1 and you're looking for some help to get started, here’s where to go:

• How to update your iPhone, iPod touch, or iPad over-the-air using iCloud
• How to update your iPhone, iPod touch, or iPad using iTunes on Mac or Windows
• iOS 5 help and discussion forum

Twitpic for iPhone had the potential to be a really neat app and a possible Instagram alternative, but it missed the mark on too many levels

Twitpic is one of the most popular photos hosting services for Twitter and now they've released their very own iPhone app that lets you browse through the photos of all the people you follow on Twitter who have shared their photos with Twitpic, add comments, as well as add filters and effects to your own photos to share to Twitter and Twitpic.

Sounds a lot like Instagram, doesn't it? In fact, it's very similar, but I'm not ready to call it an "Instagram Killer" -- it falls short in too many ways.

There are three different types of feeds with Twitpic: your main timeline, the popular stream, and streams for individual users. All off them show rectangular thumbnails of the photos with a little icon that shows how many comments have been left on the photo. For the timeline an popular streams, you will, of course, also see which user posted the photo and their profile photo.

Tapping a photo will open it on a black background, and after a brief pause, the toolbars and caption will appear, and after another short pause, will disappear again. You can tap the screen to bring up the toolbars at anytime and tapping the comments icon will bring up all the comments for that photo and allow you to leave a comment of your own.

Unfortunately, comments on photos must have been made with the Twitpic app. I would've like to see all Twitter @replies to the tweet that included the photo be marked as comments in the Twitpic app. Since most people see Twitpic photos in Twitter, it makes perfect sense.

One thing that sets Twitpic apart from Instagram is that there are more editing options available. The "Add Effects" screen has tabs for effects, enhance, crop, orientation, and brightness. Crop, orientation, and brightness should be self-explanatory.

In the enhance screen, you can choose auto, night, backlit, or balance, and the effects tab has 10 different filters you can choose from. They're OK. Nothing amazing, but not terrible.

What is terrible, is the naming inconsistencies in the Twitpic editing screens. When you first take or choose the photo you want to upload, there is a button in the top right hand corner called "Add Effects", but this screen has five different tabs, one of which is called "Effects". When tapping on one of the tabs, the navigation arrow in the toolbar to take you back is called "Editor". But wait, I thought that was the "Add Effects" screen? Sure, I know what they mean, but it's the little details like this that make me think the app was thrown together.

The other thing that annoys me about Twitpic is the edits are destructive. Once you hit "Apply", there's no turning back. Returning back to that screen doesn't let you adjust your edits, just layer on new ones. The biggest problem with this is with effects. A lot of the effects apply some sort of special edging to your photo, which is fine, until you decide you want to crop your image. You'll either crop it completely away or, depending on how you crop, only crop it off a couple of the edges. The only way to fix it is to start over and make sure you save adding the effect for last -- even though it's the first tab. Yet another thing that makes me ask "was this app really put through proper testing?"

Once you have your photo edited to perfection, you can share it to Twitter with Twitpic and… that's it. Your photo isn't even saved to your Camera Roll! And what about the unique twitpic.com URL that is assigned to each photo? Nope, nowhere to get that either. What Twitpic was thinking, I have no idea. I guess they want to be greedy with your photos and not only not give you the means to share directly to another network, but not even let you share your photos separately to somewhere else like Facebook or Instagram.

The Good

• Browse through the Twitpic photos of who you're following on Twitter
• Upload photos to Twitpic and share to Twitter
• Edit photos with minor adjustments and add filters/effects

The Bad

• Inconsistent naming
• Destructible edits
• Can only share to Twitpic and Twitter
• Doesn't save to Camera Roll

The Conclusion

Twitpic for iPhone had the potential to be a really neat app and a possible Instagram alternative, but it missed the mark on so many levels it's not even funny. The editing experience is terrible and the restriction to only sharing to Twitpic and Twitter and not even your Camera Roll is a deal breaker for me. If they wanted to be exclusive to Twitter, they could've at least pulled in the replies to the tweets with Twitpic links to the comments, but not even that's the case.

Sorry Twitpic, that's three strikes -- you're out.

At least it's free - Download Now

Apple has pushed out iOS 5.1.1, a free software update for iPhone, iPod touch, and iPad users. The minor point release focuses, as usual, on bug fixes and performance enhancements.

This update contains improvements and bug fixes, including:

• Improves reliability of using HDR option for photos taken using the Lock Screen shortcut
• Addresses bugs that could prevent the new iPad from switching between 2G and 3G networks
• Fixes bugs that affected AirPlay video playback in some circumstances
• Improved reliability for syncing Safari bookmarks and Reading List
• Fixes an issue where 'Unable to purchase' alert could be displayed after successful purchase

For information on the security content of this update, please visit this website: http://support.apple.com/kb/HT1222

You can update now quickly and efficiently, on-device and over-the-air (OTA) by going to Settings, General, Software Update on your iPhone, iPod touch, or iPad. Or you can break out the USB dock cable, tether up, and launch iTunes on your Mac or Windows desktop. If you need help updating, here's where to go:

• How to update your iPhone, iPod touch, or iPad over-the-air using iCloud
• How to update your iPhone, iPod touch, or iPad using iTunes on Mac or Windows
• iOS 5 help and discussion forum

Jailbreakers, as always, will want to stay clear. If you notice any other changes, drop us a line.

Apple has filed a case with the World Intellectual Property Organization to gain access to the web domain iPhone5.com. Currently, the site is a modest fan forum. While Apple's action here might give us a hint as to what they're going to call the next iOS smartphone, it could just very well be protecting the world at large from scams which would target unwary Apple fans. Once upon a time, Apple even had to wrestle iPhone4S.com from a porn company.  Either that, or Apple is preemptively secure potential market names like it did with iSlate.

Apple's track record with snagging domains has been spotty. It took them awhile to lock down iPhone.com, and to this day, iPad.com is stubbornly parked by someone else. Before you start getting clever about picking up some domains yourself, iPad3.com, iPhone6.com, iPhone 6S.com, iPhone7.com, and iPhone7S.com are already owned.

Whatever it's called, we're holding out for a new iPhone this fall, likely with an introduction to iOS 6 this summer at WWDC.

Source: Electronista, pic

Sanofi US announced today that the iBGStar Blood Glucose Monitoring System, consisting of the iBGStar blood glucose meter and iBGStar Diabetes Manager App, is commercially available in the U.S. iBGStar is the first Food and Drug Administration (FDA) cleared blood glucose meter that directly connects to the iPhone and iPod touch, offering accurate blood glucose monitoring that seamlessly integrates into the lives of people with diabetes. iBGStar is available for purchase at Apple Retail Stores and all Walgreens stores nationwide, online at Apple.com, Walgreens.com and through Diabetic Care Services.

Source: Multivu, Apple Store

Every week the editors at iMore carefully select some of our favorite, most useful, most extraordinary apps, accessories, gadgets, and websites. This week's selections includes a way to monitor your electricity usage, an app that helps you learn some awesome blues licks on the guitar, a godsend for regular air travelers, an app and service for listening to your favorite music, and a beautiful way to read articles on the web.

To see what we picked, and to tell us your pick, follow on after the break!

Meter Readings - Chris Oldroyd

This week’s pick is a little utility that helps me monitor and manage my electricity usage. I have just received this quarters bill and as usual it was a shock to see how much I am paying for electricity. With this app I can now log my meter readings as often as I like and see what I am spending and how it changes during the year.

The app makes it easy to monitor your homes utility meters including water, electricity and gas; if you have it. Once you start logging your readings, you can view usage costs etc. in highly visible graphs. If you are in the UK like I am, an added feature is the comparison check. This allows you to see if you can get a better deal and what savings you can make by switching suppliers. You can even make the switch from the app!

$0.99 - Download Now

Blues Licks Lessons from Guitar Jamz - Gary Mazo

I’ve written before on iMore how I have used my iPad – pretty much exclusively – to teach myself how to play the guitar. This was a new hobby I started back in November, which has now turned into more than that.

I’m continually looking for ways to improve, things to learn and tips and tricks for my guitar.

There is a plethora of stuff in the App Store for guitar lovers; tuners, chord charts and apps, sheet music, simulators and more.

Guitar Jamz has been my go to site for watching the guitar guru – Marty Schwartz – teach me quickly and easily how to play some of my favorite songs. This week I was ready for more – I was ready to progress into the acoustic guitar blues.

Blues Licks is divided into five sections; Licks Lessons, Blues Chords, Blues Scales, Guitar Licks and a Blues Guitar Manual. I progressed through each of the lessons and slowly, I am getting the hang of the blues.

This app is great for learning those quick little licks that make you look like you really know how to play cool stuff on the guitar!

Free - Download Now

WorldMate - SimonSage

WorldMate launched for the iPad this week, and having spent my fair share of time in airports, I can safely say it will be a godsend to regular travelers. WorldMate can scan your incoming flight confirmation e-mails to automatically populate your travel itinerary. WorldMate includes a full suite of useful travel tools, including mobile hotel booking, a currency calculator, local weather forecasts, restaurant search. The app is optimized for the new iPad's Retina display, and can stay synced with your iPhone at the same time.

TripIt offers similar functionality, but there's something about the WorldMate style that I always preferred. The one downside to WorldMate is that most of the sidebar options pops open a window that's pretty much the iPhone app, rather than making use of the big display with full panes on the right. At least the trip itineraries are well-formatted.

The core app is free, but to celebrate the launch on iPad this week, they're slashing the price of the ad-less Gold version from $9.99 to $2.99. Definitely worth it.

Free - Download Now

Spotify for iPad - Ally

I've been using Spotify for about a month now and while I have found it to be a great service it left out iPad. Now that Spotify has released their iPad app I feel like it's the type of service I can actually use on a regular basis. The apps still need some work to compete with the likes of Slacker and Pandora but the Mac app is really what got me hooked.

The integrated social networking is a feature users will either love or hate. I personally don't mind it and have found it to be useful as I've found a lot of great music through my Facebook friends. The iPad app allows me to now stream to all my devices. I'd still like to see Spotify integrate some of their Mac and PC app features into the mobile apps but it's a good start. I think adding the ability to view stations and popular playlists would really complete the apps. But for my personal needs, I do fine creating playlists and starring tracks and listening to them on the go. If you haven't checked out Spotify, make sure you do and let us know what you think.

Free - Download Now

Pocket - Leanna Lofte

I am way late to the game when it comes to "read later" services and completely regret that. Since picking up Pocket (formerly Read It Later), I've become hooked. The app gorgeous and being able to save articles that I find anywhere, be it Twitter, Facebook, some random website, or my RSS feed. I'm even using Pocket as a way to bookmark my favorite articles that I think I'll want to revisit, like tutorials.

Here's another weird purpose I've found with Pocket. I have extremely sensitive eyes. I can't go out in daylight with sunglasses -- I get a headache and squint all day. Anyway, part of that sensitivity carries over to light-on-dark themes. I don't care how great the article is, if the background is dark and the text is white or very light in color, I won't read it. My eyes scream in pain and my brain starts to sting. But now I just send these articles to Pocket and read them there! It's awesome.

Free - Download Now

Screenshot Journal - Rene Ritchie

Screenshot Journal is handy little utility for developers, designers -- and bloggers. The idea is simply this -- automatically collect your screenshots in one handy place. That's right, no more digging through your Camera Roll. Screenshots are grouped by months, but you can also favorite specific screenshots to keep them even closer at hand. Zoom is available at 2x, 4x, 8x, 16x, and 32x with an optional grid overlay so you can double check everything from margin width to the precision of each and every pixel.

You can also share to Twitter, email, or to the clipboard.

If you're away from Photoshop and aren't doing near-real-time preview, but still want to check over your screens -- or take a peak at the screens of others! -- Screenshot Journal is a very good, very mobile tool.

$1.99 - Download now

Tell us your pick!

Those were our picks, iMore Nation, so now it's your turn! Tell us your pick of the week below. Give us the name of your favorite app, site, or accessory, and tell us why it made your life more productive, more informed, more entertaining, or just plain more fun. Jump into the comments and let us know your pick of the week!

According to P.T. Barnum, no one ever went broke overestimating the stupidity of the American public. Sprint CEO, Dan Hesse, however, is going to lose $3.5 million for underestimating the stupidity of his shareholders. This, after Sprint was rumored to have broken their piggy bank wide open by agreeing to buy 30.5 million iPhones from Apple for a whopping $15 billion over the next four years.

Shareholders are upset because the iPhone is expensive -- upwards of $200 more than competing smartphones from other vendors. The problem Sprint faced, however, is that not as many people wanted those cheaper competing phones. They wanted the iPhone. No other single phone in the industry sells as well or increases customer retention as much as the iPhone. Sprint waited as long as they could, almost a year longer than Verizon, and threw all sorts of webOS and Android devices at their customers, and they just couldn't fill the iPhone void. So they made the deal with Apple.

Since then, Sprint sold 1.8 million iPhones and added 5 million net new customers in Q4 2011, and sold 1.5 million iPhones, 44% of which went to new customers, in Q1 2012. Yes, the upfront cost of subsidizing the handsets have hurt short term profits, but it could be worse. They could be T-Mobile, who places the blame for their slump squarely on not having the iPhone.

Given how much of AT&T and Verizon's sales last quarter consisted of the iPhone, it be interesting to see what the brain trust behind Sprint's shareholder discontent thinks Dan Hesse should have done instead. Invested the money in a time machine so he could take them back to a pre-2007 smartphone world?

Still, executive compensation being tied to actual performance is never a bad thing and if Dan Hesse is reducing his incentives in the face of Sprint losses, that's a great gesture to the company in general, never mind the iPhone complainers.

"These voluntary actions regarding my personal compensation, which total $3,250,830, will eliminate any benefit for me to the discretionary adjustment the compensation committee made earlier this year," Hesse said in a letter to the company's human resources department.

So basically, Hesse's 2012 incentives are now back down to 2010 levels. He'll still be making more money than most of our towns, Apple will still be making more money than many of our nations, and Sprint's investors will still be making more complaints than a 3 year when the toy store closes.

No word on who's getting their pay docked or hand slapped for wasting years on WiMax before finally turning towards LTE a year late and billions short. Obviously that's no where near as bad as getting the best selling phone in the U.S. on your network...

Source: Reuters

An iPhone 4 that began smoking and glowing on a passenger flight has been found to have been badly repaired. Thankfully, when the incident took place, the plane had already landed at Sydney airport and airline staff managed to deal with the alarming discovery. The ATSB (Australian Transport Safety Bureau) has now carried out a full investigation and discovered that the iPhone 4 had been tampered with.

The technical examinations found that a small metal screw had been misplaced in the battery bay of the mobile telephone; the screw puncturing the battery casing and causing an internal short circuit leading to heating and thermal runaway. It was probable that the screw had been misplaced during an earlier repair carried out on the telephone. That repair had not been conducted by an authorised service provider.

Source: ATSB

The Ness is a both a gorgeous and effective way to find places to eat near you

The Ness Dining Guide for iPhone is a gorgeous way to discover restaurants and cafes that you'll like. The Ness will make recommendations based on the ratings you've given to various places. You can also read reviews, add reviews of your own, and browse photos from Instagram that are matched with the places in Ness.

The first time you launch Ness, you will be asked to rate a bunch of places near you. You must give 4 or 5 stars to at least 10 locations before Ness has enough information to start giving recommendations.

The search screen is the main screen on Ness -- and boy is it beautiful! It features six pages, each with six categories. Each category is represented by a tall, gorgeous, and vibrant mouthwatering photo. You can tap on a category or type into the search bar in the center. The results page uses the photo for that category in the background and has the results overlaid on top of it. Each result shows its star rating and how far away it is from you.

Tapping on the place is where you'll find more information like contact info, your rating, reviews of "what's good" and "what's bad", how many times it's been mentioned on Facebook or Twitter, and a photo gallery of photos from Instagram that are matched with the place.

From the side panel, you can refine your personalization by rating more places, check out where your friends are going from the newsfeed, edit your profile, add friends, and look up your saved places. Unfortunately, The Ness doesn't let you connect with Twitter, so you can only add friends from Facebook, or via text message or email.

The Good

• Gorgeous, mouthwatering photography
• Makes recommends based on what you do and don't like
• Share favorite locations with friends
• Views photos from Instagram that are matched with the places on Ness
• The more you use it, the smarter it gets
• Connect with Facebook and Foursquare

The Bad

• Can't connect with Twitter

The Conclusion

You're probably sick of me saying it, but The Ness is beautiful! With these types of apps, the experience improves as more users jump on board, so please, pick this one up!

Free - Download Now

Walmart is set to cut the price of the iPhone 4 to $114 on contract and the 8 GB iPhone 4 to $34 according to these price cards and their internal pricing console. These are $54 and $74 price drops respectively, but it doesn't seem like many (if any) Walmarts have pulled the trigger on the new pricetags just yet.

While the price cut isn't a huge deal in and of itself, it does suggest that a new iPhone is right around the corner. We're expecting the iPhone 5 to drop in the fall, but if Walmart is already trying to clear out old iPhone stock, maybe we'll see the next iOS smartphone sooner than later.

It's a little curious that it seems like these price cuts are just for the AT&T version; maybe Verizon and Sprint models will be included with this slash goes into effect, but it's tricky to say at this point. Anyone want to take bets about a new iPhone being announced at WWDC, or are we just going to see iOS 6?

Source: Cult of Mac

UPDATE: Aaaaand it turned out to be a pricing error. Carry on, as you were.

The Daily was the very first custom daily news app created for the iPad back in 2011, and now you can get all that great content on your iPhone. The Daily for iPhone is beautiful and extremely easy to use app for Newsstand -- no fluff or complicated UI's to distract from reading your news!

If already have a subscription to The Daily for the iPad, your subscription will carry over the iPhone for no additional cost. A subscription to The Daily is $1.99/mo or $19.99/yr. If you don't want to pay for the subscription, you will still have access to great, daily content, just not all content.

When browsing through The Daily, swiping left and right will switch between categories and swiping up and down will scroll through the stories in that category. The categories include news, business, gossip, opinion, arts & life, apps & tech, sports, video, and pictures.

To read a story, view a photo, or watch a video, you simply tap on it. The Daily include 3 different font sizes that can be changed while reading each post. You can also read comments and leave a comment of your own. For stories you want to share with your friends, you can easily send them to Facebook, Twitter, or email with just the tap of a button

This really is The Daily in a nutshell. It's super easy to use and very basic -- which is a good thing.

The Good

• Swipe up and down to scroll through stories in a category
• Swipe left and right to switch between categories
• multi-panel UI to quickly jump to a category
• Read and leave comments to stories
• Beautiful photos
• Videos
• 3 different font sizes
• Share to email, Facebook or Twitter

The Bad

• I have no clue why "Switch to New Issue" is displayed. Tapping it does nothing.

The Conclusion

The Daily is a great news app for the iPhone with great journalism. If you don't want to sign up for a subscription, you'll still have access to great, free daily content. Not only is the content great, but the UI is as well. The Daily found a great balance between being visually appealing, simple to use, and efficient.

Free - Download Now

Georgia, Seth, and Rene discuss low Siri usage levels, whether iOS 6 needs a new Home screen, Notification Center do not disturb, Pandora vs Slacker vs Spotify shootout, Quasar, BIG JAMBOX, and the iPhone bra. This is iPhone & iPad Live!

• Subscribe via iTunes: Audio | Video
• Subscribe via RSS: Audio | Video
• Download directly: Audio | Video

Meta

• Editor’s desk: WWDC 2012 and iOS 6, Google Drive, Google and Facebook apps, iCloud guide, and more
• What would you do with $110 (not billion) dollars?
• iMore community spotlight for April 2012
• Siri co-founder talks to iMore about the future of technology, mobile interfaces, and implementing Siri
• Which celebrity would you most like to see talking with Siri in an iPhone commercial?

iOS 6

• Siri six months later: Community report card
• iOS 6: Is it time for Apple to revamp the Home screen?
• OS X Mountain Lion gets Notification Center do not disturb — Can we have that for iOS 6?

News

• RIM Australia admits it was responsible for Wake Up flashmob at Sydney Apple Store
• Nintendo posts first annual financial loss as casual gaming continues to shift to Apple and iPhone

Apps

• Pandora vs. Slacker vs. Spotify: iPhone music streaming app shootout!
• Now you can stream music from Spotify directly to your iPad
• View multiple windows on your iPad with Quasar jailbreak tweak [Updated]
• Now you can block retweets from individual users with Tweetbot 2.3 for iPhone and iPad

Accessories

• Take your Bluetooth speaker power to the extreme with Jawbone’s BIG JAMBOX
• Make your iPad look like a MacBook Pro with Brydge, a new Bluetooth keyboard on Kickstarter
• JoeyBra lets ladies carry their iPhones safely and discreetly while dancing the night away

Hosts

• Georgia (GeorgiaTiPb
• Seth Clifford (@sethclifford)
• Rene Ritchie (@reneritchie)

Credits

You can reach all of us on Twitter @iMore, or you can email us at podcast@imore.com

For all our podcasts -- audio and video -- including iPhone and iPad Live, ZEN and TECH, Iterate, and more, see MobileNations.com/shows

If you haven't already please subscribe to all our shows in iTunes and leave a rating. It helps people find the show and means a lot to us!

The Pop Video pico projector is a new accessory from Micron Technology, Inc. that claims to deliver the big screen experience to your iPhone or iPod touch. The accessory clips onto your iPhone or iPod touch and turns it into a projector allowing you to display a lot of your devices content on a projector screen or wall. The video resolution is qHD which is 960 x 540 pixels.

The sleek and portable PoP Vide pico projector is the ideal iPhone or iPod touch accessory to share your favorite photos, movies, TV programs, and video clips! The PoP Video connects directly to your iPhone or iPod touch without messy cords. PoP Video™ is for anyone who enjoys simple and fun entertainment through projecting humor, interests, experiences, and social networking. It's not about the device but rather the person using it...

If you fancy getting your hands on one of these, you can pre-order them now for a cost of $99.  They are compatible with the third and fourth generation iPod touch and the iPhone 4 and 4S.

Source: Pop Video

At Macworld 2007 Steve Jobs pulled the original iPhone from his pocket, held it up high above the stage, and showed off the app launcher-based Home screen... that's pretty much remained the same ever since.

That's not entirely true, of course. Apple quickly added the ability to create WebClip icons for websites, and to re-arrange and delete them. With iOS 2 (iPhone OS 2) they added native apps to that mix. They increased the number of Home pages. They added Spotlight. They added wallpaper. With iOS 4 they layered in the multitasking fast app switcher. They layered in folders. The iPad, and the iPad alone, got landscape Home screen support. With iOS 5 they layered in Notification Center and Siri.

Is it time for something more?

Familiarity is a feature

To a casual user -- someone who only makes calls, plays music, takes photographs, and runs the occasional app -- the iPhone today works almost exactly as it did back in 2007. Just like a casual Mac OS X user can ignore the Terminal, iOS users can happily ignore Spotlight, the fast app switcher, folders, Notification Center, and Siri, and still fully use and enjoy their iPhone. They can wait years between hardware upgrades (and sometimes, because of that, software upgrades) and still pick up the latest iPhone and use it exactly as they used the first iPhone.

That may not matter to gadget geeks who change their platform as often as they change their jackets, but to mainstream users, to those for whom technology has traditionally been intimidating and inaccessible, that familiarity is a huge feature.

It's why Apple made the iPad work almost identically to the iPhone and said as much -- hundreds of millions of people already know how to use it.

It's why Home screen interface and experience isn't fashion. If you're bored by the iOS UI or UX, consider how little computer UI and UX has changed much over the last few decades. For all its other advances, for all it's design tweaks, OS X still has icons and folders on a desktop, the same as the classic Mac OS had generations ago. For all of Windows 8's Metro skins and finger-friendliness, it will still ship on beige boxes with full mouse and pointer support at its core.

That being said, mobile is moving at a blisteringly fast pace. While the iPhone and iOS were the startling new in 2007, they're now one of the oldest mobile experiences in the space. Interface and experience aren't fashion, but users are fashion conscious, and phones are subject to fashion trends.

Android has a huge marketshare. Windows Phone is getting a lot of attention, not just from AT&T but from designers. BlackBerry 10 may bring a new level of gesture-based interface to the table (if they can solve the discoverability issues).

These Home screen experiences not only look different to iOS and the traditional app launcher, but they function differently as well.

App launchers and information density

iPhone wasn't the first app launcher style Home screen. Not by a long shot. Long before smartphones, Palm Pilots were based entirely on the icon grid. When smartphones came along, the Treo retained the app launcher. Windows Mobile adopted it as well. Even today, you can find app launcher Home screens on webOS, BlackBerry OS, and Android. Some of them also add other layers, like Cards or widgets, but for the most part app launchers are never far away.

That's because they're familiar, as mentioned above. You see an iconic representation of something you want to do, you tap it, and it opens up. Because they're iconic (or supposed to be), and because human brains are great at pattern recognition, they scale well and can (usually) be picked out even among a large quantities of other icons.

What they lack is information density.

With very few exceptions, all an icon on an app launcher tells you is which app will launch when and if you tap it. They're static images and there's typically no information about the current state of the app, or any relevant data beyond the static image.

In the case of Apple's iOS, Calendar will show you the current date on its icon, and Apple created a badging system to overlay the number of outstanding alerts an app has pending. But that's it. With Notification Center, with a little extra effort, you can pull down snippets of those alerts, and see widgets for Weather and Stocks. However, the level of immediately available, glanceable data remains low.

Even if we consider the status bar, which shows carrier and Wi-Fi, time and battery, location and Bluetooth, none of it is actionable. It can't provide additional information or take you to it. (Although it has added persistent color bands for tethering, voice recording, VoIP or telephone calls, etc. and tapping those will take you to the associated app or Setting.)

Widgets and cards and tiles, oh my

There's no consistent Android interface, but stock Google, Sense, TouchWiz, "Blur", and other manufacturer implementations typically offer some variety of widgeting system. With them, you can have social statues, search boxes, clocks, news feeds, and a huge amount of glanceable data available right on the Home screen. They typically take up more space, however, might use slightly more battery and bandwidth as they keep up-to-date, and add an element of chaos to the layout. However, the amount of time they can save makes for an excellent tradeoff. (If that type of data is important to you -- some users simply don't find a use for widgets on computers or smartphones.)

webOS takes a different approach, shrinking entire apps down into "Cards" that stay live-ish on the Home screen, and thanks to more recent updates, can be stacked together. Flipping through Cards doesn't give you an iconic view or a widget-ized extract, but a look at the entire app, in its current state, with its current data. BlackBerry's Tablet OS essentially aped this approach as well. The only drawback is that sometimes some apps aren't as identifiable by their actual screen as they are by their icon (long white list views just look like long white list views). So, it might take a moment to find the exact Card you want, but probably not longer than finding and launching an app.

Both Android and webOS have easily accessible app launchers as well. Both also typically provide more information in the status bar, including the ability to tap into icons to activate drop down menus or initiate other functions.

Windows Phone 7 took an even more radical approach. They threw away the Windows Mobile app launcher and replaced it with a tile-based Home screen. Squares or rectangles represent categories of functionality, and can show a small amount of live content -- a picture, an avatar, a number, an icon, etc. It's not always great, however, since at times they take up the space of a widget while not showing much more data than an icon. (They're not as informationally dense as they could be, at least not yet.) And because they update, they're not as visually persistent, which means they lose the advantage of pattern recognition.

BlackBerry 10, which will only be released later this year, seems to be taking a hybrid approach. In the little they've demonstrated so far, they've shown something akin to a set of four cards, one per corner. Sliding panels also allow access to notifications, messages, and more. (Somewhat like Twitter for iPad. There's likely a lot more to it as well, and we'll hopefully see it as time goes on.

Siri

Siri is and isn't a Home screen. It isn't the traditional implementation of a Home screen -- something you can sit in and navigate around. It demands immediate interaction. But Siri can be used to access data and apps without having to move through the traditional Home screen. Rather than unlock, look for an icon, and launch, with Siri hold down a Home button, wait for a double tone, and speak.

Siri can by no means replace the traditional iOS Home Screen, but it can and does sit in parallel to the traditional iOS Home screen, and can replace its use in a few very specific ways. Yet it's clear Apple put significant work into Siri, not just into the server-side voice and context parsing engine, but the interface as well. Siri got a lot of the widgets that the traditional iOS Home screen hasn't. Depending on what you ask, all manner of clock and alarm and to-do and information snippets pop up. All incredibly well thought out and incredibly well rendered.

Getting a Reminder into iOS using the traditional Home screen, icons, buttons, and gestures is a chore. Getting a Reminder into iOS with Siri is remarkably fast. (Granted, when Siri works.)

Siri is still in beta, it's still not fully baked, Apple hasn't implemented it on the iPod touch or iPad. So, while Siri is no doubt part of the future, how much of the future is still to be determined.

iOS 6 and the Home screen

There's not a lot of low-hanging fruit left in iOS. Over the years, Apple has slowly but steadily added in most of the features that most of the people thought were missing in the original iOS (iPhone OS) -- apps, copy and paste, multitasking, notifications. There's a lot of ways to improve the existing functionality, but not a lot of functionality that's still missing. So on what tent poles will Apple hang its iOS 6 keynote this year?

Sure, Apple's bought 3 map visualization companies (but no map tiles), so a new Maps App could be one. I'd still sincerely love a Files.app repository, now iCloud enabled. Georgia still wants her Theme Store, where users can choose between a small amount of Apple designed iOS skins. But over the years, as iOS has matured, the amount of features truly "missing" has reduced considerably.

That leaves improving existing functionality. And that brings us neatly back to the question asked in this article's title.

Is it time for Apple to revamp the iOS Home screen?

Do you want them too? Do you need them too? If so, how so? Is it as simple as adding a widget layer to the existing multitasking and notification layers? Is it increasing Siri to the point where the app launcher becomes secondary? Or does it require something completely new, something that makes Windows Phone Metro and webOS and the upcoming BlackBerry 10 look old and outdated?

If Apple does make a substantive change to the Home screen, what does that mean for the hundreds of millions of mainstream users who are used to, perhaps dependent upon, the way things work now?

Apple has always been fearless when it comes to driving the future. They obsolete hardware and software often faster than the market itself. Is it time for Apple to apply that fearlessness to the iOS Home screen?

Additional resources

• iOS 6 wants: Files app and documents picker with iCloud
• The 4 inch iPhone
• iOS 6 wants: The opposite of widgets
• The challenge of bringing Siri to the iPad
• iOS 6 and privacy: How Apple should draw inspiration from Android for better app

Apple has quietly continued the roll out of its iTunes Match service by launching it in five more countries. iTunes Match is now available in Italy, Greece, Portugal, Austria and Slovenia. iTunes Match was originally made available in the United States  back in November. It was then rolled out to a few more countries in December last year and now a five more have been added into the mix.

iTunes determines which songs in your collection are available in the iTunes Store. Any music with a match is automatically added to iCloud for you to listen to anytime, on any device. Since there are more than 20 million songs in the iTunes Store, chances are your music is already in iCloud. And for the few songs that aren’t, iTunes uploads what it can’t match. Even better, all the music iTunes matches plays back from iCloud at 256-Kbps AAC DRM-free quality — even if your original copy was of lower quality.

How to set up and use iTunes Match

Source: Macstories

From Apple II to Mac to iPad to... what exactly?

Last week, during their Q2 2012 financial results conference call, Apple CEO Tim Cook said that, in terms of sales, the iPad achieved in just 2 years what took the iPhone 3 years, the iPod 5 years, and the Mac 20+ years.

I'll let that the idea of that jump-to-warp-speed acceleration curve sink in for a moment while I digress into nostalgia.

Apple made mainstream the personal computer with the Apple II, the graphical interface with the Mac, and the multitouch interface with the iPhone and iPad. Decade after decade they made computing ever more personal, from clunky command line to intermediated mouse, to intimate touch. That is the single, relentless theme of Apple's existence.

They wove branches around the trunk of that theme as well, of course. Cameras and printers that didn't set the world on fire. Set top boxes that faded away or remain just a hobby. Social networks that have been anything but. Yet a few of those branches have been every bit as compelling as the main theme. The iPod popularized digital audio players and iTunes, digital audio. Apple Stores redefined the retail experience and the brick-and-mortar consumer electronic profit potential. The App Store revolutionized software delivery and the idea of mobile devices as platform ecosystems.

By any measure, Apple has had an unprecedented string of successes that not only dented the gadget universe, but knocked it sharply on its ass.

Now back to that acceleration curve. As mind-boggling as Apple's past successes have been, they also sharply bring this question into focus -- what's next?

Steve Jobs' biography raised television, textbooks, and photography as areas of interest. Apple has already dabbled in television with their aforementioned hobby, the Apple TV. They've stuck their toe into the textbook space with their recent Education Event and iBooks Author initiative. And, hey... they make iPhoto and Aperture.

There have been persistent rumors of an Apple television set proper, something that Steve Jobs may have said he'd cracked the interface for, and something Apple might have already prototyped to some degree in their labs. It remains to be seen if Apple will ever decide to release their own television set, however. And if Apple does release it, it's doubtful it could match or exceed the sales of the iPad, that it could it do in one year what the iPad did in 2. It could absolutely change the rules, the way the Apple II did, the Mac did, and the iPhone/iPad did, and disrupt the current television industry to the degree that it soon begins to redefine it, but it wouldn't redefine computing itself again.

An Apple television wouldn't be part of Apple's relentless theme to further democratize and popularize computing. It could further socialize it, since television is more familial than personal, but it would simply be another branch, perhaps lucrative as the iPod, or perhaps just a hobby like the Apple TV. It wouldn't be a leap beyond the iPhone or iPad.

Same with photography. Apple has already played the iPhone card, and that's a great play in the point-and-shoot, mobile photography space. High end (DSLR) isn't mainstream and supporting services is another sub-plot, not a theme.

Same with textbooks. Again, Apple has played that card with the iPad and everything else will just enhance that existing disruption.

So what does that leave? iCars, iWatches, iRobots? Unlike many of their competitors, Apple doesn't just drop nukes on the future and hope to hit something, some day. They fire cruise missiles and carefully adjust the course until they hit just exactly what they want to hit, just exactly when they want to hit it. That's why, despite their tendency towards patterns and cycles, they remain hard to predict.

The Apple II was released in 1977. The Mac some 7 years later in 1984. The iPhone and iPad some 20+ years later in 2007 and 2010. As much as the sales curve is accelerating, the big leaps in product category for the devices that serve Apple's main theme have slowed considerably.

That's why the branches are so important, and that's why there will continue to be iPods and iTunes, Apple Retail and Apple TVs. There will be products besides a personal computer and a mobile device, that mainstream consumers will still buy by the hundreds of millions, and are ripe for an Apple style revolution.

Apple will still pursue their main theme, and will follow the iPhone and iPad the same way they followed the Mac, but there will be a lot more iPods and iTunes along the way.

Perhaps Apple will get into mobile payments and further expand the reach of the iTunes checkout system (sure, Apple could buy Square and Foursquare -- and why not Squarespace -- while they're at it?). They could finally overcome the cataclysmic myopia of Hollywood by either funding creators directly and serving up more Dr. Horrible style made-for-digital content, or simply buy a studio like Sony did and force Hollywood, kicking and screaming, into the future (is Pixar for re-sale?). There are many, many opportunities ancillary to Apple's existing businesses over-ripe-to-the-point-of-rotting for innovation.

So, while every pundit and their analyst seems eager to rumor up Apple's next big thing while simultaneously dismissing all current things as "iterative", I'm eager to see all of it. From Mountain Lion and iOS 6 at WWDC 2012 to the 2012 iPhone this fall and the next new iPad beyond it.

Nothing Apple does exists in a vacuum. Sure, at some point in the future, when technology makes it possible, Apple might just re-revolutize personal computing again. Maybe they'll make it wearable or implantable. Maybe they'll make it more human, with a natural language and thought interface disruption that does to multitouch what multitouch did to mouse and mouse did to command line and command line did to punchcard.

Or maybe, just like the computer became the network, the device may become the ecosystem, and each element from hardware to software to service will drag each other inexorably forward. Maybe Siri and iCloud are the first indicators of that.

What better way to serve Apple's theme but for the next big thing to be a relentless stream of small things?

Image credit: iDoodle by Jason Harrison

Every week the editors at iMore carefully select some of our favorite, most useful, most extraordinary apps, accessories, gadgets, and websites. This week's selections include a utility, a unique Twitter client, a classic video game, a social networking iPad app, a fun photography app for creating comics, and an addicting puzzle game.

To see what we picked, and to tell us your pick, follow on after the break!

FileBrowser - Chris

This week’s pick is a little utility that helps me manage the files and folders on my NAS (Networked Attached Storage). I have just bought a D-Link NAS to store all my movies, TV shows and photographs and was looking for a way to access the content from my iPad or iPhone. FileBrowser does it all and more.

FileBrowser lets you enter the address of your NAS and then view all the files and folders right on your iPad iPhone or iPod touch. It lets you manages files, delete files, rename files and also download files and open them in apps installed on your device or even stream media in Apple approved formats.

$4.99 - Download Now

TweeTV - Chris Parsons

This week, I decided to go ahead and choose just a simple app that to me, really has no purpose yet I use it almost every day. TweeTV does nothing more than show a bunch of streaming tweets based on any number of things. It can be from a topic, a person or even just a word. I like to go ahead and airplay it to my TV while I'm working and looking for things to write. For example, set it to only pull in Apple tweets and you'll catch headlines and tweets from all over the world about Apple. It's not overly functional for collecting "up to date" info but it's fun to just watch tweets from everywhere on any chosen topic just roll by. It has themes built in just in case basic black isn't your thing but really, basic black looks the best. It's available for free in the iTunes App Store for free right now for iPhone or iPad.

Free - Download Now

Battlelog - Simon Sage

I'm a big fan of EA's Battlefield 3, so when they announced that their social network for virtual murderers was coming to iPhone, I was pretty excited. Through Battlelog for iOS, you can view the battle feed of your friends to see their latest achievements, launch directly into chat with friends online, drill down into player stats, and check your progress with various weapon and skill unlocks. There's a sub-section for checking out the latest stories on the Battlefield 3 news feed, but for the most part, this is just a good way to see which of your buddies are online and ready for a few rounds. I'd love to see some more advanced stuff like what's available in the Call of Duty: Elite app, like customizing your classes and tracking challenge progress, but this is a good start. If you're in BF3, definitely download this freebie, and feel free to add me to your buddies list.

Free - Download Now

LinkedIn for iPad - Gary Mazo

I spend a decent amount of time on various social networking sites – using my iPad as the primary tool. It is amazing that now, two years after the iPad was introduced, one of my most used social networking sites finally has an app. LinkedIn for the iPad just launched this week and while it is a bit late to the party – I am really enjoying this app.

First off, it is optimized for the retina display on the iPad – which is great. There are some new features that are very useful – one being the calendar feature. Say you have a meeting at two with someone important and you want to be prepared. With the calendar feature, you can see his/her LinkedIn profile and get set for the big meeting.

The home screen is very clean – just three large buttons to tap on the screen; All Updates, You and Inbox. Inside the All Updates section is where you find the new calendar, updates from your contacts and key news headlines from LinkedIn today.

Inside the “You” section is where you post your own updates, see who has viewed your profile and search all your LinkedIn contacts. You can also easily email your profile to a potential connection, which can be helpful, if you are searching for a new job.

Your inbox is simply where you LinkedIn messages are stored and where you will find pending invitations to connect.

All ion all, I really like the new interface and find it very useful, easy to navigate and uncluttered. It is too bad it took them so long to get this on the iPad – but, now that it is here - it is my pick of the week.

Have you tried the new LinkedIn app? Now that there is a dedicated, usable app, will you use it instead of whichever way you now access LinkedIn? Let us know in the forums!

Free - Download Now

Halftone - Rene Ritchie

When I was a kid, I'd buy comic books and read Sunday comics printed in four colors. Not four color process, mind you, but four colors and four colors only. Everything else had to be simulated by using dots of smaller or larger sizes. Looking back, it was horrible. Looking back, it was wonderful. Halftone is the name of the process used -- the smaller and bigger dots -- to make those old style comic books and Sunday comics. It's also the name of an iOS app that lets you convert photos into retro-looking comic images.

You can add filters, of course, and control the size of the dot patterns. You can also add captions, word bubbles, paper types, and special effect text.

It's not an every day app, but it's a fun one, especially for those of us who were once kids and deeply in love with halftone comics.

$0.99 - Download now

Polymer - Leanna Lofte

This week I've got yet another puzzle game! This one is called Polymer and it's a shape-creating puzzle game that is highly addicting. The goal is to slide the rows and columns around so that you create a complete, closed shape. It's very challenging.

Polymer also has really awesome, calming-like, music and sound effects. Be sure to check out my full review!

$0.99 - Download Now

Tell us your pick!

Those were our picks, iMore Nation, so now it's your turn! Tell us your pick of the week below. Give us the name of your favorite app, site, or accessory, and tell us why it made your life more productive, more informed, more entertaining, or just plain more fun. Jump into the comments and let us know your pick of the week!

Tony Fadell, affectionately referred to as the godfather of the iPod for his part in helping Apple bring their landmark MP3 player to market, says that Apple originally tested three different kinds of iPhone prototypes before ultimately deciding on the multitouch marvel we now all know and love. Fadell, speaking on On the Verge, said a hardware keyboard was a serious considerations. Fadell claims he favored the virtual keyboard approach.

Based on other stories and snippets of stories that have floated around for years, it sounds like Apple was working on a multitouch "Safari-Pad" project while also experimenting with iPod/phone options like the Motorola ROKR. Eventually the tablet got put on hold and, after seeing a demonstration of the "rubber-banding" inertial scrolling on a multitouch screen, Steve Jobs pivoted Apple into what became the iPhone.

Jon Rubentein, who was also pivotal in Apple's iPod success, really wanted a hardware keyboard on the iPhone.

Rubinstein and Jobs could not agree on the iPhone’s strategy wrt the Keyboard. This tells me that Rubinstein has a separate but perhaps also compelling vision on how the keyboard needs to be incorporated into smartphones. I can’t wait to see what that vision entails!

Rubenstein ultimately left Apple and joined Palm, where he brought the multitouch and hardware keyboard packing Palm Pre to market.

Once Apple had the iPhone -- and iPod touch -- on track, they went back to the Safari Pad project and brought out the iPad. (Which, as far as we know, no ever prototyped with a full laptop keyboard...)

Source: The Verge

Carriers have a love/hate relationship with the iPhone. They hate Apple's control (because they want that control for themselves) but love the money and customer-retention having the iPhone on their network brings them. Sprint's willingness to pay damn near all the money in their pockets, and delve into whatever passes for a corporate second mortgage, proves that that point.

AT&T, Verizon, and Sprint sell Android because they want to. They sell iPhone because they have to.

Apple isn't exactly easy to deal with. Android gives carriers far more control, generally requires far less up front investment (in terms of subsidies), and promises a thus far inexhaustible cornucopia of new devices to thrust at consumers on a seemingly weekly basis. It just doesn't generate the revenue or reduce customer churn the way the iPhone does.

They tried. They really did. Verizon pushed the Droid and Sprint pushed the Palm Pre and the EVO. They had successes to be sure, especially in sheer volume of units sold. But they never came anywhere near iPhone levels of profit or customer loyalty. And at the end of the day, even for carriers, that's what matters.

Not that you'd know it by looking at their websites. Go to Verizon.com or AT&T.com or Sprint.com and iPhones have little to no home page presence and remarkably little wireless site presence.

Verizon's home page features the eye of Sauron the Droid. Their wireless page does have the iPhone in the first of three small blocks at the bottom, but the massive feature boxes are filled almost entirely by Android. There's even a token BlackBerry thrown into the mix. But no iPhone.

This despite Verizon selling 3.2 million iPhones last quarter, accounting for more than half the smartphones they sold (i.e. the iPhone outsold all Android and other smartphones combined.)

AT&T's home page is all about Windows Phone and Android, with Nokia grabbing one of the hero slides and HTC and Samsung getting the other two. On their wireless page Nokia repeats in the spotlight, with Android and cheapy phones playing backup. There's no iPhone in sight.

Yet AT&T sold 4.3 million iPhones last quarter, which was 75% of all the smartphones they sold, and 60% of all the on-contract phones AT&T sold period (including feature phones).

Sprint's home page has the iPhone in the third of four feature spots, and the fourth of four bottom blocks. They don't have a separate wireless page, so their home page does double duty.

Still, Sprint managed to sell 1.5 million iPhones last quarter. They don't break out how many smartphones in general they sold, however, so there's no way to calculate the iPhone's percentage of total sales.

And that's just in the U.S. Internationally, Apple sold over 20 million iPhones. Rogers in Canada reported 35% more iPhone activations, year-over-year, compared to just 20% more smartphone activations overall. (And their home page features Android and Windows Phone, and iPad, and their wireless page shows an iPhone only in a block advertising their Find my iPhone-like Phone Finder service.)

So with little attention, ad spend, and product placement, Apple's iPhone still accounts for most of the carriers smartphone -- if not all phone -- sales, and reduces their customer churn. And that probably drives them up-the-wall crazy.

Apple, who doesn't let them festoon the iPhone with their revolting logos, clog it up with their dodgy crapware, allow them to delay or refuse software updates, or arbitrarily alter casing designs, and charges them among the highest up-front prices of any manufacturer in the industry, is increasingly responsible for their financial and customer success.

And it doesn't even have LTE (yet) or a ginormous screen (likely ever).

If carriers had their druthers, manufacturers -- including Apple -- would be little more than dumb assemblers (much as, if customers had their druthers, carriers would be little more than dumb pipes). Yet as much as Verizon, AT&T, and Sprint would far, far prefer to sell the always amenable Android, customers, increasingly, want iPhone. So carriers increasingly have to deal with Apple. Even if they continue to try to find viable alternatives.

That's why carriers will never go all-in on iPhone promotion. They don't want to become entirely dependent on Apple (or any one platform). It's in their best interest to have several, highly competitive platforms on the market that they can hedge with, and against.

Still, it's interesting to imagine a market where carrier manipulation didn't influences the market. Free to compete strictly on customers and merits, would smartphones be more like tablets, and would the iPhone have the same relative positions as iPad does to Android tablets, BlackBerry PlayBook, and the like? The same position the iPod had in the carrier-free MP3 space?

Back on April 8th, AT&T started a new unlock policy that gave iPhone users the ability to have their devices unlocked via the carrier as stated in the following statement.

Beginning Sunday, April 8, we will offer qualifying customers the ability to unlock their AT&T iPhones. The only requirements are that a customer's account must be in good standing, their device cannot be associated with a current and active term commitment on an AT&T customer account, and they need to have fulfilled their contract term, upgraded under one of our upgrade policies or paid an early termination fee.

Well, it has been almost three weeks now, so we decided to check in with the iMore forums and see how things were going. Was it easy? Was it difficult? Was it simply confusing?

One of the most interesting stories came from forum member xandermac, who said his back and forth with AT&T might just have caused them to change their unlocking policy.

Basically, there's been some confusion around contract buyouts and if you could still keep AT&T service after paying your early termination fee. In some cases, AT&T figured if you wanted out, you wanted all the way out. Xandermac did not, he simply wanted his unlock.

Basically, Xandermac was in need of a easy solution to have his iPhone 4S unlocked for travel, but still on AT&T for home use. After email AT&T's CEO, he was escalated to the Office of the President, and granted the ability to pay his early termination fee, keep his current service, and have his device unlocked to be used out of the country.

For a lot of other interesting stories involving the first few weeks of officially unlocked AT&T iPhones, and to share your stories, jump into our AT&T forums!

Contacts Journal is a CRM (contacts relationship management) app for your iPhone and iPad. It allows you to log information about your contacts, add to-dos associated with them, and even attach documents to specific contacts. You can add contacts from the built in Contacts app (and keep information in sync between the two apps), or add contacts separately that you don't want in your main Contacts app.

Contacts Journal is available for the iPhone and iPad (separate purchases), but all screenshots in this review will be from an iPhone. Both versions have the exact same features.

Adding contacts to Contacts Journal is very easy. You just tap the plus sign and either manually add a contact, or select some or all of all the people stored in the built-in Contacts app. When you add contacts that were already stored on your iPhone or iPad, Contacts Journal and Contacts will stay in sync.

The contact screen shows the photo you have stored for that person as well as buttons to call, message, or email that contact from directly within the app. You will also find buttons that cycle between logs, to-do's, and documents that you have associated with that individual. To add an entry or document, simply tap the plus sign.

When adding a to-do, you can choose to sync it with the built-in Calendar app and also to receive a reminder notification. You can also choose specific locations for your logs and to-do's.

The easiest way to add a document to a contact is to browse to the document from somewhere else on your iPad, like email or Dropbox, and "Open In" Contacts Journal. You will immediately be prompted to select a contact to attach the document to. The other option is to directly send a document from your computer to the app by connecting both devices to the same Wi-Fi network and typing a special URL into your browser.

The Logs and To-do tabs are simply filled their respective lists. The Maps tab show a map filled with green, red, and purple pins. The green ones represent the addresses that you have stored for your contacts. The red pins indicated places that have to-dos, and purple pins are places associated with a log.

Contacts Journal let's you backup and sync your data with Dropbox. Unfortunately, Dropbox sync is not automatic and you must manually force Contacts Journal to send or receive data from Dropbox. When I expressed my concern about this to the folks at zaal, however, they let me know that the reason for this is because an automatic sync would take up a lot of data. The good news is that Contacts Journal does add a badge to the more tab of the app with the number of changes that I have not been synced with Dropbox. This works as a great reminder -- especially for people like me who must make sure all badges get cleared.

It's also unfortunate that Contacts Journal doesn't support iCloud sync, but the developers let me know that this is actually something they are diligently working on, but are running into issues due to bugs on Apple's end. Once those are worked out, iCloud sync will be available in an update.

The Good

• Add logs and to-tods to contacts
• Attach documents to contacts
• Create groups of contacts
• Keeps contacts synced between Contacts Journal and built-in Contacts app
• Keep devices synced with Dropbox

The Bad

• Dropbox syncing isn't automatic. Must manually send and retrieve data.
• iPad version has a boring UI
• No paid universal for iPhone and iPad version available, even though the lite version is universal

The Conclusion

Contacts Journal is a great way to manage important information about contacts, make notes about meetings and assign documents to them. I'll admit to approaching this app with a "when will I actually use this" attitude, but my thoughts changed as I started exploring the app. Personally, I will probably use Contacts Journal to manage photography clients and attach contracts and receipts to each client as well as make notes about the photo sessions and client requests.

It's somewhat annoying that the iPhone and iPad version are separate, rather expensive purchases. I'm willing to pay a premium price for premium software, but since the iPhone and iPad versions are virtually the exact same app with no UI differences, I would've liked to see a universal version available, even if at just a discounted price than if I were to buy them separately.

The good news is that there is a free, universal version of Contacts Manager available for the iPhone and iPad that restricts you to just 10 logs, to-dos, and documents. It's a great way to take the app for a test drive and see if it'll meet your needs.

$9.99, iPhone - Download Now

$9.99, iPad - Download Now

Free Lite universal version - Download Now

Here's another gem to add to your puzzle game collection - Polymer for iPhone. In Polymer, your goal is create shapes, called polymers, by sliding around the rows and columns. A polymer isn't complete unless all the ends (which are marked with black dots) are closed.

As I was playing polymer and thinking about what I was going to say in this review, my mind kept wandering into thoughts of a Rubik's Cube and the similarities it has with Polymer. I was pleased to discover Polymer's description in the App Store claims the game "combines the logic of Rubik’s Cube, the sliding mechanism of Chuzzle, and the creativity of Lego." Bingo - that's a perfect description.

Polymer has three game modes, but only one of them is initially available. It's called Two Minutes, and as its name implies, you are given two minutes to create as many polymers as you can. To create a polymer, you simply slide around the rows and columns to match up the pieces. All the black dots on the pieces must be connected for a polymer to be complete -- or, as I like to think of it, all the ends must be closed up. Larger polymers give more points.

The more you play, the more points you earn and the more features you can unlock, including additional shapes (which make game-play more difficult), and more game modes. If you're impatient, you can also unlock these features with in-app purchases, but it's not required.

The other two game modes are called One Polymer and Bombs. In One Polymer, you have as much time as you want to create the biggest, highest point-value polymer that you can. In Bombs, you must destroy the pieces that are bombs before they destroy you. Again, these game modes will be unlocked as you earn more points by playing the game, or you can unlock them for $0.99 each.

There is also an in-app store where you can purchase other color schemes for $0.99 each, or you can unlock all content, including all game modes and color schemes for $2.99.

The Good

• Very fun and challenging
• Great music and sound effects
• In-app purchases aren't required to gain content
• More color schemes available as in-app purchases

The Bad

• Two minutes is great, but would love to see longer time options

The Conclusion

Polymer is my new go-to puzzle game. It's a lot of fun and very challenging. Combined with the beautiful colors and awesome music and sound effects -- I'm hooked.

$0.99 - Download Now

Sir Jonathan Ive has won the British Visionary Innovator 2012 award organised by the Intellectual Property Office. The award comes after the competition was open for seven days and allowed the public to vote for their most innovative person of 2012.

After a week of voting, you have chosen Sir Jonathan Ive as your favourite British Visionary Innovator for 2012. He received 46.6% of your votes, making him the clear favourite amongst a list of other hugely talented, creative and innovative people.

Source: Intellectual Property Office

Sprint has confirmed that it will still offer an unlimited data plan for the next generation iPhone. There was some doubt that the unlimited data would remain, especially if the iPhone 5,1 has the expected LTE radio. Sprint CEO Dan Hesse has stated that Sprint will continue to offer a no-strings unlimited plan.

"I'm not anticipating the unlimited plan would change by that point," he said. "That's our distinctive differentiator." "Frankly, it's a marriage made in heaven," he said about the combination of unlimited and the iPhone. "We're clearly attracting customers from our competitors."

The decision by Sprint to offer unlimited data when all the other carriers are cutting back on their allowances has been very beneficial for Sprint. Hesse believes that many new customers have joined Sprint purely for the unlimited data. He was also keen to point out that he had no inside knowledge as to when the next iPhone would be released or if it definitely would be LTE capable.

Source: CNET

Rogers reported their financial results for the first quarter of 2012 this morning, and cited an increase of 35% in iPhone sales compared to Q1 2011, which is a marked step up from the 20% average growth among all of their smartphones. Of course, the raw number of sales aren't even as exciting as Sprint's financials; Rogers sold a grand total of 642,000 smartphones in the quarter and saw a 7% shrink in net wireless income compared to last year. Here are the highlights.

• First Quarter Revenue of $2,954 Million, Adjusted Operating Profit of $1,091 Million, Adjusted EPS $0.68, and Pre-Tax Free Cash Flow of $485 Million
• Postpaid Wireless Net Subscriber Additions of 47,000 Driven by Second Highest Quarter of Smartphone Activations Ever, Including a 35% Increase in iPhone Activations and a Stabilizing Trend in Postpaid Churn, Wireless Network Margins Remain Strong at 46%
• Cable Total Service Units Down 7,000 in Seasonally Slow and Highly Competitive Quarter, While Margins of 46% Reflect Ongoing Realization of Cost Efficiencies
• Media Revenue Growth of 4% Reflects Seasonally Slow Quarter Combined With Continued Softness in the Ad Market Offset by Strong Subscriber Growth, While Programming Investments and New Initiatives Incrementally Dilute Margins

LTE expansion is continuing, and Rogers intends to blanket 60% of Canadians by the end of the year. Right now 12 million people are in Rogers LTE coverage, which is 35% of our population up here. Right now, that's only an issue for the LTE iPad and can make things tricky when trying to pick which carrier to go with, but seeing as most new iPad usage is on Wi-Fi, it's not a problem everyone will have.

Finally, if you happen to be a shareholder, Rogers announced that they'd be dishing out a dividend of 39.5 cents per share. Woo.

We have yet to hear from Bell or TELUS about their first quarter of the new year; anyone taking bets on how well the other big two are doing for Q1?

Source: Rogers, pic

Kevin, Phil, Derek, Simon, Jay, and Rene talk BlackBerry 10, HTC One, Nokia Lumia 900, the new iPad, something something webOS, and Google Drive. This is Mobile Nations!

• Our podcast feed: Audio | Video
• Download directly: Audio | Video
• Subscribe in iTunes: Audio | Video
• Subscribe in Zune

Agenda

• BlackBerry World 2012
• BlackBerry 10
• HTC One X
• Google Drive cloud storage service launches, 5GB free space for all
• Nokia Lumia 900
• The new iPad

Hosts

Feedback

Got something to say? Agree or disagree with something we said? Have something you want us to discuss on a future show? Don't just sit there yelling at the screen, dammit, let us know!

• Email: podcast@mobilenations.com
• Twitter: @mobilenations
• Web: www.mobilenations.com

Credits

Our music is pROgraM vs. Us3R by by morgantj. Introduction by Joseph Holder.

Thanks to the Mobile Nations network of store for sponsoring this podcast, and to our fantastic live chat members for keeping us honest and making us smart!

Snapseed is a photo editing app for iPhone and iPad that not only offers tons of features, but is extremely easy to use. Not familiar with RGB Curves, histograms, and other professional editing tools? Not a problem! What makes Snapseed so great, is that anyone can pick it up and produce amazing results even if they aren't familiar with professional editing techniques.

Snapseed is a universal app for iPhone and iPad, but I will be sharing screenshots from the iPad version in this review. The iPhone version has the exact same features.

General layout

The layout of Snapseed is very straightforward and easy to navigate. In landscape orientation, you'll see a two-column sidebar of editing tools on the left and your photo on the right. In portrait orientation, the photos is on the top and a scrollable toolbar with your tools is on the bottom.

The editing tools are displayed as simple thumbnails with their names clearly labeled and an image that's related to the adjustment type. This is a refreshing approach as many photo editing apps use a bunch of icons who's meanings you have to memorize.

There are 13 different adjustment tools. With all of them, swiping up and down lets you chose the enhancement that you're editing and swiping left and right adjusts that chosen enhancement. This gives Snapseed a very clean UI that's free of sliders and other distractions.

Another feature of each tool's screen is the Compare button. Holding this down will show what your image looked like before applying the tool you're using. To compare with the original image, hold down the Compare button on the main screen.

Auto Correct

The first and most basic available tool in Snapseed is called Auto Correct. It consists of two enhancements: contrast correction and color correction.

Selective Adjust

Selective Adjust is a fantastic tool that lets you focus your adjustments to a specific area, called a control point, of the photo. You can add as many control points as you wish. Pinching and zooming will adjust the size of the control point and while you do so, Snapseed will show a red mask over your image so you can see exactly where the adjustments will take place.

If you look closely, you'll see that this mask is actually bigger than the circle. This is because the circle designates where the photo will receive the adjustments at full strength and where the fading will begin. Without a good fade, the images would look terrible with a focused editing region. Snapseed does a fantastic job of fading so that your image looks good.

The adjustments you can apply to each focus point are brightness, contrast, and saturation.

Tune Image

Snapseed's Tune Image tool lets you adjust the brightness, ambiance, contrast, saturation, and white balance of your photo.

Straighten & Rotate

The Straighten & Rotate editing tool let's you, well, straighten and rotate your image. You simply swipe up and down or left and right to straighten. The new cropped region will be kept straight and your image will tilt behind it. Unfortunately, you cannot fine tune the final crop by moving the image around. Sometimes there's room to shift the crop left or right, but you can't.

Crop

Snapseed comes with 7 different crop ratios -- 14 if you count landscape and portrait orientation of each ratio separately like many apps do. You can also constrain the crop to the original ratio or use free transform.

Detail

The Detail tool is where you go to adjust sharpening and structure of your photo. What's extra special about this tool, however, is that it comes with a loupe that lets you zoom in on a section of the photo so that you can get a good look at the pixels and how sharp they are.

Black & White

As expected, the Black & White section of Snapseed lets you convert your photo to a black and white image. It has six different presets: neutral, contrast, bright, dar, film, and darken sky, and five different color filters: neutral, red, orange, yellow, and green. You can also make adjustments to the brightness, contrast, and grain.

Vintage Films

The Vintage Films tool in Snapseed is basically 9 different vintage filters that you can apply to your photo as well as 5 different textures. The adjustments that can be made are brightness, saturation, texture strength, center size, and style strength. The center size adjustment is Snapseed's way of referring to the strength of the vignette.

Drama

Drama is yet another set of filters: two each for drama, bright, and dark. The adjustments that can be made are saturation and filter strength.

Grunge

The last set of filters is Grunge -- and grunge is the perfect description for them. Instead of a popup of filter options like the previous filter packs, the Grunge tool actually uses a slider to change the style. This lets you fine tune it to the exact color that you want. It also comes with 5 different grungy textures that make your photo looks like it's been through quite a beating. The other adjustments you can make are to brightness, contrast, texture strength, and saturation.

Center Focus

The Center Focus tool is similar to Selective Adjust in that you have a center point with an adjustable radius around it. The difference is that the things are you are adjust about this point are blur strength and outer and inner brightness. Snapseed also includes 6 different presets if you don't want to spend time find the perfect combination of adjustments: portrait 1, portait 2, vignette, blur, old lens, and foggy.

Organic Frames

In the Organic Frames section of Snapseed, you'll find 8 different frame styles with the ability to adjust their width and offset.

Tilt-shift

The final tool in Snapseed is Tilt-Shift. People love adding fake blur to their photos and Snapseed definitely does not disappoint in this department. In fact, since this section includes a radial (circular) blur, there is a lot of similarities between this and blurring effects you can do with the Center Focus tool. The linear tilt-shift is different though. With both types, you can adjust the transition, blur strength, brightness, saturation, and contrast.

The Good

• 13 different editing tools, most of which include many different adjustment options
• Share to email, Flickr, Facebook Twitter, printer, or "Open In" another photography app
• Compare button lets you quickly and easily see how your edits compare with the original photo
• Universal for iPhone and iPad
• Supports the new iPad's Retina display

The Bad

• Can't move the cropping region when straightening
• Blurring with Center Focus and Tilt-Shift are very similar

The Conclusion

Snapseed is a fantastic photo editor that's powerful, yet easy to use. Snapseed is best for users who want to play around with adjustments, but who don't understand (nor care to understand) how to use more advanced and professional tools. Snapseed makes it easy for anyone to beautifully and artistically edit their photos on their iPhone or iPad.

$4.99 - Download Now

OneReceipt is an iPhone app that gives you a very organized way of keeping track of and saving receipts. It will automatically grab emailed receipts (from, say, Amazon or iTunes) from your Gmail account and add them to your OneReciept account or you can take a photo of a physical receipt.

When you sign up for a free OneReceipt account, you get to store your receipts in the cloud and access them from the web on the OneReceipt app. This service is technically still in beta, but it's off to a great start. You will also be given an @onereceipt.com email address for you to forward receipts that were sent to a different email account than your Gmail. OneReceipt will then automatically add them to your collection of receipts. Unfortunately, Gmail is the only email service that can be synced with OnceReceipt.

The personal @onereceipt.com account is a great idea, but it still needs some work. I forwarded an iTunes receipt from my iCloud email to my personal OneReceipt account, but it's showing up in the receipt list as being "unparsed". This is strange, because the iTunes receipts that were already in my Gmail account when I performed the initial sync were parsed perfectly. So it seems that OneReceipt is just not correctly handling the quote syntax that is commonly associated with email forwards. I imagine this is something that OneReceipt can easily fix. Even though these receipts are unparsed, I can still view the forwarded email receipt with OneReceipt.

For in-person shopping, you can take a photo of your receipt and send it to OneReceipt and they'll process it for you. I tested this out with a two different receipts, but they are currently still processing. The strange thing is that even though I did this only a few hours ago, the date on my iPhone that is being shown is "yesterday", but on the web, it's "today". Just another little bug that needs to be worked out. Processing take about a full day to complete.

If taking a photo of a receipt isn't an option, or you just don't like that option, you can also manually enter a receipt. The disadvantage to this method is that you are not able to add each item on your receipt. If all you care about is the total, then a manual entry works just fine, but sometimes you also need to save the prices of each individual item on the receipt. Those are the times that photos are the superior option.

After a receipt has been added to OneReceipt, you can categorize and tag it so that it's easily searchable. OneReceipt will also create spending summaries that you can view on the web that breaks down your monthly spending amounts by totals and category.

The Good

• Automatically retrieves receipts from your Gmail
• Receipts stored in the cloud and accessible from the web
• Personalized @onereceipt.com email address to forward receipts to
• Spending summaries
• Take photos of receipts and OneReceipt adds it automatically
• Manually add receipts

The Bad

• Only supports Gmail
• Not all forwarded receipts are recognized by OneReceipt
• Can't force a sync to look at past emails again

The Conclusion

Even though OneReceipt has a few kinks to work out, I'm still impressed with it. The app and service is completely free, so it's not like you've got anything to lose. Keeping track of receipts is something I'm terrible at, yet need to do for many of my jobs, but I expect to be much more organized with them now that I have OneReceipt.

Free - Download Now

After an initial release on iPad last summer, Sid Meier's classic swashbuckling game, Pirates!, has found its way to the iPhone. Just like the version built for the bigger screen, you build up a crew, customize your ship, stick a sword into anyone who tries to take it, fire cannons at competing pirates, pillage whatever's in sight, and rest up at the port once the gunpowder has settled.

Just like the iPad version, the Classic Sid Meier adventure has been optimized for multitouch on the iPhone. You can parry, counter, an dual all the scurvy dogs you come across into submission, while boarding their ships, attacking their taverns, and even raiding the Governor's mansion for bounty.

You get 27 ships that you can customize with ammo, cannons, and otherwise upgrade, and you get to go after the greatest pirate villains in history, including Blackbeard, Captain Kidd and Henry Morgan.

Pirates is a well-loved franchise, and one that has weathered the test of time nicely. It originally came out way back in 1987, made by MicroProse, who also kicked off the Civilization franchise. Remakes of Pirates on the PC and consoles have done really well, and it looks like 2K has properly optimized for mobile with fresh touch controls. I've never spent too much time playing the series myself, but I've got more than one friend who goes "ZOMG PIRATES!11!!" any time it comes up. Maybe now is the time to give it a shot.

Any swashbucklers in the house that have already pumped a lot of time into this game?

$2.99 - Download now

An elderly Chinese lady was stopped at customs trying to import more than 200 iPhones hidden inside used beer bottles. The iPhones which are available for a lot less in Hong Kong were being imported into Shenzhen China.

Collecting beer bottles is not that suspicious of a pastime for some as they can be given to recycling centers in exchange for a small payment. This time however customs officers were highly suspicious due to the weight of the bottles. On further investigation, officers discovered that the bottles had been tampered with. Each bottle had been professionally cut in half and each one loaded with three iPhones; they had then been taped back together.

The bottles contained a total of 216 iPhones, a mixture of iPhone 4S and iPhone 4 models. It makes you wonder about the lengths these smugglers will go just to get the iPhones back into China; where they are actually made. This seems like a highly complicated procedure and a very clever one too!

Source: MIC gadget

If you're planning a trip to a national park or want to learn more about one, National Parks by National Geographic is a gorgeous guide for your iPhone that offers beautiful photography and loads of information, including photo tips, park secrets, must-see attractions, and things to do.

Included with National Parks is one free guide to the national park of your choice. Additional guides can be downloaded for $0.99 or $1.99 each. Park info, camping and lodging information, maps, weather, stats, and a few photos are included with each national park without purchasing its guide. Included with each guide is photo tips, park secrets, what to see, and what to do sections as well as many addition photos. These photos will also be added to the photos section of the app.

When viewing a national park's page, you will find a photo gallery at the top that can be scrolled though. Tapping on the photo will strip away the distractions by opening it on a black background and also give more information about the photograph in a caption underneath it.

Back on the main screen national park screen, the photo gallery is overlaid with a weather icon and a stats icon. Tapping on these will pop up their respective information. The weather section shows the current conditions and a 5-day forecast. The stats section shows the number of visitors, the park size, and the local time.

The Photo Tips section of National Parks is very cool. The Yosemite guide includes 5 photos with the photographer of each photo giving information about the shot, including GPS coordinates, time of day, camera details (camera, ISO, focal length, shutter speed, aperture), and difficulty. Following this information is the photographer's write-up about the overview of the setup and a list of bullet points for getting the shot. It's extremely helpful and I suddenly have a huge urge to go to Yosemite to take photos.

The Parks Secrets section is simply a list of random fact about the national park. For example, one of the nine secrets for Yosemite is that the giant sequoia trees can live to be more than 3,000 years old.

The What To See section is a basically the same photos in the initial gallery presented as a list and location's name. Tapping the photo will, again, open it up on a black background and include a button that lets you see it on a map.

In the What To Do section of National Parks, you'll find a list of common hikes and places to visit in the park. Tapping one will provide a nice write-up of why it is something you should do.

The parks included in National Parks are Acadia, Arches, Bryce Canyon, Death Valley, Everglades, Glacier, Grand Canyon, Grand Teton, Great Smoky Mountains, Haleakala, Hawai'i Volcanoes, Joshua Tree, Mount Rainier, Olympic, Rocky Mountain, Sequoia and Kings Canyon, Shenanadoah, Yellowstone, Yosemite, and Zion.

The Good

• Gorgeous UI
• Stunning photography
• Photo tips are awesome
• One free guide, each additional guide only $0.99 or $1.99
• Add attractions to your itinerary
• Works offline

The Bad

• Photo gallery and What To See sections are basically the exact same thing, just presented differently

The Conclusion

National Parks by National Geographic is a must-have app for anyone planning to visit any of the park included in the app. The guides will help you plan your trip and makes sure you don't miss any of the must-see and must-do attractions.

Free - Download Now

Recent data from the New York Police Department shows that the theft of iPhones and iPads has increased by 44% since last year. From the beginning of the year to April 15, 1,196 iOS devices have been stolen, while 831 were swiped during the same period in 2011. These stats are surfacing shortly after a 26 year-old chef named Hwangbum Yang was shot and killed in the Bronx for his iPhone. His wallet was left alone, however. The NYPD advises against flashing your iPhone or iPad while on the subway, which is common sense for the vast majority of us, but a good thing to remember for those long trips when you're bored.

U.S. carriers have recently announced that they're working on forming a shared database of IMEI serial numbers of stolen mobile phones, which should allow them to remotely lock devices that have been blacklisted. While determined thieves are likely to find a work-around, the process will at least act as a deterrent to less-informed criminals.

I would be curious to see if this rise in iPhone and iPad theft is consistent across the U.S., and how it differs internationally. At the very least, let this be a reminder to have Find my iPhone installed and running - it has been known to save the day before. Our own Rene Ritchie was the victim of a smash-and-grab last fall, but do you know anybody that has had their iOS device or other smartphone stolen?

Source: New York Daily News

Every week the editors at iMore carefully select some of our favorite, most useful, most extraordinary apps, accessories, gadgets, and websites. This week's selections include an iPad note taking app, a utility for toggling Bluetooth on your iPhone, an app for relaxation, an app for knitters, a tower defense game, an alternative to cable television, a great iPad drawing app, and an addicting iPhone puzzle game.

To see what we picked, and to tell us your pick, follow on after the break!

Notability - Alli Flowers

If you want to use your iPad instead of carrying around a clipboard or pad of paper, you have quite a few choices, but Notability is right at the top of the list of available apps. Notability's latest update includes Dropbox sync, so there's not much missing.

You can write, you can type, you can add in shapes. You can change the color and size of anything you've done if you change your mind. Of course, you can import .pdf files and take notes on them - particularly useful for, well, anyone who uses .pdf's! You can import your .pdf's email attachments, Safari, other apps that take advantage of "open in," and Dropbox.

Writing is super smooth, and there are even plenty of options within the pen tips you choose. Not only is Notability one of the best in its class, at $.99 it is also the least expensive. In plain English - you can't go wrong buying Notability.

$0.99 - Download Now

BluetoothOnOff - Chris Oldroyd

This week’s pick is a little utility that came out this week. It is called Bluetooth OnOff and was somehow approved by Apple and is still available. All it does is put a Bluetooth icon on your homescreen and it then allows you to use it in two ways.

The stock way, when you click on it, a screen loads with a Bluetooth toggle switch, you can then turn Bluetooth on. If Bluetooth is already turned on then loading the app will give you the option to turn it off. The best way of using the app is to go into the apps settings and turn the OnOff switch to on. This enables you to now toggle Bluetooth On / Off from your home screen with one tap of the app icon. There is no delay or intermediate screens just a straight on/off.

This sort of feature should be standard in iOS 5 but it's not; so if you want a quick Bluetooth toggle you have to either jailbreak or pay extra for an app. This one does what it says on the tin!

$0.99 - Download Now

Serenity - Seth Clifford

"Life moves pretty fast. If you don't stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it."

-- Ferris Bueller

Of course, Ferris was talking about actual life, not life's quieter moments viewed through the lens of your iPhone or iPad screen. But if that's all you've got for the moment, then by all means, revel in the peace and tranquility that Serenity can offer you. It's an app by the venerable developers tap tap tap, and displays the usual level of visual polish as their other apps. It's basically a series of really pleasant, relaxing video clips that loop over and over again. You just stare at them and feel your blood pressure drop as the soft sounds wash over you.

If you're snickering and thinking this is really dumb, believe me, I get it. At first I was skeptical too. But there is something profoundly nice about watching flames just dance in front of you, or flowers swaying in a calm breeze, or a little sleeping kitty. You can set sleep timers if you want to zone out at the end of your day, and the apps support AirPlay if you'd rather let a giant version of the videos blanket your entire room. I think good headphones are probably the way to go, though, for the full experience. And since the interface has an easygoing 70s woodgrain feel, they should probably be big over-the-ear cans.

The iPhone and iPad apps are two separate versions, presumably for the reason that combined, the video clips would total about 700 MB. So keep that in mind before you purchase, but at $1.99, you'd hardly regret it if you grabbed both. Relax wherever you are, with whatever you're holding. I think Ferris can close this one out, too.

"It is so choice. If you have the means, I highly recommend picking one up."

$1.99 - Download Now - iPhone

$1.99 - Download Now - iPad

Knit Handy - Jessica Moss

Knit Handy is handy! This app gives you an estimate of yarn requirements for your projects. It has many project categories from which to choose. Using this app couldn't be easier. Choose your project category, gauge, and size and you are set. Before Knit Handy became an app it was first a pamphlet called Knitter's Handy Guide to Yarn Requirements. I have the pamphlet and I can honestly say I like the app better. It's way more convenient to have it on my iPhone than it is to carry the pamphlet around while planning and shopping for a project. I have a knack for either forgetting to bring the pamphlet with me or losing it all together. I never lose my iPhone. I really have no issues with the app except I wish it gave a wider range of gauges to pick from.

$0.99 - Download Now

iBomber Defense Pacific - Chris Vitek

For my pick of the week, I am going with one of my standby game types - a tower defense game. Yes, there are many of them out there, but each one has it's own flavor and interesting game twists. The tower defense game iBomber Defense Pacific is a great new game that add some of it's own ideas to the tower defense genre. You have multiple upgrade options that you need to spend victory points on. You get special power ups. You even have secondary objectives (such as protecting a airplane hanger or destroying an enemy base). I have been playing the game on the iPad, and it looks great. The graphics are crisp, and on the retina display the game is beautiful. It is a universal app, but I found that after playing on the iPad, the iPhone screen is just too small to work with. If you enjoy tower defense games, iBomber Defense Pacific should definitely be on your short list of game to try.

2.99 - Download Now

Paper by FiftyThree - Gary Mazo

I have spent a good part of this week testing our various stylus pens for the iPad, iPhone or, really, any touch screen phone or tablet. The best way for me to try these all out was to use the best apps available for both writing and drawing/painting.

That brings me to Paper by FiftyThree. This week I really dove into this app and was just amazed by what I found.

Paper is a “freemium” app; it comes with one tool and all the colors, but to really take advantage of this app you need to buy more tools. You can individually purchase the color, sketch, write and outline tools for $1.99 a piece – but it makes sense to just spend the $7.99 to buy the whole “essentials” package with all the tools.

When paired with the right stylus, this is as close to actually “drawing” on your iPad as you can get. If I moved the stylus quickly – the line was thinner. If I drew a line from top to bottom and lifted up, you could see a small ink deposit at the bottom of the line – just like using a fountain pen.

I loved using the Color tool – it was sort of like using a watercolor brush. Colors actually blended when combined on screen. Once the masterpiece is completed, just pinch to reduce the image and then you can easily send it to Tumblr, Facebook, Twitter or via Email.

One function that is a killer feature in this app is the rewind tool. Just use two fingers and make a counter-clockwise motion on the screen to undo what you last did. Keep doing that to undo more. This is a great idea and avoids the need to continually use the eraser and possibly erase more than you might want to.

Have you used Paper? Do you have any of your drawings posted? Let us know in the forums!

Free, with in-app purchases - Download Now

Global Video for iPad - Rene Ritchie

I cut the cable cord months ago. We have pretty much a-la-carte cable channel selection where I live. You need to get a base package of channels, then you can get 10, 20, etc. channels a-la-carte on top of those. So it wasn't a matter of choice, it was a matter of technology. Cable still runs on a schedule. You can only watch what it's showing at the moment. Sure, PVR/DVR can let you time-shift, but that's a horrible, high maintenance, error-prone solution. The real solution is on-demand.

And that's what I'm getting with iPad (and iPhone) apps.

Global Video lets me watch most of the programs on the Global television network (a Canadian network that re-broadcasts a lot of U.S. network programming), on demand. No daytime, no primetime, no late-night windows to contend with. Just the show I want to watch, when and where I want to watch it.

To their credit, Global has also left AirPlay intact so I can, if I want, stream the video to my big screen HDTV in the living room via AirPlay and the Apple TV. (The other major Canadian network apps, CityTV and CTV shamefully disable AirPlay due to "licensing conditions" -- to which I respond, "negotiate modern licenses".)

Their in-program ads are also decent, the kind of stuff you see during regular network broadcasts. They're highly repetitive, however, which means they may not have a lot of advertisers buying in to this model yet. That's a shame. This is the near-future of content presentation and more advertisers should be getting behind it. At least if they want our attention. (And Global, and other companies doing it right, should reap the rewards.)

Global Video isn't perfect -- it hasn't updated to Retina yet, and while some new shows post almost immediately after they're broadcast over-the-air, others take a few days. But at least they seem to get it, and they're getting there.

Free - Download now

(It's Canadian only, but search the App Store for the networks in your country and you should find quite a few.)

Addidoku - Leanna Lofte

I cannot get over how addicted I am to Addidoku right now! It's a simple number puzzle game that I reviewed earlier this week that's in the same genre as Sudoku, but totally different. The goal is to group all the numbers so that one of the numbers is the sum of all the other numbers. For example, the number 3, 5, and 2 form a group because 3 plus 2 equal 5. The premise of Addidoku is very straightforward, but solving the puzzles can be quite challenging -- and it's super addicting!

Free - Download Now

Tell us your pick!

Those were our picks, iMore Nation, so now it's your turn! Tell us your pick of the week below. Give us the name of your favorite app, site, or accessory, and tell us why it made your life more productive, more informed, more entertaining, or just plain more fun. Jump into the comments and let us know your pick of the week!

Dock is an iPhone app that acts as as screensaver of information when your iPhone is not in use. While your iPhone is docked at your desk, Dock will scroll through weather, RSS, Twitter, Facebook, Clock and Stock widgets.

Dock is a very simple and easy to use app. You can either have Dock scroll through the information in one widget (like tweets from Twitter), or you can have Dock randomly scroll through information from all the widgets you've selected. If you are interested in something that scrolls by, tapping it will give you more options. For example, you can enlarge photos, reply to tweets, "like" Facebook photos and comment on them, and more.

In Settings, you can choose to have the information scroll by every 2, 4, 6, 8, or 10 seconds and mark which widgets you want active. You can also adjust the refresh rate of each widget, but unfortunately, the fastest refresh rate for Facebook and Twitter is 5 minutes. I'd like to see that reduced down to at least a minute.

My other little complaint is that Dock doesn't include a light colored theme. I have never been a fan of light-on-dark color schemes because it hurts my eyes and makes me squint (I have very sensitive eyes).

The Good

• A great way to use your iPhone when you're not really using it
• Information is displayed big and is easy to read
• Can post status to Facebook and tweets to Twitter

The Bad

• No light colored theme. Only white-on-black.
• Slow refresh rates

The Conclusion

Dock turns your iPhone into a fantastic little utility while it's docked. It runs great and displays information nice and big so that it's easy to read.

$1.99 - Download Now

Apple is pushing the benefits of using an iPhone in business with the launch of a new webpage on its site. The new page is simply titled "iPhone at Work" and it runs through a reasonably extensive lists of business orientated apps and features.

Stay on top of your business and accomplish everyday work tasks in a whole new way. With iPhone and amazing apps that get you the information you need at a  moment’s notice, your work day is anything but ordinary.

It appears that more and more businesses are looking to integrate the iPhone into their IT infrastructures. Apple wants to ensure that it has the information available to IT professionals when they need to make the big decisions!

Source: Apple

Addidoku is new puzzle game that has some similarities to Sudoku, but is also very different. In each level, you are presented with a several numbers set in a broken up grid. The goal is to group the numbers so that they add up according to the rules of the game. Each number can only be in one group and each puzzle has only one solution.

So what exactly are these rules? Well, in each group of numbers, all of the numbers (except for the biggest number) must add up to the biggest number. For example, the numbers 3, 2, 6, 1, form a group because the sum of 3, 2, and 1 is 6. You can also pair numbers, like two 5's, because 5 equals 5. The numbers 4, 3, 5 do not form a valid group because 4 plus 3 does not equal 5.

Only numbers that are adjacent to each other can form a group. This means that if a number is diagonal to your group or separated from your group by a space, it cannot be added to your group.

That's it! The rules are simple, but the levels are challenging. Even though they're challenging, they're completely doable which makes the game extremely addicting. Because each level can be completed in a reasonable amount of time, you are always willing to play "just one more".

The Good

• Challenging
• Addictive
• 60 puzzles for free
• 140 additional puzzles available as in-app purchase

The Bad

• None

The Conclusion

Addidoku is such a fun and addicting puzzle game! The object is both familiar and unique at the same time. It's also challenging -- something I find essential in a good puzzle game. It took a lot of self control to pry my hands off my iPhone to write this review.

Now excuse me while I play "just one more level" of Addidoku.

Free - Download Now

The Bible is the most read book in the world, and tiny Bibles with microscopic text have always been popular because of their portability. But, now, today, thanks to ultra-portable devices like the iPhone and iPad with their awesome Retina displays, and apps like Olive Tree's BibleReader, the Bible is more portable and easier to read than ever.

If you search for Bible in the App Store, you will be flooded with an overwhelming amount of app choices, from good to bad to just plain different. There are so many that it's almost impossible to figure out which one to get. So I went on the hunt for the perfect Bible app. It had to gorgeously rendered, packed with features, highly customizable, and run perfectly smooth. And I kept coming back to Olive Tree's BibleReader for iPhone and iPad.

Olive Tree BibleReader is a universal app for the iPhone and iPad, but I will be using screenshots of the iPad for this review. The iPhone version has the exact same features as the iPad version.

The integrated in-app store

Included in all of the Olive Tree Bible apps is an integrated store where you can buy more books including other version of the Bible, commentary, reference materials, devotionals, and more.

All books that you purchase will be synced to your Olive Tree account so that you can download them to another device at no additional cost or re-download them if you accidentally delete them or need to restore your iPhone or iPad.

Split screen UI

One of the really neat features of BibleReader is that you can split your screen into two panels. If you're using BibleReader in portrait, the screen will split horizontally, and when in landscape, it will split vertically. In each panel, you can have any of the books you have in your Olive Tree Library.

Here's a few different situations that one may find the split screen to be useful:

• While at church, your pastor has one main passage that he's covering, but also references other verses. You can use one panel for the main passage, and the other to browse to the other verses.
• You want to compare two different versions of the Bible side-by-side -- basically converting BibleReader into a parallel Bible.
• You want to read another book, like a devotional, while having your Bible open to reference at the same time. Or maybe the Bible is the main book you want open, and you want to have easy access to a reference book.

If you don't want the split screen, you can simply slide the one you don't want off the the screen. This is also nice in case you want the split screen, but not the entire time. You can keep your secondary book open in the second panel, but keep it hidden until the moments you need it.

You also have control of where on the screen you want the split to take place -- it doesn't have to be directly down the middle.

Navigation

It's no secret that Bibles are huge and that people don't typically read them from front to back like other books. Often times, someone is looking for a specific book, chapter, or even verse in the giant book, so having a good navigational system is extremely important for a Bible app -- and Olive Tree has nailed it with BibleReader.

The "Go To" button at the upper-left of the screen is how you navigate to a specific section of the Bible. Tapping it will pop up a menu that lists all the books of the Bible in chronological order. You can also pull it down to discover a search field that allows you to type in the verse. It does recognize abbreviations, so, for example, "1 Cor 13:4" will take you to 1 Corinthians 13:4. You can also choose to see the books of the Bible displayed as a grid with their abbreviations.

Another trait that most Bible's have are superscripts that reference other relevant verses. In a printed version, you would check the bottom of the page to check the reference, then flip to the verse. With BibleReader, you simply tap the superscript and a list of all the verses associated with the nearby superscripts will appear. Tapping on one of the verse references will navigate to that verse right inside of the popup. It's very cool. You can then either read it in the popup, or choose to have it opened in the main or split window.

Highlights, underlines, and notes

People love marking up their Bible with highlighters, underlinings, and notes -- BibleReader lets you do all these things.

To select a verse, you simply tap on the verse number. Or if you want more or less than one verse, tap your finger on a word to select it, then drag the handles to extend your selection. You then see a popup of choices: copy, highlight, note, bookmark, or share. These choices are pretty self explanatory.

Highlights in BibleReader are so much cooler than with physical highlighters. You can choose for your highlights to have a traditional look, or you can customize the intensity, color, and highlighter style. For underlining, you can have the underline look like it was made with either a thin highlighter or with a pen. You can do this every time you add a highlight, or you can create your favorite looks and save them for quick access.

When you create a note, a little note icon will be placed in front of your selection as an indicator of there being a note present. Tapping the icon will popup the note.

Customizations

One of the great features of Olive Tree's BibleReader is that its look is very customizable. The default look is very traditional and easy to read, but if you want to change the font type, size, color, or background, you can. Want the words of Jesus to be in something fun like pink or green? Not a problem!

You can set different customizations for each of the three different window types: main screen, split screen, and popup.

Which version?

Olive Tree has many different Bible versions available in the App Store and making a decision on which one to buy can be a big overwhelming if you don't know which version you want, or if you're interested in more than one version. The good news is that since each app allows you to sync your Olive Tree library, it ultimately doesn't matter which one you choose.

If you are only interested in a specific version, I recommend just buying that one as it will be the quickest way to get it on your iPhone or iPad.

The most confusing part of the available apps is that it isn't clear what the difference is between the free Bible+ version and $0.99 BibleReader version. BibleReader includes the ASV, KJV, Matthew Henry’s Concise Commentary, and Jamieson, Faucett, and Brown Commentary. Bible+ comes with ASV and KJV and the Matthew Henry’s concise commentary is available for free in the integrated store. The Jamieson, Faucett, and Brown Commentary is also available, but not free. So, to sum it up, the main difference is that BibleReader comes with The Jamieson, Faucett, and Brown Commentary.

The other difference is, of course, what it will be named on your Home screen. For example, since I purchased NIV BibleReader, the icon on my Home screen is called NIV BR.

The fact that there are so many apps is confusing and overwhelming. If you're at a loss, I recommend just downloading the free version and browsing the in-app store for what you want to purchase.

The Good

• Content is stored locally to your iPhone or iPad, so an internet connection is not required
• Highly customizable
• Lots of highlighter and underlining options
• Two pane UI is very convenient.
• Keep notes and customizations synced between devices
• Universal for iPhone and iPad

The Bad

• Too many apps to choose from. Would be less confusing for users if there was only one app.

The Conclusion

Olive Tree's BibleReader is a fantastic Bible for your iPhone and iPad. The Bible has always been one of those books that I wanted to continue to read in print because of how much marking-up I like to do and I always thought it felt more personal. Since discovering BibleReader, it's the only Bible I ever read. I even bring my iPad to church and make notes and highlights into the app while my pastor gives his sermon. And not to brag or anything, but I can also navigate to verses faster than anyone else with BibleReader on my iPad.

Bible+, Free - Download Now

BibleReader, $0.99 - Download Now

NIV BibleReader, $9.99 - Download Now

All Olive Tree Bible Apps - App Store dev page

Share your favorite iPhone or iPad accessory on Pinterest for your chance to win!

UPDATE: Apologies everyone, but there seems to be a problem and it's not on our end so we can't fix it. We're scrapping this contest and will replace it with another, similar one asap! Sorry for the hassle!

The iMore Accessory Store has added a handy new "Pin it" feature, so you can share your favorite iPhone and iPad accessories quickly and easily on everyone's favorite new social pinboard, Pinterest. To test it out, have some fun, and frankly -- give the awesome members of the iMore nation some free stuff! -- we're going to hold a "pin it to win it!" contest.

It's simple to enter.

1. Head on over to store.imore.com
2. Find the accessory you love most
3. Hit the Pin it button and share it to Pinterest

That's it! We'll pick a few of you and give you whatever you pinned -- cases, charges, headsets, helicopters, whatever!

And if you want to make extra sure we find you -- and you can find and share with each other -- swap your Pinterest ID in our Social Network Forum!

So what are you waiting for! Get with the pinning so you can get with the winning! Enter now!

Apple's next generation iPhone is rumored to use a new display panel technology that could make the device not only thinner but lighter too. The panel technology which is called in-cell touch is currently being rolled out by Sharp and Toshiba. The rumors come from sources in Apple's current supply chain.

An improvement in yield rates of the in-cell touch panels at Sharp and TMD has persuaded Apple to choose to cooperate with Japan-based panel makers, the sources noted. The adoption of the in-cell touch panels, if realized, will also have a significant impact on the operations of Apple's current touch panel suppliers TPK Holdings and Wintek, which are specialized in the production of glass on glass touch solutions currently, said the sources.

Source: Digitimes, AUO

NoiseHush stereo headphones feature neodymium magnet drivers and advanced engineering to deliver a great audio experience whether used with your iPhone, iPod touch, or iPad. I'm going to review a couple of their models, starting with the NoiseHush NX26 Hi-Fi stereo headphones.

The NoiseHush NX26 headphones are for high-performance audio that promise deep bass, low distortion and a wide dynamic range. They eliminate noise, making sure no matter what you're listening to, music or video or someone else at the end of a call, you're not distracted by a lot of external chatter. They have an adjustable headband and an over-the-ear design that delivers good sound and strong bass. The microphone also claims to be acoustically tuned to filter out external noise so the people you're talking to hear you, and not the racket around you.

While the NoiseHush NX26 are a lot of headphone to love -- they're big, really big -- but being over-the-ear lets them deliver really rich, really clean sound. They don't fit as tightly as some other headphones, however, so if you're seriously getting your headbang on, you'll need to be careful so you don't know yourself out. (Kidding!)

I use similarly sized headphones for podcasting on a regular basis, so for around the house it really doesn't bother me. I wouldn't use them to go jogging or in the gym, but if I really wanted to enjoy my favorite music or a movie with amazing sound design, these would be the headphones Id' use.

The good

• Over-the-ear design is comfortable
• Sound quality is excellent

The bad

• Loose fitting
• Large

The conclusion

The NoiseHush NX26 are good headphones for the price. The size and design won't appeal to everyone -- these aren't your Apple earbuds, and thank goodness for that! -- but for those who like the form factor, they'll appeal a lot. Combining long-wearing comfort with excellent sound quality the NoiseHush NX26 are an excellent pair of headphone to keep at home for the stuff you want to listen to most.

$69.95 - Buy now

Verizon has reported it's first quarter, 2012 income and it includes the sale of 3.2 million iPhones, and $3.91 billion in net revenue. Their wireless business, which includes the iPhone and iPad, was up 7.7% in services, 8.9% in retail year-over-year. They added almost 3/4 of a million net new retail customers, almost half a million of which were postpaid. That makes their total reach now 93 million, of which 88 million are postpaid.

The iPhone numbers are down, of course, given the previous quarter included the launch of the iPhone 4S and the initial rush of immediate adopters has passed. Yet 3.2 million is still a strong number, and the iPhone still outsells every other smartphone on the network, combined.

Verizon, of course, continues to complain about the high initial cost of the iPhone, which it subsidizes and then earns back over the course of -- typically high priced -- two year contracts.

"Verizon delivered double-digit earnings growth and strong cash flow this quarter," said Lowell McAdam, Verizon chairman and CEO. "We built momentum coming out of 2011, and our results show that we continue to execute in the key growth areas of our business. Verizon Wireless produced both great growth and great margins, and we produced another strong quarter of FiOS growth. We are confident we will improve Wireline margins for the full year. Our repositioning of Verizon Enterprise Solutions has better aligned our strengths in high-growth markets, and we expect our enterprise business to contribute even more to overall Wireline revenue growth and profitability over time."

He added: "We remain confident in our ability to take advantage of the growth opportunities we see, and we are focused on driving operating efficiencies. We are on track with our plans and expect to continue to deliver strong results."

And here are the "wireless highlights"

Wireless Financial Highlights

• Service revenues in the quarter totaled $15.4 billion, up 7.7 percent year over year. Retail service revenues grew 8.9 percent year over year, to $14.9 billion, an increase of 110 basis points over fourth-quarter 2011 and the highest growth rate in three years.

• Data revenues were $6.6 billion, up $1.1 billion - or 21.1 percent - year over year, and represent 42.9 percent of all service revenues. Total revenues were $18.3 billion, up 8.2 percent year over year.

• Retail postpaid ARPU grew 3.6 percent over first-quarter 2011, to $55.43. Retail postpaid data ARPU increased to $23.80, up 16.0 percent year over year. Retail service ARPU grew 3.4 percent, to $53.66.

• Wireless operating income margin was 28.6 percent. Segment EBITDA margin on service revenues (non-GAAP) was 46.3 percent.

Wireless Operational Highlights

• Verizon Wireless added 734,000 retail net customers in the first quarter, including 501,000 retail postpaid net customers. These additions exclude acquisitions and adjustments.

• At the end of the first quarter, the company had 93.0 million retail customers, a 5.2 percent increase year over year, including 88.0 million retail postpaid customers.

• At the end of the first quarter, nearly 47 percent of Verizon Wireless' retail postpaid customer phone base were smartphones, up from 43.5 percent at the end of fourth-quarter 2011.

• Retail postpaid churn was 0.96 percent, an improvement of 5 basis points year over year. Total retail churn was 1.24 percent, an improvement of 9 basis points year over year.

• Verizon Wireless continued to roll out its 4G LTE mobile broadband network, the largest such network in the U.S. As of today, Verizon Wireless 4G LTE service is available to more than 200 million people in 230 markets across the U.S. - more than two-thirds of the population.

• Verizon Wireless introduced five new 4G LTE devices in the first quarter 2012: the Droid 4 and Droid Razr Maxx by Motorola, the Spectrum and Lucid by LG, and the Samsung Galaxy Tab 7.7. In addition, the Apple iPad with Wi-Fi + 4G became available from Verizon Wireless in mid-March.

Source: Verizon, The Next Web

If you've been on the hunt for an app to replace Apple's Clock app, Timegg for iPhone is a beautiful choice. It features a very stylish, easy to use UI and allows you to set up to 8 custom alarms, 8 custom timers (with intervals), due date reminders, and interval reminders.

When you first open Timegg, the interface is overlaid with help on how to use the app. It's very informative and is easily accessible for future reference.

At the top of the screen, you'll see the settings for the currently selected timer or alarm. Below that, you'll see a big dial with all the cost alarms, timers, or reminders inside. In each corner, you'll see an icon that represents each of the alarm types: Reminder, Alarm, Timer, and D-Day. You can also swipe along the top to switch between categories, if you prefer. In the center of the dial is a giant ON/OFF button that lets you enable/disable the currently selected alarm. If an alarm is set to off, holding your finger down on the circle associated with it will pop up options to edit or delete the alarm.

The alarm in Timegg can be customized to go off on any combination of days of the week. For example, I have one alarm for Monday-Thursday, one for Friday, and a third one for Saturday and Sunday. With each alarm, you can also choose if you want to have the ability to hit snooze. You may want to turn snooze off for alarm that are not intended to wake you up.

The sound options include with Timegg are nothing amazing. Most of them are really annoying. I prefer to wake up to something that doesn't want to make me throw my iPhone against the wall, but Timegg doesn't provide many such options. The makers of Timegg must really like animal sounds, because out of 16 provided sounds, 6 of them are of birds, cows, dogs, and ducks. As far as I'm concerned, all 6 of these sounds are worthless. Every alarm is also required to have a sound. There isn't a vibrate-only option.

The timer options in Timegg are very nice. You can set up to 8 presets for the things you time often. For example, I have one timer created and labeled for coffee, and another for laundry. With each timer, you can give it a label and also set an interval timer. For example, you can set an timer to go off in 1 hour, followed by 4 more timers every 10 minutes.

Timegg uses the term "D-Day" to refer to due date alarms, so don't confuse this with the Invasion of Normandy during WWII. A D-Day alarm is simply an alarm that reminds you of an important date (like your anniversary) one, seven or fifteen days before it arrives. Unfortunately, you can only set one alert for each D-Day.

Reminders in Timegg are actually rather disappointing. The reason is because you can't set a reminder for a specific time or day. The way that reminders work is that you set it up to remind you about something in intervals of 1 hour, 1 day, 1 week, 1 month. The countdown will start as soon as you set the reminder. You're better off using Apple's Reminders app, instead.

The Good

• Stylish
• Set up to 8 alarms
• Preset up to 8 timers
• Set alarms for important dates 15 days, a week, or a day in advance
• Can disable/enable snooze for each individual alarm

The Bad

• Reminders must be set as a countdown. Reminders in general could us a lot of work.
• Not a wide variety of alarm sounds
• Sound effects (navigational) are audible even when iPhone is on silent
• Alarm, due date, timer, or reminder must be set to OFF in order to edit or delete
• Every alarm must have a sound. No vibrate-only option.

The Conclusion

Timegg is a great iPhone app for setting alarms and timers. The UI is gorgeous and very easy to use. Unfortunately, the reminders are essentially useless and have less features than Apple's Reminders app. Due date options are also very limited. But if you're looking for great alarm and timer settings that are better than Apple's Clock app, Timegg does a satisfactory job at just a buck.

I should also mention that Timegg must be running in the background in order to work. So if you want to rely on Timegg to wake you up in the morning, double check that it's running. If you have to turn off your iPhone for any reason (including resets), you must re-open Timegg. This is a condition of the iOS SDK and is out of the developers' control.

$0.99 - Download Now

Will the next generation iPhone 5,1 switch from glass and stainless steel to something infinitely more cool -- Liquidmetal? Who know, but that's what's making the rumor rounds this morning. It's easy to see why: Apple purchased perpetual, exclusive consumer electronic rights to the sci-fi sounding substance years ago but, a single-issue SIM-removal tool aside, hasn't done much with it yet. Even after Liquidmetal announced they were shipping commercial parts a few months back, we've yet to see or hear much of anything when it comes to iPhones or iPads.

The T-1000 in Terminator 2 made the term "liquid metal" famous as a mimetic poly-alloy that let a Robert-Patrick looking robot morph shape and turn his arms into blades. This isn't that liquid metal, of course, but it still has several desirable characteristics. Namely, Liquidmetal is strong, highly resistant to corrosion, wears well, and can be moulded in a similar way to thermoplastics.

The original iPhone had an aluminum back with a plastic strip along the bottom. The iPhone 3G and iPhone 3GS had (and have) full plastic backs. The iPhone 4 and iPhone 4S have chemically treated glass backs with stainless steel antenna arrays.

Could the current stainless steel antenna array be replaced or reinforced by Liquidmetal? Could the glass back be replaced by something that somehow involves Liquidmetal (yet remains radio friendly)?

While it's only been on the market for a couple of years, there don't seem to be any widespread reports of stainless steel causing problems for the iPhone 4 or iPhone 4S antenna. The glass back, however, looks great but isn't as crack-resistent as some users would like.

The next generation iPhone could potentially include a new casing design, and other new features like LTE and perhaps a slight variance in screen size. What role Liquidmetal could play in enabling any of that remains uncertain.

So, for now, this is a fun rumors about a cool sounding technology, and nothing more.

Source: ETNews

Apple has approved an app called Bluetooth OnOff that simply allows you to turn your Bluetooth connection on and off from your home screen. Apple hasn’t previously permitted any apps that connect and interact to stock settings until now; so this is an interesting development.

Did it take too many steps just to turn on/off bluetooth? You can now turn on/off just by launching this app. Just in a second, you can activate or deactivate Bluetooth.

The app is extremely simple to use, once installed you have an icon on your home screen. If you click on it, a screen loads with a Bluetooth toggle switch, you can then turn Bluetooth on. If Bluetooth is already turned on then loading the app will give you the option to turn it off. The best way of using the app is to go into the apps settings and turn the OnOff switch to on. This enables you to now toggle Bluetooth On / Off from your home screen with one tap of the app icon.

Shortcuts similar to this were very popular when iOS 5 was initially launched. You could use Safari Bookmarklets to add various on/off settings to your home screen. This type of interaction was broken by Apple with the release of iOS 5.1.

It is very interesting that this app is now available but we don’t know if it is a mistake by Apple. It may be pulled at any minute or it could be a sign that Apple is prepared to allow apps that make its users life easier. Let’s be honest, turning systems settings on and off should not be anywhere near as tedious as it is now.

I hope that Apple finally addresses this problem with iOS 6. In the meantime let’s see if this app stays in the App Store. Maybe we will start to see more approved apps that allow us to toggle Wi-Fi and other system settings too.

$0.99 – Download Now

Put all the articles, videos, and pictures that you can't get to now, right into your Pocket so you can enjoy them later

The service formerly known as Read It Later has been updated with a new look, a new name, and a new price -- it's called Pocket, and it's free! With Pocket, you can save articles, photos, videos, and just about anything you encounter on the web and social networks for offline viewing at your leisure and convenience, on your iPhone, iPad, or other devices.

The new layout on the iPad has a collage-sytle interface that gives spotlight to the images associated with the articles you save. It's very pretty and especially nice for users who plan to save a lot of images (from, say, Flickr) to their Pocket account. But this layout comes at the expense of informational density. Images take up more space than words, after all. So, Pocket also has a list view. This list view also displays small thumbnail images with each item, but it's a lot more condense than the other view. It's also the only view available on the iPhone. Personally, I really like seeing the images, but I'm sure there are users that would prefer a concise, text-only list -- which is not available.

You can sort your saved items in Pocket by articles, videos, or images, and you can also choose to allow Pocket to decided the best view to download for each item. In Article View, all the ads and sidebars of the original website are stripped away, leaving just the content of the article. It looks very nice.

If the saved item is not an article, Pocket will display the content in its original web view. Unfortunately, not all website articles are correctly being registered as articles by Pocket and default to Web View.

When viewing an article, there are options to adjust the font size and type, screen brightness, and toggle night time reading mode. Unfortunately, there are only two fonts to toggle at this time.

The Good

• Beautiful design
• New layout displays images and short excerpts of saved items
• Condensed list view with thumbnails available
• Sort by articles, videos, images, or all items
• Adjust font size
• Night reading mode
• Supported by hundreds of apps

The Bad

• Only two fonts
• There isn't a simple list view without images available
• Doesn't always recognize articles as articles

The Conclusion

Pocket is a great way to save content from the web for viewing at a later time. The interface is both functional and pretty while still being extremely simple to use. It is also already supported by hundreds of apps (most of which still refer to the service as "Read It Later", but that should change quickly). Now that it's free, there's no reason to at least give it a try!

Free - Download Now

You've read our original iPhone 4S review and our iPhone six months later round table, but as always the take that matters most is our community's. We asked the iMore Nation how the iPhone 4S was holding up for you some six months later, if it was still competitive, and if you'd still recommend it to a prospective new iPhone buyer. And boy did you answer!

Are you still satisfied with the iPhone 4S?

The question was simple: six months after the release are you, the members of the iMore Nation, still satisfied with the iPhone 4S?

• 56% said extremely, nothing else comes close
• 23% said mostly, aging well but getting old
• 11% said meh, starting to look around for alternatives
• 10% said not at all, they regret getting it

iPhone 4S community review: Six months later

And here's a sampling of what the iMore Forums are saying about the iPhone 4S, six months later.

All I can say is that the iPhone 4S is so much more than I expected. Still reasonably priced. Easy to use. Easy to sync all of my Google contacts, calendar and of course Gmail. FaceTime. Great camera and a beautiful device.

• TurboTiger

I think the 4S is still very competitive in today's market. The speed of the A5 chip rarely leaves me waiting for anything. If someone asks me what kind of phone to get I generally ask them what they like to do with a phone. If they like to take pictures or videos, I show them what the 4S can do. If their life centres around Google and its products, I suggest an Android device, but I let them know about the 55 or so hardware devices running the Android OS and (in my opinion) how buggy it can be. I also inform them of Apple's "closed ecosystem" which I've never really been a fan of, but like Bla1ze once told me, "at least they have an ecosystem".

I must admit, I've really come to appreciate Apple, their products, and the ecosystem. There's a reason they're the most valuable company in the world. So, how do I like the iPhone 4S six months later? I... love...it.

• mcmillan27

The iPhone 4S in my opinion is still the best mobile device out to date (that I've used). Nothing even comes close to it in terms of usability--let alone the sheer beauty of the device. I do think; however, that the HTC One X is going to give the 4S a run for its money. At the same time though, its slightly an unfair comparison for the two devices. The latest iPhone was launched in October of last year, then the HTC One X is literally fresh from the factory.

After six months I can still say that I'm highly satisfied with the phone. I was looking towards a GSM Galaxy Nexus for a while, but once I saw an announcement about the One X, I was more interested in that. I'm probably going to pick up a One X on AT&T once its released--but after about a week of use, I'll most likely be reaching for my iPhone yet again. It simply works.

• circlez

Screen clarity - Nobody can touch it. Camera - Nobody can touch it. Battery life - No Android can touch it. Processor - Not the best but not the worst. Siri - Is my best friend. Use it a ton. Gaming experiece - Nobody can touch it

Yes I would still recommend it. It just works.

• Garz

More on the iPhone 4S

• iPhone 4S review
• iPhone 4S buyers guide
• iPhone 3S new users guide
• iPhone 4S six months later round table
• iPhone 4S forum

Image credit: iDoodle by Jason Harrison

The Antique model Steampunk Case for iPhone is one of a few handcrafted iPhone cases by Paul Marsh's Blujoos. Each model is a special edition, limited to 50 pieces, and designed to give your iPhone a unique look you just won't find anywhere else. A model and prop maker from the film industry with over 20 years and 25 films and TV series to his credit, Marsh is pouring every bit of that skill into these cases and it really shows. These aren't stickers -- these are actual 3D castings!

The models are built using carefully chosen parts from watches and clocks, and then a platinum silicone mould is created from the model. Marsh casts the individual cases from a tough, UV protected polyurethane and then -- get this -- impregnates them with metal powders. That's real brass, real bronze, real copper, and real iron powders. That's what gives them the incredible look of rusted, corroded metals. It's beautiful destruction and The effect is simply stunning. It looks like something out of fantasy, like the kingdoms busily assembling themselves during the opening credits of Game of Thrones...

There are currently two models available on Etsy, the Antique which I'm reviewing here, and the Salvage which has a more coppery, almost Lost City of Atlantis look to it.

Both are gorgeous and both are extremely limited, so if you like them, pounce on them soon.

The good

• Exquisite craftsmanship
• Incredible finish
• Unique look and feel

The bad

• iPhone can shift slightly in case
• Bulkier than a mass-produced skin

The conclusion

I absolutely adore the look of and feel of the Antique Steampunk iPhone case by Blujoos. Paul Marsh has put together something more than an accessory -- he's put together a real work of art. If you're a fan of the Steampunk genre, or of fantasy or sci-fi model-making techniques, or simply of unique craftsmanship and amazing design, check out Marsh's work on Etsy now.

$64 - Buy now

UK TV network Channel Five's The Gadget Show aired a 360 degree promo video for its new series which starts next week. The promo which aired last night was the first of its kind ever to be shown. To benefit from the complete experience, users had to watch live TV with an accompanying iOS app running on an iPhone, iPad or iPod touch. The app ran in time with the live TV stream and enabled you to look around the studio using the inbuilt gyroscope; giving 360 degree views in real time of the studio.

At 9pm on 16th April 2012, Channel 5 will make television history by bringing you the world’s first 360 degree promo for the new series of The Gadget Show: World Tour. Jason Bradbury and Pollyanna Woodward are off on an international gadget-filled expedition to seek out and play with the greatest tech the globe has to offer.

Source: The Gadget Show, YouTube

SpellTower for iPhone and iPad is a fun word game that adds a fun twist to the classic word search game. Instead of being limited to spelling words vertically, horizontally, and diagonally, you can choose your letters in any direction.

Specifically, if the next letter in your word is in one of the 8 surrounding letters, then it's fair game. Perhaps an easier way to explain it is -- any word that is able to be spelled by sliding over each letter, in order, without lifting your finger, is playable in SpellTower.

There are other little rules for scoring and clearing rows, but SpellTower does an excellent job of explaining them in the tutorial.

SpellTower has 5 different game modes. Tower Mode the most relaxing and pressure-free. You are simply given 150 letters and it's your goal to spell as many words as you can.

Puzzle Mode reminds me of Tetris. Each time you make a word, a new row is added and your goal is to prevent any of the columns from reaching the top.

If a letter has a small letter in its tile, the number represents the shortest length your word must be in order to use that letter. In Ex Puzzle Mode, there are a lot more of these letters than in Puzzle Mode.

Rush Mode has the same overall objective as the Puzzle Modes, except that instead of adding rows every time you make a word, SpellTower adds a new row after a set amount of time. This is by no means a leisurely game mode!

The Good

• Fun
• 4 levels of difficulty
• Challenging
• Includes helpful tutorial
• Multiplayer over bluetooth
• Night mode

The Bad

• No online multiplayer

The Conclusion

SpellTower is a very fun game. I've always had a slight aversion to word games, because I'm typically very terrible at them, but I actually really enjoy playing this one. SpellTower is the best word game I've ever played.

$1.99 - Download Now

Right now we just want to get a quick sense of your satisfaction level. Six months later, are you still happy with your iPhone 4S purchase? Is the iPhone 4S still competitive or are you thinking about switching to something else? Would you recommend the iPhone 4S to a friend, family member, or co-worker looking for a new phone today?

Cast your vote in the poll above and then jump into our iPhone 4S forum and leave us your complete iPhone 4S review, six months later!