May

My HostGator Server Crashed - Lost Articles & Comments

Posted by admin in ipod news

Just wanted to mention that because of a server failure at my web host, HostGator, I’ve lost my two latest articles: 5 iPhone Blogs I Recommend and the April Fools joke I posted yesterday, BREAKING: FCC to Issue iPhone Ban in the US — Yes, it was a joke, no need to panic!

Update: The articles have been republished. Thanks to those subscribers who e-mailed them to me.

I’ve also lost all reader comments on those articles, plus all comments that were posted on the site from March 30 on.

HostGator review

I’m not happy about how HostGator has handled the situation, since they failed to inform me of the server issue until many hours after I contacted them — I contacted them 3 times before getting a straight answer. One HostGator representative even told me he “had no idea” why my website was down.

Can you help?

If you’re subscribed to Apple iPhone Review by e-mail, ~~it would be a huge help if you could e-mail me the content of my 2 latest articles so that I can get them re-published. Unfortunately, I did not have them backed up.~~ Thanks to those of you who sent me the articles.

I would greatly appreciate your help. Thanks in advance, and thanks for reading Apple iPhone Review.

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May

BREAKING: FCC to Issue iPhone Ban in the US

Posted by admin in ipod news

iPhone owners in the United States may have their devices recalled come June due to a Federal Communications Commission ban on the iPhone, which is reportedly in violation of the National Environmental Policy Act requiring mobile devices to comply with a cap on dangerous radiofrequency energy emissions.

An FCC investigation found that the iPhone emits a “substantial level of RF energy, well in excess of what federal regulations allow,” according to the FCC report.

The Food & Drug Administration illustrates the potential health risks of radiofrequency emissions: “Large amounts of RF energy can heat tissue … two areas of the body, the eyes and the testes, are particularly vulnerable to RF heating because there is relatively little blood flow in them to carry away excess heat.”

“This is a public health issue as well as an environmental one,” said FCC chairman Kevin J. Martin. “We have no choice but to forbid further sales of the iPhone until Apple upgrades the device’s hardware to comply with federal law.”

The iPhone recall will take effect June 15 to allow time for iPhone customers to switch their wireless carriers if they choose. AT&T said it will not bind iPhone customers to their 2-year contracts if they decide to cancel their wireless service.

In an open letter, Steve Jobs apologized and said Apple is “doing all that we can” to expedite the process of upgrading the iPhone hardware and getting it shipped out to iPhone owners “as soon as possible.”

To make up for the inconvenience, Apple will grant all iPhone customers a $100 Apple Store credit, just like they did last September after dropping the iPhone price.

What you can do

Because it might not be feasible for Apple to roll out the new iPhones in time to meet the June deadline, click here to petition the FCC to extend the deadline.

If you have a blog, please link to this article to spread the word about the petition so that we iPhone owners are not left without phones while the transition to a safer iPhone takes place.

To be notified of updates to this story, be sure and subscribe to this blog.

Update: A number of you posted comments guessing this was an April Fools joke. Unfortunately, your comments disappeared after the server at my webhost crashed. Sorry about that.

But you guessed right — clue: see the “click here to petition the FCC” link above. Thankfully, you can still use your iPhone without worrying about your health.

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May

Set SMS Privacy Levels With the Caterpillar App

Posted by admin in ipod news

iPhone SMS Privacy

SMS Preview — the iPhone feature that interrupts what you’re doing to display an excerpt of an incoming text message on your screen — has been a privacy concern of mine since the iPhone was released last June. Now RiP Dev, a third-party development team, has released a solution.

By the way, I’m not the only one concerned about SMS Preview. When I asked how iPhone’s SMS Preview has gotten you into trouble, a number of you responded with stories of embarrassing situations you’ve been put in because of text messages popping up while other people were using your iPhones.

One notable story, from a commenter with the alias “Nyprg”:

A friend and I were texting back and forth about stuff while I was shopping with another girl friend of mine. The girl I was with asked to use my phone to look up something on the internet while I changed. When I came out the dressing room, she looked hurt and on the verge of tears! I later found out that while I was dressing, the girl I was texting started writing about the girl I was with and it was kind of cruel. Needless to say I got in huge arguements from both girls over that!

Although I posted about a sort of solution to turning off SMS Preview last August, the method is not reliable and it requires you to set a tedious Passcode Lock on your iPhone.

Unbelievably, despite the overwhelming public interest in this privacy issue, Apple has yet to do anything to address the SMS Preview problem.

The answer is simple: issue a firmware update with the option to customize SMS notification settings. So what are they waiting for?

I was happy to hear from a reader, apparently a blogger from Limited Edition iPhone, that the RiP Dev team has taken the matter into its own hands and created a software called Caterpillar that lets you adjust iPhone’s SMS privacy settings (among other things).

The Caterpillar app is available on a subscription basis only — $20 for 6 months, $35 for a year or $45 for unlimited use — and requires a Jailbroken iPhone, but the Privacy Level feature solves the SMS Preview problem and might be worth paying for if you are particularly concerned about this issue.

I purchased a 6-month subscription so I could test out Caterpillar’s Privacy settings for this review.

After installing Caterpillar, the app creates a RiP Dev menu in the iPhone’s Settings that allows you to tweak your Privacy Level.

Here’s a screenshot of the Privacy Level options:

Caterpillar Privacy

This is what an incoming text message looks like when you choose to “Hide SMS Sender and Text”:

Hide SMS Sender & Text

“Hide SMS Text” looks like this:

Hide SMS Text

Additionally, you can adjust the SMS notification mode to: Default, Silent, Vibration Only, or select a custom sound.

If text message privacy on the iPhone is a concern for you, you might want to purchase a subscription to the Caterpillar app. The software also has other cool features, which I’ll review in an upcoming article.

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May

ZiPhone Jailbreak: So Easy a Caveman Can Do It [See Video]

Posted by admin in ipod news

Caveman Jailbreak

Last August I published an article detailing my initial iPhone Jailbreak experience. At the time, Jailbreak was a time-consuming process, so I did it once but gave up on it after restoring my iPhone to install a new firmware update. Now there’s a much easier way to Jailbreak your iPhone — using ZiPhone — and it requires no more than 1 measly minute of your time.

ZiPhone’s Jailbreak method is fool-proof. Don’t believe me? Watch this video of a caveman I caught using ZiPhone to Jailbreak my iPhone:

Now that you’ve seen how easy it is to Jailbreak an iPhone with ZiPhone, you can do it yourself in 3 easy steps:

Go to ZiPhone’s blog and download the latest software via the “Click here to Download ZiPhone” link just above the first blog post.
Run the program.
Plug in your iPhone — leaving iTunes open — and click the “Jailbreak iPhone” button.

In about 55 seconds you’ll have a Jailbroken iPhone with the latest iPhone firmware. Open the Installer app that’s now on your home screen to browse through hundreds of useful third-party applications.

So far, I’ve installed the following iPhone apps (thanks, caveman!):

CameraPro, an app that adds digital zoom, grayscale and other features to the iPhone’s camera
Tris, a Tetris game for iPhone
weDict, a native iPhone dictionary
iCopter, an iPhone version of the Flash-based Helicopter game
Pianist, a touchscreen piano that satisfies my occasional urge to jam

Now that ZiPhone has made Jailbreaking so seamless, I can’t see why you wouldn’t want to try it out… at the very least to get a preview of what’s to come this June when Apple unveils the iPhone App Store.

And if for whatever reason you want to undo the Jailbreak, all you have to do is sync your iPhone with iTunes and restore it.

Have you used ZiPhone to Jailbreak your iPhone? What was your experience?

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May

Will Apple “Borrow” Features from Developers’ iPhone Apps?

Posted by admin in ipod news

I have a serious concern about the upcoming iPhone App Store that no one has addressed yet:

What happens when Apple issues an iPhone firmware update introducing features from a 3rd-party iPhone application in the App Store?

For example: let’s say a developer lists a Voice Dialing application in the App Store in June, and in July Apple issues an iPhone firmware update featuring voice dial functionality.

Or consider these other possibilities:

A developer solves the iPhone’s text message privacy issue by creating an app that gives you SMS privacy options, and then Apple amends the iPhone settings to allow you those same options
AOL develops an iPhone AIM client, and then Apple issues an iPhone update featuring an iChat app
Someone lists an iPhone app that lets you search the contents of your iPhone, and then Apple updates the iPhone with a similar Find function

Can you foresee the conflicts that would arise in situations like these?

Will Apple be willing to compete with — or put out of business — its third-party iPhone app developers? Imagine the bad publicity the company will endure when these kinds of scenarios arise.

And it seems likely to me that such scenarios will arise, given that Apple is constantly updating the iPhone with new features, some of which are bound to coincide with applications in the App Store.

There are plenty of things wrong with the iPhone, and once the App Store launches in June, developers will seek to solve the iPhone’s problems and make a profit by doing so.

The problem is that Apple too will continue to improve the iPhone and address the same issues that developers are tackling, so there will almost certainly be clashes between Apple and iPhone app developers.

And I’m betting that each time this happens, the developer who is negatively affected by an iPhone update will accuse Apple of stealing his idea and taking away his business.

Though I’m sure Apple reserves the right to issue whatever new iPhone features it wants, situations like these could hurt developers in several ways:

The most obvious side effect for developers will be the immediate loss of income, since iPhone users will not buy an app that Apple has already given to them for free via a firmware update.
What’s worse, it takes time and perhaps money to develop an iPhone app. These could be wasted investments without an assurance that Apple will keep its hands off your ideas.
Developers pay $99 for the privilege of listing their apps in the App Store. If Apple puts a developer out of business by taking her idea, this application fee is just salt in the wound.

What to do then?

Has Apple considered how it will handle iPhone updates that tout features that have already been listed in the App Store?

Will they somehow compensate developers whose ideas they “borrow”? I doubt it. Although this might appease some developers, not everyone will agree on what is adequate compensation, and such a practice would be unsustainable.

Or will they respect developers and avoid introducing features that have already been introduced via the App Store?

The question remains: Is it worth it for developers to invest time and money into an iPhone app if Apple could issue a similar app in an iPhone update at any moment?

Should we expect some kind of assurance from Apple that these conflicts with developers won’t occur? What do you think?

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May

How Has iPhone’s SMS Preview Gotten You Into Trouble?

Posted by admin in ipod news

iPhone text privacy

In my iPhone review last June, I pointed out a big privacy concern I had about iPhone’s SMS application: namely, the inability to turn off SMS Preview, which interrupts whatever you’re doing when you receive a text message and displays an excerpt of the message content on your screen.

As you can imagine, this can create an awkward situation when you receive a private text message and someone else is using your iPhone.

Imagine receiving a text message like the one shown above while you’re showing off your iPhone to your boss or to a coworker. (The message above was staged, I swear!)

Or perhaps you’re:

watching a movie or YouTube video with someone, or
letting a friend check their e-mail, or
sharing photos with family, or
having your copilot navigate using Google Maps

and then… *INCOMING*

…you receive a crude text from a buddy, a sexy message from your significant other, or some other private text message.

Ouch. iPhone’s SMS Preview could get you into some pretty humiliating situations.

So I’m wondering…

Has SMS Preview gotten you into trouble?

I was surprised to see how many people shared my concern about this privacy issue when I posted a sort of solution to turning off SMS Preview (which requires you to set a tedious passcode lock on your iPhone and does not always work, according to some readers).

Now I’m asking you to share any embarrassing moments or close calls you’ve had due to privacy issues with iPhone’s SMS preview.

Let’s get a discussion going in the comments so we can show Apple that SMS Preview is a real privacy concern that MUST be addressed in the next iPhone firmware update.

I’ll go first:

Recently I was at a meeting and someone in my group had to reference a PDF file but had forgotten her laptop. Since iPhone supports PDF files, I offered up my phone.

As she was scrolling through the page with the iPhone set on the table, in comes a private text message from my ex-girlfriend. Upon hearing the ring, I said “excuse me” and quickly grabbed my phone.

I avoided a potentially embarrassing situation, but why should I have to worry about incidents like these? iPhone should display text message excerpts ONLY with my permission.

So what’s YOUR story? Leave a comment below and let us know.

Update: A commenter pointed out that a third-party app called Caterpillar solves iPhone’s SMS privacy issue. Click to read my review of the Caterpillar app’s Privacy feature.

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May

What 3rd-Party iPhone Apps Are You Looking Forward To?

Posted by admin in ipod news

Soon Apple will release its much talked about iPhone SDK for developers to build native iPhone applications that run on non-Jailbroken iPhones.

So what third-party iPhone apps are you hoping to see developed?

I’ve personally given up on Jailbreaking my iPhone since I’ve had my phone replaced a number of times and I’ve been keeping up with the iPhone firmware updates — which undo the Jailbreak — so I haven’t had the chance to enjoy the expanded iPhone functionality that third-party applications offer.

That’s why I’m really looking forward to native apps, which some developers speculate will be available via the iTunes Store.

These are some third-party apps I’d like to see when Apple opens the iPhone up to developers:

A karaoke-style app that displays lyrics to the songs you’re listening to, just like TuneWiki.
A Search app that will let me search through all the data I have stored on my iPhone, including contacts, notes and calendar items
an Instant Messenger application
and of course, some good old time-wasting game apps, like NES, Solitaire, Poker, etc.

What kinds of apps would you like to see on the iPhone after Apple releases its software development kit this month? Are there apps you use on your Jailbroken iPhone that you want to see translated to the “legit” iPhone platform?

Let’s discuss in the comments below.

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May

$100 iPhone Price Drop Soon? What’s Your Opinion?

Posted by admin in ipod news

When Apple dropped the iPhone price $200 last September, just two months after the iPhone’s release, some of you said you were okay with it because you willingly paid a premium to be an early adopter, while others of you were understandably frustrated because you would have delayed your iPhone purchase if you’d only known about the looming price reduction.

The latest rumor is that Apple will once again drop the iPhone price — this time by $100 — not long after releasing the 16GB iPhone just two weeks ago.

A tipster told 9to5Mac that news of the iPhone price reduction will come at a rumored Apple event in late February (where Apple may also release a software development kit for building native iPhone apps).

Word is that the 16GB iPhone will drop from $499 to $399, and the 8GB iPhone might be phased out altogether.

Why reduce the iPhone price?

Price drops such as these may help Apple meet its target of 10 million iPhone sales in 2008, while also making it possible to release a higher-priced 3G iPhone later this year.

But as we saw last September, they also run the risk of ticking off important customers. The last iPhone price drop was so controversial that Apple gave early adopters $100 Apple Store credits in an attempt to quell the outrage — but don’t count on another store credit the next time around.

So what do you think?

Would it upset you if Apple drops the iPhone price again soon? Do you think Apple would be blowing off its loyal customers with such a move, or are frequent price drops just a reality of the fast-moving technology industry?

Although I did pay $499 for a 16GB iPhone recently and I’ll be irked to see it drop in price so soon, I thought this 9to5Mac reader made a good point:

My VCR is worth $0 now. WHERE’S MY REBATE???

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May

Pogo Stylus for iPhone (Video Review)

Posted by admin in ipod news

Although Apple designed the iPhone to be used without a stylus, there may still be some benefits to using one. Ten One Design sent me their iPhone-compatible Pogo Stylus for review.

Watch my video demonstration of the accessory below: