Make Your Music Sleep

You like listening to the music until you fall asleep but if you have to wake up for turning it off, you prefer not to listen to it at all. Isn’t it so?

Don’t worry; there is a trick for that! Did you know that iPhone takes care of your sweet sleep? It gives you an opportunity to listen to the music and it will turn off itself.

All you need is to determine by what time you want to listen to the music. After this, follow the steps:

• On the home screen, open up you Clock app; 

• Select the timer;

• Select the amount of time you want to listen to music 

• Click on When Timer Ends;

• Then scroll down to Sleep iPod and click on set;

• Start the timer.

Now you can enjoy with your favorite music not to think about player’s fate after you’re asleep.  For more tips and tricks about your iPhone, visit Apple iPhone Blog and make the best use of your beloved smartphone!

Of course this works on the iPad too, but that’s a bit less practical to sleep with...

SIRI Hacks

SIRI had to be an exclusive feature for only iPhone 4S but then some rumors have spread  that it is working quite well on the older devices as well. After this, Apple has announced  that voice assistant does not come to any other devices but iPhone 4S. This statement crushed the dreams of users of older devices and the situation calmed down but hackers have continued working on the issue.

As for now, SIRI has been made public only on iPhone4. With the help of a hack, called siri0ous, SIRI has been made in Cydia and it actually works. All you need is a Jalibroken iOS5 device that can be iPhone4, iPhone 3GS and iPod Touch (although some users have tipped out that it does not work on iPhone3GS). You also need an internet connection for the microphone to show up. Consider that the hack does not use Apple’s servers and it does not provide SIRI voice command features. It is Nuance-based dictation and the result is similar to SIRI. However Nuance Speech Recognition is not yet licensed officially.

See how does it work in video below and then if you decide to do this on you own, on your phone, that is very simple, add http://apt.if0rce.com to your list of Cydia sources, then search for “Siri0us” and download it.

We have not tested it yet ourselves, so we remove the responsibility on the consequenses, if you decide to try it out.

Black Friday Logical Continuation

Black Friday is the most awaited day of all, because so many surprises are arranged for people all over the world. Discounts offered by mostly all of the companies on the day are huge and many people are waiting for this day to make important purchases for the whole year. This year was not an exception. Besides some application discounts and giveaways, sale was in apple stores too.

If you’ve used your chance to get Apple smartphone successfully, you’re logically a newbie iPhone user. To make it easier for you to get started with your iDevice, here are some tips that might interest you.

Sometimes simple and obvious things are difficult to accomplish. Even such a simple action as renaming your iPhone may not be clear immediately. For further information, click here .

Unlike other mobile devices, arranging icons on the iPhone is extremely easy. However, it is not that easy to guess how to do this. Want to know? Click here. 

Beginning from firmware 2.x, making screenshots on iPhone has become extremely easy. To see more, click here. 

Have you already managed to unlock your new iPhone? Then your Voicemail button must be totally useless, right? This little hack will bring your Voicemail button to life. Learn the details here. 

If you are a business user of iPhone, most likely you often dial phone numbers with extensions. Listening to lengthy phone menus is not the best experience. So, this tip  teaches you how to add an extension to a contact's phone number.

To see how to set up parental control on iPod and iPhone touch, click here.

To know more about iPhone voice commands, click here. 

A battery for our iPhone can be considered as a driving engine – a heart which has to be taken care of and protected properly. To know more about how to make your iPhone’s battery last long, click here.  To know more about how to improve iPhone4 battery life, click here. 

Here  are some most useful iPhone tips, tweaks, secrets that you couldn't imagine existed for your complete and easy use of iPhone! 

Most of us have faced a situation when our smart iPhone 4 becomes unresponsive and cannot be switched on, no matter what we do. Do not worry; click here  to solve the problem.

Here  are some tips for Great iPhone Photos.

For those who have ever wanted to know the exact remaining percentage of their iPhone battery life, we have a quick solution, click here. 

Apple’s latest innovation to come to the iPhone gives users their very own digital assistant, which really boils down to voice-activated commands. It is, of course, a little more interesting than that, and the way users can talk to their iPhones in real-world language is, at times, a sight to behold. So here  are the tips.

Here  are 8 easy steps that lead you to teach Siri on your iPhone 4S to tweet.

Here  are 4 Quick Tips For iPhone4S: Locate your lost iPhone, Lock the screen orientation, Scrub through audio and video and Tap to focus the camera.

Did you know that SIRI can… click here  to see WHAT…?

Was it helpful? Has your mind about the complicated phone changed?

Discount in Apple store for you!

Great expectations about Apple’s products’ prices on Black Thursday…

Firstly Apple has announced that it was arranging a surprise for its customer. Then the company’s web store was updating  and we have assumed that big discount was approaching to us. Finally the surprise has arrived and as rumors have predicted, that is a discount. 

Discounted products are: iPad2, iPod touch, iPod Nano, MacBook Air, MacBook Pro, iMac. You can buy some essentials also, e.g.: Magic Trackpad, Apple Magic Mouse, Time Capsul, Apple wireless keyboard, iTunes Gift Card, etc. Also surround your technics in sound and discover over 10 other accessories. And finally, you will truly love amazing bags for protecting your “iProduct.”

In a word, you should definitely visit Apple web store  today. You may not know what you want until you visit it!

More Thanksgiving Deals - Cont'd

So many promises about the Thanksgiving Day and the day has finally come. Let’s see together what is this, we were waited for.

Noteshelf for iPad  – $0.99

FX Photo Studio for iPhone  – $0.99

Assassin’s Creed: Altair’s Chronicles

• iPhone  – $0.99 

• iPad  – $0.99 

Real Racing 2

• iPhone  – $2.99 

• iPad –  $4.99 

Flight Control HD for iPad  – $1.99

Mirror’s Edge for iPad  – $1.99

Garmin N. America  – $29.99 

Infinity Blade  – $2.99

A Charlie Brown Christmas –  $4.99

Checkbook HD  – $0.99 

procreate for iPad  – $0.99

And most important! You can get iTunes   FOR FREE! Get it here. 

SO MANY GIFTS! Today is a really Thanksgiving Day!

For previous thanksgiving deals see the links below:

Happy Thanksgiving To All Our Facebook Fans! 

Happy Upcoming Thanksgiving! 

More Thanksgiving Deals.

It's Black Friday For Apple too, Finally!

As Apple promised, today is going to be a great day for shopping. If you visit Apple web store now, you will see that it is updating, as shown on the picture below. We can assume that Apple is going to have really big discount today. Let’s wait and see what the surprise is, seems like it is really huge.

More Thanksgiving Deals

Apple has announced  officially that Thanksgiving Day is going to be a great day for those who will decide shopping in its store. If you are planning to buy any “iProduct,” November 25 is best moment for you.

That's what is said officially but some other rumors have spread as usual. Rumors mention the products’ prices, as expected. But all we have to do is to wait until Thanksgiving Day and see the surprise, arranged for us.

One more amazing surprise for you is that Vito Technology announces Star Walk - 5 Stars Astronomy Guide 5.5 for iOS. This is an application which allows users to locate and identify 20.000+ objects in the night sky easily. The 360-degree map displays stars, planets, constellations, satellites and galaxies currently overhead from any destination, you wish. 

Connecting to the Thanksgiving Day, you can get it for free on Nov 25-29.  Do not miss the chance, download it here .

So many surprises, connected to the Thanksgiving Day, you should be really thankful. To know more about other actions, click here. 

Happy Thanksgiving To All Our Facebook Fans!

Here is the deal for you! Apple iPhone Blog, together with Zazzle Custom Cases for iPhones is offering you to get your own designed iPhone case for FREE! All you have to do is to like our Facebook Fan Page and recommend it to your friends!

As soon as we reach 300 Fans, we'll choose one of you and award with it! The criteria for winning is to post  why you like our blog on our Facebook Fan Page wall, the author of the most creative answer will get a Zazzle Custom iPhone case for FREE! Note that shipping is free as well!

Keep tracking our Facebook Page, more deals are coming!

Could Siri help you to manage your money?

The Apple iPhone range has been at the forefront of smartphone technology since 2007 and the latest iteration brings with it a new way to enhance your day-to-day life in the form of personal assistant software with which you can hold a conversation.

That software is called Siri and it is available exclusively on the iPhone 4S, the fifth handset to emerge from Apple's labs.

Like its predecessors the iPhone 4S can help you manage your current accounts online, download finance apps and save you cash via voucher codes, but Siri makes money management easier than ever before.

One useful feature of Siri is called geo-fencing, which allows you to set alerts which activate when you go to leave a certain geographical area.

An example of how this might apply to money management is one that will be familiar to most people - bill payment.

You can ask Siri to set a geo-fenced reminder to tip you off about a bill that needs to be paid on a certain day before you leave home in the morning on your way to work.

If you inadvertently move away from your property before you pay the bill, the alert will be activated and you can transfer the funds and save yourself the hassle of having to cover the cost of any late fees.

Because Siri operates by simply listening to your voice and answering your questions, there are many other ways it can aid you with managing your money.

If you are trying to find a mortgage or work out whether a credit card deal is competitive but are feeling confused by all of the technical terms used in the wording of agreements or adverts, Siri can give you comprehensible definitions.

You can even ask Siri about the stock market, finding out whether companies in your portfolio are performing well at any given time.

Siri taps into the location capabilities of your iPhone 4S in more ways than one, letting you discover the whereabouts of local amenities and businesses whenever you need accurate information.

This is particularly convenient if you are out and about in an area you do not know particularly well and find yourself strapped for cash to pay for a taxi ride or bus fare.

You can request that Siri pulls up the location of the nearest ATMs and you can then follow directions on a map to get you to the machine by the easiest route to make a withdrawal from current accounts.

Because Siri is still a work in progress, Apple has not unlocked all of its potential yet, or indeed allowed other companies to tinker with the technology for third party applications.

This means that the future looks bright for iPhone 4S owners who get to grips with Siri, because the level of advice and information to which it has access could increase significantly.

You might be able to ask it about your current accounts or even get it to check up on your current credit score if it becomes integrated with relevant services.

MoneySupermarket.com Launches First Car Insurance Comparison App

UK Based price comparison site MoneySupermarket.com has become the first company to launch a car insurance comparison app for use on the iPhone. This gives users access to car insurance quotes provided by 100s of car insurance companies in a matter of moments upon merely taking a photograph of a car registration plate. 

The company has worked with mobile experts Mobile Interactive Group (MIG) to produce the product which is expected to revolutionise the car buying experience with car insurance prices becoming an increasingly important factor to consider when purchasing a new vehicle. This has been corroborated by the AA who reported that the average motorist pays £921 per year for a policy on top of the 40% price hikes experienced over the course of 2010. 

How does it work?

You can download a free copy of the MoneySupermarket.com car insurance app from their website or on iTunes. Once you have the app on your phone, all you have to do is follow the on-screen steps and create a MoneySupermarket.com account to make retrieve future quotes quicker and easier as you won’t have to re-enter your personal details each time you compare. 

You will then be ready to go out and about and take photos of the registration plates of any vehicles that you might be considering purchasing. This will also save people the time and effort which is required to find competitive car insurance deals; avoiding the need to trawl through the net looking at quotes provided by various different companies. 

The app is easy to navigate and quotes which are displayed will have a “click to call” function located alongside them which allow customers to phone up insurers to enquire about the potential policy or arrange for payment. In addition, your progress will be saved along the journey in case you don’t have to time to complete the process or in the event of your battery failing for example. 

You will be able to save any quotes that you have retrieved previously to access at a later date, with the “click to call” function remaining operational. 

Possible benefits

This new application fits in with MoneySupermarket.com’s objective to get more people comparing car insurance deals rather than simply accepting the first policy offer that comes their way. The company claims that the average customer stands to save £375 by purchasing car insurance through its site.

MoneySupermarket’s Julie Fisher believes that other insurance comparison sites will soon follow their example in taking advantage of smart phone technology: “The launch of our app is a real leap forward in the industry and means our customers can make big savings on their car insurance in just a few minutes on their iPhone.”

“The launch of the MoneySupermarket Car Insurance app has made it even easier for people to find the right car cover for the best possible price – allowing people to compare a huge range of quotes quickly and easily – even on the move.”

Happy Upcoming Thanksgiving!

As the matter of the fact that Thanksgiving Day is approaching, here are some surprises for you. Just move down and choose most preferable offer for you.

You can get BDlot DVD Clone FOR FREE! Consider that its normal price is $29.95.

Get 10% discount and buy BDlot DVD Ripper for $19.95.

Probably you remember that BDlot DVD Backup Pack’s price was $59.90 but now you can get it for only $29.95.

Actively time of the action is Nov18, 2011-Nov28, 2011, so hurry up! You can buy them here. 

Get WinX DVD Ripper Platinum FOR FREE! With its help you can rip DVD to AVI, MP4, H.264, FLV, MOV, MPEG, WMV, 3GP, etc.

Save $14, buy WinX DVD Copy Pro for $35.95 instead of $49.95.

Get your gift before Nov29, 2011 here. 

First 10.000 people can get MacX DVD Ripper FOR FREE!

You can buy MacX DVD Video Converter Pro Pack for 60% off! Get it now and rip DVD to H264, FLV, MP4, MOV, AVI, MP3, etc.

It valid before Nov29, 2011 so hurry up and buy it here.

Finally, the most important surprise for you! That gift is not similar to others. That is about your iPhone’s case. You can choose cases among hundreds of thousands of designs but most important is that you can create it on your own! Only 5 lucky persons can get this gift and be one of them. If you are interested, first of all, you need to contact us.

Have you already chosen which one is your gift? Get it on thanksgiving day and be thankful!

applications for Yuan

Apple made an important change in its payment policy in China. After long neglecting the Chinese market, the company has begun to accept payment in Chinese Yuan in Application Store. Now it is easy for customers to get their hands on software. The change is quite beneficial for iOS developers too.

Before that, for making App Store purchases, Chinese shoppers were required to hold dual-currency credit cards. As for now, 20 Chinese banks have entered into an arrangement with Apple to facilitate the shift. With its’ help customers are able to make payments and buy applications much more easily now.

After reading a study, which talks about China’s share in marketplace, a motivation behind Apple’s decision gets obvious.

Competition goes tougher

This week was great. Apple made iTunes match and  then Google introduced Google Music. These two products are directly competing with Amazon’s Cloud Player.

These are three biggest companies with amazing services. Are you a little confused about which one is better in this case? Here is the comparison between them. Keep reading to see which one’s best for you.

Price:
iTunes match costs $24.99 per year.
Google Music is free for everyone.
For Amazon’s Cloud Player, first 5GB is free, after this 1GB costs $1.

Access:
Apple uses iTunes as its central music hub.
Google uses web-based playback systems.
Amazon uses web-based playback also.

Availability:
As for mobile access, Apple has the most limited mobile access because the service is available for only iOS devices.
Amazon provides a mobile app for Android and an iPad.
Google Music is available for iOS devices, Android and other browsers as well.

This is only the comparison of some attributes of these three services. Of course we can match other details as well,  but you anyway won’t be able to decide who the “winner” is, as it mostly depends on where you live, what you need and of course - it depends on your taste.

via Mashable.

What you need to know about iTunes Match

iTunes match has finally entered! That is what people mostly waited for. With this new iCloud feature you can match and upload your music library to a central server. Once you download music to one device, it automatically appears on all your devices! You can use iTunes Match with only 10 iOS devices, including iPhones, iPod touches, iPads, and Apple TVs. Music, even imported from CDs or purchased somewhere other than iTunes, can be stored in iCloud. You can play them whenever and wherever you want, without syncing or WI-FI.

For turning iTunes match on your phone, go to Settings > Music > Turn On iTunes Match.
On a Mac, open iTunes > Store > Turn On iTunes March.
On an Apple TV, go to Music > iCloud library.

Here is how it works: you should scan your library and match as many tracks as it can. It determines which songs in your collection are available in the store (there are approximately 20 million songs in the store). You can upload what it cannot match. After this, it will upload those unmatched tracks to its central server. Once it is in iCloud, you can stream and store it on any device.

This beautiful feature costs only $25 per year.  Anyone with an Apple ID in the U.S. can use it. Apple hopes that by the end of the year, it will be available internationally.

Meet Arthur Levinson- the new Chairman of Apple!

Apple has just announced that Arthur D. Levinson, Ph. D. was named as the Company’s non-executive Chairman of the Board! The former chairman of Genentech and former chief executive officer, also the member of Genentech’s Scientific Research Board will now continue serving on the Apple audit committee. Arthur Levinson has authored or co-authored more than 80 scientific articles and has been a named inventor on 11 United States patents.

Note that these are the first board changes since Steve Jobs passed away. Arthur Levinson has now taken Steve’s position, after the visionary founder died on October 5, the next day after iPhone 4S introduction. Since 2005, Levinson has worked as co-lead director and has been known for pushing Apple to allow third party applications into Apple’s platform and guiding Jobs through Apple’s antenna problems with the iPhone 4.

Together with Arthur Levinson, Robert A. Iger, President and Chief Executive Officer of The Walt Disney Company, was also declared to be joining Apple for serving audit department as well. The jobs-Iger relationship initiated in 2006, when Pixar was acquired by Disney for $7.4 billion. Iger will now be joining Apple’s Tim Cook, Intuit’s William Campbell, J.Crew’s Millard S. Drexler, Albert Gore, Jr., Avon’s Andrew Jung, and Northop’s Ronald Sugar by accepting his new position.

IPhone 4S crushed the dreams about iPhone 5

Everyone was disappointed when Apple released iPhone 4S, instead of iPhone 5. People believed that a revolutionary new iPhone would be released but iPhone 4S crushed the dreams about the issue. However, this does not mean that people are not mad about their iPhone 4S-es.

However the dreams about the new phone were not unrealistic at all... It was fully designed  when it was scrapped. That happened several months before the iPhone 4S was announced. 

Business insider says that they have been told this by an industry source, which was right about Apple’s future product.

According to the source, the prototype of the phone had a bigger screen than iPhone 4S. The new phone was supposed to have aluminum backs and a messed up color profile. Also, Apple wanted to use its “liquid metal” technology, to create colorful phones.  However, the phone was kind of a homemade one and not of production quality.

Rendering the source, the prototype was much faster than the current iPhones, but that’s because it had its limiter removed to disguise its actual power and the battery sucked. With battery problems, the prototype appears to have been similar to iPhone 4S. 

Prototype of the phone featured SIRI as well (called “Assistant”) and the whole 10 megapixel lens!

One more thing that distinguishes “dream phone” from others is its home button. It was not supposed to be physical press button, but it’d feature touch function and was designed to be oval, instead of being round as the rest of iDevices have.

As a conclusion, people would be extremely happy if iPhone 5 was released, although they do not seem to be discontented with their iPhone 4S at all.

via business insider

Comments Gone

I regret to inform you that I've had to completely disable comments on the blog. I had to switch to moderation a while back since the spam detectors were failing to catch anything meaningful. Unfortunately, the rate of spam comments has been accelerating recently to the point where I simply don't have the time to search for the few actual and valid comments in the proverbial haystack of spam.

I wish I didn't have to do this. I like comments. I like hearing other peoples' takes on things and love it when somebody catches a mistake or proposes a better solution. But, comment moderation has been sucking away what little time I have for the block lately.

Maybe at some point I'll have the time to transition to software that can handle spam comments better, but I don't right now.

Sorry it had to be this way. It sucks that there are people in the world who do this shit and ruin things for everyone else.

Still battery problems

The fact, that iPhone 4S has problems with battery life, is not news for its users. But after releasing iOS 5.0.1 update , the users hoped that problems would be eliminated.

However, the problem has still occurred and some users are complaining about the issue. Apple continues working on the problem, its spokesperson Trudy Muller reported:
“The recent iOS software update addressed many of the battery issues that some customers experienced on their iOS 5 devices, we continue to investigate a few remaining issues.”

via macworld

Adobe’s intriguing decision

Adobe decided to no longer develop the Flash Player for mobile browsers. It has announced that Flash Player 11.1 is the last version of Flash for mobile devices.

Adobe developer relations lead Mike Chambers assures developers that Flesh itself is healthy. He has named some reasons explaining the company’s decision:

• Flash was never going to gain ubiquity on mobile devices;

• Users don’t consume content on mobile in the same way they do on desktop the only difference is in screen sizes’

• Developing browser plugins for mobile is much more challenging than the desktop;

• Adobe wanted to shift more resources to HTML5, and dropping Flash for mobile frees them to do so.

Chambers says:  “No matter what we did, the Flash Player was not going to be available on Apple’s iOS anytime in the foreseeable future.” By the end of his post, he admits that HTML5 will take over many functions of Flash. He says:

“A lot of the things that you have done via Flash in the past, will increasingly be done via HTML5 and CSS3 directly in the browser.”

No matter what’s been said, the fact is that the reason of the decision is the battle between Adobe and Apple. Adobe’s decision says that it has lost the game.

via Mashable

Free iPhone Ringtones

Never underestimate the importance of your ringtone! This is a proven fact that the music we like affects our mood positively, while the unattractive ringtone subconsciously irritates us and leads to stress and depression.

Ringtones on iPhones have nothing to boast about. The choice is quite limited, and moreover, it is not permitted to set your favorite mp3 as your ringing tone! The reason is that Apple does not support ringtones to be in mp3 format, and for setting your favorite track as a ringtone, you need to convert it from .mp3 to .m4r format and then add as a ringing tone from your iTunes account. Quite boring, isn’t it? Especially nowadays, when your favorite artists mange to record sometimes 10 singles a day!

Don’t worry, we’ve found a solution for this problem! Fortunately there is quite a comfortable service available, and to your surprise, IT IS FREE! Free Ringtones  does not only offer a wide variety of songs, but allows you to choose between .mp3 and .m4r formats and download your favorite tracks in seconds! The website is extremely easy to navigate, and offers all the possible searching options – animal sounds, international songs or movie soundtracks, Bollywood themes or just funny ringtones! You can find the latest songs via the artist names, or just look for it in “Popular” category. Despite eliminating the need to manually convert the tones from one format to another, Free Ringtones offers additional services as well, such as a nicely-arranged huge wallpaper gallery  and even allows you to make your own ringtone ! And once again, everything FOR FREE!

Now you can change your ringtone as many times as you want! With Free Ringtones we assure you’ll always have your ringtone updated, and will always have something to boast about!

iOS 5.0.1 Is In The Air

Not long since iPhone 4S has been released, some users have experienced problems  with the battery life. Apple has confirmed that battery performance actually has a few problems and they’d release a software update as a solution in a few weeks.

Finally,  the iOS 5.0.1 update has been released, bringing fixes to iPhone 4S battery life. Apple says that the update fixes problems with Documents in the Cloud and improves voice recognition as well, which had problems  also.

For the first time, you can update your device without connecting it to your computer. It is very simple, go to Settings > General > Software Update, and then tap the Download and Install button.

SIRI for only iPhone 4S

Some rumors have been spread that SIRI is available not for only iPhone 4S, but it works quite well on iPhone4 and iTouch 4 as well. The author of the rumor is an iPhone hacker Steven Troughton-Smith, who has tweeted that he had successfully ported SIRI to the older devices. The users of old devices were extremely happy because SIRI is the most wanted function of the phone form the very first moment it was introduced.

Apple’s official respond to this issue crushed dreams. Company’s e-mail to Michael Steeber, the iOS developer, clearly said that Apple has no current plan to implement SIRI into any other device:

“Engineering has provided the following feedback regarding this issue: SIRI only works on iPhone 4S and we currently have no plans to support older devices.”

The fact that there are Siri files on iPhone4, meaning that it may work for iPhone4 as well, however, doesn’t guarantee that intelligent voice assistant will come for iPhone 4.

Apple spent hundreds of millions of dollars for developing SIRI and after this did anyone really expect that Apple would support plans to offer it on older devices?! It’s more than obvious that if Siri rolls out suitable for older devices as well, the iPhone 4S sales will be cannibalized!

What Competitors Think of SIRI

Since iPhone 4S has been released, users are very happy because of its main function - SIRI. However, it does not seem that other industry players are glad too. Contrariwise, many of them see a reasonable competitive threat in it.

In September Google’s executive chairman appeared on Capitol Hill. Eric Schmidt frankly answered to all the questions about his company’s competitors. He said that Apple was not considered as a competitive threat until it released SIRI, which he called a “significant development.” He admits that SIRI is the biggest threat to Google’s control of search by now.

“Eric might be more right than he knows,” says Gary Morgenthaler, the first investor in SIRI in 2008, “A million blue links from Google is worth far less than one correct answer from Siri,” he adds.

In October Senior Vice President of Mobile at Google Andy Rubin said in an interview: “I don’t believe that your phone should be an assistant, your phone is a tool for communicating. You shouldn’t be communicating with the phone; you should be communicating with somebody on the other side of the phone.”

Microsoft's President of Windows Phone, Andy Lees says in an interview with Ina Fried that users can talk to their Windows Phone too, but implementations, which SIRI has, are not very useful.

It seems that the appearance of Siri has endangered Amazon as well.  Just like Apple, Amazon has opened app store, offered mp3 download store, streaming and cloud storage services recently. It also snapped up Yap, but quietly. Yap is a voice recognition software company which owned a good chunk of speech-recognition property since 2006. With this strategy Amazon has an opportunity to keep pace with Apple’s SIRI feature. The purchase has been revealed yesterday, although it was actually completed in September.

No matter what competitors say, think or do, the fact is that SIRI is an amazing function of the phone because the users are extremely satisfied. Gary Morgenthaler thinks that if people start using SIRI to bypass search that will be a huge threat to Google. The only problem can occur for SIRI is that it cannot make money with advertising.

Flash is Dead. No, Really this Time

It appears that Adobe is going to cease development of mobile Flash.

I'm not ordinarily one to gloat or dwell on I-told-you-sos, but I'm going to make an exception in this one instance. I took an awful lot of heat for those blog rants backin 2009 for saying things like

I hate to break it to you, but Flash, as it currently exists, is dead. Oh, it's not going to die quickly, it's going to die a slow painful death precisely because there has been such a large investment of time and money into using it by so many large corporations like Disney. Flash's roots run way too deep for it to disappear quickly.

Here's the thing, though: Flash is a product of a different generation of computing. It's a product of a world where 90% of the people used one platform, and the bulk of the remaining used another. There was Windows, and there was the Mac.

[…]

And now, the world is changing. People are increasingly browsing the web from mobile devices, and unlike the computer world of a decade ago, the mobile computing landscape is not anything like a monoculture or monopoly. There are several viable mobile platforms all competing in that space. We have the iPhone, Blackberry, Palm Pre, Windows Mobile, Android, Symbian and probably others that have slipped my mind. All of these are operating systems currently shipping on phones and all come with browsers. None of them, except a solitary model of Android phone, has Flash.

But before I get too smug, you know what? I missed a huge factor in the demise of Flash. I assumed the performance issues they were having back then were simply technical hurdles that would be overcome by Adobe's engineers before long. In the end, the lack of a monoculture was certainly a significant factor in the demise of mobile Flash, but the real nail in the coffin was that Adobe never even got mobile Flash working demonstrably well on a single model on a single platform, let alone working well on the "billions of mobile phones" they were shooting for with the Flash Consortium. I completely overestimated Adobe's ability to deliver, technically.

But all is not lost for Flash developers. Adobe has stated that they are going to "refocus" their efforts on allowing Flash to create HTML5 compliant web apps. What a brilliant idea!

If I may… one last quote from my much-reviled Flash rants:

But, that doesn't mean there's no hope. There are many ways that Adobe could save Flash/Flex for the mobile world. One way would be to create something like Google's GWT - an environment where some or all of the code gets translated into HTML and Javascript to be run on the client, leaving to a VM only those tasks that can't reasonably be handled that way.

I said that back in August 2009 and, frankly, I was kind of stating the obvious. Maybe Adobe should have made me CEO. I doubt I would've done much worse than the current management given the recent layoff announcements.

I know people think of me as an Adobe hater. I'm not. More accurately, I'm a disgruntled fan. In the nineties I held Adobe in higher regard than I held Apple (at least Apple before Jobs' return). I adored Photoshop, which I had started using around version 1.5 and which enabled me to make a living for a couple of years. Somehow, in the span of fifteen years, Adobe went from being a company that made amazing things to being a company that made mediocre things that they marketed as amazing. A company that had no focus. A company that churned out new versions of software in order to generate new income, not to meet honest customer demand. I watched a great company become a company that didn't care about being great as long as quarterly profit sheets looked good.

I, for one, am hoping for a Phoenix-like rise from the ashes on the order of Apple's comeback. Hoping… but not expecting.

IPhone 4S voice problems

Since iPhone4S has been released, the user opinion has divided into two - some of them are extremely happy but others have endless problems. The new trouble linked to the phone is about SIRI. People are complaining of being unable to access service at a time.

SIRI used to have trouble in accessing the network but it only lasted for minutes. Now the only answer it can give is: “I am sorry, I am having trouble connecting to the network.”  However, the problem has not occurred for every user, but it still is timely.

Beside SIRI trouble, the users cannot hear the person “on the other end of the wire” during some calls. But it can be fixed by plugging in a headset or pressing the mute button twice or by disabling SIRI.

Is it software bug or a hardware problem, is still obscure.

Apple bonuses for top executives

Apple has awarded its top executives recently. The amount of the reward is $60 million in total. The company did not just pay this sum, but awarded each of them with 150.000 shares as well. 50% of the shares will be vested on June 2013 and the rest in March 2016.

According to the spokesperson of Apple, Steve Dowling, the executives are very talented and dedicated to their work. They’re awarded exactly for their hard work and enormous contribution to the company.

Rewarded executives are: Bruce Sewell, Jeffrey Williams, Philip Schiller, Peter Oppenheimer, Robert Mansfield, and Scott Forstall. All of them were awarded with 150.000 shares, except Eddy Cue, who got only 100.000.

iOS 5.0.1 Update Now Available

iOS 5.0.1 beta is now available! You can get it on the iOS Dev Center . Even in low storage situations, it introduces a new way for developers to specify files that should remain on device.

The update also:

Fixes battery life

Adds Multitasking Gestures for original iPad;

Resolves bugs with Documents in the Cloud;

Improves voice recognition;

Improves security.

Apple has announced that as the matter of fact that they have added something to iOS 5.0.1.the problems with iOS 5 are being eliminated.

But the most important part of iOS 5.0.1 is still the non-critical storage. It does not slow down or eat up storage for your backups.

For more information, visit Apple website for Developers .

Apple Complains For Its Porn Domain Names

If you want to annoy some company, it is very easy. All you have to do is put some porn up on domain names, including its brand names. But actually, most of the reputable, or even disreputable, but relevant companies try to avoid such facts by registering all the related-to-product domain names in advance.

However, that’s not always funny.  Apple filed a complaint with World Intellectual Property Forum over seven domain names. These site domains include the term “iPhone.” E.g.:

iphonecamforce.com

iphonecam4s.com

iphoneporn4s.com

iphonesex4s.com

iphonexxxforce.com

iphone4s.com

porn4iphones.com

The product was registered in August 2008, but why Apple did not proactively get that domain name before the official introduction, still stays inexplicable.

iOS 5 Battery Problems

Not long since iPhone4S has been released, and some users already complain about the battery performance, asking for some assistance by installing a monitoring program. Fortunately the problem concerned only some users, not for all. The trouble is not affecting just the iPhone 4S, but any other IOS5 devices as well.

According to the specs , the iPhone 4S is supposed to get 200 hours of standby mode but now it actually gets 8 hours only.

Apple has confirmed that battery performance actually have  a few problems after upgrading to IOS5.

Statement released by Apple on Wednesday says: “We have found a few bugs that are affecting battery life and we will release a software update to address those in a few weeks.”

Apple has not offered any advice on what customers should do until the software update is released. The fact is that having too many GPS-based location services turned on may cause the phone to lose battery life fast. Another possible culprit is the new Notification system in IOS5. Forums contain various potential fixes, there may be hope, that my help.

Here are some examples:

The calendar bug - disable the calendar app within the Notifications center;

The Time Zone bug - go into Settings > Location Services > System Services > Setting Time Zone, and toggle off the location services;

Location services - Head into Settings > Location Services and browse through the various apps. The option to turn it off which is there for no reason.

SIRI – it uses up a lot of processing power

Then of course: you should turn off Wi-Fi and Bluetooth, turn down screen brightness, etc.

The truth is that it’s not magical solution to this problem; you should wait until software update is released.

Is not it necessary to have iPhone 4S for using SIRI?

An iPhone hacker Steven Troughton-Smith has Tweeted that he had successfully ported SIRI to the iPhone 4G and iPod touch 4G. Steven Troughton-Smith is an indie developer living in Ireland. 

He has also shared a link below, in which it is clear how SIRI works on iPhone 4G.

The hack says: “Basically, I already had everything I needed to make it work. I had spent a lot of time mapping out in my head exactly how Siri works on the iPhone. All I needed was access to a jailbroken iPhone 4S to put my hunch to the test. It literally took no longer than 10 minutes to put all the pieces in place and perform our first test on my iPhone 4, and it was an instant success.”

SIRI on iPhone 4 can recognize spoken commands in both the standard SIRI view and the keyboard Dictation view. It also has the ability to speak back to the user.

Perhaps, the most important story is that there is no technical reason for Apple not to allow Siri to run on the iPhone 4 as well.  Why Apple is making Siri an iPhone 4S exclusive is still inexplicable. It still is not authenticating commands to its servers from iPhone 4 hardware.