Photo Slideshow Director HD for iPad 2.1
Available Free for One Week

post from prMac on 28 October 2011 11:27:00 PM. © prMac

Socusoft Studios announces Photo Slideshow Director HD for iPad version 2.1 has been released. In company with this update, Socusoft Studio announced it would be free on the iTunes app store for an entire week starting from Oct 25, 2011. Photo Slideshow Director HD for iPad lets you turn your photos, Picasa web albums, Facebook photos and Flickr photos into dynamic HD slideshow on iPad in a snap. It also allows you to export the slideshow projects to videos for sharing on YouTube and Facebook.

Read The Full Article:
http://prmac.com/release-id-33006.htm

Add to del.icio.us

Digg this

Post to Furl

Add to reddit

Add to myYahoo!

DollarApp: Big Words

post from Daring Fireball on 28 October 2011 09:07:37 PM. © Daring Fireball

Those of you who follow the DF RSS feed know how the weekly sponsorship works. There’s one sponsor per week, and two posts: on Monday, an entry that appears only in the RSS feed, written by the sponsor; then on Friday, a thank-you post that appears on both the DF website and in the RSS feed, written by me. (You’re reading one of the latter now.) The rule for the sponsor-written Monday entries is that they’re limited to 100 words. Some sponsors try to use every word they can, and that’s fine. But some of my favorite sponsorship posts are the shortest ones. This week’s was the shortest ever, and is my new all-time favorite DF sponsorship post. I’ll repeat it here, in its entirety:

Tired of Twitter? Message in real life using Big Words.

That’s the entire text of the ad. I don’t know about you, but me, if I read that, my curiosity would be piqued. I would have to click. So: my thanks to DollarApp and Dom Sagolla both for sponsoring this week’s DF RSS feed, and for writing my all-time favorite sponsorship ad. Check out the app — Big Words does one simple thing, really well. Do me a favor and cough up a buck — one buck! — if only to reward him for a great ad.

?

Read The Full Article:
http://j.mp/BigFireball

Digg this

The Subtle Changes in iOS 5

post from Daring Fireball on 28 October 2011 08:06:15 PM. © Daring Fireball

Never stop sweating the pixels.

?

Read The Full Article:
http://stam-design-stam.blogspot.com/2011/10/ios-5.html

Digg this

The Siri Dictation Key Doubles as a Space Bar
When Tapped Quickly

post from Daring Fireball on 28 October 2011 08:06:15 PM. © Daring Fireball

Nice find by Gary Ng. Details, details, details.

?

Read The Full Article:
http://www.iphoneincanada.ca/iphone-4s/the-reason-why-siris-dictate-key-on-the-ip
hone-4s-is-dark-or-light-grey/

Digg this

Jim Dalrymple Calls Bullshit on Todays Samsung
Smartphone Numbers

post from Daring Fireball on 28 October 2011 07:07:13 PM. © Daring Fireball

Remember back in July, when Samsung announced it would no longer reveal phone and tablet sales data? They’re still not revealing them, but that hasn’t stopped Strategy Analytics from declaring them the unit sales leader in smartphones. (And it’s another case of shipments-vs.-sales-to-customers.)

I’m not doubting, by the way, that Samsung sold more “smartphones” than Apple for the quarter. They’ve always sold more phones, period, and the industry is rapidly transitioning to one where nearly all new phones are going to be “smartphones”. The point is that an analyst’s estimate for Samsung’s sales numbers should not be reported as fact, nor should shipments be conflated with actual sales.

?

Read The Full Article:
http://www.loopinsight.com/2011/10/28/the-bullshit-samsung-smartphone-numbers/

Digg this

FreeAppApps.com ranks the Top 5 sites and apps
offering daily free apps

post from prMac on 28 October 2011 05:50:00 PM. © prMac

FreeAppApps.com has announced the launch of its mobile website ranking the top "Free App" sites and apps for iOS. The website is the first of its kind, providing a single listing of the most popular sites and apps that offer daily deals. Typically these daily deals allow users to download a paid mobile app for free for a single day only. FreeAppApps.com is currently not affiliated with any of the listed apps, thus providing completely independent reviews and ranking.

Read The Full Article:
http://prmac.com/release-id-33117.htm

Digg this

FreeAppApps ranks the Top 5 sites and apps
offering daily free apps

post from prMac on 28 October 2011 05:50:00 PM. © prMac

FreeAppApps has announced the launch of its mobile website ranking the top "Free App" sites and apps for iOS. The website is the first of its kind, providing a single listing of the most popular sites and apps that offer daily deals. Typically these daily deals allow users to download a paid mobile app for free for a single day only. FreeAppApps.com is currently not affiliated with any of the listed apps, thus providing completely independent reviews and ranking.

Read The Full Article:
http://prmac.com/release-id-33117.htm

Digg this

Let your toddler discover the alphabet with mi A
to Z for iOS

post from prMac on 28 October 2011 03:17:00 PM. © prMac

Indian based Manipal Digital Systems has announced the recent release of mi A to Z for the iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch. Designed specifically with developing youngsters in mind, this free engaging language app entertains children while simultaneously teaching them the basics of the American alphabet one letter at a time! The app effectively educates toddlers by encouraging them to associate letters with things they're likely to remember such as animals, flowers, and more.

Read The Full Article:
http://prmac.com/release-id-33118.htm

Digg this

Apps Are the New Channels

I got an email yesterday from an up-and-coming young blogger named Jason Kottke, with a screenshot of two consecutive DF entries posted earlier in the day — “Condé Nast Subscriptions Up 268 Percent Since Newsstand Launch” and “Bloomberg TV+ for iPad”. His note read, simply:

Reading these two together, the idea for a Newsstand-ish “TV Set”app popped into my head and then the iTV suddenly made sense.Sort of.

Bingo.

This is basically my theory, re: Jobs’s “I finally cracked it”.

Back at the original iPad introduction event in January 2010, everyone knew it was going to be a “tablet”, and everyone knew that a tablet, any tablet, no matter what Apple had decided upon specifically, ought to be a good outlet for newspaper/magazine content. And all the writers who work for traditional media publications were (and remain) obsessed with the future of their business, for good reason. So there was widespread consensus that part of Apple’s day-one iPad news would be some sort of iTunes Store system for newspaper/media content. Something, in broad hand-wavingly vague terms, like the iTunes Store’s music, TV, and movie content. Where newspaper/magazine content could be purchased and subscribed to and but would be rendered in a single written-and-designed-by-Apple reader app.

And when that didn’t come to pass, there was much disappointment. Apple did announce iBooks and the iBookstore, but nothing for magazines or newspapers. There was a palpable, “Damn, I was expecting Steve Jobs to save our industry today” reaction amongst the media contingent.

Whether Newsstand was Apple’s strategy all along, I don’t know, but I think it might have been. The app is the unit of distribution for newspapers and magazines, not the “issue” or the “article”. This puts more work on the publishers’ shoulders — they need to design, create, and maintain software, not merely publish content — but it gives them more control over the reader experience and more potential for creativity and differentiation.

Why not the same thing for TV channels? We’re seeing the beginnings of this, with iPhone and iPad apps like [HBO Go], Watch ESPN, and the aforementioned Bloomberg TV+. Letting each TV network do their own app allows them the flexibility that writing software provides. News networks can combined their written and video news into an integrated layout. Networks with contractual obligations to cable operators, like HBO and ESPN, can write code that requires users to log in to verify their status as an eligible subscriber.

Why not the same thing for TV sized displays? Imagine watching a baseball game on a TV where ESPN is a smart app, not a dumb channel. When you’re watching a game, you could tell the TV to show you the career statistics for the current batter. You could ask the HBO app which other movies this actress has been in. Point is: it’d be better for both viewers and the networks¹ if a TV “channel” were an interactive app rather than a mere single stream of video.

Collect them in a Newsstand-like folder on iPhones and iPads, and make them the “home screen” of a future Apple TV.

Better for advertisers, too. Apps allow for fairly exact viewership statistics. There’d be no need for Nielsen-style statistical polling when exact analytics are available. ↩

Read The Full Article:
http://daringfireball.net/2011/10/apps_are_the_new_channels

Digg this

Play & Learn Chinese special price cut October 29
and 30

California-based developer Selectsoft is offering the educational app Play & Learn Chinese for $0.99 for iPhone and $1.99 for iPad this weekend only. Play & Learn Chinese is a fast, fun, and friendly way to play games and learn a new language. Match the picture to the word you hear, and see how high you can score as you explore settings such as the supermarket, restaurants, and city streets. Over 700 words and phrases with entertaining visuals help users learn quickly and speak with confidence.

Read The Full Article:
http://prmac.com/release-id-32958.htm

Digg this