A title comparing a podcast player to one of the most influential iPhone apps isn’t given lightly. The incredible friendliness of Twitter, combined with some inspiration from Silvio Rizzi of Reeder, has been crafted by Vemedio into what may simply be the best podcast app available for your iPhone. The features are all beautifully implemented, the interface is a score above the rest, and might I add that it’s become a mainstay on my homescreen?
Posts tagged with "iPhone"
Instacast Is The Twitter Of Podcast Apps
Verizon iPhone Unlimited Data Plan Could Be Discontinued This Summer
That sweet $30 unlimited data plan you currently have on your shiny new Verizon iPhone? Verizon may be planning to discontinue it as soon as this summer, and by summer that could mean anytime from June to September. In theory, 5 months after its introduction. Bloomberg, in fact, reports the following comments from Verizon Chief Financial Officer Fran Shammo:
Verizon Communications Inc. will stop offering unlimited data plans on the Apple Inc. iPhone as soon as this summer, Chief Financial Officer Fran Shammo said.
The carrier, which began selling the iPhone last month, now offers a $30 unlimited data plan on the device. Such plans on the handset are “not a long-term solution,” Shammo said on a conference call at the Morgan Stanley Technology, Media and Telecom Conference today.
This doesn’t come as a surprise, however, as Verizon clearly stated back in late January that the unlimited plan was a temporary offer to help AT&T users switch to Big Red’s network:
But you’d better act fast. Speaking later Tuesday morning, Mr. McAdam said the iPhone unlimited plan will be a temporary offer and that the carrier will follow AT&T’s move to tiered pricing in the not too distant future.
So: Verizon iPhones are moving to tiered data plans in the near future. AT&T made a similar move last year, and that didn’t exactly please a lot of customers. Questions remains how will Verizon iPhone users react to the news, and how many of them did actually read on the news blogs that this was a temporary offer. [via Bloomberg]
#MacStoriesDeals - Tuesday
#MacStoriesDeals - Monday
Apple Execs Hint at Cheaper iPhone, Carrier Expansion
Both Business Insider and Forbes report this morning of a research note issued by Bernstein Research analyst Toni Sacconaghi about a meeting he had last week with Apple COO Tim Cook, CFO Peter Oppenheimer and VP of Internet Services Eddy Cue. Sacconaghi’s notes about the interview help put some future Apple plans in perspective, like the release of a cheaper iPhone model to address a different market segment and the adoption of more carriers worldwide to further expand the iPhone’s marketshare.
Tim Cook referred to the iPhone as “the mother of all halos”, being the reason why sales of other Apple products like Macs and iPads have skyrocketed over the past years. Cook knows, however, that Apple can’t afford to not explore the possibilities offered by other types of markets, and he suggested Apple is not “ceding any market”. As for the cheaper iPhone and the rumors we’ve heard in the past weeks (the ones that pointed to a smaller iPhone as the new cheap entry-level device), this report seems to corroborate other media outlets’ theories:
The analyst says Cook “appeared to reaffirm the notion that Apple is likely to develop lower priced offerings” to expand the market for the iPhone. Cook said the company is planning “clever things” to address the prepaid market, and that Apple did not want its products to be “just for the rich,” and that the company is “not ceding any market.”
Expanding to other carriers is also a “priority” for Apple. Currently, the iPhone runs on 175 different networks versus RIM’s 550. As for the tablet market:
Cook indicated that the tablet market would be much bigger than the PC market. Sacconaghi concludes that if so, it could eventually be a $60 billion to $100 billion business for Apple alone. Cook also said he expected intense competition in tablets, more so than in smart phones, with all PC and smart phone vendors likely to participate, but he added that Apple has a strong head start, and that it has interesting new things in the pipeline.
From this research note, it sounds like Apple is really considering moving to a more variegate line of iPhones to address more markets, with more carriers. Time will tell, and hopefully we’ll know more come the WWDC in June. [via Forbes, Business Insider]
A Minimalist Task Manager Could Be Yours: TaskAgent Giveaway
TaskAgent is pretty slick for being so simple, and the developer has already promised an update to improve compatibilities with formatting notes on the Mac side of things (and it’s pretty stupid easy already). With such ease, you’re more likely to get things done than organizing lists of to-dos or burying important items in sub-categories of a master-category. For work or at home, those who want the bare essentials may want to check out our previous coverage of TaskAgent before entering our latest giveaway.
MacStories Product Review: Joby GorillaMobile For iPod Touch
Joby has an affliction for legs and we wonder if it’s become a fetish. Their trademark product styling involves those signature curvy, twisting joints that allow cameras of all kinds to stabilize on a variety of uneven surfaces, including from the back of car seats, refrigerators, poles, or a rocky mountain landscape. All of their tripods are incredibly versatile, but I got to go hands on with one specifically made for the iPod touch, a variant of the GorillaMobile series. Check past the break for this clingy review!
Turn Twitter Noise Into Signal With Our Smartr For iPhone Giveaway!
MacStorians are incredibly Twitter savvy (most of them - we won’t discriminate if you don’t use Twitter), and for the power users who want to turn Twitter into a pure information feed, Smartr is a super client for getting micro-information on the go. Remove annoying Foursquare checkins, save articles for later reading, show page previews instead of links, and do it all with multiple Twitter accounts for business and personal use. We’re giving away five copies of Smartr to our delicious readers, and it’s incredibly simple to join in on the fun. Beforehand you might want to check out Federico’s glowing review, naming Smartr as, “Flipboard for the iPhone.”
Engadget Awards iPad ‘Gadget of the Year’
Does it really surprise anyone that Apple’s iPad keeps winning awards? No, not really but it means Apple really knows how to make great products. Today, Engadget announced the winners of their 2010 Editors’ Choice Awards. Just a few days ago, Engadget posted their Reader’s Awards and the iPad also won ‘Gadget of the Year’ there too. Readers’ opinions are just as important as editors’ ones but it’s the editors’ decisions that more people see. Engadget is one of the most popular tech sites out there, besides us, so it’s cool to see the iPad standout from the crowd there as well. Read more