Jordan Kahn

News:

BMW iOS app integration: Following some recent Siri Eyes Free news from Chevrolet, BMW announced today that it has partnered with handful of developers to bring similar eyes free experiences for a number of third-party iOS apps to its vehicles. BMW has partnered with Audible for audio books, Glympse for location sharing services, Rhapsody for subscription music and TuneIn for internet radio, all of which will be updating their apps in the weeks to come for compatibility with the BMW Apps system.

Plants vs Zombies 2: PopCap announced today that part two of its incredibly popular Plants vs Zombies title is finally going to land on iOS in additional to all the other usual platforms “early summer.”  No clues on what might be included in the second installment, but in the meantime PopCap will launch a new version of the game on Facebook.

App Updates:

IM+ Instant Messenger version 7.7: A nice update to the very popular IM+ service today offers Beep mobile-to-mobile service as an in-app purchase, the ability to preview transferred images directly in chats, and the usual bug fixes and performance enhancements. iPad users will also now be able to capture photos and videos in the app.

StreamBoard version 5.0: The Twitter client that lets you track keywords and hashtags in real-time is updated to version 5.0 with many new features and enhancements:

For this incredible milestone, StreamBoard has been rewritten from the ground up bringing to you:
– A brand new streamlined interface powered by gestures
– A reimagined filter view featuring real-time graphs that you can interact with
– Much improved engine for faster speed!
– and many more!

Pac-Man version 3.5.0: iOS 6 support and new features for the Pac-Man iPad app.

Added support for iOS 6
Fixed Game Center issue for iOS 6
Updated More Games functionality

Deals:
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AFP reported Apple is in court in Shanghai, China again today, but this time it’s over a lawsuit alleging the company copied components of Siri’s speech recognition software. According to the report, Shanghai-based Zhizhen Network Technology Co. claimed in pretrial proceedings that Apple infringed its patent related to voice recognition technology via Siri. While the suit notes that development of Siri began in 2007, there is no mention of Nuance. Apple currently partners Nuance with to implement the speech recognition component in Siri, and it is also a market leader that presumably has its own arsenal of speech recognition related patents.

Zhizhen says it patented its “Xiao i Robot” software in 2004, while Apple’s Siri, which made its debut with the release of the iPhone 4S in 2011, was first developed in 2007.

“The company will ask Apple to stop manufacturing and selling products using its patent rights, once Apple’s infringement is confirmed,” Si Weijiang, a lawyer representing Zhizhen, told AFP.

“We don’t exclude the possibility of demanding compensation in the future,” he added.

The company is behind Siri-like software called ‘Xiao i Robot’ that it claimed was first developed before Siri in 2004. The technology is apparently available on some smart TVs and enterprise applications, but it doesn’t appear to be available as a consumer-facing app for smartphones or tablets. The video below appeared online when the company originally filed suit against Apple last year, and it shows the Xiao i Robot software running on a Lenovo smartphone:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ku0H10_G1X4

As expected, T-Mobile has just officially announced it will carry the iPhone 5 as part of its ‘Uncarrier’ event today in New York City to unveil its new no-contract, no subsidy pricing plans. According to the company’s press release, the iPhone 5 will be available April 12 nationwide for $99.99 down plus an additional monthly payment of $20 per month for 24 months. Pre-orders for the device will begin on April 5 through T-Mobile’s website.

Although that will allow you to get an iPhone 5 for around $579 compared to $649 at retail, the device will be locked to T-Mobile until its paid off. However, with no contract, you’ll be able to walk away for cost of the device.

The company will also offer the iPhone 4s for $69.99 down and $20 per month for 24 months and the iPhone 4 for $14.99 down and $15 per month for 24 months in select markets.

T-Mobile announced today that qualifying customers can get an iPhone 5 for $99.99 down, plus monthly payments. T-Mobile is the only major U.S. wireless company to offer iPhone 5 with no annual service contract plus unlimited talk, text and Web on a screaming-fast nationwide 4G network. And because there are no annual contracts, customers make the decision when to upgrade their devices — not the carrier.

As for iPhone 5 plans on T-Mobile, the company will offer just one Simple Choice Plan that starts at a base $50 per month for unlimited talk and text and 500MB of data. Users can bump up to unlimited data for an extra $20 and add a second line for $30 (plus $10 per month for each additional line).

T-Mobile noted that iPhone customers would also have access to a number of free premium benefits including nationwide HD voice (the only carrier to offer the wideband audio feature), smartphone mobile hotspot, and talk and surf with truly unlimited 4G:
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Logitech, a company that makes a number of well-made iOS accessories we’ve enjoyed in the past, today announced a new line up of iPad keyboard folios. Available for both the full-sized iPad and iPad mini, Logitech   said its goal with the new Keyboard Folio and Keyboard Folio mini was to bring its “award-winning typing experience” to a case that offers high quality materials, a variety of colors, and “an extra layer of protection.”

Marrying aesthetics and practicality, Logitech combined sophisticated materials with a clean industrial design, to evoke personal style while helping to minimize the risk of damage to your tablet. Taking protection and convenience to the next level, Logitech has included magnetic closures to further help minimize the risk of damage to your tablet while in transit, and a hands-free flip stand offers two comfortable viewing angles so you can enjoy your iPad or iPad mini in the perfect position. The Logitech Keyboard Folio also features instant On/Off functionality that wakes your tablet when you open the cover and puts it to sleep when you close it, helping to preserve your tablet’s battery life.

We’re big fans of Logitech’s keyboards, as you might have known from our previous reviews of its Ultrathin iPad Keyboard Cover, Solar Keyboard Folio, and Ultrathin Keyboard for iPad mini. 

As for colors, it looks like Logitech is offering the larger Keyboard Folio in black, yellow, blue, and pink, while the Mini variant is available to pre-order in light and dark shades of blue.

The new Logitech Keyboard Folio for the full-sized iPad is expected to land in Europe and the United States next month for $99.99, while the iPad mini version will be available in May for $89.99. Pre-orders are live on Logitech’s website now. Logitech gave a hands-on with the new cases below:
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Research firm IDC is out today with its latest report on the smart-connected device market, and it includes worldwide shipments of desktop PCs, notebook PCs, smartphones, and tablets. IDC predicted the market in total grew 29.1-percent year over year in 2012, crossing 1 billion units shipped and hitting a total value of $576.9 billion. According to the report, Apple significantly closed the gap on Samsung during the last quarter of the year. It jumped from 15.1-percent in Q3 to 20.3-percent of unit shipments in Q4 2012. That brings the company up right behind market leader Samsung, which dropped slightly from 21.8-percent to 21.2-percent in the fourth quarter:

Looking specifically at the results for the fourth quarter of 2012 (4Q12), combined shipments of desktop PCs, notebook PCs, tablets, and smartphones was nearly 378 million and revenues were more than $168 billion. In terms of market share, Apple significantly closed the gap with market leader Samsung in the quarter, as the combination of Apple’s iPhone 5 and iPad Mini brought Apple up to 20.3% unit shipment share versus 21.2% for Samsung.

Not surprisingly, Apple dominated Samsung when it came to revenue share. It took in 30.7-percent of the market compared to just 20.4-percent for Samsung by revenue:

On a revenue basis for the fourth quarter, Apple continued to dominate with 30.7% share versus 20.4% share for Samsung.

Apple’s increase is likely thanks to strong iPad and iPad mini sales, as growth in the market was “largely driven by 78.4-percent year-over-year growth in tablet shipments.” IDC expected tablet shipments to outgrow desktop PCs by the end of this year, while the tablet market could surpass the portable PC market in 2014 and provide Apple with even more opportunity to outgrow Samsung for total connected smart device shipments this year and next:
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We speculated previously that we might see Apple devices at T-Mobile’s upcoming event in New York, and a report from Cnet today claimed the company would indeed talk iPhone tomorrow at its event in New York:

Yep, T-Mobile will finally get the iPhone. Apple’s flagship device, long a gap in T-Mobile’s smartphone line-up, will play a prominent role in tomorrow’s “Uncarrier” event, according to a person familiar with the launch plans.

We knew from previous comments by T-Mobile execs that the iPhone would likely land on the carrier through its new “uncarrier” contract-free plans sometime this month or next.

It’s not certain if pricing or specific release dates would be announced tomorrow, but the device would be used to highlight the carrier’s plans of offering new no-contract, no subsidy smartphone plans. The report noted that the iPhone would not be immediately available following tomorrow’s event.

T-Mobile’s new plans offer users unlimited talk and text with tiered data options and a $70 plan that includes unlimited data, and they were previously leaked and went live on the carrier’s website over the weekend.

T-Mobile USA announced in last year that it had struck an agreement with Apple to begin supporting Apple products in 2013. The carrier’s chief executive, John Legere, later told Reuters the company planned to introduce the iPhone, eliminate cellphone subsidies, and introduce new, flexible pricing plans for customers within 3 to 4 months.

Controversy over Apple’s warranty policies in China started up earlier this month after a report from state-controlled media outlets such as China Central Television criticized the company for treating consumers unfairly with its warranty and repair procedures compared to other countries. The Wall Street Journal reported today that Chinese government appears to be going after Apple for failing to respond to requests for interviews and providing a response to the criticisms through an article in the state-run People’s Daily newspaper:

The People’s Daily newspaper, the party’s traditional mouthpiece, in a front-page article on Monday accused the electronics maker of declining journalists’ requests for interviews and issuing an “empty and self-praising” response to a recent critical report by China’s national television broadcaster. The article was accompanied by a cartoon with a figure representing the company, saying, “Apple statement: empty.

Though it can be difficult to predict government behavior based on news coverage in China’s state-run media, analysts said the string of attacks suggested that the government is considering doing more to encourage the growth of domestic smartphone companies and eat away at dominant foreign companies, such as Apple.

The initial reports claimed Apple was providing customers in China with service that differed from other countries. For example: providing repaired phones or recycled components, while giving customers in the United States new replacement devices. It was also followed by posts online from Chinese celebrities against Apple that some think was a coordinated effort to attack the company. WSJ noted that Apple responded through a message on its Chinese website on the weekend, claiming that its warranty policies are “more or less the same” in every country:
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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2AtPakZmF_M

GM announced in November 2012 that it would bring the Siri’s Eyes Free feature to the Chevy Sonic and Spark vehicles in 2013, and it officially became the first company last month to offer the enhanced Siri integration in its vehicles. GM has today kicked off a new marketing campaign to highlight the feature that allows drivers to activate Siri through a dedicated button on the steering wheel in its 2013 Sonic.

Apple originally announced a number of automakers that would include support for the feature in future vehicles, including: BMW, Mercedes, Land Rover, Jaguar, Audi, Toyota, Chrysler, and Honda. Honda confirmed earlier this year that Siri Eyes Free would be available in its 2013 Accord, Acura RDX, and ILX models.

Some more videos showing off Siri Eyes Free are below:

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XCOM: Enemy Unknown: Firaxis is officially bringing critically acclaimed turn-based strategy game XCOM: Enemy Unknown to iOS. The company first made the announcement at a panel during PAX East over the weekend and since posted the video above showing off some early gameplay footage.

The moment you have been waiting for is here! #Airspace is now accepting submissions for #leapmotion apps. More info: http://t.co/5oDwDigRMR

— Leap Motion Dev (@LeapMotionDev) March 23, 2013

News: The people behind the Leap Motion controller have announced that it will now accept app submissions ahead of the upcoming launch of its new Airspace app store. We previously brought you a hands-on with the product scheduled to officially launch in May.

More apps:

Karma- Reddit Client: Just released on the App Store, Karma is a new Reddit client for iPhone that brings a simplistic UI and everything you’ll need from one easy to navigate app.

StubHub version 4.2.1: Over 700 new interactive venue maps and more for the StubHub iOS app:

– 700+ interactive venue maps: Filter ticket listings by section
– View from section for more events: See the view from your section before you buy
– Fixes to address the app crashes reported by some users
– Bug fixes

DataMan Next version 6.3: Data tracking app DataMan Next gets tethering support for some non-US carriers as well as support for VoiceOver. 
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A police officer in the U.K. named Doug Crossan reported his own 13-year-old son for fraud after Apple refused to refund £3,700 that the child ran up playing freemium App Store titles on his iPad. DailyMail has the story:

Cameron then racked up more than 300 purchases on games such as Plants vs Zombies, Hungry Shark, Gun Builder, Nova 3. Many of them are free to download but users can buy in-game extras – in one game Cameron had purchased a virtual chest of gold coins costing £77.98.

But the technology company has refused and his only way of recouping the money is to report the purchases as being fraudulent. So Mr Crossan, of Clevedon, North Somerset, has shopped Cameron to the Action Fraud helpline – meaning his son could face arrest and questioning by the his father’s colleagues. He said: ‘I am sure Cameron had no intention to do it, but I had to have a crime reference number if there was any chance of getting any credit card payments refunded.

We reported last week that Apple was adding a new “offers in-app purchases” warning in the App Store to better inform consumers downloading free apps that additional content will require a fee. The move followed a settling a class action lawsuit that alleged children were able to rack up thousands of dollars through the iOS freemium model, i.e. in-app purchases, with both parents and children under the impression that the games were free. Apple is refusing to refund Crossan, citing “parental responsibility and pointing out that iPads contain password locks to prevent accidental or unwanted purchases.”

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Mailbox: After a bit of a controversy with its reservation system, followed by getting acquired by Dropbox for a reported $50 – $100 million, developers of the highly successful Mailbox app announced it has filled its 1 millionth reservation just 6 weeks after launching. The free Mailbox app also gets an update to version 1.1.0 with UI enhancements, performance optimizations, and a new “Shake to undo” feature.

Plex version 3.1: The iOS app for the popular Plex media server was updated today with a ton of new features and fixes. Some of the big new features include a Mobile Media Server mode to play synced content and view photo albums from any other Plex client, push notifications for recommendations, a new experimental universal transcoder. Also included is a new dark theme, redesigned photo viewer, and much, much more.

Pinterest version 2.3: Pinterest announced that it is adding some new features to its mobile apps today that include some of the recent updates to its web version. You’ll now be able to view a “people who pinned this also pinned” feature, edit your profile from the app, and get a close-up view of pins on the iPad.

Speedtest.net 3.0: Mobile speedtest.net app from developers Ookla gets an update today with a new UI and full iPhone 5 support, the ability to permanently remove ads, easier sharing, and more.

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Apple has updated its Podcasts app today with a number of new features. Among the most notable is the ability to create custom stations that update automatically as new episodes of podcasts are available. There are also a number of new enhancements for stations and playlists, including iCloud support to keep stations up to date on all your iOS devices.

The app also now includes a redesigned “Now Playing” view that shows playback controls, as pictured in the screenshots above.

Other improvements include On-The-Go playlists and support for syncing playlists from iTunes, an option to have stations begin playing with the latest or oldest episode, and other fixes and performance enhancements:
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Bloomberg noted today that Apple has updated the environmental report on its website to include new information for 2012. We reported in January that CEO Tim Cook had plans to achieve 100 percent renewable energy by the end of 2013, and Apple confirmed on Thursday it has now achieved 100 percent renewable energy at all of its data center. Apple also noted that it is investing in new methods to achieve 100 percent renewable energy throughout all of its corporate facilities worldwide. Apple said on its website that its facilities worldwide currently use 75 percent renewable energy (a 114 percent increase from the 35 percent it reported in 2010):

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SoundCloud version 2.5: SoundCloud iPhone and iPad app gets an update today that brings a “cleaner, sharper, simpler’ design, a new icon, as well as support for Sets on iPhone. iPhone users can now view sets posted by others, create and add tracks to new sets, and search for sets with a  new filter in the search tab.

TempleRun 2 version 1.1: The popular second installment in the Temple Run series was updated today with new features including daily and weekend challenges with in-game coins and gems as rewards, the ability challenge friends through Game Center, and other new enhancements:

★ Daily and weekly challenges to win free coins and gems!
★ Challenge your Game Center friends to beat your score!
★ Check out more offers for free coins
★ Powerups collected now extend the time of already active powers
★ Stuck objectives should be fixed
★ More bug fixes

Spotify version 0.6.1: Spotify for iOS gets updated today with new images and artist biographies when in the artist view and a fix for crashes when you skip in radio.

• New: Look, there are images and artist biographies in the artist view.
• Fixed: No more pesky crashes when you skip in radio.
• Fictitious: This app is reverse-engineered using alien technology.

Mailbox 1.1.0: The popular Gmail Mailbox app for iPhone and iPod touch has been updated with a Shake to Undo feature, bug fixes, and various UI enhancements and performance optimizations. 

Parcel version 3.0: Delivery tracking app Parcel gets rewritten to bring a new UI and a revamped experience on the iPhone and iPad:
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[viddler id=a66cf352 w=704 h=400]

Update: Apple responds.

Google chairman Eric Schmidt spoke at the company’s Big Tent Summit in India this morning, and, on top of claiming there are no immediate plans to merge Chrome and Android, the executive discussed the possibility of Google Now coming to iOS devices. It appears Google is in a similar situation to when it launched a standalone Google Maps app, as Schmidt claimed it’s up to Apple to approve or reject Google Now for the App Store. TechCrunch pointed us to the comment from the Google executive at around 17 minutes into the interview:

You’ll need to discuss that with Apple” (at around 17:50). “Apple has a policy of approving or disapproving apps that are submitted into its store, and some of them they approve and some of them they don’t,” he went on to say.

A video that appeared to be an ad for the debut of Google Now on iPhone and iPad landed on YouTube last week before quickly being removed. The video (above) showed that Google could implement Google Now functionality—currently only available as a Siri-like voice and contextual assistant app on Android devices—into the Google Search app.

Google already updated its Google Search app with voice recognition and Google Now-like features last October, and a number of comparison videos have since appeared online and show Siri has some serious competition with even the scaled back voice search features. Bringing the contextual assistant features that Google Now implements on Android to the Google Search app would give iOS users yet another reason to use it rather than Siri for a large number of tasks.
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