WikipediaNearly a year after Facebook Like buttons spread out across the web, Google has announced its own rival, the +1 button. It launches today as part of Google’ssearch engine, allowing you to “+1″ the search results and ads that you like. And in a few months, it’ll be arriving at a web site near you.
Is +1 (pronounced “Plus One”) part of the new social network that Google’s long been rumored to be building? Or is +1 simply that “social layer” that Google has said would come and isn’t really meant as a rival to Facebook?
+1 Your Favorite Google Search Results
Beginning today, a small percentage of Google search users on Google.com in the United States searching in English will now see a +1 button next to search listings, when they are logged in.
Image via CrunchBaseIsrael-based developers of Tawkon, who have already released their app for the Android market last year were keen to exploit the iPhone 4death grip issue by releasing an iOS version of their radiation detection software. However, Apple immediately blocked the application from appearing in an official capacity so the company has gone underground and released it on the Cydia store instead.
Apple must have been pretty serious about blocking Tawkon as it is believed that Steve Jobs himself put a stop to is with two small words “No Interest”.
In the past Apple’s iPhone 4 has suffered the so called death grip issue which dampens the signal strength of the phone. What most people don’t know is that when the phone is in this state it is emitting higher levels of radiation as it attempts to re-acquire a signal. Tawkon is supposed to detect these levels. The video below shows this in action, as you can see the presenter holds the iPhone 4 normally and the app shows a safe level of radiation, she then switches her hand position to the death grip and at this point you can see the radiation levels starting to rise to red.
I’m not completely sure how they measure the radiation levels, but it’s something to do with the RF parameters that are extracted from the device. So it measures the proximity of the phone in relation to the user’s hold on the phone, and if he places it next to his ear or on his lap. This apparently then allows them to determine the exposure level.
Mind you, as we mentioned earlier the condition is also known about on Android phones and the company even has a Blackberry app that can measure the radiation, so its not just a problem with Apple’s phone.
Still, the company feel so strongly that users need to know what levels of radiation they are being exposed to that they have set up a public petition to force Apple to make their app appear in iTunes.
"The way it works is pretty simple: plug in my transmitter into the headphone minijack of an iphone 4 and play back any video clip. you can play it through the ipod feature or through the camera roll. the transmitter instantly sends the video signal to the video repeater and the video repeater overrides any video screen that it's being held next to. it doesn't matter what shape or size the hacked screen is because the hack video will simply keep its correct dimensions and the rest of the hacked space will stay black.
CrunchBaseOne of the best new features in iOS 4.3 is the ability to stream video from apps to your Apple TV via Air Play.
Discovery Channel HD is a free iPad app that includes clips of the network's popular shows. The app doesn't include full episodes, but there are plenty of clips updated daily to keep you occupied. Price: Free Vevo is a music video streaming app. It includes all the popular artists and their latest videos in a searchable database. The app and AirPlay will work on iPad and iPhone. Price: Free
We're not sure what use cookie recipes on your TV would be, but Martha Stewart Makes Cookies will let you beam the latest recipes directly to the big screen using AirPlay. Price: $4.99 FitnessClass is an iPad app with a huge library of workout videos. AirPlay makes this app especially useful now that you can watch the videos on your TV. The app is free, but each video costs between $0.99 and $2.99 as an in-app purchase. There are also 30-day subscriptions to certain classes. Price: Free ESPN The Magazine can now push its videos to your TV over AirPlay. You can watch clips from the Wide World of Sports and other video reports. Price: Free, each issue costs $9.99 as an in-app purchase Golfplan includes video tutorials from golf pro Paul Azinger. You can also input your own golf statistics and track your progress. The app will work on iPhone and iPad. Price: $0.99 My Daily Clip delivers a movie scene to your iPhone or iPad every day of the year. The app also includes movie trivia and links to download the full movie from iTunes. Price: Free Authentic Yoga has yoga videos and tutorials that you can stream to your iPad. Price: $1.99 Baseball Gameplanis an instructional app full of video tutorials to help you with every aspect of the game. Each video category -- pitching, fielding, hitting, etc. -- will cost $0.99 as an in-app purchase. Price: Free for iPad and iPhone MLS MatchDaywill let you stream any Major League Soccer game live to your iPad or Apple TV via AirPlay. For $39.99 you'll get access to the live streaming content. Non-paying users can watch highlights and scores from previous games. Price: Free Air Videois a great app that lets you stream any video file type to your iOS device. Now, the app supports AirPlay, which means you can stream your videos to your TV from your computer, even if they aren't in an iTunes format. It's a much better option than jailbreaking Newsy is a series of quick video roundup of the day's breaking news. Reporters aggregate news and opinion from multiple sources and condense them into quick one or two minute videos. Price: Free
Image by Getty ImagesIf you need to wake up at any specific time tomorrow, beware: It appears that some Verizon iPhones fell back an hour at midnight tonight instead of springing forward. Daylight saving time hits tonight/tomorrow morning, which means we all lose an hour of sleep — unless you have a Verizon iPhone, in which case you’ll wake up utterly confused, as phones are currently falling back an hour.
This isn’t the first time the iPhone has been foiled by time — an alarm glitch kept many Apple users from getting to work on time back in January as well.
Apparently, however, this issue is only affecting those with Verizon iPhones. If you have such a phone, restart your device to fix the issue and get the clock back to normal. ***It looks like some AT&T phones were affected by the glitch as well.***
Source:mashable
It's not quite a PlayStation Phone, but Sony has announced a PlayStation app for phones. That's still pretty cool, right? SCEE will soon release "The Official PlayStation App" in Europe, offering light PSN interaction on your iPhone or Android device -- "light" as in you won't be playing games through it, but you can look at your Trophies and the status of your friends. You can also keep up with the EU PlayStation Blog from within the app.
The first version of the PlayStation App will be available soon in the UK, France, Germany, Spain, Italy and the Netherlands. Sony is working to add more countries to that list and also planning new features. No announcements have been made for a release outside of Europe, however. Source:joystiq.com
Apple iPhone and Research In Motion BlackBerry took a backseat to Android smartphones, which accounted for 34% of the U.S. market in the second quarter. Android smartphones, collectively, have surpassed the Apple iPhone and Research In Motion BlackBerry to become the leader in the U.S. market, a research firm says. Devices based on the Google OS represented a 34% share of the U.S. market in the second quarter, compared to 32.1% for the BlackBerry and 21.7% for the iPhone, Canalys reported Monday. Android smartphones soared to the top on a growth rate of 851% year to year. Driving Android sales were popular products from HTC, Motorola, Samsung, Sony Ericsson and LG. Globally, shipments of Android smartphones grew 886% in the quarter year to year, compared to 61% for the iPhone and 41% for the BlackBerry.
"The latest release of our detailed and complete country-level smart phone shipment data for Q2 2010 clearly reveals the impressive momentum Android is gaining in markets around the world," Canalys analyst Chris Jones said in a statement.
Worldwide, the smartphone market grew 64%. While the United States remained the largest smart phone market in the world, its growth rate was considerably less, reaching only 41%. U.S. shipments accounted for 23% of the global market, or 14.7 million units.,
China was the second largest smartphone market for the sixth consecutive quarter, with shipments of 6.9 million units representing 11% of the worldwide market. While Nokia smartphones based on the Symbian OS continued to dominate the market, Android vendors, such as Motorola and Samsung and local vendors Dopod, Lenovo and Huawei, achieved "promising volumes on the platform." Android went from virtually zero a year ago to hold a 7% market share in the quarter, Canalys said.
"With a population of 1.3 billion, China represents a market with enormous growth potential and Canalys expects Android to be among the platforms that will drive growth in the coming quarters and years," Canalys analyst Ty Lau said.
In the meantime, Nokia remained the leader in the worldwide smartphone market, shipping 23.8 million units, or 41% more than a year ago, to achieve a 38% share. The BlackBerry was second with an 18% share, while the iPhone was third with 13%. Source:informationweek.com
The Library of Congress made it legal, MuscleNerd showed us it was a go, and now Comex and company have delivered the long-awaited jailbreak to the fourth rendition of iPhone. According to their new page JailbreakMe, the hack works right on the iPhone 4 (or 3GS, or 3G, or iPad, or...) itself, using via the handset's Safari browser to reportedly break into most any iOS device. The servers are getting slammed pretty badly, and only a few Engadget editors have so much as seen the page pictured above so far, but rest assured we're testing this as we speak and will have more details up soon.
Update: Sorry folks, we've tried repeatedly, but apparently the servers just can't handle the load -- Comex tweets that the purple screens we're seeing are evidence of server fail. Here's hoping for a Cydia celebration when the stampede is over.
Update 2: Comex says you might want to reboot if you got stuck staring at that purple screen, and you could also try their backup server (click our second source link) to help the Dev Team divide the load.
Update 3: We successfully got the jailbreak to start working, but it crashed Safari. Upon reboot of our phone we've got... nothing but the Apple logo. Take note, this can brick your phone, so proceed with caution! Video of the experience after the break. After a reset, our phone is giving us nothing but the Apple logo. (Update to the update, the phone has been restored).
Update 4: Our intern Sam has successfully jailbroken his iPhone 4 according to this pic, so it can be done!
Update 5: Comex reports that iPads running iOS 3.2.1 aren't presently working properly, and that MMS problems after jailbreak are a known issue.
Update 6: Good news? Saurik (of Cydia fame) has pitched in to secure JailbreakMe some better hosting. Bad news? Reports indicate that FaceTime doesn't work after jailbreak, either.
Update 7: Seven updates? You bet, because it's looking like there's already a fix for the missing FaceTime and MMS features. Head on over to Redmond Pie (in more coverage below) for instructions to install the Cydia package that brought video chat back to two of our iPhone 4 handsets. If you're just downloading JailbreakMe for the first time though, you shouldn't need to do a thing, as Comex claims both have been fixed in a new version of the hack that just went live.
It’s not officially available in Ireland yet but the iPhone 4 is already getting its first firmware upgrade. According to Engadget iPhone 4 users are being prompted to upgrade to iOS 4.0.1 right this second, just weeks after iOs 4 itself became available.
The main reason for the new software is to fix the apparent software bug which over-estimated the amount of reception a user had in any given area. This – according to Apple – goes a long way to explaining why iPhone 4 users could go from full to zero bars depending on the way they hold the phone… unfortunately no software fix will be able to stop the design issue itself, however.
Apple are also due to hold a press conference tomorrow to talk about issues people have had with the new iPhone. Rumours of a product recall have been circulating but so far this looks unlikely.
As far as Irish customers go this is all meaningless. Originally given a late-July launch date there is still no word on an Irish release for the iPhone 4 (or the iPad for that matter) and the reception issues are sure to be part of the reason for the delay.
Moves by both Three and Vodafone suggest there may be some progress, however. Both are takingpre-orders online and promising the device ‘soon’, though anything more precise than that is still anyone’s guess.
The iPhone 4 should be on sale in Ireland on the Friday 30th July, if Apple CEO Steve Jobs is to be believed.
Until now Irish customers – along with those in a number of other countries – have been given nothing more than a vague ‘end of July’ time-frame and this is the first time a precise date has been officially confirmed.
At the time of publishing there was no mention of this date on the Irish Apple Store or on the websites of the various networks that will carry the phone. As mentioned before some networks are already taking pre-orders, however.
Jobs made the date announcement towards the end of his press conference on the iPhone 4′s antenna problems, which has seen reception disappear when the device is held in a certain way.
At it he accepted there were issues with the phone but contended they were not unique to Apple’s device. He said the company would offer a free case (which would stop the antenna from being interfered with) to anyone who buys the phone before the end of September and a full refund to those still not happy.
With a date now set for the iPhone 4 in Ireland next week should see the call packages of each of the three carrier networks – O2, Vodafone and Three – along with details of upgrade and purchases costs.
What is still missing is word of an iPad release date, something that was also promised in July. Given the high demand for that tablet, however, and the fact that there is still no word half way through the month, August is probably the earliest it will be seen here.
WikipediaNearly a year after Facebook Like buttons spread out across the web, Google has announced its own rival, the +1 button. It launches today as part of Google’s search engine, allowing you to “+1″ the search results and ads that you like. And in a few months, it’ll be arriving at a web site near you. 
