With Google Earth for iPhone and iPod touch, you can fly to far corners of the planet with just the swipe of a finger.
Explore the same global satellite and aerial imagery available in the desktop version of Google Earth, including high-resolution imagery for over half of the world’s population and a third of the world’s land mass.
Just tap on the App store icon on your iPhone and search for ‘Google Earth’ to get started, or
visit the iTunes Store.
Steve Ballmer himself first dropped word of this one earlier this month, but Microsoft has now finally gotten official about its new cloud computing operating system, and its name: Windows Azure. What’s more, the OS is apparently just one component of Microsoft’s larger Azure cloud computing platform, which will eventually be fully rolled out alongside Windows 7, and will encompass Microsoft’s existing Live services, SQL services, and .NET services, among other things. If that’s got you excited, you can find plenty more details at the link below, and even a few SDKs ready for downloading.
The game (and requisite instruments) was sitting on a-many of store shelves yesterday, but there’s nothing like a formal announcement to really push you to take a few hours from work and rock out this evening. There’s a variety of bundles out there ranging from the game alone ($49.99 to $59.99), the game and a guitar ($89.99 to $99.99) and the full-on band kit ($179.99 to $189.99).
The T-Mobile G1’s Google Maps Street View implementation is one of the slickest features of the first Android phone, but it looks like Apple’s going to keep feature parity — the latest builds of iPhone OS 2.2 seeded to developers have Street View, as well as the ability to give mass transit directions.
It looks like France’s SFR will be getting some tweaked variant of Aigo’s familiar P8860 Intel-based MID… with 3G on-board. The device features an 800 x 480 touchscreen display, an 800MHz Atom CPU, 512MB of RAM, 4GB of flash memory, Bluetooth, WiFi, a VGA webcam, 3 megapixel camera, and a full slide-out AZERTY keyboard (as well as some odd, circular navigation wheel). Obviously the big bonus here is the 3G connectivity, which sounds like it will be offered at €19.90 (about $26) or €24.90 ($32) per month, depending on plan. By appearances, those plans include unlimited data — though the machine translated article seems to suggest there could be some capping. The Linux-powered device will sell for €249 / $310 (€349 with a €100 rebate)
Sony got a lot of things right with its 5.0 firmware update for the PSP, with the PlayStation Store and its direct downloads making a long awaited appearance, but it looks to have caused a bit of a problem for folks with high-capacity Memory Sticks — namely, it was reporting that 8GB or 16GB cards are full when, in fact, there’s plenty of free space left on ‘em. Ever the one for a do-over, Sony now says that it’s aware of the problem and that the 5.01 firmware update will sort everything out when it’s released “soon.”
The hopes and dreams for a “summer release” have long since faded, but at least AT&T’s finally agreed to a hard date for the hotly-anticipated Bold: November 4. The news comes courtesy of the company’s earnings call — not the most obvious place to slip in news this big — but at least it’s coming straight from the horse’s mouth.
[Thanks, Joe(Engadget)]
When it was introduced two years ago, the premise of the Hybrid Dual Portable Computer was simple: mobile OS up front, Windows XP below, and ugly all over. The most recent refresh was a big visual improvement, but MIU apparently isn’t done, teasing another new version that looks far sleeker and packs an Intel Atom processor inside, though exactly which hasn’t been revealed. Beyond that, this pocket-wunderkind offers the same bevy of features as before, obviating the need for a separate nav system, PMP, e-book reader, netbook, and even in-car rear-view camera monitor. It’ll make phone calls too, and with GSM, GPRS, and CDMA connectivity, you’re pretty well guaranteed to be able to check your mail anywhere. No information on price or availability just yet, but hopefully the former stays close to the current version’s $500 and the latter extends to somewhere in North America.
Hey, turns out that people seem to like a little thing called the iPhone 3G. Apple just announced that it’s sold 6.9 million of ‘em during its financial fourth quarter, beating out the 6.1 million total first-gen iPhones sold in the previous five quarters — and beating RIM’s total sales this quarter, which Apple seems excited about. Of course, that represents worldwide availability in 51 countries vs the initial US-only launch, so it’s not totally unexpected that the numbers are up, but it means that Apple’s hit its goal of 10 million iPhones sold in 2008, which should cause some celebration in Cupertino. Apple also seems pleased with Mac sales, which are up 21 percent over a year ago to 2.6 million — more than it’s sold in any other quarter ever. All that combines with 11 million iPods sold for a total profit of $1.1 billion on revenues of $7.9 billion — that’s a lot of scratch. Still, times are tough, so Steve, do you have a seemingly-cautious statement about the US economy that also doubles as a smug shot at your competitors? “We don’t yet know how this economic downturn will affect Apple. But we’re armed with the strongest product line in our history, the most talented employees and the best customers in our industry. And $25 billion of cash safely in the bank with zero debt.”
GO APPLE!!
The Sony PSP just received a seminal firmware update. Their 5.0 iteration has brought the PlayStation Store to handhelds, a significant feature that most PSP owners will make use of to directly download movies and games. Meanwhile, illustrious PSP hacker Dark_AleX has already thwarted Sony’s new 5.0 security measures, making it safe to update without permanently losing access to precious homebrew. I might just have to dust off the old PSP to see what all the fuss is about.
