Hello

Its been a month-ish since I started playing with applications on my glorious iPod so I thought I should round up which are proving to be the most useful and entertaining. The majority are free, which is a great start but is slightly worrying given the number of previously free apps which have recently had a price tag added by their developers. I have no doubt that apps from the big developers (Facebook, Google etc) will remain free but the chances of some of the most treasured free apps, particularly games, staying free aren’t looking good. For now though, I’ll look at apps before posting about games later.

Facebook – whatever has been said about a lack of features in the first version of this one, we’re already seeing big improvements. The ability to chat with your Facebook friends is fantastic, especially for iPod Touch owners like myself who don’t have the luxury of the iPhone’s texting app. Interface issues still need ironing out, though access to photos is great. Well worth the download – and free!

Ambiance – a new one purchased (yes, for all of £0.59!) on the back of a TUAW review, and well worth the money. I’ve always wanted a ’sound box’ to help with sleep but hated the idea of paying hundreds for a box that plays trickling water at me so this, along with my trusty £15.99 iPod speaker dock from ASDA, is a fantastic alternative and amazingly it works like a treat!

Remote – probably going to change my listening habits for good. I’ve got sick of dragging my laptop round with me or trying to plug in/find batteries for my speaker dock but Remote now comes to the rescue by letting you control your iTunes library and player from your iPod via WiFi. With the help of my previously neglected AirPort Express, imagine a Sonos system for a fraction of the price with the added ability, if you invest in a little bit of shareware called AirFoil, to stream any audio from your PC/Mac to any remote HiFi in your house. Genius – and free!

Last.fm – I’ve had an account for this for ages and never used it, until now! I’m in love with the free streaming, usually accurate recommendations of what you likely want to hear and flexibility to customise your own radio station. Very cool, particularly with a speaker dock – and a good net connection – and, of course, free!

iShape – another new one which is changing my life! Having entered a few details about weight/height/age/sex etc it calculates your BMI, optimum weight and sets you a timetable and calorie count to stick to in order to reach your goal within a specific amount of time. I’m so impressed with the way you can record and track what you eat to make sure you don’t have the wrong type or amount of food and its so easy to use! Loving it and can’t wait to see if it works! At £5.99 it isn’t the most expensive app I’ve invested in so far, but its certainly been the best value for money even after only a few days.

Not to be missed also is the new BBC iPlayer web app which is a vast improvement on the initial clumsy implementation. The design is great, the quality is fine and I’m so impressed that the BBC is really leading the way in providing decent streaming video to the iPod/iPhone. If you haven’t already tried it you really should!

Perhaps to be saved for another post are the most disappointing apps – Flickr app ‘Exposure’ (for being too obsessed with advertising) and accelerometer harnessing ‘Steps’ (for simply not working!) being two of the worst. At least I didn’t pay for Exposure, but the farce that is my £2.99 copy of Steps just shows why some developers must be thanking their lucky stars that there isn’t a try before you buy option available through the AppStore yet. Be careful of reviews in the store itself though because Apple doesn’t seem to be doing a very good job of moderating them and some are clearly being used as a clever form of marketing – as I found with iShape, the best option is to trust in Google and do a search for ‘iPhone Apps’ and the type of app you’re looking for or a specific app’s name.

Today I walked one if the Yorkshire Three Peaks. It was hell!

Ok the sun was shining and the views were breathtaking… but why oh why would anyone subject themselves to doing that on a regular basis?! Apparently some people even run up them! Sado masochists the lot of em!

Nice legs though…

Omg… I can’t begin to say how amazing this film is! Perhaps the first time that I was literally dancing in the aisles and despite a few scary moments with Hollywood actors attempting to reach some crazy notes it was well worth the £7.00!

Bloody Americans! They may make good telly sometimes but their food is really starting to annoy me. How dare they put 470 calories into a tiny pack of Oreos and then have the audacity to stock them in my vending machine at work… I’m furious!

God love the moblog! I am officially on the train and attempting to type (which the iPod just tried to autocorrect as AT&T though O2 isn’t in the dictionary… how rude!)

Anyway my rant concerns tickets. The evil conductor just made us all move down the aisle which now means that I will have to queue for a ticket at the station when I arrive. Not only will this make me ten minutes later than I already am it will also really sincerely piss me off because the chavs from Moston who got on after I did will have got theirs from the fat bastard. God I could scream sometimes!

DigitalSpy is suggesting that stocks of WiiFit will run dry by September but as a stock checking obsessive for this particular slab of overpriced yet delectable white plastic I can’t help but ask, where is it actually in stock right now?! I haven’t seen a single WiiFit available anywhere outside of a Comet-rip-off bundle at c.£100,000,000!

Well it’s finally here! My blogging has been rather sparse of late due to a post holiday and new job overload of can’t be arsed to syndrome. However now WordPress has got it’s act together and released this wonderful blogging app for iPhone/Touch I have a feeling I’ll probably be blogging a lot more!

Yes there are definitely a few issues to resolve but I’m mightily impressed with the first version and look forward to it joining Super Monkey Ball, Cube Runner, Remote et al on my home screen!

Speaking of Remote, how cool and at the same time incredibly annoying is AirportExpress?! About six hours to set up but the music streaming is a joy to behold and I can’t wait to get my hands on a couple more to link the whole house!

Lastly I’d like to say how cool are Apple for being incredibly nice at the Genius Bar thingy by giving me a brand new iPod because mine was playing up. I didn’t even buy it from Apple Retail but they handed me a shiny scratch-free one within five minutes of me sitting down! I am officially an Apple fanboy from this day forth!

God I bloody hate scanning!!

I’m in the middle of a self inflicted horror story of photo scanning having decided to scan in the family’s entire photo collection, and collate, order and restore them as I go. Bizarrely my virtually brand new scanner has proved incredibly disappointing in terms of quality and I’ve had to resort to using my ten-year-old Epson multifunction with, I think, fantastic results. I know obsessives would find flaws with the scan quality and my subsequent touching up (of the photos that is) but I’m only ever planning on storing them at full-res on my Flickr for posterity so I’m more than happy with them for now. I’m loving finding the very old and incredibly embarrassing photos though, and the one above is quite a tame example compared with several of the scarier ones. My Flickr privacy settings had better hold up!

Oh my God, this is absolute genius. Comedy Dave has just been telling Moyles listeners about the ‘large’ lady who featured in the record breaking Lucien Freud painting which has just sold for £17.2m. BBC News seem to think that she is actually referred to affectionately as ‘Big Sue’ but something obviously went wrong within ITN’s newsroom and this is the result…

Wedding Dresses + Raef… a marriage made in heaven… oh, and I’m about 30 mins behind on Sky+ again!Interesting team shake up

What on earth were those models wearing

Romantic accessories? Oo la la

Helene used to model?? I don’t think so!

Central London is near North London… err, well yeah, as near as South London presumably…

I hate Michael… a sleazy git with puppy eyes, but unattractive ones

Oh stop talking like you know what you’re going on about Michael

An effortless charm? Is he talking the piss?

No, YOU are an acquired taste!

Eugh, Helene… get her out!

Pink wedding dresses?!

Aww I like the dog

Jesus is there anything that bitch HASN’T done? I really detest Claire…

Wow a designer with an ego to match the Apprentices

Mmm I’d love to go cake shopping!

Oh shut up Michael you tit

My god those knickers are VILE!

A £95 wedding dress??

Helene is right for once… nobody would spend £1000 quid on a dress without a bit of pampering at the designer’s showroom

Noooo… big mistake I think…

I think people going to a wedding fair want a bargain, not dresses worth several thousand quid

Do you want to sell your products next to Calvin Klein or Primark? Hmm, a toughie…

Scary red dress!

God I couldn’t stay in the same room as one of those cakes overnight!

OH MY GOD!! Those dresses are VILE!!

Aww I want a cupcake!!

I can’t believe that people are still that tacky… its like watching an episode of Goodnight Sweetheart with the scary 1993 dress sense…

Oh Alex… offer yourself on a plate and they’ll sign over their credit cards!

Lee is the perfect person to sell that cheap tat!

Thank you… I said that didn’t I!

I would never buy anything from Michael… Alex is right about his telesales experience

Pushy?! More than bloody pushy!

Oh my god… I want to buy an expensive dress. Oo I know, I’ll head for the giant teddy bear…

Cupcakes on a stand? Michael just lost that one big time…

I sincerely hope Michael gets fired… I literally hate him

Aww I’m glad Alpha are winning

God love Margaret and Nick

I want Lucinda’s beret! 

Oh my god what does Lucinda look like?!!

Wow a huge victory! I’m so impressed… always loved Lucinda!

Oh for crying out loud… mind you I’d love to go and do that! The lounge is now ringing with my random yelling

Oh God love Margaret… what would we do without her

Michael is such a slimy little bastard

Alex… why does he look particularly lovely this evening

Relentless… great way of describing their sales technique

Oh noooo… that slimy little git has got through again!

Ahh well at least he’ll be off next week

Woo! I love the TV advert task! Roll on next week!

Well as a loyal (yeah right) customer of the oxygenated bubble lovers I am of course going to take notice of this one. Engadget has it via the Guardian that O2 CEO Matthew Key has confirmed the launch within the next few weeks. Rather ominously he said that when we should expect an actual launch is ‘a question for Apple’ but at least we know its almost guaranteed we’ll have a WWDC announcement. Keynote! June 9th! Woo!

Does this mean that the handheld games console will have to wait then?

 

It was sooooo cold today, particularly as I only had my shorts on!

I’m loving this Flickr video, particularly as I can blog it straight from my Flickr page. Might actually have a use for it now.

Ok, so only kind of live ‘cos I’m an hour behind on Sky+…

Liking the titles

Not impressed with the start – Gladiators intro a tad pathetic (where’s the big G?!) Can’t help but think the missing ingredient is the arena… Beat the Star’s studio is better than this and thats saying something.

Contenders don’t exactly get an impressive introduction – the crowd is crap!

God we don’t need a sob story… leave it for X Factor love

Actually found myself on the edge of my seat then… I love Panther already! Lovin’ the Britney track too!!!

That replay just highlighted why this show needs to be live – felt extremely over produced

Jesus that wasn’t good, not impressed… bloody hit her!!

This just isn’t exciting enough! Oo Spartan next tho…

Lol loving these Wii adverts!

Right hopefully the lads will be more entertaining

Liking Spartan!

Wow that was amezzin!!!

Yeah thats what we want – competitive bitching!

Oh I hate people who twirl around like that… learn a proper sport

O M G! WWWIIIICCCCKKKKEEEEDDDD!! We’re LOVIN Spartan!

Now I never liked Powerball so this will be interesting – lovin Battleaxe!

Good shot lady!

Battleaxe is running round in circles – come on love!

Really don’t like this fullscreen replay graphic

Jesus those are big fellas…

Liking that look Oblivion just gave

Either these particular girls are crap or the boys contest is gonna be so much more fun – have we got our new Wolf in Oblivion?

Hit and Run? Is this new? I can’t remember it but it looks like a goodun! Can’t decide about the water.

Oh for crying out loud – get these girls off NOW! I’d bloody love to do that one!

Oo that was bad! Right in the face!

Push em arder boys!!

The Big O… its like I’ve regressed to ten years ago

Lol look at those bloody outfits… talk about Linford’s Lunchbox

Come on girls… its like being in a Whacky Warehouse with this one

That Panther is incredible!

This is gonna be nasty

There’s a problem here. Pyramid was my favourite challenge of the night, but it used to be one of ‘the crap events’… doesn’t bode well for the rest of the series really. Lets hope the eliminator is half decent.

Reese Witherspoon! Avon? You should be ashamed of yourself…

Is Kirsty good? I can’t decide.

Aww! No big paper ‘G’ to crash though?!

Oo I hate those cargo nets

Yay the zip line is back!

What an anticlimax – knocking down big foam blocks? Whoopee shit!

I’m liking the Jamie Redknapp lookalike in the crowd…

Oo the goggles can’t help surely

That looks AGONY

Oh I’d have wanted to knock the rest of them down not just jump through the gap lol

Well that was very interesting and I’m not sure what to make of it yet. I think next week will be the decider. My first live blog was fun though!

Ok so Sir Terence of Wogan is blameless as always but I’ll make an example of him, seeing as the only show the Beeeeeb have named in connection with the latest set of phone-in scandals was the travesty which is Eurovision: Making Your Mind Up, a somewhat ironic title given the mindlessness of the concept and quality of the contenders. Anyway, it appears that £6k was squirreled away from this show alone by the premium rate phone line provider who, very interestingly, is a subsidiary of BBC Worldwide (conflict of interest my a**e). The usual rigmarole of lines not being open when the numbers were announced is to blame apparently for this and over twenty other shows with revenues of over £100k being diverted from the charitable causes which should have benefitted.

Technology has been put in place to avoid a repeat in the future apparently (err, just don’t tell people the numbers ’til you open the lines you idiots) and all money has been repaid with interest according to the BBC ‘Trust’. Oh the irony.

OMG! This could either be great news, or ridiculously awful news. Digital Spy is reporting that a Donnie Darko sequel is in the works. Fox has already secured North American distribution for S. Darko which will follow Samantha, the somewhat nondescript younger sister of Jake ‘Swoon’ Gyllenhaal’s Donnie in the original. No Jake appearance it would seem (not surprising seeing as though Donnie is supposedly dead) but maybe we’ll see sister Maggie return and hopefully the glorious Mary McDonnell too. Shooting starts this month and apparently we can count on the return of Frank the Bunny! Please let it be good!

MediaGuardian have a fantastic article on ‘the real star of The Apprentice’. This week’s ‘I think Edinburgh isn’t what it used to be’ is just classic Margaret Mountford, one of Alan Sugar’s amazing sidekicks. Not to take anything away from the lovely (and ever so slightly more media savvy) Nick Hewer whose facial expressions alone are genius.

Aww what lovely news, though I’m slightly shocked as I was under the impression Jo was like reeeeally old now. Jo has that strange way of making you feel like you’re on the phone to your aunty when you’re listening so its like a family announcement, in the least stalkerish way I assure you.

Ofcom has announced record fines for ITV of £5.675m over the phone-in scandals. About bloody time too. Apparently,estimated losses put projected fines at over £30m according to MediaGuardian, and though it has been noted that ITV donated almost £8m to charity in recognition of this, I still can’t help but think they’ve got away with blatant pilfering of our hard earned cash. Ant and Dec’s Saturday Night Takeaway is apparently the biggest offender (no wonder those pesky little midgets are always so bloody perky) though reviews of X Factor votes have shown no irregularities, which puts and end to those Rhydian conspiracy theories. At last Leon can get on with his ever so successful career in peace…

What do you mean Leon who?!

UPDATE It now appears Robbie Williams has got himself involved in the fracas. Apparently the now chubby alien lover would only agree to present an award… if his bezzy mates A&D won which led some numpty in production to assure him that the People’s Choice award, which was believe it or not being phone-voted for by the public, would be presented to A&D despite the eventual winner turning out to be Catherine ‘Hello Doctor, Goodbye Career’ Tate! The mind boggles. A&D have however now confirmed that the shiny lump of perspex is on its way back to ITV HQ as we speak… carried presumably in a diamond encrusted jiffy bag by a butler posher than Carol Thatcher.

Finally a chance to use that lovely logo! Good news on Freesat from El Reg who apparently have it confirmed that it is hoped iPlayer/Kangaroo will be available through those bored little ethernet ports within a year. This could be just the killer feature that Freesat needs as I still don’t believe anyone would be daft enough to pay good money to restrict their viewing of FTA channels to the nearest satellite dish, HD or no HD. Full telly access to VOD without the evils of Virgin Media would be wonderful, as I’ve learnt through my experiments with iPlayer on the Wii so the sooner the better as far as I’m concerned

I suggested this earlier with the rumour that .mac push email will be available with iPhone 2.0 and now TUAW has further information leading them to believe that the tired service will be getting a major revamp in time for the new firmware/hardware release. It now seems that calendar and contact support are likely also as is Windows syncing (great for us tragic wannabe-Mac-owners). Still with a suggested price tag around the £50/year mark, can Apple really expect it to compete with the Google offering? Toughie.

In other iPhone news, yet another six million countries have been promised the device ’soon’ including Latin America, Poland and Spain – my costa lovin’ uncle will be happy – adding further weight to my suggestion last night that a global launch is imminent. Woo!

Ok well it wasn’t quite like that. My favourite man in the world has criticised the Beeeeb for allowing un-DRMed content to be downloaded from iPlayer, going as far as to admit that he himself has downloaded iPhone compatible videos using the user agent exploit which, in fairness to the Beeb, I thought had been plugged ages ago. I’ll admit that I tried this trick, and to be honest if it was still available I’d probably use it again when the situation demanded. Streaming is great but now and again it would be great to chuck an episode of Have I Got News for You on the ol’ iPod for a train ride, but in its current form the only people who are likely to be pilfering content are those who would undoubtedly know where to look elsewhere online for it anyway. I can’t help but think that the pros will always outweigh the cons with iPlayer and that as a concept, it really is the future.

I was amazed to hear on The Guardian’s Media Talk  a couple of weeks ago that Channel 4’s much publicised financial loss had more to do with creative accountancy and an overspend of commissioning than it did on a desperate need for more public cash so on Stevie’s second point regarding this I’m in total agreement. This country needs a strong public service broadcaster and whilst I’m all for competition, the BBC really can’t be beaten in my opinion. I love Channel 4 and would usually be in full support, but attempting to divert funds away from the BBC is the last thing we need when its nearest rival (the thieving bast**d) is about as credible as Sky Onc on a bad day.

Just when I thought I’d got over my WiiFit obsession (I haven’t actually bought it, but often gaze at PC World’s online store in hope of a stock update) now another Wii-a-licious product is on its way. El Reg is reporting that US manufacturer Peekaboo (I’m not making this up) is readying a pole dancing game – complete with presumably Wii-remote-ready pole – for my favourite white gloss gadget. Carmen Electra is even on board apparently which makes me wonder, will this appeal more to the Cheshire housewives or their lecherous hubbies who might just have found an alternative gift idea than slutty lingerie.

Either that or we’ll have a Barbie branded pole to take on the Wii Sports Boxing Baby Fight Club special edition.

Months, well it feels like months, since I watched a very interesting video (in RealPlayer – remember that?) on BBC News about a company offering super-duper-fast broadband via fibre via sewers, its been announced that Bournemouth will be the first town in the UK to benefit from what I think is a geeeeenius idea. £30m down the drain to connect council offices (they always get in there first don’t they) and residential properties within two-and-a-half years to 100mbit/s pipes. Whoopee! No details on pricing yet, but how amazing would that be?!

On a side note, I broke the toilet seat yesterday and today I’m replacing taps. andyautomatic – your one stop shop for plumbing related news stories.

Well if we needed any more confirmation today we seem to have it. O2 (the clever chaps) have replaced their iPhone page with a notice informing those who might be stupid enough to snap up an old model that the ‘8GB & 16GB iPhone [are] no longer available’. So have O2 decided to either end their deal with Apple early, or maybe, just maybe, has someone mentioned that a shiny new iPhone will be available soon? Maybe they’ve been reading Engadget even more than me recently, though thats more than can be said for Apple retail who are still quite happily shipping the old timers to unsuspecting consumers. I can see another rebate on the horizon…

The beauty of this announcement however is that, unless Apple are happy to lose out on hardware sales for a few months, the June launch is now looking to be almost certainly global in scale so we could see the 3G beauty in stores within a matter of weeks. On the 3G score, El Reg are reporting that Apple is hiring ‘iPhone Field Validation Engineers’  in Australia, Germany and the UK. Crucially they are looking for “technical understanding and experience with GSM/GPRS, Edge, CDMA and UMTS” – yes, you read it right, UMTS. All we need now is a launch date and we’re set.

What’s that now? WWDC Keynote? Second week in June? Hmm…

Good ol’ Boris has done something which I think should have been done years ago: he has banned consumption of alcohol on London’s public transport network. There is nothing worse, particularly when you have to get the train in the evening as much as I do, than having drunks getting even further drunk whilst being stuck in the cramped hellholes that are TransPennine Express train carriages. I know its meaningless and PR hoopla, but sometimes its worth the transparent self promotion to actually get things done that people care about. So good on ya guvnor. Where on earth did that come from?

Mind you, I think its a good job Boris triumphed last week as I’m sure he’d have been jolly peeved to learn just how fabulous Brian Blessed was as last Friday’s HIGNFY guest presenter. I’ve read on many occasions this week how much people loved his performance with more than a few suggesting he’d make a great permanent host. Boris must be quaking in his little booties!

Woo! Apparently the Beeeeeeeb have confirmed that The Queen of Sheba may not be the final episode of The Royle Family after all. According to MediaGuardian, both Caroline Aherne and Craig Cash are in talks to bring the show back for at least one special episode, I should think possibly in time for Christmas if they get their skates on.

I loved The Royle Family so much, and as much as I’d have loved to have been the Denise of the family, I was of course forced into the tea making role of Anthony on almost enough occasions to merit the use of child slavery as an accurate description. One of my first ever DVD purchases was a series one box set I think though that was when box sets didn’t have to be delivered literally in a box.

Paul O’Grady is off to the Beeeeeeb according to the Sun (via Digital Spy – well I’m not likely to read it, am I?!). Producers want him to replace aging, drug fueled (in my head) Bruce Forsythe as host – does Tess honestly qualify as co-host? – of Strictly.

Part of me really wants the contract negotiations to go terribly badly as another Lily vs. ITV showdown would be just what we need!

Well that didn’t take long. Neighbours replacement Out of the Blue is being shunted off to the post Working Lunch graveyard that is BBC Two following disappointing ratings according to Media Guardian. I was at home, eating lunch and had nothing better to do on the day BBC One premiered the ‘thirtysomething-murder-mystery-half-naked-surf-athon’, but I still couldn’t be bothered attempting to get into it… all of the gloss of 60 Minute Makeover and none of the class with made Jessica Fletcher one mighty fine laydee.

Anyone for Keeping Up Appearances repeats?

But there is a very good reason why, I promise.

TUAW are reporting that the iPhone (2.0 I’m assuming) will be carried by three (count em, 3!) networks in Australia, adding to the announcement that at least two will offer it in Italy. Rumour has it that unlocked iPhones will be sold through Apple stores suggesting that no network will be getting exclusivity and giving the impression that Vodafone’s recent announcement that it will bring the wonder-phone to about a squillion different countries may simply be down to the fact that anyone will be able to buy one of em.

Should the Brits be jumping for joy at the the thought of being able to spend a little bit more than we would on a new iPod for the added benefit of a glorious phone, and crucially without having to change our pesky contracts? I’m not convinced O2 will be over the moon about that prospect, unless of course the exclusivity was just for the original and not the if-it-doesn’t-arrive-in-June-we’ll-all-have-a-heart-attack 3G update, but this seems unlikely.

Speaking of the Holy Grail, TUAW also has news that .mac push email looks likely to be available with the next firmware update, though calendar and contact syncing looks to remain as an Exchange feature. I adore Gmail, particularly with IMAP, but the thought of unified address book, calendar and email… god I need to get out more! If the rumours of a Google/Apple collaboration over the future of .mac are true however who knows what will happen.

To round off a bumper iPhone post, even MORE supposedly leaked pics of the beauty have appeared on, you guessed it, TUAW. Bearing a remarkable resemblance to the shots Engadget spied online last week, except that now its white (please, please, please – I’ve been waiting for white to be the new black again!), it certainly appeals to me more than the original. At the end of the day, a touch screen is just a big black-ish expanse when switched off so I’m looking for something inventive, such as the HTC Touch Diamond (could I switch back to WinMo… could I?) or ridiculously beautiful such as my iPod Touch. Could a more svelte frame and gloss white finish tempt me to get my wallet out… only time will tell, so hurry up June!