Ex Nintendo and Activision PR Staff Hired by Apple – Rumor

Today, we hear that Apple could be hiring some new staff. This would normally not be too exciting although this time, we hear that the staff being hired are ex Nintendo and Activision PR staff.

The Nintendo staff member is Rob Saunders who was Nintendo UK’s head of PR. It is expected that his role will be related to PR and that the work will revolve around gaming on the iOS platform. [Read more…]

Android Market Books Section Goes Live

Earlier this week, some URLs were uncovered on the Android Market that hinted we would be seeing a specific music, movies and books section. When visiting the Android Market URL and putting one of those three words on the end, the store actually loaded up whilst with other words and typos, nothing but a 404 was available.

What we see now is that the Books URL has officially gone live in that when you visit here, you are able to download books like the one from Glenn Beck pictured below for $9. [Read more…]

Angry Birds for Android to Go Paid Within the Month

Angry Birds has been available on Android smartphones for a while now. But unlike the iOS version that you need to pay for, the Android version is free. The downside is that it is supported by ads.

A number of people would prefer to pay a dollar or 2 to get rid of the ads. When asked on Twitter when an ad free version was due to launch, Rovio responded as follows

@rbtdev @thetechchat give us another month and we’ll be there

[Read more…]

Windows Phone 7 Update for Samsung Omnia 7 Disabled

You may remember yesterday that reports were appearing saying that the new Windows Phone 7 update is causing problems for the Samsung Omnia 7 smartphone.

The update being installed was a very minor update that made a few changes to the way WP7 will update in the future. However, when this process was run on the Omnia 7, it caused a few devices to be bricked, which is to say they were rendered useless due to a fault in the update.

We now hear that Microsoft has stopped the update for those running Samsung devices due to a problem being found. As soon as Microsoft [MSFT] manage to fix it, they’ll allow the remaining devices to be updated. [Read more…]

Instapaper Founder Suggests Verizon iPhone Buyers Were Existing iPhone Users

Instapaper is a popular app for iOS based devices. Due to the popularity of it, it always manages to hold a decent rank in the News category. That rank is constantly between number 2 and 5.

With the steady rank and popularity, it manages to give the owner, Marco, a good look in to various spikes that iOS devices get in sales. For example, when the iPad launches in a new country, a spike happens on Instapaper downloads. Likewise, when the NYT had a large feature in December about the iPhone, Instapaper downloads spiked (2.86 times to be exact). [Read more…]

My Lawyer Android App Launches

Allen, Allen, Allen and Allen, have created a new app for Android called My Lawyer. What this app does is provide on tap assistance for when you find yourself in an accident. It works by telling you exactly what to do in the event of an accident, such as giving details as to what information to collect, what pictures to take and who to call.

The information presented is step by step allowing you to think clearly through the situation to make sure you don’t forget anything. [Read more…]

Nintendo 3DS Teardown

The Nintendo 3DS will be launching in Japan in the next few days. Somehow, someone managed to get hold of one early to tear it down and see exactly what Nintendo have crammed inside the case.

As you might already be aware, the Nintendo 3DS has a glasses free 3D screen allowing gamers to be more immersed in the action. Unfortunately, there is no detailed breakdown of the screen other than seeing it embedded in the casing of the 3DS, but expect over the coming weeks we’ll see a more indepth breakdown in regards to the screen. [Read more…]

Nokia Allowed to Customize Windows Phone 7 Experience

We’re learning more about the Nokia and Microsoft partnership as days go on. The latest we hear it that Microsoft has given Nokia the ability to customize the OS as much as they like, in that they can completely change the look of it in a similar way to what HTC does with Sense on the Android platform.

However, it appears that Nokia wont be doing much customization and instead, will be keeping the changes to a minimum from what they say. In doing this, it will allow new updates to be rolled out quickly rather than delaying them due to too many modifications. [Read more…]

Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1 Now Official

Samsung has announced the Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1. The new Galaxy Tab has a larger screen, as the name suggests. When launched, it will run the Android 3.0 Honeycomb operating system that has been designed by Google to be especially for tablet devices.

Powering the device is a Tegra 2 processor. The screen measures 10.1 inches and has a resolution of 1280 x 800 pixels. The screen is TFT and very similar to the Galaxy Tab 7 inch model. [Read more…]

Apple Looking for iOS Photography Engineer for iPad and Mac

Apple has posted a new job listing requesting for an iOS Photography Software Engineer to join the team. The job description explains that the person will be responsible for creating software for the iPad and Mac platforms in the area of Photography. It hints at iPhoto and Aperture on the Mac platform which in turn, could be ported over to the iPad in some shape or form.

Strong skills in HTML5 and CSS are also requested which also hints at some sort of web based service for photos. In iOS 4.3, some have noted that a photo stream feature has been referenced in the Beta versions which in turn, hint that some sort of service that pulls down pictures from the web to the iPad could be a possibility. [Read more…]

White iPhone 4 To Arrive in the UK in March

We are hearing reports today that the White iPhone 4 will finally be landing in the UK next month in March. This will finally see the smartphone being made available several months after it was originally intended to arrive.

Back in June 2010, the iPhone 4 was announced and also Apple announced at the time that they would have a white version available. The white version was then delayed and delayed again and we are still waiting for it to arrive. [Read more…]

PlayStation Move Could Move to PC

The PlayStation Move could be moving to the PC from what we hear today. The PS3 motion controller is expected to become part of a project called Move Server which will see PlayStation Move games being created for the PC which in turn, will allow the Move controller to be used on the PC.

SCEA will be holding a conference this year which will be used to explain what Move Server is all about and from what we understand now, it is being designed to let developers, academics and hobbyists all work with the controller in more unique ways. [Read more…]