Archive for May 29th, 2008
Earthscape Brings Earth to iPhone
Yesterday’s demo of Windows 7 focussed heavily on multi touch. In fact, it was pretty much only about multi touch. And the only part of the demo which we hadn’t already seen on the iPhone was the rather swish Google Earth style browser. Well, it turns out that the iPhone has that, too.
Earthscape is a native iPhone application which will ship some time after the official iPhone app store goes live. In the video you can see the usual browsing conventions: double-tap to zoom in and swoosh your finger across the screen to scroll. What makes Earthscape extremely cool, though, is the use of the iPhone’s tilt sensors. It’s like a game of Marble Madness, only with the whole world to play with.
Earthscape is currently also in beta for Windows, and will be made available for OS X and Linux. It looks like a serious attempt to take a bite out of Google Earth’s market, but we’d say that, unless it brings something very different to the mix, it will last precisely as long as it takes Google to put the Earth on the iPhone. Especially since Google Earth is now available in your browser.
Google Shows Off ‘iPhone-Like’ Android Features
SAN FRANCISCO – Google kicked off its Google I/O developer’s conference here with an update on several of its Web-related initiatives and a flashy demo of its Android software for mobile devices.
A prototype phone from an unnamed manufacturer was shown running Android software during the keynote. The device featured a touch screen display and a startup screen full of colorful icons for launching programs and Web services, such as Gmail, with the touch of a finger.
A quick flick of the finger from a status bar brings up pending actions such as an imminent appointment or unread e-mail.
Andy Rubin, director of mobile platforms at Google (NASDAQ: GOOG), said some of the features were shown today publicly for the first time. Google bought Rubin’s company, Android, in 2005. The Android software is the centerpiece of the Google-led Open Handset Alliance (OHA), which aims to create an open source mobile platform for developers.
Once Android is finished, OHA’s goal is to make it available on a wide variety of handsets, giving developers, in theory, a far easier, more standardized way to distribute mobile applications.
In the demo, the touch screen features were evident as the user simply flicked his finger to go back and forth between Web pages or to access more features. Unlike the iPhone, the demo only showed touch using one finger, not multitouch. Rubin claimed multitouch isn’t a software issue but more a function of appropriate hardware and sensors that weren’t in the particular phone being demoed. He also said some Android-compatible mobile phones might use a trackball instead of touch.
The phone demoed included an accelerometer put to good use by Google. The demo showed Google’s Street View” being used along with a compass feature that let you change your view as you turned with the device. That feature got a healthy round of “oooooohs” from the packed hall of developers.
Rubin stuck to previous company statements when asked when Android-powered phones might be available to consumers. “The second half of 2008,” he said. Rubin also emphasized Android is a complete software stack with all the security and features to produce a new generation of mobile phones.
Rubin also did not rule out the possibility that Android could be adapted to run on existing phones if a phone provider or developer wanted to try that.
“I’m very impressed by what I saw,” Maribel Lopez, analyst with Lopez Research, told InternetNews.com. “The iPhone is going to continue to advance, too, so this competition is going to lead to a lot of new features. My question is, where is Microsoft? Will Windows Mobile match up?”
Google Shows Off ‘iPhone-Like’ Android Features
SAN FRANCISCO – Google kicked off its Google I/O developer’s conference here with an update on several of its Web-related initiatives and a flashy demo of its Android software for mobile devices.
A prototype phone from an unnamed manufacturer was shown running Android software during the keynote. The device featured a touch screen display and a startup screen full of colorful icons for launching programs and Web services, such as Gmail, with the touch of a finger.
A quick flick of the finger from a status bar brings up pending actions such as an imminent appointment or unread e-mail.
Andy Rubin, director of mobile platforms at Google (NASDAQ: GOOG), said some of the features were shown today publicly for the first time. Google bought Rubin’s company, Android, in 2005. The Android software is the centerpiece of the Google-led Open Handset Alliance (OHA), which aims to create an open source mobile platform for developers.
Once Android is finished, OHA’s goal is to make it available on a wide variety of handsets, giving developers, in theory, a far easier, more standardized way to distribute mobile applications.
In the demo, the touch screen features were evident as the user simply flicked his finger to go back and forth between Web pages or to access more features. Unlike the iPhone, the demo only showed touch using one finger, not multitouch. Rubin claimed multitouch isn’t a software issue but more a function of appropriate hardware and sensors that weren’t in the particular phone being demoed. He also said some Android-compatible mobile phones might use a trackball instead of touch.
The phone demoed included an accelerometer put to good use by Google. The demo showed Google’s Street View” being used along with a compass feature that let you change your view as you turned with the device. That feature got a healthy round of “oooooohs” from the packed hall of developers.
Rubin stuck to previous company statements when asked when Android-powered phones might be available to consumers. “The second half of 2008,” he said. Rubin also emphasized Android is a complete software stack with all the security and features to produce a new generation of mobile phones.
Rubin also did not rule out the possibility that Android could be adapted to run on existing phones if a phone provider or developer wanted to try that.
“I’m very impressed by what I saw,” Maribel Lopez, analyst with Lopez Research, told InternetNews.com. “The iPhone is going to continue to advance, too, so this competition is going to lead to a lot of new features. My question is, where is Microsoft? Will Windows Mobile match up?”
Google Shows Off ‘iPhone-Like’ Android Features
SAN FRANCISCO – Google kicked off its Google I/O developer’s conference here with an update on several of its Web-related initiatives and a flashy demo of its Android software for mobile devices.
A prototype phone from an unnamed manufacturer was shown running Android software during the keynote. The device featured a touch screen display and a startup screen full of colorful icons for launching programs and Web services, such as Gmail, with the touch of a finger.
A quick flick of the finger from a status bar brings up pending actions such as an imminent appointment or unread e-mail.
Andy Rubin, director of mobile platforms at Google (NASDAQ: GOOG), said some of the features were shown today publicly for the first time. Google bought Rubin’s company, Android, in 2005. The Android software is the centerpiece of the Google-led Open Handset Alliance (OHA), which aims to create an open source mobile platform for developers.
Once Android is finished, OHA’s goal is to make it available on a wide variety of handsets, giving developers, in theory, a far easier, more standardized way to distribute mobile applications.
In the demo, the touch screen features were evident as the user simply flicked his finger to go back and forth between Web pages or to access more features. Unlike the iPhone, the demo only showed touch using one finger, not multitouch. Rubin claimed multitouch isn’t a software issue but more a function of appropriate hardware and sensors that weren’t in the particular phone being demoed. He also said some Android-compatible mobile phones might use a trackball instead of touch.
The phone demoed included an accelerometer put to good use by Google. The demo showed Google’s Street View” being used along with a compass feature that let you change your view as you turned with the device. That feature got a healthy round of “oooooohs” from the packed hall of developers.
Rubin stuck to previous company statements when asked when Android-powered phones might be available to consumers. “The second half of 2008,” he said. Rubin also emphasized Android is a complete software stack with all the security and features to produce a new generation of mobile phones.
Rubin also did not rule out the possibility that Android could be adapted to run on existing phones if a phone provider or developer wanted to try that.
“I’m very impressed by what I saw,” Maribel Lopez, analyst with Lopez Research, told InternetNews.com. “The iPhone is going to continue to advance, too, so this competition is going to lead to a lot of new features. My question is, where is Microsoft? Will Windows Mobile match up?”
Google Shows Off ‘iPhone-Like’ Android Features
SAN FRANCISCO – Google kicked off its Google I/O developer’s conference here with an update on several of its Web-related initiatives and a flashy demo of its Android software for mobile devices.
A prototype phone from an unnamed manufacturer was shown running Android software during the keynote. The device featured a touch screen display and a startup screen full of colorful icons for launching programs and Web services, such as Gmail, with the touch of a finger.
A quick flick of the finger from a status bar brings up pending actions such as an imminent appointment or unread e-mail.
Andy Rubin, director of mobile platforms at Google (NASDAQ: GOOG), said some of the features were shown today publicly for the first time. Google bought Rubin’s company, Android, in 2005. The Android software is the centerpiece of the Google-led Open Handset Alliance (OHA), which aims to create an open source mobile platform for developers.
Once Android is finished, OHA’s goal is to make it available on a wide variety of handsets, giving developers, in theory, a far easier, more standardized way to distribute mobile applications.
In the demo, the touch screen features were evident as the user simply flicked his finger to go back and forth between Web pages or to access more features. Unlike the iPhone, the demo only showed touch using one finger, not multitouch. Rubin claimed multitouch isn’t a software issue but more a function of appropriate hardware and sensors that weren’t in the particular phone being demoed. He also said some Android-compatible mobile phones might use a trackball instead of touch.
The phone demoed included an accelerometer put to good use by Google. The demo showed Google’s Street View” being used along with a compass feature that let you change your view as you turned with the device. That feature got a healthy round of “oooooohs” from the packed hall of developers.
Rubin stuck to previous company statements when asked when Android-powered phones might be available to consumers. “The second half of 2008,” he said. Rubin also emphasized Android is a complete software stack with all the security and features to produce a new generation of mobile phones.
Rubin also did not rule out the possibility that Android could be adapted to run on existing phones if a phone provider or developer wanted to try that.
“I’m very impressed by what I saw,” Maribel Lopez, analyst with Lopez Research, told InternetNews.com. “The iPhone is going to continue to advance, too, so this competition is going to lead to a lot of new features. My question is, where is Microsoft? Will Windows Mobile match up?”
Google Shows Off ‘iPhone-Like’ Android Features
SAN FRANCISCO – Google kicked off its Google I/O developer’s conference here with an update on several of its Web-related initiatives and a flashy demo of its Android software for mobile devices.
A prototype phone from an unnamed manufacturer was shown running Android software during the keynote. The device featured a touch screen display and a startup screen full of colorful icons for launching programs and Web services, such as Gmail, with the touch of a finger.
A quick flick of the finger from a status bar brings up pending actions such as an imminent appointment or unread e-mail.
Andy Rubin, director of mobile platforms at Google (NASDAQ: GOOG), said some of the features were shown today publicly for the first time. Google bought Rubin’s company, Android, in 2005. The Android software is the centerpiece of the Google-led Open Handset Alliance (OHA), which aims to create an open source mobile platform for developers.
Once Android is finished, OHA’s goal is to make it available on a wide variety of handsets, giving developers, in theory, a far easier, more standardized way to distribute mobile applications.
In the demo, the touch screen features were evident as the user simply flicked his finger to go back and forth between Web pages or to access more features. Unlike the iPhone, the demo only showed touch using one finger, not multitouch. Rubin claimed multitouch isn’t a software issue but more a function of appropriate hardware and sensors that weren’t in the particular phone being demoed. He also said some Android-compatible mobile phones might use a trackball instead of touch.
The phone demoed included an accelerometer put to good use by Google. The demo showed Google’s Street View” being used along with a compass feature that let you change your view as you turned with the device. That feature got a healthy round of “oooooohs” from the packed hall of developers.
Rubin stuck to previous company statements when asked when Android-powered phones might be available to consumers. “The second half of 2008,” he said. Rubin also emphasized Android is a complete software stack with all the security and features to produce a new generation of mobile phones.
Rubin also did not rule out the possibility that Android could be adapted to run on existing phones if a phone provider or developer wanted to try that.
“I’m very impressed by what I saw,” Maribel Lopez, analyst with Lopez Research, told InternetNews.com. “The iPhone is going to continue to advance, too, so this competition is going to lead to a lot of new features. My question is, where is Microsoft? Will Windows Mobile match up?”
Google Shows Off ‘iPhone-Like’ Android Features
SAN FRANCISCO – Google kicked off its Google I/O developer’s conference here with an update on several of its Web-related initiatives and a flashy demo of its Android software for mobile devices.
A prototype phone from an unnamed manufacturer was shown running Android software during the keynote. The device featured a touch screen display and a startup screen full of colorful icons for launching programs and Web services, such as Gmail, with the touch of a finger.
A quick flick of the finger from a status bar brings up pending actions such as an imminent appointment or unread e-mail.
Andy Rubin, director of mobile platforms at Google (NASDAQ: GOOG), said some of the features were shown today publicly for the first time. Google bought Rubin’s company, Android, in 2005. The Android software is the centerpiece of the Google-led Open Handset Alliance (OHA), which aims to create an open source mobile platform for developers.
Once Android is finished, OHA’s goal is to make it available on a wide variety of handsets, giving developers, in theory, a far easier, more standardized way to distribute mobile applications.
In the demo, the touch screen features were evident as the user simply flicked his finger to go back and forth between Web pages or to access more features. Unlike the iPhone, the demo only showed touch using one finger, not multitouch. Rubin claimed multitouch isn’t a software issue but more a function of appropriate hardware and sensors that weren’t in the particular phone being demoed. He also said some Android-compatible mobile phones might use a trackball instead of touch.
The phone demoed included an accelerometer put to good use by Google. The demo showed Google’s Street View” being used along with a compass feature that let you change your view as you turned with the device. That feature got a healthy round of “oooooohs” from the packed hall of developers.
Rubin stuck to previous company statements when asked when Android-powered phones might be available to consumers. “The second half of 2008,” he said. Rubin also emphasized Android is a complete software stack with all the security and features to produce a new generation of mobile phones.
Rubin also did not rule out the possibility that Android could be adapted to run on existing phones if a phone provider or developer wanted to try that.
“I’m very impressed by what I saw,” Maribel Lopez, analyst with Lopez Research, told InternetNews.com. “The iPhone is going to continue to advance, too, so this competition is going to lead to a lot of new features. My question is, where is Microsoft? Will Windows Mobile match up?”
Google Shows Off ‘iPhone-Like’ Android Features
SAN FRANCISCO – Google kicked off its Google I/O developer’s conference here with an update on several of its Web-related initiatives and a flashy demo of its Android software for mobile devices.
A prototype phone from an unnamed manufacturer was shown running Android software during the keynote. The device featured a touch screen display and a startup screen full of colorful icons for launching programs and Web services, such as Gmail, with the touch of a finger.
A quick flick of the finger from a status bar brings up pending actions such as an imminent appointment or unread e-mail.
Andy Rubin, director of mobile platforms at Google (NASDAQ: GOOG), said some of the features were shown today publicly for the first time. Google bought Rubin’s company, Android, in 2005. The Android software is the centerpiece of the Google-led Open Handset Alliance (OHA), which aims to create an open source mobile platform for developers.
Once Android is finished, OHA’s goal is to make it available on a wide variety of handsets, giving developers, in theory, a far easier, more standardized way to distribute mobile applications.
In the demo, the touch screen features were evident as the user simply flicked his finger to go back and forth between Web pages or to access more features. Unlike the iPhone, the demo only showed touch using one finger, not multitouch. Rubin claimed multitouch isn’t a software issue but more a function of appropriate hardware and sensors that weren’t in the particular phone being demoed. He also said some Android-compatible mobile phones might use a trackball instead of touch.
The phone demoed included an accelerometer put to good use by Google. The demo showed Google’s Street View” being used along with a compass feature that let you change your view as you turned with the device. That feature got a healthy round of “oooooohs” from the packed hall of developers.
Rubin stuck to previous company statements when asked when Android-powered phones might be available to consumers. “The second half of 2008,” he said. Rubin also emphasized Android is a complete software stack with all the security and features to produce a new generation of mobile phones.
Rubin also did not rule out the possibility that Android could be adapted to run on existing phones if a phone provider or developer wanted to try that.
“I’m very impressed by what I saw,” Maribel Lopez, analyst with Lopez Research, told InternetNews.com. “The iPhone is going to continue to advance, too, so this competition is going to lead to a lot of new features. My question is, where is Microsoft? Will Windows Mobile match up?”
apple store closes early for iphone 3G advert
Apple’s 24-hour flagship 5th Avenue retail store in Manhattan is in the process of shutting down for the night. Apple’s retail page reflects the temporary shutdown:
Please note we will be temporarily closed Thursday, May 29 at 3:00 p.m. and will reopen Friday, May 30 at 9:00 a.m. During this time, please visit one of our other two Manhattan locations.
Employees are telling passersby that a commercial is being shot at the 5th Avenue Apple store. We’ve been told that Apple’s 5th Avenue store has only been entirely closed twice in its history: the iPhone launch and the Leopard launch.
According to our sources, Apple is actually filming a commercial for the upcoming 3G-capable iPhone with filming to occur inside and around the 5th Avenue store.
BioShock coming to iPhone
IG Fun has taken on the challenge, as we’ve previously reported. But today I bumped into the company’s CEO Sean Malatesta at the BREW 2008 show.
He had some footage running on a BREW handset of that version of the game, but also revealed that IG Fun wants to bring the game to iPhone too, as well as Symbian.
Meanwhile, he said the company is working on a 2D version for handsets that can’t handle the full 3D game.
But back to that BREW demo. It was non-interactive, but Malatesta said the visuals were being rendered on the handset itself (i.e. it wasn’t just a video).
The demo included some spooky cut-scenes that indicate IG Fun is squeezing the most out of the BREW platform in terms of visuals.
Meanwhile, the snatch of gameplay footage looked spectacular, too – certainly not worth sniffing at, even if you’re a hardcore fan of the original game.
The real questions are over controls (will the game be intuitive to play on a mobile keypad?) and on whether IG Fun can successfully translate the original’s atmosphere to the small screen.
It’s way too early to tell that from this demo. But from what I could see, IG Fun is certainly pulling out all the stops. And the iPhone version could be even better.