The New “Tweetie” Bird

It’s a beautiful morning. No cloud in the sky, and the birds are definitely chirping. But what’s causing this celebration for these birds in particular?

In its adventure towards ever-expanding, Twitter has just announced that it polished and launched its popular new application for the iPhone called “Tweetie”. Now called “Twitter for iPhone,” the price is dropping from the reasonable $2.99 to the even better free! Loren Brichter, the developer who also created Atebits, just joined the mobile team for Twitter, and they could not be more relieved. With his help, Twitter is also planning to launch another application with the iPad coming soon.

Jason Kincaid, writer for TechCrunch, deems this as both a surprising and unsurprising move. Twitter investor, Fred Wilson, just wrote that the developers must stop “filling holes” with Twitter’s services in order to continue its success. In doing so, this requires building entirely distinguished businesses versus same-name products. Last Friday, Twitter just launched the officially BlackBerry application so that theory just seemed to fall flat on its face.

Twitter has an extremely strong and popular presence with the iPhone platform and other Mac products, so this did not seem like an entirely earth-shattering decision. There is even a Tweetie desktop application still in the works, but strategically kept hush hush. Tweetie has been perfected to arguably be the best, but other applications still need some tweaking.

But why the change in name? Twitter CEO, Evan Williams, claims that people actually seeking the Twitter application on iTunes are not finding the name. Naturally in this fast-paced, yet lazy world, searchers give up when they find no search results for Twitter instead of pursuing “Tweetie”.

Perhaps this will expand Tweetie’s database even more!

Another ZyngaVille

As if Zynga needed another “ville” game...another one is back and projected to make millions!

Farmville, believe it or not, has over 80 million monthly users! In addition to that, Zynga has launched FishVille, YoVille, PetVille, and practically any other “ville” you can think of. As ridiculous as they may seem, there is no gimmick. These games are exactly what they portray: brainless (arguably), addicting, and definitely revenue generating.

In a nutshell, the game description is as follows: “Howdy Pardner! Let’s explore a new life on the frontier. You gotta chop trees to construct buildings, clear land to raise livestock, plant crops, and raise a family. The untamed wilderness is hazardous, but your fellow pioneers are there to help.”

Now, I’m no FarmVille expert in the slightest, but it seems as if FrontierVille is just another one of those “survive in the wilderness with your friends” games. The funny part is that it’s more than likely to be another hit.

Maybe we should all take notes and think simplistically. In this case, simple = $$ = better. The equation makes sense for Zynga!

iPhone Features Strike Again!

It seems as if almost all of the new articles coming out regarding the iPhone make me want it more and more.

The iChat feature has finally found its way into the iPhone software…sort of. Though it’s still in the developing and secretive stages, there are promising things to come for this application. The iChat feature ranges from inviting fellow friends to terminating calls. Different sources can verify that Apple is testing video chat on four different servers, three of which are hosted on Apple’s intranet and the other one open to the world.

About 30 various sources did provide more insider information to 9to5mac.com, but everyone else is keeping everything under wraps. However, Apple is strategically dropping hints in this semi-private public sphere even though the company loves to keep even the smallest bits of information in secrecy. In this World Wide Web, people are sure to find out; perhaps Apple is embracing the marketing world through the beauty of rumors and word-of-mouth to draw attention to the product.

Greg Kumparak thinks that iChat on the iPhone will not be able to compete or surface with leading third-party applications out there. But Apple may still be using parts of the iChat foundation to power the video chat service.

I’m sure we’ll hear more news in the future. Apple will make sure of that.

IPG Lab: An Overview of their Tests

Location-based advertisements? Cell phones as the major web source? Netflix powered through our phones?

Technology has come a mighty long way! Josh Levison coming to our class gave us a direct and insightful perspective on what to expect for mobile and gaming aspects in the near future.

When we first discussed cell phones as the primary engaging online tool in the next three years, my circumstance directly applied. It makes sense that more and more people are converting to the 3G networks, whether that be via the Blackberry, Android, or iPhone due to the 2-year contract upgrades (or should I say gimmicks). I guess I’m one of the suckers (60% to be exact) who has an electronic 3G device that is less than 12 months old. However, I am an exception in that do not use my wifi on my phone as much as I do with my computer.

I also learned that over the next few years, Josh predicts that our smart phones are going to come equipped with wireless keyboards, a docking station, and be set up to substitute our computers. That is completely mind-blowing, since I am a dedicated computer-user who will only typically use my smart phone for emergencies or when I have (rare) downtime.

At 80 megabits per second, the speeds are becoming faster with more space available for content. Josh stated that calling our smart phones as just “phones” is almost a disservice to the product itself, when in fact, we rely on the electronic device for so much more than that. What’s more is that it’s purposely built and capable of doing that and more.

Josh also mentioned that “appointment TV” is useless. These shows rely on people who are dedicated enough to watch a specific show at an exact time for a certain time range. TimeWarner and the other cable companies are looking to face near obstacles, especially since online television programming has a fraction of the commercials and requires less dedication or focus. As soon as subscriptions for live television become more widespread on the internet, we can all follow Clint’s actions and strategically split the cost with our friends and family!

But a great message that I noted that Karen and Josh shared was the theory that human nature does not change. Even over the past 150 years, our behavior still has similarities with the past. As we start our own businesses or start-up companies, it does not matter if we’re completely original or not. Chances are almost guaranteed that someone has thought of that same idea before or it’s already been in the works.

Just get there faster or beat ‘em to the punch!

What's all the fuss about the Apple iPad Apps?

As I entered Google Reader and perused TechCrunch's latest stories about the digital world, I felt bombarded by the sheer number of consecutive titles lauding or criticizing the Apple iPad. Even though both pros and cons are presented, all the buzz is just getting ridiculous. But at least for Apple, buzz is better than no buzz...

The iPad Apps were released live in the iTunes store before the actual launch of the tablet. With over 2,000 iPad applications, the choices are plentiful, yet overwhelming. In another TechCrunch article, it's been reported that only 20% of the iPad apps are free. According to Erick Schonfeld, here are some of the most popular free and non-free apps for the latest technical toy on the market that will be continued in subsequent blog posts:

iBooks:

Apple rivals the Amazon Kindle with iBooks, which transforms the tablet into an electronic book reader. The iBook allows readers to flip through virtual fingers with a simple touch equipped with a built-in search option and dictionary. Other features include font size/brightness adjustment, book-marked/highlighted pages, and a choice of vertical or horizontal viewing. The book store provides options just like the iTunes format with best-seller and most-popular lists, but this application definitely has its downsides. While the application is free, the actual electronic books are not. This cost could add up to big bucks depending on how much individual reading you do. While some books are free, many range in price from $9.99 to $14.99.

iPad Kindle:

Although I just described the advantages and disadvantages of the iBook application, the Amazon Kindle app has brought new and old offerings to the table. It has a full-color touchscreen, animated page-turning, font-size and brightness adjustments, vertical or horizontal options, and a direct iPad download feature once purchased from iTunes. But Amazon has a larger book selection: 450,000 compared to iBook's 60,000. Thought it doesn't have a search and dictionary function, Amazon's Whispersync technology links the Kindle, iPhone Kindle App, Blackberry, Mac, and PC together and knows what page you last left off. Luckily, the Kindle application all offers all the customer reviews from Amazon customers, so the data and information is backed by their hard-earned reputation.

The application itself is also free, but the books are also priced differently on iTunes.

Since reading comprehension is so important in school, perhaps we should all order Apple iPad's for everyone in class. And at the top of the list, it's apparent how important and vital reading is to life and society...or just how lazy Americans oftentimes are.

YouTube as Essential to our Education

Who said that YouTube was only for entertainment?

Now YouTube EDU has celebrated its 1-year-old birthday and has found a ton of success. YouTube EDU, similar to its original founding brother YouTube.com, is a collection of videos from universities and colleges all around the world. Now there are some stats to track its accomplishments.

Over 300 accredited sources contribute to the video portal with a wide-range of content from 10 different countries and 7 languages. In addition to the large amount of content, YouTube uses auto-captioning, which automatically translates English lectures to other languages.

iTunes U also plays a large factor in contributing to online educational videos. Over 600 universities and colleges, twice the amount of YouTube EDU, has over a quarter of a million free lectures, films, videos, and resources -- however, there are some major differences that favor YouTube EDU. Schools partnered with iTunes U can restrict certain content to students, while YouTube videos are public and available to everyone with computer access and internet access.

So maybe we'll all soon be watching YouTube videos during class...as an assignment from the professor...