If you’ve been on the hunt for an app to replace Apple’s Clock app, Timegg for iPhone is a beautiful choice. It features a very stylish, easy to use UI and allows you to set up to 8 custom alarms, 8 custom timers (with intervals), due date reminders, and interval reminders.

When you first open Timegg, the interface is overlaid with help on how to use the app. It’s very informative and is easily accessible for future reference.

At the top of the screen, you’ll see the settings for the currently selected timer or alarm. Below that, you’ll see a big dial with all the cost alarms, timers, or reminders inside. In each corner, you’ll see an icon that represents each of the alarm types: Reminder, Alarm, Timer, and D-Day. You can also swipe along the top to switch between categories, if you prefer. In the center of the dial is a giant ON/OFF button that lets you enable/disable the currently selected alarm. If an alarm is set to off, holding your finger down on the circle associated with it will pop up options to edit or delete the alarm.

The alarm in Timegg can be customized to go off on any combination of days of the week. For example, I have one alarm for Monday-Thursday, one for Friday, and a third one for Saturday and Sunday. With each alarm, you can also choose if you want to have the ability to hit snooze. You may want to turn snooze off for alarm that are not intended to wake you up.

The sound options include with Timegg are nothing amazing. Most of them are really annoying. I prefer to wake up to something that doesn’t want to make me throw my iPhone against the wall, but Timegg doesn’t provide many such options. The makers of Timegg must really like animal sounds, because out of 16 provided sounds, 6 of them are of birds, cows, dogs, and ducks. As far as I’m concerned, all 6 of these sounds are worthless. Every alarm is also required to have a sound. There isn’t a vibrate-only option.

The timer options in Timegg are very nice. You can set up to 8 presets for the things you time often. For example, I have one timer created and labeled for coffee, and another for laundry. With each timer, you can give it a label and also set an interval timer. For example, you can set an timer to go off in 1 hour, followed by 4 more timers every 10 minutes.

Timegg uses the term “D-Day” to refer to due date alarms, so don’t confuse this with the Invasion of Normandy during WWII. A D-Day alarm is simply an alarm that reminds you of an important date (like your anniversary) one, seven or fifteen days before it arrives. Unfortunately, you can only set one alert for each D-Day.

Reminders in Timegg are actually rather disappointing. The reason is because you can’t set a reminder for a specific time or day. The way that reminders work is that you set it up to remind you about something in intervals of 1 hour, 1 day, 1 week, 1 month. The countdown will start as soon as you set the reminder. You’re better off using Apple’s Reminders app, instead.

The Good

• Stylish
• Set up to 8 alarms
• Preset up to 8 timers
• Set alarms for important dates 15 days, a week, or a day in advance
• Can disable/enable snooze for each individual alarm

The Bad

• Reminders must be set as a countdown. Reminders in general could us a lot of work.
• Not a wide variety of alarm sounds
• Sound effects (navigational) are audible even when iPhone is on silent
• Alarm, due date, timer, or reminder must be set to OFF in order to edit or delete
• Every alarm must have a sound. No vibrate-only option.

The Conclusion

Timegg is a great iPhone app for setting alarms and timers. The UI is gorgeous and very easy to use. Unfortunately, the reminders are essentially useless and have less features than Apple’s Reminders app. Due date options are also very limited. But if you’re looking for great alarm and timer settings that are better than Apple’s Clock app, Timegg does a satisfactory job at just a buck.

I should also mention that Timegg must be running in the background in order to work. So if you want to rely on Timegg to wake you up in the morning, double check that it’s running. If you have to turn off your iPhone for any reason (including resets), you must re-open Timegg. This is a condition of the iOS SDK and is out of the developers’ control.

$0.99 – Download Now

If you’ve got a blown or distorted speaker, or the bottom mic isn’t working on your Verizon or Sprint iPhone 4, you may need to DIY replace the speaker assembly. Luckily, this is one of the easier repairs to perform on your own. It’s also a lot cheaper than paying for a replacement if you’re out of warranty.

Disclaimer: As with any repair, neither iMore nor PXLFIX can be held responsible for any damage you may do to your device. It's also worth considering that opening up your device to perform any repair or modification can and will void your Apple warranty. If you don't feel comfortable opening your device, don't. Use extreme care and caution when performing a repair on any device.

What you need for a DIY CDMA (Verizon or Sprint) iPhone 4 speaker assembly replacement

PXLFIX recommends using only quality and genuine parts from a reputable supplier like eTech Parts. They have quality parts, tools, and much more for all your repair needs. We’ve linked to the part you need below but feel free to order parts from another source as well. Just verify they have high quality parts and not knock-offs.

• CDMA iPhone 4 (please note there ARE internal differences between the GSM and CDMA models – this guide strictly deals with the CDMA model – in the US, that means Verizon or Sprint)
• Replacement speaker assembly – CDMA iPhone 4 speaker assembly
• #00 Phillips screwdriver
• Pry tool or spudger
• Security screwdriver (to remove the 2 screws in your dock connector, all CDMA models will come with security screws)

Power off your iPhone 4

Before performing any repair, always power off your device before removing any screws or parts.

Remove the back

1. First remove the bottom 2 dock connector screws in your iPhone 4. Use your five point security screwdriver for this as all versions of the CDMA iPhone 4 have security screws in the dock connector.

2. To remove the back simply slide the back upwards and lift it off gently.
3. Set the back and 2 dock connector screws aside.

Organize your screws

It’s very important to make sure you remember where you are pulling screws from, so place them in an arrangement that you’ll understand and remember. I normally lay them out the same way every time I disassemble a device so I remember where they came from and how they go back in. They’re all different sizes so trying to figure out where they go if you get them mixed up probably won’t be fun.

Remove the battery

1. To remove the battery you'll need to remove the #00 screw holding the battery clip in place. Remove this screw located to the bottom left of the battery.

2. The metal clip on the battery is what clips the battery to the logic board. You'll need to pop this clip up with your plastic pry tool. Simply stick the end of your pry tool underneath the clip and gently pull upwards until it unfastens from the logic board.

3. To remove the battery, I do not recommend using the plastic pull tab. There is quite a bit of adhesive underneath the battery and the tab will normally just rip off or you can bend the battery. Instead, run your pry tool along the right side of the battery and break the adhesive that way. Once the battery is free from the adhesive, you can pull the battery out of the phone. There are no other connectors holding it in.

4. I typically fold the plastic tab over while working on the iPhone 4 to keep it out of the way while I’m disassembling parts. It’s not necessary but convenient.

Remove the grounding clip

To the left of where you disconnected the battery you’ll see another screw holding in a grounding clip over the antenna. We’ll need to remove it.

1. Unscrew the one screw holding the grounding clip in place with your #00 Phillips screwdriver.

2. Gently lift the grounding clip out of the device. It’s very tiny as you can see above. Take care not to misplace it or lose it.

Remove the dock connector shield and disconnect the cable

1. There is a shield held on with two screws covering the dock connector cable. Remove the two screws holding it in place and set the shield and screws aside, remembering where they came from. (They are labeled as screw 1 & 2 in the photo above.)

2. Next, use your pry tool to pry up the actual dock connector cable. Be careful as there is adhesive holding the cable in place as well. Peel back the adhesive gently to free the cable.

Unclip the antenna from the logic board

Underneath where you removed the grounding clip, you’ll see a tiny circular cable. This is your antenna cable. You’ll need to unclip it from the logic board.

1. Take the edge of your pry tool or spudger and gently pry up the circular head to detach it from the logic board.

2. You’ll notice the cable is wound around some metal brackets. Just gently guide it out of the brackets with your pry tool and finger. It’s attached to the speaker assembly. Once you’ve finished unwinding it from the brackets, you can leave it where it is for now.

Remove the speaker assembly

1. To remove the speaker assembly you have two #00 screws to remove. They sit to the right and the left of the speaker assembly. The left screw will have a tiny triangular shaped plastic spacer under the screw. Set it aside with the screw as well for re-assembly. If you lose this, your speaker assembly will not sit correctly.

2. Gently lift the speaker assembly out of your device and set it aside.

Place the cellular antenna on the new speaker assembly

Remove the 2 screws holding the cellular antenna down and peel it off the speaker assembly. From here you can apply cellular antenna to the new speaker assembly. Replace the 2 screws on the new speaker assembly to secure it.

Reassemble your iPhone

To re-assemble your CDMA iPhone 4, you can check out our video re-assembly walkthrough above. For a speaker assembly, just forward through to the point where you need to re-assembly.

And… done!

If you followed the above steps correctly you should now have a working loud speaker and/or mic. Now’s the time to give yourself a big pat on the back and let us know how it went! Want to know how to perform another type of iPhone repair or modification? Send me suggestions to ally.kazmucha@imore.com or leave them in our Mod & DIY forums via the link below.

For questions or to inquire about mail-in repairs through PXLFIX, please follow us on Twitter, like us on Facebook or e-mail us directly! Of course, you can like us and follow us just because you think we’re cool too!

Additional Resources:

• How to DIY replace a GSM iPhone 4 speaker assembly
• How to replace an iPhone 4 battery
• Even more DIY repair guides
• Mod & DIY forums

A recent survey by UK-based online casino, RoxyPalace, found that 11% of single men would prefer to have a new iPad rather than a new lover. In fact, 3% would even be willing to leave their current partner for the latest iOS tablet. Meanwhile, 84% of women said they would stick to their companion, and “only a small percentage” would be willing to trade them for a new iPad.  4% of respondents would make the trade for something other than an Apple tablet – sorry Android, iOS beats you on the seduction front. The survey also examined iPad usage when it comes to romance. 44% had used an app to solve relationship problems, 15% consulted the internet for advice, and 71% would prefer to call someone over FaceTime before going on a first date.

While I wouldn’t exactly call a casino a steadfast source of empirical research, the results are still pretty interesting. It’s a classic “what would you do for a Klondike bar?” situation, except this Klondike bar costs over $500, and satisfies a lot more than your sweet tooth. Then again, so does a loving (human) partner. While not many of us would be willing to admit to being that one in ten that would pick an iPad over a girlfriend, do you personally know someone who would make the trade?

Source: Macworld

The best iOS podcast in the ‘verse returns tonight to talk all the latest iPhone and iPad news, how-tos, and app and accessory reviews. Come join us!

Want to go full screen? Head to iMore.com/live. Want to watch via iPhone or iPad? Grab the Ustream app and search for “mobilenations”!

Draw Something, the super-popular iPhone, iPod touch, and iPad app that lets players take turns guessing each others — often comically bad — pictures has been updated with a crayon box full of new features.

In addition to more words to guess, you can now “say something” by commenting on drawings. That’s right — no more need to sarcastically scrawl your trash talk by hand before getting on with your own drawing.

You can also “share something” by posting your drawings directly to Facebook or Twitter. Buh Buy manual screen shots and uploading! (Not that we were trying to get our friends and followers to help us guess, of course…)

“Save something” lets you keep copies of your favorite drawings, or all your drawings, for posterity. Again, without the need for a manual screenshot.

The eraser will finally get a rest with “undo something” so you can make your last line nothing more than a memory.

And “refresh something” lets you use the popular pull-down technique to make sure you have the latest turns ready and waiting for you.

There don’t appear to any major changes to the core interface, which could certainly use them from a design-perspective (though that’s never come in the way of their success). The now Zynga-owned property promises more updates in the future, however, so we’ll keep that hope alive.

Both the paid, $0.99 and the free version of Draw Something have been updated.

Have you tried out the new Draw Something yet? If so, let us know how you like the new features and make sure you jump into the iMore Forums so you can swap usernames and get your drawing on against other members of the iMore nation!

• Read our Draw Something review

$0.99 – Download now

Free – Download now

Logitech has just announced what may very well be the most nicely-designed Bluetooth iPad keyboard to date. While many keyboard accessories have tried turn turn the iPad into pseudo-laptop with an extended case or folio, Logitech’s Ultrathin Keyboard Cover makes use of the iPad’s built-in magnet mounts to securely cover the screen when not in use. When deployed, the iPad rests nicely in a groove above the keyboard, but when connected and closed, the keyboard sits plumb against the iPad screen, and looks like a really nicely unified laptop. The keyboard’s backing and profile nicely match the iPad, and it puts the iPad to sleep when closed just like a regular Smart Cover.

While I’m not sold on tablets replacing laptops just yet, I love physical keyboards, and for anyone that needs to do a lot of writing while on the move, some kind of Bluetooth keyboard for the iPad is indispensable. What have your experiences been like with iPad keyboards? Are they big and comfortable enough? Are they worth the added bulk?

$99.99 – Pre-order now

We had a chance to sit down and talk to Pocket’s (formerly Read it Later) founder, Nate Weiner, and developer Max Weiner about their recent re-branding and the transition from a read-later service to a read-, watch-, and generally enjoy-later powerhouse. With a newly redesigned app, continued cross-platform focus, and business model that includes giving the app away from free, it’s a huge gamble for Pocket.

Doing a great app on iPhone and iPad is challenging. Doing a great app on iPhone and iPad and the plethora of Android devices Pocket decided to support is a huge challenge. But we live in a cross-platform world where Android phone users might have an iPad, or iPhone users might have a Kindle Fire, and being able to read the content you want on the device you want, when and where you want is hugely important. So, Pocket is doing an incredible amount of heavy lifting to make sure their users can just launch the app, tap, and never have to think twice about it.

Watch the video above for the full interview, and check out Leanna’s authoritative Pocket review for everything you need to know about the iPhone and iPad app.

Will the next generation iPhone 5,1 switch from glass and stainless steel to something infinitely more cool — Liquidmetal? Who know, but that’s what’s making the rumor rounds this morning. It’s easy to see why: Apple purchased perpetual, exclusive consumer electronic rights to the sci-fi sounding substance years ago but, a single-issue SIM-removal tool aside, hasn’t done much with it yet. Even after Liquidmetal announced they were shipping commercial parts a few months back, we’ve yet to see or hear much of anything when it comes to iPhones or iPads.

The T-1000 in Terminator 2 made the term “liquid metal” famous as a mimetic poly-alloy that let a Robert-Patrick looking robot morph shape and turn his arms into blades. This isn’t that liquid metal, of course, but it still has several desirable characteristics. Namely, Liquidmetal is strong, highly resistant to corrosion, wears well, and can be moulded in a similar way to thermoplastics.

The original iPhone had an aluminum back with a plastic strip along the bottom. The iPhone 3G and iPhone 3GS had (and have) full plastic backs. The iPhone 4 and iPhone 4S have chemically treated glass backs with stainless steel antenna arrays.

Could the current stainless steel antenna array be replaced or reinforced by Liquidmetal? Could the glass back be replaced by something that somehow involves Liquidmetal (yet remains radio friendly)?

While it’s only been on the market for a couple of years, there don’t seem to be any widespread reports of stainless steel causing problems for the iPhone 4 or iPhone 4S antenna. The glass back, however, looks great but isn’t as crack-resistent as some users would like.

The next generation iPhone could potentially include a new casing design, and other new features like LTE and perhaps a slight variance in screen size. What role Liquidmetal could play in enabling any of that remains uncertain.

So, for now, this is a fun rumors about a cool sounding technology, and nothing more.

Source: ETNews

Greenpeace recently released a report detailing how ecologically friendly different cloud service providers were in their data center operations, and Apple ranked 15.3% on their clean energy index. The index is built on criteria such as reliance on coal and nuclear energy, transparency in energy usage, and use of renewable sources. Google, by comparison, reached 39.4%, while Microsoft scored 13.9%.

Following the report, Apple has disputed Greenpeace’s estimates, claiming that their data center would use 20 million watts maximum, while Greenpeace ballparked usage at 100 million watts. Apple also added that they’re building a solar panel array and fuel cells powered by organic emissions, which should significantly contribute to their electrical demands at a data center in North Carolina.  Despite refuting their claims, Greenpeace stuck to their guns, and even had Amazon’s chief web engineer estimate that Apple’s new $1 billion, 500,000 square-foot data center would use at least 78 million watts. Greenpeace says that the renewable sources being built by Apple will only handle 10% of the energy demands.

Greenpeace has never ranked Apple particularly well in their rankings of electronics manufacturers, while Apple has a put a concerted effort into promoting their eco-friendly image. Apple obviously has a vested interest in proving that they’re mindful of the environment, but most of their case studies relate to manufacturing materials and battery efficiency, not necessarily power usage for iCloud data centers.

How much does eco-friendliness factor into your decision to buy electronics? I can’t imagine too many people think about data center energy consumption when signing up to cloud services, but maybe we should be. Here’s the full report, if you want to take a gander. Page 38 goes into the specifics of their clean energy index rating.

For today only the iMore iPhone Accessory Store has the Aduro Slider Keyboard Case on sale for only $38.95. That’s a whopping 57% off! Get them before they’re gone!

• Shop Aduro Slider Keyboard Case now!

If you’re looking for an easier way to type your notes, emails, and texts while providing sufficient protection for your iPhone at the same time, look no further than the Aduro Slider Keyboard Case.

The Aduro Slider Keyboard Case combines convenience with protection in this all-in-one case. Featuring a slide-out backlit keyboard along with a hardshell plastic case, this combo allows you to easily manage your busy lifestyle without carrying around a separate keyboard.

The keyboard utilizes a built-in rechargeable battery that can be powered with the included USB charging cable. There’s access to the iPhone camera and all ports of the device.

Features:

• Slide out backlit keyboard
• Hardshell plastic case
• Built-in rechargeable battery
• Includes USB charging cable
• Access to camera and ports
• Convenient for emails, texts, and notes

Debt Snowball+ for iPhone utilizes the snowball method of paying off debts to help eliminate them faster and cut down on the amount of interest paid over the life of a loan. If you need a quicker way to pay things down, or feel as if you’re paying on loans and just aren’t getting anywhere, apps like Snowball+ like this can help you set attainable goals within your budget.

Choose which method of debt snowballing you'd like to use. You can also view how applying additional payments will affect the life of the loan and how much money you can save.

For those not familiar with how debt snowballing works, it is based on the concept of paying something off and using that payment amount to apply towards another debt once it is paid off. You start by choosing whether you’d like to pay large debts off first or smaller ones. Typically, paying off smaller debts first will free up money quicker to apply towards larger debts but paying off larger debts first tends to save you more money as you’re most likely not paying as much interest. Whatever method is right for you is what you should use.

Choose a category of debt you'd like to track and pay off - then enter the details of the debt in order for Debt Snowball+ to track it and help you pay it off quicker.

Debt Snowball+ allows you to enter your debt information into the app and categorize each one accordingly. You can set up payment reminders and record additional payments you decide to make. Once all your information is input you can tap on your total debt amount at the top to receive some interesting information. Move the slider up and down or key in amounts to see how much making an additional payment will save you money and time wise.

Once a debt is paid off in full, the concept is that you will then apply the amount you were paying towards the debt that is now paid off to the next debt in line. In essence, you can just pretend you still have the same amount of debts to pay, you’re just applying more to each debt as you knock other debts out.

Use the app to determine how much money you can save if you add additional payments. Also record and track payments to see how snowballing your debt is helping you pay things off faster and more efficiently.

I’ve found Debt Snowball+ to be a great way to track debts on an ongoing basis as well as an easy way to calculate how much to apply in extra payments if you’ve got some extra coin laying around. I don’t really use the reminders within the app as I’ve already got calendar alerts set up for bills in the default calendar app. I’m assuming most other people will too so that feature seems a bit redundant.

The good

• Great way to track debts
• Easily calculate extra payments

The bad

• Reminders may be redundant

Conclusion

If you’re looking for a good way to pay off debts quickly and need something that’ll help you be a bit more conscious about your debt to income situation, Debt Snowball+ is a nice way of getting an overall picture of your situation so you can make an educated decision of what snowballing method will work best for you.

$0.99 – Download Now

Brent Schlender, a veteran journalist that has been covering Apple for the last 25 yeras, has recently published new snippets of interviews with Steve Jobs. One quote in particular from 1998 sharply counterpoints recent rumours of a full-blown Apple TV set.

I don’t really believe that televisions and computers are going to merge. I’ve spent enough time in entertainment to know that storytelling is linear. It’s not interactive. You go to your TV when you want to turn your brain off. You go to your computer when you want to turn your brain on. Those are not the same thing.

At the D5 conference in 2007, Jobs explained why the Apple TV wasn’t anything more than a hobby, and again in 2010 that there wasn’t a viable go-to market strategy that wouldn’t produce “just another TiVO”.

That’s not to say Jobs didn’t want to try to make a great TV set; his official biography cited Steve Jobs as saying that he had “finally cracked” a solution that would avoid all of the disconnected experience with cable providers and peripherals like DVD players. With Jobs gone, maybe Apple will be able to pursue its ambitions in television more freely. After all, the latest update to Apple TV sported a user interface that Jobs vetoed, so that shows some added amount of flexibility — but that doesn’t necessarily mean that it will be done right or be the right thing to do.

Then again, 2012 or 2013 isn’t 2010, 2007, or 1998. As is often cited, Steve Jobs at one point said no one wanted to watch video on an iPod, or read books, and that Apple wasn’t making a phone. Times and go-to-market conditions change.

Ikea recently launched their own integrated TV set solution (see the video, below), which I think looks great. Could Apple do something similar? What would your ideal Apple TV look like? How much overlap should there be between TVs and computers?

Source: Fast Company

FireCore has released another update to its hugely popular software for jailbroken second generation Apple TV’s (2010, 720p version). The new 1.5 release includes a revamped video player which claims to improve playback performance of most video file types.

Today we’re happy to release a brand new version of aTV Flash (black) which includes a revamped player that is optimized for iOS 5.0 and later. This new player improves performance for virtually all file type resulting in noticeably smoother playback. We’ve also baked in a number of other goodies including NFS streaming, subtitle timing settings, additional translations and a mountain of other improvements and fixes.

Still nothing concrete on the release of a jailbrealk for the latest Apple TV (2012, 1080p version) or an untethered jailbreak for the Apple  TV 2 running iOS 5.1. FireCore says that it is still working hard on both fronts but its is still too early to give an estimate on the release date.

If you're looking for the full change log, you'll find it below. If you really don't need the full details and just want to get yourself updated, version 1.5 is available now from the Firecore website. If you’re already running a version of aTV Flash (black) the new 1.5 version can be installed through the Maintenance –> Manage Extras menu.

Need help jailbreaking your Apple TV 2? If so, be sure to check out our full how-to guide.

Source: FireCore

Full Changelog

• Revamped player with improved performance (AppleTV 4.4 and later)
• Added NFS streaming
• Added Catalan, Czech, Korean and Traditional Chinese translations
• Added support for localized TV show pattern: TV Show/Season #/S##E##.extension
• Added manual subtitle time correction (-10.0s to +10.0s)
• Added support for embedded .FLAC cover art
• Added support for .AC3, .DTS and .MOD files
• Improved .EYETV file handling
• Improved audio synchronization in slow and unstable networks
• Improved slideshow operation with small images
• Improved movie folders detection logic to ignore hidden files
• Improved metadata fetching to support movies split into multiple files (dvd#, cd#, disk#)
• Improved zoom mode operation for non-square pixels
• Improved DVD menu handling
• Improved .OGG file handling (now correctly treated as audio)
• Improved error handling for connection issues
• Improved buffering logic
• Improved installation routine
• Other minor UI improvements
• Resolved format detection that was causing rare playback issues
• Resolved issue with volume level resetting during rw/fw
• Resolved floating crashes usually observed when using SMB with Windows 7 shares
• Resolved conflicts with XBMC related to SMB
• Resolved issues with metadata fetching for ‘Show.Name.###.extension’ pattern
• Resolved crashes observed in folders with significant number of files
• Resolved playback error on DVD and ISO files observed when file path contains ‘?’ character
• Resolved crashes when working with long file paths
• Resolved rare issue with incorrect pre-playback screen layout
• Other miscellaneous bug fixes

Time Magazine has named Apple CEO Tim Cook one of the most influential people of 2012, and the prose accompanying the listing were written by none other than Apple board member and former Vice President of the United States, Al Gore.

It is difficult to imagine a harder challenge than following the legendary Steve Jobs as CEO of Apple. Yet Tim Cook, a soft-spoken, genuinely humble and quietly intense son of an Alabama shipyard worker and a homemaker, hasn’t missed a single beat.

Fiercely protective of Jobs’ legacy and deeply immersed in Apple’s culture, Cook, 51, has already led the world’s most valuable and innovative company to new heights while implementing major policy changes smoothly and brilliantly.

He has indelibly imprinted his leadership on all areas of Apple — from managing its complex inner workings to identifying and shepherding new “insanely great” technology and design breakthroughs into the product pipeline.

You can read the rest via the link below. Tim Cook had assumed a lot of the functional of a traditional CEO at Apple long before Steve Jobs’ passing. As much as Apple is held in the highest of esteem as a design company, Cook is heralded as the man who figured out how to make those designs better and more cost effectively than ever before. As much as Steve Jobs and Jony Ive envisioned revolutionary products, Cook and his team forged a revolutionary production system.

Apple still has to conceive of fantastic new products, but with Cook at the helm, once they do they don’t have to worry about building them. Apple may have lost the best conceptual guy in the business, but they still have the best operations guy.

Other prominent technologists on the list included Facebook’s Sheryl Sandberg and the always getting richer Marc Andreessen. (No Googlers, Tweeters, or Microsoftians, far as we could tell.)

Source: Tim

Apple has approved an app called Bluetooth OnOff that simply allows you to turn your Bluetooth connection on and off from your home screen. Apple hasn't previously permitted any apps that connect and interact to stock settings until now; so this is an interesting development.

Did it take too many steps just to turn on/off bluetooth? You can now turn on/off just by launching this app. Just in a second, you can activate or deactivate Bluetooth.

The app is extremely simple to use, once installed you have an icon on your home screen. If you click on it, a screen loads with a Bluetooth toggle switch, you can then turn Bluetooth on. If Bluetooth is already turned on then loading the app will give you the option to turn it off. The best way of using the app is to go into the apps settings and turn the OnOff switch to on. This enables you to now toggle Bluetooth On / Off from your home screen with one tap of the app icon.

Shortcuts similar to this were very popular when iOS 5 was initially launched. You could use Safari Bookmarklets to add various on/off settings to your home screen. This type of interaction was broken by Apple with the release of iOS 5.1.

It is very interesting that this app is now available but we don't know if it is a mistake by Apple. It may be pulled at any minute or it could be a sign that Apple is prepared to allow apps that make its users life easier. Let's be honest, turning systems settings on and off should not be anywhere near as tedious as it is now.

I hope that Apple finally addresses this problem with iOS 6. In the meantime let's see if this app stays in the App Store. Maybe we will start to see more approved apps that allow us to toggle Wi-Fi and other system settings too.

$0.99 – Download Now

Oracle, the 2 ton mutant gorilla of enterprise data software, once considered buying BlackBerry or Palm in order to take on Apple’s iPhone and Google’s Android in the smartphone space. No. Seriously. Unfortunately, Oracle CEO — and former Apple board member and long-time Steve Jobs friend — Larry Ellison decided against it. I say unfortunately because, while I can’t imagine Oracle achieving anything inspired with either BlackBerry or Palm, it would have been incredibly interesting to watch them try. Gary Busey on Celebrity Apprentice interesting.

If the future really is mobile, right now only Apple and Google are positioned to own that future (though Android’s open source nature means there could end up being hundreds of Android forks from the likes of Amazon, carriers, even Oracle itself).

BlackBerry was even later to the modern mobile party than Microsoft, and Microsoft was plenty late. HP and their brutally incompetent board of directors squandered what could have been a brilliant future for webOS.

But oh, what could have been…

Source: Reuters via CrackBerry

Put all the articles, videos, and pictures that you can’t get to now, right into your Pocket so you can enjoy them later

The service formerly known as Read It Later has been updated with a new look, a new name, and a new price — it’s called Pocket, and it’s free! With Pocket, you can save articles, photos, videos, and just about anything you encounter on the web and social networks for offline viewing at your leisure and convenience, on your iPhone, iPad, or other devices.

The new layout on the iPad has a collage-sytle interface that gives spotlight to the images associated with the articles you save. It’s very pretty and especially nice for users who plan to save a lot of images (from, say, Flickr) to their Pocket account. But this layout comes at the expense of informational density. Images take up more space than words, after all. So, Pocket also has a list view. This list view also displays small thumbnail images with each item, but it’s a lot more condense than the other view. It’s also the only view available on the iPhone. Personally, I really like seeing the images, but I’m sure there are users that would prefer a concise, text-only list — which is not available.

You can sort your saved items in Pocket by articles, videos, or images, and you can also choose to allow Pocket to decided the best view to download for each item. In Article View, all the ads and sidebars of the original website are stripped away, leaving just the content of the article. It looks very nice.

If the saved item is not an article, Pocket will display the content in its original web view. Unfortunately, not all website articles are correctly being registered as articles by Pocket and default to Web View.

When viewing an article, there are options to adjust the font size and type, screen brightness, and toggle night time reading mode. Unfortunately, there are only two fonts to toggle at this time.

The Good

• Beautiful design
• New layout displays images and short excerpts of saved items
• Condensed list view with thumbnails available
• Sort by articles, videos, images, or all items
• Adjust font size
• Night reading mode
• Supported by hundreds of apps

The Bad

• Only two fonts
• There isn’t a simple list view without images available
• Doesn’t always recognize articles as articles

The Conclusion

Pocket is a great way to save content from the web for viewing at a later time. The interface is both functional and pretty while still being extremely simple to use. It is also already supported by hundreds of apps (most of which still refer to the service as “Read It Later”, but that should change quickly). Now that it’s free, there’s no reason to at least give it a try!

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