Have you ever jailbroken an iPhone? Ever used a software solution to “unlock” the iPhone’s SIM slot, freeing it from the shackles of its original carrier? Chances are, the iPhone Dev Team had something to do with it. This group, made up of some of the iPhone development scene’s finest minds, spends countless hours tearing apart the iPhone to make it do all of the things Apple won’t allow – and then figures out a way to make it work for everyone. It’s tough, unpaid, and often thankless – but they keep cracking away.
Later tonight, the iPhone Dev Team is expected to release “yellowsn0w“, a long-awaited software-based SIM unlock for the iPhone 3g. Though they don’t often do interviews, we were able to gab with one of the members, Pytey, just hours before their big release for a chat about who they are, how they operate, and a whole lot more.
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A new report entitled “2008 Mobile Banking Security Standards” by Javelin Strategy & Research finds that less than 10% of U.S. consumers use mobile banking tools. 47% of those surveyed do not use mobile banking due to security concerns and 73% are afraid that hackers will remotely compromise their handsets. Consumers are also worried about losing private banking information in the chance that they lose or have their mobile phones stolen.
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Watch out LG, looks like you’re not the only touch screen watch phone maker with an announcement this week. Phenom Communications has released an entire line of timepieces-turned-mobiles, (creatively named) the Phenom Watch Phone(s).
These unlocked GSM, MP3/MP4 playin’ watch phones sport a 1.3 TFT touchscreen display, Bluetooth, a USB port, speakerphone, digital still/video camera, and a MicroSD card slot (maxing out at 2gb). Although the press release refers to a singular device, the Phenom Watch Phone, it is actually available in a number of different styles: Read More
Update: The Dev Team has released an image with further confirms our original suspicion. Check it out after the jump.
On the eve of the iPhone 3G software unlock, the following text just went up on the iPhone Dev Team blog:
01110110 01110100 01100001 01100010 01100101 01110010 00100000 00110110 00110001 00110000 00110110 00110000 00110001 00110111 00110100 00100000
Now, any self-respecting geek should immediately recognize this as binary. If we take that block of binary and convert each 8-number chunk into it’s respective ASCII representation, we get the following:
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Research In Motion’s founder and co-CEO, Mike Lazaridis, has cleared up some non-existent confusion about his company’s first touch screen device, the Storm — it’s a netbook.
Wait, what? Sorry, can you repeat that? I must have misheard you Mr. co-CEO.
In a recent interview, when asked “Would you consider Netbooks as your competitors?,” Mr. Lazaridis responded:
No, I think I can put Netbooks in here [referring to the BlackBerry Storm]. These are Netbooks. They are just smaller.
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In a wide-ranging interview, Research in Motion talked today about all things Blackberry. Trailing only Nokia in terms of sales volume, RIM has a lot reasons to feel good. According to Jim Balsillie, Co-CEO “[t]he cell phone market in the US declined by 5 percent compounded per annum in the past five years, but the smart phone market grew 58 percent.”
Mike Lazaridis, President and Co-CEO, also declares that “[Blackberry Storms] are Netbooks. They are just smaller.” Do you buy that, dear reader? Do you think the Storm offers all the computing conveniences of something like an MSI Wind, or is this some new use of the term “netbook” of which we were previously ignorant?
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SpatialView has announced the Wazabee 3DeeShell, a protective casing that includes a removable lens to displays 3D stereoscopic images on the Apple iPhone and iPod Touch without those dorky glasses. SpatialView also offers software to create your own 3D images using the iPod camera!
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Nokia, the world’s most ubiquitous cell phone company, is showing off the new 6208c phone in China, which sports a pen for easy input of Chinese characters.
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With the iPhone 3G software unlock being set loose tomorrow, we were hoping to sit down and have a chat with the ones behind the handy work. We got into contact with the Dev Team and, sure enough, they were down to spare a bit of time on the eve of their big release.
We’ve only got a few hours before we’ve gotta finalize our questions, but we figured our readers might have a few inquiries of their own. Post’em down in the comments below – we’ll pick a handful from that lot and do our damnedest to make sure they get asked. Remember, these are the guys behind QuickPwn (for jailbreaking), the first-gen iPhone unlock, and now, the iPhone 3G unlock – if it’s an unofficial means of making your iPhone better, they probably had a hand in it.
It’s been 1.5 years since the iPhone began to take over hit the market, causing major tremors throughout the mobile world. The promise/combination of a worthwhile touch screen and accompanying UI have proven to be an incredible success, with iPhones quickly reaching the top of the smartphone charts.
It follows then, that most other mobile manufacturers (and now computer makers have joined the fray) have scrambled to get their own respective touch screen-centric devices out into the wild. What doesn’t necessarily add up is…why?
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The folks behind the iPhone 3G unlock – which will be hitting the Internets tomorrow night at midnight – gave a presentation on their project at CCC in Berlin last week. Rather than sound like a bunch mewling nerds, they have excellent speaking voices and seem very intelligent and sassy.
The most interesting thing about these guys are that they have a dedication to mission sense of humor about their project that you rarely see in the corporate world. These guys essentially created an entire gray market for the iPhone a few months after launch and by popping the cap on the 3G tomorrow they’ll do the same for Apple’s next product.
It would be great to write a white paper on these boys. It’s an amazing example of connected development and reverse engineering that is completely decentralized and endlessly powerful.
Got yourself a shiny new iPhone or (matte) G1? Wish it had a better camera lens? Like magnets and DIY? Well then you are in luck, my friend! USBfever is selling magnetic, detachable lenses for both of these devices (as well as any gadget with a crappy camera in need of some third-party lens lovin’).
Available in wide angle and telephoto (2x zoom) for $16.99 each, and fish-eye for $19.99, these lenses affix to devices via magnets. Unlike the majority of other third-party lens solutions which tend to add a lot of bulk (and awkwardness), once the magnetic lens is detached, all that remains is the slim metal/magnetic ring that you’ve previously adhered to your device.
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If you’re the type of person that likes to be surprised by mobile handset releases, you might want to look away. Also, you might want to stop reading mobile blogs. Also, you’re weird.
One of BG’s super sneaks managed to snap a shot of a blurp at the bottom of one of T-Mobile’s employee-only Daily News pages, detailing the next two months of handset releases.
What’s on the way, and what they are:
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As we mentioned a few days ago, the BlackBerry version of Sling Media’s SlingPlayer mobile has entered public beta.
If past products are any indication, it’ll go for $30 bucks after a 30-day trial once they’ve worked out all the kinks. In the meantime, however, it’s free – so if you’ve got a Slingbox at home and a BlackBerry in your pocket, go grab it quick.
We’ve seen Fennec in an early form before, but apparently the new beta alpha is much more featured, and the promises being made for Mozilla’s mobile browser are going to really shake up the scene if they follow through.
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I swear to god, if you have a real lens (as I can see in the 2nd pic), use manual focus for things like this. I guess beggars can’t be choosers, since this guy is the only one with pics of Android running on the OpenMoko hardware, but jesus! Click on for the rest of the shots — such as they are.
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Even without any sort of US Carrier availability, the Samsung Innov8 managed to crack at least one of our Top Picks of 2008 lists. As usual, however, the fact that it’s superb doesn’t equate to it being easy to buy.
Fortunately, it looks like that might be changing. Amazon just started peddling the International Version this morning, but with an oh-so-hefty $799 price tag. If that’s a bit rich for your blood, the FCC’s looselips have let on that a 850/1900Mhz model, perfectly suitable for 3G use on AT&T (or Rogers, though the Innov8 is nowhere to be seen on the 2009 Rogers Roadmap), is on the way. Go ahead, AT&T – Make it official.
[Symbian Guru]
Spyshots of a supposed Verizon-branded Casio Exilim camera-phone have surfaced on a Korean blog. The images (posted by a random forum member) of this rumored clamshell device reveal that it will include a 5.1mp camera…and not much else.
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While I can’t say I agree with the color scheme (Orange and black? I can’t decide whether it looks like a Halloween toy or a cheap pair of Reeboks), it looks like Samsung has managed one hell of an engineering feat with the just-leaked S8300.
According to DailyMobile.se, this thing comes packed tight with a 2.8″ WQVGA AMOLED touchscreen, 8 megapixel camera with autoflash, GPS, microSD support, FM radio (with RDS), Bluetooth 2.1, and 7.2 Mbps HSDPA. It’s nothing we haven’t seen before in brickphones, but in a 12.8mm thick (just a millimeter thicker than the Samsung-made Helio Mysto, and one thinner than the Samsung Soul) slider? We’re impressed.
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This one’s going to be shaky until T-Mobile makes an official statement or the first delivery is made, but it’s a nice enough idea that we figured it was worth a mention. GoogleAndBlog is reporting that T-Mobile is looking to pacify the complaints on the G1’s dismal battery by hooking up customers with a bigger, badder one.
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