Quickie Review: Shazam and Midomi Mobile

This is a two for one review today. Because Shazam and Midomi Mobile are functionally similar (yet fundamentally different) I thought I'd group them to give you a bit of a side by side comparison.

For starters we have Shazam. This is a nifty little program that lets you "tag" songs that you like or want to know the name of. All you do is hold the phone up to a speaker, TV or wherever the music is coming from and select "Tag Now." The app will listen and then consult its library to identify the tune. When I used this, it worked pretty well, though I used an MP3 recording of Mika's "Grace Kelly." Even so, the results appeared quickly and accurately.

Midomi Mobile offers more functionality, though at a price. You can hold the phone up to a speaker or TV to identify music with this app as well, but you can also hum or sing a tune. This is especially helpful when you remember just a snippet of a song. You can even say a song name or artist name and it will bring up a list.

However, when I tried--however badly--to sing a bit of Ah-ha's "Take On Me" I was greeted with a list of songs in Spanish. Hmm. I wouldn't let my singing voice be the best judge here, but the app did crash about three times in the midst of searching.

I like both apps, and though Midomi does more, I think Shazam does less better.

New iPhone Ads Are Everywhere

Apple's just release three new iPhone ads to help bolster interest in the phone and encourage consumers this phone really is "twice as fast" as the first-gen version and that you can get it for "half the price."

Good marketing, as always. Though I don't know if anything can beat the first commercial for the iPhone 3G called "Hallway." The drama, the suspense! I mean, it's Ironman telling us what device could possibly be "the first phone to beat the iPhone." 

To watch the latest ads, you can view them on the Apple website and are called Everyone, Unslow and Work Friendly. 

Enjoy! I swear, half the fun of Apple is their marketing campaigns. That's not to say I don't love their products, but the advertising is nothing short of brilliant.

[via TUAW]

Apple Removed Aurora Feint–For Now

No!! Can hear it? It's the sound of my world crumbling. My favorite app! Not my favorite app!

Okay, I've collected myself. So what's the problem? Well, it turns out Aurora Feint has some serious security issues. Nothing malicious, mind you, but a security threat, nonetheless. In order to keep track of other players online, the game uploads your entire contact list to the server. However, this transfer of your data occurs unencrypted--which poses a big risk to your personal information.

After discovering the security hole, Apple removed the game from their App Store. But now it seems the game is back in the review stage after the developers added HTTPS in order to encrypt data.

What I want to know has to do with the version of the game that's still on my iPhone. I never opted into the community feature, but how will Apple deal with those that still play the unencrypted version? Will a reinstall take care of it?

[via Just Another iPhone Blog]

App Updates Could Use Some Work

It's no secret that I love iPhone apps. You can find me browsing the App Store more often than I'd like to reveal. But getting to my point, while browsing the store, I've noticed a few things that probably need to be addressed in an upcoming update.

For instance, after I install updates to applications through the App Store on my iPhone, the updates are treated like a whole new app and clutter up my screen. Plus, I'll often have to go into iTunes on my computer in order to see what updates are really available then download them and sync them with the iPhone. 

And as if that weren't enough, the App Store crashes. A lot. And I've noticed when browsing the store on my phone that if I click on a title to read about it and then go back to the search results, it defaults back to the top of the list. Minor complaint, I know, but annoying nonetheless. 

Hopefully a few tweaks will come to us soon. Because other than these quirks, I'm in app downloading heaven!

[via MacWorld]

WinPwn 2.0 Jailbreaks Your iPhone

Good news, Windows users! If you were feeling dismayed about your inability to jailbreak your iPhone because Pwonage Tool 2.0 isn't Win compatible, WinPwn 2.0 is now available.

You can both unlock and jailbreak your iPhone 3G, though you can only unlock your first-gen iPhone. The main site, winpwn.com, has already been taken down, but there are plenty of mirrors floating around out there. 

A few words of warning before you try using any pwnage tool: 

• There's no guarantee with these tools. You could mess up your phone. This is a warning. 
• You will need to uninstall WinPwn 1.0 before installing 2.0. 
• Don't install any YouTube fix if you have AT&T service. 
• Be up to date with iTunes.

[via Slashphone]

Quickie review: Platinum Sudoku by Gameloft

Gameloft's Platinum Sudoku gives you 20 million Sudoku and Kakuro grids in your pocket. If you play one puzzle a day, you will have over 54 years of playtime. Platinum Sudoku has 5 levels of difficulty for players of all skill levels, as well as three hint options to help you along in case you find yourself stuck. The first hint will give you all the possible numbers in a current cell. The second one will help you work out one number. The third hint, meanwhile, will scan the grid to mark all the cells that are right or wrong. As you complete a predetermined number of grids, the game will start to unlock challenges such as Subtract, Pair Match, Shuffle, Choice Block, High Sum and Mine Detector. You can also customize your game by changing your font, music, skin and grid. However you need to solve puzzles to unlock these options.

Don't let the girl at the start up menu scare you. When I played early in the morning, she asked me "morning already?" When I played outside of my regular time, she told me that I normally play at night and it's not nighttime yet. The first couple of times that this happened it freaked me out, and to be honest, it's still a little creepy! The game has a feature that allows the player to draw the number on the screen with their finger. However, I was having problems with this feature: the game wouldn't recognize my numbers, and created more aggravation than it was worth. I finally switched back to the number pad. I was also unable to change the player's name. It shows up as Julia every game. I know this is a small issue, but if I paid for the game I want to be able personalize it with my name.

You no longer have to go searching in newspapers for a Sudoku puzzle to play, all you need to do is open the Platinum Sudoku.

Quickie review: Bubble Bash by Gameloft

Gameloft's Bubble Bash is the iPhone's first bubble shooting game.  Players need to group 3 or more of the same color bubbles together to pop them.  Sounds easy enough, but the game increases in difficulty as you go on.  There are also 17 special bubbles that can range anywhere from adding more bubbles to your screen or deleting whole sets of color.  The iPhone's accelerometer allows you to turn on the gravity mode so that you can aim at the bubble by tilting your phone.  Vibrant colors make the game eye-catching and fun to play, and there's even a "color blind" option for those who are color impaired.

The arcade mode has a story line that players can follow along.  The two characters in the game are Kale and Malia, and they set out to look for sections of a treasure map of Bubble Island.  There are a total of ten sections, and as the player proceeds through the game there are 30 items to collect for the gallery.  In addition, there are different outfits that can be collected so that Kale and Malia can have a wardrobe change.  There are a total of 100 arcade levels to keep you occupied.  The final mode is Crab Fever, in which the screen keeps on filling up with bubbles and you need to pop them until you can no longer keep up.  This is probably more useful for those dull queue moments where you want a brief distraction.

Quickie review: Brain Challenge by Gameloft

Gameloft's Brain Challenge gives your brain a workout while playing various mini-games.  The games are geared towards 5 areas of your brain (logic, math, memory, visual and focus).  The stress games also develops your stress management skills.  There are 9 "creativity" exercises that promotes your artistic side.  The difficulty level adjusts to your play history. so it's nice that you can have up to 5 profiles saved to the game for multiple players (that is, if you trust them with your iPhone).  Figuring out how to play each game is pretty much straightforward, if not the tutorial is helpful.

I would highly recommend this game for all ages.  You are getting 43 games for the price of one, which is always a bonus.  The menus are easy to navigate through and the animations are colorful.  The touch screen allows you to answer the question much more quickly.  Especially when you are getting timed on everything.   It's nice that the game keeps a history of your brain chart so you can compare your progress day to day.

However, there are some drawbacks to the game.  One is the screens between the games are unnecessary and time consuming.  After finishing up a game, you spend about 10 seconds for the game to wrap up before it takes you back to the main menu.  Then once you pick a game it takes about another 10 seconds to load up.  Also if  you get a phone call in the middle of a game, it interrupts the game.  Then you have to go through the whole loading process again just to get back; to be fair, this is more to do with how Apple insists third-party applications manage memory, rather than a problem with Brain Challenge, but either way it's still frustrating.  If you get a text message, you have the option to close the message rather than leave the game.  That's not so bad.

Unlocking all the games can be a long and tedious operation, but you are actually excercising your brain in the process.  The game is highly addictive, so beware.