Continuing from yesterday’s post on Managing multiple photos on the iPhone, here’s a suggestion of how much better app sorting and selection could be via iTunes.

We didn’t come up with this concept, but it’s impressive to see what could be done. Recent findings (after asking around on Twitter) showed the majority of people seem to download their apps directly to their iPhone (rather than download to iTunes and then sync) but this way of sorting could encourage people to plug in their iPhones a little more often.

The current method of organising and syncing apps with your iPhone in iTunes is not good enough right now. Apple, in a way, had to guess the way millions of people would download, organise, use, and delete apps on their iPhones an iPod Touches, and they did a pretty good job given how well things work right now. However, organising apps in iTunes has always been one of those areas that has seemed like an after thought.

Perhaps Apple have more in store? I have a feeling the Home Screen might change more than we expect in OS 3.0. Will we see a more effective way of organising our growing numbers of applications? It’s been a long time since a major iPhone OS update, and you can bet your bottom dollar that Apple haven’t been sitting around waiting for the competition to catch up.

If we can select multiple emails in Mail, and delete or move them to another folder in one go, then why can’t we do the same with our photos on the iPhone?

Deleting Multiple Photos

This puzzled me the other day when I had been on a little photo taking spree. I ended up with a load of shots that were great. But an even greater load of shots that were dreadful. Deleting the multitude of dreadful photos was a real pain – the only way to do it at the moment is to touch each thumbnail, hit the trash icon, and then “Delete Photo” on the slide up “are you sure?” pane.

So, for me to delete 10 photos, it takes 3 touches (or taps?) each. That, for those without a calculator to hand is a whole THIRTY touches. And that’s assuming all of the photos you wish to delete are next to one another. If they’re not then you might have to touch the “back to camera roll” button at the top and then scroll to find another dreadful photo, then touch that. A real pain.

If we could delete photos in my proposed way, then we would reduce it down to 3 clicks plus one click for each photo you wish to delete. Touch the “Edit” button at the top > Touch the thumbnail image of each photo you wish to delete > Touch “Delete (#) > Then confirm with “Delete Photos”.

Sending Multiple Photos

Similarly, it’s pretty annoying if you ever need to email more than one photo to someone. There is at least one app currently available that is solving this problem, aptly named “Multi-Photo Email“. That app is pretty much as good as it’s going to get from 3rd party offerings, but it’s not what I would call a complete solution to an integral missing feature. To send multiple photos with my proposed solution, you would do the same as for multiple delete, but hit “Send” rather than “Delete” (pretty obvious that one).

Rearranging Photos

A third useful, but not essential feature would be the ability to rearrange photos. Currently, photos are arranged in chronological order which makes perfect sense. Since the ability to take screen shots on the iPhone though, I have often found that I would prefer to be able to rearrange my Camera Roll to group screen shots separately from actual photos. Maybe that’s just me, but it wouldn’t be too much of a crazy idea seeing as you can rearrange Apps on the Home Screen, re-order towns in Weather, ticker symbols in Stocks, time zones in Clock, etc. etc.

All in all, it would make me that tiny bit happier to have the functionality to manage multiple photos easily in such a regularly used application.

Just a last minute idea, but being able to share photos via Flickr and Facebook (as you can with MobileMe) would be nice too. iPhoto 09 is ahead of the iPhone in that respect. Perhaps we’ll have to wait for iPhone OS 3.0 before we start cluttering that slide-up menu too much eh?

Update

Hey, it looks like Apple are on the same wavelength as us (again!) as the new iPhone 3.0 firmware allows you to send multiple photos via email with a method almost identical to the one we’ve suggested here. They’ve even gone for the same red “tick” icons. I’m not sure if there’s a way to rearrange photos yet, but this is definitely a very welcome feature addition to see.

The other day, I went back to this piece by Richard Sprague (Senior Marketing Director at Microsoft) from January 2007.

The whole article can be summed up by:

“So please mark this post and come back in two years to see the results of my prediction: I predict [Apple] will not sell anywhere near the 10M [iPhones] Jobs predicts for 2008.”

This is referring back to the original announcement of the iPhone, and the time when Jobs, being asked by numerous reporters, publicly clarified that Apple aimed to sell around 10 million iPhones by the end of 2008.

On Tuesday of this week, Apple held their quarterly earnings call. The results for the last quarter were stunning, there’s no denying it. Apple sold more iPhones than RIM sold Blackberries. Apple is now the THIRD largest phone retailer in the world, in terms of revenues. And Apple has only been making ONE phone, in the market for just 15 months.

Jobs gave this comment, showing their uncertainty (like everyone else) about the future of the World economy:

“Now, both of these things, beating RIM in units and becoming the third largest mobile supplier in revenues are amazing feats but part of this was the result of expanding into over 50 countries and there’s no guarantee that sustained sales will equal initial sales. And who knows what the future results will be, given the worldwide economic slowdown but we actually outsold RIM last quarter and ranked as the third largest mobile phone supplier in revenues. Not bad for being in the market for only 15 months.”

Referring back to Sprague’s article, he posted again the other day asking people why they thought the iPhone performed so differently to his predictions.

The problem is that he didn’t see the iPhone as the versatile device it is. He compared it to existing phones. Whereas the iPhone is not really a phone, it’s everything you could possibly want in one device. And it’s all of these things combined beautifully.

There are numerous reasons for its success, but to name a few:

The existing massive consumer base of iPod owners already have a major part of the iPhone equation on their computer: iTunes. No other phone company has anything near the power of iTunes (the software) or the content and quality (the iTunes Store). The ability for Apple to reach its already happy customer base of iPod owners through iTunes, and the email lists that the majority of them have joined is a greater advantage than many realise. Everyone I know knows of the iPhone and what it can do. They have the expectation of it being a well built, well designed device like their existing iPods. We can conclude that one of the strongest selling points of the iPhone is that it has been released after the iPod – it must be better.

The iPhone ad campaign is aired worldwide to huge audiences. The ads show off a beautiful product with a beautiful interface that performs tasks that normally seem mundane, easily and with flair. These ads are also localised to each country so show that Apple has genuinely considered the needs of each nation (even if all it has done is hired a native speaking commentator and shown a national newspaper as the news site in Safari.)

The price of the iPhone (the original iPhone) was exactly the same concept used for the original iPod. Price it high to gain artificial scarcity – the select “elite” have an extremely attractive device that is difficult to obtain for the rest of the population. Bring out a newer, better iPhone several months after at a (still relatively expensive) but cheaper price point and the customers flood in. The iPhone is still expensive, and it is still a product owned by the minority, but as Apple revises the iPhone again, and inevitably releases a second device to the line, the customer base will grow and grow.

We haven’t even begun to spoke about the number of big names building high quality iPhone apps – EA Games, SEGA, Google, Facebook, the list goes on. The press’s addiction to Apple fuels the hype given to their products. Whatever Apple does – or doesn’t – do gets reported, (the shares usually respond, too) but it means Apple’s name is seen by consumers every day. Apple is a household name unlike any other phone company around (other than Blackberry). You don’t see Sony Ericsson’s latest set of handsets on the 3rd page of The Times very often.

Other than starving the stock pre iPhone 3G launch, the last 15 months have been constant growth for the iPhone. As we enter very unpredictable times, who knows how many iPhones Apple will sell this quarter? All we tell is that Apple has historically sold double the number of iPods in the 4th compared to the 3rd quarter every year. If Apple does this with the iPhone, which is a stretch, Apple will have sold around 20 million in the same time frame they intended to sell just 10 million.

It’s no surprise the iPhone is (so far) a success, but the future is very uncertain.

There has been a lot of talk lately that Apple will be releasing something code-named “the Brick”.

There have been many rumours and suggestions as to what “the Brick” may be. 9 to 5 Mac is reporting that, according to their sources, the “brick” refers to a new manufacturing process that would involve using lasers and jet cutting instead of the traditional method of pressing to construct new Apple MacBooks from bricks of solid aluminium. If true, this process would truly revolutionise the manufacturing process of consumer electronics. It would, yet again, put Apple several years ahead of the competition, and would ensure Apple gained control over even more of the manufacturing process.

However, let’s pretend for a minute that we haven’t heard that rumour. Let’s think of “the Brick” as an actual product, rather than a manufacturing technique. What could it be?

Read the rest of this entry →

With the latest version of iTunes – 8.0.1, the Genius feature introduced in the original release has made it into yet another area of the interface – the “Now Playing” screen.

Apple seems extremely keen to promote this feature throughout its music product line, almost as if there were a profit motive, but other than the iTunes Genius Sidebar, it would seem that Steve and co. simply want us to listen to and discover more of our music.

iTunes 8.0.1 addresses quite a few bug fixes, and is recommended for all iTunes users.

You can download the latest version of iTunes here.

Like the look of Google Chrome, but waiting for its release on OS X? Wish you had something similar to meet your multi-tab-tasking needs? Meet Stainless, the (very early) development version of the same concept. Stainless breaks each tab into an individual process just like Chrome to ensure when one goes wrong, it doesn’t screw up the whole browser.

It’s still early days – there’s no bookmarking, history, or download management, but this WebKit based browser has a lot of potential. It also looks pretty good, with minimalism on a par with Chrome itself.

Stainless is for Leopard only (sorry Tiger users, time to upgrade!), and is very (VERY!) early beta. Try it out at your own risk.

Regardless, this is a fantastic start, and I look forward to seeing it develop. If a small group of developers can get this together in a matter of weeks, why can’t Google get something out the door shortly?

Another change to the App Store that occurred over the weekend was the reordering of applications so that “Release Date” refers to when the app was first released, instead of when the last update was released.

Old App Store List

Here is another, slightly annoying (and hopefully temporary) change to the App Store. As you can see, the old left hand sidebar used to include links to view all applications, and then to separate those designed specifically for the iPod Touch and iPhone.

New App Store List

However, the new sidebar seems to have disposed of these links and just shows the list of categories, with apparently no way of viewing all apps.

We can only hope that this is a temporary change and that it gets fixed quick – it’s handy being able to view all apps on one page.

Last.fm is a fantastic online service that monitors (scrobbles) the music you play through iTunes, and updates your profile with the latest song information. It then builds on this data by notifying you of trends – who you listen to most, what your favourite genres are etc. and goes a step further to suggest other artists you may like.

Last.fm itself, the website, has just been redesigned and lives up to a very high standard that could draw many similarities to Facebook. The desktop app is also very well designed, keeping the interface simple, only showing what is needed and nothing more. The desktop app also ensures that what is important – the song information – is clearly and prominently displayed.

That’s why when the original Last.fm iPhone App was released, it had a lot to live up to. The original was good, but not amazing, with quite a few features missing, and a less than smooth interface.

However, almost all of the faults of the original have now been eliminated with the latest release of Last.fm for iPhone:

• Major improvements to the user interface all around (tap to zoom album art)
• Ability to tag songs
• Personal tag radio
• Calendar based events view
• Common artists when viewing a user profile
• Lots of other usability and back-end updates

Tag Songs

Probably the most requested feature of the original app was the ability to tag songs. You can now tag any song with as many tags as you wish, and are greeted with an instant search that autofills with suggestions for tags. You can also start a new “station” based on any tag you wish. This is brilliant – they have taken user requests seriously, and not just delivered on them, but have exceeded expectations.

Cover Art Zoom

A nice little UI feature has been added on the “Now Playing” screen – the ability to double tap and zoom in or out of the album art. Simple but sweet.

Beautiful Startup Screen

Normally, waiting for an app to start is an arduous task. However, with Last.fm, the start screen is truly attractive – black to dark grey gradient, with Last.fm prominently displayed in the centre in crisp white. There is also a subtle loading animation – the “as” of Last.fm (and AudioScrobbler) winds around to indicate the app is working. First impressions count, and this is probably the most understated attractive loading screen of any app I have used.

Calendar View

A new view for the Events screen is Calendar View. Essentially this is the same as month view in iCal, and it makes perfect sense to put it here. You can now easily see any upcoming events of the selected artist by simply browsing over a calendar view.

I hope you enjoyed this post, and highly recommend you try out Last.fm for iPhone. Best of all, it’s free, so what excuse could you possibly have!

You could also read Last.fm’s official release post here.

Download Last.fm from the App Store.

Both developers and consumers on the iPhone App Store will be glad to hear some good news coming out of Cupertino today: you can’t review an app until you’ve purchased it.

This is great, especially for apps that have a high price tag (or even any price tag) as the reviews section would often become filled with users complaining and giving low ratings for the app due to its price without ever having used the app whatsoever.

This is a small step, but it’s good to see Apple adjusting to the way the app store is used.

Now, all you need to do now Apple is to help out those poor developers that spend months working on apps simply to be turned down at the last hurdle because it competes with your own plans.

Our first iPhone App Review is actually a web app, designed to run in Safari on the iPhone. Google Talk for the iPhone is something that everyone should have saved to their home screen, for those frequent occasions when ‘MobileChat’ fails to function correctly.

Delivered in a very simple, clean, quick to load interface, Google Talk allows you to send and receive instant messages in chat sessions with your contacts just like within Google Talk on the desktop. Moving between multiple open chats is very easy and status updates and contact searching have also been brought onto the iPhone for a very full featured web app.

We use it whenever we’re out on the train or at an airport and need to get in touch with the team. Google may have been better off making this into a native app to speed up loading times, and to take advantage of the opportunities provided by Multi Touch. It is almost certain that a native Google Chat app will be released soon, but perhaps they are waiting for their own Android platform to show what they can do before releasing on the iPhone.

Chatting with the iPhone dictionary isn’t too much of a nightmare: If you press the send button on the app (as opposed to return), then the dictionary doesn’t automatically correct your ‘Yo!’ into ‘To!’

To use Google Talk on your iPhone, just visit www.google.com/talk

We hope you enjoyed the post, and we’re intending to bring more helpful reviews and posts soon.