The 88 Records a Full Song on an iPhone—And It Actually Kinda Rocks

During their recent stint touring as the opening band for The B-52s, The 88 decided to record themselves a new song almost entirely through an iPhone app. And the sock actually kinda rocks.

The app is called FourTrack, and the finished song, “Love is the Thing,” is available now via iTunes. The video I’ve embedded above shows the band recording the song, and you can also read about their process here on their Website.

This is just one more reason why I love this phone. It’s not perfect yet, but it’s getting there, and you really can do amazing things with it.

iPhone Porn Comes to the App Store?

One year and one day ago, I blogged about a Time magazine article that predicted pornography would be the next big thing on the iPhone. Today, the news from Macenstein (by way of Mashable) is that there is finally an App in Apple iPhone App Store that features nudity. It’s called Hottest Girls [iTunes link] and you must be at least 17 to download it. You must also be a complete and utter moron, because you could get what you’re getting here for $1.99 entirely for free just by typing the word “boobs” into Google. You can get much worse, actually (or better, depending on your point of view).

The day may come when the adult industry brings actual pornography to the iPhone, but it is not this day. 

Geek Force FiveCast 181: Apple TV

In which ECC geeks out about the new gesture-based controls in the Apple TV Remote app for iPhone.

Geek Force FiveCast 176: Like Christmas Morning

In which ECC geeks out about iPhone OS 3.0 and Tweetdeck for iPhone, both of which were waiting for him when he woke up this morning.

iPhone OS 3.0 Arrives Today at 1 PM EDT

I can’t remember where I saw the exact time now, but iPhone OS 3.0 is due to be released by Apple today, Wednesday, June 17, 2009, at 1 PM EDT. Mashable has a comprehensive guide on what to expect from the release. Me, all I got is this: w00t!

Needless to say, I am very excited about this release. Just yesterday, I had an experience where Copy & Paste would have been amazing to have at my disposal. And that’s really just the tip of the iceberg. What I’m really excited about are all of the things that’ll be possible for app developers with the 3.0 OS. I’m particularly interested in seeing Last.fm develop an app that pulls from iTunes on the phone and scrobbles whatever I play to the Last.fm servers. That can’t be that far away, can it?

Anyway, in related news, Mac Rumors has what appears to be the first video recorded by the iPhone 3G S camera. This is exciting too, I suppose, especially if you have the bucks for a new phone.

Building Better iPhone Apps

This morning, after talking about developing my own iPhone app during the Geek Force FiveCast, I was pleased to find this Mashable article on building better iPhone apps waiting for me in my Google Reader. This is not to say that I’m going to get started this weekend—I still have no idea what my theoretical app would do, and I have never programmed Objective-C, after all—but it’s good to know that there are smarter people than me out there already thinking about how to do things better. My favorite bit of advice, and I think this applies to far more things than just iPhone app development, was this: “Step 5: Test first, test again, test some more. Also: test.”

Geek Force FiveCast 170: iPhone Apps

In which ECC geeks out about the iPhone game Hero of Sparta and then wonders what kind of iPhone app he’d create himself.

Mac OS X Snow Leopard for $29

iPhone news may be the talk of the Apple blogosphere in the wake of WWDC, but attention must also be paid to the announcement that the next version of Mac OS X, nick-named Snow Leopard, will retail at $29 for existing Leopard users. This is huge news, as far as I’m concerned, a real concerted effort by Apple to make certain that their entire install-base migrates to the new OS. And, given all of the improvements that have been made, the $29 price-tag is a steal.

Need more of an Apple fix? Check this video of first reactions from WWDC attendees, this piece on the dying goodwill toward U.S. iPhone carrier AT&T, and this article on the “huge, throbbing wall of iPhone apps” that is currently gracing the lobby of the Moscone Center in San Francisco (site of WWDC 2009).

iPhone 3.0 - The Brightside

A lot of the coverage coming out of today’s WWDC keynote from Apple has focused on the ridiculous prices that existing iPhone owners will have to pay in order to upgrade to the newer, spiffier iPhone 3G S. But, rather than waste more pixels on that angle of the story, I thought I’d spend a moment saying how thrilled I am about iPhone OS 3.0, the features of which will be available to all iPhone owners, free-of-charge (and to iPod Touch owners for $9.95).

First, cut & paste is awesome. Second, parental controls on iPhone apps will hopefully mean less stupid app store rejections (like the rejection dealt to NIN earlier this year). Third, in-app purchases are going to make apps like the Amazon Kindle app that much more useful. And fourth, the ability to play music from your iTunes library via an external app is going to hopefully make Last.fm scrobbling a reality.

Look, I’m not happy that upgrading to an iPhone 3G S is going to be so pricy. And I’m not happy that I’ll have to jailbreak my 3G to get the video recording features that the 3G S will get standard. But I am happy for what I’ve got: a tiny little computer that fits in my pocket and does tons of nifty shit that I couldn’t do otherwise. And that’s what I’m going to focus on. How about you?

Geek Force Utterz 165: Driving Home

In which ECC talks about his scary ride home after the Nine Inch Nails concert, and gabs a bit more about AudioBoo vs. Utterli.