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Getting rich by writing an app for the iPhone and selling it in the appstore sounds very lucrative… however all those free (and most times useless) apps don’t make it easier to be successful. And in my opinion they destroy the business model, as free can’t pay any bills.

For example:

Pano’s not particularly cheap, at $3, but it can create some enormous, impressive panoramas right on your iPhone. (source)

Unfortunately lots of people I talk to think the same – “oh, this app is sooooo expensive, it costs 3 Euros!”. Come on, you paid at least 200 Euros for your iPhone and you pay about 20 Euros per month for a contract… and then you complain about 3 Euros for some useful software?

What bugs me even more is if these people are software developers who write software on their own! They know how much time it takes to write (bug free, nice and shiny) software, earn money by writing software and and still they complain if a developer wants to get 3 Euros for his software?

Wow.

Update 1: it seems iAd does not really solve the issue of the million apps in the appstore. $ 14,- per sale is not worth it.
Update 2: same problem on the iPad – just too many apps and too little showroom.
Update 3: make sure you don’t miss this comic!

(Image copyrighted by theoatmeal.com)

Two non-published Dilberts talking about the “issue” of a lost 4th generation iPhone:

Hilarious!

You can read the full story at  Scott Adams Blog post.

I use one WLAN very frequently that uses WPA2 Enterprise for authentication; this also means that the certificate used for authorization has to be renewed every year. Getting the new certificate is not really that much of an issue, but renewing it was really hard this time….

In OSX 10.5 the certificate has to be imported into Keychain Access, which worked as expected. But for some reason the certificate was not used for authentication, the dialog for WPA2 Enterprise networks always defaulted back to the 1Password certificate. The first in list. Which obviously failed.
It took me a while to figure out where exactly the certificate has to be chosen in the Network Preferences pane – in a dialog that is very well hidden:

The iPhone was even worse – importing the certificate (and creating a new profile with it) was not a big deal. But again, only the first, old, expired certificate was used. Nothing easier then that, just remove the profile. Interestingly the certificate was still there in the “add WLAN” dialog. Removed the newly imported certificate – the old one is still there. Reset network settings – the certificate is still there. WTF?!?!
What finally worked was installing the old, expired certificate and then removing it again, without installing the new one. This removed the profile *and* the certificate from the phone. Then installing and using the new certificate was simple and worked as usual.
My guess is that the two profiles/certificates with the same name somehow confused the iPhone – so the process is to remove the old certificate before adding the new one.

While I hope this blog post helps others when they have to exchange their WPA2 Enterprise Certificate it will definitely help me next year on August 28th when I have renew mine again

With the recent iPhone 3.0 release Apple included a feature called “Find my iPhone“, which allows users of the MobileMe service to locate their iPhone in case it has “switched owners”.
Now Kevin left his beloved phone in a bar and was able to track it down using the new feature… in his blog he describes his experiences and the hunt for the iPhone:

Read the full story….

PS: one feature that I miss would be to be able to remote-lock the phone, so it requires a passcode immediately after the message has been received.

Finally it gets the attention in the press it deserves:

The first concerns the iPhone’s email application, which automatically downloads images within an e-mail, said Aviv Raff, a security researcher, on Thursday.
That’s problematic because the image will refer back to a server-side script when it is downloaded, indicating to the sender that the e-mail has been opened and the e-mail address is valid. The address can then be spammed.

Apple already knew about this design flaw when they released the iPhone. Also I wrote the support several times about how to disable the loading of images but all I heard back (from both Apple and t-mobile) was that this feature is not available. The support person did not not confirm that this is a security issue or write back anything in particular about this problem.

It’s the same problem (with Apple, not with the products!) that they don’t listen to the community or bug reports – I also reported the SSL issue in MobileMe as a detailed bug report and through the support. The bug report was closed with “thanks, we don’t confirm anything” and the tech support…. uhm… to be polite: was not very tech savy and said “SSL is not needed as MobileMe uses JavaScript and CSS”….

Grml. Why the heck don’t they fix those issues and take more care about the security of their users data? Is Steve Jobs himself using MobileMe and exposing all his calendar data, business contacts and mails to the public? Would be interested to hear back from him… or is he not using his own service?

Read more about the iPhone security issues.

Pretty interesting and a slightly different approach that Google is taking with their G1 phone… the next year is going to be interesting!

(Original post and copyright: joyoftech.com)

Everyone is writing about the new 2.1 firmware that Apple released for the iPhone – about improved battery life, increased 3G reception and so on. It is definitely a fine release with a lot of good improvements. But more important – what’s still missing in the 2.1 firmware? Here is my (incomplete) list of items that Apple should add to the next iPhone firmware:

• Copy & paste across applications (see comic)
• Synchronize Notes and TODO items with iCal and me.com
• Push notification service for applications (promised for September!)
• Usage of the phone as modem (“tethering“)
• Allow developers to talk about iPhone development in the public
• 3rd party syncing through iTunes
• Access to the iDisk through the iPhone
• Support for stereo Bluetooth headsets
• Real navigation (and a Bluetooth GPS extension for the first generation iPhone)

Don’t get me wrong – the 2.1 release is the best iPhone software they have delivered so far, but there is still a lot of room for improvement. Not only for the iPhone but also for me.com, which is insecure and lacks features like the iDisk sharing.

(Image from Geek And Poke)

Upgrading the iPhone (i.e. to the latest 2.0.1 firmware) while being in Flight mode is a bad idea ™. The upgrade works fine, but as soon as the iPhone reboots and needs to be activated through iTunes it complains:

The iPhone cannot be used with iTunes because the information required for activation could not be obtained from the iPhone. Check that the SIM card is inserted in your iPhone and that it is not PIN-locked.

Ok. There is a SIM in the phone but it can’t be activated. Because it is in Flight mode and therefore never requests a PIN for the SIM. Bricked my iPhone? Need to recover ? No, just get out of Flight mode by going to the “emergency call” screen, entering any number and trying to call it. The phone will complain about being in Flight mode and request the PIN for the SIM card. Voila, activation works like a charm!

So, please Apple, make your error messages a bit more descriptive!
And users, get out of Flight mode before upgrading the iPhone!

(Original instructions can be found here; but be aware, there is no need to reset the phone!)

There are 11 tips from Apple for increasing the battery life on the iPhone:

• Turn off 3G
• Minimize use of location services
• Fetch new data less frequently
• Turn off push mail
• Auto-check fewer email accounts
• Minimize use of third-party applications
• Turn off Wi-Fi
• Turn off Bluetooth
• Use Airplane Mode in low- or no-coverage areas
• Adjust brightness
• Turn off EQ

In a nutshell? Use it as an iPod. But not too often.

Agreed…

Via 43 Folders.

Einer Studie von Nielsen Mobile zufolge sind 73 Prozent der Besitzer von Apples Hype-Handy iPhone Männer; zwei Drittel sind demnach jünger als 35 Jahre. Fast die Hälfte ist ledig und war nie verheiratet.

Irgendwie treffe ich die Zielgruppe doch recht gut… und “Technologien und Funktionen” haben den Ausschlag gegeben, ganz klar.
Der ganze Bericht.