Section: iPhone / iPod touch / iPad , iPhone , iDevice Apps Today, Navigon announced another App Store first with MyRegion, a guidance app with in-app map purchases in the U.S. MyRegions has all of the great features from the North American version of MobileNavigator that made it the best navigation app on the App Store. But what makes MyRegion different is that you can buy the maps that you need, when you need them, from inside of the app. Navigon’s MyRegion splits North America into 4 regions: Eastern, Central and Western U.S. and Canada. If you’re planning on doing most of your driving in one or two of these regions, then the MyRegion app is a great choice. If instead you are on the border of two of these regions, or if you drive very long distances, then you are better off sticking with Navigon’s MobileNavigator for North America. Both are great choices with tons of features. MyRegion actually gets one of the Mobile Navigator 1.5 features early: MyRoutes. This feature offers more flexibility in navigation by presenting you with more than one route when you enter a destination. MobileNavigator users will have to wait a little longer for this update to hit the app store later this spring. Navigon currently has introductory pricing on all of this goodness. The app and first region are $5 off at $24.99, and each additional region is $2 off at $12.99. Plus, you can get Traffic Live (real time traffic data) for just $19.99 ($5 off). I have to hand it to Navigon once again; they’re ahead of the pack as usual, showing other guidance app companies what they need to do next

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Buy only the maps you need with Navigon’s MyRegion GPS

Entertain and educate the most important members of your household with this family-friendly guide to the best Mac software, websites, and iPhone apps for kids. And don’t miss our step-by-step instructions for setting up parental controls on your Mac. Let’s play!   When they’re little, kids want to be just like you–pretending to drive the car, borrowing your shoes for dress-up, and yes, pulling up a booster seat to unwind with the family Mac after a hard day in the sandbox. As fun as some Mac staples are regardless of age (Photo Booth, anyone?), your kids deserve some special software just for them–to help them master basic computer skills, stretch their creative imaginations, reinforce educational concepts, and of course, just have a grand old time no matter how young they are. With that in mind, we test-drove 29 Mac and iPhone apps and 12 activity-packed websites just for kids. Some wound up being a little too dumbed down–on the verge of becoming, well, dumb–and our reviews separate the wheat from that chaff for you. Grab the mouse; it’s time to play!   Computer Skills   KidsMouse   KidsMouse teaches basic mouse skills with 18 learning games like ABC Puzzle, Color Ball, and Shape Puzzle. Each is operated using only the mouse or trackpad, and the brightly colored, charmingly illustrated graphics will delight little ones. Some of the games test your child’s sequencing (letters and numbers), shape recognition, and memory, while others just entertain–a bitmap paint program, for example, lets them draw colorful shapes. Really little kids might need prompting from Mom or Dad–ours had fun driving from our lap. We just wished KidsMouse would lock out keyboard input because those keys sure get banged on. Click matching shapes to hear a sound

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Kidding Around – The Best Software and Websites for Kids

In this round of iPhone games and applications you have one that wants you to replicate a natural disaster, one calm title that allows you to raise a binary fish, and one that simply insults your sexual intelligence. Fingerzilla The strange destructive impulse in many arcade videogames has been captured very directly by the new free iPhone game Fingerzilla.  In Fingerzilla, which is a part of the popular Open Feint iPhone gaming network, you are asked to essentially take the “Godzilla” role and begin destroying a metropolitan snapshot.  Instead of actually seeing visual representation of the Godzilla character you will instead simply tap the screen to engage in the destruction.  This is done really by just tapping buildings until they are engulfed in flames and eventually demolished entirely.  A timer is set as you begin and you begin ‘going to town,’ so to speak.  There are a number of different building types, as well as cars driving away and minute individuals running in distress.  It is up to you to rack up the amount of money and death, and the dollar amount is declared with each destructive act.  This works as a point system of sorts, which actually keeps Fingerzilla in line with a very conventional puzzle formula.  Once you have finished with the level you will get a newspaper piece listing the destruction and mayhem you have inspired in your brief period of attack.  There are a few different levels you can engage with an the Open Feint network gives you a fairly in depth level of communication and interaction, though this plays out mostly in the form of score bragging rather than gameplay.  Fingerzilla is fun in a fairly casual way, but since there is not much diversity here or much linear progress it loses interest after a little while.  As a free iPhone game there is really no reason not to try Fingerzilla out, but do not feel like you really need to keep it on your desktop past its use.   Tap Fish One emerging iPhone game genre hails back to the mid-1990s fad of virtual pets.  This makes sense on a mobile platform that stays with you at almost all times, but does mean that you have to be even more dialed in to your iPhone.  Tap Fish is essentially a fish raising incarnation of this virtual pet format where you are given a small aquarium and all the necessary equipment to purchase and care for fish.  There are actually quite a bit of required intervention in Tap Fish starting with feeding of the fish and cleaning of the tank all the way to a leveling system based on how much interaction you have.  Each episode with the fish in Tap Fish will be a few minutes at the most, but as you acquire more fish and get more involved you are going to have to start returning several times a day.  This is fine as this is in line with the basic necessity of such a game, and really for a free iPhone game it stands up against competitors.  The financial system in Tap Fish involves much of how you will upgrade your gaming situation by going to the pet store to purchase things like new fish and food.  You have the option to visit your ‘Neighbor,’ which really just means looking at another fish tank.  All of these things will give you points toward leveling and you will constantly have options to get more money to continually move forward.  Tap Fish does stand out as a pet simulator in that it justifies the time it takes for you to be successful.  This may not be for many of the older iPhone users, but you may just find out that you have a little kid hidden deep down. 69 Positions Anyone that checks the iTunes’ App Store on a regular basis knows that the new free iPhone application phenomenon are applications that give you various sexual positions.  This is part of the way that iPhone developers have gotten around the puritanical restrictions set up by Apple and still tap into the market of ‘lurid curiosity.’  Currently one of the most popular is 69 Positions, which plays on the constant middle school laughter around the number 69.  Inside you get visual representations of this many sexual positions, each with their own little text snippet.  Each position in 69 Positions is described with humanoid figures almost devoid of any gender signifiers.  The information along with it is vague and usually including awkward puns to try and ’spice’ it up.  It is hard to judge an application like 69 Positions in general.  It is a fairly stupid concept right from its inception, but it seems by its popularity that there is somewhat of a general interest in it.  Even compared with other sexual iPhone applications 69 Positions is fairly useless in that it does not provide anything anatomically inventive, has almost no information, and there is really little reason to check it out in the first place.  There is both a free iPhone application version of 69 Positions and a paid one, and the paid one has so little extra content that it really feels like a slap in the face.

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Mini Reviews: Fingerzilla, Tap Fish, 69 Positions

Section: iPhone / iPod touch / iPad , iPhone , iPod touch , iDevice Apps , Originals You’ve all pre-ordered your iPad , right? Better get on that before the available stock is gone. And since you’re only about three weeks away from delivery, you should also stock on free apps to transfer to it when it arrives. This week’s list is all about driving games, Twitter and limited time freebies.  Half of this list won’t be free for long, so I’d better cut to the chase. Brizzly – There’s a new best Twitter app on the App Store every week, it seems. This week’s new best is called Brizzly.  It has most of the snazzy features like trends and news, lists, multiple Twitter account support, pics and more.  If you don’t already have a Twitter client, this is as a great app to take for a spin. Mini Desktop Racing Arcade – Take a toy car for a spin on your desktop.  You control the car entirely with your finger, just don’t hit anything. Transformers G1: Awakening Free – You ready to roll out?  Play as the classic Autobots against the Decepticons in this turn based strategy game.  Obviously you can transform and this is to your advatage when you want to travel faster.  And it’s all in 3D; not the red and blue 3D, this is the kind that stays in the screen

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Free apps roundup for March 12th, 2010

Square-Enix recently brought its popular Final Fantasy series to the iPhone, and now another heavy-hitter, Capcom, is bringing yet another marquee title to the platform. That title is Street Fighter — and Street Fighter IV, a port of the latest installment in the series, is now available for purchase in the App Store for $9.99. But wait, that’s a fighting game. On the iPhone. Which has no physical controls. Sure, there’s been a few to date, with mixed results, but there must be a reason the genre hasn’t caught on with developers with the ferocity of, say, accelerometer-based driving games, no? That’s definitely what I thought, but I purchased and downloaded the game anyway, against my better instincts, because I love the series, notably Street Fighter IV for the PS3. And because when I was considering a purchase, it had only received five-star reviews, which is rare even in the early going for any iPhone game. Luckily, I was not disappointed

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Street Fighter IV Arrives on the iPhone

Section: iPhone / iPod touch / iPad , iPhone , iPod touch , iDevice Apps , Mac Software Macintosh and iPhone/iPod/iPad product updates and announcements for March 10, 2010: Macintosh iPod Macintosh iWebThemesPark has launched ten new iWeb Themes for Apple’s iWeb. In addition, a free iWeb Theme has been released for all iWeb users. Brand new, amazing and supreme quality iWeb Themes from iWebThemesPark are the perfect way to create or update a website. Some iWeb Templates are recommended for building business websites, so everyone can find a perfect theme for any kind of website. The package of ten themes for an unbelievably low price is most likely to be the best offer ever. iUseMac has announced that it will be featuring the innovative image identification software PhotoBrain at 50% off on Wednedsay March 10th and Thursday March 11th. PhotoBrain is an advanced software for image identification and photo matching, it’s the first image search engine on the local drive to use image identification technology. iUseMac offers popular Mac applications at reduced prices for limited time periods. This offer will start on Wednedsay March 10th and will end 48 hours later. Intego has announced VirusBarrier X6 Dual Protection , featuring the latest version of its acclaimed anti-malware and network security software together with BitDefender Antivirus 2010 so Mac users can protect their Windows installations. The latest version of Intego’s anti-malware and network security program includes new threat-detection techniques, improved methods of detection, combined detection protocols, proactive behavioral analysis, and a full range of defensive functions. Bambooapps today announce Quiet Read Pro , an important update to their popular link management application for Macintosh. Quiet Read lets you save any link for later, and is an unobtrusive, easy to use application that features a clean interface. Quiet Read Pro features a comfortable and simple user interface, providing support for bookmarklets, syncing with MobileMe, short URLs, with list searching and filtering capabilities. Eltima Software has announced the release of Folx 1.0 , a free download manager for Mac OS X

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Mac, iPhone, iPod and iPad product news – March 10, 2010

Via Apple 2.0 , Oppenheimer analyst Yair Reiner asserts in a research note that Apple’s lawsuit with HTC over the iPhone interface was the culmination of “blunt talks” with other phone manufacturers. According to Reiner, starting in January Apple began closed-door discussions with OEMs regarding the company’s “growing displeasure” with the theft of Apple’s intellectual property. That displeasure was first noted a year earlier at a conference call. Apple COO Tim Cook responded to a question about the Palm Pre by stating that “we will not stand for having our IP ripped off,” though Cook wasn’t necessarily talking about Palm, or just Palm, anyway. Earlier this month, Steve Jobs publicly accused HTC of theft in a press release associated with the iPhone lawsuit . Unfortunately, that lawsuit may not ultimately protect the iPhone the way Steve Jobs thinks. However, in the short term tough talk and legal action has, according to “industry checks” by Reiner, resulted in hardware manufacturers reassessing their positions regarding Google’s Android operating system. Rival software and hardware teams are going back to the drawing board to look for work-arounds. Lawyers are redoubling efforts to gauge potential defensive and offensive responses.

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Analyst: Apple “Disrupting” iPhone Competitors With Legal Threats

Section: iPhone / iPod touch / iPad , iPhone , iDevice Apps , Originals Wow, there were a ton of free apps this week new to the App Store. Lots of camera utilities. Thankfully, there’s more. Why don’t you check out my list? Gibson Learn & Master Guitar Application – What a title! Gibson is known for great guitars, but a great guitar does not a great song make (not alone, anyway).  So, they’re trying to get you motivated to get better at playing that six string.  This app comes with a Chromatic Tuner with alternate tunings, a metronome to keep you on time, a chord library and some free video lessons from Steve Krenz. Plus, the app has a very appealing interface. This is a definite download for any guitar players (or wannabes) out there. Boxed FREE – A fresh take on the four color connect and remove style of games. This one has you drawing a square with all four corners landing on the same color anywhere on the screen.  Then all of the blocks in between vanish.  I like the idea. Plus, it’s OpenFeint enabled, always a good thing. Note Recorder Free – This app one-ups other audio recording apps by letting you draw notes along with the recordings. And it’s synced, so you can scrub back through your notes and listen to what was going on while you were scribbling. Your iPhone might be a bit small for this sort of task, but you can zoom in and out, and who knows, this might prove more useful on an iPad in the future

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Free apps roundup for March 5th, 2010

Section: iPhone / iPod touch / iPad , iPhone , iPod touch , iDevice Apps , Mac Software Macintosh and iPhone/iPod/iPad product updates and announcements for March 4, 2010: Macintosh iPod Macintosh app4mac has released Projector 2.0.8 , an update to their powerful project management application for Mac OS X. Projector provides all the tools you need for professional project management. It is designed to keep track of tasks and calculate a project’s cost. Projector is an easy-to-learn, cost-effective tool that simplifies project scheduling. Projector is also coming soon on iPad and iPhone. Cocoamug Software has released CosmoPod 4.2.1 , an update to their bright application for Mac OS X. CosmoPod is a one-click simple extension to Apple Safari browser that helps you saving and converting internet media content to your Mac, iPhone, AppleTV or iPod. It’s just like an extra Download window for your media. CosmoPod supports most popular web video formats, including FLV, DivX, WMV, MMS, RM, and RTSP. This update mainly improves the application capability to easily import DVD.

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Mac, iPhone, iPod and iPad product news – March 4, 2010

GPS is an amazingly transformative technology, originally designed for military commanders to pinpoint enemies and navigate through hazardous battlefields. Though GPS has since spread to car navigation devices and handheld camping gizmos. Starting with the iPhone 3G, Apple began integrating GPS into their mobile device with features users eventaully took for granted. Except when those features fail because, though GPS is now almost ubiquitous, it certainly isn’t perfect. Even the iPhone, cool as it is, has a few flaws that keep it from being the seamless experience Steve Jobs no doubt wants it to be. Here’s a list of the top ten reasons GPS can fail on the iPhone. 1. Tall buildings: Most iPhone users, especially those in New York and San Francisco, are intimately familiar with AT&T’s spotty service, but what they may not realize is that their urban environment is also working against them. GPS is a line of sight technology that needs a clear path from phone to satellite and back again. In a dense city packed with skyscrapers like New York, finding an unobstructed patch of sky to divine your location can be a serious challenge. 2

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10 Reasons Why You Can’t Always Rely on GPS on the iPhone