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The Department of Energy announced Thursday a $100,000 prize for software developers to come up with mobile applications to tell consumers how much energy they are using. But there’s already an app for that. A quick scan of the iTunes and Android markets shows nearly two dozen existing applications that accomplish the same purpose — helping users keep track of their energy consumption at home. The uMeter app, for example, allows consumers with Wi-Fi-enabled home energy meters to “manage and optimize their energy consumptions, in order to reduce their expenses and carbon footprint,” according to the description. Similarly, the Home...

I'm in the process of getting an iPad-3 and was wondering if there were any apps for precinct walking. 1. Map of precincts with the addresses of GOP registered voters. 2. Easy way of accessing candidate's platform if a vote has a question (can also incorporate graphs, pictures and videos) 3. Video of the candidate speaking directly to the voter asking for their vote. 4. Method of taking down information such as marking off houses visited, those who want more information or wish to contribute/volunteer

Microsoft has been granted a patent for its “avoid ghetto” feature for GPS devices. A GPS device is used to find shortcuts and avoid traffic, but Microsoft’s patent states that a route can be plotted for pedestrians to avoid an “unsafe neighborhood or being in an open area that is subject to harsh temperatures.” Created for mobile phones, the technology uses the latest crime statistics and weather data and includes them when calculating a route.

BlackBerry offers angry users $100 in free apps as apologyOCTOBER 19, 2011 Last week, BlackBerry users experienced a service disruption that in some countries lasted three days. Said to have affected their entire customer base of 70 million users, the outage lasted for one day in the U.S., 1.5 days in Latin America and Canada and for about three days in Europe, the Middle East, India and Africa. To compensate users for their inconvenience and frustration, Research in Motion (RIM) is offering users $100 in free premium apps between now and the end of the year. **SNIP** • SIMS 3...

If you were hoping to be able to buy digital books through Sony's platform on the iPad, kiss that dream goodbye. Apple has rejected Sony's submission of a Reader app because it allows financial transactions to take place outside of Apple. According to a New York Times report, Sony was sent a rejection letter, stating the app violates the App Store rules. According to those regulations, developers are not allowed to offer in-app transactions unless they go through Apple. That is, they must share a cut of all those purchases. Funny, though, that Amazon's Kindle app allows external purchases, and...

Earlier today, Apple officially launched its application store for Macintosh, with about 1,000 free and paid applications available. Snow Leopard users download the Mac OS X 10.6.6 update, and the store is included. But people using the software are in for a change. Consumers typically buy software by machine. Those people buying from the Mac App Store purchase by person. The software is attached to an identity. This is a dramatic departure from how consumer software is typically licensed. Licensing agreements typically restrict installation on one PC, sometimes two or even three...The Mac App Store changes the paradigm and usage...

The Mac App Store has arrived and with it comes access to more than 1,000 different free and paid apps. While nearly identical in design to the iTunes App Store for iOS apps, the Mac App Store represents a big shift in Mac application discovery and development. We’ve already done a walkthrough of the new store. What follows is our analysis of the overall store experience after spending the last few hours exploring the store, downloading applications, comparing the release to initial expectations and ruminating on how it will change the developer ecosystem. If you’ve yet to experience the Mac...

I’ve often wondered if the early Web pioneers had it all to do over again if Web companies would have put less of an emphasis on free. People have been conditioned against paying for services or content on the Web, and the Web elite only have each other to blame. For all the talk of Web companies getting users first and “figuring out” how to make money later, the only two jaw-droppingly, multi-billion-dollar, innovative new ways to advertise online have been Google’s paid search ads and Groupon’s solution to unlocking local ad dollars on a mass scale. Those who win...

Help. I just got myself a new 4th generation 32 GB iPod touch. Any suggestions for about 4-5 good apps for my new iPod? I already plan to install the Dirty Birds game, the ESPN Radio app (since I will connect with Wi-Fi over my home network) and apps for Twitter and Facebook access (so far).

A WSJ Investigation finds that iPhone and Android apps are breaching the privacy of smartphone usersFew devices know more personal details about people than the smartphones in their pockets: phone numbers, current location, often the owner's real name—even a unique ID number that can never be changed or turned off. These phones don't keep secrets. They are sharing this personal data widely and regularly, a Wall Street Journal investigation has found. An examination of 101 popular smartphone "apps"—games and other software applications for iPhone and Android phones—showed that 56 transmitted the phone's unique device ID to other companies without users'...

Experts estimate that the number of open source apps available doubles every fourteen months. Sourceforge alone has more than 260,000 projects, and with so many open source apps now available from so many different repositories, it can be hard to keep up. For this list, we've highlighted some newer open source tools you might have missed. We also included some gems from obscure categories, like Mandelbulbs, gene sequencing, and knitting, to name just a few. Other open source tools on the list are good projects that are overshadowed by older, better-known projects, and at least one is an old favorite...

Every Apple iPhone shipped since its introduction in 2007 contains a unique, software-visible serial number -- the Unique Device Identifier, or UDID. Apple provided this functionality to allow application developers to uniquely identify the iPhone being used for purposes such as storing application preferences or video game high scores. While the UDID does facilitate the process of collecting and storing certain types of data, it also creates a tempting opportunity for use as a tracking agent or to correlate with other personally-identifiable information in unintended ways. In this paper, we investigate where and how UDIDs are being shared, with whom,...

Two iPhone App developers have spotted what appears to be a hacking of the App store rankings by a rogue developer. The rankings in the books category of the US iTunes store features 40 out of 50 apps by the same app developer, Thuat Nguyen. What’s more concerning is that it seems individuals iTunes accounts have been hacked to make mass purchases of that one developer’s apps.

Wednesday June 9, 2010 Following iPhone’s Example Windows Phone 7 to Ban Porn Apps By Thaddeus M. BaklinskiREDMOND, Washington, June 9, 2010 (LifeSiteNews.com) - Following Apple's lead in trying to keep pornography off its iPad and iPhone products, Microsoft has announced a new set of policies for the Windows Phone 7 Marketplace that will not allow porn or sexually suggestive content.The application certification requirements for Windows Phone 7 program developers states that Microsoft will no longer allow content such as "Images that are sexually suggestive or provocative, Content that generally falls under the category of pornography, or Content that a reasonable...

I am looking to try and regain the technology edge (at least the best I can do at this point). I know NOTHING about apps, G3, and the ilk. When i started in "cellular" (yes there was a word before wireless) it was ALMOST "two tin cans and a string". I was always on the "bleeding" edge of the technology for most of that time. Life and circumstances has me looking at this Boost product. So I am about to pull the trigger on a Blackberry 83xx - 8330 (Boost to be precise). I am interested in your pros, cons,...

Step 1 ... point phone at someone and press 'recognise' Step 2 ... woman's name appears on screen Step 3 ... press screen and personal details appear A CAMERAPHONE application that finds names and addresses of total STRANGERS was blasted as a "stalker's dream" last night. The facial recognition "app" instantly identifies snaps by matching them to photos on websites like Facebook and Twitter, where personal info is accessed. Horrified security experts claim BURGLARS taking secret snaps of revellers could find out their addresses. Unsuspecting strangers fooling around on nights out could also fall prey to BLACKMAIL. And women could...

One of the fastest growing trends in mobile is the use of applications such as Foursquare, a social game wherein people randomly report their current location. A new Web site called PleaseRobMe.com suggests you may want to think twice about it. Such location-aware applications inform people when you’re not home, information that can be automatically posted on Twitter or Facebook. PleaseRobMe scoops up that data, mainly from Twitter, and posts that on its home page under the heading “Recent Empty Homes.”

Of the 100,000+ iPhone Apps out there, These 700+ Apps Reviewed by Category On Mashable

San Francisco, CA - The winners of the 2008 Best App Ever Awards have now been announced in the inaugural competition honoring the best iPhone apps and games released in the iTunes App Store. "The goal of the awards was to help publicize some applications that people may never have seen. Some of the best apps have never been featured on the iTunes front page or in an iPhone TV ad, yet they deserve recognition and publicity for the great work the developers have done." said Jeff Scott, founder of 148Apps and the Best App Ever Awards. And it looks...

You may have seen the Apple advertisement in the New York Times this morning (back page of the Business section) extolling the virtues of the iPhone. Nothing new there. If you made it through the fine print, you may have noticed that there are now 10,000 applications available for iPhone and the iPod Touch available on the App Store. Nothing new there, either. What is new, and absolutely stunning, is the small print at the bottom of today's ad. Apple now says that iPhone users have "downloaded over 300 million" applications from the App Store, from games to business programs....