Crave

Maybe we should have used "So bad, but so good" as our show motto instead of "High Tech, Low Brow!" Today's show is a good example of that, and we kick it off with Wilson's brief and spoiler-free review of Bruno. We also talk about the rise of the Twitterns, Apple breaking the Pre-iTunes lovefest, and Jeff meeting Tony Hawk!

Tony Hawk plays his new game, Ride.

(Credit: Jeff Bakalar/The 404)

Check it out! Jeff was invited to an Activision event last night to preview Tony Hawk's new game, but he was pretty surprised when Tony Hawk himself showed up to show him around! As you can see, the game comes with an actual "skateboard" controller to jump, ride, and pop up to do tricks within the game. Jeff tells us that the game is very realistic, but popping up the board feels more like a snowboard than skating. Check it out for yourself when it comes out on October 13 for $120.

In other news, The 404 has decided to hire a young Twittern to update our Twitter. Social media, whether it's in short or long form, is super time-consuming...anyone out there want to be our Twittern? We're only half-joking...

In more important news, Apple has finally broken up the love affair between iTunes and the Palm Pre: the smartphone no longer works with the popular desktop software. Jeff owns a Pre and figures that the only thing to do now is to refrain from upgrading to the latest software, lest some savvy developer use the latest SDK to somehow crack Apple's padlock.

Also, start getting amped for tomorrow's episode where I, Justin Yu, will debut yet another band in a segment we like to call...deep breath..."The 404 Semi-Weekly Audio Draft Sponsored by Beck's Beer in conjunction with Last.FM, a subsidiary of CBS Interactive and CNET News and Reviews." Jeez.

(Credit: Screenshot by Bonnie Cha/CNET)

On Thursday, Palm announced the public release of its Mojo SDK to all developers interested in creating apps for its WebOS and launched a new developer portal, complete with FAQs, forums, and all the associated documentation for the SDK. In addition, the company said it will open the app submission process to all developers this fall and new applications are already in the pipeline from its early access program. Sweet, sweet news for both developers and Palm Pre owners.

(Credit: Apple, Inc.)

Two weeks after iPhone OS 3.0's initial release, Apple posted new, beta 2 versions of the iPhone OS 3.1 firmware and the iPhone SDK 3.1 for developers. The OS 3.1 is available for all versions of the iPod Touch and the iPhone, while the SDK 3.1 is available in versions that are compatible with Leopard and Snow Leopard.

Without seeing the update, we don't know which changes the beta brings, but we're hoping it contains bug fixes for problems we've covered here and here.

If you've seen and used this new update, please tell us about your experiences with it in the comments.

Updated at 7:28 p.m. PDT: to reflect updated information about the iPhone OS 3.1 beta 2 release.

Gizmodo reports that the new SDK will allow developers to connect their iPhones to a Mac running Xcode over Wi-Fi using Instruments for debugging. They point out this is useful whenever the dock connector needs to be used for another reason (Tethering? Development and testing of Tom Tom like hardware add-ons?).

TUAW reports that the tethering and MMS hacks we all enjoyed on iPhone OS 3.0 and 3.1 beta 1 no longer work under beta 2.

At Tuesday's iPhone OS 3.0 preview event, Apple unveiled several new features of the iPhone operating system, including the capability to create applications specifically for interfacing with third-party hardware. Examples given included a five-band EQ interface for speaker docks, or an FM transmitter control that allows you to select broadcast frequencies based on signal strength.

An example of the Alesis ProTrack using an application front end for recording control.

This may sound like a benign little announcement to most people, but as someone who closely monitors trends in iPod accessories, I expect that this will be huge for the industry. What company isn't going to want to differentiate its products with a slick app?

I expect that everything from battery chargers to stereo Bluetooth headsets will (for better or worse) be given the app treatment. The products won't necessarily be any better for it, but the gee-whiz appeal alone will probably carry manufacturers and consumers through to the end of the year.

The nightmare for me is going to be all the apps I'll need to download for each iPod and iPhone accessory I review. Every speaker and every dock will likely require an app download to get the full picture of the product. Version updates for apps will also be a pain. If Altec Lansing hypothetically updates the EQ control on the app for its latest line of speakers, suddenly, I'll need to add a note to all its product pages.

But there are some potentially cool things to come out of hardware-specific applications. Here's what I'm looking forward to seeing:

Buttonless products. Call it the "Shuffle Effect," but if you can migrate all of a product's controls to the iPhone's touch-screen interface, then why have buttons? I'm not saying it's a good idea, necessarily, but the potential makes it inevitable that we'll see a product like this sooner or later.... Read More

T-Mobile G1, the first phone powered by Google's Android software

(Credit: T-Mobile)

Attention coders: Google has released version 1.0 of the Android software developer kit.

The kit lets programmers create applications that will run on Android phones, even before T-Mobile starts selling the first Android-powered G1 on October 22. The biggest difference from the previous Android SDK 0.9: software built with version 1.0 will actually, not just probably, work on those real-world phones, according to the SDK release notes.

Google hopes its Android operating system project will help spur the mobile phone industry into a more enthusiastic embrace of Internet technology. Google of course profits from ads next to search results, and Google Maps opens up other advertising possibilities that are more closely tied to a phone user's physical location.

A major part of the Android effort is Google's attempt to woo outside programmers into writing their own applications for Android phones, because Google hopes to bring the easier innovation of the PC market to the relatively closed mobile phone industry. The SDK is a key part of that effort, as is a forthcoming application download site called the Android Market. That market won't necessarily let people sell Android applications at first, though.

Also in the SDK release notes, Google called out some specific changes, such as some new abilities to make use of Android phone sensors, handle audio files, and use Wi-Fi networks. Serious programmers can look at Google's catalog of API (application programming interface) differences.

Google couldn't help adding a little nerd humor to the release notes:

"We regret to inform developers that Android 1.0 will not include support for dot-matrix printers."

Build apps for the Sony Ericsson Xperia X1.

(Credit: Sony Ericsson)

Sony Ericsson announced its third annual Content Awards on Thursday. Developers are invited to submit content and applications for use on Sony Ericsson devices. The company released a free SDK two weeks ago.

Sony Ericsson is asking developers to create content and applications that address three questions: How can mobile phones help us monitor our carbon footprint? How can the next generation of mobile phones make our lives less frantic? In what ways can we make our phones personal?

Entries will be judged on ease of use, entertainment factor, innovation, look and feel, and audio performance. The seven categories include Being Productive, Going Green, In-Car applications, Mobile Entertainment, Lifestyle Experiences, Themes & Graphics, and Xperia X1 Panels. Hint, hint on that last one, by the way. The Xperia X1 is set for release outside North America before the end of the month.

The winners in each category will get a trip to Sweden to share their content with developers and company execs, attend workshops, and indulge in a tasty smorgasbord lunch. All right, we made the last one up, but what would a trip to Sweden be without it?

For details, check out Sony Ericsson's Web site. The deadline for entries is November 30.

Google on Monday released the first beta version of its software developer kit (SDK) for Android phones, a significant step in the company's hope for "open" phone technology.

Google, which is leading the 34-company Open Handset Alliance to create the largely open-source Android software stack for mobile devices, already had released an "early look" SDK in November 2007. With the new beta SDK, though, the company is telling programmers they can get started in earnest creating software that will work on Android phones due to start shipping later this year, though stopping short of promising full compatibility.

"Since this is a beta release, applications developed with it may not quite be compatible with devices running the final Android 1.0," Google developer advocate Dan Morrill said in a blog post.

Google's promised advantages of Android.

(Credit: Google)

Among changes in the new SDK are the addition of the phone's new home screen as well as some new applications for controlling the camera, playing music, setting alarms, viewing pictures, and dealing with SMS and MMS messages.

Android phones, notably HTC's Dream, are due to ship in the fourth quarter.

Google had hinted in May that the new Android SDK was imminent, but the company ended up sharing it only with finalists in an Android programming contest until Monday. The Android Developer Challenge is awarding $10 million to coders to try to jump-start development efforts; on Monday, Google said a second challenge will be announced later this year that "will give developers a chance to build polished applications once hardware is available."

Google hopes Android phones will be open to run innumerable applications, not just locked down to handle a relatively small number of authorized packages. To achieve this promise though, one key step is helping programmers to write that code. And SDK does just that, for example, by providing a software emulator that can run Android applications without an actual Android phone.

Drobo, the world's first storage robot.

(Credit: Drobo Robotics)

In an effort to keep up (and possibly even surpass) other feature-rich NAS devices, such as the Synology DS107+ or the HP MV2120, Drobo Robotics today released to the Drobo Developer Community (DDC) the beta SDK for its ever popular Drobo products including Drobo, the external hard drive, and DroboShare, the network storage add-on.

The 18MB SDK includes a special firmware version for DroboShare that provides support for installing third-party applications and a sample application, which is an open-source UPnP Media Server. This means once installed, the DroboShare will allow UPnP-enabled devices, like Xbox 360 or PlayStation 3, to access and play multimedia content stored on the Drobo external hard drive. Going forward, the SDK will support more standards and types of applications including: iTunes Music Server, Rsync, FTP, Web, Squeeze Center, and so on.

In addition to supporting DroboShare, the SDK comes with extras for the Drobo external hard drive. Immediately available with this release are a Linux version Drobo Dashboard and a utility that allows Windows to show Drobo's actual storage size. Going forward, you will be able to even create certain manipulations to the Drobo's hardware, such as changing the usage of the Drobo's LED lights.

You can register to be a member of DDC and download the beta SDK right now and start further robotizing the Drobo your own way.

When Apple announced the iPhone apps store several months ago, it appeared to signal the end for the popular homebrew Installer.app by Nullriver. While the application has a few developer creations that cost money to use, most of the library is completely free, letting people load up on useful applications without spending a dime. The application became so popular it started coming with popular unlock and jailbreak utilities, including ZiPhone, which has had more than 3 million downloads of its latest version.

Apple's new system is a different story. It doesn't cost anything, but developers must go through the company's QA for approval and inclusion. Developers can also charge users to use their applications at the point or purchase instead of relying on time or feature restrictions post-download. There's also the SDK, which makes it viable for companies to spin out entirely new development teams to port over versions of their Web apps or software that are specially tuned for the device.

The obvious guess here is that the Installer.app will simply go the way of the dinosaurs because of Apple's own first party creation, but I think the groundbreaking tool has life left in it yet. Nothing besides the apps store says people will no longer want to jailbreak their phones. The new marketplace sure looks nice, but it's not going to have everything people want. There will be all manner of apps that don't make the cut and the developers that built them will want to hawk them somewhere else.

Another thing to take into account is one of the important things not included in Apple's latest software--customization.

One of the early killer apps for the iPhone was Summerboard, a simple tool that would completely re-skin the look and feel of your phone. No such application is likely to make its way to the app store, since no app made through the SDK can have that level of control. The same goes for potential VoIP apps that can be integrated at a very deep level into the device's calling software.

There's still a huge market for these things, whether Apple is willing to allow it or not. I'm not surprised the company has passed on the potential cash cow. Nokia practically built an empire in the 1990s by selling phones with interchangable faceplates, but ultimately the ratio of quality to crap from third-party creators was off the charts. That stigma still exists for some users, which is why it's likely Apple passed on adding a user replaceable battery if only to limit the offshoot of companies that would likely create glitter, and clear plastic replacements.

What it comes down to this time around is readiness. A cheaper price point means more people are likely to want and actually afford the device. The new architecture also means those same hordes of people will be open to having non-Apple applications on their phone. While I have no doubt Apple will easily pull in huge numbers from paid apps in the coming months, Installer.app might have a few surprises up its sleeves.

Update: I incorrectly referred to Nullriver as Nullsoft--makers of WinAmp. That has since been fixed.