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Moving from Cupertino to Mountain View? Samsung's here to help (update: UK only)
Moving? We all have our reasons, but if you're transferring your stuff from iOS to a Galaxy device, Samsung and Media Mushroom are there to help with the Easy Phone Sync app. The free software installs on your Galaxy product and a PC or Mac, then shleps your stuff wholesale -- media, contacts and all -- from iTunes over to your chosen Samsung Android slate or phone. It even lets you continue to use iTunes to manage music, photos and videos, while keeping everything sync'd up with the non-Cupertino devices. We're sure that Samsung is just trying to lend a hand, and doesn't have any (ahem) other purposes in mind. Check the PR after the break to see for yourself. Update: To be clear, Easy Phone Sync's only for Galaxy-toting folks living in the UK.
Apple introduces 'free app of the week,' kicks things off with Cut the Rope: Experiments
Amazon has been offering a free app of the day for a while now, but that offer is good for Android users only. Well, Apple seems to have caught on to the fact that iOS users like to save money too, as it's debuting a "free app of the week" offer. Cupertino kicked off the new promotion yesterday via Twitter, where it announced that the game Cut the Rope: Experiments will be the first free download. Click on through to the source link, and you'll see that the Appstore indeed lists the title as "free for a limited time."
Daily iPhone App: Sky Defenders
There's two big things I really don't like about Sky Defenders. First, the game is basically a reskinned clone of the much better Tilt to Live, so if for some strange reason you still haven't played that one yet, go ahead and download the original and see how this "reactive shooter" genre is done. The second issue I have with Sky Defenders is that the game depends heavily on Facebook integration, so much so that when it first starts up, you're asked to log into Facebook right away, though you can still get into the game by hitting a small, gray "Play Offline" button. I really dislike being so pressured to be social -- maybe that's a reality for the developers, but if I was just coming along to this game without knowing what it was, I probably wouldn't have gotten any farther than the Facebook login before I gave up. All of that said, there is fun to be had here, especially today, as the game is currently available for free. You play as a superhero, and just like the aforementioned Tilt to Live, you use the tilt controls to slide around the screen, grabbing and using powerups against waves and waves of invading robots and trying to score points inside a time limit. The graphics are definitely colorful and polished, and there are quite a few different powers to try and a nice bit of depth to gameplay. There are freemium powerups to explore as well, but they come across as very spammy. Fortunately, the app just had an update that upped the amount of credits you earn just by playing, which makes the powerups a little more useful. Of course, most of that is sadly "borrowed" from Tilt to Live. But if you really love Tilt to Live and could use a little different spin on things, Sky Defenders is a free download right now.
Apple announces free iBooks Author OS X app for publishing books to the App Store
We're here at Apple's education-themed event at the Guggenheim museum in New York City, and the company's just followed up its long-awaited textbook announcement with something unexpected: iBooks Author, a free OS X program for creating books. The intent is really for teachers and other educators to produce educational materials, but Apple says the format can apply to any genre. Aside from the free part, the real story here is ease of use, with the ability to drag and drop photos, videos and even Microsoft Word files into various templates. If you use Apple's own suite of office apps, in particular, you can drag and drop a Keynote presentation into the doc, and it'll live on as an interactive widget. (You can whip up other widgets, too, though you'll need to know Javascript or HTML.) Moving beyond the main text, authors can also arrange glossaries by highlighting and clicking words, and clicking again to add a definition. In a surprise move, Apple also said authors can publish straight to the store, though we're waiting for clarification that textbook writers and other scribes are actually exempt from Cupertino's notorious approval process. In any case, the app is available now in the App Store (for OS X Lion only, sadly) so you can cracking on that definitive Kurt Vonnegut glossary you never knew you had in you. Update: We've got our hands-on up! Update 2: Apple has confirmed some key approval and revenue-sharing details. First, authors will be subject to the same App Store approval process as developers. Writers can offer their books for free, or for as much as $14.99 -- the same price cap for textbooks sold in the store. And, like developers, authors must agree to a 70/30 revenue split, with writers pocketing 70 percent after Apple takes its share.
