Macgasm

The Olloclip ($69.95), by Patrick O’Neill and Chong Pak, is a clip on lens set for your iPhone 4, featuring a wide-angle, fisheye, and macro lenses. Originally a Kickstarter project, Olloclip is now available directly from the website for purchase.Unlike other lens sets that require you to glue attachment rings to your precious iPhone, the Olloclip simply clips on, making it exceptionally easy to use. [...]

Patently Apple is reporting that Apple has been given the patent for a “magnetic securing system” like what is used in the MagSafe power connector. The patent does say that “the connector may be a power connector such as the MagSafe.”

The images included in the patent filing show a tablet-like device with the aforementioned magnetic connector on the curved back. As reported back in October, Apple was thought to be considering such a connector for a future iPad. It hasn’t materialized yet, and the question remains the same now as back then: what is this for?

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I haven’t been using Apple computers for a terribly long time, just six years or so now. However, just six years ago Apple was still a small market, only popular for the iPod and iTunes really. Market share was 4-ish percent for their computers. Since then, Apple has gone from being a niche tool to being a reliable and logical choice for PC users. There are very few solutions that can’t be run on a Mac (those that can’t, you can still run in Windows on the Mac), and with iPod, iPhone, and iPad ubiquitousness it makes sense for a lot of people to have a homogenized computing experience. Because of these reasons we’re seeing Apple reach a lot of firsts — firsts that would be significant for any company, but truly amazing for a company that was on the brink of failure only 14 years ago.

AppleInsider reported yesterday that Apple experienced a ½ percent growth in Europe during the June quarter. While this seems modest and hardly newsworthy, competitive vendors experienced not a little decline, but massive year-over-year decline. AppleInsider published a great spreadsheet that you should really take a look at, but to give you an idea what the competition looks like, HP declined 6.1 percent and Acer Group fell a whopping 44.6 percent!! Yikes!

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The Android OS and its fragmented landscape of devices have hit a crucial first in the smartphone war. Google’s mobile OS showed a sales volume that was over 5 percent higher than Apple’s iOS devices in Australia locking in an impressive 42.9 percent of all smartphones sold.

This is pretty impressive, but shouldn’t be that shocking to anyone considering the sheer number of Android SKUs that exist, as well as the number of carriers that carry Android. For Apple to be even competing with its 37.2 percent this month, with four SKUs on limited carriers, is way more impressive. Not to mention that the SKU variances are for color and storage space.

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I’m going to be up front about the fact that I’m in this podcast, along with Myke Hurley (of The Bro Show fame), so if you’ve already had enough of me in your ears, you may want to think twice about checking out the link.

But, if you’re looking to add another podcast to your listening schedule, I’d love it if you would head over to iTunes, using the link at the end of the post, to check out a new podcast we’re working on — The AppOrchard

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Every couple of years we hear reports of a company refurbishing their broken products, and then selling them again to the purchasing public. Usually these types of purchases also come with a giant warning of “refurbished.” In some cases they don’t, and that’s when people start to get a little cranky, and rightfully so.

A consumer rights advocate in China has filed a lawsuit against Apple for selling refurbished iPhone 4s as new in a Beijing Apple Store. Apparently Wang Hai, the advocate in question, has six consumers who purchased new iPhones, but instead walked out of the store with refurbs.

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Remember Line Rider? Draw some virtual slopes using a flash version of MS Paint; watch a miniature man on a sled slalom down your creation; share online. It’s astonishing to think that such a simple concept did so well, spawning various fully fledged sequels on handheld gaming devices.

It’s also fairly surprising that a ‘draw and bask in your creativity’ concept can still drive game development so strongly today. Then again, user created content is all the rage at the moment — you only have to look at Little Big Planet to see how popular share-and-go gaming is in today’s world. In fact, Dream Track Nation (DTN) shares much of its DNA with creative-racing title Trackmania.

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The price of food is skyrocketing, the financial markets are slumping and nobody under the age of 25 is employed in the UK. Yet, and it’s supposedly a trend across the world, we’re still spending our money on virtual goods in mobile games. Forget beans on toast, it’s all about consumable virtual goods.

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