I’ve no idea why it took so long for Fring to embrace Google (NSDQ: GOOG)’s mobile platform, but whatever the reasoning is, it’s good to see them jumping on board. Yap, Fring is now an Android thing, too — joining the likes of the iPhone/iPod Touch, Symbian S60, Windows Mobile, Linux (Maemo) and Java ME-enabled devices.
Just like that’s the case with other smartphone platforms, Fring for Android allows users to chat with their buddies across multiple IM networks, make free calls, post status updates, as well as make calls to mobile and land-lines using SkypeOut or some of the available SIP VoIP services — either via WiFi or 3G.
And that’s it. Simply search for “fring” in the Android Market and take it from there. And check out the introductory video after the jump.
There are now more mobile apps available in the AppStore than any one person could ever hope to try out in a single lifetime. Add in the myriad Java apps out there, and the sheer volume of mobile apps becomes overwhelming. How is anyone supposed to wade through the much and find truly unique and innovative apps? Apple (NSDQ: AAPL)’s iPhone app “Top lists” clearly aren’t cutting it. Another possible solution is mplayit’s mobile app discovery engine.
At the Under The Radar conference today in Mountain View, CA., mplayit was showing off their Facebook-based mobile app discovery platform. The idea behind mplayit is to harness the power of crowd sourcing and Facebook’s massive social network to give users a quick way to find new mobile apps. A live “Apptivity Feed” integrates with Facebook to show you, in real-time, what apps other Facebook users have been checking out. The “Featured Apps” section monitors apps that are trending hot with Facebook users, while the “Shared” and “Popular” sections display apps that have been shared the most or downloaded the most, respectively.
Once you’ve stumbled upon an interesting app, mplayit serves up app descriptions, reviews, screenshots, and even videos of the app in action – if it’s a Java app, you can even demo it through mplayit’s emulator. You can even download the app, add it to your “collection,” and share the app through email and Facebook right from mplayit’s platform.
At this point, only iPhone and Java apps are supported, but Android and BlackBerry (NSDQ: RIMM) will be supported by year’s end. Windows Mobile and webOS will be coming in 2010. Check out the demo video below, and then hit up mplayit.com to see for yourself!
Instant message aficionados have been eagerly waiting on Cerulean Studios to bring their profile-synchronizing Trillian client to the iPhone. It’s been years, in fact, since we first heard of the Trillian iPhone app. Today, that wait ends. Trillian for iPhone has officially hit the AppStore with a $4.99 price tag!
The thing about instant messaging apps is that there are a veritable truckload of options available on the AppStore. Some really good apps are offered for free. If you’re not a hardcore IM user, you’re probably going to be just fine sticking with one of those apps. But, if you use instant messaging services like your life depends on them, Trillian for iPhone will probably be a worthy investment.
Trillian supports multiple IM services and allows you to switch between conversations with a tabbed interface. But, it doesn’t stop there. Trillian for iPhone synchronizes your IM accounts with their the Trillian Astra servers, so when you change your status or update your buddy list on the iPhone app, those changes will automatically be pushed to your Windows Trillian client and the web-based Trillian client. There’s also an option to have any instant messages pushed to your iPhone. And, since all chats are stored on Cerulean Studios’ servers, you’ll never have to worry about losing a chat transcript again.
Trillian for iPhone isn’t going to be for everyone, especially with its premium price-point. But, for power-users, Trillian is going to be hard to beat.
The very handy (or should I say hands free?) Drivesafe.ly app for BlackBerry (NSDQ: RIMM) has apparently reached the 1 million user threshold. Wowza! Congrats to the folks at Drivesafe.ly. If you’ve never heard of the app before, Drivesafe.ly enables you to put your phone DOWN while driving your car. It reads emails and SMS messages to you, allowing you to focus on the road (which is what you should be doing in the first place). Other key features of the app:
Hands Free – No need to touch the phone while driving
One-touch activation – no complicated setup
Bluetooth and radio transmitter compatible
Reads text message shorthand (lol, brb)
Optional customizable auto-responder
Ideally you’d turn your device OFF, or throw it in the glove box out-of-reach, but Drivesafe.ly is the best compromise I’ve seen yet.
Versions for both BlackBerry and Android are available, and new editions for the iPhone and Windows Mobile are coming soon. For more information hit up Drivesafe.ly.
Received an email this morning from the good folks at Dropbox. The news? They’ve released a Dropbox iPhone app… Cool! The app is of course free, and offers access to your Dropbox while you’re on-the-go. Access, view and download your files right from your iPhone for offline viewing. Take new photos or videos and sync them to your Dropbox… Or even share links to files in your Dropbox, all from the convenience of your iPhone.
In case you’ve never heard of Dropbox before, here’s the official skinny:
Dropbox is software that syncs your files online and across your computers.
Put your files into your Dropbox on one computer, and they’ll be instantly available on any of your other computers that you’ve installed Dropbox on (Windows, Mac, and Linux too!) Because a copy of your files are stored on Dropbox’s secure servers, you can also access them from any computer or mobile device using the Dropbox website.
For my own personal use I’ve used Dropbox to share files, pictures, movies and more. On the business side I’ve used it while collaborating on projects… uploading new documents, design files and more to a central location, ensuring the latest versions were always up and ready to go. Dropbox is truly a handy tool.
For more information on the new Dropbox app, hit up the App Store (iTunes link). For more information on the service in general (and to setup a free 2GB account) hit up Dropbox.com.
It’s been in the works for awhile, but the BeamReader PDF viewing app fro Android is now ripe for the downloading. BeamReader boasts native font rendering, text search, and no requirement for network connection to handle document processing. On top of PDFs, BeamReader can handle TIFF, JPG, PNG, BMP, and GIF image files, as well as compressed ZIP arhives. For a free app, that’s pretty dang useful. Documents to Go is still a big name in the Android Market (they even scored a preload deal on the T-Mobile Pulse), but PDF viewing in particular is locked away in the premium version. For more info on BeamReader for Android, hit up SLG, or go ahead and find the app in the on-device Market.
One of the gems for the BlackBerry (NSDQ: RIMM) Developer Conference that slipped through the cracks was the announcement of Urbanspoon for BlackBerry. You might recognize the app for its prominence in iPhone ads – it’s the one where you shake your phone to get suggested restaurants within your area based on GPS location. You can set criteria for cuisine, budget, and area, if you’re feeling picky. The Storm retains the accelerometer support, so you can shake and eat to your heart’s content. To turn the crank and spin the foodie slot machine, check out UrbanSpoon’s BlackBerry page. The iPhone version, as ever, is available from iTunes here.
Latitude, a Google (NSDQ: GOOG) service built into Maps for Mobile for sharing your location with trusted friends, just got two big updates. First up is location history, which, when enabled, will allow you to see where you were at specific times on desktop Google Maps, and follow your tracks sequentially. This seems like it could be very handy when trying to retrace steps from a hazy Friday night, seeing where you took a wrong turn, or any number of other scenarios. I’d really like to be able to slap on a Panoramio layer on top of that so I could see where geotagged pictures sit in the larger scheme of a trip. The other update is Location Alerts, which pings you via e-mail or SMS whenever someone on your Latitude list is nearby – very helpful for impromptu meetups, but depends on having a well-populated friends list. It certainly saves the hassle of actually opening up Google Maps and navigating to Latitude to see who’s usefully nearby. To get started with Location History, head on over here to enable it on your Google account, or over here for Location Alerts.
The eReader app is now available for Android! To install, hit up http://www.ereader.com/android from your Android-powered device. Installation of the app will give you support for the eReader and Fictionwise bookstores, and more. Somewhat standard yet key features will allow you to move forward, backward, change the font size and switch the reading layout within a document. Plus, the PDB format is supported too. If you’ve been looking for an e-book reader, give eReader for Android a try.
Note: I’m not sure if/when this app is going to make an appearance in the Android Market, but for now… use the download link above from your device.
There are now more mobile apps available in the AppStore than any one person could ever hope to try out in a single lifetime. Add in the myriad Java apps out there, and the sheer volume of mobile apps becomes overwhelming. How is anyone supposed to wade through the much and find truly unique and innovative apps? Apple (
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