I’ve been playing with LoKast for a few days and it’s raised some rather exciting possibilities. The application turns your iPhone into a two-way media server, enabling you to rapidly share any of your media (photos, video, contacts, music) to anyone else using the app on the same WiFi or Bluetooth connection.

My first reaction was ‘well, there’s just me at home, so…’ — but that’s to miss the point with LoKast. For any young’n'hip things regularly hitting music venues or gigs, LoKast could be hugely valuable. Provided you’re both running the app (and that’s the main issue) you can swiftly discover random people in your vicinity and start browsing the media they’ve elected to make public.

It’s an absolute breeze to use. Fire it up, give yourself a name, choose a profile photo and start tapping media you’d like to share. It’s stupidly fast — of course — because you’re not using the internet, you’re using the local connection.

‘Local-casting’ will typically work when you’re within 300ft of other LoKast users — provided there’s WiFi (or if there’s not, Bluetooth is a useful fall back).

Think about using it at a sports stadium, for example. That could be a rather interesting experience. One imagines you might be able to find some fantastic photos, videos and audio related to your team. But LoKast could be phenomenally useful around the music scene for anyone who’d like to receive (or distribute!) all kinds of band or artist related media.

Flip up the app, browse the users and you’re immediately browsing their public content. Click the ‘add’ button on anything and it’s yours (apart from DRM protected music — DRM music offers you a 30-second clip and the option to buy the track on iTunes — fair enough).

I love it’s simplicity. It’s essentially just a nice skin on top of a web server — but the simplicity is what is beginning to swiftly engage users. I hear it’s getting a riotous reception at the mediafest that is SXSX. I can well imagine why. I’m particularly keen on how the app ushers in an era of disposable media — the transitory experience of sharing media, never to be repeated again. Forget becoming friends or ‘adding people’, this is all about the media.

I’m not entirely sure where LoKast could go. I certainly think that if some of the cool’n'hip iPhone users pick it up around the music/gigs/events space, it’ll break out quickly from SXSX.

I think music is the way ahead though. Indeed, I understand that artists such as The Boxer Rebellion, The Ruse, Bazaar Royale, BlackMahal and Katia have all signed up to use LoKast at their events this month. I can imagine a lot of users all flipping up LoKast on their iPhone at the instruction of the band they’re watching. Very interesting indeed.

Speaking of SXSX, Mark Cuban’s Magnolia Pictures are reportedly planning on using LoKast to promote their new movies at one of the upcoming SXSX events. Again, that’s another area that makes a heck of a lot of sense.

I’ve made a quick video walk-through of LoKast so you can see some of the basic features in action:

You can, of course, find LoKast in the iTunes App Store (iTunes link — free). Enjoy…

• The Name – It sucks. Who cares? I’m over it.
• Closed – Oh no! Whatever will I do? As much as some arbitrary app rejections might suck here and there, the App Store has set the standard for all other app stores. All my favorite apps that I can’t live without will be on the iPad. And the fact that the App Store is closed; the fact that Apple makes the hardware and the software, is the very reason why people love the Apple experience. Developers can cry all they want about its policies, but the App Store made buying a mobile app mainstream. Millions of customers that wouldn’t have existed otherwise  are now accustomed to paying for mobile content. You’re welcome, snotty developers.
• It’s $500 – OK, I already have a MacBook Pro, an iPhone 3GS, do I need an iPad? No, I desperately need an iPad. I just do. Tech is my life, it’s how I make my living.
• Just a Big iPhone - Yes! Exactly! That’s like saying that if you have a fifty pound pile of cash–a great thing, who would want a 100 pound pile of cash? Me who. That’s who.
• Huge Bezel – OK, I’ll admit, at first sight of the big bezel–especially after seeing those sexy barely-there-bezeled mock-ups–I was taken aback. But then I thought it through. Where else would you grip it? Would you hold it like a cocktail waitress holds her tray?
• AT&T – This is the only part that kills me. But for my needs, I’ll go WiFi only, and save on the $130 bucks and extra monthly subscription to yet another service. I’ll use it to surf the web at home, and use my iPhone when I’m out in the wild–who wants to lug around a tablet anyway? So by default this doesn’t matter to me at all (I know a total cop-out and AT&T’s SHIT 3G network should be a dealbreaker if you require 3G connectivity).

So yes, sign me up! I have already pledged my soul to the His holiness in the church of Jobs. Call me a sheep, a weak-willed fanboy, but when you are fiddling with your stylus, trying to get your sodding handset to work with that fragmented application, I’ll be joyfully multi-touching my way through the Internet, an ebook or one of the most compelling 140,000 apps ever made for a mobile platform.

What’s Zit Picker you ask? 

It’s exactly what it sounds like it is. You know what are Zits, don’t you? Zit Picket makes you pinch, pop, touch and pick the Zits off a beautiful girl’s face on the iPhone. The goal of the game is simple. Keep the girl’s face clean off any marks and she’ll be thankful to you. If not, all the stress and pain will make her cry.

The game makes use of the iPhone’s multi-touch screen, allowing your to zap the Zits with either one of two fingers, touching or pinching them. Do that and *ploop* goes one. You are awarded points for every single Zit you clear. There are 3 different types of Zits and based on their complexity, they carry different points.

Zit Picker is FREE for the first 2500 downloads, so get it in the App Store while you can.

It’s great to see practical real life experiences of folk using mobile technology beyond calling and texting.

Posted by email from MIR Live (posterous)

—

So everyone, including Barack Obama, knows that the slickest way to market your product (or candidate) is with a native app for the slickest phone ever, the iPhone.

As traditional forms of advertising like TV, radio, and newspaper slowly die-off, perhaps innovative measures like this are the next solution.

But you have to do it right. Two apps that get it right are Zippo Lighter and Carling’s iPint.

Zippo Lighter, “Lit by Moderati” as it says on the launching screen, is no joke. You get to pick from a selection of colors/patterns for your lighter, the flame moves as you move your phone, and the flame even turns blue and makes the phone vibrate when you hold it upside down. Flicking the lid open gives you a satisfying “click,” and spinning the wheel of the lighter produces a nice flinty “thwick”. It’s actually a genuinely cool app, and even though it’s simple, it’s an app that I haven’t just used once, it’s something that I play with a lot. It came in handy for last week’s Neil Diamond concert (seriously).

Carling’s iPint was actually available at the launch of the App Store, and kudos to them for being on the leading edge. The actual “game” within iPint is only mildly amusing, but pouring and drinking a beer is awesome, and like the Zippo app, it draws “Ooohs” and “Awwws” from all the iPhone uninitiated I show it to. There are several paid beer app called iBeer, but why do we even care to pay when we have iPint for free? Actually, people might pay, because for some reason that I don’t know, iPint is no longer in the App Store. Maybe Apple was thinking of making a competitive beer app and had it pulled?

Living in the US, I had never even heard of Carling. But I Googled them and found out that they are a top UK beer. Even if I may not become a loyal Carling customer, they reached someone in another market and got them interested enough to Google their product. If you’re trying to build awareness for your product, reaching people for the first time who don’t know you is always the hardest.

Lastly, let’s talk about a company who got it all wrong: Audi. I could go on about the Audi A4 Driving Challenge and everything that’s wrong with it, but it’s so awful that I don’t even want to dissect it. Let’s just say that the controls are so wonky that it’s more painful than fun. Between this game and reading the recent tweets from Carlo Longino of MobHappy, my opinion of the Audi brand is at an all time low. Re-badged Volkswagens they are!

So nice work, Zippo and Carlings, two brands with which I now associate the warm fuzzy feelings that come from a slick iPhone app!

It turns out, there exists an app that can take Google Earth’s place until Google rolls up their sleeves. Presenting, Earthscape. Earthscape is an application available for the iPhone that gives you a globe to play around with, much like Google Earth. You can browse using your fingers and zoom using two fingers. The application also has the ability to point to your location on the globe using the iPhone’s location feature. The globe can be viewed in Satellite view, or you can tilt the map to view it ground level. 

The application uses its own set of imagery and hence, is nowhere as advanced as Google’s. If you’re in a city that’s not known for something, expect some non-detailed images. It features the ability to highlight locations with Wikipedia entries and users can add their own photos to the database.

For a limited time, the developers have made the application completely free through iTunes, bringing it down from the usual price of $10. So grab it while you can. It doesn’t get better than this.

[Via TechCrunch]

1. HTC Touch Dual

2. HTC Touch Diamond

3. HTC Touch Pro

4. HTC TyTn-II

5. AT&T Tilt

6. Sony Ericsson Xperia X1

The team also released an update for the iPhone version from 3.10 to 3.16 which adds location support and improved video quality. I’ve been using the service for quite some time now, and it’s been great so far. Of course, we here at MIR are great fans of the service too. 

Interested? They’re taking Sign-Ups now.

- – - – -

As someone who’s mind tends to constantly overflow with questions, ideas and useless facts of information, I’m often trying to find creative new ways of leaving myself notes. Odd text messages, cryptic emails and post-it notes stuck to my screen are a way of life. More often than not though, these snippets get lost in my daily barrage of communication. With no real system for cataloging my thoughts its any wonder I get anything done. Until now that is, enter Evernote.

The basic concept behind Evernote is a simple one, centralised storage for all you notes. Whilst the idea isn’t a new one the quality of execution is second to none.

Evernote is kind of like a web clipper on steroids, you can send it notes, pictures, sound clips, sketches, whatever and it stores them online for easy access. Seamless browser (IE7/Firefox) and OS (Windows/OSX) integration make the service a dream to use. Just right click in Windows for example and the “Add to Evernote” option appears. Its intelligent too, hit print screen on you keyboard and a crop tool appears allowing you to clip a section of the screen (perfect for maps, or non selectable text).

However, what about when your away from you desktop? I don’t know about you, but ideas seem to pop into my mind at the most inappropriate times! What makes Evernote the must have app for me is the iPhone interface. Not only can you view all of you notes through the free app (available from the AppStore), you can submit new ones too. Either sync them live or pen them offline for syncing later once you have a suitable data connection. Its a bit like having you own personal private blog that’s instantly available (provided you have a net connection) and more importantly searchable. You aren’t limited to just one notebook either, for example I have ones set up for specific development projects I’m working on.

Sending text notes and pictures from the iPhone is a breeze and I love the ability to add tags making them easier to find in the future. Sound clips are just as simple to record and post, which for an aspiring music producer is great – no more hum the tune for me!

Overall the application is slick and is a very good use of the iPhones features, posts are Geo-Tagged for example. In future versions I would like to see support for sketches but it is only early days for iPhone apps.

The service is free to use up to a 40 MB monthly limit and the Premium subscription is just $5 dollars a month if you find yourself using it more. Windows mobile users are also in luck with as there is a compatible version available.

I can think of tons of uses for Evernote, I strongly recommend going and having a play.

App: Tris
Price: Free
Type: Game

I have been a fan of Tetris ever since I got my first GameBoy in 1989. The grey graphics dancing across the green screen, the hypnotic Russian music, I probably spent the better part of my (wasted) youth playing that game. I almost bought the EA version for the iPhone but I heard that it wasn’t nearly worth it. The whole idea of EA doing a Tetris game is kind of a weird fit. Tetris is a simple game, and EA doesn’t do simple. Reports and reviews said it was overblown, overpriced and just overdone in general. So fine. I just saved ten bucks (you would call it 5 quid).

Resigned to a fate of Tetris-less iPhone, I was stoked to find that Tris, originally a Jailbroken Tetris app, had gone legit and was now in the iTunes store. I had never Jailbroken my iPhone before because I was always worried about software updates giving me an iBrick. Since my iPhone is my only phone number, and I use it for work, I just couldn’t take the risk. So I never got to check out this cool little game. The best thing about Tris? It’s free. 0 dollars, 0 pounds, free. Tris was designed by Noah Witherspoon, aka my newest hero.

The way Tris works is you tap the screen to rotate the blocks, and you can “pull” them down by dragging them. That’s it. It’s exactly like Tetris, same rules and same layout. And you don’t actually have to be touching the piece to drag them down, you can pull down from dragging anywhere above or below the piece.

Unlike EA’s version, there’s no 3D animations to suck your precious battery juice. This really is a WYSIWYG situation. Falling blocks, that you rotate to make lines.

The only problems I have with this game are pretty small gripes. One, it has no sound effects or music. The original Tetris had Russia’s greatest hits in the background, and that satisfying “CRUNCHSPLOSION” when you completed a line. Secondly, the tap-to-rotate interface only rotates the pieces clockwise. When you over-rotate, depending on the piece, you might have to tap it three more times to get it in the desired position. This can be a problem in the higher levels, when they start falling fast. Back on the GameBoy version (aka the Old Testament of Tetris), buttons B or A would rotate the piece either way, so if you over-rotated, the other button was a de-facto undo button.

These quibbles aside, this is a great game, and a highly addictive way to pass time on a bus, plane or train. The great thing about this app, is that you can listen to your iPod while you are playing, which helps to alleviate the lack of Russian accompaniment (now if only I could download the Old Testament of Tetris music and just put that on repeat on my iPod as I played!!).

Now the bad news. We’ll never get an updated version with the music and sound effects. Because Tris is getting pulled from iTunes within the next 24-48 hours. So if you have not downloaded it yet, don’t finish reading this sentence before you do. Move it!