Apple app developers switching allegiance as Android dominates market

Apple app developers switching allegiance as Android dominates market

London: Google and its Android operating system for smartphones and tablets is claiming a victory over rival Apple, as computer software designers responsible for making iPhone and iPad apps are switching their allegiance.

To date, Apple devices have had a huge advantage over rival smartphones because they offer many more sophisticated apps such as games and business tools.

However, this head start is being eroded as devices running the Google Android software now have access to a growing and increasingly impressive library of downloads, the Daily Mail reports.


According to the paper, the Google software is running on three out of every four smartphones and tablets sold ahead of Christmas, which has created a huge and growing market for App developers.

In November, Apple had about 700,000 available Apps, which is about the same number as those available from Google''s Android App store.



In September, Google announced that 25 billion Apps had been downloaded to Android devices, while Apple hit 35 billion in October, the paper said.

Tens of millions more have been downloaded since Christmas day when people around the globe activated new smartphones and tablets, it added. 

Smartphone App Can Keep You Away From STDs.

Each year millions of teens get infected with sexually transmitted diseases. Now, a new smartphone app can help teens know about STD risk beforehand.




The new app lets users 'bump' their STD status. "If you happen to be out at a bar or a fraternity house or wherever, and you meet someone, you can then bump phones and exchange contact information and STD status," said Dr. Michael Nusbaum, the developer of MedXSafe, a feature of the new app called MedXCom, ABC News reported.

He added that the new app encourages people to go for regular STD checks. People who get a negative diagnosis can then ask their doctors to document their STD-negative status on the app.

"[Some] undetected and untreated STDs can increase a person's risk for HIV and cause other serious health consequences, such as infertility," Mary McFarlane, an acting chief in the Division of STD Prevention at the CDC, told ABC News. Using apps to encourage people to get regular checks for STDs can help prevent spread of the diseases.

However, there may be some drawbacks that include letting people falsely believe that they don't have the disease when in fact, they might have had an infection that hasn't been detected yet. Also, these apps may encourage risky sexual behaviors.

"It can take months for HIV to show up on a test. So you can test negative today, go out on Friday night and have sex, and then get retested later and find out that you had HIV all along," said Renee Williams, executive director of SAFE, a nonprofit organization dedicated to abstinence education, ABC News reported.

According to statistics from Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, nearly 50 percent of all teens in the U.S. report that they've had an intercourse. About half of the 19 million new STDs reported each year occur in people aged 15-24 years.

Gangstar Rio: City of Saints Screenshots Review on iOS

 


The acclaimed Gangsta series is back on iPhone and iPad to offer you a whole new place to have criminally good fun!

You’ll never experience a better way to discover Rio de Janeiro!  

                       

‘Bumping’ Your Way to Safer Sex With a Smartphone App

Let’s face it.  Teens have sex.  Parents may choose to ignore it, and teens may choose to deny it, but almost 50 percent of American high school students are having sex, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control. And each year, millions of those sexually active teens contract sexually transmitted diseases such as chlamydia, gonorrhea, syphilis, herpes and HIV.

Now one doctor hopes to curb the spread of STDs in this tech savvy group with a smartphone app that lets users “bump” their STD status.

It’s called ‘safe bumping,’” said Dr. Michael Nusbaum, the New Jersey developer of MedXSafe, a feature of the new app called MedXCom.  “If you happen to be out at a bar or a fraternity house or wherever, and you meet someone, you can then bump phones and exchange contact information and STD status.”

The app’s special feature, according to Nussbaum, encourages dating singles to go to the doctor for regular STD checks.  Those who screen negative can ask their doctors to document their STD-free status on the app, allowing users to share the information with whomever they choose.

An alarming 19 million new sexually transmitted infections occur each year, and rates of chlamydia and gonorrhea are on the rise, according to a new report released this month by the CDC.  More than 1.4 million chlamydia infections were reported in 2011, up 8 percent from the previous year.  Cases of gonorrhea were up by 4 percent, marking the second consecutive year of increases.

Nearly half of all infections occur in young people, between the ages of 15 to 24, a group that can be particularly devastated by the associated health effects.

“[Some] undetected and untreated STDs can increase a person’s risk for HIV and cause other serious health consequences, such as infertility,” said Mary McFarlane, an acting chief in the Division of STD Prevention at the CDC.  Harnessing modern social networking technology to prevent these infections may appeal to a younger tech-savvy generation.

MedXSafe is just one of several Internet-based programs devoted to easing confidential STD-status sharing between sexual partners.  Services like Qpid.me, whose slogan is Spread the Love, Nothing Else and U Should Know, designed by a former college student and his girlfriend, also allow their users to check on a partner’s STD status.

But could these services offer a false sense of security to teens who believe that, with a simple phone bump, they have the green light to have unprotected sex?

“It can take months for HIV to show up on a test,” said Renee Williams, executive director of SAFE, a nonprofit organization dedicated to abstinence education.  “So you can test negative today, go out on Friday night and have sex, and then get retested later and find out that you had HIV all along.”

The app does nothing to prevent unplanned pregnancy, and may even encourage high-risk behaviors that young people might otherwise not have been tempted to try, said Williams.

Nor is the app likely to be completely reliable, said Dr. J. Joseph Speidel, director of communication at the Bixby Center for Global Reproductive Health.

“Does it come with a condom?” asked Dr. Richard Besser, ABC’s chief health and medical editor, who’s also a pediatrician and former acting director at the CDC.

But the app’s creator said it does promote regular STD testing and encourages potential partners to openly discuss safe sex practices.

“We’re recognizing that this behavior is going to take place no matter what we do or what we say,” said Nusbaum.  “I have friends that are nuns and I’ve run this by them, and they also agree that it’s promoting safer behaviors.”

Although each program promises to keep health information strictly confidential, none are immune from cyber attacks.

But such attacks would not expose any users who have an STD, according to Nusbaum.  MedXSafe does not allow doctors to upload information about any tests that come back positive, including HIV.  A user with an infection is simply treated for the STD and then retested.  And that user is only confirmed STD-free via the app once subsequent test results come back negative.

Still, it is too early to tell whether these services will become popular with teens.  Lingering social stigma surrounding STDs might make potential partners reluctant to mention such an app when out at a party.

“It’s a big personal step to bring up using such an app,” said Noah Bloom, creator of a smartphone app called Jiber, which uses the same “bump” technology to electronically connect new friends.  “Who really wants anything in the way of getting lucky?”

Gameloft cuts many game prices to 99 cents, wants screen time on your gift phone

More than a few of us are getting phones and tablets as gifts this year, and Gameloft wants to be there the moment we're hunting for new apps to feed our devices. Accordingly, the developer has slashed the price on many of its recent games to 99 cents during the holidays, even including better-known titles like Asphalt 7 and Dark Knight Rises.



Not surprisingly, the discounting doesn't include Modern Combat 4 and a few other releases -- there have to be profit-makers left somewhere, after all -- but it's a huge break for those who want a few starter titles and aren't concerned about always having the latest and greatest. Both Android and iOS gamers can splurge at the source links.

Why it’s time for Apple and Samsung to man up and reconcile

It’s nice to see Samsung an Apple begin the reconciliation process, even if it’s only tentative at this point.

Although indications are that Samsung’s dropping of its quest for an injunction against iPhone sales in Europe was dictated by practical considerations (i.e., it would not get the injunction), the reduction in conflict will be welcomed nonetheless by consumers.

This move follows one earlier this earlier this week in which U.S. District Judge Lucy Koh denied Apple’s request to halt sales of 26 Samsung devices.

Anti-trust and monopolistic practices in the high tech industry have been notoriously difficult to regulate.  The industry and the institutions that it spawns are new and tend to create unprecedented situations that don’t fit well with existing law. In addition, the technology itself and competitive dynamics morph so quickly that the law is always playing catch-up.

Tech companies tend to rail against some presumed monopolistic practice — until they get a hold of the right end of the stick — and then take the opposite stance, protecting their prerogatives with all their might and resources.

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 Hypocrisy and walled gardens

This institutionalized hypocrisy has tended to lead to a dystopia of walled gardens, which entice buyers in with promises of an integrated experience, but neglect to mention that travel between these gardens will be difficult, if not impossible.

They all do it.  Apple is perhaps the most egregious, jealously guarding its own perimeter in the most arbitrary and capricious way, and even, in the case of pulling Google Maps off the iPhone, going to the extent of cutting off its own nose to spite its face. 

Finger-wagging at Apple’s attempts to stamp all traces of Google out of its domain doesn’t take anything away from Google’s behavior, which is just as bad.  The search giant interweaves its services one with another in an attempt to keep users from ever leaving its platforms.

Apple has tried (and mostly succeeded) in breaking every link to other tech players.  In one notable case, when the industry agreed on a standard some years ago for the interoperation of digital consumer devices (the Digital Living Network Alliance or DLNA), the standards body, which included every company but Apple, agreed on specifications for six layers: connectivity, IP networking, discovery and control, media transport, media formats, and link protection. 

Apple was compliant already on five, but used its own Rendezvous (now renamed Bonjour) instead of UPnP for discovery and control.  The company refused to accept UPnP, even though company officials admitted that there was no technical reason for doing so.

Microsoft and trade secrets

And don’t forget the original bad boy: Microsoft. For years, Microsoft laid mines in its code to blow up other companies’ programs, always professing surprise and innocence when it happened.

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But nobody could tell for sure because no one got to look at the guilty source code, which Microsoft claimed as a trade secret.  By the time the Justice Department forced the company to open its code to select viewers, all the nasty bits had been cleaned out.  Who, us? (whistling)

Apple has chosen a closed system in which it and only it derives nearly all the economic benefit of its technology.  Google has chosen a model that looks more like Microsoft’s: broad licensing to a group of hardware vendors. 

The power of the licensing model is that licensees can deliver a wide range of devices and consumers tend to benefit from the competition, both in variety and price.

Samsung has emerged as the strongest of the Android licensees, but it is only one.  Others include HTC. Amazon, LG Electronics, and others.  Microsoft, still demanding its pound of flesh, has extracted license fees from a number of these companies, claiming infringement by Google on basic patents it owns.

Consumers would really like all this futile litigation to stop.  We would benefit most from a system in which essential patents are licensed on an unrestricted and fair basis.  Companies can compete in the market on the merits of their products.  All these shenanigans do nothing but line lawyers’ pockets at the expense of the public, keep prices high, and reduce choice.