Gmail’s Priority Inbox Comes To The iPhone

By Federico Viticci

Great news from the Google Mobile team today: the Gmail webapp for iPhone has now Priority Inbox support built-in. Priority Inbox for mobile will import all the sections you have created on the desktop and it will also display the “important and read” or “important and unread” markers you’ve got used to see in Gmail.

Now, once you set up Priority Inbox in the desktop version of Gmail, you’ll see Priority Inbox sections when you visit gmail.com from your phone’s browser and click on the ‘Menu’ screen. You’ll also see importance markers in your inbox, so you can quickly identify which messages are important.

The new feature is available to Android and iOS devices. iOS 3 or later is required.

Angry Birds “Valentine’s Day Edition” Now Available →

Linked By Federico Viticci

Angry Birds Seasons “Valentine’s Edition” Now Available

The much anticipated Valentine’s Day update for Angry Birds Seasons just went live in the App Store. It includes 15 “lovely” new levels, a Valentine’s Day theme, new achievements. Oh, and a new icon featuring a sexy female Angry Bird.

Get ready for the most heartfelt episode in Angry Birds Seasons so far: the Valentine’s Day edition! After the shenanigans of Halloween and Christmas, Angry Birds Seasons continue in the spirit of Love! As usual, Angry Birds gives the most generous updates of any app!

Go download the update here. Seasons HD for iPad is also available.

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Fake iPhones and iPods Worth $10 Million Seized By L.A. Police

By Federico Viticci

The Los Angeles Port police has seized thousands of fake iPhones and iPods coming from China in an operation that prevented these counterfeit models from ending up on the U.S. market and generate $10 million in revenue. The models, shipped from China as “replacement parts” and re-assembled to look like old Apple devices, were so similar to the original ones buyers could recognize the scam only when trying to sync them with iTunes.

Two brothers were charged for the sale of counterfeit goods and bank account records also revealed the operation had already generated $7 million in revenue. That’s quite a business for fake Chinese iPods. Apparently, the guys behind these devices thought it might be a good idea to replicate older iPods and iPhones rather than the most recent iterations.

We have seen lots of fake Apple products in the past, and it’s good to know police is always working to prevent them from ending up on customers’ hands. With the iPad 2 coming soon, I guess we’ll see several fake “used iPad 1” in 2012. [via Cult of Mac]

Smartr Twitter App Is Like Flipboard for iPhone

By Federico Viticci

I was surprised when I found this app in the App Store last week. Smartr, a free app by Factyle, is a full-featured Twitter client that, unlike the usual Twitterrific or other Twitter apps, is entirely aimed at letting you read in an uncluttered and mobile-friendly view all the links shared in your timeline or lists. In fact, Smartr might just be the closest thing to a “Flipboard for iPhone” we’ve seen yet. Read more

Vivid Gives Your iPhone A Wallpaper A Day

By Federico Viticci

Vivid, a $0.99 app for the iPhone released last week, is a simple utility to get a new wallpaper on your iPhone every day. If you’re that kind of user who’s always searching for new backgrounds and lockscreen walls to make your iPhone a little more personalized, Vivid might just be what you’ve been looking for. Once you fire up the app you’re given a preview of the daily wallpaper, usually a photograph from an internet database the app connects to, which you can save to your Camera Roll, email, send via MMS and print. An archive button in the bottom toolbar lets you see previous images, and you can hit the “Today” button to make sure you’re staying up to date with Vivid’s daily offerings.

Vivid is a simple app that accomplishes the simple task of pushing new wallpapers to your iPhone every day. Go download it here.

A Typographic Review Of The Daily →

Linked By Federico Viticci

A Typographic Review Of The Daily

Fonts In Use shares our same views on the problems with text in The Daily:

Text typography is still the weakness of nearly every iPad publication. Presented with a device that echoes the dimensions of a printed page, designers — especially those in the news world — feel obligated to stick with print conventions: static text set in justified columns. The Daily suffers the same shortcomings. When the columns are wide enough (see above) full justification works. When columns are any narrower (see below), letter- and word-spacing stretches to distraction, even with hyphenation. I admire the way text layouts change when switching between vertical and horizontal orientation — pull quotes often pop in when appropriate — but the typesetting requires more attention. Articles rarely scroll, but when they do, it works just fine. It makes one wonder whether the very short story lengths are a preference of the design staff or an editorial staff unwilling to put more meat on the table.

It also makes me wonder: will we ever see an iPad newspaper / magazine with proper text manipulation? Does’t that fall under the “interactivity” promised by many publications? [via]

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Analysts Share Predictions of Apple’s 2011 Sales and Shipments

By Federico Viticci

If analysts’s predictions are to be believed, the numbers shared this morning by Needham’s Charlie Wolf and Susquehanna’s Jeff Fidacaro are surely interesting. With 16.24 million iPhones and 7.33 million iPads sold in the last quarter, Wolf notes that 300 millions smartphones were sold last year, and Apple’s sales trajectory appears to be “higher than expected”. Wolf estimates 75 million iPhone units will be sold in 2011; last year, he predicted 40 million sales and Apple actually sold more, 47.5 million iPhones. Read more

Last.fm Radio for Mobile Apps To Become Subscription-based Service

By Federico Viticci

Earlier today music streaming service Last.fm announced that, starting February 15th, the radio functionality built into mobile apps (for iPhone and Android) and home entertainment systems will become a subscription-based service with a $3 monthly fee. The service is currently free in various countries but ad-supported; next week, Last.fm Radio for mobile will become ad-free and offer users the possibility to create personalized stations basing on their music preferences.

The service will, however, remain free in some countries and platforms:

Last.fm Radio will remain free on the Last.fm website in the US, UK and Germany and for the US and UK users of Xbox Live and Windows Mobile 7 phones. We’ll also continue to offer radio for free via the Last.fm desktop app.

The mobile music streaming landscape has become very competitive over the past months thanks to services like Spotify and MOG that provide access to large music libraries either for free or through a Premium subscription, like Spotify – which is still struggling to find its way in the U.S. market. And always in the United States, Rdio has recently revamped its website with lots of different features and social functionalities, many of them accessible from the companion iPhone app.

Last.fm Radio won’t provide users a choice to pick tracks on demand, but the offer is attractive if you’re a heavy Last.fm user who has built a music library over the years worth connecting to the Radio service.

Best Buy Tag Suggests White iPhone Coming Within Weeks

By Federico Viticci

It’s pretty clear at this point that the white iPhone 4 is launching in the next few weeks. Engadget just got a picture of a Best Buy tag spotted in Houston over the weekend, and it points at an AT&T white iPhone sold at $599 off contract.

This Best Buy tag adds speculation to several reports surfaced in the past weeks, such as production issues fixed by a new Japanese paint and the unit spotted on various international carrier websites.

The mythical white iPhone really seems to be coming now, indeed in Spring 2011.