MacRumors iPhone and iPad Blog: Apps, News, and Rumors

Grand Prairie, Texas is experiencing an epidemic of fake Apple products -- but not the kind from a fake Apple Store. The details of this scam come from the Grand Prairie police department: A car load of two or three males will pull up to someone at a convenience store or shopping center parking lot and it’s “Pssst, hey buddy. Want to buy an Apple iPad or MacBook?” They will tell the...

Adobe is expanding its suite of iOS apps with >CreatePDF, a universal app that takes files in a number of different formats and converts them to PDFs. This ensures that formatting and document layouts are preserved when passing them on to coworkers or clients. The app uses Adobe's online PDF creation service to do the heavy lifting. Some apps, including the iWork apps from Apple, already...

Dominique Leca, the co-founder of the much-loved Sparrow mail client, tells Business Insider that his team is working on an iPhone version of Sparrow. BI: Isn't one of Apple's rules for the mobile App Store that you can't "duplicate functionality"? DL: Yes, but on the Mac, they can't really apply it, so you've got a way out. You can license your software without being considered a rogue...

PopCap games is offering Bejeweled 2 + Blitz for free through Sunday morning, as part of a FreeAppADay promotion. Bejeweled has been a $0.99 app for nearly a year, but was $2.99 before that. It was one of the first major apps to be launched on the iPhone, selling for $9.99 in August of 2008. PopCap claims Bejeweled is the world's most popular puzzle game, and is a big part of why Electronic...

Forbes notes that Apple's longtime camera sensor supplier for its iOS devices, OmniVision Technologies, today offered remarkably weak guidance for the current quarter, suggesting that Apple may indeed have shifted camera orders for the iPhone 5 to Sony.For FY [Q2], the company sees revenue of $255 million to $275 million, and non-GAAP profits of 52-64 cents a share, well short of the Street...

SPY mouse is the latest game from Firemint, the Australian developer behind Real Racing and Flight Control. In the game, players guide Agent Squeak through 72 levels on 6 worlds, gathering up precious cheese. The control scheme is very similar to Flight Control, with players tracing Squeak's path through the various levels, swiping to avoid obstacles, cats, and using "zany gadgets, gizmos...

It's not just pilots who are finding iPads help them at work. Football players are too. The Tampa Bay Buccaneers have given all 90 of their players iPad 2s, loaded with playbooks, and practice and situational videos from any NFL team. The iPads are considerably easier to use, and carry around, than thick books the size of Yellow Pages, and spending hours sitting around a projector watching...

Documentary film producer and web developer Steve Rosenbaum's "The 9/11 Memorial: Past, Present and Future" app is an interactive look at the history of the World Trade Center. It chronicles the original development of the towers, the 9/11 attacks, and the lengthy rebuilding process of the memorial and museum. The New York Observer reports the app will have 400 still photographs and hours of ...

In line with reports that the iPhone 5 will debut in "mid-October", AppleInsider reports that Apple and its longtime advertising partner TBWA/Chiat/Day are beginning work on an advertising campaign to support the new device, with production on the first round of television commercials said to be wrapping up in the first week of October.More specifically, one person familiar with the matter says ...

Reuters reports that Apple and China Telecom continue to be engaged in talks regarding bringing the iPhone to China's third-largest carrier. China Telecom currently has over 100 million wireless subscribers, making it larger than either AT&T or Verizon in the United States."We have a confidential agreement with Apple and can't tell you anything as of now," Wang told a news conference after the ...

New "iPhone 5" cases based on the leaked design document have started appearing online. True Supplier has posted a new "hard shell" case design for the iPhone 5, in addition to the soft case designs we'd seen previously. These new cases show the same tapered back design of the leaked design document, as well as the mute switch being moved to the other side. We'd previously had rende...

Apple has lowered the price of a refurbished entry-level 16GB iPad 1 to $299. The price seems to have been dropped this weekend and is the lowest price we've seen for an iPad direct from Apple. All Apple's refurbished products come with the same warranty as new ones and include a new battery and aluminum outer shell. This weekend HP slashed the price of its now-cancelled TouchPad tablet...

Square has updated its very popular credit-card charging app for small businesses and released the Square Card Case, announced this past May. The Square app has been updated to improve transaction speed, add support for $0.00 price points (so merchants can keep track of notes on orders like 'no cheese') and stopped requiring signatures for purchases under $25. As for the new Square Card...

The iPhone 3GS is still holding strong in the U.S. smartphone market, ranking as the second most popular handset during the second quarter. The device's success is clearly due to the low $49 price tag, even if the cost of the service contract greatly exceeds that of the iPhone itself over the two-year term. Last week, we noted that we had received a tip that Best Buy would be offering an...

Earlier this week, it was reported that Delta Air Lines was testing iPads to improve real-time communications with flight crews. Now, British Airways is giving iPads to cabin crews to improve customer service in the air. The iPad lets crew quickly identify where each customer is seated, who they are travelling with, their Executive Club status and any special meal requests. It gives cabin crew ...

As the iPhone 5 gets closer to release, resellers are starting to offer reduced pricing on older iPhones. Canadian carrier Telus is offering the iPhone 4 for CAD$99 with a 3-year plan. The Telus deal runs through September 7. We are also hearing that Best Buy will be offering the 3GS for free with a 2-year plan on August 22 as part of a larger promotion. Best Buy has done this particular ...

Bloomberg reports that Apple is among the companies considering making a bid to provide as many as 15 million tablet devices to Turkish schoolchildren over the next four years. Microsoft and Intel are also said to be interested in bidding on the project.Apple officials told [Turkish Trade Minister Zafer] Caglayan during his visit to the U.S. that the Cupertino, California-based maker of smart...

id Software has dropped the price of the iOS version of its Rage game to free for a limited time. Rage for iOS is an arcade style rails-shooter that has been adapted from the upcoming PC and console version due later this year. The iOS version came out back in November:RAGE for iOS begins with a selection of three levels (or, "seasons" of the Mutant Bash TV...