Hasta La Gadget!

Nokia’s Ovi store got off to a rocky start Tuesday as users faced problems accessing the store and downloading the programs.

“Shortly after launching the Ovi Store at 2 a.m. ET, we began experiencing extraordinarily high spikes of traffic that resulted in some performance issues for users accessing store.ovi.com and store.ovi.mobi,” said Eric John, head of product marketing for Nokia Ovi in a blog post. “We immediately began to address this issue by adding servers, which resulted in intermittent performance improvements.”

The store features games, applications, podcasts and videos for smartphones running Nokia’s Symbian operating system.

The problems with Ovi’s launch do not bode well for Nokia, which has been struggling to better Apple’s App Store, whose more than 46,000 titles have been downloaded more than 1 billion times since the store’s July 2008 launch. Nokia has lagged other mobile platforms such as Research In Motion’s BlackBerry and Google’s Android OS, both of which launched their own app stores months ago.

The Ovi store can be accessed by about 50 million Nokia device owners worldwide, including the soon-to-be launched N97. The store will have more than 20,000 titles at launch, said Nokia, including both free and paid apps. Customers can visit Ovi through their phone’s browser to personalize and downloads services and programs.

“Ovi is open for business and we’ve stocked the shelves with both local and global content for a broad range of Nokia devices,” said Tero Ojanperä, Executive Vice President, Nokia Services in a statement. “Ovi Store makes shopping for content and applications easy for feature phone and smartphone owners alike.”

But some Nokia fans aren’t pleased. Inability to access the Ovi store on launch isn’t the only trouble that users say they faced. Allaboutsymbian.com, a web site that follows Nokia closely, pointed out that the Ovi store does not offer a clear distinction between Java and native Symbian apps.  The performance of the store client was also slow and the store did not have much content, said the site.

Ovi store users in the U.S. will face additional challenges buying from the Ovi store. U.S. consumers can access and purchase content from the Store via unlocked devices using AT&T or T-Mobile. But those purchases will require a separate credit card transaction. Later this year. AT&T has said it will offer carrier billing, so purchases from the store become a part of the monthly service bills.

Photo: Ovi store rendering on Nokia N97 (dekuwa/Flickr)

This week, we revisit some classics from your (and your grandfather’s) childhood, iPhone browsing gets upgraded, and I play what it probably the best 3D multi-animal hunting game available for the iPhone.

Boulder Dash!: Whether you’re just leaving college or having your third kid, there’s a pretty good chance that you played Boulder Dash as a kid. The official 25th anniversary iPhone edition is as faithful as you want it to be: you can choose either classic, spritey graphics or a modern, cartoonish look, and opt for either an overlaid d-pad control scheme or a new swipe-based system. The game looks great and both control system work a treat, so collecting jewels on the iPhone feels about as natural as it did on the Commodore. $4.99.

Deer Hunter 3D: A hunting video game! What kind of bizarre nerd bumpki—oh, wait, this is actually pretty fun. Deer Hunter 3D for iPhone, licensed from the Walmart-famous Deer Hunter PC franchise, takes you on hunting trips to various locations to shoot various animals with various types of guns. It looks great, and the aiming system—the core of the game—is executed well. The walk-aim-shoot routine seems repetitive at first, but the game has enough unlockable content to keep it interesting for a while. $5.99.

Nightglow: This browser brings proper tabs, more gestures and a few other little odds and ends to your iPhone. Its tab switcher is definitely faster than Safari’s, though the app as a whole can be a bit sluggish, and the screen grab feature, which lets you explore the page while still maintaining focus on a text field, is sometimes useful. It kinda reminds me of one of those old Internet Explorer tabbed shells from 2003: it’s mildly attractive for power users, but wouldn’t be necessary at all if Safari was just a little bit better. $0.99.

Pickin’ Stix: A vintage vintage game, this app asks you to do precisely one thing. Doing that one thing is easy, and strangely gratifying. It feels like it ought to be free, but $0.99 isn’t so bad.

HDR Camera: No, you can’t take DSLR-grade, hyper-realistic dynamic range photos with your iPhone. You just can’t. That said, HDR Camera does do a convincing fake. The app coaxes some decent pseudo-HDR imagery out of the iPhone’s sad little camera, albeit with filters and effects you could easily just apply in Photoshop. Its $1.99 pricetag is too high.

UpNext 3D NYC: If your life revolves around NYC, there really isn’t a better way—wait, let me rephrase that: a prettier way—to navigate the city on your iPhone. If it doesn’t, UpNext 3D’s exquisitely detailed view of the city is still great eye candy. It does everything you could want from a mapping app: subway schedules, local listings and basic mapping functions and restaurant reviews. Tapping buildings even tells you what’s inside (but only sometimes). Sorry, Brooklynites, it’s Manhattan only for now. $2.99.

This Week’s App News on Giz:

• Card Master Pro iPhone App Exposes Brian Lam’s Poor Gambling Skills

• 8Bitone Chiptunes Synthesizer App Lets You Mix It Like Mario

• Kindle 1.1 for iPhone Now Available

• New Slacker iPhone App Works Harder to Smack Pandora

• iPrivus Brings Reverse Call Lookup App To The iPhone

This list is in no way definitive. If you’ve spotted a great app that hit the store this week, give us a heads up or, better yet, your firsthand impressions in the comments. And for even more apps: see our previous weekly roundups here, and check out our Favorite iPhone Apps Directory and our original iPhone App Review Marathon. Have a good weekend everybody.

Despite Apple’s reputation for being a notorious gatekeeper with its iPhone App Store, there’s a way to sneak in content such as porn, profanity or potentially malicious code, with no hacking required: Easter eggs.

Apple initially rejected Jelle Prins’ iPhone app Lyrics, which displays lyrics for the songs in your music library, including the profanity contained in some song lyrics. Apple cited that fact as the reason for turning Prins down. So Prins installed a profanity filter and Lyrics got approved.

But he also secretly planted an Easter egg (programmer parlance for a secret feature) into the app for users to unlock the dirty words if they so pleased. All users have to do to unlock the filth is go to the About page, swipe downward three times and select the option to turn off the filter.

“It’s almost impossible for Apple to see if there’s an Easter egg because they can’t really see the source code,” Prins said. “In theory a developer could make a simple Easter egg in their app and provide a user with whatever content they want.”

The Lyrics app’s Easter egg points out the inconsistency and incompleteness of Apple’s approval process. When Steve Jobs introduced the App Store on June 9, 2008, he laid out a simple set of rules: No porn or malicious apps that invade your privacy. But Apple has kept the details of its approval process shrouded in secrecy, and as a result, little is known about how it works.

Apple declined to comment on this story.

Many iPhone developers do, however, agree on one thing: Apple’s approval policy is inconsistent. Here’s an example: The novelty fart app Pull My Finger was initially rejected from the App Store, and then later approved, but the game Baby Shaker, which involved shaking a baby to death, was initially approved before it was pulled down amid parental outrage.

Part of the problem may be that Apple lacks the manpower to review every app carefully, which is not surprising. The App Store has published 46,000 apps since it opened in July 2008, according to iPhone analytics company Medialets.

According to Prins, his server logs show that a single Apple employee tested his app prior to its approval. (His application works in conjunction with an online database, which logs activity from the app.) All Apple did during that testing, Prins says, was perform a search on profane words, which went undetected thanks to the Easter egg, and to check if the app worked when connected to the internet. A few days later, Lyrics appeared in the App Store, Prins said.

Prins said it would be technically possible for Apple to discover a hidden Easter egg, but it would require intense inspection and perhaps asking developers to hand over their source code, which Apple doesn’t currently do.

Secret features could adversely affect the iPhone and iPod Touch platform, says Nullriver CEO Adam Dann.

“If people start putting in naked pictures of their ex-girlfriend as an Easter egg to get revenge, or something like that, that isn’t quite right,” Dann said. “It has the potential to really mess things up for everybody.”

Dann has had his own run-in with App Store inconsistency: He developed the iPhone tethering app NetShare, which was approved and then banned after Apple discovered the app violated AT&T’s terms of service.

Speaking on security matters, Jonathan Zdziarski, author of the book iPhone Forensics: Recovering Evidence, Personal Data, and Corporate Assets, said the iPhone’s API is mostly secure and that it would be difficult to harm a user through an Easter egg unknown to Apple. He noted, however, a few areas where users’ privacy could be violated: audio, the camera and the address book.

For example, an audio app with a malicious Easter egg, Zdziarski explained, could potentially allow a developer to record a user’s conversations without him or her knowing about it. And a harmful photo app could snap photos with your camera even when a user is not pressing the shutter button. Third, a malicious app could steal your address book contacts.

“It’s not impossible to write code that looks innocent and acts innocent until you throw some kind of switch,” Zdziarski said. “It’s not hard to get that sort of thing past Apple…. It’s the equivalent of a doctor using a magnifying glass to try and find germs.”

However, Zdziarski said just because an application is approved doesn’t mean Apple won’t revisit it and pull it down later. That means a developer might only get away with shenanigans or harmful activities temporarily, only to be caught and banned by Apple later.

Prins said he was aware this was a possibility, and that if Apple pulled down Lyrics, he would install a better profanity filter.

Until then, Lyrics has slipped in a quiet “Screw you” to Apple’s App Store gatekeepers — albeit one mumbled behind their backs.

See Also:

• Apple Reviews NetShare; Permanent Ban Likely
• Android Welcomes App Store’s Rejects With Arms Wide Open
• Apple Rejects Twitter App Update for Alleged Bad Language
• Apple: You Can’t Play Jesus on iPhone
• AT&T: SlingPlayer for iPhone Would ‘Create Congestion’ for 3G …
• Apple Says No to Throwing Shoes at Bush on iPhone
• Apple’s Delays Could Cost iPhone Developer $600K

Photo: Jon Snyder/Wired.com

After eight months, Gadget Lab’s Charlie Sorrel still adores his Hackintosh netbook (even though at some point a software update broke his keyboard and mouse, requiring him to format his drive and reinstall Mac OS X — a detail he didn’t bother to mention). Now that he and his Crapintosh have traversed their rough patch, Charlie make believes he’s P Diddy by hosting decadent parties, passing the netbook around to guests to use it as a (gasp) wireless music player.

I’m glad he’s finally caught up to the year 2000, but I’ve found a more clever use for my netbook Hackintosh, which I deemed an impractical nuisance after six months of quick wear and tear. I propped it on top of my refrigerator and pointed the webcam at my five-week-old kitten Cuddy, whom I adopted two days ago. I also downloaded a $5 iPhone app called iCam enabling me to view the camera feed. Now, wherever and whenever I wish, I can check on Cuddy by simply opening the iCam app on my iPhone. If she appears to be going bonkers, I can hurry home to her rescue.

One major disadvantage: The audio in the webcam doesn’t work with the hacked version of Mac OS X, for which there is no fix, meaning all I can do is see, not hear, the kitten. So this pet-cam setup doesn’t make me take back my statement about Hackintoshes being all about the chase (that is, the thrills of hacking the netbook) but a failure in delivery.

See Also:

• Eight Months with a Hackintosh Netbook. Conclusion: Fantastic …
• All Sound Finally Working on Wind Hackintosh
• Gadget Lab Hackintosh: Now With Added Sound Output
• Hackintosh Update: Installing a New Wireless Card
• Six Months With a Hackintosh Netbook: It Ain’t Pretty

Photo: Brian X. Chen/Wired.com

This week’s iPhone apps are all about growing up, taking control, and inheriting new responsibilities. Get a job! Kiss important peoples’ butts! Organize your shopping! Record important things! And for some reason, SLEESTAKS.

First, a moment of silence for the recently departed John Mahoney, the great emcee of iPhone apps that everyone had grown to love so dearly and from whom I’ve inherited this hallowed feature. You’ll always live on in our hearts, other John. (And also in the real world, because you’re not dead.)

—

On to the apps.

Nobody wants to build a resume; it’s daunting, and usually depressing. ResumePRO streamlines the process for you, building a passably professional-looking resume from whatever information you enter into the various fields it provides (previous experience, education, references, pictures, whatever). It’s still up to you to grossly inflate your every modest accomplishment. Unfortunately for its intended audience (unemployed people?), ResumePRO is two bucks.

At some point, everyone has to start shopping like an adult. This means: planning, lists, budgeting, and muesli. Bazaar takes care of nearly all of these things, making it sort of easy to create shopping lists based on recipes, weekly plans, or preplanned lists from a picky spouse. This is definitely one for people with an organizational bent, but the ongoing basket price tally is pretty useful no matter how lazy you are. Three dollars.

In these hard times, you can’t blame people for turning to blatant sycophancy. Try it! Sometimes it works, but it always gives you a good gauge for how much your dignity is worth in the free market. Anyway, ExecTweets is a Microsoft-backed venture to collect and aggregate tweets from power players in a variety of industries. Now it’s got an iPhone app, which lets you peek the minds of various Twitter-inclined bigwigs, organized by industry, topic or popularity. FYI, Lee Iacocca just took a huge dump. Free.

Poddio is a great little sound recorder and editor, and the new free version is just as good, though it cripples most of your file sharing options. Still, it’s a dead-simple app that’s perfect for recording long interviews, meetings or events, and editing down to size with many of the features of a desktop nonlinear editing app. It’s free, but if you want easy recording transfers, you’ll have to go Pro, which’ll set you back ten whole American dollars.

And because, lets be honest, this whole “adulthood” thing is a hollow charade, here’s a game. I didn’t know about this until, like, right now, but Will Ferrel is about to star in a Land of the Lost remake. What the hell? Anyhoo, they made an iPhone game for it, and it’s kinda fun. It’s puzzlier than you might expect, but it’s a great time-suck and above-average for a piece of promotional material. Warning: if you don’t think that everything Will Farrel does is funny by default, do not expect to laugh. If you do, I guess the interspersed quips and quotes might work for you.

This Week’s App News on Giz:

• SlingPlayer Mobile For iPhone Review (Wi-Fi Only, $30)

• How to Hack the iPhone to Use SlingPlayer and Skype Over 3G

• Fake Txt’n’Walk iPhone App Is Now Real Email ‘N Walk iPhone App

• Resident Evil Degeneration Puts a Ton of Zombies in Your iPhone

• BitTorrent App for iPhone Gets Rejected on Anti-Piracy Grounds

• Twitterific 2.0 iPhone App Lightning Review

This list is in no way definitive. If you’ve spotted a great app that hit the store this week, give us a heads up or, better yet, your firsthand impressions in the comments. And for even more apps: see our previous weekly roundups here, and check out our Favorite iPhone Apps Directory and our original iPhone App Review Marathon. Have a good weekend everybody.