Yelp keeps rolling out new iPhone apps with compelling features. In April they released version 2 and added the ability for users to leave reviews on local businesses, a much needed feature since people want to chronicle their experiences as they happen.

Version 3, which should be available soon, adds more useful features. The one that really stands out is “Sales And Offers Near You” which lets users find deals that are physically close to them. Sort by distance (in blocks), price, whether the business is open right then, or by neighborhood. Businesses can add special offers for free on their business page.

Other features include movable maps, and new ways for users to add content. Users can vote on reviews with UFC buttons (useful, funny or cool) and send compliments to reviewers. Users can also now follow Talk conversations via the iPhone.

More:
Yelp iPhone V.3 Hits The AppStore – Find Local Deals

This is going to end well, and no one will be upset about this. Also, everything I said in that last sentence is probably wrong.

When Debian developer Joey Hess started tinkering with webOS, he noticed that it was sending something to Palm once a day. Surely, Palm wasn’t sending anything too potentially incriminating without making it blatantly obvious to the user, right? Wrong.

Joey tore apart the data the Pre was transmitting, and there it was, smack dab at the top of the page:

{ “errorCode”: 0, “timestamp”: 1249855555954.000000, “latitude”: 36.594108, “longitude”: -82.183260, “horizAccuracy”: 2523, “heading”: 0, “velocity”: 0, “altitude”: 0, “vertAccuracy”: 0 }

That was Joey’s position at the time the data was sent, accurate to the same degree that the Google Maps application was.

Also included was a list of every application Joey used, along with how long they were used for (as measured by “launch” and “close” parameters), along with crashlogs. Last but very much not least, it also sent a manifest file of all applications installed on the phone – including third-party applications not authorized by Palm. All of this data is sent to ps.palmws.com.

For some crazy reason, people don’t really like having this sort of information sent back to the mothership without their explicit consent. Palm knows this, of course, and has their bases covered in their privacy policy:

Location Based Services. When you use location based services, we will collect, transmit, maintain, process, and use your location and usage data (including both real time geographic information and information that can be used to approximate location) in order to provide location based and related services, and to enhance your device experience.

The latter part of that sentence, “in order to provide location based and related services”, makes perfect sense – you open Google Maps, and it needs to find your location. Sure. Then they tack “enhance your device experience” onto the end, essentially giving them full reign to send your data wherever the hell they want as long as it potentially makes the experience better.

Of course, Palm’s privacy policy could say that they have the right to punch you in the face and light your shoes on fire, and no one would notice. Even the most anal of gadget users don’t tear through EULAs and privacy policies before booting up their device. When it comes to location tracking and device activity, you must alert the user and specifically request permission. If you don’t, you are spying, plain and simple. Regardless of what Palm is doing with this data, the user needs to be completely aware that it is being sent.

Furthermore, why would Palm need this data? It’s not for marketing reasons; you know where I bought my phone. It’s not for technical reasons on the carrier’s end, such as network load balancing – the towers are already fully aware of who’s in each cell.

Palm, your privacy policy opens by stating “Our goal is to help you make informed decisions about the personal information you share with us.” If thats the case, you’re doing a pretty terrible job.

You can see a full list of what is being transmitted here.

Update:

Palm has since issued a statement on the matter:

Palm takes privacy very seriously, and offers users ways to turn data collecting services on and off. Our privacy policy is like many policies in the industry and includes very detailed language about potential scenarios in which we might use a customer’s information, all toward a goal of offering a great user experience. For instance, when location based services are used, we collect their information to give them relevant local results in Google Maps. We appreciate the trust that users give us with their information, and have no intention to violate that trust.

We’re not sure what method of toggling data collection they’re talking about, unless we’re missing something tucked deep away. In the end, however, they still fall back on their privacy policy.

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See the rest here:
Oh, By the way: The Palm Pre phones home with your location [Updated]

Lets say you just finished hacking and cracking your myTouch 3G through the just unveiled rooting process. With the myTouch lagging behind some other in the looks department, your first quest is to retheme it. You’d heard about a Palm Pre skin, which decks Android out with Pre-esque visuals from top to bottom. Partly out of spite and partly out of genuine curiosity, you set out to find it.

Sorry Charlie, it’s too late.

Earlier this week, the developer of the Palm Pre skin, L3wish, received a letter from the Sunnyvale mothership. “You should probably take this stuff down, or we’ll stop pretending you’re not infringing all sorts of copyrights,” it read – except spread out across 714 words.

Citing the potential for “widespread consumer confusion” and the usage of Palm’s trademarks (the skin was outright called “Palm Pre theme”), Palm demanded that all materials be taken down. The developer has since pulled the download, and any instances of it we knew of have disappeared. You can probably find them in a few minutes with Google – but then again, so can Palm’s lawyers.

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Read more:
Palm goes after Pre skin for Android

After a few false starts and a handful of hoaxes, the T-Mobile myTouch 3G has been rooted. For those a bit behind the times on their lingo, “rooting” an Android phone is similar to the concept of “jailbreaking” an iPhone, in that it gives you full access and control of your system files. This allows you to retheme the device, run applications that otherwise wouldn’t (there aren’t many of these on Android, but tethering applications are one example), and swap out just about any core OS file you want.

The magic all happened at the hands of hackers dream_kill and Haykuro, the latter of which is the same clever gent who tweaked and twurked the HTC Hero ROM onto G1s back in May. Interestingly, Haykuro doesn’t even own a myTouch – it seems that things were just passed back and forth between Haykuro and a “test dummy” (his words) until it worked.

The process is by no means for the faint of heart or technically inept. The whole thing is about 20 steps deep, each part filled with at least one thing likely to confuse. Before you even start, you’ll need to make a “gold card”, which is a memory card modified to unlock your device at startup. Though there are a handful of tutorials out there, even this step can be daunting.

If you’re still willing to take on the task, you can check out Haykuro’s tutorial here.

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myTouch 3G gets rooted

As predicted, Microsoft and Nokia announced a broad ranging alliance this morning which will bring Microsoft Office and other productivity software to a Nokia phones. The agreement marks “the first time Microsoft will make Office for non windows mobile phones,” says Microsoft Business Division President Stephen Elop. There are 200 million Nokia smart phones out there, and Microsoft wants its software on all of them eventually.

But initially, the alliance is targeting enterprise customers and will be integrated into Nokia’s E Series business phones. The Microsoft software and features that will be ported to Nokia phones include:

Read the rest here:
Nokia And Microsoft Make An Unholy Alliance To Bring Office Mobile To More Phones

I’m aware studies comparing cell phone charges generally have to be taken with a grain of salt (especially cross-country studies like the following one), but this one coming from the Japanese Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications is pretty interesting.

It’s not really a “world” ranking, but the ministry compared [JP, PDF] cell phone charges in seven major cities in Europe, Asia and the US. The result in a nutshell: New Yorkers are pretty lucky, Parisians aren’t.

Cell phone charges in Paris were the highest in in fiscal 2008 (at the end of March 2009), with one minute costing $0.33. New York is on the other end of the spectrum with just $0.11. Here is the complete breakdown:

1. Paris: $0.33 per minute
2. Tokyo: $0.28
3. Düsseldorf (Germany): $0.23
4. London: $01.7
5. Seoul: $0.13
6. Stockholm: $0.13
7. New York: $0.11

The ministry compared the cheapest rate plans of those cell phone carriers in the seven cities that have the largest market share.

Picture credit: Bling Ring

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Original post:
World ranking: New Yorkers pay lowest cell phone charges

We’ve heard real good things about the HTC Touch Pro 2. The 3.6-inch WVGA screen is good, the slide-out keyboard is apparently awesome and HTC once again shipped a great skin for Winmo 6.1. It’s just too bad that at $349, it’s the most expensive handset available at T-Mobile.

This means that only die-hard Windows Mobile fans will use the quality phone. No matter how good the hardware is on the Touch Pro 2, there isn’t any reason why someone should spend an extra $150 on it over the Android-power myTouch 3G. Hopefully Verizon doesn’t make the same mistake when the Touch Pro 2 launches in a few weeks on its network.

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Original post: 
The HTC Touch Pro 2 is now available at T-Mobile. Too bad it’s $349.

Original post:
Lenovo caves, lets you order 14-inch IdeaPad U450p laptop

Good news, UK folk! You’re getting the Pre sooner than previously thought! Well, only slightly. Last we’d heard, Brits were going to have to wait until right around Christmas before getting their hands on Palm’s wunderkind.

MyPre has it on good word that the date is now set for October 30th, which pushes it will outside of the Christmas madness. It’s still pretty dang late, coming in just shy of 5 months after the US release – but it could be a whole lot worse.

Crunch Network: CrunchBoard because it’s time for you to find a new Job2.0

Original post: 
Rumor: O2 UK Getting The Palm Pre On October 30th?

Surveys are fun. Some ask you your favorite color, purely for the sake of science. Others help you determine which Twilight character you are. Our favorites are the ones that reveal all of the awesome concepts handset manufacturers are cracking away at behind closed doors.

Take this latest one from LG, as spotted by an EngadgetMobile reader, for example. In but a few pages of text, three crazy concepts are unveiled:

• Netbook integration: Like Nokia, LG apparently wants to get into the Netbook biz. The twist here, however, is integration: Somehow, this “Synergy” netbook (No, not that Synergy) would tie into your smartphone (whether it would work on many LG phones or just one specific model is unspecified) and allow you to answer calls and texts without whipping out your phone. We’re not quite sure why this requires dedicated hardware – why not just make it a software solution and make future LG phones compatible with it?
• “Blooming” keyboards: This one’s the craziest of the bunch. Imagine a folding QWERTY keyboard, like the enV 2 – except that the keyboard, rather than staying flat, “blooms” out to a curved surface when you open the phone. This expands the space between keys without making the handset huge. It sounds awesome, but it’s difficult to imagine how usable a crazy curved keyboard would actually be.



• Elva Text Messaging Phone: Take any QWERTY phone. Strip it down to just the keyboard and a crap two-line display. Call it the Elva and sell it for $50 bucks. With smartphones becoming cheaper and cheaper and entry level handsets becoming more and more capable, we’re already starting to view feature phones as a waste of plastic. Further dumbification seems like a terrible idea to us.

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Original post:
LG survey shows netbooks, “blooming” keyboards, and ultra-dumb phones