Apple App Store

Sure we've seen iPhone apps in the App Store that let us change our Netflix queue on the go. These are useful when someone brings up a movie you'd like to see, or you can't remember the details about that DVD you have sitting next to your TV.

How many times have you wanted to actually watch movies on your instant queue? Although the iPhone suffers from a small screen and non-removable battery, there are situations where you'd want to show a clip to a friend or even watch a whole film.

Apple is asking iPhone application developers for keywords to help describe their software. The company sent an update asking for 255 characters made up of keywords separated by commas:

“It is important to enter keywords for all applications as soon as possible so your application can continue to be successfully located on the App Store. Keywords can be updated with the submission of a new binary.”

For those iPhone users with a MobileMe account, Apple has released a free application called iDisk. This utility allows iPhone users running iPhone OS 3.0 and later to view and share the contents of their MobileMe iDisk on the go.

iPhone supported file types are viewable in landscape or portrait, and can be zoomed in using standard pinch gestures. Using the Share button, MobileMe subscribers can send emails with links to large files without even downloading the file. Public folders are also accessible using the iDisk application.

The Apple App Store is an unparalleled success with 1.5 billion downloads in the last year. There are 100,000 developers currently participating in Apple's iPhone developer program. Only one problem: sifting through over 65,000 applications to find something useful.

Unfortunately, the current layout of the app store means that most users will never see even a fraction of the 65,000 that are available free and for purchase. Sure there's a lot of junk, however there are also many great apps that get lost in the crowd.

We're in a global economic recession, right? You wouldn't know it from looking at the latest iPhone sales statistics. Apple's stock jumped six dollars to $158 per share after the company announced its revenues for the third quarter.

Total revenue was $8.3 billion, leaving Apple with a net quarterly profit of $1.2 billion. According to Tim Cook, the Chief Operating Officer, "Apple can’t keep up with demand in the 18 countries where the 3GS model is now sold, a situation that won’t change in the short term."