Good times! It looks like Dev Team’s UltraSn0w unlock works with an iPhone 3GS that’s been jailbroken via purplera1n. But be warned: Some users are reporting mixed success.

On Friday, George Hotz (aka the guy who unlocked the original iPhone 2G) released his purplera1n iPhone 3GS jailbreak tool.

On the Dev Team’s decision to wait until iPhone OS version 3.1 is released, Hotz sniped:

“Normally I don’t make tools for the general public, and rather wait for the dev team to do it. But guys, whats up with waiting until 3.1? That isn’t how the game is played. We release, Apple fixes, we find new holes. It isn’t worth waiting because you might have the “last” hole in the iPhone. What last hole…this isn’t golf. I’ll find a new one next week.”

Meanwhile, Dev Team has posted a video with details of its upcoming iPhone 3GS unlock.

And while many of us were off eating ribs or playing with fireworks, Geohot was busy releasing purplera1n RC2. Amongst a variety of fixes, including less flakiness in the payload, RC2 adds support for more versions of Windows (Vista, Windows 7, International, and 64-bit). Sorry Mac folks, Hotz says an OS X version is coming shortly.

If you’re frothing at the mouth to give Purplera1n a try, iPhone Hacks has a pretty good step-by-step guide. But note: We’ve not yet tested it ourselves. As with all beta software, try it at your own risk and, please, remember to back everything up first.

I’d also recommend reading through the comments over at George Hotz’s blog. Some users have reported random SIM lock-outs and Wi-Fi issues after installing UltraSn0w. Many others are reporting success:

“Louis said…Excellent Jailbreak program! RC2 seems to work better than RC1. Make sure you restore your iPhone 3GS with the original firmware 3.0 from Apple, then run Purplrra1n RC2 from Windows. You must have a valid ATT SIM card to activate the phone, then run Freeze to install Cydia. After rebooting, update Cydia and install ULTRASN0W, then you are ready to use any SIM card you have. Enjoy a jailbroken and unlocked iPhone 3GS!”

Have you tried it? Let us know how it went. Assuming you actually do see a need to jailbreak or unlock, will you wait for OS 3.1 and Dev Team’s “official” jailbreak instead? [On The iPhone]

View post:
iPhone 3GS Unlocked with Purplera1n + UltraSn0w [Apple]

Don’t worry, everybody, your iPhone baking itself to a crisp is no cause for panic, now that Apple has found the culprit: the weather and your heartless negligence. Apparently you’ve been leaving your brand new iPhone 3GS in a hot car, and the warm sensation you feel any time you hold the phone has nothing to do with beefed up processors or inadequate cooling. Phew, glad that’s all sorted and now nobody will have any problems with self-destructive iPhones they paid hundreds of dollars for. Besides, it serves you right.

Meanwhile, hapless Samsas Traum has found a problem of his own (pictured) that’s sure to be blamed on some other act of god in the near future by Apple’s spin team: the oleophobic coating is getting rubbed right off his screen. Apparently he has a bit of a fondness for a certain “Flick Fishing” app, which explains the highly localized nature of his oleophobic destruction. We haven’t heard many other reports of a similar nature, but we’ll keep an eye out for telltale Tap Tap Revenge markings on the iPhones of our rhythm-addled loved ones.

[Thanks, Rafa]

Read – Apple blames overheating iPhones on the weather
Read – Oleophobic coating wearing off fast

Filed under: Cellphones, Handhelds

Apple blames hot iPhones on the weather, others find oleophobic screen to be fleeting? originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 04 Jul 2009 22:10:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Don’t expect much style from the iPhone cases you see in stores. In order to create something truly unique, you’ll have to do it yourself, like these fans. Continue reading to see more.

Game Boy Case

As long as you’re a gamer or Nintendo fan, this Game Boy case should meet you needs without having to bust out the console itself.

[Source]

Laser-Engraved Wood Case

If you’ll be using your iPhone as not only a handset, but also a fashion accessory, you’ll definitely appreciate the laser-engraved tree silhouette on this case.

[via Source]

Journal Cover Case

Practical, affordable, and stylish, this journal cover makes for a great iPhone case. All it took was a simple journal and lots of hard work.

[via Source]

Rotary Phone Case

Rotary phones were the “in” thing before cell phones. They’re too heavy to carry around and also tethered. Any iPhone user nostalgic for the gadget should consider this DIY case.

[via Source]

Steampunk Case

If you’re a Steampunk enthusiast, you don’t need frills like macro lenses and an ultra light carbon fiber design. You need a pseudo-Victorian mechanical look for your iPhone case.

[via Source]

Bacon Case

Using bacon as an iPhone case isn’t such a strange idea anymore. One caveat: the design itself could make you or anyone that comes in contact with it, crave bacon.

[via Source]

The rest is here:
6 Creative iPhone Cases

For $4.99, the Dirt Moto Racing iPhone / iPod Touch game features “a pounding 12-song soundtrack, online leaderboards, 21 unlockable achievements, 36 unique game events, and customizable rider and vehicle.” Video after the break.

In all, it’s really a great game that offroad racer fans have reason to embrace. The controls feel “right,” the physics are solid and it’s just a great off-road racer that stands as the king of the genre in the App Store.

[via TouchArcade]

Original post:
iPhone Gets Dirt Moto Racing

AOL tried to squeeze a little over $100 in fees from a customer for upgrades he hadn’t asked for, hadn’t approved, hadn’t used and of which he hadn’t even been notified. Unluckily for AOL, that customer is a professional writer.

Current Wall Street Journal writer Jason Zweig used to work for a Time-Warner-owned magazine, and when Time Warner merged with AOL, he and his colleagues all received free AOL email accounts. Zweig gave his to his wife, who used it up until last year.

But recently, Zweig started receiving phone calls from AOL’s customer service reps in India, saying he owed $103.60 for an upgrade he knew nothing about. Turns out the terms of agreement he signed years ago may (or may not) have included a section allowing AOL to upgrade his service and charge him for it. Zweig point-blank refused to pay for any ridiculous upgrade that may well not exist, and AOL tried to bargain him down to $85.

The argument devolved into AOL insisting they would attempt to collect through legal channels, and Zweig welcoming them to, as he plans to file a fraud report before they’d be able to do anything of the sort. We guess when you’ve floundered as much as AOL has in recent years, all you can do is try to extort old customers. It’s just bad luck one of their targets happens to write for one of the country’s largest news organizations. [Wall Street Journal]

View post:
AOL Tries to Extort Bogus Fees From Wall Street Journal Writer [Extortion]

Summer’s here for some parts of the world, and that would mean organizing cookouts as well as having a generally fun time with friends and family while the sun still shines.

The Asado Grill Instant BBQ Stand ought to make those cookouts a much more fun experience, as it boasts both simplicity and genius in a single contraption – all you need to do is slot your instant barbecue in the top, place the Asado wherever you like, light it up and you’re good to go.

Because of those slender little legs that lift the Asado high up, you can place the BBQ anywhere you like without damaging the surface underneath – on grass, even on a tabletop. It’s based on a design of portable grill that South American gauchos would carry on their horses as they ranched cattle over the wide plains. They’d huddle together over an Asado each night, sizzling a juicy steak fresh from the herd as they went – then pack up and be off the next morning to repeat the process.

Made from chrome, you can pick up the Asado Grill Instant BBQ Stand for £9.95.

View original post here:
Asado Grill Instant BBQ Stand

The iPod is truly a phenomenal device, and it has spawned hundred of accessories in the past to accommodate the iPod in various circumstances, even when underwater with a waterproof case and waterproof headphones.

Well, this time round we have the Portable iPod Outdoor Speaker that is not only waterproof, it is also shock and dust resistant, making it suitable for outdoor parties by the pool or even in the harsh Arabian deserts.

It plays nice with the iPod Classic, Nano, Mini and Shuffle series, stowing the iPod behind a clear, watertight door while offering controls through a set of exterior buttons. A quartet of C batteries power it, but you can also hook it up to an AC or car adapter if the need arises. Sounds like $99.50 well spent, this.

Source: Gizmag

See the original post:
Portable iPod Outdoor Speaker

One thing I hated about being a corporate lawyer at Wilson Sonsini back in the day – we got to work on really cool deals (the last deal I worked on before leaving for a startup was the AOL/Netscape merger), but we were only brought in at the very end to paper everything. We fought over the fine print in the contracts after the meat of the deal was ironed out by CEOs. Skinning and dressing whatever the hunters bring back to the cave is fine for some people. But it’s not exactly being in the middle of the action.

PR firms today aren’t much different than corporate lawyers. They are paid to perform a service. They like to think of themselves as core to the strategic action of their clients. But more often, they’re just there to spin whatever happened in the most favorable light possible. Then they smile and dial and pray for coverage. Occasionally they are called in to smother a story, which is mildly more exciting, I imagine. But when a CEO is wondering what she should do next to drive her business forward, she generally doesn’t call her PR firm for advice. Or at least I hope she doesn’t.

PR firms are apparently just as frustrated by always being in the back seat as the law firms are.

I’m fascinated by Clair Cain Miller’s article in the New York Times today about PR in general and the birth of a startup, Wordnik, specifically.

Forget the tech blogs, said investor Roger McNamee. Brew PR head Brooke Hammerling instantly acquiesced, and decided to go with a sort of guerrilla approach instead by “whispering” into the ears of prominent Twitter users like Kevin Rose, Jay Adelson and Jason Calacanis. CNET was also given the story, but it managed to eek out only a single comment.

Ms. Hammerling, while popping green apple Jolly Ranchers into her mouth, suggests a press tour that includes briefing bloggers at influential geek sites like TechCrunch, All Things Digital and GigaOM.

But Roger McNamee, a prominent tech investor who is backing Wordnik, is also in the room, and a look of exasperation passes across his face at the mere mention of the sites.

“Why shouldn’t we avoid them? They’re cynical,” he says, also noting his concern that Wordnik would probably appeal more to wordsmiths than followers of tech blogs. “That’s where I would be most uncomfortable. They don’t know the difference between ‘they’re’ and ‘there.’ ”

Without missing a beat, Ms. Hammerling changes course, instantly agreeing with Mr. McNamee’s take. “I love you for that,” she intones. “I’ll leave the tech blogs out. Let them come to me.”

Instead, she decides that she will “whisper in the ears” of Silicon Valley’s Who’s Who — the entrepreneurs behind tech’s hottest start-ups, including Jay Adelson, the chief executive of Digg; Biz Stone, co-founder of Twitter; and Jason Calacanis, the founder of Mahalo.

The result? Not much. Wordnik is flatlining at an abysmal amount of traffic. Comscore and Quantcast don’t even register the site as a blip.

Compare Wordnik to Topsy, another recently launch service. Topsy launched on TechCrunch exclusively. The domain now has 577,000 results on Google, compared to 56,000 for Wordnik. And the traffic difference is stunning:

I’d say this experiment in a pure social media launch failed.

The article goes on for pages describing Hammerling’s incredible networking skills and propensity to namedrop at every opportunity.

Ms. Hammerling’s connections have been crucial for Brew in finding and serving clients, says Ms. Cook, her business partner: “Without question, that allows us to play at a different level, because we’re not just doing P.R. and media relations; we’re connecting people at the highest level, helping deals get done.”

I know Brooke well. I guess you could say I’m one of her many thousands of “very close friends.” And I don’t dispute that she is well connected, or that those connections help her get clients.

I believe Brooke’s client have been better served if she stood up to McNamee and told him that Wordnik would have had a better launch if they hadn’t ignored the blogs that are interested in covering new startups. Instead she became a “yes woman” and told McNamee exactly what he wanted to hear.

Hammerling and her peers in the industry should help guide their clients through the minefield of journalists and bloggers, rather than simply avoid it entirely out of fear or ignorance. She isn’t in the room to drop names or “help get deals done.” She’s there to make sure the client’s news gets spread appropriately. In that they failed miserably, and the client suffered.

As cool as Kevin Rose is (and he did apparently Twitter that Wordnik was “truly amazing”), this is not a launch strategy.

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

Read the original:
The Reality Of PR: Smile, Dial, Name Drop, Pray.

We’ve heard a few different prices and release dates for the Archos 9 tablet since it was introduced early last month, but it looks like Archos has now come out and finally clarified things a bit — in the UK, at least.

Apparently, it’ll be offering both 80GB and 160GB versions of the tablet in the UK, which will run £449.99 and £499.99, respectively, or roughly $735 and $816. Stuff.tv is also reporting that the tablet will be available in September, although that conflicts a bit with the October 22nd launch date for Windows 7 — which would be a bit of a problem for a Windows 7-based tablet.

So, still a few details to sort out, not the least of which is word of availability ’round these parts.

[via EnGadget.com]

You don’t need to spend $20-$40 buying a combination safe for your kids to tinker with. Just follow Merijn van Wouden instructions on how to build one using LEGO pieces. Video after the break.

I’ve seen a few combination safes on youtube, but they all used an at least 5 times bigger mechanism than this one.

[via Brothers-brick]

Original post:
Fully-Functional LEGO Combination Safe