Outside Puts The iPhone Weather App To Shame

I typically use the Weather iPhone app once a week, at most. The only reason I would ever use the application is if a friend asked me the weather for a certain day of the week. Outside is trying to change the way we see weather applications on the iPhone with their new iPhone app developed by Robocat.

Outside combines current weather and local forecasts with custom push notifications on the iPhone. With Outside, you can setup push notifications for various weather conditions and get alerts when the weather matches your criteria, even when the app isn’t running. To get the notifications, you have to sign up for a subscription service. You get 30 days of push notifications when you purchase Outside, and then for $1, you get another 90 days of notifications. A yearly plan is in works as well.

The application’s UI is beautiful, and it’s the work of Michael Flarup, one of the most amazing designers I’ve seen on the internet. Just his blog is breathtaking, which of course translates to the apps beautiful design as well.

In the end, Outside is really trying to change the way we see the weather applications, and make them enjoyable to use, and I can definitely see Outside making that happen.

The app is $2.99, and available on the App Store today. [iTunes Link]

By Daniel Brusilovsky

November Showed Significant Growth for Android

AdMob Shares Findings from Latest Mobile Metrics Report

AdMob, which is in the process of being acquired by Google (regulators are still eyeing the deal), has released its Novemeber Mobile Metrics report. The themes for this one are that the Launch of new devices drove Android growth and the rise of smartphones resulted in a sharp increase in WiFi usage.

"The launch of new Android devices in the second half of 2009 has accelerated the growth of the platform. Six months ago a single Android device, the HTC Dream (G1), generated 92 percent of Android traffic, while in November 2009 the same device accounted for only 37 percent of requests," says AdMob. "The Motorola Droid, HTC Magic, and HTC Hero generated 22 percent, 21 percent and nine percent of Android requests worldwide in November 2009, respectively."



Highlights from the report include:

- 55 percent of ad requests in the US came from devices with WiFi capability, up from only 19 percent a year earlier.

- The Top 5 US devices based on WiFi requests generated were the iPod touch, iPhone, Sony PSP, HTC Dream (G1), and Motorola Droid.

- 36 percent of iPhone traffic in the US was over WiFi, considerably higher than other WiFi capable devices. Less than 10 percent of traffic from the major Android devices came over WiFi.

- The iPhone accounted for 71 percent and the iPod touch accounted for 29 percent of total unique users from Apple devices.

- Android generated 27 percent of the requests from smartphones in the US in November 2009, up from 20 percent in October 2009.

- 88 percent of requests from Android devices came from the US in November 2009, the second largest Android market is the UK with four percent of requests.

The report, which can be viewed here (pdf), examines growth in unique iPhone and iPod touch users since January 2009, finding more rapid growth outside of the US. In November 2009, half of unique users were located outside of the US. This is an increase from 39% at the beginning of the year.

By Chris Crum

Source: webpronews