SkyFire plays Flash video on iPhone and Android phones

One of the major features of the Android operating system is its ability to play Flash video using the Flash Player app. Unfortunately, not all Android-based phones have access to the Flash app and won't until Froyo or Android OS 2.2 becomes available (possibly in December for Galaxy S phones). It's also no secret that the iPhone, iPad and iPod Touch can't play Flash video either....unless you've downloaded the SkyFire app.

SkyFire is a mobile browser that converts Flash video into HTML5 format. In addition, the browser is surprisingly Facebook friendly, integrating the Facebook Like button and a shortcut to the social networking site into the browser itself.

The browser was approved for Apple's App Store earlier this month and pulled nearly 1 million users from both Android Market and App Store in it's first week. 

Facebook announces three new features, redesign still to come

Facebook had invited several press members to its headquarters in Palo Alto where the company expect to announce "something." The company live streamed the entire event via its Livestream account - Facebook Innovations.

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UPDATE: Three new features coming soon to Facebook

Maybe today's announcement wasn't quite what we were looking for but according to TechCrunch, this was only the first phase of Facebook's lockdown and the redesign is on its way.

Regardless, Facebook announced three new features that will dramatically alter the way we interact on Facebook including an overhaul of its Groups feature, a new dashboard for apps management and a new "Download Your Information" feature.

"Groups" overhauled

Under Facebook's "Groups" overhaul, users will now be able to add other users to Facebook Groups just like they would if they were tagging a friend in a photo. Zuckerberg noted that users do not want to create lists of friends to add to their Facebook Groups. So instead of one user creating a group and then picking who is allowed into the group, groups will now create social groups.

According to Justin Shaffer, product manager, groups will also have access to group chat, group doc editing and other Facebook apps.

Connected Apps Dashboard

Tools I've mentioned in the past like HootSuite - which allows users to manage Facebook accounts - and BannerSnack - which allows users to log in using a Facebook account - use Facebook apps to serve their purpose.

Now, Facebook has created a dashboard to help users manage the apps they connect to and even restrict the amount of time those apps can access your Facebook account.

Download Your Information

As Zuckerberg pointed out, users control the information they put into Facebook but there has never been any real way to pull something out of the social network...until now.

"Download Your Information" will be a key addition to Facebook users who want to take information from their Facebook profile and add it to a profile on another social platform. Now users will be able to download all forms of Facebook data into a .zip file. This marks a much more "open" path for Facebook in that users can now leave Facebook and take their entire past (as appears on Facebook) with them.

According to a post on TechCrunch, yesterday, Facebook may announce a redesign of their website today at its headquarters in Palo Alto, CA. The rumor spreads only a two months after the company went into a state of "lockdown." According to TechCrunch's sources this is a tactic CEO Mark Zuckerberg uses to get the staff ready to work 24/7. Something "The Social Network" calls "wired-in."

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Posted 11:00 a.m. on Wednesday, Oct. 6

Facebook may announce redesign as soon as today

According to TechCrunch, some users are already reporting a new version of Chat appearing in their browsers with larger avatars than the current design. Other rumored changes include redesigned app icons which might be moved directly under the profile image. Read more about the changes here.

More is expected to be announced or at the very least mentioned today including the possibility of an official Facebook iPad app, Places improvements and a possible mention of the mythical Facebook Phone.

Firefox releases cloud app for iPhone, iPad and iPod Touch

We've waited years and now it's finally here..or at least something relatively close to it is here. Firefox Home, a free app that syncs your Firefox browsing history, bookmarks and open tabs to the iPhone, iPad and iPod Touch, is now available in Apple's App Store.

According to a release from Mozilla, creators of Firefox, the new app is not a Web browser itself but when users select a Web address or search term, the app will take you to a Web page using a browser within the app.

Now the bad news. Mozilla officially cancelled its project to build a Firefox Mobile app on iOS today. Instead the company is expected to focus on Firefox home as a way to build its cloud presence.

"We do not have plans to ship the full Firefox browser for the iPhone. Due to constraints with the OS environment and distribution, we cannot provide users Firefox for the iPhone," the company said in a press release.

Below is a video explaining some of the features in Firefox home and how to sync the app to your browser.

SoundNote: An iPad app for real note takers

Calling all iPad users! Grab your iPad and make your apps wiggle. You're going to want to delete your word processing app to make room for SoundNote (formerly SoundPaper).

Basic word processing apps like Pages - Apple's traditional counter-part to Microsoft Word - are great for writing but that's about it. The features are simple - you type, we save, you export. SoundNotes, however, takes word processing a step further by catering to not only writers but note takers.

Audio Recording

How many times have you gotten caught-up in a quote or key point only to miss a better point that followed. SoundNote allows users to record audio of your meetings while typing so that the user can always go back to find that important bit of information you may have missed in your typed notes.

Even better, play the recording and select a word in your notes. SoundNote will find the word in your recording so that you can quickly check your information rather than having to listen through the entire recording - improving your productivity and efficiency.

According to the apps website, audio notes are recorded in standard m4a format. One hour of high quality audio is only 20MB.

Doodle

Ever had to add a drawing to your notes? The app also allows users to draw out illustrations. Simply select the doodle tool at the top-right corner of the screen and use your finger to add your pie-charts and diagrams.

Exporting

SoundNote users can choose from three exporting options including Email to PDF, Email Audio and PDF or File Sharing.

A few of our Twitter followers have have mentioned the need to export as a .doc. Unfortunately, SoundNote does not export as a .doc, however, when the app exports as a PDF, it's just as easy to copy and paste the text from the PDF into a .doc format.

Question: What word processing app are you using on the iPad?

Flipboard released and now running invitation only system

This past Tuesday, marked the launch of Flipboard, the world's first "social magazine." Released only as an iPad app, Flipboard integrates Twitter and Facebook posts including photos, videos and links and displays them in a clean magazine-like format.

By Wednesday, the app was on the front page of every social media and gadget news site on the net. However by Thursday, Mike McCue, CEO of Flipboard and former CEO of Tellme announced that due to the incredible response to Flipboard, the app would now run on an invitation system.

In his Thursday announce, McCue gave instruction on how to go about receiving an invite to Flipboard.

"A new version of Flipboard (ver 1.0.1) is now available on the App Store. This version enables people to reserve a setup slot and to enter their email address so that we can notify them once their slot has opened up." - Mike McCue

While overall, this may harm the app's initial hype (as if the Google Wave invitation system didn't teach us anything) Flipboard seems to have an incredible team in place to ensure the invite is worth the wait. McCue's co-founder Evan Doll is a former senior iPhone engineer at Apple®. The company has also found a strong group of big league investors including Facebook co-founder Dustin Moskovitz and Actor Ashton Kutcher.

How to watch the World Cup online, for free

Anyone who watches Futball (Soccer) knows that the World Cup is being played through July 11 in South Africa. Of course, we Futball fans also know that almost every game is being played during work hours (7:30 a.m., 10 a.m. and 2:30 p.m. EST). So we've come up with a few ways to enjoy the World Cup via your computer and mobile devices. Enjoy!

ESPN 3

Via ESPN3.com (no longer espn360.com), users can watch every World Cup game on the schedule including game replays. But if users really want to get some use out of the site, check out the "mosaic" view. Using mosaic view, users can watch up to four video streams at once including major and minor league baseball games.

Canadian Broadcasting Centre

Visit CBC.ca for a full schedule of live broadcasts of the World Cup. CBC even offers "pre-game/tactical" commentary before each game so that users are prepared for each game. ESPN 3 offers similar pre-game commentary, but CBC offers a detailed schedule explaining exactly what's to come.

Recommended Mobile Device Apps:

iPhone - ESPN World Cup (Free)

This app offers everything from Group lists and standings to text and video reports. Upgrade from the free app to the premium app for $7.99.

iPad - FIFA.com News HD (Free)

This app has everything a Futball fan could ask for on the iPad: Multimedia stories, match and group info, interviews, etc. This app is also integrated with social media sites like Twitter, Facebook and Buzz.

Have another place to watch the World Cup online? Leave a comment and share your source!

iPad Apps at First Glance

I blogging to you via my new iPad. I'm already in love with the keyboard and the screen lock feature but we'll save that for another blog post. I've already downloaded a few social apps that users may find interesting upon first use. Here they are:

Tweet Deck
As I've mentioned in past posts, the Tweet Deck iPhone app is among the slowest Twitter apps on the market. However, the iPad app (so far) doesn't seem to suffer from the same problem. The columns are beautiful, you can set them to refresh at any rate you wish and so far I've seen little to no lag time when I set the refresh rate to one minute.
Bit.ly Tools

Bit.ly recently released Bit.ly Tools for iPhone and iPod Touch. Unfortunately the link shortening service has yet to release an iPad app. To get started with the iPhone app on your iPad, just drop a link into the shortening box, click "shorten" and the app will generate a trackable Bit.ly link.

BlogPress:

This blogging app works with just about any blogging service including Blogger, Wordpress, Moveable Type, Live Journal and the list goes on. I had a couple problems with saving a draft. The save button only appears when you click the title of the post, otherwise there is a photo icon. I'm actually using BlogPress write now to type this post. I'm able to add media, links and basically do whatever I could on a computer. I've very please with this app as blogging is one of the primary reasons as to why I bought an iPad.

This post was written from my iPad....Please excuse any grammatical or capitalization mistakes.