When Google opens their wallet, big buyouts follow, and this time it’s iPhone/mobile advertising company AdMob for $750 million, and VoIP startup Gizmo5 for about $30 million.

AdMob is an obvious choice for Google, as it’s built mobile and in-app advertising (especially on the iPhone) into a $100 million a year business, enough to get Brin and Page personally involved in the courtship. Says TechCrunch:

Google is gunning hard to dominate mobile Web advertising and AdMob has an early foothold in the display side. [...] Google’s purchase price tells us it thinks the opportunity for mobile display ads is in the billions of dollars, at the very least.

Gizmo5, rather than advertising, could help round out Google’s services portfolio. Again, TechCrunch has the details:

Google Talk allows voice calls between users but has no PSTN link to allow incoming or outbound calls to real phones. Gizmo5 does this well already. [...] And Google Voice is a great VoIP and phone identity service, but they have no endpoint for calls. Gizmo5, which by the way already integrates with Google Voice, is a soft phone end point for Google phone users.

Of course, Apple will have to stop considering/reverse the rejection of Google Voice, or Google will have to deliver that killer web app version, before iPhone users benefit from that…

Dear Ladies and Germs, we present humbly, for your viewing pleasure, the 10 debut minutes of ART SCHOOL, a new web series about the trials and tribulations of today’s burgeoning art student.

In the hallowed tradition of SQUARE PEGS and BEVERLY HILLS 90210, ART SCHOOL plumbs the sex, scandal, and fake-spectacled sleaze of the hipster set. Will Chloe get pregnant? Will Jared start selling ecstasy to pay for painting supplies? Did Dr. Jameson really sleep with David Hockney?

The show starts at 8 sharp so be there or be rectilinear.

Monday, November 9th @ Tubby Dog (1002 17th Ave SW)

You can grab the Matte UI here, and the Matte Nano theme here. Or look for them on Cydia.

The very last png is a Backgrounder Badge I created to look like the one Leopard uses in the dock for open applications. If you have any questions on SSH’ing these into your iPhone just post them in the comments.

I have a handful of Xbox 360 Games, HD-DVD’s and some Blu Rays that I will be giving away. There are a few contests I’ll do for this.

First off, my current followers. Tomorrow is Follow Friday, so everyone who shows some love, *cough* #ff #followfriday @nickhesson *cough* , will be entered to take their first pick at what I have. I will select two winners from this first grab.

The second contest will be for my 1999th, 2000th, and 2001st followers.

The third contest will be a random selection from anyone who comments on this post before Sunday, October 25th, 2009, 11pm Mountain time. lol.

Have at er.

@nickhesson

Don’t forget to follow @hessonfilms and @12secondfilms

Synopsis: A satirical look at art school through the lens of teen drama.

The editing for the first episode should done by the end of this week. It’s been a struggle to get it down to under 10 minutes. The rough cut was 16 minutes and now after 2 weeks of retooling, we’ve got it down to about 12 minutes. 2 more minutes of fat to trim and then we’re good to go. It’s not going to be easy but in the interest of keeping “Art School” tight, it is going to happen. Hussein is working away on the final touches and I can’t wait to see what he has put together.

We’re currently working at securing a date for the first episode premiere here in Calgary, AB, Canada. It will premiere at Tubby Dog on 17th and the next day it will be on the web. We are hoping the premiere will be at the end of this month. I will keep you all posted on any updates. And watch for some stills to appear shortly!

Here are some stills from the first episode:

In the mean time, check out Hussein Juma’s “AssBackwards” below.

After hundreds of comments and over 8,000 views on our previous post on various ways to get BlackRa1n running, I’ve narrowed it down to a checklist you can follow to ensure that frodo will do his magic on your idevice. If there is anything I missed please let me know.

From various comments on the last post, it appears that BlackRa1n CAN run on Windows XP, Vista, and Windows 7. So if you think it’s your OS, it’s probably not. I myself have had success with an iPhone 3G on both Windows XP and Windows 7. It has also been reported that you can be on any firmware 3.0+ and it should work, so that narrows it down to the fact that it is not the OS or the firmware. Which doesn’t really narrow it down by much.

Other’s also reported that performing a backup restore prevents it from working, which again is not true. I had restored my backup after updating to 3.1.2 and some apps before Jailbreaking successfully. So scratch that.

Not every point in this list will be necessary however, to increase your success rate, I highly recommend following them.

So the checklist begins:

0. Log in as the Administrator
1. Perform a backup/sync in iTunes for safety
2. Check if you have the file QTCF.dll, in C: / Windows/System32. If you dont have,you can download it from here. [Thanks to UltraLord]
3. Remove any passlocks you may have on the phone.
4. Enable “Airplane Mode” under Settings
5. Open iTunes and disable all Syncing (Check the first comment for a detailed breakdown of how to disable this)
6. Open Taks Manager (Ctrl+Alt+Delete) and kill the following processes if open: iTunesHelper.exe iTunes.exe, AppleMobileDeviceHelper.exe, msdnresponder.. (any i missed?)
7. Leave AppleMobileService.exe running for now. (might be required to end it after stuck in a mode)
8. Unplug your phone/ipod.
9. Download BlackRa1n to the root of your C:/ drive.
10. Right click blackra1n.exe and choose Run As.. then enter the Administrator credentials. Uncheck the “Protect my computer and data from unauthorized program activity” option. If you see “This file came from another computer and might be blocked to help protect this computer” then unsure you unblock it. (this step may be skipped, but not sure. Haven’t confirmed if this is needed. Some worked without) (You can also try Compatibility Mode)
11. Click Make It Rain, when prompted, connect iPhone. If things went alright , you should see Frodo’s face and and Voila. If not, continue reading.

BlackRa1n says “Entering Recovery Mode” but my iPhone is not entering recovery mode. Or my iPhone is stuck on the iTunes/USB Restore screen and blackra1n still says “Entering Recovery Mode” or my iPhone turned off and won’t boot, blackra1n says “Entering Recovery Mode”

1. Press the power button and the home at a time and when you see the icon of the apple release the power but keep pressing the home until you see the photo of geohot with the Iphone. Let go home then.
2. Turn the phone off complete ly by unplugging USB cord. (Note Blackra1n is still running in the background) Plug it back in and try setp 2 again.

BlackRa1n has entered my iPhone into Recovery mode, and now says “Running…” but nothing is happening. I still see the iTunes/USB Restore screen on my iPhone/iPod.

If this is the case, try the following:
1. Close blackra1n and try opening it Again
2. Try terminating the process AppleMobileService.exe. (May require you to unplug/reboot your iPhone or Running BlackRa1n again)
3. [more suggestions from comments to be entered]

I’ll try and add some more scenarios. If anyone has anything they want to add, please feel free.

The application scans the most active social media networks on the Web for a keyword or phrase, and returns a real-time snapshot of what is being said where and by whom.

Users enter a search term on a simple interface, and the latest conversations from each of the social media sites are returned in an easy-to-read format. Say What? displays the most recent conversations in aggregate, unlike searching social networks or blogs via a mobile browser.

Users have the option to dig deeper into the responses on a particular source, and a search history is saved so users can get easy updates for their regularly-searched terms.

“iCrossing developed Say What? to demonstrate how search, social media and mobile can work together to provide users with information that is real-time and relevant,” said Rachel Pasqua, director of mobile strategy, iCrossing. “Our goal was to put one-click social media monitoring in the palm of the user’s hand.”

Say What? is the latest in a number projects developed by iCrossing’s growing mobile practice. iCrossing has built mobile platforms for Mazda USA and Toyota Motor Sales that were designed to meet the specific information requirements of users who are on-the-go while keeping operational costs at a minimum. iCrossing also provides clients with a robust and flexible SMS platform that currently powers sales lead alerts for Kia dealers and enables users of MazdaUSA.com to send dealer information directly to their cell phones.

Download Say What? for iPhone from the iTunes App Store:

Users have the option of finding out more on a particular topic, and a search his saved so they can receive updates for their regularly-searched terms.

“iCrossing developed Say What? to demonstrate how search, social media and mobile can work together to provide users with information that is real-time and relevant,” said Rachel Pasqua, director of mobile strategy, iCrossing.

“Our goal was to put one-click social media monitoring in the palm of the user’s hand.”

[Thanks: http://www.webpronews.com]

UPDATE: It seems some of this might need a little bit more detail and it also seems that some different Service Packs might respond differently. I have tested this on Windows XP (SP3) and Windows 7. Here are some more detailed instructions:

UPDATE 2: “on windows 7 you should use compatible mode with Windows XP SP2″ – Thanks to jusalcho

UPDATE 3: “Those of you having trouble: try killing the mdnsresponder service as well, that worked for me!” – Thanks to Brian

Step 0. Ensure that within iTunes you have unchecked “Sync Automatically” and under Edit -> Preferences, Devices, choose Prevent iTunes from syncing with Devices Automatically.

1. Ensure that your iPhone is on. You can see your Springboard. Plug your iPhone into your computer and ensure that iTunes recognizes it and preform a sync/backup/update.

2. Once you have completed this, close iTunes completely. Press the start button and choose Run. Press Ctrl+Alt+Del and check your task manager to ensure that any iTunes processes are closed, such as iPodService.exe, iTunesHelper.exe, etc. These must be turned off.

3. Ensure that your copy of blackra1n.exe is located in C:\blackra1n.exe.

4. Right click blackra1n.exe. If running Windows 7 choose properties, and then compatibility. Choose to run in Windows XP SP3 Mode.

5. Right Click blackra1n.exe and choose Run As. Chose the Administrator account and enter in the password.

6. Once blackra1n.exe is running, click Make it Ra1n.

7. You should see your iPhone automatically reboot and show a usb cable and iTunes, your typical restore/dfu screen.

8. You should see blackra1n.exe change to Running.. and GeoHotz face will appear on your iPhone. It will automatically reboot when done and that is when you should see the “Jailbreaking complete” dialog that likes to appear when you manually restart after no response.

I hope this helps a bit more. If I missed something I will try and squeeze it in right away.

Here is a video put together from David @ iPhoneDesignz. Glad my steps could help :p

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QgYobhil4uo&hl=en&fs=1&]

—-

So after I got incredibly frustrated trying to jailbreak my iPhone 3G with 3.1.2, I did some searching and came up with a fix. Every time I ran the BlackRa1n app, I was getting stuck on “Running…” and my iPhone would just stay in Recovery Mode. If this is the problem you are experiencing, try this:

1. Move blackra1n.exe to your C:/ (Copy and Paste it onto your main Hard Drive)
2. Check Task Manager for any iTunes processes running and close them! (Control Alt Delete or run taskmgr.exe)
3. Right Click and under Properties change to “Run in Compatibility Mode” and choose Windows XP. Then Run BlackRa1n.exe as Administrator (right click)

This has been tested with an iPhone 3G and Windows 7 and XP. For some reason this was the only way ti would work. Make sure your phone is on and in regular mode before all of this and that iTunes doesn’t launch (if it does, it wont work). If you still can’t get it to go, leave a comment and we’ll try to help you out! :0

Adobe has unveiled a strategic link in their social photo sharing experiment with the launch of Photoshop.com Mobile for iPhone. This free photo editing thrill ride lets users revise and share photos with a simple but useful array of one-touch effects. The user interface is intuitive and easy to mange with minimal taps and zero lag time.

The app provides about 15 individual enhancements that include the popular crop, rotate and flip for images, plus soft focus, vignette blur, sketch and pop art as part of the gang. The ability to easily add and undo photo effects makes this app a threat to many $.99 iPhone applications charging for less of the same.

What Adobe seems to really be after here is building users for their Photoshop.comsocial photo sharing network. The app was appropriately named after the company’s goal of attracting users to upload photos from their iPhone to manage and share, offering a direct Photoshop.com URL with sign-up. Once users get to Adobe’s Beta website, the options to add photo effects and manage content are almost endless.

Read more >> Original Source: iPhone Saviour

Movie★Slate
Movie★Slate is a digital slate, clapper board, shot log, and shot notepad— designed for use with film, television, documentaries, interviews, and home movies. Movie★Slate provides an easy way to log footage and take notes as you shoot— saving you time later when you capture and edit the footage on your computer. My only problem with this app is it’s price tag at $9.99. If your Jailbroken, hop over into Installous and try this one out. If not, try a free Slate app, iSlate Lite.

Ready for your Close-Up.Photograph the slate at the start of each shot.

Quick Data Entry. Simply tap on a slate field to change production information directly on the slate.

Set Timecode.Easily “jam” (set) the timecode using an optimized keypad to enter new values, or display clock time-of-day.

Sync Timecodeusing Bluetooth to other iPhones and iPod touches (requires OS 3).

Roll/Scene/Take. Use the optimized keypad to quickly increment roll, scene, take.

Add People Quickly.Choose director and D.P. names from your contacts, saved History, or enter them using the keyboard.

Load Production Data from the saved History— making it easy to quickly switch between multiple productions.

Have it your way.You can even customize the slate’s appearance for each production or shot. Choose from various clapper stick designs, slate background colors, slate fonts, and clock timecode colors.

Screenplay
Black Mana Studios’ Screenplay is the world’s first fully-functional mobile screenwriting application. It allows professionals and hobbyists alike to write complete movie and television screenplays directly on the iPhone or iPod Touch

The next version of Black Mana Studios’ iPhone screenwriting application was submitted to Apple’s review. Version 1.1 was written from scratch with stability and performance in mind, even on older iPhone models.

Among it’s many new features, version 1.1 supports:

Hitchcock Storyboard
Brought to you by the good folks at Cinemak who brought you the G35 adapter. This is a tool for filmmakers by filmmakers, aimed squarely at bringing creative tools to the indie crowd. Hitchcock is a unique little app designed to use the iPhone’s camera to build storyboards. It has a very slick interface and very comprehensive tool set. You can take a photo and ad markups, like traditional boards.