iSmashPhone

Rant To Pwn: The DevTeam Lectures On iPhone Hacking

The above video documents a lengthy -- and mondo technical -- lecture presented by the DevTeam at the recent Chaos Communication Congress. 

Unless you jailbreak iPhones the way mere mortals scarf down M&M's, the technobabble along might glaze your eyes over. 

On the other hand, the revelation that over one hundred employees at the House of Jobs are fans of pwnage is itself an eye-opener.

[Via Hackaday]

Crayon Physics Coming To The iPhone: Prepare To Be "Drawn In..."

Remember when the original board game version of Othello came out?  Remember it's slogan?  "A minute to learn, a lifetime to master?"

Crayon Physics is kinda like that: it looks ridiculously simple upon first glance, then sucks you in with its unexpected depth and complexity.  The game, which picked up the US$20K top prize in the 2008 Independent Games Festival Grand Prize Winner, is coming to the iPhone via software publisher Hudson, perhaps as early as New Year's Day '09.

Crayon Physics presents you with apparently simple physics based puzzles such as moving a ball across the screen to a target that look like they've been drawn with a crayon on a piece of craft paper like you would have had for art class back in kindergarten. You attempt to solve these challenges by drawing new shapes to create a mechanism to reach the goal.

If you still can't wrap your head around the concept, watch this:

[Via 1UP]

The Game is out, but as of the time of this post iTunes link was not available

True Lies: We Look At Three (Count 'Em!) iPhone Lie Detector Apps

If it's a sin to tell a lie, is it just as big a sin to write an iPhone lie detector app?

Acme Mobile Products' Lie Detector would make a case for voting "yea."  This US$0.99 app would appear to be the brother-from-another-mother of the fake fingerprint analyzer Touchscan, in that both claim to work just by you touching your iPhone's screen.  Then again, neither claims to be the real McCoy; Lie Detector's App Store page even says it's "a novelty polygraph for fun and amusement purposes, it does not detect anything.  C'mon lighten up its a joke [sic]."

So while Acme's product bends over backwards to admit it's a joke, two other apps: the Agile Lie Detector (US$7.99) and the Champion Lie Detector (US$2.99) -- assert, with straighter faces, that they really work.  Both Agile (whose iTunes listing does include the phrase "This software is for entertainment purposes only") and Champion employ actual voice analysis algorithms to make their true/false decisions. 

Based on iTunes reviewers, opinion is sharply divided as to whether or not either or both live up to the hype.  One reviewer of Champion's app summed it up best: "You can't use it while on the phone, which seems like the most valuable thing it could possibly do.  You can't rewind or record the person's reaction for later analysis.  Just use for fun on friends while drinking."

In the immortal words of Lily Tomlin's character Edith Ann, "And that's the truth.  Pfffffpht."

[Go to each app's website for the iTunes link...]