Much like Buddy, Sooshi gives you some ways to meet people online, though just like your average Craig’s List relationship quality pickings are slim and unlikely to lead to any long-term friendships.

One good feature found in Sooshi that many other social media apps lack is the ability to sign up for a profile directly inside the app — many force you on to the web to create an account.

Once you do this you can connect your existing social networking profiles and other links such as your web site or blog to your Sooshi account. This makes your profile a bit more complete and transparent to those who may check you out in the Sooshi community.

Using Sooshi consists of mainly trolling through the list of users and trying to strike up a conversation. You can send direct messages, update your status, or check in on the profiles of other users. One annoying feature was that Sooshi forces the users to have GPS enabled. Sure it makes for a convenient way to tag your location and find other users, but the battery drain is quite significant. That is of course if you plan to make use of Sooshi. What you are likely to find is many users who pass along “whatups” to each other or, surprisingly, complain about the app itself.

Apps like Buddy and Sooshi are trying to supplement what Twitter, Facebooks and others have launched with social networking. But the experience just isn’t that satisfying. It lacks the connection that some of the more well-established networks have.

• rating: 6/10
• price: Free
• app_name: Sooshi – Social Sushi

Fluid 2, a ninety-nine cent version of the free Fluid from Fabien Sanglard, allows you to do more than tap the screen and watch the waves ripple across the water. With Fluid 2, you can also toss a coin to make a wish, upload your own background from your photo album, listen to ambient music and change the color of the water.

Still, Fluid 2 is a do-nothing app. With so many apps-without-purpose competing for recognition, Fluid 2 does not stand out. Koi Pond, one of the original apps in this category, is more engaging.

Many of the earlier apps in the entertainment category got the attention they did because of the way they demonstrated the multi-touch and accelerometer capabilities of the iPhone. Now that over one billion apps have been downloaded from the app store, we all know how cool the iPhone is and what it is capable of. Fluid 2’s user interface is old news.

That said, Fluid 2 is a cool app. It is fun to drop coins in the water and watch the ripples for a few minutes, while listening to relaxing music. I would describe Fluid 2 as meditation in motion. But Fluid 2 is not keeping my attention any more than Fluid. Unless you have nothing else to do, download the original Fluid and save a dollar. If you already have Fluid and are eager for more user options, then Fluid 2 is worth spending your money on.

• app_name: Fluid 2
• rating: 6/10
• price: $0.99

My Brute

My Brute for the iPhone and iPod touch “is a crazy, off-the-wall game of combat that gives you the chance to challenge fighters from all over the world,” according to Bulkypix, developers of My Brute.

Yep, it’s one of those “create your own character or Brute, give it a personality and go around chopping, hacking, kicking and ideally, turning your enemies into dust and ashes..

Evidently the MyBrute site attracts more than 1.7 million visitors a day, who have created more than 70 million “brutes” or warriors.

Take on your opponent, virtual or real, anywhere around the world. With each challenge, as you gain experience, boost your confidence and unlock mad skillz, you’ll be able to dispatch them faster and faster. You can unlock and use more than 70 skills and weapons, so you can be kung fu fighting like a mad man or woman for quite some time.

My Brute lets you create up to 8 brutes and fight up to five opponents each day. You can also open your own dojo, become a master ,and invite other pupils to sit at your feet like grasshoppers and learn the techniques they’ll need to be successful warriors. You start the game with three brutes and as you get more pupils to join your dojo, you can create up to eight characters with additional powers. In that way, it’s like a Ponzi scheme.

You can also issue challenges to friend and foes on Facebook.

This is a terrific-looking game. The graphics are superb and the if you like, you can listen to your iPod while you’re throwing blows, kicking and pummeling your enemies into submission.

However, I just gotta say: I don’t understand the attraction of My Brute. Your friends must also purchase the $4.99 title if you want to invite them to become pupils and to fight head-to-head. You don’t actually fight – the action is done automatically. It’s just wasn’t engaging enough to keep me occupied for long.

• app_name: My Brute
• price: $4.99
• rating: 7/10

In 2003, consumers had flocked to the Palm Treo 600, which merged a phone, PDA, and BlackBerry into one slick package. That proved there was demand for a so-called convergence device, but it also raised the bar for Apple’s engineers.

By 2004 Apple’s iPod business had become more important, and more vulnerable, than ever. The iPod accounted for 16 percent of company revenue, but with 3G phones gaining popularity, Wi-Fi phones coming soon, the price of storage plummeting, and rival music stores proliferating, its long-term position as the dominant music device seemed at risk.

Summer 2004, while Jobs publicly denied he would build an Apple phone, in an effort to bypass the carriers, he approached Motorola. When the first prototypes showed up at the end of 2004, there was a major problem: The gadget itself was ugly.

February 2005, Even as the ROKR went into production, Jobs got together with Cingular executives to discuss a Motorola-free partnership. Jobs delivered a three-part message to Cingular: Apple had the technology to build something truly revolutionary, “light-years ahead of anything else.” Apple was prepared to consider an exclusive arrangement to get that deal done.

September 2005, Jobs unveiled the ROKR, describing it as “an iPod shuffle on your phone.” Consumers hated it.

Around Thanksgiving of 2005, eight months before a final agreement with Cingular was signed, Jobs tasked about 200 of Apple’s top engineers with creating the iPhone. Internally, the project was known as P2, short for Purple 2 (the abandoned iPod phone was called Purple 1).

Fall of 2006 — Prototype is still a disaster. It is not just buggy, it does not work. The phone drops calls constantly, the battery stops charging before it is full, data and applications routinely become corrupted and unusable. The list of problems seems endless. Steve Jobs is upset: “We don’t have a product yet.”

After a year and a half of secret meetings, Jobs negotiated terms with the wireless division of AT&T (Cingular at the time) to be the iPhone’s carrier. In return for five years of exclusivity, roughly 10 percent of iPhone sales in AT&T stores, and a thin slice of Apple’s iTunes revenue, AT&T had granted Jobs unprecedented power. Unique revenue-sharing arrangement was put in place with Apple share of $10 a month from every iPhone customer’s AT&T bill. Apple retained complete control over the design, manufacturing, and marketing of the iPhone.

Mid-December 2006, Jobs met Cingular boss Stan Sigman in Las Vegas. He showed off the iPhone’s brilliant screen, its powerful Web browser, its engaging user interface. Sigman, called the iPhone “the best device I have ever seen.”

January 2007, Jobs announced the iPhone at Macworld.

June 29, 2007, the iPhone went on sale. It is arguably Apple’s most profitable device. The company nets an estimated $80 for every $399 iPhone it sells, and that’s not counting the $240 it makes from every two-year AT&T contract an iPhone customer signs. Meanwhile, about 40 percent of iPhone buyers are new customers of AT&T’s.

According to analysts Apple spent roughly $150 million building the iPhone.

Jan 2008, According to Apple it is sold 3.71 million iPhones in 2007.

February 2008, iPhone SDK released to developers starting a new era of mobile applications.

July 2008, iPhone 3G is launched, but what is most important Apple AppStore opened its download resources to the consumers, turning instantly mobile applications industry from multi-million dollar to multi-billion dollar industry.

Jan 2009, 13.7 million of iPhones sold in 2008 beating Apple estimates by 3.7 million.

Mar 2009, Apple sold a total of 17 millions of iPhones since launch. Apple developer programm boasts 50,000 members, while the number of applications available via the company’s App Store now exceeds 25,000. There have been 800 million total downloads on the App Store so far, Apple said and 2009 AppStore revenue estimate is close to $1 billion.

June 2009, iPhone 3Gs launched with video recording support and many more other updates. Faster, better, still the same form-factor. More than 1 million iPhone 3G S smartphones have sold in the three days since the new model hit the stores

There was a huge iPhone impact on the structure of the mobile phone industry. Carriers are learning that the right phone — even a pricey one — can win customers and bring in revenue. In the pursuit of an Apple-like contract, every manufacturer is racing to create a phone that consumers will love, instead of one that the carriers approve of.

The iPhone cracked open the carrier-centric structure of the wireless industry and unlocked a host of benefits for consumers, developers, manufacturers — and potentially the carriers themselves. Consumers get an easy-to-use handheld computer.

Application developers gained new opportunities as the wireless carriers begin to abandon their walled-garden approach to snaring consumers.

iPhone story does not end here. To be continued…

This article was published by iphoneapplicationlist.com

Sounds easy, right? I’ve played a game or two of Scrabble in my day so I felt ready to take on the Letrix challenge.

You can move tiles left or right as they slide down the screen. Once a tile lands in a stack, you can still move it up, down or side to side as long as it stays within it’s row. However, with a steady stream on falling tiles, I found it difficult to concentrate on creating words.

There are just a few options for Letrix. Sound effects, basically the staccato clip of tiles falling into place, can be on or off. Disappointingly, you can’t listen to your own tunes while playing. There’s also a high score leaderboard, but I was never asked to enter my name. It seems to track scores only by date and level, not by name so you can’t compare your score to another player.

If you enjoy word games, then Letrix has the potential to be fun. (Heck for folks with a quicker response time it might already be fun!) But I would appreciate an update that makes it easier for new users to get started. I’d like a “cheat” — maybe shake to clear all the tiles or an unlimited play option that dissolves stacks instead of ending the game. I say this because I genuinely like playing Letrix, but getting up to speed is frustrating.

If you’re not sure if you’re ready for the Letrix challenge, you can start off with the free version. If you’re ready to man up, then get Letrix Classic and you’ll get two play modes.

• price: $1.99
• rating: 6/10
• app_name: Letrix Classic

Wise Guide Wrigley Field is a take-along app for any one visiting the Cubs home stadium in Chicago, which isn’t to say that home-viewers won’t enjoy it as well. The guide includes three sections — tips, trivia, eat & drink — and is great for pre-game entertainment or keeping antsy kids occupied if the games goes into extra innings.

The tips section is a general guide to Wrigley Field where users will find information about Harry Carey (and his statue), the source of the curse of the cubs (and what they’ve tried doing to end the curse), bathroom tips, where to wait for autographs and more. There are more than 40 tidbits in all.

The WG Wrigley Field trivia section is actually more of a quiz game with multiple choice answers. You can keep guessing until you get the answer right, which is a nice touch as are the cheering fans. However, there’s no way to turn down the fans without turning down your device, so don’t plan on sneaking in a quick Wrigley Field trivia quiz during Monday morning’s boring meeting.

The last section of the Wrigley Field iPhone app is Eat & Drink and it goes beyond The Friendly Confines. This section includes cafes, diners and bars in and around Wrigley Field. So you’re covered regardless of whether you want to eat before the game, after the game or throughout the game.

The nice thing about Wise Guide Wrigley Field, besides the graphics and general ease-of-use, is that it’s not just a quick repackage of old material. The app is truly a companion to the wise guides website. And, if you like the guide and visit Wrigley Field use the tab on the app to “share a tip” so that future visitors can benefit from your experience and wisdom.

• app_name: Wise Guide Wrigley Field
• rating: 9/10
• price: $0.99

This article was published by iphoneapplicationlist.com