14 Year-old gives hope to young geeks everywhere

Meet 14 year-old Robert Nay, the programmer behind Bubble Ball, the most downloaded free app according to CNN, your trusted leader in news. It's refreshing to see someone so young not only excel, but unlike so many young celebs out there, he seems refreshingly normal.

Keep up the great work, Robert and we look forward to reviewing your next game.

Kitty Code releases Hurricane HD 2.0 for the iPad

(Editor's Note: In an effort to bring you more app news faster, we are experimenting with adding app developer press releases as part of our blog posts. Let us know what you think.)

PRESS RELEASE:

Kitty Code, LLC announces the update to their award winning iOS Apps Hurricane for the iPhone and Hurricane HD for the iPad. The update to Hurricane HD includes NHC Video Updates, while the Hurricane update includes iOS 4 updates, Retina Display graphics, Multitasking support as well as other minor feature enhancements to the broadcast quality, zoomable maps covering storms in both the Atlantic and Pacific oceans.

With an area of interest already being watched off of the eastern seaboard of the US, we have a stark reminder that Hurricane Season is here, and it's time to be prepared. Forecasters expect another busy Atlantic Hurricane Season, and for people with an iPhone, iPod touch or an iPad, there's no better way to stay informed than with Kitty Code's Hurricane and Hurricane HD apps.

Hurricane HD has received a major update for 2011 with many features to keep you informed. The newly updated tracking map now allows for the display of multiple tropical systems simultaneously, while the Hurricane HD Historic Storm Library gives you access to memorable storms of the past and can be displayed along side current storms within the tracking map. With the new Storm Center, active storm bulletins, forecasts, satellites and radar are all at your finger tips, along with the ability to play through storm tracks. Hurricane HD now also includes push notifications, giving you the ability to stay up to date with whats happening in the tropics anytime day or night.

Hurricane for the iPhone and iPod touch has been updated to include world tropical cyclone, typhoon and hurricane tracking on the interactive tracking map. Hurricane is the first application of its kind to cover tropical systems around the world. We've also added push notifications to keep you informed of any critical developments.

Tracking storms since September 2008, Hurricane continues to lead the pack as the innovative and inclusive hurricane tracking option, giving you easy access to everything you need to track a tropical system and keep you informed. Hurricane introduced highly detailed, zoomable maps covering the Atlantic, East and Central Pacific oceans and now tracks the West Pacific, South Pacific and Indian Oceans as well. Receiving continued refinements over the last three years, Hurricane has added distance from your position to any point on the storm track, and the official 5 day Forecast Cone to the broadcast quality maps. Each storm continues to feature animated satellite and radar imagery when available, the latest plots for active storms as well as world satellites, bulletins and more.

"Hurricane was the first complex weather application added to the iTunes App Store, and the latest release of Hurricane builds upon the solid framework that our users have come to know and trust. The mapped forecast cone is an extremely important part of tracking hurricanes, showing you what areas could be affected. Hurricane takes this a step further, allowing you to zoom in on the forecast cone, effectively showing you the exact extent of the cone of uncertainty. Hurricane remains the only app performing this function to date on the iPhone and iPod touch and Hurricane HD is the only iPad app with this critical feature", said Ilene Jones, Co-Founder and CEO of Kitty Code, LLC. 

Hurricane has grown a lot over the last three years, and has been very successful in showing where storms are, regardless of their location in the world.

Features included in Hurricane and Hurricane HD:
* Mapped, zoomable 3 and 5 day Forecast Cone
* Animated satellite and radar imagery
* World wide tracking maps
* Atlantic, Eastern and Central Pacific historical tracking data
* Storm information page and Storm Center puts important storm details such as storm specific animated satellite, radar, forecast images and text at your finger tips
* Fully zoomable tracking maps providing a greater level of detail
* Integrated GPS to inform you of your distance from an approaching storm
* Satellite images covering all tropical seas and oceans
* An enhanced look that makes finding information easier than ever before
* Push notification of new storms

Features exclusive to Hurricane for iPhone and iPod touch
* iOS 4 Ready 
* Multitasking 
* Retina Display Images

Features exclusive to Hurricane HD:
* News tab featuring storm news and preparedness information.
* Track and compare multiple current, past and historical systems on the same interactive map
* Designed especially for the iPad's size 
* HDMI output allows for the display of Hurricane HD on a large screen 

The world is talking about Hurricane:

"Apps share similarities, but Hurricane HD, Hurricane stand out from this pack." - Macworld, Rated 4 out of 5 Mice

"This app has everything I need in one handy spot. It's not a game or a toy, just an app packed full of the latest storm information.", iTunes US

"I use this app on a daily basis, I highly reccomend it to anyone who is interested in weather or lives in a hurricane prone area.", iTunes Canada

"Preciso, claro, eficiente, la mejor aplicacion en su naturaleza, al igual la base de datos que incluye", iTunes Mexico

"Tres bonne app qui sert lorsque l'on vit au Antilles ce qui est mon cas meilleure app du genre.", iTunes France

"Sehr empfehlenswert. Sehr uebersichtlich - man sieht auch sofort auf der 1. Seite evtl. Sturmaktivitaeten und dann gibt es alle wichtigen weiterfuehrenden Angaben. Es ist fuer mich das allerbeste Hurrikane-App!!", iTunes Germany

"Sehr vielseitges App, grosse bersicht, viele Ansichten. 
So verpasst du garantiert keinen Hurri mehr." - iTunes Review (Netherlands)

Device Requirements:
* iOS 4.0 or later iPhone, iOS 3.2 or later for iPad

Pricing and Availability:
Hurricane and Hurricane HD are only $3.99 (USD) and available exclusively through Apple's iTunes AppStore. More information about Hurricane for the iPhone and iPod touch and Hurricane HD for the iPad can be found at the official Kitty Code website.

Kitty Code
Hurricane HD 2.0

Retro Tech Tuesday: British Telecom's Vision of the Future

It's funny: we walk around with FaceTime on our iPhones/iPads/iPods, and yet it still just doesn't feel like video calling has arrived. Sure high-end "tele-presence" systems from companies like Cisco have infiltrated top companies, but for most of us, our "videophone" interaction is still quite limited.

In hopes of getting us to use our videophones in our pockets a bit more, let's take a look back at how British Telecom (then named General Post Office) envisioned our video calling future:

Retro Tech Tuesday: CompuServe Strikes Back!

In last week's Retro Tech, we featured an ad for Prodigy. In an effort to rekindle the ISP war of the 90's, we bring you this CompuServe ad this week. It's funny how certain things are embedded in your brain, taking up space, and you didn't even know they were up there. I didn't think I would have any recollection of this ad at all, but within the first few seconds, I remembered, disturbingly clearly, the series of images that come rushing out of the computer screen. It's a shame I haven't been using that brain space for something more useful, like say The Breeder's "Cannonball" video.

Happy Birthday, Apple Retail

It was on this date in 2001 that Apple launched what was at the time a huge gamble: their first retail store opened in Tyson's Corner, Virginia. I was there. I wasn't in line for the opening, but despite arriving mid-afternoon, I still got a Tyson's Corner Apple Store t-shirt. Little did I know about a year later, I'd be working in an Apple retail store.

While there are many personal memories to share, and of course and analysis of the future plans for the stores in order, for now, let's just take a trip back, as Steve Jobs himself takes on tour of the Apple store just prior to opening. As a point of reference, bear in mind this all happened pre-iPod, in a far-off time where something called OS 9 ruled the Apple world, and OS X (beta) was just getting "lickable."