FIPLAB Ltd, the graduate start-up behind the leading iPhone app for the Baclays Cycle Hire Scheme announced today that its London Cycle: Maps & Routes application has surpassed 80,000 user downloads in less than 4 weeks since its launch on the iTunes AppStore.

The app, which has been a hit success from day one, has received numerous write ups on leading publications such as the Evening Standard and has been ranked on iTunes as the Number 1 Free Travel application. FIPLAB state that the application’s continued success is down to strong word of mouth by its user community, who are passionate about providing them with valuable feedback, allowing them to work towards their goal of creating the perfect companion tool for the Barclays Cycle Hire scheme.

What’s interesting is that the application is not just being used by cycle hire members, but also regular cyclists who are using the app due to the cycle-safe routes it provides. The routes allow cyclists to avoid busy roads and minimises the number of right-hand turns required to reach a destination.

After a string of updates, the company is now planning to further expand its userbase by porting their application to the BlackBerry and Android mobile platforms.

Synoptical Studios Ltd today is pleased to announce the release and immediate availability of Aerox 1.0.1, their highly-anticipated debut game for iOS. Taking full advantage of the iPhone’s powerful gaming capabilities, Aerox takes players through a stunning 3d world, brought to life by a wide array of physics-based puzzles and interactions. Aerox is an innovative ball-rolling adventure for the iPhone, packed with plenty of platforming action and physics-based puzzles! Dynamic and varied gameplay mechanics are complemented by stunning visuals for a blissful and engaging mobile experience.

Feature Highlights:
* 30 original levels
* Wide variety of puzzles, traps and obstacles
* Simple yet precise tilt controls
* Global leaderboards support
* Advanced engine technology (normal-mapped lighting, detailed shadowing, reflections, complex physics, etc.)
* Enhanced effects for 3GS and iPhone4 devices (realtime reflections, improved shadows, 60fps gameplay)

Full HD graphics support for Retina and iPad displays will also be available shortly in the next update, for no extra cost! This is not just rendered at the larger resolution/screen size, but also uses much higher resolution artwork for an unparalleled HD game experience unlike anything currently available on the App Store.

Apple has released the final Gold Master (GM) seed of iPhone 3.2 SDK for iPad, get it now via developer.apple.com:

iPhone SDK 3.2 GM Seed is now available. Starting today, all iPad apps submitted must be built using this release.

All members of the iPhone Developer Program can submit their iPad apps to iTunes Connect for review and approval. If you did not submit your app during the initial review period, but upload it by March 31, it will be reviewed but may not make the grand opening of the iPad App Store.

Make sure you read the iPhone SDK GM Seed Release Notes before installing and developing with this release.

Furthermore, 9to5Mac notes that an additional email has gone out to developers telling them they need those final apps in for approval by March 31, 5pm PDT. Any time after that and there’s no guarantees your app will be in there for launch.

(And hey, if you want to help TiPb out with coverage of your iPad app, the sooner you contact us the better as well — we’re expecting something close to insanity come Saturday!)

Apple’s new iPad tablet is essentially a larger form-factor iPhone 3GS or iPod touch G3 which leverages both the bigger, 1024×768 screen and an updated iPhone 3.2 OS with enhanced versions of existing apps like Mail and Calendar, new offerings like the iBooks e-book reader and store, low-cost 3G data plans, and a 1GHz Apple A4 processor.

Critics have called the iPad “just a big iPhone” and fail to see how it changes anything. Supporters have called the iPad “a big iPhone” and feel it changes everything. Which is it? Until it ships in March (for the Wi-Fi version) or April (for the 3G version) and TiPb gets to do a full-on review, we can’t say for sure. But we can go through and preview what we’ve seen so far and try to figure out just which direction Apple’s leaning. And we’re going to, after the break!

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Every golfer on the planet is susceptible to buying gadgets that will help them improve their game. Unfortunately, most of them end up in the closet with all of the rest of the scams that do nothing more than make us look like fools out on the course. Well the iPhone has an app that just may do more good than bad in the GolfShot: Golf GPS app.

Golf GPS devices have become pretty popular over the last few years, and this one has few shortcomings as an app. First off, it is less than $30 and that is a far cry from the hundreds of dollars stand alone devices will run from the likes of Golfsmith. It is packed with special features and while there are some flaws, it is pretty respectable for the price.

One of the toughest things for any golfer to figure

out on a new course is the range from tee to green and from their approach shot to the green. This app can not only do that, but will also be able to give target ranges as well. When you need to know how far it is down to the water hazard from where you are standing, just point and the information pops right up on the screen.

Golfshot has long been associated as the best of the best when it comes to having GPS devices for golfers, so it is no surprise that this app is considered to be one of the best available for the iPhone. There are currently well over 22,000 courses that have their information available on the app, so it will be a rare course that can be played where the information will not be in the palm of your hands.

Some of the biggest headlines in regards to Apple’s iPhone over the last few weeks revolve around the app store.

Due to the fact that Verizon has been on an all-out assault against AT&T and their precious iPhone, AT&T has responded by promoting the amount of apps that are available on the iPhone. Just about every commercial you see these days throws out the number of 100,000 plus apps that they now have in the app store.

Unfortunately for both Apple and the iPhone, software programmers are getting more and more frustrated with the ability to make money from the Apple app store. In a story that was released on BusinessWeek.com over the weekend, several programmers were quoted in reference to how crowded the app store is that it is becoming tougher and tougher to make money because of the competition of so many applications in the same niche.

They also reported that there are well over 125,000 programmers that are currently registered to make applications for

the iPhone. This number far exceeds those that are available to make applications for both Blackberry and The Droid. Many of these developers that have been in the game for quite some time are now breaking out and in addition to making their apps for the iPhone, are starting to develop apps for both Blackberry and The Droid.

While this was of course to be expected, it does not bode well for Apple and the iPhone. The app store has been their saving grace throughout this little battle and if the programmers who already have applications available for the iPhone make their products available for the iPhone’s competition, it is only a matter of time before those phones catch up in the amount of applications that they have available as well. With all the bad press that AT&T is receiving about their network coverage, the stories are only feeding the fire for people that are on the fence in getting either their first iPhone or going over to Verizon for The Droid.

This may be one of the best free apps that is available on the iPhone. We have all been in strange cities and have had to hunt down wifi spots in order to send out a quick email or send off a report.

It is almost embarrassing asking people where to go if you don’t have an aircard, this can be a major problem. The free workplace app WorkSnug does the hunting for you and lands a quite place to do whatever you need.

After starting the app up, all that is needed is to hold the iPhone up in front of you and the iPhone starts to list the various locations that have been scouted the by the WorkSnug team. It will give directions and ratings as to what the team and other users think about that spot. If directions are needed, they are right there as well.

While there are plenty of apps that are fun to have or great games to play, this is one of the most useful and practical ones that we have seen come out in a while. Best of all, it’s FREE. No more worry about where to go when you get to town or relying on the kindness of a stranger. Anyone who travels with their laptop in tow is going to appreciate this app.

Another feature that many will enjoy is that they can add their own information about the sites and share it with their friends once they have visited it. For the most part, the sites that were checked had a very accurate review and each one of them was laptop friendly. Oh yeah, the bonus feature is that if they serve coffee, the quality of the Joe is listed as well. Not too bad for a free app.

The much anticipated release of the Amidio Touch DJ application has finally been approved by Apple for sale in the App Store and it is sure to be a top seller in no time at all.
The app enables users to mix two tracks without ever hearing one second of the song and has some special features that are pretty incredible for being use on a phone.

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DJ app’s have apparently been blocked for the iPhone for quite some time and nobody is really sure why. There has been a multitude of applications and every one of them has been turned down to this point. Whether Apple is scared that the applications will hurt their iPod sales or not is unclear as they have been pretty tight lipped about everything so far. However, users have been sending letters and petitions about approval for some type of app and Apple has finally given in.

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The Amidio Touch DJ app will retail for $19.99 in the app store and is pretty amazing. Two separate tracks can be pulled up and compared via the sound waves that

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are generated. Mixers should be able to combine the tracks by visually matching the waves. At least that is the theory behind the whole thing.

While there is a lot of upside to this app, there are also some small roadblocks that Apple has in mind for its users. For instance, if the user wants to pre listen to the songs before they have been mixed, they must buy a splitting adapter to do so. They also cannot access their current library. Any songs that they want to use in the app must re-imported through another utility on the iPhone.

Even though there are some limitations, there are also a lot of special effects that can be used within the app itself that make this well worth the money. The fact that it is the only true DJ application that is usable on the iPhone doesn’t really give us a choice though if we want to use the iPhone as mixer for our iTunes library. However, Amidio did a great job with the obvious restrictions that Apple put on them to get this approved.

There has been a recent push of developers that have not been so secretive about their unhappiness with the whole vetting process that Apple uses to decide who can have an app in the store and who cannot. While it is generally believed that the denials are not supposed to be disclosed, these things have a way of leaking out and Apple has been getting put under the microscope.
Apple CEO Steve Jobs has been in the press quite a lot lately for various reasons and it is no wonder that all of this is coming back out again. In the eyes of many developers, the App Store is a contradiction in itself. Apple does not have its own developers working on these applications, but suggests that they have an open policy.

It all seems very welcoming until you hear the number of people that have been refused for one reason or another. It is not

to the point that many major developers of applications are pulling their teams off of iPhone apps and working on other systems such as Blackberry and Droid. While there will be enough start-up companies that will fill the void and there will be no shortage of new apps, it could mean more competition for the iPhone.

Many of these larger companies are set up to literally pump out app after app if need be. While I have no idea what the actual number of apps that have been developed by major tech companies is one would have to imagine that it is pretty significant. How hard can it be to create a similar app for other phones when the programming is basically done? Could these mean a sudden rush of apps that are available for the direct competition? Only time is going to tell on this one but Apple seems to making a few more enemies that friends lately.

As odd as it sounds, the iPhone is doing its share to alleviate some of the unemployment by putting people to work making apps.

While Apple may not be directly employing the latest wave of tech entrepreneurs, the iPhone is responsible for quite a few startup companies that are seeing college whiz kids cash in on the iPhone craze.

Finding a job out of college has never been harder, but because of the iPhone boom, many kids that have the tech savvy are jumping in with both feet and starting up their own businesses. More developers than ever are looking to get in on the action because of the very generous revenue share plan that Apple has in place. If these companies can come up with one or two successful apps, they can be well on their way to becoming millionaires.

Stanford University has decided to cash

in on this as well as they now offer an app building course. They have landed a couple of Apple engineers to teach the course and it is already becoming quite popular. While most of these new businesses are small in staff, a little success could lead to a larger work force. Regardless, people are being put to work in a niche that was not even there a few years ago.

It is no wonder that Palm, Google and RIM are putting serious efforts into creating the same type of App Store for their phones. Apple has big jump on them with well over 100,000 apps already in circulation and that number continues to grow every day. The other companies are going to have to loosen their purse strings though, as Apple currently has the best deal around. As long as they do, this is where the developers will end up