iPad camera apps discovered in iOS 4.3 beta

Picture Courtesy of MacRumors.com

Oh look, even more evidence that the next generation iPad will be equipped with cameras. The image above showing the three new iPad apps was discovered in the iOS 4.3 beta 2 by MacRumors. To be effective, the iPad's Camera and FaceTime apps would require both back- and front-facing cameras just like the iPhone 4. The Photo Booth app is new to iOS but already ships on Macs running OS X -- it could, presumably, use either camera to record snapshots (with filters) and video. And really, at this point, with such overwhelming evidence the only surprise would be for Apple to announce a new iPad without a camera.

Sony Launching New PSP Next Week, Next Up The Playstation Phone

Sony will unveil a new version of its handheld game console PlayStation Portable on January 27, as well as a gaming-oriented smartphone in February, Bloomberg reports, citing two people with knowledge of the company’s plans.

Rumors of Sony working on a combination of a portable gaming device and a smartphone surfaced early last year, but the details about the device were very scarce, and they still are.

No new details have been revealed about the next generation of PlayStation Portable, except that it will be revealed at a briefing on January 27, which Sony has declined to comment. The PlayStation phone will have a touch screen, and will be presented at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, held February 14 to 17.

Regardless of the technicalities, it’s clear that Sony needs to rethink its portable gaming strategy, as recent numbers show that the iPhone and Nintendo DS are causing Sony’s share in the portable gaming market to rapidly shrink.

Sony plans to do exactly that. The company will outline a new strategy to combine its various online services and enable users to share games, movies and music among devices such as handhelds and TVs, Bloomberg‘s sources claim.

Nintendo Releases Pricing and Launch Date For The 3DS

Nintendo of America’s COO and President Reggie Fils-Aime revealed the release date, price, and games for the long-awaited 3DS gaming system at an event in New York this Wednesday.

Consumers will have a chance to play these games starting March 27, when 3DS will go on sale for $249.99. The device will initially be available in either aqua blue or cosmo black, and Fils-Aime said that more than 30 games will be released before the E3 Conference in early June. 2D Nintendo DSi games will also work with 3DS.

The price is just about $50 shy of what it costs to buy a 160GB PlayStation 3 and will understandably make some consumers squirm. However, the experience is unlike anything we’ve seen. The device’s 3D feature doesn’t create the pop-out effect that 3D movies do, it’s more like looking into a hole, but it does enhance the animation and effectively pull you into scenes.

Nuance Releases Speech Transcription SDK for iOS and Android Apps

Nuance, the maker of popular speech recognition apps such asDragon Dictation, is releasing the Dragon Mobile SDK to members of the Nuance Mobile Developer Program. The SDK will enable app makers to add speech transcription capabilities to their iOS and Android applications.

The SDK is free of charge and lets developers add speech-to-text translation capabilities in eight different languages, as well as text-to-speech functionality in more than 35 languages.

Nuance’s suite of Dragon Mobile applications is widely recognized as best-in-class when it comes speech transcription, and the SDK is already being used by companies such as Ask.com. The SDK should help robust speech-enabled apps become more prevalent, and we look forward to seeing what developers can dream up.

Nuance has been working on speech-based services since the early ’90s. The veteran company has made a number of acquisitions in recent years, including startups like Jott and SpinVox.

NINTENDO 3DS IS ON ITS WAY!!!

First the good news: Nintendo’s 3DS will hit the US on March 27, 2011 for $249. That’s less than the speculated $299 price but still $70 more than the current most expensive Game Boy.  The 3DS comes packaged with a charging dock and a 2GB SD card. Cosmos Black and Aqua Blue are going to be available in North America at launch, which are the same colors available at launch in Japan.

The 3DS is the next-gen Nintendo DSi. The form factor is the same and it still uses a touchscreen for the bottom screen with a unique glasses-free 3D screen above it. There’s an analog nub above the traditional 4-way pad and the top screen is 10% larger. The 3DS is backwards compatible with DS and DSI games but they’ll just work in boring ol’ 2D. There’s even a Blackberry-ish notification light on the top corner to indicate if data is incoming or outgoing.

Playboy Coming to iPad in March!!

The entire back catalog in addition to new issues of Playboy magazine might be available on that iPad in 03 2011, Playboy founder Hugh Hefner announced via Twitter.

Hefner also confirmed on Twitter that Playboy will be coming to iPad within its uncensored mode, which makes good sense, as we doubt many would be ready to cover a watered-down version in the magazine.

However, Apple is notorious for its strict policy regarding not allowing adult content to the iOS platform (Playboy‘s official iPhone app, by way of example, has no complete frontal nudity), which makes us all wonder how exactly Hefner and Playboy will pull this off.

Steve Jobs once said very clearly that he doesn’t will allow porn to the iOS platform. Allowing full frontal nudity on the iPad would certainly blur the collection between innocuous grownup entertainment and pornography; we’ll have got to wait and notice how Apple feels about Playboy‘s plans.

When you’re a publication as major as Playboy, you can try to persuade Apple to set additional measures regarding protecting minors from accessing adult content, and it’s quite possible that we’ll notice something along these kinds of lines in 03. Such a move by Apple would open a Pandora’s container of questions: would Apple make it possible for other adult blog and magazines to the iOS platform under a similar rules? How far would it go with regard to nudity and grownup content?

What do you think, should content for example Playboy be allowed to the iOS platform? As always, share your opinions in the comments.

Sony To Launch a New PSP Next Week, PlayStation Phone in February [REPORT]

Sony will unveil a new version of its handheld game console PlayStation Portable on January 27, as well as a gaming-oriented smartphone in February, Bloomberg reports citing two people with knowledge of the company’s plans.

Rumors of Sony working on a combination of a portable gaming device and a smartphone surfaced early last year, but the details about the device were very scarce, and they still are.

No new details have been revealed about the next generation of PlayStation Portable, except that it will be revealed at a briefing on January 27, which Sony has declined to comment. The PlayStation phone will have a touch screen, and will be presented at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, held from 14-17 February 2001.

Regardless of the technicalities, it’s clear that Sony needs to rethink its portable gaming strategy, as recent numbers show that the iPhone and Nintendo DS are causing Sony’s share in the portable gaming market to rapidly shrink.

Sony plans to do exactly that. The company will outline a new strategy to combine its various online services and enable users to share games, movies and music among devices such as handhelds and TVs, Bloomberg‘s sources claim.

[via Bloomberg]