An interview with EA’s CEO John Riccitiello shows just how far the iPad and other mobile platforms have gone in just a few years. He talks about how there’s no longer a cycle with consoles and that mobile platforms provide game updates for every major holiday which helps drive sales while console games you’re lucky to see an update more than once a year. This makes devices like the iPad the fastest growing platform out there.
Source: IndustryGamers.com
Research In Motion RIM has layed off 10% of it’s employees as it struggles with its failure to anticipate and react to the smart phone and tablet markets. It is also reshuffling its executives in an effort to streamline operations. RIM has become another Nokia in the smart phone world chasing it’s tail trying to come up with a product that frankly nobody wants anymore.
The iPhone is becoming the dominant phone in the professional marketplace and has features beyond what RIM can produce anymore. RIM would be better served in producing blackberry app’s for businesses on Android and iPhone rather than wasting considerable resources producing hardware such as the PlayBook which cellular providers treated as if it were a leper.
From the story over at MacRumors today it looks like the Facebook App for iPad is nearly complete. Hopefully we will see the app sometime in the August timeframe. The app looks really great from the screenshots that I have been able to see. Unfortunately you wont get these features if you update your Facebook App on your iPad. I already tried 
Source: Macrumors
To me it’s a stretch, but Michael Saylor Co-Founder of MicroStrategy a firm specializing in business intelligence speaking at a social media conference spoke how the iPad is reaching a tipping point in the enterprise that Android may not be able to break. The iPad is the only tablet on the market that has won mass market appeal with consumers and in the enterprise.
While Android has seen success as a platform for phones, it has not made a dent in the tablet market. Perhaps fragmentation and differentiation in phones give them an edge, but the iPad’s singular form and established App Store market brings many things to the table that Android tablets just do not have.
If you have an Android tablet you can not play back mobile versions of movies even from a Windows Media format because Android lacks the licenses and in some cases the technology to handle the encryption methods that the studios demand to protect their content. The iPad has been an established method for mobile video that has universal adoption from the studios and it’s user-friendly approach to managing content through iTunes also helps adoption.
As for Monopoly status? We’ll it’s a long shot, but it will have a technical monopoly unless someone comes up with something better, that’s just how the market works.
Source for Micheal Saylor: Marketing News
It’s All Tech is reporting that IOS 5 Beta 3 has been released along with an updated version of iTunes. Carrying build # 9A5259f
There are a lot of changes related to Location Based Services which can be turned off or selectively turned on.
Interestingly enough Apple seems immune to their rules, they have placed a link to the iTunes store in the Music App. Classy.
In what appears to be a patent on using Augmented Reality on an iPad to overlay different information onto say a map that lets users see the skyline of San Francisco as seen from their perspective and also a top down look at the same area. This would be beneficial to a lot of people and would also have interesting military uses as well. Allowing a soldier to get a complete look at the battleground from their perspective would be a key advantage in urban combat.
Photo Examples after the jump
A video posted on Youtube shows a version of Skype for the iPad. While there is no set release as of yet, the video does show a functioning App so it may be sooner rather than later.
If you have access to the iOS Developer Channel then iOS 5 Beta 2 has been released. No word yet as to any changes. If you have a iOS Dev account then click here to check it out.
Update: MacRumors is reporting that Wifi-Sync is enabled in this release.
In what appears to be an attempt at pure greed, the New York Post has began blocking access to their website for users of Safari on an iPad instead you are greeted with an ad to purchase a subscription through the App Store.
While I hope they get better video out of the iPhone and iPad over a 3g signal than those satellite relays, it’s pretty amazing how the BBC has recognized the value of news instantly. Getting the drop on a story is critical to getting viewers who ultimately make sponsors pay for the content to come to them vs a slower outfit.
You can read about it here @ Journalism UK