Unless you're an Amazon executive desperately clinging on to blissful ignorance, you'll all be well aware of Apple's brand new product, the iPad. It's sleek, it's sexy, and according to Apple, it's magic. Before Apple's big announcement, I was merely interested to see how this would effect future iPhone development. I never really envisioned that I would buy one and use it for anything other than testing code. But now that the rumours have become reality, suddenly I want one. The iPad is going to be simply fantastic for email & internet usage. I can totally imagine myself sitting on the lounge, flicking through my emails, browsing the news, and selecting music. Already my laptop feels it's taking up 50% too much space. Why bash on the keyboard when I can bash on the screen?

It will be interesting to see in a couple of months if all the hype lives up to the expectations, but I think it's a pretty solid bet that Apple won't be doing anything wrong here. What you see on the stage is what we're going to get, and it's going to be pretty spiffy. The only problem for people like me now is how to get one from the US and into Australia. Ebay seems the most likely bet, but even that may be difficult as I'd say it's likely supplies will be short. Apple must have a hell of a time trying to keep something secret whilst getting enough built in order to fulfill demand. I guess there'll be a lot more smoke coming from those factory chimneys in China now.

So, let's ignore all the black skivvys and hype for just a minute and look at what's not so great about this announcement. In my mind there are two key things. The first is that there's no webcam. This is pretty disappointing, as I think the iPad is practically the perfect platform for Skype. Unfortunately, I expect Apple is bound by certain telecommunications companies who are afraid of what VOIP is going to do to their marketshare. In my mind, telecommunications is where music downloads were a few years ago. Most people have heard of it, but not that many outside the tech arena use it. Gve it a few years and it's really going to go mainstream, and the telecommunications companies can choose to embrace that or get left behind. The music industry is in pretty turbulent times right now, struggling to fight back rather than embrace. Technology isn't going anywhere, so you better jump on board rather than fight. In short, I guess what I'm trying to say is that a VOIP is an inevitability, and I would have liked to see Apple push it a little further forward with a webcam.

My second point of contention is not really a missing feature, but rather too many features. There are going to be six models of the iPad available on launch - really Apple, six? That's like having six versions of your operating system (ahem, Vista). Apple's success lies in being able to tell people what they want, without them knowing it they wanted it in the first place. If you stand in a room with 10 people, I bet at least 5 of them have iPhones, 3 of them are thinking of buying one, 1 owns an iTouch, and 1 just doesn't have any friends. People like choice, sure, but Apple's strength lies in making things simple. I don't need 6 choices of iPad, that just leads to deliberating, and frustration when I wonder if I've bought the wrong thing. Give me two clear cut choices, and make me happy with either choice.

Sure, there's some other things "missing". You'll heard many complaining about the lack of multi-tasking, but really - who cares? The iPad and indeed the iPhone are all about simplicity. No Adobe Flash support - great, no bandwidth sucking page intros for me. No new OS - why waste time on a new OS when there is a perfectly great one in existence already? No USB ports - well, this could be an issue someday I guess, but certainly not today.

The iPad is going to be a winner, there's no doubt about it. Will it be as successful as the iPhone? Very unlikely, they're simply not portable enough. Will it be as successful as the Kindle? Many, many times more so - it offers infinitely more options and just looks so much better. Will it revolutionise the insdustry? That I think can only be told with time.

We're feeling very priviedged to announce that for the past few days, PhotoCaddy has been featured by Apple in the "What's Hot" section of both the US and Canada App Stores:

This has resulted in a fantastic increase in our user base, which is going to work really nice when version 1.2 is released, which should only be a matter of days.

Version 1.2 of PhotoCaddy is currently in development, and it should hopefully be ready in the App Store in about a week. In the meantime, to reward people like you who read this blog, I'd like to share a few details on what will be appearing in this new version. I'm pretty excited about this update as it could really offer some great things to a lot of people. Let's jump in - just remember that this IS still a work in progress, and subject to change.

Global User Tips
One of the main problems in the current version is that it is very one-sided, as all the data come from, well, me. So, a major feature of the new version will be the ability to upload and share your tips with all PhotoCaddy users. This will be on a category-by-category basis, so hopefully any gaps in the data will get noticed and filled in by capable people round the world. I think this should also open the app up for including some more advanced tips or unusual tips.

Voting
To accompany Online User Tips, we are also inluding the abilty to vote for a tip. This will operate very much like the reviews in the App Store. Users will be able to say whether they found a tip useful or not, and then this will reflect a tip's position in the listing.

Custom Categories
Although we've managed to pack a lot of categories into PhotoCaddy, we have to be honest and say not every situation is covered. Now users will be able to enter notes on new situations, and in fact suggest these new categories online for inclusion in a future version.

New Categories
Naturally we've included some new categories and new material in this version as well. We'll keep them as a surprise, but it should definitely keep a few people pleased!

New Icon
Finally, as our Twitter followers will know, there's a new icon in development. Though I'm quite fond of the original, I must be honest and admit that I don't really have any graphic design skills. Fortunately the guy I'm working with does, and he's coming up with something really special which I'm quite looking forward to revealing.

Well, that's all for the moment. There's a few other bits and pieces in there but that will make up the bulk of v1.2. I've already got a few ideas for v1.3 as well, so there's plenty in store for PhotoCaddy in the weeks to come!

When data is made publicly available, chances are pretty good that somebody somewhere will analyse it and come up with some interesting trends. As Apple provides daily sales figures for iPhone applications, it's pretty hard not to get a little addicted to checking how things are going each day. There are now a large number of iPhone developers around, and making my sales data available for public analysis probably wouldn't be of much interest to anyone - after all, these are my sales, not yours. In fact, I'd go so far as to say no one is really interested in seeing another developer's sales data, unless that developer has made a phenomenal rise to the top of the charts. In fact, I'd say most people would only find this interesting in a "how can I replicate this for myself" kind of way.

The end result is that there's probably some interesting things to be seen in the ebb and flow of the iPhone world, but most of it get's missed. With millions of iPhones around the world, and billions of apps being sold, surely there must be some interesting conclusions to be drawn from all that daily sales data? Well, without access to it we'll just have to keep wondering, but what I can show you instead is some analysis of my data. Let's take a look at what's been going on the past few days.

First of all, we have an app called BeerTracker. Whilst this app was never expected to become too popular, it was quick to develop and becomes a fun little point of conversation when enjoying a few drinks. Sales are generally fairly constant, but we recently had a large spike in sales which lasted for just one day. See if you can figure out why:

Now, this is probably not so interesting all on it's own, so let's keep looking.

A second application we are selling is called iEatHealthy. This is somewhat the opposite of BeerTracker, in that it encourages you to eat well and keep track of your health, rather than, well...not doing that. Let's look at the sales data for a similar period:

If we even out the kinks, it's pretty clear that iEatHealthy has had a fairly decent increase in sales over the past few days.

So, what to conclude from this? Well, people like to drink beer on New Year's Eve, so the first graph makes sense. There's bound to be an increased interest in drinking on December 31, which explains the five-fold increase. And what do many people typically do on New Year's Day? Once they're feeling a little better after drinking so much the night before, they make new year's resolutions, and I can pretty much guarantee that a large number of these resolutions would be about diet and exercise - in other words, being healthy. Take a look at this list of popular resolutions on the US Governments website - lose weight, get fit, drink less alcohol. It's all there, and again reflected in the data.

Sometimes graphs and charts are all about measuring how well you are doing, but sometimes you can have a little fun with them too. Can you can spot any interesting trends in the data in your life?

We're very pleased to announce that PhotoCaddy has been nominated for a "Best App Ever" award, in not just one category but two! If you feel that PhotoCaddy is worthy of an award, you can vote in either or both of these categories:

Best Photography App
Best Outdoor Use App

This is a great honor to just be nominated and a pleasing vote from our users. Watch this space for a sneak preview of what will feature in version 1.2!