The app features some of the hallmarks of Bing, like the endless image search, image of the day and voice control. Some key features:

* Daily image from Bing.com
* Easy to access voice search
* Tips and tricks on the home page
* "Locate Me" functionality
* Ability to add pushpins and save locations
* Show multiple locations on a single map

This app joins similar apps already available for WinMo, BlackBerry and Sidekick (though not Android: Wonder why!) and is available now, for free, here (link opens iTunes). [Bing]

A lot of these apps will be familiar to anyone who's checked out our Essential iPhone Apps directory before, and yeah, there is a lot of overlap. What we've done, basically, is strip out the dollar signs from list, then fill in the gaps with more free.

With the new list, you can turn a fresh, untouched iPhone or iPod Touch into a decked-out powerhouse without spending a single dollar.

(To view the following gallery as a single page, click here.)

What counts as an essential iPhone app changes all the time, and so should our guide: If we've missed anything huge, or you've got a much better suggestion for a particular type of app, let us know, or say so in the comments. We'll be updating this thing pretty frequently, and a million Gizmodo readers can do a better job at sorting through the app mess than a single Gizmodo editor. Enjoy!

Airlock is a system preferences pane. Double-click to install it, associate it with your iPhone or iPod touch, set the security range, and that's it. I tried with my iMac 24 and my iPhone and it worked perfectly. You can even see a radar screen showing the distance between the two devices. The moment I stepped out of the limit, the screen locked. And then, as soon as I came into the perimeter, it unlocked automagically.

There is only one problem: If you use a wireless mouse or keyboard, it won't work due to a Bluetooth bug in Mac OS X. Otherwise, this thing will make you feel like James Bond.

Without the Aston Martin. And the Martini. And the laser watch. And the Scottish accent. And the hot girls. OK, so it won't really make you feel like James Bond, but come on, get on with the program here. [Airlock via Unplggd]

Beaterator for the iPhone might not be as full-featured as the PlayStation Portable version, but then at $4.99 compared to $39.99, we wouldn't expect it to be. Remix premade tunes or create your own in loop mode using a simple touch screen interface that might actually have a leg-up on its PSP predecessor. It won't make you the next Mozart, of course, but it certainly has the potential to make visits to the bathroom much more musical than they already are.

That didn't sound right.

Beaterator for the iPhone is available now on the Apple iTunes App Store.

The latest rumor reads like it's August all over again, but it does have one particularly disappointing aspect. According to the source, the iPod touch camera will match the not-so-hot quality of the nano's.

Here's to hoping the engineers can somehow stuff the iPhone's camera into an iPod Touch. Sure, there's not much space to work with in the Touch. And Apple releases iPods in fall, not spring, but we can believe. [The Examiner via 9 to 5 Mac]

Both the proof-of-concept video and the above illustration are by Japanese design house PROTOTYPE. Their giant hive display can begin a chain reaction when someone touches one iPod, or it's even possible to "drop" some items between iPods (I don't read that as full drag and drop capability).

Unfortunately, I have many more posts to write today, so I can't calculate the size of a 16x9 display made up of the 50 million or so iPhone/iPod touch handsets out there. But I'm sure that someone in the comments simultaneously loves math and hates their job enough to make this numeric factoid enter our existence. [Mongoose via technabob]

Apple Announces Over 100,000 Apps Now Available on the App Store

CUPERTINO, Calif., Nov. 4 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ — Apple® today announced that developers have created over 100,000 apps for the revolutionary App Store, the largest applications store in the world. iPhone® and iPod touch® customers in 77 countries can choose from an incredible range of apps in 20 categories, including games, business, news, sports, health, reference and travel. App Store users have downloaded well over two billion apps, continuing to make it the world's most popular applications store.

"The App Store, now with over 100,000 applications available, is clearly a major differentiator for millions of iPhone and iPod touch customers around the world," said Philip Schiller, Apple's senior vice president of Worldwide Product Marketing. "The iPhone SDK created the first great platform for mobile applications and our customers are loving all of the amazing apps our developers are creating."

"The App Store has forever changed the mobile gaming industry and continues to improve," said Travis Boatman, vice president of Worldwide Studios, EA Mobile. "With a global reach of over 50 million iPhone and iPod touch users, the App Store has allowed us to develop high quality EA games that have been a huge success with customers."

"With 10,000 downloads a day, worldwide customer response to our I Am T-Pain App has exceeded our wildest expectations," said Jeff Smith, CEO of Smule. "The App Store has given us a unique opportunity to create and grow a very successful business, and we're looking forward to an exciting future."

Apple continues to improve search and discovery with new features including Genius for Apps, App Store Essentials selections, sub category listings and more valuable customer reviews. With the recently introduced iTunes® 9, it's also now easier than ever to organize and sync your apps right in iTunes and they will automatically appear on your iPhone or iPod touch with the same layout.

The release of iPhone OS 3.0 this summer made over 100 new features available to iPhone and iPod touch users including Cut, Copy and Paste; MMS; landscape view for Mail, Text and Notes; stereo Bluetooth; shake to shuffle; parental controls; automatic login at Wi-Fi hot spots and Push Notifications. These new features have been incredibly popular with customers and there have already been more than two billion Push Notifications sent to apps available from the App Store. Additionally, the recently introduced In App Purchase feature for free apps means leading developers will now be able to offer customers the choice of buying content, subscriptions and digital services from directly inside their apps.

Apple ignited the personal computer revolution in the 1970s with the Apple II and reinvented the personal computer in the 1980s with the Macintosh. Today, Apple continues to lead the industry in innovation with its award-winning computers, OS X operating system and iLife and professional applications. Apple is also spearheading the digital media revolution with its iPod portable music and video players and iTunes online store, and has entered the mobile phone market with its revolutionary iPhone.

Apple is in the process of retiring their massive fleet of Windows CE handhelds, made by Symbol Technologies and introduced back in 2005, with custom-designed iPod Touches. The initial announcement made this sound like a self-satisfied, gloating move by Apple, during which they'd happily—and publicly—ditch their clunky, ugly, jury-rigged handhelds for sleek, shiny iPod Touches. But judging by these photos nabbed by AppleInsider, this isn't quite the case.

Apple's point-of-sale Touches take advantage of OS 3.0's hardware accessory support a lot. Each one will be wrapped in a large plastic case, which includes a barcode scanner up top and a card reader slot in the side, as well as an extra battery. The whole assemblage—iPod included—is powered through a mini USB port. Naturally, sales will be carried out with a custom iPhone app; not so naturally, credit card signatures need to be entered with a stylus, almost like you're using Windows Mobile (OH GOD!). Or, you know, paper.

More pictures at [AppleInsider]

The dev says that only the iPhone 3GS and latest iPod touch have the CPU, GPU and OpenGL ES 2.0 support to possibly handle smooth N64 emulation. But the "top-notch" N64 games might not be available "just yet."

Of course, the even bigger hurdle is a reasonable enough control scheme to make the games remotely playable to begin with. I had enough problems with the real N64 controller, so it's tough to imagine the iPhone handling things with any greater success. [All Tech Related via Maxconsole]

In a blog post from May, Carmack says he loves that players port Doom to every device imaginable, but he's disappointed that there's rarely any real effort to build a new, functional control scheme on platforms without a keyboard and mouse. In other words, he'd rather that instead of everyone stopping at "Does it run Doom?" they ask "Does it play Doom?"

That's why he personally developed the controls for the iPhone version, and according to early reviews, the iPhone can now play Doom. Users are saying controls as good as you would expect from Carmack. Not to mention the other enhancements like 24-bit lighting.

Sure, you might have put the game on your jailbroken iPhone years ago, but graphical upgrades and tighter controls might make it worth the $6.99 admission price. [Recombu]

The hardware capability for FM radio does exists in some models—the current iPod touch and iPhone 3GS have FM transmitters, and the 2nd-gen iPod touch also has a chip that's capable of receiving FM signals, though it uses it for Nike+ stuff (so if there is a radio app, maybe it'll just be for current-gen models).

It'd make sense to add more software parity across the line, but who knows—no date given for when we might actually see this FM radio app. [9to5Mac}

This promotional video really drives the smarmyness home:

There doesn't appear to be any actual nudity in this one, but I seem to recall other apps being rejected for less than this. The app is currently on a limited time sale for $1, but there is a good chance that won't last long before Apple gets cold feet on defining what exactly is appropriate for a 17+ rating. [iTunes via JapanSugoi via TWBE]

AP Stylebook: Anyone who has to crank out copy on a regular basis is probably familiar with the AP' stylebook, but an iPhone app seems like an odd incarnation. It's more portable and convenient that the hard copy, sure, but there's an online version too, which makes more sense for most folks, since you don't do a whole lot of actual writing on an iPhone, and flicking an alt+tab to your browser is faster than thumbing through an iPhone search query. Still great for the occasional spot-check, though. $29, which you should probably try to expense.

Talk Assist: This super-simple, free text-to-speech app was designed to help people who have trouble talking. However, it will almost exclusively be used by people who can speak, for laffs.

Squareball: A minimalist, but amazingly polished game that's sort of like if Pong had levels, or if Breakout was a side-scroller. It's really, really hard—give the free version a try before taking the two dollar dive.

cAR Locator: One old gimmick—GPS as a way to find your car—combined with a new one—an augmented reality overlay, cAR Locator is more of a tech demo or party trick than anything else, but it's a pretty cool one. 2bux, 3GS only.

Scarab: The first iPhone literary magazine, Scarab still has a few kinks to work out. Most of all, you've got to purchase each issue in-app, but due to a quirk in Store policy, the app itself isn't free. If you feel like supporting an experiment like this, feel free; there's some neat stuff here, like the ability to listen to poems read aloud by their writers. One dollar.

Buzzd: An old BlackBerry classic, buzzd meters the amount of activity at local establishments, according to other buzzd users, and tells you where the most people are, and what they have to say about it. Think real-time Yelp, roughly. The app used to depend on other buzzd users for content; now it taps into Twitter with natural language recognition, which gives it way, way more content, and enough users, or at least unwitting contributors, to make it worthwhile even in a midsized city. Free.

FIFA 10: The only licensed soccer game in the App Store, this one's got actual teams, actual players, and at least a passing resemblance to the FIFA franchise console games everyone goes so apeshit over. Controls are predictably a bit awkward, but there's a lot of game here, especially for diehard soccer fans. $10.

This Week's App News on Giz:

• iPhone Gets Better Image Stabilization from Pro-Camera App

• Cyclopedia Augmented Reality iPhone App Drenches Your World In Wikipedia

• Apple Buys Their Very Own Maps Company (See Ya, Google Maps?)

• iFukkin iPhone App Maybe Is Not What It Seems

• Why iPhone TV Apps Are Doomed to Mediocrity

• iPhone App Developer Jacks Your Phone Number to Pitch You More Apps

• ALK CoPilot GPS Navigation App Gets iPhone Keyboard, Text-To-Speech, Other Improvements

• CNN's iPhone App Makes Other News Apps Look Lazy

• iPhone Accessories Can Now Trigger App Download Prompt

• Daniel Johnston's iPhone Game Is Predictably Bizarre, Bizarrely Fun

• Tweetie 2 for iPhone: Full Offline Powers, Filters and Push Notifications

• Ping is Like a Free SMS Client For iPhone and iPod Touch Users

• Tweet Reel iPhone App Sends 640 x 480 Video to Twitter

• Ramp Champ Mixes Skeeball With Flicking

• Data Shows What Everyone Knows: Gimmicky Apps Aren't Used Frequently

This list is in no way definitive. If you've spotted a great app that hit the store this week, give us a heads up or, better yet, your firsthand impressions in the comments. And for even more apps: see our previous weekly roundups here, and check out our Favorite iPhone Apps Directory. Have a great weekend, everybody!

The RFID-equipped member card is still needed for the ignition system, and to unlock the car at the start of a session. That's a bit of a let down, but I guess it does make sense. Once that first step is out of the way, that's when you can use the iPhone to lock/unlock the car remotely.

Zipcar says it's working to add a visual snapshot of car availability (like you get on the Website), greater flexibility in reservation changes, and more detailed instructions to your parking spot.

If you have an iPhone (or iPod touch) and use Zipcar, this should probably be a no-brainer to test out. If you do, let us know how you go. [Zipcar (iTunes Link) | Zipcar]

The Price

$80

The Verdict

Mikey is a nice, solid-feeling little mic for the iPod or iPhone. When used as a voice notes recorder, holding it up to your mouth, the standard setting of sensitivity doesn't offer much of a difference versus the built-in mic. The ability to set the sensitivity for other uses, however, makes a big difference.

Setting it on a table to record an interview or conversation, for example, results in distant-sounding and quiet audio using the built-in mic. With the Mikey set to the most sensitive setting, however, the audio comes across clearly and loudly. For louder recordings, such as concerts, it'll do its best to keep things from getting overblown. If you use that low-sensitivity setting for normal use, of course, you won't be able to hear a thing.

At $80, it's tough to recommend for casual users, but for people who want to turn their iPod or iPhone into a more versatile portable audio recorder, it's pretty great.

And a note: while the Mikey isn't certified for use with the iPhone, and will prompt you to put it into airplane mode if you plug it in to an iPhone, it works just fine. Blue Microphones tells me that the next version will be certified for iPhone and will lose the prompt. [Mikey]


Sensitivity settings work great for various types of recordings

Looks and feels really solid

$80 is too expensive for an accessory like this

I don't know about you, but I wish I could have access to bits of information in my iPhone without having to access the applications themselves. Calendar, Twitter, weather, Facebook updates... widgets that will only display data and, with one click, go straight to the app itself to do an action. That will allow the iPhone to have a customized front end like the Motoblur in the new Motorola Cliq.

Sadly, it won't be available from the Apple iTunes Store: It requires to jailbreak your phone. However, it's completely worth the effort, especially if they include some useful widgets with it. The developer is going to publish an SDK for it:

A SmartScreen SDK will be available to everyone in November 2009 but widget developers are being selected to participate in a Beta programme, if you feel you could participate and would like to produce widgets, please email dev@media-phone.ch and we will consider you early access to the programme.

I'm looking forward to the widgets people can come up with. I just hope SmartScreen doesn't require me to paint my nails with glitter in order to use it. I like my current fluorescent green, thank you very much. [Media Phone]

The Onion Microfiche Reader: It's from the Onion, so it's pretty much guaranteed not to be not funny, but! For all the neat microfilm-esque presentation, this thing doesn't actually have any articles—just a bunch of those jokes-in-a-headline that the Onion is so good at. Still entertaining though. A dollar.

Foursquare: Now you can see who else is checked in at a given venue, who the current mayor is, collect nearby Tweets, and enjoy better Google Maps integration in this extremely strange, strangely popular, highly addictive territorial app. Free.

Reqall: Evernote integration. That is all. Free.

Strands: The best free exercise app for the iPhone now lets you replay your GPS-recorded running path, signals you with audio cues during exercise, includes route elevation profiles and supports in-app playlists.

Dream Day Wedding: Married in Manhattan: A fantasy wedding planner that is evidently really, really popular. Maybe because it's fun, or maybe because it's the easiest way to make your boyfriend super, super, super uncomfortable. Three dollars.

Alive 4-Ever: There are a surprising number of zombie survival apps in the App Store, I guess because they're easy to make or something? I don't know. I do know, however, that this top-down zombie slaughter is extremely fun, and only a dollar. I would pay multiple dollars, even. Like two!

Kodak Smilemaker: A charming app that adds comical smiles to your photos, or a meditation of the tragedies of birth deformities? I have no idea, but either way, its free. So.

NPR News: Sorry to keep bringing this app up, but it's great, and the biggest issue people had with the last version—the lack of fast-forwarding and pausing—is solved in this one. Still free.

Air: Brian Eno done made another app, y'all! The last one made amazing music based (partly) on user input; this one makes amazing music based (partly) on user input, except it sounds totally different. It's as mesmerizing as the last one, but feels fresh. 2bux.

Polyghost It took me a while to figure this one out, partly because I'd never really heard of "Vinyl art" toys before. Well, this is what they are, and like them or not, Polyghost is an aesthetically cool app. Here what you do: Using microtransactions, you buy little 3D characters which you can transpose onto photographs. The pricing's a little unfortunate—four dollars for the app, with new characters at at least a dollar apiece—but if you're a fan of artists like Tim Biskup and DEVILROBOTS, the rendering in this app does the work justice. So twee!

Howard Dean's Activism Book Thingeee: Whether or not you're a LI-BRULL, you've got to admire the concept behind this book-cum-activism app, which gets its users fired up with a message, i.e. Dean's writing, then puts tools at their fingertips to act on their feelings, like a location-aware "call your congressman" function. I think it might be a liiiiittle more effective if you didn't have to pay for it. Five dollars to CHANGE THE WORLD, or whatever.

This Week's iPhone App News on Giz

• Google: Apple's a Liar, Did Reject Google Voice iPhone App

• Navigon Wants an Extra $25 for Real-Time Traffic Data on the iPhone

• I Am Sting App Is Even Whinier Than I Am T-Pain

• Army of Darkness Invades the iPhone

• Wall Street Journal iPhone and BlackBerry App Free Lunch Is Over

• Penn and Teller iPhone App Is as Magical as It Is Doomed

This list is in no way definitive. If you've spotted a great app that hit the store this week, give us a heads up or, better yet, your firsthand impressions in the comments. And for even more apps: see our previous weekly roundups here, and check out our Favorite iPhone Apps Directory. Have a great weekend, everybody!

Booting the old touch took 31 seconds. The new touch takes 19. Loading a web page dropped from 34 seconds to 15. And most games teetered between loading 33% and 50% faster.

Despite Apple not reaching that 50% benchmark across the board, Macworld is still impressed because the "the new iPod touch feels much faster at any task you throw at it: applications launch (and quit) faster, Web pages load more quickly, processor-intensive games and programs perform better-you name it."

And the new touch should be faster. TUAW confirmed that this latest ipod to have a very similar ARM Cortex A8 processor as the quick iPhone 3GS, which is a surprise to absolutely no one. [Macworld and TUAW via The iPhone blog]