If you’re one of the old school who bought your iPhone on an O2 contract, a word of warning before you upgrade – check the small print.

Avid Bitterwallet reader Dominic has been in touch to let us know that you won’t get what you expect from O2’s new improved “unlimited text” tariffs:

As a subscriber of the old £35 a month tariff (600 mins and 500 texts) I thought it was a good deal to change to their £40 a month for 600 mins and ‘unlimited’ texts… but there’s a catch.

At the moment on the £35 a month tariff you can text an international number or send a picture message and it comes out of your 500 message allowance. With a new ‘unlimited text’ tariff you have to pay extra for picture messages and international texts. This wasn’t explained to me and so I cancelled my ‘upgrade’ on the subsequent phone call.

We’ve had a check and it’s now 20 pence per MMS and 16 pence per international text. Even if you stay on the same tariff, you’ll still find yourself with the new ‘unlimited texts’ alternative and having to pay for texts that were included in your allowance. Having said that, if you’ve finished your contract you might be better off looking at O2’s Simplicity deals – instead of £40 per month for two years, you pay half the price for half the contract length.

Some apples yesterday. It is unknown whether or not they contain keys

Apple have reportedly filed a patent for a piece of wacky space-age technology that will allow iPhone users to use the much-lauded device to act as a replacement for keys for the likes of the family car or the family home.

In the patent, which the Telegraph claim has been filed in the US of Americana, the following words appear…

“The device can communicate with an external device to open a lock. By way of example, the electronic device may be a model of an iPhone. The external device may be any suitable electronic device such as a portable media player, personal data assistant or electronic lock that may be used to access a door, car, house or other physical area.”

Known as Near Field Communication, it’s a similar sort of technology that is used in Oyster cards and keyless car shenanigans by the likes of Lexus, Toyota and Mercedes – and Apple clearly want a piece of that action to jam into the iPhone at some point.

Perhaps the day will come when the iPhone will be an instant source of paying for goods as well as a way of getting in and out of your house. *GROTESQUE SEXISM ALERT* You might even be able to deploy it to start the wife off in bed on a Saturday night while you watch the end of Match Of The Day…

Apple. They don’t like smut. Sorta.

See, Apple have been having a clear out and decided to decimate the top-shelf and nuked over 5,000 iPhone apps that have been deemed to contain “objectionable content”, even though they’d been seen as perfectly fine for months already.

Apple reckons they’ve responded to complaints from users (who presumably blush at the very site of a naked table leg… the wimps) and Philip Schiller, Apple’s product marketing boss, told the New York Times that recently a number of developers had submitted “an increasing number of apps containing very objectionable content”.

The App Store already contains an age rating system, so it must’ve been decidedly dodgy… or Apple are just being a bit wet.

“It came to the point where we were getting customer complaints from women who found the content getting too degrading and objectionable, as well as parents who were upset with what their kids were able to see”, Schiller added.

Kids have iPhones?! Spoiled shits.

Not all saucy apps have been wiped as Sports Illustrated’s official Swimsuit Edition app is still available and being promoted by Apple.

“The difference is this is a well-known company with previously published material available broadly in a well-accepted format,” said Schiller.

Of course, independent developers are hacked off with it all. “It’s very hard to go from making a good living to zero”, said Fred Clarke who makes an app called Sexy Scratch Off. “This goes farther than sexy content. For developers, how do you know you aren’t going to invest thousands into a business only to find out one day you’ve been cut off?”. He added that he was now investigating rival platforms.

It’ll be interesting to see how those rival platforms respond to this. Smut is always a big money spinner for media companies. Google’s Android ecosystem doesn’t particularly yell about how much it likes filth, but certainly takes a more softly-softly approach when it comes to enforcement.

Of course, failing that, as a consumer, you can presumably find other ways of staring at naked blood-filled humans.

[PocketLint]

A iphone, yesterday. We could have illustrated the story with a Nexus One or a Blackberry but we didn't.

The BBC have announced they’ll be launching free, official mobile apps for iPhone, Blackberry and Google’s Android later in the year, in a move that is certain to annoy other news-carrying organisations. Especially Rupert Murdoch’s News International – which we’re sure you’ll agree is an enormous boon. And we’re always on the look out for enormous boons.

As traditional newspapers struggle to get to grips with a paper-less future, apps are being seen as a new way to direct traffic to their floundering websites, but only if there’s money in it. The Telegraph and Sky already have free apps but with limited content, while The Guardian have launched a paid-for iPhone app, but it costs £2.39 and is somewhat lacking when it comes to usability. The BBC News app could well be a significant kick in the chops for other newspapers with similar paid-for plans.

The News app, due in April will contain content from the BBC News website, including written stories, correspondent blogs as well as audio and video. It’ll be followed up by a BBC Sport app in time for the World Cup, which has got our app glands leaking all over the place.

The Beeb say it’ll focus on football from its launch, with content from the BBC Sport website and 5 Live radio, including live commentary, and, if events are screened live on the BBC Sport site, they’ll also be available to watch through the app.  No plans have been announced for the apps to be available on the most-popular Symbian platforms as yet.

You’ve gotta love Microsoft. They’ve come up with a very exciting mobile OS in Windows Phone 7, which was launched at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona yesterday. It’s bright, contemporary (three years in, the iPhone interface is beginning to look a little dated, don’t you think?) and it features the current Emperor’s New Clothes of mobile – multi-tasking.

So Microsoft have done it, they’ve got something that potentially puts them back in the game; if they can tie up some key handware deals, they’ll probably give the smartphone market a run for its money. And by smartphone we mean, iPhone, obviously – because that’s all Microsoft cares about. They introduced Windows Phone 7 with a promotional trailer that showed off the competition more than what their own OS can do:

Ignore that fact that Android and Palm Pre handsets multi-task, and gun for Apple. It’s a shame so any time at all is spent slating the iPhone, because the trailer doesn’t give you a sense of how great the new mobile OS looks. Apple are advertising the iPhone during Corrie for crying out loud – their target market really doesn’t care about multi-tasking, it’s not a deal breaker.

Microsoft have a real chance to be a big player in mobile once more. Windows Phone 7 looks the shizzle, so hopefully we’ll see adverts like the trailer below, instead of seeing Steve ‘Crazy Horse’ Ballmer spending his money trying to run down the iPhone like a piss-drinking slag:

If you’re faced with that conundrum and you’re in South Korea, you’ve probably bought an individually-wrapped snack sausage. Sales are soaring of these tasty little false fingers after it was discovered that they replicate the size and texture of the average human digit.

Shouldn’t be long before Apple bring out the iSausage then – only £49.99 a bang.

[BuzzFeed]

Believe it or not, but we’ve checked the records and apparently we haven’t ran a story about the iPhone since 2008, so here’s one now. It’s a preview of the new iPhone 4G model that is said to be on its way later in the year, and widespread changes are afoot!

The source of the rumour is iResQ, a complicatedly-named iPhone repair shop who we’ve never heard of, but their findings are sweeping The Internet so we’re happy to report them as hardcore facts.

iResQ claim to have in their possession a front panel component of what may or may not become the iPhone 4G and the great news is that it will be one fourth of an inch of taller than its current incarnation!

They also speak in hushed tones of a “reflective, mirror-like surface” near the top of the phone’s front panel, and word is that this is almost certainly a relocated proximity sensor, which could mean that the sensor could be used for other, brand new functions. Blimey.

With all of that in mind, here are some new rumours that we’d like to introduce to the global conversation regarding the 4G iPhone…

• The 4 in 4G represents the additional fourth of an inch in height that the phone will have.

• The added space in the iPhone’s casing will house a tiny container filled with brandy for the owner to use in an emergency.

• The newly-positioned proximity sensor at the top of the iPhone will act as a dream catcher – swipe at the air with the phone and it will detect dreams that you can then watch at your leisure via its iPod feature.

• The proximity sensor will also be able to detect animal faeces from a distance of up to twenty metres, making it invaluable whenever you’re trying to sniff out bullshit.

'I want to do a poo at Paul's'

Dr Doolittle could talk to the animals but who cares? After all, the mighty Whitney Houston Houston sang ‘I believe the children are our future…’ and not ‘I believe the zebras are our future…’ didn’t she?

So rather than communicating with the beasts we should be focussing on understanding the little humans who don’t speak English yet. We refer, of course, to the babies.

Thankfully, there’s now an app for that – the Cry Translator, which will analyse and interpret your baby’s howling, letting you know just what they’re saying. And it’s only £17.99!

The makers of the app, led by Spanish paediatrician Dr Antonio Portugal Ramírez, reckon it is 96 per cent accurate. But Siobhan Freegard, of website Netmums.com, believes that learning to interpret cries is part of the bonding process and forms the foundation for good communications. She said: “Learning to interpret cries is part of the bonding process and forms the foundation for good communication.”

There’s also the chance that your baby will grab the phone as you hold it up to its crying face, crawl off under the floorboards and spend nine straight hours playing Peggle on it. But thankfully, it’s a slim chance.

A round-up of news and outlandish rumours from the last 24 hours in the Applesphere:

Apple seeks U.S. ban on Nokia imports
In the continuing ‘my dad’s bigger than your dad’ spat between Apple and Nokia, the Jobsovian Empire has now filed a complaint with the US International Trade Commission to block the import of Nokia handsets into the US. Not that a move would do any huge harm to Nokia since their market share in the US is teeny tiny – it’s just one more way Apple can piss off Nokia in their smartphone patent war.

Apple looks for iSlate mobile partner
Less of a rumour, more a case of stating the bleeding obvious – assuming Apple’s ‘latest creation’ is a tablet PC, then it’s unimaginable it would be wifi-only. This device is going to chew up a lot of data so any mobile carrier will want their pound of flesh in return, since UK operators are already struggling with massive increases in data usage.

It’s possible that a UK provider will heavily subsidise the cost of the device in return for a 24 month contract, as they do with netbooks and laptops, but with all hope of the tablet being remotely affordable receding quicker than Declan Donelly’s hairline, any deal would be unlikely to render the tablet free.

Will the new iPhone 4G stream free horse pornography live from Germany?

Apple and Microsoft discuss giving Bing top iPhone billing
Perhaps it fanboy paranoia or perhaps Apple have noticed Google’s concerted effort to RULE THE EARTH. Rumour has it that Apple and Microsoft are in discussions to replace Google with as the default search engine on the iPhone. Bing certainly hasn’t suffered from poor reviews and most users probably wouldn’t care that much, certainly not enough to bother changing the default back to Google.

Tony Blair once said that alcohol was fast becoming “a new British disease”. Then again, he gave the thumbs up to killing thousands of brown people, so it’s swings and roundabouts really. Basically, he can fuck off if he’s trying to make us feel guilty about our habits.

Anyway, when it comes to drink, we Brits don’t know when to stop. If you read the newspapers, we’re a nation of piss-cans, all puking up all over ourselves, flashing our arses at passing news crews with a collective rotten liver filled with Lambrini and 30p shots of Sourz.

Since the media went into its health-kick, telling us to have 5.9g of salt, to chew five-a-day and to enjoy booze ‘responsibly’, we’ve been taking notes. And as such, we’ve knocked some booze on the head in favour of virtual pints.

That’s right… this is a tale about iPhone apps. Our American cousins can’t get enough of talking to each other and in Europe, they can’t remember what any songs are called. Basically, in a stupid and convoluted manner, what I’m getting at is this:

The most downloaded iPhone app (ever) in the USA is Facebook. In Europe, it’s Shazam. In the UK it’s Carling’s iPint.

While us Brits invariably like talking and music as much as any other populace, it’s clear we like drinking piss-weak mass-produced virtual ale much more. Not only are we a nation of potential alcoholics, but we’re also virtual alcoholics as well.

Perhaps someone should make a kebab app or one for Alka Seltzer?

[ME]

A telephone unit, last week

What have Kodak got against fruit? They’re not happy with Apple and they’re not happy with the folks who make Blackberries.

When you’ve stopped laughing yourself into a state of weeping open sores, I’ll confirm that Kodak are not in fact angry about two of your five-a-day, but rather, the iPhone (made by Apple) and the Blackberry (made by Research In Motion/RIM).

Yep, snappers Kodak are going to sue both companies over technology used in the handsets. They reckon that both gizmos use technology for previewing pictures that infringe Kodak patents.

They’ve also filed two separate suits against Apple claiming that there’s infringements of patents relating to digital cameras and certain computer processes.

So what does this mean? Well, if Kodak get their way and the ITC uphold their complaint, both firms will be barred from shipping the phones until undisclosed monetary damages have been coughed up.

“We’ve had discussions for years with both companies in an attempt to resolve this issue amicably, and we have not been able to reach a satisfactory agreement,” said Laura Quatela, chief intellectual property officer at Kodak.

“In light of that, we are taking this action to ensure that we protect the interests of our shareholders and the existing licensees of our technology.”

This isn’t the first time Kodak have pulled someone up on a patent. Last year, an ITC judge ruled in favour of Kodak after they claimed that camera-enabled phones made by Samsung infringed upon a patent. In another case, Sun Microsystems Java technology infringed Kodak’s patents with a federal jury confirming the claim.

This will be a headache Apple could do without as they’re currently in the middle of a legal spat with Nokia. Y’see, Nokia reckon that the iPhone has infringed 10 of its “fundamental” patents relating to wireless technologies with Apple hissing back and saying that Nokia had been copying their technology. Nokia took their ball and went home, making a further legal claim that alleges “virtually all” of Apple’s products infringe on its patents.

After all this, you could be forgiven for thinking that the iPhone isn’t a piece of innovation at all, but rather, the technological equivalent of some kid copying everyone else’s homework and getting an A* for it.

[BBC]

Facebook eh? Buncha bastards. Founder of the vanity-site Mark Zuckerberg thinks you don’t want your privacy… and then there was some unsurprising news about our accounts… and now what?

Well, apparently, Facebook 3.1 (for iPhone and iPod touch) has a problem that’s causing a few red cheeks thanks to the new contact picture syncing functionality.

Some guy over at TheiPhoneBlog said:

“Beware of your profile pics, or your boss might get one of you doing something you don’t want them to see! What happens is, [Facebook 3.1] takes [all] the emails and phone numbers on your iPhone and sends them to Facebook. It then cross-checks and syncs them back to your iPhone. That’s a major security flaw right there! It should only sync the ones you’re friends with.

So for an example I have my coworker’s email and cell but I am not her Facebook friend. All of a sudden when I got a call from my coworker I saw a picture of her in a bikini because that was her profile pic!

I’m using Outlook 2010 and it has a new feature called Suggested Contacts where it keeps all your emails you been using. Those sync to my iPhone via exchange 2007. So now I have Facebook profile pics in Outlook 2010 for a bunch of folks that I don’t even really know just because I have emailed them.“

Thanks to the number of ridiculous (and sometimes really dodgy) photos people have as their profile pic, there’s quite a big chance of embarrassment. Of course, you’ll be alright if you’re down the pub with your mates and something weird flashes up on your screen… but not so cool if you’ve got a snide boss who spots something that makes them think you’re a lesser human than they’d even anticipated.

So what’s the technological advice to spare your blushes? Keep your phone in your pocket… and make sure it’s not filling up with filth while it’s in there.

[iPhoneBlog]

How the iPhone 4G might look if it has a cake mode

iPhone rumour alert! The new one is coming! In April! Some Koreans just said so! You heard it here (roughly) first!

Yes, according to a couple of reputable sources in Korea, the 4G is on its way and it’ll be chock full of new features, including a dual-core processor, improved graphics, video chat, an OLED display and a removable battery. Removable battery? Surely not?

According to The Register, the reports come from The Korea Times and Telecoms Korea, quoting sources at both Apple Korea and telecoms company KT, the Korean iPhone carrier.

Apparently, the 4G (the G is for ‘generation’) will have two built-in cameras, one front-facing and one back-facing to allow the video chat mode to work. Oddly, the removable battery would be a step away from the latest MacBook, which has a built-in battery, said to increase the number of battery cells that can be contained within the bones of the crate (we’re getting super-technical with the terminology here.)

Odder still, the rumourmongers claim that the 4G will be offered to large corporate clients to test for two months from April, ahead of a full launch in June. We’re adding our own rumours that it will have an edible ‘cake mode’ and will be able to take x-ray photographs of the insides of snails’ bodies.

Watch this space… or don’t – it’s entirely up to you.

We can’t confirm if this is an official ad for Google’s new phone or not, but if it is, iPhone users had better stay in bed for the rest of their lives because the Nexus One is coming after them…