Top iPhone Time Wasters (As of Feb 2010)

 I've been playing with my iPod touch for a while - literally. I've downloaded over 100 games of every genre, and found quite a lot of them very entertaining. I would play time-consuming games whenever I had a spare 10 minutes with nothing to do. But what sort of games am I to play if I only have say... 2 minutes? Here's the list:

1.  Alpine Crawler (Free in the App Store)

This game is quite simple - you get a pickup truck, and have to complete certain terrains against a count-down clock. Time gets added on at each check-point - sometimes youll have less than 2 seconds remaining before you hit one. The terrains are challenging as they consist of continuous hills and dips. Along with being a great arcade time waster - Alpine Crawler is also very realistic. Your truck will easily flip over if you don't plan your jumps. If you land roughly, health will be taken off (and a lot of it). With 6 stages and moderate difficulty, this game will keep you trying for a long time - in short incriments.


2.  Canabalt (Paid, Appstore)

Originally released on Kongregate, Canabalt has been ported to the iPhone for a good reason: it uses only one button. The concept is simple - You are a small pixelated guy who is running across the rooftops of a city which appears to be mid-apocalypse. By tapping on the screen, your character jumps - may that be from rooftop to rooftop, or perhaps to avoid a robotic creature blocking your path. The farther you run before plummeting to your death - the higher the score - and boy is getting a higher score addictive. Grab this game today, you won't regret it.




3. Rope 'n Fly

Another simple concept which won over iPhone users was that of Rope 'n Fly. It appears that the closest "superman experience" is actually on the iPhone! When you click 'Play' your 2d ragdoll friend appears to be plummeting to the ground, and the only way to stop him is to shoot a web onto one of the multi-coloured sky scrapers which are plentiful in the game. The farther you go before dying, the higher your score. The free version allows you to keep shooting those webs for 30 seconds, and the paid version has multiple modes for you to traverse through. Rope 'n Fly is definately a must-have.


But Nick, what about such amazing games as Doodle Jump, Flight Control, Touch Grind and Paper Toss? Chances are you allready know everything about those games just from visiting the app-store, so I decided to save you the frustration and mention only the games you might have not heard of before.

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Top iTunes Podcasts

Seeing that Apple has revolutionised the way multimedia is distributed on the internet, it is of no surprise that the premier way of sharing and listening to podcasts is on an iPod and on iTunes. There are literally thousands of different podcasts available for free, automatic download and subscription – and the iTunes store seems to be the bonding link between freelance content creators and average Joes like you and me – who want to listen/watch something interesting on their hour long commute every morning. I'm going to share some of my favourite podcasts which I have been subscribed to for a long while and really enjoy listening to/watching. So in no particular order – here are my top iTunes podcasts.



Answer Me This!
Recorded and presented by Hellen Zaltzman, Ollie Mann and “Martin the soundman”, Answer Me This is a show where three English nutters answer the questions asked via e-mail and phone by their listeners. All three of the hosts posses a magnificent sense of humour – which binds with catchy jingles to create overly humorous 30 minute episodes. Episodes get released every week and  are very addictive – be prepared to listen to 4-5 past episodes a day and face depression when you finally run out of episodes.

Diggnation
What is better than 2 drunk men talking in front of a camera? Two drunk men discussing the latest news in front of that camera. Hosted by Alex Albrecht and Kevin Rose (the creator of Digg.com) “Diggnation is a show that covers some of the hottest user submitted stories from the social news website Digg.com”. During the rather long 45min duration of each episode – Kevin and Alex discuss the weekly front page stories as voted on by the many users of Digg. They give their views on every story – which become more and more entertaining as the hosts get more and more drunk throughout the duration of the show. Diggnation episodes get released every week and are definitely worth checking out.


The Digg Reel
Some call it the brother of Diggnation – but the Digg Reel is a show that features the top videos that got a spot on the front page is Digg.com. This show is hosed by the talented (and sick minded) Andrew Bancroft a.k.a. Jelly-D. Featuring a different theme every week this show literally feeds you (no pun intended) a constant stream of viral videos – and is very much worth subscription. New episodes come out ever week and last generally 15-25 minutes.

Dilbert Animated
Everybody who has ever been on the internet knows who Dilbert is. The successful comic strips drawn by Scott Adams have conveyed the life of the average office worker – Dilbert and his thoughts on the horrible workflow in his office job. With the help of ringtales.com Dilbert is now available in short, animated strips on iTunes. New strips get released every few days and are perfect for a quick laugh. Definitely subscribe and download.

So there is it – my top iTunes podcasts. If you disagree on my choice or want to suggest your own list – please post a comment!

iPod Tips: Get the most use out of your Mac setup.

There are many ways to increase the usefullness of your ipod. I will list a few here, and also show you how to manage your iTunes libraries so you can take advantage of all the iTunes features.

Baby Steps

1. Get the latest version of iPod and iTunes software. The later the version, the more stable & easier to use you setup will be. The latest version of iTunes will most likely fix bugs of the previous version, and add new features to the system. New iPod firmware is usually released/updated regularly - so check what version you have in iTunes.

2. Make you iTunes libraries more presentable. If you are importing music from CD's or other online music stores - chances are that your music isn't tagged correctly. This means that you will see any album art or important information on your tracks inside itunes and on your ipod. However, there exists software which can mend your library, automatically tagging your music and video. A free trial of Tune Up will allow you to both tag your tracks and add cover art to your music.

3. Another thing you can do is you can subscribe to various podcasts. These are found free on iTunes and are part of topics such as news and entertainment. Once you subscribe to a few, they will be automatically downloaded and synced to your iPod.


Next Steps - Takes Little Time

1. If you want to organise your library so it easier to navigate on your computer & iPod, you should give playlists a go. A simple playlist is a folder which holds music files. For example, if you want to hold a compilation or mixtape in one place, that is the solution to your problem. To create a playlist, just open iTunes and go to File > New Playlist. You will see a blue icon on the right of your iTunes window, where you can drag your music files.

2. If you want more control over your playlists, you should give Smart Playlists a try. Smart Playlists are playlists that can automatically select songs from your library and add them into the playlist. To create a smart playlist, go to File > New Smart Playlist. Then a window will pop up asking you to filter out the songs you want in the playlist.

There are loads of nifty ways of using smart playlists. I use them with the iTunes & iPod rating system to create a play list which holds songs that need to be deleted or fixed. I reserve the 1 star rating for broken, bad quality tracks and they get filtered out automatically and are added to the Fix or Delete playlist.

Another application of the smart playlists could be really useful for jogging enthusiasts. You can create a playlist of songs that are automatically added in, that are of your jogging tempo. What you'll need to do, is use a stopwatch and record how many steps you take in one minute while jogging at your average pace. Then create a playlist limiting the selection to that number in BPM. Then you will be able to listen to music which matches your jogging style.

Going for Maximum - Get Extra Hardware

1. If you use your iPod extensively, you should aim to purchase any type of case protection for your player. It will make it more durable, and reduce the amount of scratches you will put on it. A hard case made of plastic will immitate the hard shell of your ipod, but will provide minimum prodection & shock absorbsion.You can also buy silicon and leather cases which will provide more protection.

2. If you find that your iPod is not serving with enough battery life to get you by through the day, you should purchase a battery pack which will charge your player on the go. These packs are cheap and can increase battery for up to 10 hours depending on the iPod model.

Cool Traffic Exchange Tool.

I just came upon a sweet traffic exchange tool - EasyHits4U. It is essentially a site where you are shown different websites for a certain amount of time - viewing which earns you credits. In-turn these credits can be exchanged back into traffic for any website of your choice. In 15 minutes of constant surfing I earned 100 credits. I didn't think that it was much until I learned that I could exchange them for 5,000 ad impressions (ads displayed on other sites to 5,000 visitors.

What is ever more interesting is that there is no limit to how much you can surf every day. On the contrary - they actually reward you for surfing more each day in 25 point increments. Every 25 sites you surf you will receive a special bonus - which grows in size the more you surf in a day. I found this system motivating and is the main reason why I actually like this site.

Joining is free and easy and can be done by via this link
I hope you find my discovery as useful as I have done, lets enjoy the benefits of this sweet system together!

Dub and DnB Mixes..

I have been spending quite some time setting up my new youtube page, and uploaded two mixes. One is a 16 minute long dubstep mix featuring big artists such as Rusko, Datsik and Doctor P. The other is a 10 minute long Drum n' Bass mix featuring even bigger artists such as Dj Hazard, Original Sin and Sub Zero. Both can be viewed on my youtube page (clicky) - and please subscribe to this blog/my youtube for more.

Happy New Year Everyone :D

A Musical Update...

As you may know, my favourite styles of music are the underground genres of Dubstep and Drum n' Bass. What you probably didn't know is that I host random mixes on an internet radio station - LeafPile Radio. I play almost every week and post prior to starting a show on my Twitter - @nicktick.

This week I discovered a few mind blowing track. The first is Rusko's dubstep remix of Bionic Commando (clicky) and the second being When I Look At You by Emalkay (clicky).

I might also be getting a pair of bass-boosting cans - I was looking at a few brands like Bose and Skullcandy but have no idea what to get... We'll see where my research leads..

Nick

Guess what? I'm blogging..

Well, I guess the journey begins here. I might aswell introduce myself,

My name is Nick, I'm 15 and this is an experiment. I will attempt to blog about everything that happens live and on the internet that is of any interest to me. Sure, I might just give up on the 5th post - but I might not, we will see how things go (It might be easier for me to keep motivated as I'm getting an iPod Touch for Christmas and I'll try finding an app that will help me update on the go)

There is no point in you reading my blogs unless you share some interests with me (As that is what I'm mainly going to post about) so here is the shit that I am passionate about: Internet (Youtube, Facepunch, Various Memes) Tech (New shit in tech - apple etc.) Music (Drum n' Bass, Dubstep) yeah that's pretty much it.

So stick around (or just GTFO) if you want to see posts on this sorta stuff..

Yours Falsely,
(not posting "Nick" here because that would just be gay..")

SFDNB Mixes

Drum n' Bass and Dubstep Mixes

This is the page where I will be posting the monthly mixes which I will be releasing both for free download (192kbps) as well as on my Youtube page. This page will be updated as soon as I upload a new mix (follow me on twitter to recieve instant updates)

Drum n' Bass
December Mix - youtube - download(192kbps)

Dubstep
December Mix - youtube(pt1|pt2) - download(192kbps)