Yet another update to the iPhone firmware 2.0 and the SDK have leaked out. The new firmware has been dubbed 5a308. This build was released today, along with a fresh build of the SDK. The new SDK is 1221.8MB, so it is a little bigger than the last release, which was the fifth such release. It is not known yet if this is the firmware beta that adds the rumored geo tagging features.

The firmware is fresh off the server, and the details about it are few. What we do know right now is that the new SDK requires developers to register an application ID, suggesting that they are tightening things up in anticipation of the launch, which is rumored to be soon. Application IDs are required for provisioning now, all previous provisioning is now longer valid.

Another interesting thing is you must be running OSX 10.5.3, which was just released this morning. It is odd that Apple would cut off the still large amount of users running Tiger, or 10.4. The new updates release notes were uploaded to Apple

As the iPhone continues to march across the globe, Google’s special (and slick) interface that was introduced in mid-December has been limited to English speakers. However, yesterday the company rolled it out to 33 countries in 16 languages, including Chinese–despite the fact the handset is not available through any Chinese carriers.

More importantly, Google continues to create special mobile variations of its other pages, which now includes Google News and support for users of Google Apps. Google Apps users can now check their mail using the same interface regular Gmail users have been enjoying, with the added benefit of being signed in to use the other mobile Google services.

The updated news viewer allows users to browse by the front page or by section, and features a built-in search tool. It’s still essentially a link repository to other third-party sites, but it’s now far easier to parse through on smaller screens than its original format.

What really makes the updated News page shine is that it integrates YouTube videos in the related stories. If there are videos for a selected subject, you can view them as thumbnails, which when clicked will jump you to the handset’s built-in YouTube viewer. Short of actually having Flash, this is the closest you’ll get to being able to casually watch Web videos while browsing other news networks. You could also use a conversion tool like vTap or Avot mV, but this new system requires one less step.

I still think most iPhone users will be inclined to use Safari’s built in-search tool, which can be set to use either Google or Yahoo without having to venture to a search page first. With the speed of EDGE, I often find myself skipping any unnecessary page load when it comes time to search on the go, something that won’t be fixed until the purported 3G version of the handset comes out later this year.

Twinkle – the native iPhone Twitter client with Locate Me features – has been updated, to Version 0.75.

The Dev Team has released an update to the iPhone Pwnage Tool program today – to Version 1.1.

via Ars Technica

In the last several weeks, rumors and speculation about the upcoming 3G version of the iPhone have greatly multiplied. The reasons for this sudden increase in noise could could be any number of things, but seasoned Apple-rumor-followers know from experience that an increase in chatter almost always indicates that something is about to hit, regardless of whether any one chatterer was entirely accurate.

So, we know it’s coming, but what else? Here, we try to differentiate between what we know, what we don’t, and everything in between.

What we know

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Twinkle is a shiny new native Twitter client for the iPhone, that adds location-aware features to your Twittering. It has a very nice and easy to use interface and works very well so far in my testing of it.

The Locate Me feature seems very cool, to combine Twitter with geo-location. It will be a lot more fun when more people are on Twinkle of course. The Locate Me feature can easily be toggled On and Off. If you choose to use it then you can use the

Another concept from The Greener Grass
The Greener Grass is produced by Kaleidoscope, a product development consultancy in Cincinnati, Ohio.

Multitasking is impossible to escape in today

The recently released iPhone SDK Beta 3 continues to give up juicy hints as to Apple

per TGDaily

Cupertino (CA) – Apple is accelerating its patent efforts cover all legal bases to protect its iPhone assets, which also includes a potentially new cash cow