Way down yonder here in New Orleans, you can feel the excitement in the air. Mardi Gras season has already started but really kicks into high gear starting tonight with the first weekend of parades in New Orleans. That first weekend of parades was pushed up a week to make room for the Super Bowl the following weekend. And then the next weekend through Fat Tuesday we have the main Mardi Gras festivities. New Orleans excels at hosting big parties, so if you are headed here over the next three weeks, you'll have an amazing time. Before I go enjoy some King Cake, here is the iPhone and iPad news of note from the past week:
- Attorney Andrew Weber of the Law Library of Congress tells me that the Congressional Record was added to the iPhone-friendly Congress.gov site, which I reviewed last year.
- Attorney Jeffrey Taylor of The Droid Lawyer reviews the Adonit Jot Pro stylus. I continue to use the Adonit Jot Pro and I really like it, as I noted in my review last November. Unfortunately, I recently forgot to put the top back on it (totally my fault) and the plastic disc came off and I lost it. For $6 — plus another $6 S&H (ouch!) — I bought a set of replacement discs and now I am back in business.
- Yesterday, I mentioned that Apple had yet another very profitable quarter, thanks in large part to selling a lot of iPhones. As reported by Dan Seifert of The Verge, AT&T announced its quarterly earnings this week and revealed that it sold a record 8.6 million iPhones. It only sold 1.6 million other smartphones, so that means that 84% of smartphones sold by AT&T last quarter were iPhones.
- Verizon also announced its quarterly earnings, as reported by Ina Fried of All Things D. It sold 6.2 million iPhones. It sold 3.6 million other smartphones, which means that iPhones accounted for 63% of Verizon's smartphone sales. According to John Paczkowski of All Things D, about half of those 6.2 million iPhones were the iPhone 5 and the other half were a mix of the iPhone 4 and 4S.
- Kit Eaton of the New York Times reports that pocket voice recorders with mini cassette tapes were replaced by digital voice recorders, and now digital voice recorders are starting to be replaced by smartphone apps such as Voice Recorder HD ($1.99): (via A.J. Levy)
- New York is already one of my favorite cities, but Andy Ihnatko of the Chicago Sun-Times notes another advantage of living in the Big Apple: you can use the new Aereo service to stream network TV to your computer, iPad or iPhone for as little as $8 a month, or even just $1 for a day. You can either watch live TV or have programs recorded to watch later. The service sounds very nice. It reminds me of the EyeTV hardware that I discussed almost a year ago except that you don't have to purchase hardware. Aereo is soon coming to other cities. Note, however, that Aereo doesn't allow place shifting, whereas EyeTV does let you watch your local TV from any other location in the world — useful for those who travel a lot.
- If you use Delta to travel to La Guardia airport in New York, you'll see the recently redesigned terminal with iPads available to use while you wait for your plane. Christine Negroni of the New York Times reports that you can even order food directly from the iPad and have it delivered to you.
- While you are in New York, you're going to need a cab at some point. New Orleans attorney Ernie Svenson reports on an iPhone app called Uber, available in New York and many other cities, that makes it simple to call and pay for a cab.
- Bianca Bosker of The Huffington Post wrote an interesting article on the origin of Siri.
- Philip Michaels of Macworld reviews Hipmunk, one of my favorite travel planning apps on my iPhone and iPad.
- Curious what Ashton Kusher looks like as Steve Jobs? ET Online has a clip from the upcoming movie. The movie jOBS opens in theaters on April 19.
- Stephanie Weehawk of fake news site Scoopertino "reports" on the recent Oprah interview in which a history of doping was revealed. No, not that Oprah interview, but one with Apple CEO Tim Cook.
- And finally, do you wish that it was easier to hold an umbrella in the rain and use an iPhone at the same time? Well then, you will want to check out the Brolley Rain Umbrella, a $20 umbrella that keeps your fingers free for texting. Watch this video to see how it works. (via iPhone Savior).
