jTribe awarded prize for iPhone app for parks

jTribe has been awarded a prize at he WORLD PARKS APP COMPETITION 2010.

Our competition entry is an iPhone application that uses our content delivery platform jellymo.com in the context of parks.

We are very pleased and thank the World Parks App Competition panel.

iPad Board Games Fun for Friends and Family

Touch Boards - A Classic Board Game Collection for two Players
jTribe and Conduct proudly present "Touch Boards". Our teams have joined forces to build an app that we want to have on our own iPad.




We love the traditional game box that we play at home with family and friends,



it contains classic games like Chess, Checkers or Go. We have put these boards on the iPad. We believe that Touch Boards also demonstrates some of the the possibilities of Apples incredible iPad device that will change the way we use computers.

So what is Touch Boards?

Touch Boards is a collection of classic board games for two players. Now you can take your classic box of board games with you on the road, to the park, or play it at home with family and friends. No lost pieces. No mess after the car has hit a pot whole.

We think that Touch Boards is a stylish replacement of the traditional game box.





What's in the App?
Touch Boards comes with a FREE Checkers board and pieces.

A Chess and GO board and pieces can be purchased directly from within the app. The realistic boards and pieces will make the game experience as real as possible. Touch, slide, make moves.

A manual that describes the rules for each board games is included and is presented in a popover window when it's needed.




Grab a Friend and Play a Game!
Yes, you need a second person to play. No playing against the computer here! We wanted to be as much a real board game box as it could be and you can't play against your "real" Checkers board - can you?

We believe that Touch Boards will bring people together in the same way a classic game of chess or go does. As much as the iPhone and Laptop prevents real human interaction we think the iPad will be a device that encourages human interaction. Grab a friend a play a game!



Enjoy and Spread the iPad Fun
We hope you will love Touch Boards as much as we do. As long as you don't expect some single player functionality or any AI you will be happy with Touch Boards.

Our thoughts on Augmented Reality published in NETT Magazine

The March edition of NETT Magazine is out and this month contains a feature on Augmented Reality. We were interviewed for the feature to provide our thoughts as iPhone and Android developers.

Digging beneath the (shiny) surface

Daniel Bradby is co-founder of jTribe (jtribe.com.au), a mobile apps development company for iPhone and Android. He is also excited about the prospects of augmented reality.

"We've been looking at bringing static, physical geo-located information to life with augmented reality, such as animating a billboard, " he says. "Obviously , you can add things like a game or a giveaway, to get the user to engage in the product or brand itself, as opposed to a static piece of advertising that they just take in."

He believes there are many interesting applications beyond marketing, though many of these fall into specific niches.

"I work with architects and urban planners and the Victorian Government is interested in getting their geographic system information onto the phone," he says. "You could provide good information for architects and planners, to augment what they're looking at with planning information on top, such as zoning or heritage listing of a property."

However, Apple's restrictions on augmented reality applications on the iPhone are holding the technology back.

"The iPhone platform's way of offering augmented reality is allowing you to overlay animation over the current video source," he explains. "You can't process that video that's coming in and saying 'I recognise that shape and I'm going to overlay information on that'."

Seminar: iPhone Apps for Business - How They Will Impact Your Organisation

First with the iPhone, and now the iPad. The hype around these devices in the media is almost deafening. To help block out the noise and focus on assist organisations to provide real business value on the iPhone, next month, on Tuesday 2nd March, we are running a half day seminar here in Melbourne: iPhone Apps for Business - How They Will Impact Your Organisation. The seminar is for business owners and marketing managers who keep hearing about the potential of the iPhone but are unsure of how it might be applied to their business.

Please follow the link to our iPhone Apps for Business Seminar and register soon as places will fill quickly!

Seminar Presenters: Daniel Bradby & Armin Kroll

Daniel and Armin from jTribe (http://jtribe.com.au) have been developing apps for the iPhone since the platform was released in 2008. With both a mix of their own creations, alongside delivering apps for clients, they have collected a wealth of information and experience on the platform and are excited to share it with interested businesses.

Daniel BradbyArmin Kroll

iPad Remote Control for HAL is coming

Now that the the iPad is unveiled there will be a new gold rush in App Development. One area that will be dominated by the iPad will be home entertainment.

One remote to rule them all

jTribe has worked with a home entertainment company to develop a remote control. We are happy to see that the HAL remote will also work in the iPad.

The illustration above shows how HAL remote will look like on an iPad.

Mobile ads or in-app purchase - what works best?

Google and Apple sharing the Mobile Ad Cake

Online advertisement is a model that works so well for the web and is the main cash cow for Google there is no doubt that ads based apps will be a logical extension for the mobile world where freeconomy works just so well.

Google acquired admob which is the biggest mobile advertisement network and Apple acquired Quattro Wireless. Both giants paid a substantial amount for the ad companies. Google acquired admob for $750 million. Rumours say that Apple acquired Quattro Wireless for $275 million.
The recent acquisition of Quattro Wireless did shake up the new world where phones become computers and new tablet devices will even increase the need for apps and ads. What Google and Yahoo where on the web is not Google and Apple on the mobile platforms.

A Business Model based on Mobile Advertisement

It's no news that free apps are much more popular than paid apps. Since Apple has recently fixed their in-app purchase model and extended it to free apps many iPhone developers are upselling additional features, content or subscriptions. Other free apps utilise ad networks like admob to make money with ads in their iPhone apps.

It seems like users are not too fuzzed about ads as long as an application stay free and offers a real value. One good example is "Urban Spoon". The iPhone app is free. I get good value out of the app because it has a large user community providing valuable restaurant reviews. The Google ads don't really bother me much because they value I get outweighs the ad annoyance.

So the three key ingredients for a popular iPhone app seem to be:

1. The app has to be free
2. The app has to provide value
3. The app has a loyal user base

Free and value makes the app user-base grow. More users may create more value for crowd-source or social apps. More value for the user keeps them loyal. A loyal and large user base may generate great ad revenue.

Great apps development is expensive

With smart phones taking over the world and thousands of applications to choose from the world of mobile advertisement has changed. Mobile ads are now everywhere because they are a great model to recoup app development costs and create a large user base at the same time.

Developing a great iPhone app will set you back between $60,000 and $200,000. That is a lot of money for a small developer. Assuming that there is no VC funding involved the only way to recover the costs and keep the business going is to make the app popular - quickly as well as getting some money form the user. These two goals are usually not aligned. Quick and popular apps have a low price point or are free. However a free app does not generate any revenues. So many developers followed the model of lite and pro version.

With ad networks from Google (and soon Apple via Quattro) a viable model for developers could be the ad-supported app but...

Do Users Accept Ads?

Sabre Travel Network has surveyed 800 travellers and found that all travellers surveyed are willing to accept advertising with free use of travel applications.

It looks like Urban Spoon users don't mind the ads either.

We had some less encouraging experience with an Android app that servers admob ads. The revenue was very low and we received some negative user feedback. Finally, we decided to remove the ads and at least keep our spot in the Maketplace.

My recommendation is to use ads only in highly popular apps. Small and medium apps do not benefit from ads.

Do Users Accept In-App Purchase?

In-App purchase seem actually to work well. Users seem to have no problem with in-app purchase as long as it is not an annoying upsell. Fortunately, Apple has some measures in place to make in-app purchase a pleasant experience. Apps that abuse in-app purchase and don't comply to Apples guidelines will be rejected.

Personally as a consumer, i love in-app purchase. It gives me a new product when I want one and keeps the app fresh.

Music apps like Looptastic make it so easy to buy additional loop sets.

Games seem to be benefiting a lot from selling new characters or features. Apps like Minigore are really good examples on how to sell in app.

News magazines haven't quite managed to provide in-app purchase successfully. It looks like Media Companies are still completely relying on advertisement income. They should get more creative and explore the in-app purchase feature without upsetting their advertisers.

So, what works best?

I can recommend in-app purchase to any independent developer or small and medium company. If there are valuable things to sell then sell it via in-app purchase. User acceptance is very high and users are willing to spend more money at they point of value.

Revenue via mobile ad serving seem to work only for large app publishers with "must-have" apps.

Krafty Kuts uses DJ iPhone app developed by jTribe at Summafieldayze

jTribe developed recently an iPhone app for Krafty Kuts.
Check out this video of Krafty Kuts showing off his new Against The Grain DJ Tools iPhone application at Summafieldayze on the Gold Coast during his recent 2009/10 Australian tour.