I was working away today quietly on a paper.  The kids were not bothering me, wife was napping, television was off.  I was not getting any calls, emails, or texts.  It was actually quite productive and peaceful.  I decided to take  a break and pressed the home key on my phone.  Not sure why, just what I do.  Well, my little friend did not awaken from its nap.  I clicked and clicked.  Pressed all of the buttons.  Tried a restart.  Still sleeping.  I would have attempted CPR, but couldn’t get an unobstructed breathing way!  I tried calling my phone.  The first time it did not ring, but showed the answer screen.  When I tried to answer it went blank again.  After that time, if I called it would ring, but screen stayed black.  Next, I plugged into my computer.  It made the charging sound and synced, but still had a dark screen.  Once everything was synced, I did a complete restore.  To my relief, the screen came back on.  Once the restore was done and phone synced, the world was back to normal.  Or was it?

I don’t know how long this will last but I was just informed that eMees is FREE! If you haven’t read our review, then look no further, download it now and don’t take it from us. What can I say? Sometimes a good deal comes around and well…just download it!

Quick Update: The developer had just contacted me and informed me that this giveaway or handout to all us cheap people is running this "Free" event till the end of Monday (EST) in celebration of the Easter holiday. They will probably won’t be doing this again, so get your eMees on!

Reply Butler 2.0 is a nifty little app that lets you quickly send canned email messages with a few taps. It also lets you choose from different signatures and type in landscape.

Here is how this time saving app works…

1. tap the reply button in your Mail App.
2. press the home button
3. start ReplyButler and choose your text clipping

This will paste your text snippet into an email reply or a new email. You can add more text or even add another text snippet.

The app comes with text templates but they are fully customizable.
 

At $1.99 it is priced more than fairly. During the holiday weekend, however it is priced even more fairly… that would be… FREE!

Grab it HERE.

As I note in a post yesterday, a good friend of mine recently commented that the iPhone is not a business device. To be a bit more accurate, he said something closer to, "The iPhone is a recreational device plain and simple." Another friend then chimed in that the lack of a physical keyboard makes it subpar for business and a deal-breaker as anything other than a fun device.

Now I flat out disagree.

MAYBE the iPhone started out as a touchscreen iPod with a phone (and web etc) but with the release of thousands of apps it is now much much more than that.

In fact, thanks to all these apps one of the things I love most about the iPhone is that it isn’t an "either/or" device. It IS a great recreational device for music, video, web and games but it is ALSO a terrific work device that lets me leave my notebook at home more often than I ever expected. 

And with regard to the keyboard- it is a matter of taste. I tried to go back to a physical keyboard and HATED it.

Now this from the San Franscisco Business Times– 10% of U.S. doctors, that is 75,000 physicians, have and use the Epocrates iPhone app.

(Apparently if you are in the business of medicine, the iPhone is an excellent business tool.)

So here is my end of the week question for you…

Is Doug right and it is all about fun and games or is it more to you? Is or isn’t the iPhone a business phone in your opinion?

Please start your comments with

"Dear Doug…

The iPhone is/isn’t (choose one) a business phone because…"

Shortly after I got my iPhone 3G I purchased a Dictionary app. Sure I could check for words online but the availability of a real dictionary at all times, regardless of internet connection, was a great boost to productivity for me.

There was, however, one problem. You see, the choices at the time were limited and EXPENSIVE. Yes, there were inexpensive options, but they were not JUST inexpensive.. they were also CHEAP! The real dicitonaries were expensive- very expensive.

How times have changed. There are now numerous real dictionaries available. And we aren’t talking pseudo-dictionaries. We’re talking REAL dictionaries that are intended for REAL use.

So which to choose?

We picked three good ones and decided to let you decide. Should you pick the dictionary behind Door Number 1? Number 2? or Number 3? Make your choice after the break and see how you fair.

And once again…

My favorite iPhone Twitter client gets an update.

This time Twitelator Pro is updated with new tricks and tweaks that make it easier than ever to compose and read Tweets.

A list of the new updates follows afte the jump.

You can get it HERE in the App Store.

I reviewed Cronk both here on WhatsOniPhone and over on Gear Diary a while back. Cronk is in the Zuma-family of games which made me an instant fan.

It is one of those games that I will have on my iPhone for a while, remove it for a bit to make room and then reload some time later. That, in and of itself, is a good endorsement of a game.

When I first reviewed Cronk it was $7.99- a bit pricey in my opinion. Shortly after that it dropped to $4.99 which was more in line with where I thought it should be. Well, we just found out that it is currently on sale for $2.99 which makes it a strong recommendation.

It is definitely worth checking out and, if this is your style of game, grabbing while the price is reduced.

You can get it HERE in the App Store.

A few days ago a good friend  who shall go nameless (DOUG!) commented that the iPhone is all about entertainment and isn’t a real work/business device. (Ah my misguided friend.)

That, I told him, is rediculous. Plain and simple- rediculous. It may not be HIS idea of a business device but I, and a whole lot of others, use it for work all the time.

And examples abound. Just take a look at Derick’s review of Papers. That app makes his work as a student far easier and more convenient. And now this update from Dataviz on their upcoming Documents To Go For iPhone…

Those wacky Islanders just got an update and this is one of the most interesting yet.

Wasn’t it enough that they could be fed to the sharks? NOPE.

Wasn’t it enough that with the last update they could be struck by lightning? Nope

No, there’s more to come and this time they can get devoured by…

ANTS!!!!!!!

Yup, now the island has an ant hill. Creepy, crawly red ants minding their business. Until…

One of the hidden gems in the App Store is TalkMail Pro. This little app does a terrific job of converting emails to voice on the fly. Seriously, the app reads your unread mail in a voice, computer-generated as it is, that is easy to understand and quite accurate.

Like the Google app that allows you to initiate searches by simply speaking, this app is a game-changer.

It usually costs $9.00 (which includes one year of connectivity to their server) but it is on sale now for $5.99. To my mind that is a steal.

You can read our review and then jump to the App Store to get it, HERE.

(Discaimer- I am using it with Gmail and it works PERFECTLY. There are, however, reports over on iTunes of MobileMe users having some stability issues.)