Download Squad

Have you been busy scheduling all those Tweets using Twuffer and FutureTweets? No, me neither: but if you're looking for snark, wit or paraphrases of well-known movie quotes to use in your Twitter stream in an attempt to out-humor our very own Mr Funny, then you may want to have a bit of fun with Generatus.

Enter a couple of particulars [namely, your name and select 'Boy or Girl'], hit generate and before your very eyes a status suitable for Twitter or Facebook is made for you. There's also the ability to filter by tag [for example 'Monty Python' or 'Movies' or 'Manias'] and an absolute bucketload of hilarious, ironic and generally very excellent phrases that you could be assigned, should you have the urge to press refresh a few [dozen] times.

The only oversight with Generatus seems to be that, unlike most webservices, it lacks an API. Twuffer, combined with the hilarity of Generatus would make for an epic all-singing, all-dancing autonomous Twitter bot that would allow you to never once tweet into awkward, unfunny silence again.

OK, so maybe I'm kidding when I say I'd prefer to read tweets from Generatus all-day: but very seriously, if you're looking for a little bit of laughter, and want to lose a few minutes of your day, Generatus is an excellent Time Waster.

It wasn't too long ago that I chose Twitterrific as one of my favourite three applications for the iPhone as part of our 'Favourite Apps' series. Even then, there were plenty of alternatives out there for you to use: Twinkle, Twittelator [and Twittelator Pro]. However the release of Tweetsville today appears to have changed my mind as my Twitter client of choice.

The most noticeable difference between Tweetsville and its competitiors is that the application sticks to a very conventional user interface: users will be instantly familiar with most of the controls, and a hybrid of both the iPod and Mail-esque look to the application [along with some nice touches that shows you posting tweets as messages 'To the Twitterverse'] mean you'll feel instantly at home.

On top of the nice little touches, there's TwitPic integration for posting photos and linking to them in tweets, a customisable toolbar [and two timeline views to pick from], not to mention built-in support for Twitter Search and Twitter Trends - Twitter's two biggest service additions recently.

Even though there's almost every feature you could need on the go, it's utterly intuitive to use and almost instantly has become my de-facto iPhone Twitter client: sorry Twitterrific.



Some will be unhappy without there being a free version to try - though it's worth remembering the application costs just $3.99, which isn't exactly bank-breaking - and there's no inline @replies to be found in one of the two timeline views. It's also worth pointing out that other clients include features for re-tweeting links. Despite these [admittedly few] pitfalls, for a true Twitter control panel that has almost all the features you need - along with a clean, familiar and above-all thought-out user interface - I can't help but give Tweetsville a very firm thumbs-up.

In an interview with Om Malik, the BBC has revealed that an OS X version of its much-debated iPlayer TV catch-up service is due to debut later this month. Whilst the iPlayer service has offered an online-streaming version of the service for Windows, Mac OS X and Linux since Christmas Day last year, the service's download-and-watch feature has been strictly reserved for Windows users.

Earlier in the year, the iPhone (and iPod touch) both got a sprinkling of iPlayer goodness through the streaming service, however today's announcement is the first major expansion of the download service to another desktop platform: something the BBC has to do in its role as a publicly funded, 'accessible to all', broadcaster.

There's few other details to the announcement - particularly with regards to how the BBC is going to deliver its media to Mac users - but as soon as the iPlayer for Mac touches down we'll let you know.

It's been over two years since Google brought text-only Chat to the Gmail web interface: and whilst the feature has certainly seen a number of small additions in that time, I think it's fairly safe to say that the efforts with Chat to date will pale into insignificance with Google's announcement on the Gmail blog that Video and Audio chat will shortly be arriving in an inbox near you.

The features, which require a plugin [available for both PC and Mac OS X] allow you to initiate video and audio chats from within the web browser. You can even expand the size of the video chat, and thanks to the feature being based on a number of widely used standards, you should in theory be able to chat with a fairly large number of contacts who don't need to be using the web interface [it's also worth noting that one-way video and audio chat is also possible].

Unfortunately, the feature isn't available just yet: the Googlers say the feature has only just begun rollout - however you can visit the Gmail videochat page to download the browser plugin and get ready for your account to be enabled in the next few days.

There's no shortage of eBooks available for the iPhone and iPod touch [App Store link] however one of the latest releases Classics looks set to take the crown as the best around.

The application comes with a dozen public-domain books ready for you to read: with more promised in future (free) updates. As you might expect, there's plenty of attention paid to the application's handling of your reading too: pressing home places a neat ribbon bookmark on the page you were reading, for example.

To see how Classics fared in day-to-day use, I read The Jungle Book on a 2-hour train journey home. I'm a stickler for actually reading a physical copy of a book - and no big fan of eReaders to date - however I was pleasantly surprised at how readable the books were: for someone who loathes reading books on a screen, I was absolutely happy to keep on reading.

My only gripe about the application is that swiping to the next page [which cues a stylish animation] takes too long: however as I'm something of a fast reader, and devour each page rather quickly, I'd imagine this isn't something most users will experience.

Classics is currently just $2.99 on the App Store: there's no word currently on when this introductory price ends.