Seriously folks, what's up with these prototype iPhones falling out of nondescript white vans and ending up on eBay in the shadiest of manners? Just months after we saw an original iPhone prototype (ancient OS included) pop up on The 'Bay, now we've got one of the world's first iPhone 3GSs on there as well. According to the highly ranked eBay seller, the "guy" he "got it from" actually stumbled upon it at an airport, and rather than doing the nonsensical thing of hitting up lost and found, he decided to make the most of the sudden opportunity. According to the new owner, an Apple Genius has confirmed that it is an iPhone 3GS, but due to its prototype nature, they can't help him get past the "Connect to iTunes" screen. In other words, it's an incredibly rare brick. If that sounds like just the thing to complete your collection, you can visit the road to overpaying through the read link below.

[Via ElectricPig]

Given the hype surrounding Apple's iPhone, we're actually surprised that we haven't seen more holes to plug over the years. In fact, the last major iPhone exploit to take the world by storm happened right around this time two years ago, and now -- thanks to OS X security expert Charlie Miller -- we're seeing yet another come to light. Over at the SyScan conference in Singapore, Mr. Miller disclosed a hole that would let attackers "run software code on the phone that is sent by SMS over a mobile operator's network in order to monitor the location of the phone using GPS, turn on the phone's microphone to eavesdrop on conversations, or make the phone join a distributed denial of service attack or a botnet." Charlie's planning to detail the vulnerability in full at the upcoming Black Hat conference, but Apple's hoping to have it all patched up by the end of this month.

[Via HotHardware]

Your fancy new iPhone OS 3.0 starting to look a bit long in the tooth? Heads up, Apple's now sending out the beta OS 3.1 and its SDK to the developer community to finagle with. We're still looking to see what's been changed here, so for now, if you're someone who needs the Latest and Greatest and happens to have the right access, download away!

Update: Still tinkering, but we've seen a new "Save a Copy" option for 3G S video editing that lets you retain the original film while saving an edited clip (picture after the break, thanks Kevin), as well as some reports of MMS being activated, but it seems to stall before actually being sent out over AT&T's network.

[Thanks to everyone who sent this in!]

Way back in the heady days of 2007, there was an iPhone without 3G data (hard to believe, we know, but trust us -- we were there). This iPhone, though revolutionary in some ways, was marred by the love-hate relationship its users suffered for missing out on some very basic features that they'd grown used to on mobiles of yore. One of those missing features, of course, was MMS -- and now, some two years later, here we are with a truly integrated MMS experience courtesy of the all-powerful hacking community. Granted, there have been MMS apps available for ages, but there's a difference: this is the same action 3G and 3GS owners are getting in conjunction with OS 3.0, which Apple curiously decided to hold back from original iPhone owners. As you might imagine, getting this going on your own phone is marginally more complicated than downloading from the App Store, so here's the question, you non-upgraders: just how badly do you want it?

[Thanks, Paul]

Apple's guided tour videos have featured an endless variety of creepy-android perfect "Apple Store employees" in the recent past, but we'd just like to take a moment and pour one out for OG Bob Borchers, who kicked off the entire series in 2007 with the original iPhone tours and followed 'em up with the iPhone 3G tour. Bob's leaving his post as Apple's senior director of worldwide iPhone product marketing to join VC group Opus Capital -- yeah, it's not hard gadget news, but we're getting a little misty on Sunday evening remembering how closely we all watched those initial demos looking for any tiny nuggets of information about the then-mysterious platform. Peace out, Bob -- it's been a ride. Video after the break.

Now, we're hoping this isn't some elaborate hoax perpetrated on the kind citizens of the internet, because if it's real, it's amazing. Here's the deal: a man capturing video poolside with his iPhone 3GS somehow loses control of the device and ends up dunking the entire phone... while filming. Miraculously, he manages to fish out the handset and it's still rolling. We don't know what the lifespan was / is beyond this clip, but obviously long enough to upload the video or transfer it to a computer. Impressive stuff, though we strongly suggest you don't test this one out on your own. Check out the full video after the break.

[Via George Ruiz]

If there's one thing we can decisively say about iPhone users -- and everyone else, for that matter -- it's that they shouldn't see naked people, even if they want to. Ever. Apple agrees, and it turns out that they were responsible for the removal of the Hottest Girls app after all, contrary to a statement by its developer that the app had tapped out his server which supposedly forced him to ask Apple to pull it while he ramped up capacity. Apple released a statement today confirming this, but here's where it gets interesting: the company says that "the developer of this application added inappropriate content directly from their server after the application had been approved and distributed" -- in other words, the guy pulled a bait-and-switch on Apple by serving different content to his app after it had been approved using more PG-rated content. Look, we're all for filling our iPhones with gigabytes upon gigabytes of stuff that would make us especially anxious to trigger the Remote Wipe feature if we were to misplace it, but we've got to admit -- the dude went about it the wrong way here, Apple caught him, the world keeps turning. Come on, it's not like you don't have thousands of naughty pics in a folder cleverly named "recipes" that you can just sync anyway.

From the look of it, our BFF Roger McNamee stole himself a copy of Adobe InDesign and has gone wild in Sprint's ad department, calling out the iPhone for its unitasking nature and spendy contract price. All we have to say is that if this is really going to turn into this generation's Sega vs. Nintendo war, we'd better see a whole lot more licensed Joe Montana titles.

[Via PreThinking]

We're pretty big fans of AT&T's U-verse (though, alas, we're not lucky enough to live in an area where we can have it!), and we sort of figured a few days back when the company rolled out some new tweaks to its Total Home DVR that something like this might be on the horizon, and here it is. AT&T's rolled out a free app for the iPhone app store that allows users to access the entire program guide, search for specific shows, and schedule, manage and delete programs and settings. The Mobile Remote Access App -- as it's not-so-creatively called -- sounds like a real winner for those with both U-Verse service and an iPhone... but then, we still communicate primarily with quills and parchment, so what would we know? One more screenshot of the app (plus a video!) after the break.

And just like that, the iPhone App Store is once again safe for children, people at work, and those who enjoy the iron fist of an anonymous application reviewer gently controlling their hardware / software ecosystem. Yep, the "Hottest Girls" application has been yanked after just a few hours of availability, and it's no secret why: although the app was clearly labeled and approved under iPhone OS 3.0's app rating and parental control guidelines, naked-ladies-on-the-iPhone was quickly becoming too much news for Apple's squeaky-clean image to bear. Of course, that once again prompts us to remind everyone that this exact same content is easily accessible through any number of applications on the iPhone, like, say, Safari, and that the App Store's arbitrary and capricious review procedures are an incredible liability to an otherwise dominant platform, but honestly, no one's listening because they'd rather talk about boobs. Good work.

Update: Interesting -- the dev's site now says that Hottest Girls has been "pulled" because their servers were "reaching their limits" and that the app will be back up soon, naughty pictures intact. We're guessing that means their image servers are cracking under the strain, but we'll see if this app or others like it make a reappearance anytime soon.

[Thanks to everyone who sent this in]

A final iPhone 3GS jailbreak hasn't been released yet, but that isn't stopping enterprising hackers from trying to get at all that extra horsepower, and some of the first notable hacks we've seen are these updated PlayStation 1 and Game Boy Advance emulator ports, which run way faster than the versions for the original and 3G. The revved up hardware in Apple's latest is apparently capable of running either of these at 150 - 225fps with zero frameskipping, which is pretty impressive. Of course, we'll be way more impressed when the Dev Team releases a 3GS jailbreak and we can hit these up ourselves, but in the meantime there are plenty of videos to with which to while away the time at the read links.

Read - Emulator videos
Read - ZoTTD blog post with more info

After all the cases of benign apps being rejected on grounds of "objectionable content," the first outright application featuring jiggly bits has made it to the App Store. How could this happen? Easy, Apple's shift in policy is made possible by the parental controls included in the iPhone OS 3.0 -- you know, so you can parent instead of Apple. Hopefully this brings an end to arbitrary App Store rejections and begins a new era of fire and brimstone threats of eternal damnation.

[Via MacRumors]

Read [Warning: not safe for work]

So, the first time we watched this Macbreak video, we thought to ourselves, "now, this is downright silly" but the second time? Well... we probably won't be investing $300 in a pro Red Rocks Micro shoulder mount for any iPhone 3GSs anytime soon, but the video does demonstrate what we already knew: if you stabilize an even decent mobile phone cam, the results are way, way better than if you don't. Insane? Surely. Hit the second read link for the video.



[Via Wired]

Read - Video on the iPhone 3GS: How Far is Too Far?
Read - Video of iPhone 3GS with shoulder mount