The makers of the cool and free textPlus have released a game based on texting, textRace for the Apple iPhone and Apple iPhone Touch.

Fire up those texting fingers and prepare to do battle — the ultimate texting throwdown is here. From the creators of the free, unlimited texting app textPlus, comes textRace, a no holds barred texting game that pits challengers against the clock in a test of speed and accuracy. textRace is free to download for the iPhone, iPod touch and iPad.

The premise is simple: a message appears in the app, and users must accurately retype that message to beat the clock. The faster and more precise they retype it, the more points they earn and levels they unlock. The app’s speed clock and pounding music get the blood pumping, and the fiercest competitors can boast about their high scores by posting them to Facebook.

Bound to be fun for the texter in your family, textRace is in the Apple iTunes Music Store right now for free too.

[ Links: textRace, textPlus ]

PowerA just announced their latest iPhone accessory, the iPhone Universal Remote Case. Much like the Red Eye and L5 you can control your IR based products just using the iPhone, that is assuming you’ve also downloaded the accompanying PowerA app. What makes it different from the competition is the form factor, a case that can always be attached to the phone no matter the scenario. The L5 on the other hand is rather impractical because it’s a small dongle that attached to the iPhone’s 30 pin connector and juts out, making it less than pocket friendly. The Red Eye on the other hand is stricken to one room, unless of course you buy additional boxes.

Available from Apple.com website in accessories for $60.

[ Links: Gadget Review ]

I’m still holding onto my GV Mobile [ site here ] developed by Sean Kovacs that got ripped from the Apple iTunes application store when AT&T, no Apple… no AT&T somebody disputed having Google Voice apps on the iPhone earlier this year. Since then, it’s not been updated, Google has changed the sign-in process and cannot login without a “failed credentials” type of error.

VoiceCentral Black Swan is the next revolution in iPhone® applications. It is not tied to the App Store. It is not a web site optimized for the iPhone®. It is a feature-rich weblication that enables you to view and manage your Google Voice™ data just like a native iPhone® application. It combines the iPhone’s easy-to-use interface with the convenience of an always up-to-date web application.

Well, in early 2010, RiverTurn Inc. plans to ease that pain with their upcoming VoiceCentral Black Swan edition Apple iPhone “app” which is now in private beta. Sounds interesting although I’d also welcome Sean Kovacs hint, hint to return and update his app that I paid for…

[ Links: VoiceCentral Black Swan Edition, YouTube video of VoiceCentral in action ]

I love sushi. I love seafood. I love my Apple iPhone. Combine all three and I’ll be happy… oh wait, Monterey Bay Aquarium has just done that. Well, you can’t exactly eat the app, but you can install the free Apple iPhone app and see whether or not what you’re buying is not only environmentally friendly but also what should be avoided due a plethora of reasons from overfishing to health concerns due to shipping or place of origin.

Monterey Bay Aquarium’s Seafood Watch, our new iPhone application brings the latest Seafood Watch recommendations directly to your iPhone or iPod touch. Now you can make sustainable seafood choices quickly and easily; whether you’re eating at your favorite restaurant or shopping for dinner. And at a time when the world’s oceans are severely overfished, your seafood choices make a big difference.

And if you’re not an Apple iPhone owner, you can user their mobile website just as well. Definitely worth it if you enjoy some of the yummier things from the sea and wish to raise your awareness about not only what you eat but how your decisions affect the future generations as well.

Thanks Janice for the tip. This one is staying on my iPhone!

[ Links: Monterey Bay Aquarium Seafood Watch iPhone App, Monterey Bay Aquarium mobile website ]

Being a college student usually means that your book expenses were more than your food expenses… which is not exactly fun at all. Well, Questia plans on making learning a bit more inexpensive and modern with their Apple iPhone and iPod Touch app.

The application, called Questia Library, provides mobile access to the full text of 74,000 books and over 2 million journal, magazine, and newspaper articles. The collection consists mostly of copyrighted works and is selected and organized by professional librarians to facilitate academic research in the humanities and social sciences.

“The research process is becoming increasingly mobile,” said Tim Harris, President and CEO of Questia. “Questia Library enables students and other researchers who are on the move to search, browse, skim, and read a large and valuable collection for the same price they might pay for a single ebook. Questia Library delivers amazing resources all in the palm of your hand.”

The application makes browsing for research purposes easier than ever, allowing users to quickly navigate Questia’s subject category schema and drill down to one of 6,700 research topic pages, such as psychology of war or magical realism, where they can view the top librarian-recommended books and articles for that topic.

24/7 access to just about every book!? I could have definitely used this while I was at the University of Colorado at Boulder – that’s Norlin Library above in the picture by the way.

The price of the app is 99¢ via the Apple iTunes Music Store and gives users permanent access to 5,000 public domain books and 1 week of access to every publication in Questia Library. After one week, users may purchase additional access to the full library through iTunes on a non-recurring basis and most books are quite inexpensive for purchase, while many are free public domain books.

Think I can pass for a freshman?

[ Questia ] [ Questia Library Plus ]