apps

Registrations are open for Multi-Platform App Developer Mission to Silicon Valley 17-21 June 2013.

This is the third mission hosted by UKTI and is designed to help B2B or B2C Companies with Mobile App Strategies.

Applications close on May 17, for more information and to apply click here.

What a bizarre couple of weeks for the image conscious, or at least the photographically-minded, first Instagram severs it's close ties with Twitter, then ratchets up user anger with a dramatic changes in its terms, enabling it to sell users' photos.

Meanwhile, over at Flickr, the once beloved haunt of pictures the product development wheels have cranked into high gear with numerous updates including a well-received and surprisingly snazzy mobile app.

Ever fancied sharing your opinion on issues affecting the digital industry? Or writing about your experiences setting up overseas? Maybe you've done some research you'd like to share?

Well now is your chance, Chinwag are looking for guestbloggers - it's a brilliant opportunity to tell your company's story, share your experiences and knowledge and talk about what you're passionate about.

In just over a week, we'll be joined by some of Korea's top tech talent, the winners of the Google Global K-Startup competition, in London from 5 - 9th November.

We know you'll be just as keen to chat with them as we are - so there's two opportunies where you can meet them: South Korea's Global K-Startups Pitch London (6th Nov) and Seoul2Seoul - An Evening of Networking for UK and Korean Startups (8th Nov).

You can sign up for both below, but first, let's meet the companies...

IC tomorrow, part of the Technology Strategy Board, have launched a Digital Innovation Contest for Music.

There's £150k up for grabs in this contest to encourage digital innovation in the music sector. The contest has six challenges under three themes: rights and monetisation; digital and live music; and linking digital to physical.

Like every 'social-media' guy, I dream of a world where the noise falls away. For years we've been helping brands and their PR firms kick off conversions about their products. We've created a deafening, hyperworld of mischief that flows ever more quickly towards becoming nonsense.

The fundamental truth is that there are only so many social media tools people can be expected to use and only so many ways they will want to interact with them. The smartphone brought the contact point into our hands. Facebook and Twitter fulfilled the rest. There's little you can't do on those platforms that really adds value to a person's every-day social desires. Or so I thought...

"Spotify Paid Lady Gaga $167 For 1,000,000 Plays"

This headline showed the “dark side” of music streaming start up, Spotify. Critics were in awe about how little artists were being paid for their hard work. Despite the short lived pleas from Spotify that they paid more per play people focused on this number, as if it was a bad thing.

Paying an artist less than 1p per play sounds like a raw deal, until you remember Spotify is a marketing platform. Spotify is designed as a service for people to listen to their favourite tracks cheaply. Why does this benefit the artist? Because if you love their music, you’ll go to the show, get the t-shirt and support the live scene.

As 2012 approaches I thought I would write a nice post.

I hate the clichéd "prediction" articles you tend to get at this time of the year as peoples predictions tend to be either biased hopes (which never happen) such as me wishing for a hoverboard just because Back To The Future said they would happen. Or really really easy extrapolations of what's happening right now. The industry moves fast and predictions change hourly, so that's not what this post is about.

Here are my 5 favorite iPhone apps of 2011. And why I think you should get them for 2012. I've specifically avoided the usual suspects (Twitter, Facebook, FML etc). In no particular order...