Bookmarks vom 17-03-2009

Finding inspiration is not always as simple as it sounds, whether you’ve been designing for years or only weeks. Below is a collection of 100 great web resources to find inspiration and direction on your next project, whether it be online or in print.

With more than 20,000 apps available for the iPhone, standing out from the crowd is becoming harder and harder for app developers. There are only so many slots in the the top apps lists in the iTunes Store. Discovering new apps is becoming a real problem. But what if apps started cross-promoting other apps, just like they do on Facebook?

Number of people accessing news and information on their mobile device more than doubles in a year.

Nova Spivack's semantic web company Twine is developing a free service to write and host semantic ontologies; the classification trees that enable machines to put concepts in topical context. Ready to play Aristotle and create an ontology of cheese, model airplanes, global anti-hunger organizations or any other topic?

Numbers like that help explain the burst of iPhone game/entertainment news here at SXSW 2009, from location-aware fun apps to the Facebook Connect function linking iPhone apps to the social network. But there are also challenges. Those were analyzed at a Saturday SXSW panel featuring Greenstone and three other successful iPhone developers; here are my five favorite takeaways.

Gaming on a mobile phone is a relatively new phenomenon when compared to the decades that games like Pacman and Tetris have been around. However, the mobile gaming industry is exploding, and developers who have spent years creating games for the Mac are now jumping ship to create them for the iPhone instead.

* Must Read Articles For Freelancers
* Blogs Freelancers Should Subscribe To
* Forums For Freelancers
* Where To Find Freelancing Gigs
* Useful Tools For Freelancers
* Freelancer Survey Results

Entrepreneurs are the key to building a solid economy in any nation. As we all know U.S. economy currently is facing some of the toughest times since the Great Depression. Honestly it doesn’t seem to get any better. The start of 2009 has been pretty shaky with thousands being laid off from their job already. These are tough times, no doubt about that. But these are also times when its time to step up and take a different route rather than giving up and finding yet another boss to work for.

While the iPhone has shown that there is a large consumer market for smartphones, the primary market-driver for the smartphone is – and will remain – enterprises and small businesses.

It’s clear that as mobile devices become more prevalent, and social communities grow online that they’ll take main stage in our personal and business lives.

The surge in mobile commerce is being driven by the adoption of smartphones, and the mobile-friendliness of sites like Amazon, and eBay.

Aside from the obvious missing features — copy-and-paste and multimedia text messaging — the next iPhone needs features that improve usability, such as search functionality and, most importantly, the ability to run third-party applications in the background, developers contacted by Wired.com said. With Apple scheduled to announce details of the iPhone 3.0 operating system Tuesday, hopes are running high that the Cupertino company will address some of these shortcomings.

Music junkies are crazy about their iPhones, and for good reason. Not only is it a phone and an iPod all in one, but several iPhone apps make it easy to find music clubs, hook up with friends at concerts and change plans on the fly.