We all may love our gadgets around here, but ever we have to say there is a time to put them down.

If you feel a burning need to have an application on your iPhone that will give you a video feed of what is in front of you as you walk, today is your lucky day!

A company named Phase2 has released a free (for now) iPhone application that will let you write emails on your phone with the background image being a live video feed of what your built-in camera sees.  Email n’ Walk (iTunes link) will let you see everything going on through the camera so you can walk and type at the same time.

My concern is that there is actually a market for this?  Has anyone ever heard of just putting the phone down for 5 minutes?  Or, if you prefer, stop under a nice tree to type out your message!  I can’t believe this is actually all that useful, and I imagine you stop paying attention to the feed in fairly short order.

Seriously, put down the crack pipe phone, and try to enjoy your surroundings for 10 seconds.

If the rumors are true, Hulu may soon be liquefying your brain on the iPhone and iPod Touch.

Silicon Alley Insider is reporting that Hulu, the popular video streaming service, is working on an application for the iPhone and iPod Touch.  Although the report states that the application should work over 3G or Wi-Fi, we find the 3G claim highly suspect as other video apps such as CBS’ TV.com (iTunes Link) have to work over Wi-Fi due to the bandwidth demands of streaming video content over a cellular network.

While the app has not yet been officially confirmed, it isn’t too difficult to imagine that this is indeed being worked on.  With their ad-supported revenue model, it only makes sense for as many eyeballs as possible to be watching their content.  And as for the end user, this will give you an enermous library of television shows and movies you can watch for free right at your finger tips.  The only possible downside to this whole scenario, and possibly the aspect that makes it untrue, is how this will effect iTunes store sales of their downloadable videos.

Only time will tell if this proves to be true, but I for one am hoping it is.

Proving once again that the iPhone and iPod Touch are capable of just about anything, Chrysler is going to let you start a car with them.

Chrysler is launching a new electric car next year called the Peapod.  While the car is pretty standard for the electric market (30 miles at 25 mph off of an 8 hour charge), its integration with the iPhone and iPod Touch are fairly different.  You place your device in the dashboard dock, and from the custom app you will be able to monitor information about your car, see how efficently you are using it, play music and so on.

Where it gets really odd is that the brochure for the car makes mention that you can use your favorite gadget as a key to start the car.  It doesn’t go into great detail on how this will work, just that it exists.  It does also mention that you can use your traditional key if you choose to, and we say “thank goodness for that!”  Imagine trying to call your spouse and explain, “Honey, I can’t come home yet, my iPhone ran out of power and I can’t start the car without it.”  Somehow we don’t imagine that would fly too well as an excuse.

The Peapod is due for release sometime next year.

Normally the release of an iPhone application isn’t newsworthy, but when it comes from the Wall Street Journal, and it’s free, you tend to notice.

Released just today (the United States tax day seems appropriate day to release an app about financial news), the Wall Street Journal app (iTunes link) is a bit of a surprise in that it is free.  This is only surprising because the paper was one of the first on the Internet to charge for its content years ago, and they still do to this day.

So the question is why would they allow owners of iPhones and iPod Touches access their content for free while people who visit them on the Web are still paying?  The new application is ad supported, and you have to wonder if this is possibly a test for the future of their Web access, something you still have to pay $103 a year to subscribe to, or are they possibly just thinking that there won’t be that much access from the Apple devices?

Whatever the case may be, it is a welcome addition to the devices.  Users will get to enjoy full stories, exlcusive video and podcasts, the ability to share stories, tracking the stock exchange and more.  Possibly they will want to charge for the application down the road, but that never seems to go over well with users, so it’s probably safe to assume that this will remain a free application for however long they plan to support it.

Our suggestion is to go ahead and grab it, and then decide if you really need it on your phone, but so long as it is free, why not?

The popular online dictionary Dictionary.com, has launched their own iPhone and iPod Touch application that brings an immense amount of information to your gadget.

While there have been previous dictionary applications for the iPhone and iPod Touch, almost all of them have cost as much as $24.99.  Well, Dictionary.com has decided to ruin the party for all of those other applications by not only launching their app for free, but it is also amazingly full-featured.  They could have gotten away with just a few thousand words, but instead the app has full definitions for 275,000 entries, and they also included a thesaurus with 80,000 synonyms.  However, the features don’t even stop there.  They also include:

All said, it is an amazing app, and made even more so due to the free pricing of it.  The only drawback is the size of the app is a hefty 35.6 MBs and they recommend you only install it when connected via Wi-Fi or your device is connected to your computer (iTunes link) because of the length of time it would take over cellular networks.  From our initial look at the app, it is well worth the time, effort and amount of space it takes up.

If you’ve been wondering how an application gets built for the iPhone and iPod Touch, you can stop wondering as Stanford University is here to answer your questions.

Stanford on iTunes has offered copies of courses, faculty lectures, interviews, music and sports for some time, but now they are offering a free full course on how to develop applications for the iPhone and iPod Touch.  While this is a regular course at Stanford, all of the class materials will be available on their iTunes pages with a few days of the actual class meetings.  While students in the physical 10-week course will receive class credit, those online won’t.

Considering the proliferation of iPhone applications being produced by third-party developers, and no obvious end in sight of demand, those with an idea for an application couldn’t find a better bargain on learning how to bring their concept to fruition.  If you are interested in following along with the course, you will need an Intel-based Mac of some type and the Apple SDK.  If you would like to find out more about the course, you can check out the following links.

• Stanford on iTunes U
• iPhone Application Programming Course
• Stanford Computer Science Department
• Apple iPhone App Store

It has been a long time coming, but Skype has finally made its way to the iPhone and iPod Touch with an official application.

Ever since the iPhone came out, people have been waiting for a Skype application to make its appearance.  Over the past 24-hours the tool has finally made its way around all of the iTunes Stores.  People with second generation iPod Touch units can also use the app to make calls, but first generation users will only be able to do IMing with it.  (Although I actually did make a call with my iPod, but since there is no microphone, it was just a “proof of concept’ call that it did indeed ring a phone)

While this is a fablous addition to the iPhone, there is a rather large caveat to the entire deal: Calls can only be made over Wi-Fi.  Yes, it is a rather large problem, but as Skype themselves explain, it isn’t just them that is banned form making third-party calls over the 3G network, but all app developers.  You can use the application for IMing anytime, anywhere, but calls will require you to be near Wi-Fi unfortunately.  Luckily Wi-Fi is popping up in more and more places, but until you have something like the MiFi in your car, you won’t be making calls while driving down the road.

This is still a very welcome addition to the iPhone, and the addition of Skype calling ability should keep you well under your allotted minutes each month. It should also make international calling a lot simpler… when in range of Wi-Fi, we know, we know.

Fans of Sling Media’s Sling Box product are just about to the point where they can watch it any time and any where they want… literally.

While Sling Media has always touted how their Sling Box product allows you to watch your TV from anywhere via placeshifting technology, it hasn’t always been the easiest thing to do.  There have been ways to watch via Symbian phones, Palm devices and Windows Mobile devices, but those technologies are quickly being left behind in favor of other devices.

They had been beta testing the technology for a SlingPlayer app for BlackBerrys for quite some time, but it has now been officially released.  It unfortunately is not available for all BlackBerry models, but a goodly number of the latest models are supported.  You can see which models are supported, and download the software, from this page.

In other news, the company has submitted an application to Apple for approval, and hopefully they will soon be adding support for the iPhone and iPod Touch.  For now you will have to make do with watching the demo video they have released, but it looks like it is going to be pretty smooth and useful.

If you have to be able to see your TV while you are out of the house, Sling Media is clearly the way to go.

Rumors have been circulating for some time that Apple is buying up 10″ touchscreens like mad, but the question is what they plan to do with them.

Numerous Apple rumor sites are reporting that Apple has placed large orders for ten-inch touchscreens to be delivered in the third quarter of 2009.  This places them arriving sometime between July and September, which would position them perfectly for a device to be released in September, the usual time of the annual iPod line refresh.  This is usually done to help spur holidays sales of the popular media playing devices.

While some have speculated that these screens may be for either some form of Mac OSX-based tablet, or even a Mac OSX-based mini-computer.  However, we here at StarterTech have another, perhaps wild, theory about what they are planning if these touchscreen orders are real.

What about a 10″ iPod Touch?

While Apple has always been about slimming down devices, and making them ever smaller, what if they radically shifted gears and made an entirely new product line?  While it would technically be an iPod, what we are speculating about is the possability of a 10″ media player.  The iPhone and iPod Touch have become popular media playing platforms for downloaded videos, streaming YouTube videos and even ebook reading with things like the Amazon Kindle app.

All of this has been nice, the one thing people have talked about is how much nicer it would be with a larger screen.  Apple of course can’t go this route with the iPhone as people still need to hold it up to their heads to talk, but the iPod Touch could be converted to something else all together.  I don’t feel they will discontinue the current size of the popular iPod, but I could see them launching a new super-sized version of the player.

We also add to the speculation that this is an iPod-type device due to the recent announcement that the iPhone OS 3.0 will work with accessories.  Imagine a 10″ iPod-like device with a physical keyboard accessory that would allow you to work on it like a netbook/mini-laptop when you wanted to, but then you could just use it as a media playing device when you were traveling on a plane.

All of this is completely speculation at this point. While the screens look to be likely, they are not a definite as of yet. Even if the device does exist, there is no guarantee if it will run iPhone software or Mac OSX software.  Everything being said by all sites is speculation, but the timing of the release really leads all of us here to feel the finger points more to an iPod like device than a computer of some type.

What say you?  What do you think Apple is planning to do with these 10″ touchscreens?

If you happen to be subscribed to the Apple education newsletter, you may have gotten a surprise in the latest issue of an unannounced addition to the iMac line.

Sneaking in under everyone’s radar, it appears Apple has reintroduced the discontinued 17″ version of their all-in-one desktop, the iMac.  This model is only being marketed to people who can buy from Apple’s education products, but it is not available on their online store.  The unit is priced at $899 via their email newsletter, and appears this will be the only way you can get it.  This does make it the lowest priced model in the line, and should appeal to cash strapped students.

According to AppleInsider, though, it appears that the price reflects the components, and this may be the exact same model they were selling in 2006.  This means it has a CRT monitor, lower RAM, lower video specs and so on.  Essentially you are buying an out of date computer that will shorten its life span some.

Regardless of the outdated nature, and limited availability of the product, it still makes an interesting comment about the possible state of the economy when it comes to the sale of desktops if Apple is stepping back over two years in their technology to offer an affordable solution to students.  Could we possibly see this show up for normal consumers also?