Android developer earning $13k a month from his Car Locator app. Not too shabby.

Sad reading this letter from Palm’s CEO about the worse than expected sales of Palm products. I like my Palm Pre, webOS is excellent but it’s hard to explain why I’ve gone back to an iPhone 3G. The iPhone 3G is frustrating mainly due to its lack of multi-tasking (copying and pasting a URL from an email into a tweet is dead easy on the Palm Pre, a Pain In The Arse on an iPhone.) The Palm Pre is a better phone too. But the iPhone has better apps (better games mainly) and much of my professional work has been around the iPhone in the past year. It’s scale is hard to argue with, a river you are mad to swim against. webOS represents a better mobile model than iPhone OS in my opinion but Apple executes everything else better. Colleagues just like the iPhone better and those willing to think more tend to pick Android phones as they are geeks and Android is still a geek’s wet dream. Palm the company has to do better if they expect to beat the iPhone. They can’t just make a lovely OS.

The long tail of books on the iPhone App Store shows an increase in price.

The budget from Bizcamp Dublin 2009. Helpful if you want to run your own event.

Subway takes to the skies.

Ignore Apple shacking up with Microsoft Bing in rivalry with Google. The story for my ears is the skunk-works Apple search project coupled with Apple’s recent advertising company acquisition and the many mobile Apple devices (iPhone, iTouch and possibly iTablet) ready to switch their default search provider. It comes right at the end of this Gruber post.

Google’s wavering stance in China is something any business should know before working in China. Profit before people for many companies even if they will not admit it.

Balsamiq predicted $400k in revenue for 2009. They made $1.6 million. 3 person company. Not bad.

Look after the pennies and the pounds will look after themselves. High-speed trading. Sounds dangerous though there does seem to be an element of “crash fast and often” to it. It does seem that stock markets have lost some purpose to the “real” world though. Money for money’s sake, not for creating business or employing people to live decent lives.

D4H year in review an inspiration to us all.