A sometimes overlooked feature that has been made incredibly simple on the iPhone is the ability to subscribe to a variety of calendars. Many are familiar with CalDAV as it adds a quick and easy way to keep your iPhone or iPod touch in sync with your Google Calendar, but did you know you can also add a wide range of publicly available calendar subscriptions in a matter of seconds? One of the more common subscriptions is the US holidays calendar but you can also quickly and easily add TV show schedules, network premier schedules, sports team schedules, movie releases, concert tour schedules and plenty more to your iPhone calendar. Hit the jump to find out how.

The easiest way to add calendar subscriptions is to start by finding a good directory. There are a few decent ones out there but for the purposes of this quick how-to we’ll use iCal World (another popular one is iCalShare). Simply pull the site up in Safari on your iPhone and have a look through the various available subscriptions. When you find one you like — yep, you guessed it — click on it.

Provided the link is alive of course, Safari will ask you’d like to subscribe to the calendar in a pop up message. Tap “Subscribe” and your iPhone will do just that. Once you see a confirmation message you’re good to go, and you can even tap “View Events” in the pop up to see your new events in the Calendar app.

As with most things, there is a “but” involved. You’ll find that many of the calendars you try to subscribe to are no longer maintained. As such, it can take a bit of searching to find what you’re looking for. Once you do find it though, adding the subscription to your iPhone couldn’t be easier.

While the official 1-year anniversary of the App Store isn’t until Saturday, Apple apparently decided to start the celebration early. A new dedicated page headed with the colorful banner seen above appeared in iTunes this morning, proudly proclaiming that the App Store’s first birthday is upon us. So how is Apple celebrating this momentous occasion? By trying to get you to buy more apps, duh. Apple’s anniversary page is littered with Apple’s “favorite apps and games” alongside buy links to make sure they’re all nice and easy to snag. Shamelessness aside, there’s really no question that the advent of the App Store is among a handful of game-changing events that have taken place over the past few years. Over 56,000 apps… Well over a billion downloads… Every major competitor doing its best to mimic the offering… Yeah, it’s safe to say the App Store has definitely left its mark on the wireless industry.

Read (iTunes Link)

Do you have an iPhone 3GS and a burning desire to fire up Backgrounder but no access to a PC? Well dry those eyes Mac addicts, as Geohot’s baby is now ready to go on OS X. Cohorts AriX and westbaer helped Geohot pack purplera1n into a tight little Mac OS package and it’s now available on the site alongside a new and improved RC2a version for Windows. Sweet. Standard disclaimer: we’re not sure how purplera1n and the ensuing jailbreak will affect your iPhone as new OS builds come out, so proceed with caution.

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Last night we told you that iPhone OS 3.1 beta was released to developers and we’re pretty sure each and every one of them has had a pretty long night of playing, err, working with the new OS. Thankfully however, one anonymous tipster took a break from getting his or her 3.1 on to send us a quick breakdown of the changes so far in this build:

• Options for MMS are back on AT&T, but not sending or receiving.
• Non-destructive video editing means trimming a clip no longer saves over the original video but gives you the option to “Save as copy…”
• Voice Control now works over Bluetooth
• iPhone vibrates when moving icons
• Updated AT&T profile to 4.2
• Updated modem firmware to 5.08.01
• Improvements to OpenGL and Quartz
• APIs to allow third party apps to access videos and edit them
• You can now paste phone numbers into the phone app’s dialer. This wasn’t possible under 3.0
• While pasting phone numbers, a neat feature is that it will convert alphanumeric phone numbers into a real phone number (e.g. 1-800-FLOWERS becomes 1-800-356-9377)
• Calendar appointment popup notifications now display the “Location” field from the calendar entry
• Ability to save video attachments in emails to your camera roll

One item we notice to be MIA from the listed changes is a fix for the widespread squealing issue we broke last month. Considering Apple’s refusal to comment on the matter, perhaps the company is just hoping everyone forgets about it. Then again, maybe Cupertino will swoop in under the radar and sneak a fix past us in the release build. Yeah, we hope the latter is the case — and our ear drums hope so, too.

Thanks, Jeff / The iPhone Blog!

Ahhh, the Dev Team — where would we be without them? Just last week the crew issued ultrasn0w, making jailbreaking and unlocking your iPhone 3G as easy as finding a farting app in the App Store. But what about 3GS owners? As fast as the Dev Team works, a separate hacker by the name of “geohot” (the guy who made the first iPhone unlock as well as the injection vector for the first iPhone 3G unlock) has made a major breakthrough with the help of his friends at Chronic Dev. A little before 4:00AM this morning, George Hotz became the first person in the world to have a fully jailbroken iPhone 3GS (picture above). Now of course this doesn’t mean it will be released to the masses just yet, but it does mean we’re unbelievably close to lift off. Geohot ftw! Hit the jump for one more shot.

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When it comes to branding, marketing, advertising, PR and the general concepts surrounding efforts to sell stuff, Apple is one of the best in the business — hands down. Love Apple products or hate them, there’s really no question it knows how design an attractive product and make it even more attractive using marcom. As such, the company is always meticulous with the messages it delivers, the wording it chooses and the quality of its marketing/advertising — well, almost always.

Its latest product, the iPhone 3GS, is a smash hit. It launched this past Friday in fewer countries than the iPhone 3G did last year and still managed to sell over a million handsets in its opening weekend — more units than its predecessor in fact. Remarkable. There is a major fault in Apple’s new handset however, that we likely wouldn’t have seen under Stevo’s watch: the branding. Yes, we’re sure Jobs played a major role in naming the device and we can’t believe “3GS” is what the crew in Cupertino landed on but considering how peculiar and unfriendly to search engines the name is, one would think the company would take particular care in referring to the handset. Nope. According to Apple, the official name of its new handset is “iPhone 3GS”. Fair enough. Take a look at Apple’s website at the time of this writing however, and you’ll find no less than a hundred references to the “iPhone 3G S” — with a space between the “3G” and the “S”. Crazy. This is also how the handset was presented when it was introduced earlier this month: “3G S”.

To be honest, we can’t remember ever having seen Apple fail so massively in this department. It may seem trivial but companies take branding extremely seriously for several reasons and all of these reasons play key roles in the marketing/sales processes. Apple is cleaning up its site and changing “3G S” to “3GS” but even now there are still a few omissions. The screen cap above was taken this morning and it shows less than a quarter of a page with four mistakes alone.

So welcome back, Mr. Jobs. Time to get to work.

It looks like dogs everywhere are in for some trouble as Apple reveals over one million iPhone 3G S models were sold this past weekend. Yep, that’s a whole lot of high pitched squealing — but apparently the “S” stands for “Sales”. Almost equally as impressive, it looks like Steve Jobs was somehow tracked down for comment:

Customers are voting and the iPhone is winning. With over 50,000 applications available from Apple’s revolutionary App Store, iPhone momentum is stronger than ever.

Fair enough, Stevo… Over a million handsets sold and over six million OS 3.0 downloads in one weekend is definitely a solid showing. What’s more is that despite a few issues here and there, users seem overwhelmingly happy with their new handsets. How about you guys — satisfied customers or buyer’s remorse?

PS- Apple, your website is slathered with “3G S” and today’s release repeatedly mentions “3GS”. Work it out.

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Are you enjoying your brand new iPhone 3G S? Did you get a 16GB or a 32GB? Well, that won’t matter if people are experiencing what we are. There seems to a problem with sound files on the 3G S and the result after they’re triggered. After they are done playing — like the unlock sound, SMS sound, for instance — the iPhone emits a high-frequency tone. No, we’re not kidding. Something pretty high around 15KHz. We’ve confirmed this isn’t a local isolated issue with our phone, and since some people can’t hear these types of high-pitched tones, your iPhone might produce it yet you’d never notice.

We’re 99% sure it’s software related because if you set the phone to vibrate, big surprise, no high-pitched tone. So, anyone out there experiencing this? It’s amazing this was skipped over in the many reviews published, but oh well. Hopefully Apple fixes it soon because this is kind of painful and pretty outrageous. Hit us up and let us know!

While no official numbers are available just yet of course, AT&T Mobility Prez Ralph De La Vega has just issued a preliminary 3G S assessment during an interview with CNBC. According to De La Vega, iPhone 3G S demand is exceeding AT&T’s expectations and “hundreds of thousands of customers” have pre-ordered the new Apple handset. The smartphone space is definitely heating up, what with competitive offerings like the “BlackBerry RIM” (1:17 in the video below) gaing ground every day, but it looks like Apple’s updated iPhone — however modest said update may be — will still manage to have a killer opening weekend. We certainly won’t see numbers anywhere near last year’s iPhone 3G launch but recent high profile launches such as that of the Palm Pre will apparently pale in comparison. Hit the jump for the De La Vega interview vid.

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Hoping to avoid tomorrow’s lines at Apple and AT&T retail locations but still looking to bag yourself a new 3G S? Thanks to a MacRumors forum member, it might me easier than you think. Amacfa has obtained what he or she claims to be Best Buy Mobile’s complete iPhone 3G S inventory for tomorrow’s launch and has posted it as a public spreadsheet on Google Docs. While it is not known how many units are spoken for due to pre-orders, you will definitely be able to get a good idea of which stores in your area have a healthy 3G S inventory and which ones you’d be better off avoiding. Assuming the sheet is real, that is. Hit Best Buy’s site and use the store locator to determine the store numbers for your local Best Buy locations and then hit the read link to see what kind of inventory you’re going to be dealing with. Better act fast though — according to the sheet, Best Buy locations across the country will only have a total of 17,580 iPhone 3G S units on hand for launch day.

[Via everythingiCafe]

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As we’re sure you’re all very well aware by now, tomorrow marks the day that the iPhone 3G S will be available to the masses. Online pre-orders will be delivered and both Apple and AT&T stores will be opening with stock in hand to sell. Those preparing to score themselves a shiny new iPhone 3G S may want to take heed of some of the information that AT&T and Apple have released regarding tomorrow’s launch however, so hit the jump for a full run down of the launch information.

Here is what you need to know if you are going to be braving the potentially wild crowds and heading out to get your new iPhone 3G S:

• The iPhone 3G S will be available tomorrow morning from all 2,200 company-owned AT&T retail locations and all 211 US Apple retail stores.
• AT&T stores will be opening at 7AM to fulfill in-store pre-orders for the iPhone 3G S. Customers who did not pre-order will be able to purchase the new iPhone at the regular retail opening on a first come, first served basis. Apple stores were expected to open at 8AM but are now reportedly opening at 7AM. Call ahead to confirm the hours just to be on the safe side.
• Shipments for online pre-orders will be delivered starting tomorrow. Sorry folks, even if your UPS facility is next door to your house, they will not be delivering your iPhone today according to the official info. Keep in mind that the initial inventory for pre-orders did sell out so if you were not Johnny on the spot and did not pre-order right away, your delivery date may be later than the 19th.
• The iPhone 3G S will be available for $199 (16GB) and $299 (32GB) for all new AT&T customers and existing AT&T customers who have fulfilled their contract. As we reported yesterday, AT&T extended this pricing to current iPhone 3G customers who purchased the iPhone 3G in July, August, or September 2008. Eligibility requirements apply.
• All other iPhone 3G owners who have not yet fulfilled their existing agreement can upgrade early to the iPhone 3G S for $399 (16GB) and $499 (32GB). Full retail purchases without a two year contract are also available. If you are not sure of your eligibility, you can check your online account, call AT&T or go to an AT&T store or text *639# from your current AT&T handset.
• Sorry folks, no multiple handset purchases. AT&T stores will only sell one iPhone 3G S per person for new customers, one iPhone 3G S per eligible line for current AT&T customers and one device per household for online shoppers.
• If you are porting a number from another carrier, remember to bring the appropriate documentation including a copy of your wireless bill from your current service provider, your account number, your name and billing address on the account, your Social Security number or tax ID and your account PIN or password.
• If you inherit an iPhone 3G from a friend or family member, you will need to visit an AT&T store to activate your phone. If you inherit an original iPhone, you can request a SIM card from AT&T and activate it at home via iTunes.
• Listen to your voice mail messages as all voice mail will be lost when switching devices.

Have fun out there tomorrow and report back in when you get your mitts on your new iPhone 3G S!

Read (Apple stores opening 7AM)
Read (AT&T information)

It looks like iPhone 3G early adopters will get a special bonus courtesy of Apple and AT&T today. For one reason or another, AT&T caved and those who purchased the iPhone 3G between July 2008 and September 2008 will be able to upgrade to the iPhone 3G S at fully subsidized prices — $199 for the 16GB model and $299 for the 32GB model. All of you who are eligible can now stop with the “its too expensive to upgrade” diatribe tout de suite. There is some criteria that must be met in order to be eligible such as plan minimums, credit rating and so on, so hit the read link for all the deets. If you purchased your 3G after September, well, there’s always refurbs or next year if you don’t want to cough up the cash.

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When Apple announced the upcoming iPhone 3G S earlier this month, we posted a quick little synopsis of info available to would-be 3G S owners up in Canada. Our Canadian readers thanked us, and then promptly threatened violence lest we do everything in our power to dig up contract-free pricing on Apple’s new kit. Not wanting to anger the Canadian people we got to digging and thankfully, one of our ninjas just came through with some tasty screen shots from Best Buy. According to the major retailer’s inventory system, Rogers and Fido customers are looking at no-contract pricing of $799.99 for the 32GB version and $699.99 for the 16GB version. A bargain at twice the price… Umm, or something like that. Hit the jump for screenshots of the Rogers 16GB iPhone 3G S in Best Buy’s inventory (32GB is above) along with the 16GB and 32GB models from Fido.

We got a tip from one of our most-trusty ninjas earlier this morning about this, but we’ve now also got a screenshot from someone else, too. To make a long story short, if you did not pre-order an iPhone 3G S from AT&T yet, (we’re not talking about Apple because we don’t have information on their pre-ordering/stock levels, etc) your iPhone 3G S won’t be shipping to you/your store until “7-14 days” after the order date. It seems that all AT&T’s pre-order stock is depleted leaving only iPhone 3G Ss for dying-in-line purchasing on this coming Friday, and all pre-orders going forward won’t be fulfilled until after the June 19th launch date.

Thanks, to our ninjas!

The folks over at iTalkiPhone have picked up an iPhone 3G S early and have unboxed it for all to see. Of course, there really isn’t a whole lot to see since it looks almost exactly like its predecessor save for a couple engraved markings. We were also hoping that it would be like other unboxing sessions where pictures of the contents would be taken, but it’s only the phone and the box. If anything looks different, the bezel seems a little more prominent than the iPhone 3G (it even pops a little on the box image), but it could also be the lighting conditions. We’re just a week away from the launch of iPhone 3.0 OS and the new device, so maybe these pics will inflame that spark you have inside for new, shiny toys.

Thanks, Taylor!