Music lovers can now check out new artistes with downloadable mobile music albums that stream the music to them smoothly by adapting the quality to either online or offline use.

Called Orastream, the technology was first tested by Techgoondu back in December 2011. It will play back at a lossless CD-like quality if a track is streamed, say, over Wi-Fi at home, but it will switch to a less demanding compressed quality if the user decides to stream the tracks over a cellphone network while on the move, for example.

Three artistes, including award-winning composer pianist Tze from Singapore, have now signed on to release their music on these mobile albums, which come in the form of downloadable iOS apps. The Singapore firm behind the technology, MP4SLS, calls these albums or apps digital catalog LPs (DLPs), in a tribute to the old record format. …

Always wondered how your iPhone-toting friends shot such nice pictures on their phones? Well, that Instagram camera app that lets them create, transform and share photos with friends is now coming to Android phones for free.

The company just said on its blog that it is releasing a version for Android users, after some 30 million iOS users have uploaded more than a billion photos since October 2010.

The move means yet another top iOS app is going on the Android bandwagon, following in the footsteps of the likes of the previously iOS-only Tweetdeck, for example.

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Salesforce has unveiled a slew of new tools and services to lure developers to its cloud-based platform.

Leading the pack is Database.com, a cloud database that can power apps built for Android and iOS-based devices. These apps can be hosted on Salesforce’s own Force.com or other cloud-based platforms including Amazon Web Services and Windows Azure.

Database.com can also be used to run social media applications using a social data model that holds and manages data for social feeds, user profiles and status updates. Developers can specify followers for database records or request data feeds to display real-time data updates through social APIs. …

Starting this week, we’ll be featuring quick and dirty reviews of must-have smartphone apps for Android, iOS and Windows Phone 7 devices.

In our first weekly round-up: a Rock Band-style Glee app for the iPhone, Summon Auntie to help you look out for carpark attendants and more! …

Microsoft has sent its next iteration of the Windows Phone software to handset makers, as it wraps up the operating system’s features and software code ahead of a launch in Fall 2011.

The so-called Mango update, unveiled two months ago, promises a number of fixes and updates to the original Windows Phone, which looked great when launched late last year but had an uphill struggle taking on Google’s Android and Apple’s iOS devices. …

If you thought having to choose between iOS, Android and Windows Phone 7 was enough of a headache, we’ve got news for you. Mozilla, makers of the popular Firefox Web browser, has launched a new project called “Boot to Gecko”, or B2G, to “pursue the goal of building a complete, standalone operating system for the open web”.

The end product will be an operating system that boots directly into the Web, like what Google’s Chrome OS is doing, only for your phone. A core component of the OS will be drawn from Android, to allow hardware to work easily. Mozilla plans on publishing the source code as it’s developed. …

In what could possibly be the most exciting iPad-related announcement since the iPad itself, word is going around that our social overlords at Palo Alto are finally preparing an app for the iPad.

According to The New York Times, “people briefed on Facebook’s plans” have revealed that the app has been in the works for almost a year, going through several design iterations that fully optimises it for the tablet form factor. It is even reported that Mark Zuckerberg himself has been “heavily invested in the process”. …

In the few hours after technology behemoths Microsoft and Nokia unveiled one of the most dramatic partnerships in years to take on rivals Google and Apple, terms like MicroKia, Noksoft and NoWin have quickly become popular sarcastic phrases for tech pundits predicting a doomed marriage.

As if the two new allies needed reminding, the jokes are a measure of how uncertain the future is for two companies playing catchup in the smartphone game, despite a deal that seems, on paper, to be joining their still considerable powers to crawl back their rivals’ leads. …

We already know how great the large-screen smartphone or tablet computer is as a remote controller to play music or movies from your PC server. Now, there’s also an iOS app that lets you control your Xerox machine and send documents to print – directly from your handheld device.

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When some Microsoft folks recently asked me how users and techies felt about its upcoming Windows Phone 7 OS, I told them “you’re lucky to still be in the news”.

Until the past few weeks, when favourable first-looks of Microsoft’s totally rebuilt smartphone OS came online, the only OSes that anyone was talking about were Apple’s iOS and Google’s Android.

For an example of how fast a dominant OS can fall in interest level, look at Nokia’s Symbian OS that now powers most of its phones, as it transitions to the more advanced MeeGo. Who thinks anything great of Symbian now?

And compared to Nokia, Microsoft was worse off a few months ago – it only showed glimpses of what Windows Phone 7 was about at February’s Mobile World Congress and nothing more.

So, it was with a bit of surprise when I saw how well Windows Phone 7 was built, during a hands-on preview at the Microsoft offices here in Singapore last week.

Having lost crucial market share to Android and iOS, Microsoft has clearly done the right thing by building its new OS from ground up. Gone are the clunky “halfway house” touch offerings on Windows Mobile 6.5. Absent too is any lag that you get while moving around menus. In fact, pretty animations accompany most actions – without slowing things down. …