downloads

iPhone users were busy in December downloading more than 6 million of Apple's top free apps each day.

For the last month of 2011, the iPhone app store witnessed a record 6.04 million downloads per day, a 7 percent jump over the previous high of 5.45 million daily downloads in November.

Compiled by mobile ad firm Fiksu, the App Store Competitive Index looks at the total number of downloads of the top 200 free iPhone apps in the United States. The downloads have been gaining momentum since September when the average daily number was 3.8 million.… Read more

Game time!

Today only, Amazon is having a pretty colossal sale on Mac and PC games. They're all downloads, and they're all $10 or less.

For example, Crysis 2, which debuted last March and lists for $39.99, is on sale for $9.99.

A few other titles you might want to consider:

Needless to say, there's some … Read more

Since digital textbooks are still in their infancy, it might be tough to determine success in that market just yet. But so far, it appears Apple is doing quite well.

The iPhone maker reportedly sold 350,000 digital textbooks through its iBookstore in just its first three days of availability, Global Equities Research has revealed, according to All Things Digital, which obtained the data from the analyst firm. Global Equities Research monitors textbook downloads through its own "proprietary tracking system," All Things Digital said today. The firm doesn't disclose how that system works.

Last week, Apple unveiled digital textbooks for its iPad. … Read more

If you're looking to expand your font selections, Google's Web Fonts collection has you covered.

A lot of sites say they offer free fonts, but there's either a catch, or it's just a gathering of all the fonts that came standard on your computer. Google's Web Fonts hosts hundreds of fonts that you probably don't have, and lets you download them for free. Here's how to grab your favorites:

Step 1: Head to http://www.google.com/webfonts in your Web browser.

Step 2: Adjust the filters on the left side … Read more

Generally when a file you download is corrupted, opening it results in an error or just the inability to read it properly; however, in rare cases corruption in executable files such as installers and programs can result in crashes and other unwanted behavior.

Periodically files you download from online services such as the Mac App Store or from Web sites may become corrupted and result in a verification error when you try to open them. If this happens, then it is recommended you avoid using the file, since while usually it will just not read properly there are instances where … Read more

Continuing this week's unofficial deals-under-$10 theme, let's talk cheap tunes.

For a limited time, Amazon is offering 129 one-hit wonder MP3s for 69 cents each. (That's the promotion's landing page. If you want to see the choices in list form, click here.)

You've probably heard most, if not all, of these songs on the radio, which is still the place where one-hit wonders are born. And maybe you even bought an entire album just to get one song--only to be disappointed by the rest of the tunes.

Heck, maybe you've long harbored a … Read more

Do you pray to the god of file sharing? If so, you might want to move to Sweden. The Church of Kopimism--a group with roots in file sharing and the notion that everything should be free--is now an official religion there.

Kopimism is the brainchild of philosophy student Isak Gerson, who founded the church in 2010 to protect his beliefs that copying and sharing information is a good thing. (If Kopimism has a Ten Commandments equivalent, I'm guessing "Thou shall not steal" didn't make the cut.)

Before you dispute Kopimism as hogwash, there are some things to consider. According to TorrentFreak, the movement has a couple thousand followers, and the number is expected to rise with its official status. … Read more

We've seen plenty of Internet bandwidth speed tests, both the online and standalone kind. Download Speed Test from AB-Tools.com is a standalone freeware speed test, which means it tests your bandwidth from your PC instead of from a Web site. This approach has advantages, such as letting you choose any download for your speed test. Download Speed Test also lets you run continuous tests, yielding a better average score over time.

Download Speed Test's twin automotive-style gauges display the current and average download speed. A line graph beneath the dials displays download times graphically, and the lower … Read more

Apple iPad users have been pretty busy downloading apps.

Since the launch of the original iPad in April 2010, 3 billion apps have been downloaded for the hit tablet, ABI Research announced today. It took the iPhone two years to hit the 3B mark, ABI said, while it took the iPad just a year and a half. In contrast, the market researcher said, 440 million apps have been downloaded so far for Android tablets.

The disparity in downloads further illustrates the dominance that the iPad holds in the tablet market, where its rivals have fought one other for the position … Read more