Want an iPhone app business without all the boring hassle of actually programming and releasing iPhone apps? Boy, does Brice Milliorn have a deal for you! He's auctioning off his iPhone app business, which he says has 87 different apps for sale, over on eBay.

Milliorn says he started out developing apps on his own, but the business is just too big for him to keep up so he's selling all of the apps and their rights, all of the source code, and technical support for two months to transition everything over to the new owner. He doesn't specifically say that he'll transfer the developer account on Apple's App Store to your name (he says he'll send over a DVD with the source code and transfer "the whole kit and caboodle" to you), but we presume that's what will happen -- of course if you go for it, you're doing this at your own risk.

What will a burgeoning App Store business, complete with apps like iSexyRef and Swine Flu cost you? Just a cool $100 grand. That's the starting bid in the eBay auction, which has just over a week left and no bids as of this writing. There are certainly less expensive ways to get started selling apps on the store. It only costs $100 to register in Apple's Developer Program for a year, and then you just need to find a developer you can pay -- or even do it yourself with a helper service).

If you'd rather start off with a bunch of marginal to silly 99-cent apps and happen to have an extra $100,000 lying around to spend (maybe for a nice holiday gift?), here's your opportunity.

A tweet earlier today pointed me to an iPhone calculator app that really got me laughing, as well as taking me on a trip down memory lane.

When I was in high school, calculators were expensive (US$200 for a six-function calculator with memory, for example) and just starting to make it into the hands of students. In those more naive times, anything that could be construed as even mildly suggestive got a lot of chuckles. One of the more amusing pastimes was to perform certain calculations that would come up with a result like 5318008 or 3104558 which, when the calculator was turned upside down, would spell a "dirty word."

Well, TLA Systems wants to make sure that its PCalc RPN [iTunes Link, US$9.99] and free PCalc Lite [iTunes Link] calculator apps for iPhone are used only for good purposes, so they've built in a special smut filter that will block these words when the calculator is turned upside down by displaying the word "CENSORED." Their blog entry is very tongue-in-cheek, asserting that they developed the filter to avoid getting a 17+ rating in the App Store.

Personally, I think TLA Systems developer James Thomson is just brilliant at getting blogs to write about his products. Well done, James!

Tip of the Tweet to @timhaines

Recently Fortune picked the 10 dumbest iPhone apps for 2009. In response, I thought we should pick ten search phrases that are more or less guaranteed to produce a list of horrible applications.

Our list follows. Are they the worst possible search terms? Probably not. But they're certainly guaranteed to return subquality results in your App Store search. (Yes, it is the weekend.)

So join in and add your favorite (bad) search phrases to the comments. And remember, unless a search phrase returns at least three or four really appallingly crappy applications, it does not qualify for the title.

1. jiggle: While not as salacious as you might first imagine, this search does bring up both Wobble iBoobs!! [sic], iJiggles Your Mom, and Bikini Fart.
2. pong: We love pong, but we hope we've moved past its retro appeal as far as the App Store goes. Current pong search results include Beer Pong (in several forms), iBlow Ping-Pong Ball (from CLapps!), and Cow Pong Beef.
3. gross: No, we're not talking about items that come 144 per case. An App Store search for 'gross' returns such winners as 101 Gross Sounds, Gross Facts, and (strangely enough) Speed Muscles MD, a game that challenges you to point to specific muscle groups on a cadaver. (Okay, the reviews for this last one aren't bad but the idea is just freaky unless you're a medical student.)
4. stupid: What did the great F. Gump say on this topic? One is what one does? Or at least something like that. A search for stupid returns an absolute bonanza of applications from developers who clearly have a sense of humor. Titles include Make a Face, Stupidity Test, The Idiot Test, Are You Stupider than a Kindergartner and the $0.99 A Stupid Button, which says "That's Stupid" after you have already bought and paid for it.
5. annoy: From dog whistlers, to random noise, to apps targeted to irritating our furry friends, bad App Store entries abound. There's a "Wooo!" Button app, a Free Turkey Calls app, and even one called Annoyance!. The exclamation point is courtesy of the developer.
6. jared: I know it's a little disingenuous for me to include Jared as a search term, given how I love that insanely stupid little app. But after searching for it on the App Store and finding Top Sexiest Men-Jared Leto, Screen Cleaner (from Jared Judd), SupaFan for Supernatural Fans, and The Book of Mormon Plants and Animals (no insult to LDS members, it just seems like a poor choice for an iPhone app), I knew I had to add this phrase to the list.
7. calm: I don't care how much you love your iPhone, it's not going to deliver a light spa day, provide ultimate relaxation or iSoothe your soul. I'm sure those apps are well intended but I'm also sure they're...well, see the title of this piece.
8. pickup: Without being overly insensitive, if you're carrying around an iPhone full of pickup lines, you've probably missed the point. Standouts include Lovetricity, iWingman, and (yes, you knew this was coming), Coed Spring Break
9. strip: If you're sensing a theme, well so am I. Soft pr0n seems to sell a lot of iPhone applications. Items on this search include iStrip (including its Sexy Pen edition), Poker vs Girls Strip Poker, and of course some sort of Hooters app. Sheesh.
10. fart: Yes, no worst search list would be complete without a search for "fart", including such marvelous cultural treats as Fart Shaker Deluxe, Juicy Fart, Fart Lighter, and Atomic Fart. With about 500 fart-related apps in the store, it's a benchmark of goofy that other app categories can only aspire to meet.
    

So, that's our list. Now let's see your picks for the worst searches in the App Store.

Unless you're a fan of their website, you probably don't need the Giant Bomb iPhone app. It's a pretty limited use piece of software. While it does offer easy access to everything on their site, including videos, reviews, previews, and so on, it actually costs $1.99, and we can't really justify a purchase like that. Isn't browsing sites what Safari is for?

But we are thankful that they made the app, because, at the very least, it encouraged them to make the commercial above. It features a few spot-on parodies (the first one overstays its welcome, but stick with it), and even has some nice iPhone-related humor. I don't know about you folks, but I winced when Apple's device went in the drink during the ShamWow parody. The app itself might not be worth the price, but the commercial is definitely worth every penny.

Yeah, so did you see Idiocracy? While I'm convinced it's merely a documentary sent to us from a future Mike Judge, warning us of the dangers of Brawndo and poor math education, one of the takeaway phrases from the movie has made its way into an iPhone app. Yes, Martha, you can say "balls" on the App Store. While tasteful slideshow apps like Minipops are rejected without so much as a "get bent," somehow Ow My Balls! became the first app on the store to use "balls" in this sense. Apple: always on the cutting edge.

Anyway, I wound up trying Ow My Balls! (iTunes link) on the plane back from San Francisco, and guess what? It really is strangely addictive. Not like Fieldrunners-grade addiction, mind you, but it's a low level thing that makes you play for a much longer time than you'd ever think you'd be playing. Is it worth $.99? Yeah, if you're into this sort of thing.

The game mechanic is simple: kick the guy off a ledge (in the aforementioned nether regions), tap him to "fart" and make him stay in the air longer. You have small goals like hitting every target and getting maximum rackage by hitting more stuff on the way down. That's really about it, but as I said, it's more fun than you'd imagine. My only problem: I can't find the very last object to run into. Ow, my finger!

The video of the app in action is next...

Not really -- if you really are planning to grill up some meat (or mushrooms and pineapples, they're good too) today or this weekend, you'll need a little more heat than your iPhone will give. But it's true, Apple's little handheld can get nice and toasty when it's really working*, and illustrator Chad Covino made a little Fourth of July BBQ-themed sketch about that very subject. We love it -- very nice work!

My iPhone does get hot, but not so hot I can't pick it up -- usually when I'm running 3D for a longer stretch of time or when the phone is doing some serious calculating like audio or photo editing, I start to feel the heat coming off the back. Batteries are to blame for some of the more extreme problems, however, and that's not a huge surprise, given that batteries in any mobile device have their issues. The good news in that case, however, is that the phone is unlikely to actually explode -- the repair guy Wired talks to says that "a little bit of smoke eventually is probably the best bet." Not that a smoking iPhone is a good situation at all, but you can at least be sure that your iPhone is not quite as hot as the fire under your burgers this weekend.

[* Note that the Apple KB article referenced here about temperature warnings/"don't leave the iPhone in the glove compartment" for the iPhone 3G and 3GS is not a new post, nor is the temperature alert screen unique to the 3GS; the KB was simply updated to include the newer device. Jim Dalrymple at The Loop has a solid rundown. FoxNews incorrectly reported that the support article was specific to the 3GS, but then did cite PC World's Melissa Perenson and David Coursey with personal stories of wicked-hot 3GS units. If your 3GS is overheating, check in with Apple support or your local AT&T store. -Ed.]

Jokes are relative. What's hysterically funny for one person may not even crack a smile on another person's face. iLaugh [App Store], a database of over 50,000 jokes for the iPhone and iPod touch from developer Azure Talon, uses sheer volume of bon mots to ensure that you'll be able to find a funny story for just about every taste.

You can pick from a variety of genres from Animals to Yo Mama!, and turn on/off sex or rude jokes as well as important categories such as Chuck Norris Facts. Each joke or story can receive a thumbs up or down from you and other iLaugh users, and the app allows you to filter out jokes that don't meet a certain minimum score.

Want to share a laugh with friends? iLaugh has Facebook and Twitter buttons that send the joke on to the rest of the world, and you can also use cut & paste on iPhone OS 3.0 devices to email the offending lines to your friends.

All of the chuckles are available for US$0.99, and iLaugh would be a smart purchase to make before those 4th of July picnics.

I just uninstalled it from my iPhone, and am officially retiring from Flight Control (iTunes link). It was a great four month career, I tell ya. I wanted to go out at the top of my game, and on my own terms. Despite its minimal $4.99 price tag (I think that was the price when it first came out), it has cost me much more in terms of lost bets against friends (~$20), sleepless nights, hour long stops to the restroom, and lost productivity.

Did you know that after it is broken down into all of its composite metals and materials and parts, your human body is really only worth about $4.50? Yup, you're cheap in the broadest sense -- all of that oxygen, magnesium, iron, and sodium isn't actually worth all that much in the rare metals market. In fact, according to iSuppli, you're worth way less than the iPhone 3GS -- they looked at the component parts for Apple's new handset, and calculated its raw value at around $178.96. The most expensive components are the 16gb flash memory (ringing in at around $25 per part) and the display (at $19), all the way down to the audio codec board, which Apple reportedly picked up for a cheap $1.15. Of course, there was lots more cheaper stuff (we assume the screws weren't a buck each), but iSuppli didn't actually go that granular. That also doesn't include any of the non-hardware costs: shipping fees, R&D, distribution, marketing, and so on. But it's way more than you're worth, and it's $40 more than the Palm Pre costs to make, too.

Lest you start worrying that your spouse will start valuing their iPhone more than your body, however, there is a silver lining. If you break down to the mineral components of the human body, we're cheap, but the actual components of the body are pretty expensive, it turns out. Expensive to the tune of $45 million, if you count up all the money you could pick up from taking out your bone marrow, extracting your DNA, and selling off a lung or two. Just like the iPhone's parts, when assembled, are worth more than iSuppli's $179, you too pick up some value when assembled the right way.

[via Engadget]

Just when you think you're in the groove for the new iPhone 3G S, Apple goes and starts changing the game. The 3G S is, figuratively speaking, no more. Apple has quietly been changing all references on it site from 3G S to 3GS. The space between the G and the S has been removed.

TidBITS broke the story in a piece aptly titled "Ding, Dong, the iPhone 3GS Space Is Dead". (We too did note the change in a story yesterday.) TUAW reader and personal tech review colleague Joachim Bean found the pair of images you see here. To the right is a cached image from June 15th. To the left is a shot from yesterday, June 22nd. Notice anything? Yes, it's been spacicided.

So will we miss the space? It was, as Engst points out, an awkward construction. But after forcing ourselves into the space habit, it may be a hard one to break.

So let's have a moment of silence for the 3G S space. It is dead, not stunned, and not pining for the fjords. Despite its brief moment in the pop culture sun, the 3G S space has expired and gone to meet its maker. Bereft of life, the space rests in peace. And if we at TUAW may occasionally nail it back into place by accident, be assured that it will be reinterred and pushing up daisies ASAP.

Dear Auntie TUAW,

I was driving home from an appointment today with my brother, and at a stop light, I noticed that instead of the Edge "E", I had this little blue dot. I just assumed that it was where i had connected to WiFi and had no bars, but it was much too big and centered.

My brother, who also has an iPhone, pulled his out to find that we both had the little dot. They are both first Gen iPhones, his 4GB, mine 8GB. I did not know what this meant, but being the Apple nerd I am, I figure I would have heard something of this dot before now.

Do you know what it is? Could it have something to do with 3.0 coming out soon as expected? Thanks, And I look forward to hearing what you think.

With love from your nephew,

Andrew Dixon

Andrew, sweetheart,

Speaking of the iPhone, are you including enough roughage in your diet? Now that I'm entering onto what we oldsters can only term our "tender years," I've grown to realize that bulk, bulk, bulk is the key to world happiness. Fiber is health; health, fiber. That is what we know at TUAW, and all ye need to know for better digestive function.

As for your question, that little blue circle means you youngsters were connected to a GPRS network, aka General Packet Radio Service. When the iPhone first debuted, it displayed the EDGE "E" when connected to GPRS. This made pedants cry. Newer firmware versions show this blue circle instead. As noted below, GPRS is quite a bit slower than either EDGE or 3G.

To check this icon out for yourself, you can browse through your iPhone files using sftp (on a jailbroken iPhone) or iBrowser (for iPhones with the developer deployment). The EDGE and GPRS icons live in /System/Library/CoreServices/SpringBoard.app and are named FSO_EDGE_ON.png and FSO_GPRS_ON.png. You'll need to convert the compressed iPhone-style png images to Mac compatible ones using a utility like fixpng.

Send my love to your brother and don't forget to wear a scarf to keep your neck warm!

Love and hugs,

Auntie T.

Good afternoon, and welcome to your daily brainload from TUAW, a division of Weblogs, Inc. owned by Comcast Online. Please make sure the neural connector is clicked in all the way, and then think "Start" when you are ready.

Steve Jobs returns to Apple's Board of Directors after stint at GM
Steve Jobs announced his return to Apple today after a government-mandated stint as CEO of General Motors. Obama White House spokesperson Ruth Christopher stated that since Jobs had saved the American auto company with the introduction of the extremely popular flyCar, he could return to his usual duties. Apple executives released a statement saying they were "overjoyed" to have Jobs back on the job.

New MacBooks and Mac mini appear on Apple Store site
Apple has quietly updated its legacy line of personal computers, adding exabyte molecular hard drives and gigacore nanoprocessors without raising the prices. Fans, unfortunately, were unimpressed with the updates -- "my implants can move faster than that," John Gruber transmitted to his brainload feed, along with a TwitFeeling of disappointment and anger. But Apple defended the updates, stating that the new computers were "perfect for the older member of your family who still need their hardware in the box, rather than out of it." Anyone who has purchased one of the older units in the past six months (if there are any of you out there still buying hardware) can be eligible for an exchange at any Apple center.

MobileMe announces record number of subscribers
Over three billion people have subscribed to Apple's MobileMe service since its reintroduction two years ago, according to a new study transmitted by analysts NPD. Apparently people love the fact that they no longer have to carry an iPhone, a laptop, or any hardware at all, as MobileMe now works directly with tiny processors implanted into your head to bring you brainloads, news, TwitFeelings, and the Webview over the cloud directly into your visual and memory cortexes.

"People really love not having to deal with devices or pesky buttons," said an NPD analyst. "MobileMe allows them to connect directly into the ethersphere, leaving them open to do or think or feel anything while anywhere." The price of the system was also lauded as one of the reasons it's so popular. Apparently after the big economic meltdown in 2010, Apple's customers are thrilled to get a full-service communication package for just over a billion dollars a year. "MobileMe has never been so worth it," said longtime user Dave Caolo.

Apple announces event next Tuesday: "Go ahead. Take a guess, suckers."
Press outlets around the brainsphere have recieved invites from Apple for an event next Tuesday in Chicago's Willis Tower (up until two years ago, events like this were held in San Franscisco at the Moscone Center, but of course the unfortunate earthquakes and flooding in 2014 mean that all of California is currently underwater). Rumors are flying about what might be announced at the event, but Apple hasn't given any indication of what there might be -- in fact, the invite itself features a question mark, and the text: "Take a guess, suckers. You still haven't gotten it right."

Most brainloaders have speculated that the event may finally feature the debut of the long-awaited iTablet, or maybe, finally, the reveal of The Beatles unenhanced audio recordings into the iCollective. Either way, TUAW won't be there: we still haven't gotten an invite. But we will, as usual, be providing Mike Schramm's unfiltered thoughts on the event live as it happens. Remember to make sure your children are unplugged at the time.

This new device and software not only perform the same organizational tasks as the original Neat Receipts, but now also provide the added functionality of turning your receipts into beautiful works of art. Simply touching the new Origami button on the Neat scanner (below) scans and folds your receipt, turning the receipt into useful data and either a swan, elephant, sea lion, or hummingbird.