For awhile there, it seemed like Palm and Apple would go back and forth, enabling and then disabling direct Pre + iTunes syncing for a good long time. Now, with Palm licking its wounds and PsyStar likely down for the count, Cupertino seems to be running out playmates.

Ma Bell has been getting spanked by Verizon’s highly effective TV advertising campaign and now the courts have, at least for the time being, refused to give the carrier any relief either. But now AT&T has hit back with a TV spot of their own.

Recent rumors have pointed to a “worldmode” iPhone sometime next year, which would mean Verizon network compatibility. Today, we get independent, if off-handed, confirmation that the mothership is at least talking with the chipset maker at the center of this tantalizing possibility.

Swine Flue worries gotcha feeling blue? Then you shouldn’t leave the house again until you’ve armed yourself with at least one of these powerful and/or funny (think gallows humor) apps for your iPhone or iPod touch, some free and some not so much.

Apple’s serious about mobile gaming — the company’s newest iPhone and iPod touch models include best of class ARM processors, a good bit o’ RAM and richly detailed OpenGL graphics. Moreover, Cupertino’s been kitting out its in-house iPhone game development team with Graeme Devine of Halo Wars fame already on board.

Desperate times call for desperate measures, and Ma Bell sure looks desperate now. Their belated response to Verizon’s “there’s a map for that” advertising campaign is wimpy in the extreme as it delivers statistics in textual form only about how complete its 3G + EDGE, which can charitably be referred to as a 2.5G technology, networks are to fill in the gaps.

Fresh news from the alternate universe inhabited by the mothership’s App Store grannies and developers: the guy behind the most popular app on the platform is quitting in disgust. It seems that the app review process and the people behind it are tools of the devil, or maybe just tools, a state of affairs which is hardly unique.

Those of you who have been waiting with bated breath for malware to make its way to the iPhone may resume breathing; a worm named ikee has made its appearance on the Apple handset.

Given that the English language is a mishmash of German, Gaelic, Old Norse, French and what not, it’s perhaps the richest repository of insults and profanity known to man. IPhone Blorge has a pair of apps for your iPhone and iPod touch to invigorate your vituperation, or there’s another app who’s purpose is tame the toilet, too.

Although the mothership gets endless grief for their byzantine app vetting process and for barring some apps, there’s no question the iPhone’s the smartphone to buy for the biggest selection, both in terms of quantity and quality, of mobile software. Still, those issues linger, though the FCC and Verizon seem to be pushing Apple and AT&T in the right direction.