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Google has just launched a new program aimed at improving security for its new Web browser, Google Chrome. Developers who find a bug in either Chrome or Chromium, the open source codebase used as the testing grounds for Chrome, will receive anywhere from $500 to $1,337 for reporting the issue. The amount of the reward will vary depending on the severity of the security hole discovered, says Google. Those bugs deemed "particularly severe or particularly clever" will receive the higher amount.

A regional development firm in the UK is the first to announce a development fund for the Apple iPad, offering up to £40,000 ($64,500) for iPad application ideas. The introduction of this fund comes less than 24 hours after Apple's chief executive Steve Jobs demoed the company's highly anticipated touchscreen tablet computer on stage at an event in San Francisco. Although this fund is limited to developers in the UK, there's little doubt that this firm will soon be one of many offering similar incentives to developers in order to encourage the creation of an entirely new ecosystem of applications tailored specifically for this unique handheld device.

With yesterday's reveal of the iPad now past, we can finally put myth and speculation behind us and focus on the reality that is Apple's entry into the tablet PC business. Whether the iPad is revolutionary or evolutionary is still hotly debated, but what we do know is that the computer, despite its elegance and blazing fast speed, is a decidedly first-generation device. Although one day after the product's announcement may be too soon to discuss what's coming in the next version of the iPad, we've already come across several reasons to wait... and some of those reasons are hidden away in the new iPad SDK (software development kit) itself.

Do you want to take control of your Android phone? By "rooting" your device, a process similar to jailbreaking an iPhone, you can install custom ROMs (images), which add stability and speed improvements to Google's mobile operating system, as well as install new features developed by the hacker community themselves. The procedure involves running commands that enable total access to the device. For non-developer types, hacks like these sound scary, but by following the instructions below, you can take control of your Android phone in only a matter of minutes. The end result is a truly open device which you can modify to your heart's content.

Last week, YouTube announced they will begin supporting the upcoming web standard HTML5 which allows videos to be viewed without an Adobe Flash plugin. Those who wanted to play around with the new HTML5-enabled website were directed to a separate experimental site called TestTube. However, noted the YouTube blog post, only Chrome, Safari, and IE users could give the new site a try. Firefox was notably absent from the list.

Developer Tobias Schneider has created an interesting proof-of-concept Flash runtime that allows Flash to work on the iPhone. The project, a JavaScript with SVG called "Gordon," allows Flash files embedded in HTML to be viewed within the iPhone's web browser Safari. Although this workaround to Apple's restriction of Flash content on their ever-popular mobile device is a bit cumbersome and impractical for real-world use, it's a geeky and fun project for developers who want to run Flash on the iPhone...just so they can say that they did so.

According to an independent analysis performed by investment-watching blog 24/7 Wall St., Apple's iTunes App Store has lost $450 million due to iPhone app piracy since it opened for business back in July of 2008. Although that number sounds high, they note it is small in comparison to the overall size of the App Store marketplace and the millions it generates in revenue each quarter - revenue that ranges from $60 million to $110 million according to previous estimates from a Bernstein analyst report cited in 24/7 Wall St.'s post.

However, in order to generate the $450 million figure, the author of the post uses some questionable back-of-the-envelope calculations that raise some flags. Our sources say that the real number is closer to $15 million to $20 million instead.

Kynetx offers developers a single platform for building extensions for multiple browsers. Developers write their code in Kynetx's own rule-based language and the service builds the actual extensions. Originally, Kynetx only supported Firefox and Internet Explorer, but a few days ago, the company also announced support for Google Chrome. Thanks to this, developers can now use Kynetx's AppBuilder tool to build and deploy custom extensions for the three top browsers that offer a built-in plugin architecture.

Ever since finding myself the happy owner of a Droid (+1 for early Christmas presents), I've found myself increasingly interested in the app market for Android-powered devices.

As has been noted in many iPhone/Droid sudden-death-round comparisons, the latter languishes in quality and quantity of available applications. Perhaps in an effort to increase Droid's competitiveness in the market, the powers that be have created a new section of resources for Android developers. Let the games (and other apps) begin!

Later this month, iPhone and iPod application developers can expect to see sales drastically increase by as much as 300 or 400 percent over the course of a couple days.

They'll also be unable to change their applications, change marketing materials or download sales reports during much of this time. iTunes Connect, the interface that allows developers to manage all their applications in the App Store, will be unavailable from December 23 - December 28, 2009.

At LeWeb today, Ryan Sarver, Twitter's Director of Platform, took the state during the morning session. He stressed that Twitter needs the developer ecosystem if it wants to continue to grow. Sarver also announced that Twitter will give all developers access to the full firehose feed in early 2010. In addition, Twitter will also soon launch a new developer site, increase the rate limit for services that use OAuth and launch a new API for browser-less apps.

Apple has just booted a major iPhone developer out of the iTunes App Store along with their catalog of 1,000-plus apps, a number so high it represented almost 1% of all the apps in the store. The developer, Molinker Inc., has been accused of attempting to game the ratings system where application users are allowed to review the various programs using a five-star system. As discovered by an unnamed Internet user and a reader of the iPhoneography blog, the ratings scam involved a set of iPhone application reviewers who only rated Molinker apps, giving them each a five-star review. Most of the apps in question ended up with 50 or so of these five-star reviews, representing what was clearly an attempt to boost sales by pumping up ratings through artificial means.

Our startup-minded readers may remember Mike Trotzke, our good friend who, with a little help from his good friends Marc Guyer and Brad Wisler, founded a startup incubator called SproutBox earlier this year.

One of the latest sprouts to emerge from the box is Squad, Trotzke's gift to developers everywhere - and we mean everywhere! This web-based environment allows distributed teams to collaborate in real time, opening, editing and sharing code from anywhere with an Internet connection.

We've discovered an adorable yet highly useful little product that could significantly ease some pain and lead to greater levels of productivity for smartphone developers.

It's ridiculously simple as a concept, yet it allows for more creativity, freedom, and portability than any other tool we've seen for mobile developers, hands down. The product of a design shop and a web development lab, both based in Australia, these nifty and inexpensive toys have been popping up in offices all over Silicon Valley. Read on to learn the secret behind your favorite mobile dev's favorite Christmas present.

A new website aims to publicize the details surrounding the much-maligned iPhone application review process - Apple's secretive procedures that have been under heavy scrutiny this year, especially since the FCC's involvement regarding Apple's rejection of the Google Voice application. Notable iPhone developers have publically called out the company for this "broken" process and some have even announced their retirement from creating iPhone apps, including Facebook app developer, Joe Hewitt, based on philosophical differences with the perceived tyranny of the Apple gatekeepers.

Google Chrome has begun taking submissions from third party developers. In a blog post written earlier today, Google is asking developers to contribute to the Chrome extensions gallery - an act that will put third party applications on both the Chrome browser and eventually the operating system.

Three iPhone application developers are cited in an online petition which asks Apple to approve their apps, all of which have been sitting in limbo for months on end. The developers are awaiting word about their new DJ applications which let users mix loops of their own iTunes tracks stored in their iPhone or iPod Touch's music library.

In this case, it's speculated that the holdup either has to do with rights issues surrounding the music or possibly the way the apps in question access the music library. But without word from Apple, the developers can't be sure. The delays have angered fans, too, one of whom created the petition in hopes of forcing Apple's hand.

Update: One of the applications was just approved. Click through for more info.

Today Adobe released new beta versions of the company's Flash Player and AIR. The Flash Player 10.1 technology now includes HTTP streaming and hardware decoding of H.264 video. The company plans to bring the updated Flash Player to mobile devices too, starting with the Palm Pre and then completing versions for other major smartphones by the first half of 2010 (with the notable exception of the iPhone, of course).

However, out of the two updates, it's Adobe AIR 2 that received the biggest overhaul. The new runtime allows developers to create entirely new types of applications that simply weren't possible using AIR 1. What sort of apps are those? Adobe's gallery of sample apps should give you some ideas of what's to come.

News reverberated through the developer community that long-time and highly prominent community contributor Joe Hewitt has quit developing the iPhone Facebook application. While Joe said that Apple has the right to do what it wants, he does not agree with its policies and has chosen to move on. Joe posted this tweet in the afternoon of November 11th:

"Time for me to try something new. I've handed the Facebook iPhone app off to another engineer, and I'm onto a new project."

At yesterday's Blackberry Developer Conference, several companies announced major updates to their applications and services designed for Blackberry smartphones. From Blackberry maker Research in Motion (RIM) came new geolocation, advertising and push services in addition to other developer tools. Meanwhile, companies like Loopt, eBay, Xobni, and others took the opportunity to show off their latest Blackberry applications as well.