Hardest Game Ever 2 joins the top free Android app this week at No. 10, according to research from Google Play. The gaming app from Organnose Studio measures users reaction time through quick puzzles.

Below, we’ve listed the top free Android apps of the week. The list links to Google Play’s research about the individual apps, including user reviews.

As part of Mediabistro’s Media App Summit which took place last year, we spotlight the top free apps every week–helping our readers discover, enjoy and analyze successful content. Read more

Amazon Publishing has introduced a new publishing platform dedicated to fan fiction called Kindle Worlds.

The platform is designed to let writers create fan fiction based on a range of original stories and characters. And using licenses, writers can earn royalties from their work. Amazon has licenses for Gossip Girl, Pretty Little Liars, and Vampire Diaries, and plans to announce more soon.

Amazon will 35% of net revenue for works at least 10,000 words. Amazon Publishing is also piloting a new program for  short works which run between 5,000 and 10,000 words. These short stories, which are typically priced less than $1, Amazon will pay the royalties for the World’s rights holder and pay authors a digital royalty of 20%. Read more

Elvenkind: Rise of the Dark Ones by Ola Olsson is today’s Free eBook of the Day.

The novel is the first of three fantasy novels that involves elf murders. Check it out:

Elvenkind Trilogy: Have you ever wondered how an elven race could get divided into several sub-races? This is one version, spanning millennia in a world where only elves live. Book 1: In a world where elves live in tranquil and enlightenment, no one could have known that a single boy’s desire to live, could lead to so much death and suffering.

The eBook is available through Smashwords. To get it for free, use the coupon code UC26T. It’s good until May 27th.

For more free eBooks, check out our Free eBook of the Day archive.

Disney’s has released a new iOS app to help parents share family photos from their smartphone and make a story out of it. It’s called Story.

The app accesses a user’s camera roll and the user can add photos and videos to the app to create a story. Users can write captions and create spreads of their various pictures and content. They can add pages of text, themes and layouts.

These photo stories are designed to be shared. So a user can simply tap to share with friends on Facebook or via email. The photos are not public, and a friend or family member will need an invitation to view a story. Stories can also be embedded onto a website or blog. The app is also synced with iCloud, so that users can back up all of their stories.

A placebo app may be a hard pill for your brain to swallow, but it’s  fairly innocuous and relatively simple. How does a virtual placebo even work? As it turns out, placebos have been shown to be effective despite users being told a placebo was being used. Harnessing this mental illusion is the key to making your smart phone a virtual medicine cabinet, one that could travel with you so long as you have your phone.

If this idea strikes you as palpable, then you might be the right candidate for the Placebo Mobile App campaign on Indiegogo. The project is seeking to raise the necessary funds for Android and iPhone apps. The app allows you to select and personalize your placebo – along with alerts for you to take them at an appointed time. Read more

Parking your car just got easier for Android users. ParkMe, the free iOS app that helps you find parking spots based on your location, is now available as an Android app.

The free app uses your location information to identify parking options in your vicinity. The app serves up a map with information on parking lost and garages in your area, as well as the rates that these places charge to help you compare costs. Once you find a lot you’d like to park in, the app will give you directions direct to the lot’s driveway, not just their street address.

Using a meter or a lot with limited time available? The app also has a parking timer to help you avoid getting a ticket or getting towed. In some markets, the tool also has a real time space view tool, so that you can see how many spots are actually available in real time.

While The New York Times is currently focusing on print, online, apps, and even Google Glass experiences today, the company has a lab in which they think about how readers might want to consume its content in the future.

In a talk at the AppNation conference in New York today, Michael Zimbalist, VP of research & development operations at The New York Times Co., revealed that his team is thinking about the next place that consumers will want to read news. He imagines a world in which the news is available on your coffee table or your bathroom mirror, if of course, these items become connected.

“In the lab we envision a world where everything is connected,” said Zimbalist.

The media company is testing a Google Glass app, and Zimbalist says that whether Google Glass is the thing that wins, he does experience that soon we’ll have a connected hub in our pockets beyond just mobile phones. “Instead of looking at maps, your right shoe [will be] buzzing when you have to turn… your wallet ringing when [your] kid away at college has just exceeded their credit card limit,” he said, explaining that five years ago people would have scratched their head, but today it’s easier to imagine. “

Publishers looking to get into the app business should not just adapt their online content for the mobile web, argued David Kenny, chairman/CEO of The Weather Company, said in a keynote interview at the AppNation conference in New York this morning.

“It is a big mistake to think it works like the web, it is a very different experience,” he said. “They are checking the weather six times a day. Our mobile users are  making decisions on the fly, you’ve got to flow into that.”

Kenny ought to know. The Weather Channel’s apps have been downloaded 106 million times and the business is growing, and the company’s mobile business is the fastest growing part of its business both in usage and in monetization. The company employs about a hundred mobile engineers to develop and improve mobile products every day.  The company feeds their weather forecasts into 15,000 other apps including Facebook. Read more

Using video chats over AT&T’s cellular network is impossible, but the company is giving assurances that it  is working to resolve the issue by the end of this year. The service, or lack or service, renders new video chatting apps like Google Hangout ineffective.

AT&T has only allowed iOS users access to Facetime as recently last year after blocking the service, citing its own policy for prioritizing pre-loaded apps. There’s no telling how many customers have left the company for better video features, but with T-Mobile’s  new 4G wireless network, AT&T is no longer dealing with just Verizon’s superior connections.

Here’s the full announcement on The Verge:

Read more

Guncrafter joins the top free iPhone apps list this week at No. 9 free iPhone app this week, according to research from AppData. The Naquatic app encourages users to build their own virtual guns.

Below, we’ve listed the top free iPhone apps of the week. The list links to Inside Network’s research about the individual apps, including historical charts, developer information and download information.

To support Mediabistro’s Media App Summit, we spotlight the top free apps every week–helping our readers discover, enjoy and analyze successful content. Read more