The best ideas are famously (stereotypically, perhaps) captured on the back of a napkin. That’s the thing that’s been closest to hand at a zillion restaurant or coffee shop tables when great minds have got together and come up with something new.
Ink is a new, free digital napkin for the modern era. It’s also an exercise in minimalism, designed to replicate that napkin and the pencil you’d scribble on it with and nothing more.
Twitter has updated one its Mac applications today, but no, it’s not the Twitter app. It’s TweetDeck, which now offers a number of new features, and more than 90 fixes for previous issues. The update brings the native TweetDeck client in line with TweetDeck for Google Chrome.
Here’s a new free puzzle game for young and old alike. It’s called Quento, and it’s colorful, addictive, and more difficult than it looks.
This is Hundreds, a game from the same people who brought you Canablat and Wurdle, among others.
Hundreds is a multi-touch tapping challenge for your mind and your reflexes. Rather like Letterpress, it has a gorgeous minimalist look to it. Where so many games are all about collecting stars, this one encourages you to look for empty spaces.
eBay has issued updates to its iOS apps this week to introduce a number of features that promise to make selling from your iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch a much more pleasant process. When listing a new item, the apps will now help you choose a category for your item — just like the website does — and they’ll help you select the right shipping charges. What’s more, you can now start listings on your iOS devices and finish them off on your desktop — or vice versa.
Izik is a new web search app from the makers of Blekko, a web search engine for people who are looking for a change from Google.
You could be forgiven for saying “Blekwhat?” there. Although it’s been around for a few years now, Blekko isn’t what most people think of when they go looking for somewhere else to search.
But that doesn’t mean you should dismiss it without trying it. Blekko does search pretty well in your browser, and this app is a decent attempt to do search differently on your iPad too.
You like robots? You’re gonna love this. This is an iPad app all about robots. Just robots, nothing but robots, loads and loads and loads of robots. It’s made of robots, in the same way we are made of meat. It’s fantastic.
Smartphones and tablets have been the hottest Christmas gifts in recent years, and the 2012 holidays were by far the biggest yet for Android and iOS. A new study from mobile analytics firm Flurry has found that a record-breaking 17.4 million Android and iOS devices were activated on Christmas Day, leading to an equally record-breaking 328 million app downloads.
Hackulous has announced that it has shut down Installous, the one-stop shop for “cracked” or pirated apps and games on iOS. The team blames “stagnant” forums and the difficulty in moderating them as the reason behind its decision to kill the service, which will undoubtedly be a huge victory against iOS software piracy. At least for now.
My hands shake worse than a crack addict when I take video. I’m too cheap to go buy a tripod, so I just don’t try and take video anymore. There’s a new app that’s ready to cure some of my problems though. It’s called Cycloramatic and it’s the most amazing app you’re going to see today.
Rather than forcing you to buy a tripod to take perfect 360º videos, Cycloramic uses the vibrations of your iPhone 5 to swivel around and get a clean shot every time.
The second-generation Nest thermostat has begun reaching Apple retail stores across the United States and Canada just in time for Christmas. Designed by Tony Fadell, a former Apple employee who’s often referred to as the father of the iPod, the Nest thermostat is an intelligent device that learns exactly how warm or how cool you like your home to be at different times during the day. It can also be controlled remotely via your computer or iOS device.
While Apple has managed to keep the App Store free from malware, it seems the Cupertino company has a hard time filtering out scams. Every so often, a shameless developer tries their luck at selling a title that promises to be something it isn’t. The latest claims to be a Halo 4 clone that is “iPhone/iPad exclusive.” They’ve gone through the trouble of writing a lengthy App Store description in an effort to fool you into thinking it’s the real thing. But in reality, it’s just a $4.99 game of chess.
Lekh Diagram is a clever and potentially useful diagramming app for iPad, “free” on the App Store, but not if you want to make serious use of it.
Apple’s App Store is widely considered the king of mobile marketplaces — even Android fanatics will admit that it offers a greater selection of high-quality apps and games. But it’s Google Play that’s currently seeing the most growth, according to the latest data from app analytics firm Distimo, while the App Store enjoys more than four times as much revenue.
Borderlands 2 from Aspyr is now available to download at the Mac App Store, almost exactly a month after it debuted on Steam — and there’s good news and bad news.
New on the App Store, and just in time for a Christmas gift to a Beatles fan, is this rather lovely app collating 250 of John Lennon’s letters. It’s been made with affection for the great man, and provides an interesting insight into his mind.
So, it’s finally here — Google released an official Google Maps app for the iPhone, and we love it. Not only is it back with a brand new look, it also has new features, and of course, the accurate data we’ve all been missing since Apple released iOS 6. Also in our roundup is a brand new 1Password app from AgileBits, a new Flickr app from Yahoo!, and more.
When Apple rolled out a new App Store redesign with iOS 6, the Cupertino company removed the ability for customers to gift apps and games to their friends via email. Just in time for Christmas, that’s now back, making gift-giving for those getting new iOS devices a whole lot easier.
Ok, so we may not be rockstars (yet), but we just hit 1,000,000 downloads of The CultCast, our fun, quirky, totally off-base podcast covering everything in the wonderful world of Apple. That’s like earning a platinum record! Now we know what Led Zeppelin felt like… But we couldn’t have done it without our smart, good-looking, worldwide audience supporting us all the way. If you’ve ever listened to an episode of The CultCast, thank you, we love you, and we would like to hold your hand.
But enough self sycophancy! On our newest episode, we talk Google Maps reborn on iOS. We’ll tell you what we love, what we don’t, and if it scratches the itch we’ve all had since the demise of the last Google Maps.
Plus: why Twitter wants to be your next Instagram, and a new Flickr app rises from the ashes—but is it too little too late?
Join us on our newest CultCast! Subscribe now on iTunes, or easily stream new and previous episodes via Apple’s free Podcasts App.
App making is competitive as ever and it’s only going to get more so. Apps are an awesome opportunity for entrepreneurs to turn an idea into a profitable product with little monetary investment. The problem is, everyone knows this and is trying to get their piece of the pie.
With that in mind, The Mobile App Design Starter Kit is exactly what any independent app creator needs to get ahead of the game.
There are a lot of great ideas hidden behind terribly designed apps. We all know the typical reasons for poor design – pricey professional designer prices, lack of themes, or mobile app design just being difficult in general – but what this Cult of Mac deal offers is a comprehensive kit that includes everything you need to give your app a snazzy design that will make it stick out among the competition for only $57.
The future of Microsoft’s SkyDrive service on iOS looks bleak today as the company appears to have entered into a fight with Apple over its 30% cut of App Store revenues. Microsoft recently gave iOS users the ability to upgrade their SkyDrive subscriptions from their iPhones and iPads, but until the company agrees to give Apple a 30% cut of the in-app purchases, it won’t get any future updates approved.
A critical bug fix that prevents the app from crashing has now had to be placed on hold. Should Apple’s rules be a little more flexible in certain cases?
Are you constantly sending your buddies in the office links to funny Imgur pictures or hilarious YouTube videos? Is that why your office IT department shut down any non-corporate instant messaging services on the office network? Do you still want to send your co-workers funny links to lighten the monotony of the cubicle farm you all work in?
Whatever the reason, if you want to be able to send and receive links quickly and easily without having to copy and paste them into an IM client or email, The Great Link may be the app for you. It’s easy to set up and simple to use. Here’s how.
We liked Cobook first time round, when it appeared on OS X as a clever little contacts database hidden inside a tiny Menu Bar icon. Now it’s on iPhone, and just as clever as before.
Apple’s holiday tradition of giving away freebies for Christmas continues this year with the re-launch of their 12 Days of Christmas App. The app actually looks and functions exactly like last year’s 12 Days of Christmas app.
Like previous versions of the app, 12 Days of Christmas will give away a selection of songs, music videos, apps, and books for free. Each giveaway item is only available for 24-hours so this is an app you’ll want to keep tabs on.
Keen internet users might already be familiar with speedtest.net, the website that lets you check exactly how fast your internet connection is. Now it’s available as an app too.