Alex Heath - page 42

You’ve been waiting for months and months, and it’s finally time. Plants vs. Zombies 2 is finally available in the U.S. App Store after a soft launch last month in Australia and New Zealand.

The download is free, but there are in-app purchases for certain upgrades and power-ups. But it’s not the annoying kind of freemium like Real Racing; you can play through the whole game just fine without having to buy anything. We’ll have a full review up soon.

So what are you waiting for? The sequel to one of the best iOS games in history just came out. Get downloading!

Source: App Store

Since the original iPhone in 2007, the iPhone Photography Awards have been showcasing incredible work from professional and amateur photographers. This year’s IPAA’s are no different, and the winners are on display. Selections were made for over 15 different categories from thousands of photos submitted from 38 countries.

WordPress has released an update to its iOS app that introduces several improvements. Most notably, the app has a new Reader experience for reading posts from followed blogs, liked posts, favorite topics, etc. Automatiic, the company behind WordPress, has also streamlined how the app handles multiple accounts.

One of Apple’s most-touted features in Maps is Flyover, a mode that lets you see a city in stunning 3D imagery. The feature is limited to select metropolitan areas around the globe, but Apple continues to add more locations as Maps matures.

The Norwegian government is currently blocking Apple from taking aerial photography of the country’s capital city, Oslo, due to privacy concerns.

A new report from Bloomberg reiterates previous reports on Apple’s plans for the iPad family this year. According to Bloomberg, the fifth-gen iPad will be thinner with a design that more closely matches the iPad mini. The Wall Street Journal reported the exact same thing this morning. Expect thinner bezels around the display.

Bloomberg has also said that the iPad mini will be Retina-ified “in the last three months of the year” alongside the release of the 10-inch iPad 5. Awhile back there was a scare that we wouldn’t see a Retina iPad mini until 2014 due to manufacturing problems, but things are looking good now.

At this point in the rumor mill, certain bits of news are all but confirmed, like the September 10th date for Apple’s next iPhone event. Bloomberg is backing that date after it was reported by multiple other sources recently. Apple is expected to unveil the iPhone 5S and the iPhone 5C.

Source: Bloomberg

Next Media Animation is a group of Taiwanese animators most famous for their video on the extramarital escapades of Tiger Woods. They’ve also done some pretty funny (and very weird) animated videos on Apple that we’ve covered in the past. A quick perusal of their YouTube channel reveals a trend; covering U.S. news and tabloid stories from an outsiders perspective with a touch of the bizarre.

The latest to come from NMA is a surprisingly informative breakdown of what to expect from the iPhone 5S and iPhone 5C, unannounced devices Apple is expected to launch this fall.

The animation is about as odd as it gets, and you shouldn’t watch if cartoonish decapitation and other bloody injuries disturb you. Please put down the chainsaw, Tim Cook.

Facebook released an update for its iOS app today that adds support for hashtags, an aspect of Twitter that Facebook recently added on its desktop site. Users can now add hashtags in statuses and such to filter topics.

Another notable new feature is the ability to make a restaurant reservation within the Facebook app through OpenTable. Using “Nearby Places” and official pages for restaurants that have added OpenTable integration, Facebook users can quickly make reservations without needing to open a separate Web page or app. Apple has integrated OpenTable into Siri to help make restaurant reservations as well.

TV listing information for U.S. prime-time shows and movie pages are now displayed in the app, too. Facebook notes that today’s update also introduces “faster loading and a cleaner design for timelines on iPad,” so be sure to grab it in the App Store.

Source: App Store

The rumor mill is starting to kick into full gear when it comes to Apple’s plans for the iPhone lineup in 2013. Over the weekend, it was reported that Apple would be holding an iPhone event on September 10th, and the company is widely expected to unveil not one, but two new models: the iPhone 5S and iPhone 5C. The 5S will be the successor to the flagship iPhone 5 and sport upgraded specs, while the 5C will have a plastic back and come in multiple colors.

When it comes to the iPhone 5S, this year’s upgrade could be pretty predictable—A7 chip, better cameras, etc. But then there’s the bet that Apple will do something radically different with the hardware and add a fingerprint sensor. Now the 5S could feature a redesigned home button made of sapphire. And we can’t forget about the iPhone 5C…

The Disney Legends Award is presented annually to a person who has left a significant impact on The Walt Disney Corporation. This year, the late Steve Jobs received the honor, and last night John Lasseter accepted the award on Jobs’s behalf at the D23 Expo. Lasseter is the Chief Creative Officer at Pixar, a studio Jobs co-founded, and Walt Disney Animation Studios. He created Toy Story and is arguably the most influential and iconic storyteller in the history of animation.

Disney CEO Bob Iger announced the award before bringing Lasseter onstage to accept. Both men were friends with Jobs, and Lasseter got choked up a few times while sharing stories about Jobs’s influence on the early days of Pixar.

Thanks: Ricky

The final season of Breaking Bad begins tonight on AMC, and if you’re like me, you can’t get enough of the show. Fans like myself need to check out Breaking Bad: Alchemy, an awesome book from the show’s creators. It was my pick on Faves n’ Raves during the last CultCast.

Apple will hold its next iPhone event on Tuesday, September 10th, according to AllThingsD, a site that has a spotless track record when it comes to predicting these dates. Last year’s event for the iPhone 5 was held on Wednesday, September 12th.

T-Mobile is abruptly ending its ‘$0 Down Summer Sale’ on the iPhone 5 and 4S tomorrow. The promotion allowed customers to walk out of a store with a new iPhone and no upfront charges. The cost of the phone was then recouped through smaller, monthly payments.

As of Saturday, newer iPhones can only be bought on T-Mobile with a larger upfront payment that more closely matches the subsidized retail cost at other carriers.

In the ongoing antitrust case regarding e-book price fixing, the presiding judge has denied Apple’s plea for mercy over the Department of Justice’s ruling proposal. The DoJ found Apple guilty of conspiring with publishers to raise prices on e-books with the iBookstore, and Apple continues to plead not guilty despite the fact that all of the publishers have settled outside of court.

The United States International Trade Commission (ITC) has ruled in favor of Apple today by finding Samsung guilty of patent infringement in two cases. This marks the ITC’s final ruling from the original complaint Apple filed against Samsung back in 2011, reports FOSS Patents. Apple won a decisive victory against Samsung last year that involved over a half billion dollars in damages, and President Obama recently vetoed a sales ban on older Apple products that the ITC had awarded Samsung.

KeyMe is a New York-based startup that has released an iPhone app for storing and and securely sharing digital copies of physical keys. Yes, you read that right. Instead of going completely digital and abandoning the concept of a traditional lock and key altogether, KeyMe is blending the analog with the digital.

The app stores pictures you take on your iPhone of your key, and in the event of a lockout, the digital copy can be given to a locksmith.

Remember Twitter’s #music app for the iPhone? No? Well you’re not alone. The app has only been around since April and it has already faded into the App Store’s deep recess of obscurity. It hasn’t stayed on any of the top charts while apps like Spotify and Rdio continue to gain in popularity.

But Twitter isn’t giving up just yet. Today an update was released to #music that brings more tools for discovering music, including the ability to scan an iPhone’s music library.

iOS 7 is a radical departure from anything Apple has done design wise, but OS X Mavericks largely still looks like the Mac operating system we all know and love. Much of the leather and linen has been removed in Mavericks, but the OS hasn’t been fundamentally redesigned like iOS.

A designer from the U.K. named Stu Crew sent us his “Ivericks” concept for OS X that blends the design language of iOS 7 with the desktop. “In order to visualise the new style on a Mac screen I recreated several elements and applied them to several programs,” said Crew. “Created to explore the idea of an updated OS X, this is just a update of looks with a few new functions taken from both the iPhone and iPad.”

Parts for Apple’s rumored low-cost iPhone, recently dubbed the ‘iPhone 5C’, have been trickling out of the supply chain overseas for the past few months. We’ve seen nearly all facets of the upcoming device, including a slew of bright colors Apple is considering for the plastic back.

China has been historically known as the homeland for cheap Apple knockoffs, and the unreleased iPhone 5C is no exception. Thanks to the wealth of leaked parts that are floating around, you can buy a hollow iPhone 5C right now for 98 Chinese Yuan.

Popular music video platform Vevo is working on its own channel for the Apple TV, according to a new report from AdAge. The channel will offer free access to premium music videos 24-7, and Vevo will likely use ads to make money. Vevo already offers a free iOS app that plays short ads between videos.

On the Apple TV, Vevo will probably create an experience akin to Vevo TV, the company’s free, round-the-clock internet station that shows music videos and is supported by ads.

Because the Apple TV doesn’t have an open SDK for developers, Apple has to reach out to content makers specifically. More channels have been added to the Apple TV in recent months from the likes of HBO and ESPN.

Source: AdAge

T-Mobile only recently started selling the iPhone, and it has proven to be a very good thing for the struggling carrier. By marketing itself as the hip “Un-Carrier” that charges less up front, T-Mobile is starting to see better days.

After the company reported healthy growth in its quarterly earnings report today, CEO John Legere made some comments about T-Mobile’s relationship with Apple. He said the carrier looks forward to carrying a “whole array” of Apple products in the future, hinting at more than just the iPhone. Could the iPad be next for T-Mobile after Apple announces new devices this fall?

You know the little Location Services triangle in the top right of your iPhone’s status bar well. It floats there faithfully every day, representing modern technology’s obsession with location data. Knowing where you are and what you do on a daily basis is incredibly valuable to advertisers and merchants looking to sell the next “x because you where at x.” Knowing your location also makes apps and iOS smarter, which ultimately makes the experience of using your iPhone more seamless.

If you’ve had Location Services turned on, then you’ve already been giving Apple permission to silently track your every move. A new setting in iOS 7 called “Frequent Locations” makes how and to what level you are tracked more transparent, right down to the minute you left your house yesterday.

Apple has released OS X Mavericks Developer Preview 5 today following the release of the fourth preview two weeks ago. The update is available via the Mac App Store for registered developers already on the Mavericks beta, and a direct download is available in the Mac Dev Center. Apple’s iBooks for Mac app has been included for the first time in this particular beta release. General stability and performance issues have also been addressed.

The eighth beta of OS X Mountain Lion 10.8.5 was also seeded today. 10.8.5 will likely be the last Mountain Lion update to come out before Mavericks is released to the public this fall.

Apple has been generally sticking to a two-week release cycle for Mavericks and iOS 7 betas this summer, despite the Dev Center outage. Mavericks is continuing to get more stable with each preview release, and the finishing touches are being put on 10.8.5.

Source: Apple

Infuse is my favorite third-party media player for the iPhone and iPad. And until VLC for iOS returned to the App Store, there was really no competition. FireCore, the maker of Infuse, isn’t letting other apps get the last word. In today’s big update, Infuse has received a number of great features, including support for AirPlay and file transfers over Wi-Fi.

After using iOS 7 for a couple of months, I’ve been missing some of the gorgeous iPhone themes that are out there for jailbreakers. You may think that theming iOS 6 is pointless when Apple’s next-gen OS is right around the corner, but one of the most prolific designers in the jailbreak community doesn’t agree.

We’ve highlighted Sentry’s work multiple times on Cult of Mac, and he’s most famous for Auxo, a popular app switcher replacement tweak. Aplo is a new Winterboard theme from Sentry that has been in the works for quite some time, and it’s drop-dead gorgeous.

Fitness trackers are a dime a dozen these days. Good fitness trackers are a little harder to find, but they’re out there. With rumors swirling that Apple itself is getting into wearables, everyone is getting into what is quickly becoming a very crowded market.

Shine is a new product from Misfit, a startup co-founded by former Apple CEO John Sculley, that takes a unique approach to monitoring physical activity. It comes with a gorgeous iPhone app, and it’s designed to clip onto more than your wrist.