Alex Heath - page 84

Reports surfaced earlier this month that the U.S. Federal Trade Commission (FTC) had begun a probe into Facebook’s proposed $1 billion acquisition of Instagram. No specific reasons were given for the FTC’s probe, but the acquisition was reportedly stalled due to antitrust concerns. It will likely take regulators up to a year to determine if the deal violates U.S. antitrust law.

Facebook will pay Instagram $200 million if the deal falls through. If the FTC approves the acquisition, Instagram’s two co-founders will net $500 million combined.

The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) has been challenging Apple to higher standards for quite some time. Carrying the slogan “defending your rights in the digital world,” the EFF frequently calls out tech companies and related policies when it thinks ramifications could be negative for consumers. The EFF challenged Apple to defend its third-party developers against the Lodsys patent troll, has repeatedly addressed the company’s “anti-competieve” strategies, and so on.

In a new post today, the EFF has proposed that Apple let users of its iOS platform break through the “beautiful crystal prison” and have more control over the OS. The EFF also argues that OS X is becoming more of a restricted platform on the Mac, and that Apple should pave the way for a more open culture leading into the future.

On Friday, May 25th hackers from the Chronic Dev Team released Absinthe 2.0, a tool that jailbreaks iOS 5.1.1 on nearly all iOS devices, including the third-gen iPad. The untethered jailbreak can be performed on an iOS device after downloading the free Absinthe app on any Mac, Windows or Linux computer.

Once again proving that jailbreaking is becoming more mainstream, impressive Absinthe download numbers have been announced from over the weekend.

Rumors have been saying for the past two years that Facebook is working on its own smartphone. According to The New York Times today, Facebook has been hiring former Apple engineers who worked on the iPhone and iPad. The new talent will reportedly help Facebook try to build its own smartphone by next year, according to the report.

The weekend hasn’t arrived quite yet, as Apple has quietly pushed out a revised build of iOS 5.1.1 for the GSM iPhone 4 (AT&T). The update (Build 9B208) is available now only for GSM iPhone 4 owners who have not yet updated to the 5.1.1. If you have a GSM iPhone 4 on 5.1.1 already, you won’t be able to grab this second (seemingly identical) update.

Apple has re-released iOS builds in the past, but this time around there seems to be no known bug fixes or changes. It’s also interesting that the update is only for GSM iPhone 4 owners. Some sort of changes must be included, but Apple has provided no documentation. There’s a chance that updated builds for other devices could pop up, so we’ll keep you posted.

More casting details have surfaced today for the Steve Jobs indie biopic starring Ashton Kutcher. Actress Ahna O’Reilly, most known for her role in The Help, will star opposite Kutcher as Chris-Ann Brennan, the love interest of Steve Jobs.

The biopic, titled jOBS, is expected to start filming next month and be made available later this year.

Now that you’ve successfully jailbroken your iPhone 4S running iOS 5, what do you install? Whether you’re new to Cydia or a jailbreak veteran, we’ve gathered a list of the best jailbreak apps available for Apple’s latest smartphone.

The Chronic Dev Team has pushed out a minor update to its Absinthe 2.0 untethered jailbreak. The tool was only released this morning, but this new update addresses issues where the software can freeze up during the process of jailbreaking. If you’re having trouble jailbreaking your iOS device on iOS 5.1.1 with Absinthe, grab this update now.

Following the Absinthe 2.0 jailbreak for all iOS devices on 5.1.1, a new jailbreak has been released for the second-generation Apple TV running iOS 5.0.1. Firecore has released a big update to Seas0nPass, the tool used to jailbreak the Apple TV, with the latest unther. You can grab the updated tool for free to jailbreak your Apple TV.

The Chronic Dev Team released its Absinthe 2.0 jailbreak this morning for all iOS devices running iOS 5.1.1. This is the first jailbreak available for the newly-released third-gen iPad, and Absinthe 2.0 has already become the Chronic Dev Team’s most successful release to date.

Servers are getting slammed and folks are having a difficult time jailbreaking their devices. Cydia itself seems to be buckling under the weight of all the new jailbreakers today, as repos are failing to load. iDB has also noticed the Cydia errors, so don’t fret if you can’t immediately download jailbreak tweaks and apps.

Now that you’ve had time to jailbreak and explore Cydia on your iPad, what do you install? If you’d like to rest assured knowing that you have the most incredible setup on your jailbroken iPad, then look no further. We’ve collected the very best jailbreak apps and tweaks for Apple’s tablet.

The latest Absinthe untethered jailbreak for iOS has finally been released. After months of waiting, you can download the Chronic Dev Team’s free Absinthe tool to jailbreak your iOS device in a matter of minutes.

We’ll show you how to jailbreak iOS 5.1.1 the right way in this guide.

Like we told you would happen earlier this week, the Chronic Dev Team has released Absinthe 2.0 today, a jailbreak for nearly all iOS devices, including the third-gen iPad, running the newly-released iOS 5.1.1. Absinthe 2.0 is an untethered jailbreak, meaning you won’t have to re-jailbreak every time you reboot your iOS device.

Chronic Dev Team hacker pod2g told the world last weekend that this latest jailbreak was only a “matter of days” away, and it turns out that he was right.

When you jailbreak an iOS device, you are given access to Cydia, the wild west frontier of tweaks, themes and apps you can’t get in Apple’s own App Store. Jailbreaking gives you the freedom to customize your device the way you see fit by installing various plugins, system-level extensions, tweaks and apps from Cydia.

After awhile, you can amass quite a few Cydia apps and packages, and it’s important to keep your purchases and downloads backed up for safe keeping. Whether it’s a jailbreak tweak you paid $2 for or a free one, you don’t want to lose what you find during your jailbreaking career.

Every several months a new jailbreak will come out for the latest version of iOS, and you’ll need to re-jailbreak your iOS device. Restoring to a stock version of iOS before jailbreaking removes all of your jailbreak apps and tweaks. In Cult of Mac’s ultimate roundup, we’ll show you the best ways to backup and restore your Cydia apps on your jailbroken iOS device.

Following a rollout in other iTunes Stores around the world over the last several hours, Panic’s Coda 2 and Diet Coda have officially gone live in the U.S. Mac and iOS App Stores. Panic announced the two apps yesterday by saying that both apps were set to drop on Thursday, May 24th.

A great app called Dropzone had a killer sale yesterday. The Mac app normally sells for $14 in the Mac App Store, but the developer decided to participate in Two Dollar Tuesday and drop the price of Dropzone to only $2.

After taking the gamble, Dropzone made an astounding $8,000 in one day. The dev says the money is “beyond my wildest dreams,” and this reinforces how profitable price cuts in the Mac App Store can be.

MacPaw, makers of CleanMyMac, released a new menubar Mac app today called CleanMyDrive. As a simplified version of CleanMyMac, CleanMyDrive lets you monitor and clean up external hard drives connected to your Mac. The app is super simplistic, and it’s free in the Mac App Store.

A warehouse nestled in the heart of Louisville, Kentucky is home to hundreds of unnamed machines. Each white box gently wields a robotic arm that grips a normal-looking pen. As I walkdown the aisles separating the machines, disjointed sounds of clicks and squeaks fill the air. I’m in the home of Thank You Pen, a new startup that aims to blend technology with good, old-fashioned, dead-tree communication. “And while the service’s creator modestly says he can’t compete with Apple, Thank You Pen is doing what Cards can’t: putting love, care and soul into every card sent.”

Seagate has bought French high-quality digital storage company LaCie for a reported $186 million. LaCie CEO Philippe Spruch will become head of Seagate’s consumer storage products division. LaCie makes Mac-friendly peripherals, and Seagate has been a long-time titan in the data storage business.

Google today launched the 2.0 version of its popular Search iPhone app in the App Store. Sporting a totally new design and multiple speed improvements, Google Search can be downloaded for free in the App Store.

Following an earlier report from The Daily that Microsoft was working on an iPad version of its Office suite, a new report today claims that Microsoft will launch Office for iPad in November of 2012.

Digitimes has been one of the main sources of Apple rumors over the last several years, but anyone who follows Apple will tell you that the Taiwanese publication is more often wrong than right. While Digitimes will correctly predict something like Apple making 3 variants of the iPad 2 (WiFi, GSM, CDMA), it will also publish a story saying that Apple is bringing micro-projectors to the iPhone.

After being placed under the microscope and heavily scrutinized by Harry McCracken of TIME, Digitimes has issued a statement explaining where its Apple rumors come from, and how the publication will do its best to provide more accurate information in the future.

Katy McCaffrey had her iPhone stolen on a cruise ship last month. She had lost hope in recovering her smartphone, but then photos started showing up in her Photo Stream. The handy iCloud service automatically uploads photos taken on an iOS device to a feed that can be viewed on other authenticated devices.

Thanks to Photo Stream, McCaffrey got a look into the world of the man who stole her iPhone.

We told you over the weekend that the untethered jailbreak for iOS devices running iOS 5.1.1 is dropping this week. The hacker who’s been spearheading the upcoming jailbreak, pod2g of the Chronic Dev Team, confirmed that the jailbreak was nearly done and arriving in a “matter of days.”

Coincidentally, the Chronic Dev Team will be presenting at the annual Hack in the Box (HITB) conference this week in Amsterdam, The Netherlands. Since the 5.1.1. jailbreak is expected to drop this week, we’re placing bets on a release this Friday during the team’s keynote.

Apple’s retail stores are among the most profitable in the world, and their success is largely due to the former head of Apple retail, Ron Johnson. Steve Jobs hired Johnson a decade ago to help get the company’s retail division off the ground, and Johnson turned Apple retail into a wildly successful division before leaving to become CEO of JC Penny last year.

Many have heard stories of Johnson and his responsibility in creating the Apple Stores we know and love today. There was, however, another person at Apple who made a profound impact in the early days of the Apple Store.