Steve Jobs passed away on October 5th, 2011, but his influence is sure to be felt for decades to come. As such, many artists across the globe have created mural, statues, paintings and other tributes to Steve Jobs and his amazing contributions to the tech world.

More statues and works of art are in the works for the man who revolutionized the personal computers, music, animation, smartphones and tablets, but here are some of the best coolest Steve Jobs memorials we’ve found.

Inventions of Steve Jobs – Exhibit at WIPO

The United States Patent Office Museum in Alexandria, Virginia created a monument of 30 gigantic iPhones to celebrate the 300 patents held by Steve Jobs. Each iPhone displayed 12 of Jobs’ patents certificates. The exhibit aimed to display the far-reaching impact of Steve Jobs’ entrepreneurship and innovation on our daily lives, while also serving as an example of the role intellectual property plays in the global marketplace.

Wax Model of Steve Jobs at Madame Tussauds

Madame Tussauds Wax Mueseums are renowned for their life-like representations of famous celebrities, so to mark the first anniversary of Steve Jobs’s death, the Hong Kong branch unveiled a wax statue of his Steveness himself. The  wax figure was modeled after the photos taken for his iconic Fortune Magazine cover in 2006.

To create this wax figure of a cutting-edge technologist, sculptors used methods that have been around for over 200 years, rather than embracing modern methods that remove a sculptor’s ability to manipulate each aspect of the design personally. The estimated cost of the figure is just under $200,000.

Steve Jobs Statue in Budapest

Hungarian sculptor Erno Toth unveiled his 6 1/2 feet tall bronze statue of Steve Jobs a few months after he passed away in 2011. The statue was commissioned by Gabor Bojar, founder of Hungarian software company Graphisoft. Steve Jobs and Bojar actually had a history of working together that stretched back to 1984, when Jobs came across Bojar’s software and was impressed enough to help the fledgling company out with cash and computers.

Interactive Jobs Memorial in St. Petersburg, Russia

If you happen to wander into the courtyard of St. Petersburg’s National Research University of Information Technologies, Mechanics and Optics (quite the mouthful), you will now find a giant iPhone. The monument stands about as tall as a fully grown man and a huge screen displays photos, videos and text about the late Apple co-founder.

The monument was unveiled to the public after the Progress IT Fund held a competition last year to see who would design the tribute. The winner was designed by Gleb Tarasov and named “Sunny QR Code.” The name refers to a QR code on the monument itself that links to a memorial website for Jobs. Not sure what the “Sunny” stands for.

Steve Jobs Monument in Odessa, Ukraine

Crafted by Ukranian artist, Cryil Maksimenko, the monument was installed in Odessa, Ukraine on the one year anniversary of Steve Jobs’s death.  The hand features an Apple logo in the middle and is comprised of numerous gears, screws, bearings and other pieces from bicycles, motorcycles and cars, which took over a year to fashion together.  Pretty fascinating when you look at it up close.

A Post-It Note Memorial Portrait of Steve Jobs at the Munich Apple Store

In the wake of his death, thousands of admirers flocked to Apple Stores across the globe and wrote their thanks to Steve on Post-It notes. A team of Apple fans took their tribute a bit further by creating this Steve Jobs portrait comprised of 4,001 stickies on the glass facade of an Apple Store in Munich, Germany.

The Steve Jobs Building at Pixar

Steve Jobs is mostly associated with Apple, but before he made his triumphant return to Apple and introduced the iPod, Jobs poured millions of his own money into Pixar. By keeping the company financially shored, John Lasseter and his team of animators were able to change movies forever with hit after animated hit. Now, Jobs has a permanent home on Pixar’s campus now that the studio’s main building has been renamed in his honor.

Graffiti Mural of Jobs in Buenos Aries

Mario Calvo created this Steve Jobs graffiti portrait in tribute to Steve Jobs’ legacy. The mural is located on the front of an advertising agency in Palermo district of Buenos Aries Argentina and took more then five days to paint.

Steve’s star at the Entrepreneur Walk of Fame at MIT

Modeled after the Hollywood Walk of Fame in California, the Entrepreneur Walk of Fame at Kendall Square in Cambridge, MA, opened for the first time in 2011. Included among the seven inaugural inductees were Steve Jobs, Thomas Edison, Bill Hewlett, David Packard, Bob Swanson, Bill Gates and Mitch Kapor.

Steve Jobs Avenue in Jundiai, Brazil

The small city of Jundiai is located near São Paulo, honored Steve Jobs by renaming one of its streets ‘Steve Jobs Ave.’ The street’s name isn’t the town’s only tie to Apple though. The avenue is the route that connects the small city to Brazil’s largest city — Sao Paulo, where Apple supplier Foxconn opened a iPhone assembly plant and is home to Foxconn’s new iPad plant, too.

Recreation of Steve Jobs Time cover made of apples

Artist Olivier Lefebvre created this Steve Jobs tribute by using over 3,500 apples to recreate one of Steve Jobs’ portraits from Time magazine.  The enormous portrait is 22 feet tall by 15 feet wide. Olivier brought in crates of deer apples and used a 2’x2′ grid system to guide his creation. The project took about 50 hours to complete and was left intact after completion but the orchard’s three resident deer eventually ate the remains.

“Bad Apples Spoil The Bunch” in Cincinnati

At some point between the time Steve passed away on October 5th and the morning of October 6th, a mural celebrating his life was created in a local neighborhood.  The original art on the wall originally read ‘Bad Apples Spoil the Bunch’ but it was changed to read ‘Good Apples Better The Bunch’ with a picture of the 80s Apple Icon.

Pixar’s Steve Jobs Tree

Not only did Pixar decide to name its main building after Steve Jobs, but if you wander the campus grounds you’ll come across this tree in front of the Steve Jobs Building which was also dedicated to Steve Jobs by John Lasseter and the rest of the employees at Pixar.

The big screen biopic Jobs opened this summer to mixed reviews, primarily over the film’s lack of accuracy in depicting events from Steve Jobs life and Apple’s history. It’s not the first movie out about Jobs and it definitely won’t be the last as filmmakers strive to tell a celluloid version of the life of the mercurial Apple co-founder.

A lot of Apple old-timers have commented on the accuracy of the movie, but it took a Mountain View, CA local-access TV show called John Wants Answers to get Steve Wozniak, Daniel Kottke and Andy Hertzfeld together to dish fact from fiction. Host John Vink has a long history with the Cupertino company; he was an engineer at Apple from 1996 to 2012 and currently heads Macintosh desktop engineering for Nest Labs.

The two-hour discussion went through the film scene by scene, peppered with entertaining banter and some surprising recollections from the panel. Dan Kottke, who also worked as a script consultant on the movie, noted that “in making that film, it was a huge choice of where to start it and where to end it…I thought the movie did a pretty good job of getting the emotional notes right.”

Read on to know more about why no one ever got fired over kerning, had to ask what a Macintosh was and why you should watch TV movie Pirates of Silicon Valley.

Fact Versus Fiction

The general consensus was that events, dates, facts and fiction were occasionally conflated to tell a better story. Many scenes were partially correct, but key details were altered. Some events portrayed were complete fiction, and the chronology wasn’t always right.

One example is the story of the Apple I and the Homebrew Computer Club. In Jobs the film, a young Steve Jobs stumbles across Wozniak’s new creation – a computer with a keyboard and screen – and becomes mesmerized staring into the TV monitor. He then sells the idea of a computing revolution to a reluctant Woz and convinces his shy companion to bring his system to the Homebrew Computer Club.

Woz spoke at length about what really happened:

“Steve and I both had gone over to a friend’s house, Captain Crunch, John Draper of the old blue box phone phreaking fame,” recalled Wozniak. “He sat down at a terminal, a teletype, and he started typing. Then he began playing chess with a computer in Boston.” Woz and Jobs were dumbfounded.

“Whoa!” said Woz. I thought: “this is just like Pong. I have to have this ability.”

Woz got some chips, an expensive keyboard ($60 – uppercase only) and wired the thing into his TV set. “This was not a computer, this was a terminal,” said Woz, “But it was a very short step before that terminal just got a little addition that made it a computer.”

Soon Woz made those additions and while Jobs was off at college, he started going to the HomeBrew computer club. Every two weeks, Wozniak hauled his TV set in the car, set up everything on a table in the lobby and started programming in earnest. Soon crowds began gathering and he started showing off his creation.

The buzz was growing, so Woz recalled that during one time Jobs was back home, “I pulled him to the club and showed him all the people around me. And he got the idea that we could sell them. I would have given them away for free.” The HomeBrew computer club already was full of people who wanted to change the world and Woz wanted to help.

“This is the complete opposite of the movie,” interjected show host John Vink. “In the movie we had Steve Jobs trying to convince you [Woz] to come to HomeBrew and you said ‘Nah, I don’t wanna go.'”

“Oh no,” replied Wozniak, “I’d been there since day one.”

What’s a Macintosh?

The development of Lisa and Macintosh were seminal events for the future of Apple. The group concurred that the scene where the Lisa team was chewed out for not having multiple fonts in the word processor was complete fiction. Nobody was fired for a lack of typefaces or kerning, but they did note that a different engineer at Apple was fired around that same time for not wanting to undertake the effort to build a mouse for the system.

Many of the celluloid scenes did portray parts of events accurately, with dramatic effect added for flair. One clip included in the trailer portrays Jobs drafting a young Andy Hertzfeld for the Macintosh team. When Hertzfeld asks for more time to continue working on his Apple II project, Jobs yanks the computer off his desk and says “you’re working on the Macintosh team now.” Then a quick cut to Apple employee Bill Fernandez, who asks “What’s a Macintosh?”

Via email I asked the panel if that was how things really happened, or just good theater?

All three agreed that the Mac project was not a secret around Apple engineers and management at that time.

Nobody would ever have asked “What’s a Macintosh?” That line was just tossed in for dramatic effect, and Fernandez was actually working in Japan at that time. But Hertzfeld did confirm that he lost his computer in the transition.

“[Jobs] came by my desk and said “you’re working on the Mac now’,” said Hertzfeld. “I had just started this new OS for the Apple II, DOS 4.0… and I wanted to get it in good enough shape that someone else could take it over. Steve said ‘Are you kidding? The Apple II’s obsolete, the Apple II’s gonna be dead, you gotta work on the Mac!”

Hertzfeld pleaded for more time, but ultimately to no avail. “Then he unplugged my computer and carried it away. So I had no choice but to go after him!”

The Mac Failed Terribly

Some of the most animated discussion centered around Jobs departure from Apple in 1985 and the initial failure of the Macintosh project. They felt the movie didn’t accurately portray why Jobs was removed from the Mac team.

Woz: “The real situation was that the Mac failed terribly. Totally. We built a factory to build 50,000 of them and we were selling 500 a month. Steve had cancelled projects because they could only sell 2,000 a month.”

“I think he was taking it real hard that he’d failed for a third computer he’d tried to create and his vision really didn’t understand you have to build a market, it takes time, you aren’t going to sell 50,000 on day one. And meanwhile, we had to save the company.”

Jobs wanted to cancel or hamstring the Apple II in favor of the Macintosh, but it was important to continue selling and marketing the older system for a few more years. It generated most of the revenue. That was the primary business decision.

Hertzfeld chimed in: “I tell that story a little bit differently. The Mac did sell a lot of units initially, because of its novelty, because of its positive qualities. In June of 1984 it sold over 60,000 units. So they upped the forecast because Christmas was the big time and they thought they’d sell 80,000 units.”

But sales fell off steeply after the back-to-school rush in early fall, and by the end of the year sales were down to about 1,000 a month.

“When the Macs weren’t selling, a major mistake they made was trying to focus it on the office market,” recalled Hertzfeld. This was the time of the Lemmings commercial, a disastrous followup to the wildly successful 1984 spot. “The whole Macintosh Office thing never really got developed. The Mac needed a hard disk, that was really the biggest single design mistake that we made.”

Kottke: “And meanwhile Lisa had a hard drive.”

Woz: “Patience, patience, patience. Don’t put out a machine when it’s not a good enough machine for the price you’re selling this year. Work on it, work on it, work on it, and put it out when it is a good enough machine to sell at the price you’re offering.”

Steve Jobs and Apple clearly learned that lesson in the post-NeXT period.

Woz: “The Lisa was the right machine, with the right amount of RAM, but it was the wrong year for pricing. We finally got the Lisa back when we got OS X, actually, that’s what I like to say.”

Summing Things Up

The panel generally thought the that TV movie Pirates of Silicon Valley was a better portrayal of events of this period. Regarding Jobs, “there was no sense of suspense about this movie” said Wozniak. It didn’t show Steve’s thought process, how he reasoned and argued with people.

Hertzfeld noted that both movies had good acting, but Pirates had the better script. He felt that Jobs often felt like a laundry list of incidents instead of something which would show a deeper meaning.

Kottke said the producers of the film faced many decisions about what to put in and what to leave out, such as details about Pixar and NeXT. He said the filmmakers had tried very hard to get things right.

But one of Kottke’s most surprising memories might have been a quick quip to Woz: “Did you not love the Apple III? Because we all thought it was great!”

For more fascinating details, you can watch the entire two hour episode of John Wants Answers on YouTube. Source: John Wants Answers

Image: Photos: Jeff Lee

This is the Cult of Mac’s exclusive column written by an actual Apple retail store genius. Our genius must remain anonymous, but other than “Who are you, anyway?” ask anything you want about what goes on behind that slick store facade.  

Answers will be published first in Cult of Mac’s Magazine on Newsstand. Send your questions to news AT cultofmac.com with “genius” in the subject line.

1. How much do you get paid, what hours do you work and how much continual study is required?

I get paid about $14 an hour. Pay ranges anywhere from $10-$20 an hour in the retail stores depending on position, hours, and performance. I work about 30 hours a week because I am part-time, usually on the shy side so I can keep my part-time status. My hours vary but they always fit my personal schedule because each employee submits their hours of availability and is scheduled accordingly, after approval.

As far as training goes, Apple actively trains its workforce. We are trained before we begin the job to deliver superior service and we are trained on new systems, products and software as they become available. If you are looking to advance, Apple will help train you to be ready for any future positions. I was surprised by the non-technical nature of training when I started at Apple. Most of the training I received was customer-service oriented and the technical training I needed for the job was either previous experience or was gained as I encountered issues and sought out a solution.

2. The modem of my TV cable company sits next to my TV. My new iMac is on the upper floor where I receive half the speed using a Wi-Fi connection.

To boost my Wi-Fi signal to the upper floor, do I need to buy two Apple extreme products? One connected to the router of my cable company using ethernet? And the other as a repeater via Wi-Fi?

Wi-Fi signal issues can be pretty complex. Performance will vary greatly depending on your network configuration and type as well as your household size. The simple answer is no, you do not need two AirPort Extremes.

Depending on your household size, you may be able setup one Airport Extreme next to your TV and it might just work for the whole house as it usually performs better than your typical cable company-issued wireless router. Another option would be to continue with your current setup and extend your wireless network upstairs using an Airport express. This relays the signal from your router downstairs and boosts it to reach your devices upstairs. It’s a pretty simple setup for both when using the AirPort utility on your iMac.

If you really want to get two devices to have a speedy connection anywhere in the home, get yourself an Extreme downstairs and extend the network upstairs with the Express.

3. I have AppleCare+ and want to get my iPhone 5 replaced so I can resell it for more money, but it doesn’t have any major problems nor a broken screen.

Will Apple replace it for me for $49 if it’s not really broken?

You need a damaged iPhone for a replacement. The protection plan is for accidental damage.  If Apple can repair it they will, rather than replacing it, even if the customer wants the replacement. It’s up to Apple to determine whether it’s covered by the AppleCare Terms and Conditions. If it can be repaired, they are supposed to just put a new display on. So if you want a whole new iPhone 5, it has to be damaged beyond repair or suffer from water damage. It also has to be accidental — so don’t tell them you put it in water if you just want a replacement.

If you want a new iPhone but don’t have the cash, here’s a round-up of contests we’ve found offering the latest iPhones as prizes.

Major caveat: since Apple’s crackdown on third-party giveaways, there have been fewer legit freebies. The Cupertino company has nixed a large number of these contests – in one case not approving a company’s app until it pulled the contest – but it has been hit and miss. Apple did not respond to a request for comment as to whether it is actively pursuing companies that violate its giveaway guidelines.

In any case, if you want to get your hands on one without spending any cash, it’s worth a shot.

Just about all of the contest are no-brainers that ask you to tweet or give your details in exchange for the chance to win, although some have age and geographical restrictions.

If you hear of others, let us know. And remember your due diligence.

Good luck!

Wired UK

O2

 Square Trade

iSkin

Protect Your Bubble

AMC Theaters

Crowdtilt

Peterest

Lidtime

Carter Holt Harvey

Just about any way you slice it, those new iPhone sales are pure gold for Apple. The Cupertino company moved 9 million iPhone 5s and 5cs over the weekend in the 11 countries around the globe where it dazzled buyers.

We thought it’d be interesting to track the number of iPhones sold compared to the ratio of countries it was available in for that first, breakout weekend.

And it turns out Apple is definitely still in the money. For example, the iPhone 3G launched in 22 countries but sold one million phones over the first three days. Its sales-to-availability ratio is about 450,000 per country, that’s about half amount compared to the new iPhone. The iPhone 4S and iPhone 5 were available in seven and nine countries, respectively, but their sales hover around the same ratio at about 550,000 per country. (Clearly, China’s inclusion for the first time in the launch helped move a few units, despite the underwhelming  launch event.) Apple started releasing first-weekend sales info with the 3G model.

Compare that to another fun metric: it took 74 days to sell the first one million first-gen iPhones: appetite for new Apple products seems to only increase with time.

From a security standpoint, the most interesting addition to the Apple’s iPhone 5s is its integrated fingerprint scanner, called Touch ID, which enables you to unlock the phone with the touch of a finger, rather than a passcode. You’ll also be able to make purchases from iTunes with a fingerprint scan rather than having to enter your Apple ID password.

But despite the believed uniqueness of fingerprints, using a fingerprint scan as an authentication credential isn’t a panacea for security problems. It’s worth taking a little time to understand the technology, what it can do, and how it will integrate with your digital life.

How does a fingerprint reader work?

Fingerprint recognition technology has been around for decades. It’s a form of authentication, the term used to describe the process of proving you are who you say you are. In this case, the technology scans the provided fingerprint, compares it to a database, and, if there’s a match, allows access just as a password or passcode would. While fingerprint recognition technology can technically identify you as well as authenticate you, most systems still require a username to speed up fingerprint matching and reduce errors. However, since the iPhone stores your Apple ID username, this won’t be an issue for most users.

Fingerprint readers can rely on a variety of scanning technologies. The two that can be best integrated into a mobile device are optical readers and capacitance sensors. Optical readers are conceptually simple, using what is essentially a digital camera to take an image of your finger surface.

Capacitance sensors are more complex, instead creating an image of your fingerprint by measuring the differences in capacitance between the ridges and valleys of your fingerprint. They leverage the electrical conductivity of your sub-dermal skin layer, and the electrical insulation of your dermal layer (the one where your fingerprint is). Your fingerprint is effectively a non-conductive layer between two conductive plates, which is the very definition of a capacitor. The fingerprint reader senses the electrical differences caused by the varied thickness of your dermis, and can reconstruct your fingerprint from those readings.

The Touch ID sensor in the iPhone 5s is a capacitive reader, embedded in the home button. That was a good choice on Apple’s part, since capacitive scanners are more accurate and less prone to smudgy fingers, and can’t be faked out with a photocopy of a fingerprint.

So the reader takes a picture of my finger and looks it up in a database?

Not quite. Comparing complete images is a complex — and computationally intensive — task that even powerful computers struggle with. Instead, the image from the reader is run through an algorithm that pulls highlights from your fingerprint and converts them into a digital summary — a template — that is easier to work with. This template represents your fingerprint, and varies based on the algorithm used.

The template is then stored in a database, ideally after being run through a cryptographic hashing function, just like your passwords. Passwords themselves are never stored; instead they are converted by a one-way encryption algorithm, with the result being stored in the database. Done properly, this means your password can never be recovered, even if a bad guy gets the database.

Although details aren’t yet known, we expect that Apple uses each iPhone’s unique device code as part of the hashing algorithm. Since it’s embedded in the iPhone’s hardware, it’s effectively impossible to attack off the device with more powerful computers; on-device attacks are much slower and more difficult.

When you use your fingerprint to log in to a device, the technology images your fingerprint and runs the image through its algorithm. Then it compares the result with the value stored in the database. If the two match, you are let in just as with a password.

Apple made it a point to note that your fingerprint will never be uploaded to iCloud or any Internet server. Instead, it will be encrypted and stored in what’s called the Secure Enclave within the A7 chip itself.

Is a fingerprint more secure than a password or passcode?

Not necessarily. In the security world, there are three ways to prove that you are who you say you are, with something you know, something you have, and something you are. Something you know is a passcode or password; something you have is a token, key, or even your phone; and something you are is a “biometric identifier,” like your fingerprint.

Using any one of those identifiers is known as single-factor authentication, and it’s considered strong authentication when you combine two or more factors. If you think about it (or watch enough TV), you can easily imagine ways to fool a fingerprint reader, ranging from a photocopy to a fake finger made from gelatin. Every fingerprint reader can be deceived, and doing so doesn’t necessarily require high technology.

Plus, if you have physical access to the database, you can run attacks against it just as though it contained passwords, by generating and testing fake templates. Not all algorithms and hashing functions are equally good, and it is easy to end up with a system that is weaker than the well-known ways we manage passwords.

In short, nothing is perfect, and a fingerprint alone isn’t necessarily more secure than a password. Worse, you can’t change your fingerprint. That’s why super-secure systems usually require a fingerprint and either a password or smart card.

Doesn’t my phone count as a second factor?

Sort of. Many of you may use your phone as a second factor to log in to services like Dropbox. In that scenario, you log in to the site with your username and password, and then Dropbox sends a one-time code to your phone, which it has on file. Since you know your password and have your phone, this counts as two-factor authentication.

Unfortunately, unlocking your phone is different, since the phone itself is the target. Thus, a fingerprint alone is still single-factor authentication, and not really more secure in a strict sense.

However, you are much less likely to loan someone your fingerprint, and while a bad guy might guess your passcode, the odds of someone stealing a copy of your fingerprint in the real world are very low, unless you are a high-risk target.

If it isn’t more secure, why switch to a fingerprint?

Practically speaking, for most consumers, a fingerprint is more secure than a passcode on your iPhone. It’s definitely more secure than a four-digit passcode.

But the real reason is that using fingerprints creates better security through improved usability. Most people, if they use a passcode at all, stick with a simple four-digit passcode, which is easy for an attacker to circumvent with physical possession of your iPhone. Longer passphrases, like the obscure 16-character one I use, are far more secure, but a real pain to enter repeatedly. A fingerprint reader, if properly implemented, provides the security of a long passphrase, with more convenience than even a short passcode.

As I wrote over at Macworld, Apple’s goal is to improve security while making it as invisible as possible.

Does this mean the death of passcodes on my iPhone

Not at all. First of all, iOS isn’t about to get rid of passcode support since only the iPhone 5s will have a fingerprint reader.

Second, as you can see in this image, you will always have the option of inputting a passcode instead of scanning a fingerprint.

Third, while many of us share our iPhones with our spouses and children, Apple officially supports only a single user per device. However, Apple has said that Touch ID will allow you to set up fingerprints for trusted friends and family, so they can easily access your device.

If someone steals my phone, does that mean they have my fingerprint? — Almost certainly not. There’s no reason to keep the fingerprint itself, just the template. And as mentioned previously, your fingerprints are encrypted on the iPhone 5s (we suspect Apple really means “hashed”).

Can someone gain access to my phone with a copy of my fingerprint? — Probably. As I mentioned earlier, unless you combine your fingerprint with another authentication factor, like a passcode, an attacker needs one piece to pretend to be you.

Realistically, almost no one needs to worry about this, although I fully expect there to be a number of articles written about the efforts of amateur spies to make fake fingers. I will also start being more careful when I attend certain hacker conferences, given my prankster friends.

Will I be able to log in to my bank with my fingerprint, instead of a password? — Using your fingerprint to log in to Web sites and apps, like those from your bank, might happen eventually, but not right away. Apple must first open up API support for it, then developers need to integrate it into both their apps and the back-end authentication databases. Apple said that other apps can use the fingerprint reader, but that your stored fingerprint won’t be available to those apps. Thus we suspect initial support will be using Touch ID to access a password stored in the iOS keychain, using API support of some sort.

App makers and cloud services who want direct fingerprint access, if Apple even supports it, will also need to redesign their systems to deal with scenarios like someone’s fingerprint being compromised, or a user who also logs in from a Windows-based computer that has a different fingerprint scanner. They can’t simply switch everyone to Apple-only fingerprint templates. (And as much as having an open standard for generating the templates might sound like a good idea — there’s even an industry organization called the FIDO Alliance to promote such interoperability — who knows if Apple would eventually support it.)

But again, I highly suspect Apple will, at least for a while, mostly rely on securing credentials on the phone using the venerable Keychain, perhaps adding a feature or API support that asserts the fingerprint for that registered user was authenticated.

Also, banks are legally required to use two forms of authentication. That’s why you likely have to enter a PIN when you log in from a different device, or you must do the email confirmation dance when you log in from a new computer. Technically, though, your phone could count as a second factor, and banks could update their systems to combine the fact of having your phone with your fingerprint for access.

Will I be able to use my fingerprint to log in to my work network?

Not right away. Although Apple is adding enterprise-level single sign-on (SSO) support in iOS 7, your work network and applications will still need you to authenticate using your existing username and password. SSO merely means you don’t have to re-enter those credentials for every work system. Over time I expect to see vendors offer tools to allow you onto your work network after you authenticate using your fingerprint on your iPhone, assuming your IT department approves.

Why is this so important?

Apple isn’t the first company to add a fingerprint reader to a phone. I’ve tested laptops with fingerprint readers and seen phones with embedded readers. The real excitement is that Apple will make this technology accessible to many millions of consumers.

Doing so will dramatically improve the security and usability of the iPhone 5s for average users. I hate needing to enter a strong passphrase on a tiny keyboard, especially when I’m walking around. A fingerprint reader will be far more convenient, and essentially eliminate the less secure four-digit passcodes most people use, if they use one at all.

Combine this with the fact that many users now use their phones as a second factor when logging in to a variety of cloud services, and you can see that improving the security of the iPhone 5s could generally improve the security of significant aspects of the Internet. That won’t happen overnight, but improving security at any access point improves security for the entire system.

Once we see usable fingerprint authentication made widely available for consumers, life for the average attacker is going to get a lot harder.

Author Rich Mogull has been working in the security world for 17 or so years, and breaking computers (usually by accident) even longer. After about 10 years in physical security (mostly running large events/concerts), he made the mistake of getting drunk in Silicon Valley and telling someone he “worked in security.” Article reprinted with permission from TidBITS.

With the touch of a button, Apple’s iPhone 5s will change the mobile industry. And Touch ID, the fingerprint reader built into the latest iPhone, just may simplify your life.

Thanks to its insanely simple implementation in the phone’s Home button, Apple has taken the first big step toward making its mobile devices even more central to the daily process of more efficiently managing the security-dependent details of our daily lives.

Two days after getting my brand new iPhone 5s, the fingerprint scanner stopped working. I couldn’t believe it. The iPhone wouldn’t recognize my thumb print, no matter how I caressed its button. I tried training the system to recognize my other thumb and my two index fingers. That didn’t work either. The new iPhone’s marquee feature was already a write-off. “Just works,” my ass.

The iPhone’s hottest new feature is as reliable as my cat.

Then the news broke that the Chaos Computer Club in Germany announced that it had “hacked” the sensor with a photo of a fingerprint. At first glance, this story looked really bad. Some German anarchist coders had used a slight of hand to crack a “foolproof” biometrics system with a simple picture? Before the phone flew into our eager hands, everyone imagined that more elaborate methods would be needed to fool Touch ID, like hacking someone’s finger off. But a simple picture? It was the biggest story of the weekend: “Apple’s Touch ID hacked in less than 48 hours.”

But turns out the “hack” — which is more correctly called a “spoof” — was anything but simple. It was a multi-step process that required considerable skill, specialist equipment and almost 30 hours of hard work.

Firstly, a clear, un-smeared fingerprint has to be found. This looks easy on CSI, but is tricky in real life. The fingerprint has to be “lifted” using standard crime scene techniques: cyanoacrylate fumes, fingerprint powder and fingerprint tape. Not stuff you’re likely to have on hand, in other words.

The lifted print is photographed at very high resolution (~2,400 dpi) and cleaned up in software. It’s printed on transparent sheet at 1,200 dpi using a laser printer with the toner settings turned way up, to ensure the maximum amount of toner is deposited. This creates a mold. Liquid latex or wood glue is poured into the mold and carefully peeled off when it has cured. The hacker breathes onto the mold to make it warm and moist and then presses it against the sensor. This method is well-known in the biometrics world and has a long history of fooling many other fingerprint sensors on the market.

So should you be worried? Not at all. On one hand, Touch ID will *not* protect your iPhone against a determined hacker. If a crook has the time and resources to target you, steal your phone, lift your fingerprints and create phonies, the fingerprint sensor will not prevent them from gaining entry.

But the average opportunist who finds your iPhone on the bus? Rest assured, your phone is safe.

As for my non-functioning sensor, I just retrained the system. The problem was my dry, scaly hands. If all journalists have thick skins, mine is really something else. (When my hands get really bad, a steroid cream thins it down and curbs cracking and bleeding.) I’d been using the cream and my hands looked like Heidi Klum’s when I first got the phone. But over the weekend my hands dried out like SpongeBob in Sandy’s dome. By Sunday, the sensor wouldn’t recognize any of my fingers or thumbs. I tried licking them and moisturizing my thumb, to no avail. So I deleted the five finger/thumbprints I’d trained the system on and started again. No problem! Touch ID now works flawlessly.

I just have to keep the moisturizer handy if I want to unlock my digital life.

You might not want to use your iPhone 5s to find your way out of the woods just yet.

A number of users are reporting that their iPhone 5s compass and level are showing incorrect values when placed on flat surfaces. It might be a hardware issue, leaving Apple with a costly hardware recall or replacement issue. The problem could also point to a software snafu that needs speedy patching.

The problem was first spotted on by “tharepairguy” on a forum thread over at Mac Rumors. He set his iPhone 5s and his iPhone 4 to magnetic north. The iPhone 4 reads 179 south, while the iPhone 5s reads 165 south. His car compass confirms the iPhone 4 reading.

He then checked the level app on each phone. The iPhone 4 showed a surface to be level, as did two other Johnson analog levels. The iPhone 5s? -4 degrees.

Jony Ive and the rest of the design team at Apple really pushed the boat out when it came to refreshing the look of its next-generation mobile operating system. Everything from the icons to the menus is dramatically different in iOS 7, and largely unlike anything Apple has ever developed before.

While reactions to the new design have been mixed, you have to commend the Cupertino company for making such significant changes in such a short space of time. Scott Forstall, who was previously in charge of all things iOS, left Apple just eight months ago, and it wasn’t until then that Ive was given the opportunity to make his mark on the platform.

 Ive has  made it very clear that his idea of software design is very different from Scott Forstall.

One thing’s for sure: Ive has certainly made it very clear that his idea of software design is vastly different than Forstall’s. If Forstall was still at Apple, there’s a good chance iOS 7 would look largely identical to iOS 6… and iOS 5, iOS 4, iOS 3… you get the picture.

iOS 7 doesn’t just boast a new look, either; it also delivers a number of key new features, some of which we’ve been asking for a long time. Those include Control Center, which gives us the ability to control music and toggle certain settings from anywhere; and improved multitasking, with scheduled updates and the ability to preview what’s happening inside your apps before you jump into them.

The Mask

It’s true. A number of the things we were calling for ahead of iOS 7 — the new look, the ability to change settings from anywhere, automatic app updates — have now been delivered, and we have to appreciate that Apple can only change so much in 12 months.

But there are a number of other important features — maybe more important than the annihilation of skeuomorphism — that are still missing from iOS. These things aren’t being talked about right now, because the novelty of iOS 7 is yet to wear off, but these features are still conspicuous for their absence.

iOS 7’s new design is currently acting as a mask. It’s so significant that for the majority of users, there isn’t a second thought about anything else. The question isn’t “Can I do anything new?” but “How new does it look?” But when the dust settles, it’ll be easier to spot the features that are still missing.

And things are missing, because underneath all the new frost and parallax, iOS 7 is essentially the same operating system as iOS 6. While there are some terrific improvements, it’s not the grand departure from its predecessors that it seems.

Let’s go over some of the things that are still missing.

Communication Between Apps

We’ll start with the big one. iOS apps still don’t talk to each other like they should.

Let’s use an easy example to illustrate what we’re talking about. Let’s say you want to share a photo from inside the Photos app. If you tap the ‘Share’ button,  your options will include messaging, email, iCloud, Facebook, Twitter, and Flickr.

Fair enough. But what if you want to share via WhatsApp? Or Google+? Or Skype? Or send your photo to a service like Dropbox or Evernote? Your only recourse is to open each of these apps separately and upload the image to them, one at a time.

This isn’t the way it has to be. OS X, for example, allows apps to communicate with each other. You can fairly easily shoot a file from one app to the next. The ability for apps to talk to one another without each app having been specifically programmed to know some arcane secret handshake with every other app is part of what gives an operating system its sense of cohesion.

Yet this rudimentary ability is missing from iOS. In fact, it’s all over the place, whether sharing links in Safari, videos in YouTube, and files in Dropbox. Unless an app has been pre-programmed to “know” it can share with one specific app, they simply can’t communicate. It’s a messy and inconvenient system: not at all what you’d expect from Apple software.

But this isn’t a mobile limitation. Apps talk to each other just fine on Android without any fancy tricks. When I take a picture on my HTC One, I can go into my Gallery app and then send then image just about anywhere — and I’ve only had to open one app manually.

iOS apps need a deeply integrated service to talk to one another. That’s more important than iOS getting a fresh new look: it would result in a fresh new feel, and untold new possibilities for app developers. Why isn’t Apple concentrating on that?

Default Apps

While we’re on the subject of apps, let’s quickly address the issue of Default Apps.

In iOS 7, Apple still won’t let you choose a third-party app as a default app. Hate Safari? You can’t set Chrome as your default web browser. Don’t like Mail? You have no option to make Mailbox your default mail client. And even after Mapsgate, iOS users have no way to make Google Maps the default maps app, short of a jailbreak. Apple still forces you to use its own apps, and there’s no good reason why.

It’s almost as if Apple doesn’t trust us to choose our own default apps.

It’s almost as if Apple thinks we can’t be trusted to choose our own defaults — like Apple’s worried that it’s going to have a Genius Bar full of people who accidentally set Chrome as their default browser and can’t work out why Safari won’t open when they click on links.

Maybe this is a genuine concern. But we’ve all learned to deal with this kind of thing on our desktops, and other mobile devices powered by other platforms. We should be able to deal with it on our iPhones and iPads, too. And as iPhones and iPads replace our PCs and laptops, it’s only natural that they inherit some of their tweakability

Customization

The ability to tweak our iPhones and iPads doesn’t have to end at setting default apps, though. We should also be able to install third-party tweaks on our iOS devices, and we shouldn’t have to jailbreak to do it. These don’t have to be big changes that will completely change the way our devices operate: even simple tweaks, like third-party keyboards and icon packs, would greatly enhance the way in which we connect with our iDevices.

After all, not everyone likes the keyboard Apple provides in iOS, and it would be nice if we could install something like SwiftKey, which has become so popular on Android. Tweaks like these could be sold through the App Store just like iOS apps, and Apple can demand the same 30% cut it does on everything else — it’s a win-win situation.

Admittedly, this is a big ask, especially from Apple, who is famous for locking down its software and not allowing us to tinker with it. But there is some hope. During his interview at D11 back in June, Tim Cook said, “I think you will see us open up more in the future.” Let’s hope this means the ability to customize our devices.

Live Icons

Wouldn’t it be nice if you could see today’s weather forecast, or the latest sports scores, or how many page views you’re getting on your blog, without having to open up an app? Simple information like this should be accessible from the home screen, but that’s still not possible in iOS 7.

Apple has given us one live icon with the Clock app, which now shows the time, but that’s as far as live icons go on iOS. Hopefully, it’s the start of something, and future iOS releases bring us more.

I have a great idea how live icons should work on iOS. Imagine you could tap and hold an icon and then change the size of it, so that instead of taking up just one space on your home screen, it could take up two or three, or even more. The more space it has, the more information it can display.

I’ve created a (poor) mockup below that explains what I mean. I’ve used Twitterrific as an example. As you can see, when it’s taking up just one space, the icon is static — just like normal. But as it gets bigger, it can display things like the number of mentions, direct messages, and retweets that are waiting for you inside the app.

This is a simple example, of course, but the same concept could apply to all kinds of different apps.

These aren’t simple changes, and Apple cannot implement them all in one year  so we shouldn’t have expected that. Apple’s priority with iOS 7 was clearly to remove all of the design niggles we had been complaining about and introduce a fresh new look that would immediately signal its change of direction under new leadership.

iOS 8 should be something special.

But let’s not forget that rival platforms have had some of these features for a number of years. Apple has had lots of opportunities to match them, or even take the basic concepts and create even better experiences. But it hasn’t.

As a result, iOS has gone from a cutting-edge mobile operating system that’s way ahead of everything else to a platform that’s now trying to catch up to its rivals in many key areas.

But iOS 8 should be something special. Now that the new design is here, Apple can finally concentrate on the core features beneath it and address the things that iOS is currently lacking.

I’ll bet that a lot of the features I’ve mentioned in this piece or others like them are here next fall, alongside many more that could give iOS the edge over its rivals once again.

There’s a conspiracy among some Apple watchers: the ‘iOS-ification’ of the Mac.

The past couple versions of OS X, specifically Mountain Lion, have proven that Apple is not afraid to bring features from its mobile operating system to the desktop. Sometimes the borrowing is incredibly blatant, like the Mac version of Reminders, and sometimes the trend is more subtle, like when Apple inverted scrolling in OS X Lion to recreate the “natural” scrolling experience from a touchscreen.

Before the June unveiling of OS X Mavericks, it would not have been farfetched to look at the evolution of OS X and iOS and draw the conclusion that the two were becoming more alike. Now that we’ve seen Mavericks, it’s clear that OS X isn’t getting more iOS-ified like everyone feared. The two platforms are headed in different directions and while they share similarities, Apple does not appear to be on a mission of convergence. Cupertino has decreed that never the twain shall meet.

The Walled Garden

Compare iOS 7 to Mavericks, and the untrained eye could be led to believe that the two operating systems were designed by separate companies. iOS 7 is full of bright, unrestrained colors and abstract interface elements, while Mavericks largely still looks like the OS X we know and love. There are plenty of great improvements in Mavericks, but the general aesthetic of the OS is by no means a radical departure from Mountain Lion. Mavericks remains grounded, while iOS has been set free to soar into a new world of design.

“Mavericks remains grounded, while iOS has been set free to soar into a new world of design.”

To Apple, iOS is the software used by its largest and most profitable customer base: iPhone, iPad and iPod touch owners. iOS is designed to appeal to the masses and offer a consistent experience from one device to the next. iOS 7’s aesthetic design may be incredibly different, even jarring, to users of past iOS versions, but the core philosophy behind the platform hasn’t changed in 2013.

Unlike OS X, the file system in iOS is totally invisible. You can send media and certain files in-between certain apps, but there’s nothing like a Finder equivalent—no ability to open a zip file’s contents like you can on the Mac. The innards of what composes iOS are kept hidden so you don’t sweat the small stuff, or more importantly, do something damaging to the smartphone you rely on every day.

Each iOS app is sandboxed, meaning that it is forced to operate within a silo of its own under Apple’s rules. App Store apps have limited ability to talk to each another and they definitely can’t take over all of the OS, like Facebook Home on Android. An analogy that’s commonly used is a walled garden. You can enjoy the experience, just respect the boundaries.

Apple approaches iOS in a fundamentally different way than OS X, and that’s a good thing for the future of the Mac.

“PCs are going to be like trucks.”

“PCs are going to be like trucks,” said Steve Jobs, hitting the nail on the head way back in 2010. Like the car industry has been revolutionized by the automatic transmission, power steering, and hybrids, the world of traditional desktop computers has been upturned by smartphones and tablets. “Trucks” will always be needed, just not as much. The Mac is still a cornerstone for Apple. It will never have the huge install base of iOS, but that doesn’t make it any less important. Since when has Apple only cared about taking as much market share as possible?

The recently unveiled Mavericks continues to bridge the gap between iOS with a couple of additions, like iBooks and Maps. But then there’s also plenty of new features for power users, like enhanced support for multiple displays, Finder Tabs, Timer Coalescing for more efficient CPU management, and App Nap for managing power. Apple has historically been about connecting the familiar with new, groundbreaking technology.

Word on the street is that Apple has given Mavericks less attention in recent months to devote resources to polishing up iOS 7 in time for its Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC). That may explain why iOS 7 looks so different and Mavericks is more of an incremental upgrade to OS X. Now that Jony Ive is in charge of all software design at Apple, he surely has more tinkering to do with OS X if he wants to unify the company’s design language across platforms. He’s already stripped out most the garnish textures with Mavericks (“No cows were harmed in the making of this virtual interface,” said Apple’s Craig Federighi at WWDC), but there’s a lot of needed change for OS X to truly be ushered into the era of Ive.

“The Mac is still a cornerstone for Apple.”

That doesn’t mean OS X will eventually dissolve into iOS, at least not for decades to come. While explaining the reasoning behind naming OS X 10.9 “Mavericks” on stage at WWDC, Federighi said, “We’re really excited about the future of the Mac, and we want a set of names that will carry us for the next 10 years.” Future versions of OS X will be named after special places to Apple in California. OS X is an inspirational product for the company and it has its own vision.

This is the first time in several years that Apple’s mobile and desktop platforms look so different from one another. Will our concept of “desktop computers” not exist years down the road? Thanks to the rapid pace of innovation in the tablet industry, probably. Will underpinnings of OS X fade into obscurity as the platform is phased out by iOS? Certainly not.

It’s nice to know that iOS and OS X can co-exist in the post-PC era. The future remains bright and full of possibilities.

In a 92-character shot heard around the web, graphic designer, blogger and former design director for The New York Times Khoi Vinh weighed in on Twitter about the new operating system: “If iOS 7 is revenge on Forstall, Forstall’s revenge may be that it’s kind of not that great.”

Now that he’s had a chance to play with it for a few months, Cult of Mac asked Vinh what the best (and worst) parts are of Apple’s new operating system. His first impression that iOS 7 is a mixed bag hasn’t changed – but he’s grown to appreciate the lighter side of the new OS as well as dread switching his mom’s iPhone over.

The good

The new iOS is beautiful

Lighter fonts, clear colors. And no more green felt in the Game Center! The clean lines of the new system are definitely easy on the eyes. Also, it’s the unbeige answer to the ho-hum design everyone else is doing. With a little more polish, Apple might really have something, he says.

“The overall look of it is really beautiful. And the fact that they’re willing to take this chance is commendable…they’ve built some really slick things,” he said.

Vinh finds the new mutlitasking feature irksome, but admits even that has some upsides. “They made zooming much more consistent throughout the operating system and not just on the home screen but throughout the apps too. So when you tap on an app you actually are zooming into the app tile and then you see that in the calendar app, too. When go out to a month, you zoom out to a month rather than just switching to a different view. And I think that stuff is really nice.”

You will find everything

“It’s really not that different, it’s a question of perspective. I think you could argue convincingly that the majority of the changes are cosmetic, that the underlying interaction models are consistent: you still have this concept of the home screen, there are apps that you launch and so forth.”

Your kids will love it

“I’m not concerned at all about three-year-olds understanding this,” he said. “Every time they inherit a device like this or an operating system like this they’re fully prepared to learn from square one and do so very rapidly.”

It opens up a whole new world for developers

The sleek new look of the OS makes everything that came before it look like knee-length bloomers at a Victoria’s Secret fashion show. And that may create an opportunity for indie developers to crash the scene by getting up to speed with the new UI and making the competitors look like last year’s news.

“One interesting thing of what they’ve done is they’ve created this artificial sort of disruption in the continuum of like an app’s lifecycle, and they’ve kind of created an opportunity for new players to come in and quickly gain favor. ”

The Bad

The new “back” button

Vinh feels so strongly about the former back button that he wrote a requiem for it, calling the it the best back button of all time.

“The original back button is just a really marvelous sort of piece of work. It does all those jobs at once and nobody ever has problems with visually understanding what’s there. And the new one sort of introduced this problem where there was no problem before. It was solved before. So I’m sad to see the old one go.”

Expect hell when you get stuck upgrading your favorite baby boomer’s phone

Boomers are a slow-growing but important segment of smartphone owners and they’re not always the quickest to adapt. Those of the rock n’ roll generation will probably skip the needle when they see iOS 7, given how different it looks. Expect squinting at skinny, high-fashion Helvetica Neue fonts and some senior moments over the interaction, too.

“It’s going to be kind of confusing for them. I’m kind of wary of the day I have to upgrade my mother’s iPhone,” Vinh said. “In the long run it might be just fine, but just the very fact that so much is changing, even if Apple can pull off the feat of making the net result neutral, why should someone have to muddle through it to that extent?”

The gestures are not as nicely in synch with the UI, as they were on the old operating system, he says. “There were stylistic changes that don’t necessarily break the feature, but they create like a half second of disorientation.”

The Meh

It’s pretty, but it’s not that much of an improvement on the previous version

“I haven’t seen anything that makes me believe that it’s better…I’m hoping that maybe something gets pulled out of the hat at the last minute. I also feel like we might have our minds changed a bit by new hardware,” he says, recalling that it makes sense to visually overhaul the device when what’s under the hood changes too. “Otherwise, the redesign is often just a failure.”

Then again, he added, “Maybe there’s just so much glare from the gold of the new phone that you can’t even see the UI anymore.”

When it came time to redesign the UI of iOS 7, Apple decided to buck its love of skeumorphic UIs in favor of a new minimalist look that’s flat and parallaxed all over. The big design updates have been a welcomed improvement because iOS was starting to look a little long in the tooth.

Scott Forstall and his love of skeumorphic elements may be long gone, but closely at iOS 7 you’ll see a couple of skeumorphs are still clinging to. Here are some of the real world products that inspired the new iOS 7 icons.

FaceTime

Ever notice how the App Store icon resembles the Anarchy symbol?

Safari

Phone.app

Settings

Camera

Compass

Maps

This article first appeared in Cult of Mac Magazine.

Apple devices are on the most wanted list for thieves who snatch smartphones and tablets out of the hands of distracted commuters in big cities.

This type of theft is so easy and generally without consequence that it’s become known as “Apple picking.” The Cupertino company has been on the forefront of trying to curb these crimes, dating back to the Find My iPhone app in 2010 and the new Touch ID fingerprint sensor for the iPhone 5s.  Apple has also added a new i0S 7 feature called Activation Lock, which many are dubbing the “kill switch.”

“As a consumer, I love the idea of a kill switch for the device that I, as the owner, can invoke, but giving that type of power to my carrier is another thing.”

In doing so, Apple has responded to further pressure from authorities who are inundated with cases involving iPhone and iPad crime. (See our investigation into lost and stolen iPhones on Craigslist for more.) But prosecutors in New York and San Francisco, where about half of all crimes involve smartphones, were initially lukewarm on the feature but say they are now optimistic after seeing it in action.

The industry insiders Cult of Mac sounded out, not so much.

“To really make this work, the ‘kill switch’ would need to be wired to carrier networks, so that as soon as the device’s IMEI shows up on the network, the device is disabled by the carrier,” said Tom Kemp, CEO of Centrify, a company that provides unified identity services across data center, cloud and mobile for businesses. “As a consumer, I love the idea of a kill switch for the device that I, as the owner, can invoke, but giving that type of power to my carrier is another thing.”

As smartphone use grows — nearly half of Americans own one — so has iCrime. According to recent comScore data, Apple owns almost 40 percent of the smartphone market, more than its next closest competitors Samsung and HTC combined, with 23 percent and 8.7 percent, respectively. But part and parcel with Apple’s success and their distinctive design aesthetic is the fact that Apple products are an easy targets for a quick snatch-and-resell.

“How much would mugging decrease if your wallet was worth $0? Essentially, that’s what Apple is doing with its new kill switch feature – making your smartphone worthless, ideally. But, who is it really worthless for in the end?” said David Anderson, director of product for smartphone insurance company ProtectYourBubble. “Smartphone thieves often resell stolen devices on the secondary market…Unknowing consumers will purchase devices from sites like eBay and Amazon to cut costs but (will) end up receiving a ‘killed’ device in the mail.”

Companies that survive on tracing stolen gadgets are also not worried that the kill switch will sound the death knell for their businesses. “Unfortunately for consumers, Apple’s tracking and other anti-theft measures are also fairly easy to disable. People are going to continue to steal iPhones and hackers will find a way around the kill switch. It can be as simple as jailbreaking the phone,” said Ken Westin, founder of GadgetTrak. Most of GadgetTrak’s customers are tracing Apple devices — check out the live map — and use of the service has led to a few spectacular recoveries like this one from Kansas to Mexico.

Which brings up another point: whether Apple should be partnering with authorities rather than potentially enabling users to pursue their stolen iPhones

Maybe Apple should be partnering with authorities rather than enabling their customers to pursue their stolen iPhones.

Absolute Software, which says it has recovered 29,000 devices in 100 countries to date, recently launched a partnership with Samsung and says one with Apple is very possible. They work with police and discourage people from trying to get their gadgets back, rogue style.

“Deactivating a device with Activation Lock so that an unauthorized user is unable to use it or sell it can have a positive impact on deterring theft. However, the value of this capability is limited and could lead to encouragement of owners trying to recover devices from thieves themselves,” said Ward Clapham, vice president of recovery services at Absolute. “Self-recovery can be dangerous – even fatal. The best case scenario is for the user to rely on trained professionals to work with law enforcement to recover the device and pursue any criminal charges that may result.”

iPhone users who keep their smartphones mute in their pockets out of fear may find the new service makes it once again OK to stumble down a crowded sidewalk while checking email.

The iWatch might be a really popular theft target.

“With the kill switch, you will no longer feel unsafe using your iPhone on a city street. The kill switch makes the iPhone a much less desirable target for thieves — they’ll have to go back to nicking gold watches and fancy handbags,” says Dave Howell, founder and CEO of Avatron Software, which makes a number of productivity apps. “With this feature, Apple is responding to rising iPhone theft rates, but the company may also been preparing for the launch of the iWatch. The iWatch might be a really popular theft target. The kill switch is a neat, thoughtful feature but it won’t move the market-share needle.”

Howell, a former Apple software engineering manager whose team includes a number of veteran Mac programmers, says he doesn’t have any inside knowledge about the kill switch but that the service fits into Apple’s general ethos.

“I know Apple’s been working hard for some years to make iPhone as safe as possible…Apple has always garnered a reputation for designing for the benefit of users, even when it hurts sales. Certainly preventing theft will put a dent in replacement iPhone revenues.”

This article first appeared in Cult of Mac Magazine.

iOS 7’s Photos and Camera apps have been completely redesigned. Or rather, the Photos app has, with the Camera app getting some great updates, but changing very little functionally (A good thing, too – it was always easy to use).

So what’s changed? Pull up a beanbag, put on your favorite Barry White playlist and pour yourself a glass of delicious wine, while we take a look at everything new.

Oh, hey! You got the new iOS 7 for your iPhone, iPod touch, and iPad–congrats! Wondering what to do with it? Looking for the best tips and tricks to get the most out of Apple’s pastel-and-parallax-flavored operating system for that amazing mobile device?

Well look no further than Cult of Mac for your iOS 7 needs. We’ve been working through the iOS 7 features and options since the first beta came out, and we’re here to give you the best of them.

When I was a kid, my dad had a book of record covers called “The Album Cover Album.” It was a big, glossy coffee table book of the classic LP covers from the 50s to the 70s.

My brothers and I spent hours copying the trippy Grateful Dead covers by artist Rick Griffin or making paper models of the San Francisco Victorians on Jefferson Airplane’s “After Bathing at Baxter’s.”

Growing up in Britain in the 70s, at the height of Two Tone and punk, everyone was music mad. Music was everywhere. It determined how we dressed (as punks), where we went (punk concerts) and who our friends were (other punks). Culture rotated around music.

These days, culture is defined not by music, but technology. The bull’s-eye logo of The Who has been replaced by the Angry Birds icon. The cover of “London Calling” is the cosmic wallpaper on your iPhone.

Apple’s iOS 7 is a big step forward in that evolution. Gone forever are the vestiges of interfaces of old; the skeuomorphic references to desktops, trashcans, leather and wood. iOS 7 is another step towards interfaces of the future. And with 500 million almost-overnight downloads, it’s going to be everywhere.

For me, one of the most interesting things about iOS 7 will be watching it bleed out into the wider culture. Just as the iPod launched a million gadgets in white plastic, iOS 7 will inspire countless website redesigns and scores of apps with minimalist interfaces. We’ll see lots more of that fashionably slim Helvetica Neue font and transparent tickers on TV shows.

Earlier this year I talked to Professor Andrew Hargadon, a design and innovation professor at University of California at Davis. Hargadon told me that when the iPod came out, it showed everyone what a good MP3 player should look like. Likewise with the iPhone. Everyone hated their cell phones before the iPhone. Not any more.

“Nowadays, we expect many things to have better designs,” he told me. “Because of Apple, we got to compare crappy portable computers versus really nice ones, crappy phones versus really nice ones. We saw a before-and-after effect. Not over a generation, but within a few years. Suddenly 600 million people had a phone that put to shame the phone they used to have. That is a design education at work within our culture.”

I’m hoping that iOS 7 will also be a design education. I’m hoping it’ll inspire new DVR menus and the telemetrics system in my car. I’m hoping it’ll inspire my kids to make paper models of their favorite app icons.

They’re already fans of The Clash.

Leander’s new book about Jony Ive and the Apple design studio is out in November.
“Jony Ive: The Genius Behind Apple’s Greatest Products” is available for pre-order on Amazon.

This is the Cult of Mac’s exclusive column written by an actual Apple retail store genius. Our genius must remain anonymous, but other than “Who are you, anyway?” ask anything you want about what goes on behind that slick store facade.  

Answers will be published first in Cult of Mac’s Magazine on Newsstand. Send your questions to with genius in the subject line.

With iPhone 5 warranties about to expire for early adopters, our Genius runs through the litany of legitimate issues you can use to get your iPhone replaced for free. We also dive into whether it’s better to be upfront about water damage and switching colors when the Genius Bar replaces your device.

1. My iPhone 5 warranty is about to expire.  How can I get my device replaced for free so I have a new iPhone from the warranty of the old one?

Like any piece of advanced tech, the iPhone certainly has its faults and manufacturing defects, even if they are somewhat rare.

Hardware defects are the easiest way to go

One of the biggest problems we have to swap iPhones for is the sleep/wake button. That button often gives out or gets jammed and becomes unresponsive. If that happens we swap the device. Same thing for the volume buttons. The home button isn’t as common a replacement. We may be able to do a modular repair to replace the flex assembly that goes to your home button. Often times that fixes it, but if it doesn’t we’ll swap it out.

Essentially, hardware defects are the easiest way to go. Camera defects come up frequently too, with issues like spots or lines on the sensor and shutter fails being the most common issue. We don’t have a camera replacement for the iPhone 5, so if you have any of those issues, definitely bring it in. There have also been issues with the iPhone 5’s metal enclosure getting bent out shape. As long as the screen isn’t cracked and the bend or morphing is noticeable, your warranty covers that as well.

Getting an iPhone replaced under warranty for a software issue is a bit trickier. Most software issues that people see will not lead to an iPhone replacement. Before you come to the Genius Bar you’ll be reminded to try rebooting your iPhone and restore from a backup. Those two quick steps usually do fix most software issues. Some software issues – like maybe your WiFi has gone out – can get you a replacement iPhone as long as the Genius can observe and verify the issue.

The good thing about taking your iPhone 5 in for those issues:  it won’t cost you anything and extends your warranty for another 90 days. After two replacements we have to ask a manager for permission to replace an iPhone, even if it’s a legitimate reason. Most of the time managers are cool and will just tell us to go ahead and swap it, but the two-replacement policy is supposed to act as a safeguard from people who try to milk Apple for an infinite number of replacement iPhones.

2. Why won’t the Genius Bar let me change the color of my iPhone when I get it replaced under AppleCare+?

Essentially, we don’t allow it in order to benefit our customers and make sure that inventory flows through the channels in the most efficient way possible.

When you buy a black iPhone, Apple keeps track of how many models it has sold in each color and plans out how many it will need to supply for replacements at the Apple Store. It’s a complicated process to get all the Apple Stores stocked with the right amount of iPhones in the various configurations, even though Apple makes it look easy.

Allowing customers to change colors at random would add an extra element of variation to Apple’s supply chain and could result in supply shortages. And then customers who actually need a device swap in their original color would get screwed over. So, sorry, you’re stuck with your original color choice. Choose wisely.

3. My 30-day-old MacBook Pro had a little accident involving water on the ride home. The screen isn’t working, but it will output video to an external monitor. What’s my best bet when approaching the Genius Bar – pretending I don’t know what happened, or fessing up?

Honesty is the best policy right? The Apple Geniuses are going to find out one way or another that your MacBook is water damaged. It’s better for them to find out from you right away, so fess up to it, but ask them what the best options are.

The Genius Bar is there to fix your computer, but it’s really about fixing your relationship with Apple

Ask them what was damaged and what repairs can be done. Sometimes – especially in your case where you purchased it very recently – they may be able to talk to a manager to help you out, so it’s good start off on the right foot.

The Genius Bar is there to fix your computer, but it’s really about fixing your relationship with Apple. Because the company wants to represent itself well and get great customer satisfaction scores, a manager might give you a break and only make you pay a partial amount of the repair, or even hook you up with a free repair.

iOS 7 is Apple’s most revolutionary operating system to date, and even in beta, it features some killer tips and tricks that will improve pretty much every iPhone or iPad lover’s life. Here are some of our favorites.

Manually Update Your Apps

A promising feature of the upcoming iOS 7 is the automatic updating feature for apps. As Senator John McCain knows, manually updating ever sigle app on your iOS device–especially as you start to collect a bunch–can be a real time sink.

Fortunately, iOS 7 beta has the ability to just let all your apps update in the background, automagically, with nary a trip to the App Store Updates tab to waste your time. However, if you want to be able to pick and choose which apps to update, you’ll need to make a trip to the Settings app.

Launch Settings with a tap, and then scroll down to the iTunes & App Stores button. Tap it to go to that specificic preference screen, and then scroll down to the Automatic Downloads area. You’ll see the already in place Music, Apps, and Books auto-update toggles, and then you’ll see a new one: Updates. This is set to ON by default.

To turn off automatic updating for your apps, tap the toggle to OFF, which will change the toggle from a bright green to a pure white. There you go; no more automatic updates.

Now you’ll be able to hit the Updates tab in the App Store App to choose which apps to update, just like you do not in iOS 6.

Enable Dynamic Text Size In Apps That Support It

Let’s be honest–sometimes it gets a little tricky to see the stuff on those tiny little iPhone screens, especially as we all get a little (ahem) older. While the accessibility feature to set large text has been around for a while, there’s a new feature in iOS 7 beta that holds promise, and isn’t actually in the accessibility section.

Dynamic Type will let any application that supports the feature adjust the font size in the app to better match what works best for your vision.

Here’s how to access and change the settings for Dynamic Type in iOS 7 beta.

Tap into your settings app and then tap on General. A bit down the page, you’ll see Siri, Spotlight Search, and then Text Size. Tap there.

There’ll be a slider at the bottom to let you increase (or decrease, you eagle-eye) the size of your preferred text. Any apps that support Dynamic Type will “adjust to your preferred reading size below,” says the screen.

Now,when you’re using apps like Mail, iBooks, or others that support Dynamic type, the font will be large enough (or small enough) to fit your own personal preferences. Neat!

Force Quit Apps When Multitasking

iOS 7 beta brings with it a host of surprising features, one of which is the new way in which the mobile operating system handles multitasking. In iOS 6, a double click on the Home button on your iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch brings up a multitasking bar along the bottom of the screen. On iPhone and iPod touch, it only works in Portrait mode. On the iPad, it works in both Portrait and Landscape screen orientations.

That’s the same in iOS 7, but the visual look of the multitasking system is quite different. Instead of a small bar sliding up from the bottom, you get full previews of each app in the multitasking list. You can swipe left and right to move between apps at will. Also different in iOS 7 beta is the way you force quit apps, to start them anew or prevent certain ones from running in the background.

In iOS 7 beta, double click the Home key as per usual to engage the multitasking system. You’ll see an icon for the app and an app screen preview across your iOS device.

Previously, you’d tap and hold on a multitasking bar app icon and get the app wiggle. You’d then tap the X button to remove it from the multitasking bar, letting it start from a clean state next time you started it up, or keeping it from running in the background.

In iOS 7 beta, all you need to do is swipe the app preview up toward the top of your screen, and it will be taken out of the list, essentially doing the same thing: letting it start from a clean state as well as keeping it from running in the background, if the app supports that.

Set The Preferred Directions Type For Maps

In Apple’s Maps app, which debuted in iOS 6, you have always been able to set the volume of the voiced directions, choose whether you want to use mile or kilometer units, and set your Map Labels to Always English or not.

In iOS 7 beta, however, you’re now able to set your preferred direction type. Here’s how.

Launch your Settings app with a tap, and scroll down to the Maps icon. Tap that, and then you’ll see the preferences for the Maps app in the right hand column if you’re on an iPad, or on the preferences screen if you’re on an iPhone or iPod touch running iOS 7 beta.

Scroll to the bottom, just under the Map Labels section, and tap on your preferred directions type: Driving or Walking. Now, when you type an address into the Maps app, you’ll automatically get the type of directions you want. So, if you’re a walker by nature, you’ll always get the best walking route. If, on the other hand, you live in a place where driving is the only option, then you’ll get the best driving directions.

No options for Transit yet, so we have yet to figure out how that will work once iOS 7 is out of beta this fall. So far, the Transit button in Maps itself does the same thing it did in iOS 6: it lets you choose from apps that support transit directions from the App Store or your own iOS device.

Use A Panorama As Your Lock Screen, Wallpaper, Or Both

File this one under super cool! In previous incarnations of iOS, you’ve always been able to set a photo from your camera roll as the image that shows up on your iPhone or iPad screen. You can place one image on your lock screen, and one as your wallpaper, or the same image on both screens.

Now, however, in iOS 7 beta, you can actually set panoramas as your lock screen image, or as your wallpaper image. Or both! When you do so, the iPhone or iPad will show your panoramic image in full size, which lets you move the device around in a circle and see the whole image dynamically move across your screen.

Here’s how to make this happen.

First up, tap into your Settings app in iOS 7 beta, and select Brightness & Wallpaper. Tap on the Choose Wallpaper area and then scroll down to where your Photos are. Tap on My Panoramas, and select one with another tap. You’ll get a quick preview, so see how it works. Hold the iOS device up in front of you and pan around as if you were taking a panoramic shot. See how it moves? So cool!

On the iPhone, tap the Set button to get a choice to set the panorama as your Lock Screen, Home Screen, or Both. On an iPad, once in the preview mode, you will see a Set Lock Screen button, a Set Home Screen button, and a Set Both button. Tap the one you want, and your iPad will set up with it.

Now, whenever you look at your Lock screen or home screen icons, you’ll get this slick motion effect. Even when you have Lock Screen notifications, the panorama will move around in the background, even though it’s blurred out under the notifications. Bonus tip: on an iPad, the panoramic effect will work in Landscape orientation as well.

Be Handy – Use The Compass And Level Built Right In

iOS 6 gave us the Compass, which, honestly, I’ve never really used that much.

The new iOS 7 beta, however, has given me some functionality I’m much more likely to need and use. Heck, I even have a third-party app to make sure my handyman projects around the house aren’t crooked.

I’m talking about a level, and there’s a new one built right into iOS 7 beta, within the Compass app on the iPhone. I haven’t found a comparable app on my iPad running iOS 7 beta, but maybe in the future?

Either way, here’s how to find and use the compass and level app.

Launch the Compass app with a quick tap. If this is the first time, you’ll need to gyrate the iPhone around a bit to completely calibrate it. Now, just hold the iPhone out from your body, like you would reading a text message. Try to keep the iPhone parallel with the ground, and simply point in the direction you want to go. The app will figure out which way you’re facing and give you a pleasant little readout.

The level function in the Compass app is, to me, much more useful. I’d love to see the whole thing renamed as a Level app with a compass functionality. Or add the Compass into the Maps app. But I digress.

Once in the Compass app, swipe to the left to get a surprisingly art-deco styled level. To measure the level-ness of any object, place the edge of the iPhone on the surface of the object, either in portrait or landscape orientation. There will be two white circles on a field of black while the object is out of true, but the display will go green when the angle is at 0˚.

Reveal Hidden “Smart Mailboxes”

In OS X, you can create a mailbox with a bunch of filtering rules to help you gather together jus the email you’re interested in into one place.

iOS 7 beta doesn’t let you create your own smart mailbox, though. Rather, it has four or five new “mailboxes” that filter your incoming email into new categories, like Flagged email, email with attachments, or others. Here’s where to find, and ultimately enable, these new mailboxes in iOS 7 beta.

Tap into the new iOS 7 Mail app, and you’ll see a familiar list of All Inboxes, Inboxes for each email account you add to your iPhone, and a VIP mailbox, the “smart” mailbox that was introduced in iOS 6.

To find the newly added smart mailboxes, simply tap on the Edit button (more of a word) in the upper right corner. The mailboxes section will expand, letting you tap the Flagged, Unread, To or CC, Attachments, All Drafts, All Sent, and All Trash smart mailboxes.

Tap each of the ones you want to enable, and then hit the Done button in the upper right corner. Now, when you look at your Mailbox view, you’ll see these new ones ready for you to use. Tap on any of them, and you’ll see just the email that fits that smart mailbox.

Just see Unread email? Sign me up.

Mark All Mail Messages As Read

Next, let’s check out Mail, the built-in app for checking and sending your email from Apple. One of the biggest things I’ve always wished for in the previous app is a way to mark all the messages in my inbox as read in one fell swoop.

It looks like, in iOS 7 beta, anyway, that you can do just that. Here’s how.

Once you’ve launched Mail on your iPhone, tap into one of your email accounts, or the All Mail account. Once in that Inbox or All Inboxes, tap the Edit button in the upper right corner of the newly redesigned screen. Large circles will appear to the left of your messages, which will slide out to the right themselves. You can tap the circles to then Mark, Move or Trash the individual messages.

If you want to mark all the email messages at once, though, tap the Edit button, then the Mark All button in the lower right of the screen. When you do that, you’ll then be able to tap the Flag or Mark as Read button below, to do either one to all the messages in that Inbox or list.

Use AirDrop And Set Privacy Preferences In Control Center

One of the most exciting features in the upcoming iOS 7, and it’s in the beta as well, is AirDrop, Apple’s configuration-free file sharing protocol that has been on OS X for a while. It’s making its way to iOS 7, and here’s how to use it in the beta, as well as how to set the privacy settings for the protocol.

When you’re browsing a photo in the Photos app in iOS 7 beta, tap the new share icon, which now looks like a proper rectangle with an arrow pointing straight up and out of it. When browsing all your photos, tap Select in the upper right, then Share in the lower left. You’ll get the same effect.

All you need to do from here is tap the AirDrop icon, and it will do a little subtle pulse, letting you know you’re offering these files to be shared over AirDrop. AirDrop can handle pretty much any file type, including Passbook passes, as you can see in the screenshot above. The person you’re sharing the files with will be notified on their iPhone, and then the files will zip over. Hooray!

Now, if you want to fine-tune the security of AirDrop, you have three options: Off, Contacts Only, or Everyone. Slide your finger up from the bottom of the iOS 7 beta screen on your iPhone to bring up the Control Center, and then tap the AirDrop section on the left. Tap the option you prefer (I chose Contact Only for now), and then slide the Control Center down again.

It’s exciting to be able to share files ad-hoc like this, and I look forward to the unique ways developers will add this pretty amazing tech into their apps and games.

Block Numbers From Calling Or Messaging You

Another of the most exciting new features coming to iOS 7 is call blocking, in my opinion. To be able to keep folks from texting or calling has got to be one of the more requested features on the iPhone, since the beginning.

iOS 7 beta has two places to block numbers. Here’s where they are, and how to add numbers to your blocked list.

First up, tap into your Settings app, and then tap Messages. Scroll to the bottom and tap on Blocked. Once there, tap Add New… and then all your Contacts will slide up from the bottom, letting you choose folks in your contact list to block.

Tapping back out to the main Settings app, and then tap on Phone. Near the bottom, you’ll see the place to tap, called Blocked. Tap there, and then choose a number from your Contacts, as above with Messages.

It seems a bit counter-intuitive to block Contacts rather than recent calls or Messages, as most of the numbers I want to block aren’t folks I’ve added to my Contacts. It would be nice to have a way to do this from the Messages or Phone app, as well. Let’s hope that gets added to the beta in time.

Use Turn By Turn Walking Directions For Safer Passage

The iPhone’s built-in navigation system has profoundly changed my life. No longer do I need to plan extra time to get to a meeting so I can deal with my ability to get lost on even the most benign route in my own hometown, since I can use turn by turn spoken directions to get me to my destination.

When walking however, I’m the guy who’s usually staring down at his iPhone, waving it around in some weird figure eight pattern to resolve interference, and generally bumping into things along the way.

No longer, though, as iOS 7 beta has turn by turn walking directions. Here’s how to use them.

Launch Maps in iOS 7 beta with a tap, and then get a destination the normal way, either with Siri or via the search field. Tap on the destination pop up box and then tap, Get Directions To Here. You’ll get a walking route possible if you’re nearby, and you can tap the little waking person icon to set it. Then tap the arrow button in the upper left to start the route. Otherwise, when you hit Route, you’ll see the standard choices across the top: car, walking, public transportation. Tap on the walking person icon here, then hit Route.

Now, you’ll see the overview of your walking route. Tap on Start, and begin to follow the spoken directions. Pop in a set of headphones and put your iPhone in your pocket – you’re walking without having to look at your screen. Slick, right?

When you’re done, or want to stop the turn by turn directions, tap End in the upper left corner.

I’m planning on using this in the next unfamiliar city I visit, and see how well it steers me.

Apple released the iOS 7 GM to developers earlier today, and while the final version doesn’t have any major new features Apple did manage to toss a ton of new still and dynamic wallpapers into iOS 7, along with a completely new set of ringtones.

iOS 7 won’t be released until September 18th, but you can get your iPhone in the mood for all of Jony Ive’s upcoming changes by downloading the new wallpapers to your iPhone right now, thanks to our buddy Dom at MacMixing. Check them out:

In the final months leading up to the next major iOS release, there’s barely enough activity on the jailbreak front to fill a couple of conference rooms. But with the public release of iOS 7 just around the corner, it’s like the calm before the storm as hackers gear up for what may be the toughest system to crack yet.

Developers, hackers, and hardcore fans gathered in late August at JailbreakCon in New York City, an annual summit for the meeting of the minds within the jailbreak community. And while the conference’s founder, Craig Fox, wasn’t “overly pleased” with attendance for the third edition, he still considers the event a success. Why? It fulfilled its mission.

For the past few years, JailbreakCon has played a crucial role in providing face time to code jockeys from different continents who would otherwise only know each other by Twitter handles. Friendships are formed and ideas are shared. This year was no different. And as the release of iOS 7 draws near, jailbreaking’s closely-knit group of hackers and developers is getting back in the game.

Apple is becoming a victim of its own success. It’s been several years since the company launched the iPad and revolutionized yet another product category, but we haven’t seen anything truly groundbreaking since then. Sure, we’ve had the iPad mini, the Retina MacBook Pro, and the awesome new iMac, but they’re all variations or improvements on existing products.

Now the world is clamoring for something completely new — something that’ll take off just like the iPod, iPhone and iPad.

Some reports suggest it will be the Apple “iTV,” the company first television set, which is said to be in development inside the company’s Cupertino headquarters. But it’s more likely that Apple’s immediate concern is with the “iWatch,” a smartwatch powered by iOS that will bring all kinds of crazy-cool technology to your wrist.

I had suspicions Apple might be working on its own watch when it redesigned the iPod nano last year. A lot of fans used the tiny nano as a watch thanks to third-party strap accessories, and it seemed like its form factor and design were changed for a reason — to make way for something new.

We’ve been reading iWatch rumors for the past few months, so it’s time to put them all together and establish what we think we know about the iWatch so far.

This article first appeared in Cult of Mac’s weekly Newsstand magazine. Check it out here.

Apple takes color very seriously. You might say the Cupertino company is obsessed with it. Sir Jonathan Ive, the head of industrial design, is most famous for his restrained approach to color.

After the first iPod in 2001, most of Apple’s products come in plain colors: black, white or silvery aluminum. But behind the scenes, his design department has long created prototypes in a dizzying array of hues, including hot pink. Some prototypes are mocked up in up to 64 different shades.

“You can imagine a Crayola box with 64 colors in it,” Gautum Baksi, a former Apple engineer who worked closely with Jony Ive’s industrial design group (IDg), told Cult of Mac. “They’ll go through the gamut of making prototypes of all 64 to iterate until they find the ones that they want.”

This is the very first column for Cult of Mac written by an actual Apple retail store genius. Our genius must remain anonymous, but other than “Who are you, anyway?” ask anything you want about what goes on behind that slick store facade.  

Answers will be published first in Cult of Mac’s Magazine on Newsstand. Send your questions to news@cultofmac.com with “genius” in the subject line.

To start this off, we asked the Genius, “What are the top 3 questions you get asked at work at the Apple Store?”

Here they are:

1. When is the new iPhone/iPad/Mac coming out?

We’re not allowed to divulge anything about upcoming products, or address rumors. If we even talk about rumors with customers we could lose our jobs. When a customer asks if I know when a new product is coming out, my response is simply, “We don’t know when it’s coming out. We find out when everyone else does, when it’s announced.”

But don’t you really know?

No. We all read the same rumors as you do, but Apple’s not going to tell employees at the Apple Store when stuff is coming out because how many of us would leak it? We would instantly tell our friends and ruin Apple’s marketing plans, so they won’t tell us until the day Apple announces it publicly.

2. Do I have to make an appointment? Can’t I just come in?

Company policy is that yes, we can accept walk-in appointments. But truly, can we? Not always. Some days we have a full day of open reservations for customers to fill in as scheduling allows. Other days you might have to come back a couple hours later for an open reservation.

The Genius Bar is a lot like a car dealership service center. You can’t just drive up to Toyota and ask for your Camry to be serviced without an appointment. Most of the time you need an appointment for those things because there’s a limited number of technicians.

Bottom line, the easiest way to get into the Apple Store Genius Bar is to make an appointment. Go onto the website or use the Apple Store app and you can get seen right away instead of waiting for hours if you just come by.

3. Am I really getting a NEW iPhone when I pay $49 for Apple to replace a broken iPhone covered by AppleCare+? 

My line is that, yes, it is a new iPhone, but Apple terms and conditions state that “Apple may use parts or products that are new or equivalent to new in reliability and performance,” meaning the iPhone you’re getting is really “reconditioned,” not straight from the factory like it is when you buy a brand new iPhone.

We’re told to say that they aren’t “refurbished” because they’ve been totally gutted down to the frame. Apple’s stance is that they really are brand new devices, in the sense that they get a new enclosure, display, and innards, but there are a lot of parts that have been recycled from old iPhones, like the metal frame and some other parts.

We know they’re just rebuilding them. I’ve seen some that had a screw missing, others with a bad display, but it’s only been a small percentage. I’ve seen reconditioned iPhones that lasted twice as long as a new iPhone, so they’re not necessarily worse.

This article first appeared in Cult of Mac Magazine. 

You may think a gold iPhone is the tackiest thing since Mr T’s chains, but Apple is actually fashion forward.

Cult of Mac asked EDITD, a leading fashion forecasting firm, whether the gold iPhone would be in step with what’s going on in the world, fashion-wise.

“Metallics, and gold in particular, are certainly a growing fashion trend,” noted EDITD’s Julia Fowler. “We’ve recorded an 88 percent increase in gold products over the last 3 months.”

Over the sweltering summer, gold went from being barely a glimmer with about 10,500 items stocked at stores like Gap, Target and ASOS, to 19,600 products.

Bring on the bling.