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No matter how you feel about Apple and the iPhone, it’s impossible to deny that the device completely revolutionized the mobile industry when it was launched in 2007. Without it, the smartphones of today may have been completely different.

Take Android, for example. It’s the biggest competitor to the iOS operating system that powers the iPhone, and it’s now the world’s largest mobile platform — but the iPhone is the reason Android is what it is today. Google started work on the software way back in 2005, but it scrapped everything and started again the day after iPhone was revealed to the world.

The iPhone has already been named Yahoo’s top ranked search in tech for the year, and now Google has released its top 10 searches for 2013. It’s no surprise that the iPhone was part of the list, coming in at third under Nelson Mandela and Paul Walker. The poor Samsung Galaxy S4 snagged the number 8 spot.

Here’s the full list of Google’s “global trending searches” for the year:

Today Google brought its Chrome apps to any Mac with the Chrome web browser. These apps are not the same as Chrome OS, and essentially act as web apps that can be launched from a launcher in the Mac’s dock.

Google started beta testing Chrome apps on OS X earlier this year, but now any Chrome user can use the apps from a new “For your desktop” section in the Chrome Web Store.

The Oculus Rift has quickly grabbed the hearts of gamers with it’s amazing 3D tech, but it looks like Apple has been thinking along similar lines as the company has dreamed up a variant of a wearable 3D display that would be perfect for gaming.

Apple was awarded a knockout patent today by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office for a head mounted display that would allow users to view media and play games on a bigger screen than their mobile device’s built-in display. The Apple goggles are much more sophisticated than just a display strapped to your face, as each screen can be lined up with your eye and adjusted for corrected vision if you wear glasses.

Google has today announced that an additional ten applications for Android and iOS now support Chromecast streaming. VEVO, Red Bull.TV, Songza, and more have been updated to allow users to enjoy news, sports, and music on their $35 dongle.

The native calendar app on your iPhone or iPad is pretty great, and since it’s built right into iOS and the info is on your iPhone, not the internet, you have access to all your calendar events even when you’re offline or can’t find a network signal.

Now, many of us use Google Calendar to schedule our stuff. Personally, I like that I can sync my calendars across the web and my iOS devices, and share events with other Google Calendar users. But I’ve always wanted to have my events on my iPhone’s Calendar app, too, for the whole “can’t find a network” reason above.

It’s pretty easy, really, to get it all to sync together.

If you’re a Google Glass Explorer who paid $1,500 to get your hands on the device early, then you can expect to receive an email from Google inviting you to upgrade to the latest model free of charge. The design of the new wearable remains the same, but it’s not more durable and slightly faster.

While Android may be running away with the lion’s share of the smartphone market, there’s still no doubt about what rules the roost when it comes to tablets. New data from InfoScout reveals that roughly 40% of iPads sold on Black Friday were purchased by Android smartphone users.

Earlier this year, the leader and visionary behind Android, Andy Rubin -—the man Apple co-founder Steve Jobs once called an “arrogant f***” — stepped down as head of Google’s mobile OS. What’s he been doing since?

Well, if there’s any accuracy to claims Rubin ripped off Apple to make Android, then this time, it looks like Rubin intends to steal inspiration from Skynet. Rubin’s latest project for Google? Frickin’ robots.

You’ve probably heard that the new iPad mini with Retina display has a significantly smaller color gamut that the larger iPad Air, but how does it compete against rival tablets like the Google Nexus 7 and Amazon’s new Kindle Fire HDX?

According to the experts at DisplayMate, not very well. In fact, the new iPad mini came a “distant third” in their tablet display shootout, thanks to Apple’s “inexcusable” decision to use old technology.

“Apple was once the leader in mobile displays, unfortunately it has fallen way behind,” DisplayMate says.

It’s a widely established fact that Android dominates the mobile landscape’s market share globally. IDC’s most recent numbers say Android accounted for 80% of the market in the third quarter of 2013, while iOS only accounted for 13%.

But there’s much more to consider than just market share when determining who’s winning the mobile wars. For instance, Apple brings in the lion’s share of mobile profits. We told you just earlier today why developers pick iOS to make apps on before Android: apps on Android generally make only a fraction of the money that can be mined from App Store users.

Adfonic tracked third-quarter mobile ad impressions and found that iOS received twice the number of ad impressions of Android. That means there’s a much higher level of user engagement on iOS.

The Google Chrome browser for Mac and PC now understands your “Ok Google” voice commands thanks to an official “Voice Search Hotword extension” that’s available to download now from the Chrome Web Store. You can use it to make handsfree web searches, quick conversions, and even to set reminders.

To mark the release of Fred Vogelstein’s new book “Dogfight: How Apple and Google Went To War And Started A Revolution”, Cult of Mac chatted to the author to gets his thoughts on the iOS vs. Android smartphone wars, writing a book without Apple’s approval, and why both sides could stand to learn a thing or two from their rival.

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The HBO Go apps for Android and iOS have today been updated with support for Google’s Chromecast. The feature works on Android smartphones and tablets running Android 2.3 Gingerbread and above, and on iPhones and iPads running iOS 6 and above.

iOS users that long for something other than Safari will be delighted to know that Google has released a free update for Chrome for iOS.

The new updated includes an Autofill feature that lets users complete forms with just a few clicks, similar to the autofill feature Apple introduced in iOS 7 with iCloud Keychain. Along with some stability enhancements and bug fixes, Google has also improved image searches by adding the ability to long press on an image to search for related images.

Here are the release notes:

This story first appeared in Cult of Mac Magazine 

Architecture hasn’t really ever been considered too important in the brick and mortar-averse tech industry. It wasn’t all that long ago that digital utopians proclaimed physical geography dead altogether, with a vocal minority apparently pleased to leave the actual world behind them and embrace the cyberspace of William Gibson’s Neuromancer.

It is perhaps unsurprising, then, that the technological breakthroughs of Silicon Valley have advanced almost inversely to the region’s architecture. In a brave new world of lush rolling hills and the always impressive San Francisco Bay, the most that the majority of companies have managed to come up with are drab industrial parks filled with two-story, cubicle-lined buildings.

Apple has added another two new channels to the Apple TV today in the form of Yahoo Screen and PBS. The former provides access to the Yahoo video portal, which delivers popular clips from shows such as Saturday Night Live and The Daily Show; while the latter allows users to enjoy their favorite PBS shows like Frontline.

There’s no Downton Abbey, though, unfortunately.

The fines just keep mounting for Google. In the wake of last year’s Safarigate, in which Google was revealed to be tracking millions of iOS & Mac Safari users against their knowledge, Google first agreed to pay a $22.5 million fine to the FTC, the largest such fine in history. But it’s not stopping there, with Google now agreeing to pay $17 million to settle the issue with 37 states.

An official Google Play Music app is finally available on iOS, bringing Google’s All Access music streaming service to your iPhone. Users can listen to millions of tracks on demand and enjoy custom radio with no limits, as well as access to the music they’ve uploaded to Google’s cloud-based storage service.

The official Google Music app for iOS, which will allow Google Play Music All Access subscribers to enjoy the music streaming service on iPhone and iPad, is now “imminent,” a reliable source reports.

This story first appeared in Cult of Mac Magazine 

Architecture hasn’t really ever been important in the brick and mortar-averse tech industry. It wasn’t all that long ago that digital utopians proclaimed physical geography dead altogether, with a vocal minority apparently pleased to leave the actual world behind them and embrace the cyberspace of William Gibson’s Neuromancer.

It is perhaps unsurprising, then, that the technological breakthroughs of Silicon Valley have advanced almost inversely to the region’s architecture. In a brave new world of lush rolling hills and the always impressive San Francisco Bay, the most that the majority of companies have managed to come up with are drab industrial parks filled with two-story, cubicle-lined buildings.

Apple has topped the list of world’s most valuable brands for the third straight year in a row, and is now worth almost twice as much as any other brand on the planet, Forbes reports. The Cupertino company is now valued at $104.3 billion, up 20 percent over last year, which puts it way out in front of Microsoft, Samsung, and even Google.

While the iPad’s Retina display has traditionally been considered the finest tablet display on the market, that’s no longer the case thanks to Amazon. Its new high-end Kindle Fire HDX has the best tablet display ever tested by DisplayMate expert Dr. Raymond Soneira, “significantly outperforming” the iPad Air’s in several key areas.

While Apple has aimed to keep the design of the iPhone consistent over the last six years – same screen size, same form factor, same metal band antenna on the outside – Google has managed to keep fans excited by providing different variants of its flagship Nexus device every single year.

Sure, all those different screen sizes and hardware changes have helped push the state of horrific fragmentation in the Android market, but at least fandroids get new design choices every year. To celebrate the release of the Nexus 5, our friends over at GadgetLove created an awesome GIF  GIF showcasing how the Nexus has evolved over the years.

Check it out below: