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News - page 1068

Hermès’ pricey Apple Watch bands are now available online

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The Hermes Double Tour band is now available for everyone.
The Hermes Double Tour band is now available for everyone.
Photo: Apple

You don’t have to visit select Apple Stores to get your wrists on Hermès’ special Apple Watch bands anymore.

After debuting this Fall as limited edition pieces only available at Hermès’ and Apple retail stores, the stylish leather straps can now be purchased via the online Apple Store by any unhip nerd with a credit card.

Should Apple ever release a budget iPhone?

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Could a budget iPhone help Apple's smartphone business?
Photo: Ste Smith/Cult of Mac

Friday-Night-Fights-bug-2Speculation surrounding a “budget” iPhone died out when Apple marketing chief Phil Schiller promised it would never happen. But with iPhone 6s demand allegedly falling and the global smartphone market becoming increasingly saturated, could a more affordable phone give Apple a security net? Could it prevent the iPhone business from stagnating in the same way the iPad business has?

Join us in this week’s Friday Night Fight between Cult of Android and Cult of Mac as we bicker like children over these questions and more!

WhatsApp to begin sharing your data with Facebook

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whatsapp-to-begin-sharing-your-data-with-facebook-image-cultofandroidcomwp-contentuploads201508WhatsApp-Google-Play-jpg
New features found in the latest WhatsApp beta. Screenshots: Javier Santos
New features found in the latest WhatsApp beta. Screenshots: Javier Santos

WhatsApp made millions of smartphone users happy with week when it announced it will be ditching its annual subscription fee, but its next move might not be so popular.

According to a hidden option found in the latest WhatsApp beta for Android, the service is planning to share user data with Facebook “to improve [your] Facebook experiences.”

Fujifilm is going to make it more expensive to live in the past

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Putting a roll of film in your dad's old 35 mm camera is about to get more expensive.
Putting a roll of film in your dad's old 35 mm camera is about to get more expensive.
Photo: Andrew Hutton/ Wikipedia CC

For the photographer still in love with film, the romance is about to get more expensive.

Fujifilm announced it will implement a worldwide price increase for film starting sometime this month. Exact prices were not announced but in announcing the increases, Fujifilm characterized them as “substantial” and “double digit.”

How to use Picture in Picture mode to watch YouTube on iPad

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YouTube videos come to Picture in Picture mode on iOS 9, thanks to Corner Tube.
YouTube videos come to Picture in Picture mode on iOS 9, thanks to Corner Tube.
Photo: App Advice

Picture in Picture mode is one of the best features of iOS 9. On iPads, it lets you continue to watch a video from one app (say, Netflix) in the corner of your screen, even while you’re browsing a webpage, reading your email, and so on.

A lot of cool video apps already support Picture in Picture mode, but curiously, Google’s YouTube app isn’t one of them. But if you want to watch YouTube in PiP mode, there’s another app you can try.

AT&T CEO thinks Apple should give up on protecting encryption

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Should Apple cave when it comes to encryption?
Should Apple cave when it comes to encryption?
Photo: Jim Merithew/Cult of Mac

Apple is a fierce defender of its customers’ privacy, which is why every iPhone and iPad has its data encrypted by default. But according to AT&T CEO Randall Stephenson, Apple and CEO Tim Cook should show their bellies and let Congress decide whether encrypted data should be accessible through backdoors by government agencies.

Tim Cook meets with Pope Francis during whirlwind tour of Europe

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No, my Friday schedule doesn't look so exciting either.
Photo: Carol Glatz

Tim Cook met with Pope Francis today. The 15-minute appointment reportedly took place from 11:30 a.m. to 11:45 a.m. local time, as can be seen from viewing the pope’s daily schedule, which describes a meeting between the Holy Father and “Signor Timothy Donald Cook, Amministratore Delegato di Apple.”

Apple thinks this house is the Bermuda Triangle of lost iPhones

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Dozens of people have been told their lost iPhones are this house. But they're not.
Dozens of people have been told their lost iPhones are this house. But they're not.
Photo: Fusion

Find my iPhone is a fantastic way to recover your iPhone when it is lost or stolen. Most of the time. If you’re Christina Lee and Michael Saba, though, you hate Find my iPhone, because it has ruined your life.

For some reason, Apple constantly reports stolen or lost iPhones as coming from Saba and Lee’s small suburban Atlanta house… even though they are nowhere near by.

Surprise! Samsung disses Apple yet again in its latest ad

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surprise-samsung-disses-apple-yet-again-in-its-latest-ad-2-image-cultofandroidcomwp-contentuploads201504samsung_pay_0_0-1-jpg
Samsung Pay has a big advantage over Apple Pay.
Photo: Samsung
Samsung Pay has a big advantage over Apple Pay. Photo: Samsung
Samsung Pay has a big advantage over Apple Pay. Photo: Samsung

Samsung has long subscribed to the “If you can’t beat ’em, release a load of ads making fun of them” strategy when it comes to smartphone rival Apple.

In its latest ad, the South Korean tech company keeps this trend alive by recruiting comedian Hannibal Buress to show off Samsung Pay’s big advantage over Apple Pay.

And — you know what — as far as petty ads taking shots at your rivals go, this one actually isn’t bad.

Meet the man who taught Steve Jobs to think different

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1280px-Stewart_Brand_-Sausalito,_California,_USA_-at_home-14Dec2010
"Stay hungry, stay foolish"
Photo: Cellanr/Wikipedia CC

Steve Jobs reminisced about acid trips and, despite his status as a “master of the universe,” was also a total hippie, according to legendary Whole Earth Catalog founder Stewart Brand.

Brand is making a rare appearance today at San Francisco’s Obscura Digital for an event entitled “The 1960s Revisited: A 50th Anniversary Celebration.” In an interview to promote it, he talked about Jobs’ “hippie-to-tech pipeline” and much more.

Apple hires a top virtual reality expert

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Apple Goggles, anyone?
Photo: Apple/USPTO

Apple has hired a top virtual reality researcher as it continues to slowly ramp up its focus on the field.

Doug Bowman was previously a professor computer science as well as director of the Center for Human-Computer Interaction at Virginia Tech. While there, he was the principal investigator of the 3D Interaction Group, focusing on the benefits of immersion in virtual environments.

Google paid Apple $1 billion to keep its search bar on the iPhone

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Got a new iPhone? Set it up right.
Breaking news: There's big money in search.
Photo: Killian Bell/Cult of Android
Breaking news: There's big money in search. Photo: Killian Bell/Cult of Android
Breaking news: There’s big money in search. Photo: Killian Bell/Cult of Android

Android and iOS may be mortal enemies in some ways, but Google clearly realizes the value of having Apple’s hundreds of millions of customers use its search engine.

So much so, in fact, that in 2014 Google paid Apple a massive $1 billion to keep its search bar on the iPhone.

Apple TV’s new ad animates the future of television

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Apps are how you get your content now on Apple TV.
Apps are how you get your content now on Apple TV.
Photo: Apple

The Apple TV future of television is apps, says Apple. Whether you’re sitting down to watch The Simpsons on Fox, Game of Thrones on HBO, or racing your buddies in Asphalt 8, these days it’s a good chance you’re using some sort of app.

You’re definitely app-ing it up if you’re using Apple’s latest hockey-puck device, which brought games and media apps to the big screen not too long ago.

The latest ad for the device, up on YouTube now, highlights all the good stuff with a cleverly animated Apple TV. Check it out.

3D-printed Apple Watch stand is Mac-tastic

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3D-printed-Apple-Watch-stand-Mac
Wait until you see the rest of it.
Photo: Erich Styger

Some intrepid makers have put their 3D printers to work making cool, retro-themed Apple Watch stands. Specifically, they’re creating ones shaped like Apple’s early, beloved desktop computers like the 128K.

It makes sense, really. The Apple Watch shows the time in big green letters when it’s on its side in Nightstand Mode, and green was basically the only color those monitors were capable of displaying. So that’s where these creators are taking their inspiration for some sweet places to hang their Apple Watches.

WATCHe app makes Apple Watch look oldfangled

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WATCHe app
WATCHe lets you turn your Apple Watch into a mechanical timepiece. Kind of.
Photo: Evan Killham/Cult of Mac

A new app for your fancy Apple Watch delivers a super-cool and stylish education on the inner workings of actual watches.

The free app, called WATCHe, shows you the time. Obviously, your Apple Watch can already do that on its own, but the app ups the class by simulating the gears, cogs, springs and movements of an analog watch. And it might actually teach you something.

You’ll waste 3.5 days of your life untangling Apple headphones

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EarPods aren't going wireless in 2016.
EarPods aren't going wireless in 2016.
Photo: Buster Hein/Cult of Mac

This one factoid is the greatest reason why Apple needs to kill the headphone: Over the course of your life, you’ll spend a total of 3.5 days untangling headphones.

Edward Aten decided to dive into the math of how much time is wasted in frustration as you endlessly untangle your Apple EarPods. Depending on your listening habits, you may spend up to 32 seconds a day solving the headphone cord puzzle, which adds up ton of wasted seconds over a 38 year span.

New app turns your iPhone into mobile podcasting studio

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Phone in your podcast (no kidding)  with the app ZCast.
Phone in your podcast (no kidding) with the app ZCast.
Photo: Zula

You don’t need a high-frequency antenna or FCC license to be a broadcaster in the 21st century. Anyone can have a podcast – well, that is, anyone with the technical know-how and money for equipment, such as a good microphone, to produce their work.

A company called Zula wants to eliminate what might be the last barrier for the DIY media star. It launched an iPhone app called ZCast, which allows users to produce an audio podcast anywhere with just an iPhone or Mac computer.

Your heart rate sets the pace of Massive Attack’s new album

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Massive Attack fans, take note.
Massive Attack fans, take note.
Photo: Rob LeFebvre/Cult of Mac

Massive Attack just jumped ahead of the curve with a new app called Fantom Sensory Music. It uses your iPhone camera, motion sensors, location data and even the heart rate from your Apple Watch to remix one of four new tracks from the trip-hop collective that hasn’t had an album out since 2010.

The app itself is a trippy, almost spooky black and white affair that will have you listening to the tracks as you point the camera in all directions, shake your iPhone, and jog in place to raise your heartbeat. Or, at least, that’s what I was doing.

Face palm, bacon, water polo and 71 other emoji may be coming to iOS 10

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Some of the new emoji in Unicode 9.0.
Some of the new emoji in Unicode 9.0.
Photo: Emojipedia

iOS 10 may come with a big batch of new emoji, including pictograms for things like shrimp, croissant, owl, wrestlers, a bunch of hand gestures, a shrug emoticon and more.

The Unicode Consortium has recently accepted the updated Unicode 9 emoji set that contains as many as 74 new emoji that companies like Apple and Google will be able to add to their software keyboards. The consortium will make a final determination on which emojis to add later this year, with the release of Unicode 9.0 set for June 2016. That’s pretty good timing for Apple which is expected to unveil iOS 10 at WWDC in June, with a public launch scheduled for the fall.

Here’s the full list of new emoji:

Exploding Kittens iOS game is absolutely claw-some

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Boom goes the kitty.
Boom goes the kitty.
Photo: Exploding Kittens

I’d imagine it’s difficult to bring a beloved tabletop card game to iOS without losing something in the translation, but Exploding Kittens has found the trick.

Created by gaming veterans Elan Lee and Shane Small, and illustrated by internet cartoonist The Oatmeal (Matthew Inman), Exploding Kittens is like Russian Roulette, only with detonating felines. The game is fairly simple, but it has something not many gaming apps include these days: you’ll play with other people in the same room as you.

Even better, the devs have made all the in-app purchases (extra decks, new avatars) free as a launch special over the next four days. You don’t want to miss out on all the extra fun now, do you?

Cherie Blair thinks Apple needs to hire more women

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Cherie Blair, women's rights advocate and wife of a former British prime minister, chides Apple for its lack of diversity.
Cherie Blair, women's rights advocate and wife of a former British prime minister, chides Apple for its lack of diversity.
Photo: HuffPostRise

Apple CEO Tim Cook continues to take fire over the company’s lack of diversity, the mostly white, male makeup of management described by one investor last year as a “bit too vanilla.”

Women’s rights activist Cherie Blair chose words Wednesday with a little more bite. The British barrister and wife of the former prime minister Tony Blair called Cook “so shortsighted” in Apple’s seemingly less-than-urgent effort to add more women to leadership.

Proposed law could ban Apple from selling iPhones in California

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The iPhone isn't ditching LCD screens.
Designed by Apple in California. Just not for sale there.
Photo: Jim Merithew/Cult of Mac

Apple could be banned from selling iPhones on its home turf of California if a new bill banning unbreakable encryption is passed.

Called bill 1681, the proposed law was put forward by California assembly member Jim Cooper, who wants any smartphone sold in California after July 1, 2015 to be “capable of being decrypted and unlocked by its manufacturer or its operating system provider.”