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How a California real estate developer helped create Apple as we know it

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A classic promotional shot emphasizes the stylish open-plan living found in an Eichler home. Photo: Eichler
A vintage promotional shot emphasizes the stylish open-plan living found in an Eichler home. Photo: Eichler

With an innovative architectural style that brought elegant living to the masses, real estate developer Joseph Eichler left an indelible mark on California in the 1960s.

His beautifully simple blueprints also had an undeniable impact on Apple’s co-founders — although Steve Wozniak and Steve Jobs took very different lessons from his work. Remarkably, Eichler’s design philosophy continues to shape Apple’s products, inside and out, to this day.

“I was very lucky to grow up in an Eichler,” Wozniak told Cult of Mac, referring to his family’s four-bedroom home in Sunnyvale, California. “It greatly influenced my liking of simplicity and open style. I like it whenever I see those attributes in any architecture.”

Jay Z challenges Apple with artist-owned streaming music service

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Jay Z
Jay Z's got 99 problems, and Tim Cook may be one. Photo: NRK P3/Flickr CC
Photo: Flickr/NRK P3

On his Kingdom Come album, Jay Z talked about being a big star “befo’ Steve Jobs made the iPod.”

Now, close to a decade later, the hip-hop mogul is keen to show that he is still ahead of Apple by introducing his new streaming music rival to Spotify and Pandora, prior to Apple’s own rumored Beats Music rebrand.

Your Uber could be paying for others to ride

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Uber failed to win over Apple as a partner for its delivery business.
Dark web sites are reportedly selling Uber usernames and passwords for as little as $1. Photo: File/Cult of Mac
Photo: Cult of Mac

Your Uber account is handy for catching a ride. It may also be handy for someone else to get around town on your dime.

Stolen Uber customer accounts have turned up for sale on the dark web for as little as $1, according to a report by the website Motherboard.

One seller claims to have “thousands” of user logins for sale.

Apple to reveal Q2 2015 results on April 27

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Photo: Apple
Photo: Apple

Apple’s stock has been a bit stagnant the last few weeks, but that could quickly change next month after Apple reveals to investors how much profit it raked in during Q2 2015.

Apple announced today that it will hold it’s quarterly earnings report for Q2 2015 on Monday, April 27th. Tim Cook and CFO Luca Maestri will reveal how many iPhone 6 units were sold in what’s expected to be the company’s second biggest quarter of sales ever.

Spray-on Life Paint gives bicyclists a special glow

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Photo; Volvo
Photo; Volvo

When you’re flying down the road on a bicycle at night, visibility could mean the difference between life and death at the hands of an automobile driver.

Volvo has designed what it’s calling Life Paint as a way for cyclists to protect themselves on the road, but the spray’s other use cases are potentially just as interesting.

Amazon now delivers a plumber to your door

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Would you like free two-day shipping with that?
Would you like free two-day shipping with that?

Amazon already delivers your toilet paper. Now it wants to deliver your plumber.

The online retail giant debuted a new service today called Home Services. It’s designed to take the simplistic Amazon ordering approach and apply it to real-world service needs, like fixing your home computer, cleaning the gutter or teaching aerial yoga lessons.

Facebook Messenger’s app store is here, and it sucks

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Facebook Messenger's app platform is off to a pretty 'meh' start. Photo: Alex Heath/Cult of Mac

Facebook is building its own kind of app store around Messenger, or so was the pitch at the social network’s F8 conference last week.

But now that the new platform, which manifests itself as a list of approved iOS apps that integrate with Messenger, is out in the wild, it’s not that impressive.

iPad Pro details possibly revealed by leaked dummy images

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iPad Pro could prove that size mattesr. Photo: Canoopsy
iPad Pro could prove that size mattesr. Photo: Canoopsy

We still haven’t gotten a glimpse of Apple’s long-rumored 12-inch iPad Pro, but a new set of images of an alleged iPad Pro dummy unit show that the mythical giant tablet might actually be real.

Images of an alleged iPad Pro case posted to Weibo today could potentially reveal some of the new features Apple has in store for it’s enterprise-focused tablet, including a USB-C port in a very unexpected place.

Take a peek:

9 features we want to see in the iPhone 6s

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Your iPhone is about to get some new features. Photo: Jim Merithew/Cult of Mac

Tim Cook called the iPhone 6 and 6 Plus the biggest advancements in the history of iPhone. It’s barely been six months since the bigger-than-big devices launched, but we’re already craving some upgrades.

With the first iPhone 6s leaks and rumors starting to hit the Internet, we decided to dream up what Apple could possibly do to make its next smartphone kick more ass than ever.

Here are nine upgrades we hope the iPhone 6s gets this fall:

‘Leaked’ photo offers first glimpse of colorful iPhone 6c

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Is this the future iPhone 6c?  Photo: Future Supplier
Is this the future iPhone 6c? Photo: Future Supplier

Apple decided to kill the iPhone C lineup when it debuted the iPhone 6 and 6 Plus, but the colorful plastic cases could be making a comeback in 2015, based on an alleged leak out of Apple’s supply chain.

A new 4-inch iPhone 6c might debut alongside the iPhone 6s this fall, according to leaked images that show an iPhone rear shell similar in size to the iPhone 5c. But this design may come with a few tweaks.

Check it out:

This Rube Goldberg machine has plagues, pyramids and a message – ‘Let my people go!’

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This Rube Goldberg Machine made by students at Technion in Cleveland quickly runs through the story of Passover. Photo: Technion/YouTube
This Rube Goldberg machine made by students at Technion quickly runs through the story of Passover. Photo: Technion/YouTube

Who knew the Plague of Blood could be so fun.

Students at Technion-Israel Institute of Technology created a Rube Goldberg machine that covers the highlights of the Passover story, complete with falling Matzo crackers as part of the chain reaction.

Rube Goldberg machines are fun, over-engineered contraptions designed to complete a simple task, but the Passover story, by no means, is simple. There are plagues, a burning bush, a baby Moses in a basket and the parting of the sea.

Experience tech’s greatest-ever demo as an opera

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Photo:
Think the Apple Watch unveiling was impressive? Not compared to this it wasn't. Photo: The Demo

If you think the 2007 unveiling of the iPhone is tech’s most impressive demo, you haven’t seen anything yet!

Back in 1968, when Tim Cook was barely 8 years old, an engineer named Doug Engelbart put on a computer demonstration at the Fall Joint Computer Conference in San Francisco.

Over the course of 90 minutes, Engelbart showed off for the first time a stream of new technologies that would shape computing for the next half-century: windows, hypertext, computer graphics, the mouse, video-conferencing, word processing, real-time collaborative editing and more.

Now those of us who missed it the first time around can see it live, thanks to a new avant garde opera taking place at Stanford’s Bing Concert Hall.

It took 800 Nanoblocks to build this insanely accurate Apple Watch replica

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Photo:
The most detailed Apple Watch replica yet? Photo: Christopher Tan

Okay, this is pretty cool: a 2.6x scale model of an Apple Watch built entirely out of Nanoblocks, the tiny building blocks made popular in Japan, but with a growing international following.

With the smallest brick being 4mm x 4mm x 5mm, creating this take on Apple’s eagerly-anticipated wearable device took more than 800 bricks. It was created by Christopher Tan, a well-known Nanoblock brick artist, who has previously built scale models of everything from the Great Wall of China to zombie dioramas.

You can check out more pictures of his Apple Watch below.

Tim Cook rips discriminatory laws that ‘rationalize injustice’

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As if Tim Cook doesn't already have enough on his plate!
"Apple is open for everyone," Cook says. Photo: Apple
Photo: Apple

Among the biggest differences between Steve Jobs and Tim Cook as leaders of Apple is Cook’s willingness to use his platform as CEO to push positive social change.

Having last week shamed Indiana’s controversial “religious freedom” bill — which potentially allows a business to deny service to would-be customers if they disagree with their sexual orientation, based on religious beliefs — Cook elaborated on his thoughts in a weekend editorial for the Washington Post.

Proclaiming that “Apple is open … to everyone, regardless of where they come from, what they look like, how they worship or who they love,” Cook makes a powerful case. Check out his thoughts below.

Apple hopes to stop China from ripping off its best retail store yet

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Why visit the Apple Store when you can get stuff deliver same day?
The gorgeous West Lake Apple Store in Hangzhou. Photo: Foster + Partners
Photo: Apple

As can be seen everywhere from Xiaomi’s not-so-original smartphone designs to the number of knockoff Apple Watches already available for sale, Apple has a problem with ripoffs in China.

But having recently unveiled its stunning new West Lake store in Hangzhou — featuring an all-glass facade and floating second floor — the company’s taking no chances: it’s filed (and been granted) a design patent to make sure that no-one tries to mimic its iconic design.

FDA is taking a ‘hands-off approach’ to Apple Watch

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Apple Watch isn't being too closely, err, watched. Photo: Apple
Apple Watch isn't being too closely, err, watched. Photo: Apple

The Food and Drug Administration is in a tough spot when it comes to health-tracking wearables. As the U.S. government agency in charge of regulating medical devices, it can’t promote health-oriented technology that doesn’t do what it claims, but it also doesn’t want to stifle innovation at a time when Silicon Valley is finally turning its attention to the field.

That’s why, according to a new report, the FDA is giving the tech industry, and particularly tech giants like Apple, leeway to develop new products without aggressive regulation.

The most awesome new apps you might have missed this week

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Awesome-Apps-of-the-Week2

It’s the weekend, which means it’s time to catch up on all of the hot new apps you might have missed throughout the week.

Twitter sets the live video world ablaze with Periscope, a couple great iPhone photography apps, the best way to calendar on the Mac, and some others made it into this week’s roundup.

Without further ado, here are this week’s awesome apps!


Awesome Apps

Apple TV rumors and our future robot overlords take over The CultCast

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Come with us if you want to CultCast.
Come with us if you want to CultCast.

This week: more rumors of a souped-up Apple TV coming in June, and we examine the softer side of Steve Jobs, as described in a new unofficial, Apple-backed biography. Plus: Skynet is the stuff of movies, but Elon Musk, Steven Hawking, and now Steve Wozniak, all believe AI is a big threat. Should we worried? You’re gonna want to unplug your Segway after this discussion.

Our thanks for Freshbooks for supporting this episode. FreshBooks is the easy-to-use invoicing software designed to help small business owners get organized, save time invoicing and get paid faster. It also makes tax time a cinch. Get started now with a 30-day free trial.

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Full show notes ahead!

How App Store optimization can harm indie developers

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iOS App Store.
Critical errors can do real damage as you try to rise to the top of the App Store.

I followed the advice of an App Store optimization expert last year in an attempt to promote my iPhone app. Big mistake. It felt wrong at the time, and it did more harm than good. Now I’ve learned to trust my gut instincts instead.

The only good way to brick your MacBook

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Seriously, how could you resist? Photo: Brik Case/Gizmodo

 

I pretty much love Apple and Lego in equal measure, so the idea of somehow combining the two is never going to fail to win my approval.

Assuming that I’m not the only person to feel this way, allow me to introduce the Brik Case: a fantastic Kickstarter campaign intended to raise the cash needed to manufacture a MacBook case that can be decorated with Lego bricks, to create any design of your choosing.

Comcast denies talking with Apple about TV service

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Apple isn't talking with NBC's parent company about a TV service. Photo: NBCUniversal
Apple hasn't approached NBC's parent company about a TV service. Photo: NBCUniversal

It turns out Apple isn’t talking with NBCUniversal about partnering for its forthcoming TV service. At least not yet.

How do we know? Because Comcast, NBCUniversal’s parent company, hasn’t been approached by Apple at all. But that doesn’t mean NBCUniversal’s content won’t be on Apple’s service when it launches.