News - page 1452

For a company that people are either making fun of, or else talking about overtaking — Apple sure is doing well these days, isn’t it?

Apple will begin using iBeacon technology in 254 of its U.S. stores from Friday.

Apple demonstrated the tech this week at its 24-hour Fifth Avenue store in New York City, where the company has installed around 20 iBeacon transmitters.

As ever with many of Quirky’s excellent crowd-sourced designs, the Prop Power Pro inspires me to make my own. I’m pretty sure a regular extension cable plus a bendy wire coat-hanger plus a length of flexible tubing would do the trick. The thing is, by the time I’d bought all the parts (plus a roll of gaffer tape), I’d be in the hole for way more than the $25 Quirky want for its version.

In the market for a new Lightning cable for on-the-go charging purposes? Then consider the awkwardly-named “8-pin Lightning Data Sync (iTune) Blocker” from USB Fever. Not only is is like about a third of the price of Apple’s own cable, but it comes with a switch on the wire that’ll let you plug your iDevice into any charging hole without worrying that it’s going to suck out your data of pump it full of filthy malware.

The Mesh Card is a wallet so small and slim that it’ll fit inside a single card pocket in your own fat wallet. And it’s not just a place to keep cards and cash: it doubles as a neat iPhone stand, and even as a bottle opener.

Mr. Reader, the best RSS news reader app for the iPad, is now fully iOS 7-ready, letting me (finally!) get the last non iOS 7 app out of my dock. As you’d expect, it now looks great, and adds a few neat new features.

Apparently, Americans like to pull up stakes and move to greener pastures more often than almost anyone else — which would explain the swirl of activity at the umpteen websites that help renters find an apartment. As one of the umpteen, RadPad is a relative newcomer to the group that stands out because of its user-friendliness.

RadPad is sort of the graphic novel of the apartment-hunting site breed: It emphasizes big, pretty pictures over a dull jumble of text. RadPad says their staff tries to ensure all listings have at least three up-to-date images by actually calling the author of each listing as they’re posted to verify.

There are really only two obvious solutions for backpackers to keep electronics charged out in the boonies.

There’s the more conventional route of using a solar-powered battery, like the Joos Orange, or Solio’s line of chargers. Or there’s the less common alternative of using one of an increasing number of stoves that can charge gadgets while heating dinner or water for coffee.

The upcoming newest member of the latter group, the PowerPot X (that “X” is a 10, btw), can even charge an iPad.

Spicy Horse Games (Akaneiro), the studio spearheaded by American McGee (American McGee’s Alice), and DeNA (owner of mobile games studios Mobage and ngmoco;), announced today that iOS game The Gate is now ready in the App Store for iPhone, iPad and iPod touch.

Originally titled Hell Invaders, The Gate is an innovative mashup of a game that brings a digital collectible card game together with the fun of a real-time strategy (RTS) game into one beautiful package.

Spend some time with physics-puzzler, Drei, and you’ll get a first-rate gaming experience on your iPad.

Spend a little more of that precious time with this game, and your faith in humanity just might be restored.

That’s the idea here with this innovative game: work to solve puzzles together with an another anonymous player somewhere in the world, and remind yourself that we’re all interdependent.

Maybe that’s a good idea, considering all the things we need to work together to solve in real life.

Foursquare released a new update for its iPhone app today that finally brings the app in-line with iOS 7’s new white and minimal UI along with some new enhancements that make the app more socially aware than ever before.

iTunes users across the country are reporting an issue Apple ID being unable to log them into iTunes to make purchases or access previous purchased. A wave of Apple customers have taken to the online support forums over the past 12 hours to complain about a that is preventing users from being able to log in to iTunes.

When trying to sign in to the iTunes Stores the bug pitches back an error that reads “FATAL::Unable to process your request. Please try again.” Unfortunately the error isn’t limited to just desktop iTunes users, as many iPad and iPhone owners are having the same sign in problems. 

Official 100 Pushups — Health & Fitness — Free

Recently, I realized that I didn’t even want to look at myself without a shirt on. So I downloaded the new official 100 Pushups app, and it claims it can do something about this whole … situation I have going on here. It’s a six-week program with three sessions per week, and it will send you reminders so you don’t “forget” to exercise. First you show it how many pushups you can do, and then it assigns you to a Beginner, Intermediate, or Advanced program. Somehow, I’m not so out of shape that I didn’t qualify for the Advanced tier.

…ladies.

Official 100 Pushups

Although not a new technology by any means, fingerprint scanners have historically been hamstrung by issues that have caused their sensors to degrade relatively rapidly, no longer being able to correctly read a fingerprint after only a few months.

When Apple introduced Touch ID with the iPhone 5s, they claimed to have solved that problem. Protected by nigh-indestructible Sapphire Glass, the Touch ID sensor is supposed to be able to read the curves and contours of your fingerprints at a resolution of up to 500 pixels per inch. But could Touch ID be just as susceptible to degradation issues over time as previous biometrics solutions?

Essential media player application Plex is now out in a new version for iOS users — adding support for the latest firmware along with a refreshed media component.

One of the most popular series of games for home consoles is Ubisoft’s Assassin’s Creed, in which a 21st Century cyberpunk is tasked with recovering memories of his ancestors from the past. The plot doesn’t make a lot of sense, frankly, but it doesn’t have to: it’s just the framing mechanism that allows players to take on the role of a number of assassins throughout history, from 15th Century Florence to ancient Jerusalem and Colonial America.

The latest game in the Assassin’s Creed series, Black Flag, brings the backstabbing and throat-slitting to the high seas, but it’s only available on the Xbox and PlayStation. No fear, though, because a companion game called Assassin’s Creed: Pirates has just been released on the App Store for iPhone and iPad users.

One of the more popular app Kickstarter campaigns in recent memory is the one for Mail Pilot, an app that allows you to tame your inbox by treating it like a to-do list. In April, Mail Pilot was released for iOS, and users were told that a public beta was coming soon. And now it’s here!

Forbes contributor Mark Fidelman has posted an article arguing that Microsoft’s new mobile strategy will help it overtake Apple within three years.

Fidelman’s case comes down both to the possibility of “seamless integration” with Windows 8.1, Office 365 and Xbox — in addition to the growing share of the smartphone market that Windows Phones currently represent.

When Barack Obama first made his run at the United States presidency way back in 2008, much fuss was made about how this politician was so cool, he used a BlackBerry.

Seems laughable now, doesn’t it? Yet at the time, Obama was considered so technologically hip for using a BlackBerry that he once laughingly said that if the Secret Service wanted to take it from him, they’d have to pry it from his hands.

Flash forward five years, and President Obama’s BlackBerry doesn’t seem so cool anymore. In fact, it seems ridiculous. So why isn’t he using an iPhone?

This goldie-lookin Lightning cable seems absurd at first, a piece of shiny nonsense that surely costs a fortune, aimed squarely at the kind of fools that pay real money for Swarovski crystal and Vertu phones. But in fact it’s a pretty great gadget. Why?

Last night’s South Park episode depicted a shirtless Bill Gates — revealing the Microsoft co-founder to have a tattoo reading “RIP Steve Jobs 2011.”

Great news for corrupt restaurant employees and criminal scum everywhere: you can now use the latest Google Wallet app to skim credit cards right into your iPhone. In theory at least. And without actually recording the magnetic strip. But “Google Wallet update allows easy addition of credit cards using the iPhone camera” doesn’t have the same link-baiting ring to it. So scum and villainy it is.

Indian-based Reliance Retail will shut down 16 of its 20 Apple premium reseller stores because they do not comply with the strict guidelines set out by Apple.

Apple dictates that its stores must conform to a standardized design featuring high ceilings, white LED lighting, wooden floors, specific display tables, and numerous other details.

One of my favorite parts of the Kanex Multi-Sync keyboard I reviewed in October. In fact, I said that “Kanex could sell it as a standalone product and do well.” And guess what? You can now buy it, in a pack of two, for just $18.

Did Apple invent the “app”?

In terms of coining the word — or coming up with the idea of software — the obvious answer is that of course they didn’t.

But did Apple’s approach to apps — seen most readily through the type of applications sold through its App Store — forever change what the typical user thinks of when they hear the word?