News - page 1460

Updates on the French and German versions of Amazon.com suggest a new, replacement Apple TV coming the day after this week’s Apple announcement — just in time for Christmas.

The prospect of a shiny new Apple TV product makes everyone think of a radical new Apple TV box with crazy new user interface options, or an actual Apple TV set, both of which people have been predicting for years.

And then that Scrooge MG Siegler comes along to say he’s hearing that the Big Apple TV Update has been delayed, and that maybe there will be a minor update to the existing product.

Whether something grander has been delayed or not, I think TV will be the most interesting product at the Tuesday announcement — not because of hardware, but because of a new software interface and new deals I think Apple will announce.

Google has updated its free Hangouts iOS app with a major feature: free voice calling anywhere in the U.S. and Canada. The app now integrates Google Voice to make calls over cellular or WiFi. 

Confirmed! Apple’s October 22nd iPad event is locked and loaded, but it’s not just iPads we’re expecting to take the stage. We’ll walk you through what other treasures to expect sultry new CultCast. Then, Steve Jobs and his nights of profound amore; Apple hires a fashion icon to man retail stores; and we review a new app that makes it insanely simple to send money to anyone you know.

Have a few laughs and get caught up on each week’s best Apple stories. Stream or download new and past episodes of The CultCast now on your Mac or iDevice by subscribing on iTunes, or hit play below and let baseline roll!

This week’s edition of Cult of Mac Magazine explores the issue of privacy in the PRISM age. Whether you have anything to hide or not, awareness of what data you are sending out and who can see it as always a good thing.

We’ve got great how-tos to about keeping things locked down in your email, browser, instant messaging and backups as well as what to know about the key privacy settings in iOS 7 and how to cover your privates with social media apps.

For those of you who have, ahem, things to hide from a snooping spouse, roommate or parent, we’ve also got you covered.

And if you think you’re an open book, we talk to an artist who broadcast his life from his iPhone screen to an open web page for an entire year. He tells us what happens when your wife gets in the act and your mother always knows what you’re up to.

Publisher Leander Kahney discusses his foray into the private lives of Apple designers while researching his latest book and our exclusive Apple Genius column discusses drinking on the job and vintage Macs.

We hope you check it out – and let us know what you think!

And now you know. That’s right, it is being reported that Apple employees internally nicknamed the gold iPhone 5s “The Kardashian Phone” during production.

New York Times reporter Nick Bilton first tweeted the revelation, saying he heard it from a source at Apple. TechCrunch then followed up with its own sources and added, “apparently this was not a serious ‘code name’ or anything, just an internal joke.”

U.S. Cellular, one of the last carriers in the country to get the iPhone 5s and 5c, has announced that it will start offering Apple’s latest handsets on November 8th. After Verizon, AT&T, Sprint, and T-Mobile, U.S. Cellular is the fifth largest carrier in the country with 4.6 million customers.

Many of the regional carriers started offering the new iPhones on October 1st, and Cricket is slated to sell on October 25th. U.S. Cellular hasn’t released pricing information yet, but expect the devices to sell for the normal retail value. Many resellers and third-party stores have already started offering discounts on the 5s of up to 50%.

Source: U.S. Cellular

I just love tower defense games. I also love Steampunk. Chillingo has just published a game, developed by DreamGate, that combines both great tastes into one great game.

In contrast to a traditional tower defense game, where you typically place towers along a fixed path to keep the bad guys from getting to your base, Steampunk Tower gets you to build up your tower’s defenses with turrets like machine guns and cannons. The creeps come at you from both sides, and it’s up to you to cleverly manage your monetary and weaponry resources to keep them from destroying your beautiful, beautiful tower.

There are a bunch of apps out on iOS for kids, from educational apps to sports apps and more. Sure, you can get reviews of these games by adults, sometimes even from parents of kids who use them.

We thought it’d be fun, though, to ask the kids themselves.

Welcome to Kid APProved, a series of videos in which we ask our own children what they think of apps on the App Store that they’re using.

This week, it’s Halloween-themed Costume Quest from Double Fine Productions. Here’s what our Kid APProved reporter thinks.

Apple’s next big media event is taking place this coming Tuesday, October 22nd at the Yerba Buena Center in San Francisco. Banners for the event have started going up today, and they match the colorful invites Apple sent out to the press earlier this week.

Updated with new photos below:

Cult of Mac Magazine has an upcoming issue dedicated to iPhone & iPad art. Email me to be a part of it.

Veteran pop artist David Hockney took to sketching with the iPhone and iPad a few years ago, using his fingers to brush out works that he sent daily to friends and family.

Hockney’s works brought a new sheen to art on Apple’s devices, making them more than just instruments for amateurs. His forthcoming show which includes the digital works at San Francisco’s de Young Museum will have so many works, curators can’t even count them.

The official release of OS X Mavericks is just around the corner, but if you’re looking to bring a bit of iOS 7 to your Mac, check out this wallpaper created by Deviantart user filipe-ps, that looks similar to an expanded version of the gorgeous nebula wallpaper Apple created as the default for iOS 7.

A blurred version of the nebula is also available and comes with a 2560×1600 resolution, both of which, can be downloaded right here.

Source: filipe-ps

Via: Mark Gurman

Apple has assured iMessage users that it does not have easy access to the messages sent through its servers and that it has no desire to read them anyway. The statement comes after security researchers at QuarksLab claimed the Cupertino company could intercept iMessage communications between its users if it wanted to.

Will the new iPad mini have a Retina Display or won’t it? That’s the question everyone wants to know ahead of Apple’s Tuesday iPad event. According to everyone’s favorite goofball analyst, Peter Misek, the answer is yes… but it may hard to get one.

iOS 7’s influence is already extending beyond the bezels of your iPhone or iPad. A new update to Tumblr’s dashboard has been flattened and cleaned up to the extent that it would look at home on your iPad’s screen. And this is the regular site, remember, not an iOS-specific one.

As they are wont to do, J.D. Power Associates has just released its second Wireless Smartphone Satisfaction Study for 2013. Guess what? The iPhone is on top again, the second time since it claimed the title of king of all smartphones in J.D. Power’s previous Wireless Smartphone Satisfaction Study back in May.

With all the hubbub about the iPhone 5s’s wonky accelerometer, which has thrown off the iPhone’s accuracy by a couple of degrees, you’d think that iPhones from the first-generation to the iPhone 5 had perfectly accurate compasses, wouldn’t you? But such is not the case.

It’s been well over a year since the Apple TV received a significant refresh, so we’ve long been wondering whether Apple was planning to unveil a new model at its iPad event this fall. Amazon listings in France and Germany seem to suggest that’s the case, with the $99 set-top box now out of stock until October 23 — a day after Apple’s event.

Asphalt 8: Airborne, the latest high-octane racing game from Gameloft, is now free for a limited time as part of Apple’s App of the Week promotion. The discount comes less than two months after the game made its App Store debut, and it’s usually priced at $0.99.

TeeVee, my go-to TV episode listings app, has just gotten a super-useful update: calendar integration. Now the app not only keeps you updated about airing TV shows via push notifications, it can also integrate them right into your calendar.

I love my Fujifilm X100S, but I’m sure glad I didn’t ditch my Micro Four Thirds Panasonic when I bought it. Why? Because Micro Four Thirds is fast shaping up to be the iOS App Store of camera standards: if you want to make some cool hardware for a big market that will buy new things (hell, they bought into Micro Four Thirds already didn’t they?) then it’s the place to go.

Exhibit, uh… Where are we now? Exhibit D? Exhibit D is the Experimental Lens Kit from Lomo, a three lens kit for your Micro Four Thirds body that costs just $90.

Fujifilm has announced two new cameras today. One is the hot-looking X-E2, which adds phases-detection AF, split-image manual focus and some hardware tweaks to the X-E2. Way more interesting though is the new XQ1, which puts Fujifilm’s amazing X-Trans sensor into a tiny compact camera.

Apple has recalled 64GB and 128GB flash storage drives that were used in the previous generation MacBook Air. The systems were sold during June 2012 and June 2013, and those affected qualify for a free flash storage drive replacement at their local Apple retail store, or authorized service provider.

A year and a half ago, Bob Shor’s diabetic dad asked him if he had seen his dad take his insulin. Bob’s answer, “No, I didn’t see you take your meds” was interpreted by his father as “No, you haven’t taken them.” His dad overdosed that day, which Bob says was the reason he and his brother Rotem created MediSafe, a collaborative app that helps keep track of long-term medication.

The app will remind users when it’s time to take meds, and display dosage and an image of what the meds actually look like. There’s even a refill reminder and personalized information and details about taking the drug and effects. But the big feature is the app’s collaborative nature.

Cell phone numbers are a direct path that often lead straight to us, regardless of where we are or what we’re doing. And once we’ve given someone our number, they have it for good. And if things go south, the only option is to change your number, right?

Pretty much — but that’s easy to do if you used a new app called RingMeMaybe to give them a temporary number in the first place.

Apple just released a new firmware update for mid-2012 MacBook Air owners. The release notes say that Apple recently discovered that a small percentage of flash storage drives in these models may have an issue that could cause data loss.

The update, available here, tests your drive and should, if there’s a problem, install new firmware to prevent the issue from happening to you.

If your drive can’t be updated, Apple will replace it free of charge. That’s big news.