This post is a little “inside baseball,” as it’s about a new tool for grabbing high-res app icons direct from the command line (or using an app), and this is the kind of thing that is most useful to writers like me. Then again, it’s by Brett ‘I just built this’ Terpstra, the Hardest Working Man on the Internet™, and is plain ingenious, so lets take a look.
Popular RSS app Reeder received a pretty big update in the App Store today. The iPhone version of Reeder has been updated to version 3.1 with support for Feedbin, a paid Google Reader alternative. RSS feeds can now be manually entered and stored locally in the app as well.
When Google declared that Google Reader is set to shut down on July 1st, Reeder announced that it would be adding Feedbin support in an upcoming update. The app already supports Fever, a Google Reader-like paid service that aggregates articles from multiple feeds and determines the most important stories of the day.
Feedbin is still in its early stages, and because the company doesn’t have Google’s deep pockets, it costs $2 per month. Reeder for iPhone costs $3 in the App Store. The Mac and iPad versions of Reeder will be receiving major overhauls in the coming months.
Source: App Store
If you haven’t played Ticket to Ride yet, all you need to know is that the iPad version is the most addictive board game I’ve played on the device. On the iPhone? Nothing even comes close (O.K., except maybe chess and Words with Friends).
This weekend the newest version of the game to hit the iPhone, Ticket to Ride Europe Pocket, goes from $2 to free. Don’t miss out on this one — and make sure you tell a buddy so you can play ’em.
With all the brouhaha over the 2-minute sell-out of Apple’s upcoming World Wide Developer Conference (WWDC) this June, it’s not too surprising that the Cupertino-based technology company has taken a few steps to support those developers who weren’t able to get a ticket to the popular event.
Apple has already decided to offer video of the WWDC sessions, and has contacted some developers who were unable to get a ticket due to the online ordering system overload.
Today, however, in a post on its News and Announcements for Developers page, Apple has announced that there will be a traveling tour, dubbed Tech Talks, making its way to various cities around the country, perhaps like the ones held in 2011 for the launch of iOS 5.
Ok, so you’re a prince sent out to learn your magic at Bogsmarts, a magical boarding school for aristocratic youth in a far away kingdom. While you’re gone getting your Bachelor’s degree in petty magic, your evil aunts and uncles have predictably taken over all the smaller castles in your father’s lands, shutting you out of your rightful inheritance. So, it’s up to you to muster your troops and set off across the land, beating up your relatives’ troops, barricades, and (eventually) taking over their castles as well.
Chat Heads. They made their grand debut in Facebook Home for Android, and Facebook added them later to its official iOS app. Now they are venturing out of Facebook’s iPhone app and into the rest of iOS, thanks to a jailbreak developer.
This time around on CultCast: why we need $150,000 $230,000 $500,000 for coffee with Tim Cook; Mr. Cook talks iPhone with a 5-inch screen; and with mobile products like the iPad taking over, could Apple eventually stop selling Macs? Plus, we’re finally getting a new Xbox console; the next iOS and OS X at WWDC; and the current Apple hardware drought needs to end!
All that and more on this week’s CultCast. Stream or download new and past episodes on your Mac or iDevice by subscribing now on iTunes, or hit play below and let the good times roll.
Show notes up next.
The game in this video is called Super Monster Bros By Adventure Time Pocket Free Games. Yep, that’s the entire title. Bodes well, doesn’t it? I bet you’re itching to play it. Sadly, though, you can’t. Apple’s already yanked it from the App Store. You probably didn’t want to play it anyway, though: it has to be the most shamelessly abusive examples of in-app purchases that mortal mind can comprehend.
There’s a weird glitch that has started affecting Apple’s iMessage platform. When users text certain phrases over iMessage the last word of the text is deleted once its sent, but a large space is left behind where the word once was.
Right now there are only a couple known phrases that appear to be affected by the glitch, and one of them involves Obama. To test for the glitch, send someone an iMessage of the phrase “I could be the next Obama” but leave a trailing space at the end.
Everything will look fine when you hit send, but then the last word suddenly disappears on both users’ screen. The glitch also works with the phrase, “The best prize is a surprise”
Apple has reversed its decision to change the way iOS devices handle connections with Virtual Private Networks (VPN), now that its patent lawsuit with VirnetX has concluded. Earlier this month, Apple said it plans to kill the “Always” feature for iOS devices with VPN On Demand configured, by rolling out a software update that would kill the feature on shipped devices.
Apple proposed that users would just have to use the “Establish if needed” option until an alternative solution was provided via software update, but it looks like Apple may have reached an agreement with VirnetX to keep the “Always” feature on shipped iPhones and iPads for now.
Apple posted the following update to an article on its support site to announce the reverse in decisions:
Although it’s been almost over a week since the carnage of the Boston Marathon Bombings and the related manhunt and shootout came to a close, but there are still a lot more questions than answers about what happened and why.
A new report from Boston.com, though, has filled in some of the blanks in regards to the three hours on April 18th in which the Tsarnaev brothers carjacked a Mercedes driven by a 26-year-old Chinese man… and it looks like an iPhone app helped save his life.
Didn’t get a ticket to WWDC this year? Don’t worry, you’re certainly not the only one. But if you were looking forward to a week out of the office, then there is another event you can attend instead.
It’s called AltWWDC, and it’s a free, open alternative to Apple’s prestigious conference that encourages Mac and iOS developers to meet up and mingle and discuss the latest software from Cupertino. You won’t get your hands on OS X 10.9 or iOS 7, but you will get free lunch for a week.
It’s been a while since we’ve had a contest here at Cult of Mac, so let’s start the week off with a little bit of fun. We’re looking for a few talented (or not-so talented) readers to voluntarily decapitate themselves and replace their head with an iPad. It’s gruesome and beautiful at the same time, plus we’re giving away five free copies of FX Photo Studio Pro to best entries.
To win the contest all you have to do is take a self-portrait, and then overlay it onto an iPad in another portrait. You can go traditional and use your own face, or use a friends’ or celebrity’s face. Hell, you can draw a face and then overlay it on the iPad, we don’t care. Surprise or delight us and you’ll probably win.
After spending several years in beta testing, the popular Swype keyboard made its official debut on Android earlier this week, and at the moment it’s only available on a small number of platforms. But there’s a chance that we could see Swype’s typing technology on iOS in the future.
Swype vice president Aaron Sheedy has confirmed that his company has held talks with Apple, sparking speculation that suggests the pair are working together to develop a “revolutionary” new keyboard — possibly for Apple’s upcoming iOS 7 update.
UPDATE: Bidding just reached $505,000!
Earlier this week we wrote about a Charitybuzz auction that will get you coffee with Apple CEO Tim Cook at the company’s headquarters in Cupertino, California. At the time, the auction had reached $5,250, but its estimated value was just under ten times that amount at $50,000.
Just a few days later, the auction has received 68 bids and reached a whopping $295,000 with 18 days still to go. It’s now Charitybuzz’s biggest ever auction.
The official IMDb app for iOS had been given a number of new features today, including a new light theme on the iPad, and the ability to look up worldwide movie release dates, actor heights, “crazy credits,” and more. The update also makes some visual tweaks, and offers bug fixes that should improve stability.
Alongside its weekly App Store refresh this week, Apple introduced a new page that helps App Store users “learn more about in-app purchases.” The guide explains what in-app purchases are, how they work, and most importantly, how to prevent your kids from spending a small fortune on them without your permission.
Scapple is a great new app for writers. If you were looking for an app that creates a sheet of paper on your Mac, then this is it. Scapple comes from Literature and Latte, the folks behind the amazing Scrivener, so you know that it has been designed and used by writers.
Lifehacker’s Adam ”never seen without a beanie" Dachis has come up with an ingenious solution for the gadget-laden traveler. Instead of messing around with travel chargers or any other gadget-by-gadget solution, he built a mobile charging station out of a giant portable battery and a USB hub.
Derrick Story – photographer, Macworld writer, podcasts and the man who (somewhat brilliantly) named his site The Digital Story – has just launched a new book called iPad for Digital Photographers.
The book isn’t proposing that you use you iPad to take photos, holding it up in front of you like some big dork, but that the iPad is a slim and powerful computer that should be slipped into the gear bag of anyone who takes pictures.
You don’t want to see my desk. Trust me – it’s pretty bad. In fact, you mightn’t even be able to see it, hidden as it is under a stack of junk and gadgets.
Actually, I’m kidding. I’m a neat-freak, which is why I have my eye on the Station, a bamboo desk tidy for your iPhone and all your other crap.
Critically acclaimed real time strategy game, XCOM: Enemy Unknown, has just hit the Mac App Store with a new Elite Edition, just for the Mac.
XCOM stands for Extraterrestrial Combat Unit, and the game lives up to its name, with turn-based tactical battles on a global scale, with a solid storyline and deep role playing game systems to boot. If you’re a sci-fi gamer who loved StarCraft I and II, XCOM is right up your alien-infested alley.
And now it’s finally on the Mac.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NoVW62mwSQQ
Now that’s pretty. Apple just posted a HD video of its new, poignant TV ad, “Photos Every Day,” on its YouTube Channel.
SpeakingPhoto is a new social photography app that lets you connect in real-time with anyone you like, using photos and recorded audio to share your special moments. Competing with Vine, Snapchat, and Digisocial, SpeakingPhoto aims to be a nicer place to be; instead of the party-atmosphere of the latter two apps, this one wants to let you record and archive the “memories, notes, and stories behind milestone moments in your personal and professional lives.”
Pretty heady stuff for a photo sharing app, right?
American McGee’s Spicy Horse Games (Akaneiro, Alice: Madness Returns) revealed its new real time strategy (RTS) digital collectible card game today, tentatively titled Hell Invaders.