News - page 1577

Remember PostSecret? That was an app based on the PostSecret website, where people were encouraged to share secrets anonymously, with pictures and words. The app got discontinued due to potential abuses; the founder, Frank Warren, pulled it from the App Store when he thought it had gone too far.

Whisper, then, uses the same idea: allow people to post pictures with meme-like text over the top to anonymously share secret things they can’t get out there on regular social networking sites. What Whisper does differently, though, is to put the private messaging behind a paywall. You’ll need to pony up six bucks a month to be able to message users of the service privately.

While tech experts have been eager to announce the demise of Apple and the iPhone, a different story has taken place in the U.S. as Apple has continued to widen its lead against Samsung.

comScore just released its latest report on the state of the U.S. smartphone market, and their findings show that Apple managed to widen increase its marketshare. Samsung saw some growth as well (1.0% ) but Apple grew about four times more (4%).

Whenever third-party retailers start selling an Apple device at a discounted price, it’s usually a good indication that the next product iteration is on the near horizon. While this isn’t always the case, it’s a historic trend that points towards something new from Apple.

Based on recent price cuts from big retailers and the rumor mill, it looks like the iPad will be getting a refresh soon.

Today Facebook unveiled “Home,” its new, immersive Android experience. HTC has partnered with Facebook to launch the HTC First, a smartphone designed from the ground up for Home. Other Android handset makers are in the pipeline to release Home-based devices down the road.

Home is a great idea for Facebook and Facebook lovers, and it will probably be very popular on Android after it becomes available next week. But don’t expect to get Facebook Home on your iPhone. Not in this lifetime.

France Telecom CEO Stephane Richard says that budget smartphone buyers are threatening sales of Apple’s pricey iPhone. Consumers are becoming more frugal due to the state of the economy, particularly in Europe, Richard told Bloomberg Businessweek, and so they’re turning to cheaper options when it’s time to get a new cellphone.

Apple fans looking for some nerdy decor will love these Apple I and Apple II schematic prints from City Prints. They’re printed on heavy stock at 12×16-inches, with a bit of shine to make the schematics pop. Just think of all the hours you can waste, marveling at Woz’s magical craftsmanship.

The prints only cost $40 a piece, but if you want to get a frame for it too, you’ll have to pay $180. Either way, the frames look awesome as a piece of decoration, while also acting as a shout out to your first favorite computer.

Source: City Prints

Via: Gizmodo

Apple has made a small change to the way in which App Store age ratings are displayed to make them a little easier to find. They’re now displayed alongside app icons on iOS devices — just under the name of the developer — so they’re not so easy to miss when you’re downloading new apps.

Owners of the Big Jambox are in for a treat. Just head over to the MyTalk page and administer a new firmware update. You ill be treated to two whole hours of extra battery life (in addition to the 15 you already enjoy) plus a host of genuinely hand new features.

Do you ever worry that federal agencies might be hacking into your smartphone to read your text messages and listen to your calls? Then you’re probably up to no good, but you can sleep easy if all of your dirty business deals are carried out through iMessage on your iOS device.

Apple’s iMessage encryption is so good, not even federal agencies are able to crack it.

The budget for Apple’s “spaceship” campus has ballooned from $3 billion to “nearly $5 billion” since 2011, according to a new report from Bloomberg Businessweek. Five people close to the project say its cost will now eclipse the $3.9 billion being spent on the new World Trade Center complex in New York City.

With five days to go, the MiDock Kickstarter project has just been funded for it’s £7,000 asking price, and with good reason. This brushed aluminum, glass bead blasted, anodized metal unibody iPhone 5 dock looks like it could have come out of the design work of Apple itself.

For the £34 (a bit over $50) asking price, you can get any of the colors of MiDock now as a reward for pledging to the Kickstarter project.

Earlier this morning we found out that Best Buy is selling Retina display iPads for $30 off, and it looks like Walmart may have a similar deal on the iPad mini.

Depending on the zip code you live in, Walmart is offering the 16GB iPad mini Wifi-only models for $299. That’s 30 bucks cheaper than buying it directly from Apple. Walmart’s offering both standard shipping and in-store pickup depending on the availability of units in your area. If you’ve been on the fence about embracing the iPad mini, this is the lowest price on new units that we’ve seen so far.

Source: Walmart

Via: DealNews

Today is the iPad’s third birthday. It was on this consecrated day that Apple shipped the original iPad with WiFi. It’s hard to believe that Apple has invented and popularized an entirely new market in only three years, but it’s the truth. Tablets just weren’t a thing before the iPad, and now they’re cannibalizing PC sales. As Apple calls it, we’re in a post-PC era.

A lot of people mocked the iPad from the beginning. Sure, there were the faithful believes, but many wondered why anyone would want to use a limited, 10-inch slab of glass over a full-fledged laptop. It just didn’t make sense at the time. The iPhone and iPod touch filled the need for portable computing… or so we thought.

The question was, as always with Apple, whether the iPad could live up to all of the hype. Looking back, the answer is obvious: yes. The iPad has seen—and continues to see—monumental success, and competitors are still playing catch up.

In honor of the iPad’s birthday, let’s take a look at some of its early critics. As it turns out, the iPad was rather hated during its infancy:

It seems like we’ve been using iPads forever now, but the greatest tablet computer ever made is still an incredibly young piece of gadgetry. In fact, it’s celebrating its third birthday today.

What other three year old do you know who has changed the world like the iPad has?

A ton of tech luminaries and pundits thought the iPad wouldn’t even make it this far, but boy, were they wrong. Over the the last three years the iPad has become a cultural phenomenon.

Here are 25 ways showing how the iPad has taken over the world in just three years.

Twitter has updated its iOS app with new “App Cards” it introduced to developers yesterday. Twitter Cards let companies and advertisers embed media like photos and videos directly into tweets so you don’t have to load a separate webpage. Now developers can include download links with info about their apps for Twitter users to see without leaving the timeline.

Remember Amazon AutoRip?

It was a cool service Amazon launched earlier in the year which did something pretty cool: if you bought an AutoRip-compatible CD at any point since 1998, it’ll automatically show up in your Amazon Cloud Player, which can be accessed either online or through the free iTunes app

Pretty neat, and now, AutoRip is even neater: it now works with vinyl records you’ve purchased too. For example, I bought a copy of the excellent album Stranger by Balmorhea on vinyl a couple months ago, and it’s now in my Cloud Player.

This is pretty neat. Vinyl is already one of the more savvy ways to buy music, not just because of the improved sound quality and presentation over digital or CD, but because when you buy a vinyl album, you often get the digital version for free as a download anyway. With AutoRip now working with vinyl, buying a record is an even more compelling way to consume music.

Remember how word came down the pipeline the other day that Spotify wanted to start a video streaming service? Guess who just beat them to the punch? That’s right, Rdio — the better of the subscription music streaming services in the United States — and their new service is called, coincidentally enough, Vdio.

Duke Nukem II, the side-scrolling shoot ’em up first developed for PC, is back to celebrate its 20th anniversary on iOS. This is original Duke Nukem at its finest — only it’s been optimized and improved for touchscreen devices.

I really like Nikolai Lamm’s concepts for imaginary, rumored, (and possibly forthcoming) Apple products, and this transparent concept for a cheaper budget iPhone is no exception. I love how it merges the 2012 iPod touch’s candy colored backshell with the iMac G3’s transparent casing.

I think there’s little to no chance Apple would actually make an iPhone that looks like this — in the mind of Jonny Ive, transparent gadgets are so 1998, I bet — but heck, I’d buy a phone like this.

Source: Myvouchercodes.co.uk

Looking for a Retina iPad? Here’s a killer deal: Best Buy is having a clearance of up to 30% off third-gen iPads, meaning you can now buy a 16GB Retina iPad for less money than it costs to buy the entry-level iPad mini.

Sonic & Sega All-Stars Racing is one of my favorite Sega games on iOS, and it’s making its way to the Mac thanks to Feral Interactive. The game will be available to download from the Mac App Store tomorrow, April 4, with support for Game Center and iCloud game syncing.

Brian White, an analyst with Topeka Capital Markets, brings us a crazy new rumor about the much-anticipated Apple television today following recent meetings with supply chain sources in China and Taiwan.

White claims that the “iTV” will finally launch during the second half of 2013, and that it’ll come with a miniature device called the “iRing”, which the user will wear on their finger to act as a pointer. The device will enhance the motion detection experience and take over some of the functions of the traditional remote control, apparently.

One would think that the self-evident answer to the question posited in this post’s headline would be “No,” followed by a pregnant pause, a licking of the lips and then followed it up with the words “You idiot.”

And, in fact, that probably is the answer. But if Apple’s not working on a robot, then why the heck is Apple hiring one of the country’s foremost robotics experts, John Morrell?

Remember when your phone seemed neat because it could actually tell you where you were on a map? That seems pretty quaint now that the gyroscopes and compasses and magic location beetles [1] not only tell our photons where they are, but how they’re moving and even which direction they’re pointed in.

And now that same quantum leap is about to happen in the world of personal fitness trackers. Oh boy.

App Store links mysteriously disappeared from Google search this week, making it more difficult to find iOS apps with a simple web search. Some suspected Google may have killed them intentionally, but it turns out that a technical issue is to blame for the glitch.

Google says it’s now working with “the team” to get it fixed.