News - page 1591

Reader is one of the most popular RSS clients out there for Apple devices. It’s available on OS X and iOS, and up until now it has mainly been used in conjunction with Google Reader. Now that Google has announced its plans to kill Google Reader in the coming months, many are starting to look to alternative RSS aggregators.

Today the maker of the app Reeder, Silvio Rizzi, announced that Feedbin support will be added soon to the iPhone version. Feedbin is a simple, clean-looking Google Reader replacement with an API that third-party clients can utilize.

We all know that Samsung loves to copy Apple more than anything in the world. It’s embarrassing  And while most of the copying has been limited to hardware, Samsung’s decided to step up its game on the software front, too.

Yesterday Samsung introduced its version of Apple’s iTunes Store, except it’s got a really bad interface and even worse name. They’re calling it “Samsung Content & Services“, and with a little magic pixie dust, Samsung hopes its customers will think it’s as good as the App Store or Google Play.

There are all kinds of little tricks developers can use to try to get their app to gain some recognition in the App Store, but Matt Henderson inadvertently discovered that naming your app ‘Butt Crack’ can reap unfathomable rewards.

No one launches a product like Apple. There are lines, and fanboys, and cheering, and crying. It’s truly amazing. But what if Apple Stores were stocked full of beer instead of gadgets?

Somersby Cider made an excellent ad which parodies Apple’s product launches… only it’s all about beer. They’ve even got docking stations and different storage options for your brew.

Source: YouTube

Apple’s stock hasn’t been doing too well lately. While many analysts think the problem is that Apple hasn’t released any new products in months, Microsoft’s former COO thinks it’s more of a leadership problem.

In a recent article, former Microsoft COO, Bob Herbold claimed the problem with Apple is that it doesn’t have a visionary leader who is paranoid with details, so Apple’s totally going to start sucking like Microsoft pretty soon.

EA’s on the loose with a machete, and it’s been slashing App Store prices like you wouldn’t believe. The company has reduced 55 of its best iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch games by as much as 90% for a limited time. Check out the massive list of titles below and grab yourself a bargain.

Do you know what a hookworm is? It’s a filthy parasite which hides in your intestine, secured by a its hooks, and feeds on your blood. Ugh. They affect around 600 million people in the world, and can’t be detected with the human eye. Why the hell am I telling your about this in the Cult of Mac? Because an enterprising Canadian doctor has hacked his iPhone to diagnose the presence of these filthy animals.

Gmail is already one of the best email apps on iOS and it’s getting just a little bit better today. Google just released an update for the native Gmail app for iOS.

The new Gmail for iOS app comes with a couple of new features, including the ability to swipe left and right to move between messages, and better editing options for a batch of multiple emails.

Here are the full release notes:

iPhone app downloads dropped significantly last month following a spike over the holiday season. According to app marketing platform Fiksu, downloads dropped 13% to 5.2 million per day in February, from 6.01 million per day in January.

My huge 27-inch iMac is currently hanging on the wall thanks to a VESA mount and adapter, which means I’m intimately familiar with the heavy aluminum leg that used to hold it up. I have been looking for something to do with it other than using it to gather up dust under my bed, and now I think I have it: An oversized iPad stand.

Or I could just give Bluelounge $40 for the Mika, a “Universal” stand for anything vaguely tablet-sized.

The tiny Mediterranean island nation of Cyprus has fallen on some hard times lately.

The bleak financial prospects facing Cyprus has resulted in the govenment having to come up with capital control measures to prevent runs on banks, and keep investors from taking money out of the country. Worse, depositors in Cypriot banks who have more than 100,000 euros in the bank could soon see 40% of their funds converted into bank shares, while those with less than 100,000 euros will not lose any funds – but face limits on what funds they can access.

It’s all looking bleak, and the Cypriot situation has all of the Euro zone panicking. What should Cyprus do? According to one commentator, let Apple buy them.

I’m a sucker for wood paneling my Apple products, and so I’m absolutely going to have to do this: the guys over at RAWBKNY (whom we’ve written about before) are now selling laser-etched replacement keys for the MacBook Pro.

They look great, and Michael over at RAWBKNY says that while they are only designed for the non-Retina MacBook Pro right now, he’s tweaking it so it should work on the Retina MacBook Pro and MacBook Airs soon.

We’ve got a review unit on the way to see how well these work, but be warned: replacing every key on your MacBook is likely to be a time consuming process. $40 will get you a set.

Source: RAWBKNY

Remember the app Dark Sky? If you’re outside the U.S., what you’ll remember is the frustration of not being able to use its amazing real-time rain warnings, which would literally tell you when it would rain on your location in the next hour or so.

Now, the developers of Dark Sky have come out with Forecast, which works anywhere in the world, and will run on Android, iOS, the desktop, anywhere. How? It’s a web app.

Wow, this is incredible. Redditor Kepgnar works in the tech department of a charter school. Every month, one of the departments has to put together a message for the school’s official announcement chalkboard.

Here’s what Kepgnar came up with: a meticulously drawn “Think Different.” logo with an actually working QR code which, when scanned, leads to the YouTube version of the original commercial narrated by Steve Jobs.

How’d Kepgnar do the QR code? They designed it, then projected it onto the chalkboard and traced it. Talk about thinking differently.

Source: Reddit

Over at Asymco, Horace Dediu has compared Apple’s retail economy versus Amazon, and while the results aren’t anything we haven’t seen before — Amazon has annual revenue about twice the size of Apple’s retail revenue, but makes only 10% of Apple’s same operating income on that revenue — it’s informative to see it laid out so clearly. Check it out.

Source: Asymco

https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=Ku0H10_G1X4

One of the curses of being an innovator is every time you innovate, someone comes along and says they had a patent on it first. Apple knows this dilemma well, and the latest patent infringement claim Cupertino has to defend itself against is in China over Siri, Apple’s virtual assistant.

Apple is gearing up to send its much-anticipated “iTV” into mass production during the second half of this year, according to sources in the Cupertino company’s supply chain, who have been speaking to DigiTimes. The set will reportedly boast a 4K “Ultra HD” display with a 3840×2160 resolution, and it’ll be controlled by voice and motion.

Today Flipboard received a huge 2.0 update that brings a slew of new features and additions, most notably the ability to create custom magazines and share them with friends. You can assemble articles, photos, audio and video into a collage of content that Flipboard will format. It’s a big step towards putting curation in the hands of Flipboard users, and it’s implemented beautifully.

What if you tok Twelve South’s neat Plugbug Mac charger extension and shrunk it down to work with the iPad charger? You’d get Scosche’s CoverCharge, that’s what. Just like the Plugbug, the adapter slides onto its host and adds an extra USB port.

T-Mobile will begin selling the iPhone 5 on April 12th, but the model that they’re selling isn’t exactly like those found on other carriers. T-Mobile’s iPhone 5 is actually a tweaked model A1428 iPhone that Apple sells for AT&T, except it comes with AWS support.

Updating your apps on iOS isn’t hard, but for some reason, I suck at remembering to. There are always about nine update notifications waiting for me in the App Store, and I always think I’ll get around to it in a minute, but never do.

One of the best new reasons to jailbreak though, is an app called Auto App Updater. Like its name says, the app makes it so you never have to think about updating your apps on your iPhone or iPad again.

Okay, this is rad. YouTube user HM231 had no use for his car stereo’s old, crusty audio cassette slot, so what did he do? Hollow it out and mount a 30-pin connector inside it so he could slide in his iPod instead to pump up the jams. Rad!

Via: Reddit

If you own a Retina MacBook Pro, here’s a nice little perk to upgrading to OS X 10.8.3: you’ll get about 20 minutes more battery life per charge.

The iPad is great for photographers, but the built-in Photos app sucks. You can’t change the viewing order. Making albums and moving photos is a multi-tap pain in the ass, and navigating is confusing even for the experienced user.

That’s where Focus Point comes in. It’s a photo-viewing app that’s been around for a while, but the latest update adds enough new goodies to make it worth a look.

For Apple to really compete with Samsung in terms of global smartphone marketshare, many analysts believe Apple will have to release a cheaper iPhone to appeal to customers in India and China.

As talk of a cheaper iPhone has ramped up over the last few months, Apple is also planning to increase its presence in India by tripling the number of exclusive authorized reseller stores in the country from 65 to 200 by 2015.