News - page 1651

James Bond gets all the cool stuff. Fancy gadgets. Fast cars. Beautiful ladies. And a bottomless bucket of martinis. But he doesn’t have an iPhone controlled dragonfly that can spy on all the bad guys without making a sound.

You’re not James Bond, but you can get your very own dragonfly robot to conduct your own espionage missions, or just take pretty ariel pictures to post on Instagram. The best part is that your flying robot will be controlled with your iPhone and it’ll only cost you 120 bucks.

Yesterday we told you that TIME magazine had shortlisted Tim Cook for its prestigious Person of the Year award, but U.S. President Barack Obama ended up getting selected as this year’s winner. Since Cook is the runner-up, TIME has profiled the CEO with an interview and a look at his history with Apple.

While much of the content in TIME’s profile has already been covered in Businessweek’s extensive interview and NBC Rock Center’s segment, the article does offer a nice overview of how Cook has stepped out of Steve Jobs’s shadow to become the leader of the most valuable company on earth.

Looking for a good, affordable last minute Christmas gift for the gamer in your life? Look no further: the Humble Indie Bundle is back with its seventh iteration, and they are offering some awesome games (and a movie) for one low, bundle-y price.

Right now, the games include Snapshot, the wonderfully weird rogue-like The Binding of Isaac, the action platformer Shank 2, the platform puzzler Closure, and — if you pay more than the average contributor — the awesome Dungeon Defenders tower defense game, and Legend of Grimrock, one of the year’s best old-school RPGs. All that and a high-res copy of Indie Game: The Movie! Sweet.

All games, as usual, are cross-platform, so you get them on Mac, Linux and Windows. Right now, the average contribution is sitting around $5.92, so move quick, and you can get these games for a song.

Source: Humble Indie Bundle

How many college-aged girls do you know running around with broken iPhone screens? 15? 20? All of them? It takes the average college girl like 2.37 days to shatter her new iPhone screen, or at least that’s the stereotype some choose to believe.

To make things easier for college girls, Apple is launching the iPhone 5C. It comes with a pre-shattered screen so all your friends think you live a wild and crazy life. It’s genius. It’s like buying pre-faded jeans. It’s also totally fake, but The Onion is on to something in their latest hilarious but fake news story that covered the launch of the fictitious device.

Here’s the video of the iPhone 5C’s launch:

Redbox Instant, a joint-venture between Redbox and Verizon that hopes to compete with services like Netflix, has today made its debut on Android and iOS in the form of a private beta. The new app allows subscribers to stream unlimited movies to their devices for $8 a month. Here’s how to get on the waiting list.

One of the better Yuletide traditions is the venerable holiday Advent Calendar, in which each day of December leading up to Christmas is marked off on a special calendar by opening its corresponding door to find a small gift, toy or chocolate squirreled away inside.

This year, we here at Cult of Mac decided we wanted to give our readers their very own Apple-themed advent calendar, filled with the year’s best apps, gadgets, stories and other curios. So each day in December, we’re going to lovingly peel back the door on the Cult of Mac 2012 Advent Calendar to reveal another delicious morsel, something really special that came out this year that we think every one of you should enjoy.

Day 19 is here, and along with it, one of our favorite iPhone cases: the Speck PixelSkin HD.

EA makes some of the best games for iOS and they’re ready to unload a truckload of Christmas gifts on you. EA just launched a massive sale on their iOS games today. The most expensive games are now listed for $0.99 while many are now free.

If you’re dreading spending some quality time with your family this holiday season, and want to get lost in some long games of Madden, Mass Effect, and Monopoly, you should probably take advantage of this deal.

Here is a list of some of the games on sale:

What could be tougher than a fire hose? Nothing, that’s what – not even a dragon’s hide can beat out these woven polymer wonders. And it turns out that they are also pretty damn useful: when not being used to quench fires or give civil-rights protesters a jocular nudge, a firehose can be used to protect your iPhone.

I’m pretty sure I have some speakers on my desk. I say “pretty sure” because, while I can hear them loud and clear, I haven’t been able to see them amongst the clutter for many months now. I’m just terrified of unplugging the little cable from my MacBook’s jack socket in case I can never listen to music again. Not that I can find my MacBook either.

But the UCubes might be the answer. First, they hook up via USB, sucking both sound and power out through the bus, meaning I can leave my existing speakers hooked up, just in case.

Second, they are so handsome that I might be inspired to do my annual spring clean a few months early to allow them full aesthetic access to my desk. Where by “spring clean” I mean “sweep everything but my computer into a box and start over.”

It seems Apple’s problematic new Maps app was discouraging a lot of people from upgrading to iOS 6, the Cupertino company’s latest software. But now that Google Maps is official available as a native iOS app, there’s nothing to stop users from finally performing the upgrade. In fact, its arrival boosted iOS 6 adoption by 29%.

Would Apple ever make a credit card? They’ve got millions of credit cards on file for iTunes and App Store purchases. They could integrate it with Passbook. And they’ve got over $100 billion in cash just chillin in the bank, so why not?

We don’t think Apple would ever make a credit card, but it’s an interesting idea that the guys at Credit Card Compare dreamed up – like how it would integrate with Find My iPhone so you could chase down anyone who swipes your wallet. The mockup marketing materials they created for the iCard are perfect. It’s exactly what Apple.com would look like after the big iCard keynote.

Take a look:

Realmac Software, the developers behind Clear and RapidWeaver, have slashed the price of their Mac apps by up to 65% for the holidays. All of their titles are included in the sale, which lasts until January 6, and Clear for iPhone has also been reduced to just $0.99. We’ve got a complete list of the apps on sale below.

If you know someone who just got a new iPhone or iPad, or might be getting one for Christmas, you can help them stock up on apps, music, and movies for cheap with an iTunes gift card. Walmart is selling $50 iTunes gift cards for only 40 bucks. That’s 20% off and the biggest discount we’ve seen.

You can only get this deal online from Walmart.com. Once you purchase the gift card you’ll receive an email with a code that you can redeem via iTunes that will give you a $50 credit in your account. It’s free money. Hurry and get the deal while it’s still available.

Source: Walmart

Just a few weeks back we brought you the then-cheap $100 ring-light for the iPhone, a cheap way to shoot flat fashion photos and videos with your favorite camera. Now, though, you can achieve the same thing for just $10.

Bonus: It’s a DIY project, so you have a great excuse to ignore your family this Christmas.

Apple’s much-anticipated television set has entered its initial testing phase at Hon Hai Precision Industry, a company source has revealed. It’s expected to feature a display between 46 inches and 55 inches in size, and shipments are likely to be “huge.” Don’t expect to have one in your living room anytime soon, however; it doesn’t look like it’s going to get its grand unveiling during 2013.

If you want a waterproof bag, forget about zippers, velcro, or any other kind of fastening. What you need is a roll-top bag – just ask Ortlieb, the king of waterproof gear.

The same goes for gadget bags, and Smithfly’s Digi-Pouch offers a tight-sealing, easy-access home for your cameras, iPhones and anything else you want to keep dry.

Struggling Kodak has finally agreed to sell its digital imaging patents to Intellectual Ventures and RPX Corporation — two consortiums backed by Apple, Google, Microsoft, and others — for $525 million. Kodak will receive a portion of the money from 12 intellectual property licensees, with each licensee receiving rights to the patents, while another portion will be paid by Intellectual Ventures, which will then acquire the digital imaging patent portfolio, plus the new and existing licenses.

Japanese toy manufacturer Legend Toys has unveiled a remarkably detailed Steve Jobs figure to commemorate the first anniversary of his death. Sculpted by Takao Kato, it’s called the ‘Steve mini’, and it comes bundled with a number of props, such as a chair and a tiny iPad. It’ll begin shipping at the end of December — but there’s a good chance Apple will stop it soon.

Android’s market share continues to grow throughout the world, but one country where Google’s platform is having its biggest impact is in China. It’s now the largest single Android market in the world, with one third of all Android devices sold there during 2012. The iPhone, on the other hand, is struggling there.

Just a week ago, New York Governor Andrew Cuomo began slyly hinting that Apple would be building a 3.2 million square foot computer chip factory somewhere in his state. This project is known as Project Azalea.

But not so fast. Now a new report has popped up saying that New York isn’t the destination of Apple’s massive new fab plant, but Oregon is instead.

Are you one of the many people unhappy with your new iPad mini’s low-res screen? Good morning! Here’s a handful of salt in your wound. Apple may already be revving up retina iPad mini production, according to a tenuous new analyst report.

Back in August, Google-owned Motorola Mobility sued Apple for violating 7 of its software patents. Motorola accused Apple of infringing on patents relating to everything from location-based reminders to email notifications.

Now The International Trade Commission (ITC) has thrown out Motorola’s claim that the iPhone violates a patent on “a sensor that prevents accidental hang-ups,” according to Bloomberg. Motorola’s proximity sensor patent has been deemed invalid by the ITC for the second time, and it looks like Motorola won’t have much luck at appealing the decision.

Penny Arcade The Game: Gamers vs. Evil is a deck-building card game published by Cryptozoic Entertainment. Today, the company announced that a stand alone iOS game app based on the deck-building game becomes available tomorrow, December 19. It features characters from the Penny Arcade comic, including Gabe and Tycho, and will launch at a $4.99 price point. The iOS game was developed by PlayDek Games.

Instagram recently updated its Terms of Service (TOS), and everyone freaked out at a clause that said a “business may pay Instagram to display your photos in connection with paid or sponsored content or promotions without any compensation to you.” INSTAGRAM CAN SELL MY PHOTOS WITHOUT MY PERMISSION?!? Quick, everyone move to Flickr!!!

As with most news involving social network privacy, it has all been blown way out of proportion. No, Instagram does not want to sell your precious pics you take on your iPhone.

Today Apple seeded a new beta of OS X Mountain Lion 10.8.3 to developers in the Mac Dev Center. The build number is “12D43” and the release contains no known issues.

This is the third 10.8.3 beta to be released after the original was seeded back in November. It was previously discovered that OS X 10.8.3 hints at the faster AMD Radeon 7000 chip making its way to the rumored Mac Pro refresh in 2013.

Apple released OS X 10.8.2 to the public back in September with Facebook integration, Game Center, and some other new features. This third 10.8.3 beta comes out just before Apple shuts down iTunes Connect for the holidays this Friday.