A certain indie film starring Ashton Kutcher as Steve Jobs has been the recipient of a ton of press lately, but that little film is being put together by an ragtag crew with no experience, based off a screenplay from an unknown writer. That film is probably going to suck, but the movie being put together by Sony Pictures should get everyone excited because they just hired one of the best screenwriters in Hollywood – Aaron Sorkin.
Announced back in December, Sonic The Hedgehog 4 Episode II is finally ready for prime time. The next iteration in the Sonic series includes our favorite blue mammal along with his furry friend Tails. The game launched on the PlayStation Network and Steam today but will hit the Google Play Store tomorrow and the App Store on Thursday.
We’ve figured out how to get the best prices on every piece of Apple gear you buy, and on the latest CultCast, we’ll tell you how, too.
Plus: our source within Apple has seen their secret new HDTV – we tell he told us.
And don’t miss our our reactions to what this insane Apple fan installed on his person.
Subscribe to the CultCast now on iTunes, and read on for our show notes!
In two days, hundreds of thousands of Verizon customers will be able to experience the blazing speeds of 4G LTE thanks to another major rollout. Verizon continues to leave its competitors in the dust and come May 17, Verizon will have blanketed 258 markets with its 4G LTE network. This week’s expansion lists a few areas we’ve already told you about, and includes 28 new markets as well as 11 expansion markets. If you live in any of the following areas, get ready for a nice speed boost:
May is Mobile Management Month at Cult of Mac,
Notify has been providing a range of enterprise mobile solutions for quite some time. In addition to its NotifyMDM mobile management solution, the company produces a push messaging solution known as NotifyLink as well as NotifySync, an Exchange ActiveSync solution for BlackBerry devices. NotifyMDM supports the core mobile management needs with a focus on user self-servicing options and on providing comprehensive device use information.
An official ESPN app could eventually make its way to the Apple TV set-top box, according to a new report today. Bloomberg says that Disney, parent company of ESPN, is open to offering Apple digital access to its sports network for Apple TV users. While a deal is by no means confirmed, it appears that the companies could be in talks to add an ESPN Apple TV app in the future.
The Socialmatic Instagram camera concept caused quite the buzz after we posted it last week. After making the rounds on all kinds of blogs and design sites, the concept’s creator, Antonio De Rosa of ADR Studios, decided there was enough interest to try and turn the dream into reality.
De Rosa has launched a campaign on Indiegogo to raise funds for turning the Socialmatic into a real-life camera. The concept is based entirely around Instagram and the idea of physicalizing the way we share on social networks. Will the camera actually see the light of day? That’s up to you.
While there’s been a lot of speculation about Apple’s plans to enter the HDTV market, most of the discussion – including information from our source who has seen the device – has focused on the device itself. The form factor, pricing, manufacturing options, interface, input and remote control mechanisms, which iOS and OS X technologies could be leveraged in a TV – all these are key elements to the story of an iTV or Apple HDTV or whatever the device might be called.
These areas of speculation, however, don’t ask the most critical question: Will people buy an Apple HDTV?
According to tech research firm Strategy Analytics, the answer is yes – and it’s a pretty emphatic yes for iPhone owners.
For a very brief moment in time, the Nokia 900 reigned supreme in the eyes of Siri. When asked what the best smartphone ever is, Siri replied back that the Nokia 900 4G was the best. Apple fixed that problem pretty quickly and made sure that Siri now replies that the iPhone 4S is lord of all smartphones. Now Nokia is pissed and says that Apple is conspiring against the truth, and if Siri’s opinions on smartphones can’t be trusted, what can? It’ll be anarchy.
We all know that Pixar, the revolutionary computer animation house Steve Jobs helped build in his wilderness years, makes the Toy Story films at least in part on Macs, alongside other Unix-based machines.
Back when Toy Story 2 was being made in the late 90s, though, the Unix-based nature of the machines Pixar uses for their animation almost led to the complete destruction of the film when an employee accidentally used the “rm *” command on the machine the film was being stored on. In seconds, all of Toy Story 2 was lost: a year’s work of other thirty people.
Not to worry though. A Mac-loving mom she had at home saved the day, and made sure that Toy Story 2 reached theaters on time to delight a generation of kids and adults alike.
Facebook’s iOS app is terrible.
That’s not a matter of opinion: it’s fact. It’s a festering pile of an app, with an average 2 star rating on the US iTunes App Srore.
The app’s slow. The notifications don’t work. The whole thing’s buggy. In every way imaginable, if you open Mobile Safari and type in facebook.com, you’ll have a better experience.
How could a company like Facebook that sees so much of its traffic come from mobile sources release such a terrible, unuseable app? And why hasn’t it gotten better?
This is kind of neat. Back in early 2011, Apple patented an idea for a way for drivers to control the tunes playing on their iPhones or iPods without taking their hands off the wheel.
The solution? A tiny little ring that fits on your steeling wheel with an iPod clickwheel on top.
Google’s latest Stable release of Chrome now includes the ability to sync tabs across multiple devices. As long as you are signed into Chrome, you’ll now have the ability to take your tabs with you when switching between work, home, mobile (with Chrome for Android beta), etc. Accessing them is quick and easy thanks to the new “Other devices” menu located on the New Tab page, and even the back and forward buttons will work, allowing you to pick up browsing right where you left off.
The iTV. The Apple HDTV. SiriTV.
Whatever you want to call it, there’s a lot of talk out there about how Apple is going to revolutionize the living room experience by releasing their own proper television set.
There’s reason enough to be skeptical of these reports. From the industry’s notoriously low margins — Sony’s losing billions on their television business — to the fact that consumers simply don’t upgrade their TVs like they do their smartphones, does it even make sense that Apple would want to release their own television set?
Sure, Steve Jobs said he had “cracked” the TV problem before he died, but who’s to say that he wasn’t talking about Cupertino’s existing set-top box, the Apple TV, a $99 puck that anyone can afford and that slurps up streaming content from the web or the iPhones, iPads and (with Mountain Lion) Macs already in the home?
I’ll say it. The Apple TV is not enough, and Apple absolutely must release a revolutionary television set in the next two years.
Why? Because no matter how popular the Apple TV becomes, it will never be essential.
Only in the world of technology could a company get away with calling these earbuds “wireless.” The product is called the BackBeat Go, and the company is Plantronics, and to anybody with more than zero eyes, it’s clear that they are connected by a wire.
Not so, according to the product blurb: “No wires, no hassle, no compromise,” it says. To which we might add “no brains.” Even better, just a few lines later you can read this sentence: “Inline controls let you pause music to take a call, change volume, or skip tracks.”
Mobile marketing and advertising firm Velti recently released its April Data report, which includes several interesting and surprising details including AT&T’s lead as U.S. iPhone provider. The most surprising piece of information in the report, however, is that adoption rates for the new iPad appear to have peaked and slowed.
The BBC is planning to take home the gold in Olympic coverage this year as they prepare to provide live coverage of every London 2012 sport from every venue throughout the day.
“We will be bringing live coverage of every Olympic Sport from every venue, through a combination of BBC One and BBC Three and up to 24 simultaneous streams live online on PC, mobile, tablet or connected TV
BBC has big plans for its various sports apps on both mobile and smartTVs. Custom built BBC Sport apps for Android and iOS will allow users to watch live video on the go and ensure they never miss a moment.
Hearst, the publishing conglomerate that includes several of the world’s largest magazine brands, sees a bright future of iPad and tablet editions. Duncan Edwards, CEO of Hearst Magazines International, delivered some surprising statements as to what that future will look like at this week’s World e-Reading Congress in London.
The most surprising statement was that Hearst doesn’t plan to include interactive content in its digital publications despite work done in the company’s little known App Lab and the belief that users will pay more for a digital edition. Edwards also described mix of devices used by Hearst digital subscribers. That mix is headed up by the iPad but with Barnes & Noble’s Nook platform right behind it.
Just a day after releasing Sparrow 1.2 for iPhone, the Sparrow team has issued an update to Sparrow for Mac. This release brings a number of new features, improves Sparrow startup times, and quashes bugs.
Do you hate those morons who wander through the streets whilst tapping text messages into their phones? Do you want to knock the stupid handset out of their hands every time you’re forced to swerve or step aside to avoid them? Then you might consider moving to Fort Lee, New Jersey, where police have started fining pedestrians who they catch texting while they walk.
Google Chrome is quite possibly the best web browser you can install on your Mac or PC, and it could soon be the best browser on your iOS device, too. According to one analyst, Google is “definitely” bringing Chrome to the App Store this year — possibly before the end of this quarter — which is bad news for Apple.
The Justice Department’s anti-trust suit and the accompanying class action suit brought by various states (totaling 31 plus the District of Columbia) on behalf of consumers against Apple and the major publishing houses has always been tinged with more than a little irony. After all, the alleged price fixing and collusion actually broke Amazon’s monopoly-like hold on the ebook market. In doing so, it opened the door for products and platforms to compete with Amazon’s Kindle.
The idea of Apple as a sort of digital age Robin Hood is a powerful one in the narrative and one that could give Apple a viable case in the anti-trust suit if the actually goes to trial. Unfortunately, new evidence in the class action suit throws a bit ice water on Apple’s attempt to cast itself as the good guy (or at least as the better guy than Amazon).
With Apple’s entire family of iOS devices now kitted out with high-resolution Retina displays, it’s time for the Cupertino company’s Macs to get the same treatment. We’ve speculated about Retina display MacBook Pros for some time, but there’s been little mention of a high-resolution display for the iMac.
But fear not. Those of you with a love for Apple’s all-in-one won’t get left behind when the Retina display upgrades begin their rollout.
We’re all familiar with just how stringent Apple’s App Store approval process is, but the journey iOS apps take between submission to Apple and finally reaching the App Store is a mystery to most of us. However, one Facebook profile gives us a sneak peek into Apple’s testing lab.
Dive Apple, a female who lives in San Francisco and looks like an upside-down cat, is an App Store reviewer whose Facebook profile reveals a lot about unreleased iOS apps and life behind a desk in Cupertino.
Apple’s next-generation iPhone could finally put an end to fragile smartphones by adopting a flexible OLED display that can bend and twist without so much as a crack. The technology will reportedly come from Samsung — one of Apple’s biggest display partners — which claims to have already received “huge” orders from certain companies.