News - page 1954

I went down to the local Apple store this evening with my son Lyle. The store is usually packed, and paying for something isn’t always easy.

That’s what Apple has developed EasyPay, a new system for scanning and paying for goods yourself using your own iPhone. You just scan the barcode and hit “Pay.” It’s so easy, Apple staffers joke it should be called “EasyTheft.” But it’s a pretty radical new way to go shopping.

Here’s a short video of us buying some goods, showing how quick and easy it is to use:

I’ve seen a lot of weird videos on the internet over the years, but ‘iMac Believer’, a video tribute to Steve Jobs takes the cake. It’s probably the most bizarre video tribute I’ve ever seen.

Steve Jobs is the leading contender for Time‘s annual Person of the Year award, even though it’s not usually awarded to someone who is no longer alive.

“The smartphone has changed the world as much as the Bible has,” said celebrity chef Mario Batali, who was pro-Jobs at Time‘s annual POY panel debate in New York.

Apple has released an update for Java on Mac OS X 10.6 and 10.7 the updates are available now via Software Update on your Mac.

Check out all the exciting details about these updates after the break.

According to a new report by Chitika Insights, nearly 40% of iPhones are currently running iOS 5. Apple released its latest mobile operating system to the public on October 12th, and users are continuing to install the new OS at a rapid pace.

Nearly one month has now passed since the release, and iOS 5 can be found on 38% of iPhones, 30% of iPads, and only 12% of iPod touch devices.

The Criterion Collection consists of the “important classic and contemporary films” from around the world. 46 of its films from throughout the years have been made available in iTunes for film aficionados to download.

The films in the collection are considered to be titles that have made a significant impact on the world of cinema. Many titles have been remastered and released in the highest quality possible for iTunes distribution.

Microsoft allegedly aborted a deal with a Swedish mobile blogger because he uses an iPhone.

Toni Johansson, at the helm of site winMobile.se, said that responding to an email with the “sent from my iPhone” signature cost him a funding deal from Microsoft. As a result, he’s closing the site.

We recently told you about the hidden panorama mode in the iOS 5 Camera app that could be enabled by editing a .plist file. Since then, a jailbreak tweak called “Firebreak” has been released that automatically enables the feature on any jailbroken iOS 5 device.

Panorama mode in the iOS Camera actually works, and you can get it on your own device right now without jailbreaking.

Pilots use them. Maintenance crews use them. Now you can rent an iPad to boost your entertainment options in flight.

The much-touted iPad entertainment system has finally take off at Jetstar, a subsidiary of Australian airlines Qantas. They will keep the minds of passengers off priority boarding irks and missed upgrades on a Nov. 9 flight from Melbourne to Auckland and will be on board for all flights over two hours.

Has your Mac’s MagSafe adapter been worn down to the wires? Apparently, many people have experienced problems with MagSafe power adapters damaging where the cord and connector meet. So much so, in fact, that Apple had to redesign the MagSafe adapters to the L-shaped ones we know and love today just to try to resolve the problem, but to no avail.

No worries, though. Apple has launched an official Adapter Replacement Program for customers with damaged cables and broken hearts. There are now steps in place for getting your MagSafe adapter replaced and your money refunded.

The iPhone 4S’s mysterious battery drain issues under iOS 5 are notorious, and now Apple is seeding a beta version of iOS 5.0.1 to customers who have complained about battery life as part of its AppleSeed program.

In addition, Apple has also told its Genius Bar employees that any customers who come in reporting battery life issues should be told to wait patiently until iOS 5.0.1 is released in a “few weeks” if no hardware issues are found.

“A few weeks” sounds like an official iOS 5.0.1 release time table to me, but “suck it up and wait” is still pretty hard guidance to hear for the many people with new iPhones that bleed out their full charge every few hours.

If you’re still rocking the red panda as your default browser, great news. Following the new rapid release cycle that saw Firefox leap from version 4 to version 7 in just six months, Firefox has made another evolutionary leap today with the official release of Firefox 8.

An Australian retailer is playing a bit of ‘cat-and-mouse’ with Apple and a recent court ruling blocking sales of Samasung’s Galaxy Tab 10.1. Any hope of staying off Apple’s radar, however, vanished with a taunting online note and offshore servers melting under the crush of demand.

Apple co-founder Steve Jobs could get a little ticked-off when speaking about Android. At one point, Jobs told biographer Walter Isaacson: “I’m going to destroy Android, because it’s a stolen product. I’m willing to go thermonuclear war on this.” Well, Google certainly knows how to push Steve’s buttons. The latest example: Eric Schmidt, executive chairman of the Mountain View, Calif. company, says Android was way out ahead of the iPhone – sort of. Kind of. Well, pretty close, okay?

Infrared light. We can’t see it, but it surrounds us, permeating everything… especially our digital camera sensors, leading to images filled with off, unnatural colors.

With the iPhone 4S, Apple introduced an infrared filter to improve color quality in the images. But what are the practical effects of this filter? Much more accurate color and the elimination of the reddish tint that plagues so many iPhone photos.

If you’ve ever wanted to use Siri on your Mac, we’ve got the next best thing: how about using Siri on your iPhone 4S to pass along commands to your OS X desktop, launching apps just by giving your command out loud? Now you can, thanks to the latest update to the popular iTeleport VNC app.

A good report by Horace Dediu over at Asymco shows that about every quarter, about 56% of all new iPhones are replacing old models that have been discarded.

That’s interesting, but it doesn’t necessarily paint a good picture for AT&T, which seems to be growing new iPhone customers at a much slower rate than they once did.

Cue up the Norma Rae theme music. Apple is about to go up against the unions. Well, not quite. The tech giant is starting mandatory training for retail store managers that includes the “legal do’s and don’t of dealing with unions.” The training comes as Apple marks the 10th anniversary of its retail stores, now numbering 357 worldwide.

Noticing that people really liked to wrap the new iPod nanos around a wrist band and turn them into watches, Apple decided to embrace the Nanowatch movement with their latest update, specifically by rolling out a number of fun new watch faces. The most iconic of the new options, though, is the one that mimics the classic Mickey Mouse watch face, famous with Mouseketeers all around the world since the 1950s.

If you don’t have an iPod nano, there’s a cool, easy way to get yourself the nano’s Mickey Mouse watch face on your Dashboard. Here’s how.

There’s an easter egg in iOS 5: a new panorama mode that lets you stitch together multiple shots you take with your iPhone’s camera into a gorgeous 180+ degree image. Unfortunately, while Apple clearly spent some time putting this together, there’s no way to access it as a consumer unless you jailbreak your iPhone. Here’s how to get Apple’s panorama mode working on your iPhone 4, iPhone 4S or iPad 2.

Remember that new cheekily-christened “EasyTheft” system Apple was planning on rolling out to its official Apple Store app? The official update is here, and anyone can now try it out!

Remember those days when you didn’t want to go to school? Mondays. Rainy days. Exam time.

What if they’d told you it was “iPad Day?” You’d be up and atom with your lunchbox, pronto.

Teachers at three elementary schools in South Carolina say that thanks to the iPad, keeping kids focused on formerly “boring” subjects isn’t a problem.

We told you a couple of hours ago about security guru Charlie Miller’s new iOS vulnerability that allows an approved App Store app to run unsigned code remotely. Miller has been hacking Apple’s products for years, and this most recent bug is a particularly nefarious exploit that could be used for all kinds of evil purposes.

Charlie Miller is one of the good guys, however, and he is planning to show his cards at the SysCan conference in Taiwan next week. The ends don’t always justify the means in this case, as Apple has now kicked Miller out of the App Store and iOS Developer Program.

The iPhone 4S continues to break sales records left and right. Pre-orders for the iPhone 4S started in Hong Kong last Friday, and it’s been reported that pre-orders sold out after the first 10 minutes of availability.

Apple will launch the 4S in 14 more countries this Friday, and the smartphone is expected to reach mainland China by December.

Earlier today Google announced the addition of Google+ Pages, which allows businesses to create pages and interact with fans, just like on those other social networks. We’re really excited about Google+ (Hangouts are pretty freaking awesome), so we’re not wasting time to get started. We created our shiny new Google+ Page for Cult of Mac that will be getting all latest Cult of Mac news and love. Now you can add us to your circle and enjoy Cult of Mac’s news in Google+.

You can get to our Google+ Page by clicking here. And if you haven’t added us yet to your Facebook and Twitter parties, we’d love to be your friend there, too.