The time-traveling dwarves of Time Bandits. Photo: Handmade Films
Terry Gilliam’s fantasy film Time Bandits is set to be turned into a TV series by Apple.
The iPhone-maker is reportedly closing in on a deal that would give it the rights to make a TV series based on the 1981 movie, but Terry Gilliam won’t be attached as a writer for the series.
Android has, or is soon to get, an incognito mode for the YouTube app, which will stop watched videos from showing up in your YouTube history. Google will still know exactly what you watch, of course. It’s just a way of keeping embarrassing movies out of your watched videos list.
iOS may or may not be getting the same feature, but that doesn’t matter. By using iOS’ (and the Mac’s) built-in tools, you can already watch YouTube videos without them showing up in your YouTube history. It even stops YouTube from tracking your history via cookies.
The US government may soon be looking over Facebook's shoulder to better protect your privacy. Unless Facebook and Google can prevent it, of course. Photo: Facebook
The Commerce Dept. is reportedly talking to social networking companies and consumer advocates about rules to protect online privacy. Also included are possible protections for companies that have data breeches.
This is supposedly laying the groundwork for legislation that might be proposed this fall.
People in Japan hit by the recent massive floods are getting a little help from Apple if their iPhones, Macs or iPads were damaged as a result of the floods.
In a message posted on its regional support site, Apple says it is offering flood victims free repairs on damaged Apple products from now until the end of September.
Apple has long been a target for patent lawsuits. Photo: Charlie Sorrel/Cult of Mac
A company named SpeakWare is suing Apple, Samsung, and Microsoft, claiming that all three are infringing on one of its patents.
Specifically, it claims that the tech trio are illegally using technology described in SpeakWare’s 2002 patent for “Hands-Free, Voice-Operated Remote Control Transmitter.” The allegedly infringing products are voice-activated systems which are used to control appliances. In Apple’s case, that’s Siri.
Taking your iPad to watch Orlando Bloom perform is a bad idea. Photo: Gage Skidmore/Flickr CC
Apple’s normally happy to get a public shout-out for one of its products from a celebrity. It’s unlikely to be quite so chuffed about a recent incident involving actor Orlando Bloom, however.
Bloom was acting in a play at Trafalgar Studios in London, England, when he flipped out at an audience member using an iPad during his performance.
Pick up the Bluetooth speaker that fits your summer plans. Photo: Cult of Mac Deals
Summer trips are always better with the right playlist. So we’ve rounded up some of the best speakers for outings of all kinds. That includes a speaker that’s not much bigger than an iPhone, a super tough, waterproof speaker, and even one that doubles as a lamp. Read on for more details:
Telegram Passport wants to be the go-to authorization service. Photo: Telegram
Secure messaging app Telegram now lets you save copies of your most important documents so that you always have them with you.
Telegram Passport can hold your driving license, passport, other forms of ID, and more — and promises to protect them with end-to-end encryption. You can then use those documents to prove who you are when logging into other services.
Just how good is the 2018 MacBook Pro after Apple's patch? Photo: Apple
This week onThe CultCast: Apple has issued a patch that significantly increases performance for all 2018 MacBook Pros, but there’s one glaring problem it doesn’t fix…. We talk benchmarks and real-world performance. Plus, we take a peek at the new HomePod features from iOS 12 beta, and we wrap up with your emails!
Our thanks to Squarespace for supporting this episode. It’s simple to accept Apple Pay and sell your wares with your very own Squarespace website. Enter offer code CultCast at checkout to get 10% off your first hosting plan or domain.
See, you don't need in-app purchases to be a success! Photo: Feral Interactive
Grid Autosport, the AAA racing game that offers a console-quality racing experience on iOS, has passed more than 100,000 downloads since debuting on the platform last November.
That’s an impressive figure in its own right. But it’s also welcome news for anyone who’d like to see fewer of the freemium games loaded with in-app purchases that have clogged the App Store in recent years. Here’s why.
Everyone should welcome skill-based matchmaking. Photo: Killian Bell/Cult of Mac
Epic Games is finally bringing Fortnite to Android this summer following its launch on iOS back in March. But don’t get too excited just yet.
New reports claim the game will be exclusive to one Samsung handset that isn’t even out yet. There’s a chance your existing device won’t support it at launch.
Recent poll underlines how people are viewing the race to $1 trillion. Photo: Kārlis Dambrāns/Flickr CC
Competition is heating up between Amazon and Apple, regarding which will pass the trillion dollar valuation mark first. But despite Apple still being ahead to the tune of approximately $949 billion to Amazon’s $888 billion, investors seem to believe that Jeff Bezos’ retail giant will be the one to set the record.
According to a recent survey at the 8th Annual Delivering Alpha Conference in New York, CNBC asked 100 investors which company they thought would set this record first. Amazingly, a whole 70 percent said that Amazon is likely to pip Apple to the post.
Search suggestions help you find what you’re looking for. Photo: Killian Bell/Cult of Mac
Apple just rolled out its latest update to the official Apple Store app, introducing an improved search interface.
The version 5.1 release now displays search suggestions like the App Store and iTunes apps, and thanks to speech recognition, you can find products using your voice for the first time.
Wall Street hammered Facebook today. But the privacy concerns that pushed the company's share price down almost 20 percent aren't an issue for Apple. Photo: Ste Smith/Cult of Mac
Facebook lost more value today than any other company in history: $120 billion. The massive selloff came after CEO Mark Zuckerberg admitted that the growing privacy concerns of the public, and the likely response of lawmakers and regulators, will hit the company where it hurts: in the pocketbook.
On the same day Facebook lost 19 percent of its value, Apple’s share price was unaffected. This is because the two companies have diametrically opposing views on the privacy rights of the public. What hurt Facebook so much is actually one of Apple’s strengths.
An improved Samsung RAM will almost certainly make future iPhone models more efficient. Photo: Samsung Electronics
The highlight of Samsung latest mobile RAM chip is power efficiency. The second-generation LPDDR4X uses up to 10 percent less electricity without sacrificing speed. That’s almost certainly going to benefit future iPhone models.
With batteries improving only slowly, the best way to increase the time between charges is for the phone’s components to draw less energy. Hence Samsung’s efforts to make its RAM more efficient.
Someone who has sent you money can potentially get your Apple Pay account locked. Which might be a real problem for some people. Screenshot: Apple
Some people treat Apple Pay like a bank account. They keep a balance of cash on this payment system and use it to pay off debts or accept money from friends.
A Redditor has a story that shows a potential pitfall of this strategy, especially if a large sum of money is involved.
Jony Ive has been the most important designer in tech the last 20 years. Photo: BBC
Wired is turning 25 years old. To celebrate, the magazine invited Apple design chief Jony Ive to come to an event to talk about the crazy changes technology has been through over the last few decades.
Raise to wake might finally be coming to an end. Photo: Ste Smith/Cult of Mac
Apple Watch is finally starting to face some bigger competition from rival smartwatch-makers, based on the latest data from Canalys.
Fitbit and Garmin are capitalizing on the wearables trend and diversifying their lineups to appeal to specific use cases. As a result, Apple Watch’s market share shrunk even though it sold more watches in Q2 2018 than it did during the same period last year.
Samsung's ads set at an "Ingenius" bar criticize the iPhone rather than praise the Galaxy S9. Screenshot: Samsung
When a product isn’t doing well, one marketing strategy is to sling mud at the competition. That’s why all Samsung’s latest ads don’t focus on the Galaxy S9, but criticize the iPhone instead.
There are four new ads that target some aspect of Apple’s products, such as the notch, no microSD card slot, and a lack of on-screen multitasking.
FretBud is super-simple, and that’s what makes it so useful. Photo: FretBud
If you’re learning to play the guitar, then you will constantly be looking up two things: Scales and chords. After you get a bit further into it, you’ll add arpeggios to that list. And you will keep referencing them for years, becasue there are a zillion way to play each chord, scale, or arpeggio on the guitar. And here’s the problem. Reference materials for these three essentials are a pain to use. Either you spend more time clicking around an app than you do practicing, or you have to keep a ton of PDFs around, and try to keep those organized. Now, though, a super simple (maybe too-simple) app finally ge ts it right. It’s called Fretbud, and I love it.
Get ready to earn those Battle Stars! Photo: Epic Games
The week is almost over, but Fortnite’s week three challenges for season five have only just begun.
As usual, there are seven to complete — four easy and three hard — that will earn you a total of 50 Battle Stars. You should find most of them relatively easy, but we have some tips if you find yourself struggling.
Here’s our guide to smashing week three’s Battle Royale challenges.
Street View looks even better on iPhone X. Photo: Google
The official Google Street View app has been updated to take full advantage of the iPhone X’s stunning Super Retina HD display.
It’s one of the last Google apps to get iPhone X support, following an update to Inbox that (after a very lengthy wait) rolled out last month. Users can also look forward to improvements to 360-degree panoramas.