John Oliver took on Apple’s continuing privacy standoff with the FBI during Sunday’s Last Week Tonight — describing how crucial encryption is when it comes to protecting important data such as, “our financial information, health records, dick pics, trade secrets, classified government records, [and] dick pics.”
And you know what? As well as being very funny, it’s actually one of the best mainstream news reports I’ve yet seen on the whole issue.
Check it out below.
Apple’s Chinese retail store will continue this month with the opening of a brand new Apple Store in the port city of Dalian.
The store will be located at 66 Olympia Plaza in a giant complex, and opens at 10.00am local time on Saturday, March 19th.
The iPhone 7, set to arrive this September, is likely to ditch the ugly antenna bands which have hung around since 2014’s iPhone 6 — according to a new leaked image which has appeared online.
Check it out below:
What better way is there to spend a Sunday than by catching up on the latest great iOS apps?
Whether you’re wanting to transform the way you text with a fantastic new messaging tool, or just fancy unwinding with a top-down, open-world driving game that makes Grand Theft Auto look tame by comparison, you’ve come to the right place.
Check out our top picks below.
If you thought LED light bulbs couldn’t get cooler, well, you were wrong. Energy saving, long-lasting, superior quality light, the StrimLIGHT LED bulb has all that going for it. It also has the ability to play crisp, clear audio. Yes, from a light bulb. Right now you can get a StrimLIGHT LED bulb for just $29.99.
Snapchat is one of those essential social networking apps that makes a ton of sense to early adopters (read: young folks) and not much sense at all to those who arrive later to the party.
As obfuscated as most of Snapchat’s features are, it takes a bit of guidance if you want to go beyond simply snapping a shot and sending it to a buddy. These four easy Snapchat tips will turn you into a master.
This week on The CultCast: it’s official, Apple is going to “loop us in” at their March 21 press event. Join us as we decode the mysterious event invitation. Plus: some new leaks give us glimpses at the iPhone SE and iPhone 7 designs; the incredible size and scope of Apple’s new spaceship campus; and don’t miss the stuff we’re embarrassed to secretly love in an all-new Get To Know Ur Cultist.
Our thanks to FreshBooks for supporting this episode, the easy-to-use invoicing software designed to help small business owners get organized, save time invoicing and get paid faster. Get started with a free trial at Freshbooks.com/cultcast.
If you’re considering making the smart move of expanding your skillset to include digital development, today’s your lucky day. SitePoint Premium is a massive library of courses, videos and e-books aimed at web developers, designers, and other digital professionals looking to learn or refine their chops. Their web development books are known for being written by industry leaders, and right now you can get a lifetime subscription for $49.
When you start a workout, Apple Watch only gives you a three-second countdown. There’s no time for a warmup first. And when you’re done, the Workout app does not prompt you to cool down either.
That is very different from the treadmills and bikes you find in most gyms, which ease you gently into your workout and steadily lower your pace at the end.
Apple Watch may not (yet) support the warmup and cool-down phases of a workout, but that does not mean you should skip them. These Apple Watch fitness tips will help you get the most out of your workouts.
If the rumor mill is correct, Apple’s releasing a new 4-inch iPhone, possibly dubbed the iPhone SE, at its upcoming keynote in March. What the heck will it look like, what are the specs, and how much will it cost?
We’ve got a look at all the possibilities in this week’s Cult of Mac Magazine, plus a look at why your iPhone battery will never last more than a day, Apple’s cryptic “loop you in” invite, a way to lock down your iPhone, and a ton of killer tips and product reviews to keep you informed.
All that, plus a bunch more, in this week’s issue. Here are the top stories for the week:
President Barack Obama was in Austin, Texas, for the opening day of the South by Southwest Interactive festival, and talk turned inevitably to the current tension between law enforcement and tech companies on subjects like security and citizen privacy.
The president couldn’t comment on the specific case that has Apple and the FBI fighting over whether the government can compel a private company to provide access to a locked device (in this case, an iPhone 5c belonging to San Bernardino shooter Syed Farook). But he did provide some insight into the government’s view of the ongoing legal battle.
You can check out the whole conversation in the video below; the session starts about 39 minutes in.
There are hundreds, maybe even thousands, of games available in the App Store. I’ve played tons of them over the years. Some of those games eventually ended up getting deleted, or moved to the last few pages of my games folder, where they remain for long car or plane rides.
However, there are a few games that have remained on my iPhone or iPad’s Home screen for literally years now. Even long after their launch, I still launch these games regularly, play them, and thoroughly enjoy them.
Mac users needn’t bother pre-ordering an Oculus Rift headset because they can’t use it. According to Oculus founder Palmer Luckey, that’s because none of the machines Apple offers are powerful enough to meet its recommended specifications.
They’re not powerful enough to play the latest games at high-settings, either. Even if you spend thousands on a high-end Mac Pro, you’re going to be disappointed with its gaming prowess — especially if you want to drink in some of those sweet, sweet 4K graphics.
So, is it about time Apple built a Mac that’s good for gaming?
Join us in this week’s Friday Night Fight between Cult of Android and Cult of Mac as we battle it out over this and more!
Building a smartphone that beats the Galaxy S6 has likely been Samsung’s biggest challenge so far. How do you improve upon an already stellar design and one of the best smartphone cameras on the market? You build the Galaxy S7.
With its curved glass back, larger battery, Dual Pixel camera and even more powerful internals, the Galaxy S7 is the smartphone to beat in 2016.
Republican presidential front-runner Donald Trump’s bid to make America great again by boycotting its most valuable company has already failed.
Three weeks ago Trump called for a boycott of all Apple products because the company has refused to comply with a federal order to unlock the San Bernardino shooter’s iPhone 5c, but it looks like his love for iPhone ultimately won.
This morning, Trump unleashed a flurry of tweets. Only instead of going with an Android, his itsy-bitsy hands embraced the iPhone once again:
In a post that surprises no one in the tech community, Adobe needed to fix another Flash security flaw today, rushing out a patch for its web multimedia software.
Adobe is rating the update as a critical vulnerability “that could potentially allow an attacker to take control of the affected system.”
Which, of course, sounds like kind of a big deal. Time for yet another security patch for Flash.
If you’ve grown bored of Instagram’s filters, there’s a new option for giving your iPhone photos a little touch of magic.
New image-editing app Glaze is a one-stop-shop for photo tweakers that lets you jazz up still images, videos and — for iPhone 6s users — Live Photos, too.
“When I was looking around for an app to create, I couldn’t find a single image app which was comprehensive across all content types,” says Glaze creator Ryan Stephen. “This was my response.”
Perhaps most impressive of all? Stephen is a 16-year-old from Portland, Oregon, whose self-taught coding skills landed him a place at last year’s Worldwide Developers Conference — on Apple’s dime.
The iPad Air lineup hasn’t been updated since October 2014 but that is finally set to change on March 21st when Apple is expected to unveil a new 9.7-inch iPad that will undoubtedly be the best tablet to ever come out of Cupertino.
Thanks to a flurry of rumors and leaks over the winter we have a pretty solid idea what Tim Cook and company will reveal when Apple loops us in at 1 Infinite Loop. If you want Apple’s first keynote of 2016 to be a surprise, stop reading now.
Here’s everything to expect from Apple’s new iPad:
If one Gabba is excellent, then Gabba 2 has to be better.
The Gabba 2 Convertible Jacket is just that — Gabba turned up a notch.
Take what was the highly popular and highly functional original Gabba jersey, add some removable sleeves, and the Gabba 2 jacket is the perfect on-the-road companion.
If you’ve heard about or used the Cult of Mac buyback program, you might be wondering what we do with your old devices — especially if you sent in broken gear. Is your old-but-loved iPad or iPhone in good hands?
We’ve all got a system for keeping track of the dozens of online passwords we need these days. While some are more effective than others, none are as simple and secure as keeping all your passwords and auto-fill information under a single password. That’s exactly what Password Boss Premium does, and right now you can get a lifetime subscription for just $19.99.
It was a good day when Netflix added My List to the list of awesome features it has to allow us to watch anything we want on our TV, computer, or game console. It lets us all keep track of what we want to watch while helping corral the overwhelming amount of distracting movies and TV shows on offer.
However, Netflix still wants to manage what you watch; My List is ordered by some magic Netflix algorithm that makes sure it puts movies it wants you to see up front.
Switch your Netflix My List queue to Manual sorting, then move some stuff around, and you’ll supercharge your Netflix watch list in no time.
Here’s how.
There’s some great news for jailbreakers to end the week on, as the Pangu Team has just made its latest iOS 9.1. jailbreak available — offering iPad Pro users (along with the usual iOS suspects) the chance to jailbreak their device for the first time.
Pangu claims that its untethered iOS 9.1 jailbreak works with 64-bit devices including the following:
With a growing number of people siding with Apple in its privacy standoff with the U.S. government, United States Attorney General Loretta Lynch attempted some damage control last night by appearing on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert to defend the FBI’s position.
Check out her appearance below.
Toy-making giant Hasbro wants to bring its kiddy-friendly offerings into the twenty-first century with a nifty smartphone accessory, which would let people scan their favorite toys using their iPhone.
Unless their favorite toy happens to be an iPhone, that is. Hey, given Apple’s popularity among youngsters, stranger things have happened!