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We decipher Apple’s March 21st event invitation, this week on The CultCast

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Apple March 21 event invite
What do you mean?!
Photo: Apple

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.

Dive into this deep well of digital developer knowledge [Deals]

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SitePoint's lessons, video courses and short, screencasts cover the full spectrum of topics in digital development.
SitePoint's lessons, video courses and short, screencasts cover the full spectrum of topics in digital development.
Photo: Cult of Mac Deals

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.

How to warm up and cool down with your Apple Watch

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Doing a warm-up before your workout and a cool-down afterwards can reduce your risk of injury
Warming up before your workout and cooling down afterward can reduce your risk of injury and improve your performance.
Photo: Graham Bower/Cult of Mac

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.

Apple’s new 4-inch iPhone, killer Netflix tips, the FBI fight, and more

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What's next? We've got some ideas.
What's next? We've got some ideas.
Photo: Ste Smith/Cult of Mac

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:

Obama warns against ‘absolutist views’ on encryption

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Obama at SXSW
President Obama spoke at SXSW Interactive today.
Photo: WH.gov

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.

9 classic iOS games to keep you entertained this weekend

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Games iOS
Gaming's good on iOS, but couldn't it be better?
Photo: Ally Kazmucha/The App Factor

app-factor-logo-thumbnailThere 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.

Why won’t Apple build a game-worthy Mac? [Friday Night Fights]

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fnf
Tell us, Apple!
Photo: Ste Smith/Cult of Mac

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.

Friday-Night-Fights-bug-2They’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!

Samsung Galaxy S7 is the smartphone to beat in 2016 [Review]

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samsung-galaxy-s7-is-the-smartphone-to-beat-in-2016-review-image-cultofandroidcomwp-contentuploads201603Galaxy-S7-jpg
Good luck finding a better phone than this today.
Photo: Ste Smith/Cult of Mac
Good luck finding a better phone than this today. Photo: Ste Smith/Cult of Android
Good luck finding a better phone than this today. Photo: Ste Smith/Cult of Android

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. 

Donald Trump’s Apple boycott disappears in a flurry of tweets

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Yeah, we're pretty incredulous about your ideas, too, Mr. Trump.
The brief has been successful despite support from big companies.
Photo: Gage Skidmore/Flickr CC

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:

Adobe rushes out yet another security patch for Flash

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Once more unto the breach, dear friends, once more.
Once more unto the breach, dear friends, once more.
Photo: Adobe

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.

Teen dev’s ambitious app isn’t your typical photo editor

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unnamed
Ryan Stephen makes his WWDC debut.
Photo: Ryan Stephen

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.

Everything we know about the new 9.7-inch iPad

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Get ready to meet the iPad Pro's smaller sibling.
Get ready to meet the iPad Pro's smaller sibling.
Photo: Apple

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:

Gabba 2 jacket prepares you for the worst [Reviews]

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With a zip of the sleeves the Gabba 2 jacket readies you for any amount of inclement weather.
With a zip of the sleeves the Gabba 2 jacket readies you for any amount of inclement weather.
Photo: Jim Merithew/Cult of Mac

Best List: Gabba 2 Convertible Jacket

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.

It’s time to wrangle your unruly password situation [Deals]

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Get control of your passwords and auto-fill information with a single, secure password
Get control of your passwords and auto-fill information with a single, secure password
Photo: Cult of Mac Deals

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.

How to supercharge your Netflix watch list

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Watch it your way.
Watch it your way.
Photo: Rob LeFebvre/Cult of Mac (original image Volkan Olmez/Unsplash CC

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.

The latest iOS 9.1 jailbreak now supports iPad Pro

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pangu-jailbreak-ios-9-1
It's a good day to be a jailbreaker.
Photo: Pangu

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:

Attorney general defends iPhone hacking on Stephen Colbert’s show

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Screen Shot 2016-03-11 at 13.55.46
Loretta Lynch argues her case to Stephen Colbert.
Photo: The Late Show with Stephen Colbert

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.

Hasbro wants to turn your iPhone into a 3D scanner

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little_pony
Scanning your toys into the digital world would be hours of fun.
Photo: Cult of Mac/Ste Smith/Lisa Brewster

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!

Oops! Alphabet chairman Eric Schmidt spotted using an iPhone

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oops-alphabet-chairman-eric-schmidt-spotted-using-an-iphone-image-cultofandroidcomwp-contentuploads201603Eric-Schmidt-iPhone-jpg
The iPhone camera app is clearly visible.
Photo: Osen
The iPhone camera app is clearly visible. Photo: Osen
The iPhone camera app is clearly visible. Photo: Osen

Eric Schmidt has been outspoken about his belief that Apple’s smartphones are nothing but a Samsung Galaxy clone, that user data is safer with Google than Apple, and that (slightly oddly) jumping ship from iOS to Android is not dissimilar to switching from PC to Mac.

So why wouldn’t Alphabet chairman and former Google CEO Eric Schmidt use an iPhone to document his recent trip to South Korea? Makes perfect sense to us!

Nintendo’s first mobile game will debut on March 17

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nintendos-first-mobile-game-will-debut-on-march-17-2-image-cultofandroidcomwp-contentuploads201602Miitomo-png
Coming soon to a smartphone near you. Photo: Nintendo
Coming soon to a smartphone near you. Photo: Nintendo

Nintendo’s first ever smartphone game will finally land on iOS and Android this month — and we now know when and where it will be making its world debut.

Called Miitomo — and described by its creators as a “smart-device app that sparks one-of-a-kind conversations between you and your friends” — the game will first be available to download in Japan on March 17.

Former Apple exec takes charge of the world’s biggest hedge fund

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Photo: AllThingsD
Jon Rubinstein was one of Steve Jobs' most trusted lieutenants.
Photo: AllThingsD

With its massive on-hand cash pile, Apple could easily be mistaken for a bank disguised as a tech firm. Modern hedge funds, on the other hand, are increasingly tech firms disguised as banks.

Which is one reason it kind of makes sense why one of Steve Jobs’ most trusted former lieutenants, ex-Apple exec Jon Rubinstein, has just been announced as the new co-CEO of Bridgewater Associates, the world’s largest hedge fund — with a massive $169 billion in assets.

That’s an amount that would even make Apple sit up and pay attention!

Apple’s top lawyer: DoJ ‘has thrown all decorum to the winds’

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Apple Security Jacket
The Department of Justice is taking Apple to task -- and head counsel Bruce Sewell just isn't having it.
Photo: Jim Merithew/Cult of Mac

We knew we were going to hear back from Apple’s lawyers after the Department of Justice filed another motion in its ongoing struggle to get the company to disable the passcode lock on a terrorist’s iPhone, and we weren’t disappointed.

Apple’s lead counsel Bruce Sewell fired back at the new document in a phone conversation with reporters today, and this whole thing is just one chair-toss away from being a talk-show episode. According to Sewell, the government’s response was “intended to smear [Apple] with false accusations and innuendo,” and he just kept going from there.

‘Let us loop you in’: Decoding Apple’s latest cryptic invite

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Apple March 21 event invite
What do you mean?!
Photo: Apple

Apple’s sent out the invite to its March 21 event, and it’s making everyone crazy. The message contains a single image (one version of which is pictured above) and a message: “Let us loop you in.”

The Internet has been trying to figure out what it all means since it went out.

And some of its guesses are … well, we’ll just say “interesting.” But others might be on to something.

Cola Messenger wants to streamline texting with ‘bubbles’

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Cola's bubbles want to take over your texting experience.
Cola's bubbles want to take over your texting experience.
Photo: Cola.

Most iPhone users spend more time texting than in any other app. Everything from scheduling meetings to finding out what your buddies want to eat tonight is done through texting, the only problem is the experience really hasn’t evolved since iOS was first introduced.

Cola is a new messenger app that wants to fix that by streamlining your communication with little bubbles that let you do stuff like create polls, make a to-do list, and much more so you can spend less time texting and more time enjoying life.