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Reeder 3 enters public beta, immediately becomes best Mac feed reader

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Reeder 3 might be the new Mac feed reader to beat.
Reeder 3 might be the new Mac feed reader to beat.
Photo: Cult of Mac

Developed by Silvio Rizzi, Reeder 2 was our favorite feed reader for Mac when it was released last year, but design wise, it was themed an OSX Mountain Lion app in an OS X Yosemite world.

Now, Reeder 3 is here, available to everyone as part of a public beta. And not only does it have a new look, it comes with a huge number of new features.

New version of Google Glass will turn your boss into a Glasshole

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Google Glass header
Just when you thought you were safe from the Glassholes ...
Photo: Google

Google Glass has returned to keep looking like a really lame version of the future, according to reports. The company is rolling out a new, office-ready version of its augmented-reality wearable to businesses that aims to correct some of the problems of the earlier model.

The new hardware features a smaller form factor, prolonged battery life, and a faster processor.

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iPhone 6 Plus still works after months at bottom of ocean

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Water way to test your iPhone!
Your iPhone doesn't usually feel like a dip. Possibly never, in fact.
Photo: Lifeproof

If you’re taking your iPhone 6 Plus on vacation with you, and you anticipate being near a large body of water like, say, the Pacific Ocean, it’s a good idea to take precautions. One kayaker’s ounce of prevention worked out for the best when his iPhone ended up at the bottom of the damned sea.

Months later, a scuba diver found the phone and returned it, and they could do that because both the waterproof bag the owner had bought and the phone inside of it were still working perfectly.

Jimmy Fallon’s Mac throws Clippy into a rage

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Jimmy Fallon Clippy Windows 10
Hide the Mac, Fallon, or he'll rip the rest of your fingers off.
Photo: NBC

If you’re going to own a Mac, you should maybe put it away somewhere if you’re expecting a visit from Clippy.

Tonight Show host Jimmy Fallon learned that lesson the hard way when he was talking up the launch of Windows 10, Microsoft’s latest OS last night. As is his wont, Microsoft Word’s built-in assistant appeared at random, and everything was cordial until the talking paper clip spotted the MacBook on Fallon’s desk.

You can check out the rest of the clip below.

More iPhone 6s components leak online

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iPhone camera
The iPhone 6s is on the way.
Photo: Jim Merithew/Cult of Mac

The iPhone 6s is just weeks away (okay, two months, but saying “weeks” makes it sound closer), and so it stands to reason that more leaked components from Apple’s supply chain would start finding their way online.

Check out the latest pictures below:

Streamline and safeguard your Mac’s hard drive with Drive Genius 4 at 50% off [Deals]

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Drive Genius 4 is the leading app for maintaining, repairing and protecting your Mac's hard drive.
Drive Genius 4 is the leading app for maintaining, repairing and protecting your Mac's hard drive.

We trust our Macs to be solid and reliable, but what if there’s a problem lurking under its silvery hood? Drive Genius is an award-winning app that leads the market in maintaining, optimizing, preventing and even reversing problems in your computer’s main brain, it’s hard drive. Right now you can get peace of mind and peak performance from your Mac with Drive Genius 4 for $49.99 at Cult of Mac Deals.

Angry Birds 2 flings its way onto the App Store

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The thirteenth Angry Birds game is here.
The thirteenth Angry Birds game is here.
Photo: Rovio

Rovio has churned out more sequels to its Angry Bird franchise than any developers on the planet. They even have sequels to the sequels (we see you Angry Birds Star Wars II), but six years after the original was released, Angry Birds 2 is finally here.

The thirteenth title in the Angry Birds franchise is packed with new puzzling towers to topples, missile birds, and boss piggies. There’s also a new feature that lets you challenge your friends over Facebook to see who’s the true master at flinging birds.

Check out the first gameplay teaser:

Apple invents texture-sensing stylus for future iPads

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Screen Shot 2015-07-30 at 14.35.16
This stylus would add new meaning to the word touchscreen.
Photo: USPTO/Apple

Steve Jobs was famously opposed to including a stylus with the iPad, but even he might have changed his mind had he caught a glimpse of the futuristic texture-sensing input device Apple just patented.

According to a pair of patent applications published today, Apple is working on stylus with in-built camera which would allow it to detect the surface over which it is passed and reproduce these textures for the user — even down to replicating the feel of different fabrics.

Leica invented autofocus, then abandoned it

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Leica invented the autofocus camera system with the Correfot in 1976.
Leica invented the autofocus camera system with the Correfot in 1976.
Photo: WestLicht Camera Auction

Legendary German camera maker Leica spent nearly 20 years patenting technology that would take focusing out of the hands of photographers. As with the 35 mm still camera the company created in 1925, Leica stood ready to once again revolutionize photography, this time with an autofocus system.

But after spending the last part of the 1970s working on prototypes, Leica dropped plans to bring autofocus to consumers. Leica figured its customers already knew how to focus their cameras.

“There’s an element of truth in that,” said Heinz Richter, who was a member of the Leica Historical Society of America when he held one of the first autofocus cameras at a meeting in Minneapolis in 1980. “Leica used to be an extremely conservative company. The autofocus mechanism as they were available then didn’t fit into the company’s ideal of precise focusing.”

Apple’s the No. 1 IoT company, despite not making any devices

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Sorry Tony Fadell. Better turn up the temperature if you want to win customers!
Apple's rivals better turn up the temperature to compete with Apple.
Photo: Nest

Google may have poured billions into buying smart thermostat maker Nest Labs, but according to a new piece of consumer research, Apple’s the company most people think of when it comes to Internet of Things devices.

Conducted by ThroughTek, a leading Machine-to-Machine (M2M) solutions provider, almost half of consumers (48 percent) aware of IoT devices on the market are said to be familiar with Apple’s devices in the category, while just 22 percent know Samsung’s, 15 percent know Amazon’s, and 13 percent know Google’s.

Despite, you know, the fact that Apple’s not really an Internet of Things company at all!

Hollywood badasses swap their weapons for selfie sticks

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Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban selfie stick
Harry Potter really loves magic, it seems.
Photo: Evan Killham/Cult of Mac

The Internet has gone crazy for selfie sticks ever since a couple of Twitter users posted modified images of Hollywood’s toughest characters with their guns swapped out for the hated tech accessories.

The Photoshop swap really has a way of removing all the menace from a person — especially if their new phone has a ladybug case on it. You can see some examples below (as well as some we put together because we just couldn’t help ourselves).

Apple will let visitors drop in for coffee at its ‘spaceship’ campus

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visitor-center-map
Come and hang out with Tim Cook and co.
Photo: Apple

Apple’s forthcoming $5 billion “spaceship” Apple campus may be designed to squeeze in a massive 13,000 employees, or the equivalent of 35 fully-filled Boeing 747s, but don’t worry: it’s got plenty of space for you, too.

According to Apple’s plans for the new headquarters, the Apple 2 campus will include a glass-walled structure for visitors, boasting a 2,386-square-foot cafe, 10,114-square-foot gift shop, and rooftop viewing space, where visitors can gaze out over Apple’s domain while Tim Cook tells you that everything the light touches is his kingdom.

Russia is Putin its foot down about gay emojis

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Everybody loves emoji. Even the weird ones.
Emojis are the new subliminal messaging.
Photo: Technewz

When iOS 8.3 introduced new gay-friendly emojis, one person no doubt responding with a :( sad face was Russian President Vladimir Putin.

Putin’s not taking it lying down, however. According to Russian media watchdog Roskomnadzor, the President has requested a full pro-Kremlin group investigation and crackdown on same sex emojis, concerned that they violate the country’s ban on “gay propaganda.”

Because if there’s one thing proven to make you trade girlfriends for boyfriends, it’s someone sending you a picture of two male smiley faces holding hands.

Apple still determined to bring sapphire displays to iPhone

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Apple is gobbling up sapphire supplies at an alarming rate of knots. Photo:
It's coming. One day.
Photo: GT Advanced Technologies

It would be easy to think that Apple’s sapphire iPhone dreams went down the pan when GT Advanced Technologies went bust, but Apple’s nothing if not persistent.

Today, the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office published a patent application from Apple describing a new method for manufacturing sapphire displays by irradiating the sapphire crystal and then using a laser and “second gas medium” to slice it into the super-thin sheets Apple requires.

NFL sacks Tom Brady for switching to iPhone 6

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nfl-sacks-tom-brady-for-switching-to-iphone-6-image-cultofandroidcomwp-contentuploads2015073866185527_50e908e551_o-940x512-jpg

NFL commissioner Roger Goodell announced that he is upholding the four game suspension the league gave Tom Brady for his role in Deflategate earlier this year, all because the four-time Super Bowl champion refused to hand over his cellphone.

The New England Patriot quarterback told fans this morning that he’s disappointed with the league’s decision, but he’s got a perfectly good explanation as to why he couldn’t give investigators his phone to access to his text messages – he had just switched to the iPhone 6.

AT&T pushes back on $100 million throttling fine

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at&t
AT&T is at war with the FCC.
Photo: AT&T

AT&T is asking the FCC to not make it pay the largest proposed fine in the agency’s history as punishment for throttling customers’ data speeds.

After being slammed with the $100 million fine by the FCC last month when the government agency found the carrier had throttled speeds for customers with ‘unlimited’ data plans, AT&T says it didn’t really harm anyone, so it shouldn’t have to pay up.

iFixit can now help you repair more broken gadgets than ever

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iFixit's Kyle Wiens.
iFixit's Kyle Wiens.
Photo: iFixit

iFixit has made repairing broken iPhones as simple as setting up Ikea furniture thanks to the site’s easy-to-follow guides and excellent repair tools Apple doesn’t really want you to use. Now the company is about make it easier to fix even more broken gadgets by partnering with Electronic Recyclers International.

Finding parts to fix broken Kindles, GoPros, and Nexus devices can be practically impossible, but now that iFixit and ERI are teaming up, consumers will have a way to keep more of their busted gizmos alive, instead of tossing them in the wood chipper.

Custom ID chip is key to Apple’s HomeKit

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Photo: Jim Merithew/Cult of Mac
Our house of tomorrow is going to have to wait.
Photo: Jim Merithew/Cult of Mac

Apple’s HomeKit connected devices are rolling out slower than expected, and one reason for this is that Apple reportedly requires that anyone making a third-party HomeKit device buy and use a special identity chip — a fact that caught many devs unawares.

“I know a lot of people who have been surprised by this requirement and had to re-spin boards for the chip,” said Michael Anderson, chief scientist of engineering firm PTR Group during a recent talk. “A lot of manufacturers are up in arms [about the] Apple silicon [that makes their] device more expensive.”

iPad still has biggest slice of the (crumbling) tablet pie

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3-American-Pie-quotes
The tablet pie's not what it used to be.
Photo: Universal Pictures

The tablet market continues to plummet worldwide, but Apple’s still leading the pack, thanks to the iPad.

According to new figures released by the International Data Corporation (IDC) Worldwide Quarterly Tablet Tracker, tablet shipments fell 7 percent year-over-year in the second quarter of 2015 to a total of 44.7 million units.