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Crazy iPhone 8 concept will cost you twice as much when it breaks

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Heading
To paraphrase Steve Jobs, these are not two separate devices. 
Photo: Jermaine Smit

The iPhone 6s is on the way, but that’s not going to stop forward-looking Apple watchers from speculating about future phones — like, say, 2018’s iPhone 8.

Alongside regularly-demanded features like wireless charging, designer Jermaine Smit has come up with an unusual dual-screen concept reminiscent of Russia’s YotaPhone — which would offer a 2K display on one side and a low-power screen on the other.

Check out a video below:

The unbelievable true story of Farty Troll‘s struggle to release

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Farty Troll
Sometimes, games have a lot of trouble coming out.
Photo: Toonhound Studios

Apple has a history of blasting fart apps from its App Store. But when is a fart just a fart, and when is it art?

Scott Kurtz, artist and writer of popular webcomic PvP, and his business partner Cory Casoni decided to find out with Farty Troll, a Flappy Bird clone about propelling a flatulent, blue giant named Skull through a maze of coffee cups using nothing but his own wind. Apple repeatedly rejected the app, but after a bit of straining and a lot of effort, it has finally come out.

It all started a year ago as part of Kurtz’s comic, which is about the employees of a magazine who were transitioning into game publishing.

How to follow non-artist profiles in Apple Music Connect

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You'll see way more new music suggestions this way.
You'll see way more new music suggestions this way.
Photo: Rob LeFebvre/Cult of Mac

Apple Music Connect is like another version of Apple’s failed Ping service. It’s being promoted as a way to keep in touch with your favorite artists, but man is it impersonal.

My Connect page is full of bland PR-style stuff and links to buy music from artists I’m following. There’s just not enough quality posts in there to justify checking it each day.

Until now. Jonathan Poritsky has a fantastic idea over at his music blog: why not follow the folks on Apple Music who actually share and curate music? Follow Julie Adenuga, Zane Lowe, or any of the genre or curator profiles hidden in Apple Music.

These are the folks that are sharing amazing music. Here’s how to follow them.

Your hard drive is crowded with freeloading files, let this app help kick them out

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This post brought to you by Disk Analyzer Pro.

Having a computer with a lot of storage space is just like having a house with a gigantic attic. After a couple years, the thought of actually sorting through your collection of long-forgotten items packed into the nooks and crannies becomes more and more frightening. Even the most diligent among us end up with forgotten heaps of digital detritus.

Toyota radio ad shuts down iPhones because drivers won’t

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Toyota Siri radio ad
Oh, Toyota. You puckish tricksters.
Photo: Toyota

Let’s be clear: It is incredibly dangerous to do anything with your phone while you’re driving. You shouldn’t be texting, checking your mail, or swiping through Tinder when you should be focused on all of the people and giant, dangerous machines around you.

But Toyota knows that despite all of the warnings and common sense, some people are just going to chance it anyway. So a new radio ad it’s running in Sweden is taking the choice out of their hands.

You can see the promotional video about the ad below.

Heroes: Reborn prequel debuts as iOS exclusive

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Phoebe channels the darkness in the new Heroes: Reborn prequel.
Phoebe channels the darkness in the new Heroes: Reborn prequel.
Photo: NBC

Excited about the new Heroes: Reborn series coming back to television? Want to relive highlights from the original Heroes series in preparation for the reboot set to air this fall?

How about an entire prequel series that explains how the world has changed since Heroes? You’re in luck, then, as NBC has created a digital series that does just that: Heroes Reborn: Dark Matters.

If you want to see it, though, you’ll need to download the Heroes: Reborn app, which is only on iOS.

Slack’s ‘emoji reactions’ make your co-workers awesome

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slack-emoji-reactions
Slack now lets you react to a message with an emoji, any one of the 722.
Photo: Slack

Slack is ingraining emojis even deeper into your work environment whether you like it or not. Users were already able to send emojis casually while chatting, but now anyone can specifically react to messages in Slack with emojis. It’s pretty easy to get creative with this, and it’s sure to spice up the chat with your co-workers.

Conan is so metal on his road trip to Comic-Con

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You ain't never seen a road trip like this.
You ain't never seen a road trip like this.
Photo: Team Coco

Conan O’Brien and sidekick Andy Richter head off to Comic-Con International this week on the late night television show.

Instead of taking the train down, Richter decides to take a road trip. Conan is excited!

What happens next is a thing of beauty, as Team Coco blasts on down the Fury Road in a auto-monster straight out of Mad Max’s latest big-screen adventure. Check it out in the video below.

Microsoft Office 2016 for Mac is here

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Office 2016 is finally here
Office 2016 is finally here
Photo: Microsoft

After previewing its productivity suite to testers for the past four months, Microsoft Office 2016 for Mac is now available to anyone with an Office 365 subscription.

Microsoft announced this morning that the final version of Office 2016 is ready for primetime, marking the biggest update to come to Office for Mac since the last version was released nearly five years ago.

The new version of Office boasts a number of huge features that were designed with Mac in mind, including an improved user interface that feels like it’s part Windows, part Office for Mac 2011. The familiar Ribbon user interface is still around and plays nicely with OS X features like sandboxed, apps, Retina screen optimization, Multi-Touch gestures, and full screen views.

Check out some of the new goodies:

Fix your broken iPhone without breaking the bank with this easy-to-use DIY repair kit [Deals]

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original_2292_iCrackediPhone6RepairKit_MF-MAIN (1)

Too many of us are familiar with the resonant thud as our iPhone takes a faceplant onto the ground, letting us know without even looking that it’s been busted. It’s a huge inconvenience and expensive to get fixed properly, not to mention the psychological ache at having something we rely on taken out of commission. All of those issues are soothed with iCracked’s iPhone 6 DIY Screen Repair Kit, available now for $114.99, a meaty 36% off of the normal price.

Apple-designed packaging for third-party items hits store shelves

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Apple is teaching third-parties how to create magical packaging.
Apple is teaching third-parties how to create magical packaging.
Photo: Cult of Mac

Apple is known for its uncompromising demands on quality, and now it appears that the iPhone-maker is helping third-party accessory makers learn the magic of making beautiful packaging too.

Apple Stores have begun stocking third-party accessories with redesigned packaging that was created with help directly from Apple. The new packaging aims to reinforce the Apple Store’s image as premium retail location by matching the color of Apple Stores’ storage wall.

Here’s a look some of the new packaging:

Apple Music to face new competition from Facebook

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Apple-Music-iPhone
Apple Music is about to get some new competition.
Photo: Apple

Spotify and Apple Music are now the two major players in the battle for music streaming supremacy, but if Facebook has its way the world’s most popular social network may also become the best place to discover and listen to tunes.

Facebook is in early talks with record labels to develop a music streaming service of its own, according to a new report that claims the social network has some bold plans for the future of music.

Facebook is making it easier to organize your News Feed

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Get ready for the Big De-Cluttering.
Photo: Facebook

Facebook is making a pretty big update to its iOS app today — for the first time ever giving users a major say in how their News Feed is organized.

As anyone who has ever agonized over whether to unfriend that one person who keeps on posting incomplete statuses like “had a bad day :(” will know, up until now Facebook’s News Feed have been pretty much left up to the company’s algorithms.

That’s about to change. And about time, too!

Among music players, the Tefifon never found its groove

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The Tefifon player never found commercial success and mostly existed in the former West Germany.
The Tefifon player never reached commercial success and mostly existed in the former West Germany.
Photo: Wikipedia

The history of music is full of stories of inventors – from Edison to Apple – trying to improve the listening experience. Even formats and devices that became obsolete, such as 8-track tapes or iPods, have a lasting place in the soundtracks of our growing up.
 
There were also interesting ideas that flopped. Such is the category reserved for instruments like the Tefifon. If you haven’t heard of the Tefifon, then that means you probably didn’t grow up in West Germany during the 1950s and 60s.

Imagine if the 8-track tape and a vinyl record could produce offspring. The music player’s cartridge known as a Tefi would be it.

iPhone’s encryption is so good, not even cops can get past it

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New York cops say iPhone encryption is making their job harder.
New York cops say iPhone encryption is making their job harder.
Photo: Cult of Mac

Law enforcement has a love-hate relationship with the iPhone. Features like Activation Lock have helped crack down on smartphone thefts, but there’s always the lurking threat of someone asking Siri about 9/11 and accidentally dialling 911 in the process.

The latest issue police are butting heads with Apple about relates to the company’s late-2014 decision to no longer maintain decryption keys which let Apple unlock iOS 8 devices for police as part of active investigations.

And New York’s cops aren’t happy about it!

Egg freckles? Apple is working on handwriting recognition for iPad Pro

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The classic
The classic "Egg Freckles" Doonesbury cartoon punctured Apple's confidence back in the day.
Photo: Doonesbury

Steve Jobs may have been adamant that the iPad would never ship with a stylus, but more and more evidence is mounting that the upcoming 12.9-inch iPad Pro will do exactly that.

Today, the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office published an application from Apple for something called “Continuous Handwriting UI,” describing how a future iPad could be geared toward picking up and understanding handwriting.

Kids love iPads so much that being forced to watch TV is a punishment

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Yep, kids love their iPads.
Yep, kids love their iPads.
Photo: Payless

You might hear people talking about declining interest in the iPad, but try telling that to kids — who have expressed so much love for Apple’s tablet that last year it was named the #1 brand among children aged 6-12.

Now a new piece of research suggests that little ones are so use to using tablets as their primary “screen” that it’s a punishment to have their iPad privileges revoked and be made to watch regular old, non-touchscreen TV instead.

Your future iPhone’s Apple logo may be more than just a pretty fruit

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Otter-Box-iPhone-6
That weird, random window on your Otter Box case may one day serve a purpose other than letting that part of your iPhone get scratched up.
Photo: Otterbox

That Apple logo on your iPhone sure is pretty, but it doesn’t do a whole lot other than remind you who made your phone in case you forget. It’s kind of lazy that way, really.

But a recently published patent suggests that Apple might put that shiny bobble to use in future models of its hardware.

DARPA on health tracking: ‘Who cares about that stuff?’

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Never mind Touch ID, this could be the best way of unlocking future phones.
"Hey, Siri, what am I thinking right now?".

If you think it’s amazing that your iPhone can recognize your thumbprint and take your pulse, apparently you’re in for some future shocks.

Dr. Justin Sanchez, program manager of the Biological Technologies Office at the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency says that these basic biometrics are just the beginning for how our bodies could one day interact with technology.

“Many of you are just getting things back like, ‘This is what your heart rate is right now’ or ‘You took 6,000 steps today,'” Sanchez said at DARPA’s annual conference last month. “Who cares about that stuff? What you really want to do is use that information to help you interact with machines in a much deeper way.”

You can see the full presentation below.

Here’s a sneak peek at Apple’s News app in iOS 9

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ios-9-news
Apple's News app finally debuted in iOS 9 beta 3.
Photo: Apple

It’s a little late to the party, but three betas in Apple released the News app it announced at WWDC 2015. Soon to be on every iPhone and iPad running iOS 9, News lets users customize the topics that are most important to them, then browse and read distraction-free news articles.

If you’re not running iOS 9 beta 3 or in a supported country like the U.S., fear not, we have the full tour.