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Tesla, blackjack and burgers: Woz tweets his Reno roadtrip

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Photo: Steve

Given everything we know about him, you wouldn’t have ever expected Steve Jobs to tweet out his hotel room number, details of a greasy meal at Chili’s Grill & Bar, or brag about winning $300 at blackjack in Nevada.

That, in short, is what separates Jobs (and, indeed, Tim Cook) from Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak.

Woz recently took a road trip to Reno with his wife in his $100,000 Tesla — pausing only to send out a string of entertainingly wacky tweets to his 370,000 Twitter followers regarding hamburgers, Segways, an unnamed “blackjack system” he’s been working on and, naturally, a number puzzle that revealed exactly where he was staying.

Apple makes targeted ads possible on iTunes Radio

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Photo: Apple
Photo: Apple

Apple is beefing up its iAd network for iTunes Radio by making it easy for advertisers to target certain customers. Like iAds for apps, advertisers can also buy their own audio ads without having to go through Apple’s sales team.

The change seems geared towards making advertising on iTunes Radio a more attractive opportunity, especially now that brands can use Customer Match, Apple’s ad-targeting system.

How Yahoo plans to blast your Apple Watch with news

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Will you read the news on Apple Watch? Photo: Apple

Developers are making a mad dash to finish their first Apple Watch apps before the wearable goes on sale in April. Yahoo is among those looking to make a big splash with must-have apps, and when it comes to bringing you the news, the company is hoping you’ll want it in bite-size chunks.

Yahoo’s Nick D’Aloisio sat down with Bloomberg today to talk about how digesting the news is going to change once you slap a tiny Apple Watch screen to your wrist. To bring long-form news to wearers, D’Aloisio says Yahoo Digest will focus on giving you the most salient pieces of a story, accompanied by little visual elements called atoms.

Watch Nick explain the news revolution Yahoo plans to unleash:

Steve Jobs’ high school yearbook lands on eBay for $13,000

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Jobspic
The luscious hair didn't last into the Apple years, unfortunately. Photo: Homestead High School

 

Have you always wanted to own a piece of Steve Jobs history, while also disposing of $13,000 in a hurry?

If so, you may be the perfect buyer for an eBay copy of the high school yearbook for Steve Jobs’ graduating class, in which the long-haired future Apple co-founder looks more on course to be voted “Most likely to start a progressive rock band” than “Most likely to become CEO of the world’s most valuable company.”

Carrying a Buy It Now price of $12,999.98 (or an opening bid value of $4,999.98), the book currently belongs to a fellow student at Homestead High School, who spoke with Cult of Mac about the sale.

30 Mac SEO tools to boost your website’s traffic

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Ready to solve your SEO woes?
Ready to solve your SEO woes?

This post is brought to you by SEO PowerSuite.

Search engine optimization can make or break your website. And Google and other search engines’ constant tweaking of their algorithms means a “set it and forget it” policy can lead to disaster for your site’s SEO.

Luckily, there are plenty of DIY tools to help you boost and maintain your site’s search engine ranking. Some are free, while others come in a variety of paid versions to accommodate businesses of all sizes. All offer different tool sets to help you achieve various goals. The roundup below shows the key features and pricing info for 30 top Mac SEO tools so you can quickly and easily decide which one works best for you.

This museum wants you to touch the art and take lots of pictures

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Go ahead, touch the art and have your picture taken at Art in Island interactive musuem in Quezon City, Philipines. Photo: Art in Island/Facebook
Go ahead, touch the art and have your picture taken at Art in Island interactive musuem in Quezon City, Philipines. Photo: Art in Island/Facebook

It figures that the city known for generating the most Instagram selfles would open a museum to attract selfie shooters.

Art in Island, an interactive art museum in a suburban Manila, Philippines, has installations designed for visitors to incorporate themselves into master 3-D copies of some classic works.

Tony Stark is The Avengers’ Jony Ive

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Tony Stark really does make the Avengers look cool. Photo: Marvel Studios
Tony Stark really does make the Avengers look cool. Photo: Marvel Studios

Tony Stark isn’t just Iron Man — he’s The Avengers’ own personal Jony Ive.

“He’s the boss,” says Stark (referring to Captain America) in the new TV spot for The Avengers: Age of Ultron. “I just pay for everything … and design everything … make everyone look cooler.”

While Ive doesn’t pay for everything at Apple, the rest of that self-confident self-description sounds a lot like Cupertino’s design guru.

Get ready for used Apple Watch trade-ins

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Apple Watch - useful, or just a trend? Photo: Apple

One of the biggest questions surrounding the Apple Watch is how well its value will stand the test of time. Will Apple offer some sort of upgrade program for the opulent 10K Edition model? Will the tech-laden timepiece on your wrist be obsolete in two years?

Gazelle is banking on there being a thriving market for used Apple Watches as early adopters upgrade, much like there already is for used iPhones and iPads. The company announced its new trade-in program today ahead of the Watch’s April release.

Slide over, car companies are ready to take the wheel

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Drive from SF to Seattle without touching the steering wheel. Photo: Mercedes Benz
Drive from SF to Seattle without touching the steering wheel. Photo: Mercedes Benz

The future of automobiles is getting closer every day.

German auto maker Mercedes Benz showed off a “car of the future” prototype self-driving car in California on Wednesday and futurist and Steve Jobs wannabe Elon Musk’s new Tesla Model S is getting an autopilot mode within the next few months.

It’s only a matter of time before we’re all sitting in a living-room style automobile, sipping slow-brewed coffee and reading the latest social news from our iPads as we zip along to our next appointment or meeting, right?

Because as Musk famously said: “Someday, driving a car will be illegal.”

Count down to your death with this Apple Watch clock

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Countdown to your date with the Reaper. Photo: Rehabstudio
Countdown to your date with the Reaper. Photo: Rehabstudio

Tim Cook touted Apple Watch’s supreme timekeeping capabilities at last week’s Spring Forward event, but Rehabstudio plans to give wearers a unique look on time — by counting down to their death.

Life Clock is an upcoming Apple Watch app that’s like the reverse of an activity tracker. Rather than giving you a readout of actions you did in the past, Life Clock tracks all the positive and negative actions you take throughout the day to calculate when you’re going to kick the bucket.

Angry Birds lose a few feathers in first revenue drop

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It's hard out there on a pig. Photo: Rovio Entertainment
It's hard out there on a pig. Photo: Rovio Entertainment

It’s tough at the top.

Mobile video game publisher Rovio Entertainment detailed Thursday its first revenue drop since the Finnish company hit it big with the Angry Birds franchise in 2009.

Perhaps the saturation of the market with no less than 11 Angry Birds-themed games since then (and three spin-offs) and way too many toys and animation projects has something to do with the loss of revenue, down 9 percent to $170.6 million in 2014.

Of course, as Rovio’s mobile gaming business did rise a bit (16 percent), making the overall drop in revenue that more incredible, the company seems to be focused on doubling-down on its mobile game offerings.

“2014 results show that steps in the game portfolio, free to play competency building and advertising are going in the right direction. I am confident that with new simplified organisation and clearer vision, we will be back to the path of growth in 2015,” said CEO Pekka Rantala in a statement.

iDown: Apple struggles during its first day on Dow

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AAPL shares are down the first day on the Dow. Photo: Cult of Mac
AAPL shares are down the first day on the Dow. Photo: Cult of Mac

Apple officially joined the Dow Jones Industrial average today, placing the world’s most valuable company among historic brands like Coca-Cola, Boeing and 3M. But Apple’s first day with the big boys isn’t getting off to a great start.

An Apple drone? One man dares to dream

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Apple drone
The Apple Drone is an unauthorized concept, but the design looks right. Photo: Eric Huisman
Photo: Eric Huisman

We have Apple products atop our desks, in our pockets and, soon, on our wrists. As if there aren’t enough Apples in our airspace, one man is nudging his favorite company to design a quadrocopter. He’s even taken a stab at designing his dream Apple drone — and was careful to remain faithful to the Jony Ive aesthetic.

Eric Huisman presents his Apple drone concept like a classic Apple ad, with the product photographed on a seamless white background, perfectly lit, with a subtle shadow.

Triplecorder didn’t have a dynamic sound but it sure looked pretty

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The Answer  ATR-102 triple corder. Photo: Georges Meguerditchian
The Answer ATR-102 Triplecorder. Photo: Georges Meguerditchian

There was a time when a device that had more than one function was something to behold.

It took a real feat of engineering to make a machine that could do several things without taking up a good chunk of your living room.

I don’t know if the Answer ATR-102 Triplecorder can be considered such a marvel of technology, but it is awfully cool to look at.

6 awesome comic books you must read before the movies hit theaters

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Hulk smash! Iron Man huge! Photo: Marvel Studios

Having to do your background reading just to go and watch a movie sounds a whole lot like schoolwork, but thankfully when it comes to the world of comic books things ain’t so bad!

With theaters set to play host to a gorgeous buffet of superhero flicks over the next year, Cult of Mac took it upon ourselves to play teacher and instruct you on exactly which graphic novels you should be chowing down on before walking into Avengers: Age of Ultron or Batman V Superman.

Now you too can be the snide guy (or gal) in the back row, telling everyone why it wasn’t as good as it was on the page…

Force Touch could make your next Mac keyboard a virtual one

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Photo: Matt Buchanan CC
Typing on your iMac may one day be like using your iPad. With one crucial difference. Photo: Matt Buchanan/Flickr CC

Apple’s magical Force Touch trackpad — which uses haptic technology to make the new MacBook trackpad feel like it’s clicking, even when it’s not — was unveiled at the company’s recent “Spring Forward” event.

But a patent application published today suggests that this is merely the tip of the iceberg when it comes to the interest in haptic technology on the part of Tim Cook and co. The application describes a whole virtual keyboard for the iMac, meaning that users could type onto a flat glass or metallic plate, but would still be able to feel the individual keys.

Almost 4 out of 5 users have now upgraded to iOS 8

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A new iOS 8 update is here.
iOS 8 adoption keeps on climbing. Photo: Jim Merithew/Cult of Mac
Photo: Photo: Jim Merithew/Cult of Mac

When it comes to almost everything Apple does (except for iPhone sales, of course) you could characterize the company’s approach as “Slow but steady wins the race.” That’s certainly what’s happened with iOS 8 adoption, which started out sluggishly, but has slowly continued to climb upwards in the months since.

According to Apple’s latest developer stats, a solid 77 percent of eligible iOS users are now upgraded to the latest version of Apple’s mobile operating system: a not inconsiderable 5 percent rise from early February, when the company last shared its adoption figures.

Why did Steve Jobs make Tim Cook watch Remember the Titans?

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Remember the Titans is a movie starring Denzel Washington as a shouty coach who turns a disorganized football into a crack, disciplined outfit. Credit: Disney
Remember the Titans stars Denzel Washington as a shouty coach who turns a disorganized football team into a disciplined outfit. Photo: Disney

A few days before he died, Steve Jobs asked Tim Cook over to his house to watch a movie together.

The movie he selected was Remember the Titans, a football drama starring Denzel Washington. It’s set in the South, and concerns the struggles of integrating a racially mixed team during the civil rights’ era. Cook was surprised by Jobs’ choice of movie — Jobs had little interest in sports — but he said they talked about it afterward.

Why would Jobs, who had recently stepped down as Apple CEO and appointed Cook in his place, want to watch this movie with his successor just a few days before he died? Was he trying to pass on some crucial knowledge?

I re-watched the movie last night and have a pretty good idea.

The weather app that’ll make you LOL even when it’s raining

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There's a Sharknado up in here! Photo: CARROT Weather
There's a Sharknado up in here! Photo: CARROT Weather

“Fun” isn’t often a word I’d use to describe the ability to check the weather forecast on your iPhone. Thanks to a new app from developer Brian Mueller, however, that’s exactly what it now is. Mueller’s CARROT Weather app is an eerily accurate weather app which serves up twisted meteorological predictions.

Powered by existing weather app Dark Sky, CARROT Weather serves up hilarious weather scenes with its predictions, so that cloudy weather is accompanied by dancing nuclear smokestacks (of course!), snow unleashes evil penguins (what else?), and tornados are signified by flying sharks (is there any other choice?).

Check out more of the deets below.

Here’s how to make your very own Apple Watch out of Lego

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Your Apple Watch could be on the way! Photo: Apple
This Apple Watch is brick-tastic! Photo: Chris McVeigh

Are you still trying to work out how to scrape together enough money to buy a $349 Apple Watch, let alone a $10,000-plus Apple Watch Edition? If so, an answer could be the neat solution dreamed up by Chris McVeigh: Build one out of Lego.

Rather than waiting until April 24, by following master builder McVeigh’s instructions you can have the joy of building a Lego Apple Watch from the privacy of your own home, even putting up “Do Not Enter” signs and making your spouse sign nondisclosure agreements to achieve that fully authentic Apple effect.

Check out the details below:

Cue the dragons: New Game of Thrones clips hint at war to come

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"Who said anything about him?" Photo: HBO

“I believe men of talent have a part to play in the war to come,” says spymaster Varys to Tyrion, the Lannister least likely to beat anyone in a duel.

That’s the takeaway line from one of a pair of new clips out today from HBO’s hotly anticipated Game of Thrones Season 5 premiere, which is slated to air April 12.

Isn’t that (and the newly announced cable-free HBO Now) why you all got a new Apple TV? I know I did.

Design guru Dieter Rams says Apple built his dream PC

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Dieter Rams
Legendary designer Dieter Rams. Photo: Wikipedia
Photo: Vitsoe/Wikimedia Commons

Braun’s lauded designer, Dieter Rams, has long been cited as an inspiration behind Apple’s classic design. Nearly everything Rams touched, from calculators tape recorders, radios, and even infrared emitters, have inspired Apple’s products, and according to Dieter himself, it’s a huge compliment.

In a recent interview with Fast Company, the prolific designer said if he had to do it all over again, he “would not want to be a designer.” However, if he were forced to take out his sketchpad and design a computer, it’d probably look just like Apple’s.