Cult of Mac

One of the world’s top tech companies is suing Samsung for patent violations, only this time its not Apple.

Microsoft announced this afternoon that it filed a lawsuit against Samsung in the U.S. District Court of Southern District of New York, for not paying up on cross-licensed intellectual property from Microsoft that its been using in smartphones since 2011.

U.S. District Judge Denise Cote has granted Preliminary approval to Apple’s proposed $450 million settlement for claims that it colluded with the five major U.S. publishers to increase e-book prices.

The settlement fee is still pending the appeal of Judge Cote’s 2013 ruling, but if it stands, Apple will pay $400 million to consumers and $50 million to lawyers. However, Judge Cote says she was deeply troubled by a provision that could see Apple pay as little as $70 million.

Watch today’s Cult of Mac news roundup for details on how one popular group of protesters are picketing Steve Jobs and Apple itself. Plus, get info on a new Snapchat clone from Instagram, news on unlocking your iPhone and even how one KickStarter is turning MacBooks into huge touch-enabled tablets.

Of course, don’t forget to subscribe to Cult of Mac TV on YouTube and catch all our latest videos.

A new smartphone unlocking bill has made its way through the Senate and House of Representatives, and now it’s getting the seal approval from President Obama.

Today The White House announced that Obama will sign the “Unlocking Consumer Choice and Wireless Competition Act” into law, which gives the right to unlock your phone after your contract is up and take it to another carrier.

One of the App Store’s most beloved to-do apps, Wunderlist, has received a major redesign and a ton of new features.

Wunderlist 3 boats a more polished design on desktop and mobile, new icon, 30 new backgrounds, real-time sync, smart lists, and new gestures. There’s an emphasis on collaboration for the app’s pro users, including unlimited task assigning, file uploads, and subtasks.

Who needs a tiny screen behind the seat in front of you when everyone has a smartphone or tablet?

Beginning today, Delta is rolling out free in-flight movies and TV shows for flyers through its Fly Delta app. The service is being called Delta Studio, and it follows the trend of other airlines like United delivering free content to flyers’ personal devices.

Dong Nguyen’s runaway viral hit mobile game, Flappy Bird, is back in a new form, but this time it’s only on Fire TV, Amazon’s answer to the Roku and Apple TV devices.

The new game, titled Flappy Birds: Family, is available now on the Amazon App Store, and seems to only work on the Fire TV as of this moment.

The game seems to have the same basic gameplay as the original (tap or click a button to flap the bird’s wings and avoid pipes), but adds ghosts as a new obstacle and a new multi-player feature.

“Flappy Birds now are on Amazon Fire TV,” says the app description, “with incredible new features: Person vs Person mode, more obstacles, more fun and still very hard. Enjoy playing the game at home (not breaking your TV) with your family and friends.”

Apple’s $3 billion acquisition of Beats was finalized this morning, and it’s up to Apple to determine what will happen to the hundreds of remaining Beats employees it hasn’t laid off.

Dr. Dre and Jimmy Iovine have already said that they’re joining Apple, and now it’s being reported that the head of Beats Music, Ian Rogers, will oversee iTunes Radio as well.

I was supposed to get a Roost to review last year after the successful Kickstarter went into production. I didn’t, but we fixed that at the beginning of this summer, and think God we did – this stand will change the way you use your MacBook.

The Roost is a crazy collapsible scaffold that unfolds from nothing to become a sturdy stand the holds the MacBook at eye-level. Assuming you combine it with regular breaks, and set your keyboard at the right height, you will never have to experience neck, arm or back pain ever again.

A new set of images of the the iPhone 6 home button flex cable have been leaked to Nowherelse.fr that show some of the changes coming to Apple’s new smartphones.

You could nearly build your own iPhone 6 with all the leaked components we’ve seen the last few weeks, but based on these alleged home button cables, the design of the new iPhone 6 won’t just be different from the iPhone 5s, but the the 4.7-inch and 5.5-inch iPhone 6s will also be very different from each other.

It’s Freebie Friday and that means that you can get a treasure trove of useful stuff for, you guessed it, free.

To download a Freebie, all you have to do is create an account at the Cult of Mac Deals store (that is, if you haven’t already). Then, follow Cult of Mac on either Twitter or Facebook, and share the deal on the social media network of your choice. It really is that easy. Read on to see what Cult of Mac Deals has in store today.

Apple today officially welcomed Beats Music and Beats Electronics to its family, along with Beats co-founders Jimmy Iovine and Dr. Dre, following its $3 billion takeover back in May.

“Music has always held a special place in our hearts, and we’re thrilled to join forces with a group of people who love it as much as we do,” reads an announcement on Apple.com, while those buying products from the Beats website will now be routed through the Apple Store.

HP is probably the last company you’d expect to make a genuinely good-looking smartwatch, but it appears to have done that with a little help from Gilt and fashion designed Michael Bastian. The company’s upcoming wearable, which it teased for the first time today, will deliver a custom operating system that’s compatible with both Android and iOS.

San Diego Comic-Con 2014 may be over, but with all of the announcements out of the way, now we get to reap the rewards. Among the event’s iOS-related announcements was Marvel’s proclamation that its great Marvel Pinball app is getting a new table, to celebrate the company’s new Guardians of the Galaxy movie. To mark the occasion, the app is going free for the first time ever.

There are some pretty great Wikipedia apps out there already (my favorite is Das Referenz, an iPad app which turns Wikipedia pages into what looks like 17th century book entries), but Wikipedia has just made a gambit to be best of the bunch with a major redesign of its own iOS app.

Version 4.0 of Wikipedia Mobile sports a total overhaul of the app’s design, with a complete native rewrite that makes searching for information a faster and more enjoyable experience.

Travel can be a chance to practice minimalism, or an opportunity to drive yourself nuts. What am I talking about? Luggage. You can pare down your essentials to fit in a carry-on – even if you’re away for a month – or you can throw in every item of clothing and every charger you have. The second approach will result in a broken back, and you’ll still find that you left something essential at home.

Over the years, I’ve perfected my packing technique so that I only take the bare minimum. And when I say “perfected,” I mean “struggled with.” But it works for me, and the principles can be applied even if you’re the kind of person who hires a boy to carry your trunks for you when you take a cruise on the Titanic.

So here’s the Cult of Mac Guide to Traveling Light, a roundup of strategies, product recommendations and other tips to make your next trip a breeze.

The original Typo keyboard for the iPhone racked up quite a few column inches (or whatever the blogosphere equivalent might be) after it was revealed that none other than Ryan Seacrest had invested $1 million in it, shortly followed by BlackBerry filing a lawsuit against it, claiming that it was stealing the company’s trademark keyboard.

Well, the Typo is back — and apparently better than ever — thanks to the new Typo 2 keyboard, which is currently available for pre-order. Costing $99, the iPhone case essentially adds the functionality of a BlackBerry keyboard to your existing iPhone, although hopefully without looking so much like a BlackBerry that it provokes further legal action.

Apple did sticker and decal makers a massive favour with its recent “Stickers” ad for MacBook Air, showing the myriad ways users choose to customize their ultra-thin Apple notebooks.

That is backed up by figures, unearthed by website Macstories, which discovered that sticker-makers did, in fact, receive a huge influx of new visitors following the ad — with sales in some cases quadrupling since Apple’s ad aired earlier this month. Geeky Decals, for instance, says that it was selling around 8-10 stickers per day prior to the ad, but is now selling between 40 and 50 per day.

The iPhone is quickly taking the place of the everyday point and shoot camera with their digital zooms and overall lack of features. There’s less and less reason to pick one up when you’ve already got the almighty iPhone – which camera improves with each updated model.

We wanted to see whether it’s possible to replace your DSLR with your iPhone, and with some tips, tricks and useful add-ons, the results are pretty surprising.

I went out on to the city streets armed with my iPhone 5s, battling against a professional photographer Sam Mills and his pricey DSLR, to see how close the iPhone could get to the quality of his professional images. Checkout the video below to learn the basic tips needed to get pro photos. Plus! We’ve got a great giveaway for you and more just below the jump!

Instagram soft-launched Bolt this week, its new app to take on Snapchat. The app is only available in Singapore, New Zealand, and South Africa right now while Instagram squashes bugs and gets it ready for everyone else in the world.

That doesn’t mean you can’t see what Bolt is like now. Cult of Mac reader @ravirajim sent us a bunch of screenshots of Bolt in action, which you can view above. We’ll let you know when Bolt ships to the App Store in the U.S. and elsewhere.

Apple’s sales in Japan have been skyrocketing quarter after quarter, but then the company reported “dampened” growth during its most recent earnings call.

Japan has been one of Apple’s fastest-growing countries, so what happened? A big increase in Japan’s federal taxes is not only effecting Apple, but competitors like Amazon.