I have a personal Instagram filter that protects my eyes from all the cute pet pictures. But now and then, a dog or cat slips through. One pretty pooch in particular — an Alaskan husky with arresting, ice-blue eyes — has me looking forward to her daily adventures in rural New Hampshire.
Stare into the eyes of Bella, and you’ll get a glimpse into the heart of her owner, photojournalist Cheryl Senter.
“There is total love in every image that I take of her,” Senter told Cult of Mac.
Designer Chris Weir is dismissive of products that take a Swiss Army knife approach to features. He thinks a speaker should be a speaker — and nothing else.
“It’s a speaker, not a speakerphone,” he says.
He’s talking about his Packable Wireless Speaker System, a diminutive Bluetooth speaker he designed for Grain Audio, a hot audio startup. Weir resisted all temptation to add a microphone (for phone calls) or the ability to charge phones from its internal battery. It’s just a speaker, and a surprisingly good one at that.
In a market crowded with dozens of unexceptional, me-too products, Grain Audio stands out. Not only are all of its products made of wood (solid walnut, not wood veneer), Grain’s products do one thing, and one thing well: Pump out sound.
Almost from the start, iPad users have begged and pleaded with Apple to add a missing feature: split-screen multitasking.
Split-screen multitasking is the ability to run two or more apps simultaneously, side by side, just like you can on a desktop computer. But iOS, of course, is the antithesis of traditional multitasking. You can have only one app on the screen at a time.
That may be about to change. Apple is rumored to be adding multitasking to the iPad in iOS 8, which is expected to be shown to developers at next month’s Worldwide Developer’s Conference.
With split screen multitasking, you could write a paper in Pages on the left while researching in Safari on the right. You may even be able to drag and drop items between the two apps, like photos or chunks of text.
For some, this would be nirvana. Better multitasking would turbocharge the iPad, especially for work, right?.
Microsoft loves to crow about the Surface 2 tablet’s ability to multitask, which in Redmond’s eyes makes the tablet appear more suited for work than watching cat videos. Some iPad users have been lobbying for it for years. The feature has been the subject of plenty UI mockups, design videos, and jailbreak tweaks.
My iPad Air is jailbroken, and for the last week I’ve been using a new jailbreak tweak called OS Experience, which allows me to have split-screen multitasking.
I’ve tried using it as part of my daily workflow. And what I found was surprising.
With summer coming up, it’s the perfect time to start planning your vacation. As a result it’s also the perfect time to download Kayak Pro, the smart hotel, flight, and car search and booking app.
This iOS app makes everything from booking flights to accommodation a straightforward, hassle-free task, with hundreds of available options and a ton of smart in-app features. These include a fight tracker to check that your flight is on time, price alerts regarding cheap destination tickets, and even maps to help you find your way around airport terminals.
Bullish billionaire activist-investor Carl Icahn recently ramped up his stake in Apple to the tune of 2.8 million shares — bringing his total stake in the company to a little over $4.4 billion.
Icahn’s position was revealed in a Securities and Exchange Commission filing on Thursday, showing how Icahn now owns more than 7.5 million AAPL shares. The buy took place during the March period, which preceded Apple’s announcement of the 7-to-1 stock split and share repurchase program.
iOS devices have made tools like video editing more accessible for the general public, but they’re increasingly being used by the pros too.
Car maker Bentley’s latest ad, called “Intelligent Details,” was shot and edited using only an iPhone 5s (for filming), iPad Air (for stitching it all together) and handheld of accessories — including iPhones lenses and mounts.
The use of the iMovie iOS software meant that filmmakers were able to carry out the majority of the editing work from the back seat of their car.
If you’re anything like me, you’re constantly shuffling around town (or around the country) with bits. No, not those bits; you know the ones I’m talking about: pens, cables, more pens, headphones, USB sticks, pocket knives and pens. They get shoved into a small pocket in a bag, where they sit, unharmonious and disorganized, until I fumble around for them.
David and Calvin Laituri of design outfit Onehundred have a better way. The father-son team have come up with Ledr, a leather strip that organizes all that stuff and rolls it up into a compact toolkit.
You’ve probably noticed Booq’s odd penchant for naming their strange, sophisticated baggage after snakes. And if you’ve really been paying attention, you’ll have noticed variations on one species crop up over and over again: The Booq Boa.
The Boa’s DNA has mutated into a variety of different forms, all with the purpose of carrying a MacBook and associated equipment. But the newest iteration, the Boa Flow Graphite, may be the most perfect yet — especially for those of us who lug a MacBook and DSLR on adventures.
Barry Allen, also known as The Flash, gets his own TV show this fall on the CW, the network that brought you Smallville for ten years.
In this extended trailer (below), we get to see the fastest man alive’s origin, which in this version seems to be a combination of getting hit by lightning and being doused in some weird green chemicals.
While the exciting superhero scenes in the trailer below are probably culled from the best bits of the show, which will may more likely consist of mostly long, lingering looks and beautiful people in soft lighting, we have to say we’re pretty excited to see the return of the DC speedster to the small screen, even if his costume looks a bit silly.
There are few companies you can trust with your private data ever since the revelations leaked by Edward Snowden shook the tech world last year, but according to the latest report from the Electronic Frontier Foundation, our iPhone-making friends in Cupertino have gone from being a privacy chump to the people’s champ in just a year.
Dong Nguygen struck App Store gold when Flappy Bird became the viral video game hit of the year in early 2014, but after seeing the addicting affects of flapping it first hand, Nguyen says he’s working on a new game that doesn’t involve feathery friends, green pipes or repetitive deaths.
Nguygen took to Twitter this afternoon to give fans a preview of his next his next addicting game by posting a screenshot showing a small helmeted man jumping between two buildings; simple, clean, and probably just as addictive as his original hit.
With a brand new motion picture releasing in theaters soon, the hype for Godzilla has returned. Try your hand at creating chaos in the new app Godzilla – Smash3 – Rogue Play, Inc. as you swipe matching colored tiles to make Godzilla strike the enemy. Leading up to the final boss, play through over 30 levels upgrading and strengthening your Godzilla more and more. Will you smash the competition?
Take a look at the video to see what you think.
The FIFA World Cup 2014 is set to get underway in Brazil in less than a month which will bring four years worth of soccer football promotions packed into a month of kicking, grass stains and sweat to your TV.
Giraffas, a one of the largest restaurant chains in Brazil, may have already scored the coolest cross promotion with their clever iOS app that turns your greasy tray of fastfood into a tiny soccer shootout game.
Check out how it works in the video below:
I don’t really like using iPad cases; I tend to put one on just before I hand my device over to my kids, and then it comes off again as soon as they’re done. One of the best things about the iPad mini is its form factor, but that’s lost when you slap on a big, bulky case.
But although I like my iPad to be naked when I use it, I need some protection when I’m on the go and carrying it around. That’s when I’m most likely to drop it — and when it’s most susceptible to getting scratched up in the bottom of my bag.
I’ve found the COTE leather sleeve from BUKcase to be the perfect solution to this problem.
Along with the OS X Mavericks update it released this morning, Apple also published a new version of iTunes that will make sure you never miss an episode of your favorite podcast again.
iTunes 11.2 adds a couple of improvements to the Podcast section of iTunes that make browsing between subscribed podcasts easier by showing you which episodes you haven’t listened to, thanks to a new Unplayed tab.
After months of beta testing Apple has finally made OS X 10.9.3 available for public release.
The update is light on new features but does pave the way for 4K to come to the iMac in the future thanks to new support for a full range of Retina scaling modes for 4K monitors, allowing users to juice their extra pixels to make things crisper instead of just smaller.
Foursquare is reinventing itself, and a new app called Swarm is the first piece of the puzzle.
Launched today in the App Store, Swarm is a tool for finding friends based on their general location and check-ins. While Apple’s Find My Friends pinpoints you exactly on a map, Swarm takes a different, more friendly approach.
One of the easiest ways to become more productive is by automating simple tasks you perform every day, and that’s exactly what this power pack of 12 Mac apps is designed to do.
Whether you need to manage your finances, keep track of daily tasks, efficiently manage your social media and email accounts, or work towards personal goals, there’s an app for that. And right now you can get The Productive Life Mac Bundle for only $24.99 for a limited time courtesy of Cult of Mac Deals!
Hey bike thieves – if you see a Skylock on my bike, then go ahead and cut through my frame and leave the lock behind. Why? Because my shitty beater cost like €50 and the Skylock is $250, that’s why.
$250? Yup, although you get a lot of tech for that money.
Maybe you have a busy life, and you need some help making time for the things that matter. Like, a lot of help. I’m talking about zero willpower here.
PlayTimer is for you. It locks your phone down but good so that you can play with your kid or focus on other things for a while. You just set the interval, press the cute smiley face, and you’re off. If you touch your phone, an alarm sounds unless you show the app your unlock key.
The unlock key is your child’s face, and that’s kinda weird, but I do like the idea.
I know I’ve said it before, but video games hate bricks.
And to that end, here’s yet another title about destroying those square bastards. It’s called Bricks, and it has a novel approach to smashing things that gets as fast-paced and exciting as it does embarrassing to be seen playing.
It’s probably not that bad if someone catches you, but you may raise some eyebrows. Here’s why.
Sometimes, not very often, old technology beats the heck out of new technology.
Okay, so it’s not an entirely fair test to base technological superiority on who comes out intact in a confrontation between a present generation iMac and a WWII anti-tank rifle, but it sure makes for a fun video.
When your girlfriend grabs the iPad and won’t give it back, you know you’ve got a hit game in your hands. Well, her hands. Seriously, I had to arm-wrestle her to get the iPad back so I could do this review.
Demons vs Fairyland seems at first glance to be yet another cute, fixed-path tower defense game with free-to-play in-app purchases, but the sheer breadth of options available to upgrade your tower defenses, along with the adorably cute artwork and epic music, take this game to a whole new level of awesome.
But seriously, she still won’t give the iPad back.
Just yesterday I had the experience of sending a text message to the wrong person. Okay, luckily it wasn’t a compromising message in any sense, but it goes to show what happens when you’re carrying out too many text conversations at the same time.
Clearly someone at Apple has had a similar experience, because a patent published Thursday reveals how future iOS devices might incorporate background images of the people you’re messaging, to ensure you don’t send out misdirected messages.
A lot of people I know used to use Birdbrain as their iOS Twitter client back in the day, but in recent times it’s fallen by the wayside due to a lack of updates.
Well, it’s back — and it’s just received a major revamp, adding support and optimization for iOS 7, brand new graphs showing Twitter statistics, and more.