The recently revealed exploit that allows anyone to bypass the iPhone’s Activation Lock system is a rather simple process that requires adding just a single line of code to a computer running iTunes.

The exploit, which is called DoulCi (“iCloud” backward), has already been used thousands of times on locked iPhones and iPads around the world. It’s the work of a pair of anonymous hackers, who cracked Apple’s theft-deterrent measure by tricking lost or stolen iOS devices into thinking they are being reactivated by Apple’s servers.

While mockups of Apple’s eagerly awaited iPhone 6 have been popping up for a while now, it’s still pretty amazing to see just how far we’ve come since the first generation iPhone made it to our sweaty palms back in the good old days of 2007.

That comparison is made clearer in a new video put together by YouTube user DetroidBORG, which does a great job of comparing a dummy iPhone 6 handset with every previous model of iPhone that has come before.

When you’re dealing with a Robert Rodriguez/Frank Miller project, visuals are everything — which is why it’s great when they live up to expectations.

Following years of waiting, Sin City: A Dame to Kill For is almost upon us, opening August 22. A perfect opportunity, then, to release five character posters, highlighting a combination of brand new characters and previous fan favorites.

And, man, do they ever look pretty!

Disney has announced the screenwriter-director combo who will helm the new Star Wars standalone film. The writer will be Gary Whitta, a tech nerd turned screenwriter who has written the dialogue to some of the best adventure games on the Mac and iPad. As for the director? He’s behind the number one movie at the box office right now, Godzilla.

Outside of reading Cult of Mac (which you’re already doing!) Medium is one of the best go-to destinations of quality writing on the Internet. A blog publishing platform co-founded by ex-Twitter founders Evan Williams and Biz Stone, Medium is an effortlessly easy-to-use social journalism network that puts content — not ads — first. It’s like WordPress meets Instagram.

Medium already has a wonderful iPhone app, but sadly, universal support was missing at launch. But that’s all changed, and you can now surf Medium on your iPad as well.

Apple has issued an update to its iAd producer tool — adding support for creating full-screen banner ads for iPhone, along with the ability to upload Producer project to iAd workbench.

iAD Producer version 4.2 additionally includes folder reorganisation in the tool’s Assets sidebar, alongside the expected unspecified bug fixes and performance tweaks.

Apple’s been big on education under Tim Cook’s leadership — whether that be pushing for iPads in schools around the world, or teaching people to code in Apple Stores.

Apple’s latest Editors’ Choice in the App Store continues this educational theme, with a brain-training app called Elevate designed to help improve articulation, reading and listening focus, writing abilities, and information-processing speed.

Conventional wisdom is that while Beats has a lot of fashion credibility, the actual audio quality blows. So why does Apple want to buy them?

Rumors have swirled that it’s an acqui-hire, and that Apple wants Beats so that it can also own Beats executive Jimmy Iovine and Dr. Dre, whose contacts in the music industry are unparalleled.

But there could be another reason, too. Apple might want to prevent Samsung from purchasing Beats.

It is often said that what separates Apple from companies like Samsung and Sony is that at Apple, design is law. Other companies put engineering first.

But that’s not true, according to former Apple senior designer and user experience evangelist Mark Kawano. Speaking to Fast Company’s design site, Co.Design, Kawano says that Apple is still an engineering first company.

The difference? Every engineer at Apple knows how to think like a designer.

Still stumped what to get your dad for Father’s Day? Apple’s hoping you’ll go big and gift him an iPad Air, but even if you just want to get a sweet iPhone case for the old man the online Apple Store will now ship it to you at no extra cost.

I don’t think I would make it in life anymore without my Google calendars. Having my appointments and date-based reminders in Google’s system makes sure I can access them wherever I am, and with whatever device I have at hand: iPhone, iPad, MacBook, someone else’s computer.

Today I went looking to see if this coming Monday is Memorial Day, because as an online writer, I totally forget those sorts of things, along with info like, “what day is it,” and “did I wear pants yet?”

Regardless, I went searching and realized my calendar did not have major US holidays on it. Here’s how I fixed that oversight.

You probably don’t waste much thought on where to plug-in your iPhone, but not using a real Apple charger has its disadvantages. Not only are they higher quality, and safer, but they also charge faster than a 5W Chinese knockoff.

Millions of cheap Apple copycats make it difficult to tell whether a charger is the genuine article and have been blamed on everything from iPad explosions to spontaneous electrocutions, but thanks to a teardown comparison from Ken Shirriff there’s one little flaw to look for that gives the dangerous fakers away.

Just look for the signature.

While Apple’s personal assistant Siri may be irritating to use at times it comes stocked in iOS with thousands of uses. In today’s how-to find out how to usefully use Siri in your life with 5 quick and simple tips.

Take a look at the video to see what to do.

Samsung’s like the spoiled brat you went to school with: they have almost everything, but if another kid comes in with a toy that’s not part of their collection, mummy and daddy will make sure they get it.

Rumor has it the South Korean company is now developing its own virtual reality headset that will work alongside Galaxy devices — and it is desperate to get the product to market before Facebook and Sony launch theirs.

When Disney bought Marvel Studios, they gained a huge backlog of intellectual properties and stories to mine. The Avengers and the various supporting live-action superhero flicks like Ironman and Thor were just the beginning, as we can see from this new trailer (below) for upcoming animated adventure, Big Hero 6, based on the comic of the same name.

“Big Hero 6 [is] an action comedy adventure about brilliant robotics prodigy Hiro Hamada,” says the Disney press release, “who finds himself in the grips of a criminal plot that threatens to destroy the fast-paced, high-tech city of San Fransokyo. With the help of his closest companion – a robot named Baymax – Hiro joins forces with a reluctant team of first-time crime fighters on a mission to save their city.”

We’ve got another bundle in store for you at Cult of Mac Deals – one’s that bound to appeal to the “whte hat” hackers out there.

The White Hat Hacker Bundle features 6 online courses with 40 hours of actionable training. You’ll
learn how to increase your web security and protection, all with professional video instruction to guide you along the way. And this bundle is marked down from the regular price of $622 to just $49 during this limited time offer.

If I leave the house for more than a quick trip to the corner store, I take my Klean Kanteen Reflect with me. It sits in my Velo backpack when I walk, it slips into the bottle cage on my bike when I ride, and it passes through airport security — empty and ready to be refilled in the departures lounge — when I fly. It is my single most-used gadget after my iPhone and iPad, but unlike those I don’t feel I have to replace it every year. It doesn’t need an annual upgrade, and every dent, scratch and scar makes it look even cooler.

The Reflect is a water bottle rolled from 18/8 stainless steel and capped with a “stainless unibody bamboo cap.” The cap is sealed with a silicon O-ring and has a carrying loop on top; the body comes in two finishes — brushed or polished.

Apple is also a big fan. On Earth Day last month, the company gave every employee an Apple-branded Klean Kanteen.

Anyone who has ever tried jumping from iOS to Android, while keeping the same cell number, will know about the horror of trying to get hold of their messages.

The so-called “iMessage purgatory” means that unless you first deactivate your iMessages before ditching your iPhone, Apple’s servers will think that you’re using its proprietary messaging platform. The upshot? Say goodbye to your messages.

While the problem has been gaining more awareness recently as a result of class-action lawsuits filed against Apple, it’s just gotten worse, courtesy of a recent server glitch. The glitched rendered moot one of Apple’s key methods for sorting out the issue.

With some truly great titles out there, and apps like Comixology making them easier to read then ever, there’s never been a better time to be a comic fan.

But with so many choices, what exactly should you be reading? Particularly for comic newbies it can be a little daunting searching through mounds of comics, whether that’s in your local brick-and-mortar, or on the virtual comic rack. Luckily, reading comics is part of my job, so I was all too happy to scour the four-color archives for the cream of the current crop.

There are superheroes, flesh-eating zombies, and, err, time-stopping intercourse — all of them read just as well on paper or your iPad screen. Personally, I’m a stickler for physical books, although digital ones are looking better all the time, and they’re continuing to explode in popularity.

But ultimately how you choose to consume your comics is a personal choice. Just so long as you read ’em.

So get reading!

What if you had access to any song you wanted while you were DJing? “It’s like giving a chef infinite resources for ingredients,” explains Algoriddim co-founder and CEO Karim Morsy. Algoriddim’s popular djay app is getting a major update today that gives users the ability to mix and match millions of tracks on the iPhone and iPad.

Thanks to a partnership with Spotify, djay users can now play any of the streaming’s service’s 20 million songs. Some fancy audio matching technology also makes it incredibly easy to match and discover new tracks.

Stroll into your local record store and you won’t find the dusty-floored wasteland of empty bins you might imagine. Chances are you’ll see something that’s more vibrant, relevant and vital than before.

Like the nerdy know-it-alls at specialty wine stores and comic book shops, today’s typical employee at an indie record store is still a tastemaking wizard — just turned up to 11. Staff picks bear the unerring zeal of the true believer, and staffers are more focused on uncovering stuff that you’ll never find on a Walmart CD shelf.

“Since there’s been a turn to Spotify, Bandcamp and iTunes, we sell way more vinyl,” said Jim Haynes, assistant manager at San Francisco’s Aquarius Records. “We’re at about 75 percent vinyl to 20 percent CD and a smattering of cassettes. People are turning to an even more seemingly obsolete medium.”

Predictions of the end of physical media are as played-out as those reports about the death of rock ‘n’ roll, with everyone and their mother proclaiming that Spotify and other streaming services have killed the local record store. That fear-mongering sounds smart and might even contain a kernel of truth, but the reality is much different.

Phrases like “it’s a comic book brought to life” are usually hyperbole, but that’s not the case for SXPD, a new iOS game which blends gorgeous black and white comic art with compelling gameplay.

Described by developer Little Chicken as “essentially the world’s first true game-comic book hybrid,” SXPD is a racing game interspersed with kinetic Comixology-like comic book interludes — upping the story-driven quota far beyond what we’re used to seeing in video games. In all there’s a 42-page digital comic book included, which is broken down into 6 chapters for you to play through.

Hearing an Apple executive talk about their work in a relaxed setting is pretty unusual stuff, but that’s what happened earlier this week when Lisa Jackson, Apple’s VP of Environmental Initiatives, spoke as part of Fortune’s Brainstorm Green conference.

The 16-minute conversation, with Fortune Senior Editor (and former Apple author) Adam Lashinsky, touches on various topics related to Apple’s desire to go green — including some potentially revolutionary plans for its 400+ chain of retail stores.

If you’re an iPad-owning fan of turn-based tactical games, you’ll be happy to know that popular Nintendo DS game Panzer Tactics DS has received an iPad remake.

Called Panzer Tactics HD, the game puts players in 1939 Europe and allows them to engage in three mission-extensive campaigns — creating tactics as part of the German Wehrmacht, the Soviet Red Army and the Western Allies.

We’ve heard casting announcements in the form of Batfleck and Jesse “Lex Luthor” Eisenberg (to name a few), had our first sniff of the Batsuit and the Batmobile — and now we finally have a name for the forthcoming Batman-starring Man of Steel sequel.