We all know that Siri has some fun Easter eggs, but according to some Apple’s virtual assistant also has an entire backstory — unlockable by asking just the right questions.

“We developed a backstory for Siri to make sure everything that it said was consistent, and as part of that, we had to answer questions like, is Siri a man or a woman?” says Adam Cheyer, one of the chief engineers for the project. “Is it human, a machine, an alien? Is it an Apple employee? What is its relationship with respect to Apple?”

As mentioned in our iOS 7.1 screenshot roundup, the new iOS update adds auto-HDR mode for the iPhone 5s, letting the camera’s brain decide whether or not to activate the High-Dynamic Range feature.

In theory, this should mean that your iPhone will switch to HDR when there is too much contrast in the scene for the camera to capture in one exposure.

Let’s be honest with ourselves here: When we’re in the air, we don’t give a second thought to our luggage traveling in the belly of the plane just a meter or so below us. We don’t really start thinking about our checked bags until we’re standing at the carousel, as we’re wondering if it would look more suspicious to the customs officials if we visited the bathroom before or after picking up our suitcases.

So the Calypso Tag, which lets you know that your bag is about to exit the luggage conveyor, is probably a better option than a GPS tracking tag that you can’t follow when you’re in the air anyway.

If you replaced your first-gen Kindle Paperwhite with the new model just to get Goodreads integration, Cloud Collections and the cool new page-skimming feature, then you should look away now. An update pushed today to the first-gen Paperwhite has added all of these features to the older model.

Instagram has added a new “Lux” filter to its iPhone app, letting you “strengthen or soften your photos with a custom slider.” The slider affects the contrast of your image, but it does in in a way that actually looks good.

Growing up I was a huge fan of the game Asteroids.

While popular video games like Battlefield and Call of Duty rule home video game consoles, good shooter games have been hit or miss on mobile platforms. The developers at Glu Mobile aim to solve this problem with their new app Frontline Commando 2, the sequel to their popular third-person shooter title. Will Frontline Commando 2 find its way onto your devices?

Take a look at Frontline Commando 2 and find out what you think.

This is a Cult of Mac video review of the multi-platform application Frontline Commando 2 brought to you by Joshua Smith of “TechBytes W/Jsmith.”

Seriously, if I have to start over from scratch one more time when I try and use Siri to send a Tweet or book an appointment, I may just give up using Apple’s much-touted personal digital assistant altogether.

As it is, I tend to skip trying to use Siri other than as a glorified app launcher and I use the built-in dictation instead from within the Messages, Twitter, or Calendar apps.

But that was before I found out that you can just tell Siri to change whatever it is she’s not getting.

Today Apple updated its Remote iOS app with some additional options for playing content through the Apple TV.

You can now control iTunes Radio like music played through a shared iTunes library. The ability to browse purchased movies and TV shows from the iTunes Store has also been added. Apple added the option to stream purchased content last September, and now it’s easier to navigate an online iTunes library from an iOS device.

Update 4.2 to the Remote app includes bug fixes as well. It can be downloaded for free in the App Store.

Source: App Store

Last week, the Churchill Club in Menlo Park, California gathered a small panel of journalists who all share something in common: they’ve written recent books about Apple.

Cult of Mac editor-in-chief Leander Kahney, author of Jony Ive: The Genius Behind Apple’s Greatest Products, joined former Wall Street Journal reporter Yukari Iwatani Kane, author of Haunted Empire: Apple after Steve Jobs, and Fred Vogelstein, contributing editor at Wired and author of Dogfight: How Apple and Google Went to War and Started a Revolution. The panel was moderated by Adam Lashinsky, senior editor-at-large of Fortune Magazine and author of Inside Apple: How America’s Most Admired – and Secretive – Company Really Works.

The hour-and-a-half talk covered a wide range of topics, from Apple’s post-Steve Jobs identity to the products the company is working on for the future.

Along with releasing iOS 7.1 to the public, Apple also pushed out a firmware update for the Apple TV this morning. The update, labeled Apple TV 6.1, doesn’t bring any radically new features but it does make it easier than ever to hide your unwanted Apple TV channels.

After months of building and testing, Apple has finally taken the wraps off iOS 7’s biggest update ever, so to celebrate they’ve add a new iOS 7.1 section to homepage touting the update.

iOS 7.1 update https://t.co/0IJFsNWa8Z

— Philip Schiller (@pschiller) March 10, 2014

The long awaited update introduces CarPlay to the iPhone along with improved Siri controls, HDR Auto, an improved calendar, and lots of bug fixes

The new promo page gives an overview of some of the changes, but for a deeper look at all the design tweaks, check out our gallery of iOS 7.1’s new features.

Source: Apple

Months of beta testing has finally culminated with the official release of iOS 7.1 to the public, Apple’s biggest update to iOS 7 since its launch last September.

The update doesn’t come with big new features, but Jony Ive and the software team have made a ton of small design tweaks, most notably in areas like the Phone app, shutdown interface, calendar, as well as a number of Accessibility options that tweak the UI further with Button Shapes and darker colors and improved contrast.

Here’s a rundown of all the design tweaks you’ll be getting on your iPhone today:

Apple has just started rolling out its latest iOS 7.1 update with performance improvements, design tweaks, and more. This is the first major update we’ve seen since iOS 7 made its debut last September, and it’s available on iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch.

If living next door to Tim Cook is on your bucket list you just missed the narrow window to scoop up the condo next door to the Apple CEO.

After being put on the market just a few weeks ago the four bedroom condo owned by Google Ventures co-founder, Bill Marris has been bought for a little under $3 million.

I love living in the future, but sometimes I feel a little spoiled. This app wants you to find useful things, but it thinks that your iPhone or iPad keyboards are just too hard to use.

Shot & Find is a visual-search app that lets you quickly search YouTube, Amazon, Google, Wikipedia, or Spotify just by snapping a picture of a movie, video game, or CD cover. It works really well, too. I did a YouTube search from a DVD, and it pulled up the trailer. A Wikipedia search from a 12-year-old video game also worked just fine.

The app’s effectiveness is almost as ridiculous as its premise, but you can’t argue with results.

Source:Shot & Find – Free | Arctic Toucans

Sure, it’s Monday, but what better way to blow off your entire day than with some gaming?

See, Cellar Door’s Rogue Legacy is one of them fancy-pants Rogue-like-like action games, and it’s got all the sticky, addictive power of “just one more go” with a whole heap of extra “play me more” sauce.

Typically $14.99, it’s on sale right now for a measly $5.09, so get your feets over to Steam and give it a try. Though you really might want to hook up an Xbox 360 controller, as the keyboard controls are just, well, odd.

I like Angry Birds as much as the next person, but it’s a little too, I don’t know … angry.

Sure, those birds have valid beef with the egg-stealing pigs, and destroying their blocky structures is a lot of fun, but I don’t find any joy in it. Revenge is a rough business, and it takes its toll. Just ask the eponymous villain from Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan. Oh, wait, you can’t — he’s dead. And also fictional, but whatever.

Demolition Crush, however, is a new free-to-play game that brings fun back to rampant and wanton destruction, and it’s worth your download.

Your iPad Mini is slim, clean and beautiful, and we’re sure you want to keep it that way. If you’re looking for extreme protection without the bulk, Spigen’s Tough Armor has changed the game in protective cases.

The iPad Mini Tough Armor Bundle lets your iPhone’s hardware keep up with its shiny new iOS 7 software. This bundle of iPad Mini goodness comes with the Tough Armor case, the Crystal Screen Protector, and the Kuel C10L Sync and Charge Cable to make sure your smartphone is protected and charged at all times. And all for the low price of just $54.99.

Back in the day, I used to care for a couple of labs full of Macs. Invariably, I’d find myself in the lab at the end of the day, shutting them all down for the night. I’d run up and down the rows of eMacs or whatever they were at the time, and hit the power button, then click on the Shut Down button. Or, if I was feeling frisky, I’d just hold down the power button until they shut off.

This took some time, needless to say. I wish I’d known of these useful keyboard commands to shut down or sleep the Macs, saving myself several minutes each day.

Keeping with the times, musician Neil Young is set to launch a storming attack on Apple’s iPhone iPad iWatch iPod with his forthcoming PonoPlayer.

Young is set to exhibit the PonoPlayer, alongside a music download store called PonoMusic, at this year’s SXSW.

Popular (and speedy) Reddit client app AMRC has just received a major update.

Adding a new icon for the app, the update also offers (for a $2.99 in-app purchase) some premium features, including night mode, search, and shortcuts to save subreddits.

The Stubilizer is an accelerometer-and gyroscope-controlled mount for GoPro cameras, and it’s designed to smooth out shaky video shot with the action sports cam. Designed by extreme sports junkie Stuart Smith, the rig is small and light enough to mount ion a helmet, and it uses little motors so it doesn’t’ need giant cantilevers and counterweights.

iPhone users may be “wall huggers” according to BlackBerry CEO John Chen, but that doesn’t mean that he’s not taking a page or two out of the Apple playbook.

Describing his vision for BlackBerry in a recent interview with the New York Times, Chen compared his present situation to that of Steve Jobs returning to a beleaguered Apple in the late-1990s.

Mujjo’s new “Understated & Low-Key” case collection is out, and if you like slick and simple leather sleeves for your devices then you’re in luck. I have my eye on two pieces: the Slim Fit iPhone 5s Wallet and the Slim Fit iPad Air Sleeve , both in tan.