I write a lot on my iPad. I love the distraction-free atmosphere provides and the portability of the platform. I have written a ton of blog posts on the iPad, and wrote the majority of my book using the device as well. That said, it’s tough to write regularly on the iPad without a keyboard. And it’s even tougher to find a keyboard that doesn’t adda ton of bulk to the device at a price that’s easy to swallow.

That’s why the Touchfire appeals to me, and Cult of Mac Deals has it available for only $34.99 during this limited time offer.

Apple’s iPad event is slated to happen in two weeks on Tuesday, October 22nd, according to the venerable AllThingsD. Not only will the iPad and iPad mini be updated, but the “new Mac Pro and OS X Mavericks will likely get some stage time as well.”

The U.S. government has no love for Samsung after the Korean company requested that President Obama veto a sales import ban that had been placed on some of its older products. Back in August, the ITC ruled in favor of Apple and placed a ban on several Samsung phones and tablets that infringe on Apple’s patents.

Samsung had hoped that the ban would be vetoed, but no dice.

Do you miss the dedicated .com button from the iOS 6 and earlier software keyboard? Many of us do, remembering that you could tap and hold it for other oft-used URL finishers, like .net, .org, and the like.

If you want to find the .com button again, you’re out of luck, but if you want to get that same functionality in iOS 7, here’s how.

Back in March we took a look at the SIMPLcase, an iPhone case which stored your spare SIM cards and a SIM tray eject tool inside. One Kickstarter campaign and several months later, the SIMPLcase is a shipping product, and one which I which I have been testing out in a recent move from sunny Barcelona to gray Germany.

Does the SIMPLcase pass? Yup. With flying colors, in fact.

Ever since Phil Schiller admitted that Apple considered making a standalone camera at one point, we’ve wondered what the results would look like if Sir Jony Ive’s obsessive attention to detail was applied to a full-framed camera. As part of Bono’s charity auction for Project (RED), Leica unveiled The Leica M for (RED) designed by Jony Ive and Marc Newson that will be auctioned off at Southeby’s on Nov. 23rd to fight AIDS, malaria, and tuberculosis.

Jony and Marc redesigned the Leica M by going through a total of 561 models and nearly 1000 prototype parts over 85 days to create the one of a kind camera that features a laser machined aluminum body, and an anodized aluminum outer shell to go with the full-format CMOS sensor inside.

Get a glimpse of all the impeccable details in the gallery below:

Yahoo! has today updated its Yahoo! Mail apps for Android and iOS to introduce support for threaded messages (which it is calling “Conversations”), themes, and 1TB of storage for every user. That’s enough to store 500,000 to 1 million attachments, Yahoo! says, or 6,000 years’ worth of emails for the average user.

I am not a fan of clutter – be it paper-based, digital, or otherwise. I’ve got a scanner that takes care of the first type, and a combination of apps (including Hazel) helps take care of the second type. But I’m also a guy who likes to keep things need and tidy in order to avoid clutter. My desk doesn’t have a lot of working space, so I really need to keep desk clutter at a minimum. I had yet to find a fully functional solution…until the latest Cult of Mac Deals offer came along.

The 100% bamboo Station is the solution I’m talking about. Functional, minimalist, eco-friendly – it’s the ideal desk organizer. And Station is at an ideal price as well – only $34.99 for a limited time.

Every once in a while, an alien threat arises that is so malevolent and so heinous that the only thing to do is send a one-man ship out into space to take them all on singlehandedly.

Alright, so that’s never happened in the history of ever, but in video games, it’s been going on at least since Space Invaders in 1978. And it is in this fine tradition of lonely, foolish heroism that we have Space Qube, a new shooter for the iPhone and iPad. If you’ve played any “One ship vs. all aliens” game before, you know what to expect here: The ship goes back and forth; the aliens fly in distinct patterns and shoot at you; you pick up powerups; and every once in a while, you fight a boss.

And if that’s all it did, I would say that Space Qube is very capable and leave it at that. But it has one extra feature that makes it stand out.

Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer has confirmed that Microsoft Office will come to the iPad just as soon as it’s ready for devices with a touchscreen. Speaking at the Gartner Symposium/ITxpo in Florida today, Ballmer said, “iPad will be picked up when there’s a touch first user interface.”

That user interface is “in progress” Ballmer added, but it’s likely to come to the Windows version of Office first.

AT&T has updated its U-verse apps for Android and iOS to add live streaming for over 100 channels, more than 20 of which can be enjoyed “outside the home.” The service is available at no extra cost for AT&T subscribers as part of their existing U-family or U-verse TV package.

Nest Labs, the company that was founded by “father of the iPod” Tony Fadell, is famous for reinventing the home thermostat with the pretty little Nest device launched in 2011. But now the company is hoping to expand its presence in your home with a new, $130 smoke and carbon monoxide detector called Nest Protect.

Instead of just beeping at you, Nest Protect provides vocal alerts that will inform you just how dangerous the conditions in your home may be. And if it goes off accidentally — as ours often does when my wife is cooking — you can silence it just by waving at it.

If you want to get all Ansel Adams and start exploring black and white photography, you could go out and buy a fancy photo editing program like Adobe Photoshop, you could go see if anyone still makes film cameras with black and white film, or you could go the super easy and cheap route and just use Preview, an app that’s already on your Mac.

Your call, of course, but here’s how to get Preview to make your photos all arty and stuff.

Admit it. There’s two major things you still want from OS X: multitouch support, and 4K support. 4K support would make the Retina iMac finally possible, and as for multitouch, this is where the laptop and desktop market is heading despite Steve Jobs’s protestations about “gorilla arm.”

It’s taking Apple its sweet time to deliver the above, but you don’t have to wait. Sharp has just announced OS X compatibility for their 32-inch 4K touchscreen monitor.

How good is the iPhone 5s camera? Good enough for National Geographic. And Apple’s own Phil Schiller is getting braggy about it on Twitter.

Everyone knows that listening to podcasts is one of the most computationally complicated tasks you can possibly do. In fact, it was only a few years ago that anyone who wanted to listen to some anonymous Internet dork mouthbreathing his thoughts into a mic in low-fidelity audio had to purchase themselves a veritable supercomputer to accomplish the feat.

I kid, of course, but even in podcasting, every bit of performance helps. Which is why we’re happy to report that our favorite podcasting app, Instacast, has just hit version 4.1, adding support for the iPhone 5s’s 64-bit processor.

Former Apple CEO John Sculley believes Tim Cook is doing a “terrific job” at leading Apple after taking over from Steve Jobs two years ago. Cooks is “continuing the Apple philosophy of no compromise and quality of their products and great styling,” Sculley said, and he commends Cook for “not trying to be Steve Jobs.”

I think I might finally have found a screenshot app for OS X which is simple enough to replace the built-in screen-capture tools. It’s called Inboard, and it further distinguishes itself by having one of the best app icons ever.

Imagine that you had a stick of gum that could be bent into any shape. OK, that part was easy – all you had to do was imagine a normal stick of gum. Now imagine that that stick is weight-bearing, and that it would actually stay in the shape you gave it.

If you were doing it properly, then you just imagined the Gumstick, a rubbery, pose-able stick of gadget goodness.

Camera+, one of the best third-party camera apps for iOS — and one of the most supported — has today received its fourth update since Apple released iOS 7. This one delivers full resolution burst mode on devices that are capable of supporting it, plus all of the photo filters you’ll find in iOS 7’s built-in Camera app.

Sadly, the “Mobislyder” isn’t a way to make delicious, tiny steamed hamburgers with your cellphone, but it’s almost as good: It’s an aluminum track rail for your mobile phone, letting you make amazing tracking shots when shooting video with your iPhone.

Apparently Nikon’s D600 was already pretty much perfect, because the new D610 that replaces it is little more than a tweak. Let me put it this way: If Apple released a “new” iPhone with such a minor spec bump, the company would be “finished.”

Google chairman Eric Schmidt has dismissed claims that Android is insecure by claiming “it’s more secure than the iPhone.” The platform, which has more than a billion users worldwide, goes through rigorous real-world testing, Schmidt said, before promising consumers would be happier with Android “more than you can possibly imagine.”

iTunes Radio is currently limited to the United States, but according to a report from Bloomberg, Apple is gearing up to expand the service internationally in the coming months. The U.K, Canada, Australia and New Zealand are all reportedly set to gain access by “early 2014.”

Offering iTunes Radio outside of the U.S. is complicated because Apple has to get separate licensing rights for each country. Apple is using a combination of luring big advertisers and aggressively negotiating with labels to build its iTunes Radio empire.

Source: Bloomberg

Apple announced today that its financial earnings call with investors for Q4 2013 will be held on October 28th at 2PM PT.

AAPL shares have been slowly recovering from a recent slump after hitting a high of over $700 per share in 2012. The recent announcement that iPhone 5s and iPhone 5c sales shattered past iPhone sales records with 9 million units sold should portend good things for Apple’s earnings and the share price, but Wall Street is always pretty fickle with AAPL, so we’ll have to wait and see if the good news will be enough to get more of Wall Street on board.

Like its previous earnings calls, Apple is allowing the press and its shareholders to listen in to a live audio webcast, which is available via its website and can be accessed on iOS devices. Cult of Mac will be on hand to liveblog the results as they come in, along with any commentary from Tim and the gang.