Vodafone U.K. has today announced that it will begin rolling out its new 4G network on August 29 — the same day rival O2 will launch its own 4G service. The company will reach 12 major cities across the country initially, with further expansion planned before the end of this year.
That means that by the end of this month, EE will no longer be the U.K.’s only 4G provider.
If there’s one thing us iPad owners like as much as iPad cases, it’s iPad stands. And no wonder: without such a prop, the iPad can do little more than lay flat on the floor or table like a dead fish. Only unlike the poor fish, it won’t even entertain us by flapping desperately around for a few long seconds as it fruitlessly tries to push a few more drops of nonexistent water through its gills, before slowly expiring and laying eerily still.
The Boomerang case won’t provide the same pizzazz as the last few seconds of a suffocating real-life Big Mouth Billy Bass, but it does bend in the middle, and it does support your iPad.
There’s one safe prediction even prophecy-shy folks can make about the “next” iPhone: It will have a better camera.
But what does “better” mean these days? The 8MP photos from my iPhone 5 are more than big enough for editing, cropping and printing, so where does Apple go with the iPhone 5S?
If it listens to the biased opinions of the nerds who participated in DIY Photography’s latest poll, then the answer is not “more megapixels” but “better low-light performance.”
The FlameStower looks like a clever way to keep your iPhone charged while you’re camping in the wilderness. Just fill its reservoir with water, stick the other end into the flames of your campfire and plug your chosen gadget into the USB port. Relax with the charred meat and beverage of your choice, and—just three hours later—your iPhone will be fully charged.
Bind is one of those ideas that’s so simple that you get the idea you could just go and make it yourself. It’s a wide band of “methacrylate compound” (aka plastic) that has a few slots cut into it to fit the battery chambers of your Apple wireless keyboard and your Magic Trackpad. The idea is that it keeps them next to each other on your desk.
OmniWeb has just been updated to v6.0. “What?!” I hear you scream? “OmniWeb is still around?” The answer is yes. And it seems like it’s as great as it ever was—in a retro-style kind of way.
Spinlister is like Airbnb for bikes. Instead of renting some piece-of-junk city bike for exorbitant rates while you’re on a city vacation, you can instead rent a hipstermobile from a private individual. For—it seems—equally exorbitant rates. And you can of course make some extra cash in your home town renting out your own spare steed.
Quora is a motherlode of information and often sees top experts answer thoughtful questions posed by its users. Every once in a while, a superstar will step into answer—as Ashton Kutcher himself did, when someone asked “How did Ashton Kutcher prepare for his role as Steve Jobs in the new movie Jobs?”
Here’s a problem: Let’s say you’re a diabolical dictator bent on world domination. You’ve decided to bypass the corporate mass media (which can’t be trusted) and inform the little people of your plans via podcast. You create one—only you don’t have a method of broadcasting the podcast, since you insist on personally playing your message directly onto the iDevices of your soon-to-be thralls.
The answer, of course, is the world-domination tool TuneMob. As long as you can gather everyone in the world into the same room. And by everyone, I mean a maximum of seven people. Who all need to be running TuneMob. And have fairly newish iDevices.
Two dazzling innovations we’re pretty enthused about have melded, as Flowboard becomes one of the first apps to integrateLeap Motion into its Mac platform.
So, the dude who said he’d quit rock and roll when he turned 33 just turned 70. This is a guy that typically covers 12 miles during a Stone’s show as he leaps about the stage, running and dancing. Mick Jagger has been on the cover of Rolling Stone (no relation) twenty times, the first time in 1968.
To celebrate this fairly amazing milestone for the quintessential rock and roll superstar, This Day In Music apps has made its Rolling Stones tribute app, This Day In The Rolling Stones, free.
If you’re a Stones fan, and let’s face it, most of us are in some way, you should check this one out. According to the developers, This Day In The Rolling Stones is going to remain free forever. Bravo!
After using iOS 7 for a couple of months, I’ve been missing some of the gorgeous iPhone themes that are out there for jailbreakers. You may think that theming iOS 6 is pointless when Apple’s next-gen OS is right around the corner, but one of the most prolific designers in the jailbreak community doesn’t agree.
We’ve highlighted Sentry’s work multiple times on Cult of Mac, and he’s most famous for Auxo, a popular app switcher replacement tweak. Aplo is a new Winterboard theme from Sentry that has been in the works for quite some time, and it’s drop-dead gorgeous.
Fitness trackers are a dime a dozen these days. Good fitness trackers are a little harder to find, but they’re out there. With rumors swirling that Apple itself is getting into wearables, everyone is getting into what is quickly becoming a very crowded market.
Shine is a new product from Misfit, a startup co-founded by former Apple CEO John Sculley, that takes a unique approach to monitoring physical activity. It comes with a gorgeous iPhone app, and it’s designed to clip onto more than your wrist.
We’re big fans of the Philips Hue lighting system, which allows you to control your house’s mood and lighting with a slick iOS app. The only problem is that there’s been only one kind of Hue lightbulb until now.
But the Hue lineup is getting more versatile. Philips is set to expand their funky Wi-Fi-controlled lightbulb line with LightStrips and Bloom Bulbs.
Twitter announced today that it is bringing a new verification process to its iOS and Android apps to improve security. The new feature allows you to protect your account with two-factor authentication that can be turned on and managed directly from the app, rather than having to depend on third-party SMS clients.
Along with beefing up security, Twitter also added a new gallery view that can be seen when you tap “view more photos’ from a profile, or by doing a photo search. Lists can be managed from within the app now, too.
You can read about all the engineering details that went into the new two-factor authentication on Twitter’s blog and grab the free update right now on the App Store.
If you have the time and inclination, and a certain sense of daring, you can share your cellular data as a Wi-Fi signal for free, without connecting through your data carrier. I’m not a huge fan of jailbreaking, per se; even the non-jailbreaking solution seems a bit technical, and some folks might see it as borderline unethical.
If you fall into either camp, and want to set up your qualifying iOS device via your cellular data carrier, here’s how.
Twelve South, one of Cult of Mac’s favorite accessory makers, has a new stand out called the HiRise. Announced today, the elegant, metallic device is designed for holding the iPhone 5 and iPad mini. Like most of Twelve South’s products, the HiRise looks right at home amongst your other Apple products.
Shuttr by Muku Category: Photography Works With:Anything with Bluetooth Price: $29
Possibly the most ridiculous omission from the iPhone’s camera app is a self-timer. If you want to take a selfie, or a group shot with you in it, or even a shake-free photo in low-light, then you’ll have to download a third-party camera app with a countdown timer built in.
Why is such a simple feature missing? Who knows? My cyclical side says that Apple is avoiding the inevitable lawsuits that would pour in when phones started getting snatched mid-photo whilst propped on the tops of inner-city walls.
Whatever the reason, Shuttr is here to fix the problem.
Holy crap, right? Robert Suarez dropped this amazing video up on YouTube, showing him beating the entire tower in under three minutes (2:58, to be exact), a full 32 seconds faster than the game developer’s own Game Center achievement.
There are some slight spoilers in the video, as it shows the entirety of the tower, from the bottom to the top level, with some cool avatars, power ups and the final boss. If you don’t want to see these things, preferring to work your own way up to the top, don’t watch the video.
For the rest of us, who know we’ll never be as good as this guy, it offers an incentive to keep plugging away at the game, which we reviewed favorably here.
We’ve contacted Robert via Twitter to find out how he got to this feat of Knightmare Tower awesomeness, and will update as we hear more.
And our big for the best of the bunch! Photo: Apple
It’s only been a week since the last iOS 7 beta came out, but Apple just seeded the fifth beta to developers this morning. The new update can be downloaded over the air, or directly through the iOS Dev Center.
I remember trying to wrap my head around the Adobe suite a few years ago, and at first I used trial and error to make things happen. Needless to say, things didn’t happen. Then I picked up several books on the software suite, but they only provided some marginal help… at best.
I’ve given up on learning Adobe’s stuff (mainly because I don’t believe I can give learning it the attention it deserves), but if you’ve been wanting to get a solid grasp on Adobe’s new Creative Cloud then there’s no time like the present. Cult of Mac Deals is offering a video course—called The Adobe Authorized Creative Cloud Bundle—for only $79 that will help you get a leg up on this powerful software suite.
Those still rocking an iPad 2 may have been disappointed to see that it wasn’t supported by Deus Ex: The Fall when the title made its debut on iOS last month, but a new update out today fixes that problem. It also brings major improvements to enemy artificial intelligence, and addresses some bugs.
Apple rejects a lot of iOS apps and games, but Send Me To Heaven has to be the first that was turned away due to the way in which it is played. The aim of the game is to throw your $700 smartphone up into the air as high as you can, but rather unsurprisingly, Apple thinks that this behavior “could result in damage to the user’s device.”
Fortunately, those who enjoy smashing up expensive items can get it on Android instead.