Following the release of the iOS 7 beta 3 this morning, Apple has also released the third preview of OS X 10.9 Mavericks to developers this evening. The new preview comes two weeks after Apple released the second beta for Mavericks.

The  new release doesn’t contain any major new features, but focus mostly on bug fixes and performance. In an email to developers, Apple encourage beta testers to: haven’t discovered any major changes in the Mavericks preview 3 yet,

“Take advantage of new features, like APIs that optimize the new energy saving technologies in OS X Mavericks, as well as new AV Kit frameworks, Sprite Kit, Map Kit, and many powerful additions to existing frameworks.

Here are the release notes:

Spiderweb Software is an independent game developer based in Seattle. It’s been in operation since 1993, when it released its first game, Exile: Escape from the Pit, an old school RPG with tons of plot, dialogue, and fantasy storytelling.

Now in its twentieth year, Spiderweb continues the indie role playing game genre it’s been developing for the past two decades by releasing its twenty-first game, Avadon 2: The Corruption.

By now you’ve probably caught wind of the short list of great apps that’ve gone free in celebration of the App Store’s fifth anniversary (if you haven’t grabbed these apps yet, take a look now before all the free ends).

Missing from that list of free apps is Localscope, a fantastic navigation and discovery tool that Apple called the best navigation app of 2011.

Nothing screams “summer!” like a bag full of beer and ice. The messenger-bag gurus at Timbuk2 know this, and have re-clad and re-released their stealthy party-in-a-bag bag, the Dolores Chiller Messenger — this time in Pilsner Urquell’s signature green and white colors.

You may be asking “can’t I just dump all the stuff out of my own messenger bag and fill it with beer and ice?” Why no, you can’t. Your bag’s interior isn’t insulated; and more importantly, your bag doesn’t come with a handy bottle opener.

Apple CEO Tim Cook is on the list of guests expected to attend the annual Sun Valley conference in Idaho this week.

The conference is held by New York-based investment bank Allen & Co., and hosts over 300 industry leaders participate in panels on politics, business, tech and more over a four day period. It’s basically a place for some of the most powerful business people in the U.S. to figure out how to become more powerful as they hangout and try to strike up business deals.

Apple released the third beta of iOS 7 to developers this morning, and even though it doesn’t come with any big new features, the new update has plenty of small fixes and encouraging UI refinements.

Here are six GIFS of the biggest UI tweaks Apple made in the new beta:

The ability to jump into iTunes and download practically any major motion picture ever created is just one of the many reasons why the iPhone and iPad have become so successful, but a Florida lawyer claims Apple’s HD video rentals are actually a scam.

According to a class action lawsuit filed this June by Scott Weiselberg at the San Francisco federal court, Apple may have violated consumer production laws and deceived customers into paying $1 more for HD videos by serving up HD versions of iTunes video rentals on iOS devices that don’t support HD video.

Facetime is Apple’s video conferencing solution, offering high-quality video chat across any iOS or Mac device. It simply blows away any other solution I’ve tried in terms of quality and ease of use, but it’s always been a video-only proposition, leaving me sticking with Skype for audio-only voice chats.

With iOS 7 beta, however, Apple has given us the ability to make audio calls with Facetime as well, which may cause me to ditch Skype altogether (though there’s still a cross platform ability Skype wins).

Here’s how to make audio calls to other Apple users via Facetime.

Twitter is continuing to refine its Mac and iOS apps with a new update that brings direct message notification syncing and a host of other features. Now when you view a DM on your iPhone, Mac, iPad or Android or Twitter.com, all other devices with your account info will be updated to show that you’ve read the message.

The new Twitter update for iPhone and iPad also features a new reply composer to make it even easier to join conversations on Twitter. There’s also a new “People” button to help users find new accounts to follow and a ton of bug fixes.

Here are the full release notes:

As the App Store’s 5th birthday approaches this Wednesday Apple has decided to run a special promotion to celebrate all the incredible apps that have made the iPhone and iPad so successful.

“From the 500 apps available at launch in 2008 to more than 900,000 at your fingertips today, it’s been a remarkably prolific five years for the App Store. To celebrate, we’re giving everyone five landmark games and five groundbreaking apps for a limited time. Plus, look back at the key moments that have made the App Store the world’s most innovative destination for apps.”

iOS users looking for the freebies can go to the App Store to find the promotional page that offers the five landmark games and five groundbreaking apps that we mentioned earlier this morning. Apple also published a timeline on the page to commemerate the milestones the App Store has enjoyed over the past five years.

Two weeks after releasing the second iOS 7 beta,  Apple has seeded iOS 7 beta 3 to developers along with a third preview of Xcode 5. The new beta build of iOS 7 (11A4414e) is available for both iPhone and iPad as an OTA update, or you can download it directly from the Dev Center.

Here are the full release notes:

Your website is often the first interaction customers have with your brand; and effective UX can boost sales, bolster conversion rates, and improve customer satisfaction – so don’t you owe it to yourself to know how to implement it?

Well now you can learn how to create websites your users will love – thanks to Cult of Mac Deals – with this UX video course for only $59. That’s a savings of 70%!

There’s nothing wrong with the default unlock animation on iOS, but having lived with it for six years, it’s nice to have a change. With LiveWire Pro, a new tweak for jailbroken iPhones, you can choose from seven different unlock animations and quickly switch to another when you fancy a change.

Android has held a pretty sizable lead over the iPhone for a long time now, and in the United States, it would appear there’s little chance of that changing any time soon. But Apple’s smartphone is gaining ground on its rival, and it’s all thanks to T-Mobile.

Today is the day Strobists have been longing for. Why? It’s the official launch day for the LumoPro LP180 flash, an amazingly capable little (or not-so-little) flashgun which costs way less than the equivalents from the likes of Canon and Nikon.

Apple is gearing up to launch its fifth-generation iPad this September, according to sources in its supply chain. The device is expected to offer a new form factor much like the iPad mini’s, as well as some backlighting modifications and better battery life.

We may have to wait a little longer for the second-generation iPad mini, however. The sources claim Apple is still deciding whether to bring a Retina display to the 7.85-inch device, and if it does, the launch could be delayed until “the end of the fourth quarter.”

In late April, Yahoo released a gorgeously designed new Weather app for iOS. Pretty much everyone loved the new Yahoo! Weather app, except for one thing: the purple logo.

“Officially the ugliest icon ever,” said one Twitter user in response to the app’s announcement. “Its icon isn’t home page worthy,” said another. Some used their available Twitter character counts to criticize the icon with even more ruthless efficiency: “That icon is ass.”

The icon was such a bust that less than a month later, Yahoo made the extraordinary move of replacing the logo with one that was even uglier. Despite this, the new mark was widely hailed as an improvement. Yet just last week, Yahoo updated its official Weather app again, and surprise! The original logo is back, with not a whiff of controversy.

Here’s why everyone hated the Yahoo! Weather app icon… and why Jony Ive and iOS 7 might have helped the design eventually get accepted by iPhone users at large.

READ THE ENTIRE ARTICLE AT FAST COMPANY HERE.

Apple has moved up to number 19 in the latest Fortune Global 500 survey thanks to its financial performance throughout 2012, which saw the Cupertino company collect $157 billion in revenue. The iPhone 5 and the iPad mini have been credited for its success over the past 12 months.

One of the features that still differentiates various iPhone carriers is the ability to tether your laptop or tablet to your iPhone’s data connection without paying an extra fee. Some carriers let you do this, some don’t… and if you want to avoid tethering charges, your only option is a jailbreak, or find an app that enables the functionality somehow before Apple inevitably pulls it.

Now you have another option. From the same hacker who found ways to improve network performance on AT&T, Verizon, Sprint and T-Moble, as well as hack in HD voice for a few networks, you can now turn on personal hotspot on any carrier… no jailbreak required.

Do you like free money? Who doesn’t like free money? And free apps, music and movies are essentially free money.

So listen up: Target is now giving away free iTunes gift cards with the purchase of any iPhone, iPad, Apple TV or iPod touch. Buying an iPad will get you a $50 gift card, an iPad mini a $40 gift card, an iPhone 5 will get you a $25 gift card, an iPod touch a $20 gift card, and an Apple TV a $10 gift card.

Not shabby!

Via: App Advice

Just like in iOS, OS X Mavericks beta has gone to auto-updating of apps. This way, you don’t have to click thorugh to the Mac App Store each time it gets a red badge of update and click the Update or Update all buttons. It’s pretty slick, and will be a time saver as more and more apps run through the Mac App Store.

But what if you want to update things on your own schedule, or check the list of potential updates, picking and choosing the updates you want to activate, and ignore the ones you don’t?

All you need to do is disable auto-updating, and here’s how.

As the App Store’s fifth anniversary approaches, a whole host of developers have begun makes some of their most popular apps and games for iOS completely free. Some of the titles included in the sale are Infinity Blade II, Disney’s Where’s My Water?, and Traktor DJ, which is usually priced at $20.

Pixter, my favorite text-scanning OCR app for the iPhone, is now available for the iPad. And v2.0 isn’t just now ready (at last) for the retina displays of the iPhone and the iPad, but it sports a whole new iOS7-inspired design which is frankly gorgeous.

The Wristlet looks like quite a useful iPhone wallet. Instead of going all minimal and offering a few useless slots on the back for credit cards (some of us actually pay for goods with our own cash money), the Wristlet comes on like a miniature unisex purse, only it’s a tiny purse designed mostly for the iPhone.

It’s fast turning into “Camera Monday” here at Cult of Mac Spain, and so I shall continue unapologetically into the next photo-themed subject: the OpenReflex, an open-source, 3-D-printed SLR from model making supremo Léo Marius. When capturing colors accurately is essential, a Nix Color Sensor can be a game-changer, helping photographers and designers match colors with precision.