The Mummy from Loop Attachment — the creators of the wonderful Loop wristband for the iPod nano — is a premium silicone case or the iPhone 4 and iPhone 4S that aims to provide all-around protection for your device while preserving its identity.

It leaves the Apple logo and the iPhone name on the back of your handset exposed, while providing plenty of protection to shield it from dings and drops.

The Mummy’s key features include an incredibly lightweight design, impact resistance protection for all sides of your iPhone, and easy access to all your buttons, switches, and ports. Its design even allows you to slip a credit card or two in the back of the case before you rush out.

The Mummy is available in a range of pretty colors — ten in total — and costs just $25. But is it worth your hard-earned cash?

It’s back to school time, of course, and that means textbooks for a large portion of students in higher ed, at least. And textbooks cost a lot. Like, a LOT.

The folks at TextbookLand aim to change that fact with their new iPhone app, TextbookMe. With it, you can search, scan a barcode, or browse your way to less expensive textbooks as you wander the quad looking for cute people to connect with at the party later in the evening. Or, so we hear.

In a move that makes the Square/Starbucks partnership announced last week look like small potatoes, a group of national and international retailers announced plans to develop their own mobile payment network complete with mobile apps and digital wallet functionality. The move seems almost certain to shake up the nascent mobile payments market where a wide range of companies and organizations have been trying to figure out the secret sauce that will turn mobile payments into a mainstream retail system for the past couple of years.

The Merchant Customer Exchange or MCX, as the new company is known, plans to deliver a solution that offers convenience in both making purchases and in receiving customizable offers from retailers. Development of a mobile app and payment network are underway, but MCX has yet to announce any details about either the app or its network.

Ever heard of MirrorLink? A bunch of really big names in the car and tech world — Honda, GM, Toyota, Panasonic and pretty much all the big Android handset makers (that’s right, no Apple) — got together, called themselves the Car Connectivity Consortium and created a standardized communication format so that smartphones could easily communicate with car audio head units and the like. The format is called MirrorLink, and today Sony has unleashed no less than five MirrorLink-equipped units head units out onto U.S. roads, two of which are equipped with MirrorLink.

After two weeks of Apple laying down their evidence that Samsung has violated their patents and completely ripped-off the iPhone and iPad, Samsung is now going on the defensive in the Apple vs Samsung trial. So far, Samsung’s biggest strategic defense has been to flip the trial around and claim that Apple has infringed on their standard essential patents.

To help their case, Samsung has listed two expert witnesses to justify their claims that Apple should pay up to 2.5% in royalties. One of the experts – David J. Teece, a professor at the University of California, Berkley, was recently used by Motorola in their case against Microsoft related to H.264 patents.

An interesting crop circle was reported at Cheesefoot Head, near Winchester in Hampshire, southern England, last week. An infinite loop, the formation has no beginning nor end. It has been likened to the Tibetan Buddha, symbolizing peace and motion simultaneously. It also reminds us of the command key symbol, an emblem of Mac keyboards over the last thirty years.

If the iPad mini is really coming later this year, then why haven’t we seen a bunch of leaked parts for it? Daring Fireball’s John Gruber speculated that it was because the iPhone 5 was further along in production than the iPad mini, but now the guys at nowherelese.fr have come forward with a pretty convincing argument that this dock connector component is for the iPad mini: it’s way too big to be for the iPhone 5. Even Kyle Wiens of iFixIt says it appears to be a legitimate Apple part.

Curiously, though, it appears to have 10 pins, not the 9 pins seen on iPhone 5 dock connectors. However, we’re judging that from the inside of the dock connector cable, not from the actual plug. What does it mean?

Source: Nowherelese.fr

FileWave launched a new free app called Lightning this week. The new app makes quick and easy work of deploying Mountain Lion (and Lion) to multiple Macs, particularly recent Macs with Thunderbolt. It can be used to roll out existing master images that a business or school has already created as well as a base OS X install that can be customized with a range of files and applications.

Judge Lucy Koh has once again made a plea of Apple and Samsung to make peace in their patent dispute before a verdict is handed down. Not doing so, the federal judge warns, could be a danger to both Apple and Samsung.

Let’s say you want to program, oh, everything. Websites, responsive-design websites, iOS games, and iOS apps. Then let’s through in, just for kicks and giggles, Ruby and PS6. Cool?

This is hours and hours of classes. If you take classes the “traditional” way in a classroom, getting through all this will take a while. Don’t get me wrong, I’m all for in-person classes (I teach them myself), but I’m also a big fan of self-paced, online courses that let you learn at your pace and on your own terms/time.

This is why I like these bundle deals for courses. Like the Programming Bootcamp we kick off today.

When your dad’s a radiologist you probably get to see all kinds of neat crap get x-rayed, because hey, why not take an x-ray of those apples and carrots before you put them in a blend? Maybe the radiation will make you into a super mutant. You’re the boss of the magical x-ray machine and can do whatever you want.

That’s kind of what happened to one Redditor. They ordered a new MacBook Air, but when it arrived their dad didn’t tell him it arrived. Instead he took it to his lab, x-rayed it, and gave his son the x-ray to tell him that his new Mac was finally here. Ain’t that sweet?

Source: Reddit

Dude, what is Apple going to call this newer, thinner, smaller iPad they’re about to launch? iPad Junior? iBook? iPad Mini? iPad Air? iPad 3? I have no idea anymore. Last night I went to bed completely confident that Apple was going to probably call it something simple like “iPad Mini,” but then I woke up to some new renders of the smaller iPad and talk about how Apple might call it the iPad Air.

Now I’m second guessing the whole iPad Mini thing, and leaning towards iPad Air. I really want Apple to call it an iBook, just because I want to read iBooks on my iBook, but that’s probably not going to happen. Are there some better possible names for a smaller iPad? What do you think Apple should call the “iPad Mini.” I need to know!

Click here to tell us what Apple should call the smaller iPad in the Cult of Mac Forums

Image: iMore

Korean carriers SK Telecom and KT have revealed that they are currently in talks with Apple over supporting the next iPhone on their 800 MHz and 1800 MHz LTE networks. Although it seems inevitable that the handset will indeed boast LTE connectivity, as we know from the new iPad, different carriers use different frequency bands all around the world, and so not every LTE network will be supported.

If you’re in Korea, however, it seems there may be support for you… though it may not be available from launch.

Microsoft has positioned its Windows RT tablet OS as an iPad competitor, particularly in business and enterprise markets. Windows RT devices, which includes the ARM-based version of Microsoft’s Surface, are designed to be less expensive than Intel-powered Windows 8 tablets and are meant to push the new touch-oriented Metro interface.

Microsoft has even gone so far as to introduce special licensing terms for businesses that will offer free access to a virtual desktop from Windows RT devices while other platforms, including the iPad, will need to buy a new type of license for such access.

Windows RT would seem a perfect choice for businesses that want to support mobile employees with a tablet, except that Windows RT seems keep hitting one wall after another – the latest being that two of Microsoft’s longstanding OEM partners have decided to pass on creating Windows RT tablets.

Despite being labeled an “iPad killer” prior to hitting the market, Amazon’s $199 Kindle Fire never really gave the iPad anything to worry about. However, it’s going to come back and take a second shot at Apple’s hugely popular tablet, and this time its chances could be improved by a larger display. If a recent FCC filing is anything to go by, the Kindle Fire 2 will be significantly larger than its predecessor.

How excited are you for Apple’s sixth-generation iPhone? Could you give up sex to get it two weeks early? According to one survey, one in eleven men would be more than happy to, while 38% would make a “significant sacrifice” to avoid the queues on launch day.

Tired of OS X Mountain Lion notifying you of things? Sick of the little menu bar icon in the upper right corner of your Mac’s screen? Do you not even use Notifications at all on your Mac? You might, then, want to get rid of the entire thing, disabling it completely and removing the icon from the menu bar.

We’ve got two ways to show you, one that’s more permanent than the other. Check it out.

Remember The Simpsons: Tapped Out? It was a free iOS game from EA that launched earlier this year, but it only spent a short time in the App Store because it became so popular that EA’s servers couldn’t handle it and it was pulled. The company promised, however, that it would return, and it’s making its comeback this month.

Microsoft Office 2011 looks awful on the new MacBook Pro’s Retina display. But unfortunately for its customers, it seems Microsoft has no plans to add high-resolution graphics. While Outlook 2011 does have Retina graphics, the company has confirmed that the rest of the suite will have “the same viewing quality as on any non-Retina device.”

You lucky thing. The summer’s over, or nearly over, and you’re already planning on heading back to school. Just like last year, you will begin this year fresh and full of energy and enthusiasm, only to be ground down by the man. Luckily, we’re here to help with advice on the best apps and gear to get you through the year and into next year’s summer vacation with the least effort possible.

So sit back, relax and take a look at the Cult of Mac back to school/college superguide.

Here’s a great freebie for all you Cult of Mac fans. We have a slick looking WordPress theme designed to show off your new iOS app idea. Simple as that. A premium theme usually $37 now FREE for you for just a short time. So, go check out the theme for yourself and then come back and download it. Why? Because it’s free and I’m sure there is always a project that you can find a great theme for.

Speaking of free, our Retina MacBook Pro Giveaway is also ending soon! Better check that one out ASAP.

Cult of Mac Deals is powered by our partner StackSocial

Social bookmarking service Pinterest today announced a new app for Android and iOS in a move to appeal to an even larger audience. If you’ve not used the service, it’s like a image-based social bookmarking system. You “pin” websites to your own Pinterest account, then share the pinned bookmarks via categorical lists. It has a heavy Facebook and Twitter integration as well, and last week it opened the doors to the general public, not requiring an invite any longer.

Wood is, indeed, awesome. Speaker makers have been using wood for years to wrap high-end speakers in, utilizing the highly resonant natural properties of wood for sound reproduction. Now, with the all the rage for tiny bluetooth speakers like the Jambox and the Logitech Mini Boombox, perhaps it’s time for something just a bit more, well, woody.

We told you last week that Sprint was selling iPhone 4S models for discounted prices, and that Apple had quietly authorized its retail employees to match discounts from other carriers as well as from Sprint.

Well, in a second surprise move, Sprint has started selling new iPhone 4S devices for $50, which represents a huge discount even on top of the $150 it started selling them for the last time we reported on it.

Earlier this morning Cult of Mac reported that 35-year-old homeless man, Kariem McFarlin, broke into Steve Jobs’ house and stole more than $60,000 worth of computers and personal items.

We now have a list of items McFarlin stole, which includes a lot of Apple hardware, and some personal items, like Steve Jobs’ wallet, that still had his license, credit card, and the $1 annual salary he earned as CEO of Apple.