Those with a curious mind can continue to expand their horizons from home thanks to e-learning options. For a limited time, we’re serving up a special offer on a package that’s primed to elevate those efforts.

Featuring highly popular language app Rosetta Stone, The Unlimited Lifetime Learning Subscription Bundle is currently available for a fraction of its standard cost. Normally sold for nearly $1,800, this bundle pairs Rosetta Stone with StackSkills Unlimited, which is loaded with classes led by more than 350 experts, for only $149 combined.

Adonit Star is an iPad stylus for those who love antiques but don’t want to forgo modern technology. It’s designed to look like a fountain pen, not the usual plastic pencil.

It’s an accessory any 19th century lawyer would be proud to own. But is surprisingly affordable.

Home-office goods maker Grovemade rolled out white-oak versions of its popular desk shelves Tuesday, adding a classy new option for anyone trying to improve their computer setup.

You can get the new desk shelves in small, medium or large sizes. They’re not cheap, but you deserve to have nice things.

Worried about keeping your valuables safe? Venerable lock maker Yale said Tuesday it has two new smart safes for you: Yale Smart Safe and Yale Smart Safe with Wi-Fi.

And you can control the new safes using the Home app via HomeKit. Or, in the case of the Wi-Fi-enabled safe, with the Siri voice assistant.

The Face ID sensors reportedly will be hidden from users in next year’s iPhone 16 Pro. That would free up space for more screen area.

If true, under-display Face ID might mean that the days of the Dynamic Island are numbered, even though the feature only recently debuted in the iPhone 14 Pro.

Did the iPad mini catch your fancy? Amazon has a killer deal on Apple’s smallest tablet, knocking $99 off its retail price.

After the discount, you can get the 2021 iPad mini for $399.99, down from its original $499 MSRP. This is the same price the tablet was available for during Black Friday.

BOSTON — Before he put pen to paper and gave us violent sagas of lowlife P.I.s and desperate criminals, Dennis Lehane used to deliver flowers to a hospital next door to the Liberty Hotel. Now the novelist, who acted as writer and showrunner for the brilliant Apple TV+ miniseries Black Bird, is sitting here in the Liberty, so named because of its former vocation: a prison.

It’s an appropriate setting. Black Bird tells the true story of Jimmy Keene, a prison informant who risked his life to nail a serial killer. (The series is based on Keene’s autobiographical novel, In With the Devil: A Fallen Hero, a Serial Killer, and a Dangerous Bargain for Redemption.)

Lehane and his chilling Black Bird star Paul Walter Hauser sat down with Cult of Mac and other journalists recently to discuss their critically acclaimed Apple TV+ show, which is racking up nominations as awards season gets underway. If Black Bird’s outstanding cast and crew receive the recognition they deserve, the show stands a good chance of picking up a handful of awards — and adding to the growing glow of prestige programming on Apple TV+. (Update: Hauser won the Golden Globe on Tuesday night for Best Performance by an Actor in a Supporting Role in a Limited Series, Anthology Series or Motion Picture Made for Television.)

In the group interview, Lehane and Hauser talked motivation, working conditions and seeing into the mind of a psychopath, among other things.

Your Mac and MacBook can easily share a monitor, and quickly flip between them, with the IOGear 2-Port 4K USB-C KVM Switch with DisplayPort Output.

I tested it in my home office, and it really reduces the hassle of switching between two computers. And it lets the computers easily share a wired mouse and keyboard.

Nobody said you have to wait for spring cleaning to tidy up a little. If you’re sick of cable clutter, a simple solution is to get rid of most of your cords and replace them with a multi-surface wireless charger. The MagStack is a foldable, three-in-one wireless charging station that works with any Qi-compatible phones or Bluetooth earbuds, and it’s on sale now for the best price online. Get one for just $44.99 (regularly $69.99).

Apple will bring a microLED screen to its wrist wearable, according to a reliable source of insider info. This would replace the OLED displays currently in Apple Watch.

A switch to microLED would bring an improved type of screen: brighter and less prone to burn-in.

Apple has released a couple of new ads highlighting the iPhone 14’s Action Mode and the Undo Send feature in iOS 16’s Messages app. The features are available on both regular iPhone 14 and 14 Pro series.

This is the second ad Apple has released since the iPhone 14 release to promote Action Mode. The advanced stabilization mode provides gimbal-like stabilization.

Apple’s drawn-out effort to make its own 5G modem will reportedly begin to bear fruit in 2024. This will replace ones now sourced from Qualcomm.

And the iPhone-maker is also working to produce other wireless chips it currently gets from Broadcom.

iPhone users can now find a parking space with Apple Maps. Starting Monday, the navigation application has SpotHero built in, giving parking options for more than 8,000 locations across North America.

The feature is free, though the spaces are not. Here’s how to use it.

So many people love Apple gear because the Cupertino tech giant gets a lot right with its hardware. That certainly includes monitors, and not just the phenomenal Pro Display XDR and new Studio Display. We see a fair number of new computer setups relying on classic Apple screens like Cinema Display and Thunderbolt Display.

Today’s featured MacBook Pro and Xbox setup is a good example. Even with a modern gaming console — and given the right adapter — a display from a dozen years ago is still keeping it real.

The iPhone 15 is reportedly in trial production, a fairly early stage in bringing the product to market. Still, it means the final feature set and design are essentially complete and Apple is thinking about assembling the device.

Trial production is going on at a Foxconn plant in China. The iPhone 15 will also be made in India.

Apple’s first retail store in India has moved closer to its opening. After years of delays, the company has started hiring retail store workers in the country.

The company has posted 12 job positions on its career page in India as it looks to fill various retail positions.

Eating well on a budget can be tough, but one way to enjoy more adventurous or healthier meals without spending a ton of money is by making them at home. If you’re planning to cook more this year, you’ll want to consider shopping at Costco.

With a Costco Gold Star Membership, you can find shelves of enticing ingredients and premade delectables to help you create amazing breakfasts, lunches and dinners. For a limited time, you can get a one-year Costco Gold Star Membership for $60 — and it comes with a $30 Digital Costco Shop Card.

Most people don’t really use AM and FM radios anymore, but streaming live content is hardly dead. Lots of podcasts do live streams — and you can still tune into radio stations online. Broadcasts, an app by independent developer Steven Troughton-Smith, makes listening to live music and streaming radio on your iPhone very easy.

Let me show you how it works.

Every year, Apple has some significant hardware upgrades planned for at least a few devices in its product lineup. 2023 could be an outlier, though.

This year, Apple’s major hardware launches will include its first AR/VR headset and the iPhone 15 series. While other products in the company’s lineup will receive a refresh, they will be relatively minor upgrades.

Contrary to rumors, the upcoming Apple silicon Mac Pro might disappoint many in the design department. A new report suggests the forthcoming Mac Pro refresh will have the same design as the 2019 Intel-based model.

The Apple silicon Mac Pro is widely expected to launch later this year. It would stand out in the Mac lineup by offering a certain degree of user upgradability but come with non-upgradeable system memory.

Most iPhone users have finally gotten on the iOS 16 bandwagon, according to a tracking company. Adoption passed 70% last week, almost four months after it launched.

That’s significantly slower than iPhone users adopted previous iOS versions. The data shows that people simply don’t trust that Apple’s iPhone updates will be bug-free. Not the way we used to, anyway.

With 2022 officially and fully in the rear-view, we’re all looking at how 2023 will be different. But some things don’t need to change. With that, it seemed only fair that we look back at some of the apps that made the biggest difference this past year. With so many apps to choose from, knowing the ones we (the Cult of Mac team) actually used and loved this last year may even help you nail that New Year’s resolution.

This week on Cult of Mac’s podcast: The more we hear about Apple’s upcoming AR/VR headset, the more we’re perplexed about who is actually going to buy one. We take a long, hard look at the latest leaks — and come up shaking our heads.

Also on The CultCast:

• We might get a raft of exciting new Macs — including the first Mac Pro powered by Apple silicon — at a March event.
• Apple’s Pro Display XDR and Studio Display get some high-end competition.
• Sorry, voice actors. AI narrators look like the future of audiobooks (and Apple leads the charge).
• Our final best-of-2022 picks.

Listen to this week’s episode of The CultCast in the Podcasts app or your favorite podcast app. (Be sure to subscribe and leave us a review if you like it!) Or watch the video live stream, embedded below.

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The Mac is hardly ever the focus of events like CES. But at this year’s massive tech conference in Las Vegas, two promising displays were announced by Samsung and Dell.

Any new Retina display options for the Mac are a welcome treat. Let’s see how these new monitors stack up.

Owning a professional knife set completes a kitchen and makes whipping up outstanding meals easier than ever. This eight-piece Seido Japanese Master Chef Knife Set, which comes with a gift box, is one of the best you can get.

Now you can grab it for just $99.99, marked down from $249.