The iPhone 12 isn’t out yet, and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk has yet to fulfill his ambition of landing on Mars — but Russian luxury firm Caviar is getting ahead of the game.

This week, it announced a new limited series of 19 “Musk Be On Mars” iPhone 12 Pro handsets. Rather than being blinged out with gold and diamonds like previous Caviar iPhones, these special-edition units will feature “a piece from the SpaceX spaceship that was in space,” bas relief of the Dragon spacecraft, and a laser-engraved Musk signature.

All yours for a starting price of $4,990.

Parallels Desktop 16 for Mac launched Tuesday, bringing new features and performance enhancements that mean the virtualization software delivers the “ultimate Windows-on-Mac experience,” the company said.

The update also preps the popular software for the upcoming release of macOS Big Sur. That required a major effort from Parallels’ engineers.

“We had to re-engineer all of the (kernel extensions) that we would need from scratch to work with the new macOS kext that’s integrated into the product,” said John Uppendahl, Parallels’ VP of global communications, during an online briefing about the software. “And to give you context, that alone took 25 man-years of engineering work.”

The CEO of Apple reportedly passed a huge milestone: He’s now a billionaire. Tim Cook’s net worth has risen significantly, partially as a result of Apple stock more than doubling in value in the past 12 months.

But Cook is not likely to stay a billionaire. And not for the reason you might think.

Apple’s newest iMac is by far the fastest yet, with huge increases in both CPU and GPU performance. It also ships with improved speakers and microphones. And yet, it seems a lot of Apple fans don’t care.

The reason? The new iMac is powered by Intel processors, like all its predecessors since 2006, instead of Apple Silicon. Since Apple revealed its plan to switch to its own custom chips at the Worldwide Developers Conference in June, Intel processors just don’t hold the same appeal.

But there are some great reasons to continue buying Intel-powered Macs in 2020. Here are a few.

A version of Google Maps for the Apple Watch starts rolling on Monday. The goal of this app is to allow users to navigate by car, bike, public transit or on foot, without having to look at an iPhone.

Also, Google Maps for Apple’s CarPlay Dashboard got some convenient new features today.

When Apple gets into the foldable phone market, as arch-rival Samsung has already done, its first model might well look much like the iPhone 12 Flip. But for now, this is only a concept design.

Watch a video of it now:

If you looked at the crowds of white nationalists bearing tiki torches at the infamous Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, and wondered what took them from innocent children to gimlet-eyed monsters of borrowed ideology, Boys State is a harrowing but necessary research tool.

The new Apple TV+ documentary by Amanda McBaine and Jesse Moss delivers a frightening look at a time-honored tradition that appears to have actively made the world a worse place.

Sundance Grand Jury Prize Winner Boys State, which premieres Friday on Apple TV+, may nauseate you. But you’ll be glad you saw it, if only because it’s a shocking and sobering reminder that the next generation of conservatives is ready to step in and replace the one about to die — and they’re no less efficacious.

A 34-year-old Chinese citizen living in Switzerland has been sentenced to three-and-a-half years in jail for a massive fraud involving Apple’s AppleCare+ warranty system. His 56-year-old mom, who helped him pull off the scam, was given a suspended 18-month jail sentence.

The pair, who have not been named, bought cheap copycat iPhones from China, before swapping them out for 111,000 new authentic iPhones. AppleCare+ allows customers to replace defective devices with new models when they are damaged.

Instead of stressing out over unanswered emails or mindlessly scrolling through social media, you can use your smartphone to get your head straight and settled.

A Chinese company facing U.S. sanctions for using forced labor provided clothing or raw materials to Apple, possibly in the form of uniforms for its retail employees, claims The Guardian.

Changji Esquel Textile is one of a group of 11 companies that reportedly violated human rights in China’s western Xinjiang region. The company denies using forced labor “anywhere” in its business and says it will appeal its inclusion on the sanctions list.

Want to go to Apple co-founder Steve “Woz” Wozniak’s 70th birthday party? Of course you do — and, thanks to Woz’s wife Janet Hill, you can.

To celebrate her famous husband’s landmark birthday this Tuesday, Hill is throwing Woz a massive online birthday bash, and you can tune in to watch it streaming live at 5 p.m. Pacific time on Wozbday.com and Twitch.tv/inspirehouse. Oh, and there’s a typically Woz-style event you can participate in as well.

Booting WeChat out of the App Store could drive down worldwide iPhone shipments by up to 30%, claims respected Apple analyst Ming-Chi Kuo.

While WeChat’s total removal from the App Store seems an unlikely prospect, it could be the worst-case scenario of President Donald Trump’s recent executive order to stop U.S. transactions with WeChat and parent company Tencent.

Apple is taking aim at a meal planner and grocery list app called Prepear, which it claims bears a more-than-passing resemblance to Apple’s iconic logo.

In an Instagram post by the app’s creators, Prepear’s founders express their shock that the “trillion dollar Apple” has gone after a small business’ trademark. They say that fighting Apple will cost “tens of thousands of dollars,” but that they will fight nonetheless.

One of the greatest things about computers is how easy it is to create music. Even more so if you use a Mac, because of Logic Pro X, Apple’s industry–leading Digital Audio Workstation. With this massive collection of lessons, you can learn to use it like a pro.

A portable monitor makes you more productive on the go. And the 15.6-inch Vissles-M is a thin and lightweight LCD screen that easily connects to a Mac or iPad Pro through its USB-C port.

I tested this affordable external display in a variety of conditions, and used it for both for work and fun. Here’s how it held up.

We’re all going to miss Phil Schiller now that he’s stepped down from his role as Apple’s marketing chief. He was a close friend of Steve Jobs, and he played a major role in Cupertino for decades.

To be clear, he’s not leaving Apple entirely. Instead, he became an Apple Fellow (and he’ll run the App Store and Apple Events). Still, it’s a big change for Cupertino. In tribute to an Apple OG, let’s take a trip down memory lane and relive Phil Schiller’s greatest hits.

That post is just one of the good reads you’ll find in this week’s free issue of Cult of Mac Magazine. Download it now and get all the week’s top Apple news, reviews and how-tos in an easy-to-read package.

Marketing moved online long ago, and every week that goes by, it becomes more fundamental to the ways we buy and sell. Facebook, YouTube, Google and Amazon have become the core of our modern economy. So if you’ve got a product, brand or anything else you want to connect with customers or audiences, you’ve got to learn the ins and outs of digital marketing.

This week on The CultCast: The brand-new iMac may look the same, but it’s so powerful that video editors are gleefully buying two or three at a time — we’ll tell you everything that’s new.

But look, forget buying the shiny new iMac, and put your money in Apple stock instead! I’m going all in on AAPL. Find out why I’m about to dump a huge cash stockpile into Apple stock, and the cash value of my current investments. We’re talking real numbers here, people.

Our thanks to Squarespace for supporting this episode. Easily create a beautiful website all by yourself, at Squarespace.com/cultcast. Use offer code CultCast at checkout to get 10% off your first purchase of a website or domain.

Apple and T-Mobile are collaborating to connect up to 1 million California students in need with iPads already equipped with high-speed internet connectivity.

Travel to before the events of HBO’s hit series in Game of Thrones: Tale of Crows, a new game released Friday on Apple Arcade.

Explore the history of the Night’s Watch in this narrative-driven, real-time idle game that extends beyond the TV series. Become the shield that guards the realms of men, the sword in the darkness and the enduring sentry upon the Wall.

Apple reportedly encountered a problem with some of the camera lenses it plans to use for the iPhone 12. Specifically, some of the coatings for the wide-angle lens cracked during a high-pressure, high-humidity stress test, according to TF International Securities analyst Ming-Chi Kuo.

While that might not sound great, there’s actually no reason to panic. And the supply-chain problem might even wind up saving Apple a few bucks.

Staying home hasn’t meant we’re using our phones any less. Quite the opposite, in fact.

Get the most out of your iPhone with any of these four great iOS apps — all discounted by more than half.

The Facebook Gaming app finally landed in the App Store on Friday, several months after it made it to Android devices. The delay isn’t the only downside, though. According to Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg, iOS users will get a considerably “inferior experience” due to Apple’s App Store policies.

The app allows users to livestream video games, much like the ultra-popular Twitch app. And the Android version includes mini-games users can play. But not the iOS version. “We had to remove gameplay functionality entirely in order to get Apple’s approval on the standalone Facebook Gaming app,” she said.

Despite the controversy surrounding it, 15-second video creation and sharing app TikTok remained the world’s most downloaded non-gaming app in July, according to a new report by Sensor Tower.

TikTok ranked as the No. 1 app on both iOS and the Google Play app stores, with more than 65.3 million installs in the month. This represents a 21.4% increase from July last year. In the first quarter of 2020, TikTok registered the best three months of any app ever when it comes to downloads.

President Donald Trump’s executive order blocking “transactions” involving Tencent’s WeChat will not hurt games owned, or partially owned, by the company.

That means it would not affect the likes of Riot Games’ League of Legends or Epic Games’ Fortnite, both of which have financial ties to Tencent. Instead, the executive order covers only WeChat transactions.