The upcoming Nanoleaf Learning Series home-automation products are designed to learn users’ needs and react proactively. These smart switches and smart bulbs support Apple’s HomeKit, so they can be controlled from an iPhone, too.
Nintendo’s new subscription model seems to be paying off in droves for the company — as shown by the company’s most popular mobile game, Mario Kart Tour.
Mario Kart Tour debuted to massive download numbers in late September 2019. According to Apple it was the most downloaded App Store game of 2019. But as figures exclusively obtained by Cult of Mac show, it’s proving quite the money generator as well.
Facebook remains one of the most powerful platforms for reaching an audience and customers. But you can’t get the most out of Facebook marketing without learning the ropes.
This week on The CultCast: According to a new report, Apple is prepping a new super-charged gaming Mac for WWDC! We discuss… Plus: full-screen TouchID will be replacing FaceID in a notch-less 2020 iPhone, at least according to a new rumor.
Our thanks to Linked In for supporting this episode. A business is only as strong as its people, and every hire matters… head to LinkedIn.com/cultcast and get a $50 credit toward your first job post.
It’s Friday, which means, among other things, that it’s new Apple TV+ episode day; providing hours of fresh viewing to while away the first weekend of 2020.
Or, rather it would be if the well of new Apple TV+ shows wasn’t already running weirdly dry. Just 53 days since launching, Apple TV+ this week gained just two new episodes of shows — a total of 74 minutes of new content. That’s MacBook Air thin.
Apple shares hit an historic $300 milestone Thursday, representing a new overall all-time high. The amazing figure gives Apple a market cap of $1.3 trillion. That takes Apple a whole lot closer to the once crazy dream of being valued at a whopping $2 trillion.
New Year’s Resolutions for Tim Cook, anyone?
Don’t miss your chance to save 15% on all of Mifa’s amazing Apple Watch bands in the Cult of Mac Store.
The traditional Classic Leather band, rugged Hybrid Sport band, and stunning Sparkle Bracelet are all available for less than $22 today. This sale ends tomorrow, January 3, so enjoy it while you can!
At the end of November last year, I took delivery of the new 16-inch MacBook Pro. Around a month later, thanks to Apple’s generous holiday return policy, I returned it. You can read my first impressions, but they mostly remain the same after a month of use. In short, it’s a fantastic MacBook. But in my conclusion, I wrote this:
But really, this Mac is fantastic. My Cult of Mac colleagues tease me that I buy Apple gear, and then immediately send it back. This new MacBook is staying with me.
So, what went wrong?
Forner HBO chief executive Richard Plepler has signed a five-year deal with Apple to make original feature films, documentaries and television series for Apple TV Plus.
Plepler was at HBO for 27 years and played important roles in the rise of original programming at the network.
Did you know that you can take remote control of another Mac’s screen via iMessage screen sharing? If you’re troubleshooting a family member’s Mac, for example, you can ask them to share their screen with you, and then take over from your own Mac. This is a hell of a lot quicker than trying to talk them through the deeper recesses of their Mac over the phone.
And, of course, it’s pretty easy to set up. Let’s take a look at how to share screens using Messages on the Mac.
Christmas Day turned out to be one of the biggest moneymaking days ever for Apple and Google as far as app sales go.
SensorTower published its latest report of holiday app sales revealing that overall spending on the App Store and Google Play topped $277 million on Christmas Day. Thanks to consumers who had just been gifted new devices and gift cards, spending rose 11% compared to last year, and games were the biggest winner.
Brydge just dropped its first keyboard with a built-in trackpad for the 2018 iPad Pro. And it’s everything we’ve been waiting for.
The Pro+ Keyboard is one of the first to take full advantage of mouse support in iPadOS. It also offers handy shortcuts that make it easy to access system features like the Dock and App Exposé.
There’s also a standalone iPad Pro trackpad for those who don’t need the keyboard.
Go to AppStore.com and it will connect you with, well, the App Store. And you’ve got Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff to thank for it.
In his recent book Trailblazer, Benioff tells the story of how Steve Jobs gave him the idea for what became the first enterprise app store. And how Benioff later thanked Jobs by signing over the AppStore.com domain.
It’s no surprise Apple is working on a new iPhone SE for 2020. Recent rumors have indicated it will make its debut in the spring. But that particular model might be just one of two planned for this year.
A new report claims Apple is also working on a larger, “upgraded” version that will be available later in the year.
Apple is seemingly having a supplier shakeup to kickstart the 2020s — with Cupertino shifting production for some of its biggest products to other manufacturers. Including adding another supplier for its ultra-popular AirPods Pro.
According to longtime Apple analyst Ming-Chi, Apple will be making changes to the suppliers of the AirPods Pro, the S-series chips for the next-gen Apple Watch, the iPod touch and the non-cellular iPad.
The job market is getting more competitive and specialized. So a strong resume can make the difference between getting an interview and getting overlooked. With this software, you can create resumes designed to get you through the search criteria and onto the desk of your next employer.
Streaming music services such as Apple Music have completely taken over the music market, a new report from the Recording Industry Association of America makes clear.
The organization notes that streaming now accounts for a massive 80% of the music market in the United States. That’s up from a minuscule 7% a decade ago in 2010. In the first half of 2019, 61 million people in the US had streaming subscriptions.
One of the first things I heard when Apple first showed off its AirPods was “wow, those are going to be easy to lose.” If you’ve got a kid in the house, however, you might also want to consider how swallowable they are.
That’s a lesson learned by a parent in DeKalb County, Georgia over the holidays. They had a scary incident in which an AirPods Christmas gift was swallowed by their 7-year-old son. Fortunately, he’s okay.
Apple’s next-generation 5-nanometer chipsets for the 2020 iPhone lineup are expected to enter production during the second quarter of this year.
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC) will remain Apple’s sole supplier, according to a new report.
UK chip company Imagination Technologies has agreed to a new licensing deal with Apple. The British company designed Apple’s mobile graphics processors for years. However, it fell out with Cupertino three years ago. Apple instead focused on developing its own mobile GPUs in-house.
Recently Imagination launched a new generation of its mobile GPU architecture which it calls the most important upgrade in 15 years. The new multi-year agreement between Apple and Imagination is good news for both companies.
2020 is a new year, a new decade, and another opportunity to improve our skills and careers. We’ve rounded up four awesome lesson bundles, from SEO to Excel, Fulfillment By Amazon and coding, so you can walk into the next decade with new professional possibilities. Even better, save an extra 20% off with promo code “20SAVE20” at checkout for a limited time.
With the holidays behind us and a new decade just getting started, New Year’s resolution season is officially here.
If you want to make amends for your seasonal overindulgence and get in shape for the Twenties, here’s our essential guide to nailing your New Year’s resolutions with Apple Watch.
For my job at Cult of Mac, I test a lot of apps. But of course, I also use a lot of apps, for work, for recreation, and for making music. I thought I’d make a short list of my most-used apps this year. Few, if any, of these apps are new this year, although some of them received major updates in 2019. But all of them are excellent, well-made apps, well worth checking out.
So, let’s get started.
Mike Harvey, well known to the Apple II community as the founder and publisher of Nibble magazine, passed away recently at his North Carolina home. He was 84.
His death was announced this morning by the Apple Puget Sound Program Library Exchange, an Apple user group that started in 1978.
What were you listening to most this year? Was it Lil Nas X’s Old Town Road, one of the catchiest songs of the whole year? Or were you — like Cult of Mac writer Luke Dormehl — only listening to music made before 1997, after which he claims everything got unlistenable? Or perhaps you were hooked on the inexplicably popular Coldplay?
If you did all your listening on Apple Music, then you can easily check your top 100 songs of 2019, and also other years past. You just need to check your Apple Music Replay playlists. Only it’s not quite as easy as you might have thought…