Tim Cook squashed years of speculations and rumors this morning, only instead of doing it with an iPhone announcement, he made his first public declaration that’s he proud to be gay.

Cook never denied his sexuality, but the letter marks a huge moment for the LGBT community, equal rights, and society in general, as the world’s most powerful CEO committed to being an example and inspiration to those wanting to rise above adversity and bigotry.

The world’s reaction to Cook coming out like a boss has been overwhelmingly positive. Yes, the trolls and bigots have crawled out of their dark places to admonish Cook, but their voices have been refreshingly blasted out by accolades and congratulations from the world’s top CEO’s, celebrities, and activists applauding Tim’s courage.

Here’s how the world turned Tim’s coming out party into a celebration:

Apple will be holding on to its top executives until at least 2019, if the granting of new stock options by the Apple board has anything to do with it.

Angela Ahrendts, Eddy Cue, Phil Schiller, Craig Federighi, CFO Luca Maestri, VP of hardware engineering Daniel Riccio, lawyer Bruce Sewell and COO Jeffrey Williams all received stock grants potentially valued at a total of $27 million, based on the high closing price of AAPL stock Thursday.

Tim Cook crowed over the sales figures of the iPad during yesterday’s Apple keynote, pointing out that it has sold a whopping 225 million units since debuting in 2010.

Despite the iPad Air 2 looking like the finest iPad iteration yet, however, sources in the supply chain reckon Apple’s new flagship tablet is going to be available only in limited quantities during the remainder of 2014 — thanks to production difficulties with the devices’ new anti-reflective coating.

The iPad Air 2 is the best tablet Apple’s ever made. The iPad mini 3 is good, but it’s also a gigantic ripoff.

Phil Schiller gushed over all the new iPad Air 2 upgrades during today’s keynote, reveling in its improved camera, powerful A8X chip, anti-reflective coating and Touch ID. But when it came to the iPad mini 3, Apple tried to slide quickly past it, and for good reason – there weren’t any upgrades to brag about.

Here are the new iPad mini 3 features:

It’s been way too long, joked Apple, since any groundbreaking announcements like the Apple Watch and iPhone 6 Plus. While the product refreshes announced at today’s iPad-centric event aren’t as high on “wow” as the revelations during last month’s big show, these are solid updates to product lines that continue to make Apple great.

Here are the top 12 things you need to know from today’s Apple event.

After two long years sitting on the bench, Apple finally updated the humble Mac mini with faster processors, faster Wi-Fi and much better graphics. It also gets a modest price drop, now starting at a reasonable $499 — although you could probably buy two low-end Windows PCs for the same price.

However, the mini is a Macintosh, running OS X Yosemite, and not stinky Windows. It makes for a great media center PC or a starter machine. In fact, everyone here at the Cult of Mac offices is talking about buying one to put under their TV.

“People love Mac mini,” said Phil Schiller, Apple’s head of marketing said in a statement. “It’s a great first Mac or addition to your home network, and the new Mac mini is a nice upgrade packed into an incredibly compact design.”

Apple’s iPad Air 2 and Retina iMac keynote this morning was short on surprises, but if you weren’t able to watch the live stream as Tim Cook and Phil Schiller revealed the deets on Apple’s newest products, you can relive it on Apple.com.

The full video of today’s keynote has been posted on Apple’s website, and is also available on the dedicated Apple TV channel that showed up on devices today. The first half was mostly just a recap of Apple’s news from WWDC and last month’s keynote, but now you can just skip straight to Chief Secrecy Officer Stephen Colbert’s hilarious skit with Hair Force One at the 30 minute mark.

Source: Apple

Tim Cook and Phil Schiller just got done revealing the new iPad Air 2 and iMac with Retina 5k display, and while you can’t pre-order the new iPads until tomorrow, the new iMac and Mac mini are available now.

The online Apple Store is back up and running with new sections for the iMac with Retina 5k display, and the updated Mac mini that got a price drop. Both items can be ordered right now, with the Retina iMac starting at $2,499, and the Mac mini coming in at $499.

Five top Apple execs — including Tim Cook and Phil Schiller — unloaded $143 million AAPL shares as part of a 10b5-1 planned sale, according to a new report from Barron’s.

Cook sold 348,425 Apple shares for $35,250,297, while Schiller dropped 348,846 shares for $35,256,000.

Other Apple higher-ups who did the same include CFO Luca Maestri, who sold his entire direct holdings for $1,631,286; Jeffrey E. Williams, senior vice president of operations, who raked in $35,233,446; and Bruce D. Sewell, general counsel and senior vice president of legal and government affairs, who made $35,393,915 on the deal.

For the last 2,078 days, musician Jonathan Mann has been composing a song a day.

For his latest ditty, Mann summed up Apple’s entire iPhone 6/Apple Watch event in song form, covering everything from the rather underwhelming iPhone 6 debut to the excitement of Apple announcing its first new product category in years. There’s even a funny chorus about the bizarre Chinese voice-over in the livestream.