Top stories - page 133

You can’t control when you lose or break your phone, but you can control how much of a pain it is when it happens. With the right data backup service, you can protect your photos, messages, videos and other difficult-to-replace files.

The Degoo Premium: Lifetime 10TB Backup Plan offers a massive amount of automatic data backup. And it works on all your devices to keep your files safe, even if the hardware breaks down or disappears.

For a limited time, you can get Degoo Premium for only $79.99 (regularly $3,600) with code SAVE20NOW.

This week on Cult of Mac’s podcast: Haters gonna hate, but digital artist Adam Duff explains why Apple’s new Studio Display is the perfect monitor — for some users.

Also on The CultCast:

• iPhone 14 leak reveals sizing, pricing and more.
• Who needs a smart water bottle?
• Apple TV+ has some hits on its hands.

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 livestream, embedded below.

Our sponsor: Squarespace

Special thanks to this week’s sponsor, Squarespace. Get all the tools you need to set up your very own website and commence selling anything online. Start your free website trial today at squarespace.com/cultcast (no credit card required). Save 10% off your first purchase of a website or domain with code cultcast at checkout.

If you want to explore the great outdoors, a car cabin is a dream come true. The Carsule pop-up cabin for your car gives you a waterproof, standing-height space to camp in, anywhere you can drive to.

And today, this car-camping essential is on sale for just $299.99. That’s a 20% discount off the regular price of $379.

In this week’s intense installment of Shining Girls, Kirby finds the clue to her killer’s identity and Dan dries out long enough to have an epiphany of his own. The only question is, can they stop Harper before he kills again, or fundamentally alters their reality?

The new time-traveling murder mystery on Apple TV+ finally finds it footing in an investigation-heavy fourth installment.

Effectively managing a project is more complicated than it looks from the outside. Depending on your industry, you might be working as a creative lead, a data analyst or just the person making sure everyone else stays on task.

The 2022 Premium Project Management Super Prep Bundle is a comprehensive training tool designed for project managers across industries. For a limited time, this project management training bundle is on sale for $59.99 (regularly $999).

There is a lot of explicit content out there on the internet, or so I am told.

Before handing a device off to a child, you may want to disable or limit access to the wide-open internet and App Store. Read on to learn how to block explicit content on iPhone and iPad.

When Apple TV+ spy thriller Tehran returns Friday, the show picks up right where it left off after its taut first season. Mossad agent/hacker Tamar’s crimes catch up with her as she waits for extraction from Iran. And humbled Revolutionary Guards chief Faraz is still seething over his seeming defeat by Mossad, with the eyes of the Iranian government on him.

The spy-on-spy action remains good, but Tehran is playing a dangerous game in dramatizing the Iranian government as the greater of two evils. I’m hoping there’s a little more lip service paid to the idea that, though Iran is the villain on this show, Israel is the aggressor. It’s something the show forgets when convenient.

We usually prefer to feature sunny or exotic or just-plain-fun computer setups on Fridays, but today a dark and brooding one caught our eye. A 13-inch M1-powered MacBook Pro and a 34-inch LG curved ultra-wide display are at its center.

But the “cozy productivity corner” also features excellent input devices, formidable audio and a rather nice standing desk.

Apple TV+’s latest documentary series The Big Conn is a too-earnest, too-cute look at the biggest scandal to ever hit the Social Security Administration.

The story is fascinating and filled with interesting people. But the approach taken represents the very worst tendencies of modern nonfiction. That includes its four-episode run time, which could easily have been tightened to a single movie.

Ultimately, there’s something a little crass about making a documentary about fraud that jukes every scene until it’s two minutes too long, just to make sure it meets a series order.

The right planner can change your life, or at least organize it. When you can keep your to-do list, calendar, notes and productivity helpers all in one place, it starts to feel like there’s nothing you can’t do.

Lunatask is an all-in-one planner that can give you the control and structure you need to get more out of the day. For a limited time, a lifetime subscription to Lunatask Premium is on sale for $49 (regularly $180).

A few years ago, it was shocking when a computer-generated voice didn’t sound like an underwater answering machine. These days, social media like TikTok practically runs on synthesized voices.

Now you can generate your own lifelike voices for books, school and a ton of other functions. The TexTalky AI text-to-speech app is a lifelike speech generator with 128-plus languages. And you might be speechless to learn that you can get a lifetime subscription at the heavily discounted price of $37 (regularly $540).

Fortnite got kicked out of the App Store as part of a legal battle between Apple and Epic Games, but you can play it on your iPhone today for free. Microsoft added it to Xbox Cloud Gaming so the combat game is playable on iOS and iPadOS devices.

Setting up your iPhone or iPad to play Fortnite from the cloud rather than the App Store is different from what you’re used to. Not hard, just different. I’ll walk you through it.

When you want your iPhone to be visible, but you need your hands to do other things, mount your device almost anywhere with Xvida’s brilliant cases.

Built-in magnets allow it to be securely attached to a whole host of metal surfaces, as well as a bunch of companion Xvida accessories — like wireless chargers, stands, car mounts, and more.

Get yours today for from as little as $19.

Even if you love writing, it takes time. Between an empty draft and a finished document come plenty of research, revisions, formatting and other time-consuming tasks.

AI copywriting platform Autowriterpro streamlines the writing process, with automated tools that can free you from much of the drudgery of writing and rewriting documents. And for a limited time, you can get a lifetime subscription for for just $39.99 (regularly $469).

Even if you’re motivated, it can be hard to actually start learning the tech skills you need to start a side hustle. If you want to master complex apps or learn to code, Stream Skill Software Training is the way to go.

With this unlimited lifetime membership, you get 110 in-depth courses for a discounted price of $59 (regularly $1,250).

Smart speaker maker Sonos will soon deploy its own voice assistant, similar to Apple’s Siri. It will let you play and control music on the company’s products, according to a new report.

The new voice assistant, “Sonos Voice,” will work with Apple Music and a handful of other services.

In the world of watch bands, nylon is sometimes overlooked in favor of steel, leather or silicone, but it’s an exceptionally good material for the job. That’s true of analog timepieces as well as smart watches like Apple Watch.

Done right, nylon is soft, comfortable and durable. It’s breathable and it dries quickly, too. It often doesn’t even look like nylon, either.

And if you can find a nylon band that looks and feels a lot like a knit weave fabric, all the better. But look no further, because the popular brand BluShark sells a selection of them in the Cult of Mac Store at a good price.

Ever wonder how champion pro athletes overcome all odds to win? Apple TV+ unveiled its trailer Tuesday for the second season of Emmy Award-winning sports documentary series Greatness Code.

It gives you a glimpse at what drives top athletes to succeed in impossibly competitive scenarios.

The series premieres May 13 on Apple TV+.

“Conversion” stories are fairly common in computing, with people deciding to switch from one “ecosystem” or another. Given Apple’s recent rash of hugely popular products, a fair number of folks are switching from PC-and-Windows-based setups to Apple-centric ones.

An avid PC gamer — strike that, a former avid PC gamer — owns today’s featured setup. In it, a new M1 Pro MacBook drives a couple of big displays. And an Elgato Stream Deck and killer audio components also enter the mix.

Happy Star Wars Day — even if you didn’t know that was a thing. Apple is celebrating the nerdy holiday by showcasing the widespread use of Macs and iOS devices at Skywalker Sound.

Festivities include the release of a “Behind the Mac” YouTube video and feature article about the audio artists at George Lucas’ Skywalker Ranch, along with a special online “Today at Apple” session about creating Star Wars sound effects.

Every night can be movie night if you have the equipment, even if you’re camping (or glamping). With the right free-standing screen and portable projector, you can functionally carry a home theater experience around in the back of your car.

That’s what you get with this Outdoor Movie Bundle, which pairs a powerful Wemax Go portable projector with a 50-inch portable screen.

The powerful mini projector works indoors or out. And the freestanding screen is designed for travel and cozy campfire movie nights. For a limited time, this movie bundle is on sale for just $549.99 (regularly $798).

To make the most of your iPhone’s MagSafe charging capabilities, you need a great battery pack. And the Speedy Mag is one of the best.

Right now, you can grab it on sale for just $48.99, which is a 59% discount off the regular price of $119.

If you think something that’s “compostable” must be easily “destructible,” well, that may be true of your coffee filters. But it’s not true of everything. Take Casetify’s Ultra Compostable iPhone Cases, for example.

These things are tough as hell. They’ll protect your iPhone as well as many other iPhone cases. And the ultimate beauty of them is, once you move on to another iPhone and discard the case, it won’t hurt the environment.

Accelerating work on its self-driving electric vehicle project, Apple recruited veteran Ford engineer and executive Desi Ujkashevic to join the team.

The move comes after various stalls and road bumps in Cupertino’s secretive Project Titan in recent years, including Ford luring away Apple car chief Doug Field last year.

If you’re one to suffer charging anxiety while out and about, Anker has your cure. It unveiled its latest portable, MagSafe-compatible charging bank Monday, the Anker 633 Magnetic Battery.

The beastly little brick packs a 10,000mAh battery capacity, Anker’s first product of this kind to do so. Plus it features speedier wireless charging than some previous packs as well as spritely USB-C charging when you just want to pull out a cable and get it over with.