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From a rare Apple Lisa computer to the original rainbow-colored signs from the Cupertino offices there have been some great Apple items up for auction as of late. Now you can add “rare Mac prototype” to that list.

A prototype model made out of painted foam, this alternate Macintosh LC model was built in 1989 by Apple’s Industrial Design Group and Matrix Product Design (which later became IDEO). Unlike the actual Mac LC that shipped it has a vertically-oriented screen: possibly targeted toward the business world, rather than the artistic, publishing and educational markets that the Mac traditionally sold to at the time.

Despite the fact that Steve Jobs didn’t want Apple to become a company in which people were constantly asking themselves “What Would Steve Do?” after his death, it was inevitable that people would compare Apple under Tim Cook to Apple under its legendary co-founder.

Asked about that topic during an interview with Walt Mossberg and Kara Swisher at yesterday’s Re/code Code Conference — and specifically whether there had been a “reset” period following Jobs’ death —  Eddy Cue commented that:

Two weeks after the news of the deal was first reported, Apple has officially announced its buyout of Beats Electronics for $3 billion.

Apple will keep the Beats headphone and Beats Music brands separate as part of the deal. As previously reported, Dr. Dre and Jimmy Iovine will join Apple full time.

“Music is such an important part of all of our lives and holds a special place within our hearts at Apple,” said Apple CEO Tim Cook. “That’s why we have kept investing in music and are bringing together these extraordinary teams so we can continue to create the most innovative music products and services in the world.”

Coding marathons, packed parties and more fanboys than should be legally permissible in one building await developers when Apple’s Worldwide Developers Conference kicks off in San Francisco next week, and while the conference is serious business for most devs, who says you can’t have a little bit of fun too?

WWDC rips into high gear with a keynote on June 2nd followed by days of coding sessions, high-profile speakers, hands-on labs and tons of get togethers for developers of all sizes and backgrounds.

Sneaking in time to tour San Francisco is nearly impossible thanks to the stuffed scheduled at WWDC and nearby AltConf, but whether you’re coming to WWDC as a first timer or a seasoned vet, here are nine things every Apple fan must do at least once while visiting the Bay Area.

We showed you ours. Now it’s your turn. Here are the items big and small that Cult of Mac readers most want to see designed and produced by the mothership. We’ve got Apple solar pens, food packaging and yes, puppies — because even pets could use the Sir Jony treatment.

Apple says that iCloud was not hacked, following on from the news that a number of iOS and Mac users in Australia, New Zealand, Canada, and the U.S. report have had their devices remotely locked in exchange for ransom.

It’s been speculated that the hacking in question was done using login credentials gained from users as a result of recent data breaches and then used as Apple ID logins to lock users out via iCloud. While this may be the case, Apple says that it is not the result of the iCloud being compromised in any way.

We’re less than a week away from WWDC and while Apple’s official app is slim on clues for the event, the company just revealed it will stream its entire keynote to Macs and iPhones so you can learn about all the new goodies, even if you didn’t get a golden ticket.

Thanks to its amazing products, Apple already runs your social life, your work life and your downtime. But what if the Cupertino company designed products for the rest of your world? Over the years, there’s been much speculation about the company branching out – especially the Jetsons-like iWatch that will sync all our data and make sure the burrito is at the perfect temp when we get home.

Here are a few items we wish Sir Jony Ive would turn his hand to — because we’d like to take a dip, drop trou, drink and drive with that sweet Apple logo. Maybe just not in that order.

What would you like to see Apple’s design team dream up? Let us know in the comments below.

Imagine a world in which an Apple portable called Pippin rules the video game industry. Nintendo and Sony are nothing more than petrified corpses after a surprise attack from Cupertino vaporizes their platforms with a portable device so simple, so magical, that Michael Spindler would have let John Sculley waterboard him with Pepsi to make it a reality.

That’s the world imagined by Mike Donovan, a New York City designer who draws faux prototypes of everything from retro iPads to iPhones based on the iMac G3. His retrotastic mockup of the gaming gadget that never was, which he shared exclusively with Cult of Mac, takes the concept of Apple’s failed Pippin video game platform to its logical, period-appropriate extension.

“We’re inundated with new tech choices at almost every turn but there is something so alluring about the fun and simplicity of those early ’80s and ’90s gadgets,” Donovan told Cult of Mac. “Plus, who doesn’t love a good throwback?”

I don’t need to tell the readers of a blog called Cult of Mac that Steve Jobs could be brilliant. Nor, if you’ve read much about Jobs’ life, do you likely need to be informed that he could sometimes be a little unhinged — whether that meant berating co-workers, or bursting into tears because the design for a forthcoming product didn’t totally live up to his expectations.

A good case can, in fact, be made for the fact that these two qualities went hand-in-hand: that treating the creation of a personal computer or a smartphone as if life depended on it was what made, and still makes, Apple products great.

Taking this idea into consideration, a new plan by Japan’s Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications seeks to find the country’s next great technology mogul who is just a bit “hen” — the Japanese word for odd, weird, or crazy.

If you’ve previously felt left out by the lack of Touch ID on non-iPhone 5s devices, have no fear: according to well-resepected KGI Securities analyst Ming-Chi Kuo the fingerprint sensor will be featured as a standard in all new Apple devices– including the iPhone 6, iPad Air 2 and iPad mini 3.

For many of us, our iPhones are already the most-used remote controls in our entire house. But come June’s Worldwide Developers Conference, Apple’s ready to make that official. A new report says the company is planning a platform that would turn its iOS devices, including the iPhone, into universal remotes for the internet of things inside your house. Think of it as Made for iHome.

As warmer weather hits even San Francisco, we’re pooling our beer money for a robot bartender. And some wasabi-flavored toothpicks. Our ever-expanding crew could use some of these modular Modos bookshelves and stools, too. There are so many things on Kickstarter that we want — jeans, maps, comic books — that we’re sharing our wish list with you.

Even cranky futurist Jaron Lanier supports Kickstarter — it “turns consumers into a priori funders of innovation” and we’re pretty sure that translates into robotic cocktails for everyone.

Ever since Apple first unveiled the iPad, we’ve been hearing rumors about Apple switching to ARM-based Macs. Now, the rumor is back again, with a French website claiming that Apple is actively developing 64-bit, quad-core Mac variants with ARM-based chips. But we’re just as skeptical as we’ve ever been.

If you thought that round two of Apple vs. Samsung was the end, you are sadly mistaken.

Although Apple recently won $119 million in a second victory against Samsung in patent court, that modest figure is nowhere near enough to make Apple back down. Not only is Apple seeking a retrial, but it wants to ban past and potentially future Samsung phones from being sold.

Apple’s video chat feature FaceTime has bridged the miles for families, sparked a ton of romances and probably shattered a few marriages.

This may be the first time it’s ever shipwrecked someone, though.

John Berg was sailing off the coast of Kona, Hawaii when a FaceTime login request started messing with the navigation app on his iPad. Although sailing apps on smartphones and tablets so popular they’re credited with having sunk the market for Garmin products,  imprecise navigation has been a concern.

We get slammed 24/7 with new Apple rumors. Some are accurate, most are not. To give you a clue about what’s really coming out of Cupertino in the future, we’re busting out our rumor debunker each week to blow up the nonsense.

Cooking, charging, camera-ing and generally staying out-of-doors are the themes this week. But if you are stuck inside out of the sun, don’t worry – we have you covered too.

This week we get cooking with a gadget-charging camping stove and a slick, iPhone-friendly food thermometer. We also do DIY projects (without tenderizing our thumbs) with the German Latthammer, charge our flagging phones with a purse that packs a built-in battery, and record everything using the super-dorky Lifelogger camera. Is the sun shining? Yes it is!

With another week full of news in the past, your host Joshua Smith is here to give you a wrap-up on some of the latest and biggest features. Facebook’s alleged Snapchat competitor, Microsoft’s latest attempt at an ‘iPad killer’ and iCloud’s hacking are among just some of the featured stories in today’s rundown.

Take a look at the video and be sure to return next week for another. Subscribe to CultOfMacTV on youtube.com to catch new episodes of the roundup and other great video reviews, how-to’s and more.

Thailand is one of the world’s most coup-prone countries. It’s also home to people who smile the most in selfies. So even when the tanks roll in, the urge to snap takes over. Better yet: get that shot with the soldiers. Or the tank. That’s what’s happening in Bangkok, where the smartphone set is taking keepsakes as the coup comes to town.

The recently revealed exploit that allows anyone to bypass the iPhone’s Activation Lock system is a rather simple process that requires adding just a single line of code to a computer running iTunes.

The exploit, which is called DoulCi (“iCloud” backward), has already been used thousands of times on locked iPhones and iPads around the world. It’s the work of a pair of anonymous hackers, who cracked Apple’s theft-deterrent measure by tricking lost or stolen iOS devices into thinking they are being reactivated by Apple’s servers.

While mockups of Apple’s eagerly awaited iPhone 6 have been popping up for a while now, it’s still pretty amazing to see just how far we’ve come since the first generation iPhone made it to our sweaty palms back in the good old days of 2007.

That comparison is made clearer in a new video put together by YouTube user DetroidBORG, which does a great job of comparing a dummy iPhone 6 handset with every previous model of iPhone that has come before.

Conventional wisdom is that while Beats has a lot of fashion credibility, the actual audio quality blows. So why does Apple want to buy them?

Rumors have swirled that it’s an acqui-hire, and that Apple wants Beats so that it can also own Beats executive Jimmy Iovine and Dr. Dre, whose contacts in the music industry are unparalleled.

But there could be another reason, too. Apple might want to prevent Samsung from purchasing Beats.

It is often said that what separates Apple from companies like Samsung and Sony is that at Apple, design is law. Other companies put engineering first.

But that’s not true, according to former Apple senior designer and user experience evangelist Mark Kawano. Speaking to Fast Company’s design site, Co.Design, Kawano says that Apple is still an engineering first company.

The difference? Every engineer at Apple knows how to think like a designer.

Anyone who has ever tried jumping from iOS to Android, while keeping the same cell number, will know about the horror of trying to get hold of their messages.

The so-called “iMessage purgatory” means that unless you first deactivate your iMessages before ditching your iPhone, Apple’s servers will think that you’re using its proprietary messaging platform. The upshot? Say goodbye to your messages.

While the problem has been gaining more awareness recently as a result of class-action lawsuits filed against Apple, it’s just gotten worse, courtesy of a recent server glitch. The glitched rendered moot one of Apple’s key methods for sorting out the issue.