Posts in news

ICONIC: A Photographic Tribute to Apple Innovation [Sponsor]

I’d like to tell you about a very cool coffee table book – it’s a book about Apple.

Back in 2009, a guy named Jonathan Zufi collected and photographed pretty much every single product Apple has ever made since 1976 and produced this stunning coffee table book. It’s called ICONIC: A Photographic Tribute to Apple Innovation.

If there was ever a perfect gift for the Apple fan – or history buff – this is it. 350 beautifully designed pages and hundreds of fantastic photos of basically every product Apple has ever made – every desktop, laptop, iOS device, printer, and even the old gaming devices, it’s all in here and I guarantee you’ll see some products that you didn’t even know Apple made. There’s an amazing chapter about prototypes and there’s also a chapter on packaging – all the boxes that came with all this amazing technology.

I personally own a copy of the original ICONIC book, and it’s indeed stunning. The book feels great, photographs are professional and well laid out – I had no idea some Apple products existed, but ICONIC provided a great visual intro.

ICONIC includes a foreword by Steve Wozniak and hundreds of amazing quotes from other Apple pundits – it’s really something.

The book comes in a few different versions including a version in a book case that looks like an old Apple floppy drive, and a new ‘UItimate Edition’ that ships in a white clamshell with an embedded glowing standby light that pulses just like the old sleep indicators on the MacBook Pros. It’s really worth seeing so visit iconicbook.com and take a look.

You can order the Classic Edition at Amazon, but if you decide you want the Classic Plus, Special, or Ultimate Editions then enter the code macstories when you check out for a 10% discount.

My thanks to ICONIC for sponsoring MacStories this week.

Apple Debuts ‘Change’ Advert for the iPad Air 2

Overnight Apple published a new advert for the iPad Air 2 called ‘Change’. Unlike their previous ‘Your Verse’ iPad adverts, which focused on how one person or small group used the iPad, this latest advert is a fast-paced montage of many different people using the iPad in many different ways.

Those apps featured in the advert include iStopMotion, AutoCAD 360, Molecules, Animation Creator HD, and many more. In fact along with the advert is a new page on Apple’s website that is dedicated to highlighting every single app that was featured in the advert.

You can view the advert on YouTube or on Apple’s website, as well as embedded below.

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Apple Posts “Best of 2014” App Store and iTunes Store Lists

Apple has today published their “Best of 2014” iTunes and App Store lists, which include editorial picks for the best releases in apps, music, movies, TV shows, books and podcasts from 2014.

For the best apps and games, Apple has picked Elevate and Threes for the iPhone, Pixelmator and Monument Valley for the iPad and Notability and Tomb Raider for the Mac. Runners up were Hyperlapse and Leo’s Fortune for iPhone, Storehouse and Hearthstone for iPad and Affinity Designer and Transistor for Mac.

Some of the winners in the other categories include 1989 by Taylor Swift as the best music album, Guardians of the Galaxy as the best blockbuster movie, Fargo as TV show of the year, All the Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr as the best fiction book, and Serial as the best new podcast. Although keep in mind that some of these lists vary from country to country.

Last year, Apple picked Wunderlist and XCOM: Enemy Unknown as winners for the Mac; Disney Animated and BADLAND for the iPad; and Duolingo and Ridiculous Fishing for the iPhone. In 2012, Apple picked Day One and Deus Ex: Human Revolution as winners for the Mac; Paper and The Room for the iPad; and Action Movie FX and Rayman Jungle Run for the iPhone.

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ICONIC: A Photographic Tribute to Apple Innovation [Sponsor]

I’d like to tell you about a very cool coffee table book – it’s a book about Apple.

Back in 2009, a guy named Jonathan Zufi collected and photographed pretty much every single product Apple has ever made since 1976 and produced this stunning coffee table book. It’s called ICONIC: A Photographic Tribute to Apple Innovation.

If there was ever a perfect gift for the Apple fan – or history buff – this is it. 350 beautifully designed pages and hundreds of fantastic photos of basically every product Apple has ever made – every desktop, laptop, iOS device, printer, and even the old gaming devices, it’s all in here and I guarantee you’ll see some products that you didn’t even know Apple made. There’s an amazing chapter about prototypes and there’s also a chapter on packaging – all the boxes that came with all this amazing technology.

I personally own a copy of the original ICONIC book, and it’s indeed stunning. The book feels great, photographs are professional and well laid out – I had no idea some Apple products existed, but ICONIC provided a great visual intro.

ICONIC includes a foreword by Steve Wozniak and hundreds of amazing quotes from other Apple pundits – it’s really something.

The book comes in a few different versions including a version in a book case that looks like an old Apple floppy drive, and a new ‘UItimate Edition’ that ships in a white clamshell with an embedded glowing standby light that pulses just like the old sleep indicators on the MacBook Pros. It’s really worth seeing so visit iconicbook.com and take a look.

You can order the Classic Edition at Amazon, but if you decide you want the Classic Plus, Special, or Ultimate Editions then enter the code macstories when you check out for a 10% discount.

My thanks to ICONIC for sponsoring MacStories this week.

FastFeed – Multi-Tab Enhancement for Tumblr/Instagram/500px [Sponsor]

FastFeed is a series of iOS apps that brings the power of multi-tab management to Tumblr, Instagram, and 500px.

FastFeed’s versatile tab bar is designed to be unobtrusive, but it’s highly versatile and customizable: it sits at the bottom of the screen, it can be auto-hidden when you scroll, and it lets you open new feed links in new tabs so you can easily switch between them. In FastFeed for Instagram, you can have multiple tabs for user profiles and a location; in FastFeed for Tumblr, you can open the dashboard and user pages as multiple tab bars so you don’t have to constantly navigate back and forth.

Tab control gestures are supported by the FastFeed apps, and, when you tap an active tab, you’ll see a handy menu to close the current tab, close all other tabs, or view tab history. You can switch between grid and flow layouts with a gesture, and smart paging is supported in flow mode.

And for each service, FastFeed comes with unique features: you can explore photos on a map in Instagram; you can search for photos by keyword or tag in 500px; and you can post any type of content in FastFeed for Tumblr.

The three FastFeed apps are available for free on the App Store, and you can find out more here.

Our thanks to FastFeed for sponsoring MacStories this week.

Apple Debuts Two New iPhone 6 Adverts Featuring Gaming and Continuity

Overnight Apple released two new adverts for the iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus. One, called ’Gamers’, features the new iOS game Vain Glory and the other, ‘Reservations’, demoes the ability to make and receive phone calls on an iPhone, iPad or Mac with Continuity’s Phone Relay feature.

These new iPhone 6 adverts continue to be narrated by Jimmy Fallon and Justin Timberlake and are the fifth and sixth adverts in the series. Previous iPhone 6 adverts included Duo, Health, Cameras and Huge.

We’ve embedded the adverts below, but you can also view them in YouTube (Gamers and Reservations).

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Apple Launches (RED) App Store Promotion, Donating Proceeds to Fight AIDS

Update: Apple has confirmed the campaign with an official press release and webpage. The campaign, called Apps for (RED), will feature 25 apps and all proceeds from November 24 to December 7 will go to the Global Fund to fight AIDS. Apps for (RED) is the first global App Store campaign for this cause, and developers have created RED-inspired content for it.

“Apple is a proud supporter of (RED) because we believe the gift of life is the most important gift anyone can give,” said Tim Cook, Apple’s CEO. “For eight years, our customers have been helping fight AIDS in Africa by funding life-saving treatments which are having a profoundly positive impact. This year we are launching our biggest fundraising push yet with the participation of Apple’s retail and online stores, and some of the brightest minds in the App Store are lending their talents to the effort as well.”

In addition to Apps for (RED), Apple will donate a portion of sales from Black Friday and Cyber Monday from retail and online stores. More details are available at Apple’s new (RED) website.

Original post follows below with updated list of apps.

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iTunes Connect Shutting Down December 22 to December 29

In an email sent to iBooks publishers last night, Apple confirmed that iTunes Connect will shut down for a week from December 22 through December 29. While the email has been sent to registered iBooks Store publishers, Apple’s annual iTunes Connect holiday shutdown will also affect iOS and OS X developers, who during that time won’t be able to access iTunes Connect.

From the email:

From Monday, December 22, through Monday, December 29, 2014, iTunes Connect, iTunes Producer, and iTunes Connect for iOS will be unavailable.

During this time, you will not be able to access iTunes Connect, submit new books or book updates, or make price changes. You can schedule a book release or price changes to take place between December 22 and December 29. Just make sure that your changes are scheduled, submitted, and approved by December 18, to ensure your book remains available during this busy period.

For users, this means that no new apps, updates, or price changes will be available during the week. Developers who wish to release new apps and updates or price changes to apps or In-App Purchases will have to do so before the iTunes Connect shutdown.

Currently, Apple has only shared the 2014 iTunes Connect holiday shutdown dates with iBooks publishers; a developer update should be posted on the company’s Developer News page soon.

Automatic: Your Smart Driving Assistant on Your Smart Phone [Sponsor]

There’s a mountain of data inside your car waiting to be unleashed, and all you have to do is plug in a quick little connector and download a mobile application.

Automatic is a smart driving assistant that plugs into your car’s data port and lets you connect your smartphone (either iPhone or Android) with your car. By  talking to your car’s onboard computer and using your smartphone’s GPS and data plan to upgrade your car’s capabilities, Automatic will allow you to easily diagnose your engine light, never forget where you parked your car, and save hundreds of dollars on gas.

Automatic learns your driving habits and gives you suggestions through subtle audio cues to drive smarter and stop wasting gas. Thanks to a map view available on your phone, Automatic can display a trip timeline after every driving session, showing you how you’re doing with a Drive Score; the app can even track local gas prices and tell you how much you’re spending.

In case of engine problems, Automatic can decipher what the “check engine” light means and show you a description of the issue with a possible solution. And thanks to a feature called Crash Alert, Automatic can detect many types of serious crashes and automatically alert local authorities as well as your loved ones when you can’t.

Automatic is currently available in the US for iPhone and Android devices, with a 45-day return policy and free shipping in 2 business days. Automatic retails at $99.95 with no subscription fees.

MacStories readers can go to automatic.com/macstories to get $20 off and buy Automatic at just $79.95. For more information, check out Automatic’s website.

Our thanks to Automatic for sponsoring MacStories this week.