Tripp Mickle's Book 'After Steve' Covers Apple's Rise to Trillions

Wall Street Journal correspondent Tripp Mickle has a book coming out called After Steve with an eye-catching subtitle, “How Apple Became a Trillion-Dollar Company and Lost Its Soul.” It goes on sale May 3, 2022 and is available to preorder today. From the website: “His research shows the company’s success came at a cost. Apple lost its innovative spirit and has not designed a new category of device in years. Ive’s departure in 2019 marked a culmination in Apple’s shift from a company of innovation to one of operational excellence, and the price is a company that has lost its soul.”

Get a Wooden Photo Print With New Offering From Mimeo Photos

Mimeo Photos has launched three new product categories: framed prints, framed canvases, and wooden photo prints using certified sustainable maple wood. Framed Prints: Available in black or white, images are encased in a wooden frame that’s hand cut and assembled. Choose with or without matte. Framed Canvas: Images are printed on a premium-grade canvas with ¼” gap between the canvas and the frame for a floating effect. Wood Prints: Photos are printed directly on to 1/2″ thick maple wood that’s sustainably sourced and eco-friendly.

'Deliveries' App Update Supports Shortcuts on macOS Monterey

The Deliveries app update now supports macOS Monterey and iOS 15. The version notes for Monterey include Shortcuts support. The update includes a lot of improvements and bug fixes, so here is just part of the notes: Shortcuts are now supported on macOS Monterey. Note: due to limitations in macOS, shortcuts only have a written or spoken description, rather than showing the relevant deliveries like on iOS. The “scan a package” shortcut will open the “Add a Delivery” window since scanning barcodes is not supported in Deliveries for Mac. Notifications that a package has been delivered are now marked as Time Sensitive on macOS Monterey. Sharing a single delivery via Messages now just sends a link. Sharing via AirDrop now sends a link instead of a file, so it’s easier to share with someone that doesn’t have the app.

PSA: Neil Young Still on Apple Music, Amidst Joe Rogan Spotify Row [Updated]

Neil Young is headed off of Spotify, having decided he won’t be on the same platform as podcaster Joe Rogan, but he remains on Apple Music. You can get classic albums like 1972’s Harvest and 1989 hit “Rockin’ in The Free World” with a subscription. The service costs $9.99 per month, or $14.99 for family sharing, and is included in all Apple One bundles.

[Update: January 28] Apple Music appears to be trolling Spotify over its Neil Young/Joe Rogan decision. It is posting tweets from its official Twitter accounts as well as push notifications reminding people that the artists is still available there, The Verge reported.

Apple TV+ Makes 'The Afterparty' Premiere Episode Available on YouTube

Apple TV+ made the entire premiere episode of The Afterparty available for free on YouTube. It is a very interesting move. While we have seen plenty of clips of movies and shows released online previously, as well as trailers and complimentary content, there have never been full episodes shared likes this. The Afterparty is a comedy-drama that follows the fallout of a school reunion gone wrong. It features a star-studded cast led by Tiffany Haddish. A further two episodes, alongside the pilot, were released to subscribers on Friday.

'Fraggle Rock: Back to the Rock' Guest Stars Ed Helms, Cynthia Erivo, Daveed Diggs Play Frictionary

In a newly released clip, Fraggle Rock: Back to the Rock guest stars play ‘Frictionary’. Ed Helms, Cynthia Erivo, and Daveed Diggs all appear in the new Apple TV+ series, but do they really know what all the phrases they are saying mean? Their answers are, it’s fair to say, unimpressive…However, the show is lovely and available now to subscribers to the streaming service.

'The Matrix Resurrections' Now Available to Rent or Buy on Apple TV

The newest movie in the franchise, The Matrix Resurrections is now available to buy or rent on Apple TV. Keanu Reeves, Carrie-Anne Moss, Jada Pinkett Smith, and Lambert Wilson reprise their roles from the previous films, and they are joined by Yahya Abdul-Mateen II, Jessica Henwick, Jonathan Groff, Neil Patrick Harris, and Priyanka Chopra Jonas. The film is set sixty years after Revolutions and follows Neo, who lives a seemingly ordinary life as a video game developer troubled with distinguishing dreams from reality. A group of rebels, with the help of a programmed version of Morpheus, free Neo from a new version of the Matrix and fight a new enemy that holds Trinity captive.

Apple Releases 'Unity Lights' Watch Face for Black History Month

Apple has released a Unity Lights watch face to celebrate Black History Month. In a press release this morning, the company shared all the ways in which it will celebrate this year. Throughout February, Apple Watch users can participate in the Unity Challenge and earn a limited-edition award by closing their Move ring seven days in a row. The Unity Lights watch face will be available today and requires Apple Watch Series 4 or later running watchOS 8.3, and iPhone 6s or later running iOS 15.2. The Black Unity Braided Solo Loop is available now at the link below and in the Apple Store app, and will be available in select Apple Store locations beginning Tuesday, February 1 for US$99. The Black Unity Braided Solo Loop is compatible with Apple Watch SE and Apple Watch Series 4 or newer.

AirGuard Lets You Detect AirTags on Android Smartphones

Android owners, this one is for you. AirGuard lets you detect AirTags on Android so you won’t get secretly tracked like we’ve been hearing about in the news. You can download it from Google Play, F-Droid, or straight from the GitHub page linked below. From the page: “With AirGuard you get the anti-tracking protection you deserve! The app periodically scans your surroundings for potential tracking devices, like AirTags or other Find My devices. If a devices follows you, you will get a notification in less than an hour. With the app you can play a sound on AirTags and find it easily. Afterward, you can view at which locations the device has tracked you. If no one is trying to track you, the app will never bother you.

ProtonMail 1.15.11 Update Fixes Bugs With Push Notifications

The ProtonMail 1.15.11 update for iOS fixes a slew of bugs that users were experiencing. From the version notes: Fixed a bug where push notifications where not received properly. Fixed an occasional bug where swipe actions in the inbox were applied to the wrong message. Fixed an occasional bug where the reply, reply all and forward option did not work on some messages.  Fixed an occasional bug during signup where the prompt for captcha was not fully visible. Fixed a bug where contacts migrated through the Proton Easy Switch functionality were not properly displayed. Preparation for upcoming change to exclude embedded images from counting towards attachments. Technical improvements behind the scenes (including updates to the cryptographic library, improvements related to key management and password changes and more).

'PUBG: Battlegrounds' Now Free to Play on all Platforms

KRAFTON, Inc announced on Wednesday that its game PUBG: BATTLEGROUNDS is now free to play on PC and consoles. With the game’s transition to F2P, it introduces BATTLEGROUNDS Plus, an optional premium account upgrade that allows players to access a variety of new and exclusive in-game features. While all new players will start with a Basic Account that offers access to most game features, they can upgrade to BATTLEGROUNDS Plus for a one-time fee of US$12.99 USD and gain access to the following: Bonus 1,300 G-COIN; Survival Mastery XP + 100% boost; Career – Medal tab; Ranked Mode; Custom Match functionality; In-Game items, including the Captain’s Camo set, which includes hat, camo mask and camo gloves.

Update to 'Apple Frames' Shortcut Supports Apple Watch Series 7, 2021 MacBook Pro

Over at MacStories, Federico Viticci updated his Apple Frames shortcut. This is a brilliant tool I use nearly every day to frame my screenshots into an Apple device frame, or outline. He recently updated it to support the Apple Watch Series 7 and 2021 MacBook Pro. You can find Mr. Viticci’s article at the link below. “Starting with Apple Frames 2.1, the Shortcuts app will detect whether you have an older version of the Frames.json installed in iCloud Drive, and it’ll automatically replace it with the latest one from the MacStories CDN. That’s it. If an old version of the Frames.json file is found, Shortcuts will send you a notification and re-download the file from cdn.macstories.net.

'PDF Expert' for iOS Lets You Convert PDFs to Word, More

PDF Expert’s latest update lets you convert PDFs to Word, Excel, PowerPoint, JPG, PNG, TXT, and other formats. The built-in PDF converter is a part of the PDF Expert PRO subscription at US$49.99/year. The PRO subscription also allows you to edit the text and images in PDFs, sign documents, redact sensitive data, and more. The current PDF Expert PRO subscribers get the new converting functionality at no extra cost.

These NFT 'Meta Watches' Aim to Transform the Luxury Watch Market

Meta Watches is a set of unique watches automatically generated and represented as NFTs, living on the Ethereum blockchain. Every watch will have a unique name and feature set. A Meta Watch is fully functional and will show you the current time on your device. Currently there are three ways to obtain a metawatch: schachter-welker collection: 10 unique nft watches that can be acquired for 10 eth each by the nagel draxler gallery. Gm collection: 17 handcrafted watches that already sold for an average of 0.55 eth each. Analog summer 2021 collection: 1234 generative art watches we are soon releasing for minting (0.08 eth each)

The MKBHD Smartphone Awards 2021

It’s the time of the year where YouTuber Marques Brownlee hands out his smartphone awards.  The Galaxy S21 Ultra and iPhone 13 Pro go head-to-head for the main prize, but which will come out on top? As ever, the MKBHDs reviews are worth listening to, even if you don’t agree with the outcome!

'Cryptomator' 2.0 is Here and it Integrates Into iOS Files App

The team behind Cryptomator has rewritten the app in Swift, and with version 2.0 the app is completely integrated into the Files app. This means that your vaults are directly accessible from there. For example, you can now save and edit a Word document directly in an encrypted vault via the Files app. In addition, features like thumbnails, grid view, swiping through images, and drag & drop are possible with the new app. To summarize, Cryptomator gives you end-to-end encryption for your files. You can store them in Google Drive, iCloud Drive, Dropbox, and more. You can also store them offline in the Files app or on a hard drive.

Check Out These Colorful X-Ray Wallpapers for Your iPhone

The Basic Apple Guy (via 9To5Mac) created a series of colorful iPhone wallpapers based on the X-ray images from iFixit. These iPhone 13 Pro | Pro Max schematics are a fun way to let you know the details hiding underneath your display. “Ten different designs have been created: Black, Xray, Sunset, Slate, Neon Blue, M1, Card, Blueprint, Rainbow Bloom, & Rainbow . And as a special treat, I’ve also added three additional designs: 3021, R08135, & DF, which celebrate figures in the community I admire. I plan on creating other colour patterns to release over the next few months, with these 11 being the first of many to come.”

'Dashlane' Password Manager Updates With New Menu, Quick Actions

Dashlane has updated its iOS app to help users save time. The way the Dashlane iOS app was structured, items in your vault, like passwords, personal and payment info, Secure Notes, and IDs, all required two taps to get to. Now, those key items are just a tap away thanks to the new horizontal menu sitting at the top of the main screen.  Dashlane has added something they call “quick actions” to items. By tapping the three dots on the right hand side of each item listed in the user’s vault, it will bring up a mini-menu that will allow users to copy different parts of their credentials or personal data, share or delete the item, or open the corresponding website. Dashlane has moved the notifications to the bottom menu of the app, right next to the home button. Now, users can’t miss security alerts, sharing invites, or product updates.

'Pixelmator Photo' Launches for iPhone With 50% Off Introductory Deal

Previously only available for iPad, Pixelmator has released the Pixelmator Photo app on iPhone. It features over 30 desktop-class color adjustments, support for over 600 RAW image formats, including Apple ProRAW, deep integration with the Photos app and iCloud Photos, tools powered by groundbreaking machine learning technologies, and much more. It even includes the company’s ML Super Resolution tool, a way to scale up your images using AI. So far I haven’t seen any actions for Pixelmator Photo within Shortcuts. The price says that the deal is US$3.99, but it downloaded for free on my iPhone because I already had Pixelmator.

New VPN Called 'Exidio dVPN' Runs on Sentinel's Node Network

Exidio is a new decentralized VPN application that uses the Sentinel blockchain, which itself is part of the Cosmos ecosystem. “Exidio dVPN is rewriting the true definition of what it means to be a VPN. This is made possible by the Sentinel blockchain where all the global, distributed nodes are sharing their available and unused bandwidth. So as long as the Sentinel blockchain stays active, the network of nodes that offer bandwidth to the network remain active.” Exidio claims that traffic is end-to-end encrypted with proven no data logging.

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