Taking a flight soon on a carrier with no entertainment system? We got you.

Going for a flight? No entertainment system? Need something to focus on other than sir-breathe-a-lot dressed all in weird velvet next to you?

Dudes, got an iPhone? Yeah? Sweet. Go to Safeway/Trader Joe’s/Wholefoods, and buy a ziplock bag.

You’re welcome.

Image courtesy of Imgur.

Sunday Funday

Get it?

HA!

Image courtesy of Imgur& Discover Magazine.

Image courtesy of Imgur.

How to get your hands on a 5S

The iPhone 5C has been available for pre order for more than a few hours now, but what about the 5S?

In an unprecedented move, Apple is not offering the iPhone 5S for pre order.

Wah!

We know. Instead, customers will have to wait for the 20th of September when the 5S will be available for purchase in two ways-

1, You can purchase your new shiny iPhone 5S online after 12:01 AM on September the 20th. So, like, wait until 11PM on the 19th, wait an hour, BAM IPHONE 5S.

2, The 5S will also be available for purchase in Apple retail stores, starting 8AM. It’s too early to tell if there will be lines at this stage, but cross your fingers. Unless you like that kind of thing. Lining up, we mean.

If you do, more power to you! Send us a pic of you standing in line, and not only will we feature you in the blog, but if you use our service to sell your stinky old iPhone, we’ll give you $5 extra on your quote!

Images courtesy of imore & kittentoob.com

Images courtesy of imore.com

The iPhone 5C pre order stock is getting low in what color?

YELLOW!

Like the submarine, man.

We certainly would not have guessed that this would be the first color to be running low, but there it is.

If you go to pre order the yellow 16Gb iPhone 5C SIM free right now, you’ll see that the shipping date slips past the 20th of September to being available to ship by the 25th of September.

There doesn’t seem to be any indication from Apple yet just how many pre order’s for the iPhone 5C have been registered so far.

We’ll just have to wait and see how many folks caught the 5C fever!

Image courtesy of Appleinsider

See Burberry showcasing the iPhone 5S camera capabilities

We’ve heard that the camera on the new iPhone 5S combined with the camera software that comes with iOS 7 is supposed to be, well, really  straight up awesome for taking photos.

You guys wanna see for yourselves what you can do with it? Pleased to accommodate, as always.

High fashion house Burberry has partnered with Apple for their Spring/Summer 2014 runway show, which will take place on September the 16th. Burberry will use the 5S equipped with iOS 7  to take videos and photos before, during and after the event.

Beginning yesterday, Burberry began showcasing some of the photos and videos using the 5S on it’s social media channels and on it’s website.

Here is a preview:

Pretty slick, huh.

Image courtesy of desk123.com

Twitter IPO

Twitter is an online networking service, microblogging service and a hugely popular social media company that enables its users to send and read text-based messages of up to 140 characters known as “tweets“.

Whether or not you’re on the Twitter ride, you probably know this much.

If you dream in tweets, organize your awesome too-late comebacks, fame catapulting strategies and pop culture observations and everyday life rants into 140 words, then you probably know a little more.

The company has gone from strength to strength since it’s creation by Jack Dorsey in 2006 thanks to tweetaholics such as you, marking over 200 million monthly active users last December.

Now, Twitter is set to go public. On September 12th this year, the company tweeted; ” We’ve confidentially submitted an S-1 to the SEC for a planned IPO”

Cool. Now can you tell me what that means in 140 characters please iPhone Antidote?

Well…. no. As much as we love Twitter, we’re not very good at doing that 140 character thing. We talk a lot if you haven’t noticed. BUT we’re kinda ok at explaining things, so here’s what Twitter going public means, and how it might affect you, dear tweeters.

First things first. IPO stands for Initial Public Offering. It is basically a stock market launch where members of the public (that’s you, if you gots the cash) can buy shares in the company (that’s Twitter)  on a securities exchange ( think of Wall Street).

Members of the general everyday public will make up some of the people who buy shares, but Twitter will also be looking for big time BIG TIME investors to buy shares. Lots of them. For lots of money. Cos, monies.

With monies, you can build. and they will come. Not really, sorry, we just watched Field of Dreams. But with money, otherwise known as capital, twitter can grow and build and become a better company and provide more for your trusty shareholders and the 200 million + users.

So, basically, Twitter is now a private company, and they are planning on becoming a public company. Simple, really, except it’s pretty huge, as the beginning of the process is and has been for a while a hugely anticipated moment in the tech, financial and tweety world.

But… why are they doing it?

The advantages of becoming a public company are many, and they’re mostly to do with money, but also reputation and growth. With new investors, the company will be able to access a large amount of capital to catalyze growth. It’s a way of monetizing parts of the company. It will make acquisitions easier and increase the company’s (already huge admittedly) public image .

People who invested in Twitter in the beginning and employees will be able to assign a value to their shares, making their association to the company increasingly valuable (hopefully). Shares in the company can also be used as an extra attraction for potential employees, as long as the value is set to open and stay high.

There are also potential disadvantages. The company, once public, will have to disclose business and financial information, which is of course useful to shareholders, but can be risky as they also expose the business to it’s competitors. The stocks could dive. There’s risk associated with Twitter’s reputation and there will be pressure for them to fulfill their promised potential.

Now, Twitter has filed their ‘S1’ confidentially, which means that they make less than $1 Billion dollars annually. If a company earns more, that is when they have to file the S1 out in the wide open plains of the tech and financial world.

Twitter will have to make their IPO documents public, but not until 21 days before they start pitching themselves to investors on Wall Street.

One way to attract investors before and during the official pitch is to convince them that Twitter, like Facebook before them, can advertise in this new social media world better, more subtly and more effectively than any other social media company out there.

They’ve only quite recently started to gain revenue from placing ads in the stream of tweets users see, but it’s already significant. According to eMarketer, they’ll haul in $583 million in advertising revenue for 2013 and hit $1 billion in 2014.

They are said to be creating a type of advertising that will work better than any other social media advertising.They have just purchased MoPub, the world’s largest mobile ad server,which is indicative of the direction they’re going in making huge advertising profits and attracting investors.

Speaking of Facebook, their IPO famously did not go very well. After they initially started selling their shares at $38, the company’s share prices dropped by more than half over the following 3 months. Investors lost billions and blamed Facebook and the investment banks involved in the IPO, claiming they had deceived them on Facebook’s revenue estimates. Facebook has however recently recovered, currently sitting at $44.75 as we write this.

Twitter will be super keen to show potential investors that their revenue is and will be exponentially increasing. In the near future, expect to see more ads on twitter, and advertising used in different ways within the platform. You’ll probably start hearing a whole bunch about Twitter going public.

As for when Twitter will take the jump to being a public company? Well, that depends on how attractive they’re looking, and how the stock market is performing. They will want the best conditions to get the best price.

For now, Twitter is going ‘back to work’.

Good luck Twitter, we love you! Now for the rest of you kids, happy tweeting and dreaming about how to explain to the world in 140 characters that you just bought a stake in your favorite company! #awesome

Image courtesy of Independent.ie, Forbes, Rapgenius, Wired.co.uk and Cheezburger.com

There’s a dude in Japan already lining up for the new iPhone

Tetsuya Tamura, a 44-year-old Japanese businessman has started lining up outside the Apple store in Tokyo’s glitzy shopping district of Ginza. In fact, he started lining up  on Tuesday, before the two new smartphones had even been unveiled.

He is using up his annual leave in order to do this- but says ” getting the first handset will make it all worth it.”

Way to go passion!

He has said that he’s “glad to have secured a place.”

That seems like that might be a little bit of an overestimation, but it looks like he’s maybe right. He might just be lucky to have secured a place. This is a photo he uploaded of himself:

and one of some other dudes in line.

The new iPhones will be available on September the 20th in Japan, same as here.

That’s so many days away.

Anyway, we wish him luck!  If you want to follow him on twitter, because you can, he’s tweeting pretty frequently, and his name is xxxprius.

How to pre-order the new iPhone 5C

Alright you guys, so this blog post is all about how to pre order the iPhone 5C. That’s cool. It’s also weirdly difficult to describe when this can actually happen. We know what’s right, we think, but it sounds wrong. So we’re gonna try it so that there can be no misunderstandings.

You will be able to pre order the iPhone 5C at 12:01, the night time version, on the 13th of September. So, like, when its the 12th of September, wait until it’s 11pm, wait an hour, and then you can go ahead and pre order!  That’s California time, too. Make sense?

Now, we got the time right, but what do you do then? Well, you do a little jig, cos you’re buying an iPhone 5C b*tches!

Then, you do this stuff. (Do most of this stuff before midnight though, cos the amount of iPhones available for pre order will shrink. Real fast.)

You need to decide if you’re buying on or off contract.

For the free spirits out there, you can buy the iPhone 5C off contract with T-Mobile, or SIM free. You can do both through Apple.

If you do this, you’ll be buying the phone outright for $549 for 16Gb, and $649 for 32Gb in both of these options, but you don’t get a SIM with the SIM free option. Duh.

If you choose the SIM free option you WILL need a SIM from somewhere at some stage for the phone to work as a phone. Specifically, you’ll need to get a GSM compatible nano-SIM. Your iPhone will be unlocked, so you can use a SIM from any carrier, domestically or international, as long as it has the right specifications as above.

If you choose to buy the iPhone 5C off-contract with T-Mobile, you will be choosing them as your mobile provider, and will pay them month to month for data, voice, text etc, but you won’t be locked in to a contract and can exit any time. Your phone will arrive with a nano-SIM card already installed that you can activate by visiting an Apple Retail Store or a T-Mobile store or by calling T-Mobile.

If you’re already on contract, but really want the new phone, you have the option to upgrade. You are of course eligible to upgrade once you have ended your current contract, after 2 years.

But, here’s the thing. A lot of people don’t realize that you are more than likely eligible for an upgrade 18 months after your contract started, not two years. It’s definitely worth checking! Go check, dudes.

For Verizon, Sprint and AT&T upgrade eligibility, you’ll most likely need the number for the phone you would like to upgrade, the last four digits of the primary account holder’s Social Security number, and the billing ZIP Code. To see if you’re eligible for an upgrade, or to see the price you qualify for, check out this link.

For Sprint you can also use your phone- dial *2, press send, press 1, enter your phone number and then press 1 to check for eligibility.

AT&T also has the option to check your upgrade eligibility via your phone, just dial *639# and press send and you will receive a text message shortly after letting you know when you’re eligible for an upgrade.

If you’re a little unsure about the whole idea of upgrading, you should talk to your carrier. BUT, you should also read this– If you are eligible for an upgrade, it means that all you have to pay to get the new phone is the price Apple shows next to the phone.

For the 5C, that means that when you upgrade and preorder, you will pay upfront and outright $99 for the 16Gb version and $199 for the 32Gb version. You will be committing to another 2 year contract with the provider.

If you are not eligible for an upgrade, but you reallllly want the new phone, you can, of course, get it. You will pay an extra fee, and how much that fee is depends on the carrier, but i’ll give you an example.

Say you started a new 2 year contract this time last year when you bought the iPhone 5. You’re a year into your contract, so you won’t be eligible for an upgrade, but you’re going to go ahead and get it anyway, because hey, it’s a free country right?

Your carrier will more than likely be absolutely cool with that, because that means they have your business guaranteed for another 2 years, but, they will charge a fee, which will more than likely be about $200. So you’ll be paying $300 upfront for the iPhone 5C 16Gb, and $400 upfront for the iPhone 5C 32Gb.

You also absolutely always get to keep your old phone, so that you can use it as financial leverage! It’s a stinky old iPhone! Sell it for CASHMONEY, YO!

If you’re joining up with a new provider, you’re looking at 2 year contract and paying upfront $99 for the 16Gb or $199 for the 32Gb. When choosing a new provider it’s important to look at their plans, and it’s also important to check out the coverage maps of each of the options. You can do this below by clicking on the blue links.

AT&T Coverage Map

Verizon Coverage Map

Sprint Coverage Map

T-Mobile Coverage map

Ok, so now you know what category you’re in, and you’re prepared for all your choices and options, how much you have to pay, which carrier, upgrade eligibilty, etc.

Now it’s almost midnight.

Dance!

And then, time to move!

You can pre-order on all of the carrier’s websites, as well as Apple’s.

To buy straight from Apple, go to this link.

Choose your color, you sparkle pony you. You have the option of blue, green, yellow , pink and white.

Next, choose the model you want, the smaller 16Gb or the 32Gb. The bigger the GB ( Gigabytes), the more stuff you can have on your phone, basically. Things that take up storage space include photos, videos, lots of songs or apps. 1000 songs is about 7Gb, for example.

Once those decisions are made and entered into the system, you’ll have to fill in some personal details, you will need a credit card, and you will need to press enter at the end. You will need to do a little dance. And send it to us. Yeah, do that.

Remember, if you’re upgrading from an iPhone 4S or older and have accessories that use the old connector port, such as a dock or something, you will also need to purchase a lightening to 30 pin adaptor.

And, guys, last year the iPhone 5 pre order was sold out in about an hour. So be quick. If you miss out, you have to wait until the 20th of September, when they’ll be available in store.

Happy pre-ordering! Remember – 11PM, Californian time, on Thursday the 12th of September. You have one hour after that until you can pre – order.

Image courtesy of The Verge. addictinginfo.com, iphonehacks.com, speres.com & sweetclipart.com

The Ultimate iPhone 5S & iPhone 5C Rundown (Full Specs)

So, today’s the day, huh?

NEW APPLE PRODUCTS OH MY GOD SKRILLEX NEEDS TO BE PLAYING THE SOUNDTRACK TO THIS BLOG POST.

I’m sorry, we’re a little bit excited over here.

So, hey, WHATSUP.

At 10am pacific time Apple held a special media event at their town hall auditorium in Cupertino, California.

Everyone was VERY excited,  even though the select few members of the press who were super special enough to be invited didn’t really show their excitement very well. Here are some of them lined up like they’re waiting for a bus, instead of shiny new iPhones!! Silly super special people!

BUT! Then they went inside…. 

Inside, Tim cook, Craig Federighi, a few special guests, and ( sadly, only) videos of Jony Ive were awaiting.

AND…

We got ourselves a shiny-ass brand spanking new iPhone 5S AND a pretty bubbly multicolored sparkly iPhone 5C!

SUPER RAD

Now, this is the part where we say a lot of words about hardware and software specs and you skim through and judge whether you’re going to want one, or whether you’re gonna want to complain about it not being up to par with expectations and in line with what other smart phone giants are doing with their tech.

Here’s our opinion on that, first up. We… we want one. Of both. We don’t know how to justify that, but we do.

There was a few surprises, which is always great considering the multitude of leaks that appeared in the weeks leading up to this event. We got a few things that we were expecting, and a few other things that Apple kept up their sleeves like the crafty tech magicians that they are.

Tim Cook started things off, as he usually does, and he did so by talking about the iTunes Music Festival, which you can read about here.

He moved on to speak about how Apple retail is expanding, and how next month, Apple is forecasting that they will sell their 700 millionth iOS device. Millionth. Wowsers.

Craig Federighi got up and spoke about iOS 7, how awesome it is, and how with it you might miss your phone calls because of the new techno ringtones? He’d probably like our Skrillex blog soundtrack!

Tim then let everyone know that on any new iOS device sold, the following apps will be available to download for free- Keynote, Numbers, Pages, iMovie and iPhoto. SCORE!

Then they got down to business. You know the business. The iPhone business.  Two new designs.

The iPhone 5C

It’s pretty, guys. It’s really pretty. The 5C is made from one single hard-coated polycarbonate  surface with no seams, part lines or joins which has a reinforced steel structure on the inside. ( Polycarbonate is basically a plastic shell instead of aluminum).

It’s replacing the iPhone 5, however the 8Gb 4S will stay in the lineup as their low end model, offered for free on contract.

As expected, the 5C comes in a range of bright poppy rainbow bright colors that will no doubt attract many young rainbow bright individuals.Green, Yellow, Blue, White and a quite salmony looking red.

The phone has a 4 inch retina display, integrated touch, 8 megapixel camera, and is powered by the same chip as in the iPhone 5.

The 5C still has both rear and front facing cameras, so selfie takers can breathe a sigh of relief! The cameras are both still 5 megapixel and the back camera has a flash, so you don’t have to prepare yourself for any loss of quality.

It will also have slightly larger battery capacity and  a new HD Facetime camera.

This colorful sparkle pony will be offered in 16Gb  for $99 and 32Gb for $199 on a two year contract, with cases costing $29 each.

The cases-

So. It’s basically the iPhone 5, except slightly better, but more platsicky and colorful. We really like the idea of the seamless shell, and really wanna see if it lives up to our idea on how nice it would feel in the hand.

Jony Ive ( via video) said it perfectly- ” The iPhone 5C is beautifully, unapologetically plastic… It’s simpler, more essential, more capable and more colorful.”

The iPhone 5S

It’s really shiny looking. Also, according to Apple, “The most forward-thinking phone we’ve ever created.”

The 5S will come in three colors- Gold, Space Gray and Silver, and yes, although not called champagne, the gold is refined and ridiculously shiny and wanted.

The iPhone 5S has an A7 chip, and is the first smartphone ever to have one. The A7 is a modern instruction set, with 2x general purpose registers, 2x floating point registers, over 1 billion transistors and 100 square mm die size.  It has twice as many transistors for roughly the same size as the A6. It will have Xcode support, and it’s backwards-compatible. 32 and 64-bit.

This stuff? It means that this phone is hella fast, and hella powerful. The CPU performance is 40 times faster than the original iPhone, and half of that increase comes with the A7 chip. The graphics performance is 56 times the original iPhone. The phone will be significantly and noticeably faster and better at doing everyday operations.

The way they choose to show this? The announcement and demo of Infinity Blade 3, by Epic Games co-founder Donald Mustard. You can run 5 times faster on the 5S than on the iPhone 5, for example, and there is four times the detail on characters, such as this guy:

Infinity Blade 3  will be available alongside the iPhone 5s.

The iPhone 5S will also come with a chip called the M7 chip which measures motion continuously – it acts as an accelerometer, gyroscope, and as a compass support. It will also have a CoreMotion API  which will be able to identify your movement, if you’re running or driving, etc. Nike is coming out with an app called Nike + Move which will use these features to keep track of your activities.

Battery time is AWESOME! Just looky here:

The camera on the new iPhone is where a lot of the surprising and most welcome improvements (in our opinion) were made. The new camera has a 5 element Apple designed lens with f/2.2 aperture and 15% larger active sensor area.  It looks like this:

iOS 7 will automatically set white balance, exposure level and will pick the sharpest from a series of photos.

The duel LED flash is there, they’re calling it True Tone. It will allow of better low light photography and  will combine the two lights to get the right color balance for the room.

There is digital auto stabilization, and, something we love- burst mode.  If you hold the shutter down, the camera will take ten photos per second until you lift your finger off the button. It will also analyze all the burst shots and present which one it thinks is the best, whilst still storing the others.

SLO-MO!  Slo-mo  is supported you guys! That’s HD, 120 frames per second slo-mo we’re talking. That is so cool! You can even select which parts of your video you want in normal speed, and which parts in slo-mo. There’s going to be so many slo-mo you-tube videos this winter…. Cue snowballs to the face!

Finally, when you shoot panoramic shots, the camera can adjust the exposure automatically as you go along. Thank god, cos the sun just is not a team player when we shoot panoramic.

Ok, now for security- yeah, it’s the fingerprint sensor. Or, as it’s now known- the Touch ID.

The new iPhone has a crystal inlaid fingerprint scanner in place of the home button that can read multiple fingerprints. There is a stainless steel detection ring around the home button, so that the sensor can detect your finger without you having to press the button.

This is the finger they showed- just in case you forgot what one looked like. Sorry if you did. That’s… awkward.

The sensor is 170 microns thin, 500 ppi resolution, scans sub-epidermal skin layers and has 360-degree readability.

It basically takes a picture of your fingerprint in order to analyze it, all fingerprints are encrypted, and they will never be stored on Apple servers or backed up to the cloud. Awesome.

The fingerprint scanner will come in handy for security and shopping – the examples they give are not having to enter a passcode for your iPhone ( or worry about how you’re too lazy to set up a passcode) and having your fingerprint replace the ever irritating iTunes password.

Pricing is the same as the iPhone 5, 16Gb – $199, 32Gb – $299, 64Gb – $399 with a two year contract. Cases for the 5S are $49 each.

Here’s a picture of Tim Cook talking. It made us feel more involved.

Now we’re down to the nitty gritty end. iOS 7 will be available to download for free on September 18th.

The iPhone 5C will be available for pre-order starting midnight the 13th of September, with full release in stores on the 20th of September. The iPhone 5S will not be available for pre-order, but will be available online and in-store on September the 20th.

By December, the new iPhones will be available in more than 100 countries.

The Apple store has been down since 6am this morning in preparation for the iPhone announcements-but will be back online right now if you want to check out the goods! 

Overall, we’re really pleased with these releases. They show consistency, reliability, and significant hardware and software upgrades, alongside iOS 7.

Without having physically held or played with today’s releases (yet!), we can’t be for realsies sure, but it sounds like having ( at least) one of these phones will definitely improve how we use our mobile technology, and increase out affection for said technology.

We… we really like them. We also believe that it is serious time, guys, to start thinking about upgrading and how you’re going to go ahead and do that. Which phone is best for your needs, and how are you going to get that shiny newness into your hot little hands?

We want the champagne 5S, 64Gb, because we like shiny, sophisticated, fast, powerful, and awesome tech that makes everyone’s life better.

Just like we do.  Right?  But, also, it has the super sweet camera stuff. And the Touch ID. And the fast and powerful stuff.

Whichever one you choose, if you are considering selling a stinky old iPhone in order to get the CASHMONEY to upgrade or buy new these shiny new iPhones, you should click on this blue link right here, which will tell you all you need to know about preparing your old phone for moving on to it’s new forever home.

You can also click on this blue link right here to see how much CASHMONEY we can give you for your stinky old iPhone! Super fast, super easy, super large CASHMONEY!!

And that’s a wrap! We hope this brightened your day!

Images courtesy of Macrumors, The Verge, and Engadget. Special thanks to the super awesome Brad Molen over at Engadget for providing pretty much the best live blog we’ve ever read. Serious.

Important info if you’re thinking of selling your stinky old iPhone!

GUYSGUYGUYS!

September 10th is rushing up to meet us like a bull chasing a crowd of gingers!

You know what that means, right? NEW PHONE TIME!

If you are awesome, and planning on buying or upgrading to a 5S, 5C, or even to the Samsung Note III or <other>, then, in the very near future, you probably won’t be wanting your stinky old iPhone anymore.

Cos it stinky.

You know what’s cool? Selling it for extra cash. Everyone likes extra cash. Sooo much. So if you want to sell it in order to do said upgrading/purchasing, ( extra cash)  you’re going to want to READ THIS.

We suggest selling your iPhone to us ( D’uh, right?), because it’s the easiest thing to do, apart from watch the whole series of Orange Is The New Black in one go. But we’ll give you cash.

In case you’re not sure how it works, here’s the low down:

1, go to our website and fill in your iPhone model details, your name, address, and if you would like to be paid via Paypal or by cheque. We only have a few condition categories- Brand new in box, Used, Broken or water damaged, and Cracked.

2, The quote you get is the amount of money you will get after you send in your phone. Weird, huh?

3, We will send you a fancy little black box with a shipping label.

4, Put the phone in the box.

5, Put the box in a post box.

6, Get cash.

7, Party.

Pretty gosh-diddly-darn easy! And cash! Lots of it! Best of all, (in our opinion)  we won’t change your quote based on just how beer soaked or smashed or scratched or old your phone is.

We’re also BBB rated, awesomely rated on Yelp and resellerratings.com, and just about the most trustworthy people out there. It’s us, guys!

Here’s where you start, and don’t forget you can contact us if you have ANY questions at all.

DON’T STOP READING HERE GUYS

Ok, now that you know who to sell you old stinky iPhone to, we have some more info that you might be interested in no matter who you sell your phone to or give it to. If it’s leaving it’s home with you forever, this stuff is handy.

You have all your music, apps, games, and selfies on your current iPhone, right? Ok, well follow this link to learn how to properly back up your iPhone.

We erase ALL data off ALL the iPhones we receive (that have not been already erased). A lot of people, especially right now, are feeling particularly vulnerable and hence hesitant to let go of anything that might have information on them. Understandable. If you want to make sure that all your data is erased off your phone, follow this link to a quick and easy How To.

If you guys have any other ideas about How To’s we can do that would help you transition from stupid old iPhone to brand-new-shiny-possibly-baller-champagne-colored- iPhone email us and let us know!

We are at your service.

Image courtesy of cultofmac.com