How Has Apple Changed Under CEO Tim Cook?

This Saturday, Aug. 24, marks two years since Tim Cook took over as Apple CEO. In that time, the company has been on a roller coaster ride of highs and lows.

Over the last two years, Cook has watched Apple become the world's most valuable company — and then watched the company's stock price tumble more than $200 a share.
While Apple still finds success whenever it releases a new device, the public (and even Apple's board of directors) have noted concerns about the company's pace of innovation. While the tech industry has become more competitive and innovative, the public still expects the most cutting-edge releases from Apple, which came to be standard under Steve Jobs.

Hacker Leaks Details of 15,000 Twitter Accounts

An Islamist hacker says he gained access to "the entire database of users on Twitter" and has already leaked the login details of more then 15,000 accounts online.

A hacker under the name Mauritania Attacker, who claims to be from the Islamic Republic of Mauritania, a country in West Africa — shared details on Tuesday about the leak via file-sharing site Zippyshare, according to a GigaOm report. The account information compromised includes every account's Twitter name, ID and authentication tokens associated with third-party apps that have access to the account (for example, Instagram or HootSuite).
Twitter has not yet responded to a request for comment, but the news comes after Twitter sent an email late Monday to verified users urging them to use two-step authentication to keep accounts secure.

Samsung's 12-Inch Tablet Coming in October

News out of Korea suggests Samsung will launch its widely publicized 12-inch tablet with a hi-res display in October.
Citing unnamed industry sources, The Korean Economic Daily reports that the tablet will use a "higher than Full HD resolution" display from Samsung Display and claims that the model will be launched sometime in October.

41% of Teens Ask Parents for Online Privacy Advice

As teens continue to share personal information about their lives on the web, a new study suggests America's youth cares about their online privacy and is taking steps to make sure they are protected.

Data conducted by the Pew Research Center revealed that although teens ages 12 to 17 tend to manage their privacy settings themselves, the majority (71%) have sought outside help at some point about how to do so.

7 Ways Teachers Use Social Media in the Classroom

1. Encourage students to share work socially.
Anna Divinsky created an iTunes U class at Penn State University called Art 10: Introduction to Visual Studies, which she then adapted into a massive open online course (MOOC) on Coursera. The MOOC, called Introduction to Art: Concepts and Techniques, amassed more than 58,000 students.

For each class assignment, students were responsible for evaluating each other's work. Because the class was online, social media played an essential role in connecting students and creating an online community.

Students shared their work on a variety of platforms. On Flickr, they tagged their artwork with "artmooc." On Twitter, they included the #artmooc hashtag. Others posted to Facebook, and continue to do so to this day, even though the course has been over for quite sometime.
"It was fascinating to see learners from all over the world wanting to connect with one another in order to build a sense of community," Divinsky says.

But what was even more surprising was how social media allows students to self-organize into smaller, independent groups. These groups were based on commonalities like age, language and art proficiency levels. By allowing students to share on the site of their choosing, social sharing will come more naturally.

What to Do When Your iPhone Freezes

1. Restart Your Phone

This one’s a no-brainer, but it might work. Turn off your phone by holding on the Sleep/Wake button (top left). If nothing happens, try a hard reset by holding in the Home Button and the Sleep/Wake button at the same time for at least 10 seconds or until you see an Apple logo appear onscreen.

Restarting your phone will complete updates or downloads of your recently installed apps (similar to how your computer restarts every time it updates iTunes). Periodic restarts will keep your phone from wasting computing power on almost-finished installs.

5 ways your smartphone's ‘smarts’ have become more important than the ‘phone’

It’s been headline news this week that smartphones outsold feature phones for the first time. Huzzah!

My first thought was, “They still sell non-smartphones?” My second thought was “Why do we even still call it a ‘phone’?” I mean, a PC is basically an evolution of a calculator, but we don’t get excited about whether or not PCs outsell calculators, and we don’t call PCs “supercalculators.”

If you think about it, making and receiving voice calls is one of the more minor functions of a smartphone. Sure, the devices we use today evolved from a basic mobile phone, and they’ve gotten “smarter” with new features and capabilities and a seemingly endless array of apps. But the term “smartphone” is a bit of a misnomer that doesn’t accurately describe what the device is.