IM+ Pro version 7.1: One of the top IM apps on the App Store received a nice update today that includes new Off-the-Record messaging available via in-app purchase, fixes for bugs with Yahoo! and Windows Live Messenger authentication, and a number of other bug fixes and enhancements. The free version of IM+ received the same update. Asphalt 7: Heat version 1.0.1: Gameloft’s popular racing title Asphalt 7 was updated today with a bunch of new features and vehicles....

Yesterday LinkedIn presented a new service called Intro that integrates LinkedIn contact information directly in your iPhone’s Mail app, but it looks like the social networking service is launching to a rather dismal reception. According to a quick poll held by Polar, more than 80% of users answered negatively when asked if having email proxied was worth native LinkedIn headers. Personally, I found the setup process especially unfriendly for the audience being served (it’s much more technical than downloading an app via the App Store)....

When the platform first went live, it was already a pretty powerful tool. Marketers could discover and begin working with influencers on content for campaigns—no surprise for a marketplace, but the included campaign management tools were step ahead of what anyone else was doing in the space. We first reviewed Aspire a year ago, giving it 4.3 stars overall. The chief criticism was the discovery engine, which was serviceable but not great....

AT&T is offering a buy one, get one free deal currently on many of its popular smartphones, and while it’s not listed likely due to Apple, we’ve learned that iPhone 6s is actually eligible. You won’t find any mention of iPhones in AT&T’s advertising for the deal— in fact, it’s promoting the Samsung Galaxy S6 as the standout device for the deal— but we’ve confirmed with AT&T reps that iPhone 6s is also included and eligible for customers to include in the offer....

The August Smart Lock product family is already one of the easiest smart security solutions for anyone to install, and today August announced several software features to improve the user experience as well. Changes include improvements to the Smart Lock, Smart Keypad, and Doorbell Cam. August Smart Lock offers an optional feature called auto-unlock that uses location to unlock the deadbolt when you arrive within a set proximity. You don’t want to accidentally unlock your door, of course, so the August app sends alerts when auto-unlock is triggered....

You’d be forgiven for thinking that Autodesk’s SketchBook Mobile is just a fad which ranks down below on the App Store earnings chart. I mean, how popular a pro-grade paint and drawing software costing two bucks a pop can become in this freemium economy? You will probably be surprised to learn it amassed a cool seven million paid downloads on the App Store thus far. This would mean revenues in the range of fourteen million dollars for the company, or about $9....

Thanos actor Josh Brolin talks about the status of his MCU contract with the upcoming release of Avengers: Endgame. Marvel Studios had been teasing Thanos as early as the first Thor, with his first on-screen appearance in 2012’s The Avengers. But it wasn’t until 2014’s Guardians of the Galaxy that the Mad Titan first got a part in a film that’s basically not a glorified cameo. Even after that, the public had to wait four more years before he properly debuted in last year’s Avengers: Infinity War....

Bachelorette Rachel Lindsay is bored by Peter Weber’s casting on The Bachelor; she wanted to see the first black lead instead. Most of the Bachelor Nation is still reeling from the recent decision and hopes this new season won’t be a bust. Being the first bachelorette of color was a source of great pride for Lindsay. She believed that for the first time she was going to be able to watch history in the making on the upcoming season....

The Bachelorette’s Hannah Brown recently showed off her battle scars from training for Dancing with the Stars. Choosing between 30 men may have been tough on the emotions, but her latest television venture appears to be taking a much more physical toll. The time in between The Bachelorette and Dancing with the Stars has not been easy for Brown. She ended an engagement with Jed Wyatt and then went on a date with runner-up Tyler Cameron that didn’t progress into a long-term relationship....

Back to the Mac is a series focused specifically on the Mac, including hardware, accessories, I/O, software, and more. On this week’s episode of Back to the Mac, we go nuts with an eGPU setup featuring two Sonnet eGFX Breakaway Box 650 units mated with a pair of workstation-class 16GB AMD WX 9100 GPUs. As we’ve touched on before, if you’re a DaVinci Resolve user, or if you use any other app that can wield multiple GPUs at the same time, such a setup can put up some noteworthy numbers....

Technology has changed the way that we work and operate; the flood of advances that we see daily are mind-boggling in their variety and quantity. While technological advances are necessary for the advancement of our race, they can also bring with it a slew of other problems. The major culprit is the massive amount of information that we can now store and collect; with so much data in our hands, it is easy for persons with malicious intent to misuse such information....

The Caped Crusader is going metal this year, with the release of the comic book series Dark Nights: Metal. Batman has had a lot of adventures on the comic book page over the years, so it’s hard to pick a definitive history of the character. Still, some of these stories have served as the jumping off points for other media featuring the Dark Knight. Frank Miller’s The Dark Knight Returns, for instance, helped inform Batman V Superman: Dawn of Justice....

1. ​Bring old PC to life One very popular reason for lightweight Linux distributions is their ability to breathe new life into old PCs. Lightweight Linux distros require some very minimum requirements and will run on very old computers (the ones that came with XP). You could even build your very own server with these lightweight distros and you would be surprised how smooth the entire experience is going to be....

Memorial Day weekend has delivered a full slate of deals on Apple products, HomeKit lighting, and much more. Today’s special edition of 9to5Toys Lunch Break highlights the Best Buy Memorial Day sale, along with discounts on Philips Hue products, and official Apple accessories. Head below for more. Best Buy Memorial Day Sale You can count on the Best Buy Memorial Day sale each year as one of the biggest Apple events....

Without further ado, the shutterbugs at Plann present: First we have a gorgeous, snowy capture by Joachim Gjølga, a self-proclaimed amateur photographer based out of Trondheim, Norway. You can’t tell from the photo, but he claims the supermoon wasn’t quite full at the time of shooting. Doesn’t the whole vignette remind you entirely of those glorious/infamous wolf sweaters? What You Can Take Away: Lighting and contrast. Light clouds, light snow, dark shadows, sky and trees (the artistic term for this is interplay is chiaroscuro)....

Last month in the UK, a bill that could significantly change how Apple is able to encrypt user data on iOS was introduced. Called the Investigatory Powers Bill, it has the potential to require Apple to hold a key to encrypted smartphones and services such as iMessage and FaceTime. While Apple didn’t comment on the bill at the time, it has now, as expected, spoken out against it in a written submission to the UK House of Parliament....

As always, we will update our list of new apps and updates hitting the App Store and Mac App Store throughout the day: Angry Birds Seasons version 2.5.0: New content for Rovio’s “Seasons” edition of Angry Birds rolled out today (including the HD version). The update includes 20 new schoolyard levels, bonus levels, a new pink bird, and new theme music for the playground levels. Shazam version 5.0.6: All of the versions of the song recognition app Shazam were updated today with an improved recognition rate and faster application startup time....

Arrow is leaving the Arrowverse, but thanks to its final season and Crisis on Infinite Earths, Green Arrow and the Canaries joining the franchise makes for a strong addition. The DC TV universe has been going through major changes in the current season, primarily with the Stephen Amell-led drama ending. The 5-part crossover was also a prominent part of the Arrowverse, as it allowed a new phase to begin. With a new chapter for Greg Berlanti’s DC TV lineup starting comes new stories and characters....

There’s the DC Extended Universe, which includes all the DC movies and the characters within them, and there’s the world of DC-inspired TV shows that is treated as a separate universe. For obvious reasons, it’s rare to see much cross-over between the cinematic and television incarnations of the DC uber-world, but fans often clamor for there to be more sharing of characters and even actors between the two platforms. Mostly, it seems these hopes will remain in the realm of speculation, unless multiple rights-related and economic realities are somehow resolved....

Over the past few months, Snapchat has been facing the consequences of a controversial redesign. Today, a new survey shows just how much that redesign has affected the public’s perception of Snapchat, but the company is also starting to rollout some changes to its app’s design… A new survey from YouGov Brand Index, shared by Recode, shows that Snapchat’s user sentiment fell by 73 percent following the full rollout of the redesign earlier this year:...