Weekly Mobile News Roundup – 11 January 2014

 Once again the week is coming to an end and that means it’s time for a roundup of the past weeks news!

Essential apps for decking out your new Mac — the best software and utilities – If you’ve been fortunate enough to unwrap a new Mac over the holidays or need help deciding how to use those iTunes gift cards, I’ve collected some of my favorite apps and utilities for taking your Mac to the next level.

How To Get Live Weather App Icon On iOS 7 Home Screen – Apple’s Weather app icon. It’s never been something that users of the iPhone or iPod touch have been keen on. In fact, its inability to change its appearance as the weather changes outside the window has often been the subject of much ire and consternation amongst those of us that spend far too much time worrying about icons.

iBeacon Could Be Apple’s Secret Gaming Weapon, Developer Says – To date, very few games have figured out how to entertainingly integrate a player’s location. The best known exceptions are perhaps the StreetPass games on Nintendo’s 3DS and the mobile game Ingress, made by Google’s Niantic Labs.

Apple’s Lunar New Year Sale Includes Discounts on iPhone and Retina iPad Mini – Apple’s Lunar New Year sale kicked off today in several Asian countries, with discounts available on a wide range of Apple products.

Can iTunes Radio Compete With Spotify and Pandora? – With the launch of iOS 7, Apple started offering its users iTunes Radio, a purposed Spotify and Pandora killer, but can iTunes Radio stand up to these streaming giants and possibly even become competition for them? It’s still early to say, but it’s possible.

BlackBerry’s Funeral May Have To Wait. It Seems To Have Returned From The Dead – BlackBerry (BBRY) refuses to die. Despite horrible results and management chaos, the company continues to operate and to raise capital. Fairfax Financial just put another $250 million into BlackBerry’s treasury to keep the company liquid while newly installed CEO John Chen takes a shot at a turnaround.

Apple Expands PC Marketshare as Mac Sales Grow with Microsoft Computers on Decline – Apple’s PC marketshare in North America jumped nearly 4% over the holiday quarter thanks to iMac sales growth outpacing every other brand.

15 Apple Events That Helped Change The World – Apple Computer, Inc. was born on Jan. 3, 1977 when the company became incorporated. Thirty years ago, on Jan. 24, 1984, Apple released the world’s first Macintosh. On Jan. 9, 2007, the late Apple CEO Steve Jobs proclaimed “Apple is going to reinvent the phone,” and he was correct. The iPad was announced on Jan. 27, 2010.

SteelSeries ‘Stratus’ Made for iPhone/iPad/iPod Bluetooth game controller – I previously reviewed the first two Apple authorized game controllers to hit the market under Apple’s new Made for iPhone/iPad/iPod touch program from Logitech and Moga. Both used Apple’s form-fitting design that docks an iPhone or iPod touch directly into the controller via a Lightning connector.

Apple Offering Free Fitness App to Apple Store App Users – If you use the Apple Store App on your iPhone (not to be confused with the App Store, the Apple Store App is where you can buy your Apple devices and computers just like on the website), you can download a free 7-minute fitness app.

Smart thermostat EverSense shows off ‘Aura’ iBeacons to intelligently adjust room temperature – This week at CES 2014, Allure Energy, makers of a $400 smart thermostat Nest competitor called EverSense, showed off an upcoming add-on to its system that uses Apple’s new Bluetooth LE iBeacon technology