Luke Dormehl - page 148

Apple is reportedly fleshing out the cast for its original sci-fi series from Ronald D. Moore, adding Joel Kinnaman, Michael Dorman and Sarah Jones in lead roles. The as-yet-untitled show takes place in a world in which the global space race never slowed down.

Kinnaman, who previously appeared in the RoboCop reboot and Netflix’s Altered Carbon, will play Edward Baldwin, one of NASA’s top astronauts. Dorman (who starred in Amazon’s Patriots) and Jones (USA Network’s Western drama Damnation) will play Gordo and Tracy Stevens, a prominent NASA couple.

Apple hosted Nobel laureate Malala Yousafzai for a discussion at Apple Park on Monday.

A Pakistani activist for female education, 21-year-old Yousafzai is the youngest Nobel Prize laureate in history. Apple teamed up with Yousafzai’s Malala Fund back in January, with the goal of supporting education among girls around the world.

If you’ve been hankering to use the Apple Pencil with your iPhone, you may finally get your wish this year. That’s according to a new report from market intelligence firm TrendForce, which suggests that Apple’s next-gen OLED iPhones will boast support for the company’s high-end stylus.

At present, the Apple Pencil is available only for the iPad Pros and the latest entry-level iPad. Apple introduced the accessory in late 2015.

With Apple recently hitting a $1 trillion valuation, you’d think it would be a great time to be an Apple supplier. According to new quarterly earnings released by Apple’s long-time manufacturer Foxconn, however, that’s not entirely true.

As revealed in Foxconn’s latest financials, consolidated revenues rose 17 percent year-on-year to reach a new historical high of $34.43 billion for Q2 2018. Unfortunately, net profits for the quarter fell 2.18 percent on-year to their lowest level in five years.

The iPhone is among the U.S. electronic good that could be barred from Turkey as part of a new boycott announced by the country’s president on Tuesday.

“If [people currently] have iPhone, there is Samsung on the other side,” President Recep Erdogan said in a speech at a Symposium in Ankara, the country’s capital city. “And we have our own telephone brands,” he added.

Apple will open a new Apple store location in Kyoto, Japan this month, its first in the city, which is located in the Kansai region of Japan.

This will be the ninth Apple Store to be opened in Japan, although one of these in Shibuya-ku, Tokyo is currently closed. The August 25 opening comes approximately 15 years after Japan was selected in 2003 as the first country outside of the U.S. to receive an Apple Store.

If you live in the UK and are a fan of the BBC, Spotify has some good news for you — since it’s just added “thousands of episodes” of BBC content to its app.

“The BBC is one of the largest content creators in the UK, and have worked with the biggest and best audio talent in the world,” said James Cator, Spotify’s Head of Podcast Partnerships, in a statement. “To have a comprehensive audio catalogue in the UK, the BBC are essential, so adding the BBC to our rapidly-expanding catalogue of podcasts was a natural partnership.”

An iPhone user from South Carolina is suing Apple because he alleges that his handset exploded in his pocket two years ago.

The incident occurred in fall 2016, when concerns about lithium-ion batteries exploding were being widely reported — largely due to Samsung’s disastrous Note 7. The iPhone explosion supposedly injured the plaintiff enough that he had to be airlifted to a burn center in nearby Georgia.

Apple plays down its financial milestones these days, and there’s a good reason for that: tax.

According to a new report, Apple is one of a few companies which are “particularly aggressive” in downplaying the value of the property they own for tax purposes. Specifically, Apple thinks it’s been overtaxed on the buildings, land, lab equipment, and other expenses — and it wants to reclaim millions of dollars as a result.

Spotify is exploring new ways to let users on its free tier skip audio and video ads whenever they want.

The feature gives listeners the chance to get back to their music more quickly by skipping ads they’re not interested in. The company is currently user-testing the feature in Australia, with plans to later roll it out elsewhere.

Qualcomm just saved itself the best part of $700 million , due a settlement with Taiwan’s antitrust regulators.

Taiwan’s Fair Trade Commission had accused Qualcomm of abusing its position in the marketplace by refusing to provide products to clients who would not agree to its terms and conditions. Qualcomm was issued a record $773 million fine last year, but most of that has now been reversed.

Apple may have opted for Face ID over in-display Touch ID for the iPhone X, but plenty of lower cost handset makers aren’t in a position to use facial recognition in their handsets — and they’re embracing in-display fingerprint sensors as a result.

According to a new report, global shipments of in-display fingerprint sensors are expected to top 42 million units in 2018. And that number will more than double in 2019.

A former official with the Metropolitan Transportation Authority official has been indicted in an apparent scam in which he purchased almost $60,000 worth of iPhones with taxpayer money — and then sold them for personal gain.

Doug Field, a former Vice President of Mac Hardware Engineering at Apple, has returned to the company after spending several years at Tesla.

The interesting part? At Tesla, Field was employed as the Vice President of Vehicle Programs with a role overseeing development of new electric vehicles for the company. Now that he is back at Apple, he is reportedly working as part of the “Project Titan” Apple Car group.

Apple is cracking down on gambling content in the App Store. The problem is that some of the apps caught in the crossfire don’t have very much to do with gambling at all.

Several developers have noted on social media that their apps — ranging from a Polish magazine to a game that lets you send Xbox game clips to buddies — have been removed from the App Store as part of the purge.

Apple may have “won” its standoff with the FBI over privacy, but it’s unlikely to be able to repeat the same feat in a clash with the Indian government on the same topic.

A new article published by Reuters runs down the various obstacles Apple faces in its battle with India’s telecom regulator over an anti-spam app, which Apple believes infringes on user privacy. And while nothing is settled yet, this looks like one fight Apple won’t be winning!

Want to give the Roku experience a go, but don’t own a Roku TV streaming device? Today may be your lucky day, since Roku has announced that its free, ad-supported streaming service, the Roku Channel, is now available for people to watch, via the internet, on your smartphone, tablet, or personal computer.

To access the content — which includes plenty of good, albeit slightly older movies like The Matrix trilogy, in addition to other content — you’ll simply need to create a Roku account.

Apple held a special “Today at Apple” session on Wednesday at its Michigan Avenue, Chicago store to celebrate young developers.

The event took place under the banner of Apple’s “Everyone Can Code” initiative, and featured students who had participated in the “One Summer Chicago” program, giving a public demonstration of their Swift-coded apps.

Earlier this week, Apple booted five of Infowars‘ six podcasts out of iTunes and its Podcasts app, but made the decision to keep the company’s app in the App Store.

In a statement, Apple has said that it continues to support “all points of view” being represented in the App Store, but notes that it will continue to review the situation.

A research project funded by the Department of Homeland Security has discovered a “slew” of vulnerabilities in the mobile devices offered by the four main U.S. cell phone carriers.

These vulnerabilities reportedly leaves these devices open to possible attacks by hackers.

As if Amazon customers needed yet more to make their Prime subscription worth it, select Prime users can now take advantage of a new curbside grocery pickup feature at their local Whole Foods.

The feature allows users of the Prime Now app to shop online for fresh produce and then, on orders over $35, elect to pick up the packed groceries in store. They can do this within one hour of placing their order — or, for a charge of just $4.99, within 30 minutes.

In a short interview for Fast Company, Tim Cook raves about his love of music, and talks about Apple’s reasons for getting into the space with Apple Music.

“I couldn’t make it through a workout without music,” Cook said. “Music inspires, it motivates. It’s also the thing at night that helps quiet me. I think it’s better than any medicine.”

Snapchat has blamed the lingering effects of its disastrous redesign for a decline in its number of daily active users.

The messaging company reported its Q2 earnings yesterday. One of the key takeaways was that the number of people using Snapchat daily shrank from 191 million last quarter to 188 million this quarter. CEO Evan Spiegel blamed the 1.5 percent decrease on, “disruption caused by our redesign.”

In a possible glimpse at the future of elections, a small number of voters in November’s midtermS will be able to vote via mobile app.

The app will predominantly be used by West Virginian military personnel serving overseas. To vote, users must first register by taking a photo of their government-issued ID and a selfie-style video of their face. The app then uses facial recognition technology to make sure the registered voter is, in fact, the same person casting their ballot.

Whether it’s our phones, our fitness trackers, or even something as innocuous as a dating app, much of the technology we use on a regular basis tracks our physical location.

Knowing the potential security risk this poses, the Pentagon banned deployed military personnel from using tech with active location-tracking features.