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Luke Dormehl - page 168

Watch a drone crash-land on Apple Park’s solar roof

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drone2
Well, that's one way to lose a drone!
Photo: Matthew Roberts

A would-be photographer lost his drone while attempting a flyover of the Apple Park campus last weekend. After he lost control of the unmanned aerial vehicle, it crashed onto the solar panel-covered roof of Apple’s new circular headquarters.

Check out the Apple Park drone crash footage below.

How Apple could fix HomePod’s white ring problem

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Apple HomePod smart speaker Listening History
HomePod has caused issues for some users.
Photo: Ste Smith/Cult of Mac

One of the least welcome aspects of the HomePod smart speaker is its propensity for leaving unsightly white rings on your tables, due to an interaction between the silicone used in the device and the wood.

According to one industrial designer, however, the problem could be solved by Apple without too much cost — although there may be a bit of retooling of their equipment required.

Falling iPhone X demand leaves Samsung Display in the lurch

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iphone x
Samsung is suffering the brunt of falling iPhone X demand.
Photo: Ste Smith/Cult of Mac

Apple’s decision to slash iPhone X production has reportedly left Samsung looking for new customers to sell its OLED panels to.

Samsung ramped up production capacity in order to meet Apple’s demands, only to find itself sitting on excess production capacity now that Apple has reduced its iPhone X orders. While Samsung hopes to sell OLED displays to other manufacturers, many have been slow to adopt the technology due to the expense of changing from LCD screens.

Florence, Sodes, and other awesome apps of the week

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Awesome Apps
'Appy weekend!
Photo: Ste Smith/Cult of Mac
Awesome Apps

A poignant, beautiful, story-driven game that’s bound to go down as one of the year’s best iOS titles is just one of this week’s “Awesome Apps.”

In addition, we’ve got a great update of a top navigation app, a minimalist podcasting app, and a challengingly entertaining puzzle game. Check out our picks below.

Apple is hurrying to deliver a fix for latest iMessage bug

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iphone
Look for iOS 11.2.6 soon!
Photo: Apple

Apple knows that it has a problem with the newly discovered iOS bug which blocks access to messaging apps — and it promises you won’t have to wait until iOS 11.3 for a solution.

According to Apple, although the beta version of iOS 11.3 fixes the issue, it is planning to release an update prior to this that will address the problem. In other words, watch out for an iOS 11.2.6 very, very soon. (We’re guessing that a few Cupertino engineers are suddenly cancelling their weekend plans!)

Developers must ensure apps are optimized for iPhone X

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Guidelines
The notch isn't going away anytime soon!
Photo: Apple

Apple wants iOS developers to make sure that they are creating their new apps with the iPhone X in mind.

According to the company’s newly updated developer guidelines, all apps submitted to the App Store from April 2018 onwards must be sure to support the iPhone X’s edge-to-edge Super Retina display, as well as accommodating the still-controversial “notch.”

Apple Park employees have already injured themselves walking into glass walls

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Apple Park Close up
A stunning headquarters? Sure. One to rush through at high speed? Probably not.
Photo: Apple

Apple employees have only just moved into the new Apple Park headquarters, and there are a few teething problems they’re dealing with in the short term.

One of those? The fact that at least two people have injured themselves walking into the glass walls and doors throughout the sprawling Apple new $5 billion headquarters. While these have only resulted in minor cuts and no hospitalization, a new report suggests it could actually be enough to violate California law by creating an unsafe working environment.

Snapchat won’t back down on controversial redesign

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Snapchat icon
Snapchat isn't willing too many new fans right now.
Photo: Ste Smith/Cult of Mac

Snapchat’s not rolling back its new design, despite more than 1 million people (and counting) signing a petition for it to do so.

The company recently debuted its new layout — designed to separate interactions with friends from branded content — but many users have complained that it is difficult to use, prompting a popular change.org petition to revert to its previous design.

Major new iOS bug can lock you out of messaging apps

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Cult of Mac's buyback program pays good money for your gear, even broken ones.
The latest iOS bug can crash iPhones that receive a text message containing an Indian character.
Photo: Warren R.M. Stuart/Flickr CC

A newly discovered iOS 11 bug lets a text message containing a specific character crash iPhones. It can also block access to Messages, WhatsApp, Facebook Messenger, Outlook for iOS and Gmail — in a way that can be challenging to reverse.

The character in question is from the Indian language character set of Telugu. When a message containing the character is received, iOS Springboard crashes and the aforementioned messaging apps will no longer open.

Move over HomePod? Facebook has two smart speakers on the way

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the Facebook logo on an iPhone 6 Plus
Facebook wants to take its next step into your home.
Photo: Jim Merithew/Cult of Mac

The HomePod may have just dropped, but Apple’s not the only tech giant to be getting into the smart speaker business in 2018. According to a new report, Facebook will be launching two smart speakers this year — with July being given as “the latest” that they could make their debut.

Warren Buffett is betting even bigger on Apple

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What’s it like to have your startup bought by Apple? Stressful
One of the world's most legendary investors is doubling down on his Apple love.
Photo illustration: Ste Smith/Cult of Mac

Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway firm has massively increased its AAPL holdings, while ditching virtually all its IBM stock, showing how confident the super investor is of Apple’s immediate future.

Buffett’s firm increased its Apple holdings by 23.3 percent to 165.3 million shares, according to SEC filings. The firm took a dimmer view of IBM, however, and made the decision to drop a massive 94.5 percent of its holdings, leaving it with just 2.05 million shares.

Here’s how much experts think HomePod costs Apple to build

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Don't take a chance on a bricked HomePod.
The HomePod costs a lot more than its rivals, but it costs Apple a lot, too.
Photo: Ste Smith/Cult of Mac

A new report from Bloomberg suggests that Apple’s $349 HomePod smart speaker costs the company around $216 in components, giving Apple a 38 percent margin.

If accurate (and we’ll come to that!), the figures suggest that despite charging users considerably more money than Amazon and Google charge for their rival smart speakers, Apple is actually earning smaller margins than Google Home’s 66 percent and Amazon Echo’s 56 percent.

But the numbers almost certainly don’t tell the whole story.

Apple could source local chipsets for Chinese iPhones

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iphone x
Apple could be embracing Chinese manufacturing to help grow its brand in the country.
Photo: Ste Smith/Cult of Mac

Apple may be expanding its supply chain further by buying storage chips from the Chinese memory chipmaker Yangtze Memory Technologies, a new report states.

What makes this interesting is that the chips will reportedly be used only in iPhones and other devices for the Chinese domestic market. It suggests that Apple may be willing to modify its iPhone manufacturing process in order to please the Chinese government’s push toward more local manufacturing.

Pro-grade acoustic tests find HomePod delivers on its promises

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Siri display
HomePod lives up to its sound quality promises.
Photo: Ste Smith/Cult of Mac

Professional grade acoustic tests appear to confirm that the HomePod is indeed the real deal as far as speakers go.

Apple has been talking up its smart adaptive speaker and high-end audio processing algorithms since the HomePod was first shown off at last year’s WWDC event. According to Apple, the HomePod can adapt its sound to fill any room it’s put in. It seems it wasn’t kidding!

Apple says that Apple Park campus is a ‘no drone zone’

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no drone
Drones aren't Apple's favorite technology, it seems.
Photo: Kif Leswing/Twitter

Apple has no time for your drones! Yesterday was Apple’s annual investors meeting, and one of the attendees tweeted this photo of signage erected at Apple Park declaring it a “no drone zone.”

Given Apple’s insistence on privacy — and Tim Cook declaring that keeping Apple products under wraps is the “bane of [his] existence” — that’s not necessarily a surprise. Still, it does mean that Apple is seemingly none too happy about the myriad drone flyover videos which keep on showing up online.

Tim Cook says keeping Apple’s secrets are ‘the bane my existence’

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Tim WWDC
Keeping secrets isn't easy.
Photo: Apple

When you’re a company the size of Apple and under the scrutiny that Apple is, keeping secrets is hard.

That’s what Tim Cook told investors during Tuesday’s annual investors meeting, during which he described how, “keeping stuff confidential is the bane of my existence.” In other words, with the exception of the visitor’s center, you shouldn’t expect a tour of Apple Park any time soon!

Flipboard CEO (verbally) flips off Apple News

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flipboard
Flipboard is a rival to Apple News in the news aggregation space.
Photo: Flipboard

The CEO and co-founder of Flipboard has some harsh words for Apple’s rival Apple News aggregation app.

Speaking at the Code Media conference, Mike McCue said that Apple News is “a product … living in the past,” and is lacking behind Flipboard in some very important ways.

French pranksters face Apple Store ban for tax protests

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Flagship
Apple's flagship store in Paris.
Photo: Apple

Apple wants us to think of our friendly local Apple Store as a “community hub” or “town square,” but that apparently doesn’t include being a space for public protests.

According to a new report, Apple has gone to court in Paris to try and prevent French tax campaigners from pulling stunts inside its local retail stores. Specifically, it wants to ban the French NGO Attac from entering its premises.

Rise of the Tomb Raider: 20 Year Celebration brings Lara Croft back to Mac

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Tomb Raider
An excellent installment in the tomb raiding series.
Photo: Feral Interactive

Feral Interactive has announced that Rise of the Tomb Raider: 20 Year Celebration will be making its way to Mac sometime this spring.

The critically acclaimed title stars everyone’s favorite tomb-raiding adventurer Lara Croft, now with slightly more realistic proportions. It was originally released for Xbox in late 2015, while the 20 Year Celebration special edition landed on PlayStation 4 in October 2016.

Check out its spectacular trailer below.

Retro video imagines what Siri would look like in 1980s

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Siri
I can't decide whether to be glad to live now, or nostalgic for the past.
Photo: Squirrel Monkey

Thanks to HomePod, everyone is talking about Siri and how it compares to the other AI smart assistants created by companies like Google, Amazon and Microsoft.

But no matter what Siri’s relative failings may be, the technology is way ahead what was possible only a few years ago — as a brilliant 1980s-style parody for S.I.R.I. software makes abundantly clear. Check it out below.

Here’s what Apple’s got planned for iOS 12

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iPhone X wireless charging
Apple is changing its strategy when it comes to iOS launches.
Photo: Ste Smith/Cult of Mac

The biggest launch features for iOS 12 will reportedly involve allowing a single set of apps to work across both iOS and macOS, a Digital Health tool for monitoring screen time, and improvements to Animojis, a new report claims.

Apple will meanwhile hold off on introducing a redesigned home screen and revamped Photos app until 2019. This marks a new strategy for Apple, in which software engineers won’t have to rush to finish features in time for each year’s iOS refresh around the time of the new iPhone launch.