Luke Dormehl is a U.K.-based journalist and author, with a background working in documentary film for Channel 4 and the BBC. He is the author of The Apple Revolution and The Formula: How Algorithms Solve All Our Problems ... and Create More, both published by Penguin/Random House. His tech writing has also appeared in Wired, Fast Company, Techmeme and other publications.
Apple has pledged to do more on the diversity front. Photo: Apple
Twitter has hired away Apple’s Director of Worldwide Inclusion & Diversity, Jeffrey Siminoff, who will join the microblogging company as its new VP of Diversity and Inclusion from January.
Steve Jobs was a one-man quote machine. Photo: Ben Stanfield/Flickr CC
Pretty much everyone who met or worked with Steve Jobs has some anecdote about Apple’s late CEO that shines a light on an aspect of his personality and/or approach to life.
The latest is Evan Doll, co-founder of news reading app Flipboard, who worked at Apple from 2003 to 2009. In a series of tweets, Doll recalls the time Jobs was asked why Apple didn’t better remunerate its engineers.
Jobs’ response was classic Steve: part obfuscation, part passive-aggressive masterclass, all while subtly (or not-so-subtly) reminding the asker that they were lucky to be at Apple, and that it was their own fault if they weren’t being paid more.
You can't complain about North Korea's attention to detail. Especially if you live in the country. Photo: James Pearson/Reuters
User privacy has been a massive focus for Tim Cook during his time as CEO at Apple, but it’s apparently not an area of much concern for North Korea’s OS X ripoff RedStar OS.
The operating system, which borrows Apple’s “look and feel” but little else, is basically the “wet dream of a surveillance state dictator,” according to security researchers who analyzed RedStar OS.
The man who designs Apple's chips just got a few more of his own. Photo: Apple
Johny Srouji may only have been an Apple Senior Vice President for a hot minute, but already he’s reaping the benefits of his new position — courtesy of the festive awarding of restricted stock units currently valued at $9.6 million, plus common stock holdings worth $10.9 million.
One of the most surprising movie flops of 2015 was Aaron Sorkin and Danny Boyle’s Steve Jobs: a movie which, miraculously, earned even less for its creators than 2013’s panned Jobs, starring Dude, Where’s My Car‘s Ashton Kutcher.
Now the movie has received another ignominious fate: being singled out by major film critic and former co-host of At the Movies Rex Reed as his pick for no. 1 worst film of the year. Ouch!
Asia and Europe are Apple Pay's two biggest focuses next year. Photo: Jim Merithew/Cult of Mac
Apple watchers should expect the company’s mobile payment service, Apple Pay, to expand to new markets in 2016 — with a heavy emphasis on Asia.
According to a new report, Apple is focusing on Asia and Europe since adoption in the United States has been slower than expected. Regions set to get Apple Pay next year so far include China, Hong Kong, Singapore and Spain.
I'd be happy with just the one iPhone, to be honest. Photo: Tigard PD
Police in Tigard, Oregon have cracked an organized retail crime ring which used stolen gift cards worth three-quarters of a million dollars to buy iPhones bound for the Hong Kong black market.
Tigard Detective T.J. Hahn told the local KOIN 6 News that organized retail theft has become a bigger crime than even drug sales.
“This kind of activity makes millions of millions of dollars, into the billions,” he said.
You'll now be able to WhatsApp your friends with full motion video. Photo: Macerkopf.de
Having added voice calling at no extra cost earlier this year, WhatsApp is now reportedly looking to introduce FaceTime-style video calls, according to a new report.
The leaked iOS screenshot shows a full-screen video call, along with a smaller inlaid video preview with the camera view of the call recipient, just like Skype or Apple’s own video calling service.
Immersive 360-degree videos are now available to fourth-gen Apple TV owners. Photo: Jim Merithew/Cult of Mac
Now you can watch (and explore) 360-degree videos on the new Apple TV, thanks to virtual reality network Littlstar’s free app.
The network’s new tvOS app delivers content from the likes of Showtime, Disney and PBS. It works with Apple TV’s Siri Remote, granting users the ability to control the angle used in the immersive 360-degree videos via the remote’s nifty trackpad.
Well, that's one way to show you remember your classmates. Photo: Weibo
Christmas came early for schoolfriends of a Chinese businessman when he distributed 39 brand new iPhone 6s handsets during an elementary school reunion (!) over the past weekend.
The rose gold iPhones were engraved with the words, “To commemorate the Beilun Sanshan Primary School Class of 1998.” The generous giver of the gifts, a businessman with the surname Zhang, reportedly handed out the iPhones during a dinner in Ningbo, a city in China’s Zhejiang province.
A somewhat sketchy video showing a supposed iPhone 7 prototype has surfaced online, sparking speculation that Apple will ditch the bezel and physical Home button for next year’s iPhone handset.
T’was the night(s) before Christmas and all through the App Store, not a creature was moving except… wait, was that? I thought I was alone in here!
Welcome to the world of Dark Fear, a retro-styled pixel horror game that’s creepy and creative enough to keep you tingling throughout the holiday season.
There’s a reason it’s so damn scary: Dark Fear was created by Arif Majothi, a 38-year-old game developer who got his start working on horror movies. He combined his mastery of the horror genre with his love of classic ’80s and ’90s Sierra games like Phantasmagoria (it even starts with an MS-DOS-style floppy disk prompt).
The resulting title pays homage to the past, while being spooky enough to scare the bejesus out of you in the closing days of 2015. What more could you ask for?
Services like iMessage could be affected by the U.K.'s Investigatory Powers Bill. Photo: Apple
Apple has publicly criticized the U.K.’s draft Investigatory Powers Bill, a.k.a. the “snooper’s charter,” for fear that forcing companies to create backdoors in encryption services like iMessage could “hurt law-abiding citizens.”
Looking forward to Christmas? So am I — unless humanity ignominiously implodes en route to December 25.
What would lead me to raise that possibility? Oh, just the fact that not only did Kim Kardashian’s newly-launched emoji app immediately shoot to the top of the App Store charts, but its popularity even caused sweeping technical difficulties across Apple’s giant app repository.
Apple's supersize tablet may not be headed for supersized sales. Photo: Leander Kahney/Cult of Mac
Apple may be hoping that the iPad Pro can help turn around its flagging tablet sales, but according to a new report sales are off to a somewhat disappointing start — with just 49,000 units selling in the first month in Apple’s much-emphasized China region.
Apple is trying to get the iPhone 6s into more people's hands in India. Photo: Apple
Apple has slashed the price of the iPhone 6s in India, reportedly after lower than expected sales over Diwali.
The handsets are now at least 16 percent cheaper than when they first launched two months ago — with the the basic 16GB iPhone 6s now costing between Rs 52,000 and Rs 55,000 ($785 – $830), down from the Rs 62,000 ($935) launch price. Many retailers are additionally offering other incentives to try and get customers to buy.
Your favorite songs may sound even better next year. Photo: Jim Merithew/Cult of Mac
Apple users may get a music quality upgrade in 2016, with a new report claiming that the company has been developing hi-res audio streaming up to 96kHz/24bit.
Apple is stepping up its focus on accessibility. Photo: Apple
Apple is reportedly set to start selling new accessibility-related peripherals and accessories for both Mac and iOS in its brick-and-mortar Apple Stores as well as online.
The accessories, which are reported to be going on sale in the first quarter of calendar year 2016, are designed to help users with disabilities to better engage with Apple products.
Finally Ericsson execs will be able to afford Christmas presents. Photo: Jim Merithew/Cult of Mac
It’s nearly Christmas: the time of mince pies, good cheer, and, apparently, settling patent disputes with the potential to cost you hundreds of millions of dollars each year.
With that in mind, Apple has agreed a patent licensing deal with Swedish telecom company Ericsson, ending a dispute in which Ericsson was accused by Apple of engaging in, “abusive licensing practices.”
Jony Ive shows Charlie Rose the company's secret design studio. Photo: CBS
60 Minutes host Charlie Rose took a deep dive into all things Apple in an episode that aired Sunday.
Featuring interviews with Tim Cook, Jony Ive, Phil Schiller, Angela Ahrendts and others, the show explored everything from the iPhone’s inner workings and Apple’s manufacturing in China to Cook dancing around the question of whether Apple is building a car.
What we've all been watching in 2015. Photo: Ste Smith/Cult of Mac
2015 brought us a souped-up Apple TV, so it’s great news that the same year yielded plenty of high-quality entertainment to watch on the fourth-generation device.
From tenured favorites like ’60s Madison Avenue masterpiece Mad Men to the arrival of smash hits like Mr. Robot, there was no shortage of great entertainment gracing our screens.
In our humble opinions, these were the best TV shows of 2015.
Just one dollar, people! Photo: Jim Merithew/Cult of Mac
Big savings on Apple products have meant that Best Buy is increasingly living up to its name, but today’s iPhone deal may be one of the best yet for the cash-starved.
The retailer is selling the 16GB iPhone 6s for $1, while also throwing in a $200 gift card if you trade in a working iPhone 5 as part of the deal.
A long time ago, on a streaming music service not so far away. Photo: Star Wars
If you’re already bored of playing Christmas songs on repeat, there’s some good news — since Star Wars fans can now enjoy John William’s The Force Awakens soundtrack on iTunes and Apple Music.
More than 7 out of 10 users are running iOS 9. Photo: Jim Merithew/Cult of Mac
71 percent of iOS users are using the latest version of the mobile operating system, according to stats released by Apple. Measured by visits to the App Store this week, the stats also show 21 percent of users are running iOS 8, while 8 percent are running previous versions of iOS.
"My Christmas bonus? It's about this much." Photo: 60 Minutes
60 Minutes viewers will get an early Christmas present this Sunday, as presenter Charlie Rose gets a rare peak inside Jony Ive’s design studio, while also receiving a tour of “Apple’s store of the future” from retail guru Angela Ahrendts.