Tile, a startup that makes location-aware tracking tags, will testify against Apple in a congressional antitrust hearing today.
Apple and Tile previously enjoyed a good relationship. Apple sold Tile products in its stores starting in 2015. However, last year, Apple stopped selling Tile products. It also hired away one of its engineers — with all signs pointing to Apple having developed its own rival product.
Police have arrested three people in Hong Kong after discovering a massive shipment of undeclared iPhones, Apple Watches, iPads, and assorted luxury items. The suspected smugglers were attempting to sneak the products into China to avoid paying tax on imports.
The South China Morning Post describes it as one of the “biggest hauls of electronic goods” in Hong Kong history. The total value of the tech products was $1 million. Other smuggled goods, including tech components and edible bird’s nests, were worth an extra $2.2 million.
After a draught of new content on Apple TV+ over the holidays, the streaming service got 5 hours and 15 minutes of new shows to watch this week. Apple debuted all 8 episodes of its Apple Originals series Little America.
The critically acclaimed anthology series tells true stories of immigrants in America. It was developed by Kumail Nanjiani and Emily Gordon, writers of The Big Sick, and former US Office writer and producer, Lee Eisenberg.
NBCUniversal’s streaming service Peacock will employ a distinctly different pricing strategy than Apple TV+, Netflix and other competitors. It’ll be free, but with advertisements.
Those willing to pay will have access to additional content, however.
The 5G iPhone coming this fall is widely expected to be a huge windfall for Apple. But this handset might then turn around and hurt the company next year, according to a pair of market analysts.
And their prediction is equally bad news for those planning to upgrade to the 5G iPhone.
Apple original movie The Banker will hit theaters and Apple TV+ this March following a delay, the company confirmed to Cult of Mac.
Starring Samuel L. Jackson, the film tells the fascinating true story of Bernard Garrett Sr. and Joe Morris, two African Americans who built up a successful banking business in the 1950s and ’60s.
The Banker’s release was put on hold last November so that Apple could investigate allegations made against one of its producers.
Apple is expected to deliver at least one iPhone model without a Lightning connector next year, according to a new Barclays report.
The device won’t make the switch to USB-C, as previous rumors have predicted. It is instead expected to rely solely on wireless connectivity options for both charging and data transfer.
Barclays analysts also believe that this year’s iPhone refresh will bring an improved TrueDepth camera system that could mean even better Face ID.
Apple’s 1-for-1 donation matching program, and paying employees for time spent volunteering, resulted in $100 million going to charities last year, the company said.
And it’s not only developers helping kids learn to code. There’s also a barbershop for the homeless run by an Apple employee.
Apple is deepening its partnership with the NBA by teaming up to launch a global playlist on Apple Music to highlight independent hip-hop artists.
The new playlist, dubbed “BASE:LINE” (get it? Cause there’s a baseline in rap songs and on the basketball court), will be curated by Apple Music’s director of hip-hop and R&B Ebro Darden. New artists and songs will be added to the playlist every Thursday with the first edition being made available today.
Apple sold almost 60 million AirPods wireless headphones in 2019, according to a market-analysts firm. That’s a dramatic increase from the 35 million the company is estimated to have sold the year before.
And Apple took the lion’s share of 2019 sales of totally wireless (TWS) headsets.
Revelations that the FBI has access to a tool that can unlock data on secure iPhones are raising questions as to why the agency is demanding Apple help to create a “backdoor” to recover data on the iPhones of a Florida shooting suspect.
Apple is among the companies which want to stop so-called patent trolls from stifling innovation with their claims.
A patent troll, for those unfamiliar with it, is a person or company that holds patent portfolios but does not actually make any products. Instead, they earn their money by licensing out the technology — or suing companies which use it unlawfully. And Apple and 34 other multinationals — including Microsoft and BMW — are none-too-happy about them.
When it comes to artificial intelligence (AI), Apple wants to have its cake and eat it, too. That is to say that it wants cutting edge data-driven machine learning on its devices, without violating its own user privacy pledge.
And you know what? It’s managing to pull it off — as the company’s latest AI startup acquisition underlines.
The Cult of Mac Store’s big January sale is still under way, with sweet discounts on some of the best Apple Watch accessories. Choose anything from our entire lineup of stunning Strapa bands today and save 15% before this discount disappears on January 17.
And enjoy free standard shipping on orders over $100!
What do you get when you’ve been at Apple for five years — aside from a (hopefully nice) paycheck and the knowledge that you’re valued enough by the world’s biggest tech company that they want to keep you around for half a decade?
The answer: A nifty five years plaque you can hang up on your wall, signed by none other than CEO Tim Cook.
M. Night Shyamalan and Tony Basgallop’s Servant may be arguably the best of the Apple Originals. But it may not be so, well, original, according to a new lawsuit filed against Apple.
The suit claims that the spooky Apple TV+ drama borrows a fair amount from Francesca Gregorini’s 2013 film The Truth About Emanuel.
Search YouTube for Apple-related content, and you will easily find hosts who unbox, hosts who hack, hosts who fawn, and, of course, plenty who throw snark and shade.
Then there’s Luke Miani, whose Apple-centric videos with a rising number of views fall under a different category: useful.
A pair of fresh Apple videos demonstrate that its tablets can be tools for professional artists. They show the complete creative process of several advertising posters for Apple TV+ shows done on iPad Pro with Apple Pencil.
Watch them now:
Elkson makes some absolutely terrific accessories for AirPods and Apple Watch, then goes and sells them at amazingly low prices. And you can get yours even less today from the Cult of Mac Store.
We’ve slashed up to 40% off of a number of Elkson’s best products, including a protective AirPods case that adds wireless charging, an incredibly comfortable Apple Watch band, and more.
Apple hired an expert on drones and aviation law as a lobbyist. But this doesn’t mean the company is about to introduce a line of unmanned aircraft.
Audient’s Evo is an excellent-looking new iOS-friendly USB audio interface. Like all other “sound cards,” the Evo lets you hook up speakers, headphones, and connect microphones, guitars, and so on. It then connects to a computer or iDevice via USB, so you can route all that audio in and out of your apps.
But the Evo brings a few clever extras. One is the Smartgain feature, which automatically sets your input levels. The other is something called loopback, which lets you record your iPhone’s own output. This is handy on the Mac and Windows, but essential on iOS, and very welcome.
Apple purchased Xnor.ai, a company that creates artificial intelligence software for mobile devices. The acquisition will apparently lead to AI applications running directly on iPhones, iPads, etc., not outsourced to the cloud. This should make these tasks more private and quicker.
A documentary about the rap group the Beastie Boys written and directed by Spike Jonze reportedly will debut on Apple TV+ this spring.
It will also supposedly be the first film from Apple’s streaming service to appear in theaters.
Crazy Russian modders have one-upped themselves yet again by creating an absolutely absurd guitar made out of 106 iPhones (and one iPod touch).
The one-of-a-kind working guitar, with a neck based on a 1999 Fender Telecaster, is being sold by Moscow-based guitar shop Copper Guitars. We’ve seen some pretty wild ways to repurpose old Apple devices, but this is the most metal one yet. And it could be yours for just over $6,000.
Take a closer look:
A new version of the Microsoft Edge web browser based on Google’s Chrome starts rolling out today for Windows, of course, but also macOS.
Among the most notable benefits is support for Chrome extensions.