Snapchat is taking Stories, its concept that lets you see the world through your friends’ perspectives, to a new level today. By collaborating with the likes of Vice, Comedy Central, Yahoo News, and National Geographic, Snapchat’s new Discover feature brings you the news in the form of a story.

The ephemeral social network says it’s taking aim at social media companies who “tell us what to read based on what’s most recent or most popular” (like Facebook).

Discover stories are created by editorial teams and refreshed every 24 hours. Unlike Stories, Discover content also supports long form journalism, making it a huge threat to Facebook and Twitter as the top place to find and read your news.

Here’s how to use Discover:

Apple took the top spot for smartphone sales in China last quarter for the first time in the company’s history, reports financial research firm Canalys.

To accomplish the stunning feat, Apple leapfrogged Samsung, Huawei, and Xiaomi, thanks to the sales of the iPhone 6 and 6 Plus. Apple is also selling more iPhones in China now than it is in the United States, even though the iPhone costs nearly double its nearest competitor. Canalys credits this to Apple tapping into trends like larger screens and LTE.

Four months down the line, the iPhone 6 and 6 Plus still feel like new devices, but that’s not stopping enthusiastic, design-minded techies from creating concept showing how they hope Apple’s next generation iPhone will look.

This concept, created by Netherlands-based graphic designer Yasser Farahi, shows a sleeker iPhone with thinner bezel and profile, and a few of the less popular design features of the iPhone 6 taken out. Most enticing of all is Farahi’s dream of wireless charging: a technology which has been often rumored over the years, but not as of yet implemented by Apple.

Given that Farahi has chosen to name it the iPhone 7, this particular model would likely arrive in 2016, since this year will probably see the iPhone 6s, with the majority of changes being under the hood. Personally, I’m not mad keen on some of Farahi’s subdued color choices, but it’s still a tantalizing glimpse at what we could have to look forward to next year.

Check out more pictures, and a video, after the jump.

Apple is close to becoming the world’s top smartphone maker for the first time since it conceded the title to Samsung more than three years ago. The Cupertino company is selling more iPhones than ever before, while Samsung’s smartphone sales are slowing.

As the world gets smaller and smaller thanks to the global marketplace called the internet, you may sometimes need to know exactly how much your dollar will get you in the wider world. Is that £15 widget really worth it? You’ll only know if you convert it to some form of currency that you understand better.

Your Mac has at least three ways to do this sort of calculation: with a Dashboard widget, the built-in Calculator app, and even with Spotlight. Here’s how to convert currencies into something that makes more sense, right from your handy Mac computer.

Post-Apple Pay, everyone is looking to Cupertino when it comes to innovation in the mobile payment sector. eBay is no different — with the online auction company starting up a new division, designed especially to develop payment-related technology.

And wouldn’t you know it? It’s filling it with ex-Apple folk.

Five years ago today, Steve Jobs introduced the iPad. A giant screen with one button, the iPad represented possibly the purest distillation of Jobs’ tech dreams. Yet at the time it was met with derision. “I got about 800 messages in the last 24 hours,” Jobs told his biographer, Walter Isaacson. “Most of them are complaining…. It knocks you back a bit.”

Half a decade and multiple iterations on, the iPad is an established part of Apple’s ecosystem. While it’s had its ups and downs, nobody’s flooding Apple’s inbox with iPad-related hate mail anymore.

So what were people complaining about? We hopped in our time machine to take a look at the original criticisms — and what, if anything, Apple’s done about them in the years since.

What is it with Apple and the gaming-related patents as of late?

Just weeks after the publishing of an Apple patent showing a concealed gaming joystick capable of being hidden in future iPhones, today the U.S. Patent and Trademarks Office has revealed another Apple invention related to a snap-on gaming controller for iOS devices.

As with the joystick patent, the idea here is to allow gamers to fully capitalize on the present golden age of iOS gaming, without having to block parts of the screen using their fingers for multitouch controls.

When Tim Cook unveiled Apple Pay last year, the company hailed it as a simple contactless payment solution that also brings extra security to credit cards. Except according to one report, Apple Pay is actually making it easier for scammers to commit credit fraud.

Apple Pay’s security problem has nothing to do with Touch ID, NFC, Apple’s secure element, or stolen iPhones. All of that is locked down as tightly as Apple advertised. The problem, according to an unconfirmed report from DropLabs, is that Apple Pay is so easy to use, fraudsters don’t even have to create a physical fake card anymore.

Five years ago today, on January 27 2010, Steve Jobs unveiled the iPad at the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts in San Francisco — giving the world its first glimpse of the so-called “Jesus tablet.”

Although not Apple’s first venture into the tablet market (that would be 1993’s Newton MessagePad 100), the iPad was the first tablet Apple had released while Jobs was running the show. And, boy, was it great!

When looking at the iPad, at first the temptation was to think of it as a giant iPhone. That’s not the case, however. In reality, Apple began work on its tablet before its now-iconic smartphone. For Jobs, the idea went back to 2002 and a conversation he had with a boastful Microsoft engineer, who bragged about a stylus-based tablet computer. A patent application from Apple followed in March 2004, with Jobs and Jony Ive as two of the inventors named.

Things have come a long way since then, but it’s worth re-watching Jobs’ original iPad introduction — just for a reminder of how much Apple’s revolutionary device has meant in the half-decade since.

Check out the video after the jump:

Google is about to become its own wireless network, and while the company is keeping quiet on its cellular ambitions, new details have leaked claiming Google’s service might finally be able to cure your signal loss problems.

Citing unnamed sources familiar with Google’s plans, the Wall Street Journal reported today that Google’s network will switch between service on Sprint, T-Mobile and WiFi to route all voice, text messages, and data through the best possible signal.

The iPhone 6 is a marvellous device that takes productivity and mobile entertainment to a new level. With heavy use, though, users can find themselves economizing the charge on their batteries so they can stay productive all day long.

With the MOTA Smartphone Battery Case, however, you can feel free to continue using your phone all day and into the night without worrying about the charge on your device’s battery.

There’s nothing more frustrating than a beautiful iPhone that has zero GB of storage left. Especially when you see that a lot of room is actually taken up by a mysterious “other” section that just seems to grow bigger over time.

In today’s handy video, I’m going to show you a few quick methods to clear your phone of unnecessary files, giving you more room for favorite albums, pictures and apps.

The biggest snowstorm to ever hit New York City is pounding the Northeast today, and it doesn’t look like the blizzard is going to let up any time soon.

More than 2 feet of snow are expected to hit the area. NYC Mayor Bill de Blasio has already canceled school for tomorrow and the state announced all highways will be closed by midnight tonight. But before you hole up with your loved ones for the next few days, make sure to download these eight apps that will help you make it out alive.

These days, any photo you shoot with your iPhone or other smartphone will typically contain location data (unless you have that feature turned off) to allow apps like iPhoto to place your images on a map.

Even photo-sharing services use this data, with some — like Flickr — posting it prominently on your photo pages (along with all the other EXIF data, like shutter speed and f-stop).

If you don’t want the location of your photos to be known, the Yosemite version of OS X’s Preview can take care of it for you. Let’s strip that location data before we post that photo to the Web, OK?

Apple Pay has already invaded MLB stadiums and NBA games, but next up on the list of major sports to accept Apple’s contactless payments system will be golfers.

The city of Phoenix is gearing up to host the Super Bowl this week, but the PGA is hoping to steal a little thunder with the revelation this morning that Apple Pay will make its first ever debut on the golf course at the 2015 Waste Management Phoenix Open this week.

Apple acquired TestFlight maker Burtsly last year and quickly added it to iOS in an effort to improve the iOS beta testing experience for both developers and testers. Now Apple plans to close the independent site TestFlightapp.com to Android users and everyone else, forcing iPhone and iPad owners to only test apps through the official TestFlight iOS app.

Xiaomi, the Chinese smartphone maker that’s found fame in the West thanks to its many Apple clones, is said to be preparing a trade-in program that will swap your iPhone for the newly-announced Mi Note phablet.

The program is designed to dissuade those with an older iPhone from upgrading to an iPhone 6 or iPhone 6 Plus, or to encourage those who already have to make the switch.

Apple is set to announce record-breaking earnings tomorrow for its 2014 holiday quarter. Apple projected making $63.5 billion to $66.5 billion in revenue, but Wall Street’s consensus is that the company will blow past its own guidance and report revenue closer to $68 billion.

That’s about $20 billion more than Google’s last three quarters of revenue combined.

Growth will likely be fueled by strong iPhone sales, although the Mac is also projected to reach record sales.

A rare phaser pistol from the original Star Trek television series is “set to stun” when it goes on the auction block next month in Los Angeles.

It is made of fiberglass and one of only two known phasers to have survived the 1960s television series, which starred William Shatner and Leonard Nimoy as the leaders of the starship Enterprise.

The phaser could fetch more than $60,000, according to the website Luxurylaunches.com when it hits the block Feb. 21 during a Star Trek auction by Propworx.

Google and Motorola went all out with the Nexus 6 to make it as good as flagship rivals from other manufacturers, but their super-sized handset could have been even better.

The device was set to get a fingerprint scanner, according to former Motorola CEO Dennis Woodside, but the plan had to be scrapped when Apple bought the best supplier in the industry.

China may have been a bit late to the iPhone 6 party due to a drawn-out regulatory approval period, but it seems the wait was worth it — both for Chinese customers and Tim Cook’s wallet.

Ahead of what should be a blockbuster earnings call for Apple on January 27, UBS analysts are predicting that the holiday season will be the quarter in which China finally sold more iPhones than the U.S.

Over the weekend, we showed you sexy new renders that showed the rumored new 12-inch MacBook Air and iPad Pro side-by-side. Designed by render artist extraordinaire Martin Hajek, it gave us our best look yet at what Apple’s next big products could look like.

But in the renders we saw, Hajek’s iPad Pro was missing at least one critical ingredient: the plus-size tablet’s rumored stylus accessory. Now Hajek’s back, giving us his notion of what a Jony Ive-designed stylus could look like.

In public, the big smartphone competition may be between Apple and Samsung, but behind the scenes the faltering Samsung has another battle on its hands: with rival manufacturer TSMC over who gets to build the A9 processor for the next generation iPhone.

And while Samsung is decisively losing the battle to sell the most smartphones in the marketplace, the A9 chip orders could be one clash it is going to emerge victorious from!

In 2013, Twitter introduced a new policy that was designed to prevent third-party Twitter clients from gaining too much popularity. The design to the Twitter API basically capped the number of API “tokens” a third-party developer have. Each token is tied to a user, so the effect is that if a third-party Twitter client gets too popular, Twitter will stop allowing new users of that app into the service.

Over the weekend, it appears that Tapbot’s third-party Twitter app, Tweetbot for Mac, finally ran up against its token limit… and as of right now, has been pulled from the Mac App Store.