Apple has issued a statement which explains its commitment to customer privacy and how it handles government requests for data following the PRISM scandal. The Cupertino company has reiterated that it did not know about the PRISM program until June 6 when it was first contacted by the media, and that it does not provide government agencies with direct access to its servers.
I’ve given iOS 7 a lot of hate this morning — just because I hate its icons — so I thought it was about time I showed it some love. It may not look the best, but the next-generation of iOS is packed full of awesome new features that should greatly improve the user experience.
A lot of those were detailed during Apple’s keynote at WWDC yesterday, but some got left out. So here’s ten awesome features in iOS 7 that didn’t get a mention at the event.
Some iOS 7 features Apple didn’t have time to talk about:
• FaceTime audio – you can now make high-quality audio-only calls over FaceTime.
• Activation lock – If a thief wipes a stolen device, guess what? They can’t reactivate that iPhone without the original Apple ID that was used to remotely wipe it.
• Phone, Message and FaceTime blocking – You can block people who just won’t let go. Fantastic!
• Notification Sync – Your notifications now sync across all devices! Yes!
Apple has this morning added a new iPod touch to its online store that does away with the rear-facing iSight camera in an effort to be cheaper. The device also has just 16GB of internal storage — half that of the regular iPod touch — but it is $70 cheaper at $229.
During a Q&A session at D11 last night, Tim Cook was asked whether Apple would ever port any of its apps to rival platforms like Android or Windows Phone. His response was somewhat surprising; Cook said that Apple wasn’t against porting apps and services to other platforms — if it made sense.
The only problem is, Cook doesn’t believe that it does make sense.
Since it was revealed that FaceTime over Cellular was coming to iOS 6 last summer, AT&T has been gradually rolling out the feature to different segments of its subscriber base.
At first, you had to be on a “Mobile Share” plan, and then it was opened up to LTE iOS devices on a traditional tiered plan. Back in January, AT&T gave everyone access except subscribers with grandfathered unlimited plans.
Now FaceTime over Cellular on AT&T will be available to all iOS device owners, including those with unlimited data, by next month.
While the rear camera in the iPhone continues to improve by leaps and bounds — and we can expect the iPhone 5S to continue that trend — the front FaceTime camera improves at a far more glacial pace. In an age of selfies, the iPhone 5’s front facing camera isn’t that much better at offering the sort of fidelity of resolution necessary to deeply inspect our blackheads and pores than the iPhone 4 was.
That’s probably about to change though. Omnivision — maker of the iPhone 5’s front-facing camera sensor — have just announced the OV2724, which crams a full 1080p sensor (or 2MP, compared to the current camera’s 1.2MP sensor) into a tiny cube small enough to go into the next iPhone. And it even shoots at 60 frames per second and offers some impressive dynamic range to boot.
It’s going into production this summer. With decent yields and some luck, that should make it ready for the iPhone 5S when it lands in fall.
Source: Omnivision
Via: Gizmodo
This Cult of Mac Deals offer is for Boom, a sweet little Mac app that both boosts your Mac’s volume and equalizes and enhances its sound. Boom seamlessly integrates itself with your Mac so all you have to do is adjust the volume as you wish. As for the deal….we’ve got it here for just $4 for a limited time.
Nope, it’s not just you: iMessage and FaceTime are experiencing issues this morning, with loads of users on Twitter (and, for that matter, my girlfriend) reporting problems. Yesterday, iMessage and Facetime also reported a number of issues. Jeez, Apple, get it together.
Source: Apple
Having a hard time sending iMessages to friends recently? You’re probably one of those that are affected by the current iMessage and FaceTime outage.
Word of the outage quickly spread across Twitter this afternoon that users are experiencing outages with iMessage. A FaceTime outage quickly followed and Apple just updated its support page to acknowledge the service outage.
We’ll let you know once things are back on.
Update: Looks like everything is back up and running.
Apple has posted two new iPad ads to its official YouTube channel that highlight the device’s expansive app catalog. Called “Alive” and “Together,” the videos use the iPad and the iPad mini to showcase some of the 300,000 apps available through the App Store, including iBooks, GarageBand, iPhoto, FaceTime, TED, and more.
I’ve never given much thought to Apple’s FaceTime icon, but it really doesn’t make any sense. Like seriously, what is the trapezoid on the right? It can’t be the lens because there’s a lens in the box. Is that the back facing camera and the triangle trapezoid is the front camera?
It’s supposed to be an old video camera glyph with the lens superimposed, but it’s so redundant that it still doesn’t make any sense for FaceTiming purposes.
The FaceTime icon should probably look something like this instead:
AT&T has been dancing around its FaceTime restrictions for several months now. Before iOS 6 even went public, it was discovered that the carrier would block FaceTime calls over a cellular connection at its own discretion. AT&T later confirmed that users would have to be on one of its new shared data plans.
Public outcry caused AT&T to then backtrack and extend the feature to anyone with a tiered, traditional data plan and a LTE device. That still didn’t cut it. Now AT&T has updated its policy again, and subscribers with grandfathered unlimited data plans are the only ones still left out in the cold.
So, Facetime over cellular data networks has been available to some AT&T unlimited data customers since late November.
What about you? Is your iPhone able to use this much-anticipated feature? How do you know? Well, read on, and we’ll show you.
Happy Thanksgiving! This year to observe the holiday we asked each of our writers to tell us a bit about the things they are most thankful for in 2012: specifically, the Apple product, app, service, third-party accessory and person they most relied upon and were grateful for this year. All through the rest of the day, we’ll be posting these thanksgiving observances. Here’s Cult of Mac Social Media Editor Buster Heine’s list of the things he’s most thankful for this year. You can find the rest of our Thanksgiving Smorgasbord entries here.
AT&T has notoriously been stingy, which made it no surprise back in August when they announced that they would only allow subscribers on Shared data plans — and not grandfathered plans — to utilize the new FaceTime over Cellular feature in 2016.
Call it an early Christmas present, call it a change of heart, but AT&T has now opened up FaceTime over Cellular to grandfathered unlimited data plans.
A couple of days ago, Cult of Mac reported that Apple had been successfully sued by an internet security software company, resulting in a $368.2 million damages award due the patent holders. Apparently, that award sum just wasn’t enough, as VirnetX has filed another complaint, claiming that Apple willfully infringed four patents.
As if another suit isn’t enough of a craziness, these are the same exact patents that were involved in the first suit. This time, the suing company says, they complaint includes the iPhone 5, the iPad mini, and the latest iPod touch, products that were not yet released when the initial complaint was filed.
AT&T received a lot of negative attention in the press when it announced that it would restrict the use of FaceTime over cellular on Apple devices running iOS 6. Instead of letting anyone use the video chat feature no matter the device or data plan, AT&T decided to keep FaceTime limited to customers with new Mobile Share plans. This meant that traditional data plan customers, including those with grandfathered unlimited data, were out of luck.
Today AT&T announced a change to its FaceTime over cellular policy, and things are looking better for iPhone 5 and LTE iPad owners on tiered data plans.
Shortly before unveiling the iPad mini last week, Apple announced a new fourth-generation iPad — just 7 months after it released the third-generation iPad. In addition to an improved FaceTime camera, faster Wi-Fi, and Apple’s new Lightning connector, the device comes with the latest A6X processor. But is it a worthy upgrade over its predecessor?
Well, if performance is important to you, then yes, it is.
When Apple holds a press event to announce its latest gadget, the vast majority of us are frantically refreshing our favorite websites in an effort to keep up with the news as it’s breaking. It’s not often we get to watch the event live.
But sometimes, Apple treats us to a live video feed. And it’s doing that today for the much-anticipated iPad mini event.
Apple has released a new digital user guide for the fifth-generation iPod touch, which was announced alongside the iPhone 5 back in September. The 138-page eBook covers “everything you need to know” about the device, and is available to download now — for free — from the iBookstore.
In addition to this, the new iPod touch has now received its first benchmarks, which reveal it’s packing an 800MHz dual-core A5 processor.
We’ve all been itching to get our hands on iOS 6 since it got its first unveiling at WWDC back in June, and today, three months after that announcement, the software finally gets its public debut. Apple’s packed a ton of new features into this update, including some major new features like Map and Passbook, plus some enhancements to existing apps and features, such as new Siri capabilities and a VIP inbox in Mail.
Apple’s been promoting some of these features on its website, but there are tons you may not have heard about. With that said, here’s your comprehensive guide to everything that’s new in iOS 6.
Apple has finally released iOS 6 to the public, more than three months after the software was first previewed at WWDC. It brings more than 200 new features to the iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch, including Apple’s brand new Maps and Passbook apps, Facebook integration, FaceTime over cellular, enhancements to Siri, Mail, and Phone, and lots, lots more.
When Apple releases iOS 6 tomorrow, it will finally allow users to make FaceTime calls over 3G and 4G data connections. But AT&T has decided — unlike most other carriers — that it’s going to charge its customers extra to take advantage of the feature. Understandably, this has annoyed a lot of people.
So much so that the Free Press, Public Knowledge, and the New America Foundation’s Open Technology Institute have warned AT&T that they will be filing a complaint with the FCC against the carrier for violating network neutrality rules.
We’re all excited to see what the iPhone 5 has in store for us later today, but it may not be the only new iOS device worth celebrating. One analyst believes the iPod touch will also get its “biggest upgrade ever,” one that adds a 5-megapixel camera, a GPS, a 4-inch display to match that of the new iPhone, and much more.
