iPhone News

Wow, Reuters pulls Phil Schiller ‘no budget iPhone’ story. Umm… Now what?

Here's something for naysayers to chew on: Reuters, the respectable news gathering organization, Friday morning issued a clarification stating it had withdrawn the story that was originally published under the headline "Apple exec dismisses cheaper iPhone as a market share grab — report". It's not clear what prompted Reuters to rescind its report sourced from an interview Apple's marketing honcho Phil Schiller gave to the Shanghai Evening News.

iDB also cited that Chinese newspaper interview, in which Schiller reportedly claims that “despite the popularity of cheap smartphones”, a so-called budget “will never be the future of Apple’s products”. It's unclear why Reuters has now distanced itself from Schiller's denial concerning the so-called iPhone mini project.

Managing Editor Matthew Panzarino of The Next Web has verified with Apple that it’s an official interview and Reuters relayed his claim. Later yesterday, however, the news organization updated its original interview story after the Shanghai Evening News made "substantial changes to its content", but didn't give the specifics.

Friday morning, Reuters retracts its story altogether. It's an interesting turn of events no matter how you look at it, one that raises new questions. Like, why would Reuters risk its credibility by pulling the Phil Schiller budget iPhone story, despite the supposed confirmation from Apple? So... What do you make of this?

Cut the Rope gains a new Steam Box of 25 levels

Red hot UK developer Chillingo has refreshed its popular physics-based puzzler, Cut the Rope, with a brand new Steam Box containing 25 levels. The charming game invites you to feed candy to your little monster.

Released two years ago, it's been downloaded 250 million times across platforms. With this new update, which is free to those who've purchased the game, Cut the Rope now sports a whopping 325 levels spread across thirteen boxes and Chillingo is promising more to come. Just like Angry Birds, Chillingo has been constantly adding new content to Cut the Rope with free content packs.

Rovio also yesterday updated its Angry Birds Space game with 30 new aquatic levels and while I'm a huge fan of the series, I must admit I've been feeling a little Angry Birds fatigue lately so this Cut the Rope update should keep me busy. It's very entertaining and I love its charming characters and crisp graphics. If you haven't already, I urge you to at least check out a out free demo version...

Apple wins Technology and Engineering Emmy Award

Apple was presented with a Technology and Engineering Emmy Award last night during a special reception in Las Vegas. The annual event honors innovation in broadcast technology and recognizes companies and individuals whose breakthroughs have a significant effect on TV engineering...

Apple’s Chinese New Year Gift Guide now live

Apple is more focused on China now than it's ever been before. Tim Cook is actually in the country this week, meeting with high-level government officials and the chairman of the world's largest carrier, China Mobile.

The company also just published its new Chinese New Year Gift Guide. It features Apple's top picks for products and accessories, and can be seen in its China, Hong Kong, Singapore and Malaysia web stores...

Beats CEO spent years trying to convince Steve Jobs to do a music service

This is pretty interesting. Former chairman of Interscope Geffen A&M and Beats Audio CEO Jimmy Iovine recently sat down for an interview to discuss the popular headphone-maker's upcoming streaming music service, Project Daisy.

During the conversation, Iovine talked about his relationship with Apple, and more specifically Steve Jobs. And he said that he spent at least three years trying to convince the then-CEO to do a subscription-based streaming music service...

Nearly 50% of Verizon’s data traffic travels over LTE

iPhone 4s

Although LTE may not be available in some corners around the world yet, it's certainly taken the US by storm. Three out of our four largest carriers have live LTE networks, and the fourth one, T-Mobile, will have one up shortly.

In fact, Verizon, who was first to market with LTE technology back in 2010, has its 4G network lit up in close to 500 markets. And the company says that it's now seeing nearly 50 percent of its data load travel over that network...

The Daily Recap – Jan 10, 2013 edition

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=27ycSRmT4vw

Welcome to The Daily Recap for January 10th, 2013. Watch our video for a quick look at some of the top stories from the day in less than two minutes. If you missed out on any of today's big news, this is a great way for you to get caught up fast.

For your convenience, you'll also find links to all of the stories listed in today's recap inside...

On budget iPhone…

Just a quick thought here on this less-pricey iPhone meme. Per reports, Apple's marketing boss Phil Schiller uncharacteristically responded with a statement to Shanghai Evening News in order to poke holes in the rumor that was beginning to pick up considerable steam. He claims that "despite the popularity of cheap smartphones", such a device "will never be the future of Apple’s products".

But it's an ambiguous dismissal (it's translated from Japanese) and it does't outright deny whispers of Apple internally exploring the idea. His words just don't tell the whole truth. Plus, Apple has a history of lying to the media. The company often makes bold denials, only to refute its own rebuttal by doing exactly what it's said won't do. If Android is anything to go by, an affordable iPhone could easily make a huge difference...

Rumor: Apple evaluating Retina screens for the next iPad mini

According to a new rumor out of Taiwan, Apple is already testing display panels for the second-generation iPad mini. With LG Display and AU Optronics already suppling panels for the current-generation tablet, Apple is thought to add a third company to the mix, Foxconn's subsidiary Shenzhen Century Science & Technology (SCST). For the iPad mini 2, Apple is considering SCST's panels with Retina-class resolution, which are based on One Glass Solution (OGS) technology. These panels have reportedly been sent to Apple for testing, indicating the Cupertino firm is in the exploration stage where it evaluates competing solutions before locking suppliers for the second-gen iPad mini...

‘Pig Dipper’ update adds 30 new aquatic levels to Angry Birds Space

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TCPD3z6iWWE

Rejoice, Angry Birds fans. Just like clockwork, Rovio has updated its Angry Birds Space game with an ambiguously titled Pig Dipper episode bringing thirty new galactic-aquatic levels to your iPhone, iPad, iPod touch and Android devices. This episode introduces a new planet called Splash that features pigs in boats - how bizarre is that?.

Also look for strange aquatic extraterrestrial life and water-based physics allowing for some nice trick shots. The game adds power-up specific leaderboards and amuses with the stuff like inflating the pigs with Pig Puffer and creating black holes with Space Egg, to name a few. I wonder if the giant fish is the boss...

Cook on new products, China Mobile, retail and why he loves China

Apple's Tim Cook is on his second China tour since becoming the CEO. Cook has attended meetings in Beijing with government officials, he visited Apple stores and met with China Mobile, the world's top carrier with 700 million subscribers, to talk "matters of cooperation" amid intensifying rumors of a possible iPhone deal with that carrier.

Apple's chief also confirmed that the cellular version of the iPad mini will arrive on the mainland in late January and talked business and discussed wide-ranging topics with the Chinese media on Thursday, here are some choice quotes...

Google releases a brand new iPhone application, Coordinate

Google has just release a brand new application for the iPhone on the App Store. Dubbed Coordinate, it's a workforce management tool aimed at business users that the company says will improve the efficiency of your mobile teams. The Mountain View, California-headquartered search Goliath explains that by getting real-time visibility into where teams are and what jobs they are doing, "work can be allocated in a smarter, more efficient way" using the mobile Coordinate app. The software is targeted at businesses so it doesn't work with consumer Google accounts...