Apple’s free app of the week: Power Hover

Apple on Thursday updated its App of the Week promotion with the game Power Hover. This means that for the next 7 days, you’ll be able to pick up the hit minimal, gravity-defying title on both iPhone and iPad for free—a savings of $4.

In Power Hover, players get to defy gravity and enjoy the freedom of controlling their own hoverboard. You must do your best to avoid various hazards and collect energy as you navigate your way through a desolate, robot-ruled world.

Bloomberg: Apple’s Project Titan prioritizes autonomous driving amid new hirings

Apple's rumored electric vehicle project has shifted its focus towards autonomous driving systems although that shouldn't be interpreted as Apple abandoning efforts to design its own vehicle, Bloomberg reported today.

After bringing former hardware chief Bob Mansfield back from retirement to run its Project Titan initiative, Apple has now hired BlackBerry and Ford talent to help perfect its secret self-driving software.

Last month, revenue from U.S. sales of wireless headphones surpassed that of wired ones

If you need the definite proof that Apple's rumored decision to remove the 3.5mm headphone jack from the next iPhone is based on some actual real-world numbers, here's one. According to the latest stats for the month of June, published Thursday by research firm NPD, revenue from sales of wireless headphones in the United States during the month of June beat that of their wired counterparts. Revenue from wireless headphones accounted for 54 percent of U.S. dollar sales and 17 percent of unit sales in the headphone category.

WSJ: Apple’s “hard-nosed” negotiation tactics have “alienated” cable providers

Apple's stubbornness and “hard-nosed” negotiation tactics have backfired and “alienated” cable providers, who say the firm is a cheapskate in terms of paying for digital content, reports The Wall Street Journal. For years, Apple's been persuading cable firms to let it sell their cherry-picked programming in a skinny TV bundle of its own for about $30 per month vs. $80+ for traditional cable subscriptions.

Pegatron, another iPhone manufacturer, cuts back on hiring due to assembly line automation

Taiwan-based Pegatron Corporation, which has long been Apple's secondary product manufacturer after Foxconn, has begun automating production lines where gadgets for other companies are being assembled. As a result of increased automation at the Shanghai plant, the company cut back on new hires, said its chairman TH Tung according to Chinese media quoted Thursday by DigiTimes.

Genuine-looking iPhone 7 Lightning-to-3.5-mm audio adapter caught on video

As you know, the next iPhone is expected to ditch the 3.5mm analog audio jack for wireless headphones, powered by Bluetooth, and wired ones, driven by Lightning. Now, certain sources are adamant that the handset may ship with a Lightning-to-3.5-mm audio adapter in the box so that folks could continue using their existing audio accessories.

Today, we get another glimpse of the claimed adapter in a set of leaked images and an accompanying high-resolution video. This latest leak came on Thursday via Vietnamese blog Tinhte.vn, which claims to have received the adapter from a Foxconn factory.

Samsung enjoys its most profitable quarter in two years thanks to strong Galaxy S7 sales

Samsung this morning announced results for the second calendar quarter ended June 30, and the numbers are encouraging despite global smartphone sales cooling down. The South Korean conglomerate's mobile division reported “substantial earnings improvement” buoyed by strong sales of its flagship Galaxy S7 and Galaxy S7 edge flagship smartphones.

The data is newsworthy given strong competition Samsung has been facing on the low-end from Chinese rivals like Xiaomi and Huawei and on the high-end from Apple's iPhone. This is the best earning result Samsung has posted in two years, by the way.

Here’s why PC notebook makers, aside from Apple, have been slow to adopt USB-C

When it debuted in March 2015, Apple's twelve-inch MacBook has ushered in an era of USB-C, then new high-speed connectivity option from the USB Implementers' Forum with a reversible, ultra-thin plug resembling Apple's proprietary Lightning port. In fact, the MacBook was the first notebook to incorporate a USB-C connection as its power port, completely replacing Apple's own MagSafe charging.

PC notebook vendors around the world were supposed to follow in Apple's footsteps and readily adopt USB-C across their products—and some have—but too many of them were, and still are, less keen to adopt USB Type C connections on their products. The reason for this is two-fold: design and cost considerations.

iPhone 7 pre-orders to kick off on September 9?

Last week, revered leakster Evan Blass of @EVLeaks predicted that Apple's next iPhone would launch on the week of September 12. He later clarified that he was referring to the iPhone 7's retail release—which should happen on Friday, September 16—not the launch event. Following up on his claims, Blass wrote today on Twitter that Apple will kick off pre-orders for the device on Friday, September 9.