Opinion: don’t hold your hopes high for next-generation Apple TV this year

Christian Zibreg ∙ January 28, 2015

Between the bigger iPhones, new and faster iPads, Apple Pay, the Watch and latest versions of iOS and OS X, the Apple TV project appears to remain on the back burner for now.

Whether or not the decision is meant to prevent spreading Apple too thin and keep its engineers focused on products that matter over a longer arc of time is anyone's guess.

Now, I'm not pretending that I'm privy to Cupertino's inner workings.

But the fact remains that, for the time being, Apple seems content with simply stuffing the set-top box with new content sources. Yesterday, for example, Apple TV owners saw the addition of Sports Illustrated’s 120 SPORTS network.

Of course, Tim Cook & Co. must do a whole lot more than simply keep adding new channels to the box. Fans, on the other hand, have been keeping their fingers crossed for an Apple TV hardware upgrade sporting a major OS update and new features like DV-R, live TV functionality, an app store to download and play games on it with the use of ‘Made for iPhone’ controllers.

Watchers are now hoping for an Apple TV refresh at WWDC 2015. But if I were you, I wouldn’t hold my hopes high for a major hardware revision to the set-top box in 2015, and here’s why.

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TodayRemote is a widget with iTunes playback controls

Lory Gil ∙ Updated April 30, 2018

With Apple’s Remote app, you can access your computer’s iTunes playback controls so you don’t have to get off the couch to switch songs. But, unlocking your iPhone, opening the app, and selecting your device is still just way too much work.

TodayRemote lets you control playback of iTunes right from the Lock screen of your iPhone. You’ll never have to work for your music again.

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Facebook rolls out new Super Bowl experience

Christian Zibreg ∙ Updated May 16, 2016

Super Bowl XLIX is upon us and Facebook wants to beat out Twitter to the punch and become the epicenter of conversation. Building on the more than 50 million people who joined the conversation on Facebook during last year's Super Bowl, the social networking service today announced a brand new experience at facebook.com/superbowl.

Replacing Twitter as your Super Bowl companion begins with official posts from the NFL/NBC and related stories by teams and individual players. You'll also find live scoring updates, real-time reactions, posts from your friends (with “watching Super Bowl XLIX” in their status updates) and more, all neatly organized in one place.

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Photos for Mac goes from “early 2015” to “available at a later date”

Christian Zibreg ∙ January 27, 2015

Photos for Mac, a missing piece in the iCloud Photo Library puzzle, has just gotten delayed until later this year.

Last summer, Apple took us by surprise saying it would cease development of Aperture and transition users to Photos for Mac, a new app that was supposed to replace iPhoto on OS X Yosemite as well. But Yosemite came and went and native Photos Mac app was nowhere to be seen.

Apple then gave us a vague new shipping date: “early 2015.” However, the updated wording in this support docs now lists the app as being “available at a later date.”

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More than 25 million Apple TVs sold to date, though growth may be slowing

Christian Zibreg ∙ January 27, 2015

Forgetting for a minute that Apple obliterated expectations by announcing a truly fantastic 74.5 million iPhone sales while earning an astounding $18 billion in profit, how did the company's hobby project, the Apple TV, do?

As you may have guessed, Piper Jaffray's Gene Munster got that question in during the Q&A section of Apple's conference call with analyst, to which CEO Tim Cook responded by confirming his company has managed to move about 25 million set-top boxes to date.

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15 interesting points from Apple’s Q1 2015 earnings call

Cody Lee ∙ January 27, 2015

Apple announced its financial results for its fiscal first quarter of 2015 this afternoon, and the numbers are staggering. The company sold 75.4 million iPhones and earned $74.6 billion in revenue, smashing both Wall Street expectations and its own records.

We’re just finishing up the conference call, where Tim Cook and other members of the executive team discussed Apple’s performance, and offered up some insights into its future. And as usual, we’ve rounded up the 15 most interesting points for you below.

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Apple patches several vulnerabilities used by TaiG jailbreak in iOS 8.1.3

Cody Lee ∙ Updated April 30, 2018

Apple has posted a support page on the security content of the just-released iOS 8.1.3, confirming fears that the firmware effectively breaks the TaiG jailbreak tool. In the page, the company credits the TaiG Jailbreak Team for discovering four vulnerabilities patched in the update.

Among those vulnerabilities was a hole in the symbolic linking mechanism of AppleFileConduit, which allowed access to protected parts of the filesystem, and a state management issue, which gave local users the ability to execute unsigned code. Keep reading for a full rundown.

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Apple’s record-smashing Q1 2015 earnings: 74.5M iPhones, 21.4M iPads, $74.6B revenue

Cody Lee ∙ Updated April 30, 2018

Apple has posted its [fiscal] first quarter earnings report for 2015 this afternoon and they are incredible. The company says it sold a staggering 74.5 million iPhones and recorded $74.6 billion in revenue during the holiday-driven 3-month period.

Both of the numbers beat even the most optimistic Wall Street estimates, and are all-time records for the company. To give you an idea of how big this is, Apple sold 51 million iPhones and earned $57.6 billion in the exact same quarter last year.

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