Earlier this month we told you that California inventor Richard L. Ditzik was suing Apple, claiming its iPhone infringed on one of his patents. Well this week, the Cupertino company won the case against the 70-year-old electrical engineer.
Bloomberg is reporting that Apple was found not guilty of infringing on Ditzik's so-called 'smartphone patent.' A jury in Los Angeles made the call yesterday, completely rejecting the claim by NetAirus Technologies—Ditzik's shell company...
Rumors have been circulating for the past few weeks that China Mobile is on the verge of launching its LTE network next month. And it looks like the reports were true, as the news has been confirmed this week by state-run news outlet Xinhua.
This is big news for a couple of reasons. For one, this will be the country's first major rollout of 4G. And two, it means Apple will finally be able to start offering its two latest iPhone models on China Mobile, as they support its TD-LTE standard...
Popular accessory-maker Incipio announced a new version of its Atlas iPhone case yesterday, called the Atlas ID. As the name suggests, the case is Touch ID-friendly and it provides the same protection from water and other elements as the previous Atlas model.
This is fairly significant, as there aren't many waterproof cases available for the iPhone 5s that work with the handset's built-in fingerprint reader. Most element-proof offerings cover the Home button completely, rendering the Touch ID feature effectively unusable...
It's hard to imagine how someone could call a person who stole your iPhone 'considerate,' but that's exactly how some media outlets are referring to a certain Chinese pickpocket. The thief took a man's iPhone during a shared cab ride.
The reason why some are calling the criminal considerate is that shortly after stealing the handset, he mailed the owner a list of his contacts. And this wasn't simply a computer printout, he hand wrote over 1000 contacts–11 pages worth...
During a summit in San Francisco's Fort Mason on June 27 of this year, Tim Cook spoke to Apple Retail Store leaders about upcoming changes to the company's iPhone marketing tactics. He said he was hoping the changes would help their stores start selling more handsets.
Well here we are, nearly 6 months later, and it looks like the changes have done just that. According to a new survey from Consumer Intelligence Research Partners, the amount of iPhones purchased from Apple stores has increased from 20% to 25% over the past several months...
Remember the absolutely eye-candy re-imagining of Apple’s clunky Messages app in Mavericks, so awesomely done by Ramotion, a Palo Alto, California interface design shop? If not, stop what you’re doing (reading this) and give it a quick look, now. Some of the best UI/UX designers in the world, Ramotion's grown just as sick and tired of Viber's out-of-touch looks as us.
Yours truly used to be a heavy Viber user. Now I no longer care. Why? I'll tell you why: the app's proven itself a really frustrating experience. The soft keyboard fails to honor my system-wide international settings. It crashes a lot. It acts up far too often. As if that weren't enough, Viber's aesthetics fails miserably as a victim of a bunch of poor design choices - so much so that I can't stand using it anymore. Viber really, really needs some serious rebooting.
Ramotion's vision for Viber stunned me by being so much more than a fresh coat of paint, like WhatsApp’s upcoming iOS 7 update (screenies, hands-on video) is shaping up to be. Small wonder: these guys know good interface design so I'm not surprised they've actually gone about re-imagining the whole app experience.
Are you ready to see how Viber's iOS 7 overhaul should, but probably never will, look like? Just hit the jump and feast your eyes on gorgeous renders...
Folks looking to take advantage of the holidays this week by venturing out to their favorite eating spots may want to check out the latest version of Yelp. The iOS client was updated today with a new feature that allows you to make restaurant reservations from within the app.
The new feature is the direct result of Yelp's summer acquisition of SeatMe, a tech start-up that developed a solution for making online reservations at popular food and drink locations, and reduces the friction between discovering a great place on Yelp and experiencing it...
Apple's given its 'Made for iPhone' (MFi) initiative a nice little kick in the pants by introducing all-new support in iOS 7 for physical gaming controllers (examples: Moga's Ace Power and Logitech's PowerShell), but now the company is looking to give another industry vertical a much-needed boost: the market for hearing aids and associated devices.
According to a new report Monday by Reuters, Apple has worked closely with Copenhagen, Denmark-based GN ReSound on the first batch of iPhone-connected devices for hearing-impaired customers.
The new gear is much more compact than before and taps the 2.4-gigahertz band using Bluetooth 4.0's low-energy mode. The hardware works in tandem with special iOS software not only to improve one's hearing, but to also stream music and double as a two-way headset for receiving phone calls...
Microsoft has built up quite the library of iPad-bashing TV spots. And now that it's buying out Nokia's mobile hardware business, it's getting them in on the gag. Today, Nokia launched a new TV commercial taking potshots at Apple's popular tablet.
The ad is supposed to be about Nokia's new Lumia 2520 slate, which launched last week, but you only see it for about 5 seconds at the very end of the 1 minute and 18 second-long video. For the other 72 seconds, it shows a user defending his iPad...
Last week, Patently Apple shed light on an Apple patent filed with the United States Patent and Trademark Office which covers the various aspects of its Touch ID fingerprint scanner, a new feature exclusive to the iPhone 5s.
The invention is entitled Capacitive Sensor Packaging and details collapsing the full fingerprint maps into a hashed, encrypted data securely stored on the A7 chip's Secure Enclave. It's curious that the patent's main inventor, Wayne Westerman, developed Multi-Touch technology at Fingerworks, a startup Apple snapped up in 2005.
In another massive 612-page patent application Apple filed with the World Intellectual Property Organization in May 2013, the iPhone maker indicates it's been researching mobile screens with Touch ID embedded, along with trackpad capabilities allowing for panning of on-screen content by moving your finger over the Touch ID Home button...
Good news gamers, Chair Entertainment is offering Infinity Blade free as a limited time Black Friday special this week. The game, which normally retails for $5.99, supports a wide range of iOS devices dating back to the iPad and iPhone 3GS.
This was the first mobile game powered by Epic’s Unreal Engine 3 technology, giving it gorgeous visuals and a fully 3D castle realm. And for those that haven't played it yet, this is your chance to see where the Infinity Blade series began...
A punditry consensus has been forming for some time that Apple of California is planning on entering the mobile payment space with a service of its own. Conventional wisdom has it that such a product would tap into more than half a billion iTunes accounts with credit cards on file.
In between Apple's purchase of smart sensor maker AuthenTec and the company's iWallet shopping app patent, Apple has done little to indicate that a branded mobile payment solution is in the works, until today.
An Apple job listing now indicates in black and white that Apple's management is in the process of hiring experts who will "help build a next-generation payment platform" to help its retail "enter new markets"...