Apple

You can now embed Instagram photos and videos in web pages, here’s how

Christian Zibreg ∙ July 10, 2013

Instagram's insistence on requiring people to use its mobile apps exclusively never really sat with me. In a time when people can embed all kinds of content in web pages, here we are unable to embed our Instagrams in blog posts.

But times are changing fast. After Twitter's Vine service came along, we soon gained ability to embed those five-second recordings pretty much everywhere (here's how).

And just as Instagram video became a reality, I suspected it won't be too long before we could embed 15-second Instagram clips across the web. Indeed, web embeds for Instagram photos and videos launched today and we've got the full details below the fold...

Wall Street prepares for flat year-over-year growth from Apple

Ed Sutherland ∙ Updated April 18, 2016

If Wall Street was caught flat-footed by Apple's lower earnings back in April, analysts are preparing for more bad news for the third quarter. Apple is expected to announce lower quarterly revenue and sales, prompting one expert to slice thirteen percent off his previous forecast for the third quarter. Although a $5.4 billion reduction in expectations might seem dramatic, it is actually rosier than a review of what Apple may announce July 24...

Pirate Bay co-founder touts ‘secret’ messaging app

Ed Sutherland ∙ Updated January 26, 2016

So, you want to order a pizza or text sweet nothings to your significant other without the NSA listening? The co-founder of The Pirate Bay, known for swapping illicit copies of movies and software, has a secret - literally. Peter Sunde is raising funds for Hemlis (Swedish for "secret"), a new kind of messaging app for iOS and Android he and his team are working on. They boldly claim the software is designed to keep out the most prying eyes, such as those from the U.S. government's PRISM program...

Apple’s content king Eddy Cue also attending 2013 Sun Valley retreat

Christian Zibreg ∙ July 10, 2013

The Sun Valley tech and media conference is kicking off today. Apple's CEO Tim Cook arrived to Idaho-based Sun Valley Resort earlier today and was unexpectedly accompanied by Senior Vice President of Internet Software and Services, Eddy Cue.

More than 300 executives from technology and media companies are slated to attend the annual conference, which runs through Friday and is hosted and wholly independently funded by private investment firm Allen & Company.

Cook was in attendance of last year's retreat, but this time around he's brought Cue with him, perhaps to kick the show up one more notch and cut lucrative new content deals...

T-Mobile to ‘upgrade upgrades’ with new Jump unlimited upgrade plan

Christian Zibreg ∙ Updated October 12, 2018

T-Mobile is holding a media event later today at 2:30PM Eastern / 11:30AM Pacific to announce "our boldest moves yet." A leaked memo suggests the Deutsche Telekom-owned telco is readying a new unlimited upgrade plan for smartphones. "We've upgraded upgrades," the memo reads. Called Jump, the idea is to allow customers to upgrade when they actually want to instead of waiting the usual two-years until their contract expires. I've included more tidbits after the break...

Apple found guilty of orchestrating e-book pricing conspiracy

Ed Sutherland ∙ July 10, 2013

A court Wednesday found Apple had conspired to increase the prices of e-books, setting a separate trial for damages.

In a 159-page decision, U.S. District Court Judge Denise Cote wrote that "Apple played a central role" in the conspiracy, which the company flatly denied.

The government has charged Apple with working with five publishers together to undercut Amazon's control of the market. In response to the verdict, some watchers opined that the government playing so openly into the hand of a monopolist like Amazon may reduce competition...

Deus Ex: The Fall arrives on the App Store

Christian Zibreg ∙ Updated October 12, 2018

Square Enix originally planned to unleash Deus Ex: The Fall on iOS tomorrow, but in a change of heart the publisher has released the game on the App Store a day early (not that we're complaining). Based on Square's Deus Ex cyberpunk franchise, the game takes place after the Deux Ex: The Icarus Effect novel. This action-based RPG is another premium triple-A release on the App Store, featuring console-grade graphics with unique design style and full-blown Deus Ex experience...

Google shows off new Google Maps features, coming soon to iOS

Christian Zibreg ∙ July 10, 2013

As announced on Google's official Lat Long blog yesterday, the company has begun rolling out a major update to Google Maps that was first showcased at Google I/O 2013 in May. The company has issued a promotional clip to detail some of the new features, now available to Android 4.0.3+ users as a free download on the Play store. Although the new build hasn't hit the App Store yet, Google said it will be soon available for iOS 6+ devices...

Apple asks ITC for stay on sales ban affecting older iOS devices

Cody Lee ∙ July 10, 2013

Apple has asked the United States International Trade Commission (or ITC) to stay a ban on sales of older iPhone and iPads while a court considers an appeal. The company filed a motion on Monday arguing that the ban, which is the result of a Samsung patent infringement complaint, will 'sweep away an entire segment of Apple's products...'

iOS 7 smooths out iPhone apps on non-Retina iPads

Christian Zibreg ∙ July 9, 2013

With each passing day we learn more about the subtleties and under-the-hood tweaks that have made their way into the third beta of iOS 7. Today, I want to talk about the iPad's 2x compatibility mode. Hasn't it always bothered you how iPhone apps run pixel-doubled on your iPad mini and other non-Retina iPad devices, resulting in jagged corners and edges and just all-around pixelated appearance?

You can tick that issue off as iOS 7 Beta 3 added a new feature that makes every iPhone app look very clear running on an iPad 2 or iPad mini, in a manner reminiscent of a tweak for jailbroken devices by Ryan Petrich, called RetinaPad...

Microsoft’s fourth iPad-bashing ad touts Windows 8 multitasking

Christian Zibreg ∙ Updated January 26, 2016

iPad-bashing is becoming the recurring theme for Microsoft as the once dominant force in computing struggles to reclaim its relevancy in the post-PC world. Nowhere is this more evident that in Microsoft's inability to hit the ground running with Windows 8 on tablets.

With a few notable exceptions, you can tell an also-ran has run out of ideas when it puts together a television commercial advertising its contender against the industry leader.

Sometimes the strategy of piggy-backing on the top dog's popularity can do wonders (case in point: Samsung), but often times it just backfires. The latter appears to be happening with Microsoft's anti-iPad ads. I'll let you be the judge of that: the latest iPad-dissing 30-second spot sporting two baseball scouts is below the fold...

Massive outage affects one in three iMessage users

Christian Zibreg ∙ July 9, 2013

We thought Apple by now has figured its customers have come to expect better than this, but here we go again: in a massive outage earlier today, the company's messaging service for iOS and Mac devices went offline for nearly one-third of its installed user base, by Apple's own admission.

Now, I know iCloud now has more than 300 million accounts (Tim Cook labeled it “the fastest growing cloud service ever” at WWDC last month). Likewise, I'm aware that with 800 billion iMessages sent and more than 7.5 trillion push notifications received, Apple no doubt has the scale and computing power to drive iMessage.

But something seems to be amiss here. The more I think of it, the more I tend to be bothered by the frequency and sheer reach of these outages. At the very least, I'm beginning to question Apple's ability to cope with such an exponential growth of its cloud service...