Apple

AT&T opens up its Watson speech engine via SDK for iOS and Android

Christian Zibreg ∙ Updated January 22, 2018

Realizing Apple and Google are moving swiftly to mainstream speech recognition on mobile devices, U.S. carrier AT&T today announced that it is opening up its own Watson speech engine to iOS and Android platforms via a software development kit (SDK), now available on the AT&T Developer website.

Much like Apple's Siri or Google Voice Actions in Android (and Google Now), Watson takes input, analyzes it, performs one or more services and returns a result. Input can be audio files, speech, gestures, face recognition and text. Here's a video of Watson in action...

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New report reiterates why Apple needs China Mobile deal

Cody Lee ∙ July 9, 2012

A new report is out this morning regarding the current state of the smartphone market in mainland China. With three providers on the world's 20 largest carriers list, and more than a billion cell phone users, the country is quickly become a battleground for smartphone-makers.

The new data comes from Needham & Company's Charlie Wolf. The analyst issued his quarterly report on the smartphone industry today, and it contains both good news and bad news for Apple's handset business...

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iWatch concept with Retina display and FaceTime

Christian Zibreg ∙ Updated January 25, 2016

Ever since Steve Jobs joked about iPod nano wrist straps during the September 2010 presser ("one of our board of director members is gonna clip it on to an armband as a watch"), there has been no shortage of futuristic iWatch concepts, ranging from ADR Studio's James Bond-like thing to Italian designer Federico Ciccarese's Star Trek-like wearable device with curved glass we told you about last week.

If you can't get enough of these, you'll appreciate this one by Swedish designer Anders Kjellberg who earned our respect with a remarkable iWatch vision featuring FaceTime (quite logical, isn't it?), Retina display (why not?) and a whole bunch of other nice-to-haves...

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Apple to bring iOS 6 Maps to Macs?

Christian Zibreg ∙ July 9, 2012

Having ditched Google Maps in favor of its in-house mapping solution in iOS 6, Apple could now be extending iOS 6 Maps to Macs running OS X Mountain Lion. This would seem logical and inevitable given Apple recently confirmed the use of OpenStreetMap data in iPhoto for both iOS and Mac. Apple conceivably has the maps.apple.com subdomain set up, which currently redirects to the iOS 6 section on its website...

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The Woz speaks up on Microsoft’s Surface tablet

Christian Zibreg ∙ Updated April 4, 2018

The outspoken Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak usually has an opinion on many things, be it Siri and her reliance on a network connection, Facebook IPO (he said he'd invest regardless of opening price), patent war fallout, the iPhone 4S battery life and Android march and what not.

His latest comment from a a press conference at Entel Summit in Chile last week concerns Microsoft's Surface tablet, unveiled with much fanfare on June 18...

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Apple begins taking down sites that sell UDID activations

Christian Zibreg ∙ Updated April 15, 2024

Apple has begun cracking down on unofficial sites that sell UDID activations to folks who aren't registered Apple developers, letting them download and install iOS and OS X betas on their devices, a strict violation of Apple's agreement with developers.

In fact, a developer's $99 a year membership in the iOS Developer Program can be terminated if pre-release software is provided to non-authorized folks. Apple isn't just revoking access to developers that sell UDIDs, it's now going after sites that advertise UDID activations, filing DMCA requests to hosting firms.

As you can imagine, financial incentives outweigh risks and punishment involved. Savvy "entrepreneurs" have found the business of selling unauthorized access to iOS betas worth tens of thousands of dollars. You don't need an office, staff, a telephone line or even a business name - just a small upfront investment, a web page advertising your "service" and spare time on your hands to get the word out...

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Amazon launching new Kindle Fire with better display, camera in Q3?

Christian Zibreg ∙ Updated August 13, 2012

Online retailer Amazon has reportedly informed select developers that it will be launching a new version of its Kindle Fire tablet some time in the second half of this year, possibly in the third quarter, in time for the holiday shopping season. The new Fire allegedly has a much improved display running at HD-ready 1280-by-800 pixels, matching Google's Nexus 7...

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Apple pulls products from Environmental Assessment Tool registry

Cody Lee ∙ Updated January 25, 2016

Despite Apple's efforts — utilizing large solar farms at all of its major campuses, and offering a recycling program for used products — the company continues to catch heat over its effect on the environment.

And this latest move certainly isn't going to help its case. Word is that the company has just pulled all of its products from EPEAT's (Electronic Product Environmental Assessment Tool) green-friendly registry...

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Apple accused of stealing noise reduction technology

Cody Lee ∙ Updated January 25, 2016

Apple is no stranger to the defendant's chair in the courtroom. It's been sued a number of times over the years, for a number of reasons — most recently over alleged patent infringements involving Siri.

But this new lawsuit from Noise Free Wireless seems a bit more serious. The small Silicon Valley company is claiming that Apple intentionally stole critical noise reduction technology from them...

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On Apple’s plans for a mobile payment system

Cody Lee ∙ Updated January 25, 2016

There have been a few rumors bouncing around the Apple community for the last two years that just won't die out. Among them is the iPhone-embedded, iTunes-based mobile payment system. Pundits believe that Apple, and its 400 million iTunes accounts, has the ability to kickstart the struggling mobile payment industry.

Apple itself added fuel to the fire last month when it unveiled its new Passbook application. It acts like a digital wallet of sorts, allowing users to store event tickets, gift cards, and even creditcards on their iOS devices. But it's still not the end-all mobile payment solution we were all expecting. At least not yet anyway...

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