Apple

WSJ: Samsung moving up Galaxy Note 5 launch to August to beat iPhone hype

Cody Lee ∙ July 10, 2015

Samsung is moving up its Galaxy Note 5 launch to August this year in hopes of beating the new iPhone hype in September, reports The Wall Street Journal. Until now, the South Korean company has leveraged the annual IFA Berlin conference to debut the big-screened handset.

Citing a source familiar with the matter, The Journal says the move is part of a bid to give the Note some breathing room before mid-September, when Apple typically unveils its new iPhones—a product that often dominates both the news cycle and consumer attention for weeks.

New iPods could be announced next Tuesday

Christian Zibreg ∙ July 10, 2015

If you're buying an iPod music player these days, hold off your purchase for just a little bit longer as Apple is thought to be unveiling new iPod touch, iPod nano and iPod shuffle models next Tuesday.

According to French blog iGen.fr, a pretty reliable source of Apple leaks, the iPod touch could get a substantial refresh in the form of a 64-bit processor.

The iPod nano and shuffle models are said to be receiving only cosmetic changes.

Apple launches two new “If it’s not an iPhone” ads

Jeff Benjamin ∙ Updated May 7, 2018

Today, Apple launched two new iPhone advertisements touting the device's uniqueness and how much its customers love them. In the first ad, entitled Hardware & Software, Apple big-ups the way the iPhone's hardware and software are both created by the same company.

In the second advertisement, entitled Love, Apple touts how 99% of iPhone customers love their devices. It then ends both advertisements with a similar tag line: If it's not an iPhone, it's not an iPhone.

Apple posts five new ‘Shot on iPhone 6’ videos

Cody Lee ∙ Updated January 28, 2016

Apple on Thursday added five new clips to the World Gallery films section of its 'Shot on iPhone 6' microsite. The company launched the Shot on iPhone 6 campaign in March, showcasing beautiful photos and videos taken with its latest smartphone.

The new videos are very similar to the previous entries, in that they are 15 seconds long and accompanied by an analogous soundtrack. They were captured by photographers from around the world, and show what the iPhone 6 is capable of.

‘Card Wars – Adventure Time Card Game’ goes free as Apple’s App of the Week

Cody Lee ∙ July 9, 2015

Apple has just named Cartoon Network's "Card Wars - Adventure Time Card Game" its App of the Week for this week. This means that from now through next Thursday, you’ll be able to download the card combat game for free—a solid savings of $4.

In Card Wars, players are tasked with commanding an army of awesome warriors to destroy their opponent's forces. You can collect new cards to level up your creatures, spells and towers, or choose to fuse them together to make them more powerful.

Readdle’s excellent Spark email client gains bulk actions, setting for remote images and more

Christian Zibreg ∙ July 9, 2015

Readdle's Spark, my new favorite go-to mobile email client, received a big update in the App Store today. Although you couldn't tell it from a minor version number change (1.0.1), the new version does make the app much better while fixing a plethora of user-reported issues.

For starters, you can now delete and archive emails in bulk, a tremendous productivity boost. Next, Spark now consumes less energy, which is always a good thing.

You can now empty your Trash with a single tap, as opposed to selecting multiple messages before hitting the Delete button, like before.

Security advocates will definitely appreciate a new setting to disable loading of remote images, which protects you from spammers while keeping data usage under control.

On the downside, today's update has removed a pair of useful features due to mixed reviews, though Readdle assures us it may bring them back “someday.”

Facebook rolls out richer News Feed controls with a new ‘See First’ option and more

Christian Zibreg ∙ Updated November 9, 2016

Facebook on Thursday introduced and updated set of controls letting you finally tell the service precisely what you want to see in your News Feed, as opposed to relying to Facebook's mysterious algorithm which surfaces posts its servers think you want to see while demoting others it flagged as uninteresting.

The reworked controls now permit you to actively shape and improve your personalized News Feed experience.

You also get more control over what you see in your News Feed via a brand new 'See First' option designed to help you prioritize whose posts you don't want to miss to ensure you'll always find them at the top of your News Feed.

Endless snowboarding odyssey Alto’s Adventure receives its first major content update

Christian Zibreg ∙ July 9, 2015

Alto's Adventure, an endless snowboarding odyssey for iOS unlike any other, has received its first major content update after making its App Store debut in February of this year.

Available free to existing users, the 'Workshop' update includes support for Apple's 64-bit processors, iOS's low-level graphics frameworks called Metal, along with a bunch of other new things.

Alto's Adventure 1.1 also packs in six new languages and a bunch of fun new items available via the in-game workshop, such as helmets, llama horn, wingsuit timer and more.

T-Mobile rolls out unlimited talk, text and 4G LTE data in Canada and Mexico

Christian Zibreg ∙ Updated August 4, 2016

Deutsche-Telekom owned T-Mobile on Thursday announced another Un-Carrier move in the form of a brand new service, called 'Mobile Without Borders' and available starting July 15 in select Canadian and Mexican markets.

T-Mobile's U.S. business and individual customers with Simple Choice postpaid and prepaid plans will be able send and receive unlimited phone calls, text messages and use 4G LTE data, to and from Mexico and Canada, at no additional cost.

Facebook reportedly planning its own music-streaming service

Christian Zibreg ∙ July 9, 2015

Apple Music, Spotify, Rdio, Pandora and other popular music-streaming services could be faced with competition from Facebook as the popular social network is reportedly planning a streaming-music product of its own, Music Aally reported Thursday.

Facebook has been testing ad-supported native videos with a small group of media partners, but that was just a prelude to discussions with major labels about “getting into music” with a full-on subscription product.

A look at Apple’s new, more secure 2-factor authentication in iOS 9 and El Capitan

Christian Zibreg ∙ Updated October 14, 2018

At WWDC, Apple has made a promise to step up security with native two-factor authentication in iOS 9 and OS X El Capitan. Before today, the feature was unavailable on iOS 9 betas prior to beta 3.

But with today's release of iOS 9 beta 3, the new system has made its debut, with some users offered the option to upgrade their Apple ID to use the new two-factor authentication.

Here's what you need to know about this new system, how it increases your security and how it's different from Apple's existing two-step verification process.

iOS 8 adoption flat at 84 percent, but iOS 8.4 matches Android KitKat and Jelly Bean adoption

Christian Zibreg ∙ Updated February 27, 2018

A history of iOS 8 usage paints a rosy picture of more or less steady adoption of Apple's latest and greatest mobile operating system. But according to latest data published Wednesday on Apple’s dashboard for developers, iOS 8 adoption rates have remained flat at 84 percent of iPhone, iPod touch and iPad devices in the wild, as measured by the App Store on July 6, 2015.

Two weeks ago, the same 84 percent figure was captured by Apple, indicating that the number of users who have upgraded from previous iOS editions to iOS 8, or bought a new device with iOS 8 pre-installed, wasn't enough to move the needle.

More interesting than that, however, is the latest data point by analysts Mixpanel which basically tells us that the recently-released iOS 8.4 software update now accounts for 40 percent of all iOS usage, just one week after release.