Apple

Flint adds in-app invoicing, Passbook coupons, card scanning and more

Christian Zibreg ∙ December 10, 2013

Flint is a nice little mobile payment service that lets anyone easily accept and process credit cards on the go.

The service provides an interesting alternative to the likes of PayPal (which revamped its iOS app and just launched a digital gift cards shop) and Square (which just redesigned its credit card dongle).

Flint is cross-platform and fees start at just 1.95 percent.

Today, the company has refreshed its free iPhone application with notable new capabilities, like the ability to scan and redeem coupons using your iPhone's built-in iSight camera. Flint Mobile version 2.0 also lets you create invoices within the app and supports loyalty coupons in the form of Passbook passes...

Apple poaches top radio exec to lead iTunes Radio ad sales

Christian Zibreg ∙ Updated January 26, 2016

In another move meant to capitalize on the success of its free iTunes Radio streaming-music service, Apple's hired a top radio exec as the company preps to offer iTunes Radio to advertisers in 2014 and take the service international, AdAge claims.

Former Cumulus Media Executive Vice President of Sales, Michael Pallad, has now joined Tim Cook & Co. and is now overseeing ad sales for iTunes Radio internationally, according to people familiar with the matter who spoke to AdAge. He will report into the iAd unit, which is led by Apple Vice President and former Yahoo exec Todd Teresi...

iPhone 5s now available within 24 hours from online Apple Store

Christian Zibreg ∙ December 10, 2013

Following reports last week indicating that Apple's iPhone 5s has finally achieved 100 percent availability across Apple's retail stores in the United States, the online Apple Store on Tuesday has updated its shipping times as well.

Web orders for the device are now shipping in 24 hours, another sign that Apple and its suppliers have fully caught up with demand, which is always good news with the Christmas shopping frenzy upon us.

All iPhone 5s models are now being advertised as available to ship within 24 hours, regardless of capacity, color or carrier...

VLC 2.1.2 is out with experimental decoding of HEVC and WebM/VP9

Christian Zibreg ∙ December 10, 2013

VLC, the free cross-platform desktop media player, has been through some turmoil as VideoLan, which manages the project, has undergone reorganization as the multinational development team now spans twenty nations.

The open source media player made its App Store debut back in October 2010 as one of the first iPhone apps that could render media file formats unsupported by iTunes and iOS. Unfortunately, the app got pulled in January 2011 over licensing issues.

The problems came down to the GNU General Public License (GLP) requirements as developer Rémi Denis-Courmont, lead contributor to the VLC project, filed a licensing claim based on the code he had contributed to the project.

Following a two-year hiatus, VLC made its way back into the App Store earlier this summer (you can download it for free). And today, VideoLan has pushed an update to VLC for Mac and Windows desktops, bringing a lot of fixes and a cool experimental decoding of media files in HEVC and WebM/VP9 file formats...

Verizon says it’s nearly fixed LTE issues in New York

Christian Zibreg ∙ December 10, 2013

The nation's top wireless carrier, Verizon Wireless, last month admitted its strained network in major cities such as New York, San Francisco and Chicago was underperforming, with many users experiencing their 4G data throughput dropping to slower 3G speeds.

Verizon yesterday blamed the sub-par network quality on “capacity constraints” and argued these data throughput hiccups are now a thing of the past as the carrier has successfully fixed its network in New York City...

Apple expands iTunes Match to Finland, Norway and other countries

Cody Lee ∙ December 10, 2013

Apple has expanded its iTunes Match service to several new European countries this week. Users in Finland, Denmark, Sweden and other areas are reporting that they have been granted access to the music-mirroring service.

First introduced in late 2011, iTunes Match allows users to match songs from their iTunes libraries to tracks in Apple's cloud. This way they can access their music from any device, without having to spend hours uploading it...

Apple updates ’12 Days of Gifts’ app for 2013 holiday season, opens it to US users

Cody Lee ∙ Updated March 16, 2018

You know it's getting close to Christmas time when outlets start publishing gift guides, and Apple updates its '12 Days of Gifts' application. The 2013 version of Apple's free-download-a-day app went live this evening, ahead of its December 26 kickoff.

Folks in European countries have become accustom to this yearly ritual, but it's never been available to those of us here in the US. I'm happy to announce, though, that this year, Apple has finally opened up the program to iOS users in the United States...

Post-Apple, Scott Forstall said to be traveling abroad, advising startups

Cody Lee ∙ December 9, 2013

Ex-Wall Street Journal tech reporter Jessica Lessin recently launched a new technology news site called The Information. The site promises to provide the inside scoop on technology news and trends, and thus far it's made good on that.

Today the site is out with a report that helps answer the frequently-asked question: "what has Scott Forstall been up to since he was ousted from Apple last fall?" The former iOS Chief has been extremely quiet since he left the company...

Square introduces new card reader developed by Apple’s Lightning plug designer

Cody Lee ∙ December 9, 2013

Square unveiled a new version of its Square Reader accessory today, which is used to input credit and debit cards into the Square app. It says the new Reader is roughly 45% thinner than its predecessor, and is more accurate at reading cards thanks to its new design.

But what makes the new device really interesting is who designed it. According to a report from Wired, Square's new ultra-thin card reader was developed by a team led by Jesse Dorogusker—a former Director of Engineering at Apple and developer of the Lightning plug...

Watch LeAnn Rimes’s latest music vid, shot entirely on iPhone

Christian Zibreg ∙ December 9, 2013

Here's something awesome. The Grammy award-winning artist LeAnn Rimes has tasked her crew with filming the entire video for Gasoline and Matches, a single from her latest album, Spitfire, on Apple's iPhone, the artist has confirmed.

They opted for the Apple smartphone for footage and stop-motion animation because that particular pocket camera is "easy, affordable and portable" versus your average filmmaker's heavy gear. The result is nothing short of astonishing, as Rimes' music video included after the break attests for itself...

If Siri drove a car…

Christian Zibreg ∙ Updated March 19, 2019

Forget Apple's iOS in the Car initiative, or Siri Eyes Free, or even big name car makers rolling out support for iOS mirroring and other hands-free features that tap Apple's iPhone, iPod touch and iPad devices - here comes the ultimate Siri-driven feature (yeah, pun intended).

Introducing Steeri, the world's first driverless car app.

Put together by the Smart Department sketch comedy group, the video humorously depicts what Siri-powered driving might be like. The video is right after the jump so have a look and join us in comments...

Apple Stores to host ‘Hour of Code’ class this week

Cody Lee ∙ Updated January 26, 2016

Interested in learning how to code? Then you may want to stop by your local Apple Store. Apple has joined the likes of Google and Microsoft in participating in the Hour of Code program, and will be hosting free one-hour classes at its stores this week.

The Hour of Code project aims to demystify computer science for students and show them that anyone can learn the basics of programming. And it does this by offering up introductory tutorials that can be completed online, a smartphone or unplugged...