Apple

Apple investigating claims of ‘serious’ labor rights violations at Pegatron

New York-based China Labor Watch has accused Apple manufacturing partner Pegatron of 'serious' labor violations this morning. In a new report out today, the organization claims the device-maker is committing of 86 labor rights violations in three of its factories.

Among the infractions listed in the filing are the employment of underage workers, insufficient employee wages, and poor working conditions. In all, the watchdog group says that it found Pegatron to be guilty of 36 legal infringements and 50 ethical infringements...

SVP of Technologies Bob Mansfield no longer on Leadership team, Apple confirms

Bob Mansifeld, Apple's Senior Vice President of Technologies, has been removed from the company's Leadership web page without explanation.

This is newsworthy because rarely does it slip Apple to pull corporate description of a high-ranked executive without announcing a leadership change beforehand.

Hopefully, Apple wouldn’t just take his description page down without an announcement so this could be some sort of a slip up, though the chances of that are very slim.

Update: a Reuters reporter has an official statement from Apple...

Huge collection of forgotten 80s Apple ads surface on YouTube

If you're looking for a way to kill your Sunday afternoon, you might try checking out the YouTube channel EveryAppleAds. The channel, as the name implies, hosts a massive collection of TV commercials for Apple products from the past few decades.

These guys have been steadily posting ads over the last several months. But just within the past week or so, they've started adding vintage Apple television spots from the 1980s that you've either forgotten about, or more likely, never knew existed...

How Samsung is beating Apple in China

Reuters:

Apple Chief Executive Tim Cook believes that "over the arc of time" China is a huge opportunity for his pathbreaking company. But time looks to be on the side of rival Samsung Electronics Co Ltd, which has been around far longer and penetrated much deeper into the world's most populous country.

Some great insights in this article where the authors break down how Samsung is outdoing Apple in China. In shorts, it all comes down to the different strategy Samsung adopted in China: multiple devices with low to high prices, creating "perceived innovation", a large retail presence, and maintaining good relationships with carriers.

New Nexus 7 vs iPad mini comparison [Video]

The new Nexus 7 has touched down in stores, and it's a pretty compelling little device at $229 for the base 16GB Wi-Fi unit. It's much improved over its predecessor in nearly every facet, and will likely become a thorn in Apple's side as time goes on without a significant iPad mini (Retina) refresh.

With that all said, the iPad mini still has a few distinct advantages over Google's latest offering. Its main advantage is readily apparent, as its screen size completely dwarfs the smaller screen of the Nexus 7. Interestingly enough, the bezel on the older iPad mini is still smaller on all four sides when compared to the Nexus 7. Lastly, the iPad mini is still thinner than the Nexus 7. By themselves, all of these advantages may not amount to much in the eyes of consumers, but when compared side by side, they all add up for a pretty intense debate regarding which is superior.

Make no mistake though, in terms of sheer power and screen prowess, this is no competition. After comparing the two, running benchmarks, playing games, etc, it's evident that Apple has a legitimate competitor on its hands when it comes to the low end of the tablet market. Check inside as I compare both the new Nexus 7 and the iPad mini in our hands-on video walkthrough.

Apple says Motorola asked for more than 12 times going rate to license its patents

As Apple continues to hold unfruitful settlement talks with Samsung, it seems to have reached an impasse with Motorola as well. The iPad-maker has submitted a new court filing, accusing the Google-owned company of overcharging for its standards essential patents.

The complaint lodged against Motorola was filed with the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit today, as part of Apple's opening brief in an appeal effort. Apple wants the court to force Motorola—which is Google at this point—to license its technology at a fair price...

Max Payne and Grand Theft Auto games are 40% off until July 30

Don't declare the weekend yet before taking a closer look at a nice little promotion the merry fellows at Rockstar Games have put together for us, avid iOS gamers. I'm sure you're aware that Rockstar makes some of the finest games around for the iPhone and iPad.

Earlier this week, the UK-based developer kicked off a time-limited promotion where its Max Payne first-person bullet-time shooter is half price now. Also 40 percent off: three Grand Theft Auto Games for the iPhone and iPad, including the awesome Vice City.

Your download links are right below...

Dev Center is back!

Apple's Dev Center has been knocked down for more than a week following an attempted breach last Thursday that exploited an iAd Workbench vulnerability, warrantying an emergency shutdown.

Seven top priority sub-systems have gone back up this afternoon (scammers won't like this), with eight more to follow suit soon.

I'd checked the portal out briefly prior to publication and nothing seemed out of ordinary. Most major sub-systems seem to be working now, with current iOS and OS X betas available for downloaded as if nothing had happened.

New betas of iOS 7, Xcode 5 and OS X Mavericks should become available after Apple brings the remaining systems online. It was just yesterday that Apple updated us on the outage and posted a brand new Dev Center System Status page...

Apple taps U.S. university professors to advise Supplier Responsibility program

As part of its never-ending efforts to improve working conditions at overseas plants where its devices are being assembled, Apple has enlisted help of eight professors from top U.S. universities to establish an academic advisory board for its Supplier Responsibility program.

The academics will provide guidance and advice to improve working conditions within Apple's worldwide supply chain and help provide "safe and ethical working conditions wherever its products are made"...

Kutcher on channeling Jobs, loyalty, technology, startups and tweeting troubles

Actor Ashton Kutcher in a recent appearance on The Tonight Show with Jay Leno spoke about passing on an opportunity to meet Apple's late co-founder Steve Jobs, whom he likened to "the Leonardo da Vinci of our generation". As you know, Kutcher channels Jobs in the upcoming bio pic titled jOBS.

And as the studio's promo machine kicked into high gear ahead of the upcoming August release, Kutcher sat down with The Verge editor Joshua Topolsky to share his thoughts on the technology landscape, his portrayal of Apple's co-founder, investing in tech startups, re-tweeting versus RT-ing and lots more...

Steve Ballmer admits Surface defeat

Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer Thursday played Captain Obvious, telling Microsoft workers the company may have overestimated demand for its Surface tablets. Really? The revelation comes only after the software giant announced a nearly $1 billion writedown after slashing Surface prices.

Not willing to take such things as a sign to go off and do something else, Ballmer and operations chief Kevin Turner reportedly told a closed-door town hall meeting a new Surface is now being tested...

U.S. agency offers code-of-conduct for apps collecting user data

Are you concerned about the personal data collected by various mobile apps? A U.S. government agency feels your pain, sort of. The National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) has issued a draft of a voluntary code of conduct it hopes will improve user privacy.

Although the NTIA is an arm of the same government rifling through your emails and other Internet activities, the agency head modestly called the voluntary guidelines a "seminal milestone" in protecting mobile privacy...