News

Microsoft is buying LinkedIn for $26.2 billion

Christian Zibreg ∙ June 13, 2016

Windows giant Microsoft on Monday announced it's purchasing business-oriented social networking service LinkedIn for a cool $26.2 billion. Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella said in a message to troops that he's been learning about LinkedIn for some time “while also reflecting on how networks can truly differentiate cloud services.” LinkedIn has a network of more than 433 million business professionals, meaning Microsoft would be paying an average of about $60 per user.

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Siri is trolling us ahead of WWDC keynote with vague hints of dark mode in iOS 10

Christian Zibreg ∙ June 13, 2016

Go ahead, pull an iPhone out of your pocket right now, press and hold the Home button and tell Siri to please “turn on dark mode”.

Much to your surprise, instead of responding with a “I didn't quite get that”, “I don't understand” or some such, she'll inform you that “I'm not able to change that setting”.

As noted by AppleInsider, the wording is unusual given that iOS currently contains no reference to any kind of dark mode. Is Apple trolling us ahead of the keynote?

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Metal detectors reportedly being installed at WWDC amid Orlando mass shooting

Christian Zibreg ∙ June 13, 2016

As noted by Workflow co-founder and developer Nick Frey, metal detectors are going up at WWDC ahead of today's keynote, a first for Apple's annual developers conference.

The last-minute security measure is apparently in response to the horrific terrorist attack which saw fifty people shot to death in a gay club in Orlando. Several Apple executives have acknowledged the tragedy on Twitter.

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Hacker demos Flying JB, an iOS 9.2.1 jailbreak of little interest

Sébastien Page ∙ June 12, 2016

Chinese hacker Min Zheng has showed a demo of Flying JB earlier today, a jailbreak for 32-bit devices running iOS 9.2.1 or lower. The video demo shows off an iPhone 5c going through the jailbreak process as well as Mobile Terminal running on the device once jailbroken.

What may sound like exciting news at first is actually nothing to call home about as the limitations and actual usage potential of Flying JB are extremely limited.

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Our pre-WWDC roundup is here, now tell us what’s on your wish list

Christian Zibreg ∙ June 11, 2016

Worldwide Developers Conference, Apple's annual event for people who write apps for its platforms, kicks off with a keynote presentation on Monday, June 13. iDownloadBlog will be providing you with detailed around-the-clock coverage of everything that Apple will present at WWDC.

WWDC is a software-focused event aimed at developers, which doesn't exclude possible hardware announcements. Here's everything we think Apple will announce at WWDC and, please, do feel free to post your own observations and predictions in comments.

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Amazon to take on Apple and Spotify with new streaming music service

Cody Lee ∙ Updated April 17, 2018

Amazon is preparing to launch a new standalone streaming music subscription service, reports Reuters. The tech giant is currently finalizing licenses with labels for the service, and it's aiming for a late summer or early fall launch.

Of course, Amazon already offers a limited music service for free to Prime subscribers. But this new service will cost $9.99 per month and offer a much more competitive catalog, putting it squarely up against Apple Music and Spotify.

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Rumor: Apple to announce Apple Pay for websites at WWDC

Cody Lee ∙ June 10, 2016

Apple is preparing to take on Pay Pal and others by expanding Apple Pay to the web, reports Digital Trends. Citing an anonymous source, the outlet claims that the company will announce that it's launching Apple Pay for websites during its WWDC keynote on Monday.

The report offers up few details about how web-based Apple pay will work, and whether or not it'll be compatible with non-Touch ID devices. The site does say, however, that the service will initially be limited to select retail partners, and it'll be much faster than PayPal.

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Bluetooth 5 to double the speed and quadruple the range

Christian Zibreg ∙ Updated June 17, 2016

Bluetooth Special Interest Group (BSIG) is prepping to announce Bluetooth 5 next week. The next major revision of the popular short-range wireless standard will bring four times the range and two times faster data transfer than the current Bluetooth 4.2 standard, BSIG Executive Director Mark Powell said in an email to Blue Maestro, a United Kingdom health and monitoring company. The new Bluetooth standard will be formally announcement at a media event on June 16 in London.

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Bloomberg: Intel cellular modems will be reserved for AT&T iPhone 7 models

Christian Zibreg ∙ June 10, 2016

Supply chain whispers recently claimed that a significant portion of LTE cellular modems for the iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus would be built by Intel instead of Qualcomm and now Bloomberg is reporting that Intel modems will be actually reserved for AT&T iPhone 7 models.

Qualcomm is expected to remain Apple's modem provider for Verizon and China-bound iPhone 7 handsets. Qualcomm's boss had said he expected a major customer to diversify its supplier base.

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