News

Apple selects sci-fi Wild West shooter Space Marshals as its new Free App of the Week

Christian Zibreg ∙ April 14, 2016

Like on any given Thursday, Apple today refreshed the App Store to reflect new software arrivals and promotions.

In addition to highlighting apps whose proceeds will go to the World Wildlife Fund until April 24 through the new 'Apps for Earth' section, Apple's editors have slashed Pixelbite's award-winning sci-fi action adventure, Space Marshals, as the App Store's new Free App of the Week.

This universal iPhone, iPod touch and iPad game normally retails for $4.99, so do yourself a favor and save a few bucks by grabbing this great freebie right now.

Apple close to signing footballer Raheem Sterling as its global ambassador ahead of Euro 2016

Christian Zibreg ∙ April 14, 2016

Apple is allegedly “close to agreeing a deal” to have Premier League Manchester City F.C. and England national football team's Raheem Sterling become a global ambassador for the global Apple brand, British tabloid The Sun reported Thursday.

Apple wants Sterling to help launch its Euro 2016 promotional campaign and will be paying him a reported £250,000 per year, or about $355,000 per year, to act as its brand ambassador.

‘Apps for Earth’ App Store promo sends 100% of proceeds from select App Store purchases to WWF

Christian Zibreg ∙ Updated October 16, 2018

Apple has partnered with the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) on a brand new App Store initiative that will have the world's leading organization in wildlife conservation and endangered species receive 100 percent of the proceeds from select App Store purchases until April 24, just in time for Earth Day.

Descriptions of participating apps were updated this morning to reflect that “Apple and WWF are working together to protect life on our planet”.

Universal search on Apple TV has gained support for finding CBS shows

Christian Zibreg ∙ April 14, 2016

Apple continues to add more content sources to the universal search capability of the fourth-generation Apple TV. Last week, for example, it added Starz content to the Apple TV's universal search.

And now, owners of the set-top box who installed CBS's tvOS application can take advantage of Siri to find such CBS shows as “Big Bang Theory”, “NCIS“, “Supergirl” and others, just by using their voice. Apple's support document was updated yesterday to reflect the addition of CBS to the universal search lineup for the fourth-generation Apple TV.

Safari to gain support for audio/video chats via WebRTC standard without needing a plugin

Christian Zibreg ∙ April 14, 2016

Apple is hard at work on adding support to its Safari browser for cross-platform audio/video communications capability that won't require any special plug-in, enterprise computing blog No Jitter learned yesterday.

The Cupertino firm's reportedly decided to incorporate support for the open-source WebRTC project, a real-time video and audio standard originally created by Google.

Microsoft's Edge and Mozilla’s Firefox browsers have adopted this technology recently, which lets web developers create messaging applications that run in a browser and offer two-way audio/video communications capability without a plug-in.

Samsung and other suppliers secure orders for second-generation Apple Watch parts

Christian Zibreg ∙ April 14, 2016

According to Taiwanese trade publication DigiTimes, which knows this stuff inside out, Apple's Asian suppliers are now starting to receive orders for the components that will be used in a second-generation Apple Watch.

Samsung, along with other overseas manufacturers like Advanced Semiconductor Engineering, have reportedly secured component orders for the Apple Watch 2, which one analyst believes could be up to forty percent thinner and debut at Apple's annual developers conference this summer.

Apple is ending support for iTunes Allowances on May 25

Christian Zibreg ∙ Updated August 30, 2017

Apple is ending support for iTunes Allowances, a tremendously useful feature that allowed parents to send a monthly iTunes Store credit to their kids or just about anyone so that they can make purchases from the iTunes, App or iBooks Store.

Apple broke the news in a support document on its website, which was updated this morning to reflect that support for iTunes Allowances will be ending on May 25, 2016. It has also informed customers of the upcoming change via email blast.

You can now watch Vine clips without having to manually scroll through individual posts

Christian Zibreg ∙ Updated October 16, 2018

A new Watch button was rolled out yesterday to Vine's iPhone application in the App Store, allowing you to enjoy videos in channels and on profile pages without having to manually scroll through individual posts. It's basically a whole new way to watch Vine as you can now kick back and view the entire story of any channel or watch an account from start to finish.

You can now attach Google Drive/Dropbox files and GIFs from Tumblr to emails in Yahoo Mail

Christian Zibreg ∙ April 13, 2016

The failing Internet pioneer Yahoo today announced a major update for its mobile email application.

Bumped to version 4.3, Yahoo Mail for iOS introduces new third-party integrations allowing you to add cloud files directly from your Google Drive or Dropbox to your messages as attachments, or add animated GIFs to your emails from Tumblr, which is another Yahoo-owned property.

The compose interface makes it easy to choose among Tumblr's most popular GIFs of the moment, search for that perfect GIF or browse GIF categories including Love, LOL, Cute, Cheers, Fail, Happy and more. GIFs are added to your emails as attachments.

Reliable Japanese blog reaffirms Smart Connector, no headphone jack and other iPhone 7 rumors

Christian Zibreg ∙ April 13, 2016

Mac Otakara, a fairly reliable Japanese-language blog, learned from its own sources this morning that the rumors pertaining to some of the more controversial iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus features are in fact true. No headphone jack? You bet! That CAD design rendering supposedly sourced from Apple manufacturer Catcher Technology which gave us a closer look at a trio of suspicious-looking dots on the back of the phone? Yup, that's a Smart Connector! Wait, what?

First Safari Technology Preview update drops

Christian Zibreg ∙ Updated October 24, 2017

Safari Technology Preview, a special version of Apple's desktop browser designed to give developers their first look at upcoming new features and future enhancements, today received the first official update since its release two weeks ago.

The new build packs in a host of fixes and improvements for Safari's layout and rendering engine, CSS, JavaScript, Web APIs, Accessibility, Web Inspector and other facets of the app.

Snapchat stickers can now move in tandem with objects and people in your videos

Christian Zibreg ∙ April 13, 2016

Snapchat today announced a very cool object-tracking feature that works with live video, in real time.

Now available in Snapchat for Android and coming soon to the company's iPhone application, users can optionally attach a sticker to an object or a person in the frame and Snapchat's algorithm will handle the rest and do all the heavy lifting for you, Engadget reports.

You could add colorful scribbles to your photos and videos before but these were static. By pairing stickers with specific parts of your recording, the Snapchat algorithm can make them move, rotate and change their size to follow the object it's attached to as it moves around the frame.