Apple

Apple may have purchased an eye tracking technology company called SensoMotoric Instruments, MacRumors believes. The report is based on legal activity discovered through a shell company and Apple attorney Gene Levoff.

Expand
Expanding
Close

Apple is opening registration for its annual Camp program for kids at Apple Stores starting today. Three tracks for kids 8-12 this year include sessions on iMovie, GarageBand, and coding. Apple has also introduced new Today at Apple offerings with new Kids Hour sessions covering robotics, filmmaking, and illustration for ages 6-12.

Expand
Expanding
Close

Yesterday one of the first screen protectors allegedly for iPhone 8 leaked claiming to show the device’s expected design and other features. It was made by case manufacturer Olixar, and today the company is one of the first to reveal an entire line of cases for the upcoming iPhones. It’s also started accepting preorders for the cases that it says depicts both the front and back of the iPhone’s new design accurately.

We’re told by the company selling the cases, MobileFun, that Olixar has created them using “information and schematics they’ve acquired through their factories and contacts in the far east.”

Expand
Expanding
Close

The big reveal today at Apple’s Worldwide Developers Conference in San Jose was the unveiling of the company’s much anticipated standalone Siri speaker device officially called ‘HomePod’.

Expand
Expanding
Close

Apple releases two reports each year on how customer data is requested by governments and private parties as part of its privacy effort. While the reports are generally fairly general, the latest report released this week includes a notable change from previous versions…

Expand
Expanding
Close

Qualcomm has released its quarterly earnings results and acknowledged the ongoing legal dispute with Apple in detail. Specifically, Qualcomm says Apple’s suppliers have “withheld ~$1 billion from their payments” over royalties for sales activity in the December quarter alone. Qualcomm has also provided a wide range of guidance for its next fiscal quarter because of the ongoing legal battle…

Expand
Expanding
Close

While this could turn out to be nothing at all, there’s an interesting detail on Apple’s system status page: the Apple Online Store is scheduled to go down tomorrow from 12:00 am to 5:30 am PT. Apple’s online store typically goes offline for several hours ahead of product refreshes.

Expand
Expanding
Close

Apple’s iTunes Store is celebrating International Women’s Day 2017 by dedicating the entire Movies and TV Shows pages to titles and collections featuring actresses, directors, producers, TV series, films, and documentaries. IWD’s official theme this year is ‘#BeBoldForChange’ and focuses on the goal of a gender inclusive world.

Expand
Expanding
Close

It’s never a great experience when iCloud goes down and Apple services are affected, but it always helps to know it’s not just you having issues. Apple typically acknowledges ongoing outages on its System Status site with a brief description of the problem, and this week Apple has updated its design to emphasize last known issues.

Expand
Expanding
Close

An interesting tidbit from Apple history recently made its way from a Seattle Goodwill to the web. In a blog post, a user by the name of vadermeer shared a handful of internal memos, progress reports, and other various notes from within Apple during 1979 and 1980 and some of it is surprisingly accurate today…

Expand
Expanding
Close

Apple appears to be planning to further expand its data center presence in Northern Nevada according to a newly surfaced building permit. An application that was filed and withdrawn on February 2 points to a $50 million data center codenamed Project Isabel with Apple listed as the client.

Expand
Expanding
Close

Each year, Harris Polls runs rankings of the top 100 “most visible” companies operating in the United States, ranking them by their reputation among customers who participate in the survey. This year, in a survey of 30,000 customers, Apple has taken the 5th spot.

Expand
Expanding
Close

Smart home accessories are priced at a premium over basic appliances which makes HomeKit an expensive hobby. Homebuilders are offering HomeKit accessory packages for new home buyers with a $4,000 starting price so that’s one ballpark estimate, but how much would it cost to retrofit your existing home with HomeKit hardware?

Expand
Expanding
Close

Apple’s BeatsX wireless earphones (stylized as Beats^x) are now available to purchase from Apple.com after an extended delay following their introduction in September. Like AirPods, BeatsX earphones use Apple’s special W1 chip that makes pairing and switching between Apple devices nearly instant.

Apple.com is quoting short shipping times for the black and white BeatsX, with delivery for Valentine’s Day. Apple’s website is also selling the newly-announced gray and blue colors with longer 2-3 week wait times.

Expand
Expanding
Close

Update: A full video of Cook’s appearance at the University of Glasgow can be seen below. It’s not great quality, but it’s something.

Apple CEO Tim Cook today received an honorary degree from the University of Glasgow, in the UK. The ceremony (video below) was then followed by a brief interview where Cook described the institution as ‘one of the finest universities in the world’. He also condemned the Donald Trump immigration order, saying that ‘if we stand and say nothing, we become a part of it’.

Watch Tim Cook receive his degree after the jump as well as his answers to questions about coding in school, Steve Jobs, Apple’s role in activism and more …

Expand
Expanding
Close

United Airlines is the latest company to work with IBM through their MobileFirst partnership with Apple to develop a suite of enterprise iOS apps. IBM says the enterprise iOS apps will be analytics-driven and run on over 50,000 iPhones and iPads used by “front-line employees” of United Airlines.

Expand
Expanding
Close

Apple has hired software engineer Greg Duffy for an unknown role at the company, according to The Information. Duffy is the co-founder of Wi-Fi camera firm Dropcam which was bought by Google in 2014 after being independent for five years.

Expand
Expanding
Close