Ben Lovejoy is a British technology writer who started his career on PC World and has written for dozens of computer and technology magazines, as well as numerous national newspapers, business and in-flight magazines. He has also written several books, and creates occasional videos.
He is old enough to have owned the original Macintosh. He currently owns an M1 Max 16-inch MacBook Pro, an M1 13-inch MacBook Air, an iPad mini, an iPhone 16 Pro Max, and multiple HomePods. He suspects it might be cheaper to have a cocaine habit than his addiction to all things anodised aluminum.
He’s known for his op-ed and diary pieces, exploring his experience of Apple products over time, for a more rounded review:
He speaks fluent English but only broken American, so please forgive any Anglicised spelling in his posts.
He gets a lot of emails and can’t possibly reply to them all. If you would like to comment on one of his pieces, please do so in the comments – he does read them all.
A Taiwanese report says that Apple had told its suppliers to boost initial iPhone 14 production from 90M units to 95M, an increase of more than 5%.
In response, lead iPhone assembler Foxconn is said to have substantially increased its recruitment bonus for iPhone workers …
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A scandal surrounding the use of NSO’s Pegasus spyware by Israel’s police has provided a rare look at early screenshots of the app in action when remotely accessing a compromised smartphone.
A series of screenshots show the spyware doing everything from displaying the contents of WhatsApp messages to activating the camera to spy on the owner’s surroundings …
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We’ve seen the results of a whole bunch of benchmarks measuring M2 Mac speeds in the latest MacBook Air and MacBook Pro models. We can now add web browsing speed into the mix – for whatever that’s worth.
On the one hand, web browsing is probably the single most frequent activity on a Mac. On the other, the speed of the browser itself pales when compared to your connection speed, and the speed of the webserver at the other end. There’s a third real-life factor too …
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US consumers are downloading fewer mobile games this year than last, thanks to a combination of factors, including the end of COVID restrictions, and rapidly-rising inflation.
Of 14 mobile games genres tracked by app analytics company Sensor Tower, only one saw increased downloads in the first half of 2022, and there were steep declines in most others …
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Apple has reportedly warned suppliers about a further act of Chinese revenge for this week’s controversial visit to Taiwan by the speaker for the US House of Representatives, Nancy Pelosi. China’s response may disrupt shipping of iPhones and/or their components.
China has expressed its extreme displeasure at the visit, applying a whole raft of measures – ranging from imposing sanctions on Pelosi and her family, to live-fire military exercises within Taiwan’s waters. Now a further measure of revenge has been revealed which is reportedly disrupting iPhone production …
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Chinese smartphone shipments fell dramatically in the first half of the year, according to official data, and look set to fall to a 10-year low by the end of this year.
The news sheds some light on Apple’s first-ever iPhone discounts on its official Chinese website …
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Update: Megan Mohr has since written a blog post explaining more about how Apple handled the incident.
A report today cites 15 different women accusing Apple HR of mishandling serious misconduct allegations, and more than half of them say that the company retaliated against them for bringing the complaints.
One of the allegations related to a sexual assault committed outside of work hours and premises. This can be a tricky area for companies – but the human resources manager responding was said to have been entirely dismissive, likening the attack to “a minor traffic accident” …
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A European court ruling could result in ad tracking rules becoming much stricter in future. The court essentially set a precedent that inferred data is still personal data.
This means that if a company can work out things about you, then that information is protected every bit as much as personal data you provided directly …
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AAPL investors need to see inside the company’s “$70 billion black box,” say analysts – a reference to Apple lumping together all its Services revenue into one figure, despite the fact that it effectively covers ten different businesses with the company.
The issue is vital to understanding the level of the threat posed to Apple by antitrust regulations in respect of the App Store, they say …
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The controversial Nancy Pelosi Taiwan visit reportedly included meeting with TSMC chairman Mark Liu to discuss the CHIPS Act in relation to the chipmaker’s Arizona plant. The plant is expected to make chips for Apple.
China is extremely unhappy about the visit, and has responded by announcing live-fire military exercises in waters close to the island …
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A former cellphone store owner made an estimated $25M by unlocking T-Mobile phones using stolen credentials. He now faces a possible prison sentence of up to 165 years …
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AppleCare+ theft and loss cover is now available in France, Italy, and Spain. Previously, these countries only offered cover for accidental damage.
This means that customers in these countries can now choose between two different versions of Apple’s insurance policy …
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GaN chargers have been around for a while now, but it’s only relatively recently that the price of the gallium nitride (GaN) has fallen the the point where they are becoming mainstream. The main benefit is high power in a small package.
The UGreen 200W GaN charger claims an astonishing 200W, while the OneWorld65 shows just how compact a Mac travel charger can be …
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A firm of lawyers that successfully negotiated two Apple antitrust settlements is once again taking on the Cupertino company.
Hagens Berman, which won a $560M e-book settlement, and more recently a $100M App Store one, is again targeting Apple’s 15% or 30% cut of iOS app sales …
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Security researchers have discovered a developer error in more than 3,200 mobile apps, which make possible full or partial Twitter account hijacks.
In the worst examples, affecting around 320 apps, it enables an attacker to gain complete control of a Twitter account …
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A growing number of people have been reporting Studio Display speaker problems, and the good news is that it’s not a hardware problem. The bad news is that there’s no fix available as yet.
Apple has acknowledged the issue, and while the company doesn’t yet have a solution, the fact that it has been identified as a software issue suggests that a future update will resolve it …
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The scale of subsidies for the TSMC Arizona plant are in doubt as it becomes clear that the $52B CHIPS Act grants won’t go far, and Intel is angling to take the largest slice of the pie.
TSMC has previously said that the subsidy for American chip manufacturing was “vital” to its Arizona plant, which has been expected to begin US production of Apple’s A-series and M-series chips from 2024 …
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The expected differences between iPhone 14 base and Pro models keep growing. A new report today says that not only will ProMotion displays be limited to the Pro models, but even the pixels themselves will reportedly be higher-quality in the top-tier models.
Display supplier Samsung is reported to be using their highest grade of OLED materials for the iPhone 14 Pro and Pro Max, while the two base models will use lower-grade materials …
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Apple Pay web support has been made available to third-party browsers in iOS 16 betas. The change has been confirmed to apply to Chrome, Edge, and Firefox.
Apple has likely made the quiet change in response to upcoming antitrust legislation that seeks to outlaw the practice of forcing browser developers to use WebKit …
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In the latest bizarre twist to the patent infringement battle between Apple and Ericsson, the Cupertino company has responded to the iPhone ban in Colombia by claiming that its human rights have been infringed.
The company requested emergency relief in Colombia just days after being warned by a US judge not to abuse the court system there by filing emergency requests for non-emergencies …
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Apple union-busting techniques have been described as “traumatic” by employees in the first Apple Store to unionize, Towson, Maryland.
They accuse Apple of failing to live up to its own human rights policy, and say that various threats were made to workers intending to join the union – including one who was told that the immigration assistance offered by the company could be withdrawn …
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The long-awaited Apple Brompton Road store opening took place yesterday afternoon, bringing a third flagship Apple Store to London, after Covent Garden and Regent Street.
Since I had a 360/action cam to test (review to follow), I thought I’d give you a 360-degree video tour, supplemented by some photos provided by Apple …
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Yesterday saw the announcement of Apple Q3 2022 earnings. While it was technically a record quarter, the analysts were right that this would be the point at which Apple’s pandemic-boosted growth would tail off.
Mac revenue was down 10% year-on-year, iPad dropped 2%, and wearables (Apple Watch and AirPods) fell 8%. Services continued to rise, of course, but the only good news on the hardware side was the iPhone …
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It might seem a little early for a virtual reality antitrust intervention, in a field which is as yet still a niche interest, but the FTC is taking no chances. It has moved to block Meta’s planned purchase of VR fitness company Within.
The aggressiveness of the move makes it seem likely that Apple will face similar bars on acquiring VR companies to assist its upcoming Apple Headset product …
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