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.
The acquisition of Activision Blizzard could have led to a Microsoft union battle, as some employees recently voted to unionize. However, the a senior exec has stated that the company ‘absolutely supports’ the union.
The apparent attitude of Microsoft toward unions stands in stark contrast to that of Apple …
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Discussions about the role of social networks in the wake of the deadly mass shootings in Buffalo, New York, and Uvalde, Texas, look set to rekindle arguments about end-to-end encryption of private messages.
Politicians weighed in after it was discovered that both Buffalo and Uvalde alleged killers used social media apps to discuss their plans with online groups …
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Some state privacy laws use wording written by tech companies and their lobbyists, says a new report today. A formerly Apple-backed lobbying group has previously been cited as pushing for weaker privacy protection based on this wording.
Tech giants are aiming to push through weak privacy legislation in order to fend off more meaningful requirements, with one state senator admitting that the text of a privacy bill he put forward was supplied by a tech lobbyist …
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Millions of children who used remote learning apps during the pandemic have had their personal data – and even behavioral information – shared with advertisers, says a new report.
This includes apps which students were required to use by their schools, says Human Rights Watch …
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Apple’s iPhone production plans for 2022 are said to be around 220 million units – some 20M lower than the consensus estimates of analysts. It would also represent zero growth on 2021.
The Cupertino company is facing a perfect storm of obstacles in the run-up to the launch of this year’s iPhone lineup …
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Apple Store pay is to be significantly increased as part of the company’s fight against unionization of retail store employees. Starting pay is being increased by almost 50% over 2018 levels.
The move follows an aggressive anti-union video by retail chief Deirdre O’Brien. The video, lasting over six minutes, was almost entirely focused on anti-union messaging …
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Apple tax increases in Ireland and elsewhere were expected to take effect in 2023, but will now likely be delayed until 2024 as a result of slow progress on agreeing a global digital tax deal.
The delay is good news for Apple, whose European headquarters is based in Ireland, where it currently pays a tax rate of just 12.5% …
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Microsoft has revealed what looks very much like an M1 Mac mini clone during its developer conference, Build 22. The device is known as Project Volterra.
The resemblance is more than skin-deep: the machine is ARM-based, and effectively plays the same role as Apple’s Developer Transition Kit (DTK), offered back in 2020 …
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Way back in 2017, a security researcher created a fake apple.com website where the URL looked completely correct. The trick was that the domain he registered used a unicode character that looks like an “a” but is in fact a Cyrillic character.
Browsers were updated to detect this kind of fakery, but it’s far from a simple process – as a new video (below) illustrates …
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iPhone 14 availability is at risk in the worst-case scenario, says a new report today, as preparatory work for production has fallen behind schedule.
Apple and its suppliers are said to be working hard to make up for lost time, but this is proving “challenging” given COVID-19 shutdowns in China …
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We last year saw an Apple patent showing that the company was exploring the possibility of creating a titanium iPhone, iPad, and MacBook – and another one has been granted today.
Specifically, today’s patent grant describes a process for creating a textured surface on titanium, and one of Apple’s illustrations depicts an Apple Watch, iPhone, iPad, and MacBook …
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A domestic violence app aims to provide help to victims of intimate partner violence (IPV), offering everything from an encrypted diary of evidence to a way to call police without the need to speak.
To guard against the risk of abusive partners recognizing the app, it takes a number of precautions – including having no name …
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Apple may have abandoned the Touch Bar, but that isn’t stopping other laptop companies from borrowing the concept. Last month saw Dell put touch-sensitive keys into the trackpad, and the Corsair Voyager a1600 gaming laptop is next in line …
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The impact of the Russian invasion of Ukraine saw European smartphone shipments fall 10% year-on-year in the first quarter of the year, according to a new report today.
The global chip shortage played a role, but the latest market intelligence data said that the war was a bigger factor in the scale of the decline …
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The TIME 100 most influential people of 2022 list has been published, with Apple CEO Tim Cook listed first in the Titans category.
Tim Cook is featured on one of five different covers, and his entry was written by Steve Jobs‘ widow, Laurene Powell Jobs …
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Back in 2018, I talked about a process you might call digital calming: decluttering my devices by removing redundant apps, and switching off most notifications and badges. Four years later, that remains the single best change I’ve ever made to my use of technology.
Thanks to the focus modes in iOS 15, that process has never been easier …
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Apple’s Google search payment – the billions of dollars Google pays to be the default search engine on Apple devices – is likely safe for years to come, say analysts. The controversial payment is thought to contribute as much as 3% of Apple’s pretax profit, but is potentially under threat from antitrust action.
Neither company has ever disclosed the sum, which Apple lumps into its Services category without splitting it out, but one of the more recent estimates suggested that it would amount to between $18B and $20B this year …
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Apple is asking a court to prevent future patent infringement claims from someone who appears to be a Face ID patent troll.
California resident Chian Chiu Li last month filed a patent infringement against Apple, then last week withdrew the complaint without explanation …
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It’s not unusual to hear Tony Fadell talk iPod, but a 20-minute video provides a new perspective as it’s illustrated by CT scans of three different iPod models.
Fadell talks about a number of the design considerations. For example, the team was extremely nervous about the reliability of the hard drive as consumers – unused to the delicacy of such devices in such a portable product – might treat the iPod rather more casually than they would a laptop …
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Parent company Snap has been slower to offer Snapchat parental controls than other social media apps, but it will be offering parents and guardians limited chat-monitoring capabilities.
Limited because teens will have to approve the monitoring, and because parents won’t be able to see the actual content of messages …
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A class action lawsuit against Apple for the so-called MacBook Pro stage light issue has been dismissed, the court ruling that Apple had no legal obligation to disclose the design flaw.
An earlier court upheld part of the claim against Apple, while dismissing a second element …
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An apparent iPhone eSIM bug is randomly deactivating iMessage and FaceTime. In some cases, the only resolution appears to be to install a physical SIM.
Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman experienced the issue with T-Mobile, but others report they’ve experienced the same issue with other carriers …
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The problems faced by tertiary Apple display supplier BOE appear to have gone from bad to worse, according to a new report. The company is now in danger of losing all orders for the iPhone 14.
Too many of the company’s displays were failing to pass quality control checks, and BOE reportedly tried to solve this by quietly changing the specs – without telling Apple …
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Police report seeing increasing evidence of drug deals via apps like Snapchat, Instagram, and TikTok – and say that this is one of the factors behind soaring drug fatalities though fentanyl-tainted pills.
Emoji are used as code for different drugs, deals struck in private messages, and apps like Venmo and Cash App used for payment …
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