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 two technothriller novels , a romcom novel, and an SF novella series.
He is old enough to have owned the original Macintosh. He currently owns an M1 Max 16-inch MacBook Pro, a MacBook Air 11, 12.9-inch iPad Pro (LTE 256GB), iPhone 13 Pro Max (256GB), Dell Ultrawide 49-inch monitor, an Apple Watch (Series 4 WiFi) and multiple HomePods – he suspects it might be cheaper to have a cocaine habit than his addiction to all things anodised aluminum.
He thinks wires are evil and had a custom desk made to hide them, known as the OC Desk for obvious reasons.
He’s known for his op-ed and diary pieces, exploring his experience of Apple products over time, for a more rounded review:
He considers 1000 miles a good distance for a cycle ride and Chernobyl a suitable tourist destination. What can we say, he’s that kind of chap.
He speaks fluent English but only broken American, so please forgive any Anglicised spelling in his posts.
If @benlovejoy-ing him on twitter, please follow him first so that he can DM you if appropriate. If you have information you can pass on, you can also email him. If you would like to comment on one of his pieces, please do so in the comments – he does read them all.
We’re likely less than six months away from the launch of third-party app stores on the iPhone – at least in Europe – and Apple’s plans for this appear to be advancing.
We’ve already noted that most consumers are unlikely to switch from the official App Store, unless they are given good reason to. But Apple also needs to keep developers loyal to the platform, and a seemingly small piece of news over the weekend likely revealed how the company intends to go about this …
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The 2026 Apple Watch Ultra, expected to be the first model to switch from OLED to micro-LED, looks set to have a significantly larger display – and a higher price-tag.
A new supply-chain report suggests that the display of the higher-tech model could grow to 2.12 inches …
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In what would be a massive privacy breach if it were true, a major marketing company is claiming that it can eavesdrop on your conversations, through microphones in smartphones, TVs, and smart speakers.
Calling the claimed capability Active Listening, Cox Media Group (CMG) has been promoting the service on its website, and pitching it to brands …
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The on-off Apple vs Corellium legal battle has been going on now for four years, but the final case has now been settled out of court, according to a report today.
The dispute had an amusing moment when Apple failed in its claim that Corellium had breached copyright by replicating iOS – and responded by claiming copyright infringement of Apple wallpapers …
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There’s no letup in the race toward ever smaller processes. It’s just a couple of days since we heard that TSMC has shown Apple test results from a 2nm chip, and the company is already discussing the next generation – using a 1.4nm process.
Somewhat confusingly, TSMC is switching from the N prefix it has used in the past to an A prefix – meaning that the 1.4nm chips will be labelled as A14 – the same name Apple gave to the 5nm chip used in the iPhone 12 line-up …
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A Proton Mail Mac app is now available as a beta, but most users are going to have to wait until early next year to try it – unless you want to hand over $40 per month for a Visionary tier subscription.
At the same time, the secure email company is making some new features available to all users, including auto-forwarding rules – which can decrypt messages for non-Proton users …
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We learned yesterday that the European Union looks set to impose an App Store anti-steering ban on Apple. That is, Apple would no longer be allowed to prevent Spotify and other music services from linking to their own company’s website for subscription sign-ups.
The ruling we’re expecting is a narrow one, in response to a complaint filed by Spotify almost four years ago now, and will likely only apply to streaming music services. But the principle is a sound one, and is unlikely to pose any great risk to Apple …
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The FTC is investigating Adobe, after widespread consumer complaints that the company makes it too hard to cancel app subscriptions.
Adobe was one of the earliest software companies to switch from a one-off purchase model to recurring subscriptions, but consumers have long complained that it’s easier to start a subscription than it is to end one …
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Social network Threads has now launched in EU countries, with Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg noting that this now opens it up to an additional 448M people. The company first teased this last week.
EU citizens will also be able to browse Threads without having to create an Instagram account – a move likely intended to placate antitrust regulators …
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One of the key features added in the iOS 17.3 beta is Stolen Device Protection. This is a thoughtful and creative solution to balancing out the need for protecting iPhone users without stopping them do the things they want to do with their devices.
What I love about Apple’s solution here is that someone has clearly put a lot of thought into that balancing act …
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For the first time ever, customers wanting to carry out DIY repairs on their devices will be given access to Apple diagnostics software. This software was previously limited to Apple Stores and authorized service providers.
Apple announced the news today, noting that its Self Service Repair program has also been extended to the iPhone 15 line-up, and M2 Macs – as well as rolling out to new countries …
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We’re today learning of a major acceleration in plans to shift more production of Apple devices from China to India. In less than one year, Foxconn has increased its planned investment in an Indian plant by almost 400%.
It follows a recent report that Apple has told its battery suppliers that it would like as many iPhone 16 batteries as possible to be manufactured in India …
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X owner Elon Musk has continued his tirade against major corporations who’ve suspended advertising on his social network, after growing concerns about hate speech on the platform.
Musk last year asked whether Apple “hate[s] free speech in America” when the company paused advertising over previous concerns about the social network, and is now calling for Disney CEO Bob Iger to be fired …
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Yesterday saw an Epic Games victory in its court case against Google, a jury finding that the Play Store was indeed operated in an anti-competitive fashion.
This is despite the fact that Epic mostly lost a near-identical case against Apple back in 2021. The differing conclusions in the two cases puts Apple back under pressure …
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When it was revealed that foreign governments were demanding push notification data from Apple and Google, it was suspected that the US government was doing the same. This has now been confirmed, one use of it being to investigate January 6th Capitol rioters.
Apple was not previously allowed to reveal that it was receiving legal demands for the information, but now that it can do so, it has also set a higher bar for compliance …
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As part of the company’s continuing work to reduce its dependence on China, Apple has reportedly told suppliers that it has a preference for iPhone 16 batteries being made in India.
One battery supplier which already manufactures in India has been asked to scale-up production there, and Chinese suppliers have been urged to establish battery factories in the country …
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Update: Apple issued the following statement to 9to5Mac:
Apple is committed to transparency and we have long been a supporter of efforts to ensure that providers are able to disclose as much information as possible to their users. In this case, the federal government prohibited us from sharing any information and now that this method has become public we are updating our transparency reporting to detail these kinds of requests
Apple has confirmed that foreign governments have been carrying out what has been described as “push notification spying,” stating that the company was not previously allowed to disclose the practice.
Governments have been serving both Apple and Google with secret legal orders to hand over details of the push notifications sent to iPhones and Android smartphones …
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The European Union’s iMessage antitrust investigation looks set to rule in favor of Apple, meaning that the secure messaging service would be exempt from upcoming interoperability rules.
If confirmed, it would mean that Apple would not have to make iMessage able to exchange messages with rival chat apps …
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A new supply-chain report suggests that we could see an under-screen Face ID camera in the iPhone “after 2026,” using technology developed by LG Innotek.
It’s likely that the tech would initially be used for Face ID only, but would be a stepping stone toward a later true all-screen design, with the front-facing camera similarly embedded beneath the screen …
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iPhone assembler Foxconn had already predicted “significant growth” during the holiday quarter, but now says that October and November have been even stronger than expected.
The company told investors that its November revenue hit T$650 billion ($20.65 billion), the second highest on record for the month …
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India is planning to copy the European Union’s USB-C charging port law, requiring all smartphones to adopt the standard, which poses three big problems for Apple – and not just in India.
A new report today says that Apple is lobbying either for an exemption for older models still manufactured in the country, or delayed enforcement of the proposed legislation …
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A new industry group known as the AI Alliance believes that artificial intelligence models should be open-source, in contrast to the proprietary models developed by OpenAI and Google.
Meta, IBM, Intel, and NASA are just some of the organizations to sign up, believing that the approach offers three key benefits …
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A new Verizon Netflix and Max bundle is being offered to some customers, priced at just $10 per month – which essentially amounts to getting Netflix free with Max.
However, the bundle is limited to the ad-supported tiers of the streaming video services, and is only available to Verizon myPlan customers …
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A few Windows laptops are already powered by ARM CPUs rather than Intel ones, but we can expect to see a lot more in the future.
A new report says that Microsoft is accelerating efforts to overcome the current limitations of these, so that more PC brands can follow Apple’s example in using ARM chips …
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