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.
Meta has announced that parents can receive alerts when their teens discuss suicide or other forms of self-harm with its AI on Instagram, Facebook, or Meta Horizons.
You’ll need to opt in to Meta’s supervision tools for parents and guardians in order to select the family accounts you want to supervise …
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Five Apple Watch models are able to measure your blood pressure in order to generate alerts for possible hypertension. However, they do not provide your actual blood pressure readings.
A few smart rings and other fitness devices do so, but rely on regular calibration with a traditional cuff monitor. The upcoming Signal Ring says that it delivers full blood pressure measurements without any calibration …
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There are few software limitations on anyone considering a switch from Windows to Mac. Not only do all the biggest PC apps run on the platform, but there are countless examples of useful apps that are exclusive to Mac.
The one big exception is gaming. However, new tests show that Windows games run better than ever on Mac, whether that’s being done officially or unofficially …
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Apple chipmaker TSMC had already said that it would build a total of eight plants in Arizona, and has now announced an investment boost that could see that number increased to 12.
This could potentially see more chips for Apple devices made in the US, but there are reasons to be skeptical about this possibility …
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Jony Ive and Sam Altman made a big promise when they teased the launch of a completely new concept in AI hardware more than a year ago.
The most recent report suggests that OpenAI may technically be delivering on this promise, but could end up at least partly competing with an upcoming AirPods model. If so, I can easily see AirPods Ultra proving the more popular choice …
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While macOS is generally very stable, there are times when an app will crash and your Mac will offer to send a diagnostic report to Apple.
A new form of Mac malware has been discovered, which creates fake versions of this form, requesting your Mac password as part of the data collection. If you comply, it will get access to a huge range of personal data, including your password managers and cryptocurrency wallets …
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The new Siri and other Apple Intelligence features are currently only supported in the iOS 27 beta in English in a small number of countries, but Apple has promised that they will “quickly expand” to additional countries and languages.
China posed a particular challenge for the company as the law there only permits partnering with a Chinese AI company. A report today says that Apple has now reached agreement on this, and will be using two different models …
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Unicode’s emoji tsar Jennifer Daniel has given us a sneak peek at nine emoji set for release next year – though not all of them are entirely new.
She says the committee responsible for the selection of emoji is doing some tidying up to help avoid misunderstandings …
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Former Apple design chief Jony Ive always described his long-term vision for the iPhone design as “a single slab of glass.” Apple is believed to have retained that goal long after Ive left the company, with Liquid Glass representing the company’s software prep ahead of the new hardware.
We’ve already seen reports of a number of ways in which the 20th anniversary iPhone could take us significantly closer to Apple’s vision, and the latest of these may provide another piece of the puzzle …
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Many X users have found that their feed is rather random, with comments on their posts similarly more from randos than those who follow you. The platform says it has finally noticed this and is fixing it with a “tweak” to the algorithm …
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Navigation app Waze is rolling out an update to its iPhone and Android app to introduce three new AI-powered features.
The first uses your journey history to understand your routing preferences in order to provide personalized navigation options …
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An online safety regulator has said that tech giants need to do more to combat sextortion (sexual extortion), naming Apple, Meta and Google among the companies who need to do better.
Victims of sexual blackmail tend to be younger, including children below the age of 16 …
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Apple stock slid significantly downwards in the wake of the WWDC keynote, with some attributing that to disappointment in the company’s AI announcements.
While we disagreed with that analysis, investors do now seem to be welcoming the company’s caution when it comes to AI spending, with the stock rallying 15% since that June low …
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An open letter written by Tim Cook back in 2014 contrasted Apple with ad-funded services where customers are the product. That letter has been removed from the company’s website ahead of ads coming to Apple Maps for the first time.
Apple commenter John Gruber has suggested that incoming CEO John Ternus should pull the plug on this and the rest of the company’s ad business …
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The European Union is proposing to ban under 13 year olds from using social media apps, with a plan for “phased and gradual access” for teenagers.
While most social media apps claim to have a minimum age of 13, this is extremely poorly enforced. The EU proposal would give this the force of law, as well as applying restrictions for older teens …
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We’ve talked on a number of occasions about the problem with USB-C cables: namely, they all look alike but can have very different capabilities.
Google addressed this issue in Chrome OS several years ago, and we suggested at the time that Apple should copy it. That hasn’t yet happened, but there’s now a free Mac app, WhatCable, to turn your Mac into a hardware cable tester …
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I think if we are honest with ourselves, most of us would admit that smart home tech falls into one of two categories. First, there is the genuinely useful. Second, there’s the stuff we do just because we can, and it is to some degree cool.
I think I’ve now discovered a third category: things that really aren’t worth all of the time and effort they take …
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Overuse of smartphones is now a widely recognised problem, but we’re also starting to see people perhaps get overly dependent on chatbots like Claude AI and ChatGPT.
Claude creator Anthropic is currently testing a beta feature intended to allow users to reflect on how they are using the AI and be prompted to perhaps use it less …
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Luxshare is one of the ultimate rags-to-riches stories, founded by a woman who started out as a Foxconn assembly-line worker and growing into a multi-billion dollar company and key Apple supplier.
It’s been a publicly traded company in China since 2010, but has now added a second listing in Hong Kong, making it more accessible to overseas investors. Its latest listing set a new record before sliding back …
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Meta this week launched its own AI image model integrated into the Instagram app. While this might sound useful, it comes with rather a big privacy issue: by default, anyone can use your profile photo and posts as prompts for generative images.
You can fix this by flipping two toggles, but they’re pretty well hidden …
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Apple recently increased the prices of most of its products, from the Apple TV and HomePods through iPads and Macs to the Vision Pro. iPhones have so far escaped the increases, but that will likely change in September.
You’d think that would be bad news for the company, reducing demand – but ironically, increasing memory costs might actually end up boosting iPhone sales …
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One of the things tucked away in the small print of macOS 27 beta 3 is the news that you’ll need a 2TB iCloud+ subscription in order to use the new AI features for home security cameras in the Apple Home app.
While some are suggesting that we shouldn’t be too surprised by this, I do find it a somewhat disappointing move by Apple …
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More supply chain sources have rejected claims of delays to iPhone Ultra production, reporting that it appears to be on track for a September release.
However, the latest report doesn’t rule out limited initial supplies of Apple’s most expensive ever iPhone …
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Apple has today lost a major antitrust appeal in Europe, with all three of its claims being rejected.
The company has long been fighting its requirement to comply with the EU’s Digital Markets Act (DMA), but a court has dismissed all of its claims …
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