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.
If your Apple Watch weather complication is not working, we already found one workaround that seems to help, but Apple now has two suggested fixes.
What is happening for a significant number of people is that all weather complications – conditions, temperature, and precipitation – show no data, with two dashes where the numbers should be …
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Update: Reuters reports that the Chinese regulator has now published a list of 26 companies who have complied with the law, and Apple is not listed.
A range of Android app stores have taken action to comply with the latest developer clampdown in China, meeting a deadline of the end of August. Several days past the deadline, however, Apple’s Chinese App Store appears to have taken no action to comply with the new law …
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Apple’s environmental credentials were front and center in the iPhone 15 event thanks to a lengthy and somewhat cringeworthy skit (making an unfunny video with Octavia Spencer is kind of an achievement in itself, but I guess that’s what happens when you commission a sketch during a writers’ strike).
A new piece says that the company’s actions and commitments put it way ahead of major rivals, but the elephant in the room is the annual product cycle for iPhones …
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The new Oceanic+ 2.0 app finally supports freediving of up to 130 feet (40 meters) on both the original Apple Watch Ultra and the new Ultra 2.
The ability to use the Apple Watch Ultra as a fully-fledged dive computer was one of the headline features when Apple launched the original model, but it’s taken some time for all the promised features to arrive …
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The iPhone 12 enjoyed some unexpected time in the spotlight, some three years after launch, when French authorities suddenly announced that it was found to have exceeded legal radiation exposure limits. There was talk of having the model withdrawn from sale.
The drama now looks set to end, as Apple has delivered a promised software update to resolve the issue, and the French government is now testing it …
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Widespread reports are circulating about the iPhone 15 overheating, seemingly across all models. Measurements taken with an infrared camera show temperatures as high as 116F.
The issue appears to affect all four iPhone 15 models, with some owners reporting that their phones get too hot to even hold without a case – including 9to5Mac’s Ian Zelbo …
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I may have just taken delivery of my shiny new iPhone 15 Pro Max, but I do get to write one last diary post about its predecessor, before it gets unceremoniously packaged up to be sent back to Apple.
Not content with one time-consuming hobby – Argentine tango – I attempted to add another: amateur filmmaking. The latter didn’t get too far, as it struggled to compete for my time and attention (I’ve so far managed just two micro-shorts, totaling all of three-and-a-half minutes), but I did get to combine the two in one project …
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Streaming video piracy is on the rise again, according to a new study, in apparent response to growing subscription costs for services like Netflix and Disney+ …
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iFixit has shared a video of its iPhone 15 Pro Max teardown, with the periscope camera and its 5x telephoto lens the key new thing to see.
The company also found the new titanium casing is vulnerable to scratches, and that Apple has further extended the parts pairing that makes DIY repairs more difficult …
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Apple has now moved a total of $7B worth of iPhone production out of China and into India, according to an unnamed government official cited in a new report.
The same official says that Apple plans to hit $40B within the next five years, as the company accelerates plans to reduce its dependence on China …
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Update: Engadget reports that Tinder Select is now live for ‘selected’ users, and does indeed cost $500/month or $6k/year.
The companies behind popular dating apps like Tinder, Grindr, Match, and Bumble are planning to offer premium tiers, with subscription costs as high as $500 per month …
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Rivos, a stealth startup, was accused of stealing Apple chip secrets by poaching staff who took with them “gigabytes of sensitive System-on-a-Chip specifications and design files.” The startup has now countersued the iPhone maker.
The countersuit argues that the restrictions Apple places on staff seeking employment elsewhere are overly broad, and intended to make employees scared to leave the company …
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iFixit has done an Apple Watch Ultra 2 teardown, before doing the same thing with the Series 9 – and the internals don’t reveal any significant changes.
In apparent confirmation that the new Double Tap feature is just a software update to the existing accessibility feature, neither teardown revealed any new hardware relating to this …
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When I say first impressions of the iPhone 15 Pro Max, I mean just that: I’ve owned the phone for a couple of hours, and so far done nothing other than set it up, play with it a little, and test the new 5x telephoto camera.
I do have to say that the delivery and setup experience wasn’t quite as smooth as it could have been …
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One of the additional perks of having an Amazon Prime subscription is free access to some of the company’s video content. But as of next year, Amazon Prime Video users will start seeing ads, unless they pay an additional premium for ad-free viewing …
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We first heard back in June that Spotify Supremium might be the name given to the company’s long-awaited lossless audio tier, and that now appears to have been confirmed by code found within the app.
The code also contains a reference to pricing of $19.99/month, which is in line with a previous report – but may be a tough sell …
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The iPhone 15 Pro Max stands out from the other models in this year’s lineup mostly because of the periscope lens, which extends last year’s 3x optical zoom to 5x this year. But Samsung’s main competing phone – the Galaxy S23 Ultra – offers 10x optical zoom. Why doesn’t the latest flagship iPhone do the same?
Apple says there are three reasons for this. Of these, I’d say one is weak, one moderately persuasive, and the third is a killer argument …
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Attempts to design an Apple modem chip to replace the Qualcomm radio chips used in iPhones have been ongoing since at least 2018 – but some five years later have been deemed a failure by engineers who worked on the project.
Even by last year, the chip Apple managed to produce was found to be slower than Qualcomm ones, prone to overheating, and so large it would have occupied more than half the space inside an iPhone …
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The British government’s hugely controversial Online Safety Bill has today passed in the second chamber of Parliament, and after six years of debate is now set to become law.
While Apple’s iMessage and other end-to-end encrypted messaging apps were saved from being outlawed by the bill, the government hasn’t yet given up the fight …
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In what appears to be the latest in a series of T-Mobile security breaches, customers are reporting that they are seeing the personal data of other users when logged into their accounts.
Data accessible includes sensitive information like credit card details, home address, purchase history, and current credit balance …
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The iPhone 14 iFixit repairability rating has been dramatically reduced, after the company listened to feedback from consumers and independent repair shops, and admitted that it didn’t take into account the huge barrier imposed by Apple’s parts pairing process.
The phone’s repairability rating has now been reduced from 7/10 to 4/10, which moves the product from “recommended” to “not recommended” …
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Update: In seeming response to the White House comments, China has now accused the US of hacking Huawei servers and stealing data.
The iPhone versus Huawei battle is back on in China, following the launch of the Mate 60 Pro (yeah, that’s not an iPod, despite appearances). Sales of the Chinese company’s smartphones plummeted last year, after US tech sanctions blocked it from purchasing 5G radio chips.
The fact that Huawei has now solved this problem has raised a lot of eyebrows, including those of the US National Security Advisor, who commented on it during a recent White House press briefing …
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Philips Hue Matter support was first promised by March of this year, before quietly admitting to a delay just a few days ahead of the deadline.
Whatever caused that delay has now been addressed, and Matter integration is now available within the Hue app …
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Windows PCs powered by future Intel chips will rival the performance of Apple Silicon Macs, claims the company’s CEO, Pat Gelsinger.
No such claim was made for this year’s chip, Meteor Lake, which will debut on December 14 – but Gelsinger says things will change with Arrow Lake, Lunar Lake, and Panther Lake …
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