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.
Apple Intelligence privacy is a key differentiator for the company’s own AI initiative, with the company taking a three-step approach to safeguard personal data.
But Apple says we won’t have to take the company’s word for it: It is taking an “extraordinary step” to enable third-party security researchers to fully and independently verify the privacy protections in place …
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We already knew it was going to be a wait for Apple Intelligence beta access, with the company warning that the new features won’t be available until later in the year, but code found in iOS 18 indicates that there will be a waitlist for access.
Apple has also indicated that, while Apple Intelligence will be available to those outside the US, we may have to put up with delayed responses …
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CEO Tim Cook has admitted in an interview that Apple Intelligence may hallucinate, but says that its responses will be “very high quality.”
He also said that the company has not been willing to compromise on its values to move into AI, and that there are guardrails in place for its upcoming artificial intelligence features …
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Apple briefly showed us a glimpse of an upcoming Blackmagic camera designed specifically for shooting Vision Pro immersive video during yesterday’s keynote.
The company has now shared a few images of the Blackmagic URSA Cine Immersive, which appears to be based on the URSA Cine 12K …
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The bad news from yesterday’s keynote is that Apple has never listed so many new features as “coming later.” This includes all of the Apple Intelligence ones.
The other bad news is that AI features will initially be limited to US English, although Apple’s wording here does suggest that those of us in other countries will still be able to try it …
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Aka I installed the iOS 18 beta 1 so you don’t have to …
I normally steer clear of the first developer beta of a new iOS release. This year I thought I wouldn’t be able to resist, as I was keen to play with the new AI features, but of course yesterday’s keynote quickly killed all hope of that. Every single one of them was billed as coming later. Still, there were a few things I did want to try, so I took a deep breath and pressed the button …
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Apple today formally introduced macOS 15, alongside iOS 18 and iPadOS 18 – and this year it’s really simple.
It’s also good news for those of us who dived in early with an Apple Silicon Mac …
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iPadOS 18 hasn’t given us all the features we’d like to have the software finally catch up with the hardware, but it’s still a very welcome update.
The bad news, of course, is that each major update means dropping support for some older iPads, and this year is no exception …
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Replacing the iPhone might seem a strange goal for Apple; it’s been the most successful product the company has ever made, and one of the most successful premium products any company has ever made. But it’s been reported that this is the company’s long-term goal.
Specifically, Apple execs were said to believe back in 2019 that an Apple Glasses product would replace the iPhone in roughly a decade …
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Microsoft Recall sounded like a very cool idea, but was very quickly revealed to be a security disaster. Instead of helping you recall everything you’ve done on your Windows PC, it was found that it could easily help a hacker do the same.
However, as much as the company messed-up the implementation, I do think there’s mileage in the concept, and if there’s one company I’d trust to do it with proper privacy protections, it’s Apple …
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A Frontier hack exposed the personal data of at least 750,000 customers, including full names and social security numbers, which places them at significant risk of identity theft. The ransomware group said to be behind the attack claims that the actual number is two million.
The company has now notified the customers it believes to have been impacted by the security breach, but waited almost two months to do so …
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Hidden Bar is a free Bartender alternative which might find itself seeing quite an uptake in demand, following the surprise takeover of the popular Mac utility.
While Bartender’s creator did later chip in with some comforting words, Bartender has a fairly frightening list of permissions – including the ability to take screengrabs of our Macs – so it’s not surprising that a number of us have opted to err on the side of caution …
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One of the things we’re expecting to be announced next week is a ‘new’ Apple Passwords app on iPhone, iPad, and Mac – a move we’ve suggested on more than one occasion.
For 9to5Mac readers, this will bring one small but worthwhile benefit. The really big impact, though, will be with non-techies …
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With WWDC fast approaching, Apple has highlighted some of the resources and support options available to developers.
These include the YouTube channel first announced back in March, and the Pathways resource launched last month …
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iPhone voice transcription is already included in iMessage, and is available in some other chat apps – but not always for free. In Telegram, for example, you have to pay for a premium membership to get the feature.
The latest Bloomberg piece says that Apple is finally bringing audio transcription to the Voice Memo app, and this seems a perfect opportunity to make it a system-wide feature …
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A change to Adobe terms set the internet alight yesterday, after a number of pro users of the company’s apps reacted with anger and confusion to the scary-looking wording.
The company initially issued a rather dismissive statement that its terms have been in place for years and it was merely clarifying them, but subsequently wrote a blog post which tackled the issue in more detail …
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A new report suggests Apple may announce a number of iOS 18 Mail app AI features during WWDC.
These include the option to automatically create Smart Replies to emails, as well as the ability to draft a reply yourself and then ask Siri to change the tone – for example, ‘make this sound more professional’ …
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Update: Both the UK’s Information Commissioner’s Office and the European Commission have now launched investigations into the legality of making it opt-out instead of opt-in.
If you use Instagram or Facebook, Meta is using your data to train its AI models. The company uses posts as training material for its generative AI systems. Privacy legislation in the UK and European Union means that the company is forced to offer an opt-out option – but it is doing so in a rather sketchy way …
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It’s not unusual in pieces around Apple’s move to OLED for iPads (now) and MacBooks (in future) to have someone ask in the comments why the company doesn’t just skip ahead to micro-LED. The latest Samsung’s micro-LED TVs point to two very good reasons …
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eBay is dropping Amex card support, emailing users to advise that it will no longer accept American Express cards for payments from mid-August …
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Update: Adobe has now clarified the meaning and intent.
A change to Adobe terms & conditions for apps like Photoshop has outraged many professional users, concerned that the company is claiming the right to access their content, use it freely, and even sub-licence it to others.
The company is requiring users to agree to the new terms in order to continue using their Adobe apps, locking them out until they do so …
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Nvidia has overtaken AAPL in the market cap stakes, as its valuation exceeded $3T. The company’s rise in value has been truly spectacular, increasing from $2T back in February to more than $3T just four months later.
The company is now challenging Microsoft for the title of most valuable company in the world, and for the same reason …
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Apple continues to dominate the wearables market, says a new report, despite a steep drop in shipments for both Apple Watch and AirPods.
There was movement lower down the charts, with Huawei taking third place from Samsung during the first quarter of the year …
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If you use the Dexcom G7 continuous glucose monitoring system, you’ve long been able to view your blood sugar measurement on your Apple Watch – but you can now do so without your iPhone.
Previously, the G7 wirelessly transmitted the health data to your iPhone, which then relayed it to your Apple Watch …
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