Apple

6,154 'Apple News' stories November 2008 - April 2014

Apple News and Brief History

Before you can properly understand Apple News, it’s important to know its history. Apple was founded by Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak in 1976. In 1977, Apple’s sales were growing with the success of its early computers. Within a few years, Jobs and Wozniak hired designers and a production line crew. Apple went public in 1980 and was an instant success. Over the next few years, Apple shipped new computers featuring new graphical user interfaces, such as the original Macintosh in 1984. As the market for personal computers expanded through the 1990s, Apple lost market share to the cheaper Microsoft Windows on PC clones. Eventually, Wozniak and Jobs both left Apple. Jobs would go on to found NeXT and would return to Apple when NeXT was acquired in the late 90s. Apple then began a journey to the great second act in the history of the business world.

Since the release of the iPod in 2001, Apple has become a major player once again in the technology industry. After releasing the iPhone in 2007, the iPad in 2010, and the Apple Watch in 2015, Apple is now one of the largest companies in the world. Apple’s worldwide annual revenue totaled $274.5 billion for its 2020 fiscal year.

Today, Apple operates retail stores all across the world, has a growing services division, and an ever-expanding hardware lineup. The technology industry follows Apple news to see where the company is headed in the future.

Keep reading for the latest Apple news

First Apple Store opens to public in Turkey

Seth Weintraub Apr 5 2014 - 4:51 am PT

3 Comments

[youtube=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m4bQxN-bXFQ]

After a long build up, Apple’s first Eastern Europe/Asia Minor store opened up today in Istanbul at the Zorlu Center. As with some other flagship stores, it is mostly subterranean with a glass upward protrusion. This one has four large panes of glass covered by a white roof with a darker Apple logo surrounded by a fountain as pictured below.

Image via ifoAppleStore

Apple yesterday held a press event attended by one of the Apple Store leads Steve Cano. Tim Cook took to Twitter to announce the opening:

[tweet https://twitter.com/tim_cook/status/452417592544608256]

Chinese smartphone vendors disappointed by 5s but eagerly awaiting iPhone 6, says analyst

Ben Lovejoy Apr 4 2014 - 6:29 am PT

11 Comments

Cantor Fitzgerald analyst Brian White, quoted in Business Insider, had both bad news and good for Apple in his talks with smartphone vendors during a tour of China and Taiwan, claiming disappointment with sales of the iPhone 5s but big hopes for the iPhone 6.

In the near term, we sensed disappointment around demand for the iPhone 5s.

That said, we heard great enthusiasm around the potential for Apple to introduce a larger iPhone form factor in China this year with the iPhone 6. In our view, the iPhone 6 with a larger screen (e.g., 4.7-inch, 5.5-inch) has the potential to meaningfully accelerate Apple’s growth trajectory in China during 2H:14. We have not heard this type of excitement in China around the iPhone in at least two years and thus we believe this could be a very special iPhone launch for Apple.

White doesn’t have the greatest record of reliability (he’s the guy who told us the Apple television set was launching last year, with an iRing controller), but lower than anticipated iPhone 5s sales does seem consistent with the rather muted comments made by China Mobile chairman Xi Guohua last month.

iPhoto for iOS update adds white border printing option alongside various bug fixes

Benjamin Mayo Apr 3 2014 - 2:59 pm PT

2 Comments

Following a slew of updates to iWork, Apple has released a minor update to iPhoto for iOS, part of its iLife suite. The update adds a new border printing option. When ordering prints, you can now frame your photos with a white border. As usual, the update also includes miscellaneous bug fixes and “other improvements”.

What’s New in Version 2.0.1

• Add a white border to photos when ordering prints
• Includes bug fixes and other improvements

iPhoto costs $5 on the App Store, but new iOS device purchases automatically unlocks the app for the registered account for free.

Apple, Microsoft and others group to lobby against upcoming patent troll legislation

Benjamin Mayo Apr 3 2014 - 8:24 am PT

4 Comments

Apple is worried that new legislation will limit its ability to protect its own intellectual property.

Reuters is reporting that Apple, Microsoft, Ford, General Electric, IBM and other companies are forming a lobbyist group called the ‘Partnership for American Innovation’. The group is worried that upcoming legislation focused on patent trolls may adversely affect true ‘innovators’ as well.

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Expect faster MacBooks with longer battery-life thanks to DDR4 RAM

Ben Lovejoy Apr 3 2014 - 7:31 am PT

4 Comments

Matt Margolis is predicting that Apple will be switching from DDR3 to DDR4 RAM for future MacBooks this year, suggesting faster performance and improved battery-life.

One of Apple’s RAM manufacturer. Micron, says that DDR3 bandwidth tops out at around 17GB/s, while DDR4 aims to double this by 2015:

Since the introduction of the iPhone, the industry has responded with an evolutionary transition from 2.6 GB/s LPDDR1, to 8.5 GB/s LPDDR2, to 17 GB/s LPDDR3, the technology currently is powering today’s high-end devices in volume production. DRAM bandwidth has roughly doubled with each generation to keep pace with demand.

The next generation of low-power DRAM (LPDRAM)—also known as LPDDR4—addresses these constraints by doubling the bandwidth of LPDDR3 while maintaining power neutrality. For example, LPDDR4 targets 34 GB/s of total bandwidth for a x64 memory subsystem, doubling the bandwidth target from LPDDR3

The company has not given specific targets for improved battery-life, but says that it aims to reduce power consumption in both active and standby modes.

Margolis suggests that DDR4 RAM may also make it into future iPhones and iPads.

Microsoft’s ‘Cortana’ Siri-clone shows the potential of third party app integration for the personal assistant

Benjamin Mayo Apr 2 2014 - 12:17 pm PT

8 Comments

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DE5wCBb7GwI&list=UUZPiiUjDlrBv4jiiRqk5dSA

At its BUILD conference, Microsoft officially unveiled its personal assistant for Windows Phone named Cortana. The similarities to Siri are rather uncanny (and three years late) but in some areas, Siri could definitely learn from Cortana’s feature set.

Cortana certainly does a good job of cloning Siri’s appearance and functionality. However, it goes further by allowing third-party applications to do tasks and answer questions as well. For instance, you can ask Cortana to add a film to your Hulu watch list with natural language.

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Amazon announces $99 Fire TV set-top box shipping today: automatic recommendations, voice search, games and more

Benjamin Mayo Apr 2 2014 - 8:36 am PT

40 Comments

Amazon has just announced its Apple TV competitor, dubbed ‘Fire TV’. You can buy it now from Amazon.com for $99. The product roughly resembles an Apple TV in size and shape, but is thinner by a few millimetres and has square (rather than rounded) edges. Spec-wise, Amazon claims it is three times as powerful as Apple TV or Roku. It runs on a quad-core processor with 2GB RAM. The fireTV can stream video at 1080p over HDMI, alongside Dolby Digital surround sound.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HHoNQrxG_8M

Input comes via a Bluetooth remote that features a five-way directional pad and some ancillary buttons. The remote has an inbuilt microphone, so you can speak show titles to have it automatically search for them.

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Apple ranked well in Greenpeace’s ‘Green Internet’ report for its renewable energy efforts

Zac Hall Apr 2 2014 - 8:36 am PT

11 Comments

As Business Insider points out, Apple’s renewable energy efforts have ranked it well on Greenpeace’s “Clicking Clean: How Companies are Creating the Green Internet” study. Apple scored an “A” rating in ‘energy transparency’, ‘renewable energy commitment & siting policy’, and ‘renewable energy deployment & advocacy’, while it scored a “B” in ‘energy efficiency & mitigation’. Facebook and Google both averaged well in the same categories, while Amazon, Microsoft, and Twitter all scored poor to dismal ratings in each category. Full report card below:
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OWC processor/memory upgrades available for the Mac Pro you’re still waiting to receive

Ben Lovejoy Apr 2 2014 - 7:20 am PT

1 Comment

You may still be waiting for your Mac Pro to arrive, but OWC is ready to sell you a CPU upgrade once it does. The company offers a choice of four E5 2600-series processors, ranging from an 8-core 2.6GHz chip with 20MB cache for $950, to a 12-core 2.7GHz processor for $1480.

We first confirmed that CPU upgrades were possible last December. The company says the upgraded processors offer speed gains ranging from 25 percent to 46 percent over Apple’s base model 4-core 1600-series processor. You can get rebates of between $100 and $750 for trading in the processor supplied with your Mac Pro, and also have the option of boosting the RAM from Apple’s maximum of 64GB to 128GB …
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The research that shows Apple is right to take its time over the iWatch

Ben Lovejoy Apr 2 2014 - 6:25 am PT

14 Comments

New research from Endeavour shows that more than half of U.S. consumers who have owned a wearable device no longer use it, and of those two-thirds stopped using it within the first six months of ownership. This is up from the 40 percent abandonment found by a similar survey by CSS Insight last fall.

The Guardian newspaper in the UK has a supporting piece in which it found more than 900 Galaxy Gear watches for sale on eBay, with asking prices as low as a third of the purchase cost.

While the data may be bad news for existing smartwatch and fitness band suppliers, The Guardian has an apposite comparison with early mp3 players, which also suffered high abandonment rates a decade ago.

So lots of those early MP3 players eventually ended up in drawers; but that didn’t stop the sector becoming huge.

And the company responsible for that shift was, of course, Apple: the company which took its time getting both the device and the user-interface right.

Apple so rattled by ‘Next Big Thing’ ads, it almost changed ad agency, claims Samsung

Ben Lovejoy Apr 2 2014 - 4:41 am PT

17 Comments

[youtube=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tNxDd3l0lEU]

Apple senior VP of marketing Phil Schiller was so concerned about Samsung’s Next Big Thing ad campaign, in which the company poked fun at Apple customers, that he emailed Tim Cook to suggest a change of ad agency to fight back – according to a claim by Samsung lawyer Jon Quinn.

The Verge reports that Quinn made the claim in his opening arguments in the patent trial in which Apple is accusing Samsung of violating five of its iOS-related patents.

Quinn says Schiller became “obsessed” with the campaign, writing CEO Tim Cook to suggest the company look into using another ad agency instead of its mainstay TBWA\CHIAT\DAY. That even led to Apple board discussions over the issue, Quinn added …

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Covers removed from first Apple Store in Turkey, showing a mostly-glass design

Ben Lovejoy Apr 2 2014 - 4:12 am PT

9 Comments

Turkish websites DonanimHaber and iPhoneTurka provide our first look at Apple’s first Turkish store now the covers have been removed, revealing a mostly-glass design. Like the iconic 5th Avenue store in NYC, what is visible above ground is simply an empty glass space, though in this case it’s a lower and more subtle skylight than the famous glass cube.

More photos below …
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Mac sales success “defies the laws of economics,” says analyst

Ben Lovejoy Apr 2 2014 - 12:01 am PT

24 Comments

Noting that the Mac’s share of the PC market has risen almost continuously over the past decade (with just a brief dip in 2012) despite costing an average of $700 more than competitor machines, Needham’s Charlie Wolf is quoted by Fortune as saying that it “seems to defy the laws of economics.”

The only explanation that we see is the now-mythical halo effect. Beginning with the iPod in the middle of the past decade and then extending to the iPhone and iPad, a meaningful number of Windows users who bought these products seem to have switched from a PC to a Mac […]

What should be underscored is how unique the Mac phenomenon is […] we view the Mac’s success as the rare instance where sales increased in the face of rising prices.

The halo effect of the brand undoubtedly plays a part, but he seems to have missed the rather obvious point that OS X is a rather better operating system than Windows, and the slickness of the ecosystem makes a Mac an obvious choice for anyone who already owns an iOS device …

What are the five iOS features Apple is claiming that Samsung (or Google) stole?

Ben Lovejoy Apr 1 2014 - 7:39 am PT

63 Comments

With the second patent battle between Apple and Samsung now underway, we thought it would be useful to look at each of the five features Apple claims Samsung (or Google) stole from iOS.

The patents are, of course, worded in the usual dense legaleze. If you want to read them for yourself, you can find them on the US Patent and Trademark Office website in the links below. But here’s my reading of what each one is about, in plain English …
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Apple vs Samsung patent jury selected, Phil Schiller confirmed as first witness

Ben Lovejoy Apr 1 2014 - 4:15 am PT

0 Comments

Image: Mobile Magazine

The jury for the second Apple vs Samsung patent case has now been selected after a number of potential jurors were dismissed for possible bias. Apple is seeking damages of up to $40 per device sold for those Samsung phones and tablets it says violate up to five Apple patents, while Samsung is counter-claiming that Apple devices violate two of its own patents.

Unlike the previous trial, in which the similarity of Samsung’s hardware to iPhones and iPads was a key issue, the patents in dispute here are all software ones, and include standard Android features, leading some to suggest that Google is the real target in this case.

Trying to find unbiased jurors in Silicon Valley was never going to be an easy exercise, and several of those with connections to the tech sector were accepted. The court also found it impractical to eliminate jurors because they owned products from one or both companies, and it’s been reported that most own at least one Apple device, with some also owning Samsung TVs.

The final jury comprises six women and four men. Occupations include a former IBM manager, county government employee, accountant, store clerk, plumber, secretary, police department community service officer and a retired teacher.

The trial opens today with a video providing an overview of patent law, before opening arguments from each side. Apple has scheduled senior VP of marketing Phil Schiller as its first witness. The trial is expected to last around a month.

In the previous patent case between the two companies, Apple was initially awarded $1B in damages before $450M was cut, with a retrial ordered to look again at the damages awarded for some of the patents. The retrial awarded Apple $290M instead for that portion of the case, giving Apple a revised total award of $930M. Apple did, however, fail in an attempt to obtain an injunction against the products found to infringe its patents.

Several potential jurors dismissed from Apple v Samsung patent hearing over connections to either company

Zac Hall Mar 31 2014 - 2:22 pm PT

0 Comments

As the latest patent dispute between Apple and Samsung kicked off in court today, the search for unbiased jury members to serve with Judge Koh began today resulting in a standing room-only environment in the court room with over 100 potential jurors summoned.
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Apple adjusting App Store prices for several currencies

Zac Hall Mar 31 2014 - 11:04 am PT

1 Comment

As it has previously done from time to time, Apple has announced to developers in an email (seen above) that it will be adjusting App Store prices in a number of countries to address changes in foreign exchange rates.

Prices in Australia, India, Indonesia, Turkey, and South Africa that use the currencies listed above will automatically see an increase on the App Store over the following 24 hour period, Apple says.

Apple has also announced prices listed with the Israeli New Shekels and some listings using the New Zealand Dollar will actually see App Store prices decrease per recent changes in the foreign exchange rate.

Latest iPhone 6 concept based on Japanese sketches looks more persuasive

Ben Lovejoy Mar 31 2014 - 6:37 am PT

51 Comments

Martin Hajek has been busy this week: after iPhoneclub commissioned him to create concept images of an iPod Nano-inspired design of the iPhone 6, French site Nowhereelse asked him to use the Japanese sketches mentioned in that piece to create something far closer to the existing iPhone 5s design.

With many of our commentators criticizing the square corners of the previous concept, this latest one returns us to the rounded corners we know and love. More controversially, perhaps, we also see a return to the glass back. More images below the fold …

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Want to upgrade your iPhone 5s camera to 2k video? All you need is this app …

Ben Lovejoy Mar 31 2014 - 5:41 am PT

21 Comments

[vimeo 90202587 w=800 h=451]

If you like to use your iPhone to shoot video and Apple offered to upgrade your iPhone 5s from 1080p HD to 2k video for just $7, the decision wouldn’t require much thought. That’s exactly the trick Ultrakam has pulled off with its new iPhone app.

If you’re wondering how a mere app can convert your camera to a higher resolution, it doesn’t: it simply allows the software to use more of the hardware capabilities of your camera. Apple may say that your iPhone 5s has a 1080p HD videocamera, but that’s not quite true: the camera hardware itself is capable of anything up to 3264×2448, it’s just that the software can’t process that many pixels at a sensible frame-rate …
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Is Android the real target of latest Apple vs Samsung patent battle that starts today?

Ben Lovejoy Mar 31 2014 - 4:21 am PT

19 Comments

Photo: Reuters

Pieces in The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal suggest that the real target of Apple’s second courtroom patent battle with Samsung may be Android.

Some features in Samsung devices that Apple objects to are part of Google’s Android operating system, by far the most popular mobile operating system worldwide, running on more than a billion devices made by many manufacturers. That means that if Apple wins, Google could have to make changes to critical Android features, and Samsung and other Android phone makers might have to modify the software on their phones …

Jury selection begins today for the second patent case between the two companies after mediation attempts failed. Apple is seeking around $2B in damages for five patents it alleges Samsung has violated, while Samsung is counter-claiming that Apple is in violation of two of its own patents.

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Foxconn gives a shoutout to Apple products after profits climb 13 percent

Ben Lovejoy Mar 28 2014 - 8:35 am PT

8 Comments

Apple’s lead manufacturer Foxconn reported a 13 percent rise in net profit to 106.7B new Taiwan dollars (US$3.5B) following record iPhone and iPad sales, reports the WSJ. More than 40 percent of the company’s revenue comes from Apple.

The news comes a few days after Apple supplier Pegatron reported a 22 percent rise in earnings.

Hon Hai’s results were underpinned by demand from Cupertino, Calif.-based Apple, which sold 51 million iPhones in its fiscal first quarter ended Dec. 28, 2013—up 7% from the same period the previous year […]

Apple also said it sold a record 26 million iPads in the quarter, compared with 22.9 million in the year-ago period …

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Macworld/iWorld conference panel kickoff condensed into 2 minutes

Ben Lovejoy Mar 28 2014 - 7:02 am PT

7 Comments

[youtube=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xhnRfthbarE]

IDG’s senior VP Jason Snell tried to provoke comment with the view that “Apple must release a smart watch in 60 days or it’s all over,” but if the rest of the clips are any guide, there wasn’t too much controversy in the rest of the discussion …

The show opened yesterday in San Francisco, and ends tomorrow.

This week’s iPhone 6 concepts seemingly inspired by iPod Nanos

Ben Lovejoy Mar 28 2014 - 5:41 am PT

51 Comments

One of our favourite concept designers, Martin Hajek, has been busy again – this time with an iPhone 6 concept reminiscent of the iPod Nano design, commissioned by Dutch site iPhoneclub.

The iPhone 6 is widely expected to be launched in two different sizes, with Bloomberg and Nikkei specifically suggesting 4.7- and 5.5-inch sizes. Hajek’s design shows the 4.7-inch model, though thinner bezels and reduced casing top and bottom mean that the exterior dimensions don’t increase too dramatically.

Three of the images contrast the new concept with the iPhone 5s, shown in the gallery below …
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It’s official: Apple’s first store in Turkey to open in Istanbul on April 5th

Mark Gurman Mar 28 2014 - 5:29 am PT

4 Comments

Following several months of anticipation, Apple’s first official Apple Retail Store in Turkey will open in Istanbul on April 5th. The new store is located in the center of the Zorlu Center mall, and the official announcement has come in the form of emails to customers in Turkey and on a banner around the physical store…

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