Apple

6,140 'Apple News' stories November 2008 - September 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

Guess Watches CEO pretends she welcomes the Apple Watch as she announces GUESS’s smartwatch plans

Ben Lovejoy Sep 15 2014 - 6:58 am PT

35 Comments

If you’re the CEO of a watch company, you likely watched the announcement of the Apple Watch with a mixture of optimism and fear. Optimism because Apple just made watches cool again in a market where many people haven’t worn one for years. Fear because most of those who now have a renewed interest in watches aren’t going to buy yours.

Guess Watches CEO Cindy Livingston put a brave face on it with a letter welcoming Tim Cook to the watch industry (full version below) as she announced the company plans to make a smartwatch of its own …
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Apple’s employee reservation system seemingly excludes iPhone 6 Plus, lends weight to short supply rumors

Ben Lovejoy Sep 15 2014 - 5:43 am PT

5 Comments

Apple has advised store staff that those working overnight or morning shifts on Friday will be able to reserve an iPhone 6, but not a 6 Plus, if a tweeted photo is genuine (and we have evidence it is). This would lend further weight to longstanding rumors and overwhelming evidence that the 5.5-inch model would be in short supply …
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Apple announces record 4 million preorders for iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus in first 24 hours

Benjamin Mayo Sep 15 2014 - 5:38 am PT

73 Comments

Apple has just announced that preorders for iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus have topped all previously set records, achieving 4 million sales in the first twenty-four hours. In the press release, Cook said he is thrilled that customers love them “as much as we do”.

Apple® today announced a record number of first day pre-orders of iPhone® 6 and iPhone 6 Plus, the biggest advancements in iPhone history, with over four million in the first 24 hours. Demand for the new iPhones exceeds the initial pre-order supply and while a significant amount will be delivered to customers beginning on Friday and throughout September, many iPhone pre-orders are scheduled to be delivered in October.

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Apple Pay may mean the end of physical bank cards within 2-3 years, argues Moven CEO

Ben Lovejoy Sep 15 2014 - 4:48 am PT

44 Comments

While we’d all expected plastic bank cards to be replaced by apps eventually, the CEO of mobile banking startup Moven is suggesting that Apple’s backing could mean the end of physical bank cards within 2-3 years.

The additional sweetners here are three fold. Firstly, tokenization will avoid much of the type of breaches we’ve seen at Target and Home Depot because the token is only a one-time use thing. Secondly, the move to tokens and the combination of biometrics, etc allow for the emergence of a ‘cardholder present’ approach to interchange rates that will potentially give mobile payments a competitive merchant rate. Lastly, the US might effectively jump straight from magstripe to mobile, especially if issuers can figure out how to reduce the cost of card replacement by moving straight to mobile SE and tokens …

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Square and Apple acquisition talks reportedly fell apart over pricing disagreements

Mike Beasley Sep 12 2014 - 3:01 pm PT

33 Comments

TechCrunch is reporting today that Apple and mobile payment processor Square were briefly in talks about a possible acqusition. The talks didn’t get far, it seems, as the two companies couldn’t reach an agreement on how much Square was actually worth. Eventually, Square walked away:

Separately, TechCrunch has heard that Square and Apple were in acquisition talks, but that Square walked away. Apple wanted the company to come aboard, but the discussed price was a sticking point: Apple wanted to buy Square for around $3 billion, one source said. Square, valued at the time at a firm 66 percent delta to that price point, declined to accept.

It’s interesting to consider what Apple Pay might have looked like if the merger had gone through. You can read the more over at TechCrunch.

Apple notifying iPhone 6 customers w/ reservations due to carrier issues to complete purchase within 24 hours

Zac Hall Sep 12 2014 - 10:39 am PT

36 Comments

Pre-order sales for Apple’s newly announced iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus kicked off last night at 3:01 AM EST with the larger 5.5-inch model quickly seeing ship dates slip, but some customers were unable to complete the pre-order process on Apple’s online store due to issues reaching carrier systems.

Rather than receiving a purchase confirmation, these customers were issued reservation numbers for the iPhone model attempting to be pre-ordered with the promise that the order can be finalized with carrier systems were able to be accessed again. As of this morning, Apple has begun notifying these customers that the transaction for their desired pre-order device is ready to be completed as carrier systems have stabilized.
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Apple says some users experiencing issues with iCloud Mail & Notes (U: Apple says resolved)

Zac Hall Sep 12 2014 - 10:03 am PT

2 Comments

On the same day as the rocky iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus pre-order, Apple is reporting on its iCloud System Status site that a small percentage of users are experiencing issues with iCloud Mail and iCloud Notes. According to the detailed timeline, the issues began about 45 minutes ago and are ongoing for 0.05% of users. August proved a rough month for iCloud uptime, with major issues reported by Apple on multiple occasions, although the current outage seems minor so far.
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Wondering what it cost Apple to give away that U2 album to every customer?

Ben Lovejoy Sep 12 2014 - 6:57 am PT

32 Comments

If you were wondering how much it cost Apple to give away a copy of U2’s Songs of Innocence album to every customer, the answer, according the the New York Times, is more than $100M.

To release U2’s album free, Apple paid the band and Universal an unspecified fee as a blanket royalty and committed to a marketing campaign for the band worth up to $100 million, according to several people briefed on the deal. That marketing will include a global television campaign, the first piece of which was a commercial that was shown during the event.

Yep, that album that ended up on many people’s iPhones uninvited cost Apple whatever the royalty fee is for half a billion downloads plus a further $100M spend on marketing it. Nice. Perhaps the band will be donating a portion of it to Project RED?

Bono and Cook joked around about the cost during the keynote, with Bono telling Cook “you would have to pay for it, because we’re not going in for the free music around here.”

Why Apple timed things perfectly with the launch of Apple Pay

Ben Lovejoy Sep 12 2014 - 5:53 am PT

32 Comments

After years of annual rumors that each successive iPhone would feature NFC, there was understandable skepticism when the rumor rolled around again this year for the iPhone 6. It was looking like Apple might have put all its short-range communication eggs in one basket with Bluetooth LE.

Instead, of course, the iPhone 6 and 6 Plus got NFC as the mechanism for Apple’s contactless payment service, Apple Pay. Pando suggests that the company’s timing may not be entire coincidental.

While U.S. banks have so far ignored the more secure chip-and-pin cards used in Europe, sticking doggedly to magnetic strips and signatures, all that will be changing next year. As of October 2015, banks are switching to chip-based cards – and that means merchants will need to upgrade their payment terminals.

You can still get chip-reading terminals without NFC, but it’s likely that the vast majority of stores will opt to go contactless at the same time. Which means that instead of the 220,000 places you can use contactless payment today, there will be much closer to nine million outlets by this time next year – and you’ll be able to pay with your iPhone 6 at any of them.

U.S. card issuers are already pushing Apple Pay, MasterCard running a full-page ad in today’s New York Times (via Business Insider).

Apple Pay headed to China with UnionPay partnership, references found in iOS code

Benjamin Mayo Sep 12 2014 - 5:50 am PT

1 Comment

Apple is set to bring Apple Pay, its mobile wallet service, to China using a partnership with China UnionPay. @KhaosT on Twitter found references to the credit card type in iOS 8 code and now MarketWatch is corroborating with sources that a deal is in the works.

Apple announced Apple Pay as a US only service, coming to iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus in October with a software update. A deal with UnionPay would obviously mean Apple wants to bring the feature to Chinese iOS customers soon.

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60 percent of apps fail basic privacy tests, finds international cross-governmental study

Ben Lovejoy Sep 12 2014 - 5:10 am PT

8 Comments

A review of 1,211 apps carried out by a coalition of privacy officials across 19 countries found that 60 percent of them failed at least one basic privacy test, reports the WSJ.

The officials found that 60% of apps raised privacy concerns, based on three criteria: They did not disclose how they used personal information; they required that the user give up an excessive amount of personal data as a condition of downloading the app; and their privacy policies were rendered in type too small to be read on a phone’s screen …

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iPhone 6 vs iPhone 6 Plus: Which one should you buy?

Dom Esposito Sep 11 2014 - 10:57 pm PT

60 Comments

It’s iPhone buying season again and this year we’re faced with a very tough decision. Apple recently unveiled the iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus at its press event on Sept. 9, 2014 and as many rumors indicated, we now have a 4.7-inch model and a 5.5-inch model. Normally our choice would be narrowed down between color and capacity, but this year it’s much more than that…

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Apple to offer in-store pickup option for iPhone 6 preorders

Dom Esposito Sep 11 2014 - 12:39 pm PT

68 Comments

Pre-orders for the iPhone 6 will start at 12:01 a.m. PDT and will be available to purchase in Apple Stores on Sept. 19th, 2014, but what isn’t widely known is that it looks like Apple is kicking off Personal Pickup availability starting with preorders as well. This means that you’ll be able to preorder an iPhone 6 and select a store in your area and pick it up on launch day….

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Apple VP Greg Joswiak to attend Code/Mobile conference next month

Zac Hall Sep 11 2014 - 8:48 am PT

0 Comments

Re/code announced today that Apple VP Greg Joswiak will be attending its inaugural Code/Mobile conference next month to talk about Apple’s new products announced earlier this week including the new iPhone 6 models, the new iOS 8, and the company’s mobile payment system due out next month called Apple Pay.

“Joz,” as he is called, is a veteran of Apple who manages both product marketing and product management for both iPhone and iPod hardware, as well as iOS. He usually keeps himself quite busy behind the curtain, so we’re delighted to have Joz on stage in what’s a rare public interview for Apple (and even rarer for Joswiak).

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Most analysts satisfied with Apple’s announcements, think AAPL stock will climb

Ben Lovejoy Sep 11 2014 - 7:16 am PT

8 Comments

Big-name analysts seemed satisfied with what they saw and heard during Apple’s launch of the iPhone 6, Apple Watch and Apple Pay, reports Forbes. Summarising investor notes from a dozen major companies, Chuck Jones found the general feeling was that Apple had delivered what was expected.

The overall average of AAPL stock price targets was $109, against the current price of just over $100. Analysts pointed to a range of factors in forming their views, among them …
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Sketchy supply-chain report says production gearing-up for 80M iPhone 6 sales this year

Ben Lovejoy Sep 11 2014 - 6:25 am PT

2 Comments

DigiTimes is citing supply-chain sources as stating that Apple is gearing-up its iPhone 6 production plans for an anticipated 80 million sales by year-end. If achieved, it would represent 33 percent year-on-year growth.

Makers in the iPhone supply chain are preparing parts and components for production of up to 80 million units of iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus before year-end 2014, according to sources at Taiwan-based iPhone supply chain.

As ever with DigiTimes, the number should be taken with a large dose of salt: while manufacturers will be aware of their own order-books from Apple, and thus have some degree of insight into the company’s expectations for early sales, it’s a stretch to extrapolate from that to sales targets up to the end of the year.

We won’t have too long to wait for a good indication of how well the new models are selling. They go on sale on Friday 19th, and Apple is expected to issue its usual announcement of opening weekend sales on Monday 22nd September. Last year, Apple announced a record 9M iPhone sales in the first three days.

This year’s opening weekend numbers may take a hit, however, with the New York Times reporting that regulatory problems may mean the new models won’t go on sale in China – a massive market – on 19th September.

Via Business Insider

Tesla iOS & Android app updated ahead of car’s 6.0 firmware

Ben Lovejoy Sep 11 2014 - 5:08 am PT

4 Comments

Good news and bad news for Tesla Model S owners: the iOS and Android apps have been updated to allow you to start the car without a key – but the matching firmware update needed by the car hasn’t yet arrived.

Version 2 of the iOS app also provides support for the new calendar function, where the car can pull in data from your iPhone calendar and offer to navigate you to the location – as well as providing several new alerts …
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Poll: Was a square format the right choice for the Apple Watch, or would round have been better?

Ben Lovejoy Sep 11 2014 - 4:30 am PT

109 Comments

The fact that Apple was working on a smartwatch may have been one of the worst-kept secrets in the world, but the company did at least manage to keep us guessing about the form it would take – right down to whether the form factor would be square or circular.

Was a square format the right choice? To help us form a view, UX/UI designer Alcion has put together a series of renders showing what the Apple Watch would look like with a round face …
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Google Voice for iOS updated w/ refreshed design and Hangouts integration

Chance Miller Sep 10 2014 - 5:23 pm PT

2 Comments

Google this evening rolled out an update to the Google Voice app on iOS, adding several new features and much-needed visual enhancements. Bumping the app to version 1.6, this evening’s update is the first the app has seen since September 2013, and the first major update since 2012.

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T-Mobile unveils expanded WiFi calling capabilities, Personal CellSpot router, partnership with Gogo for in-flight texts

Chance Miller Sep 10 2014 - 1:54 pm PT

8 Comments

During its Uncarrier 7.0 event this afternoon, T-Mobile revealed a handful of new announcements as part of its ongoing quest to lead the mobile industry. Firstly, CEO John Legere announced that every phone it sells from here on out will be capable of WiFi calling and texting. The company says that anyone who does not currently have a phone capable of WiFi calling can upgrade to a supported phone with the carrier’s Jump program. As the name implies, WiFi calling and texting allows you to make calls and send texts over your WiFi network, as opposed to over the cellular connection.

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IDG shutters Macworld Magazine, much of the editorial staff let go

Seth Weintraub Sep 10 2014 - 10:49 am PT

28 Comments

[tweet https://twitter.com/pinatubo2000/status/509752111790579712]

[tweet https://twitter.com/jsnell/status/509749300683735041]

International Data Group (IDG) is shutting down Macworld Magazine, the long time Apple periodical according to tweets by staff and conversations I’ve had with personnel. Dan Miller, Editor, Macworld tweeted the following:

The Macworld.com website will remain open [although as a shell of its former self -ed] with a reduced staff according to Miller, who himself is leaving in a month.

As a former contributor and fan of Macworld.com it is sad to see the publication go. Ironically, the transition from print to digital hastened by Apple’s own iPad and other online tools made the publication one of the last remaining Apple publications in print.

There’s no word yet on the fate of the annual trade show of the same name that has also taken a hit since Apple stopped attending. We’ll update as we hear more.

Update: Dan Miller wrote in to clarify that he never implied that the magazine “would be a shell of its former self” (even though most of the names and faces that were the backbone of the magazine have been let go).
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Vogue editor delivers a fashion industry verdict on the Apple Watch [video]

Ben Lovejoy Sep 10 2014 - 7:21 am PT

27 Comments

Lisa Armstrong, a contributing editor to Vogue and former Fashion Writer of the Year in the UK, has provided a fashion industry verdict on the Apple Watch – and if she speaks for the rest of the fashion world, Apple should be feeling pretty happy right now. Writing in the Telegraph, she said:

The Apple Watch […] looks terrific, although most of us will deploy a fraction of its potential. Would I like one? Yes. I love watches, and I’m a sucker for a good looking gadget […] [With the Apple Watch] the company is entering the style arena. It should be one hell of a show.

Apple always knew that the watch would need to succeed as a fashion accessory every bit as much as a gadget. The above image – from the Apple website – tells its own story…
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Jay Carney joining CNN after reportedly being considered for Apple PR chief

Zac Hall Sep 10 2014 - 6:24 am PT

4 Comments

Former White House Press Secretary for the Obama Administration Jay Carney is joining CNN as a political commenter, Politico reports. The announcement was made by the cable network and Carney today.

“I’m thrilled to be joining CNN at a time when there is so much happening in the nation and the world,” Carney said in a statement.

Carney’s move to CNN surely means the end to reports that the former White House Press Secretary is in the running for Apple’s top PR spot vacated by now-retired Katie Cotton. Re/code reported earlier this year that Carney was among the top candidates in the running for that role, and Bloomberg later corroborated that report. This likely means Apple was in talks with Carney, but Apple and Carney will be going in different directions. The search for a ‘friendlier, more approachable’ PR chief continues.

First headphones to use Lightning port announced – and they’re not from Beats

Ben Lovejoy Sep 10 2014 - 6:19 am PT

14 Comments

When Apple quietly created a new MFi spec for headphones, allowing them to connect via the Lightning port rather than the headphone jack to deliver higher-quality audio, everyone expected Apple-owned Beats to be first to take advantage of it. But instead Philips has, ah, beaten them to it …
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