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This is Rumor Replay, a weekly column at 9to5Mac offering a quick rundown of the most recent Apple product rumors, with analysis and commentary. Today: an iPhone 17 Air leak, Apple’s spring product details, iOS 19 redesigns, and more. Here are this week’s Apple rumors.

Need to lock down your new M4 Mac mini? Apple has added a new desktop accessory to its online store just for that purpose.

Benjamin and Chance give their thoughts on Apple’s attempts to placate the BBC’s complaints about notification summaries with iOS 18.3. Also, the rumored iPhone 17 Air design has a divisive camera bar on the back, and this week also saw an intriguing leak showing apparent design changes for the iOS 19 Camera app. 

And in Happy Hour Plus, Chance struggles to find new things to watch and — much to Benjamin’s delight — brings his own Apple TV app complaints to the table. Subscribe at 9to5mac.com/join.

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Over the last year, we’ve seen multiple long-term holdouts finally cave to the pressure and adopt Apple Pay. At this point, the largest holdout in the United States is Walmart, and the company today indicated that it has absolutely zero plans to change its stance.

Apple has just released a new beta firmware update for AirPods Pro 2, bringing revisions for developers ahead of an expected public launch.

The EU is not exactly on the best of terms with several US tech giants, including Apple, and now the newly inaugurated President Trump is speaking up about it.

Apple starting adding Thread radios to its devices in late 2023, but has said very little about it. iPhone 15 Pro and Pro Max were the first to debut the new radio, but more iPhones, iPads, and Macs have followed suit. Now, a key Apple director has revealed why.

Apple TV+ has been on a roll with its TV shows lately, but movies remain a struggle for the streamer. Today’s newly unveiled Oscar nominations confirm that, as a grand total of zero nominations were received by Apple.

India remains Apple’s largest market opportunity after China. Growing the business in India, however, has always required a bit of compromise with the local government. In 2019, it was a small investment of $1 billion that helped unlock iPhone exports from India. More recently, India has pressured Apple to put its government-backed app store on the iPhone.

Not every music streaming service pays artists equally, and a new report highlights the breadth of disparities from one streamer to the next—including Apple Music paying more than double Spotify’s average rates.

Update 2:50 p.m. ET: Added statement from Spotify spokesperson to the end.

The never-ending saga of the TikTok ban continues, with a ByteDance board member suggesting that a compromise would be possible.

The remark was made by William E. Ford, an American businessman who is one of the directors of parent company ByteDance …

AI chatbot ChatGPT is down for many users in the US and the UK, with a variety of errors being reported – including gateway errors, login failures, and chats not loading …

Ookla, the firm behind Speedtest, just published its semi-annual U.S. connectivity report covering the second half of 2024. One takeaway is that 5G performance is improving. However, this raises one key question: can anyone notice?

Used iPhones with TikTok installed on them are being listed for sale on eBay for thousands of dollars, as people try to cash in on the ban. One listing even asks $50,000 for an unlocked iPhone 12 Pro Max “with TikTok app.”

Although Trump has issued an executive order claiming to shield companies from liability for breaking the law, Apple, Google and others continue to comply by keeping TikTok out of their US app stores …

A judge has ruled that there is a “reasonable possibility” that Apple illegally paid women less than men, meaning that a class action lawsuit filed on behalf of 12,000 current and former female employees will proceed.

Apple admits that the pay disparities exist, but claim that these can be justified by the individual circumstances …

The UK government today announced that the Competition and Markets Authority has launched strategic market status investigations into mobile ecosystems, specifically the App Store models of iPhone and Android.

The report says it will assess Apple’s market power, and potential exploitative conduct. This includes options for app distribution to customers, and the terms app developers must agree to to be listed in the App Store in the first place.

Apple Watch users regularly credit the device with helping save their life during health scares and emergency situations. For the founder of Whole Foods, however, it was insight gained from the Apple Watch that helped him improve his life.

I love my AirPods Pro 2, but I can’t say the same about every “intelligent” feature Apple has added over the years. If you want to roll with your AirPods Pro as straightforward as possible, these are the features to disable.

There’s a new app called “People” coming soon to the iPhone that looks promising. Like Cardhop and other Contacts app alternatives, People wants to modernize your address book with important context.

This is the pitch from indie developer Andrew Theis: