Monday, March 7, 2016
Apple users targeted in first known Mac ransomware campaign Jim Finkle reports for Reuters: Hackers infected Macs through a tainted copy of a popular program known as Transmission, which is used to transfer data through the BitTorrent peer-to-peer file sharing network, Palo Alto said on a blog …Tuesday, November 10, 2015
Apple has learned nothing from Microsoft’s Surface - The Verge iPad sales are indeed down, but it does not follow from that fact that iPad use is down. This Time article did the yeoman’s work of aggregating some data about iPad sales. The bottom line is that in the five years since the …Wednesday, October 14, 2015
Hackers Can Silently Control Siri From 16 Feet Away Well this is concerning: A pair of researchers at ANSSI, a French government agency devoted to information security, have shown that they can use radio waves to silently trigger voice commands on any Android phone or iPhone that has Google Now or …Tuesday, September 22, 2015
Most of this article is an extensive discussion of my hunt for the best ad blocker on iOS. It isn’t exhaustive and, given the pace at which the App Store moves, probably won’t remain current for long. That’s why I want to open things with my own thoughts on ad blocking, because I …
Sunday, July 19, 2015
Ex-Googler says she exposed company-wide pay inequality with crowdsourced spreadsheet Kristen V. Brown wrote for Fusion about Googler Erica Joy’s recent salary spreadsheet. Google had no response to her request for comment, which is the worst kind of response to something like this. Apple …Thursday, July 9, 2015
iOS 9 Public Beta coming today? I rarely cross-post from my geekery-focused Tumblr, but I’m so excited about this I had to share it here, where I have literally thousands more followers. I’ll be writing a proper post about the public beta after I’ve used it for a few days. There are some interesting …Thursday, June 18, 2015
Apple Revokes Monster’s Authority to Make Licensed Accessories Daisuke Wakabayashi writes at The Wall Street Journal: Mr. Tognotti said he told Apple that the move would significantly disrupt Monster’s business and that the two companies had worked well for years, with Monster paying Apple more …Thursday, May 7, 2015
Apple under federal anti-competition scrutiny, again Micah Singleton writes for The Verge: Sources also indicated that Apple offered to pay YouTube’s music licensing fee to Universal Music Group if the label stopped allowing its songs on YouTube. Apple is seemingly trying to clear a path before its …Wednesday, April 1, 2015
Tim Cook: Pro-discrimination ‘religious freedom’ laws are dangerous Tim Cook, in an op-ed at the Washington Post: Our message, to people around the country and around the world, is this: Apple is open. Open to everyone, regardless of where they come from, what they look like, how they worship or …Friday, December 5, 2014
Tim Cook will lend his name to Alabama LGBTQ billApple initially expressed corporate reluctance, but Apple General Counsel Bruce Sewell later told Pamela Todd, Alabama’s only openly gay lawmaker, that CEO Tim Cook “would be delighted” to have a bill named after him which would protect LGBTQ Alabama …Saturday, October 11, 2014
I’ve heard from many people who insist their iPhone or iPad “can’t handle” or “doesn’t fit” iOS 8. I read an article about a slow-down in updates to iOS 8. John Gruber of Daring Fireball first posited that some well-documented software bugs were making people reluctant to update. But his follow-up …Thursday, October 9, 2014
A sense that it wasn’t designRobert Sullivan has such a good interview with Jony Ive over at Vogue: In other words, the secret weapon of the most sought-after personal-electronics company in the world is a very nice guy from Northeast London who has a soft spot for woodworking and the sense that …Friday, September 26, 2014
FBI Director dislikes encryption on Apple and Google devicesEncryption of data on mobile devices is a big selling point in our post-Snowden world. But FBI Director James Comes isn’t happy about it: What concerns me about this is companies marketing something expressly to allow people to place …Tuesday, September 23, 2014
Apple can’t bypass your iOS passcodeApple says in the latest revision of its page on government information requests: On devices running iOS 8, your personal data such as photos, messages (including attachments), email, contacts, call history, iTunes content, notes, and reminders is placed …Sunday, March 2, 2014
Tim Cook and the same question When Cook turned the spotlight on someone, he hammered them with questions until he was satisfied. “Why is that?” “What do you mean?” “I don’t understand. Why are you not making it clear?” He was known to ask the same exact question 10 times in a row. Once upon a time …Saturday, January 25, 2014
Mac turns 30Steve Jobs, in 1985: We’re just in the beginning stages of what will be a truly remarkable breakthrough for most people — as remarkable as the telephone. The remarkable thing is that, at least for people my age, ~30, as old as the Mac itself, the computer is far more remarkable than …Tuesday, December 31, 2013
Apple and “market realities”Apple, it turns out, is not happy about the legal consequences of its ebook price-fixing scheme. I would be unhappy as well if the attorney assigned by a federal judge to make sure I reformed my anti-competitive practices was sending me $1,100-per-hour bills. …Sunday, August 4, 2013
A Day In The Life Of An iPhone Factory WorkerThis is something everyone should read. Apple isn’t the only company benefiting from working conditions like this, and that makes it worse, not better. The dominant press narrative is that Apple is profiting from the misery of toiling foreign workers. The …Tuesday, April 9, 2013
Apple removes app curation app from App Store"Yes, you can live here," Apple seems to say to developers, "but if you ever break one of our vague rules, or if we ever decide for any reason or even for no reason at all that you must go, you will be evicted. No appeal, no questions asked, no …Wednesday, January 30, 2013
Apple store trade dressI wonder if there are any retail stores out there that have looked like Apple stores since before Apple stores, and before this trademark was granted earlier this month. I don’t mean knock-off stores, though. I’m thinking make-up shops, art galleries, and other entities that …Wednesday, January 30, 2013
128 GB iPad perfect for pros?I still personally have no interest in a 128 GB iPad, but as John Gruber points out, some professionals prefer the tablet form factor generally, and the iPad specifically, but run out of space for the multimedia they use every day.Tuesday, January 29, 2013
The 128 GB iPad is official……but I’m not interested. Peter Cohen of The Loop shared this earlier today, but I wonder why he didn’t offer any of his own thoughts on it. Here’s why I’m not interested: Part of the iPad’s appeal to me is that it isn’t another crufty “filing cabinet.” I rather …Wednesday, December 19, 2012
Nilay Patel on what we agree to when we use cloud servicesNilay Patel at The Verge reads some Terms of Service and drops some knowledge bombs. It’s definitely a must-read if you’re a Google, Dropbox, iCloud, or Skydrive user. So, if you’re on the internet at all, basically.Thursday, December 6, 2012
Tim Cook tells Brian Williams TV is “an area of intense interest”Ronnie Polidoro, writing at NBC: “When I go into my living room and turn on the TV, I feel like I have gone backwards in time by 20 to 30 years,” Cook told Williams. “It’s an area of intense interest. I can’t say more than …Tuesday, November 27, 2012
Apple Maps lead firedRichard Williamson is his name, and shipping a less-than-perfect mapping application on the iPhone 5 was his game, until, as Bloomberg's Adam Satariano reports, Senior Vice President Eddy Cue fired him. As an aside, I really like that Bloomberg lists both the reporter’s and the …Tuesday, October 23, 2012
iPad mini - Every inch an iPad.Everyone is shitting their pants over this thing, but I’m more excited by the new MacBook Pro.Thursday, October 18, 2012
Verizon Activated 3.1 Million iPhones In Q3 2012, But Only 651K Were iPhone 5sMG Siegler, commenting on the TechCrunch post by Chris Velazco, linked above: In other words, the iPhone 5 was on sale for just nine days before the quarter ended. And it was supply-constrained the whole time. Mr. …Saturday, October 6, 2012
Why We’ll Never Stop Talking About Steve JobsMat Honan, writing at Wired: Jobs, like the titans of industry before him, realized that when we think about how the world works, we are actually thinking about the way people have made it to work. And that means that if you don’t like the way the …Saturday, September 29, 2012
Apple Is Heavily Promoting Alternative Map Apps In The App StoreRelatedWednesday, September 19, 2012
Twitter continues to value advertiser utility above user experienceRomain Dillet at TechCrunch explains it like this: Now when you land on a company profile page, you will see a big brand name with a small @username below, a gigantic header photo, a small logo next to every tweet, photos of new …