MacRumors

Apple this week shared a series of inspiring videos tied to its "Everyone Can Create" and "Everyone Can Code" initiatives on its YouTube channel in Brazil. The titles and captions are in Portuguese, but some of the videos have English narration.

The first video interviews students on what creativity means to them, while the other videos highlight students using Apple's free Swift Playgrounds app to learn how to code in classrooms around the world, including in Orange, California; Blackpool, England; Osaka, Japan; Querétaro City, Mexico; and Sainte-Julie, a suburb of Montreal, Canada.

Everyone Can Create is designed to allow teachers to easily incorporate creativity into their existing lesson plans in any subject, including language arts, math, science, history, social studies, and coding. The series of guides teach students to develop ideas through drawing, music, video, and photos on the iPad.

Everyone Can Create resources are available through Apple Books, while the Swift Playgrounds app is available on the App Store.

KO_OP's "Winding Worlds" is this week's addition to Apple Arcade on the iPhone, iPad, Apple TV, and Mac. The game is described as a finger-wiggling puzzle-adventure about a girl named Willow, a Wurm, and how to say goodbye.

You're far from home. You're not sure how you got here. But you do know one thing: it's your calling to help your new friends, however you can. But not all of them are being cooperative...

"From the award-winning studio that brought you GNOG comes Winding Worlds, a finger-wiggling puzzle-adventure about a girl, a Wurm, and how to say goodbye.

Willow just wants to mind her own business. But after she finds a broken magical necklace, she is transported on a spellbinding journey to a network of strange planets, each with a different inhabitant. Hired and guided by a mysterious cosmic Wurm, Willow's task is to find out how to help her new friends heal and move on. In Winding Worlds, join a cast of characters, big and small, in a heartwarming tale of grief, love, truth, and acceptance.

"Winding Worlds" is available on the App Store with an Apple Arcade subscription. The service provides iPhone, iPad, Apple TV, and Mac users with access to over 100 games with no in-app purchases or ads for $4.99 per month.

Apple plans to introduce its widely rumored augmented reality glasses in March or June of 2021, according to leaker Jon Prosser.

Yesterday, reputable analyst Ming-Chi Kuo predicted that the Apple Glasses will launch in 2022 at the earliest, so it is possible that Apple unveils the glasses in 2021 and releases them in 2022. This would be consistent with the original Apple Watch, which was previewed in September 2014 and launched in April 2015. Apple also introduced the HomePod in June 2017 and launched the speaker in February 2018.

A lengthy gap between Apple announcing and shipping the glasses could provide developers with time to create apps and experiences for the augmented reality platform, provided that an SDK is released in advance. An early announcement can also help to prevent leaks, although Prosser claims that he will be showing off a prototype of the glasses soon.

Keep in mind that Apple is rumored to be working on two separate head-worn augmented reality products, including a bulkier headset and sleeker glasses. The headset is expected to launch prior to the glasses, so there could be some confusion between the products. In any case, it does not sound like either product is imminent, so the wait continues.

Apple's chipmaking partner TSMC today announced its intention to build and operate an advanced semiconductor factory in Arizona, with construction planned to start in 2021 and production targeted to begin in 2024.

The facility will be able to manufacture around 20,000 wafers per month using TSMC's latest 5-nanometer fabrication process. TSMC has been gradually miniaturizing its process over the years, going from a 16nm A10 chip in iPhone 7 models to a 7nm A13 chip in iPhone 11 models. iPhone 12 models are expected to use a 5nm A14 chip.

TSMC estimates that its total spending on this project, including capital expenditure, will be approximately $12 billion from 2021 to 2029, with the facility expected to create over 1,600 high-tech professional jobs directly.

TSMC already operates a factory in Camas, Washington and design centers in both Austin, Texas and San Jose, California, so the Arizona facility would be its second manufacturing site in the United States. The company's main factories are in Taiwan.

Apple's main iPhone assembler Foxconn posted an almost 90 percent drop in first-quarter profit on Friday, as the impact of the global health crisis hit production demand from clients (via Reuters).

But the Taiwanese electronics manufacturer said the worst was over, and the company would "stabilize in the second quarter," adding that it expects revenue to show double-digit growth in comparison to the first quarter.

Foxconn reported net profit of T$2.1 billion ($70.25 million) for the January-March quarter, falling well short of a Refinitiv consensus estimate of T$8.88 billion drawn from 14 analysts.

Foxconn slashed its 2020 revenue outlook in March after strict quarantines were enforced at its China plants for a period in February, at the height of the crisis, which has now largely resolved in the country.

Apple sold fewer than 500,000 iPhones amid the ongoing curbs on travel and transport – a 60 percent slump in ‌‌iPhone‌‌ sales compared to the February 2019 quarter. The same month, Apple announced that its financial guidance for the March quarter would fall short. Foxconn went on to suffer its biggest monthly drop in revenue in about seven years because of the containment measures.

The manufacturer had earlier claimed the viral outbreak had had a "fairly small impact" on ‌‌‌iPhone‌‌‌ production, suggesting its factories in other countries like Vietnam, India, and Mexico had been able to fill the gap.

It and other factories in China have reportedly implemented stringent measures to prevent the another viral outbreak in the country, while the Chinese government is mandating that employers check temperatures and provide face masks to employees, as well as submitting daily reports on workers' health statuses.

Foxconn has since resumed normal operations at all of its main factories in China.

Apple's eighth-generation iPad will arrive this year and feature an A12 chip, according to an anonymous Twitter account with a thus-far proven track record for forthcoming Apple product leaks.

Apple's seventh-generation ‌iPad‌, introduced in September 2019, was an iterative update to the sixth-generation low-cost ‌iPad‌, with a larger 10.2-inch display and support for new accessories. However, it used the same A10 Fusion chip as the sixth-generation ‌iPad‌.

On Thursday, Apple analyst Ming-Chi Kuo said that Apple is working on two new ‌iPad‌ models, which include a 10.8-inch ‌‌iPad‌‌ and an 8.5 to 9-inch ‌‌iPad‌‌ mini. These new iPads are expected to launch in the second half of 2020 and the first half of 2021, respectively.

Kuo said that he believes the two new ‌‌iPad‌‌ models will follow the ‌iPhone SE‌'s product strategy, which means affordable price points. The existing low-cost ‌‌iPad‌‌ is 10.2 inches, so it's not clear if Apple plans to introduce larger-sized tablets or increase the available display size through bezel reduction.

Rumors aside, it would be reasonable to expect a new entry-level ‌iPad‌ this year, as the device has been updated annually for the past three generations. Also, the A10 chip was first used in the ‌iPhone‌ 7 and 7 Plus, so there's a good case for arguing that it's about time Apple took the processing power up a notch in its most affordable ‌iPad‌. The A12 chip first appeared in the ‌iPhone‌ XS, XS Max, XR and the 2019 versions of the iPad Air and ‌iPad‌ Mini.

In recent weeks, the anonymously-run Twitter account "L0vetodream" has noted that some products and components have been delayed, including the new iMac models and the A14 chip. It has also hinted at a 2021 release for a rumored 14-inch MacBook Pro.

The Twitter account accurately revealed several details about the new ‌iPhone‌ SE before any other leakers that we know of, including that the device would launch in the second week of April and come in three storage capacities. Likewise, the account accurately claimed that new iPad Pro models would launch in the third week of March.

Spotify users can once again use Safari to access the streaming service's web player, following the restoration of support for Apple's browser this week after over two-and-a-half years of incompatibility.

A Spotify support page explaining how to use the web player includes a list of supported web browsers, which has been updated to include Apple's browser alongside Chrome, Firefox, Edge, and Opera.

Previously, users who visited the Spotify web player on Safari received the message, "This browser doesn't support Spotify Web Player. Switch browsers or download Spotify for your desktop."

Spotify confirmed the incompatibility between its web player and Safari in September 2017, but never fully explained the problem. One theory was that it had something to do with Google's Widevine media optimizer plugin, which Spotify used for music streaming on the web but Apple opposed on security grounds. Whatever it was, the issue now appears to have been resolved.

Apple's $299 HomePod is no longer able to be purchased from the online store because it's been out of stock since this morning.

Both the white and space gray versions of the ‌HomePod‌ are currently listed as "Sold Out" on Apple's website, perhaps due to supply chain issues.

There's no word on when the ‌HomePod‌ might be back in stock from Apple, but customers who want to purchase one can still order from stores like Best Buy and B&H Photo.

There have been rumors suggesting Apple is working on a new low-cost, smaller version of the ‌HomePod‌ that will be released at some point later this year, but the current shortage is most likely a supply problem.

Update: ‌HomePod‌ now appears to be available again with a slight shipping delay.

Chrome plans to start blocking resource-heavy ads that drain a lot of battery in August, Google announced today on its Chromium blog (via VentureBeat). Chrome will block ads that mine cryptocurrency, are badly programmed, or are unoptimized for network usage.

We have recently discovered that a fraction of a percent of ads consume a disproportionate share of device resources, such as battery and network data, without the user knowing about it. These ads (such as those that mine cryptocurrency, are poorly programmed, or are unoptimized for network usage) can drain battery life, saturate already strained networks, and cost money.

In order to save our users' batteries and data plans, and provide them with a good experience on the web, Chrome will limit the resources a display ad can use before the user interacts with the ad. When an ad reaches its limit, the ad's frame will navigate to an error page, informing the user that the ad has used too many resources.

Chrome plans to limit the resources that an ad can use before the user interacts with the ad, and when that limit is hit, the ad's frame will redirect to an error page to let the user know that the ad has eaten up too many resources.

Google says that it extensively measured the ads in Chrome, targeting the most "egregious" ads that use more CPU or bandwidth than 99.9 percent of all detected ads for that resource.

Chrome will have thresholds that allow for 4MB of network data or 15 seconds of CPU usage in any 30 second period, or 60 seconds of total CPU usage before an ad is blocked. Just 0.3 percent of ads exceed this threshold, but today, account for 27 percent of network data used by ads and 28 percent of all ad CPU usage.

Google will experiment with the changes for the next several months with the intention of releasing the feature on Chrome stable towards the end of August.

Following its merger with Sprint, T-Mobile is aiming to unify its brand and will start phasing out Sprint branding this summer, T-Mobile CEO Mike Sievert said at an investor event earlier this week (via Fierce Wireless).

Retail stores will be T-Mobile branded with Sprint's name removed, and the Sprint branding will also be removed from things like customer bills.

Sievert said that T-Mobile had always been aiming for a summer timeframe for the phase out of the Sprint branding and the unification of the new T-Mobile, and mid-summer is when the company plans to be "advertising one flagship postpaid T-Mobile brand as well as operating a unified fleet of retail."

Existing Sprint customers will be able to keep their current plans and won't need to swap over to T-Mobile's plans, but new customers will likely need to sign up for T-Mobile plans rather than Sprint plans as the Sprint brand is consumed by the new combined company.

T-Mobile has not announced a specific date for the transition, just later in the summer. T-Mobile had initially planned to begin implementing the changes in early summer, but postponed due to the global health crisis.

As The Verge points out, T-Mobile and Sprint have a long way to go to fully combine their networks, and some problems have already emerged. Sprint and T-Mobile have started combining their 5G networks, and unfortunately, Sprint's existing customers with 5G smartphones can't use them on the new T-Mobile network.

Apple supplier TSMC, which makes the A-series chips used in Apple's devices, will soon announce plans to build an advanced chip factory in Arizona, reports The Wall Street Journal.

TSMC is expected to announce the plans as soon as Friday after finalizing its decision at a board meeting on Tuesday. The factory could be up and running by the end of 2023 at the earliest.

The new TSMC plant would produce five-nanometer chips, which are the fastest and most power-efficient chips available today, a person with knowledge of TSMC's plans told The Wall Street Journal.

Apple's upcoming A14 chips designed for the 2020 iPhone models will use TSMC's 5-nanometer technology, with production to begin in the second quarter of 2020.

At this time, it's not known if TSMC is getting financial incentives from the U.S. to build a factory in Arizona, nor how many jobs the factory will bring. A typical TSMC factory employs thousands of people.

TSMC had been talking to U.S. officials and Apple about a U.S. chip factory for some time, but the conversations "gained momentum" amid concerns with the fragility of the Asian supply chain.

Note: Due to the political or social nature of the discussion regarding this topic, the discussion thread is located in our Political News forum. All forum members and site visitors are welcome to read and follow the thread, but posting is limited to forum members with at least 100 posts.

Apple today shared its 2020 Supplier Responsibility progress report [PDF], and as noted by TechCrunch, it includes a letter that details Apple's plans to increase safety and protection in its worldwide supply chain in the wake of the coronavirus outbreak.

Authored by Sabih Khan, Apple's senior vice president of operations, the letter details changes that Apple has made to protect its supply chain partners, such as strict adherence to social distancing, limiting density, and health screenings.

This pandemic has left no country untouched, and we want to thank all our suppliers around the world for their commitment, flexibility and care for their teams as we navigate COVID-19's complex and rapidly evolving impacts. From the outset, we worked with our suppliers to develop and execute a plan that puts the health of people first. Thousands of Apple employees have worked tirelessly to execute that plan in partnership with our suppliers around the world.

Some of the measures that Apple has put in place include the following:

• Personal protective equipment during work and in common areas is required.
• Masks and sanitizer have been provided to employees.
• Enhanced deep cleaning protocols and been implemented.
• Suppliers have redesigned and reconfigured factory floorplans where needed for social distancing.
• Flexible working hours and staggered work shifts have been implemented for maximizing interpersonal space.

Apple is also sharing its plans with other organizations in the hopes of establishing similar standards across the industry.

The 2020 Supplier Responsibility Report was created based on interviews with 52,000 workers, with Apple auditing suppliers in 49 countries, up from 30 in 2018. There were 1142 total audits in 2019. Some additional highlights from the report:

• $1.3 million in recruitment fees were repaid to employees in 2019.
• There was a 53% year over year increase in supplier sites committed to achieving zero waste.
• 30.5 billion gallons of freshwater have been conserved by suppliers to date.
• Apple saw 100 percent participation in third-party audits across tin, tantalum, tungsten, gold, and cobalt smelters and refiners.
• There was a 13% increase in high-performing supplier facilities year over year.
• Less than one percent of Apple's suppliers were considered low-performing.
• Over 154,700 suppliers used SEED learning opportunities in 2019.
• 41 people took part in Apple's intensive app development course with a 100 percent graduation rate.

Full details about Apple's supply chain can be read in the full Supplier Responsibility Report. [PDF]

Apple has acquired California-based virtual reality company NextVR, Apple confirmed to Bloomberg today.

New's of Apple's planned NEXTVR acquisition first surfaced in April, but it appears the purchase wasn't completed until recently. Apple reportedly spent around $100 million to purchase the company.

The NextVR website has disappeared, and there is a message that says the company is "heading in a new direction." Apple gave Bloomberg its standard acquisition statement: "Apple buys smaller technology companies from time to time and we generally do not discuss our purpose or plans."

NextVR melds virtual reality with sports, music, and entertainment, providing VR experiences for watching live events on VR headsets from PlayStation, HTC, Oculus, Google, Microsoft, and other manufacturers.

Prior to its acquisition by Apple, NextVR had established partnerships with the NBA, Wimbledon, Fox Sports, the WWE and more, plus it holds more than 40 patents that could be of interest to Apple.

Apple has been working on multiple augmented, virtual, and mixed reality headsets over the course of the last several years. Just today, Apple analyst Ming-Chi Kuo said that Apple's augmented reality Smart Glasses that are in the works could launch in 2022.

Along with the smart glasses, there have also been rumors indicating Apple is working on some kind of virtual reality headset that would feature an 8K display for each eye and that would be untethered from a smartphone or computer.