Last year, Apple was fined $1.2 million in Italy over how the company advertises its warranty to customers. Italy's antitrust regulators ruled that Apple has not been providing adequate disclosures about the two free years of product warranty assistance required under Italian law, while also pushing customers to purchase AppleCare extended warranties without disclosing that many of the benefits overlap the standard warranty.
As pointed out by @setteBIT, Apple has lost its appeal [Google Translate] in the case. There will be a followup hearing on May 9th. In the meantime, Apple will have to pay €900,000 fine previously assessed by the Italian antitrust authority.
Apple added disclosures to its Italian online store to address the court's concerns, after the initial ruling. It's unclear if those will be returning as part of the appeals court's decision.
This comes on the heels of a series of letters sent earlier this week to European Union regulators from consumers groups in 11 countries asking for action against Apple regarding its warranty practices.
As a reminder for our international readers, the new iPad will be on sale in 25 more countries starting tomorrow, Friday March 23. In fact, it's currently on sale in New Zealand, where it's already tomorrow.
Starting March 23 the new iPad will be available in Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Denmark, Finland, Greece, Hungary, Iceland, Ireland, Italy, Liechtenstein, Luxembourg, Macau, Mexico, The Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain and Sweden.
The 3rd Generation iPad launched in 10 countries including the U.S. last Friday and is now expanding further internationally. The iPad is available for online order with 1-2 week delivery delays.
Wired profiles Linus Torvalds the creator of the popular open source operating system Linux. The article reveals that Apple's Steve Jobs tried to recruit Torvalds to Apple with a job offer.
Torvalds has never met Bill Gates, but around 2000, when he was still working at Transmeta, he met Steve Jobs. Jobs invited him to Apple’s Cupertino campus and tried to hire him. “Unix for the biggest user base: that was the pitch,” says Torvalds. The condition: He’d have to drop Linux development. “He wanted me to work at Apple doing non-Linux things,” he said. That was a non-starter for Torvalds. Besides, he hated Mac OS’s Mach kernel.
In 2000, Apple had had not yet shipped the first version of OS X 10.0 to the public. Apple had adapted the NeXTSTep operating system after acquiring NeXT in 1997. It wasn't until March, 2001 that the first version of OS X was launched.
Steve Jobs' job offer was at a time when Apple was heavily investing in Mac OS X which would later serve as the foundation for their iPhones and iPads.
A security firm has discovered a security issue in the iOS 5.1 version of MobileSafari, the most recent version of the operating system that runs on millions of Apple mobile devices. The behavior was discovered and detailed by David Vieira-Kurz of MajorSecurity.net.
The weakness is caused due to an error within the handling of URLs when using javascript's window.open() method. This can be exploited to potentially trick users into supplying sensitive information to a malicious web site, because information displayed in the address bar can be constructed in a certain way, which may lead users to believe that they're visiting another web site than the displayed web site.
To test it out, visit this demo page on an iPhone, iPod Touch or iPad running iOS 5.1. Click the 'Demo' button and MobileSafari will open a new window displaying "www.apple.com" in the address bar, though it's actually loading a page from MajorSecurity.net.
The security firm does note that Apple was informed of the vulnerability three weeks ago, and it is only being made public today. Apple acknowledged the bug and should be pushing a fix soon.
Representatives Henry A. Waxman (D-CA) and G.K. Butterfield (D-NC) have sent letters to thirty-four app developers with a number of questions about their information collection and use practices. This follows on a letter from the Congressmen sent to Apple requesting information on the company's data collection policies it imposes on App Store developers.
The letters were sent to a wide variety of developers, and were selected by the Representatives on the basis of "their inclusion in the “Social Networking” subcategory within the “iPhone Essentials” area of Apple’s App Store." They include Turntable.FM, Twitter, Tweetbot, Path, Instagram, Facebook, and Apple itself.
Last month, a developer of applications ("apps") for Apple's mobile devices discovered that the social networking app Path was accessing and collecting the contents of his iPhone address book without having asked for his consent. Following the reports about Path, developers and members of the press ran their own small-scale tests of the code for other popular apps for Apple's mobile devices to determine which were accessing address book information. Around this time, three other apps released new versions to include a prompt asking for users' consent before accessing the address book. In addition, concerns were subsequently raised about the manner in which apps can access photographs on Apple's mobile devices.
We are writing to you because we want to better understand the information collection and use policies and practices of apps for Apple's mobile devices with a social element. We request that you respond to the following questions:
(1) Through the end of February 2012, how many times was your iOS app downloaded from Apple's App Store?
(2) Did you have a privacy policy in place for your iOS app at the end of February 2012? If so, please tell us when your iOS app was first made available in Apple's App Store and when you first had a privacy policy in place. In addition, please describe how that policy is made available to your app users and please provide a copy of the most recent policy.
(3) Has your iOS app at any time transmitted information from or about a user's address book? If so, which fields? Also, please describe all measures taken to protect or secure that information during transmission and the periods of time during which those measures were in effect.
(4) Have you at any time stored information from or about a user's address book? If so, which field? Also, please describe all measures taken to protect or secure that information during storage and the periods of time during which those measures were in effect.
(5) At any time, has your iOS app transmitted or have you stored any other information from or about a user's device - including, but not limited to, the user's phone number, email account information, calendar, photo gallery, WiFi connection log, the Unique Device Identifier (UDID), a Media Access Control (MAC) address, or any other identifier unique to a specific device?
(6) To the extent you store any address book information or any of the information in question 5, please describe all purposes for which you store or use that information, the length of time for which you keep it, and your policies regarding sharing of that information.
(7) To the extent you transmit or store any address book information or any of the information in question 5, please describe all notices delivered to uscrs on the mobile device screen about your collection and use practices both prior to and after February 8, 2012.
(8) The iOS Developer Program License Agreement detailing the obligations and responsibilities of app developers reportedly states that a developer and its applications "may not collect user or device data without prior user consent, and then only to provide a service or function that is directly relevant to the use of the Application, or to serve advertising.";
(a) Please describe all data available from Apple mobile devices that you understand to be user data requiring prior consent from the user to be collected.
(b) Please describe all data available from Apple mobile devices that you understand to be device data requiring prior consent from the user to be collected.
(c) Please describe all services or functions for which user or device data is directly relevant to the use of your application.
(9) Please list all industry self-regulatory organizations to which you belong.
The developers are given until April 12, 2012 to respond.
It appears that some iPad Smart Covers aren't working properly with the new iPad, including older Apple Smart Covers. The new iPad has a slight change in how its magnets work. Apple has reversed the polarity of one set of magnets related to the sleep/wake sensor that turns the iPad off when the Smart Cover is closed. As a result, older Smart Covers, that weren't designed with this change in mind, fail to turn the new iPad off when they're closed.
Mark Booth has more details as to why Apple choose to make the change:
I've learned why Apple decided to use a polarity sensitive switch in the new iPad 3. Some iPad 2 customers were having issues with their iPads entering sleep mode when they flipped Apple's Smart Cover around flat behind their iPad 2. Since the iPad 2's sleep/wake sensor wasn't polarity specific, it could sometimes be triggered from the magnet being positioned at the rear of the iPad. By changing to a sensor that requires the correct polarity, the problem is eliminated.
Booth also notes that Apple is replacing older Apple Smart Covers at Apple Stores for customers who ask. New iPad owners having difficulties with third-party smart cover-compatible cases should contact their case-makers for possible resolutions.
TechRadar reports that Sony is bringing their Music Unlimited service to iOS devices "in the coming weeks".
"We will be launching our music service on iOS in the next few weeks," said Layden, who was speaking at the IP&TV World Forum with TechRadar in attendance.
"We want to be on as many devices for users who want to be part of Music Unlimited."
Music Unlimited is Sony's on-demand all you can listen to music service that costs $9.99 a month. Sony claims to have a global catalog of over 10 million songs that you can listen to on your computer, Android phone, Sony Enabled device, and soon, iOS device. They offer unlimited skips and no ads for the paid service.
Perhaps most interesting is that on the Android version they've introduced offline playback. Users can download their Music Unlimited playlists to their devices and play them even without a wireless signal.
Angry Birds Space, the latest installment of the best selling mobile game of all time, has finally arrived. Rovio, the developer behind the series, partnered with NASA, the U.S. space agency, to promote the release, including a plug filmed by an Angry Bird-toting astronaut on the International Space Station.
Angry Birds Space delivers the biggest change yet in the series' well-known "launch birds out of a slingshot at pigs" gameplay. Instead of dealing with the gravity of just one planet, players are dealing with several. Kotaku explains:
Yes, you still play level by level. You still have a set number of birds—birds of different types—that you'll slingshot at towers of blocks, hoping to squash some pigs.
But now you're shooting your birds through space, from one planet to the next. Each planet has a gravitational field. Gone is the simplicity of just lobbing a bird in an arc. No. Welcome to the physics of the heavenly bodies. Shoot a bird into open space and it'll fly off in a straight line. Shoot one toward another planet and it'll get caught in its gravitational field and start orbiting the planet... or slowly descend as it encircles the planet to smash into the ground.
iDownloadblog reveals some new iOS 5.1 strings that include references to "4G".
“4G_ON_CALL_CANCEL” = “Cancel”; “4G_ON_CALL_OK_DISABLE” = “Disable”; “4G_ON_CALL_OK_ENABLE” = “Enable”; “4G_ON_CALL_WARNING_DISABLE” = “Disabling 4G will end your phone call. Are you sure you want to disable 4G?”; “4G_ON_CALL_WARNING_ENABLE” = “Enabling 4G will end your phone call. Are you sure you want to enable 4G?”; “4G_ON_FACETIME_4G_WARNING_DISABLE” = “Disabling 4G will end FaceTime. Are you sure you want to disable 4G?”; “4G_ON_FACETIME_WIFI_WARNING_DISABLE” = “Disabling 4G may end FaceTime. Are you sure you want to disable 4G?”; “4G_TEXT” = “Using 4G loads data faster, but may decrease battery life.”;
The site suggests these may have been put in place for true 4G ("LTE") in the next iPhone.
While we do believe the next iPhone is likely to get LTE, our guess is that these 4G strings were put in place at the same time to reference the updated 4G indicator that Apple also included in the iOS 5.1 update. Existing iPhones now show "4G" at the top of their screen when they are on AT&T's HSDPA+ network. We expect Apple will continue to distinguish the faster LTE networks by specifically calling them "LTE" as they do on the 3rd Generation iPad.
We also don't think references to 4G and Facetime are necessarily predictive. Apple has had strings in the past suggesting that Facetime might work under cellular data, but the restriction appears to be carrier imposed rather than a technical issue.
The original mod was revealed late last year, and they've since added a new feature which they describe as a "headphone jack torch". This video walks through the original glowing Apple mod and also the new headphone jack one:
The headphone jack remains fully functional, and they are even working on a fibre optic headphone cabling that would give you illuminated cables in different colors.
iPatch is a a third-party iPhone repair company based in the UK and can also be followed on twitter at iPatch_iPods.
A couple of new findings as people spend more time with their new iPads. First, iLounge reports on findings by DisplayMate on the new iPads charging behavior. It turns out the iPad continues to charge for as long as an hour after it says its at 100%, suggesting the on-screen indicator isn't quite accurate and may still need more charging.
In an email exchange with iLounge, DisplayMate President Ray Soneira indicated that the third-generation iPad—when connected to power via the included Apple 10W Power Adapter—actually continued to draw 10W of power for up to one hour after reaching what is reported by iOS as a full 100% charge
iLounge found in their battery testing of the new iPad that sometimes the charge would drop initially quickly when they thought the iPad was fully charged.
Earlier in the week, Tom's Hardware noticed that Safari on the new iPad was automatically scaling large images down significantly.
Large images were automatically scaled down to near 1 megapixel resolutions. This means that if you are viewing large images through Safari, you aren't getting the full Retina experience. A workaround mentioned is to save the image to Photos which seems to preserve the original resolution.
These findings were confirmed by web developer Duncan Davidson who ran into the limit when trying to enhance his websites with Retina-sized images.
Bloomberg reports that Apple's iPhone surpassed RIM's BlackBerry as the number one in Canadian smartphone shipments in 2011. RIM is based in Canada and has had strong loyalty amongst its customers.
RIM, based in Waterloo, Ontario, shipped 2.08 million BlackBerrys last year in Canada, compared with 2.85 million units for Apple, data compiled by IDC and Bloomberg show. In 2010, the BlackBerry topped the iPhone by half a million, and in 2008, the year after the iPhone’s debut, RIM outsold Apple by almost five to one.
RIM has been on a decline since the launch of the iPhone and Android platforms with sales and profits dropping. RIM's worldwide numbers have been dropping precipitously in contrast to significant grown from iOS and Android.
Apple patent applications tend to cover a broad set of topics, including many research items that never make their way out of the labs. A new one found this morning, however, is more interesting than usual given the recent rumors of an Apple television.
The application is titled "Configurable Remote Control" and is detailed by PatentlyApple.
In the application, Apple describes the use of the iPhone as a self-configuring universal remote for your home entertainment system. Specifically, they suggest using the iPhone's camera to take a photo of your existing remote, and then comparing that photo to a database of known remotes.
The method may begin by obtaining an input that may be used to identify the electronic device that is to be controlled, such as by using image processing techniques to compare the captured image against a database of known devices.
Apple acknowledges the iPhone in question would also need IR transmission capabilities. The patent application is dated from 2010.
Apple has been widely expected to use voice-recognition in their rumored Apple Television. As with many patent applications, we don't necessarily think this concept will make its way into production. Still, it shows Apple's research interests into home entertainment systems and seems relevant given the ongoing rumors of a Apple TV set.
Adobe has launched a free public beta for their new Photoshop CS6 Beta. As detailed in the press release, the commercial release will follow in the first half of this year for both Mac and Windows. Final pricing has not been announced.
According to Macworld, the new version of Photoshop works only on 64-bit Mac systems and is no longer available in 32-bit mode. CNet provides a hands-on look of the new Photoshop and describes some of the many changes:
There's so much big news surrounding Photoshop CS6 that I'm not sure where to start. This is Adobe's first-ever public beta of its most important product (expected to ship sometime in the first half of this year). It's the first Adobe product to incorporate the company's new DRM architecture. It's the first version of Photoshop to take video seriously and to make it into the Standard Edition of the product rather than the extra-pricey Extended version. It's the first version to integrate the company's GPU-accelerating Mercury Graphics Engine (MGE) . And for the first time in more than 20 years, Photoshop goes dark.
Macworld also covers many of the new changes in detail.
Adobe highlights several of the new features found in Photoshop CS6 in this video:
Adobe Photoshop CS6 Beta is available for download at Adobe's site.
Reuters relays rumors from a South Korean newspaper which revives claims of a larger screen on the next iPhone.
Apple has decided on the bigger 4.6-inch display for its next iPhone and started placing orders to its suppliers, the Maeil Business Newspaper said, quoting an unnamed industry source.
A 4.6-inch screen, however, would be significantly larger than that has been previously rumored. There have been persistent rumors that the next generation iPhone would carry a larger 4" screen. And we are convinced that Apple had exactly such designs in late prototype stages in China. The proliferation of iPhone cases with measurements of at least a 4" screen seemed to suggest that a number of suppliers were also convinced of that fact.
A 4.6" screen, however, is even harder to believe, and would place the new iPhone amongst the largest screen sizes available on a smartphone. Here's a comparison shot between the 4.65" screen of the Galaxy Nexus and the iPhone 4S which has a 3.5" screen.
TheVerge comparison between Galaxy Nexus (4.65") and iPhone 4S (3.5")
Apple has been consistent by offering the same screen size (3.5") across five generations of iPhones, so any change would be notable. The reason this particular claim seems most dubious, however, is the fact that it comes from an otherwise unknown Korean media source with no track record.
Still, it's hard to dismiss the talk of a larger 4" iPhone screen completely. Back in November, iLounge first reported that the 3rd Generation iPad would be "approximately 0.7 mm" thicker than the iPad 2. As it turns out, they were on the mark with the actual new iPad being 0.6 mm thicker (per official specs) than the previous design. The same source that provided that information had this to say about the next generation iPhone:
Our source says that the next-generation iPhone will not look like the teardrop-shaped version that was widely rumored for release in 2011. We’ve been told that the device will have a 4-inch display and will be 8mm longer than before, with a metal casing (probably aluminum). It is on track to be introduced in summer of 2012, and is still in the engineering phase, not early production. We suspect that poor battery life doomed the prior prototype version, and that this one is being built with LTE-ready battery drain in mind.
Social game-maker Zynga has agreed to acquire OMGPOP, the development house behind the incredibly popular Draw Something. The acquisition price is reported to be $180 million plus $30 million in employee retention payments, according to Peter Kafka at All Things D, though Zynga isn't confirming that number.
OMGPOP brings to Zynga an incredible team of industry veterans and a community of highly engaged players. It’s a great industry example of creating games around the ethos of giving people a place to play, meet and make friends. OMGPOP’s existing mobile and platform games will not change. We fully support what they’ve built to date, and we’re going to work hard to give Draw Something and all of their games the resources and tools they need to grow and flourish.
Dan Porter has built an amazing team and culture at OMGPop, and I can’t wait to see what that team builds next. We think we can amplify their efforts, and we’re going to work together to make sure that more players love more of their games, both in the current stable of titles, and new IP we’ll see in the future.
Draw Something has shot to the top of the App Store charts since it was released six weeks ago, logging 35 million downloads. Last week alone, Draw Something recorded more than 1 billion drawings.
Draw Something is available as a universal app, in a free ad-supported edition and a $0.99 ad-free version. [Direct Links: $0.99/Free]
Hipstamatic and Instagram -- Apple's iPhone Apps of the Year in 2010 and 2011 -- will be announcing a partnership that allows photos taken in Hipstamatic to be ported to Instagram's social network with one click. The partnership was reported by Fast Company.
It represents the first time Instagram has opened up this platform API to third parties, and marks a move toward letting photos freely flow into Instagram's network from outside sources. "When we launched, it was all about Facebook and Flickr and Twitter, and now we're seeing a huge shift in our user base toward Instagram," says Hipstamatic cofounder and CEO Lucas Buick. "We've never been a social networking company, but we clearly benefit from social networks. So this will be the first app outside of Instagram that lets you into their network. That's pretty cool for us."
Hipstamatic users will have the option to push their photos directly to Instagram, including notes about which lens, film, and flash were used. The photos will be tagged with the attribution Taken with Hipstamatic.
Instagram and Hipstamatic aren't the only photography apps to enable cross-app partnerships. The makers of Camera+ recently updated their app with APIs to allow other app developers to integrate Camera+ into their apps.
Hipstamatic for iPhone is available for $1.99 on the App Store. [Direct Link]
Instagram for iPhone is free on the App Store. [Direct Link]
Last year, Apple was fined $1.2 million in Italy over how the company advertises its warranty to customers. Italy's antitrust regulators ruled that Apple has not been providing adequate disclosures about the two free years of product warranty assistance required under Italian law, while also pushing customers to purchase AppleCare extended warranties without disclosing that many of the benefits overlap the standard warranty.
Netflix's 
Social game-maker Zynga has 
