Eric Slivka
Eric is the Editor-in-Chief of MacRumors and has been writing for the site since 2008.
An avid swimmer and former biophysicist, Eric has been using Apple products for over 35 years and has been interviewed for pieces by The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, Reuters, BBC, CNBC, and other publications.
Eric's current primary role involves day-to-day oversight of the editorial operations at MacRumors, but he also contributes occasional news and review articles while handling various other duties related to the site's operation.
An avid swimmer and former biophysicist, Eric has been using Apple products for over 35 years and has been interviewed for pieces by The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, Reuters, BBC, CNBC, and other publications.
Eric's current primary role involves day-to-day oversight of the editorial operations at MacRumors, but he also contributes occasional news and review articles while handling various other duties related to the site's operation.
Eric Slivka's Articles
Purported Physical Model of 'iPad Mini' Surfaces
Just after posting photos of a purported metal engineering sample of the next-generation iPhone's massing, Gotta Be Mobile has now posted photos of a similar physical model of the "iPad mini". The model appears to be a case maker's mold that shows the basic shape of the device, so it is unknown whether it accurately reflects the device's form factor. While case designs have proven accurate...
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New Photos of Next-Generation iPhone 'Engineering Sample' Massing
Gotta Be Mobile posts a pair of photos of what it calls an "engineering sample" of the next-generation iPhone. While it isn't entirely clear just what the sample represents, it seems to be solid chunk of aluminum machined into the form factor of the rumored device. Assuming that the sample is genuine and related to the iPhone development and production process, it supports previous photos...
Why Apple's 7.85-Inch 'iPad Mini' Isn't a 7-Inch Tablet
With rumors of an "iPad mini" launch in the coming months ramping up, there has been much discussion about just how usable such a device would be running at the 1024x768 resolution of pre-Retina iPad models. In particular, some commenters have pointed to Steve Jobs' October 2010 discussion of the 7-inch tablets from competitors that were just then hitting the market, where he outlined Apple's...
13-Inch Retina MacBook Pro Shows Up in Benchmarks
Amid continued rumors that Apple intends to release a 13-inch Retina MacBook Pro in the coming months, a Geekbench 2 benchmark submitted late last month as a "MacBookPro10,2" appears to represent the machine in question. In comparison, the new non-Retina 13-inch MacBook Pro carries the model identifier "MacBookPro9,2", while the 15-inch non-Retina model is "MacBookPro9,1" and the corresponding ...
Revamped iPod Nano to Include Oblong Body with Home Button?
Japanese blog Mac Otakara reports that Apple will be redesigning the iPod nano later this year with a new form factor that more closely resembles an iPod touch. According to the report, the iPod nano will apparently sport a rectangular screen and a home button similar to that found on iOS devices. Given that the screen size on this redesigned iPod nano would appear to be substantially...
Google and FTC Near Deal for Record $22.5 Million Fine over Safari Privacy Circumvention
The Wall Street Journal reports that Google and the U.S. Federal Trade Commission are nearing a deal that would see Google paying a record $22.5 million fine over its tactics to circumvent privacy settings in Safari on iOS to track users' behavior.The fine is expected to be the largest penalty ever levied on a single company by the U.S. Federal Trade Commission. It offers the latest sign of the...
Apple's 13-Inch Retina MacBook Pro to Launch 'Before October'?
Just before last month's Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC), KGI Securities analyst Ming-Chi Kuo correctly predicted that Apple's MacBook Pro with Retina display would appear alongside the standard MacBook Pro instead of as a direct replacement, also accurately claiming that only the 15-inch Retina MacBook Pro would be making an appearance while a 13-inch model remained in the works. At...
San Francisco to Block Most Municipal Mac Purchases Following Apple's EPEAT Withdrawal
Following last week's news that Apple had pulled all 39 of its qualifying Macs from the Electronic Product Environmental Assessment Tool (EPEAT) registry, it was suggested that Apple would lose business with federal, state, and local governments in the United States. Many agencies require that most or all computer purchases be limited to products listed on the EPEAT registry. As noted by The...
Apple Wins Patent for NFC-Enabled 'iTravel' Transportation Ticketing App
With Apple announcing its new Passbook digital wallet app for iOS 6 last month, speculation regarding the inclusion of near field communications (NFC) and mobile payment capabilities for future iOS devices has begun to increase. The speculation comes amid rumors of iPhone prototypes with NFC, although Apple has been said to be intentionally moving slowly on the mobile payment front. Now...
Apple to Launch Third-Generation iPad in China on July 20
Apple today announced that the third-generation iPad will launch in China on Friday, July 20. The announcement comes a little over a week after Apple settled a trademark dispute over the "iPad" name in China for $60 million.In China the new iPad will be available through the Apple Online Store (www.apple.com), select Apple Authorized Resellers and by reservation from Apple retail stores....
Microsoft to Acquire Multi-Touch Pioneer Perceptive Pixel
Microsoft today announced that it intends to acquire Perceptive Pixel, a company founded by multi-touch pioneer Jeff Han and currently focused on large-screen touch displays such as those used by CNN and other television networks to allow anchors to present live, interactive data on set. We've featured Han's work a number of times over the years both before and after the launch of the iPhone ...
Evidence of Apple Maps for OS X Shows Up in iOS 6 Beta
Technically Personal reports on some interesting code found in iOS 6 suggesting that Apple's new mapping solution may be making its way to OS X in some form. The evidence, discovered by developer Cody Cooper, arrives by way of references to several older Intel graphics solutions for which map features such as shading are disabled.In this XML file, there is a reference to a set of Intel based...
UK Judge Rules Samsung Tablets 'Not as Cool' as iPad
With the avalanche of patent lawsuits involving Apple, we try to restrict our coverage to the most significant developments such as issued injunctions, final settlements, and monetary awards. But while a UK judge's ruling today that Samsung's Galaxy Tab products do not infringe upon Apple's iPad design merely maintains the status quo from a competitive perspective in one of the many ongoing...
Prices of Thunderbolt Cables Likely to Drop in 2013
One of the main criticisms of the new Thunderbolt connectivity standard embraced by Apple has been its cost, which adds a considerable premium to the prices of compatible peripherals. Even Thunderbolt cables are expensive, with Apple's 2-meter cable priced at $49, a price on par with offerings from the few other companies selling Thunderbolt cables so far. In a report published earlier this...
Sketchy Claims of Revamped iPad with IGZO Display and Thinner Enclosure in Late 2012
Over the past few days, Digitimes has posted a series of rumors from its own supply chain sources and other reports out of Asia discussing a number of modifications reportedly being made by Apple on the third-generation iPad. Apple is said to already be making some of the changes, with a public launch of the revised model set for later this year. The changes include: - As we mentioned in...
Amazon Planning to Take on Apple in Smartphone Market
Bloomberg reports that Amazon is currently working with Foxconn on a new smartphone product, one that would compete head-to-head with the iPhone and Android devices.A smartphone would give Amazon a wider range of low-priced hardware devices that bolster its strategy of making money from digital books, songs and movies. It would help Chief Executive Officer Jeff Bezos -- who made a foray into...
Apple Working on Fix for Corrupted App Store Downloads [Update: Fixed]
Earlier today, we noted that Apple's App Store was experiencing issues with corrupted binaries affecting dozens of newly-updated apps over the past few days. While in many cases the corruption is resolved a few hours after an updated app becomes available, TechCrunch reports that Apple has now officially acknowledged the issue in its developer forums and is working on a broader fix.According to...
Apple Pulls Russian SMS Spam App from App Store [Updated]
Earlier today, Russian security firm Kaspersky Lab reported that it had been alerted to an app available in both Apple's App Store and the Google Play store for Android that was quietly harvesting users' address book contacts and sending them to the developer's servers. The developer's systems were then sending text messages to those contacts advertising the application, with the "From" field...
Apple-Motorola Judge Questions Need for Software Patents
Late last month, federal judge Richard Posner threw out one of the major U.S. cases in the ongoing patent battle between Apple and Motorola, and Reuters today publishes an interesting interview with Posner in which he discusses his view that patents have become too widely used and suggests that there may not be a need for software patents at all. Noting his belief that software and other...
App Store Pushing Out Corrupted App Downloads
Instapaper developer Marco Arment notes that Apple's App Store is apparently pushing out corrupted app binaries of a number of different applications to users. The issue, which renders the apps unusable, has apparently been triggered on app updates approved over the past few days.Characterizations of this issue: - The app crashes immediately on launch, every time, even after a delete and...
