MacRumors iPhone and iPad Blog: Apps, News, and Rumors

Instagram made a major change to its service recently, allowing photo uploads from its mobile site for the first time. When accessing the Instagram website on an iPhone or iPad, there's now a new photo upload button. Prior to the update, Instagram only allowed photo uploads from its mobile apps, and the iOS app is limited to the iPhone, so iPad users were forced to download an iPhone-only app...

A year after the public disagreement between Apple and the FBI, which centered on the passcode-locked iPhone 5c of the San Bernardino terrorist, one of the major questions remains how much the United States government and the FBI paid for the tool it used to crack open the iPhone. That question became so focused upon that a trio of news organizations filed a lawsuit to find out the exact amount...

It's been a few months since the last few rumors regarding Foxconn's potential manufacturing expansion into the United States, with company chairman Terry Gou placing uncertainty on the reports at the time. Now, sources in the Taiwan supply chain are once again claiming that Foxconn -- one of Apple's biggest suppliers -- is currently talking with both the U.S. federal government as well as...

Harman Kardon has teased its upcoming Cortana-integrated connected smart speaker with a product page that revealed a little more about the device's design and features. The web page for the Invoke speaker appears to have been removed since it was spotted by Thurrott.com this morning, but it offered a better glimpse at the device's sloping cylindrical design, which appears to fall somewhere in...

An alleged leak of a draft technical paper prepared by the U.K. government contains proposals that endorse the "live" surveillance of British web users' online communications, it emerged this week. Civil liberties organization the Open Rights Group received the document on May 4 and decided to publish the draft, which states that telecommunications companies and internet service providers...

Facebook is actively developing around two dozen television shows with plans to premiere some of them in mid-June, according to a report on Saturday. The social media company has big-budget marquee shows geared towards a TV audience in the works, alongside a tier of less expensive shows that will span about 5 to 10 minutes, according to sources who spoke to Business Insider. The news comes...

For this week's giveaway, we've teamed up with BiteMyApple.Co to give MacRumors readers a chance to win an iPhone-connected Bionic Bird, which was originally an Indiegogo project. BiteMyApple.Co didn't develop the Bionic Bird, which actually comes from French company XTIM, but it is a site that is a one-stop shop for all manner of successfully funded Kickstarter and Indiegogo campaigns that...

An unreleased Prince concert film and a documentary about the making of the film could be heading exclusively to Apple Music, according to sources close to the Prince estate (via Billboard). The late singer's estate is said to be shopping around the rights to the concert film and doc to a variety of streaming services, namely including Apple Music and Spotify. The agreement for the two films...

ExxonMobil this week announced an update to its Speedpass+ iOS app, which gives users the ability to pay for fuel and car washes using their Apple Watch and Apple Pay at over 10,000 participating Exxon and Mobil refueling stations across the United States. For the Apple Watch payments process, users will have to navigate to the Speedpass+ watch app, select the pump they are at, authorize it...

Uber found itself in more hot water on Thursday after Reuters revealed that the ride-hailing service is facing a criminal investigation by the U.S. government. The Department of Justice has reportedly begun an investigation over the company's use of "secret" software that allowed its drivers to operate in areas where Uber was banned or restricted. First reported by The New York Times, the...

Bosch has won orders to supply Apple with some of the motion sensors in its next range of iPhones, according to a report by Bloomberg, potentially loosening Invensense's position as the primary supplier of the smartphone components. California-based Invensense exclusively supplied the gyroscopes and accelerometers in the iPhone SE, iPhone 6s, and iPhone 7, but Apple's new deal with Bosch could ...

YouTube has announced plans to produce a raft of original programming beginning this year, as the Google-owned video site moves to counter the rising tide of premium streaming services like Netflix, Amazon, and Hulu. The difference in YouTube's approach to original content is that its shows will be free to view on its website and apps through an ad-supported format, rather than being tied to...

Puzzle game Zip-Zap has been named Apple's App of the Week, and as a result, it is available to download for free for the next seven days. Zip-Zap is normally priced at $1.99 and this is the first time it's been free since its September 2016 launch. Zip-Zap is a puzzle game that asks users to solve puzzles using Rube Goldberg-style hinges and levers that are put into place via well-timed taps. ...

Apple today seeded the fifth beta of an upcoming tvOS 10.2.1 update to developers for testing purposes, one and a half weeks after seeding the fourth 10.2.1 beta and more than one month after releasing tvOS 10.2, an update that included improved scrolling and iPad support for the Apple TV Remote app. The tvOS 10.2.1 beta is designed for the fourth-generation Apple TV. It can be downloaded by...

GE today announced that its connected LED light bulbs C-Life and C-Sleep will gain Apple HomeKit compatibility this summer. A new C-Reach hub with HomeKit support will allow homeowners to turn on and off their "C by GE" lights, dim them, and control bulbs individually or in groups by rooms with Siri voice commands. The lights also should be able to be controlled with the Home app on an...

Epix has updated its iOS app with a new feature called "Epix Cast," which allows users to beam videos from the service's mobile app to compatible smart TVs and streaming boxes, even if the receiving device doesn't have an Epix app. Notably, Epix Cast allows iOS and Android smartphones to be used normally during a casting, and videos will continue playing "even if the device turns off." To use...

Snapchat is gearing up to launch a slate of original television shows, using the social network's unique, short-lived media hook as a means to create content that lasts between 3-5 minutes long. Snapchat has signed original show deals with a collection of companies over the past few months, including NBCUniversal, Turner, A+E Networks, Discovery, BBC, ABC, ESPN, Vice Media, Vertical Networks,...

Last week we reported that Apple had emailed all iTunes Affiliate Program members to inform them that its commission rate for all apps and in-app content would be reduced to 2.5 percent on May 1, down from 7 percent, globally. The news came as a blow to app review and discovery websites like AppShopper and TouchArcade that depend on the commissions to generate revenue. However, this...