Search Results for users

Facebook loses users for the first time in its history

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Washington Post, on yesterday’s quarterly Meta/Facebook earnings report:

Facebook lost daily users for the first time in its 18-year history — falling by about half a million users in the last three months of 2021, to 1.93 billion logging in each day. The loss was greatest in Africa and Latin America, suggesting that the company’s product is saturated globally — and that its long quest to add as many users as possible has peaked.

And:

Facebook Reality Labs, the company’s hardware division that builds the Oculus Quest headset, lost $3.3 billion in the quarter, despite bringing in $877 million in revenue.

And:

Meta’s stock price plummeted more than 20 percent in after-hours trading following the news.

And from CNBC:

Facebook parent Meta said on Wednesday that the privacy change Apple made to its iOS operating system last year will decrease the social media company’s sales this year by about $10 billion.

“We believe the impact of iOS overall is a headwind on our business in 2022,” Meta CFO Dave Wehner said on a call with analysts after the company’s fourth-quarter earnings report. “It’s on the order of $10 billion, so it’s a pretty significant headwind for our business.”

Interestingly, Google/Alphabet are not having the same issue:

A day before Facebook’s results, Alphabet blew past estimates with its fourth-quarter numbers, and cited strength in e-commerce ads, an area where Facebook saw weakness.

Wehner suggested that Apple’s changes aren’t having the same impact on search as they are on other types of apps. He referenced how much money Google makes for Apple as the default search engine on the Safari browser.

“Given that Apple continues to take billions of dollars a year from Google Search, the incentive clearly is for this policy discrepancy to continue,” Wehner said.

Lots of fingerprinting and political posturing here.

Spotify users frustrated over lack of HomePod support

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More than a year ago, at the 2020 Worldwide Developers Conference, Apple announced that it would be adding third-party music service support to ‌HomePod‌. A few months later, Apple highlighted some of the apps that would take advantage of the new feature, including Amazon Music, Pandora, and iHeartRadio. A notable exclusion from the list – Spotify.

Whether Spotify opted not to be part of the initial batch of third-party music providers with ‌‌HomePod‌‌ support or Apple didn’t ask remains unknown.

With all of the noise Spotify has made over the years against Apple, I would guess they had been asked to be one of the third-party providers. Apple wouldn’t want to be seen excluding them from the list. With all of the bad sentiment from its users, Spotify could simply say that Apple wouldn’t let them on HomePod and turn the pressure back on Apple.

Whatever is going on, it seems Spotify needs to address this issue with its users quickly.

PYMNTS: Only 6% of US iPhone users use Apple Pay in-store

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PYMNTS:

Seven years post-launch, new PYMNTS data shows that 93.9% of consumers with Apple Pay activated on their iPhones do not use it in-store to pay for purchases.

That means only 6.1% do.

The survey was conducted between Aug. 3-10, 2021, 3,671 U.S. consumers.

Apple Pay’s adoption and usage isn’t much larger than it was 2015 (5.1%), a year after its launch, and is the same as it was in 2019, the last full year before the pandemic.

Does this mean Apple Pay usage is saturated? The folks who are going to use it are using it?

The growth in total Apple Pay transactions since 2015 has come almost entirely from more stores having contactless terminals to accept it, more people having new iPhones that can use it, and the overall growth in retail transactions.

And almost none of that growth comes from more iPhone users wanting to use it instead of plastic cards.

Pulling out that credit card is a tough habit to break. I think it’ll take a much bigger marketing push from Apple to change that ingrained behavior. Some sort of carrot, even a temporary one.

For example, when Apple Card came out, it offered a 3% discount if I used the card on any Apple purchases. That’s a solid discount, more than any other card in my wallet, and I was able to set it and forget it for all my monthly Apple services payments (iCloud usage, Apple TV bundle, etc.) That carrot got me into the habit.

Apple does offer regular Apple Pay promo discounts, but none of them are regular enough (at least in my spending patterns) to pull me in, to cement the habit.

If I was a regular subway rider, that’d do it. Or if my favorite restaurants offered an Apple Pay discount, that’d do it too.

I actually love the Apple Watch Apple Pay experience. Maybe once (and if) we’re ever able to move past masks, Apple Pay will start to grow again.

Kuo: iPhone 13 to support LEO satellite communication, allowing users to make phone calls and send texts without cell signal

Written by

Benjamin Mayo, 9to5Mac:

In an investor note, Ming-Chi Kuo today said that he expects the upcoming iPhone 13 models to feature a low-earth-orbit (LEO) satellite communication mode. This would allow an iPhone 13 user to send messages and make phone calls, even when they are not within standard 4G/5G cell tower coverage.

And:

Kuo says that the iPhone 13 will use a customized version of the Qualcomm X60 baseband modem chip. This chip will support communications over satellite.

And:

In the future, Kuo speculates that LEO satellite communication may also be used by the upcoming Apple AR headset, the Apple Car and other Internet-of-Things accessories.

The big question for me is, if true, how will this perform under load? Well enough to move people off traditional carriers?

In other words, if I have WiFi at home and at the office, would a LEO phone/text capability be good enough that I’d have no need for a cellular connection?

Also, what would the physical constraints be? Outdoor use only? Would it work in a moving vehicle?

More to look forward to in the upcoming (rumored) Apple event.

Side note: Most of the artificial objects in space are in low Earth orbit, including all crewed space stations and the Hubble Space Telescope.

Mark Gurman: Apple’s iOS 15 reversal shows it’s now actually listening to users

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Mark Gurman, Power On:

Steve Jobs used to say that consumers don’t know what they want and trust Apple to make decisions for them.

And:

That way of thinking has helped make Apple one of the most successful companies ever, topping $2 trillion in market value and selling billions of iPhones, iPads, Macs, AirPods and Apple Watches. Those products wouldn’t be the hits they are today without Apple’s approach. But it has also created problems for the technology giant.

One major example:

It took Apple about four years and several lawsuits before it admitted and fixed serious problems with its “butterfly” keyboards introduced in 2015.

All this leads to the point raised in the headline:

For iOS 15’s release this year, Apple planned to make some of the biggest changes ever to the design of the Safari web browser on the iPhone. The fundamental shift: moving the address bar from the top of the screen to the bottom, erasing nearly 15 years of muscle memory.

This past week, after mounting complains from users, including by me in Power On, Apple reversed course, making the new design an option in the Settings app. With that change, Apple will offer users two distinct interfaces for a core app, a rarity in the iOS world.

Interesting take. Mark’s Power On newsletter is a consistently good read.

I can’t remember the last time Apple made such a dramatic interface change in response to feedback from the user base. Of course, this assumes that feedback from users, as opposed to internal design feedback, is what caused the change.

iCloud users continue to be plagued by calendar spam

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Sami Fathi, MacRumors:

Despite previous attempts to put the situation at rest, some iCloud users continue to experience spam calendar invitations, causing their calendars to be filled with random events.

And:

Victims are targeted in various ways. The most common method is by receiving a normal iCloud calendar invitation through their calendar app.

Interacting with the invitation, including declining, accepting, or choosing “Maybe,” lets the spammer know that the email is valid, so it can continue to be targeted.

Other users are targeted through web pop-ups on potentially malicious or adult websites.

If you find yourself subscribed to a spam calendar event, check out the video below, which Apple Support posted a few weeks ago. Also, check out this Apple support document, which basically says the same thing as the video.

PSA: iPhone users reporting ‘SIM Failure’ error after updating to iOS 14.7 beta 2

Written by

Filipe Espósito, 9to5Mac:

Apple today released iOS 14.7 beta 2 for developers, and while bugs and other weird issues are quite common in beta software, sometimes they can make your device nearly unusable. According to some reports, today’s beta seems to be causing a “SIM Failure” error for iPhone users.

Not enough data to know for sure, but this may be an eSim issue. But that said, if you’ve not yet made the leap, I’d hold off on installing the latest beta until this gets sorted.

Apple to ban apps that reward users for enabling App Tracking

Written by

Sami Fathi, MacRumors:

Apple says that it will ban and reject apps on the App Store that attempt to offer users monetary incentives to enable tracking through App Tracking Transparency (ATT), one of many measures the company is taking to ensure developers follow through with the new framework.

From Apple’s Human Interface Guidelines:

Don’t offer incentives for granting the request. You can’t offer people compensation for granting their permission, and you can’t withhold functionality or content or make your app unusable until people allow you to track them.

Don’t display a custom message that mirrors the functionality of the system alert. In particular, don’t create a button title that uses “Allow” or similar terms, because people don’t allow anything in a pre-alert screen.

Don’t show an image of the standard alert and modify it in any way.

Don’t draw a visual cue that draws people’s attention to the system alert’s Allow button.

And:

If you display a custom screen that precedes a privacy-related permission request, it must offer only one action, which must display the system alert. Use a word like “Continue” to title the action; don’t use “Allow” or other terms that might make people think they’re granting their permission or performing other actions within your custom screen.

This seems fair. Everything about Apple’s approach to third party App Tracking feels loaded to provide perfect transparency to the user, to prevent an app from misleading the user.

Developer highlights how fake apps scam users via Apple’s In-App Purchasing system

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Sami Fathi, MacRumors:

Eleftheriou has highlighted yet another scam app on the ‌App Store‌. This time Eleftheriou is shining a light on how one scam app called “Privacy Assitant: StringVPN” uses Apple’s in-app purchasing system to trick people into purchasing either a weekly, monthly, or yearly subscription for a fake VPN service.

Here’s the tweet:

https://twitter.com/keleftheriou/status/1379682377304211457

First things first, wrap your head around what’s going on here. Then wonder why these sorts of apps are allowed on the App Store.

I posed that question in this tweet. Follow the link, read the responses.

Some have suggested that Apple makes money on the scams, is not motivated to fix the problem. I just can’t accept that explanation. No way.

A better explanation is in this tweet from Joe Cieplinski:

I think it’s because for every one of these, there are 10,000 more that they did take down. I don’t think most of us understand the scale at which people are scamming the App Store. How many per day can a small group of reviewers take down, realistically?

If so, feels like Apple either needs to ramp up their efforts here, budget for more reviewers, or find a way to get smarter. Maybe they could create a trusted list of third party reviewers, starting with @Keleftheriou, who can help trim the scams out of the App Store. Maybe even offer them a bounty.

This hurts users, hurts Apple’s reputation, and also harms the developer community, especially indie devs, because it makes it so much harder for their apps to stand out/stay in business. This has got to change.

Apple users bombarded with group FaceTime spam, often in the wee hours

Written by

Dan Goodin, Ars Technica:

FaceTime users are getting bombarded with group calls from numbers they’ve never seen before, often as many as 20 times in short succession during late hours of the night.

Griefers behind the pranks call as many as 31 numbers at a time. When a person receiving one of the calls hangs up, a different number will immediately call back. FaceTime doesn’t have the ability to accept only FaceTime calls coming from people in the user’s address book. It also requires that all numbers in a group call must be manually blocked for the call to be stopped.

If this is happening to you:

A user can also turn off FaceTime in iOS settings or in the macOS app, but that prevents users from receiving wanted calls as well. Last, people can uncheck their phone number under the FaceTime setting “where you can be reached.” Once again, however, this will prevent wanted calls that are initiated using the user’s number.

They’ve found a hole in the system. Hopefully, Apple will roll out a fix before this grows much larger.

Daylite CRM for Apple Users

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Thank you Daylite for sponsoring The Loop! Struggling to stay on top of client follow-ups and projects by relying on Apple Contacts, Calendar, spreadsheets, Siri reminders and your memory? Daylite to the rescue for all Apple lovers!

Daylite is a native Mac CRM and project management app for teams. Keep track of communication with clients and the status of projects and deals all in one place, even when you are working offline. Sync with your iPhone and iPad when you’re on the go (or on the couch). Compatible with Big Sur and M1-powered Macs, plus enjoy the new sleek look of Daylite in dark mode.

Daylite is designed to work seamlessly with all the Apple features you love:

  • Integrate with Apple Mail on Mac
  • Share your Apple Contacts and iCal
  • Leverage features like Siri & Caller ID on your iPhone
  • FaceID and TouchID support

Unlike other Web based CRMs that just focus on customer relationships and sales, Daylite takes you through the full customer lifecycle. From meeting prospects & winning business, to managing the moving pieces on projects, all the way through following up for referrals and repeat business, it’s all done in Daylite.

Daylite offers complimentary onboarding support to help you get the most out of Daylite. Ready to grow your business? Start your free 30-day Daylite trial today!

Daylite CRM for Apple Users [Sponsor]

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Struggling to stay on top of client follow-ups and projects by relying on Apple Contacts, Calendar, spreadsheets, Siri reminders and your memory? Daylite to the rescue for all Apple lovers! Daylite is a native Mac CRM and project management app … Continued

Facebook strikes back against Apple privacy change, prompts users to accept tracking to get ‘better ads experience’

Written by

Salvador Rodriguez, CNBC:

Facebook on Monday will begin urging some iPhone and iPad users to let the company track their activity so the social media giant can show them more personalized ads.

The move comes alongside Apple’s planned privacy update to iOS 14, which will inform users about this kind of tracking and ask them if they want to allow it.

I actually have no problem with Facebook’s approach here. I don’t see this as striking back, but more as playing by the rules.

Follow the headline link and check out that pair of iPhone screen shots, about halfway down the page. Facebook is making their case to the user, then asking for permission to do their tracking thing. Key for me is that Facebook’s “learn more” link goes to a page that is honest about what happens to the user’s data.

Every deleted Parler post, many with users’ location data, has been archived

Written by

Dell Cameron, Gizmodo:

The researcher, who asked to be referred to by their Twitter handle, @donk_enby, began with the goal of archiving every post from January 6, the day of the Capitol riot; what she called a bevy of “very incriminating” evidence.

In a nutshell, Parler was hacked before it was taken down, all the posts, including deleted posts, were downloaded and archived. I can’t help but imagine the FBI will be interested in getting their hands on that data.

Here’s a link to an alleged description of how this all was done.

Twitter rolling out voice tweets to more iOS users — No Android ’til 2021

Written by

Ben Lovejoy, 9to5Mac:

Voice tweets – the ability to record and tweet an audio message – are coming to more iOS Twitter users, while Android and web users will need to wait until some time next year. The company first began testing the feature on iOS back in June.

The testing started in Brazil. Have confirmation it’s popped up in iOS clients in both the US and Canada.

As to Android:

https://twitter.com/KoHoSo/status/1310992014767398912

Facebook says Apple rejected its attempt to tell users about App Store fees

Written by

Reuters:

Facebook Inc on Thursday told Reuters that Apple Inc rejected its attempt to tell users the iPhone maker would take a 30% cut of sales in a new online events feature, forcing Facebook to remove the message to get the tool to users.

And:

Facebook said that Apple cited an App Store rule that bars developers from showing “irrelevant” information to users.

“Now more than ever, we should have the option to help people understand where money they intend for small businesses actually goes. Unfortunately Apple rejected our transparency notice around their 30% tax but we are still working to make that information available inside the app experience,” Facebook said in a statement.

Speaking of disingenuous, that last sentence just leaves a bad taste all around. There’s an implication that Facebook is a champion of transparency.

But I digress:

Facebook earlier this month said it planned to roll out a new tool that would let online influencers and other businesses host paid online events as a way to offset revenue lost during the COVID-19 pandemic.

The company said it had asked Apple to waive the 30% fee the iPhone maker charges for in-app purchases so Facebook could pass on all of the events revenue to business owners, but that Apple declined.

Facebook had aimed to provide a notice of Apple’s cut to users, according to mock-ups it released at the time, but Reuters found on Thursday that the promised message was not present on the new events feature.

On the surface, this does look bad for Apple. Did Apple actually prevent Facebook from transparently laying out the fee structure for in-app purchase? Or is there more to this story?

Hoping for a response from Apple telling its side of this story.

Facebook apologizes to users, businesses for Apple’s monstrous efforts to protect its customers’ privacy

Written by

The Register:

Facebook has apologized to its users and advertisers for being forced to respect people’s privacy in an upcoming update to Apple’s mobile operating system – and promised it will do its best to invade their privacy on other platforms.

The antisocial network that makes almost all of its revenue from building a vast, constantly updated database of netizens that it then sells access to, is upset that iOS 14, due out next month, will require apps to ask users for permission before Facebook grabs data from their phones.

I’m a sucker for a well-written headline. Monstrous. Onion-worthy.

Apple gives users more time to buy AppleCare+ after sales slow

Written by

Mark Gurman, Bloomberg:

Consumers currently have a chance to sign up to the warranty-and-support program within 60 days of buying an Apple product. This subscription window is increasing to up to a year now in the U.S. and Canada.

“This gives customers another opportunity to protect their device and have access to all the AppleCare+ benefits,” Apple wrote in a memo to staff seen by Bloomberg News. The company told employees the offer is available to customers who pay for AppleCare+ in full versus monthly payments, or for those that subscribe via installments on the Apple Card credit card.

Keep that change in mind. Looks like you’ll now have up to a year after you buy Apple Hardware to sign up for AppleCare+.

AppleCare is what you get for free, AppleCare+ is what you pay for. Note that you’ll have to have your device screened by an Apple retail employee to make sure it is not damaged before they’ll let you sign up.

Apple iOS 14: Best update for wheelchair users

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[VIDEO] Terrific take on the iOS 14 beta, bike elevation data, and the benefits that came to wheelchair users. I’m hoping the Apple Maps and Accessibility team gets a look at this video (video embedded in main Loop post), both for the bravo moment, as well as for the suggestions made for future releases.

Zoom says it’ll provide end-to-end encryption even for free users now

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Yet another example of a company having two options – the “right” thing and the “wrong” thing – knowing what the “right” thing to do is, and still choosing the “wrong” thing only to be forced by public pressure to backtrack and do the “right” thing after all.

Some iPad Pro users complaining that the Magic Keyboard causes excessive battery drain

Written by

Benjamin Mayo, 9to5Mac:

A number of users are now airing their frustrations about battery life issues. A slice of Magic Keyboard owners are noticing that their iPad’s battery drops quickly when using the keyboard with the backlight enabled, and some reports indicate battery drain problems arise even when the iPad is idle and not in use.

I’ve seen a good number of people complain about this on Twitter. Hopefully, this is fixable with a software/firmware patch.

Apple weighs letting users switch default iPhone apps to rivals

Written by

Mark Gurman, Bloomberg:

Apple Inc. is considering giving rival apps more prominence on iPhones and iPads and opening its HomePod speaker to third-party music services after criticism the company provides an unfair advantage to its in-house products.

The technology giant is discussing whether to let users choose third-party web browser and mail applications as their default options on Apple’s mobile devices, replacing the company’s Safari browser and Mail app, according to people familiar with the matter.

And:

Last year, Stockholm-based Spotify submitted an antitrust complaint to the European Union, saying Apple squeezes rival services by imposing a 30% cut for subscriptions made via the App Store. Apple responded that Spotify wants the benefits of the App Store without paying for them. As part of its complaint, Spotify singled out the inability to run on the HomePod and become the default music player in Siri, Apple’s voice-activated digital assistant.

How about reminder, calendar, and shopping list replacements? This part of the thinking?

Jason Snell on Apple TV+, gifts for users, and the soul-sucking term ARPU

Written by

Jason Snell:

In the regular phone call with Wall Street analysts, Apple CEO Tim Cook tried very hard to get investors excited about Apple’s opportunities to make lots of money while not making it seem like Apple’s lost its soul in the process.

And:

Consider the soul-sucking term ARPU. It stands for Average Revenue Per User (or, alternately, Unit), and it’s a useful-yet-noxious lens through which businesses can view their customers. Of course, businesses should be aware about how much revenue their customers are generating—the issue is more that focusing on ARPU is often a sign that a business is on a path that will attempt to wring every last penny out of its customers.

Jason does a nice job explaining the balance Apple finds between being purely focused on ARPU, and prioritizing a positive customer experience. Part of that balance is the. “gift” of Apple TV+:

The analysts wanted to understand why Apple, after spending billions of dollars on developing a bunch of new premium television content, was going to give it away to purchasers of Apple hardware for a year.

And Tim’s reply:

Yeah, it’s it’s a gift to our users, and from a business point of view, we’re really proud of the content, we’d like as many people as possible to to view it. And so this allows us to focus on maximizing subscribers, particularly in the early going.

Read the whole article. It’s interesting, and really frames the competing pressures of maximizing revenue, quickly building up a subscriber base from nothing, and finding a way to keep customers happy, all at the same time.