Business

Facebook still ‘secretly’ tracks your iPhone — This is how to stop it

Written by

Zak Doffman, Forbes:

Despite me telling my iPhone “never” to allow Facebook access to my location, despite me checking Facebook online to confirm it knows “location history for mobile devices” is set to “off.” Facebook continues to exploit a loophole, harvesting photo location tags and IP addresses, all of which it will, in its own words, “collect and process.”

Loophole?

I took a photo with my iPhone and then uploaded that to my Facebook account. I used Facebook’s app on my iPhone, the same app that has been told “never” to access my location, the same account that knows I have this switched off. But Facebook still collects the location tag from that photo, along with my IP address.

And:

Facebook and Instagram do in fact strip the metadata, the so-called EXIF information, from photos that are saved to their platforms. You can see this, because if you save a photo from Instagram or your Facebook albums onto your phone, there will be no location information. That has been replaced with Facebook’s own codes.

And so, you might assume that Facebook has deleted this data. Wrong. If you go to your Facebook privacy settings and select “your Facebook information,” you can download a copy of the data it holds. If you select “photos and videos,” you will see the data that Facebook saved from the images you uploaded.

This is heinous. Read the whole piece. There’s a lot more detail here, but in a nutshell, the loophole is Facebook’s access to your photo EXIF data.

iFixit M1 iMac teardown

Written by

Jump right to the iMac Xray (direct link). So much to see here.

  • Start off with that huge Apple logo (upper middle)
  • Then move down to see two coin cell batteries (presumably to back up the NVRAM)
  • The real mystery is those two massive rectangles on either side

Those rectangles appear to be acoustic chambers for the speakers. Interesting that they are different in shape, though the sound, no doubt, is perfectly symmetrical. Apple has some genius acoustic engineers.

Lots more detail in the post itself. Love teardowns.

Everything new in iOS 14.6 (don’t miss the bit right at the bottom)

Written by

Juli Clover, MacRumors:

Apple today released iOS 14.6 and iPadOS 14.6 to the public. The iOS 14.6 update isn’t quite as significant as the iOS 14.5 update that preceded it, but it still introduces a number of notable new features. We’ve highlighted everything that’s new in iOS and iPadOS 14.6 below.

There’s Lossless and Spatial Audio. Support for. But the switch to turn it on won’t be flipped ’til June.

Apple Card Family. See this post for details on that.

Podcast subscriptions, AirTag Find My support. Good info there.

But down at the very bottom, there’s this:

iPhone users with the Voice Control accessibility option enabled can unlock their iPhones for the first time after a restart using only their voice after installing iOS 14.6.

I’ve never used Voice Control before. Definitely going to experiment with this. Unlock your iPhone after a restart with your voice. That sounds like a huge assistive win.

Apple Card Family, co-owners, and participants

Written by

From this Apple support document:

Apple Card Family lets you co-own your Apple Card account with one member of your Family Sharing group. You can share your credit line with a co-owner and build credit together as equals. You can also share your Apple Card with members of your Family Sharing group, including teens and adults. Everyone on the shared account can use Apple Card and view their spending. Account owners and co-owners can see a participant’s activity, set transaction limits, and more. And there’s a single monthly bill.

Co-ownership involves risk! From the footnote:

Each co-owner is individually liable for all balances on the co-owned Apple Card including amounts due on the existing co-owner’s account before the accounts are merged. Each co-owner will be reported to credit bureaus as an owner on the account. In addition, co-owners will have full visibility into all account activity and each co-owner is responsible for the other co-owner’s instructions or requests.

As to participants, they are not liable for their charges.

Coming July 2021: You will be able to invite another Apple Card owner to combine credit limits and form one co-owned account.

You can have up to 6 people (yourself and 5 others) on an account.

Apple makes it easy to add co-owners and participants. Watch the videos below (very short) for details.

Google LaMDA, Siri, and conversation

Written by

Google AI blog:

While conversations tend to revolve around specific topics, their open-ended nature means they can start in one place and end up somewhere completely different. A chat with a friend about a TV show could evolve into a discussion about the country where the show was filmed before settling on a debate about that country’s best regional cuisine.

That meandering quality can quickly stump modern conversational agents (commonly known as chatbots), which tend to follow narrow, pre-defined paths. But LaMDA — short for “Language Model for Dialogue Applications” — can engage in a free-flowing way about a seemingly endless number of topics, an ability we think could unlock more natural ways of interacting with technology and entirely new categories of helpful applications.

LaMDA was shown off in the Google I/O keynote, embedded below (it’s the second video). The discussion starts at about 17:03 in. Obviously, this is a demo, and not a shipping product. It’s interesting to me how free Google is in showing off internal technologies, contrasted with Apple’s focus on products that are for sale or coming soon. Of course, there are exceptions on both sides, but the trend is clear.

LaMDA is a tantalizing demo, showing off a technology that is so very close to Apple’s original Knowledge Navigator personal assistant concept, first shown off back in 1987. If you’ve not seen it, check it out below (it’s the first video).

The differences between Knowledge Navigator, the LaMDA demo, and Siri are stark. Of course, Siri is a shipping product, and has both limited context (once you move on, the stuff you asked about is forgotten) and a limited domain set (Siri knows about a limited set of things. If Siri doesn’t have the topic built-in, it defaults to a web search, or an “I can’t help you” response).

LaMDA, on the other hand, is a highly controlled demo, used internally, an R&D project. Again, not a shipping product.

But, that said, both Knowledge Navigator and LaMDA really make me want much more from Siri. I want more sophisticated language, more context, more understanding. Something more human, more beyond-the-moment interaction. I’d like a little more conversation.

In this one instance, I’d love to see what experiments the Siri team is working on, get a little taste of where Siri is headed.

iOS 14.7 beta lets you set timers on HomePod using the Home app

Written by

Filipe Espósito, 9to5Mac:

When you go to the HomePod settings in the Home app with the latest version of iOS, there’s now the option to set timers right from there without having to ask Siri. This new option is located right below the HomePod alarms.

Obviously, you could long (since iOS 12) set timers using Siri. But now you can see the timers count down, at a glance. I use Siri timers when I’m cooking and I always have to ask Siri “How much time?” to get a sense of things.

After adding the timer, you can see the countdown for all of them in the Home app and cancel them from there as well. In addition to iOS 14.7, this also requires HomePod Software 14.7 installed on your HomePods.

Really glad to see this interface. Once you go beyond a single timer, asking Siri about timers is just awkward. This is a great add.

Apple TV 4K and ARC: Streaming all your TV’s audio through Apple TV

Written by

One of the most underrated features of the new Apple TV 4K is the addition of ARC support. ARC is Audio Return Channel, an audio link meant to an replace the cabling between your TV and your audio speakers.

Why should you care? As is, if you use HomePod to stream audio from your older Apple TV, your other TV inputs will be streamed though your TV speakers, or some other mechanism.

But with ARC, all the audio that goes into your ARC-ready TV gets piped back out through the TV’s audio return channel. With the new Apple TV 4K, you can pipe ARC from your TV to the Apple TV, and then set the output of the Apple TV to HomePod (or whatever speaker systems you output to).

Follow the headline link to Tim Hardwick’s MacRumors article for more detail, but ARC is a revelation. Once you’ve used it, you’ll be glad you have it.

Amazon and the James Bond franchise

Written by

Variety:

Industry executives are stunned that Amazon is in negotiations to buy Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer in a deal that could reach $9 billion. Their shock comes from a belief that the price tag severely overvalues the studio behind James Bond, the Pink Panther and “Legally Blonde.”

And:

Insiders believe that Broccoli and Wilson would likely nix any plans to debut Bond films on Amazon’s streaming service Prime Video and would insist on a theatrical release, as is their contractual right. That was a key stumbling block when MGM briefly floated the possibility of selling the COVID-delayed Bond sequel “No Time to Die” to Apple for north of $600 million.

Wow! Amazing to think that the umpteenth Bond film could command that kind of a price. It’ll be interesting to see where Bond lands. Seems inevitable that a streaming service is going to own them all, à la Disney+ and Marvel.

Apple VP talks new Apple TV and Siri Remote

Written by

Mobile Syrup did a great interview with Tim Twerdahl, Apple’s Vice President of Product Marketing for Home and Audio. They got into all things Apple TV, including performance, gaming, and the New Siri Remote.

This quote is getting all the attention:

We are super excited about AirTags and what we’re doing with U1, and part of that power is the Find My network and the fact that we can leverage a billion devices around the world to help you find stuff.

To your point, that is the most powerful out of the home. With the changes we’ve made to the Siri Remote — including making it a bit thicker so it won’t fall in your couch cushions as much — that need to have all these other network devices find it seems a little bit lower.

Personally, I’ve misplaced way bigger remotes than the new Siri Remote, but I’m such a fan of this new remote, this is just not an issue to me. And if it does become an issue, I’ll put an AirTag on it. Or maybe inside it.

Interesting to me to look at the older Apple TV remote (the one before the goth remote) side-by-side with the new one. If that black remote didn’t exist, the new remote would seem like a natural evolution.

And Siri Remote talk aside, this entire interview is a fascinating read.

Steve Jobs 1997 fireside chat

Written by

This is from the Friday of 1997’s WWDC, the travel day for most attendees, a day when you’ve just spent an exhausting week drinking from a very technical firehose.

If nothing else, watch the first few minutes of this video, where Steve is introduced, and the crowd of developers reacts. I feel this very deeply.

Matti Haapoja: Crazy fast M1 iPad Pro editing

Written by

The whole video is both interesting and entertaining. But jump to about 5:23 in and check out the playback of the 4K drone footage. Buttery smooth.

I get the same feeling watching these M1 iPad Pro videos as I got when I first started playing with my M1 MacBook Air. What a performance leap.

Craig Federighi says the Mac has an ‘unacceptable’ malware problem

Written by

Chance Miller:

Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers, who is presiding over the Epic vs. Apple case, asked Federighi about why the Mac can have multiple app stores, but not the iPhone. “It is regularly exploited on the Mac,” Federighi explained. “iOS has established a dramatically higher bar for customer protection. The Mac is not meeting that bar today.”

“Today, we have a level of malware on the Mac that we don’t find acceptable,” Federighi added.

More quotes from Federighi:

The Mac is a car. You can take it off road if you want and you can drive wherever you want. That’s what you wanted to buy. There’s a certain level of responsibility required. With iOS, you wanted to buy something where children can operate an iOS device and feel safe doing so. It’s really a different product.

And:

If operated correctly, much like that car, if you know how to operate a car and obey the rules of the road and are very cautious, yes. If not, I’ve had a couple of family members who have gotten malware on their Macs, but ultimately, I believe a Mac can be operated safely.

Interesting analogy. I get that he’s talking about the ability to side load apps on your Mac but not on your iPhone or iPad. But it makes me think about repairing a car, and the fact that it is getting harder and harder to maintain your own car, and almost impossible to repair your own Mac.

Apple previews powerful software updates designed for people with disabilities

Written by

Apple:

Apple today announced powerful software features designed for people with mobility, vision, hearing, and cognitive disabilities.

And:

Later this year, with software updates across all of Apple’s operating systems, people with limb differences will be able to navigate Apple Watch using AssistiveTouch; iPad will support third-party eye-tracking hardware for easier control; and for blind and low vision communities, Apple’s industry-leading VoiceOver screen reader will get even smarter using on-device intelligence to explore objects within images. In support of neurodiversity, Apple is introducing new background sounds to help minimize distractions, and for those who are deaf or hard of hearing, Made for iPhone (MFi) will soon support new bi-directional hearing aids.

Apple is also launching a new service on Thursday, May 20, called SignTime. This enables customers to communicate with AppleCare and Retail Customer Care by using American Sign Language (ASL) in the US, British Sign Language (BSL) in the UK, or French Sign Language (LSF) in France, right in their web browsers.

At the top of that quote is a reference to AssitiveTouch. This is amazing stuff. Check out the video below, and imagine the possibilities. Some brilliant work here.

Austin Mann: M1 iPad Pro for photographers

Written by

I always look forward to Austin Mann’s camera reviews. But, in this case, he’s showing off the flip side of the lens, the M1 iPad Pro used as a photography tool.

Specifically, scroll down about a quarter of the way down the review and hit play on that first video (it’s portrait mode), check out that performance as Austin steps through, and then fast scrolls through a large collection of 60 megapixel images.

And, with Thunderbolt, this is true for internal or external storage. Blazing fast. No lag. Amazing.

Man creates ‘traffic jam’ on Google Maps using kart full of mobile phones

Written by

Unilad:

The experiment, which was filmed in Berlin, shows a man dragging 99 mobile phones across an empty bridge, alongside a real-time screen recording of Google Maps’ traffic feature.

Like magic, as the phones make their way across the bridge, the map gradually updates to show an orange, then a red line extending along the road. Within seconds, Google Maps has created a major jam in an otherwise traffic-free neighbourhood.

I’m amazed this sort of hack hasn’t happened more often. This sort of crowdsourcing is ripe for disruption.

Also, I’m wondering if the same sort of thing could be done to Apple Maps.

Here’s the video:

20 years of Apple Stores

Written by

Michael Steeber, 9to5Mac:

In May 2001, Mac users had a reason to celebrate. The iMac was a hit, Mac OS X had just been released, and soon there would be a better way to get hands-on with the latest products. The excitement of Apple was back. Lining up to be the first inside an Apple Store was as much about celebrating a reinvigorated Apple as it was about the store itself.

But then a funny thing happened. The lines didn’t slow by store ten. Or one hundred. They grew, often stretching around the block or snaking through mall corridors. New products brought opening day lines back to stores that opened long ago. New versions of Mac OS X became World Premiere events. iPhone turned the dial to eleven.

Great series of articles (three of the four are out now) from Apple Store aficionado Michael Steeber, full of stories covering the twenty year history of the Apple Store.

This resonates strongly for me. I was at the opening of the very first Apple Store (not including the one on Apple campus) and it was wild. Amazingly, two of the folks who worked on that opening day still work there.

The Verge: 2021 iMac review

Written by

This is just one of a river of iMac reviews that will go live today.

The upshot:

Sure, there are some other differences between this 24-inch iMac and the 21.5-inch model from 2019 that it’s replacing. There are better microphones and better speakers. There are fewer ports, and some of them have moved around. The screen is bigger and better. The keyboard now has TouchID. But the M1 is the star of the show.

Read on for the pros and the cons (a handful of cons, but no dealbreakers, just things to be aware of before you buy). And if the iMac form-factor is your jam, there are plenty of pros.

Nice, detailed writeup by Monica Chin.

No Lossless for HomePod or Lightning-connected AirPods Max

Written by

John Voorhees, MacStories:

When Apple announced that Spatial Audio and Lossless Audio are coming to Apple Music, it wasn’t entirely clear from the press release whether Lossless Audio would work with AirPods or HomePods. Since then, Apple has confirmed to T3 that AirPods Pro and AirPods Max do not support Lossless Audio.

Short read, with links to various “Apple confirmed” articles. But in a nutshell, no Lossless on AirPods, even Lightning connected AirPods Max, and no Lossless on HomePod either.

I’m still going to find a setup that works, give Hi-Res Lossless a try, see if I can tell the difference.

Gruber on NY Times investigation of Apple’s “Hard Bargain” in China

Written by

Start by reading The New York Times piece: Censorship, Surveillance and Profits: A Hard Bargain for Apple in China.

At its heart:

Tim Cook, Apple’s chief executive, has said the data is safe. But at the data center in Guiyang, which Apple hoped would be completed by next month, and another in the Inner Mongolia region, Apple has largely ceded control to the Chinese government.

Chinese state employees physically manage the computers. Apple abandoned the encryption technology it used elsewhere after China would not allow it. And the digital keys that unlock information on those computers are stored in the data centers they’re meant to secure.

And:

Internal Apple documents reviewed by The New York Times, interviews with 17 current and former Apple employees and four security experts, and new filings made in a court case in the United States last week provide rare insight into the compromises Mr. Cook has made to do business in China. They offer an extensive inside look — many aspects of which have never been reported before — at how Apple has given in to escalating demands from the Chinese authorities.

Moving on to Gruber’s headline linked take:

It’s a big report, but the above is fundamentally true and gets to the heart of the conflict: physical access to the hardware in the facility is game over. But what’s missing from the whole piece is any serious discussion of what else Apple could do. Apple has no option other than to comply with Chinese law, or else stop selling products in the country.

Both of these are worth reading.

But Gruber has nailed the issue for Apple. What else can they do? They are between a rock and a hard place. If they pull out, they will have a massive manufacturing/supply chain issue.

iMac, iPad Pro, and Apple TV 4K in stores Friday

Written by

Apple:

Beginning May 21, customers can get their hands on the all-new iMac, the M1-powered iPad Pro, and the next generation of Apple TV 4K at Apple Store locations and authorized resellers around the world. Customers who already ordered their new products will begin receiving deliveries Friday.

Wondering if they’s have stock of the new Siri Remote, as a standalone product. They could keep ’em on an impulse buy rack, right next to the cash register (yup, I get it, no racks, no cash register, but still.)

Apple’s WWDC costs $50 million a year to run

Written by

Mark Gurman, Bloomberg:

Apple Inc.’s annual worldwide developer conferences cost the company about $50 million a year to put on and the company is building a new center at its Silicon Valley headquarters to assist developers, according to its top App Store executive.

This is from Phil Schiller’s testimony yesterday at the ongoing Epic v Apple court proceedings.

$50 million. That’s a lot. Going to assume (speculation on my part) that that number includes the costs of paying all the engineers for time they contribute to prepping their sessions, as well as for time they spend at WWDC itself. And then, at least in the olden days, there’s the cost of renting the venue, prepping the venue, and staffing the venue.

Those costs surely have come down significantly, now that everything is virtual and held in house.

Another piece of the accounting puzzle that’s changed is the income from the hefty $1,599 ticket price. Multiply that by 5,000 attendees (pre-pandemic) and that’s about $8 million back to Apple.

The second bit of that quote is “the company is building a new center at its Silicon Valley headquarters to assist developers”. Can’t wait to learn about this.

Will WWDC ever return to an in-person event? If so, will it be downsized (like sporting events, with their 25% crowd limits, at least in the short term)? Will this center be designed to replace the in-person labs that are such a critical part of pre-COVID WWDC?

Apple Music announces Spatial Audio with Dolby Atmos; will bring Lossless Audio to entire catalog

Written by

Apple:

Apple today announced Apple Music is bringing industry-leading sound quality to subscribers with the addition of Spatial Audio with support for Dolby Atmos. Spatial Audio gives artists the opportunity to create immersive audio experiences for their fans with true multidimensional sound and clarity. Apple Music subscribers will also be able to listen to more than 75 million songs in Lossless Audio — the way the artists created them in the studio.

And the deeply buried lede:

These new features will be available for Apple Music subscribers starting next month at no additional cost.

More detail, from the announcement:

By default, Apple Music will automatically play Dolby Atmos tracks on all AirPods and Beats headphones with an H1 or W1 chip, as well as the built-in speakers in the latest versions of iPhone, iPad, and Mac.

Great that this will work on all the AirPods, going back to the first generation.

Apple Music will be adding new Dolby Atmos tracks constantly and will be curating a special set of Dolby Atmos playlists to help listeners find the music they love. In addition, albums that are available in Dolby Atmos will have a badge on the detail page for easy discovery.

It’ll be interesting to start digging through the catalog, especially the custom Dolby Atmos playlists, just to get a sense of the changes.

At launch, subscribers can enjoy thousands of songs in Spatial Audio from some of the world’s biggest artists and music across all genres, including hip-hop, country, Latin, pop, and classical. Apple Music is working with artists and labels to add new releases and the best catalog tracks, as more artists begin to create music specifically for the Spatial Audio experience.

As to Lossless Audio:

Apple Music will also make its catalog of more than 75 million songs available in Lossless Audio. Apple uses ALAC (Apple Lossless Audio Codec) to preserve every single bit of the original audio file. This means Apple Music subscribers will be able to hear the exact same thing that the artists created in the studio.

Fantastic. And at no additional cost.

To start listening to Lossless Audio, subscribers using the latest version of Apple Music can turn it on in Settings > Music > Audio Quality. Here, they can choose different resolutions for different connections such as cellular, Wi-Fi, or for download. Apple Music’s Lossless tier starts at CD quality, which is 16 bit at 44.1 kHz (kilohertz), and goes up to 24 bit at 48 kHz and is playable natively on Apple devices. For the true audiophile, Apple Music also offers Hi-Resolution Lossless all the way up to 24 bit at 192 kHz.

And the most critical point about Lossless is hidden in this footnote:

Due to the large file sizes and bandwidth needed for Lossless and Hi-Res Lossless Audio, subscribers will need to opt in to the experience. Hi-Res Lossless also requires external equipment, such as a USB digital-to-analog converter (DAC).

My understanding:

  • No extra cost, even for Hi-Res Lossless
  • AirPods (even wired AirPods Max) will not handle Lossless
  • Special headphone adapter required for both Lossless and Hi-Res Lossless.

I will definitely be exploring this, weigh in once I get my hands on the new tracks.

Can’t wait!

How to remotely control your iPhone’s camera

Written by

Lance Whitney, Macworld:

There are several reasons why you might not want to hold your iPhone while taking a picture: You need to snap the perfect still photo while your iPhone is on a tripod and don’t want to spoil the shot by jostling it. You’re taking a group photo but also want to be in it. You’re too lazy to lift your finger. Whatever the reason, it’s not a problem. There are actually a few different ways to remotely trigger the shutter button on an iPhone.

This is one of those handy tips that’s great to know. Consider setting up the shortcut (as an easy way to get to know Shortcuts) now, so you have it when the need arises.

Apple, Rome’s historic Via del Corso flagship store, and that GIF

Written by

John Voorhees, MacStories:

Today, Apple took the wraps off its latest flagship store in the heart of Rome’s Via del Corso shopping district. The store is Apple’s first in Rome’s historic center, although the company has long had a presence in Rome and other parts of Italy, including another flagship store that was opened in Milan in 2018. The new Rome location isn’t open yet but will be soon.

Bucket list. And near the top for me.

But not to be missed: Follow the headline link, scroll about 2/3 of the way down, and check out that gorgeous Apple logo animated GIF. Hoping they find a way to incorporate that into the finished store, even as a hard-to-find Easter egg.

‘Twitter Blue’ subscription service: Undo tweets, collections, $2.99 a month

Written by

José Adorno, 9to5Mac:

Today, researcher Jane Manchun Wong said the service is going to be called Twitter Blue and, as for now, is priced at $2.99/month.

And:

Twitter Blue will feature a new function called ‘Collections’ which will let users save and organize their favorite tweets into collections to easily find them later.

And, on “Undo Tweet”:

This feature looks a lot like Gmail’s “undo send” button. The app just waits a few seconds before actually sending the message, so this could be what Twitter is planning to launch. As Wong shows, the company is working on the ability to adjust the duration of the undo Tweet timer from 5 seconds to up to 30 seconds.

More detail in the headline linked post. Note that “undo send” is not the same as an edit button. I use Gmail’s undo a fair amount, it’s definitely useful, but only when you realize a mistake/issue within a few seconds of clicking send.

I wonder if you’ll automatically get the blue checkmark if you subscribe, since it is supposed to be about being a verified account.

How tough are AirTags? We froze, washed and dried, ran over, and put them in the hot sun

Written by

Kirk McElhearn:

You take good care of your iPhone or iPad, but AirTags aren’t meant to be coddled. If you have one with a keyring, it’ll be in your pocket or purse, getting scratched and bounced around. If you put one in your gym bag, it’ll sit around in the trunk of your car in extreme temperatures in summer or winter. And if you forget one in a pocket, it might go through the washing machine and dryer.

I put a few AirTags through the most grueling stress tests I could find. Here’s what happened.

An entertaining read. The conclusion:

AirTags can stand up to a lot, and they are well designed for most of the extreme conditions they’ll encounter. Don’t worry too much about how you treat them, and, by all means, don’t buy AirTag screen protectors.

Wondering what would happen if you put one of these through the wash. To me, that’d be a fair test.