Apple has announced that it will hold a conference call tomorrow morning to discuss the company’s plans for its approximately $100 billion in cash reserves. The announcement will occur at 6AM Pacific / 9 AM Eastern time, and the discussions will be led by Apple CEO Tim Cook and Apple CFO Peter Oppenheimer. Apple specifically notes that the call will be focused on Apple’s decision, not on the current quarter or topics besides the company’s cash reserves....

Apple had been confusing many Apple Watch app developers due to some confusing wording in the developer documentation for iTunes Connect, pictured above. The wording indicated that app submissions, including a Watch app, would require at least one screenshot of their app taken on an Apple Watch itself. However, this was confusing as it was therefore impossible for developers to submit Watch extensions without owning an Apple Watch themselves. This caused some concern that there would be very few third-party apps on day one of the Watch launch (April 24th) as most developers would not get access to hardware aside from the select partners Apple worked with in Cupertino....

We’ve already run down most of what we’re expecting from the new iPad Pro, iPad mini 4, iPhone 6s, iPhone 6s Plus, Apple Watch bands, and the new gold Apple Watch Sport colors expected to be announced at Apple’s September 9th event. On the eve of the event, we’ve received some additional details from several sources, which we roundup below. According to sources, the iPad Pro will actually start out at a 32GB capacity (which is still double the current 16GB base configuration of the iPad Air and iPad Mini lines) for $799....

Among the hoopla surrounding the 30th anniversary of the Mac last week, Macworld‘s Jason Snell had an excellent interview with Apple’s Phil Schiller, Craig Federighi, and Bud Tribble about both the past and the future for the Mac. While the entire interview is well worth a read, the talk from Apple executives about iOS and OS X convergence being a “waste of energy” stood out to me the most. Of course, it appears that the Apple executives are taking shots at Microsoft, Windows 8, the Surface line of products, and Google’s new Touch-enabled Chromebooks....

Apple will have to continue battling a class-action lawsuit in California over its butterfly keyboard design. Reuters reports today that a federal judge has rejected Apple’s request to dismiss the proposed class-action lawsuit over the keyboard’s failure and reliability issues. The lawsuit was first filed in May of 2018, with the Apple users arguing that reliability issues make Apple’s butterfly keyboard “inoperable and unsuitable for its ordinary and intended use.” Furthermore, the lawsuit alleges that Apple knew of the butterfly keyboard issues, but did nothing to remedy them....

Ahead of Apple’s fiscal Q1 2015 earnings report today, there were signs that Apple had enjoyed significant growth in China and a record number of smartphone sales in the region during the holidays. Today, we get some more insight into that growth, as Apple reported a 157% increase from the previous quarter: revenue of $16.144 billion in Greater China compared to $6.292 billion in Q3. That’s up 70% year over year from the $9....

They say imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, and Apple’s biggest flatterer to date has been Chinese brand Xiaomi, with its Mi Phone, Mi Pad, iOS-like Android skin and even website and keynote presentation cloning. But another Chinese brand is seemingly aiming to take things one step further … Leaked photos of the upcoming Leagoo S9 show a phone with a familiar-looking rounded corner screen and a notch cutout that looks like an exact copy of that on the iPhone X....

Apple today posted a new advertisement for the iPad to highlight artist Elliphant’s recording and beat making via the tablet. The one minute long ad highlights different applications used to make music with the iPad, ranging from first-party apps like Garageband to third-party programs such as Manual Camera and Nano Studio. The “iPad Remix” of the song All or Nothing is linked to from Apple’s page for the advertisement, and it is worth a listen to see how music made an iPad sounds....

The use of an Apple ID for a perfectly legal purchase was the key piece of evidence that has enabled the Department of Homeland Security to identify the man they suspect to be the owner of the biggest pirate website on the net, KickAssTorrents.com (KAT). A lengthy criminal complaint filed against Ukranian national Artem Vaulin by the U.S. Attorney’s Office explains how the Apple ID enabled authorities to identify the suspect …...

Yesterday we detailed an Apple patent showing work on a stackable Smart Connector plug of sorts. Today we get a look at a similar invention aimed at making the I/O on future devices more versatile with Apple’s invention of a “Universal Magnetic Adapter” that could allow for more future-proof devices using only a single port. As pictured in the drawing accompanying the patent above, the technology allows for a single port that uses magnetic inserts as adapters for your various devices....

Apple has begun contacting iPhone customers who complain about poor battery life on their device following installation of iPhone 3.1. Customer care operatives are making contact with 11 questions, focusing on such things as push email, WIFI, Bluetooth and which apps a user uses. Customers are also being offered Battery Life logging software, which gathers information about their product usage and battery life. The application – seemingly distributed using the Ad Hoc system – also gathers extensive data logs on this, which are then shared with Apple....

On your iPhone, iPad or iPod touch go to Settings » General » Restrictions. Tap Enable Restrictions. You’ll need to enter in a four digit Passcode twice. Now go through and set the restrictions. Move the slider to the Off position to disable access. You can turn on restrictions to disable music and in-app purchases from iTunes. Very handy if you let your kids use your device. It also lets you turn off links in Safari and only allow TV and music content by ratings....

The idea that ‘Apple is doomed’ has been a constant refrain from some quarters throughout the decades, and has been given something of a boost during the coronavirus crisis. First, there was the opening quarter of the year – Apple’s fiscal Q2. There was a dramatic difference between Apple’s original guidance and the actual numbers … Delays do not mean Apple is doomed Apple originally guided an extremely high $63-67B for the quarter, then withdrew the guidance and actually delivered $58....

Update: Apple appears to have removed the job listing, but we grabbed a screenshot above and below. We know that Apple has been investigating various methods of incorporating flexible displays in its mobile devices thanks to a handful of patents and patent applications published over the last year. Flexible display rumors have picked up steam even more since rumors of an iWatch from Apple, and just today we came across two new Apple patent applications detailing flexible devices that could change states as a user bends or twists the device....

All of today’s best deals are headlined by Apple’s Magic Keyboard for iPad Pro at up to $100 off. That’s alongside up to $150 off previous-generation iPad Pros and this highly-rated leather Apple Watch band at $9. Hit the jump for all that and more in the latest 9to5Toys Lunch Break. Apple’s Magic Keyboards for prev-gen. iPad Pro up to $100 off Apple’s Magic Keyboard brings an improved typing experience to your iPad centered around a unique floating hinge design that allows for an adjustable viewing angle....

Apple is now on its third-generation system for handling Siri queries, moving to the open source Mesos platform, according to the Mesosphere blog. Apple reportedly made the announcement at the Bay Area Mesos meetup last week. During a presentation, Apple engineers said that the switch to Mesos would reduce latency, assist scalability, and made it easier to deploy new services as Siri’s capabilities are expanded … The engineers said that Siri comprises around 100 services on a Mesos cluster spanning many thousands of nodes....

Apple’s new app privacy labels went live in the App Store last month, giving users the chance to see what data is collected by each. We then explained how to view them. All apps are required to show what data is used to track you, and what data is linked to your identity. Looking at that more comprehensive category reveals some stark differences between four popular messaging apps… App privacy labels for messaging apps Forbes compared Signal, Apple’s own iMessage, WhatsApp and Facebook Messenger....

5G might still be at a rather early stage in terms of coverage, but that’s not stopping work on Apple’s 6G plans. The goal of 6G is to allow speeds up to 100 times faster than 5G, but that is simply a broad ambition at this stage, with much of the required technology still to be figured out. Apple has placed job ads for research engineers to work on the next generation of high-speed mobile data…...

Apple talks about augmented reality at any opportunity it gets, but so far its fierce ambition has only materialized to consumers as ARKit apps on the iPhone and iPad. It has been widely reported that Apple is developing an AR glasses / headset product. Today, Ming-Chi Kuo reports that Apple’s first augmented reality product will go into mass production as soon as the fourth quarter of this year, but hedges the timeframe slightly and says it will be mass-produced by the second quarter of 2020 at the latest....

Apple announced last month the transition from Intel processors to its own ARM chips, which the company calls “Apple Silicon.” Today Apple has confirmed another important aspect of this transition regarding the future of the Thunderbolt connection, which will continue to be present in Apple Silicon Macs. With the big change to the Mac lineup coming later this year, users were concerned whether these new Mac models will be compatible with Thunderbolt devices — which is a hardware interface developed by Intel in collaboration with Apple....