Apple has completely removed all product promotion from its www.apple.com homepage this evening and replaced it with a touching tribute to the life of Nelson Mandela, who passed away earlier this week. The New York Times has an interactive timeline of Mandela’s life. Apple has previously replaced its homepage to mark the passing of only a few other individuals: Gregory Hines, George Harrison, Rosa Parks, board member Jerry York, and Steve Jobs....

Following a petition with thousands of signatures related to GPU complaints, Apple has been named a defendant in a new class-action lawsuit filed against the Cupertino-based company in the United States District Court for Northern California over system failures and graphical issues affecting 2011 MacBook Pros. The class-action lawsuit was filed by Kentucky-based law firm Whitfield Bryson & Mason on behalf of plaintiffs Zachary Book, Donald Cowart, and John Manners, a trio of individuals that accuse Apple of failing to rectify the graphical issues that have affected both 15-inch and 17-inch MacBook Pro models released in 2011....

A certain Cupertino, California consumer electronics powerhouse has more cash on its hands than the cash-strapped US government which is struggling to raise its debt limit before the August 3 deadline and avoid a default at the same time. Business Insider nails it down, saying “the world’s largest tech company has more cash than the world’s largest sovereign government”. Apple sat on a cash pile of $76.2 billion at the end of the June quarter, the sum which is comprised of cash, cash equivalents and marketable securities....

As noticed by Apfelpage, Apple has published a new page to be more open about why it rejects apps. A chart at the bottom of the page shows the top ten reasons for app rejection in the last seven days; such as lack of information, crashes or bugs encountered, complicated user interfaces. Around 60% of rejections come from violation of just ten guidelines of the App Store rules. Some of these, like the existence of placeholder text in applications, seem rather trivial issues and it’s interesting that it arises so frequently as a cause of rejection....

Health is one of the main areas that Apple has been investing in in recent years following the growth of the Apple Watch and services like Apple Fitness+. Now the company is hiring a cardiologist specializing in clinical product development to take its health features even further. As noted by MyHealthyApple, the company shared the job opening earlier today on LinkedIn, and according to the social network, seven candidates have already applied for the position....

That’s logical, as we already know the latest iPhone Software 2.0 pre-release build offers location-aware services that let you tag images with your location as you take images, if you like. And while the Skyhook system’s impressively effective, it’s no great leap to think GPS is on the road-map. Apple’s recruitment advertisment says: “As a member of a cross-functional design team at Apple, you will help to create the next generation of the world’s finest handheld devices....

Apple is one of four tech giants to come out in opposition to a proposed new law in Australia which would force companies to provide access to encrypted user data. The fear is that, if the law is allowed to pass, it could set a precedent which other countries are likely to follow – with the USA high up the list of likely candidates to effectively ban strong encryption …...

Variety reports today that ‘Captain America’ star Chris Evans has signed on to Apple’s upcoming limited series ‘Defending Jacob.’ Apple has placed a straight-to-series order for the drama, according to the report. Evans hasn’t held a regular TV role since 2000, when he appeared in the miniseries ‘Opposite Sex.’ He’s best known for his role playing ‘Captain America’ in multiple Marvel films. Apple’s series ‘Defending Jacob’ is said to be based on the 2012 best-selling novel of the same name by William Landay....

Based on the real life terror attacks of 2008, Hotel Mumbai is a gripping, violent, yet inspiring portrayal of horror and humanity, of normal people banding together in an effort to survive against impossible odds. Directed by Anthony Maras, the film stars an ensemble cast which includes Dev Patel, Armie Hammer, Jason Isaacs, and Anupam Kher, all of whom play civilians who are trapped inside the besieged Taj Mahal Palace Hotel....

While Apple has been facing a dispute against Epic Games regarding its In-App Purchases system, the company yesterday asked WordPress to include native payment options in its app. However, Apple and WordPress have now reached an agreement to allow the app in the iOS App Store without In-App Purchases. If you are not familiar with WordPress, it’s a free, open-source platform used by many website creators around the world. However, WordPress allows users to pay for more storage, technical support, and extra features, which caused the conflict with the App Store team....

File this under the “wow, just wow” category. According to Curbed (via MacRumors), Apple could be interested in building a new store at the Third Street Promenade in Santa Monica, California, right in the neighborhood of another store the company already runs in the area. What’s interesting about this particular brick-and-mortar shop is concept. Breaking away from its usual flagship stores design, this could be Apple’s first-ever flagship store with an all-glass transparent ceiling (sans the Upper West Side store), accentuated by an “expansive floor-to-ceiling height”, per this proposal (PDF document) from applicant Howard Robinson....

Ahead of the public release of tvOS 13, beta testers have noticed that the Apple Arcade app on the Apple TV is now live. Apple’s subscription service for new and original games debuted last week as part of iOS 13. Apple Arcade will launch on iPad today with the release of iPadOS and iOS 13.1. tvOS 13 is also launching soon. Apple Arcade will feature around 100 games by the end of the year....

iOS 9 introduces Apple News, which replaces Newsstand as the default way to read news publications and blog content on the iPad and iPhone. Apple is automatically including many famous partners automatically with smaller publications having to request inclusion. We explained how to submit to Apple News a few days ago. Now, it seems Apple has begun the approval process for these submissions. It has started sending out emails to let people know they have been accepted into Apple News....

Last month Apple confirmed that it would soon beef up encryption for iCloud email following a report detailing security flaws in major email services. While Apple previously encrypted emails sent between its own iCloud customers, now the company has enabled encryption for emails in transit between iCloud and third-party services for me.com and mac.com email addresses. The change is documented on Google’s transparency website that shows the percentage of emails encrypted in transit for both inbound and outbound email exchanges (pictured below):...

Apple has begun seeding its next OS X Mountain Lion update, OS X 10.8.4, to AppleSeed testers. Apple will likely begin seeding this to registered OS X developers soon… Apple does not specify what the update includes, but it is likely focused on bug fixes and performance improvements like most OS X maintenance releases. Apple asks developers to focus on WiFi, Graphics Drivers, and Safari. The first 10.8.4 beta is build number 12E27....

Apple just announced at WWDC 2021 that it is bringing Safari web browser extensions to its mobile devices. With iOS 15 and iPadOS 15, iPhone and iPad will have access to the same web extensions available in Safari for Mac. Web browser extensions are used to add more features to a browser, with things like ad blockers, VPNs, password managers, and much more. Previously restricted to Safari on the Mac, web browser extensions are now coming to Safari on the iPhone and iPad with iOS 15....

According to several sources, the Catholic Church Pope, Pope Francis, is meeting with Apple CEO Tim Cook today for a private discussion. The exact agenda for the meeting is unknown, but ‘Signor Timothy Donald Cook’ is booked in for 11.30 as shown in the photo. The meetup is likely related to visits the Pope has been receiving from other tech giants. Francis met Eric Schmidt, Alphabet (Google’s) chairman last week. It could just be a cordial exchange of greetings....

Apple today updated its Investor Relations webpage to announced that CFO Luca Maestri will speak at the Goldman Sachs Technology and Internet Conference tomorrow afternoon. Maestri is expected to speak around 1:20PT/4:20ET and there will be a live audio stream of the speech. Tim Cook has attended the Technology and Internet Conference in the past, which takes place every year and is put on by Goldman Sachs. Maestri’s appearance at the conference comes following Apple’s record earnings report for Q1 2017....

After earlier reports claiming that Apple was planning to open a new office of sorts in Hyderabad, India, today the company has confirmed to local publications that it will indeed expand in the area with a new development office planned for later this year. Apple’s statement via a report from The Economic Times is below: The project itself will see Apple invest around $25 million and, according to the report from The Economic Times, employ around 4,500 people during construction....

The company is expected to unveil its new iPhones — or at least the 4.7-inch version, probably an iWatch, rollout of iOS and Mac OS X Yosemite among other things at the event. The venue choice is interesting. The company usually holds its event at the Yerba Buena Center in San Francisco or its campus, but this time it has picked Flint Center — a place where its corporate headquarters are located....