Originally published at: https://appletalk.com.au/2018/09/monday-morning-news100918/
MacRumors has an extensive roundup of everything to expect at this week’s Apple event. Besides new iPhones, we should also see Apple announce the Apple Watch Series 4, with decent chances for AirPower and the AirPods wireless charging case to also make their debut. They’ll probably be some kind of recap about all of Apple’s software updates, but I wouldn’t hold my breath for iPad Pro updates, a Mac mini refresh, a cheaper MacBook Air, or any kind of Mac news at all.
With just a few short days until the official announcement, a leak from a Chinese telco gives us the purported names of at least two devices in Apple’s iPhone lineup. The iPhone “XC” will be the lowest-cost iPhone in the range, corresponding to the 6.1-inch LCD model, while the larger 6.5-inch OLED model being called the iPhone XS Plus, leaving the regular-sized 5.8-inch OLED device to become the iPhone XS, with pricing more or less matching current iPhone pricing.
Apple has banned Alex Jones’ Infowars app from the App Store, which should be the last major platform Jones should be banned from following being booted from Facebook, YouTube, Apple podcasts, Spotify, and Twitter. Apple confirmed the ban to Buzzfeed, saying that Infowars would not be allowed to return to the App Store for violation of its App Store Review Guidelines.
Security researchers say dozens of popular iPhone apps are capturing your location data and sending it along to third parties. While certain categories of apps require your location to work properly in the first place, what they’re not telling you is that they’re secretly collecting that information and sending it to other companies without your explicit consent, with the moral of the story being to be careful about what you download from the App Store.
Similarly, John Gruber of Daring Fireball recaps the story of Adware Doctor on the Mac App Store, which silently collected your web browsing history and uploaded it to a server in China. Besides the security loophole in macOS that allowed this to happen and the obvious privacy implications that stem from it (the app was fourth top paid app), there are some questions that need answering.
In a letter to the US Trade Representative, Apple said planned import tariffs imposed on goods originating from China will negatively impact pricing of many of their products, making them more expensive across the board. In a sort of response, US President Donald Trump has encouraged Apple to start building products in the US instead of China, ahead of massive import tariffs imposed on that country. Trump’s tweet says there would be zero tax incurred as a result, and may even be tax incentives for Apple to move manufacturing to the US, even though doing so probably wouldn’t decrease the cost of goods, and may even raise prices for consumers.
Recode writes Apple is looking to big newspapers to sign up for a possible subscription service. Discussions with the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, and the Washington Post are happening, although whether anything happens will largely depend on how successful they think Apple will be at selling subscriptions, perhaps even in a bundle like they currently do for music and music publishers. The big question will be if the newspapers want to cannibalise their own subscriptions.
It should then go without saying that Apple News continues to be a big focus at Apple, with the latest hire being a former Condé Nast executive. Liz Schimel, former president of Condé Nast in China, joined Apple back in July, with her LinkedIn profile now stating her new position as “head of news business”.
Apple Music goes from strength to strength, with the release of new top charts showing the top 100 from the world and countries from all around the world. They’re updated daily, and show the most-streamed songs on Apple Music for the day, according to MacStories, who also tells us about better organisation of releases on artist-specific pages.
Macworld’s Dan Moren tells us what not to expect from this week’s Apple event. Anything Mac is probably out, as previously mentioned, and you can probably leave a cheaper HomePod off your bingo list this time around.