TMO Link Archives - Page 2 of 121 - The Mac Observer

Plex Apple TV App Offers Customizable UI

Jeff Butts · August 20, 2021

One of the coolest thigs about Plex is that it works on so many different platforms and devices. You can run the Plex app on your iPhone, iPad, Mac, Raspberry Pi, or almost anything else. The app is very helpful in managing your media library and watching your favorite content. With the latest version of the Plex Apple TV app, you’ve got new options for how your library looks and feels. You can customize the app and home background, what artwork should be displayed, and how much of a title’s metadata shows up.

[O]ur challenge is that since Plex is used by so many different types of users (a great problem to have!), each one of you has different habits and desires and styles as well as a vast variety of TVs with different resolutions and brightness and contrast ratios.

Speed Testing iOS 15 Beta 6 and iOS 14.7.1

Jeff Butts · August 19, 2021

The latest beta of iOS 15 is available now for both developers and the public. The team over at Geeky Gadgets have put the newest build through its paces on a number of devices, both new and older. They’ve also compared boot-up times and app speeds to iOS 14.7.1 on the same devices. The results of speed testing iOS 15 Beta 6 and iOS 14.7.1 seem a bit surprising.

In the speed test with the iPhone XR the device running the new iOS 15 beta 6 was the first handset to boot up. There were no major speed improvements in the apps.

In the final speed test with the iPhone 11 the device running the iOS 14.7.1 softwarewas the first to boot up, there are no noticeable speed improvements in the apps.

More Bitcoin-Linked Visa Cards Than We Thought

Jeff Butts · August 18, 2021

On Apple Context Machine, Bryan Chaffin and I briefly discussed credit and debit cards that are linked to cryptocurrency. It turns out, there are actually 54 such cards already, just in the Visa catalog.

These projects have gained traction — crypto-linked Visa debit cards facilitated over $1 billion worth of transactions across Visa’s 70 million merchants worldwide in the first half of 2021 alone. $1 billion is only a small fraction of the trillion-dollar payments industry, however retail interest in cryptocurrencies is picking up, suggesting the market has room to grow, especially with younger generations.

Apple Music and Kanye West to Hold Third 'Donda' Listening Party

Jeff Butts · August 18, 2021

Kanye West fans have been clamoring for the artist to finally release his upcoming album, Donda. Unfortunately, the release date keeps changing. Maybe the album will drop next week, during or after the just-announced third listening party on Apple Music. The event is slated for Thursday, August 26 at 10pm EDT, from Soldier Field in Chicago.

While West has recorded and teased or even announced release dates for multiple unreleased albums over the years, “Donda” has had the most public gestation of them all — and of any album by a major artist in history. Some have speculated that he is setting up a release-date battle with Drake — who has said he’s finally finished his long-awaited “Certified Lover Boy” album — similar to his release-date face-off with 50 Cent in 2007.

Apple Pay Support Comes to Qatar

Jeff Butts · August 17, 2021

Believe it or not, some countries still don’t have Apple Pay support. We can now count Qatar as one of the countries that does offer support for Cupertino’s digital wallet, after a recent announcement by Qatar bank QNB.

QNB is one of the largest financial institutions in the region and operates a number of subsidiaries in 31 countries, including many neighboring states. While the company announced Apple Pay availability for all customers, it appears the service is currently limited to people living in Qatar.

“We are proud for taking the initiative of bringing Apple Pay to the Qatari market. QNB has a reputation of providing its customers with state-of-the-art technologies,” said Heba Al-Tamimi, general manager at QNB Group’s Retail Banking arm.

Apple Allegedly Shutting Down Surveys by Employees on Pay Equity

Charlotte Henry · August 10, 2021

Apple has allegedly shut down a number of surveys regarding pay equity started by employees. Lawyers told The Verge this could be illegal.

“Apple cannot bar its employees from discussing pay equity as it relates to protected classes,” says Vincent P. White, a labor lawyer with White, Hilferty & Albanese. “If they were, they could tell people not to talk about pronouns. The logical outgrowth of that doesn’t even track. I view their effort to shut this down as an act of retaliation.” The first known survey began in the spring and asked people to volunteer salary information in addition to how they identify in terms of race, ethnicity, gender, and disability. After about 100 responses, Apple’s people team — the company’s name for what is commonly called human resources — asked employees to take the survey down, saying the demographic questions constituted personally identifying information, or PII. Last week, employees tried to start another pay equity survey but were again told to take it down because it included a question on gender. When they created a new survey without the gender question, the Apple people team allegedly said it had to be shut down because it was hosted on the company’s corporate Box account.

Users Not Excited by iOS 15, iPadOS 15 Features

Charlotte Henry · June 22, 2021

Users appear to be somewhat underwhelmed with the iOS 15 and iPadOS 15 features announced at WWDC 2021. The results of a survey by SellCell, reported by MacRumors, revealed that nearly half were not excited.

Over 50 percent of all of the survey’s respondents said that the ‌iOS 15‌ and ‌iPadOS 15‌ updates are only “slightly” or “not at all” exciting. 28.1 percent rated the updates “somewhat” exciting, but as few as 19.3 percent are “extremely” or “very” excited about them. Within ‌iOS 15‌ and ‌iPadOS 15‌, 23 percent of users said that the most exciting upgrade is ID cards in the Wallet app, 17.3 percent are most excited about enhanced Spotlight search, and 14.2 percent are most excited about new Find My features.

Might Apple buy a Hollywood Studio? Analysts Think it Should

Charlotte Henry · June 2, 2021

The lack of content on Apple TV+ compared to its rivals is a regular source of discussion and criticism against the service. According to The Hollywood Reporter, some analysts want it to fill this gap by following Amazon in purchasing a major Hollywood studio.

CEO Tim Cook has described streamer Apple TV+’s ambition “to be one of the most desired platforms for storytellers,” singling out comedy series Ted Lasso, drama The Morning Show and the miniseries Defending Jacob as its titles with “significant buzz.” But the streamer is seen by some Wall Street analysts as lacking multiple, regular breakout hits, which has led some to argue for a studio acquisition. Morgan Stanley research released in April found only 8 percent of U.S. respondents said they use Apple TV+, a figure that lags far below Netflix (58 percent), Amazon Prime (45 percent) and Disney+ (31 percent).

Finnish Mental Health Startup Vastaamo Leaked Patient Data

Andrew Orr · May 7, 2021

Vastaamo ran the largest network of private mental-health providers in Finland. William Ralston tells the story on WIRED, and how hackers used the data to threaten patients.

A security flaw in the company’s IT systems had exposed its entire patient database to the open internet—not just email addresses and social security numbers, but the actual written notes that therapists had taken. A group of hackers, or one masquerading as many, had gotten hold of the data.

What an incompetent company. No anonymization of patient records, no encryption of data. In other words, unfortunately common. Two developers hired at Vastaamo were even arrested in a previous security breach.

IBM Creates World-First 2nm Computer Chip

Andrew Orr · May 6, 2021

IBM has created a 2-nanometer chip using a prototype manufacturing process. It’s likely we won’t see these chips in the market until late 2024, however.

Chip makers routinely talk about their 10nm, 7nm, and 5nm nodes, in their efforts to pack more and more transistors on a piece of silicon. However, the nanometer nomenclature is often just marketing speak […] based on the company’s slides, there actually isn’t a component on the chip at a 2nm size. Instead, the announcement is more about a generational improvement from IBM’s earlier 5nm process, which debuted in 2017.

“The chips must be insulated from human thought, as an errant memory of grandma from 1970 can cause quantum effects in the chip.“

Poll Shows 63% of Americans Don’t Trust Their ISPs

Andrew Orr · May 5, 2021

Mozilla is releasing results from a survey conducted with YouGov, showing that 63% of them don’t trust their ISPs (n=1305).

63 percent of consumers do not trust ISPs to look out for their best interests, and 72 percent want control of what they see online without meddling or interference from ISPs, according to the findings released today from a new survey we conducted with YouGov.

App ‘Winnie’ Helps Connect Parents to Available Childcare Providers

Andrew Orr · May 4, 2021

On Tuesday Apple shared the story of Winnie, an app that helps connect parents to childcare providers with openings.

Winnie is the brainchild of Chief Executive Officer Sara Mauskopf, 36, and Chief Product Officer Anne Halsall, 37, who met while working at the same startup six years ago. Both were mothers with young children, and knew how challenging it could be to find quality childcare.

New Cloud Browser ‘Mighty’ to Cost $30 per Month

Andrew Orr · April 30, 2021

A startup called Mighty is building a cloud-based web browser that it claims will reduce loads on battery, CPU usage, and RAM. You can find the company’s blog post here, and a link to coverage from The Verge below.

Mighty claims it’ll eliminate distracting cookies and ads, automatically notify you about Zoom meetings, quick search Google Docs and presumably other integrations to come. Mighty also says it encrypts your data and keystrokes, among other security promises.

I think the concept of a cloud-based browser is interesting. But I prefer free Safari over paying a US$30/month fee.

VMware Fusion Won’t Run x86 VMs on M1 Macs

Andrew Orr · April 30, 2021

VMware announced on its blog Tuesday that it won’t support installing or running x86 VMs on M1 Macs.

We will be delivering a Tech Preview of VMware Fusion for macOS on Apple silicon this year. We don’t plan to support installing or running x86 VMs on Macs with Apple silicon. macOS VMs are not in scope in the short term. There are challenges there which will require Apple to work with us to resolve.

Here’s When The FCC Emergency Broadband Benefit Program Starts

Andrew Orr · April 29, 2021

FCC Acting Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel announced the start date of the Emergency Broadband Benefit Program. It starts on May 12 for U.S. residents with low incomes or those who lost income during the pandemic. You can sign up for the program here. Benefits include:

Up to a $50/month discount on your broadband service and associated equipment rentals; Up to a $75/month discount if your household is on qualifying Tribal lands; A one-time discount of up to $100 for a laptop, tablet, or desktop computer (with a co-payment of more than $10 but less than $50)

IRS Asks For Help to Hack Hardware Cryptocurrency Wallets

Andrew Orr · April 29, 2021

The IRS is asking for help to hack into hardware cryptocurrency wallets that could be useful in criminal investigations.

The decentralization and anonymity provided by cryptocurrencies has fostered an environment for the storage and exchange of something of value, outside of the traditional purview of law enforcement and regulatory organizations. There is a portion of this cryptographic puzzle that continues to elude organizations—millions, perhaps even billions of dollars, exist within cryptowallets.

Experian’s API Exposed Credit Scores for Anyone to Discover

Andrew Orr · April 29, 2021

Credit bureau Experian recently fixed a flaw in its API that let anyone find a credit score of a person by typing in their name and mailing address.

Demirkapi declined to share with Experian the name of the lender or the website where the API was exposed. He refused because he said he suspects there may be hundreds or even thousands of companies using the same API, and that many of those lenders could be similarly leaking access to Experian’s consumer data.

Password Manager Dashlane Introduces ‘Essentials’ Plan for $4

Andrew Orr · April 28, 2021

On Wednesday, password manager Dashlane introduced an affordable subscription plan for US$3.99/month.

Following its relaunch in beta, Dashlane’s one-of-a-kind Password Changer will also be available within the Essentials plan. Password Changer seamlessly logs users into compatible websites, generates strong, unique passwords, then changes the passwords for those sites on the user’s behalf in one-click. Secure Notes, a Dashlane feature for storing sensitive, plain-text information like private keys to software or wifi passwords, rounds out the Essential plan’s offerings.

Photo Ninja by DoNotPay Can Confuse Facial Recognition Algorithms

Andrew Orr · April 28, 2021

DoNotPay can perform a variety of tasks for you, like cancelling subscriptions, appealing parking tickets, and dealing with copyright protection. It has a new service called Photo Ninja that can help block facial recognition.

Photo Ninja uses a novel series of steganography, detection perturbation, visible overlay, and several other AI-based enhancement processes to shield your images from reverse image searches without compromising the look of your photo.

Opera Browser Adds Support for Crypto NFT Addresses

Andrew Orr · April 28, 2021

Opera has partnered with blockchain domain name provider Unstoppable Domains to support decentralized .crypto NFT addresses.

Launched in 2018, Unstoppable Domains provides .crypto and other top-level domain names to users with no renewal fees. When users claim a domain, it is minted as an NFT on the Ethereum blockchain, granting the user full ownership and control. Along with accessing the decentralized web through Opera, .crypto domain names replace complex wallet addresses for payments across 40+ cryptocurrency wallets and exchanges.

Cryptee Photos Adds Tagging for Better Organization

Andrew Orr · April 27, 2021

Cryptee is an online-only end-to-end encrypted storage platform, and recently added tagging to its Photos component.

First things first. All your tags and photos are encrypted and private. So we can’t see them. Now keep that in mind, and be prepared to be mind blown.

It’s 2021. We thought tagging should be as easy as typing out the tags in natural language. So we thought it would be amazing if you could tag your photos in Cryptee Photos the same way you tag your photos on Instagram or Twitter with hashtags.

For DEAR Month, Libby Gets Updates for Smart Tags and More

Andrew Orr · April 27, 2021

Reading books is important and that’s why I like to share the latest news from OverDrive’s Libby app. Just in time for “Drop Everything and Read” month, Libby 9.0 gets smart tags, notification, and design updates.

With Libby 9.0, you’ll be able to get push or email notifications about new issues of your favorite magazines. You’ll also be able to sync your wish list from the OverDrive app to Libby, one of our most frequently requested features.

You’ll also see several improvements in the overall visual design that will improve searching and browsing for ebooks, audiobooks, and magazines.

Spotify’s Podcast Subscriptions Leave 100% Fees for Creators

Andrew Orr · April 23, 2021

Next week, Spotify is launching a podcast subscription service for its creators and it will let them keep 100% of the revenue.

Spotify has said it was going to test paid subscriptions for podcasters to allow them to offer exclusive content to subscribers, officially announcing that during its February “Stream On” event. But it has not yet provided details on how that will work.

I’m sure Spotify will keep drumming the “no tax” part in contrast to Apple’s 30% fee from Apple Podcast Subscriptions. But in the end it doesn’t matter because the most important people win: The content creators.