Former NBA star Shaquille O'Neal reflects fondly on a time when he used to pester former Apple CEO Steve Jobs to allow him an early look at the iPhone. As one of the most famous names in sporting history, Shaq was accustomed to companies falling over each other to have him endorse and use their products for promotional purposes, but despite calling Jobs every other day, the late, great Apple co-founder refused to budge. In a rather heartwarming tale of conversation between two legends in their own right, Jobs had to contend with an almost daily barrage of "Stevey baby, it's Shaqy, can I get one of those iPhones?"
Sometimes a story comes along that requires more than a few deep breaths before being written. This one needed some deep breaths, some coffee and some strong words. But before we launch into the absolute stupidity of the whole thing, let's get into the nuts and bolts of the story first.
In what is fast becoming something of a habit, Apple SVP Phil Schiller has launched another attack on the biggest competitor to its own iOS in Google's Android smartphone operating system.
The claims that Apple is finally looking to bring an "iWatch" device to market seem to have gained some traction over the past couple of months. For years, fans have suggested the fruit company would bring some kind of wearable device to the mass market, and having seen the fanfare surrounding the Pebble Smartwatch, it seems as though Apple may be ready to silence the speculation and come through with a new product. Concepts of the iWatch have been aplenty, particularly of late, and this latest one courtesy of MacUser magazine is one of the best we've seen yet.
Since releasing iOS 6.1, Apple has slowly but surely been working on improvements. iOS 6.1.1 beta was seeded shortly after iOS 6.1 had reached the public domain, but because iOS 6.1.1 and 6.1.2 had to be hurriedly released to the public to see to a number of bugs and security flaws, the next beta was renamed iOS 6.1.3 beta 2, in an attempt to restore some kind of order. Today, rather than releasing iOS 6.1.3 beta 3, the Cupertino company has instead pushed out the update to Maps for those boasting an iOS device - the same updates first seen in those earlier betas.
We've been using and adoring the iPhone for six years now, and in that time, we've seen Apple iterate the device through a number of aesthetic designs to get to where it is today. It's naive of us to assume that when Steve Jobs and his company first decided to get serious about the iPhone, we believed that the design of the original device was the only one that they considered. During the last six years, we've seen a number of iPhone prototypes popping up all over the web after having been leaked through various sources, but have we ever stopped to consider what the original iPhone looked like?
The success of print publications on the iPad and other tablets has been a mixed bag: while some have succeeded enormously, others have slipped into irrelevance shortly after launch. New York Magazine is the latest publication launching a digital subscription service for the iPad.
We're living in a digital world these days, and more and more of our music and video is being consumed via online methods. Apple's iTunes is one of the forerunners when it comes to offering music, movies and indeed TV shows to customers all over the globe. Even today though, there are some people who don't want to buy their content online and would rather pick up CDs, DVDs and Blu-rays instead.
As always tends to be the case a few months prior to a purported iPhone launch, the rumor mill has been awash with speculation that Apple could follow in the footsteps of Nokia et al and bring wireless charging to its prized smartphone this year. A report surfacing from the famously hit-and-miss Digitimes suggests the Cupertino company will indeed be introducing the technology as a built-in feature to the so-called "iPhone 5S", but 9to5Mac's notion to the contrary would seem more correct.
German designer Philipp Tusch has come up with an interesting concept idea for iOS 7's weather app, which takes the look and feel of Android's offering and brings it straight to the iPhone. Not only does it look clean and crisp, but it is a vast improvement on the dull, monotonous, dated-looking native Weather app which currently graces every iPhone, iPad and iPod touch.
