You may have heard already that the Federal Bureau of Investigations (FBI) is seeking help from Apple in order to crack the IPhone from, Syed Farook, one of the individuals implicated for the attacks which occurred in San Bernardino, California. Many would suggest that Apple should do all it can in its powers to hack into Farook’s phone in order to gain access to potentially harmful information which could be counter to the U.S.’s National Security. Such information could prove to be an invaluable asset to the FBI about various terrorist organizations, specifically, any communication Farook had with these organizations prior to the San Bernardino attacks. However, others believe that permitting such a course of action would allow a “backdoor” for various governmental organizations to gain common Americans’ information for any purpose the government deems necessary under the justification of the Patriot Act.
It is unclear whether the FBI intends to only use the reverse software Apple could develop to hack into Farook’s phone just for this one occasion or hold onto such a program for future use. The government does not have a clean record when it comes to spying on Americans either, which adds further validity to Apple’s current CEO, Tim Cook’s statement on setting up a dangerous precedent around privacy rights.
Privacy is an issue that more and more Americans are willing to sacrifice in order to maintain “National Security” but is there a limit to the prying? Much of invasive behaviors exhibited by various intelligence agencies points to an ever-increasing move towards Orwellian politics.
Expect to see Republican candidates bring this subject matter into the public realm and discuss their various opinions on what they believe the FBI and Apple should do.
What do you think? Is gaining access to Farook’s phone worthy of potentially sacrificing our privacy or is this another power grab for intelligence agencies to gain greater access to our private lives?
Thank you for reading and please reply with your commentary below. We are interested in hearing your opinion on this matter.
The rumors have subsided, iOS devices updated, and the new iPhone s has released. Usually, this time of year is exciting for me. But I find myself underwhelmed with Apple’s selection of new toys for me to buy. The tingly feeling of unboxing a shiny, new iPhone every year is virtually gone, replaced by apathy for, not only Apple products, but almost all consumer tech products today.
The three biggest products launching this holiday season are the iPad Pro, new Apple TV, and the biennial iPhone s.
The imminent launch of the iPad Pro was something rumored for the past couple years. It was a certainty that Apple would try to infringe on Microsoft’s Surface Pro market by releasing their own oversized tablet with a keyboard and stylus. Apparently, the iPad market isn’t squeezed dry just yet. Apple wants to get a few last drops of juice (ha ha) out of it before it’s completely overtaken by the 5.5″ and up phone market. Now, not only does Apple have a phone you can’t fit in one hand, they also have a tablet that doesn’t fit on your coffee table.
The comically large size of the iPad Pro keeps with the trend of Apple foregoing innovation and staying safe with the same product line. Whether it be a bigger iPhone, a small iPad, or more powerful innards, Apple hasn’t scratched the surface of revolution since Steve Jobs’ tragic passing. In fact, most of these “new” Apple offerings contradict Job’s philosophy on consumer hardware sizes. The original 9.7″ iPad was created that size because Jobs believed that was the perfect size for tablets. Same with the iPhone: Jobs believed the smaller 4″ phone was the perfect size for the human hand, even in a market where 4.5″ plus Android phones were selling like hot cakes. Definitely the largest slap in the face to Jobs this past September was the introduction of the egregiously priced Apple Pencil. In the original introduction of the iPhone, Jobs famously mocked styluses, telling us our fingers were the perfect tool to interact with touch screens. These were all one man’s opinions on what people want, but considering Apple’s meteoric rise after Jobs took back his CEO position, I’d say his opinions were pretty reliable ones.
With a price starting at $800 for the 32GB model, plus the heinous $150 and $100 for the Smart Keyboard and Apple Pencil respectively, I have to wonder who exactly this iPad is for.
The new Apple TV was a no brainer if you look at the past year’s media players. When Apple TV relaunched back in 2010 in its smaller, black box it was one of the only products of its type, joined by Roku and Xbox 360. Now, there are a plethora of media player devices with a plethora of apps, making the 2010 Apple TV feel underpowered by today’s standards. The new Apple TV will have its own dedicated app store, voice controls, and a unified search engine. With seemingly every tech product today acting as a Netflix player, the new Apple TV is hardly a must have, especially if you’ve been enjoying 2010’s model. But, if you’re in the market for a new media player, at $150, the new Apple TV is one of the better options.
The obligatory yearly iPhone complete with its newest features from the Apple gimmick machine released on September 25th. To its credit, iPhone 6s’ sold 13 million units during its first weekend world-wide, which is no small number, however not outselling last year’s iPhone 6 in the same amount of time. The fact that most people are on two-year contract cycles and usually don’t adopt s models as heartily as proper numerical iPhone iteration makes it obvious that the 6s was never going to outsell its older brother. I, myself, am not going in for the newest iPhone this year for the first time since the 3G. I figure I just got my iPhone 6 last November, I guess it can last me another year until the iPhone 7 release.
My brief hands on with the iPhone 6s confirms my belief that yes, its most advertised improvement is a gimmick. 3D Touch is the main interface addition to the iPhone lineage, proceeded by Force Touch on the Apple Watch and MacBook. 3D Touch makes it a little faster to get where you need to go around your iPhone, but only stock apps and a couple third parties like Instagram take advantage of the feature. For example, when you hold down the Phone application, certain selections pop up on your home screen like Favorites and specific contacts. I couldn’t help but feel that remembering this is a feature and using it as it’s meant to be used would take longer than simply opening the app and selecting Favorites. Of course, if I actually lived with 3D Touch, much like Touch ID, I’d eventually get used to it and couldn’t imagine a phone without it. And that’s good. Touch ID, while gimmicky now, does project well for future phones and applications. I’m sure all other companies will soon follow suit with all their Android-powered phones, using 3D Touch in their own way. If Apple isn’t revolutionizing on a large-scale with new hardware launches, at least they can make your boring old devices feel a little bit newer.
Apple won’t be introducing anything that changes our lives in the near future. They don’t need to. We have to remember why they revolutionized in the past and why they will again: money. Apple is the most profitable company in the world. For as much shit as people give them for standing pat on their hardware, fact is that everything they sell just works. Their phones are the best in the world, their tablets are the best in the world and their smart watches are some of the best in the world. Apple is never first, but they are the best. I guess the best is boring.
Apple Music launches this Tuesday, June 30th, bringing its entire catalogue of music to iOS and Android users for $9.99 a month. Standing on the shoulders of companies like Spotify and Beats Music, Apple plans to re-revolutionize the music industry through their new streaming service.
Of course Apple Music won’t do for the industry what iTunes did back in 2001. iTunes turned buying albums into buying songs, making things like mix CDs obsolete and widening the fame door or thousands of indie bands. However, Apple Music will help usher in the next era of consuming music.
Streaming music isn’t something Apple invented, the company actually pretty late to the party in tech years, but it is something Apple will perfect. When Apple Music launches on Tuesday, it will immediately become the most popular service of its type, defining its category.
Music professionals from around the world are working with Apple to make sure Apple Music is the only streaming app anybody will ever use. Industry superstars like Drake and Jimmy Iovine. Included in Apple Music is a live, 24-hour radio station called Beats 1 curated by famous DJs from Los Angeles, London, and New York. Unlike internet radio, Beats 1 will have some personality to it, being attended to by live people the moment you’re listening to it. Beyond music, Beats 1 will offer exclusive interviews and industry news to keep listeners in the music loop.
image credit: theverge.com
One aspect of Apple Music that is destined to flop is the resurrection of iTunes’ social media service Ping, rebranded as Apple Music Connect. Here listeners can share their favorite songs and albums off of their favorite artists’ pages. Each artist will have their own social media page where they can post whatever music-related materials they’d like from pictures to videos to songs. The feature is designed to help listeners feel more “connected” to the artists they listen to, but I can’t see this gaining much traction. My prediction is that artists will play with their pages initially, seeing as a pretty cool fad, but eventually it’ll fall to the wayside, forgotten bout in their busy lives. It’s faster and more popular to simply post pictures and videos to already established social media sites like Twitter and Facebook.
Personally, I don’t know much about music, even less about music I like. Whenever someone asks me what my favorite music is, I feel embarrassed to either not give them an answer or to tell them “whatever’s on the radio.” I will be subscribing to Apple Music in the hopes that its “music discovery” initiative can help me find a path of music I can travel down.
This week Apple rolled out its newest iOS update bringing its usual list of incremental improvements and bug fixes as we’ve come to expect between year to year new iOS launches. 8.3 is special, though. Apple has added a feature that proponents of it have long-awaited for- racially diverse emoji.
The update included over 300 new emoji characters to choose from with every shade of color a human being can be, from dark to light dark to barely brown to yellow. Also included in the Apple’s affirmative action update was groups of people with all manners of familial variety- two men and a little girl, two women and a little boy, two men and a little boy, two women and a little girl and so on and so forth. It seems that if there is a different type of people in the world, aside from the traditional nuclear family, Apple has an emoji to accommodate them. Funny part is, if users with the update send the new emoji to users who have not updated their phones yet, the emoji will appear as alien icons.
I really have no opinions about the new emoji colors, I just think they’re funny to look at. All of the former white face people can now be viewed as black and brown, which to me looks racist in a minstrel show sort of way. If I ever use emoji, I usually just use the yellow smiley faces to express myself. I like the new UI flow of the emoji space, all emoji just sort of flow together instead of tapping through each section. The only thing I dislike about the new set is the lack of different colored poo emoji. Poo can be all different colors and I find it offensive that Apple thinks all poos look the same.
On Monday, Apple held it’s “Spring Forward” media event in San Fransisco to give updates on Apple TV, Apple Pay, MacBook, and the highly rumored about Apple Watch. The Watch will be available for pre-order on April 10 with a April 24th release date. Price tiers range from a steep $349 for the base model Sport to a staggering $17,000 for the most expensive Apple Watch Edition. The bands follow suit with prices ranging from $49 to $449! For a f****** watch band! The watch comes in three makes: aluminum body for the Sport, stainless steel for the Watch, and gold for the Edition.
As you may have seen from a few earlier posts, I’m deep into the Apple lifestyle. I’m a clear example of someone who’s been drinking the “Cult of Apple’s” Kool-Aid for years and have literally bought into everything they’re selling. Back in September when they first unveiled Apple Watch, my excitement was tempered. I was ecstatic that Apple was finally entering the smart watch category, but I wasn’t sold on the aesthetics of the device. Over the past few months, I’ve read just about everything about Apple Watch, watching videos on it, and trying to make it, in my mind, more appealing, which I accomplished. Before the event, I was poised to drop $350 or a little more on an Apple Watch just based on the fact that it was a new Apple product and it was shiny (I know. Like I said, I’ve been taking a few too many gulps of Apple’s Kool-Aid). Now that it’s over, I’m questioning my commitment to Apple and by extension my entire existence.
I’ve been able to justify the price on almost every Apple product. I bought my first iPhone for $200, a good amount of money, but worth it because of all the functionality a smart phone has. I paid $400 for my iPad mini, a bit more money, definitely a steep investment for me at the time, but for all the convenience a tablet brings and the amount of use I’ve gotten out of it has confirmed my decision to purchase many times over. My MacBook Pro, same thing: a lot of money at almost $1200, but I needed a laptop for school and a computer is an investment that’s still paying off to this day. I’ve been happy with all my previous Apple purchases to this point. But now I look at Apple Watch and what it does and doesn’t do. The functionality it impressive, being able to check emails, make calls, and monitor your home all from your wrist could be useful, but I can’t justify spending a bare minimum of $350 just for the convenience of leaving my phone in my pocket. This product, to me, has little practical application in read life like iPhone and iPad does. It’s main reason for being is to be fashion statement, made annoyingly clear by the $10,000 base model Edition that Tim Cook awkwardly announced on stage. Over the past couple years, Apple has made its most popular products (iPhone, iPad, iPod) accessible to the public by having tiers catering to everyone’s financial situation. While they could change the price points in the future, a la iPhone from 2007 to 2008, Apple should have gone with the affordability route right from the starting point. I want to buy innovative Apple products that I enjoy using. I want to buy a smart watch from Apple. But the message they sent today was two steps backwards, putting people back in the mindset that Apple products are expensive and only for the elite. I’m not going to buy a $400 smart watch and even if I do, I’m certainly not going to spend $249 on a god damn wrist strap for it. I sincerely hope this product crashes and burns because Apple has had a history of learning from its mistakes and coming back with a better product. Early adopters be warned: don’t but this product.
Television as we’ve known it for the past 60 plus years is coming to an end. The days of sitting in your living room, clicking the “power” button on the remote control, and taking in whatever shows are currently airing on your favorite networks will soon be coming to an end. Televisions have become little more than monitors these days with so many different devices hooked up that provide much better content than anything a cable company can provide. Apple is currently in talks with content producers to create a new web-based TV service that would allow users to subscribe to programs that they want to enjoy, rather than paying for hundreds of useless channels. For years Apple has been rumored to be working on some sort of television-related device or service, but all reports have not come to fruition.
We’re heading towards an Internet-run media society pretty quickly. More and more people, new home/ apartment owners especially, are turning away from traditional television cable and looking for other ways to fill their media needs. At this point in my young life, I find myself filling my free time with YouTube content above anything else. I just don’t have time for the slow pace of cable. When I have time to myself, I like to watch what I want to watch, not what my cable provider has on for me at that time. With the Internet chock-full of shows and short videos that speak to me, why would I waste time watching something “just because it’s on”? When I do turn on my TV it’s usually for a sports game or some background noise while I’m paying more attention to something else I’m doing. YouTube, HBO Go, Netflix, and Hulu Plus offer an all around better experience than archaic cable providers cannot duplicate or match and at a cheaper price.
It’ll be interesting to see what Apple does with its [rumored] service. Hopefully Apple can take what it did to the music industry with iTunes and translate that into TV content. I’m looking forward to a future void of soap operas and Jerry Springer cluttering my mid-day relaxation.
Wow. Microsoft just announced their latest foray into the “face computing” technology market and it’s a step above notable entries Facebook’s Oculus Rift or Sony’s Project Morpheus. HoloLens was described by Microsoft’s presenter as the most advanced holographic computer the world has ever seen. HoloLens aims to change computing as we know it. It’s the first fully untethered holographic computer, something that you can wear on your head and take with you everywhere. Microsoft says HoloLens can process terabytes of data through its many censors on the unit all in real time. It takes augmented reality a step father, by allowing the user to interact with 3D objects HoloLens projects. Essentially, anything can be a canvas to create.
image credit: Wired.com
Impressions from reviewers have been generally good. The press conference saw a user of the HoloLens putting together a quadcopter in augmented reality space. She used various tools from a virtual toolbox, selecting each my tapping her finger on them much like she would have a mouse and cursor. The virtual model was then rendered in reality using a 3D printer. While a bit rough around the edges, this demo showed the potential applications and usefulness of this device.
I apologize if it sounds like I’m trying to promote the product. In reality, I never interact with anything Microsoft branded other than my Xbox, as I’m sure is the case with many other people. I’m deeply ingrained in my Apple-centric lifestyle, but I need to give Windows props where it’s due. While the device is larger than the failed Google Glass, I believe HoloLens will succeed because it’s fully aware that it is a big hunk of computer on your face.
In their ever expanding goal to rule the planet, Google has purchased drone-maker Titan Aerospace with plans to bring Internet access to parts of the world with out it. This is their second project aimed at ruling the sky, the other being “Project Loon,” a plan that will use helium balloons to bring connectivity to remote places.
I’m no conspiracy theorist; I believe a better world starts with better Internet access for everyone. But in recent years, drones have been closely associated with two things in the mindset of the American public: privacy breeches and military strikes, both of which are bad.
It’s a sad fact that people today are skeptical of anything that could be beneficial to them, like a constant “too good to be true” mentality. Maybe the drones and balloons will do what Google say they’re going to do. But since I cater to a mostly American audience, I’m going with the former theme.
Google, or as I like to refer to them, Skynet, is systematically working to destroy humanity’s privacy and dictate how people should live their lives by trying to seduce them with their “open source,”net neutral facade. They already own the Internet, creating utopian search bubbles for each individual who surfs the web. They own global geographical information, having worldwide access to everyone’s back yard. Now, with their new drones, they could conceivably do two things: track every individual’s movement and dictate everyone’s Internet access.
Google makes money by putting relevant advertisements in from of the right users. When individuals use Google, they are adding to their own online history book of sorts. If one particular thing or topic is searched more often than another, Google notices. Through one of its many algorithms, it can put together sites that certain individuals will likely click on based on their search history. The next step in advertisement for Google is likely taking the same algorithm and applying it to real life travels. Drones from Titan Aerospace can stay in the air for up to five years without needing to land. In that time, Google’s new drones could perceivable travel around the world a couple times keeping tabs on people though their smart phone’s internet connections and other devices people use on a daily basis.
Net neutrality isn’t a huge issue yet, but as the Internet grows older, we’ll see it become a bigger one. Simply put, companies want to control the flow of information on the Internet. Internet providers today such as Comcast and Verizon are already making a push to block some sites and promote others for their users. Google and other such online companies want to quell this greedy censorship, right now. Google has always been about a free an open Internet policy with all their products. Now, some believe Google will be the perfect company to provide Internet to the masses because of their web philosophies. What they don’t consider is what would happen if Google is given complete control over everything Internet related. Conceivably, such a powerful entity, one that already controls what information users find on the web, could dictate everything put on the information superhighway. The lines between reality and cyber space are blurring everyday. Now is Google’s chance to take control of more than just the Internet.
For right now, Google is a laid back company who wants nothing more than for people to live free and search without charge. But could this simply be the receding water before the massive title wave? I’m not sure, but remember Think Different.
You may have heard already that the Federal Bureau of Investigations (FBI) is seeking help from Apple in order to crack the IPhone from, Syed Farook, one of the individuals implicated for the attacks which occurred in San Bernardino, California. Many would suggest that Apple should do all it can in its powers to hack into Farook’s phone in order to gain access to potentially harmful information which could be counter to the U.S.’s National Security. Such information could prove to be an invaluable asset to the FBI about various terrorist organizations, specifically, any communication Farook had with these organizations prior to the San Bernardino attacks. However, others believe that permitting such a course of action would allow a “backdoor” for various governmental organizations to gain common Americans’ information for any purpose the government deems necessary under the justification of the Patriot Act.
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The Trivial Matters 