Earlier this year, Apple officially discontinued Music Memos, an iPhone app that allowed musicians to quickly record audio and develop new song ideas. Now, a new startup called Tape It is stepping in to fill the void with an app… Continue Reading
The U.K. government is preparing to spend over half a million dollars to encourage the development of detection technologies for child sexual exploitation material (CSAM) that can be bolted on to end-to-end encrypted messaging platforms to scan for the illegal… Continue Reading
Ford Motor has hired Doug Field, the engineering executive who was leading Apple’s special projects team, as the automaker seeks to gain an edge in software and other advanced technology. Field, who previously was senior vice president of engineering at… Continue Reading
Microsoft today is introducing its own personalized news reading experience called Microsoft Start, available as both a website and mobile app, in addition to being integrated with other Microsoft products, including Windows 10 and 11 and its Microsoft Edge web… Continue Reading
Invites just went for Apple’s next big event, scheduled for 10AM PT/1PM ET on September 14. The invite doesn’t offer a lot in the way of what’s to come — it’s a neon logo set against a lovely sierras backdrop… Continue Reading
Apple has delayed plans to roll out its child sexual abuse (CSAM) detection technology that it chaotically announced last month, citing feedback from customers and policy groups. That feedback, if you recall, has been largely negative. The Electronic Frontier Foundation… Continue Reading
Hello friends, and welcome back to Week in Review. Last week, we dove into the truly bizarre machinations of the NFT market. This week, we’re talking about something that’s a little bit more impactful on the current state of the… Continue Reading
Our voice technologies have not been engineered to confront the messiness of the real world or the cacophony of our actual lives.
Summer is still technically in session, but a snowball is slowly developing in the world of apps, and specifically the world of in-app payments. A report in Reuters today says that the Competition Commission of India, the country’s monopoly regulator,… Continue Reading
Apple has reached a settlement with the Japanese regulator to allow developers of “reader” apps to link to their own websites for users to manage their accounts. The change goes to effect in early 2022. Apple has been facing scrutiny… Continue Reading
A stealthy startup co-founded by a former senior designer from Apple and one of its ex-senior software engineers has picked up a significant round of funding to build out its business. Humane, which has ambitions to build a new class… Continue Reading
The rumored satellite features for future iPhones are reserved for emergency uses only, Bloomberg says, after an initial analyst report sparked speculation about carrier-free calls and messaging.
The scale of the tech industry’s spending to influence the European Union’s tech policy agenda has been laid out in a report published today by Corporate Europe Observatory and LobbyControl — which found hundreds of companies, groups and business associations… Continue Reading
After a number of delays, South Korea’s National Assembly today voted to approve the passage of its “Anti-Google law.” Nicknamed after the search giant but more wide-ranging, the law will prevent Google and Apple from forcing developers to use their… Continue Reading
In a bid to expand its classical music offering, Apple today announced that it has acquired Primephonic. The Amsterdam-based service, which launched in 2014, will bring a laser focus on a music genre that’s been sorely lacking in Apple Music’s… Continue Reading
The survey asked professionals: Do you believe antitrust legislation should be used to break up Big Tech companies like Amazon and Google?
Hello friends, and welcome back to Week in Review! Last week we dove into Bezos’s Blue Origin suing NASA. This week, I’m writing about the unlikely and triumphant resurgence of the NFT market. If you’re reading this on the TechCrunch… Continue Reading
Welcome back to This Week in Apps, the weekly TechCrunch series that recaps the latest in mobile OS news, mobile applications and the overall app economy. The app industry continues to grow, with a record 218 billion downloads and $143 billion in global consumer… Continue Reading
Apple announced today it has reached a proposed settlement (embedded below) in a lawsuit filed against it by developers in the United States. The agreement, which is still pending court approval, includes a few changes, the biggest one being that… Continue Reading
Apple today is launching a new program that will allow subscription news organizations that participate in the Apple News app and meet certain requirements to lower their commission rate to 15% on qualifying in-app purchases taking place inside their apps… Continue Reading
Tech giants Apple, Google and Microsoft have pledged billions to bolster U.S. cybersecurity following a meeting with President Joe Biden at the White House on Wednesday. The meeting, which also included attendees from the financial and education sectors, was held following… Continue Reading
Can an old Terminal learn new tricks? Fig, a company out of Y Combinator’s S20 class, has raised a $2.2M seed round to prove that it can. Their goal: augment (but don’t try to replace) the command line terminal that… Continue Reading
Canalys released its quarterly U.S. PC sales today, and while the news was quite good with sales overall up 17% YoY, the growth slowed significantly from the prior quarter when sales soared to 74% pushed by the pandemic. Perhaps that… Continue Reading
Spotify today is opening access to Podcast Subscriptions to all podcast creators in the U.S., after first launching the service for testing with a smaller number of creators back in April. Through Spotify’s podcast creation tool Anchor, podcasters of all… Continue Reading
A Bahraini human rights activist’s iPhone was silently hacked earlier this year by a powerful spyware sold to nation-states, defeating new security protections that Apple designed to withstand covert compromises, say researchers at Citizen Lab. The activist, who remains in… Continue Reading
Welcome back to This Week in Apps, the weekly TechCrunch series that recaps the latest in mobile OS news, mobile applications and the overall app economy. The app industry continues to grow, with a record 218 billion downloads and $143 billion in global… Continue Reading
If you’re a founder who finds yourself in a meeting with a VC, try to remember two things — you’re the smartest person in the room, and investors are looking for a reason to say “yes.”
If Spotify is still a growth-focused company, shouldn’t it preserve its capital to invest in exclusive podcasts and the like — efforts that may grant it pricing power in the future?
Apple recently began a research study designed to collect speech data from study participants. Earlier this month, the company launched on the App Store a new iOS app called “Siri Speech Study“, which allows participants who have opted in to… Continue Reading
If you use AirPods Pro or AirPods Max, your mobile Netflix watching is about to get a bit more immersive. Yesterday, Netflix confirmed that it has begun rolling out spatial audio support on iPhone and iPad on iOS 14 after… Continue Reading