Facebook is making it easier to never leave its app. The company’s partnership with Spotify is coming to fruition today in the form of a miniplayer for the News Feed that’ll allow people to play music and podcasts from within Facebook. Audio content can be shared from Spotify to Facebook, and once on Facebook, listeners can press play and listen to it even as they scroll around. It’ll be available on both iOS and Android and in 27 markets, including the US, at first. More will follow in the coming months. Users will also see the miniplayer on shared videos that have music in the background. A play button will surface after the video finishes where people can play the song.
Facebook listeners will hear the shared track, and once it ends, Spotify will continue to play music on shuffle, as it usually does. Free users will hear ads, too. The ads will come directly from Spotify, but Facebook will receive “limited data” about users trying the integration, including subscription type and metrics to assess the miniplayer’s performance. It won’t use this information to target ads, Spotify says, and listeners will have to consent to the data sharing when they first start the player.
This partnership comes along with a larger audio push from Facebook. The company announced multiple new features last week, including its Clubhouse competitor Live Audio Rooms as well as shareable, short sound clips called Soundbites. Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg also emphasized an interest in podcasts, and this partnership is one way people will be able to listen to shows without sacrificing any Facebook time.
Last week Apple announced its new podcast subscription service, and Spotify could be about to follow suit. In fact, according to sources speaking to The Wall Street Journal, it could launch as soon as this week.
The service will allegedly allow those creating the podcasts to set their own prices, but unlike Apple, Spotify won’t charge a fee or take a cut of each membership.
Crucially, payment could also work a bit differently to Apple’s service. Sign up through Spotify’s iOS app, and you will be re-routed to a website to complete the transaction, instead of Apple’s App Store, as is customary. This would deny Apple its usual cut of in-app purchases.
It’s likely Apple wouldn’t take kindly to this approach – when Epic Games tried the same thing with its hugely successful game Fortnite, Apple kicked it off the App Store (that legal case is due to start next week).
Spotify hasn’t confirmed the plans, but its advertising business officer Dawn Ostroff has previously said there is “room for everybody” in podcasting.
Apple announced last week that it would let podcasters charge subscribers to listen. As well as setting the price, podcasters can decide what extras (if any) you get for paying – examples include bonus content, early access, and ad-free shows. Free trials and sample episodes are also options.
Apple’s service launches next month.
Audio content like podcasts has boomed over the last year, especially during lockdown and Facebook will soon let members listen to podcasts directly through its platform, too.
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Check out 10 of the best podcasts for music lovers
(Pocket-lint) – There’s a little thing in the car world called CMP – Common Modular Platform. While you won’t see it, it’s underpinning a number of cars coming from the PSA group – Citroën, Peugeot, Vauxhall, DS Automobiles, and for those in Europe, Opel.
That’s why you’ll find a number of cars with what look like similar specifications on the road, while the bodywork is all different. Basically, it’s different flavours of the same ice cream. The ë-C4 being Citroën’s flavour of this electric car. So just how tasty is it?
Design
Sitting in the crossover segment, the Citroën ë-C4 – and the combustion C4 versions – look to offer something a little different in terms of design. The C4 has always been slightly playful – we’ve seen the Picasso and the Cactus in previous years – and here we have coupe stylings, rather than just being another hatch.
We’ll come right forward and say that we like this design. It’s fresh and it’s different, the front half of the car swirling in some of the design elements we’ve seen from Citroën recently – with coloured trims and sculpting – while the rear drops off giving you a split rear window that’s reminiscent of the C4 Coupe of yesteryear.
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This big coupe design has often been the preserve of German premium marques – Mercedes, BMW and Audi have all made SUVs with coupe styles in recent years. Adding Citroën to this list makes a lot of sense: this isn’t just another C segment hatchback and it’s all the better for it.
What’s missing is a full glass roof – there’s a sunroof on the options list (it’s £800 in the UK) – but we can’t help feeling that with a glass roof this car would be even nicer in the interior.
The move to that faster coupe style back brings with it a couple of points to note. The rear window has a horizonal split, with a trailing spoiler on the exterior and that does cut across your rearview vision slightly, although we think Citroën should have taken the glass higher up the back to give better rear vision.
That also means you don’t have the same standing height in the 380 litre boot that you might in a regular hatch design, but it’s slightly deeper – larger than the DS 3 Crossback E-Tense – and potentially more usable as a family car as a result.
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At the same time, adding that split allows Citroën to keep the e-C4’s roofline slightly higher, meaning that interior space isn’t compromised and does give for an interesting design.
While it looks great, there are some minor quality concerns. The boot lid, for example, needs a really good slam and it just feels as though it’s not quite as substantial as you’ll find elsewhere.
A comfortable interior
Citroën puts a focus on comfort and the interior is a truly comforting space. There’s reasonable space in the front, while the interior gives respectable headroom for the rear passengers.
Comfortable seats get a cloth finish, leaving the leathers aside for the sake of affordability. There are touches of leather through the cabin, but the predominance is for hard- and soft-touch plastics. That lacks the premium feel that you’ll find in the DS 3, for example, but it doesn’t look cheap and has the attraction of being easy to clean.
There are colour details – with inserted blue stripes to remind you you’re in an electric car, while the only part we find that lets the side down is the glossy black plastics on the centre console. Gloss black leads to fingerprints and dust which always seems to be visible – you’ll be forever cleaning it.
The layout of the interior is similar to the DS Automobiles equivalent – you can see that these cars are related – although Citroën has minimised many of the controls. There’s a full spread of aircon dials and buttons, but other functions controlled though the display lack direct access buttons.
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There’s a home button and a button by the electronic brake toggle for the electric stats screen – but radio, satnav and other functions all require you to punch the home button and then use the on-screen control. That means you’re often having to press a number of buttons to use these functions.
There’s also a mite more convenience than the DS layout which puts all the window controls in the centre of the car – the Citroën leaves them on the door, which we think is sensible.
The c-ë4’s interior display sits nice and high on the dash for easy visibility. And although the driver display is a little small, the head-up display (HUD) adds a touch of class.
What you really take away from it, however, is the comfort. There’s plenty of space in the front and you’ll fit adults in the rear too, with enough headroom for taller passengers.
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There’s a false floor in the boot, but we like the fact that you can drop it to gain the maximum storage space – or keep it in place to keep your charging cables out of sight.
Talking about technology
The Citroën ë-C4 is reasonably well appointed with technology, but as we hinted at above, its biggest failure is in the lack of controls.
There’s a 10-inch display in the centre of the car, mounted on the top of the dash, so most of the interaction will be via touch. There’s a slight frame to it, like a shelf along the bottom edge, which gives you somewhere to rest your hand while tapping away – which makes it more usable.
The downside is that there are only a couple of physical buttons: the home button, which takes you home; a car button, which takes you the vehicle settings (which you’re unlikely to change once you’ve setup the car the first time you drive); and an electric button, which takes you through to see some of the electric stats, but little else.
Outside of this, you can scroll through pages, like the radio stations, using the steering wheel controls, but there’s no other direct controls via other buttons. Instead, you have to use touch – and often you’ll have to press the home button and then select what you want – navigation for example. There’s not even a home button on the display, so it’s a multitude of presses no matter what you want to get done.
That sours the experience slightly and really takes away from what is otherwise a decent offering. It’s in stark contrast to the DS 3 Crossback E-Tense which has massive buttons for every area. We can’t help feeling that somewhere between the two would be the more practical system.
Regardless, Citroën covers the basics pretty well, focusing on radio, navigation and calling. There’s support for Apple CarPlay and Android Auto via the USB connections, while the top trim will also give you a Qi wireless charger for compatible devices.
The navigation, visually, is ok, but the search isn’t very good. It’s just too hard to get to the essentials – like car charging stations. This should be front and centre on the satnav app, but buried in points of interest, somewhere after local helipads and other nonsense you’re never going to need to navigate to.
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The Citroën ë-C4 offers essentially the same information as the DS 3 E-Tense under its electric button – that’s a flow diagram showing the battery power driving the wheels, or a bar chart showing average consumption across recent trips. At least Citroën is using a scale that works, so you can see if you’re driving more or less efficiently than previously – but still, compared to the data you’d get from the Kia e-Niro, it just feels like it should be trying harder.
The ë-C4’s driver display doesn’t offer customisation and is on the small side, but we’re not hugely worried about that – it does the job well enough in cahoots with the HUD.
While we’re also talking tech, there’s one downside to all that plastic in the door panels: it can’t really handle stronger bass from the standard speakers, so if your music gets a bit heavy, the performance isn’t that good and you’ll get some vibration back from it.
Citroën also offers a voice command system. This can get around some of the problems: you an just ask for the radio station by pushing the button on the steering wheel. However, once you’ve hooked up Android Auto and found that the same button will also support Google Assistant, you’ll likely never use the native system again.
The ë-C4 is also hiding a small surprise for tablet users, with a mount for tablets on the dashboard. Pop open the drawer and you’ll find a cover with a privacy screen in the front, which will accommodate a range of tablet sizes, but it’s mostly built around normal iPad sizes.
Once your tablet is on the cover, you’ll be able to attach it to the dash on a mount so the passenger can watch at leisure, the privacy screen ensuring that the driver isn’t distracted. It’s great because it all neatly hides away when not in use.
Overall, it feels like there are some easy improvements to be made here. The lack of direct controls and the lack of home button within the touch system just makes eveything more fiddly than it could be.
Drive, range and performance
The starting point for Citroën is comfort. The Citroën ë-C4 wafts over broken roads and speed bumps rather more majestically than many comparable models which are setup with suspension so firm it will knock your teeth out when you hit a pothole. Instead there’s a sense of tranquillity: it’s soft, quiet, comfortable – actually a nice place to be without the boneshaking adrenaline of pretending you’re a rally driver.
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The important core specs of this car will sound familiar if you’re looking at cars in this segment. As we said in the opener, there are various flavours, so the 50kWh battery and 100Kw motor (136hp) will come as no surprise.
Yes, that’s not a huge battery and this is the thing that separates the Citroën ë-C4 from the likes of the Kia e-Niro (with its 64kWh battery) and longer range, or the likes of the cheaper Mini Electric (with its 32.6kWh battery) and shorter range.
Citroën says you’ll get 217 miles range from it (that’s the WLTP measure), but we found it easy enough to average 4.6-miles-per-kW, which comes in at 230 miles. More carefree driving might see that drop to around 170 miles from an average around 3.6 miles per kW, which is what we got in typical runs to the supermarket and other suburban chores – exactly what we expect this car to be doing.
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The absolute range will of course vary based on all sorts of factors – how you drive, the conditions you’re driving in – but with support for 100kW charging, you’ll soon be back on the road.
There are three driving modes – eco, normal, sport – each changing the drive slightly as their names suggest. After playing with the faster sport mode, we settled into eco, which gives better lift-off regeneration than the normal mode so it’s closer to one-pedal driving – although you can’t bring it to a complete halt without using the brake.
In addition there’s the option of both D (drive) and B (battery) modes, the latter again making the car a little more economical. It’s slightly irksome that to engage B mode you have to press a button, but to select D you just move the drive selector. Again, it’s hard to fathom why that additional step was added.
Apple CarPlay explained: Taking iOS on the road
By Britta O’Boyle
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The steering is light, with indicators for close front obstructions and a useful reversing camera to help you get into those tight charging spaces. It’s an easy car to manoeuvre and the visibility and road positioning is generally very good, even with that slight rear obstruction due to the split rear window. You can get a complete 360 vision system (£350 on the options list), though, which is a nice addition.
Verdict
The Citroën ë-C4 slots nicely alongside stablemates like the Peugeot e-2008, sitting around the same price and offering similar performance. Stepping up the range means moving to something like the Kia e-Niro, which will cost you more, so the Citroën feels like it’s about the right price for what you get – although it is about £10k pricier than the cheapest combusion version.
Overall, the Citroën ë-C4 is a great electric car. It sits somewhere in the middle of practical options available out there at the moment, offers a good balance of price to performance, all wrapped into a car that above all else is majestically comfortable for driver and passengers alike.
Alternatives to consider
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Kia e-Niro
Those looking for more range will be attracted to the 64kWh e-Niro, one of the top EVs on the road, while the lower capacity e-Niro is around the same price as the Citroen, but with a smaller battery.
Read our review
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Nissan Leaf
The Nissan Leaf is one of the best EVs on the road, and certainly one of the most popular. For just a little more you can get the 62kWh version which will give you more range, although it lacks the appeal of the ë-C4’s crossover stylings.
The iPad Pro now uses M1, Apple’s homegrown processor that is also in the 21-inch iMac, 13-inch MacBook Pro, MacBook Air and Mac Mini. That’s a lot of power, but don’t expect the iPad to merge with the Mac line anytime soon.
In an interview with The Independent, Apple hardware lead John Ternus and marketing chief Greg ‘Joz’ Joswiak were steadfast that the two platforms are separate.
“There’s two conflicting stories people like to tell about the iPad and Mac,” Joswiak told The Independent. “On the one hand, people say that they are in conflict with each other. That somebody has to decide whether they want a Mac, or they want an iPad. Or people say that we’re merging them into one: that there’s really this grand conspiracy we have, to eliminate the two categories and make them one. And the reality is neither is true. We’re quite proud of the fact that we work really, really hard to create the best products in their respective category.”
Indeed, the iPad Pro is far and away better than any other Android tablet. Between the M1 and, if you splurge on a keyboard cover, the iPad Pro can easily handle many workflows with aplomb.
“We don’t think about well, we’re going to limit what this device can do because we don’t want to step on the toes of this [other] one or anything like that,” Ternus said. “We’re pushing to make the best Mac we can make; we’re pushing to make the best iPad we can make. And people choose.” He pointed out that some people have both, and that their workflow spans both devices.
But it also highlights what some consider the Mac’s biggest weakness: its lack of a touchscreen. Apple has long suggested that the Mac and macOS weren’t designed for touch, while critics have bragged about the flexibility some Windows PCs have gained from touch screen options. The iPad, however, is getting its most advanced touchscreen ever, with mini-LED technology with extreme dynamic range borrowed from the desktop Pro Display XDR.
The Mac, as of macOS Big Sur, can run some iOS and iPad OS apps. This doesn’t yet go the opposite way, and Apple can’t show the same pro apps running on both the iPad and the iMac in stage demos.
Yesterday, The Verge‘s Monica Chin wrote an op-ed entitled “Put macOS on the iPad, you cowards,” suggesting perhaps the ultimate convergence. If you’re not going to put touch on the Mac, let users run their Mac apps on the iPad. After all, they share the same processor.
But with rumors of iPadOS 15 getting a significant change, perhaps one differing it more from iOS on the iPhone, it doesn’t seem like the Mac and the iPad will become one anytime soon. Or perhaps ever.
“[W]e’re just going to keep making them [the iMac and iPad Pro] better. And we’re not going to get all caught up in, you know, theories around merging or anything like that,” Ternus said.
Apple’s new Tile-like AirTags, long-rumored and finally announced at this week’s Spring Loaded event, are now available for preorder on Apple’s website. The small circular trackers work with Apple’s “Find My” app on iOS and have a built-in speaker, accelerometer, Bluetooth LE, and a replaceable battery. They cost $29 for one set or $99 for a four-pack.
Apple says the AirTags’ battery should be good for a year. They should start delivering between May 3rd and May 5th.
The existence of AirTags first became known nearly two years ago, in copies of the iOS 13 beta. Apple accidentally confirmed the AirTags name in a support video last year that has since been deleted.
Also revealed at Spring Loaded was the new purple iPhone 12. It’s identical to the other colors of the iPhone 12; it’s very fast, has a very nice screen, 5G, and great cameras, according to our review. It’s also available for preorder today on Apple’s website and will be widely available starting April 30th.
The 2021 iMac, new Apple TV 4K, and new iPad Pro models Apple showed off at the Spring Loaded event will be available for preorder starting April 30th.
Spotify is reportedly planning to debut its in-app podcast subscription offering next week. The Wall Street Journal reports today that the company will not take a cut from podcasters who choose to sell in-app subscriptions and also will allow them to set their own pricing. Listeners on its iOS app will be routed through a website to purchase the subscriptions, thereby allowing Spotify (and podcasters) to skirt around Apple’s fees.
The news comes right after Apple Podcasts debuted its own in-app subscriptions. The company will allow podcasters to sell access to ad-free, bonus, or early-access content at whatever price they choose to set. Unlike this reported Spotify plan, however, Apple requires podcasters to pay $19.99 per year to even list their subscriptions, as well as a 30 percent cut for each subscriber’s first year. That drops to 15 percent for every following year.
It’s increasingly likely podcasters will have to manage their subscriptions across multiple platforms’ backends. Apple doesn’t allow podcasters to use RSS to distribute their exclusive content — it has to be uploaded manually through Apple’s system. Spotify has never accepted RSS, and presumably, podcasters will have to do something similar to get their subscription content on the service.
The things we still don’t know: what kind of data, if any, Spotify will provide podcasters; how long this no revenue share agreement will last; if all podcasters will be able to participate; and whether content has to be exclusive to Spotify. We’ve reached out to Spotify for comment and will update if we hear back.
Things are getting a bit recursive around here. Epic Games today announced the addition of several PC apps, including the Itch.io game platform, to the Epic Games Store.
Itch.io is mostly known for indie titles, many of which are free or cost very little, but it also hosts “game jams” that encourage developers to create something based on the parameters set by the event’s organizers.
Bringing the platform to the Epic Games Store essentially means that a marketplace primarily focused on games will feature another marketplace primarily focused on games. Hopefully someone goes further down the rabbit hole at some point.
Itch.io isn’t the only program heading to the Epic Games Store. The marketplace has also expanded to include the iHeartRadio client, the Krita painting app, the Brave browser and the KenShape model generator as part of this push outside gaming.
Epic Games said that social platforms Houseparty (which it owns) and Discord will also be added to the Epic Games Store “in the future.” These additions don’t appear to be included with the store’s public roadmap, but that might change.
The company also indicated that games and apps won’t necessarily be confined to their own silos by announcing that “Fortnite Crew Members will receive three free months of Spotify service” if they don’t yet have a Premium membership. Spotify is another Windows app that is already available on Epic.
For anyone who isn’t in the know: Fortnite Crew is a subscription that offers access to each season’s battle pass, additional V-Bucks and other benefits in exchange for $11.99 per month. Now those benefits appear to be expanding beyond Fortnite.
All of these additions make it clear that Epic Games didn’t just want to compete with the likes of Valve and GOG when it released the Epic Games Launcher. It’s actually creating its own app store that just happened to launch with a focus on games.
That might lend some additional context to the company’s dispute with Apple over app distribution on iOS and iPadOS devices.
For now, however, it seems that Epic Games isn’t content with offering an alternative game marketplace for Windows 10 users. It has a long way to go before apps become a core part of the Epic Games Store, but this is a sttart.
Snap has finally reaped the benefits of building a fully functional Android app. The company announced in its earnings report today that its user base mostly uses Android instead of iOS. That overall user base continues to grow, too. During the first quarter of 2021, Snapchat reached 280 million daily active users, an increase of 22 percent year over year.
CEO Evan Spiegel called the moment Android users overtook iOS users a “critical milestone that reflects the long-term value of the investment we made to rebuild our Android application,” in his prepared remarks today. As a reminder, Snapchat originally launched only on iOS and released its first Android app in 2012. The team later spent over a year rebuilding the app to bring it up to par with its iOS counterpart. As the Android app languished, Snapchat bled Android users. It finally released the final version of that app in 2019, making the app more functional and accessible to global users.
The company says its growth has also fueled it to invest in content abroad. Spiegel highlighted a Snap Original show the company launched in India in March, as well as its efforts to improve language support and feature localization.
Interestingly, new social apps, like Clubhouse in particular, continue to launch on iOS at first, sacrificing the potential Android market locally and abroad. If there’s anything to take away from Snap’s earnings this quarter, it’s not to sleep on Android users.
Update April 22nd, 1:12PM ET: Updated the first paragraph to reflect that Garmin wouldn’t disclose how long its introductory price of $319.99 will last.
Garmin has upgraded its premium Venu smartwatch for 2021 (via DC Rainmakerand Ars Technica). It now comes in two sizes instead of a single 43mm-sized model. The 45mm Venu 2 houses a 1.3-inch 416 x 416 OLED screen. For smaller wrists (or those who just prefer a less wrist-dominating device), the 40mm Venu 2S has a 1.1-inch 360 x 360 OLED screen. Both watches have an optional always-on mode, and they are available now for an introductory cost of $319.99, which is $80 cheaper than the original Venu when it launched in late 2019. Garmin hasn’t shared how long this price will be in effect (the product pages mention a $399.99 asking price), and the company declined to disclose how long this lower price will last.
Other than the differences in case sizes, there isn’t much else distinguishing the Venu 2 lineup visually from the predecessor. They’re slick-looking touchscreen wearables with Gorilla Glass 3-covered touchscreens that feature two buttons. One of the biggest gen-to-gen improvements is its battery performance. The original Venu could last five days in smartwatch mode, but Garmin’s bigger 45mm Venu 2 watch doubles it (and then some) to a claim of 11 days of operation if you’re just using it for getting phone notifications with light usage otherwise. If you’re using its built-in GPS and streaming music from the watch to your headphones via Bluetooth, Garmin predicts up to eight hours of battery life, up from six in the previous model.
A close-up of the larger Venu 2.Garmin
Surprisingly, the smaller 40mm Venu 2S also has better battery life than the original, with 10 days of use expected in smartwatch mode or up to seven hours in GPS mode with music. Garmin has a whole page that backs up how it makes predictions on battery life, telling you what to expect depending on the kind of activities you’re doing. Garmin is also touting faster recharging for both models, with 10 minutes of charging giving you up to one day of use in smartwatch mode or an hour of GPS usage with music. Both models can store up to 650 songs from Spotify, Amazon Music, or Deezer, up from 500 in the Venu and the 2020 Venu Sq.
The Venu 2 watches are packed with sensors, featuring a heart rate sensor, GPS (GLONASS and Galileo), a wrist-based pulse ox sensor to measure blood oxygen, a barometric altimeter for altitude, compass, gyroscope, accelerometer, thermometer, and an ambient light sensor. Each watch also features NFC for the Garmin Pay contactless payment feature. These watches work with iOS and Android, but only on Android can you respond to text messages.
In terms of new software features coming to the watches, Garmin’s Sleep Score will give you an aggregate score based on tracking your sleep stages, heart rate, stress, respiration, and your blood oxygen levels. The Venu 2 series can estimate your “Fitness Age” based on your level of activity and can guide you through high-intensity interval training (HIIT) and advanced strength training.
They work super well, and they’re one more thing keeping you on the iPhone
I was starting to get really worried that I wouldn’t find my friend.
For this first look at AirTags, I sent Vjeran Pavic off into an unfamiliar city with a single Apple AirTag and no phone, no smartwatch, or any other mode of communication. The challenge was to see if Apple’s Find My system for locating AirTags would be able to lead me to him.
Apple AirTags weren’t designed for an elaborate game of hide-and-seek. They can help you locate anything they’re attached to; most of the time you’ll be listening for their little chirps as you hunt down the keys you inexplicably left sitting on top of the fridge instead of on the hook where they belong. For that purpose they work incredibly well, right on down to a little arrow on the iPhone’s screen pointing in the direction and little haptic taps as encouragement that you’re getting warmer.
But this exercise was a very good stress test for the new $29 iPhone accessory ($99 for a four pack), because it meant that the only chance I had of tracking Vjeran down is if one of the near-billion Find My-enabled devices on the planet happened to pick up the AirTag’s Bluetooth signal and send it back to me.
After a half-hour of walking around, I finally found him. He was standing on a street corner with no foot traffic whatsoever, which meant that the intermittent signals I got detailing his location came from a couple of iPhones in cars that were driving by.
That’s impressive.
AirTags have been rumored for years but never seemed to materialize. They’re really here now and though I wouldn’t go so far as to say they’re worth the wait, I do think Apple has put together a thoughtfully designed system that goes a long way toward ensuring privacy and safety while still making it easier for you to locate your stuff.
AirTags are a very Apple-y Apple product, and that ends up being great but also just a little annoying (and, for third-party companies like Tile, troubling).
AirTags
The basics of AirTags are simple enough to understand: each one is a tiny little puck with a Bluetooth Low Energy radio and a U1 ultra-wideband (UWB) chip. You pair it with your iPhone just like you do with AirPods, holding it nearby and then tapping through a short setup process. After that, they’re available in a new “Items” tab in the Find My app.
From the app, you can set the AirTags to chirp, mark them as lost (which enables some different features), or just tap the button that lets you locate them in space. If you have an iPhone with UWB, it can locate the AirTag in physical space and point a little arrow at it when you get within four feet or so. It all works very well and is very satisfying.
From a design perspective, an AirTag is classic Apple. It’s a white and shiny silver little button, and you can have custom emoji or letters printed on the plastic. They are as cute as the buttons they resemble.
However, you’ll soon find the plastic is scuffed and the chrome on the back is scratched. Sincerely, do not expect these to stay looking pristine for long — not since the weird early days of the iPod nano has an Apple product gotten scuffed this easily.
One clever touch is that the plastic body itself serves as the speaker. It’s what vibrates to make the chirping noise. It gets plenty loud, though my old ears had a bit of a difficult time using just that sound to locate one. Also, if for whatever reason the AirTag is squeezed or compressed, that will dampen how loud it can get.
There’s also no hole on them for a lanyard loop. If you want to actually attach one to anything instead of dropping it in a pocket, you’ll need to buy an accessory. That, increasingly, also feels like a classic Apple move.
The one un-Apple part of the design is that the battery is actually user-replaceable. A little twist of the bottom reveals a standard CR2032 cell, which Apple claims should be good for a year of battery life.
The real trick — and the hidden complexity — arises when you are tracking an AirTag out in the world, when something is truly lost. Like everything in Apple’s Find My network, the AirTag’s location is end-to-end encrypted so only you can see its location. But any iOS device can send that location to you.
If somebody comes upon a lost AirTag, they can tap it via NFC to see information about it, including its serial number (which could be important if you think it’s being used to track you). If the owner has put it in “Lost Mode,” they have the option to have that information page show their phone number and a brief message so you can contact them. This NFC feature works equally well with iPhones and Android devices.
That means all it takes to locate an AirTag is for any iPhone with Bluetooth on to see it — even if that iPhone is whizzing by in a car. Apple is leveraging its huge network of devices as a competitive advantage here — along with the competitive advantage of directly offering this functionality as a system-level feature. Tile has asked Congress to look into that.
The pairing process for AirTags is just like pairing AirPods.
A Bluetooth device broadcasting anything is a potential privacy risk, so Apple is cycling each AirTag’s Bluetooth identifier “frequently.” More than that, though, Apple has also done some work to develop a system that also considers personal safety.
If the Find My network notices that an AirTag has been separated from its owner for a while and seems to be in the same place you are, it will alert you. If you’re an iPhone user, you’ll see a notification that says “AirTag Found Moving With You.”
A bunch of AirTags.
Apple says that there are options to disable these “Safety Alerts” if you are “borrowing” something. But the real purpose is clear: to protect you from somebody using an AirTag to surreptitiously track you.
When you see the alert, you can tap the notification to get a screen that will allow you to make the AirTag start beeping. The alert will also instruct you on how to disable the AirTag by removing the battery.
Finally, Apple says, “If you feel your safety is at risk, contact your local law enforcement who can work with Apple. You might need to provide the AirTag or its serial number.” Apple won’t be able to provide your location, but it could provide governments with information related to the person who registered the AirTag as theirs in the first place.
If you’re an Android user, well, virtually none of this is going to work for you. However, the AirTag does have at least one potential trick. If it’s been separated from its owner and then detects that it’s suddenly on the move, it will start beeping.
All in all, I think it’s a thoughtfully designed system, but it’s also definitely one that leverages Apple’s strengths.
An AirTag.
Really, the AirTag is the Most Apple Product I’ve seen in a while. It’s just a little more expensive than the competition. It’s beautifully designed, but its hardware still somehow fails to actually take the practical realities of our dirty, messy world into account. It’s very privacy-focused. It really only works with Apple devices. It offers features that no third-party device can really match thanks to Apple’s tight integration (or tight grip on its APIs, depending on your point of view). And since there’s no Android version of Find My, it’s another piece of the Apple ecosystem that’s going to keep you from switching.
An AirTag is a very Apple-y thing for Apple users who already live in Apple’s ecosystem. They work great — and will be great at keeping you in Apple’s world.
Apple is getting ready to announce a raft of software updates for the iPhone and iPad in June according to a new report from Bloomberg, including “the most significant update to the [iPad’s] Home Screen since first launching the product in 2010.”
The new versions of iOS and iPadOS — iOS 15 and iPadOS 15 — will be unveiled at Apple’s upcoming Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC) on June 7th, says Bloomberg. Last year’s iOS 14 update was announced at WWDC on June 22nd, before becoming available for download on September 16th in time to accompany the iPhone 12 release.
Bloomberg’s story has a host of details about what to expect from the latest versions of Apple’s mobile software, but here are the biggest points:
New notification filters based on user status. From a new menu accessible from the Lock Screen and Control Center, users will have more granular control over how notifications are displayed (do they play sounds or not, for example) based on whether they’re driving, sleeping, at work, or have turned on Do Not Disturb mode.
iPad home screen upgrade. This will reportedly include the ability to add widgets (introduced in iOS last year). Bloomberg doesn’t offer any more details, but claims this will be the most significant update to the iPad home screen since the product launched.
Quick access to privacy data. A new menu will reportedly let users see what information apps are collecting about them. Presumably this would tap the same data used by Apple for new “privacy labels” introduced to the App Store last December.
Updated iOS Lock Screen. This will include access to the above privacy menu. It’s not clear if any other changes are coming.
Social upgrades for iMessage. New features would help iMessage compete with WhatsApp “with the eventual goal of acting as more of a social network.” But Bloomberg says these are “still early in development” and might be announced later this year.
Minor updates for macOS, watchOS, and tvOS. Apple launched a big redesign for macOS last year with Big Sur, so it seems right to expect only small changes this time round.
These are the first reliable rumors we’ve heard about what to expect from iOS and iPadOS 15, though they aren’t particularly surprising. Updated notification filters and access to app data are solid additions but not splashy features. Meanwhile, giving iPadOS the same widgets available in iOS is welcome but hardly a major change. Given that the iPad Pro got upgraded with a beefy M1 processor this week, we’re still hoping that Apple will be a bit more ambitious about what its tablets can deliver in future in terms of software. Bloomberg’s report doesn’t suggest a leap forward but we’ll have to wait for WWDC to see.
Meanwhile, iOS 14.5 is set to arrive next week featuring support for Apple’s new AirTag item trackers, and the company’s new podcast features.
Apple’s new TV calibration feature, which uses the iPhone’s front-facing sensors to sense and tweak the output of the Apple TV, works with the company’s older streaming boxes, 9to5Mac reports. The new feature will arrive with tvOS 14.5, which is due to release “early next week” for the 2017 Apple TV 4K and 2015 Apple TV HD. Apple says viewers will see “much more accurate colors and improved contrast” after calibration.
The calibration feature was announced alongside the new Apple TV 4K. It works by having you hold up the front of your iPhone to your TV, so it can sense how the screen is outputting different colors. If the phone’s light sensor sees that color is being outputted inaccurately, the Apple TV can adjust its output to compensate. The process only covers the Apple TV’s content, and won’t affect the TV’s built in apps or other devices it has plugged in.
According to 9to5Mac, Apple TV HD and 4K owners can access the calibration feature via the Video and Audio section in the Settings app. As well as requiring an Apple TV updated to tvOS 14.5, the feature also requires Face ID-equipped iPhone running iOS 14.5. Both FlatPanelsHDandCNETnote that the feature doesn’t work on TVs with Dolby Vision enabled after testing it with older Apple TVs running the latest tvOS 14.5 beta build, though it’s not immediately clear why this is.
Between this and the news that Apple’s redesigned Siri Remote will also work with older Apple TVs, Apple is making it pretty easy for existing Apple TV owners to hold off on upgrading.
Get ready for Twitter to start looking a whole lot crisper — starting today, the company is letting all users tweet (and view) pictures in 4K on iOS and Android.
Twitter’s web app already supports higher-resolution images (at up to 4096 x 4096 resolution), but the mobile apps had been limited to just half that, with a maximum resolution of 2048 x 2048. The company had previously started testing the 4K image upload option for mobile users earlier this year, and it seems those tests went well, as its now rolling out the feature to all users starting today.
Time to Tweet those high res pics –– the option to upload and view 4K images on Android and iOS is now available for everyone.
To start uploading and viewing images in 4K, update your high-quality image preferences in “Data usage” settings. https://t.co/XDnWOji3nx
— Twitter Support (@TwitterSupport) April 21, 2021
In order to enable the new feature, users will have to go to the “data usage” section of the settings menu in the Twitter app and enable both “high-quality images” (for viewing 4K images) and “high-quality image uploads” (for tweeting them). Users can select whether they’d like the higher-resolution images to be enabled for both cellular and Wi-Fi, just Wi-Fi, or disabled entirely — similar options to how Twitter handles higher resolution or auto-playing video.
Apple’s AirTags have one feature not mentioned during the announcement yesterday: they’ll work with Android to a limited extent. As 9to5Mac noted, there’s a support article on Apple’s site that details how AirTags will work with an Android device if you don’t have your iPhone handy.
The way AirTags function is by securely communicating with Bluetooth devices and iPhones equipped with ultra-wideband that are in the area. If AirTags exclusively worked with Apple devices it would severely limit their effectiveness, particularly in regions where iPhones aren’t as popular as Android.
Any NFC-equipped phone should be able to just tap the AirTag to get more details.Image: Apple
AirTags won’t work out of the box with an Android device, nor can you use an Android device in lieu of an iPhone with one. Instead, it will only work with Android devices equipped with NFC and only communicate when the AirTags are in Lost Mode.
First, you’ll need to use your iPhone to activate Lost Mode, which is supposed to show you on a map where your AirTag has wandered off to. Then if someone with an Android device finds your lost AirTag, they can hold it up to their NFC-equipped phone and get details on how to contact you. They’ll only be able to get details if the Lost Mode is activated, which should help with privacy concerns.
The Android support makes AirTags way more useful, but if you want the full experience on an Android device, you’ll probably want to take a gander at Tile’s offerings. The company is reportedly working on an AirTag competitor that should work on both iOS and Android. Samsung also has its own AirTag competitor, Galaxy SmartTags. Like the AirTags and planned Tile offering, the Galaxy SmartTags use UWB to provide a more exact location for a lost tag. The Galaxy SmartTags only work with Samsung Galaxy phones, but unlike AirTags and the Tile tag, Galaxy SmartTags are available now and start at $29.99.
OnePlus CEO Pete Lau tweeted pictures of some attachable gaming triggers the company has created, and they’re made for more than just OnePlus’ phones. SlashGearand Android Headlinesnoticed them being teased during the unveiling of the OnePlus 9 back in late March, but they’re available online now in India from the OnePlus site for 1,099 rupees, which converts to roughly $15. OnePlus hasn’t confirmed that these gaming triggers will be releasing globally, and the company wouldn’t comment on pricing and availability when I reached out.
These triggers can be clipped around the edge of most phones (any Android or iOS device, so long as they’re less than 11.5mm thick with a case on). If you want to do some mobile gaming but hate touch controls, these could provide a more intuitive, controller-like alternative to tapping on your screen.
We designed the OnePlus gaming triggers to be solid, responsive, pleasingly “clicky,” and, yes, beautiful. We also made sure they work with many other phones—because the best product design is one that leaves you free to make your own choices. pic.twitter.com/hJNa4Dsa5s
— Pete Lau (@PeteLau) April 21, 2021
Each trigger appears to have just one shoulder button with an Omron switch that Lau says are “pleasingly clicky” to tap. Some of the pictures make it seem like there’s also a rear trigger, which would give you a second button to map, but OnePlus didn’t provide any further details on how the mechanism worked when I asked.
According to the product page, these triggers are interchangeable and can be fastened to your phone in whatever way is most comfortable to you. To use them, though, your game of choice needs to allow for deep customization of its touch controls, to the level of allowing you to move touch-activated zones to where these triggers’ conductive silicon pads clip onto your phone.
If you’re serious about mobile gaming, these triggers could level the playing field if you’re up against gamers who are playing on phones like the Asus ROG Phone 5 or others that feature ultrasonic sensors laid along their edge to mimic physical shoulder buttons. The Black Shark 4 lineup features actual mechanical shoulder buttons built into the phone.
OnePlus’ option seems to be a solid, budget-friendly option for making your phone easier to game on, though there’s a downside if you value your phone’s expansive screen real estate: these clamps obscure parts of the screen. But if they’re as easy to clip on and remove as OnePlus’ photos indicate, I can live with that.
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