Rumor Roundup: 1573rd time's the charm
The Wall Street Journal says Apple is on a hiring spree in Asia, and they claim this means Apple will perform "faster and more frequent product launches."
The Journal only very rarely gets anything right about Apple, and that usually occurs the night before a product launch. As there are no product launches imminent within the next few days, I'm not convinced. I'm even less convinced by the Journal's claim that Apple is aiming for "faster and more frequent product launches," because that smells an awful lot like the "Apple needs to be more like Samsung unless it wants to be DOOMED" advice that the more brainless analysts love to dish out.
Leak: iPhone 6 component photo may reveal major design overhaul (BGR)
Congratulations to BGR for falling for such a blatantly obvious fake. And by "congratulations" I mean "LMAO."
iPhone 6 camera will be even better without entering the megapixel war (BGR)
The source for this rumor is some random post on Weibo. Keep an eye out next week when BGR posts next-gen iPad specs gleaned from my Facebook timeline.
Apple to Reportedly Stop Production of 13-Inch Non-Retina MacBook Pro Later This Year (MacRumors)
"...according to a new report from Digitimes." BZZZZT! Next.
Apple's A8 Chip Production for iPhone 6 Underway at TSMC (MacRumors)
This marks roughly the 1573rd time in the past two years that chip production for Apple has been "underway" at TSMC. It never actually happened on occasions 1 through 1572, but you know what they say, 1573rd time's the charm!
Report: Apple bringing full screen, interstitial iAds to iPhone (9to5 Mac)
From the article: "The new iAd option will allow included video content to play automatically at full screen rather than being prompted by tapping a more subtle banner." This does not sound remotely like anything Apple would ever do. Automatically-playing video ads are among the worst user experiences ever -- we do our best to squash them immediately whenever such ads dare to show their ugly faces at TUAW. They're even more irritating on a touchscreen device, which should never automatically do anything without user input of some kind.
The user outcry over this would be immediate, swift, and brutal if it ever came to pass. I don't believe for a second that Apple would compromise its user experience this way... but it sounds like something that would be right up Google's alley.
