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Apple planned ahead for the inevitable hardware slump
It was inevitable but nonetheless concerning to investors: iPhone sales flattened out this quarter, part of an overall trend of weakness in the smartphone market, and Apple admitted that next quarter will see sales decline year over year for the first time. Yes, the company just reported record-breaking profit -- again -- but as the iPhone goes, so does Apple. As such, the company is forecasting its first revenue decline in years.
Apple to open its first European app training center in Italy
In its bid to keep the App Store full of interesting and profitable apps, Apple has announced it's opening its first iOS Developer Center in Naples, Italy. The center will operate as a formal training school, allowing developers from across the continent to learn what Apple believes are the best tools to success on its marketplace. The training will have its own "specialized curriculum" and should it be a success, the company believes will open the door for more centers around the world.
A lot of people apparently got Fitbits for Christmas
If Apple's App Store rankings are any indication, a lot of you got a Fitbit for Christmas yesterday: The company's fitness-tracking app quickly shot to the top of the free list in iTunes. As Qz points out, Fitbit's activity tracker was already the most-downloaded health and fitness application for iOS, but as Christmas approached, it leapfrogged 20 spots to the top, suggesting many a couch potato unboxed one of the firm's wristbands.
The App Store now shows you when iOS apps work on Apple TV
The fourth-generation Apple TV already has over 2,600 apps, a significant number considering tvOS is such a young platform. Naturally, as more developers make their applications compatible with the new hardware, Apple wants users to easily find these. In order to do that, Apple's iOS App Store now lets you know when its iPhone or iPad apps also have an Apple TV version, similar to what it does with the Watch.
The Apple TV already has over 2,600 apps
It really shouldn't surprise anyone that the new Apple TV is already home to over 2,600 apps. The company that helped launch the entire app-centric industry might have been a bit late to the streaming-media box app store, but according to data collected by appFigures, tvOS is well on its way to becoming another popular platform for developers to build upon.
In the App Store, love comes cheap
When you're a writer, people expect you to write. And when you're courting someone the pressure to write for them, and to do it well, is amplified. My most recent romantic conquest, a Mexican interior designer, lived in LA. He was a diehard romantic, hundreds of miles away, and despite a slight language barrier, he had a way with words that I struggled to match. He had the ability to make me melt with a single text. I, in turn, would sit for minutes at a time, wringing my heart and brain for just one drop of sweet sentiment.
App Store's failed download bug traced to expired security certificate
Numerous Apple customers found themselves unable to download and run Mac apps from the App Store on Wednesday night. It appears the service outage culprit is Apple itself. More specifically, the culprit was an anti-piracy security certificate that Apple issued back in 2010 but which expired last night just before 10 PM GMT. Once developer Paul Haddad spotted the error, however, Apple quickly issued a new certificate to get the store back up and running.
Google buys Fly Labs, Photos to get in-app video editing
The team at Fly Labs announced on Friday that Google had acquired their company and will be rolling their image-editing technology into Google Photos. "We'll be pouring the same passion into Google Photos that we poured into Clips, Fly, Tempo and Crop on the Fly," the company wrote in a blog post. Existing users should note that while Fly Lab's existing suite of tools will remain free and available in the App Store for the next three months or so, there will be no more updates. Furthermore, if you've already downloaded the apps, they'll continue to work even after this three-month grace period. You won't, however, be able to re-download them once they've been removed from the App Store so make sure you don't go accidentally uninstalling them.
Apple now ranks the top Apple TV apps
One of the best ways to discover new Mac and iOS apps is to simply peruse the charts in their respective App Stores. When the fourth-gen Apple TV debuted last week, this particular feature was missing -- which is perhaps no surprise, given hardly any transactions had been made yet in the tvOS App Store. That's now been rectified, however, so you can swipe around with Apple's upgraded remote and get a better sense of what's hot. As 9to5Mac notes, video games seem to be making an early impression. Given the medium is entirely new to Apple TV, it's logical that titles like Alto's Adventure, Lumino City and Manticore Rising are creeping into the "Top Paid" rankings. That could change, of course, as the new Apple TV install base grows -- once everyone's usage settles down, we suspect the usual suspects like Netflix and HBO Now will dominate the "Top Free" spots.
Google's redesigned Play store starts rolling out
After being teased last week by Google engineer Kirill Grouchnikov, the redesigned Play store has apparently started showing up on some Android devices. Android Central says the new mobile shop for apps, books, music, movies and more, which features a simplified tab-based interface, hit one of its smartphones last night. We checked ours to no avail, so you shouldn't freak out if it's not on yours either. Now that it's out there for certain people, it won't be too long before everyone can begin using it. Patience is a virtue.
Apple pulls hundreds of apps that collected personal data
Apple recently suffered a rare breakdown of its App Store review policies. Because of that lapse, a couple hundred apps that used private APIs to collect personal information from users made its way into the App Store -- but Apple has confirmed that it pulled the offending apps. Analytics service SourceDNA first noticed these problematic apps and discovered that a third-party SDK for Chinese advertising platform Youmi was grabbing device serial numbers, lists of installed apps and the phone's Apple ID email address.
Google Play's pending redesign gets an early tease
While an app store redesign may not be the most exciting update, there are some pending tweaks to the Google Play store app that tidy things up a bit. Thanks to Google software engineer Kirill Grouchnikov, we have an early look at a few of the changes. Aside from some aesthetic polish and scrolling animations, Google is dividing the store into two main parts: Apps & Games and Entertainment. Google Play is currently divided into six categories that appear when you first open up the app, so reducing those down to two seems to simplify matters a bit. There's also support for languages that read right to left, based on some of the screenshots Grouchnikov uploaded to Google+. Unfortunately, there's no indication as to when Android users will receive the update. For now, you can see how the Google Play has evolved since its early days as Android market on the other side of the break.
Bell Canada gets slapped for fake App Store reviews
Bell Canada has been handed down a $1.25 million CAD ($970,719) fine by Canada's competition bureau after its employees posted fake reviews of Bell apps. According to the regulator, the carrier "encouraged" staff members to post glowing testimonials of the MyBell Mobile and Virgin My Account apps on the App Store and Google Play. Unfortunately, these overenthusiastic write-ups neglected to mention that they were written by people on Bell's dollar. Oops.
BBM app lands on Apple Watch before WhatsApp
Apps are continuing to trickle into Apple's wearable, with recent standouts including Airbnb, Google and...BlackBerry? The company once called RIM has announced Apple Watch support for its messaging service, BBM. When reading the product description on the iTunes store, you find that the companion app will allow you to share photos and voice notes, see when people are responding to your messages, and even offer groundbreaking features like delivered and read receipts. There isn't a wide variety of alternatives available on the Apple Watch at the moment -- with WhatsApp and Facebook messanger still missing from the app store -- but maybe there's a reason for that. What's your PIN? Let's discuss this some more through our wearables. [Thanks, Sterling Jordan!]
Apple removes malware-infected apps from Chinese App Store
Last week we reported how a number of malware-ridden apps were found on the Chinese version of Apple's App Store. The iPhone-maker has since confirmed the offending apps have been removed. The malicious apps were reportedly created using a bogus version of Xcode (the developer tool for iOS apps) that snuck hidden, malicious features into genuine apps with a program called "XcodeGhost". Curiously, a tactic also considered by the CIA at one point. Exactly how many apps were affected is unclear, but popular titles in the country like WeChat, and car-hailing app Didi Kuaidione are reported to be on the list. Security firm Qihoo360 Technology is reporting at least 344 were removed from the store.
Malware-ridden apps found in Apple's Chinese App Store
The iOS App Store is usually a trustworthy source of software. But as hackers tend to do, they found a way to get their nefarious wares into the China version of the software supermarket. By using altered versions of Apple' development tool Xcode they were able to slip malware into apps being built by unaware devs. The problem started when developers downloaded altered versions of Xcode (named "XcodeGhost" Alibab researchers) from third-party sites. When apps built with the modified compiler are launched, they collect the phone's name, UUID, language and country, current time and network type. That data is then encrypted and sent to servers. Not a huge breach, but no one wants to be tracked by unknown sources.
Pebble Time's iOS app hasn't been approved by Apple yet (update: it's live!)
The iOS faithful who already received their shiny new Pebble Time smartwatches are likely more than a little disappointed. The wearable is shipping to Kickstarter backers, but there's one big problem: the Pebble Time Watch iOS app hasn't been approved by Apple yet. Despite pushing minor bug fixes for approval on May 22nd, and asking that the folks in Cupertino fast-track the request, the software needed to get the gadget up and running isn't in the App Store. Even though a version of the app was approved on May 18th, it can't be released "due to quirks in the App Store submission process and rules."
Automatic launches an app store for cars
Two years ago, Automatic released a $100 Bluetooth-enabled car adapter along with an accompanying smartphone app to give you all kinds of insight about your vehicle. You could use it to track your trips, figure out your fuel consumption, locate your parking spot and even find out what that Check Engine light really means. Today, Automatic is taking that whole smart driving assistant thing one step further: It's opening an app store so that third-party apps can harness some of that same metadata too. And since Automatic's adapter works with any car with an OBD-II (Onboard Diagnostics) port -- that's all vehicles built and sold in the US since 1996 -- that means this store will be compatible with a great majority of vehicles out there. Likely one you already own.
The clone that won't disappear: 'Threes' vs. '2048' on Google Play
Google removed the quirky puzzle game Threes from the Play store on Tuesday. Its removal was unceremonious and sudden, but that's not exactly why Threes creator Asher Vollmer found the situation frustrating. That came down to two reasons: A robot informed Vollmer that his game was removed from Google Play in a cold, automated message. Threes was removed from Google Play because it used "2048" as a keyword -- and 2048 is a blatant, known clone of Threes. Google -- probably a human there, not a robot -- reinstated Threes after just a few hours offline and following a stream of articles and Twitter activity around its removal. Of course, 2048 remained live on Google Play the entire time, alongside a bunch of other Threes clones. This string of events highlights one of the biggest differences between Google and Apple, and how they approach their app stores. "Apple's policies are preventative and Google's policies are retroactive," Vollmer says. "You can probably figure out which one I prefer."
Apple Watch App Store is ready to equip your device upon arrival
If you've already ordered Apple's smartwatch, it should arrive sometime in the next few weeks. To prep for that delivery, the App Store's selection of Watch-specific apps is available for browsing on the web or with that trusty iOS device. The Wall Street Journal reports that over 3,000 software options now reside in iTunes, ready to outfit the wearable with tools for keeping tabs on scores, fitness data, news, social channels, payments and more. Of course, if you haven't secured one yet, you won't be able to nab the gadget at your local retail store tomorrow, so you'll have to wait until it arrives by mail.
