Slashdot Mirror
Apple Announces Smartwatch, Bigger iPhones, Mobile Payments
Today at Apple's September press conference, they announced the new iPhone 6 models. There are two of them — the iPhone 6 is 4.7" at 1334x750, and the iPhone 6 Plus is 5.5" at 1920x1080. Both phones are thinner than earlier models: 5S: 7.6mm, 6: 6.9mm, 6 Plus: 7.1mm. The phones have a new-generation chip, the 64-bit A8. Apple says the new phones have a 25% faster CPU, 50% faster GPU, and they're 50% more energy efficient (though they were careful to say the phones have "equal or better" battery life to the 5S). Apple upgrade the phones' wireless capabilities, moving voice calls to LTE and also enabling voice calls over Wi-Fi. The phones ship on September 19th, preceded by the release of iOS 8 on September 17th.
Apple also announced its entry into the payments market with "Apple Pay." They're trying to replace traditional credit card payments with holding an iPhone up to a scanner instead. It uses NFC and the iPhone's TouchID fingerprint scanner. Users can take a picture of their credit cards, and Apple Pay will gather payment information, encrypt it, and store it. (Apple won't have any of the information about users' credit cards or their purchases, and users will be able to disable the payment option through Find My iPhone if they lose the device.) Apple Pay will work with Visa, Mastercard, and American Express cards to start. 220,000 stores that support contactless payment will accept Apple Pay, and many apps are building direct shopping support for it. It will launch in October as an update for iOS 8, and work only on the new phones.
Apple capped off the conference with the announcement of the long-anticipated "Apple Watch." Their approach to UI is different from most smartwatch makers: Apple has preserved the dial often found on the side of analog watches, using it as a button and an input wheel. This "digital crown" enables features like zoom without obscuring the small screen with fingers. The screen is touch-sensitive and pressure sensitive, so software can respond to a light tap differently than a hard tap. The watch runs on a new, custom-designed chip called the S1, it has sensors to detect your pulse, and it has a microphone to receive and respond to voice commands. It's powered by a connector that has no exposed contacts — it magnetically seals to watch and charges inductively. The Apple Watch requires an iPhone of the following models to work: 6, 6Plus, 5s, 5c, 5. It will be available in early 2015, and will cost $349 for a base model.
Apple also announced its entry into the payments market with "Apple Pay." They're trying to replace traditional credit card payments with holding an iPhone up to a scanner instead. It uses NFC and the iPhone's TouchID fingerprint scanner. Users can take a picture of their credit cards, and Apple Pay will gather payment information, encrypt it, and store it. (Apple won't have any of the information about users' credit cards or their purchases, and users will be able to disable the payment option through Find My iPhone if they lose the device.) Apple Pay will work with Visa, Mastercard, and American Express cards to start. 220,000 stores that support contactless payment will accept Apple Pay, and many apps are building direct shopping support for it. It will launch in October as an update for iOS 8, and work only on the new phones.
Apple capped off the conference with the announcement of the long-anticipated "Apple Watch." Their approach to UI is different from most smartwatch makers: Apple has preserved the dial often found on the side of analog watches, using it as a button and an input wheel. This "digital crown" enables features like zoom without obscuring the small screen with fingers. The screen is touch-sensitive and pressure sensitive, so software can respond to a light tap differently than a hard tap. The watch runs on a new, custom-designed chip called the S1, it has sensors to detect your pulse, and it has a microphone to receive and respond to voice commands. It's powered by a connector that has no exposed contacts — it magnetically seals to watch and charges inductively. The Apple Watch requires an iPhone of the following models to work: 6, 6Plus, 5s, 5c, 5. It will be available in early 2015, and will cost $349 for a base model.
After all, you trusted us with your nude photos.
SJW's don't eliminate discrimination. They just expropriate it for themselves.
Square, less space than a Nomad. Lame
The new iPhone looks like a Samsung Galaxy. Considering I have been putting off upgrading my iPhone 4S till now, I'll be sure to express my indignation by asking the Apple Sales Genius about the new Galaxy 6 and how it compares to the Galaxy 6+. And every time they correct me, I'll look confused and say, "No -- that's clearly a Samsung Galaxy, you can tell by the rounded edges and the shape of the Main Button".
Whoever was in charge of the live stream are a bunch of amateurs, incompetent idiots and should be fired, publicity shamed and never hired again.
Interlacing problems with the image, video looping, audio with no video, chinese audio on top of the english one, a stream so full of errors that it froze my Apple TV.
I stopped watching and I'll try later tonight, after Apple has cleaned up that fucking mess. What a joke.
I may be an Apple user and fanboy, but this time the Microsoft and Android fanboys can rip into Apple for this clusterfuck of problems, I'll be cheering for them.
Get free satoshi (Bitcoin) and Dogecoins
A gigantic set of the population is no longer even used to the concept of wearing a watch, because they have their phone. This device doesn't replace their phone. What exactly is the reason to have this as well, as opposed to pulling your phone out of your pocket?
Unless some company comes up with a functionally independent wearable device that replaces the need for keeping your phone with you I do not see the appeal. I don't understand what the pitch is supposed to even be. Literally every functionality can be responded to with "but i have my phone right here, it also does that and better"
Ice Cream has no bones.
apple has had CCs linked to iTunes/icloud for a decade now, with no problems. the apple pay transmits a one-time code, not the CC itself, so if somebody hacks it then enjoy. it's actually a really well designed system.
I was hoping for a Maxwell Smart style shoe phone myself.
I'm not a giant Apple fan, but one thing that I actually liked about their strategy up to this point was keeping their phones smaller. I've had a 4.7" phone, and that was almost too large for my (admittedly small) hands. I've got a 5" screen now, and it's notably difficult for me to use. I'm pessimistic about my future upgrade options at this point, if even Apple is jumping on the mega-sized-phone bandwagon.
It is pitch black. You are likely to be eaten by a grue.
As the android phones grew to massive sizes, they could just keep buying iphones that fit in their pockets (without having to wear baggy pants or cargo shorts).
Same thing happened with the Moto X for me I guess. I was ok with the form factor. Bigger than the iphone, but smaller than the competition...and still just (barely) small enough that I could reach all 4 corners of the screen with my thumb while holding it in one hand. Now the new Moto X+1 is getting even bigger and it is definitely not going to be my next phone. Luckily I am still loving the Moto X and have no reason to upgrade for another year...but I have zero interest in going bigger.
Bottles.
They've caught up with last year's Nexus 5!
there are 3 kinds of people:
* those who can count
* those who can't
In a few iterations the Apple Watch will be untethered from the phone, have decent storage, and a slimmer form-factor than the monstrosity that was unveiled today.
In a world of tablets, smartphones and smartwatches, dedicated music-players are starting to look rather "quaint".
You're holding it wrong.
Let's face it, we all agree with the assertion I'm about to make. Everyone does.
Cloudiot: A person who does not see offsite storage as a way to lose control over access to his or her own data.
I think they were right to go with a larger phone. Let's face it, times have changed. And a lot of people (myself included) really like the idea of a 5.5" phone. My large fingers make a larger screen a godsend, and it's a lot easier on the eyes.
As someone who has fairly big hands I had a hard time adapting from a 4" Android phone to my current 4.95" Nexus 5. I tried to use the big phone in the same way that I had been using smaller smartphones in the past, by holding the phone firmly in my hand and moving my thumb around the screen. The problem is that my thumb only reaches about 4.2 inches, so I kept trying to reach further than I could by over-reaching with my thumb. It got to the point where I had to switch to using my phone with my left hand out of fear of permanently injuring my right thumb (feel free to joke...).
I eventually learned that you should sort of slide the phone around your palm to align it with your thumb. Now I could probably adapt to a 5.5" phone, but I think I would go for the 4.7" one if I was an Apple user.
It's going to be interesting to hear if iPhone thumb becomes a thing now that there are no longer any "thumb-sized" new iPhones.
Have you seen what people are wearing these days?
This is so they can check what time it is without having to attempt to extract their new, larger phone out of the pocket of their skinny jeans, and then try to put it back in again.
Where it'd actually be cool is if it had a 'lack of proximity warning' ... eg, an alert of 'hey, you left your phone' when the two get out or range of each other. Not that it would justify the price (or switching to an iPhone), but it'd be kinda cool, as I just realized I left my phone in my car.
Build it, and they will come^Hplain.
I would not have thought it was possible for a live video feed to go that bad. In addition to all the issues you mentioned, towards the end I had the video feed randomly flip between live content and content from an hour prior. It also froze for a while when the words "Image Stabilization" came on screen, a little too much stabilization!
Bandwidth issues I could almost forgive, or at least understand. But the technical issues they were so technically awful it seemed like they hired a first grade class to do AV and fed them jello shots beforehand.
Hope they can assemble a watchable video for viewing later, it was so bad you almost have to wonder if Chinese is not permanently embedded over Cook's voice in the master recording.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
One bum note is that they are no longer selling the iPod Classic as of today, quietly ending thirteen years of scroll-wheel iPods.
That's too bad, as it's a much better music player than the iTouch and the iPhone, with its larger storage capacity and controls with tactile feedback.
I don't think they mentioned official battery capacity or battery life numbers, but they did say "very easy to charge at night". That tells me it has 1 day of battery just like the Moto 360.
Honestly, the battery is the worst part of smartwatches currently. It ruined the Moto 360 for me and it comes close to ruining to Apple Watch, if it actually is only 1 day.
I would settle for 3 days, my Sony sw2 goes 4 days without charging. I was expecting the same from Apple, looking at the criticisms of the Android Wear watches which are all focused on the 1-2 day battery life. I don't want to charge a watch every night!! I get it, it has a nice screen and it's slim, and it's running a lot of sensors and wireless transactions, but still... just awful battery life!
The Slashdot post I was expecting[1] ;-)
[1]: http://slashdot.org/story/01/1...
No, they'll just hack off your thumb, too.
Cashiers never notice the old "dismembered bloody thumb authentication" trick.
We don't have a state-run media we have a media-run state.
There are various purposes for various tools. A phone (Apple or otherwise) is not going to replace a proper camera for recording in situations in which you know you need massive storage, massive battery life or professional optics. You likely will also need good lighting and sound, but that's going beyond a camera now. What a phone does do well in, are situations where you had not planned on taking video. A camera you can carry everywhere that's good enough for many applications is the major use case and why dedicated photography and videography equipment is relegated more and more to situations that warrant it.
When my toddler is going to take his or her first steps, I might not be ready with a full recording setup, but I will have a phone at hand, for example.
If I am planning on recording my teenagers graduation, I will bring dedicated equipment that can record for hours at better resolution, for example.
Clearly the iPhone will not replace a camcorder, but it will serve as a suitable replacement for a camcorder in many situations. The market trends seem to support this view.
I suppose Apple had to join in on the 2009 smartphone market at some point. 5+ years too late, better than never?
They were "late" to the Music Player and Phone markets, too. And look how that turned out.
wow. really? If someone steals my phone and hacks off my thumb, then one of the last things that i'm going to worry about is them going to a McDonalds and hold up a bloodied iPhone and dismembered finger up to the payment system to buy a cheeseburger.
There's always Florida!!!!
Here's to hot beer, cold women, and Glaswegian kisses for all.
You're moving the goalposts, but before I address your question, let's consider the alternatives that this is intended to replace: swipe or chip-and-PIN. Yes, Touch ID can be cracked, but it requires extended physical access to the device, a copy of the fingerprints, significant expense (around $2000 for the type of printer used and the various other consumable materials), and a day or so to go through the multi-step process of creating the fake fingerprint. All of which means it won't be done casually by unscrupulous cashiers or amateur thieves, which is something Americans face today (my parents are dealing with this right now, in fact). And by the time a person who's actually invested in this stuff manages to go through the whole process of creating a fake fingerprint, the owner of the lost device would be likely to have already revoked Apple Pay access remotely anyway.
Contrast that with swipe: if you compromise physical access to the card, you compromise everything. Or chip-and-PIN, which only adds the additional barrier of a PIN that can be procured by just looking over someone's shoulder at the right time. In comparison to either one of those, it's both more convenient and more secure.
So, to answer your question, no, it's not foolproof, but considering amateur card theft is still rampant in America and perfectly possible overseas, we can say that this system is significantly more secure than what we have now for payments at physical retail locations. It's also more private, since I never have to expose my information to the retailer. And it's more durable, since I don't need to worry about magnetic stripes failing due to wear and tear. And it's also more convenient, since it means less things to carry and less interactions necessary to complete the transaction.
Which is all to say, it's good to point out that Touch ID has been cracked and that that is indeed a vector for a possible form of theft, but let's put that fact in context and recognize that our current systems are significantly less secure and that this represents a massive improvement over them.
Sign up for what? Xcode is a free download from the app store, and you can use it to install Homebrew and be a single command away from having gcc4[345789] installed. There's almost literally nothing they could do to make that easier other than shipping Xcode with OS X, but that would be a waste of storage for the 99.9% of users who wouldn't ever use it.
Dewey, what part of this looks like authorities should be involved?