MacRumors

The Automatic connected car system today received an over-the-air update that allows users to turn their Automatic Link hardware devices into iBeacons, reports TechCrunch. As iBeacons, Automatic devices let users transmit to or receive information from other sensors or devices in the vicinity.

First introduced in March of 2013, the Automatic hardware plugs into a car's onboard diagnostics (OBD) port and provides detailed data on driving habits and mileage within the Automatic app.

With the addition of iBeacon technology, Automatic could be a far more functional device in the future. While the iBeacon addition has no use at the present time, Automatic co-founder Thejo Kote says that it could be used to enable car-specific applications with a host of potential partners.

Applying iBeacon technology to a vehicle could make it easier for people to pay for things like parking, or gas fill ups, for instance — making the experience much better than it is today.

For right now, those types of applications are still theoretical, but Automatic is interested in seeing where it could go.

iBeacons, which have been growing in popularity over the last several months, use Bluetooth 4.0 to transmit data to nearby devices. This technology has been used within Apple Retail Stores to provide additional information on products, among other things.

In addition to iBeacon support for the Automatic hardware, the Automatic app was also updated today, adding event recording for external APIs and a number of bug fixes and improvements to the software.

Automatic can be purchased from the Automatic website for $99.95. The accompanying Automatic app is a free download from the App Store. [Direct Link]

Back in December, it was reported that Sprint -- the U.S.'s third-largest cell carrier -- was preparing a bid to acquire T-Mobile, the country's fourth-largest carrier. The deal, depending on the stake Sprint attempts to buy, could be worth more than $20 billion.

Recently, a pair of Sprint board members met with the U.S. Department of Justice to discuss a possible acquisition, reports The Wall Street Journal. The report says the DoJ has concerns over a potential deal.

The conversation, which occurred in January, signals the seriousness of Mr. Son's interest in a deal, but also underscores his highest hurdle. U.S. antitrust authorities believe the current lineup of four national carriers is important to maintaining a competitive market, and department officials indicated at the meeting that a deal combining Sprint and T-Mobile could face regulatory difficulties, the people said

According to the WSJ, Sprint has lined up roughly $31 billion in potential financing and the company is not deterred from pursuing an acquisition.

Japanese carrier Softbank purchased a 70 percent controlling interest in Sprint back in 2012 for roughly $20 billion. T-Mobile is majority owned by German telecom giant Deutsche Telekom.

Previously, AT&T attempted to acquire T-Mobile but government intervention prevented the deal from concluding. Since then, the companies have had a growing feud as they launch ever escalating marketing efforts in an attempt to poach each other's customers.

While developer Steven Troughton-Smith has shared several screenshots and a video of iOS in the Car running on iOS 7.0.3, the iOS 7.1 beta currently available to developers offers even more iOS in the Car functionality, including a redesign.

According to Troughton-Smith, it is difficult to access iOS in the Car in iOS 7.0.3, but another developer, Denis Stas, has discovered that it's much easier to access iOS in the Car in iOS 7.1 and has detailed how to enable the feature using iOS Simulator.

Stas details three steps that are necessary to get iOS in the Car running in iOS Simulator with iOS 7.1:

- Download the second developer preview of Xcode 5.1
- Clone https://github.com/zyafa/iOSCar
- Build and run cloned project and follow included instructions

Developers with access to iOS 7.1 and Xcode 5.1 DP2 will be able to give iOS in the Car a try, but non-developers will not be able to access the necessary software.

According to Stas, the current implementation of iOS in the Car is both unofficial and unstable. The iOS 7.1 version of iOS in the Car features a different design than was previously seen in iOS 7.0.3, featuring a look more in line with the style of iOS 7.

As noted earlier today, these design changes may be the result of organizational issues that have affected the development of iOS in the Car. While iOS in the Car can be accessed by developers using iOS Simulator, it remains unclear when Apple might officially debut the feature.

AT&T today announced its 4Q 2013 earnings, revealing the company added 1.2 million postpaid smartphones to its network (both upgrades and new subscribers) and gained 809,000 new subscribers, with 566,000 being postpaid customers with a contract. It is unclear how many of AT&T's new customers were choosing iPhones, however, as AT&T, like Verizon, no longer reports quarterly iPhone activations or sales.

Smartphones made up 93 percent of total phone sales and 77 percent of the postpaid phone base. The carrier also added 440,000 new tablets during the quarter.

Compared to the year-ago quarter, AT&T gained 300,000 fewer new subscribers, but saw a record low contract churn rate of 1.11 percent and an overall churn rate of 1.43 percent. A company's churn rate is the percentage of customers that leave the carrier during the quarter. It appears that AT&T is managing to retain most of its subscriber base at this point, but during the next quarter, T-Mobile's efforts to lure AT&T customers may become more apparent.

AT&T Next, AT&T's smartphone and tablet upgrade program, has drawn more than 1.5 million customers since it was first launched in July of 2013.

Earlier in January, AT&T competitor Verizon announced smartphone activations of 8.8 million along with 1.7 million new subscribers. Verizon continues to have a bigger postpaid customer base than AT&T at 96.2 million wireless customers compared to AT&T's 72.6 million.

Overall, AT&T announced a profit of $6.9 billion on $33.2 billion in revenue.

Rap Genius, the site that recently had a run-in with Google for its dubious SEO strategies, today launched an official Genius iOS app that allows users to access the site's archive of song lyrics.

The app includes access to annotated lyrics for millions of songs, and it also includes lyrical breakdowns and explanations that delve into the meaning behind phrases and words in music. Annotations found within the Genius app are designed to explain cryptic lines, reveal references and inside jokes, define unusual terms, and give context.

Have you ever been confused by a song's lyrics? Or wondered what your favorite artist meant by a line? Now you'll never have to worry about this (or anything) ever again! Genius breaks down lyrics with line-by-line annotations, many contributed by the artists themselves.

Genius also functions similarly to Shazam or Soundhound, identifying songs that are playing nearby. According to the app's description, it uses "Genius Recognition Technology" to listen to songs and provide lyrics for whatever's playing.

Genius isn't just a music app; it's your pocket guide to human culture. So whether you're looking for the true meaning of a line from The Great Gatsby, a breakdown of President Obama's latest speech, or a guide to Matthew 25, we've got you.

Genius by Rap Genius can be downloaded from the App Store for free. [Direct Link]

Google today launched Chrome apps for iOS and Android, which will see Chrome-based apps encased in a native application shell that allows them to be distributed through the Apple App Store and Google Play. Currently, Chrome-packaged apps are written in JavaScript, HTML, and CSS, but are able to launch outside the browser, access APIs and work offline.

Developers can access an early developer preview of a toolchain based on Apache Cordova, an open source platform for building native mobile applications with HTML, CSS, and JavaScript. Using the toolchain, developers can wrap existing Chrome Apps with a native shell, which transforms them into apps that can be sold on the App Store.

We provide a simple developer workflow for packaging a Chrome App natively for mobile platforms. You can run your Chrome App on a device or emulator using the command-line or an IDE. Alternatively, you can use the Chrome Apps Developer Tool to run your app on an Android device without the need to install an IDE or the mobile platform’s SDK.

Google has made multiple core Chrome APIs available to Chrome apps that are designed to run on mobile devices, including automatic sign-in via OAuth2, push messaging, storage, alarms, file system syncing able to store and retrieve files backed by Google Drive, and more.

In addition to the Chrome APIs, developers are also able to access APIs supported by the Cordova platform.

Chrome mobile apps come following the September launch of Chrome apps that work offline by default and function as native applications. In December, Google brought Chrome apps to the Mac, following a beta testing period that began in May. Chrome apps on the Mac are designed to function like native Mac apps, working offline, updating automatically, and syncing on any computer where a user is signed into Chrome.

Developers have the opportunity to begin working with Apache Cordova and their Chrome apps beginning today, but it may be some time before consumers see Chrome apps in the App Store.

Even as Apple's share of the smartphone market declined in the fourth quarter of 2013, the rise of smartphones to replace more basic feature phones has allowed the company to continue increasing its share of the overall mobile phone market, according to new numbers from research firm IDC.

According to IDC, yearly smartphone shipments topped one billion for the first time in 2013 and now represent 55 percent of mobile phone shipments, up from under 42 percent in 2012. The fourth quarter alone saw smartphone capture over 58 percent of the overall mobile phone market.

For full-year 2013, Apple's iPhone sales increased by 12.9 percent over 2012, trailing the broader smartphone industry's growth rate of 38.4 percent. Apple was, however, still able to retain firm control of second place in the rankings behind Samsung even as Apple's market share fell from 18.7 percent to 15.3 percent. It was a similar story for the fourth quarter on its own, with Apple's 6.7 percent growth in shipments trailing the broader market and causing the company's share to dip from 20.9 percent to 17.9 percent.

Apple posted record shipment volume during 4Q13, driven primarily by the addition of multiple countries offering the iPhone 5S and 5C, and sustained demand from its initial markets that saw these models launch at the end of 3Q13. Still, Apple had the lowest year-on-year increase of all the leading vendors. Now that Apple has finally arrived at China Mobile, it remains to be seen how much Apple will close the gap against Samsung in 2014.

But when looking at the overall mobile phone market, Apple performs much better due to its exclusive focus on the rapidly growing smartphone segment. According to IDC's numbers, Apple easily outpaced overall market growth of 4.8 percent for 2013 and 0.9 percent for the fourth quarter alone, boosting Apple to an 8.4 percent share for the full year and 10.4 percent for fourth quarter. Apple continues to sit firmly in third place among all mobile phone manufacturers behind Samsung and a rapidly falling Nokia.

Just yesterday, Apple released its earnings report for the fourth quarter (first fiscal quarter of 2014), revealing fairly strong overall performance but weaker than expected iPhone numbers that helped drive Apple's stock down nearly 8 percent at the opening of trading today. And with the iPhone accounting for 56 percent of Apple's revenue for the quarter, it's clear the device continues to be the main factor in measuring Apple's success.

Documents leaked by former NSA contractor Edward Snowden and made public yesterday claim U.S. and UK intelligence agencies are retrieving personal data sent by mobile apps during mass surveillance sweeps.

Rovio's Angry Birds was one of the apps targeted by intelligence agencies for key profile data such as age, location and gender, and the company has now defended itself against these allegations, denying any voluntary cooperation with government agencies.

Rovio Entertainment Ltd, which is headquartered in Finland, does not share data, collaborate or collude with any government spy agencies such as NSA or GCHQ anywhere in the world.

There has been speculation in the media that NSA targets Angry Birds to collect end user data. The speculation is based on information from documents leaked by Edward Snowden.

The alleged surveillance may be conducted through third party advertising networks used by millions of commercial web sites and mobile applications across all industries. If advertising networks are indeed targeted, it would appear that no internet-enabled device that visits ad-enabled web sites or uses ad-enabled applications is immune to such surveillance. Rovio does not allow any third party network to use or hand over personal end-user data from Rovio’s apps.

Apple last year faced similar allegations it and other technology companies provided the NSA with backdoor access to its servers. Apple CEO Tim Cook denied these reports, saying last week the NSA "would have to cart us out in a box" in order to gain access to Apple's servers. Cook also has been vocal about increased transparency, asking the government for permission to talk about information requests from federal and law enforcement agencies.

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