Mitchel Broussard

In celebration of Valentine's Day today, February 14, numerous companies have launched sales for a variety of products, ranging from iPhone and MacBook accessories to Bluetooth speakers and more. Below we've rounded up a few of the sales going on today, most of which will be ending by midnight tonight or early tomorrow. Note: MacRumors is an affiliate partner with some of these vendors. When...

Just over two years after "Rise of the Tomb Raider" first launched as an Xbox console exclusive in late 2015, Feral Interactive today announced that it will bring the definitive edition of the game to macOS and Linux this spring. Called "Rise of the Tomb Raider: 20 Year Celebration," the Mac game will be a port of the same title that launched for PS4 in late 2016, bundling the base game with all...

Siri on HomePod lets you listen to any show found in Apple's Podcasts catalog with a few voice controls that are similar to those for Apple Music playback. In this guide, we've listed some of the most useful Siri controls for Podcasts, along with basic commands that will help you do things like pause and rewind parts of a Podcast you might have missed, subscribe to a podcast, change the volume,...

Last month, Apple sued French tax activist group "Attac" for occupying its flagship Parisian store during a protest of what Attac called "wide-scale tax evasion." Today, Apple has asked the court in Paris to ban the group from its French stores and prevent any further stunts from happening. In response to the court filing, Attac today mobilized in front of the court in further protest,...

iOS game developer Snowman today announced that "Alto's Odyssey" will launch on the iOS and tvOS App Stores on Thursday, February 22. With the confirmation of a release date, Apple today shared a new card on the iOS App Store noting the launch, along with snippets of an interview with the game's developers (via TouchArcade). The game was originally set to debut in the summer of 2017 but got delaye...

Update: EMagin's Chief Financial Officer Jeffrey Lucas told Bloomberg that Apple has not invested in the company, despite the document filed with the Securities and Exchange commission. Emagin listed the companies in the document because it "has had discussions with them at industry events." Lucas says Apple did not actually invest in the company and the filing was misinterpreted. Apple has ...

Google's upcoming software update for its Android smartphone operating system will "embrace" an iPhone X notch-like design, according to people familiar with the company's plans speaking to Bloomberg. With the software, referred to as Android P, Google is readying a "new generation" of Android smartphones that will be "mimicking" the iPhone X's front-facing camera cutout design. Just like...

One of the main uses for Siri on HomePod is to control your Apple Music collection. There are Siri voice commands for accessing content like playlists, genres, moods, liking or disliking songs, playing more music based on something you've heard, starting a new radio station, and much more. Because the list of Siri commands is so extensive, this guide won't be covering every possible option...

In a new test shared today by Loup Ventures, Apple's HomePod was put through its paces in categories including Siri, sound quality, and ease of use. For Siri, Loup Ventures' Gene Munster reported that while the AI assistant understood 99.4 percent of queries asked of it, it answered only 52.3 percent of them correctly. Loup Ventures tested three separate HomePods and asked 782 queries total....

There are many commands that Siri can understand on the HomePod that make it super simple to take quick notes and set up reminders for later, which all sync to any iOS device connected to the smart speaker. As long as you allowed the HomePod access to Contacts, Messages, Reminders, and Notes in the initial pairing process, you'll be able to ask Siri to do the commands in this guide. First,...

Over the past five days, Uber and Waymo have been entangled in a court case over Waymo's allegations that Uber stole its self-driving LiDAR system. Today, the two companies have announced that they reached a settlement agreement, under which Uber will pay Waymo a 0.34 equity stake, "amounting to about $245 million at Uber's recent $72 billion valuation" (via CNBC). Additionally, Uber has...

DirecTV Now has updated its Apple TV 4K deal today with an even lower price point: if you prepay for just three months of the streaming TV service for a total of about $105, you'll get the 32GB Apple TV 4K at no cost. The deal is an improvement on the original DirecTV Now offer of prepaying for four months of the $35/month service (that's the entry price point), which ended up costing $140 for...

Following a Target BOGO deal earlier in the week, PayPal on eBay has now launched a better discount on App Store & iTunes cards: you can get the $100 iTunes card for $85 while supplies last. Similar to previous sales on PayPal's Digital Gifts eBay storefront in the lead up to Christmas last year, you'll get the iTunes code delivered to you via email, and it's valid only on purchases made in the...

Hulu on Reddit this week announced that it will begin rolling out support for 60 frames per second live streams on its "Hulu With Live TV" cord-cutting service, launching in time for viewers to stream the Olympics and March Madness. Hulu said it was aware that 60fps streaming was "one of the most-requested features" by its viewers, leading to this week's announcement (via Cord Cutters News). ...

Yesterday Snapchat announced its first-ever live television event coverage, aimed at key highlights coming out of the 2018 Winter Olympic Games. Today, the company is revealing an enhanced version of its custom Geofilters with a new paid "Create Your Own Lens" studio that lets users build and edit their own personalized selfie Lenses for major events and parties. Snapchat's "Create Your Own ...

Nintendo last week announced that its next mobile game will be "Mario Kart Tour," but with a launch date aimed at any time before the company's fiscal year ending March 2019, not much information is known about the game. Today, DeNA CEO Isao Moriyasu was reported as saying that Mario Kart Tour will be free-to-start (via TouchArcade and The Wall Street Journal). The "free-to-start"...

Following a discount on bundles for movies in the Cloverfield and Mission: Impossible franchises earlier this week, Apple on iTunes has now launched a collection of "Award Winning" film bundles focused on categories from the Academy Awards. The sale is debuting just under one month before the 90th Academy Awards on Sunday, March 4. The categories include Best Actor, Best Actress, Best Picture, ...

Snap Inc. today announced an all-new Live feature that will allow users of the iOS and Android apps to stream key snippets of major televised events, the first partner being NBCUniversal in time for the 2018 Olympic Winter Games in PyeongChang. Beginning this Saturday, February 10, Snapchat users will see these live streams of the Olympics in the app's Discover page. NBCUniversal will also be...

Yesterday, reviews for the HomePod launched online and with them new details about Apple's smart speaker began emerging ahead of its release date on February 9. One new tidbit of information came from Rene Ritchie's review of the speaker on iMore, which confirmed that any music streamed via HomePod does not count toward an Apple Music subscription's device streaming limit. Additionally, HomePod...

Over the past few weeks, iOS app developers have been sharing stories on Twitter about their apps getting rejected by Apple's App Review team because emojis were used in "non-keyboard based situations." So if an app displayed an emoji in its user interface, where the user did not type it in with a keyboard, Apple said it was not complying with its trademark and Apple Emoji imagery guidelines....