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The Most-Important-Topic Edition Thursday, December 10, 2020

Tim Cook Takes A Swipe At Big Tech Rivals And Their 'Lack Of Responsibility', by Michelle Gao, CNBC

"You can be a great amplifier of misinformation, of violence, of a lot of different things out there," said Cook. "We don't want to be a part of any of this. We don't want to be a part of the hate at all. And I feel, by and large, that we've avoided that."

Cook also differentiated Apple from other Big Tech companies on privacy, which he said could be "the most important topic of the 21st century" aside from climate change.

Apple Responds To WhatsApp Criticism, Confirms Its Own Apps Will Show Privacy Labels, by Michael Potuck, 9to5Mac

Apple has now responded saying that its own apps will follow the same rules and privacy details will be available on its website for any apps that aren’t in the App Store.

Apple Complicit In Labor Law Violations, Say Former Staff, by Ben Lovejoy, 9to5Mac

Three former members of the Apple Supplier Responsibility team say Apple was complicit in labor law violations in China. They are supported by a former Apple senior manager familiar with the company’s Chinese operations.

They say Apple was aware of the violations by its suppliers, but took no action because it feared that to do so might delay product launches.

Stuff

Apple’s MagSafe Wallet Now Has Competition That’s Cheaper And Packs More Features, by Mitchell Clark, The Verge

MOFT’s version [...] holds three cards like Apple’s, but it also has a built-in kickstand. The stand lets users keep their phone upright in portrait, landscape, or what the company is calling “float mode”

Caviar Launches $6,000+ Custom iPhone 12 Pro With Fragment Of Steve Jobs' Original Turtleneck Embedded In Apple Logo, by Tim Hardwick, MacRumors

Caviar, a site known for creating extravagant, expensive replacement casings for Apple’s iPhone models, today announced the launch of its latest custom creation, an iPhone 12 Pro customized in the style of an ‌iPhone‌ 4.

Develop

Apple Reminds Developers Of App Store Connect Shutdown In December, by Mike Peterson, AppleInsider

No new apps or app updates will be accepted during the period, which occurs every year. Releases can still be made live, but must be submitted, approved, and scheduled in advance.

Notes

Is The Browser Ready For Its Close-Up?, by M.G. Siegler, 500ish Words

An app built for macOS from the ground up is likely to be better designed for that system than, say, one built to be cross-platform on the web. But that distinction is also fading with time, in large part because Apple now has an operating system that is far larger than macOS: iOS.

Apple And Google To Stop X-Mode From Collecting Location Data From Users’ Phones, by Byron Tau, Wall Street Journal

The two largest mobile-phone platforms told developers this week that they must remove X-Mode’s tracking software from any app present in their app stores or risk losing access to any phones running Apple’s or Google’s mobile operating systems.