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The Tricky-to-Regulate Edition Wednesday, October 26, 2022

USB-C iPhone: Greg Joswiak Confirms That Apple Will Be Forced To Comply With New EU Regulation, by Chance Miller, 9to5Mac

Joswiak said that the EU lawmakers and Apple have “been in this little bit of a disagreement” about the idea of a common charger regulation. He noted that despite the fact that the EU has good intentions, it’s a tricky thing to regulate. In particular, he points out that the EU lawmakers once tried to standardize on the now-outdated micro-USB connector.

Craig Federighi And Greg Joswiak Discuss USB-C On iPhone, iMessage On Android, Lack Of iPadOS Calculator App, Pace Of Innovation, And More, by Sami Fathi, MacRumors

“If we’re going to enter a market and go down the road of building an application, we have to be in it in a way that’s going to make a difference, that we’ll have a lot of customers, and have a great experience,” Federighi said.

“If we just shipped an app that really didn’t get critical mass on other platforms, what it would have accompanied is it would have held us back in innovating in all the ways we want to innovate in messages for our customers and wouldn’t have accomplished much at all in any other way,” Federighi explained. iMessage on Android seemed like a “throw-away” that “was not going to serve the world,” he concluded.

On App Stores

Developers Complain About Gambling Ads Appearing In Their App Store Listings, by Joe Rossignol, MacRumors

“Now my app’s product page shows gambling ads, which I’m really not OK with,” tweeted Arment. “Apple shouldn’t be OK with it, either.”

As noted by Arment, Apple provides advertisers with the choice to have their ad shown in app categories different than their own app’s category, allowing ads for gambling ads to appear in listings for unrelated apps like the podcast app Overcast.

Apple’s New App Store Tax On Ads Is A Direct Shot At Meta, by Alex Heath, The Verge

On Monday, Apple quietly updated its App Store rules to require that iOS developers use in-app purchases — and thereby give Apple 30 percent — on “sales of ‘boosts’ for posts in a social media app.” This primarily affects Facebook and Instagram, which let people pay to boost the reach of their posts. It’s the first time Apple has directly taxed advertising in iOS apps.

Spotify Says Apple Is “Choking Competition” And Ruining Its Audiobook Store, by Emma Roth, The Verge

Spotify says Apple’s rules make the process of buying an audiobook on Spotify “far too complicated and confusing,” adding that Apple changes its “rules arbitrarily, making them impossible to interpret.” [...]

As outlined in a webpage Spotify specifically made to support its cause, the company says Apple rejected its proposed audiobook purchasing process three times because it went against the App Store’s policies. To comply with Apple’s rules, Spotify hides the price of its audiobooks and doesn’t let users buy content in the app. Instead, you select the book you want to buy and Spotify then emails you a link to check out on the web.

Coming Soon

iOS 16.2 Lets Users Report To Apple When Emergency SOS Is Unintentionally Triggered, by Filipe Espósito, 9to5Mac

iOS 16.2 beta now asks users for feedback when they cancel Emergency SOS mode. The system shows a notification that opens the Feedback Assistant to send Apple data about what happened at that moment.

Apple To Let Users Keep Live Activities Updated More Frequently With iOS 16.2, by Filipe Espósito, 9to5Mac

Code seen by 9to5Mac confirms that when this option is enabled, Live Activities (and consequently Dynamic Island interactions) will request updates at shorter intervals to show “more real time information.”

iPadOS 16.2 Beta Adds Support For Using Stage Manager With External Displays On M1 And M2 iPads, by Juli Clover, MacRumors

With the new beta of iPadOS 16.2 provided to developers today, Apple has re-enabled external display support on iPads that have an M1 or M2 chip.

Stuff

Apple Updates iWork Apps With New Collaboration Features, iPadOS 16 Enhancements, More, by Chance Miller, 9to5Mac

The company is out with extensive updates to Pages, Numbers, and Keynote today with new features for collaboration, optimizations for iPadOS 16 and macOS Ventura, and more.

New Final Cut Pro Update Delivers Faster Video Exports On Apple Silicon Macs, by Andrew Orr, AppleInsider

Just before the annual Final Cut Pro Global Summit starts in November, Apple has updated its flagship video editor, plus iMovie with macOS Ventura compatibility, stability fixes, and performance improvements.

Notes

Passkeys—Microsoft, Apple, And Google’s Password Killer—are Finally Here, by Dan Goodin, Ars Technica

For years, Big Tech has insisted that the death of the password is right around the corner. For years, those assurances have been little more than empty promises. The password alternatives—such as pushes, OAUTH single-sign ons, and trusted platform modules—introduced as many usability and security problems as they solved. But now, we’re finally on the cusp of a password alternative that’s actually going to work.

The new alternative is known as passkeys. Generically, passkeys refer to various schemes for storing authenticating information in hardware, a concept that has existed for more than a decade. What’s different now is that Microsoft, Apple, Google, and a consortium of other companies have unified around a single passkey standard shepherded by the FIDO Alliance. Not only are passkeys easier for most people to use than passwords; they are also completely resistant to credential phishing, credential stuffing, and similar account-take-over attacks.

The Days Of Cheap Music Streaming May Be Numbered, by Ariel Shapiro, The Verge

Between inflation and the licensing fees, it seems inevitable.

Spotify Is Considering Raising U.S. Subscription Prices, CEO Daniel Ek Says, Following Apple And YouTube, by Jem Aswad, Variety

During Spotify’s third-quarter earnings call on Tuesday, co-founder and CEO Daniel Ek said the company is considering one as well.

“When our competitors are raising their prices, that is really good for us,” he said, noting that the company has raised prices more than 40 times in markets around the world.

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I wish the iPhone lock screen customization stuff makes it to the iPadOS too, because I don't like the clock's font that Apple has chosen for me.

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Thanks for reading.