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The Reading-or-Browsing Edition Wednesday, October 23, 2024

Hands-on With The 2024 iPad Mini: Spot The Differences, by Samuel Axon, Ars Technica

There are a lot of things I like about the iPad mini. It’s comfortable to hold, making it ideal among Apple’s tablets for reading or browsing the web. Typing on it while holding it in landscape mode feels ideal for me, though your mileage may vary, as hand sizes, of course, vary.

It lacks the power of the otherwise similar iPad Air, and it certainly can’t pack the same punch as the beefy iPad Pro. But it’s enough for most passive consumption use. As we noted in our 2021 iPad Air review, you probably wouldn’t want to try to do heavy work on a screen this small anyway.

Review: Apple iPad Mini (A17 Pro, 2024), by Brenda Stolyar, Wired

iPad Mini owners bemoaned that one side of the screen refreshed slower than the other when scrolling up and down on the display. I didn't experience this with my Mini, but Apple did make it a point to optimize the LCD in the latest model to alleviate this issue. Apple was tight-lipped on exactly what it changed, but for what it's worth, I once again have yet to see any problems on my test unit.

Apple iPad Mini 2024 Review: Missing Pieces, by David Pierce, The Verge

The whole pitch for the new Mini, aside from the fact that it’s the iPad Mini, is that it’s the smallest iPad made for Apple Intelligence. Apple Intelligence better be a hell of an upgrade because, without it, the new Mini isn’t much of an upgrade at all.

Stuff

iCloud Drive Review: The Cloud Storage Service All Apple Users Can Access, by Lloyd Coombes and Karen Haslam, Macworld

What better way to access your Mac, iPhone and iPad files via the cloud than Apple’s own iCloud platform? Despite some minor inconveniences, it has a lot to offer and is well worth a look.

Apple Releases New AirPods Pro, AirPods, And AirPods Max Firmware, by Juli Clover, MacRumors

Apple today released a new firmware update for the original AirPods Pro, the AirPods 2, the AirPods 3, and the Lightning version of the AirPods Max headphones. The new firmware is version 6F21, up from the prior 6A326 firmware that these devices were previously running.

Farewell To Foursquare's App, by Sarah Perez, TechCrunch

“I would be lying if I didn’t admit that I have been in a real funk these last few days over this news,” writes Foursquare founder Dennis Crowley, speaking about the company’s plan to sunset the Foursquare City Guides app later this year in favor of focusing on its check-in app Swarm. The move reverses Foursquare’s ambitious 2014 decision to split up its app into two different properties: one for exploration and discovery and the other, Swarm, for sharing your location to find nearby friends.

The Foursquare app’s closure, scheduled for December 15 of this year, isn’t surprising. It’s been a long time since Foursquare was talked about in the same breath as other social networks. When Foursquare launched, people were competing to become the “mayor” of their favorite venue and were less concerned about the safety issues of sharing their real-time location online.

Notes

Apple CEO Tim Cook Meets China's IT Minister During Beijing Visit, Ministry Says, by Casey Hall and Joe Cash, Reuters

Apple CEO Tim Cook met on Wednesday with China's Minister for Industry and Information Technology Jin Zhuanglong during a visit to Beijing this week, the ministry said in a statement.

During the meeting, Jin told Cook that he hoped Apple would continue to deepen its presence in China, increase investment in innovation, grow with Chinese companies and share the dividends of high-quality development, the statement showed.

Advertisers And Publishers Call On Apple CEO Tim Cook To Suspend The iPhone's New Distraction Control Feature, by Lara O'Reilly, Business Insider

In the letter, the groups raise concerns that users could hide websites' consent management platforms — the tech that powers cookie consent pop-ups — which could put site owners at risk of noncompliance with Europe's General Data Protection Regulation.

This could also hamper publisher revenue, they say in the letter. European media companies are increasingly asking users to consent to being served personalized advertising — which is generally more lucrative than non-targeted ads — or else pay to access their content.

Bottom of the Page

It seems to me that this new iPad mini is a good iPad, except that for many people, there's probably a different iPad or iPhone that is more suitable to what they priortise. Even if the smallest iPad is what I want, I will still face the question: maybe I should just get a big iPhone?

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Thanks for reading.