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The Answer-Is-Yes Edition Wednesday, April 9, 2025

Rooms At The Top: How This ADA-winning Team Built A Title That Defies Description, by Apple

Ask Jason Toff whether his Apple Design Award winner is a game or an app, and his answer is yes.

“There’s no one-sentence description for Rooms, and that can be a blessing,” laughs Toff, CEO and head designer of Things, Inc. “It’s not entirely a game, and it’s not entirely a tool. It’s more like a toy.”

Next-gen CarPlay Is The Broken Apple Promise That Foreshadowed The Siri Fiasco, by Jason Cross, Macworld

When 2024 came and went without even a hint of next-gen CarPlay coming to market, we could have realized that Apple has started to engage in that most un-Apple practice of promoting stuff while it is still early in development.

Stuff

Apple Arcade Adds Five New Games Soon, Here’s What’s Coming, by Ryan Christoffel, 9to5Mac

Apple just announced a line-up of five new games coming to Apple Arcade in the coming weeks, including WHAT THE CLASH?, a new party game from the team behind WHAT THE GOLF? and WHAT THE CAR?. Here’s what’s coming.

Fresh Off ‘Severance’ Success, But Amid Tariff Turmoil, Apple Offers Rare TV+ Discount, by Alex Weprin, Hollywood Reporter

The company says that beginning today it will offer three months of Apple TV+ to both new and returning customers for $2.99 per month, a discount from the $9.99 standard price, and a substantially better deal than the free seven-day trial it currently offers (Apple does give some buyers of its Macs and iPhones three free months).

Eye-Catching Mood.Camera iPhone App Adds A Powerful Preset Editor, by Jeremy Gray, PetaPixel

iPhone camera app Mood.Camera released last year, promising a point-and-shoot style camera experience and an incredibly convincing filmic look to photos. Mood.Camera version 1.7 launched today, adding an advanced Preset Editor that enables mobile photographers to create their own film emulations easily.

Notes

Top EU Official Downplays Expectations Over Apple, Meta Digital Fines, by Francesca Micheletti and Jacob Parry, Politico

The chief of the European Commission’s competition directorate downplayed expectations over the size of the fines that the EU executive is set to hand down to Apple and Meta for infringing the bloc’s digital antitrust rules.

Enforcing the bloc's Digital Markets Act (DMA), which lays out rules for how tech companies should operate on the European market, is not about fines but about compliance, DG COMP’s Director General Olivier Guersent told an evening event hosted by the Global Competition Law Centre in Brussels on Monday.

A 'US-Made iPhone' Is Pure Fantasy, by Jason Koebler, 404 Media

The truth is that, assembled in the U.S. or not, the iPhone is a truly international device that is full of components manufactured all over the world and materials mined from dozens of different countries. Apple has what is among the most complex supply chains that has ever been designed in human history, and it is not going to be able to completely change that supply chain anytime soon.

Even Streaming Services Might Be Hurt By Trump’s Tariffs, by Angela Watercutter, Wired

Since some of the biggest industries being hit by tariffs—like automakers—are also big advertisers, the amount those companies spend on ads could slip.

“With streaming platform operators increasingly turning to ad-supported tiers to bolster profitability—rather than just rolling out price increases—this strategy could be put at risk,” says Matthew Bailey, who analyzes advertising for Omdia. “Against this backdrop, I wouldn’t be surprised if we do see some price increases for some streaming services over the coming months.”

Bottom of the Page

I wonder what time Mr Tim Cook wakes up and start work nowadays.

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Thanks for reading.