The Independent Articles

Apple has revealed the iPhone 12 Pro, the premium version of its new handsets.In addition to the features found on the normal iPhone 12, the Pro models comes in a range of more expensive finishes. It also has a vastly improved camera, keeping the three lens system found in last year’s Pro models.The pricing of the new phones costs the same. The normal Pro will start at $999, and the Max will cost $1,099.They will be available for pre-order on 16 October, and go on sale a week later, on 23 October.Together with the two versions of the cheaper handset, and the two sizes of Pro, Apple unveiled four new handsets during its “Hi, Speed” event, more than ever before.Read moreThe design of the phone also means that it can introduce the largest display ever in an iPhone. The iPhone 12 Pro Max has a screen size of 6.7-inches – 0.2-inches bigger than the iPhone 11 Pro Max – while keeping much the same design, Apple said.The new finishes found on the iPhone include a new “pacific blue”, in addition to the silver, “graphite” and gold that have been found on existing handsets, Apple said.

The information confirms rumours that Apple is preparing four versions of the phone, in three different sizes: the smallest iPhone Mini; the equally-sized iPhone 12 and iPhone 12 Pro; and the iPhone 12 Pro Max, which will be the biggest handset Apple has ever made.The images were revealed by leaker Evan Blass, who has had a strong track record of announcing information about phones before its official release in the past. They appeared to come from official Apple renders, suggesting they are a reliable indication of how the phones will actually look.The images also seem to confirm existing rumours that the new phones will come in an array of colours, including a new, dark blue. That seems to replace the “midnight green” that was first introduced with last year’s iPhone 11 Pro.The images of the iPhone 12 Pro also seem to confirm the inclusion of the LiDAR camera that has been rumoured to be coming to the new line-up. That tool – which is visible in the images as a dark circle underneath the right-hand camera lens – has already arrived on the iPad Pro, where it enables more precise depth tracking for better augmented reality experiences.Because the leaked images only show the front and rear of the phone, they actually obscure what is rumoured to be the biggest external design change on the iPhone: squared rather than curved edges on the sides, to bring it more in line with the iPad Pro.Mr Blass also revealed what appeared to be official images of the widely rumoured HomePod Mini. It includes a much larger display on the top, and a more squat and round body, which will presumably also be much smaller than the larger and existing HomePod.

Apple has announced 5G iPhones, the first time it has ever integrated the new network technology.Proponents claim the 5G technology will be both far quicker and more reliable than the existing 4G technology.Tim Cook, Apple’s chief executive, insisted that the company had worked with network carriers to ensure that the network technology would actually work as promised.He claimed that the technology represented a “step change” that would fundamentally alter the way the iPhone works.Read moreHans Vestberg, Verizon chief executive, appeared during the live-streamed event to promise that the network would roll out 5G connections across the country and with particular performance focused on busy areas such as stadiums. “We can finally say ‘5G just got real’,” he said during the event.

Apple has revealed four versions of its new iPhone 12, running from the tiny Mini to the very large and premium Pro Max.Pricing will remain the same for the new handsets as it was for the old ones. The iPhone 12 Mini will start at $699 while the iPhone 12 Pro will start at $999, with an upgrade to the larger version of each costing $100.But the relative simplicity and consistency with the pricing is offset by a staggered release schedule that will mean some of the phones will not arrive until November.It is the unusual sized versions of the phones that will be delayed, Apple said during the event, with the standard versions of each coming relatively soon.Both the larger iPhone 12 and the smaller iPhone 12 Pro will open for pre-order on Friday, 16 October. They will then go on sale on Friday, 23 October.Read moreAnyone wanting the smaller iPhone 12 Mini and the bigger iPhone 12 Pro Max will have to wait. Those models will open for pre-orders on Friday, 6 November, and then go on sale on Friday, 13 November.Those phones together represent the smallest iPhone display of recent years and the biggest iPhone ever, though it is not clear whether the unusual size or design has led to the delay in availability.Apple had already been forced to delay the unveiling of the new iPhones by a month, apparently because of coronavirus lockdowns. The company would normally be expected to hold its unveiling event in mid-September, but announced over summer that problems had led that event to be delayed “by a few weeks”.The delays in the release of the new phone are also likely to be a result of the global pandemic. Reports have suggested that Apple had trouble both transporting engineers to manufacturing plants to oversee the creation of the new iPhones as well as shipping the phones themselves.It is not the first time that Apple has undertaken a staggered release for new iPhones. When Apple revealed the iPhone 8 and iPhone X – the last time it undertake a major redesign of its handsets – the more innovative and expensive model was delayed for around six weeks.

Apple has launched the HomePod Mini, a smaller and cheaper version of its Siri-powered speaker.It follows the HomePod, which was first announced in 2017. When that speaker was introduced, it focused on sound and was more expensive than competitors like the Amazon Echo or Google Home – but as a result did not seem to sell as well.Now HomePod Mini puts some of that same technology into a more compact and rounded design, which Apple insisted still has the same high-quality audio hardware.The HomePod Mini costs just $99 – compared with $299 for the full-sized one. It will open for pre-orders on November 6, and will ship on 17 November.Apple noted that the release of the speaker and its associated smart home features came as people were spending more time in their house than ever before. It also stressed its privacy features, such as the fact that Siri recordings are not associated with an individual user.Read moreThe speaker also comes alongside the release of new iPhone features, which allow people to it near their HomePod and receive a notification that will allow them to quickly handoff anything they are listening to.The built-in Siri capabilities also mean that the HomePod Mini can pull information from the phone, too, allowing it to read out messages, for instance.Multiple HomePod Minis can be placed around the house, and will work together continuously, Apple said.Numerous users can also use the HomePod Mini, which will recognise its users’ various voices and read out the relevant information, Apple said.

Facebook says it will finally ban anti-vax ads.But it will still allow ads that push against governments policies that promote vaccines, it said.The decision comes amid increasing concern about the movement’s dangers for public health, as well as worries that Facebook is helping promote such posts.Facebook noted that there almost certainly will not be any approved or publicly available Covid-19 vaccine for some time, but that the coronavirus outbreak meant that other public health measures – including the flu shot – are even more important than normal.In that context, it said it would ban ads everywhere “that discourage people from getting a vaccine”. It will also launch a “new flu vaccine information campaign on Facebook” and work with “global health partners on campaigns to increase immunisation rates”.Read moreFacebook noted that it had already banned vaccine hoaxes that are identified by health organisations such as the World Health Organization (WHO) and the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).But it will now ban any ad that “explicitly discourages someone from getting a vaccine”. That policy will go into effect over the next few days, it said.

Facebook has announced an update to its Messenger app, giving it a new logo, more chat themes, and custom reactions.The update focuses on aesthetics; the Messenger app now has a purple-red gradient logo rather than the previous blue and white one, and Facebook is also bringing ‘love’ and ‘tie-dye’ themes to the platform.Custom reactions, including a fire emoji, pizza, a party horn, the ‘100’ sign, and a unicorn are also being rolled out.The social media giant’s latest look “reflects a shift to the future of messaging, a more dynamic, fun, and integrated way to stay connected to the people you’re close to”, the company wrote in a blog post.It also comes as Facebook is integrating its Messenger and Instagram services.Read moreUsers on one platform will now be able to message users on the other; people can control where they receive messages and calls – in their chats, through message requests, or disable the feature entirely. Instagram messages will receive multiple features already available to Messenger users, including a ‘vanish mode’ where messages will disappear after sending, similar to Snapchat, personalising messages with colours, and quick-forwarding.The integration will be rolled out to “most users in North America soon”, the company says.Facebook is also making its other services more tightly-linked, such as its main social media app and its Oculus virtual reality products.Existing users will be offered the option to merge their current Oculus account with their Facebook one. Full functionality of the Oculus headset will be inherently tied to a Facebook account from 2023.

More than a year after smartphone giants Huawei and Samsung launched their first 5G phones, Apple is set to unveil its first 5G iPhone.The predecessor of 5G proved to be an era-defining technology. Launched shortly after the first iPhone, 4G transformed Apple’s first smartphone into the industry leader and paved the way for a decade of new apps, services and innovation.5G promises to be orders of magnitude faster than 4G, but exactly what this speed will be used for is still unclear.UK networks began switching on 5G in 2019 but only on a very limited scale. Coverage maps show that large parts of the UK still don’t even have 4G, and areas with 5G tend to be limited to densely-populated urban areas.
In comparison with previous generations of data connections, 5G signals project over a smaller range, and so more masts are required to cover the same area. That has slowed the rollout and meant that coverage spots are much smaller than may be expected.
Read moreIn the UK and elsewhere, delivering 5G has also been complicated by questions over the infrastructure required to make it work. Arguments over whether Chinese firm Huawei should be allowed to build the masts and other equipment required to broadcast 5G networks have slowed the rollout and led to widespread and sometimes confusing arguments in the media and among politicians.

More than a year after smartphone giants Huawei and Samsung launched their first 5G phones, Apple is set to unveil its first 5G iPhone.The predecessor of 5G proved to be an era-defining technology. Launched shortly after the first iPhone, 4G transformed Apple’s first smartphone into the industry leader and paved the way for a decade of new apps, services and innovation.5G promises to be orders of magnitude faster than 4G, but exactly what this speed will be used for is still unclear.UK networks began switching on 5G in 2019 but only on a very limited scale. Coverage maps show that large parts of the UK still don’t even have 4G, and areas with 5G tend to be limited to densely-populated urban areas.
In comparison with previous generations of data connections, 5G signals project over a smaller range, and so more masts are required to cover the same area. That has slowed the rollout and meant that coverage spots are much smaller than may be expected.
Read moreIn the UK and elsewhere, delivering 5G has also been complicated by questions over the infrastructure required to make it work. Arguments over whether Chinese firm Huawei should be allowed to build the masts and other equipment required to broadcast 5G networks have slowed the rollout and led to widespread and sometimes confusing arguments in the media and among politicians.

A remote Native American tribe is among the first users of Elon Musk’s Starlink space internet project after it connected to SpaceX’s constellation of satellites.The Hoh Tribe in Washington State said Starlink’s high-speed broadband enabled remote learning and telehealth appointments during the coronavirus pandemic for the first time. “We’re very remote. The last eight years I felt like we’ve been paddling up river with a spoon and almost getting nowhere with getting internet to the reservation,” said Melvinjohn Ashue, vice chairman of the Hoh Tribe.“It seemed like out of nowhere, SpaceX came up and just catapulted us into the 21st century.”There are currently around 800 Starlink satellites in low-Earth orbit, offering internet connectivity to northern areas of the US and Canada. SpaceX eventually plans to launch tens of thousands more satellites to provide “near global coverage of the populated world by 2021”.Watch moreThe Hoh Tribe were introduced to Starlink through the Washington State Department of Commerce, which sits within the current reach of the Starlink network.It is one of several early testers of Starlink , with emergency responders in Washington State also recently using the network to set up a WiFi hotspot for residents of Malden after 80 per cent of the town was destroyed by wildfires.The Hoh Tribe revealed that internet speeds prior to  Starlink ranged from between 0.3 and 0.7 megabits per second (Mbps) – a long way off the 100Mbps advertised by SpaceX.Responding to a tweet from the Hoh Tribe, SpaceX CEO Elon Musk said: “You’re most welcome.”SpaceX has received criticism from astronomers for disruption caused by trails of Starlink satellites crossing the night’s sky.The satellites are launched in batches of 60, creating long strings of bright lights that have prompted UFO reports after several of the launches.