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The competition against Clubhouse has been increasing as multiple social networks have recently announced their own live audio platforms. Meanwhile, Clubhouse is today introducing a new feature called “Clubhouse Payments” that lets users support content creators by sending them money. The announcement was made today by Clubhouse in a blog post. According to the company, Clubhouse Payments aims to “help creators build community” on the app since it lacked a way to monetize content there....

Libby, a popular ebook and audiobook iOS app that works with 90% of public libraries in North America has been updated today with support for CarPlay. Libby announced the news in a press release: The app’s CarPlay integration for rented audiobooks through supported libraries features the ability to change playback speed, skip forward and back, as well as pause. Libby is a free download from the App Store. Learn more about Libby here....

Carrot Weather has seen some great updates over the years, particularly with some sharp widgets alongside iOS 14 last year. But today’s 5.0 update is next level for the highly popular weather app. Carrot Weather now features a fresh vertical layout, all-new icons built from scratch, a slick “Interface Maker” to customize the app exactly how you want, new “Cards” UI element, and the app has now gone free to download with in-app purchases to unlock all the premium features....

Hyper, the company behind many battery packs, Wi-Fi enabled storage solutions, and external MacBook battery packs, is today launching another unique battery solution that caught our eye. The new HyperJuice Expand is a three USB port battery pack that will let you charge up to two iPads and an iPhone at once, but the really interesting part is the new patented solution for magnetically attached battery packs of various sizes. Hyper is selling a head unit with three usb ports for $20, and then various battery sizes that attach magnetically to the head....

After a Chinese state-run TV channel last month described the iPhone as a “national security concern” (a claim Apple denied), Bloomberg reports that the Chinese government has stepped up its war on Apple by removing the company’s products from its procurement lists. Ten Apple products — including the iPad, iPad Mini, MacBook Air and MacBook Pro — were omitted from a final government procurement list distributed in July, according to officials who read it and asked not to be identified because the information isn’t public....

Retailers and analysts say that it’s not just price that has driven disappointing iPhone sales in China: consumers are also switching to Chinese smartphone brands because they feel some features are better. Apple last year saw its market share of the $500-800 segment in China plunge from 81.2% to 54.6% … The most obvious reason for that is, of course, price. The iPhone X was the first iPhone to break the $1000 barrier, taking Apple out of the accepted $500-800 premium price bracket in the country and into a whole new luxury band, reports Reuters....

San Francisco accidentally made it illegal for city employees to use iPhones with Face ID after it banned the use of face recognition technology in May. The city had to amend the law last week to make iPhones legal to use. San Francisco isn’t the only city to have discovered this issue with bans intended to outlaw the indiscriminate use of face recognition on the street for public and corporate surveillance…...

A premiere date has been set for season 2 of Caste Rock, the Hulu anthology based on the works of Stephen King. Premiering in 2018, the series takes its name from one of the locations which have recurred throughout King’s prolific career: the town of Castle Rock, which is featured in Cujo and several other notable titles from the master of horror. The story of season 1 followed Henry, a death row attorney that returns home after a mysterious prisoner specifically requests his services....

Musk made his audio debut on Clubhouse in January, answering a series of questions, predominantly about softball, and shared his views on topics such as space travel, colonies on Mars, crypto, AI, and Covid-19 vaccines. He then interviewed Vlad Tenev, CEO of Robinhood, about what had happened during the last week with the Wall Street Bets debacle. Musk’s chat resulted in more than 5,000 people concurrently in the room, breaking the Clubhouse listening number cap....

Apple showed off a number of its own apps at last week’s iPhone 6 event to illustrate how the larger display phones can show content in new ways, specifically using the iPad-like two-column view in landscape mode. Apple also encouraged developers to update their own apps to take advantage of the 4.7-inch and 5.5-inch displays rather than relying on system scaling to blow up content made for 4-inch displays, and CNN’s news app for iPhone was the shining example of what third-party app makers can do....

Apple’s CarPlay infotainment feature in cars is available in more places than ever today, but it’s not a standard in every make and model yet. Read on for a roundup of some of the latest new cars to offer CarPlay. First up is Mini Australia which shared this summer that it’s bringing Wireless CarPlay to 2018 ‘LCI’ Hatch and Convertible models. BMW was first to offer Wireless CarPlay in the US through its iDrive system (which includes its Mini brand), and CarAdvice calls this a first for Australia:...

Cats director Tom Hooper says the movie’s CGI and visuals have evolved since the backlash to its original trailer. In the decades following its arrival in 1981, Andrew Lloyd Webber’s Cats stage musical has gone on to become one of the most popular Broadway shows ever produced. It’s also known for being pretty out-there, even by Broadway standards, between its slim plot (a Christ allegory, basically) and humanoid cat characters. But as charmingly whimsical as many find the musical to be, it begs the question: how do you translate it to the big screen?...

WeChat, or 微信 (Weixin) as it’s known inside China, dominates people’s digital lives in China in a way that no app does in the United States. It’s WhatsApp, Facebook’s news feed, Venmo, Uber, Tinder, and a gaming platform all rolled up into one. And even that hardly scratches the surface. Now Tencent, the behemoth that owns WeChat, is adding one more function to the latest version of the app for iOS — stickers....

China Unicom and China Telecom announced today that they will start selling the iPad Air 2 and iPad mini 3 to customers starting March 27. This is the first time the carriers, two of the top three largest in the country, will offer customers in China the Wi-Fi + Cellular models of Apple’s latest generation tablets. Both China Unicom and China Telecom released press releases today to announce the news....

UK act Coldplay seems set to smash US iTunes album sales records this week. Hits Magazine suggests the band’s new album, Viva La Vida, sold over 275,000 copies in the US in the most recent week, overtaking the previous record held by Jack Johnson. The album also sold in excess of 700,000 copies in US retailers. Apple has been engaged in a Coldplay-focused iTunes campaign, which has helped raise the profile of the Chris Martin-fronted act....

I’ve said more than once that I’m relaxed about Apple’s decision to fit only USB-C ports in the new MacBook Pro. I’d rather have to pay for two adapters and one cable now than be stuck with outdated ports for most of the 4-5 years I expect to keep the machine. But I discovered that Apple did have one more hidden extra cost in store for 2016 MacBook Pro buyers: the $69 (13-inch model) or $79 (15-inch model) power adapter the company sells as an accessory doesn’t include the USB-C cable you need to actually, you know, use it …...

A search warrant issued on behalf of Homeland Security Investigations provides a glimpse into how Apple detects and reports child abuse images uploaded to iCloud or sent via its email servers, while protecting the privacy of innocent customers. The first stage of detection is automated, using a system common to most tech companies… For each child abuse image already detected by authorities, a “hash” is created. This is effectively a digital signature for that image, and tech companies can have their systems automatically search for images that match this hash....

Netflix’s The Chilling Adventures of Sabrina season 2 ends up with our heroine finally defeating the Dark Lord at a terrible cost, and a new dawn coming to the Church of Night. Here, we’ll break down the big reveals of the season’s final episode, and what they mean for the future of the show. The second season of The Chilling Adventures of Sabrina is as dark and violent as the first, but remains buoyed by Sabrina’s strong circle and family and friends - both mortal and magical....

We may be getting closer to seeing the first Chinese OLED iPhone displays. China’s biggest display maker, BOE, has been chasing Apple’s OLED business for some time but hasn’t yet met the Cupertino company’s quality standards. However, the company now appears confident that it will do so … ETNews reports that the company is investing in OLED production lines intended to be used exclusively for iPhone displays. The company first made the offer to Apple way back in 2017....

The first trailer for MGM and Orion Pictures’ upcoming Child’s Play reboot could potentially debut next week. The film is set to arrive in theaters this summer, and while two teaser posters have been released to build excitement, fans have been waiting for a glimpse at the new film, as this will be Chucky’s first appearance on the big screen since 2004’s Seed of Chucky. Despite the reboot, original franchise creator Don Mancini is still continuing his vision of the pint-sized killer doll on cable television - separate from the movie....