A Right to Disconnect law introduced by a Californian lawmaker aims to end the tyranny of employers who expect their staff to respond 24/7 to emails, Slack alerts, text messages, and other out-of-hours notifications.

It mirrors similar laws already passed in several European countries …

Spotify is cranking up the volume, err, subscription price, for the second time in a year. Whether it’s to cover the increased cost of licensing music or to fund future complaints against Apple, Spotify will start charging subscribers $1 to $2 more per month, depending on their plan.

Sponsored by Kolide: If a device isn’t secure, it can’t access your apps. It’s device trust for Okta. Visit kolide.com/appleatwork to learn more and watch a demo.

Two things are being discussed by every CIO, CEO, and board in 2024: security threats and the impact of AI. Today, companies are caught between a rock and a hard place, grappling with the need to safeguard their operations without hampering their ability to get things done and stay ahead of the competition. This clash between security measures and the pursuit of productivity is nothing new. Still, it’s become more pressing than ever, thanks to increased cyber threats and the rapid growth of generative AI.

The biggest earthquake to hit Taiwan in 25 years has killed at least four people, with TSMC plants evacuated as a safety precaution.

Apple’s chipmaker is still assessing the impact on production; even the slightest vibration can result in entire batches of chips being destroyed …

We’ve already seen at least two examples of a Vision Pro headset assisting with surgery, and another first has now been notched up in Florida.

Vision Pro was used to provide “touch-free access to the surgical setup, inventory, and procedural guides from within the sterile field of the operating room” during a shoulder replacement – specifically, a reverse one …

Installing a third-party app store is now possible for iPhone owners in the EU – but it’s not exactly a quick-and-easy process.

It seems a safe bet that this is a deliberate move on Apple’s part to deter people from doing it – something which is likely to land the company in court on antitrust charges …

Green energy pioneer BLUETTI has a brand new portable solution that’s ready to power your adventures on land, water, and anything in between. Here’s what you get with the mobile, yet powerful new weatherproof BLUETTI AC240. Plus 9to5Mac readers can get an extra $100 off the already generous early bird launch pricing.

Apple released iOS 17.5 beta 1 to developers today, after a month-long gap with zero beta releases. While iOS 17.5 beta 1 is a relatively minor update, there are a few things worth pointing out. Head below for more.

Apple last year announced a partnership with Google to work on a new “industry specification to address unwanted tracking” after many concerns about stalkers using accessories like to silently track people. Now it seems that Apple is planning to launch these new anti-stalking features with iOS 17.5.

As Apple is expected to introduce new iPad Pro and iPad Air models soon, we’ve also heard rumors about the company working on new accessories for its tablets. 9to5Mac has now found evidence that corroborates the development of a new Apple Pencil 3 – and that it will feature a new “squeeze” gesture.

Apple is rolling out a new firmware version for AirPods Max users today. The update is the first firmware release for AirPods Max users since the end of January, but don’t expect any major changes.

Listen to a recap of the top stories of the day from 9to5Mac. 9to5Mac Daily is available on iTunes and Apple’s Podcasts app, Stitcher, TuneIn, Google Play, or through our dedicated RSS feed for Overcast and other podcast players.

Sponsored by Capital One Shopping: Capital One Shopping users saved over $800 million in the past year. Get automatic free coupons at over 100+ stores.

Update: We’re told May 2 is the release date for Beats Solo4 headphones. Early May sounds busy. No word on when this guy makes a come back.

It’s been a few days since Apple announced new Beats Solo headphones. 2,764 days and counting to be exact. The day counter is clearly about to reset, however, as more and more signs point to Beats Solo4 hardware launching soon.

The clearest sign yet? 9to5Mac has exclusively received the full rundown on Beats Solo4 specs from trusted sources. The TL;DR is this: Beats is about to deliver a big upgrade to the on-ear headphones for the same price as their predecessors from 2016. That translates to a great value in 2024 dollars, plus they’re USB-C. Here’s what we’re told to expect from Beats Solo4 headphones…

Update: Public beta versions are starting to roll in. Have fun!

Miss living on beta? All aboard the iOS 17.5 beta train. After a few too many weeks with no developer beta, Apple has released the first iOS 17.5 beta for testing. The full list of beta releases today includes Apple’s other platforms as well:

• iOS 17.5
• macOS Sonoma 14.5
• visionOS 1.1
• watchOS 10.5
• tvOS 17.5
• HomePod 17.5

Enjoy the fresh beta bits, and let us know what you find!

It feels like just yesterday when Apple continued to sell 2017’s Apple Watch Series 3 despite it not receiving an already announced watchOS update. Fortunately, Apple hasn’t repeated that mistake again. Instead, we’re merely looking at the successor to that Apple Watch potentially missing support for the next major watchOS release.

In February, images of unreleased Beats Solo 4 headphones were revealed thanks to the iOS 17.4 beta. Now, the Beats Solo 4 have popped up in the FCC’s database, signaling that a launch is imminent. They’ll mark the first update to the Beats Solo line in eight years…

Nothing makes me feel more like Zion Williamson than shooting hoops at the arcade. And while I’d love to take arcade basketball home with me, I’m not sure that’s the best investment. Fortunately, Apple Vision Pro has quickly become the best way to turn any space into an arcade basketball arena.

Higher-end Apple Watch Series 9 models are headlining today’s best deals. You can save $257 on stainless steel styles alongside iPad mini 6 from $400. Plus, Anker’s new 15W Qi2 Magnetic Charger sees its first discount down to $20. Hit the jump for all that and more in the latest 9to5Toys Lunch Break.

Apple is rolling out notable updates to its suite of iWork applications today. New versions of Pages, Numbers, and Keynote are now available with new iPad optimizations, improved collaboration, and more. Head below for the full release notes.

Update: MacRumors has updated its piece with this: “We’ve received information from several sources indicating that the image is fake.”

Apple Vision Pro’s greatest contribution to humankind in year one may just be inspiring the iOS 18 redesign everyone wants. Our friends at MacRumors have published what they describe as an “iPhone frame template from an anonymous source who claims they obtained it from an iOS engineer.” It could be nothing, or it could be the first glimpse at a return to realism in iPhone software design.

The final Anker Qi2 releases that were first shown off at CES 2024 are beginning to ship. We’ve seen a handful of the company’s new 15W chargers already debut, but today, the brand’s new 3-in-1 charging stands hit store shelves, complete with 15W magnetic power pads and Apple Watch fast charging.

on Tuesday announced a new special edition of its Beats Fit Pro wireless earbuds. In partnership with Alo Yoga, the new Beats “Alo Special Edition” will be available later this week with an exclusive new finish to celebrate the partnership between the two companies.

Google Maps is perhaps one of the most widely used applications on the planet and, as such, even minor changes to its design are super important. But, on Apple’s CarPlay, Google Maps is in need of a massive overhaul, because it’s a bit of a dumpster fire.

Apple has announced that beta spatial Persona support is coming to Apple Vision Pro starting later today. The feature expands on the existing Persona feature of Vision Pro, but with an even more human-like experience.

Spatial Personas allow Vision Pro users to “break out of the familiar FaceTime tile and feel more present, like they are gathered in the same physical space.”

A remark by EU competition head Margrethe Vestager has suggested that Apple may be required to let iPhone owners delete the Photos app.

While this possibility hasn’t previously been raised, Vestager mentioned in a brief speech that this was one of the things Apple had failed to do in its DMA response – and it would obviously involve a massive change to the way iOS works …

A potential new Apple Watch emergency SOS feature described in a new patent application could help save some swimmers from drowning.

The patent describes how the Watch could detect “irregular behaviour” and automatically transmit a call for help …

Jon Stewart interviewed Federal Trade Commission (FTC) head Lina Khan yesterday, saying that he’d wanted to do it while his show was hosted on Apple TV+, but the company wouldn’t allow it.

The revelation comes after one of the (many and varied!) complaints in the DOJ’s antitrust lawsuit was that Apple was controlling content and impacting on free speech …

Apple @ Work is exclusively brought to you by Mosyle, the only Apple Unified Platform. Mosyle is the only solution that integrates in a single professional-grade platform all the solutions necessary to seamlessly and automatically deploy, manage & protect Apple devices at work. Over 45,000 organizations trust Mosyle to make millions of Apple devices work-ready with no effort and at an affordable cost. Request your EXTENDED TRIAL today and understand why Mosyle is everything you need to work with Apple.

Sponsored by Kolide: If a device isn’t secure, it can’t access your apps. It’s device trust for Okta. Visit kolide.com/appleatwork to learn more and watch a demo.

In this episode of Apple @ Work, I talk with Weldon Dodd about the early days of the iPad, what it’s good for today, and where it goes in the future.

With the Digital Markets Act (DMA) in the EU, Apple was forced to allow developers to distribute their apps through alternative app stores (or App Marketplace) in member countries. However, these developers are required to pay Apple a Core Technology Fee after they reach a certain number of downloads. To make things easier for small developers, AltStore will offer Patreon-backed apps.

One of Apple’s lead designers for Safari has departed the company to join The Browser Company. The news was announced today by Josh Miller, CEO of The Browser Company.

The Browser Company is the company behind the increasingly popular Arc web browser, which claims to offer “a calmer, more personal” internet browsing experience.

Apple is widely expected to revamp its AirPods lineup later this year with multiple new models. In a new investor note on Monday, analyst Jeff Pu corroborated these expectations and said that Apple will release new lower-cost “AirPods Lite” sometime during the second half of 2024.

Pu also corroborates that new AirPods Max are coming later this year.

Apple and Goldman Sachs are set to drop the interest rate offered by Apple Card Savings Account later this week, according to a new report. Currently, the account offers a 4.5% annual percentage yield, but this is set to change to 4.4% on April 3.

There’s a lot coming to Apple TV+ in April. From detective dramas to historical fiction to political documentaries, and more, here’s what to watch on Apple’s streaming service this month.

Listen to a recap of the top stories of the day from 9to5Mac. 9to5Mac Daily is available on iTunes and Apple’s Podcasts app, Stitcher, TuneIn, Google Play, or through our dedicated RSS feed for Overcast and other podcast players.

Sponsored by Capital One Shopping: Capital One Shopping users saved over $800 million in the past year. Get automatic free coupons at over 100+ stores.

If you’re having problems accessing Meta’s Instagram and Threads apps today, you’re not alone. Both services appear to be suffering from an outage that affects your ability to post and interact with content.

Want to be featured on the App Store? Develop a new feature that uses Apple’s latest technologies. Looking for a similar featured spot on Apple Podcasts? Consider charging listeners for your podcast.

Siri has recently been attempting to describe images received in Messages when using CarPlay or the announce notifications feature. In typical Siri fashion, the feature is inconsistent and with mixed results.

Nevertheless, Apple forges ahead with the promise of AI. In a newly published research paper, Apple’s AI gurus describe a system in which Siri can do much more than try to recognize what’s in an image. The best part? It thinks one of its models for doing this benchmarks better than ChatGPT 4.0.

Over the years, there have been a number of smartphones with built-in kick-stands. I always thought they were somewhat gimmicky. After spending some time various iPhone kick-stands, I am now in the “I wouldn’t hate an iPhone with a built-in stand. I’ve been testing the for the past week or two, and it’s great device to keep in your travel bag.

Apple launched the new M3 MacBook Air last month, offering more powerful performance, a more durable Midnight finish, and other upgrades. In a new interview this week, Apple product marketing exec Evan Buyze offered an interesting look at how Apple optimizes the MacBook Air for travel – specifically on a plane.

A new rumor today reiterates the expectation that iOS 18 will be compatible with all the same devices as iOS 17. For iPadOS 18, however, Apple is planning to drop support for several older generation devices.

These deals are no joke. You can bring home a 15-inch M2 MacBook Air with 16GB of memory at the all-time low of $1,499 – or $400 off today. Apple’s iPhone 14 Plus is an even better value as it falls to $540, and the beloved Lutron Aurora smart bulb dimmer switch is finally on sale for the first time in ages at $33. Hit the jump for all that and more in the latest 9to5Toys Lunch Break.

Siri launched with the iPhone 4S in October 2011, replacing Voice Control with a more capable virtual assistant. A dozen years later, Siri has evolved into the primary way we interact with our Apple products.

Wait, no, I’m being told Siri sounds more natural but the core technology is roughly the same. Meanwhile, artificial intelligence now means generative AI and chat bots are based on large language models.

Siri and the rest of iOS 18 will join the AI revolution in June, ending our long national nightmare of Siri being somewhere between hot garbage and kinda useful sometimes. At least that’s what’s being reported, but we don’t really have a great sense of what to expect yet.

World Backup Day has arrived and, like every year, is reminding you that it’s time to be smarter about your data. Whether it’s beloved family photos, Time Machine backups of your Mac, or your expansive media server, having plan in place to ensure all of your data is protected is crucial. NAS plays an important role in this, and today for the occasion, we’re taking a look at what  from Synology bring to the table to join all of the price cuts now live on hard drives and more. Head below for all of our World Backup Day NAS recommendations, tips, and tricks.

Apple will soon release iOS 17.5 with build number 21F5048f, according to information shared on social media by a private account with a strong track record.

This account generally posts this information just before an update is released, so it’s possible iOS 17.5 beta 1 is released sometime this week. 9to5Mac has also seen growing evidence of iOS 17.5 in our Google Analytics data.