Apple SVP Greg “Joz” Joswiak just confirmed via the social media platform formerly known as Twitter that the company’s annual World Wide Developer Conference is set for June 10-14.
In what is no doubt a nod to the company’s artificial intelligence ambitions, the exec is promising that the event will be “Absolutely Incredible.”Mark your calendars for #WWDC24, June 10-14.
pic.twitter.com/YIln5972ZD — Greg Joswiak (@gregjoz) March 26, 2024As the name “D” in WWDC suggests, the event is heavily focused on developers for Apple’s various operating systems.
WWDC seems like the most likely platform for such an announcement — and, perhaps, details on a rumored Google Gemini partnership for the iPhone.
As ever, the event will include a small cohort of “winners,” 50 of whom will be invited to the in-person event in Cupertino.
Adobe today announced Firefly Services, a set of over 20 new generative and creative APIs, tools and services.
Firefly Services makes some of the company’s AI-powered features from its Creative Cloud tools like Photoshop available to enterprise developers to speed up content creation in their custom workflows — or create entirely new solutions.
In addition, the company also today launched Custom Models, which allows businesses to fine tune Firefly models based on their assets.
Custom Models is already built into Adobe’s new GenStudio.
In addition to these AI features, Firefly Services also exposes tools for editing text layers, tagging content and applying presets from Lightroom, for example.
The one time that Europe is explicitly mentioned, however, is in relation to Apple’s grip on digital wallets, NFC and mobile payment technology within its iOS ecosystem.
For context, the EU filed charges against Apple in May 2022, concluding that Apple “abused a dominant position” around mobile wallets by preventing rival services from accessing the iPhone’s contactless NFC payment functionality.
For example, Apple allows merchants to use the iPhone’s NFC antenna to accept tap-to-pay payments from consumers.
Then there is cross-platform smartwatch compatibility, which the DOJ says Apple impedes by restricting certain features from third-party smartwatch makers.
However, NFC, digital wallets, and mobile payments are where they seem to be most neatly aligned on.
Meanwhile, Fortnite maker Epic Games has been accusing Apple’s iOS App Store of antitrust violations for years in an ongoing, arduous legal battle.
“Apple often enforces its App Store rules arbitrarily,” the suit says.
And unlike Android devices, iPhones do not allow for sideloading apps, meaning that Apple has control over any app in its App Store.
“While Apple has reduced the tax it collects from a subset of developers, Apple still extracts 30 percent from many app makers,” the suit says.
On Thursday, the Coalition for App Fairness (CAF) – which includes Epic Games, Spotify, Deezer, Proton and other companies – released a statement in favor of the DOJ’s action against Apple.
Social network X (formerly Twitter) launched new top-up packs for its developer API program on Tuesday.
Last year, Elon Musk curtailed free API access and released new paid tiers with the basic level starting at $100 per month.
With the new top-up launch, the social network said that there are also limits to the number of upgrades developers can purchase.
Developers with basic tier are capped at 10 top-ups and developers with pro tier are capped at 5 top-ups per month.
The company’s alternations to its API rules also impacted researchers and their ability to study the platform’s data.
Sentry has long helped developers monitor and debug their production code.
While it’s called Autofix, this isn’t a completely automated system, something very few developers would be comfortable with.
In the process, Autofix will provide developers with a diff that explains the changes and then, if everything looks good, create a pull request to merge those changes.
Autofix supports all major languages, though Elser acknowledged that the team did most of its testing with JavaScript and Python code.
That also means that users must opt in to send their data to these third-party services to use Autofix.
India’s antitrust regulator has ordered an investigation into Alphabet’s Google, alleging the U.S. tech giant abused its dominant position in the country’s online market by imposing unfair terms and discriminatory practices in its popular app store.
The order came in response to complaint filed by multiple Indian app developers and industry groups, many of whom have also publicly raised concerns about what they allege is unfair practices by Google.
CCI’s allegations centre around Google’s billing system for in-app purchases and paid apps on its Play Store.
The watchdog’s decision is the latest headache for Google in India, its biggest market by users but one where it has long faced allegations of anti-competitive practices.
The U.S. giant has previously defended its Play Store policies, saying the service fee supports its investments in Android and Play Store, allowing it to provide developers with tools and a global platform to access billions of consumers around the world.
While the rest of you are out there touching the proverbial and literal grass, the world’s developers are jamming into conference halls to find out what the next year holds for AI and OSes.
Things kick off next week with NVIDIA’s GTC, with the next few months holding Microsoft Build, Apple’s WWDC and, of course, Google I/O.
Invites just dropped for the latter, which is set for May 14 and 15 at Shoreline Amphitheater in Mountain View, California — the usual spot.
We’ve still got two months to book travel, but we’ll be there (I might pack a hat this time).
While the show is aimed specifically at developers for Google’s various operating systems, things customarily kick off with a Sundar-led keynote.
Google announced a bunch of new features for Google Play listings for games including AI-powered FAQs, displaying the latest YouTube videos, new immersive ad formats, and support for native PC game publishing.
These announcements were made at the Google Games Developer Summit held at San Fransisco.
Play Pass and Play PointsTo drive more in-app purchases, Google is now allowing developers to set discounts for users who have the company’s Play Pass subscription.
Support for PC gamesIn the last few years, Google has made its Play Games for PC program available in more than 120 countries.
Now, the company is set to allow publishers to put native PC games on the Play Store.
Apple will allow iOS developers located in the European Union to distribute apps from the web, rather then via its App Store.
“Web Distribution, available in a software update later this spring, will let authorized developers distribute their iOS apps to EU users directly from a website the developer owns and operates,” it writes.
iOS users will also need to approve the developer installing apps from their site via their iPhone Settings.
Apple’s initial proposal for DMA compliance did not allow web based distribution for apps.
While its current attempt to force EU users to consent to tracking is being challenged via GDPR and consumer protection complaints.
