Apple commemorates World Cup final with Apple.com overhaul

Ahead of the World Cup final, Apple seems to be getting into the spirit of it, too. French Apple news site, iPhoneAddict spotted a change to Apple’s homepage where a short three-second clip with floating soccer balls and the French flag are floating around. After the video is played, the regular Apple homepage reappears. The Apple’s homepage for Croatia is similar too, except without the Croatian flag. What’s floating around instead is a fire and heart emoji with soccer balls floating around. Apple has been gung-ho about promoting the World Cup this year with the tournament being featured in different apps and services.

Source: 9to5Mac

Feel the World Cup fever with Apple

Starting today, you can keep up and celebrate all things World Cup on Apple devices and services. You can ask Siri about everything from scores, standings, team rosters, schedules, etc. The App Store will feature favorite apps and games from football stars. App Store editors will even offer tips on how to take perfect football photo and get your football fix on social media. If you use the Apple TV App, you can keep track of all of the action on TSN and RDS, Bell Media’s English and French language apps in Canada. You can favourite teams and follow their matches in Up Next as well as receive notifications on your Apple devices when their team is playing or when a match is coming up.

If you just want to keep up on the news, the News app will make it easier for you to follow what’s happening. You get up-to-date scores and schedules as well as a knockout bracket and profiles of the event’s key players from Eight by Eight magazine. Meanwhile, Apple Music will have playlists for each participating nation that feature the most exciting local artists the teams have selected. And Apple Podcast and iBooks will both feature editorial collections called “The Beautiful Game” that highlight podcasts and books that celebrate the sport. If you want to show your love for the sport creatively, Clips now comes with football-themed graphics, which include an animated sticker, label, and poster with customizable text.

Hublot debuts US$5,200 Wear OS smartwatch

After discarding the Android Wear name, Google’s Wear OS platform is well and truly alive. It finds home in some of the big fashion brands like Tag Heuer, Kate Spade, and others. Joining the fray is another LVMH brand, Hublot. (LVMH also owns Tag Heuer.) The watchmaker is making a limited edition US$5,200 Wear OS smartwatch called the Big Bang Referee 2018 World Cup Russia watch, which as you suspect is helping promote this year’s World Cup. There will only be 2,018 units made and some of these will be given to the referees. It will, as Hublot details have the referees’s watches “connected to goal-line technology, an electronic video assistance system for refereeing which follows all the trajectories of the ball and determines for certain if the ball did or did not entirely cross the goal line. “

On top of this, wearers will also be alerted 15 minutes before kickoff of any match, player changes, whenever goals are made, and red/yellow cards. The watch will also get a special watch face during matches that will show things like the current score, player substitutions, number of cards/goals, and the match time. The Big Bang Referee 2018 World Cup Russia watch features a 49mm titanium body, six H-separated screws along the bezel, and Kevlar insert. The watch will go on sale starting May 1^st at Hublot shops.

Source: Android Central

Google helps ease the pain of Brazilians over World Cup loss, filters search trend news

Google said they don’t want to rub salt to the wounds of Brazil after its horrifying loss to Germany in the World Cup semi-finals. Google told NPR that the company’s experimental social newsroom has avoided covering some of the bigger Brazil-related search trends during the match because they were too negative. Producer Sam Clohesy said the decision was made based on pure sympathy and the desire to go viral.