Apple CEO Tim Cook poses for selfies (Timothy Clary/AFP via Getty Images)

Slow iPhone sales are weighing on AT&T, too

No good news for Apple from the telecoms just yet.

10/23/24 9:29AM

AT&T doesn’t seem to have seen a surge in iPhone sales for the latest model, either. The telecom reported that its mobile-equipment operating revenue was down nearly 6% in the third quarter compared to a year earlier. The quarter goes through the end of September and would include, but is not limited to, early iPhone sales, since those went on preorder midway through the month. Those declines offset higher services sales and contributed to a slight revenue miss.

That’s similar to Verizon, which reported yesterday that its mobile-equipment sales were down 8% in the third quarter. T-Mobile reports after the bell, so we’ll see if there’s a telecom trifecta.

The reports let some more air out of the idea that Apple’s iPhone 16 will drive a super-cycle of upgrades.

“You might even argue whether or not everything that Apple is offering right now on this device really requires a hardware change,” AT&T CEO John Stankey said during a Goldman Sachs technology conference last month. “It’s entirely possible other software and other apps show up on the device; it does many of the same things that they’re offering in Apple Intelligence that can be done somewhere else on the deck.”

As we’ve mentioned before, people don’t really buy new iPhones for new features. Instead they get one when their last phone breaks or is lost or is too old to hold a charge. At the same time, phones, especially iPhones, are lasting much longer than they used to. Meanwhile, hardware upgrades are more incremental, meaning there’s less difference in a phone’s capabilities from one year to the next. Therefore people are holding onto their phones longer.

Bullish analysts had hoped that Apple’s incorporation of AI in its latest iPhone would be such a sea change that consumers would need to upgrade. Seeing as Apple Intelligence capabilities are only coming out in underwhelming dribs and drabs, it’s not causing the masses to rush the Apple stores — or AT&T’s or Verizon’s — for a new iPhone just yet.

Chris Stokel-Walker

Bot bias

6/17/26

Companies are getting AI chatbots to smear their competitors

The race to influence AI chatbots is leading to some companies to adopt shady competitive tactics.

Tom Jones6/17/26

Prediction markets have, predictably, been given a boost by the summer of sports

Major platforms like Kalshi and Polymarket have seen huge upticks in users of late, thanks in no small part to what’s felt like a recent sporting smorgasbord, with major competitions across hockey, basketball, and soccer soaking up fans’ time (and spending, clearly) at the outset of summer.

While gaming industry groups may not like it, there’s been a huge change in the methods people are using to put money on the big games, with everyone from fortunate NYC bar owners, to a far less fortunate Spanish supporter, turning to prediction markets to try and turn their sports know-how into cold, hard cash.

According to a new report from Adam Blacker for apptopia, that shift might have been even more seismic than imagined in the wake of the NBA and NHL finals and around the 2026 World Cup kicking off.

2026 World Cup Reverses Seasonal Lull for Sports Betting Apps

According to a new report from Adam Blacker for apptopia, that shift might have been even more seismic than imagined in the wake of the NBA and NHL finals and around the 2026 World Cup kicking off.

South by Southwest Conference and Festivals

Gold Tesla Cybercabs are piling up, but they’re not picking up passengers yet

Low-volume production started in April. Now people are noticing them more and more in the wild.

Rani Molla6/15/26

Millie Giles

TAKING ACCOUNTS

6/15/26

Britain announces social media ban for under-16s starting early 2027

The UK government plans to use the same model for the restrictions as Australia — but how successful has that case study been so far?

UK Prime Minister Announces Under-16s Social Media Ban

Jon Keegan6/15/26

Anthropic pulls Fable and Mythos access worldwide after Trump administration bars their use by foreign nationals

Only days after releasing two versions of its next-gen AI model, Anthropic has disabled them for users worldwide.

Anthropic says it received a Friday night order from the Trump administration to suspend access to the models for any foreign national (anywhere in the world) — a group that included some Anthropic employees. In response, the company turned off access to everyone.

Last week, the company released to the public its much-anticipated Claude Fable 5 model (and its restricted version Claude Mythos 5, which is still being tested with trusted partners). Anthropic said in a blog post announcing the action that officials cited national security concerns with the new models, while offering few specific details.

The post said that the government gave the company “verbal evidence of a potential narrow, non-universal jailbreak” of the public Fable 5 model. A jailbreak is a means by which users can evade restrictions built into the code to unlock prohibited functionality. Anthropic downplayed the significance of the attack, and said other major models, such as OpenAI’s GPT-5.5, could also be affected by the technique described.

Fears of these first Mythos-class models being misused are running high, after Anthropic warned the cybersecurity world in May that the advanced cyber capabilities of Mythos have rapidly discovered thousands of vulnerabilities in ubiquitous software, leading to the decision to restrict the full version of the model to a close group of trusted partners for testing.

This morning, Axios reported that Anthropic technical staff have flown to Washington to meet with White House officials to resolve the issue.

The Wall Street Journal is reporting that the Trump administration’s decision to take action against Anthropic was prompted by discussions that Amazon CEO Andy Jassy had with officials, including Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent. According to the report, Amazon researchers said they had been able to evade some of Fable 5’s security restrictions using specific prompts. Amazon is a major investor in Anthropic.

Anthropic is currently suing the US government to fight the Pentagon’s blacklisting of the company on national security grounds.

Statement on the US government directive to suspend access to Fable 5 and Mythos 5