T-Mobile U.S. on Tuesday added Apple Music to the list of streaming services under Music Freedom, a perk for carrier subscribers that excludes those services from counting against monthly data caps.
T-Mobile has a new promotion for both new and existing family subscribers, and it’s significantly cheaper than anything from the other major carriers.The new plans provide 10GB of 4G LTE data per line, starting at $100 per month for two lines. Subscribers can add a third line—also with 10GB of its own data—for $20 more per month. For those who sign up by Labor Day, T-Mobile is giving away a fourth line at no extra charge (though taxes and fees still apply).
By comparison, Verizon charges $170 per month for two lines with 20GB of shared data, and AT&T charges $180 per month. For a plan with four lines and 40GB of shared data, Verizon and AT&T both charge $360 per month—three times the price of T-Mobile’s current promotion.
Hey Siri, play the sound of...
Not every sound effect in the Apple Music library is available for streaming. But there's certainly enough for the merry prankster to have some fun. Let us know your favorite discoveries in the comments below.
On Thursday, the iOS 9 public Beta introduced a completely new native app: News. Similar to Flipboard, News uses RSS feeds to deliver stories from different publishers together in a magazine-style layout. News, however, does away with Flipboard’s built-in social capabilities, like incorporating a feed of just links shared by your Twitter network.
Previously, iOS devices had a Newsstand folder that served as a hub for newspaper and magazine apps. Newsstand is gone in iOS 9—all your Newsstand apps are still there, and any newspaper or magazine subscriptions remain active, but the apps are placed in a regular (read: deleteable) folder instead.
But the real gem of Apple Music is something that isn’t all that modern: a censored radio station. Streaming services have turned music listening into a very individualized experience, so it was somewhat surprising when Apple announced Beats 1 as one of the main features of its new service. But what’s truly surprising is how great it is.
Even when its would-be assassin was announced at Macworld San Francisco, Steve Jobs stressed the “widescreen iPod with touch controls” aspect as one of its three tentpole features. In fact, it was the very first thing we learned iPhone could do, and Steve waited a full 12 seconds until the applause died down and he could tell us the new device was also a phone. And even then, most people just wanted the touchscreen iPod, which Apple delivered a few months later.
