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Apple Announced a New Sleek Titanium Built Credit Card Offering Rewards & Cashbacks to its Users

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Apple hosted an event on Monday at the Steve Jobs Theater in its Apple Park campus headquarters, in Cupertino, California. The event included many new launches along with Apple’s new credit card named Apple Card.

Apple has been a leader in the field of computers and smartphones, and now, it has put its steps into a new business line with the new credit card, i.e. finance. For the financial services, the company has partnered with Goldman Sachs and Mastercard. According to Apple, the Apple Card will not have any annual fee, international fee, over-limit fee or late charges and will provide the lowest interest rate to its users.

Apple Card
Image Source: cnbc.com

It is an off-white coloured credit card, with all new sleek design and is build with Titanium. Apple is trying to provide full security for the transactions through the card and has stripped off all the numbers like the card number, CVV, expiration date, or signature bar on the back from the card.

The company has also introduced an app to function in sync with the card, as like any other credit cards, the card can be used to make payments physically as well as digitally. The user just needs to signup for the new Apple card with their iPhone, and they are good to go.

After signing up for the card, the user can see a rainbow gradient card on the screen. For every digital transaction, the digital wallet will ask for face Id or touch Id along with a secure pin. The users are able to easily pay their dues for the Apple Card through the app, where they are given multiple payment methods. The users will also be provided with 2% cashback with transactions on Apple pay and 3% cashback on Apple Store purchases using the app. And for the physical card, the cashback on every purchase will be 1% of the purchase.

The app will also allow the users to track their transactions through the card on the app. The transactions will be segmented into categories like ‘food and drinks’, ‘entertainment’ as well as ‘shopping’. The app will show all the details about the user’s spending through the card, mentioning the time, date, merchant and the location of the transaction. The user can also track the weekly and monthly spending summary through the app.

The card is available for users all around the world, and the users will also receive 24/7 customer support from Apple. The new Apple Card is a creative and innovative kind of credit card, that like every other Apple product is on the way to become a status symbol.

Netflix is Testing Cheaper Mobile-only Subscription Plans in Selected Countries

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Reportedly, Netflix is testing its cheapest mobile-only subscription plan in a few selected countries, including India. The company will be reducing the costs of its plans up to 50 per cent, i.e. the basic plan provided by Netflix will now cost $3.63 a month.

netflix
Image Source: fortune

The cheapest Netflix plan in India costs Rs. 500 per month, which will now cost Rs. 250 per month, maintaining the quality of videos purely SD. The cheapest plan will work only on a single mobile device, and there is no option for HD video streaming.

Even though the prices have been reduced by 50 per cent, Netflix still is the most expensive streaming plan in India. One of Netflix’s competitor in India, Hotstar offers a yearly subscription of Rs 365, which is way cheaper than Netflix, offering Re. 1 per day streaming. On the other hand, Amazon Prime is available for Rs 1000 per year, Zee5 for Rs 1188 per year, and AltBalaji Rs 400 per year.

“We will be testing different options in select countries, where members can watch Netflix on their mobile device for a lower price, and subscribe in shorter increments of time. Not everyone will see these options, and we may never roll out these specific plans beyond the tests”, stated a Netflix spokesperson.

However, the original content has been tempting many Indians, who are already paying the ‘expensive’ monthly charges to access it, and Netflix itself has expressed earlier that the company is not facing any pricing issues in India. So people who are already using it will be the happiest, and the ones who wanted to get the subscription, but were not convinced to pay the costly fee every month, may also get their hands on it now.

But, currently, the cheaper plans are only being tested, and only a few Indians have got access to them. And, only if the tests go right, the company will make those changes permanent. Till then, we can only hope for the prices to lower down for every subscriber.

T-Mobile Starts to Roll Out its Invite-only Home LTE Internet Service

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T-Mobile, on Thursday, announced that it is piloting a new in-home invite-only internet service on LTE, for the rural and underserved areas in the U.S., through a news post. According to the post, though the service the company intends to connect 50,000 homes this year. The service is only available for T-Mobile‘s existing users and will get the service through invites-only.

T-mobile
Image Source: wsmv.com

This limited service will cost $50 a month for its subscribers, and it is a trial for the company’s future cable internet business. Since it is about to launch its 5G service, soon, ahead of that, it is also the test for the company that it is capable of delivering the 5G services to its huge user base.

The new wireless technology will help the home users get rid of the broadband wires, and they will not have to roam around the router to get the full coverage. For now, the company is providing a 50 Mbps over the 4G LTE network, with no data caps, and after the launch of the 5G network, the speed will, eventually, be raised to 100Mbps.

“For now, only a limited few T-Mobile customers – the goal is to reach 50,000 households this year, less than .04% of U.S. households. But the New T-Mobile plans to cover more than half of U.S. zip codes by 2024 with the capacity for 9.5 million households to cut the cord.” stated the company in the news post.

Earlier this month, T-Mobile had also announced that if it fulfils its pending merger with Sprint, it will launch its 5G home internet soon. So the in-house 4G home internet can be a hint on that the company is ready for its 5G home internet service. By providing the internet service to the rural areas, the company is also trying to warm FCC decision makers up to the merger.

Currently, AT&T and Verizon are already bracing up for the launch of their home internet service, and if the merger succeeds, there will be lesser competition left for T-Mobile in the wireless service industry. The company also claimed that this new service will help Americans choose better internet service and will save billions of dollars.

Instagram is Trialing a Shopping Checkout Feature to be Available for its US Users

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Instagram on Tuesday, announced that it is testing a new checkout feature for its US users and will be rolling out the same in the next couple of weeks. According to a statement from Instagram, its US-based users will be able to shop items with tags for sale, directly from Instagram.

instagram-shopping
Image Source: esquire.com

Currently, Instagram is one of the most engaging platforms operated by Facebook Inc., and many retailers are using the same to selling their products online. But the News Feed of this platform is not enough to engage people for a longer time. Also, shopping through the app is not convenient as there is no payment feature embedded to the app and people are forced to contact the retailers even to know the price of the goods. This is one of the steps that Facebook has taken to monetise its one of the most popular platforms, in order to enter into the eCommerce business.

The users now will be able to see and order products directly through the app. For the payment, the users will be offered with options like Visa, Mastercard, American Express, Discover, PayPal, etc.

Though the feature will only be available for the US users, and for now, only a few famous brands including Adidas, H&M, Kylie Cosmetics and Michael Kors will be able to use it to sell their goods on Instagram. Noticeably, the company has already partnered with twenty different brands.

Though the company has not commented on the worth of the partnership with different brands, it has confirmed that it will be charging a fixed fee from the various brands interested to sell on Instagram. The fee will also be covering the purchase protection policy for those brands, and it will be Instagram which would pay for any damage to the items or lost items.

According to an Instagram spokesperson, the users will only be able to buy one thing at a time, and the feature is only available for the mobile app users. However, the company is still working on improving the shopping experience for its users.

While it is a piece of exciting news for the Instagram users, and also, this step will help many brands with their business, many people are also worried about the Facebook’s track record on privacy, which may also affect the launch of this new in-app purchase feature of Instagram.

Snapchat to Uncover its New Gaming Platform in the Upcoming Snapchat Summit in April

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snapchat-gaming
Image Source: tubefilter.com

According to a report from Cheddar, the parent company of Snapchat, Snap Inc., is planning to launch its own new gaming platform in the coming month. The rumours about the new gaming platform from Sanp Inc. has been making rounds since June last year, and now if we believe the reports the company is all set to launch one in April.

Snap Inc. has already tried its hands in gaming field with its set of AR lens games named Snappables, and also, in January, the company acquired the Australian game studio Prettygreat for an $8.6 million. Furthermore, the Chinese gaming conglomerate Tencent bought a 12 per cent share in Snap, in 2017, which is a clear indication of Snap Inc. paving its ways towards the gaming industry at a bigger level.

According to the reports, the new gaming platform will allow its users to play third party games over it. The new platform will also accept games from outside developers, and those games will play on the Snapchat application itself.

The company is hosting a Snap Partner Summit in Los Angeles on April 4th, for developers and creators from different regions, where the company is expected to unveil its new gaming platform, which is also referred as the “Project Cognac”. Cheddar has even reported of an invitation for the event having a slogan imprinted over it saying, “Less talk. More play”. The slogan, too, is hinting towards the same new gaming platform, that the company may launch at the event.

Snapchat currently is facing tough competition as many other Snapchat-look-alike apps have come in the market and to move ahead in the competition, entering the gaming business can be a fruitful decision for Snap Inc. Moreover, the new gaming platform will be a source of increased user engagement and higher revenue.

For now, the company has not commented on the matter. But, if the sources are to be believed, the new gaming platform will be a great place for the outside developers and creators to place their games, and for the advertisers too, it will be a popular platform to play their ads.

YouTube Launches its Music Streaming Services for its Indian Users

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It has been less three weeks since Spotify has entered the Indian music streaming market. And now, Google has also just entered the same market after it launched its new music streaming service, the YouTube Music, along with YouTube Premium and YouTube Music Premium.

Youtube-Music
Image Source: techaeris.com

The YouTube Music will be a free but ad-supported music service for the Indian users, whereas the YouTube Music Premium will be a paid service like YouTube Premium. YouTube Music Premium will cost Rs 99, and the YouTube Premium will cost Rs.129, a month per user, offering an ad-free experience to its users. Through the premium service, the users will have access to features like background play, and millions of tracks and videos, which also will be available for offline downloads. The YouTube Premium subscribers will also get access to YouTube Originals, and YouTube Music Premium.

YouTube is already hosting over 245 million monthly active users, and the number is constantly increasing every day. It has been an effective platform for different types of content creators, especially for the musicians.

“India is where the multi-lingual music scene thrives. It’s interesting to note how Indian artists have consistently claimed top spots over the last few months in the Global YouTube Top Artists chart. With YouTube Music, we are hoping to bring the best in global and Indian music to millions of fans across India, and give them an immersive music experience, with the magic of music on YouTube.” said Lyor Cohen, Global Head of Music, YouTube.

Google is already active in the music streaming service with Google Play Music. For now, the subscribers registered with the Google Play Music service will also be able to access their purchased music and uploads through their YouTube Music service.

The Indian music streaming market is already dominated by the streaming services like Amazon Music, Apple Music, JioSaavn, and Gaana, etc., and in this tough competition, to lure new customers, Google is offering a special introductory offer of 3 months free subscription for YouTube Music Premium to be redeemed by March 31, 2020. But the offer is valid only for the people who are not registered to the YouTube Premium or Google Play Music. Also for the Samsung Galaxy S10 users, Google is offering the same free subscription for a period of four months.