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Manchester Evening News
Manchester Evening News
Entertainment
Justin Connolly

Tech news: Apple WWDC dates, Musk on board at Twitter, Fujifilm goes retro again, Roli's right key, and Rode gets into headphones

Apple names the date for WWDC

Apple has revealed the dates for its Worldwide Developers Conference for 2022. This year's event will, like the last two, be a largely online affair - although a lucky few will attend in-person.

The conference, which is designed to showcase Apple's latest technologies and allow developers access to the company's engineers for support and advice. The event will be held between June 6 and 10 this year.

In addition to the sessions with Apple staff, the event always kicks off with a keynote address headed up by Apple CEO Tim Cook and featuring various other executives.

Read more: Review: Nothing ear (1) earbuds

They will give us all a rundown of the features of the next versions of the Apple operating systems for all their platforms - including Mac and iPhone. It's not totally out of the question that Apple will also reveal new hardware at the event.

Apple is is in the middle of moving its entire line-up of Macs to its own range of custom-built chips. The only Mac yet to make the jump is the Mac Pro, and speculation is fife that will happen at this event.

Find out more from Apple.

Elon Musk has bought a big stake in Twitter (AP)

Musk joins Twitter board

Tesla and SpaceX boss Elon Musk is to be appointed to the board of Twitter - less than a week after he became the company’s largest single shareholder.

Twitter CEO Parag Agrawal said in a tweet: “I’m excited to share that we’re appointing Elon Musk to our board.
“He’s both a passionate believer and intense critic of the service, which is exactly what we need.”

The day after disclosing his $2.8bn investment in the social network, which gives him almost 10% of the company, Musk polled his 80m Twitter followers to ask them if they’d like to see an edit feature to allow users to alter tweets after they had been sent - and the poll was retweeted by Agrawal.

Read more: Sound advice - Microphones for vlogging, podcasting and video calling

An edit feature is Twitter’s most requested feature, but one the company has so far resisted. As of the time of writing, Musk’s poll registered about three-quarters of people in favour of adding the feature. What kind of influence Must may have over the actual direction Twitter takes is unclear, but he’s clearly not going to sit on the sidelines and watch.

Fujifilm’s retro hybrid

Fujifilm has done it again with a cool retro hybrid camera - and this time the Instax Mini Evo is perhaps more than just a toy. The image quality isn’t anything to write home about, but the built-in effects - 10 ‘lens’ effects, and 10 ‘film’ effects - mean you can get 100 different looks for your shots. And then print them out using the camera’s built-in printer.

You can, of course, export images to your phone or computer, and only print out the ones you really want to - a neat trick is the lever that you’d use to wind on the film in a traditional camera is repurposed here to initiate a print. Handily, you can even transfer pics taken on your phone to the camera, apply filers, and print. A whole lot of fun.
Cost: 174 from Jessops.

Roli hits the right key

Roli is an interesting UK company churning out innovative musical instruments the likes of which have never been seen before. This week it revealed plans to update its Seadboard Rise keyboard.
The keyboard is unique in that it offers a smooth continuous playing surface, which responds to pressure as well as movement.
There are a host of improvements technically, but the biggest is the addition of ‘frets’ raised ridges through the middle of each key, which the company hopes will make the keyboard easier to play without looking at it.
Cost: £1,009 from roll.com

Rode’s first headphones

You will know Rode as the maker of fine microphones - chances are, if you’ve at all involved yourself with the recording of music or of podcasts, you will at some point have used one of their devices. It makes sense, then, given that expertise, that they’re hitting the market with some pro-level headphones.

The NTH100 headphones offer some unique features which make them a compelling offer even if you’re not a pro. All reports suggest stellar sound, of course, and for the price you’re looking a lot better build-quality than you might find with the competition.

Cost: £149 from Gear4Music.

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