Linked List: October 9, 2025

Thursday, 9 October 2025

Some Lakers Games This Season Will Be Broadcast Live in Immersive Video for Vision Pro ★

Jacob Krol, writing for Techradar:

We’ve seen a broad range of content, but I’ve been waiting for something live — specifically, live sports. Seeing that Apple TV+’s Friday Night Baseball is capturing games with the iPhone 17 Pro and 17 Pro Max gave me some hope, and now we have a confirmed release. In what might be the start of something new, select Los Angeles Lakers games will be live-streamed in Apple Immersive for the Vision Pro this coming season.

It’s not every game, but for those that are streaming — exclusive to the $3,500 Spatial Computer — you’ll get access to views that put you right in the middle of the action. Special cameras that support the format will be set courtside and under each basket to give you perspectives that amp up the immersion. The Lakers’ games will be shot using a special version of Blackmagic Design’s URSA Cine Immersive Live camera.

Kind of weird, to me, that it wasn’t Apple’s own Friday Night Baseball broadcasts first, but I can’t wait to try this.

Apple’s Justification for Removing DeICER From the App Store ★

Pablo Manríquez, reporting for Migrant Insider:

Apple has quietly removed DeICER, a civic-reporting app used to log immigration enforcement activity, from its App Store after a law enforcement complaint — invoking a rule normally reserved for protecting marginalized groups from hate speech.

According to internal correspondence reviewed by Migrant Insider, Apple told developer Rafael Concepcion that the app violated Guideline 1.1.1, which prohibits “defamatory, discriminatory, or mean-spirited content” directed at “religion, race, sexual orientation, gender, national/ethnic origin, or other targeted groups.”

But Apple’s justification went further. “Information provided to Apple by law enforcement shows that your app violates Guideline 1.1.1 because its purpose is to provide location information about law enforcement officers that can be used to harm such officers individually or as a group,” the company wrote in its removal notice.

The decision effectively treats federal immigration agents as a protected class — a novel interpretation of Apple’s hate-speech policy that shields one of the most powerful arms of government from public scrutiny.

Delicate flowers, these ICE agents are. And it’s a lie, anyway. There’s not one story about any of these apps being used to harm ICE agents. And even if such an attack happened, that wouldn’t imply it’s the purpose of these apps. The purpose of these apps is to protect people — citizens and non-citizens alike — from ICE.

Alas, there’s no more courage, conviction, or honesty from Google on the Android side of the fence either.

It’d be both interesting and honest if either Apple or Google justified these app bannings by simply saying the Trump administration demanded them and that they — Apple and Google — fear reprisal from Trump if they don’t comply.

Apple Banned an App That Simply Archived Videos of ICE Abuses ★

Joseph Cox, reporting for 404 Media:

Apple removed an app for preserving TikToks, Instagram reels, news reports, and videos documenting abuses by ICE, 404 Media has learned. The app, called Eyes Up, differs from other banned apps such as ICEBlock which were designed to report sightings of ICE officials in real-time to warn local communities. Eyes Up, meanwhile, was more of an aggregation service pooling together information to preserve evidence in case the material is needed in the future in court.

The news shows that Apple and Google’s crackdown on ICE-spotting apps, which started after pressure from the Department of Justice against Apple, is broader in scope than apps that report sightings of ICE officials. It has also impacted at least one app that was more about creating a historical record of ICE’s activity during its mass deportation effort.

“Our goal is government accountability, we aren’t even doing real-time tracking,” the administrator of Eyes Up, who said their name was Mark, told 404 Media. Mark asked 404 Media to only use his first name to protect him from retaliation. “I think the [Trump] admin is just embarrassed by how many incriminating videos we have.”

Sometimes consistency is a bad thing.