Today the focus of Apple’s event in Cupertino are new Macs and big updates to other non-iPhone products, like Apple TV. But the company also used the moment as a coda to yesterday’s earnings to provide some updated numbers — a coda to its earnings earlier this week.
CEO Tim Cook started out with some data about the new iPhone and newest version of its operating system, iOS 10. Specifically, he focused on a new photo feature that highlights the new cameras on the devices. Memories — the feature that uses AI and facial recognition on your whole trove of pictures to create new slideshows each day — has been a popular addition to the native photo app. Cook said that since it was first introduced in June as part of iOS 10, there have been 400 million Memories viewed. “People are loving it,” he said of the new iPhone 7 models.
Competing against the likes of Facebook’s On This Day and TimeHop, it’s a testament to what a challenge it is for non-native apps to compete against the handset maker when it decides to wade in and offer your service itself. That’s a trend that has been played out in other areas, like music and calendars. In music, so far Spotify has managed to hold its ground against Apple Music, despite the huge customer crossover between Spotify users and iPhone owners. The solution seems to be having a huge user base and keeping them tied to you with features that are harder to replicate.
He also said that since iOS 10 was launched, more than 60 percent of customers have installed it. And there are now 8,000 Apple TV apps.