Welcome to The Tech Dump! This is the brand new  technology blog dedicated to all things happening in consumer electronics. It will be curated by me, Riley Katz. If you want to contact me, I live on Twitter @rkatz94.
So without any further ado, this week’s biggest news.
On Monday Apple held its annual Worldwide Developers Conference and revealed to the world what consumers should expect to see in the upcoming year. This week, I am going to break down the biggest takeaways from the conference and explain what you need to know.
iOS 9
As expected, Apple announced its yearly revision to the immensely popular mobile operating system; however, this year Apple introduced a series of firsts for the company in terms of being open to help from the public.
One of the most un-Apple like things the company did was announce an open public beta starting in July. Starting with iOS 7 and moving further into iOS 8, the operating system quickly became a buggy and unstable mess, and then swelled to have an almost five gigabyte footprint on every device it was installed on. This proved to be highly unpopular as people could fit significantly less content on their devices. By providing a public beta, Apple can get ahead of the curve by having as many people as possible try out the operating system and report any bugs they see before a final official release to the public.On top of being more stable, iOS 9’s footprint drops down to less than two gigabytes. Selfie takers rejoice.
Now that the technical news is out of the way, we can get down to the fun part: new features.
iOS 9 brings a smarter Siri, that makes her more useful than ever. Swiping all the way to the left home screen brings up information that Siri finds relevant for you. Some examples of this content would be frequently used contacts or nearby restaurants or even news stories that Siri thinks you might find interesting. Also when bringing up the personal assistant by holding the home button, Siri has been graphically changed to more resemble the assistant present on the Apple Watch.
Since iOS 7, the native Apple Maps app has left plenty to be desired. This time around, Apple wants to make Maps the GPS app users turn to for navigation. By adding the much requested public transit information, users can get up-to-the-minute updates on where their bus or subway is and how fast they need to run to catch it. The feature is rolling out to a handful of cities in America. Don’t get too excited just yet, Tigers. Apple has yet to announce a rollout schedule for other cities.
The iPad was the biggest winner at the conference as many huge features are finally coming to the device. The major feature that everyone is talking about is the split screen multitasking capabilities and picture-in-picture video streaming. What this means is that you can finally use your iPad as a portable computer rather than a tablet. Multitasking is something that has been highly requested, and now those prayers have been answered as two apps can now run at the same time on one screen, increasing productivity and speed. Since the introduction of the iPhone 6 Plus, iPad sales have tanked. Now with the multitasking, the iPad can establish itself as something more than just a bigger iPhone.
Other Stuff:
Passbook now has more connectivity than ever with the ability to add gift cards to the app. The notes app received new writing features that allows a user to write instead of type quick notes, as well as add bulleting systems for lists. Newsstand is now News, and Apple wants to bring rich news stories to you wherever you may be.
OS X
Another expected announcement was the newest iteration of Apple’s other immensely popular OS X. Most of the features were in the same vein as iOS trying to clean up the system and rid it of bugs before a major release next year.
One unexpected announcement was the brand new name: El Capitan. If you thought that was a joke, don’t worry, I did too. Upon further research El Capitan turned out to be a mountain in California, and not someone who thought he or she was in snarkily charge of something. The name keeps the same theme of last year’s release, Yosemite.
Instead of breaking down the incremental features, I’ll announce them in one paragraph. Spotlight search is smarter than ever and typing phrases like “pictures from last June” will find relevant search results. This year’s iteration of the OS brings a Windows 7 style window system that allows you to split applications into equal sections of the screen. Like iOS, Notes has been given plenty of new features, the biggest one being able to add in-line photos to your notes. Safari has been given new features as well which are nice if you use Safari. You can choose which tabs play sounds and pin your favorite websites to the bookmark bar.
Apple Music
While I hope to do a much bigger dedicated article to Apple Music, I’ll break down the specifics of what was actually announced yesterday. This was Apple’s classic “One more thing…” announcement that only is reserved for the biggest of announcements. The iPod and the iPhone, two revolutionary products were revealed with the same phrase, so you know Apple is pumped about the new music streaming service.
In hopes to compete with Spotify and Tidal along with other music streaming services, Apple is looking for their share of the streaming pie. For $9.99 a month ($14.99 for families of 6 or fewer), subscribers have unlimited access to Apple’s huge library of music. Accenting the service is a news-feed type service called Connect that will allow users to view exclusive videos and other content that their favorite artists post to the feed. If that sounds familiar you may be thinking of Ping, Apple’s dead music centered social network that was shut down over a year ago. Apple is hoping for higher adoption rates this time around as it is being released in conjunction with their new service.
If musical social networks are not your thing, you might be interested in Beats 1, the first ever digital 24/7 radio station. The station originates in Los Angeles, New York, and London; and hopes to provide brand new music, interviews and “culture,” as Apple describes on its website.
If you are worried that you are going to miss out if you have no iOS devices, the service is officially coming to Android as well. Apple wants to bring this service to as many people as possible, and now Android users can be part of the fun as well.
If you aren’t sold on the service just yet, you have the option to try it for three months free. I personally have an Android phone and want to try the three free months of service.
The actual service launches on June 30.
___________________________________________________________
This concludes the first post of the Tech Dump. While this post was massive, I doubt that every week will be this big as not this much news happens all the time. Summer is press conference season, so tons has come down the pipeline lately. But for now I’m done. Thanks for reading!

Gallery • 5 Photos

Apple Press Images