With last week’s news that Apple achieved the biggest quarterly profit that any company anywhere in the world has ever made – a staggering $18bn (£11.9bn) – it’s worth pondering how they did it.

One of Apple’s most loyal supporters, programmer, writer and former CTO at Tumblr, Marco Arment, has kicked off something of a Twitterstorm by suggesting that the tech giant’s software is “nosediving” in quality. Maybe he’s got a point.

Even those of us immersed in the world of digital content occasionally need to use a humble pen to jot thoughts and ideas down before they disappear into the mists of your mind. Now thanks to Apple, it’s going to be possible to inscribe your precious mental gems into digital and pen-and-paper media at one and the same time.

There’s a forgotten secret about Apple: back in 1997, it nearly didn’t make it. Struggling for survival, it received blunt advice from Michael Dell (yes, he of Dell Computers) - shut down and give your money back to your investors. Fast forward to November 2014 and financial results show it topping the $700 billion value market cap, making it not only the most valuable tech company on the planet, but the most valuable public company per se, whatever industry you’re looking at.

Could Apple be preparing to square up to Google in the world of search? OK, it seems pretty unlikely - a bit like David trying to get one in Goliath’s eye with a marzipan slingshot and a sprained wrist. That’s not meant to be insulting; it’s just a recognition of how massive the search giants really are out there. But Ghent-based web developer Jan Moesen has nonetheless noticed something interesting: Apple seems to be crawling websites with its very own automated bot.

The wait is finally about to end: Android’s newest operating system, the colourfully named Lollipop (or Android 5.0 for the more prosaic) will debut in the first week of November, timed to tie in with the release of the Nexus 6 smartphone and the Nexus 9 tablet. Other models will see the new OS rolled out progressively during 2015. So what can we expect?

It seems that the big players in cyberworld are becoming very twitchy about public perceptions of their somewhat lackadaisical attitude to personal security: last week, Google announced that its new Android “L” OS will feature automatic data encryption built-in just a day after Apple announced that its new iOS 8 shields users data with passwords that Apple can’t decrypt (even if they’re confronted with a court order).

So, it’s nearly upon us. The long wait for the iPhone 6 is about to end as the launch will be on 9^th September.

The technology giants are awash with cash, so apart from buying up other companies what can they do with it? The answer is… they can build themselves futuristic headquarters to impress us all. Quirky designs fit the image of such companies and as money is no object, why not create something really special?

As predicted, Apple has announced some new features to their range of integrated apps with some software updates that are set to rival Dropbox and WhatsApp.