Disney’s ABC to livestream all programming to iOS devices starting this week

Seth Weintraub

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Big news from the New York Times this evening. ABC, a subsidiary of the Walt Disney Company,  will begin streaming live content to iOS devices later this week in Philadelphia and New York City using a new button on their app called ‘live’. Users will be able to live stream all the programming from ABC’s local stations there, ‘the first time that any major broadcaster has turned on such a technology.’

For the first six weeks the service will be free to anyone with an iOS device according to GigaOM. Before you go grabbing the scissors to cut that cable cord, be warned that the live stream will eventually be available only to paying subscribers of cable and satellite providers, even though the stations’ signals are available free over the public airwaves.

ABC, a unit of the Walt Disney Company, said the live stream would be available in the other six cities where it owns stations sometime this summer. It is also in talks with the companies that own ABC’s more than 200 affiliates to make the “live” button work in their markets.

Also, not all shows have beencleared for streaming so there might be some discrepancies between the live feeds and the stream. The news comes as a service called Aereo (which we’ve reviewed) is place shifting broadcast signals to the internet, making live channels available to portable device owners. Read more

New York City Mayor Bloomberg blames iPhones & iPads for increase in crime

Jordan Kahn

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In September, we noted some statistics from the NYPD that claimed Apple-related crimes were increasing 10 times the 4 percent increase other crime in the city was experiencing. Today, New York City Michael Bloomberg is once again pointing to thefts of iPhones and iPads as the cause of the increase in the city’s annual crime index (via The New York Times):

Crime in New York City inched up this year, and Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg on Friday fingered the culprit: too many iPhones and iPads were being swiped.

As of Monday, the Police Department recorded 3,484 more crimes than for the same period last year. A full breakdown of the year’s crime statistics was not immediately available, but city officials were quick to focus on the Apple figure. The increase in Apple product thefts: 3,890.

“If you just took away the jump in Apple, we’d be down for the year,” said Marc La Vorgna, the mayor’s press secretary.

 

T-Mobile/Solavei roll out iPhone-compatible HSPA+ to 14 new metro areas, as Verizon LTE arrives in 29 markets

Jordan Kahn

T-Mobile-iPhone

T-Mobile’s Chief Technology Officer Neville Ray announced on the company’s blog today that 14 new metro areas are getting access to its iPhone-compatible HSPA+ 4G network. The updates are hitting areas such as New York, Boston, Philadelphia, Detroit, Dallas, Texas, Florida, and San Antonio, following rollouts to Chicago, California, and elsewhere earlier this month.

The carrier also said enhancements to its network in additional areas like Los Angeles and San Diego have already started. This means that customers on Solavei, the new, no-contract T-Mobile MVNO offering of $49 per month unlimited, will also get coverage for unlocked iPhones in the new areas. A full list is below:

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Apple’s Tim Cook takes TV project from hobby to ‘intense area of interest,’ says the industry is 20- to 30 years behind

Jordan Kahn

Tim Cook NBC interviewApple CEO Tim Cook’s much hyped NBC interview is set to air tonight at 10 p.m. EST, but we are already learning much of what will be discussed during the conversation that took place in, among other places, Apple’s Grand Central retail store location in New York. Earlier today, a profile from Bloomberg revealed Cook’s plans to bring at least some production of the Mac back to the United States in 2013, but he also hinted that the company has big plans for a next-generation Apple TV product. According to a preview of the interview on NBC’s website, Cook referred to the project as an “intense area of interest”—opposed to the “hobby” that the company has considered the product since its inception:

“When I go into my living room and turn on the TV, I feel like I have gone backwards in time by 20 to 30 years,” Cook told Williams. “It’s an area of intense interest. I can’t say more than that.”

Internal Apple video documents Apple Store philosophy

Seth Weintraub

Washington Square Films (NYC) gave us a rare look at one of the internal videos that Apple has shown its retail store employees. This one is obviously over a year old, with Ron Johnson at the helm (the date says 7/7/2011).

The video is a pretty impressive piece of work from director Peter Sillen for something that never aired publicly. Among other interesting tidbits, the video shows a store mock-up inside Covent Garden (London) in 2008 before construction with Apple execs examining design elements.

The video seems to be the type you might see on TV. And, with the departure of Ron Johnson (just guessing here), it might have been scrapped without stable store leadership to fill in. Bob Bridger, Apple’s vice president of Retail Development, gets significant ‘face time’, as well.

Update: The video was taken down by Apple. We’ve found another mirror in China embedded above. Here’s a mirror. Here’s another.

Thanks, Gary! Read more

Initial iPad mini stock selling out at various Apple Stores around the world

Jordan Kahn

iPad mini window display from NorthStar Mall, San Antonio (via @alanweinkrantz)

iPad mini officially went on sale at 8 a.m. this morning and reports are already starting to flow in that many Apple Stores have sold out of initial stock. Topeka Capital’s Brian White released a note to clients this morning (via BusinessInsider) that noted all models of iPad mini sold out in just over two hours at Apple’s flagship Fifth Avenue New York City store. Before today’s launch, shipment dates for Apple’s online pre-orders of the device had been pushed back, while shipment dates for pre-ordered LTE models of the device were recently removed.

Now reports indicate stores in the United Kingdom, Singapore, Canada, and many other states from Alabama to Hawaii have sold out of initial supplies.

It’s unclear just how much stock Apple had delivered to its various stores and resellers, but we noted earlier today that lines were much smaller than usual at many locations. The lines were most likely due to the fact today’s launch included just the Wi-Fi-only model, but it looks like Apple is still not able to meet demand in many locations. Some stores were rumored to get about 100 units, as noted in the tweet above, while we heard bigger stores received as many as 300.

It’s also not yet clear if supply of the new iPad mini will be held back by similar manufacturing troubles and supply constraints of which Apple is now experiencing with iPhone 5 and the new iMacs leading into the holidays.

Judging by the collection of tweets that we put together below, Apple is quickly selling out of initial iPad mini stock in many locations around the globe. Most stores are not expecting additional shipments today:

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