Jordan manages the internal Partner Program for sponsorships and partnerships across the 9to5 network’s media brands including 9to5Mac, 9to5Google, 9to5Toys, Electrek.co, SpaceExplored and DroneDJ.com.
Jordan also writes about all things Apple as a Senior Editor of 9to5Mac. He covers Google for 9to5Google.com, the best gadgets and deals on 9to5Toys.com, and EV and solar news on Electrek.co. He also co-authors 9to5Mac’s Logic Pros series and makes music sometimes.
Contact Jordan with partnership inquiries and long-winded complaints:
Following a launch of its new Amazon Music Unlimited plan in the U.S. last month and an EU launch earlier this week, today the company announced a family plan option for the service.
Update: Apple has added 28 new banks and credit unions in the U.S. too. Full list below.
Apple today updated its list of Apple Pay banks to add new banks and credit unions supported in the U.S., Mainland China, Russia, and Australia.
The additions include twenty eight new banks and credit unions in the U.S., nine in China, four in Russia, and over thirty in Australia.
The newly added banks include:
After announcing in September that it would begin “removing problematic and abandoned apps” in an effort to clean up the App Store, new data shows Apple is now fulfilling that promise with removals dramatically increasing around 238 percent last month.
The data below from research firm Sensor Tower (via TechCrunch) shows around 47,300 apps were removed in October, around 3.4 times more than the average month for the App Store prior to the new purging initiative.
Expand
Expanding
Close
According to a new report from Australian publication The Age, Apple is eyeing Federation Square in Melbourne for the location of a new flagship retail store in the country.
With the new MacBook Pros with Touch Bar arriving to the first pre-order customers and going on sale at Apple stores this week, you might be looking to try out some apps that support the new hardware. Fortunately, Apple has already confirmed many apps that will get support for Touch Bar, the new contextually sensitive touchscreen panel embedded into the MacBook Pro’s keyboard, and many others app developers are announcing updates.
Head below for the full list.
Update: Some customers report being able to purchase the new MacBook Pro with Touch Bar at some locations as of Wedneday, November 15th. Other stores will officially start selling stock of the new device tomorrow, as detailed in our original story below.
The new MacBook Pro with Touch Bar will be available at Apple retail stores later this week alongside demo units for customers to try, according to sources familiar with Apple’s plans.
Apple’s new MacBook Pro with Touch Bar has up until now only been available to order with a 4-5 week shipping estimate from Apple’s website, but this week the device will arrive at retail stores as the first shipments are delivered to pre-order customers. So far Apple has only had the new MacBook Pro with Touch Bar models displayed under glass with a demo loop, but this week customers should also be able to get their hands on demo units to try for themselves in at least some locations.
Today official reviews for Apple’s new MacBook Pro with Touch Bar have surfaced online as the first preorders for the device arrive to customers this week alongside a retail launch. Apple started shipping pre-orders over the weekend with the first deliveries expected to be in customers’ hands by early this week.
How does the new contextually sensitive Touch Bar panel embedded into the MacBook Pro’s keyboard perform in the real world? And are the rest of the machine’s hardware upgrades enough to warrant the price tag?
The consensus seems to be that most enjoyed using the Touch Bar and noted its potential for the future. There are, however, mixed reviews when it comes to overall performance with many reviewers pointing out the price of the new MacBook Pros in relation to specs, performance, and the competition.
Head below for the review rundown:
In this week’s top stories: Early MacBook Pro reviews roll in as Apple starts shipping the device to customers, a possible AirPods release date emerges, iOS 10.2 beta 2, iPhone 8 rumors, and much more.
Apple has started hiring for positions needed at its new Campus 2 facility ahead of a move-in date expected for sometime early next year.
Reviews for Apple’s new MacBook Pro have yet to officially go live, despite a couple false starts earlier this week. Those should arrive any day now ahead of a retail release for the machine, but one pro video editor today published his early hands-on review after using the new 15-inch model in a real-world setting. The review also aims to address some of the early criticisms of the new MacBook Pro from pros, showing how the machine held up in a real-world, professional environment.
The author Thomas Grove Carter works at Trim Editing, a studio in London where he edits “high end commercials, music videos and films” using Final Cut Pro.
Apple is now preparing to ship the first MacBook Pro orders as early as this Friday, November 11, as some preorder customers report updated shipping and delivery estimates today.
After launching its new Snapchat-inspired ‘Stories’ feature earlier this year, which allows users to share a time-limited collection of videos and photos in a slideshow-like format, Instagram is today rolling out an update that adds new functionality to Stories.
New in the update is a built-in “Boomerang” mode that lets you tap into some of the functionality from Instagram’s standalone app of the same name. That is, the ability to stitch together a burst of photos into a GIF-like video…
Just over a month after launching Apple Pay on the web to bring the payments service to website checkouts via its Safari web browser, new data shows Apple has already made it into the top five payment technologies online.
Apple has a new web page up today sharing exclusive holiday offers available for customers who use its newly launched Apple Pay on the web feature.
Some of the companies offering deals for using Apple Pay on the web this holiday season include Adidas, Casper, Grubhub, lululemon, Overstock, Shopify, seamless, and more.
Apple has sold out of refurbished last-generation 15-inch MacBook Pros from its online store as the company introduces new models expected to ship to customers in the coming weeks.
As noted by customers on Reddit, Apple previously had several models of refurbished last-generation MacBook Pro models available at discounted prices, but that supply is now dwindling as customers pick up remaining stock.
Last week Apple announced a decision to decrease USB-C accessory prices to help out new MacBook Pro users who might need adapters temporarily. Apple has now started automatically crediting customers who purchased the reduced products just prior to the announcement.
Earlier today we noted that Gmail was getting a big update today for iPhone and iPad that introduces an overhauled UI and new features. Not to be left out, Google’s Calendar app for iPhone— still not available for iPad— also gets a few new features today.
The app’s user interface gets a big improvement in the form of a new Month view while your iPhone’s in Portrait mode, and Week view now available while the device is in landscape mode. Take a look:
Also new for Google Calendar for iPhone is support for Spotlight search, which Google notes will allow you to find events, Reminders and Goals stored within the app using iOS’s built-in Spotlight Search function.
For G Suite users, the app will now let you add guests to events and automatically suggest meeting times and rooms. And finally, the updated Calendar app gets support for alternative calendars with today’s update:
Alternate calendars. If you often look up dates in a non-Gregorian calendar — like Lunar, Islamic, or Hindu — you can now add that calendar to easily see those dates alongside your current calendar.
The updated Google Calendar app for iPhone, version 1.6.3, is available on the App Store now.
Earlier today Google released a completely redesigned Gmail for iOS app w/ enhanced search, Undo Send and more.
Facebook’s popular messaging app WhatsApp is today adding support for GIFs to its iPhone app, allowing its billion users to search for customize and send animated GIF images in chats (Android support is still in beta and coming soon).
An increasing number of customers that ordered Apple’s new MacBook Pro with Touch Bar models report having their credit card charged this morning ahead of Apple’s earliest expected shipping date of November 17. A few of us on the 9to5Mac team have also had our cards charged today.
Google today released an updated Gmail app for iPhone and iPad that introduces a redesigned user interface alongside a few features from Gmail on the web that it says were highly requested. The new design is notably similar to the Gmail app available on Android devices.
In this week’s top stories: Apple answers your MacBook Pro questions, cuts USB-C adapter prices, iOS 10.2 arrives for testers, and we break down the best wireless cord-free earbuds available ahead of Apple’s AirPods.
Following an announcement from Apple today that it would decrease prices of USB-C accessories to help ease the transition to the all USB-C ports on the new MacBook Pro models, it’s also offering discounted pricing on the new LG UltraFine 5K and 4K displays that it introduced to go alongside the new Thunderbolt 3-equipped Macs. The deals get you around 25% off the newly announced displays made for the new MacBook and MacBook Pro models.
With Apple announcing new MacBook Pros last week, Pad & Quill’s latest bag for MacBooks arriving at my office was perfect timing.
Apple today shared a new iPhone 7 ad called “Dive” through its official YouTube channel, this time around focusing on the device’s new louder stereo speakers and waterproof features.