Apple

In a statement to Re/code, Apple has acknowledged the iMessage issue which affects customers who switch away from the iPhone, without disabling iMessage. This means that texts to these users are never delivered, as iPhone devices continue to use the iMessage protocol on the phone number that is no longer associated with an iPhone. Aside from a second-hand report by an AppleCare representative, this is Apple’s first official response to the recent criticism.

Expand
Expanding
Close

If Apple does indeed reach a deal to acquire Beats Electronics and announce it this week as expected, the clock is once again counting down to offer up your take on the whole scenario before it’s actually official. Steve Jobs’ biographer Walter Isaacson got that opportunity earlier this week thanks in part to Dan Lyons of Fake Steve Jobs fame; Isaacson told Lyons he believes the expected $3.2 billion acquisition by Apple is all about creating a world class video service led by Beats’ co-founder Jimmy Iovine.

But when you think about Beats and what the company has to offer for Apple, the subscription music service launched by the company in January earlier this year comes to mind. Spotify, of course, dominates in this space as seen by the company’s announcement today that they now have 10 million paid subscribers and 40 million active users.
Expand
Expanding
Close

Apple’s new expensive line of Mac Pro computers seem to be causing a headache for a tiny fraction of the Mac userbase. According to several professional video editors who have contacted us or posted information to various online forums, the recent OS X 10.9.3 update is breaking compatibility between some Mac Pro graphics cards and video editing applications such as Adobe Premiere Pro and Blackmagic DaVinci Resolve…

Expand
Expanding
Close

Omega Seamaster Planet Ocean watch with Liquidmetal

Apple has extended its rights to the metal alloy material that it originally licensed from Liquidmetal Technologies in 2010 for exclusive use in consumer electronics products. The proof comes from a recent filing with the SEC:

On May 19, 2014, Liquidmetal Technologies, Inc. (the “Company”) and Apple Inc. (“Apple”) entered into an second amendment (the “Second Amendment”) to the Master Transaction Agreement that was originally entered into on August 5, 2010 (the “MTA”) and amended on June 15, 2012 (the “First Amendment”). Under the MTA and the First Amendment, the Company was obligated to contribute to Crucible Intellectual Property, LLC, a special purpose subsidiary of the Company, all intellectual property acquired or developed by the Company from August 5, 2010 through February 5, 2014, and all intellectual property held by Crucible Intellectual Property, LLC was exclusively licensed on a perpetual basis to Apple for the field of use of consumer electronic products under the MTA. Under the Second Amendment, the parties agreed to amend the MTA and the First Amendment to extend the February 5, 2014 date to February 5, 2015.

Up until now Apple has tested the material in its SIM card ejector tool that came with previous generation iPhones, but several rumors in recent years have claimed it could take advantage of Liquidmetal for batteries, screws or other components of its products. However, back in 2012, one of Liquidmetal’s inventors noted that Apple was likely still three to five years away from using the material on a large scale in products:
Expand
Expanding
Close

[youtube=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eZCfK1ZXyP4#t=641]

Apple’s Lisa Jackson, who joined Apple in June last year to oversee environmental issues from her previous position as head of the Environmental Protection Agency, sat down for an interview this week with Fortune. As you’d expect, the topic of conversation was all things environmental issues at Apple and Jackson talks about many of the accomplishments the company recently announced for Earth Day. In addition to just stats and Apple’s renewable energy initiatives— Apple’s supply chain is responsible for 60% of its footprint— she also gives some hints at what Apple plans to improve in the future.

Jackson noted that Apple has more work to do getting renewable energy to all of its retail stores, but said its working hard to overcome some of the challenges and reach 100% renewable energy:
Expand
Expanding
Close

We’ve written about former Apple employee Wayne Goodrich before. Back in 2012 he launched a lawsuit against Apple claiming that co-founder Steve Jobs told him in 2005 he’d be guaranteed a job for life at the company. That was after being fired by Apple a year after Jobs’ death despite his guarantee of job security. Now, Goodrich, who was an executive producer of public presentations and with Apple for almost 20 years, has been given the go ahead for the lawsuit by a judge in Santa Clara (via BizJournals):
Expand
Expanding
Close

According to multiple sources, Facebook will unveil a new service today that can identify television shows and music playing in the background. The new software, which will be available via an updated App Store app on iPhone and a Google Play app on Android, will work in tandem with your smartphone hardware’s microphone. Facebook is said to be integrating the feature so Facebook users can more easily share what music they are listening to or what TV show they are currently watching to their Timelines. In iOS 8, Apple will unveil a new Siri feature in partnership with Shazam to identify songs playing in the background. Update: Official announcement after the break…
Expand
Expanding
Close

Besides a slew of events focused squarely on the technical side of developing and designing applications for iOS 8 and OS X 10.10, Apple, this year, will be holding a pair of interesting events over the course of the first week of June at WWDC.

On Wednesday June 4th from 4:30 to 5:30 PM Pacific Time, an event called Women in Technology Get Together will take place. This important event will discuss “the increased participation of women in technology,” the schedule in the updated WWDC app reads. Apple is making a point to further involve women in the conference this year, even announcing that the National Center for Women & Information Technology (NCWIT) will provide scholarships for women to attend WWDC:

Expand
Expanding
Close

Apple’s Craig Federighi (Getty)

This morning, Apple revealed the schedule for next month’s Worldwide Developers Conference. To start things off, an Apple keynote will be held from 10AM to 12PM on Monday, June 2nd at Moscone West. Apple typically holds keynote addresses to kick off WWDC, but this schedule serves as the first direct confirmation from Apple. The event will likely be led by Apple CEO Tim Cook with assistance from Senior VPs Craig Federighi and Eddy Cue, who have some new software and services announcements, respectively…

Expand
Expanding
Close

Steven Lamar, who helped create Beats headphones in 2006, has filed a complaint against Dr. Dre and Jimmy Iovine claiming he’s owed royalties on most of the company’s latest headphones, according to the Hollywood Reporter. In the complaint, Lamar recounts the earliest connection between Beats and Apple—and that the Cupertino company was almost the first Beats distributor.

Back in 2006, Lamar first hatched the idea for a line of celebrity-endorsed headphones. He took the idea to Interscope Records co-founder Jimmy Iovine and asked if Dr. Dre would be the celebrity sponsor. Lamar worked with a firm called Pentagram to create the first design for what would become Beats headphones.

That’s when Ivovine introduced Lamar to Apple retail VP Jerry McDougal. Lamar suggested to McDougal that Beats headphones should be sold in Apple retail stores, even going so far as to design the packaging around that very idea. McDougal introduced Lamar to Don Inmon, the man responsible for product placement in Apple’s retail stores.

Expand
Expanding
Close

Apple is quietly negotiating with some of the largest ISPs in the country in order to roll out their own Content Distribution Network, which would help ensure faster and more reliable downloads for iTunes content, iCloud data, and software (via StreamingMediaBlog). Apple has previously made strides to improve its networking infrastructure, including purchasing hardware to boost performance and creating a team dedicated to improving download speeds. It is also opening new Data Centers at a frenetic pace.

The creation of these deals with Internet Service Providers comes amid a firestorm surrounding net neutrality and peering deals of this type. Apple recently declined to join a group of 100 tech companies backing Net Neutrality in a written statement to the FCC.
Expand
Expanding
Close

While FOSS Patents’ Florian Mueller may be confident of Apple and Samsung reaching an early settlement on their patent disputes, a court-mandated update on the talks seems to tell a different story, with each side explaining why talks were not going well, reports The Verge.

For Apple, that includes statements made by Samsung’s lead attorney John Quinn, who referred to Apple as a “jihadist” and called the protracted trial “Apple’s Vietnam” in a pair of interviews …

Expand
Expanding
Close

With the expected Beats Electronics acquisition by Apple expected to take a week longer than first reported, industry watchers are making their last minute predictions as to why Apple would be interested in the audio and music service company.

The latest notable guess? Walter Isaacson, the man who literally wrote the book on Steve Jobs. Dan Lyons, former Fake Steve Jobs, reporting for Billboard:

“Isaacson thinks the Apple-Beats deal is not about headphones or streaming music but rather is about video. He speculates that Cook wants Iovine to run Apple’s content business and help Apple launch the TV product that analysts have been gossiping about for years. The product has been held up because Apple can’t get all the content owners on board.”

Lyons adds that Isaacson shared with him something which he did not include in the authorized biography of the late Apple co-founder: Jobs was pitched on Apple buying Universal by Jimmy Iovine around 2002 or 2003…
Expand
Expanding
Close

When Ron Johnson finalized his decision to move from leading Apple’s retail strategy to become the Chief Executive Officer of J.C. Penney, the executive jumped in his car to drive to Steve Jobs’ home and notify the Apple co-founder in his living room of the decision. During his short car ride to Jobs’ Palo Alto home in the summer of 2011, Johnson likely thought about how he would explain his choice. But what Johnson likely did not imagine is that it would take nearly three years for Apple to find a true new leader for the stores the duo created.

In one of current Apple CEO Tim Cook’s first major missteps, the long-time operations maestro hired John Browett, formerly of Dixons, to run retail. Browett’s hire was immediately met with skepticism from Apple customers and retail employees, but Cook defended the hire and called the British executive the “best [choice] by far” to run Apple’s retail division. In the six months that he ran retail, Browett cut back on employee hours, initiated layoffs, and fell out culturally with the rest of the Apple executive team.

Alongside Scott Forstall, Browett was ejected from the Cupertino-based company, leaving Tim Cook and head-hunting firm Egon Zehnder, again, with the tall task of finding a suitable replacement for Ron Johnson. As the man who ran Dixons, the United Kingdom equivalent to Best Buy, Browett was in many ways built in the image of Johnson. Johnson ran Apple Retail for nearly a decade, and before that he was an executive at both Target and Mervyns. But unlike Browett, Johnson fit into Apple’s culture and was close with both Jobs and Cook throughout his tenure.

Expand
Expanding
Close

<a href="http://9to5mac.com/2014/05/19/this-is-what-ios-looks-like-on-a-4-7-inch-iphone-6-display-video/">Full video below</a>

Over the past couple of months, it’s been rumored that Apple’s iPhone 6 will feature a larger 4.7-inch display. Several mockups and schematics have appeared online that mimic this rumor, but we won’t have confirmation until Apple announces the iPhone 6 later this year.

Instead of waiting for the rumors to be confirmed, we thought it would be fun and useful to create a physical iPhone 6 simulator. Doing so, would give us an idea of what iOS would look like if it were running on a 4.7-inch display…

Expand
Expanding
Close