Pinterest is introducing a new feature for its iOS app called Lens. Rolling out now as a beta feature, Lens lets you point your camera at your surroundings to discover new design ideas based on what it captures.
Users of the Bing app for iPhone are getting some welcomed improvements today with the latest update bringing a new barcode scanner with price comparison functionality and a new deal finder feature.
Every year, Apple puts together a beautiful-looking holiday gift guide on Apple.com, packed with the latest iOS devices, Macs, and accessories people would love to receive as gifts. The hitch is that Apple’s prices are almost always full retail, with no discounting, so it’s easy to spend anywhere from $5 to $300 more per item than if you shopped around.
This year, 9to5Toys and 9to5Mac have done the bargain hunting for you. We’ve found savings on virtually every item on Apple’s holiday shopping list, which this year is organized into 6 sections: Gaming, Photography, Music, Fitness, Learning and Travel. Using the links below, you can save up to $350 on a new 12″ MacBook, between $20 and $80 on many third-party accessories, and up to $130 on a pair of Beats headphones…
Apple’s Personal Pickup service – where you place your order online but can pick it up from a local Apple Store as early as an hour later – just hit six more European countries today: France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Spain and Sweden.
Long limited to the U.S. only, it made its way to Australia and Canada a couple of weeks ago, and the UK a few days later. German site Macerkopf first noticed its availability in Germany, before updating with the additional five countries.
Personal Pickup can be a useful option if you’re in a hurry, allowing you to get your hands on a product the same day while minimizing the amount of time you spend fighting the crowds in an Apple Store.
Welcome to our iPad Holiday Gift Guide! There’s currently a lot of excitement around the world of iPad, and rightfully so.
On the software side, Apple injected new life into prior models by adding side-by-side apps and picture-in-picture video with iOS 9. In hardware, the smaller 7.9″ iPad mini family got major speed and notable display quality improvements with the iPad mini 4, while brand new 9.7″ iPad Air 2’s are being sold at prices lower than minis, and a completely new class of iPad debuted in the just-launched 12.9″ iPad Pro.
There are essential accessories in all price ranges for every iPad regardless of which size you’re addressing, and we’ve tested a lot of products over the years. Read on and please share our iPad Holiday Gift Guide so you and your loved ones can buy the best iPad accessories for the holidays.
After first announcing plans earlier this month to become a storefront of sorts with a new Buyable Pins feature, Pinterest just confirmed the feature is rolling out today for iPhone and iPad users in the US. In addition to the new buyable pins feature, Pinterest is also launching “Shop our picks” with curated lists of items for various product categories.
As a catalog of ideas, our mission is to help people bring their creative ideas to life. In the next few weeks, 30 million Pins all over Pinterest will become buyable (this includes Pins people have already saved that will light up with blue prices at launch). You’ll see products from brands like Macy’s, Neiman Marcus and Nordstrom, retailers powered by Demandware like Gardener’s Supply Company and Michaels, and Shopify stores like Poler Outdoor Stuff and SOBU.
Pinterest notes that users will notice a blue price tag next to buyable pins that will show up in user’s home feed, boards, category feeds, search results and recommendations.
Here’s a closer look at how the feature will appear in the iPhone app:
The feature is rolling out slowly in the US. If you’re a Pinterest user, keep an eye out for an email notification that will let you know when buyable pins are available to you.
Shopping this year through iPhone and iPad apps is significantly more convenient thanks to Apple Pay and Touch ID. The latest iPhones and iPads allow you to avoid the arduous process of re-entering your credit card information each time at checkout and instead pay for your purchase with the touch of your finger.
Hopefully our holiday gift guides are steering you in the right direction for what to buy this year, especially with guides focused on using your iPhone and iPad in the car, making music with Apple devices, outfitting your home with connected smart devices, and more, and these shopping apps should continue to help you along the way.
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The latest stats from Swirl Networks, the company behind a number of beacon deployments at high-profile retailers, shows that shoppers in the US are embracing Bluetooth beacons and along with it Apple’s iBeacon framework for app developers sending location sensitive notifications to users. More specifically, data collected from the company’s beacon deployments in recent months shows that beacons are influencing the way we shop with more than half engaging with the feature and many redeeming beacon offers when making purchases.
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For Black Friday, Apple has refreshed the frontpage of its online store with a rather-drastic redesign. Each product category now dominates the webpage, with full-bleed images of their main product lines. The new iPad updates get the top spot, but interestingly Apple TV and Beats headphones also get prime placement. In fact, the product images for Beats accessories are so large, it only takes four images to dominate the screen.
The strap-line ‘From one gift come many’ headlines the page, which also links up with Apple’s upcoming retail store holiday changes. The same tagline will soon be featured in Apple Store windows around the world, highlighting the wide scope of the iPhone and iPad, as shown below.
Apple executive Eddy Cue, in charge of the team that developed Apple Pay, recently participated in some holiday shopping with local news station KTLA to demonstrate how the new mobile payments platform works. Cue, alongside tech reporter Rich DeMuro, visited a number of stores in Santa Monica, California, including Panera Bread, Bloomingdale’s and the Disney Store.
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A new app created by the supermarket chain Sainsbury’s is aiming to integrate the virtual and physical shopping process, allowing you to create shopping lists, be guided to those products in the store and to pay on your smartphone, skipping the checkout queues. It is currently being tested internally, with customer trials to follow early next year, initially in the UK.
Sainsbury’s says that the app is all about saving time.
Overall, the app is proven to cut the time taken to do a shop – reducing checkout time to seconds in testing.
Jon Rudoe, Digital and Technology Director at Sainsbury’s, said “We know that customers’ weekly shop doesn’t start at our front door – they know what they like and they also like that search for a bargain. They still want to come into store – but with limited time, they want to be able to get their shop done quickly. That’s why we’re putting digital firmly at the forefront of our agenda, and putting technology in the hands of our customers.
Personally I’ll stick to online shopping and letting the supermarket deliver the goods to my kitchen, but if you’re one of those people who still like to visit stores personally, this looks like it’ll at least speed up the process.
Taking advantage of a new technology introduced in iOS 7, eBay for iPhone has integrated sharing support for AirDrop in the latest update to its app.
AirDrop sharing allows you to share content you are viewing with others around you without your friends having to search the app or click any links. eBay also integrated Pinterest board sharing in its new version.
Customers in the US and UK now have the option to pickup purchases at local retailers as well.
Download or update the latest version eBay for iPhone for free on the App Store.
(eBay for iPad also received an update, which was mostly supplemental. Both change logs below.)
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Not only did the iPod (Rasputin) Classic not die as predicted (again) today, Apple is wrapping the ‘old man of the iPods’ up with its Apple Care Plus plans along with the more popular iPod touch. According to the updated iPod support page, Apple customers can now purchase an additional year of coverage for the iPods as well as phone support beyond 90 days and most importantly, two incidents of accidental damage coverage (+$29 service fee) for $59 here.
Previously, only regular AppleCare as available to iPods and was grouped in with Apple TVs.
Apple also raised AppleCare+ fees today on iPhones from $49 to $79 and also launched in Europe.
Update: We have also learned that out of warranty replacements for the iPhone 5 (and presumably 5s) will be priced at $269, an increase of $40 over the past year. This inflated cost may make it easier for iPhone owners to justify the up-front cost of AppleCare+.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qRdRwyFceJY
Today, PayPal has announced a significant update to its iPhone app. Ahead of iOS 7, the application has been completely redesigned with a simpler, flatter user-interface.
Feature-wise, the app update focuses around mobile payments. With a new “Shop” tab, users of the new PayPal app can find restaurants, shops, and venues that support paying with PayPal. On top of that, some of these shops even support purchasing and paying for food or another item before walking into the store.
As explained to TechCrunch, some of these shops even support coupons. Ordering ahead includes the nice benefit of skipping the line. Another feature that goes nice with the “Shop” feature is the ability to pay a restaurant bill via the app.
A bill-me-later option has also been added. The new update for iPhone is expected to arrive on the App Store today.
eBay has just released a new app for iOS that will allow customers to customize select products to be manufactured using 3D printing technology. As per its description, the app allows you to select a from a pre-determined list of available products, choose a design, and then further customize that specific item for yourself or someone else.
Customers can choose from a variety of materials including plastics, woods, and metals to create anything from personalized iPhone cases to figurines or even jewelry. The company notes that there is no limit to the amount of products you can customize and print.
eBay is relying on partnerships with established 3D printing companies to back its program including Makerbot, Sculpteo, and Hot Pop Factory. The app, eBay Exact, can be downloaded from the App Store today free of charge.
Today, Amazon has updated its popular shopping app for the iPad to work in China and Japan. Both of those countries are known as critical growth markets for the mobile shopping and technology industries, making today’s update notable. Additionally, the update brings a new “Shop by Department” mode and performance improvements for the iPhone and iPod touch Amazon app.
Apple has announced that it’s opening a new store in Melbourne on Saturday, based in the Highpoint Shopping Centre in the western suburbs. While the company already has five stores in the State of Victoria, this is the first in Melbourne, Australia’s second-largest city …
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Ahead of the Mother’s Day “commercial holiday” in May, Apple has updated its online store with a Mother’s Day theme. Apple seems to be heavily promoting the iPad more than other products. Additionally, the company is promoting various accessories.
We recently showed you some of the possible innovative and or highly requested new features Apple could add in the next version of iOS. It’s unclear whether Jony Ive’s new software design responsibilities will lead to a radically new design for iOS 7, but many features of iOS are becoming more and more outdated with every slick new jailbreak tweak that gets released. One example is the lock screen—something that new jailbreak tweak Peekly aims to revamp.
Peekly brings weather, a selection of clocks, and a 3-month calendar in a two-page theme that reimagines the lock screen:
Peekly is a 2 page lockscreen theme for iOS. On the first page, you get the time and date. Currently you can choose between the default clock, a digital clock or no clock/date at all. More clocks coming soon! Dragging your lockscreen to the right will allow you to “Peek” at a 3 month calendar. This is the default peek. You can currently choose to put in a Twitter feed, yourGoogle Calendar events or an RSS feed. More options will be added soon. Swiping the lockscreen to the left will bring you to page 2, which has today’s weather. “Peeking” to the left on this page will show you a 4 day forecast.
From a bygone era, Amazon today announced AutoRip. It is a service that will let customers that purchase AutoRip enabled CDs from Amazon access MP3 versions from Cloud Player. The service isn’t just for newly purchased CDs, it includes over 50,000 albums for CDs since the launch of Amazon’s music store in 1998, but we’re not sure how many people have stacks of CDs lying around since ’98 that they’ve yet to rip. If for some reason you’ll still purchasing physical CDs from Amazon’s music store, and you’re located in the U.S., you can start taking advantage of the AutoRip service today.
@9to5mac More useful if they would offer Kindle versions of the books you buy.
— Mark Jowett Tan (@jowett) January 10, 2013
From 9to5Toys.com:
Update: Best Buy is now down to 15%. Still worth your time.
Today only, Best Buy knocks 20% off the price of physical iTunes gift cards across the board from $15 -$100 (including the very handy $10 three-pack). iTunes gift cards are good for music, videos, iBooks, movies, and iOS/Mac Apps. They can be ordered site-to-store for pick-up up until 3PM on Dec 24th or ship for free if you don’t need them by Christmas.
If you are looking to buy an email-redeemable iTunes credit, Walmart still sells a $50 emailled iTunes credit for $40, though readers sometimes complain about Walmart’s reliability.
Obviously, these make great last minute gifts/stocking stuffers and are an easy way to get 20% off all of your Apple media.
Amazon also offers gift cards that can be sent via email, Facebook or printed out in any denomination.
From 9to5Toys.com:
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For a limited time, Walmart is offering the $50 iTunes gift card for $40. That’s 20 percent off and the lowest price we’ve seen for these. The card comes immediately through email, and it counts toward free shipping on other items. It can be purchased for use in the US iTunes Store on iBooks, Mac and iOS Apps, Music, Videos, Movies and more.
Limit two per customer. International readers have mixed results when purchasing these. You usually need US-based credit cards.
You can save even more on your iTunes purchases by using this discounted gift card to purchase heavily discounted apps. 9to5toys has been tracking some of the best iPhone and iPad app deals for the holiday season. Most notably:
EA Games iOS holiday sale, over 50 iPhone & iPad titles starting from just 99 cents
iPhone & iPad game, Infinity Blade II, temporarily $2.99 (Reg. $6.99)
iPhone & iPad game, Infinity Blade, temporarily 99 cents (Reg. $5.99)
iPhone & iPad app, Skyfire Web Browser (iOS Flash media player), now on sale
iPhone & iPad game, The Dark Knight Rises, temporarily 99 cents (Reg. $6.99)
Great commercial—except they did not really show how or if it even works. It reminds me more of an iPod shuffle commercial than a hybrid tablet/laptop introduction.
[youtube=”http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mrRHPf0_B3M&feature=plcp”]
Shown during its media event last month, Apple posted a new iPod advertisement online. It has also been appearing on television. The ad, titled “Bounce”, highlights the various new designs in Apple’s iPod lineup and the choice of colors it now offers.
In case you are wondering how these iPods really bounce, we have the first iPod touch drop test below:
