News - page 39

This week on Cult of Mac’s podcast: It sounds like Apple’s partnership with Goldman Sachs is on the rocks. What does that mean for the future of Apple Card?

Also on The CultCast:

• The latest iOS 17.2 beta reveals some interesting new features.
• Apple’s deal with Arm is pretty sweet … and pretty annoying for Arm!
• Those panicky headlines about NameDrop you’ve been seeing that paint the iOS 17 feature as danger to children? Ignore them.
• Apple seems pretty committed to Vision Pro: Multiple lower-priced versions of the headset are reportedly in the works.

Listen to this week’s episode of The CultCast in the Podcasts app or your favorite podcast app. (Be sure to subscribe and leave us a review if you like it!) Or watch the video live stream, embedded below.

December 2, 1991: Apple ships its first public version of QuickTime, bringing video to Mac users running System 7.

Containing codecs for graphics, animation and video, QuickTime confirms Apple’s status as a leading multimedia tech company. The software also starts us all off on the path to playing video on our computers. This fundamental transformation of Macs into media machines eventually leads to iTunes Movies, YouTube and more.

Apple showed off its Apple silicon lab to media for the first time recently, allowing unusual access along with video interviews with executives about Cupertino’s major chipmaking strides in recent years, culminating in the current M3 series.

“One of the most, if not the most, profound change at Apple, certainly in our products over the last 20 years, is how we now do so many of those technologies in-house,” Apple’s Senior Vice President of Hardware Engineering John Ternus said in one interview.

As we ring in the first day of December, let us toast winter. More specifically, let us toast what a user calls their “winter edition” computer setup in Berlin, Germany, featuring a powerful MacBook Pro, a gorgeous 5K display, a cool mechanical keyboard and the best tool of all for toasting — a bottle of extremely good, peat-forward scotch from Islay, Scotland.

December 1, 1981: After the disastrous rollout of the “next-gen” Apple III the previous year, Apple corrects the computer’s most glaring hardware faults and relaunches it.

Unfortunately, the damage has already been done. Apple experiences its first “flop” product with the Apple II‘s doomed successor.

Missed out on buying the 14-inch M3 MacBook Pro during Black Friday or Cyber Monday? You are in luck, as the laptop is now available for an even lower price.

Best Buy is taking up to $250 off the M3 MacBook Pro, making it a great time to buy one.

There’s good news for those who subscribe to both Apple TV+ and Paramount+. Friday brought word of a potential bundle of these streaming video services that would save subscribers money.

If the unconfirmed report pans out, it’ll be the first such deal for Apple TV+.

If you haven’t tried a multi-device charging stand, you’re missing out. There’s nothing like the convenience of plopping your Apple devices — iPhone, Apple Watch, AirPods — in one place like a side table or night stand to top them off.

And right now you can get up to 47% off SwitchEasy’s 4-in-1 and 2-in-1 magnetic wireless charging stands in the Cult of Mac Store.

A bride in England recently snapped an iPhone photo of herself trying on a wedding dress in front of mirrors. She was shocked to find her reflection looked different in each one.

That may sound like a disturbance you’d see in dark sci-fi series Black Mirror, but it’s actually a rare but understandable result of a computational-photography error.

Apple reportedly will bring the iPhone 15 Pro’s Action button to the entire iPhone 16 lineup next year. It will seemingly be a capacitive button and pack a lot of additional functionality.

The new rumor indicates the iPhone 16’s Action button will use a force sensor, allowing it to detect changes in pressure.

Peter Capaldi and Cush Jumbo are set to star as dueling detectives in Criminal Record, a crime drama premiering on Apple TV+ in a few weeks.

The trailer for the series dropped Thursday, offering an early look at the eight-episode series.

Apple released iOS 17.1.2 and macOS Sonoma 14.1.2 on Thursday. These are security patches for bugs that have been actively exploited by hackers. As such, they come strongly recommended.

iPadOS 17.1.2 was also released to take care of the same issues.

The new Personal Voice feature in iOS 17, iPadOS 17 and macOS Sonoma can restore a person’s voice even after they lose it for any reason.

Apple demonstrated that quite well Thursday in an article and video featuring a disability advocate suffering facioscapulohumeral muscular dystrophy (FSHD).

MacBook Air performs well without a MacBook Pro’s cooling fan, but now a tiny cooling chip can bridge the difference between the two laptops, according to a new report.

The thin membrane-based AirJet chip fits in Apple’s lightest laptop and boosts its performance when needed. Too bad you can’t just buy it and install it.

November 30, 2003: Apple expands its retail chain outside the United States for the first time, opening an Apple Store in Tokyo’s trendy Ginza shopping district.

On opening day, thousands of Apple fans — possibly the biggest queue in Apple history — line up around the block in the rain to gain early access to the store, which offers five full floors of Apple product goodness.

Apple CEO Steve Jobs does not show up for the opening of the 73rd Apple Store. However, shoppers hear a welcoming speech from Eiko Harada, president of Apple Japan.

Amazon is once again running an insane deal on the AirPods Pro 2, dropping them to their Black Friday price. You can get the earbuds for $189.99, a whopping $59 off their $249 MSRP.

With no AirPods Pro successor coming anytime soon, Apple’s 2nd gen earbuds are the best earphones you can get for your iPhone.

Apple silicon processors that TSMC makes at its Arizona plant will be packaged by Amkor at a nearby facility. This will save them from having to be shipped to Taiwan before going into iPhone, Mac, etc.

“Apple is deeply committed to the future of American manufacturing, and we’ll continue to expand our investment here in the United States,” said Jeff Williams, Apple’s COO. “Apple silicon has unlocked new levels of performance for our users, enabling them to do things they could never do before, and we are thrilled that Apple silicon will soon be produced and packaged in Arizona.”

There are few things more classic than a stainless steel watch band. It’s durable yet stylish, rugged yet elegant, and appropriate for work or play. You can wear it with a T-shirt or a tuxedo. And that goes for your grandfather’s Rolex as much as it goes for your Apple Watch.

Lucky for you, Elago’s stainless steel watch bands for Apple Watch in three colors to the Cult of Mac Store. And they’re affordable, too.

Apple has announced the 2023 App Store Awards winner after highlighting the 37 finalists earlier this month. The iPhone App of the Year went to AllTrails, while Prêt-à-Makeup won the iPad App of the Year.

Photomator was crowned as the Mac App of the Year. Unsurprisingly, generative AI was the Trend of the Year, with App Store Editors highlighting some apps that used it to deliver an innovative app experience.

Actor Robert De Niro slammed Apple this week over anti-Donald Trump comments deleted from his speech at the Gotham Awards Monday evening.

The legendary actor noticed the commentary missing from the teleprompter as he began to introduce the Gotham Historical Icon and Creator Tribute to Martin Scorsese’s Killers Of The Flower Moon, produced by Apple (and starring De Niro). So he took out his smartphone and read them anyway.

The new Belkin Connect Universal USB-C 11-in-1 Pro Dock packs Silicon Motion technology, provides ports some newer laptops lack and can connect three external monitors, the company said last week.

All Apple computers run on chips based on technology licensed from Arm. And it turns out the licensing fee is surprisingly low. Pennies per device.

Apple is one of Arm’s most important customers, and the two have a relationship that goes back to the early 1990s. That’s turned into a sweet deal for the iPhone-maker.

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: If you’re not elevating your laptop, iPad and displays on mounts and arms, you’re limiting your computer setup. Today’s feature MacBook Pro and iPad setup illustrates the point well by putting those devices and dual displays on four separate mounts, some with moveable arms.

That makes all of those devices more flexible, and much easier to move around than they would be on stationary stands. It also frees up space on the desk.

November 29, 1995: Capitalizing on the success of Toy Story, Pixar floats 6.9 million shares on the stock market. The IPO makes Steve Jobs, who owns upward of 80% of the animation studio, a billionaire.

After the windfall, one of the first people Jobs calls is his friend, Oracle co-founder Larry Ellison, who’s already a member of the billionaire’s club.

“Hello, Larry?” Jobs tells his friend on the phone. “I made it.”

Apple’s partnership with Goldman Sachs for the Apple Card is reportedly coming to an end. The Wall Street Journal says Apple sent a proposal to the bank to exit from the agreement in the next 12 to 15 months.

At the moment, it remains unclear if Apple has zeroed in on another banking partner for Apple Card.