Apple

Apple Music to cost €9.99 per month in Europe, but many indie acts could be absent from launch

Christian Zibreg ∙ June 17, 2015

Apple Music launches June 30 and while the company has said that unlimited streaming will set US-based music lovers back $9.99 per month, the iPhone maker has yet to reveal pricing for other markets in which the service will sell.

A recent sighting in the latest iOS 8.4 beta shared with iDownloadBlog indicates Apple Music will be priced the same dollar for dollar across Europe, with UK customers paying £9.99 per month and the rest of the continent €9.99 per month, or £14.99/€14.99 for family plans.

These prices have yet to be confirmed on Apple’s official website. It's important to note that UK prices include tax while US ones don't include sales tax, which varies by state. As a result, Brits will be paying a bit of a premium compared to US users.

Meanwhile, many independent labels in the UK may refuse to sign Apple Music contract, meaning the service could launch without such big-name artists as Adele and the Arctic Monkeys.

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Apple Watch in-store sales rolling out today

Christian Zibreg ∙ June 17, 2015

Starting today, Wednesday, June 17, in-store sales of the Apple Watch have kicked off in select Apple retail stores with limited availability across launch markets.

As per web reports, last evening certain Apple Stores in the United States have begun receiving shipments of the device for in-store pickup via Apple's new Reserve & Pickup service for watch buyers.

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KGI: iPhone 6s to be marginally thicker due to Force Touch

Christian Zibreg ∙ June 17, 2015

Several supply chain reports have indicated that this year's 'iPhone 6s' and 'iPhone 6s Plus' releases will feature Apple's pressure-sensitive screen technology called Force Touch that debuted on the Apple Watch and now a revered analyst has given these reports an aura of credibility.

Ming-Chi Kuo of KGI Securities wrote in a note to clients, a copy of which was obtained by the Japanese blog MacOtakara, that Apple's implementation of Force Touch on the upcoming phones will make them slightly thicker than the present-generation iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus.

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Apple pulls Monster’s MFi license following Beats lawsuit

Cody Lee ∙ June 16, 2015

Apple has revoked Monster's MFi license in wake of its Beats lawsuit, reports The Wall Street Journal. Monster, the A/V company who manufactured headphones for Beats in its early days, filed a lawsuit against the company in January for duping it out of potential proceeds from the Apple acquisition.

Monster’s general counsel David Tognotti said Apple's move to pull its MFi license is in retribution for the suit, and that it can significantly disrupt their business—which still involves building premium headphones. “It shows a side of Apple that consumers don’t see very often,” he said. “Apple can be a bully.”

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Apple hiring a team of professional journalists to run Apple News service and curate content

Christian Zibreg ∙ June 16, 2015

Apple News, a brand new Flipboard-like app set to debut when iOS 9 launches this fall, will be run by a team of professional journalists who are currently being hired by Apple, The Financial Times learned Tuesday.

It's part of a broader push by the company to personalize the content it delivers to users of its devices, according to a recent job ad seeking successful candidates that would “identify and deliver the best in breaking national, global and local news”.

More importantly, the move indicates Apple is more interested in doing curated distribution for the News service than rely on algorithms like Google News does.

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Telltale Games announces its first ever mini-series called The Walking Dead: Michonne

Christian Zibreg ∙ June 16, 2015

Telltale Games, the makers of rather popular cinematic cross-platform games such as The Walking Dead, Game of Thrones and The Wolf Among Us, announced at E3 a brand new miniseries for the iPhone and iPad called The Walking Dead: Michonne.

Developed by Skybound and framed as the next installment in The Walking Dead: A Telltale Games Series, the game takes place between issues #126 and #139 in the comics series and features the particularly popular Michonne character.

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Spotify launches fun new feature called Rewind that turns your music back in time

Christian Zibreg ∙ Updated October 14, 2018

If you ever wondered which artists you would be listening to if you were born in another time, now you can thanks to Rewind, a new feature by Spotify that helps you turn your music back in time.

By doing so, Rewind makes it easy and supposedly fun to know what you'd be listening to in another decade, based on what you listen to today and thanks in no small part to Spotify's rich knowledge graph about its user base.

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You can now watch Apple’s WWDC 2015 keynote on YouTube

Cody Lee ∙ June 15, 2015

It's taken a week, but Apple has finally uploaded this year's WWDC keynote to YouTube. The replay has been available as an embedded video on Apple's website, but it required that you be on a device with QuickTime installed to watch it.

So folks who missed Apple’s WWDC keynote last week, or would just like to watch it again, things have just been made much easier. You can now view it within YouTube's desktop or mobile web app, or via the native mobile YouTube app.

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Apple posts four new ‘Shot on iPhone 6’ videos

Cody Lee ∙ Updated January 28, 2016

Apple has added four new clips to the World Gallery films section of its "Shot on iPhone 6" microsite. The company launched the Shot on iPhone 6 campaign earlier this year, showcasing beautiful photos and videos taken with its latest smartphones.

The new videos are very similar to the previous ones, in that they are 15 seconds long and accompanied by an analogous soundtrack. They were captured by photographers from countries around the world, including the US, Australia and Norway.

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Apple seeds OS X 10.10.4 beta 6 to developers, public testers

Cody Lee ∙ Updated April 18, 2018

Apple on Monday seeded the sixth beta of the upcoming OS X Yosemite 10.10.4 software to both developers and public testers. The update, labeled build 14E36b, is available through the Update tab in the Mac App Store, and the Dev Center for all registered Mac developers.

OS X 10.10.4 has been in testing since mid-April, and we have yet to see it bring about any significant user-facing changes or new features. It appears that the release will be more of a maintenance update, as Apple attempts to iron out remaining bugs and other known issues.

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How to set up and use Apple Pay with Apple Watch

Christian Zibreg ∙ Updated June 30, 2023

The Apple Watch has built-in NFC, which stands for Near-Field Communication, for making wireless payments on the go. And in a typical Apple fashion, the watch doesn't even have to be in the range of its paired iPhone, nor does it have to establish a network connection, to make the payment.

Before you can start making payments with a flick of your wrist, you're going to need to set up Apple Pay on your Apple Watch. In this tutorial, I'm going to lay it all out for your and explain how to set up, manage and use Apple Pay with your Apple Watch.

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