“Go” concept of latest Apple Watch ads has worked out well for Apple because the company just posted a pair of new commercials for Apple Watch Series 2 on its YouTube channel. Titled “Go Ride” and “Go Surf,” the 30-second videos highlight water resistance and position the wrist-worn device as the perfect companion for cyclists and surfers. Check them out and let us know how you liked them.
With Super Mario Run now live on the App Store following its announcement at the iPhone 7 event back in September, both Apple and Nintendo are now promoting the game like crazy. Early reviews indicate that Super Mario Run has all the hallmarks of the Mario franchise even though the game is optimized for one-handed gameplay so Mario constantly moves forward through the courses. Celebrating Mario's App Store debut, Nintendo has put together a little video showing how the game has evolved over the years.
After seeding iOS 10.2.1 beta 1 and macOS Sierra 10.12.3 beta 1 to members of the Apple Developer Program yesterday, Apple today released versions of these software updates for public beta-testing. If you sign up at the Apple Beta Software Program website to become a beta tester and install an appropriate configuration profile on your device, you too will be able to install the first beta of macOS Sierra 10.12.3 on your Mac and take iOS 10.2.1 for a spin on your iPhone, iPad and iPod touch.
Want to give your new iPhone 7 that vintage look without sacrificing device protection? Look no further than BookBook, the family of stylish leather cases from premium accessory maker Twelve South. Starting today, their BookBook case is available for iPhone 7/Plus and they also have an all-new edition, called Journal. Billed as their most luxurious folio case, Journal uses full-grain leather on both the outside and inside for a clean look.
Like BookBook, Journal features slots for cards, cash and ID. Both BookBook and Journal are now available for $59.99 and $69.99, respectively.
Deliveries, my favorite package tracker for iPhone, iPad, Mac and Apple Watch, received a major update on the App Store this morning. Bumped to version 8.0, Deliveries is now fully compatible with iOS 10 and watchOS 3 and supports many new iOS 10 features, from rich notifications and haptic feedback to a reworked widget, deeper 3D Touch support, faster background updating for the Deliveries widget and its Apple Watch app, improved suggestions when you add a delivery, an iMessage sticker pack and more.
Apple today published a new commercial on its Japanese YouTube channel, titled ”Race”.
The 30-second television spot is all about iPhone 7, which in Japan comes with a special chip supporting Sony-developed FeliCa mobile payments technology.
With FeliCa support, folk in Japan can buy tickets via Apple Pay at terminals supporting Suica, QUICPay or iD. Apple Pay launched in Japan at the end of October 2016.
Popular cloud-storage service Dropbox has refreshed its iPhone and iPad application on the App Store with three new features: bulk-renaming of photos, offline folders and recent save locations. In addition, the company announced a major infrastructure push enabling faster sync speeds thanks to several new proxy servers established across the globe, including accelerators in California, Texas, Virginia, New York, Washington, the UK, the Netherlands, Germany, Japan, Singapore and Hong Kong.
Google wants to make it even easier for Apple fans to switch from iOS to the Android platform so it's turning the mobile Google Drive app into a migration tool of sorts with new features that let you upload and synchronize your contacts, photos, videos and calendar events.
The search giant also provides a Quick Switch Adapter with its Pixel smartphones that allows users to quickly transfers data directly from an iPhone to their Pixel phone.
Google Drive is available at no charge from the App Store.
Over the past few months, Apple has been quietly hiring engineers away from Here, a Berlin-based automotive mapping company, for mapping jobs in Berlin. Interestingly, Apple's never publicly confirmed that it has an office in Berlin.
According to LinkedIn profiles discovered by Business Insider, Apple's poached at least half a dozen employees from Here, jointly owned by German car makers Audi, BMW and Daimler.
Don't bother trying to lock your Apple Watch by tapping a dedicated Lock button in Control Center!
That's because watchOS 3.1.1 update (currently pulled over bricking complaints) has killed that button. It's not a bug—the feature disappeared from Control Center in the first beta of watchOS 3.1.1.
I'm unsure as to why Apple has tweaked how manual unlocking works, but am certainly not a fan of the change. Actually, I've felt so ticked off by this apparent “feature” of watchOS 3.1.1 that I've decided to come up with a few workaround solutions for those of us who manually lock our watches before going to sleep.
1Password developer AgileBits was there on day one with a brand new Apple Watch app when the wearable device made its April 2015 debut. As useful as it was, the app wasn't exactly a speed demon and was limited in functionality by only supporting items stored in your Primary vault. Those issues are now a thing of the past as 1Password for Apple Watch is now a 100 percent native app that takes full advantage of the speed and performance enhancements afforded by running directly on Apple Watch hardware.
As a bonus, the new app now permits you to add items from any vault to your Apple Watch, including items stored in your 1Password.com account vaults.
Following yesterday's public releases of iOS 10.2, macOS Sierra 10.12.2, watchOS 3.1.1 and tvOS 10.1, Apple on Thursday seeded to its registered developers first betas of what would become minor software updates in the form of iOS 10.2.1 beta 1 (build 14D10), macOS Sierra 10.12.3 beta 1 (build 16D12b) and tvOS 10.1.1 beta 1 (build 14U707). These betas are available via Apple's portal for developers and can be installed over the air on devices with an appropriate configuration profile installed.