Mark is an award-winning journalist who worked at 9to5Mac for over six years. He covers Apple and other topics related to the consumer technology industry.
After months of negotiations between Amazon and the record labels, Amazon Prime Music, the Kindle maker’s streaming music service, has just gone live on the web. The service, Amazon says, has “over a million songs and hundreds of playlists. The service is exclusive to Amazon Prime members, but you can start listening now with a 30 day free trial. The service is unlimited and ad-free, unlike Apple’s iTunes Radio but like Beats Music, but the promised mobile apps for tablets and phones do not yet seem to be available. That may be because the official launch of Prime Music is only expected to occur tomorrow…
Apple has shared a video on its official YouTube channel of its preparations for the June 13th grand opening of the Omotesando, Tokyo Apple Store. The video is just under a minute long, but it does provide some perspective into the lengths that Apple takes to prepare stores for their openings. You can view the video below:
Now, developer Steven Troughton-Smith has dug further into the upcoming split-screen multitasking feature and has hacked the iOS 8 iPad Simulator to make the function partially work. As can be seen above, Safari is taking up half the display. The tweaking to the simulator is yet to completely unlock all functionality with two different apps running side by side, but this demonstrates that Apple has been definitely testing the feature internally.
Troughton-Smith has also put together a video showing the split-screen mode in action on the simulator. That video can be seen below:
Even though his team is down a game in the NBA Championship series against the San Antonio Spurs, athlete LeBron James does have something new to smile about. As part of Apple’s $3 billion acquisition of Beats Electronics and Beats Music, James is due to net a profit of $30 million:
Apple is reportedly set to begin production of its next-generation iPad Air this month with display components going into mass production in the middle of this month and components such as the processor and camera sensors going into production next month. The design of the sixth-generation full sized iPad will mimic that of the current model and the display resolution will stay at 2048 x 1536, according to ETNews.
The new iPad Air will sport a more advanced A8 processor, which sources previously noted focuses on efficiency and battery performance for the iPhone (likely for the iPad too):
This update is recommended for MacBook Air (mid 2013 and early 2014) models.
This update improves reliability when waking from sleep and when booting while certain USB and Thunderbolt devices are connected.
This update also addresses a rare memory issue that may cause the system to randomly reboot, and an issue where the system may not properly sleep the built-in display when an external display is connected while running Windows using Boot Camp.
You may have noticed Skype for iPhone/iPod touch disappear from the App Store in select markets today. Skype tells us that the reason is preparations for the upcoming 5.0 update. Here’s the statement:
We have removed the Skype for iPhone app from the Apple iTunes store in some markets, as we begin rolling out the latest version. Skype 5.0 for iPhone will soon be available worldwide for download – in the meantime, you can learn about the great new features coming with the new version here.
In addition to the comprehensive redesign, OS X Yosemite could have made a significant change to how the Mac operating system functioned since it originally shipped just over thirty years ago. The above image from a source shows a March build of OS X Yosemite that featured a Control Center panel. The panel did not end up shipping in the first beta of Yosemite and was not announced on the WWDC stage last week, but Apple definitely considered including it.
In fact, developers have located numerous code strings in the first Yosemite build that confirms Apple’s testing of an OS X variant of Control Center:
Apple has posted the video about OS X Yosemite’s new design from the WWDC keynote. The video gives a look at the system’s new inherent translucency, cleaner layout, redesigned icons, and new buttons. You can watch it below:
A few years ago, Skype was the rockstar of the messaging world, but now with smartphones and mobile messaging apps like WhatsApp, Facebook Messenger, and iMessage, Skype’s iPhone feature-set and application have begun to stagnate. However, the Skype development team has not been standing still. The Microsoft-owned company is revealing today that it is nearing the launch of a completely revamped Skype application for the iPhone and iPod touch. I met with lead Skype designer Guilherme Schneider last week for an exclusive preview and an interview regarding the new software, and the application certainly seems impressive…
This weekend, Apple has notified App Store developers that the South African App Store will see app price changes due to the country’s new 14% Value Added Tax rate. Apple commonly makes these changes to align with tax changes in certain regions. It’s likely that these price changes will spread to other Apple web properties such as the iTunes Store and iBookstore. Expect to see these changes within the next 24 hours. A new pricing matrix can be accessed by developers in iTunes Connect.
Apple is preparing to enhance its Apple Store-based iPhone sales operations in the United States around pre-paid and month-to-month plans in order boost sales, according to a source briefed on the upcoming initiatives. For the first time in U.S. Apple Stores, customers will be able to purchase an iPhone at full-price and then connect the phone to a pre-paid plan or a month-to-month plan within the store. Previously, iPhone customers could only buy full-priced iPhones as unlocked devices then connect the devices to pre-paid plans or month-to-month plans via a previously purchased SIM-card or through a carrier store…
Last month, we noted that Apple’s re-constructed Austin, Texas campus is now fully operational. The campus brings the feeling of Cupertino to Texas, and it has state-of-the-art facilities for Apple support, engineering, and operations staff. Now, we’ve learned that Apple CEO Tim Cook and Senior VP of Internet Software and Services Eddy Cue visited the Austin campus today to celebrate the opening. Various photos of Cook at the campus have been posted online:
Luca Maestri is Apple’s senior vice president and Chief Financial Officer reporting to CEO Tim Cook. As CFO, Luca oversees the accounting, business support, financial planning and analysis, treasury, M&A, investor relations, internal audit and tax functions at Apple. Luca joined Apple in 2013 as vice president of Finance and corporate controller, and has worked closely with Apple’s senior leadership since his arrival.
Luca has over 25 years of experience building and leading finance teams in global companies with significant operating scale and complexity. Prior to joining Apple, Luca was CFO at Xerox and previously at Nokia Siemens Networks. He began his career with General Motors and spent 20 years in finance and operating roles in the Americas, Asia Pacific and Europe. While at GM, Luca was part of the team that established GM’s regional Asia Pacific operations, including manufacturing investments in China and Thailand.He later became CFO for all of GM’s operations in Europe, which spanned over 45 countries with annual net revenue of approximately $40 billion.
Luca graduated from Luiss University in Rome with a bachelor’s degree in Economics and earned a master’s degree in Science of Management from Boston University.
Before becoming CFO, Maestri was Corporate Controller and a Vice President at Apple. Thanks, Joseph!
Seth Weintraub|8:33Apple Store still up….what does it all mean? Head South to the comments to discuss.
Someone forgot to take the AppleStore down…unless Apple got some new 1990’s technology that doesn’t require the store to go down for updates—
Seth Weintraub (@llsethj) June 02, 2014
Mark Gurman|8:07We are just under two hours away from the kickoff WWDC keynote, and here’s the latest news: there are cars situated inside Moscone West. This likely indicates that some significant CarPlay announcements are in-store for today. Also, some OS X 10.10 and iOS 8 APIs for developers are already appearing on some open source WebKit files.
We’re approximately two hours away from Apple’s major WWDC 2014 keynote address, and we’ll be providing live blogging and analysis of the event as it proceeds. We’re expecting Apple to discuss updates to iOS and OS X 10.10, with the former seeing enhancements across the system and the latter receiving a complete redesign to bring the software in line with the iOS 7 design aesthetic. You can catch our full analysis and live updates from the conference below:
In an SEC filing today, Apple announced that Luca Maestri has officially transitioned into the Chief Financial Officer and Senior Vice President role. His first official day on the job was yesterday, May 29th. Maestri is not yet on Apple’s executive biographies page, but an official profile will likely go live in the coming days. Apple says that Maestri’s previous job as Principle Accounting Officer will be folded into his CFO role.
Maestri, previously Corporate Controller and a Vice President at Apple, replaces long-time CFO Peter Oppenehimer. The transition was announced by Apple earlier this year. Oppenheimer will shift his remaining responsibilities to Maestri over the course of the next few months and completely retire from Apple at the end of September of this year. As part of his promotion, Maestri will now receive an annual salary of $1 million and new stock-based payment packages:
But on Monday, June 2nd, Apple will make major announcements that will indicate the immediate future of its two major platforms: iOS and OS X. The Cupertino company will share details behind the changes in iOS 8, a redesigned Mac operating system, and perhaps even new hardware.
Over the past several months, we have exclusively reported the majority of the news to expect next week and you can find our extensive roundup (along with new details) below:
Apple wants to replace yet another daily tool with your iPhone: your wallet.
Executives from the Cupertino-based technology company have begun discussions with directors from retail store chains about a mobile payments service, according to a source with direct knowledge of the talks. Previous reports indicated that Apple is exploring new payments services through discussions with executives from existing payments companies. These latest mobile payments-related discussions, which have occurred with retail store brands such as those that sell luxury clothing and premium goods, have taken place over the past couple of months, according to the source. The source declined to be named and requested that the identities of the companies talking to Apple not be published.
The Apple mobile payments service would be integrated into iOS Devices such as the iPhone and would be a comprehensive solution that would allow an iPhone user to leverage their device as a form of payment in retail stores. Based on information from various people briefed on the matter, the service would tie directly to iTunes accounts. Apple Senior Vice President Eddy Cue noted last night that Apple has 800 million iTunes accounts with credit cards, and that this arsenal opens up the door for many future products and services. Apple CEO Tim Cook previously hinted that the iPhone’s Touch ID fingerprint identity sensor could someday be leveraged for mobile payment purposes beyond the existing iTunes and App Stores…
Earlier today, Apple announced that it has acquired Beats Electronics and Beats Music for a total of $3 billion. Tonight, two of the masterminds behind the deal will be interviewed about a range of topics at the Code Conference. Apple Senior Vice President of Software and Services Eddy Cue along with Beats co-founder and music mogul Jimmy Iovine will be interviewed by Re/code’s Walt Mossberg and Kara Swisher. Previously, Cue was scheduled to be interviewed alongside Apple Senior Software Vice President Craig Federighi, but it appears that the acquisition’s announcement changed up the plans. We are on hand for the interview and we will be providing live coverage below. The interview starts around 8PM Pacific/11PM Eastern Standard time:
