MacRumors

The iPhone was the most searched for term on Yahoo in 2011, edging out both celebrities and the year's major news stories.

"This is the first time since 2002 that we have had a gadget at No. 1, which is an iPhone." Vera Chan, a Web trend analyst at Yahoo, said in a conference call announcing the results of the review now in its 10th year.

Sony's PlayStation 2 topped the list that year.

According to Reuters, Chan "credited the iPhone with helping to facilitate political movements around the world and said the device embodied the vision of Apple co-founder Steve Jobs who died in October".

Other top searches on the list included Katy Perry, Kim Kardashian, Jennifer Lopez, Lindsay Lohan, Jennifer Aniston, American Idol, the Casey Anthony trial, Osama bin Laden's death, and the earthquake in Japan.

Research firm ChangeWave today released the results of an early November survey of over 200 iPhone 4S owners, finding that 96% of them registered as either "very satisfied" or "somewhat satisfied", up from 93% for the iPhone 4 following its launch last year.

Siri topped the list of most-liked features on the iPhone 4S, with nearly half of survey respondents citing it. Other positives include the ease of use, the new 8-megapixel camera, and faster browsing. On the downside, battery life issues and a lack of 4G (LTE) capability easily led the pack of complaints.

Two-in-five owners said they had experienced reduced battery life with their iPhone 4S (40%). But when asked how much of a problem this issue was for them, only 8% of all owners said it was a Very Big Problem while 20% said it was Somewhat of a Problem.

ChangeWave has long focused on dropped calls as one of its metrics, and the current survey reports a dropped call rate of 2.5% for the iPhone 4S, down significantly from the 5.2% rate for the iPhone 4 just after its launch. The significant drop is due in large part to Verizon now offering the iPhone, as Verizon iPhone 4S owners reported a dropped call rate of only 1.3% while AT&T iPhone 4S owners reported a rate of 4.1%. Sprint's iPhone 4S dropped call rate was not broken out in the survey.

In line with previous rumors, Apple has officially revealed that its massive new retail store inside Manhattan's Grand Central Terminal will be opening on Friday, December 9th. The opening date was made official today with an updated message on the digital signage installed on the construction barrier surrounding the store.

Apple Store, Grand Central.
Arriving Friday, December 9.

One MacRumors reader has also provided us with an overhead shot of a portion of the store, revealing that Apple has installed the wood tables where it will display its products for customers to test out. A small portion of the store's Genius Bar can also be seen in the photo.

Meanwhile, in the wake of yesterday's disclosure of Apple's lease terms for the store, which total $60 per square foot and no revenue sharing with the Metropolitan Transportation Authority, The New York Post now reports that the State of New York is investigating the deal.

State Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli has launched an investigation into whether the Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA) gave Apple overly generous terms on its lease for the shop, which is slated for a splashy opening next week.

...

“The article in the New York Post about the MTA’s contract with Apple in Grand Central Terminal is a cause for concern,” DiNapoli said in a statement yesterday. “This is a prime property, and I intend to make sure that the MTA hasn’t given away the store.”

The MTA has pointed out that Apple is paying four times the rent paid by the previous tenant, the restaurant Metrazur, and that Apple is investing in new infrastructure, including an elevator, to support the store.

In addition, Apple paid $5 million to Metrazur in order to buy out the restaurant's lease, with the MTA arguing that the payment makes Apple's 10-year lease on the store equivalent to $180 per square foot in annual rent. But even considering that payment, which does not go to the MTA, Apple's lease rates remain below that of many other tenants in the terminal and well below market rates charged in other prime shopping areas of Manhattan.

Over the last couple of days, there has been a significant amount of press over the findings of Trevor Eckhart who exposed the presence of extensive logging software found on many Android, BlackBerry and Nokia phones. A video showing the extent of the logging was posted and is summarized by PCWorld. The software is called "IQRD" by a company called Carrier IQ.:

After connecting his HTC device to his computer, Trevor found that IQRD is secretly logging every single button that he taps on the phone--even on the touchscreen number pad. IQRD is also shown to be logging text messages.

In the video, Eckhart shows that Carrier IQ is also logging Web searches. While this doesn't sound all that bad by itself, it suggests that Carrier IQ is logging what happens during an HTTPS connection which is supposed to be encrypted information. Additionally, it can do this over a Wi-Fi connection with no 3G, so even if your phone service is disconnected, IQRD still logs the information.

It doesn't seem entirely clear what information is transmitted and used, though the presence of the software itself has generated many privacy concerns. Eckhart noted in his original findings that on his Android HTC phone, there was no way to turn off logging. He also notes that the Carrier IQ application is embedded so deeply that it can't be fully removed without rebuilding the phone from source code. Forbes is suggesting that the company may have even violated wiretapping laws based on its actions. Carrier IQ maintains that its actions are aimed at device performance only.

Tonight iPhone developer @chpwn reported on Carrier IQ references in Apple's iOS as well, though its logging seems to be much more in line with Carrier IQ's official statements about device performance. (The references were first spotted by Intell on our own forums). Chpwn reports:

Importantly, it does not appear the daemon has any access or communication with the UI layer, where text entry is done. I am reasonably sure it has no access to typed text, web history, passwords, browsing history, or text messages, and as such is not sending any of this data remotely.

The information logged for iOS seems limited to phone call activity and location (if Location Services are enabled). Also unlike the implementation found on Eckhart's HTC, iOS users can opt out of these diagnostics by simply going to Settings -> General -> About -> Diagnostics & Usage -> Don't Send. The actually logged diagnostic data appears to be fully accessible for perusal in that same setting menu.

TUAW describes the iOS findings as "probably benign" and consistent with expected network performance diagnostics.

Newly appointed Apple board member and Disney president and CEO Bob Iger purchased 2,670 shares of Apple stock on the open market, according to a filing with the SEC. The average purchase price of the shares was roughly $375, valuing the purchase at $1,001,250.

The large open-market purchase shows Iger's faith in the future of Apple. When he was appointed director, Iger was awarded 142 restricted stock units, or RSU's, which vest into AAPL shares in February of 2012. His wife holds 75 shares of Apple from before he was appointed director.

Non-employee Apple board members are typically paid $50,000 per year in compensation for their time, plus an annual stock award in the form of RSU's.

While a nice perk, Iger's pay as an Apple director is small change. His compensation package from Disney totaled more than $29.5 million dollars in 2010.

Piper Jaffray analyst Gene Munster has long been one of the strongest advocates for an Apple-branded television set, and with increasing claims of just such a product pointing to a launch as soon as the second half of next year, it seems that his persistent confidence in the idea may be panning out.

Keeping in mind that Munster does not have specific knowledge of Apple's ultimate plans for its television sets, he does have ideas about what he thinks Apple will do with the product. Business Insider reports that he shared some of those ideas at a conference this morning, going as far as to recommend that anyone thinking of buying a TV wait until Apple shows its hand. Among Munster's predictions:

- Full-fledged television set. Given that Apple seeks to streamline the user experience and its recognition that users don't really want yet another set-top box, Apple will almost certainly be going for an all-in-one solution. But given that Apple does not currently offer a full suite of television content offerings, most users will likely not be able to cut ties to their cable or satellite providers. Apple's TV will instead serve as an advanced interface that still draws upon the standard signal coming in from a cable box.

- Range of sizes and twice current pricing. Munster believes that Apple will introduce its television in a range of sizes, recognizing that customers have different needs. He also believes that Apple will price its television at approximately twice the prevailing market price of similarly-sized televisions. The price premium would cover the additional hardware and software necessary for integration with the Apple ecosystem while also preserving Apple's high profit margins in a competitive market.

- Simplicity and Apple's ecosystem. Aside from the rumored Siri voice-powered interface, Munster predicts that the Apple television will integrate with iOS devices and Apple's content ecosystem for video, games, and apps, serving as another hub for digital entertainment tied into Apple. The interface will likely include a traditional remote control, but also iPad and iPhone apps for controlling the set's features, as well as Siri voice control that seeks to remove much of the complexity of interacting with television sets. Users will simply be able to input or say "ESPN" to be taken to the sports channel rather than having to look up or remember the channel number.

In line with some of the other predictions and rumors, Munster sees the Apple television set making an introduction late next year, in time for the 2012 holiday shopping season.

Nikkei Business reports [Google translation] that Japanese carrier NTT DoCoMo has reached an agreement with Apple that will see an LTE-enabled version of the iPad launch next summer, with an LTE iPhone to follow in the fall. The agreement is said to have been hammered out in discussions that saw NTT DoCoMo senior executives travel to Cupertino earlier this month to meet with Apple CEO Tim Cook.

The two companies reportedly reached a basic agreement on bringing the next-generation iPad and iPhone to the carrier, with more specific negotiations now focusing on details such as guaranteed sales volumes. Earlier this month it was reported that Apple and NTT DoCoMo were in discussions about the iPhone but that DoCoMo was hesitant to agree to Apple's demands on unit volume and its refusal to allow the carrier to add its own applications to the device.

Apple has yet to add LTE technology, which will enable faster data speeds, to its mobile devices over battery life concerns and a simple lack of chips appropriate for Apple's needs. But with carriers such as Verizon reaching a significant buildout of LTE and other major carriers also in the early stages of rolling out the faster network technology to their customers, Apple may be looking to take advantage of forthcoming LTE chips from Qualcomm to begin supporting the technology in 2012.

At Apple's "Let's Talk iPhone" event in October, Epic Games showed off some visuals from Infinity Blade II, the sequel to the company's ground-breaking and profitable title launched nearly a year ago. Infinity Blade, utilizing Epic's Unreal Engine 3, has been highly-regarded for its rich visual textures and gesture-based input in fighting scenes.

As an encore performance, Infinity Blade II is making its way into the App Store today, with our sister site TouchArcade calling it "an iOS masterpiece".

Infinity Blade 2 is a step a step or two beyond what was accomplished in the original, adding in layers and layers of next-level environmental and character texture detail on top of a ton of fantastic ambient touches -- sharper shadows, stronger lighting, and a glut of atmospheric effects bolster what's already a visual delight, especially on iPad 2 and iPhone 4S.

...

It's a consistently well put together visual feast that shows off what Unreal 3, and now your new devices, can do.

Beyond the enhanced visuals, Infinity Blade 2 also advances the storyline of the original game and expands the combat experience to include more options and less predictable enemies.

Infinity Blade II has already appeared in Apple's Asia-Pacific App Stores such as in New Zealand [App Store], and should be hitting the U.S. store priced at $6.99 at 11:00 PM Eastern Time tonight.

Update: Infinity Blade II is now available in the U.S. App Store.

The New York Post reports on some of the details of Apple's contract with the Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA) for its Grand Central Terminal retail store, noting that Apple received an extremely favorable deal for the space compared to other tenants at the terminal. Among the most significant concessions made by the MTA was a lack of any revenue sharing from what has been estimated to be a potential $100 million per year sales location.

But while real estate insiders estimate the shop will rake in $100 million a year in sales, Apple won’t be sharing a nickel with Grand Central’s operator, the Metropolitan Transportation Authority.

The tech giant is the only retailer in the fast-growing retail transit hub to have such a sweet lease.

Critics likewise note that Apple’s $60-a-square-foot lease is well below what many other tenants are paying — including a future Shake Shack burger joint that will be shelling out more than $200 a square foot, according to the leases, copies of which have been obtained by The Post.

All other tenants at the terminal with the exception of a Chase ATM branch pay a percentage of their sales to the MTA once an agreed-upon threshold has been reached. The MTA has apparently been willing to sacrifice such an arrangement in order to land Apple as a tenant, projecting that the company's presence will drive increased sales at many of the over 100 other retail stores at the terminal.

Apple has posted digital signage advertising the forthcoming store, with The New York Post having indicated that it will be opening on December 9th.

Following the release of Final Cut Pro X back in June, Apple received a significant amount of criticism from users unhappy with the direction the company had taken with the professional-level video editing software and the many features that had gone missing in the revamp. The outcry resulted in Apple posting an FAQ on the situation and promising that updates to increase the software's functionality would be coming.

fcp.co now points (via Cult of Mac) to a recent interview with RHED Pixel founder Richard Harrington in which he claims that Apple had completed work on a new 64-bit Final Cut Pro 8 product before scrapping the software to build the revamped Final Cut Pro X. According to Harrington:

There was a Final Cut 8 and it was 64bit and it was done and they looked at it and said 'This is not what we want to do, this is evolutionary, this is not revolutionary' and they killed it.

Curiously, the video of Harrington's interview was removed from public view after his comment was publicized by fcp.co.

The report notes there has been no corroborating evidence of a finished Final Cut Pro 8 product, but also that there is no reason to disbelieve Harrington and that it does not appear that the comment has been taken out of context.

Update: Harrington did note in a Tweet that the comment was misunderstood and that he had merely "heard efforts were well underway then killed". He did also comment on the fcp.co article:

I do not have explicit knowledge of FCP8. Wasn't saying I did. Wasn't implying I did.

Just repeating rumors I had heard multiple times. I had been told many times that there were efforts to bring 64 bit to the type of interface used in FCP7.

Harrington's backtracking conflicts with what fcp.co's thought was a clear interpretation, but it does appear that "Final Cut Pro 8" was not nearly in as finished a form as had been initially thought from his statement.

The Next Web summarizes several reports from the Brazilian media claiming that Apple is preparing to launch its iTunes Music Store in Brazil and perhaps throughout Latin America on December 8th. While users in many of these countries currently have access to the App Store, they have been unable to purchase music through iTunes.

According to the weekly Brazilian magazine Veja, the launch of iTunes Music Store even has a date, being scheduled for December 8th. While it seems very soon, Apple has been getting ready beyond the scenes and already closed deals with Brazilian music labels, Veja said.

...

Veja followed up on its initial piece today, declaring that the Store will launch all across Latin America on the same date, except in Mexico where it is already available.

The report notes that the iTunes Music Store, like the App Store in these countries, will offer pricing in U.S. dollars rather than local currencies, requiring users to hold international credit cards for paid purchases. According to Veja, local currency pricing should arrive for Latin American countries in about six months. The situation is reminiscent of the one in China, where Apple initially required payment in U.S. currency for the App Store but recently began accepting the local renminbi currency.

Apple appears to be taking significant steps to increase its presence in Brazil and the broader Latin American market, working with manufacturing partner Foxconn to launch iPhone and iPad production in Brazil in order to avoid high import taxes that have so far hampered adoption of Apple's products there.

Update: The Associated Press reports that Brazil's major music publishers organization is close to a deal with Apple, setting the stage for an iTunes Store launch by the middle of December.

Executive Director Michaela Couto of the Brazilian Union of Music Publishers tells the O Globo newspaper that negotiations with Apple Inc. are at an "advanced stage" and that iTunes could be launched in Brazil by mid-December.

Sydney Morning Herald reports that an Australian court has lifted the ban of the Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1 in Australia, reversing a previous injunction.

The full bench of the Federal Court - Justices John Dowsett, Lindsay Foster and David Yates - today unanimously reversed a Federal Court judge's ruling last month that Samsung's Galaxy Tab 10.1 be banned from sale in Australia.

"Samsung will be permitted to launch the Galaxy Tab 10.1 in Australia provided it keeps accounts of all transactions involving that device in Australia," the judges wrote in their judgment.

Apple, however, was able to extend the ban until Friday at 4pm while it prepares for an appeal to the High Court.

For those who have been following the legal battles between the two companies, Apple has been trying to ban Samsung's Galaxy tablet in a number of markets due to similarities to the iPad design. In this case, Apple had previously obtained an injunction preventing Samsung from selling the Galaxy Tab 10.1 in Australia. The Galaxy Tab had also been blocked in Germany.

Apple today released Safari 5.1.2, bringing several bug fixes and other enhancements. Most notably, it addresses issues with PDF viewing and pages "flashing white".

This update contains various improvements, including fixes that:

- Improve stability
- Address issues that could cause hangs and excessive memory usage
- Address issues that could cause webpages to flash white
- Allow PDFs to be displayed within web content

Apple seeded a version of Safari 5.1.2 to developers for testing earlier this month.

Dow Jones Newswires reports that Apple has filed a request for a preliminary injunction that would bar Samsung from selling its new Galaxy Tab 10.1N in Germany. Samsung launched the 10.1N earlier this month as a design-tweaked variant of the original Galaxy Tab 10.1 that is already barred from sale in Germany under an earlier injunction.

Apple has requested a preliminary injunction, and the Duesseldorf regional court has scheduled a hearing on the matter on Dec. 22, a spokesman for the court told Dow Jones Newswires on Tuesday.

The move has no effect on sales and distribution of the product, Samsung said in an emailed statement, while Apple repeated earlier comments that it intends to protect its intellectual property.

Samsung slightly tweaked the design of the Galaxy Tab 10.1 hardware to create the 10.1N, resulting in a frame that wraps around slightly onto the front of the device along its two short sides. Apple clearly feels that this design is not sufficient to overcome the ruling that the Galaxy Tab design infringes upon Apple's designs for the iPad, and is thus pursuing the new injunction.

Meanwhile, FOSS Patents confirms that Apple's initial injunction awarded against the Galaxy Tab in Germany does in fact cover all three announced sizes of the device: 10.1, 8.9, and 7.7. Apple cites that injunction in a filing in its U.S. case against Samsung, illustrating how the company is using its string of wins over Samsung in international courts to bolster its U.S. case.