MacRumors' Mac Blog: Mac Apps, News and Rumors

Last week, The Guardian published a negative-sounding article by Ken Segall with the title "How Apple lost its way: Steve Jobs' love of simplicity is gone". Ken Segall worked with Steve Jobs as his ad agency creative director for 12 years. In that time he led the team behind Apple's famous 'Think Different' campaign, and helped Apple create its 'i-brand' with the naming of the iMac, therefore...

Confirming rumors reported last week, Apple on Monday issued a U.S. dollar bond in Taiwan that is estimated to raise between $1 billion and $1.2 billion (via Reuters). The yield on the 30-year bond compares with a range between 4.2 percent and 4.3 percent ahead of its pricing, according to people familiar with the matter. That yield comes in significantly lower than recent bonds by...

Microsoft has announced it is rolling out a new project management and collaboration app called Planner to certain Office 365 subscribers for free from today. Similar to Trello in concept, Planner enables users to organize projects into "buckets", or collections of tasks that can then be dragged and dropped between buckets in the project interface. Planner has a marked emphasis on team...

In recent months, 13-inch Retina MacBook Pro owners have been complaining of a bug that causes Safari to completely freeze up, requiring a full system restart. Apple addressed the problem in a new support document that was released on Friday. Complaints about Safari freezing issue started popping up in March, following the launch of OS X 10.11.4, but the bug was also present during the beta...

Apple has announced that it will be opening its 39th and 40th retail stores in China in Tianjin and Shanghai on Saturday, June 11 and Saturday, June 18 respectively. Both grand openings will take place at 10:00 a.m. local time. Apple's second new store in Tianjin this year will be located at the Galaxy International Shopping Center on 9 Le Yuan Road in the city's southwest Hexi District. The...

Netflix today announced its first original television series from India, one of the 190 countries where its streaming service was launched in January. Netflix has seen fantastic success producing original shows for its American and English customer base, and the news follows similar announcements for original shows for the company's subscribers in Argentina and Germany. Netflix is...

Apple is set to make Bollywood superstar Shah Rukh Khan its brand ambassador for India, according to a local report yesterday. Indian tech website PC Tablet cited sources familiar with the matter, claiming that the announcement will be made when Apple launches its latest iPhone models in India later this year. Tim Cook with stars Shah Rukh Khan (left) and Sania Mirza. (Source: Instagram) ...

Apple today released a minor 12.4.1 update to iTunes, introducing several bug fixes to address issues with VoiceOver and other features. iTunes 12.4.1 can be downloaded immediately from the Software Update mechanism in the Mac App Store.This update addresses a number of problems where iTunes doesn't work as expected with VoiceOver. It also restores the option to Reset Plays and fixes the...

The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office on May 26 invalidated two of three patents owned by Smartflash LLC, a patent licensing firm that was awarded a $532.9 million verdict against Apple in February 2015, according to Bloomberg.A three-judge panel at the patent agency found that the two patents never should have been issued in the first place because the idea of storing and paying for data is an...

Apple continues to defend its proposed data center in Galway County, Ireland, during an oral hearing brought together from an appeal by independent planning body An Bord Pleanála. This time, those against the company's site in Derrydonnell Forest argued that it is planning to build in a location that's too close to a local nuclear power plant (via Business Insider). Oscar Gonzalez, who works...

Apple is set to issue bonds in Taiwan with the aim of raising $1 billion, according to Reuters. The news signals the company's first attempt to sell bonds on the island where many of its supply chain partners operate, such as iPhone manufacturer Foxconn, contract chipmaker TSM, and camera lens producer Largan Precision. The move would place Apple alongside a number of big global names...

Over a year after announcing its plan to spend $2 billion on new data centers in Ireland and Denmark, Apple is now defending its decision for the former location amidst rising concern that its state-of-the-art facilities will have negative effects on local animal populations, and could lead to potential flooding concerns on a neighboring golf course (via Business Insider). Irish planning body...

Apple shares have soared 9 percent since American business magnate Warren Buffett revealed his company's $1.2 billion stake in the company on May 16 (via Fortune). Apple stock looked to be on the wane following Apple's earnings call at the end of April, when the company announced its first ever drop in iPhone sales and its first year-over-year revenue drop in 13 years. Shares of Apple...

Popular image editing app Pixelmator was today updated to version 3.5, adding two impressive new tools to improve selections and a new Pixelmator Retouch extension for the Photos app. Pixelmator's new Quick Selection Tool, which is smarter than the existing tool, makes it much easier to select large areas of an image with a single brushstroke. The tool is designed to analyze color, texture,...

Apple today released a new update for Safari Technology Preview, the experimental browser Apple first introduced on March 30. Apple uses Safari Technology Preview to test features that may eventually be introduced in the release version of Safari. Safari Technology Preview release 5 includes a bug fixes and updates for JavaScript, CSS, web APIs, Web Inspector, media, security, networking, and...

Kanex has introduced a new GoPower rechargeable 15,000 mAh USB-C battery pack capable of delivering one full charge to the 12-inch Retina MacBook. The slim aluminum battery pack also has a traditional USB port that can provide multiple charges to iPhones, iPads, and other USB devices. USB-C to USB-C and USB-C to USB-A cables are included for charging the GoPower itself. A four-LED status...

Apple today seeded the first beta of an upcoming OS X 10.11.6 beta to public beta testers, just a day after releasing the first OS X 10.11.6 beta to developers and one week after releasing OS X 10.11.5, the fifth update to the OS X 10.11 operating system. The new beta is available through the Software Update mechanism in the Mac App Store for those who are enrolled in Apple's beta testing...

Apple today released a new firmware update for all of its 802.11n Wi-Fi base stations, including the AirPort Express, AirPort Extreme, and AirPort Time Capsule. According to Apple's release notes, the update includes bug fixes and is designed to improve the stability and performance of the products.This update: - Fixes an issue which may prevent communication between clients on the same network ...