MacRumors' Mac Blog: Mac Apps, News and Rumors

Apple is now selling JJ Abrams' Star Trek Into Darkness on the iTunes Movie Store three weeks ahead of its September 10th general release.The film is available in HD for $20 and SD for $15, or as a $25 HD bundle with the prior Star Trek film. There is no rental option -- rentals will be available September 10th -- and it appears to only be available to U.S. iTunes customers.J.J. Abrams STAR...

Nuance, the company that makes some of the voice recognition technology behind Apple's Siri, has adopted a 'poison pill' measure to deter any possible takeover attempts. Activist investor Carl Icahn, who recently bought more than $1 billion worth of Apple stock, also owns 16% of Nuance.Icahn is famous for putting pressure on companies that he invests in, and some believe he could press Apple to ...

Apple today announced that it will be making changes to its affiliate program for its digital content stores, bringing on a new partner to help expand participation to new countries. Under Apple's affiliate programs, participants can earn commissions on revenue generated through links to the iTunes Store, App Store, Mac App Store, and iBookstore in various countries. The program also provides a...

The Wall Street Journal reports that Taiwanese manufacturer Hon Hai Precision Industry Co., better known as Foxconn, is ramping up its television production through an exclusive partnership deal with 7-Eleven, a convenience store chain. The move comes after a report earlier this year indicated that Foxconn was at least partially pushing its television production forward in anticipation of landing ...

Apple is aiming to encourage Mac usage to its business consumers by displaying iMacs running a copy of Microsoft's Windows 8 operating system within Parallels Desktop 8 for Mac in the business section of its stores, according to a report from 9to5Mac. Apple Retail Stores will also train business specialists on using Parallels and Windows software as part of the initiative. Apple currently...

Apple senior vice presidents Phil Schiller and Dan Riccio recently exercised and sold more than 40,000 combined common stock shares worth over $20 million, according to documents filed today with the SEC. Schiller sold 37,172 shares of common stock at a price of $500 for a total haul of $18.6 million. Riccio sold a total of 3,754 shares of common stock over the course of 11 trades with prices ...

Apple has seeded a second beta version of iTunes 11.1 to developers, several weeks after the debut of the first iTunes 11.1 beta. The second beta comes after an emergency update to iOS 7 and the release of iTunes 11.0.5, both of which fixed an issue with iTunes in the Cloud, so it is probable that this update addresses the same issue. Apple's iTunes 11.1 includes iTunes Radio, which is...

Primate Labs has announced on its blog that it has released Geekbench 3 – the first major update to the popular benchmarking service since 2007. This third iteration of Geekbench features 15 completely new benchmark tests that are designed to mimic real-world processor tasks, such as image and signal processing, encryption, and physics simulation that aim to give a more accurate score of...

Apple has released AirPort Base Station and Time Capsule Firmware Update 7.6.4.The update is available for all Apple 802.11n Wi-Fi base stations including AirPort Express, AirPort Extreme, and AirPort Time Capsule.AirPort Base Station Firmware Update 7.6.4- Resolve an issue that may cause AirPort Time Capsule to report that the backup disk is in use- Resolve an issue that may cause an IPv6...

Apple is currently holding a sale on movie bundles in the U.S. iTunes Store, offering heavy discounts on collections of both SD and HD versions of films. The bundles include film collections of popular franchises such as the Lord of the Rings, Harry Potter, and Spider Man. Last week, Apple launched movie support for iTunes in the Cloud in eight new countries, including Japan and Italy. The...

Oracle CEO Larry Ellison, who was a close friend of Steve Jobs, hinted that Apple may have a bleak future without Jobs in an interview with CBS News' Charlie Rose (via AllThingsD) where he was asked how he thought the company would do without its co-founder."Well, we already know," Ellison told Rose. "We saw — we conducted the experiment. I mean, it's been done. We saw Apple with Steve Jobs. We ...

Pixar founder John Lasseter accepted Steve Jobs' Disney Legends Award yesterday at the D23 Expo, an annual Disney event held for fans. In a video from YouTube channel WDWINFO, Lasseter can be seen emotionally talking about how Jobs had become like a brother to him after he lost his own brother to AIDS, going on to share several stories about Jobs' involvement with the animation company over the...

Security researchers from Webroot have revealed a malicious email campaign attempting to trick users into thinking they’ve received a $200 Apple Store Gift Card. But rather than being a simple phishing effort as is common with such emails, the malicious emails contain malware that can be used to compromise targets' Windows-based machines. Specifically, when the user clicks on a hyperlink...

Apple today seeded build 12F33 of OS X 10.8.5 to developers, marking the eighth beta iteration of 10.8.5. The release comes exactly one week after the previous OS X 10.8.5 beta, build 12F30. As with previous betas, the update contains no known issues and can be downloaded via Apple’s Developer page or through the software update tool of the Mac App Store. Apple’s OS X 10.8.5 beta is being ...

After launching in a beta capacity earlier this year, Copportino’s Vox 1.0 music player is now officially available for download from the Mac App Store. The Vox player was first released in 2007, but has since seen a major redesign and functionality overhaul. The app, which offers a minimalistic design, is designed to be a replacement for playing music within iTunes. It supports a wide variety ...

SimCity for Mac will be released on August 29th after being delayed several times in order to "ensure a great experience" for players, EA said today.The Mac version was originally set for a February release, but was delayed to June 11th and then again delayed until August. The PC version of Sim City was released back in March.SimCity's PC launch was more than a little rocky, largely because...

As reported by The Wall Street Journal, Chinese government officials are investigating Apple suppliers and electronics manufacturers UniMicron and Foxconn after local environmental groups accused both of dumping large amounts of toxic heavy metals into nearby rivers. The area in question is an industrial district 40 miles west of Shanghai that has been a longtime area of electronics development,...

Digitimes reports that Apple may shift some of its iMac production from supplier Quanta to electronics manufacturer Pegatron, a longtime Apple supplier. Currently, Quanta is the original design manufacturer (ODM) for much of Apple's Mac lineup, including the MacBook Pro, MacBook Pro, and iMac, while Pegatron currently produces one-third of the world's iPhones and iPads. The iMac was last...