MacRumors' Mac Blog: Mac Apps, News and Rumors

Apple and THX will attempt to solve their speaker patent dispute out of court, reports Bloomberg, after lawyers for the two companies filed a request with the San Francisco federal court to ask for a postponement of a case-management conference scheduled to take place on June 14. THX, the sound engineering company that was founded by George Lucas, originally sued Apple in March over patented ...

Intel announced the next generation of Thunderbolt, codenamed "Falcon Ridge," back in April, but today the company 2/">shared some a few additional details about the upcoming release. As previously announced, Falcon Ridge, now officially dubbed Thunderbolt 2, supports up to 20Gbps bi-directionally, doubling the bandwidth of the original Thunderbolt. The new version of Thunderbolt will support...

Apple is planning on opening three new retail locations in the near future, reports ifoAppleStore. Job listings posted last month reveal that the stores will be located at the Station Park shopping mall near Salt Lake City, Utah; the Stonebridge at Potomac Town Center Mall in Woodbridge, Virginia; and the Quaker Bridge Mall, located near the Princeton University Campus in New Jersey. Stonebridg ...

Two months ago, Topeka Capital Markets analyst Brian White gained significant attention for his claims that Apple is targeting a late 2013 launch for its long-rumored television set. In his research note, White claimed that Apple has been working on a 60-inch television that will use an "iRing" motion controller as well as iPad-like auxiliary second screens. In a new research note published...

Back in April, Apple CEO Tim Cook appeared in an event at Duke University's Fuqua School of Business discussing leadership. Cook earned his MBA from Duke after getting a BS from Auburn University.He discusses collaboration, ethical leadership, career planning and more. Cook doesn't address Apple specifically, but in response to a question about achieving good collaboration, he talks about the...

Apple may be planning to release the final version of OS X 10.8.4 in the near future, as it today sent out notices to AppleSeed members announcing the closure of the OS X 10.8.4 software update project. As noted by AppleInsider, participants received a notification stating that weekend infrastructure maintenance requires the company to close existing products. The notice thanks AppleSeed...

Apple has updated its Apple Certified Macintosh Technician (ACMT) Certification, making it easier for individuals to get their initial certifications and for existing techs to keep theirs without yearly recertification exams.The company is making its AppleCare technician certifications permanent as of June 23rd, making it so technicians will not need to go through a yearly recertification...

Longtime Mac users are likely to be familiar with Camino, a Mac-specific browser based on Mozilla's Gecko engine, the same engine used in Netscape 6/7, Firefox, and other browsers. Officially launched in February 2002, Camino took advantage of Cocoa APIs and Apple's Aqua user interface elements and also integrated with several other Mac OS X features. The open source browser continued under...

One of the key features of Mac OS X 10.4 Tiger, launched in April 2005, was the addition of Dashboard Widgets, miniature apps with specific functions that could exist side by side on a dedicated screen accessible at the touch of a key. The feature spawned a market for third-party widgets, leading Apple to launch a dedicated page where it has hosted widgets for download and provided an easily...

Tapbots has released an update for Tweetbot on the Mac, adding several features that were introduced with the April update to the iOS version of the app, including a new media view and support for cover photos. The media view, which can be accessed at the top of the timeline by typing Command + F, provides an in-line view of photos have videos that have been tweeted, with the Tweets themselves ...

While talking with AllThingD's Kara Swisher and Walt Mossberg at D11: All Things Digital, Apple CEO Tim Cook announced that Apple has hired former Environmental Protection Agency chief Lisa Jackson to lead the company's environmental responsibility efforts.Lisa Jackson is joining Apple. Lisa was running the EPA for the last four years. She's going to be coordinating a lot of this activity across...

As noted by 9to5Mac, Apple today seeded build 12E55 of OS X 10.8.4 to developers. The release comes nine days after the previous build 12E52 and marks the eighth beta iteration of OS X 10.8.4. As with previous beta releases, Apple continues to ask developers to focus on Wi-Fi, Graphics Drivers, and Safari. The update is available through the software update tool in the Mac App Store and Ap...

The Daily Show host Jon Stewart ran a satirical segment (via Apple 2.0) on last night's show about Apple CEO Tim Cook's appearance in front of a U.S. Senate Committee examining the tax strategies of multinational corporations. Stewart suggests that a number of Senators are Apple fanboys for praising Cook and his company, as well as questions asking Apple executives what they think should be...

Evernote has added the ability to set reminders and alarms to its note-taking and organizational app, a popular new feature request the company says.For the millions and millions of people around the world that use Evernote everyday to achieve their goals, we’re excited to announce a new part of Evernote that will keep you on track every step of the way. Reminders are here. Our three most...

Forbes reports that former Gartner research director Michael Gartenberg has joined Apple. While his exact position at Apple hasn't been revealed, Gartenberg is said to be working under Apple marketing chief Phil Schiller.This isn’t Gartenberg’s first time jumping into one of the technology companies he tracks — though his last foray lasted less than a month. In Feb. 2007, he joined...

Twitter has updated its Mac app today, adding notification support. When a Direct Message or mention is received, users will now be alerted with a popup notification. This option can be configured in the app’s Preferences window. The update also brings a number of bug fixes:- Fix for Growl notifications not working in Lion and Mountain Lion - Fix for bug that prevented un-favoriting tweets - ...

Millward Brown today released its annual BrandZ study of global brands (via AllThingsD), which found Apple to be the world's most valuable brand for the third straight year. Although Apple topped the list once again, its brand value only increased 1% to $185 billion, which is not as impressive as the 19% increase (from $153 billion in 2011 to $183 billion in 2012) it received last year. Apple...

Apple today released MacBook Air Flash Storage Firmware Update 1.0, an update for Mid-2012 MacBook Air models to address an issue with recovering from crashes.This update is recommended for MacBook Air (mid 2012) models. This update addresses a storage firmware issue that, in rare cases, may cause a system to fail to recover from a crash. Flash storage module from mid-2012 MacBook Air (Source: iFix ...