Apple has updated its special enterprise-focused version of iTunes that still has a built-in App Store for those who need it.
Download links for iTunes 12.6.4.3 have been quietly made available in an Apple support document related to deploying iPhone and iPad apps in a business environment with iTunes on Mac or Windows PCs.
The update was prepared on March 20 and released on Tuesday, according to German blog iFun.de. The version doesn't include new release notes, so it is likely a minor update with bug fixes and stability improvements.
Apple removed the App Store in iTunes 12.7 last September, but it released iTunes 12.6.3 shortly afterwards for business customers or anyone who might still need to use the desktop software to install iOS apps.
Those who have already downloaded iTunes 12.6.3 will likely not be prompted about the iTunes 12.6.4.3 update, so they'll have to update manually by downloading and installing the new version from Apple's support document.
iTunes 12.6.4.3 can be downloaded by anyone, including those who have already installed iTunes 12.7. If at any point users want to update to iTunes 12.7.4 or later, they can do so manually from the main iTunes download page.
Bloomberg's Mark Gurman has a new report out this morning, claiming that Apple is working on future iPhone models that will incorporate "touchless gesture control" as well as curved screens. The company is said to be looking at how it can differentiate its flagship product in a smartphone market that's becoming increasingly saturated with devices.
According to people with knowledge of Apple's plans, the touchless control feature is described as a hover-like gesture system that would let future iPhone owners navigate iOS "by moving their finger close to the screen without actually tapping it." This technology would be advanced enough to take into account the proximity of a finger to the screen and is predicted to still be around two years away, if Apple chooses to move forward with it.
Gurman also compared Apple's gesture design to Samsung's Air Gestures in Android smartphones and Google's Project Soli. In comparison, Apple's future iPhone "would require gestures to be closer to the screen than with Project Soli," and be based on technology built in the display rather than some kind of motion sensor added to the iPhone's bezel, as it is with Air Gestures.
Secondly, Apple is in the works on an iPhone display that curves inward "gradually from top to bottom," unlike Samsung's smartphones that curve down and away at the edges of the screen. Gurman's sources said that this major iPhone upgrade is around two to three years away. The company has been connected to curved display rumors in the past, and in October 2017 was said to be working with LG Display on an iPhone with a foldable display.
The new report also quickly corroborates many of the current rumors for the 2018 iPhone lineup:
While the Apple projects aren’t imminent, the company has near-term plans to expand OLED technology to more devices, according to other people familiar with the matter. It will release a second iPhone with that type of screen later this year; a larger model with a 6.5-inch screen, up from the 5.8-inch size in the current iPhone X. The company is also working on an update to the iPhone X’s size and a new, lower-cost LCD model.
Earlier in February, another one of Gurman's reports focused on the launch of iOS 12 later this year, which is believed to feature Animoji in FaceTime, deeper Siri integration, and an overall focus on quality rather than the introduction of many new features.
Apple CEO Tim Cook revealed that Apple Pay would be launching in Brazil during the company's first quarter earnings call, and today the "coming soon" label was removed from Apple's website. A number of Brazilian users have been able to set up Apple Pay as of this morning, according to social media posts.
Apple Pay can be set up in the Wallet app and is accepted at a wide range of locations in Brazil, including Bullguer, Starbucks, Taco Bell, The Fifties, and Track&Field. The service is currently limited to Visa and Mastercard credit cards from Itaú Unibanco, but it will likely expand to additional banks soon.
Apple Pay works with the iPhone 6 or later and any Apple Watch. Apple Pay in apps and on the web is also available on iPads with Touch ID, including the low-cost iPad, iPad mini 3 and iPad mini 4, and iPad Pro models.
Since 2014, Apple Pay has expanded to more than a dozen countries, including the United States, Australia, Canada, China, Hong Kong, France, Ireland, Italy, Denmark, Finland, Japan, New Zealand, Russia, Spain, Singapore, Switzerland, Sweden, Taiwan, United Arab Emirates, and the United Kingdom.
Several TV and music services and other apps offer free trials through the App Store that automatically renew to become paid subscriptions after the trial period ends.
If you want to prevent an App Store subscription from running beyond the trial period or cancel a subscription you're currently paying for, then read on. This article explains how to cancel any App Store subscription on iOS, Mac, and Apple TV.
Tap on the subscription in the list that you wish to cancel.
Tap Cancel Subscription at the bottom.
How to Cancel App Store Subscriptions on Mac
Launch the App Store application.
At the bottom left corner, click on your name to load your account and previous purchases.
Near the top right of the window, click View Information. Enter your Apple ID credentials if required.
Scroll down to the Manage section and on the Subscriptions line, click Manage.
In the Active section, click Edit next to the subscription that you want to cancel.
Click the Cancel Subscription button.
How to Cancel Subscriptions on Apple TV
Open Settings on your Apple TV.
Select Users and Accounts.
Select the user you wish to manage subscriptions for.
Scroll down and select Subscriptions. Enter your Apple ID credentials if requested.
Choose the subscription that you want to end.
Select Cancel Subscription.
Confirm that you want to cancel.
How to Change a Subscription or Re-subscribe to a Canceled Service
Apple keeps a record of your subscription history, which makes it easy to re-subscribe to a service you previously canceled. (Note that after re-subscribing to a service, your subscription will automatically renew until you cancel it again.) You can also change an existing subscription from the same screens. The following steps relate to iOS and are largely similar to the ones for canceling a subscription.
Open Settings on your iPhone or iPad.
Tap your Apple ID at the top of the page.
Tap Subscriptions.
Under the Expired section, tap on the service that you wish to re-subscribe to, or tap an active subscription to change it.
Tap the in-app purchase payment method you want to use to purchase the new subscription and authorize with Touch ID or Face ID.
How to Change or Re-subscribe to a Service on Mac
Launch the App Store application.
At the bottom left corner, click on your name to load your account and previous purchases.
Near the top right of the window, click View Information. Enter your Apple ID credentials if required.
Scroll down to the Manage section and on the Subscriptions line, click Manage.
In the Expired section, click Edit next to the service that you want to re-subscribe to, or click Edit next to an active subscription to change it.
Select your desired subscription option.
Click the Done button at the bottom of the page and authorize with your credentials or Touch ID.
One of the TV shows Apple has in the works, a "morning show drama" starring Reese Witherspoon and Jennifer Aniston, is getting a new showrunner, reports Variety.
The original showrunner and creator, Jay Carson, had planned to work with Apple on the series, but he has departed over creative differences. Kerry Ehrin, known for "Bates Motel," is instead set to take over and is close to inking a deal with Apple.
Ehrin was the co-creator, executive producer, and showrunner of "Bates Motel."
Apple has signed a deal for two seasons of the as-of-yet untitled morning show drama, each with 10 episodes. The show, based on the 2013 book "Top of the Morning" by Brian Stelter, takes a look inside the cutthroat world of morning television. Stelter's book was based on the rivalry between NBC's "Today" and ABC's "Good Morning America."
Apple has multiple TV shows in the works, all of which are outlined in the original content section of our Apple TV roundup. Rumors have suggested the first of Apple's TV shows could debut in 2019.
Apple today shared a new "Groceries" ad that's designed to highlight the ease of using Apple Pay with Face ID on the iPhone X.
In the short 12 second spot, which will likely be shown on TV, YouTube, and social media networks, a woman shopping for produce at the grocery store uses an iPhone X and Apple Pay to make her purchases.
The fruit she buys is then crafted into an elaborate sea scene with a shark made from watermelon, banana dolphins, watermelon waves, pineapple palm trees, and more.
Apple in recent weeks has shared several videos focusing on Apple Pay features on the iPhone X. "Fly Market," published in late March, for example, featured a man dancing through an open air market making purchases with just a glance, while a second spot with the same actor demonstrated Apple Pay Cash.
Update: Apple has uploaded several additional short iPhone X videos, all of which feature Apple Pay on iPhone X. "Coffee" and "Kicks" highlight a traditional in-store Apple Pay purchases, while "Grooming" features an in-app Apple Pay purchase.
Seven Apple executives this week received major stock awards after restricted stock units or RSUs awarded in 2014 and 2015 vested.
Apple issues RSUs to its executives as bonus compensation, with the restricted units vesting after a set period of time as long as the employee stays with the company.
Shares received by each were originally awarded on March 3, 2014; October 17, 2014; and October 5, 2015, with Riccio, Williams, Cue, and Schiller receiving stock from all three dates and Maestri, Ahrendts, and Federighi receiving stock from the October awards. The March 2014 award has now fully vested for employees who received it, while employees who received the other two rewards will see additional shares vest on April 1, 2019 and April 1, 2020.
A portion of each award was withheld by Apple to satisfy tax withholding requirements on vesting of restricted stock units.
Apple today seeded the first beta of an upcoming macOS High Sierra 10.13.5 update to developers, just under one week after releasing the macOS High Sierra 10.13.4 update.
The new macOS High Sierra 10.13.5 beta can be downloaded through the Software Update mechanism in the Mac App Store with the proper profile installed.
It's not yet clear what improvements the fifth major update to macOS High Sierra will bring, but it's likely to include bug fixes and performance improvements for issues that weren't addressed in macOS High Sierra 10.13.4.
We are waiting on several features to come to macOS and iOS, including Messages on iCloud, a feature that was in the iOS 11.3 beta but later pulled. Messages on iCloud has been reintroduced in the iOS 11.4 beta and is likely in macOS High Sierra 10.13.5 as well.
The previous macOS High Sierra 10.13.4 update brought support for external graphics processors (eGPUs) along with Business Chat in Messages and several other bug fixes and smaller feature improvements.
We'll update this post should any new features be discovered in macOS High Sierra 10.13.5.
Update: The macOS High Sierra 10.13.5 beta is now listed in the Apple Developer Center.
Apple has snapped up John Giannandrea, who today stepped down from his position as the head of Google's search and artificial intelligence unit, reports The New York Times.
According to Apple, Giannandrea will run Apple's overall "machine learning and A.I. strategy," reporting directly to Apple CEO Tim Cook.
In an email sent out to employees and obtained by The New York Times, Cook had high praise for Giannandrea. "John shares our commitment to privacy and our thoughtful approach as we make computers even smarter and more personal," he said. "Our technology must be infused with the values we all hold dear."
Giannandrea's hiring comes as Apple has recently faced criticism for Siri, the AI-based personal assistant built into products like Macs, iPhones, iPads, the Apple TV, and the HomePod. Many believe Siri has serious shortcomings in comparison to AI offerings from other companies like Microsoft, Amazon, and Google due to Apple's heavy focus on privacy.
The Information, for example, recently shared an in-depth look at Siri and how it has become a "major problem" for the company due to rushed development and poor communication between teams.
At Google, Giannandrea, a senior vice president, was involved in the push to integrate artificial intelligence throughout Google products, including internet search, Gmail, and Google Assistant.
Prior to joining Apple, Giannandrea spent 10 years at Google, joining the company following Google's acquisition of Metaweb, a startup where he worked as a chief technology officer.
In recent years, Apple has been bolstering its artificial intelligence team. In 2016, the company hired Carnegie Mellon researcher Russ Salakhutdinov to lead a team focused on artificial intelligence, and in October, Apple acqui-hired the team from Init.ai, a customer service startup focused on creating AI with natural language processing and machine learning to analyze chat-based conversations between humans.
There has also been an uptick in the number of positions Apple has recently offered on its job website that mention the term "Siri," suggesting a ramp up in AI hires.
Male employees who work for Apple in the United Kingdom earn five percent more on average than women, according to a UK Gender Pay Gap report released today by Apple [PDF]. The median hourly pay gap was two percent in favor of women, however.
According to Apple, the average pay gap is due to more men holding senior positions at the company, and when factoring in "similar roles, markets, and performance" it has achieved pay equity. Apple has more than 6,000 employees in the UK.
Apple believes strongly that equal work deserves equal pay. Every year, we examine the compensation employees receive and make adjustments where necessary to ensure we maintain pay equity. And we have achieved this in every country -- women at our company earn the same as men when you factor in similar roles, markets and performance.
As part of our commitment to eliminating pay disparities from the first day at Apple, later this year we'll also stop asking candidates about their salary history.
Apple says that 30 percent of its UK employees are women, and 36 percent of new employees last year were women. 40 percent of the companies "leaders under the age of 30" are also women.
92 percent of men received a bonus including vested stock, while 88 percent of women received the same bonus. Additional detail on the wage gap in the UK is available in Apple's full report.
Apple published this information because of a new UK law that requires companies with more than 250 employees to publish the average total pay received by men relative to that received by women.
Note: Due to the political nature of the discussion regarding this topic, the discussion thread is located in our Politics, Religion, Social Issues forum. All forum members and site visitors are welcome to read and follow the thread, but posting is limited to forum members with at least 100 posts.
Spotify, Apple Music's main competitor, this morning opened on the New York Stock Exchange at $165.90 per share, valuing the company at $29.5 billion.
When Spotify filed to go public in February, CNBC estimated the company's valuation at ~$23 billion based on private trades that had reached as high as $132.50. Spotify used the $132 per share figure as its reference price, which would have given the company a $23.5 billion valuation.
As noted by TechCrunch, Spotify is not selling its shares on the stock market and is not raising money today. Its direct listing is instead a collection of transactions from existing shareholders selling shares to stock market investors.
Spotify employees are allowed to sell their shares right away, unlike with a traditional IPO, which could lead to volatility in the coming weeks.
As of December 31, 2017, Spotify had 159 million active monthly users and 71 million premium subscribers, which Spotify says is "double the scale" of Apple Music. Apple as of February boasted 36 million paying subscribers.
In an appearance on CBS This Morning, Spotify cofounder and CEO Daniel Ek today discussed the company's public offering and a recent report from The Wall Street Journal suggesting Apple Music is on track to overtake Spotify in U.S. subscribers.
In response, Ek said that because Spotify is twice the size as Apple Music, the company "still has some room." Ek said that he's "very happy" with the growth that Spotify is seeing. The music industry, he says, is too big for Spotify alone.
"What we've found is that when we've got competition, it actually grows the market because more people are now talking about streaming. It's easy to forget that just three years ago, even in the U.S., streaming wasn't a thing," he said.
Update: Spotify closed at $149.60, giving it a market cap of $26.5 billion.
Apple today seeded the first beta of an upcoming tvOS 11.4 update to its public beta testing group, one day after providing the beta to developers and a little under a week after releasing tvOS 11.3, a minor update that introduced a few smaller features.
The tvOS 11.4 public beta can be obtained by going to the Settings app on the Apple TV and navigating to the Software Updates section under "System." "Get Public Beta Updates" will need to be toggled on, and once it is, the Apple TV will download the beta software.
tvOS 11.4 and iOS 11.4 reintroduce AirPlay 2 features that were included in early iOS 11.3 and tvOS 11.3 betas but were pulled from the update ahead of its release.
AirPlay 2 is designed to let you play the same audio content on multiple devices throughout your home, full a whole-home audio experience. AirPlay 2 works with the Apple TV, the HomePod, and it will work with future speakers that implement AirPlay 2 support.
Following the installation of iOS 11.4 and tvOS 11.4, the Apple TV will once again be listed in the Home app, as it was when AirPlay 2 features were available in iOS and tvOS 11.3 betas.
No other major feature changes were discovered in the tvOS 11.4 beta that was provided to developers.
Apple today seeded the first beta of an upcoming iOS 11.4 update to its public beta testing group, one day after seeding the beta to developers and a little under a week after releasing iOS 11.3, the last major update to the iOS 11 operating system.
Beta testers who are members of Apple's beta testing program will receive the iOS 11.3 beta update over-the-air after installing the proper certificate on an iOS device.
Those who want to join the beta testing program can sign up on Apple's beta testing website, which gives users access to iOS, macOS, and tvOS betas. iOS betas are not always stable and should not be installed on a primary device.
iOS 11.4 is going to look a lot like iOS 11.3 because several features that were removed from iOS 11.3 ahead of its release have been re-introduced in iOS 11.4.
The update includes support for AirPlay 2 features, allowing you to play the same song on multiple devices and adding the Apple TV to the Home app, plus it offers Messages on iCloud.
Messages on iCloud was present throughout the iOS 11.3 beta testing period, but it did not make it into release. The feature is designed to let you store your iMessages in iCloud, syncing them across devices and saving valuable storage space.
Stereo sound in HomePod is also an available feature, but it is not functional at this time as Apple has not provided the 11.4 HomePod software to developers or public beta testers.
The Weeknd's new single "Call Out My Name" was streamed 6 million times in its first 24 hours of release on Apple Music last Friday, March 30. As a comparison, Apple Music's streams of the song nearly doubled Spotify's 3.5 million streams in the same 24-hour period.
As reported by The Verge today, Apple Music's numbers on the new song are impressive given the context of Spotify's advertising push for The Weeknd's new album "My Dear Melancholy." On Friday, Spotify debuted two exclusive videos from the album, one of which was for "Call Out My Name." The Weeknd also tagged Spotify in multiple Instagram posts focusing on the new videos after the album dropped.
Still, Apple Music beat out Spotify for the single's streams on Friday, and in total Apple's service managed over 26 million streams for the full My Dear Melancholy album.
Apple Music has seemingly cracked the streaming formula when it comes to hip-hop and R&B, despite a sizable disadvantage in users compared to Spotify. While Apple Music isn’t the dominant service when it comes to subscribers, it’s quickly becoming the leader when it comes to engagement — at least when it comes to the world’s biggest genre — and that can’t be overlooked.
In March 2017, Drake's "More Life" album streamed 29 million more times on Apple Music than on Spotify in its first 24 hours of launch. Later in the fall, Post Malone dropped his single "Rockstar" and quickly broke Apple Music records with over 25 million streams in one week, grabbing 56 percent of the first week streams of the song in the United States.
At the time, Apple Music head of artist curation Carl Chery said that the company repeatedly wins the streaming game on songs like "Rockstar" because it's "ahead of the curve on them."
“A lot of times on those records where we outperform is because we’re ahead of the curve on them, Chery says.” Chery told me he heard "Rockstar" before it was released and knew immediately that it would be a hit, allowing Apple to move fast and add it to the relevant playlists in the first week. “And to a point, Apple Music becomes the destination where people want to hear that particular record,” Chery said.
In terms of paying subscribers, Apple Music had 38 million worldwide as of March 2018, and Spotify had 71 million as of February 2018. Spotify also has a free, ad-supported tier, giving it over 159 million listeners overall around the world.
The latest addition to Apple Music launched last week in the form of an overhauled music videos section, where subscribers can stream continuous video playlists, watch exclusive videos, and browse a deep back catalog of video content.
Update: Spotify now claims that streams of "Call Out My Name" reached 7.5 million in its first 24 hours of release, while the full "My Dear Melancholy" album was streamed 29 million times, surpassing Apple Music on both counts. The Verge asked The Weeknd's label, Republic Records, for the single's streaming numbers again, but instead of the previous 3.5 million number, the label said it was streamed 6.5 million times on Friday, which is still one million less than Spotify's claims. It remains unclear which number is accurate.
Ahead of the 2018 NAB media trade show, which starts on April 7, Adobe today announced its traditional spring update with new updates for several Creative Cloud apps, including Premiere Pro, After Effects, Audition, and Character Animator.
Adobe's aim in 2018 is to introduce new tools and improvements to allow its customers to streamline their workflows to save time.
"The demands and pace of video content creation are reaching levels we've never seen before. The time pressure on video professionals means the need for powerful and efficient creative tools has never been greater," said Steven Warner, vice president of digital video and audio at Adobe. "Adobe video apps like Premiere Pro and After Effects give them that power which, combined with the services available in Creative Cloud, provide broadcasters, media companies, filmmakers and YouTubers a complete ecosystem to bring their stories to screen faster than ever."
In Premiere Pro CC, Adobe's video editing software for professionals, Adobe has introduced a Color Match feature, powered by its artificial intelligence engine Adobe Sensei. Color Match is able to take the color and light values from a reference image and then apply them as editable color adjustments to the current shot, all while intelligently adjusting for skin tones.
With Color Match, it takes just a few clicks and adjustments to match the colors of various video clips. For broadcast-quality content, the Video Limiter ensures color grading meets broadcast standards.
In the Essential Graphics panel, there are new tools for animating text and graphics, along with Auto Ducking improvements that are part of the Essential Sound panel and new options for tracking time codes with a Time Code panel.
There are new integrations between Premiere Pro and Audition, with Adobe introducing the ability to open Premiere Pro projects in Audition to select specific sequences you want to work on. A new Track panel has been added to allow users to better manage their projects, and Clip Spotting updates video previews in Audition in real-time.
Adobe After Effects CC, designed for motion graphics, offers a Master Properties option for seeding individual values to all versions of a composition, plus there's a new Advanced Puppet Engine for smoother, more realistic object movement. Adobe's data-driven animation tools have also been improved with support for spreadsheet files like .CSV and .TSV.
Adobe Immersive Environment, which now includes support for the Windows Mixed Reality Platform, is available in After Effects CC, allowing users to preview VR content with a new immersive workflow.
Character Animator has gained improvements that make it faster to create new characters than ever before with a new option to drag layers from the Puppet panel into the Triggers panel to refine existing behaviors or create new ones.
All of Adobe's Creative Cloud updates will be available starting today, with additional information on what's new available on Adobe's site. Adobe's Creative Cloud plans, which cover the complete range of Adobe CC software, start at $49.99 per month.
Apple this week updated its Apple Music Android app with the revamped music videos section that launched on iOS and macOS devices late last week.
Announced earlier in 2018, Apple Music's new music videos section provides access to a wider variety of both classic and brand-new videos, exclusive videos from artists like Kylie Minogue, and full video playlists that let subscribers stream music videos back-to-back without ads. Similar to the non-video section, there are curated playlists for topics like The Beats 1 Video List and Today's Video Hits, but users can also create their own custom playlists of music videos.
WHAT'S NEW: Apple Music now includes a new music video experience. Find what’s new and popular in Music Videos within Browse, and play videos back-to-back with exclusive music video playlists.
The new Android update comes about a month after the last one, which also focused on music videos. Instead of major changes, the March version update introduced the ability for users to watch music videos in fullscreen or inside Now Playing, so that the music continued playing while browsing other parts of the app. About a year ago, Apple introduced major design changes to the Android app that more closely resembled the look of the Music app on iOS devices.
The most notable new chip is the first-ever Core i9 processor for notebooks. With six cores and 12 threads, Intel says the Core i9 is the highest-performance notebook processor it has ever designed. The H-series processor has a 2.9GHz base clock speed with a Turbo Boost frequency of up to 4.8GHz.
Given the Core i9 is a 45W chip, it is appropriate for the high-end 15-inch MacBook Pro and could be included in a refreshed version of the notebook as early as this year. Apple last updated the MacBook Pro lineup with Kaby Lake processors at WWDC in June 2017, so a Core i9 model could debut at WWDC 2018.
Of note, while the Core i9 processor allows for systems with up to 32GB of RAM, this is unlikely to apply to the next MacBook Pro, since low-power DDR4 RAM is still not supported. Back in 2016, Apple's marketing chief Phil Schiller said 32GB of standard DDR4 RAM would compromise battery life.
The eighth-generation Core processor family also includes new quad-core Core i5 and Core i7 processors with base clock speeds between 2.3GHz and 2.7GHz and integrated Iris Plus graphics. These 28W chips, part of the U-series, are suitable for future 13-inch MacBook Pro and Mac mini models.
Intel says the new Core i9, i7, and i5 processors for notebooks are based on its Coffee Lake platform and leverage its 14nm++ manufacturing process, enabling the chips to deliver up to 41 percent more frames per second in gameplay or edit 4K video up to 59 percent faster than the previous generation with the same discrete graphics, based on its internal benchmark testing.
As with Intel's Kaby Lake Refresh processors introduced last August, these new Coffee Lake chips pave the way for a quad-core 13-inch MacBook Pro should Apple choose to release one. The current lineup is limited to dual-core models.
Intel also expanded its lineup of eighth-generation Core processors for desktops today after an initial rollout last October. Two chips suitable for future 4K and 5K standard iMac models include six-core Core i5-8600 and Core i5-8500 chips with base clock speeds of 3.1GHz and 3.0GHz respectively.
The desktop lineup also includes six lower-power 35W chips with four or six cores and base clock speeds between 2.1GHz and 3.2GHz. While the current Mac mini lineup uses 28W chips, previous generations have used up to 45W chips, so the 35W processors could be suitable for future Mac mini models.
All in all, Intel has potentially laid the groundwork for a high-performance, top-of-the-line 15-inch MacBook Pro, quad-core 13-inch MacBook Pro models, a long-overdue Mac mini refresh, and updated iMacs as early as this year.
Looking further ahead, Bloomberg News on Monday reported that Apple plans to design and use its own processors for Macs starting as early as 2020. Intel shares saw their biggest price drop in two years following the report.
In February, Apple updated its website with a new section explaining the advantages of closing the Apple Watch's three Activity rings. At the same time, the company kicked off an internal challenge for its employees that tasked them with closing their Move, Exercise, and Stand rings every day for the entire month.
Those who managed this feat have now begun receiving their rewards, and posting shots of the loot on Reddit. Included in the gift is a card that congratulates employees on achieving their personal Activity ring goals for an entire month, along with an exclusive all-black Woven Nylon band that has a hint of the Activity ring's blue/green/red color scheme on the band fastener.
This was the second "Close Your Rings" fitness challenge for company employees, with the rewards last year including an Activity rings pin and a matching T-shirt. For the 2018 challenge, eBay users have already begun taking advantage of the Woven Nylon band's exclusive status, with Buy-it-Now prices going as high as $250-$350 at the time of writing. Apple sells Woven Nylon bands for $50.
Besides internal challenges, Apple frequently launches public Activity challenges on Apple Watch, with recent ones focused on International Women's Day, Heart Month, and the New Year.
Several TV and music services and other apps offer free trials through the 
Apple has snapped up John Giannandrea, who today stepped down from his position as the head of Google's search and artificial intelligence unit, reports 
