MacRumors

Although Apple.com has listed the BeatsX Earphones as not launching until sometime in February, a few tipsters emailing MacRumors have pointed out that Amazon updated their pre-orders to suggest that BeatsX will be arriving earlier than expected. The updated delivery windows are large, but both place the upcoming earphones with a January delivery date: one ranges from January 17 to January 27, and another from January 18 to January 30.

Additionally, Fry's Electronics lists a shipping date on January 23 for BeatsX. Although that would fall in the window of Amazon's orders, the date is most likely a placeholder. Fry's was a part of a few retailers who suggested a December launch for BeatsX back in November -- a debut which the earphones obviously missed.

On both Apple.com and the official Beats website, BeatsX are currently not available to pre-order. Apple describes the earphones as "currently unavailable" along with the general "Coming February" launch month. On the Beats website, users can opt in for an e-mail notification when BeatsX launches, but there is no purchase or order button option either.

In terms of features, the $149.95 BeatsX Earphones include in-line volume and playback controls on a flex-form cable, along with multiple wingtip and eartip add-ons (four total) that the company says will ensure a secure and comfortable fit for each user. Each bud of the earphones is magnetic and attaches to the other when hanging around a user's neck, further ensuring BeatsX can't easily be lost when not listening to music. The earphones are also part of the new "Got No Strings" Beats advertising campaign.

BeatsX were one of the W1-enabled earphones that Apple announced during its September 7 iPhone event, also including the AirPods, Powerbeats3, and Beats Solo3. The AirPods launched on December 13 and stock quickly dwindled, while the Beats Solo3 have been out since September, and the Powerbeats3 were available to order in October.

(Thanks David and Sandler77!)

After partners like CBS and NBC were confirmed to be part of Hulu's upcoming live-streaming TV service, Mashable recently got a glimpse of the early build for the service on both iOS and full-screen TV apps. Hulu has still kept details under wraps regarding specific price points and plans, although Hulu Chief Executive Mike Hopkins said last week that it will cost users "under $40" each month.

The addition of live TV is said to have changed Hulu's "entire user experience," by combining the company's existing on-demand content with the all-new live TV streams. The app guides users through a taste-test quiz about the type of TV they like to watch, using the information and accumulated data of what each user watches to offer recommendations on its home screen. If there are multiple users in a house, each person will get their own menu, recommendations, and everyone can watch their shows at once.

If the new Hulu has a philosophy, it's personal, personal, personal. From the home screen to the recommendations it serves up, the new Hulu is intended to be about you. That becomes clear the moment you launch the new app on your phone, which quizzes you on the kind of content you like — genres, networks and specific shows — before you even get to the home screen. Sorta like Foursquare, but for TV.

The "Lineup" greets users when they first dive into their personal profile, and it's said to be "a compilation of the content — live or on-demand — Hulu thinks is most important to you." Favorite shows will take top billing, while shows recorded in a cloud DVR (an expected add-on feature) will also be added to the Lineup.

The user interface then splits content into a horizontal list with icons at the top of the screen representing Movies, News and Networks. The Networks tab is where most of Hulu's live content will be housed, with users able to tap on any channel and tune into what's happening now on each station. Mobile notifications will be available to warn users when a game is starting with their favorite team, but the feature will only encompass sports at launch. Notifications for breaking news and warnings about expiring TV shows are being worked on as well.

One of Mashable's concerns about the new service is its attempt at seamlessly mixing Hulu's old content with its new live-streaming options. The site compared the move to when Apple decided to do something similar with both old, downloaded songs and the new streaming content in Apple Music, which confused many users.

The demo I got of Hulu's new UI was canned, so I didn't get a chance to navigate it myself. From the looks of it, Hulu has done a good job of mixing together live and on-demand content into a single interface, although it's questionable if they ever should have been mixed in the first place.

Similarly, when Apple mixed together on-demand music streaming with downloads in Apple Music, it stepped into a minefield. It eventually rolled back the UI to better separate the two things the app does. Will the same thing happen to Hulu?

Curiosity surrounding the new live TV service from Hulu has been building ever since it was rumored last May. As of now, Hulu's cord-cutting service includes partners CBS, Walt Disney, Time Warner, Fox, and NBC. When it launches sometime in the spring, the service will enter the market to competitors including Sling TV and DirecTV Now, but Hulu won't have to worry about competition from Apple's own live-streaming service since it has long been shelved after the company failed to make inroads with network programmers.

Fitbit has made another acquisition in the wearables market, this time buying out European luxury smartwatch maker Vector Watch for an undisclosed price.

Vector Watch only launched in March of last year offering a range of 12 smartwatch models in various fashion-conscious styles. Key features in its line-up include basic activity tracking, phone notifications, and 30-day battery life, with some third-party apps built into the interface. The London-based company announced the buyout in a statement on its website.

Today, we are happy to announce that the Vector Watch team and our software platform are joining Fitbit, the leader in the connected health and fitness market! We believe this is an important milestone as a moment when we will start building other new and amazing products, features and experiences, incorporating our unique technology and knowhow with Fitbit's experience and global community.

Vector said its integration with Fitbit would have no impact on existing customers, whose smartwatches would continue to function as usual, while technical support and warranties would be unaffected. However, new product features (software and hardware) would not be added.

The buyout comes just one month after Fitbit acquired U.S.-based Pebble for a reported $40 million, signaling the company's intention to continue to invest in software development, despite falling shares and a gloomy outlook for the overall wearables market.

Global shipments in the last quarter fell by more than half compared to last year, according to recent figures by IDC. Despite the numbers, Fitbit remains the market leader with 23 percent share, up from 21.4 percent a year ago, on the strength of its new Charge 2 fitness tracker. The Apple Watch is still the world's best-selling smartwatch, but basic wearables account for 85 percent of the market, putting Apple in fourth place overall with 4.9 percent share and 1.1 million devices shipped in the last quarter.

Less than a year after introducing a fee for customers upgrading their smartphones, Verizon has raised the the price of said fee from $20 to $30, reports The Verge.

The fee change was quietly implemented last week alongside the discontinuation of two-year contracts for existing customers. Those customers previously had to pay a $40 fee when activating a new contract and purchasing a new device, while the fee has been $20 for device payment plans and outright purchases from Verizon.

With two-year contracts no longer available, all customers will now pay $30 when upgrading their smartphones on the Verizon network. A separate activation fee when purchasing a new line also applies.

According to Verizon, its upgrade fees help to cover "increasing support costs" from customers switching their devices.

Verizon also recently clarified its data usage policies for unlimited customers, notifying employees that customers who use over 200GB per month will be forced to move to a tiered data plan.

Apple today seeded the second beta of an upcoming watchOS 3.1.3 update to developers for testing purposes, three weeks after releasing the first watchOS 3.1.3 beta and four months after the launch of watchOS 3.

watchOS 3.1.3 can be downloaded through the dedicated Apple Watch app on the iPhone by going to General --> Software Update. To install the update, the Apple Watch must have 50 percent battery, it must be placed on the charger, and it must be in range of the iPhone. watchOS 3.1.3 requires an iPhone running iOS 10 to install.

We don't know yet what new features or bug fixes might be included in the watchOS 3.1.3 update, but no outward-facing changes were found in the first beta. watchOS betas are often rather minor in scale, focusing on small bug fixes and performance improvements rather than major interface changes.

The second watchOS 3.1.3 beta comes after Apple pulled the watchOS 3.1.1 release after it was found to be bricking some Apple Watch Series 2 devices. Apple has not re-released an updated version of watchOS 3.1.1 that fixes the bug, so many users are still running watchOS 3.1.

Apple today seeded the second beta of an upcoming tvOS 10.1.1 update to developers for testing purposes, almost four weeks after seeding the first tvOS 10.1.1 beta and nearly a month after releasing tvOS 10.1, the first major update to the tvOS 10 operating system.

Designed for the fourth-generation Apple TV, tvOS 10.1.1 beta can be obtained by connecting the Apple TV to a computer with a USB-C to USB-A cable, downloading and installing the software from a registered developer account via iTunes or Apple Configurator.

Once a beta profile has been installed on the device through iTunes, new beta updates will be available over the air.

We don't yet know what features or changes are included in tvOS 10.1.1, but as a minor update, it's likely to focus on bug fixes and other performance enhancements. No immediately visible changes or bug fixes were found in the first beta.

tvOS 10.1.1 follows tvOS 10.1, a significant update that introduced the new "TV" app, which serves as an Apple-designed television guide and TV watching hub.

Popular Chinese mobile app company WeChat [Direct Link] congratulated Apple on ten years of the iPhone earlier this morning, with founder Allan Zhang posting photos online from the iPhone's unveiling in January 2007.

Simultaneously, WeChat parent company Tencent Holdings launched a suite of cloud-based smartphone apps that analysts believe suggests WeChat intends to "play a leading role in the next decade" of the smartphone software business (via The Wall Street Journal).

The new platform is called "Mini Program" and is made up of a collection of apps, all stored in the cloud, that users can access without downloading or requiring storage space on their smartphone. Although seemingly a direct counterpart to the iOS App Store and Google Play Store, a Tencent spokeswoman speaking with The Wall Street Journal said that the company "maintained regular dialogue with Apple" throughout the development of Mini Program. WeChat also deliberately avoids calling it an "app store."

The company has taken care not to describe Mini Program as an app store, saying it doesn’t have a central location to distribute applications. Apple doesn’t allow third-party app stores in its iOS App Store. Tencent also dropped plans to include the word “app” in its name, calling the features “programs” instead.

“Apple won’t let us call it App Accounts, which might turn out to be a good thing,” Tencent Chairman Pony Ma wrote on his WeChat account in September, as Mini Program began beta testing.

Although Mini Program provides experiences and programs similar to iOS apps, none are located in a "central location," akin to the actual App Store app on iPhone and iPad. Programs are instead discoverable through third-party means, like scanning a QR code or finding a new program in a search result. The programs are said to provide small but useful functionalities, similar to the simplified apps on the iMessage App Store.

WeChat itself began as a chat app in China and has slowly evolved into "a digital Swiss Army Knife," including extra features that let users stay up-to-date on the news, pay bills, check their bank accounts, buy tickets to the movies, and more. Mini Program is yet another feature addition to the popular app, but analysts believe it will take a while for both developers and users to get the full use of the programs.

Industry experts say the first mini-programs are less sophisticated than most conventional apps, with fewer features and functions. “For heavy users, the experience on apps is still better so I don’t think this would threaten the status of app stores,” said Zhu Xiaohua, product supervisor of online question-and-answer platform Fenda.

“Mini Program is not a simple substitute,” said Hong Bo, a Beijing-based tech analyst. “It will take a fairly long term for developers and users to get used to it.”

For Apple, the iOS App Store continues to account for a large portion of the company's revenue, with $240 million in sales on New Year's Day 2017 -- the "busiest day ever" for the App Store. In total for 2016, App Store developers made $20 billion, which the company said was up 40 percent from 2015. The iMessage App Store is also growing, with 21,000 apps now available for users to download, up from 1,600 last September.