Apple today got in the holiday spirit by announcing the top five best-selling holiday movies of all time on iTunes, ever since the movie rental section of the digital marketplace opened in 2008.
The top five highest grossing iTunes holiday movies are:
Elf [Direct Link] - $9.99 HD Purchase / $3.99 HD Rental
National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation [Direct Link] - $9.99 HD Purchase / $3.99 HD Rental
Dr. Seuss’ How the Grinch Stole Christmas [Direct Link] - $9.99 HD Purchase / No Rental Available
Home Alone [Direct Link] - $9.99 HD Purchase / $3.99 HD Rental
The Polar Express [Direct Link] - $9.99 HD Purchase / $3.99 HD Rental
Apple didn't offer any specifics behind each film's download numbers, but gave snippets about plots, writers, directors, and actors for each holiday favorite.
The company prompted users to ask Siri on an iPhone, iPad, or Apple TV to search for the movies listed today, as well as other seasonal mainstays like Home Alone 2: Lost in New York, The Night Before, A Christmas Story, The Santa Clause, It’s a Wonderful Life, Love Actually and Mickey’s Christmas Carol.
We're doing a series of holiday giveaways ahead of Christmas, and for today's giveaway, we've teamed up with Flexibits to offer MacRumors readers a chance to win a copy of Fantastical 2 for Mac.
Fantastical is one of the most popular calendar apps in the Mac App Store, with a clean, easy-to-use layout and the ability to use natural language like "lunch with Eric at 2:00 p.m. on Thursday" to create calendar events and reminders.
There's a full Mac app and a menu bar widget that makes it easy to see what you've got going on at a glance, and it works with all kinds of calendar accounts: iCloud, Google, Microsoft Exchange, Yahoo, and any other CalDav account.
It features a Notification Center widget, Handoff support, Action and Share Extensions, and it was recently updated with Touch Bar support for the new MacBook Pro. Fantastical 2 for Mac syncs with Fantastical 2 for the iPhone and the iPad, so your calendar is always at your fingertips no matter what device you're using.
Other Fantastical 2 features include time zone support, geofence alerts, built-in maps, Google and Exchange integration, multiple themes, calendar sets for organizing work and personal calendars, support for multiple languages, and more.
Fantastical 2 for Mac normally costs $50, but 25 MacRumors readers will get a copy for free. To enter to win, use the Rafflecopter widget below and enter an email address. Email addresses will be used solely for contact purposes to reach the winner and send the prize. You can earn additional entries by subscribing to our weekly newsletter, subscribing to our YouTube channel, following us on Twitter, or visiting the MacRumorsFacebook page.
Due to the complexities of international laws regarding giveaways, only U.S. residents who are 18 years of age or older are eligible to enter. To offer feedback or get more information on the giveaway restrictions, please refer to our Site Feedback section, as that is where discussion of the rules will be redirected.
The contest will run from today (December 22) at 8:00 a.m. Pacific Time through 8:00 a.m. Pacific Time on December 29. The winners will be chosen randomly on December 29 and will be contacted by email. The winners will have 48 hours to respond and provide a shipping address before new winners are chosen.
AirPods became available for purchase on Apple's website on December 13, and customers who ordered quickly began receiving their shipments as early as December 19. Orders quickly became backlogged, however, and Apple's shipping estimate slipped to four weeks in less than two hours, and to six weeks by the following day.
For customers that ordered within the past nine days, the six-week wait potentially meant waiting until late January or early February to get the all-new wireless earphones. Fortunately, as is often the case, Apple is now shipping many of those orders sooner than expected, with some deliveries now slated for late December.
AirPods delivered to MacRumors forum member iPhenom
"Just received my shipping notice for my AirPod order," said MacRumors reader York in an email. "The original delivery date was January 12, but it should arrive on December 28th." Likewise, another reader with an original December 29 delivery estimate has now seen his AirPods ship with an estimated delivery date of December 23.
In the AirPods order tracking topic in the MacRumors discussion forums, a handful of other customers with estimated delivery dates ranging from December 29 to January 12 claim their AirPods have now shipped for delivery as early as this week. For some of those customers, AirPods will arrive just in time for Christmas.
"Awesome, mine were scheduled for delivery on the 29th, but suddenly they are supposed to get here tomorrow, the 22nd," said one person. "Order scheduled for delivery on January 12th has shipped with a delivery date of December 28th," said another, noting his shipment was still in China.
With only three days remaining until Christmas, customers may now be pushing their luck to find AirPods in time for the holidays, but a lucky few have managed to find a pair at an Apple Store or place an order through resellers such as Best Buy and the United Kingdom's Carphone Warehouse over the past few days.
Other resellers such as Sprint and Verizon have unfortunately been less reliable, as some customers were able to purchase AirPods from these vendors only to later receive an email saying the order could not be fulfilled at this time. AT&T also has AirPods on sale, but it is unclear when orders will ship.
AirPods are Apple's all-new $159 wireless earphones. The cord-free earphones instantly turn on and connect to your iPhone, Apple Watch, iPad, or Mac when taken out of their charging case thanks to Apple's custom W1 chip. Likewise, audio automatically plays as soon as you put them in your ears and pauses when you take them out.
AirPods are controlled mainly by Siri. Doubling tapping an earpiece invokes Siri, and voice commands can be used to adjust the volume, change the song, make a call, and so forth. AirPods deliver up to 5 hours of listening time on one charge, and a 15-minute fast charge provides up to 3 hours of listening time.
The launch of a new Apple product usually comes along with the debut of many third-party accessories, but the only viable option for AirPods currently being sold are cables that attach to each headphone to prevent drops. One alternative that might see fruition down the road by a few companies is a charging dock that cradles the AirPods case in one convenient place.
This week, Reddit user jimbojsb shared a project on Thingiverse that was created with a Wanhao Duplicator i3 V2 3D printer, resulting in a desktop charging cradle for the AirPods and their charging case. The dock has a hole underneath to pass a Lightning cable through, so when the charging case is placed into it, the AirPods begin charging up again.
If you have the requisite 3D printer, Thingiverse provides all of the files you'll need to download and print the AirPods Charge Dock for yourself. You can also simply order one that's already been printed through the site's "Order This Printed" button.
Check out more pictures of the dock on Thingiverse.
After first testing out a new update to the Photos web app on the iCloud beta website earlier this month, Apple has now rolled out the update to all users (via Mac Generation). The overhaul to the app on iCloud.com introduces a macOS-like Photos experience with a sidebar that can be toggled on and off, and a scrollable thumbnail view of every photo in an album at the bottom of the site when looking at individual pictures.
Previously, Photos on iCloud.com placed albums in a tab bar at the top of the site, so the update makes it easier to navigate multiple albums at once. To top off the navigation tweaks, there are also four action buttons in the top right corner of the web app for uploading, adding, downloading, sharing, and deleting albums and photos.
The Photos web app on iCloud.com is still lacking macOS and iOS features like editing, shared albums, memories, and people, which uses facial recognition to organize your photos on Mac and iPhone. Users can head over to iCloud.com to check out the new Photos update on the site.
Apple is looking at ways to offload the Apple Watch's haptic feedback mechanism from the device's chassis to the wrist strap, according to a new patent application.
Published by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office and spotted by AppleInsider, the patent application for a "Band attachment mechanism with haptic response" describes a band capable of alerting the wearer to incoming alerts and other notifications.
Applied to Apple's timepiece, the proposed design would serve to reduce the thickness of the chassis by transferring the linear actuator assembly to the bottom or the side of the wearer's wrist.
The document describes a hardware component outside the main casing that is able to move laterally and side to side relative to the watch chassis, with other embodiments able to move up and down or rotate around the axis, in contrast to existing embodiments which are limited to back-and-forth movements.
This would allow the outside mechanisms to reproduce the various movements of Apple's Taptic Engine, such as taps and shakes, with further variations possible depending on the integrated haptic subsystem.
The patent goes on to describe ways in which haptic devices could be embedded in the smartwatch band, such as within the strap buckle or spring bars, presumably receiving motion instructions via a hardwired connection.
Perhaps in contrast to some of Apple's other products, making the next-generation Apple Watch thinner would likely be welcomed by users. Locating the actuator outside the casing would also likely make haptic feedback more noticeable to the wearer.
The patent application was filed relatively recently, in June of this year, suggesting such a feature could still be included in the next iteration.
Atari has released RollerCoaster Tycoon Classic on iPhone and iPad, combining the best features of the popular PC and Xbox titles RollerCoaster Tycoon (1999) and RollerCoaster Tycoon 2 (2002) to create "a new RCT experience" for long-time fans.
Create and run amazing parks complete with the most outrageous rides imaginable. RCT Classic includes a mixture of authentic playability, depth of gameplay and unique graphical style of Chris Sawyer’s original best-selling RollerCoaster Tycoon® PC Games, now enhanced for handheld devices.
Packed with content, players can enjoy designing and building roller coasters and rides, landscaping parks and managing the staff and finances to keep their guests happy and the money flowing in.
The game includes hundreds of pre-made designs and classic building tools for bespoke coaster construction, a fully featured park designer and park management tools, 95 classic park scenarios from the two games, and the original graphics, park music and sound effects.
RollerCoaster Tycoon Classic costs $5.99 and is available on the App Store for iPad and iPhone, with the expansion packs Wacky Worlds, Time Twister and Toolkit available as in-app purchases. [Direct Link]
Uber has removed its fleet of self-driving cars from San Francisco streets on Wednesday after the California Department of Motor Vehicles revoked its vehicle registrations (via Reuters).
Earlier this week, the DMV ordered Uber to shut down its self-driving car test program and comply with regulations requiring a permit to test the autonomous vehicles on public roads. The order came after an Uber car was reportedly seen running a red light in downtown San Francisco, but the company refused to comply with the agency's demand, arguing that it did not require a permit because each of its 16 vehicles are continuously monitored by a driver and an engineer who sit in the front seats.
Uber disputed the interpretation by the DMV that the cars require a special permit and said the state laws were being unevenly applied, owing to the fact that the self-driving capabilities of Uber's fleet matched those of Tesla's vehicles, which have an optional "autopilot" feature.
Uber's defiance brought threats of legal action from the DMV and the state attorney general, but the dispute has apparently come to an end now that state officials have yanked registration for the cars used in the company's pilot program.
"We have stopped our self-driving pilot in California as the DMV has revoked the registrations for our self-driving cars," San Francisco-based Uber said in a statement emailed to AFP.
"We're now looking at where we can redeploy these cars but remain 100 percent committed to California and will be redoubling our efforts to develop workable statewide rules."
DMV director Jean Shiomoto said in a letter sent to Uber on Wednesday that she would "personally help to ensure an expedited review and approval process," for the required permits, which she said can take less than three days. It's still unclear whether Uber will take up the offer.
San Francisco was the company's second testing ground for its self-driving cars. Uber unveiled its autonomous car fleet in September in Pittsburgh. Uber launched its self-driving car program to passengers in the city on December 14 after testing the cars on San Francisco roadways for over a month.
Apple has met with California DMV officials in the past regarding self-driving car laws within the state, with its Apple Car team said to be focusing on in-car autonomous systems rather than developing an out-an-out vehicle.
Google has also scaled back its self-driving car ambitions, and is now reported to be working with established car companies to develop vehicles that will include self-driving features. Google's autonomous vehicles have clocked over two million miles of tests on public roads. Like Uber, the company has complained to authorities about the situation regarding nascent state and federal laws for self-driving vehicles.
Amid rumors suggesting Apple is planning on introducing at least one iPhone model with a flexible OLED display in 2017, Bloomberg has taken a closer look at Japanese company Canon Tokki, the corporation responsible for making the machines that will likely be used to create OLED displays for the iPhone.
Canon Tokki is said to produce nearly all of the machines that make OLED Displays. Each ELVESS OLED machine is actually a vacuum production system that's 328 feet in length and is used to deposit red, blue, and green pixels on a glass surface using evaporating organic materials.
Canon Tokki has developed key technologies for the production process that have significantly reduced the margin of error, leading to much higher yields that other companies can't compete with.
According to Bloomberg, Canon Tokki reportedly makes fewer than 10 machines per year and has a two-year backlog due to high-demand, but it is not clear if this will have an impact on Apple. Apple is rumored to be using OLED displays produced by Samsung, and much of the equipment may already be on hand.
Samsung's own line of smartphones have used OLED displays for several years, but Blooomberg does warn that Samsung may not be able to make enough OLED displays to meet Apple's demand due to low yield rates.
The potential production bottleneck is raising questions over Apple's ability to feature OLED displays in next year's iPhones, and whether the Cupertino, California-based company will be able to line up additional suppliers. The current wait for a machine, which can cost more than 10 billion yen ($85 million) each, is about two years.
"We are doing all we can to increase output and make that wait shorter," said Chief Executive Officer Teruhisa Tsugami, adding that demand from display makers, including Samsung Display Co., LG Display Co. and Sharp Corp., will remain strong for the next three years.
OLED displays offer superior contrast and better power efficiency for improved battery life compared to traditional LCDs. OLED displays can also be made from flexible plastic and can be made much thinner.
According to rumors, Apple will release at least one iPhone model that uses an OLED display in 2017, but rumors have disagreed on what the display will look like. While some rumors suggest the iPhone 8 will use a curved OLED display that wraps around the edges of the device (similar to the Galaxy S7 Edge), others point towards less dramatic curves, suggesting a flat OLED display that eliminates all bezels for an edge-to-edge design.
Apple has announced its Northshore retail store in Peabody, Massachusetts, an outer suburb of Boston, will be relocating to MarketStreet, an open-air shopping and entertainment center in nearby Lynnfield, Massachusetts.
The new location will be open starting Saturday, January 28, which is presumably around the time when Apple Northshore will permanently close. No exact time was specified, but 10:00 a.m. local time is typical for Apple Store grand openings.
MarketStreet Lynnfield is located approximately 5 miles from Northshore Mall, where Apple's current store in the North Shore region of Massachusetts is located. Apple Northshore opened on September 1, 2001 as only the company's sixth retail store overall, retaining its classic black facade with two Apple logos for over 15 years.
Only four other Apple Stores remain with the classic storefront design:
We're doing a series of special software giveaways this week in celebration of the holidays, and our first giveaway features an app that just came out today: djay Pro for iPhone.
djay Pro for iPhone, from Algoriddim, brings full-fledged professional-level DJ software to a device small enough to fit in a pocket.
Designed from the ground up for the iPhone, djay Pro is simple enough for a beginner to use but is outfitted with features to suit a professional's needs, including multiple waveforms, support for up to four decks, Spotify integration, and a huge range of tools.
The new app was built for iOS 10 and the iPhone 7, incorporating haptic feedback in unique ways - when scratching and scrubbing music, you can actually feel the beats.
djay Pro for iPhone costs $4.99 to download, but we have 25 copies to give away to MacRumors readers. To enter to win, use the Rafflecopter widget below and enter an email address. Email addresses will be used solely for contact purposes to reach the winner and send the prize. You can earn additional entries by subscribing to our weekly newsletter, subscribing to our YouTube channel, following us on Twitter, or visiting the MacRumorsFacebook page.
Due to the complexities of international laws regarding giveaways, only U.S. residents who are 18 years of age or older are eligible to enter. To offer feedback or get more information on the giveaway restrictions, please refer to our Site Feedback section, as that is where discussion of the rules will be redirected.
The contest will run from today (December 21) at 1:00 p.m. Pacific Time through 1:00 p.m. Pacific Time on December 28. The winners will be chosen randomly on December 28 and will be contacted by email. The winners will have 48 hours to respond and provide a shipping address before new winners are chosen.
Finance and budgeting software Quicken for Mac was updated to version 4.4 this week, adding a handful of useful new features ranging from auto backup to improvements to summary reports.
With Auto-Backup, Quicken will back up five files at a time to a user-set location whenever someone logs out of the app, preventing data from being accidentally lost. A new Transaction Sidebar indicator has been added, which highlights all accounts that have new transactions when connected accounts are refreshed.
Comparison and summary reports can be exported or copied to a spreadsheet for printing or data analysis, and there's a new Total column in the summary report. New report comparison customization options make it easier to compare the current period with previous periods on a quarterly or monthly basis.
First released in October, Quicken 2017 features a new interface, a range of custom report options, and Quicken Bill Pay for paying for bills directly within the app.
Apple today seeded the second beta of an upcoming iOS 10.2.1 update to public beta testers for testing purposes, one week after releasing the first iOS 10.2.1 public beta and one day after providing the second beta to developers.
Beta testers who have signed up for Apple's beta testing program will receive the new iOS 10.2.1 beta update over-the-air after installing the proper certificate on their iOS device.
Those who want to be a part of Apple's beta testing program can sign up to participate through the beta testing website, which gives users access to both iOS and macOS Sierra betas. Betas are not stable and include many bugs, so they should be installed on a secondary device.
It isn't known what features are included in iOS 10.2.1, but as a minor 10.2.x update, it appears to focus on bug fixes and performance improvements rather than major outward-facing changes.
No new features were discovered in the first two developer iOS 10.2.1 betas, and we likely won't know the full extent of the changes until the update is released with full release notes.
Apple today seeded the second beta of an upcoming macOS Sierra 10.12.3 update to public beta testers, one week after seeding the first public beta and one day after seeding the second 10.12.3 beta to developers.
Beta testers who have signed up for Apple's beta testing program will receive the 10.12.3 macOS Sierra beta through the Software Update mechanism in the Mac App Store.
Those who want to be a part of Apple's beta testing program can sign up to participate through the beta testing website, which gives users access to both iOS and macOS Sierra betas. Betas should not be installed on a primary machine due to the potential for instability.
According to Apple's release notes, the 10.12.3 update "improves the stability, compatibility, and security of your Mac." No specific changes, bug fixes, or feature additions were discovered in the first two developer betas.
Nokia today announced that it has filed several complaints against Apple in Germany and the United States, accusing the Cupertino company of infringing on Nokia patents.
Nokia's lawsuit stems from a disagreement between Apple and Nokia over licensing fees for Nokia technology. Apple this morning filed an antitrust lawsuit against several patent assertion entities that it claims are attempting to collect excessive fees for Nokia patents through lawsuits and royalty demands.
According to Apple, Nokia's failing cellphone business has prompted Nokia to transfer patents to patent assertion entities to get out of FRAND (Fair, Reasonable, and Non-Discriminatory) licensing deals it established for essential patents, allowing the company to collect higher royalties. From Apple's complaint:
With its cell phone business dying, Nokia began to seek out willing conspirators and to commence its illegal patent transfer scheme in full force; that scheme has continued in full effect to the present. The driving force behind Nokia's strategy was to diffuse its patent portfolio and place it in the hands of PAEs. Acacia and Conversant were its chief conspirators.
Nokia's own patent infringement complaint against Apple claims that Apple has declined to establish licensing deals for Nokia technology that is used in Apple products.
Ilkka Rahnasto, head of Patent Business at Nokia, said: "Through our sustained investment in research and development, Nokia has created or contributed to many of the fundamental technologies used in today's mobile devices, including Apple products. After several years of negotiations trying to reach agreement to cover Apple's use of these patents, we are now taking action to defend our rights."
Nokia has filed lawsuits in the US District Court for the Eastern District of Texas and Dusseldorf, Mannheim and Munich in Germany. The lawsuits cover 32 patents that cover technologies including display, user interface, software, antenna, chipsets, and video coding. Nokia says additional actions are to come.
Update: Nokia today filed additional patent lawsuits against Apple in Asia, Europe, and the United States. As of today, Nokia has filed 40 patent suits in 11 countries.
Update 2: Apple is now suing Nokia itself as the legal battle continues to escalate. Apple has added Nokia Corporation, Nokia Solutions and Networks Oy, and Nokia Technologies Oy to the list of defendants in its aforementioned antitrust case against several patent assertion entities that have sued Apple over Nokia patents.
Apple released iOS 10.2 earlier this month with an all-new "TV" app, a range of new emoji, bug fixes, and other improvements, including one that was not mentioned in the changelog — improved support for MFi hearing aids.
After updating to iOS 10.2, Reddit user dshafik noted Find My iPhone pings now come through the iPhone's speakers, while FaceTime rings for outgoing calls through his ReSound 9-Series hearing aids.
On previous software versions, Find My iPhone would ring through the hearing aid itself, making it harder to find a lost iPhone, while FaceTime would ring on the iPhone's speakers for outgoing calls, despite the actual call being routed through the hearing aid.
The accessibility improvements are good news for those with hearing aids, and certainly show attention to detail.
Apple today released a new update for Safari Technology Preview, the experimental browser Apple first introduced in March of 2016. Apple designed the Safari Technology Preview to test features that may be introduced into future release versions of Safari.
Safari Technology Preview release 20 includes bug fixes and updates for Visual Viewport, Touch Bar, JavaScript, Web API, Security, CSS, Pointer Lock, Web Inspector, WebCrypto API, and more.
Apple's goal with Safari Technology Preview is to receive feedback from developers and users on its browser development process. Safari Technology Preview can run side-by-side with the existing Safari browser and while designed for developers, it does not require a developer account to download.
Apple today seeded the first beta of an upcoming watchOS 3.1.3 update to developers for testing purposes, more than a week after watchOS 3.1.1 was released and three 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 we'll update this post with any new discoveries. watchOS betas are often rather minor in scale, focusing on small bug fixes and performance improvements rather than major interface changes.
The watchOS 3.1.3 beta comes shortly 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 
