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Weight Watchers Offering Apple Watch Series 2 With Membership

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apple-watch-series-2Weight Watchers today introduced a variation of its OnlinePlus subscription plan that includes a new 38mm model Apple Watch Series 2 with an annual membership.

The subscription plan has an initial installment fee of $99.95 in the first month, followed by a monthly fee of $34.95 for the next 12 months, for a total price of nearly $520.

Apple Watch Series 2 models start at $369, while a standalone OnlinePlus membership currently costs $242 for 13 months, so the combo would cost $611 if purchased separately.

In other words, if you were already planning to join Weight Watchers and purchase a new Apple Watch Series 2, this promotion will save you around $109.

"Weight Watchers and Apple share the belief that moving more each day has a powerful impact on people's lives," said Jeff Williams, Apple's Chief Operating Officer. "We are thrilled that Weight Watchers will be helping their members live a healthier day with the addition of Apple Watch to their OnlinePlus program."

At the end of the 13-month period, the plan automatically renews for a standard monthly fee of $19.95 until you cancel.

Weight Watchers told us customers do not have to return the Apple Watch at the end of the membership period, but there is a $304 early cancellation fee to pay for the device if you cancel in the first month. The cancellation fee will be reduced by $25.33 per month thereafter until the 13-month installment plan expires.

With an OnlinePlus subscription, the official Weight Watchers app [Direct Link] for iOS and Apple Watch enables members to track their food intake and physical activity with a personalized dashboard. Users can set tailored and adaptive activity goals, access a community exclusive to Weight Watchers, and more.

Related Roundup: Apple Watch 10
Buyer's Guide: Apple Watch (Caution)
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Song Learning App Capo 3 for Mac Updated With Touch Bar Support

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Popular music app Capo 3 received a major update today, adding Touch Bar support for the 2016 MacBook Pro and other new features that are designed to improve the overall user experience.

For those unfamiliar with Capo 3, it is a music app that can detect the chords in any song, allowing users to isolate specific sounds and vocals to play along with.

On 2016 MacBook Pro models, the Touch Bar can be used to scrub through songs and quickly access playback controls like volume, pause, and more. A waveform scrubber displays the waveform of the song and the locations of regions that have been added by the user.

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"The Touch Bar support in Capo 3.5 was fun to build, but it's even more fun to use," says Chris Liscio, SuperMegaUltraGroovy founder and chief developer. "It's great to jump instantly to a point in the song, and if you have regions placed then you can identify them in the waveform overview by color. It's also helpful to have the audible feedback while scrubbing, so you can hear whether you're in the right spot."

Along with Touch Bar support, there's a new Song Views option, which allows users to choose between a new Practice view and a Tabbing view with the Spectrogram display. New view customization options are available, allowing the tablature display and automatically detected chords to be disabled.

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Transcription Playhead, a new playback mode that makes it easier to listen to individual notes has been added, and there's an improved scrubbing feature, also for better identifying individual notes.

"I spent a week in the summer prototyping a new effect that would allow users to 'freeze time' so that they could hold a note still to help identify it by ear. I attached it to Capo's scrubbing feature--just to see whether it worked--and I couldn't stop playing with it. Since then, I've used it to pick apart some truly difficult solos in the Tabbing view faster than ever before."

Capo can be downloaded from the Mac App Store for $29.99 through the holidays. A free trial is also available from the Capo website. [Direct Link]

Tag: Capo
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Instagram Has Gained 100 Million Users After Copying Snapchat

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Instagram announced today that it now has more than 600 million users, with the last 100 million of those users joining the photo and video sharing service in the past six months, a period in which it has added several new Snapchat-like features. Instagram has doubled the 300 million users it had in December 2014.

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A lot has changed this year, but the Instagram community and the diversity of expression it provides has remained consistent. And you now have more ways to share than ever before with Instagram Stories, live video and disappearing photos and videos in Direct. Additionally, with updated safety tools that give you more control over comments and other parts of your experience, we’re working to make Instagram safer than ever for connection and self-expression.

Instagram, owned by Facebook, has morphed into a Snapchat competitor this year with the addition of "Stories" that disappear after 24 hours, a new "Events" channel, and photos and videos that disappear in direct messages. Facebook has also wittingly added Snapchat-like features to Messenger.

Update: In related news, Facebook Messenger has been updated today with another new Snapchat-like feature enabling users to customize their photos and videos with text art, filters, stickers, and more, as reported by TechCrunch.

Tag: Instagram
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Uber Expands Color-Coded 'Beacons' to Four More Cities to Help Riders Find Their Drivers

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One year after testing color-coded rider pickups in Seattle through a system called "SPOT," Uber today announced that the initiative is now called "Uber Beacon," and beginning December 16 it will expand to Miami, Denver, Nashville, and Newcastle in the United Kingdom. Uber Beacon is a piece of hardware that attaches to a driver's windshield and "uses color-pairing technology" to match up drivers with their riders.

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In the Uber app, riders will be able to select from an endless amount of color options when calling for a ride. As their driver gets to the pickup destination, the Uber Beacon in the windshield will match the color the rider picked, making it easy to find a ride at night and at crowded venues. The new hardware has also been designed to match Uber's rider app logo.

On the rider side of things, users can hold up their smartphone to display their unique color and make it quicker for the driver to find and pick them up.

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Uber said the Beacon itself can be installed easily, removed in seconds, and lasts for "several evenings without charge."

Enter Uber Beacon, designed for simplicity and scalability. Drivers can install it themselves within minutes and then remove it in seconds. And with a powerful battery and Bluetooth connection to our driver app, it can last several evenings without charge, while keeping the dashboard cable-free. And our technology also allows for customized color palettes and animation styles to celebrate events and holidays —imagine Beacon pulsing St. Patrick’s Day green or colorful rainbows all weekend for Pride.

Uber drivers in Miami, Denver, Nashville, and Newcastle will begin receiving Uber Beacons at community events in preparation for New Year's Eve celebrations within each city. Riders wanting the helpful system to make it to their city have some hope, with the company noting: "Our goal is to make Beacons the new standard for the Uber experience, so in 2017 we’ll be expanding Uber Beacon to more cities across the world."

Tag: Uber
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Apple CEO Tim Cook Attends Executive Tech Summit at Trump Tower

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Apple CEO Tim Cook visited Trump Tower along with other prominent tech executives on Wednesday as they gathered in New York for a summit with U.S. President-elect Donald Trump, who was accompanied by three of his adult children.

According to The New York Times, the meeting was attended by 11 other tech executives, including Alphabet's Larry Page and Eric Schmidt, Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg, Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos, Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella, IBM CEO Ginni Rometty, and Tesla's Elon Musk. Vice-President-Elect Mike Pence was also at the table.

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Cook sat two seats away from Trump, beside Facebook board member and Trump transition official Peter Thiel, and listened as the president-in-waiting began by heaping praise on the executives in the room.

"This is a truly amazing group of people. Anything we can do to help this go along, and we're going to be there for you… you'll call my people, you'll call me – it doesn't make any difference, we have no formal chain of command here. We're going to do fair trade deals, we're going to make it a lot easier for you to trade."

According to The Wall Street Journal, executives were then invited to introduce themselves one by one.

"Tim Cook, very good to be here," said the Apple CEO. "And I look very forward to talking to the President-elect about the things that we can do to help you achieve some things you want."

A number of issues were discussed once the press were ushered out of the meeting room. According to several executives who attended the meet, topics included trade, immigration, and vocational education – the latter being one of the main reasons Cook has previously given for why most Apple products are made in China.

Trump has rebuked Apple in the past for basing the vast majority of it assembly plants in other countries. While campaigning earlier this year, Trump said "we're going to get Apple to start building their damn computers and things in this country instead of in other countries", while he has also threatened to introduce a 45 percent tax on products imported from China.

According to USA Today, Trump also told executives at the meeting that he planned to slash the corporate tax rate in the U.S. in order to make it a lot easier to repatriate money kept overseas.

Referring to his commerce and economic administration picks, Trump said they would "make it easier for you to trade across borders, because there are a lot of restrictions, a lot of problems". He added, "If you have any ideas on that, that would be great."

The meeting reportedly ran for two hours and included "productive discussions about job creation and economic growth", said incoming White House Chief of Staff Renice Priebus. At the end of the summit, Trump suggested, and tech leaders agreed to, meeting quarterly, according to a person briefed on the meeting. 

Cook was a Hillary Clinton supporter during the election campaign and hosted a fundraiser for the Democratic presidential nominee in August on behalf of himself. In a company-wide memo issued following Trump's victory, Cook urged Apple employees to "move forward together" despite "uncertainties ahead".

Despite any personal misgivings he may have had in the past, Cook reportedly stayed at Trump Tower after the summit was over to meet privately with the President-Elect for further discussions.

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.

Tags: Donald Trump, Tim Cook
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Pebble Says Existing Smartwatch Services Will Continue to Function Through 2017

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Pebble has moved to reassure its customers that software and services will continue to run through 2017, following Fitbit's acquisition of the company last week.

Fitbit bought out Pebble for its software assets, not for its hardware, which has concerned many existing owners of Pebble smartwatches about the continued functionality of their devices. Today, however, Pebble sought to allay fears by confirming in a blog post that services would continue as normal for at least another year.

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Fitbit is going out of its way to keep Pebble software and services running through 2017. To be clear, no one on this freshly-formed team seeks to brick Pebble watches in active service. The Pebble SDK, CloudPebble, Timeline APIs, firmware availability, mobile apps, developer portal, and Pebble appstore are all elements of the Pebble ecosystem that will remain in service at this time.

Pebble said it has "seen a massive influx of community developers teaming up to keep the Pebble watch experience alive, long into the future," but as TechCrunch notes, what that means for third-party apps developed for the smartwatch remains unclear.

In addition, Pebble said that it was working on an update for release in the coming months that will ensure the normal operation of core Pebble functions, including Pebble Health, once the company's cloud services close down.

Tags: Fitbit, Pebble
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Evernote's New Privacy Policy Lets Staff Read Customers' Notes 'to Improve the Service' [Updated]

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evernoteSome users of Evernote have threatened to stop using the note-taking service after the company announced a new privacy policy scheduled to go into effect on January 23 that allows employees to read customers' notes.

The policy changes are related to machine learning algorithms, says Evernote, which are being tested on user content that the company has accumulated since going into operation. Specifically, Evernote explained that staff may need to read customer notes in order to ensure the algorithms are working as they should.

The latest update to the Privacy Policy allows some Evernote employees to exercise oversight of machine learning technologies applied to account content. While our computer systems do a pretty good job, sometimes a limited amount of human review is simply unavoidable in order to make sure everything is working exactly as it should.

In describing this position more succinctly, Evernote's privacy policy states that employees will look at notes "for troubleshooting purposes or to maintain and improve the Service". But some users are concerned about the vague wording of the clause, which journalist Stacy-Marie Ishmael has called "so broad as to be all inclusive". Meanwhile, some users have taken to social media to join a growing chorus of revolt.

Evernote says that only a limited number of employees who have undergone background checks will be able to access note content and that users can encrypt notes to prevent staff from reading them.

But while users can opt out of having their notes reviewed for machine learning purposes, Evernote can still access content for other reasons, including violations of terms of service, to protect the rights, property, or personal safety of Evernote and its users, or to comply with law enforcement requests, warrants, or court orders.

Users can read more about the new changes to Evernote's privacy policy here.

Update: Evernote CEO Chris O'Neill has shared a note to further address and clarify the changes. He said Evernote employees may see "random content" to ensure its machine learning algorithms are working properly, but "they won't know who it belongs to." Moreover, if any personal information is identified, it "will mask it from the employee."

If you choose to participate in these experimental features, you’ll enjoy a more personalized experience. Select Evernote employees may see random content to ensure the features are working properly but they won’t know who it belongs to. They’ll only see the snippet they’re checking. Not only that, but if a machine identifies any personal information, it will mask it from the employee.

O'Neill said Evernote remains committed to its Three Laws of Data Protection.

Tags: Apple Privacy, Evernote
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Wireless Charging Company Energous Partners With Apple Supplier Dialog

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Apple supplier Dialog Semiconductor recently made a $10 million investment in Energous, a company that's developing long-range wireless charging techniques and has been rumored to be working with Apple in the past, reports Fast Company.

According to Energous CEO Steve Rizzone, going forward, all Energous technology will be sold under the Dialog brand. Dialog makes power management chips and is said to get as much as three quarters of its business from Apple.


Energous has developed WattUp, an emerging wireless charging technology that uses radio frequencies to charge devices from up to 15 feet away. There's been no concrete proof that Energous has partnered with Apple in any way, but in 2015, Energous inked a deal with an unnamed consumer electronics company, and speculation has suggested it could be Apple.

The deal between Energous and known Apple supplier Dialog doesn't add any further evidence towards rumors of a partnership between Apple and Energous, but as Fast Company points out, Dialog's resources would make such a partnership more viable. Through Dialog, Energous now has access to Apple, knowledge of how Apple's supply chain works, and an inside edge on how to establish a deal with the Cupertino company.

But if Energous were trying to get into a position to supply technology to Apple, it couldn't have made a better move than tucking itself under Dialog's wing. [...]

On its own, Energous is probably too small to be an Apple supplier. Apple suppliers have to be large enough to reliably supply parts at Apple's huge scale. Dialog obviously already has that capacity. With the Energous technology basically being folded into the Dialog structure, all of a sudden Energous has it too.

Rumors suggest Apple is planning to integrate some kind of long-range wireless charging technology into the iPhone 8, set to be released in 2017. Long-range wireless charging is superior to many existing wireless charging methods because it does not require devices to be close to a charging source or mat, but there are also challenges to overcome.

With long-range charging, there's a loss of power transfer efficiency that occurs as the distance between the transmitter and the receiver is increased. That means devices charge more slowly when they're further away, and Apple is said to be aiming to overcome that limitation.

Apple has been hiring engineers with expertise in wireless charging, testing wireless charging modules, and has been seeking a supplier for wireless charging chips, all hints that point towards the imminent implementation of wireless charging. Still, it remains unknown how wireless charging will be implemented and whether Apple will partner up with a company like Energous to implement the feature.

Energous' CEO says the company's technology should be ready to start shipping out in real world products starting in the second quarter of 2017, but he did not comment on whether the partnership with Dialog was made in an attempt to secure some kind of deal with Apple.

Tags: Dialog, Energous
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Yahoo Discloses Second Major Hack, More Than 1 Billion Accounts Compromised

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Yahoo today announced that it believes more than one billion Yahoo user accounts were compromised in a hack by an unauthorized third party in August of 2013.

Information stolen from affected accounts includes names, email addresses, telephone numbers, birth dates, hashed passwords, and both encrypted and unencrypted security questions and answers. Clear text passwords, bank account information, and credit/debit card information were not believed to be accessed in the attack.

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According to Yahoo, the hack was discovered after law enforcement officials provided the company with what appeared to be Yahoo user data from an unknown source. Yahoo says it has not been able to identify the specific intrusion, but it is "likely" distinct from a late 2014 hack that compromised more than 500 million Yahoo user accounts.

Earlier this year, Yahoo confirmed that "at least" 500 million user accounts were accessed in September of 2014, and this marks a second attack during the same general timeframe.

Yahoo is notifying users who may have been affected by the attack, and says it has "taken steps" to secure their accounts by implementing mandatory password changes. Unencrypted security questions and answers have also been invalidated.

Along with the 2013 hack compromising 1 billion user accounts, Yahoo has also announced that an ongoing outside investigation suggests an unauthorized third party accessed proprietary code to forge cookies, a technique that may have been used by the hackers responsible for the September 2014 attack. Those account holders are also being notified.

The outside forensic experts have identified user accounts for which they believe forged cookies were taken or used. Yahoo is notifying the affected account holders, and has invalidated the forged cookies. The company has connected some of this activity to the same state-sponsored actor believed to be responsible for the data theft the company disclosed on September 22, 2016.

Yahoo suggests users "review all of their online accounts" to check for suspicious activity and change any passwords that might have been used for a Yahoo account and another online account. Yahoo also recommends implementing two-factor authentication and avoiding links from suspicious emails.

Tag: Yahoo
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New MacBook Pro Users Report Improved Battery Life on macOS 10.12.2

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Apple released macOS 10.12.2 yesterday with stability improvements and fixes for several key bugs, including major graphics issues plaguing some late 2016 model MacBook Pro users.

What the changelog did not mention is that Apple also removed the "time remaining" battery life indicator following an increasing number of battery life complaints, likewise among new MacBook Pro users.

macbook-pro-battery

A new MacBook Pro on macOS 10.12.2 with a 99% charge and an estimated 9 hours and 21 minutes of battery life remaining

What it may have also failed to mention is that macOS 10.12.2 appears to have led to battery life improvements for some users. A growing number of MacRumors forum members using the new MacBook Pro claim to be experiencing longer battery life after updating to macOS 10.12.2, despite experiencing less-than-desirable battery life while running macOS 10.2.1 just days earlier.

Many of the users using battery apps like coconutBattery have noticed their new MacBook Pro's battery is discharging with lower wattage, and if accurate, the lower power consumption would certainly lead to longer battery life.

MacRumors forum member lobo1978 — edited slightly for clarity:

Ok it is official. macOS Sierra 10.12.2 fixed my battery. I am up back to 9-10 hours of regular use. Before updating, idle power consumption was not going lower than 6 watts. On macOS Sierra 10.12.2, it is now <4 watts at 60% brightness with the ambient light sensor on.

MacRumors forum member JohnnyGo:

Before the update was getting 7-9 hours with 50-60% brightness. Now getting >10 hours with 70-75% brightness with the same workload (Wi-Fi and Bluetooth on of course).

At least a dozen other users have reported similar results since yesterday after upgrading to macOS 10.12.2. Since publishing this article, a number of Reddit users have also confirmed seeing longer battery life.

While the user reports are worth acknowledging, they remain anecdotal and reflect only a small subset of new MacBook Pro users. It remains to be seen if Apple actually made battery life optimizations in the latest macOS Sierra update; if it did, however, Apple could be choosing to do so quietly as to not confirm that battery life issues were actually a problem for some users.

Apple officially says the new MacBook Pro is rated for up to 10 hours of battery life. Specifically, its tech specs page says all new 13-inch and 15-inch models are capable of up to 10 hours of wireless web browsing, up to 10 hours of iTunes movie playback, and up to 30 days of standby time on a single charge.

Following the release of macOS Sierra 10.12.2, Apple told The Loop that, after a lot of testing, it stands behind the 10-hour battery life advertised.

As more user reports surface, we should be able to see if the alleged battery life improvements are circumstantial or part of a larger trend.

Related Roundup: MacBook Pro
Tag: Battery Life
Buyer's Guide: MacBook Pro (Neutral)
Related Forums: MacBook Pro, macOS Sierra
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GoDaddy and Causemo Implement Apple Pay

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Web domain registrar GoDaddy and donation platform Causemo today separately announced they now accept Apple Pay on their respective websites.

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GoDaddy is providing Apple Pay to all of its online store merchants who enable credit card payments through Stripe on mobile devices.

Causemo, a startup platform enabling non-profit organizations to acquire and retain donors, is providing Apple Pay on the web in Safari on Mac, iPhone, and iPad. When using Apple Pay, donors do not have to enter their billing, shipping, or contact details. Apple Pay is shown as the default payment option on enabled devices.

In November, Apple announced that nonprofit organizations in the United States are now able to accept donations using Apple Pay.

"We're making it incredibly easy to give back with Apple Pay," said Jennifer Bailey, Apple's vice president of Apple Pay. "Websites and apps tell us they see twice as many people actually completing a purchase with Apple Pay than with other payment methods. We think offering such a simple and secure way to support the incredible work nonprofits do will have a significant impact on the communities they serve."

Earlier this month, Apple Pay vice president Jennifer Bailey said 35% of merchants in the United States now accept Apple Pay, compared to only 4% of merchants that accepted the payment option when it launched in October 2014.

Related Roundup: Apple Pay
Related Forum: Apple Music, Apple Pay/Card, iCloud, Fitness+
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Apple Seeds First Beta of macOS Sierra 10.12.3 to Developers

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Apple today seeded the first beta of an upcoming macOS Sierra 10.12.3 update to developers, just one day after releasing macOS Sierra 10.12.2 and almost three months after launching the macOS Sierra operating system.

macOS Sierra 10.12.3 is available for download through the Apple Developer Center or through the software update mechanism in the Mac App Store.

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Because this is a first beta, we don't yet know what features are included in the update, but Apple's release notes say the 10.12.3 update "improves the stability, compatibility, and security of your Mac." We'll update this post with any changes that are discovered in the beta.

Available since September, macOS Sierra is the latest Mac operating system. It includes Siri support, Apple Pay for the web, Universal Clipboard, Apple Watch auto unlocking, improved iCloud Drive integration, Picture-in-Picture multitasking, and dozens of smaller features that can be found in our macOS Sierra roundup.

Related Forum: macOS Sierra
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Apple Seeds First Beta of iOS 10.2.1 to Developers

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Apple today seeded the first beta of an upcoming iOS 10.2.1 update to developers, two days after releasing iOS 10.2 and three months after introducing the new iOS 10 operating system.

Registered developers can download the new iOS 10.2.1 beta from the Apple Developer Center or over-the-air with the proper configuration profile installed.

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It's not yet clear what features are included in iOS 10.2.1, but as a minor 10.2.x update, it's likely to focus on bug fixes and performance improvements rather than major outward-facing changes.

iOS 10.2.1 comes shortly after the release of iOS 10.2, a major update that brought new emoji, the TV app, new Messages Screen Effects, Music improvements, and a whole slew of bug fixes.

Related Forum: iOS 10
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Apple Seeds First Beta of tvOS 10.1.1 to Developers

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Apple today seeded the first beta of an upcoming tvOS 10.1.1 update to developers for testing purposes, just days after releasing the tvOS 10.1 update and more than a month after launching tvOS 10.

Designed for the fourth-generation Apple TV, the 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.

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It's not yet known what new features or changes might be included in the new tvOS beta, but as a 10.1.x update, it's likely to be minor in scale, introducing bug fixes and other performance enhancements.

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

Related Roundup: Apple TV
Buyer's Guide: Apple TV (Don't Buy)
Related Forum: Apple TV and Home Theater
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'Pastebot 2.0' Clipboard Manager From Tapbots Launches on Mac App Store

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Tapbots, the developers behind the popular Twitter client Tweetbot, today launched Pastebot 2.0 for Mac, which is designed to make copy and paste better.

Pastebot is a clipboard manager that saves everything you copy so you can access it later. Pasteboards, which are built into Pastebot, let you store links and snippets of text that you frequently copy and paste so you can access the info in just a few seconds.

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Multiple Pasteboards can be used to keep your text clippings organized, and the clipboard itself can be opened up with a Command + Shift + V keyboard shortcut or through a Menu bar app. Filters can be applied to copied text snippets for formatting purposes to save even more time. Options include Create List, Wrap in Paragraph Tags, Convert to Plain Text, Change Case, Emoji Remover, and more.

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Pastebot has been in beta testing since August, but is now available for download from the Mac App Store starting today. It's priced at $19.99. [Direct Link]

During beta testing, Pastebot content was not able to sync between Macs because CloudKit is required, and CloudKit was not available to apps outside of the Mac App Store prior to the release of Xcode 8. With the version that's launching today, syncing is available so Pastebot can be used across multiple Macs.

Tags: Pastebot, Tapbots
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Instagram Now Lets You Save Posts to View Later

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Instagram today launched a small update for its iOS and Android apps, allowing users to save a post they're interested in to check out later. Underneath each post in the feed users will find a small bookmark icon, and tapping it will send it to a new Saved Post section in the Profile tab.

Saved Posts are private and only visible for you to view, and Instagram says that it'll help organize and memorialize each user's favorite videos and images from their feeds and the Explore tab. Any public profile can have their pictures saved for later by other users, but only followers of private accounts can save their posts.

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When you stumble upon a funny video you want to remember, a new outfit you like or even inspiration for an upcoming vacation, you can now keep track of favorite posts right from your profile.

Over the past few months Instagram has been focusing on "pressure-free" updates and anti-harassment tools that let users navigate and post on the social network in a more relaxed environment. Coming soon, users will be able to turn the comments section of their posts off completely.

Instagram is available to download from the iOS App Store for free. [Direct Link]

Tag: Instagram
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AirPods Now Estimated to Ship in 6 Weeks

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Apple has updated its website to indicate AirPods are now estimated to ship in 6 weeks in the United States and many other countries around the world. The wireless earphones have been available for purchase on Apple's website since yesterday, with initial orders set to be delivered as early as December 19.

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Apple said AirPods will be shipping in limited quantities at launch, so it is unsurprising that shipping estimates have quickly slipped from 2 weeks to 4 weeks to 6 weeks around the world. The delay means customers who have yet to place an order will likely not receive their AirPods until 2017.

However, those who missed out still have a chance, as Apple said AirPods will be available for purchase at Apple Stores, authorized resellers, and select carriers next week. Apple noted stores will receive "regular AirPods shipments," and customers would be wise to call their local store ahead of time to confirm stock.

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. Likewise, audio automatically plays as soon as you put them in your ears and pauses when you take them out.


AirPods, driven by Apple's custom W1 chip for one-tap setup, 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 accompanying charging case holds multiple additional charges for more than 24 hours of listening time.

AirPods use optical sensors and a motion accelerometer to detect when they are in your ears. Doubling tapping an earpiece invokes Siri, which can be used to adjust the volume, change the song, make a call, or get directions. An accelerometer works with beamforming microphones to filter out background noise.

Related Roundup: AirPods 4
Tag: Apple Store
Buyer's Guide: AirPods (Buy Now)
Related Forum: AirPods
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iPhone 7 Tops Google's 2016 'Year in Search' Tech List, Loses to Pokémon Go in Overall Searches

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Google has listed its annual "Year in Search" results, highlighting the most popular searches performed by people throughout 2016. As is usually the case, Apple-related search inquiries topped a few of the charts over the last twelve months, with Apple winning four total spots in the Consumer Tech category: the iPhone 7 topped the list ahead of the Freedom 251, iPhone SE, iPhone 6s, Google Pixel, Samsung Galaxy S7, iPhone 7 Plus, Galaxy Note7, Nintendo Switch, and Samsung J7.

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Last December, the iPhone 6s ranked #1 in the same category, with the Apple Watch coming in at a high point at #3. Apple's wearable was nowhere to be seen in the top Google tech searches in 2016, despite Apple launching the new Series 1 and Series 2 versions of the device.

In the Overall searches category, Pokémon Go came in first place in 2016 thanks to the height of its popularity and player base earlier in the summer, and the game's continued updates and additions throughout the fall. iPhone 7 ranked second behind Pokémon Go, and was the only Apple-related item to be listed in the section this year. Other popular search terms in 2016 were for Deadpool, the Olympics, Slither.io, Prince, David Bowie, and more.


Check out the rest of Google's Year in Search rankings here to discover the most popularly searched movies, news, tv shows, musicians, and more this past year.

Tag: Google
Related Forum: iPhone
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