MacRumors

As reported earlier in the week, the special edition Apple Watch Hermès collection today became available for purchase online, letting customers purchase the high-end editions from the online storefronts of both Apple and Hermès. The collection comes in ten models, all branching off of three band varieties -- the Single Tour, Double Tour, and Cuff -- and was introduced by Apple at its September iPhone event.

Each model of the Hermès collection includes a stainless steel Apple Watch case, and gives users a unique Hermès clock face for the wearable device. The pricing for the collection begins with the Single Tour band for $1,100, Double Tour for $1,250, and Cuff for $1,500. The Single Tour is the only one of the collection available in both 38mm and 42mm case sizes, with the Double Tour exclusively sold in 38mm and the Cuff only available in 42mm.

To purchase one of the Apple Watches in the Hermès collection, visit the online store of Apple or Hermès.

Japan Display today announced that it will begin the mass production of OLED panels in 2018 (via Reuters), confirming a rumor from December that the company would do so in attempts to be the supplier of OLED panels in a future iPhone model. This would put Japan Display -- a joint venture between Sony, Toshiba, and Hitachi -- in direct competition with LG Display and Samsung in the production of the rumored OLED-supported iPhone.

"We will take advantage of our advanced thin-film transistor technology in developing OLED screens," Akio Takimoto, chief of Japan Display's research center, told reporters on Friday.

Japan Display, in addition to rival Sharp, already supplies the manufacturing of LCD panels for Apple's iPhone. In 2015, estimates of an iPhone supporting OLED panels -- which would be the first non-LCD model since the original iPhone -- put it off for at least the next three years, aligning with Japan Display's plans for the mass production of OLED panels.

Recent OLED rumors suggested that Apple's new Taiwanese lab could potentially focus on adopting OLED and micro-LED technology for future iPhone models. Towards the end of last year, a report also claimed that Apple is "close" to signing a final agreement with Samsung and LG Display in regards to OLED manufacturing for the so-called "iPhone 8." According to that report, both manufacturers are planning to spend $12.8 billion combined to prepare for the production of OLED in 2018's iPhone.

Apple CEO Tim Cook traveled to Europe this week to meet with European Commission antitrust chief Margrethe Vestager in Brussels on Thursday, before heading to Rome on Friday to meet Pope Francis and Italian developers.

Cook first met with Vestager to lobby against an European tax investigation that could force the iPhone and iPad maker to pay more than $8 billion in back taxes on overseas earnings, according to Bloomberg.

Apple is accused of operating multiple subsidiaries in Ireland to avoid paying higher taxes outside the United States, where it earns just under 60% of its revenue. Apple books its taxes in Ireland using low operating costs, allowing it to pay a foreign tax rate of only 1.8%, according to the report.

If the European Commission finds wrongdoing with Apple’s corporate arrangement in Ireland, the company's $64.1 billion in profit generated from 2004 to 2012 could be subject to a higher 12.5% corporate tax rate -- just over $8 billion in back taxes.

A decision in the probe could be made by March, but may take longer due to additional information requested by European regulators. Apple continues to deny any wrongdoing, and vows to take the European Commission to court over any negative verdict.

Meanwhile, the agenda of Cook's meeting with Pope Francis remains private. The 15-minute discussion was held at 11:30 a.m. local time.

Pope Francis is known to incorporate technology into his position and takes to Twitter fairly regularly to share messages, and his old iPad was auctioned for $30,500 last year.

On Thursday, Cook tweeted about Apple's newly announced iOS development center in Italy, and said the company has created over 1.4 million jobs across Europe.

Cook met some of those iOS developers on Friday alongside Italian prime minister Matteo Renzi.

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.

It's common knowledge that Apple and Google have a monetary agreement that ensures Google's position as the default search engine on Apple's iOS devices, but the details of that deal have been kept under wraps, until now. A recent court transcript from Oracle's copyright lawsuit against Google was obtained by Bloomberg and sheds some light on the agreement, suggesting Google pays out a lot of money to keep its search bar on Apple's iPhones and iPads.

Apple receives a percentage of the revenue that Google earns from searches made on iOS devices, and in 2014, Apple's payout from Google totaled $1 billion. That information mirrors a similar rumor from 2012 that also suggested Google was paying Apple upwards of $1 billion.

The current cut Apple receives from the advertising revenue Google collects isn't known, but according to a Google witness questioned during the Oracle-Google lawsuit, the revenue share was at 34 percent "at one point in time." According to Bloomberg, it was not made clear in the transcript if 34 percent is the amount Apple received or the amount Google got to keep.

An attorney for Google objected to the information being disclosed and attempted to have the judge strike the mention of 34 percent from the record.
"That percentage just stated, that should be sealed," lawyer Robert Van Nest said, according to the transcript. "We are talking hypotheticals here. That's not a publicly known number."

Both Google and Apple attempted to have the court records blocked from public review because the information is "extremely confidential," but a judge denied the request. Google went on to ask the court to seal the transcript because the release of the information could affect its negotiations with other companies. The company's request was presumably granted, as Bloomberg says the transcript is no longer available.

Apple and Google's search contract was reportedly set to end in 2015, sparking speculation that Apple could terminate the agreement in favor of working with Microsoft or Yahoo. Yahoo and Microsoft were both interested in inking a deal with Apple to overthrow Google as the default search engine on iOS devices, but as no shift to another search engine has been made, it appears Google and Apple may have established a renewed agreement.

In a May 2015 interview, Google's chief business officer Omid Kordestani said Google wanted to continue its partnership with Apple. "We'd love to continue our partnership with them and doing our best to work with them, and that's all I can say for now," he said.

Apple has hired Doug Bowman, one of the U.S.' leading virtual reality experts, according to a new report from the Financial Times. Bowman joined Apple after going on sabbatical from his job as a computer science professor at Virginia Tech.

His experience spans both fully immersive VR, as used in Facebook’s Oculus Rift and HTC’s Vive headsets, as well as augmented reality, where transparent visors such as Microsoft’s Hololens, Google Glass and secretive start-up Magic Leap mingle digital images with the real world still visible.

Bowman has been director of Virginia Tech's Center for Human-Computer Interaction for the past five years. He's also the lead author of the book "3D User Interfaces: Theory and Practice." His past experience also includes serving as a User Experience Consultant for Walt Disney Imagineering and honors like numerous IEEE awards for 3D user interfaces and technical achievements in virtual reality. Bowman's LinkedIn page had not been updated to reflect the hiring and has since been deleted.

In the past year, Apple has acquired three companies with experience in either augmented reality or virtual reality. It acquired augmented reality startup Metaio last may, real-time motion capture firm Faceshift last September and expression analysis startup Emotient a couple weeks ago.

It's unclear what Apple could have Bowman and its acquired companies working on, but there have been persistent rumors the company has been interested in VR. Apple has filed several patents for VR products, including video goggles, motion-sensing 3D virtual interfaces for iOS and 3D "hyper reality" displays. It's also been reported that the company has a "small team" working on virtual reality projects.

Apple recently began offering the 12-inch Retina MacBook in its online store for refurbished products, marking the first time refurbished versions of the Retina MacBook have been made available for purchase.

Released in April of 2015, the Retina MacBook is Apple's thinnest, lightest Mac product, measuring in at just 13.1mm thick and weighing 2 pounds. The machine has a full edge-to-edge keyboard, a fanless design enabled by a low power Core-M chip from Intel, and a Retina Display.

While the main refurbished site does not yet have a listing for the Retina MacBook, refurbished models are available on a dedicated MacBook page. All of the refurbished machines are available at a 15 percent discount.

Apple has four refurbished Retina MacBook models for sale at the current time, including two entry-level 1.1GHz models for $1,099, a $200 discount, and two higher end models. The 1.2GHz/8GB/512GB Retina MacBook in Silver is available for $1,359, a $240 discount, while an upgraded 1.3GHz/8GB/512GB machine in Silver is available for $1,489, $260 off the regular price of $1,749.

For many months after its launch, Retina MacBook supplies were constrained. Shipping estimates were upwards of a month for most models, and most Apple retail stores received very little stock. Personal Pickup for the MacBook wasn't available until August, four months after it was released. Refurbished editions of newly released Macs often show up in the refurbished store after a few months, but the supply issues may explain why refurbished MacBook models haven't previously been available.

Apple's refurbished inventory fluctuates on a regular basis based on available supply, so models that are available today may not be available tomorrow. All of Apple's refurbished products are tested, certified, and come with a one-year warranty.

(Thanks, Matt!)

Apple today shared a new Apple TV ad on its YouTube channel, highlighting the many apps and games that are available on the device through the dedicated tvOS App Store. Entitled "The Future of TV is Apps," the ad features an Apple TV set-top box that morphs to match the theme of each app that's shown off in the spot.

Netflix, Apple Music, WatchESPN, Asphalt 8: Airborne, Disney Infinity, Gilt, GrubHub, Showtime, Crossy Road, HBO Now, and Fox Now, are among the apps that are featured. The ad ends with the brightly colored television test bars that have been used in all fourth-generation Apple TV advertisements.

Since the Apple TV 4 launched in October, Apple has been promoting it through a series of television ads, colorful billboards displayed across a number of cities, web ads, and social media campaigns. Today's ad is the second in the company's app-focused series.

As the argument over smartphone encryption continues on between device manufacturers like Apple, devoted to strong encryption, and U.S. federal government officials pushing for backdoors to access data, several states have gotten involved in the fray.

New York State Assemblymember Matthew Titone introduced a bill last summer that would require smartphone manufacturers to create devices that can be decrypted or unlocked or face fines, and now California State Assemblymember Jim Cooper is following in his footsteps.

Cooper on Wednesday introduced a bill that would require any smartphone manufactured after January 1, 2017 and sold in California to "be capable of being decrypted and unlocked by its manufacturer or its operating system provider." Violations carry a $2,500 fee per phone.

Should such a bill pass, it would, like the New York bill, affect both Apple and Google. iOS and Android have default encryption settings that do not allow the companies to access locked customer phones. Starting with iOS 8, Apple ceased storing encryption keys for iOS devices, making it impossible for the company to unlock content on passcode-protected devices under police request.

In a conversation with Ars Technica, Cooper argued that giving local law enforcement officials the tools to access unencrypted smartphones using warrants to fight crimes like human trafficking was not the same as giving the NSA or CIA unfettered access.

"If you're a bad guy [we] can get a search record for your bank, for your house, you can get a search warrant for just about anything," Cooper told Ars in a brief phone call on Wednesday afternoon. "For the industry to say it's privacy, it really doesn't hold any water. We're going after human traffickers and people who are doing bad and evil things. Human trafficking trumps privacy, no ifs, ands, or buts about it."

In a meeting with White House officials last week, Apple CEO Tim Cook urged the Obama administration to issue a strong public statement defending unbreakable encryption and to adopt a "no backdoors" policy.

In all of his recent interviews, Cook has spoken passionately about Apple's commitment to user privacy and its strong stance on encryption. "There have been people that suggest that we should have a backdoor," Cook told Charlie Rose in December. "But the reality is if you put a back door in, that back door's for everybody, for good guys and bad guys."

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.

Apple is offering 50 percent off a range of productivity apps as part of a "Get Productive" iOS App Store promotion that's taking place this week. Each app is available at a 50 percent discount from its regular App Store pricing. Many well-known apps like Clear, Things, Drafts 4, and Deliveries are included in the promotion.

Available apps cover a wide range of productivity tasks, from note-taking and editing PDFs to creating to-dos, making scans, converting currency, and more. A full list of apps and their pricing with the discount is below:

- PDF Expert 5, a PDF editing tool - $4.99
- Duet Display, for using an iPad or iPhone as a second monitor - $7.99
- Things, a popular and powerful to-do app - $4.99
- PCalc, a calculator app - $4.99
- Clear, a list making app - $1.99
- Drafts 4, a quick note-taking app - $4.99
- Prizmo, a scanning app - $4.99
- Moleskine Timepage, a calendar app - $1.99
- Genius Scan+, a scanning app - $2.99
- Due, a reminders/timers app - $2.99
- Deliveries, a package tracking app - $1.99
- Carbo, an app for making handwritten notes - $3.99
- Numerics, an app for visualizing numbers in charts and widgets - $4.99
- Amount Plus, a unit and currency converter - $0.99

Some of these apps have Mac counterparts that are also being offered at a 50 percent discount, including PCalc, Things, Clear, and Prizmo.

Apple's App Store promo sales often last from Thursday to Thursday, so these discounts should be available for the next six days.

In a separate sale, password management app 1Password for Mac is available from the Mac App Store at a 50 percent off discount, dropping the price to $24.99. This is the lowest price AgileBits has offered for several months, and at $24.99, 1Password is well worth picking up. The iOS app is a free download.

A number of tech blogs have shared a video from Chinese website M.I.C. Gadget that claims to provide the first real look at Apple's next-generation 4-inch iPhone, but there are some clues to suggest the mystery smartphone may simply be a regular 4.7-inch iPhone 6 or iPhone 6s.

First and foremost, the distance between the speaker grille, pentalobe screws, Lightning connector, headphone jack and microphones appears to be the same as the iPhone 6s. If this were truly the so-called "iPhone 6c," those components would need to be closer together on the bottom of the smartphone.

The display width also appears to resemble an iPhone 6s compared to the size of the home button, but exact measurements are hard to determine without an object for scale. The lack of a 4.7-inch iPhone 6s and 5.5-inch iPhone 6s Plus for comparison also makes the video more questionable.

M.I.C. Gadget has accurately leaked some iPhone, iPad and iPod touch components in the past, so there remains a slim possibility this video truly depicts a new 4-inch iPhone. The website has also aggregated a number of false leaks and rumors, however, so the authenticity of this video remains in doubt.

The much-rumored "iPhone 6c" may feature a 64-bit Apple A8 chip, 1GB of RAM, 16GB and 64GB storage sizes, 8-megapixel rear-facing iSight camera, improved FaceTime HD camera with ƒ/2.2 aperture, Apple Pay, Touch ID, VoLTE calling and more. The smartphone could launch by the end of March for around $500.