MacRumors

Increased consumer interest in NFC mobile payments related to Apple's recent launch of its Apple Pay mobile payment service appears to be having benefits for other services as well, reports Ars Technica. A major beneficiary of this new consumer awareness of mobile transactions is Google Wallet, which reportedly has seen a marked increase in usage over the past few months.

NFC-based mobile payments have had a boost in recent months, possibly thanks to the launch of Apple Pay, which was announced in September. Now, a person with knowledge of the matter tells Ars that Google Wallet, which launched back in 2011 and saw tepid success in the ensuing three years, has had considerable growth in the last couple of months. According to our source, weekly transactions have increased by 50 percent, and in the recent couple of months, new users have nearly doubled compared to the previous month.

Apple launched its mobile payment service in October with the support of major retailers and credit card companies. The service logged over 1 million card activations in the first three days of usage with overall positive reviews.

The Apple Pay launch was not without controversy with both CVS and Rite Aid suspending their mobile payments shortly after the service made its official debut, moves that affected not only Apple Pay but all NFC-based payment services including Google Wallet.

The two pharmacy chains, along with a number of other major retailers, are developing a competing service, CurrentC, which as currently implemented uses QR codes and an app to process transactions. The shutting down of NFC at these retailers has even resulted in an alliance between Android and iOS users on Reddit to boycott retailers involved in the CurrentC effort.

French Apple website iGen.fr is reporting [Google Translate] that pricing for the stainless steel Apple Watch may start at $500, while the gold Apple Watches' pricing could start between $4,000 and $5,000. iGen.fr has been reliable in the past, most recently reporting the dimensions of both the iPhone 6 and 6 Plus.

While Apple had announced that the Apple Watch would start at $350, which was widely assumed to be the price of the aluminum model, and estimates pegged the price of the gold Apple Watch at prices as low as $1,000 or as high as $5,000, there has been little information regarding the pricing of the stainless steel option.

The site's sources also indicate that Apple still aims to release the Apple Watch by Valentine's Day 2015, which somewhat echoes an earlier report that said the company would be "lucky" to release the device by that timeframe. iGen.fr also mentions that manufacturers and resellers are preparing as if the Watch would release in mid-February 2015. Previously, Apple Senior Vice President of Retail and Online Stores Angela Ahrendts said the Watch would release in Spring 2015.

Following yesterday's news that Christian Bale had opted to pull out of Sony's upcoming Steve Jobs biopic penned by Aaron Sorkin, Variety has shared news that Michael Fassbender is now in talks to take on the role of Steve Jobs.

According to the site, Fassbender is in "early talks" with director Danny Boyle and Sony executives about possibly starring in the film. Fassbender, while less well known than Christian Bale and previous Jobs candidate Leonardo DiCaprio, has been in several high profile movies including Inglourious Basterds, Prometheus, 12 Years a Slave, and The Counselor. He's perhaps most widely known for his role as Magneto in X-Men: First Class and X-Men: Days of Future Past.

Aaron Sorkin's upcoming Steve Jobs biopic focuses on three continuous 30-minute scenes that depict three of Jobs' product launches including the debut of the Mac, the introduction of the NeXT Computer, and the release of the iPod.

While it is unclear who will take on the role of Steve Jobs, Seth Rogen is reportedly in talks to play Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak. Jessica Chastain, from The Help, is also being considered for an unspecified role in the film.

Law firm Schubert Jonckheer & Kolbe, specializing in class action lawsuits, has announced that it has launched an antitrust investigation into CVS and Rite Aid over their decision to stop accepting Apple Pay in their retail stores.

The firm says that it is looking into a potential class action lawsuit that would aim to restore Apple Pay at CVS and Rite Aid stores, and it is currently asking to speak with consumers who may have been affected by the stores' decision to stop offering the payment method.

In light of this situation, Schubert Jonckheer & Kolbe is investigating whether CVS and Rite Aid violated the antitrust laws by banding together with other MCX members in a decision to boycott other payments systems, including Apple Pay. Consumers with phones that support Apple Pay may be able to participate in a class action to restore the service at CVS and Rite Aid retail stores.

Both Rite Aid and CVS stopped accepting Apple Pay just over a week ago, disabling the NFC capabilities of their payment terminals to prevent it from being used. Rite Aid and CVS are both members of the Merchant Customer Exchange or MCX, a consortium of retailers developing their own barcode-based payment system called CurrentC.

MCX has confirmed that all of its retail members, including CVS and Rite Aid, are subject to exclusivity agreements that prevent them from accepting alternate forms of payment, but all MCX members are free to leave the group at any time. Merchants may be reluctant to do so, however, as many have likely invested significant resources into the creation of CurrentC.

MCX executives have said that the exclusivity agreements are "closer to months than years" and have been put in place to offer "breathing room" for the development of CurrentC. The Apple Pay competitor is currently being tested in a limited number of markets, with a release planned for next year.

The Unicode Consortium has released a technical report (via Emojipedia) detailing a new method for handling the representation of multi-ethnic groups in emoji. Previous guidelines have stated that emoji people be "as neutral as possible regarding race, ethnicity, and gender". Unless the emoji calls out specific gender or racial cues, then a "generic (inhuman) appearance, such as a yellow/orange color or a silhouette" should be used in its place.

A forthcoming update, Unicode 8.0, plans to change all of that. It proposes to introduce a skin-tone modifier which could be added to certain emoji, allowing users to send any emotion using any skin tone. Plans even reach as far as to allow emoji couples to feature individually different skin tones. Planned for release in the middle of next year, Unicode 8.0's skin tone and racial diversity proposals are only proposed drafts at the current stage.

"Tim forwarded your email to me. We agree with you. Our emoji characters are based on the Unicode standard, which is necessary for them to be displayed properly across many platforms. There needs to be more diversity in the emoji character set, and we have been working closely with the Unicode Consortium in an effort to update the standard."

The most recent major change to emoji on Apple platforms was for iOS 6, when the company expanded native support beyond Japan and made the feature accessible to all users without the use of a third-party app.

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.

Microsoft and Dropbox today announced a partnership that will bring Dropbox support to Microsoft's suite of Office mobile apps. Microsoft will add this new Dropbox feature in upcoming versions of Word, Excel and PowerPoint for the iPhone and iPad.

The new Dropbox integration would allow Office users to open, edit and share files that are stored in Dropbox. After adding a Dropbox account to an Office app, users will be able browse their Dropbox contents, which appear alongside OneDrive and locally stored files. All mobile edits will be synced to Dropbox automatically with a sharing option available within the Office app.

Over the coming weeks, we’re updating Office apps so that they work with Dropbox, too. With the next updates to Word, Excel and PowerPoint on iPhone, iPad and Android Phone you’ll be able to connect to your Dropbox account, so you can access, edit and share your Dropbox files right from your Office apps. Once you’ve added your Dropbox account to Word, Excel or PowerPoint, you can navigate folders and files on Dropbox for viewing and editing in the native Office apps. And accessing Word, PowerPoint and Excel from your Dropbox app is just as easy. Navigate to the file you want, and the Dropbox app will open the Office app you need.

This collaborative effort is only in the beginning stages, with plans to expand Dropbox integration to other Microsoft products over time. After updating its mobile apps in the coming weeks, Microsoft is planning to add Dropbox support to its Office online web apps early next year.

A number of iPhone 6 and 6 Plus owners have been reporting an issue with the device that causes it to crash and remain stuck in a boot loop following a restart. The issue appears to primarily affect 128 GB models, particularly those with larger app libraries, and some suggest it may be a hardware problem associated with the increased storage available on that device.

While the exact cause of the issues has not been determined, speculation by industry contacts speaking to BusinessKorea (via G for Games) suggests the problem may lie in the controller for the TLC (triple-level cell) NAND flash included in the device. This issue reportedly is new to the iPhone as Apple previously has typically used MLC (multi-level cell) NAND flash in its iPhone units. The only recourse for owners experiencing this boot loop is to bring their phone back to Apple and request a replacement.

Some in the industry point out that considering that technical defects mainly occur in the 128GB version of the iPhone 6 Plus, there might be a problem in the controller IC of triple-level cell (TLC) NAND flash. [...]

As numerous reports of low read performance of the Samsung SSD 840 and 840 EVO using TLC NAND flash have surfaced on the Internet, a problem in the controller IC is considered to be the more likely cause of the defects.

The report says Apple could be facing a "huge potential recall" to address the issue, but the claim is purely speculative given that the prevalence of the problem has not been established and an exact cause remains undetermined.

While Apple's iPhone 6 and 6 Plus have generally been praised since their release in September, the devices have experienced a few issues related primarily to software. In a problematic release, Apple's iOS 8.0.1 update disabled cellular service and Touch ID on the new iPhone models. Other reports pointed to a Bluetooth problem with owners claiming to have difficulty connecting to Bluetooth-enabled car stereo systems after purchasing a new iPhone model or updating their existing phone to iOS 8, an issue that appears to have been largely addressed with iOS 8.1.

Following yesterday's report that Apple was preparing to hold a new bond sale that includes a component denominated in euros, the company today filed a prospectus with the Securities and Exchange Commission outlining its general plans, which include two chunks of debt with staggered maturities. The Wall Street Journal has more details on the prospectus and how its yields will be the lowest ever for 8-year and 12-year debt:

The iPhone maker is seeking to raise at least €1 billion ($1.2 billion) from two chunks of euro debt maturing in eight and 12 years.

Those would beat the lowest yields ever paid for euro-denominated, corporate bonds of these maturities, according to Dealogic data, reflecting solid confidence that the bonds represent a safe bet. Bankers managing the bond sale suggested the eight-year notes will give investors a yield of roughly 1.1% and the 12-year notes around 1.7%.

Apple spoke with investors on Monday about issuing bonds and will use the proceeds of the sale for general corporate purposes, including share buybacks and dividend payments.

This would mark first time that Apple would begin issuing bonds in euros, with Deutsche Bank and Goldman Sachs arranging the sale. This past April, Apple held a $12 billion bond sale, which followed a record $17 billion sale last year. Apple's bond offerings are a part of its expanded capital return program, which primarily involves a major stock buyback program and a quarterly dividend that aims to return more than $130 billion to shareholders by the end of 2015.

Update: The Wall Street Journal has revised its article to note Apple is actually looking to raise €2.8 billion ($3.5 billion) in the bond sale.

Following this afternoon's release of the first OS X Yosemite 10.10.1 beta, Apple has seeded the first iOS 8.1.1 beta to developers. The iOS 8.1.1 beta comes two weeks after the release of iOS 8.1, which included support for Apple Pay, SMS Forwarding, and more.

The beta, build 12B432, is available through the iOS Developer Center. Apple has also released a new Apple TV beta.

According to Apple's release notes, iOS 8.1.1 includes bug fixes and increased stability and performance improvements for both the iPad 2 and the iPhone 4s, two of the older devices that support the operating system.

As a minor update , iOS 8.1.1 includes fixes for several bugs, but major new features rumored for iOS 8, like improvements to Maps and split-screen multitasking for the iPad, will be reserved for major iOS 8 updates that are also in development.

Apple acquired Seattle-based cloud networking startup Union Bay Networks sometime in the last couple of months and has opened an office in the city that houses more than 30 engineers, reports GeekWire. The site uncovered Apple's acquisition and Seattle office after former Union Bay Networks co-founder Benn Bollay posted a job opening for a Systems Software Engineer that read "Ever wanted to work at Apple, but didn't want to live in Cupertino?"

Apple later confirmed the acquisition of Union Bay Networks to The Seattle Times, providing its standard acquisition statement: Apple "buys smaller technology companies from time to time, and we generally do not discuss our purpose or plans."

Union Bay Networks was a stealth startup focused on "enabling the next generation of networking for cloud computing and software defined datacenters," and seven out of nine former employees are said to have been hired by Apple, moving to an unknown office location.

Apple's Seattle office is already home to more than 30 employees, and the company is hiring more, posting two software engineering positions in the city last week. Both positions mention a focus on the design and development of core infrastructure services, and both mention iCloud, suggesting Seattle is being positioned as the hub for Apple's future cloud development projects.

At its Worldwide Developers Conference in June, Apple announced HomeKit, a platform designed to allow smart home devices to seamlessly integrate with iOS devices via Bluetooth and Wi-FI. As part of the certification process for Apple HomeKit, manufacturers must purchase their Bluetooth and Wi-Fi chips from Apple-approved chipmakers like Marvell, Texas Instruments and Broadcom. Those Apple-approved chips have begun shipping to smart home accessory makers, according to Forbes.

These chipmakers have begun shipping their chips loaded with HomeKit firmware to device manufacturers, Broadcom and Texas Instruments have confirmed to me. That means we could begin seeing HomeKit-certified devices show up on store shelves sometime soon. Although Apple hasn’t officially launched HomeKit yet, device makers can at least start putting together their gadgets now that they have the wireless chip armed with the HomeKit firmware.

Brian Bedrosian, Broadcom's senior director of embedded wireless, tells Forbes that smart home device makers are "getting ready" and that users should "expect to see new product launches in the next cycle of product releases." Bedrosian does caution that the firmware on the chips hasn't been finalized by Apple yet, and is essentially just a beta version of HomeKit. Broadcom and other chipmakers will be able to update the firmware remotely as HomeKit's feature set continues to be developed.

According to Bedrosian, the smart home device market has been fragmented thus far, but HomeKit provides a reliable way to bridge protocols and create simple connections between various devices using iCloud.

We've already seen several products that will take advantage of HomeKit, including a smart USB charger, a line of connected home sensors from Elgato, and the August Smart Lock, but Apple's HomeKit supports a wide range of products like lightbulbs, locks, fans, thermostats, power outlets, garage doors, and more. Apple has also announced several partners already, including Philips and Honeywell, and has finalized hardware specifications, bringing us one step closer to the launch of HomeKit.

Apple has plans to hold a Made for iPhone (MFi) summit November 12 through November 14, providing accessory manufacturers and developers with information on HomeKit, iBeacon, AirPlay, and more, and with chips shipping to manufacturers, we should be seeing additional hardware products with HomeKit support surfacing in the near future.

Apple today seeded the first beta of an upcoming OS X 10.10.1 Yosemite update to developers, nearly three weeks after first releasing OS X Yosemite to the public.

The new beta, build 14B17, is available through the Software Update mechanism in the Mac App Store and through the Mac Dev Center.

While it is unclear what improvements the first update to OS X Yosemite will bring, there are several bugs in the operating system including a major Wi-Fi issue that has caused connection problems for a number of users.

Apple is asking developers to focus on Wi-Fi, Exchange accounts in Mail, and the Notification Center.

Apple may be planning to discontinue its iPad mini lineup in order to focus its efforts on the upcoming larger-screened "iPad Pro," according to a somewhat questionable rumor from Taiwan's Economic Daily News [Google Translate] (via GforGames). The site believes Apple will cease updating the 7.9-inch iPad mini next year, making the new iPad mini 3, released in October, the last tablet in the series.

A preference towards larger screen sizes, the introduction of the 5.5-inch iPhone 6 Plus, declining iPad sales, and "fierce competition" in the tablet market are said to have led to Apple's alleged decision to discontinue the tablet.

It was a bit of a surprise when Apple announced a major update to the iPad Air in October, introducing an upgraded A8X processor, Touch ID, slimmer form factor, improved camera, and more in the iPad Air 2, while the iPad mini 3 gained no new features aside from Touch ID support. Rumors have suggested that the relatively minor update was due to the iPad mini's lack of popularity compared to the 9.7-inch iPad Air.

Apple has been known to pull resources away from products that are not selling well. For example, Apple has been investing fewer resources in the iPod touch, a device that no longer receives regular updates. The fifth-generation iPod touch was released in 2012 and while the device received a major update at that time, only a few changes have been made since then, tweaking storage capacities and prices. It's possible the iPad mini could go the way of the iPod touch -- remaining in the product lineup but receiving few updates.

Economic Daily News, much like Taiwanese news site Digitimes, appears to have some solid supply chain sources, but lack of context and ever-changing production plans have resulted in some serious rumor misses. For example, the site said that the iPad mini 3 would be 30 percent slimmer when it launched, and suggested the larger iPhone 6 Plus would not be called an iPhone. Some accurate information has come from Economic Daily News, however, including several correct rumors pointing towards Apple Watch sizing and release dates.

Apple's "iPad Pro," which is said to be replacing the iPad mini as a companion to the iPad Air, is rumored to have a screen size between 12.2 and 12.9 inches. It's said to be slightly thicker than the iPad Air 2, coming in at around 7mm, and it may have stereo speakers and an ultra high-definition display. A release date for the iPad Pro remains unclear, as Apple was said to be targeting an early 2015 launch but pushed back production in order to focus on the iPhone 6 Plus.