MacRumors

As noted by Re/code, YouTube today updated its app for the Apple TV, improving its appearance and expanding the content available to stream. With this update, the Apple TV version catches up to the Xbox, PlayStation and other similar streaming devices.

Besides a refreshed design, the new YouTube Apple TV update adds features such as personalized recommendations, channel subscriptions and predictive search. It also now supports all YouTube content, including music videos, vlogs and even advertisements.

Apple today added four new channels to its Apple TV set-top box, further expanding the variety of content available on the device. The new additions include ultimate fighting channel UFC.TV, digital video shorts channel The Scene, news and pop culture channel Fusion, and video sharing site Dailymotion.

UFC.TV offers access to a variety of Ultimate Fighting Championship content, including free and paid video. Users can subscribe to the service's Fight Pass premium offering with a 6-month membership priced at $54.99 or a 12-month membership at $99.99. Users can also access archived pay-per-view content, although some pay-per-view content is unavailable in many countries due to regional restrictions.

The Scene offers digital shorts from a variety of Condé Nast media brands and third-party partners, including ABC News, Epicurious, Forbes, GQ, PBS, The New Yorker, The Weather Channel, Vogue, and more. All content is available free of charge.

Fusion is a joint venture between Disney-ABC and Univision, offering a variety of content including news, pop culture, and lifestyle. Finally, Dailymotion offers access to the popular site's library of videos from premium brands and regular users alike.

All four channels are available now, with Apple calling out each of the new channels with a "New" flag on the main screen icons. Country restrictions may, however, limit where some of these new channels can be seen.

Some of the last known video of Steve Jobs, from the deposition tape that was played in court last Friday, may be made public as a group of lawyers representing CNN, Bloomberg, and the Associated Press filed a motion earlier this week to have it released (via CNET).

Up until now, both Apple and the plaintiffs in the case have asked the court to consider the video "regular testimony," which would prevent it from being shown outside the court walls. Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers has not yet sealed the evidence, however, leaving open the possibility of the video being made publicly available. Representing all three media outlets, attorney Thomas Burke cited public interest as a major argument for releasing the video.

"Given the substantial public interest in the rare posthumous appearance of Steve Jobs in this trial, there simply is no interest that justifies restricting the public's access to his video deposition," attorney Thomas Burke wrote in the filing Monday.

Burke sent an official email request to broadcast the video on Sunday, to which Apple's lead attorney, Bill Isaacson replied, "Apple does not consent to your request. We are preparing a substantive response to your points and will get that to you tonight hopefully."

Jobs' deposition video is acting as evidence in the ongoing lawsuit dating back to 2005 that sees Apple facing accusations of attempting to enforce a monopoly over the iPod and iTunes by shutting out competing services.

In the video, Jobs echoed much of the same sentiment Apple has expressed in the case so far, stating that "We had pretty much black and white contracts with the labels," and that preventing the iPod from playing music from competing music services was "collateral damage."

Apple has yet to comment on the attempt to make the video public since Isaacson's initial response. According to the plaintiff's lawyers in the iPod case, whether or not the deposition video is released to the public is entirely up to Apple.

Apple announced on Tuesday that it will be opening a new research and development center in Japan, reports The Wall Street Journal. The announcement followed a statement by Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, who revealed earlier today that Apple was eyeing Japan for its research expansion.

Abe relayed the information about Apple while campaigning in Tokyo, stating that Apple planned to "conduct the most advanced research and development in Japan." Abe went on to describe the facility as being "among the largest in Asia." Apple confirmed these R&D plans in a statement released to the media.

"We’re excited to expand our operations in Japan with a new technical development center in Yokohama which will create dozens of new jobs," Apple said in a statement.

Apple did not reveal on how it will use the future Yokohama site or how much it is investing in the facility. The operation will join other research and development centers Apple operates in China, Taiwan, Israel and other overseas locations. The company reportedly also is opening a new research center in Cambridge, England within the coming weeks.

Update 12/10/14: Though Apple has not disclosed the focus of its Japan-based research and development center, Nikkei reports that it will "center around health." The building is located in an economic zone designated as a hub for life sciences and environmental technology, and Apple is sponsoring research on blood pressure and blood sugar conducted in Yokohama.

In March 2013, Apple introduced two-factor authentication to provide additional security for Apple IDs. It expanded the feature to several new countries earlier this year and introduced it to the company's iCloud.com website this September. This was after CEO Tim Cook promised to broaden use of its two-factor authentication system in the wake of a hacking incident that saw several celebrities' iCloud accounts hacked.

The system requires a user to have a second "trusted" device that is used to verify a user's identity in addition to an extra security code called the "Recovery Key". However, in a new account from The Next Web's Owen Williams, that Recovery Key also has the potential to completely lock a person out of their account if they're being hacked.

Williams found that someone had tried to hack his iCloud account. Apple's two-factor system kicked in and locked the account, denying entry to the would-be hacker while also denying entry to Williams. When he went to iForgot, Apple's account recovery service, he assumed two of his password, Recovery Key or trusted device would unlock his account, as he was led to believe by an Apple Support document.

When I headed to the account recovery service, dubbed iForgot, I discovered that there was no way back in without my recovery key. That’s when it hit me; I had no idea where my recovery key was or if I’d ever even put the piece of paper in a safe place. I’ve moved since I set up two-factor on iCloud.

Williams contends he took a screenshot of the Recovery Key and printed that out as well as taking a photo on his iPhone to keep as a backup, but could not locate either and was on the verge of losing his "digital life". He called Apple customer support and was told  that he had forfeited his Apple ID by losing his Recovery Key and that there was no way Apple could help him. He called back a second time.

When she got back on the line, the story was just as bleak. “We take your security very seriously at Apple” she told me “but at this time we cannot grant you access back into your Apple account. We recommend you create a new Apple ID.”

After a couple more days of talking to Apple customer support and even friends who worked at Apple, he continued to receive same responses: he was locked out of his account due to someone trying to hack into it and couldn't unlock it without a Recovery Key even though Apple's support document says it's possible with a trusted device. Eventually, Williams located his Recovery Key in what he calls the "depths" of his Time Machine backup, allowing him to finally unlock his account.

Williams concludes with a warning that anyone with two-factor authentication should take far greater care in protecting and remembering where they store their Recovery Keys, as losing it could permanently lock a user out of their Apple ID with Apple unable to do anything to help. The entire account, which is a fascinating and worthwhile read, can be read at The Next Web.

Just a couple weeks after it was revealed that Natalie Portman was in talks to play an unspecified part in Aaron Sorkin's Steve Jobs movie, Variety is reporting that the actress has decided to pass on the movie, though it's unclear why.

Other actresses are already meeting with filmmakers over the potential role, and the film is still on track to begin filming in the Spring of 2015. The film is rumored to have several female parts, including Steve Jobs' daughter, Lisa Brennan, and Katie Cotton, Apple's well-known former PR lead.

The movie has seen its share of ups and downs thus far, with both Leonardo DiCaprio and Christian Bale passing on the role of Steve Jobs before Sony Pictures dropped the movie due to a disagreement on the filming schedule with director Danny Boyle. According to Fusion, internal data from Sony Pictures, leaked via a data dump by hackers who infiltrated Sony Pictures' systems, reveals the studio's revenue forecasts for the film dropped 25% after DiCaprio dropped out, indicating the studio wasn't as confident in the movie's financial success as it used to be. However, the movie was quickly picked up by Universal Pictures.

The film, based on Walter Isaacson's Steve Jobs biography, will consist of three 30-minute scenes depicting three of Apple's product launches.

Back in October, Apple removed all Bose audio products, both demo and sellable, from its retail stores around the world, but it appears the company may be planning to reintroduce Bose products to store shelves in the near future.

According to a source that spoke to French Apple website iGen.fr [Google Translate], some Apple retail stores have begun receiving shipments of Bose products with orders to put the products back on store shelves next week.

It was not clear why Apple removed Bose products from its retail stores, but the decision did follow Apple's acquisition of Beats Electronics and a July patent infringement lawsuit that Bose filed against Beats. In the lawsuit, Bose accused Beats Electronics of infringing on several patents related to noise cancellation and other audio technologies with its Beats Studio and Studio Wireless headphones.

Shortly before Bose products were removed from Apple Stores, Beats and Bose agreed to settle the dispute between them, so it's possible that a planned removal and reinstatement of Bose products may be related to now-settled disagreement between the two companies. The move to remove Bose products from stores may have been initiated ahead of the settlement, with the products now able to return due to the end of the feud.

While a return of Bose products to the Apple Store following the end of the lawsuit makes some sense, it remains unclear whether iGen.fr's information is accurate. Beats and Bose still offer competing products, and recently, Bose teamed up with the NFL to ban NFL players from wearing Beats headphones during games. Rather than taking offense at the move, however, Beats co-founder Jimmy Iovine was pleased with the attention the ban garnered Beats, saying "I can't believe I'm this lucky" and that it made Beats "look like superheroes."

Bose products are not the only products that Apple has removed from its store shelves in recent months. The company also pulled Fitbit fitness accessories from its retail and online stores in November, without explanation.

Update 12/9: 9to5Mac has acquired internal store information that confirms Bose products such as the SoundLink III Bluetooth Speaker will be returning to store shelves shortly.

TIME today posted its shortlist of people who are being considered for the publication's annual "Person of the Year" award, and Tim Cook is once again on the nomination list. TIME is recognizing Cook for the launch of the iPhone 6 and 6 Plus and his recent decision to come out as gay.

Back in late October, Tim Cook made the bold move of announcing his sexual orientation in a letter written for Bloomberg Businessweek, where he said that his decision was done to "bring comfort to anyone who feels alone" and to "inspire people to insist on their equality."

Alongside Tim Cook, other nominees include the Ferguson protestors, the Ebola caregivers, Russian president Vladimir Putin, pop artist Taylor Swift, Alibaba CEO Jack Ma, acting president of the Iraqi Kurdish Region Masoud Barzani, and National Football League commissioner Roger Goodell.

Tim Cook, who introduced Apple's iPhone 6 and 6 Plus, Apple Watch, and Apple Pay this year, and whose decision to come out made him the first openly gay Fortune 500 CEO.

TIME's Person of the Year award is given to "a person, couple, group, idea, place, or machine" that has "for better or for worse done the most to influence the events of the year," with the publication's editorial team ultimately deciding on a winner.

Tim Cook was previously nominated in 2012 alongside Yahoo CEO Marissa Meyer, Bill and Hilary Clinton, and the three scientists who discovered the Higgs Boson, but the award went to U.S. president Barack Obama. In 2013, the Person of the Year award went to Pope Francis, and in 2010, it went to Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg, the only tech company CEO to receive the award since Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos won in 1999.

Update December 10: TIME has named the "Ebola Fighters" as its Person of the Year for 2014.

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.

Panic's file management app Transmit made its way to iOS with the launch of iOS 8, bringing several useful capabilities that took advantage of iOS features, including "Extensibility" options that let any app upload files to a server using Transmit and a "Send" feature that let files be shared to multiple services like Dropbox and iCloud Drive.

As of last week, the function that let files be sent to Dropbox or iCloud Drive was removed from Transmit, at the request of Apple. As Panic explains in a blog post, Apple has asked the company to remove the "Send" feature from Transmit because Apple's rules state that apps cannot upload content to iCloud Drive unless content was created in the app itself.

In short, we're told that while Transmit iOS can download content from iCloud Drive, we cannot upload content to iCloud Drive unless the content was created in the app itself. Apple says this use would violate 2.23 -- "Apps must follow the iOS Data Storage Guidelines or they will be rejected" -- but oddly that page says nothing about iCloud Drive or appropriate uses for iCloud Drive.

Though Panic is only barred from uploading files to iCloud Drive, the company says that it was forced to remove the "Send" feature entirely because the Share Sheet used to send documents to other services automatically lists iCloud, and it can't be altered.

Panic is hoping that its blog post will attract the attention of Apple employees who may be able to fix the frustrating position Apple has put the company in, either through making the Share Sheet alterable or by simply allowing Transmit to upload to iCloud Drive.

iOS 8 brought quite a few changes to iOS, including Notification Center widgets, third-party keyboards, and deep integration between apps in the form of extensions. Apple has had difficulty sorting out how it wants various features in iOS 8 to be used, however, and the company's indecision and its unclear documentation has led to several instances where developers were asked to remove key functions from their apps.

Useful Notification Center widget Launcher was pulled from the App Store in September, and more recently, Apple has asked apps like Neato and Drafts to remove widget functionality that violates the company's guidelines. There is some hope for Transmit, however, as Apple has reversed course on one notable removal request. In late October, Apple asked calculator app PCalc to remove the calculator functionality from its Notification Center widget, a decision that was later reversed after the issue received significant attention.

Transmit can be downloaded from the App Store for $9.99. [Direct Link]

China's minister of the Cyberspace Administration recently sat down with Tim Cook for a meeting that included discussion about the Apple Watch and Chinese security concerns, reports China.com.cn (via Bloomberg Businessweek). Lu's visit to the U.S. also included meetings with Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg and Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos.

Cook was photographed showing off his wrist watch to Internet Information Officer Lu Wei, who is holding the device in his hand. Though the device is not identified in the source photo, it certainly appears to be the Apple Watch with white Sport Band frequently worn by Cook, and a translation of the original report quotes Cook as telling Lu he is the first outsider to see the watch.

The comment is not strictly true as executives have shown the watch to others on occasion since its unveiling and it has been featured in Vogue China and at Parisian fashion boutique Colette, but Lu may be one of the first government officials to handle the device.

Apple may face some regulatory hurdles with Apple Watch in China, as Lu reportedly reiterated to Cook that China is willing to open its markets to new products and technology, but the devices must face scrutiny before they are released. Each device must pass an official network security assessment that ensures national security is not being compromised, and the user's information is being accessed properly.

Apple may be willing to subject its watch to Chinese government oversight to a certain degree, as China already is a hotbed for smartwatches with more than half of existing devices coming from Chinese companies. Most of these smartwatches are low quality, off-brand products available in the largely unregulated Chinese marketplace.

In the latest phase of its Priceless Surprises promotion that rewards cardholders for simply using their credit and debit cards, MasterCard is partnering with Gwen Stefani to offer private performances, unique experiences, and other surprises for customers. The campaign comes with a new ad featuring Apple Pay and Stefani's new single, "Spark the Fire."

To kick things off, MasterCard will debut a new 30 second TV spot today featuring Stefani who, with the help of a “Surprise launcher,” sends Priceless Surprises to cardholders paying with their MasterCard with Apple Pay. The spot features Stefani’s new song, Spark The Fire.

Surprises include everything from handbags and golf experiences to concert tickets, and even a chance to hang out with Gwen Stefani herself. The spot, directed by Sophie Muller of Wondros, exemplifies what the MasterCard platform is about: surprising cardholders with unbelievable prizes while also inspiring them to give, and share their own Priceless Surprises whether they’re paying with traditional credit, debit or prepaid cards or using innovative new payment options like Apple Pay.

MasterCard previously featured Apple Pay and its Priceless Surprises program alongside the World Series in October, encouraging Apple Pay users to take advantage of the opportunity to win rewards such as tickets to World Series games and meet-and-greets with baseball stars.

Credit card issuers have also proven to be firmly behind Apple Pay due in large part to increased security. Last month, Chase launched its own ad campaign featuring Fun front man Jack Antonoff's side project Bleachers using Apple Pay around Los Angeles while preparing for a rooftop concert.

Apple is continuing to expand its digital audio expertise with the recent addition of digital signal processing (DSP) expert Dana Massie to its team as an SoC Audio Architect. Massie has over 30 years of extensive experience working with DSP hardware and software architecture with high-profile companies such as Audience and Waves, as well as prior brief stints at Apple and NeXT.

While at Audience for the past nine years, Massie was the Director of DSP chip architecture, focused on developing "the most advanced audio processing algorithms available for speech enhancement." Massie also formerly worked at Apple starting in 2002 as the manager of audio hardware. In his year-long stint, Massie was responsible for the audio input/output system on Apple desktops and notebooks.

Apple and Audience have a history of working together, with Apple licensing Audience's voice processing technology to use in its iPhone 4 and 4s. The Cupertino company used a standalone voice processing chip from Audience in the iPhone 4 and opted to incorporate this signal processing functionality directly into the A5 chip used in the iPhone 4s. Audience's earSmart noise cancellation technology was a key component powering Siri in the iPhone 4s.

Massie joined Apple this month as an SoC Audio Architect following a six-week sabbatical upon leaving Audience. It's unclear what his exact duties at Apple will involve, as Massie not surprisingly only says he will work on "audio stuff" in his LinkedIn profile. Given his work history, Massie may be tasked with improving either voice recognition technology or audio quality in upcoming Apple hardware.

Massie joins other audio pioneers employed by Apple in recent years. The growing list includes Audio expert Peter Eastty of Oxford Digital Limited who was hired earlier this year and THX pioneer Tomlinson Holman who joined Apple in 2011.

(Thanks, Manu!)

Apple today released the 2014 version of its iTunes Store awards, which highlights the best music, movies, TV shows, apps, books and podcasts of the year.

Here are some of the top-level winners for 2014:

Apps:
iPhone App of the Year: Elevate - Brain Training
iPhone Game of the Year: Threes!
iPad App of the Year: Pixelmator
iPad Game of the Year: Monument Valley

Music:
Best Artist: Beyoncé
Best Album: 1989 by Taylor Swift
Best Song: Fancy (feat. Charli XCX) by Iggy Azalea
Best New Artist: Sam Smith

Movies:
Best Blockbuster: Guardians of the Galaxy
Best Family Movie: The LEGO Movie
Best Director: Richard Linklater
Best Discovery: Obvious Child

TV Shows:
TV Show of the Year: Fargo
Best Performances: True Detective, Season 1
Best Discovery: The Honorable Woman
Best Breakthrough: Key & Peele, Volume 4

Books:
Best Fiction: All the Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr
Best Nonfiction: The Short and Tragic Life of Robert Peace by Jeff Hobbs

Apple has also given its end of the year charts for the most downloaded and top grossing iPhone and iPad apps. For the iPhone, Heads Up!, Facebook Messenger, and Clash of Clans finished as the top paid, top free, and top grossing app, respectively. For the iPad, Minecraft - Pocket Edition, YouTube, and Clash of Clans finished as the top paid, top free, and top grossing app, respectively.

As customary for its end of the year listings, Apple has also highlighted various games and apps from a wide variety of categories. The company is also featuring content across the various genres and categories for each content type.

A list of previous winners are also available here: 2013, 2012, 2011, 2010, 2009