iPhone-enabled home monitoring solution Canary has just hit $1.25 million in funding on startup campaign site Indiegogo, raising well over its intended goal of $100,000. The project is on track to become the most successful crowd-funded home product ever, and has received pre-orders from 67 countries in the world.
The $1.25 million commitment marks a stretch goal for project that will enable to Canary team to add additional features to the product such as an Ethernet port and adaptive video quality.
Canary is a single device that contains an HD video camera and multiple sensors that track everything from motion, temperature and air quality to vibration, sound, and activity to help keep you, your family and your home safe.
The accompanying app and service with Canary are set to be free of charge, although the company plans to offer optional service packages that include features such as increased data storage and call center options.
Apple has purchased content discovery startup Matcha.tv for $1 to $1.5 million, reports VentureBeat. Matcha.tv is a company that formerly operated a website and mobile apps dedicated to providing recommendations for movies and TV shows based on user preference.
Before being quietly shutdown in May, the service aggregated content from popular streaming services like Netflix, iTunes, Hulu, and Amazon Prime to provide users with a list of TV shows and movies available across all of the sites. At the time the company's app went offline, Matcha.tv CEO Guy Piekarz told TechCrunch that the company was working on a "new direction" for the service.
A screenshot from Matcha.tv's iPad app
Matcha.tv is basically an iOS app that provides a comprehensive overview of everything that’s available for you to watch via cable TV providers (Comcast), streaming video services (Netflix, Hulu, Amazon Prime), and digital video stores (iTunes, Amazon). Additionally, you can manage what you watched from a universal queue, get video recommendations, and connect with social networks to see what your friends were watching/liking.
Matcha.tv's functionality seems like a solid fit for Apple, as the company offers a range of content from a variety of sources on its Apple TV. For example, customers can watch TV shows and movies via Netflix, iTunes, and Hulu using the device, and Apple has been working hard to extend its content offerings over the last several months.
Apple confirmed the purchase of Matcha.tv to VentureBeat with a standard acquisition statement: "Apple buys smaller technology companies from time to time, and we generally do not discuss our purpose or plans." Under the terms of the acquisition, Matcha.tv's founders will continue to work at Apple for at least two years.
Music video app VEVO was today updated to version 2.8 adding full AirPlay support, which will allow users to stream both audio and video to the Apple TV.
The addition of complete AirPlay support for the iOS version of VEVO comes just days after news leaked that VEVO would release a 24/7 music video app for the Apple TV.
VEVO's iOS app includes a catalog of 75,000 music videos from 21,000 different artists, plus a VEVO TV channel that plays continuous non-stop content, which is similar to how a potential Apple TV app will work. According to AllThingsD, the VEVO app could be released for the Apple TV as soon as this month. In the meantime, the new AirPlay functionality allows the app's full range of content to be broadcast to the TV.
VEVO is an iPhone-only app that can be downloaded from the App Store for free. [Direct Link] There's also a free HD version for the iPad. [Direct Link]
The update is available for all Apple 802.11n Wi-Fi base stations including AirPort Express, AirPort Extreme, and AirPort Time Capsule.
AirPort Base Station Firmware Update 7.6.4
- Resolve an issue that may cause AirPort Time Capsule to report that the backup disk is in use - Resolve an issue that may cause an IPv6 Tunnel error - Resolve an issue that may intermittently cause a loss in Wi-Fi connectivity with iOS devices
Note: This firmware update is for all 802.11n AirPort base stations.
The English Premier League football season begins this weekend and NBC, the new rights holder for EPL games in the United States, will be streaming every game live and on-demand on both its website, and via its NBC Sports Live Extra app for iPhone and iPad.
This year the EPL license for the US was bought by NBC and the US will get to see every single match. Matches will show on NBC, NBC Sports, streaming from the NBC site, and for the first time ever, live streaming in the NBC Sports Live Extra app. According to NBC, every single match will be live streamed in the app. That’s right, every single match of the entire EPL season. The US is the only country that gets that luxury, not even the home country of the UK gets to watch every single match. I’m a bit excited, can you tell?
In order to watch the streaming games, users must authenticate via TV Everywhere.
NBC Sports Live Extra is currently available for Comcast Xfinity, Verizon Fios, Cablevision, Suddenlink, Mediacom, Bend and Grande customers. It is a free download from the App Store. [Direct Link]
Hon Hai Precision Industry Co., Apple's primary iPhone and iPad assembler, has experienced a 41% jump in second quarter net profit thanks to strong iPhone sales, reports The Wall Street Journal.
The company, better known as Foxconn, saw a net profit of NT$16.98 billion, which is approximately US$566.7 million. During the second quarter of 2012, Foxconn's net profit was just NT$12.06 billion. Foxconn reportedly earns more than 40% of its revenue from Apple.
Foxconn's high profit numbers mirror Apple's own record breaking Q2 iPhone sales of 31.2 million units, first announced during the company's third quarter earnings call. Foxconn could see even greater profits in the coming quarters as Apple gears up to release its next generation iPhone, along with additional products like the fifth generation iPad and the Retina iPad mini in the fall months.
Apple is also expected to unveil a new iPhone this fall, which would help pad Hon Hai's earnings in the second half of the year, typically a strong selling season for technology companies due to the back-to-school and holiday shopping seasons.
The products Apple has in the works will also have a huge impact on Pegatron, the company assembling Apple's low-cost "iPhone 5C". According to analyst estimates, the new phone could contribute as much as 40% to Pegatron's third quarter revenue. At a recent investor conference, Pegatron estimated that its sales would grow 40%–50% in Q3 2013.
Both Pegatron and Foxconn have been reported to be hiring a number of new employees as production ramps up on the upcoming devices.
Apple's next generation iPhone 5S is expected to be released during a September 10 event, but it remains unclear if the event will also include the iPhone 5C. Apple is also expected to hold a second event in the last three months of the year to debut new iPads.
Legendary investor Carl Icahn disclosed on Twitter today that his holding company has taken a 'large position' in Apple, believing that the company is 'extremely undervalued' and should increase its share buyback program.
We currently have a large position in APPLE. We believe the company to be extremely undervalued. Spoke to Tim Cook today. More to come. - 12:21 PM - 13 Aug 13
Had a nice conversation with Tim Cook today. Discussed my opinion that a larger buyback should be done now. We plan to speak again shortly. - 12:25 PM - 13 Aug 13
Icahn, who has an estimated net worth of $20 billion, has recently been extensively involved in efforts to keep Dell from going private and he also holds a 16% stake in Nuance, the speech recognition company that Apple uses for Siri.
Update: According to Bloomberg, Icahn has taken a position of at least $1 billion in Apple and is projecting the stock price to rise to over $600.
"This is a no brainer to go buy stock in a company that can go borrow" at a low rate, Mr. Icahn said. "Buy the company here and even without earnings growth, we think it ought to be worth $625."
Mr. Icahn's thesis rests on Apple borrowing at about a 3% interest rate and buying back shares right now, likely at around $525 a piece. That would send shares to $625, Mr. Icahn says, without taking into account any earnings growth.
Yelp for iOS was updated to version 7.0.0 today, adding a much desired review feature. After installing the update, users will be able to add reviews to any business or restaurant from their phones.
While Yelp on the iPad has allowed reviews for quite some time, iPhone users were previously limited to adding short tips or drafting reviews that could be saved and added later via the website.
The new version of Yelp supports full reviews, and the former "Tip" button has now been replaced with a "Review" button that offers a standard review interface.
What's new Today’s release is pretty epic, and we’re not kidding around. Are you sitting down? You might want to sit down. Starting today, you can add reviews from your phone! Visit any business page, tap "add review", and go bananas.
Yelp is a universal app that can be downloaded from the App Store for free. [Direct Link]
Amazon has added a new service to its Amazon Web Services division that should make it easier for developers to integrate push notifications into their apps, particularly when developing for multiple platforms.
SNS Mobile Push allows developers to send notifications to iOS, Android and Kindle Fire devices for $1 per million notifications sent, without developing a complicated push notification backend and with Amazon's backing as apps scale to millions of users.
Supporting push notifications at large scale has been incredibly complicated for mobile app developers. Each popular mobile platform maintains a different free relay service that delivers notifications through persistent connections to devices running the platforms they own. This means that to support millions of users on multiple mobile platforms, developers must integrate with each of these platform-specific relay services, which introduces operational complexity and cost. In addition, the nature of mobile app distribution is such that successful apps can become popular almost overnight, exacerbating these challenges for customers.
“Many customers tell us they build and maintain their own mobile push services, even though they find this approach expensive, complex and error-prone,” said Raju Gulabani, Vice President of Database Services, AWS. “Amazon SNS with Mobile Push takes these concerns off the table with one simple cross-platform API, a flat low price and a free tier that means many customers won’t pay anything until their applications achieve scale.”
Smaller developers can integrate the service as well, with Amazon allowing developers to send one million notifications per month for free.
In an interview with Australian newspaper AdNews (via The Next Web), Samsung Australia's chief marketing officer Arno Lenior offered retrospect on the Korean company's 2012 "Next Big Thing" ad that mocked Apple loyalists, saying that it signaled Samsung "coming-of-age" as a brand, and "marked a tipping point" for the company's standing in consumer electronics globally. Lenior also stated that Samsung still sees itself as a "challenger" and invests heavily in research and development to stay ahead.
That really did mark quite a tipping point for us globally. We were able to tell a cheeky story – if you think about it, we’re a Korean company starting to really mess with the order of things.
We’ve been able to do some good things from that [campaign]. The interesting thing about it from my perspective is that some of it is not the best work you’ve ever seen, some of it is the best work you’ve ever seen, but it’s getting people talking, that’s what I really love about it.
You’ve got fanboys after fanboys going, ‘You can’t put that out there’, and then the Samsung fans saying, ‘Yes, you can’, and they’re starting to have that conversation, which is brilliant. So that piece of content has been amazing for us, both globally and here in Australia.
Earlier this month, a survey from the American Customer Satisfaction Index (ACSI) ranked Samsung’s Galaxy S III and Galaxy Note II phones ahead of Apple’s iPhone 5 in customer satisfaction. Since 2011, both Samsung and Apple have been in a long, ongoing legal battle over patent and design issues, with the first U.S. trial awarding $1 billion to Apple in 2012. However, a judge voided nearly half of that amount in March, and a new trial between the two companies is set for November of this year.
Piper Jaffray analyst Gene Munster late yesterday released a new research note to investors centered around Apple’s upcoming product launches for the rest of the year, including key predictions on the anticipated low-cost iPhone, potentially named the iPhone 5C.
In his note, Munster predicts that the iPhone 5C will not come with Siri, the intelligent personal assistant within iOS, and that the device will replace the iPhone 4S at the bottom of the iPhone lineup. Munster also believes that the lower-cost iPhone will sell for an estimated $300 off-contract.
In terms of the phone itself, we expect the cheaper phone to have a plastic casing, 4" display, and lower end internal specs (processor, camera, memory, etc.) than the 5S/5 line up. Additionally, we believe that Apple may exclude some software features, such as Siri, which we note was not an option on the iPhone 3GS or iPhone 4 upon launch.
Munster apparently believes that omitting Siri from the iPhone 5C would help differentiate the lineup enough to limit cannibalization of Apple's more expensive iPhones by the cheaper 5C model. It would, however, seem to be an odd move given Apple's efforts to promote Siri and other voice functionality, as well as the fact that the cheaper iPhone 4S currently on the market already supports Siri.
The analyst also makes remarks on the iPhone 5S, stating that the phone will indeed incorporate a fingerprint sensor into the home button, but that the feature would be limited to user authentication.
We expect the iPhone 5S to include a fingerprint sensor with a basic unlocking feature, but do not believe the sensor will be built into iOS 7 enough to introduce a feature like secure payments as we believe that Authentec has only been a part of Apple for less than one year. We believe that payments could be a key feature of the next version of iOS in 2014.
The phone is otherwise expected to follow Apple's upgrade patterns in processor speed and battery life, moving to a new custom A7 chip while featuring more memory and other spec bumps. Munster expects Apple’s new iPhone lineup to feature the iPhone 5S, iPhone 5, and low-cost iPhone, which contradicts an earlier report last month which stated Apple would discontinue production of the iPhone 5 alongside the launch of the iPhone 5S and lower cost iPhone.
Munster also makes predictions on the upcoming iPad line and other products, stating that October would be the likely release month for the fifth-generation iPad and the new iPad mini. The analyst, who has for many years been a proponent of the idea that an Apple television is right around the corner, also states that Apple is likely to introduce a new TV device before the end of 2013, with a 70% chance of the product shipping within the first half of 2014.
Last week, news hit that Apple would unveil its next generation iPhone at a September 10 event, but it remains unclear if the low-cost iPhone will also be revealed at that time. Apple is also expected to introduce the fifth-generation iPad as soon as next month, with an updated iPad mini rumored to be following fairly soon after.
Apple is currently holding a sale on movie bundles in the U.S. iTunes Store, offering heavy discounts on collections of both SD and HD versions of films. The bundles include film collections of popular franchises such as the Lord of the Rings, Harry Potter, and Spider Man.
Last week, Apple launched movie support for iTunes in the Cloud in eight new countries, including Japan and Italy. The service was first launched for music in June 2011 in the United States, with movie and TV show support in March 2012.
Update: Pricing and availability on some of the bundles is changing rapidly, suggesting that some of the pricing deals may have been in error. The complete set of Harry Potter films was initially priced a $9.99, but is now carrying a $59.99 price tag. Similarly, the Lord of the Rings was originally also priced at $9.99 before briefly being removed from the promotion page and then returned with a $17.99 price tag.
DIRECTV today launched a newly revamped iPad app designed to offer improved content discovery and quicker access to TV shows and movies. While the app retains its current feature base that allows customers to watch live TV, DVR content, and on demand titles, it includes several newly implemented tools to make browsing and viewing simpler.
The app's content and features are now aggregated into a single "Menu" section and TV Show and Network options join already existing Guide and Movie sections. There's also a newly implemented "Watch" button designed to display available programming on both the iPad and the TV in one location.
New "Menu" section to make browsing for content easier.
New "TV Show" and "Networks" sections, as well as updated Guide and Movies with filter capabilities based on where you want to view your programming- on your iPad or on your TV.
Redesigned Info Page with an enhanced visual experience.
New "Watch" feature that combines all the ways you can watch a program on your iPad or TV into a single location.
In addition to streaming movies and TV, the DIRECTV app also allows customers to connect to social media sites, browse and search for DIRECTV content, control content that is sent to the TV, and manage DVR recordings.
DIRECTV for the iPad can be downloaded from the App Store for free [Direct Link] and the update should go live in the app store shortly.
Oracle CEO Larry Ellison, who was a close friend of Steve Jobs, hinted that Apple may have a bleak future without Jobs in an interview with CBS News' Charlie Rose (via AllThingsD) where he was asked how he thought the company would do without its co-founder.
"Well, we already know," Ellison told Rose. "We saw — we conducted the experiment. I mean, it's been done. We saw Apple with Steve Jobs. We saw Apple without Steve Jobs. We saw Apple with Steve Jobs. Now, we're gonna see Apple without Steve Jobs."
Ellison seems to be referring to when Jobs was ousted by the Apple board in 1985, causing the company to struggle. Jobs returned in 1997 and rebuilt the company, streamlining product lines and introducing successful new offerings like the iPod, iPhone, and iPad.
In addition to being friends with Jobs, Larry Ellison was an Apple Director until he stepped down from the board in 2002, affording him a look at the inner workings of Apple. He also publicly hinted at buying the company when it was struggling in 1997.
The full interview is set to appear on "CBS This Morning" on Tuesday morning.
As parts leaks have suggested, Bloomberg reports that Apple will release a thinner full-sized iPad in the final three months of this year -- this would suggest that the iPad would be released at a separate media event from the one supposedly scheduled for September 10th when the next iPhone is expected to be released.
Bloomberg also says Apple will release a Retina-equipped iPad mini in the same time-frame, similar to previous reports.
Apple Inc. is preparing to introduce a new version of the iPad with a thinner design, people familiar with the plans said, as the company works to stay atop the increasingly crowded tablet-computer market.
Apple also plans to introduce a new iPad mini, the first with a high-resolution screen, said the people, who asked not to be identified because the development is private. The new iPad models are set to be introduced in the last three months of the year, one of the people said.
The new full-sized iPad is expected to have a thinner screen bezel like the existing iPad mini, while the new mini is not expected to have any significant design changes.
Australian writer Sonny Dickson has shared some images of what he claims are the volume buttons for Apple’s upcoming low-cost plastic-shelled iPhone, dubbed the "iPhone 5C." The buttons are shown in bright shades of green, yellow, red, and blue, matching previous descriptions of the device.
The pill-shaped button design, which deviates from the round volume buttons found in the iPhone 5, matches up with design drawings leaked in June. Based on those drawings and other component leaks, MacRumors released renderings of the low-cost iPhone that clearly show what the volume buttons of the device could look like when fully assembled.
Though leaked component images and videos of the iPhone 5C have been surfacing at a rapid pace over the last couple of months, the prototype designs have thus far lacked full cut-outs for power and volume buttons.
In addition to a polycarbonate shell and a multitude of bright colors, Apple's low-cost iPhone is said to feature rear curved edges and a slightly thicker design. It is also said to share components with the current iPhone 5 and may be priced anywhere from $450 to $550.
Over the weekend, news hit that Apple would unveil its next generation iPhone at a September 10 event, but it remains unclear if the low-cost iPhone will also be revealed at that time. Additional images of the volume buttons in all four colors can be seen on Dickson's website.
Apple is expanding its USB Power Adapter Takeback Program to countries beyond the United States and China, reports 9to5Mac. First introduced last month following the electrocution of a Chinese woman using a counterfeit iPhone charger, the recycling initiative is designed to allow iOS users to safely replace and dispose of questionable third-party power adapters.
Under the terms of the program, Apple will accept and recycle any third-party charger, no questions asked. The company will also provide an authentic replacement charger for a fee of $10 in the United States, which is $9 cheaper than the standard $19 cost.
While the trade-in program was initially aimed at U.S. and Chinese Apple customers, it has now been expanded to cover Australia, Canada, France, Germany, Japan, and the U.K. as well, with the website displaying appropriate pricing included for each country.
Apple is currently preparing its retail locations for the program’s launch, providing training materials for employees. Trade-ins will be accepted beginning on August 16, with users able to bring any USB power adapter and an iPhone, iPad, or iPod to an Apple Retail Store or participating Apple Authorized Service Provider for a replacement. The program is set to last for several months, ending on October 18, 2013.
The hashtag support was added to Facebook recently as part of a greater push to keep track of trending topics across the social network. The OpenTable integration is part of a broader partnership between the two companies that allows Facebook users to make restaurant reservations right from the Facebook app, using the 'Nearby Places' function as well as restaurant fan pages.
Facebook says its integration is far more seamless than with OpenTable's other partners, like Yelp and Google Maps, which require you to open a browser window to complete a booking. All reservations can be made without leaving the Facebook app. In fact, you don't even need to register with OpenTable to make a reservation.
Reservations will not generate posts on Facebook and reservations will not be sharable with friends.
Music video app VEVO was today updated to version 2.8 adding full AirPlay support, which will allow users to stream both audio and video to the Apple TV.
Legendary investor Carl Icahn disclosed on Twitter today that his holding company has taken a 'large position' in Apple, believing that the company is 'extremely undervalued' and should increase its 
Amazon has 
