You no longer have to fire up your computer if you want to give your Spotify playlist a better cover image than a jumble of album art. Spotify has added support for uploading custom playlist images through its Android and iOS apps. Once you’ve create...

Google's latest accessibility app could help people with motor and speech impairments to communicate. Look to Speak includes a number of phrases that users can select with their eyes. The app is now available on devices running Android 9.0 or above,...

Accessory maker OWC has launched a new app that makes copying photos and videos from an iPhone or iPad to external storage much easier.Credit: OWCThe aptly named Copy That app simplifies the process of copying content from iOS or iPadOS devices to generic media. OWC says it gives you the ability to decide "what you want to copy, where you want to copy, and how you want to copy your data."

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It's official. The best M1 MacBook Pro deals are in full swing as the holiday shopping season reaches a fever pitch. AppleInsider readers can save $120 to $200 on every single 13-inch M1 MacBook Pro on top of $60 off AppleCare, delivering the absolute lowest prices available on the Apple Silicon-equipped machines.Steeper M1 MacBook Pro discountsAppleInsider recently highlighted exclusive deals on Apple's brand-new MacBook Air and the compact Mac mini, but shoppers looking for the M1 MacBook Pro can also save on every single model with coupon code APINSIDER at Apple Authorized Reseller Adorama.

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• AirPods Max. [credit:
  Apple
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This morning, Apple made a surprise announcement: it has started taking orders today for its long-rumored over-ear headphones bearing the AirPods brand. Called AirPods Max, they take design cues from existing Apple products and use several internal sensors and microphones to deliver "computational audio" features.

Priced at $549, AirPods Max are fully wireless headphones, and they use Bluetooth aided by Apple's custom tech...

Sonnet Technologies has announced a new chassis that allows users to use up to three PCI Express cards externally on Thunderbolt 3 computers, including Apple Silicon Mac devices.Credit: Sonnet TechnologiesThe Echo III expansion system supports up to three full-length PCIe cards simultaneously, and connects to a computer via a single Thunderbolt 3 cable. That makes it useful for professional users on Apple machines like the MacBook Pro, Mac mini, or iMac.

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Engineers at Cloudflare (an Internet privacy company), Apple, and Fastly (which makes a programmable edge cloud platform) have developed a new proposed DNS standard — co-authored by engineers from Cloudflare, Apple, and Fastly — that separates IP addresses from queries, so that no single entity can see both at the same time. 

They’ve also made the made source code available, so anyone can try out Oblivious DNS-over-HTTPS (ODoH, for short) or run their own ODoH service. Here’s the context, as provided by Cloudflare: 

The Domain Name System (DNS) is the foundation of a human-usable Internet. It maps usable domain names, such as cloudflare.com, to IP addresses and other information needed to connect to that domain. A quick primer about the importance and issues with DNS can be read in a previous ...

Apple’s software engineering SVP Craig Federighi has warned that developers must follow the company’s anti-tracking rules, or else their apps will be removed from the App Store…

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After many months of rumors, Apple today announced AirPods Max, the latest member of its headphone line that brings the technology of its popular AirPods earbuds to a new over-ear design to rival high-fidelity offerings from Sony, Bose, and Beats. And in a nod to Apple’s other ubiquitous wearable, the Apple Watch, the AirPods Max have a Digital Crown to control your music.

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Adobe released Lightroom version 4.1 with native support for Apple Silicon Macs so users can take full advantage of the hardware when editing photos.Adobe Lightroom is now M1 nativeDuring the "One More Thing" event, Craig Federighi announced that Adobe Lightroom would be the first Adobe app to be made native for the M1 processor. Other Adobe apps are expected to follow in 2021.

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Apple has announced AirPods Max, wireless headphones that the company says “brings the magic of AirPods to an over-ear design with high-fidelity sound.” However, at US$549, they’re about $150 more than most pundits predicted.

They combine a custom acoustic design, H1 chips, and software to power computational audio for a listening experience with Adaptive EQ, Active Noise Cancellation, Transparency mode, and spatial audio. AirPods Max come in five colors, including space gray, silver, sky blue, green, and pink, and are available to order starting today, with availability beginning Tuesday, Dec. 15.

“AirPods are the most popular headphones in the world, beloved for their effortless setup, incredible sound quality, and iconic design. With AirPods Max, we are bringing that magical AirPods experience to a stunning over-ear design with high-fidelity audio,” Greg Joswiak, Apple’s...

More than a week after Black Friday, Apple's announced its AirPods Max over-ear headphones for $549. It's available for preorder now, and will ship Dec. 15. From a report: Apple said its AirPods Max are designed with similar features to its $249 in-ear AirPods Pro, but in an over-ear design. As a result, it offers many of the same features as its AirPods cousins, including simple setup and connections, active noise cancellation, transparency mode to pipe sound from the outside world into your ears along with whatever you're listening to, and "spatial" simulated surround-sound audio. It also comes in five colors, including silver, green and pink. "With AirPods Max, we are bringing that magical AirPods experience to a stunning over-ear design with high-fidelity audio," said Greg Joswiak, Apple's senior vice president of Worldwide Marketing, in a statement Tuesday.

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Sonos is out with an update that will be welcome news for those looking for more bass. The latest Sonos S2 iOS app release allows owners of its home theater speakers or Amp to use two of the company’s wireless Subs simultaneously.

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A newly granted Apple patent (number 10,861,210) shows that future Apple devices may offer audio and video features based on a user’s face and voice.

The invention involves systems, methods, and computer-readable medium for providing audio and/or video effects based at least in part on facial features and/or voice feature characteristics of the user. For example, video and/or an audio signal of the user may be recorded by a device. Voice audio features and facial feature characteristics may be extracted from the voice audio signal and the video, respectively. The facial features of the user may be used to modify features of a virtual avatar to emulate the facial feature characteristics of the user. 

The extracted voice audio features may modified to generate an adjusted audio signal or an audio signal may be composed from the voice audio features. The adjusted/composed audio signal may simulate the voice of the virtual avatar. A preview of...

Apple and Cloudflare have jointly developed a new Internet protocol designed to protect your privacy, by preventing your internet service provider (ISP) from seeing which websites you visit.

Currently, when you enter a web address into your browser, that address is passed to a Domain Name Server (DNS) which looks up the domain name in order to convert it to the numerical IP address needed to connect to it …

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The Chinese government has blocked more than 100 apps in the country, with Tripadvisor one of the few international apps to no longer be listed in the App Store as part of a local regulator's crackdown on apps.The Cyberspace Administration of China removed 105 apps it had deemed to be "illegal" in the country, the regulator advised on Tuesday. The takedowns, which had apps pulled from Apple's App Store as well as others, is the first in a new wave of activity by the regulator, intending to "clean up" the Internet.The apps were targeted for potentially infringing Chinese laws concerning content, including obscenity, pornography, fraud and gambling, prostitution, and violence, the authorities advised in a statement spotted by CNN. The...

Apple TV+ is in final negotiations for “Carrie & Me,” a new film adapted from “Carrie and Me: A Mother-Daughter Love Story,” Carol Burnett’s bestselling memoir about her daughter Carrie Hamilton, reports Deadline.

Tara Miele will write and direct the project, which will be produced by Apple Studios along with iconic entertainer Burnett, Emmy winner Tina Fey, Eric Gurian, Steven Rogers and Josh McLaughlin. Jeff Richmond will executive produce.

In the memoir, described as “a touching tribute to her eldest daughter,” Burnett tells the story of Hamilton, who won the hearts of everyone she met with her kindness, quirky humor and unconventional approach to life. After overcoming her painful and public teenage struggle with drug addiction in a time when personal troubles were kept private, Hamilton lived...

Another day, another lawsuit. Medical device company AliveCor is suing Apple for patent infringement, says the Apple Watch electrocardiogram feature infringes three of its patents, reports AppleInsider.

The lawsuit, lodged in the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Texas on Monday, claims that the ECG functionality on the Apple Watch Series 4 and later infringes on its intellectual property related to use wearable sensors to improve cardiac monitoring technology. All three patents focus on monitoring for cardiac arrhythmias, or an irregular heartbeat. The patented technology includes the use of data from wearable devices to aid in diagnosing the condition.

AliveCor is a medical device and artificial intelligence company that sells ECG hardware and software for...

By Dustin Darnell

The US$99.99 Quatro Wireless PowerBank (10000 ah) from Satechi is a product I was excited about trying. However, my high expectations didn’t match with reality.

It features a Qi wireless charger, built-in Apple Watch charger, USB-C PD, and USB-A port to recharge multiple devices at once (though the charing cables are sold separately). I really liked the magnetic watch charger being included on the power bank. 

I wanted to use the Quatro Wireless PowerBank as my watch charger when I traveled. I tested it out once at home before I traveled and everything worked perfectly, but that was the only time. 

I fully charged the PowerBank before my trip. The first night I plugged in my phone and placed my watch on the charger and turned the power bank on.The next morning, I had a...

With funding from Apple, Malala Fund is conducting research to look at the impacts of climate change on girls and young women, and education's role in building resilience to future crises.

"We have to invest in quality education for girls,” says Malala Fund founder Nobel Prize laureate Malala Yousafzai. “Climate change is connected to all the issues that are around us and education is one of them.”

She joined Lisa Jackson, Apple’s vice president of Environment, Policy and Social Initiatives to call on governments and businesses to act quickly and decisively to meet climate targets.

"Malala Fund is heading into doing research…on the link between girls education and climate change while also providing the curriculum on sustainability and environmental protection and what is the role that girl's education plays in that,” says Yousafzai. “We will also be proposing and providing...

The beta test of Waze CarPlay Dashboard mode was apparently successful, as the feature is now rolling out in a new update to the release version after just a couple of weeks of testing.

Dashboard mode means that you can see Waze directions on your CarPlay home screen, alongside audio controls, meaning less need to switch between screens, which is safer as well as more convenient …

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Good news! M1-based Macs have given pundits a new thing to complain about!

The new complaint is that M1-based Macs don’t “live up to the hype” because in introducing them Apple made claims that are vague or untrue.

This is how you can be correct in the letter of the law but still be charged with public indecency. You know, like, when you’re caught in the park wearing pants made of clear plastic. Yes, you’re wearing pants, but you are also still nude. Not that that’s ever happened to the Macalope.

That you can find out.

Those records have been sealed.

Anyway, let’s take a look at the writing of Patrick Moorhead over at the Forbes contributor network and unlicensed hernia diagnosis clinic.

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Text messages have a reputation for being informal and inconsequential, but you can sometimes have some really critical information in there! If you deleted some texts to clear up space on your iPhone and—whoops!—accidentally got rid of one that's important, all hope is not lost. 

There are three potential avenues for recovering a deleted text message. You can restore your iPhone to a time before the message was deleted, you might be able to contact your phone provider, and you may be able to use a third-party app. Here's a brief explanation of all three options.

Recover deleted texts using an iCloud backup

This is probably the simplest and fastest way to restore missing texts. If you have an iCloud backup from the time before you deleted the text, you should be able to get it back by restoring your phone to that iCloud backup.

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The new MacVoices Live! has David Ginsburg, Frank Petrie, Kelly Guimont, Guy Serle, Andrew Orr, Mark Fuccio, Brittany Smith, and host Chuck Joiner discussing “Where do you hang out online…and why?” 

They discuss what is and isn’t isn’t social media, where Reddit and Slack fit in to the conversation, and more. There are some picks that could be anticipated, and some that are surprising. 

MacVoices is an Internet show that delivers in-depth discussions with the most influential people in the Mac industry as well as the individuals who are out there making it happen on the front lines of the global Apple community. Founded as an audio program in 2005, the show has evolved into audio and video versions to offer the best of both worlds.

Joiner is the producer and host of MacVoices. You can catch up with...

And at just $10 each for color-changing bulbs, it’s aggressively attacking the value space.

Christopher Nolan has been vocal about his distaste for releasing movies in theaters and online at the same time for many years, including a 2017 interview when he called Netflix’s attempt “untenable” before later apologizing. So it shouldn’t be a su...

We’re all curious about a potential new hardware that Apple is expected to announce this week. While the reliable leaker @L0vetodream made it clear that he’s not expecting a new Apple TV this year, AppleTrack said today that Apple is planning an imminent launch of the AirPods Studio.

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Just one week after Singapore became the first country in the world to approve the sale of lab-grown meat, XPrize has announced a new competition to foster the development of technologies that will transform the global food industry. In partnership w...

Music enhances almost every experience, from family dinners and house chores to kicking up one's feet after a long day of work. So, it should come as no surprise that one of the most highly requested gifts around the holidays is an at-home speaker. A...

California is partnering with Apple and Google on an app to let people use their phones to track potential exposure to COVID-19. CNET reports: The digital system uses Bluetooth signals from people's phones to alert them if they've been in contact with someone who's tested positive for the novel coronavirus. The project takes advantage of two of the world's most popular operating systems -- Apple's iOS and Google's Android -- to potentially reach billions of people. To use the features, people can download the app, called CA Notify, starting Thursday. On iPhones, people can turn on the alerts in their phone settings. The companies said they intend to shut down the tools after they are no longer needed to fight the pandemic.

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We’ve seen some small hops, but the SpaceX Starship is ready to make a much larger leap. The SN8 prototype is on the launch pad in Boca Chica, TX, and SpaceX has confirmed that its first high-altitude test flight could take place as soon as Tuesday,...

Medical device company AliveCor has levied a lawsuit against Apple alleging that the Apple Watch electrocardiogram feature infringes on a trio of its patents.Credit: Andrew O'Hara, AppleInsiderThe lawsuit, lodged in the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Texas on Monday, claims that the ECG functionality on the Apple Watch Series 4 and later infringes on its intellectual property related to use wearable sensors to improve cardiac monitoring technology.

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To help bring in the 2020 holiday season, 9to5Mac is offering readers exclusive deals on the latest accessories for iPhone, Mac and more, with help from our Holiday Deal Hub. That includes our featured deals: 25% off sitewide at Hyper with code 9TO5HOLIDAY and 20% off sitewide at Monowear with code 9TO5MAC20.

Head below for some of the best holiday deals on iPhone and Mac accessories, ranging from cases for iPhone 12, to Qi chargers, USB-C hubs and docks, and much more. There’s also a ton of discounts to help upgrade your workspace.

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The post Holiday Deal Hub: Exclusive discounts on the best iPhone and Mac accessories...

Right after the Apple event in October, Samsung mocked the company for not including the power adapter in the iPhone 12 box and also removing it from the older models. Now, as some rumors have predicted, the Galaxy S21’s documentation suggests that it will also not come with a charger included in the box.

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Apple's new 13-inch MacBook Pro equipped with the speedy M1 chip is currently on sale, with exclusive promo code savings knocking $150 off an assortment of models with 16GB of memory.New, steeper M1 MacBook Pro savingsExclusive discounts are in effect for AppleInsider readers at Apple Authorized Reseller Adorama when shopping through this pricing link and applying coupon code APINSIDER during checkout. Need help redeeming the code? Step-by-step instructions can be found further down this page.

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You've long been able to buy an app once and have your entire family use it, but now Apple's brought that to some subscriptions — although with similar limitations and exceptions.Credit: AppleAs announced back in June, and finally going live in early December, Apple has introduced the ability to share your subscriptions with your family. It's taken some time to roll out to all users, but it's now available to everyone — with a certain limitation.

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If your iPhone 11’s touchscreen has become unresponsive, Apple may fix it for free under a new repair program.

NVIDIA has developed a new approach for training generative adversarial networks (GAN) that could one day make them suitable for a greater variety of tasks. Before getting into NVIDIA’s work, it helps to know a bit about how GANs work. Every GAN cons...

Apple has released a video promoting the Up Next "Class of 2020," new artists championed by the Apple Music initiative throughout the year.Apple Music's Up Next aims to shine a light on upcoming musicians, bands, and musical artists that Apple believes are "fresh-faced innovators and ground-breakers" in the music scene. One up-and-coming artist is selected each month to become the focus of the initiative, which includes promotion on Apple Music itself, a mini documentary or an interview, an Up Next Session, and potentially a television performance.

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Netflix ends Chromecast with Google TV integration in a step back for streaming.

A few months after Baidu's robotaxi service arrived in Beijing, the company has received the first permits to run driverless vehicle tests in the city. China's capital granted Baidu Apollo permission to deploy five such vehicles on public roads.The c...

California will launch its coronavirus exposure notification app, based on the Apple and Google framework, to the public on Thursday.Credit: Patrick Holmes/UC BerkeleyThe CA Notify app is based on the Apple-Google Exposure Notification API, which the two tech giants unveiled earlier in 2020. The app was initially piloted at the University of California, San Diego and the University of California, San Francisco.

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It’s not quite a hell-freezing-over moment but it’s close. Google and Apple have announced that Apple Music is now available to stream on all Google Nest smart speakers without needing to resort to Bluetooth pairing.

To get started, you’ll need to make sure you have the Google Home app, which you can download from either the App Store (iPhone/iPad) or the Google Play Store (Android). After you log in to the Google Home app with your Google account, head over to the Assistant Settings inside your account and tap Music. Under More music services, select Apple Music, then Link account...

Apple Pay, with 227 million users worldwide is estimated to be the leading digital wallet, up from 140 million users in 2018, according to UnivDatos Market Insights. In 2020, Samsung Pay and Google Pay are projected to both cross 100 million users globally, the research group adds.

Over the last couple of years, the digital payments market has witnessed heightened activity with four major shifts being observed in the global landscape. According to UnivSatos Market Insights, these four major shifts include:

° Digital and information technology revolution, which has led to the increased penetration of smartphones and Internet - Mobile Internet use is rising sharply. By 2020, the number of people using mobile Internet services is projected to hit 3 billion, representing 65% of the world's adult population, compared to around 1.9 billion in 2015.

° Entry of several payment...

Apple leaker @L0vetodream has tweeted that Apple’s “Christmas surprise” for tomorrow could be an updated Apple TV set-top box. 

On Dec. 3, MacRumors said it had obtained an internal Apple memo from a “reliable source” that says the tech giant informed service providers that it has AppleCare-related changes planned for Tuesday, December 8, at approximately 5:30 a.m. Pacific Time.

Specifically, Apple has advised technicians to prepare for new product SKUs, new/updated product descriptions, and new/updated product pricing, according to the memo. If — and that’s the key word — new hardware is coming, it will likely be announced via a press release.

My first thought when I read the MacRumors report that we’d finally see the AirTags tracking devices and/or AirPod Studio over-the-...

After launching a pilot program for digital contact tracing last month, the state of California will now officially start the public rollout this week, that’s about half a year after Apple/Google made the feature available on iPhone and Android. But better late than never, the support will allow the almost 40 million people living in California to stay safer amid the pandemic.

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Apple supplier LG may use components from Samsung Electro-Mechanics for a folded zoom camera that Apple could use on an iPhone in 2022, according to a new report.Credit: Andrew O'Hara, AppleInsiderA report from late November indicated that Apple was searching for suppliers for folded camera technology that could improve the zoom capabilities on its iPhones. Back in July, well-connected TF Securities analyst Ming-Chi Kuo said that an iPhone with a "periscope" lens was on-track for a release in 2022.

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Google has switched on Stadia in eight more European countries. Residents of Austria, the Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Slovakia and Switzerland will be able to start using the game-streaming service over the next day or so as G...

Owners of Google's Nest and other smart speakers and displays that use the Google Assistant are now able to use their Apple Music subscription through the devices for the first time.Google is rolling out support for Apple Music to its Google Assistant-enabled devices, including Nest Audio, Nest Hub Max, Nest Mini, and others, from Monday. The move, arriving just before the holidays, will let those with an Apple Music subscription listen to over 70 million songs, as well as albums and playlists hosted by the service.To enable Apple Music on the devices, users have to link their Apple Music account to their Google Home app, and then set Apple Music as the default music streaming...