Monday November 19, 2012 10:49 am PST by Jordan Golson

Presidnet Obama met with corporate leaders including Apple CEO Tim Cook, JPMorgan Chase chief Jamie Dimon, and investor Warren Buffett, and others.

"The president reached out to and spoke with each of these business leaders as a part of his continuing conversations and outreach on the need to find a balanced deficit-reduction solution that protects the middle class and continues to move our economy forward," the White House official said.

It's not particularly surprising that Obama reached out to Cook -- Apple has been one of the most valuable companies in the world for a while now -- but it does show how important Apple has become in recent years.

Note: Due to the inevitable 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.

Sunday November 18, 2012 10:06 pm PST by Arnold Kim

Lifehacker notes that AC/DC's music has finally appeared in digital form on iTunes. [Direct Link]

Once the Beatles signed up, Australian hard rockers AC/DC were the biggest major act holding out from selling their music on iTunes (or in any other digital music store). That changed today, with AC/DC finally realising that if rock and roll ain’t noise pollution, you might as well make money while the download sun shines.

AC/DC's selection includes the "Complete Set" for $149.99 [iTunes], Studio Collection for $99.99 [iTunes], Ringtones, Live at River Plate, as well as individual albums.

AC/DC had previously rejected iTunes distribution in an attempt to preserve the concept of the album.

AC/DC, formed by brothers Angus and Malcolm Young in 1973, is among only a handful of musicians to refuse to put their music on the popular download website in a move that Johnson defended as a bid to protect the album format from the Internet's emphasis on buying single songs.

Friday November 16, 2012 10:27 am PST by Jordan Golson

OS X Daily points us to the launch video for the Twentieth Anniversary Macintosh featuring a much younger and less-polished Jony Ive, complete with hair and British accent.

For those who don’t know, the 20th Anniversary Mac was a limited edition Mac priced at a whopping $7499. It was one of the first all-in-one computers to have an LCD display, and at the time was about as cool as a computer could be. Looking back, it’s easy to see how the design and thought of the 20th Anniversary Mac influenced the design of future Macs, especially iMacs.

Jony Ive was recently promoted and put in charge of all Human Interface teams at Apple, in addition to his existing role as head of Industrial Design.

Friday November 9, 2012 3:46 pm PST by Jordan Golson

CNET is reporting that Judge Lucy Koh will "consider the questions" of whether the jury foreman in the Apple v. Samsung case conducted himself improperly during the jury selection process.

Jury foreman Velvin Hogan has been one of the more visible members of the jury, speaking with numerous media agencies about the case and the billion-dollar verdict awarded in the case.

Koh said she will look into the matter during a December 6 hearing. As part of her inquiry, Koh said she will require Apple to disclose what information the company's lawyers knew about the jury foreman.

[…]

Samsung argued that jury foreman Velvin Hogan didn't disclose during jury selection that he had been sued by Seagate, his former employer. Samsung pointed out in court papers that Seagate and Samsung have a "substantial strategic relationship." The litigation with Seagate led Hogan to file for personal bankruptcy in 1993. Samsung maintains Hogan should have informed the court about the case.

Though the jury trial was finished earlier this year, Apple and Samsung's courtroom drama does not look to be abating any time soon.

Thursday November 8, 2012 3:11 pm PST by Jordan Golson

Apple has released a 127.07 MB update for all the Mac notebooks introduced in June 2012 -- the new MacBook Air models, as well as the spec-bumped MacBook Pro, and the MacBook Pro 15" with Retina display.

Apple is nonspecific about the exact issues the update fixes, but mentions graphics performance and compatibility with USB devices:

About MacBook Air and MacBook Pro Update 2.0

This update includes graphics performance and reliability enhancements and improves compatibility with some USB devices.

This update is recommended for all Mac notebooks introduced in June 2012.

The update is available via Apple's support website or the Mac App Store.

Installing the update also changes the build number of OS X 10.8.2 from 12C60 to 12C3006.

Thursday November 8, 2012 12:44 pm PST by Jordan Golson

Notoriously difficult video game classic Dragon's Lair has arrived on OS X nearly thirty years after its original release on LaserDisc. The game features video transferred directly from the high definition film master. Ports of the game have previously been released for both iPhone and iPad.

Dragon's Lair was unlike any other video game when it was released back in 1983. Instead of using low-definition sprites, the game used more traditional animation to show game play, with the user executing actions by timing sword swings or other button presses to correctly to clear each level.

You control the actions of the daring adventurer, finding your way through the castle of a dark wizard, who has enchanted it with treacherous monsters and obstacles. In the mysterious caverns below the castle, your odyssey continues against the awesome forces that oppose your efforts to reach the dragon’s lair. Dragon’s Lair is a fully animated classic arcade game from legendary animator Don Bluth. You’ll make your way through the castle and caverns below and wield your sword against some strange creatures. Beware of your foes, as they are numerous!

Dragon's Lair is available for $9.99 on the Mac App Store. [Direct Link]

Thursday November 8, 2012 11:59 am PST by Jordan Golson

Pixelmator, which was recently name-checked by Phil Schiller during the iPad mini media event, has updated its image editing software to include CMYK support, as well as a new feature called "Soft Proofing" that allows users to apply different color profiles to images in order to get a better idea of what the image will look like in the real world.

In the digital world, colors can be defined in many ways, and when it comes to precision, a feature called Soft Proofing comes in handy. Soft Proofing lets you quickly apply different color profiles to your images so you can get an idea of how the outcome, such as the printed image, might look. That’s right, CMYK lovers, now you can preview and work in CMYK colors.

On top of that, thanks to the sRGB standard, the image colors inside Pixelmator will also look better. The sRGB color standard is widely used on most devices you come across every day, such as digital cameras, scanners, or even your iPhone. This means that the colors of images you edit in Pixelmator will look absolutely perfect outside Pixelmator and across all of your Apple devices.

Pixelmator is available on the Mac App Store for $29.99. [Direct Link]

Thursday November 8, 2012 8:15 am PST by Jordan Golson

Last week, RealMac announced that its popular to-do app Clear was coming to the Mac, complete with iCloud syncing between the iOS and desktop clients. However, a number of commenters expressed concern with the planned $14.99 price point for the app.

RealMac Software has heard those voices and priced Clear for Mac at $6.99 through Monday, and then $9.99 for some amount of time after that. Eventually, the price will rise to the planned $14.99.


Clear for Mac is currently $6.99 on the Mac App Store. [Direct Link]

Clear for iPhone is $1.99 on the App Store. [Direct Link]

Monday November 5, 2012 11:04 am PST by Jordan Golson

Jony Ive is now the spiritual successor for Steve Jobs at Apple, according to technology journalist Micah Singleton. Tim Cook is playing the role he always played. Cook is a details guy and handles the supply chain like no one else. But, Jobs was always the product guy, and his fingerprints were on everything Apple did.

Singleton:

When Steve Jobs was CEO of Apple, its senior leadership was a two-headed monster. Steve put his touch on every product Apple released, while then COO Tim Cook made sure operations ran smoothly, and products were properly distributed. Using this model, Apple had unprecedented creative and financial success. With the recent moves made by now CEO Tim Cook, this model has returned, albeit slightly altered, with Cook leading, and Sir Jony Ive playing the role of Jobs, taking over creative control of the world’s largest company.

Thursday November 1, 2012 3:28 pm PDT by Jordan Golson

Apple today released a new version of Safari for Mac, bringing the browser up to version 6.0.2. The update is available through the Mac App Store or Software Update. However, full update notes are not yet available.

Safari 6.0.2

Safari 6.0.2 is recommended for all users running OS X Mountain Lion v10.8.2 and includes security updates. For more information, please visit: support.apple.com/kb/HT1222

Thursday November 1, 2012 3:08 pm PDT by Jordan Golson

Apple has updated its prosumer photo editing/management software Aperture, bringing it to version 3.4.2. The company has also released a new version of iPhoto, version 9.4.2. Both updates are available via the Mac App Store or Software Update.

What's New in Aperture 3.4.2

• Photos received via My Photo Stream or shared streams can now be added directly to other shared streams
• Multiple email addresses can now be copied and pasted in the "Shared with" field for shared streams
• When more than five subscribers "Like" a photo in a shared stream, all their names are now displayed correctly
• The Info panel for a shared stream now includes an Unsubscribe button
• The status line in the toolstrip now displays the number of new photos added to a shared stream
• Faces are now properly detected on photos imported into a library from a shared stream
• Adjusted photos added to shared streams are now published with EXIF metadata properly preserved
• Addresses the reliability of Shared Photo Streams when switching between iPhoto and Aperture with the same library
• Custom keyboard shortcuts are now properly preserved when upgrading from earlier versions of Aperture
• Double-clicking a photo in Viewer-Only mode now correctly toggles to the Browser view
• Addresses a problem that could prevent the Viewer from displaying images with correct color after Auto White Balance and Auto Enhance are applied
• Addresses an issue that could cause JPEGs exported with a custom ICC profile to render incorrectly
• A dialog now displays progress when deleting large numbers of photos using the Empty Aperture Trash command
• Fixes a problem that could cause duplicate detection on import to fail when the "Auto-Split Projects" option is enabled
• RAW files are no longer displayed in the Import window when the "JPEG files only" option is enabled
• Key photos made from panoramic images are now displayed at high resolution
• Addresses a problem that could cause the Info panel in the Inspector to display the wrong metadata view
• Fixes an issue that could prevent Microsoft Outlook from being used to email photos from within Aperture
• Improves stability when working with AVCHD video files
• Fixes a problem with using the Zoom navigator on a second display
• Addresses issues that could cause web journals to export incorrectly
• Includes stability improvements

--

What's New in iPhoto 9.4.2

• Photos now can be added to shared streams or My Photo Stream by dragging them to "Photo Stream" in the source list
• Multiple email addresses can now be copied and pasted in the "Shared with" field for shared streams
• When more than five subscribers "Like" a photo in a shared stream, their names are now displayed correctly
• Contextual menu now includes an Import command to import all the photos contained in a shared photo stream
• Addresses the reliability of Shared Photo Streams when switching between iPhoto and Aperture with the same library
• Fixes an issue that could prevent Microsoft Outlook from being used to email photos from within iPhoto
• Updated national holidays are available for use in printed photo calendars
• Includes stability improvements

Aperture is available for $79.99 on the Mac App Store. [Direct Link]

iPhoto is available for $14.99 on the Mac App Store. [Direct Link]

Thursday November 1, 2012 2:13 pm PDT by Jordan Golson

Feral Interactive today released Sid Meier's Railroads! on the Mac. The game is the most recent release in the much beloved Railroad Tycoon series, the first of which was released in 1990. Railroads was originally released for the PC in 2006, but this is its first appearance on the Mac.

Build a railroad empire and shape a nation!

Lay track, route trains and watch the world come to life in this compelling mix of train set and business simulator. Become the ultimate railroad robber baron with the drive to shape a nation, build an empire and amass a fortune.

Spanning the history of the railroads from the steam engines of the 1830s to the bullet trains of today, Sid Meier’s Railroads! for Mac is a bold re-imagining of the legendary Railroad Tycoon (1990), the game that launched the “tycoon” genre.

The game has very generous system requirements, asking for at least a 1.8GHz Intel processor running OS X 10.6.8, 3GB of RAM, and a 128MB graphics card. Sid Meier's Railroads! is available for $30 from Feral's online store, and will soon be available on the Mac App Store as well.

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