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The Delivery-Before-Christmas Edition Tuesday, December 13, 2016

AirPods Now Available To Buy From Apple Online Store For $159, Delivers As Soon As Monday 19, by Benjamin Mayo, 9to5Mac

The AirPods are now available to buy from Apple’s Online Store, with delivery before Christmas. After many delays, Apple’s truly-wireless headphones are finally on sale which are the company’s preferred solution to the wireless audio future heralded by the iPhone 7. Quantities are likely to be limited so get in quick if you want to secure a pair before Christmas Day.

Apple Says BeatsX Earphones Delayed Until February, by Joe Rossignol, MacRumors

Apple has updated its website to indicate its all-new BeatsX wireless earphones will be available in February in the United States, Canada, Australia, United Kingdom, and several other countries, after originally saying they would launch in the Fall. Online pre-orders can still not be placed at this time.

iOS 10.2 Released

Apple Releases iOS 10.2 With New Emoji, TV App, And More, by Federico Viticci, MacStories

iOS 10.2 is a notable release for emoji: Apple is now fully supporting the Unicode 9 emoji specification that includes 72 new emoji first approved by the Unicode Consortium earlier this year.

An Emoji With A Nose Is A Horror To Behold, by Megan Farokhmanesh, The Verge

But one question: where are its nostrils? What kind of nose comes unequipped for basic smell duties?

tvOS 10.1 Released

TV App Review, by Ryan Christoffel, MacStories

Apple is playing the long game with its TV app. Its bet is that more and more content providers will integrate over time, making TV more valuable. The biggest outstanding problem is not with the app itself, but with the lack of important integrations like Netflix and Amazon Prime Video. If Apple could get the content those companies offer into the TV app, I'd never have a reason to watch television elsewhere.

As it stands today, TV provides the best experience I've found for watching movies and TV shows, and it provides that experience seamlessly across the Apple TV, iPad, and iPhone. Silly as it may seem, from now on my decisions regarding which movies and shows to watch will be influenced by a new factor: can I watch those things in the TV app? Because if not, I'll be settling for a lesser experience.

watchOS 3.1.1 Released

watchOS 3.1.1 With Unicode 9 Emoji Support Now Available For Apple Watch, by Zac Hall, 9to5Mac

watchOS 3.1.1 includes support for new Unicode 9.0 emoji as well as the ability to change skin tones when picking certain emoji characters.

watchOS 3.1.1 Fixes A Handful Of Bugs, by Adam C. Engst, TidBITS

Apple is closing out the year with updates to most of its operating systems, and the least significant is undoubtedly watchOS 3.1.1, which lists just seven bug fixes in its release notes.

Stuff

Q&A: Shigeru Miyamoto On 'Mario', 'Minecraft' And Working With Apple, by John Davison, Glixel

Probably the that easiest thing to point to is the fact that Apple, like Nintendo, is a company that thinks about how people will use their products. We design things to be usable by a very broad range of people. They put a lot of effort into the interface and making the product simple to use, and that's very consistent with Nintendo. I think Apple also likes to do things differently and take a different approach. In the early days when computers were very complicated things, computer companies were purposely presenting them in ways that made them seem very complicated. Then you had Apple who came along with their very simple and colorful logo and it all had more of a fun feel to it.

Gen 2 Pokémon Go Are Here: What You Need To Know!, by Rene Ritchie, iMore

Pokémon Go is getting new Pokémon from the second generation, starting today. More specifically, Togepi, Pichu, and other 'mon from the Johto Region in Pokémon Gold and Pokémon Silver video games.

Apple Rejects Samsung Pay Mini To Be Registered On Its App Store, by Etnews

Main reason why Apple rejected Samsung Pay Mini is not exactly known. It can be that Apple rejected Samsung Pay Mini because its particular functions do not meet with Apple’s policies on security and regulations. If this is the reason then Samsung can reapply after tweaking some of functions according to Apple’s regulations. However Samsung has decided not to reapply again. [...] If Apple rejected Samsung Pay Mini without any particular reasons then there is a cause of violation of Fair Trade Law.

Android And iPhone Reject Female Nudity App, by BBC

Melina thinks both of these decisions are "extremely hypocritical".

"When you take a look at what's in both stores, many [other apps] are over-sexualising women.

"If you're going to allow those things in the app store then minimally illustrated lady parts should be in there too.

Notes

MacBook Pro Launch: Perplexing, by Jean-Louis Gassée, Monday Note

I have little doubt the new MacBooks will eventually sell well. On paper and in demos, they’re very attractive. But I wonder how and why Apple let so many glitches and self-inflicted wounds mar the launch of this anxiously awaited successor to the MacBook Air and MacBook Pro.

When Trump Meets Tech Leaders, Jobs Will Be On The Agenda, by David Streitfeld, New York Times

Apple has already drawn the president-elect’s scrutiny over jobs. “One of the things that will be a real achievement for me is when I get Apple to build a big plant in the United States, or many big plants in the United States,” Mr. Trump said in late November.

On Monday, in what perhaps could be seen as a pre-emptive strike, Apple was revealed to be negotiating a major investment in a technology fund celebrated by Mr. Trump last week for its jobs-making potential.

Bill Gates Leads New Fund As Fears Of U.S. Retreat On Climate Grow, by Hiroko Tabuchi, New York Times

Mr. Gates, the billionaire co-founder of Microsoft, announced on Monday the start of a fund to invest in transformative energy research and development to reduce the emissions that cause climate change. The work would supplement and build on basic research already underway at government labs that may be threatened by the incoming administration. [...]

“We don’t have any inside knowledge of what the energy policies of this administration will look like,” said Mr. Gates, who said he had a brief telephone call with Mr. Trump several weeks ago but declined to describe it further. “It’s possible they will reduce energy research. But it’s also significantly possible they would increase energy research.”

Bottom of the Page

So, finally, the AirPods are available for sale.

Let's see how long before one can purcahse single replacement pods.

~

Thanks for reading.