Apple’s entry level configuration of the new 21.5-inch iMac is now shipping in 7-10 business days from Apple’s online store. That shipping time is up from the 1-3 business days that the product was quoted as shipping in yesterday. The 27-inch iMacs were initially said to ship in 2-3 weeks, but they have since been pushed back to 3-4 weeks for new orders. Update: Both 21.5-inch iMacs are now up to 7-10 days for shipping....

A Chinese report says that Apple’s cheapest iPad – currently sporting a 10.2-inch screen and 32GB storage – will get an upgrade in the spring. It indicates that the screen size will be increased to 10.5 inches, and the base storage will be doubled to 64GB – alongside other improvements … iMore spotted the report from cnBeta. If you were hoping the entry-level iPad would join the rest of the iPad family (bar the mini) in making the switch to USB-C, cnBeta says you’re out of luck: Apple is sticking to a Lightning socket for this model....

[UPDATE: Chris Lattner has tweeted his reaction to the BI piece, calling it “fabricated or speculating”.] The surprise decision of Swift creator and long-time Xcode lead Chris Lattner to leave Apple was in large part driven by his frustration with the culture of secrecy at the company, say developer friends. Lattner, who was Apple’s head of developer tools and widely respected as the voice of developers within the company, left the company after more than a decade to lead Tesla’s Autopilot software efforts …...

Apple announced today that its new ResearchKit platform is now available to medical researchers as an open source framework. Apple first unveiled ResearchKit on stage last month during the March event, promising that it would be available as an open source framework for developers and medical researchers this month. The framework enables the medical community to use the iPhone to distribute actual medical and health research through ResearchKit-enabled apps. The announcement that ResearchKit is now available to medical researchers follows a new partnership between Apple and IBM to share HealthKit and ResearchKit data with companies like Johnson & Johnson through an initiative called Watson Health....

It was announced last week that Apple would once again face off against the FBI in Congress this week after its previous testimony over the FBI’s request in the San Bernardino gunmen case. During the hearing today, which was entitled “Deciphering the Debate Over Encryption: Industry and Law Enforcement Perspectives,” Apple’s General Counsel Bruce Sewell continued to defend the need for strong user encryption. He also clarified, however, that Apple has refused requests from China for source code....

Following the introduction of the iPhone Xs earlier today, Apple has shared a video on its YouTube channel highlighting video shot with the device. Apple touts that this video offers a first-look at how water, fire, metal, and light were used to capture these stunning videos. Throughout the 1 minute and 44 second video, Apple shows how iPhone Xs was used to capture several different experimental video. For instance, the first video is an experiment using water, sound, and light to create a slow-mo video....

Apple has a special message for the world going into the holiday season: “Open your heart to everyone.” That’s the tagline at the end of its new holiday commercial called “Frankie’s Holiday” which sees an iPhone-toting Frankenstein feeling a bit left out. This year’s holiday ad limits product placement to a single iPhone 7 with Voice Memos being used to record a small music box. Ads in previous years have prominently included the whole family of Apple products....

Apple has shared Nian, a 12-minute Chinese new year film shot, created by the team behind the 2019 Golden Globe-nominated American comedy drama The Farewell. There’s a separate behind-the-scenes (BTS) video showing how the film was shot on an iPhone 12 Pro Max. You can watch both videos below … Nian is based around the traditional Chinese New Year legend which led to the famous lion dances. This is a fresh take on the story, director Lulu Wang describing it as ‘a heartwarming coming of age tale about a young girl caught between the fantasy of her childhood and growing up into the real world....

Apple will begin rolling out an iPhone trade-in program in China in the near future. The option may become available in stores as soon as March 31st, allowing Chinese users to take advantage of the program that has helped boost iPhone sales in several countries already, including the United States, Canada, Australia, France, Germany, Italy, Spain, Switzerland, and the Netherlands. Chinese retail employees will determine the condition of the phone being traded in, and offer Apple Store credit to customers, Bloomberg reports....

Apple TV+ has officially announced its sci-fi series ‘Invasion’, which has been in production for almost two years — shooting was naturally delayed due to the pandemic. The show follows characters across several continents preparing for an alien invasion. It will premiere on October 22nd, 2021. Invasion stars Sam Neill, Shamier Anderson, Firas Nassar, Golshifteh Farahani, and Shioli Kutsana. Each must prepare and battle the oncoming threat in a different way....

Following the addition of the official Cricket Australia channel for Apple TV users down under earlier this week, Apple refreshed its video streaming box for US users Friday night with new content through the Tennis Channel Everywhere service. The new Apple TV channel features both on-demand tennis and live matches with an optional annual subscription. The annual subscription is called Tennis Channel Plus and goes for $69.99/year unlocking access to live tennis coverage including the 2015 Australian Open starting next week and 2015 French Open starting in June....

In recent weeks, a spate of local and national news reports about stalking incidents and auto theft attempts involving AirTags has popped up. The reports typically involve someone finding an unknown AirTag secreted away in a handbag, tucked behind their vehicle’s license plate, or stashed somewhere else that will let a thief or stalker track the location of themselves or their vehicle. In what was almost certainly an effort to alleviate some of the negative public sentiment toward AirTags being caused by continued reports like this, Apple has updated its Personal Safety User Guide with new advice on what to do if you find an AirTag that may be tracking you for criminal purposes....

As the company has done now for several years, Apple has posted some gift suggestions for Mother’s Day, which takes place on May 14, with prices starting from $49 … The gift page, headed ‘Perfect for Mother’s Day – and every other day,’ has the iPad Pro as its main promotion, with the Apple Pencil and Smart Cover suggested for those mums who already own an iPad. At the lower end of the pricing scale, the company suggests Woven Nylon and Sport Bands for the Apple Watch, each starting at $49, while wireless headphones fill out the middle ground at prices starting from $149....

The usually secretive Apple recently signaled that it would begin publishing artificial intelligence research, and now it appears that the first example of this has appeared online. The newly published research paper (via Forbes) is titled “Learning from Simulated and Unsupervised Images through Adversarial Training” and credits Ashish Shrivastava, Tomas Pfister, Oncel Tuzel, Josh Susskind, Wenda Wang, Russ Webb and Apple Inc. as its authors. The paper shows a publication date of December 22 although it was submitted for publication on November 15....

[UPDATE: Apple has now said that its reasoning for delaying the earnings call is because of the memorial service for former board member and tech icon Bill Campbell, who passed away this week.] Apple today has updated its investor relations page to reflect that its second quarter earnings call will now take place on Tuesday, April 26th. Previously, the company had said that it would hold the call on Monday, April 25th....

Apple today has released the first developer beta of macOS Catalina 10.15.1. This comes after the official release of the new operating system version for the public earlier this week. The latest developer release features some of the changes included in the iOS 13.2 beta, such as new emoji and Siri privacy settings. Developers can update to the latest beta through System Preferences if they’re already enrolled in the Beta Program....

One week after the release of iOS 14.5, Apple today is releasing iOS 14.5.1 to the public with bug fixes and performance improvements. Apple is also releasing iOS 12.5.3 for older iPhones that are not supported by iOS 14.5. Today’s new release iOS 14.5.1 is available via an over-the-air update in the Settings app. As usual, if the update does not immediately appear for download, keep checking, as it sometimes takes a few minutes to roll out to all users....

The report says the service may launch this fall, enabling iPhone users to pay for goods with their devices in retail outlets. Apple has apparently discussed the plans with credit card institutions, according to the report, as a user’s banking information “would essentially be uploaded to the wallet”. Apparently, Visa is already onboard with the project. According to the report, new phones will include a ‘secure element’ to store such sensitive data....

The Korea Times today reports that Apple is in negotiations with Samsung to have the company supply the flash memory for the next-gen iPhone models. Currently, the flash storage is provided by Toshiba, SK hynix and SanDisk. The report also notes that Apple is looking to increase the storage capacity of its iPhone models. Apple currently offers the iPhone 6 and 6 Plus in 16GB, 64GB, and 128GB variants. Today’s report suggests that Apple, rather than working to go beyond the 128GB amount, will increase the storage of the mid-tier models....

Update: TNW confirmed with Apple that a total of 12 countries have received access to movies in the Cloud, while France is the only to get TV shows today: As first reported by French website iGen.fr, Apple appears to be rolling out iCloud access to TV shows and movies in France. The feature allows users to download content purchased through iTunes to various Apple devices, and it has been available in the United States and elsewhere since 2011....