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Sony Corporation has issued an official news release in regards to the status of their manufacturing companies in Japan after the Kumamoto earthquakes. Having confirmed the safety of their employees in the affected regions, Sony has listed out a few details of the manufacturing sites that have been impacted as result of the earthquake. Sony’s semiconductor factory in Kumamoto, which primarily manufactures image sensors for cameras, had seen its production halted after the earthquake and has yet to be started again....

Apple’s ninth annual Environmental Responsibility Report summarises the company’s work on its three environmental priorities of renewable energy, safer materials & processes and conserving resources. As part of the third of those, the company revealed that its recycling program last year recovered 89 million pounds of materials – Business Insider noting that this included a cool $40M worth of gold. Gold is commonly used in circuit boards because it has low electrical resistance and, unlike copper, doesn’t corrode....

Apple’s request for a new trial in its never-ending legal battle with VirnetX has been denied. Apple had asked for a new trial as part of the patent battle, and while it won’t get that trial, there’s still the possibility of an appeal. As reported by AppleInsider, the final judgement was handed down by Judge Robert Schroeder in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Texas. In that final judgement, Schroder denied Apple’s motion for a new trial and “denied-in-part and granted-in-part a VirnetX Motion for Entry of Judgment and for Equitable and Statutory Relief....

In early November, we reported that Apple had begun seeding versions of OS X Mavericks 10.9.1 and 10.9.2 to employees within the its Software Engineering division. Since then, Apple provided two OS X 10.9.1 seeds to registered developers. These builds focus on improvements to Mail, Voice Over, and general system stability. The update will serve as the first point-update to the recently released OS X Mavericks. Now, we’ve learned that Apple has provided build 13B40 of 10....

Just a month after the release of Developer Preview 2, Apple seeded OS X Mountain Lion Developer Preview 3 (build 12A178q) today to developers. There is no word on new features, but like always, we are working to find those quickly. Apple listed a number of known issues with this build—as seen after the break. Registered members can grab the update at the Developer Center. Apple even seeded Xcode 4.4 Developer Preview 3 to developers, which is also available at the Developer Center....

In the midst of all the high-profile Samsung vs. Apple cases throughout courtrooms worldwide, some have missed the smaller court cases popping up that could have just as much of an impact depending on the outcome. Bloomberg reports Taipei-based semiconductor manufacturer Via Technologies Inc. is suing Apple based on three patents related to microprocessors in tablets and smartphones. The case was filed yesterday with the U.S. District Court in Delaware and seeks an order to prevent Apple from selling products that are covered by the three invention patents in the US....

Servant was one of the first Apple TV+ original shows announced last year, and Apple confirmed today that the psychological thriller has been renewed for a third season. This comes ahead of its second season premiere on January 15, 2021. The show debuted in 2019 with 10 intriguing episodes that tell the story of Leanne, a nanny who was hired by Dorothy and Sean Turner to take care of a baby who is actually a doll....

As we head into the weekend, all of today’s best deals are headlined the best price of the year on Apple Pencil 2 at $104. That’s alongside being able to save $199 on the M1 MacBook Pro and Razer’s Kishi iPhone game controller at $85. Hit the jump for all that and more in the latest 9to5Toys Lunch Break. Pair your new M1 iPad Pro with Apple Pencil 2 for $104 Verizon Wireless is currently offering the second-generation Apple Pencil for $104....

As Apple prepares for its official iOS 5 launch in the fall (likely in September), the company has unleashed their latest iOS beta as on over-the-air update. This over the air process will only work for those running iOS 5 beta 3. Apple warns that doing an OTA update will delete your photos and will require a physical re-sync: iOS 5 also includes all new notifications with Notification Center, iMessages, Newsstand, and more....

At WWDC earlier today, Apple revealed Mac OS X 10.11 El Capitan with a handful of new features, including improvements to Safari, new Spotlight capabilities, side-by-side window functionality, performance improvements, and more. Apple released a developer beta of El Capitan today via its developer portal, while also noting that a public beta will come in July. We have learned this evening, however, that Apple has also seeded a beta version of El Capitan to retail employees for testing....

New Refreshed Apple TV App with iOS 12.3 The emphasis of the new design is on curation and includes support for premium channels. “With the free iOS 12.3 and tvOS 12.3 software update, customers around the world can now subscribe to Apple TV channels within the Apple TV app — paying for only the ones they want — and watch on demand directly in the app. In the US, Apple TV channels include popular services such as HBO, Starz, SHOWTIME, Smithsonian Channel, EPIX, Tastemade and new services like MTV Hits, with more to be added over time,” Apple writes in today’s announcement....

Just a few days after releasing iOS 15 beta 2 to developers, Apple has now released an updated build that is still labeled as the second beta. The new release, however, features an updated build number and is rolling out now via an over-the-air update. The updated build of iOS 15 beta 2 is available to developers 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 registered developers....

In addition to seeding OS X 10.11.4 beta 5 to developers and public beta users, Apple today has also pushed beta 5 of watchOS 2.2, as well as tvOS 9.2 to developers. The builds come just a week after the fourth betas were released. watchOS 2.2 so far has added a totally revamped Apple Maps app and glance, and it’s required to use iOS 9.3 beta’s new multi-watch feature. The app includes a new screen of actions and Nearby search powered by Yelp....

Following the release of iOS 13.6, Apple today released watchOS 6.2.8 for Apple Watch users. The update adds support for the Car Key feature and it also enables ECG to three more countries. With Car Key, drivers can replace physical keys with their iPhone. As Apple demonstrated during the WWDC 2020 keynote, you can simply hold your iPhone close to the car’s door handle to unlock it using NFC technology. This feature also works with the Apple Watch Series 5 running watchOS 6....

Apple is releasing the first public beta of iOS 12.2 later today, three days after releasing its first iOS 12.2 developer beta on Thursday. With its first developer beta, we found evidence of a new generation of AirPods, the Apple News subscription service, new iPads and iPod touch, and many other changes and improvements. It’s likely that tvOS 12.2 public beta 1 and macOS 10.14.4 public beta 1 will also become available; we will update the post if they are released....

Like it previously has, Apple reminded users in an email this morning that the iWork.com public beta will shut down July 31. In the email, as seen below, Apple encourages users to grab their documents by closing time. iWork.com launched in January 2009 as a service for users to collaborate on iWork documents, with the ability to view, download, and comment on uploaded documents. Now Apple is pushing users to use iCloud, which offers a similar feature to store and edit documents....

An organization representing emergency services in more than 80 countries worldwide has said that Apple adding Advanced Mobile Location (AML) in iOS 11.3 is ‘huge news,’ having previously estimated that it would result in saving around 7500 lives over the next ten years … AML allows emergency services dispatchers to automatically pin-point the location of someone making a 911 call. It takes data from both GPS and WiFi chips to automatically transmit a location so precisely that it can not only identify the exact address, but sometimes even narrow down the location to a specific room....

It’s already Friday in Australia, and Apple’s Black Friday deals – aka ‘one day shopping event’ – have just gone live in the country. Apple is offering a Apple Store gift card worth up to A$210 (US$160) with the purchase of selected iPhones, iPads, Macs and Apple Watches … Apple’s Australian homepage has an ‘Imagination is a gift’ panel leading to a gifts page headed by the offer. Clicking through shows the following incentives in the form of an Apple Store Gift Card:...

Toshiba MacBook Air “blade” SSD – iFixit Anandtech notices that Apple’s newer MacBook Air shipments appear to contain Samsung-built SSDs versus Toshiba ones that originally shipped in the MacBook Air. It’s hard to pinpoint exactly when Apple made this change but it’s worth noting that our MacBook Air from late 2010 carries a Toshiba SSD and the one we purchased about a month ago carries a Samsung SSD. Additionally, iFixit’s teardown from 2010 features the Toshiba drive....

New banks and credit unions across the world are continuing to adopt Apple Pay, and 40 additional institutions have joined Apple’s list of participating partners since the last refresh earlier this month. Check out the latest Apple Pay banks below: 1880 Bank Argent Credit Union Bank of Sullivan Byline Bank CFSB Emprise Bank EverTrust Bank Extraco Banks First Citizens Bank (IA) First Northern Bank and Trust First Security Bank Generations Bank Great Lakes First Federal Credt Union Grinnell State Bank Horicon Bank Illiana Financial Credit Union Inspire Federal Credit Union Kings Federal Credit Union Lamar Bank and Trust Members Cooperative Credit Union Monterey Credit Union North American Savings Bank Oconee State Bank PCSB Bank Raymond James Bank Regional Missouri Federal Credit Union River Valley Credit Union Sanborn Savings Bank Seamen’s Bank Sharonview Federal Credit Union State Bank Financial TAP FCU Texas Tech Federal Credit Union The Lowell Five The Middlefield Banking Company Union Square Credit Union United Bank (AR, CT, and MA now) Unity Catholic Credit Union In the UK, Danske Bank also joins the list of participating institutions while Tesco Bank no longer claims to only work with credit transactions....