Originally published at: http://appletalk.com.au/2016/11/thursday-morning-news241116/
Apple has teased a one-day shopping event on their website. This Friday will be Black Friday in the US, and while Australians are somewhat removed from Thanksgiving culture, Apple’s one-day shopping event on Friday appears to be a worldwide thing, with deals online and extended shopping hours on the day.
While we’re all waiting for AirPods, there’s also the release of the similar BeatsX for wireless earphone aficionados to look forward to. Rumour has it BeatsX will be released sometime in December, with a few different online retailers putting December dates on the BeatsX.
An older article from Neil Cybart says Jony Ive is making people uneasy with some of his recent design decisions. It’s impossible to know for sure how much influence Ive has at Apple, but you can see glances here and there, which leads to criticism of his latest work and the questioning of how Apple will continue to do as a design-focused company who also wants to excel at the customer experience.
But rumours are a tricky thing, as many people also believe Ive is no longer involved with the design of the iPhone or Macs. Even John Gruber admits to the theory that Ive is now working on architectural design or other projects and has stepped away from product design, as evidenced by the popularity of the Christmas tree project by Ive and Marc Newson.
Thankfully, later Gruber clarifies things by posting about Ive’s role at Apple. Gruber says Ive’s appointment to Chief Design Officer reflects his increased authority over design at Apple, even if that means he’s spending time doing architectural details for the new Apple campus, or working on side-projects here and there.
Six Colors’ review of the MacBook Pro with Touch Bar says that it’s still too early to say if the Touch Bar is as innovative as Apple are claiming. There’s no denying it adds an extra dimension to the keyboard by providing another input method, but there’s a good chance we’ll know what works and what doesn’t in the next couple of months. Until that time, people have been asking for Touch ID on Macs for a long time, and the Touch Bar delivers the goods on that front.
The new MacBook Pro with Touch Bar renders content in FCPX twice as fast as the original Retina MacBook Pro, which 9to5Mac notes is a perfectly reasonable comparison given that many people will hang onto their computers for about 4-5 years. The article concludes that the MacBook Pro with Touch Bar is “surprisingly usable”.
Everyone’s favourite analyst Ming-Chi Kuo says next year’s iPhone will feature an all-glass casing in order to support wireless charging. Such a design would not only mitigate many issues with wireless charging mostly-metal devices, but also satisfy an Ive-related goal of creating a device that looks like a single piece of glass.
President-elect Donald Trump has said that he wants Apple to make products in America, and he’s willing to offer the company a “very large tax cut”, among other incentives. It seems unlikely that Apple would consider manufacturing the iPhone in America.
Apple’s holiday ad for this year is Frankie’s Holiday. It starts off a little weird, but ends up OK in the end and delivers an important message, although I’m not sure it resonates with me as much as last year’s ad did.
RRP it is…