Originally published at: http://appletalk.com.au/2017/10/wednesday-morning-news111017/
Apple’s latest push into the world of original programming starts with a revival of Steven Spielberg’s Amazing Stories series. 10 new episodes will be produced at a cost of $5 million per episode, with Spielberg likely to serve as executive producer on the new series. The Verge has questions about how the series will be distributed, as they can’t see Spielberg settling for his new series as simply a value-add to Apple Music, like how Apple’s video efforts are currently distributed.
Either way, Billboard reports Apple Music will soon have another short film up its sleeve, with Niall Horan going on the record with Apple Music. The new short film will give fans a behind-the-scenes look at the production of Horan’s latest album, Flicker, with interviews and footage of the creation process.
Apple has released a white paper on its paper and packaging strategy, outlining how the company aims to reduce its environmental impact by being more efficient with paper and packaging use, as well as how responsibly sourcing paper and using recycled materials where possible contributes to a lower environmental footprint.
A survey from CNBC says something like 64% of Americans own an Apple product, with the average US household owning 2.6 Apple products. The last time the survey was run in 2012, about 1 in 2 Americans owned an Apple product, with the average household owning 1.6 Apple products. That’s not a bad increase for Apple, and to have that kind of market penetration is kind of impressive.
A new Apple patent sees the company investigating self-adjusting Apple Watch bands. The patent for “dynamic fit adjustment for wearable electronic devices” patent describes watch bands that are self-tensioning via some kind of mechanism, either extending out from the device housing or using some kind of internal volume changer to properly secure the wrist-worn wearable.
Security researcher Felix Krause has demonstrated a phishing attack which prompts for a user’s Apple ID password. The only problem is, it’s a third-party app that’s displaying the text box, and it’s very hard to distinguish between an official pop-up and one displayed by a third-party app, as they both use the same style of pop-up, but there are a few ways you can tell if the pop-up is legitimate or not.
Our friends across the pond are adding their second bank to Apple Pay, with the Bank of New Zealand adding Apple Pay “soon”. Stuff writes that New Zealand’s favoured Eftpos technology may win out over Apple Pay for retailers, with Apple Pay still being the more niche technology.
An all-new Twitterrific has landed on macOS, following a successful Kickstarter period. Available for $30.99 on the Mac App Store, Twitterrific 5 features a clean timeline layout, a bunch of customisable options, and is of course designed for the Mac, including full support for Notification Centre, Retina displays, and more.
A review of the new Twitterrific from Six Colors says it’s a great Twitter client for the Mac, with much the same caveats that come with all third-party Twitter clients on all platforms. Being a 1.0, there’s also things that you might want that are missing, but it seems likely that they’ll be added in over time. MacStories has a similar review, pointing out features which didn’t make the cut.
The consensus on fast-charging the iPhone 8 using Apple’s higher wattage USB-C power adapters is that there’s a 12W sweet spot that you should be aiming for. If you have a fairly recent iPad, it should have come with a 12W charger in the box, and that’s the one you should be using with your iPhone 8 or 8 Plus. You can get faster charging using a 29W or even the 61W or 87W USB-C charger for the MacBook Pros, but it’s hardly a change that’s worth the extra expense.