Just checked. In stock. Get ’em while they last.

Jason Snell, Six Colors:

When I’m traveling with only my iPhone and iPad, I can record audio on an external device—an SD-card recorder from Zoom, usually—but how do I get those files onto my iOS device? iOS can’t see the contents of a standard SD card.

And:

It’s still a little bit silly that, now that iOS has a file-management app, you still can’t plug in a mass storage device via a USB adapter and copy files off of it directly.

And this from John Gruber:

Apple even makes an SD card reader for iOS devices. It just seems downright wrong that it only allows you to import photos to your camera roll. Clearly a connected SD card ought to show up as a source in the iOS 11 Files app, right?

To me, the inability of iOS to handle external drives, SD-cards, etc., is a barrier to an iPad becoming a first class computing citizen.

Benjamin Mayo, 9to5Mac:

It took almost six months since the initial murmurings, but Apple and Amazon have finally resolved their differences. The Apple TV 4K and fourth-generation Apple TV are available to buy from Amazon.com, following the launch of the Prime Video tvOS app earlier this month.

Checked it just now, here’s what I see:

Here’s a US link to the Apple TV 4K – 32GB. Hopefully, Apple and Amazon will work the stock issue out in the next day or so.

Roger Fingas, AppleInsider:

When users tap the button to listen to a song, the app will now save a sample for upload when internet access returns. A notification should pop up once a result is ready. The Android version of Shazam previously had equivalent offline support.

“Apple’s Shazam”. Weird to hear, but yup, Shazam is now all Apple’s.

Smart addition. Glad to have this in iOS.

Back in August this year, Apple replaced the App Store logo consisting of pencil, ruler, and paintbrush with the new logo featuring three plain sticks (kind of) on iOS and MacOS. According to KON, the new logo of the App Store on iOS and MacOS is a clear violation of the Chinese copyright law.

There is no doubt that they are the same. Apple has been using a similar looking logo for years, so it’ll be interesting to see if they argue that it was just changing what it was already using. We’ll see.

Last week, we ran a post titled iPhone 6s running slow? Consider replacing your battery.

In response to the referenced reddit thread, Geekbench founder John Poole did some testing. If the battery/performance issue is of interest, this is a fascinating read.

Grab a link to an Amazon product you are considering buying, or to an App on the App Store.

Next, fire up this URL in your browser, and paste the link in the text field, tap the Analyze button. There will be some chugging, machine learning at work, and then you’ll get some results, an assessment of the reviews for the product in question.

This is not an endorsement for Fakespot. Time will tell how accurate their assessments of fake reviews are. But this is certainly interesting, a step down the machine learning path, showing what’s possible and what’s definitely coming.

Worth a look.

Jean-Louis Gassée, Monday Note:

Apple execs have had to eat their words after strong but imprudent pronouncements. For example, thus spake Steve Jobs at an August 2010 iOS 4 event:

“It’s like we said on the iPad, if you see a stylus, they blew it. In multitasking, if you see a task manager… they blew it. Users shouldn’t ever have to think about it.”

And:

When Jony Ive explains that Apple didn’t make a stylus but something “more profound”, a Pencil, we welcome the change of mind while smiling at the language Apple’s Chief Design Officer uses to share his insights in the matter of writing instruments and bridging the gap between the analogue (using Sir Jony’s British spelling) and digital worlds.

But this is more than Jean-Louis pointing out Apple crow-eating opportunities. As you read his (as always) well-written reasoning, you’ll explore the real premise:

How far will reversals go?

I’ll start with something I consider unlikely: The introduction of tablet features to the Mac. For Mac laptops, Apple has issued a strong edict: The ergonomically correct way to use a laptop it to keep your hands on the horizontal plane, no lifting one’s arm to touch the screen, no matter how tempting. The MacBook Pro’s Touch Bar keeps our hands where they belong, on the desk.

This is a terrific read. But I agree with Jean-Louis, a Mac iPad merger is not likely. But he does go down an interesting path. An ARM-based Mac? I definitely can see that happening.

Especially with this precedent.

Malcolm Owen, AppleInsider:

According to the Apple website, orders in the United States for all combinations of color and capacity of the iPhone X are claimed to be “In Stock” for deliveries, with orders arriving with customers as soon as “Tomorrow.” This appears to apply to devices for all four major carriers, as well as the SIM-free variant.

Bottom line, supply has caught up with demand, and there’s still time to get an iPhone X in time for Festivus.

New York Times:

For much of the last week, I have been trying to persuade the world’s most powerful search engine to remove my photo from biographical details that belong to someone else. A search for “Rachel Abrams” revealed that Google had mashed my picture from The New York Times’s website with the Wikipedia entry for a better-known writer with the same name, who died in 2013.

And:

When an acquaintance said she was alarmed to read that I had passed away, it seemed like an error worth correcting.

And so began the quest to convince someone at Google that I am alive.

This is a riveting story, a trip down the rabbit hole trying to convince Google to change something they are locked in certain is correct.

This reminds me of another story, about Google’s algorithmic approach to deleting videos they found objectionable, which cut funding from videos that got caught in the bigger sweep. To read about this, Google (ironically) the term adpocalypse.

Go to the site, type in your address, and it will list the “consumer providers” available at that address. I found this interesting and useful.

UPDATE: Even better, via Drew Leavitt, check out broadbandnow.com. More detail and, I suspect, more accurate.

If you were thinking about picking up AirPods as a Christmas gift, better get moving. eBay is an obvious solution, but if you head to iStockNow, you might be able to find a set at original pricing.

Nellie Andreeva, Deadline:

Ronald D. Moore is heading back to space. Apple has given a straight-to-series order to a space drama from the Battlestar Galactica developer. The untitled project hails from Sony Pictures Television and Moore’s studio-based Tall Ship Productions.

Created and written by Moore, along with Fargo co-executive producers Matt Wolpert and Ben Nedivi, the untitled series explores what would have happened if the global space race had never ended. Tall Ship Prods.’ Moore and Maril Davis executive produce with Wolpert and Nedivi.

Ronald D. Moore was one of the creators and main writers of the excellent Battlestar Galactica. I’ve got high hopes for this one. Fingers crossed.

How excellent was Battlestar Galactica? Watch the video below to see what happens if you start watching it. And if you liked the video, click here to watch the second half, which brings some recognizable Battlestar faces into the action.

Zac Hall, 9to5Mac:

Scott Killian never imagined his Apple Watch might save his life, but that’s exactly what happened a few weeks ago when he had a heart attack in the middle of the night. Killian recently shared his personal experience with 9to5Mac, and the details of his story are absolutely amazing.

This is a great story, worth reading and sharing. A tremendous side benefit that ships with your Apple Watch and a sign of the health benefits to come as this technology matures.

An interesting post by Brian Bien on Amazon fake reviews, with an example of three very different reviews of the same product, all of which had this exact sentence:

The light can be pretty bright, you can adjust it where it’ll be dim and slowly brighten 30 minutes before the alarm time.

Brian makes the point:

Amazon – who has some of the world’s most advanced ML – really needs to step up its review fraud detection game. Imagine how great the Amazon shopping experience would be if we could trust its reviews.

This is one of the great potential values of machine learning. Apple’s early machine learning frameworks focused on two specific areas: Image Recognition and Natural Language Processing. Image recognition helps pick out images of cats, or roses, or your best friend Francis from your photo library. Natural Language Processing (NLP) focuses on parsing streams of text to pull out relevant details.

The fake reviews problem is a perfect problem for NLP and machine learning. There’s really no reason Amazon can’t do better. Maybe Apple could give them a hand.

Malcolm Owen, AppleInsider:

Apple is making the decision for customers acquiring the iMac Pro to pick up AppleCare+ with their purchase easier, by keeping the price of the extended warranty service the same as for the iMac despite the increase in hardware cost.

AppleCare+ for the iMac Pro is $169, same as the iMac. AppleCare+ for the Mac Pro is $249.

I’ve always seen AppleCare as an insurance model. More expensive devices equals more expensive coverage cost.

Begs the question, when the Mac Pro ships next year (fingers crossed), will AppleCare+ coverage be priced in line with the iMac Pro? Is this a new cap on AppleCare?

It also begs the question, will the coming Mac Pro be cheaper than the iMac Pro?

Why? Well, the iMac Pro ships with an integrated 5K display. Presumably, the Mac Pro will be standalone. It might have more expensive components, but my thinking is, the cost of the 5K display should more than offset that cost (Insert “I’m no expert caveat” here).

Rene Ritchie, iMore:

This isn’t a beloved tower reimagined inside Darth Vader’s helmet — an OpenCL monster designed for a future that never quite materialized. This is the same iMac many of us already know and love, just gutted of its consumer-grade engine and rebuilt for a very different kind of pro. The kind that was already sold on the all-in-one but always wished it was hit by enough gamma rays to make it more hulkingly pro.

And that’s exactly what Apple is delivering: A sleek space-gray chassis filled to the aluminum limit with next-generation Intel, AMD, and Apple muscle. Starting at $4999.

This is richly researched, well written. Rene has pulled together a real technologist’s view of the iMac Pro. There’s a lot to learn here, especially the deep dive into the Intel Xeon W processors at the heart of the iMac Pro.

Just go read it. Does this guy ever sleep?

There are currently 20 partners on the page. Worth a look. From the fine print:

Offer valid in the U.S. only, while supplies last. Limit one App Store & iTunes Gift Card per partner.

Makes me wonder how these sorts of partnerships work. Is this $5 straight out of Apple’s pockets, a promotion to help push Apple Pay use? Do the partners kick in some or all of that $5 for the exposure on Apple’s site?

Stephen Hackett, MacStories:

When thinking about the earliest days of Apple, it’s easy to recall the Apple I, the Apple II line and the Macintosh. However, there’s one more computer that defined Apple’s early years. This computer was ground-breaking but incredibly expensive, and exposed many things wrong within Apple itself.

The Lisa launched 35 years ago next month. Today, it is mostly considered as a precursor to Mac. While that is true, it doesn’t come close to doing this computer justice.

Apple Lisa was an incredibly important part of Apple’s history. This is a terrific read. Don’t miss the embedded and linked videos.

Matt Birchler has his magnum opus, a massive 8-part, 13,000 word review of Android Oreo. But written with iOS in mind.

It’s a worthwhile read, lots of talking points, a chance to see what switching to Android would be like.

If you are considering the move, read this first. Nice job, Matt.

At WWDC this year, Apple announced it would soon offer its own podcast analytics service for show creators who publish on Apple Podcasts. Today, that service has launched into beta, offering podcasters the ability to track unique devices and playback metrics for their podcasts, including when listeners drop off in the middle of a show.

This is great news. It only tracks iOS 11 on mobile devices, but people move to the latest iOS pretty quick on Apple devices, so that shouldn’t be much of a drawback.

Apple today announced a major update to its professional video editing app, Final Cut Pro X, with new features including 360-degree VR video editing, advanced color grading tools and support for High Dynamic Range (HDR) video. Optimized to take full advantage of the incredible performance capabilities of the all-new iMac Pro, Final Cut Pro users can now edit full-resolution 8K video for the first time on a Mac. Apple is also extending 360-degree VR video support to Final Cut Pro companion apps, Motion and Compressor.

Wow!

What you say is not nearly as important as what we hear.

We would all do well to remember this.

Amazon.com Inc will start selling Google Chromecast and Apple TV, which compete against its Fire TV, on its online store, an Amazon spokeswoman told Reuters on Thursday.

This is great news for Apple. Amazon is a huge reseller of products and it has a very strong brand—I would think a lot of people will go to Amazon to purchase Apple TV. Amazon Prime Video is also now available on Apple TV, so the two companies are mending the fences.

This will break your brain.

From Apple’s press release:

Apple today released iMac Pro, an entirely new product line designed for pro users who love the all-in-one design of iMac and require workstation-class performance. With Xeon processors up to 18 cores, up to 22 Teraflops of graphics performance, and a brilliant 27-inch Retina 5K display, iMac Pro is the fastest, most powerful Mac ever made. iMac Pro delivers incredible compute power for real-time 3D rendering, immersive VR, intensive developer workflows, high megapixel photography, complex simulations, massive audio projects and real-time 4K and 8K video editing.

There’s a lot more detail in the release. This is one beautifully designed, incredibly powerful machine.

But it’ll cost you.

I went on-line and worked through the various configurations.

The standard configuration priced out, as announced, at $4,999. I suspect that will be plenty of power for most users. Here’s what you get for that $5K:

• 3.2GHz 8-core Intel Xeon W processor, Turbo Boost up to 4.2GHz
• 32GB 2666MHz DDR4 ECC memory
• 1TB SSD
• Radeon Pro Vega 56 with 8GB of HBM2 memory
• Magic Mouse 2 – Space Gray
• Magic Keyboard with Numeric Keypad – US English – Space Gray

If you select all the hardware configuration extras, that bumps the price up to $13,199. Here’s what that looks like:

• 2.3GHz 18-core Intel Xeon W processor, Turbo Boost up to 4.3GHz
• 128GB 2666MHz DDR4 ECC memory
• 4TB SSD
• Radeon Pro Vega 64 with 16GB of HBM2 memory
• Magic Mouse 2 – Space Gray
• Magic Keyboard with Numeric Keypad – US English – Space Gray

It’d be interesting to see some benchmarks comparing these two configurations.

The $4,999 standard configuration promises delivery by December 28th.

The $13,199 souped up, hot rod configuration shows delivery at 6-8 weeks (Jan 25- Feb 8, if ordered today).