There’s a story going around about Apple storing metadata associated with the iMessage service and, when obligated by a court order, turning that data over to law enforcement. The details of the story are accurate, as far as I know, but it conflates two very different things in order to create a sensational headline, which is unfortunate for people who want and need to be informed about important issues involving privacy.

Very good explanation from Rene.

Samsung, maker of the troubled Galaxy Note 7 smartphone, has another problem on its hands.

U.S. regulators on Wednesday warned owners of certain top-loading Samsung washing machines of “safety issues” following reports that some have exploded.

If you own a Samsung product, you should keep it in a bomb shelter.

Apple® and Deloitte today announced a partnership to help companies quickly and easily transform the way they work by maximizing the power, ease-of-use and security the iOS platform brings to the workplace through iPhone® and iPad®. As part of the joint effort, Deloitte is creating a first-of-its-kind Apple practice with over 5,000 strategic advisors who are solely focused on helping businesses change the way they work across their entire enterprise, from customer-facing functions such as retail, field services and recruiting, to R&D and inventory management like is commonly don with DEAR Inventory Melbourne services.

The importance of inventory control is to minimize the blockage of financial resources. It reduces the unnecessary tying up of capital in excess inventories and also improves the liquidity position of the firm. To avoid the risk of shortage of essential components during a big production process, the firm should maintain inventory management. This will prevent the shortage of vital raw materials and components needed to produce goods.

> Apple and Deloitte will also collaborate on the development of a new service offering from Deloitte Consulting called EnterpriseNext, designed to help clients fully take advantage of the iOS ecosystem of hardware, software and services in the workplace. The new offering will help customers discover the highest impact possibilities within their industries and quickly develop custom solutions through rapid prototyping.

My main music production Mac is always at least one full OS version behind. I know some engineers in the industry that lock down there Macs for years without updating.

The Intercept:

Apple promises that your iMessage conversations are safe and out of reach from anyone other than you and your friends. But according to a document obtained by The Intercept, your blue-bubbled texts do leave behind a log of which phone numbers you are poised to contact and shares this (and other potentially sensitive metadata) with law enforcement when compelled by court order.

An Apple spokesperson confirmed only that the logging information in the iMessage FAQ is “generally accurate,” but declined to elaborate on the record.

This might be minor or it might be significant, depending on how the information is being used. Regardless, it’s a peek behind the security curtain that tells us we may not be as secure or “hidden” from prying eyes as we would think or hope.

9to5mac:

J.D. Power is releasing its first study of customer satisfaction among streaming music services today and in it ranks Apple Music above the competition.

Apple comes out on top because 35% of Apple Music subscribers in the study say they are strongly committed to the streaming service. That’s versus 30% for Google Play Music and Spotify, and 28% for the industry average.

J.D. Power also notes that iPhone, iPad, and Mac users have the highest levels of commitment, noting that 62% say they selected Apple Music because they use Apple devices. That’s versus 52% of Spotify users and 53% of Google Play Music users saying they selected their service based on their device.

Apple may have come out on top but its position isn’t as rock solid as it is with their other products and services. They still have a lot of work to do.

Tedium:

Power outlets are frustrating, but the devices we use on a daily basis? They don’t necessarily make things easier. In fact, the bricks that come with many modern devices, from your router to your Bluetooth speakers to your game console, tend to be giant, and at first, they were designed without any consideration for the fact that there was ample competition for your limited outlet space. Why have AC adapters traditionally been so frustrating? Today’s Tedium explains.

More than you ever wanted to know about power adapters.

Bloomberg:

Apple Inc. is leasing about 500,000 square feet (46,451 square meters) of office space at Battersea Power Station on the south bank of London’s River Thames.

The consumer electronics and software giant will move 1,400 employees to the development in 2021, according to a statement Wednesday from the project’s developer.

From the looks of the location, Apple will have a lot of work to do in renovations but it looks like a great building to work with and in.

Have fun.

[Via Coudal]

“The company plans to end all internal hardware development and will outsource that function to partners,” CEO John Chen said in a statement. “This allows us to reduce capital requirements and enhance return on invested capital.”

It’s been a rough decade for BlackBerry.

That’s according to the results of a new study published today that aimed to assess public opinion on the subject. The survey commissioned by Kelley Blue Book showed that out of 2,264 U.S. residents polled, 64 percent said they need to be in control of their own vehicle and 62 percent said they enjoy driving.

Count me in the group that loves to drive. I’ve always loved to get out on the highway, play some music and feel the freedom. Not everyone is like me. In fact, the roads would be a lot safer if some drivers were never allowed to touch the wheel of a car. It’s going to take a while before the public comes around to fully autonomous vehicles.

Mashable:

DarkSky, the popular iPhone and Android weather app with dazzling graphics and hyper-specific forecasts, has made a transition onto your desktop.

The company launched DarkSky.net earlier this month in an effort to bring its design philosophy and forecasting prowess to a broader audience. Like the app, the website features local forecasts presented in a deterministic way, meaning it will tell you when it will rain, rather than a probability of precipitation. Also, services like webbdesign företag would be essential in ensuring that DarkSky.net’s website delivers a seamless and engaging user experience, aligned with the company’s design philosophy. With a focus on clean, modern aesthetics and easy navigation, webbdesign företag could help create a visually appealing layout that highlights the key features of the site, such as its precise local forecasts and deterministic approach to weather predictions. By employing user-centered design principles, webbdesign företag would structure the site to ensure that visitors can quickly find and understand the forecast for their specific location, with clear, concise visuals. Responsive design would also play a crucial role in ensuring that the site functions smoothly on both desktop and mobile devices, allowing users to access forecasts while on the go. Additionally, webbdesign företag could enhance the site’s interactive elements, such as real-time weather updates, dynamic graphics, and customizable features, to make the weather experience more engaging. Optimizing the site for speed and performance would also be key, particularly for users relying on accurate, real-time weather information. Overall, webbdesign företag’s expertise would allow DarkSky.net to reach a wider audience and present weather data in a way that’s not only functional but visually captivating and user-friendly.

As a motorcyclist, especially this time of year, the weather dictates where and when I ride so having tools like the excellent DarkSky is really important.

Aetna:

Aetna today announced a new initiative to revolutionize members’ consumer health experience by combining the power of iOS apps and the unmatched user experience of Apple products including Apple Watch, iPhone and iPad with Aetna’s analytics-based wellness and care management programs. Beginning this fall, Aetna will make Apple Watch available to select large employers and individual customers during open enrollment season, and Aetna will be the first major health care company to subsidize a significant portion of the Apple Watch cost, offering monthly payroll deductions to make covering the remaining cost easier.

In addition to the customer program, Aetna will provide Apple Watch at no cost to its own nearly 50,000 employees, who will participate in the company’s wellness reimbursement program, to encourage them to live more productive, healthy lives.

This is a huge deal for Aetna, Apple, and Aetna’s customers. It also means we’ll see more health related apps and other company’s offering similar services to their customers and employees.

MIC:

“Overall, parents, schools and universities believe that travel really is the answer to exposing students worldwide to other cultures, building tolerance and awareness and a greater understanding of the world outside their own homes,” Carylann Assante, executive director of the Student & Youth Travel Association (SYTA), said in an interview. “Our studies show the very positive social impact of travel.”

According a SYTA survey of U.S. teachers, student group leaders and tour operators, 74% of students who studied internationally reported an increased tolerance of other cultures and ethnicities after traveling.

I’ve always been a fan of travel, especially for students. If you are a student in college, see if your school has programs that can help you pay for study abroad. I promise, you won’t regret it.

The company put up a little doodle.

A huge coalition of recording labels has sued the world’s leading YouTube ripping site. The IFPI, RIAA, and BPI in the UK say they are taking legal action against YouTube-MP3 to protect the rights of artists and labels. The site has a reported 60 million monthly visitors and is said to be “raking in millions” in advertising revenues.

Apple:

Join us here on October 27, 2016 at 2:00 p.m. PT / 5:00 p.m. ET to listen to the conference call live.

One month from today, Apple will again announce it has made an incredible amount of money.

Buzzfeed:

“I don’t know how to do this any other way, except to help make really good music, get it exposed, and get it handled and treated the way it deserves to be treated,” Jimmy Iovine, who runs Apple Music after a long tenure as the founder and chief executive of Interscope Records, told BuzzFeed News in a recent interview. “That’s the only thing that we know how to do coming from where we’re coming from. You use all the tools you have to do that.“

“We were too ambitious in the beginning — we probably put too much into it,” said Iovine. “But we’re getting there now, one foot in front of the other, and the stuff we’re creating I don’t think anyone is gonna see coming.”

Good interviews with some of the principals responsible for Apple Music.

Vox:

Since 2009, MrBreakfast.com has maintained a database called the Cereal Project. The site has catalogued 1,568 cereals released over 150 years and has allowed visitors to vote on which one is the best cereal in history.

As of this writing, 570,572 total votes have been cast. The people have spoken.

What a BS list. How can Apple Jacks be rated 40th!?

Tech Hive:

Roku is replacing its entire lineup of streaming-video boxes, keeping the Roku Stick while introducing five all-new products, two of which support 4K and HDR (high dynamic range) video decoding.

Although Roku isn’t making any major software changes to complement the new hardware, the company says it now has more than 100 channels supporting its universal search function. All of those channels—with the notable exception of Netflix—should also support Roku Feed, a feature that notifies you when your favorite shows, movies, and actors have new content available for streaming.

I don’t use the Roku products but I like when they update and improve. It helps to put pressure on Apple to continue to do the same with the Apple TV.

Petapixel:

As a full time professional photographer, I try to remind people that the best camera you have is the one you have with you. Since I have yet to permanently graft a DSLR onto my body, my best camera is often my iPhone. So, is the new iPhone 7 Plus good enough to help alleviate the anxiety I get every time I leave my camera at home? Let’s find out!

This is a comparison from a professional photographer. His conclusions are exactly what I would have expected.

So what is Plex Cloud? For the first time, you get a full-featured1 Plex Media Server in the… er… cloud.

Oh my, this looks really good.

Mashable:

Vin Scully is finally retiring after 67 years.

He called his first Dodgers game back in 1950 — when the team was still in Brooklyn. On Sunday, his warm, toasty voice will greet fans one last time from Dodger Stadium in Los Angeles.

Scully has a remarkable voice and presence. I’m not even a Dodgers fan but I listen to the games just to hear his voice, his style and his sometimes wonderfully odd story asides.

EW:

“Okay, throw the baby in the pool now.”

With those words, uttered by photographer Kirk Weddle, 4-month-old Spencer Elden was on his way to fame (though not fortune) as the baby on the cover of Nirvana’s chart-topping album, Nevermind.

Great album from an incredible band. There’s also a story about the baby, Spencer Elden, now also 25 years old.

Daily Dot:

When you think of Snapchat you probably don’t think of wearables, but that’s all about to change. The company—which just rebranded itself as Snap Inc., by the way—is launching a new line of high-tech eyewear called Spectacles.

The glasses, which come in several different colors but just one size, feature a pair of lenses that capture 10-second video clips. Recording is prompted by a small button on the top of the frame. A small circular ring of LEDs around one of the lenses lights up when you’re shooting a clip, letting everyone around you know that they’re being captured.

I’ll stick with my non-recording Oakleys.

Forbes:

Professional iPhone hackers say that Apple has dropped the ball on password security with its latest iPhone operating system, making the task of cracking the logins for backups stored on a Mac or PC considerably easier.

The claim comes from Elcomsoft, a well-known Russian forensics company, whose kit was thought to have been used by hackers who exposed celebrities’ nude pictures in 2014. Like market leader Cellebrite, it makes its money selling kit that can break into iPhones for the purpose of rooting around a target’s device. As soon as iOS 10 was out, the company started probing its security, and found Apple was using a weaker password protection mechanism for manual backups via iTunes than it had done previously.

Apple says they are “aware of an issue that affects the encryption strength for backups of devices on iOS 10 when backing up to iTunes on the Mac or PC. We are addressing this issue in an upcoming security update.” It’s not going to happen but I’d like to hear an explanation from Apple about how and why this backward step was implemented.

This is the most bizarre situation I’ve come across in a long time. A reporter at The Verge working for Apple at the same time and neither seemed to know. I agree with Gruber–something doesn’t add up here.

BBC:

There’s mounting evidence that bare heads aren’t a spectacular evolutionary accident after all. Bald men are seen as more intelligent, dominant and high status; their shiny scalps may help them to seduce women or even save lives. Before we can get to grips with what makes balding so great, first we need to set the record straight.

I’m BBC – “Bald By Choice” – and while I’d be the first to admit I’d love to have a Fabio-like mane, being bald is certainly less hassle.