Vivendi confirmed the purchase this week, according to Bloomberg, and the deal puts Apple another step closer to wrapping up its buyout deal with Beats. Vivendi's 13 percent stake in the company had been held by Universal Music Group, one of the other properties it owns and also the world's largest record label. Apple announced…
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U.S. Appeals Court Rules Microsoft Must Turn Over Email Hosted in Ireland
Microsoft's Deputy General Counsel has written about the original issue on Microsoft's site, discussing the challenge filed and outlined the reasons why it felt compelled to challenge the law in this case: It’s generally accepted that a U.S. search warrant in the physical world can only be used to obtain materials that are within the…
That Time the iPhone Owner Punched His Mugger in the Face
TMO Artist's Rendering of the Event The incident took place in Elver Park in Madison, when a 20-year-old man was walking along the path and texting on his iPhone. According to an incident report published by the Madison Police Department, the iPhone owner was approached by a teenager from the other direction. The report described…
Bose Sues Apple Acquisition Beats for Patent Infringement
Bose wants an injunction prohibiting import of the infringing devices, financial compensation for past infringement. The Verge reported that the suit also seeks a complete accounting of, “all infringing sales and other infringing acts by Beats.” The patents in question involve noise cancelling properties in Beats Studio and Beats Studio Wireless headphones. Bose claimed in…
Judge Cote Calls Apple Ebook Settlement Unfair to Consumers
Judge Cote says Apple's Ebook price fixing settlement isn't fair to consumers Apple and the top book publishers were all accused of conspiring to artificially raise book prices by the Department of Justice, leading to a Federal trial before Judge Cote. The publishers all settled out of court to avoid potentially crippling fines, although Apple…
Sweet Design: the CODE Donut Bluetooth Speaker
Taotronics has released the CODE Donut Bluetooth Speaker, a rather unique portable Bluetooth speaker that is shaped like a donut. CODE Donut Bluetooth Speaker This speaker should appeal to teens and tweens because it is colorful and unique. The sound is satisfactory. A full charge on the 1000 mAh bettery provides up to eight hours…
Apple's Tim Cook Says iPad Sales Behind IBM Partnership
____________________ The initial remarks came during the call's preamble in which Tim Cook and CFO Luca Maestri summarized Apple's the hardware unit sales. For the second quarter in a row now, Tim Cook has had to explain a slight drop in iPad sales, both year over year and in successive quarters, and that has to…
Jot Touch with Pixelpoint: Like Adobe's Ink Stylus, but More Buttons
When Adonit teamed up with Adobe to bring the design software company's stylus to market, Ink and Slide (TMO review) weren't the only pieces of gear to take advantage of the technology because Adonit also released its own Jot Touch with with Pixelpoint pressure sensitive stylus for the iPad. It costs less than Adobe's Ink…
Voyager Q Conveniently Docks Your Extra SATA Drives
The Voyager Q dock from NewerTech allows you to access a 2.5- or 3.5-inch SATA drive with a Mac (or PC) using a conventional connection, USB, FireWire or eSATA. It's a boon for those moving on from the old Mac Pros but want to keep a SATA drive or two active. NewerTech's implementation is very…
Bill Campbell Retires from Apple's Board, Sue Wagner Joins
Apple announced on Thursday that Sue Wagner is joining its board of directors, while Silicon Valley legend Bill “Coach” Campbell is retiring. Ms. Wagner is a founding partner and a director at BlackRock, a Silicon Valley asset management firm, and she was named one of the 50 Most Powerful Women (#33) by Fortune in 2011.…
It's a Mistake to Declare Apple Supply Chain Rumors of Problems a Disaster
_______________________ When I read about issues Apple may be having with its production of sapphire, problems with the case or display or battery production problems, I assume that Apple is able to bring its own engineering and manufacturing expertise along with that of the supplier to bear. Perhaps I feel that way because I worked…
The Bidding is Open: Have Lunch With Apple's Eddy Cue
Charity Buzz has the details. Currently, the highest bid is at US$16,000. Bidding closes on Wednesday, July 16 at 2:20 PM EDT. You must bid at least $17,000 to bump the current high bid. Mr. Cue is a 25-year veteran of Apple, and lunch with him, while not likely to divulge any Apple secrets, would…
Poke a Used and Reset Android Phone: it'll Spill its Guts
What they found will alarm you. In contrast, iPhones use a hardware encryption, so when the encryption key is destroyed on a reset, the data is very hard to recover. Not so for Android phones apparently. Here's the story: “Hard Proof That Wiping Your Phone Doesn't Actually Delete Everything.” So … I'll never forget the…
Canaccord Raises AAPL Target to $112 on Strong iPhone 6 Expectations
“We believe the extended replacement rates combined with new larger-screen iPhones position Apple with its large installed base for record iPhone 6 sales,” Mr. Walkley said. “We believe Apple will charge a premium for these larger-screen iPhones resulting in stable gross margin trends for overall Apple but with a higher gross margin dollar contribution due…
CEO Satya Nadella Willing to Shed the Past and Reinvent Microsoft
Microsoft CEO Satya Nadells Source: Microsoft From the letter: More recently, we have described ourselves as a 'devices and services' company. While the devices and services description was helpful in starting our transformation, we now need to hone in on our unique strategy. At our core, Microsoft is the productivity and platform company for the…
Amazon Tries to Woo Authors in Hachette Dispute
The two companies are fighting over terms of an agreement for Amazon to sell Hachette titles. This is the first contract from one of the Big 4 publishers to come up for renewal following a settlement two years ago between the publishers and the U.S. Department of Justice. As such, there's a lot on the…
Samsung's Profits Decline on Weak Smartphone Sales
Weak smartphone sales hurt Samsung's Q2 numbers Adding salt to their wound, Samsung also said its tablet sales were “sluggish,” according to the Financial Times. The company thought demand for its Android-based mobile devices would be substantially higher in China and Europe, but actual sales didn't live up to expectations. Samsung didn't lay the blame…
Tim Cook May Be Planning Much-Needed Expansion for Apple's Board
Shopping for Apple Apple's board has also been quite stable. Hand-picked by the late Steve Jobs, four members have been served for more than ten years. Two of them—former Intuit CEO Bill “Coach” Campbell and current chairman and CEO of J. Crew Group Millard Drexler—have been there since shortly after Steve Jobs returned to Apple…
Twitter Shanghaied Email Notifications - Here's How to Take Them Back
First, go to Twitter and log in. When you're logged in, you'll see your timeline in the middle of the page. Click on the gear in the top right corner, and then click Settings from the menu that drops down. Why yes, that IS Neil Patrick Harris barefoot on a unicorn. Why do you ask?…
Ink and Slide: Adobe's Stylus Revolution
Adobe is finally making its first venture in to the hardware market, and it's doing so with the highly anticipated stylus and ruler combo it first teased a year ago. That combo, Ink and Slide, work together to turn your iPad into a full-on art tablet, but not like any stylus that's come before. At…
Analyst: Get Ready for a Fast Move to Blend iTunes, Beats Music
Apple will likely move fast to roll Beats Music into iTunes Mr. Garcha said in a statement to shareholders, With iTunes stores in 123 countries, 425 retail stores, App stores in 155 countries and an army of 800 [million] users, Apple could very quickly scale a music streaming service, given its existing reach and music…
iFixit Teardown Shows no Surprises in New 16GB iPod touch
The iFixit team said, We delved inside Apple's 'refreshed' device and found the same components we'd seen in Touches of yesteryear, but with 16 GB of on-board flash memory. So it's not really that this 16 GB variant gains a camera — instead, it loses half of its 32 GB of storage. That means the…
Google I/O 2014 Keynote Highlights: Wear, Cars, and 'L'
First off there's a new version of Android, so far without a dessert-y name, so it was referred to as “Android L.” One of the new features of this version is a feature called “personal unlock,” a rather clever way for the device to determine if it is in a trusted environment and if so,…
Samsung Legal Team gets $2M Fine for Leaking Apple Documents
Samsung, Quinn Emanuel hit with $2M document leak fine Quinn Emanuel came under fire for sharing the confidential documents with Samsung that were intended only for special witnesses. Samsung found itself in hot water for then allegedly using those documents to gain an unfair advantage in its own negotiations with Nokia, and for sharing the…