Innehållsförteckning för #350 från AppleMagazine

Wouldn’t it be amazing if there was a way for you to access an array of exciting new software features on your Apple devices months before most Apple customers? Indeed, there is a way: joining the Apple Beta Software Program. This lets you test-drive the next major versions of iOS, macOS and tvOS months before their expected arrivals to mainstream audiences this fall. However, joining the beta program carries both benefits and caveats that are worth heeding before you go ahead. MAPPING OUT THE ISSUES THANKS TO APPLE MAPS Unlike many Apple services which we now take for granted, such as iTunes, iMessage and iCloud, the Apple beta testing program didn’t originate from Steve Jobs’ tenure at the Apple helm. Instead, it was a case of fruit, an apple or…

From Lee Deangelis’ perspective, “once you get 100 feet up, everything looks better.” A full-time IT professional at the University of Scranton and self-described amateur filmmaker, Deangelis bought his first drone four years ago as the burgeoning technology began to take off among hobbyists. He hoped to experiment with new aerial perspectives and got the chance when Scranton Cooperage caught fire in June 2014, sending plumes of black smoke into the air above his Jessup home. “It was right outside my door, so I just happened to send the drone up and got some pictures,” Deangelis said. “And that’s when I knew that’s what I wanted to do.” In the years since, Deangelis has gone from drone enthusiast to chief executive officer of his own drone-photography company, Access Aerial, an…

Two of Alphabet’s high-flying startups are leaving the nest. Loon and Wing are graduating from X, Alphabet’s secretive incubator known as the “moonshot factory.” Loon aims to deliver internet signals via hot air balloons, while Wing builds airborne delivery drones. By graduating, they are considered full-fledged businesses and will be part of Alphabet’s“other bets,”aside from the company’s main cash cow, Google. They join companies like smart-thermostat maker Nest, health-data firm Verily and self-driving car company Waymo. Astro Teller, X’s captain of moonshots, says on a blog that the two companies now “seem a long way from crazy” after having started as X projects several years ago. Loon, for instance, provided internet service from the stratosphere to Puerto Rico after Hurricane Maria devastated the island last year.…

Facebook is facing its first financial penalty for allowing the data-mining firm Cambridge Analytica to forage through the personal data of millions of unknowing Facebook users. A U.K. government office that investigated the Cambridge Analytica scandal announced its intention to fine Facebook 500,000 pounds ($663,000) for failing to safeguard that user information. The amount is the maximum that the agency, the Information Commissioner’s Office, can levy for violation of Britain’s data-privacy laws. The penalty is a pittance for Facebook, which generates that sum roughly every seven minutes, based on its first-quarter revenue of $11.97 billion. But it would represent the first tangible punishment for the company’s privacy scandal, which tarnished its reputation, temporarily pushed down its shares and forced CEO Mark Zuckerberg to testify before Congress, but otherwise led to…

Outlaws ‘tile the End, Vol. 1 DevilDriver Outlaws ‘tile the End revisits some classic outlaw country songs, but it is definitely still a Metal album at heart and is true to DevilDriver’s much loved sound. The band’s decision to re-imagine western classics and add their own Metal edge is certainly unusual but, somehow, it works. FIVE FACTS: 1. This album has been called “their darkest yet”, despite it being a covers album. 2. This is the band’s eighth album, and although it is a set of country covers, this is certainly still a Metal album. 3. One of the album’s guest singers, Hank Williams III, has performed a number of concerts that feature both country and metal sets. 4. The band was originally named Deathride, but due to copyright issues,…

Drake officially owns the Billboard charts, where seven of his songs currently sit in the Top 10. All 25 tracks from Drake’s ultra-popular “Scorpion” album, released on June 29, are on the Billboard Hot 100 chart. His former No. 1 hit, “Nice for What,” returns to the top of the chart, while “Nonstop” debuts at No. 2. Drake’s other songs in the Top 10 are “God’s Plan,”“In My Feelings,”“I’m Upset,” “Emotionless” and “Don’t Matter to Me,” which includes previously recorded vocals from Michael Jackson. Drake’s new feat breaks the Beatles’ 1964 record, when five of their songs reached the Top 10 in the same week. Overall, Drake has 31 Top 10 hits, tied with Rihanna. They only trail behind The Beatles (34) and Madonna (38). “Scorpion” sold 732,171 equivalent albums…

NASA’s Kepler Space Telescope is almost out of fuel and has been forced to take a nap. Flight controllers placed the planet-hunting spacecraft into hibernation last week to save energy. It will remain asleep until early August, when controllers attempt to send down the data collected before observations were interrupted. Kepler has been searching for planets outside our solar system for nearly a decade. Considered the pioneer of planet hunting, it’s discovered nearly 3,000 confirmed worlds and as many potential candidates. Launched in 2009, Kepler has endured mechanical failures and other mishaps. But there’s no getting around an empty fuel tank. The fuel is needed for pointing the telescope. Kepler’s antenna must be pointed toward Earth to get the most recent observations back. For now, that’s the team’s highest priority.…

BMW Group and the biggest Chinese SUV brand, Great Wall Motor, announced a partnership to produce electric MINI vehicles in China as global automakers ramp up development under pressure from Beijing. The companies said they signed an agreement Monday during an event in Berlin attended by Chinese Premier Li Keqiang and German Chancellor Angela Merkel. BMW and Great Wall said their venture, Spotlight Automotive Ltd., also will make electrics for the Chinese partner’s brand. Automakers are pouring billions of dollars into creating electric models for China, the biggest market for the technology. Beijing is using access to its market as leverage to induce global automakers to help Chinese brands develop battery and other technology. Auto brands in China are required to make electric vehicles at least 10 percent of their…

Paul Petroskey - also known as “Weird Paul” - had been waiting for something like YouTube for decades. Petroskey considers himself the “Original Vlogger.”The 47-year-old Bethel Park native had hours of video tapes that he recorded in the ’80s and ’90s that included homemade music videos starring his family, a review of McDonald’s breakfast items, homemade award shows and whatever else the teenager found interesting. “As soon as YouTube came about, I said, ’This would be great. We didn’t have this when I was making these back in the ’80s,’” Petroskey says. “I wanted to put it on YouTube because I knew it would be something interesting for people, because not everyone was alive then and the people that were, not all of them had video cameras.” However, he had…

Electric car producer Tesla will build its first factory outside the United States in Shanghai under an agreement signed this week, becoming the first wholly foreign-owned automaker in China. Tesla Inc.’s announcement comes amid mounting U.S.-Chinese tension over technology and follows Beijing’s April promise to end restrictions that required foreign automakers to work through local partners. Tesla said construction would begin in the near future, once official permits are obtained. It said production would begin two to three years after that and eventually increase to 500,000 vehicles annually. No financial details were announced. A city government statement said the factory would be the biggest foreign investment to date in Shanghai, a base for joint ventures between General Motors Co. and Volkswagen AG and a state-owned automaker. The signing ceremony was…

Twitter says it will begin removing suspicious accounts it has locked from its counts of users’ followers. Twitter users are likely to see a reduction in their follower counts in the coming days. For many, this will amount to a reduction of four followers or less. But large accounts of celebrities and public figures could see bigger drops. An account that’s been locked can’t tweet, like or retweet posts, and it won’t be shown ads. The company said Wednesday that the move will not affect its number of monthly or daily active user figures. In the first three months of the year, it had 336 million active users. Twitter has been working to remove fake accounts, bots and abusive posts from its service.…

Marvel Studios landed its 20th straight no. 1 box-office debut with an uncharacteristically small superhero for the swaggering comic-book juggernaut. “Ant-Man and the Wasp” opened with $75.8 million, according to final studio figures Monday. While not approaching the heights accustomed to by Thor or Captain America, Disney’s “Ant-Man” sequel easily surpassed the $57 million debut of the 2015 original. Befitting the summer season, the weekend’s top five films were all sequels. The films that trailed “Ant-Man” hit milestones. Disney’s “Incredibles 2” passed “Finding Dory” to become Pixar’s top-grossing film domestically, not accounting for inflation. Universal’s “Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom” crossed $1 billion worldwide. The weekend’s other new wide release was Blumhouse Productions’“The First Purge,” the fourth film in the low-budget horror franchise about an annual 12-hour period of lawlessness. It…

An Israeli organization said that it hopes to become the first non-governmental entity to land a spacecraft on the moon when it attempts to launch a module later this year. SpaceIL and the state-owned Israel Aerospace Industries plan to launch their unmanned craft in December, the team said at a press conference at an IAI facility outside Tel Aviv. If successful, Israel would become the fourth country to land a craft on the moon, after the U.S., the Soviet Union and China. SpaceIL will ship the as yet unnamed module to the United States in November ahead of the launch. The 585 kilogram (1,289 pound) landing craft will piggyback on a SpaceX Falcon rocket to enter Earth’s orbit, then slingshot around the planet several times to reach the moon. Upon…

Chinese exporters were scrambling to cope with a plunge in U.S. sales while China’s state press shrugged off the impact of Washington’s tariff hikes in a spiraling technology dispute. The impact of last week tariff hikes on the world’s second-largest economy should be limited, according to private sector analysts. But President Donald Trump’s measures targeting Chinese medical, construction and factory equipment hit exporters that say price-conscious American customers have stopped buying. The general manager of a medical device exporter that makes 15 to 20 percent of its sales to the United States said he plans to fly there this week to negotiate with customers who stopped ordering its syringes and other equipment. Wuxi Yushou Medical Devices Co., Ltd., with a workforce of 500, stands to lose 30-40 million yuan ($4.5…

Japanese internet company SoftBank Corp. is investing about $2 billion to raise its stake in Yahoo Japan through an acquisition from U.S. investment company Altaba Inc. SoftBank has been boosting its collaboration with Yahoo Japan, a search-engine company, to strengthen its e-commerce, smartphone services and other businesses. The deal, announced this week in a statement from Softbank, will raise its stake in Yahoo Japan to 48 percent from about 43 percent. The three-way transaction between Altaba, SoftBank and Yahoo Japan will cut the stake of Altaba, which was formerly known as Yahoo, to 27 percent. SoftBank, a leading Japanese telecommunications company, has financial-technology, ride-booking services, solar energy and the Pepper human-shaped companion robot among its widespread businesses. It also owns British semiconductor company ARM, an innovator in the “internet of…

THERE’S AN APP FOR THAT It may seem hard to believe, but the App Store will turn ten this month. Whether you want to hail a cab, order a meal, split a bill, find a new partner or buy a house, there’s an app on the App Store for practically all of our needs, with new innovative technologies entering the market every day. Before the Store was released with the iPhone 3G, Steve Jobs was dead set against the idea, arguing third-party apps could damagethe reputation and performance of Apple’s hardware. However, when the late Apple founder took to the stage back in March 2008, he said that he knew developers wanted their software “in front of every iPhone user” and revealed “we’re going to solve that problem for every…

Uber is getting into the scooter-rental business. The ride-hailing company said that it is investing in Lime, a startup based in San Mateo, California. “Our investment and partnership in Lime is another step towards our vision of becoming a one-stop shop for all your transportation needs,” Rachel Holt, an Uber vice president, said in a statement. Uber will add Lime motorized scooters to the Uber mobile app, giving consumers another option for getting around cities, especially to and from public transit systems, Holt said. Financial details of the deal were not disclosed. Lime co-founders Toby Sun and Brad Bao wrote in a blog that Uber’s “sizable investment” is part of a $335 million fund-raising round led by GV, the venture-capital arm of Google parent Alphabet Inc. They said Alphabet is…

Google’s YouTube says it is taking several steps to ensure the veracity of news on its service by cracking down on misinformation and supporting news organizations. The company said it will make “authoritative” news sources more prominent, especially in the wake of breaking news events when misinformation can spread quickly. At such times, YouTube will begin showing users short text previews of news stories in video search results, as well as warnings that the stories can change. The goal is to counter the fake videos that can proliferate immediately after shootings, natural disasters and other major happenings. For example, YouTube search results prominently showed videos purporting to “prove” that mass shootings like the one that killed at least 59 in Las Vegas were fake, acted out by “crisis actors.” In…

Ready Player One Steven Spielberg brings us a science fiction adventure, based on Ernest Cline’s bestseller. The film focuses on an expansive virtual reality universe, in which people in 2045 find salvation as their world is on the brink of collapse. When the creator of this vast universe dies, he leaves his fortune to the first person to find a digital Easter egg, hidden in his universe, a contest that grips the entire world. FIVE FACTS: 1. Steven Spielberg commented that this was the third most difficult movie has had to make, after Jaws and Saving Private Ryan. 2. Others considered to direct the film include Christopher Nolan, Robert Zemeckis, Peter Jackson and Edgar Wright. 3. The music score was originally going to be composed by John Williams, who has…

I like to imagine what King Kong, as a popcorn-chomping moviegoer, might make of “Skyscraper,” the latest summer actioner staring Dwayne Johnson. Would he, watching a goliath ascend the exterior of a high-rise with helicopters and klieg lights swirling, woundedly mumble, “Hey, that’s my gig.” But in Rawson Marshall Thurber’s thriller, there is Johnson steadily — and without too much trouble, really — swinging up a 100-story-high crane to then leap across a mammoth chasm and land in an open window on the burning 220-story tower where his wife and twin kids are trapped. It goes without saying that if you’re the sort to scoff at a tale’s implausibility, “Skyscraper” may not be the movie you’re looking for. Experts in fields including physics, thermodynamics and screenwriting should proceed cautiously. But…

“Can we keep the hard hats?” asked Frederick Threats. The senior at General Trass High School had just completed a tour of the Graphic Packaging paper mill in West Monroe. He came back with questions about how much the mill pays to start and a desire to investigate careers in technology and engineering. Threats is seriously considering a career in STEM (science, technology, engineering and math), but he wasn’t until his coach convinced him to sign up for summer camp. East Carroll Parish hosted a monthlong STEM camp in June, the kickoff to adding STEM curriculum to classrooms. West Carroll Parish schools started the same camp for high school students this summer. The camps were funded by the Louisiana Department of Education through Supplemental Course Allotment (SCA) funds. In the…

With one prototype already in the ground, the Holland Board of Public Works is planning to install 10 more “Smart Bricks” along the snowmelt route to monitor surface temperatures and collect data. What started as a hobby in radio technology for a self-described tinkerer has led to more efficient data collection for the Holland Board of Public Works’ snowmelt system. BPW’s new “Smart Brick” will use low-powered radio technology to monitor surface temperatures downtown, which will help BPW better run its snowmelt system and potentially save energy. With one prototype currently in the ground, BPW is now working toward planting 10 of these bricks along the snowmelt routes downtown, the Holland Sentinel reported. Pete Hoffswell, the brick’s inventor, is more than just broadband services manager at BPW. He also spends…

Technology and U.S. anxiety about Chinese competition are at the center of the trade dispute between the world’s two largest economies. Washington accuses Beijing of trying to build its own tech champions by stealing or pressuring foreign companies to hand over technology. Here are some of China’s biggest names in telecoms equipment, clean energy and medical equipment: ZTE CORP.: The No. 2 Chinese maker of network gear for phone and internet companies was nearly driven out of business this year after running afoul of Washington over its exports to Iran and North Korea. State-owned ZTE says it spends 13 billion yuan ($2 billion) a year on research and development, but the company still needs U.S. components and technology. The company pleaded guilty in 2017 to violating restrictions on exports of…