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Yesterday, we told you the iPad 2 was discounted by $100, as announced by Apple during the new iPad unveiling, through a number of retailers including BestBuy and RadioShack. According to one tipster, Apple retail stores are also offering the discounted iPad 2. However, in the case of the West Farms Apple Store in Connecticut, Apple discounted at least one Wi-Fi + 3G 32GB iPad 2 (White, AT&T) by $200. As you can see from the receipt above, store employees mistakenly added an extra $100 discount to the already discounted iPad 2....

While most of the numbers announced yesterday were broadly in line with analyst expectations, there was one particularly disappointing element: revenue from China. This was down 29% on the previous quarter, and a full 33% year-on-year – from $13.2B in Q3 2015 to $8.8B the same quarter this year. CEO Tim Cook pointed to slowing growth in the Chinese economy as a factor, but there are two other factors at play …...

Update: The chart above was updated to reflect Sprint’s just announced iPhone Forever upgrade plan pricing. Sprint is offering $22/month regular pricing ($15 for those that trade-in a device) through its iPhone Forever Upgrade program. Customers can upgrade every time there is a new iPhone, but they’ll have to pay off the remainder of the retail price to keep it. Yearly cost for all plans added. With the launch of its new iPhone 6s lineup this week, Apple is competing directly with its carrier partners by introducing an iPhone Upgrade Program that aims to rival similar offers from T-Mobile, AT&T, Sprint, and others....

Just like other modern store locations, Apple Burlingame features an entirely glass facade with floor to ceiling windows running the entire width of the building. Large slabs of stone wrap the side of the building, interrupted only for a large Apple logo and rear windows. The store originally opened in 2003 and occupied the same location, but you’ll find little reminder of the old architecture now. Every surface has been redone....

Apple has today shared a handful of new ads, focusing on security, ease of use, and environment. The series of ads have a tagline that read switch to iPhone, showcasing features that are better on the iPhone compared to its competitors. The videos are 15 seconds in length and are titled Environment, Safe, Ease, and Apple Support. The ads are pretty self-explanatory, and are meant to be lighthearted. Apple has mainly been focusing on iPhone X in its most recent ads, so seeing these are a breath of fresh air....

While Apple officially announced via a sign at the location that the mega Apple Store in New York’s Grand Central Terminal will open its doors for the first time on December 9th, Apple has now noted this on its website. The new retail webpage for the Grand Central Terminal Apple Store, notes the 10 AM Grand Opening on that Friday. The new retail store’s official address is marked as 45 Grand Central Terminal New York, NY 10017....

Apple is adding a new “Movement Disorder API” to its open-source ResearchKit framework that will allow Apple Watch to continuously monitor Parkinson’s disease symptoms. The new API will provide app developers using ResearchKit the ability to offer passive, all-day monitoring via an Apple Watch running watchOS 5. To achieve this the API will monitor two very common symptoms of Parkinson’s including Tremors, indicated by shaking and quivering detected by the Apple Watch, and Dyskinesia, a side-effect of treatments for Parkinson’s that causes fidgeting and swaying motions in patients....

While most analysts are expecting Apple to comfortably beat its holiday quarter guidance of $75.5-$77.5B, one large firm of analysts goes much further. An investment note by Morgan Stanley seen by Business Insider says that an analysis of Apple’s financial report suggests that the company could be gearing up for quarterly sales totalling as much as $84.4B. The clue, claims the company, is the company’s off balance-sheet spending commitments. It should be noted that although Apple has recently been beating its own guidance of late, this has typically been by just a few percent – nothing like the leap Morgan Stanley is suggesting....

Apple is making many of its services smarter in iOS 10 and macOS Sierra through the use of differential privacy which enables artificial intelligence to become smarter while still balancing privacy. Given Apple’s strong position on protecting user privacy, Recode requested more details on how the company’s use of differential privacy would work. Apple so far has resisted collecting a lot of user data that could make Siri, iCloud, and other services smarter....

Update 10/7: Apple has also stopped signing iOS 13.1. Today, Apple has stopped signing iOS 13.1.1 after releasing iOS 13.1.2 earlier this week with more bug fixes and improvements. That means users are no longer able to downgrade from the current iOS version to iOS 13.1.1. It’s been a hectic couple of weeks of updates for Apple since releasing iOS 13 to the public. After rolling out iOS 13.1 a week after iOS 13, we also saw iOS 13....

It was back in January that we first heard that Apple was planning a new flagship retail store in Milan, Italy, with an outdoor amphitheater – and the company has now confirmed those plans. The store will sit beneath the amphitheater, and you’ll enter it using a staircase that descends through the middle of a fountain … The store will be named Apple Piazza Liberty and will be located at Piazza del Liberty, 1–20121 Milano....

Earlier this week, Apple received FCC clearance with a new sleep monitor product that looked like an updated version of the Beddit Sleep Monitor that it acquired in 2017. Today the updated Beddit Sleep Monitor 3.5 (replacing version 3.0) is now available through the Apple Store. The new Beddit Sleep Monitor 3.5 retails for $149.95 and is currently available in Apple Stores and ships to customers in a few days. Withings (formerly Nokia Health) has a similar product that retails for $99 and currently sells for $79....

With the Mac OS X 10.7.2 update released earlier today, Apple has also updated Safari to version 5.1.1. On top of the obvious iCloud support, Apple just posted this support document claiming the new version is 13 percent faster in Javascript performance. Definitely a welcomed performance boost. Of course version 5.1.1 also includes the a number of fixes and overall stability improvements. You can check out everything included in the update in the support document after the break....

The year 2021 is shaping up to be massive for the Mac. Apple began the transition to Apple Silicon processors in the Mac last year with a new Mac mini, a new 13-inch MacBook Pro, and a new MacBook Air. Things are expected to gain more traction this year, with the rumor mill currently suggesting the first iMac redesign in a decade, new 14-inch and 16-inch MacBook Pro models, and much more....

Burberry CEO-turned-Apple Retail SVP Angela Ahrendts returned to posting on her LinkedIn blog after nearly five months over the weekend with a holiday message to her followers: “Let peace begin with me.” In the blog post, Ahrendts wrote about her effort to share a leadership lesson relevant to the holidays, something which she admits she has struggled to do initially, but points to being inspired by B.J. Thomas’ recording of “Let There Be Peace On Earth....

[Update: The issues seem to be resolved around 12:00 PM EST.] [Update 2x: Apple has also acknowledged the outage on its system status page noting that it began last night and may still be ongoing.] No word on Apple’s official iCloud system status page, but the Calendar and Reminders web apps on iCloud.com are currently down as several readers have pointed out. We’ve tested it here and the above error was returned....

Leading up to the unveiling of Apple’s new iTunes Radio service earlier this month at WWDC, we reported on some small details regarding deals Apple had reached with the major labels necessary to get bring its Pandora competitor to market. Earlier reports claimed that Apple was paying Warner around 10% of ad revenue— that’s around twice as much as Pandora reportedly pays. Today, The Wall Street Journal provides us with some in-depth info on what Apple is paying labels and publishers after taking a look at the terms of the deal....

Apple is continuing its barrage of iPhone X advertisements today with three new ones hitting YouTube. The new videos each focus on a specific feature, including Portrait Lighting and Face ID. Head below to check them out… The first ad aims to show how seamless Face ID is when unlocking your device. Apple touts that the iPhone X “opens with a glance” thanks to Face ID. The company also continues to call Face ID “the most unforgettable magical password ever created....

Apple is developing iAds for video, developing a new product that will deliver in-stream ads to videos shown on the iPhone, iPad and (presumably) the Apple TV. These ads will appear both within apps, and on mobile websites. A report tells us Apple’s new ads network is expected to launch in the first half of next year, and it does seem to dovetail nicely with development of ways publishers of popular video on Apple’s networks could make some money for their work....

Just one day before Thanksgiving in the US and a month before Christmas, Apple has shared its annual holiday ad on YouTube. The video spans about a minute and a half, featuring legendary artist Stevie Wonder (a known Apple fan) performing with Andra Day, with various Apple products including MacBooks running GarageBand and Apple Watches in view. At the start of the video, Wonder, who has been blind since shortly after birth, uses OS X’s built-in VoiceOver accessibility features to mix a song in the audio editing software that comes with each Mac....