Just as it did last year, Apple will be making donations to the National Parks Foundation when you use Apple Pay to make a purchase from the Apple Store – whether it’s in a retail store, online or through the app … The company is also offering a new Activity Challenge for Apple Watch customers on September 1, to celebrate Redwood National Park’s 50th anniversary. “America’s national parks are treasures everyone should experience, and we’re proud to support them again this month by donating a dollar for every purchase made with Apple Pay at one of our stores,” said Apple’s CEO Tim Cook....

Apple has agreed to wait for money owed to it by Japan Display in order to assist the bailout of the troubled display-maker … Reuters doesn’t go into details on the money owed to Apple, but it likely relates to the Cupertino company paying most of the upfront costs of a new LCD factory built specifically for iPhone production back in 2015. It was reported back in March that Apple paid most of the $1....

A Bloomberg analysis of the presumed acquisition of Beats Electronics by Apple says that while the two companies may have very different cultures, the partnership is not so strange as it might first appear. “These aren’t strange bedfellows at all,” said Peter Csathy, chief executive officer of entertainment law firm Manatt Digital Media Ventures. “Steve Jobs really drove the relationship with the music industry. The executives at Apple and Beats know each other very well, and there’s a comfort level there” …...

Apple and Google seem set for another bidding war with both companies said to be sniffing around at purchasing mobile payments firm, BOKU. A TechCrunch report explains both Apple and Google are considering acquiring the firm, or at the least an extensive partnership with it. “BOKU President and CEO Mark Britto and co-founder Ron Hirson have held multiple meetings with executives at the helm of Apple’s iPhone business in the course of the past 3 weeks....

As part of the iPhone 7 event, Apple has announced brand new truly wireless AirPods, premium wireless headphones that work in concert with the iPhone 7. The AirPods are independent separate earbuds, that have sensors in the buds to know when they are actually inside your ear. The AirPods automatically switch between output to your iPhone and Apple Watch, so its a seamless experience to listen to music across all your devices....

As it has in the past, Apple held a lottery for WWDC 2016 tickets. The lottery opened on Monday, April 18th, and closed earlier today at 10:00AM PST. The lottery format puts developers on even ground, lending all a chance to win the right to purchase a $1,599 ticket. Though Apple has stated that it plans on notifying winners of the lottery by Monday, April 25th, some winners have already begun to see their credit cards charged....

According to an internal AppleCare document, Apple is actively investigating a series of WiFi-related issues affecting the third-generation iPad. Since the new iPad’s launch, many users have been complaining about third-generation iPad WiFi issues ranging from connection drops, slow download and upload speeds, or the device’s inability to even pickup local WiFi networks. A thread discussing the issue exists on Apple’s online support forums has almost amassed 700 replies from users with similar issues....

Apple continues to expand its video content line-up by extending its partnership with Vice today as the duo have released the first episode in a new documentary series. Apple Music and Vice’s series, The Score, take a focus on various music scenes around the world. Episode one looks into the life of Minnesota’s Native American hip-hop scene and artists. Not much is given about the new series on Apple Music or Vice’s website, but it’s reported that future episodes will take a look at the music scenes in other countries like Brazil, Iceland, and Vietnam....

Apple is once again coming under fire for business practices and deals around Apple Music, the subscription music and video streaming service it launched last month. Consumer Watchdog, a prominent consumer advocacy group, issued a letter to the United States Federal Trade Commission and Department of Justice today, asking the government to put restrictions on Apple’s “plans to dominate the subscription music sector” while citing “serious antitrust concerns” based on information it received....

Apple has acquired Novauris Technologies, a company with a lot of talent in the automatic speech recognition field, according to a report from TechCrunch. The purchase of Novauris Technologies actually happened sometime last year, and the team is now at Apple working to improve speech recognition features of Siri. A quick look at CEO Yoon Kim’s LinkedIn page shows that the company likely joined Apple in September of last year....

Apple shared a Newsroom briefing today announcing a new contest to find the “best photos shot on iPhone”. Running from January 22 to February 7, Apple says its panel of eleven photography judges from around the world (including Phil Schiller), will select the ten winning photos to be featured on billboards in select cities, and Apple retail locations. The judges come from a wide range of backgrounds, including White House photographer under President Obama Peter Souza, Luísa Dörr from Brazil, Chen Man from China and more....

Apple’s annual lottery for WWDC tickets officially ended this morning at 10AM PST and lucky developers have started receiving confirmation emails this evening. The developers who were lucky enough to win an opportunity to the attend event have received emails in their inbox and their credits have been charged. For developers who did not receive a notification from Apple regarding their WWDC ticket, the company says that some sessions throughout the event will be live streamed, while most will be available to watch on-demand....

Apple CEO Tim Cook is apparently visiting China today for the second time since replacing Steve Jobs as chief executive in 2011. According to a statement on the Chinese Ministry of Industry and Information Technology website, Cook met with Head of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology Miao Wei to “exchange views on the development of China’s information and communications industry, global mobile communications, the development of smart devices and trends in innovation....

In 2015 we reported on an issue with MacBook Retina displays that were seeing problems with the anti-reflective coating wearing off, which came to be known as ‘Staingate.’ Although some customers experienced the issue as early as 2012, Apple started covering the repair free of charge in 2015. Now, it seems that Apple has extended this coverage even further… According to MacRumors, Apple’s quality program will extend through October of this year or possibly longer depending on the purchase date of eligible machines....

When Steve Jobs said something was going to happen, it generally did. One notable exception, though, has been Apple’s mobile advertising platform, iAd. Jobs said back in 2010 that it would grab 50% of the mobile ad market; right now, it’s sitting at just 2.6%. That may be about to change after advertising middleman Rubicon announced that automated purchasing of iAds will soon be supported … The ad business has long criticized Apple for its “slow, cocky and downright stingy” approach to selling advertising, forcing companies to buy ad slots direct from Apple....

As it regularly does following the release of a new version, Apple today has stopped signing iOS 11.2.6. The company last week officially released iOS 11.3 to the public following an extensive period of beta testing with developers and the public. What this means is that users who are already updated to iOS 11.3 will be unable to downgrade to the previous version of iOS, whether it be because they have issues with the latest release or because of something such as a jailbreak becoming available....

Google confirmed in May that it applied for domains, such as .google, .youtube, and .lol, as part of ICANN’s program to increase the amount of generic top-level domains. Today, ICANN officially published its list of the 1,409 applied-for domains. Among the other companies requesting domains, AssociatedPress reported Apple is after the “.apple” domain name: While several companies—such as Google— have applied for various domains that cover different products and more common words like ....

An aerial view of the new Apple datacenter in Maiden, North Carolina, which doubled in size. More super datacenters are due across the US and Europe, an analyst says. More and more analysts are calling for an Apple-branded television set that should wow us with a big, beautiful display (Retina, anyone?), built-in Apple TV and DVR capabilities, live programming and television channels via iTunes, 1080p iOS gaming via the App Store and what not....

Earlier today, Apple provided developers with the first beta for the upcoming release of OS X Mavericks version 10.9.3. Apple did not disclose any new features coming in 10.9.3, but we have discovered that the update includes notable enhancements for users with Macs connected to 4K-resolution monitors. With 10.9.3, Mac users can now natively set their 4K monitors to run the Mac operating system at a pixel-doubled “Retina” resolution. The new settings, which appear nearly identical to the settings on a standard Retina MacBook Pro display, can be seen here on a 10....

Analysts so far appear mostly unfazed by the Apple coronavirus impact. The prevailing view is that the effect will be temporary, and that Apple’s core strengths mean the medium- and long-term outlook remains good. Investors appear to be taking the same view. The stock did take a bit of a dip yesterday, at one point 3.2% down after a bigger fall in pre-market trading, but ended the day just 1.83% down …...