Apple's GarageBand app celebrates 15 years of music creation for the rest of us

John Mayer and Steve Jobs demo an earlier version of GarageBand

Apple is celebrating 15 years of Garageband, the app included in macOS which enables anyone to put together various loops and samples as well as integrate live voice or musical instrumentation. Garageband was an ambitious and successful application that was part of iLife, the suite of apps included with every Mac sold.

GarageBand brought drag and drop simplicity to music creation and added myriad options for instruments, loops, and beats which were mostly royalty free. For budding musicians or composers, it gave them the ability to put together music even without having to read notes or having access to various instruments.

The app, originally introduced onstage at Macworld '04 by Steve Jobs and John Mayer, has grown to be the most widely used music app in the world — and is now on over 1 billion iPhones, iPads and Macs globally. 

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Apple announces blockbuster holiday week with $1.22 billion in sales

Apple announced a record-breaking holiday sales week and New Year's Day with a huge $1.22 billion in sales spent in apps and games. 

"The holiday week was our biggest week ever with more than $1.22 billion spent on apps and games, and New Year’s Day set a new single-day record at more than $322 million,” said Phil Schiller, Apple’s senior vice president of Worldwide Marketing. “Thanks to the inspiring work of our talented developers and the support of our incredible customers around the world."

Apple says services set new all-time records in multiple categories, including the App Store, Apple Music, Cloud Services, Apple Pay and the App Store’s search ad business. Huge earners in the app department includemultiplayer games like Fortnite and PUBG as well as productivity, health and fitness apps. "1Password, Sweat and Luminosity charting in their respective categories," Apple reported.

Apple stock takes a 9% dive due to earnings notice

By Gadjo Cardenas Sevilla

We're quickly seeing the market react to Apple's bombshell announcement of a lower stock earnings guidance. Yesterday, Apple CEO Tim Cook issued a letter to Apple investors revising the company's earnings guidance, a move that hasn't happened since 2002.

Cook implied various macroeconomic factors, including less spending in China, a major market for Apple, for the lower earnings in Q1, usually Apple's strongest quarter. As Cook mentioned in a TV interview, there are various reasons for this lower earnings expectation, many of which were out of Apple's control.

The brewing US trade-war with China and less spending from that country, the staggered iPhone release schedule in 2018 (which saw a month's apart launch for iPhone XS and iPhone XR) slower ramping up of product for iPad Pro. Mac mini and MacBook Air, as well as the $29 battery replacement service that took a bite out of potential earnings.

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Fuchsia OS is likely Google's unifying operating system of the future

By Gadjo Cardenas Sevilla

Google is in an interesting place with regards to its various operating systems. Google Android, as we all know, is the dominant mobile OS. Google Chrome is the web-based desktop OS that's become the standard in schools and is poised to expand to the consumer and enterprise segment. Chromebooks can now run Android apps as well as Linux applications, but what is the future?

Google sees Fuchsia OS as its future. This OS is not based on Linux but on a new microkernel and is geared or use on various devices (smartphones, tablets, PCs, laptops). Fuchsia OS is still a few years away from release but it is already trying to solve many of Android's pain points (not scaling well for tablets or laptops, security vulnerabilities, etc). Fuschia OS, if successful, can be the one Google OS to rule them all and will be able to run thousands of Android apps from the get-go. More importantly, users will see a familiar interface no matter what device they are on.

Source: Engadget