There are a lot of little news items today dealing with video content, 5G, and Apple’s sky-high share price:
- Hit-or-miss director M. Night Shyamalan (good: The Sixth Sense, really bad: The Last Airbender) is the latest to get a green light from Apple for an original series. Thank God he’s only directing one episode…
- There’s a big sale on 4K HDR movies and more in the iTunes Store right now
- Mobile providers T-Mobile and Sprint throw their hats into the 5G ring
- AAPL reached a new record high of $180.48 before retreating today, buoyed by nice words from Warren Buffett
The text version of the podcast can be read below. To listen to the podcast here, click the play button on the player below. Apple News readers need to visit Apple World Today in order to listen to the podcast.
Text Version
This is Steve Sande for Apple World Today, and you’re listening to the AWT News Update podcast for Tuesday, February 27, 2018.
I’m really beginning to wonder about Apple’s desire to become a content provider with its own original shows. The latest is a 10-episode, half-hour thriller that will be produced by M. Night Shyamalan, who will also direct the first episode. Well, although he had an early successful run with a few films, he’s also made a series of bombs. Let’s hope that he decides to turn the directing reins over to someone else. On the other hand, the series will be written by writer Tony Basgallop, who wrote two of the “24” series — 24: Live Another Day and 24: Legacy.
Speaking of video, Apple has a bunch of 4K HDR Oscar-winning movies on sale right now for under $10. You can get such hits as Inception, American Sniper, The Revenant, Hacksaw Ridge, and Braveheart, as well as older movies like 12 Monkeys for under $5. Check out the iTunes Store today for the deals.
Last week we had a story on the podcast about AT&T bragging up its 5G network, which it hoped to have running in 12 American cities by the end of the year. Well, not to be outdone, T-Mobile is now saying that it will try to have 5G deployed in 30 cities, including New York, Los Angeles, Dallas and Las Vegas. Sprint doesn’t want to be left out of the competition, and it announced earlier today that it will launch 5G in Atlanta, Chicago, Dallas, Houston, Los Angeles and Washington, DC by mid-2019. Verizon also says it will get into the 5G game, but hasn’t named any markets. Sadly, most manufacturers will not have 5G-capable phones available by the end of 2018, and it’s likely that Apple may wait until 2019 to bring 5G iPhones to market. At least we’ll have our choice of fast networks to run on!
Apple shares reached a new record high today of $180.48 after billionaire investor and friend of Bill Gates Warren Buffett commended Apple on a CNBC conversation. Buffett revealed that his company Berkshire Hathaway has purchased more shares of Apple than any other stock in the past year, pointing out that Apple has an “extraordinary consumer franchise.” According to the US Securities and Exchange Commission, the company holds 65.3 million shares of Apple. Buffett went on to be a fanboy for Apple CEO Tim Cook, saying “I like Tim Cook very much, I like their policies. I see how strong that ecosystem is. It’s to an extraordinary degree.”
That’s all the news for today – join me tomorrow afternoon for another edition of the AWT News Update.
