Dennis Sellers

<p style="white-space: pre-wrap;">Apple has updated its Apple Leadership page to include John Giannandrea, who now serves as Apple's chief of Machine Learning and AI Strategy. </p>

<p style="white-space: pre-wrap;">The majority of smartphone owners use navigation apps and most prefer Google Maps, according to new survey data from <a href="http://themanifest.com/app-development/popularity-google-maps-trends-navigation-apps-2018" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer"><em>The Manifest</em></a>. It has 67% of the market compared to 12% for Waze, 11% for Apple Maps, and 8% for MapQuest.</p>

<p style="white-space: pre-wrap;"><a href="http://www.philo.com" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Philo </a>—  a live streaming television service focused on entertainment, lifestyle and knowledge programming — has launched on the Apple TV, giving consumers access to 40 top channels for $16 per month. </p>

<p style="white-space: pre-wrap;">SurveyMonkey, a “people powered data platform,” in collaboration with Fortune, has released the third edition of its annual U.S. consumer rankings of Fortune 500 companies. Americans were asked to rank the top 75 companies from the list based on their employer appeal, impact on the country and innovation (willingness to change in pursuit of success), among other dimensions.</p>

<p style="white-space: pre-wrap;">Apple has been granted a patent (number 10,018476) for “live traffic routing’ on its Maps app for the iPhone and Apple Watch. It would allow the mapping app to generate alternate routes based on the user's current location, live traffic conditions and estimated time of arrival at certain locations along the route.</p>

<p style="white-space: pre-wrap;">BlueFin Research is out with its <a href="https://www.barrons.com/articles/apple-betting-big-on-production-of-forthcoming-iphones-says-bluefin-1531163452" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">latest investor note</a> in which its analysts claim Apple will discontinue the iPhone SE and iPhone X this year as focus shifts towards the “iPhone 9, iPhone 11, and iPhone 11 Plus.”</p>

<p style="white-space: pre-wrap;">Apple has <a href="https://developer.apple.com/news/?id=07092018a" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">announced</a> the availability of searchable transcripts for its June 2018 World Wide Developer Conference session videos. </p>

<p style="white-space: pre-wrap;">Although Mac sales have been outgrowing the PC market for some time, Apple’s global market share of 7.8% shows there's still plenty of growth opportunity. Could Apple spur that growth by making Macs with AMD processors instead of Intel chips?</p>

<p style="white-space: pre-wrap;">BRAVEN Audio’s <a href="https://braven.com/405.html" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">BRAVEN 405</a> is a versatile mini Bluetooth speaker that boasts 24 hours of playtime and doubles as a backup battery, making it a fine companion for the active person who’s on-the-go this summer.</p>

<p style="white-space: pre-wrap;">Apple has released iTunes 12.8 for the Mac. It now supports AirPlay 2.</p>

<p style="white-space: pre-wrap;">Now that my <em>Apple World Today</em> compadre, Steve Sande, is transforming his daily news update podcast into <em>Tangible Tech</em>, Yours Truly will offer an end-of-the-day text-and-graphics only update of various Apple news items. Because, hey, Steve and I can’t cover everything!</p>

<p style="white-space: pre-wrap;">Apple has released macOS High Sierra 10.13.6. It adds AirPlay 2 multi-room audio support for iTunes and improves the stability and security of your Mac.</p>

<p style="white-space: pre-wrap;">StarTech has released the $259.99 <a href="https://www.startech.com/AV/Converters/Video/usb-c-video-capture-device~UVCHDCAP" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">HDMI to USB-C Video Capture Device (UVCHDCAP)</a>, which enables users to record video and audio directly to a Mac or Windows computer. It features automatic installation thanks to the use of UVC: USB Video Class Technology. </p>

<p style="white-space: pre-wrap;">Apple has released iOS 11.4.1, HomePod 11.4.1, watchOS 4.3.2 and tvOS 11.4.1.</p>

<p style="white-space: pre-wrap;">Apple has its work cut out for it in beefing up HomePod sales. <a href="http://www.canalys.com" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Canalys</a> expects the smart speaker installed base will approach the 100-million barrier by the end of this year, making it almost 2.5 times bigger than at the end of 2017. </p>