Dennis Sellers

<p>According to Hong Kong-based research firm Counterpoint Research — as noted by <a target="_blank" href="http://www.businesskorea.co.kr/english/news/ict/14588-winning-back-samsung-regained-top-spot-us-smartphone-market-11-months" rel="noopener noreferrer">Business Korea</a>, Samsung accounted for 28.8% of the U.S. market in terms of sales in March to take over the top spot for the first time in 11 months since it led the market in April 2015.</p>

<p>Yay! It must be freebie day. The CoreCode team has announced TableEdit, a free spreadsheet app for Mac OS X. It offers features such as charts with cell styling, formatting options, and comprehensive import/export capabilities. </p>

<p>Micromat, the company behind the TechTool Pro line of software, has released a new troubleshooting utility called MacCheck. The new product can perform a series of critical tests on Mac systems running OS X 10.6 or higher, helping to isolate what might be wrong with a particular computer. </p>

<p><a target="_blank" href="http://www.kohls.com" rel="noopener noreferrer">Kohl’s</a> customers are now able to pay for their purchases with Kohl’s Charge and simultaneously earnYes2You Rewards loyalty points with a single tap using ApplePay. The service is available in approximately 250 Kohl’s stores and is expected to be in all Kohl’s stores in the U.S. later this month. </p>

<p>Apple will announce “sweeping” changes to its Apple Music at its Worldwide Developer Conference next month, <a target="_blank" href="http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-05-04/apple-to-revamp-streaming-music-service-after-mixed-reviews-departures" rel="noopener noreferrer">according to Bloomberg</a>. </p>

<p>In the long-ago days of Ben Bajarin, writing for <a target="_blank" href="http://macte.ch/ZfOzV" rel="noopener noreferrer">Techpinions</a>, predicted that desktops are going to make a comeback and that it's notebooks that are "the past" as tablets such as the iPad continue to grow in popularity. I think he was onto something, despite a more-common line of thinking that the desktop is the past of personal computing as ever more folks move to laptops.</p>

<p>Apple has lost exclusive ownership of the “iPhone” name in China. The company has lost a trademark suit against a Chinese company, which now holds the right to make and sell handbags and other leather products branded “IPHONE,” reports <a target="_blank" href="http://qz.com/674813/apple-is-being-forced-to-share-the-iphone-name-in-china-with-a-handbag-maker/" rel="noopener noreferrer">Quartz</a>.</p>

<p>Just as you can get a wrist band for the Nintendo Wii controller, we need one for the Siri Remote that comes with the fourth generation Apple TV. I was hoping that Griffin Technology’s Survivor Play would be the answer. But it’s only half an answer. </p>

<p>In a note to clients —as noted by <a href="http://macrumors.com">MacRumors.com</a> — KGI Securities analyst Ming-Chi Kuo predicts the iPad Air 3 will debut in the first half of 2016 (but without 3D Touch) and that the iPhone 7 will arrive in the September timeframe.</p>

<p>Good news for the Apple TV: new data from <a target="_blank" href="http://www.parksassociates.com" rel="noopener noreferrer">Parks Associates</a> finds that 14 percent of U.S. broadband households plan to buy a streaming media player by midyear 2016 and that, as of the third quarter of 2015, 31 percent of U.S. broadband households currently own a streaming media player, up from 27 percent at the beginning of the year.</p>

<p>Apple has updated its OS X version of iTunes to 12.3.2. It brings the desktop version of Apple Music in line with the recently released iOS 9.2 version of Apple Music. </p>

<p>Apple's iOS platform is the highest performing among its competitors with about 55 percent of the medical app market in terms of dollars for 2015, according to <a target="_blank" href="http://www.kaloramainformation.com" rel="noopener noreferrer">Kalorama Information</a>. </p>

<p>Apple is predicted to close out 2015 with 32 percent share of the ultraportable PC segment, specifically due to its MacBook Air models, according to <a target="_blank" href="http://www.abiresearch.com" rel="noopener noreferrer">ABI Research</a>. </p>

<p>Along with Mac OS X 10.11.2 and iOS 9.2, Apple has released tvOS 9.1, an update to the operating system of the fourth get Apple TV. It introduces support for Siri search for Apple Music, which lets Apple TV owners ask Siri to play content from Apple Music. </p>

<p>Apple has been granted a patent (number 9207833) by the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office for a “collaboration system” that hints at future users for <a href="http://www.apple.com/apple-pencil/">the Apple Pencil</a> introduced for <a target="_blank" href="http://www.apple.com/ipad/" rel="noopener noreferrer">the iPad Pro</a>. Or perhaps an “offspring” of the pen.</p>