Dennis Sellers

<p>Another day, another lawsuit. A company called Somaltus is suing Apple in the lawsuit-friendly U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Texas for allegedly infringing on a 2010 patent concerning battery technologies, reports <a target="_blank" href="http://www.macrumors.com" rel="noopener noreferrer">MacRumors</a>.</p>

<p>A new study from recommence site <a href="http://decluttr.com/">Decluttr.com</a> found that some smartphones are depreciating faster than cars, with some losing as much as half of their value after only one year of use.</p>

<p>Apple plans to provide a full repair service in Russia for all iPhone damages as the result of a lawsuit filed by a dissatisfied customer, according to <a target="_blank" href="http://www.themoscowtimes.com/business/article/apple-plans-to-build-specialized-repair-center-in-russia-after-lawsuit/574942.html" rel="noopener noreferrer">The Moscow Times</a>. </p>

<p>Apple ranks highest among manufacturers of smartwatches, and Samsung ranks highest among manufacturers of fitness band devices, according to the <a target="_blank" href="http://www.jdpower.com" rel="noopener noreferrer">J.D. Power</a> <em>2016 Fitness Band Device Satisfaction Report</em> and J.D. Power <em>2016 Smartwatch Device Satisfaction Report</em>.</p>

<p>Apple files for — and is granted — lots of patents by the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office. Many are for inventions that never see the light of day. However, you never can tell which ones will materialize in a real product, so here are today’s patent highlights: </p>

<p>Yellow Lemon Software's $20 <a target="_blank" href="http://www.scsc.no/products/folderglance/" rel="noopener noreferrer">FolderGlance</a>, a utility for browsing files and folders, is still a solid addition to your Mac's software arsenal after all these years. </p>

<p style="margin-left:0px; margin-right:0px">Apple has donated 7 million yuan (about $1 million) to the Chinese Foundation for Poverty Alleviation (CFPA) as the country deals with its worst flood in years, reports <a href="http://www.usatoday.com/story/tech/2016/07/11/apple-donates-1m-help-china-cope-flood/86954728/">USA Today</a>. It’s the first U.S. company to do so.</p>

<p>If you're a movie buff, you've probably heard of the Steadicam, one of those big harnesses videographers use to stabilize their shots while filming. For $149.95, you can have a mini-version of the device for your iPhone. Overkill? Maybe.</p>

<p>The overall PC (personal computer) market has been declining for seven consecutive quarters, but the Mac has avoided the trend. No more. Both the IDC and Gartner research groups have issued new reports that show Apple’s computers have lost market share in the second quarter of 2016. (Of course, it might help if there were some substantial upgrades to the Mac line-up.)</p>

<p>On a regular basis, <em>Apple World Today</em> posts a list of notable new apps or app updates that have been released. They may not necessarily be new, but they're popular and deserve mention. Here are today's picks.</p>

<p>For over a year after its introduction, Apple Pay was the only real option for consumers who wanted to pay with their smartphone. That changed towards the end of 2015, when Android Pay and Samsung Pay were rolled out.</p>

<p>U.S. Treasury Secretary Jacob J. Lew will meet with European Union antitrust chief Margrethe Vestager as she prepares to deliver a final verdict on a probe into Apple’s tax affairs in Ireland, <a target="_blank" href="http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-07-11/u-s-treasury-chief-lew-set-for-apple-tax-showdown-with-vestager" rel="noopener noreferrer">reports Bloomberg</a>, quoting two unnamed people “people familiar with the case, who asked not to be identified because the matter is private.”</p>

<p>Canalys forecasts that 7.5 million smart watches with cellular connectivity — including a second generation Apple Watch — will ship in 2016, rising to 53.6 million in 2020. </p>

<p>Camtasia is a program for recording and annotating audio and video captured from your Mac commonly known as screencasting.  I’ve used other programs in the past to do raw captures from my Mac and then did the painful editing in iMovie and GarageBand but Camtasia does everything  with an intuitive and easy-to-use Mac interface.</p>

<p>In its biannual Computer Repair Report, RESCUECOM — a computer repair company in the U.S., the U.K., and Canada — says that difficulty with Windows has not eased as much as expected, though it has slightly. As for Macs, the report says they’re “extremely reliable” and make up just 0.7% of the repair calls to RESCUECOM.</p>