As announced earlier this week, Apple has now launched the One-Day Shopping Event with discounts on iOS devices, Macs, and accessories. The event will propagate on Apple’s online stores across the world according to different time zones; right now, it is available on Apple’s Australian and New Zealand stores with a dedicated webpage.

Apple reports some important details on its website:

Enjoy special pricing on all the great gifts below. Buy online and get fast, free shipping. Or shop at your favourite Apple Retail Store, where you’ll enjoy faster checkout with Express Shopping.

Shopping event prices are solely available on 23 November, 2012, from 2:01 a.m. to 24 November, 2012, 1:59 a.m. in AEDT, are subject to change, and include GST. Promotional pricing cannot be combined with any other offers. Not all sale products are available in all Apple Retail Stores.

Starting with the iPad 2 and Retina iPad at the top of the list, the exclusive offer doesn’t include the iPad mini. Notably, for Macs, only portables are included, but there are accessories that are usually meant for desktop computers such as Magic Mouse, Magic Trackpad, and Apple’s Wireless Keyboard.

The official One-Day Shopping Event webpage is available here for Australian users. We’ll update this post with links to EU and US pricing as soon as they become available. Note only the base model prices are listed below.

• iPad: A$498 – save A$41
• iPad 2: A$398 – save A$31
• iPod touch (5th gen): A$298 – save A$31
• iPod touch (4th gen): A$194 – save A$25
• iPod nano: A$158 – save A$11
• MacBook Pro (13″ Retina): A$1,794 – save A$105
• MacBook Pro: A$1,244 – save A$105
• MacBook Air: A$994 – save A$105
• AirPort Express Base Station: A$108 – save A$11
• AirPort Extreme Base Station: A$178 – save A$21
• Time Capsule: A$298 – save A$21
• Apple Magic Mouse: A$64 – save A$11
• Magic Trackpad: A$64 – save A$11
• Apple Wireless Keyboard: A$64 – save A$11
• iPad Smart Case: A$44 – save A$15
• iPad Smart Cover (Polyurethane): A$34 – save A$11
• iPad Smart Cover (Leather): A$58 – save A$21
• Apple In-Ear Headphones: A$88 – save A$11
• Apple EarPods: A$28 – save A$7

It was previously reported the next-generation iPhone would be available on U.S. carrier Sprint, and today The Wall Street Journal adds some details to its initial report, claiming that Sprint is “betting the company” on a $20 billion iPhone deal that will see Sprint purchasing 30.5 million iPhones over the next four years.

New details, not previously reported, give a rare look at Apple’s closely guarded dealings with carriers, and reveal just how high the stakes are for Sprint.

Mr. Hesse told the board the carrier would have to agree to purchase at least 30.5 million iPhones over the next four years—a commitment of $20 billion at current rates—whether or not it could find people to buy them, according to people familiar with the matter. In order to keep the price people pay for the phone low and competitive with rivals, Sprint would be subsidizing the cost of each phone to the tune of about $500, which would take a long time to recoup even at the high monthly fees iPhone users pay.

Sprint’s board called the iPhone “project Sony” internally, and a person familiar with the matter has been quoted by the WSJ saying “We have to have it”. The deal’s hit on Sprint’s operating income is “staggering”, according to another source. In a lawsuit filed against the AT&T / T-Mobile merger in September, Sprint said the company “has had to compete without access to the iPhone for nearly five years”.

Apple is expected to introduce a new iPhone tomorrow in Cupertino at 10 AM Pacific time. Check out our roundup for a breakdown of rumors and predictions.

How great would it be to have access to some kind of deal for useful and well-designed Mac apps bundled with resources for web design, CSS, or even Photoshop? That’s exactly what BundleHunt is offering in its latest initiative to sell a bundle of “11 Mac Apps + Design Goodies” at $49.99. For the same price of a Thunderbolt Cable you’ll get gems like Launchbar and Divvy — we reviewed the latter here — as well as Hype, the beautiful HTML5 design app, Xslimmer and WriteRoom. And on top of the OS X love, you’ll also get your hands on 4 Smashing Magazine design ebooks, 3 WordPress themes from Theme Trust, and a complete Geomicon icon set.

BundleHunt includes:

• LaunchBar: Objective Development’s LaunchBar is the original application launcher for the Mac, used every day by folks who care about being productive with their Macs. Gestures may be the hot new trend in Lion, but let’s not forget about the power of the keyboard. LaunchBar lets you control every aspect of your Mac, it’s highly customizable and efficient in letting you access applications, folders, contacts, bookmarks — you name it. Normally $35.
• Color Schemer Studio 2: This app lets you build color schemes quickly, so you can create and save palettes, and use the color wheel to check out harmonies between your color choices. Available on the Mac and Windows, it fully supports web (RGB) or print (CMYK) standards. Sold  for $49.99.
• WriteRoom: A full-screen writing environment to get words on a page, stay focused, and keep your work synced across the Mac and iOS. Normally $25.00.
• Divvy: A new way to manage your desktop by quickly choosing the exact proportions of application windows with keyboard shortcuts. You can create as many shortcuts as you want, and manage your apps’ settings through Divvy’s grid interface. $14.00.
• Tumult Hype: With “no coding required”, Hype enables designers to build beautifully animated websites that will work on desktop computers, iPhones, and iPads. By rivaling Flash content with a universal standard supported by any modern web browser, Hype uses WebKit to visually build animations, giving you additional tools to create custom JavaScript code and edit an element’s HTML. Original price is $30.00.
• Seamless Studio: A desktop app that makes it easy to design vector patterns for the web, print, fabric, or any other design project. Available both on Mac and PC, regular price is $49.00.
• Smashing Magazine: Ebooks from Smashing Magazine are available as PDF, ePUB, Mobipocket (DRM-free) and they include: Mastering CSS for Web Developers; Professional Workflow Package; Modern Web Design & Development; Mastering Photoshop for Web Design, Volume 2. Normally $30.00.
• TN3 Gallery: An HTML-based customizable image gallery with slideshow, transitions and multiple album options so you can create web galleries that support CSS, XML, and Flickr. $37.00.
• GeomIcons Full Icon Set: 315 royalty-free vector icons in EPS format desgned by Brent Jackson. $16.00.
• ThemeTrust: 3 WordPress themes licensed under GPL, with support for widgets, and more. $147.00.
• XSlimmer: Sometimes applications come packaged with unnecessary code that your Mac will never use, and Xslimmer understands this. You can use Xslimmer to right-size your Mac apps and remove binaries or other chunks of code your Mac won’t need, while retaining the functionality of the app and, actually, trimming the code down to what’s really used so that apps will launch even faster. Normally sold for $15.

I’d argue that LaunchBar and Divvy alone make up for the bundle’s price, yet with BundleHunt you’re going to save $400 and get a variety of other Mac software, plus some useful goodies for your next design work. $49 gets you 7 great apps to add to your Mac’s library with licenses delivered directly to your email inbox.

Disclaimer: For every bundle purchased through MacStories, we receive a small kickback. If you’re interested in the bundle and supporting the MacStories crew, please use the link here or any of the affiliate links above.

According to The New York Post, Apple will hand over between $100 and $150 million in advance payments to the four major record labels as part of its iCloud deal with them. Each of the four, which includes Sony Music, EMI, Warner Music and Universal, were offered between $25 million and $50 million as incentives to get on board with Apple. The exact figures will ultimately depend on how many tracks consumers end up storing on Apple’s iCloud offering.

Yesterday we reported on the expected initial cost of iCloud, which is rumoured, to be free for the first year and $25 a year after that. The New York Post also notes that Apple will take a 30% cut of fees, the music publishers receiving 12% and the rest to going towards record labels and artists.

We also reported yesterday that Apple had finalised its iCloud deals with Universal Music, which was the hold out record company.  The New York Post also notes that the size of the advance payments was the major stumbling block for Google, which had apparently been negotiating with the music companies before launching its cloud music offering last month. The official iCloud announcement will come on Monday at the WWDC keynote.

[Via The New York Post]

BGR reports one of Apple’s announcements at the upcoming WWDC will be about the Back to School 2011 program, which was initially rumored to launch this week. According to the website, this year’s Back to School will continue offering a free iPod touch to students who purchase a new Mac, although it’s possible that Apple will also kick off a new promotion with a $200 discount off an iPad following the purchase of a new Mac.

We have been told Apple will continue to offer educational discounts on computers and either a free iPod touch, or $229 towards the purchase of any other iPod. Our source also let us know that there might be something new in the works, as well… they heard that it’s possible Apple might offer students up to $200 off an iPad with the purchase of a new Mac.

The Back to School program has usually been announced in late May or early June. With the WWDC starting on June 6, the promotion could play nice with other major announcements such as Lion and iOS 5 made on stage. In the past years, Back to School allowed students to get a free 8 GB iPod touch, and the current family of iPod touches starts at $229 with the 8 GB model featuring the Retina Display and FaceTime camera. Apple’s push in the educational market was brought to the press’ attention again two weeks ago as the University of Delaware said an “Apple Store” would come on campus, enabling students to check out and buy products directly next to university’s library. With a wide selection of apps targeting students available on the App Store, $200 off an iPad combined with, for example, a MacBook Air indeed would be a good deal.

As work on the rumored cloud music service nears finalization for an official WWDC announcement, Bloomberg reported last night Apple has reached a deal with Sony Music Entertainment, following reports that the company managed to sign the Warner Music Group and EMI. This leaves Universal, the biggest label of all four in the United States, out of the equation, but according to the rumors Apple’s Eddy Cue is actively focused on closing all the remaining paperwork with music labels by next week.

Apple has reached licensing accords with Sony Corp. (6758)’s music division, EMI Group and Warner Music Group, the people said. Universal Music Group, the largest recording company, is close to a deal, another person said. The company also would need to reach agreements with music publishers, which control different rights than the labels.

Apple’s cloud music service is said to be part of a major MobileMe revamp the company has been working on for the past two years, which will include several new functionalities and a new price point with basic features offered for free. As for the music service, it’s unclear whether Apple will adopt an upload system like Google and Amazon or a subscription-based delivery with songs coming from the iTunes Store, but a patent surfaced yesterday seems to suggest Apple’s implementation will go as far as allowing users to upload their own songs, and stream others they don’t own from a larger “content source” like the iTunes Store.

A TechCrunch post from late yesterday suggests that Apple and voice recognition company Nuance have been negotiating a deal for months following Apple’s acquisition of Siri. Siri, which Apple acquired last April, developed an iPhone app that was marketed as a “virtual personal assistant” and would listen to audible questions from a user (such as “where can I find parking around here”), and would respond with an answer.

In a previous report, TechCrunch said that they believed the acquisition of Siri would lead to iOS 5 having “assistance technology [that] is said to be deeply integrated into the OS for all the different services offered.” However, Apple has had to renegotiate deals with all the partners of Siri since it acquired them and apparently the one hold out is Nuance. According to TechCrunch’s sources, the negotiations between Apple could be as big as an acquisition or just a partnership.

Apparently an acquisition is unlikely at this stage, likely for a number of reasons mainly surrounding the cost; Nuance is a public company valued at over $6 billion, furthermore much of that value is because of various licensing deals that would likely be stopped if Apple bought Nuance. The other alternative is that Apple partners Nuance and licenses the voice recognition technology; and at this stage it is the more likely option according to TechCrunch’s sources. The hold up is apparently because of Nuance CEO Paul Ricci being a “really hard bargainer”, going as hard as Steve Jobs would in the negotiations and resulting in a standoff between the two companies.

Apple does have alternatives to dealing with Nuance, it could build its own service but this would be fraught with legal issues (Nuance holds many patents) and would take time (that Apple may not want to spend) or it could go with Google, but given the current smartphone battle this seems unlikely. Consequently it seems unlikely that Apple has any good alternative here, particularly given how well the Nuance voice recognition technology works.

With with WWDC rapidly approaching, and iOS 5 fairly likely to make some kind of appearance, one would presume that Apple would be at this stage rushing to finalise a deal with Nuance, particularly if it is a major cornerstone of the iOS 5 experience. One final point made by MG Siegler in the article is that;

And the truth is that Nuance needs Apple too. Not only are they also threatened by Google, but Nuance technology is simply not very meaningful without apps that utilize it like Siri. And many of those apps are appearing guess where: iOS.

[Via TechCrunch]

Apple just posted the details of the Black Friday sale for the US Apple Store. You can save $101 on iMacs, MacBook Pros and Airs, $41 on the iPad, $11 on the iPod Nano and $21 on the iPod Touch.

Just like in other international Apple stores where the sale is happening, the deals include a variety of accessories. Check out the details below. (more…)