Apple today published its picks for the best media in 2018 across its various platforms and services. These include selections for best app on iPhone, iPad, Mac, and Apple TV, as well as top picks in categories of music, TV and movies, podcasts, and books. Alongside these editorial selections, Apple has published top charts for the year across the App Store, Apple Music, Apple Podcasts, and Apple Books.
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Apple Publishes ‘Best of 2018’ Lists for Apps, Music, Books, and More
Instagram Adds Close Friends Feature to Stories
In development for over a year, Instagram announced today that it is adding a new ‘close friends’ feature to Stories. The new feature, which is rolling out in stages today, lets users limit who can see individual Instagram Stories posts.
Limiting a photo or video to close friends is straightforward. Friends can be added or removed from the ‘Close Friends’ list from the side menu in your Instagram profile. When you’re ready to share a photo or video as part of your Instagram Story, the new feature adds a circular green button with a white star to the bottom of the screen that restricts sharing to people on your close friends list.
When you receive content from people who have added you as a close friend, their avatar at the top of Instagram’s main view will be outlined in green to signal that a close friend has shared something. The image or video is also badged as having been shared by a close friend.
It will be interesting to see how the Close Friends feature impacts Instagram. I like the idea of limiting some of what I share on Instagram with a smaller circle of friends. For many people, I expect the feature will make them more comfortable with sharing more as opposed to moving their entire Stories usage to a private group. However, it also has the potential to drain Stories of much of their content in favor of private silos.
Apple Music Coming to Amazon Echo Devices
In a blog post published this morning, Amazon announced that Apple Music is set to launch on Amazon Echo devices next month, starting the week of December 17.
According to Dave Limp, senior vice president of Amazon Devices, Echo users will be able to ask Alexa, the device’s built-in voice assistant, to play their favorite songs, artists, albums, playlists created by Apple’s curators, as well as radio stations available on the service. Beats 1, Apple Music’s own live radio station featuring artist interviews and daily programs, will also be accessible via the Amazon Echo, the company said. The integration will be enabled just like any other skill on the Amazon Echo by connecting your Apple Music account to Amazon’s device using the Alexa app.
“Music is one of the most popular features on Alexa—since we launched Alexa four years ago, customers are listening to more music in their homes than ever before,” said Dave Limp, senior vice president, Amazon Devices. “We are committed to offering great music providers to our customers and since launching the Music Skill API to developers just last month, we’ve expanded the music selection on Alexa to include even more top tier services. We’re thrilled to bring Apple Music – one of the most popular music services in the US – to Echo customers this holiday.”
While Apple Music has long been available on Android in addition to iOS and macOS (and on Sonos speakers in addition to HomePod), the upcoming Amazon Echo integration marks a major shift as Apple Music has never been able to integrate with competing smart speakers through third-party voice assistants. It’ll be interesting to see if the Amazon Echo integration will be more limited than the HomePod’s native Apple Music access, which we’ll make sure to test once Apple Music’s Alexa skill goes live next month.
Joswiak Says the XR is Apple’s Most Popular New iPhone and Details the Company’s World AIDS Day Efforts
In an interview with CNET, Apple Vice President Greg Joswiak revealed that the iPhone XR has been the best selling of the latest iPhone models every day since it was launched, a statement that is no doubt aimed at recent reports that XR parts orders have been reduced due to weak demand. Joswiak declined to provide specific sales figures to CNET.
Joswiak also said that Apple would again be marking World AIDS Day by making a donation to support Red, a nonprofit founded by U2 band member Bono. Apple is a long-term supporter of Red and has participated in World AIDS Day in a variety of ways over the years, raising $160 million since the group was founded in 2006.
In the past, the company has made donations based on Black Friday and Cyber Monday sales, donated based on Apple Pay purchases, turned store logos red, and worked with music artists and app developers to release special Red-themed content. According to CNET, this year:
The company will donate $1 for every Apple Pay purchase at an Apple Store, Apple.com or through the Apple Store app from Dec. 1 to Dec. 7, and it plans to turn 125 Apple Store logos red in honor of the day.
That’s similar to last year, except that this year the donation does not include in-app transactions, and Joswiak told CNET the App Store is not participating with any special promotions this year. That’s a shame because past Red-themed promotions raised awareness of Red’s efforts to combat AIDS as well as funds to support the group’s work.
Deliveries, the Package Tracker App, Introduces Siri Shortcuts Support
If you’re at all like me, then now is the time of year you receive the most packages. In the midst of the holiday season, the usual assortment of deliveries my wife and I have coming for ourselves are joined by all the gifts we’ve purchased for others. It couldn’t be better timing, then, that my package tracker of choice, Deliveries, has added Siri shortcut support today.
Popular iOS Podcast Player Castro Sold to Tiny
Big announcement from Supertop’s blog today:
We have some news to share. Tiny has purchased a majority stake in Castro. We are still shareholders and will continue working on the app full time.
The post goes on to explain the reasons for this transfer of ownership.
Castro has reached a size where the demands of running the business have been pulling us in too many different directions. We haven’t been able to focus as much on the core work of designing and building a product. Selling to Tiny gets Castro access to more resources, contacts and expertise. By growing the team we can specialize our roles to be more focused individually and get more done collectively. We can get back to what we’re good at and what we love doing.
Castro underwent a business model transition earlier this year, moving from paid up front with Castro 2 to free with Castro 3 alongside the launch of the Castro Plus subscription option. It sounds like that shift has led to an increased amount of administrative work for Supertop’s development team, which should be alleviated thanks to this acquisition. The post concludes:
We’ve started work on Castro 4. The plan is to improve the design to bring more listeners into the Castro flow. We’re excited, because for the first time in five years of work on Castro, we’ll have the resources to focus exclusively on it as product designers and developers, without contract work to distract us, and with a team around us to handle the administrative tasks.
Castro is one of the best podcast clients on iOS, so I’m thankful that today’s announcement doesn’t spell its end. On the contrary, it sounds like there’s reason to be hopeful about the app’s future in Tiny’s hands. Only time will tell, of course, so I’ll be curious to watch the app’s update cycle over the coming year.
Apple Celebrates the Hour of Code with Today at Apple Sessions and Announces New Curriculum Offerings
As in the past, Apple is marking Computer Science Education Week by participating in the Hour of Code. The company will host special Hour of Code sessions in its retail stores from December 1 - 14 as part of its Today at Apple programming. Apple also announced new curriculum offerings:
The company also introduced Swift Coding Club materials to help teach coding outside of the classroom with Swift, Apple’s easy-to-learn programming language used by professional developers to create world-class apps. And to help prepare and develop students for the workforce, the company unveiled new Advanced Placement curriculum and App Development with Swift certification.
This is the sixth year that Apple has participated in the Hour of Code. Participants from 6 - 12 years old will learn to code with robots, while kids 12 and up will use Swift Playgrounds and the iPad.
The Hour of Code is just a small part of Apple’s Everyone Can Code initiative, which has dramatically expanded in recent years. The program now reaches children from their earliest years in school through college graduates.
My kids have participated in past Hour of Code sessions and had a great experience. They are an excellent introduction to coding for any kid who is curious about programming. I suggest signing up soon if you’re interested though because in past years, the sessions, which should go live soon, have filled quickly.
Google Integrates Assistant App with Siri Shortcuts on iOS
Google released an exciting update for its Assistant iOS app today, bringing support for Siri shortcuts and, for the first time, opening lines of communication between the two competing assistants.
Siri and the Google Assistant have historically been unable to work together in any way, but thanks to the opening up of Siri via shortcuts in iOS 12, that changes now. With the latest update, you can set up a shortcut in iOS to immediately, via Siri, trigger any command you’d like to give Google’s Assistant.
Apple Releases Annual Holiday Ad ‘Share Your Gifts’
Apple has released its annual holiday ad titled ‘Share Your Gifts.’ The video tells the story of Sophia, a creative young woman who uses a MacBook to write but puts her finished work in a box where no one can see it. Set to ‘come out and play’ by Billie Eilish, the story follows Sophia over time as she continues to write and pursue other creative avenues always hiding them from others.
In the heart-warming conclusion of the video, Sophia’s dog pushes her window open causing the pages of her printed writing to blow out the window into the streets. Sophia races outside after the sheets of paper, but can’t retrieve them before townspeople pick them up and start reading with smiles on their faces as they enjoy her writing.
The video was released with an accompanying ‘making of’ video that shows how much went into the piece, which combines hand-built miniature sets and CG graphics. It’s a fascinating look at how much care and work went into making the nearly three-minute video.
I’ve always enjoyed Apple’s holiday ads and this year’s is no exception. The message of sharing your creativity as a way of connecting with others is a great message for the holiday season that also fits well with the company’s products.