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Apple Introduces New Apple Music Plan, Siri Features, and HomePod Mini Colors

At this morning’s event, Apple Music’s Zane Lowe made his keynote debut to announce the new Apple Music Voice Plan. Coming in at a mere $5/month, the Apple Music Voice Plan is now the lowest-cost way to gain access to Apple’s music streaming service 1.

The Voice Plan has a catch though. True to its name, it only grants full access to Apple Music via Siri. This includes a customized in-app experience in the Music app for Voice Plan subscribers. It’s not yet clear what exactly this experience entails, but based on Apple’s press release, these users will be able to access a limited set of the Music app’s features. Specifically, they’ll be able to access their playback history and Apple Music’s built-in playlists, but it seems unlikely that they’ll be able to create custom playlists using Apple Music songs. Whether or not full search of the Apple Music catalog will be available is unclear, but requesting specific songs from Siri should be possible.

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Replay Apple’s October 18, 2021 Keynote and Other Videos

If you didn’t follow the live stream or announcements as they unfolded today, you can replay it on Apple’s Events site and catch the product videos on Apple’s YouTube channel.

The keynote video can be streamed here and on the Apple TV using the TV app. A high-quality version will also be available through Apple Podcasts as a video and audio podcast. There is also an American Sign Language version of the event, which is available here.

https://youtu.be/exM1uajp–A

More videos after the break.

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Apple Announces Availability of New HomePod mini Colors, AirPods, New MacBook Pros, and macOS Monterey

Apple announced the following pre-order and availability dates for the products announced today:

New Yellow, Orange, and Blue HomePod minis

  • Availability: November

AirPods (3rd Generation)

Pre-order: Today
Availability: October 26

14 and 16” MacBook Pros

Pre-order: Today
Availability: Tuesday, October 26

macOS Monterey

  • Release Date: Monday, October 25

You can follow all of our October Apple event coverage through our October 2021 event hub, or subscribe to the dedicated RSS feed.

I Made the Most Annoying App. And People Loved It. [Sponsor]

“Annoying” is probably not a word a developer would like his app to be associated with.

I certainly don’t mind.

Thankfully, users have also thought of my app as “indispensable” and a “game changer.”

Hi, I’m Junjie, and I made Due.

It has helped people living with ADHD and early dementia. It has saved marriages. And it seems to have even saved lives.

I’d love to say I had these noble goals in mind when I made Due.

The truth is, I created Due in 2010 for myself.

The first version tackled just one thing—quickly capture what needs to be done, and when it needs to be done.

When I realized it was easy to miss notifications, I added Auto Snooze. It repeatedly notifies me of overdue reminders until I act on them.

Often, I also needed to reschedule reminders. So I made it easy to postpone a reminder—even without launching the app.

Someone who had used Due for the past 9 years said the person who created Due knows his stuff.

I guess that’s because there isn’t a day that goes by where I don’t use Due myself.

Learn more about what Due can do for you. Available on iPhone, iPad and Apple Watch.

Also available separately for Mac—on the Mac App Store and Setapp.

Our thanks to Due for sponsoring MacStories this week.

MacStories Unwind: Apple Frames 2.0, an Upcoming Apple Event, and a Safari Extension for iPad

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Sponsored by: Discourse – A Powerful, Customizable Platform for Civilized Discussion

This week on MacStories Unwind:

MacStories

Club MacStories

  • MacStories Weekly
    • Federico on Remind Me Faster
    • A Reminders tip for applying tags to tasks with Siri
    • John on the future of read-it-later apps
    • Apps, links, and more

AppStories

Unwind

AppStories, Episode 244 – iOS and iPadOS 15 Top Tips→

This week on AppStories, we share a long list of iOS and iPadOS 15 tips, highlighting lesser-known features that we are using to get the most out of the latest versions of the OSes.

[Subscribe here.](https://appstories.net/plans)

Subscribe here.

On AppStories+, John tries to convince Federico to try a robot vacuum cleaner and Federico explains the technique he’s using to bring localization to his popular Apple Frames shortcut.

We deliver AppStories+ to subscribers with bonus content, ad-free, and at a high bitrate early every week.

To learn more about the benefits included with an AppStories+ subscription, visit our Plans page, or read the AppStories+ FAQ.

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Apple Announces October 18, 2021 Media Event

As tweeted by Greg Joswiak, Apple has announced an online media event for October 18, 2021, at 10:00 am Pacific.

Based on the latest speculation and rumors, Apple is likely to introduce new Apple silicon-based Macs. Apple has already replaced part of its Mac product line with models based on its own chip architecture, but it’s expected that the company is preparing to introduce new MacBook Pros and perhaps other models at the high end of its product line. Another product we could see introduced at the event is the long-rumored AirPods 3. With the winter holidays approaching, now seems like the perfect time to rekindle interest in AirPods.

Apple may also take the opportunity to announce a release date for macOS 12.0 Monterey. If last month’s Apple event and the timing of iOS and iPadOS are any indication, the final version of Monterey should be released to the public within days after the event.

Apple Frames 2.0: Faster, Lighter, and Featuring Support for iPhone 13, iPad mini, iPad 10.2”, iMac 24”, MacBook Air, and Multiple Languages

Apple Frames 2.0.

Apple Frames 2.0.

Today, I’m pleased to introduce Apple Frames 2.0, an all-new version of my popular shortcut to put screenshots inside physical device frames of Apple products. The new Apple Frames, which you can download at the end of this post or on the MacStories Shortcuts Archive, has been completely rewritten so it’s faster and lighter, comes with support for the latest iPhone 13 lineup and iPad mini, brings support for framing iMac and MacBook Air screenshots, and, at long last, is available internationally in seven different languages.

This is a massive update to Apple Frames, so let’s dive in.

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Discourse: A Powerful, Customizable Platform for Civilized Discussion [Sponsor]

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Toxicity and spam are two of the biggest problems for online communities, and we’ve developed features to help make your corner of the Internet a more civilized place. Discourse’s automatic trust system encourages new users to interact with your community in helpful, thoughtful ways – all while keeping spammers at bay. Plus, our built-in community-led moderation tools assist in keeping the trolls out and topics on track.

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Oh, and did we mention that you can trust your data with Discourse? Discourse never sells your data to advertisers, and you can download a full backup of your community at any time – no questions asked and no hidden fees.

Ready to try it out? MacStories readers can get a 60-day 100% free trial by using coupon code SHORTCUT when signing up. Start building your community today with Discourse.

Our thanks to Discourse for sponsoring MacStories this week.