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Canceling Difficult Content is a Bad Omen for Apple TV+

Charlotte Henry ·

We learned this week that Apple TV+ show Bastards has been scrapped. The show, which starred Richard Gere, is not the first piece of challenging content pulled by Apple. At Cult of Mac, Luke Dormehl made a compelling case as to why this might not be the right approach.

This isn’t the first time we’ve heard murmurs about Apple’s family-friendly TV and movie ambitions. Last year, The Wall Street Journal reported that Tim Cook made the call to cancel a semi-autobiographical drama about Dr. Dre… Apple TV+ should arrive this fall at roughly the same time as a bunch of other new streaming services. The biggest of the newcomers, Disney+, will presumably sate many people’s appetite for family-friendly fare. Carving out a niche for Apple TV+ in this crowded environment could mean counter-programming against Disney. Where Disney goes light, Apple could have gone dark. Cupertino’s enormous cash reserves give it the capability to take risks that few others can.

 

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Prepare Your iPhone for Hurricane Conditions

John Martellaro ·

USA Today has a list of excellent tips on how to prepare your smartphone for disaster conditions.

If you’re preparing for a hurricane, your survival plan should include your smartphone. But you’ll want to do a few things in advance to make sure it will work, and actually be helpful in an emergency. And it’s a good time to remember: you won’t be able to rely on your mobile device for everything.

The author’s checklist is impeccable.

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Google Built Fake Webpages Called 'Push Pages' to Defy GDPR

Andrew Orr ·

As part of Google’s DoubleClick/Authorized Buyers advertising system, the company created hidden webpages for advertisers that violate its own policies.

Google Push Pages are served from a Google domain (https://pagead2.googlesyndication.com) and all have the same name, “cookie_push.html”. Each Push Page is made distinctive by a code of almost two thousand characters, which Google adds at the end to uniquely identify the person that Google is sharing information about. This, combined with other cookies supplied by Google, allows companies to pseudonymously identify the person in circumstances where this would not otherwise be possible.

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Apple Prepares to Offer Bonds to Fund Share Buybacks

Andrew Orr ·

Apple is preparing a bond offering to raise money for share buybacks so it doesn’t have to dip into its cash hoard. The company hasn’t offered bonds since 2017.

We estimate the net proceeds from sales of the notes will be approximately $ , after deducting underwriting discounts and our offering expenses. We intend to use such net proceeds for general corporate purposes, including repurchases of our common stock and payment of dividends under our program to return capital to shareholders, funding for working capital, capital expenditures, acquisitions and repayment of debt.