Happy July 4th!

In honor of Independence Day—a U.S. holiday—The Mac Observer is taking off Monday, July 4th. We will return on Tuesday, July 5th, with our usual Apple, Mac, iPad iPhone, and Apple Watch news. Enjoy the holiday!

TMO Daily Observations 2016-07-01: Apple Music and Tidal, Spotify's App Store Gripe

Word on the street says Apple is in talks to buy the streaming music service Tidal. Bryan Chaffin and Dave Hamilton join Jeff Gamet to share their thoughts on whether or not a deal between the two makes sense, plus they look at Spotify’s complaint that Apple is blocking competition in the streaming music market with its App Store approval process.

Save $600 on MacTech Conference, Includes Home Automation Showcase

This fall will mark the 7th annual MacTech Conference, happening in Los Angeles November 15-18. For the first time, MacTech Conference 2016 includes a Home Automation Showcase featuring demonstrations of products and services that work with Apple’s HomeKit and other platforms. That’s not all, of course, as MacTech Conference continues its stellar conference track with sessions built especially for IT Pros, enterprise administrators and consultants of all levels. Super early-bird pricing ended back in May, but as a TMO reader you can take advantage of that pricing until Tuesday, July 5th by using our special link. That means you can register for MacTech Conference 2016 for just $999. Don’t let the weekend get in your way, register now and I’ll see you at MacTech in November!

Last Chance for the World Class Mac Bundle: $24.99

It’s the last chance to grab  8 Mac apps in the World Class Mac Bundle. It includes iStat Menu 5—a utility I can’t imagine not having—Freeway  Pro 7, uBar 6, Painter Essentials 5, DropZone 3, Xee 3, Data Rescue 4, and Hype 3.5. Those are solid apps, and you can get them all in this bundle for $24.99. There are detailed descriptions on each app in the deal listing, so check it out.