Daily News Courier

Fans of Ashton Kutcher and Apple technology have a new reason to look forward to 2013. jOBS, the new independent movie based on the life of the late Apple boss will start screening in theatres in April. However, this is not the same movie, shot by Sony Pictures and inspired by Walter Isaacson?s biography. The movie will feature Ashton Kutcher in the leading role and will be premiered this month at the Sundance Film Festival.

Open Road Films and Five Start Feature Film posted this week more information about the flick:

?Directed by Joshua Michael Stern, written by Matthew Whitely, shot by Oscar- winning cinematographer Russell Carpenter and produced by Mark Hulme, jOBS details the major moments and defining characters that influenced Steve Jobs on a daily basis from 1971 through 2000.?

jOBS also stars Dermot Mulroney, Josh Gad, Lukas Haas, J.K. Simmons and Matthew Modine amongst others. Ashton Kutcher has acted in movies like ?Dude, Where?s my Car? and ?The Butterfly Effect? and TV shows like ?Two and a Half Men?. He is a tremendous popular actor. However, it remains to be seen if he can slip into the skin of the Silicon Valley overlord.

Apparently, this is not all Steve Jobs fans will get. Another movie is in the works and this time efforts are lead by Aaron Sorkin who also did ?The Social Network?. The film is said to focus on the launches of the Mac, NeXT and iPod.

Source: CultOfMac

AppleInsider reports today that Wall Street analyst Rob Cihra, from Evercore Partners, has today updated his projections for Apple?s quarterly earnings report, which is due to be announced on January 23. In his latest report, Cihra says that he thinks that Apple will report sales of 50 million iPhones for the holiday quarter, which would represent a 35% increase on the same period a year ago, and 86% growth from the previous quarter. As far as the iPad is concerned, Cihra says that he thinks that Apple sold 24 million iPads in the quarter, which would see a 56% growth year on year, and a 71% growth spurt from the previous quarter. Cihra makes particular note of the dynamic sales achievement of the iPad mini, which he says will have made up 10 million of Apple?s overall iPad sales figures. Cihra goes on to say that the iPad mini had a ?booming launch?, and that Apple still cannot make them quick enough to satisfy customer demand.

Source: 50M iPhone sales, ‘booming’ iPad mini expected in Apple’s holiday quarter

When Samsung first released its Galaxy Note device that featured a stylus, some voices commented that the pen was an aging accessory. Nevertheless, the device turned out to become quite popular and many people reconsidered their standpoint regarding the usage of styluses on tablets and related devices. New recently surfaced information, suggests that now Apple wishes to join the stylus party as well.

HotHardware uncovered the fact that Cupertino already filled a patent for a stylus like accessory that has been described as an ?active stylus?. From the patent application:

?(The pen) can either act as a drive electrode to create an electric field between the drive electrode and the sense lines of a mutual capacitive touch sensor panel, or as a sense electrode for sensing capacitively coupled signals from one or more stimulated drive rows and columns of the touch sensor panel or both.?

So, basically, HotHardware claims that the pen will work as any normal stylus would but its performance would be a better one because of its more advanced input.

Apple has been known to follow the trends of the markets, so it wouldn?t be so surprising that the company wants to add a line of styluses to its iOS devices. However, the fact that the company has filed a patent doesn?t absolutely mean we will actually see something of it in real life. So, for the time being, we can just sit back and imagine using a stylus with our iPads.

Source: TechCrunch

Since we already stepped in 2013, Apple has announced the date for its first quarter earnings report conference call. The date is just around the corner ? it?s January the 23rd and the conference will be broadcasted live on the web. The official announcement:

?Apple plans to conduct a conference call to discuss financial results of its first fiscal quarter on Wednesday, January 23, 2013 at 2:00 p.m. PT / 5:00 p.m. ET.?

Apple wrapped up things very well in 2012. The fourth fiscal quarter of 2012, which ended September 29th saw Cupertino post a total revenue of $36 billion. The tech giant sold 14 million iPads, 26.9 million iPhones and 4.9 Macs. The entire 2012 fiscal year, Cupertino accomplished to accumulate a total of $156.53 billion revenue.

Nevertheless, we are very interested in seeing what numbers Cupertino is going to post for the first quarter of 2013, since the first fiscal semester of the year has been known to be the biggest for the company. This particular quarter saw the launch of the iPhone 5, iPad 4 and iPad mini as well as Thanskiving/Black Friday/Christmas. Also, on the 3rd of December, Apple launched the iPhone 5 in 47 international markets.

By the end of December 2012, the tech giant announced that the availability will spread to a total of 102 countries. Also, in the first quarter of 2013, Apple unleashed the iPhone 5 in one of the largest untapped markets to date ? China. The tech giant already shared with the public that in the first weekend Chinese customers purchased 2 million units. So the results are expected to be pretty massive.

Source: AppleInsider

It?s finally official. After countless rumors that Apple will terminate the long term contract it had with its big time rival ? Samsung, in the processor department, here comes the confirmation that the link has been broken. According to The Commercial Times, the tech giant has finally struck a deal with the Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co company. The report goes on to say that TSMC?s first task will imply starting production for Apple?s brand new fourth generation iPad A6X processor.

The partnership was long overdue, since rumors of the two companies agreeing to do business with one another have been circling around the Internet since the last quarter of 2012. And Apple is known to have been looking for ways to ditch Samsung in one way or another. The two giants have been battling for years on the tech market as well as in courtrooms.

As a result of legal actions taken against them, Samsung was ordered by a judge to pay up to $1 billion in damages to Apple for infringing a number of patents. Apparently, Cupertino is doing everything it can in order to move as farthest as possible from Samsung.

On the other hand, TSMC seemed the perfect candidate for Apple, not only because it is an independent company but because it specializes in the 20nm design process which might prove to be very useful for Cupertino in the near future. Reports have surfaced that TSMC has already started trial production of A6X processors and the trials were completed very successfully.

Source: AppAdvice

For some, New Year?s Eve is the time to be reunited with ones friends and family, in order to celebrate the coming a new and better year. For others, things are apparently not that simple. The flagship Apple store in PAris was the scene of an armed robbery during New Year?s Eve.

The events started unfolding at around 9 p.m when armed individual broken in the Palais Garnier Apple store and stole different Apple items. The store is situated in the vicinity of the Galleries Lafayette department store. The police is currently investigating the break-in. It seems like the robbers took their time and appropriated a lot of products, as the loss was estimated somewhere between 1 million and 1.25 million euros. However, the police hasn?t officially confirmed the sum. A Paris police spokeswoman commented:

"It is too early to give an accurate estimation of the damage. An inventory is taking place to determine the exact amount of the damage. The price of an iPhone 5 is typically 679 Euros ($895) in France.?

The robbery was apparently well planned. The perpetrators threatened a security guard, but the only casualty to result from the attacks was a janitor who was ?lightly injured?. The burglars then escaped in a van with all the loot.

Christophe Crepin from the UNSA police union commented on the situation as well.

"They prepared their coup pretty well. Since the essential bulk of police forces were mobilized to patrol the Champs-Elys