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The Moving-Art Edition Tuesday, December 5, 2023

Halide Says It Will Never Support Video, So It’s Launching Kino Instead, by Jess Weatherbed, The Verge

Halide cofounder Ben Sandofsky has a message for everyone who’s asked if video capture will be added to the popular iPhone photography app: “Never.” Lux, the development team behind Halide, is instead working on Kino — a new, dedicated video capture app for iPhones that aims to provide professional recording features now that Apple supports log video encoding. Its release is scheduled for February... if all goes as planned.

Comixology Was Never Going To Save Comics, But It Tried, by Susana Polo, Polygon

Arguably, the tension between Comixology and its corporate mothership has been there since the 2014 acquisition of the digital comics platform. After Amazon acquired the app from its founders, the company removed the ability to purchase comics from all iOS versions of Comixology, so as not to pay app store fees to its biggest tech competitor, Apple.

But this isn’t a clear-cut case of a huge monopoly throwing its weight around a small industry. Comixology was already a monopoly. It’s monopolies all the way down.

Stuff

iOS 17 Bug Switches Apps While Typing - How To Fix, by Tim Hardwick, MacRumors

An increasing number of iPhone users are reporting a persistent iOS 17 bug that causes the app switcher to suddenly appear when they are typing on the screen. If you have experienced this frustrating issue, you are not alone.

Apple Music Users Experiencing Bug With 'Add Playlist Songs' Setting, by Joe Rossignol, MacRumors

In recent weeks, many Apple Music subscribers have reported that the "Add Playlist Songs" setting is broken on the iPhone, iPad, and sometimes the Mac. After a user toggles off the setting, the bug can cause it to turn back on, resulting in any songs that a user adds to a playlist being added to their music library in an unwanted manner.

MarsEdit 5.1, by Agen Schmitz, TidBITS

Red Sweater Software has released MarsEdit 5.1 with support for Mastodon, enabling you to download, edit, and publish to any Mastodon service.

Dynamic Island Diet: Calory App Adds Meal Fasting Feature With Live Activities And More, by Chance Miller, 9to5Mac

For those unfamiliar, Calory is an iPhone and Apple Watch app that lets you count calories, track macros, and more. The focus is on making the process as simple and easy as possible, and this week’s addition of fasting support keeps in line with that focus.

Ride Into My DM's: Strava Unveils New Messaging Feature, by Betsy Welch, Outside

On Monday morning, global fitness tracking platform Strava launched a new messaging feature. Allegedly over two years in the making, the new feature will allow users — or ‘athletes,’ as the brand refers to them — to send both direct and group messages.

While Strava claims that it “definitely heard the community ask for messaging for some time,” the launch also comes curiously close to some interesting press.

Mophie Makes Its MagSafe Travel Charger Even Better With Apple Watch Fast Charging, by Rikka Altland, 9to5Toys

Mophie has achieved an even closer level of near perfection with the refreshed 3-in-1 MagSafe travel charger now that it has Apple Watch fast charging.

Notes

London's Battersea Power Station Transformed For Christmas With Giant 'Drawn On iPad' Animation, by Ed Hardy, Cult of Mac

Battersea Power Station, home of London’s latest Apple retail store, is decorated for Christmas with an enormous moving art display projected on the front. Reasonably named “Bigger Christmas Trees,” it was created by artist David Hockney on an iPad.

Apple Warns India's EU-style Charger Rules Will Hit Local Production Target, by Aditya Kalra and Munsif Vengattil, Reuters

In a closed-door Nov. 28 meeting chaired by India's IT ministry, Apple asked officials to exempt existing iPhone models from the rules, warning it will otherwise struggle to meet production targets set under India's production-linked incentive (PLI) scheme, according to the meeting minutes seen by Reuters.

Spotify Is Screwed, by Amanda Hoover, Wired

“It’s too cheap,” says Dyson. “To have access to every single piece of music that’s ever been released—and ever will be released—for $10 a month is just astounding.” The same is true of Spotify today as was true when it was founded 17 years ago: it’s a business that’s good for listeners and labels, but bad for both streamers and artists.

Bottom of the Page

In the past two days, I've encountered two bugs with the Shortcuts widget on my iPhone.

Yesterday, one of my Shortcuts widget changed from the two-buttons variety to the single-button version. Today, a different Shortcuts widget stopped responding to any of my taps, refusing to run any of my shortcuts no matter how hard I pressed on them.

Shortcuts on iPhone, as well as the Shortcuts widget, brings me such joy and convenience that losing the ability to use them, even temporary, was such a frustration.

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Thanks for reading.