Today’s the day: Apple is holding its “Spring Forward” event at the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts in San Francisco, California. This article contains the latest updates from the event in live blog style; all of our detailed individual stories from the event are now summarized at this link. The event officially began at 10 AM Pacific/ 1PM Eastern time, and our live coverage is below.
– Anyone interested in MacBooks besides me or it is 100% Apple Watch day?
– Lines are fun!
– I wouldn’t eat those
Meet the press pic.twitter.com/azCcMEUg3i
— mat honan⭐️ (@mat) March 9, 2015
– Some Apple folks have Watches already
Wraps!! #AppleEvent pic.twitter.com/nQCLPk4TTV
— alexei oreskovic (@lexnfx) March 9, 2015
– Sir Jony on the scene with a new sweater
Lots of Apple employees wearing the Apple Watch in the back of Yerba Buena pic.twitter.com/w9bAsPWuUs
— James Martin (@Jamesco) March 9, 2015
– Jimmy Iovine already wearing an Apple Watch. No word on if Apple Forgot to give Dre one
Jony Ive outside the Apple event in SF pic.twitter.com/EAJiL2IKh8
– PED from Fortune on scene
BREAKING: Jimmy Lovine wearing #AppleWatch heading into #AppleWatchEvent via @LaurenGoode #meerkat stream #mouthfull pic.twitter.com/yfJJ60BtM2
— Jim Carter III (@noinput) March 9, 2015
– People already inside the event:
The filthy Apple press pic.twitter.com/1i40smVgMp
— Philip Elmer-DeWitt (@philiped) March 9, 2015
– We’re 20 minutes out
– View from inside Yerba Buena:
– Former U.S. Vice President and current Apple Board Member Al Gore. Art Levinson also in attendance (Chairman):
– Free OneRepublic album?
Al Gore in the house at Apple Event! pic.twitter.com/TOU3c0hW6r
— Mark Spoonauer (@mspoonauer) March 9, 2015
– Trent Reznor in the audience as well.
Getting psyched backstage listening to I Lived by @OneRepublic.
— Tim Cook (@tim_cook) March 9, 2015
– Event has begun with a video showing the January 2015 West Lake Apple Store in China. Nice video.
– Tim on stage:
– Cook announces HBO coming to Apple TV. HBO CEO says HBO Now an Apple TV exclusive. $15 per month. Brand new HBO Now channel on Apple TV. HBO Go also on iPhones and iPads. Launches in early April. No Cable box required. “Transformative moment for HBO,” CEO says.
– Apple TV price dropped to $69. 25 million units sold to date. Cook says this Apple TV is “just the beginning.”
– On to iPhone, Cook says 700 million phones sold to date. Calls the latest iPhones the “best phones in the world.” “The iPhone is growing stronger than ever.”
– Apple Pay update from Cook: 2500 banks supporting service. 700,000 Apple Pay supported locations across the U.S. Cook gives a shoutout to vending machines that support Apple Pay.
– Cook announces that every major car band has committed to delivering CarPlay. When though? 40 new models of cars shipping by end of this year.
– HomeKit update: more products rolling out through the year, announced at CES.
– HealthKit: 900 apps tracking health and fitness on iOS. Cook now discussing medical research, brings up Senior VP of Operations Jeff Williams to discuss.
– Williams announces ResearchKit, a service within Health that allows medical researchers to more easily collect Health data for research purposes. It turns iPhone and the Health app into diagnostic tools. Apple’s been working with many top universities on this, and has developed 5 apps so far.
– Anyone with an iPhone can now contribute to Parkinson’s research with an app called mPower. Tapping tests to evaluate hand tremors. Microphone can use the microphone and the chip and as well motion sensors to measure Parkinson’s disease.
– New Asthma and Heart Checking apps. Also a new app for Breast Cancer.
– Privacy with these Health apps. Apple will not see your data. Apple now playing a video with the researchers who worked on the the new Health applications.
– ResearchKit is open source. Available next month. First 5 apps available today.
– Cook back on stage to talk about the Mac.
– The new MacBook Air. Silver, Gold, Space Gray. Retina Display. 2 Pounds. 12-inches. Edge to Edge cover glass. 2304 x 1440. Force Touch Trackpad. Taptic Engine, like the Apple Watch. Fanless. Intel Core M processor. 5th generation, 14NM process. 1.3GHz, Turbo Charged to 2.9 GHz. New battery technology. 9 Hours of battery life. One port. USB Type C. Reversible.
– Cook talking about the Apple Watch and Glances. Cook announces the Heart Rate Glance.
– Digital Touch redesigned since it was last shown off. Send people sketches.
– Cook talking about notifications, ESPN, News, etc. Now talking about the WatchKit SDK for the Apple Watch.
– Kevin Lynch on stage discussing Instagram app, WeChat, Whole Foods Apple Pay.
– Pricing ($349/$549/$10,000/$17,000) and 18-hour battery life were are discussed. Pre-orders start April 10 with in-store sales on April 24.
