Professionals Successfully Push Mac Pro to Absurd Limits With 558-Day Video Timeline in Final Cut Pro [Mac Blog]

After waiting for several years for Apple to release a new professional tower, the company finally released the new Mac Pro last year. With dual-GPUs and an innovative cooling system, the diminutive machine has impressed professional users.

FCP.co decided to test out Final Cut Pro X and their well-equipped 8-core Mac Pro to absurd limits. The site put 1600 connected clips into the GUI, and actually got the Mac Pro to play 50 ‘layers’ of 4K video for a few seconds before it began dropping frames. It also made a 500,000 pixel wide project, useful perhaps for making (extremely wide) digital signage projects. Finally, the site successfully made a 558-day video time line — roughly a year and a half.

We pushed FCPX and the Mac Pro to silly limits, of course nobody will make a year long or a 500,000 pixel wide timeline, but it’s good to know the combination will go that far.

It seems that the real limitation is a hardware one, yes FCPX will do 16K, but you have to have the storage bandwidth to supply the huge number of pixels per second. When creating that huge timeline, we used the same clip over and over. Making the same timeline from different shorter clips wouldn’t be as easy as we think very large numbers of clips within FCPX will slow the machine down.

Apple have however, built a combination that will be good for nearly all different media sized projects within the foreseeable future. The Mac Pro and FCPX handle 4K like SD, so 8K should be fine.

FCP.co notes that most of the limitations occur with the hardware, not artificial limitations with Final Cut Pro X itself.

Twitter’s Little-Used Music App Shutting Down April 18 [iOS Blog]

One year after it launched, Twitter is killing off its #Music iOS app. The company announced today that it will be removing the app from the App Store this afternoon, with existing users continuing to have access to the app until April 18.

Twitter said in a tweet that it will “continue to experiment with new ways to bring you great content based on the music activity we see every day on Twitter.”

AllThingsD reported back in October that the app was likely to be discontinued because of “abysmal” download numbers and a lack of user interest. With Apple launching its iTunes Radio streaming music service alongside iOS 7, the iOS music scene has become increasingly more competitive and crowded.

It was reported earlier today that Apple is considering a new on-demand streaming music service similar to Spotify, along with an Android platform of the iTunes Music Store and iTunes Radio.

Apple and Google, Like Microsoft, Reserve Right to Read Customer Emails

Apple, Yahoo, and Google all have terms of service that allow them to read users’ emails if necessary, according to research done by The Guardian. Apple’s iCloud Terms and Conditions includes a clause that gives Apple permission to disclose Account information and Content, including iCloud email, when necessary by law, to address security, fraud, or technical issues, or to protect the rights and property of Apple.

You acknowledge and agree that Apple may, without liability to you, access, use, preserve and/or disclose your Account information and Content to law enforcement authorities, government officials, and/or a third party, as Apple believes is reasonably necessary or appropriate, if legally required to do so or if we have a good faith belief that such access, use, disclosure, or preservation is reasonably necessary to: (a) comply with legal process or request; (b) enforce this Agreement, including investigation of any potential violation thereof; (c) detect, prevent or otherwise address security, fraud or technical issues; or (d) protect the rights, property or safety of Apple, its users, a third party, or the public as required or permitted by law.

Google, Yahoo, and Microsoft’s terms of service all contain similar wording granting the technology companies unfettered access to content. The Guardian initially began investigating the rights of major companies to access user email after Microsoft looked through the personal Hotmail account of a blogger in order to discover the source of a Windows 8 leak.

Microsoft employee Alex Kibkalo was found sending a tech blogger parts of Windows 8 code back in 2012, allowing the blogger to access screenshots of the operating system, which were then posted online. Microsoft fired Kibkalo, but its methods of discovery were questioned, prompting the company to make a statement on its investigation policies, pledging not to read customer emails except in circumstances where a court order would be justified and vowing to announce such searches in its bi-annual transparency report.

While it is Microsoft that’s under fire for reading the email of its users, as mentioned above, Apple, Google, and Yahoo have the same rights to access content under questionable conditions. Apple does not mention whether or not it accesses iCloud email for non-security reasons in its own transparency reports and it is unclear whether the company has accessed private content in the search for leaks.

Apple is a notoriously secretive company, however, going to great lengths to protect its upcoming products. According to Apple CEO Steve Jobs, product secrecy is one of the specific tenets that has been responsible for Apple’s success, and in 2012, Tim Cook said the company would “double down on secrecy on products.”

Nevertheless, Apple has had a hard time keeping leaks under wraps. The iPhone 5s and the iPhone 5c were both unveiled long before their release, and more recently, some significant iOS 8 leaks have come to light.

Apple and Google both opted not to comment to The Guardian on the clauses in their Terms of Services, but all customers opt-in to possible searches when signing up for an email account with either company.

Apple in Talks for On-Demand Streaming Music Service, Considering Android iTunes App

Apple is considering launching an on-demand streaming service similar to Spotify in light of declining music sales, reports Billboard. The service would be part of a multi-prong strategy that may also include an iTunes app for Android.

Apple has opened exploratory talks with senior label executives about the possibility of launching an on-demand streaming service that would rival Spotify and Beats Music, according to three people familiar with the talks. Apple is also thinking about adding an iTunes App for Android phones, the Google rival that has been growing faster than the iPhone, these sources said.

In January, it was reported that music sales had declined for the first time since the iTunes Store opened 2003, with individual song downloads falling 5.7 percent from 1.34 billion units sold to 1.26 billion, and digital album sales dropping from 117.6 million units from 117.7 million units.

In recent months, Apple has attempted to lure more customers with exclusive album releases, such as Beyoncé’s fifth album, released first on iTunes, and has been pushing record companies for additional deals of that nature.

Album sales have remained down, however, as streaming services have risen in popularity, prompting Apple to explore other options as well. A March report from the RIAA indicated Spotify, Pandora, and YouTube had generated $1.4 billion in subscription, advertising, and licensing revenues in the U.S. in 2013, a 39 percent increase from 2012.

Apple introduced its iTunes Radio streaming music service last year, but it is station-based like Pandora, limiting how many songs users can choose for themselves. An iTunes service similar to Spotify or Beats Music would allow listeners to pick and choose all of their content, which could potentially be accessed on other non-Apple platforms like Android.

“They are feeling out some people at labels on thoughts about transitioning its customers from iTunes proper to a streaming service,” says one major label source. “So when you buy a song for $1.29, and you put it in your library, iTunes might send an e-mail pointing out that for a total of, say, $8 a month you can access that song plus all the music in the iTunes store. It’s all in the ‘what if stage.”

Apple’s talks with record labels about a possible expansion of iTunes Radio into a full-fledged music streaming service are still in the early stages, and the company has declined to comment.