Hasta La Gadget!

Gift cards often get a bad rap as the last resort in holiday shopping, what we supposedly get only when all hope of a carefully considered present has gone out the window. Apple isn’t quite so cyncial, and it may have injected new life into gift giving now that it has switched on buying gift cards through the recently updated Apple Store iOS app as of this weekend. Pick a color and a card value — up to $2,000, if someone’s been good enough to earn a MacBook Pro — and the resulting email lets iOS 6-touting recipients load the card into Passbook. Besides saving some plastic, the Passbook entry adds some worth through geofencing that reminds recipients to splurge if they’re near one of Apple’s steel-and-glass stores. All told, the card may be more than welcome by iPhone fans and save the ignominy of a last-minute rush to the store. Just make sure the recipient doesn’t mind going without a physical gift on the big day — it wouldn’t be right to drain all the romanticism out of a special occasion.

Filed under: Cellphones, Internet, Apple

Apple starts offering Passbook-enabled gift cards, may save our hides in holiday shopping originally appeared on Engadget on Sun, 11 Nov 2012 14:47:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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You give a friend a thoughtful gift certificate for their birthday, but how do you know it’s not going to sit in a drawer forever and just end up expiring? It’s not for lack of gratitude, but because those plastic cards are easy to forget about. Gyft is an app that gifting a whole lot simpler. More »

When it launched with iOS 6 this Wednesday, Apple’s Passbook mobile-ticketing feature boasted a handful of high-profile partners — including Fandango, Live Nation, Lufthansa and Ticketmaster — but that list still leaves plenty of room for fleshing out. According to Venture Beat, AmEx is launching integration with Passbook later today. The credit card company’s Passbook functionality will include notifications for new account transactions, along with the ability to view your current balance and redeem membership rewards points. The service can also use smartphones’ location to verify charges flagged as suspicious.

Starbucks, which was featured in an early Passbook demo at WWDC, also announced the timeline for its integration with the service, tweeting today that an “update is coming at the end of the month” and offering no further details. Judging by Apple’s earlier previews, Passbook will let customers pay with a Starbucks card. The coffee chain’s Passbook functionality looks to be quite similar to its partnership with Square, which will be the go-to mobile payments option for non-iOS customers when it launches this fall.

Filed under: Cellphones, Software

AmEx, Starbucks announce plans for Passbook integration: both live by end of the month originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 22 Sep 2012 13:55:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Now that iOS 6 has officially landed, Apple has pulled back the veil revealing the first wave of apps to support its new Passbook feature. The initial group of companies to jump on the bandwagon include: Ticketmaster, Live Nation, Lufthansa, MLB.com At Bat, Sephora to Go, Walgreens and Fandango Movies. While this list is a tad bit shorter than we hoped for, it’s safe to say that more apps will follow in the not-so-distant future. Want to be the first to know when they arrive? Be sure to keep an eye on the Passbook section of the App Store for the latest updates.

Filed under: Cellphones, Software, Mobile

PSA: Passbook supported apps now listed in iOS 6 App Store originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 20 Sep 2012 06:02:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Now that the iPhone 5 is officially out of the bag, it’s time to talk software. Apple hasn’t exactly kept its cards close to its chest in regards to iOS 6: Cupertino teased the software at WWDC, letting us in on the direct Facebook integration, the new Maps application, Passbook and “Do Not Disturb” in the process. Today the OS gets official, and Scott Forstall demoed the software on the iPhone 5.

Not too much new here, but the software is out of its beta phase and ready to ship. One of the most hyped additions to iOS 6 has been the Maps application, which includes Siri navigation, 3D building view and satellite imagery. In Safari, there’s now a full-screen mode and you’ll be able to share tabs from your desktop with your phone (dubbed iCloud Tabs). We’re also seeing Passbook in action once again, bringing up a plane ticket at the lockscreen when you get to the airport, for example. One new thing here: Delta is confirmed as a partner for this digital ticket service.

As we’ve already known, on the Siri front you can bring up sports ranking and Rotten Tomatoes movie ratings via the voice assistant. And, of course, one of the most welcome new features is FaceTime over cellular — no mention of whether that will be supported on all carriers, but it certainly looks that way. iOS 6 will be available on September 19th (also when the iPhone 5 will go on sale), and it’s coming to the iPhone 4S, iPhone 4, new iPad, iPad 2 and iPod touch.

Check out all the coverage at our iPhone 2012 event hub!

Filed under: Cellphones, Software

iOS 6 gets official debut on the iPhone 5: Maps, Passbook, iCloud Tabs and more originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 12 Sep 2012 13:44:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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