Apple just sent out a letter to AppleTV customers telling them to upgrade lest they temporarily lose some media.  Another reason to stay at version 2.Boxee?

Apple Stores get a little nuts during the holidays.  Apple is helping those who want to get in and out with "Reserve and Pick Up".  It is what you'd think: You buy something online and pick it up at the nearest store.  Also a good way to make sure they have the product you are looking for in stock (and no aiting for adding memory or upgrading hard drives). They'll even wrap it for you, you lazy bastard. 

Who remembers the days of summer when we spent quality time speculating that iTunes LP content would fit snugly onto Apple TVs for playback on your big TV sets?

Well, as we know this exact feature took its place inside Apple TV 3.0, but owners of iTunes LP content were advised they’d have to redownload the material - and today the great rush to Apple TV begins, with Apple notifying purchasers of its iTunes LP content that updated versions of these which are compatible with Apple TV 3.0 are available now. (Thanks to MacRumors).

Apple introduced Apple TV 3.0 last week, featuring a redesigned main menu that makes navigating your favorite content simpler and faster - and no longer makes you navigate to the bottom of a list to find the content you already own.

Media invitations went out today for the grand opening of Apple's 4th Manhattan Store, on 67th and Broadway.  The date is set from a week from tomorrow on Saturday the 14th of November.  By many accounts, this store is thought to be even more spectacular than the other Manhattan Apple Stores, including the iconic square cube venue on 5th Avenue.

While the store will miss today's Yankees ticker tape parade, it will be along the route of the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade which heralds in the Holiday Shopping Season.  It might make sense for Apple to use its location during the parade for publicity.  Maybe we'll see a giant iPod floating down Broadway?

Well, with the latest Pew Internet and American Life Project finds (gasp) that people’s use of cellphones and the internet, particularly social networks such as Facebook are actually good for helping them build wider social networks, it’s clear that walled garden approaches to services have no long term future. It’s all about the network.

This is probably why Facebook is preparing a standards-based interface for its Facebook chat system which will potentially make it accessible via GTalk, iChat and other Jabber-based chat services.

Looking at Apple’s most recent financial report and this latest Digitimes explanation of growing shipments for notebook makers, it’s interesting to reflect that the 2,226,000 notebooks Apple shifted in its last quarter equates to approximately 20 per cent of Quanta’s c.3.5 milion units per month of notebook production.

Quanta's shipments in October are estimated to have grown about 10% on month from 3.6 million units in September. The company also makes computers for HP, Apple, Acer and Sony. We wonder what impact the new MacBook models had on output, as we’ve heard (non-evidentially) these to be selling pretty well.

Apple today announced the opening the first Apple Store in France, at the Carrousel du Louvre shopping center.  Apple plans other French Store openings in  Montpellier in ten days and another Paris Location, Opéra next summer.  Apple also looks to have a new Upper West Side NYC Store opening in the next few weeks.

Ron Johnson, Apple's VP of Retail and Pascal Cagni, Apple's head of Europe were on hand for the opening as you can see in the video below

Pictures from MacGeneration and anthonynelzin on Flickr

Steve Jobs has been declared “CEO of the Decade” by Fortune Magazine, which has published an extensive treasure-trove of data on America’s most enigmatic business leader.

There’s over 100,000 apps now available through the App Store, and it’s official - and there's been over two billion app downloads so far, the company also confirmed.

Apple boss, Steve Jobs, took a lot of convincing to embrace the name “iMac” when the company introduced the company-saving computer, but, as history shows us, he came round in the end.

That’s just one of the many nuggets contained in Cult Of Mac’s interesting interview with former TBWA\Chiat\Day creative director, Ken Segall, the man who thought up the iMac name and created the “Think Different” campaign.

He tells the story of how his team was introduced to the Bondi Blue iMac - and it seems the creative team were “horrified” when they first saw the appliance.

“We were pretty shocked but we couldn’t be frank,” Segall says. “We were guarded. We were being polite, but we were really thinking, ‘Jesus, do they know what they are doing? It was so radical.”

He then tells the story of the name, which required multiple meetings, many counter-suggestions, and which was never “formally” accepted by Jobs, who hated it, at least at first.