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Enlarge Apple is releasing the initial versions of most of its major operating system updates today, following its announcement at the company's Worldwide Developers Conference in June and the unveiling of new iPhone and Apple Watch hardware last week. Compatible devices can now download the iOS 17, iPadOS 17, watchOS 10, and tvOS 17 updates without signing up for one of Apple's beta programs. The iOS 17 update this year is fairly mild; it includes a smart-display-esque feature called StandBy that can keep your screen on when your phone is plugged in and placed on a stand, plus "contact posters" that display full-screen photos when someone in your contacts list is calling, improved autocorrect, and live voicemail transcription. Many of iOS 17's announced features, including a new journaling app, several Messages improvements, and Internet-enabled AirDrop transfers, will come in later iOS 17 releases. This is a typical practice for Apple, though the list of "later this year" features (via MacRumors) seems longer than usual. Read 8 remaining paragraphs | Comments View the full article

At the Michigan stop on 50 Cent's Final Lap tour, celebrating 20 years of Get Rich or Die Tryin', the rappers performed their collaboration "Crack a Bottle" View the full article

The Mexican star talks about interpreting timeless songs by Vicente Fernandez and Juan Gabriel on his new project 'México En Mi Voz'View the full article

Over the last couple years, Mikal Cronin has occasionally provided music for videos by the comedian Conner O’Malley. Today, Cronin has released his first full-length soundtrack as a result of his collaborations with O’Malley. It’s a score for a short film called The Mask, which is available via O’Malley’s website Endorphin Port for five bucks. It’s described as “a short film about Tyler Joseph a young man from illinois who loves whose line is it anyway and the mask.” View the full article

Mark Hoppus, Tom DeLonge, and Travis Barker preview three songs from first album together since 2011's Neighborhoods in trailer for Apple Music interviewView the full article

From 1989 to 2011, the intro music to Monday Night Football was a reworked version of Hank Williams Jr.’s “All My Rowdy Friends Are Coming Over Tonight” — the “Are you ready for some football?” song. That ended after Hank Jr. compared Barack Obama to Adolf Hitler. A new version of “All My Rowdy Friends” by Florida Georgia Line was reinstated in 2017, but ESPN discontinued the song again in the early days of COVID-19 because the prospect of all your rowdy friends coming over didn’t jibe with social distancing. They replaced it with a new version of the late Little Richard’s “Rip It Up.” View the full article

Here are all the reasons reasons why Justin Timberlake should seriously consider surrendering to the inevitable and hitting the road with Lance, Chris, Joey, and JC View the full article

The issue of venues demanding cuts of touring bands’ merch money has become a major talking point lately. Earlier this month, Jeff Rosenstock posted a breakdown of all the venues that he’s playing on his current tour and what percentages the venues were demanding from artists’ merch, kicking off a spirited Twitter debate with Steve Albini. Other artists like Jack Antonoff have called for venues to stop demanding merch cuts. Now, the great indie singer-songwriter Sarah Beth Tomberlin has posted about a recent experience where she ultimately decided not to sell merch while performing at Wolf Trap in Vienna, Virginia. View the full article

Enlarge / Microsoft's Surface Pro 9. Panos Panay has been in charge of the Surface line since its inception. (credit: Andrew Cunningham) Microsoft's Panos Panay, who has been in charge of the Surface hardware line for its entire existence and of Windows development since 2020, is leaving the company, according to a press release Microsoft sent out today. Panay's duties on the Surface and Windows teams will be taken over by Consumer Chief Marketing Officer Yusuf Mehdi, who in the last year has been most visible as the face of most of the company's big generative AI-related announcements. “Thank you, Panos, for your impact on our products, culture, company, and industry over the past two decades. I’m grateful for your leadership, support, and all you’ve done for Microsoft and our customers and partners," wrote Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella in a message that was shared with the press. "We remain steadfast and convicted in our strategy, and Yusuf Mehdi will take lead on our Windows and Surface businesses and products externally.” If you've ever watched a Microsoft Surface announcement, you'll know Panay from his emotional delivery, soulful eyes, and colorful shirts, and also by how genuinely he seemed to relish the opportunity to be telling you about what processors would be used in Microsoft's next laptop. Panay joined Microsoft in 2004 and most recently was promoted to the company's senior leadership team in 2021. Read 4 remaining paragraphs | Comments View the full article

It was already a momentous occasion. Five years after their inaugural Homecoming festival, the National were returning to Cincinnati for a long-awaited second installment amidst their big comeback year. This time around, they had a lineup that illustrated the band’s stature and reach: an icon like Patti Smith, revered forebears in Pavement, peers on their own comeback streak with a reunited Walkmen, beloved younger artists like Bartees Strange and Snail Mail. The National headlined both nights, marking anniversaries for both High Violet and Trouble Will Find Me by playing them in full. It was an event in a lineage of events for 2023 — selling out Madison Square Garden, releasing their first album in four years. Then, from the stage, they announced there would be another new National LP dropped into the world on Monday. View the full article

Zach Bryan, the newly minted country-rock megastar, is apparently getting over the crushing shame of being arrested for arguing with a cop, and he’s making some famous friends. Bryan recently went to #1 with “I Remember Everything,” his duet with Kacey Musgraves. Next year, Bryan will tour arenas and stadiums, and his opening acts will include people like Sheryl Crow and Jason Isbell. And now Bryan is posting clips of new songs that he’s recorded with Bon Iver and Noah Kahan. View the full article

Earlier this year, the Brooklyn band Model/Actriz released their debut album Dogsbody. They wrapped up a headlining tour this past spring, and they’re already in the midst of another one, with dates that will take them through the end of 2023. Today, they’re sharing a new single, “Winnipesaukee,” and here’s what frontman Cole Haden had to say about it: View the full article

Enlarge / SHANGHAI, CHINA - SEPTEMBER 13, 2023 - A light box advertising Huawei Mate 60 mobile phone is seen in front of the Apple store on Nanjing Road in Shanghai, China, September 13, 2023. (credit: CFOTO/Future Publishing via Getty) In March, Tim Cook was among the first batch of foreign executives to land in Beijing to court high-level officials after the lifting of pandemic-era restrictions, with Apple’s chief lauding how the company and China had grown together in a “symbiotic relationship.” Six months on, that relationship is under strain. Apple is facing new competitive pressures in a country that is not only its largest manufacturing hub but also its biggest international market, responsible for nearly 20 percent of sales in its last quarter. A share sell-off cut almost $200 billion from Apple’s market capitalization this month after news that various government agencies had imposed bans on the use of Apple products in government departments and state-owned enterprises. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs on Wednesday denied any formal prohibition but alluded to iPhone-related “security incidents” and told smartphone makers to comply with the law. Read 20 remaining paragraphs | Comments View the full article

Enlarge / The original AI-generated spiral village that captivated social media, created using Stable Diffusion and ControlNet. (credit: Ugleh / Stable Diffusion) On Sunday, a Reddit user named "Ugleh" posted an AI-generated image of a spiral-shaped medieval village that rapidly gained attention on social media for its remarkable geometric qualities. Follow-up posts garnered even more praise, including a tweet with over 145,000 likes. Ugleh created the images using Stable Diffusion and a guidance technique called ControlNet. Reactions to the artwork online ranged from wonder and amazement to respect for developing something novel in generative AI art. "Never seen pictures like this. Something new in the world of art," wrote one X user. "Tbh, I’ve seen a LOT of ai art, been in this space a long long time, and this is one of the most awesome pieces I’ve ever seen. You did so good," wrote AI artist Kali Yuga on X. Perhaps most notably, Y-Combinator co-founder and frequent social media tech commentator Paul Graham wrote, "This was the point where AI-generated art passed the Turing Test for me." While Graham was referencing the Turing Test (which purports to test if a machine's behavior is indistinguishable from a human) as a metaphor rather than literally, he was clearly impressed. Read 9 remaining paragraphs | Comments View the full article

Enlarge / Examples of new and modified emoji in Unicode 15.1. (credit: Emojipedia) The Unicode Consortium has finalized version 15.1 of the Unicode standard this week. Although Unicode is used to display tens of thousands of characters in languages used worldwide, the headlining change to any new version is usually about new emoji additions. As implied by the version number, version 15.1 is a minor update to last year's 15.0 release that makes no changes to the core specification. Nevertheless, the update adds six new emoji, plus 108 new variations on people emoji (the short version: all emoji depicting someone moving rightward can now be flipped to show them moving leftward). The new designs, as summed up by the emoji experts at Emojipedia, include shaking and nodding heads, a phoenix, a lime, an "edible mushroom," and a broken chain. Family emoji have also been updated to include options for gender-neutral parents and children. Read 5 remaining paragraphs | Comments View the full article

All year long, the music world has been celebrating the 50th anniversary of hip-hop. Surprisingly, the Recording Academy had the most memorable tribute to the genre so far, with Questlove stringing together a generations-spanning medley that went down as one of the great Grammy moments in recent memory. Now the VMAs have staged a star-studded rap history showcase of their own as the finale of tonight’s broadcast. View the full article

The singer celebrated turning 30 with a stripped-down version of her Rolling Up the Welcome Mat (for Good) trackView the full article

Doja Cat's barely-there style was only the beginning to an evening of beautiful, brave, and bizarre looks at the 2023 MTV VMAsView the full article

Early in the summer Fall Out Boy covered Billy Joel’s “We Didn’t Start The Fire,” updating the lyrics to reference topics from the past 30+ years, though not in chronological order. “Listen, we did our best,” the band’s Pete Wentz told Zane Lowe at the time. “It’s very, very, very difficult.” Tonight Fall Out Boy returned to the MTV Video Music Awards for the first time since 2007 (when they performed with Rihanna) and they took the occasion to play the cover live for the first time. (Their version references the infamous Taylor x Kanye VMAs moment — meta.) Wentz and Patrick Stump also wore David Byrne-style oversized suits. Perhaps in tribute to last night’s Stop Making Sense event? Anyway Fall Out Boy played on a flame-adorned stage outside of Network’s Prudential Center, so Taylor Swift didn’t get to watch it go down. But you do because here’s a video. View the full article

Anitta also won her second Best Latin award in a row after taking it home for "Envolver" last yearView the full article

The band are up for two awards, including Best Alternative for "Hold Me Like a Grudge" and Best Visual Effects for "Love From the Other Side"View the full article

The Colombian superstar — who performed "Tá OK" and "Oki Doki" — is also nominated for Artist of the YearView the full article

The K-pop octet, who are up for a Best K-Pop award, make their VMAs live performance debutView the full article

The singer is nominated for three awards, including Best New ArtistView the full article

The rapper and business mogul delivered a career-spanning performance of hits with appearances from Yung Miami, Keyshia Cole, and his sonView the full article