Last month it was reported that a South Korean court ordered Apple to pay out compensation of one million won (about $946 at that time) to an iPhone user in a legal argument regarding collection of location data. Then it became known that the plaintiff’s lawyers were preparing to file a class-action lawsuit to obtain compensations for other user who claimed to have been harmed by the Apple’s collection.

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Tonight at the Planning Commission of Santo Monica, California, Apple is said to have proposed building of a new Apple Retail Store on the Third Street Promenade of the city. As Curbed notes, the proposal was made by an unnamed retailer. He wants to build 8.084 square foot retail store in the place where three story Borders Bookstore is currently situated.

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9to5mac recently found new code files, related to the announced iOS5-wide voice-recognition app called Assistant. They allow to suggest that the app will be able to browse a user’s e-mail, address book, phone application, calendars and even to open links. However, this is only a suggestion since the code files may not be related to the final version of Assistant.

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As Reuters reports, Apple may invest $1 billion in Sharp’s Kameyama plant to secure shipment of sufficient amount of iPhone and iPad's displays. David Rubenstein, analyst from MF Global FXA Securities said:

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The first authorized biography of Apple CEO Steve Jobs, a book with the simple  title  "Steve Jobs", reportedly set to be released on November 21, 2011.

Based on more than forty interviews with Jobs conducted over two years as well as interviews with more than a hundred family members, friends, adversaries, competitors, and colleagues this book chronicles the rollercoaster life and searingly intense personality of a creative entrepreneur whose passion for perfection and ferocious drive revolutionized six industries: personal computers, animated movies, music, phones, tablet computing, and digital publishing.

As the publisher claims, Jobs has cooperated with the book and has not asked for any control over the final product. The book will probably yield the most open look at Jobs' personal and professional life.

Over the weekend, there had been a lot of interest in a 3G-capable MacBook Pro that has an external antenna. The notebook appeared on eBay and its price reached $ 70,000. The seller describes the antenna as "quite tiny" and attributes some of the initial reactions to the bad angle. Most notably, it's actually attached to the MacBook Pro with magnets, and can come off.

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DigiTimes reports citing a source that sales of iPad rivals turned out to be lower than it was expected, and the demand for them from retail companies continues to drop sharply, so manufacturers of non-Apple tablets will have to cut prices for their devices as early as late September. According to the source, this is the only way for them to sell numerous devices in warehouses and minimize their losses.

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Apple has pre-announced late July that they would offer Mac OS X Lion USB Thumb Drives. And today Apple Store has started selling special USB Thumb Drives with Mac OS X Lion. This Thumb Drive is intended for all Mac owners that don’t have broadband Internet access to download this OS from the Mac App Store.

This USB Thumb Drives costs $39.01 more than the digital version at the Mac App Store that is available there for $29.99.

According to many rumors regarding Apple’s next-generation tablet, the iPad release was planned for later this year, and its first shipment had to be limited. However, as DigiTimes reports, citing Apple’s component suppliers, the company has canceled all orders for this year’s iPad 3 production, which means that iPad 3 won’t be put on sale until 2012.

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Digitimes suggests that Apple has increased the orders for their iPhone line by about 12-13% from 50 million units to 56 million units. The iPhone 5 in particular will reportedly account for 25.5-26 million units in the second half of 2011. In the 3rd garter the iPhone 5 orders have been decreased from  7 million units to 5.5-6 million units, but in the 4th quarter they have been raised from 14 million units to more then 20 million units. But Apple declines the iPhone 3GS and iPhone 4 orders from over 20 million in the 3rd quarter to 8 million in the 4th quarter. These numbers, however, are not surprisingly, because, if you look at the history sales graph, these times of the year do represent major jumps in sales for Apple.

As you know release of the next-generation iPhone is expected in September. It’s not clear yet whether this smartphone will support 4G transmission technology LTE (Long Term Evolution), but BGR wrote that Apple and some mobile carrier in US have already tested iPhone models with LTE support.

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Today co-founder and CEO of Google Larry Page officially said that their company has acquired one of the largest smartphone manufacturer – Motorola, specifically Motorola Mobility. The company was sold for $12.5 billion, which is 63% more than the closing price of the company on Friday, August 12. This deal has yet to be approved by several official authorities in USA and European Union, as well as Motorola Mobility’s shareholders. All transition processes is expected to finish in the end of 2011 or beginning of 2012.

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We have already heard many rumors about upgrade of Apple’s smartphone line this fall, as well as information about the release of next-generation tablet. Also rumors about launch of iPod touch with 3G modem have been circulating. But we forgot that upgrade of all iPod line is planned on September.

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In early August it was reported that Apple plans to sell USB sticks with OS X Lion through AppleCare. Now, it is likely that Apple will release USB sticks this week at the price of $69 for the general public. As MR.X said, this USB stick has shown up in the internal system of the company for a release on August 15th – but it is not known for certain will Apple actually release this product on the 15th. But the fact that the product has shown up in the system suggests that the product’s launch will happen very soon.

The City of Cupertino posted some pictures and more information on Apple's "spaceship" campus that was first revealed in June and is expected to be completed in 2015. The project includes the following:

• An Office, Research and Development Building comprising approximately 2.8 million square feet;
• A 1,000 seat Corporate Auditorium;
• A Corporate Fitness Center;
• Research Facilities comprising approximately 300,000 square feet;
• A Central Plant; and
• Associated Parking.

As Steve Jobs described it back in June:

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