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Apple is closing three of its retail stores this summer, including its first location to unionize. The tech company said it plans to permanently close Apple Store in Trumbull, CT, Escondito, CA, and Towson, MD. The Apple Store location in Towson, was the first where unionized workers and Apple reached a contract agreement back in 2024. MacRumors published a statement from Apple confirming the closures. The company credited noting "the departure of several retailers and declining conditions" at the shopping centers where this trio of stores are housed as the reason for ending operations. "Our team members at Trumbull and North County will continue their roles at nearby Apple Retail stores," the statement reads. "Towson employees will be eligible to apply for open roles at Apple in accordance with the collective bargaining agreement." We reached out to the company for additional comment, and were sent the same statement. The International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers, which leads the union the Towson workers had joined, released a statement about the closure. "Apple’s claim that the collective bargaining agreement prevents relocation is simply false and raises serious concerns that this closure is a cynical attempt to bust the union," the organization said. "We are exploring all legal options and will work with elected officials and allies to hold Apple accountable." This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/big-tech/apple-is-closing-three-us-stores-including-the-first-to-unionize-225941912.html?src=rss
You may already know that emulators can run Wii games on a Mac . But one developer has flipped the script. Bryan Keller now has an ancient version of the Mac's operating system running on Nintendo's 2006 game console (via Kottke ). Why? Because they said it couldn't be done. The developer first had the idea in 2013 while a sophomore in college. However, they found renewed motivation five years ago when Redditor u/CussdomTidder posted , "There is a zero percent chance of this ever happening." Developer Bryan Keller took it personally. YouTube / ESPN / Netflix Keller used that as fuel to begin plugging away, "feeling encouraged" by the anonymous contrarian. Thus began the process of porting Mac OS X 10.0 (Cheetah) onto a device designed to play Wii Sports and Super Mario Galaxy . "Last year, when I saw that Windows NT had been ported to the Wii, I felt a renewed sense of motivation," Keller wrote. "Even if my lack of low-level experience resulted in failure, attempting this project would still be an opportunity to learn something new." Keller didn't allow something as trivial as a flight to get in the way of the task at hand. Bryan Keller / GitHub Keller noted that the Wii is a phenomenally hackable console, with other enterprising hackers porting Windows 95 and NT, Linux and NetBSD onto it. Nintendo's system also runs a PowerPC chip similar to those found in older Macs. "Given this close lineage, I felt confident that the CPU wouldn't be a blocker," they wrote. From there, Keller wrote a custom boot loader, patched the kernel and wrote new drivers. They even got the Wii's USB ports working for mouse and keyboard input. Tthe developer found the process "deeply satisfying," especially given the initial doubt. (I'm talking to you, disparaging Redditor.) "In the end, I learned (and accomplished) far more than I ever expected," Keller wrote. "And perhaps more importantly, I was reminded that the projects that seem just out of reach are exactly the ones worth pursuing." For the technically minded, the developer's blog goes into extensive detail about the process. And full-on madlads can visit Keller's GitHub to try it for themselves. This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/computing/a-maverick-hacker-got-mac-os-x-running-on-a-wii-200800027.html?src=rss
OpenAI has closed a yawning gap in its ChatGPT subscription pricing with a new $100 per month Pro plan that slots between the $20 per month Plus plan and $200 per month Pro plan. Offering five times more Codex than the $20 option, it appears designed to challenge Anthropic's $100 per month Claude option. "Compared with Claude Code, Codex delivers more coding capacity per dollar across paid tiers," an OpenAI spokesperson told TechCrunch . So what's the difference between OpenAI's two Pro plans? The $200 version does offer four times the Codex. However, you get the same advanced tools and models with $100 plan, according to OpenAI's product page. To encourage users to jump in, it will offer double the Codex for a limited time, or 10 times what you get with the Plus plan. Users have been screaming for such a plan for a while now, according to posts on OpenAI's developer community forums. "The Plus plan will continue to be the best offer at $20 for steady, day-to-day usage of Codex, and the new $100 Pro tier offers a more accessible upgrade path for heavier daily use," OpenAI said in a post on X . With the launch of GPT 5.2 late last year and GPT-5.3-Codex in February, OpenAI significantly boosted the speed and reasoning capabilities of Codex, giving developers a tough choice between ChatGPT and Claude Opus. However, the sticking point for many power users was ChatGPT's $200 per month price — so OpenAI no doubt hopes the new plan will convince those on the fence to switch. This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/ai/openai-has-a-new-100-chatgpt-pro-plan-to-better-match-up-with-claude-062705626.html?src=rss
The database app Cornerstone ended up being more of a cinderblock.
