Rupert Murdoch’s British newspaper subsidiary was reported to have reached a new batch of settlements on Wednesday in the hacking scandal. Apple today announced financial results for its fiscal 2011 fourth quarter ended September 24, 2011. The Company posted quarterly revenue of $28.27 billion and quarterly net profit of $6.62 billion, or $7.05 per diluted share. These results compare to revenue of $20.34 billion and net quarterly profit of $4.31 billion, or $4.64 per diluted share, in the year-ago quarter. Gross margin was 40.3 percent compared to 36.9 percent in the year-ago quarter. International sales accounted for 63 percent of the quarter’s revenue. Nine whooping cranes that had been following an ultralight aircraft as it guided them on their migratory route stopped when they reached Alabama, 500 miles short of the intended destination. The Benetton Group, headquartered in Venice, Italy, is internationally known for its lively fashions and memorable ad campaigns. Recently, they created a fast, color-accurate iPad catalog app that replaces bulky, production-intensive hardcopy catalogs. As a result, the company saves 60 days per year in preparing its sales materials for its staff and is able to adapt instantly to changes. COLUMBUS, OH—Fantastic roommate Billy Grant just won't stop buying toilet paper. After an investigation into a woman’s claim that she was raped by Greg Kelly, a son of Police Commissioner Raymond W. Kelly, the Manhattan district attorney’s office said the facts “do not fit the definition of sexual assault crimes.” Students at Punahou School in Honolulu, Hawaii, are using Mac notebooks to research class assignments and show results in ways they never could before. These include songs and podcasts recorded and edited in GarageBand, digital presentations and portfolios created in Keynote, campus news videos edited in iMovie and Final Cut Pro, and even iOS apps built using Xcode. Says sixth grade teacher Sandy Chang, “The Macs in my classroom are completely indispensable.” A 48-year-old West Palm Beach millionaire and polo club founder has adopted his 42-year-old girlfriend in an apparent bid to avoid paying out a wrongful death lawsuit. Apple announced that GarageBand, its breakthrough music creation app, is now available for iPhone and iPod touch. Introduced earlier this year on iPad, GarageBand uses Apple’s Multi-Touch interface to make it easy for anyone to create and record their own songs, even if they’ve never played an instrument before. GarageBand 1.1 for iPad, iPhone, and iPod touch is available on the App Store for $4.99 (US) to new users, or as a free update for existing GarageBand for iPad customers. WASHINGTON—According to a report from the U.S. Department of Education released Thursday, watching a single episode of the British TV series Downton Abbey is the cultural and educational equivalent of reading an entire book. The biggest New York City hotel operators have agreed to a contract that will give workers, among other things, security devices that would summon help if hotel staff encounter danger in a guest’s room. Area Woman Recalls Days When She Resented Being Hit On Miami-Dade County officials are expected to abolish the city of Islandia, a desolate chain of 33 islands that mid-century land developers had hoped to turn into a rollicking resort town. Man Wants To Give To Local PBS Affiliate But Can't Stand Thought Of Free Doo-Wop Album Talking Trash Apple today announced iBooks 2 for iPad, featuring iBooks textbooks, an entirely new kind of textbook that’s dynamic, engaging, and truly interactive. iBooks textbooks offer iPad users gorgeous, full-screen textbooks with interactive animations, diagrams, photos, videos, and unrivaled navigation. Leading education services companies including Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, McGraw-Hill, and Pearson will deliver educational titles on the iBookstore, with most priced at $14.99 or less. And with the new iBooks Author, anyone with a Mac can create iBooks textbooks and publish them to Apple’s iBookstore. Starting today, iBooks 2 is available free from the App Store and iBooks Author is available free from the Mac App Store Wired Magazine reports that Newsstand, a new feature of iOS 5, is “hitting it big with traditional media publishers thanks to its windfall delivery of new digital subscriptions.” Newsstand keeps all app subscriptions for newspapers, magazines, and journals in one convenient place on the iOS 5 home screen and makes it easy to shop for new reading material. Wired cites Conde Nast and The New York Times among publishers seeing large spikes in app subscriptions since Newsstand launched. StudioDaily’s Beth Marchant reports on “key features” delivered in Final Cut Pro version 10.0.3. Marchant interviews Radical Media CTO Evan Schechtman — an early adopter of Final Cut Pro X — who calls version 10.0.3 “an even bigger deal than the original release,” noting that his company is “ready to transition completely to Final Cut Pro X now that broadcast monitoring and multicam editing are in the mix.” In an interview at National Geographic’s Adventure blog, director Tim Kemple of Camp 4 Collective — an outdoor video and film production company — describes using iPhone 4S to shoot a hi-def music video at the Great Salt Lake as an experiment in remote location capture. Kemple reports getting excellent video from iPhone 4S, noting that “because it’s always with you means you end up using it when you’d least expect.” The interview includes tips for stabilizing shots, optimizing for iOS 5 features, using helpful apps in extreme environments, and shooting in low light. With no family or friends in attendance, Matt and Shandra Fink were quietly married in a low-key Las Vegas ceremony, but the couple went right from there to pulling off an exciting casino robbery. Lobbyists were in a tizzy over provisions of a Senate-passed ethics bill that tighten regulation of lobbying and require secretive “political intelligence” firms to register as lobbyists do.