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Apple is predicted to be worth $1 trillion next year, according to Barron’s latest cover story. It’s not exactly a counterintuitive bet given that it has flirted past the $900 billion mark in the last month or so. But the company did take a beating in the markets yesterday after a report claimed Apple slashed its orders for iPhone X after weaker than expected demand. The company forecast about 30 million sales of its latest iPhone, down from a planned 50 million units for the holiday quarter. [Barron's]
Just before Christmas, Elon Musk and his SpaceX private spaceflight company gave Southern California a real-life Star Wars sky spectacular with the year’s final Falcon 9 rocket launch. During rush hour on the Friday before Christmas, hundreds of thousands of earthlings — including Musk — captured the uncanny light show on their phones and cameras, and of course shared the images on social. Here’s a look back at SpaceX’s triumphant 2017 and what it means for the science — and business — of rocketry. [Peter Kafka / Recode]
Traffic conditions may be worsened in some places because of the apps designed to circumvent it. An explosion of ride-hailing app services has transformed the way that people get around New York City — of the more than 103,000 for-hire vehicles, 63,000 are affiliated with ride-hailing apps; midtown traffic has slowed from 6.5. miles per hour over the past five years. And as well-intentioned navigation apps like Waze divert highway traffic to quieter side streets, some neighborhoods are fighting back. [The New York Times]
After falling from the world’s most valuable unicorn to a “unicorpse” in 2016, Chinese smartphone maker Xiaomi is being called a “Chinese phoenix” — and its billionaire founder Lei Jun is sometimes called “the Steve Jobs of China.” Analysts say Xiaomi could overtake Oppo, Huawei and Apple in the next year to become the world’s second-largest smartphone vendor, behind Samsung. And executives are reportedly considering an IPO in 2018, which could be among the highest-valued ever. [David Kline / Wired]
This in-between week is a good time for looking back and reading deep. So, from Trump mania to bitcoin mania, here is Recode’s 2017 in 11 charts. [Rani Molla / Recode]
Not fake news — just plain wrong: The head of Poynter’s International Fact-Checking Network rounds up the year’s top media corrections. [Alexios Mantzarlis / Poynter]
Top stories from Recode
Home Depot has considered buying a $9 billion logistics company so Amazon doesn’t.
XPO Logistics has been a partner of both companies.
GM’s Cruise is launching self-driving pilots in cities because that’s where the money is.
Cruise has often touted the technological benefits of training its cars how to drive in big cities, but the financial benefit is just as substantial.
Dockless bike-sharing startup LimeBike is working on creating virtual parking spots.
It’s the company’s answer to cities’ concerns over bike congestion.
Not just for hookups anymore, Grindr is now a media company, too.
On the latest Recode Decode, Zach Stafford and Trish Bendix explain why Grindr is publishing a queer lifestyle magazine called Into.
This is cool
This article originally appeared on Recode.net.
