Toyota's U2 concept focuses on urban utility at the Canadian International AutoShow

New to the Canadian International AutoShow this year is Toyota's U2 concept which is designed as featuring the best parts of an SUV, mail truck, and cargo van. Focusing on versatile functionality, the u2 concept only has one seat for the driver and everything else can be customized or added as needed. It's a clever concept, one that we would expect from Toyota's now retired Scion brand.

It's rare to have a concept vehicle that's so versatile and open in what sort of user or applications it can be used on and this is one of the concepts that we are looking forward to checking out when the Canadian International AutoShow kicks off this week in Toronto.

U2 free album download on iTunes ends Oct. 14

If you still haven’t gotten to downloading the free U2 album on iTunes, you have a few more days to do so. The free offer of Songs of Innocence will end on October 14. After that, the physical album will be sold with an additional 10 tracks not part of the free release.

Apple and U2 got a lot of flak for how they released the album but that didn’t stop 26 million downloads of the album since its release on September 9.

Source: Billboard | Via: iMore

U2's iTunes giveaway 'Songs of Innocence' breaks records, revives back catalog

As part of the announcement bonanaza that was last week's Apple Event which gave us two iPhone 6's, Apple Pay and the Apple Watch, Apple also gave every iTunes subscriber instant access to U2's new album 'Songs of Innocence,'. This free download broke some records to the tune of 2 million downloads which grants the album 'double-platinum' status, a big deal in term of distribution. A nice halo effect of this freebie is that it reanimated U2's back-catalog and so people have been rediscovering their classic songs as well. 

How significant is this halo effect, Re/Code has noted that 'In addition to the strong download performance for Songs of Innocence, some 17 of the group's 27 previous albums have made their way into the iTunes top 100 chart. That's something that would never happen in real world record sales and charts, but hey, good for Bono and the lads. Have you downloaded U2's latest album or did it automagically appear on your iTunes library? What do you think of the new album? Let us know below.

Apple's (product) RED contributions weigh in at US $70 million

One of Apple's most high-profile charities is the (product) RED initiative which was started by U2 frontman Bono to raise awareness and funds to help eliminate HIV/AIDS in Africa. Since it's involvement in 2006, Apple has raised more money than any other company for (RED).

Apple has been selling various (RED) themed devices and accessories to raise awareness and funds for the charity. More notably, Apple's Jony Ive and his friend designer Marc Newson teamed up to create a bevy of limited edition products for the charity including a one-of-a-kind Mac Pro and gold Apple EarBuds as well as a rare Leica camera. The $70 million raised by Apple is the largest contribution by any one entity to the initiative.

Source: MacRumors