(Reuters) – Apple Inc reported its first quarterly increase in iPhone sales in a year, powered by strong demand for the latest version of its flagship smartphone, sending the company’s shares up more than 3 percent in after-hours trading.

Apple sold 78.29 million iPhones in the first quarter ended Dec. 31, up from 74.78 million last year. Analysts on average had estimated 77.42 million, according to research firm FactSet StreetAccount.

The results, which reflected the first full quarter of iPhone 7 sales, come at a time when global demand for smartphones is slowing and cheaper Android alternatives are flooding the market.

The company is heavily dependent on the success of iPhones, which account for more than three-quarters of its total revenue.

Analysts and investors have already set their sights on Apple’s 10th-anniversary iPhone, which is expected to feature better touchscreen technology, wireless charging and a shift to OLED display.

Apple Chief Executive Officer Tim Cook said demand was especially high for the larger iPhone 7 Plus in the first quarter.

Revenue in the services business – which includes the App Store, Apple Pay and iCloud – jumped 18.4 percent to $7.17 billion, helped by the popularity of games, including Pokemon Go and Super Mario Run, and increased revenue from subscriptions.

Analysts expect growth in the segment to help offset declining hardware sales as the smart phone market matures.

Apple Chief Executive Tim Cook said on a conference call on Tuesday that he expects services revenue to double in the next four years.

“Services obviously continues to be a real success story for them. It’s one of the fastest-growing segments they have, driven largely by the App Store,” said Jackdaw Research analyst Jan Dawson.

Apple’s revenue from the Greater China region fell 11.6 percent to $16.23 billion.

“We were encouraged by our performance in China because it was clearly an improvement over the last couple of quarters. In mainland China in particular, our revenue was flat and actually grew in constant currency terms,” Chief Financial Officer Luca Maestri said.

The company also forecast revenue of between $51.5 billion and $53.5 billion for the current quarter. Analysts, on average, had expected revenue of $53.79 billion, according to Thomson Reuters I/B/E/S.

Maestri added that a stronger dollar hurt the company’s revenue forecast.

Analysts on average expect the company to sell 53.43 million iPhones in the current quarter, according to FactSet.

The company’s net income fell to $17.89 billion in the quarter from $18.36 billion a year ago. On a per share basis, it earned $3.36, beating the average analyst estimate of $3.12.

Revenue rose 3.3 percent to $78.35 billion in the quarter, compared with the average estimate of $77.25 billion, according to Thomson Reuters I/B/E/S.

Up to Tuesday’s close, Apple’s shares have gained 14.7 percent since mid-November, compared with the 5.3 percent rise in the Dow Jones Industrial Average.

(Reporting by Narottam Medhora in Bengaluru; Editing by Saumyadeb Chakrabarty)

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The deaths were all in the southeastern province of Fujian, where the typhoon made landfall, the civil affairs ministry said in a statement on its website.

Total economic damage has been put at 900 million yuan ($134.60 million), with 16,000 hectares (40,000 acres) of crops destroyed and more than 900 houses wrecked, the ministry said.

In Taiwan, the storm caused at least three deaths and more than 300 injuries.

The storm is expected to worsen already severe flooding in parts of central and eastern China as its remnants slowly make their way inland.

Typhoons are common at this time of year in the South China Sea, picking up strength over warm waters and dissipating over land.

Typhoons used to kill many people in China but the government now enforces evacuations and takes precautions well in advance, which has helped save many lives.

 (Reporting by Ben Blanchard; Editing by Robert Birsel)

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1. “There’s Something Wrong with Aunt Diane”

This HBO documentary dives into the 2009 Taconic State Parkway crash that claimed eight lives. You may remember the story of Diane Schuler, who barreled down the highway going the wrong direction at 85mph, colliding with another vehicle, and killing herself, her two-year-old daughter, her three nieces, and all three men in the other car. Her son, Bryan, five years old at the time, was the sole survivor. The documentary takes its name from a panicked cell phone call that Diane’s eldest niece made to her father, saying, “there’s something wrong with Aunt Diane.”

Toxicology reports revealed that Schuler’s blood alcohol level was 0.19, over twice the legal limit. Her stomach also contained six grams of alcohol that had yet to be absorbed, and her blood contained high levels of THC, the active ingredient in marijuana. But Schuler’s husband and sister-in-law, both of whom are interviewed in this film, refused to accept the findings. They claimed that Schuler must have suffered some kind of medical event, like a stroke. Eerier still, is the extended length of the deadly drive itself. Schuler departed the campground at 9:30 a.m. The trip home should have taken an hour at most. Yet for nearly four hours, she remained at large with her captive passengers, even ditching her cell phone on the Tappan Zee Bridge. Imagining the terror of those children trapped in the vehicle—in particular, the niece who knew something was wrong—is simply blood-chilling.

2. “The Staircase”

If you liked “Making a Murderer” but wanted more in the way of gore and mystery, “The Staircase” is for you. On December 9, 2001, 911 received a phone call from novelist Michael Peterson that his wife had fallen down the stairs. Yet when the police arrived at Peterson’s home, they discovered a strange scene. Blood was everywhere. Kathleen had sustained devastating injuries, including seven lacerations to her head, and a fracture of the neck cartilage, dying from loss of blood about 90 minutes to 2 hours after the injury, according to the coroner’s report.

Peterson was immediately a suspect in Kathleen’s murder, though he and his family, including his four children, insisted on his innocence. The subsequent trial revealed that Michael and Kathleen’s marriage contained its fair share of secrets, and that Michael may have been involved in a similar crime nearly 30 years earlier, with yet another woman who died after falling down the stairs.

3. “The Cheshire Murders”

Another excellent documentary by HBO Films, “The Cheshire Murders” covers the senseless murder of Jennifer Hawke-Petit and her two daughters, Hayley and Michaela. Career criminals Steven J. Hayes and Joshua A. Komisarjevsky had planned to rob the Petits, spotting Jennifer and 11-year-old Michaela at a grocery store in Cheshire, Connecticut. Hayes took Jennifer to the bank the following morning to withdraw $15,000. There she successfully alerted the teller of the situation, who called the police. What happened next makes this doc a harrowing watch.

4. “Dear Zachary”

When his best friend Dr. Andrew Bagby was murdered in 2001, Kurt Kuenne set out to make a documentary so that Bagby’s infant son would know his father. Bagby was deeply loved by his family and many friends. Who would’ve wanted to kill him? The shocking suspect turns out to be the mother of Babgy’s child, his on-and-off again girlfriend. Though “Dear Zachary” starts off as a celebration of Bagby, who had touched the lives of so many people, the disturbing twists that follow will have you tossing and turning in your sleep. Proceed with caution.

5. “The Imposter

In what reads like the description of some new paranormal television show, “The Imposter” tells the story of Nicholas Barclay, who disappeared at the age of 13 in 1994, only to seemingly resurface in Spain years later. As it turns out the reappearance of Barclay was the work of French grifter Frédéric Bourdin, a charming and manipulative man who had made a career out of impersonating missing or abducted children. Though “The Imposter” is a documentary, it flows like a narrative film thanks to stylish reenactments, archival news footage, and interviews with the man who convinced so many people that he was their long, lost loved one.

6. “The Jinx”

In 1982, Kathie Durst disappeared. Her body has never been found, and the case remains unsolved. In 2000, the writer Susan Berman was murdered in her home. And in 2001, Morris Black was killed and dismembered. What do all three cases have in common? Robert Durst. The truth about what happened to these three victims is revealed piece-by-piece in this sleek series that ends on a jaw-dropping conclusion—thanks to the overwhelming arrogance of Durst himself.

7. “Capturing the Friedmans”

Initially director Andrew Jarecki (also of “The Jinx”) set out to make a short film about David Friedman, who worked as a clown for children’s birthday parties. But in the midst of production, both Friedman’s brother and father were accused of child sexual abuse, a series of crimes that had allegedly taken place in a computer class taught out of the Friedman basement in the 1980s. Jarecki follows the reactions of David and his mother Elaine throughout the case, exposing the dark secrets of a seemingly normal middle class family.

8. “Paradise Lost Trilogy”

This epic three-part documentary tells the story of the Memphis Three: three teenage boys, Damien Echols, Jessie Misskelley, Jr., and Jason Baldwin, who were accused of the 1993 murders of three boys Christopher Byers, Michael Moore, and Stevie Branch. Police found the victims hog-tied in the woods and believed they had been killed as part of a Satanic ritual. Despite little forensic evidence, the Memphis Three were convicted in 1994—thanks to coerced confessions and character assassinations targeting Echols’ preference to wear black and love of Metallica. Echols was sentenced to death, while Misskelley and Baldwin received life in prison.

For those obsessed with the class politics in “Making a Murderer”, “Paradise Lost” is a wormhole of an unbelievable crime and a disturbing miscarriage of justice.

9. “Aileen: The Life and Death of a Serial Killer”

Aileen Wuornos is not the only female serial killer, but she is one of the most notorious. The subject of the narrative film “Monster”, which won Charlize Theron her Oscar, Wuornos claimed that she was a sexually-abused prostitute who was just doing society a favor by removing rapists from society. Wuornos was eventually captured, and confessed to killing seven men. She was executed by lethal injection in 2002. In 2003, Nick Bloomfield released a follow-up to his first documentary about Wuornos, in which we hear from the killer herself while incarcerated in Florida as she comes to terms with her death sentence. The chilling conclusion includes a reading of her last words, which were, in part, “I’ll be back.”

This story was originally featured on The-Line-Up.com. The Lineup is the premier digital destination for fans of true crime, horror, the mysterious, and the paranormal.

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(Reuters) – U.S. networks are changing the way they develop and release new shows, and even commercials, as they seek to adapt to new TV viewing habits and profit from the “binge-watching” made popular by video streaming services like Netflix.

The changes could help offset declining audiences and the trend known as “cord cutting,” as a growing number of Americans opt to go without traditional cable or satellite television service and rely instead on Internet streaming video.

Viacom Inc’s TV Land network is developing more serialized programming where the plot unfolds with each episode, and recently changed the storyline of a new show to encourage binging.

Time Warner Inc’s Turner Broadcasting System in January launched its new comedy “Angie Tribeca” by airing the entire 10-episode season in a 25-hour “binge-a-thon” on TBS. A third of viewers were new to the network.

TV executives are also working with advertisers to change commercials, so binging viewers stay engaged. Experiments include making brands part of the show on Turner. CBS Corp, meanwhile, is studying whether commercials themselves should be serialized to tell a story.

The changes reflect a realization that fewer people, particularly younger viewers, watch shows when they air and instead binge-watch series like Netflix’s “House of Cards” or “Orange is the New Black.”

“The streaming platforms have created a more competitive environment and we all need to deliver better,” said David Levy, president of Turner.

Networks used to cringe at serialized shows because they did not lend themselves well to syndication. Out-of-order reruns can be confusing, so program developers preferred series such as CBS hits “The Big Bang Theory” or “NCIS,” which wrap up a story in each episode.

But with the rise of binge-watching, TV networks see a chance to hook viewers through cliffhangers. They make batches of current episodes available on-demand through cable boxes or online apps, and sell them later to the likes of Netflix.

Forty-six percent of millennials – people in the 18-to-34 age group – watch shows after they air, according to media researcher Comscore. And 42 percent of viewers binge-watch multiple episodes of a show, one to two times per month.

“Bingers are super fans,” said Jonnie Davis, president of creative affairs for 20th Century Fox TV. “These are the people who go to work the next day and want to talk about the show.”

At TV Land, creative and marketing executive Kim Rosenblum said one new show, “Impastor,” was rewritten from the pilot to drive the story across episodes and attract binge viewers.

The show follows slacker Buddy Dobbs who escapes from his gambling debt by pretending to be a preacher in a small town. To encourage people to keep watching, writers developed a story line about thugs hunting down Dobbs, giving each episode a cliffhanger, Rosenblum said.

“Instead of it being every episode as a standalone, we added a storyline that was told more episodically as the mystery unravels,” she said.

Turner has added original, serialized shows like “The Alienist” and “Good Behavior,” to TNT, which traditionally has been rerun heavy.

Binging viewers are also less likely to watch ads because most are watching them via their DVRs, which allow them to fast forward past commercials. Forty-three percent of viewers prefer to binge watch shows via their DVRs, compared to only 19 percent who do so through video on demand, according to Comscore.

To address this, Turner is ramping up brand placement in its shows, for example filming a scene of truTV’s “The Carbonaro Effect” at Papa John’s Pizza, which sponsored the episode.

CBS is considering adding serialized commercials, to make sure that binge viewers are not exposed to the same ad again and again, and draw them in with a story, said David Poltrack, chief research officer at CBS.

It all comes down to networks realizing that streaming video has become one of broadcast television’s biggest threats, and potentially its salvation, said Dave Morgan, chief executive of Simulmedia, a New York-based ad tech firm.

“If they don’t get viewership, they don’t get paid,” he said.

(Reporting By Jessica Toonkel; additional reporting by Lisa Richwine in Los Angeles; Editing by Peter Henderson and Tom Brown)

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By Luciana Lopez and Steve Holland

LAS VEGAS/COLUMBIA, S.C. (Reuters) – Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump rolled to victory on Saturday in South Carolina in a contest that saw former Florida Governor Jeb Bush drop out, while Democratic hopeful Hillary Clinton beat back a strong challenge from Bernie Sanders in Nevada.

The victories by Trump and Clinton solidified their positions as the front-runners to win their parties’ respective presidential nominations ahead of the Nov. 8 election.

Bush suffered a distant fourth place finish in the Republican contest and announced he had suspended his campaign, ending his dream of becoming a third Bush president after his father and brother.

“The people of Iowa, New Hampshire and South Carolina have spoken, and I really respect their decision,” an emotional Bush said in Columbia. He finished far out of the running in each of the first three states.

By winning both South Carolina and New Hampshire and holding leads in the 11 states that vote on March 1, Trump was arguably on track to win the nomination, an outcome that seemed astounding to contemplate when he got into the race last summer.

“It’s going to be very difficult for him to be derailed at this point,” said Hogan Gidley, who was a senior adviser to former Republican candidate Mike Huckabee.

Trump, 69, was declared the victor about an hour after polls closed in South Carolina.

“Let’s put this thing away,” Trump said in his victory speech in Spartanburg.

Trump was as feisty and anti-establishment as ever, denouncing TV pundits for saying that if his remaining opponents consolidated around one Trump alternative, there would be enough anti-Trump votes to beat him.

“These geniuses,” he said. “They don’t understand that as people drop out, I’m going to get a lot of those votes also. You don’t just add them together.”

He easily defeated Florida Senator Marco Rubio and Texas Senator Ted Cruz, who were in a close fight for second place and the right to declare themselves the anti-Trump alternative.

With 73 percent of South Carolina precincts reporting, Trump had 33.1 percent, followed by Rubio with 22.3 percent and Cruz with 21.7 percent.

It was Trump’s second victory in a row, an outcome that frightens establishment Republicans but thrills the “throw-the-bums-out” conservative base of the party that has long been fed up with Washington.

The bellicose New York billionaire had created some last-minute drama in South Carolina after Pope Francis said on Thursday his views on U.S. immigration were “not Christian.” Trump initially called Francis “disgraceful,” but later called him “a wonderful guy.”

Trump, who has also advocated a ban on Muslim immigrants to counter domestic terror threats, stirred fresh controversy on Friday when he told a crowd about a U.S. general who was said to have dipped bullets in pigs’ blood to kill Muslim prisoners a century ago.

After South Carolina, the Republican presidential campaign is about to rapidly pick up steam in March when dozens of states hold nominating contests. Another candidate, Ohio Governor John Kasich, is concentrating on midwestern and northern states in the state-by-state contest to pick nominees for the Nov. 8 election.

Clinton’s victory in the Nevada Democratic caucuses, meanwhile, could help calm Democratic Party worries about the strength of her campaign.

Her win denied Sanders the breakthrough win he had sought in a state with a heavy minority population, but his ability to close a one-time double-digit polling lead for Clinton suggests the Democratic nominating race will be long and hard fought.

With 87 percent of precincts reporting, Clinton was leading with 52.5 percent of the vote to Sanders’ 47.4 percent. Vote counting was delayed in Nevada by heavy turnout.

Clinton’s victory buoyed worried supporters and gave her fresh momentum as she heads into the next contest in South Carolina on Feb. 27, where polls show her with a double-digit lead largely as a result of heavy support from black voters.

“Some may have doubted us, but we never doubted each other,” she told cheering supporters at a victory rally in Las Vegas. “This is your campaign.”

Sanders vowed to fight on and set his sights on the 11 states that vote on “Super Tuesday,” March 1. He predicted that when Democrats gather for their nominating convention in Philadelphia in July, “We are going to see the results of one of the great political upsets in the history of the United States.”

“The wind is at our banks,” he said. “We have the momentum.”

After routing Clinton in New Hampshire and finishing a strong second in Iowa, states with nearly all-white populations, Sanders had hoped to prove in Nevada that he could win over black and Hispanic voters and compete nationally as the race moves to states with more diverse populations.

But entrance polling in Nevada showed he badly lost among black voters, by 76 percent to 22 percent, a bad omen for South Carolina and other southern states with big black populations. He did win among Hispanics by 53 percent to 45 percent.

Clinton’s campaign has argued she would assert control of the Democratic race once it moved to more diverse states with black and Hispanic populations who have traditionally backed Clinton and have been slow to warm to Sanders.

(Reporting by Luciana Lopez and Steve Holland; Writing by John Whitesides, Steve Holland and Richard Valdmanis; Editing by Andrew Hay)

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