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Apple Inc. said advance sales of its iPhone 5 topped 2 million units in one day, more than double the record set by the previous model of the device.
Because demand for the iPhone 5 exceeds the initial supply, some of the smartphones will be shipped to customers in October, Cupertino, California-based Apple said today in a statement. Most orders will be delivered on Sept. 21, the same day the handset arrives in U.S. retail outlets, Apple said.
“Clearly it’s a blowout,” said Brian White, an analyst at Topeka Capital Markets in New York, in an interview. He had anticipated sales of 1.3 million to 1.5 million units in the first 24 hours and up to 12 million by the end of the month. “These estimates look conservative.”
Apple gained 1.2 percent to $699.78 at the New York close and traded as high as $700.44, a new record, in extended trading.

 
(CNN) -- Anti-American rage sparked by an online film that insulted Islam's prophet boiled over Friday among Muslims in at least half a dozen countries, as the United States stepped up security at diplomatic posts across the Middle East.
One of the worst riots took place in Sudan, where a thousands converged on the German Embassy and set it on fire, a journalist on the scene said. Some managed to get inside and pull down a German flag before police with tear gas forced the crowd to retreat.
In Egypt, a running battle between police and protesters in Cairo continued into its fourth day. And Afghanistan saw its first demonstrations Friday, despite the government's attempts to block the online video from sparking riots.
 
Aware that protests were planned for Friday -- the Muslim holy day -- the United States beefed up security at its embassies and consulates across the Middle East.

PHILADELPHIA (AP) — Retired boxing great Muhammad Ali will visit Philadelphia to receive the Liberty Medal, an award recognizing his longtime role as a fighter outside the ring for humanitarian causes, civil rights and religious freedom.

Turmoil in the Arab world linked to a contentious video denigrating the Prophet Muhammad spread on Thursday to Yemen, where hundreds of protesters stormed the United States Embassy, two days after assailants killed the American ambassador in Libya and crowds tried to overrun the embassy compound in Cairo.

News reports also spoke of a separate protest in Tehran, where around 500 Iranians chanting “Death to America” tried to converge on the Swiss Embassy, which handles United States interests in the absence of formal diplomatic relations with Washington. Hundreds of police officers held the crowds back from the diplomatic compound, which Swiss officials had evacuated as a precaution, Agence France-Presse said.

As many as 700,000 minority voters under age 30 may be unable to cast a ballot in November because of photo ID laws in certain states, according to a new study. The lower turnout could affect several House races as well as the tight presidential contest.

Using calculations based on turnout figures for the past two presidential elections, researchers at the University of Chicago and Washington University in St. Louis concluded that overall turnout this year by young people of color ages 18-29 could fall by somewhere between 538,000 to 696,000 in states with photo ID laws.

Eleven years after the 9/11 terrorist attacks horrified the nation, the families and friends of the thousands who perished have gathered at Ground Zero, the Pentagon and in rural Pennsylvania to remember their loved ones.

At the World Trade Center site, relatives clasped pictures of loved ones, while others brandished signs reading names and messages of love. Bagpipers played as police watched guard over the memorial pools and a giant flag unfurled on Freedom Tower.

More than 1,000 relatives of those killed and others gathered for the annual reading of the list of 2,983 people killed at the three sites.

The reading began at 8:39 a.m., with pauses for moments of silence at 8:46 a.m., 9:03 a.m., 9:37 a.m. and 10:03 a.m., the time of impact for the four planes, and again at 9:59 a.m. and 10:28 a.m., the times that the north and then the south tower fell.

A jury on Monday awarded casino mogul Steve Wynn $20million in his slander case against 'Girls Gone Wild' founder Joe Francis, who claimed the creator of some of Las Vegas' most upscale resorts threatened to kill him over a gambling debt.

Witnesses disputed Francis' claims during a four-day trial, including Grammy winning record producer Quincy Jones, who Francis said told him about Wynn's threats and showed him a stack of emails that contained them.  Wynn vehemently denied that.

In siding with Wynn, the jury determined that there was clear and convincing evidence that Francis slandered the casino mogul and knew his allegations were false when he made them. Francis had claimed Wynn threatened to hit him over the head with a shovel and have him buried in the desert.

Neither Wynn nor Francis was present in court Monday morning when the verdict was read.

Jurors convicted Drew Peterson of murdering his third wife Thursday, capping a sensational, five-year legal saga that began after the swaggering former Illinois police officer's fourth wife vanished.

Peterson, 58, sat stoically looking straight ahead and did not react as the verdict was read, but several of Savio's family members gasped before hugging each other as they cried quietly in the courtroom. Illinois has no death penalty, and Peterson now faces a maximum 60-year prison term when sentenced on Nov. 26.

The trial was the first of its kind in Illinois history, with prosecutors building their case largely on secondhand hearsay thanks to a new law, dubbed "Drew's Law," tailored to Peterson's case. That hearsay, prosecutors had said, would let his third and fourth wives "speak from their graves" through family and friends to convict Peterson.

Two suspected robbers at an East Los Angeles Bank of America, who kidnapped the bank manager and strapped her with apparent explosives, avoided being seen on bank security cameras, authorities said.

The men stole a significant amount of cash from the bank Wednesday morning. FBI and Los Angeles County sheriff's officials said the woman was told to get money from the bank vault, then toss it in a bag out the back door of the bank.  The men were beyond the range of the cameras, officials said.

The suspected robbers also were wearing masks, and there has been little description provided. They remain on the loose.

Law enforcement sources are scouring potential surveillance video from the area between the bank manager's home in Huntington Park, where she said she was kidnapped Wednesday morning as she opened her garage, and the branch on Atlantic Boulevard in East Los Angeles.

The White House released a photo of first daughters Malia and Sasha Obama sitting on a couch with their father as they watched their mother give her moving convention speech last night.  While the image of the threesome closely huddled together on the couch is undeniably heart-warming, even more striking is the degree to which the two young girls have grown over the past four years.