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Upgrade

186: Black Market Crayons

 

00:00:00 ◼   ► [Music]

00:00:08 ◼   ► From Relay FM, this is Upgrade, episode 186.

00:00:12 ◼   ► Today's show is brought to you by Anchor, Mac Weldon, and Simple Contacts.

00:00:17 ◼   ► My name is Myke Hurley, and I am joined live and on location by Mr. Jason Snell.

00:00:22 ◼   ► Hi, Jason Snell.

00:00:23 ◼   ► Hello from Chicago, Myke Hurley.

00:00:26 ◼   ► We're gonna get to all of this in a moment,

00:00:29 ◼   ► including the special location that you're in.

00:00:31 ◼   ► But I have a Snail Talk question for you, Jason.

00:00:34 ◼   ► And we're going completely off reservation today

00:00:37 ◼   ► with a question from Corey.

00:00:38 ◼   ► And Corey wants to know, Jason, The Office or Parks and Rec?

00:00:42 ◼   ► - I'm gonna say that one's actually pretty easy

00:00:46 ◼   ► 'cause Parks and Rec, because I find The Office makes me,

00:00:50 ◼   ► I like The Office, makes me a little uncomfortable.

00:00:53 ◼   ► It's my daughter's favorite TV show.

00:00:54 ◼   ► But for me, I would choose Parks and Rec

00:00:56 ◼   ► because it's a little less cringy and painful.

00:01:00 ◼   ► And I never had a boss like Leslie Knope,

00:01:03 ◼   ► but I did have a boss who was kind of like Michael Scott.

00:01:06 ◼   ► So Parks and Rec.

00:01:07 ◼   ► - That is interesting to me because I love Parks and Rec,

00:01:12 ◼   ► but The Office wins for me.

00:01:14 ◼   ► I'm a huge fan of The Office.

00:01:15 ◼   ► And I actually wanted to provide a piece of follow out

00:01:17 ◼   ► here, Jason, to a new show on The Incomparable

00:01:20 ◼   ► that features Micah Sargent and Tiff Ahman.

00:01:23 ◼   ► It's called Somehow I Manage.

00:01:24 ◼   ► And it's all about The Office.

00:01:26 ◼   ► They're doing a rewatch of the entire show and it's adorable and wonderful.

00:01:30 ◼   ► And I think everyone should go and listen to it because it's great.

00:01:32 ◼   ► And now I'm now slowly rewatching the office along with them.

00:01:35 ◼   ► Yes, I agree.

00:01:36 ◼   ► I think people should check it out.

00:01:38 ◼   ► Without further ado, we should probably get into today's proceedings.

00:01:42 ◼   ► You are calling in from Chicago.

00:01:45 ◼   ► You are in the Dubai Friday slash Robo ism slash cards against humanity studio.

00:01:50 ◼   ► Yes, the magic tavern.

00:01:52 ◼   ► Indeed.

00:01:52 ◼   ► Indeed.

00:01:53 ◼   ► And we have a producer today, which is a wonderful thing.

00:01:57 ◼   ► We're so professional now.

00:01:58 ◼   ► - Finally.

00:01:59 ◼   ► - Hi, producer Alex Cox.

00:02:01 ◼   ► - Hello.

00:02:02 ◼   ► - This is a thing, this is quite a thing.

00:02:04 ◼   ► I feel like we've ascended to the big leagues now

00:02:06 ◼   ► that we have a producer for an episode.

00:02:09 ◼   ► - Yeah, there's like a big glass window

00:02:12 ◼   ► with somebody sitting behind it who's listening

00:02:14 ◼   ► and occasionally laughing, but you can't hear it

00:02:16 ◼   ► because it's soundproof.

00:02:18 ◼   ► And then they can press a button and they talk.

00:02:20 ◼   ► - At any moment.

00:02:21 ◼   ► And it makes me feel like I'm on a TV show about radio. Like Frasier, that's, "Hello,

00:02:28 ◼   ► Seattle. I'm listening." Except we're in Chicago.

00:02:32 ◼   ► You are in Chicago.

00:02:33 ◼   ► And I'm not listening.

00:02:34 ◼   ► Because today you attended Apple's Education Event, and listeners of our previous episode

00:02:42 ◼   ► will know that we took a draft, as we always do, for our predictions of the event. And

00:02:47 ◼   ► I guess we should run through how we did. And it was a disaster. I think it was ugly.

00:02:55 ◼   ► The best way to put it. I feel like we may have in the past scored similarly, but not

00:03:04 ◼   ► so badly because there were so many of these picks that weren't even close. And sometimes

00:03:11 ◼   ► what happens is we score, you know, we get about half of the picks right, but kind of

00:03:17 ◼   ► we're in the ballpark with some things, right, but we just missed the exact answers. But

00:03:23 ◼   ► for this draft, about two thirds of the things that were on our list were just not even close.

00:03:30 ◼   ► No, in fact, I am at some point late in the event when they were showing a video, I flipped

00:03:38 ◼   ► over to my Apple draft scorecard and I looked at the ones I didn't go back and

00:03:45 ◼   ► forth I just looked at mine first and I thought oh my god I got destroyed I only

00:03:50 ◼   ► got four right now I looked at your side

00:03:55 ◼   ► it's like this is the I am going to wear the crown for this draft but it is a

00:04:00 ◼   ► crown of shame. I kind of scored it at like 4-2? Yeah it's arguably 4-3 and it

00:04:10 ◼   ► doesn't really matter because I got four but Stephen Hackett our adjudicator you

00:04:15 ◼   ► know the rules the Constitution the bylaws of the upgrade draft say one

00:04:20 ◼   ► Stephen Hackett will make all decisions and that were we can't agree and two no

00:04:25 ◼   ► half points mm-hmm yeah because even give give a half point for one of your

00:04:29 ◼   ► That's not how it works. It turns out our adjudicator doesn't know the rules.

00:04:34 ◼   ► So the things that I kind of scored you was correct. New Apple Classroom features, Apple

00:04:39 ◼   ► Pencil support on non-Pro iPads, Class Kit, and a new Apple-created iOS app. That's what

00:04:45 ◼   ► I scored your four on. I had a question mark on the lower base price for the iPad, but

00:04:52 ◼   ► I don't think that we can count the education price, really.

00:04:55 ◼   ► No, it already existed. That price was already the education price.

00:04:59 ◼   ► - Oh, look at that, I didn't know that.

00:05:00 ◼   ► - Yeah, so that's definitely not it.

00:05:01 ◼   ► No, at least I prioritized my picks right.

00:05:03 ◼   ► My first four picks are right,

00:05:05 ◼   ► and then there were the four I threw away at the end.

00:05:07 ◼   ► - Yeah, that's actually pretty good skill from you there.

00:05:10 ◼   ► I got new basic iPad.

00:05:13 ◼   ► - First pick, good pick.

00:05:14 ◼   ► - And iWork updates, which if I remember rightly,

00:05:16 ◼   ► you thought was never gonna happen, which is hilarious.

00:05:18 ◼   ► - I was very impressed when they announced that.

00:05:20 ◼   ► I was just thinking, it was like a picture of Myke

00:05:22 ◼   ► appeared above the screen, and angels sang,

00:05:25 ◼   ► like, ♪ iWork updates ♪

00:05:28 ◼   ► - I was pretty happy with that.

00:05:29 ◼   ► When I saw that, I was like, oh, I'm gonna clean up.

00:05:31 ◼   ► (laughing)

00:05:34 ◼   ► So yeah, the other one that was a question for me

00:05:37 ◼   ► was an iBooks update, but that didn't really happen,

00:05:40 ◼   ► which is a surprise, 'cause that was the one

00:05:42 ◼   ► that literally everyone thought was a lock, right?

00:05:44 ◼   ► Like everybody thought it was a lock.

00:05:47 ◼   ► - And the only reason it was a potential half point

00:05:49 ◼   ► is that they did basically, it seems like,

00:05:52 ◼   ► kill iBooks author and roll it back,

00:05:54 ◼   ► 'cause it actually was an adapted version of pages

00:05:56 ◼   ► back into Pages on Mac and now on iOS

00:06:00 ◼   ► for book creation inside Pages.

00:06:02 ◼   ► But that's not actually an update to iBooks.

00:06:05 ◼   ► And if one of us had picked iBooks Author,

00:06:08 ◼   ► which was actually on our list and didn't get picked,

00:06:11 ◼   ► that would have been the one that would have gotten,

00:06:13 ◼   ► I think, credited.

00:06:14 ◼   ► So I think in the end it's four to two, I would say.

00:06:18 ◼   ► - Yeah, I still think that like 11.3

00:06:20 ◼   ► is still gonna change the name,

00:06:21 ◼   ► but that nothing was even mentioned close to that on stage.

00:06:25 ◼   ► So you take away the first win of the year,

00:06:29 ◼   ► which is a strong point to have, right?

00:06:32 ◼   ► Because you're going into WWDC with a point in your pocket.

00:06:35 ◼   ► So you could potentially take the entire year at WWDC.

00:06:40 ◼   ► - Yeah, I could basically just pick Spinal Tap

00:06:43 ◼   ► for all my picks and still be okay,

00:06:45 ◼   ► as long as I do well in the fall.

00:06:46 ◼   ► - I feel like you've misunderstood my point,

00:06:48 ◼   ► but like, sure, you can do that if you want to.

00:06:49 ◼   ► Do you know what, Jason?

00:06:50 ◼   ► Do it.

00:06:51 ◼   ► I would like you to go for that

00:06:53 ◼   ► because there is literally any chance of there ever being

00:06:56 ◼   ► Spinal Tap has now passed, right?

00:06:59 ◼   ► Because like 11 has come up and they did a jet black phone.

00:07:02 ◼   ► - That's what they want you to think.

00:07:04 ◼   ► And that's when they get you.

00:07:04 ◼   ► That's when Apple truly surprises you.

00:07:06 ◼   ► - Mm-hmm, that is what they do when on stage,

00:07:10 ◼   ► true surprises.

00:07:11 ◼   ► All right, we should talk about the whole event

00:07:14 ◼   ► then some of the announcements from today.

00:07:16 ◼   ► But before we do that, let me thank our first sponsor.

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00:08:21 ◼   ► full eye health exam.

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00:08:26 ◼   ► Now Jason, I understand you have downloaded

00:08:28 ◼   ► the Simple Contacts app and taken the vision test,

00:08:31 ◼   ► and I kind of just wanted to know

00:08:32 ◼   ► what that experience was like.

00:08:34 ◼   ► - Yeah, it was very easy.

00:08:35 ◼   ► You set it up and it takes pictures of your face,

00:08:38 ◼   ► of your eyes, and it's trying to make sure

00:08:40 ◼   ► that you can read.

00:08:42 ◼   ► Basically it wants your,

00:08:43 ◼   ► to make sure your prescription hasn't drifted

00:08:45 ◼   ► because this is not a replacement for that eye test.

00:08:47 ◼   ► And they wanna make sure everything's okay.

00:08:49 ◼   ► And then at that point, you're done with that.

00:08:52 ◼   ► And then you just go on and put in what the contact brand

00:08:55 ◼   ► is that you use, which mine is,

00:08:57 ◼   ► I have a really obscure prescription

00:08:59 ◼   ► with a astigmatism correction and all this stuff.

00:09:01 ◼   ► And they had it.

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00:09:03 ◼   ► It was not a problem.

00:09:04 ◼   ► It showed up first thing, they had it.

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00:09:31 ◼   ► So today I was following live blogs like it was 2009.

00:09:36 ◼   ► There was no video of the event.

00:09:39 ◼   ► I had Twitter up, I had the live blog up, I had the Verges live blog up and I was following

00:09:44 ◼   ► along and the Six Colors Live Events Twitter account.

00:09:48 ◼   ► And was kind of just tune in and see what was going on.

00:09:51 ◼   ► It was really weird for me to kind of know that stuff was happening but all I could do

00:09:57 ◼   ► was wait for things to refresh.

00:09:58 ◼   ► Like every time I saw, "Oh it's a video now!"

00:10:01 ◼   ► It's like, "Okay well I'll wait for a minute shall I?"

00:10:04 ◼   ► It was very strange.

00:10:05 ◼   ► But I have to say, I did enjoy the nostalgia because I would say overall the event was

00:10:12 ◼   ► a whelming event, like there wasn't a ton to it, it wasn't a lot of excitement, kind

00:10:16 ◼   ► of got a bunch of stuff that I was expecting that you were expecting.

00:10:20 ◼   ► So I don't know, to have there be some kind of nostalgia to it gave me something.

00:10:25 ◼   ► Having been in the environment, having seen the event Jason, because you were there in

00:10:29 ◼   ► person today in Chicago at Lane Tech High. Do you think that there was more of a reason

00:10:35 ◼   ► to not have the live video than just a technical one? Do you think they were handling expectations?

00:10:41 ◼   ► Why do you think that there was no live video today?

00:10:45 ◼   ► It's a good question. I think my number one theory is that it's a new place with new equipment

00:10:50 ◼   ► that they've never been before and that they were reluctant to do it because it could not

00:10:55 ◼   ► work and then they would have people complaining and there'd be a stream

00:10:59 ◼   ► failure and you know it is a minor event on their calendar so perhaps investing

00:11:05 ◼   ► money in and frustration and potentially in getting it to go live when they could

00:11:12 ◼   ► just make it live an hour or two later maybe wasn't worth it for them so that's

00:11:16 ◼   ► my number one is just it was that they didn't not that they couldn't do it but

00:11:19 ◼   ► that they couldn't do it and feel like they wouldn't run into trouble and

00:11:23 ◼   ► and didn't want to spend the effort to double and triple protect so that it worked right

00:11:30 ◼   ► the first time and this is the only time they're probably ever going to do an event here, so

00:11:34 ◼   ► do they really want to do that?

00:11:35 ◼   ► That's my number one.

00:11:36 ◼   ► Number two would be, I suppose yes, since it's a minor event, doesn't matter as much.

00:11:40 ◼   ► I guess, though, it's an Apple Media event.

00:11:43 ◼   ► People are going to pay attention regardless.

00:11:45 ◼   ► I think any Apple event is going to get attention, so if they could stream it live, I don't think

00:11:51 ◼   ► they would be like, "Eh, people aren't going to be happy about it."

00:11:53 ◼   ► I don't think that's the case. I think they want people to see it.

00:11:55 ◼   ► That's why they call the event.

00:11:57 ◼   ► My third wildcard theory is that there may actually be something specific and I

00:12:01 ◼   ► don't know what this would be exactly, but it is a Chicago public school.

00:12:05 ◼   ► And I don't know if there potentially is some weird regulation about,

00:12:10 ◼   ► uh, about live, you know, performances or on the internet or something.

00:12:15 ◼   ► I honestly don't know, but my guess is it's the first one max. Max says no,

00:12:19 ◼   ► by the way, mass friends of friend of the show,

00:12:21 ◼   ► Max Temkin has just emerged from a secret location behind producer Alex Cox to shake

00:12:27 ◼   ► his head. So I think it's just they didn't want to screw it up. I think literally I think

00:12:31 ◼   ► the simplest explanation, the Occam's Razor explanation is they couldn't guarantee with

00:12:38 ◼   ► the level of precision they can do for the venues that they're familiar with that they

00:12:42 ◼   ► would be able to make it work live. So they just decided not to worry about it.

00:12:46 ◼   ► And it wasn't as an important enough event that they felt like they had to like control

00:12:50 ◼   ► 100% of what was being said about it, right?

00:12:53 ◼   ► Like, you know, they weren't unveiling anything here

00:12:56 ◼   ► that was gonna like, shatter headlines around the world.

00:12:59 ◼   ► - No, it's not an iPhone announcement.

00:13:01 ◼   ► And the iPhone announcement is the big one

00:13:03 ◼   ► and it wasn't that.

00:13:04 ◼   ► And they'll be sure to do that one live everywhere.

00:13:06 ◼   ► I have to say, while we were walking in,

00:13:07 ◼   ► I had several people say to me,

00:13:10 ◼   ► like, this is like the old days, right?

00:13:12 ◼   ► I'm like, yeah, it's pretty funny

00:13:13 ◼   ► that we're back doing this.

00:13:15 ◼   ► And I was reminded, I said, I remember when we were told,

00:13:19 ◼   ► as we were walking into an Apple event,

00:13:20 ◼   ► and I think town hall,

00:13:22 ◼   ► although it might've been at Moscone,

00:13:24 ◼   ► no live blogging, no blogging, no blogging.

00:13:27 ◼   ► (laughing)

00:13:28 ◼   ► That was actually a thing.

00:13:29 ◼   ► And I said, "Oh, I'm not gonna do any live blogging."

00:13:31 ◼   ► And instead what I had is I had an iChat window open

00:13:34 ◼   ► to Peter Cohen, our news writer back at the office.

00:13:38 ◼   ► And I would just give him the play-by-play,

00:13:40 ◼   ► and then Cohen would turn it into a news story

00:13:42 ◼   ► with quotes and paragraphs and stuff.

00:13:45 ◼   ► And we weren't live blogging,

00:13:46 ◼   ► we were doing a continuously updated news story.

00:13:49 ◼   ► Totally different.

00:13:50 ◼   ► Anyway, they got over it.

00:13:51 ◼   ► Yeah, they got over it because they realized

00:13:55 ◼   ► that the live blogging was actually good.

00:13:56 ◼   ► And then they did get to that moment

00:13:58 ◼   ► where they started doing it live.

00:13:59 ◼   ► And then all of us live bloggers were like,

00:14:02 ◼   ► why do we exist anymore?

00:14:03 ◼   ► And I actually think that the live commentary stuff

00:14:06 ◼   ► is better.

00:14:08 ◼   ► I actually kind of like,

00:14:09 ◼   ► I prefer when we're there to give analysis

00:14:12 ◼   ► to what we're seeing on stage beyond like the,

00:14:15 ◼   ► you know, 'cause there's probably,

00:14:17 ◼   ► in terms of news breaking at any of these events,

00:14:19 ◼   ► even the most laden with information events,

00:14:22 ◼   ► there's probably a good, what, eight tweets in that,

00:14:26 ◼   ► if we're live tweeting an event,

00:14:28 ◼   ► and the rest of it is all quotes and details

00:14:30 ◼   ► and things like that that I think it's kinda nice

00:14:33 ◼   ► to stop having to do that, 'cause people can watch live,

00:14:36 ◼   ► and the people who really want the breaking news

00:14:38 ◼   ► can get that, and then you can also add this other layer,

00:14:41 ◼   ► which is I'm no longer transcribing

00:14:43 ◼   ► what Greg Joswiak is saying on stage.

00:14:47 ◼   ► Now I'm saying, here's why that's an interesting point.

00:14:50 ◼   ► Here's their, you know, referencing Google there,

00:14:52 ◼   ► that's interesting because of this and all of that.

00:14:54 ◼   ► And I think I actually kind of like it better that way

00:14:57 ◼   ► now that everybody can see most of these events live.

00:14:59 ◼   ► But this was a throwback and that was fine.

00:15:02 ◼   ► - So I wanna ask you like kind of an overarching meta

00:15:08 ◼   ► question for this entire event.

00:15:10 ◼   ► having seen it all and being in the environment,

00:15:14 ◼   ► why did this event exist?

00:15:16 ◼   ► Why did Apple not do this stuff with press releases?

00:15:20 ◼   ► Like what was happening that really required

00:15:24 ◼   ► bringing all of these people together today?

00:15:27 ◼   ► - Apple wants to tell, wanted to tell

00:15:32 ◼   ► a story about education.

00:15:34 ◼   ► Bottom line, they wanna talk about how awesome

00:15:36 ◼   ► their products are in the education market,

00:15:38 ◼   ► especially the iPad.

00:15:39 ◼   ► They really wanna push further the idea of iPads in schools.

00:15:43 ◼   ► And the fact is there is a narrative out there

00:15:49 ◼   ► that is about the success of Chromebooks in schools.

00:15:52 ◼   ► Chromebooks have, I think they have more than half

00:15:54 ◼   ► the market now in education.

00:15:57 ◼   ► It has been a huge success for Google

00:15:59 ◼   ► and its hardware partners.

00:16:00 ◼   ► For Chromebooks, these cheap laptops

00:16:03 ◼   ► that don't run any operating system,

00:16:05 ◼   ► which also means that they need much less maintenance

00:16:07 ◼   ► because they're just Chromebooks.

00:16:08 ◼   ► They're basically browser tabs.

00:16:10 ◼   ► They all get updated automatically.

00:16:12 ◼   ► They can be very easily controlled by administrators.

00:16:15 ◼   ► And so put the ease of control

00:16:20 ◼   ► and the limit to what you can do with them

00:16:22 ◼   ► to screw them up together with a low price.

00:16:25 ◼   ► And you can see why those would be successful in schools.

00:16:28 ◼   ► So Apple is fighting against that perception

00:16:32 ◼   ► and wants to tell a story about why they're,

00:16:36 ◼   ► Again, people who were expecting Apple to,

00:16:39 ◼   ► I kind of hoped they would cut the price a little bit,

00:16:41 ◼   ► but expected Apple to compete on price

00:16:43 ◼   ► down at the level of a Chromebook.

00:16:45 ◼   ► I think that was unrealistic.

00:16:47 ◼   ► In fact, if you look, the first Chrome OS tablet

00:16:50 ◼   ► just was announced, and I think it costs

00:16:53 ◼   ► what the iPad costs. (laughs)

00:16:56 ◼   ► I think it's a 329 or maybe it's a 349.

00:16:58 ◼   ► It's not an unreasonable for a product with these specs

00:17:01 ◼   ► to have this price.

00:17:03 ◼   ► I think what Apple wants to tell is not the,

00:17:04 ◼   ► we're gonna be your low price leader,

00:17:05 ◼   ► we're gonna compete with this cheap, crappy,

00:17:08 ◼   ► but cheap laptop.

00:17:10 ◼   ► And you get what you pay for,

00:17:12 ◼   ► but the advantage is it's cheap,

00:17:14 ◼   ► a cheap Chromebook laptop, right?

00:17:17 ◼   ► What Apple wants to do is tell the story

00:17:18 ◼   ► of why you pay more for Apple, because you get more.

00:17:21 ◼   ► And you get more because you get these apps

00:17:23 ◼   ► and you get the pencil now,

00:17:26 ◼   ► and you get these apps, again, these apps,

00:17:29 ◼   ► you get AR, you get,

00:17:31 ◼   ► like they're trying to tell that story about why,

00:17:35 ◼   ► even though the Apple stuff is more expensive,

00:17:38 ◼   ► it's better as a way to get some segment of the market

00:17:43 ◼   ► to be willing to spend that money to get the better thing

00:17:46 ◼   ► or to feel good about it or to give ammunition

00:17:49 ◼   ► to the people who are arguing that this should be

00:17:52 ◼   ► what we buy instead of the Chromebooks.

00:17:54 ◼   ► And so by adding the new iPad with the pencil

00:17:57 ◼   ► and all of that and the AR apps and the improvements

00:18:01 ◼   ► to their software, including the expansion

00:18:05 ◼   ► of the iCloud storage space, which is a big thing today,

00:18:08 ◼   ► they're able to tell that story.

00:18:10 ◼   ► And that's why this event exists, is essentially,

00:18:12 ◼   ► instead of just rolling out the iPad with a press release

00:18:15 ◼   ► and saying, we also have a couple of changes

00:18:17 ◼   ► to our education stuff, like,

00:18:18 ◼   ► most people don't even know that.

00:18:20 ◼   ► They mentioned the multi-user login stuff today for iPads.

00:18:25 ◼   ► And I will guarantee you that somebody wrote that up

00:18:27 ◼   ► as a brand new feature.

00:18:28 ◼   ► And I think it's existed for two years now.

00:18:30 ◼   ► but people don't know about it

00:18:32 ◼   ► because people aren't really attuned to the education market.

00:18:34 ◼   ► So this was a chance for Apple to devote some time

00:18:38 ◼   ► and show some love for education.

00:18:40 ◼   ► And I think also saying we care about education

00:18:43 ◼   ► and we love teachers and all of these things

00:18:45 ◼   ► makes people who are in the education world

00:18:47 ◼   ► feel better about Apple too.

00:18:48 ◼   ► So I think that's part of it,

00:18:49 ◼   ► is Apple selling itself to education.

00:18:52 ◼   ► So it's about all of that.

00:18:55 ◼   ► - And they seem to bring a lot of teachers in

00:18:57 ◼   ► And if I'm correct, in kind of following along from home,

00:19:01 ◼   ► it was all female, all the teachers.

00:19:02 ◼   ► - All women, yeah.

00:19:03 ◼   ► - Which was great, right?

00:19:05 ◼   ► There was, I think, just Joss and Tim Cook

00:19:09 ◼   ► were the only guys on stage,

00:19:10 ◼   ► and it was all women from there, I think.

00:19:12 ◼   ► - Yeah, the teachers and also the Apple,

00:19:14 ◼   ► some Apple people, yeah.

00:19:15 ◼   ► - And I just wanted to shout out,

00:19:17 ◼   ► it was great to see AppCamp for Girls

00:19:19 ◼   ► get a mention on stage as well, which is a--

00:19:21 ◼   ► - Yeah, that was exciting.

00:19:22 ◼   ► That was Tim Cook just saying, you know,

00:19:24 ◼   ► here is AppCab for Girls is using Swift to teach girls how to code in Red Apps.

00:19:27 ◼   ► - Oh, he actually said it? That's amazing, because we don't get it.

00:19:30 ◼   ► I saw the logo on a slide, but he actually spoke about it?

00:19:35 ◼   ► - Oh, no, Tim Cook said AppCab for Girls out loud, yes.

00:19:38 ◼   ► - Wonderful.

00:19:39 ◼   ► - I'm sure when the video comes up, then they'll be even more excited.

00:19:42 ◼   ► But yeah, it was an example in how different education groups are teaching

00:19:48 ◼   ► people how to code.

00:19:49 ◼   ► - That is amazing. I'm really pleased about that.

00:19:51 ◼   ► - It was pretty cool. They did a great job with the whole

00:19:53 ◼   ► highlighting education stuff.

00:19:55 ◼   ► And we all, especially in the media,

00:19:59 ◼   ► have to look at it with that layer of remove,

00:20:02 ◼   ► which is what is Apple selling here?

00:20:04 ◼   ► And why are they doing what they're doing?

00:20:06 ◼   ► But on the base level of how they showcased education

00:20:11 ◼   ► and how technology is being used in education,

00:20:13 ◼   ► they did a great job of showing that.

00:20:15 ◼   ► And then people can criticize that and say that it was,

00:20:17 ◼   ► you know, they can say it was cynical

00:20:18 ◼   ► or that it's not realistic.

00:20:20 ◼   ► There are lots of things that I think your experts

00:20:22 ◼   ► who are educators, who are people like Fraser Spears

00:20:26 ◼   ► and Bradley Chambers and people like that

00:20:28 ◼   ► who talk about this and write about this a lot

00:20:30 ◼   ► will have their takes on it.

00:20:33 ◼   ► But I did think Apple did a great job of expressing

00:20:38 ◼   ► a love of teachers and students and a pride in the fact

00:20:43 ◼   ► that like the everyone can code stuff

00:20:45 ◼   ► has been so embraced in a lot of places.

00:20:50 ◼   ► - So you had a whole day at school today, turns out.

00:20:53 ◼   ► - Yeah, I went to school, had to get there,

00:20:56 ◼   ► you know, got there a little before 8.30,

00:20:59 ◼   ► got a, had to wait in line to be locked in the door,

00:21:01 ◼   ► which is unusual, I think, for school,

00:21:02 ◼   ► but then we were in this huge,

00:21:05 ◼   ► it's a huge building with these long halls

00:21:07 ◼   ► and there's lockers and there's an auditorium

00:21:10 ◼   ► and there are classrooms, and so we, you know,

00:21:12 ◼   ► we started in a, in kind of a holding area,

00:21:15 ◼   ► which was in this big, sort of a wide spot in the hallway,

00:21:19 ◼   ► quite frankly, but it was in the middle of a hallway,

00:21:21 ◼   ► right by the teachers' bathrooms.

00:21:24 ◼   ► I went in the teachers' bathroom at one point, Myke.

00:21:26 ◼   ► It was very exciting.

00:21:27 ◼   ► I kept waiting for a teacher to come in and say,

00:21:29 ◼   ► "Hey, you don't belong in here.

00:21:31 ◼   ► "Get back to class."

00:21:32 ◼   ► But it didn't happen, 'cause it was spring break,

00:21:35 ◼   ► so there were no teachers there.

00:21:36 ◼   ► There were students,

00:21:37 ◼   ► there probably were some teachers there,

00:21:38 ◼   ► but there were a bunch of Lane Tech students were there.

00:21:41 ◼   ► They had to get a permission slip signed,

00:21:43 ◼   ► 'cause I actually heard somebody say,

00:21:44 ◼   ► "If you're a student, bring your permission slip,

00:21:46 ◼   ► "sign, and we'll let you in." - Incredible, incredible.

00:21:49 ◼   ► and they got to see the event, which was cool.

00:21:50 ◼   ► And they were running around, at one point there were a bunch of them running

00:21:52 ◼   ► down the stairs from upstairs where we weren't allowed to go.

00:21:54 ◼   ► And, um, one of the people who was there, cause the Apple stashed these things

00:21:59 ◼   ► incredibly, like hundreds of people there lining the hallways saying,

00:22:02 ◼   ► do you need any help? Where would you like to go? And they said to the, the,

00:22:06 ◼   ► there was like five girls coming down the stairs. Do you need any help?

00:22:09 ◼   ► And one of them just says, no, we go here,

00:22:12 ◼   ► we know where everything is and they left. It was pretty great. But they were,

00:22:15 ◼   ► they were at the event, which was pretty cool. So after all of that, um,

00:22:18 ◼   ► sort of like the preview stuff where we get there

00:22:21 ◼   ► and they serve coffee and they've got breakfast

00:22:23 ◼   ► and stuff like that.

00:22:25 ◼   ► And you know, journalists are never gonna turn down

00:22:27 ◼   ► free food, so that's very popular.

00:22:29 ◼   ► Then they lead us into the auditorium,

00:22:31 ◼   ► we have the presentation which was about an hour.

00:22:33 ◼   ► And then actually as we were checking in,

00:22:36 ◼   ► we were told check your email,

00:22:37 ◼   ► you just received your class schedule.

00:22:39 ◼   ► And we all got this little thing that said,

00:22:42 ◼   ► here's where you're going, you're going,

00:22:44 ◼   ► you know, you're going here for orientation,

00:22:46 ◼   ► which was the breakfast basically,

00:22:47 ◼   ► then there's the presentation.

00:22:48 ◼   ► And then you're gonna go, there's a classroom

00:22:50 ◼   ► and there's a hands-on lab.

00:22:51 ◼   ► And there were multiple rooms,

00:22:53 ◼   ► so they were kind of scheduling different people

00:22:54 ◼   ► to different places.

00:22:56 ◼   ► But after the event, that's what we ended up doing

00:22:59 ◼   ► is walking down many of these very long hallways

00:23:01 ◼   ► into these classrooms, these amazing classrooms.

00:23:04 ◼   ► There's like an arts section in one classroom

00:23:07 ◼   ► and there's like a science section in another classroom

00:23:09 ◼   ► where the people are like using Swift Playgrounds

00:23:13 ◼   ► to fly drones and to roll around little Sphero balls.

00:23:17 ◼   ► A lot of really cool stuff.

00:23:19 ◼   ► And then also like a classroom demo and an iPad cart demo

00:23:24 ◼   ► and administrative and IT for that stuff.

00:23:27 ◼   ► So they had multiple classrooms and then these four,

00:23:31 ◼   ► no, three big hands-on areas with people showing off apps

00:23:35 ◼   ► and different technologies.

00:23:37 ◼   ► So they put a lot of effort into getting

00:23:40 ◼   ► just a huge amount of samples of what people are doing

00:23:43 ◼   ► with educational apps and also like maintenance

00:23:47 ◼   ► and rollout of these devices.

00:23:48 ◼   ► So there was an awful lot of other stuff in this huge venue.

00:23:53 ◼   ► They took over many, many classrooms.

00:23:56 ◼   ► - It seemed like that they really leaned into the theme.

00:23:59 ◼   ► - Right.

00:24:00 ◼   ► - That they, you know, these were hands-on areas,

00:24:02 ◼   ► but they gave them a fun flair, right?

00:24:04 ◼   ► And I think that's kind of cool.

00:24:05 ◼   ► - Yeah, yeah.

00:24:06 ◼   ► And I think they want to leave the impression

00:24:09 ◼   ► with everybody involved that Apple is serious

00:24:11 ◼   ► about education, which I think they did successfully.

00:24:15 ◼   ► And I think there's a point of pride here too,

00:24:18 ◼   ► which is Apple feels that they are really innovating

00:24:22 ◼   ► in education stuff and that when people write about,

00:24:26 ◼   ► I think maybe they wanna change the narrative

00:24:27 ◼   ► from Chromebooks are selling well to be,

00:24:32 ◼   ► well, Chromebooks are selling well,

00:24:33 ◼   ► but look at all the amazing things Apple is doing.

00:24:36 ◼   ► 'Cause honestly, that's what they wanna do.

00:24:38 ◼   ► They wanna be the people who,

00:24:41 ◼   ► they wanna be the company that is viewed

00:24:45 ◼   ► as being the better answer.

00:24:48 ◼   ► They're not gonna be the cheaper answer,

00:24:51 ◼   ► but they wanna be viewed as the better answer.

00:24:53 ◼   ► And so by setting all this up and telling the story

00:24:55 ◼   ► and showing the richness of it,

00:24:56 ◼   ► and then relaying this event,

00:24:59 ◼   ► and all the other work they're gonna do,

00:25:00 ◼   ► every other conversation they have

00:25:01 ◼   ► with somebody in education now,

00:25:02 ◼   ► they're gonna point at this and say,

00:25:03 ◼   ► "See, did you see our event?

00:25:05 ◼   ► "Did you see how many things?

00:25:06 ◼   ► "Did you see the story that came out of it?"

00:25:08 ◼   ► all of that is going to factor in.

00:25:10 ◼   ► But isn't there like a weird kind of duality

00:25:13 ◼   ► to this type of thing?

00:25:14 ◼   ► Like Apple are on stage talking about like all of the tools

00:25:18 ◼   ► that they have and how amazing it is

00:25:20 ◼   ► and how it helps kids learn.

00:25:22 ◼   ► But it is priced at a point where many, many, maybe

00:25:26 ◼   ► most schools can't afford it.

00:25:28 ◼   ► Isn't there like a weird thing to that,

00:25:31 ◼   ► where they're like, oh, our tools are better,

00:25:32 ◼   ► but not for all kids?

00:25:33 ◼   ► I mean, it's awkward, right?

00:25:38 ◼   ► It's kind of an awkward thing to say,

00:25:41 ◼   ► like to stand on stage and say like,

00:25:43 ◼   ► how much better your tools are

00:25:45 ◼   ► and how much more they can help kids learn.

00:25:47 ◼   ► But then it's priced at a point which they choose

00:25:52 ◼   ► and that point that they choose,

00:25:54 ◼   ► whether it's through what they want their margins to be

00:25:57 ◼   ► or what they want their hardware to look like,

00:26:00 ◼   ► but it prices schools out of the equation.

00:26:04 ◼   ► - Yeah, I think that's the underlying tension

00:26:07 ◼   ► in any conversation about Apple and education.

00:26:10 ◼   ► And I see a lot of criticism of Apple for it,

00:26:13 ◼   ► and I think some of it is justified,

00:26:15 ◼   ► which is Apple is trying to do both.

00:26:18 ◼   ► It's trying to be what it's always been,

00:26:20 ◼   ► which is this kind of luxury brand.

00:26:23 ◼   ► We always talk about how it's never the low price leader.

00:26:26 ◼   ► Apple's never gonna make a $400 laptop, right?

00:26:28 ◼   ► They're just not gonna do it

00:26:29 ◼   ► because Apple's not gonna play in that market.

00:26:32 ◼   ► Apple's gonna always be in the mid to high end,

00:26:35 ◼   ► and you get what you pay for.

00:26:37 ◼   ► You get quality and they're not making

00:26:41 ◼   ► a completely de-specced device

00:26:44 ◼   ► so that they can sell it for $300

00:26:46 ◼   ► and you've got a lousy experience and it doesn't last

00:26:48 ◼   ► and it feels flimsy.

00:26:49 ◼   ► They're just not gonna play in those areas

00:26:51 ◼   ► and that's been their game for a long time

00:26:53 ◼   ► and they're very successful with it

00:26:54 ◼   ► 'cause they're playing in areas where the margins are better.

00:26:57 ◼   ► Same on phones, same on computers.

00:26:59 ◼   ► The problem is that schools are not,

00:27:05 ◼   ► a lot of schools anyway, and certainly public schools,

00:27:07 ◼   ► are not places where, you know,

00:27:10 ◼   ► purchasing luxury products are particularly common,

00:27:13 ◼   ► even if it's affordable luxury products.

00:27:16 ◼   ► It doesn't really fit with Apple,

00:27:18 ◼   ► that part of Apple's brand,

00:27:20 ◼   ► because schools, especially public schools,

00:27:22 ◼   ► have very small budgets.

00:27:24 ◼   ► They need to get stuff that's cheap,

00:27:25 ◼   ► and they need it to last, which is very hard.

00:27:28 ◼   ► So if you're Apple, you know, you have a choice to make.

00:27:32 ◼   ► you can forego margins on education products.

00:27:37 ◼   ► And I believe that back in the day, they did more of that.

00:27:41 ◼   ► Back in the day, the education prices for Apple stuff

00:27:44 ◼   ► was a lot lower than the regular price.

00:27:46 ◼   ► And they don't seem to do as much of that anymore.

00:27:49 ◼   ► And I don't think Apple has cut its margins

00:27:51 ◼   ► that much to regular people.

00:27:53 ◼   ► I think it's just reduced the margin cuts

00:27:56 ◼   ► that it offers to education.

00:27:57 ◼   ► And that's just something that they've decided

00:27:59 ◼   ► is that they're not willing to sacrifice margin

00:28:02 ◼   ► in order to increase their market share in education.

00:28:05 ◼   ► And as a result, you end up in this situation

00:28:07 ◼   ► where Apple is making the case saying,

00:28:10 ◼   ► yeah, our stuff's more expensive, but it's better.

00:28:12 ◼   ► And if you can afford it and it's better

00:28:17 ◼   ► and it lasts longer and the apps are great,

00:28:19 ◼   ► and it will be an overall better buy for you.

00:28:22 ◼   ► The funny thing is the complaints I hear from educators,

00:28:25 ◼   ► talk to Fraser Spears about who does out of school

00:28:29 ◼   ► with Bradley Chambers, right? They do a podcast about education tech.

00:28:32 ◼   ► - Did, it ended last week, but yes. - Oh, they did, well.

00:28:35 ◼   ► - Yeah, it came to an end last week, but there's still a lot of information there if you want

00:28:39 ◼   ► it. - That's true, that's true, but it was a bad

00:28:42 ◼   ► timing, I would say. They need to bring it back for one more episode now. It's complete

00:28:48 ◼   ► now, you can listen to the whole thing and not worry about it. So, Fraser's complaints

00:28:54 ◼   ► about this, about Apple's presentation in schools.

00:28:58 ◼   ► Like he's not complaining about the hardware.

00:29:01 ◼   ► He's not complaining about the prices.

00:29:03 ◼   ► He's complaining about the software and the cloud services

00:29:07 ◼   ► and all sorts of, and the administrative overhead

00:29:10 ◼   ► and managing Apple IDs and things like that.

00:29:12 ◼   ► So again, yes, it's true.

00:29:16 ◼   ► Apple has chosen not to build the low cost,

00:29:21 ◼   ► the low-cost technology solution

00:29:26 ◼   ► that will get them to maximize

00:29:29 ◼   ► their market share and education.

00:29:31 ◼   ► But their argument is very similar to the argument

00:29:33 ◼   ► in the rest of the market, which is,

00:29:35 ◼   ► no, we're not gonna give you a $150 iPad,

00:29:39 ◼   ► but when you buy our stuff, you get what you pay for.

00:29:42 ◼   ► You get value that you're not gonna get.

00:29:44 ◼   ► And as long as that's true, I think it's okay.

00:29:46 ◼   ► The challenge is if somebody looks at a Chromebook

00:29:49 ◼   ► and looks at an iPad and says,

00:29:51 ◼   ► this costs half of what the iPad does,

00:29:54 ◼   ► and it basically does everything I need.

00:29:57 ◼   ► And this other AR and the pencil and all of that,

00:30:00 ◼   ► that's great, but I can't afford it,

00:30:02 ◼   ► and would we really use it?

00:30:05 ◼   ► And it's nice to have, but it's not in my budget,

00:30:07 ◼   ► and I'm not gonna prioritize it and forget it.

00:30:10 ◼   ► And that's where the rubber meets the road

00:30:12 ◼   ► for Apple and education, is can they do enough

00:30:17 ◼   ► so that people see the value in what they're doing.

00:30:21 ◼   ► Do they have that value there to make that argument

00:30:24 ◼   ► that you get what you pay for

00:30:25 ◼   ► and even though it's more expensive,

00:30:26 ◼   ► there's a whole lot of advantage to using the Apple stuff.

00:30:30 ◼   ► And you talk to people in education

00:30:32 ◼   ► and some of them say that's true

00:30:34 ◼   ► and some of them say it's not true.

00:30:35 ◼   ► And I think that's behind the rise in Chromebooks.

00:30:38 ◼   ► And I'm not convinced that this is gonna be enough

00:30:40 ◼   ► on its own, but if the rise in Chromebooks

00:30:42 ◼   ► has lit a fire under Apple in terms of education

00:30:45 ◼   ► and this is the first real sign of it, then great.

00:30:50 ◼   ► If Apple walks away and says, "We've done enough now,"

00:30:52 ◼   ► and the market says, "Forget it, you have not,"

00:30:55 ◼   ► then they'll feel it.

00:30:56 ◼   ► - Yeah, I definitely can't detach myself

00:31:00 ◼   ► from the weirdness that I feel with some of it.

00:31:04 ◼   ► I know where I went to school,

00:31:06 ◼   ► and I know my school wouldn't have been able to afford this,

00:31:10 ◼   ► where I grew up in London,

00:31:11 ◼   ► and I know that they still wouldn't be able to now.

00:31:14 ◼   ► And so it is awkward.

00:31:17 ◼   ► I find it an awkward thing at times.

00:31:19 ◼   ► You know, like you look at that school

00:31:21 ◼   ► that they picked out today,

00:31:22 ◼   ► it seemed like that that is a very, very well

00:31:25 ◼   ► put together school that they chose,

00:31:27 ◼   ► like from a financial perspective.

00:31:29 ◼   ► You know, and I think that it is awkward

00:31:32 ◼   ► to kind of be like we're enabling this amazing stuff

00:31:34 ◼   ► for the future, you know, the future of today,

00:31:37 ◼   ► but like only in areas that can afford it.

00:31:40 ◼   ► And I don't know, there is an awkwardness to that to me,

00:31:43 ◼   ► but we don't need to belabor the point anymore.

00:31:45 ◼   ► - No, I think it may be worth talking about at some point.

00:31:48 ◼   ► This is a criticism that our friend Andy Anico,

00:31:52 ◼   ► late of the Chicago Sun-Times, but no longer.

00:31:55 ◼   ► By the way, if you are somebody who wants to hire

00:31:58 ◼   ► a great tech writer, Andy is available,

00:32:00 ◼   ► and you should talk to him.

00:32:02 ◼   ► I saw him today, he's great.

00:32:04 ◼   ► He brings up this point a lot, which is,

00:32:06 ◼   ► there is a debate to be had about whether Apple,

00:32:10 ◼   ► if its goal is to make the world better,

00:32:13 ◼   ► should be saying, "Well, we want to make the world better, but only for people who can afford

00:32:18 ◼   ► the lowest level to which we're willing to stoop." And that if you can't afford a laptop that costs

00:32:26 ◼   ► more than $7.99 or $6.99, if you can't afford an iPhone that costs whatever the base price of the

00:32:35 ◼   ► cheapest iPhone is, sorry, you can't afford us. And I think there's an argument to be made that

00:32:41 ◼   ► that Apple has standards and that they don't want their brand connected with products that

00:32:45 ◼   ► they don't think are good enough. But I have heard and I can understand the other argument,

00:32:49 ◼   ► which is it is Apple saying basically our stuff is for schools that have money and then

00:32:57 ◼   ► if you don't have money find a lesser product to use instead. That's the dark way of painting

00:33:03 ◼   ► that.

00:33:04 ◼   ► All right. There were a bunch of announcements today and there is a bunch of interesting

00:33:09 ◼   ► stuff in that. So why don't we put a pin in this topic. We'll move on to that. But first,

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00:35:03 ◼   ► The iPad was the big news of the day in general.

00:35:07 ◼   ► I want to ask you some questions about the lack of the Mac in this event a little bit

00:35:12 ◼   ► later on.

00:35:14 ◼   ► But the iPad was what we expected, the iPad was what was focused on.

00:35:18 ◼   ► We got the new 9.7 inch iPad.

00:35:22 ◼   ► Well is it?

00:35:23 ◼   ► Is my question to you Jason.

00:35:25 ◼   ► What is this device?

00:35:26 ◼   ► Is this an update to the 9.7 inch or is this just a slightly hobbled iPad Pro?

00:35:33 ◼   ► What is this device?

00:35:36 ◼   ► It's the sixth generation iPad, Myke.

00:35:39 ◼   ► I mean it is a 9.7, it's got the updated processor, it's got the A10, you know, Touch ID, all

00:35:47 ◼   ► those things, and it's got the really the thing that is different is that it's got Apple

00:35:52 ◼   ► pencil support, which, you know, is a no-brainer. I think that's why we all talked about it

00:35:57 ◼   ► last week. Like, that is such a great thing to offer to education to have a pencil support.

00:36:03 ◼   ► Just you can think of it like students using the Apple Pencil to write and draw and take

00:36:08 ◼   ► notes and do all of those things. Like, yes, they need to do that. So they added that in,

00:36:13 ◼   ► which means that they had to upgrade the digitizer and, you know, do all the magic that they

00:36:16 ◼   ► need to do to get the Apple Pencil to work on it. But otherwise, it's just a step forward

00:36:20 ◼   ► for that base model 6th generation 9.7 inch iPad.

00:36:25 ◼   ► So it really is better to think of this as a 9.7 inch with a pencil, right?

00:36:30 ◼   ► Because it has no smart connector, it doesn't have ProMotion or TrueTone or anything like

00:36:34 ◼   ► that, right?

00:36:35 ◼   ► Exactly.

00:36:36 ◼   ► It's just…

00:36:37 ◼   ► And is the processor… is that an update, the A10 processor, is that an update to this

00:36:41 ◼   ► line?

00:36:42 ◼   ► Yeah, I think so.

00:36:43 ◼   ► Okay, so it's… but again, like it doesn't have the A10X like our current iPad Pros do.

00:36:50 ◼   ► talk about the Apple Pencil. Because really, that's what's going on here. You can get it

00:36:55 ◼   ► in a gold, that lovely gold colour now, which is like the gold that you get on the iPhone

00:36:59 ◼   ► 8. But really this is just an iPad at the same price point, but it's got Apple Pencil

00:37:05 ◼   ► support. So why now? Apple Pencil support is now clearly not seen to be a pro thing

00:37:12 ◼   ► anymore. This is what we were speculating on, but Apple have made that the case, right?

00:37:17 ◼   ► pencil support doesn't mean that your iPad is a pro iPad anymore.

00:37:22 ◼   ► Yeah, I would say, and we talked about this last week, the iPad Pro doesn't mean what

00:37:28 ◼   ► it meant when the Apple Pencil came out. Like iPad Pro used to mean it has a smart connector,

00:37:34 ◼   ► well first it meant it's 12.9 inches, right? And then the 9.7 came out, iPad Pro, and we're

00:37:40 ◼   ► like, oh, well what they've got in common is they've got the, with the 9.7 it was, they've

00:37:47 ◼   ► got the white color gamut and they've got the pencil and they've got the smart connector.

00:37:53 ◼   ► That's what it is.

00:37:54 ◼   ► That's really what separates them.

00:37:56 ◼   ► But in the intervening year, the 9.7 got turned into a 10.5 and then they also updated the

00:38:06 ◼   ► 12.9 to bring it into spec.

00:38:08 ◼   ► So they're both with bigger screens and better specs.

00:38:13 ◼   ► there's enough room in there for them to push the pencil down and say the pencil

00:38:17 ◼   ► is not what makes an iPad Pro an iPad Pro now, which would have been harder, a

00:38:22 ◼   ► harder case to make when they introduced the iPad Pro, but I think that was the

00:38:26 ◼   ► right call. I think if you look at this, if there's if there's one thing to do,

00:38:29 ◼   ► it's to bring down the it's to bring down the the pencil to this because this

00:38:35 ◼   ► is such a great market for it in education. That's probably the core of

00:38:39 ◼   ► of why this event happened.

00:38:41 ◼   ► That's probably the little seed at the center

00:38:44 ◼   ► that said, okay, what story can we tell around this

00:38:46 ◼   ► 'cause we wanna bring the pencil to the low end iPad

00:38:49 ◼   ► because it's gonna be great in education.

00:38:51 ◼   ► And then from that, they built an entire education event.

00:38:55 ◼   ► - Yeah, 'cause it really did feel

00:38:58 ◼   ► like the pencil was the star of the show.

00:39:00 ◼   ► It appeared to be that every slide was drawn

00:39:03 ◼   ► with an Apple Pencil, right?

00:39:05 ◼   ► It looked like that.

00:39:06 ◼   ► And all of the marketing on Apple's website

00:39:08 ◼   ► is very focused around handwriting. So like the Apple Pencil is right there. It's like

00:39:14 ◼   ► right front and center in all of this.

00:39:18 ◼   ► Yeah, that's the story.

00:39:21 ◼   ► But there was no new Apple Pencil. It is the Apple Pencil that we know and love, right?

00:39:25 ◼   ► It's the same one that there's always been.

00:39:28 ◼   ► Yeah, it's no different. There's an $89 education price, which I assume was there before, but

00:39:34 ◼   ► now it's more relevant. But it's just the Apple Pencil. Nothing new. That was a draft

00:39:40 ◼   ► pick. It didn't go.

00:39:42 ◼   ► Do you think that adding an Apple Pencil to a regular iPad makes it an easier purchase

00:39:47 ◼   ► for people? Do you think we're going to see even more sales of this $329 iPad, which is

00:39:54 ◼   ► what it's priced at for consumers, because it now supports the Apple Pencil?

00:39:58 ◼   ► Yeah, I think it makes a better product in general. I think that's true. I don't know

00:40:03 ◼   ► how much, you know, how niche is the pencil? Like, is it the product that, like so many

00:40:14 ◼   ► people, I just want to draw things on my iPad. I don't know. I don't know. But I'm sure it

00:40:18 ◼   ► will sell more of them. I think Apple is confident enough that any lost sales to somebody who

00:40:25 ◼   ► was going to buy an iPad Pro just for the pencil will be made up by the fact that they

00:40:30 ◼   ► are going to sell a lot more iPads and there are plenty of other reasons to buy an iPad

00:40:34 ◼   ► Pro.

00:40:35 ◼   ► Yeah, I do think it's interesting though.

00:40:38 ◼   ► I definitely believe that this year the iPad Pro takes more steps into its future, like

00:40:44 ◼   ► what makes it a Pro device.

00:40:46 ◼   ► We spoke about that, the way we think it's going to look.

00:40:48 ◼   ► And it is interesting to me that they haven't got that to show now, but they have brought

00:40:53 ◼   ► this, the lower end iPad closer to it.

00:40:57 ◼   ► So they've made the iPad Pro less competitive, right, at this point right now.

00:41:03 ◼   ► So, you know, obviously our assumption would be that they really believe that this is going

00:41:08 ◼   ► to be a net positive thing for the iPad line to add the Apple Pencil to the lower end iPad

00:41:14 ◼   ► now, potentially at the detriment of the iPad Pro, which is a much more expensive device.

00:41:19 ◼   ► I guess it depends on how much you love the Apple Pencil because as somebody who loves

00:41:24 ◼   ► the Apple Pencil, you may feel very strongly that it's a huge asset for the iPad Pro.

00:41:29 ◼   ► I don't, as somebody who doesn't use the Apple Pencil, I think it's there, but I

00:41:35 ◼   ► think it can survive without it. I don't think it's that big a deal.

00:41:37 ◼   ► I do think that Apple believe it though. You know, like they put a lot of marketing weight

00:41:42 ◼   ► into this at least. Well sure, but I think Apple believes that

00:41:46 ◼   ► it's not, the Pencil support is no longer required to drive people to the iPad Pro.

00:41:51 ◼   ► there are plenty of other reasons to get an iPad Pro and presumably there will be a new

00:41:55 ◼   ► iPad Pro probably, you know, later this year that will make it even more of a stark difference

00:42:00 ◼   ► between them and that's enough.

00:42:02 ◼   ► But what do you think is more important though, Apple Pencil or Smart Keyboard? Two schools.

00:42:09 ◼   ► Ah, good question. Now the Smart Keyboard is not cheap. I'm a little surprised. I wondered

00:42:16 ◼   ► about that. I think the smart connector is not great. I think maybe it's not as much

00:42:25 ◼   ► of a driver as we thought it might be. I wonder what research Apple did about the like the

00:42:32 ◼   ► smart keyboard in schools and whether they would buy smart keyboards if those were available

00:42:37 ◼   ► versus the pencil and realized the pencil is cheaper and the potential applications

00:42:43 ◼   ► for the pencil are so strong that it's more important to get that on there than the smart

00:42:48 ◼   ► keyboard.

00:42:49 ◼   ► I'm still a little surprised that they didn't have like, well, we've added the smart connector

00:42:52 ◼   ► to this thing and there's this fancy Logitech case.

00:42:54 ◼   ► I also heard from some people who said that in some schools for certain tests, a wired

00:43:00 ◼   ► keyboard is required.

00:43:02 ◼   ► Like they don't trust wireless keyboards, which is kind of wacky, but that would be

00:43:05 ◼   ► an application for the smart connector.

00:43:08 ◼   ► So I don't know.

00:43:09 ◼   ► I mean, I think the answer is probably that if you look at the cost of the Logitech case

00:43:15 ◼   ► they mentioned when they rolled this out, that there's a new Logitech, like, rugged

00:43:21 ◼   ► case for it, that the whole goal there was kind of to optimize for price.

00:43:28 ◼   ► And building in a smart connector does not do that.

00:43:32 ◼   ► So I think it's an arguable thing for the future that bringing a keyboard down for schools

00:43:39 ◼   ► is going to be also a use case. But as we found out, it's not the end of the world

00:43:44 ◼   ► to use a Bluetooth keyboard. You know, that's what I use.

00:43:46 ◼   ► Most of the time.

00:43:47 ◼   ► Or to type on the screen.

00:43:48 ◼   ► Right.

00:43:49 ◼   ► Or to type on the screen.

00:43:50 ◼   ► Again, I feel like it cannot be.

00:43:51 ◼   ► Yeah.

00:43:52 ◼   ► I know that there are some schools and some school districts that require keyboards in

00:43:54 ◼   ► the US, which I know is why it's an important thing, and maybe for some older students.

00:43:59 ◼   ► But unless that is a requirement, I really, really just feel like we have to remember

00:44:05 ◼   ► that kids are used to glass. Like this is...

00:44:08 ◼   ► - Yeah, that's right.

00:44:09 ◼   ► - This is what we do now, right?

00:44:11 ◼   ► - They may not have any problem with the,

00:44:13 ◼   ► I'm still not convinced that there are schools out there

00:44:16 ◼   ► that are saying write a whole essay on your iPad's keyboard,

00:44:19 ◼   ► but it's less of an issue over time.

00:44:23 ◼   ► - So we mentioned it, but I'll reiterate it.

00:44:27 ◼   ► This iPad is at $329 for consumers and $299 for schools.

00:44:32 ◼   ► Is this the pricing you would have wanted to see?

00:44:35 ◼   ► Would you have liked to have seen,

00:44:36 ◼   ► I mean, everyone would have liked to have seen this be less,

00:44:39 ◼   ► of course, like why not?

00:44:40 ◼   ► Make it $50, you know what I'm saying, right?

00:44:43 ◼   ► Everyone would like it to be less,

00:44:45 ◼   ► but was this what you was expecting?

00:44:47 ◼   ► Did you think Apple were gonna try and price this

00:44:49 ◼   ► more aggressively than they did?

00:44:51 ◼   ► - I will refer back to what we talked about

00:44:55 ◼   ► a little while ago, which is,

00:44:57 ◼   ► I would like to have seen them be a little more aggressive.

00:45:00 ◼   ► Yes, I think from Apple's perspective,

00:45:02 ◼   ► maybe what they did was say,

00:45:04 ◼   ► okay, we're not gonna lower the price,

00:45:05 ◼   ► but we're gonna add pencil,

00:45:07 ◼   ► and we're gonna do it that way.

00:45:08 ◼   ► Like, which would you prefer?

00:45:10 ◼   ► A, an iPad that was $40 cheaper,

00:45:13 ◼   ► or an iPad with pencil,

00:45:15 ◼   ► because I don't know how much the pencil support

00:45:17 ◼   ► adds to the cost,

00:45:18 ◼   ► but it definitely adds to the cost of the hardware.

00:45:21 ◼   ► You could also argue though,

00:45:22 ◼   ► that you could, you could afford a lower price

00:45:25 ◼   ► if you're selling a certain number of $89 pencils

00:45:29 ◼   ► along with those iPads.

00:45:32 ◼   ► So, yes, I would love Apple

00:45:35 ◼   ► to be cheaper because I want schools to have the option

00:45:40 ◼   ► more easily to buy iPads.

00:45:42 ◼   ► I think that would be great because as you said earlier,

00:45:45 ◼   ► it opens up more schools to this product,

00:45:49 ◼   ► but Apple's got its pricing philosophy.

00:45:54 ◼   ► And as we've said many times on this show,

00:45:57 ◼   ► if you have an imaginary price that you would love

00:46:00 ◼   ► for an Apple product, it will be higher than that.

00:46:03 ◼   ► It's just, that's Apple.

00:46:05 ◼   ► - $329 for this iPad for consumers is pretty good though.

00:46:11 ◼   ► Like--

00:46:13 ◼   ► - It's a great price.

00:46:13 ◼   ► It was a great price last year and it's still a great price

00:46:15 ◼   ► and that's why, the funny thing,

00:46:17 ◼   ► when we talk about quarterly results for Apple,

00:46:20 ◼   ► one of the funny things that comes up

00:46:22 ◼   ► is they've had quarters that show the iPad Pro strategy.

00:46:25 ◼   ► Now that they've bifurcated the line

00:46:27 ◼   ► and there's iPad Pros and iPad,

00:46:29 ◼   ► and the iPad's cheaper and the iPad Pros are more powerful,

00:46:33 ◼   ► What has happened is that sometimes we get results that say,

00:46:38 ◼   ► "Oh, the iPad Pro is really selling well."

00:46:41 ◼   ► And other times we get results that say,

00:46:43 ◼   ► "Oh, that low cost iPad is really selling well."

00:46:46 ◼   ► Which I take away to mean the iPad's doing well.

00:46:51 ◼   ► They split those things in two

00:46:53 ◼   ► and they're both successful at what they're trying to be.

00:46:57 ◼   ► One is the very expensive cutting edge tech iPad Pro

00:47:02 ◼   ► and the other is enough iPad for most people for $329,

00:47:06 ◼   ► which is down from what it used to be.

00:47:09 ◼   ► And if you look at the tablet market,

00:47:10 ◼   ► there's nobody in the tablet market anymore.

00:47:12 ◼   ► That new Chromebook tablet, Chrome OS tablet,

00:47:16 ◼   ► is basically the price of the iPad.

00:47:18 ◼   ► - It's the same price as $329.

00:47:21 ◼   ► - And then there's Amazon with their cheap tablets,

00:47:23 ◼   ► and that's basically it.

00:47:25 ◼   ► That market has just died.

00:47:26 ◼   ► Google has abandoned it for Android.

00:47:30 ◼   ► And there's just not a lot of,

00:47:33 ◼   ► I mean the iPad does incredibly well in all the segments

00:47:35 ◼   ► that it plays in in the tablet market.

00:47:37 ◼   ► So by pushing it down to 329,

00:47:40 ◼   ► Apple has already opened the door there.

00:47:41 ◼   ► And it's great.

00:47:42 ◼   ► Again, I keep thinking to myself,

00:47:44 ◼   ► if it was 299 for everybody and 279 for schools,

00:47:47 ◼   ► would that make the iPad even more successful?

00:47:51 ◼   ► But at the same time,

00:47:52 ◼   ► I get that Apple has the cost of building these things

00:47:54 ◼   ► and they have a profit margin they wanna hit

00:47:56 ◼   ► and they may feel like they came down enough

00:47:59 ◼   ► to go all the way down to 329 for them.

00:48:01 ◼   ► - So let's move into some software related stuff.

00:48:04 ◼   ► So iWork received some updates

00:48:07 ◼   ► to give it more pencil features.

00:48:09 ◼   ► One of these things, two things.

00:48:11 ◼   ► There's like a reports feature where you can annotate on it

00:48:14 ◼   ► and there's a feature coming for teachers

00:48:16 ◼   ► called smart annotation.

00:48:17 ◼   ► Did you have any chance to play with either of these?

00:48:20 ◼   ► - I didn't get to play them, I got to see them,

00:48:21 ◼   ► but I didn't get to actually use them.

00:48:24 ◼   ► Smart annotation is clever because what it does

00:48:26 ◼   ► is it attaches your pen marks to the text on the document.

00:48:31 ◼   ► So if you circle a word and say, remove this

00:48:37 ◼   ► or cross it out or whatever,

00:48:39 ◼   ► and then they're inputting changes into the document

00:48:41 ◼   ► in pages and the paragraph rewraps,

00:48:45 ◼   ► the pen overlay moves with the word that it was over,

00:48:49 ◼   ► which I'm sure there are gonna be interesting issues there,

00:48:52 ◼   ► it'll be interesting to see how it works in practice,

00:48:54 ◼   ► but it's a clever idea because that's a real thing

00:48:56 ◼   ► that happens where somebody gives you a file

00:48:58 ◼   ► and what you have to do is sort of have the file over here

00:49:00 ◼   ► and make the changes over there and track like,

00:49:03 ◼   ► oh, now this is different, so where's that comment again

00:49:05 ◼   ► and all of that and the idea here is that it all just

00:49:07 ◼   ► is happening live and it moves with you.

00:49:09 ◼   ► So it certainly demos well, we'll see how it works

00:49:12 ◼   ► in practice but I thought that was pretty clever.

00:49:14 ◼   ► - Feels like nice additions, right?

00:49:16 ◼   ► And being able to like create reports of numbers

00:49:20 ◼   ► and keynote and write and scribble and that kind of stuff.

00:49:23 ◼   ► - Feels like just good additions.

00:49:24 ◼   ► - In general saying, look, iWork's gonna be better

00:49:27 ◼   ► with the pencil, that we're gonna make iWork

00:49:30 ◼   ► a stronger citizen in terms of the Apple Pencil,

00:49:34 ◼   ► I think is a good move.

00:49:36 ◼   ► - And it was funny to me where I was like,

00:49:38 ◼   ► oh, they didn't have stuff like this before.

00:49:41 ◼   ► (laughing)

00:49:41 ◼   ► It's like, oh, interesting.

00:49:43 ◼   ► - Yeah, giving you more reasons to use iWork.

00:49:45 ◼   ► I think that's, I mean, that was one,

00:49:47 ◼   ► that was part of this story, right?

00:49:49 ◼   ► During that iWork section, I kept thinking to myself,

00:49:51 ◼   ► well, they've got this software,

00:49:53 ◼   ► they oughta leverage it to do whatever they want.

00:49:56 ◼   ► And so they said, we're gonna leverage it

00:49:57 ◼   ► for pen markup in schools, and we're gonna leverage it

00:50:00 ◼   ► to use iWork to build books.

00:50:04 ◼   ► And it's like, we've got this software

00:50:07 ◼   ► that we own and control and can build

00:50:10 ◼   ► to our latest and greatest hardware.

00:50:12 ◼   ► That's kinda why it exists, so let's do it.

00:50:14 ◼   ► And it's funny that they're doing that now

00:50:18 ◼   ► and that they didn't necessarily do that so much

00:50:22 ◼   ► when the pencil came out originally,

00:50:23 ◼   ► but it's good that it's there now.

00:50:25 ◼   ► - So pages has now seemed to have swallowed up iBooks Author

00:50:29 ◼   ► and you can create digital books right in pages.

00:50:32 ◼   ► I don't know this, I don't know if you know this,

00:50:34 ◼   ► is iBooks Author dead?

00:50:37 ◼   ► Is it done with?

00:50:38 ◼   ► - I think it is, I don't know that.

00:50:41 ◼   ► I assume it is, I'll put it that way.

00:50:43 ◼   ► And one of the reasons I assume that is

00:50:45 ◼   ► for people who haven't used iBooks Author,

00:50:47 ◼   ► iBooks Author was based on pages.

00:50:49 ◼   ► It was based on an old version of pages.

00:50:51 ◼   ► And so it was always this weird thing where it was kind of

00:50:53 ◼   ► like this is kind of pages, but kind of not.

00:50:56 ◼   ► But I'm sure people like David Sparks

00:50:58 ◼   ► and Serenity Caldwell are gonna be investigating

00:51:01 ◼   ► quite what has changed, people who have spent a lot of time

00:51:03 ◼   ► using iBooks Author.

00:51:05 ◼   ► But my guess is that this is iBooks Author

00:51:08 ◼   ► getting pulled back into pages,

00:51:10 ◼   ► which is gonna be good 'cause iBooks Author

00:51:12 ◼   ► didn't get a lot of love.

00:51:14 ◼   ► And if those features are just nice book creation features

00:51:18 ◼   ► inside a core iWork app,

00:51:20 ◼   ► it probably bodes well for the product because iBooks Author would sort of like

00:51:25 ◼   ► sit out there and not get any updates and, you know, and get old and creaky while iWork

00:51:31 ◼   ► was moving ahead. And so if it's all just back inside pages, that's probably all for the best.

00:51:35 ◼   ► Okay, that makes sense then. And also, I guess it does have some extra features though,

00:51:41 ◼   ► like you can collaborate, right? Like there is collaboration of sorts built into pages, so

00:51:47 ◼   ► multiple people can work on a book at the same time, which is not something that can

00:51:50 ◼   ► occur with the current crop of tools, right?

00:51:54 ◼   ► Sure.

00:51:55 ◼   ► Yeah.

00:51:56 ◼   ► iBooks Author, yeah, doesn't do a lot.

00:51:58 ◼   ► I have a question for you on this, though.

00:51:59 ◼   ► I was thinking about this.

00:52:03 ◼   ► Does taking iBooks Author away, like removing a standalone product and making it a feature

00:52:07 ◼   ► of pages, does that emphasize or de-emphasize the feature?

00:52:12 ◼   ► Does it make it more important because it's part of pages, or does it make it less important

00:52:16 ◼   ► because it doesn't have its own app anymore.

00:52:20 ◼   ► I think in the long run I think it makes it more important because it's part of the core

00:52:25 ◼   ► functionality and not a strange side project that gets less love.

00:52:30 ◼   ► And then let's not forget the major thing that's happening here is this is on iOS and

00:52:34 ◼   ► Mac, whereas iBooks Author was Mac only.

00:52:38 ◼   ► So that's a big step forward that you can do book creation on iOS, you don't need to

00:52:42 ◼   ► go to the Mac for it.

00:52:44 ◼   ► And what you did mention there about being in the core product, it means it forces them

00:52:49 ◼   ► to update it because if they put something whiz-bang into pages that you can't export

00:52:53 ◼   ► as a book, well that's a problem, isn't it?

00:52:56 ◼   ► So it locks the team into making sure that the digital book creation tools, as Apple

00:53:03 ◼   ► called them, are updated with all of the new stuff, which is a good point.

00:53:11 ◼   ► I'm expecting that you will be happy anytime

00:53:13 ◼   ► that iCloud storage limits are updated

00:53:16 ◼   ► and they've increased it from students

00:53:19 ◼   ► from five gigabytes to 200 gigabytes for free

00:53:22 ◼   ► for all students as part of the school, which is great.

00:53:25 ◼   ► - Can we get that for everybody?

00:53:27 ◼   ► But they were like, just for students.

00:53:28 ◼   ► (laughing)

00:53:31 ◼   ► Everybody else like, can we, does that mean I get free?

00:53:34 ◼   ► - No, not for you. - You don't get 200 free.

00:53:37 ◼   ► Regular people just get five, but for students, 200.

00:53:40 ◼   ► which is that is a case where Apple is forgoing

00:53:43 ◼   ► profit margin in order to tell a better story for education.

00:53:47 ◼   ► That's a case because that was a huge complaint in education

00:53:50 ◼   ► for this five gigabyte iCloud storage per Apple ID.

00:53:54 ◼   ► And so to take that to 200 gigs,

00:53:56 ◼   ► that is a place where they're being aggressive and saying,

00:53:58 ◼   ► you know, we don't need to,

00:54:00 ◼   ► this is not a place where we need to squeeze profits

00:54:03 ◼   ► out of this and we can make this a much better experience

00:54:06 ◼   ► for education.

00:54:08 ◼   ► I wish they do that for all their customers,

00:54:10 ◼   ► but for education it's a very good move.

00:54:12 ◼   ► - Just a more sort of light breaking news

00:54:14 ◼   ► sent to us by Steven Hackett.

00:54:15 ◼   ► iWork updates are out on iOS now

00:54:19 ◼   ► and they have a feature to collaborate in real time

00:54:22 ◼   ► on documents stored in Box.

00:54:24 ◼   ► I don't know whether these applications--

00:54:27 ◼   ► - Cloud Storage. - Cloud Storage.

00:54:29 ◼   ► So if you have documents in Box,

00:54:32 ◼   ► you can collaborate in real time on those documents.

00:54:34 ◼   ► - So that's basically a business enterprise kind of feature.

00:54:38 ◼   ► which is cool.

00:54:40 ◼   ► I wonder if it's any different.

00:54:41 ◼   ► - For all those enterprises that are using pages, but.

00:54:44 ◼   ► - Yeah, well, yeah, but if you use Box though,

00:54:47 ◼   ► and you maybe now have a really good application for it,

00:54:50 ◼   ► like it's gonna require testing, right?

00:54:51 ◼   ► Like how real time is real time?

00:54:53 ◼   ► Is it more real time than the iCloud stuff?

00:54:56 ◼   ► And if that's the case,

00:54:57 ◼   ► that could be a really good reason to use it,

00:55:00 ◼   ► which could be cool.

00:55:01 ◼   ► You know, I think that could be cool.

00:55:03 ◼   ► Apple Classroom, which is an administrative tool

00:55:06 ◼   ► for teachers and administrators that are managing lots of devices is coming to the Mac now in

00:55:15 ◼   ► June. Now a friend of the show, Guillermo Rambo, pointed out, which I thought was very

00:55:20 ◼   ► interesting that this is an existing iOS only application that's coming to the Mac in June.

00:55:26 ◼   ► And he says, "Hmm."

00:55:29 ◼   ► Thinking emoji.

00:55:30 ◼   ► Yeah.

00:55:31 ◼   ► Yeah.

00:55:32 ◼   ► here is this a hint of some of these cross-platform Marzipan tools? We don't know, possibly,

00:55:40 ◼   ► potentially, but it is interesting that this stuff is coming later. There's a lot of

00:55:44 ◼   ► things actually that are coming in June with 11.4, which they mentioned and is mentioned

00:55:50 ◼   ► on some kind of asterisks on Apple's website today.

00:55:53 ◼   ► Yeah, I think Marzipan, if it even happens, there's a question of like, will apps be

00:55:59 ◼   ► be able to be built back for older versions

00:56:02 ◼   ► or will this be for new versions that come out this fall?

00:56:05 ◼   ► But of course it's Apple,

00:56:06 ◼   ► so they could build something using it as a test case even.

00:56:09 ◼   ► And then have it be compatible with current versions

00:56:13 ◼   ► even though other people's apps might not be, I don't know.

00:56:16 ◼   ► It's interesting, my semi snarky take on this is like,

00:56:21 ◼   ► oh look, an iOS app coming to the Mac,

00:56:23 ◼   ► why would they do that in education?

00:56:25 ◼   ► And the answer is it's the app for teachers

00:56:28 ◼   ► 'cause teachers are olds,

00:56:30 ◼   ► and they like computers instead of iPads.

00:56:33 ◼   ► And the fact is, it's true,

00:56:35 ◼   ► teachers are older than students, right?

00:56:37 ◼   ► And people who are older are more likely

00:56:40 ◼   ► to be comfortable with personal computers

00:56:42 ◼   ► than they are with iPads and with a touch interface.

00:56:45 ◼   ► And I've seen it in my kids' schools that,

00:56:47 ◼   ► in my son's middle school, they've got iPad one-to-one

00:56:50 ◼   ► and the teachers have laptops,

00:56:52 ◼   ► they have Mac laptops on their desks

00:56:54 ◼   ► and they're comfortable with the laptops.

00:56:56 ◼   ► So this is smart because this shows

00:56:58 ◼   ► that they're hearing the feedback

00:57:01 ◼   ► that teachers would like this on the Mac.

00:57:05 ◼   ► But it is a little intriguing, I will admit,

00:57:07 ◼   ► that an iOS app being brought back to the Mac,

00:57:10 ◼   ► what's happening there?

00:57:11 ◼   ► How is that happening?

00:57:12 ◼   ► But it's not as if, like you could argue that iWork

00:57:16 ◼   ► and iMovie in their latest Mac iterations are the same

00:57:21 ◼   ► in a way where they re-architected those programs

00:57:25 ◼   ► and basically rewrote them so that they would work

00:57:27 ◼   ► across iOS and Mac OS,

00:57:30 ◼   ► and that they were doing some of that work.

00:57:32 ◼   ► So it's not unprecedented,

00:57:33 ◼   ► but it is worth a thinking face emoji.

00:57:36 ◼   ► - I have more real-time follow-up from Steven.

00:57:39 ◼   ► Pages-- - Does he wanna be on the show?

00:57:41 ◼   ► Should we just dial him in here?

00:57:43 ◼   ► We've just got so much to say. - Pages does not open

00:57:44 ◼   ► any existing iBooks author files,

00:57:47 ◼   ► and you cannot export from Pages

00:57:49 ◼   ► to the iBooks author format.

00:57:51 ◼   ► You can only export to EPUB,

00:57:53 ◼   ► but I believe it is to a newer version of EPUB,

00:57:55 ◼   ► which allows for a lot of these digital things in it.

00:57:58 ◼   ► - So this may be the ultimate,

00:58:00 ◼   ► like the deprecation of iBooks author as a concept,

00:58:04 ◼   ► and instead just kind of getting on

00:58:06 ◼   ► the more elaborate EPUB train,

00:58:09 ◼   ► which is the right thing to do.

00:58:10 ◼   ► - I think it's EPUB caught up, right?

00:58:11 ◼   ► It kind of seemed a bit pointless for Apple

00:58:13 ◼   ► to maintain their own file format,

00:58:15 ◼   ► but I bet that that's gonna take away

00:58:18 ◼   ► all of those weird restrictions

00:58:20 ◼   ► about not being able to sell an iBooks

00:58:22 ◼   ► author file outside of iBooks, right?

00:58:26 ◼   ► So now people could make these files in pages

00:58:29 ◼   ► and in theory sell them because they're not locked down

00:58:33 ◼   ► to Apple's file format and potentially,

00:58:35 ◼   ► I mean I haven't looked to what the legal say,

00:58:37 ◼   ► but it may change the situation a little bit.

00:58:39 ◼   ► So I could-- - I don't know,

00:58:40 ◼   ► I mean in the vast array of non-Apple EPUB eBooks,

00:58:45 ◼   ► readers and stores that are out there,

00:58:47 ◼   ► I mean there's not, that's the thing,

00:58:50 ◼   ► is great but kind of irrelevant

00:58:54 ◼   ► 'cause the big book juggernaut here is Amazon,

00:58:59 ◼   ► which doesn't even support EPUB.

00:59:01 ◼   ► - Yeah, for sure.

00:59:03 ◼   ► There was a new app announced,

00:59:04 ◼   ► which is an iOS app and a cloud service called Schoolwork.

00:59:07 ◼   ► What is Schoolwork?

00:59:08 ◼   ► - Schoolwork is,

00:59:12 ◼   ► it's kind of like an aspect of Google Classroom.

00:59:15 ◼   ► It's like lets teachers manage,

00:59:19 ◼   ► What is it?

00:59:20 ◼   ► They let teachers manage--

00:59:21 ◼   ► - It's like handouts and homework and stuff.

00:59:23 ◼   ► - Handouts and homework and track progress and also apps.

00:59:27 ◼   ► - Yeah, you can assign specific things in applications,

00:59:30 ◼   ► right, like this week you have to do this

00:59:31 ◼   ► and it's from a third party app.

00:59:33 ◼   ► - And it uses the new class kit framework.

00:59:35 ◼   ► So you have the ability to say,

00:59:37 ◼   ► you know, do this segment of this app,

00:59:39 ◼   ► this coursework, and then it'll actually send back data

00:59:44 ◼   ► of the student's progress, which the teacher gets to look at

00:59:48 ◼   ► and say they completed it, they're halfway through it,

00:59:50 ◼   ► whatever, they did this well on it,

00:59:52 ◼   ► they did this poorly on it.

00:59:53 ◼   ► So it's more tools for teachers to communicate with students

00:59:57 ◼   ► in Apple's administered environment,

01:00:00 ◼   ► which is one of the places where Apple is really fighting

01:00:02 ◼   ► against Google because Google Classroom stuff

01:00:04 ◼   ► is available on iOS.

01:00:06 ◼   ► And like I said, my son's iPad one-to-one program

01:00:10 ◼   ► at the middle school uses Google Classroom to administer it.

01:00:14 ◼   ► And that's a challenge for Apple

01:00:17 ◼   ► because Apple would like to control that and not have Google control that.

01:00:22 ◼   ► The last piece of Apple's puzzle is providing resources to teachers. They do this and they

01:00:30 ◼   ► highlight something called Apple Teacher, which is not a new thing, but it is an online

01:00:34 ◼   ► learning suite of tools to help teachers understand how they can integrate apps and devices and

01:00:41 ◼   ► services into their classes, into their classwork.

01:00:45 ◼   ► But Apple also creates curriculum and they have a new curriculum set called Everyone

01:00:50 ◼   ► Can Create, which focuses on music, photography, video and drawing and has a bunch of

01:00:55 ◼   ► like lesson plans and stuff like that that teachers can use for creating new, I don't

01:01:04 ◼   ► know, classes. I don't know.

01:01:06 ◼   ► I don't really know how to describe it, but you may probably know better than me.

01:01:10 ◼   ► - Yeah, I think for the company that's at the intersection

01:01:15 ◼   ► of technology and the liberal arts,

01:01:18 ◼   ► doing everyone can create alongside everyone can code

01:01:22 ◼   ► is a nice idea because it's the other,

01:01:25 ◼   ► I don't know whether it's the other half of the brain,

01:01:27 ◼   ► but it is a different set of things

01:01:29 ◼   ► that are great for education, music and art

01:01:33 ◼   ► and stuff like that, that they're doing

01:01:35 ◼   ► with that curriculum.

01:01:36 ◼   ► So it's not just Apple would like a new generation

01:01:39 ◼   ► of app developers to develop for its platform, thank you very much. Yes, also perhaps you

01:01:45 ◼   ► could be learning about music and drawing and painting and stuff like that. Video making.

01:01:54 ◼   ► So basically everything that we've spoken about, the hardware, basically all of the

01:02:00 ◼   ► software, all of the videos that you saw, all of the slides, very heavily focused on

01:02:06 ◼   ► the iPad and on iOS. Before the event you tweeted, and I will read this tweet to our

01:02:13 ◼   ► audience here, "As an iPad fan, I am always hoping for iPad news and I think we'll get

01:02:17 ◼   ► some, but I do hope the Mac gets a little time too. If it doesn't, I think that will

01:02:21 ◼   ► be telling about the Mac's place in the Apple landscape."

01:02:26 ◼   ► My feeling was that when you wrote that you were at least a little bit hopeful that you

01:02:30 ◼   ► were going to see some Mac stuff and there kind of wasn't really anything. What does

01:02:35 ◼   ► - What does that tell you?

01:02:36 ◼   ► - I can tell you the two places

01:02:38 ◼   ► where the Mac really played in this presentation.

01:02:40 ◼   ► One is, they had a picture of a Mac

01:02:43 ◼   ► and announced, "Oh, and now you can do this on iOS."

01:02:49 ◼   ► And the Mac swiped away to be replaced by an iPad.

01:02:52 ◼   ► And I thought, okay.

01:02:54 ◼   ► 'Cause the Mac was up there and I was like,

01:02:56 ◼   ► "Ooh, look, they're using a Mac as an explanation of,

01:02:58 ◼   ► oh no, get that thing out,

01:03:00 ◼   ► get that smelly thing out of here."

01:03:02 ◼   ► And the other one was what I said earlier,

01:03:04 ◼   ► which is, yeah, we're bringing this app from iOS to the Mac

01:03:07 ◼   ► 'cause teachers are old people who use computers

01:03:09 ◼   ► instead of iPads and fine teachers, fine, you're fossils,

01:03:14 ◼   ► you're old, but yeah, we'll give it to you on the Mac.

01:03:16 ◼   ► And those were the two places that the Mac appeared in this.

01:03:19 ◼   ► So I think that says, like I said,

01:03:21 ◼   ► I think that tells you what Apple feels

01:03:24 ◼   ► the Mac's place is in education,

01:03:26 ◼   ► which is it's not their area of emphasis,

01:03:29 ◼   ► especially in K through 12,

01:03:31 ◼   ► which is really what this was about, not higher ed.

01:03:33 ◼   ► I think higher ed is a different story entirely.

01:03:36 ◼   ► And that, but they're viewing this as being a place

01:03:38 ◼   ► that's mostly, it's funny also, because I have to say,

01:03:42 ◼   ► in one of the areas where we were doing after the event,

01:03:45 ◼   ► where we were doing these, you know, hands on and demo areas,

01:03:49 ◼   ► one of those rooms on the second level,

01:03:52 ◼   ► it had like a little kind of mezzanine

01:03:53 ◼   ► above the main lab area.

01:03:56 ◼   ► There were, you know, a couple dozen IMAX all in a row.

01:04:01 ◼   ► And I imagine that they're doing like video editing

01:04:04 ◼   ► or audio stuff up there was in the kind of creative space.

01:04:08 ◼   ► And I sat there and I thought, you know,

01:04:10 ◼   ► well, there are the Macs in this school,

01:04:11 ◼   ► there are lots of them and they're using them,

01:04:14 ◼   ► but not part of this conversation.

01:04:16 ◼   ► So for whatever reason,

01:04:18 ◼   ► and we can come up with lots of reasons,

01:04:20 ◼   ► but like this is, if you're taking the temperature

01:04:22 ◼   ► of what Apple's really pushing in education,

01:04:25 ◼   ► that's the answer is that it's iPad and it's not the Mac.

01:04:29 ◼   ► The Mac is not part of the story.

01:04:30 ◼   ► Macs there and people who want the Mac for various things and for some stuff

01:04:33 ◼   ► like video editing right now at least until you know Final Cut comes to iOS

01:04:38 ◼   ► and Logic comes to iOS you know for now they've got some reasons why you would

01:04:44 ◼   ► still have Macs in school but you get the distinct feeling that once Apple can

01:04:48 ◼   ► get those reasons out and into the iPad they'll do they'll do that too. So that's

01:04:53 ◼   ► it does I think I stand by my statement that it is telling that how exactly how

01:04:59 ◼   ► the Mac played into this, which is almost not at all once for old teachers and once

01:05:05 ◼   ► as a before shot in a before and after.

01:05:08 ◼   ► Like, I'm not trying to lead the witness here, but does this fill you with any negative feelings?

01:05:15 ◼   ► Do you feel any unease or may I even say dread at this?

01:05:20 ◼   ► If you made me choose between would the iPad be all there was or would it be Mac and iPad,

01:05:28 ◼   ► I would probably have chosen iPad would be all there is.

01:05:31 ◼   ► I think it was clear the iPad was going to be the bulk of it

01:05:35 ◼   ► and it was really about like, will the Mac get mentioned?

01:05:38 ◼   ► And the answer is no.

01:05:39 ◼   ► Basically no, it didn't get mentioned.

01:05:43 ◼   ► So it's what I expected.

01:05:46 ◼   ► And I think I love the Mac and I think the Mac has its place

01:05:50 ◼   ► but I totally see why Apple, first off,

01:05:52 ◼   ► the Mac starts at 999 and the iPad starts at 329.

01:05:58 ◼   ► You wanna talk about price,

01:05:59 ◼   ► like the Mac's not even in the conversation.

01:06:02 ◼   ► iPad for this market especially, like that's the product.

01:06:06 ◼   ► That is Apple's lowest cost, straight up,

01:06:10 ◼   ► let's leave phones and subsidies like aside.

01:06:13 ◼   ► Like that is Apple's entry into computing

01:06:15 ◼   ► is the iPad for through 29.

01:06:17 ◼   ► That's it.

01:06:18 ◼   ► The Mac's way up there, forget about the Mac.

01:06:20 ◼   ► And I think that's why the story is what it is.

01:06:23 ◼   ► The Mac still has its uses,

01:06:24 ◼   ► but this is part of that, you know,

01:06:26 ◼   ► truckification of the Mac as for very specific jobs

01:06:31 ◼   ► and very specific plays.

01:06:33 ◼   ► And it's not like it doesn't have its uses.

01:06:35 ◼   ► Like I said, I bought my daughter a MacBook

01:06:38 ◼   ► for her birthday and she's a high school student

01:06:42 ◼   ► and she'll presumably take that MacBook to college.

01:06:44 ◼   ► And I think it's the right decision for a lot of reasons.

01:06:47 ◼   ► But I also understand exactly why my son's school

01:06:50 ◼   ► has iPads for all the students.

01:06:52 ◼   ► and I'm pretty supportive of that.

01:06:54 ◼   ► I think that they have good reasons for doing that.

01:06:58 ◼   ► And if I'm Apple and I'm building a foundation

01:07:00 ◼   ► for a long-term future in education, price aside,

01:07:05 ◼   ► of course, every long-term future decision Apple's making

01:07:09 ◼   ► has to be rooted in iOS and not the Mac

01:07:11 ◼   ► because it's their newer platform,

01:07:13 ◼   ► it's their more popular platform,

01:07:15 ◼   ► and it's the one that is more positioned

01:07:19 ◼   ► to move forward into the future,

01:07:21 ◼   ► whether it gets new features or it kind of like leads the way into a, you know,

01:07:26 ◼   ► a new Apple platform down the road. So it all makes sense to me. It's,

01:07:29 ◼   ► am I a little wistful about it? You know,

01:07:32 ◼   ► I think I'm over that too just because like I said,

01:07:35 ◼   ► when you can get a Mac book air that's old tech for nine 99 or you can get a

01:07:39 ◼   ► brand new iPad for three 29 that I'll grant you is not the latest and greatest

01:07:43 ◼   ► processor, but it's way more latest and greatest than the Mac book air is. Um,

01:07:48 ◼   ► I think the writing's on the wall there.

01:07:50 ◼   ► I'm just going to say, like, at this point, I do not believe we're going to see that cheap

01:07:54 ◼   ► current MacBook Air. I don't think that's going to happen. I feel like if it wasn't

01:07:57 ◼   ► happening today, it's not happening. I think what we will see is a cheaper current version

01:08:02 ◼   ► of the Retina MacBook as the next product in that line.

01:08:06 ◼   ► Given Mark Gurman's report and the fact that it didn't get mentioned or announced today,

01:08:10 ◼   ► even in a press release, it makes me think that the report of a cheaper MacBook is a

01:08:16 ◼   ► weird misunderstanding of what German's reporting,

01:08:19 ◼   ► of a cheaper MacBook Air,

01:08:21 ◼   ► is it's a misunderstanding of what German's reporting,

01:08:24 ◼   ► the fact that there's gonna be a cheaper MacBook,

01:08:26 ◼   ► that Apple's gonna try to take the MacBook

01:08:28 ◼   ► and push it down in price

01:08:29 ◼   ► so that they can replace the MacBook Air.

01:08:32 ◼   ► And they may not push it down to 999,

01:08:34 ◼   ► they might push it down to 1099 or 1199,

01:08:37 ◼   ► but it would still be down,

01:08:38 ◼   ► and they may keep the MacBook Air around for a little while,

01:08:41 ◼   ► but yes, I'm with you,

01:08:43 ◼   ► I think this makes that story seem less likely,

01:08:46 ◼   ► because why wouldn't they have done it if the whole reason that product exists is to

01:08:50 ◼   ► reach people in education and other places that just are not going to spend more than

01:08:55 ◼   ► a thousand dollars on a computer, then they would have talked about it today.

01:09:01 ◼   ► Like with all big events, we have lots of questions from the Upgradians, so we should

01:09:07 ◼   ► move to #askupgrade.

01:09:10 ◼   ► But before we do, let me thank our final sponsor for this week, and that is Mack Weldon, who

01:09:15 ◼   ► make the most comfortable underwear, socks, shirts, undershirts, hoodies and sweatpants

01:09:20 ◼   ► that you are ever going to wear. MacWilden is better than whatever you're wearing right

01:09:24 ◼   ► now and they are so confident of this, they have a no questions asked return policy. Whatever

01:09:28 ◼   ► you buy at MacWilden is going to be amazing because they use premium fabrics, use premium

01:09:33 ◼   ► cotton with natural fibres, they make stuff, they make their undershirts that stay tucked

01:09:37 ◼   ► in, they make their stocks that stay rolled up and their waistbands that don't roll down.

01:09:42 ◼   ► They are so confident of all of this amazing stuff that they are going to be able to send

01:09:46 ◼   ► you that if you are not amazingly comfortable in whatever you buy for any reason, if you

01:09:51 ◼   ► don't like it, just send it back to them and they will refund you, no questions asked.

01:09:56 ◼   ► This is because Mack Wilder know that they are making great stuff.

01:09:59 ◼   ► They have a line of silver underwear and shirts that are naturally anti-microbial which means

01:10:03 ◼   ► that they eliminate odour which is some really cool science stuff.

01:10:06 ◼   ► But you can take it from me as over time I have slowly replaced all of my underwear and

01:10:12 ◼   ► all of my flying attire, and also all of my gym wear as well with Macworld and stuff.

01:10:23 ◼   ► And I have been doing this with my own money. This isn't just because they're sending it

01:10:26 ◼   ► to me. Every time I come out to the States, I buy like a big package of Macworld and stuff

01:10:31 ◼   ► and get it sent to me because I really genuinely find this stuff to be extremely comfortable

01:10:36 ◼   ► and my favourite stuff to wear.

01:10:39 ◼   ► as

01:10:55 ◼   ► C K W E L D O N dot com. Just use the code upgrade and you will get that 20% off. Our

01:11:01 ◼   ► thanks to Macworld and for their continued support of this show and Relay FM.

01:11:06 ◼   ► So we move into #AskUpgrade and our first question comes from Victor. Victor asks, "Now that

01:11:12 ◼   ► the base 9.7 inch iPad has pencil support, who is the target audience of the 10.5 inch

01:11:17 ◼   ► iPad Pro? It's nearly double the price and almost no significant features above the base

01:11:22 ◼   ► model except the display. Do you think that there are still people in this segment that

01:11:30 ◼   ► this product is targeted at before there's an update? Do you think that there are people

01:11:35 ◼   ► that this product is really made for? Do you think it's keyboard people? Do you think it's

01:11:38 ◼   ► people who just want the latest and greatest and best? Or do you think that basically everybody

01:11:43 ◼   ► could be served by this 9.7 now?

01:11:45 ◼   ► Yeah, it's bigger screen smaller bezels. It's faster. It's thinner

01:11:49 ◼   ► It's got the keyboard support. It's got the display and it hasn't even had its update this year

01:11:57 ◼   ► So that's my answer. I agree with you

01:12:01 ◼   ► I think that like, you know, I understand why people are like it's double the price but really like you are thinking of the iPad

01:12:08 ◼   ► Pro is just only having a pencil like that's kind of like if that's the way that you look at it

01:12:15 ◼   ► That's like all you think the iPad Pro has,

01:12:17 ◼   ► but it is more than that.

01:12:18 ◼   ► It's all of those things you mentioned, right?

01:12:20 ◼   ► The promotions-- - It goes back

01:12:21 ◼   ► to what we said earlier, which is, you know,

01:12:24 ◼   ► if the only reason you can think for buying an iPad Pro

01:12:27 ◼   ► over this iPad was the pencil, then yeah, sure.

01:12:32 ◼   ► But I don't think that, and I would imagine

01:12:34 ◼   ► that it's a fairly small group of people.

01:12:37 ◼   ► I will grant that this brings it closer,

01:12:39 ◼   ► but keep in mind, this is now the 2018 iPad

01:12:43 ◼   ► and the 2017 iPad Pro.

01:12:46 ◼   ► And what's gonna happen later this year,

01:12:48 ◼   ► maybe in June, maybe in September, maybe in October,

01:12:51 ◼   ► is those iPad Pros are gonna get updated.

01:12:54 ◼   ► They're gonna get Face ID probably.

01:12:55 ◼   ► They're gonna lose the bezel even more.

01:12:57 ◼   ► They're gonna get the latest and greatest processor.

01:13:00 ◼   ► They're gonna have other whizzy new features.

01:13:03 ◼   ► So they've gotten a little closer today.

01:13:07 ◼   ► They're gonna spread back apart.

01:13:09 ◼   ► And that is the way it works.

01:13:12 ◼   ► So, Stae asked, "Today's event seemed pretty heavy on the creative side.

01:13:18 ◼   ► Were there any updates or hints of updates to apps like GarageBand, iMovie, or other

01:13:23 ◼   ► consumer-level creative apps other than iWork?"

01:13:26 ◼   ► There's a GarageBand update that's got like education wacky stuff, wacky sound packs

01:13:35 ◼   ► and stuff like that in there.

01:13:37 ◼   ► There was a clips update.

01:13:38 ◼   ► And there's a clips update too, yeah.

01:13:40 ◼   ► But I did want to note that something that wasn't mentioned on stage, I don't believe,

01:13:45 ◼   ► or I didn't see it until the release notes. GarageBand on the iPhone 10 uses the TrueDepth

01:13:51 ◼   ► camera to allow you to control instrument effects with your facial expressions. Like

01:13:58 ◼   ► synth parameters and wah pedals and stuff like that. You can make a face and make, like

01:14:05 ◼   ► if you open your mouth, like with a step tap thing.

01:14:08 ◼   ► Sir Alex has doubled over with laughter in the booth at this point.

01:14:12 ◼   ► Alex, what is your opinion of these TrueDepth instrument effects? Are you on board with

01:14:19 ◼   ► this idea? I mean, I'm sure that I'm going to have a

01:14:21 ◼   ► lot of fun with it for about 15 minutes. It's going to be great with Animoji and similarly

01:14:28 ◼   ► used probably. Hey, try stuff out. See what happens. Maybe that's great. You're DJing,

01:14:34 ◼   ► you're playing stuff and then you stub your toe and you grimace and it's like, "Oh, that

01:14:37 ◼   ► was a pretty good sound. And then that makes you smile and then the sound goes away because

01:14:41 ◼   ► you're not grimacing anymore, you're smiling. Just imagine the possibilities there.

01:14:44 ◼   ► The better your music is, the better it will sound, right? If you're happy with how your

01:14:48 ◼   ► music's sounding, then it's going to sound better. I think that's what they're trying

01:14:51 ◼   ► to do. All right, so basically I'm going to have

01:14:54 ◼   ► a GarageBand project and I'll be like, "Okay, I've got to smile while I'm exporting this

01:14:57 ◼   ► or it'll sound bad." So going back to the new iPad, Matthias asked,

01:15:02 ◼   ► Does the iPad, the new iPad, have the laminated screen from the iPad Pros, or is there like

01:15:08 ◼   ► that gap like there is on the previous iPad?

01:15:12 ◼   ► I think it is like on the previous iPad.

01:15:15 ◼   ► I think that's the deal.

01:15:17 ◼   ► Yeah, the tech specs do not say fully laminated display as it does on some of the other products,

01:15:25 ◼   ► including, which is hilarious to me, the iPad Mini has it, but the 9.7" iPad Pro has it,

01:15:32 ◼   ► - Does not.

01:15:34 ◼   ► - So iPad Mini is still a product.

01:15:36 ◼   ► - Still a product.

01:15:37 ◼   ► - In Apple's product line.

01:15:38 ◼   ► - Still more expensive, it's still there,

01:15:39 ◼   ► still kind of doing whatever it is it's doing.

01:15:42 ◼   ► - Whatever that is.

01:15:43 ◼   ► Did they make too many of those

01:15:44 ◼   ► and they've got them sitting in a factory somewhere?

01:15:46 ◼   ► - Most definitely did they.

01:15:48 ◼   ► Woo, boy howdy.

01:15:50 ◼   ► Lee wants to know if we have any more information

01:15:53 ◼   ► on the Logitech Crayon.

01:15:54 ◼   ► And I have some information here, Jason.

01:15:57 ◼   ► - I don't because I went to the event

01:15:59 ◼   ► and didn't get that information.

01:16:01 ◼   ► - You just didn't bother to look for it

01:16:02 ◼   ► 'cause you probably weren't that excited about it.

01:16:04 ◼   ► - Yeah, that's also probably true.

01:16:05 ◼   ► I was intrigued.

01:16:06 ◼   ► The question for me, so you can tell me this.

01:16:09 ◼   ► The question for me is, does it use some secret sauce

01:16:13 ◼   ► that the Apple Pencil uses,

01:16:15 ◼   ► or is it just yet another Bluetooth stylus?

01:16:17 ◼   ► - Yes and no.

01:16:19 ◼   ► So the Logitech Crayon is a $49 education only stylus,

01:16:24 ◼   ► but it uses the same technology as the Apple Pencil.

01:16:30 ◼   ► So it has the same latency, you can tilt and it will make the lines grow thicker and thinner,

01:16:36 ◼   ► but it has no pressure sensitivity.

01:16:39 ◼   ► So that's the thing that it lacks.

01:16:40 ◼   ► It has basically all of the technology that the Apple Pencil has, but no pressure sensitivity.

01:16:46 ◼   ► It connects directly to the iPad via a single frequency, it's not Bluetooth, I don't really

01:16:52 ◼   ► know what that actually means, but fine.

01:16:56 ◼   ► It has eight hours of battery, but with a lightning plug in.

01:16:59 ◼   ► It doesn't have a lightning port built into it, you plug a lightning cable into it.

01:17:05 ◼   ► So that's very different.

01:17:06 ◼   ► It's available this summer, sold directly to educators for $49.

01:17:10 ◼   ► So it is, it has a lot of what the Apple Pencil has, it doesn't have everything which is why

01:17:16 ◼   ► it's cheaper.

01:17:18 ◼   ► It does have a little LED status light so you know when it's connected and it blinks

01:17:21 ◼   ► red when the battery's running low.

01:17:24 ◼   ► So it has some additional things, it's a lot cheaper, it doesn't have all of the features,

01:17:29 ◼   ► But it has the most important features, in my opinion, which is the low latency and the

01:17:34 ◼   ► tilt sensitivity of the Apple Pencil, with, I'm assuming, easy connection as well.

01:17:40 ◼   ► So yeah, I think that's really cool.

01:17:42 ◼   ► I like that this product exists.

01:17:43 ◼   ► I really like that Apple works with Logitech on these features for education.

01:17:49 ◼   ► I think it's great.

01:17:50 ◼   ► Like, let Logitech make stuff if Apple don't want to make it.

01:17:54 ◼   ► Brian wants to know, can the shared iPad functionality in schools be used without using education

01:18:01 ◼   ► tools? What is the shared iPad functionality?

01:18:03 ◼   ► >> You imagine you get an iPad and it's got a picture of various users on it and you tap

01:18:09 ◼   ► on one and it loads that user's documents and it's their iPad and then they can basically

01:18:14 ◼   ► log out.

01:18:15 ◼   ► >> And this is existed for a while, right?

01:18:16 ◼   ► >> Two years, I think.

01:18:17 ◼   ► >> It's like 10-3?

01:18:18 ◼   ► >> Yeah.

01:18:19 ◼   ► >> Okay.

01:18:20 ◼   ► >> And the answer is no, it's an education-only feature.

01:18:21 ◼   ► >> Great.

01:18:22 ◼   ► >> And our last question today comes from Michael.

01:18:24 ◼   ► Michael simply asks, are you underwhelmed,

01:18:26 ◼   ► whelmed or overwhelmed at today's event?

01:18:29 ◼   ► - I think whelmed, you said it before

01:18:34 ◼   ► and I think that is about right.

01:18:35 ◼   ► This was a focused Apple event to launch a new iPad

01:18:40 ◼   ► at the low end and some stuff around it

01:18:45 ◼   ► and tell about its education strategy.

01:18:48 ◼   ► And it pretty much delivered that and only that.

01:18:52 ◼   ► So whelmed, I would say is about right.

01:18:55 ◼   ► - It met my basic expectations

01:18:57 ◼   ► for what an acceptable event could be today, really.

01:18:59 ◼   ► Like it did that, it ticked those boxes.

01:19:02 ◼   ► - And no more, but no less.

01:19:04 ◼   ► - Producer Alex, are you underwhelmed,

01:19:06 ◼   ► whelmed or overwhelmed?

01:19:07 ◼   ► - I'd say I agree, I am whelmed.

01:19:12 ◼   ► You know, I'm actually really disappointed about one thing

01:19:16 ◼   ► and I'm gonna say if you wanna leave this in

01:19:20 ◼   ► and you are, if there are any upgrade-ians

01:19:23 ◼   ► who work in the education market,

01:19:25 ◼   ► and I could possibly pay you to get a few

01:19:28 ◼   ► of those Logitech crayons, @AlexCoxx on Twitter.

01:19:32 ◼   ► All right, goodbye.

01:19:33 ◼   ► - There you go, @AlexCoxx on Twitter.

01:19:34 ◼   ► Alex really wants some Logitech crayons.

01:19:37 ◼   ► If someone can hook her up with that,

01:19:39 ◼   ► we would appreciate it. - Black market crayons.

01:19:42 ◼   ► - It's orange and it tells you when it's dying.

01:19:45 ◼   ► It's perfect.

01:19:46 ◼   ► - I am really keen to try one of those out personally,

01:19:49 ◼   ► just like to see what it's like.

01:19:51 ◼   ► - But it's also not coming out until like June, right?

01:19:55 ◼   ► - June, yep.

01:19:56 ◼   ► - Yeah.

01:19:56 ◼   ► - I did see something, like a few people,

01:19:58 ◼   ► so I think it's pretty funny.

01:20:00 ◼   ► Like so many of these features are coming out June,

01:20:02 ◼   ► like in June, like three months before the school year ends.

01:20:04 ◼   ► Like it's like, okay.

01:20:05 ◼   ► - Well, I mean, that's the point is that

01:20:08 ◼   ► it's not for the school year,

01:20:10 ◼   ► it's for the buying for next school year.

01:20:12 ◼   ► The buying cycle for the school starts

01:20:13 ◼   ► at the end of the previous school year,

01:20:16 ◼   ► because they're planning for the summer

01:20:18 ◼   ► to roll things out and have them in the schools for the fall.

01:20:21 ◼   ► So this is actually a good time for something like this.

01:20:24 ◼   ► - So that is it for this week's episode.

01:20:27 ◼   ► Jason, congratulations on your draft victory.

01:20:31 ◼   ► - Oh, thank you, thank you.

01:20:32 ◼   ► I'd forgotten all about that, but thank you for reminding me.

01:20:34 ◼   ► Yes, it was not my best effort,

01:20:37 ◼   ► but we did just enough to win.

01:20:38 ◼   ► - I want to extend our thanks to Alex Cox

01:20:43 ◼   ► for being the producer of this episode

01:20:45 ◼   ► and also providing Jason with an incredible environment in which he could record this

01:20:50 ◼   ► episode. Thank you, Alex.

01:20:51 ◼   ► Of course, always.

01:20:53 ◼   ► You can find Alex at DubaiFriday.com and at Relay.fm/Roboism.

01:20:58 ◼   ► They are two of Alex's wonderful podcasts that you should go and listen to both of them

01:21:02 ◼   ► because they're both great in equal ways, but different ways.

01:21:06 ◼   ► And I love both of those shows dearly.

01:21:07 ◼   ► So you should go and check those out.

01:21:08 ◼   ► And Alex is Alex Cox, A-L-E-X-C-O-X on Twitter.

01:21:13 ◼   ► if you need to get her some of those crayons that she so desperately needs. I think Alex

01:21:19 ◼   ► is willing to do a bulk purchase order requisition, if that's something that you need for your

01:21:25 ◼   ► school. I believe that she's willing to take a thousand, was what I heard of those, right?

01:21:29 ◼   ► About that amount, yeah.

01:21:30 ◼   ► Okay, about a thousand. You could just back up a truck to her apartment and she'll just

01:21:35 ◼   ► scoop them all in. If you want to find our show notes for today's episode, you can go

01:21:39 ◼   ► to relay.fm/upgrades/186. Don't forget that Relay FM is going to be doing a live show

01:21:46 ◼   ► at AUGQH-CONF on June the 6th as part of WWDC. You can go to augqh-conf.com to get tickets

01:21:53 ◼   ► right now. These are selling out pretty quickly. I know that a lot of people will now know

01:21:59 ◼   ► they're going to be in WWDC because the lottery winners and results have been announced. It's

01:22:06 ◼   ► It's so hilarious and winners of the ability to pay $1500 to go to a conference.

01:22:12 ◼   ► But if you are going to be at WWDC and you don't yet have a ticket to our show or to

01:22:17 ◼   ► ATP, you need to go and get one of those because they're selling out and we want to see you

01:22:23 ◼   ► there.

01:22:24 ◼   ► I will be there, Jason will be there, many relay FM hosts will be there to entertain

01:22:28 ◼   ► you for an afternoon and evening.

01:22:31 ◼   ► Jason writes at 6colors.com. I'm sure you'll be able to find a lot more post-event analysis

01:22:37 ◼   ► over at 6colors.com. Jason is also @JSNEL, J-S-N-E-double L on Twitter. I am @IMyke, I-M-Y-K-E.

01:22:44 ◼   ► Thanks again to Anchor, Mac Wilden, and Simple Contacts for their support of this show,

01:22:49 ◼   ► and we'll be back next week. Until then, say goodbye, Jason Snell.

01:22:53 ◼   ► Goodbye, everybody.

01:22:57 ◼   ► [ Music ]

01:23:03 ◼   ► [ Silence ]