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Upgrade

125: A Bear Did it For Me

 

00:00:00   [Music]

00:00:08   From Real AFM, this is Upgrade episode 125.

00:00:12   Today's show is brought to you by Encapsula, Smile, and Squarespace.

00:00:16   My name is Myke Hurley.

00:00:17   I am joined by Mr. Jason Snell.

00:00:20   Good morning, Mr. Hurley.

00:00:21   Good morning, Jason Snell.

00:00:22   How are you today?

00:00:23   Hello to everybody out there in podcast land where it may be night, morning, daytime.

00:00:28   The dead of night, I don't know.

00:00:29   - It could be anything. - I'm doing well.

00:00:31   For us, it's Monday.

00:00:32   And for me, it's Monday morning.

00:00:35   - For me, it's Monday evening,

00:00:36   but for you, it could be anything.

00:00:38   - This is how we start our week.

00:00:39   - So we have some pretty huge follow-outs

00:00:40   to start off this week's show.

00:00:42   - We do.

00:00:43   People don't realize if you were not listening to live

00:00:48   that we actually did about a two plus hour show last week.

00:00:51   And we decided it was too long.

00:00:54   And so we cut the Ask Upgrade segment last week.

00:00:59   But there was a debate about whether we should cut that segment or our discussion of Chris

00:01:03   Lattner leaving Apple. And we decided to keep Chris Lattner's segment because we thought

00:01:11   that that was worth talking about and it was very timely and we could replay some of those

00:01:15   Ask Upgrade questions later. And in it, we really referred to strongly that people should

00:01:22   listen to ATP, episode 204, where they talked in detail about Chris Latner and LLVM and

00:01:29   Swift and what this all, you know, what it all means from a developer perspective. So

00:01:32   we were like, yes, it's very nice of us to refer to ATP. And then like the next day they

00:01:37   dropped their next episode, which includes a complete show wall-to-wall interview with

00:01:44   Chris Latner.

00:01:45   Mm-hmm.

00:01:46   Yeah, as Seth pointed out, they use the weight of their 3P upgradey win to pull in a star

00:01:55   like Chris.

00:01:56   They're an award-winning podcast.

00:01:58   Free time.

00:01:59   Yeah.

00:02:00   So yeah, it's a really great episode.

00:02:02   If you for any reason have not listened to it, you should.

00:02:05   I will give a disclaimer that it is very, very developer heavy.

00:02:10   Like the show starts off and they were like trying to dumb things down and explain it

00:02:15   it to everyone, but that didn't last very long. And then they got super in the weeds.

00:02:20   But I don't understand what they were talking about. But I really enjoyed listening to it

00:02:24   is it was, you know, it's the idea of like, they're speaking very passionately about things

00:02:27   and every now and then I can kind of grok what they're talking about. But yeah, I really

00:02:31   recommend it. It was a it was a fun episode. As you can imagine, like that there isn't

00:02:35   like a lot of like behind the curtain stuff. But I think you can kind of get an idea from

00:02:41   I'm listening to Chris, like kind of his motivations

00:02:44   for wanting to move on.

00:02:45   Like he clearly sounds like someone

00:02:47   who needs to have new challenges

00:02:49   and this just sounded like a big new challenge.

00:02:52   - But it also is that, you know, he was, yes, he was at Apple

00:02:55   but he's also at working on open source projects, right?

00:02:59   So I kept thinking about, well, you know, wow,

00:03:01   he's going into a lot of detail here,

00:03:03   but as he pointed out himself,

00:03:06   the, a lot of what Apple does on those projects

00:03:10   is wide open, right?

00:03:11   I mean, those are open source projects.

00:03:14   So they're not the super secret part of Apple

00:03:17   that Chris Latner was working on.

00:03:19   And he did, yes, he did very carefully steer around

00:03:21   a couple of, I think, levels of detail

00:03:24   that would have been inappropriate.

00:03:27   Also taking full advantage of the fact

00:03:30   that he currently has no employer.

00:03:32   It's like the perfect time to do something like this.

00:03:34   Sort of he's decloaked, he's about to re-cloak again,

00:03:37   but here he is.

00:03:38   And again, though, the cloak isn't the same

00:03:40   because it's open source stuff.

00:03:42   So that's the beauty of these open source projects

00:03:45   is that they are done out in the open

00:03:47   and you can communicate about them.

00:03:49   And a lot of conversation goes on about these.

00:03:51   I mean, John Syracuse has been on that Swift mailing list

00:03:54   since the beginning.

00:03:55   And so he was able to say, you know,

00:03:57   people argue about this and what do you think about that

00:03:59   and all that because that conversation's happening

00:04:02   out in the open.

00:04:03   - Yeah, Latner was in like a weird position,

00:04:05   like a unique position at Apple anyway, right?

00:04:09   But yeah, it was a surprise to hear him on the show

00:04:11   because even then it's like, oh, wow.

00:04:13   He's like in between these two jobs

00:04:15   and they probably both don't want him talking about too much

00:04:17   but like Uppy Pops.

00:04:19   It was a great episode.

00:04:20   You go check it out, episode 205 of the Action Intersect

00:04:22   podcast and I have some follow up suggested by a listener,

00:04:25   Michael, which is related to ATP

00:04:29   and their three time upgradey win.

00:04:32   Michael suggests that ATP become the lifetime achievement

00:04:36   award winner of the tech podcast for the upgrade is as it goes forward because they've had

00:04:41   three wins now they could potentially continue winning the award forever so to let other

00:04:46   people maybe try and claim it I think that ATP could become the lifetime achievement

00:04:49   award and you know think if they want to you know they could maybe present the award to

00:04:55   the the later winning tech podcast what do you think of that just like a micro suggestion

00:04:59   yeah I think this is exactly right I had been thinking this myself so I appreciate Michael

00:05:03   suggesting it and I think we'll put ATP in the in the upgradey Hall of Fame the

00:05:09   first entrant into the upgradey Hall of Fame yes and we'll retire it and let

00:05:14   somebody else have a chance at winning next year but this year ended this year

00:05:17   2017 2017 fourth annual this year yeah wow that's correct that's crazy to think

00:05:27   about a bit of follow-up regarding Netflix and Apple TV we spoke about this

00:05:31   this

00:05:50   gives Netflix results now and it will play these results in the TV app as

00:05:55   opposed to jumping you out. I think it maybe gave the results before but you

00:05:58   click them and it will take you to the Netflix app. Now it will play that

00:06:01   content within the TV app so you don't leave it and you're not jumping around

00:06:04   from application to application. However Netflix titles will not appear in the

00:06:09   recommended shows list and you cannot queue up Netflix programming either.

00:06:14   So what this says to me is that like Netflix do not want to be having their

00:06:23   recommendation system like kind of usurped by apples. They believe in

00:06:29   their system and they want their system to remain but I do wonder how they think

00:06:36   this is going to help them if people were leaving their application because

00:06:40   then people are not going to see the recommended content. So this is kind of confusing.

00:06:43   getting the data and I think they're feeling like if you want to get more, you'll go...

00:06:49   It's an interesting decision. I think they must feel like the upside of having this key

00:06:53   app that is... Apple's trying to place at the center of the Apple TV experience that

00:06:59   making their offerings there. So if you're looking for Luke Cage or something, you're

00:07:04   gonna find it and not be frustrated that it's not in the main TV interface. So I think that's

00:07:11   okay. But yeah, from their perspective, what they don't want is people to never use the

00:07:20   Netflix app and never see--because Netflix recommendations are entirely geared toward

00:07:24   watching things on Netflix and promoting their own material, their own originals and all

00:07:29   of that. The TV app, the way Apple has designed it, is to be promoting material across all

00:07:36   of the things you subscribe to. And so that gives you the opportunity to see something

00:07:41   on HBO Go or Hulu instead of, just as examples, instead of Netflix. And if that's the case,

00:07:49   then, you know, this is the trade-off for all of these companies is they want complete

00:07:53   control. And this is the case where Apple ironically is in the state of being, trying

00:07:59   to be the place where everything comes together and synthesizes all the different catalogs,

00:08:05   But everybody else really would rather live in a universe where they're the only competitor.

00:08:12   There is no competitor, right?

00:08:14   Once you're in the Netflix app, they have you, and everything you see is on Netflix.

00:08:19   And hey, that's a great place to be if you can get them there.

00:08:22   I think that the challenge here for any provider like Netflix seems to me to be that if there's

00:08:30   enough critical mass, enough momentum behind the TV app, if it becomes useful enough that

00:08:36   iOS users and Apple TV users really start to see it as the place where they find their

00:08:42   content and watch their TV, then it becomes a problem for Netflix, because then Netflix

00:08:49   is trying to, you know, is not being considered, it's not being shown, and then their promotion

00:08:56   is nonexistent and that's bad for them. But is that really going to happen with the TV

00:09:02   app? I'm kind of skeptical. I mean, they're going to need enough providers who are willing

00:09:07   to take the chance at competing in kind of an open market. And that's the shame of this,

00:09:13   really, is that I mean, frankly, first off, I have this on Mytivo now. Mytivo does this.

00:09:21   TiVo integrates Netflix content, and I can add Netflix shows to my season pass, and they

00:09:29   show up, and it keeps track of what I've watched and what I haven't, and when I choose an episode,

00:09:35   it goes to the Netflix app. Now, what doesn't happen is if I play the next episode, I think

00:09:40   it doesn't keep track of that because it's in the Netflix app and not the TiVo app anymore.

00:09:44   So there's still some complexity here, but I will tell you, it's great. But yeah, if

00:09:49   you're Netflix and you think you're number one and everybody should just live in the

00:09:53   Netflix universe, I could see why you don't want to have to compete with whatever is on

00:09:58   HBO and Hulu and Amazon Video. But, so it's a, it's like I see both sides of this. I think

00:10:03   for consumers, clearly, it's better if everybody's in the TV app, even if we can complain a little

00:10:09   bit about what the TV app's premise is and how it works and all of that. The idea that

00:10:12   all of, all of the internet video that you pay for is in one place and you can manage

00:10:17   it in one place is a good one for users, but I see why Netflix would not like the idea.

00:10:26   And of course Amazon's not there on the Apple TV at all, so yeah.

00:10:30   Yeah, yeah. At this point, do you think that we're gonna see Amazon video? Like, I've

00:10:39   given up hope.

00:10:40   I don't--well, I can't make a prediction because I don't see why it hasn't happened,

00:10:45   There is an iOS app. There is literally no reason why they couldn't do it. They have

00:10:51   the wherewithal to do it. I know it's not as simple as saying, "Well, let's turn this

00:10:54   into an Apple TV app," but they have the will to put it on iOS. So clearly, Amazon Video

00:11:01   wants to be present on iOS because there are so many iPhones out there especially. That's

00:11:05   like their number one reason for doing it. I get it. And there aren't that many Apple

00:11:08   TVs out there, and they make a device that is much better suited to consuming Amazon

00:11:14   video than the Apple TV, which is the Fire TV, right? Which is theirs, and it's totally

00:11:20   built around that, even though Amazon, you know, Netflix is on there, right? It's just

00:11:24   iTunes that isn't on there. So, technically there's no reason for them not to be there,

00:11:30   and in fact you can airplay to an Apple TV, it's just less convenient. So at this point

00:11:35   I don't really know, because it's all about politics. Because I'm on the record on this

00:11:40   show is saying, "I thought that they would be there last year sometime. I thought they

00:11:44   would finally do it." Because in the end, what should matter most to Amazon is having

00:11:51   as many people as possible have access to their content and not selling Fire TV sticks,

00:11:59   right? In the end. But I think you could argue that this is the same thing we were just talking

00:12:04   about, which is Amazon would much rather you have a Fire TV stick where they control all

00:12:10   the recommendations in the UI and can show you their stuff than an Apple TV where you

00:12:16   have to go through Apple's recommendation engine and like go away from it to the Amazon

00:12:22   app and then see it, right? They would much rather you be there. I get that, but at the

00:12:27   same time, I don't know if that's enough reason not to have it on an Apple TV too,

00:12:35   just to get more of your customers watching your stuff.

00:12:39   Yeah, it really feels like you're putting the money into the content, just give it to

00:12:42   people wherever they want it. I feel like Netflix, the company that really understands

00:12:46   that, the Netflix app is built into everything. Yeah, exactly. Netflix knows, Netflix doesn't

00:12:55   have a box. Although I was talking to somebody about this the other week that Roku when it

00:12:59   started was kind of the Netflix box. That was its first iteration was it played Netflix

00:13:05   and it was the and it was kind of the official Netflix player box.

00:13:09   They have the kind of did they have a button or this was it something else that they had

00:13:13   on the Roku remote set a button for a service that maybe went away or something.

00:13:17   Yeah. Oh yeah. The current ones do that. They have they have services that are that are

00:13:20   dead that are on their on their remote controls that of new ones that they're still selling.

00:13:24   The original Netflix, original Roku,

00:13:26   which I guess they would call a Roku one right now

00:13:29   was actually called the Roku Netflix player.

00:13:32   That's what it was called.

00:13:34   It was so, but Netflix basically doesn't have hardware.

00:13:38   They don't care.

00:13:39   They're not trying to sell you hardware.

00:13:40   They just want to be everywhere

00:13:42   because they think Netflix is where you want to be, right?

00:13:45   That's what they believe.

00:13:47   And they're willing to share space with competitors

00:13:50   on the app level,

00:13:51   but not like integrate their recommendations and stuff

00:13:54   into and data into somebody's shared area.

00:13:59   And Amazon has taken a different approach, right?

00:14:03   Because Amazon's making its own hardware.

00:14:04   It's funny, I mean, Apple is the same way,

00:14:07   sort of in the sense that Apple is limiting its services

00:14:09   to its own hardware, which Amazon's not doing,

00:14:12   but that's what Apple's doing.

00:14:13   Apple doesn't want you to be able to watch iTunes movies

00:14:17   from any device but the Apple TV.

00:14:20   and that's just been, you know, that's just the way they've chosen to do it.

00:14:26   Kevin asked why you were so down on Bluetooth in cars that you didn't bother to use it in

00:14:32   Hawaii.

00:14:33   Yeah, this was a good question. The, I'm not down on Bluetooth in cars, I mean, I don't

00:14:41   love Bluetooth in cars, I have a Bluetooth radio in my car that I use to listen to music

00:14:46   podcast when I'm driving my car and it's finicky but it works. Sometimes I have to wait like

00:14:53   20 seconds for it to finally kind of lock on and start playing the audio but it does

00:14:59   work and that's what I use. On a rental car, two reasons, one is it's weird because you

00:15:08   don't know where that car has been, right? It's like who has paired to that car? I don't

00:15:15   know of any stories of things other than the short of people having like address book syncing

00:15:19   and things like that, but the idea that your phone is now connecting to this device, that

00:15:24   makes me feel kind of weird, but honestly the reason I don't even consider pairing to

00:15:29   Bluetooth and rental cars is that I find the car setup experience so strange in different

00:15:36   cars and it's just hard to figure out, it's different in different cars, and then you

00:15:42   end up with this kind of finicky Bluetooth situation anyway. So I should probably consider

00:15:47   doing that, but when I've done that in the past, I've gotten frustrated. Some cars also

00:15:52   you start going to your destination and then, like my wife's driving and I'm there setting

00:15:55   up the technology and all that for us to get, I'm navigating and I'm plugging things in

00:15:59   and getting chargers in and all that, and then I try to pair the Bluetooth and it says,

00:16:05   "Oh no, you can only pair Bluetooth when a car is stopped." That's a frequent one. Because

00:16:11   'Cause they don't want drivers pairing their Bluetooth

00:16:13   while they're driving, which is fine.

00:16:15   Although, I mean, I would question that scenario,

00:16:18   but people are dumb and they do dumb things

00:16:20   like pair Bluetooth when they're driving.

00:16:22   But at that point you're out of luck.

00:16:24   That's happened to me too.

00:16:25   So I don't know.

00:16:26   It's probably a good reminder that I should

00:16:28   at least consider that as an option.

00:16:29   And I might have, if my phone was completely out of battery

00:16:34   and I wanted to, you know, I wanted to still listen to music

00:16:38   I might've, I would have obviously had to use

00:16:40   the lightning port to charge my iPhone and then I might have considered, well, I could

00:16:45   go through Bluetooth but the aux port is way easier, right? You plug it in and it works.

00:16:52   And so that's usually my number one choice.

00:16:54   Okay. I mean, yeah, it's the analog way of doing things. Sometimes a little bit nicer.

00:17:01   And Steven wrote in to say that on his iPhone, using, I assume, mail and the calendar app,

00:17:09   What's up tickets and flights, etc.

00:17:11   On his calendar he doesn't need to use Google Calendar, which is something you mentioned

00:17:13   last week about how Google services put sort of stuff in automatically for you.

00:17:17   So I guess we should have expanded on it a little bit more that yes iCloud can do this.

00:17:22   This was introduced in iOS 9 I believe, where there's some AI smarts happening there where

00:17:28   mail/calendar can recognize some booking receipts and things like that and suggest these things

00:17:35   to go in your calendar.

00:17:36   also suggests names and addresses and phone numbers for contacts. Sometimes you'll get

00:17:42   a call from someone and it will say, "Hey, this could be this person because they recognize

00:17:46   it from your email," which is good stuff. But in my experience, it doesn't recognize

00:17:52   a lot of these. There are some companies that it works with and some that it doesn't that

00:17:56   I've found. British Airways booking information always works, but Virgin Atlantic stuff isn't

00:18:02   recognized. I've found Expedia bookings, sometimes, like if it's flights it will get booked in,

00:18:08   but if it's hotels it doesn't, but then some third party, like some direct hotel bookings,

00:18:14   like when I book my San Francisco hotel, it recognizes that. Basically I've found that

00:18:19   it works but not 100% reliably, and at least from what I've heard from people like you

00:18:24   and from Federico with Google stuff, it seems to always work.

00:18:29   Yeah, one of the challenges here, and this is what we were trying to talk about, is that

00:18:34   Google has access to more data because more data is unencrypted and able to be processed

00:18:38   by Google servers and Apple doesn't do that. So, this, I think one of the questions here

00:18:45   that I have is, I think this is working in mail, where mail is seeing these events in

00:18:52   your mailbox. Yeah, and then it's, when you have the email open, it recommends it at the

00:18:57   the top like above the subject and it's like hey you could add this to a calendar or if

00:19:02   you go to the calendar app and you have those emails in your inbox still it recognizes them

00:19:06   in like a little thing called the calendar inbox which is nice and confusing.

00:19:11   What I don't know is if Apple's doing any processing on mail that's on the iCloud you

00:19:16   know iCloud mail you know mac.com, me.com, iCloud.com email addresses there's a doc we'll

00:19:24   put in the show notes that Apple has that says what's encrypted on Apple servers and

00:19:28   what's not and your mail is not because it's IMAP basically and that means that Apple could

00:19:32   actually be reading your mail and doing what Google does which is read the mail, identify

00:19:38   it as a flight reservation and pop it on your iCloud calendar and maybe they're even doing

00:19:43   that.

00:19:44   I do believe this is happening on device.

00:19:45   Yeah, my guess is that it's doing what everything Apple does is doing which is on the device,

00:19:51   you know, Apple mail knows that it's there and creates an invitation essentially on your

00:19:57   calendar, which is what Google does. But what Google does is on the server it does it. And

00:20:02   that does have the advantage of happening whether you're checking your mail or not.

00:20:07   So one thing I've found of trying to do this, because I like it, because otherwise I'm entering

00:20:11   this stuff manually because I use Apple services for these right now. Like I use iCloud email

00:20:16   I'm

00:20:34   I'm not going to go into the details of the process, but I'm going to go into the

00:20:41   details of the process.

00:20:42   I'm going to go into the details of the process.

00:20:43   I'm going to go into the details of the process.

00:20:44   I'm going to go into the details of the process.

00:20:45   I'm going to go into the details of the process.

00:20:46   I'm going to go into the details of the process.

00:20:47   I'm going to go into the details of the process.

00:20:48   I'm going to go into the details of the process.

00:20:49   I'm going to go into the details of the process.

00:20:50   I'm going to go into the details of the process.

00:20:51   I'm going to go into the details of the process.

00:20:52   I'm going to go into the details of the process.

00:20:53   I'm going to go into the details of the process.

00:20:54   I'm going to go into the details of the process.

00:20:55   having it all happen server-side like Google can provide some a little bit more magic in

00:21:02   the whole process honestly.

00:21:03   Right.

00:21:04   It's just happening without you doing anything explicit.

00:21:06   And our goal is not to sort of say that, "Boy, Apple is dumb and Google is great."

00:21:12   I think the point, the larger point here is one of the issues that happens with these

00:21:17   two strategies is they have to build their stuff differently.

00:21:22   with Google because, and everybody can say, "Well, this is why Google has liabilities,"

00:21:27   right? Because Google knows, its servers know what's on my calendar. They can look at that.

00:21:33   And they can look at what's in my email because I am on Gmail and I have a Google calendar.

00:21:39   But what it gives them is the ability to scan messages as they pop in my inbox, even if

00:21:43   my devices are all off and I am in the woods somewhere, right? It will go, "Oh, that is

00:21:48   a... although how I made the reservation in the woods is a question for later.

00:21:52   But...

00:21:53   The bear did it for me.

00:21:59   The calendar will just get that as a... I think they do it as a meeting invitation.

00:22:03   So you can say no or yes or whatever, but it will pop it in there and say, you know,

00:22:08   this is Southwest Airlines reservations and we'll pop it in there.

00:22:11   Apple doesn't... although Apple does have access if you're using iCloud mail to your

00:22:17   I don't think it's actually doing anything with it, but it at least has access. It doesn't

00:22:21   have access to your calendar data because it's all encrypted because that's Apple's

00:22:24   whole thing, right? And so everything Apple tries to do is device side, and it's just

00:22:29   different and there are challenges with that.

00:22:31   You just choose what your comfort level is really, I think.

00:22:34   Yeah, but I do, it is great and it's great that Apple does have some of that in there

00:22:38   now and it should keep working on that because that is, when we're talking about intelligent

00:22:43   assistance. I mean, this is one of those areas that is such a natural that, you know, your

00:22:48   device or cloud service, depending on how you've set it up, should be smart enough to

00:22:53   start doing things like looking at your mail. And I know people will be like, "I don't want

00:22:57   anybody looking at my mail." It's like, well, yeah, but if it's your device and it's doing

00:23:00   the work for you, that's, to me, an easy trade-off, because that's not even Google's things in

00:23:06   the cloud looking at my stuff. That is my iPhone on my iPhone looking at the stuff that's

00:23:11   on my iPhone, but to have it be able to see what's coming in in mail and realize that

00:23:17   I bought movie tickets or a plane reservation or whatever and knows what to do and puts

00:23:24   it on my calendar so that when I go to my calendar to put it in there, it's already

00:23:28   there, that's pretty great. That's pretty great. That you could theoretically buy a

00:23:32   ticket to a movie, let's say, and not ever look at the email. Maybe the email doesn't

00:23:39   even, well it gets filed or something, but you know, it comes to you but you don't look

00:23:42   at it, and you forget about it, and then on the day you look at your calendar and it says

00:23:47   you've got movie tickets tonight. It should be able to do that, and that's cool. So, Apple

00:23:52   just has to do all that stuff sort of processing on the devices, and there are challenges there

00:23:56   because you've got multiple devices, so which device does the processing, do they all work

00:24:01   the same, do they all check the calendar to see that an event has already been created,

00:24:06   right? There's way more challenges to the way Apple does it, but this is the choice

00:24:10   Apple has made to make it encrypted so that only your devices know about it.

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00:26:15   Upgrade, thank you so much to Smile for their support of this show and RelayFN.

00:26:21   So yesterday evening as we recorded this Samsung held a press conference to finally unveil

00:26:29   and to expose I guess the reasons for their exploding Galaxy Note 7s.

00:26:36   So I'll put a link in the show notes to Recode, Recode has a bigger explanation along with

00:26:40   some diagrams that Samsung published but I'll give you kind of the cliff notes of it.

00:26:44   Samsung had 700 of their own team members testing 200,000 phones and an additional 30,000

00:26:51   batteries on top of that. They also brought in three outside companies to conduct tests

00:26:56   and investigate along with them and Samsung are saying that these findings were validated

00:27:00   by these investigators. As we record, no journalists have been able to get these investigators

00:27:05   to give quotes. Samsung is saying that there were two separate

00:27:14   faults that occurred with the batteries. The first fault in the first batch of phones was

00:27:20   caused by a design flaw in the battery that made electrons prone to bend which in some

00:27:26   cases led to a short circuit. I have condensed that. There is a lot more of a scientific

00:27:31   reason as to why that happened. Basically these batteries weren't designed very well.

00:27:41   was an issue with one of the corners of them and they made them in some instances short

00:27:46   circuit and catch fire. These were the batteries that were involved in the first recall. So

00:27:53   when Samsung said stop using these we're bringing them back. Then there was a second fault.

00:27:59   So then the ones that happened after that, like that one that happened on the plane,

00:28:02   you know the three or four more that happened after they did the recall. These were caused

00:28:07   by a welding defect that also led to short circuiting from a second battery supplier.

00:28:14   Samsung believes that this issue was caused because of the tight timelines they put on

00:28:18   the battery manufacturer due to them needing to replace the recalled devices quickly. Samsung

00:28:23   also said that if they wouldn't have put these tight timelines on, they believed that these

00:28:31   batteries would have been fine and that they would have been able to continue selling this

00:28:36   device.

00:28:37   But that seems like a moot point really.

00:28:42   Samsung stresses that the design for the Note 7 that they created was not the issue but

00:28:49   it was due to the batteries they sourced.

00:28:52   Samsung now has an 8 step battery testing process that has been beefed up in the wake

00:28:57   of this.

00:28:58   I saw a tweet from somebody who was retweeted a couple of times by some journalists that I follow

00:29:02   by someone by the name of Avi Greengart who kind of summed it up quite nicely.

00:29:06   So is Samsung the unluckiest OEM ever or is there something in its process that pushed multiple

00:29:13   suppliers to deliver flawed components? I think this perfectly sums things up.

00:29:18   When I read this, I mean I've been I was seeing some skepticism online about this report.

00:29:24   I believe that Samsung are being truthful with their findings.

00:29:28   I don't think they're trying to cover anything up at this point.

00:29:31   I think that would be a really stupid idea, right, to like have found something out that

00:29:36   they're not talking about.

00:29:38   But I do feel like there is an underlying cause to these issues that an eight-step battery

00:29:44   testing process will solve, but at the wrong end.

00:29:48   Yeah, yeah, that's the, it's great that Samsung did all of this disclosure, but I think what

00:29:56   has made some people uneasy is the fact that what they said is, "Great news everybody,

00:30:06   it turns out it's the battery's fault, and the first battery, there was this mistake

00:30:11   that caused it to do this, and the second battery, there was this mistake that caused

00:30:15   it to do this, but it was totally the battery's fault and not us. Which may be true, but everybody

00:30:22   kind of looks at that and says, "Well, boy, that's really unlucky, right, that you had

00:30:29   this problem both times." Now, I think Samsung admitted that the second one, right, like

00:30:35   you said, the second one, the reason that it failed is that they tried to ramp up production

00:30:42   dramatically in order to get back, get the Galaxy Note 7 back in action. And so it's

00:30:49   not so much of a coincidence. It's actually, it was a result of rushing to try and solve

00:30:54   the problem that caused the second problem.

00:30:56   Yeah, Samsung Electronics in America said basically that if they would have had more

00:31:01   time, you know, like if they wouldn't have rushed, if they would have always gone with

00:31:05   battery supplier B, they feel that the Note 7 wouldn't have had this problem.

00:31:11   Well I mean it's an easy thing to say because they were still blowing up but like I get

00:31:16   the point which is like they believe that these batteries were good and would have been

00:31:20   good but they rushed the production of them and basically like there was just some abnormalities

00:31:27   in them some of them didn't have correct insulation tape in them like they were they were really

00:31:33   really rushed and there was a welding issue in them.

00:31:36   Which is which is it's weird because I mean I don't think Samsung I didn't see the press

00:31:40   conference. I don't think what Samsung is saying here is it's totally not our fault,

00:31:45   but it is somebody's fault, right, that these batteries, after there had been a battery

00:31:53   problem, new batteries were rushed into manufacturing and they were rushed so quickly that they

00:32:01   had manufacturing defects, multiple kinds of manufacturing defects that caused some

00:32:07   percentage of them to fail. What struck me, I think the larger issue here is about trust,

00:32:14   right? Because the Galaxy Note 7, it's over, right? It's done. It's done. It's all over,

00:32:20   but the announcements at airports, those continue, but it's done. The problem is what comes next?

00:32:27   What happens with the Galaxy Note 8? They say they're going to, you know, keep on keeping

00:32:31   on. They're not getting rid of the name. They're just going to do Galaxy Note 8. And I was

00:32:35   struck by a reaction, there was a piece in the Wall Street Journal by Jeffrey Fowler

00:32:40   and Joanna Stern about this, and what they said was, "Its explanation sometimes left

00:32:48   us scratching our heads. We don't have a clear sense on whether these tests will raise the

00:32:53   bar for safety or just catch Samsung up to other smartphone makers. What Samsung is still

00:32:59   missing is its Tylenol moment," and that's a reference to the Tylenol cyanide poisoning

00:33:05   incident in the 80s and what happened is Johnson & Johnson changed pill packaging, made sealed

00:33:13   pill containers, and basically create through kind of marketing and product design some

00:33:21   reassurance that this product was going to be safe. What's the equivalent of that for

00:33:27   Samsung? I don't know, but what strikes me about that is that this is Samsung coming

00:33:33   clean saying we got all figured out and then when two fairly tech savvy people, right,

00:33:37   I mean, when Joanna Stern who is as tech savvy as they come says, "I kind of give them a

00:33:41   grade of a C on this." It's like, you know what that's about? That's about not trusting

00:33:46   Samsung, about looking at their explanations and looking at what led to the decisions that

00:33:51   led to both of these failures, especially the second one honestly where they rushed

00:33:56   basically like, "Let's make more batteries as fast as we can and not be as concerned

00:34:01   about if they fail, which caused them to fail again. And extend that to consumers, right?

00:34:07   I think that is the number one challenge for Samsung right now, is how do you communicate

00:34:12   to people that you have addressed this? And if all they do is come out with a Note 8 and

00:34:18   say, "It's great," and don't do a more clear job of communicating what they've done and

00:34:25   kind of communicate that we know that the last one was a problem, which is tough, right,

00:34:29   have part of your marketing message for a product be an apology for the previous product.

00:34:34   Nobody wants to do that. But if you're so proud that you just don't acknowledge it,

00:34:38   I think you risk everything because I think people don't forget something like that. And

00:34:44   so that's a challenge. And let's be honest, Samsung's marketing, at least I can say in

00:34:49   the US, you know, Samsung's never been good at nuanced marketing. Their marketing has

00:34:56   always been kind of weird and I don't know whether that's just a cultural thing of precepts

00:35:02   of marketing in South Korea not translating to the US market or whether it's just that

00:35:07   Samsung's weird and they do weird stuff, but their marketing in the US has always been

00:35:13   a little bit strange and sometimes quite tone-deaf and this is a case where they really need

00:35:19   to do this right or they're going to do, you know, even, well, permanent damage has been

00:35:26   done but I do think, like, they will kill their products if they don't do this right

00:35:32   because they, this is not enough. And how do you make people feel like they can trust

00:35:38   Samsung and that it's learned its lesson and that the new phones are safe? You, you know,

00:35:43   there are lots of ways they could try to do that including having a commitment, which

00:35:45   is I think what the Wall Street Journal wanted, a commitment from Samsung to being basically

00:35:50   the safest smartphone in existence. But what the journal came away with is thinking, um,

00:35:58   maybe what they ve done is raise their standards to everyone else s, which is not, not, not

00:36:03   great. So Samsung were due to unveil the S8 at Mobile World Congress in February? They

00:36:13   They did confirm to the Wall Street Journal that they will delay this until after.

00:36:19   The Wall Street Journal is expecting it to be maybe March/April time.

00:36:24   So the test is coming soon.

00:36:27   It's a different line.

00:36:30   It's the regular line rather than the big note line.

00:36:33   But it's a new Samsung phone and we will see within the next couple of months how Samsung

00:36:40   is going to pitch its marketing because the whole Samsung brand has been damaged here.

00:36:45   And I'm interested to see what the S8, how the S8 is pitched. And it seems like from

00:36:51   what they're kind of hinting at that one of the reasons that they're delaying it is to

00:36:54   do more safety checks on this phone.

00:36:57   So it's good. It's again, especially on an Apple centric podcast, it's very easy to read

00:37:04   all of this discussion as Samsung bashing, but that's not, I think as we've done for

00:37:08   the last year when we've been talking about this, I think it's more about like what do

00:37:12   you do? It's an interesting problem to solve and to see how they're going to approach it

00:37:15   because they are one of the giants of the tech industry and they have very successful

00:37:21   product line and when you have something this spectacularly bad happen to you, the question

00:37:26   is how do you get past it? And this is another step along the way, but I think the way that

00:37:32   I read it, the reactions to it is sort of people feeling like they better not think

00:37:37   that this is the last step because it's not good enough. Not yet.

00:37:42   Dan Provost, host of Thoroughly Considered on this very network and one of the guys behind

00:37:49   Studio Neat published an interesting article which goes along with some of the rumors that

00:37:55   we've been seeing and that we've been discussing at length on Connected recently about a 10.5

00:38:01   and

00:38:20   sat down and did some math. When Apple introduced the 12.9" iPad Pro, Phil Schiller pointed

00:38:34   out that the width of the 12.9" iPad Pro is the height of two 9.7" iPads stacked side

00:38:40   by side. So what was that that time? The iPad Air. If you took two iPad Airs, put them next

00:38:44   to each other, that's basically the width of the 12.9" iPad Pro. A 12.9" iPad Pro can

00:38:50   and therefore run two full-sized iPad applications side by side in portrait mode.

00:38:55   So the screen is basically a 2 for 1 of the 9.7" iPad.

00:38:59   So you take two regular iPads, put them side by side in portrait mode,

00:39:02   you get a 12.9" iPad Pro.

00:39:04   So if you take that leap, imagine them doing the same exercise but with the iPad Mini instead.

00:39:11   It's got the same number of pixels as the full-size iPad, they're just packed into a smaller display.

00:39:16   So if you made an iPad Pro that could run two iPad apps side by side at the iPad Mini's

00:39:22   resolution instead of the Air's resolution, you get 10.5 inches diagonally.

00:39:29   So depending on how small the bezels were around the display, a 10.5 inch iPad Pro could

00:39:35   have roughly the same physical dimensions as the 9.7 but would have the same number

00:39:40   of pixels, 2732 by 2048, as the 12.9 inch.

00:39:44   So you would be taking a 12.9 inch iPad Pro and effectively shrinking it down to fit inside

00:39:51   of a 10.5 inch screen, which is also in the inverse taking two iPad minis, putting them

00:39:56   side by side and stretching them up.

00:39:58   Yeah, so the idea here is if you think of the iPad Air or iPad Pro 9.7 and the mini,

00:40:06   they have the same number of pixels that crammed into a smaller space.

00:40:11   So if you did that with the 12.9, the mini version of the 12.9 would be a 10.5, 10.48

00:40:20   or something like that.

00:40:21   And Dan did the math, bless him for that.

00:40:23   Thank you for reading my article, which is much more, I think, I did the math last week.

00:40:29   Let's not, right.

00:40:30   Let's not revisit it.

00:40:31   We did it.

00:40:32   That's, that's what it is.

00:40:33   So the idea is it actually kind of works, right?

00:40:35   It kind of makes sense, this rumor that we've had for a while that I think it was a 10 to

00:40:40   10.5 inch, like very vague, but with Dan's math it's at 10.47 or whatever it is. It's

00:40:47   very close to 10.5 but not quite there. And it's just the same pixels as the iPad Pro

00:40:55   12.9 in a smaller area. And that leads to, so I wrote this piece where I was trying to

00:41:05   think what else would happen here, and like Dan says, Dan cut out, it's great, he cut

00:41:09   out a piece of paper that's that size and laid it on the existing iPad Pro 9.7 and it

00:41:18   fits with very little bezel. And so like they could really shrink the bezels and have it

00:41:25   be the same size. I think it's more likely that it would physically be a little bit bigger

00:41:30   than the 9.7. But I think it's I'm intrigued by this for a few reasons. One is I love my

00:41:38   12.9-inch iPad Pro, but it is big and heavy. And if I could get... but when I use

00:41:44   the 9.7, I just think the screen's not big enough, right? I just keep thinking to

00:41:48   myself, I go into split-screen mode especially, I'm like, "No, no, forget it, no."

00:41:53   But a somewhat bigger screen, a little bit bigger, and all the pixels of the

00:42:00   big iPad Pro might be a really nice combination. The screen being a little

00:42:05   bit bigger also means that something like the, although the keyboard might not be quite

00:42:09   the size of a full-size keyboard, the software keyboard would be bigger than on the existing

00:42:16   9.7-inch iPad Pro. And then the other thing I thought was accessories. One of the problems

00:42:24   with the 12.9 iPad Pro is that it's hard to do accessories for it because it's so huge,

00:42:30   and then you clip on a thing that's the same size as a keyboard or something, and it's

00:42:34   And you can do a full-size keyboard that doesn't have to be the length of the

00:42:39   iPad Pro 12.9. There's extra space on it. And I started to think, I wonder if you

00:42:45   had a 10.5-inch iPad Pro that was a little bit longer than the 9.7, if you

00:42:50   could make a full-size keyboard that would be sort of exactly the size, and

00:42:56   and that would be great. That would be-- I would buy that. So I just I started to

00:43:02   to play it all around in my mind based on Dan's math because that is the best explanation

00:43:10   I've heard yet about why there would be a product in between. It's a little bit like

00:43:14   astronomy like finding like discovering something new because there's something weird in the

00:43:20   data and you're like why would that be there and then you start to think about come up

00:43:24   with a hypothesis about why it would be there. The 10.5 iPad Pro was always kind of like

00:43:28   that of like, why is this here?

00:43:30   This is a strange result.

00:43:31   And then Dan comes in and goes, here's my, here's my hypothesis.

00:43:34   It's the best hypothesis I've seen.

00:43:36   So it's interesting to me.

00:43:39   I mean, I really want this device, right?

00:43:41   Like I, I really want a different version of the nine seven.

00:43:47   Cause I love that.

00:43:48   It's my favorite of the iPads, but I really get kind of cramped

00:43:52   with the software sometimes.

00:43:53   Like I want to full size apps side by side.

00:43:55   I don't want one iPad app, one iPhone app, which happens a lot of the

00:43:58   time right when you're using the multi-phase game. I really love that I can have like on

00:44:02   the big one these two apps side by side. Right that's the whole idea is it's two full-size

00:44:06   iPad apps side by side. That's what unlocks like the real power. Right and so this would

00:44:11   be two full-sized apps on two iPad minis side by side essentially right. So it still works

00:44:18   but everything is just smaller. Now I would really really like that but I want it to stay

00:44:24   the same physical size and hopefully weight.

00:44:27   That's the 9.7.

00:44:28   Yeah, that's the 9.7, but you seem to want it that little bit bigger.

00:44:31   Well, so I'm of two thoughts here.

00:44:34   One is, I think if I'm Apple, well, part of it is, if I'm still selling the 9.7, it's

00:44:39   a little bit weird to have two iPads of exactly the same size physically, but one has a screen

00:44:46   that's bigger.

00:44:47   Ah, see, I think it sounds weird unless you look at Apple's current product line.

00:44:51   Well, hold on though, because the other thing they could do is do a new 9.7-inch and 12.9-inch

00:44:57   model that have much smaller bezels. So the 10.5 could be the size of the current 9.7,

00:45:06   but the new 9.7 could be smaller.

00:45:08   Yeah, I think--oh. Oh.

00:45:10   Right? So that's possible. My reasoning--and I cop to it in the piece. I cop to it in the

00:45:16   piece. My reasoning for this is literally if it was a little bit bigger, that smart

00:45:20   keyboard the keys could be basically full size and accessories because you can't, as

00:45:26   we've seen with the existing 9.7, you can't make a keyboard that is quite full sized on

00:45:34   the 9.7 but if you had it just a little bit wider you could do it. I don't know if that's

00:45:38   enough of a reason to do it. I really don't want three iPads, like three new iPads in

00:45:43   the Pro line. I know and yet this is this is where we are it's possible that the

00:45:49   10.5 is the new model that the 9.7 goes away or is just sold for cheaper and

00:45:57   I think it's cheap and deprecated and it's basically like we've taken the same

00:46:01   iPad size and put a much larger more high-resolution display now the iPad Pro

00:46:09   has the same resolution on either model and then the iPad Air or the old 9.7" Pro kind

00:46:19   of continues along. That would make, yes, I agree with you, three new iPad Pros does

00:46:24   seem kind of redundant and it does make me wonder if another thing that's happening here

00:46:29   is these reports of a new version of the 9.7 are wrong because it's really like an iPad

00:46:33   Air revision or something like that where it's getting some of the features of the

00:46:39   the iPad Pro, but they're just going to call it the iPad Air and because there's a new

00:46:44   iPad Pro at that size and it's got the bigger screen, it's got the 10.5 screen.

00:46:48   Yeah, one of the things that makes me hesitant to think that they would make it a bigger

00:46:52   iPad is because the iPad's always been this size, right? Like I feel like that there is

00:46:58   like this story around it like being the perfect size physically, but now they've made the

00:47:04   screen bigger. Right. Right, and also, you know, I think, I keep saying this, but I think

00:47:11   the hope is that they show this design off as a way to show that there will be a new

00:47:15   iPhone whenever that comes. Oh sure, this is the hint that, if this scenario plays out,

00:47:21   this is the hint that the, you know, reduced or no bezel iPhone is also coming. Yeah, I

00:47:26   think so. That would be the argument here. And the side bezel has already been getting

00:47:31   smaller mostly I mean and they've got some some you know touch screen rejection stuff

00:47:37   that they work on if you do need to grab it by the sides although I think generally the

00:47:40   idea is you grab it by the larger bezels that are at the top and the bottom which is why

00:47:46   I thought that it's possible that it gets no wider but a little bit taller or however

00:47:52   you want I mean it depends on how you orient the directions but you get me that the bezels

00:47:55   on the sides that are the narrow bezels might get smaller but the bezels that are on the

00:48:00   the top and bottom, like where the home button is, might actually get a little bigger, but

00:48:06   they could also just keep it exactly the same dimensions as the classic 9.7 if they wanted

00:48:11   to. Again, if they can get that technology to work, I don't know how hard that -- the

00:48:15   smaller the bezel is, the harder it is to fit everything in there and fit the screen

00:48:18   on there. But I don't know, my piece last week about this was very much that I'm kind

00:48:23   of warming to this as an idea. Dan doing the math made me feel like, okay, finally something

00:48:29   makes sense here about why this would exist. But yeah, I agree, there's a question of what

00:48:35   happens to the 9 7, and I have a hard time seeing it get updated and remaining exactly

00:48:39   the same if there's a 10.5. It's more likely that it either gets updated and smaller, that

00:48:45   they do the bezel reduction on it too, or that it goes away and there's just sort of

00:48:51   a new iPad Air that is that size and that's the differentiator between the Air and the

00:48:57   and the pro is this pro resolution that they've got or that 10.5 has to be bigger than the

00:49:03   9.7 I don't think I don't think they can all be true yeah I wonder if the iPad pro goes

00:49:08   the way of what iPad was it that was called the new iPad well remember when they went

00:49:13   was it like the iPad 4 that was the iPad 3 3 and then it kind of just like they just

00:49:18   kind of got rid of it and it was not wasn't that the iPad 3 and it was the retina iPad

00:49:21   that they just said it was the new iPad yeah and then third generation it had didn't have

00:49:25   the dock, the 30 pin and then it got replaced by the fourth generation which had which was

00:49:32   called what I think was maybe called the air or something I don't know but yeah there was

00:49:35   like that weirdness. No that was the iPad fourth generation. Yeah I don't think it was

00:49:40   even numbered that was a weird time for the iPad. The new iPad. Yeah it's the new iPad.

00:49:47   Well that's fine I mean they could they could do that it was just yeah it was weird. That

00:49:51   a weird time. I remember that because I was in—that was when I went to Mobile World

00:49:55   Congress so I remember being in Barcelona thinking about the third generation new iPad.

00:50:02   That was the retina iPad.

00:50:05   Yeah, so I have my fingers crossed for this. I would be very excited about an iPad that

00:50:10   looked and acted this way. That would make me very, very happy.

00:50:13   Yeah, well, as somebody who—I look at the—I mean, we were talking about this when we were

00:50:17   both in Memphis and you were showing off your 9.7 inch with the keyboard and all that and

00:50:21   It's like, it's great 'cause it's light

00:50:26   and my big iPad Pro is big and heavy,

00:50:30   but I have never been convinced to use the 9.7.

00:50:35   Like I just, it's not for the reasons

00:50:38   that we've cited here.

00:50:39   It's just not gonna do it.

00:50:41   Something like this, I would give very serious consideration

00:50:45   as my next iPad, absolutely.

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00:52:13   So last week Apple updated their audio production applications. More specifically they updated

00:52:23   Logic on the Mac and GarageBand on iOS received some heavy updates as well. So Logic got a

00:52:33   new flatter user interface but I guess more importantly it gained Touch Bar support. So

00:52:40   There are timeline overviews and customizable shortcut buttons.

00:52:45   What I like the sound of, there are different banks of buttons.

00:52:47   So if you hold the Alt key or the Option key, who has a Microsoft keyboard?

00:52:54   I do!

00:52:55   Or the Command key, you'll get different shortcuts.

00:52:59   I use the Microsoft Sculpt Ergonomic keyboard, so I look down at my keyboard and it says

00:53:05   Alt.

00:53:06   I apologize.

00:53:07   here is it is, um, this is the thing that I kind of wanted to see and, and I'm glad

00:53:12   they did it. Yeah. There's a timeline view where you can see a little mini version of

00:53:15   your timeline and where you're zoomed into and you can slide it around and all that on

00:53:19   the touch bar. But the, the shortcut buttons view, you can customize all of them. You can

00:53:25   say, I want this, you know, I want when I don't have a, a, a modifier key put down,

00:53:31   I want it to look exactly like this and you can have it be, um, you can choose what commands

00:53:36   go where, what the commands are, what the color of the button is. You can put in text

00:53:42   of what you want the button to say, and you can do that for all of the different versions

00:53:49   of modifier keys and all of that. So if you really want to go to town and reprogram it,

00:53:54   it comes with buttons program, but you can reprogram everything.

00:53:58   I tell you, man, this makes me want one so bad.

00:54:01   I did, I programmed in so to drop a marker,

00:54:04   I put that in on a red button with the,

00:54:09   because it's an inside joke with a German flag

00:54:11   on the button. - Oh, Jason.

00:54:13   - So I can go boom, chapter marker,

00:54:17   and it just shows up, which is great.

00:54:20   And I put, I had something else too,

00:54:22   strip silence, I think, and it had, was that it?

00:54:25   It was something where the description,

00:54:26   the text that it was using for the button,

00:54:28   'cause some of them come with an icon that you can use

00:54:30   and some of them just come with text

00:54:32   and they didn't make sense to me.

00:54:33   So I just edited it and put in my own text

00:54:36   that made more sense,

00:54:36   'cause you can fit a few letters on each button.

00:54:40   And that was, when I saw the touch bar for the first time,

00:54:42   that was my thought was, this would be really great

00:54:44   if you can really customize it in a complicated app

00:54:47   like Logic or Final Cut.

00:54:48   That's what I think people are gonna want

00:54:51   is to be able to make it their own

00:54:52   and take their top features and put them out there.

00:54:55   Now, the UI for assigning these commands,

00:54:58   like the UI for assigning any keyboard shortcut

00:55:00   or menu item in Logic, which it has to its credit,

00:55:05   is, you know, it's not my favorite,

00:55:07   but it does the job, you know, it does do the job,

00:55:13   and I appreciate that, so it's a nice example.

00:55:16   - Here's a question for you.

00:55:17   Can you, with the keyboard shortcuts,

00:55:19   only set one keyboard shortcut,

00:55:22   or can you set like multiple keyboard shortcuts per button?

00:55:24   - Per touch bar button?

00:55:25   - Yeah, so like for example, could I put on one button

00:55:29   above shortcuts like command F, command I or something.

00:55:34   Or is it just like each button is one shortcut?

00:55:37   You seeing what I'm saying?

00:55:38   - No.

00:55:39   - Okay, so let's say I wanted one button

00:55:41   to perform two actions, which are usually triggered

00:55:43   by two different keyboard shortcuts.

00:55:45   - I don't think you have the ability to run macros,

00:55:47   which is basically what that is from the buttons.

00:55:50   I didn't try that, but I don't think so.

00:55:52   And the way it works is not, you know,

00:55:55   it's not doing it by keyboard shortcut,

00:55:56   it's doing it by command in logic.

00:55:58   so you actually have to find the name of the command.

00:56:01   And, which it's got a search function, right?

00:56:04   But you're, 'cause the keyboard shortcuts

00:56:07   are also defined in that same interface.

00:56:11   So.

00:56:12   - I mean, I know the shortcuts of things.

00:56:14   I don't know what Apple calls them,

00:56:16   you know, like a lot of the time.

00:56:18   - That was exactly my thought too.

00:56:20   And actually, as cool as it was

00:56:22   to see those keyboard shortcuts,

00:56:24   I feel like I have learned enough about logic

00:56:27   that I don't need them.

00:56:30   'Cause like I already wired strip silence to command

00:56:33   or to control X, I think,

00:56:35   or maybe it was even already wired to that.

00:56:37   And I just do that now.

00:56:38   And I don't need to put that on a button.

00:56:40   I think the value of this stuff is going to be

00:56:42   for people who are learning

00:56:44   that they're going to be able to provide

00:56:45   those keys in context.

00:56:48   But if you're somebody who uses a lot of commands

00:56:52   in these apps and you can't remember

00:56:55   the keyboard shortcuts for them,

00:56:56   that's what these buttons are going to be good at.

00:56:59   - So I disagree to a point,

00:57:01   which is from my own experience,

00:57:03   'cause I moved to a Wacom, right?

00:57:06   And my Wacom tablet has six buttons on it

00:57:08   that can be programmed.

00:57:10   And I have programmed those six buttons

00:57:12   to perform different actions in Logic.

00:57:14   Now, I know what the keyboard shortcuts are

00:57:16   for all of those things, but it's way quicker,

00:57:19   like I have them programmed in such a way

00:57:21   that I will very frequently hit button one,

00:57:23   button two, button three, like in succession, and it will do something that I frequently

00:57:28   do. So like for example, it might do select all, cut, select all forward. So they are

00:57:35   three different buttons that I have assigned and I do those actions when I'm editing very,

00:57:39   very frequently. So like having all of those things just like one, two, three is really

00:57:44   nice. So even on the touch bar, you could set it up. So those three keyboard shortcuts,

00:57:49   the keyboard shortcuts that you trigger in succession very often are right next to each

00:57:52   other. Again, it's like I know what they are, but it's way nicer to just go boom, boom,

00:57:58   boom, and they're all done. I like that. And it's worked for me very nicely. I can do all

00:58:03   these things on the keyboard. I do when I'm on my MacBook Pro or my MacBook, but it's

00:58:08   way nicer for me to have them all kind of lined up and ready to go. So I'm excited about

00:58:13   that. I wish I could do it. There are virtual instruments. A lot more virtual instruments

00:58:19   have been added to Logic. So you can, this is on the touch bar, so the idea is there's

00:58:24   a piano on the touch bar that you can have or a drum kit that you can have on the touch

00:58:29   bar. Crazy in a good way. Play the piano, instead of the keyboard typing feature which

00:58:36   they have had, now there's also a touch bar keyboard basically or drum kit. GarageBand

00:58:42   for iOS has received updates which are interesting, targeted for people that use Logic but they

00:58:48   They wanna use it on the go?

00:58:50   - Yeah, this is, the way they described it to me,

00:58:52   'cause I did talk to some people at Apple about this,

00:58:54   is they used the example of the guy from "Fallout Boy"

00:58:56   who apparently was taking the tracks

00:58:59   that they were recording for their album,

00:59:01   and then on his iPhone or iPad,

00:59:03   he was singing the vocals that I believe there are,

00:59:06   I think what they said is there are some vocals

00:59:08   on the "Fallout Boy" latest album

00:59:10   that are from an iPad or an iPhone, which is kind of funny.

00:59:15   But the idea, the larger point there

00:59:17   is that a lot of musicians, yeah, they are moving around,

00:59:20   they've got, you know, maybe they're on tour or whatever,

00:59:23   and inspiration strikes and they wanna work on it.

00:59:25   So they wanted to, and GarageBand is it for Apple on iOS.

00:59:30   This is their high-end audio product

00:59:32   'cause there is no logic for iOS.

00:59:34   So they put in pro features in this release too,

00:59:38   'cause Apple said the goal of both of these releases,

00:59:41   they try to sort of theme their releases,

00:59:42   like what are we gonna focus on for this wave?

00:59:44   And this was sort of high-end audio production.

00:59:46   So even GarageBand for iOS has sort of high-end audio production features, which, you know,

00:59:52   if you're just using it to noodle around, it might seem dumb, but they have some compelling

00:59:57   stories that they've got professional customers who use GarageBand for iOS all the time.

01:00:03   So GarageBand for iOS has 12 new mixing effects, a visual equalizer, a professional grade compressor,

01:00:09   and also has gained something called the Alchemy Synth Synthesizer from Logic, which is this

01:00:14   very cool synthesizer.

01:00:16   that has been added to iOS too. But the thing that is kind of mind-blowing to me is that

01:00:21   you can now mix down a version of a logic project and sync it via iCloud to become a

01:00:26   GarageBand project, GarageBand project, to use on iOS and then anything added to the

01:00:32   GarageBand file will then sync back to logic via iCloud. That is really cool.

01:00:37   Yeah, so what you can't do is go to, you know, take your iPhone out with your logic project

01:00:44   and edit the drum track,

01:00:45   because that's not what it's doing.

01:00:46   It is doing a bounce down,

01:00:49   a flattened version of what you've got in Logic.

01:00:51   But what you can do is add to it.

01:00:53   So that's the example of the singer wants to take the track

01:00:58   and do vocals on it on the go.

01:01:01   They can do that.

01:01:02   And if they wanna add like an instrument track

01:01:05   and put something in there,

01:01:07   like I'm gonna try a few different things with this bassline

01:01:10   to see what I can do with it,

01:01:11   'cause there's no base on the recording or whatever,

01:01:14   they can do that.

01:01:15   And then that all syncs via iCloud.

01:01:17   So when you go back to that Logic project on the Mac,

01:01:19   back at home base,

01:01:21   those new tracks that you've created

01:01:23   are added to the existing project,

01:01:25   the existing multi-track project.

01:01:27   Really cool.

01:01:29   - So there's some stuff there,

01:01:30   like I'm happy to see Apple continuing

01:01:33   to push these applications forward.

01:01:34   - Logic, since it went to version 10 on the Mac,

01:01:37   has released, they said 15 updates.

01:01:41   So, here's something, we were kind of knocking Apple

01:01:46   when we were talking about the report card,

01:01:49   about people's concerns about the first party software,

01:01:53   not the OS, but like Apple's apps.

01:01:55   And this is an example where they are putting effort

01:01:59   into the audio apps.

01:02:00   And GarageBand is based on the logic code base.

01:02:03   It's all part of one big base.

01:02:08   So the people who are working on these things,

01:02:10   it's all interrelated, which is how they can do stuff like this.

01:02:14   But, um,

01:02:15   here's an example of a place where Apple is still investing in updates to their,

01:02:20   uh, their own professional apps.

01:02:23   So the big thing about Logic, right,

01:02:25   is all of the stuff that they're doing with the touch bar,

01:02:27   like that is like the big marquee feature here.

01:02:30   So it seems that Apple is continuing to invest time

01:02:36   and people into working on making the touch bar better, you know,

01:02:39   like with their own applications,

01:02:41   by making the software better,

01:02:42   they make the touch bar better.

01:02:43   So how long is it gonna be

01:02:47   until the touch bar breaks out of the MacBook Pro?

01:02:50   Like if this is a tool aimed at professionals, right?

01:02:53   It's debuted with the Pro for a reason,

01:02:56   doesn't it make sense to make a version

01:02:59   that desktop professionals could use as well?

01:03:02   So you wrote a piece on Macworld about this,

01:03:06   and a quote from you was that,

01:03:07   "I'd argue that for the touch bars

01:03:08   to be taken seriously as a core part of the Mac experience.

01:03:11   It needs to be on more Macs than just the MacBook Pro.

01:03:14   - Yeah, I think that's the challenge here is

01:03:18   the MacBook Pro is a great product for professionals.

01:03:22   Two thirds of Apple's or three quarters somewhere in there

01:03:25   of Apple's Mac sales are laptops,

01:03:28   but a lot of those are gonna be MacBook Airs and MacBooks.

01:03:30   So you've got the MacBook Pro that has the touch bar.

01:03:32   I feel like for this to in the long run be a touch bar,

01:03:37   run be a feature that people focus on, you need to at least give them the option of having

01:03:45   it work on the desktop. And you saw it even at the MacBook Pro with Touch Bar event, you

01:03:50   could see it because they like to stage these areas sort of like showing you all the great

01:03:55   features of these products. And the area that was running Final Cut on two 5K monitors or

01:04:02   maybe three 5k monitors. It was trying to show off those, you know, the ability

01:04:06   to do high-resolution video out. So they have these big monitors and the

01:04:12   MacBook Pro in a video workstation setup. But they still have the MacBook Pro

01:04:15   laptop sitting on a table with its lid open, and the idea was you would use the

01:04:20   trackpad and the keyboard and the touch bar on the open laptop to drive those

01:04:26   huge screens as well as the little laptop screen. And I'm sure people work

01:04:30   like that, but I looked at that and thought, "Huh, that's weird." Like, what you're saying

01:04:35   is we love the Touch Bar, but the only way you can get the Touch Bar is when the laptop

01:04:40   is open. So even though you can connect your laptop to these enormous screens, you need

01:04:44   to leave your laptop open and at the level where your hands are so that you can use the

01:04:50   Touch Bar. I don't know. I'm sure, like I said, I'm sure some people do that, but there

01:04:57   a lot of people who have who who are working on an iMac or maybe a Mac Pro someday again

01:05:05   or they're using a MacBook Pro or MacBook or something like that docked and ergonomically

01:05:12   I think having the laptop open is not necessarily the best experience for you so you maybe close

01:05:19   the laptop but if you close the laptop you lose the touch bar so you know in the end

01:05:23   I think the Touch Bar would be given a bit of a shot in the arm if Apple had some solution

01:05:31   for people to use the Touch Bar who are not sitting in front of a MacBook Pro that is

01:05:36   open.

01:05:37   Again, from your piece, the most logical product for Apple to roll out is the Magic Keyboard

01:05:41   2 featuring the Boss to Fly mechanism keyboard design used in the MacBook Pro topped by a

01:05:46   Touch Bar.

01:05:47   Yeah, that's the most logical.

01:05:50   I was, I had a good Twitter discussion with somebody who was doing the, they were running

01:05:55   the math about the battery use on the Apple Watch, which has a processor and an OLED screen,

01:06:03   and they're trying to get sort of like how much battery does the touch bar use. I think

01:06:07   the touch bar screen is bigger than the Apple Watch display, and so I'm not entirely sure

01:06:13   that I want to, I want to map those things out, but his argument was that if Apple can

01:06:18   get a day of battery life out of the Apple Watch, then if you put a touch bar in a Magic

01:06:25   Keyboard, you could get a day or two. I would like to believe that they want to shoot for

01:06:30   more than a day's charge on a keyboard, but they might think that that was enough, that

01:06:36   as we've seen, Apple makes those decisions sometimes, which is, you know, yeah, it's

01:06:40   great if your keyboard lasts a week, but really, you could plug it in once a day at the end

01:06:44   of the day, and then it would work fine the next day. So this does seem logical. And with

01:06:51   the new keyboard, I'm afraid, even though I love the Magic Keyboard, it certainly seems

01:06:58   that Apple feels that they've nailed it with the MacBook Pro keyboard. And so it would

01:07:05   seem most likely to me that that would be what a Magic Keyboard 2 would be. It would

01:07:09   be essentially like sawing off that portion of the MacBook Pro, like that keyboard, that

01:07:16   touch bar, and then, you know, and the internals necessary to run the touch bar, and a battery

01:07:23   so that it can run for at least a day.

01:07:26   It's what made me sad, you know, as I copped to earlier, I use a Microsoft keyboard, right?

01:07:33   Like I use the Sculpt ergonomic keyboard for ergonomic reasons.

01:07:38   And it would be sad to me if this product existed attached to a keyboard because I would

01:07:43   really like a touch bar. But my hope would be, you know, I would even be happy to have

01:07:50   the thing plugged in all the time, you know, so I got the battery. But I struggle to imagine

01:07:54   Apple doing that.

01:07:56   You literally want to buy a touch bar.

01:07:58   That's all I want, just a touch bar.

01:08:00   And you can put it wherever you want.

01:08:01   Yeah, anywhere.

01:08:02   Yeah. Yeah, I, there are some ergonomic problems with that because the heights of the tops

01:08:07   of keyboards vary widely, right?

01:08:10   So there's some issues with like,

01:08:12   how tall would they make that thing?

01:08:14   And if it's flat, if it's fairly flat,

01:08:17   then do you need like a riser behind your keyboard?

01:08:20   And there's lots of issues there,

01:08:21   but I think you're right.

01:08:22   I think the number one reason that that's not a product

01:08:24   is that it just doesn't feel like an Apple product to say,

01:08:27   here's an add-on widget, right?

01:08:29   It's much more likely they'll say,

01:08:31   we have this totally integrated thing and here it is.

01:08:36   I don't know.

01:08:38   But you also posed the idea of what if it was integrated into a Magic Trackpad.

01:08:44   Yeah, it's a wacky idea, but what I keep thinking is I already have a multi-touch surface from Apple on my keyboard tray.

01:08:54   I already have one. It's the Magic Trackpad 2, right? I already have it. It's right there.

01:09:00   And I think it's highly unlikely

01:09:02   that this will happen anytime soon,

01:09:05   but I just keep thinking like,

01:09:07   if I'm an Apple and I'm thinking about interesting ways

01:09:09   to do multi-touch as an input device on the Mac,

01:09:12   what if the multi-touch device

01:09:16   that they already sell for the Mac externally, wirelessly,

01:09:20   you know, what if some of it or all of it was a display

01:09:25   or optionally a display,

01:09:27   or sometimes had a display that was visible,

01:09:30   like on the Touch Bar but on the Magic Trackpad.

01:09:32   There are lots of issues 'cause the Magic Trackpad

01:09:34   is way narrower than the Magic Keyboard,

01:09:37   or the Touch Bar.

01:09:40   So you couldn't have that long Touch Bar interface on it.

01:09:44   So then now all of a sudden if you did something like that,

01:09:47   do you have two different layouts for the Touch Bar?

01:09:50   It gets weird.

01:09:51   How would you design something like that?

01:09:54   I don't think there's reasonably a product here,

01:09:56   and yet something in my mind just keeps turning over like,

01:09:59   yes, but it is a multi-touch surface, right?

01:10:02   It is the most logical place for something

01:10:06   like the touch bar. - I would love it there.

01:10:06   It'd make way more sense for a touch bar

01:10:08   to be integrated into the track pad

01:10:10   because that hand is doing tapping and poking and,

01:10:13   you know, that's where I would want it to be.

01:10:16   But I agree, it would be hard to put it there.

01:10:20   But, you know, I could imagine it being easier that way.

01:10:24   I expect more people probably say that. At least it would be easier, I think, to get

01:10:29   people to go trackpad than to change their keyboard. I feel like people are maybe more

01:10:35   picky over their keyboard than they are their input mechanism.

01:10:38   Yeah, I mean, and everybody varies. Some people are picky about the input device, the pointer,

01:10:45   and some people are more picky about the keyboard. But that's just, you know, again, the most

01:10:52   thing to do with the least overhead is to make a Magic Keyboard with a touch bar at

01:10:57   the top of it. But again, and that fits with the use case where you've got one hand on

01:11:03   the trackpad on the MacBook Pro and one hand on the touch bar, which they showed on stage,

01:11:09   which is different than like one hand on the keyboard and one hand on the touch bar, although

01:11:12   you could do that too on the MacBook Pro. But I just, you know, my way I use my Mac

01:11:17   is I've got my left hand on the keyboard and my right hand is either on the keyboard or

01:11:22   it is right next to the keyboard on that trackpad where I've got multi-touch gestures and all

01:11:26   of that. You know, the other problem with a lot of this is that the track or the touch

01:11:31   bar works in a part because it's not very far from the screen and in a desktop the screen

01:11:38   and the control surfaces move apart, right? Your screen goes up, especially if you're

01:11:44   following good ergonomics, because laptops aren't great with the ergonomics, surprise.

01:11:49   Your screen should go up, because it should be at your eye level, and your keyboard should

01:11:53   go down at, you know, right angle of your elbow, right? At which point they are further

01:12:01   apart, which means your eyeline is that much split, so when you're looking down at your

01:12:04   keys and your touch bar, you're now looking way further down. But at the same time, you

01:12:11   know, I think you would argue that if you need to look at your keyboard now, you're

01:12:14   still looking down at it and then back up at the screen. So the act of keyboard

01:12:18   looking is still there, and if Apple's whole premise with the touch bar is "I put

01:12:24   a screen on your keyboard," then keyboard looking is required. So even though it

01:12:29   might be a little bit harder and a little bit further apart, I'm not sure

01:12:33   it's a deal-breaker. It might be less good or it might be

01:12:36   different but I still think people would rather have it than not. So

01:12:42   whether there's a Magic Keyboard 2 with Touch Bar and they keep selling the

01:12:47   other Magic Keyboard or whether it's a separate standalone Touch Bar, you know, I

01:12:51   hope they do something so it isn't just the MacBook Pro that gets this,

01:12:54   especially since it unlocks everything in all scenarios, all their desktop

01:12:59   systems, all their laptop systems that have a, you know, that might run on an

01:13:04   external monitor basically everything can get the touch bar if you buy the

01:13:08   external touch bar but still in the back of my mind I keep thinking I'm not sure

01:13:12   the keyboard is the right place for it. Cards on the table will we see this in

01:13:17   2017? Will the touch bar break outside of the MacBook Pro? I think so. I think

01:13:22   that some part of the new iMac and maybe other desktops who knows will be

01:13:28   something like this. Do Apple make over desktops? They did they might again

01:13:33   We'll see. We'll see. But it's just, it would... Is it a must-have? No, absolutely.

01:13:39   If I had to put money on it, yeah, I think maybe I would say more likely than not, only

01:13:43   because they put all this effort into the Touch Bar to have it only be on the MacBook

01:13:48   Pro. I don't... Like, I would be shocked if a new MacBook had a Touch Bar, right? I mean,

01:13:54   maybe it would, but that's a lot to pack into that MacBook.

01:13:57   I feel like pros first, so like it comes with the next professional machines, you know,

01:14:02   alongside. So whether the next professional machine is a Mac Pro or

01:14:07   it's just an iMac, regardless, having it for that seems to make sense to me. I

01:14:12   would say my wacky idea about a screen magic trackpad, although that feels like

01:14:18   a very Apple product to me, I feel like that's not gonna happen anytime soon if

01:14:23   ever. It's so beautiful, right? Like it would be all black and then that, you know, maybe

01:14:27   the little, they would like light up when you, "Oh, that would be so good." You know, but

01:14:30   The number one reason I think it won't happen is,

01:14:32   if they were gonna do that,

01:14:35   wouldn't they have engineered the MacBook Pro

01:14:38   to have the touch bar be in the track pad?

01:14:40   - Yeah, yeah, they probably would have.

01:14:44   - And they didn't.

01:14:45   So this is where we are.

01:14:48   And it would give them parallelism, right?

01:14:51   It would give them the same thing,

01:14:52   which is it's part of the keyboard.

01:14:53   It's in the function row.

01:14:55   And, you know.

01:14:56   - The thing is though,

01:14:57   that it was easier space-wise

01:14:59   to have it replace the keys.

01:15:01   You know, but like with a Magic Trackpad,

01:15:04   it can be as big as you want it to be.

01:15:06   - Yeah, and there are lots of challenges

01:15:08   in getting the screen, you know,

01:15:11   I'm not saying just because it's a multi-touch surface,

01:15:13   it doesn't necessarily mean it's the same kind

01:15:14   of engineering that has to go into it

01:15:16   versus something like the Touch Bar.

01:15:17   But still, it is, you know,

01:15:20   the Touch Bar has a similar texture to the Magic Trackpad.

01:15:25   I mean, they're cousins, right?

01:15:28   And so I do wonder about that.

01:15:30   I will say, I think I like the idea of a touch ID sensor

01:15:35   on an external device.

01:15:38   I think that's far more likely than a touch bar.

01:15:41   - Yeah, they've done it.

01:15:42   You know, like the iPhone can authenticate things

01:15:45   on the Mac, like they've worked out how to transmit that.

01:15:48   - Exactly, so I think a touch ID sensor,

01:15:51   maybe even on a Magic Trackpad,

01:15:53   is the most likely scenario there.

01:15:57   So, I'm with you, I think 2017 we see the touch bar break out somehow.

01:16:04   I'm just not sure what that implementation is yet.

01:16:07   Yeah.

01:16:08   Alright, we should move into Ask Upgrade.

01:16:10   We didn't do any last week so we must do it this week.

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01:17:24   Luke wrote in with a conundrum.

01:17:27   It will cost Luke $1000 AUD which is about $750 USD to replace the video card in a dead

01:17:34   but specced out mid 2011 iMac 27" iMac.

01:17:40   Should Luke do this or upgrade to a new iMac?

01:17:44   Now this is an interesting question right, this is a machine that has maybe gotten about

01:17:49   5-6 years use out of. My feeling on this would be if you can afford it without it causing

01:17:57   too much financial trouble, I would go new. This is a machine that has served a good life

01:18:04   but my feeling is it's failed you now, I would be concerned it would fail again in some other

01:18:11   way. That's just my look on these things. You know, I would be concerned that I'd spend

01:18:16   $1,000 now, but then in six months, something else goes wrong and I need to pay again to

01:18:22   have it replaced in some way. So if you can afford it, Luke, I would say to maybe to start

01:18:28   to upgrade.

01:18:29   Yeah, I mean, that's the name of the show, right? I agree. That's a lot of money to spend

01:18:34   on a five to six year old iMac.

01:18:39   And the iMacs, you know, the new iMacs are priced

01:18:47   pretty well, I mean, you can get a,

01:18:50   if you wanted another 27, that's gonna be a 5K iMac now,

01:18:54   right, and that is, that's pretty good, that's pretty good.

01:18:59   So I guess you, you know, you got it,

01:19:03   you got it exactly right, which is,

01:19:05   if you can afford to go without for a little while

01:19:09   or just replace it now,

01:19:10   I think throwing another $755

01:19:13   at a six-year-old machine is not ideal.

01:19:21   - I mean, look, you're gonna be spending

01:19:27   about two grand for a new iMac

01:19:29   because you wanna at least have the Fusion Drive in it,

01:19:33   right? You really shouldn't get the one that has just the hard drive, which continues to

01:19:36   be a joke that exists.

01:19:38   Well, I mean, I would say you'd be better off spending that money and a little bit more

01:19:42   on a, or maybe just that money on a 20, you know, on a, on a 25th, what, 2014 5k iMac

01:19:51   that might be used or, yeah, I mean there, there are, or, or, or that somebody is a,

01:19:56   when the new iMacs come out, maybe somebody buys a new one and their two year old, two

01:19:59   two and a half year old one goes for sale or even a a pre-retina like a 2014 like I

01:20:05   think you'd be better off spending that money on something else if at all possible even

01:20:10   if it's a used system that is more recent than that because it's already pretty old

01:20:17   and it's just gonna keep aging and it hurts to think of spending $750 and yeah and parts

01:20:22   may still keep failing too. So yeah. Brent asked, "As a casual gamer, am I crazy

01:20:30   for thinking the Nintendo Switch is the most innovative console I've seen in a long time?"

01:20:35   So Brent, I will say, whilst they're also good dogs, you're not crazy. Weird joke.

01:20:44   I love that meme, the good dogs meme. It's fantastic. If you don't know what I'm talking

01:20:48   about just Google Good Logs meme you'll find it. I don't think you're crazy. I think that

01:20:53   the Switch is very innovative but you have to be open to that type of innovation. If

01:20:58   you're looking for Nintendo to create a PlayStation 4 competitor this is not that. But if you

01:21:05   have had the dream like I and Federico have had of same console everywhere like I've had

01:21:11   this dream for as long as I've played video games then this is the innovation you're looking

01:21:15   for. Basically, the Nintendo Switch is a super powerful handheld console that you can plug

01:21:20   into the TV. That's what it's not the other I read a great piece on the Guardian about

01:21:25   this that I'm going to find and put in the show notes. That explains it that way, which

01:21:30   I really loved. It's like people are thinking of it as a home console you can take on the

01:21:34   go. It's more the other way around it is a handheld console. It was a piece written by

01:21:40   Kate Gray, it's in the show notes. It is more like a handheld console that you can plug

01:21:44   into the TV and continue your experience there. Like, it doesn't have great battery life,

01:21:49   it can get anywhere between three to six hours, but it's USB-C. And when it's on the go, you

01:21:54   can plug in external battery packs, any USB-C cable will go with it. Like, that is a new

01:21:59   Nintendo, like for years Nintendo had their own weird proprietary ones.

01:22:04   I just bought my son a DS last year and I had to find a DS charging cable.

01:22:08   Doesn't come in the box.

01:22:09   And the right... It's ridiculous.

01:22:11   But they're really changing some of the ways that they work.

01:22:15   And it's got these controllers that you can snap off and you can have two people play

01:22:19   with just the controls that it comes with.

01:22:21   It is doing a lot of really innovative stuff, but you've got to be open to that.

01:22:25   If you want a new Xbox One or a PlayStation 4, but it's made by Nintendo, this is not

01:22:31   that.

01:22:32   And honestly, I don't think they're ever going to make that.

01:22:33   I think that's right.

01:22:35   This is never going to be that.

01:22:37   In fact, you could argue, I mean, the last two Nintendo consoles have been a generation

01:22:41   behind their competition as a console, and that will probably continue.

01:22:48   The difference is that this is not just a console, and they're merging their handheld

01:22:55   and console into one.

01:22:57   It is no surprise that the people I know who are really, really into console gaming were

01:23:00   not impressed by the switch and that's fine because again it is not a ps4

01:23:06   competitor it's it reminds me a little bit about people complaining about

01:23:10   things Apple does because they're not following the rules of Windows PC makers

01:23:15   which always happened and now it happens a little bit with smartphones too it's

01:23:18   like I can't believe that they're not just being like Dell was a classic right

01:23:22   and it's like well Apple's not even remotely like Dell so why would they be

01:23:25   that it's a little bit like that where it's like it's Nintendo they're gonna

01:23:29   to be Nintendo and what they're trying to do, I mean, that Nintendo Switch announcement

01:23:35   reminded me of Apple so much in the sense that Nintendo is relentlessly making these

01:23:40   decisions that are like not what the industry decisions are. And some of them will flop

01:23:45   and some of them will succeed, but that's what they do, right? And the Switch is like

01:23:49   that. It's a weird product, but I think it's got a lot of potential, especially the idea

01:23:56   that you have one system and you can play it around the house. Like, my son does this

01:24:02   all the time where he's playing the Xbox One and I want to watch a TV show and I'm like,

01:24:05   "I gotta kick you off, sorry." Right? It's like, with this, again, it's not an Xbox One,

01:24:10   but if he's playing something on the Nintendo Switch, he just picks it up out of the dock

01:24:15   and keeps playing it. And you can take it to a vacation or to a friend's house or whatever

01:24:19   and it's your Nintendo that comes with you. Plus, there's the, anybody who brought computers

01:24:26   over for a LAN party in the olden days will know this, that like, plus now you're your

01:24:31   Nintendo Switch and your friend's Nintendo Switch and all of a sudden you've got like

01:24:36   multiple controllers and they will network with each other and you can have a bunch of

01:24:41   people playing games together. And that is actually a thing that I think will happen

01:24:45   with it. So I think there's a lot that's cool about it as long as you're not, like you said

01:24:48   Myke you're not judging it by the ps4 and the Xbox one because it's not playing that game and I think yeah

01:24:54   I think Nintendo is not gonna ever play that game

01:24:56   Matt asked blue snowball versus blue yeti

01:25:01   So Matt's asking for a microphone recommendation here out of the two. I would say yeti

01:25:06   But I know Jason's gonna say do neither and buy something else

01:25:10   Yeah, that's that's it. Which is the yeti is by far the better microphone than the snowball. I don't recommend the snowball

01:25:16   I started with a snowball, but don't don't buy it

01:25:18   I think the best value if you're in the US especially because I know it's harder to get

01:25:23   overseas.

01:25:24   The best value is the Audio-Technica ATR2100 USB, which sounds really good.

01:25:29   It's really cheap.

01:25:31   It's a USB microphone by a mic stand.

01:25:33   I wrote an article on six colors about how you can get in a whole podcast studio for

01:25:37   less than $100.

01:25:39   That's what I recommend.

01:25:40   The Yeti is great.

01:25:41   The problem with the Yeti is it's big.

01:25:44   And that makes it not only is it heavy and big, but it's less compatible with mic stands

01:25:51   and pop filters and things like that.

01:25:54   And, you know, I loved I used a Yeti for like three years and it's it's great, but I think

01:25:59   it's been surpassed.

01:26:00   Something I've noticed recently.

01:26:04   I've been sending the link that, you know, Marco's big microphone mega review to a bunch

01:26:09   of people.

01:26:10   Like I'm getting asked these questions a lot like what microphone should I buy?

01:26:14   What microphone should I buy? And I really don't have a good

01:26:16   recommendation. But you know I send Marco's review to people because he reviewed a bunch of them and

01:26:22   you also get all the sound clips and stuff. It is it's just interesting to me that I'm getting

01:26:27   a lot more of those questions. It seems like people people want to start podcasts.

01:26:31   [Joe] The ATR2100 is the cheapest microphone in Marco's top five basically.

01:26:38   - And it's in the top five.

01:26:40   - I mean, I guess it's not, it's number four,

01:26:44   and it's the cheapest in the top four.

01:26:46   The mic at number five is cheaper,

01:26:47   but you've got to add a $100 XLR interface.

01:26:49   And the ATR2100 does XLR if you want, but it is a USB mic,

01:26:54   so you just plug it in to your computer with a USB cable.

01:26:57   And like Marco says, amazing value for the money.

01:27:01   So that's the one that I am now recommending.

01:27:06   And Brent also asked a couple of questions, kind of podcast related.

01:27:10   One, how often do you monitor download statistics?

01:27:13   And two, why do you rarely, if ever, ask for iTunes reviews?

01:27:16   So I make a note of my statistics or our statistics, all of Relay FM's download

01:27:23   numbers monthly, so I have a graph to track our shows and kind of see how they go

01:27:27   over the year. So that's one time where I always do it.

01:27:30   Sometimes an advertiser will ask and I'll get the numbers that way.

01:27:33   so I see them or other times like when I'm uploading a show to the host, I might just

01:27:38   check how the download numbers are but I used to be like obsessed with checking those numbers

01:27:43   but I'm not so much anymore honestly.

01:27:46   Yeah, I don't look except when I need to. When somebody like when my ad network asks

01:27:53   for the stats, I will look the stats up and put them in their little form that says here's

01:27:58   how many downloads we had but I don't look and I don't look at iTunes reviews either.

01:28:02   I mean, I just don't look because I know what I wanna make,

01:28:06   I know what I wanna do.

01:28:07   I was like this at IDG too.

01:28:11   People would expect me to like know,

01:28:12   how many page views did PC World have last month?

01:28:14   I'm just like, I don't know, I could look it up for you.

01:28:16   They're like, you don't know?

01:28:18   Yeah, you know what?

01:28:19   I don't obsess about that.

01:28:20   Like we used some stats, like some live stats,

01:28:25   like Chartbeat of sort of like what stories were trending

01:28:29   and for a news site that was useful

01:28:31   finding out like what people really cared about and what what people were reading at a time. But

01:28:37   like the big, you know, daily, weekly, monthly stats, I felt like that was much more likely to

01:28:41   distract me and confuse me than to inform me because you can just start chasing flukes and

01:28:49   you can start changing chasing sort of like bad stuff if you do that and you know I kind of know

01:28:55   I kind of know what I want to do and and those numbers get magnified right you we do an episode

01:28:59   that does 10,000 more than any of the episodes around there.

01:29:02   And we might be like, oh, what did we talk about

01:29:03   in that episode?

01:29:04   We should totally do that.

01:29:05   But it turns out that, you know,

01:29:07   it almost certainly had nothing to do with the content

01:29:09   of that episode, especially since the downloads happened

01:29:11   before people listen, but it had to do

01:29:12   with somebody mentioning us or somebody linking to us,

01:29:15   or there was a hiccup in the network.

01:29:18   And so people had, their clients had to redownload the file.

01:29:21   I mean, there's so many reasons and you can get steered

01:29:23   so far off course, if you look at it that closely.

01:29:26   So, you know, I try to look at it like ten steps back and with a lot of perspective and

01:29:32   So I don't look very often

01:29:35   And then why don't we ask for iTunes reviews? I think it's mainly because most of the shows that we do

01:29:41   iTunes tends to be one of the smaller

01:29:44   Traffic sources. Yeah, it can be hard to tell exactly

01:29:49   But I would estimate that we have somewhere between 10 to 15 percent of our listeners that listen through iTunes

01:29:56   And honestly with the kind of the focus of iTunes these days that the shows that they tend to focus on

01:30:01   I don't think that

01:30:03   Reviews are gonna help us get the visibility that used to it used to be like having good reviews in iTunes

01:30:08   was good for getting features and promotions, but the podcasting market and the landscape is very different now and

01:30:14   The types of shows that tend to get featured on iTunes tend to be the more mass-market shows, which is fine

01:30:20   Honestly, it doesn't it doesn't really concern or affect us in a big way

01:30:26   Because the the tools the shows that our shows a lot of our tech focus shows

01:30:30   People listen in the apps that they like to listen in and there isn't a consistent way to rate or review

01:30:37   You know to make sense in those applications, you know, like we could say that you know

01:30:41   Marco has the starring thing you could star us on overcast you could leave a review in iTunes

01:30:45   But really the thing that we would love the most if you ever want to do anything

01:30:49   This is tweet about the show tell friends about the show

01:30:52   recommend the show to people something that they might want to listen to that's probably

01:30:55   going to have a bigger effect than any of like you know leaving these reviews in these

01:30:59   buckets within different applications so if you do like enjoy the show tell people about

01:31:04   it because that's cool yep and if you want to find our show notes for this week head

01:31:10   on over to relay.fm/upgrade/125 Jason is online he is at sixcolors.com and the incomparable.com

01:31:17   and you can find Jason here @jsnell on Twitter, JSNEELL.

01:31:21   I am @imike, I-M-Y-K-E.

01:31:24   Thank you so much for listening, as always,

01:31:25   and we'll be back next time.

01:31:26   Thanks again to our sponsors,

01:31:28   the fine folk over in Capster, Smile, and Squarespace.

01:31:31   Say goodbye, Jason Snow.

01:31:32   - Bye, everybody.

01:31:33   (upbeat music)

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