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Connected

332: Pretending — Once Again — to be John Voorhees

 

00:00:00   (upbeat music)

00:00:02   - Hello and welcome to Connected episode 332.

00:00:12   It's made possible by our sponsors this week,

00:00:15   Hover and Mack Weldon.

00:00:17   My name is Steven Hackett

00:00:18   and I am joined by Mr. Federico Vittucci.

00:00:20   - Hello, my name is Federico Vittucci.

00:00:22   - Hi.

00:00:23   - I don't know, you just say my name is

00:00:24   and I figure I should say the same.

00:00:26   Hi.

00:00:27   - Okay, you're Federico Vittucci?

00:00:29   Yes, it's me.

00:00:30   We're also joined by Myke Hurley.

00:00:32   Hello, my name is Federico Vitticci.

00:00:34   Boy.

00:00:35   I know, right?

00:00:36   But then we have a problem.

00:00:37   You weren't expecting that, were you?

00:00:38   Steven, you need to make us solve some kind of puzzle

00:00:42   or like a cap shot to prove that we are.

00:00:44   We're the Spider-Man meme now.

00:00:46   Yes.

00:00:47   We're both Federico.

00:00:48   So Steven, you have to choose

00:00:50   which one's the real Federico.

00:00:52   Or which one is the real Myke.

00:00:54   Maybe that's the actual way to do it.

00:00:56   Maybe Myke is like an entity that doesn't actually exist.

00:01:01   It's more like a state of mind.

00:01:03   - I'm like Ditto.

00:01:04   I just take on the form of people around me.

00:01:07   - Steven, what is Ditto?

00:01:09   - I don't know.

00:01:10   It's a Pokemon.

00:01:11   - Mm, okay.

00:01:13   - I guess that because it was the two of you,

00:01:16   but who I was really thinking about was Kirby.

00:01:21   Isn't Kirby the mazendo?

00:01:22   You can pull your powers.

00:01:24   Actually, it sort of works too. Because they're both pink and kind of blob-like and they both,

00:01:34   like Kirby's thing is that he eats people and then can absorb their power which is so

00:01:39   gross and horrifying. Kirby is like a terrifying character, really. Kirby's power is so upsetting.

00:01:49   But in a way, so imagine like if Myke ate me and then took onto my semblance, that would

00:01:55   be sort of like what Kirby does.

00:01:58   But the ditto is better because ditto just looks at something and then can become it.

00:02:04   Yeah.

00:02:05   Okay.

00:02:06   It's not as gross.

00:02:07   Yeah, that's less upsetting than having to eat it.

00:02:09   Right.

00:02:10   Yeah, I don't want to do that.

00:02:11   The digestion is really what makes the difference.

00:02:14   Should we do follow-up?

00:02:16   Please.

00:02:17   I just wanted to point people to the end of last week's show where I had real-time follow-up

00:02:24   But of course it was too late because people had already

00:02:27   Commented to me as they're listening to the show so

00:02:30   Reminders has had sorting on Mac OS for quite a while, but it's not

00:02:36   Remember I talked about like tasks with no times go at the top all that stuff

00:02:43   That's all true of the old Mac version of sorting and reminders.

00:02:47   What's new in iOS 14.5 and Mac OS 11.3, their respective betas, is that the sorting works the same way.

00:02:55   So the sorting on iOS does it the way I want it to and the Mac

00:03:00   follows suit. So that's weird.

00:03:04   It's always weird that the Mac version had sorting before the iOS version even though it got some things wrong about it.

00:03:09   but they're moving to unify how the two work.

00:03:13   Now as far as I can tell the newer betas don't solve my badging problem but I filed a feedback

00:03:21   and hopefully that will spur some discussion.

00:03:24   You're very well behaved.

00:03:26   Me?

00:03:27   Mhmm to file a feedback.

00:03:28   Yeah.

00:03:29   Like a good testing board.

00:03:30   Well it was a rock that I tied a note to and then threw it over the wall at Apple Park.

00:03:34   Mhmm fair enough.

00:03:35   Like whatever you gotta get it done, get it done.

00:03:38   That's right.

00:03:39   have a heck of an arm to throw something over the building into the middle.

00:03:43   Isn't that like an Olympic sport?

00:03:44   I guarantee that lasers would appear and just shoot it out of the sky. You're not gonna

00:03:49   get it over there.

00:03:52   Defense lasers?

00:03:53   Just straight out there.

00:03:55   Like a drone defense system.

00:03:57   Yep.

00:03:58   Kind of like that.

00:03:59   We spoke about Carrot Weather 5 last week, and we were talking about the various weather

00:04:03   services we use, listener Brian wrote in to tell us about a website called

00:04:09   Forecast Advisor. Now this only works in the US, so if you're outside of the US

00:04:15   sorry about this, but if you're in the US you can enter your zip code like I'm

00:04:20   entering mine right now and you can compare forecast accuracy for your area

00:04:27   over the last month and the last year. So it turns out for me I've been using

00:04:33   AccuWeather, but AccuWeather is only about 80% accurate over the last month

00:04:39   and the last year. That's unacceptable. Yeah, they should call it like

00:04:44   kind of weather or something. 80 weather. 80 weather. So the Weather Underground,

00:04:52   the Weather Channel, and Forca? F-O-R-E-C-A? Forca. It's a forca. I wanted a

00:05:01   spoon oh whoa hello hi are you Federico

00:05:10   prove it we're all Federico now so anyways I've switched to this because it

00:05:17   seems to be the most accurate and it is funny and carrot whether if you switch

00:05:21   between them sometimes how different the forecast can be the forecast the fork

00:05:28   Um, okay. I mean, this is a nice, nice idea. It's like a fact checking for weather forecasts.

00:05:35   Yeah, it's pretty cool. But again, only in the US, so that's, that's a bummer for some people.

00:05:40   Twitter should start applying labels to these other services, right? So like,

00:05:45   AccuWeather tweets and it's like, oh, this is only correct 80% of the time.

00:05:50   Oh, like they did to, uh, what's his name? They kicked off Twitter.

00:05:53   Yeah, that guy.

00:05:55   That guy. What is it?

00:05:57   they should start doing that for weather services now too.

00:06:00   Myke.

00:06:01   This one did, this follow-up did sting a little bit honestly

00:06:04   because I was the one who wanted this and I can't

00:06:08   and it's US only. I was the one of the three of us that wanted to know if there

00:06:12   was a better service than the one I was using but

00:06:16   you know. Sorry. Can't help that Brian did

00:06:19   what Brian could and this was the best that Brian could do.

00:06:23   Myke, you have been on a vision quest to try to understand how the Apple Watch

00:06:29   unlock works with masks and the betas.

00:06:31   Do you have any, any new visions from your quest?

00:06:34   I still don't have the answer that I want.

00:06:37   So what I want to know is exactly how Apple is doing the authentication for Face ID.

00:06:44   Um, Alex wrote in to say that they've been able to basically just get it to

00:06:50   unlock on any face as long as he was holding the phone basically.

00:06:54   So it seems like it's the proximity thing. Um,

00:06:56   so it seems very much like that's the case, right?

00:06:59   That like it's all proximity based, but I, I would love, uh,

00:07:04   I was talking about some upgrade with Jason because Jason was doing similar

00:07:07   testing to,

00:07:08   I would love Apple to publish a white paper and say what they're doing here.

00:07:11   Like I want, and again, it's not that I'm like trying to be like, Oh,

00:07:15   this isn't safe. I just want to know. I'm just curious. Like what, how,

00:07:19   what is it and like what what kind of level of security do they deem this feature as like is it

00:07:26   is it less secure than touch id like what is it in like or do they although they really believe in

00:07:32   their proximity stuff that it's better than that or you know it's like i'm just intrigued i would

00:07:39   just like to know and i'm also intrigued to see what the kind of so federico when you sign when

00:07:46   and you set this up.

00:07:47   Yeah.

00:07:49   Did the iOS talk you through it all?

00:07:51   No, you just go to settings

00:07:54   and you flip a switch.

00:07:55   See, I would I'm intrigued to see

00:07:57   if in the final version, if there

00:07:59   isn't like an onboarding of any kind

00:08:01   to explain this to people or

00:08:03   whatever.

00:08:03   Yeah, I don't know.

00:08:04   It's a really cool feature, but it

00:08:06   is it's potentially

00:08:08   less secure than your passcode.

00:08:10   Right.

00:08:11   Well, I guess once iOS 14.5

00:08:13   comes out, they will update the

00:08:16   security white paper that they already have on the website with a new section for this.

00:08:20   You still have to make sure that your watch is authenticator, of course. So yeah, you're

00:08:26   giving up on some level of security, but it still relies on the fact that you are wearing the Apple

00:08:31   Watch. So, I mean, yeah, technically somebody could forcibly grab you and force you to authenticate

00:08:39   just by the fact that you're wearing an Apple Watch. But at that point you've got all kinds of

00:08:44   But exactly, at that point you have all kinds of problems. More realistically speaking,

00:08:49   it could also mean that if you go to sleep with your watch on, whoever kind of person lives with

00:08:58   you, for example, they could grab the phone at night and unlock it just by using proximity.

00:09:06   But again, at that point…

00:09:07   Then again, you have trust issues and all that.

00:09:10   You have a different set of problems.

00:09:12   You have a different set of problems. So, yeah, once you enable this, very convenient,

00:09:17   just make sure, you know, be aware of your surroundings, I guess. If you wear the Apple

00:09:21   Watch at night, and, you know, when you go out and about, just the people around you

00:09:26   may be able to authenticate your phone, to unlock your phone, just by, you know, taking

00:09:32   advantage of the fact that you're wearing an Apple Watch, essentially.

00:09:35   Matt's saying in the members Discord that if you use sleep mode, it doesn't work during

00:09:39   sleep mode.

00:09:41   I was literally about to say that, thank you Matt.

00:09:43   That makes a lot of sense.

00:09:44   Yeah.

00:09:44   That makes a lot of sense.

00:09:46   You might not use sleep mode, right?

00:09:47   Like, I don't know.

00:09:49   Right.

00:09:49   It's up to you if you use that feature or not.

00:09:51   But that's-- that is good design, to put that in there.

00:09:55   If you remember last week, we were talking about Dan Riccio

00:09:58   was going to be moving on.

00:10:00   Apple announced that he was going on a special project.

00:10:02   And we were talking about what that could have been.

00:10:04   And I remember saying, I don't think it was a car,

00:10:07   like everybody else thought.

00:10:08   And I figured it was more likely he

00:10:09   was going to be working on the AR and VR project.

00:10:12   Mark Gurman is reporting in Bloomberg that that's exactly what Dan Riccio

00:10:15   is going to be moving on to, is helping Apple kind of realize

00:10:18   their hardware goals for the AR/VR project.

00:10:23   So he's kind of helping oversee a lot of that now, apparently,

00:10:26   according to Mark Gurman.

00:10:27   This makes way more sense than a car to me, and he may work on

00:10:32   if they're working on some kind of car project.

00:10:34   That might be a thing that he does next, but it really seems like it would more

00:10:38   likely be whatever the next big project is rather than like the next next next

00:10:44   big project. Some articles put this in context as that he stepped down to do

00:10:49   this which I mean he was in charge of basically all hardware engineering it

00:10:54   seemed like or a lot of it and is now just doing this but I don't know I don't

00:11:00   know if Apple sees that as a step down if I feel like at Apple and from what

00:11:04   I've read about the beginning of the iPhone and iPad and other projects. To be moved from

00:11:10   your regular work to secret project, right, where no one knows really what it is and you

00:11:17   sort of disappear for a while, that seems like an honor within Apple. So I don't know

00:11:22   if stepping down or it being a demotion, that sort of thing is quite right. It's definitely

00:11:26   not how I view it. I view it as he's going to go do this future thing and let and let

00:11:32   Turn us take over everything else that's that's up and and running. I don't know that framing just sort of struck me as weird

00:11:39   I think that there's two ways to look at it, right?

00:11:41   Like one we know that we know from what Apple said that he is reporting directly to Tim Cook

00:11:47   But in his new role Dan Riccio running this special project the AR VR stuff

00:11:52   We assume he probably reported straight to Tim Cook anyway

00:11:55   Because I don't think that there is anybody else like previously he may Dan Riccio may have reported to Johnny I've but I don't think

00:12:02   think that there's anyone that fills that kind of role anymore. I don't know though.

00:12:08   But I understand how some people refer to it as a stepping down because it's surely

00:12:13   less work than running all hardware. Because as the Senior Vice President of Hardware Engineering,

00:12:22   this AR/VR hardware would have come under his purview anyway, right? Because it's hardware.

00:12:28   But now he's going to be moving on to kind of like help shore up this entire part of

00:12:34   the division.

00:12:35   He's not reporting directly to Tim Cook, but you assume that he now has a much more focused

00:12:39   role.

00:12:40   So I know why people call it stepping down, but I also understand why you're saying like

00:12:45   it doesn't seem like it would be stepping down because this is, I mean, I'm sure Apple

00:12:49   is currently trying to set this up as like their next like huge project, right?

00:12:55   big as the iPhone project or whatever is what I assume is what they want this

00:12:59   whatever this endeavor is to be so heading being responsible for helping

00:13:05   bring that to market I mean that could put your name in the history books I

00:13:09   have a quick aside okay something I noticed while preparing for the show I love

00:13:14   Safari reader view okay it's so good I I use this when I'm preparing for shows so

00:13:20   So even though I use Reader, R-E-E-D-E-R, Reader for RSS to look through all my feeds,

00:13:28   I typically don't read stuff there for show prep.

00:13:32   Like I read things there just for interest.

00:13:35   But if I want to read something for preparing for the show, like all of the links that I

00:13:39   put into our document today, I send them out to Apple Notes.

00:13:43   And then I will then open them when I'm sitting down at my Mac.

00:13:46   websites that I genuinely love their reporting and there's the awesome too

00:13:52   many ads on them like just to the point where it becomes difficult to read them

00:13:56   that's where I have an issue like sometimes I'm trying to like I can't

00:14:00   even read the stuff or what's even worse auto playing video and all that kind of

00:14:03   stuff I love Safari review because it works very well and my favorite feature

00:14:08   about it the main reason I wanted to bring it up today is I love so much that

00:14:12   you can automatically turn it on for some websites I don't do this for all

00:14:16   websites but there's some that are so bad that I do and I just really appreciate

00:14:20   that feature because like reader views and stuff like that very normal right

00:14:24   like they've been around since like I guess Instapaper was the first right

00:14:29   of these kinds of things yeah I think so I mean well I mean if you go way if you

00:14:34   go way back like delicious is kind of that but well back then there used to be

00:14:41   like some kind of dispute between Instapaper and Pocket before it was

00:14:45   called Pocket, it was called ReadItLater. But I believe that the text parser was an

00:14:52   Instapaper thing.

00:14:55   So that's kind of what I'm talking about, is like the taking a web page and stripping

00:15:01   all of the bad stuff out of it so you just get the text. So it's been around for a while,

00:15:06   but what I really like about ReadItView is that you can just say, "Hey, for every time

00:15:09   I click on a link from this domain, just turn it on." It's a great feature. It's a great

00:15:14   feature Safari. Yeah, and I love how you can... I believe it was added last year, the settings

00:15:20   that you can, like, enable it on a per website basis. It's really well done, like, you can

00:15:24   say some websites I always want to open in this mode. Like, for example, there's a few

00:15:30   blogs that I enable content blockers for in the Safari settings, and I also switch to

00:15:37   reader view by default. So as soon as I open, like, an article from those websites, it stops.

00:15:42   whatever, the content blockers need to stop, and it also switches to reader view. And it's

00:15:46   really nicely done. And it also integrates with shortcuts. It's one of the Safari features

00:15:52   that you can also activate from shortcuts. Really well done. Too bad that the reader

00:15:59   view, like, it had so many updates, especially over the past couple of years, but the feature

00:16:06   that could take advantage of it the most, which is Safari Reading List, has basically

00:16:11   languished for six, seven, probably eight years at this point without virtually any

00:16:17   updates whatsoever. So reader view, lots of good progress there. Reading list, kind of

00:16:24   a shame. It's been the same since the... I don't think it's an exaggeration to say since

00:16:31   iOS 7, it's basically stayed the same.

00:16:35   It feels like one of those features that they decided to do and it's like this is a good

00:16:40   idea and then maybe came to the realization that pretty much everybody that wants a service

00:16:45   like this has something that they use, you know?

00:16:49   At some point they added an option to automatically download the content of those stories, but

00:16:55   when I looked at it, it was real hit or miss as to whether it actually worked.

00:16:59   Yeah, one time I was going to WWDC, I was so happy that I had a reading list set to

00:17:05   automatically download stories for me, and so I get on a plane and I enable airplane

00:17:09   and I'm like, "Okay, yes, fantastic. I'm going to read a bunch of articles."

00:17:12   And then I opened Safari and nothing was saved offline.

00:17:15   -Oh, no. -I can't remember this.

00:17:16   I don't know how they can remember this.

00:17:18   I was very sad.

00:17:20   So, yeah, I mean, we're going to have to revisit this topic, I think.

00:17:26   I'm in between places at the moment when it comes to reading things later.

00:17:30   I'm very undecided because, on one hand, I like to use Reader,

00:17:38   the RSS client and it's read later integration.

00:17:41   So you can save things for later.

00:17:43   And it strips the text with its own specific like text parser.

00:17:48   But then if you want, you can also reopen articles in Safari View Controller within Reader.

00:17:52   So that's cool.

00:17:53   And it syncs with iCloud and it's got shortcuts integration.

00:17:56   It's really nicely done.

00:17:57   On the other hand, a couple of months ago, when I got the Kindle, basically,

00:18:01   I signed up for this survey. I'm actually like a patron on Patreon for this

00:18:08   service. It's called Push to Kindle, and it's this little bookmarklet that lets

00:18:14   you save any article from the web to your Kindle as like a personal document

00:18:21   that's in theory what they're called in the Kindle system. So anything that I

00:18:26   I find on the web. I push this little bookmarklet in Safari and the text parser is really, really,

00:18:33   really well done. I think it's the best one I've tried. Like, better than Safari Reader,

00:18:37   better than Insupaper, better than Reader. And it sends that document to your Kindle.

00:18:42   The problem is I love reading on the Kindle and I love the text extraction that the Push

00:18:47   to kindle service does. The problem is I miss the fact that if I want to then take something

00:18:56   from that article and, I don't know, tweet it or link it on Mac stories, it becomes a problem

00:19:05   because that article is then on my kindle. So I gotta find the article on my iPad again and find

00:19:11   a bit of... You need a reverse service that pushes kindle to the web.

00:19:17   And now that you mention it, I've actually been thinking through this over the holiday

00:19:20   break. There is that kind of service, something called Readwise. I don't know if you guys

00:19:26   have ever seen this. I think David Sparks mentioned this recently. It's a service that

00:19:30   aggregates all of your highlights from your Kindle library. And it's got Notion integration.

00:19:35   I don't use Notion, but I know that a bunch of folks use it because of that.

00:19:38   It's got Notion. No, it's got a bunch of export options, and it's got a native app as well as

00:19:44   as a website. The thing is, Readwise only works for actual Kindle books. It doesn't

00:19:51   work for personal documents that you save to your Kindle. So even if I highlight something

00:19:57   in an article that I saved to my Kindle library, it doesn't sync up with Readwise, because

00:20:04   it's not a book. It's a personal document, and Readwise does not support personal documents.

00:20:09   So, like I said, I'm in between places at the moment.

00:20:13   Have you used like a Instapaper or Pocket or anything now?

00:20:18   - Three months ago, I went through all of them again.

00:20:22   And each one of them had something that was like,

00:20:24   eh, like I like it, but this thing I'm not really sure about.

00:20:29   Like Instapaper, what turned me away from it

00:20:33   was the infrequent updates and sort of the sense that,

00:20:38   I don't know, it just feels like it could go away any moment.

00:20:42   I don't know. It's been through a bunch of different ownerships over the years and I

00:20:49   don't know. I just saw in the release notes that like last update one year ago, I was

00:20:54   like, "Oh, boy." So I looked at Pocket, and the thing with Pocket is that they really

00:21:00   tried... It's owned by Mozilla now, so that's cool.

00:21:03   I always forget that.

00:21:05   But they really try to sell you on the discovering more articles thing.

00:21:13   Like, I don't want to open something and see all of these different recommendations for,

00:21:19   "Hey, discover more articles."

00:21:21   I already got like hundreds of things in my backlog.

00:21:23   I don't need to...

00:21:24   Remember when Evernote started doing that?

00:21:26   Yes, yes.

00:21:27   Like, "Hey, your notes about this, maybe you want to read this from the New York Times."

00:21:31   Yeah.

00:21:32   No, I don't.

00:21:33   And also Pocket is like very non-native in the way that it looks. So that was out.

00:21:40   Then I started looking at this other application that nobody sees. It's one of those things that I

00:21:46   discovered on the App Store. Nobody really knows about it. It's called Articles Plus, I think.

00:21:52   It's got a blue icon with the shape of an A, of the letter A. And it's really nicely done. It's

00:21:58   it's got a subscription model, there was something that did not convince me. And so it was down

00:22:03   to Reeder and something else. But I tried them all and it was like, ultimately, I really

00:22:13   like what Reeder is doing. ReadKit recently came out. So ReadKit used to be a Mac app

00:22:18   that came out in 2012 or 2013, back when I used to write about Mac apps. And it was like

00:22:23   an alternative to Reader for Mac back in the day. Then it sort of disappeared. The developer

00:22:29   got in touch with me again last month and said, "Hey, I've been working on a major revamp

00:22:33   of ReadKit, it's coming back on the App Store, and there's going to be an iPhone and iPad

00:22:37   version now." It's like, great, yes. It's nice. It's very nice. I think you can log

00:22:43   in with your Instapaper and Pocket credentials as well, but I still kind of prefer Reader.

00:22:49   and the way that just... Reader has got something.

00:22:51   I talked about this on App Stories a few months ago.

00:22:54   It's got that special something.

00:22:55   I don't know if it's the animations or the design

00:22:57   or the speed.

00:23:00   So I don't know. I got to decide what I want to do, really.

00:23:05   Maybe I'm just going to stick with the Kindle.

00:23:07   It's not like I find myself having to highlight things

00:23:11   and export them, you know, that frequently.

00:23:14   -Steven, do you use anything?

00:23:16   -Yeah, I use Reader for RSS

00:23:18   And then for saving things later I use Good Links.

00:23:21   Good Links! Oh, that's a good one. I saw that you wrote about this in six colors.

00:23:26   Yeah.

00:23:27   Yeah, I like Good Links.

00:23:30   And it uses Safari View Controller if you want to open an article, right?

00:23:35   Yes. And you can force it. You have Safari Reader Mode there. I think you can force it

00:23:39   into Reader Mode.

00:23:40   You can force it, yeah. John really likes Good Links, also because of the shortcuts

00:23:46   integration that it's got and the I think it also has like custom actions

00:23:51   right you can make your own yes um yeah I don't know why like I've heard people

00:23:59   talk about good links for ages I don't for some reason it never clicked in my

00:24:04   head that it was like an insta paper thing I always kind of thought it was

00:24:08   like a pinboard thing you know there's still plenty of folks who use pinboard

00:24:13   that surprises me I did yeah I did for a long time but gave up on it but like

00:24:19   that's what I thought good links was I thought it was just like you just saved

00:24:22   links and then you went and did something with them I didn't know that

00:24:25   you could like read yeah and them read in it as well yeah okay but this feels

00:24:32   like good links feels a bit like a mixture between a pin board and a

00:24:37   insta paper right like kind of like it is cool because you from the way they

00:24:43   got it set up it kind of looks like you keep things in it forever and you like

00:24:46   tag them and stuff. You can or you can archive them I don't use any tags I just

00:24:50   have an unread list and then I mark it as read and it just goes in the read

00:24:54   list forever. I have a question for both of you. I'm just gonna say I'm not this kind of person so I'm intrigued.

00:25:01   Like you see you're going through your day, you're seeing things,

00:25:07   you're putting them in good lengths, you're putting them in read later or

00:25:10   or whatever. When do you actually read these things?

00:25:13   Later.

00:25:14   Well, okay, so for me...

00:25:15   Why? Obviously later.

00:25:17   For me, it's two very specific moments.

00:25:20   If it's something that I know I want to link on Mac Stories,

00:25:25   I'll save also a reminder for a very specific time of day.

00:25:29   So, like, if I know I'm going to link this, like, in the afternoon,

00:25:32   I'm going to sit down at 5 p.m., read it,

00:25:35   and then contextually to that,

00:25:37   I'm also going to do a link post on Mac Stories.

00:25:39   stories. But usually it's before going to bed.

00:25:43   Yeah, if there's something, if there's something I'm going to link, I'll make a task. If it's

00:25:48   something that I want to save for a show, I have a way to save things directly into

00:25:52   Kraft for future show notes. Good Links is mostly like non-tech stuff that I come across

00:25:59   that again I want to read later. And usually it's in the evenings or on the weekends. And

00:26:04   it's great on the iPad.

00:26:06   So you've settled on Kraft for show links now?

00:26:08   I have all my work notes in Kraft, all my personal notes in Apple Notes.

00:26:12   I have all my notes in Kraft and we also do our show notes in Kraft.

00:26:16   No, no, don't think about it, Myke.

00:26:19   I am thinking about it, though.

00:26:21   We have.

00:26:22   So we've been doing app stories and unwinding Kraft

00:26:25   for almost three months at this point.

00:26:28   I don't think I don't imagine show notes like because what I just did

00:26:32   something to our document that Google Docs is best for.

00:26:36   Like I just picked something up and moved it.

00:26:38   And I know with craft that's going to take a little bit to refresh.

00:26:43   And someone might have moved, like gone straight into that topic.

00:26:46   And I'd intended to move like the thing about Google Docs,

00:26:49   which makes it what it is, is like it's instant.

00:26:52   The changes are instant. You can watch me typing. Right. For sure.

00:26:55   And once you're used to that, if you work that way,

00:27:00   it's hard to move away from.

00:27:01   Like if you have the kind of show notes that are like

00:27:06   you don't move them around a lot or whatever, then fine.

00:27:09   But I think for this show, for many of my shows, we've gotten

00:27:13   maybe too used to it, right?

00:27:15   Like maybe if I was starting something from scratch, it wouldn't be so

00:27:18   I wouldn't be so used to it.

00:27:19   So Google Docs, I do struggle with, but craft like it's interesting.

00:27:23   It's interesting to me.

00:27:24   Like I keep my eye on it and I use it,

00:27:27   but I don't use it to the extent that you guys are.

00:27:31   And I'm intrigued.

00:27:32   It's just I have a lot of stuff that I still want to move into it,

00:27:36   but I'm still waiting for them to add some features that I want.

00:27:38   Like tables. Tables is my thing. I want tables.

00:27:42   I also want better outlining support.

00:27:44   I need to contact them about that at some point.

00:27:47   They don't do a very good job with like keyboard control of outlining.

00:27:52   Yeah, indenting.

00:27:53   My indent right and indent left.

00:27:56   That's what it was. Indent right, indent left.

00:27:58   Yeah, they don't.

00:27:59   They don't do a very good job with that.

00:28:00   And they have a lot of work that they need to do.

00:28:04   if you are a bulleted list type person like I am, especially, like I write pretty much everything in

00:28:13   outline format, of a loose outline format, and while they support it, it's slow, it's very slow.

00:28:20   And they recently, just a few days ago, they added this new toggle list mode, which at first I thought

00:28:29   it was like folding and it's basically the opposite of...

00:28:34   I could not understand it.

00:28:35   Yeah, so if anybody from Kraft is listening to this, I don't think you did an excellent job

00:28:44   with the toggle list mode because like it defies the expectations of anybody who's ever

00:28:50   used any folding system in a text editor before. At least my default interpretation of that was

00:28:58   like "Oh great, I can now fold headings!" Which is usually what you do, like in an outliner

00:29:04   or in a markdown editor that has support for folding, like say editorial years ago, or

00:29:10   task paper. You usually fold the heading, so if you do like an heading like an H2 or

00:29:16   H3, then you can fold it and it folds the entire section contained within that heading,

00:29:21   within that section. Or in an outliner, you can fold anything. For example, in OmniOutliner,

00:29:31   you enter things in a list, and then you decide what you want to open and what you want to

00:29:35   fold. Here, and I still struggle to understand what the toggleList thing does, but it seems

00:29:42   that you have to write first, and then you apply the toggle list format, and then you

00:29:51   can fold? It's very strange and very weird. And I spent 20 minutes trying to understand

00:29:58   it, and then I texted John, and I was like, "Hey, do you know how this works?" And usually,

00:30:04   like—and I mean, I don't mean this to brag, but like, I've tried many, many, many text-based

00:30:11   apps over the years and usually when I don't understand something it's not a good sign.

00:30:18   So I gotta send them some kind of feedback I think.

00:30:20   Yeah I tried it out and I could not work out how to do it. I don't know why, I felt stupid,

00:30:28   right? Because it's like "what's wrong with me? Why can't I work this out?"

00:30:31   Because I was pressing the little arrow and then I started typing and the arrow disappeared.

00:30:36   I was like "wait, what's happening here?" In any case.

00:30:41   app. It is cool. I look forward to the day when I can use it more, but because

00:30:48   I'm very confident that the things that I want added are things they will add and

00:30:53   improve. So I use it a lot for a specific type of thing, but I would like

00:30:57   to move more stuff into it, like preparing my links and stuff for shows,

00:31:02   because it seems good for that.

00:31:03   Let's take a break, and then I have a proposal

00:31:06   before we move on, so don't jump into the next topic yet.

00:31:10   I accept, yes, Steven, I say yes.

00:31:12   I will marry you.

00:31:13   All it took was for you to pretend to be him

00:31:18   and now he's ready to marry you.

00:31:20   I'm ready, I'm yours, babe.

00:31:21   This episode of Connected is brought to you by Hover,

00:31:31   one of Relay FM's longest running sponsors.

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00:32:32   enter it in, if it's not available,

00:32:33   they will make a bunch of suggestions

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00:33:07   and Relay FM.

00:33:08   - Can I just give a bit of real time follow up real quick?

00:33:11   Is that okay?

00:33:12   Just before your proposal, before we move on from it?

00:33:14   - Okay, yes.

00:33:14   - 'Cause I was trying out the craft thing again,

00:33:19   the toggling thing.

00:33:20   - Yeah.

00:33:21   - I was on my iPhone.

00:33:22   - Yeah.

00:33:23   - And it seems like the way that you get the little,

00:33:26   basically it's all, the problem is the indenting.

00:33:29   - Right.

00:33:30   Because to get it to nest, you have to do indenting.

00:33:34   And one of the reasons that the nesting doesn't work very well

00:33:37   is because they have to work on their indenting.

00:33:39   So these things actually seem to go hand in hand.

00:33:44   OK.

00:33:45   Please, please give us your proposal.

00:33:47   We have five topics, five mini topics,

00:33:50   and then one regular topic, which isn't even all that long,

00:33:54   I don't think.

00:33:55   I don't think it's a traditional full length topic.

00:33:58   So my suggestion is that I spin a wheel,

00:34:03   and a wheel that's one through six,

00:34:06   I already have it prepared,

00:34:07   and then we do that corresponding number of tiny topic.

00:34:12   So if I roll a four, we talk about what is labeled

00:34:16   number four in the show notes.

00:34:18   And we do three of these, we take a break,

00:34:21   and then we do the last three, and then we're done.

00:34:22   I just feel like we need some spontaneity today.

00:34:25   - All right.

00:34:27   - Okay.

00:34:28   You just wanted to spin the wheel. Yes. I mean, you know, some people spend a bunch

00:34:31   of time like putting them in the right order. Trying to understand what's the flow of a

00:34:36   show, trying to understand like what topic follows one another and then comes... I have

00:34:40   to tear up my entire script now. Then comes in Stephen Hackett spinning his wheel just

00:34:45   for the funsies. Okay. All my jokes are going to be in the wrong place and they don't make

00:34:49   any sense. And you can say like, as I mentioned before, no, because you didn't mention it,

00:34:54   I can't say that. Okay.

00:34:56   Oh boy.

00:34:58   We're going off script. Okay.

00:35:00   [Clicking]

00:35:02   So we scroll down number four.

00:35:06   Oh well, isn't that a coincidence?

00:35:08   You said number four as an example

00:35:10   and then number four is the first one?

00:35:13   Just say that you really want to talk about this thing.

00:35:16   It's fine.

00:35:17   I don't care about this thing. I don't care about this thing.

00:35:20   Tiny topic number four. Another weird charging device.

00:35:23   device so our friends at Satechi are back they will basically put a USB port

00:35:29   and a charging pad on anything. On anything? Anything. You can't move for USB-C ports at Satechi.

00:35:39   I saw this on MacRumors and just thought that I feel like over the last

00:35:44   few months especially I just keep bringing increasingly more peculiar

00:35:49   charging devices to the show but I actually thought this one's kind of

00:35:53   ingenious it's like a little I don't know it's maybe the size of a like a

00:35:58   like a box of matches or something you know maybe somewhere between a box of

00:36:02   matches and a pack of playing cards it's just this little piece of aluminium on

00:36:06   one side is an Apple watch charging puck and on the other side is a rectangular

00:36:13   Qi charger that is perfectly sized for an AirPods case to go on. And because it's

00:36:20   USB-C, it's like bi-directional, not bi-directional, what do you call it when you can put it

00:36:27   in either way around? Maybe it's just that. Reversible? Reversible. Reversible. There you go.

00:36:32   So the idea would be you'd plug this into the side of your laptop or to

00:36:37   your iPad if it was laying down and then you could, if one side you could charge

00:36:43   your Apple watch flip it over charge your AirPods it's 50 bucks you can only

00:36:48   buy it in the Apple store it's colored to look like the the color of the over

00:36:53   MacBook I just thought it was like a cool little gadget so that's the end of

00:36:57   my point on this do either of you think this is cool at all no well so when do

00:37:05   you need chart okay here's the air pod thing I get I struggle to imagine the

00:37:10   sort of a

00:37:12   Emergency situation you may find yourself in that you really need this accessory

00:37:17   Yeah, what do you need to like charge your Apple watch on the go?

00:37:20   I mean, I don't know what it's like for you people that charge your Apple watches

00:37:24   I don't know. Maybe you need to you know, you're sleeping in it or whatever and you need I don't know

00:37:28   I don't know what it's like to put people like you who wear Apple watches all the time. Maybe you need that

00:37:33   I think it's cool. So the reversible design, I think it's really it's really cool

00:37:38   Honestly, that's why I brought because I just thought it was kind of genius. I just think it's like an ingenious little design.

00:37:42   It is. It's very compact. It's got a single USB-C plug. I think it's very nicely done as an object.

00:37:49   I just I have doubts about the practicality of it.

00:37:54   It's like most of the time I charge my AirPods on my main charger and the watch in the morning

00:38:01   It's like do I need another

00:38:03   What is essentially like a little dongle? Do I need another of these things?

00:38:08   things in my life? And right now maybe the answer is no, but also because I'm spending

00:38:13   a lot of time at home, so maybe if I was traveling more... I just think that a lot of these accessories

00:38:18   that we're seeing lately, they would make a lot more sense in a COVID-free world?

00:38:24   Yes, of course. I mean, this looks to me like a really good "I work all day at the coffee

00:38:29   shop" kind of thing, right? Because it's like, "Oh, I need to charge my AirPods. I'll just

00:38:38   Put them on there. Nice.

00:38:40   But I struggle to imagine, I think we're all having this problem right now,

00:38:47   I struggle to remember what that feels like at this point.

00:38:52   Like hey, remember when you could go and work from a place without any restrictions whatsoever?

00:38:59   So yeah, this makes a lot of sense.

00:39:04   And it made a lot of sense two years ago.

00:39:07   Now I think it's... the concept is very cool.

00:39:11   The need for it may be limited.

00:39:14   I don't know.

00:39:15   Ian has made a very good point in the Discord that this is kind of like a shelf and you

00:39:19   love shelves.

00:39:21   Maybe this is for you.

00:39:24   It's a shelf for your other devices.

00:39:27   It is a shelf.

00:39:29   I'm buying five of them!

00:39:31   Put them all over my house!

00:39:33   It does look like a mini shelf for your iPad. So a shelf! It's a charging shelf.

00:39:38   Okay, I take back everything I said. And you can use it on the iPad. Although,

00:39:43   like, ultimately less usable on the iPad, because it has to be, like, flat on the table,

00:39:48   right? If you could change the angle of the thing,

00:39:53   like if you could rotate the shelf, now that would be cool.

00:39:57   That would be the pro version next year for $89.

00:40:00   dollars yeah yes yeah I guess the Apple watch is probably good right because

00:40:04   it's magnetic so that's gonna work but for the air pods is tricky all right

00:40:09   that was tiny topic number four spin the wheel spin the wheel again number five

00:40:18   oh well that's stupid we're just moving in the order of the show now you

00:40:25   complained about one way you can plan about the other way do you remember when

00:40:28   Apple added like was it called smart gene it's smart shuffle it was genius

00:40:36   genius play a shuffle oh yes I always loved that feature where it it may

00:40:41   because I think I remember Steve jobs like describing it as like the thing

00:40:45   about shuffle is that it is like completely shuffling so sometimes you

00:40:50   will get to artists that were the same one after another and a playlist of

00:40:54   random music because it's purely random so then Apple created Genius Shuffle

00:40:59   where that wouldn't happen. I just thought it was just such a great little

00:41:03   software design. I always really liked that. So you should you should put

00:41:07   Genius Shuffle in your wheel there, Steven. So what was the tiny topic? Number

00:41:12   five. Apple is coming after Waze. This is an article over on Mac stories

00:41:19   by John. One true John. One true John. OTJ. OTJ, is that right? Yes. Yeah, One True John.

00:41:26   Call it that. So in Waze, forever, you've been able to report things like an accident

00:41:32   or a speed trap, right, where a cop is like behind a tree, he's gonna catch you speeding

00:41:37   right at the sign. Problems on the roads, like there's a pothole on the road and whatever.

00:41:42   Yeah, all that stuff, right? And it goes into the Waze database and everyone using Waze

00:41:47   is alerted and you know, it can reshape traffic

00:41:51   because of that.

00:41:52   In the iOS 14.5 beta, Apple Maps has had accident hazard

00:41:57   and speed check reporting added to the phone,

00:42:02   to CarPlay and to Siri, which is pretty cool.

00:42:05   And so if you are out driving about,

00:42:08   you can hit the report button.

00:42:11   And as John points out, and I agree with this,

00:42:13   In CarPlay, it's like on the far right-hand side,

00:42:17   which is the opposite side of the driver in the US.

00:42:20   It's kind of hard to reach, and it's a really small target.

00:42:24   But you can use Siri as well.

00:42:26   And so you can report one of these things,

00:42:29   and it will mark where you are,

00:42:31   and feed into the giant algorithm

00:42:34   that makes people drive around with Apple Maps.

00:42:37   - I have a question. - Okay.

00:42:40   - As I don't know.

00:42:42   In other countries where you drive on the other side of the road, does the carplay UI flip?

00:42:48   Yes. I think it does.

00:42:50   It does. That's cool.

00:42:51   Yeah.

00:42:52   That's cool.

00:42:52   Yeah, where the dock is on the right-hand side if you drive on...

00:42:55   What if your car goes over like the line of where if...

00:43:01   No, I guess it doesn't matter, right? You're always on that...

00:43:04   Anyway.

00:43:04   What? That's not how you drive?

00:43:07   Never mind. Don't worry about what I just said. Forget I said anything.

00:43:11   If you go over the ladder, you're gonna die.

00:43:16   I think speed check is really weird to add in here.

00:43:20   Why?

00:43:21   By Apple explicitly.

00:43:22   Because you only need to know about speed checks if you're going over the speed limit.

00:43:28   Well, well...

00:43:29   No, that's the only reason, right?

00:43:31   So it seems kind of strange that you choose three things and one of them is "help me break

00:43:36   the law", right?

00:43:38   It's a way for people to know where speed cameras or speed checking checkpoints usually

00:43:45   are installed.

00:43:48   You only need to know that if you're going too fast.

00:43:52   I don't want to say things that would be misinterpreted, so... yes.

00:43:59   Yes, that's correct.

00:44:03   It's a way for people to know.

00:44:05   I think it's good when these devices or sensors, they tell you like, hey, you're going over

00:44:09   the speed limit. I think that's useful to know in case people don't know.

00:44:12   I think, okay, I'm going to try to generalize my thought.

00:44:15   Yeah, please.

00:44:16   I think a lot of people in Italy would, so in my country, a lot of people would agree

00:44:24   that sometimes speed limits are a bit unrealistic. And so, yes, a speed limit exists, but I challenge

00:44:37   you to drive on any road and find that the speed limit is more of like a technicality.

00:44:45   Like if you tried, like, let's be honest, if you try to drive by the speed limit in

00:44:49   Rome, there's going to be people honking at you all day.

00:44:53   Yeah. You can do that. I mean, technically, the law is by your side if you do that. But

00:44:59   in the practicality of the day to day life in Rome, you're going to have a bad time in

00:45:06   traffic if you do that. And I'm not saying that that that breaking the law is right.

00:45:12   I'm just saying what most people do. Right. Yeah. I mean, also the Discord. The Discord

00:45:20   is currently giving me a taste of what my Twitter mentions are going to look like for

00:45:24   the next few days, because people seem incensed that I even suggested such a thing. But it

00:45:31   just stood out to me as like a little peculiarity, right? But I get it, like I completely understand

00:45:39   what you're saying, but at the same time, it's just a little bit weird to me, Nick,

00:45:44   as a thing.

00:45:46   you may have an actual emergency for which you need to, like, let's say you gotta go

00:45:52   to the hospital very quickly, right? And so, yes, in theory, you're breaking the law if

00:45:58   you go over the speed limit. But maybe if you know that there's an automated speed camera

00:46:04   installed, you can be mindful of that just for those 30 seconds. Just a silly example,

00:46:12   And then there's the whole question of are speed cameras actually legal?

00:46:19   And there was a whole thing in Italy a few years ago where they needed to pass regulations

00:46:24   for which you need to signal x kilometers before the camera that you will find a speed camera soon.

00:46:34   And so we have all these signs on our roads saying starting now for the next 10 kilometers

00:46:41   you're gonna find speed cameras. Because basically the government was fining people,

00:46:47   and nobody was paying those speed tickets, basically. And so they passed regulations,

00:46:52   because people were saying, "I was going over the limit because of X and Y reasons,

00:46:57   so you can issue this speed ticket to me." It was a whole thing. So yeah, the speed camera situation

00:47:03   is complicated, and it changes country by country. I guess the simple reality of it is, a lot of these

00:47:10   services like Waze and back in the day there used to be like the TomTom thing, right?

00:47:15   Yeah, poor TomTom.

00:47:17   Yeah, it also had this feature like crowdsourced speed camera databases.

00:47:24   Everybody's doing it, so I figured Apple said why not.

00:47:28   Yeah, I think the thing that was peculiar to me is I was just like questioning the

00:47:35   legality of such a thing. And because I mean I don't know right? I think it's I think it's

00:47:42   weird that a company as big as Apple maybe is doing this in a very first party way. That's

00:47:47   why it's strange as well because they only have three options. Yeah yeah. So one third

00:47:53   of their options is help people get around speed limits or like you know and so yeah

00:48:01   - Yeah, I just found that, it was just intriguing to me

00:48:05   that this was one of the three that they added.

00:48:08   When there are legitimately many more of these types

00:48:11   of things that you could have,

00:48:12   like Waze has loads of them.

00:48:14   - Like what?

00:48:15   - Well, you can have lots of things

00:48:16   about issues with roads, right?

00:48:19   Or you could have, I don't know, incorrect directions.

00:48:21   I don't know.

00:48:22   But anyway, nevertheless, how many there are,

00:48:24   it just stood out to me.

00:48:25   Maybe I'm terrible because I don't drive a car,

00:48:28   So I don't understand how speed limits really work in the real world, but it just seemed

00:48:35   weird to me.

00:48:40   One iPhone has many sales.

00:48:44   Many or mini.

00:48:45   I can't pronounce those words differently.

00:48:49   No, try again.

00:48:51   Small is mini.

00:48:55   More than few is mini.

00:48:57   I can't, there's no difference.

00:48:58   It's the same!

00:48:59   His mouth cannot make that sound.

00:49:05   Okay.

00:49:06   Yeah, that's interesting.

00:49:08   Okay, so are you feeling sad about this report, Steven?

00:49:14   Let me talk about the report, and then I'll share my feelings.

00:49:18   This was a report by JP Morgan analyst William Yang, who said that the smaller iPhone 12,

00:49:25   especially the iPhone 12 mini has underperformed and it might lead to Apple

00:49:31   stopping production in the second quarter. There was a report earlier

00:49:37   like maybe even the end of last year that the 12 mini that Apple was slowing

00:49:42   down that manufacturing line to adjust in the quarterly calls. A couple weeks

00:49:49   ago Tim Cook said that the the iPhone cycle this time has been really

00:49:54   driven by the 12 Pro and 12 Pro Max. People seem really excited about those.

00:49:59   And I think you can add all this up and say that okay maybe the 12 mini is the

00:50:04   worst selling of the new phones. In fact this report says that the iPhone 12 mini

00:50:10   accounted for just 5% of overall sales of new iPhones in the US during the

00:50:17   first half of January. Now I don't know why you picked the first half of January

00:50:21   because people already bought all their phones for the holidays but it's the time that was

00:50:27   sampled for this. But yeah, 12 mini may not be a big seller.

00:50:32   Yeah, I mean there could be like a lot of reasons that January particularly could be

00:50:37   tough but you know it's probably still approximate and also as well this isn't the first time

00:50:42   we've heard this. I will ask you, 5% of sales, the iPhone 12 mini apparently, let's just

00:50:49   assume that this is somewhat accurate. Are you surprised by this number? Does this seem

00:50:54   unexpected? Like what would you both have imagined the makeup would look like percentage

00:51:00   wise for the mini?

00:51:02   I figured it would be the smallest selling but I didn't it 5% seems really low to me.

00:51:09   Now there's the factors we already mentioned there's also the factor that TJ pointed out

00:51:12   in the discord is that the iPhone SE 2 came out in the spring and there may have been

00:51:19   a lot of people who would have done the 12 mini, but they were afraid there wasn't ever

00:51:23   going to be a small iPhone again, so they went to the SE2 as a holdout against larger

00:51:28   phones.

00:51:29   So maybe some of the potential 12 mini market is tied up in the SE2, but I can't imagine

00:51:34   that's the reason people buy that phone.

00:51:37   I mean, I don't know, right?

00:51:40   Like I could imagine just like the argument for the SE is that it's the cheapest iPhone.

00:51:46   it still has Touch ID that some people really want who don't want face ID. So the SE2 has

00:51:51   a lot going for it and I think the overlap between the 12 mini and the SE2, like I think

00:51:57   it's real but it's not one-to-one by any means. Federico do you have an expectation? Does

00:52:04   five percent seem low? It seems low and I think this phone should go away. Oh. I don't

00:52:10   think, I don't, this is one of those things where people think that they wanted a small

00:52:15   phone and then when they actually get it they realize well this is now too small.

00:52:19   This is good, this is good. So Steven within our next like two or three topics you have to

00:52:26   say something that's gonna make people mad so start thinking about that because I have

00:52:31   speed traps, Federico has small phones shouldn't exist so now you need to think so get working on

00:52:39   that. Well we'll see where the wheel takes us. No I think there's a

00:52:43   legitimate niche of people who want a small phone.

00:52:48   I think it's a very small niche of people and their numbers

00:52:53   seems to be a suggestion. And it's getting smaller. I mean again,

00:52:59   pure anecdote, right, like a lot of this stuff is pure anecdote, but I know people

00:53:03   in my life who always wanted small phones then they ended up getting a big

00:53:07   phone and now wouldn't go back. Yeah, and I think the volume of articles and hot takes

00:53:17   about small phones is... what's the word? When something is like the complete opposite of

00:53:24   something else. Antithesis? No, there's an expression that I'm thinking of. Something

00:53:30   like disproportionate or something. So basically the more people, like, a lot of people talk

00:53:35   about it, nobody actually wants it. This is what I'm trying to say. Like, you see all

00:53:40   these articles, all these stories, all these hot takes, and you think, "Oh, this is going

00:53:44   to be popular," because so many people are talking about it. But in the real world...

00:53:48   Yeah, "Finally, Apple have made a small phone! Finally!" Right? Like, that's all, you know...

00:53:53   Finally, you say, "Finally, Apple has made a..." and then you hear podcasters saying,

00:53:56   "Yes, there's going to be a small phone!" And you think, "Oh, there's all this discussion.

00:54:00   This is going to be the hot new thing, and everybody's going to buy this phone." And

00:54:05   And then you see these numbers and you realize maybe the world has moved on from small phones,

00:54:11   which is not an attack on the small phone itself or the people who want one.

00:54:18   It's just, don't be surprised.

00:54:21   Because a lot of people have moved on, a lot of people want bigger phones because their

00:54:25   phones are also their computers.

00:54:27   And so they want to watch movies, they want to play games and all of that.

00:54:31   And they want a long battery life as well.

00:54:33   So it doesn't shock me.

00:54:36   So my next question is, if these numbers are correct, do you think there will be another

00:54:43   Mini?

00:54:44   No.

00:54:46   You think it might be one and done?

00:54:47   iPhone 12 Mini and then iPhone 13 and there's three of them?

00:54:50   I think maybe you're gonna see one this year, again.

00:54:55   But that's gonna be it.

00:54:57   And we're gonna go back to getting the SE model every few years.

00:55:00   What do you think, Steven?

00:55:02   Yes, thank you John Voorhis who reached out in the private iMessage.

00:55:07   The expression I was looking for was inversely proportional to.

00:55:13   Thank you John. That is English.

00:55:16   He's an editor. One true John.

00:55:19   Very good English, thank you John.

00:55:21   One true John.

00:55:23   Man, that's a good expression. Thanks John.

00:55:25   So yeah, maybe this year we're gonna get the 13 mini.

00:55:28   12S mini.

00:55:30   12 that's 14 that's a name 12 straight to 14 they're gonna skip 13

00:55:37   iPhone 14 yeah, I don't think it would be a one-and-done. I could see Apple doing

00:55:43   Count what Federico is suggesting where the mini gets an update and then maybe next time they redesigned the case

00:55:50   They gets rid of it

00:55:52   You know whether that be two years from now or three years from now whenever it may be

00:55:57   there's maybe also a world where they do it this year and then

00:56:01   like the mini and the SE kind of get folded into the same thing and the I it just becomes the iPhone mini and

00:56:09   It is sort of a standalone thing and maybe they don't have to update it every year after that, but they sort of

00:56:15   somehow take the

00:56:17   more affordable phone and the small phone but with good tech and kind of

00:56:21   Merge them somehow because it is a little weird that they've got the SE 2 and the mini

00:56:27   and they they do compete pretty directly with each other at least for some

00:56:32   shoppers so I don't know I don't think it'll be a one-and-done but is this

00:56:37   gonna be a phone that we see from here on out is there going to be four new

00:56:41   iPhones every year if that number is true and that number is consistent

00:56:46   throughout the 12 minis lifecycle I don't know if Apple would keep that up

00:56:50   five percent is not a lot of percent no but it is five percent of a ginormous

00:56:55   And that's the balance. And so it is still a lot of phones but not percentage-wise.

00:57:00   So like I feel like 5% for me while it's small is as you say because of the

00:57:08   the absolute unit sales might make it worth it but I could imagine that they

00:57:14   may say kind of like what Federico suggested let's give it another go we'll

00:57:18   give it another year see what happens and then maybe we readjust what this

00:57:24   product is in the lineup. Like, we will still want to sell it, but maybe we don't want to

00:57:30   put the engineering effort in every year for one of these.

00:57:34   I think something else to consider here is anytime there's a new phone design, so like

00:57:39   with the iPhone X or now this cycle with the 12, people who are enthusiasts are always

00:57:47   more likely to upgrade, period. In a year, right? But especially in a year where there's

00:57:52   is a new design.

00:57:54   And I just have to imagine that people who see

00:57:58   the new design and say,

00:58:00   "Okay, I'm gonna upgrade my phone this year,

00:58:02   "even if I wouldn't have otherwise."

00:58:04   They may be the same consumers who are drawn

00:58:07   to something like the 12 Pro or the 12 Pro Max anyways.

00:58:12   And so I wonder if this were year two or year three

00:58:17   of the new hardware design,

00:58:19   would the Mini be accounting for a larger percentage

00:58:22   just because those people who jump on board early

00:58:25   with a new design are sort of filtered out.

00:58:27   I think part of this could be answered by the fact

00:58:30   that this is your January numbers

00:58:32   and the phone's been out for a couple of months,

00:58:33   but I can't help but think that it would rise naturally

00:58:36   over time as the enthusiasts kind of have what they want

00:58:40   and maybe people who don't upgrade as often,

00:58:44   who maybe still have a smaller phone,

00:58:45   maybe they're still on something like an iPhone 7 or 8

00:58:49   and they don't upgrade that often,

00:58:50   just buy a phone when there's breaks or when it dies or whatever and they move

00:58:53   to the 12 mini naturally over a longer period of time and so maybe your point

00:58:59   Myke is is give another year and see what it does maybe it could end up being

00:59:03   better for the mini year two or three in because of these other factors but again

00:59:09   it's depending on the fact that the non-enthusiast customer wants the small

00:59:14   phone and I don't know we don't know if that actually is true right I think it's

00:59:19   an assumption that's made but I can just as easily make it the inverse assumption

00:59:24   that like bigger phones seems like it's worth it to you you may already have a

00:59:28   phone which is large right like if you if you're coming from like an iPhone 6

00:59:33   the iPhone mini is physically smaller I mean you've lived with the iPhone 6 so

00:59:38   maybe you just want to get a 12 I don't know we'll find out in a couple of years

00:59:43   I guess if the iPhone mini still updated every year yeah if it goes away we know

00:59:48   would happen. You know and I think like the original iPhone SE the people

00:59:55   who have the mini are probably more likely to love their phone than people

00:59:58   who have the others. Maybe the max maybe it's on either end the mini and the max

01:00:02   and people in the middle maybe have slightly dampened feelings but I remember

01:00:07   with the original SE when people hold on to that forever it was an iPhone 6s

01:00:12   inside and people held on to it for a really long time because they were so in

01:00:15   love with the form factor.

01:00:17   And again, this is partially anecdotal

01:00:19   'cause my wife has a 12 mini.

01:00:21   She really loves it.

01:00:22   I think people who are attracted to small phones

01:00:24   and who want the size and portability,

01:00:27   like that's the most important thing to them, right?

01:00:29   And those other factors are maybe less important.

01:00:31   And so I would guess that people who have the mini

01:00:35   really love it and would be really sad

01:00:37   to see Apple get rid of it, but time does move on

01:00:41   and Apple has killed beloved products

01:00:43   many, many times before.

01:00:44   But I guess one of the main differences between the SE and the Mini is every time they've had an

01:00:49   SE the stories are always that they can't keep them in stock, right? That always the demand is

01:00:55   always too strong for the SE and that doesn't seem to have happened yet for the Mini. Well maybe if

01:01:01   they scale down production a little bit that would even out, I mean who knows? So that's a complicated

01:01:06   metric. Whatever it was, if this is the case, Apple thought it was going to do better than it has,

01:01:13   we would assume. Yes, I think we can agree on that. Yeah. Four iPhones is so many new phones, I mean,

01:01:19   it's bananas. I agree with the strategy, iPhones, like just do loads of them because it's how you

01:01:25   continue to grow it if that's what you want to do. You've got to start leaning into the niches,

01:01:31   but really there's only one niche that they're leaning into because people think the max is a

01:01:36   niche and it is not like you know I think it's about time people realize

01:01:42   that like there's a lot of thought like oh the max is big phone oh it's like

01:01:47   just for people that want big phones no no no like the max drives a lot of these

01:01:52   that like it's a big seller worldwide but it's like this blinkered view that

01:01:58   it's a niche phone when it's not it's the best one.

01:02:01   - Set the guy with the iPhone 12 Max.

01:02:03   - What do you think?

01:02:05   - Let's take an ad break.

01:02:06   - Yeah, there you go.

01:02:07   There we go, see he's done it again.

01:02:08   He's gonna edit that out again.

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01:04:07   Topic number two, Twitter subscription rumored.

01:04:11   What's going on here, Myke?

01:04:12   According to a report from Bloomberg, Twitter is continuing to consider a subscription product.

01:04:18   They've mentioned this before.

01:04:19   I think it was on a recent earnings call that they were looking into it.

01:04:23   there's also some job postings that came up and it seems like it's continuing.

01:04:27   There's an internal team at Twitter called Rogue One, which is the team that's looking

01:04:32   at the potential subscription options, according to this Bloomberg report.

01:04:38   And they've got a few different things that they're considering, but the reason that they're

01:04:41   doing this is kind of twofold.

01:04:44   Apparently it's to lessen the reliance on advertising going forward and also to combat

01:04:49   a slowing of new user growth.

01:04:52   these two things kind of go together. They can't make more money in advertising if they're

01:04:56   not bringing on enough new people. So there's five things that are listed in this article

01:05:03   that are being considered currently. One is tipping. So if Federico has a really good

01:05:10   tweet I could throw him $2 or whatever I guess. Like good tweet and then you give him a little

01:05:17   coin or something. Which would be nice. I wouldn't mind that. I could imagine the animations

01:05:22   being pretty cool, you know?

01:05:24   [laughter]

01:05:25   Right?

01:05:26   You know, like maybe you, it's kind of like, I think of like Twitch here, like imagine

01:05:29   you pay Twitter like $5 a month and you get a bunch of credits that you can then give

01:05:33   to Twitter users, like a Reddit Gold or whatever, right?

01:05:36   You could pay for exclusive content, so I don't know, something between like OnlyFans

01:05:42   and a newsletter.

01:05:43   I don't know.

01:05:44   [laughter]

01:05:45   That's some, that's some, some crossover of content.

01:05:48   You know, anything in between.

01:05:51   But it's like, I don't know, if you want my hot takes, you've got to give me $5 a month

01:05:55   for my hot takes.

01:05:57   You just get tepid takes.

01:05:59   All the hot takes are behind the pay wall, I suppose.

01:06:04   They're considering charging for TweetDeck, which just makes so much sense.

01:06:07   I don't know why they haven't done that already.

01:06:09   TweetDeck is very much a company-focused app, right?

01:06:15   It's like for social media managers.

01:06:16   I don't know why they haven't done that already.

01:06:19   called undo send which I literally have no idea what this means it's just

01:06:23   deleting like I don't know what undo send is as a option for people that give

01:06:28   you money I think it's just deleting which even in the official Twitter app

01:06:32   doesn't work super well like you can delete a tweet but it's still like cashed

01:06:37   for people who saw it already sometimes sometimes it's not so maybe it's just

01:06:41   making that better yeah maybe I could imagine this being this like hey it's

01:06:46   It's like the thing that, too terrific does this right?

01:06:50   Where like you can press undo and all it does is just delete the tweet that you just sent

01:06:55   and copy paste it back onto a new tweet window.

01:06:58   It's like a kind of a hacky way but it might do something like that.

01:07:01   And then enhanced profile customization, whatever that means.

01:07:05   Yeah, I want to make it like my Myspace page from 10 years ago.

01:07:09   Oh yeah, you could put your top 8 follows.

01:07:11   I want to do that, I want to put all kinds of crazy stuff up there.

01:07:15   Oh my god.

01:07:16   could go there music starts playing yeah confetti starts falling from the page

01:07:20   you've described my space like a geocities page of sorts also just my

01:07:25   space but Twitter yeah so good man my space was the one true social network

01:07:30   and it all started going to you know after that and it's like I remember I

01:07:35   remember this I think we spoke about on the show but I saw this as a meme once

01:07:38   and I loved it like Tom was just like the best founder he just sold out and

01:07:42   disappeared right like he didn't try and take over the world or anything he doesn't care he didn't

01:07:48   he didn't open a big campus you know with all kinds of facilities just cashed out retired i

01:07:55   think he's like he's a photographer now he doesn't care yeah takes pictures of at the beach of the

01:07:59   mountains so that's the life you're like i'm out this is this is terrible i'm off what have i done

01:08:07   So, we have this list of things. What would make you want to pay for Twitter?

01:08:13   Yeah, if I could mute specific kinds of people, like for example, people who interject when

01:08:23   they're not necessarily part of a conversation, or people who make fun of your music choices,

01:08:30   or people who have to ruin any good moment with a, well, actually, you know, like I,

01:08:38   like I don't want to have specific, like if I could mute certain attitudes, that would

01:08:44   be terrific. Like use some kind of natural language parsing or whatever, like mute certain

01:08:50   sentiments. You do some sentiment analysis on tweets and like, Hey, do you want to mute

01:08:55   angry people? Yes. You want to meet annoying people? Yes. Like that sort of thing. Is that

01:09:02   possible? Like can I have a filter for annoying people?

01:09:07   How would that work?

01:09:10   I mean, with machine, like I'm only half joking. Sentiment analysis is a real thing.

01:09:15   They have the quality filter, so you know.

01:09:18   They have the quality filter for like curse words and that kind of stuff. Like more generic

01:09:23   approach to, you know, I don't want folks who are gonna bother me in my

01:09:29   mentions or in my timeline. So I would say, in a similar vein, I would love like

01:09:36   mute filters or filters for tweets about a specific type of topic which doesn't

01:09:44   include hashtags, right? So like I could just be like "no Super Bowl" and it just

01:09:51   goes away, right? And, you know, it's not outside of the realm of possibility that

01:09:57   you could have a decent go at that, right? Like, you know, you wouldn't be

01:10:02   100% perfect, things would get caught up, things would slip through, but it's not

01:10:07   an impossibility to do something like this. Just like certain words that are

01:10:10   used or whatever, you know? So like it seems like something that is

01:10:14   theoretically possible. Sentiment analysis is a thing that exists and would

01:10:20   be of course tricky to implement but again not an impossibility. What would

01:10:25   make you pay for Twitter, Steven? I mean I would like an ad free experience in

01:10:30   the first party app but just be I'm fine with ads like it's not a big deal but

01:10:37   thinking through other things like yeah I would like to be able to support

01:10:40   creators or if I see something that I like or you know it's you see the thing

01:10:46   pretty often where like people have a GoFundMe or something like better

01:10:50   integration for that kind of stuff like that doesn't have to be paid but it's

01:10:54   like Twitter could do so much more. The thing that blows me away about Twitter

01:10:58   is they have the world's simplest social media network and they were the slowest

01:11:02   to make changes to it and I understand that they've got complicated problems I

01:11:07   mean they just kicked that guy off not too long ago but it just they seem so

01:11:12   afraid of changing their product in any way. Myke, you texted us the other day

01:11:17   that you, Twitter told you you'd been on the service for 14 years. Yeah. Imagine

01:11:23   what Facebook was 14 years ago. Well I know what it was, I don't think it

01:11:27   existed. Well like it was it was just for colleges or whatever point it was then.

01:11:33   Yeah I was on it whenever it rolled out to my university, right? Very simple and

01:11:38   very basic and it has basically nothing to do,

01:11:41   it was better, it was much better.

01:11:43   Basically nothing to do with what Facebook is now.

01:11:46   And Twitter just, they just talk about this stuff.

01:11:49   And I think if they offered a service

01:11:52   that combined some of these things,

01:11:54   I think some people would be interested in it.

01:11:56   I think especially like news organizations

01:11:59   and brands and that sort of thing.

01:12:02   Like, yeah, build more things on top of Twitter,

01:12:06   like TweetDeck or things like Buffer.

01:12:09   There's other services out there.

01:12:10   - There's also that newsletter thing

01:12:12   that they just bought, right?

01:12:13   - Yes.

01:12:14   - Review or something.

01:12:15   - Yeah.

01:12:16   - Yeah, implement that quickly and do it well

01:12:18   because Substack exists on the back of Twitter, right?

01:12:23   Like so many, like Twitter has these

01:12:27   just catastrophic failings where businesses

01:12:31   have supported themselves, like entire new industries

01:12:35   on the back of Twitter with things Twitter should have done, right?

01:12:40   Like Meerkat and then Periscope

01:12:44   and then Twitter just swept

01:12:48   like Meerkat's legs from under it and then couldn't capitalise.

01:12:52   Right. And it's like, I don't understand this.

01:12:56   These things happen like Substack is the one right now. Right.

01:12:59   Everyone's creating these newsletters and they exist

01:13:03   because people have Twitter followings and they promote their newsletter

01:13:07   and they promote clips and then like little screenshots of some of the

01:13:10   newsletter or whatever and then people sign up

01:13:12   and it's like this entire business exists and like has grown

01:13:20   from Twitter as a marketing tool but they should have done it

01:13:24   Twitter is text right like this should have been a thing they did

01:13:28   Here's a go!

01:13:29   [Clicking]

01:13:33   Up next, number six, iOS 14.5 and music services.

01:13:39   We're finishing on the most boring one.

01:13:41   The wheel has ruined everything.

01:13:44   Okay, so I assume I'm gonna be talking about this one.

01:13:49   This is all you, buddy.

01:13:51   The internet discovered a few days ago that in the latest, in the beta of iOS 14.5,

01:13:57   you can now set a different music streaming service, a different default

01:14:04   music streaming service on your device. It's kind of broken right now, it's

01:14:08   working for some, it's working for some apps. There's a few broken things that we

01:14:15   need to mention. So in iOS and iPadOS 14.5 you can now do things like playing

01:14:22   music via Spotify directly using Siri without having to say, for example, "in

01:14:28   Spotify" as an additional part of the command. And you can do this in a couple

01:14:35   of different ways. The way that I did it, which is not working for other people,

01:14:38   but it did for me, I said to Siri "change my music streaming service" and it let me

01:14:45   pick from a series of apps installed on my device. Now, it was kind of weird

01:14:50   because it brought up a list of music players as well as podcast clients. So

01:14:56   for example in the same list I had Spotify and Castro, YouTube, Amazon music

01:15:02   and Overcast. Like it was a whole collection of things. When you pick one

01:15:07   Siri will then say I need to access your Spotify data if I have to do this. You

01:15:13   confirm that and then once you confirm that you can ask for anything. So you can

01:15:17   search for songs, you can play playlists, you can play albums, you can shuffle playlists,

01:15:24   and it just works. And it defaults to Spotify or whatever music streaming service you pick,

01:15:29   and you don't have to say anything else. You just say "Play", for example, "Live Forever

01:15:33   by Oasis", and it takes that from Spotify and it plays music. Really well done. The

01:15:38   thing is, it is kind of weird right now, and it's beta 1, so I assume it's gonna get...

01:15:45   going to clarify how this works by the final release. There's no way to do this without

01:15:50   Siri. It's not like changing your default browser or your default email application

01:15:55   in iOS 14, where you go to a page in Settings and you say, "This is my music app," for example,

01:16:02   or "This is my podcast app." Right now, there's no page. You only do this with Siri. And it

01:16:07   seems that the way that it works is your default becomes whatever you pick and give back, like

01:16:14   the latest option, like the last option you choose, becomes your default. So then later

01:16:21   if you say "play", I don't know, what's a good bet, "My Chemical Romance on Apple Music",

01:16:27   then from that point on it's gonna default to Apple Music.

01:16:31   So then if you just say "play Kings of Leon", it's gonna be Apple Music, right?

01:16:35   But yes, so you can switch that with Siri, but there's no explicit way to go to settings

01:16:40   and say, "Let me choose either Spotify or Apple Music." So whatever your last request

01:16:46   is, for example, right now it's using Spotify for me. But then, if I say "Play Kings of

01:16:52   Leon on Apple Music," it's gonna switch, and then my next request is gonna default to Apple

01:16:57   Music. I think this is the way that it works right now. What's also kind of confusing is

01:17:03   that both music players and podcast apps come up in the list, however, those two things

01:17:09   are those two things are separate. I can also ask to play podcasts in Castro but

01:17:15   play music in Spotify. So I think Apple is combining this for obvious reasons

01:17:22   because Spotify has both music and podcasts and because both of these like

01:17:28   these applications they fall under the audio domain and the media domain so I

01:17:33   I get it, but you can split those.

01:17:36   And right now I'm using Castro

01:17:39   and you can request specific episodes

01:17:41   and you can request like play the latest episode

01:17:43   of Cortex, for example.

01:17:45   And for me, it defaults to Castro to do that now.

01:17:49   It's very cool.

01:17:50   - Now they never announced this, right?

01:17:52   Like this.

01:17:53   - And here's my sort of a theory,

01:17:55   but also like public discussion.

01:17:58   I wanna hear from developers or folks who know about this.

01:18:02   What I'm confused about right now is whether this is based on the same API that is available

01:18:09   on the HomePod for third-party music streaming services or not. My theory is that this is based

01:18:15   on standard, circuit media intents. On HomePod, there is an API for developers

01:18:23   to become a compatible third-party music streaming service, and that is an API that talks directly

01:18:31   to the music streaming service. Spotify is not part of that. Spotify, I believe at the moment,

01:18:38   cannot be set as a default option on the HomePod, but it can be set up in iOS 14.5 beta. So I think

01:18:47   the two technologies are different, like it's two different kinds of integrations. And what I think

01:18:54   is happening right now is, and I say this because Castro works the same way, it's using the existing

01:19:02   SiriKit support for media intents and it's simply letting you switch the default in Siri. So it's

01:19:10   taking an existing API of iOS and allowing you to change the default in iOS 14.5. The fact that once

01:19:20   Once you ask a few of these commands, you open the shortcuts app and you see Siri shortcuts

01:19:31   for those commands is another indication that it is based on this system.

01:19:36   So for example, right now if I open shortcuts and I search for Spotify, I'm going to see

01:19:41   a Siri shortcut for "Play my Discover Weekly," which is one of the commands that I asked

01:19:47   to Siri yesterday, and it's now a suggestion in the shortcuts app. So what I think is happening

01:19:53   here is Apple is taking the existing API that they launched in iOS 12 or 13 for circuit

01:20:02   media intents, and it's letting you change the default in Siri. What is also confusing

01:20:09   right now is certain commands, like for example if you ask Spotify to like a song or to add

01:20:20   a song to a playlist, it says Spotify hasn't added support for this feature yet. So it

01:20:26   seems very in the early stages. My interpretation of this is that the HomePod integration and

01:20:32   the iOS 14.5 integrations are different. I think it's all using the current

01:20:39   circuit media API for iOS and iPadOS and it's letting you change the default in a

01:20:45   kind of confusing way because you have to do this in Siri. There is no page in

01:20:49   settings to say Castro is my podcast player and Spotify is my music player.

01:20:55   You have to configure everything via voice, which makes sense, but also I wish

01:21:00   there was a more like official and visual way. Does it make sense what I described?

01:21:07   It's kind of confusing.

01:21:08   No, I get it. It seems that what's happening is it's using the surrogate system. And to

01:21:14   be on the HomePod, even if it is using the surrogate system, it's almost like CarPlay

01:21:19   where you have to get Apple to say, yes, you're allowed to do this, right? Like no one can

01:21:24   just rock up and be the default music provider on HomePod for whatever reason. They've made

01:21:30   this kind of thing where you have to be able to work directly with Apple to have access

01:21:36   to this where I believe SiriKit is just a thing that you can implement provided that

01:21:41   you're an app within one of the categories that's listed.

01:21:46   But the thing that is intriguing to me is like, so Apple announced two things over the

01:21:51   last year or so.

01:21:53   It was email and web browsers you could set as third parties and that you would be able

01:22:00   I have third parties on HomePod. But this idea of choosing your music service and podcast service

01:22:07   on the iPhone, I don't recall that ever being spoken about until now. And Apple isn't even

01:22:15   talking about it. People have just found it. This isn't in anything that 14.5 to this point

01:22:22   is even suggesting is a thing you can do, right? So it's intriguing here because it's like,

01:22:27   why is it happening now and what are they gonna do about it?

01:22:31   Like, what are they doing about it?

01:22:32   What is it for?

01:22:33   That's why I can't get my head around.

01:22:35   - The thing in the background of all this is antitrust,

01:22:38   right, like, oh, you can only use Apple's smart system

01:22:40   with Apple's media services.

01:22:43   And this has been a big complaint of Spotify and others.

01:22:46   I mean, if they just opened the door,

01:22:48   they announce it, or even if they don't announce it,

01:22:50   it takes pressure off from that angle.

01:22:54   I could see a world where Spotify doesn't announce it either though.

01:22:58   Like they, they like arguing with Apple,

01:23:00   but given that it already seems to work,

01:23:03   they've already done work for this to work.

01:23:05   I think it's just going to roll out into the world and someone will announce it

01:23:09   at some point and then people will be happy.

01:23:11   What I think is also interesting here.

01:23:13   This is actually something that I was trying to look for it.

01:23:17   I am 100% certain that we made this very specific argument on connected a couple

01:23:24   of years ago, where we said, "Wouldn't it be interesting if Apple allowed you to change

01:23:28   default apps, but only in the context of Siri? Like, change my default in Siri." And this

01:23:35   is what they're doing now with music players and podcast apps, right? But if you are using,

01:23:41   in fact, the existing SiriKit integration, and you're just changing the default, why

01:23:47   Why not do that for all the other SiriKit domains?

01:23:52   So Todoist, for example, it's using the Todo and List API.

01:23:58   Wouldn't it be nice if I could switch the default reminder application from reminders

01:24:03   to Todoist?

01:24:04   Similarly, for note-taking, there's a SiriKit domain for note-taking.

01:24:09   You could switch your default note-taking app from notes to, I don't know, craft or

01:24:13   something.

01:24:14   Once you do this for music and podcasts, and if you are in fact using that API, why not

01:24:21   do that for all the other circuit domains?

01:24:24   So what's so special about audio?

01:24:27   Exactly.

01:24:28   I mean, arguably it's going to be even easier to do that for like to-do apps and note-taking

01:24:35   apps.

01:24:36   There's fewer ramifications involved for those apps.

01:24:38   There's less libraries to get used to and all that kind of stuff.

01:24:42   And I mean, in this case Spotify, what you're doing is you're querying an application, you're

01:24:47   saying search for this song from this artist and then return the song. It's more complicated,

01:24:53   right? So I think at this point, if you're going to do that for music and podcasts, you

01:24:57   should do it for all kinds of circuit integrations from note-taking, to-do apps, what else is

01:25:06   there. Sending money, right? There's a SiriKit domain for payments. So you could change your

01:25:12   default from Apple Pay to Vemmo or something. Is there one for messaging? Yes, there is

01:25:17   one for messaging. So I wonder, like, has a lid been lifted here? And will we soon be

01:25:25   able to change all kinds of defaults in Siri? With SiriKit. It's interesting, we'll see.

01:25:31   Meanwhile, I also want to mention real quick something that Spotify is doing.

01:25:35   We talked about Spotify a few weeks ago regarding my switch from Apple Music, and I said that

01:25:41   the single feature that I miss the most from Apple Music is real-time lyrics, and it seems

01:25:47   like Spotify is finally rolling out this functionality.

01:25:51   It's been available in 20-something countries for a while, but not in any of the big markets,

01:25:57   and specifically not in the US.

01:25:59   So as of yesterday, Spotify has expanded its "limited beta test", as they call it, of

01:26:06   live lyrics to some users in the United States.

01:26:11   And this is kind of a strange story.

01:26:14   Spotify used to have a deal with an Italian company called Musix Match, that does real-time

01:26:19   lyrics a few years ago.

01:26:21   And real-time lyrics used to be available in Spotify on desktop, I believe, via... powered

01:26:28   by Music's Match. Then their deal expired, and now they have a new deal, and Music's

01:26:36   Match is going to power real-time lyrics in Spotify again, including on mobile devices.

01:26:43   So it looks, the way that it works on iOS and I assume on Android, you will get this

01:26:49   new UI in the Now Playing screen, and you will be able to swipe across from the Now

01:26:56   playing sort of from the cover art to the animated cover art, which is called Canvas

01:27:02   in Spotify. And the third tab will be lyrics. And these will be live, real-time lyrics,

01:27:10   sort of like in Apple Music, that follow the song you're listening to.

01:27:14   Turns out, Music's Match powers Apple Music's lyrics, they say on their website.

01:27:20   Not completely. I think Apple is also doing a lot of like in-house lyrics.

01:27:24   Right, but they're at least using their data. Instagram uses it. And hey Federico, MusicSmatch

01:27:29   is an Italian company.

01:27:30   I just told you that. It's an Italian company.

01:27:32   Sorry, I was reading it and must have mis- not heard you. I apologize.

01:27:34   It's based in Bologna. I know the founder. They're really good guys.

01:27:38   Wow.

01:27:39   Yes.

01:27:40   I was too busy looking it up and surprised.

01:27:42   It's one of the few Italian success stories that I really appreciate. Yeah. I absolutely

01:27:48   cannot wait for this. I don't have access to it yet, unfortunately, even though I have

01:27:53   my, you know, US account. And even though I try to log in with a VPN, set to Chicago,

01:28:00   pretending once again to be John Voorhees on the internet.

01:28:05   We've all been there.

01:28:08   We've all impersonated John once or twice.

01:28:10   Our music match works with everyone.

01:28:13   Yeah.

01:28:14   Huh. Cool company.

01:28:17   I think they also powered the deal when you like ripped a CD in iTunes and it pulled the

01:28:22   track listing. I think that was the same company. And there's a Music Smash app which you can use

01:28:28   right now for... but it's a standalone app. If you're listening to Spotify and you open Music

01:28:34   Smash on your phone, you will see the current Spotify song you're listening to. However,

01:28:39   it's kind of like... the Music Smash app is trying to do too many things at once. Like,

01:28:44   they have a social component and they have a crowdsourced lyrics component. Like, I don't

01:28:49   don't really care about any of that stuff, I just want to see real-time lyrics in my

01:28:52   music player, so I'm looking forward to getting this beta test eventually or the official

01:28:57   rollout. It's even like... if once they do this, all of my... the majority of my concerns

01:29:09   surrounding the switch from Apple Music to Spotify will be set aside, I think I'm really

01:29:15   really missing lyrics in my music player. So hopefully soon, hopefully this year.

01:29:22   I would like to read the list of founders, their names, because there's just a great

01:29:26   selection of names. Very beautiful Italian names. Massimo Ciocciola.

01:29:32   Ciocciola, yes, I know him.

01:29:36   Gianluca D'Elicari. Valero Paolini.

01:29:43   Francesco Delfino and Giuseppe Constantino. Giuseppe, not Giuseppe. Sorry, Giuseppe Constantino.

01:29:50   That's the most Italian sounding to me. Yeah, Giuseppe Constantino. It's very Italian sounding.

01:29:57   It's like he walked out of a sitcom or something. It's an incredibly Italian name. It's a very

01:30:02   Italian name. Constantino is a really good last name. What does it mean? Well, it's from

01:30:10   the Roman Emperor right that's what it means right it means I'm a Roman Emperor

01:30:17   well it means you're what's the the objective Imperial is that is that an

01:30:24   objective I don't know you're of Imperial descent I don't know it turns

01:30:28   out according to robot MLG in the discord iTunes used grace note I'm sorry

01:30:34   I was wrong yes Grayson the Grayson is it's match was founded in 2010 I didn't

01:30:39   to be the one to have to tell you that. You were just gonna leave me hanging out there for feedback

01:30:42   all week? It was too late at that point. I didn't have the answer either way but I assumed it wasn't

01:30:47   correct because it was 2010. You've yet to anger the listeners yet so I know you've got to work on

01:30:53   that in our final topic the barn burner topic. Let me spin the wheel and see what it says.

01:30:59   Don't spin the wheel there's no need to spin the wheel.

01:31:05   Number three! All right, topic number three. Apple has opened a repair extension program for a select

01:31:15   number of MacBook Pros with battery issues, which is a real bummer if you have one of these.

01:31:20   So these are 2016 and some 2017 MacBook Pros. The battery won't charge past one percent,

01:31:29   which is not enough of a percentage to have.

01:31:32   [LAUGHTER]

01:31:37   The battery will also report that service is recommended

01:31:41   in the battery when you borrow them.

01:31:43   Yeah, no kidding.

01:31:45   Yeah.

01:31:45   Wow.

01:31:47   The real smarts in that battery.

01:31:49   Does it actually not charge, or is it just reporting?

01:31:52   So here's what's weird about this, OK?

01:31:55   So I'm going to read a little bit from this page,

01:31:58   because trying to figure out what happened here

01:32:00   is difficult.

01:32:02   If your 2016 or 17 MacBook Pro exhibits these behaviors,

01:32:06   contact Apple to get your battery replaced free of charge.

01:32:10   Your computer will be examined prior to service

01:32:12   to verify it is eligible for the free battery replacement.

01:32:15   And normally what happens if you've paid for this

01:32:18   in the past and you go to Apple,

01:32:19   normally they'll waive it or figure something out.

01:32:23   Here's the next paragraph from Apple.

01:32:25   Apple has also released a macOS update

01:32:27   that prevents this issue from happening

01:32:29   to other 2016 and 17 MacBook Pro computers.

01:32:33   Please update to macOS Big Sur 11.2.1

01:32:38   or install the Catalina 10.15.7 supplemental update.

01:32:43   - So, wait.

01:32:44   - Yeah, so with software killing these batteries?

01:32:47   - How is that possible?

01:32:49   If it's happened to you, the only way to have it fixed

01:32:52   is to have the battery replaced.

01:32:54   - Right, but if you update,

01:32:56   it shouldn't happen to you in the future.

01:32:58   (laughing)

01:32:59   - What?

01:32:59   - I know for years Apple has done adaptive charging

01:33:02   on their batteries, so there's a little controller

01:33:04   that sits between the battery and the system and says,

01:33:07   this is the battery level in all the cells

01:33:11   and then it cuts off charging or reduces charging,

01:33:14   all these different things, right,

01:33:15   to try to protect battery life.

01:33:17   I think that came out in the first unibody,

01:33:19   like 17-inch MacBook Pro.

01:33:20   Whatever the first one was with the battery sealed in,

01:33:22   this was part of the trade-off.

01:33:24   So maybe something in macOS

01:33:27   or I guess it's got to be Mac OS or maybe firmware somehow

01:33:32   cooked a small percentage of these batteries

01:33:36   where the system won't let them charge past 1%

01:33:39   and then it's fixed in this.

01:33:42   But these machines, some of them are now five years old,

01:33:45   I'm like four and a half years old.

01:33:47   So like what happened that some of these batteries

01:33:52   got stuck with this problem?

01:33:55   It's very strange, very strange.

01:33:57   Just another thing to add on to these beloved computers.

01:34:01   Yeah, right.

01:34:02   It's like a footnote on a terrible era.

01:34:05   Get my head around...

01:34:06   I can't get my head around this.

01:34:07   What must have happened?

01:34:09   I guess it's not the battery that's the problem.

01:34:12   It's like the system can't read it.

01:34:14   And so it's just doing weird stuff.

01:34:16   Surely.

01:34:17   I don't understand it.

01:34:19   It's very weird.

01:34:21   I see this battery health thing a lot, or whatever they call it.

01:34:25   because I keep my mac pro plugged in a number of times so it's never charged.

01:34:29   Or it's like you see it on AirPods now too right where it's trying to like make sure that it doesn't

01:34:34   charge too much because even like little AirPods to make sure that the battery is lost. Yeah.

01:34:39   I think Apple has gone all in on that after those issues that they had with the battery stuff.

01:34:45   So I would say if you're running a machine that's covered by this and you're on Catalina or Big Sur

01:34:53   Go to software update and save your batteries life.

01:34:55   That's wild.

01:34:56   It really, really unusual.

01:34:58   One percent.

01:35:00   I mean, I'm sure it's terrible if you have this happen,

01:35:02   but it's kind of funny to think about what possibly went wrong.

01:35:06   If this has happened to you, you're listening as this happened to you.

01:35:10   I want to know, does like does the machine stay on, but stay at one percent?

01:35:14   For like an hour, right?

01:35:17   Or does it just die immediately? Yeah.

01:35:20   Right, like is it only charging 1% or does the system think it's only 1% so it won't

01:35:25   stop screaming at you but it will keep running?

01:35:27   I mean Apple says that the battery, an issue with the battery not charging past 1% so my

01:35:34   guess is it would just die very quickly.

01:35:36   Right it's not the indication it's the actual fact that it will not charge.

01:35:40   I bet it has something to do with that charging management they do.

01:35:45   But anyways, runs off for update.

01:35:47   we finish after that absolutely incredible end to the show. Thank you for disrupting

01:35:53   the order as you did. You've yet to take the pledge of angering listeners.

01:35:57   I'm a man of the people.

01:35:58   Well you're not going to do it. You're going to leave me and Federico just out there.

01:36:01   What should I say?

01:36:02   I don't know. You've got some kind of unpopular opinion.

01:36:06   Each of you give me several examples of things that could make people mad and I'll pick from

01:36:09   one of them.

01:36:10   Oh that's good. Yeah that's very smart. Yeah nice try. I can't believe you're just going

01:36:17   leave us. This is betrayal. Is it? Federico, do you feel betrayed? Yes. Do you see how sad he is?

01:36:25   That's Si. Of all people who could have betrayed me, you know, this one I was not expecting. Yeah,

01:36:33   it was your fiance. Babe. I forgot that you two got engaged during this episode. I'm already

01:36:42   texting my lawyer and filing for divorce and asking for a really, really chunky settlement.

01:36:52   You're only engaged!

01:36:53   All right, all right, you're gonna get, you're gonna get 18 power books is what you're gonna get.

01:36:57   Yeah.

01:36:58   Yeah, man, it would suck to get half of your estate.

01:37:01   I know you got your secret stash of cash in your home studio, Walter White.

01:37:07   I'm onto you, don't worry about it.

01:37:10   I'm gonna do my thing. So if you want to find links to stuff we spoke about, they are over on the website at relay.fm/connected/332.

01:37:19   While you're there, I'll just point out that there are some buttons at the top of the page where you can join

01:37:25   Connected Pro, which is an ad-free, longer version of the show each and every week.

01:37:30   And like all Relay FM memberships comes with a bunch of cool perks, including member-only podcasts

01:37:36   and access to our Discord, where a bunch of people are hanging out right now, just waiting

01:37:41   for you to show up. We're all waiting for you, dear listener, to join us. So join, become

01:37:46   a member of Connected Pro.

01:37:48   And you'll find out why Steven's going to be encased in ice for eternity.

01:37:53   That's right. That was the topic today.

01:37:55   And it's what we spoke about.

01:37:57   You can find us all out on the open internet. You can find Federico on Twitter @vitiicci,

01:38:04   he's the editor-in-chief of backstories.net. Federico, I have a question for you.

01:38:10   Okay.

01:38:11   If you were to be absorbed by Kirby, what power would Kirby gain?

01:38:18   This is not from your usual list of questions.

01:38:20   No, it's not. This is handcrafted.

01:38:23   Can you imagine if this was in the list?

01:38:26   What is my power? I think that's...

01:38:27   Yeah, did you say... Discord's picking this up. Did you say backstories?

01:38:31   [Music]

01:38:35   Editor-in-chief of backstories.net

01:38:38   of backstories.net

01:38:40   backstories

01:38:41   [Music]

01:38:45   I heard backstories and the Discord has

01:38:47   exploded into backstories

01:38:49   Say backstories?

01:38:50   I thought that it must have been a Skype

01:38:52   issue

01:38:53   What is backstories?

01:38:55   You said backstories!

01:38:57   It's actually a very good name for a

01:38:58   for like a website

01:39:00   that tells you the backstories of what we do. In any case, what would my power, like, what is my

01:39:06   power? So, Kirby, if it were to absorb me, would gain the power of... I don't know, what would it gain, like,

01:39:17   really good headphones? Or... Is that your power? No, I guess my... It would... I don't know, what is my power?

01:39:28   Kirby would start, you know,

01:39:30   completing all the levels of the video games via automation, maybe?

01:39:37   The power of automating things?

01:39:40   Or

01:39:42   The power of... Steven, it would gain the power of love.

01:39:47   That's the power Kirby would get from me.

01:39:51   Huey Lewis sang about.

01:39:52   Backstories.net is taken. That's a bummer.

01:39:54   I was gonna buy it and redirect it to John's Twitter account. Ian had a really good suggestion. Kirby would have a beard, tattoos, and he would be very passionate.

01:40:04   Very passionate.

01:40:05   Gain the power of passion. That's not love. It's passion, man.

01:40:08   It's passion.

01:40:09   Yes, I take back and I accept Ian's suggestion.

01:40:12   Passion of pics.

01:40:13   Beard, tattoos, and passion.

01:40:15   Passion pics.

01:40:16   Alright, that's good. You can find Myke on Twitter as @imyke. Myke is on Twitch doing

01:40:25   a bunch of keyboard stuff. Twitch.tv/mikehurley.

01:40:29   Yeah, Myke.live.

01:40:31   Myke.live.

01:40:32   Nice and easy.

01:40:33   Doesn't even sound like a website. But it is a website.

01:40:36   I know, but it is.

01:40:37   Myke.live. Myke hosts a bunch of other shows here on Relay FM as well, so go check out

01:40:42   all of those.

01:40:43   You can find me on Twitter and Twitch as ISMH.

01:40:46   Boo.

01:40:47   I'm booing you now.

01:40:48   Why are you booing me?

01:40:49   You betrayed us in this episode, so now I'm going to boo you through your entire talk

01:40:53   about yourself.

01:40:54   Federico, will you join me when he starts doing it again to boo him, please?

01:40:58   Yeah.

01:40:59   Carry on, Steven.

01:41:00   You can find me writing on phytophixles.net.

01:41:02   Boo.

01:41:03   Boo.

01:41:04   Boo.

01:41:05   Boo.

01:41:06   Boo.

01:41:07   Boo.

01:41:08   Boo.

01:41:09   Boo.

01:41:10   Boo.

01:41:11   Boo.

01:41:12   Boo.

01:41:13   Mutiny and you will see what what's happening here. Yeah with me and Myke. Yeah, we're done. We're tired of your misspelled mutiny

01:41:20   Yeah

01:41:28   Yes mutiny is a revolt among a group of people to oppose change or overthrow an organization to which they were previously loyal

01:41:36   That sounds about right. I'd like to thank our sponsors this week hover and Mack Weldon until next week

01:41:43   guys say goodbye. Adiós,