Connected

00:00:00 ◼   ► [Music]

00:00:08 ◼   ► Hello and welcome to Connected, episode 308. It is made possible by our sponsors

00:00:15 ◼   ► Pingdom and Mack Weldon. My name is Stephen Hackett and I'm joined by Mr.

00:00:20 ◼   ► Myke Hurley. Hello. Oh hi. Oh wait, wait. Hi Steven. Hey, so we're just gonna go right into that? I

00:00:33 ◼   ► think it's a good idea to do that. Okay, so our membership special for all Relay FM members,

00:00:41 ◼   ► I published it about two hours ago, and I'm just gonna play you a little trailer here. Hello,

00:00:48 ◼   ► Hello and welcome to Connected's 2020 Membership Special.

00:00:54 ◼   ► I hit the microphone for a third time.

00:00:57 ◼   ► I need to get better at that.

00:00:59 ◼   ► I am playing Pokemon Sword and I thought I would give you a tour of my new team.

00:01:07 ◼   ► An Apple Extended 2 keyboard.

00:01:12 ◼   ► (keyboard clicking)

00:01:14 ◼   ► Man, that was a real special time in my life editing that.

00:01:17 ◼   ► - How did it feel to edit it?

00:01:21 ◼   ► Did you feel anything?

00:01:23 ◼   ► - I don't ever feel anything.

00:01:24 ◼   ► No, I'm just kidding.

00:01:25 ◼   ► Really, no, Federico is very upsetting.

00:01:29 ◼   ► 'Cause he was very quiet.

00:01:33 ◼   ► I really struggled to get his loud enough

00:01:35 ◼   ► where you could hear it.

00:01:37 ◼   ► And his is quieter than ours in the episode.

00:01:39 ◼   ► Like I just did the best I could.

00:01:41 ◼   ► but it is spectacular.

00:01:44 ◼   ► So go check it out.

00:01:45 ◼   ► - What I think that that special show more than anything

00:01:48 ◼   ► is that we all are promising ASMR creators,

00:01:53 ◼   ► but have a lot of work left to do.

00:01:57 ◼   ► - Speak for yourself.

00:01:58 ◼   ► - To really, "Mm, no, you're a bit raspy.

00:02:01 ◼   ► "We all had our own problems.

00:02:03 ◼   ► "Federico was too quiet, you were too raspy,

00:02:05 ◼   ► "and I kept bumping the microphone."

00:02:07 ◼   ► - Yeah.

00:02:08 ◼   ► - So, you know, but like this is our first shot, you know?

00:02:10 ◼   ► But it was very fun.

00:02:12 ◼   ► I was sitting in my studio earlier

00:02:14 ◼   ► and Adina was listening to it

00:02:15 ◼   ► and I could just keep hearing her chuckle away.

00:02:17 ◼   ► So it's definitely worth it.

00:02:19 ◼   ► If you're a Relay FM member of any type,

00:02:21 ◼   ► where you're supporting any show

00:02:23 ◼   ► or just the standard membership,

00:02:24 ◼   ► you would get access to this.

00:02:25 ◼   ► It's all in the crossover feed,

00:02:27 ◼   ► which is where we put tons of wonderful content,

00:02:31 ◼   ► hundreds of hours of content in the crossover feed.

00:02:34 ◼   ► Now, if you are not sure how to get that feed

00:02:36 ◼   ► and you are a member,

00:02:38 ◼   ► there's a link in the show notes

00:02:39 ◼   ► called the Relay of Home crossover feed.

00:02:40 ◼   ► If you click that, it will take you straight

00:02:42 ◼   ► to the memberful page, log in and you can subscribe.

00:02:45 ◼   ► It's very easy to do.

00:02:47 ◼   ► If you want to become a Relay of Home member

00:02:48 ◼   ► and support this show, go to connectedpro.co

00:02:52 ◼   ► or getconnectedpro.co.

00:02:55 ◼   ► There's lots of wonderful domains for you

00:02:57 ◼   ► and you'll be able to get access to those member bonuses

00:03:00 ◼   ► as well as a special feed of this show,

00:03:03 ◼   ► which includes pre and post show content and no ads.

00:03:06 ◼   ► So it's a wonderful deal for just $5 a month.

00:03:09 ◼   ► I have some huge news.

00:03:10 ◼   ► - It's just, I am so bummed that Federico isn't here

00:03:14 ◼   ► right now because now I have to deal with this on my own.

00:03:17 ◼   ► - Oh, you mean the weight of congratulating me

00:03:20 ◼   ► is just on your shoulders.

00:03:21 ◼   ► - I don't know what you think

00:03:22 ◼   ► you're getting congratulated for.

00:03:24 ◼   ► - Apple has officially addressed and fixed #GreenGate.

00:03:29 ◼   ► So last week, actually right after we recorded,

00:03:35 ◼   ► like I really wish this had been breaking during the show

00:03:38 ◼   ► because I think that would have been really funny.

00:03:40 ◼   ► - It would have been better than me having to do with it now.

00:03:42 ◼   ► - Apple released iOS 13.6.1, also iPad OS 13.6.1.

00:03:47 ◼   ► Can we just, just as a side, can we just use iOS

00:03:52 ◼   ► as shorthand, meaning iOS and iPad OS?

00:03:54 ◼   ► It's so wordy to talk about these things now.

00:03:57 ◼   ► I find it very frustrating.

00:03:59 ◼   ► - Yeah, I think you can say iPad OS on its own,

00:04:04 ◼   ► but otherwise iOS applies to everything.

00:04:07 ◼   ► Yes, I think that is, I think I'm down with that.

00:04:12 ◼   ► - Yeah, but like, this is the problem though.

00:04:13 ◼   ► Like, we agree that that makes sense.

00:04:15 ◼   ► But then it's like a while ago,

00:04:16 ◼   ► me and Jason agreed that we would just say 13 inch iPad,

00:04:19 ◼   ► but you stopped doing it.

00:04:20 ◼   ► Like, you know, you just,

00:04:22 ◼   ► 'cause it's difficult to get the world

00:04:24 ◼   ► to come along with you, you know?

00:04:26 ◼   ► - Well, the world has come along with me.

00:04:27 ◼   ► So I broke this.

00:04:30 ◼   ► I mean, honestly, like the pandemic is small potatoes

00:04:32 ◼   ► compared to this issue with iOS.

00:04:34 ◼   ► - Oh my God.

00:04:35 ◼   ► some devices you would wake them up or in certain circumstances you'd have a

00:04:39 ◼   ► green tint to your display. I don't care. 13.6.1 fixed it. I have lots of

00:04:45 ◼   ► questions about this though so in the 9to5Mac article, according to Apple this

00:04:49 ◼   ► problem was caused by thermal management failure and is now fixed. Clearly this

00:04:54 ◼   ► was a thermal corner they could back themselves out of. This one was no problem.

00:05:00 ◼   ► Wow.

00:05:01 ◼   ► I could get right out of this corner.

00:05:03 ◼   ► So it's fixed.

00:05:07 ◼   ► You know, the year of Steven continues.

00:05:08 ◼   ► I feel like if you were having a thermal issue with the phone, other things would be happening

00:05:13 ◼   ► rather than just the screen going green.

00:05:15 ◼   ► I have so many questions.

00:05:16 ◼   ► Like did it only affect the screen or is that all they're talking about?

00:05:20 ◼   ► Why wasn't it every phone?

00:05:23 ◼   ► And how can you just fix it?

00:05:26 ◼   ► Like it's all very strange.

00:05:29 ◼   ► Honestly, I'm pleased it has been fixed so you will now never have to talk about it again

00:05:33 ◼   ► Well, I put it on my calendar as a repeating thing so we can talk about it next year

00:05:38 ◼   ► Why because I have his skate on there. I should have green gate on there, too

00:05:42 ◼   ► I feel like the hissing thing was a real thing the green thing not a thing like it's not like

00:05:49 ◼   ► You had like a million views on this podcast because you spoke about your screen going green. You don't know that

00:05:58 ◼   ► No, I do. I really do. Look, if every time we spoke about a screen going green and we

00:06:07 ◼   ► got a million listens to an episode, we would be breaking news left, right, and center,

00:06:11 ◼   ► my friend. We would be going for it. I would be talking about the fact that we'll call

00:06:17 ◼   ► it camera refresh gate, which is what I've been dealing with the last couple of weeks.

00:06:21 ◼   ► We would really go for it. We'd just create the absolute clickbait of podcasts, but that's

00:06:26 ◼   ► That's not how it works around here.

00:06:28 ◼   ► So yeah, I'm glad that I could help humanity through this.

00:06:33 ◼   ► It is the fall, Myke.

00:06:35 ◼   ► September is right around the corner.

00:06:37 ◼   ► September is National Childhood Cancer Awareness Month.

00:06:41 ◼   ► For the last several years, we've been taking this time to raise money for St. Jude Children's

00:06:45 ◼   ► Research Hospital, an institution that treats children with cancer and other life-threatening

00:06:50 ◼   ► diseases both here in Memphis and using their research all around the world.

00:06:55 ◼   ► We are really excited to announce our second annual podcast.

00:06:58 ◼   ► So if you missed this last year, it was it is a six hour live video show that we put

00:07:04 ◼   ► on so Myke and I host it.

00:07:06 ◼   ► We have a bunch of relay FM people doing segments are coming on and off.

00:07:10 ◼   ► We have some interviews with some St. Jude people.

00:07:12 ◼   ► A lot of fun stuff planned.

00:07:14 ◼   ► That is going to be Friday, September 18 from two to 8pm Eastern.

00:07:19 ◼   ► So mark that off on your calendar.

00:07:22 ◼   ► Six hours come hang out with us.

00:07:24 ◼   ► It'll be at twitch.tv/relayfm.

00:07:27 ◼   ► We'll be talking a lot about this and sharing links

00:07:30 ◼   ► leading up to that.

00:07:31 ◼   ► But that's a month off.

00:07:33 ◼   ► You're thinking, well, why are we talking about this now?

00:07:34 ◼   ► It's because our fundraising starts now.

00:07:37 ◼   ► And so if you go to stjude.org/relay,

00:07:41 ◼   ► you can donate to this awesome cause.

00:07:44 ◼   ► And what's amazing about it is all of the research

00:07:46 ◼   ► and the treatment and housing and meals,

00:07:50 ◼   ► everything is paid for by donations.

00:07:53 ◼   ► families never pay St. Jude a dime for their care.

00:07:56 ◼   ► I've got a son who's been a St. Jude patient now

00:07:59 ◼   ► since he was six months old,

00:08:00 ◼   ► and he's getting ready to be 12,

00:08:01 ◼   ► and we've never paid anything for his life-saving treatment,

00:08:05 ◼   ► which has included just countless things.

00:08:07 ◼   ► So it's really awesome.

00:08:09 ◼   ► We'd love you to join us

00:08:11 ◼   ► in supporting St. Jude again this year, stjude.org/relay.

00:08:16 ◼   ► - So we have a very, very large goal.

00:08:19 ◼   ► - Yes.

00:08:20 ◼   ► - So last year we started out,

00:08:22 ◼   ► we wanted to raise like $50,000 and we were all absolutely blown away.

00:08:27 ◼   ► By the end of the campaign, we raised $315,000.

00:08:32 ◼   ► Absolutely incredible.

00:08:33 ◼   ► Some research had been taken up by the wonderful people at AllSack, which is

00:08:38 ◼   ► the fundraiser now I'm seeing Jude and to their understanding, it was the

00:08:41 ◼   ► largest podcast related fundraiser in history, which is absolutely incredible.

00:08:46 ◼   ► And it's something that I and Steven and we're all so unbelievably proud of.

00:08:51 ◼   ► So we thought let's do it again, shall we?

00:08:53 ◼   ► We want to raise at least $315,000.

00:08:56 ◼   ► I know that's a lot of money.

00:08:57 ◼   ► It's a massive ask, but we believe in you,

00:09:00 ◼   ► the Relay of Home community,

00:09:02 ◼   ► that we can do this again together.

00:09:04 ◼   ► This is a difficult time for so many people, right?

00:09:07 ◼   ► Like, money is difficult.

00:09:10 ◼   ► Times are hard.

00:09:12 ◼   ► But institutions like St. Jude still need the money

00:09:16 ◼   ► to continue pushing their research

00:09:19 ◼   ► into curing childhood cancer, right?

00:09:22 ◼   ► Like they have done such incredible things

00:09:25 ◼   ► that have affected our lives personally,

00:09:28 ◼   ► and also the lives of countless individuals around the world.

00:09:33 ◼   ► I believe that the Relay FM community

00:09:35 ◼   ► can get to this level again.

00:09:38 ◼   ► I want you to prove me right.

00:09:39 ◼   ► So go to stjou.org/relay, donate whatever you can.

00:09:44 ◼   ► If your company does corporate fun, like charity matching,

00:09:49 ◼   ► How do people get in touch with us, Stephen?

00:09:51 ◼   ► Like, so if you can, if you donate and your company will also match, that's

00:09:55 ◼   ► like something that we can do, right?

00:09:57 ◼   ► So they email us.

00:09:58 ◼   ► Yes.

00:09:59 ◼   ► So if your employer will match, I need some sort of documentation of the amount

00:10:06 ◼   ► and you can send it directly to me, stephen@relay.fm and I'll make sure

00:10:11 ◼   ► that it gets added into the campaign.

00:10:13 ◼   ► So it's, um, that's really awesome.

00:10:15 ◼   ► It's awesome that companies do it.

00:10:16 ◼   ► Double your money, right?

00:10:18 ◼   ► So if you work for a large company,

00:10:20 ◼   ► they probably do some kind of corporate matching.

00:10:23 ◼   ► So if you want to donate and be so generous to donate,

00:10:26 ◼   ► you can also get your company to donate as well, right?

00:10:29 ◼   ► And that was something that really helped us

00:10:31 ◼   ► get to the level that we got to last year.

00:10:32 ◼   ► So seriously, this is so important to us.

00:10:36 ◼   ► And I really hope that you'll come along with us for this.

00:10:40 ◼   ► And you're going to hear a lot about it

00:10:41 ◼   ► because this is something that we want to continue doing.

00:10:45 ◼   ► So you're going to hear a lot about it now

00:10:46 ◼   ► throughout September and also we've changed all our artwork to gold because

00:10:51 ◼   ► that's the yellow gold what's the it's an actual name for the color it's like a

00:10:55 ◼   ► yellowy gold color yeah it's yellowy gold color yellowy gold is like the is

00:11:00 ◼   ► the color for childhood cancer awareness yes so from now and throughout the end

00:11:06 ◼   ► of September you'll be seeing that appear in lots of relay FM artwork so

00:11:12 ◼   ► yeah that's a thank you Myke thank you listeners it is an exciting time every

00:11:16 ◼   ► year to get to do this is very humbling so I'm excited to do a podcastathon.

00:11:20 ◼   ► I'm so excited for the podcastathon because last time we didn't really know

00:11:24 ◼   ► what it was gonna be right like all we knew is we were gonna be doing something

00:11:29 ◼   ► for six hours like leading up to it it was hard for us to talk about the

00:11:33 ◼   ► podcastathon because we'd never done one before but this time we know what it's

00:11:37 ◼   ► like because we've done one before and it is full of Japes full of guests it is

00:11:44 ◼   ► like your favorite podcasters putting on a telethon. Like that's what we thought

00:11:49 ◼   ► it was gonna be and that's what it ended up being and we have some really fun

00:11:53 ◼   ► things that we've learned from and that we're building on. It is gonna be an

00:11:57 ◼   ► absolutely fantastic time and I mean we've all got some more time at home

00:12:01 ◼   ► right so make sure you block off that calendar time on September 18th from 2

00:12:06 ◼   ► to 8 p.m. Eastern.

00:12:07 ◼   ► Should we get into some tiny topics?

00:12:10 ◼   ► Yes.

00:12:11 ◼   ► Do you remember last year when Apple opened up

00:12:14 ◼   ► the iPhone repair program,

00:12:16 ◼   ► so you could go into a bunch of like third party places

00:12:18 ◼   ► and get actual parts?

00:12:20 ◼   ► So that has been expanded to cover the Mac.

00:12:26 ◼   ► And so before this,

00:12:27 ◼   ► to get genuine Apple parts for your Mac,

00:12:30 ◼   ► you had to go to the Apple store

00:12:34 ◼   ► or an Apple authorized service provider,

00:12:36 ◼   ► which that's a difficult business to be in.

00:12:39 ◼   ► We talked about that before,

00:12:40 ◼   ► But this is a shift in this strategy.

00:12:43 ◼   ► So there will be more locations that you can

00:12:48 ◼   ► take your Mac into to have repairs done

00:12:51 ◼   ► with, again, genuine Apple parts.

00:12:53 ◼   ► So if you need a logic board or a video card

00:12:56 ◼   ► or whatever it may be, keyboard and top case,

00:12:59 ◼   ► more locations will be able to do it,

00:13:01 ◼   ► which is fantastic because in a lot of parts of the world,

00:13:04 ◼   ► there's not an Apple store nearby for a lot of people.

00:13:08 ◼   ► And so these smaller shops already exist.

00:13:12 ◼   ► They'll now be able to take part of this program as well.

00:13:14 ◼   ► And I'm glad to see that.

00:13:15 ◼   ► - I mean, it's a good thing to see them expanding

00:13:18 ◼   ► for a bunch of reasons.

00:13:19 ◼   ► I mean, especially right now,

00:13:20 ◼   ► it's good because it enables more small business owners

00:13:23 ◼   ► to be able to make money during the pandemic.

00:13:26 ◼   ► And it also takes the burden off of Apple

00:13:28 ◼   ► for not needing to have everybody come to their store.

00:13:30 ◼   ► Right?

00:13:31 ◼   ► Like it spreads people around a little bit, which is great.

00:13:34 ◼   ► Like let alone it being good for the fact that like

00:13:36 ◼   ► there aren't Apple stores everywhere.

00:13:38 ◼   ► There are service providers basically everywhere, right?

00:13:42 ◼   ► And especially where there aren't Apple stores,

00:13:44 ◼   ► the service providers do,

00:13:46 ◼   ► like they pop up and they do great work.

00:13:48 ◼   ► And now being able to have Macs taken into these companies

00:13:51 ◼   ► and these shops is even better.

00:13:53 ◼   ► - Yep.

00:13:54 ◼   ► - Beats One is no longer always on worldwide.

00:13:57 ◼   ► - Oh no, what happened?

00:13:59 ◼   ► - They shut it down, they've rebranded it.

00:14:01 ◼   ► Beats One is now Apple Music One.

00:14:04 ◼   ► for this part it's basically they've basically rebranded it uh apple music one is just what

00:14:08 ◼   ► beats one was so it's like a radio show with radio shows inside of it so it's like not all radio

00:14:14 ◼   ► networks or stations are like this where they'll have a dj that plays tracks but then also have

00:14:21 ◼   ► guest djs come in and talk and like this is a very british radio thing i don't know if this is a thing

00:14:27 ◼   ► that happens on american radio where you'll have like such and such person has their radio show and

00:14:33 ◼   ► and it's on at this time every week.

00:14:35 ◼   ► Basically, it's a podcast with music, right?

00:14:38 ◼   ► That's pretty much what they're like.

00:14:40 ◼   ► So they're keeping what they had going

00:14:42 ◼   ► and adding in new shows.

00:14:44 ◼   ► They rotate the people out, so they'll have like,

00:14:47 ◼   ► they have mainstays, people like Elton John has had,

00:14:50 ◼   ► like Elton John showing on Beats 1

00:14:52 ◼   ► and Apple Music 1 has been around for ages,

00:14:54 ◼   ► but they're adding lots of new people in now.

00:14:56 ◼   ► Haim, Nile Rodgers, and Lady Gaga are coming in

00:14:59 ◼   ► to host their own shows for a bit, and some people,

00:15:02 ◼   ► like it's like a rotating cast of characters. I know that Billie Eilish has a popular show

00:15:07 ◼   ► as well, Apple's favorite artist, Billie Eilish.

00:15:10 ◼   ► They invented awards just to give her.

00:15:13 ◼   ► Exactly, just to give Billie Eilish. They're doing that stuff, that's the same. Apple's

00:15:19 ◼   ► also introduced some new stations, so there's Apple Music Hits, which plays top songs from

00:15:24 ◼   ► the 80s, 90s, and noughties. Is that good? I wish I hadn't said that now. Noughties?

00:15:30 ◼   ► There isn't a good phrase for it, right?

00:15:32 ◼   ► Yeah, 'cause "oughts" is bad too.

00:15:33 ◼   ► I don't like "oughts" 'cause...

00:15:35 ◼   ► Would you say that the hit station really slaps?

00:15:37 ◼   ► You're getting closer to understanding what that phrase means.

00:15:41 ◼   ► Like, you're nearly there.

00:15:44 ◼   ► It's good.

00:15:45 ◼   ► So Stephen keeps saying "slaps" to us.

00:15:48 ◼   ► This is just like his thing at the moment, is that for some reason the phrase that Stephen's

00:15:52 ◼   ► picked up in his life.

00:15:53 ◼   ► Where did you get that one from, do you think?

00:15:56 ◼   ► The kids.

00:15:57 ◼   ► Not my kids, just youth out in the world.

00:15:59 ◼   ► Yeah, you're getting closer to nailing that one.

00:16:04 ◼   ► So as well as the music, which that hit station actually does sound like fun to me.

00:16:09 ◼   ► Like the top hits from those decades, I think I would enjoy that.

00:16:13 ◼   ► And Apple Music Country as well, playing new and classic country songs.

00:16:18 ◼   ► So these are the new stations coming in.

00:16:20 ◼   ► This feels like the beginning of the end of the Beats brand.

00:16:22 ◼   ► And it's a thing that everyone, not everyone, it's a thing that lots of people have been

00:16:24 ◼   ► debating for a while.

00:16:26 ◼   ► I mean, at some point I don't believe that the Beats brand will exist.

00:16:31 ◼   ► I don't know how long it's going to be until that happens, but I feel like this is the

00:16:37 ◼   ► start of that going away, right?

00:16:40 ◼   ► I think so, at least on this content side.

00:16:44 ◼   ► What do you think about the hardware side though?

00:16:46 ◼   ► Eventually, yes.

00:16:49 ◼   ► It seems to me that they're going to scrub it of Apple Music stuff and then the headphones

00:16:55 ◼   ► will kind of, over time, slowly transition. I think it makes sense. I think it's confusing

00:17:03 ◼   ► to people who don't know the history that some Apple Music features are called Beats

00:17:07 ◼   ► and branded that way and others aren't. And I think that Apple Music is a pretty strong

00:17:13 ◼   ► brand, right? It's easy to remember, you just know what it is, you don't have to search

00:17:18 ◼   ► for it, like it's just Apple Music, right? So I think it makes sense to bring all that

00:17:22 ◼   ► into the fold.

00:17:23 ◼   ► Yeah, just to mention in case people had forgotten or didn't know, Apple bought Beats, right?

00:17:30 ◼   ► And not only did they get the headphones, they also picked up a music streaming service

00:17:35 ◼   ► called Beats Music, which was the streaming service that me and Federico were using at

00:17:40 ◼   ► the time and were very happy with.

00:17:42 ◼   ► Apple bought that and they were doing human curation and all that kind of stuff and rolled

00:17:48 ◼   ► a lot of that up into what would become Apple Music, including hiring Jimmy Iovine, Dr. Dre.

00:17:56 ◼   ► It was a very peculiar $3 billion acquisition because there were so many ramifications from

00:18:02 ◼   ► it.

00:18:03 ◼   ► Originally, people were buying their headphones, but then Apple, and it kind of made sense

00:18:07 ◼   ► at the time, yeah, they got the headphones, but they were kind of buying their way into

00:18:10 ◼   ► the music streaming service, which ultimately was and has become more important for Apple

00:18:16 ◼   ► than the Beats headphone brand because they've created their own headphone brand which is

00:18:24 ◼   ► not really arguably but is more important now. AirPods in the cultural significance

00:18:29 ◼   ► are much greater than Beats which is probably another reason why over time it is likely

00:18:35 ◼   ► that they will phase out the Beats brand as the AirPods brand continues to rise especially

00:18:41 ◼   ► if they do do what we think they're going to do and release all kinds of air pods, right?

00:18:47 ◼   ► Like a cheaper model, a sport model, and over the ear model, which is what is rumoured to

00:18:53 ◼   ► be the case. At that point, I mean...

00:18:57 ◼   ► Yeah, why would you keep both of them, you know?

00:19:00 ◼   ► Why would you keep them? You don't need them at that point.

00:19:01 ◼   ► I mean, Beats does have an angle to it that, like, there is a Beats sound, and a lot of

00:19:06 ◼   ► people like that sound and it's kind of what a lot of people equate with the

00:19:10 ◼   ► brand and Apple's done a pretty good job at diluting that over time I think I

00:19:15 ◼   ► think there was a time where beats all sounded a very specific way and now

00:19:19 ◼   ► there's you know like more true sound sounding beats yeah I mean like as you

00:19:24 ◼   ► say that is definitely sound people like and I mean I had a pair of Beats headphones

00:19:28 ◼   ► and I liked the bass-y sound personally like I don't consider myself like a

00:19:31 ◼   ► headphone connoisseur but like what I've found over time from the youtubers that

00:19:37 ◼   ► I watch is that they all think that Beats are getting better and I think

00:19:40 ◼   ► what it means is they're just neutralizing that sound turning down the

00:19:44 ◼   ► bass yeah but you know I think ultimately like the Beats brand was

00:19:49 ◼   ► always a weird fit for Apple marketing wise the Beats brand has kind of

00:19:53 ◼   ► continued to do its own thing quite a lot yeah and that you know and that's

00:19:58 ◼   ► fine but if they don't need to keep it going to have a successful headphone business I

00:20:04 ◼   ► don't know why you would do it.

00:20:05 ◼   ► If someone just walks into a Best Buy to buy a pair of headphones like do they even know

00:20:09 ◼   ► Beats is owned by Apple?

00:20:11 ◼   ► Absolutely not.

00:20:12 ◼   ► Yeah a lot of consumers have no idea.

00:20:14 ◼   ► Because Apple have been pretty fair right in the sense that they didn't with most of

00:20:19 ◼   ► the existing Beats lines they didn't really like make them Apple products.

00:20:24 ◼   ► over time have started to do that right with like the newer ones that used

00:20:28 ◼   ► Apple's chips in them right and like but they still work fine same as AirPods

00:20:33 ◼   ► with Android devices so. One other thing I noticed in this sort of announcement

00:20:38 ◼   ► from Apple is that Apple Music has its own boilerplate press release copy which

00:20:45 ◼   ► only I care about because I have this blog post I've updated now for six years

00:20:48 ◼   ► anytime Apple changes this you know is it the bit at the bottom right like we

00:20:52 ◼   ► made the Mac and the iPad's really cool and we want to make the world a better

00:20:55 ◼   ► place you know that sort of text and Apple Music has its own I thought that

00:20:59 ◼   ► was interesting a bunch of people sent it to me so and it's um it's got the

00:21:03 ◼   ► iPod in it twice actually. Do they still don't sell iPhones anymore right they're

00:21:08 ◼   ► all gone. iPod touch is still. Touch. Oh the iPod touch. Music. iPod touch. There it is.

00:21:15 ◼   ► $199. Yeah I've got one I've got one of the current ones. I wouldn't you know I

00:21:21 ◼   ► I would have expected that.

00:21:22 ◼   ► Yeah, well, it's our it's our playlist

00:21:25 ◼   ► iPod when we do live shows.

00:21:27 ◼   ► And I thought we're going to do a lot of live shows in 2020.

00:21:29 ◼   ► Better make sure I have an iPod touch that can do it.

00:21:31 ◼   ► I think it's gathering dust.

00:21:33 ◼   ► Yep. This episode of Connected is brought to you by Pingdom.

00:21:38 ◼   ► Myke, do you have a website?

00:21:40 ◼   ► What? Yeah. Cool.

00:21:42 ◼   ► That website probably has a bunch of stuff on it, right?

00:21:44 ◼   ► Like people clicking play on MP3s and clicking links to email us.

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00:22:52 ◼   ► - Beta 5 came out of iOS 14.

00:22:58 ◼   ► There's a few changes.

00:22:59 ◼   ► I mean, honestly, a couple of things surprising to me

00:23:03 ◼   ► considering where we are in the beta cycle.

00:23:05 ◼   ► The biggest one is the date picker.

00:23:07 ◼   ► They've made quite a serious revision,

00:23:09 ◼   ► I think, to the date picker.

00:23:11 ◼   ► So if you remember, the old date picker, time picker,

00:23:14 ◼   ► would be like this slot machine wheel roll around.

00:23:18 ◼   ► One of the old vestiges of iOS design that stuck around for a long time, and it's kind

00:23:24 ◼   ► of one of those things that until you think about it, you forget.

00:23:28 ◼   ► You know, it's like, "Oh yeah, that doesn't fit anymore."

00:23:32 ◼   ► Like visually, it doesn't really fit with what the rest of iOS is doing.

00:23:37 ◼   ► So they changed it to what I think is a vastly superior date/time picker, where it's a calendar

00:23:43 ◼   ► and you can type in the time.

00:23:45 ◼   ► But understandably some people don't want to type in the time all the time.

00:23:49 ◼   ► And I've had it as well where it's like I only want to move this by an hour based on

00:23:52 ◼   ► the default and I have to type it all in again.

00:23:54 ◼   ► What I've added is kind of an interesting feature where now you have the little time

00:24:01 ◼   ► there in the box and it looks like you can type it in, which you can, but you can also

00:24:05 ◼   ► swipe up and down on it to adjust by hour or minute.

00:24:09 ◼   ► So it's basically doing what the old roller, rolling wheel style would do, but just on

00:24:15 ◼   ► text.

00:24:16 ◼   ► I've seen a lot of people say it's undiscoverable and I understand that, but you know, I think

00:24:22 ◼   ► it's fine because it's something that I would use every now and then, but I do think that

00:24:26 ◼   ► really just typing in the time that you're wanting is a better and faster way of getting

00:24:32 ◼   ► things done with more precision.

00:24:34 ◼   ► Yeah I like it they've...

00:24:35 ◼   ► But I'm surprised to see that.

00:24:36 ◼   ► I'm surprised to see them make a change like this, this light.

00:24:39 ◼   ► Me too.

00:24:40 ◼   ► I was really surprised to see it, but it means they're still listening to feedback.

00:24:44 ◼   ► And honestly, I like the addition of it back because I like the swipey thing in some instances.

00:24:52 ◼   ► If you're just one or two days off, like in the calendar, the swipey thing's really fast.

00:24:57 ◼   ► And if I'm way off, then I get to use the keyboard.

00:25:00 ◼   ► So I think having them both is a good move.

00:25:03 ◼   ► Yeah.

00:25:04 ◼   ► Lots of bugs that I was having seemed to have been resolved

00:25:08 ◼   ► My camera can now take pictures again without refreshing a billion times. That's really good

00:25:15 ◼   ► That's good. And one thing that I was having I've seen lots of people have different keyboard issues

00:25:19 ◼   ► so like I have some shortcuts that I run say from the the today view right and

00:25:24 ◼   ► They require text entry. So I was having this thing where I start typing the keyboard would go away

00:25:30 ◼   ► Yeah, and I'd have to select the text cut the text cancel the shortcut run the shortcut again paste the text finish

00:25:37 ◼   ► What I was writing in that seems to have been fixed to which is great

00:25:40 ◼   ► So far, I mean this has only been out for a day

00:25:43 ◼   ► But this beta is already a billion times better than pay for because that that it got rough

00:25:49 ◼   ► I was having that keyboard issue in the share sheet

00:25:51 ◼   ► So I go to share a tweet and I want to text

00:25:54 ◼   ► You know kind of like a comment about it and the keyboard would disappear after like 10 keystrokes

00:25:58 ◼   ► And so I sent a bunch of texts that were like stopped halfway through the word and then just picked it up where it left off

00:26:04 ◼   ► so yeah that they've

00:26:06 ◼   ► They've obviously broken some things and now it's better. So so far beta 5 feels great

00:26:11 ◼   ► I mean, I've been on the beta train for a while on my phone and

00:26:14 ◼   ► So far this feels honestly like the best build which is what you would hope as we get closer to

00:26:21 ◼   ► Whenever this thing comes out. Well, I mean closer, but we don't know how close there's another

00:26:27 ◼   ► widget added an Apple widget. It's an Apple news widget, but this one's really weird. It is a custom size

00:26:33 ◼   ► So it's larger than any other widget. It is a size that nobody else can or does use

00:26:39 ◼   ► And it only shows in the old widgets area in the today view. It can't be placed on the home screen

00:26:45 ◼   ► Which is very strange

00:26:48 ◼   ► yeah, I'm

00:26:50 ◼   ► Putting it on on my phone now and it's massive. It's massive. Yeah

00:26:56 ◼   ► Well basically you know what I think this is? It's just Apple replacing the old widget.

00:27:03 ◼   ► But they want it to be in the new widget view and not relegated to the old widgets that

00:27:09 ◼   ► live down below. You know like the ones that have been deprecated basically. I don't know

00:27:16 ◼   ► why they couldn't have just put this in the large style. I don't know why they had to

00:27:20 ◼   ► create a completely unique size of widget but there you go.

00:27:25 ◼   ► I saw you saying something today, I think it was in Slack, which I liked the thought

00:27:30 ◼   ► of, which was maybe at some point in the future having an even smaller widget.

00:27:34 ◼   ► Yeah, because right now you have small, medium, and large, and you can have two small ones

00:27:40 ◼   ► side by side, and I think they take up the vertical space of roughly two app icons.

00:27:47 ◼   ► So the small widget size takes up roughly the space of four app icons on your home screen.

00:27:52 ◼   ► I think that's just too big for a lot of stuff.

00:27:55 ◼   ► If I've got a widget that just shows sunrise or sunset or just shows me the temperature,

00:27:59 ◼   ► it'd be nice to have a compact one that I think is one tall but two wide so you could

00:28:06 ◼   ► have some text or maybe even that scrolling text or something.

00:28:09 ◼   ► I would really like that compact size.

00:28:12 ◼   ► You could get a nice stock ticker in there for all of your stocks.

00:28:14 ◼   ► That's right.

00:28:15 ◼   ► Apple is worth $2 trillion a day so I could keep up with that.

00:28:20 ◼   ► I would just like to see that because on my today view, you know, I'm trying some widgets

00:28:25 ◼   ► out from various developers and like this list is getting really long, even with a bunch

00:28:30 ◼   ► of small ones.

00:28:31 ◼   ► Yeah, I don't really like the small widget that much.

00:28:35 ◼   ► The widgets that I've been using, I tend to use the medium one, but maybe I just haven't

00:28:38 ◼   ► had a lot of like really good examples of it for now.

00:28:43 ◼   ► The shortcuts one is the funniest one to me.

00:28:46 ◼   ► The small shortcuts one, which is just one shortcut.

00:28:48 ◼   ► Yeah, the most important shortcut.

00:28:50 ◼   ► You know, it's like here's one shortcut.

00:28:52 ◼   ► It takes four app icons.

00:28:55 ◼   ► Go wild.

00:28:56 ◼   ► Like you'd be better off just using like the medium one and taking up more space but fitting

00:29:01 ◼   ► more shortcuts in there.

00:29:02 ◼   ► Like it's a very strange one for me personally.

00:29:06 ◼   ► I am wondering now if I'm getting towards the time to put this on the 12.9 iPad Pro.

00:29:15 ◼   ► my machine still on 13. Kind of around this time, beta 5, beta 6, that's when I would

00:29:22 ◼   ► go all in and I'm thinking now might be getting to the time. You know, I have it on my 11

00:29:28 ◼   ► which I use quite a lot and I have it on my iPhone so I'm thinking it might be time now.

00:29:33 ◼   ► Because I'm realizing there are like things I'm getting used to and it's then becoming

00:29:38 ◼   ► frustrating to not have access to those. Like a lot of the new, the compact UI shortcut

00:29:43 ◼   ► stuff and getting really used to that and like it a lot.

00:29:47 ◼   ► Especially for some of the shortcuts that I'm using to like, you know, like if you're

00:29:50 ◼   ► entering text or something into a shortcut, it's really nice to just do it without having

00:29:54 ◼   ► to open the shortcuts app.

00:29:57 ◼   ► So you know, the stuff that I'm getting really getting used to that I think I would like

00:30:01 ◼   ► to be able to have more access to, but I still remain like excited about the shipping version

00:30:08 ◼   ► of iOS.

00:30:09 ◼   ► It's still features that I really want to try like the AirPods stuff

00:30:12 ◼   ► You know the fast switching and the spatial audio and stuff like that like I'm really excited about trying those features out

00:30:20 ◼   ► So there's still stuff there that I that I wanna that I want to try out

00:30:24 ◼   ► So we'll see you have a note in here. That is very concerning. Yeah

00:30:28 ◼   ► So I don't have a case on my iPhone right? Yeah boy, so I was using a

00:30:35 ◼   ► Pop socket auto box case

00:30:38 ◼   ► which I liked quite a lot, it was for my iPhone, it was the one that Apple sells

00:30:45 ◼   ► directly I think it was called Figura Pop and it had like a pop socket mount

00:30:53 ◼   ► built into the case so you could swap out your pop socket. Over time the case

00:30:58 ◼   ► started to like warp and was becoming like loose not so much that it was an

00:31:05 ◼   ► issue but I could see that like it wasn't completely conformed to the phone

00:31:10 ◼   ► anymore around the edges right and like if I looked at the back where the camera

00:31:15 ◼   ► was the top left hand corner gave it was like had a gap right like it wasn't

00:31:20 ◼   ► flush to the camera anymore like it started to warp yeah your phone would

00:31:24 ◼   ► just like shimmy out of that yeah maybe it would rattle around or like you could

00:31:29 ◼   ► squeeze it I don't know it wasn't just not right like it wasn't right it wasn't

00:31:33 ◼   ► great. You know, but it was fine. But then I kind of got frustrated with it and I

00:31:40 ◼   ► was popping it in and out and then you know when like I've done this with Apple

00:31:45 ◼   ► Silicon cases before the Apple one or like you can get this with other stuff.

00:31:49 ◼   ► It's something like it starts to break or starts to like say like the corner of

00:31:54 ◼   ► something comes up and you just start kind of like picking at it a little bit

00:31:57 ◼   ► and then two hours later you've peeled something completely off. You know what

00:32:02 ◼   ► I'm saying like a sticker starts to come up from a piece of technology and then you can't help but pull the sticker off

00:32:09 ◼   ► Basically did this with my case where I ended up just destroying it

00:32:13 ◼   ► Anyway, so that case is gone. So I am now without a case on my 11 Pro Max

00:32:20 ◼   ► I have a pop socket stuck to the back of it. It feels so good. I love it. It feels so good

00:32:25 ◼   ► It feels really thin

00:32:27 ◼   ► I like the texture of the glass. I

00:32:31 ◼   ► I like the texture of the rails that go around the phone.

00:32:37 ◼   ► It makes my phone feel a little bit more futuristic and I have the green one and I like to look

00:32:42 ◼   ► at it.

00:32:43 ◼   ► I am terrified I'm going to break it.

00:32:47 ◼   ► But I figure...

00:32:48 ◼   ► That's the phone I bought you last year for the Podcastathon.

00:32:50 ◼   ► You say it like, "I paid for it, but you arranged it."

00:32:55 ◼   ► I mean the company paid for it, so...

00:32:57 ◼   ► That means I paid for it.

00:32:59 ◼   ► Wow.

00:33:00 ◼   ► Did you get one?

00:33:01 ◼   ► Right, so that's half and half I paid for it.

00:33:03 ◼   ► Right? Like, you know, alright, I paid for half of mine and half of yours.

00:33:07 ◼   ► Yours is the max. You got a better deal than I did.

00:33:09 ◼   ► Yours is more expensive.

00:33:11 ◼   ► You could have done whatever you wanted. You were the one procuring these devices.

00:33:14 ◼   ► That's right.

00:33:15 ◼   ► But anyway, so I, it feels very dangerous to have a phone without a case on it.

00:33:21 ◼   ► But there was also this part of me that was thinking, the iPhone 12 is rumored to have

00:33:27 ◼   ► this like really cool new design with flat sides and all that kind of stuff it

00:33:31 ◼   ► feels like that phone shouldn't have a case on it maybe. I choose to believe

00:33:36 ◼   ► until I'm proven otherwise that the iPhone 12 is like a modern take on the

00:33:40 ◼   ► iPhone 4 like sign me up for that because that phone still feels awesome

00:33:45 ◼   ► in the hand. So I'm going I'm gonna plan on having no case on this phone now for

00:33:53 ◼   ► as long as it's in my possession and I will plan to not get a case from will not

00:34:00 ◼   ► use a case on my new phone I will buy one depending on what's available just

00:34:05 ◼   ► so I have one in case I change my mind right because I don't want to be like oh

00:34:08 ◼   ► no this phone definitely needs a case and then all the cases like six weeks

00:34:12 ◼   ► back ordered at that point yeah but you know I was also thinking you know I was

00:34:17 ◼   ► in the back of a taxi yesterday and I was thinking to myself I don't know why

00:34:20 ◼   ► I was thinking this, do I still want a phone as big as this one?

00:34:23 ◼   ► I feel like I'm going through a lot of changes, you know, but like just

00:34:27 ◼   ► considering there's going to be so many options in phone size this year,

00:34:31 ◼   ► I'm basically not necessarily signing myself up to getting the biggest phone.

00:34:36 ◼   ► Right.

00:34:37 ◼   ► Um, so I, I basically just like, I want to wait and see what Apple has

00:34:43 ◼   ► available before just blindly saying, I'm going to go for the Pro Max.

00:34:49 ◼   ► Like, probably it will be what I end up going for, but I just want to say that the jury

00:34:55 ◼   ► is out on that one.

00:34:57 ◼   ► Because I was remembering, like, what made me think about the iPhone X.

00:35:02 ◼   ► It wasn't the biggest phone.

00:35:04 ◼   ► It was the only phone that we had that was available to us, right?

00:35:07 ◼   ► Like, it wasn't the biggest.

00:35:08 ◼   ► Right, the 8 Plus was a little bit bigger, but it was the only Face ID phone.

00:35:13 ◼   ► Yeah, I don't remember how the screen size thing ended up working out, but nevertheless,

00:35:18 ◼   ► I was fine with that so I don't know like to be honest like I feel like I'm

00:35:23 ◼   ► probably will never be able to let go of what do we call it like Pro Club Max

00:35:30 ◼   ► Max the Pro Max gang gang plus Club but I'm basically just allowing for myself

00:35:39 ◼   ► to rethink that a little bit yeah the the standard size Pro is what I've had

00:35:45 ◼   ► you know I tried the 10s max and it wasn't for me and it went to a family

00:35:48 ◼   ► member but I I like the iPhone 10 size and it seems like everything is gonna

00:35:53 ◼   ► get bigger next time around if those rumors are true so I think that big phone

00:35:57 ◼   ► for in the 12 like the 12 Pro Plus Max that thing is gonna be potentially

00:36:03 ◼   ► enormous and I think it I think a lot of people who like the max or even the plus

00:36:08 ◼   ► size may find that the new big phone is a little beyond their reach so to speak

00:36:15 ◼   ► Mm-hmm. Get it? Good pun. Yeah, it's good. Yeah, it's good. Yeah, no, it's good. I like that.

00:36:19 ◼   ► It's better when you draw a lot of attention to it after the fact, I've learned.

00:36:21 ◼   ► Yeah, especially when you say so to speak. Get it, get it. No pun intended. Waka waka. That kind of stuff.

00:36:27 ◼   ► Waka!

00:36:28 ◼   ► [DING DING DING DING DING DING DING DING DING DING DING DING DING DING DING DING DING DING DING DING DING DING DING DING DING DING DING DING DING DING DING DING DING DING DING DING DING DING DING DING DING DING DING DING DING DING DING DING DING DING DING DING DING DING DING DING DING DING DING DING D

00:36:28 ◼   ► (bell dings)

00:36:31 ◼   ► - The question is though, if you carry it caseless,

00:36:35 ◼   ► what happens if you break it?

00:36:36 ◼   ► 'Cause that's a bummer.

00:36:38 ◼   ► - Well, I've been thinking about this, right?

00:36:40 ◼   ► So like, I definitely could break my phone.

00:36:42 ◼   ► It feels like it's really difficult right now

00:36:44 ◼   ► to get a phone replaced.

00:36:45 ◼   ► I don't know, like I had my first AppleCare experience

00:36:47 ◼   ► recently when I had one of my AirPods replaced

00:36:50 ◼   ► and that was fine.

00:36:51 ◼   ► If Apple would do that for a phone,

00:36:53 ◼   ► which is basically, give us your card.

00:36:55 ◼   ► If you don't send us the AirPod back,

00:36:57 ◼   ► we're gonna charge you.

00:36:58 ◼   ► Otherwise, here's the airport in a box, put it broke one in a mail it to us

00:37:02 ◼   ► like because I have Apple care plus.

00:37:04 ◼   ► So you know like I have to pay I don't know what is it like 50 bucks or

00:37:09 ◼   ► something and for accidental damage and also this kind of as part of me like

00:37:13 ◼   ► I've had a book a plus and so many phones never broken one you know maybe

00:37:17 ◼   ► if I break one I'll finally get my money's worth. I don't really know why

00:37:20 ◼   ► that thought processes I've been allowed to go through my brain, but I'm also

00:37:25 ◼   ► kind of testing it like this phone's on the way out right like it's got a couple

00:37:30 ◼   ► of months left can I go for a couple of months about breaking this phone I guess

00:37:35 ◼   ► we'll see like I have Apple care on it I can fix it we'll see I'm using the black

00:37:41 ◼   ► leather case on my phone 11 Pro you know the summer it's warm here I wear shorts

00:37:46 ◼   ► all summer and shorts and iPhones don't go well together they kind of slip out

00:37:50 ◼   ► of the pockets which is could be disastrous yeah that see it's shorts

00:37:54 ◼   ► time here too, right? Like, and I'm having that, I'm definitely having that fear, but

00:37:59 ◼   ► I always worry that I'm going to lose my phone anyway, so.

00:38:02 ◼   ► So yeah, I think you should try going caseless and you know, maybe days you go to the studio

00:38:07 ◼   ► or you know, you can go in and out, right? It's not a one-time decision. So you do have

00:38:13 ◼   ► that flexibility if you feel like, "Hey, I'm going to go somewhere. I need the case." Like

00:38:17 ◼   ► in cooler months when I'm wearing jeans, I generally go caseless, but then if I'm going

00:38:22 ◼   ► to work in the yard or go to a football game or like be out and about somewhere

00:38:26 ◼   ► I generally will pop it in the case just for that extra protection because the

00:38:29 ◼   ► back is glass and it's expensive to fix even with AppleCare+

00:38:34 ◼   ► It's like I know there's a lot of like logic problems in the things that I'm saying

00:38:37 ◼   ► I'm gonna say I'm one now two and it's fine human beings are flawed I kind of

00:38:43 ◼   ► feel like I don't want to buy a case now like it's too soon to replacing my phone

00:38:48 ◼   ► right in like the next three months that I want to buy a new case like there's a

00:38:52 ◼   ► company called case defy and they have the like an official Pokemon license you

00:38:56 ◼   ► remember Pokemon right and they have a bunch of cool Pokemon cases out right

00:38:59 ◼   ► now and there's kind of as part of me it's like why would you release a new

00:39:02 ◼   ► case line now but but the other thing is I'd as much as I might like them I don't

00:39:07 ◼   ► want to buy one because I'm gonna be upgrading my phone in a couple of months

00:39:12 ◼   ► and they probably won't fit anymore and it's like this is the same reason why I

00:39:16 ◼   ► I don't want to buy a new case in general right now because I'm gonna be changing the phone over soon

00:39:21 ◼   ► So well, good luck. I

00:39:23 ◼   ► Guess if I break my phone, I'll let you know. Okay. Yeah, please do because I've never broken fun

00:39:31 ◼   ► I don't know what it's like. Yeah be good for you to get that experience. Uh-huh. Yeah

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00:41:01 ◼   ► boy

00:41:04 ◼   ► Steve and I have an epic story for you Oh

00:41:09 ◼   ► You're very bell heavy today. I am very bell heavy

00:41:11 ◼   ► I kind of rearranged my space here like right under my monitor and stuff and the bell is way easier to reach now

00:41:17 ◼   ► That's I'm really pretty maybe I should move it further away. So I don't want to

00:41:23 ◼   ► Rehash all of the things I've already said on

00:41:26 ◼   ► Upgrade this week episode 311 neither

00:41:30 ◼   ► Do I really feel like at this point we need to tell the story of what's going on with Apple and epic?

00:41:36 ◼   ► I will also put a link in the show notes to a kind of like a history of what happened,

00:41:43 ◼   ► what has been happening with Apple and Fortnite and Epic and all that kind of stuff.

00:41:50 ◼   ► I wanted to get your opinion on this because you've been pretty silent in at least our

00:41:58 ◼   ► group threads about your opinions on what's going on with Apple and Epic.

00:42:03 ◼   ► And plus there's some other stuff that's been happening over the last couple of days that

00:42:09 ◼   ► could be pretty interesting to dig into.

00:42:11 ◼   ► So I guess on a very high level, do you find yourself more sympathetic towards one company's

00:42:21 ◼   ► argument than the other?

00:42:23 ◼   ► I feel like they both have things about the arguments that are good.

00:42:28 ◼   ► So on epic side, I do think that apples some of apples policies around the App Store are

00:42:34 ◼   ► outdated.

00:42:36 ◼   ► I think that their 30% cut is too high.

00:42:39 ◼   ► I think that there is room for third party, either third party payment processing in apps.

00:42:47 ◼   ► And I think Apple should have a say on what that is.

00:42:49 ◼   ► So okay, you have to use Apple Pay, or PayPal or like these, these known entities, you can

00:42:56 ◼   ► just have a credit card form. And I think that Epic is as clearly orchestrated this to

00:43:02 ◼   ► to move into this right as antitrust stuff is heating up in the US. And if if we see a

00:43:09 ◼   ► government change in the fall, that could be a real issue for these big tech companies. So like,

00:43:16 ◼   ► Epic, I think is making a lot of good points. I think they're making them in a smart way.

00:43:21 ◼   ► And I think that the way that Apple has responded just makes Epic look better.

00:43:27 ◼   ► Like, we're gonna talk about their latest response, but they have...

00:43:31 ◼   ► Like, Apple's saying the parts out loud, they're not supposed to say out loud, I feel like.

00:43:36 ◼   ► And that's a bad look.

00:43:39 ◼   ► They've been doing that for the last two months.

00:43:40 ◼   ► Yep.

00:43:40 ◼   ► Right.

00:43:41 ◼   ► Yeah, they did it with "Hey." Right?

00:43:43 ◼   ► It was like, "Oh, well, your other app, which we're totally not threatening here,

00:43:47 ◼   ► has never made us any money, you know, that's not spectacular. So on the whole, I think that Epic

00:43:55 ◼   ► has the upper hand here. I think from the Apple perspective, I think that they feel tricked that

00:44:03 ◼   ► this happened in and out because they did it without an update. I think that they feel like

00:44:08 ◼   ► they have their back against a wall that, and Apple doesn't like operating that way, right?

00:44:15 ◼   ► Apple likes controlling the narrative and Epic is in the driver's seat for all of this, right?

00:44:19 ◼   ► It's all about Apple's response to Epic and Apple doesn't like that.

00:44:22 ◼   ► Yeah, because even though the most recent development of Apple saying,

00:44:27 ◼   ► "We're going to kick Epic out of the store by the end of August if they don't do something,"

00:44:31 ◼   ► whilst that could be seen as Apple taking an element of control back,

00:44:38 ◼   ► if they do do that, if Epic play chicken, Apple looks bad in the public, not Epic.

00:44:44 ◼   ► because a wide scale people don't care about Apple's rules.

00:44:51 ◼   ► No, the story will be Apple removed Fortnite from the store.

00:44:56 ◼   ► Yeah, because they wanted all of Epic's money, which is not completely false.

00:45:04 ◼   ► It's not false at all.

00:45:05 ◼   ► It's what they want.

00:45:07 ◼   ► They also want Epic to play by the rules, the rules that Apple have set.

00:45:10 ◼   ► We can maybe get into the rules themselves, but Epic have broken the rules, right?

00:45:14 ◼   ► I would like to assume that Epic knew this was a possibility, but I still think it's

00:45:21 ◼   ► going to be interesting.

00:45:22 ◼   ► I don't know if it's obvious at this point that Epic will update Fortnite to remove their

00:45:32 ◼   ► own purchasing system to make sure that Apple doesn't kick them out.

00:45:37 ◼   ► I don't know about that yet.

00:45:39 ◼   ► I mean, there is an asterisk about the unreal engine, which we can get into if you want

00:45:43 ◼   ► to.

00:45:44 ◼   ► But I don't know if it's clear cut that they're going to do that.

00:45:49 ◼   ► Yeah, I think you're, I think you're right about that.

00:45:53 ◼   ► And Apple has as much as epic has to lose here, which again, I want to talk about the

00:45:58 ◼   ► unreal engine in a second epic has a lot to lose here.

00:46:01 ◼   ► But Apple has way more because Apple has way more attention on it.

00:46:06 ◼   ► the story will be

00:46:08 ◼   ► You can't play for tonight on the iPhone because Apple removed them

00:46:11 ◼   ► from the store right and that's as far as it'll go and

00:46:15 ◼   ► And on top of that you have the antitrust stuff and Apple

00:46:20 ◼   ► Removing fortnight from the store even if fortnight did break Apple's rules, which they did clearly and

00:46:27 ◼   ► Boldly Apple doesn't need another hit on its record when it comes to App Store

00:46:34 ◼   ► What some would say our app store abuses I think at this point it's really just how bad is Apple gonna lose here

00:46:42 ◼   ► Mm-hmm. I don't think there's a win condition for them

00:46:45 ◼   ► because if epic do this like if they

00:46:49 ◼   ► Roll over accept the rules take their lick right and update the application

00:46:55 ◼   ► So they don't get their developer thing removed and then the app will be reinstated into the store if they do this

00:47:02 ◼   ► The lawsuit isn't gonna go away and I think gives epic more ammunition

00:47:07 ◼   ► I think it does too. I think that there is an argument here, which is like oh

00:47:11 ◼   ► And you know like this this big company that we're saying is monopolistic. They forced us to

00:47:18 ◼   ► Remove something. Otherwise, they were going to kick us out and because it's like yes, they broke the rules

00:47:24 ◼   ► But there is an argument as to whether the rules are fair in the first place that that needs to and will be had

00:47:31 ◼   ► Like you know it. This is the thing of like yeah, they accepted the rules

00:47:34 ◼   ► but

00:47:37 ◼   ► Should the rules be written the way that they're written?

00:47:39 ◼   ► Right like I think it's a separate argument to be made here

00:47:44 ◼   ► And that is like that's the argument that epic war make of like well

00:47:49 ◼   ► We had to accept the rules, but we got to the point where we felt like the rules weren't fair enough

00:47:52 ◼   ► So we decided we'd we'd break them. I don't know how that all plays out legally. I'm not smart enough to know that yeah

00:47:59 ◼   ► Yeah, but from a publicity standpoint, I don't think it's gonna it's gonna be very good cuz like, you know, look at the moment

00:48:06 ◼   ► Epic are able to say hey fortnight players were saving you money, right?

00:48:11 ◼   ► Yeah

00:48:11 ◼   ► And I heard I think on dithering that epic said at some point that because that that updates still in the store

00:48:17 ◼   ► Or not in the store. It's still in people's people's devices

00:48:21 ◼   ► And so if you had fortnight download already

00:48:23 ◼   ► You can just pay them directly and that it was like a 50/50 split of people doing it directly versus going through Apple

00:48:29 ◼   ► I just I I can't help but think that what you said about

00:48:33 ◼   ► The rules are now unfair like that is the heart of it for me. These rules may have made sense 12 years ago

00:48:41 ◼   ► But they don't all make sense now and things like not being able to buy

00:48:46 ◼   ► Books in the Kindle app and sign up in Netflix sign up and hey pay them directly all this stuff

00:48:53 ◼   ► it wasn't really wasn't a

00:48:57 ◼   ► It really wasn't a factor when the App Store launched.

00:49:00 ◼   ► And that purchase wasn't even in the first version

00:49:02 ◼   ► of the App Store.

00:49:03 ◼   ► Remember it came on a couple of years later.

00:49:05 ◼   ► And because of that, and things like subscriptions

00:49:08 ◼   ► and these other things, the App Store

00:49:10 ◼   ► has fundamentally changed.

00:49:12 ◼   ► The way that consumers and developers interact,

00:49:15 ◼   ► the way that things are bought and sold,

00:49:17 ◼   ► that has all fundamentally changed in the last 12 years,

00:49:20 ◼   ► and Apple's rules haven't kept up.

00:49:22 ◼   ► And I think it is definitely time for them

00:49:25 ◼   ► to address a lot of those things.

00:49:27 ◼   ► And I think Epic is a big enough,

00:49:30 ◼   ► like no offense to Hay and Basecamp,

00:49:32 ◼   ► like I think they're great,

00:49:34 ◼   ► but they're not big enough to force this

00:49:36 ◼   ► the way that Epic is.

00:49:38 ◼   ► Epic is a big enough combatant in this lawsuit

00:49:43 ◼   ► that this is going to be the thing

00:49:45 ◼   ► that I think forces these changes.

00:49:48 ◼   ► - You know, there's been a lot of people

00:49:49 ◼   ► who said this isn't new,

00:49:50 ◼   ► but I think it's worth pointing out.

00:49:51 ◼   ► Like Epic might be the only company that can do this

00:49:56 ◼   ► because they're big, they have a lot of power

00:49:59 ◼   ► and they're a private company.

00:50:01 ◼   ► Now like Netflix can't do this

00:50:03 ◼   ► because their shareholders will go bananas, right?

00:50:07 ◼   ► Because Epic is gambling a lot here.

00:50:12 ◼   ► And again, like they're not doing it

00:50:15 ◼   ► for the goodness of everyone.

00:50:17 ◼   ► They're doing it because they believe

00:50:19 ◼   ► that Apple shouldn't be taking a slice of their business,

00:50:23 ◼   ► which I also, to a level, believe as well.

00:50:27 ◼   ► But there is a possibility that if Epic are able

00:50:31 ◼   ► to force Apple to make changes,

00:50:33 ◼   ► that there could be wider benefits to other developers.

00:50:38 ◼   ► There could also be disadvantages.

00:50:40 ◼   ► Like, we don't know, but I do think that the situation

00:50:44 ◼   ► that we are in right now is deserving of change.

00:50:48 ◼   ► And like the other thing about like the rules, right, because we keep talking about the rules.

00:50:52 ◼   ► One of my biggest issues is that the rules are not equally applied.

00:50:58 ◼   ► Right?

00:50:59 ◼   ► There are exceptions to the rules.

00:51:01 ◼   ► Despite what Tim Cook told Congress, that we treat all people the same.

00:51:06 ◼   ► And that's my issue.

00:51:07 ◼   ► It's like, you can have rules, and you can have exceptions to rules.

00:51:11 ◼   ► But don't hide them.

00:51:13 ◼   ► Don't pretend that they don't exist.

00:51:14 ◼   ► And I would like to read Apple's statement that they gave about Epic, because I want

00:51:20 ◼   ► to pick a couple of pieces apart for this, because I think it's important.

00:51:25 ◼   ► The App Store is designed to be a safe and trusted place for users and a great business

00:51:29 ◼   ► opportunity for all developers.

00:51:31 ◼   ► All right, fine.

00:51:32 ◼   ► I'll go along with that.

00:51:33 ◼   ► That's true.

00:51:34 ◼   ► I agree with that.

00:51:35 ◼   ► Sure.

00:51:36 ◼   ► Yeah.

00:51:37 ◼   ► Epic has been one of the most successful developers on the App Store, growing into a multi-billion

00:51:41 ◼   ► dollar business that reaches millions of iOS customers around the world. Get out of town.

00:51:46 ◼   ► I hate this so much because they are insinuating that Epic's success came from them. And that

00:51:54 ◼   ► is absolutely, categorically not true. Right? Like Apple keep doing this and they've done

00:52:01 ◼   ► it again. They've done a different way of saying it, right? Of trying to say that they

00:52:07 ◼   ► They are for some reason successful because Apple allowed them to be on the platform when

00:52:11 ◼   ► that is absolutely not true.

00:52:16 ◼   ► Fortnite was the biggest game in the world before there was an iOS version of it.

00:52:22 ◼   ► Before Fortnite, Epic has been around forever being a massively successful company before

00:52:30 ◼   ► the App Store, before even the idea of the App Store.

00:52:35 ◼   ► And Apple is more successful because of companies like Epic, not the other way around.

00:52:43 ◼   ► The iPhone is what it is because of apps.

00:52:47 ◼   ► There is no argument about this.

00:52:51 ◼   ► The iPhone is a success to the level that it is because of developers making apps for

00:52:56 ◼   ► the platform.

00:52:58 ◼   ► That's what made that piece of technology so incredible.

00:53:02 ◼   ► There were smartphones before the iPhone.

00:53:04 ◼   ► But what made the iPhone what it was is the App Store.

00:53:06 ◼   ► Apple had a great idea.

00:53:09 ◼   ► Apple made the right decision to put apps on the App Store.

00:53:13 ◼   ► I think it's pretty clear at this point.

00:53:15 ◼   ► Like they didn't really want to do it, but they did it.

00:53:17 ◼   ► They made the right decision.

00:53:18 ◼   ► They put apps on the App Store.

00:53:20 ◼   ► And they helped a lot of developers along the way.

00:53:23 ◼   ► But we cannot continue to assume that large companies are only successful because of Apple.

00:53:31 ◼   ► They keep saying this like "oh, Basecamp had a successful business, you know, like they've

00:53:38 ◼   ► been freeloading on us for years" is basically what they're saying.

00:53:42 ◼   ► And it's like all this stuff is just...

00:53:44 ◼   ► Anyway, we very much want to keep the company as part of the Apple developer program and

00:53:49 ◼   ► their apps on the store.

00:53:50 ◼   ► Yes, I'm sure you do.

00:53:52 ◼   ► The problem Epic has created for itself is one that can be easily remedied if they submit

00:53:57 ◼   ► an app of that app and an update of that app that reverts it to comply with the

00:54:01 ◼   ► guidelines they agreed to and which apply to all developers. All right. Okay.

00:54:05 ◼   ► Yes. Epic created this problem for themselves provided there were no

00:54:13 ◼   ► conversations that came before it, which I am convinced that there are, right?

00:54:17 ◼   ► Like I'm sure that Epic and Apple have been trying to come to an agreement that

00:54:22 ◼   ► Epic is comfortable with for a while. And that's why this happened. But yes,

00:54:27 ◼   ► So Epic did do this for themselves because they did decide to kick up a stink, right?

00:54:32 ◼   ► But then we have this other part of they agreed to the guidelines.

00:54:35 ◼   ► Yeah, they did.

00:54:36 ◼   ► They apply to all developers.

00:54:37 ◼   ► Yeah, they do.

00:54:39 ◼   ► But then we have this next point.

00:54:40 ◼   ► We won't make an exception for Epic because we don't think it's right to put their business

00:54:45 ◼   ► interests ahead of the guidelines that protect our customers.

00:54:48 ◼   ► I want to reread this in the way that I think it should actually be said.

00:54:53 ◼   ► We won't make an exception for Epic because we don't think it's right to put their business

00:54:58 ◼   ► interests ahead of the guidelines that protect our customers.

00:55:02 ◼   ► Because that's not completely true where there is a quid pro quo for Apple.

00:55:07 ◼   ► They will make an exception for Amazon because their business interests and Apple's business

00:55:14 ◼   ► interests make sense.

00:55:16 ◼   ► They will make an exception for Netflix because it makes sense.

00:55:20 ◼   ► Like they apparently was a cut deal for Netflix.

00:55:24 ◼   ► And then also, you know, we saw this with Netflix and Hey, right?

00:55:27 ◼   ► Like Netflix could do things that Hey couldn't go, couldn't do.

00:55:30 ◼   ► And like, I just can't stand this anymore.

00:55:34 ◼   ► Right. That like Apple feel like they need to control the businesses of every

00:55:40 ◼   ► company in the App Store.

00:55:41 ◼   ► I mean, it reminds me of someone who, you know, built an airport or built some

00:55:47 ◼   ► some sort of waterway, right, and trying to take a tax on every boat or plane

00:55:52 ◼   ► that goes through it. It just doesn't work in the 21st century. And something

00:55:57 ◼   ► you said a second ago really caught my interest is that the iPhone is its apps.

00:56:01 ◼   ► Right, like when we talk about using an Android phone or using a PC or something,

00:56:06 ◼   ► what always brings me back is the apps that I'm used to and the workflows that

00:56:12 ◼   ► I want to use and Apple has a very rich ecosystem of these applications on the iPhone and beyond

00:56:18 ◼   ► and in some ways that's despite the rules that they have in place that are very old

00:56:25 ◼   ► and creaky in places.

00:56:27 ◼   ► If these big companies continue to struggle with Apple's rules it hurts their devices,

00:56:33 ◼   ► it hurts their users and you know getting rid of a weird email app is not that big of

00:56:39 ◼   ► a deal. It's a big deal if you're, you know, base camp, but in the world, not that big

00:56:44 ◼   ► of a deal. Epic's a bigger deal. But if Netflix or Facebook or Amazon Prime Video is one of

00:56:51 ◼   ► these big apps really were to go up against Apple with this, then I think that line of

00:56:56 ◼   ► "Well, we should buy the same" definitely comes to light as being false because they

00:57:00 ◼   ► would bend for those other apps.

00:57:02 ◼   ► There was a report from The Information that Epic is apparently trying to get other companies

00:57:06 ◼   ► to come on board with this. I don't think they're going to be incredibly successful.

00:57:09 ◼   ► Yeah, because they're afraid of Apple. Yeah, I mean, so there has been an increase

00:57:14 ◼   ► in rhetoric from a lot of companies about, like, supporting Epic. Like, apparently that

00:57:19 ◼   ► came from this. Facebook was working on a project, like this events project, right,

00:57:25 ◼   ► where you could pay, like, people that were putting on digital events inside of Facebook.

00:57:33 ◼   ► Facebook brought this forward because of this so they were planning to launch

00:57:37 ◼   ► this and they launched it early because they want because and then part of their

00:57:40 ◼   ► press release about this is that oh you can do this on the App Store but Apple's

00:57:44 ◼   ► gonna take 30% of the money right so like there is an increase in like

00:57:51 ◼   ► companies trying to push this which again I will say is like Apple you got

00:57:56 ◼   ► change because these companies are gonna keep pushing on you and it'll be so much

00:58:04 ◼   ► better for you if you find a way to make this work before you are forced to.

00:58:09 ◼   ► Because if you are forced to, it's gonna be real bad for you.

00:58:14 ◼   ► Yeah I mean having Congress or the EU or some other government force this upon

00:58:22 ◼   ► them it will be harsher. It will be it will include things they don't want to

00:58:28 ◼   ► do and if Apple takes the first steps here then they can control at least part

00:58:34 ◼   ► of that right and maybe they do enough to placate those antitrust people you

00:58:41 ◼   ► know looking looking at them so yeah they've got to give on some of these

00:58:45 ◼   ► things I think they've got to give on the 30% I think they need to be building

00:58:50 ◼   ► in systems that allow for purchases outside of the old iTunes payment system.

00:59:00 ◼   ► If you offer Apple Pay, they still get a small cut, right?

00:59:02 ◼   ► And people would use it.

00:59:04 ◼   ► If they offered...

00:59:05 ◼   ► Again, Apple needs some way to make sure that's secure for their users, because one nice thing

00:59:11 ◼   ► is you can hand somebody an iPhone or iPad and it's generally, as long as they stay in

00:59:15 ◼   ► apps, less sketchy than going out to the web.

00:59:18 ◼   ► Let me ask though, like, when was the last time you paid for something on the web and

00:59:24 ◼   ► that payment system was a scam?

00:59:26 ◼   ► Yeah, I mean, every time my debit card has been stolen the last 10 years, it's been at

00:59:31 ◼   ► physical retail stores.

00:59:33 ◼   ► Yeah, like, realistically, come on, come on, right?

00:59:39 ◼   ► And like, Apple could still approve the payment processor, you know?

00:59:45 ◼   ► Like one, two, three company is not going to create their own payment processing system.

00:59:51 ◼   ► You could still have the payment processing systems be approved, right?

00:59:57 ◼   ► Because how many are they realistically going to be?

01:00:01 ◼   ► They can allow this.

01:00:03 ◼   ► They can make a small list here and you can use this, this, and this, and you can have

01:00:08 ◼   ► a company like Stripe come in, right?

01:00:11 ◼   ► And they could create a payment processing system for all of the third party developers

01:00:15 ◼   ► to take advantage of if they wanted to.

01:00:17 ◼   ► And it's only Stripe that needs to be done, right?

01:00:20 ◼   ► It's like Karl's saying in the chatroom, PayPal, Apple Pay, Stripe, you could have Google Pay

01:00:24 ◼   ► in there.

01:00:25 ◼   ► Right.

01:00:26 ◼   ► And that's going to be enough for everyone.

01:00:28 ◼   ► At that point, developers get like, I don't know, 17% back or something.

01:00:35 ◼   ► And then it enables this.

01:00:37 ◼   ► All right, so if you are going to continue to use Apple systems, all right, Apple, will

01:00:41 ◼   ► you down for me lately?

01:00:42 ◼   ► Right?

01:00:43 ◼   ► make me choose, make me want to choose you. Why is your 30% worth it? They should be,

01:00:51 ◼   ► at this point, they should have to prove that that cut is worth it. Why? Right? Like, show

01:00:58 ◼   ► me, show me what you give me because I pay for your system, right? Like I pay to be a

01:01:03 ◼   ► developer. So that's one, right? Like I give value to your product by creating an app for

01:01:10 ◼   ► device why do you also want to get 30% could you not get 15% like what is the

01:01:16 ◼   ► 30% given me I think that right now in 2020 they need to remake that case

01:01:23 ◼   ► because I don't think it exists the way it used to let's talk about unreal okay

01:01:29 ◼   ► yeah cuz that's that's the bigger almost the bigger topic so this is the game

01:01:34 ◼   ► engine built by epic they manage it which we should say is used for lots of

01:01:39 ◼   ► things not just games lots of different applications of all different types use

01:01:43 ◼   ► the Unreal Engine it really like goes out far and wide into different types of

01:01:50 ◼   ► entertainment products like it is a game engine yes but unreal can be used in a

01:01:56 ◼   ► lot of wonderful and weird ways if epics developer ID is pulled like Apple has

01:02:04 ◼   ► promised it would do on the 28th if Epic doesn't get in line with the Fortnite

01:02:11 ◼   ► app that is a big problem for those potentially a big problem for those

01:02:17 ◼   ► other applications I think part of this is a little unknown exactly how the

01:02:21 ◼   ► technical details would play out but at the very least it would make develop

01:02:27 ◼   ► other developers who work on top of unreal it's going to make their lives a

01:02:32 ◼   ► a lot harder. So there's a few things which could be problems here right so there can't be any new

01:02:41 ◼   ► versions of unreal which won't necessarily cause problems for existing applications that are using

01:02:47 ◼   ► it unless there's a bug in unreal for ios 14 right so if something's going wrong with unreal

01:02:55 ◼   ► and ios 14 which i don't know is the case that would be an issue right if they wanted to add

01:03:00 ◼   ► new features to Unreal or fix other bugs in Unreal, they can't do that. One of the

01:03:06 ◼   ► bigger potential problems is there would be no Unreal applications on Apple

01:03:10 ◼   ► Silicon because none of that work has been finalized, right? Like this is what

01:03:17 ◼   ► I'm seeing people say online, so let's do transfer status, Brandon says this,

01:03:21 ◼   ► and I agree with these people, like it makes sense to me, like these

01:03:25 ◼   ► processes have not been finalized yet. There's no like GM for Apple

01:03:31 ◼   ► Silicon stuff, there's no GM for Unreal running on Apple Silicon. So they cut this off, it

01:03:36 ◼   ► would mean that no apps could run Unreal. And like we're not talking everything

01:03:42 ◼   ► in the world here but we're talking a lot of developers that rely on it

01:03:46 ◼   ► and this is where you've got to start looking back at Epic and saying is this

01:03:52 ◼   ► responsible? Are you being a responsible platform holder of your own here? Because

01:04:02 ◼   ► people that have decided to use Unreal for whatever reason and are quote-unquote

01:04:09 ◼   ► paying for the privilege, you know, they are being dragged into this without any

01:04:16 ◼   ► say. If you are currently an app developer who uses Unreal, you've got to

01:04:24 ◼   ► be pretty nervous. Because it might not be today, it might not be August 28th

01:04:31 ◼   ► that's the problem. But for as long as Epic and Apple are going at it, you're

01:04:36 ◼   ► gonna be nervous about Unreal. And that is like, that feels like a mutually

01:04:43 ◼   ► assured destruction thing here because that's bad for both now because it's bad

01:04:49 ◼   ► for Apple because there are I mean it's it's a funny thing at this point but

01:04:54 ◼   ► like there are Apple arcade games that are made using unreal right now

01:04:59 ◼   ► ultimately I feel like that part like I see a lot of people talk about this it's

01:05:04 ◼   ► true like it would be awkward that was like collateral damage for Apple like

01:05:08 ◼   ► I'm sorry but like fortnight is more important to them than Apple arcade

01:05:12 ◼   ► monetarily outside of PR wise in the world right like they are willing to

01:05:18 ◼   ► stand their ground to make sure fortnight remains on the App Store more

01:05:21 ◼   ► than they are willing to lose the the game made using the Unreal Engine and

01:05:26 ◼   ► Apple arcade like these equations they don't balance unfortunately so like

01:05:34 ◼   ► there are other applications like not working that they somehow control it's

01:05:38 ◼   ► like collateral damage but this is this is like I kind of thought of this phrase

01:05:42 ◼   ► earlier like mutually sure destruction is like the Unreal Engine and Epic not

01:05:48 ◼   ► being on Apple's platforms is a problem for them it's also a massive problem for

01:05:51 ◼   ► Epic right more than fortnight being a problem because it's probably safe to

01:05:58 ◼   ► say that at this point epic are not onboarding as many users into fortnight

01:06:06 ◼   ► as they used to right it is most likely and I think already actually has seen

01:06:11 ◼   ► its peak. It's no longer I believe the most popular game in the world. For a while, if

01:06:17 ◼   ► not still, Minecraft came back and was the most popular. But it's a massive, massive

01:06:24 ◼   ► game. But now the business is in keeping people interested, getting people that have lapsed

01:06:31 ◼   ► to come back and getting them to keep giving you money for different in-game events and

01:06:35 ◼   ► stuff like that. So the idea of Fortnite not being available to download on the App Store,

01:06:41 ◼   ► not so much of a problem for them, especially if they can keep making more money out of

01:06:45 ◼   ► the people that are already in it, right? So like whatever. But the Unreal Engine, not

01:06:50 ◼   ► being able to work going forward in some ways, is more of a PR problem for Epic, again, because

01:06:58 ◼   ► now there could be game developers A, B and C could file a lawsuit with Epic for doing

01:07:05 ◼   ► all of this right and then from a PR perspective that starts to look bad so

01:07:11 ◼   ► at this point I can't really work out where we're gonna go because Epic has

01:07:16 ◼   ► filed an additional suit about this thing here and I don't know whether

01:07:23 ◼   ► they're gonna go to the line here with this and have Apple kick them out of the

01:07:28 ◼   ► store I can't I don't know I can't put my money down on this one like it kind

01:07:35 ◼   ► of feels like they would play chicken on this but I don't know if they're really

01:07:41 ◼   ► willing to go through with it or not. If the Unreal Engine was not impacted I

01:07:46 ◼   ► would say that they would go all the way right because it will look great for

01:07:51 ◼   ► them if Apple continue to put the screws in right and make it worse for people

01:07:58 ◼   ► that are playing Fortnite and iOS. The damage that they will cause to their

01:08:02 ◼   ► developer community could be too strong here. You've got to think that Epic would

01:08:09 ◼   ► have seen that Unreal could be caught up in this, right? Like if they didn't see that

01:08:13 ◼   ► coming I would be shocked because the rest of this seems pretty well thought

01:08:19 ◼   ► through. I mean yeah but I think that there might have been an element of

01:08:25 ◼   ► gutsiness to think they wouldn't do that to us. Maybe. I could see that because

01:08:30 ◼   ► Because when I saw that Apple is doing this I was like, "Ooh, I know that that's technically

01:08:37 ◼   ► what you can do, but I don't know if you should do that."

01:08:42 ◼   ► In the same way that if Apple said, and this, I don't know, I actually don't know what would

01:08:46 ◼   ► happen here, but if they said, "If you don't do this, we're going to remove Fortnite from

01:08:51 ◼   ► people's phones."

01:08:52 ◼   ► Because they can do that.

01:08:54 ◼   ► And it's a kind of a thing where it's like, "Yeah, I know Apple can do that, but I don't

01:08:57 ◼   ► know if I would do that."

01:08:59 ◼   ► That would be from the PR perspective. Not only did Apple kick him out of the store. They took it off my iPad

01:09:06 ◼   ► I don't think they want but like I don't know like what happens if they removed the developer license

01:09:12 ◼   ► Yeah, I don't know

01:09:13 ◼   ► But I don't know like and I have yet to be able to find like a definitive answer

01:09:18 ◼   ► To this like if Apple does kick like remove epics developer license

01:09:25 ◼   ► What happens to fortnight on people's phones?

01:09:28 ◼   ► I don't know the answer to this or like you know maybe maybe someone in the chat room

01:09:33 ◼   ► can try and give us something I can see there's lots of people typing right now in the discord

01:09:37 ◼   ► but like this is it feels like a like you know maybe maybe not but like the idea of

01:09:44 ◼   ► of them cutting off the app they are allowed to do that if they want to and you know like

01:09:52 ◼   ► I know that it is a security thing Apple could argue as they already are trying to argue

01:09:56 ◼   ► that that Epic's payment processing system is a security issue.

01:10:00 ◼   ► And it's like, yeah, it's like you have the ability to do it, but I don't know if you

01:10:03 ◼   ► would do it.

01:10:04 ◼   ► And this is how I feel about them removing Epic from the store.

01:10:07 ◼   ► It's like, I don't know if it's the right move, but I also don't think it's the right

01:10:16 ◼   ► move for Epic to go all the way on this.

01:10:20 ◼   ► I don't know.

01:10:21 ◼   ► I don't know.

01:10:23 ◼   ► We've got, we've got, what have we got?

01:10:24 ◼   ► A weakened change?

01:10:26 ◼   ► that's that's really why it's kind of hard to talk about because it's

01:10:29 ◼   ► There are so many so many variables, but I think at the end of the day

01:10:33 ◼   ► epic saw a moment in time where they could have great leverage to change Apple's policies and

01:10:40 ◼   ► so far Apple has

01:10:43 ◼   ► Mostly just dug the hole deeper for themselves

01:10:45 ◼   ► Carl's found a note on the

01:10:49 ◼   ► Apple developer renewal page your apps will still function for users who already installed or downloaded them

01:10:55 ◼   ► And you will still have access to App Store connect and free development resources

01:10:59 ◼   ► But like this is the thing that is if your membership expires

01:11:02 ◼   ► There may be a different case for if Apple forcibly removes you

01:11:06 ◼   ► Right, like that's the thing of like there are lots of things we can find and assume based on stuff that's out there

01:11:12 ◼   ► But what is the rules if Apple say bye-bye?

01:11:16 ◼   ► This is a so like this is a real mess, but I gotta say I love it. I love this story

01:11:22 ◼   ► This is a great story, right? Like

01:11:25 ◼   ► This has got all of the drama that we want out of tech story in it

01:11:31 ◼   ► we can talk about it for hours and it's genuinely interesting to talk about and

01:11:36 ◼   ► I feel like it's doing a really good job of summarizing

01:11:40 ◼   ► The main issue I have of Apple at the moment. Like I don't really have issues with their software

01:11:46 ◼   ► I don't really have issues with their hardware like everyone has their fiefdom, right?

01:11:51 ◼   ► that the thing that annoys them. The thing that annoys me with Apple is their business practices.

01:11:56 ◼   ► I don't like, and I've not liked this for a long time, that Apple believes that they can tell other

01:12:04 ◼   ► businesses how to run their business. I don't like that. I don't think it's fair. I don't think that

01:12:11 ◼   ► they are in the position to be able to do that. And I don't like that they say in public that they

01:12:20 ◼   ► apply things fairly when we know it's not true, we have evidence now to prove that that's

01:12:25 ◼   ► not true.

01:12:26 ◼   ► So I find all that stuff like really sneaky and I don't believe that they need to do it.

01:12:32 ◼   ► And you can come at me with services revenue and you can tell me until you're blue in the

01:12:37 ◼   ► face.

01:12:38 ◼   ► But like, so what?

01:12:40 ◼   ► Right?

01:12:41 ◼   ► Like services revenue is only important because it's the thing Apple chose to be important.

01:12:45 ◼   ► Yep.

01:12:46 ◼   ► Yeah, Wall Street value it because Tim said, look at it.

01:12:49 ◼   ► You know, like Jason made this point to me, I don't remember if it was in Upgrade Plus or not,

01:12:54 ◼   ► but wearables is actually growing more than services. But services is just the thing that

01:12:59 ◼   ► Apple has chosen to really like put their public image into at the moment. But they didn't have to

01:13:05 ◼   ► do this. Like they chose to do this. And so now, like if Apple wasn't doing this whole services

01:13:12 ◼   ► push, I would probably look at this a little bit differently. But they are choosing to muscle their

01:13:18 ◼   ► way into this business that other people are occupying in and they're using their platform

01:13:23 ◼   ► advantage for their benefit.

01:13:26 ◼   ► Even the move of calling App Store revenue services revenue, like that was the first

01:13:31 ◼   ► decision and all this stuff follows from that.

01:13:36 ◼   ► It didn't have to be that way, right?

01:13:38 ◼   ► But they wanted that number to be good because their hardware business is about as big as

01:13:43 ◼   ► it could be.

01:13:44 ◼   ► there's not that many more people to sell iPhones to and they saw this large group of

01:13:50 ◼   ► People who have their hardware in their pockets all the time saying we can get and extract more money from them and it's just

01:13:58 ◼   ► The whole thing is icky and but this really feels like okay Apple

01:14:03 ◼   ► You are not only trying to get more money out of me

01:14:05 ◼   ► But you are continuing to limit what other people can do on your platform in ways that don't make much sense anymore

01:14:13 ◼   ► You know, I am all for things like app review. I don't want a second app store

01:14:18 ◼   ► I don't want necessarily even want sideloading, but I want their policies to be more flexible for

01:14:22 ◼   ► other businesses to

01:14:25 ◼   ► Work and thrive on top of what Apple's built

01:14:29 ◼   ► These companies right like they're all finding their own ways to stop taking the in-app purchase

01:14:36 ◼   ► Right, whether they said like sign up on the web order. It's like if they're not gonna do it anyway

01:14:42 ◼   ► Just let me do it in the app. Yeah, because like what you are creating what you are forcing is a worse

01:14:49 ◼   ► user experience yes

01:14:51 ◼   ► Right, like that is what you're doing and Apple you are supposed to be the user experience company and

01:14:59 ◼   ► a big part of your business

01:15:02 ◼   ► Forcibly makes bad user experiences like can you reconcile this are you cool with this?

01:15:11 ◼   ► Because you shouldn't be

01:15:13 ◼   ► The story's not going away. That's for sure. No, and you know what? I'm pleased because it's interesting

01:15:19 ◼   ► It's a big this is a huge deal

01:15:21 ◼   ► this is the story of the year when it comes to Apple like without a doubt like and

01:15:26 ◼   ► and I want it to be finally the time that they make a change and I like

01:15:33 ◼   ► Apple I beg of you now like

01:15:35 ◼   ► Please do it before you're forced to

01:15:40 ◼   ► Do it before your public perception changes.

01:15:43 ◼   ► Do it before a government forces you and do it so you can save face.

01:15:49 ◼   ► Like save face.

01:15:52 ◼   ► Be the company we want you to be.

01:15:55 ◼   ► Make the change that is beneficial to me as a user and to your development community.

01:16:01 ◼   ► Like before this continues to spiral out of control and stop being this weird

01:16:08 ◼   ► Company that seems to believe that like your mere existence means other businesses can thrive

01:16:15 ◼   ► Because it's not that you're not that like

01:16:18 ◼   ► Netflix isn't a big company because they have an iPhone app

01:16:21 ◼   ► like

01:16:23 ◼   ► Amazon isn't a big company because you can buy products from the Amazon iPhone app, but you seem to think that that's

01:16:30 ◼   ► the case and I just I

01:16:33 ◼   ► Can't get my head around it

01:16:36 ◼   ► If you want to find our show notes this week, they're on the web at relay.fm/connected/308

01:16:43 ◼   ► While you're there, you can send us an email with feedback or follow up.

01:16:47 ◼   ► You can become a member to get a bunch of awesome annual specials as well as Connected Pro, the ad-free version of the show.

01:16:55 ◼   ► This is the fall. We are raising money for St. Jude.

01:17:00 ◼   ► stjude.org/relay. We'd love your support as we help celebrate National Childhood Cancer

01:17:06 ◼   ► Awareness Month and stay tuned for the second annual, second annual, Relay FM podcast-a-thon

01:17:13 ◼   ► for St. Jude on Friday, September 18th. I like to ask questions of Myke every time at

01:17:19 ◼   ► the end of the show. So Myke, what's another podcast you do?

01:17:23 ◼   ► I host many shows.

01:17:25 ◼   ► Such as?

01:17:26 ◼   ► Upgrade.

01:17:27 ◼   ► Good job. So you can find Myke on upgrade on Mondays here on relay FM. You can also

01:17:32 ◼   ► find Myke on Twitter as I M y ke Federico is off this week but you can find him on Twitter

01:17:38 ◼   ► as Viti VITI CCI and he is the editor in chief of Mac stories.net. You can find me online

01:17:45 ◼   ► as is mh and my writing over at 512 pixels.net. I'd like to thank our sponsors this week Pingdom

01:17:53 ◼   ► and Mack Weldon. Until next time, Myke, say goodbye. Bye-bye. Bye, y'all.