Connected

00:00:00 ◼   ► (upbeat music)

00:00:02 ◼   ► Hello and welcome to Connected, episode 230.

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

00:00:14 ◼   ► Smile, Luna Display, and Squarespace.

00:00:18 ◼   ► I'm your host, Stephen Hackett,

00:00:19 ◼   ► and I am joined as always by Mr. Federico Vittucci.

00:00:21 ◼   ► - Hello, Stephen, how are you?

00:00:23 ◼   ► - I'm doing well, how are you today?

00:00:25 ◼   ► - I'm doing good, I'm just in front of my Luna Display

00:00:28 ◼   ► and my entire automated setup,

00:00:31 ◼   ► which works really, really well.

00:00:33 ◼   ► We're gonna talk about that in a minute.

00:00:34 ◼   ► But yeah, I'm fine.

00:00:36 ◼   ► - I'm excited to dig into that.

00:00:37 ◼   ► And we are also joined, of course, by Myke Hurley.

00:00:40 ◼   ► - Hi.

00:00:41 ◼   ► - How are you?

00:00:42 ◼   ► - Fine.

00:00:44 ◼   ► - What's wrong, Myke?

00:00:45 ◼   ► - I thought today that you might introduce me first

00:00:48 ◼   ► as a way to atone for instance.

00:00:50 ◼   ► - Can you please introduce him first next time, Steven?

00:00:53 ◼   ► - Okay.

00:00:54 ◼   ► Do I need some sort of system where like odd episodes,

00:00:56 ◼   ► Myke goes first and even episodes, Federica goes first.

00:00:59 ◼   ► - I think that that is the only way

00:01:01 ◼   ► to make everybody feel better.

00:01:03 ◼   ► - I'm on a couple of shows where we alternate the openings

00:01:06 ◼   ► of both Liftoff and Mac power users,

00:01:09 ◼   ► alternate who says the beginning.

00:01:11 ◼   ► And like it is, I have a note basically

00:01:13 ◼   ► at the top of each document of like,

00:01:14 ◼   ► Steven gets the odd ones or Jason gets the even ones

00:01:17 ◼   ► or whatever the case may be.

00:01:18 ◼   ► 'Cause it's impossible to keep up with.

00:01:20 ◼   ► - There you go, so you already have a system.

00:01:22 ◼   ► Just employ that system,

00:01:23 ◼   ► but you're just alternating with yourself.

00:01:25 ◼   ► just doesn't want to use it with you. It's funny how these things happen. Okay so here's

00:01:28 ◼   ► the thing, I'm going to put this at the top of the document, so are we saying Federico

00:01:32 ◼   ► gets even episodes? Yeah I feel like I'm more odd than Federico. Odd are you? I feel like

00:01:39 ◼   ► just in general I am a little bit more odd than you are. Myke. Sure, okay. Do you not

00:01:45 ◼   ► agree? I don't know, I never thought of myself in that way, am I odd? Possibly, I don't know.

00:01:53 ◼   ► You see, I know I am.

00:01:55 ◼   ► I like being even though. I like being even.

00:01:57 ◼   ► You see?

00:01:58 ◼   ► Well, you know, maybe you're odd because you're left-handed.

00:02:01 ◼   ► That's the only possible explanation.

00:02:03 ◼   ► You're more sinister, if you will.

00:02:05 ◼   ► What is that supposed to mean?

00:02:07 ◼   ► Why is left-handedness sinister?

00:02:11 ◼   ► Well, you know, in tradition, traditionally, you know, there's the thing that people are left-handed.

00:02:18 ◼   ► they're like, especially in medieval times, that was seen as something obscure to an extent,

00:02:23 ◼   ► you know, being left-handed, you know, the whole sort of hand of the devil, that kind of stuff.

00:02:27 ◼   ► Okay, well I only write with my left hand, everything else I do with my right hand,

00:02:32 ◼   ► does that make it any different?

00:02:33 ◼   ► Well, it makes you a little bit of both, I suppose.

00:02:36 ◼   ► So somewhere in between even and odd, you are like a fraction, we could say.

00:02:43 ◼   ► Okay.

00:02:44 ◼   ► You're like, what's it called when, like a non-even number, like 1.5, what's the name

00:02:53 ◼   ► for that?

00:02:54 ◼   ► Like a decimal.

00:02:55 ◼   ► A decimal, exactly.

00:02:56 ◼   ► You're like a decimal, Myke.

00:02:58 ◼   ► Okay, perfect.

00:03:00 ◼   ► Okay.

00:03:01 ◼   ► I'm really pleased we got that cleared up before we started the show today.

00:03:04 ◼   ► You know, I was looking at my to-do list this morning and I said, "There's some things I

00:03:07 ◼   ► need to accomplish today, but this is the crowning achievement of the day, I think.

00:03:12 ◼   ► We've solved this problem."

00:03:13 ◼   ► This was very productive.

00:03:15 ◼   ► That is now at the top of the, of the Google doc and comic sand.

00:03:18 ◼   ► So we know to take it very seriously.

00:03:19 ◼   ► So it's up there.

00:03:20 ◼   ► Okay.

00:03:21 ◼   ► So now that that's done, we should talk about follow-up.

00:03:24 ◼   ► Does that sound good?

00:03:25 ◼   ► Yes.

00:03:27 ◼   ► Oh, this wasn't follow-up.

00:03:28 ◼   ► Okay.

00:03:28 ◼   ► Well, that was like pre-show for the show and appetizer for the show.

00:03:35 ◼   ► This is what gets people in the door to listen to the rest of the episode.

00:03:38 ◼   ► Okay.

00:03:39 ◼   ► They're definitely hooked now, right?

00:03:40 ◼   ► Like we didn't lose anybody in the last three minutes.

00:03:42 ◼   ► new listeners are like, oh boy, this is what I've been looking for in my life.

00:03:47 ◼   ► This is exactly the show I wanted.

00:03:49 ◼   ► Yeah. How did they know? It's like they made it for me.

00:03:53 ◼   ► Can you believe that this show is featured in a WWDC keynote? It's amazing.

00:03:58 ◼   ► I don't like to think about that whilst we're recording.

00:04:01 ◼   ► I like to just think about it later. Like, so when,

00:04:05 ◼   ► when I have the feeling afterwards of like, oh, Connected was fun this week,

00:04:08 ◼   ► right? So like, I just have that memory of like, oh, it was good.

00:04:11 ◼   ► So people will like it as opposed to like thinking about it right now because that's that's like judgment

00:04:17 ◼   ► Which I'm uncomfortable with a lot of pressure. Okay, follow up the FaceTime

00:04:21 ◼   ► Fix is out iOS 12.1.4

00:04:26 ◼   ► There was also a supplemental update to macOS Mojave that didn't rev the version number

00:04:31 ◼   ► But just had an update out and so now we can all group FaceTime securely and safely without people

00:04:37 ◼   ► Should we though should we though so this is kind of what this is kind of where I wanted to go with this

00:04:42 ◼   ► we've used group face time as the three of us for a couple things, but like I

00:04:47 ◼   ► Don't use face time in any form

00:04:50 ◼   ► Very often at all. It's really pretty rare

00:04:53 ◼   ► Most of the time is when I'm traveling and I want to see you know

00:04:57 ◼   ► My family when I'm out of town and I was curious about y'all's usage of face time

00:05:01 ◼   ► Is it is it heavier than mine or you know, where are you?

00:05:05 ◼   ► I FaceTime my mom when we're out of town and my mom is watching the dogs and so we use FaceTime to make sure the

00:05:12 ◼   ► Dogs are alive and my mom is doing a good job

00:05:15 ◼   ► My mom would like to FaceTime me more

00:05:19 ◼   ► Like even like during a normal weekday for some reason because she misses me. She's very sweet

00:05:27 ◼   ► But I maybe she wants to get pranked

00:05:29 ◼   ► Maybe maybe a FaceTime prank would be a good idea

00:05:33 ◼   ► But I'm opposed to doing too frequent FaceTime conversation.

00:05:38 ◼   ► It's just a whole thing.

00:05:40 ◼   ► My mom is gonna judge, like, "Oh, your hair is too long,"

00:05:42 ◼   ► or, "Your beard is too long," or, "Put on a sweater,

00:05:46 ◼   ► you're gonna get cold."

00:05:47 ◼   ► You know what moms do.

00:05:48 ◼   ► So I don't wanna be seen by my mom

00:05:50 ◼   ► unless it's strictly necessary.

00:05:52 ◼   ► - Hmm, what about you, Myke?

00:05:53 ◼   ► - I probably FaceTime about as frequently as you do.

00:05:57 ◼   ► Maybe a little bit more, but it's mostly when I travel.

00:06:02 ◼   ► I did have to re-enable FaceTime over the weekend.

00:06:06 ◼   ► I'd forgotten I had never enabled, but I had to like, I had someone was going to call me on FaceTime,

00:06:11 ◼   ► so I had to like update all my devices.

00:06:15 ◼   ► It was like a whole big thing. It was like 20 minutes before I was like, oh, I have to update everything.

00:06:21 ◼   ► So I did all of that and then turned it back on again.

00:06:23 ◼   ► Yeah, I used the FaceTime audio occasionally. Myke and I, you and I will use it.

00:06:28 ◼   ► use it, but since slack calling came about, that's basically what you and I use if we're

00:06:32 ◼   ► not on Skype. So I like that it's there. I think it's I think it says something that

00:06:37 ◼   ► all of us use it like with our closest family members. And like, it means a lot to me that

00:06:41 ◼   ► it's there, but it definitely has never worked its way into my, like everyday life by any

00:06:46 ◼   ► stretch. I have no doubt that like, kids use it more. I mean, I know that there are a bunch

00:06:52 ◼   ► of apps like house pot and stuff that and that are made for this and like Instagram

00:06:56 ◼   ► But like I could imagine, you know, best friends calling each other on FaceTime.

00:07:01 ◼   ► Like if it's not like a group situation and kind of just hanging out,

00:07:04 ◼   ► I could imagine that I would have done something like that.

00:07:06 ◼   ► You know, I've read this thing that a lot of kids playing Fortnite or Apex.

00:07:14 ◼   ► Now it's this new game that just came out.

00:07:17 ◼   ► They use FaceTime as sort of a side companion to the game.

00:07:22 ◼   ► So like, they play the game but they chat using FaceTime on the phone or the iPad nearby,

00:07:27 ◼   ► which is very clever.

00:07:28 ◼   ► I mean, if I were a teenager today, like if I was in high school today, I would be totally

00:07:33 ◼   ► over FaceTime, like to do homework together in the afternoon, like that would be amazing.

00:07:37 ◼   ► Can you imagine the trouble we could get into today with all the apps and services available

00:07:45 ◼   ► to us?

00:07:46 ◼   ► Yeah, I think about it, like how hard it must be for like teachers and for schools to keep

00:07:51 ◼   ► track of all these new things that just came up. It must be impossible at some point to

00:07:56 ◼   ► just give up or... There was a while ago, there was on the news I saw here in Italy,

00:08:03 ◼   ► that a school tried to banish phones. So like kids in the morning, they would drop their

00:08:10 ◼   ► phone into a locker and they would be unable to use the phone during the rest of the day

00:08:15 ◼   ► until school was done. And it was not met kindly to put it.

00:08:22 ◼   ► I'm kind of surprised that kids are allowed to have phones in school. Like we weren't

00:08:27 ◼   ► because I mean, what our problem was, at least where I grew up, the concern was that like,

00:08:32 ◼   ► if you got in a fight at lunchtime, you could call your friends to come down. So it was

00:08:36 ◼   ► like, that was like, no, we won't allow phones for that reason. It surprises me though that

00:08:42 ◼   ► that like schools, some schools at least allow them.

00:08:45 ◼   ► I don't know. It just seems a bit strange, right?

00:08:48 ◼   ► Because it's just like, you're almost like asking for distraction.

00:08:54 ◼   ► I don't know. Like it got, it started, iPods was where it really started to like, to turn,

00:08:59 ◼   ► I think, because it just became too difficult.

00:09:01 ◼   ► I mean, when I was in high school, everyone had tape players.

00:09:06 ◼   ► Rotary dialing phones.

00:09:07 ◼   ► Rotary dialing.

00:09:08 ◼   ► Have I ever told you guys my story for cheating in school using my MP3 player?

00:09:16 ◼   ► No? Come on!

00:09:18 ◼   ► So I was really bad at math. Like, really, really bad.

00:09:23 ◼   ► We had a grading system, one out of ten.

00:09:26 ◼   ► And all other subjects, I was very good in school.

00:09:32 ◼   ► Like, I had eights and nines, a few tens.

00:09:35 ◼   ► Were you well behaved?

00:09:37 ◼   ► I was, but also I was constantly cracking jokes.

00:09:43 ◼   ► And most teachers would not get upset at me because I was really good.

00:09:48 ◼   ► My only problem was that I was terrible at math. I had two out of ten.

00:09:54 ◼   ► So I was like, I didn't like the subject, I've never been good.

00:09:59 ◼   ► But I realized that my teacher was, technologically speaking, ignorant enough that I could trick her into believing that I was better than I actually was.

00:10:12 ◼   ► And so my friend and I devised a system where, when we had tests, the day before we would use my Acer MP3 player to record our voice reading the book for the subject.

00:10:28 ◼   ► the subject. We would actually read the entire chapter of like, I don't know, logarithms

00:10:34 ◼   ► or that kind of stuff. Then the following day during the test, so everybody sitting

00:10:39 ◼   ► together in class and we're doing the test, I would say, "Hey Prof, can I listen to some

00:10:44 ◼   ► music while I do the test because it helps me concentrate?" And she was like, "Yeah,

00:10:48 ◼   ► sure, whatever you want." But it was not music. My friend and I would share the headphones,

00:10:56 ◼   ► the earbuds and we were listening to ourselves reading the subject aloud

00:11:00 ◼   ► while pretending to listen to music. Like we would tap our hands, we would tap our

00:11:05 ◼   ► like feet, pretending that we were listening to music, but we were actually listening to my

00:11:10 ◼   ► voice reading the book. I cannot believe that. That is unbelievable. Did you record

00:11:18 ◼   ► like different files to different chapters? Oh yeah, totally. They were

00:11:21 ◼   ► named and put in a folder, like, it was an entire job.

00:11:25 ◼   ► That is so clever. You deserve the grade that you got for being so smart, I think. I feel

00:11:32 ◼   ► like if you cheat well enough, you just deserve it.

00:11:34 ◼   ► That's not the lesson that we want to teach as a podcast, I don't think.

00:11:38 ◼   ► Sure it is, sure it is. No one needs math anyway, math's pointless.

00:11:42 ◼   ► Despite my vice efforts to cheat for math tests, when it was like, when it was not a

00:11:49 ◼   ► a written test, my ignorance would show. And therefore my final grade out of high school,

00:11:58 ◼   ► we had a system 0 to 100, my final grade was 95. And those five points were lost due to

00:12:07 ◼   ► math and physics. Yeah, I was really happy with it, honestly. Yeah.

00:12:14 ◼   ► This has been an amazing time.

00:12:17 ◼   ► never been more proud of you than I am right now you've achieved a lot in your

00:12:20 ◼   ► life but I think that's your best achievement. Thank you. Wow. Shall we move on to more

00:12:26 ◼   ► enterprise... I'm just trying to get back on track I'm just trying to... enterprise

00:12:32 ◼   ► certificates remember those Google and Facebook well it turns out according to

00:12:36 ◼   ► TechCrunch was like by the way TechCrunch is killing they're all over it. They are

00:12:40 ◼   ► destroying this it's so good. So I'm just gonna read the headline Apple fails to

00:12:47 ◼   ► block porn and gambling enterprise apps. So there are some developers it seems

00:12:52 ◼   ► like who have been using the same system so again you can download the enterprise

00:12:57 ◼   ► certificate and basically sideload apps onto an iOS device and they were using

00:13:02 ◼   ► them to install let's call it from now on adult themed apps which of course is

00:13:09 ◼   ► against basically every single App Store policy you can think of. It seems like

00:13:18 ◼   ► something is fundamentally broken with the system that Apple like this stuff is

00:13:23 ◼   ► just going on. They need to start over like this clearly this clearly is

00:13:30 ◼   ► untenable now because they're being made to look like fools at the moment so they

00:13:37 ◼   ► need to I don't know what you do but they need to do something different I

00:13:42 ◼   ► have no idea how you solve this problem because you can't really put these apps

00:13:47 ◼   ► through review that's the whole point of the enterprise system existing I wonder

00:13:55 ◼   ► the middle ground I thought of and I don't know this is small enough to know

00:13:59 ◼   ► if this is feasible or people would freak out but like I could see Apple

00:14:03 ◼   ► saying you can use enterprise certificates to install apps, but those apps have to be

00:14:10 ◼   ► registered with us. You know, maybe not a full blown app store review, but maybe something like

00:14:16 ◼   ► test flight review of like, we're making sure that these apps sort of fall in line with what we want

00:14:22 ◼   ► for the platform. I could see Apple doing that. I personally think that is probably an overstep of

00:14:27 ◼   ► their power to say you can't build this app for like internal use only. But clearly,

00:14:33 ◼   ► people aren't using it for internal use only. So you got to think Apple's weighing its options

00:14:37 ◼   ► and what it could do. What if they like, you could only download these apps from an App Store account

00:14:44 ◼   ► with an associated email domain. So like, you have to create a you can have multiple accounts,

00:14:52 ◼   ► right? And you just have to do it would be on you to check in on it every now and then or whatever.

00:14:57 ◼   ► But you could only, for example, get the Facebook enterprise app if your App Store

00:15:04 ◼   ► account is something at facebook.com. Right, it has some sort of flag on it saying this is...

00:15:09 ◼   ► Yeah. Yeah, I could see that too, because then, you know, like the

00:15:11 ◼   ► adult app corporation obviously wouldn't get that blessing from Apple, so they couldn't run.

00:15:17 ◼   ► And/or the amount of effort that you would have to go to to still try and trick this system,

00:15:24 ◼   ► I think is more effort than most people would want to have to go to.

00:15:28 ◼   ► Sure.

00:15:28 ◼   ► Because Apple would have to bless the domain, right?

00:15:31 ◼   ► And then, what, you're just going to give people email accounts?

00:15:34 ◼   ► It just seems like too much, right?

00:15:36 ◼   ► Like, I'm sure that there would still be some abuse, there's abuse of every system,

00:15:39 ◼   ► but that could do something.

00:15:41 ◼   ► Clearly, they need to find a way to lock enterprise apps down to the companies

00:15:46 ◼   ► that it's supposed to be used for, because right now,

00:15:48 ◼   ► it's just too easy to be able to get into these systems.

00:15:52 ◼   ► Yeah, well, apparently it's like easy, easier than I thought it was to get a certificate,

00:15:56 ◼   ► right? Like this random group got it. And there's a there's a an image in the tech

00:16:02 ◼   ► wrench article of an entire home screen full of these types of applications. Like

00:16:06 ◼   ► clearly, I don't know about you guys, but like I've had, um, the indie developers or just like

00:16:12 ◼   ► developers of apps offer me enterprise certificates instead of test flight. Yes. Yeah. Right. Not like

00:16:19 ◼   ► Not cool. That's not that that should you shouldn't do that.

00:16:22 ◼   ► Right. So like I kind of at first didn't really realize what it was, what it was.

00:16:26 ◼   ► But it's more recently I kind of realize what these are.

00:16:29 ◼   ► And I'm like, nah, I'm all right. I'll just wait.

00:16:31 ◼   ► And there are like entire industries of apps

00:16:36 ◼   ► that are not available on the app store and that are using certificates like

00:16:40 ◼   ► emulators are a big example of like something that will never be allowed

00:16:45 ◼   ► on the app store, but you can get on iOS using a certificate or

00:16:49 ◼   ► I've seen, I cannot remember the name, but I've seen this app that allows you to install

00:16:55 ◼   ► tweaks, like jailbreak tweaks without a jailbreak on iOS, and that also uses a certificate.

00:17:03 ◼   ► There are all kinds of apps that Apple will not approve for the App Store that are using

00:17:07 ◼   ► this system to circumvent releasing stuff to consumers, and I guess the problem is not

00:17:12 ◼   ► necessarily that people want to install these kinds of apps, and you cannot control what

00:17:17 ◼   ► people want, even if it's questionable content. And there's always the solution of, well,

00:17:22 ◼   ► you can just, you know, if you want to release an emulator for iOS, like Provenance, for

00:17:27 ◼   ► example, it's an emulator for Nintendo games, which is super illegal, but still people want

00:17:31 ◼   ► it, and so you can go to GitHub and download the source code and compile it yourself and

00:17:34 ◼   ► install it on your device. This is what I do. I've done it for the Apple TV, I've done

00:17:38 ◼   ► it for the iPad, I've done it for the iPhone. But I guess the problem is when this, you

00:17:44 ◼   ► this method of using GitHub and Xcode of course has a high barrier to entry for most people

00:17:51 ◼   ► and therefore developers use certificates and that is wrong.

00:17:54 ◼   ► So I don't know, like Apple will never be able to fully prevent people from installing

00:17:58 ◼   ► software that doesn't come from the App Store, that's just unrealistic to imagine, but they

00:18:02 ◼   ► can probably do something to make sure that people do not abuse certificates this way.

00:18:08 ◼   ► But I've seen people say "Oh, Apple should just outright prevent installation of software

00:18:13 ◼   ► that doesn't come from the App Store and that is a silly proposition.

00:18:16 ◼   ► That cannot work.

00:18:17 ◼   ► If only because developers need to test their software by installing it locally via Xcode.

00:18:23 ◼   ► There will be no apps, right?

00:18:25 ◼   ► Yes, exactly.

00:18:26 ◼   ► It doesn't work like that.

00:18:27 ◼   ► The problem is abusing certificates.

00:18:29 ◼   ► That is the only problem, not the fact that you can sideload software on your iOS device

00:18:34 ◼   ► in other ways.

00:18:35 ◼   ► It works if you are one person or two people making an app, right?

00:18:39 ◼   ► You can just do what you need to do with Xcode.

00:18:41 ◼   ► if you're a big company, like a Facebook or a Google or a Microsoft, right, like these

00:18:48 ◼   ► applications are sent to much, much larger groups and you can't have like every Monday

00:18:53 ◼   ► everybody lines up at this person's desk and plugs their phone in. That cannot work. That's

00:19:00 ◼   ► why the enterprise certificates exist. I mean, like Apple are already blessing these certificates,

00:19:06 ◼   ► but then something's going wrong. Maybe they need to be reviewing them. Maybe it's as simple

00:19:09 ◼   ► as that, like they have somebody that reviews the applications distributed by the certificate.

00:19:15 ◼   ► I don't know what it is, but whatever it is they're doing right now, this isn't it.

00:19:20 ◼   ► I don't know, maybe if you see that a certificate is being installed on 50,000 devices, maybe

00:19:25 ◼   ► something is wrong there, because who has 50,000 employees? I mean, it's possible for

00:19:29 ◼   ► big companies, but… Facebook!

00:19:31 ◼   ► Yeah, I know, I know. I would be surprised if some of these apps reported by TechCrunch

00:19:35 ◼   ► they don't have multiple hundreds of thousands of users.

00:19:38 ◼   ► Yes, yes. And like there should be a flag and if it pops up, right, like if you don't

00:19:43 ◼   ► know the name of that company, then it's bad. You know the names of them otherwise, like

00:19:48 ◼   ► you just don't have companies that large and they're not household names. There you go,

00:19:53 ◼   ► Apple, just take any of those fixes. You're all set.

00:19:57 ◼   ► I fully expect that we will see some change to this program this year. You know, we'll

00:20:02 ◼   ► We'll get into the summer or the fall and Apple will be like, "Publish to the developer

00:20:05 ◼   ► forums."

00:20:06 ◼   ► Hey, we're changing some things.

00:20:07 ◼   ► No reason why.

00:20:08 ◼   ► You know, not related to anything that happened before.

00:20:13 ◼   ► We have a little follow out to App Stories episode 98.

00:20:19 ◼   ► Congratulations, almost hitting 100 by the way.

00:20:24 ◼   ► This is about your mixed iOS Mac automation, which if people haven't been keeping up with

00:20:30 ◼   ► It is absolutely incredible what you're doing to control your Mac via iOS.

00:20:38 ◼   ► The video alone where you ask the voice assistant to set up a podcast recording is... it blows

00:20:46 ◼   ► my mind, honestly.

00:20:48 ◼   ► Yeah, I do that every week now and it works really well.

00:20:52 ◼   ► So the idea would be... this is going to be like a multi-part series for the iPad Diaries

00:20:57 ◼   ► column that I have a Mac stories, but the idea is now that I have this Mac mini, I figured

00:21:03 ◼   ► I can use the Mac mini for some tasks that the iPad is not capable of doing. This includes

00:21:10 ◼   ► downloading YouTube videos or Plex, for example, or AppleScript, which of course is not supported

00:21:17 ◼   ► on iOS, but also includes... for those few times when I had to use a Mac, such as recording

00:21:23 ◼   ► podcasts, I figured maybe I could automate the setup and sort of write a

00:21:28 ◼   ► workflow, so to speak, that moves and resizes my windows just like I like them.

00:21:33 ◼   ► And so this idea of, I can still use shortcuts on iOS to trigger these

00:21:38 ◼   ► automations, but I'm gonna trigger them on the Mac. And on the Mac they are a

00:21:42 ◼   ► different type of automation. They are keyboard maestro macros, or AppleScript,

00:21:46 ◼   ► or better touch tool actions, or shell scripts, and all of that stuff you can

00:21:51 ◼   ► trigger from iOS. And there's also the fact that I've found this new app to access the

00:22:01 ◼   ► Mac Mini as a server for files, so having my downloads folder or my home folder available

00:22:09 ◼   ► in the files app on iOS as a file provider extension, that was pretty cool.

00:22:14 ◼   ► That's amazing. I need to get that out.

00:22:18 ◼   ► And just the idea of, they are sponsoring this week's show, but it's a product that

00:22:22 ◼   ► I bought myself and I enjoy myself, the Luna Display.

00:22:25 ◼   ► The idea of being able to use my Mac Mini without actually going to my desk and sitting

00:22:32 ◼   ► down and using the physical Mac Mini.

00:22:35 ◼   ► So using Mac OS like it were an app on my iPad.

00:22:41 ◼   ► And so the next...

00:22:42 ◼   ► It's the best.

00:22:43 ◼   ► It's the best feeling.

00:22:44 ◼   ► Yeah, and the next installment...

00:22:45 ◼   ► I know.

00:22:46 ◼   ► The next installment I think will be a few tricks that I've learned and things that I've put together to

00:22:52 ◼   ► make it easier using Luna Display to control macOS from an iPad because of

00:22:58 ◼   ► course you introduce, you know, by using an iPad you introduce touch and so you

00:23:01 ◼   ► create a few inconsistencies and a few situations where it doesn't quite line

00:23:08 ◼   ► up and so things that I've done to make it easier to use macOS on the iPad.

00:23:12 ◼   ► It's gonna be fun.

00:23:14 ◼   ► There's a, definitely I, there's this nostalgic feeling

00:23:19 ◼   ► that I feel when putting together these things

00:23:21 ◼   ► because it's been a few years since I dabbled

00:23:24 ◼   ► in Mac automation, you know, Keeper Master and AppleScript

00:23:27 ◼   ► and the more that I'm digging back into this stuff,

00:23:30 ◼   ► the more I'm like, yeah, I remember doing this,

00:23:32 ◼   ► you know, seven years ago.

00:23:34 ◼   ► That was fun and I'm sort of brushing up again

00:23:37 ◼   ► on all of this and it's been quite

00:23:39 ◼   ► the learning experience so far.

00:23:41 ◼   ► Yeah, I think it's super cool to see these two platforms that have very different backgrounds.

00:23:48 ◼   ► And like you said, like even like scripting paradigms, being able to work together is

00:23:52 ◼   ► pretty awesome.

00:23:53 ◼   ► It makes it makes me excited to think about what the future of both could be as they as

00:23:58 ◼   ► they grow closer together with time.

00:24:01 ◼   ► Yeah, just I was using the automator.

00:24:04 ◼   ► And I was like, well, some actions, they would be pretty cool to have on iOS in shortcuts.

00:24:10 ◼   ► "Man, does the entire UI feel more difficult than shortcuts?"

00:24:13 ◼   ► And I kind of wish that the entire automator was rebuilt as shortcuts for Mac.

00:24:18 ◼   ► Yeah, it hasn't gotten a lot of love.

00:24:20 ◼   ► I mean, they've added actions to it over time, but the basic structure of it

00:24:24 ◼   ► is the same as it's been since, I guess, whenever it came out, Tiger.

00:24:28 ◼   ► You know, it's it's more or less the same application.

00:24:31 ◼   ► You could do more with it.

00:24:32 ◼   ► You can launch in more places.

00:24:33 ◼   ► But I agree with you.

00:24:35 ◼   ► I think it'd be interesting to see them bring some of this modern

00:24:38 ◼   ► automation like thinking and workflows to the Mac. All right, we have some stuff to talk about

00:24:45 ◼   ► rumored Apple events, Mac cares, sonos thing, but first, tell you about our first sponsor.

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00:27:06 ◼   ► Our thanks to text expand or for their support of this show and relay FM. So we're recording

00:27:12 ◼   ► this in the middle of February and word on the street is that Apple is planning a late

00:27:18 ◼   ► March event. So, Myke, do you want to tell us about the story?

00:27:22 ◼   ► Yeah, this came from Buzzfeed news, the technology section of Buzzfeed news from

00:27:29 ◼   ► John Paxkowski. And basically, according to Paxkowski, we're looking at... Let's break

00:27:38 ◼   ► this down. I don't want to... I kind of want to start with some of the stuff he

00:27:42 ◼   ► said is not going to be there. And then maybe do some of the stuff that is because

00:27:47 ◼   ► this is an interesting rumor, but I'm a little bit... I'm not sure about all of it myself.

00:27:55 ◼   ► So the gist of it is there's going to be an event at the Steve Jobs Theater on March 25th,

00:28:01 ◼   ► and that services, the Apple services, is probably going to be the biggest thing, whatever they end

00:28:08 ◼   ► up showing. Paxkowski said that there won't be new AirPods or the new iPad Mini. He followed that up

00:28:18 ◼   ► in a tweet to say that that's not going to be there. But what he did explicitly call out as

00:28:26 ◼   ► headlining the event is the magazine and news service. Let's just pause that a second because

00:28:33 ◼   ► there's a bunch of other stuff to talk about here. One of the other things that he said in this,

00:28:38 ◼   ► it's a relatively short article, which is fine.

00:28:39 ◼   ► I mean, he has all the he's given all the information he has

00:28:42 ◼   ► is saying that and I'll get a quote here about the video streaming service.

00:28:47 ◼   ► So sources describe the event as subscription services focused,

00:28:51 ◼   ► but declined to say anything about Apple's standalone video streaming service,

00:28:56 ◼   ► which is also rumored to debut in 2019.

00:28:59 ◼   ► And I've seen a lot of people take this to be like, well,

00:29:02 ◼   ► it's not going to be there then.

00:29:03 ◼   ► And I find that to be extremely unlikely.

00:29:07 ◼   ► And also the idea of like, just because somebody declines to say something means that it won't exist.

00:29:14 ◼   ► Like, I can see that Paxowski's source gave him a lot of information, right?

00:29:21 ◼   ► Like the date, you know, like the location, stuff that's not going to be there, some stuff that is going to be there,

00:29:27 ◼   ► but said nothing about this or declined to talk about this.

00:29:31 ◼   ► My feeling is there could be a million reasons for that.

00:29:34 ◼   ► like it reminds me of the original kind of like Apple TV thing where Apple wasn't sure if they

00:29:43 ◼   ► were going to launch it or how they were going to launch it like the actual kind of the the update

00:29:47 ◼   ► to Apple TV or tvOS because they didn't sign the deals that they wanted and the and so it was all

00:29:51 ◼   ► up in the air and it may be that some stuff's up in the air but it seems super strange to me

00:29:57 ◼   ► to have an event for services and just talk about the new subscription service which

00:30:03 ◼   ► Which, according to the other rumors that we're going to get to, seems like it's not

00:30:07 ◼   ► even really going to have any major players in it.

00:30:08 ◼   ► So I am still standing personally with the idea that the headlining thing of any spring

00:30:16 ◼   ► event or any event, in my opinion, between now and WWDC is Apple's video streaming service.

00:30:24 ◼   ► So if they do one in March, I think that they still show it off then.

00:30:30 ◼   ► If only by virtue of entertainment being a more marketable event than news, like more

00:30:37 ◼   ► people care about TV shows and movies than they care about the news, let's just face

00:30:40 ◼   ► it. It seems wild to bring everybody to Cupertino to just show off a new service. For a bunch

00:30:46 ◼   ► of magazines, really, with all due respect to magazines, but it's not a good, you know,

00:30:49 ◼   ► this is going to be a public event, it's going to be live streamed, and if magazines and

00:30:53 ◼   ► news are the only event, it's going to be a boring one. So I would be really surprised

00:30:58 ◼   ► if this TV and original content stuff that Apple has been working for the past, Myke,

00:31:03 ◼   ► you can correct me, three years, two years?

00:31:05 ◼   ► Yeah, I think it's been about two years in public.

00:31:08 ◼   ► If they have nothing to show at this point, I would be very surprised, especially if they

00:31:12 ◼   ► want to do an event focused on services, this would be the perfect opportunity to present

00:31:18 ◼   ► their new and modern and more extensive service strategy.

00:31:23 ◼   ► So then again, Bass Feed News, they have good sources and it makes it interesting why would

00:31:31 ◼   ► this source not confirm the TV stuff.

00:31:33 ◼   ► I have no idea, but I agree with Myke, it would be super strange if it's just the news,

00:31:38 ◼   ► especially considering the rumor that is going on about what this news service is all about.

00:31:44 ◼   ► So my one theory, which is just a complete theory and is obviously rubbish because I'm

00:31:50 ◼   ► making it up is that the TV service probably isn't launching any like very

00:31:57 ◼   ► soon I reckon if when they do show it they're just gonna show it be like it's

00:32:01 ◼   ► coming and that maybe this person works in marketing and there is no marketing

00:32:05 ◼   ► for this service yet because it's not launching where maybe everything else is

00:32:09 ◼   ► I don't know that's my only theory so let's talk about the magazine and news

00:32:14 ◼   ► service so the event specifically calls out that this is where we're gonna see

00:32:19 ◼   ► it and this is on the same time that there is a Wall Street Journal article reporting that Apple

00:32:26 ◼   ► is telling currently still, probably it seems, telling news organisations that their plan is to

00:32:32 ◼   ► keep, I quote, "about half of the subscription revenue from their upcoming service". The other

00:32:37 ◼   ► 50% will then be divided up amongst publishers according to the total time users are spending

00:32:44 ◼   ► reading content. So more engagement, more money, which is the logical way to do that,

00:32:49 ◼   ► but we'll get to the 50% part in a minute. It's currently rumoured that the price for the service

00:32:53 ◼   ► will be about $10 a month standalone. There will probably be a bundle, right? And then what happens

00:33:00 ◼   ► when it's bundled? That's like a whole other mess. As it stands right now, according to the Wall

00:33:05 ◼   ► Street Journal, the Washington Post and the New York Times are two of the largest publishers who

00:33:09 ◼   ► have not agreed to this deal. Understandably as well, and I totally get this, publishers

00:33:15 ◼   ► are also concerned that they won't get any subscriber data after giving away 50% of their

00:33:22 ◼   ► revenue.

00:33:23 ◼   ► I understand that. Like my, and I tweeted this yesterday, I'm a, you know, compared

00:33:29 ◼   ► to the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal, I'm a small publisher. And from my

00:33:35 ◼   ► perspective, 50% seems just insane. Especially because in 2019 there are so many different

00:33:43 ◼   ► solutions to roll your own paywalls or subscriptions or memberships, whatever you want to call

00:33:49 ◼   ► them. And so I look at this from two different perspectives. If you're a big publisher, if

00:33:56 ◼   ► you're the New York Times or the Wall Street Journal, you likely don't need the exposure

00:34:00 ◼   ► that Apple provides. The only argument in favor of this is the convenience of people

00:34:04 ◼   ► trusting their iTunes payment system compared to signing up for your own system. So instead

00:34:10 ◼   ► of subscribing to the Times via the Times website, you can do it from Apple News. And

00:34:14 ◼   ► you trust Apple and all of that. But otherwise, you don't need the exposure that Apple provides

00:34:20 ◼   ► because you're the Times. You maybe don't want to give away 50% just for distribution,

00:34:27 ◼   ► especially because this is gonna, you know, this platform, it's not like it's provided

00:34:32 ◼   ► for free, there's costs involved with optimizing your content for Apple News, you're going

00:34:36 ◼   ► to have developers that have to follow a different markup specification, for example, so it's

00:34:42 ◼   ► not like it's provided for free, it just happens.

00:34:44 ◼   ► You straight up know they're not going to make it easy.

00:34:47 ◼   ► No.

00:34:48 ◼   ► No.

00:34:49 ◼   ► Because they never have.

00:34:50 ◼   ► Judging from the current Apple News format, which is a spec that you can read up, it's

00:34:54 ◼   ► available online, it's not easy, so you're going to have developers to work on this and

00:34:58 ◼   ► you're going to give away 50%.

00:35:01 ◼   ► And also, if you're a big publisher, you may say, "Well, okay, so it's a high fee, but

00:35:07 ◼   ► then people trust Apple, we're on Apple News. I suppose we can give away 50% and then we

00:35:12 ◼   ► can use those customers for other promotions, sort of to cross-promote newsletters or that

00:35:17 ◼   ► type of stuff." But no, because Apple doesn't want to give you access to the email address

00:35:21 ◼   ► or data of these people. So it's a very costly proposition for a big publisher.

00:35:28 ◼   ► For a small publisher like me, it's just absurd, because I don't have millions of subscribers

00:35:34 ◼   ► like the Times or the...

00:35:35 ◼   ► You cannot make it up at scale.

00:35:37 ◼   ► I cannot make it up with scale.

00:35:39 ◼   ► The numbers just don't add up.

00:35:42 ◼   ► And also, technologically speaking, why would I lose 50% and also invest time on optimising

00:35:49 ◼   ► this content, which means, you know, a developer and making sure that everything works, to

00:35:54 ◼   ► to have my content in a proprietary system, because, you know, we got a bunch of people

00:36:00 ◼   ► that want to read Club Max stories on Windows PCs and that kind of stuff. But no, this will

00:36:05 ◼   ► be exclusive to Apple devices. When it's so much easier for me to save money and have

00:36:11 ◼   ► my content available in an open format, whether it's an email newsletter or a webpage on my

00:36:17 ◼   ► own website. This would have made sense in 2010, when things like Stripe or MailChimp or Memberful

00:36:25 ◼   ► or Patreon or all other kinds of membership and payment software did not exist, but now they do,

00:36:32 ◼   ► and it's so much easier for a small publisher to pay like 5% or 10% than 50% commission to make

00:36:41 ◼   ► this happen. It just, I cannot... I can't believe that Apple wants to do this, but I will be very

00:36:48 ◼   ► skeptical of small publishers jumping on board just because it's Apple News and just because

00:36:54 ◼   ► it's cool. Because this, to me, is, you know, it's a prime example of something that you're

00:36:59 ◼   ► going to regret. If this is true, of course, if this rumor is true and that's the...

00:37:03 ◼   ► - We don't know. - We don't know, but it seems...

00:37:05 ◼   ► Seems possible. I want to read you a quote from the press release when Apple bought

00:37:11 ◼   ► Texture. So this is Eddy Cue saying, "We are committed to quality journalism from trusted

00:37:18 ◼   ► sources and allowing magazines to keep producing beautifully designed and engaging

00:37:23 ◼   ► stories for users." So like that is a position that Apple have posed themselves as like

00:37:30 ◼   ► caring about quality journalism, but then they want to take 50% of these companies'

00:37:35 ◼   ► money away from them. Look how much they care. They care so much they want 50%.

00:37:40 ◼   ► Like if this is true, again we don't know, if this is true, it feels greedy. It's just greedy,

00:37:46 ◼   ► right? Like I can't work out why they would need 50% from magazines, but 30% from app developers,

00:37:55 ◼   ► or really 15% from app developers have to do in a subscription, which is what this is.

00:38:01 ◼   ► Like, it's really, really wild to me. And I can't fathom how this helps Apple because the amount of

00:38:10 ◼   ► money they will actually make from this will not make a huge difference to the services revenue.

00:38:16 ◼   ► I cannot imagine that this part of their overall plan, like the news and magazines part,

00:38:22 ◼   ► is what will make them the most money.

00:38:24 ◼   ► Like, I can't understand where 50% comes from.

00:38:29 ◼   ► Like, the...

00:38:29 ◼   ► Like, I've seen a lot of people talking about this.

00:38:33 ◼   ► Like, I follow a lot of journalists, right?

00:38:35 ◼   ► So, like, people have been, like, super mad

00:38:37 ◼   ► over the last 24 hours.

00:38:39 ◼   ► And there's one that I can't remember who I saw say this originally,

00:38:43 ◼   ► but I've seen a bunch of people say it.

00:38:44 ◼   ► It's like, Apple now is not seen as being the same company

00:38:51 ◼   ► as iTunes Store Apple. They're not providing as much benefit as they think they are anymore,

00:38:59 ◼   ► nor are they like the scrappy upstart that you're willing to give a little bit more money

00:39:03 ◼   ► to. They're not that company anymore. And I'm kind of shocked about the amount. It's

00:39:13 ◼   ► almost like I feel like it can't be true because it just seems way too unrealistic.

00:39:19 ◼   ► It seems like the situation where in a meeting with an executive they were just laughing

00:39:25 ◼   ► in your face when you bring up the number.

00:39:27 ◼   ► Yes.

00:39:28 ◼   ► Like, you must be kidding, right?

00:39:29 ◼   ► You must be kidding.

00:39:30 ◼   ► Yes, like someone sitting down, like Eddy Cue sitting down with like the person in charge

00:39:34 ◼   ► of like the Wall Street Journal or the New York Times, and like they just like do a spit

00:39:38 ◼   ► take over the...

00:39:39 ◼   ► Like, it's just like, what are you talking about?

00:39:41 ◼   ► Like why would we give you this money?

00:39:43 ◼   ► Yeah.

00:39:44 ◼   ► If you keep on, like, anyone who follows, for example, video game news,

00:39:50 ◼   ► you must know that we live in an era where there's a whole debate going on,

00:39:56 ◼   ► whether the 30% fee that certain game companies like Valve, with Steam,

00:40:02 ◼   ► or like Apple, with the App Store, they keep from developers,

00:40:06 ◼   ► whether that's acceptable or not.

00:40:07 ◼   ► And we're seeing, sure enough, a move toward more sustainable fees,

00:40:13 ◼   ► for example, with the Epic Games Store, and what's it, 12% or 10%?

00:40:19 ◼   ► Yeah, I think it differs depending on the amount of money that you make, but that's

00:40:23 ◼   ► kind of like an average.

00:40:25 ◼   ► There's already a debate in other industries related to software and mobile software, whether

00:40:32 ◼   ► in 2019 the economy of scale makes, you know, justifies a 30% commission, or whether these

00:40:41 ◼   ► companies are keeping this old commission because they're greedy. So 30%, I think to

00:40:46 ◼   ► ask 30% of the Times and other publishers, that will already be high enough. But to almost

00:40:53 ◼   ► double that, because 50% is almost double that, it's just insane. Like I said, I want

00:41:01 ◼   ► to believe it is not true. Because if it is, I don't know what to say.

00:41:07 ◼   ► I think it's important to think about where media has been with tech companies over the

00:41:12 ◼   ► last five years.

00:41:13 ◼   ► So you had Facebook going to these companies and saying, "Hey, we're going to do this video

00:41:17 ◼   ► platform.

00:41:18 ◼   ► We can get you all these views."

00:41:20 ◼   ► Turns out those numbers were completely inflated and we saw massive layoffs as companies had

00:41:26 ◼   ► to basically fire all their video people.

00:41:29 ◼   ► This comes on the heels of things like BuzzFeed laying off a lot of people, Vice laying off

00:41:34 ◼   ► a lot of people.

00:41:35 ◼   ► The media industry is bleeding, and that has been true for a long time.

00:41:40 ◼   ► That was true, that was part of the conversation back in 2010 or 2011 when Apple was like,

00:41:45 ◼   ► "Oh, you can ship your newspaper or magazines in the iPad, and it's gonna be great."

00:41:51 ◼   ► It didn't work then, it's not gonna work now, because Apple is unwilling to play the way

00:41:58 ◼   ► these companies want them to play the money, the customer data.

00:42:02 ◼   ► fine I guess but it is important to realize that like these media companies

00:42:08 ◼   ► need something but I don't think this is it right I don't think this is going to

00:42:11 ◼   ► be the thing that saves them because there's a whole history of things like

00:42:16 ◼   ► this that haven't worked and this so far is no different I cannot get my head

00:42:21 ◼   ► around this the whole thing yeah I still think it's not true I mean it cannot be

00:42:26 ◼   ► true it has to be not true right it's like the only way that you can accept it

00:42:30 ◼   ► it.

00:42:31 ◼   ► >> Mm-hmm.

00:42:32 ◼   ► >> Yeah.

00:42:33 ◼   ► >> I cannot, I just cannot understand how you can go with a straight face to the New

00:42:36 ◼   ► York Times and ask for 50% for distribution on Apple News.

00:42:40 ◼   ► It just, I don't know.

00:42:41 ◼   ► It's we'll see, I guess.

00:42:44 ◼   ► I don't know.

00:42:45 ◼   ► Maybe, maybe just one, it's one of those things where they, they leak the information.

00:42:50 ◼   ► I don't know.

00:42:51 ◼   ► Just to see the reaction of people.

00:42:53 ◼   ► I don't know.

00:42:54 ◼   ► No idea.

00:42:55 ◼   ► Who knows?

00:42:56 ◼   ► Yeah, I mean, it's maybe that someone said 30, but they heard on the phone is 15. That's

00:43:02 ◼   ► the story, right? But I just maybe maybe it's 15. And they heard 50. Yeah, that'd be way

00:43:07 ◼   ► better. But you know, just like, all these, you know, all these reasons would be enough

00:43:13 ◼   ► when you add up like these, these publishers want customer data. The price cuts too big.

00:43:20 ◼   ► It's a bunch of work for them to support the Apple news format, like any one of these things

00:43:24 ◼   ► would be enough for somebody like the New York Times to say no, but add it all together

00:43:28 ◼   ► like New York Times actually has like they just had something a couple weeks ago back

00:43:33 ◼   ► there publisher or publishing base like the money they're making like they're okay the

00:43:39 ◼   ► Washington Post is fine like and so you take them off the table and you move downstream

00:43:44 ◼   ► then the deal gets worse for like medium and small publishers and I just don't know I don't

00:43:51 ◼   ► know what publisher is looking at this thinking, oh, this is a great deal for me and my readers

00:43:55 ◼   ► and this is going to be good for my business because like, I just don't see an upside for

00:43:58 ◼   ► them. I really don't. That is a very good point, right? That like,

00:44:02 ◼   ► the only companies that are likely to take a deal with these kinds of terms are companies

00:44:07 ◼   ► that are already struggling for money and then you're taking half of the money away

00:44:11 ◼   ► from them anyway. Or like it's more, it's, it is more likely that they don't have a thriving

00:44:18 ◼   ► business of their own in subscription revenue.

00:44:20 ◼   ► Right. Because otherwise, why on earth would you do this?

00:44:23 ◼   ► Like no company that has good subscription revenue is going to jump into this and

00:44:27 ◼   ► give half of it away to Apple because you know Apple is going to do what they do

00:44:31 ◼   ► with with other companies and be like, well, now you can't promote your own.

00:44:35 ◼   ► Right. Like they're the terms of the deal, right?

00:44:38 ◼   ► Like you can you can do this here or you can do it over there on your own, but your

00:44:43 ◼   ► app can't have it in anymore. And like any of the content that comes into our system

00:44:46 ◼   ► can't talk about yours. Right. So, yeah, it's... I also, this is, so this is how this conversation

00:44:56 ◼   ► leads into the event, right? If this is the headlining feature of the event, what publishers

00:45:01 ◼   ► do they actually have? And that's why I find it, just why I'm struggling to believe that

00:45:07 ◼   ► this is all the event is for, because I'm sure that they're going to have some great

00:45:11 ◼   ► publications, but they're not going to have the ones that you're either already paying

00:45:16 ◼   ► for the ones you want to pay for because they are most likely already doing okay enough

00:45:22 ◼   ► on their own.

00:45:24 ◼   ► What was the deal years ago, you guys remember this, with the daily?

00:45:30 ◼   ► Remember the daily?

00:45:32 ◼   ► The iPad magazine?

00:45:33 ◼   ► Oh my god, yeah.

00:45:35 ◼   ► What was that all about?

00:45:37 ◼   ► What was the deal?

00:45:39 ◼   ► It was owned by News Corporation I think.

00:45:42 ◼   ► Yes, Rupert Murdoch was on stage at some point I think.

00:45:46 ◼   ► And basically I think they'd basically just lost like a pile of money, they hired a staff

00:45:52 ◼   ► and wrote this app and everything.

00:45:55 ◼   ► It was like an iPad only magazine, what was like the thing about it?

00:45:59 ◼   ► The Daily was the world's first iPad only news app in the US and Australia owned by

00:46:05 ◼   ► News Corp.

00:46:06 ◼   ► And it shut down, we have an article on Mac stories, on December 2012.

00:46:11 ◼   ► So it didn't last too long.

00:46:14 ◼   ► Man.

00:46:14 ◼   ► If you are a publisher,

00:46:20 ◼   ► this is less true now than it was in 2010,

00:46:22 ◼   ► but if you do all this work to only target a single platform,

00:46:27 ◼   ► whether it be just iOS or just Apple,

00:46:30 ◼   ► 'cause news is on the Mac and everything now,

00:46:32 ◼   ► like that's a big user base,

00:46:37 ◼   ► but it's not big enough to build a news corporation on it.

00:46:40 ◼   ► not big enough to fund a newspaper.

00:46:43 ◼   ► Like you have to go broader than just that.

00:46:45 ◼   ► And again, like another blow against this, like if there was some way that

00:46:49 ◼   ► Apple news could just like go to your site and do it all for you, that'd be

00:46:52 ◼   ► one thing, but as we've seen with our own stuff, Supporting the Apple news format.

00:46:57 ◼   ► Isn't necessarily the easiest thing in the world.

00:46:59 ◼   ► And it's so I actually don't do it on five 12.

00:47:02 ◼   ► I just have it suck in the RSS feed and I have no idea who reads it there, but it's

00:47:07 ◼   ► there, but because it wasn't even worth for me as an investment, like.

00:47:10 ◼   ► It's just not enough people, it's not enough money, it's not enough control.

00:47:14 ◼   ► Why would you do it?

00:47:16 ◼   ► Maybe we're all wrong.

00:47:17 ◼   ► Maybe it's 0.50% and everything's amazing.

00:47:21 ◼   ► It would be interesting as a consumer to have one place.

00:47:25 ◼   ► I just opened the news app and everything I want is there.

00:47:28 ◼   ► Right.

00:47:29 ◼   ► It would be great.

00:47:31 ◼   ► And this is what Apple's telling to these people, right?

00:47:34 ◼   ► Everyone wants this so we'll take half of it off you because we're the place that people

00:47:39 ◼   ► want to go to. But I don't think it's worth that. Because the thing is, if all these big

00:47:46 ◼   ► publishers say they're not going to do it, then it's not that one place. So then Apple

00:47:50 ◼   ► doesn't win. Like this is it's like, you familiar with the phrase you cutting your nose off

00:47:55 ◼   ► to spite your face?

00:47:56 ◼   ► Yeah, well, we don't use the nose, but yeah.

00:47:59 ◼   ► Yeah. But it's, you know, it's, I don't even want to know. So it's like that that's kind

00:48:04 ◼   ► of the situation that they're in by like setting the bar so high, they're not going to be able

00:48:08 ◼   ► to provide the benefit that people will actually looking for to make this an attractive proposition.

00:48:13 ◼   ► Yeah, I mean, also, let's be honest, if you like the New York Times enough or you feel

00:48:18 ◼   ► really into the Wall Street Journal, chances are you're fine with subscribing through their

00:48:22 ◼   ► website because you like them enough that it's you go to the website every day. And

00:48:27 ◼   ► I mean, it's, you know, I subscribe to the Wall Street Journal and I never go to the

00:48:33 ◼   ► Wall Street Journal. I can. But now I subscribe to the Wall Street Journal. I can read these

00:48:38 ◼   ► articles and people tweet them. It's the perfect reason for me, right?

00:48:43 ◼   ► How much do you pay for that, by the way? I do not remember. I think it's like $15 a

00:48:47 ◼   ► month or something. But I find the Wall Street Journal's content to be really good, like

00:48:53 ◼   ► this one. And basically I found myself talking about, reading about, and sharing links to

00:49:02 ◼   ► people writing up the Wall Street Journal's articles. And I felt bad about that, so I

00:49:07 ◼   ► subscribed to the Wall Street Journal so I could read them there. So that was why I did it.

00:49:12 ◼   ► Way to be a good citizen of the world, Myke.

00:49:16 ◼   ► No, no, no. I'm just saying why I did it, right?

00:49:20 ◼   ► Yeah. So no hardware, no AirPods, like all this other stuff, just later? Is that what you're

00:49:29 ◼   ► going with?

00:49:30 ◼   ► I mean, I would totally understand if they didn't have a new iPad Mini, but no new AirPods

00:49:34 ◼   ► does seem strange, but maybe...

00:49:36 ◼   ► No, air power seems strange.

00:49:38 ◼   ► No, that seems correct.

00:49:40 ◼   ► Come on.

00:49:41 ◼   ► Correct, correct and accurate.

00:49:42 ◼   ► If they did announce air power right now, that would be strange.

00:49:48 ◼   ► That would be outside of the normal.

00:49:50 ◼   ► Just going to reload the Apple newsroom real quick

00:49:53 ◼   ► and make sure that hasn't happened.

00:49:54 ◼   ► I'll be-- if they're ever going to do it,

00:49:57 ◼   ► that's when I want it to happen.

00:49:58 ◼   ► I want it to happen while we're recording this show.

00:50:00 ◼   ► You two have lost your faith in Apple.

00:50:04 ◼   ► Wow.

00:50:04 ◼   ► Yeah.

00:50:04 ◼   ► I'm so sad.

00:50:05 ◼   ► I have.

00:50:05 ◼   ► for this specific thing. I lost it a long time ago.

00:50:09 ◼   ► Is that it? So I guess we'll see if there's an invite in a month or so.

00:50:18 ◼   ► Yeah, yeah, it's a bit of a ways away.

00:50:21 ◼   ► Yeah, I mean six weeks. It's far enough out we're like, we'll maybe forget about the story.

00:50:24 ◼   ► Oh, there's an event! Ah, crazy!

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00:52:25 ◼   ► So Steven, have you flip flopped to the MacBook Air?

00:52:29 ◼   ► Is that where you've currently landed?

00:52:31 ◼   ► I'm not using the MacBook Air.

00:52:33 ◼   ► Did you sell your iMac Pro and buy a MacBook Air?

00:52:36 ◼   ► Well, see, the thing is, I know that you bought one for your wife, Mary, and you seem to like

00:52:44 ◼   ► it very much in your review.

00:52:46 ◼   ► So my only assumption is that you are merely minutes away from from buying one for yourself

00:52:51 ◼   ► and selling your MacBook Pro.

00:52:53 ◼   ► No, I am using the MacBook Pro because it's a quad core 13 inch machine.

00:52:57 ◼   ► And I need that power when I'm doing audio and video work out of my office.

00:53:02 ◼   ► Like the MacBook Pro is the machine for me with my specific needs where I am in my career.

00:53:09 ◼   ► But I think the MacBook Air has the potential, at least if it's not there already, to be

00:53:16 ◼   ► become the default Mac notebook again. So after 2010 or so when they refreshed

00:53:22 ◼   ► the MacBook Air it became that wedge shape they got rid of the the weird 13-inch

00:53:25 ◼   ► with the flip down door and the iPod hard drive and they made the MacBook Air

00:53:28 ◼   ► that we're all thinking of. It became the default Mac notebook for almost

00:53:32 ◼   ► everybody. So if you were a student or a user at home or an office unless you

00:53:37 ◼   ► were doing something like video production the MacBook Air met everyone's

00:53:41 ◼   ► needs because it was light and portable it was pretty fast especially later

00:53:45 ◼   ► models and it had all SSD storage which made it feel way faster than it actually was because

00:53:51 ◼   ► we were all used to you know machines with spinning hard drives and the MacBook Air was

00:53:55 ◼   ► the first Mac to go all SSD but over time that we know what happened right the MacBook came out

00:54:02 ◼   ► the air just got older and older and was just hanging around when they released the 2016 MacBook

00:54:10 ◼   ► pros that the MacBook, I know Federico really likes the nicknames, the escape, which is

00:54:15 ◼   ► the two port MacBook.

00:54:17 ◼   ► So Marco Marco named it.

00:54:18 ◼   ► I was wondering what was going to happen first.

00:54:21 ◼   ► Either you were going to tease him or he was going to get upset about it.

00:54:24 ◼   ► Yeah.

00:54:25 ◼   ► Thank you for answering that for me.

00:54:26 ◼   ► So real names come the MacBook Pro to Thunderbolt three ports, all parentheses, that machine

00:54:35 ◼   ► the two port MacBook Pro, it was pitched in the keynote by Phil Schiller as, "Hey, you

00:54:40 ◼   ► used to buy a MacBook Air, now we have this."

00:54:42 ◼   ► Ignore the fact that it's $400 and more expensive, but, "Hey, what about this?"

00:54:47 ◼   ► And it just didn't go anywhere.

00:54:49 ◼   ► People didn't respond to that very well.

00:54:51 ◼   ► I know there are people who really like that machine.

00:54:53 ◼   ► I really like that machine because I don't care for the touch bar, but it clearly hasn't

00:54:58 ◼   ► done what Apple wanted it to do.

00:55:01 ◼   ► And then a couple years later, now we're in the present and we have this new MacBook Air,

00:55:06 ◼   ► which like my headline was getting the band back together.

00:55:08 ◼   ► Like it's kind of trying to relive the glory days, which was my alternative headline of

00:55:13 ◼   ► like, the epic air was really good for a long time.

00:55:16 ◼   ► Let's modernize it, see if we can like, bring that magic back a little bit.

00:55:20 ◼   ► So that's kind of where we are.

00:55:22 ◼   ► It's not my machine is my wife's machine.

00:55:24 ◼   ► She really likes it.

00:55:25 ◼   ► She was coming from a 2015 MacBook with a brief stint of like a 2013 iMac, which I put

00:55:32 ◼   ► SSD in for her, but she wanted to go to a notebook.

00:55:34 ◼   ► So yeah, that's kind of where we are.

00:55:36 ◼   ► It's a lot of talking, but the MacBook Air is great.

00:55:39 ◼   ► It's not for me personally, but it could be for, I think, almost anybody.

00:55:43 ◼   ► This is a very different opinion to your original opinions about the MacBook Air.

00:55:47 ◼   ► What was my original opinion?

00:55:48 ◼   ► I saw this in the notes, and I don't know what I said originally.

00:55:52 ◼   ► You were very upset about the MacBook Air.

00:55:54 ◼   ► Because of the CPU?

00:55:55 ◼   ► Was it a CPU?

00:55:56 ◼   ► Yeah.

00:55:57 ◼   ► So let's talk about the CPU.

00:55:59 ◼   ► It is the only Mac that I can think of and definitely in like modern Apple since like

00:56:05 ◼   ► the late 90s that is only has one CPU option.

00:56:09 ◼   ► So it's like buying an iPad or like you just get the CPU that comes in it.

00:56:14 ◼   ► And that's really unusual, right?

00:56:15 ◼   ► Most Macs you can kind of pick between several.

00:56:17 ◼   ► So it's a 1.6 gigahertz dual core i5.

00:56:22 ◼   ► It does have turbo boost, a 3.6 gigahertz.

00:56:25 ◼   ► So it's sort of a mid range CPU.

00:56:29 ◼   ► And there was a lot of debate when this came out.

00:56:31 ◼   ► Is it five watts?

00:56:32 ◼   ► Is it seven watts?

00:56:33 ◼   ► Does it have a fan?

00:56:34 ◼   ► So it is a seven watt CPU and it does have a fan.

00:56:37 ◼   ► The MacBook Air has a fan unlike the MacBook.

00:56:40 ◼   ► It's a little single fan.

00:56:41 ◼   ► You can hear it under load, but it's fine.

00:56:43 ◼   ► In reality, I was really pleasantly surprised

00:56:49 ◼   ► that this MacBook Air feels fast.

00:56:52 ◼   ► I was worried that, especially under load,

00:56:55 ◼   ► it was gonna kinda chug and stutter,

00:56:58 ◼   ► and the reality is it just doesn't.

00:57:00 ◼   ► I didn't do any 4K video editing on it,

00:57:04 ◼   ► but that's not what this machine is for, I don't think.

00:57:05 ◼   ► I'm sure you could do it, probably be slow,

00:57:08 ◼   ► but in everyday use, which is who this machine is for,

00:57:12 ◼   ► it's totally fine.

00:57:14 ◼   ► It is speedy, it's quiet, the battery life is really good,

00:57:19 ◼   ► And so it has made me a believer, so to speak,

00:57:23 ◼   ► where I definitely had my doubts before,

00:57:24 ◼   ► but I see what they're doing with it,

00:57:27 ◼   ► and I'm fine with it.

00:57:29 ◼   ► I can change my mind, it's fine.

00:57:31 ◼   ► - No, it's fine to change your mind.

00:57:33 ◼   ► But I'm pleased that you have, right?

00:57:36 ◼   ► Because that's, you know, this is a good,

00:57:38 ◼   ► I think this is a good looking machine.

00:57:42 ◼   ► Like I feel like if I was in need of a laptop today,

00:57:44 ◼   ► it's probably the one that I would get.

00:57:45 ◼   ► Like there is enough power in it

00:57:48 ◼   ► to do what I would need to do.

00:57:49 ◼   ► I think, considering how infrequently I would be using it.

00:57:52 ◼   ► But you know, this is really just for

00:57:56 ◼   ► if I am gonna be on a trip and I need to record some shows,

00:58:01 ◼   ► for example, I'm taking a trip next month,

00:58:03 ◼   ► two actually, where I need to do that.

00:58:04 ◼   ► So I'm gonna have to have my MacBook Pro with me.

00:58:07 ◼   ► But I wouldn't necessarily need a MacBook Pro.

00:58:10 ◼   ► So I guess I could save a little bit of money

00:58:12 ◼   ► and maybe gain a little bit of portability.

00:58:14 ◼   ► I know it's like thinner at one edge and it's a bit lighter.

00:58:17 ◼   ► So that's probably what I would be maximizing for is the ability to be able to move the

00:58:22 ◼   ► thing around, which is why I originally went with a MacBook, right, but ran into some issues

00:58:28 ◼   ► with the MacBook's ability.

00:58:29 ◼   ► The performance there is not nearly as good.

00:58:33 ◼   ► The portability is interesting.

00:58:34 ◼   ► It is lighter than the 13-inch MacBook Pro, but not by much.

00:58:40 ◼   ► But it tricks you.

00:58:41 ◼   ► The wedge shape is so nice to hold and nice to have in your bag.

00:58:45 ◼   ► It feels thinner than it is.

00:58:47 ◼   ► In fact, the Air is a hair thicker than the MacBook Pro at the hinge if they put them

00:58:52 ◼   ► like back to back, which is just hilarious to me.

00:58:56 ◼   ► But yeah, I think I think even if you're doing what we do with like podcast production, you

00:59:00 ◼   ► could do podcast production on a machine like this.

00:59:02 ◼   ► It wouldn't be as fast as a MacBook Pro to export, but it wouldn't be a nightmare by

00:59:07 ◼   ► any means.

00:59:08 ◼   ► Definitely way better than the five watt single port MacBook.

00:59:13 ◼   ► Do you think that the MacBook Air, this current MacBook Air, has a different average customer

00:59:20 ◼   ► to the previous MacBook Airs?

00:59:22 ◼   ► I think the previous MacBook Air, if you wanted to buy a laptop, especially say like 2011

00:59:29 ◼   ► and later, after they've been out for about a year and people kind of understood what

00:59:32 ◼   ► it was, I think it's the one you bought, unless you needed a MacBook Pro.

00:59:40 ◼   ► started here and then you upgrade it to a pro if you you know we're doing video

00:59:45 ◼   ► production or something like that now I think it's it's more confusing I think a

00:59:52 ◼   ► because this machine is new and it hasn't sort of settled in yet that this

00:59:55 ◼   ► is a really good laptop like it's way better than I thought it would be I was

00:59:59 ◼   ► totally impressed with it I didn't I expected to write this review and have a

01:00:02 ◼   ► lot more like sadness about it than I did I think it can get there again I

01:00:09 ◼   ► I think it's going to take Apple continuing to update it, you know,

01:00:14 ◼   ► annually or every 18 months or whatever they're doing now.

01:00:16 ◼   ► And I think it's going to take some clarification around the two port Mac book

01:00:22 ◼   ► pro that machine is faster than this.

01:00:25 ◼   ► It has an older CPU has the older keyboard.

01:00:28 ◼   ► It does not have touch ID and this machine does.

01:00:31 ◼   ► I don't know why that computer is still for sale, except that the touch

01:00:35 ◼   ► bar makes the machine too expensive.

01:00:38 ◼   ► And, uh, I would think, I think I would be okay.

01:00:42 ◼   ► Honestly, if the line went MacBook MacBook air, touch bar, and they got rid of the two

01:00:47 ◼   ► port, even though that would mean a pretty big price jump, it would clarify things at

01:00:52 ◼   ► least saying, okay, if you're this kind of user, this is the machine for you.

01:00:56 ◼   ► If you're not, we have this other one and they just don't have that because Apple is

01:01:01 ◼   ► afraid of leaving any price points untouched.

01:01:03 ◼   ► And I think that's a mistake ultimately with this line.

01:01:05 ◼   ► Yeah, I mean, it's often said at the moment and has been more and more echoed, especially

01:01:10 ◼   ► in the last few months of the year.

01:01:11 ◼   ► But price is the complicating factor.

01:01:15 ◼   ► And this MacBook Air is about $200 too expensive.

01:01:19 ◼   ► And that is a significant issue.

01:01:22 ◼   ► And I think is one of the reasons that maybe this machine isn't getting the love that it

01:01:27 ◼   ► could deserve.

01:01:28 ◼   ► Because at that price, this machine would be no brainer.

01:01:32 ◼   ► If it started at $999 for the current specs,

01:01:36 ◼   ► like don't put like a 32 gig SSD in it or something silly.

01:01:40 ◼   ► Like, current base model was $1,000.

01:01:44 ◼   ► I think everyone would be praising this machine.

01:01:47 ◼   ► But right now, I feel like I did it in the review,

01:01:50 ◼   ► I feel like I have to temper that with it's

01:01:53 ◼   ► really confusing with the other models all priced the same.

01:01:57 ◼   ► And maybe you don't get as much bang for your buck

01:02:00 ◼   ► you as you could get in the past. Yeah I feel like the last maybe 10 years has

01:02:07 ◼   ► kind of ingrained in me that if a laptop is over $1,000 it's one of two reasons

01:02:11 ◼   ► it's either groundbreaking in some way which this one is not or it is a pro

01:02:17 ◼   ► machine which this one is not so if you're if I'm gonna be paying a four

01:02:21 ◼   ► figure sum for a laptop from Apple I expect it to be one of those two things

01:02:26 ◼   ► things. And the MacBook Air is not that.

01:02:28 ◼   ► Yeah, I mean, you know, if you if you spec them all with the same SSD and RAM, the MacBook,

01:02:34 ◼   ► the Air and the Pro are all very close, if not exactly the same price. And, you know,

01:02:40 ◼   ► I've said it a thousand times, like, if you walk into a store with $1,200 in your pocket

01:02:44 ◼   ► to buy a notebook, you have no idea what to do. It's like, and you just kind of like,

01:02:49 ◼   ► you know, pick one blind. And that's not the way to shop for a computer. And Apple's got

01:02:53 ◼   ► clear that up. Well maybe before we move on from this, the the keyboard is the

01:03:01 ◼   ► because I got some questions about this after the review so I want to say it

01:03:04 ◼   ► here too. The keyboard is exactly the same as the 2018 MacBook Pro. So typing

01:03:09 ◼   ► on the air and then turning and typing on my MacBook Pro is a 2018. They feel

01:03:14 ◼   ► exactly the same. They have the little silicone you know job underneath to try

01:03:20 ◼   ► to keep crumbs out, they sound the same, they travel the same. I don't hate that

01:03:25 ◼   ► keyboard but I certainly don't love it but it's fine I've gotten used to it

01:03:28 ◼   ► over the years but it has the same exact same keyboard the only difference is it

01:03:32 ◼   ► has the function keys which like I just love like I I am cooler on the touch bar

01:03:39 ◼   ► now than I ever have especially after using this machine for a couple of weeks

01:03:42 ◼   ► But having touch ID is fantastic and I want to see them continue to push that.

01:03:50 ◼   ► I'd like to see it on the external keyboards. I'd like to see honestly like

01:03:54 ◼   ► there's like an alternative future. I don't really buy that this is happening

01:03:58 ◼   ► so it's not a prediction but I could see a world where they fix some of this

01:04:02 ◼   ► pricing by getting rid of the touch bar and the MacBook Pro starts at you know

01:04:06 ◼   ► $14.99 or something with Touch ID and four ports.

01:04:12 ◼   ► And they can sort of fix the pricing that way.

01:04:14 ◼   ► Because my understanding is the Touch Bar

01:04:16 ◼   ► is one reason these new machines are so expensive.

01:04:19 ◼   ► Whether that's actually true or not,

01:04:20 ◼   ► I don't have the spreadsheet, obviously.

01:04:22 ◼   ► But I've heard that from enough people over the years

01:04:24 ◼   ► that I buy it.

01:04:25 ◼   ► And getting rid of it--

01:04:28 ◼   ► I know there are those of you out there who really like

01:04:31 ◼   ► the Touch Bar and who are doing crazy things with Better Touch

01:04:34 ◼   ► tool and all these things.

01:04:36 ◼   ► But I think for the average user, even someone like me,

01:04:38 ◼   ► I'm not an average user.

01:04:40 ◼   ► I'm a professional user.

01:04:42 ◼   ► It just hasn't changed my workflow.

01:04:44 ◼   ► If I edit in Logic on my laptop, I

01:04:47 ◼   ► have play/pause and all these tools and stuff

01:04:49 ◼   ► on the touch bar.

01:04:50 ◼   ► And it just don't matter.

01:04:53 ◼   ► I have not found a compelling use case for it.

01:04:56 ◼   ► When I'm typing, the autocorrect can't keep up with my typing.

01:04:59 ◼   ► By the time I'm done with a sentence,

01:05:01 ◼   ► I'm like three words past the thing it's trying to correct.

01:05:04 ◼   ► It's frustrating at best.

01:05:05 ◼   ► And so most of the time I just leave it as the expanded thing

01:05:08 ◼   ► with the volume keys and stuff.

01:05:10 ◼   ► And I just don't think it's taken off.

01:05:13 ◼   ► And I think this machine kind of proves it.

01:05:17 ◼   ► I mean, they couldn't put it in it for price reasons

01:05:18 ◼   ► or thickness reasons.

01:05:20 ◼   ► But this machine's a really good computer.

01:05:23 ◼   ► And at no point in using this MacBook Air

01:05:25 ◼   ► for the last couple weeks have I thought,

01:05:27 ◼   ► man, I really wish I had the touch bar.

01:05:29 ◼   ► Like I really feel compromised in my experience

01:05:31 ◼   ► 'cause I don't have it.

01:05:32 ◼   ► And that's pretty bad, right?

01:05:34 ◼   ► for something that Apple pitched is like the future of the notebook, this machine is better

01:05:39 ◼   ► than the Pro in a lot of ways and a lot of it has to do with the fact that that's not

01:05:42 ◼   ► there.

01:05:43 ◼   ► It's just getting you ready for that all glass keyboard which is fun.

01:05:46 ◼   ► Oh, no.

01:05:47 ◼   ► And then you'll be fine.

01:05:48 ◼   ► So yeah, that's the MacBook Air.

01:05:50 ◼   ► It's nice, it's a modern machine, has thin bezels, you can get it in silver and space

01:05:54 ◼   ► grey and the new gold color.

01:05:57 ◼   ► My wife got it in silver because she's a traditionalist, I think it looks really good in silver.

01:06:00 ◼   ► But I would say if you have a, you know, an old MacBook Air, that's 2011 2012 2013, and

01:06:07 ◼   ► you're thinking, hey, it's time.

01:06:09 ◼   ► I start with this, I totally recommend it.

01:06:11 ◼   ► As long as you're not doing like video production or something like yours doing kind of normal

01:06:15 ◼   ► user stuff.

01:06:16 ◼   ► Even if you're doing photo editing or graphic design, or maybe even some audio work, it

01:06:21 ◼   ► should be able to handle all of it.

01:06:22 ◼   ► It's got a retina display.

01:06:23 ◼   ► It's not as bright as the pros, but that's fine.

01:06:26 ◼   ► No true tone, but that's fine.

01:06:27 ◼   ► It's a it's like a really nicely spec'd machine. Like I felt that made the I felt they made

01:06:33 ◼   ► the right compromises with this. And that's kind of refreshing to say about a Mac notebook

01:06:37 ◼   ► these days. You're excited Federico. You excited about the Medicare?

01:06:41 ◼   ► Yes. Still here? Yeah, I am. I'm excited for you. You should be excited for Mary. It's

01:06:47 ◼   ► her laptop. Well, I know you're gonna get one anyway. So that's how it goes. No, no,

01:06:52 ◼   ► you're just delaying the inevitable. That's what you're doing. We all know it. If it was

01:06:57 ◼   ► as fast as it is but weighed half of my pro did you will find a reason to get it no I

01:07:03 ◼   ► like having a quad core 13 I'm not saying that you don't like it I'm saying you're gonna

01:07:07 ◼   ► like an additional one because it's what you do I don't know I've definitely not done that

01:07:13 ◼   ► with phones recently that's that's not a thing mm-hmm I don't talk about that sure let's

01:07:18 ◼   ► move on can't do that you can't just be like I can't above a lot no Federica did about

01:07:23 ◼   ► iPads for weeks yeah but at least said what it was that he'd done and then we

01:07:30 ◼   ► just didn't talk about it sure what I'm saying is I know my flaws so I'm upfront

01:07:38 ◼   ► about it and you know my flaws clearly why talk about it then this is next week

01:07:47 ◼   ► okay next week I'll talk about fans I promise okay all right one little story

01:07:52 ◼   ► before we move on and it's really a it's a weird one yesterday Mac rumors

01:07:59 ◼   ► published an article and the headline again WBC 2019 dates confirmed colon

01:08:06 ◼   ► found confirmed I have a real problem with that choice of words June 3rd through

01:08:11 ◼   ► 7th in San Jose and then they updated it so what happened here confirmed is the

01:08:18 ◼   ► wrong word. Apple has not announced that we see dates. Yes, I believe these are

01:08:23 ◼   ► the dates but Apple hasn't said it. So that's the wrong verb Mac rumors. But

01:08:27 ◼   ► what happened is they were digging through it.

01:08:30 ◼   ► But it's close enough this time. It's close enough.

01:08:33 ◼   ► It's the right word if you want people to click on it.

01:08:36 ◼   ► Right. Also the way that it was discovered, like, I see the the verb

01:08:42 ◼   ► confirmed, thrown around for things that are like rumors.

01:08:47 ◼   ► Well, it's like the word breaking.

01:08:50 ◼   ► Yes. These in this case, I feel like it's more like a gray area because it is still

01:08:55 ◼   ► a rumor and it's not being confirmed by Apple.

01:08:57 ◼   ► But as we'll see in a second, Steven, where was this discovered?

01:09:02 ◼   ► This is great.

01:09:06 ◼   ► MacRumors went to the 2019 event calendar for the city of San Jose's Office of Cultural Affairs.

01:09:15 ◼   ► I applaud the ingenuity of this reporting so strongly. This is so clever and like so sneaky.

01:09:26 ◼   ► I think it's brilliant. I think that hats off to MacRumors for working this one out, I think.

01:09:33 ◼   ► So what, what happened here is the, uh, the bash happens at a park called discovery meadow.

01:09:39 ◼   ► There's a wonderful name for a park.

01:09:41 ◼   ► Really?

01:09:41 ◼   ► I love that name.

01:09:42 ◼   ► And that's apparently managed somehow by the city of San Jose's office of cultural affairs.

01:09:48 ◼   ► And so they had on their public schedule on their website, June 6th, 6 to 11 PM, uh, team

01:09:56 ◼   ► San Jose, 2019 WWDC with apple.com listed as the URL.

01:10:01 ◼   ► And an apple, like as the organization, like as well above it, not just the URL, it's just

01:10:08 ◼   ► apple slash team San Jose team San Jose clearly being the code name. Right. Like that's what's

01:10:16 ◼   ► supposed to appear. Here's the thing about code names, Apple. Here's the thing. A that's a terrible

01:10:22 ◼   ► code name, right? Like you just put team in front of the name of the city you're in. That's awful.

01:10:26 ◼   ► But code names should be aloof, right? Like you got to be cool to know the code name. Yeah.

01:10:30 ◼   ► like project porridge, for example, that's my new company.

01:10:34 ◼   ► Supposed to be something that people can not, you know, glean from

01:10:42 ◼   ► why are we in this podcast now?

01:10:43 ◼   ► I just don't understand.

01:10:45 ◼   ► Sorry.

01:10:45 ◼   ► So anyways, so this seems like a pretty surefire thing.

01:10:51 ◼   ► It was, it was in the, this calendar last year, apparently.

01:10:54 ◼   ► And, uh, so.

01:10:56 ◼   ► Mac stories, Mac, sorry, Mac rumors published this with a fine print that I

01:11:04 ◼   ► just have to read to you because it's the best fine print I've ever seen on a blog

01:11:07 ◼   ► post.

01:11:08 ◼   ► So good.

01:11:08 ◼   ► While we are confident about these dates, comma Apple could change its plans.

01:11:12 ◼   ► Anytime Mac rumors can't be held responsible for any airfare or

01:11:16 ◼   ► accommodations booked based on this information.

01:11:19 ◼   ► I love it, but I do.

01:11:22 ◼   ► I do this, this, this line, I see people say it's like Apple could change its

01:11:26 ◼   ► plans and no it can't it cannot it cannot like this is categorically

01:11:31 ◼   ► incorrect right they can't the next day it's the downtown farmers market they

01:11:36 ◼   ► can't compete with that can't compete with that but like I just mean like in

01:11:40 ◼   ► general if Apple has booked anything for the WWDC they cannot change that I don't

01:11:47 ◼   ► think people understand how planning these events work like yeah it's it's

01:11:52 ◼   ► They said, you know, people say, no, it's not confirmed until Apple says it's confirmed.

01:11:57 ◼   ► Sure.

01:11:58 ◼   ► In most cases, I would say that for WWDC rumors.

01:12:02 ◼   ► But when you find the name of the event...

01:12:06 ◼   ► One booking, right?

01:12:07 ◼   ► Like if they had four different dates booked at this place, then sure, they can change

01:12:13 ◼   ► it.

01:12:14 ◼   ► They're covering their bases.

01:12:15 ◼   ► But if this really is them, which let's be real, it really is them because it got changed,

01:12:20 ◼   ► right?

01:12:21 ◼   ► got changed and it now just says Team San Jose.

01:12:24 ◼   ► - It could be Apple Records and their San Jose department.

01:12:28 ◼   ► You know? - That's true.

01:12:29 ◼   ► - Sure. - And it's a music venue,

01:12:31 ◼   ► so they could be them, Apple Records.

01:12:32 ◼   ► - It could just be those.

01:12:34 ◼   ► So like, you know, this is probably,

01:12:36 ◼   ► this is definitely when the dates are.

01:12:39 ◼   ► This is when they are.

01:12:40 ◼   ► We just haven't had Apple confirm it yet.

01:12:42 ◼   ► - Excuse me, I need to say something.

01:12:44 ◼   ► - Yes. - While we are not confident

01:12:45 ◼   ► about these dates, Apple could change its plans at any time.

01:12:47 ◼   ► "Connected and Relay FM LLC can't be held responsible

01:12:51 ◼   ► "for any airfare or accommodations booked

01:12:53 ◼   ► "based on this information."

01:12:55 ◼   ► - Very true, that is very true.

01:12:57 ◼   ► We will turn just very quickly to,

01:13:02 ◼   ► this is brought up all the time now,

01:13:03 ◼   ► and I understand why, everything's super expensive.

01:13:07 ◼   ► So the hotels are really expensive now because of this.

01:13:11 ◼   ► I would just say it's not just because of this.

01:13:13 ◼   ► I have, well me and Federico have bookings on multiple weeks in the month of June. We did this

01:13:22 ◼   ► a few months ago. And for a room in the same hotel that is smaller than the previous room,

01:13:28 ◼   ► it is twice the price of last year. This is just what happens. You know, I really wish that it

01:13:36 ◼   ► didn't happen. I would love it if Apple could do something about it, but it's not going to happen

01:13:41 ◼   ► because like you know this is what this is what hotels are gonna do I'm blame

01:13:46 ◼   ► the hotels right yeah there was some some tweeting and stuff yesterday before

01:13:52 ◼   ► I just quit Twitter for the day about like oh it's like bad because it's in

01:13:56 ◼   ► the Bay Area and stuff like this will happen in any city this will happen yes

01:13:59 ◼   ► anytime there's a big conference it is a little worse in San Jose because San

01:14:03 ◼   ► Jose is not very big and your hotel choices are limited but if this were in

01:14:08 ◼   ► basically any city, you know, this is just what happens with conferences and

01:14:14 ◼   ► with trade shows, right? Have people ever traveled around Christmas or New Year's

01:14:19 ◼   ► Eve or any other holiday? Or go to WBC in San Francisco where there are

01:14:24 ◼   ► approximately 2 billion more hotels and this happened there too, right? So like, I guess Apple could just...

01:14:31 ◼   ► Oh, San Francisco hotels are a joke all the time. They're always massively expensive. Like the only way to solve this

01:14:36 ◼   ► problem is to go to a place which probably doesn't exist that has more

01:14:40 ◼   ► hotels so that the hotels will never sell out. That's the only way you can do

01:14:44 ◼   ► this, but I don't think such a place exists.

01:14:46 ◼   ► Or Apple just picks a new city every year and they just surprise the city, right?

01:14:51 ◼   ► Like, you can go to Viterbo and you're gonna have that situation.

01:14:57 ◼   ► Is there a lot of hotels?

01:14:59 ◼   ► Sorry.

01:14:59 ◼   ► Like, look, please do not misunderstand what we are saying here. This is like

01:15:04 ◼   ► cost prohibitive for so many people and that is a great shame. It is a great

01:15:10 ◼   ► shame and I wish it wasn't that way. I genuinely wish that Apple could kind of

01:15:15 ◼   ► throw their weight around and like put a cap on these hotels. To be like if you

01:15:20 ◼   ► want us to keep coming back this is the maximum you can charge you can't go

01:15:24 ◼   ► above this right like I wish that they could do that for all we know they are

01:15:27 ◼   ► doing that right like I don't know what the situation is like. Or at least make the

01:15:31 ◼   ► ticket more affordable. Yes, the ticket should be more affordable. At least don't make the ticket

01:15:37 ◼   ► $1500. Yes, that's definitely something that they have within their control because,

01:15:44 ◼   ► come on, what does it matter if they're out of pocket on this event, right? Which they probably

01:15:50 ◼   ► are anyway, but like, they can afford it. Like this is not, you know. Take it out of the lunch

01:15:55 ◼   ► budget it's fine yeah well John said I'll be fine this is this is a great it

01:16:01 ◼   ► is a great shame that it is that way but I understand why it is that way and it's

01:16:05 ◼   ► always gonna be this way no matter where they go but it's frustrating and I and I

01:16:09 ◼   ► totally understand I mean I understand if somebody was paying the money like

01:16:13 ◼   ► you would not believe the amount of money this trip cost me like because we

01:16:18 ◼   ► are also flying from Europe which is already a four-figure sum right before

01:16:24 ◼   ► or we're even getting to the hotels, which is another four figure sum.

01:16:27 ◼   ► And then as a company that books event spaces,

01:16:30 ◼   ► all the event spaces start to increase in price.

01:16:33 ◼   ► Right. Like this is just how these things go.

01:16:37 ◼   ► Right. Like so it's unfortunate.

01:16:40 ◼   ► But, you know, I'll be there because I have a hotel.

01:16:44 ◼   ► I haven't booked flights yet. I'm not going to book flights.

01:16:46 ◼   ► That's the thing, right?

01:16:47 ◼   ► Like I'll book hotels on dates like this. I'm not booking a flight.

01:16:50 ◼   ► I'll wait for Apple to book the same.

01:16:52 ◼   ► I've got a place to stay, but I will do flights after this is announced.

01:16:57 ◼   ► Because as well, flights are more... it's easier to get flights than it is to get hotel

01:17:01 ◼   ► rooms.

01:17:02 ◼   ► Yeah.

01:17:03 ◼   ► Yeah, so.

01:17:04 ◼   ► Yeah, so there's that.

01:17:06 ◼   ► So quickly before we move on, are we applying for tickets?

01:17:10 ◼   ► Yes.

01:17:11 ◼   ► Of course.

01:17:14 ◼   ► This will, as promised, this is my first year where I begin applying.

01:17:18 ◼   ► Yay!

01:17:19 ◼   ► Finally!

01:17:20 ◼   ► Well, I hope you're not gonna steal my ticket, Myke.

01:17:23 ◼   ► But I'm very happy to finally get one.

01:17:25 ◼   ► That's gonna be it. If I get a ticket and he doesn't get one,

01:17:28 ◼   ► the whole time Federico will blame me personally for taking his ticket away.

01:17:31 ◼   ► Oh yeah, I'm already telling you. Like, I'm telling you in advance.

01:17:33 ◼   ► So, you know, it's just how I'm built.

01:17:37 ◼   ► If you get a ticket and I don't, I will blame you.

01:17:39 ◼   ► But it's fine. It's just so-

01:17:41 ◼   ► Steve-O, are you gonna do it?

01:17:43 ◼   ► I was going to, but I think my wife is coming with me this year,

01:17:47 ◼   ► so I am not going to be putting my name in the ring.

01:17:50 ◼   ► This would be the worst year.

01:17:52 ◼   ► But like, thanks for coming on this trip.

01:17:55 ◼   ► See you later.

01:17:56 ◼   ► [laughter]

01:17:57 ◼   ► I spent an additional $1500 to go to a conference that I only have a little bit of business

01:18:02 ◼   ► going to, so.

01:18:03 ◼   ► Yeah, especially when I guess you guys are spending more money if you're coming together

01:18:06 ◼   ► anyway.

01:18:07 ◼   ► Yes.

01:18:08 ◼   ► But WBC often lands on our wedding anniversary, and that is true this year if these dates

01:18:14 ◼   ► are real.

01:18:15 ◼   ► And so instead of me like skipping town on our anniversary, we'll be traveling together.

01:18:18 ◼   ► So that's better than the alternative.

01:18:22 ◼   ► Yeah, I look forward to this trip every year.

01:18:24 ◼   ► I just hate that it's so expensive

01:18:26 ◼   ► 'cause it cuts so many people out.

01:18:27 ◼   ► It cuts so much of the community down that can't make it.

01:18:31 ◼   ► And Macworld and stuff is all gone.

01:18:34 ◼   ► There are very few opportunities

01:18:35 ◼   ► for the Apple community to be together.

01:18:37 ◼   ► And the main one is prohibitively expensive

01:18:40 ◼   ► for most people.

01:18:41 ◼   ► It's a real shame.

01:18:43 ◼   ► All right, we're gonna talk about Myke's sad audio.

01:18:48 ◼   ► I didn't want to talk about this thing that's coming up, but you guys wanted me to talk about it

01:18:53 ◼   ► And I didn't want to but we're doing it anyway

01:18:55 ◼   ► We're gonna share a little bit about your your audio situation at home, but first I want to tell you about

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01:20:02 ◼   ► So anytime we have an announcement about a new podcast or a live show coming up or anything like that

01:20:08 ◼   ► Myke and I can we can write a blog post we can do it in markdown, which I love

01:20:11 ◼   ► Put it into Squarespace drag images in resize the images make sure it all flows the way you want it to and then publish it

01:20:19 ◼   ► Then we can go back to doing our regular jobs, and I just know that that site will be up there

01:20:24 ◼   ► It will be stable everyone can read it. It looks really good. I just don't have to worry about it

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01:20:59 ◼   ► next website. Alright Myke, tell us, lead us down your trail of woe.

01:21:08 ◼   ► Since I was about 20 years old I have been building a record collection. I kind of built

01:21:15 ◼   ► it a lot.

01:21:16 ◼   ► Wow, you just started right off with like...

01:21:18 ◼   ► What a lead, okay.

01:21:20 ◼   ► I built, I started that collection about then, I built most of it up over a few years and

01:21:26 ◼   ► then I've added to it incredibly slowly maybe over the last five years.

01:21:29 ◼   ► Were you into vinyl before Casey lists?

01:21:31 ◼   ► I'm well.

01:21:33 ◼   ► I was into it before I knew him.

01:21:36 ◼   ► I think yes, actually, because Casey didn't own a record player of his own.

01:21:40 ◼   ► I don't think he's a reason.

01:21:41 ◼   ► So you're saying he's opposed or compared to you who are like 100 percent.

01:21:44 ◼   ► No, I'm OG and he's not.

01:21:47 ◼   ► Gotcha. So I bought a record player and like,

01:21:51 ◼   ► so I started collecting records kind of accidentally

01:21:55 ◼   ► because there was like a band that I liked at the time

01:21:58 ◼   ► and I was in a music store and they had a bunch of signed singles available to purchase

01:22:07 ◼   ► because I don't know why. I think they must have been there for signing and they over

01:22:11 ◼   ► signed so the music store was just selling them. So I bought a couple of them and then

01:22:15 ◼   ► I started buying more because it was a cool thing to collect and then I bought a record

01:22:18 ◼   ► player so I could actually play them. And the record player that I've had for years

01:22:23 ◼   ► and years and years is very ugly. It's a new Mark record player, a new Mark is a DJ

01:22:29 ◼   ► brand. I bought one that had a USB in it because I thought it maybe would be cool

01:22:33 ◼   ► for me to record some, because there are some some records have additional music

01:22:39 ◼   ► on them or different versions of a song so I thought I might be kind of cool to

01:22:42 ◼   ► record them turn them into mp3s. I never did this but at the time it didn't

01:22:47 ◼   ► really bother me how it looked or whatever so that was that and I've

01:22:51 ◼   ► become increasingly frustrated.

01:22:52 ◼   ► Like we have this in our front room and I just had this like ugly DJ record player

01:22:57 ◼   ► and speakers just like in our front room and an Ikea Calax, of course, because

01:23:02 ◼   ► of course, of course, just because of course, actually, uh,

01:23:05 ◼   ► 12 inch vinyl records fit perfectly into a Calax. So, you know, it's great.

01:23:10 ◼   ► That's a hot tip.

01:23:11 ◼   ► Yep. So I've considered upgrading to something for a while.

01:23:15 ◼   ► It was a little bit more stylish. And at the same time I was thinking to myself,

01:23:19 ◼   ► I actually don't want to buy speakers because I have really good speakers

01:23:23 ◼   ► already in the room and then my home pods, like they're the best speakers that I

01:23:27 ◼   ► have in my house. They were expensive. I like the way they sound.

01:23:31 ◼   ► Surely there's a way for me to be able to play this stuff on my,

01:23:36 ◼   ► uh, on my home pods. Like there must be some, some way to send that signal.

01:23:40 ◼   ► And I'd remembered hearing about, um,

01:23:43 ◼   ► I think this may have been from Marco first and then like,

01:23:46 ◼   ► I just saw a bunch of it. Sonos make a product called the AMP and they were

01:23:50 ◼   ► releasing a new version. I think it's called the Connect AMP and now it's

01:23:53 ◼   ► called the AMP, right? Because I was looking around and like this I was doing

01:23:58 ◼   ► some googling and there are some companies that say they make like Airplay

01:24:03 ◼   ► record players and stuff but I couldn't really find... they weren't from any

01:24:08 ◼   ► companies I'd ever heard of and no one was supporting Airplay 2. It was all just

01:24:13 ◼   ► AirPlay and like one company that made a product that looked good they didn't have it available

01:24:18 ◼   ► anymore it was all just kind of a bit like I wasn't really sure what to do that.

01:24:22 ◼   ► So I thought okay the Sonos amp one of the big things about it is that it was supporting

01:24:28 ◼   ► AirPlay 2 and I also thought this would be a cool product to own because it feels expandable

01:24:35 ◼   ► like it has a bunch of like ports on it you know like I could connect actual speakers

01:24:40 ◼   ► to it one day, I could connect the TV to it one day, like it could end up in the future

01:24:44 ◼   ► being part of a home entertainment system. So I figured get it now and it would be like

01:24:49 ◼   ► expandable. So I was then looking around and Sonos have some record players on their website.

01:24:56 ◼   ► And so rather than doing like a big deep dive into record players, they had one which is

01:25:00 ◼   ► exactly what I was looking for visually. So I decided to get the amp and this record player

01:25:07 ◼   ► together and the read like this record player is super minimal and it's made of

01:25:11 ◼   ► walnut which matches of a furniture that we have in our front room so it was like

01:25:15 ◼   ► perfect this is exactly what I want and you know Sonos if it's I know it's gonna

01:25:20 ◼   ► work without any issues because Sonos is selling it and etc etc so it's like

01:25:25 ◼   ► great so it arrived and got to setting everything up and then after a bunch of

01:25:30 ◼   ► tinkering I come to the realization that you cannot send audio out from the amp

01:25:36 ◼   ► via AirPlay. You can just send AirPlay streams from iOS devices to it so you

01:25:43 ◼   ► can then play this audio on Sonos speaker systems which is exactly not

01:25:51 ◼   ► what I wanted. I'll come back to this in a second. So I tried a bunch

01:25:56 ◼   ► of things there was no way around it. Federico had the idea of using something

01:26:00 ◼   ► like Airfoil but it's the same problem. There's no way for me to

01:26:05 ◼   ► to get the audio from the record player via the Sonos to anything else.

01:26:10 ◼   ► So, for example, if there was a way for me to send it to a Mac,

01:26:14 ◼   ► then I could use Airfoil by Rogue Amoeba

01:26:17 ◼   ► to send it to my home pods and it would work great.

01:26:20 ◼   ► I guess you could if you had like a audio breakout box

01:26:24 ◼   ► and a Mac mini in your front room plugged into the thing.

01:26:28 ◼   ► Yeah, well, what I mean is with the Sonos, right?

01:26:31 ◼   ► Yeah, you have to bypass it.

01:26:32 ◼   ► It is possible to get from record player to home pod with Airfoil.

01:26:35 ◼   ► But not with Sonos, probably not in a way you're willing to do.

01:26:38 ◼   ► Yeah, I would have to have the Mac Mini in there and then it's like, then I will get

01:26:43 ◼   ► another box.

01:26:44 ◼   ► Like, I have not ruled that out as a possibility, by the way, but like, that's just not what

01:26:48 ◼   ► I did and it wouldn't have helped the situation that I found myself in yesterday.

01:26:53 ◼   ► So I contacted Sonos support via Facebook Messenger, which was useful rather than me

01:27:00 ◼   ► calling them.

01:27:01 ◼   ► that they had some kind of messaging platform.

01:27:04 ◼   ► And I told them what I wanted,

01:27:07 ◼   ► and then they started going through all this stuff with me about, like,

01:27:10 ◼   ► "Let's change some settings on your router," and all this kind of stuff.

01:27:14 ◼   ► And I was just like, "Before I do any of this, can you just confirm to me,

01:27:17 ◼   ► 'Can this product do what I asked it to do?'"

01:27:20 ◼   ► And they're like, "Oh, no, it can't do that."

01:27:22 ◼   ► I'm like, "So why are we going through this?"

01:27:24 ◼   ► this. So the Sonos amp can take AirPlay in but can't send AirPlay out.

01:27:32 ◼   ► So Sonos do have a good return policy, so I'm returning the amp. I'm keeping the

01:27:36 ◼   ► record player and I've currently got it plugged into my old ugly speakers but

01:27:40 ◼   ► I'm getting rid of the old record player. Like the Sonos return policy is good,

01:27:45 ◼   ► they're gonna send someone to my house to come pick it up. It's like, alright,

01:27:48 ◼   ► like fun. So I don't know who to be most mad at in this situation. So I feel like Sonos

01:27:57 ◼   ► could have been more clear about this on their website about what their Airplay 2 support

01:28:02 ◼   ► is. But then I'm also annoyed at myself that I maybe should have spent more time reading

01:28:05 ◼   ► about what it could do. So there's two references on the Sonos AMP webpage to Airplay 2. One

01:28:12 ◼   ► of like one of them is just like supports Airplay 2. And then another one talks about

01:28:16 ◼   ► streaming stuff to it, which I just figured was an example.

01:28:19 ◼   ► Right. Like, but maybe I don't understand what Airplay is.

01:28:24 ◼   ► Like, do I not understand what Airplay is?

01:28:27 ◼   ► Like, is it possible?

01:28:28 ◼   ► That's the problem for a company.

01:28:30 ◼   ► Like a company can make a box that can send an Airplay to stream out.

01:28:35 ◼   ► Right. Is that possible?

01:28:38 ◼   ► I don't know.

01:28:39 ◼   ► Like, I think so.

01:28:41 ◼   ► See, this is the thing.

01:28:42 ◼   ► I don't. This is where I've realized, like, do I even not understand

01:28:45 ◼   ► what Airplay is? Can only iOS devices send an Airplay stream that can be picked up by

01:28:50 ◼   ► something else? I don't know the answer to this and I can't seem to find it easily.

01:28:57 ◼   ► But then I started getting annoyed at Apple because a $350 speaker is an expensive speaker.

01:29:06 ◼   ► I should be able to integrate it better into my home entertainment system. I feel like

01:29:14 ◼   ► there should be a way for me to do this more easily and there is a... Imagine if you

01:29:19 ◼   ► could you'd have like some sort of opening on the back of the home pod

01:29:25 ◼   ► maybe it would be round and you could take something like maybe a wire or some

01:29:30 ◼   ► sort of hose some sort of thing and plug one end into the record player then you

01:29:35 ◼   ► drag it over and the other one would plug into those little openings on the

01:29:40 ◼   ► back of the home pod like what I mean I should patent this this seems like a

01:29:43 ◼   ► Yeah, but have you thought of waterproofing though?

01:29:46 ◼   ► That could be a problem.

01:29:48 ◼   ► Now with the HomePod, where are you using your HomePods?

01:29:51 ◼   ► Well, that's beyond the...

01:29:54 ◼   ► You like wrap it in a floaty and have it in the pool? What are you doing?

01:29:58 ◼   ► It would be great if they even had LineIn, which is what you're saying, so I could do this.

01:30:02 ◼   ► I mean, so like, the thing is about the AirPlay support,

01:30:06 ◼   ► I think that you do have to do it through an iPhone somehow.

01:30:12 ◼   ► I don't know. But like it could be done via an app, right?

01:30:15 ◼   ► Like, sure. What what should happen here is the Sonos amp.

01:30:20 ◼   ► I should be able to get the audio from that somehow and send it some.

01:30:24 ◼   ► But like irrespective that this product doesn't work.

01:30:27 ◼   ► I don't really know what I'm going to do going forward.

01:30:29 ◼   ► Like either get new speakers that are more visually appealing

01:30:33 ◼   ► or keep my old speakers or I find something that can do what I want.

01:30:38 ◼   ► And like, I don't think I'm going to be able to find a product

01:30:42 ◼   ► that can send an AirPlay stream out. Like I'm really struggling to find something

01:30:48 ◼   ► that seems to be able to do this. Like so I can be able to plug this

01:30:52 ◼   ► something, my record player, via RCA or LineIn but preferably RCA so I can, you

01:30:59 ◼   ► know, whatever because that's just the easiest way to do it. And so I can plug

01:31:03 ◼   ► it in to this box which can then I can just route the audio through to my home

01:31:10 ◼   ► That's what I want to do. But I feel like what I the only realistic way of doing this is sending the audio to my Mac Mini

01:31:17 ◼   ► Mm-hmm and then from the Mac Mini

01:31:20 ◼   ► To the home pods, but then even that is like I don't know if I want to do that

01:31:27 ◼   ► Alright, so Kate has found this is kind of the stuff that I've been

01:31:30 ◼   ► Seeing which is like I felt like I'm I feel like maybe I was missing something

01:31:35 ◼   ► But like the Airplay 2 system requirements say you can stream from basically iOS devices,

01:31:41 ◼   ► HomePods and Macs.

01:31:42 ◼   ► So Airplay 2 is purely like if the audio doesn't go to an Apple device it can't leave it.

01:31:51 ◼   ► So what I'm thinking that you could do is hook up a Raspberry Pi to the record player

01:32:01 ◼   ► and have the Pi basically fake being an Airplay 2 device, like an iOS device.

01:32:06 ◼   ► So that, you know, basically it's acting as a bridge

01:32:10 ◼   ► between the record player and the HomePod.

01:32:13 ◼   ► So let me say one of the other things is I really don't want to settle

01:32:17 ◼   ► on a solution that feels like it could break at any minute.

01:32:19 ◼   ► Well, yeah. Right.

01:32:22 ◼   ► That's because, you know, I am hesitant of a lot of this stuff

01:32:25 ◼   ► because I go into these things not fully understanding what I'm doing.

01:32:29 ◼   ► Right. So like I would be going into this Raspberry Pi solution,

01:32:33 ◼   ► finding a way around it, but if something broke, I wouldn't know how to fix it.

01:32:37 ◼   ► Well, and then I did some reading about this and it seems like, I didn't go,

01:32:41 ◼   ► I didn't go too deep,

01:32:41 ◼   ► but it seems like you're under the same issue where you can make a Raspberry Pi

01:32:45 ◼   ► and AirPlay receiver,

01:32:47 ◼   ► but not a generator of AirPlay content.

01:32:52 ◼   ► So I don't even know if that would honestly would work.

01:32:59 ◼   ► So it's one thing that I thought is like Bluetooth.

01:33:03 ◼   ► To like Bluetooth feels like a more

01:33:07 ◼   ► understandable situation, right, that I could connect it to some kind of Bluetooth

01:33:11 ◼   ► device that goes to my Mac Mini and goes to the home pods.

01:33:14 ◼   ► Right. So what Bluetooth.

01:33:18 ◼   ► I could probably I haven't looked into this in any great detail, but I'm sure I

01:33:21 ◼   ► could send it to Bluetooth and then is that possible to Bluetooth to a home pod?

01:33:27 ◼   ► Bluetooth to a Mac Mini.

01:33:29 ◼   ► I don't even know if that's possible.

01:33:30 ◼   ► I'm not sure that it is.

01:33:32 ◼   ► I mean, so if you wanted to route through your Mac Mini,

01:33:34 ◼   ► like you could run an audio cable,

01:33:37 ◼   ► even if the Mac Mini is not in there.

01:33:38 ◼   ► I mean, I know, but I don't know if I just haven't

01:33:41 ◼   ► decided if I want to do that.

01:33:43 ◼   ► But then, like, if I needed to do something on the Mac Mini,

01:33:47 ◼   ► like say the Mac Mini needed to be rebooted,

01:33:49 ◼   ► I would then like, I might end up--

01:33:52 ◼   ► Walk around the corner and reboot it.

01:33:53 ◼   ► I mean--

01:33:54 ◼   ► Well, no, no, no, because it was like I

01:33:56 ◼   ► thinking about like, so my Mac Mini right now is next to a TV in my office. So I can plug into

01:34:00 ◼   ► a HDMI cable with like, for example, I have to update it because then I need to log in before

01:34:05 ◼   ► I can activate Luna display again. Right. Right. But I could just plug it into the TV in my living

01:34:10 ◼   ► room. Yeah, or have auto login like their ways around that. But yeah, yeah. I mean,

01:34:15 ◼   ► I think the big picture here is though that Airplay two is sort of still an incomplete ecosystem,

01:34:19 ◼   ► because it doesn't seem like from the research that three of us have done to make a product that

01:34:25 ◼   ► as an AirPlay to generator, you can make a receiver, but not something that can push

01:34:30 ◼   ► AirPlay to out onto your network.

01:34:32 ◼   ► And this is where I hope that we just missed something.

01:34:35 ◼   ► And maybe listeners have a suggestion for you.

01:34:37 ◼   ► But I guess the question is, like, is this just because no one's done it yet?

01:34:41 ◼   ► Is it a limitation that Apple wants its products to be the generator of AirPlay to and nothing

01:34:47 ◼   ► else and it doesn't care where you send it, but where it generates from they care about

01:34:51 ◼   ► like, that's kind of how I feel like it is like, it's a limitation.

01:34:55 ◼   ► on the on the standard but we will I guess maybe we'll learn more as time

01:35:01 ◼   ► goes on I'm sorry buddy I'm sorry it didn't work the way you wanted it to

01:35:04 ◼   ► yeah I haven't decided what I'm gonna do like I think the the main thing is I

01:35:10 ◼   ► don't want to keep those speakers so I either buy new speakers or I'll move the

01:35:15 ◼   ► Mac Mini into the into the front room and and then that's just where it lives

01:35:24 ◼   ► and the Mac Mini is hideable.

01:35:25 ◼   ► - Sure. - We could hide it, you know?

01:35:26 ◼   ► - It's small. - And it's small.

01:35:28 ◼   ► And that might be the option.

01:35:30 ◼   ► I just haven't decided if I wanna do that yet.

01:35:32 ◼   ► 'Cause I need to just judge how often I'm gonna do this.

01:35:36 ◼   ► Could we get speakers that do aesthetically improve,

01:35:40 ◼   ► like look nice, you know,

01:35:41 ◼   ► like it's an improvement to the room.

01:35:43 ◼   ► To have some really nice speakers,

01:35:44 ◼   ► I haven't decided yet.

01:35:45 ◼   ► - Yeah, well you could set it up in a temporary way

01:35:47 ◼   ► and see even if this does what you want it to.

01:35:50 ◼   ► - Yeah, like how reliable is it, right?

01:35:52 ◼   ► like for this set up, like how well will it actually work and will I end up with

01:35:57 ◼   ► like a bunch of other weird situations where like I accidentally start playing

01:36:01 ◼   ► audio on my home pods from the Mac when I don't mean to, right?

01:36:04 ◼   ► Like is that a thing that I'm going to end up doing?

01:36:06 ◼   ► Um, cause what I don't want to do is every time I turn on the record player,

01:36:11 ◼   ► have to go in and like set up a bunch of settings and turn on airfoil and all

01:36:15 ◼   ► that kind of stuff. Like I want it to just work, which is, but yeah, we'll see.

01:36:20 ◼   ► We'll say if anybody has any like realistic suggestions

01:36:24 ◼   ► that don't require me to install this open source thing

01:36:29 ◼   ► on this device and then just get Homebridge and Raspberry Pi and just hack it all together.

01:36:33 ◼   ► Like I'm not interested in doing that.

01:36:35 ◼   ► I kind of want something that hashtag just works.

01:36:39 ◼   ► And I do count something like Airfoil and this just works, right?

01:36:45 ◼   ► Like that is a product that you buy and they have support.

01:36:48 ◼   ► That's kind of where my line begins.

01:36:52 ◼   ► Well, keep us posted.

01:36:54 ◼   ► Let us know how it goes.

01:36:56 ◼   ► I think that does it for this week.

01:36:57 ◼   ► If you want to find links to the stories we spoke about, they're in your podcast app,

01:37:02 ◼   ► or you can find them on the website relay.fm/connected/230.

01:37:08 ◼   ► While you're there, you can send us an email with feedback or follow-up, or you can do

01:37:11 ◼   ► so over on Twitter.

01:37:14 ◼   ► You can find Federico there at Viti V I T I CC I and keep an eye out on Mac stories for

01:37:20 ◼   ► more wild iOS Mac automation madness.

01:37:25 ◼   ► I love it so much.

01:37:26 ◼   ► I really do.

01:37:27 ◼   ► You can find Myke on Twitter as I am Y ke and Myke is the host of a bunch of shows here

01:37:32 ◼   ► on relay FM.

01:37:33 ◼   ► So if you like the sound of Myke's voice, there's plenty more opportunity to hear more

01:37:38 ◼   ► of it.

01:37:39 ◼   ► You can find me on Twitter as ismh and I write 512pixels.net.

01:37:44 ◼   ► And until next week gentlemen, say goodbye.

01:37:47 ◼   ► Adios.

01:37:48 ◼   ► Adios.

01:37:48 ◼   ► Adios!

01:37:50 ◼   ► [BLANK_AUDIO]