Connected

00:00:00 ◼   ► [Music]

00:00:08 ◼   ► From Relay FM, this is Connected, episode 174 of today's show is brought to you by Hover, Squarespace and Pingdom.

00:00:16 ◼   ► We have a very special episode for you all today. Happy New Year. It is our year interview.

00:00:21 ◼   ► We're gonna look back at 2017 now that we're in 2018 and we're gonna think about it. We're gonna talk about it.

00:00:28 ◼   ► Flicchia Anna Nuevo Federico.

00:00:31 ◼   ► That's great. Grazie Myke. That's pretty good actually.

00:00:35 ◼   ► You've been practicing Italian behind the scenes.

00:00:38 ◼   ► I've just been listening to Google Translate in my ear whilst I was doing the intro, so I've got new skills.

00:00:44 ◼   ► Happy New Year, Steven.

00:00:46 ◼   ► Hey buddy. Happy New Year.

00:00:48 ◼   ► How you doing?

00:00:49 ◼   ► Good.

00:00:49 ◼   ► We actually do have follow-up, believe it or not.

00:00:52 ◼   ► But it is the longest form of follow-up that we have maybe ever participated in.

00:00:58 ◼   ► (upbeat music)

00:01:01 ◼   ► So each year we make predictions about the year

00:01:04 ◼   ► and we're going to follow up on our predictions for 2017,

00:01:08 ◼   ► which we made 12 months ago.

00:01:10 ◼   ► It's really the follow up of the year,

00:01:14 ◼   ► literally of the year.

00:01:16 ◼   ► So we have a couple of rounds of predictions here

00:01:19 ◼   ► and I thought that I could,

00:01:22 ◼   ► I would just share the predictions that we made

00:01:24 ◼   ► and then we can talk about maybe how they went.

00:01:26 ◼   ► So up first we have Federico, because we in our style round robined these predictions.

00:01:33 ◼   ► Round robined?

00:01:34 ◼   ► Rounded robin?

00:01:35 ◼   ► I like rounded robin.

00:01:36 ◼   ► Rounded robin.

00:01:37 ◼   ► Rounded robin.

00:01:38 ◼   ► Rounded robin.

00:01:39 ◼   ► Rounded robindon.

00:01:40 ◼   ► We went right around the robin, and Federico you said, "Siri on iOS will gain more verbal

00:01:48 ◼   ► responses.

00:01:49 ◼   ► Speak more than it does now when activated with your voice.

00:01:52 ◼   ► It can hold longer conversations without the user needing to look at the screen."

00:01:56 ◼   ► Yeah, maybe, kinda. Not to the extent that I was hoping for. I think we've seen at least the intention of having some kind of non-screen Siri with the HomePod, but that of course was delayed. So I would give myself 40% correct.

00:02:20 ◼   ► Let's go with a half point.

00:02:22 ◼   ► Half point, okay, half point. We've seen some improvements with the voice activation on

00:02:27 ◼   ► IOS and we will get the audio only Siri with the HomePod but it's not here yet.

00:02:34 ◼   ► I'll give you a kinda. I think kinda is the word come down on that. So I was up next and

00:02:41 ◼   ► I said, I got the names wrong, I said the iPhone 7S and 7S Plus will look like the 7

00:02:48 ◼   ► 7 plus not this unicorn edge-to-edge phone that's been been rumored so I

00:02:53 ◼   ► would say other than the naming I got that I got that right so yeah so kinda

00:02:58 ◼   ► do I get a point for the point deducted for the name maybe no see like I think

00:03:02 ◼   ► there's a bunch of things I think yes you're gonna get the point but like I

00:03:04 ◼   ► wonder what Steven of January 2017 was thinking like was Steven of January 2017

00:03:11 ◼   ► thinking there would be no iPhone 10 that's what I wonder yeah you just like

00:03:15 ◼   ► the only phones, I mean that's one I'm not sure of, but you do, I mean I think

00:03:19 ◼   ► that's worth a point, like what you're saying is basically what happened.

00:03:22 ◼   ► The names are slightly different. Also are we keeping points because I haven't

00:03:26 ◼   ► written anything down yet. I am keeping points, I'm doing it right now. You're

00:03:29 ◼   ► always scoring things aren't you, just like throughout the day. I score everything.

00:03:32 ◼   ► Mm-hmm everyone's got a score with me. Yeah. All right well Myke we come to you

00:03:37 ◼   ► next. 2017 will see a more powerful iMac at the top of the line that rivals and

00:03:44 ◼   ► and replaces the Mac Pro, the Mac Pro will go away, the Mac Mini also goes away, by the

00:03:52 ◼   ► end of 2017 only the iMac remains.

00:03:56 ◼   ► I have a couple of things I want to address on this prediction.

00:03:59 ◼   ► Okay.

00:04:00 ◼   ► One, I was too greedy.

00:04:01 ◼   ► I tried to do too many things.

00:04:02 ◼   ► Way too many things.

00:04:03 ◼   ► Two, way too many things.

00:04:04 ◼   ► I would say, right, like if you discount the Mac Mini part from this, in January of 2017

00:04:11 ◼   ► I was correct because that was clearly what Apple was going to do.

00:04:14 ◼   ► It was a safe bet then.

00:04:17 ◼   ► Because they had no plan for a Mac Pro.

00:04:19 ◼   ► So I don't know, I feel like I would give myself half, because I did at least get the

00:04:23 ◼   ► iMac part right.

00:04:24 ◼   ► But I'm going to leave it to you two.

00:04:27 ◼   ► I would say, I think you make three predictions here.

00:04:29 ◼   ► A more powerful iMac, no Mac Pro, no Mac Mini.

00:04:35 ◼   ► If you count them as three Mini predictions, I think you get a third of a point.

00:04:39 ◼   ► You're really screwing up the point system here.

00:04:41 ◼   ► need to just decide zero half or one we can't start fractions this is half a

00:04:47 ◼   ► point and I mean I mean by the end of 2017 only the I'm at the more powerful

00:04:54 ◼   ► iMac remains it's it is not totally wrong they didn't go away you can still

00:04:59 ◼   ► buy a Mac Mini you shouldn't because it's super sure you can also buy the Mac

00:05:04 ◼   ► Pro but you one isn't out yet so half point you shouldn't you shouldn't but

00:05:09 ◼   ► It's a it's a half point point. Yeah, there's a sub point here and I don't know we broke the robin

00:05:14 ◼   ► I said also had end of life for the mac mini

00:05:17 ◼   ► So that's not correct, but it does feel that way that wasn't even a real prediction youtube were just lumping on

00:05:23 ◼   ► Yeah, so we'll just discard that

00:05:25 ◼   ► so round two

00:05:28 ◼   ► iCloud so I said this iCloud free five gigabyte limit will be increased

00:05:33 ◼   ► That's zero points

00:05:38 ◼   ► Oh well. I got very excited for the next prediction.

00:05:45 ◼   ► This is another one where the lesson of today is your predictions should be simple.

00:05:51 ◼   ► I would say before you read this, before you read this, I knew at the time that this prediction

00:05:57 ◼   ► was unlikely, but I was going with like if I was right, it was going to be a great one.

00:06:03 ◼   ► - So next time we make predictions,

00:06:06 ◼   ► we should have predictions where we risk it

00:06:11 ◼   ► and you can get double points.

00:06:12 ◼   ► - Oh, that's good. - Because it's a bold one.

00:06:14 ◼   ► But if you lose, you lose one, you get minus one.

00:06:18 ◼   ► - That is a very, very good rule

00:06:20 ◼   ► that we will institute for the next prediction.

00:06:23 ◼   ► Somebody needs to write that down,

00:06:24 ◼   ► but that is a great rule.

00:06:25 ◼   ► - That's next week, right?

00:06:26 ◼   ► We're gonna do it next week?

00:06:27 ◼   ► - Yeah, we're gonna do it next week.

00:06:28 ◼   ► - Oh, perfect.

00:06:29 ◼   ► Just write it down because we have short memory.

00:06:32 ◼   ► - All right, so if you're standing up listening

00:06:34 ◼   ► to this podcast, you should sit down for this one.

00:06:37 ◼   ► (laughing)

00:06:39 ◼   ► An iPhone Pro with Apple Pencil support.

00:06:44 ◼   ► Two Apple Pencils, the standard and a new short one

00:06:49 ◼   ► that supports the iPhone and iPad mini.

00:06:52 ◼   ► - I mean, the idea is amazing, but--

00:06:55 ◼   ► - I still think one day, I still think one day

00:06:58 ◼   ► it will happen, but it was not in 2017.

00:07:01 ◼   ► No. No. It wasn't. I do see though, if they're going to make one for the phone, like I see

00:07:09 ◼   ► where you're going with this, right? If they make one with the phone, the pencil should

00:07:12 ◼   ► not be longer than the phone is tall.

00:07:14 ◼   ► Yeah, and if they make an iPad mini pro, which it doesn't look like you're going to, but

00:07:19 ◼   ► we weren't sure at that point, it still wouldn't work because like the pencil I think is taller

00:07:23 ◼   ► than the iPad mini.

00:07:24 ◼   ► So I have my iPhone 10 in one hand and my Apple pencil in the other and it feels like

00:07:28 ◼   ► I'm writing with like a giant, giant tool.

00:07:32 ◼   ► Well you know you get those novelty jumbo pencils.

00:07:36 ◼   ► Exactly.

00:07:37 ◼   ► It's like one of those.

00:07:38 ◼   ► That's how it feels.

00:07:39 ◼   ► Alright, so to finish up round two, Federico predicted Apple Music will be redesigned again

00:07:44 ◼   ► and gain more Spotify-like algorithmic...

00:07:49 ◼   ► That's a word I can't say and it's in here.

00:07:50 ◼   ► Algorithmic.

00:07:51 ◼   ► Algorithmic.

00:07:52 ◼   ► Algorithmic.

00:07:53 ◼   ► Machine learning features.

00:07:54 ◼   ► We'll call it that.

00:07:55 ◼   ► Version of the daily mix and a way to discover back catalog songs from artists. You don't know

00:08:01 ◼   ► parentheses discover weekly question mark

00:08:04 ◼   ► So we didn't get there so let's go let's go over what they did that we didn't get the redesign

00:08:10 ◼   ► We got the new chill mix in the for you page and we got the ability to ask

00:08:18 ◼   ► Siri to play something I like

00:08:22 ◼   ► And the social features, but I didn't mention those at all. So I would say this is not a point

00:08:27 ◼   ► because

00:08:29 ◼   ► I don't think it is because redesign no gain more Spotify

00:08:34 ◼   ► The only algorithmic feature could be the daily mix. I'm not sure that's worth half a point though. Myke I'll leave it to you

00:08:40 ◼   ► I don't think it is

00:08:42 ◼   ► Yeah

00:08:43 ◼   ► No, I think that

00:08:45 ◼   ► But what we actually got was vastly more simple than what Federica was. Yeah. Yeah

00:08:51 ◼   ► Yeah, yeah, so no point.

00:08:53 ◼   ► All right, the final round.

00:08:55 ◼   ► Myke learned his lesson from the previous two rounds

00:08:58 ◼   ► and went something simpler and more open-ended,

00:09:00 ◼   ► which is another smart way to do a prediction.

00:09:04 ◼   ► Some element of an AR focused device from Apple.

00:09:07 ◼   ► I think that's a--

00:09:08 ◼   ► Straight up.

00:09:09 ◼   ► Yeah.

00:09:09 ◼   ► Right?

00:09:10 ◼   ► Yeah.

00:09:11 ◼   ► Because the iPhone X is AR focused, and we got ARKit.

00:09:14 ◼   ► Like, yeah, we got that.

00:09:16 ◼   ► Federico wanted to see heads roll.

00:09:18 ◼   ► an executive shakeup in the Mac OS or iOS software teams.

00:09:22 ◼   ► [Laughter]

00:09:25 ◼   ► Why though? Was I upset for some reason?

00:09:28 ◼   ► Everyone was upset in 2016.

00:09:32 ◼   ► You can see the negativity here.

00:09:35 ◼   ► I mean, okay, that's obviously no point

00:09:39 ◼   ► and also I was wrong. In fact, I'm pretty sure that

00:09:43 ◼   ► even more teams are now under Craig, Federighi.

00:09:47 ◼   ► So, yeah.

00:09:49 ◼   ► - No.

00:09:50 ◼   ► - I mean, really the only change we saw,

00:09:52 ◼   ► and it wasn't an executive shakeup,

00:09:53 ◼   ► we saw Siri move from EdiQ to Craig's organization.

00:09:57 ◼   ► So that's not an executive shakeup, it's just a change.

00:10:00 ◼   ► So I don't think there's any points there.

00:10:01 ◼   ► - Yeah, no points.

00:10:02 ◼   ► - And rounding us out, I said,

00:10:07 ◼   ► and it seemed bananas at the time, a redesigned Mac Pro.

00:10:11 ◼   ► - That's half a point.

00:10:13 ◼   ► - Yeah, I guess so.

00:10:14 ◼   ► - I think it is.

00:10:15 ◼   ► see anything but we knew it was coming right so I guess I guess that would count I think it's a half

00:10:21 ◼   ► I'll go with that all right so now this is where the points are because we have some extras that

00:10:27 ◼   ► no points are awarded and Stephen that puts me and you at tie a one and a half points each

00:10:32 ◼   ► okay what frederico have half a point sorry I bet I better win next year what a half point

00:10:42 ◼   ► Gonna try harder, gonna try harder with the new rules the next time we do these predictions.

00:10:48 ◼   ► But okay, let's do the extras, let's see.

00:10:50 ◼   ► Okay, so these we said, no points will be awarded, but we're just talking.

00:10:58 ◼   ► Myke said a 10.9 inch bezel-less iPad Pro.

00:11:02 ◼   ► It's like kinda, right?

00:11:03 ◼   ► We thought it was gonna be 10.9, it ended up being 10.5, and it has less bezels, not

00:11:08 ◼   ► no bezels.

00:11:09 ◼   ► It's not no bezel.

00:11:11 ◼   ► Less bezel.

00:11:12 ◼   ► Federico hung his hat on iOS 10.3 with a redesigned split screen revealing the home screen and

00:11:22 ◼   ► the app switcher instead of the vertical slider we have now.

00:11:25 ◼   ► It was not 10.3 and it was not the split screen showing you the home screen.

00:11:33 ◼   ► So something changed with the app switcher of course and the multitasking but not that

00:11:39 ◼   ► kind of, because this is basically what I had in mind for the concept also.

00:11:44 ◼   ► So this is not what we got.

00:11:46 ◼   ► I came up next with another iPad prediction.

00:11:50 ◼   ► All four of these are iPad predictions actually now that I look at this.

00:11:54 ◼   ► Multi-user support on iPad for the masses.

00:11:56 ◼   ► Nope.

00:11:57 ◼   ► Nope.

00:11:58 ◼   ► Nope.

00:11:59 ◼   ► That's still in education right?

00:12:00 ◼   ► Yeah it is.

00:12:01 ◼   ► It is.

00:12:02 ◼   ► And you can do it like if you basically treat your house as a school and like run Mac OS server and do much crazy stuff

00:12:08 ◼   ► But that no one should do

00:12:10 ◼   ► Federico finished us off new iPad accessories keyboard plus protection plus pencil holder

00:12:17 ◼   ► Basically almost right we didn't get the keyboard, but we got the sleeves and we got the pencil holder

00:12:23 ◼   ► Yeah, so

00:12:25 ◼   ► 75% right

00:12:27 ◼   ► Yeah, so three-quarters of an imaginary point. Yeah, so that's that's our

00:12:32 ◼   ► were our predictions for 2017. Clearly we didn't do great. It's after the new year,

00:12:39 ◼   ► you're feeling good, you want good things to happen, and I think we all got a little

00:12:45 ◼   ► excited. Myke got the most excited. I'm gonna say, considering how out there I got, the

00:12:49 ◼   ► fact that I was 50% correct, I'm feeling alright about that. I got one and a half points out

00:12:56 ◼   ► three points and I predicted that Apple would only have one computer at the end

00:13:02 ◼   ► of the year so I think all in all I did a pretty good job. But today we are gonna talk about

00:13:07 ◼   ► month by month the big news, the things that we were excited to review and

00:13:12 ◼   ► take a look at how they've changed over the last year. We will begin with January

00:13:16 ◼   ► and of every story that I came across the one that surprised me the

00:13:21 ◼   ► most as I can't believe that happened this year was in January at .NET

00:13:25 ◼   ► shut down. That was when it shut down. Because it had been running in that maintenance mode,

00:13:33 ◼   ► right? For a long time. And the service was shut down in January. And this was why micro.blog

00:13:42 ◼   ► then appeared on Kickstarter, which is something we spoke about for a bunch. Jimmy Iovine says

00:13:49 ◼   ► that Apple Music is becoming more than music alone. This is where we start to get the first

00:13:54 ◼   ► hints of original content from Apple. Becoming Apple more, it's in your name. Apple

00:13:59 ◼   ► more. A lot more stuff. Is that a prediction? No, no, no, no, no, no. Don't do that to

00:14:06 ◼   ► me. I gotta think about that. Also in January, Chris Latner appeared on ATP the day after

00:14:13 ◼   ► he left Apple to go to Tesla, or it was just around the same time. Chris will pop up later

00:14:20 ◼   ► on in the show because that wasn't all he did this year. But he leaves Apple, he leaves

00:14:25 ◼   ► the Swift team, goes over to Tesla to work on their self-driving stuff.

00:14:28 ◼   ► I will say, you know, that was a really fascinating interview on ATP. And it was nerdy as you

00:14:35 ◼   ► would expect, but it really was great. And I'm still so thrilled for those guys that

00:14:39 ◼   ► they landed that.

00:14:40 ◼   ► Yeah, they did a great job. Rumors began in January that Apple were going to replace Touch

00:14:44 ◼   ► ID. We were talking about it for like nine months. Can you believe that? Wow. Apple versus

00:14:49 ◼   ► Consumer Reports on MacBook Pro battery tests. What was this? I don't remember this.

00:14:54 ◼   ► It feels like forever ago that basically Consumer Reports was saying that the batteries in the

00:15:00 ◼   ► new MacBook Pros were not lasting long enough and then it turns out that Consumer Reports

00:15:04 ◼   ► was doing something non-ordinary with their testing procedures. Like they... Steven, what

00:15:11 ◼   ► were they doing? Like they were loading Safari in some weird way?

00:15:15 ◼   ► Yeah, they had it set where like it, I think it wasn't saving cookies and like all this

00:15:20 ◼   ► stuff where making it work harder than it needed to and like Phil Schiller like tweeted

00:15:26 ◼   ► an iMore link, it was crazy.

00:15:29 ◼   ► Really crazy.

00:15:30 ◼   ► Um, iOS 10.3 launches with standardized...

00:15:34 ◼   ► With nothing Federico wanted.

00:15:36 ◼   ► standardized app review prompts and the ability for developers to reply to reviews.

00:15:42 ◼   ► I feel like, so I see the standardized app review prompts every now and then.

00:15:45 ◼   ► I rate more apps now, since then, because it's just an easy way to do it.

00:15:50 ◼   ► It's right there.

00:15:51 ◼   ► It's in the app.

00:15:52 ◼   ► And I've found that on the whole, like a lot of developers have found really good places

00:15:55 ◼   ► to put it.

00:15:56 ◼   ► Like you've completed an action and it pops up with a review.

00:16:00 ◼   ► But the developers being able to reply to reviews, I think when it was announced, it

00:16:04 ◼   ► seemed like it was like everyone was really excited about it.

00:16:06 ◼   ► It was going to be a great thing.

00:16:07 ◼   ► And I feel like I've never heard anything about it ever again, nor do I ever really

00:16:10 ◼   ► feel like I see them, but I don't read the reviews of them.

00:16:12 ◼   ► - I see some of them.

00:16:14 ◼   ► I see, I would say 70% of the time

00:16:17 ◼   ► when I'm looking for a new app that I don't know,

00:16:21 ◼   ► and the app has been around for a while.

00:16:23 ◼   ► For example, I was looking at Lear, the RSS reader,

00:16:27 ◼   ► and it turns out it's been around for several months.

00:16:30 ◼   ► And I often, because you need to scroll horizontally

00:16:35 ◼   ► on iOS 11 on the App Store, and I see,

00:16:38 ◼   ► Yeah, I know, it's totally terrible. And I see developer responses. Now, do I find

00:16:45 ◼   ► them useful? Not really. It feels like I'm reading an email between two people and that's

00:16:52 ◼   ► just us. Just like one person is really upset in the developer response. We're sorry you're

00:16:58 ◼   ► having issues. Like, okay, this is like you're just complaining in public.

00:17:03 ◼   ► You've been assigned ticket number 4623.

00:17:08 ◼   ► So I don't think they're really useful.

00:17:10 ◼   ► It feels like when people get upset with each other and they post screenshots of emails

00:17:15 ◼   ► on Twitter, you know, some folks like to do that.

00:17:18 ◼   ► And I don't really like it.

00:17:20 ◼   ► So yeah, I don't think they're really useful.

00:17:24 ◼   ► I do.

00:17:26 ◼   ► So there's one app I use and I won't app shame them here.

00:17:29 ◼   ► But they throw up the old like, what was the what was like the open source project like

00:17:35 ◼   ► put review stuff in your app and like if you hit no it basically had an email form so like

00:17:40 ◼   ► you wouldn't leave. So there's an app I use on a regular basis that still does that and

00:17:45 ◼   ► every time now I send them an email and I just say use the new review system and they

00:17:54 ◼   ► never email me back. You should maybe leave a review on the app and say please use this

00:18:00 ◼   ► So maybe they're gonna reply there.

00:18:02 ◼   ► Or you could just send them a fake like app review rejection and cite the rule change.

00:18:12 ◼   ► That's terrible.

00:18:13 ◼   ► That's terrible.

00:18:14 ◼   ► We move into February.

00:18:15 ◼   ► In February, Tim Cook started to talk about how amazing AR could be when he was being

00:18:21 ◼   ► asked about VR.

00:18:23 ◼   ► He started changing the conversation to AR on one of his many international tours that

00:18:29 ◼   ► Tim does. To everybody's surprise, in February, Apple announced that WWDC was moving to San

00:18:36 ◼   ► Jose. That was a fun morning for everyone. That was a shock. I was in my pajamas, just

00:18:42 ◼   ► minding my own business. I was making soup. I was casually sipping my espresso. It was

00:18:47 ◼   ► like noon or 11am, I don't remember. And John texted me on iMessage and he's like,

00:18:55 ◼   ► WWC just got announced and my reply, I cannot say what I replied on the show, but I was

00:19:02 ◼   ► quite upset and initially surprised then upset then, Oh my God, we need to cover this. And

00:19:08 ◼   ► then, Oh my God, I need to text Myke and we need to make plans.

00:19:12 ◼   ► We were days like single digit days away from signing a deal to have another like live relation

00:19:20 ◼   ► and San Francisco. And the contract was flexible enough where we could change the date within

00:19:27 ◼   ► the month of June, but not so flexible that we could change city. So thankfully...

00:19:32 ◼   ► And also, it was... We were actually like... We were... Like, Steven had asked for the

00:19:36 ◼   ► contract. He was like, "Please send it." And they just hadn't sent it yet. And I think

00:19:41 ◼   ► the contract... We would have been on the hook for 50% of the... It would have been

00:19:47 ◼   ► Very upsetting. So luckily it was just at the right time. We were just very confident

00:19:53 ◼   ► we needed a date based upon Moscone calendars, but the reason it was open was because Apple

00:19:57 ◼   ► just wasn't going there. Maybe we should just book Moscone in future. The Twitterrific for

00:20:03 ◼   ► Mac Kickstarter appeared in February. I think that's gone very well overall for the Archon

00:20:10 ◼   ► Factory which is great. In February, even though we knew the name and some of the basics

00:20:15 ◼   ► of the show, we see for the first time the Planet of the Apps trailer in February.

00:20:22 ◼   ► Oh my god, really?

00:20:23 ◼   ► So this is where we see the elevator pitch and escalator pitch and all of that stuff.

00:20:31 ◼   ► Also Carpool Karaoke had its first trailer at the Grammy Awards in February as well.

00:20:38 ◼   ► Rumours start to circulate of a 5.8-inch iPhone with function row and 3D-sensing front camera

00:20:44 ◼   ► for facial recognition. I would say on the whole, like, that was a pretty solid...

00:20:52 ◼   ► And the function row, it could... I sometimes wonder if it was like a translation, you know,

00:20:59 ◼   ► miscommunication between the supply chain and whoever reports these rumors, because

00:21:03 ◼   ► if you look at it, it's a function bar, it's a horizontal thing that you interact with.

00:21:10 ◼   ► So it's kind of a function bar row.

00:21:13 ◼   ► And the 3D sensing, of course, we got with the facial recognition.

00:21:16 ◼   ► So it's pretty correct, I would say.

00:21:21 ◼   ► Instagram rolls out support for multiple photos in a post.

00:21:24 ◼   ► I'm still not very happy with the interaction of that.

00:21:28 ◼   ► If you swipe it just wrong, you end up in messages.

00:21:30 ◼   ► It's like, no.

00:21:31 ◼   ► Maybe that's why they're making that separate messaging app.

00:21:34 ◼   ► Who knows?

00:21:35 ◼   ► Apple says that Apple Park will be open to employees in April.

00:21:38 ◼   ► I think it was open to one employee would be my expectation. If you don't know, the

00:21:45 ◼   ► reason we find this funny, I think everybody that any of us have ever spoken to does not

00:21:50 ◼   ► and has not moved in. I don't know if people have now. I think maybe it's happening more

00:21:55 ◼   ► now, but it seemed like April was the first employees, but then there were no more. That

00:22:01 ◼   ► was it.

00:22:02 ◼   ► I think we've got friends who have just moved and some that haven't yet. All construction

00:22:09 ◼   ► projects are like this. I've taken part in several now. It all goes really well until

00:22:15 ◼   ► it goes terribly wrong, and the end of projects like this just takes a long time. You're dealing

00:22:19 ◼   ► with all these little details, and you have Johnny Ive walking around with calipers, measuring

00:22:25 ◼   ► the thickness of door handles. It just takes a while, and I think they're still getting

00:22:29 ◼   ► there, but yeah, that's really funny in hindsight that it's January and there's still people

00:22:34 ◼   ► who haven't moved in yet. They had a press release and everything with

00:22:37 ◼   ► a photo tour and videos and everything up on Apple.com. I wonder what happened.

00:22:45 ◼   ► Mozilla required Pocket in February. I remember those comments.

00:22:50 ◼   ► I had totally forgotten about this acquisition like a few weeks ago. I was doing some research

00:22:55 ◼   ► about Pocket and I saw our own story on the side and I was like really? Mozilla acquired

00:23:02 ◼   ► Pocket and John wrote the story? Okay. Yeah. I mean I guess it makes sense now Firefox

00:23:09 ◼   ► has native Pocket integration so which is pretty nice.

00:23:12 ◼   ► I don't use Firefox. Me neither, me neither but you know they're still around so.

00:23:19 ◼   ► Alright that is February and we're going to take our first break at this point and thank

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00:24:43 ◼   ► The best news of the year happened in March when the Nintendo Switch was released.

00:24:47 ◼   ► Yes, I agree.

00:24:48 ◼   ► This is the best news.

00:24:49 ◼   ► We can end the roundup here.

00:24:53 ◼   ► The year ended for me and Federico.

00:24:55 ◼   ► That point, that was it.

00:24:57 ◼   ► Wow.

00:24:58 ◼   ► The remaster got ruined.

00:25:01 ◼   ► It was a show about all types of gaming and then I think from March onwards it just became

00:25:05 ◼   ► a Nintendo Switch podcast.

00:25:07 ◼   ► There's nothing I can do about it.

00:25:09 ◼   ► I love my Nintendo Switch so, so, so, so much.

00:25:12 ◼   ► And yeah, it's the best.

00:25:14 ◼   ► It is the best, best, best.

00:25:16 ◼   ► - Yeah, I've been, I play, I checked the other day.

00:25:19 ◼   ► I played almost 190 hours of Zelda Breath of the Wild.

00:25:24 ◼   ► As Myke said, the Nintendo Switch totally changed

00:25:29 ◼   ► what we do at remaster.

00:25:31 ◼   ► And the, even though I bought this year a 4K TV

00:25:35 ◼   ► and a PlayStation Pro, and I'm now playing with Horizon

00:25:39 ◼   ► on my PS4, I still think about Zelda and the Switch.

00:25:43 ◼   ► And we are currently, we take the Switch out to,

00:25:48 ◼   ► I bought a carry-on bag.

00:25:53 ◼   ► Sylvia's making fun of me every single day

00:25:55 ◼   ► she sees this bag.

00:25:56 ◼   ► It's like a little suitcase for the Switch.

00:25:59 ◼   ► And I have a separate dock and a set of cables.

00:26:01 ◼   ► And basically whenever we go visit our parents

00:26:04 ◼   ► or some friends, I take the Switch with us.

00:26:06 ◼   ► It's like a family member now.

00:26:08 ◼   ► It's like our dogs, but it doesn't bark and it's also fun to play with.

00:26:11 ◼   ► And yeah, it's discount, you know, set inside Apple products,

00:26:17 ◼   ► the Switch is the Apple, the product of 2017 for me, hands down.

00:26:22 ◼   ► It's amazing.

00:26:23 ◼   ► And then a product that I don't think anybody remembers.

00:26:27 ◼   ► The product red iPhone 7 came out in March.

00:26:30 ◼   ► Again, one of those things where I saw it and was like, that was in 2017?

00:26:33 ◼   ► Sure. Yeah, there was a new iPhone in March.

00:26:36 ◼   ► It was weird, right?

00:26:37 ◼   ► - Yeah, and it was a wrap up.

00:26:39 ◼   ► - I have a weird story about this iPhone.

00:26:41 ◼   ► So I went to the store to see it,

00:26:44 ◼   ► and I took a picture of it,

00:26:45 ◼   ► just kind of like a cruddy Instagram photo.

00:26:48 ◼   ► And I've never had something on Instagram

00:26:51 ◼   ► go viral on Instagram.

00:26:53 ◼   ► I didn't know that was really a thing.

00:26:54 ◼   ► 'Cause like there's no,

00:26:55 ◼   ► I don't know how people found it.

00:26:56 ◼   ► Like there's no hashtags,

00:26:58 ◼   ► 'cause I'm not that person.

00:26:59 ◼   ► My caption was one word,

00:27:01 ◼   ► all it said was shiny.

00:27:02 ◼   ► But this thing got tons of comments,

00:27:05 ◼   ► and like 3,600 likes on Instagram, which I just don't,

00:27:09 ◼   ► I don't know how or like if it was embedded

00:27:11 ◼   ► in some article somewhere, but it was, it was crazy.

00:27:16 ◼   ► - I wonder if it was embedded in an article,

00:27:17 ◼   ► that sounds about right.

00:27:18 ◼   ► - It's gotta be, it's gotta be right.

00:27:20 ◼   ► But the phone is very red, and I thought really kinda pretty

00:27:23 ◼   ► but then it was, you know, gotten rid of in September

00:27:27 ◼   ► and never to be heard from again.

00:27:29 ◼   ► - I had a white front, right?

00:27:30 ◼   ► - It did, and people were very upset about that.

00:27:35 ◼   ► at the same time as the product read iPhone 7, Clips was announced to be released in April.

00:27:41 ◼   ► When it was then released in April, everybody didn't like it. I mean, I know there are some

00:27:46 ◼   ► people that did, I'm being facetious, but I think the overall thing was it was a weird

00:27:51 ◼   ► app. I will say that Clips has gotten way better as the year went on, and I think that

00:27:54 ◼   ► it is actually now a really solid, fun little application for making videos that I think

00:28:00 ◼   ► may be underwhelmed a little bit when it came out in April.

00:28:03 ◼   ► I think initially many of us had the reaction that this is another side project like Music

00:28:09 ◼   ► Memos or Cards or all the subs that Apple did before.

00:28:14 ◼   ► And this one seems to be the one that has been able to stick around, get updates, a

00:28:20 ◼   ► big 2.0 version later.

00:28:23 ◼   ► So I wonder if this is sort of a playground for Apple and their camera team and their

00:28:28 ◼   ► photos team.

00:28:29 ◼   ► it is because the difference between this and something like Music Memos is there probably will

00:28:34 ◼   ► be new stuff it can do every year because the camera is such an important part of the operating

00:28:38 ◼   ► system so like I expect it to be able to continue to do new things in a way that some of these other

00:28:45 ◼   ► side projecty apps haven't been able to. We spent a bunch of time, we devoted basically an entire

00:28:54 ◼   ► episode talking about workflow in April, talking about our favorite workflows and

00:28:58 ◼   ► then Steven was asking me and Federico a bunch of questions including like what

00:29:02 ◼   ► would you do if they went away. I think either like two weeks later Apple

00:29:07 ◼   ► bought workflow. Me and Federico were terrified. The rest of the year has kind

00:29:12 ◼   ► of proved that workflow is in safe hands right now. But obviously we still

00:29:18 ◼   ► don't know what the future holds. Yeah we're not getting the same update pace

00:29:24 ◼   ► that the app used to have when it was independent, but it was clear

00:29:30 ◼   ► I mean it's clear now that all those big updates that we got at the end of

00:29:35 ◼   ► 2016 and early 2017 like magic variables and all those

00:29:42 ◼   ► new designs for file actions, those were updates meant to sort of leave the app in a good state

00:29:50 ◼   ► before the acquisition.

00:29:52 ◼   ► And in fact, the workflow got a bunch of updates throughout 2017, and it was also updated for

00:29:58 ◼   ► iOS 11, but not with groundbreaking stuff.

00:30:02 ◼   ► Like they were not updates to the extent of magic variables or web APIs, for example.

00:30:10 ◼   ► So Apple is maintaining workflow, they're ensuring that it works well on iOS 11, on

00:30:14 ◼   ► the iPhone 10, that it supports some form of drag and drop, but the idea, at least my

00:30:21 ◼   ► feeling is they're working on workflow 2, whatever, and whether that's a system feature

00:30:27 ◼   ► or still a separate application on iOS, I don't know.

00:30:32 ◼   ► But I get the feeling that they're maintaining the current version while they're working

00:30:36 ◼   ► on whatever's coming next.

00:30:39 ◼   ► And at a time when we were clamoring for new iPad Pros, Apple released a $329 iPad 9.7

00:30:47 ◼   ► inch just called the iPad.

00:30:50 ◼   ► I remember at the time just being so concerned because, you know, especially the 12.9 inch

00:30:56 ◼   ► iPad Pro was really old at that point.

00:30:59 ◼   ► And yeah, it was concerning.

00:31:01 ◼   ► It was 18 months old.

00:31:03 ◼   ► There was no new software, right?

00:31:04 ◼   ► Nothing had happened.

00:31:05 ◼   ► We didn't get the 10.3 we wanted.

00:31:07 ◼   ► And then the iPad came out and it was like that was all it was.

00:31:12 ◼   ► It was a concerning time to be an iPad fan.

00:31:16 ◼   ► We move on to April.

00:31:17 ◼   ► In April it was a less concerning time to be a Mac fan because Apple brought a bunch

00:31:22 ◼   ► of journalists to some weird Mac design lab somewhere and they sat them all around a table

00:31:30 ◼   ► which was circular.

00:31:32 ◼   ► So they were able to call it the round table and they spoke about the iMac Pro which was

00:31:37 ◼   ► going to be released this year and a completely rethought modular Mac Pro which we don't have

00:31:45 ◼   ► any more details about but we knew that it was coming.

00:31:48 ◼   ► This was Apple's recommitment to the Mac and to professional Mac users.

00:31:52 ◼   ► They owned up to the fact that they totally screwed up the Mac Pro.

00:31:56 ◼   ► Yeah, it was an apology meeting saying we're going to make the Macs you want, you're just

00:32:02 ◼   ► going to have to wait. I just remember waking up that morning and

00:32:08 ◼   ► you know kind of opening tweetbot on my phone because it broke pretty early and people just

00:32:15 ◼   ► freaking out that you know Apple had addressed this at all let alone like in a hands-on meeting

00:32:21 ◼   ► in in you know some sort of secret Mac lab. I think in Panzareno's article he mentions

00:32:29 ◼   ► is that there's like a 20th anniversary Mac

00:32:31 ◼   ► on a bookcase in the room or in the lobby or something.

00:32:34 ◼   ► This crazy inside Apple view that we just don't see.

00:32:38 ◼   ► And so far they are on track to deliver what they promised.

00:32:43 ◼   ► We have the iMac Pro now and in that press release

00:32:48 ◼   ► announcing the sale of the iMac Pro, they reiterate

00:32:50 ◼   ► there is a modular, upgradable Mac Pro coming later.

00:32:55 ◼   ► And so we're in chapter one of the story.

00:32:58 ◼   ► Chapter two is pending, you know,

00:33:00 ◼   ► we're not gonna make predictions today,

00:33:02 ◼   ► but you know, my guess is we'll see something at WWDC

00:33:04 ◼   ► and then release at the end of the year.

00:33:06 ◼   ► So it is, if you're a pro Mac user

00:33:08 ◼   ► and you were concerned about hardware,

00:33:11 ◼   ► hopefully those concerns are put at ease now.

00:33:15 ◼   ► - Snapchat releases the first of their AR lenses.

00:33:18 ◼   ► So like it was like a rainbow and stuff.

00:33:20 ◼   ► And this has been a thing,

00:33:22 ◼   ► which it was really cool at the time.

00:33:23 ◼   ► Snapchat to date is still using their own technology.

00:33:28 ◼   ► for all of their lenses and stuff,

00:33:30 ◼   ► but that's been a popular thing.

00:33:32 ◼   ► It's the, remember the hot dog?

00:33:34 ◼   ► Remember the hot dog?

00:33:35 ◼   ► That was one of those.

00:33:36 ◼   ► Dancing hot dog.

00:33:37 ◼   ► No, you wouldn't, it's okay.

00:33:39 ◼   ► The Internet Archives Classic Mac OS Emulation.

00:33:43 ◼   ► I don't know what this means.

00:33:44 ◼   ► - Yes.

00:33:45 ◼   ► - You just put it in there.

00:33:46 ◼   ► - Steven knows.

00:33:46 ◼   ► - You threw in a word soup for me to read.

00:33:48 ◼   ► What does that even mean?

00:33:49 ◼   ► - No, so you can go to this.

00:33:51 ◼   ► The most important thing you need to know

00:33:53 ◼   ► is you can play Oregon Trail from MECC,

00:33:57 ◼   ► which is like the Minnesota Educational Computing Consortium,

00:34:01 ◼   ► I think, this company that used to make educational games.

00:34:04 ◼   ► And you can play like Oregon Trail,

00:34:05 ◼   ► like on an old Mac in your browser,

00:34:08 ◼   ► because the Internet Archive is made of magic.

00:34:10 ◼   ► - Why don't you want to, Myke?

00:34:11 ◼   ► - Yeah, I can't wait.

00:34:12 ◼   ► Can't wait to do it.

00:34:13 ◼   ► - Why would you play with your Nintendo Switch instead?

00:34:15 ◼   ► - I know, then we go play Oregon Trail.

00:34:16 ◼   ► - Oregon Trail was so good.

00:34:18 ◼   ► - Never played it.

00:34:19 ◼   ► - I'll put a link to Oregon Trail

00:34:20 ◼   ► directly into the show notes.

00:34:22 ◼   ► People can go play it.

00:34:23 ◼   ► - Also in April, Apple confirmed

00:34:25 ◼   ► worldwide Apple Store redesigns.

00:34:27 ◼   ► they first used the town hall name and introduced the Today at Apple program.

00:34:32 ◼   ► This is where we got the Genius Grove and I mean, some stores have started to open.

00:34:36 ◼   ► Some stores have been open for quite a while.

00:34:39 ◼   ► But this is where Apple really kind of doubles down on the idea that today Apple

00:34:43 ◼   ► program really kind of started to take shape and they moved ahead from this point.

00:34:48 ◼   ► But this is like where redesign stores are opening more stores and they're all going

00:34:51 ◼   ► to have this this design aesthetic.

00:34:53 ◼   ► This is where they, I think, finally come to the conclusion of the changes that

00:34:57 ◼   ► they've been trialing in some of the bigger stores, they then started to push it out to

00:35:01 ◼   ► the world.

00:35:02 ◼   ► Just remembering this, a wave of inspiration is washing over me. Pretty much like when

00:35:08 ◼   ► I read about Dropbox, you know, it's Dropbox, the design inspiration and the Apple Town

00:35:15 ◼   ► Halls and the Genius Grove and beautiful trees. Yeah, this is one of my favorite changes of

00:35:23 ◼   ► the year.

00:35:24 ◼   ► So you're creative.

00:35:26 ◼   ► In May, we're into May now, Apple made a weird announcement, kind of a little bit, about

00:35:32 ◼   ► affiliate program changes, where they were going to cut them from 7% down to 2.5%. Then

00:35:38 ◼   ► they kind of backtracked it a little bit to clarify that it only applied to in-app purchases.

00:35:44 ◼   ► It was a very strange thing. It seemed like maybe something got sent out that shouldn't

00:35:49 ◼   ► have been sent out, and they tried to do their best to walk it back.

00:35:53 ◼   ► Yeah.

00:35:54 ◼   ► It was very peculiar. Very peculiar indeed. We also got a couple of new Echo products

00:36:03 ◼   ► in May, the Echo Look and the Echo Show. So the Echo Look is like the fashion camera thing

00:36:08 ◼   ► and then the Echo Show is the weird TV guy that sits on your kitchen counter. I would

00:36:15 ◼   ► say the Echo Look is mostly forgotten about at this point.

00:36:18 ◼   ► Yeah, I think so.

00:36:21 ◼   ► Google I/O was also in May.

00:36:24 ◼   ► A bunch of stuff was announced, mostly Android-focused stuff,

00:36:28 ◼   ► but something that happened in the Apple world

00:36:29 ◼   ► was Google Assistant comes to iOS.

00:36:32 ◼   ► I was actually racking my brain about this a little bit,

00:36:34 ◼   ► and I couldn't remember a lot of what actually happened

00:36:36 ◼   ► at Google I/O.

00:36:38 ◼   ► -Yeah, I don't remember a lot either.

00:36:40 ◼   ► We got Android O.

00:36:44 ◼   ► -Yeah, they showed a bunch of O stuff.

00:36:46 ◼   ► I think this was the first time that they showed Google Lens.

00:36:50 ◼   ► But I keep thinking it was Allo, but Allo was the year before.

00:36:54 ◼   ► Allo was the year before.

00:36:55 ◼   ► Yeah.

00:36:56 ◼   ► This year's Google I/O was mostly,

00:36:58 ◼   ► like, it felt to me, like enhancements on the stuff

00:37:00 ◼   ► that they had been doing previously as opposed

00:37:02 ◼   ► to any huge, huge debuts.

00:37:04 ◼   ► Well, and their exciting consumer stuff

00:37:06 ◼   ► came in their fall Pixel 2 event anyway.

00:37:08 ◼   ► So for me, it's kind of hard to separate the two.

00:37:12 ◼   ► And it's just because we don't pay as close attention to them

00:37:15 ◼   ► as we do to WBC versus the iPhone event.

00:37:18 ◼   ► but I think they are using a similar pattern.

00:37:21 ◼   ► Like, IOS is gonna probably be more developer focused,

00:37:26 ◼   ► and then they're gonna announce the consumer stuff

00:37:28 ◼   ► in the fall.

00:37:28 ◼   ► That works really well for Apple and other companies.

00:37:30 ◼   ► I think Google's gonna fall into that rhythm as well.

00:37:32 ◼   ► - Yeah, they had a bunch of stuff about Daydream,

00:37:34 ◼   ► Android TV, like there are updates across the line,

00:37:38 ◼   ► but it wasn't anything like Super Super Mega Excite.

00:37:41 ◼   ► I mean, this one. - Yeah.

00:37:43 ◼   ► - Federico Vitucci debuted his iOS 11 concept video

00:37:47 ◼   ► to the world at this time in May.

00:37:49 ◼   ► - That was in May.

00:37:51 ◼   ► - Yeah, you can not leave any time for Apple

00:37:54 ◼   ► to implement the features that you request.

00:37:57 ◼   ► - Every single time I publish these concepts,

00:38:02 ◼   ► people say, "Why didn't you do this in October or November

00:38:07 ◼   ► so Apple can go through your list?"

00:38:09 ◼   ► And we talked about this when I did the concept.

00:38:12 ◼   ► Yeah, but it went well, it went really well.

00:38:16 ◼   ► considering that I was late and that we had a bunch of problems trying to release the

00:38:21 ◼   ► video in time. I was actually not just late in general, but I was planning on posting

00:38:28 ◼   ► on Wednesday, it ended up being Friday. Definitely going to make some changes next year if we

00:38:34 ◼   ► do this again. But I was happy with the way the video turned out and the features that

00:38:41 ◼   ► I picked. And I thought it was funny when a bunch of Apple engineers stopped me in San

00:38:47 ◼   ► Jose and they started asking questions about the video. And they were like, "How did you

00:38:51 ◼   ► know that? Did you hear something from someone?" I was like, "I don't know. Did you like the

00:38:59 ◼   ► video?" And yeah, I was happy with the result. So we'll see if it happens again this year.

00:39:06 ◼   ► I don't know. First I guess I gotta think up some wishes and ideas.

00:39:13 ◼   ► I have an idea. What if there was a section of the OS that you could put things temporarily?

00:39:18 ◼   ► What would you call that?

00:39:19 ◼   ► I feel like some kind of nook.

00:39:21 ◼   ► Like a cupboard?

00:39:22 ◼   ► Yeah, that was a good idea actually.

00:39:25 ◼   ► It's not a good name though.

00:39:27 ◼   ► Yeah, but I feel like that's a concept that you could definitely expand a little bit.

00:39:32 ◼   ► I could play around with that.

00:39:33 ◼   ► - Yeah, for sure. - Good grab bag.

00:39:35 ◼   ► - Yeah. - Yeah, something like that.

00:39:37 ◼   ► - The video, as always, is great.

00:39:38 ◼   ► The animation is great.

00:39:39 ◼   ► It's done half a million views, which is awesome.

00:39:41 ◼   ► So I always look forward to seeing these.

00:39:43 ◼   ► I like it when you show us little pieces

00:39:45 ◼   ► that you're working on throughout the process,

00:39:47 ◼   ► 'cause it's just so well done.

00:39:48 ◼   ► - Instagram copies Snapchat's face filters,

00:39:53 ◼   ► continuing to push towards doing their best

00:39:56 ◼   ► to kill Snapchat.

00:39:57 ◼   ► And I think they're succeeding.

00:40:02 ◼   ► 2017 showed a lot of trouble for Snapchat and this is mostly in part I would expect

00:40:08 ◼   ► you to Instagram stories and all the stuff that they've been doing. Shazam, the Apple

00:40:14 ◼   ► owned company, launches a complete redesign of their application as well in May.

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00:42:39 ◼   ► We move into June, huge month in June.

00:42:42 ◼   ► So I'm going to rattle through this stuff.

00:42:44 ◼   ► All right.

00:42:44 ◼   ► So we had WWDC.

00:42:45 ◼   ► WWDC gave us iOS 11

00:42:47 ◼   ► with the first news of the 32 bit app cutoff

00:42:51 ◼   ► that was going to hit in September.

00:42:53 ◼   ► We got new iPad Pros, the 10.5 inch and the 12.9.

00:42:57 ◼   ► We got Mac OS High Sierra with which kind of had the promise of a snow leopardy

00:43:02 ◼   ► type fix, which way the whole pod was announced

00:43:07 ◼   ► to be shipping at the end of the year.

00:43:08 ◼   ► That also didn't happen.

00:43:09 ◼   ► Where the timing of the app season premiere happened during

00:43:14 ◼   ► the BBC for a selection of very excited developers.

00:43:18 ◼   ► The iMac Pro was previewed.

00:43:22 ◼   ► We got watchOS 4, ARKit, and the first mention of Prime Video coming to the Apple TV.

00:43:29 ◼   ► That only took six months.

00:43:31 ◼   ► Waaah, waaaah.

00:43:32 ◼   ► It was big. I'll say it was big. This was a great WWDC.

00:43:36 ◼   ► It was a great WWDC. It was a great iOS 11 segment of the keynote.

00:43:42 ◼   ► I was smiling the entire time, of course.

00:43:45 ◼   ► - Yep. - You were.

00:43:46 ◼   ► And yeah, I had a really good time at keynote at the conference in general.

00:43:50 ◼   ► I went to a bunch of sessions and of course we hang out. So that was cool. Always a good

00:43:57 ◼   ► time of the year. And also we got the iPads. I got the iPad, I brought it to my hotel room

00:44:03 ◼   ► and I was riding in the other room while you guys were having fun and chatting and talking

00:44:10 ◼   ► and laughing. I was riding and listening to Brain.fm. So yeah, that was not fun but also

00:44:16 ◼   ► it was pretty great.

00:44:17 ◼   ► - Because you're a pro blogger, you can't stop.

00:44:19 ◼   ► - Pro blogger, yeah.

00:44:21 ◼   ► - Pro blogger.

00:44:22 ◼   ► It really was the first WWC in several where,

00:44:26 ◼   ► unless you're a hardcore Mac mini enthusiast,

00:44:29 ◼   ► everybody got something, right?

00:44:32 ◼   ► You iOS kids got something,

00:44:33 ◼   ► us grown up Mac people got something,

00:44:36 ◼   ► people who wanted Apple to have a speaker,

00:44:37 ◼   ► or, you know, Siri extended.

00:44:40 ◼   ► It really, it was very well rounded.

00:44:44 ◼   ► Now it was very full, and, I mean,

00:44:46 ◼   ► It was like a full two hour keynote

00:44:48 ◼   ► and there was a lot of stuff to process.

00:44:49 ◼   ► In fact, when I was looking through this document,

00:44:52 ◼   ► looking at everything they introduced at WWDC,

00:44:54 ◼   ► I actually kind of honestly forgot about some of the stuff.

00:44:57 ◼   ► It was like, oh right, everything was here.

00:45:01 ◼   ► And yeah, it was just a great summer

00:45:03 ◼   ► and I think it set off the rest of 2017

00:45:06 ◼   ► to be on the whole a pretty good year for Apple fans.

00:45:11 ◼   ► There's some stuff we'll talk about later on,

00:45:12 ◼   ► but all in all, June I think was a big home run.

00:45:16 ◼   ► Scott Forstall returned.

00:45:18 ◼   ► He did a great interview at the Computer History Museum

00:45:21 ◼   ► to mark the 10th anniversary of the iPhone.

00:45:24 ◼   ► - Which we visited.

00:45:25 ◼   ► We didn't see this.

00:45:26 ◼   ► This was like the week after,

00:45:28 ◼   ► or a couple weeks after we were in San Jose.

00:45:31 ◼   ► But we went to visit some friends

00:45:35 ◼   ► at different tech companies.

00:45:36 ◼   ► We do that every summer.

00:45:37 ◼   ► And we went to Google this year.

00:45:40 ◼   ► And then because I was the only one in the car

00:45:42 ◼   ► that could drive, I drug the two of you and Gray

00:45:46 ◼   ► to the Computer History Museum and made you walk with me

00:45:48 ◼   ► as I explained how rope memory used to work.

00:45:51 ◼   ► And it was the highlight of the trip.

00:45:53 ◼   ► It was very fun. - I like that you said drug,

00:45:55 ◼   ► as in like the only way you could've got us there

00:45:57 ◼   ► was to actually just drug us in the Google cafeteria.

00:46:00 ◼   ► You just dropped a little pill in all of our drinks

00:46:02 ◼   ► and then it-- - Dragged you?

00:46:03 ◼   ► - Yeah, I think it's dragged. - Something dragged?

00:46:05 ◼   ► - I think it's dragged.

00:46:06 ◼   ► - Drung, I drung you through the museum.

00:46:08 ◼   ► - You dragged us. - You dragged us.

00:46:09 ◼   ► - You dragged us and you threw us in--

00:46:11 ◼   ► - I did drag you, it is like being dragged.

00:46:14 ◼   ► - You threw us in the trunk of the car

00:46:16 ◼   ► Yeah, which was unnecessary, because there was so much space in the car.

00:46:19 ◼   ► Come on boys, let's go to the museum.

00:46:22 ◼   ► Yeah, I picked you all up, you're like, "Why do you have a white panel van as the rental

00:46:26 ◼   ► car?"

00:46:27 ◼   ► Well, you'll find out later.

00:46:28 ◼   ► Sir, can you pop the trunk, please?

00:46:30 ◼   ► Why do you have three vloggers in your trunk?

00:46:33 ◼   ► I'm no blogger, don't paint that on me.

00:46:36 ◼   ► You kinda are, you have a website.

00:46:39 ◼   ► You sometimes share opinions in written form.

00:46:43 ◼   ► No, it was two vloggers and then you found it.

00:46:46 ◼   ► A couple of vloggers and a blogger. How do you call a group of vloggers and bloggers

00:46:51 ◼   ► together? For bloggers? Loggers? Loggers? Yeah, it's just loggers. A couple of loggers.

00:46:56 ◼   ► MyChillMix launches on Apple Music as well, so hooray for that. Everybody got more chill.

00:47:02 ◼   ► Everyone got more chill in June. July brought with it the iOS 11 Blue Bar location furor

00:47:08 ◼   ► that occurred during the betas, where there was a blue bar at the top of the iPhone constantly

00:47:15 ◼   ► whenever the location was being shared.

00:47:17 ◼   ► Everybody was under the belief that this was a way for Apple to try and shame companies.

00:47:22 ◼   ► I think those companies got super mad and Apple changed their course on that.

00:47:26 ◼   ► The Rock debuted a movie with Apple about Siri, which was fantastic.

00:47:33 ◼   ► I enjoyed that so much. That was great.

00:47:36 ◼   ► Stephen Hackett had his most successful blog post in history

00:47:40 ◼   ► when he posted some 5K wallpapers, which are amazing.

00:47:44 ◼   ► It is, I'm actually trying to log in to WordPress, I believe that it is the single

00:47:51 ◼   ► most viewed page on my website of all time after a decade.

00:47:55 ◼   ► So there's that.

00:47:57 ◼   ► People really like their wallpapers, what can you say?

00:48:00 ◼   ► Coming in 2018, 512wallpapers.com.

00:48:03 ◼   ► Steven's rebranding.

00:48:05 ◼   ► Apple launches as well their Public Machine Learning Journal, so a place for them to publish

00:48:11 ◼   ► research about the machine learning that they're doing. I'm expecting, you know, just all the

00:48:16 ◼   ► great autocorrect learnings to go there. It's going to be great. I can't wait to correct

00:48:22 ◼   ► things more automatically.

00:48:25 ◼   ► This is a more interesting story than it appears because Apple, of course, is very private

00:48:30 ◼   ► and they've taken some heat because the machine learning and artificial intelligence community,

00:48:36 ◼   ► there's a big push on publishing what you're working on so other people can see it. It's

00:48:40 ◼   ► of how you build your resume in public, both as individual scientists or engineers or developers,

00:48:48 ◼   ► but as well as a company. And so, they've had eight posts since then, excuse me, issues.

00:48:55 ◼   ► They're on volume one, issue eight. I don't know when they go to volume two. Is that 2018,

00:48:59 ◼   ► maybe? I don't know.

00:49:00 ◼   ► Oh, you'll know. The volume two is when the machine learning starts writing the posts.

00:49:04 ◼   ► You don't want to read the volume two, trust me.

00:49:07 ◼   ► Yeah. There'll be nobody around when volume two is published.

00:49:10 ◼   ► If you see a volume two, it's too late.

00:49:17 ◼   ► But this is giving Apple a place for their employees to publish some stuff and their

00:49:22 ◼   ► names aren't necessarily on it, I don't think.

00:49:26 ◼   ► It's a step in the right direction.

00:49:27 ◼   ► I've read all of these issues.

00:49:29 ◼   ► I don't understand them.

00:49:32 ◼   ► I try to read them thinking I want to know more.

00:49:35 ◼   ► I want to see what they're doing.

00:49:37 ◼   ► it's very difficult because I'm not in this field. But I do think it's more interesting

00:49:41 ◼   ► than Apple made a blog but called it a journal because they're pretentious.

00:49:45 ◼   ► Every time I try to read these posts, it ends up with me just scrolling through until I

00:49:52 ◼   ► find the paragraph in plain English that I understand. So I basically read the opening

00:49:57 ◼   ► and the conclusion and everything in the middle with weird mathematical signs and the equations

00:50:03 ◼   ► and the graphics I just skim over because I don't understand.

00:50:08 ◼   ► I just like that emoji makes it into one of them. That's fun. That's fun for me. I get

00:50:13 ◼   ► to look at the pretty pictures. In August the iPod Nano and iPod Shuffle were removed

00:50:18 ◼   ► from sale. Womp womp womp. They're gone. Dead.

00:50:22 ◼   ► Yeah. Yeah. I made a video about it. You should go watch because it's like I did it. I speak

00:50:27 ◼   ► monotone, I have very sad music in the background and there's a lot of shots of iPads fading

00:50:34 ◼   ► out of view and stuff. It came out nice.

00:50:37 ◼   ► In better news, Carpool Karaoke launched on Apple Music. I remember I was in New York

00:50:42 ◼   ► a bunch in August and they had just huge ads in Times Square for this thing. Didn't do

00:50:48 ◼   ► very well, I don't think. I heard nothing about it. At least Planet of the Apps people

00:50:55 ◼   ► were talking about it. Carpool Karaoke, it feels like nobody was talking about it.

00:50:59 ◼   ► This was just, yeah, sure. I mean, maybe, I guess, a few people watched it. I saw the

00:51:07 ◼   ► episodes in the main page of Apple Music whenever there was a new one. I never bothered to watch

00:51:14 ◼   ► it because I feel like this stuff, if an episode is really good, I'm gonna hear about it and

00:51:20 ◼   ► I'm gonna watch it on YouTube. But this didn't happen with this series. Like, there was no

00:51:25 ◼   ► social sharing of people saying "oh my god you need to watch" like for example last year

00:51:31 ◼   ► I saw a bunch of people saying you need to watch the episode with Harry Styles and James

00:51:35 ◼   ► Corden in Carpool Karaoke and so I went to YouTube and I found the episode. I didn't

00:51:39 ◼   ► see that kind of word of mouth sharing for Carpool Karaoke and Apple Music which I guess

00:51:45 ◼   ► it's a problem because of course it's not the kind of platform that YouTube is. So it'll

00:51:50 ◼   ► be interesting to see this year if Apple continues with this video content and Apple Music?

00:51:55 ◼   ► I don't think they will. I think all the video content will be in a TV app. They're more

00:52:00 ◼   ► serious now. This was all jokes, right? This was all just them... Honestly, I don't even

00:52:05 ◼   ► know why they were doing it, really. I don't know what they were attempting. But they're

00:52:09 ◼   ► serious now. The money that they're spending, the people that are attached to their projects

00:52:13 ◼   ► is serious business.

00:52:15 ◼   ► us brought my favorite story of the year which was the HomePod firmware leak because it revealed

00:52:21 ◼   ► everything. It was, I mean I understand why people were like, got mad about it because

00:52:29 ◼   ► it did spoil, like it spoiled everything like even like an emoji right which really shouldn't

00:52:33 ◼   ► have leaked but the thing was I spent, we all spent like a month where like every day

00:52:40 ◼   ► we were finding out some new thing. It was exciting for that period of time. And as people

00:52:45 ◼   ► that have to try and come up with content every week, it was brilliant because August

00:52:51 ◼   ► is dead time. Nothing happens in August. But we had just like a whole thing. It was great.

00:52:58 ◼   ► August was great because of that.

00:53:01 ◼   ► So what all, I mean I'm trying to think through everything we saw in here. We saw the iPhone

00:53:06 ◼   ► shape so the notch was confirmed. LTE watch was confirmed.

00:53:11 ◼   ► Oh yeah LTE watch. The low poly version but still an emoji and we saw the way that the

00:53:19 ◼   ► status bar worked with the split layout and the notch and the ears. We saw, I think we

00:53:26 ◼   ► saw the multitasking, how it worked I'm pretty sure. Or Gurman actually described the multitasking

00:53:34 ◼   ► and then there was the HomePod leak and we saw the side button with the multiple features

00:53:40 ◼   ► for Siri and rebooting the phone or whatever. We saw... what does the iPhone X do? Face

00:53:52 ◼   ► ID? I mean... Yep, we have all the animations, right? Like the setup. The code name and the

00:53:58 ◼   ► code name for it. Everything. It was... It was bonkers. I mean, I remember... Unprecedented.

00:54:03 ◼   ► It was unprecedented.

00:54:04 ◼   ► I remember watching the September event and it's like, "Oh, we have one more thing!"

00:54:13 ◼   ► And Phil Stiller comes out after a flashy video talking about the iPhone X and just

00:54:19 ◼   ► the disconnect of everyone in the audience, everyone watching knows what he's going to

00:54:23 ◼   ► say but Apple still has to…

00:54:26 ◼   ► Pretend.

00:54:27 ◼   ► … still has to deliver the keynote as if it's exciting.

00:54:31 ◼   ► Yeah, they have to go for the motions.

00:54:33 ◼   ► is how it is, they just keep doing it. But yeah, it was very interesting. Our friend

00:54:37 ◼   ► Chris Latner's back, he leaves Tesla and joins Google. He joins the Google Brain machine

00:54:42 ◼   ► learning team. Clearly Tesla was not the place for Chris Latner.

00:54:46 ◼   ► You could say there was a swift departure.

00:54:49 ◼   ► Whoa!

00:54:50 ◼   ► Oh boy!

00:54:51 ◼   ► Whoa!

00:54:52 ◼   ► I have waited four months for this joke!

00:54:57 ◼   ► I've been sitting on this joke for literally weeks and now I finally got to deliver. I

00:55:04 ◼   ► feel so, so happy right now.

00:55:08 ◼   ► Oh man, can you imagine if I would have just busted that out by accident? You'd have been

00:55:11 ◼   ► so mad.

00:55:12 ◼   ► I would have aided you so much.

00:55:13 ◼   ► You've been testing this joke for several months now.

00:55:15 ◼   ► I've been practicing with Sylvia, yeah.

00:55:17 ◼   ► Oh, run throughs. Is he still at Google?

00:55:20 ◼   ► Yeah.

00:55:21 ◼   ► I guess he is.

00:55:22 ◼   ► There were new Apple Maps and App Store icons debuted and everybody flipped out but it wasn't

00:55:30 ◼   ► important at all.

00:55:31 ◼   ► I forgot about this.

00:55:32 ◼   ► They are still bad icons though.

00:55:33 ◼   ► I don't think they're bad icons.

00:55:35 ◼   ► I don't think they're bad.

00:55:36 ◼   ► I think that...

00:55:37 ◼   ► The Maps one is fine.

00:55:38 ◼   ► It's just their new campus.

00:55:41 ◼   ► But the App Store one is still...

00:55:42 ◼   ► People are mad about the Maps one though.

00:55:44 ◼   ► Like they just...

00:55:45 ◼   ► I don't even know why.

00:55:47 ◼   ► The Maps one is fine.

00:55:48 ◼   ► The App Store looks like a popsicle sticks.

00:55:51 ◼   ► I like it.

00:55:52 ◼   ► I like it. The Essential Phone debuted in August.

00:55:57 ◼   ► I remember that.

00:55:58 ◼   ► Beautiful phone that came out then, but unfortunately the Essential Phone basically has no future

00:56:04 ◼   ► at this point, I think. And Ulysses, Federico's favorite text editor, moved to a subscription

00:56:11 ◼   ► pricing model. One of the big apps that moved.

00:56:15 ◼   ► Why was that?

00:56:16 ◼   ► think Ulysses was one of the last apps, one of the last modern apps with a

00:56:26 ◼   ► full suite of Mac and iPhone and iPad that was still using the old paid

00:56:31 ◼   ► upfront model. And I guess the idea of a subscription-based text editor was

00:56:38 ◼   ► still new months ago. Now of course we're seeing a lot of different

00:56:43 ◼   ► types of apps using the subscription model.

00:56:45 ◼   ► But at the time, Bear, the not-taking app,

00:56:48 ◼   ► was the only similar idea.

00:56:51 ◼   ► But Ulysses was an app that's been around for a decade,

00:56:54 ◼   ► at least.

00:56:54 ◼   ► And people are really attached to it.

00:56:57 ◼   ► And also the fact that this move was a surprise.

00:57:03 ◼   ► We had no-- like these days, I see a lot of developers

00:57:08 ◼   ► preannouncing the fact that they are

00:57:10 ◼   ► going to use a subscription model for their next version.

00:57:13 ◼   ► And instead, I wonder if maybe the Ulysses team should have planned this announcement

00:57:20 ◼   ► in a different way, maybe months before, started to sort of preparing their customers for this

00:57:26 ◼   ► change.

00:57:28 ◼   ► And it was really unexpected.

00:57:29 ◼   ► I mean, of course I signed up right away, but it was really unexpected for a lot of

00:57:33 ◼   ► people.

00:57:34 ◼   ► And also, they were having issues with the discounts that they promised to existing customers.

00:57:41 ◼   ► didn't really work, so a bunch of people got charged more and that only added to

00:57:47 ◼   ► the discomfort of those people with the subscription. I think it should have

00:57:52 ◼   ► should have been handled maybe a little better from a PR

00:57:57 ◼   ► perspective, but I hope, I mean I think and I hope it everything is fine now. I

00:58:02 ◼   ► see that the Ulysses folks are continuing to release updates at a

00:58:06 ◼   ► faster pace than before, which is good, which is the entire point of moving to a

00:58:10 ◼   ► subscription it allows you to to continue to ship features and changes

00:58:15 ◼   ► and updates and fixes without having to wait for the big you know 4.0 5.0

00:58:21 ◼   ► releases big milestone type of releases now you can do you can break updates down

00:58:26 ◼   ► in smaller chunks and release you know every couple of weeks which is better

00:58:29 ◼   ► for everybody so I hope it's working out now. So moving to September in the

00:58:34 ◼   ► beginning of September Apple kills off the iTunes Music Festival after 10 years

00:58:37 ◼   ► It's now gone. They're moving to more local events, different events. Not doing the festival

00:58:43 ◼   ► in London anymore. Siri moved under Craig Federighi's organization, which was kind of

00:58:49 ◼   ► detailed on Apple's leadership page. And then of course we had a bunch of product releases.

00:58:54 ◼   ► We had the iPhones 8 and the iPhone 10, the Apple TV 4K and the Apple Watch Series 3,

00:59:00 ◼   ► which had an immediate bug where it was struggling to connect to LTE networks. It was also fixed

00:59:06 ◼   ► pretty quickly. But yeah, I think it was a pretty great product release. I mean, I've

00:59:11 ◼   ► got the iPhone X, the Apple TV, and the Apple Watch Series 3, and I'm really happy with

00:59:15 ◼   ► all of those products. They all do exactly what I want them to do. And in the case of

00:59:19 ◼   ► the iPhone X, a little bit more as well. I continue to be very, very, very, very happy

00:59:24 ◼   ► with these products.

00:59:25 ◼   ► You know, the iPhone 8 and 8 Plus get overlooked by sort of our circle of people because we

00:59:30 ◼   ► all like the X. But during the holiday season, I mean, I can't tell you how many people,

00:59:36 ◼   ► you know, friends and family ask, you know, "Hey, I'm going to buy a new phone for myself

00:59:39 ◼   ► or for somebody else." And a lot of these people were coming from like an iPhone 6 or

00:59:44 ◼   ► 6s. And the 8 is a great update over a phone of that age. And I mean, there would have

00:59:51 ◼   ► been complaints that that was the only iPhone because it does look basically the same. But

00:59:55 ◼   ► if you don't want the X, the 8 and 8 Plus are really good choices.

01:00:00 ◼   ► And iOS 11 is obviously released in September and it came with Federico's masterwork and

01:00:08 ◼   ► I lost my voice.

01:00:09 ◼   ► So it was good for everybody all around September I think.

01:00:15 ◼   ► Yeah, it was this year, again, we had some issues on the site.

01:00:23 ◼   ► Again another instance of things that will need to be changed and get better in the future.

01:00:28 ◼   ► But it was also different for me because I didn't take the usual break after publishing

01:00:35 ◼   ► my review because as we'll see in October we all met again.

01:00:42 ◼   ► So yeah it was a different review release day and week and month than usual.

01:00:50 ◼   ► And I hope to be back on a normal review month in 2018.

01:00:55 ◼   ► team.

01:00:56 ◼   ► Thank you

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01:02:30 ◼   ► And thanks to Pingdom for their support of this show and RelayFM. All right, October rolls around. The Sonos One

01:02:37 ◼   ► Is announced which is a product that I still have my eye on

01:02:41 ◼   ► I'm interested to see how that thing unfolds

01:02:45 ◼   ► as time goes on.

01:02:46 ◼   ► If it does get Google Home and then seeing how that

01:02:51 ◼   ► integrates with the Amazon Echo,

01:02:53 ◼   ► and if it does get AirPlay 2 and how that all integrates

01:02:56 ◼   ► together, could be a very compelling product.

01:02:58 ◼   ► Google had their hardware announcement, the Pixel 2,

01:03:02 ◼   ► the Pixel 2 XL, the Google Home Mini and Max,

01:03:05 ◼   ► and the Pixel Buds are all announced.

01:03:07 ◼   ► At least at the event on the whole,

01:03:09 ◼   ► looked like a really good crop of products,

01:03:11 ◼   ► but as we know, the Pixel 2 XL and the Google Home Mini

01:03:14 ◼   ► had some significant problems which had a real long news cycle to them. I felt really

01:03:18 ◼   ► bad for Google because things just kept going wrong for them. It wasn't great, it wasn't

01:03:23 ◼   ► great. Some personal news, hashtag, we had a great live show in Chicago at Release Notes,

01:03:32 ◼   ► including excellent moments like the iMac G3 Clamshell Surprise and Federico and the

01:03:38 ◼   ► Baker. Some real just key moments of the year there as part of our live show. I also played

01:03:46 ◼   ► AR basketball. People still bring it up. As they should. Yeah I remember that. You were playing with the game on the table as we were talking.

01:03:54 ◼   ► You just got up from the table. Can't take you anywhere. I felt like I felt like we needed some

01:04:00 ◼   ► energy in the room so I decided to go play basketball. That really was a great a great

01:04:04 ◼   ► week. Federico you spoke at Release Notes and just did a killer job. We did, the

01:04:09 ◼   ► Panetta did a live show at Field Notes and then we actually kind of helped host a

01:04:13 ◼   ► meetup at Field Notes as well, everyone's favorite paper notebook brand. So it was

01:04:18 ◼   ► just a really fun, a fun time and I think that we will do more live stuff next

01:04:25 ◼   ► year for sure. And we were also on Do It By Friday where we challenged each other

01:04:29 ◼   ► and challenged ourselves. So that was fun too.

01:04:31 ◼   ► challenged your stomachs.

01:04:33 ◼   ► - We most definitely did.

01:04:35 ◼   ► iPhone X reviews started dropping.

01:04:37 ◼   ► There were some YouTubers and everyone went mad.

01:04:39 ◼   ► So that was a whole big scene.

01:04:42 ◼   ► But eventually iPhone X reviews came out

01:04:45 ◼   ► via the more traditional channels

01:04:47 ◼   ► and then everybody was happy again.

01:04:49 ◼   ► - The further we get away from Apple people

01:04:53 ◼   ► just losing their cool that some YouTube kids

01:04:56 ◼   ► got their phones before them,

01:04:57 ◼   ► the more angry I am about it.

01:04:59 ◼   ► I thought I would be less angry,

01:05:00 ◼   ► but it's like, it's such a bad look

01:05:02 ◼   ► on people who are upset about that.

01:05:03 ◼   ► Just, just, just, just grow up, it's fine.

01:05:07 ◼   ► They can have the phone before you, it's okay.

01:05:09 ◼   ► - It was announced that SiriKit will be on HomePod

01:05:14 ◼   ► and there's just some weird stuff going on.

01:05:17 ◼   ► So like, basically all that HomePod's gonna be able to do

01:05:20 ◼   ► is a subset and then some of the SiriKit commands

01:05:24 ◼   ► that currently exist and all of the processing

01:05:28 ◼   ► of HomePod commands will occur on an iPhone,

01:05:31 ◼   ► which is connected to it, which I think is disappointing.

01:05:35 ◼   ► And there's just another reason

01:05:36 ◼   ► why I'm not interested in the HomePod.

01:05:39 ◼   ► But we'll see how that goes.

01:05:40 ◼   ► We'll see how that goes as time moves into this year.

01:05:44 ◼   ► In November, the iPhone X actually arrives in our hands

01:05:48 ◼   ► and we rejoice at the wonder of the phone from the future.

01:05:52 ◼   ► I think I speak for all of us that we love our iPhone Xs

01:05:55 ◼   ► and they're wonderful in every single way.

01:05:58 ◼   ► Our national nightmare is over as Google Docs finally gets...

01:06:03 ◼   ► drop.

01:06:03 ◼   ► Doesn't get dragged so much, but it definitely gets dropped.

01:06:09 ◼   ► So we're happy about that.

01:06:10 ◼   ► Twitter goes to 280 characters, where I'm gonna give a hot take.

01:06:14 ◼   ► I like it.

01:06:15 ◼   ► Yeah, it's useful.

01:06:18 ◼   ► It is useful. And I don't feel like I'm reading blog posts, right?

01:06:22 ◼   ► Like I know I feel like on the whole people aren't using 280 characters for every tweet

01:06:27 ◼   ► Most people are still keeping their tweets short

01:06:30 ◼   ► But I find myself a lot of the time being able to explain things and and point out what I want to point out way

01:06:37 ◼   ► easier in 280. Yeah, and it's just for when you want to like for example whenever I want to

01:06:43 ◼   ► Post about like a big story that I've been working on or a review or something like that now

01:06:50 ◼   ► I don't need to be extra careful counting the characters that I can include in the tweet and that extra space with

01:06:57 ◼   ► Combined with the fact that now images don't count against the quota anymore

01:07:01 ◼   ► It's been really great to announce new big feature stories on the site this past few months so much easier so much

01:07:09 ◼   ► Yeah, yeah

01:07:11 ◼   ► It really is great

01:07:13 ◼   ► The home pod has been delayed

01:07:17 ◼   ► in November. We will not see it this year.

01:07:20 ◼   ► #MykeWasRight. And then Animal Crossing launches on iOS.

01:07:25 ◼   ► I missed this. I was traveling when it came out

01:07:28 ◼   ► and by the time I would have got to play it

01:07:32 ◼   ► everyone was super mad about it so I just never played it. I never played it either.

01:07:36 ◼   ► From what I've seen it doesn't feel like the Animal Crossing I know

01:07:41 ◼   ► and considering my taste in

01:07:44 ◼   ► in beta games, putting up with some mobile restrictions with timers and lift tickets

01:07:50 ◼   ► and stuff like that. It's just not for me, so I won't even bother.

01:07:53 ◼   ► Then we move into December. So last month of the year, Apple had a really mega bad week

01:07:58 ◼   ► with the Mac root bug and the iOS date bug. That was bad times.

01:08:03 ◼   ► It was a bad week.

01:08:05 ◼   ► Apple Pay Cash launches with iOS 11.2. I'm still waiting for that, so I have nothing

01:08:10 ◼   ► to say. Steven, do you ever use it?

01:08:13 ◼   ► Besides sending Jason Snell the same $2 back and forth, I did actually use it because I'm

01:08:18 ◼   ► traveling with some friends next year and I'm splitting a hotel room with somebody and

01:08:23 ◼   ► they Apple Pay cashed me their half.

01:08:26 ◼   ► And so I have used it for one large thing and it's really fast and you take it and you

01:08:30 ◼   ► go into settings and tell it, "Hey, I want to deposit this in my bank account.

01:08:33 ◼   ► It was there in a couple days."

01:08:34 ◼   ► So it works, but it hasn't taken off yet.

01:08:37 ◼   ► Apple's iMac Pro went on sale.

01:08:41 ◼   ► Very expensive.

01:08:42 ◼   ► happy I get to play the game again where you can make it the most expensive computer imaginable.

01:08:47 ◼   ► It's like 13,000. I like to do that. I like to play that game. I'm looking forward to

01:08:52 ◼   ► playing that game when the Mac Pro comes out. See if we can get it even higher. The Apple

01:08:56 ◼   ► podcast analytics beta rolled out. It's been interesting. I'm very keen, obviously, to

01:09:03 ◼   ► see what this leads to. I think that it confirmed a lot of my own assumptions that I've made,

01:09:08 ◼   ► which I was pretty pleased about, about the way that people consume and listen to shows

01:09:12 ◼   ► and what they're listening to and what they're not. I think some people thought that this

01:09:16 ◼   ► was going to be a death knell for podcasting. It definitely isn't and won't be. And actually

01:09:20 ◼   ► I think could end up being good for certain people who require this type of stuff. So

01:09:25 ◼   ► I'm keen to see how this continues to roll out next year, around this year, next year

01:09:29 ◼   ► into the future. Who knows? App pre-orders exist for the first time on the iOS app store

01:09:35 ◼   ► with a bunch of games that were popping up and it seems like this is something that some

01:09:40 ◼   ► indie developers as we hoped are starting to integrate into their launch plans so this is

01:09:45 ◼   ► great to see. I think that we're all, as we spoke about a couple of weeks ago, very keen about this.

01:09:50 ◼   ► And then I'll run through this one, Apple requires Shazam. We'll wait and see on that one.

01:09:55 ◼   ► And then two stories that broke over our holiday break. There was a Mark Bloomberg

01:10:02 ◼   ► rumor, Mark Bloomberg, that's what I call him now, Mark Bloomberg over at GermanTech,

01:10:09 ◼   ► He had a rumor about Apple, apparently,

01:10:13 ◼   ► WWC maybe this year will announce that iOS apps can run on the Mac.

01:10:19 ◼   ► This looks like a very interesting thing.

01:10:22 ◼   ► I think we should just point people to Under the Radar.

01:10:25 ◼   ► There's a great episode of Under the Radar about this where Marco and David,

01:10:29 ◼   ► who are very well versed on this stuff, sit down and talk about it.

01:10:32 ◼   ► I will say personally, I'm excited about this because being able to run some iPad

01:10:38 ◼   ► apps on my Mac where I don't have a Mac component app that

01:10:41 ◼   ► like goes along with them, I think could be great.

01:10:43 ◼   ► And if there is a potential for the inverse,

01:10:45 ◼   ► which I'm not sure about really,

01:10:48 ◼   ► where maybe you never know some Mac apps

01:10:50 ◼   ► could come to the iPad because it is, we don't know yet.

01:10:52 ◼   ► There's a lot to unpack and I think this will happen.

01:10:57 ◼   ► I don't know what you guys think, but I'm interested.

01:10:59 ◼   ► I don't know if it will be this year,

01:11:01 ◼   ► but I think this will happen eventually.

01:11:02 ◼   ► - Yeah, I just, I made it a blog post

01:11:04 ◼   ► that was literally just a list of questions I have.

01:11:07 ◼   ► and

01:11:09 ◼   ► That's still how I feel there just a lot of questions here and I

01:11:13 ◼   ► Was pretty

01:11:16 ◼   ► Pessimistic about it initially and then that under the radar episode which again is a link in the show notes

01:11:20 ◼   ► Really changed my like really changed my thinking on it. Honestly, I've wrote a post about that as well that

01:11:26 ◼   ► The argument they laid out from the iOS side of things

01:11:30 ◼   ► was really

01:11:33 ◼   ► Concise and

01:11:35 ◼   ► I'm

01:11:36 ◼   ► consciously optimistic now about what this could mean, but we just don't know there's just not enough information in that german report and

01:11:42 ◼   ► We're just gonna need to see where it goes

01:11:44 ◼   ► My guess is if this is coming at WWDC as he said could be possible that we will start hearing more about this

01:11:50 ◼   ► In the lead up to it or you know other things will start moving around that seem like something is coming

01:11:56 ◼   ► so I think we need to keep an eye out for

01:11:59 ◼   ► App store changes or policy changes that could be could point to something else happening here. Yeah. Yeah

01:12:06 ◼   ► When I saw the rumor a few days ago on Twitter the of course, I the first reaction by many people was to

01:12:13 ◼   ► Was to post screenshots of iPhone apps running on a Mac and I don't think that's what's happening at all

01:12:20 ◼   ► I don't think this is a way to get you to use iOS apps on the Mac. I think we're going to see

01:12:26 ◼   ► It's more about a new UI framework that lets you write a single application that can be

01:12:33 ◼   ► run on iOS on the iPhone on the iPad and on the Mac.

01:12:37 ◼   ► It's a new UI framework or it could be a bridge from UIKit to AppKit sort of like

01:12:42 ◼   ► what's it called? UXKit that Apple is now using with photos on the Mac.

01:12:46 ◼   ► But I could see a new, I could see this new UI framework that is consistent and that it's

01:12:52 ◼   ► adaptive to the platform that it runs on and that it's 64 bit only. Maybe it's Swift only, I don't know,

01:12:59 ◼   ► but it could definitely be 64 bit only. There's a requirement for Mac OS apps on the Mac App Store to be 64 bit only

01:13:06 ◼   ► next year. I mean in 2018, just in a few months.

01:13:10 ◼   ► And I could see how there could be an option for developers to have universal, actual universal

01:13:17 ◼   ► iOS and macOS apps or maybe just write a macOS app with a new framework and keep selling it on the

01:13:24 ◼   ► Mac App Store. So I would be surprised if we will get the requirement that now every single Mac app

01:13:31 ◼   ► on the App Store needs to be an iOS app first. I think we're going to see this new shared UI

01:13:38 ◼   ► framework which in theory should help developers be more consistent in the feature set that they

01:13:43 ◼   ► use but I want to see how Apple themselves are going to use this if this is true. Does

01:13:49 ◼   ► it mean we're going to get more feature parity between Mac OS and iOS apps? Is this a thing

01:13:54 ◼   ► that is going to happen massively for every single built-in iOS application in 2018? We

01:14:00 ◼   ► don't know. So it should be a fun WWDC I think.

01:14:03 ◼   ► All right, and for our last story of the year, which is one I'm sure you're all very familiar

01:14:08 ◼   ► with by now, which is the Apple battery throttling thing. So for a little bit of background,

01:14:13 ◼   ► were talking about this a few weeks ago right there were Geekbench test results

01:14:16 ◼   ► with a bunch of stories that came out around it about the fact that it looked

01:14:20 ◼   ► like Apple were throttling the CPUs of some phones as they were getting older

01:14:25 ◼   ► then Apple confirmed in some statements to some press that it was part of a

01:14:29 ◼   ► software update that they did for battery health and then this set off a

01:14:34 ◼   ► tidal wave of stories of people saying that their fears their greatest fears

01:14:39 ◼   ► were confirmed that Apple were throttling phones. Like a thing that we've all been having to deal

01:14:45 ◼   ► with for years saying that no Apple don't do that, Apple don't do that. When it turned out that they

01:14:49 ◼   ► did for whatever reasons they admitted to doing it. People started freaking out. Then Apple wrote

01:14:55 ◼   ► this huge open letter. They apologized for their lack of communication on the issue. They went into

01:15:01 ◼   ► quite a lot of detail about why they do this and what the benefits are. And then they have said

01:15:06 ◼   ► that there's going to be an upcoming release of iOS which will include more information to the user

01:15:11 ◼   ► which is exactly what we want and will alert users if their device's performance has been degraded

01:15:15 ◼   ► because of battery health and then from now on throughout 2018 you can get a battery replacement

01:15:21 ◼   ► for your 6, 6s, SE or 7 for just $29 so these these prices are being reduced kind of across the

01:15:28 ◼   ► world and they're knocking around 50 off of the original price so this was a pretty huge story I

01:15:34 ◼   ► I mean, it's not very normal for a story like this to happen right at the tail end of the year, but we got one

01:15:39 ◼   ► Apple I think did the right job

01:15:41 ◼   ► They did the right thing in addressing it and saying that their communication was bad because it was

01:15:46 ◼   ► Because this was a bad look for them. This is something that nobody wanted to see

01:15:51 ◼   ► The fact that your phones are getting slower by a software update

01:15:54 ◼   ► Nobody wanted to see that and I'm happy to see that Apple have addressed it and they've got a good battery replacement program in place

01:16:00 ◼   ► right now

01:16:01 ◼   ► But we're gonna have to wait and see I don't think this is gonna be the last that we hear about this story

01:16:05 ◼   ► But it is the last one that we're gonna talk about on this special wrap-up episode

01:16:10 ◼   ► So that was 2017 like every year there's a bunch of stuff where we can look back and laugh at ourselves

01:16:18 ◼   ► And there's been some interesting trends throughout the year. I think it's been a good year mostly especially since June

01:16:24 ◼   ► I've been very happy with the most of the stuff that's happened since then

01:16:28 ◼   ► Apple just had a really bad December though, right? Like just a just a poopy December like just not a good one for them

01:16:35 ◼   ► So which is a shame so I hope that that trend doesn't continue into this year and through the for the rest of the year

01:16:42 ◼   ► Let's just say they just had a lot of bad luck in December

01:16:44 ◼   ► We'll of course be back next time as we will be doing our predictions for the year

01:16:50 ◼   ► Which I'm already really concerned about I don't feel like I have any good ones. So

01:16:57 ◼   ► Apple pencil - we're gonna go we're gonna keep keep pushing on that. Who knows if you want to catch our show notes for this

01:17:02 ◼   ► Week, there's a great place that you can go and do that. It's over at relay.fm/connected/174

01:17:09 ◼   ► Federico is @Vittici on Twitter and he is over at maxstories.net

01:17:16 ◼   ► Steven is @ismhachings at 512pixels.net

01:17:19 ◼   ► I am @imike and we'll be back next time until then say goodbye guys

01:17:24 ◼   ► Adios