Connected

00:00:00 ◼   ► [Music]

00:00:06 ◼   ► from relay FM this is connected episode 155 today's show is brought to you by

00:00:12 ◼   ► Blue Apron Squarespace and Bombfell my name is Myke Hurley and I am joined by

00:00:18 ◼   ► Mr. Steven Hackett. Hello Michael we're together. We are high five

00:00:22 ◼   ► that's how we prove it we're in uh relay FM

00:00:26 ◼   ► world headquarters which is Steven's office. Yeah

00:00:29 ◼   ► So this is the first time you've been in the studio?

00:00:31 ◼   ► - Recording this show, yes.

00:00:32 ◼   ► - Yeah, you've had quite the experience

00:00:36 ◼   ► with all the old Macs.

00:00:37 ◼   ► You've touched a lot of them.

00:00:38 ◼   ► You've asked me lots of questions.

00:00:40 ◼   ► - They're all behind me.

00:00:41 ◼   ► - Yes, they're on a big shelf.

00:00:43 ◼   ► - Let me take a look at them quickly.

00:00:44 ◼   ► - Okay.

00:00:45 ◼   ► - I'm trying to work out which one of them I like the most.

00:00:50 ◼   ► - The--

00:00:51 ◼   ► - Probably the orange iMac.

00:00:52 ◼   ► - The orange iMac. - On the floor, I think.

00:00:53 ◼   ► - The single iMac G3 that remains.

00:00:55 ◼   ► - Yeah, I think it's the best looking.

00:00:57 ◼   ► Although I do like the old ones, right?

00:00:59 ◼   ► The very top little cute ones, the original Max.

00:01:02 ◼   ► - Yeah, there's a 128K, a Plus, and a SE up there

00:01:05 ◼   ► joined by a Classic, we're gonna cut it open this afternoon.

00:01:08 ◼   ► Someone melt us a Classic.

00:01:09 ◼   ► - Not us. - Me.

00:01:11 ◼   ► - You, I have nothing to join. - Joint custody.

00:01:13 ◼   ► - Really? - In my Classic, no.

00:01:14 ◼   ► - Oh, that's nice.

00:01:15 ◼   ► - Yeah, so we're together, we're celebrating

00:01:18 ◼   ► Relay's Birthday Week together as we do every year.

00:01:20 ◼   ► There's some more about that a little bit in the show,

00:01:22 ◼   ► but we have some follow-up.

00:01:23 ◼   ► - We sure do.

00:01:25 ◼   ► And we spoke forever ago about the smart connector,

00:01:29 ◼   ► a little three-pin gizmo on the spine of the iPad Pro line,

00:01:34 ◼   ► and how it's basically only being

00:01:36 ◼   ► used for a couple of things.

00:01:38 ◼   ► And there was an article in Fast Company

00:01:41 ◼   ► last week that talks about this.

00:01:43 ◼   ► And I think it mirrors kind of what we had felt was true,

00:01:46 ◼   ► that there are high costs and maybe some high wait times

00:01:50 ◼   ► to get the components you need, and that it's sort of difficult

00:01:52 ◼   ► build for, sort of a difficult system and I think a lot of accessory makers have

00:01:56 ◼   ► just decided that Bluetooth is easier and a better fit and so they're

00:02:01 ◼   ► doing that which makes sense. I mean so one of the things the article

00:02:06 ◼   ► calls out is that Bluetooth might be better for keyboards. I don't agree I

00:02:10 ◼   ► mean it might be easier as a manufacturer to make something which is

00:02:14 ◼   ► Bluetooth over smart connector but having been a daily user of a smart

00:02:20 ◼   ► connector attached keyboard, smart connector is vastly superior because there's no battery

00:02:25 ◼   ► to worry about, there's no charging, and it can be constantly attached to the device.

00:02:31 ◼   ► There are struggles, right, around viewing angles and power I'm sure is a difficulty,

00:02:38 ◼   ► but there have been, and I have used backlit keys with a smart connector keyboard, I think

00:02:44 ◼   ► that it is a superior connector for the user, provided that the features could be there

00:02:49 ◼   ► from the developer or the creator.

00:02:52 ◼   ► - Yeah, do you think it's holding the iPad Pro back?

00:02:54 ◼   ► - No, I don't think it's holding it back.

00:02:55 ◼   ► I think that a richer ecosystem

00:03:00 ◼   ► of smart connector accessories

00:03:02 ◼   ► could enhance the iPad Pro

00:03:06 ◼   ► and make it even better than it already is, right?

00:03:08 ◼   ► Like to prospective buyers.

00:03:11 ◼   ► But I don't think that it is holding the product back per se

00:03:16 ◼   ► because it's not there, if that makes sense, right?

00:03:18 ◼   ► I don't think people are like, oh, I don't want one of those things because it's not

00:03:25 ◼   ► got enough accessories, but in having more accessories it would be better, if that makes

00:03:29 ◼   ► sense.

00:03:30 ◼   ► It's fair.

00:03:31 ◼   ► Apple does say that multiple companies are working on products.

00:03:33 ◼   ► Right now it's just been them and Logitech.

00:03:36 ◼   ► They have that weird charging base stand that charges it very, very slowly.

00:03:42 ◼   ► Yeah, that thing is not a real product, in my opinion.

00:03:45 ◼   ► No.

00:03:46 ◼   ► I do want to talk about Logitech for a second though.

00:03:49 ◼   ► So I picked up those, the circle 2, the camera, we talked about that several weeks ago, and

00:03:55 ◼   ► I ran into the trouble that I was getting a lot of reflection in my window mount because

00:03:58 ◼   ► the way my windows are, no problem with the camera itself, but I have a storm window and

00:04:03 ◼   ► I'm getting a lot of reflection.

00:04:04 ◼   ► So I decided to return them.

00:04:06 ◼   ► So they were on the inside, looking out, but the reflection coming from the outside onto

00:04:11 ◼   ► the window meant you couldn't see outside.

00:04:14 ◼   ► And so I'm going to send them back.

00:04:18 ◼   ► This is my completely self-entitled rant.

00:04:21 ◼   ► It's really difficult to return things to Logitech or talk to their customer support

00:04:24 ◼   ► page or support people.

00:04:26 ◼   ► They, you know, the cameras are great, but I'm having some interesting times trying to

00:04:32 ◼   ► get a return label.

00:04:33 ◼   ► Sad.

00:04:34 ◼   ► It's hard.

00:04:35 ◼   ► Everything should be easy, and it is not.

00:04:37 ◼   ► So workflow got updated.

00:04:38 ◼   ► Again.

00:04:39 ◼   ► I remember that app.

00:04:41 ◼   ► is a very detailed what is new in the newest workflow update 1.7.5 on their website. It

00:04:51 ◼   ► seems to be mostly very small things. They've added some little bits and bobs, right, like

00:04:57 ◼   ► different actions for some different applications. But they've also have a column of items that

00:05:06 ◼   ► adjust for the iOS 11 beta, which is good.

00:05:09 ◼   ► I mean, it shows that they are attempting

00:05:12 ◼   ► to keep the app running well, which is a good sign.

00:05:15 ◼   ► I think that was something we were worried about.

00:05:17 ◼   ► But I think what remains to be seen

00:05:19 ◼   ► is what the actual application is doing now.

00:05:22 ◼   ► Like, are we just in maintenance mode here?

00:05:25 ◼   ► - Right, just bug fixes, or is there new,

00:05:28 ◼   ► exciting stuff coming for 11?

00:05:30 ◼   ► - Exactly.

00:05:31 ◼   ► - I would have read that page,

00:05:32 ◼   ► but they didn't put in their app store release notes.

00:05:34 ◼   ► It just said bug fixes and compatibility improvements.

00:05:37 ◼   ► So I didn't read the document that they put out

00:05:39 ◼   ► because they put out--

00:05:40 ◼   ► They changed it then.

00:05:42 ◼   ► --crutty app store release notes.

00:05:43 ◼   ► Oh, how interesting.

00:05:44 ◼   ► They changed it because when I got it,

00:05:46 ◼   ► it told me to look at the URL.

00:05:46 ◼   ► I looked this morning.

00:05:47 ◼   ► Yeah, I looked this-- well, the URL's there,

00:05:49 ◼   ► but you can't tap on it.

00:05:50 ◼   ► Well, but like--

00:05:51 ◼   ► Oh, come on.

00:05:52 ◼   ► Put it in the release notes.

00:05:53 ◼   ► That's why they're there.

00:05:54 ◼   ► This is a bigger rant about many apps.

00:05:57 ◼   ► But workflow, you should know better.

00:05:59 ◼   ► Workflow 1.7.5 includes bug fixes and compatibility

00:06:02 ◼   ► improvements.

00:06:03 ◼   ► See the full list of changes of workflow.ly/what'snew.

00:06:06 ◼   ► I don't think that's too difficult.

00:06:07 ◼   ► - It's lazy.

00:06:09 ◼   ► Anyways, I agree with you.

00:06:11 ◼   ► Like the question now is, is it maintenance mode?

00:06:14 ◼   ► Like Federico, do you remember Federico?

00:06:15 ◼   ► He used to be on the show.

00:06:17 ◼   ► He had a tweet or something recently talking about

00:06:20 ◼   ► like the possibilities of an I was loving.

00:06:23 ◼   ► You and I were talking about it this week.

00:06:25 ◼   ► Like how cool would it be to have your workflows up

00:06:26 ◼   ► in split view and drag a bunch of content onto a workflow

00:06:30 ◼   ► and let it fire?

00:06:31 ◼   ► Like all sorts of things could happen.

00:06:33 ◼   ► and I hope they're working on that.

00:06:34 ◼   ► I kinda think they probably are,

00:06:36 ◼   ► but I think we'll see more as the fall rolls on, hopefully.

00:06:41 ◼   ► - Yeah, I mean, we could've asked this question about them,

00:06:45 ◼   ► whether they were bought by Apple or not.

00:06:47 ◼   ► - Sure.

00:06:48 ◼   ► - Right, like, there's no way of knowing

00:06:50 ◼   ► if someone's gonna actually implement

00:06:52 ◼   ► the features that you want,

00:06:53 ◼   ► so we're kind of in the same area,

00:06:56 ◼   ► but I don't know of anyone that has a workflow beta.

00:07:00 ◼   ► Like, I don't know.

00:07:02 ◼   ► I mean, people may, but I don't know.

00:07:04 ◼   ► I've not seen anything.

00:07:06 ◼   ► So I know as much as anybody else knows

00:07:08 ◼   ► as to whether they're actually implementing these features.

00:07:10 ◼   ► - Yeah, and being an internal team,

00:07:12 ◼   ► that may have come to an end.

00:07:12 ◼   ► I don't really know either.

00:07:14 ◼   ► - Yeah, I have faith, though.

00:07:15 ◼   ► - Me too.

00:07:16 ◼   ► I'm choosing to remain positive about it,

00:07:18 ◼   ► that because they're doing bug fixes,

00:07:20 ◼   ► because they are doing something,

00:07:22 ◼   ► I want to believe they're doing a lot more than this.

00:07:25 ◼   ► And it's a whole lot of really smart people

00:07:27 ◼   ► working on something that's great,

00:07:28 ◼   ► just for it to be limping along.

00:07:30 ◼   ► So fingers crossed, I think, for me.

00:07:33 ◼   ► - So the reason that I am here and that we are together,

00:07:36 ◼   ► that isn't the reason that Federico's away.

00:07:39 ◼   ► Federico just couldn't make it today.

00:07:42 ◼   ► - It was sad that he wasn't here.

00:07:43 ◼   ► - He is very sad and he wants you all to know

00:07:44 ◼   ► that he loves you so much, but he couldn't make it today,

00:07:48 ◼   ► which is okay, I think that's okay.

00:07:50 ◼   ► The reason that I'm here is because it is Real AFM's

00:07:55 ◼   ► third anniversary this week, so me and Steven get together

00:07:57 ◼   ► kind of around this time every year,

00:07:59 ◼   ► so we can go over some stuff business-wise,

00:08:01 ◼   ► but also because we have a lot of fun things

00:08:03 ◼   ► happening this week,

00:08:05 ◼   ► and actually throughout the rest of the month,

00:08:07 ◼   ► lots of Relay FM bonuses will be occurring.

00:08:10 ◼   ► If you are a Relay FM member,

00:08:11 ◼   ► we've mentioned this in the past,

00:08:13 ◼   ► go to relay.fm/membership and you can sign up,

00:08:16 ◼   ► support any show and you'll receive all of the bonuses,

00:08:19 ◼   ► which currently the feed, the bonus feed,

00:08:21 ◼   ► includes our connected bonus episode

00:08:23 ◼   ► where we talk about our home screens, that's already out,

00:08:25 ◼   ► and there is some fantastic stuff coming

00:08:27 ◼   ► the rest of the month and this includes a new we have a new perk which is 5k

00:08:33 ◼   ► wallpapers desktop wallpapers of all of the relay FM show artwork they're

00:08:39 ◼   ► beautiful which are amazing and they are now available to members if you're an

00:08:42 ◼   ► existing member take a look at your email if you're a new member there'll be

00:08:45 ◼   ► a link in the email that we send you it's all email just everybody just check

00:08:49 ◼   ► your email right now and then maybe you'll have a link and if you don't it

00:08:52 ◼   ► means you need to become a member so go to relay.fm/membership please

00:08:55 ◼   ► sign up we'd really appreciate it and we try and give you lots and lots of fun bonus content

00:08:59 ◼   ► to make that worth your while.

00:09:01 ◼   ► Whilst we're focused on our lovely company here, we have a new design for our website

00:09:07 ◼   ► which we haven't really spoken about too much yet.

00:09:10 ◼   ► Yeah, so we launched this Sunday night. There's a blog post on the Relay blog talking about

00:09:16 ◼   ► it. The idea was to make the site feel and look much more like the rest of Relay. The

00:09:21 ◼   ► website came from a time very early on in the company and we've finally been able to

00:09:26 ◼   ► come back around to it. It's much faster, it's much easier to see what's new and discover

00:09:30 ◼   ► more and the guys behind it, so the mysterious Twitter user ForgottenTowel and then a developer

00:09:37 ◼   ► here in Memphis by the name of Jason, both have worked extremely hard on this and I'm

00:09:43 ◼   ► really happy with it. It looks really good.

00:09:45 ◼   ► Yeah, my favorite thing about the new design is that each show when you click into an episode

00:09:50 ◼   ► or a show they get their own color. The page kind of changes color based upon the show

00:09:55 ◼   ► and it helps give each of our podcasts at Relay FM their own identity when you're on

00:10:02 ◼   ► the website and I really liked that. I think that was a really nice touch. Whoever it was

00:10:06 ◼   ► that came up with that was very smart. It wasn't me. I'm not trying to take that glory

00:10:10 ◼   ► but one of the crew, the web design team came up with it and yeah we really love it. There

00:10:15 ◼   ► are still some things that need polishing because as everybody knows it doesn't matter

00:10:20 ◼   ► how great you test something once you put it to production, things start to go wrong

00:10:23 ◼   ► and we're working our way through a lot of those little things now.

00:10:27 ◼   ► But yeah, we're really really happy with it and I want to extend my thanks to Steven for

00:10:31 ◼   ► managing it and to Frank and Jason for doing all the hard work putting the thing together.

00:10:36 ◼   ► It is a, it was a huge long project that's been going on for a while and it was really

00:10:41 ◼   ► great that we got to unveil it this week.

00:10:43 ◼   ► It was a lot of fun.

00:10:44 ◼   ► We also did our annual Q&A, but this time we did it on video.

00:10:49 ◼   ► sure did over on my YouTube channel. We put together a Q&A video which I recommend that

00:10:55 ◼   ► you watch. If you're interested in learning more about how we think about our company,

00:11:00 ◼   ► then definitely take some time, watch the video. It's about 30 minutes long. We answer

00:11:04 ◼   ► a bunch of great questions from Relay FM listeners. If you're not really that interested, just

00:11:09 ◼   ► watch the first 30 seconds and the last 30 seconds and you won't be disappointed, I think.

00:11:13 ◼   ► Yeah, it's really something. It was a lot of fun to do.

00:11:17 ◼   ► Yeah, we put that together all in the studio.

00:11:18 ◼   ► So you also get to see a little bit of Steven's studio as well.

00:11:20 ◼   ► So I recommend that you go ahead and watch that because we had a lot of fun

00:11:24 ◼   ► putting that together.

00:11:25 ◼   ► All right.

00:11:27 ◼   ► So should we take our first break?

00:11:28 ◼   ► Let's do it.

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00:13:08 ◼   ► - More follow up.

00:13:09 ◼   ► - More follow up, all the great follow up.

00:13:11 ◼   ► Chris Latner, Chris Latner you may remember,

00:13:14 ◼   ► he spent a long time at Apple.

00:13:16 ◼   ► He created Swift along with some other stuff.

00:13:19 ◼   ► I think Clang and LLVM, which my understanding

00:13:22 ◼   ► is they are compilers and that's the end of my knowledge.

00:13:25 ◼   ► - Yeah.

00:13:26 ◼   ► - Do a good job?

00:13:27 ◼   ► - It's good.

00:13:28 ◼   ► He left Apple sometime in the last few months.

00:13:31 ◼   ► He went to Tesla, as you may remember, which was big news.

00:13:36 ◼   ► Or like four days.

00:13:37 ◼   ► He then left Tesla for what seemed like differences.

00:13:41 ◼   ► Yeah, it seemed mutual.

00:13:45 ◼   ► And so he put out a statement and then sort of cleaned the statement up afterwards that

00:13:50 ◼   ► it just wasn't a good fit.

00:13:51 ◼   ► So whatever happened, wasn't a good fit.

00:13:54 ◼   ► The news now is that he has landed at Google working on Google Brain

00:13:58 ◼   ► Which we actually had to look up because neither of us were that familiar with it

00:14:01 ◼   ► No, I I've never heard of Google Brain before and I think they don't talk about it really which is the reason

00:14:08 ◼   ► But I went and took a look at it. I did some

00:14:11 ◼   ► Googling I found out that Google Brain is a team focused on

00:14:16 ◼   ► artificial intelligence and deep learning and they are actually a part of Google's research arm and

00:14:22 ◼   ► And from the page, this is what I read,

00:14:24 ◼   ► "Google Brain team members set their own research agenda,

00:14:28 ◼   ► with the team as a whole maintaining a portfolio of projects

00:14:30 ◼   ► across different time horizons and levels of risk."

00:14:34 ◼   ► So when I read this, take a look at this and look at the fact

00:14:38 ◼   ► that Latner left Apple, who are clearly starting to work on AI,

00:14:42 ◼   ► and then he went to Tesla and then left Tesla so quickly,

00:14:47 ◼   ► my kind of read on this is that maybe he wasn't able to work

00:14:51 ◼   ► on what he wanted to work on at Apple which is clearly artificial intelligence because

00:14:56 ◼   ► he's taken two AI focused roles since he left Apple. I assume that Apple probably wanted

00:15:01 ◼   ► him to focus on Swift because that was where he was best fitting for them. So he must have

00:15:06 ◼   ► wanted to go and work on AI. Again this is all just conjecture, I'm just trying to read

00:15:10 ◼   ► the tea leaves on it. And my assumption is that for whatever reason he couldn't get on

00:15:16 ◼   ► with the people at Tesla or didn't like the work or it just wasn't a fit for him. But

00:15:21 ◼   ► this role at Google seems like it would give him a lot of flexibility to work on whatever

00:15:26 ◼   ► he's interested in, right? Like setting your own agenda for research seems like a real

00:15:30 ◼   ► kind of pie in the sky, airy fairy type job, right? Like you can go in and think and write

00:15:37 ◼   ► and like it's incredibly smart and there are lots of incredible people and stuff comes

00:15:41 ◼   ► out of that, but it feels very relaxed, right? Like in what you'd be able to do as an individual,

00:15:47 ◼   ► right? Like it feels like something that is Google just hire a bunch of smart people on

00:15:51 ◼   ► the off chance that one of them might have a great idea.

00:15:53 ◼   ► Yeah, it seems like a very academic setting.

00:15:56 ◼   ► And I'd imagine that's a change of pace from working on compilers and languages and even

00:16:02 ◼   ► from Tesla where he was over sort of real products and real things.

00:16:06 ◼   ► This seems a little more abstract, but I wish him all the best and I think it's interesting

00:16:11 ◼   ► that that's where he is and at least the two of us and hopefully maybe some of our listeners

00:16:15 ◼   ► learned a little bit more about this program at Google.

00:16:18 ◼   ► I think it's fascinating that these companies have little pockets where it's just super

00:16:23 ◼   ► smart people doing research and doing stuff that could take place in an academic setting

00:16:28 ◼   ► but within the walls of a corporation.

00:16:31 ◼   ► Yeah, I think this may be the last we hear from Chris Lattner for a while.

00:16:38 ◼   ► And I hope that the reason is because he fits there.

00:16:41 ◼   ► Yeah.

00:16:42 ◼   ► Yeah, I don't know how much like public research comes out of this.

00:16:44 ◼   ► I know that's been a conversation.

00:16:46 ◼   ► Probably a bit.

00:16:47 ◼   ► on Apple right? Where people wanted to publish their research and so

00:16:52 ◼   ► Apple made a blog, we didn't call it a blog, and you know journal writing and

00:16:56 ◼   ► all this stuff is very important in this industry so I think that we will over

00:17:01 ◼   ► some time after some time passes we'll see a little bit more about what he's up

00:17:04 ◼   ► to there. All right we got an abundance of follow-up and feedback from the

00:17:13 ◼   ► connected audience about AirPods interference. I started saving tweets and

00:17:18 ◼   ► then had to stop. It got out of hand. Because there were too many like it and

00:17:22 ◼   ► everybody was saying very similar things so to kind of sum up what we heard about

00:17:26 ◼   ► AirPod interference it seems that a lot of people have these problems whilst in

00:17:32 ◼   ► big cities, like walking around in big cities. So we had lots of reports from

00:17:37 ◼   ► people who struggled with their AirPods breaking up whilst they're listening to

00:17:40 ◼   ► them in New York, San Francisco and London. They seem to be like the pockets that were really

00:17:46 ◼   ► giving me information like a lot, you know, people called out where they'd had issues.

00:17:51 ◼   ► So it seems that there is something going on here, but it's intermittent enough that it's not

00:18:01 ◼   ► considered to be an issue, which I completely understand. But the best possible explanation

00:18:07 ◼   ► for this came in from Yoni and Yoni says there are broadcast wireless microphones that sit close to

00:18:16 ◼   ► the radio frequency of bluetooth for bluetooth audio so it is possible that when you go by

00:18:22 ◼   ► or when you walk past certain places in cities where there could be broadcast microphones

00:18:27 ◼   ► bluetooth would break up on audio devices. Now this might not be the only explanation

00:18:35 ◼   ► but it seemed like a good explanation to me, especially because I was having the most problems

00:18:42 ◼   ► whilst I was walking through Times Square. Which is just chock full of stuff.

00:18:46 ◼   ► Yeah. So when I was walking through Times Square, like right in the center,

00:18:50 ◼   ► I could barely hear them. And then as I would get further away, it would get better. So it could

00:18:56 ◼   ► just be that it's like radio interference from other types of microphones and things like that,

00:19:01 ◼   ► that kind of break up. So I think whatever the exact cause is radio

00:19:05 ◼   ► interference is probably the reason for this. Yeah I'll go with that. It was it

00:19:10 ◼   ► was really surprising to me to see how many people have this exact thing. Yeah

00:19:15 ◼   ► what I found surprising is how many people seem to have it but I've never

00:19:18 ◼   ► heard that it was a thing. Yeah me too I mean I didn't had it I mean I guess it

00:19:23 ◼   ► if I had thought about it it would have made sense but yeah I've never really

00:19:26 ◼   ► come across it. But like even when it's happening to me I'm not like oh man

00:19:29 ◼   ► these things are broken. I'm assuming it is something that is going on around me,

00:19:35 ◼   ► so I think that's probably why people don't talk about it very much because it's not an issue, right?

00:19:39 ◼   ► Yeah. So we should talk about the Marco service trademark.

00:19:43 ◼   ► Trademark. Trademark. Is that the right one? Is the trademark the right one? So Tyler wrote in

00:19:49 ◼   ► to confirm that the service that Marco Armond provided him when he bought, I think, an iPad

00:19:55 ◼   ► from Marco was indeed top notch like the service that I received from buying my MacBook Pro

00:20:01 ◼   ► so I think that we can attest that buying things from Marco you're going to get the

00:20:05 ◼   ► best service possible.

00:20:07 ◼   ► Yeah, I've purchased a camera from him in the past as well and it's great. It came all

00:20:11 ◼   ► wrapped up with a little bow on top. There wasn't a bow.

00:20:16 ◼   ► I bet there was. So I guess our recommendation is if Marco's selling it, buy it?

00:20:23 ◼   ► So what do you think about the MacBook Pro? It's sitting here on the desk. How has it

00:20:26 ◼   ► been in the week or so that you've had it? Would you say that I was right? He's nodding

00:20:34 ◼   ► quietly.

00:20:35 ◼   ► So no, the idea of claiming the rightness is...

00:20:39 ◼   ► Perfectly accurate.

00:20:42 ◼   ► I mean...

00:20:43 ◼   ► And fair.

00:20:44 ◼   ► This came up because I questioned it myself.

00:20:47 ◼   ► Well earned.

00:20:48 ◼   ► you just jumped in like a hyena to pick the bones of my consternation.

00:20:55 ◼   ► Wow.

00:20:56 ◼   ► I know.

00:20:56 ◼   ► So I would say that your recommendation, especially if your recommendation was for me to get this

00:21:04 ◼   ► exact machine, was right. That you were right to recommend it. Because I love it. I think

00:21:10 ◼   ► it's fantastic. This MacBook Pro is brilliant. It's the best MacBook Pro I've ever had. I

00:21:16 ◼   ► actually been using it predominantly the last few days, not because, you know,

00:21:23 ◼   ► there's nothing wrong with my iPad, I love my iPad, it's better than the MacBook Pro for

00:21:27 ◼   ► everything I want to do with that for me, but I have been focused on just the

00:21:38 ◼   ► types of work that I need for, that I need to be able to do on on Mac OS.

00:21:43 ◼   ► So anyway, over the last few days I've been spending so much time on this and I've come

00:21:49 ◼   ► to love the keyboard which I wasn't expecting.

00:21:52 ◼   ► It's way too loud but it feels nice to touch the O key on this keyboard that's been sticking

00:21:57 ◼   ► for me.

00:21:58 ◼   ► That's fine.

00:21:59 ◼   ► Which is funny because I remember Marco having those exact problems with this exact machine.

00:22:04 ◼   ► It made me laugh when it happened.

00:22:05 ◼   ► But yeah it's great, it's super powerful.

00:22:09 ◼   ► like I can't notice too much of a difference between it and my iMac honestly, some tasks

00:22:15 ◼   ► which is really impressive. So yeah I think this is fantastic and I'm pleased that I got

00:22:21 ◼   ► it because I think I would have lost my mind by now with trying to do all this stuff on

00:22:25 ◼   ► the MacBook. I think so because you're doing so much production on the road. Yeah I am.

00:22:30 ◼   ► Yeah well good. I'm glad it's here. To do a little more follow up I did provide you

00:22:36 ◼   ► with a couple of stickers on the back and we had some stickers show up in the mail

00:22:40 ◼   ► so you got some of those. So it is slowly

00:22:43 ◼   ► you got two or three on there now? There's two on there. So you're slowly getting there.

00:22:47 ◼   ► Yeah it will take its time as it becomes part of the family.

00:22:50 ◼   ► Yeah it's good I'm glad you're happy with it and

00:22:54 ◼   ► I think the more thing about the more I think the two port

00:22:59 ◼   ► no touch bar MacBook Pro is probably like the right MacBook for most people.

00:23:05 ◼   ► We, as I was talking to somebody today, who's, who's thinking about replacing an

00:23:08 ◼   ► older MacBook Air.

00:23:09 ◼   ► And that's kind of what I said to them like this, you know, it's a little bit

00:23:13 ◼   ► more than the MacBook Air would have been, especially if you need some storage

00:23:16 ◼   ► space, right?

00:23:16 ◼   ► That that cheap model is, it's pretty cheap as far as it's going to be as far

00:23:22 ◼   ► as storage.

00:23:23 ◼   ► But, but I think it's kind of the default right answer for me now that the MacBook

00:23:28 ◼   ► is great if the portability is the most important thing.

00:23:31 ◼   ► But I think as far as like balance, the no touch bar is probably the way to go.

00:23:38 ◼   ► Yeah, I think I agree with you. I think I agree with you. Like this provides you with most of the

00:23:43 ◼   ► power that you're going to need whilst also keeping the price lower. And I don't know if

00:23:52 ◼   ► the touch bar is ready for prime time right now. And I don't know if it's going to get there.

00:23:57 ◼   ► But I just don't, whenever I see people using it, it looks nice, but I haven't seen any

00:24:04 ◼   ► application of it so far that I'm like, well that makes perfect sense.

00:24:08 ◼   ► That's way better than a button.

00:24:09 ◼   ► Yeah, I agree and I've got the touch bar sitting in front of me.

00:24:13 ◼   ► And really I kept this machine and sold my two port because I needed four ports for some

00:24:18 ◼   ► of the stuff I do.

00:24:20 ◼   ► But the touch bar is real lackluster at this point.

00:24:24 ◼   ► Yeah, they had a way to put more ports on the the the

00:24:28 ◼   ► What is it called what is this machine called ATP cause of the escape? Yeah, I know but what it is a MacBook Pro

00:24:35 ◼   ► 13-inch like parenthetical to

00:24:38 ◼   ► Thunderbolt 3 port or so get it just it would be nice to put more ports. Their names are awful. Their names are really bad

00:24:43 ◼   ► Well good. I'm glad it's working out. Yeah, me too. Me too

00:24:47 ◼   ► And it was it was a great it was a great decision to make I think and also

00:24:52 ◼   ► I've traveled with it in a bag and didn't notice. Yeah, I mean you're going from two to three pounds

00:24:58 ◼   ► They're also light. Yeah, it's

00:25:01 ◼   ► It's all it's all great

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00:26:58 ◼   ► - So we have new beta bits.

00:27:00 ◼   ► - Yep, we have a new beta, beta six.

00:27:04 ◼   ► We had beta five last week.

00:27:06 ◼   ► Now we have beta six this week.

00:27:08 ◼   ► And I think the reason for that is pretty clear

00:27:11 ◼   ► if you were using beta five, it was buggy.

00:27:14 ◼   ► - Yeah, it was rough.

00:27:15 ◼   ► - It was pretty buggy.

00:27:16 ◼   ► I had to keep, I had to do many many forced restarts over the week just because of things

00:27:22 ◼   ► like the doc not appearing, multitasking not working, you know I wasn't able to split screen

00:27:27 ◼   ► any applications like there were lots and lots of little problems, my wallpaper kept

00:27:31 ◼   ► disappearing and it was replaced with a black screen.

00:27:33 ◼   ► That was my favorite.

00:27:35 ◼   ► Except for the background of notifications which was kind of cool.

00:27:39 ◼   ► It was a good look.

00:27:40 ◼   ► Yeah it was super buggy.

00:27:42 ◼   ► There are bugs in 6, so currently every application that I open for the first time opens in the

00:27:47 ◼   ► wrong orientation when I'm in landscape, and then I have to close it and reopen it again.

00:27:51 ◼   ► This is what beta life is all about, but beta 5 was particularly bad.

00:27:56 ◼   ► However, beta 6 has introduced a few things which has set the internet ablaze, namely

00:28:03 ◼   ► a couple of icons.

00:28:05 ◼   ► Now I want to start with the maps icon, because I think this is the less egregious of the

00:28:09 ◼   ► two.

00:28:10 ◼   ► So Apple have taken the maps icon which used to show a road that was leading into One Infinite

00:28:17 ◼   ► Loop and have replaced it with a new icon which shows a road leading into Apple Park.

00:28:24 ◼   ► And I see many people tell me, well not tell me, tell the internet, kind of me, that for

00:28:29 ◼   ► some reason they don't like it.

00:28:32 ◼   ► And I can't understand what's wrong with this icon.

00:28:38 ◼   ► I have no... it's basically the same parts that were on the previous one just

00:28:43 ◼   ► remixed.

00:28:43 ◼   ► Just in a different orientation like they're just mixed around a little bit more and there's a circle in it now like

00:28:47 ◼   ► I don't fully understand like why this icon would make you mad if the old one

00:28:54 ◼   ► didn't like putting them side by side I don't

00:28:57 ◼   ► I don't see what the problem is.

00:29:00 ◼   ► Yeah.

00:29:01 ◼   ► So that's yeah that's very very peculiar to me.

00:29:05 ◼   ► - Yeah, and all these people have maps

00:29:07 ◼   ► on their home screen, that seems dubious.

00:29:09 ◼   ► But I'm fine with it.

00:29:11 ◼   ► But we should talk about the App Store icon.

00:29:12 ◼   ► - Yeah, this is the one that people are really upset about.

00:29:14 ◼   ► - So it has been different in iOS 11 than it was in iOS 10.

00:29:19 ◼   ► And it's always kind of been an A of some sort,

00:29:23 ◼   ► right, that sort of Apple's indication

00:29:25 ◼   ► for an application bundle on the Mac.

00:29:27 ◼   ► It's a very simple A.

00:29:29 ◼   ► The new one looks, I see like three Popsicle sticks

00:29:33 ◼   ► forming an A.

00:29:34 ◼   ► It's sort of a test.

00:29:35 ◼   ► Some people say it looked like a lean-to

00:29:38 ◼   ► or some sort of skiing house structure.

00:29:40 ◼   ► I see popsicle sticks.

00:29:42 ◼   ► What do you think about this?

00:29:43 ◼   ► - I mean, I see architectural drawing.

00:29:45 ◼   ► I can look at it.

00:29:46 ◼   ► - Yeah, kind of.

00:29:48 ◼   ► - Like it's a blueprint.

00:29:50 ◼   ► That's what it looks like to me.

00:29:51 ◼   ► And I think that that makes sense to me in my mind,

00:29:54 ◼   ► like this kind of like a blueprint.

00:29:56 ◼   ► It's showing that something's being built.

00:29:58 ◼   ► I think it's fine.

00:30:01 ◼   ► I don't understand.

00:30:04 ◼   ► I like it. It's like fine. Yeah, I don't you know, I don't really care for it like the old one better

00:30:09 ◼   ► But it's whatever it's an icon design. Like I don't think this is something that is is all like we're only talking about it because of the

00:30:15 ◼   ► Response it got like otherwise this would not be a story. It would have been a simple bullet point, right?

00:30:22 ◼   ► I have no problem with this icon. Um, I think it's pleasing to the eye

00:30:29 ◼   ► And that's kind of about it really like Apple have had a history of weird icons

00:30:35 ◼   ► right like so many of the iOS 7 beta 1 beta 2 icons were just like

00:30:40 ◼   ► Some of those remain with us basically unchanged Safari's basically the same photos is basically the change

00:30:45 ◼   ► I'm not a problem with safari photos. We've come to grow actually really like the photos one

00:30:49 ◼   ► Yeah, they've we've come they've come to grow on us and at some point

00:30:52 ◼   ► we'll look back on this application the App Store icon and

00:30:55 ◼   ► And it will be just how it always has been.

00:30:59 ◼   ► And everything before it will look old.

00:31:00 ◼   ► It's just the way that these things--

00:31:02 ◼   ► I mean, I'm looking at the icon on the Mac App Store

00:31:07 ◼   ► on this Mac in front of me, right?

00:31:09 ◼   ► That is not nice looking to me.

00:31:11 ◼   ► It's a pencil and a paintbrush and a straight line.

00:31:15 ◼   ► That's very much how Apple has formed

00:31:17 ◼   ► that A for a really long time.

00:31:19 ◼   ► I don't like--

00:31:20 ◼   ► I mean, when I look at it, like, objectively,

00:31:24 ◼   ► I take myself out knowing what it is and just look at it.

00:31:27 ◼   ► I don't like that any, you know,

00:31:30 ◼   ► I don't look at that and be like,

00:31:31 ◼   ► "Oh my gosh, that is so much better

00:31:33 ◼   ► "than the one we have now."

00:31:35 ◼   ► Because effectively, the one that we have now,

00:31:37 ◼   ► the one that potentially we'll have,

00:31:40 ◼   ► it's the same idea but just taking away the skeuomorphism,

00:31:45 ◼   ► if you would call it that, of a paintbrush and a pencil.

00:31:48 ◼   ► Right, like it's the same layout,

00:31:49 ◼   ► it's the same three things.

00:31:50 ◼   ► - It's just sort of flattened out into sticks.

00:31:54 ◼   ► - Yeah, and I think that it's fine.

00:31:55 ◼   ► But I do think that it looks weird

00:31:58 ◼   ► next to the iTunes store icon.

00:32:00 ◼   ► - Which is just a glyph of a star on a purple background.

00:32:04 ◼   ► - And my assumption is those things

00:32:06 ◼   ► should match up in some way.

00:32:07 ◼   ► Like I think it does look a bit peculiar

00:32:09 ◼   ► next to that one now, because they kind of fit together

00:32:12 ◼   ► in the previous version, so I don't know.

00:32:16 ◼   ► I think maybe an outline, a star outline,

00:32:18 ◼   ► would make more sense to me.

00:32:19 ◼   ► - Or a little drop shadow in there.

00:32:21 ◼   ► just something to sort of punch it up a little bit.

00:32:24 ◼   ► - But yeah, I don't, you know, it doesn't bother me too much.

00:32:26 ◼   ► - Can we agree that the health icon

00:32:28 ◼   ► is really the worst of the defaults?

00:32:29 ◼   ► - It's kind of a bit lazy, isn't it really?

00:32:32 ◼   ► - It's a white field with a red heart

00:32:34 ◼   ► in like the upper right corner that takes up authority.

00:32:37 ◼   ► - I mean, I like the upper right corner thing

00:32:38 ◼   ► 'cause it's like, ah, that's where the heart is, but like--

00:32:41 ◼   ► - It's where the heart is.

00:32:41 ◼   ► - Yeah, it's where the heart is.

00:32:42 ◼   ► Home screen is where the heart is.

00:32:46 ◼   ► I do like the settings, the increased settings.

00:32:51 ◼   ► The contrast, I do too.

00:32:53 ◼   ► That's sticking out to me a lot.

00:32:56 ◼   ► Yeah.

00:32:57 ◼   ► But I do like it.

00:32:58 ◼   ► I used to keep settings on my dock

00:32:59 ◼   ► and the internet shamed me in doing that.

00:33:02 ◼   ► Internet shamed people into a lot of different things.

00:33:05 ◼   ► And they fixed reminders, they flipped it back around again.

00:33:07 ◼   ► Oh did they?

00:33:08 ◼   ► Yeah, they flipped it back around again.

00:33:09 ◼   ► That was super weird with it on the right side.

00:33:11 ◼   ► One of the other big features or changes

00:33:14 ◼   ► is around auto brightness.

00:33:15 ◼   ► So question, do you have your devices auto brightness on or off?

00:33:20 ◼   ► Off.

00:33:22 ◼   ► Okay. Now I know that Federico has it off and keeps his devices on maximum,

00:33:26 ◼   ► which I don't understand how he has any retinas.

00:33:28 ◼   ► I leave it on. I don't know why you wouldn't.

00:33:32 ◼   ► I think when I turned it off the first time it was very good yet and I just said

00:33:37 ◼   ► that's just been my default. Like this is something I do.

00:33:40 ◼   ► So you set and do you must be changing your brightness all the time, right?

00:33:43 ◼   ► I mean most of the time I'm using a device that's with lights on.

00:33:48 ◼   ► I don't use my devices in bed or late with no lights on very much.

00:33:51 ◼   ► Yeah, which also surprises me that Federico doesn't like this feature.

00:33:55 ◼   ► Since he works in the dark like 12 hours a day.

00:33:58 ◼   ► So I mean I have used auto brightness and it works fine for me.

00:34:02 ◼   ► I very rarely find myself in a situation where I need to bring it up or down.

00:34:06 ◼   ► I do do it but I know I don't do it as much as I would do it if I had this feature off.

00:34:11 ◼   ► everybody's gonna get the chance to experience this now. Because auto

00:34:15 ◼   ► brightness is now on by default for everybody I believe they're changing the

00:34:21 ◼   ► default. I could tell you my phone's over there though. And that it is now an

00:34:26 ◼   ► accessibility feature. That's the most interesting to me that that's where they

00:34:29 ◼   ► put it that this is not just a statement of we think you should use auto

00:34:32 ◼   ► brightness. They've hidden it. But the statement is auto brightness is the way

00:34:36 ◼   ► forward. Yeah. And I assume this is about battery life or... There is literally some

00:34:42 ◼   ► some warning text that says that if you turn it off it will decrease your

00:34:46 ◼   ► battery life. Wow. Yeah. It's heavy-handed. Yeah. So there you go. I don't know much

00:34:50 ◼   ► maybe someone can help so maybe you know this is so on the like the LCD panels

00:34:55 ◼   ► they use on the on the iPhone and iPad when they move to OLED with this new

00:34:58 ◼   ► phone which is rumored is backlight usage more battery intensive on an OLED

00:35:03 ◼   ► display than an LCD? I don't know. I have no idea. If you know this please let us

00:35:08 ◼   ► know and maybe that's part of the puzzle here of we're moving to something new

00:35:13 ◼   ► and and it's gonna work better or they just think auto brightness has gotten

00:35:17 ◼   ► good enough where they can just do it and you know. That's what I think like I

00:35:20 ◼   ► don't understand why somebody would need to manage their brightness manually like

00:35:24 ◼   ► I never have problems with auto brightness. Yeah. But it is weird to take a

00:35:29 ◼   ► feature like that and stuff it into accessibility settings and then change

00:35:32 ◼   ► the defaults potentially. I mean I've said that but I'm not 100% sure but I

00:35:36 ◼   ► believe that it is changed for people like that they've set it and then they

00:35:39 ◼   ► pushed it away. I don't think that this is a one that they need to go back on

00:35:44 ◼   ► though. I think like this is something that people don't maybe don't like but

00:35:47 ◼   ► you can still fix it if you really need to. If you're the type of user who is

00:35:51 ◼   ► gonna notice auto brightness is on and don't want it you're the same kind of

00:35:55 ◼   ► user who probably knows where accessibility settings are. Yeah and

00:35:59 ◼   ► the fact that they still give you the option if you really must have that option, that's fine.

00:36:04 ◼   ► And I actually can assume that there are some accessibility reasons why they have kept it

00:36:09 ◼   ► around, like that there are there are genuine reasons that somebody might want to have it

00:36:13 ◼   ► rather than just personal preference. So it's good that they've kept it, but it is interesting

00:36:18 ◼   ► that they changed it. But I'm not sure if this really says anything about the next iPhone. Like

00:36:25 ◼   ► if the battery life thing is a thing then yeah but this doesn't screen that to me.

00:36:30 ◼   ► without knowing the information. yeah unless there's something about ola that we just don't

00:36:35 ◼   ► know. yeah exactly. yeah it just may just be hey we're gonna do this and this is the beta that it

00:36:39 ◼   ► made it into. so talking about the new phone or the leaked details of the new phone, there's a

00:36:49 ◼   ► a rendering of a phone going around put together by Steve

00:36:53 ◼   ► Trout Smith of the notch at the top of the screen,

00:36:58 ◼   ► but also being present at the bottom of the screen.

00:37:02 ◼   ► Yeah, so just to clarify that, so Steve Trout Smith,

00:37:05 ◼   ► he has given more information, which

00:37:07 ◼   ► led to a user experience designer

00:37:09 ◼   ► by the name of Maxim Petrov to create the actual images

00:37:13 ◼   ► that 9to5Mac had published in their post.

00:37:15 ◼   ► So I think that Steve created an idea,

00:37:18 ◼   ► And then somebody went ahead and pushed that a little bit

00:37:21 ◼   ► further to show what it could look like in use.

00:37:24 ◼   ► So this brings up the questions that we've been talking about.

00:37:28 ◼   ► Will iOS 11 sort of flow around the notch

00:37:31 ◼   ► and you have stuff on either side of it?

00:37:33 ◼   ► Or are they going to lob it off with dark pixels

00:37:36 ◼   ► to make it look flat at the top?

00:37:38 ◼   ► Or at the bottom, like these renderings at the bottom

00:37:41 ◼   ► is really where I disagree with this idea.

00:37:44 ◼   ► I don't-- I mean, they could do it, right?

00:37:46 ◼   ► Obviously in three weeks this could be moot.

00:37:48 ◼   ► 'Cause one of the images shows a mirror image

00:37:52 ◼   ► that you would create in software a notch at the bottom,

00:37:56 ◼   ► which doesn't actually really exist.

00:37:57 ◼   ► - Yeah, yeah, I don't know.

00:38:00 ◼   ► And if you have an app like Tweetbot

00:38:02 ◼   ► with your controls and tabs across the bottom,

00:38:05 ◼   ► they sort of get pushed up a little bit,

00:38:07 ◼   ► and the outer ones kind of fall around.

00:38:11 ◼   ► It is as awkward as it is at the top,

00:38:13 ◼   ► the status bar can take care of itself

00:38:15 ◼   ► with the new icons they're using.

00:38:17 ◼   ► But at the bottom, so much stuff goes down there.

00:38:20 ◼   ► I just don't know if I buy that not being a completely flat

00:38:25 ◼   ► level starting point at the bottom of the screen.

00:38:28 ◼   ► - Yeah, because I am still of the opinion

00:38:31 ◼   ► that the home button will not be a persistent thing

00:38:34 ◼   ► and that you'll be able to do more interesting things with it

00:38:36 ◼   ► than it just live there.

00:38:38 ◼   ► So, I mean, I understand why you might wanna do this

00:38:41 ◼   ► for visual reasons, but I figure if you wanna do this

00:38:44 ◼   ► then you may as well actually just put a button there.

00:38:46 ◼   ► - A tiny little, tiny little baby button.

00:38:48 ◼   ► - Like a really physical button

00:38:49 ◼   ► and just double up the notch.

00:38:50 ◼   ► I think that it would be weird to have this mirror image

00:38:55 ◼   ► in place sometimes and not other times,

00:38:57 ◼   ► because by making it in place,

00:38:59 ◼   ► it makes it look as part of the industrial design

00:39:01 ◼   ► and therefore the silhouette of the phone,

00:39:03 ◼   ► which isn't actually how the phone's gonna look.

00:39:05 ◼   ► - Right.

00:39:06 ◼   ► I think if this were like a hardware notch,

00:39:08 ◼   ► we would have seen it in those Apple Pay icons

00:39:11 ◼   ► that got dug up in the HomePod firmware.

00:39:13 ◼   ► - I think we're gonna be very confident

00:39:14 ◼   ► like the screen is flat at the bottom. I hope so. Nothing pops up into the bottom at this point.

00:39:19 ◼   ► So let's talk about the notch a little bit. We spoke last week or two weeks ago about the

00:39:23 ◼   ► possibility, and MQHD had a video of a mock-up with a white front glass, and so the notch was

00:39:30 ◼   ► white. Which made me say that I thought that they wouldn't do it because they wanted to like show

00:39:35 ◼   ► off how the OLED screens look, right? Right. So I've had a thought that if they decide to sort

00:39:41 ◼   ► sort of cover up the notch so that if the cover glass is black the notch would

00:39:46 ◼   ► be black glass with the cameras and stuff sunk into it the status bar on

00:39:50 ◼   ► either side of it would be black and so looking at it it would appear if the if

00:39:54 ◼   ► the top of the screen were actually flat as it is now you're kind of blending

00:39:57 ◼   ► software and hardware at the top to hide it yep and if they do that with a black

00:40:03 ◼   ► status bar and white glass I think to your point I agree with you it looks

00:40:07 ◼   ► kind of icky but and talking about and thinking about it some more there's

00:40:13 ◼   ► nothing saying that they couldn't have a white status bar on the white front

00:40:18 ◼   ► phones and the rest of the UI could be the same when you pull it down you know

00:40:23 ◼   ► the very top would stay white but the rest of it I think would work you know

00:40:26 ◼   ► when you go into your notifications or widgets or something I think it would

00:40:29 ◼   ► work and when all that stuff is closed you're just on your home screen or on an

00:40:34 ◼   ► app it blends really seamlessly. I think they could actually look really really

00:40:40 ◼   ► nice because so much of iOS is white now. Like I think maybe it would look as good

00:40:45 ◼   ► or even better than the black front if they decided to blend software and

00:40:48 ◼   ► hardware at the top and use a white status bar instead of a black one. And

00:40:52 ◼   ► there is some precedent for this. I don't know what version of iOS it was but for

00:40:57 ◼   ► years now the startup screen on iOS with the splash screen with the logo has

00:41:04 ◼   ► matched the color of the device if you have a white iPad you get a white screen

00:41:09 ◼   ► if you have a black iPad you get a black screen they're already aware of that and

00:41:13 ◼   ► they can do things with it so why not if you're gonna hide the notch if you're

00:41:16 ◼   ► going to absorb it and with pixels on either side why not go all the way so

00:41:23 ◼   ► basically what you're proposing then is that it could be possible that if you

00:41:28 ◼   ► had a phone with a white face on it that the status bar is all white and then the rest

00:41:35 ◼   ► of the UI remains as it is. So what we currently see as a black status bar at the top of the

00:41:39 ◼   ► phone would be a white status bar and it would include cell reception, clock and battery

00:41:43 ◼   ► per se. So I think that this is an interesting idea as like a way to blend the colors together.

00:41:49 ◼   ► The only question I have though is like how good it will actually look. So what we're

00:41:56 ◼   ► expecting is that one of the reasons Apple is able to potentially do this to

00:42:01 ◼   ► blend everything together is because OLED blacks are basically true blacks

00:42:04 ◼   ► right so it is more likely then if everything's black for to all look like

00:42:09 ◼   ► it blends in together I'm wondering if white replication would be as close or

00:42:16 ◼   ► maybe weird once you get into night shift or something I don't think it

00:42:20 ◼   ► would I don't think the blending would be nearly as good cuz like you said black

00:42:23 ◼   ► on OLED is basically off and it would look very seamless I think. So yeah it

00:42:28 ◼   ► may be some trade-off but I think it would be better than my aesthetic

00:42:34 ◼   ► having those ears up there. I'm inclined to agree with you there right that I feel

00:42:38 ◼   ► that having a really having this white front would look really peculiar when

00:42:45 ◼   ► it's all off and stuff like as I said before like it feels like if you have a

00:42:49 ◼   ► an almost edge-to-edge display, try your best to hide the edges. Yeah. And I think

00:42:55 ◼   ► that white doesn't do that but we'll see. I mean you know if people really like

00:42:59 ◼   ► white phones, I mean and this might be like one of these things where it's like

00:43:03 ◼   ► a data point that Apple can't ignore that maybe they sell more white iPhones

00:43:06 ◼   ► than black iPhones and if that's the case can you really go and not make a

00:43:11 ◼   ► white iPhone? I mean forever they've used white front glass on the majority of

00:43:15 ◼   ► of their color options.

00:43:17 ◼   ► - You can buy what, five colors now

00:43:19 ◼   ► and three of them have a white face?

00:43:21 ◼   ► - Yeah, red, silver and gold are all white

00:43:24 ◼   ► and then black and jet black.

00:43:24 ◼   ► - Oh no, it's actually more than that, isn't it?

00:43:26 ◼   ► It's red, silver, rose gold and gold, it's four.

00:43:30 ◼   ► And then there's two black.

00:43:31 ◼   ► - Yeah, black and jet black.

00:43:33 ◼   ► - So this has been, maybe since they first introduced gold,

00:43:38 ◼   ► there have been more white-faced iPhones

00:43:40 ◼   ► available for purchase,

00:43:41 ◼   ► which therefore might skew the numbers.

00:43:43 ◼   ► So like if you're looking at the numbers,

00:43:45 ◼   ► we sell white to black iPhones three to one.

00:43:48 ◼   ► - Then they've got to account for that.

00:43:50 ◼   ► - You've at least got to take a go with it, right,

00:43:51 ◼   ► and see if people actually like it or not.

00:43:53 ◼   ► That could be, I mean, that's one of those things

00:43:55 ◼   ► of like, how do you ignore that?

00:43:57 ◼   ► And I feel like Apple, just how I believe they work

00:44:02 ◼   ► these days is maybe they work a little bit more

00:44:04 ◼   ► data-driven in that way.

00:44:05 ◼   ► - Yeah.

00:44:06 ◼   ► - And not just so much based purely on design.

00:44:08 ◼   ► - I think so.

00:44:09 ◼   ► - So that might be something, a reason for it.

00:44:12 ◼   ► 'Cause I really think that it's just not gonna look

00:44:14 ◼   ► good as the black ones. Yeah but either way I want them out of all these ideas I

00:44:18 ◼   ► would like them to work to hide the notch into the screen. I don't want I

00:44:22 ◼   ► think a flat top screen is more pleasing to me personally. Yeah yeah

00:44:28 ◼   ► we'll see how that goes. I am though I think in the embrace the notch team. I

00:44:36 ◼   ► kind of want I when we look at these whenever you look at these these mockups

00:44:43 ◼   ► You kind of see two things right now one of them just shows like the UI flat across the screen and then the other shows

00:44:50 ◼   ► The UI going up into the corners little Batman ears little Batman ears

00:44:53 ◼   ► I want it to go all the way up into the corners because to me it's like I have that screen don't waste it

00:44:57 ◼   ► like and this is how I feel about the the

00:45:00 ◼   ► If they just have like this

00:45:02 ◼   ► Home button on the screen with blank space on the left to the right of it

00:45:06 ◼   ► I feel like it's a waste of this big screen

00:45:08 ◼   ► Like don't give me a big screen and then waste it like find a way to use it

00:45:12 ◼   ► If you don't know what that way is keep working harder until you find out what it is

00:45:16 ◼   ► Like just giving me a phone that has this fantastic screen, but with a ton of unusable space

00:45:21 ◼   ► It's like well, why are we even doing this?

00:45:23 ◼   ► I think that depends on how deep that notch goes if it's just the status bar

00:45:27 ◼   ► Then it kind of comes out in the wash I think

00:45:30 ◼   ► But yeah, if it's further if it pushes into the content area somehow, right?

00:45:34 ◼   ► But if they cut off the UI, then why even do it?

00:45:38 ◼   ► Well, if all that would be lost is the status bar,

00:45:41 ◼   ► and you put the status bar on either side of the notch,

00:45:42 ◼   ► you haven't lost anything.

00:45:43 ◼   ► No.

00:45:43 ◼   ► But I mean, there are different mock-ups.

00:45:45 ◼   ► Some of the mock-ups just have it go flat straight

00:45:46 ◼   ► across the top, like completely unused,

00:45:48 ◼   ► and the UI remains the same.

00:45:50 ◼   ► So we'll see.

00:45:51 ◼   ► I mean, I am enjoying this.

00:45:53 ◼   ► I know we are spending more time on iPhone rumors

00:45:58 ◼   ► than we ever have in the past.

00:46:00 ◼   ► Usually you don't get Apple leaking firmware that details

00:46:02 ◼   ► it.

00:46:03 ◼   ► But like also this iPhone has a level of excitement around it that I don't think we've had for a few years.

00:46:08 ◼   ► Yeah.

00:46:08 ◼   ► Right, where like the physical design of the iPhone can inform some new decisions about the way the software is designed.

00:46:16 ◼   ► That hasn't happened since the Plus.

00:46:18 ◼   ► And that was a long time ago.

00:46:21 ◼   ► And like the last three iPhones that we've had, or maybe two iPhones,

00:46:25 ◼   ► they've looked exactly the same as the one that came before it.

00:46:29 ◼   ► that there wasn't really much of an interest in discussion to be had around the hardware

00:46:32 ◼   ► of the device, but we get to have that discussion now.

00:46:36 ◼   ► And that's kind of why I'm excited to continue talking about this.

00:46:41 ◼   ► But we're probably like two weeks away from the event announcement, maybe three weeks

00:46:45 ◼   ► away from the event at this point.

00:46:47 ◼   ► Like we're mid to late August now.

00:46:51 ◼   ► I can't imagine that we'll get to a month from now without seeing what this phone looks

00:46:56 ◼   ► like in the flesh.

00:46:57 ◼   ► Yeah, I mean even the events the week of the 11th and 12th, you know, somewhere in there,

00:47:03 ◼   ► we're three or four weeks away.

00:47:04 ◼   ► And so it's all coming quick.

00:47:07 ◼   ► I actually kind of realized that just yesterday, I was like, I want to win the, I was kind

00:47:11 ◼   ► of thinking ahead of through September, I was like, oh yeah, the funny events right

00:47:14 ◼   ► around the corner.

00:47:15 ◼   ► Sneaks up every year.

00:47:16 ◼   ► Yes, most certainly does.

00:47:17 ◼   ► All right, should we take a final break?

00:47:19 ◼   ► Let's do it.

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00:50:13 ◼   ► All right, what else do we have on the docket today,

00:50:14 ◼   ► Mr. Stephen Hackett?

00:50:15 ◼   ► - So many things.

00:50:17 ◼   ► So let's talk about the Canary.

00:50:21 ◼   ► - Okay.

00:50:21 ◼   ► - So this is a home security device.

00:50:23 ◼   ► You and I both have one.

00:50:25 ◼   ► It's got a camera, it's got a microphone,

00:50:27 ◼   ► it can send you notifications.

00:50:29 ◼   ► It has an alarm built into it, which we both like, so--

00:50:32 ◼   ► - And tested.

00:50:32 ◼   ► - Yeah, we tested it in the studio

00:50:34 ◼   ► 'cause you never heard it. - Nope.

00:50:35 ◼   ► - And so we opened the door to the studio

00:50:36 ◼   ► and backed way far away and turned it on.

00:50:39 ◼   ► - It's incredibly loud. - Very loud.

00:50:41 ◼   ► - It's good to know, it's good to know.

00:50:42 ◼   ► Yeah, so if you're at home or if you're away

00:50:47 ◼   ► and a Federico Vittucci breaks into your house,

00:50:48 ◼   ► you can blast him with the alarm.

00:50:50 ◼   ► He'll know what's up.

00:50:51 ◼   ► So they had a blog post up earlier this week

00:50:54 ◼   ► introducing kind of three new features

00:50:56 ◼   ► we wanted to talk about.

00:50:57 ◼   ► Canary Talk, desktop streaming,

00:50:59 ◼   ► and a new sort of reduced latency

00:51:03 ◼   ► to deliver real-time video.

00:51:05 ◼   ► It's all good stuff.

00:51:08 ◼   ► The latency, I think, is the one I'm most excited about

00:51:10 ◼   ► because their notifications have been noticeably slower

00:51:13 ◼   ► than what the Nest Cam can do.

00:51:15 ◼   ► And they seem to have really caught up.

00:51:17 ◼   ► It seems nearly instantaneous that if I walk

00:51:20 ◼   ► in front of the camera without disarming it,

00:51:22 ◼   ► I get to push notification on my devices, which is great.

00:51:25 ◼   ► The desktop streaming, again, desktop streaming.

00:51:28 ◼   ► Desktop screaming, Myke.

00:51:29 ◼   ► - Oh no. - Desktop screaming.

00:51:31 ◼   ► (yells)

00:51:32 ◼   ► That's a different thing.

00:51:35 ◼   ► Desktop streaming lets you view the camera on the web.

00:51:40 ◼   ► So before you were stuck with their iOS device.

00:51:42 ◼   ► Again, this catches them up with Nest,

00:51:44 ◼   ► which again is what I'm most familiar with.

00:51:47 ◼   ► But you can log in and do that.

00:51:48 ◼   ► That is only accessible if you are part of their membership,

00:51:53 ◼   ► their subscription, which--

00:51:54 ◼   ► - I think that's fine.

00:51:55 ◼   ► - Yeah, I think it's fine too.

00:51:56 ◼   ► It incentivizes that.

00:51:57 ◼   ► And then there's Canary Talk,

00:52:00 ◼   ► which I think you wanted to talk through.

00:52:02 ◼   ► - Yeah, so I was excited to see this

00:52:04 ◼   ► because it enables you to talk through the camera, right?

00:52:08 ◼   ► so you would be able to talk to somebody at home,

00:52:11 ◼   ► which you can do for intruders, which is good,

00:52:13 ◼   ► but also family members, pets, that kind of stuff.

00:52:17 ◼   ► And I think you and Rem were talking about this

00:52:18 ◼   ► on query recently, and she upset her dogs

00:52:21 ◼   ► quite significantly.

00:52:22 ◼   ► - Yeah, she talked to them and they freaked out.

00:52:24 ◼   ► - Yeah, so don't necessarily think that that's gonna work

00:52:27 ◼   ► for your animal, maybe you wanna try that out

00:52:29 ◼   ► a little bit beforehand.

00:52:30 ◼   ► But I'm really pleased that this is a feature

00:52:34 ◼   ► that now exists because it's kind of,

00:52:37 ◼   ► All of these things for me are further validating my purchase, which is nice.

00:52:40 ◼   ► It's nice when you make a purchase and then later on the company adds more and more features

00:52:46 ◼   ► to the product and/or service, which just further gives you an extra value for money.

00:52:51 ◼   ► And that's what I feel like I've gotten here.

00:52:53 ◼   ► And just before the show today, Adina was at home whilst I'm here and I was talking

00:52:59 ◼   ► through the canary at her and she was confirming that it was coming through and with the messages

00:53:03 ◼   ► that she was sending me, it seemed like it was pretty real time.

00:53:06 ◼   ► So I can hear her through the microphone that it has and she can hear me through the speaker

00:53:12 ◼   ► now.

00:53:13 ◼   ► And I think that is so cool to have this new feature added to hardware that I haven't had

00:53:18 ◼   ► to change in any way.

00:53:19 ◼   ► There wasn't even a firmware update that I'm aware of, like there was nothing I had to

00:53:22 ◼   ► perform.

00:53:23 ◼   ► I updated the app in Memphis and could talk through my Canary in London.

00:53:27 ◼   ► It was really, really impressive.

00:53:29 ◼   ► And I'm super, super excited and super pumped about this because I love this product.

00:53:34 ◼   ► And you know, if you've been listening to me over the last few weeks, I kind of been

00:53:37 ◼   ► umming and ahhing about the nest because of some of the features that it has.

00:53:41 ◼   ► But now I feel like it's basically on par again.

00:53:44 ◼   ► Like, so I'm thrilled.

00:53:46 ◼   ► I'm really, really excited about this.

00:53:48 ◼   ► Yeah.

00:53:49 ◼   ► And I think that that idea that these products should improve over time, like we were talking

00:53:53 ◼   ► about it, it makes a lot of sense with something like a home security device that you're going

00:53:57 ◼   ► to have for years and years.

00:53:58 ◼   ► But clearly the hardware was capable of this when they designed it and they've been working

00:54:02 ◼   ► towards it in software.

00:54:03 ◼   ► And that's exciting too that companies have forethought and that sort of thing.

00:54:06 ◼   ► Yeah, I guess the speaker for the siren, right, like the alarm is what has enabled them to

00:54:11 ◼   ► do it.

00:54:12 ◼   ► Maybe.

00:54:13 ◼   ► It's really impressive.

00:54:14 ◼   ► I'm very pleased about it.

00:54:15 ◼   ► So, yeah, good.

00:54:16 ◼   ► Yeah, so I think a lot of these features have been enabled by the fact that there is a membership

00:54:20 ◼   ► scheme, right?

00:54:21 ◼   ► So there are people paying Canary every month, which brings us on to…

00:54:26 ◼   ► Our next topic.

00:54:27 ◼   ► Ulysses.

00:54:28 ◼   ► Ulysses.

00:54:29 ◼   ► Ulysses has switched to a subscription model.

00:54:31 ◼   ► Can you tell me about this?

00:54:32 ◼   ► Sure, so Ulysses is a writing app for Mac and iOS.

00:54:37 ◼   ► It was pretty pricey before.

00:54:38 ◼   ► I think the Mac app was like 40 bucks.

00:54:40 ◼   ► The iOS app was maybe 10 or 15 or 20 bucks.

00:54:43 ◼   ► It's high in stuff if you do a lot of writing.

00:54:46 ◼   ► I know a lot of people write in Ulysses exclusively,

00:54:51 ◼   ► including, or at the very least a lot,

00:54:54 ◼   ► including our friend Federico.

00:54:55 ◼   ► - Yep, he does.

00:54:57 ◼   ► - His review has been written of iOS 11 in Ulysses.

00:55:01 ◼   ► What they announced is that the apps are now free,

00:55:04 ◼   ► they have come with a 14 day free trial,

00:55:07 ◼   ► and at the end of those 14 days you can subscribe.

00:55:10 ◼   ► A single subscription gets you both the Mac and iOS versions,

00:55:14 ◼   ► which is really nice that you can just pay once and have

00:55:17 ◼   ► access to it on all of your devices.

00:55:20 ◼   ► If you're a student, they have student pricing for like $12

00:55:23 ◼   ► every six months.

00:55:24 ◼   ► It's kind of a funny way of saying that.

00:55:26 ◼   ► But reduced for students, which I think is nice.

00:55:29 ◼   ► And if you're an existing customer,

00:55:31 ◼   ► you get 18 months worth of usage for free,

00:55:34 ◼   ► and then you get a lifetime discount on your subscription.

00:55:37 ◼   ► It's five bucks a month or 40 bucks a year.

00:55:40 ◼   ► - I don't think that every customer

00:55:41 ◼   ► gets an 18 month free period.

00:55:43 ◼   ► - I don't know.

00:55:45 ◼   ► They have like three blog posts about this.

00:55:47 ◼   ► Their marketing is a little confusing.

00:55:48 ◼   ► But at some point if you bought it

00:55:50 ◼   ► in the most recent period of time.

00:55:51 ◼   ► - Yeah, there is like a, I think there is a bracket

00:55:56 ◼   ► in which you had to abort the application

00:55:58 ◼   ► benefit from the free period. Like I don't, I think that it's not for all existing customers, like

00:56:04 ◼   ► there is an existing customer period of time. Do you know what, I can actually tell you this maybe

00:56:10 ◼   ► by the fact that I have downloaded the app. I agree with you that it has been pretty confusing,

00:56:14 ◼   ► but these things tend to be, right? Like I don't think I've ever seen one of these things go

00:56:18 ◼   ► completely seamlessly. Yeah, like day one did this a couple months ago and it was confusing. I mean,

00:56:22 ◼   ► it's a hard thing to do to change business model like midway through, but their blog posts,

00:56:28 ◼   ► or one of the blog posts, talks a lot about the reasons they're doing this. And it's a lot of stuff

00:56:34 ◼   ► you'd expect to hear that ongoing development costs money. And to do that, there are big cons

00:56:42 ◼   ► to just having paid upgrades, or just having one app you build on forever, and just hope new people

00:56:47 ◼   ► show up. And so they said that they're okay at this point, but they're looking towards the future.

00:56:52 ◼   ► and that this is why they're doing this.

00:56:54 ◼   ► I don't, I do pay for several subscriptions at this point.

00:56:59 ◼   ► Ulysses is not an app I used before.

00:57:03 ◼   ► - Yep.

00:57:03 ◼   ► - So I'm not really affected by this,

00:57:06 ◼   ► but if you look on Twitter, there's always people saying,

00:57:09 ◼   ► well, I wouldn't look at an app that had a subscription,

00:57:12 ◼   ► but I think ultimately, if you want these things

00:57:15 ◼   ► to stick around, the ones that you use,

00:57:17 ◼   ► you're gonna end up paying for.

00:57:19 ◼   ► So I don't like the way that they're expressing this,

00:57:22 ◼   ► but I can see how you got confused.

00:57:25 ◼   ► You can get a free use period of up to 18 months, right?

00:57:29 ◼   ► Depending on what you bought.

00:57:31 ◼   ► So if you bought, as they call,

00:57:34 ◼   ► recent purchases of the Mac app

00:57:36 ◼   ► will unlock 12 months of free use.

00:57:38 ◼   ► Recent purchases of the iOS app

00:57:40 ◼   ► unlock six months of free use.

00:57:42 ◼   ► So you can get up to 18 months.

00:57:44 ◼   ► But from everything that I've found,

00:57:45 ◼   ► it doesn't seem very clear,

00:57:47 ◼   ► like in the blog post, like let's say in the last couple

00:57:50 ◼   ► of months or so you bought the application.

00:57:53 ◼   ► So what it does when you start doing your Ulysses

00:57:55 ◼   ► is checking something and I assume it's checking

00:57:57 ◼   ► those receipts, you know, you get like the little

00:57:59 ◼   ► purchase receipts that apps can check.

00:58:01 ◼   ► I think it's checking those 'cause then it tells you

00:58:03 ◼   ► kind of what you qualify for and I have to pay full price

00:58:06 ◼   ► probably 'cause I bought it like eight months ago,

00:58:07 ◼   ► eight, nine months ago, something like that.

00:58:10 ◼   ► Only on iOS, I don't have Ulysses on the Mac.

00:58:13 ◼   ► So, you know, this is one of the things that's like,

00:58:16 ◼   ► and I think it's good to criticize when it's unclear.

00:58:21 ◼   ► So if I am a customer, which I am, coming to this,

00:58:24 ◼   ► I'm not 100% sure what I'm supposed to be getting, right?

00:58:28 ◼   ► It's like I don't think that their marketing

00:58:31 ◼   ► is super clear about this,

00:58:32 ◼   ► probably because it is an incredibly difficult thing

00:58:36 ◼   ► to convey.

00:58:37 ◼   ► Now, people are upset about this, as you can understand,

00:58:42 ◼   ► because Ulysses was an expensive app to begin with.

00:58:45 ◼   ► - Yes.

00:58:46 ◼   ► So I think I paid like $20 or however much it was,

00:58:51 ◼   ► something like that, to get the application.

00:58:53 ◼   ► And that's a higher priced application than most, right?

00:58:59 ◼   ► - Yeah.

00:59:00 ◼   ► - And, but at least my expectation was

00:59:02 ◼   ► if I was paying that amount of money,

00:59:04 ◼   ► then I was probably good for a while.

00:59:06 ◼   ► - Right.

00:59:07 ◼   ► - Right, and I think that might be a thing in people's minds

00:59:08 ◼   ► is like, if this isn't a $3 app,

00:59:10 ◼   ► like this might be all I'm ever gonna pay it.

00:59:13 ◼   ► So I think that's why like,

00:59:14 ◼   ► there seems to have been quite a bit of backlash,

00:59:16 ◼   ► especially in the user reviews about this.

00:59:18 ◼   ► But this is the type of application

00:59:22 ◼   ► that definitely should be a subscription application,

00:59:24 ◼   ► I think.

00:59:26 ◼   ► - Because it's something, if you use this,

00:59:27 ◼   ► you rely on it day in and day out.

00:59:29 ◼   ► - And it's super professional, and it's super niche,

00:59:32 ◼   ► and it has a bunch of incredibly powerful features

00:59:35 ◼   ► that most people don't need.

00:59:37 ◼   ► Like, it really is an application

00:59:39 ◼   ► for people that write professionally.

00:59:41 ◼   ► That's who should own Ulysses.

00:59:44 ◼   ► And my belief is that if you make an application like that,

00:59:47 ◼   ► then you should have a subscription

00:59:48 ◼   ► because it makes sense.

00:59:50 ◼   ► And it enables you to continue

00:59:51 ◼   ► to push the application forward.

00:59:53 ◼   ► What makes it trickier is when the app

00:59:54 ◼   ► was already a higher price than most applications.

00:59:58 ◼   ► Now again, was Ulysses worth however much I paid for it?

01:00:01 ◼   ► Of course it was, it's a great application.

01:00:03 ◼   ► I've only used it a few times,

01:00:05 ◼   ► but whenever I use it, it's great.

01:00:06 ◼   ► Like I use it for specific tasks,

01:00:08 ◼   ► like when I've had scripts for YouTube videos,

01:00:10 ◼   ► or when I've written long blog posts and stuff like that,

01:00:12 ◼   ► like I use that, but it becomes tricky for people when they feel like that they've paid

01:00:22 ◼   ► quite a lot of money and then the rug gets poured from under them.

01:00:27 ◼   ► Like I understand why people feel that way, right?

01:00:30 ◼   ► Yeah, and I think that's going to be the case whenever you do this as a developer, that

01:00:36 ◼   ► going into it you just need to know that there's going to be this sort of response and regardless

01:00:42 ◼   ► of the time that you do it regardless of if you just had an update or it's been years

01:00:47 ◼   ► since you've had an update or if you were expensive or you were cheap, people are going

01:00:50 ◼   ► to respond negatively to this at first.

01:00:53 ◼   ► And I think if you're a developer and once you kind of swallow that pill it makes it

01:00:56 ◼   ► easier to move forward.

01:00:57 ◼   ► And I think as long as you're clear about your reasons and users see that as they start

01:01:03 ◼   ► paying for it features are rolling out and their money is going towards something, then

01:01:07 ◼   ► I think people, your users that really care about your app,

01:01:12 ◼   ► they'll settle down.

01:01:13 ◼   ► - Yeah, and look, this is the thing, right?

01:01:15 ◼   ► Like, I believe that this is something that they should do,

01:01:19 ◼   ► because if this is what their business requires to continue,

01:01:23 ◼   ► then yeah, do it, right?

01:01:25 ◼   ► Like, I feel like this is something that they should do,

01:01:28 ◼   ► and then people can make their decisions, right?

01:01:30 ◼   ► Like, I haven't purchased this yet

01:01:32 ◼   ► because I don't use Ulysses that often,

01:01:35 ◼   ► but when I come to a next reason

01:01:38 ◼   ► for me to use this application,

01:01:40 ◼   ► then maybe I'll think about it then.

01:01:41 ◼   ► Or I'll just keep the app that I currently have.

01:01:43 ◼   ► - Sure. - Right, like it still works.

01:01:44 ◼   ► I don't know how long it's gonna work for,

01:01:46 ◼   ► but it still works, right?

01:01:47 ◼   ► 'Cause this is something I did like about this,

01:01:49 ◼   ► is set up a new app, right?

01:01:50 ◼   ► So like people that have the app can keep the app.

01:01:52 ◼   ► - Yeah. - And it will work

01:01:54 ◼   ► for as long as it works.

01:01:55 ◼   ► But when it comes to the time

01:01:57 ◼   ► where I'm going to be writing something again,

01:01:59 ◼   ► I'll make the decision as to whether I want to

01:02:02 ◼   ► buy this application.

01:02:03 ◼   ► Like I don't necessarily feel that people should just pay

01:02:08 ◼   ► for things because they're available.

01:02:11 ◼   ► - Sure.

01:02:12 ◼   ► - Like don't pay just to support,

01:02:14 ◼   ► pay to support and get something.

01:02:16 ◼   ► - Yeah.

01:02:17 ◼   ► - And if what you're getting is the application

01:02:19 ◼   ► or relay of bonus content,

01:02:21 ◼   ► then you're getting something in return, right?

01:02:23 ◼   ► - Right.

01:02:24 ◼   ► - Like that's why, I mean, so for us,

01:02:25 ◼   ► when it came to doing our membership,

01:02:28 ◼   ► providing things and then as we have done over time,

01:02:31 ◼   ► continuing to provide more makes sense.

01:02:35 ◼   ► I think that there should be some kind of exchange.

01:02:38 ◼   ► If you're giving somebody money

01:02:39 ◼   ► and when you're used to getting something free

01:02:41 ◼   ► or used to getting something for an existing relationship,

01:02:44 ◼   ► if you're changing that relationship,

01:02:45 ◼   ► you should get something back.

01:02:46 ◼   ► So when I come to make the decision

01:02:48 ◼   ► as to whether I want to buy this application

01:02:51 ◼   ► to get the subscription,

01:02:52 ◼   ► then I'll just make the decision of whether I want to do it.

01:02:54 ◼   ► And I saw Federico and a bunch of people being like,

01:02:57 ◼   ► "This is a no-brainer for me.

01:02:58 ◼   ► "Of course I'm gonna sign up."

01:03:00 ◼   ► Well, yeah, you use the app every day.

01:03:01 ◼   ► it makes perfect sense for you to do that, right?

01:03:03 ◼   ► Like if you use it every single day,

01:03:05 ◼   ► 100% you should be paying.

01:03:07 ◼   ► If you use it very frequently, yeah, you probably should.

01:03:10 ◼   ► If you barely ever use it, then think about that

01:03:12 ◼   ► before you sign up for a monthly subscription.

01:03:14 ◼   ► This is like the purchasing decisions that people,

01:03:17 ◼   ► we knew that people would have to start making

01:03:19 ◼   ► when we first heard about this.

01:03:21 ◼   ► Like the idea of just grabbing an app for fun

01:03:24 ◼   ► and seeing if it works for you

01:03:26 ◼   ► comes to an end of stuff like this.

01:03:27 ◼   ► But they do have stuff like a free trial,

01:03:29 ◼   ► which I think is great, so you can go in and try it out.

01:03:31 ◼   ► there's more opportunity to play with this app now than before because the

01:03:36 ◼   ► the price was a bar for casual checking out. And I bet this is one of the

01:03:41 ◼   ► reasons that they did that like that they believe their application is worth

01:03:44 ◼   ► good money which it is it's fantastic so that but they knew that people were

01:03:49 ◼   ► never trying it they were never getting the experience because the application

01:03:54 ◼   ► was I'm just saying $20 I've tried looking and it's really difficult to

01:03:58 ◼   ► find this information out now because if you Google Ulysses Price all you get is the new

01:04:02 ◼   ► information. But so like if you wanted to give it a go, there was a high barrier of

01:04:09 ◼   ► entry compared to what you're used to paying on the App Store, right? I mean all of this

01:04:13 ◼   ► is relative, okay I have to say that, like all of this is relative to the environment

01:04:16 ◼   ► that the applications run in and blah blah blah blah blah. So yeah it probably is a good

01:04:20 ◼   ► thing for them now because more customers can try it out because there is a 14 day free

01:04:25 ◼   ► trial and that's I bet that that's going to be a really good thing for them they

01:04:28 ◼   ► just need to get through this right now and I don't think any developer you put

01:04:32 ◼   ► this great like I don't think any developer can do this in 2017 and not

01:04:36 ◼   ► expect this reaction business model changes upset people because people

01:04:40 ◼   ► don't like change and they don't want to see like this application is now gonna

01:04:45 ◼   ► cost me more money than ever like I feel like I'm being ripped off like that's

01:04:48 ◼   ► how people feel that's how people react to this stuff so I feel like anybody

01:04:51 ◼   ► that does this has to expect it, right?

01:04:56 ◼   ► - Yeah, and I think if an app you use

01:05:01 ◼   ► goes through one of these transitions,

01:05:04 ◼   ► it's an opportunity to think if it's really critical or not.

01:05:08 ◼   ► And a lot of developers, or at least the reputable ones,

01:05:11 ◼   ► are doing what Ulysses did and what day one did

01:05:15 ◼   ► of hey, the version that you have now will still work

01:05:18 ◼   ► for the foreseeable future,

01:05:20 ◼   ► but if you want to move forward with us,

01:05:22 ◼   ► you need to get on this other train.

01:05:23 ◼   ► And that gives people ample opportunity

01:05:25 ◼   ► to really evaluate if it's worth it for them.

01:05:29 ◼   ► And if it's not, that's fine,

01:05:30 ◼   ► and if it is, that's fine too.

01:05:31 ◼   ► And I would imagine, without having done any math,

01:05:34 ◼   ► that if even a subset of their users do this,

01:05:39 ◼   ► and they leave a bunch behind,

01:05:40 ◼   ► then they'll still be okay financially.

01:05:42 ◼   ► And that's what this is all about,

01:05:43 ◼   ► making an app sustainable over the long term.

01:05:45 ◼   ► - Yeah, there is a problem in regards to reviews

01:05:48 ◼   ► with the way that the free trial stuff works now is like,

01:05:51 ◼   ► say a developer had a $5 app

01:05:54 ◼   ► and then version two was another $5, right?

01:05:56 ◼   ► People couldn't leave one star reviews on the new app

01:06:00 ◼   ► unless they bought it, but now you could download the app,

01:06:04 ◼   ► get the free trial and leave a one star review

01:06:05 ◼   ► on the new app, right?

01:06:07 ◼   ► That can be a problem for people.

01:06:08 ◼   ► 'Cause I mean, their reviews are in a dumpster right now.

01:06:13 ◼   ► Like it's not good, right?

01:06:14 ◼   ► Because people were protesting, people are upset, right?

01:06:16 ◼   ► people want to say like we don't think you should be doing this you're ripping

01:06:20 ◼   ► us off that kind of thing so that that is a problem now with the fact that you

01:06:24 ◼   ► can grab these these applications for free for 14 days that you can go ahead

01:06:28 ◼   ► and leave a review I mean that could be something for Apple to think about like

01:06:31 ◼   ► should you be able to leave a review during the trial period yeah that would

01:06:35 ◼   ► be really interesting to see if that's something they address because more

01:06:40 ◼   ► developers are moving to this and Apple's been so responsive because the

01:06:44 ◼   ► trial period is a real thing that exists. This isn't just something people are messing

01:06:47 ◼   ► around with anymore. The 14 day free trial thing can lock you out. That's it. That's

01:06:53 ◼   ► why this low tier of use exists. That's why this 14 day thing exists so you can do this.

01:07:01 ◼   ► So it would be nice if Apple maybe were like, "Hey, you just can't leave reviews during

01:07:04 ◼   ► this period of time." That would be kind of cool.

01:07:07 ◼   ► Sure, if you develop one of these apps, that's exactly what you want.

01:07:10 ◼   ► There probably is. So it's something to think about. I mean, but this is just, these are

01:07:14 ◼   ► the things that come out as the business models continue to move. And as we stand here in

01:07:20 ◼   ► August 2017, I still see way less of my applications on a subscription model than I expected. I

01:07:26 ◼   ► really thought it was going to be more than this. And I think a lot of developers are

01:07:30 ◼   ► hesitant because of reactions, like what Ulysses are getting.

01:07:33 ◼   ► Yeah, I think so.

01:07:35 ◼   ► All right. I think that rounds out this week's episode. If you want to find our show notes

01:07:39 ◼   ► this week go to relay.fm/connected/155 I recommend that you do go there because the

01:07:44 ◼   ► website is new and fancy and beautiful and you can go and take a look at it and peruse

01:07:48 ◼   ► over the cornucopia of attractive pixels.

01:07:53 ◼   ► I really was curious how you were going to end that sentence.

01:07:56 ◼   ► Yeah I'm still not sure if I know how it's going to end. Thanks to Blue Apron Squarespace

01:08:01 ◼   ► and Bombfell for supporting this week's show. Thanks to Mr. Steven Hackett for allowing

01:08:05 ◼   ► me to join him in his studio to record today and for giving me equipment and a glass of

01:08:11 ◼   ► water.

01:08:12 ◼   ► You don't want to do it outside in the rain. Inside is better.

01:08:14 ◼   ► Memphis weather is like, you've lied to me. The weather's so bad. It's been pouring for

01:08:20 ◼   ► three days.

01:08:21 ◼   ► Well, don't come in August.

01:08:22 ◼   ► And it's raining warm and humid.

01:08:23 ◼   ► Come in April and May, it's nice.

01:08:25 ◼   ► This is unacceptable. This is unacceptable. Steven's online at five12pixels.net and he

01:08:31 ◼   ► is @ismh on Twitter. I am @imike, our wandering co-host, Mr Federico Vatici is at maxstories.net

01:08:40 ◼   ► and he is @Vatici on Twitter, V-I-T-I-C-C-I. I think we're all back together next week.

01:08:45 ◼   ► I think so. But then I'm gone for a week the week after that.

01:08:48 ◼   ► Yes. Summertime everybody. How does it work? It doesn't. Thanks so much for listening.

01:08:53 ◼   ► We'll be back next time. Until then, please sign up for our membership. We love you if

01:08:56 ◼   ► you already have related.fm/membership. Give us money and you get cool stuff. Goodbye.