Connected

00:00:00 ◼   ► [Music]

00:00:06 ◼   ► From Reel AFM, this is Connected, episode 132.

00:00:10 ◼   ► Today's show is brought to you by Casper, Squarespace, and Away.

00:00:15 ◼   ► My name is Myke Hurley, and I am joined by Mr Federico Vittici.

00:00:18 ◼   ► Hi Federico.

00:00:19 ◼   ► Ciao Myke.

00:00:20 ◼   ► And Mr Stephen Hackett. How are you Stephen Hackett?

00:00:24 ◼   ► I'm good, Michael Hurley.

00:00:25 ◼   ► So me and Federico have pulled ourselves away from Zelda to be here today,

00:00:28 ◼   ► So I think everybody should just consider how lucky they are to have us.

00:00:32 ◼   ► Yeah, you're very fortunate to have me and Myke in the podcast instead of, you know,

00:00:37 ◼   ► lost in the lands of Hyrule.

00:00:38 ◼   ► It's so good, right?

00:00:41 ◼   ► I will say, since the two of you unboxed your switches, our iMessage thread has been noticeably

00:00:47 ◼   ► quieter.

00:00:48 ◼   ► I'm just sitting stuff to you.

00:00:49 ◼   ► I'm just like, "Leave me alone!"

00:00:51 ◼   ► Yeah, it just goes into the abyss.

00:00:53 ◼   ► You haven't seen the other iMessage thread that Myke and I share with Jon Voorhees.

00:00:58 ◼   ► been talking about you know the Nintendo Switch. It's just you know how to how to

00:01:02 ◼   ► make runs at the castle you know like all the equipment that we need it's a

00:01:06 ◼   ► very different kind of thread going on over there. Yeah. But me and Federico will

00:01:10 ◼   ► be doing our review on remaster later on this week so go subscribe to remaster

00:01:16 ◼   ► and then me Federico and Che and we're gonna talk about the Nintendo Switch. If you

00:01:19 ◼   ► are interested in finding out more that's a good place for that. That's what

00:01:22 ◼   ► they call follow out kids. It's good it's pre follow out it doesn't exist yet.

00:01:27 ◼   ► brief follow out okay all right yeah okay I'm looking forward to hearing it I

00:01:33 ◼   ► am very much on the fence about purchasing one really only for Mario

00:01:39 ◼   ► Kart once it ships in what April so I may end up with one to play Mario Kart

00:01:43 ◼   ► with my kids because we have a Wii in the house I don't know if you guys know

00:01:46 ◼   ► that someone gave us a Wii like just randomly it showed up at our house and

00:01:50 ◼   ► we've been playing stuff with kids they really like Lego Batman so we've been

00:01:53 ◼   ► playing that. Those games are so good. They are good. Our two-year-old

00:01:57 ◼   ► there really wants to play with the other kids and so what we have done and

00:02:01 ◼   ► one day he will hear this maybe and be upset with me is we have given him a Wii

00:02:05 ◼   ► controller that's not actually hooked up to anything so he thinks he's playing

00:02:08 ◼   ► with the other kids but he's really not. That is a parenting masterstroke right there. That is freaking genius.

00:02:16 ◼   ► So one time about 10 to 12 years ago when I was a teenager, me and my

00:02:25 ◼   ► friends at the glamping area, we used to get together at my house and play

00:02:31 ◼   ► with either the PlayStation 2 or the GameCube, I don't remember. So you know we

00:02:37 ◼   ► were teenagers, we were you know just not a lot of preoccupations let's say. So one

00:02:44 ◼   ► afternoon we were playing with Pro Evolution Soccer, you know, the soccer game. So I think

00:02:50 ◼   ► it was PlayStation 2 definitely. So there was this guy that we didn't like and he was

00:02:55 ◼   ► a very peculiar character. So we fooled him into thinking that he was playing one of the

00:03:01 ◼   ► teams but actually the controller was not hooked up to anything.

00:03:06 ◼   ► So it was the computer?

00:03:08 ◼   ► No, it was another guy actually in the back with another controller. So we told him "look

00:03:13 ◼   ► Team A for example and he was really upset for five minutes because he

00:03:17 ◼   ► couldn't win and was like the players are not moving like I want them to move

00:03:21 ◼   ► so I was crying in just laughing it was amazing but yeah doing that for children

00:03:27 ◼   ► Steven is a whole another level of cruelty. It comes from a different place

00:03:32 ◼   ► I'm not sure it's a cruel place. Yeah it's not cruel it's I want no children

00:03:36 ◼   ► to be screaming and if he plays then all children are screaming so yep all right

00:03:42 ◼   ► Alright, so let's do some follow-up.

00:03:43 ◼   ► Last week, I rather foolishly and rashly promised

00:03:47 ◼   ► that I would use Myke's beloved Gboard for one week.

00:03:51 ◼   ► And I have put together some thoughts on this.

00:03:55 ◼   ► I will say, as we discussed, that iOS is doing

00:03:57 ◼   ► a lot better job today than it was a couple years ago

00:04:00 ◼   ► at not failing around third-party keyboards.

00:04:05 ◼   ► So I never once had a situation where I just didn't have

00:04:09 ◼   ► a keyboard, that used to be real common in the early days.

00:04:12 ◼   ► I have noticed a couple times if I was,

00:04:14 ◼   ► so I had Gboard and I had the TextExpander keyboard,

00:04:18 ◼   ► and sometimes it wouldn't remember

00:04:19 ◼   ► which one was the default,

00:04:20 ◼   ► so I'd like go to reply to a notification or something

00:04:23 ◼   ► and it'd pop up TextExpander instead of Gboard,

00:04:25 ◼   ► even though Gboard had priority.

00:04:27 ◼   ► But all in all, far less buggy than I remember it being

00:04:30 ◼   ► last time I tried this.

00:04:33 ◼   ► And Gboard itself is really pretty awesome.

00:04:35 ◼   ► So like you said, Myke, there's emoji

00:04:37 ◼   ► and GIF search built right in.

00:04:39 ◼   ► like you can just tap and very quickly find something as opposed to the iOS

00:04:44 ◼   ► emoji keyboard you're like scrolling back and forth trying to find the thing

00:04:48 ◼   ► you know even on the Mac Apple has emoji search it's like crazy to me that it's

00:04:53 ◼   ► not on iOS they really I think need to do that and they're already like

00:04:57 ◼   ► halfway there with the emojify feature and messages but even then like you have

00:05:02 ◼   ► to type a word then hit the emoji button and then the word turns orange like it

00:05:06 ◼   ► could be better and having GIF search is really nice because you know putting

00:05:10 ◼   ► GIFs into things is always fun but I will say that especially with iMessage

00:05:14 ◼   ► and we're gonna talk about iMessage apps today having Giphy and then you know

00:05:20 ◼   ► other like GIF services keyboards or apps makes that faster so the the GIF

00:05:26 ◼   ► search is cool in Gboard but not as necessary as maybe it once was. I will

00:05:32 ◼   ► the voice dictation I found a little confusing at first so it has Google's

00:05:38 ◼   ► like excellent voice dictation built into the keyboard but you you tap the

00:05:41 ◼   ► button and then it swings you into the Google or the Gboard app and then you

00:05:46 ◼   ► record in there and then you when it's done it puts you back into wherever you

00:05:50 ◼   ► were typing so it's a little bit of a switcheroo but the dictation is super

00:05:54 ◼   ► accurate if you haven't really ever played with Google's voice dictation

00:05:57 ◼   ► like go like install the Google search app and try it. It is really really good

00:06:03 ◼   ► it's really hard to confuse it and in my experience has done a better job than

00:06:10 ◼   ► iOS has and Apple's voice dictation is actually pretty good it's better I think

00:06:14 ◼   ► than some of the stuff Siri tries to do but but all in all I will say like

00:06:19 ◼   ► Gboard is great all these features are really nice but years of muscle memory

00:06:24 ◼   ► on the iOS keyboard and years of kind of learning and it learning me is really

00:06:31 ◼   ► hard to give up where I appreciate the G boards things like autocorrect are

00:06:37 ◼   ► potentially much smarter than what Apple is doing it has taken some getting used

00:06:42 ◼   ► to that sort of new set of corrections and ways that it thinks about things and

00:06:48 ◼   ► so at this point like I've been using it for a week I still feel sort of slow on

00:06:53 ◼   ► on my iPhone in a way that I wasn't expecting.

00:06:56 ◼   ► At this point, I'm not sure I'm gonna stick with it.

00:06:58 ◼   ► I'm probably gonna give it another couple days and see.

00:07:00 ◼   ► But it's great, it's a really nice alternative,

00:07:03 ◼   ► but I'm afraid that years of muscle memory

00:07:06 ◼   ► are just going to overcome all the good stuff in Gboard.

00:07:10 ◼   ► - It's interesting, I don't recall feeling that way,

00:07:13 ◼   ► but I've always been weird with this sort of stuff.

00:07:17 ◼   ► But yeah, I'm pleased that you can see the merits in it

00:07:20 ◼   ► at least, and I hope that more people will try it.

00:07:22 ◼   ► There was a few people that wrote in to say that they were going to give it a go as well.

00:07:25 ◼   ► I think it is a good alternative.

00:07:28 ◼   ► I think it's better in some ways, it's not as good in other ways, but I think that, as

00:07:33 ◼   ► you said, that the situation for a keyboard to be good now is easier than it was before.

00:07:40 ◼   ► Yeah.

00:07:41 ◼   ► One thing I didn't mention in the chat room is asking about is the swipe typing.

00:07:46 ◼   ► So if you're not familiar with this, basically you can use your thumb or finger and basically

00:07:50 ◼   ► instead of picking up your thumb and typing on each letter, you can swipe and basically

00:07:54 ◼   ► stop on the keys.

00:07:55 ◼   ► And so it can be much faster and it uses all of its intelligence to figure out what words

00:07:59 ◼   ► you meant.

00:08:01 ◼   ► I disabled it on Gboard very quickly for the same reason that...

00:08:05 ◼   ► No, but let me get through this.

00:08:07 ◼   ► For the same reason I don't use it, I haven't used it elsewhere, is that that sort of motion

00:08:13 ◼   ► for me is extremely uncomfortable over time

00:08:16 ◼   ► and even painful after a couple of days.

00:08:20 ◼   ► And that may not be as bad on smaller phones,

00:08:23 ◼   ► I mean I am on the Plus which is a bigger phone,

00:08:25 ◼   ► but I find that sort of motion for whatever reason

00:08:29 ◼   ► just really makes my thumb and hand uncomfortable.

00:08:33 ◼   ► - That's a shame, 'cause that is my favorite feature, right?

00:08:35 ◼   ► Like it's the reason that this stays installed.

00:08:37 ◼   ► - And it is super, it's super fast.

00:08:40 ◼   ► But for me it just doesn't work for whatever reason.

00:08:43 ◼   ► The same reason I think that the, you know, Myke, you and I both tried the Logitech MX

00:08:49 ◼   ► Master Mouse, which has a horizontal scroll control on the side of the mouse.

00:08:56 ◼   ► And it's sort of that same sort of motion, and that just killed me, and I went back to

00:09:00 ◼   ► the whatever this one's on my desk, the Performance MX.

00:09:03 ◼   ► So that just doesn't work for me for RS-ISUs.

00:09:05 ◼   ► But if it does work for you, and you've never tried it, like swipe typing is incredibly

00:09:11 ◼   ► fast and once you sort of learn some little tricks with it you can you can

00:09:16 ◼   ► really fly through stuff and it's great for like one-handed use but for me just

00:09:21 ◼   ► personally in my situation it doesn't really work but if you haven't tried it

00:09:26 ◼   ► like that alone is worth trying out something like gboard I think I agree

00:09:30 ◼   ► well it's a shame that you can't use that because I think that that is

00:09:33 ◼   ► especially for people with the larger phones that's the like the winning

00:09:36 ◼   ► feature in my opinion I mean it does surprise me that Apple has never built

00:09:40 ◼   ► this into the iOS keyboard like the standard iOS keyboard because it really is a very smart

00:09:46 ◼   ► way of doing things and it's much easier if you can handle it to do this with one hand

00:09:53 ◼   ► when you're on a bigger phone than trying to reach all the way across the keyboard because

00:09:57 ◼   ► it has a really good way of guessing what it thinks you're trying to type based upon

00:10:01 ◼   ► where your hand's moving so it's very cool.

00:10:03 ◼   ► Totally and it may be that Apple doesn't feel like it has that sort of intelligence at this

00:10:08 ◼   ► point to to do that where Gboard obviously does. I would imagine too

00:10:13 ◼   ► that's something where crowdsource data comes in handy that you know if people

00:10:17 ◼   ► are swiping the word Federico a certain way then it can learn that and it can

00:10:22 ◼   ► make that better. So all in all like I like Gboard I think you're right it's

00:10:27 ◼   ► like the best alternative out there and if I don't stick with it like that's not

00:10:32 ◼   ► a huge blow against its credibility like it's a great option. Yep. So moving down

00:10:39 ◼   ► the list isn't really isn't really follow-up but I wanted to just to

00:10:43 ◼   ► mention it here it is the springtime so it is always the time for your favorite

00:10:47 ◼   ► podcast and websites to be making t-shirts and so I've got a 512 shirt up

00:10:52 ◼   ► it's the first one I've done I did I did one when I went independent a year and a

00:10:55 ◼   ► half ago and haven't done one since so this is a new one it's all about the

00:10:59 ◼   ► iMac G3. Forgotten towel, did the artwork so it's amazing. And if you follow the link in the

00:11:04 ◼   ► show notes there are both EU and US options so if you are not in the United

00:11:08 ◼   ► States the EU options may be a lot cheaper as far as shipping. The colors

00:11:14 ◼   ► available are a little bit different in each campaign. I can't do anything about

00:11:17 ◼   ► that but if you are not in the United States check out the EU link it may be a

00:11:23 ◼   ► lot more affordable to ship from there or it may not be just check out both.

00:11:27 ◼   ► wanted to to mention that. Thank everyone who's done a shirt so far. It's always

00:11:30 ◼   ► nice to have those have those out there. Very nice shirt. Thank you. Up next,

00:11:38 ◼   ► Twitturrific has been funded on Kickstarter. Wow this jumped a lot since

00:11:43 ◼   ► yesterday. Yeah. Yeah so as of this recording they're at $81,000. Today's

00:11:49 ◼   ► March 7th. They have eight days to go. So they they've reached that first level.

00:11:54 ◼   ► they as we talked about they have a stretch goal of a hundred thousand to

00:11:58 ◼   ► add things like direct messages and a bunch of other stuff I think should be

00:12:03 ◼   ► there but isn't it so yeah I'm hoping they get 200,000 I backed this early on

00:12:09 ◼   ► I would like to have this client be full-featured so things like direct

00:12:13 ◼   ► messages or lists built in Twitter search built-in viewer for user profiles

00:12:20 ◼   ► again like I don't understand how some of the stuff wasn't in there 75,000

00:12:24 ◼   ► dollar plan but I guess that ship has sailed. It got on Darren Fireball

00:12:28 ◼   ► yesterday that explains it. That did it. So yeah so hopefully they hit the

00:12:33 ◼   ► hundred thousand goal it's nice now that you guys talked about this an upgrade a

00:12:37 ◼   ► little bit yesterday but now that it is funded I think there will be people who

00:12:40 ◼   ► feel more comfortable backing it. So if you haven't backed it yet and you're a Mac

00:12:44 ◼   ► user and you want a good alternative to Tweetbot and don't want to use the

00:12:47 ◼   ► first party Twitter app because it's not super great go check this out. I think

00:12:52 ◼   ► it's going to be I think I'm excited I'm excited that I've backed it I'm excited

00:12:55 ◼   ► to start seeing the betas at some point and I'm glad there'll be some

00:12:57 ◼   ► competition in that space. What else what else my friends we have Apple Pay so

00:13:06 ◼   ► Apple Pay is now in the land of Ireland and coming soon to the land of Vatici.

00:13:13 ◼   ► Yeah it's coming to Italy the webpage has been updated Apple has officially

00:13:19 ◼   ► said there's a "coming soon" label and they have confirmed the three banks that are going

00:13:25 ◼   ► to be supported. There's Unicredit, which is one of the biggest bank groups in Italy,

00:13:30 ◼   ► and there's Carrefour Bank, which I think is also in France, and Boon, which is this

00:13:35 ◼   ► payment system that basically creates... my understanding is it creates a virtual credit

00:13:41 ◼   ► card, I think. It's supported in a bunch of countries, and it wasn't officially supported

00:13:44 ◼   ► in Italy. There were a bunch of articles last year on how to create a Boon account in Italy

00:13:51 ◼   ► with the fake US, you know, UK method, I think. I never followed the procedure. So now in

00:13:59 ◼   ► theory Apple Pay is also going to launch with Boon in Italy. Now I'm very happy to see this.

00:14:05 ◼   ► I'm not so happy about the fact that some of the other major banking groups are not

00:14:10 ◼   ► gonna be supported in this initial rollout, including my bank, which is really one of

00:14:16 ◼   ► the top three banking groups, and it's not included.

00:14:20 ◼   ► So on the one hand, I feel like this is a repeat of other Apple Pay launches, and Apple

00:14:26 ◼   ► is gonna add other banking institutions.

00:14:29 ◼   ► But I've also been, you know, I tweeted this morning and I've been talking to people on

00:14:34 ◼   ► Twitter today after this announcement, and a lot of folks, especially in France, Spain,

00:14:41 ◼   ► I think also Australia, they complained about the fact that after the initial launch, Apple

00:14:47 ◼   ► and the banks, they couldn't come to an agreement on the terms, on the licensing fees, and so

00:14:52 ◼   ► even after a year, a full year after the initial launch, the supported banks are still the

00:14:58 ◼   ► same ones.

00:15:00 ◼   ► So in my tweet and in my link on Maxstories I said it's fine, I'm gonna wait.

00:15:05 ◼   ► But even if I wait a full year there's a strong chance that Apple won't work out the details

00:15:10 ◼   ► with Italian banks and so we, like France or like Spain or like Germany I think, will

00:15:16 ◼   ► be stuck with the same banks for another 12 months.

00:15:19 ◼   ► So in some European countries the situation is a bit different from the US where Apple

00:15:24 ◼   ► is rolling out, you know, 20, 30 institutions every couple of weeks.

00:15:29 ◼   ► different in Europe and I'm pretty sure it's because Apple basically doesn't want to agree

00:15:35 ◼   ► with the banks on their terms. So I'm happy that it's happening. I don't want to change

00:15:41 ◼   ► my bank. So a lot of people say just change your bank.

00:15:44 ◼   ► No, that is not an acceptable solution to this problem.

00:15:47 ◼   ► When you have, especially when you have a business and when you're dealing with payments

00:15:51 ◼   ► and wire transfers coming from a bunch of places, going to a bunch of places, you don't

00:15:57 ◼   ► want to change your bank just because of Apple Pay.

00:15:59 ◼   ► This Boon thing might be good though, right? Because it's not really a bank.

00:16:03 ◼   ► So this Boon thing might be a good solution. Not necessarily because I want to be the guy

00:16:08 ◼   ► who goes to the Carrefour supermarket and pays with Apple Pay, right? Not just because

00:16:12 ◼   ► of that, mostly because of payments in Safari, you know, on the web. And that's why I want

00:16:18 ◼   ► to use Apple Pay, because I feel safer, because it's going to be easier, because it uses Touch

00:16:21 ◼   ► ID, you know, all of those benefits of Apple Pay in Safari, that's what I want to use.

00:16:26 ◼   ► because I want to go to H&M and be super fancy and pull out my phone or my Apple watch, because

00:16:31 ◼   ► everyone is going to look at me with that look on their face anyway. So Apple Pay and

00:16:36 ◼   ► Safari, that's what I want. And maybe I should consider this Boom system. But there's no

00:16:41 ◼   ► details on the Italian launch on the website, so I figure we're going to have to wait for

00:16:46 ◼   ► Boom as well.

00:16:48 ◼   ► You're always fancy when you go to H&M. You don't need Apple Pay.

00:16:52 ◼   ► you but it's you know and every time you try to do even in Rome so Rome is a big

00:16:58 ◼   ► city but it doesn't have big city habits you know like when you go to London for

00:17:02 ◼   ► example you took me to the tube and it was so modern so civilized you know

00:17:07 ◼   ► compared to the metro in Rome yeah you know and so I can only imagine I go to

00:17:13 ◼   ► the store in Rome and I pull out my phone and everyone is gonna make fun of

00:17:17 ◼   ► me so because we're in Italy and you know maybe it's a problem in Rome maybe

00:17:21 ◼   ► slightly better if you go to Milan which is I feel like it's more of a European

00:17:26 ◼   ► city vibe than Rome. But yeah I mostly want to use it for Safari and when I go

00:17:31 ◼   ► to London or when I go to the US but you know we'll see. Yeah I've definitely run

00:17:35 ◼   ► into places so I use it at Walgreens and Whole Foods on a regular basis like

00:17:40 ◼   ► usually at least once a week if not more and it is funny sometimes it happens

00:17:46 ◼   ► less and less but occasionally I'll get I'll get a look when I do it but I

00:17:51 ◼   ► I don't do it with the watch. I know a lot of people really like that. I do it with the phone.

00:17:55 ◼   ► I feel like the watch is a step too far for kind of the same reasons you said.

00:17:58 ◼   ► Sometimes there's social awkwardness around it. But it is really nice in Safari.

00:18:03 ◼   ► So I'm a Chrome user, have been for a long time, but we recently added it to

00:18:10 ◼   ► the membership program at Relay and I wanted to, you know, kind of, it's really

00:18:16 ◼   ► the first time I've ever used it. I kind of wanted to understand how it works so I went

00:18:18 ◼   ► there to purchase on it and it really is great and especially if you have a

00:18:23 ◼   ► touch bar enabled Mac but even if you don't it's so integrated with with your

00:18:27 ◼   ► other devices that it's really fast and really pretty awesome and so you know

00:18:31 ◼   ► Apple Pay is one of those things we don't we don't talk about it a lot I

00:18:34 ◼   ► sort of like quietly there in the background but I think it really is

00:18:38 ◼   ► gaining steam out in the real world and as more countries get it as more banks

00:18:44 ◼   ► get it I mean I waited over a year before my credit union added it and I

00:18:48 ◼   ► I didn't switch banks for all the same reasons

00:18:49 ◼   ► you just said, Federico.

00:18:50 ◼   ► It's just a nightmare if you have a business.

00:18:53 ◼   ► But it is nice now that I have it.

00:18:55 ◼   ► I'm glad that I do.

00:18:56 ◼   ► And I think that Apple will continue to push forward on it

00:18:59 ◼   ► and I think we'll continue to see advancement in it

00:19:01 ◼   ► even though it doesn't necessarily garner headlines

00:19:03 ◼   ► all the time.

00:19:04 ◼   ► - I'll just say like for me,

00:19:06 ◼   ► 'cause I'm in a land of privilege

00:19:08 ◼   ► when it comes to having chip and pin

00:19:11 ◼   ► and contactless and stuff everywhere, right?

00:19:13 ◼   ► Like the UK payment system is made for something like this.

00:19:17 ◼   ► If I'm paying for something that is under £25, I use Apple Pay on my watch every single

00:19:23 ◼   ► time no matter where I am.

00:19:25 ◼   ► I remember, I saw you do that.

00:19:27 ◼   ► I used to get on the tube when I was buying coffee.

00:19:31 ◼   ► We have a store, like a small supermarket in our building, on the downstairs floor of

00:19:37 ◼   ► our building.

00:19:38 ◼   ► Whenever I go down there…

00:19:39 ◼   ► Wait, seriously?

00:19:40 ◼   ► Yeah, this is a very normal thing in the UK.

00:19:42 ◼   ► Oh, that's amazing.

00:19:44 ◼   ► apartment buildings have like a small like oh wow like what you know that

00:19:49 ◼   ► could like a chain store like a big yeah store but like a small version of it

00:19:52 ◼   ► but so the essentials in it like a mini market exactly that's that's the way

00:19:56 ◼   ► so when I need to buy anything from there I don't even take my wallet I

00:20:00 ◼   ► don't even take my phone I just use my watch I don't need it it's brilliant and

00:20:04 ◼   ► I use it all the time all the time and I do get the occasional look but it's

00:20:08 ◼   ► usually people saying that they think it's cool like the people the check it

00:20:12 ◼   ► "Oh, look at that!" or like some the usual phrase I guess, "Ah, future, huh?" and I'm like,

00:20:16 ◼   ► "Yep, that, future, that!" "Sick burn!" "It's right now!" I don't really know what to say to

00:20:23 ◼   ► stuff like that, but people aren't trying to be mean, like they are, they tend to be very

00:20:27 ◼   ► interested, like because they've either heard about it or they've never seen it before, but

00:20:30 ◼   ► there just isn't that requirement that there seems to be in other countries where like

00:20:35 ◼   ► these terminals have to support it. If there is a terminal that has contactless payment,

00:20:40 ◼   ► it will support Apple Pay 100% of the time here.

00:20:42 ◼   ► Like, and I think it's great, so I use it all the time. It's awesome.

00:20:46 ◼   ► So I hope that you both get this and I hope Federico that it comes for you soon.

00:20:53 ◼   ► But yeah, it's funny because you're going through the exact same thing

00:20:55 ◼   ► that Stephen went through and then I went through.

00:20:57 ◼   ► Like it launched in our countries, but not our banks.

00:20:59 ◼   ► Yeah, and I just wanted to kind of note how it's not necessarily my problem about

00:21:05 ◼   ► like the social awkwardness. It's more of the Italian mindset of

00:21:09 ◼   ► I know if I use Apple Pay at a big store where there's a big line and the equipment is gonna fail

00:21:16 ◼   ► and it's not my fault but because I'm the guy with the phone...

00:21:19 ◼   ► Oh look at this guy!

00:21:20 ◼   ► Exactly! I'm gonna get in an argument with the people behind me

00:21:23 ◼   ► accusing me of breaking the system with my fancy iPhone and I don't want to do that, you know?

00:21:28 ◼   ► Especially because some people, especially in you know in Italy and especially in Rome,

00:21:33 ◼   ► I have a tendency to kind of want to cause a scene, and I really don't like that.

00:21:40 ◼   ► And I really don't like that.

00:21:42 ◼   ► So I try to stay away from, you know, getting into public arguments when waiting in line

00:21:47 ◼   ► at the store.

00:21:48 ◼   ► So.

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00:24:12 ◼   ► So last week we spent a ton of time talking about a rumor

00:24:17 ◼   ► that the Wall Street Journal put out there

00:24:18 ◼   ► that seemed to indicate that the next iPhone,

00:24:21 ◼   ► the fancy iPhone of the three,

00:24:23 ◼   ► we'll be getting a USB-C port.

00:24:25 ◼   ► And we were talking a lot about what that would be

00:24:27 ◼   ► and what that could look like.

00:24:29 ◼   ► Our friend of the show, Ming-Chi Kuo, from KGI Security--

00:24:33 ◼   ► - Is he? - I think he is now.

00:24:34 ◼   ► We talk about him every week.

00:24:36 ◼   ► - Okay. - Third person on the show.

00:24:39 ◼   ► Fourth, fourth, sorry, there were three of us already.

00:24:42 ◼   ► Fourth person.

00:24:44 ◼   ► Anyway, and they published a note to say

00:24:48 ◼   ► that based upon what he is aware of,

00:24:51 ◼   ► that the next iPhone will keep the lightning port,

00:24:55 ◼   ► but will have the adoption of USB Type-C power delivery.

00:24:59 ◼   ► So fast charging like the iPad Pro 12.9 will have.

00:25:04 ◼   ► - See, I wish I made the point last week

00:25:08 ◼   ► because it sounds so obvious now

00:25:11 ◼   ► that Apple has done this fast charging on the iPad Pro

00:25:14 ◼   ► and now it makes sense to bring that technology to,

00:25:16 ◼   ► and that kind of benefit to other devices.

00:25:19 ◼   ► You know, quick charge, which is a Qualcomm standard on Android phones is amazing.

00:25:23 ◼   ► You can, you know, fast charge and Nexus 6P, for example, in like, I don't know, less than an hour, I think.

00:25:29 ◼   ► You can go to 70 percent in just a few minutes.

00:25:32 ◼   ► Usually like 15 minutes or something like that.

00:25:33 ◼   ► Yeah, it's amazing. Right.

00:25:35 ◼   ► And it sounds amazing. There are external battery packs with quick charge and you don't get those benefits on the iPhone because Apple does, you know, standard lightning charge.

00:25:44 ◼   ► But fast charging on the iPad Pro.

00:25:46 ◼   ► I mean, I did an entire article last year.

00:25:50 ◼   ► It's amazing, you can get to 80% relatively quickly,

00:25:54 ◼   ► and it makes sense to have that kind of benefit

00:25:56 ◼   ► to the iPhone as well.

00:25:58 ◼   ► Now, the bigger problem here, I think,

00:26:00 ◼   ► is if Apple changes the default cable,

00:26:04 ◼   ► so the cable that you get in the box,

00:26:05 ◼   ► from a USB-A connector to a USB-C connector,

00:26:08 ◼   ► that's probably gonna be a problem,

00:26:11 ◼   ► because airplanes, they have standard USB,

00:26:14 ◼   ► they don't have USB-C.

00:26:15 ◼   ► - Yep, I ran into this exact problem a little while ago

00:26:19 ◼   ► when I was on a sleeper train to Glasgow

00:26:22 ◼   ► and I took my charger with me.

00:26:24 ◼   ► I just picked up a charger that was from the drawer

00:26:26 ◼   ► and it turned out it was the USB-C one.

00:26:29 ◼   ► And then I was like, okay, I'll just plug it in

00:26:32 ◼   ► when I get on the train.

00:26:34 ◼   ► They didn't have plug sockets, but they had USB-A sockets

00:26:37 ◼   ► and then I had nothing to charge my phone with.

00:26:40 ◼   ► So, you know, but I do, for all of the same reasons

00:26:43 ◼   ► we were talking about last week,

00:26:44 ◼   ► this is still a thing that is interesting to me, right? Like, I would like the fast

00:26:49 ◼   ► charging, I would like to see USB-C just eclipse USB-A because it is a better

00:26:54 ◼   ► connector, but I am a little bit disappointed that we might not get to

00:26:59 ◼   ► the world, at least this time around, where the iPhone goes to USB-C because

00:27:03 ◼   ► the more I think about it, the more that's something that I want.

00:27:07 ◼   ► I mean, we went through the, I think, a fair good list of pros and cons for USB-C on the iPhone last week.

00:27:16 ◼   ► And now, according to Ming-Chi Kuo, it might be that Apple is kinda edging towards the "we should not do, we should not ditch Lightning" kind of side of the debate.

00:27:26 ◼   ► And I think it makes sense for, you know, the reasons that I outlined last week.

00:27:32 ◼   ► There's an entire ecosystem of Lightning devices, Apple changed, you know, gave even more importance to Lightning,

00:27:40 ◼   ► last year with the iPhone 7, so it makes maybe more sense for Apple to go there.

00:27:44 ◼   ► But I should say, I've been buying, also primarily because of the Nintendo Switch,

00:27:50 ◼   ► a lot of USB-C connectors, battery packs, chargers, cables...

00:27:56 ◼   ► I'm trying to go USB-C everywhere, and it feels amazing that I can just pick up any cable,

00:28:02 ◼   ► and it fits, and it charges quickly, and I don't have to think about it anymore.

00:28:07 ◼   ► And I would love to have the same experience on the iPhone, but I feel like it's never gonna happen,

00:28:15 ◼   ► because Apple likes to do its own thing. I just feel like it was possible to live

00:28:20 ◼   ► that kind of tech life to just, you know, one cable, one standard and

00:28:25 ◼   ► you're good to go. Sounds like it's not gonna happen with Apple devices, which

00:28:31 ◼   ► makes me kind of sad. I mean, I understand, but it also makes me kind of sad because

00:28:35 ◼   ► everyone likes to not worry about connectors, but we have to.

00:28:41 ◼   ► yeah. Does it make sense what I just said? I mean I love USB-C, I understand why Apple is

00:28:48 ◼   ► doing lightning, I just wish, you know, life was different.

00:28:53 ◼   ► Yeah, I mean really either end of the cable they change will lead to change,

00:28:59 ◼   ► right? It'll be all the stuff we talked about last week or it'll be stuff we're

00:29:02 ◼   ► talking about now where a USB-A has kind of become a universal power outlet in a

00:29:08 ◼   ► lot of places and so either way this will bring change. Right like how many

00:29:14 ◼   ► cars have USB-A jacks in them like my car has two side by side and so that

00:29:20 ◼   ► there's there's there's pain either way for me if they don't do this if they

00:29:27 ◼   ► don't put it in the phone but they put on the other end of the cable and allows

00:29:30 ◼   ► for fast charging stuff that'll be great fast charging is really nice when I went

00:29:34 ◼   ► from the 12.9 back to the 9.7 inch iPad Pro.

00:29:38 ◼   ► That's one thing that I miss.

00:29:41 ◼   ► And so I think it would be an evolutionary step to have that.

00:29:48 ◼   ► My guess is after a week of reflecting

00:29:50 ◼   ► on this in this article and some other things is that Lightning

00:29:53 ◼   ► is here to stay, at least for a little while.

00:29:55 ◼   ► I think all the reasons to move to USB-C are still valid.

00:29:59 ◼   ► But my guess is that this is not going to be a 2017 thing.

00:30:04 ◼   ► and that it may be a little bit slower than that.

00:30:08 ◼   ► But I mean, either way, people will be cranky about it

00:30:13 ◼   ► and that's just, I think that's fine.

00:30:15 ◼   ► I don't think that keeps Apple from doing anything,

00:30:17 ◼   ► but I think it's something that we'll have to deal with

00:30:20 ◼   ► in our lives.

00:30:21 ◼   ► Let's talk a little bit about the iMac.

00:30:24 ◼   ► So we're gonna switch gears a little bit.

00:30:26 ◼   ► I finally got around to reviewing my 27-inch 5K Retina iMac

00:30:31 ◼   ► this past week.

00:30:32 ◼   ► I've had it since the fall,

00:30:33 ◼   ► but I wanted to spend some time with it

00:30:34 ◼   ► before writing about it.

00:30:36 ◼   ► This is the computer, Myke, that you use.

00:30:38 ◼   ► You have one that's one generation older than mine.

00:30:41 ◼   ► So I have the P3, like today's record this,

00:30:44 ◼   ► this is the new, you know, the current iMac,

00:30:47 ◼   ► the late, what is it, the late 2015 model.

00:30:50 ◼   ► - I have late 2015.

00:30:52 ◼   ► Don't throw that hate on me.

00:30:53 ◼   ► - Sorry, sorry, yes.

00:30:56 ◼   ► You have the 2015?

00:30:57 ◼   ► This is all very confusing because the year change

00:30:58 ◼   ► and Apple hasn't done anything. - I have the last one

00:30:59 ◼   ► that came out I bought, 'cause it was the second generation,

00:31:02 ◼   ► the 5K Retina display, that's what I call it.

00:31:04 ◼   ► - So we both have the late 2015,

00:31:05 ◼   ► so we both have the wide color gamut,

00:31:09 ◼   ► but a lot of our friends have these machines.

00:31:11 ◼   ► Jason Snell has one, he has the first one

00:31:13 ◼   ► before the wide color display,

00:31:15 ◼   ► and I feel like a lot of people I know

00:31:17 ◼   ► who are kind of making things for a living

00:31:20 ◼   ► have one of these.

00:31:21 ◼   ► Marco has one, the Sarcusas have one,

00:31:23 ◼   ► I think Merlin's got one.

00:31:25 ◼   ► It seems to be a very popular option among people

00:31:27 ◼   ► who still use a Mac at their desk.

00:31:31 ◼   ► I mean, of course it is.

00:31:32 ◼   ► Because there's no other good option.

00:31:33 ◼   ► There's the only one.

00:31:34 ◼   ► There isn't another one.

00:31:36 ◼   ► Right.

00:31:36 ◼   ► So I talked about this in my review.

00:31:38 ◼   ► I think I talked about it on the show

00:31:39 ◼   ► even that if there was a Mac Pro that was viable,

00:31:45 ◼   ► I would have probably purchased it.

00:31:48 ◼   ► But there wasn't.

00:31:49 ◼   ► And so I bought an iMac.

00:31:50 ◼   ► And I'm really happy with the iMac,

00:31:52 ◼   ► and we're going to get into that.

00:31:53 ◼   ► But if you want a modern, powerful Mac,

00:31:57 ◼   ► it's kind of your only option.

00:31:59 ◼   ► like I was using a Mac Pro, right?

00:32:01 ◼   ► And I would probably still be using that Mac Pro

00:32:03 ◼   ► if it didn't go bad on me.

00:32:04 ◼   ► - Right, and that complicates things, right?

00:32:06 ◼   ► Not only are they old, but they had a bunch of failures,

00:32:08 ◼   ► including the one you had, which was sadness.

00:32:12 ◼   ► - But I, and like, 'cause basically for me,

00:32:15 ◼   ► I just want the most powerful machine that I can get

00:32:18 ◼   ► for what I consider to be a relatively fair amount of money.

00:32:22 ◼   ► So like, I use an iMac because it is the most powerful

00:32:25 ◼   ► modern computer that I can buy, like that is realistic

00:32:28 ◼   ► for, I want to use it for. And a Mac Pro just isn't.

00:32:32 ◼   ► Right, the Mac Pro still outperforms the iMac, but you're buying something that has not been

00:32:40 ◼   ► improved any ever. I mean, now going on three and a half years. So that's a real sticky

00:32:47 ◼   ► situation. I know some professionals who do a lot more video stuff than what you and I

00:32:52 ◼   ► I do who are kind of in a really bad situation where they're still using

00:32:56 ◼   ► cheese grater Mac Pros and I know one guy in particular needs to upgrade it, like

00:33:01 ◼   ► needs to replace it, and he just feels completely hamstrung because he's not

00:33:05 ◼   ► gonna buy a trash can Mac Pro, especially for the money, but his cheese grater is

00:33:10 ◼   ► like literally falling apart in his hands. So it's it's not a good situation

00:33:14 ◼   ► but we're not gonna fully go into that today of course. I did want to talk a

00:33:21 ◼   ► a little bit about refurbished Macs and I was very curious if the two of you

00:33:24 ◼   ► have ever purchased like a refurbished Apple product and if so which ones no no

00:33:32 ◼   ► never sorry never we're no good yeah it's why not never never wanted to like

00:33:39 ◼   ► every time I've bought a new computer like I've been in a situation where I

00:33:43 ◼   ► would want even the newest thing or like I was okay for the extra couple of

00:33:47 ◼   ► hundred dollars or whatever you know like it was sure oh like just you know

00:33:50 ◼   ► whenever I've gone to buy a new Mac if I'm not buying it like immediately when

00:33:54 ◼   ► it comes out I take a look at the refurb store but a lot of times the savings

00:34:00 ◼   ► aren't incredible so you know it's not something that I've done before yeah I

00:34:05 ◼   ► did I do the same it's actually you know I prefer to save money for longer and

00:34:10 ◼   ► buy something that is new because I don't like the idea of having to deal

00:34:14 ◼   ► something that has been owned before and you never know what happens. You know, I've used all

00:34:19 ◼   ► pre-owned cars for 10 years and this year

00:34:24 ◼   ► I just I saved money for several several months and then I bought a new car because I was fed up with the idea of

00:34:31 ◼   ► This car has problems. Is it because I did something or is it because you know someone else before did something to this car?

00:34:37 ◼   ► So that's why I don't use I don't buy used products anymore because I want to be sure

00:34:41 ◼   ► that whatever is going on is either my fault or you know a factory problem.

00:34:46 ◼   ► Sure and I think that I think those are both super fair reasons that on the

00:34:52 ◼   ► refurbished side you there may not always be exactly what you want in fact

00:34:56 ◼   ► this machine has one thing that there's one spec that I that I bought that I

00:35:02 ◼   ► wasn't super thrilled with but I went ahead and did it for the for the savings

00:35:05 ◼   ► but I think too like there's a lot of a lot of truth that idea like this has

00:35:10 ◼   ► been owned by somebody else. Now Apple when they refurbish a Mac it comes out

00:35:16 ◼   ► of the box as new. Anything that so when when you return a product so this iMac

00:35:24 ◼   ► assumedly was purchased by somebody and then returned. If it was returned for a

00:35:28 ◼   ► defect my understanding at least when I was there and it's been a long time ago

00:35:32 ◼   ► is that defective machines depending on the defect were not refurbished that

00:35:38 ◼   ► they were broken down and recycled and and machines that were just returned for

00:35:43 ◼   ► a change of you know change of heart or something like that would be in the

00:35:47 ◼   ► refurbished pool and I don't know if that's still true or not if you know

00:35:49 ◼   ► write me an email but they but most importantly they warranty them as new so

00:35:55 ◼   ► that comes with the year warranty you can buy AppleCare for them which I did

00:35:59 ◼   ► because then I'm act like I can't do anything I can't open it so anything

00:36:03 ◼   ► that goes wrong with that Apple's gonna have to open so I wanted AppleCare on

00:36:06 ◼   ► this particular machine. So I agree with both of you. I think there's a good

00:36:11 ◼   ► reasons but I think they're good counter reasons as well. I did it for

00:36:17 ◼   ► the savings. So even though the company bought this I wanted to be able to spend

00:36:22 ◼   ► as little as possible to get really a machine with a terabyte SSD. That was my

00:36:26 ◼   ► number one spec. Anything less than that on my work machine is just a lot of

00:36:30 ◼   ► juggling and it's a very expensive option and so I wanted to help offset

00:36:33 ◼   ► that desire with with saving on some some other things and so I ended up with

00:36:38 ◼   ► an i5 I really wanted an i7 but I looked at the refurb store for a while and one

00:36:43 ◼   ► didn't pop up so I went with the i5 and in all honesty I've never been in a

00:36:48 ◼   ► situation even a Final Cut or in Logic or in Adobe Audition which I'm slowly

00:36:54 ◼   ► switching to that I've ever said oh man I really wish I'd done the i7 like I've

00:36:59 ◼   ► I've never felt slighted by that option.

00:37:03 ◼   ► So I'm okay with that.

00:37:05 ◼   ► But I think that the experience is so good

00:37:10 ◼   ► that the warranty situation is so good that I don't mind it.

00:37:14 ◼   ► It's not my first refurbished Mac,

00:37:17 ◼   ► but I don't always buy.

00:37:18 ◼   ► Like my Mac Pro Pro I bought new.

00:37:20 ◼   ► But I think it's a nice option to at least,

00:37:22 ◼   ► like Myke, like you said,

00:37:23 ◼   ► like if you're going to buy a computer,

00:37:25 ◼   ► at least like stop by there

00:37:27 ◼   ► and see if something works for you.

00:37:29 ◼   ► I've never bought a refurbished iOS device, never bought a refurbished iPod, only a couple

00:37:34 ◼   ► Macs here and there.

00:37:36 ◼   ► But it's a good option if you're not familiar with it.

00:37:40 ◼   ► What I really want to get to today is what does the future of the iMac hold?

00:37:44 ◼   ► I know Federico, you have lots of thoughts on this.

00:37:46 ◼   ► Yeah, yeah.

00:37:47 ◼   ► I'm just waiting for the right moment to interject.

00:37:52 ◼   ► We've been joking off air that Federico needs a new computer, so maybe this new iMac will

00:37:56 ◼   ► be for him.

00:37:58 ◼   ► So the late 2015 has what Apple would now call legacy ports.

00:38:02 ◼   ► You've got USB 3, you have Thunderbolt 2.

00:38:06 ◼   ► Clearly those will collapse into USB-C Thunderbolt 3 ports like on the MacBook Pro.

00:38:11 ◼   ► I do hope that they keep the ethernet and the SD card reader that the iMac has had forever.

00:38:17 ◼   ► It would be kind of silly to get rid of it.

00:38:20 ◼   ► Like it would just be spiteful because there's so much space back there.

00:38:24 ◼   ► There's no need to remove those ports.

00:38:26 ◼   ► you can't even see them, like it would be,

00:38:29 ◼   ► that would be very, very disappointing

00:38:31 ◼   ► to lose those, to be honest.

00:38:33 ◼   ► - I think it would be in spite,

00:38:34 ◼   ► and you can see in the review,

00:38:35 ◼   ► one of the pictures I took from behind the iMac

00:38:37 ◼   ► is it sits on my desk, and like,

00:38:39 ◼   ► if you're at the cables nicely,

00:38:40 ◼   ► yeah, I don't see anything,

00:38:41 ◼   ► I don't see any cable clutter, it's all behind the screen.

00:38:44 ◼   ► And I use the Ethernet jack,

00:38:46 ◼   ► even though I've got wireless in the studio,

00:38:48 ◼   ► I prefer a gigabit connection.

00:38:50 ◼   ► But I think this Thunderbolt and USB ports will collapse

00:38:52 ◼   ► USB 3, USB C Thunderbolt 3 ports. But uh you know I think this next iMac you know

00:39:02 ◼   ► maybe even as early as this month of Apple holds an event will be very

00:39:05 ◼   ► evolutionary. We'll see those ports, we will see Kaby Lake, we will see a better

00:39:10 ◼   ► graphics card, but I don't I don't expect Apple to reinvent the iMac this year.

00:39:15 ◼   ► Really maybe ever. It's been a very stable design really really since like

00:39:21 ◼   ► the G5 days when they first put the guts behind the display and they've slowly

00:39:24 ◼   ► been refining that now for like 10 years. Yeah, just been making it slimmer and then

00:39:28 ◼   ► change the material like it's kind of you know there hasn't been... there was

00:39:32 ◼   ► there was a divergence you know every now and then but it's pretty much been

00:39:35 ◼   ► the same kind of... you can see the design right like it's not like when they went

00:39:40 ◼   ► from the G3 to the G4 to the G5 like they were completely different but

00:39:44 ◼   ► but look at me I know all the G's now. Look at you. I've been spending too much time with you and now

00:39:49 ◼   ► Now, since then, since we went to Intel, like you say, it's been effectively the same design.

00:39:56 ◼   ► And I don't expect that to change anytime soon.

00:39:58 ◼   ► I think one reason—

00:39:59 ◼   ► It's the perfect design for this computer.

00:40:01 ◼   ► It works great.

00:40:03 ◼   ► But in the rumors have been the idea of an iMac Pro.

00:40:07 ◼   ► So if the Mac Pro were to go away or Apple to replace it with a beefed up iMac, what

00:40:12 ◼   ► would that look like?

00:40:14 ◼   ► And there are a bunch of things that the Mac Pro has, even in its decrepit state, that

00:40:19 ◼   ► iMac does not. First and foremost you got the Xeon processors that gives you more

00:40:24 ◼   ► than four cores. It gives you substantially more headroom when it

00:40:29 ◼   ► comes to processing power. Those of course take up a lot more heat. They

00:40:33 ◼   ► require a lot more power. They give off a lot more heat and they take up more

00:40:37 ◼   ► space. All three of those things the iMac doesn't really have to give. It

00:40:42 ◼   ► also has error correcting RAM up to 64 gigs. The current iMac tops out at 32

00:40:47 ◼   ► which is what I have in mind. HDMI out, second audio out, and the big thing the

00:40:53 ◼   ► other big thing is the second GPU and the GPUs and the Mac pros are really

00:40:56 ◼   ► tuned for like OpenGL computing type stuff and the iMac uses you can get a

00:41:04 ◼   ► nice video card in it I mean it's not a gaming card like John Sarkeesa would

00:41:07 ◼   ► would point out but it is for most people a perfectly viable solution. So

00:41:13 ◼   ► So really the Mac Pro is much more than it just being faster, that it has more professional

00:41:18 ◼   ► parts, it is exponentially more flexible.

00:41:21 ◼   ► And I just don't know if the iMac design would support that sort of system.

00:41:27 ◼   ► Now I am not a hardware engineer, but I can look at the Mac Pro, even the trash can, and

00:41:32 ◼   ► look at all the cooling that is in there with that big fan of the thermal architecture.

00:41:36 ◼   ► And I can look at my iMac and say, well, those two things, like, I don't know how they go

00:41:41 ◼   ► together even if they were to return to the old thicker aluminum design before

00:41:45 ◼   ► 2012 and they made the edges thin and the back of it is thicker which is sort

00:41:49 ◼   ► of silly but it looks nice from the edge even with that if they went back with it

00:41:54 ◼   ► with a flat back I just don't see how they put Xeons in this chassis and

00:42:00 ◼   ► more importantly I don't see them spending the money to basically recreate

00:42:06 ◼   ► the iMac to reinvent it to have a new design and call it an iMac Pro like why not take

00:42:13 ◼   ► that money and effort and fix whatever's wrong with the trash can like I'm the further we

00:42:18 ◼   ► go the more I believe the next Mac Pro will not be a trash can that there is something

00:42:22 ◼   ► inherently flawed in that design they've been unable I mean at times they've been unwilling

00:42:27 ◼   ► they did skip a generation or two seemingly on purpose but seemingly unable to update

00:42:33 ◼   ► that design for whatever reason. And my assumption has been that something in

00:42:37 ◼   ► that design makes it impossible to update for whatever reason. And that if

00:42:43 ◼   ► we see a new Mac Pro that it will not be structurally the same as the trash can

00:42:48 ◼   ► we have now. Maybe they use the same external case but the insides are

00:42:52 ◼   ► way different. Maybe we see a new case but I think something has gone horribly

00:42:55 ◼   ► wrong. And if that's true then why spend the money on like kind of taking an iMac

00:43:02 ◼   ► and making it worse as opposed to making a Mac Pro with everything Pro users want.

00:43:07 ◼   ► See what I'm saying? There's a tension there and I don't see Apple

00:43:11 ◼   ► tipping in favor of "let's make an iMac worse and put a Xeon in it." Why do you

00:43:17 ◼   ► think though that they would spend the money on a new design or fixing the

00:43:21 ◼   ► trashcan design but not on adapting the iMac design? Well I think there are

00:43:27 ◼   ► two things. One, I don't know and again this is where like I'm just a layperson

00:43:31 ◼   ► but I don't know if even if you made the iMac thicker I don't know how much

00:43:36 ◼   ► thicker I don't know how much larger an iMac would need to be to support things

00:43:43 ◼   ► like Xeons and EEC RAM and the GPUs required so it may be that that's that's

00:43:49 ◼   ► a fool's errand anyways and we're gonna get into a minute like what if Apple

00:43:52 ◼   ► gave up gave up some of that stuff but I think if they are committed to having

00:43:57 ◼   ► those features then ultimately a case design designed for those features makes

00:44:04 ◼   ► more sense that shoehorning them into something that was designed for an i5 or

00:44:09 ◼   ► an i7 may not be the right answer. There's lots of assumptions there right?

00:44:15 ◼   ► Like this is fun conjecture hour on connected but it's something that I

00:44:19 ◼   ► struggle to see how it work out the other way. So what do you think then?

00:44:25 ◼   ► I mean I think I think a couple things could happen I think that I mean

00:44:29 ◼   ► obviously like the Mac Pro could just go away and you're told to buy an iMac and

00:44:33 ◼   ► tough luck. I think if that were going to be the case it would have already

00:44:36 ◼   ► happened like why in the world is it still for sale three and a half years

00:44:39 ◼   ► later? I think there's a middle ground where they could say you know the iMac

00:44:46 ◼   ► still gonna have an i7 in it they give up the Xeons they give up the EC RAM

00:44:49 ◼   ► which would make you know a lot of professional users upset but maybe they

00:44:53 ◼   ► they moved to like external GPUs over Thunderbolt 3. Thunderbolt 2 supported

00:44:59 ◼   ► that there are a couple of cards and chassis you can buy for that I don't

00:45:03 ◼   ► think they ever really took off and they were always kind of buggy in Mac OS they

00:45:06 ◼   ► would need to really put their heart into it and make it a viable option but

00:45:10 ◼   ► they could say hey you can buy an iMac but if you need a lot more GPU power

00:45:13 ◼   ► then you can go buy this external GPU but in this case we designed or that we

00:45:17 ◼   ► partnered with whoever to make and it gets you like halfway there between

00:45:21 ◼   ► where we are now and the Mac Pro. I'm not sure that's super Apple-like. Like I'm

00:45:26 ◼   ► not sure that their solution would be buy a breakout box. This seems sort of

00:45:29 ◼   ► very un-Apple, very un-Johnny Ive-like. Put another box on your desk with a cable

00:45:35 ◼   ► running to it. But is that the company that would work of OG for a monitor? I

00:45:39 ◼   ► mean who knows, right? Like who and then who didn't quality check it against Wi-Fi?

00:45:45 ◼   ► Like who knows? I mean we're this is all like kind of out there but it's a

00:45:49 ◼   ► possible route. And then the third one is that they replace the Mac Pro with

00:45:54 ◼   ► something. So I just don't know. I just don't know if how important this is to

00:45:58 ◼   ► Apple. I don't know how important it is to their their product line where they

00:46:02 ◼   ► want to go with things. But the idea of Apple just taking the Mac Pro guts and

00:46:06 ◼   ► putting in a thicker iMac, I think that is a super problematic route. And I'm not

00:46:12 ◼   ► sure that would even work or that it'd be worth it or even that users would

00:46:17 ◼   ► accept it. You know there are there's a big case for having a you know external

00:46:23 ◼   ► displays and having multiple of them and not having a computer you just like

00:46:27 ◼   ► there are pros who want that sort of modularity and now of course a lot of

00:46:31 ◼   ► those pros have given it up already right because a lot of us have moved to

00:46:34 ◼   ► iMacs like Myke you and I and people like Marco like we are the the we are

00:46:38 ◼   ► the customer for the Mac Pro right like we're not developers but you and I are

00:46:42 ◼   ► in professional applications all day every day rendering audio rendering

00:46:45 ◼   ► video and ten years ago we would have bought a Mac Pro like hands down because

00:46:49 ◼   ► the iMac was not a professional option but the iMac has started to skew

00:46:54 ◼   ► upstream. If you buy the cheapest iMac and the most expensive iMac they are

00:46:58 ◼   ► vastly different machines. They look the same but they are vastly different as

00:47:01 ◼   ► far as their capabilities and that is a relatively new thing in the Mac line and

00:47:07 ◼   ► so you have some pros that are okay with the iMac but you still have some pros

00:47:11 ◼   ► who for whatever reason want or need those things that have been reserved in the Mac Pro bucket for

00:47:16 ◼   ► so long. And those people, this is not new, it's not a new concept, but those people are understandably

00:47:23 ◼   ► worried. And I think holding out the idea that Apple is going to make an all-in-one for those

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00:49:18 ◼   ► So I've been reading this article by Adam Howell about the iMessage app store and how

00:49:25 ◼   ► Apple is not doing enough to promote new sticker packs, to promote new iMessage apps and how the user experience of the

00:49:34 ◼   ► of stickers in iMessage in iOS 10 is really slow and could use some improvements.

00:49:40 ◼   ► I've been rereading this article again because I kind of I disagree with some of the points that

00:49:47 ◼   ► that it makes and I actually agree with a lot of them.

00:49:52 ◼   ► So I kind of wanted to ask you guys about your use of you know

00:49:56 ◼   ► The iMessage app store if you use iMessage apps again, you know and so forth, but before we get to the questions

00:50:02 ◼   ► I

00:50:04 ◼   ► Wanted to say where I disagree. So if you read the story, you know Adam makes some iMessage sticker packs

00:50:11 ◼   ► so he knows what he's talking about, but I

00:50:13 ◼   ► partially disagree on the point of Apple not doing enough curation and

00:50:19 ◼   ► basically the Disney sticker packs being the only thing that Apple features on the front page of the iMessage App Store.

00:50:26 ◼   ► I mean, Disney has an advantage over other companies because one, they have one of the most recognizable brands on the planet.

00:50:34 ◼   ► But I also feel like they totally understand, they completely nailed the idea of

00:50:42 ◼   ► making sticker packs on the iMessage App Store and asking people to pay up for them.

00:50:48 ◼   ► Disney has a couple of dozen sticker packs, maybe more, and they're all sold at different price points.

00:50:56 ◼   ► So from 99 cents to $2 to $3.

00:51:00 ◼   ► And you can find this huge catalog of stickers with Disney characters,

00:51:06 ◼   ► but it's not just that they're kind of taking PNGs from their popular franchises and sticking them into iMessage.

00:51:14 ◼   ► They're actually redrawing them and making stickers with expressions, with animation,

00:51:21 ◼   ► so they're actually optimizing their characters for the MSaj App Store.

00:51:24 ◼   ► And of course, they tend to be floating up in the top charts,

00:51:29 ◼   ► because they had this opportunity, and unlike other companies, such as Nintendo, for example,

00:51:34 ◼   ► they completely went for it and they're reaping their words.

00:51:39 ◼   ► That said, I feel like Apple is doing a good enough job with curation.

00:51:44 ◼   ► So we run a weekly section on our newsletters for members.

00:51:51 ◼   ► And one of the sections is called "The Album" where we highlight some of our favorite sticker packs.

00:51:59 ◼   ► So we browse the iMessage App Store inside of Messages every week.

00:52:04 ◼   ► And I feel like maybe not as often as the full iOS App Store, but at least twice a week.

00:52:11 ◼   ► Apple launches new sections, Apple features new sticker packs, new iMessage apps, and they try to

00:52:18 ◼   ► update existing sections with new sticker packs. So for example, there's a section called "Keep it weird",

00:52:25 ◼   ► which is one of our favorites, where Apple features this weird, odd,

00:52:29 ◼   ► I don't know how to describe them, sticker packs, and they're constantly adding new packs to this section.

00:52:36 ◼   ► But also, for example, if you go this week, you will find that Giphy has launched this initiative,

00:52:41 ◼   ► I think it's called Giphy Arts, and it's a collection of 12 sticker packs from 12 different artists, and

00:52:48 ◼   ► they're all featured by Apple. So Apple tweeted them with the App Store account, and they're also on the front page of the iMessage App Store.

00:52:54 ◼   ► But besides this, like I said, every week if you go on Tuesday or if you go on Fridays,

00:53:00 ◼   ► you will likely find new entries in the new stickers we love section or

00:53:06 ◼   ► new sections like the Giphy Arts one, for example when it was Valentine's Day, there was a Valentine's Day

00:53:13 ◼   ► section for you know love themed stickers.

00:53:17 ◼   ► So I feel like Apple is doing a good enough job there and also they're actually featuring and promoting

00:53:23 ◼   ► iMessage apps and iMessage sticker packs on Twitter with the App Store account, but also on the App Store itself.

00:53:30 ◼   ► So if you go to the App Store, you know, the standard one, and you scroll the front page,

00:53:35 ◼   ► you will find iMessage apps and stickers there as well.

00:53:38 ◼   ► So you don't need to go to the iMessage App Store to find or install stickers. That said, so we

00:53:45 ◼   ► disagree a little on the amount of curation that Apple is doing, but I feel like the points about

00:53:52 ◼   ► you know, the user experience of the iMessage app drawer and using stickers is completely

00:53:59 ◼   ► 100% right. It takes too many taps to open the app drawer and it takes just too much time to explain to people

00:54:08 ◼   ► how it works. And the difference is between "Oh, this is an iOS app that contains an a message component" or "This is an iMessage

00:54:16 ◼   ► only app, so if you download it from the App Store, you actually won't find it on the home screen.

00:54:21 ◼   ► screen, you need to look into messages, but you know there's no actual way to

00:54:25 ◼   ► launch the iMessage app from the App Store. That drives me mad. That's so slow.

00:54:30 ◼   ► Why put them in the App Store if I then have to go to the other App Store to

00:54:33 ◼   ► install them? It doesn't make any sense. Exactly. So there are, you know, he has a

00:54:37 ◼   ► very very good breakdown of all the taps that it takes to navigate the iMessage

00:54:43 ◼   ► UI. So with this being said, I wanted to ask you, we're what, six months? Maybe more

00:54:49 ◼   ► into iOS 10 officially. How do you find yourselves using the iMessage App Store?

00:54:55 ◼   ► Do you still buy and download sticker packs? Have you used other kinds of

00:55:00 ◼   ► iMessage apps beyond stickers or did the novelty effect just wear off months ago?

00:55:06 ◼   ► I think for me the novelty has really worn off. I still send stickers, I send

00:55:12 ◼   ► them mostly to the two of you, but I feel like the sticker packs that I am using

00:55:15 ◼   ► and have have really stabilized,

00:55:17 ◼   ► that I kind of have what I like

00:55:18 ◼   ► and I haven't really been exploring much past that.

00:55:22 ◼   ► And a lot of the big reason is that, you know,

00:55:25 ◼   ► the design and the UX of finding them

00:55:29 ◼   ► and downloading them and managing them

00:55:31 ◼   ► is just really clunky.

00:55:33 ◼   ► And I don't really feel a big need to like go in there

00:55:37 ◼   ► and try to find new stuff all the time.

00:55:40 ◼   ► And for me, like the inability to sync those apps

00:55:43 ◼   ► across devices has only hurt this that I kind of have my iPhone set up with the

00:55:47 ◼   ► packs that I want and like the one app that I use that we can talk about but my

00:55:52 ◼   ► iPad has like sort of the same ones but they sort of scattershot and I haven't

00:55:56 ◼   ► really sat down with like both devices and made them all the same and that's

00:56:00 ◼   ► really frustrating. Every now and then I'm like look for a pack I was like oh

00:56:04 ◼   ► it's not there so then I have to go through my purchases and download all

00:56:07 ◼   ► the recent packs that I've been enjoying and and it does make it so I'm like less

00:56:11 ◼   ► likely to maybe install a pack to try it out because then I'm gonna have to like

00:56:15 ◼   ► if I'm on my iPad I would then I'm going to put it on my iPhone and it's

00:56:18 ◼   ► really annoying. Like I would say for me that my experience of stickers is

00:56:25 ◼   ► exactly as I expected it would be. I use them all the time, I think it's hilarious,

00:56:29 ◼   ► it's so much more expressive than emoji or text because you get to do silly

00:56:34 ◼   ► things with them and I install new packs relatively frequently like I don't think

00:56:41 ◼   ► I'm doing it every day, but like maybe every week I'll get a new one. It really helps that

00:56:45 ◼   ► I know Jon Voorhees because Jon puts together the majority of the sticker stuff for Club

00:56:49 ◼   ► Max stories. So like maybe one day every week Jon will like just destroy my iMessage and

00:56:55 ◼   ► then I'll pick up a pack that of his that he's recommended and I'll grab those and I'll

00:57:00 ◼   ► use them. But I do really love the sticker pack and I spend money on them like I but

00:57:05 ◼   ► you know I'm cool with it like and as Steven said like I have a few that I've really kind

00:57:09 ◼   ► of like, they're like my mainstays. I'll put a link in the show notes to a couple of my

00:57:14 ◼   ► favourites. Like for example, the Happy Toast pack, Ragtag Classic, Pusheen and the Make

00:57:22 ◼   ► It Rain. Like they are like just super mainstays for me and of course the Relay FM ones because

00:57:29 ◼   ► a sticker of yourself is very useful to have. I recommend people make their own stickers

00:57:35 ◼   ► of themselves. It's very good to just drop your own little character all over the place.

00:57:41 ◼   ► I use stickers all the time.

00:57:43 ◼   ► And there is an app that we should point out that you can basically give it images and

00:57:49 ◼   ► it makes your own stickers. It is called Sticker Book. So I have one listeners may know of

00:57:55 ◼   ► the Boba car little guy. It's very frightening looking. And so sometimes I drop that and

00:58:02 ◼   ► iMessage. So you can make your own pretty easily, you don't have to like do the whole

00:58:05 ◼   ► Xcode thing. But yeah, I just feel like it's, I mean, I don't know, I just feel like there

00:58:12 ◼   ► was a lot of excitement around it at first and it sort of leveled off.

00:58:16 ◼   ► What I don't use is apps.

00:58:18 ◼   ► Yeah, yeah, especially for apps. I mean, and Apple is really trying here, I think, at least

00:58:22 ◼   ► in terms of promotion. There's always, you know, when they update the iMessage App Store,

00:58:28 ◼   ► they update the App Store, they always update both the stickers, so the featured sticker

00:58:34 ◼   ► packs and the iMessage apps. And there are some cool ideas, right, like, I don't know,

00:58:40 ◼   ► sharing music or playing games. There are, you know, like calendar apps, for example.

00:58:46 ◼   ► You know, remember in my iostan review, I imagined this one, two, three, three planner

00:58:51 ◼   ► from developer Myke Hurley, which is a guy called, just like you, Myke.

00:58:55 ◼   ► It's funny, yeah.

00:58:56 ◼   ► Yeah, it's Myke with an eye, not with a, you know, like yours, but and he lives in Scotland,

00:59:02 ◼   ► not in London, and he makes apps.

00:59:06 ◼   ► So you know, those apps actually exist now.

00:59:11 ◼   ► So you know, like agenda planners, calendar apps in iMessage, those are possible, but

00:59:18 ◼   ► it's just, it's a combination of they're too difficult to use, they're too limited, because

00:59:24 ◼   ► you know, with the whole system of sharing message bubbles and limited interactions within a conversation

00:59:33 ◼   ► and the fact that they're too hard to discover, I feel like the usage isn't taking off as much as Apple was hoping.

00:59:42 ◼   ► So I don't think Apple is backing away from the idea of an App Store inside iMessage.

00:59:49 ◼   ► If anything, I think and I hope that they will make it easier for developers to make apps that interact with users in a conversation and for users to access those apps.

01:00:00 ◼   ► The only aspect that doesn't convince me we're going to see these changes soon is if it took us seven, probably more years to see any kind of change to the home screen.

01:00:16 ◼   ► Are we going to get any change for DI message home screen for apps and stickers?

01:00:24 ◼   ► Maybe because maybe people use stickers and care about stickers more than icons on a home

01:00:30 ◼   ► screen, but let's just say Apple doesn't make great app launchers.

01:00:37 ◼   ► And DI message app drawer is another example.

01:00:42 ◼   ► Anytime Apple makes a launcher, it's not so great, whether it's the home screen or launchpad

01:00:47 ◼   ► or split view, they need to hire more app launcher people.

01:00:54 ◼   ► I think they will make some changes in 11 to make it better just because there are some

01:00:57 ◼   ► really easy routes to make it better.

01:01:01 ◼   ► Like just how we were talking about the sync in between devices, the way that you install

01:01:05 ◼   ► sticker packs and stuff, like all of that stuff, it seems like the theory behind what

01:01:11 ◼   ► you should do is easy to see. I mean, you know, practicality is a different, right?

01:01:15 ◼   ► But you can see like, oh, this should be better. So I expect that with time and once things

01:01:21 ◼   ► grow out, they see how people are using them, they understand the flaws, right? Which you

01:01:24 ◼   ► maybe can't see in the bubble of when there's only two packs, right, before it launches.

01:01:28 ◼   ► So I have faith that there will be some improvements there to make it a better experience with

01:01:33 ◼   ► like the way that things are installed and managed, I think.

01:01:36 ◼   ► But the app stuff is just, it's just not really materialized to be very useful to me. There's

01:01:41 ◼   ► only one app that I use which is the same app that Steven uses. GamePigeon!

01:01:46 ◼   ► GamePigeon! Everybody loves GamePigeon. Me and Steven frequently play pool in

01:01:52 ◼   ► GamePigeon. And you always wanted... I wondered if you knew this, I've never

01:01:56 ◼   ► mentioned this, but I am undefeated with you and I didn't know if you knew that. Really?

01:02:01 ◼   ► Yeah I've been keeping track, you've never beat me at pool. I'm done playing

01:02:05 ◼   ► that. I'm the same way, like the apps just haven't really been a big

01:02:14 ◼   ► deal for me and I really don't know why that is. I just haven't really solved

01:02:20 ◼   ► anything that I needed like a hole in my workflow. We should say

01:02:26 ◼   ► the chat room is going crazy about iMessage on the Mac. The apps aren't

01:02:31 ◼   ► coming, right? Like they're iOS apps that they're not going to run on the Mac

01:02:34 ◼   ► unless something crazy happens. Stickers are the same way really that even though

01:02:38 ◼   ► they're just images they are bundled in apps and maybe there's a way for Apple

01:02:44 ◼   ► to make those cross-platform somehow since they really are just folders of

01:02:49 ◼   ► PNGs like once you get down into it but I don't see that being a super high

01:02:53 ◼   ► priority. If anything and maybe we'll see the iMessage effects come to the Mac

01:02:58 ◼   ► right now the only one that works on the Mac is if you send me something and like

01:03:01 ◼   ► the what is it called like the secret one we have like scrub your finger over

01:03:04 ◼   ► it to read it. That works on the Mac with the cursor but like none of the others

01:03:11 ◼   ► come through it just says you know in parentheses you know "sent with lasers" so

01:03:15 ◼   ► I don't know how big of a importance that is to Apple at this point that the

01:03:22 ◼   ► Mac is sort of behind iOS in that regard. I think one of the big problems for me

01:03:28 ◼   ► at least in the way that the apps have kind of materialized is they are too

01:03:32 ◼   ► tied into messages? Like, I find it frustrating that to confirm my action in the application,

01:03:42 ◼   ► I have to send it as a message. It's just weird. I feel like the apps, if they really

01:03:51 ◼   ► are going to work, they should be collaborative and active within the message window, as opposed

01:03:56 ◼   ► to it being this two and throw between people. I think that's why it doesn't work for me.

01:04:02 ◼   ► The problem, you're 100% right,

01:04:05 ◼   ► Apple went with this framework based on the idea

01:04:07 ◼   ► of a message session and message bubbles.

01:04:11 ◼   ► And so there are so many constraints for developers

01:04:15 ◼   ► on what they can actually do with the bubble itself.

01:04:18 ◼   ► And all of those confirmation steps are,

01:04:21 ◼   ► Apple made them so they're by design

01:04:24 ◼   ► because they're so, you know,

01:04:25 ◼   ► Apple likes to be so sure about, you know,

01:04:28 ◼   ► user interaction,

01:04:29 ◼   ► confirming that you want to share data with others.

01:04:32 ◼   ► And I feel like I appreciate that Apple makes it so secure.

01:04:37 ◼   ► I mean, developers cannot even access the names

01:04:43 ◼   ► of people in a conversation, just some alphanumerical IDs.

01:04:48 ◼   ► So there are a bunch of limitations.

01:04:50 ◼   ► Those are by designs to ensure privacy and all that.

01:04:53 ◼   ► But there are also other things that I feel like

01:04:55 ◼   ► they should be on a technical level.

01:04:58 ◼   ► they don't deal with user details or usernames and that aspect of privacy.

01:05:05 ◼   ► There should be more flexibility for apps to display, you know, like custom message bubbles, for example,

01:05:12 ◼   ► or to do animations, to do additional buttons in the UI of a conversation instead of having to tap to reveal the UI.

01:05:22 ◼   ► But otherwise, it's just a bubble.

01:05:24 ◼   ► So this being stuck of everything's a message bubble,

01:05:28 ◼   ► I feel like that's one of the biggest problems

01:05:30 ◼   ► at a technical level for the iMessage app framework.

01:05:33 ◼   ► - Do you think that they're gonna make it better?

01:05:39 ◼   ► Do you think this might be something like keyboards

01:05:40 ◼   ► where it kind of just stays stuck for a while?

01:05:42 ◼   ► - Exactly.

01:05:43 ◼   ► So it's kind of like USB-C really.

01:05:47 ◼   ► I'm 50/50 on this.

01:05:48 ◼   ► I don't know because I can see how iMessage

01:05:51 ◼   ► a bigger deal than custom keyboards. A lot of people use iMessage and every time a new

01:05:58 ◼   ► celebrity makes one of those emoji sticker packs, they shoot up in the top charts. So

01:06:06 ◼   ► people are buying them. People are buying stickers and you can see this with celebrities,

01:06:10 ◼   ► you can see this with stickers by Disney. But I don't know if Apple cares enough. They

01:06:18 ◼   ► They did the basic ground work, it works, just like custom keyboards will just leave

01:06:23 ◼   ► it untouched for the next 3-4 years.

01:06:26 ◼   ► So I don't know, I hope they do differently than what they did with custom keyboards,

01:06:31 ◼   ► because iMessage is much more popular, much more pop culture than TextExpander.

01:06:39 ◼   ► I mean I love TextExpander, but you don't go on Ellen to talk about snippets.

01:06:45 ◼   ► So you know what I mean right? Yeah I get you. I get you. So yeah maybe it'll be different

01:06:51 ◼   ► this time.

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01:09:35 ◼   ► On this show, and especially Myke and I, we talk a lot about replacing our Macs with iPads

01:09:42 ◼   ► and working from iOS.

01:09:44 ◼   ► And we love working on iOS, we switched many of our tasks from desktop computers to just

01:09:53 ◼   ► do it on the iPad.

01:09:56 ◼   ► But I've seen a lot of people lately just fall into the trap of thinking that the iPad

01:10:04 ◼   ► is perfect and that people who use Macs are, you know, they don't know better

01:10:10 ◼   ► that, you know, they're using Macs because they're old and stupid and I don't think

01:10:15 ◼   ► that's true. I'm just... I agree it's not true. It is not true. It's, you know, we

01:10:22 ◼   ► try to say very frequently that we completely understand why some folks

01:10:30 ◼   ► need to work on a Mac, why some other people need to work on a Windows PC, and

01:10:34 ◼   ► it's completely reasonable, I think. And I just find it funny that we went from,

01:10:41 ◼   ► you know, trying to prove a point that it is possible for some people like us to

01:10:47 ◼   ► do a lot of work on the iPad, to having the arrogance of some to say that, you

01:10:54 ◼   ► Macs are for folks who don't know, who have no idea what they're missing,

01:11:00 ◼   ► just assuming that other people and telling them what computer they should be using

01:11:06 ◼   ► and assuming they don't know themselves.

01:11:08 ◼   ► With that said, I felt it would be nice to try to do the reverse of what we usually do

01:11:17 ◼   ► and pick two aspects of where iOS is still behind the Mac

01:11:24 ◼   ► and where the Mac can do things that iOS cannot.

01:11:28 ◼   ► And, you know, because I felt like a lot of people wouldn't expect that from Myke and I.

01:11:36 ◼   ► We've been very nice to the Mac today, I think, in general, you know?

01:11:42 ◼   ► We have, we have, and I just wanted to kind of highlight how we're not blind to the argument that, you know,

01:11:49 ◼   ► a lot of people make, even in the chat room when we record the show, that they cannot use an iPad for X and X reasons.

01:11:58 ◼   ► So, we're gonna do round robin style, of course, obviously, and we're gonna do two aspects of iOS lagging behind the Mac each.

01:12:10 ◼   ► I'll go first. And this can be, you know, whether it's about a specific app or a specific system feature, it doesn't matter.

01:12:18 ◼   ► The first aspect that I picked is there are not enough power user email clients that allow you to customize the experience as you can on the Mac.

01:12:30 ◼   ► So on the Mac you have Apple Mail, which packs a lot of...

01:12:35 ◼   ► whether it's in the preferences or hidden behind right-clicking the interface for example,

01:12:41 ◼   ► it packs a lot of customization features and also advanced features.

01:12:47 ◼   ► You can create small folders, you can customize the toolbar, you can do saved searches,

01:12:54 ◼   ► you can personalize so many aspects of the Apple Mail experience.

01:12:59 ◼   ► But on the Mac, you also get these more advanced plugins for Apple Mail, for example.

01:13:06 ◼   ► I think one is called Mail Butler, maybe.

01:13:10 ◼   ► But there's also apps like MailMate, for example, that allow you to have this custom, you know,

01:13:15 ◼   ► very power user-oriented approach to email management.

01:13:20 ◼   ► And on iOS, I feel like a lot of the modern email clients are just trying to, I don't

01:13:26 ◼   ► I don't want to say copy, but to be very yearly inspired by mailbox and trying to do just

01:13:34 ◼   ► the bare minimum work to resemble mailbox.

01:13:37 ◼   ► Or Sparrow even.

01:13:39 ◼   ► Or Sparrow, yeah, good memory.

01:13:41 ◼   ► Rest in peace, man.

01:13:42 ◼   ► Yeah, always.

01:13:43 ◼   ► Without trying to go beyond the traditional feature set of the modern iOS email client.

01:13:50 ◼   ► So if you think of the modern iOS email app, you think of snoozing, you think of custom

01:13:55 ◼   ► gestures, maybe some 3D touch here and there, maybe an iPad component, but

01:14:02 ◼   ► those apps usually don't have all of the features of an email client on the Mac.

01:14:07 ◼   ► And I'm gonna be very specific here. For example, if you are a sandbox

01:14:13 ◼   ► user, so you deal with mailboxes for newsletters and unimportant messages, or

01:14:19 ◼   ► really, if you're just any kind of user who uses folders to manage their

01:14:24 ◼   ► email. On iOS you're gonna have a hard time to find an email client that allows

01:14:30 ◼   ► you to, for example, mark some mailboxes as favorites and put them in a

01:14:37 ◼   ► more important position in the sidebar or to assign custom colors to

01:14:42 ◼   ► those favorites or to customize the archiving experience so that when you

01:14:47 ◼   ► archive a message that is already in a folder it doesn't go back to the inbox

01:14:51 ◼   ► But it goes into all mail, you know, if you use Gmail you're gonna be familiar with this problem. Now it is possible

01:14:57 ◼   ► There are some you know

01:14:58 ◼   ► You can do you can do favorite mailboxes in Apple mail and you can do favorites gestures and colors in air mail

01:15:05 ◼   ► But the more I think about it the more it feels like air mail is the only option for power users

01:15:11 ◼   ► And I would love to have more options and I would love to have you know

01:15:16 ◼   ► different approaches to power user email on iOS. Because airmail is fantastic and I love the app,

01:15:22 ◼   ► but it doesn't have the most polished interface and it's not as fast or as

01:15:29 ◼   ► glitch free as I would like it to be. I would love to have an app that is as polished as Apple Mail and

01:15:36 ◼   ► as powerful as airmail, but that's not possible yet. And I

01:15:41 ◼   ► continue to try email clients on a regular basis.

01:15:45 ◼   ► Newton could be an interesting contender, but they lack several of these features that I mentioned.

01:15:55 ◼   ► And I feel like these apps, Gmail, Outlook, Email by EasilyDo, there are so many.

01:16:06 ◼   ► They tend to have the same basic feature set.

01:16:10 ◼   ► Every email client likes to do snoozing these days,

01:16:14 ◼   ► but they don't go the extra mile

01:16:17 ◼   ► to be more like an email client on the Mac.

01:16:22 ◼   ► And I feel like whenever I have to do

01:16:25 ◼   ► some more complex email management,

01:16:27 ◼   ► that isn't really complex if you talk to any Mac user,

01:16:30 ◼   ► I need to go through so many hoops on iOS,

01:16:33 ◼   ► or I just need to use airmail.

01:16:35 ◼   ► But I'd like to have more choice.

01:16:37 ◼   ► - Yeah, I see what you're saying, right?

01:16:40 ◼   ► 'cause I think a lot of the mindset

01:16:41 ◼   ► that people take these days

01:16:43 ◼   ► when they're creating apps like this

01:16:44 ◼   ► is to try and make them simple, right?

01:16:46 ◼   ► To try and do a lot of things for you.

01:16:48 ◼   ► - I don't want simple.

01:16:49 ◼   ► - Exactly, this is one of the applications

01:16:52 ◼   ► where I think you can go super granular,

01:16:54 ◼   ► which is why I like AirMail,

01:16:55 ◼   ► because it is the most of all of them, right?

01:16:58 ◼   ► Like it has like a million settings,

01:16:59 ◼   ► but an email application, I want a million settings, right?

01:17:03 ◼   ► That is like the one type of app that I can think of

01:17:06 ◼   ► where I wanna get super granular

01:17:08 ◼   ► over the way that I do things,

01:17:10 ◼   ► email is definitely one of them.

01:17:13 ◼   ► So I'm going to go with an easy one for my first pick, like it's an obvious one, but

01:17:17 ◼   ► just the way that audio is dealt with on iOS is so frustrating. All I want to be able to

01:17:23 ◼   ► do is to have a Skype call and record it. It would be amazing if I could get it in one

01:17:28 ◼   ► place I would obviously ideally like two places, right, like I can have on the Mac, right,

01:17:31 ◼   ► I'm recording with Ecamm call recorder and audio hijack for redundancy right now. Basically

01:17:37 ◼   ► I can't ever feel comfortable moving to an iOS workflow for recording podcasts until

01:17:44 ◼   ► I can do this because I need the redundancy. I have had enough times where a recording

01:17:49 ◼   ► has failed and I want to have it in two places because if I lose it, well, that's gone now.

01:17:54 ◼   ► I really just want to see iOS become more capable when it comes to dealing with audio

01:18:00 ◼   ► streams through applications. Please do not send me links to that thing. You know what

01:18:05 ◼   ► I'm talking about that came with GarageBand that like spec where you could have audio

01:18:10 ◼   ► being recorded.

01:18:11 ◼   ► Oh yeah, oh no.

01:18:12 ◼   ► I don't want, I know about it, no one supports it so don't send me it, I'm not interested.

01:18:16 ◼   ► We need like, Apple needs to create just a new framework for the way that audio is dealt

01:18:21 ◼   ► so applications can take control of it.

01:18:23 ◼   ► And it's not about Skype having the ability to record, it's other apps being able to record

01:18:29 ◼   ► Skype.

01:18:30 ◼   ► That's what needs to happen.

01:18:31 ◼   ► Right.

01:18:32 ◼   ► Yep, I totally agree with you.

01:18:35 ◼   ► So mine, I'm actually stealing one from you because I ran into it just a couple of nights

01:18:40 ◼   ► ago, which is better rich text support.

01:18:43 ◼   ► So I wasn't going to say it one today because I've said it so many times.

01:18:47 ◼   ► So I'm pleased that you picked it.

01:18:49 ◼   ► Yeah.

01:18:50 ◼   ► Well, it burned me down the other night where I was trying to copy an outline from notes

01:18:55 ◼   ► into mail, I think, or into air mail.

01:18:58 ◼   ► And basically it just stripped all the formatting away.

01:19:00 ◼   ► So it's like just a bunch of texts like that's not at all what I want.

01:19:04 ◼   ► And apps have to implement different controls for outlines, bold, italics, etc.

01:19:10 ◼   ► And things really break down if you try to move a lot of text around.

01:19:13 ◼   ► Myke, the example you always use, I'm copying stuff from Google Sheets into an email and

01:19:19 ◼   ► I just get the contents of the sale, but no structure from the sale.

01:19:23 ◼   ► It's like, well, that's not really at all what I wanted.

01:19:27 ◼   ► So it's really twofold.

01:19:28 ◼   ► I mean, that's a way to do it.

01:19:30 ◼   ► It's not the way that anybody expects.

01:19:31 ◼   ► Don't you want minimalism in your spreadsheets, Myke?

01:19:36 ◼   ► One app at a time.

01:19:39 ◼   ► For me it's twofold.

01:19:40 ◼   ► It's that sort of support that if I copy something you need to retain the formatting.

01:19:44 ◼   ► On the Mac it does that and you can also paste without formatting.

01:19:49 ◼   ► Paste as plain text on the Mac where I just get the content of the cells for instance

01:19:53 ◼   ► and not the structure of them.

01:19:55 ◼   ► So on the Mac you have both options and I think that it would be pick whichever one

01:20:00 ◼   ► is the default and then have the other one in that pop-up so I can say you know

01:20:03 ◼   ► paste with or without formatting would be really nice and the the flip side of

01:20:07 ◼   ► it is that all these apps do it differently right so if you look at just

01:20:11 ◼   ► note-taking apps if you look at bear Evernote and notes they all have

01:20:15 ◼   ► different implementations for creating outlines and for stylizing text and

01:20:21 ◼   ► Google Docs has its own like that should be standardized and it's it's a little

01:20:27 ◼   ► bananas to me that it's been so long and it hasn't been. My next complaint really

01:20:35 ◼   ► is about downloading files or saving web pages with Safari on iOS. I love

01:20:43 ◼   ► Safari and I don't use Google Chrome. I really do think Safari and

01:20:49 ◼   ► Apple Notes are two of Apple's best apps on iOS. I have a problem every time

01:20:56 ◼   ► might need to download the file. There's no download manager interface on iOS.

01:21:01 ◼   ► On the Mac when you download something it goes into the downloads pop-up in Safari

01:21:06 ◼   ► so you can view the progress, you can view the download speeds and all that

01:21:10 ◼   ► and you can actually click a button to reveal the download in the Finder.

01:21:14 ◼   ► There's no download manager interface on iOS, there's no single location for

01:21:20 ◼   ► downloading files. Apple made some improvements with iOS 10 so now when you

01:21:25 ◼   ► click a link to a zip file, for example, the address bar in Safari, the

01:21:32 ◼   ► blue progress bar, that will reflect the download progress. But there's no actual

01:21:38 ◼   ► information about the download size of a file, you don't get any message. So you

01:21:44 ◼   ► just tap a link and then you're like "Oh, okay, I guess it is downloading now, maybe?"

01:21:49 ◼   ► Eventually, after the download is complete, you get this screen with

01:21:55 ◼   ► an opening menu and with the option to open the file in one of the apps that

01:21:59 ◼   ► you have installed. So I can live with that I guess, but one of my biggest

01:22:06 ◼   ► problems is I cannot save web pages as HTML sources in Safari on iOS. The other

01:22:17 ◼   ► day, so we're looking to update the free sample that we provide people on the, you

01:22:23 ◼   ► for the Club Maxories newsletter. We have a free sample that you can read online right now, but it's

01:22:29 ◼   ► from issue 5, I think nearly two years ago, and I wanted to download one of my most recent issues

01:22:37 ◼   ► and convert it to HTML, make some adjustments to the webpage, and send it to my developers so that

01:22:46 ◼   ► we could update the free sample. So I was in Safari, I was looking at this newsletter's web view on the

01:22:53 ◼   ► MailChimp website and I realized well I cannot save this to HTML on iOS and I

01:22:59 ◼   ► know I could have done it in a bunch of ways I could have.

01:23:03 ◼   ► - iCab probably right like I'm sure iCab has everything.

01:23:07 ◼   ► - Probably iCab but it was just I needed that file quickly there was Sylvia next to me working on her

01:23:15 ◼   ► MacBook Pro and I was like look I'm gonna drop you a link can you just open

01:23:20 ◼   ► the page and save it to HTML. That's heartbreak man. I know but it just I

01:23:24 ◼   ► needed to I know and you know coming from me I guess it's gonna be a

01:23:28 ◼   ► surprise but it's just I realized I was just I needed that file in a few seconds

01:23:34 ◼   ► I didn't want to go you know start a new research on okay let's look at what app

01:23:39 ◼   ► can download a web page for me you know because it could have been a 30 minute

01:23:43 ◼   ► rabbit hole you know there and then so I was like... Tichy we're losing all our

01:23:48 ◼   ► credit today man. I'm just being honest. People have this idea of me being, I

01:23:53 ◼   ► don't know, the savior of the iPad. It's just, no. I stumble upon the same

01:24:00 ◼   ► problems as every other person trying to work from the iPad. But

01:24:05 ◼   ► it's one thing to admit it and another to pretend that everything's fine, the

01:24:10 ◼   ► iPad is perfect, the iPad is great. It is great, I love it, but it has problems. And

01:24:14 ◼   ► And this is one of the problems downloading stuff.

01:24:19 ◼   ► I could use apps and I know, I recommended those apps,

01:24:25 ◼   ► for example, Documents by Reedo as a download UI.

01:24:29 ◼   ► Textastic probably could have handled the download for me

01:24:32 ◼   ► or iCab or Pythonista or Workflow.

01:24:34 ◼   ► There are a bunch of options, but it should be a default

01:24:37 ◼   ► and it should be easy for everyone.

01:24:40 ◼   ► There are some things you shouldn't need an app for.

01:24:43 ◼   ► That is something, I'm gonna break through Robin for a second.

01:24:47 ◼   ► That, what you just said, sums up so much frustration I think a lot of people feel about

01:24:53 ◼   ► iPad productivity.

01:24:54 ◼   ► That it's one thing for the three of us, we have the three of us to say, "Oh, just use

01:24:59 ◼   ► Workflow for this or just download iCab."

01:25:02 ◼   ► That's fine and that stuff is there for those of us who know that it's there and who want

01:25:06 ◼   ► to pursue that.

01:25:07 ◼   ► But there's so much just simple stuff in iOS

01:25:11 ◼   ► that should be there that isn't.

01:25:13 ◼   ► I mean, downloads for Safari, some of Safari's

01:25:17 ◼   ► like the best example I can think of of this.

01:25:19 ◼   ► Like people need to do that.

01:25:21 ◼   ► And Apple has not solved that problem for them yet.

01:25:24 ◼   ► And maybe they never will, maybe they haven't gotten to it.

01:25:26 ◼   ► You can never tell.

01:25:27 ◼   ► But I think that's where a lot of people

01:25:29 ◼   ► sort of get frustrated with wanting to move to an iPad

01:25:32 ◼   ► or even hearing how the two of you have done it.

01:25:35 ◼   ► Well, that's fine for them because they know

01:25:36 ◼   ► to use workflow, but the rest of us mere mortals can't do it.

01:25:41 ◼   ► So I like that we're doing this today to help deal with that because I think it's a complaint

01:25:45 ◼   ► that we see in our emails, a complaint that we hear, and I think it's a fair one a lot

01:25:50 ◼   ► of the time.

01:25:52 ◼   ► But yeah, so Myke, I think you're up next.

01:25:56 ◼   ► On my Mac, I use Spaces a lot because I like to have corresponding applications grouped

01:26:01 ◼   ► together just so I know where they are, right?

01:26:04 ◼   ► So it makes sense to me.

01:26:05 ◼   ► I have the stuff that I'm using for recording on one space.

01:26:07 ◼   ► I have like Twitter and Slack on another space.

01:26:10 ◼   ► I would love to be able to have these types of defaults

01:26:12 ◼   ► in iOS, so like if I activate the multitasking menu,

01:26:15 ◼   ► I could have a bar at the top,

01:26:16 ◼   ► which is common pairings of applications

01:26:19 ◼   ► that I have suggested.

01:26:21 ◼   ► So like I could tap a button and Notes and Chrome

01:26:24 ◼   ► would just open side by side next to each other.

01:26:26 ◼   ► So like I didn't have to go through the dance

01:26:28 ◼   ► of opening one application and opening another application.

01:26:31 ◼   ► Like I just wanna be able to have a UI,

01:26:34 ◼   ► which is like an iOS version of Spaces, where I can just bring up the application

01:26:38 ◼   ► pairings that I use frequently.

01:26:40 ◼   ► I don't want like window management, right?

01:26:44 ◼   ► Because I prefer the iOS way of doing things, but I do miss like having the

01:26:49 ◼   ► shortcuts or just like things being in the same place like they are on the Mac.

01:26:54 ◼   ► And if I could have something on iOS, which was like a bridge between those two

01:26:58 ◼   ► things, that would make me very happy.

01:26:59 ◼   ► Yeah, totally.

01:27:01 ◼   ► I can see that because you don't want the complexity of resizing windows.

01:27:06 ◼   ► I generally don't like the idea that is going around lately of let's bring overlapping windows

01:27:12 ◼   ► to the iPad.

01:27:13 ◼   ► I really don't like that, but I would love to have easier multitasking management for

01:27:18 ◼   ► multiple things at the same time, maybe even three apps at the same time on the iPad Pro.

01:27:22 ◼   ► I could see that.

01:27:23 ◼   ► I just don't want to manage resizing from the corners or overlapping stuff, but I totally

01:27:29 ◼   ► get that and I totally agree.

01:27:30 ◼   ► That would be awesome.

01:27:31 ◼   ► It'd be cool.

01:27:35 ◼   ► So mine is actually related to yours, Fedor Go, on downloading.

01:27:39 ◼   ► And mine is just having a place to stick files temporarily.

01:27:43 ◼   ► So a workflow that I do a lot on my Mac, I mean multiple times a week, sometimes every

01:27:47 ◼   ► day of the week, is I keep up with the expenses for Relay.

01:27:52 ◼   ► So anytime we pay our hosts or we pay our web hosting company or a developer or designer,

01:28:01 ◼   ► my end of the business is to pay those people and then to make sure that those records are

01:28:04 ◼   ► entered into FreshBooks, which is the system that we use.

01:28:08 ◼   ► We use them long before they were a sponsor.

01:28:10 ◼   ► And that workflow is really simple on my Mac.

01:28:12 ◼   ► I take the email receipt that I get or, you know, a lot of these places will, you know,

01:28:17 ◼   ► you pay somebody and you can download a PDF receipt right there on the web page.

01:28:21 ◼   ► I'll either create or save that PDF onto my desktop.

01:28:24 ◼   ► I'll go to FreshBooks, I'll enter the expense, and I will attach that PDF receipt to the

01:28:29 ◼   ► expense so I have a paper trail of the money that I'm spending out of the company.

01:28:34 ◼   ► Like I said, I do this all the time.

01:28:37 ◼   ► And I do it on my Mac because it's much faster and much easier.

01:28:42 ◼   ► Now you can create a PDF on iOS from a bunch of different ways.

01:28:46 ◼   ► can do it from the print screen if you know the really stupid like hidden PDF

01:28:51 ◼   ► make button thing that you have to like what is it you have to force touch on

01:28:54 ◼   ► the iPhone or like squeeze in on iOS like just make it a button Apple just

01:28:59 ◼   ► make it a stupid button if you use air mail fuse other other apps you can do it

01:29:04 ◼   ► a bunch of different ways you can use workflow to create a PDF but then you

01:29:08 ◼   ► have to stick it somewhere so you can create a PDF and you can upload it to

01:29:11 ◼   ► iCloud Drive so in my iCloud Drive I have a folder called temp where if I do

01:29:16 ◼   ► I do this sort of thing, I have a place to stick it.

01:29:19 ◼   ► You can put it on Dropbox.

01:29:21 ◼   ► But it's a lot of dancing around.

01:29:22 ◼   ► It's a lot of making the PDF, putting it in a document

01:29:25 ◼   ► provider, going to the browser, attaching the thing,

01:29:28 ◼   ► going back to the document provider.

01:29:30 ◼   ► If you're not using iCloud, you have to tell it, no, I don't

01:29:32 ◼   ► want iCloud, I want it in Dropbox.

01:29:35 ◼   ► And it's all very clumsy.

01:29:36 ◼   ► And it's something that, for something that I do so often,

01:29:41 ◼   ► that speed is super important.

01:29:42 ◼   ► So I can do it on my Mac much faster,

01:29:44 ◼   ► because I can just put it on the desktop

01:29:46 ◼   ► and I know where it is in the file system.

01:29:48 ◼   ► Now I'm not saying Apple should put a file system on iOS.

01:29:52 ◼   ► I think the document picker just needs to be better

01:29:54 ◼   ► and to be faster and to have the option for local storage.

01:29:58 ◼   ► That hey, you know what, I don't wanna wait

01:30:00 ◼   ► for iCloud Drive to pull this in.

01:30:02 ◼   ► I don't wanna wait for Dropbox to sync.

01:30:04 ◼   ► I just wanna put it in this folder for like four seconds

01:30:06 ◼   ► so I can go put it somewhere else.

01:30:08 ◼   ► And that sort of like local cache,

01:30:11 ◼   ► like I don't need Finder.

01:30:13 ◼   ► You could do that in the document provider interface.

01:30:16 ◼   ► Just give me a local option that's fast.

01:30:19 ◼   ► And that would definitely-- especially coupled

01:30:23 ◼   ► with PDF creation, which has been built into OS X since day

01:30:25 ◼   ► one, because fun fact, all the graphics in OS X

01:30:28 ◼   ► are powered by PDF.

01:30:30 ◼   ► And that's all been built in for the Mac for a long time.

01:30:33 ◼   ► And so making PDFs being faster, getting to them faster

01:30:37 ◼   ► in a file system would definitely

01:30:38 ◼   ► make my life on the iPad a lot better.

01:30:41 ◼   ► So there you go, nothing's perfect including iOS.

01:30:47 ◼   ► Thank you so much for listening to this week's episode of Connected.

01:30:50 ◼   ► If you'd like to find our show notes head on over to relay.fm/connected/132.

01:30:55 ◼   ► If you want to find Federico online he is @Vittici on Twitter, V-I-T-I-C-C-I and @MacStories.net.

01:31:02 ◼   ► Steven is at 512pixels.net and he is @ismh on Twitter and I am @imike_I-M-Y-K-E.

01:31:09 ◼   ► Thanks again to our sponsors this week for supporting the show.

01:31:11 ◼   ► That's Away, Casper and Squarespace.

01:31:13 ◼   ► And most of all, thank you for listening.

01:31:15 ◼   ► Until next time, say goodbye, guys.

01:31:18 ◼   ► Arrivederci. Adios.

01:31:19 ◼   ► [ Silence ]