Connected

00:00:00 ◼   ► (upbeat music)

00:00:02 ◼   ► - From Relay FM, this is Connected, episode 17.

00:00:10 ◼   ► This week's episode of Connected is brought to you by

00:00:13 ◼   ► ICONic, the ultimate tribute to Apple innovation and design.

00:00:16 ◼   ► Harry's, an exceptional shave at a fraction of the price

00:00:20 ◼   ► and i-Snap menus, an advanced system monitor

00:00:22 ◼   ► for your max menu bar.

00:00:24 ◼   ► My name is Myke Hurley and I am joined, as I always am,

00:00:26 ◼   ► by Mr. Federico Vittucci.

00:00:27 ◼   ► Hi Federico.

00:00:29 ◼   ► Hello Myke, good evening to you.

00:00:31 ◼   ► Good evening to you Federico, and good evening to you Steven Hackett as well.

00:00:35 ◼   ► Hey boys, what's up?

00:00:36 ◼   ► How are you?

00:00:37 ◼   ► A little sick.

00:00:39 ◼   ► I thought I would just allow you to demo that so people didn't think that your voice had

00:00:43 ◼   ► changed.

00:00:44 ◼   ► No, I'm here with my friends and I'm ready to talk about some things and after this I'm

00:00:49 ◼   ► gonna go sleep for like 36 hours.

00:00:51 ◼   ► It's great.

00:00:53 ◼   ► I'm not sure that's like the right amount of sleep you're supposed to get.

00:00:58 ◼   ► I'm pretty sure the Apple Health app cannot track that much sleep.

00:01:01 ◼   ► I don't think it can track anything very well.

00:01:05 ◼   ► No, they fixed it.

00:01:07 ◼   ► In fact, I was looking on Twitter today, there's a new iOS 8.2 beta.

00:01:12 ◼   ► I'm sorry, Myke, I'm just starting up with a quick topic.

00:01:15 ◼   ► Do you mind?

00:01:16 ◼   ► No.

00:01:17 ◼   ► So there's a new iOS 8.2 beta and they added some new HealthKit stuff, I think, like a

00:01:24 ◼   ► new gender option.

00:01:26 ◼   ► really a welcome change. Yeah. Good. I don't know, Steven measuring Salipo

00:01:31 ◼   ► made me think of HealthKit. It's been a while since we talked about it.

00:01:35 ◼   ► What if I mentioned rage, do you also think about HealthKit? No. Think about

00:01:41 ◼   ► iCloud Drive, but that's another topic. Can HealthKit monitor your anger towards HealthKit?

00:01:47 ◼   ► Well, it can monitor your heart pressure. I think heart pressure.

00:01:53 ◼   ► Heart pressure.

00:01:54 ◼   ► Heart pressure.

00:01:55 ◼   ► Sounds scary.

00:01:56 ◼   ► If I have heart pressure, I need to know.

00:01:59 ◼   ► Yeah, you probably need a physician.

00:02:02 ◼   ► Federico, you make my heart pressure go up.

00:02:05 ◼   ► I know.

00:02:06 ◼   ► That's always a problem.

00:02:09 ◼   ► I'm so excited for the follow-up.

00:02:11 ◼   ► So sent in by a stupidly awesome friend of the show, Alan, which I agreed I would call

00:02:17 ◼   ► him, sending this in, Evan wrote a blog post about context.

00:02:22 ◼   ► And there was a couple of points now, I will read them and then I will talk about them.

00:02:26 ◼   ► Is this advertising?

00:02:28 ◼   ► Is one of the questions in their frequently asked questions document.

00:02:32 ◼   ► No, Evernote does not get paid based on the number of views or clicks.

00:02:36 ◼   ► We have no financial incentive to show any articles or other content.

00:02:40 ◼   ► We only show things that we think are useful to our users.

00:02:42 ◼   ► We don't share user account information with our partners.

00:02:45 ◼   ► And we allow users to determine which contact sources they want to see or turn this feature

00:02:50 ◼   ► off completely.

00:02:51 ◼   ► How does Evernote make money from context?

00:02:53 ◼   ► Evernote makes money by providing products and features end users are happy for.

00:02:57 ◼   ► We think context is a powerful feature that will help people do their best, most informed

00:03:01 ◼   ► work.

00:03:02 ◼   ► It's one of several features that people enjoy when they sign up for Evernote Premium or

00:03:06 ◼   ► Evernote Business.

00:03:07 ◼   ► Obviously we were talking about this a couple of weeks ago, we had a big discussion about

00:03:10 ◼   ► Evernote context and I said that we had no proof that they were paid for putting it in

00:03:16 ◼   ► there.

00:03:17 ◼   ► You guys potentially believed that they were paid?

00:03:20 ◼   ► This article does kind of dance around a little bit, so we can't be 100% sure.

00:03:25 ◼   ► However, we do all the only proof.

00:03:30 ◼   ► We have no financial incentive to show any articles or other content.

00:03:34 ◼   ► That one sounds better than the first.

00:03:35 ◼   ► If they would have just said that, we have no financial incentive to show any articles

00:03:39 ◼   ► or other content, I would have felt better about it.

00:03:41 ◼   ► It does still seem a bit weird, however, I said, "Show me the proof."

00:03:45 ◼   ► This is all the proof we have right now, is them saying that they do not get paid for

00:03:48 ◼   ► it.

00:03:49 ◼   ► I will chalk this up as a win for me.

00:03:51 ◼   ► - And then wait for the follow up. - And we were wrong.

00:03:54 ◼   ► - I'm joking. - When I'm wrong,

00:03:56 ◼   ► - Don't speak for me. - I am gonna say that I'm,

00:03:58 ◼   ► no, okay, when I'm wrong, I'm gonna say that I'm wrong.

00:04:00 ◼   ► So you were right, Myke.

00:04:01 ◼   ► - Thanks. - This is, I guess, good news.

00:04:03 ◼   ► Just two points, if you allow me.

00:04:07 ◼   ► - Of course.

00:04:08 ◼   ► - The first one is that I still think

00:04:10 ◼   ► it's not really useful.

00:04:11 ◼   ► - I agree with that.

00:04:13 ◼   ► - Not in this first version.

00:04:15 ◼   ► It's pretty much useless for me.

00:04:16 ◼   ► Like I said, I would really like the ability

00:04:18 ◼   ► to at least have some kind of control over the sources.

00:04:21 ◼   ► Not just, I know that you can turn it off

00:04:25 ◼   ► or select specific sources.

00:04:27 ◼   ► I would just like to add any RSS feed.

00:04:32 ◼   ► The second point, I don't like that Evernote is,

00:04:37 ◼   ► I mean, I told the app to turn off the feature

00:04:39 ◼   ► and it got automatically turned on again.

00:04:44 ◼   ► - No, that's bad. - We cannot display a message.

00:04:47 ◼   ► So that was really, like it's not the right thing to do.

00:04:51 ◼   ► And I know for sure, I'm 100% sure

00:04:55 ◼   ► that I turned off the feature.

00:04:56 ◼   ► And today it was turned on again.

00:04:59 ◼   ► And I'm getting, basically once a day,

00:05:04 ◼   ► I'm getting messages in the Evernote app for iOS

00:05:08 ◼   ► to try the new work chat, to try the new sharing features.

00:05:12 ◼   ► And every time I dismiss these messages

00:05:14 ◼   ► and I keep getting these messages in the inbox when I'm opening search.

00:05:18 ◼   ► And I don't know why they got so aggressive to tell me about all these features.

00:05:24 ◼   ► I mean, they should at least look at my account and they can tell.

00:05:29 ◼   ► I've been using Evernote since 2009.

00:05:32 ◼   ► I have a lot of notes in Evernote.

00:05:34 ◼   ► I don't need tips, especially every day.

00:05:38 ◼   ► So yeah, hopefully they will get better at managing these sort of messages.

00:05:43 ◼   ► Yeah, the WorkChat thing is driving me crazy.

00:05:45 ◼   ► It definitely is still feeling misguided.

00:05:47 ◼   ► You're finding it useful?

00:05:49 ◼   ► You're finding it useful guys.

00:05:50 ◼   ► I've never used WorkChat, I don't even know how to or why I would.

00:05:54 ◼   ► I just talk to people outside of Evernote, it's perfectly fine.

00:05:57 ◼   ► I mean, I think part of our complaint is still valid.

00:06:03 ◼   ► It does, like, the sentence about it's one of several features that people enjoy when they sign up for Premium or Business.

00:06:10 ◼   ► it still seems misguided.

00:06:13 ◼   ► And to y'all's point, maybe not all that useful

00:06:18 ◼   ► unless they give it some more options.

00:06:20 ◼   ► And so it might not be as creepy as we had thought,

00:06:23 ◼   ► but I think it still is like a warning sign

00:06:26 ◼   ► that Evernote's vision, I guess, for their product

00:06:31 ◼   ► and what they provide their users is not in line with ours.

00:06:34 ◼   ► And you know, it's something that I use

00:06:38 ◼   ► and rely on every day.

00:06:39 ◼   ► That makes me a little bit worried.

00:06:41 ◼   ► Yeah, I shared the same feeling.

00:06:44 ◼   ► I was just thinking about this for the past couple of days,

00:06:48 ◼   ► the fact that there's no real alternative to Evernote,

00:06:51 ◼   ► at least for the stuff that I want to do,

00:06:53 ◼   ► like rich notes with images and documents inside the notes,

00:06:57 ◼   ► the ability to clip content from Safari,

00:06:59 ◼   ► the ability to append rich text, so no plain text,

00:07:03 ◼   ► to append rich text to the bottom of an existing note.

00:07:07 ◼   ► Like all these features that I struggle to find a good alternative that is as popular and supported as Evernote.

00:07:14 ◼   ► So when they do this kind of stuff it kind of makes me sad because I know that I need to stick with it.

00:07:21 ◼   ► And yeah, basically I'm a little sad.

00:07:24 ◼   ► But also I'm not like super sad because I trust Evernote.

00:07:30 ◼   ► I know there's people there who genuinely care so I'm optimistic this time.

00:07:36 ◼   ► this time. I want to be in general, I want to be more optimistic guys on this show. I

00:07:41 ◼   ► feel like lately lately I've been... Debbie Downer. Yeah. Yeah, we got called that on

00:07:49 ◼   ► Twitter. And there's the iTunes review, right? Yeah, there's the one iTunes review. We need

00:07:54 ◼   ► to be happier. It's an hour of moaning. We need to be... So from today on, only happy

00:08:00 ◼   ► topics.

00:08:01 ◼   ► Okay.

00:08:02 ◼   ► Well, then you're not going to like topic one.

00:08:05 ◼   ► Only happy topics.

00:08:07 ◼   ► Well then thanks so much for listening to this week's episode.

00:08:12 ◼   ► So we had some follow up from Jimmy on Twitter where he tried looking at the show notes on

00:08:19 ◼   ► his Nintendo Wii and it didn't go very well.

00:08:24 ◼   ► I would like to point out before you guys talk about video games for half an hour how

00:08:28 ◼   ► hilariously ridiculous the Wii interface looks in this picture like look at those

00:08:33 ◼   ► buttons what what is happening here if they were big how would you see them

00:08:37 ◼   ► it's a TV come on well it doesn't have to be like ugly oh it's a difference

00:08:43 ◼   ► between it's different to big so how's the Wii browser I imagine it's pretty

00:08:47 ◼   ► terrible I have a story but if Myke wants to to share his thoughts I might

00:08:54 ◼   ► go first. I've never used the Wii browser. Never? You never had a Wii? Yeah I just never used the

00:09:02 ◼   ► browser. Why? Not even out of curiosity? Not that I can remember. Maybe I did but I don't remember.

00:09:09 ◼   ► No you did. I'm pretty sure you did. Come on. Are you watching? It was...

00:09:13 ◼   ► Wow. Yeah I don't know. I'm pretty sure you did. It's like the browser in your Kindle.

00:09:20 ◼   ► You have one, but that doesn't mean you should use it.

00:09:23 ◼   ► So I have a story about the Wii browser.

00:09:26 ◼   ► It's basically how I started using YouTube.

00:09:31 ◼   ► My first experience with YouTube was on the Wii browser.

00:09:35 ◼   ► I think it was back in 2007.

00:09:38 ◼   ► I don't know when YouTube launched.

00:09:40 ◼   ► Was it 2005 or 2006?

00:09:42 ◼   ► I cannot remember.

00:09:44 ◼   ► So after high school, I started going to university, or as Americans call it, to college, I guess.

00:09:54 ◼   ► And in my brief experience there, like four months, I shared this apartment with other

00:10:03 ◼   ► friends and we were not exactly computer savvy back then.

00:10:12 ◼   ► It was really different back then.

00:10:13 ◼   ► We all had Nokia phones, we didn't have smartphones, there was no concept of apps yet, because

00:10:22 ◼   ► the iPhone just came out in the US, it wasn't really popular in Italy, so we had dumb phones.

00:10:31 ◼   ► And we had computers of course, but I'm pretty sure my friends only used them for music and

00:10:39 ◼   ► photos.

00:10:40 ◼   ► So we wanted to go, for some reason, I don't know why, we wanted to go to YouTube one night

00:10:47 ◼   ► and we wanted to have YouTube on a big screen and you can understand this was really like

00:10:54 ◼   ► a new experience for us because we never, we were, like I'm pretty sure only two of

00:10:59 ◼   ► us, we were six people, only two of us knew what YouTube was so we used the Wii browser

00:11:08 ◼   ► to put YouTube on the TV screen.

00:11:10 ◼   ► And I remember we were really impressed by the fact that you could stream all these videos.

00:11:20 ◼   ► It sounds crazy that because YouTube is now as obvious as Google search, right?

00:11:24 ◼   ► To me.

00:11:25 ◼   ► I mean, it's like when you think of the web, you think of Google, Gmail, YouTube, this

00:11:29 ◼   ► kind of stuff.

00:11:30 ◼   ► And my first experience with this, with YouTube was on the Wii browser, which was terrible,

00:11:36 ◼   ► really, really terrible, as the screenshots suggest.

00:11:40 ◼   ► And it's just a little memory that I have when I think of the Wii browser,

00:11:45 ◼   ► which I think was based on Opera, by the way,

00:11:48 ◼   ► because Nintendo has always done stuff with the Opera browser.

00:11:50 ◼   ► Yeah, because they had the Opera DS.

00:11:53 ◼   ► On the DS, and I'm pretty sure the Wii was also Opera-based, I guess,

00:11:58 ◼   ► with the custom interface, of course, because Nintendo really wanted to do

00:12:00 ◼   ► the large buttons that you could activate.

00:12:04 ◼   ► You could point the Wiimote at the buttons in the browser,

00:12:08 ◼   ► and I'm pretty sure I remember it would recognize the pointer from the Wiimote.

00:12:13 ◼   ► It was kind of cool. But also terrible. Terrible and kind of cool.

00:12:18 ◼   ► Like a nice demo for like 20 minutes and that's it.

00:12:22 ◼   ► - Steven, what's next in our follow-up?

00:12:26 ◼   ► - So, a friend of the internet, Greg Pierce,

00:12:29 ◼   ► who we're going to get to a little bit later, I think,

00:12:33 ◼   ► has a new ringtone

00:12:34 ◼   ► and it is us uh...

00:12:36 ◼   ► it was the... I guess you put it in the beginning of the show didn't you? All of us groaning

00:12:40 ◼   ► when I said today widgets.

00:12:42 ◼   ► So Greg's had a hard time and I'm glad that we can help him through this time of

00:12:46 ◼   ► pain and suffering

00:12:48 ◼   ► and uh... he has a link to the MP3 if you want to make it your ringtone

00:12:53 ◼   ► if you want to hear us be sad all the time

00:12:56 ◼   ► Maybe if I'm wrong

00:12:58 ◼   ► I should make it the the sound effect when uh...

00:13:01 ◼   ► Matt Alexander sends me a text message.

00:13:03 ◼   ► It's like, I always wanted to have a text ringtone with Myke just saying

00:13:12 ◼   ► superb with his accent.

00:13:15 ◼   ► Oh man.

00:13:16 ◼   ► Would you like me to give you a clear, like a clear clip here so you can cut it

00:13:20 ◼   ► out?

00:13:20 ◼   ► Please.

00:13:20 ◼   ► Yes.

00:13:21 ◼   ► Superb.

00:13:23 ◼   ► See, I'm just going to use my MP3 editing app of choice on my iPad.

00:13:31 ◼   ► I'm guessing there must be one.

00:13:33 ◼   ► Well, you can use GarageBand to actually make returns.

00:13:36 ◼   ► Yeah, I can use GarageBand.

00:13:38 ◼   ► That's a mic tip right there.

00:13:40 ◼   ► Done.

00:13:41 ◼   ► No, you cannot use tips.

00:13:44 ◼   ► You gotta have another brand.

00:13:45 ◼   ► Okay, mic posit.

00:13:47 ◼   ► Stop.

00:13:48 ◼   ► Okay, I am fine with that.

00:13:53 ◼   ► We spoke last week about the idea of an ideal social network, and we ended up talking a

00:13:59 ◼   ► about App.net and sort of what was good about it and there was a lot of good in

00:14:05 ◼   ► that App.net little moment of time. But one that I didn't think about until the

00:14:10 ◼   ► other day was Path and you know we'll get to some of it in a second but you

00:14:16 ◼   ► know Path is it's app based I don't know if they have a web interface you can do

00:14:20 ◼   ► much with and you can it's sort of like a combination of like Foursquare you can

00:14:24 ◼   ► check in places you can edit and post photos sort of like Instagram you can

00:14:28 ◼   ► send direct messages, they've kind of broken it off to a separate app like Facebook and

00:14:32 ◼   ► Facebook Messenger.

00:14:33 ◼   ► Mm-hmm.

00:14:34 ◼   ► And all this kind of gets built into a timeline.

00:14:36 ◼   ► So I can scroll back and I can see places, you know, like where Myke checked in a coffee

00:14:40 ◼   ► shop.

00:14:41 ◼   ► I can see Federico's picture of his coffee.

00:14:42 ◼   ► You know, I can see, you know, Malek Zander, a picture of a mannequin.

00:14:47 ◼   ► It kind of is all like one mashed up timeline.

00:14:50 ◼   ► And Path, the app, at least I've redownloaded it this week and logged in.

00:14:53 ◼   ► I've been playing with it.

00:14:54 ◼   ► The app is really nice.

00:14:56 ◼   ► And I think those guys do a really good job at the experience of using the network.

00:15:01 ◼   ► Which is a big deal, talking with Twitter apps versus API and stuff.

00:15:07 ◼   ► Path like it is, everything's an app.

00:15:10 ◼   ► You can't go out and build your own path app.

00:15:13 ◼   ► I think what hurt Path, they've kind of got a little bit of a spotted past.

00:15:17 ◼   ► There's two links in the show notes about them kind of doing some creepy things with

00:15:23 ◼   ► address book information.

00:15:24 ◼   ► And I think that's all in the past, I couldn't find anything recent, but I think it hurt

00:15:28 ◼   ► their reputation, at least amongst people like us who, you know, are going to be sort

00:15:35 ◼   ► of more critical of things like that.

00:15:37 ◼   ► Well it also started off as a different type of social network, where I had the Donbar

00:15:41 ◼   ► number, 150 people restriction on the amount of people that could be in your contacts.

00:15:45 ◼   ► I'd forgotten about that.

00:15:46 ◼   ► Is that still in place?

00:15:48 ◼   ► No, they've lifted that now.

00:15:49 ◼   ► I also think you gotta have two phones to use Path.

00:15:53 ◼   ► I did hear that actually.

00:15:54 ◼   ► I think now you have one phone which has the main timeline, and you have another phone

00:16:01 ◼   ► which has the DM app.

00:16:03 ◼   ► And I think you use one in the daytime, one in the nighttime, but I can't remember how

00:16:06 ◼   ► that works.

00:16:07 ◼   ► Yeah, so you're always on the... never on the defense.

00:16:12 ◼   ► Always on the offense, yeah.

00:16:13 ◼   ► That's right.

00:16:14 ◼   ► So you can find those links in the show notes.

00:16:17 ◼   ► Federico, if someone were interested in the show notes, where could they acquire them?

00:16:22 ◼   ► Are you sure you want to do this?

00:16:24 ◼   ► I'm always sure.

00:16:25 ◼   ► The show notes can be found on your browser, on the web, and on digital.

00:16:35 ◼   ► You can find it on r/fm/live and you can find it directly.

00:16:42 ◼   ► You can find it on r/fm/connected/dishasset, which is the number of the show notes.

00:16:49 ◼   ► He's trying to do something with the link, with the link that Myke and Steven have,

00:16:56 ◼   ► but at this moment they're not doing anything, they're just saying something.

00:16:59 ◼   ► He's trying to do something.

00:17:03 ◼   ► He's trying to do something.

00:17:05 ◼   ► Is this okay?

00:17:06 ◼   ► Oh, no, thank you, thank you.

00:17:08 ◼   ► I think that that's added a layer of understanding for people that may not have got it before.

00:17:13 ◼   ► Yeah, I want to take connected international, you know?

00:17:19 ◼   ► Worldwide.

00:17:20 ◼   ► Yeah.

00:17:21 ◼   ► This week's episode of Connected, I'm doing this part in English, is brought to you by

00:17:27 ◼   ► iStat Menus from Bajango.

00:17:29 ◼   ► iStat Menus is an advanced system monitor for your max menu bar.

00:17:33 ◼   ► It lets you keep an eye on pretty much every aspect of your Mac's hardware including CPU,

00:17:37 ◼   ► GPU, memory, disk usage and activity, networking, battery temperatures fans and oh so much more.

00:17:44 ◼   ► The new iStat Menus 5 supports Yosemite's dark menu bar as well as many new Yosemite

00:17:49 ◼   ► and Maverick specific features like memory pressure, like heart pressure for your memory

00:17:54 ◼   ► and compressed memory.

00:17:55 ◼   ► iStat Menus also features a new time menu intended to replace the standard OS X time

00:18:00 ◼   ► menu bar item.

00:18:01 ◼   ► It includes loads of info including a calendar, calendar events, sunrise, sunset and world

00:18:05 ◼   ► clock for over 120,000 cities.

00:18:08 ◼   ► This is one of the main reasons that I love and use iStep Menus is I can keep it all in

00:18:11 ◼   ► the menu bar, I'm able to enter in the cities for my co-hosts so I can see them all and

00:18:18 ◼   ► see where they are in their day as well as enable multiple calendars so I can keep a

00:18:21 ◼   ► check on the show broadcasting times all in one place.

00:18:25 ◼   ► In this little guy called Federica Viticiu's review of iStep Menus he says "It's always

00:18:29 ◼   ► there in my max menu bar and it's one of my must-have apps that I mention every year.

00:18:34 ◼   ► You can't argue with Federico, apparently he knows what he's talking about and surely

00:18:37 ◼   ► you must trust his opinion by now. Federico, would you have anything you'd like to add

00:18:40 ◼   ► about iStack Menus 5?

00:18:43 ◼   ► It's really, I think that the first app that I install on a, every time, like every year

00:18:49 ◼   ► when I download a new version of iStack, Django, they usually have an updated version of iStack

00:18:55 ◼   ► menus. So like for the past four years I've always found a new version of iSAT menus for

00:19:02 ◼   ► a new version of OS X. I use it for like my two, I have two main reasons. One is the battery

00:19:10 ◼   ► menu they have and the other is the custom clock menu and I really really like the clock

00:19:17 ◼   ► menu because I need to know quickly time zones for you know all the people that I work with

00:19:24 ◼   ► like you guys and the Max Stories team.

00:19:27 ◼   ► So iSAT menu lets you customize the system clock.

00:19:30 ◼   ► It lets you put on a custom dropdown and you can have a calendar, you can have your calendar

00:19:37 ◼   ► events, you can have time zones, which is awesome for me, and you don't have to have

00:19:42 ◼   ► like 12 icons for all this stuff.

00:19:44 ◼   ► It's just one icon and you click the icon and there's a menu.

00:19:47 ◼   ► There's a bunch of other things, but really just for the battery and the clock menu, for

00:19:52 ◼   ► For me it's absolutely worth it.

00:19:54 ◼   ► You can go crazy with the CPU, all the other kinds of stuff that I don't understand, but

00:19:59 ◼   ► it's really, really nice.

00:20:01 ◼   ► Yeah.

00:20:02 ◼   ► Steven, do you have anything you wanted to add?

00:20:05 ◼   ► Yeah, absolutely.

00:20:07 ◼   ► This is a tool that even as someone who is a power user of OS X, it puts really nice

00:20:12 ◼   ► system information just a glance away.

00:20:15 ◼   ► I don't have to run Activity Monitor.

00:20:17 ◼   ► If I'm concerned about something, I can just look up in the menu bar.

00:20:19 ◼   ► It's great.

00:20:20 ◼   ► you should check it out.

00:20:21 ◼   ► If you do want to check it out, you want to head over to Bajango right now.

00:20:26 ◼   ► Bajango.com.

00:20:27 ◼   ► This is something you should definitely have installed.

00:20:29 ◼   ► You can get a 14-day free trial of iStep Menus 5 right now.

00:20:32 ◼   ► And when you decide to buy, listeners of this show can get a huge 25% off by using the coupon

00:20:37 ◼   ► code "Connected".

00:20:38 ◼   ► Thank you so much to Bajango for supporting this show and Relay FM.

00:20:44 ◼   ► So what's up on the docket today?

00:20:47 ◼   ► So I'm not going to read the topic name because it's obscene, but there's kind of a list of

00:20:54 ◼   ► links at this point in the show notes about the App Store.

00:21:00 ◼   ► Marco block quoted this post from Developer of Launcher, which is this nice little app

00:21:11 ◼   ► that Apple ended up rejecting.

00:21:13 ◼   ► And so basically what these developers were told is that their app was in uncharted territory

00:21:21 ◼   ► and that Apple felt they needed to make an example of it so other developers would not

00:21:25 ◼   ► follow them on this new path of functionality.

00:21:29 ◼   ► So basically making an example out of a popular app to dissuade other developers from doing

00:21:36 ◼   ► things that are sort of, you know, not clearly defined within the rules of the App Store.

00:21:42 ◼   ► Which of course is a ridiculous thing to say to a developer and bad for the ecosystem,

00:21:48 ◼   ► I'm sure we will get into that.

00:21:53 ◼   ► If you look over the last month or so, you know you had Peacock, you have Drafts, which

00:21:58 ◼   ► has been told, Greg's been told all sorts of crazy things about his today widget, and

00:22:04 ◼   ► we have widgets like Evernote, which we were talking about earlier, they have a today widget

00:22:08 ◼   ► where you can go in and launch the app and do some things and that is seemingly

00:22:13 ◼   ► against the rules if drafts can't do it and there's a lot of like weird, somebody

00:22:20 ◼   ► in the chat room is calling "unapple" like things kind of going on around this and

00:22:25 ◼   ► if this is true then it's really pretty unseemly, Mark calls it

00:22:31 ◼   ► disgraceful. Yeah it depends what you consider as "unapple" though right? I mean

00:22:35 ◼   ► because it's heavily controlling which is not on Apple. It's not, you know,

00:22:40 ◼   ► it's definitely the Apple that we have known. I think that maybe we expected it

00:22:46 ◼   ► to be a different Apple now but doesn't look like that's the case.

00:22:50 ◼   ► It's just, I mean, I get what you're saying where, you know, Apple is

00:22:55 ◼   ► controlling the thing and Apple has, I mean, historically in the App Store like

00:23:01 ◼   ► there's been gray area and they go back and forth and you know they allow

00:23:06 ◼   ► certain things for a time and then it you know it gets out of hand they reel

00:23:09 ◼   ► it back and it just seems like maybe it's because iOS 8 opens up all these

00:23:14 ◼   ► new powerful options but it seems like it's getting sort of more out of hand

00:23:19 ◼   ► currently than it has in the past.

00:23:22 ◼   ► I don't know guys I mean I've been thinking about this especially the issue

00:23:30 ◼   ► with panic and transmit and uploading files to iCloud Drive so basically Apple

00:23:38 ◼   ► told the transmit couldn't upload files downloaded from outside the app to

00:23:46 ◼   ► iCloud Drive there only files created inside transmit can be uploaded to and

00:23:53 ◼   ► saved to iCloud Drive so like what's what's the motivation here what's the

00:23:59 ◼   ► problem because I know that Apple is controlling and that's okay. I mean, we're pretty much

00:24:05 ◼   ► used to that at this point. And I know that also, you know, there are gray areas in the

00:24:14 ◼   ► App Store and sometimes you launch a new technology and you don't know what people are going to

00:24:19 ◼   ► do with it, so you gotta basically judge on a case-by-case basis sometimes. So in this

00:24:25 ◼   ► specific case of, because we talked about the widgets before and we theorized that

00:24:31 ◼   ► Apple doesn't want shortcuts to replicate the home screen and all that kind of stuff.

00:24:36 ◼   ► Now in this case, what's the problem? The problem is that Apple doesn't want you

00:24:42 ◼   ► to save any kind of file to iCloud Drive. That is exactly the opposite of the

00:24:48 ◼   ► marketing message on the iCloud Drive website, which specifically says any kind

00:24:54 ◼   ► file on any device. So if Apple didn't think of the possibility of saving any file to iCloud

00:25:01 ◼   ► Drive on iOS, that seems pretty much absurd because you can't save any kind of file to

00:25:08 ◼   ► iCloud Drive on the Mac. You can just use drag and drop.

00:25:12 ◼   ► So it appears to me that the only possible explanation is that there's no... Like, there

00:25:17 ◼   ► was an app reviewer at Apple. There are two different teams, App Review and App Store

00:25:24 ◼   ► editorial. And this guy, I guess, stumbled across this feature and said, "No, you cannot

00:25:30 ◼   ► download files from servers and FTP stuff. This stuff seems scary and you cannot upload

00:25:35 ◼   ► these kind of files to Apple Drive." Because I'm saying that the issue here is a communication

00:25:42 ◼   ► problem because there's no technical or ideological explanation for this kind of feature being

00:25:52 ◼   ► removed.

00:25:53 ◼   ► So in my opinion, and this is also the case with widgets, with pcalc, with drafts, with

00:25:59 ◼   ► launcher, maybe not with launcher because I can understand that, but there's an issue

00:26:05 ◼   ► with communication between app review, between the App Store editorial team, because you

00:26:11 ◼   ► You cannot possibly approve an app, request marketing material, promote an app on Twitter,

00:26:18 ◼   ► on the App Store, on Facebook, on all these different channels.

00:26:21 ◼   ► So you're putting your official Apple stamp of approval on an app and then you ask the

00:26:27 ◼   ► developer to remove features from it.

00:26:29 ◼   ► Because if you're unhappy with some features, you don't promote the app entirely.

00:26:34 ◼   ► Especially when the app shows screenshots of those features.

00:26:37 ◼   ► So I think there's a communication problem between people here.

00:26:40 ◼   ► I don't know the extent, and that's what I want to discuss with you guys, I don't know

00:26:45 ◼   ► the extent of this issue because maybe it's just a small communication problem, right?

00:26:49 ◼   ► Because especially on Twitter this week, a lot of people are talking about these latest

00:26:54 ◼   ► rejections and everybody's going, "There's a major problem at Apple and Apple is imploding

00:27:01 ◼   ► and we need to destroy app review and rebuild it from the ground up."

00:27:06 ◼   ► I don't know the extent of this issue and probably nobody outside of Apple knows.

00:27:11 ◼   ► Well, it seems to be...

00:27:15 ◼   ► We have always had these problems in the past.

00:27:19 ◼   ► We spoke about it last week, you can go back in history and find them.

00:27:22 ◼   ► But right now it seems like there is more of this going on than ever.

00:27:26 ◼   ► And I don't think it's just a case of "Oh, we have a new thing, we have some new things,

00:27:30 ◼   ► extensions and widgets are new."

00:27:31 ◼   ► but every version of iOS brings with it some new thing, right?

00:27:37 ◼   ► You know, whether it was like the multitasking stuff, or I don't know,

00:27:41 ◼   ► the whole new design language and things like that, like there are always new ways

00:27:45 ◼   ► and new things to reject people over, but it seems like for some reason it's

00:27:50 ◼   ► happening more now. And the main problem isn't that apps are being rejected,

00:27:53 ◼   ► they're being rejected after already being accepted, or they're being like

00:27:59 ◼   ► developers are just being contacted like you've got 72 hours to change your app

00:28:02 ◼   ► we're pulling it from the store like and that's happening more and more and as we

00:28:06 ◼   ► said it last week like the other problem being that it's it's the it's the

00:28:11 ◼   ► clearly bad communication between editorial and review like because a lot

00:28:16 ◼   ► of the apps that are being pulled right now are high-profile they're so

00:28:19 ◼   ► high-profile that Apple agrees and features them like Greg Pierce the

00:28:24 ◼   ► developer of drafts, so he has had another rejection after submitting a fix

00:28:30 ◼   ► which simplified the widget, like the notification of the widget, saying that now

00:28:36 ◼   ► he's been rejected because his widget doesn't do enough. That's messed up, I mean come on.

00:28:40 ◼   ► So now like he just said he's pulling it, like there's not gonna be a widget

00:28:43 ◼   ► anymore, which is bad for Apple. Yeah, especially, and you see why it's more

00:28:51 ◼   ► prone to happen with like new features but Apple needs developers to be on

00:28:55 ◼   ► board with these new tools in iOS 8 and for someone... you know, Drafts is a big app

00:29:02 ◼   ► to a lot of people it's not you know it's not like Evernote but it's it's

00:29:06 ◼   ► popular in its certain crowd it's it's not like if I was a developer looking at

00:29:13 ◼   ► this like thinking about adding it today widget I would think seriously about it

00:29:17 ◼   ► before diving into anything remotely like near the edge case just in case like

00:29:24 ◼   ► you put hours and time and money into this and then Apple says nope you know

00:29:28 ◼   ► too bad. I think, sorry, go on Steven. I said to back up a second though like

00:29:34 ◼   ► talking about the app review team versus editorial in the App Store it was on

00:29:41 ◼   ► someone's podcast this week somebody the point of like app review is a very quick

00:29:45 ◼   ► process like it's not like these people are spending hours with your app they're

00:29:49 ◼   ► spending minutes with it and so it's possible the stuff is getting in the app

00:29:53 ◼   ► store that would not be approved if Apple is paying closer attention and

00:29:57 ◼   ► then it's out there and then they're like oh no no who you know that slipped

00:30:00 ◼   ► through pull it back and it I'm not saying burn

00:30:04 ◼   ► a preview to the ground like some people are but I do think there is a case to be

00:30:07 ◼   ► made that maybe more time needs to be spent with these things and like it is

00:30:13 ◼   ► better I would think, not being a developer, but I would think it would be

00:30:16 ◼   ► better to be rejected off the bat than have a feature out there and your users

00:30:20 ◼   ► getting used to it and then that feature being pulled. That seems like a worse

00:30:25 ◼   ► situation not only for the developer but for Apple itself. So one thing that I'm

00:30:31 ◼   ► thinking about with this, especially you know if I was a developer and looking at

00:30:35 ◼   ► the types of things that are having problems at the moment, I would not

00:30:38 ◼   ► because of this I would not want to be developing for the watch right now. Which

00:30:42 ◼   ► I think is more of a significant issue for Apple because they're already asking

00:30:46 ◼   ► a big thing of developers can you develop some stuff considering you

00:30:50 ◼   ► haven't got a device to test it on so we have some things to give out on day one

00:30:54 ◼   ► but a lot of the things that are having problems right now are extensions and

00:30:58 ◼   ► widgets in app review and that is like exactly what the watch is based on yeah

00:31:03 ◼   ► if you're saying that it's complex like you know you're having too many buttons

00:31:06 ◼   ► too much information like in what's already there like it's even worse when

00:31:11 ◼   ► it comes to the watch.

00:31:14 ◼   ► But on the flip side of that coin though, Apple has been, from my understanding, pretty

00:31:20 ◼   ► clear in the documentation of what will be allowed on the watch.

00:31:25 ◼   ► More clear than what they have said for iOS itself.

00:31:28 ◼   ► And the watch does a lot less.

00:31:30 ◼   ► There's less opportunity for developers to kind of go crazy.

00:31:34 ◼   ► But I get what you're saying and I definitely like looking at, like it's very clear now,

00:31:40 ◼   ► right that extensions and iOS 8 were built with the watch in mind.

00:31:43 ◼   ► Like it, it is a little, it gives me a little pause to think about, you know,

00:31:50 ◼   ► like what if, what if this stuff just isn't there on day one for the watch,

00:31:54 ◼   ► the way it could have been otherwise, like that's not good for, for Apple's

00:31:57 ◼   ► new pro, you know, I'm sure what Tim Cook would call their flagship product right

00:32:01 ◼   ► now, like they have a ton of energy and money and like excitement, like Tim Cook

00:32:06 ◼   ► fist-pumping gif of the watch and

00:32:08 ◼   ► They need people on board

00:32:10 ◼   ► James Thompson in the chat room the developer of peak out. He actually did say this a moment ago that he is

00:32:16 ◼   ► Concerned about the watch like that. He's looking to do something for it for peak alky said, but who knows what will be allowed

00:32:24 ◼   ► so he's considering it but it is like a a

00:32:26 ◼   ► Fear point at the moment because it feels like you know

00:32:30 ◼   ► I'm paraphrasing for him now like it feels like that there is a lot of uncertainty around a lot of these things

00:32:35 ◼   ► So it's you know, it is a it's a it's a peculiar time. I mean a lot I've seen people

00:32:41 ◼   ► Suggesting that potentially the the hammers coming down on these things now because of the watch

00:32:47 ◼   ► Right, so they don't want people getting away with themselves of the widgets

00:32:52 ◼   ► But just it seems like a rough it just seems like that the communication that was supposed to

00:32:59 ◼   ► Inherently have been there with joining the teams up is not there. It's just the inconsistency

00:33:05 ◼   ► Because they first approve and then they reject.

00:33:09 ◼   ► And then while they are rejecting some apps or they're going after

00:33:13 ◼   ► some developer, at the very same time

00:33:17 ◼   ► they are approving other apps that either do the same thing or

00:33:21 ◼   ► do even worse depending on whether you think

00:33:25 ◼   ► it's worse or better. It's just they don't

00:33:29 ◼   ► have a defined set of rules. Because if they only said

00:33:33 ◼   ► "Look, in this webpage you can find all our rules, and they are written down in this page and you can read them and whatever. We don't care. These are the rules."

00:33:45 ◼   ► It's just that you are running software against a platform with no defined rules at this point.

00:33:53 ◼   ► And what I wanted to ask you guys is, does it even make sense to have rules that go into the specifics at this point?

00:34:01 ◼   ► Because iOS is not so...

00:34:04 ◼   ► When the Apps to Review guidelines were first published, iOS was a relatively simple platform.

00:34:11 ◼   ► I mean, iOS apps couldn't be as complex and as potentially powerful as they are today

00:34:21 ◼   ► with iOS 8.

00:34:24 ◼   ► Does it even make sense to have rules organized in categories and sections that go into the

00:34:30 ◼   ► specifics such as "oh you can create widgets with buttons but only if the

00:34:34 ◼   ► buttons take you to a section of an app..." I'm saying it's so... there are so many

00:34:41 ◼   ► ramifications with iOS today that making rules and writing down the rules is

00:34:46 ◼   ► it's like writing the constitution of a country. You cannot go into every

00:34:51 ◼   ► specific, every possible case. Of course not, but it feels like if you're going to

00:34:56 ◼   ► to have, I assume, a set of rules internally that we don't see that maybe they need to

00:35:03 ◼   ► try and-- Oh, you've got to say those.

00:35:05 ◼   ► Yeah, because you'd expect that there are some guidelines to these rejections, right?

00:35:09 ◼   ► You'd like to think that a rejection needs to have a guideline cited.

00:35:14 ◼   ► And if the guidelines, if they're just using the same guidelines that everybody else sees,

00:35:18 ◼   ► we already know that they're not clear enough in some instances.

00:35:21 ◼   ► So maybe there needs to be more rewriting.

00:35:24 ◼   ► And I think just fundamentally, if you're in a situation where you have a gatekeeper

00:35:29 ◼   ► and you have people putting time and money into creating something for the gatekeeper

00:35:32 ◼   ► to say yes or no, I think you need to have more...

00:35:36 ◼   ► There doesn't need to be rules, but stronger guidelines.

00:35:39 ◼   ► I think there needs to be stronger guidelines than the ones that currently exist.

00:35:44 ◼   ► Because if things are getting rejected at a high rate, then...

00:35:49 ◼   ► I mean, I don't know what those rates are, right?

00:35:52 ◼   ► as well, like you see things that should be rejected but are in the store. It feels like

00:35:56 ◼   ► there needs to be stronger guidelines. Like in some instances Apple aren't enforcing

00:35:59 ◼   ► the guidelines strong enough, which is really peculiar, right? Because you see these junk

00:36:04 ◼   ► apps in the App Store and you wonder how they ever get there. Like you look at the whole

00:36:07 ◼   ► Flappy Bird thing, like 95% of the apps that were in the App Store at that point in time

00:36:13 ◼   ► shouldn't have been there. So you just wonder what is the right thing and the wrong thing.

00:36:19 ◼   ► I agree with you. Do you want to write out a million rules? No, probably not, because it makes it worse, not better.

00:36:24 ◼   ► But if there is a lot of uncertainty and a lot of people that are unsure about what's going on,

00:36:29 ◼   ► maybe in certain areas there needs to be more rules or more communication in a public forum

00:36:35 ◼   ► so people can see the conversations that occur, so they can understand from other people.

00:36:41 ◼   ► There should be a developer forum where these questions can be answered openly.

00:36:45 ◼   ► There should be a developer blog, like they're doing with Swift.

00:36:49 ◼   ► They have a blog now.

00:36:51 ◼   ► Yeah, I think just keep it in the developer center, though.

00:36:55 ◼   ► Yeah.

00:36:56 ◼   ► Some kind of public forum to discuss this kind of stuff.

00:36:58 ◼   ► And also, I think the basic problem, there should be at least better communication with

00:37:04 ◼   ► the people that pick apps for editorial promotions and the people who approve apps.

00:37:10 ◼   ► Because what it seems like from the outside is that the right hand doesn't know what the

00:37:15 ◼   ► left hand is doing and that's bad of course. But also my last question for you is does

00:37:22 ◼   ► this matter for normal people? Because we're so upset about transmit losing a feature,

00:37:30 ◼   ► which is a button really, and drafts losing the widget and peacock going through all this

00:37:36 ◼   ► stuff but do like... Is Apple doing this because they know that people outside of our circle

00:37:42 ◼   ► don't care.

00:37:44 ◼   ► They're somehow justified to do this kind of stuff because they know that it doesn't

00:37:49 ◼   ► reach my mother or my father or my friends.

00:37:53 ◼   ► But it depends on the app.

00:37:56 ◼   ► I don't know if that's so much about audience as it is just that Apple's on charge.

00:38:00 ◼   ► Selling iPhones.

00:38:01 ◼   ► Well, it's that it's Apple's hardware, it's Apple's platform, and maybe they believe,

00:38:08 ◼   ► devil's advocate that they can make some developers upset, that they can push around their weight

00:38:14 ◼   ► because they own the whole stack, right?

00:38:18 ◼   ► The developers are completely dependent on Apple for APIs, for store, for distribution,

00:38:25 ◼   ► for payment, and maybe Apple's like, "You know what?

00:38:28 ◼   ► We're going to do what we want to do."

00:38:30 ◼   ► And so be it.

00:38:32 ◼   ► You got to wonder if it's really true when the blog post from the guy that you mentioned

00:38:37 ◼   ► before we need to figure out how to pronounce his name.

00:38:42 ◼   ► He says that basically, App Review

00:38:44 ◼   ► knows when they want to make a big-- get into the news,

00:38:49 ◼   ► basically, with popular-- with rejections of popular apps.

00:38:54 ◼   ► You've got to wonder if that's really true or not.

00:38:57 ◼   ► If it's not true, when you do see an app like Peacock,

00:39:00 ◼   ► from a developer with more than 20 years of experience,

00:39:04 ◼   ► when you get that kind of app, don't you

00:39:07 ◼   ► think that maybe you want to talk to a manager or to a supervisor? I mean, if you don't want

00:39:12 ◼   ► to get into the tech blogs talking about this rejection, why don't you... How is it possible

00:39:18 ◼   ► that it gets to this point? So the argument that Apple wants this kind of reaction, it's

00:39:24 ◼   ► not completely absurd, but also it's so strange if it's true. I really don't know.

00:39:34 ◼   ► It's definitely problematic.

00:39:37 ◼   ► And I really think that so much of it is that the store is just really big and these teams

00:39:42 ◼   ► aren't big enough and there's not enough internal communication.

00:39:48 ◼   ► The tragedy is that good, hardworking men and women get caught in that crossfire of

00:39:53 ◼   ► having their work rejected or say, "Hey, you got to undo all this or you're going to be

00:39:58 ◼   ► in trouble."

00:40:01 ◼   ► But you know, people outside of our community don't see it.

00:40:07 ◼   ► Because they're not using these apps at the cutting edge.

00:40:10 ◼   ► The Facebook app is not going to get rejected.

00:40:12 ◼   ► You know how better communication would be possible?

00:40:15 ◼   ► Within Apple?

00:40:17 ◼   ► With stuff like the Drust widget.

00:40:20 ◼   ► It would really simplify the act of emailing people.

00:40:23 ◼   ► You're just having...

00:40:24 ◼   ► And saving notes.

00:40:25 ◼   ► ...building workflows for Apple employees now.

00:40:28 ◼   ► That should be, that's a possible idea, you see.

00:40:32 ◼   ► Making workflows for big companies.

00:40:34 ◼   ► Yeah, you could be a workflow guru.

00:40:37 ◼   ► Consultant.

00:40:38 ◼   ► Ninja.

00:40:39 ◼   ► A workflow ninja.

00:40:40 ◼   ► Yeah, I was just saying ninja, thanks Steven.

00:40:43 ◼   ► So yeah, we don't know, we don't know.

00:40:45 ◼   ► That's the conclusion, right?

00:40:46 ◼   ► We don't know.

00:40:47 ◼   ► So yeah, it's...

00:40:50 ◼   ► We are sad again.

00:40:52 ◼   ► This is not possible.

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00:43:30 ◼   ► What are you getting me for Christmas, Myke?

00:43:32 ◼   ► A Twitter client.

00:43:34 ◼   ► Really?

00:43:35 ◼   ► Yeah, I've been developing tt tweet for a few months now.

00:43:40 ◼   ► Are you using Swift?

00:43:41 ◼   ► I'm happy to say that I really like it.

00:43:43 ◼   ► Which language?

00:43:44 ◼   ► Yep, so it runs nice and fast for you.

00:43:49 ◼   ► That's really your summary of Swift.

00:43:51 ◼   ► It runs nice and fast.

00:43:53 ◼   ► Nice and fast.

00:43:54 ◼   ► So, hang on.

00:43:56 ◼   ► Before we talk about the real topic, if there was a tch Twitter app, I think that you would

00:44:02 ◼   ► open the app and it's a grid and there's a picture of pasta, there's a picture of espresso,

00:44:09 ◼   ► So there's an iPad and then there's a picture of a question mark and you tap the buttons

00:44:15 ◼   ► and a tweet goes out.

00:44:16 ◼   ► It's pre-populated.

00:44:17 ◼   ► A tweet goes out about one of those items.

00:44:19 ◼   ► So if you hit the iPad, something about working on the iPad, Posture, Espresso.

00:44:23 ◼   ► But if you hit the question mark, it searches Giphy randomly pulling from the dictionary

00:44:31 ◼   ► and post that.

00:44:32 ◼   ► And I frankly think that podcasting is over and we should develop this app full time.

00:44:37 ◼   ► Yeah, I don't know why we're still waiting around here.

00:44:40 ◼   ► That sounds like the new tweet deck.

00:44:45 ◼   ► So many enterprise opportunities with that idea.

00:44:47 ◼   ► I know, I really think that we could go to Apple and IBM and their new partnership and

00:44:51 ◼   ► really just do this.

00:44:55 ◼   ► No, I just want to imagine Myke making apps, like writing code and being upset that stuff

00:45:03 ◼   ► doesn't work.

00:45:04 ◼   ► Oh, I've made apps before.

00:45:06 ◼   ► made that what kind of apps have you made so many apps like you break mark

00:45:11 ◼   ► down like once a week it's not gonna go well for you you can stop writing my

00:45:16 ◼   ► show notes I love you thank you so Federico Federico wrote a thing he wrote

00:45:22 ◼   ► his review like that all of the words another magnum opus which I have read

00:45:28 ◼   ► I've read the entire thing it took me four days

00:45:31 ◼   ► like Italy Federico was I think he knew that I wouldn't read it in time for the

00:45:36 ◼   ► show unless he gave it to me in advance and he did and I've been reading it over

00:45:40 ◼   ► a few days. Myke has been reading for a few days now. And I'm happy to say that

00:45:44 ◼   ► I like it and I have lots of I have lots of questions and thoughts. You have a

00:45:50 ◼   ► follow-up. Yeah so Federico, rather than like so I think what would be nice, listen

00:45:56 ◼   ► you can tell me if you don't think this will be nice but what I think will be nice is

00:45:59 ◼   ► if you give people a very brief overview and tell them why they should read the

00:46:03 ◼   ► the article and then I will ask you my many questions. Should I pitch my article?

00:46:07 ◼   ► Pitch it, give an elevator pitch for your article.

00:46:10 ◼   ► So there was no comparison as objective as possible of popular Twitter clients in 2014,

00:46:19 ◼   ► so I did one. That's my pitch. It's good. Focusing, I mean this is something that people

00:46:27 ◼   ► don't do I think even when they're doing these heavy comparisons even like in the past, is really

00:46:31 ◼   ► look at and properly use the first party client as well.

00:46:35 ◼   ► I think that's the key for you.

00:46:37 ◼   ► >> Yeah.

00:46:38 ◼   ► >> Is that you've come up to that.

00:46:40 ◼   ► >> Especially after years of third party clients,

00:46:45 ◼   ► we're talking three years and more of Tweetbot almost exclusively.

00:46:51 ◼   ► Using switching to the Twitter app for iOS,

00:46:55 ◼   ► which I ignored since 2011,

00:46:58 ◼   ► it was really quite a challenge for me

00:47:00 ◼   ► because I know that it's just a Twitter app,

00:47:03 ◼   ► and I know that it doesn't change the world,

00:47:05 ◼   ► it doesn't make the world a better place, whatever.

00:47:07 ◼   ► But still in this software niche that we have,

00:47:12 ◼   ► using and switching to this kind of app,

00:47:15 ◼   ► I really struggled in the first few weeks.

00:47:18 ◼   ► And also when iOS 8 came out, I was kind of, yeah,

00:47:21 ◼   ► I want to switch back to Tweetbot and Twitterrific

00:47:23 ◼   ► because they have all these features with iOS 8.

00:47:26 ◼   ► So it really took some dedication for me,

00:47:28 ◼   ► not just the writing part or the research for the article,

00:47:32 ◼   ► but really just making sure that I could stick to my mission,

00:47:37 ◼   ► in a way.

00:47:40 ◼   ► Yeah, it was really challenging for me.

00:47:43 ◼   ► I use Twitter more than the Messages app on a daily basis.

00:47:47 ◼   ► It's like the app that I use the most.

00:47:49 ◼   ► So switching-- it's like when you change your house.

00:47:53 ◼   ► It's like everything's different.

00:47:54 ◼   ► Oh my god, what am I doing here?

00:47:56 ◼   ► That was the effect that I had for the past few months.

00:48:00 ◼   ► So I would like to go now and ask you and make my thoughts about your articles,

00:48:08 ◼   ► my think piece.

00:48:09 ◼   ► Your posits.

00:48:10 ◼   ► My posits.

00:48:11 ◼   ► So I think as a whole, like especially if you're going at like 20,000 words, right?

00:48:19 ◼   ► Yeah, 20,081.

00:48:25 ◼   ► That's what Red Terpstra's Markt says.

00:48:29 ◼   ► - Very detailed.

00:48:31 ◼   ► I can see how it took you as long as it did

00:48:35 ◼   ► and I can see why it took as long as it did

00:48:39 ◼   ► because you have done an incredible amount of research

00:48:42 ◼   ► and I think that the piece is only good

00:48:46 ◼   ► because you did that.

00:48:47 ◼   ► Like if it wouldn't have been this detailed,

00:48:49 ◼   ► it wouldn't have been as good.

00:48:51 ◼   ► Like it's the credit of the piece lies in the research

00:48:55 ◼   ► you did. I think that's clear. Thank you. Thank you. I think that also if I didn't spend so much time

00:49:03 ◼   ► I wouldn't have had the conclusion, you know? Because it's the detail, it's the

00:49:11 ◼   ► knowing all the different parts that form my opinion. That's really the most important

00:49:19 ◼   ► consequences I think. Fundamentally I came away from this wanting to try out

00:49:26 ◼   ► the Twitter app more. Like through reading what you have said and the way

00:49:31 ◼   ► that you've approached things and the benefits that you are taking out of the

00:49:36 ◼   ► client itself and I'm gonna I want to touch on a few of those in a moment. I

00:49:40 ◼   ► can see why you're doing it and also like this is where Twitter is going and

00:49:46 ◼   ► and I can't stop it.

00:49:48 ◼   ► That was kind of like a feeling that I had from you

00:49:51 ◼   ► whilst reading this.

00:49:51 ◼   ► It was like, well, I'm on this train

00:49:55 ◼   ► and there's nothing I can do to change it,

00:49:56 ◼   ► so I may as well get on board and just stick with it

00:50:00 ◼   ► because Twitter's going this way.

00:50:02 ◼   ► And you've been saying this for weeks on the show.

00:50:04 ◼   ► Twitter's going this way.

00:50:05 ◼   ► Whether you like it or not, you just have to do it.

00:50:07 ◼   ► And here, reading your detail

00:50:11 ◼   ► and looking at the way that you've structured things,

00:50:13 ◼   ► I can see how you have come to that conclusion

00:50:16 ◼   ► And I think I needed to read this to see that, as opposed to around previous weeks.

00:50:22 ◼   ► So you're saying it's like some kind of Stockholm syndrome.

00:50:26 ◼   ► That wasn't what I was saying, but yeah, I guess it maybe is like that a little bit.

00:50:31 ◼   ► I think that…

00:50:32 ◼   ► Yeah, maybe.

00:50:33 ◼   ► There's an aspect to that of, you know, I may as well get used to it now rather than

00:50:37 ◼   ► later.

00:50:38 ◼   ► That was at least my original feeling, yeah.

00:50:40 ◼   ► Yeah, I agree.

00:50:42 ◼   ► I think though that the main reason why I've not yet started using the Twitter app on a

00:50:47 ◼   ► daily basis since reading your piece is the timeline sync and the gap detection, because

00:50:52 ◼   ► it sounds horrific in the way that you describe it.

00:50:55 ◼   ► And I don't know how you deal with it.

00:50:59 ◼   ► The way that you pitched in the piece was like, "It takes me time every day to go back

00:51:02 ◼   ► and look for the tweets."

00:51:05 ◼   ► But that doesn't feel like enough to me.

00:51:07 ◼   ► How do you deal with this every day without pulling your hair out?

00:51:11 ◼   ► 'Cause I've used Twitter clients,

00:51:13 ◼   ► where it's been like that.

00:51:14 ◼   ► Twitterific is not great at this.

00:51:16 ◼   ► And when I used Twitterific for a while,

00:51:19 ◼   ► when I wasn't using Tweet, but I think with iOS 8,

00:51:24 ◼   ► it drove me a little bit crazy.

00:51:27 ◼   ► - So I saw this question coming.

00:51:29 ◼   ► So yeah, I do spend at least a couple of minutes every day,

00:51:34 ◼   ► every morning, especially,

00:51:35 ◼   ► trying to find my position again.

00:51:37 ◼   ► And what I found is that

00:51:39 ◼   ► When I'm scrolling back, my scrolling of the timeline has become non-linear.

00:51:50 ◼   ► So while I'm scrolling back, I find stuff and I follow that stuff immediately without waiting to reach the bottom and then going up again.

00:51:57 ◼   ► Does it make any sense? So basically I'm going all sorts of places.

00:52:01 ◼   ► So you're reading in two directions now. You're reading down and back up again.

00:52:05 ◼   ► Yeah, basically, I go down, but if I find something, I just follow it right away.

00:52:14 ◼   ► So yeah, I guess I'm all over the place.

00:52:20 ◼   ► It takes me like a couple of minutes, and now that I figured out this new way to load

00:52:24 ◼   ► the timeline gap, you need to be close to the top of the screen, it only takes a couple

00:52:31 ◼   ► of seconds, you gotta just tap a couple of times.

00:52:34 ◼   ► The problem is when the app for some reason just completely restarts without restoring

00:52:42 ◼   ► your state and just completely loses the timeline from the night before.

00:52:49 ◼   ► Is that random?

00:52:50 ◼   ► That appears to be random.

00:52:51 ◼   ► I don't know if it's a RAM issue.

00:52:53 ◼   ► I mean on the iPad Air 2, I was guessing that there could be enough memory.

00:52:59 ◼   ► It doesn't seem to be the case.

00:53:01 ◼   ► I don't know why Twitter is doing this.

00:53:05 ◼   ► So yeah, I think probably because I was forced to, my behavior in scrolling back to my last

00:53:14 ◼   ► position has changed, but it's not so bad.

00:53:18 ◼   ► I mean, I'm getting stuff done anyway, I'm talking to people and discovering links anyway,

00:53:25 ◼   ► so those couple of minutes maybe will add up over time.

00:53:30 ◼   ► So far, I mean, it's been six months, so I think I have enough data about me, I guess,

00:53:35 ◼   ► to make a, to see like what the actual consequence, it's not terrible.

00:53:42 ◼   ► So in the article, you kind of, you go into why you think this, it's not important to

00:53:49 ◼   ► them.

00:53:50 ◼   ► Like Twitter wants you at the top because they want to know what you, they want you

00:53:53 ◼   ► to know what's happening now, not what happened 12 hours ago.

00:53:59 ◼   ► So do you think that they're never going to change this then?

00:54:02 ◼   ► I don't know because on the one hand they do this kind of "let's make sure you always

00:54:07 ◼   ► see new tweets" stuff and then they launch this new search that lets you find any tweet

00:54:16 ◼   ► from at any point during Twitter's history.

00:54:20 ◼   ► So they kind of seem to be improving in two different places.

00:54:25 ◼   ► They want to let you see new stuff, but they also want to let you find old stuff.

00:54:30 ◼   ► So maybe there's a big picture here.

00:54:33 ◼   ► It's just so big of a company and so big of an app that it's difficult to...

00:54:37 ◼   ► Just right now, I'm receiving tweets from a few people who are seeing new features in

00:54:45 ◼   ► the Twitter app today in the timeline.

00:54:49 ◼   ► So it's constantly evolving.

00:54:52 ◼   ► That was a big problem for me.

00:54:54 ◼   ► Twitter, because they're doing sort of like Facebook, they release updates.

00:54:59 ◼   ► They don't do the major update thing on the App Store, but they don't exactly mention

00:55:04 ◼   ► details in the release notes. So sometimes you see the big feature mentioned, like you see,

00:55:10 ◼   ► we added a new profile design. But other times you only see bug fixes or improvements,

00:55:17 ◼   ► and then you get all these new features out of nowhere. So today they seem to be adding some new

00:55:23 ◼   ► card integration with the timeline adding buttons directly into tweets without having

00:55:29 ◼   ► to open them.

00:55:30 ◼   ► So yeah, it was difficult, Myke, to...

00:55:35 ◼   ► Why are they trying to get me to the top and then why are they trying to let me find old

00:55:40 ◼   ► stuff?

00:55:41 ◼   ► I don't know.

00:55:42 ◼   ► I guess it's just a little bit of both.

00:55:44 ◼   ► Yeah, well, I think that app evolution has a lot to do with what we spoke about, Twitter

00:55:51 ◼   ► the platform versus Twitter the app and I don't want to rehash all that but you know clearly that

00:55:56 ◼   ► there's some vast majority of people that they interact with Twitter only through the app you

00:56:02 ◼   ► know I mean they might go to the web but I would imagine for a lot of people Twitter is that blue

00:56:07 ◼   ► app icon on their phone and that's all there is and that's what you know

00:56:12 ◼   ► Twitter is whatever's behind that that icon and so for them to change that sort of thing

00:56:18 ◼   ► It's changing the very way that Twitter works for a lot of people and from the outside,

00:56:23 ◼   ► it seems like, I jump into the Twitter app every couple of months just to kind of see

00:56:27 ◼   ► where it is and it feels like it's crazy town.

00:56:31 ◼   ► I'll look at it and three months later things will be pretty different and I think that

00:56:36 ◼   ► iteration, they're trying to get it where they think it should be, but it's definitely

00:56:41 ◼   ► much faster than something like Tweetbot or Twitterific that's stuck sort of in legacy

00:56:46 ◼   ► Twitter land.

00:56:47 ◼   ► I think going back as well, like about the differences in Twitter's timeline and they're

00:56:54 ◼   ► not putting things in the release notes, because they do that thing where certain users get

00:56:58 ◼   ► certain features and other users don't, right?

00:57:00 ◼   ► They do that testing.

00:57:01 ◼   ► Yeah.

00:57:02 ◼   ► Mm-hmm.

00:57:03 ◼   ► So they probably, they don't, unless they're definite about something, they probably don't

00:57:05 ◼   ► say about it, which is probably why, Federico, when you're getting people contact you who

00:57:11 ◼   ► may actually have a slightly different Twitter experience to you anyway and there's nothing

00:57:14 ◼   ► you can do about it.

00:57:15 ◼   ► Yeah, true.

00:57:16 ◼   ► I didn't consider that. I don't seem to ever get this timeline and various experiments.

00:57:24 ◼   ► I think I have a pretty traditional version of Twitter for iOS.

00:57:29 ◼   ► Probably could you don't. So I'm going to assume that you think, or at least that will

00:57:36 ◼   ► be the case, is that they're never going to change the timeline syncing. But, you know,

00:57:43 ◼   ► I think that surely the more I look through my timeline,

00:57:48 ◼   ► the more ads I'm gonna see, right?

00:57:50 ◼   ► Is that not a benefit to them?

00:57:51 ◼   ► Like if I'm scrolling through the entire last 12 hours,

00:57:56 ◼   ► they can show me more ads.

00:57:58 ◼   ► - Yeah, for sure.

00:58:00 ◼   ► - Probably, yeah.

00:58:00 ◼   ► But also if you want to scroll back manually,

00:58:03 ◼   ► you're just gonna scroll anyway and see the ads.

00:58:06 ◼   ► I don't know, it's strange because it seems like

00:58:10 ◼   ► one of those features that an iOS engineer

00:58:13 ◼   ► would love to build and to have,

00:58:16 ◼   ► just for the sake of the challenge,

00:58:19 ◼   ► being able to sync Twitter across clients.

00:58:22 ◼   ► - Because they do some of it, right?

00:58:24 ◼   ► Like DM.

00:58:25 ◼   ► - They do DM, they do, what else?

00:58:29 ◼   ► Contacts that you block now,

00:58:32 ◼   ► of course those are synced to your account

00:58:35 ◼   ► and they have like a new page on the web

00:58:38 ◼   ► with a list of all accounts that you blocked

00:58:41 ◼   ► and they're doing, I don't know, I guess some Mac stuff.

00:58:45 ◼   ► I don't know if the state of the Mac app,

00:58:49 ◼   ► I'm not sure what improvements there have been on the Mac

00:58:54 ◼   ► because I didn't check that out.

00:58:56 ◼   ► They do some sort of syncing,

00:58:59 ◼   ► just not big stuff like the timeline.

00:59:02 ◼   ► - So the suggested follower list,

00:59:05 ◼   ► I always thought was stupid.

00:59:06 ◼   ► Like what I see on the web,

00:59:08 ◼   ► it's always like three celebrities, it's like pointless.

00:59:11 ◼   ► But you mentioned it was useful, so I went on the app.

00:59:13 ◼   ► And I found some really interesting people there.

00:59:16 ◼   ► And I think it's because the list is longer.

00:59:18 ◼   ► So there's more chance for them to actually be relevant.

00:59:21 ◼   ► Because the list in the app, it seems to be endless.

00:59:26 ◼   ► What's really cool is when you follow someone

00:59:29 ◼   ► in Twitter for iOS--

00:59:31 ◼   ► and I noticed this in Twitter for iPhone--

00:59:34 ◼   ► when you follow someone new, there's

00:59:36 ◼   ► like an animation that looks like the old iOS 6 folder

00:59:41 ◼   ► animation on the home screen.

00:59:43 ◼   ► There's a box that opens in the app,

00:59:47 ◼   ► and it gives you more people similar to the one

00:59:50 ◼   ► that you just followed.

00:59:52 ◼   ► The other day, I finally followed

00:59:54 ◼   ► Kyle, a friend of the show.

00:59:56 ◼   ► Kyle's the gray.

00:59:57 ◼   ► Yeah.

00:59:58 ◼   ► I don't know why I wasn't following.

01:00:00 ◼   ► No, he showed me--

01:00:01 ◼   ► I'm pretty sure he showed me--

01:00:05 ◼   ► My memory is good. It's not good.

01:00:09 ◼   ► Somebody else you're not following, basically.

01:00:11 ◼   ► Yeah, it's like people similar to Kyle, you know?

01:00:15 ◼   ► Those kinds of people.

01:00:16 ◼   ► Is there anybody similar to Kyle?

01:00:17 ◼   ► Wow.

01:00:18 ◼   ► There's a group of people.

01:00:20 ◼   ► There's like a club of people like Kyle.

01:00:24 ◼   ► Yeah.

01:00:25 ◼   ► So yeah, it's really nice.

01:00:27 ◼   ► The suggestions are-- you're right, Myke.

01:00:29 ◼   ► They're pretty nice.

01:00:31 ◼   ► They got better, for sure, the suggestions.

01:00:34 ◼   ► So with the timeline stuff and just some of the other things

01:00:38 ◼   ► that you mentioned, I think that I need to start

01:00:40 ◼   ► thinking differently about how I use Twitter maybe.

01:00:43 ◼   ► Maybe I shouldn't be a completionist.

01:00:45 ◼   ► So if I focus on reading everything,

01:00:48 ◼   ► then that makes it more difficult for me.

01:00:49 ◼   ► Maybe Twitter don't want me to do it this way.

01:00:51 ◼   ► Maybe I need to start getting used to not doing that.

01:00:54 ◼   ► Otherwise, they're gonna upset me later.

01:00:58 ◼   ► Do you feel this way?

01:01:00 ◼   ► You should try and just change what you see.

01:01:02 ◼   ► maybe not to be a completionist anymore.

01:01:05 ◼   ► - I'm just trying to go with the flow, you know?

01:01:08 ◼   ► - Yeah.

01:01:08 ◼   ► - Because it's one of those features.

01:01:13 ◼   ► The other stuff that I get is more important than fighting

01:01:18 ◼   ► or than being upset for the stuff that I'm not getting.

01:01:21 ◼   ► So the compromise is not worthy for me anymore.

01:01:25 ◼   ► So unfortunately, because I love the feature

01:01:28 ◼   ► and because it would save me

01:01:29 ◼   ► those couple of minutes every day,

01:01:31 ◼   ► Timeline syncing has to go because I need the other stuff.

01:01:36 ◼   ► - So something that, I'm interested to see

01:01:41 ◼   ► if I'm calling you out on this one or not,

01:01:44 ◼   ► but I think I might be.

01:01:46 ◼   ► So in the article, you talk about using Twitteriffic

01:01:51 ◼   ► on your iPad a lot, a lot more than I expected.

01:01:54 ◼   ► You kind of say that you read your lists there,

01:01:57 ◼   ► you use it for extensions, so obviously

01:01:58 ◼   ► when you find links you're sharing,

01:02:00 ◼   ► How much are you actually using the official app?

01:02:03 ◼   ► - No, no, that's a very simple reason.

01:02:06 ◼   ► It's just because I had all the different apps installed

01:02:10 ◼   ► on my devices.

01:02:11 ◼   ► On my second screen, I had all the Tweetbot and Twitterific.

01:02:16 ◼   ► So I needed to keep the apps installed

01:02:18 ◼   ► and I needed to use them.

01:02:19 ◼   ► So of course I was using Twitterific more

01:02:21 ◼   ► because of all the stuff that it had.

01:02:24 ◼   ► But I already set up a shortcut in Launch Center Pro

01:02:29 ◼   ► Pro to make up for the lack of a sharesheet in the Twitter app.

01:02:35 ◼   ► So yeah, now I'm just basically going to uninstall the apps that I was keeping for the article

01:02:39 ◼   ► and I'm going to just use the Twitter app.

01:02:43 ◼   ► Because I have this shortcut in Launch

01:02:43 ◼   ► Because I have this shortcut in Launch99 Pro, I will soon have other shortcuts with the

01:02:50 ◼   ► Workflow app, which is coming out this week.

01:02:53 ◼   ► So will you share those?

01:02:56 ◼   ► I assume you're going to write those up.

01:02:58 ◼   ► Yeah.

01:02:59 ◼   ► Okay.

01:03:00 ◼   ► So people should look out for that.

01:03:01 ◼   ► Where can they find this amazing writing?

01:03:03 ◼   ► My Macstories.net.

01:03:04 ◼   ► Perfect.

01:03:05 ◼   ► Which is my...

01:03:07 ◼   ► It happens to be my website.

01:03:08 ◼   ► Federico, I have more questions for you.

01:03:11 ◼   ► Okay.

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01:05:33 ◼   ► Okey dokey.

01:05:36 ◼   ► The discover tab.

01:05:39 ◼   ► So the discover tab is interesting to me

01:05:42 ◼   ► because there's always new stuff in there to find, right?

01:05:47 ◼   ► So this is something that I didn't really know

01:05:48 ◼   ► like you just keep refreshing it

01:05:49 ◼   ► and it just keeps populating.

01:05:50 ◼   ► - Yeah, yeah. - It would just keep going.

01:05:52 ◼   ► - It was really strange initially.

01:05:53 ◼   ► Like I was upset because I was like,

01:05:56 ◼   ► I want to reach the top of this section.

01:05:58 ◼   ► There is no top.

01:06:00 ◼   ► You can always get new stuff.

01:06:01 ◼   ► - I guess this is what Twitter's going for, right?

01:06:05 ◼   ► Because it means that you always have a reason

01:06:07 ◼   ► to be in the app because you keep finding stuff.

01:06:09 ◼   ► But I'm concerned I would get lost forever.

01:06:12 ◼   ► - Well, after a while,

01:06:14 ◼   ► it is the same set of suggestions just in different order.

01:06:20 ◼   ► Like if you keep refreshing 12 times,

01:06:22 ◼   ► you're not gonna get new suggestions.

01:06:24 ◼   ► It's going to be basically a remix

01:06:25 ◼   ► of the ones that you saw.

01:06:27 ◼   ► It's just the concept that there's no stopping to the refresh.

01:06:31 ◼   ► What that tells me, though, is that you did get lost in it one day,

01:06:34 ◼   ► and you found that out.

01:06:36 ◼   ► Yeah, because I needed to understand.

01:06:38 ◼   ► Yeah, those are actually pretty good.

01:06:43 ◼   ► It's a good mix of, at least for me,

01:06:47 ◼   ► because they say those are tailored suggestions.

01:06:50 ◼   ► It's a good mix of like I found video game stuff,

01:06:54 ◼   ► A lot of funny Twitter jokes because I like Twitter for the jokes as well.

01:07:01 ◼   ► Video games, Apple stuff of course.

01:07:05 ◼   ► I mentioned this in the article, I get stuff about football and American sports and sometimes

01:07:13 ◼   ► sci-fi TV shows, stuff that I'm not interested in too.

01:07:18 ◼   ► I can see why Twitter wants me to care about that stuff, you know, because hashtags and

01:07:23 ◼   ► people talking about TV shows in real time.

01:07:27 ◼   ► Overall, it is a pretty good set of suggestions.

01:07:30 ◼   ► I started making sure that at least twice a day

01:07:36 ◼   ► I opened the section, because I generally find maybe a link

01:07:40 ◼   ► post for Mac Stories or maybe a link for the Mac Stories

01:07:45 ◼   ► Weekly newsletter.

01:07:46 ◼   ► So yeah, it is useful.

01:07:48 ◼   ► It was a nice surprise.

01:07:51 ◼   ► So I have been thinking about Twitter a lot

01:07:56 ◼   ► because we keep talking about it,

01:07:59 ◼   ► so much so that I pressured Casey

01:08:02 ◼   ► into talking about it on analog this week.

01:08:04 ◼   ► And one of the things that we were talking about

01:08:06 ◼   ► is like following and unfollowing

01:08:09 ◼   ► and kind of like the social implications that come with that

01:08:13 ◼   ► and there was just a quote in your article

01:08:14 ◼   ► that I really liked which is a much healthier outlook

01:08:17 ◼   ► than my solution of permanently muting people.

01:08:20 ◼   ► I've realized that of all the things one could feel bad for in this world,

01:08:23 ◼   ► unfollowing someone on Twitter shouldn't be one of them for me.

01:08:26 ◼   ► Yeah.

01:08:28 ◼   ► I mean, it's just, it's just, you know, I don't want you to

01:08:34 ◼   ► overthink my, my, my, my social networks.

01:08:38 ◼   ► You know, it's not like I'm unfollowing my mother.

01:08:41 ◼   ► Uh, I mean, we are all in this, in this space, you know, in this social web space,

01:08:48 ◼   ► because we are interested in the links or the tweets that other people publish.

01:08:55 ◼   ► And it is not personal, you know, most of the time it is not personal.

01:09:00 ◼   ► At least for me, like my real friends, I either talk to them privately on iMessage or I have them on Facebook.

01:09:11 ◼   ► Twitter is for me, like I state many many times in the article, it's an information network.

01:09:18 ◼   ► I am there because I want to find stuff and I'm guessing that I am there because the people who follow me want stuff.

01:09:28 ◼   ► Like links and news and you know, the stuff that are right. Like it's purely based on utility for me.

01:09:35 ◼   ► Yeah, so it's not really like, like I'm not upset at you.

01:09:38 ◼   ► I'm not mad.

01:09:39 ◼   ► It's not personally if I am following you.

01:09:41 ◼   ► I don't wanna say we're not friends, you know,

01:09:45 ◼   ► that's really not the point.

01:09:47 ◼   ► It's about following and being followed.

01:09:50 ◼   ► Like it's right there in the Twitter, in the Twitter app.

01:09:53 ◼   ► If you wanna, if you want to have friendships,

01:09:55 ◼   ► you go to Facebook or you talk to people on Snapchat,

01:09:58 ◼   ► whatever.

01:09:59 ◼   ► - I think in the article,

01:10:03 ◼   ► Maybe the app that you were most critical on

01:10:05 ◼   ► from a design perspective was Twitterific,

01:10:08 ◼   ► because I think it does things different to the other apps,

01:10:12 ◼   ► like in some pretty severe ways.

01:10:15 ◼   ► And I have a theory about Twitterific

01:10:19 ◼   ► and some of the decisions that they make.

01:10:20 ◼   ► And I think a lot of Twitterific's foibles

01:10:24 ◼   ► and some of the interesting choices that they make

01:10:26 ◼   ► fall down to their insistence on the unified timeline.

01:10:29 ◼   ► So having your tweets, your mentions, and your DMs

01:10:32 ◼   ► all in one view if you want.

01:10:34 ◼   ► Because this, I think, what it does is it makes them

01:10:38 ◼   ► do things fundamentally different,

01:10:41 ◼   ► and it can in some instances seem like it breaks the app

01:10:44 ◼   ► to people that are used to things in a certain way.

01:10:46 ◼   ► Like you really pull apart and do a good job

01:10:49 ◼   ► of explaining the interesting and kind of strange way

01:10:53 ◼   ► they deal with DMs.

01:10:54 ◼   ► So they're not in a threaded conversation, right?

01:10:58 ◼   ► They're kind of just like regular tweets,

01:11:01 ◼   ► but in a different view.

01:11:03 ◼   ► So the way that you reply,

01:11:04 ◼   ► the UI that you see when you reply to a mention

01:11:06 ◼   ► is the same as when you reply to a tweet.

01:11:08 ◼   ► Like you only see the previous one in the history.

01:11:10 ◼   ► And it kind of feels strange to me,

01:11:15 ◼   ► and I know that I used to have quite a lot of DM fails

01:11:19 ◼   ► when I used Twitter.

01:11:20 ◼   ► (laughing)

01:11:21 ◼   ► And I think that they do this

01:11:23 ◼   ► because they kind of have to pull,

01:11:25 ◼   ► I mean this is very layman,

01:11:26 ◼   ► and I'm sure like anybody that works at Twitter

01:11:28 ◼   ► can just tell me I'm flat out wrong,

01:11:30 ◼   ► and I would love the feedback if you do.

01:11:32 ◼   ► It feels like that they have to kind of load,

01:11:34 ◼   ► then they do load like three timelines at once,

01:11:36 ◼   ► as opposed to one timeline,

01:11:37 ◼   ► because they're loading a timeline

01:11:39 ◼   ► for the main tweets, mentions, and DMs.

01:11:42 ◼   ► Because as well, their gap detection isn't as good,

01:11:45 ◼   ► so they don't pull in as many tweets

01:11:47 ◼   ► when you do a refresh of a gap as well.

01:11:49 ◼   ► Have you found that, Federico?

01:11:50 ◼   ► - Yeah, yeah, that's been the case generally, yeah.

01:11:54 ◼   ► - And it feels like that potentially

01:11:56 ◼   ► that it is the unified timeline that holds them back.

01:11:58 ◼   ► However, it is a clear defining feature,

01:12:00 ◼   ► and they actually have users because of that feature,

01:12:02 ◼   ► like John Sirk user and Jason Snow.

01:12:04 ◼   ► They love it because--

01:12:06 ◼   ► - Seems like sometimes they design features

01:12:11 ◼   ► just for the sake of keeping the concept

01:12:14 ◼   ► of the unified timeline.

01:12:16 ◼   ► And for messages, the big problem for me is that

01:12:20 ◼   ► today every major communication service is using

01:12:25 ◼   ► the style and the layout of the threaded conversation

01:12:30 ◼   ► view popularized, I guess, by the Apple Messages app

01:12:35 ◼   ► or by IRC chats in a slightly different way.

01:12:40 ◼   ► That's the idea, right?

01:12:41 ◼   ► It's new messages at the bottom, and there's a Compose field.

01:12:44 ◼   ► And when you type, you see the stream of messages above.

01:12:47 ◼   ► That's the basic idea.

01:12:50 ◼   ► And by doing away with that concept,

01:12:53 ◼   ► it kind of complicates everything.

01:12:56 ◼   ► Because by default, you see the stream of conversations,

01:12:59 ◼   ► but you can also show an entire conversation.

01:13:01 ◼   ► However, you cannot reply into that conversation.

01:13:04 ◼   ► It's kind of like they want to mix and match

01:13:07 ◼   ► two different systems, and it kind of doesn't

01:13:09 ◼   ► work in either of those.

01:13:12 ◼   ► My last points are--

01:13:18 ◼   ► well, it's about the blue line and what

01:13:21 ◼   ► you call external tweets.

01:13:23 ◼   ► I'll explain that in a moment

01:13:24 ◼   ► for anybody that hasn't seen it, read it.

01:13:26 ◼   ► Although I hope that kind of people

01:13:28 ◼   ► have read your article at this point,

01:13:29 ◼   ► but it is quite big, so maybe they haven't finished it yet.

01:13:32 ◼   ► On principle, I would have shunned these ideas,

01:13:37 ◼   ► and I have done, especially the blue line, right?

01:13:39 ◼   ► Just be like, I have no interest in you,

01:13:41 ◼   ► leave me alone, never come back,

01:13:43 ◼   ► you're just so dumb, what are you doing?

01:13:45 ◼   ► - I feel that way.

01:13:47 ◼   ► - But when I read what you were saying,

01:13:51 ◼   ► Again, it's like, I don't know,

01:13:53 ◼   ► do you work for Twitter, by the way?

01:13:55 ◼   ► I just wanna double check.

01:13:56 ◼   ► Like, you don't work for them, right?

01:13:58 ◼   ► - No, I really don't.

01:13:59 ◼   ► - I just wanted to double check.

01:14:01 ◼   ► Because you seem to do a better job explaining them.

01:14:05 ◼   ► So I've never been sure about it,

01:14:06 ◼   ► especially the blue line, right?

01:14:07 ◼   ► Moving my tweets around, what's wrong with you?

01:14:09 ◼   ► Like, show me them in chronological order.

01:14:11 ◼   ► Especially when you say it can be a bit weird sometimes

01:14:14 ◼   ► 'cause you see like the same tweet like five times

01:14:16 ◼   ► and you're just scrolling through the same list.

01:14:18 ◼   ► But the idea of seeing things in context makes more sense.

01:14:23 ◼   ► It's like sometimes, I mean, I try and read most of my tweets,

01:14:26 ◼   ► but I don't read every tweet.

01:14:27 ◼   ► And sometimes I see somebody who applies to something

01:14:29 ◼   ► and I swipe into the view to see what they're replying to.

01:14:32 ◼   ► - Yeah, but that's not, it's not like it's out of your way

01:14:35 ◼   ► to swipe over in Tweetbot to see that.

01:14:38 ◼   ► - No. - You know, it's--

01:14:39 ◼   ► - No, because I'm used to it, but in a way,

01:14:42 ◼   ► I can see how it's nicer to just have it there.

01:14:45 ◼   ► I can see how that's possible to be a good thing.

01:14:48 ◼   ► - Yeah, it's just, like I said a couple weeks ago,

01:14:50 ◼   ► it's confusing and even reading your article,

01:14:53 ◼   ► it seems inconsistent at times.

01:14:55 ◼   ► Like I don't always clearly know why this conversation

01:15:00 ◼   ► got a blue line, but another conversation

01:15:02 ◼   ► that appears similar didn't.

01:15:04 ◼   ► And maybe they just need to tighten that down

01:15:05 ◼   ► or maybe it's apps not replying into the thread correctly

01:15:10 ◼   ► with the way the URLs work or something.

01:15:12 ◼   ► but in its current state it feels a little bit broken and sort of frustrating because

01:15:20 ◼   ► it doesn't always do the same thing.

01:15:23 ◼   ► Is that fair?

01:15:24 ◼   ► >> Yeah, that's one of the big issues, not just with the blue line, with other features

01:15:29 ◼   ► too, is that they seem to be testing them rather than be sure that they want to use

01:15:35 ◼   ► them, if that makes any sense.

01:15:39 ◼   ► Basically they're really inconsistent sometimes with features and design ideas.

01:15:46 ◼   ► Maybe there's a motivation behind the fact that sometimes you get the blue line, other

01:15:51 ◼   ► times you don't.

01:15:52 ◼   ► If there is one, it's hard to find it.

01:15:56 ◼   ► I kinda see why the blue line makes sense for, I really don't wanna say casual users,

01:16:04 ◼   ► I'm gonna say users who are not experts of Twitter clients, you know?

01:16:09 ◼   ► Because for us, you know, "Oh, I know I can swipe on tweet, but I know I can use this

01:16:14 ◼   ► gesture or I know I can use this shortcut to make sure I view this tweet in a particular

01:16:21 ◼   ► mode with a particular view."

01:16:23 ◼   ► But for people who don't write about Twitter clients for a living, it is kind of difficult,

01:16:30 ◼   ► You know, to find a correlation between a new tweet and an old conversation, and also

01:16:37 ◼   ► for people who come from Facebook, you know?

01:16:41 ◼   ► People are used to comments and the original posts above the comment.

01:16:47 ◼   ► Being able to see both at the same time starts to make sense after you accept the fact that

01:16:54 ◼   ► Twitter, the official app is not as precise or as schematic as Tweetbot or Twitterific

01:17:02 ◼   ► because those apps, they have a set of design rules and they always, always follow them.

01:17:09 ◼   ► The Twitter app is more like a cauldron of ideas and you just gotta accept it, man.

01:17:18 ◼   ► Because if you try to find, it's like the App Store guidelines, don't try to find every

01:17:24 ◼   ► single rule for every single case.

01:17:26 ◼   ► Oh gosh.

01:17:27 ◼   ► Yeah.

01:17:28 ◼   ► That's a terrible example.

01:17:29 ◼   ► Yeah, I know.

01:17:31 ◼   ► You just got to accept it.

01:17:32 ◼   ► You just got to be like whatever, you know?

01:17:35 ◼   ► It's just there.

01:17:37 ◼   ► Yeah.

01:17:38 ◼   ► So maybe we can close out here.

01:17:41 ◼   ► Are there things in the Twitter app or in sort of like Twitter's idea of itself that

01:17:46 ◼   ► you think are problematic or things that you think they will back away from or do you feel

01:17:53 ◼   ► looking at all these things that Twitter is sure of itself and is marching in a direction

01:17:58 ◼   ► with a clearly defined vision.

01:18:00 ◼   ► Yeah, there is one.

01:18:04 ◼   ► And that is the external tweets, like the tweets that don't come from people you follow,

01:18:11 ◼   ► but come from activity of the people you follow.

01:18:14 ◼   ► So let's say the mic follows, I don't know, Scott Forsall.

01:18:20 ◼   ► And let's say that Scott first of all tweets a lot of stuff, he doesn't, that's sad.

01:18:25 ◼   ► But let's say that he does, and I don't follow the guy, but Myke does.

01:18:28 ◼   ► So on occasion I see tweets from Scott because Myke either retweets, no because he retweets,

01:18:35 ◼   ► because Myke favorites his tweets, or just because Myke follows Scott.

01:18:42 ◼   ► So it's activity from people you follow, from the tweets that they see, the tweets that

01:18:46 ◼   ► they mark as favorite.

01:18:49 ◼   ► And I think that can potentially be a problem only because I realized I was thinking, okay,

01:18:59 ◼   ► maybe people don't care about this sort of feature. Maybe it's another -- it's one of

01:19:04 ◼   ► those things that we tweetbot and Twitterific users we hate, but maybe normal people don't.

01:19:10 ◼   ► But a couple of weeks ago -- I know this is a silly example, but I saw the Zach Braff,

01:19:17 ◼   ► the Scrubs guy, the actor, very popular on Twitter, he tweeted -- now, I'm just assuming

01:19:23 ◼   ► that Zach Braff doesn't blog about apps normally. So I saw Zach Braff tweeting WhatsApp with

01:19:31 ◼   ► the tweets in my Twitter timeline. So if normal -- I'm assuming that Zach Braff is not a normal

01:19:38 ◼   ► person because he's a celebrity, you know? But it's just from a tech reviewer point of

01:19:44 ◼   ► you is normal. So if someone like Zach Ruff can see what's up, can see that there's something

01:19:52 ◼   ► strange, maybe if Twitter overdoos, that kind of policy of showing tweets from other sources,

01:20:05 ◼   ► people can get upset. And they need to go easy with that, I think. Like, it's cool if

01:20:12 ◼   ► show me, like in my experience I always see these kind of tweets at night when my timeline

01:20:17 ◼   ► is really slow, so Twitter gives me suggestions. And that's cool. I don't want to see 20 external

01:20:24 ◼   ► tweets as I call them. I don't want to see 20 external tweets during an Apple event,

01:20:29 ◼   ► for example. Which is back to Myke's point, is they want to keep you in the app. They

01:20:33 ◼   ► want to keep you in their advertising platform. Yeah, that was a general feeling that I got.

01:20:41 ◼   ► They want to keep you engaged at all times.

01:20:44 ◼   ► Cool.

01:20:45 ◼   ► Federico, I enjoyed it very much.

01:20:49 ◼   ► I think people need to go to Mac stories and they can read at macstories.net and you'll

01:20:55 ◼   ► be able to find… you can find Teaches Fantastic post there.

01:21:00 ◼   ► You can go to our show notes which are at, I will do it this time, relay.fm/connected/17.

01:21:07 ◼   ► You will find the links to everything that we wanted to show you and you'll find everything

01:21:12 ◼   ► you want to read, including a tweet from Zach Braff.

01:21:15 ◼   ► If that's what you're into, you'll find that too.

01:21:18 ◼   ► If you want to find us online, there's a few ways you can do that.

01:21:21 ◼   ► I am @imyke on Twitter and I am a podcaster at Realism, of course.

01:21:27 ◼   ► You should know this by now.

01:21:28 ◼   ► Steven is @ismh on Twitter and he writes at 512pixels.net and Federico, of course, is

01:21:33 ◼   ► at Macstories.net and here @Vittiichi on Twitter. V-I-T-I-C-C-I. If you enjoy the show, please

01:21:39 ◼   ► consider rating it on iTunes. We never ask you to do that. It would be nice if you did.

01:21:43 ◼   ► I would like it anyway. We have a store, store.realafm, if you'd like to pick up stickers, t-shirts,

01:21:48 ◼   ► it's a great way to do it. Helps support the show. Talking about supporting the show, thanks

01:21:52 ◼   ► to our sponsors this week, the great people at Bajango, Harry's and ICONic. We'll be back

01:21:58 ◼   ► next time with another episode of your favorite podcast, which is also called Connected, I

01:22:03 ◼   ► I think we can probably at least win that one.

01:22:06 ◼   ► Say goodbye everybody.

01:22:07 ◼   ► - Adios.

01:22:09 ◼   ► - Adios.