00:00:19 ◼ ► Federico Vittucci, and it's my pleasure to be joined by Mr. Stephen Hackett. Hello, Stephen.
00:04:14 ◼ ► I don't mean to, like, Frederico Christmas Tree is not like a sponsor of this week's show.
00:05:12 ◼ ► And so thank you, Frederico Christmas Tree's, for obviously for keeping your company in business
00:06:16 ◼ ► I created a project for my iOS reviews, and it's using the 10 markdown documents that I uploaded.
00:06:29 ◼ ► But with my reviews, I was always able to ask questions and get detailed results with citations
00:06:55 ◼ ► in the AI space lately, which is called RAG, and it stands for Retrieval Augmented Generation.
00:07:03 ◼ ► but it's basically a system that, and I'm going to oversimplify this because this is not an AI
00:07:33 ◼ ► information directly into the data source, the external data set that is effectively augmenting
00:07:45 ◼ ► Now, I also tried to do something else, which is I thought, well, if it works so well for all of my
00:07:53 ◼ ► iOS reviews, what would happen if I took my folder in Obsidian that contains all of the articles that
00:08:07 ◼ ► I guess, at this point. So not 15 years worth of documents, but four years worth of documents.
00:08:13 ◼ ► And I sure was able to upload them, but it stopped at 50 documents. So I couldn't upload to those 400
00:08:23 ◼ ► something files, just 50 of them. And still, even with 50 documents randomly chosen from my archive
00:08:31 ◼ ► in Obsidian. So there's an app review, there's a news post, there's a linked post. It's an
00:08:37 ◼ ► assortment of articles. Even then, I was able to ask questions like, can you tell me what some of
00:08:43 ◼ ► my favorite apps are? And it produced a list of apps organized by category, linking back to the
00:08:51 ◼ ► reviews. Like this technology is pretty wild if you are a researcher, if you are an academic, or
00:09:00 ◼ ► if you just want to be able to have effectively a super intelligent, fuzzy search system that lets
00:09:10 ◼ ► you ask questions in natural language and is fast and produces accurate results that, and this is
00:09:16 ◼ ► essential, that link back to the portion of the document where that information is coming from.
00:09:24 ◼ ► So yeah, pretty impressive results. Kind of bummed that this is the only solution for this problem
00:09:33 ◼ ► right now. I love to pay for a service that has support for unlimited documents and lets me upload
00:09:41 ◼ ► my entire backlog of articles that are published. And it's a Google product. So there's always
00:09:50 ◼ ► the thought in the back of my mind saying, well, they're going to shut it down in a couple of
00:09:54 ◼ ► months because this is an experiment. So we'll see what happens. But for now, it's very good.
00:10:01 ◼ ► And I also did something else, which I don't know. So you probably have seen this online,
00:10:08 ◼ ► notebook LM as a podcast generation. So they can generate a quote unquote podcast between two fake
00:10:19 ◼ ► people talking to each other about the contents of the documents that you uploaded in a project.
00:10:40 ◼ ► Now, there's a link in the show notes. You can click the link and have a listen. I mean,
00:10:56 ◼ ► I don't know who like. Would you ever consume an AI podcast on a weekly basis? Probably not.
00:11:03 ◼ ► But the only argument that I've read in favor of like what like because one has to wonder,
00:11:11 ◼ ► why does this exist? Why is this a feature? Why is it useful? The only argument that I've read
00:11:24 ◼ ► We like people having a conversation about a topic than it would be for a variety of reasons
00:11:30 ◼ ► to read through a long document. Some people it's easier to listen to 20 minutes or 40 minutes of a
00:11:39 ◼ ► really dense information, dense conversation than it would be because it's like an attention span
00:11:46 ◼ ► thing or whatever. They would be to read that information in an article. I mean, it exists.
00:11:53 ◼ ► And unfortunately, people are going to make fake AI podcasts and they're going to distribute them.
00:12:11 ◼ ► I don't think so. I mean, once again, I hope not. I hope not. You know, the AI will never
00:12:23 ◼ ► about playing this audio and we decided not to. So you can go click the link if you want.
00:12:37 ◼ ► we put AI generated content in the show. I believe it was like, wasn't it like people got real mad?
00:12:48 ◼ ► And it was a joke. It was a joke. OK. It was like still. So if you want, you can click on the link
00:12:53 ◼ ► in the show notes and, you know, listen for yourself. But yeah. OK. I I've been talking about
00:13:03 ◼ ► my Apple Watch problems. How have you? I spoke about it. I'll connect to last week. I spoke
00:13:08 ◼ ► about it in an upgrade on Monday. The struggles continue. I have made a bunch of changes to my
00:13:19 ◼ ► Pretty extreme battery drain on my ultra and it will drop connection to my phone. In fact,
00:13:27 ◼ ► the other night I was sleep tracking a word that I definitely know how to pronounce, unlike last
00:13:33 ◼ ► week, I learned how to say it and it stopped. It like disconnected at two thirty in the morning
00:13:40 ◼ ► and that's when sleep tracking stopped. It's like, OK, OK, like what are we doing? So yesterday
00:13:45 ◼ ► I set up a series nine, which I have for development with underscore, wiped it, set it up
00:13:53 ◼ ► as new on my personal phone. And I've been wearing it 24 hours. Like, I don't know if it's fixed it
00:13:58 ◼ ► or or or not. Like, is this an issue with older Apple Watch hardware because I'm on an ultra one?
00:14:03 ◼ ► Like, I just don't know what to do. I have a lot of emails from people with suggestions, which I
00:14:09 ◼ ► appreciate. I'm slowly working through those. It's just it's kind of frustrating, but I did
00:14:17 ◼ ► because I got a really good deal on Amazon, I did upgrade Mary from her older Apple Watch to a new
00:14:24 ◼ ► series 10. Thank you, Cyber Monday. And I gave it to her and she said, this thing is enormous. I got
00:14:31 ◼ ► her the smaller size. It's actually the size of the big Apple Watch in the beginning. Like,
00:15:06 ◼ ► Hmm. Don't know. This is historically this is when someone from Apple and anonymous listener
00:15:14 ◼ ► usually swoops in and saves the day. But that hasn't happened yet. It has not happened yet.
00:15:33 ◼ ► to do that. But I'm looking up the feedback number. I'm trying to log in. I have to get
00:15:57 ◼ ► Cool. My computer just beeps at me if I try to click anything. And it's frozen. OK, well,
00:16:03 ◼ ► I would read you the feedback number, but I can't because the feedback app is frozen on my Mac.
00:16:08 ◼ ► Cool. That's the show notes. Maybe or you can mention it later. You know, we have we have our
00:16:14 ◼ ► ways. Oh, got it. OK. Feedback one six zero two six seven nine five. It has logs from an Apple Watch
00:16:25 ◼ ► Ultra. Please fix this for Steven. Please take a look at it. The guy needs his Apple Watch to work
00:16:39 ◼ ► that we wanted to talk about. Well, I want to talk about you're not going to like this.
00:16:44 ◼ ► OK. Nathan wrote in I'm using the new Macintosh screensaver, the new one in Sequoia. It's really
00:16:52 ◼ ► cool with random colors. I approve. I'd I regularly come back to my Mac Mini M2 Pro with a full green
00:16:59 ◼ ► screen without any animation. No, no, no, no. After five to 10 minutes, it will resume the
00:17:05 ◼ ► animations and change color, but it always freezes on green. I would like to know if it's just me or
00:17:11 ◼ ► is anyone else having the same issue. Oh, you're sneaky with this follow up items. You you didn't
00:17:19 ◼ ► you didn't write in the subject of the main item that it was about Greengate. That's right.
00:17:24 ◼ ► Is this also is this also the case for the second one? Let's read the second one. This is from
00:17:32 ◼ ► listener Grag. So you mentioned color gamut and Siri in this week's episode, last week's episode,
00:17:38 ◼ ► and I can confirm that the new Siri actually uses HDR for the glow, at least on Mac OS.
00:17:44 ◼ ► As an eye, this is wild as an iMac owner who experiences the jittery step up, step down effect
00:17:51 ◼ ► when the screen switches into pseudo HDR mode. It's hard to miss the fact that invoking Siri
00:17:57 ◼ ► always causes that to happen. So my theory that Apple made the fancy screenshots with 16 bit
00:18:05 ◼ ► display P3 to show off the Siri colors was not wrong. They are actually they are actually doing
00:18:13 ◼ ► this. They're doing this for more than just the Siri glow effect. But yeah, interesting.
00:18:40 ◼ ► This episode of Connected is brought to you by NetSuite. What does the future hold for businesses?
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00:19:55 ◼ ► opportunities. And speaking of opportunity, download the CFO's guide to AI today at NetSuite.com/Connected.
00:20:04 ◼ ► That's N-E-T-S-U-I-T-E. NetSuite.com/Connected. Our thanks to NetSuite for the support of the show
00:20:14 ◼ ► and all of Relay. I also have some follow out because Mike has been off. I've been just like
00:20:23 ◼ ► making the rounds on Relay. Upgrade 540, I joined Jason to talk about things. I was listening before
00:20:31 ◼ ► sitting down to record this episode. So yeah, pretty good episode. Do you know that upgrade
00:20:39 ◼ ► Upgrade is my podcast of the year. All right. Yeah, I don't miss I don't miss any episodes like
00:20:49 ◼ ► straight to the top of my inbox. And I really love the show. So you should listen to it because
00:20:56 ◼ ► Steven is a very good replacement for Mike on the show. We're basically interchangeable. The thing
00:21:02 ◼ ► that I've realized is I'm the same way. I don't miss an episode of Upgrade. And I realized when
00:21:06 ◼ ► it came out Monday evening, I was like, oh, I can't listen to this. I was on it. It's always
00:21:11 ◼ ► a bummer. Yeah, it's kind of thrown off my podcast listening this week. Honestly, it's a bit strange.
00:21:19 ◼ ► I was also on focused episode 218 talking about sabbaticals David and Mike. And then part two
00:21:26 ◼ ► of our state of the platforms on MPU came out on Sunday. Very happy with that. But the biggest news
00:21:32 ◼ ► Yes. in podcast land. Tell us what your NPC co host are up to. So MPC next portable console. It's my
00:21:41 ◼ ► show about portable gaming and handhelds. My two co hosts. So OTJ, John Boris and Brandon Bigley.
00:21:51 ◼ ► The boys are going to Vegas for CES 2025. They are going together. They got a media pass for CES
00:22:03 ◼ ► and they will be trying all the weird half broken vaporware handhelds and some of them actually real
00:22:12 ◼ ► and weird accessories that will be shown off at CES. John has plans to take videos of everything.
00:22:22 ◼ ► We still have to decide how to properly cover their experience, their daily experience at
00:22:29 ◼ ► MPC. Maybe we're going to do some some YouTube videos. We'll see. Also, depending on actually
00:22:36 ◼ ► how many gaming related announcements we'll see at CES. But we usually do. And it's widely expected
00:22:43 ◼ ► that we're going to see. I don't know how plugged into the whole portable gaming scene you are,
00:22:47 ◼ ► Steven. You probably aren't. But anyway, there's this there's this portable PC handhelds, right?
00:22:56 ◼ ► Like the Asus makes one Lenovo makes one. And they're all running on this version of an AMD
00:23:04 ◼ ► chip. It's called the Z1. And they're all using this this this APU. It's like the equivalent of
00:23:11 ◼ ► a system on a chip. And it's widely expected that at CES AMD will show off the Z2 and the Z2 Extreme.
00:23:19 ◼ ► And so that's going to be exciting. We're probably going to see more handheld PCs. And so that's why
00:23:25 ◼ ► Brendan and John are going to be there. And of course, there's going to be all these companies
00:23:28 ◼ ► out of China bringing their, you know, their much lower priced handles for like emulation and all
00:23:34 ◼ ► that stuff to the to the to the to the show. And so we'll see. But I'm mostly excited for Brendan
00:23:42 ◼ ► and John to be together for a few days in Las Vegas. Yeah. Who knows what they're going to
00:23:46 ◼ ► who knows what they're going to do and if they will survive. Brendan will definitely survive.
00:23:52 ◼ ► John is John. John is more up in the air, I guess. Yeah, I agree. When I think about all of our
00:23:58 ◼ ► friends who could or have or might go to CES, John being there is the funniest to me for some reason.
00:24:06 ◼ ► Yeah. Yeah. This is not like an age thing. It's just like John. It's a vibe thing. It's a vibe
00:24:13 ◼ ► thing. Yeah. Like, can you picture John in Las Vegas? My only problem? No, but here's here's a
00:24:22 ◼ ► thought. John may surprise us because maybe he's got a dark side and maybe he was a lawyer. Maybe
00:24:30 ◼ ► he was a lawyer for many years and a and a bankruptcy lawyer at that. So the guy has seen
00:24:36 ◼ ► some stuff that's right in his previous life. And so who knows? Maybe wouldn't be a problem for John
00:24:42 ◼ ► to work all day and then go party hard at night because maybe in a previous life used to do that.
00:24:54 ◼ ► Apple released iCloud passwords for Firefox. For real? That's the whole breaking news. Did they
00:25:03 ◼ ► at the very least release the release candidate of 18.2? Not that I've seen. Okay. So yeah,
00:25:09 ◼ ► if you're a Firefox user, now you can log into your favorite websites. Yeah. Big news for four
00:25:15 ◼ ► people. Yeah. You know, it's also big news. The relay membership sale is still going on.
00:25:22 ◼ ► It's still going on and you can log into your member account using iCloud passwords on Firefox.
00:25:27 ◼ ► That is true. Yes, it's true. So what is this? Well, each week we do connected pro, which is a
00:25:35 ◼ ► longer ad free version of the show each week. This week, Federico and I explored our Apple music
00:25:42 ◼ ► replay and Spotify wrap results. And at the end we pick titles and do some other stuff. And you
00:25:48 ◼ ► can get that for 20% off until December 18th. So that makes it, you know, 20% off is a pretty good
00:25:56 ◼ ► deal. It's like twice as good as 10% off Federico. Yeah. Yeah. Sure. I went to college. Can you tell?
00:26:03 ◼ ► I can tell. So you get connected pro, but you also get a bunch of really cool other perks. You get a
00:26:09 ◼ ► monthly behind the scenes newsletter, some wallpapers, access to backstage and spotlight,
00:26:15 ◼ ► which are two members only podcasts on backstage. Mike and I talk about the business and answer
00:26:20 ◼ ► people's questions. And then I'll spotlight Kathy Campbell interviews, a different relay host.
00:26:26 ◼ ► It's a great show. I love listening to spotlight and you get access to the relay members discord,
00:26:32 ◼ ► which is a really awesome place on the internet. All of that 20% off until December 18th. The link
00:26:44 ◼ ► So go check that out. You can get it for yourself. You can send a gift to somebody else
00:26:53 ◼ ► you know, send this link to your aunt and she'll know what to get you for Christmas. So
00:27:08 ◼ ► Okay. I'm here to help. Yeah. So I'm going to go straight to the point. Okay. And then we're
00:27:13 ◼ ► going to talk about it. Okay. I miss the third camera on the iPhone 16 pro. Oh no. And now let
00:27:22 ◼ ► me explain why I love everything about the 16 plus literally everything I love. Like I've read about
00:27:32 ◼ ► this two months ago. Um, I love the color. I love that it's lighter. I love that it's thinner.
00:27:39 ◼ ► I love that it's fun. And I don't care about the things that most people told me on social networks
00:27:55 ◼ ► that hasn't been a problem. But this week I realized something and then I talked about it
00:28:03 ◼ ► with my girlfriend and she confirmed that it's a pattern. It's a behavior that she also noticed.
00:28:23 ◼ ► I think I know because I thought about it and I have a theory. I went to a, uh, some of our,
00:28:30 ◼ ► two of our best friends back in Viterbo. They had a baby last year and he turned one a couple
00:28:36 ◼ ► of days ago. And so we went to the, to the, you know, to the first birthday party that they,
00:28:41 ◼ ► that was a pretty big deal. You know, it's a, it's, it's his first birthday and you know,
00:28:48 ◼ ► some friends were there, family was there. It was a really nice occasion. And I noticed that I never
00:28:54 ◼ ► took out my phone to take pictures and Sylvia took them all with her 16 pro. And, and then she
00:29:02 ◼ ► mentioned like, Oh, I noticed you didn't take any pictures. Um, and so I, and that sort of had me
00:29:09 ◼ ► thinking like, and I started scrolling through my photos library for the past couple of months.
00:29:14 ◼ ► And I noticed that it was full of screen, full of screenshots and way, way fewer photos than in
00:29:23 ◼ ► previous years. And so I realized, huh, I love the 16 plus so much for everything else, but the camera
00:29:36 ◼ ► part is what gets me here. And I think it's then I sort of did some self research and sort of
00:29:45 ◼ ► self analysis here. I went back to photos from the years before and it turns out that much to
00:29:53 ◼ ► my surprise, I really relied on the five excellence way more than I thought. You didn't look at that
00:30:02 ◼ ► before you, before the purchase. No, I thought it's going to be, I, and I think I wrote about
00:30:07 ◼ ► this in the article. I thought, Oh, it's going to be fine with two X and I'm pretty sure I said,
00:30:16 ◼ ► And in practice after two months, you know, this is what I like about, like, this is what I like
00:30:23 ◼ ► about doing this show and sort of like publishing on the internet and then waiting a few months and
00:30:30 ◼ ► then following up on what you said. There's a lot of, uh, in our community, there's a lot of like,
00:30:35 ◼ ► Oh, you published something. Therefore it must be the law. And therefore you must also be consistent.
00:30:53 ◼ ► This is the thing we both do, you know? Uh, but the thing is like, I took a look at my,
00:31:01 ◼ ► I took a look at my photos and I realized, Oh wait, this is full of screenshots, full of
00:31:06 ◼ ► screen recordings. Why am I not taking as many photos of my dogs as I used to? Why did I go to
00:31:14 ◼ ► a birthday party? Very nice occasion. And I never took out my phone. It's because subconsciously,
00:31:21 ◼ ► I know that I got this phone that I really like for like phone and productivity things and social
00:31:29 ◼ ► media things. But when it comes to pictures, I guess I don't. And I guess I'm, I missed the
00:31:36 ◼ ► 16 pro max and, and it sucks. Here's the thing. It sucks because I don't want to use the 16 pro max.
00:31:48 ◼ ► I don't care about promotion. I don't care about the bigger screen. I don't care about the longer
00:31:53 ◼ ► battery life. I have been totally fine with the 16 plus, but here's the thing. Phones change every
00:32:01 ◼ ► year, right? And we upgrade our phones because we can, because it's what we do for a living
00:32:06 ◼ ► phones change, but the photos and the memories, those, if you don't capture them or gone forever.
00:32:21 ◼ ► I think it's worth doing the flip flop in my case, if anything, to make sure that I don't end up
00:32:28 ◼ ► like on Sunday, a few days ago, when I went to a really nice family gathering and I didn't take
00:32:35 ◼ ► any pictures because subconsciously I knew that I didn't have the good zoom and the digital zoom was
00:32:41 ◼ ► not going to be as good as the pictures that Sylvia was taking on her iPhone. And so I deferred
00:32:48 ◼ ► to Sylvia for the taking of the pictures and the saving of the memories. And that's not okay. So
00:33:00 ◼ ► I got to do it for the pictures, man. Like it's, I, I, you know, longterm, like three years from now,
00:33:10 ◼ ► looking back, I couldn't forgive myself if I wouldn't have certain captures of certain memories
00:33:20 ◼ ► because I want to keep using the 16 plus because of the color and because of the thinness and
00:33:25 ◼ ► because of the things I like about it. And I kind of wish that I guess all this to say, I kind of
00:33:31 ◼ ► wish that there was a cheaper, more colorful 16 from X that didn't require getting the best
00:33:38 ◼ ► that didn't require getting the boring white or titanium phone. Yeah. Okay. I look, it's a silly
00:33:47 ◼ ► thing that it comes down to color, but I really liked the color of this phone, but it's been two
00:33:53 ◼ ► months and it's a problem that I don't have as many pictures as I thought. Hmm. Yeah. I agree.
00:33:59 ◼ ► It does. I want to play devil's advocate for a second because Kyle brought this up in discord.
00:34:05 ◼ ► Is there an angle where you were more in the moment rather than thinking about taking photos?
00:34:10 ◼ ► No, I was in the moment. I, you know, just, it doesn't take you out at the moment to just take
00:34:17 ◼ ► one or two photos or maybe a photo in a video when, when the kid is blowing on the birthday cake,
00:34:23 ◼ ► you know, but like not having it, it really sucks, you know? And, and I mean, sure. I could ask Sylvia
00:34:31 ◼ ► for, for the pictures and I mean, she shared them in the WhatsApp group that we have, but still,
00:34:44 ◼ ► Like I, I shouldn't have to, I shouldn't have to have a backup photographer. Yeah. Yeah. You know,
00:34:54 ◼ ► interesting. This is how they get you, you know, not with the color, not with the titanium,
00:35:01 ◼ ► not with the display that gets you with the camera. Yeah. Interesting. I have found that the, the,
00:35:11 ◼ ► the zoom is something that I do use quite a bit and, you know, this year my phone changed was I
00:35:18 ◼ ► went from the pro max to the pro size and I've been, I've been very happy with that because the
00:35:35 ◼ ► the camera is the most important thing. So I get it. It definitely stinks. And, you know,
00:35:47 ◼ ► but I get it. I get it. Yeah. Yeah. So you will not find judgment for me when it comes to flip
00:35:54 ◼ ► flopping. Thank you. I felt, I felt a warmth coming from you as I was explaining my problem.
00:36:03 ◼ ► So thank you. Welcome. So welcome. Well, I guess, you'll, you'll, you'll sell off the other phone.
00:36:13 ◼ ► Yeah. I, I think that's what I got to do. Yeah. So we'll see. I just wanted to bring it up on the
00:36:21 ◼ ► show to see like as a sanity check, you know, make sure like, am I crazy for thinking this?
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00:38:56 ◼ ► right? But now the hot thing are agents. Everybody is doing agents. So why are we talking about this?
00:39:07 ◼ ► Um, a couple of days ago, the company behind the Arc browser called Aptly, the browser company,
00:39:15 ◼ ► announced... Really painted themselves in the corner with that name, it turns out. Right,
00:39:25 ◼ ► Go dog. It does seem like everybody's making browsers, but we'll get to this in a minute.
00:39:32 ◼ ► So they announced their plans to build a new AI web browser called Dia. Is that how they're... I
00:39:45 ◼ ► haven't watched the video. Did they say Dia or... I believe it's Dia. Dia. Okay. Doesn't mean
00:39:53 ◼ ► anything. I don't know. But it's a separate browser for Mark, and it's going to be heavily
00:39:59 ◼ ► based on an agent. So a large language model agent, meaning agent in the sense like the
00:40:07 ◼ ► large language model, in addition to answering your queries via text, can also perform actions.
00:40:12 ◼ ► And they showed off this demo where the agent was able to draft an email with some links for
00:40:20 ◼ ► Amazon products. Fun fact, they showed off... I actually did watch this part of the video.
00:40:25 ◼ ► They showed off the agent inside the browser, sending an email to the browser company CEO's
00:40:31 ◼ ► wife and beginning the email with "Hi, hope things are well with you." And is that really
00:40:52 ◼ ► Oh my god. Oh my god. In any case, they showed the browser being able to grab some product links and
00:40:59 ◼ ► send an email. They mentioned the browser being able to act almost independently and do things
00:41:05 ◼ ► in the background. Perform searches, collect links, basically do these sort of things where
00:41:14 ◼ ► it's actually working inside the browser and has the full knowledge of the open tabs that you have,
00:41:20 ◼ ► your browsing history, and is able to perform actions on those things based on your commands.
00:41:26 ◼ ► Now, this is the hot new thing in the AI tech space, in the large language model space,
00:41:38 ◼ ► for a variety of reasons, I think. It all started obviously with generative AI and the ability to
00:41:52 ◼ ► they have objectively advanced at an incredible pace in terms of the generation of illustrations
00:41:59 ◼ ► and photos. I mean, don't look at what Apple is doing with Image Playground because they are
00:42:04 ◼ ► effectively two years behind. The state of the art now, even though it sucks that it exists,
00:42:13 ◼ ► they produce remarkable results. And OpenAI are supposed to be announcing, I guess tomorrow or
00:42:21 ◼ ► in a few days, the official debut of Sora, which is going to be their model to create videos.
00:42:26 ◼ ► It's terrible, but these tools have advanced and continue to advance. Then there's been the whole,
00:42:32 ◼ ► and this is still kind of in the beginning phase, of this assistive version of AI, where
00:42:39 ◼ ► these tools, these large language models, they're kind of pitched as a way to assist you in your
00:42:45 ◼ ► work. And so, use them for productivity purposes, for doing research, code. I don't know if you're
00:42:53 ◼ ► familiar, Steven, but there's this company called Cursor that is becoming really, really popular,
00:42:59 ◼ ► especially over the past year. And it's basically an IDE where it sort of writes the code for you.
00:43:08 ◼ ► And the next evolution of this, if you think about it, if you're using an assistive AI,
00:43:15 ◼ ► whenever it comes to productivity and to productivity tools, and we've seen this playbook
00:43:21 ◼ ► before, it's almost embedded within human nature that the next step is, "Oh, but how can we automate
00:43:31 ◼ ► this?" It's natural. We think of a new productivity tool, we use the productivity tool, and then we
00:43:39 ◼ ► wonder, "Can we automate this process?" It happened with AppleScript, it happened with Automator,
00:43:45 ◼ ► it happened with shortcuts. It is the course of human nature to find a new productivity system,
00:43:52 ◼ ► a new tool, and then to wonder, "Can we automate it?" So now, the new frontier is, "Well,
00:43:59 ◼ ► these assistive AI tools, what if we automated them?" And so, the way that they're doing this is
00:44:05 ◼ ► giving the large language model these agent capabilities where the model is able to take
00:44:17 ◼ ► I have seen, and in fact have played around with, these AI web agents. It's kind of funny,
00:44:26 ◼ ► because when you see what they're doing, and there's a couple of services that let you actually
00:44:31 ◼ ► see in real time what's happening, these companies have created a cluster of virtualized instances of
00:44:47 ◼ ► and they have these models that are using vision APIs, so image recognition, the ability to parse
00:44:54 ◼ ► the structure of a web page, and the natural language prompts to browse around and do things
00:45:02 ◼ ► for you. I played around with one of them a couple of days ago, and I asked him, "Can you
00:45:07 ◼ ► find the latest episode of App Stories on Apple Podcasts and get me the link for the latest
00:45:12 ◼ ► episode?" And you can see in real time what's going on, and it's a virtualized Google Chrome
00:45:18 ◼ ► window with a model that is using image recognition and parsing of the web page structure
00:45:25 ◼ ► and understanding of your language to browse around, open tabs, click on menus, and copy
00:45:33 ◼ ► links and send your response. Now, this is the cloud version. It appears that there's going to
00:45:39 ◼ ► be a consumer version of this trend built inside web browsers. So this is what the browser company
00:45:46 ◼ ► is doing. They have understood that the money is now flowing in this direction of a version of AI
00:45:55 ◼ ► that is more productivity-oriented, and not just that, because they did have AI with this sort of
00:46:00 ◼ ► thing before, with summaries and collecting of multiple sources. But the money is flowing in
00:46:07 ◼ ► the direction of productivity and automation based on large language models. So this is what
00:46:16 ◼ ► they're building. But here's the problem. They're not the only ones building this stuff. Just today,
00:46:25 ◼ ► I saw a link on the verge for a new browser. This is going to be, you know, if we ever do 2025
00:46:34 ◼ ► predictions, I can tell you there's going to be so many of these. This new surf browser, it's called
00:46:39 ◼ ► surf, by a startup called DETA. They're building an agent, or as they call them, agentic. That's
00:46:51 ◼ ► the new term that they're using. They're building a web browser with an agent inside. So it helps you
00:46:56 ◼ ► sort of browse around, take actions, organize, and keep track of things you want to do. But the other
00:47:03 ◼ ► problem, I guess the other two problems for the browser company are Google has said that they're
00:47:09 ◼ ► going to do this with Gemini inside Google Chrome, and OpenAI. Assuming they still own Chrome, I
00:47:15 ◼ ► guess. Assuming that it's, you know, what are they going to call the Google Chrome company?
00:47:21 ◼ ► Hey, here's a galaxy brain thought for you. If Google is forced to give up Google Chrome,
00:47:34 ◼ ► non Google Chrome? The browser company. But I'm just saying, I wouldn't be surprised if the
00:47:43 ◼ ► browser company, this is actually a thought that comes from my MPC co-host Brendan Bigley.
00:47:48 ◼ ► I wouldn't be surprised if this pivot by the browser company is a plan to get acquired.
00:47:54 ◼ ► Basically, pivot until you find the thing that attracts investors that want to give you money
00:47:59 ◼ ► to acquire the thing. And let me be clear, this thing, a browser with an agent is the thing right
00:48:06 ◼ ► now. Like if you are in Silicon Valley, this is the thing. So hey, maybe they'll get acquired by
00:48:12 ◼ ► the non Google Chrome company in the future. We'll see. But the other the second problem. So the
00:48:18 ◼ ► the first problem for the browser companies that there's going to be a bunch of startups
00:48:28 ◼ ► So chat GPT is moving from, well, if you think about it, like the biggest problem for OpenAI
00:48:35 ◼ ► and Anthropic are, well, we own the assistant in terms of like we have a website that you can go
00:48:41 ◼ ► to. We have an app that you can download, but we don't own your operating system. So short of being
00:48:48 ◼ ► able to release actual operating systems, these companies are probably going to do two things.
00:48:53 ◼ ► The first one, the more obvious and easier one, I guess, is make a browser because a bunch of people
00:48:59 ◼ ► live in a browser. You know, I mean, the browser is in Chrome OS's world is actually true. But
00:49:06 ◼ ► for most people, the browser is the OS because you're just online all day doing stuff. And the
00:49:11 ◼ ► OS it matters to people like us. But for most people, it doesn't. It doesn't. So the first
00:49:17 ◼ ► thing they're going to try is make a browser. And the second thing may be build hardware. Now,
00:49:22 ◼ ► that's much more challenging. But, you know, wouldn't be surprised if in the next three years,
00:49:27 ◼ ► OpenAI actually comes out with hardware of their own. Now, this is potentially going to be
00:49:33 ◼ ► problematic for for the browser company if, you know, there's going to be Chrome with an AI agent
00:49:39 ◼ ► inside and, you know, chat GPT becoming, I don't know, the GPT browser or something where it
00:49:45 ◼ ► actually does a lot of things and can perform actions for you and do the research for you and
00:49:50 ◼ ► all that sort of stuff. So right now, the browser company is saying Arc isn't going away. But, you
00:49:58 ◼ ► know, these things go. This new Dia product obviously has their attention right now. And
00:50:07 ◼ ► this is their pivot. I don't fully understand how and why they couldn't say Arc 2 is going to be
00:50:15 ◼ ► all about an agent inside the browser. There must be a reason for that in their own minds. But we
00:50:22 ◼ ► don't know that reason. I first of all, I wanted to know what you think. And then I have another
00:50:30 ◼ ► brief conversation I want to have with you about like, well, Apple's role in all of this could be.
00:50:36 ◼ ► But first of all, how do you feel about a little agent living in your browser organizing the KBase
00:50:43 ◼ ► for you? I mean, who knew that the Rabbit R1 was onto the right idea the whole time? Right?
00:50:49 ◼ ► It was orange and weird, but this feels very. This feels very of the moment, and I don't think this
00:51:02 ◼ ► is the future. Like this just feels like the late the latest like flash in the pan kind of thing.
00:51:07 ◼ ► And while I do think that making the browser smarter and being able to do things for the
00:51:15 ◼ ► users like, oh, that's interesting, but is it going to change the world? Is it is it enough
00:51:20 ◼ ► to build a company over like I look at this and I think you're totally right. I think the browser
00:51:25 ◼ ► company wants to get acquired. I do like that they throw shade like AI is not going to be in a button
00:51:30 ◼ ► like, OK, sick, sick burn to what's that product named the what's the AI pin humane. Yeah, you mean
00:51:40 ◼ ► but they also say AI is not going to be in an app. It's like, OK, you're betting against the apps,
00:51:44 ◼ ► like good luck with that. But the thing I'm most so this may be interesting. I don't know if it's
00:51:49 ◼ ► the future. The thing that I'm most sort of. Surprised by, it's like, why would the browser
00:51:58 ◼ ► company give up on arc, like you said, and you know, arc is not a hugely successful project. Like
00:52:07 ◼ ► it has a lot of weird ideas in it, but the people who love it really love it. Like in discord,
00:52:12 ◼ ► people are talking about it right now, like how they enjoy it does things that other browsers
00:52:17 ◼ ► don't do. And I don't know why you would burn the goodwill you have with your user base.
00:52:23 ◼ ► And yes, they say it's going to continue, but clearly don't think it's the future of the company.
00:52:29 ◼ ► And I don't understand why you couldn't. Have this be a feature that comes to arc first and
00:52:38 ◼ ► then other places or like leverage what you already have in the browser you build it just
00:52:48 ◼ ► Yeah, yeah, I don't really understand this part. The other point that I wanted to raise is,
00:52:57 ◼ ► so if there's if this idea of agents with large language models that can do things for you
00:53:04 ◼ ► continues to be developed and continues like becomes a thing. Chai GPT is rumored to be getting
00:53:11 ◼ ► support for agents at some point. And in fact, I think just today, OpenAI announced that they're
00:53:17 ◼ ► going to have 12 days of announcements starting tomorrow. They're expected to announce Sora,
00:53:23 ◼ ► which is their text to video generative model and a bunch of other things. Maybe they will
00:53:29 ◼ ► show a teaser for the browser or maybe they'll show off agents, whatever. We'll see. I think
00:53:35 ◼ ► it's fascinating to see where Apple may be. But now maybe, well, Apple is behind in terms of
00:53:45 ◼ ► like just the fact that they don't have a large language model. They don't have a Siri LLM.
00:53:53 ◼ ► In the sense of like something you can talk to and keep the context going, have a list of
00:53:59 ◼ ► conversations like you can with Chai GPT or Claude. They are behind and they're rumored to
00:54:04 ◼ ► be announcing Siri LLM next year in iOS 19 for launch in spring 2026. So they're 18 months away.
00:54:25 ◼ ► They may be ahead of the curve. If only by virtue of owning the operating system with their plan to
00:54:37 ◼ ► roll out. Apple intelligence with app intents next spring. The idea of Siri being able to
00:54:48 ◼ ► perform multiple actions with a natural language query using your favorite apps. That is effectively
00:54:56 ◼ ► almost like a mini agent. I wouldn't call it like a proper agent because the idea of agents is that
00:55:08 ◼ ► What Apple showed off is being able to input a command, be like, take my markdown document
00:55:17 ◼ ► from Ulysses and convert it to PDF using PDF expert and then send it over, send it an email
00:55:26 ◼ ► to Steven with a document using Spark. Like if those three apps implement the proper app intents
00:55:33 ◼ ► and support for Apple intelligence, that's going to be a chain of actions that could be executed
00:55:38 ◼ ► with a natural language query. Now that is not based on what Apple showed off, a repeatable,
00:55:46 ◼ ► right? A repeatable thing that can happen in the background over time. But Apple has the
00:55:52 ◼ ► huge advantage here of owning the operating system and owning the native apps, which is what OpenAI
00:56:00 ◼ ► doesn't have, which is what Anthropic doesn't have. And if agents is my angle here, if agents
00:56:07 ◼ ► are going to be the thing, if a Siri. So if all these pieces fall into place, if a serial
00:56:19 ◼ ► intents infused flavor of Apple intelligence actually works, Apple also owns shortcuts.
00:56:27 ◼ ► And that is by definition a product that lets you set up repeatable, consistent chains of actions.
00:56:41 ◼ ► Right. Set aside the performance consideration, like just theoretically speaking, they do own
00:56:47 ◼ ► a system that they are updating it for Apple intelligence. And it's a system that potentially
00:56:55 ◼ ► now we call them automations. We call them personal automations. I wouldn't be surprised
00:57:02 ◼ ► if they get renamed something like agents, Siri agents, and they're actually shortcuts.
00:57:27 ◼ ► prepared to do anything with them, which is kind of unusual. I think the only other company kind of
00:57:35 ◼ ► in Apple's position is Microsoft. They have an OS, they have a browser, but while they do have some
00:57:43 ◼ ► of their own AI technologies, they also rely on open AI for a lot of things. And it will be very
00:57:50 ◼ ► curious to see what these honestly, like pretty in the internet age, pretty old platforms of iOS and
00:57:56 ◼ ► windows and Mac OS, how they evolve in this era. And so far, a lot of people just want to run a
00:58:05 ◼ ► browser and the OS is less important to more and more people and Apple and Microsoft seem to be
00:58:14 ◼ ► kind of swimming upstream against that to a degree. And it's like, does this make that,
00:58:21 ◼ ► like, what does it do to that? Does it make the OS more relevant for the browser company?
00:58:27 ◼ ► If they could build what they want to build, it doesn't because they're just going to have
00:58:34 ◼ ► But if you start talking about, like you said, integrating with apps and other things beyond
00:58:40 ◼ ► just your browser tabs, that's when Apple does have more in its toolbox to play with. And it
00:58:51 ◼ ► and I'm going to write about this, I'm going to show off some examples. The comparison between
00:58:56 ◼ ► what you can do with chat GPT in Siri and what you can do with a standalone chat GPT experience.
00:59:03 ◼ ► Just comparing the two, like the two flavors chat GPT in 18.2 built inside Siri and chat GPT
00:59:11 ◼ ► standalone in its own app. The differences are kind of ridiculous, like what you can do,
00:59:17 ◼ ► and that's due to Siri not being a persistent app, a place where you can go and find your previous
00:59:26 ◼ ► conversations, find your previous context, keep the conversation going over multiple days,
00:59:34 ◼ ► So the comparison, like it's not even fair, to be honest. And so they're getting some help from
00:59:40 ◼ ► chat GPT now to, you know, to basically chat GPT in Siri. I think the way that I describe this in
00:59:48 ◼ ► the article that I'm working on is basically chat GPT is now the replacement for, I found this on
00:59:55 ◼ ► the web for those kinds of results. And that's a much better version of that Siri gap, right?
01:00:02 ◼ ► So you're being unable to fulfill a request and saying, well, I found this on the web. Now,
01:00:06 ◼ ► at the very least, if you opt in because it's turned off at the very least, you're getting
01:00:11 ◼ ► an answer from chat GPT. But it's kind of funny because if anything, like on one hand, yes,
01:00:17 ◼ ► it's useful. And I think a lot of people are going to find it useful, especially because you can use
01:00:22 ◼ ► it for free. But for us, the critics, so to speak, it kind of is ironic in that it's useful, but it
01:00:32 ◼ ► also serves as a reminder of how limited Siri is still. Yeah. Right. So we'll see. They are behind,
01:00:41 ◼ ► but they have this potentially exciting technology that no one has tried because this is likely going
01:00:48 ◼ ► to be 18.4 next spring. They made a big deal out of telling developers last June, make sure that
01:00:57 ◼ ► every single functionality of your app is now an app intent because this Apple intelligence feature
01:01:02 ◼ ► is coming. They promised it's going to work. No one has tried it. No one has seen it in action.
01:01:08 ◼ ► We'll see. But yeah, I think it's going to be interesting to compare these two flavors of go
01:01:17 ◼ ► to the chat GPT app and have a proper conversation and have a lot of context there versus I can tie
01:01:25 ◼ ► together the different apps on my phone without having to build a shortcut by hand just by issuing
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01:03:05 ◼ ► So you mentioned iOS 18.2. We are getting pretty close to that being released and we don't have the
01:03:17 ◼ ► release candidate yet. I don't think as of this recording. So yeah, I'm in a bit of a difficult
01:03:22 ◼ ► spot. So we're gonna try a new strategy once again at Mac Stories because we like to keep things fresh
01:03:28 ◼ ► after 15 years. After 15 years, people shouldn't expect what they think they're expecting from me.
01:03:34 ◼ ► 15 years, right? I mean, you and I, we've been on the internet for pretty much the same amount of
01:03:44 ◼ ► time. You gotta keep things fresh otherwise people get bored with you. That's right. You know,
01:03:49 ◼ ► I wrote perform a month just to get people excited. Exactly. So this is what we're gonna do.
01:03:55 ◼ ► We're gonna have a standalone article about all the changes in iOS and Apple OS 18.2 and
01:04:02 ◼ ► I am going to write about Apple intelligence. But with my spin on it. Because you are running it,
01:04:12 ◼ ► right? Can you remind people of what is your state with Apple intelligence? Yes. My state is that I,
01:04:20 ◼ ► for work reasons, because we gotta have capital C content on the podcasts and the website and I
01:04:32 ◼ ► don't want to be an old car margin not trying things. I gave up on my, on my dream to use my
01:04:41 ◼ ► new real Italian Apple account. I went back to my US Apple account and even though I am geographically
01:04:51 ◼ ► in Italy with my US Apple account and my devices region set to English, I can use Apple intelligence
01:05:01 ◼ ► in Italy. It is no longer geo-restricted like it used to be a few months ago. So I am using it.
01:05:15 ◼ ► 18.2 to come out next Tuesday. Yeah. Right. We're getting pretty close to the holidays.
01:05:24 ◼ ► Really. Exactly. But usually we would have a race candidate by now. And if I'm not mistaken,
01:05:34 ◼ ► didn't Apple release a 0.2 or big 0.3 a couple of years ago in mid December? I could see a
01:05:44 ◼ ► December 15th or December 16th release actually. Yeah. So Ryan over at 9to5 put this together.
01:05:51 ◼ ► iOS 17.2 was December 11th. 16.2 was December 13th. 15.2 was December 13th. Today's the 4th.
01:06:01 ◼ ► So they got nine days, but I would have expected the release candidate today at the latest. Maybe
01:06:18 ◼ ► We'll see. But yeah. So are you using Apple intelligence? First of all, do you have 18.2?
01:06:28 ◼ ► Yes, I have. I have 18.2 on my carry phone, which is very exciting. Sometimes things just don't work.
01:06:36 ◼ ► See, I have been using it and you know, the features are, are really scattershot. Like I
01:06:44 ◼ ► don't envy your task of like reviewing Apple intelligence because it is not a cohesive strategy.
01:06:51 ◼ ► It's a bunch of features scattered across the OS and sometimes in ways that don't make much sense
01:06:58 ◼ ► in the way that they're integrated. Well, it's easier if you straight up refuse to cover the
01:07:03 ◼ ► generative aspects of it. That's true. That is what I'm doing. That is true. I think the best part of it
01:07:12 ◼ ► to, sorry, is the Jinmoji. Like I think that's fun. I think that art style is way better than
01:07:28 ◼ ► And I've enjoyed sending those to people. There's some in our group chat floating around.
01:07:33 ◼ ► Yeah, those are decent. I'm not sure if I'm going to include at least a little section about those
01:07:39 ◼ ► in my story. But yeah, I'm trying to take in a, trying to focus in on, I mean, I did an episode of
01:07:47 ◼ ► App Stories about this with Jon last week. Like, much more interested in the productivity
01:07:53 ◼ ► angle here. Like in the actual, like, how can you actually use this? Like, why can this stuff
01:07:59 ◼ ► actually be useful to you when you're using your iPhone or you're working on your iPad?
01:08:05 ◼ ► Like that sort of stuff. And that's the question, right? Like, it's fun to make a little picture of
01:08:14 ◼ ► you know, somebody on a surfboard surfing on an ocean of money, you know, the day that Apple's
01:08:19 ◼ ► results come out. But it's probably not useful for your work. And I think most people, like,
01:08:25 ◼ ► through the productivity lens, it's things like the writing tools and maybe the visual search.
01:08:40 ◼ ► The visual one, honestly, I forget exists. Like, I've used it a couple of times, but it has made
01:08:45 ◼ ► no impact on me whatsoever in terms of like sticking my phone at something like, what am I
01:08:50 ◼ ► seeing? Like, I just, that's not a need that I feel like I have. Yeah. Yeah. So I, I'm having fun
01:08:59 ◼ ► with this article on sort of trying to compare the kind of experience that you get with Apple
01:09:06 ◼ ► intelligence and Child JPT versus what you get with other standalone apps. And I think it's
01:09:13 ◼ ► going to be, I think it's going to, I am going to be interested in seeing if regular people,
01:09:21 ◼ ► where by regular people, I mean people who don't listen to this show or read Mac stories. It's a
01:09:28 ◼ ► pretty clear divide, I think. Right. Child JPT for iOS, Child JPT for iPhone is consistently the most
01:09:38 ◼ ► downloaded app on the app store. On a, like, and I believe just today, I'm looking up the numbers
01:09:46 ◼ ► now, just today, OpenAI announced they have 300 million weekly active users. Geez. So 300 million
01:09:58 ◼ ► weekly active users and 1 billion, 1 billion with a B, messages sent to Child JPT every day. Geez.
01:10:07 ◼ ► So this is from 30 minutes ago. So, you know, it's obviously the most downloaded app on the
01:10:17 ◼ ► app store, continues to grow. One of the, if not the fastest growing piece of software in recent
01:10:25 ◼ ► history. I'm skeptical that people will see the new integration in Siri as a replacement for that
01:10:35 ◼ ► app experience. And I think for most people will likely be a fallback of like, ah, yeah, I guess
01:10:43 ◼ ► Siri can now instead of saying, here's web results, I guess now at least it gives me an answer.
01:10:50 ◼ ► But it's no thanks to Siri, right? If anything, it damages series already lackluster reputation.
01:10:59 ◼ ► Exactly. Like you're only getting better because you're getting a little help from your friends.
01:11:05 ◼ ► Basically, you're not really smarter. You just struck a deal to get proper answers. Yeah.
01:11:13 ◼ ► Literally struck a deal as it turns out. Yeah. Yeah. Uh, so I don't think having Chai JPT in
01:11:20 ◼ ► Siri will change the fact that Chai JPT for iPhone is the most loaded app on the app store.
01:11:26 ◼ ► But regardless, I, I'm going to keep an eye, uh, you know, keeping an ear on, you know, what,
01:11:33 ◼ ► what people in my real life say if they noticed. Um, I mean, I guess they will notice in a few
01:11:42 ◼ ► months because in Italy we'll only have access to Apple intelligence at some point in the spring,
01:11:47 ◼ ► but it's going to be, you know, you know what, Steven, you keep an eye on regular people in
01:12:23 ◼ ► the new Siri, like where it knows about things in your apps and not having that available right now.
01:12:39 ◼ ► Syrian like it has that fancy animation, which may or may not be HDR, but it is the same Siri.
01:12:45 ◼ ► It's just falls back to chat GPT. And like, I have all that wired up. And I don't think a single time
01:12:52 ◼ ► I've gone to chat GPT on purpose through Siri. I just opened the chat GPT app per year, you know,
01:12:59 ◼ ► your observation. And so I don't, I don't really know what kind of a difference that's going to
01:13:06 ◼ ► make. I just, I don't know. Maybe I'm thinking about it wrong. Maybe, maybe there are people who
01:13:13 ◼ ► have not, and I'm sure there are people who have not used chat GPT. This will be their first
01:13:16 ◼ ► experience with it. They may not even know it's its own app. And like, they don't really understand
01:13:22 ◼ ► the difference between like Siri and chat GPT. And I think some of that may be actually confusing for
01:13:27 ◼ ► some users. And that's something I want to keep an eye on. Yeah. I mean, there are at the very least,
01:13:33 ◼ ► you know, on planet earth, you know, at least, you know, six and change more billion people
01:13:41 ◼ ► that could potentially use chat GPT. So, and obviously like the power, the power of having
01:13:49 ◼ ► it built in your phone, right? There's obviously something to that, you know, and, you know,
01:13:56 ◼ ► knowing Apple, you know, they're going to tell you that there's going to be a splash screen somewhere
01:14:00 ◼ ► telling you, Hey, now you can enable this. And so, you know, that's going to catch people's attention.
01:14:05 ◼ ► But I still think it's not going to change the fact that a lot of people now, and I see this,
01:14:12 ◼ ► I see this right now. I noticed it, especially like now with the holidays and family gatherings,
01:14:19 ◼ ► I see chat GPT installed on people's iPhones. They don't, they don't have an account. They use
01:14:25 ◼ ► it for free. Some of them have an account, but they don't subscribe. But, but I see the app on
01:14:31 ◼ ► people's phones. They're using it. It's like, it's for a lot of people. It's like the new Google,
01:14:35 ◼ ► right? Yeah. Yeah. The search is compelling. Jason and I talked about that on upgrade on Monday.
01:14:51 ◼ ► I do also wonder, I mean, you have Siri, you have chat GPT, you know, I wonder what sort of average
01:14:58 ◼ ► users will think of the writing tools. I think the proofreading stuff is useful. Are people going to
01:15:03 ◼ ► like write an email and then hit the button and say, like, make this more friendly? Like, I just,
01:15:07 ◼ ► I just don't know. I mean, that is the one that is really hard for me. And honestly, I think probably
01:15:13 ◼ ► you to evaluate because we are writers for a living. And I mean, I use Grammarly as a, like a
01:15:21 ◼ ► grammar checking thing, but I don't let it change my tone. I leave a lot of things that Grammarly
01:15:26 ◼ ► says are wrong because it's the way that I write, but it is, it is interesting. I think to see what
01:15:33 ◼ ► people will do with those, with those sets of tools. Yeah. Yeah. So I don't know. 18.2. It's coming.
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01:17:42 ◼ ► I wanted to wrap up today talking about the Flex Bar. This is the most... if a product could embody
01:18:30 ◼ ► That is... I mean, it looks like a touch bar. And the idea is you plug it into your Mac
01:18:44 ◼ ► it'll be integrated with a bunch of your OS and apps. And they promised a bunch of plugins,
01:18:49 ◼ ► including... I'm just looking at the screenshot. YouTube, the Office apps, Adobe, the Adobe Cloud,
01:19:08 ◼ ► you can easily implement almost any functionality on the Flex Bar with your own integrated third
01:19:13 ◼ ► party APIs. Okay, we will see how that goes. That's all fine, I guess. Like, two things,
01:19:22 ◼ ► several things jump out at me. One, their goal was only $2,600. It actually was $2,569.
01:19:29 ◼ ► Nice. I don't know a lot about hardware manufacturing, but that doesn't seem like a lot
01:20:33 ◼ ► number of backers, 582. So there's some people who want this. I just don't know. I just...
01:20:42 ◼ ► Touch Bar. Let me say first of all, and clearly people who think that this is a useful tool.
01:21:09 ◼ ► to be negative about like a hardware project by... it seems like a new company. And obviously,
01:21:23 ◼ ► healthy third party developer ecosystem, I don't know why you wouldn't get a Stream Deck.
01:21:35 ◼ ► your desk. Sure. But it seems to me like this product is trying to solve the same problem
01:21:42 ◼ ► that is currently being solved by really popular, inexpensive hardware by a company with a proven
01:22:10 ◼ ► Yeah. Yeah, maybe. It's just it made the rounds in the Apple world so fiercely yesterday,
01:22:19 ◼ ► which I think they launched like two days ago. It's a very young campaign. And clearly,
01:22:27 ◼ ► they're leaning into that, right? Like, oh, we're bringing the Touch Bar back. That's what
01:22:30 ◼ ► they want people to consider. And like, too, like, I got an email from somebody like, maybe
01:22:34 ◼ ► I was a little harsh on this in my blog post, but I don't mean these folks any like ill will like,
01:22:39 ◼ ► you know, go out and try things. This just doesn't seem like a compelling product. And it and I think
01:22:45 ◼ ► saying, oh, we brought the Touch Bar back is like actually kind of a really interesting but maybe
01:22:50 ◼ ► slightly problematic way to describe this product. I read something I forget, I think it was one of
01:22:57 ◼ ► the many blogs that linked to this and they were like, the Touch Bar enjoyed great software support
01:23:01 ◼ ► for many years like no, it didn't like, no, no third party kind of adopted it. Apple never really
01:23:08 ◼ ► extended what it could do. And then it went away in four or five years. And I think the stream deck
01:23:16 ◼ ► shows that people want something like this. I got a stream deck Excel right here under my monitor,
01:23:20 ◼ ► I use it all the time. And I think the form factor of the stream deck is also more compelling,
01:23:25 ◼ ► like this thing is going to sit flat on your desk. And it's got a USB C cable coming out the side
01:23:31 ◼ ► and like, you know, the stream deck is really, really nice. There's one picture or GIF, I guess,
01:23:40 ◼ ► Can you imagine closing your laptop for getting it's in there? No, yeah, no, no. Game over.
01:23:45 ◼ ► Don't do that. So I don't know, I'm keeping my eye on it. It is interesting, but I don't think
01:23:50 ◼ ► it's something that is going to prove successful. I just don't I just don't see that. That happening.
01:24:05 ◼ ► The only thing I consistently used it for was media control and sometimes picking out an emoji.
01:24:12 ◼ ► But like I never got into like, oh, let me edit photos with it or use it in logic. Like it never
01:24:20 ◼ ► made its way into my workflows at all. I think I remember these conversations. And I also remember
01:24:26 ◼ ► like people doing some things like using better touch to to put together like custom buttons and
01:24:31 ◼ ► custom macros that you could execute from the touch bar. I did have a button that had a hotdog emoji.
01:24:36 ◼ ► And when you tapped it, the computer said hotdog. Nice. That's a productivity boost. I'm a developer.
01:25:00 ◼ ► I don't know. Just quarter soaps and Xcode. What is this? As an iPad user. So the touch bar does
01:25:09 ◼ ► live on inside car kind of. Is this still in there? I don't even actually know. I think it is.
01:25:15 ◼ ► I think it is. Yeah. But like as an iPad user, like it's something like this, like physical
01:25:18 ◼ ► controls. Interesting to you or like the media playback on the keyboard enough is actually a
01:25:26 ◼ ► good question, because like thank you. That's just a few. Yeah, you're welcome. You do have those
01:25:41 ◼ ► that Elgato they made, I believe it's called Stream Deck Kit. Yes. It's a framework to support
01:25:49 ◼ ► a stream deck in your iPad app. I remember this. And I am fairly certain that no third party
01:25:59 ◼ ► developers whatsoever have added support for Stream Deck Kit on their iPad apps. I think there's
01:26:07 ◼ ► one or two Elgato apps that actually let you use stream deck commands with an iPad app by Elgato.
01:26:16 ◼ ► I think it's well, Elgato Cam and Elgato Capture or something like that. I have looked far and wide.
01:26:23 ◼ ► Far and wide. And I couldn't find a single result of a third party app that said on the iPad, we now
01:26:31 ◼ ► integrate with the stream deck. Yeah. I would love to have it when I work on my desk, like,
01:26:38 ◼ ► but the problem is, here's the problem. Like. I would love Obsidian for iPad to support the
01:26:49 ◼ ► stream deck so that I could execute specific plugins or commands just by pressing a physical
01:26:55 ◼ ► button at my desk when I'm working with the iPad. Well, the problem with the stream deck on the iPad
01:27:00 ◼ ► is that due to how driver kit is built. And due to how the I guess the stream deck SDK is built,
01:27:10 ◼ ► those commands are going to be app specific when you're on the home screen or when you're using
01:27:16 ◼ ► Safari, you won't be able to do anything because Apple is never going to support stream deck kit
01:27:22 ◼ ► in iPad OS. And even then, if you're a developer of an iPad app, like you're already part of a
01:27:29 ◼ ► niche, right? Oh, it's the iPad version of my app. So it's really quite a niche. And then to support,
01:27:36 ◼ ► like it would be like a niche of a niche to say, well, it's stream deck kit on the iPad. Like it's,
01:27:43 ◼ ► I understand why nobody's doing it. And so I am on principle very much interested. And I almost
01:27:51 ◼ ► bought one of those like stream deck Neo models. They're adorable. They're really cute. And I
01:27:58 ◼ ► almost got one, but then I realized what am I going to use it for? You know? Yeah. Yeah.
01:28:09 ◼ ► It's kind of weird kind of weird thing to you. Now I am in favor of weird things. Of course.
01:28:27 ◼ ► can you imagine though, like assign a shortcut to the stream deck on the iPad and you run a
01:28:33 ◼ ► shortcut. I mean, the obsidian folks who maybe consider it, you know, I could see, I could see
01:28:40 ◼ ► drafts also being like a really good candidate for the stream deck kit on the iPad. I could see,
01:28:47 ◼ ► uh, what are some automation apps? There's some programming apps on the iPad. They could
01:28:53 ◼ ► take advantage of it, but yeah, it's mostly going to be like apps that have like a strong
01:29:23 ◼ ► If you want to find us online, uh, we're pretty easy to find. Federico is the editor in chief
01:29:29 ◼ ► of max stories.net. Stay tuned for his iOS 18 Apple intelligence coverage. It's going to be
01:29:35 ◼ ► great. Uh, and be sure to check out the huge growing family of podcasts over at max stories.
01:29:41 ◼ ► And if you're going to CES, keep an eye out for John. Yeah. John's going to be there. Uh, you can
01:29:47 ◼ ► find Federico across social media as fatigue. Uh, just search for him because social media is
01:29:54 ◼ ► fractured beyond all repair. You can find my writing at five 12 pixels.net and I co-host Mac
01:29:59 ◼ ► power users here on relay each and every Sunday. Uh, this coming Sunday, we're talking about
01:30:09 ◼ ► from friends and family. I think it was pretty good. Uh, and you can find me on social media