0:00:00But I did see Star Wars last night, we can talk about that for a while.
0:00:03Yeah, it's old news.
0:00:04Aw, man, I missed my chance.
0:00:06Now that Marco's seen it, it's old news.
0:00:08It's all downhill from there.
0:00:10Do you want to do some follow-up?
0:00:12Sure, we actually have some.
0:00:14One person who's not...
0:00:17I don't know if this person lives in Dubai or just knows about the Apple Store in Dubai,
0:00:21but I'm trying to think of a reason why this person is not like every single person in
0:00:25the United States on vacation and not sending us any follow-up. But in episode
0:00:31149 we talked about the foliage walls and the Apple model store things from
0:00:37the 60 minutes television show. They showed like oh here's a store where we
0:00:42try out all the different ideas we have for Apple stores and they have this one
0:00:45wall of the store that had plants like real living plants just sort of
0:00:48cascading down the wall and I thought that would be funny if they actually put
0:00:50that in a store. Well apparently they have it's just goes to show that
0:00:54that everything they show in 60 minutes has to be something that already exists, so that
0:00:57no secrets are revealed.
0:00:59The Apple Store in Dubai, they have a foliage wall.
0:01:02So there you go.
0:01:03That's super exciting.
0:01:04That is a definite reason to visit there.
0:01:07To just pet the foliage wall.
0:01:09I wonder how that would, like, I mean I guess they have to have people keeping the plants
0:01:12alive, but, like, why don't we get foliage?
0:01:15If it's a good idea, why isn't it a good idea everywhere?
0:01:18Why is it only a good idea in the desert?
0:01:19I don't know.
0:01:21Beats me.
0:01:24It struck me as a little weird, although I really did like—and I think, Jon, you had
0:01:27briefly mentioned this when we talked about it—I really liked the display case for all
0:01:34the cases, the iPhone cases, where the case is on the outside of what ends up being a
0:01:40drawer.
0:01:41So you grab the case and pull the case, and then there's a drawer of these cases behind
0:01:46it.
0:01:47That was a terrible word picture, but hopefully that makes sense.
0:01:49I thought that was really clever, and I don't recall having ever seen that before.
0:01:52did write in, I misplaced their email or maybe it was a tweet, and said that those pull-out
0:01:57drawer things actually exist in stores too. So basically there's nothing in 60 Minutes
0:02:00that they showed you that doesn't already exist in an Apple Store, which is not surprising.
0:02:05Not surprising, but a little bit sad. That's okay, though. All right, so any other follow-up
0:02:10we need to talk about? That's it, everyone's still on vacation, including us. So not only
0:02:14California, but everyone is on vacation. Well, California's always on vacation. That is true.
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0:04:13So the Christmas time has come and passed, and Casey has some new toys, ladies and gentlemen.
0:04:20It's exciting.
0:04:21So we have talked about the new Apple TV.
0:04:27I now have a new Apple TV.
0:04:30And now I will make everyone sit here and listen to my oh-so-outdated thoughts about
0:04:34the Apple TV.
0:04:35That's all right.
0:04:36I'll talk about the Mac Pro later, so I'll get you back.
0:04:38Oh, God.
0:04:39serious, then I will happily forego the Apple TV talk, if that means you will forego the
0:04:44Mac Pro talk.
0:04:45Well, I have to tell you about the new Mac Pro I got.
0:04:47Oh, dear God, I hope you're kidding. I don't have any alcohol nearby, so this is going
0:04:50to be a long night for me. Well, on a happier note, set up via Bluetooth on my new Apple
0:04:55TV. Flawless. No issues whatsoever. So let's just be a lesson, children, that you never
0:05:01actually do want to have the fear of missing out that I have a chronic case of, and you
0:05:05do actually want to wait just a little bit to get something new.
0:05:08Because I had no problems with Bluetooth setup.
0:05:11I had no real problems with the remote app.
0:05:16Although it took me a minute to realize that I needed to do
0:05:19the software update in order to get it, if memory serves.
0:05:24Speaking of the software update, at 7 o'clock--
0:05:26I think this was Christmas Day, 7 o'clock in the evening
0:05:28on Christmas Day.
0:05:28Flawless.
0:05:29No issues.
0:05:31I connected via Ethernet, which might have made things a lot
0:05:34easier, but that was really nice.
0:05:37Oh, that's what it was.
0:05:37It wasn't that the software update screwed me up for the
0:05:39remote app.
0:05:40I actually did take notes.
0:05:41I just didn't read far enough.
0:05:42It took me a while to remember that the remote app is paired
0:05:48to your home sharing account.
0:05:51And I had not yet set up my home sharing account in the
0:05:55Apple TV, even after I'd done the update and all that.
0:05:57So for the life of me, I couldn't understand why the
0:05:59remote app wouldn't see the Apple TV.
0:06:01And then I forget how I figured it out.
0:06:02But somehow or another I realized, oh, no, I need to sign into home sharing.
0:06:07And so once I did that, that worked no problem, which was really nice.
0:06:11The control receiver, or the remote in general, having a Bluetooth remote is wonderful.
0:06:18I've learned that from the Fire TV Stick.
0:06:21But it's really great having that Bluetooth remote on the Apple TV as well.
0:06:24I also really, really liked, and maybe we talked about this and I just had a brain fart
0:06:29or something, but I really liked that it gave me the option of instead of controlling volume
0:06:36on my TV via HDMI CEC or whatever magic it uses, I could program an IR remote that it
0:06:43would use, it would emit that same IR to change a different thing's volume, which is exactly
0:06:50what I needed to do because I have my receiver doing the speakers and all that.
0:06:54And so I had the remote learn my receiver's IR profile, or whatever you want to call it.
0:07:00And that worked no problem.
0:07:01And so now the volume controls the receiver, which is really awesome.
0:07:04I didn't even know that was a thing.
0:07:05I didn't like that I had no idea how much battery power the remote has.
0:07:11And at some point or another I saw some dialogue or something that said, "Oh, we'll tell you
0:07:15when the remote needs charging," which is an Apple thing to do, and that's fine.
0:07:19But it was weird that I couldn't even see it when I went digging into the remote settings
0:07:22screens.
0:07:23I didn't like and I don't like that there's no native Spotify app.
0:07:26Yes, I am aware that there is such a thing as AirPlay.
0:07:31That is what I've been doing with my Apple TV for a long time now.
0:07:33But it seems to me like there's no reason why I couldn't select songs or do whatever
0:07:37in a native app.
0:07:40Or just have some sort of scenario wherein the Spotify app on my phone controls an instance
0:07:47of it on the TV.
0:07:49that's the way Spotify works, is I can control the playback from my computer from the Spotify
0:07:55app on my phone. And it's kind of like the remote app works. And it's really, really
0:07:59awesome. And I'd like to not have to have my phone be beaming all that data to the Apple
0:08:04TV when it could just do that on its own. And on a final note, surprising precisely
0:08:11no one, oh my God, you guys, Plex is so good. It's so good. It's worth the cost of admission
0:08:16just for Plex. But to that end, I have like four apps on this thing. I have Plex, I have
0:08:21Netflix, I think I put the ESPN app on there, and I think that might be it. And so I'm not
0:08:27really seeing what's so great about the App Store yet, with the exception of Plex of course.
0:08:32But there's been no other killer app that I've thought to myself, "Man, I really, really,
0:08:36really want to download whatever."
0:08:38Well, to be fair, I mean like the kind of device that it is, where this is like this
0:08:43this TV-connected box, I mean, how many apps
0:08:46do most people really use in that kind of context?
0:08:49I mean, to me, it is useful to have a large selection
0:08:52of apps, but to any one person, any one user of this device,
0:08:57it might only ever use two to four apps,
0:09:00and that might be perfectly fine enough for them.
0:09:03For you, it might be Plex and Netflix.
0:09:06For me, it might be a game and Netflix,
0:09:11and maybe, I probably won't use Plex,
0:09:13I might, you know, I will use the iTunes store stuff,
0:09:16and then maybe down the road I might get HBO Now,
0:09:19go whichever one is one that doesn't use cable.
0:09:22That, you know, one of those, like, you know,
0:09:23it's like, it's the kind of thing,
0:09:24and if everything works well, which is still debatable,
0:09:29but if everything works well, then I think that's enough.
0:09:32You know, you don't need, it isn't a phone,
0:09:35you know, you don't need to be doing
0:09:37tons of different apps all the time on your TV.
0:09:39I think most people are gonna pick like three or four,
0:09:41at most, you know?
0:09:42So wouldn't it be a good enough device
0:09:45and a valuable purchase,
0:09:46even if you never use any other apps for it
0:09:49than what you use now?
0:09:50- I think you're absolutely right.
0:09:51And you know, as you were talking,
0:09:52I was thinking to myself, well, why am I,
0:09:54I don't know, I'm not bummed out,
0:09:56but I can't think of a better way to describe it,
0:09:57but why am I a little disappointed
0:09:59that I don't have 305 apps on this thing
0:10:02that I was really excited about?
0:10:04And you know what I think a part of it is,
0:10:05is that it looks so paltry and silly
0:10:08compared to the prior-gen Apple TV, which had, like, what is it, 40 or 50 apps and new
0:10:14ones just spawning like rabbits constantly? But to be fair, you're exactly right that
0:10:20I really never used any of those. And so in the end of the day, it was really clutter.
0:10:24But because it feels like I have fewer things now, it feels worse, even though in reality
0:10:31it's actually probably a lot better. You should put some other, like, sort of staples
0:10:36on there like I think you should probably put the YouTube app on there and maybe does
0:10:40Amazon have like free video maybe Amazon video one if they have some things for free or if
0:10:44you have Amazon Prime?
0:10:45No I don't think there is an Amazon video app there that's kind of the whole point of
0:10:49that whole thing.
0:10:50No?
0:10:51I used the Siri thing recently where I I think you have to say show me I don't know it sounds
0:10:56so dumb to say show me but I said show me and then spoke a movie title and I was impressed
0:11:00by two things.
0:11:01that it actually transcribed what I was saying as I spoke it.
0:11:05Three things.
0:11:06Two, that it properly title-cased the title of the movie in real time as I spoke it.
0:11:13Wait, which proper title casing?
0:11:16Just the regular one.
0:11:18So did it capitalize prepositions and articles in the middle of the title and stuff like
0:11:23that?
0:11:24It doesn't matter.
0:11:25My son wanted to see The Maze Runner, so all those words are capped.
0:11:27I said show me the Maze Runner and the was capital, Maze was capital, and you know in real time as it spatted out
0:11:33So that was impressive and three it gave me a bunch of options for
0:11:37Where to watch it one of which was because I was if I had done it
0:11:41Let me put it this way if I had done it with the old Apple TV
0:11:44I would have been like we don't have the Maze Runner
0:11:46So let me just look to see if it's available on iTunes and either buy it or rent it based on how likely I think
0:11:50We as a household are to want to watch this again
0:11:53But instead I said show me the maze runner and I put it down there as an option and I clicked on it
0:11:59And it was available on HBO go
0:12:01So I just played it for free
0:12:02and so that's that's a pretty flawless victory for the new Apple TV over the old one because
0:12:07It took less time because it just picked up to the remote and spoken to it
0:12:10It did the right thing and it let me watch for free, you know, cuz I already pay for HBO
0:12:14It didn't have to go rent it from iTunes. So thumbs up there
0:12:18Yeah, something I haven't tried, but I'd really like to and I just didn't think about it until you said that is, you know,
0:12:25can I
0:12:26get into my Plex library through Siri from like the home screen and I believe there's APIs that allow that to happen
0:12:33But I don't have the faintest idea whether or not Plex supports it. Yeah, I had some Plex a couple run-ins with Plex
0:12:39I was trying to watch I forget I was watching trying to watch something that I that I had
0:12:45available in many different ways and my TV due to weirdness of
0:12:49HDMI and
0:12:52misguided attempts at copy protection if I play through the DLNA
0:12:55Client on my television very often it only wants to output like stereo down to my receiver
0:13:00It won't even though it'll be fed 5.1 from my DLNA server in the basement
0:13:05That 5.1 goes into my television
0:13:08But it never gets to leave what comes out the back of it instead is like even though it's on the audio return channel
0:13:13But anyway, I fought with it for a while.
0:13:14And like bottom line is, if it goes,
0:13:16if I have my, the television itself,
0:13:18the smart TV feature do it,
0:13:20sometimes I don't get the high quality audio.
0:13:21So I'm like, well, this video has high quality 5.1 audio.
0:13:25I want to get that directly.
0:13:26But I didn't want to turn on the PlayStation,
0:13:27which also would have worked because it's noisy.
0:13:28So I said, it's time for the Apple TV to do it.
0:13:31And then I did like a search,
0:13:32like is there a simple DLNA client for Apple TV?
0:13:35And there are a bunch of them, but I said,
0:13:36you know what, let me try Plex.
0:13:37'Cause I have the Plex server set up on Synology.
0:13:40So I did, and the thing was there.
0:13:42And for whatever reason, it just wouldn't play
0:13:45off of the Synology.
0:13:46I don't know if the Synology couldn't transcode it
0:13:48'cause it was too high a bit rate
0:13:50or didn't understand the codec or something.
0:13:53But then I remembered like I have Plex all over the place.
0:13:55So I just started Plex on my wife's new iMac,
0:13:58pointed it at the same, you know,
0:13:59I had already had it set up there.
0:14:01I just mounted the Synology there.
0:14:03And my wife's iMac had no problem transcoding it
0:14:05and I played it from there.
0:14:07So Plex kind of came through for me there, like halfway.
0:14:11I mean, it was flexible enough that if it didn't work
0:14:13off of my NAS, I could just run it
0:14:15on the much more powerful Mac, and that did work.
0:14:18So, kind of thumb sideways there.
0:14:20But anyway, it let me play the video I wanted to play
0:14:24and the quality I wanted with 5.1
0:14:26without having to hear a fan, so that's good.
0:14:28- Yeah, and it's funny because I moved the now old
0:14:32and busted Apple TV from the family room to the bedroom,
0:14:37and I had on like MTV Unplugged or something like that
0:14:40this morning. I forget specifically what it was, but I was...
0:14:43- I hope it was the Alice in Chains. That's the best one.
0:14:44- No, I don't think I have that one. I'm sure whatever one it was you would judge me for,
0:14:48and we don't need to go into that. We'll save that for the after show.
0:14:51- Many of them are very good, including the seal one that you gave me that I don't think
0:14:54is available legally anywhere. - I believe that's right. And that was one
0:14:58of them that we watched. It was an MTV Unplugged morning. Maybe we can argue about that in
0:15:02the after show, since that appears to be what we do these days.
0:15:04- I mean, everyone loves the Nirvana one, and the Nirvana one is very good, but I think
0:15:08the Alice in Chains one is better.
0:15:09Yeah, I feel like I've heard it at some point, but not any time recently, so I should take
0:15:14a note to listen to that again.
0:15:17But anyway, so I was trying to--the point of the matter is, I was trying to play Plex
0:15:20from--onto the old Apple TV, which was wired via Ethernet, now is Wi-Fi, and is the way
0:15:30the crow flies, so to speak, through the house.
0:15:33like 15 to 20 feet away from my airport extreme.
0:15:39Now granted that's through like two or three walls.
0:15:42And oh my god, the new Apple TV, I don't know if it's because of Ethernet, I don't know
0:15:46if it's because I'm not doing AirPlay hop.
0:15:49I'm sure it's a combination of both, but it was so much nicer watching this stuff on the
0:15:55new Apple TV than it was air playing from the Plex app on the old Apple TV.
0:15:59Anyway, but so yeah, I'd say at least one thumb probably two thumbs up for the new Apple TV
0:16:05The play the Plex experience just is everything to me and it's wonderful. I mean, there's a couple of minor issues
0:16:11I have here and there but but overall really really like it
0:16:14Do you like the I think the Plex UI on Apple TV looks plain to me
0:16:18Like I know I'm Plex you can pick like a background for the things then they have all these
0:16:22You know background images that people have made and I remember the the Mac Plex client
0:16:28Had all these fancy backgrounds and the UI looked all different the Apple TV one
0:16:31It's kind of boring especially if you view by folder I use Plex by the way to watch harmy's do specialized editions
0:16:36My parents wanted to see the the first three Star Wars movies before going to see the seventh
0:16:41Not not the first three episode one two and three guys
0:16:45And new hope Empire and Jedi and I wanted to show him harmony. It was the same situation
0:16:50I could play it off my PlayStation, but then you'd have to hear the PlayStation fan
0:16:55so and I wanted to get all you know that the multi-channel sound and everything and
0:17:00So Plex to the rescue again, it could it could play them and it played them correctly and I didn't have to hear a fan
0:17:07But when you view by folder went into my little Star Wars folder and navigated to it
0:17:11it was kind of boring looking it was just like a list of words and
0:17:13You know a cover art off to the left
0:17:16I don't know. I I just expected Plex to be fancier like not that I demand it to be fancy. But I
0:17:23I don't know. It seemed to be not up to the standards of the other Plex clients I can remember.
0:17:28Same thing with the PlayStation 4 client, by the way, but that's the least of my concerns.
0:17:32If it just gets to the video and plays it, I'm happy. So, uh, Plex is rising in esteem in this household, let's say.
0:17:38[Laughter]
0:17:39No, I agree with you. I think that the UI is good. I would not say it's great.
0:17:43And I think it could definitely use some massaging here and there.
0:17:47However, it is so much a better experience
0:17:50than having to have some like iOS device
0:17:52sitting around air playing everything
0:17:54that even with the world's ugliest UI,
0:17:57it could still in many ways do no wrong in my book
0:18:00because oh my goodness, it's so nice having that natively
0:18:04on the Apple TV now.
0:18:05- You should share your Plex library with me.
0:18:07- I would be happy to, I should do that.
0:18:09Okay, or both of you.
0:18:12- I don't think I can share it with you
0:18:13is my mass is not exposed to the internet at all.
0:18:18So I don't think I can share with you,
0:18:19but that doesn't matter.
0:18:20I just want to get your stuff.
0:18:21- Are you running Plex on your Synology?
0:18:23- Yeah.
0:18:24- Really?
0:18:25- You can do that?
0:18:26- Well, yeah, you can,
0:18:27but I found it was,
0:18:28whenever I tried to transcode anything live,
0:18:30it was a disaster.
0:18:31- Well, that's what I was saying.
0:18:32I couldn't watch the,
0:18:34one of the things I wanted to watch just didn't play at all
0:18:36and I had to use the iMac,
0:18:37but Harmony Specialized Edition's played fine.
0:18:40- Hmm.
0:18:41You know, I think what it might be is if you have it formatted,
0:18:43it formatted as like, I'm gonna get this wrong, video nerds, I apologize, but if you have
0:18:47it in some Apple friendly format, let me just be vague.
0:18:49No, I don't, I do not pre-transcode anything like so. Whatever I downloaded the harmies
0:18:55as, that's what they are. I refuse to like throw them into Handbrake and reconvert them
0:18:58because then you're going double lossless, right? So if it won't play exactly as it was
0:19:02downloaded, then I find something else to play.
0:19:05Completely agree. I've lamented in the past that this is, the technology that we all have,
0:19:09as an 1813+ does not have a quick enough processor to do transcoding.
0:19:14And a lot of people, and I've complained about this in the past, have said, "Oh, we'll just
0:19:18transcode everything and make it all in whatever magical Apple format I need."
0:19:22And I completely agree, Jon.
0:19:23That's just a bunch of work.
0:19:24Whether or not you have the double lossy conversion, it's just so much work that I just don't want
0:19:29to have to do.
0:19:30Jon Streeter And I found my technology does transcode a
0:19:32whole bunch of stuff on the fly at a reasonable speed for me.
0:19:35All it needs to do is be able to keep up with real time, and it can in a lot of cases, but
0:19:39In other cases it just doesn't matter.
0:19:41That's why I threw the iMac at it, which, you know, didn't break a sweat, can transcode
0:19:44anything on the fly because it's super duper fast and makes my Mac Pro feel bad.
0:19:49And that's why I have my old platter-driven MacBook Pro sitting on constantly.
0:19:54I probably never used this thing if it wasn't for the fact that it is my Plex server.
0:19:58So yeah, so I will invite you guys after the fact to share, to see my Plex stuff and so
0:20:05you can stream all of the things that I have.
0:20:08- Legally.
0:20:09- Totally.
0:20:10Well, I mean, you can only stream it, you can't download it.
0:20:13I'd like to talk about another gift I got,
0:20:15but do you wanna talk about something else that's awesome,
0:20:17or do you want me to just keep on truckin'?
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0:22:17- All right, so the other thing
0:22:18that I received this Christmas,
0:22:20which I know everyone is so excited about the accidental
0:22:22look at me and humble bragging podcast,
0:22:24is Erin got me a new RetinaPad Mini.
0:22:28She got me an iPad Mini 4 with Retina and cellular, and I am really into this device.
0:22:35I've always loved my iPad Minis.
0:22:39This is my fourth iPad.
0:22:40I had the original.
0:22:41I had the iPad 3, which was the first with the Retina, which is what you are still rocking,
0:22:47Jon?
0:22:48Is that right?
0:22:49Yeah, still.
0:22:50It's getting long in the tooth, man.
0:22:51I don't know how long I can keep it up.
0:22:52It's getting heavy in the tooth.
0:22:53Yeah, too.
0:22:55Then I had the original Retina Mini and now the iPad Mini 4.
0:23:02And the last two, both the Minis have been cellular.
0:23:05In the last couple of months I've given up on my AT&T Unlimited plan and so now I can
0:23:10actually tether.
0:23:11I'm not entirely sure going cellular was the most right choice, but so far I've liked it.
0:23:18And the Apple SIM is actually pretty cool.
0:23:20I put a post on my site about some random things that I've discovered with regard
0:23:25to the Apple SIM, and so you can go check that out if that's interesting to you.
0:23:29The short, short version is it's a single SIM card that you can use with multiple carriers,
0:23:34which is really kind of fascinating.
0:23:37I don't have too much to say about the device other than, why didn't somebody tell me
0:23:41that this iPad multitasking stuff was really cool?
0:23:43Like I wish Federico had said something or something like that, because this is kind
0:23:47of exciting.
0:23:48- I love that this episode is like,
0:23:50"Casey discovers after Christmas
0:23:52"what everyone else in Apple community discovered
0:23:54"in the fall."
0:23:55- That's what I've been talking about for months.
0:23:58- Welcome to October.
0:23:59- And he saw Star Wars too.
0:24:01- Yeah, and I saw Star Wars just yesterday,
0:24:03actually, as we record.
0:24:04So anyway, I won't go on about this
0:24:06like I did about the Apple TV,
0:24:08but suffice to say, it genuinely,
0:24:10I'm not trying to be funny,
0:24:12it genuinely changes how you use the device
0:24:16when you can genuinely do more than one thing at once.
0:24:20Well, on the old Mini, I could do,
0:24:22I believe it's slide over,
0:24:23where you can just slide something in and interact with it,
0:24:25and then you have to make it go away
0:24:27because they wouldn't let you do
0:24:29a full-on two-pane multitasking.
0:24:32I could do picture-in-picture,
0:24:33which, by the way, quick aside,
0:24:36Plex on the iPad actually does support picture-in-picture,
0:24:39even though it doesn't have the same UI
0:24:41that everything else on the planet does.
0:24:43As it turns out, if you just hit the Home button
0:24:45while you're playing something,
0:24:46it will automatically kick on picture in picture, which is really awesome.
0:24:51So anyway, so I really, really have liked having multitasking on it.
0:24:57And I can't think of any specific thing that I've done that has been amazing, but just
0:25:04the ability to be able to say, "Hang out in Slack," while catching up on Twitter or what
0:25:10have you, has been so awesome and genuinely changes.
0:25:14I know I've said that word like 18 times, but it really does.
0:25:16It changes the way I think about my iPad, and it makes me feel like even my mini is
0:25:23so much more capable.
0:25:25This new mini is so much more capable than the mini that came before it for me.
0:25:30And I'm really excited to be able to dig into using this a little more, not for work stuff
0:25:35or anything like that, but just to be more, I don't know, productive or efficient maybe
0:25:40is the word I'm looking for, while even just goofing off.
0:25:43And so I'm really stoked with it, really pleased with it.
0:25:46And so far I'm excited that I got a cellular one.
0:25:51And I now understand Federico's rage over people, over apps that don't support the two-pane
0:25:57multitasking, because it is really annoying.
0:26:00Marco, were you the one who tweeted or retweeted something showing some person saying, "You
0:26:06know, guys, it doesn't take too many changes to UI window to make it into it."
0:26:10Like, they had, like, windows?
0:26:12Yeah, Steve TS did just like a little mock-up, like a working mock-up demo of multiple UI
0:26:18windows on screen at once with draggable edges and draggable titlebars.
0:26:22And this is on the iPad, and what they basically had it look like is OS X windows, but with
0:26:25really big finger-sized widgets for the little stoplight widgets.
0:26:30And it looked silly, and I'm going to say this is probably not the way you should go,
0:26:34but people are mad with power now, basically.
0:26:37Like "Split View?
0:26:38Wait a second.
0:26:39Wait a second, the CPU is capable of doing more than things it wants.
0:26:42I need Windows and I need to arrange for them.
0:26:43They're just, you know, recreating all, they're recreating my desktop on their iPads, which
0:26:47is probably not what they want.
0:26:49They're not ready for that.
0:26:50But it's, you know, I guess someone could do that.
0:26:54Maybe Apple would reject it because they're kind of like that, oh, this tries to make
0:26:56a new, you know, windowing environment or I don't know, I'm sure Apple would find some
0:27:00way to reject it because like imagine an app.
0:27:02Yeah, well, there's been a rule forever against apps that try to create their own like desktop
0:27:07type environments inside themselves to have any kind of like multiple widgets inside of
0:27:11one central app there.
0:27:13Like, and it's a very vague rule, but that's been there since the very beginning.
0:27:15It's like the one that got status board rejected, but then not because it was ridiculous to
0:27:19reject status board, but like, but definitely making actual windows because I don't even
0:27:23know how you would, what you, what would you put in those windows?
0:27:26Like, well, I think it was my, maybe if someone did like a sketching application for the iPad
0:27:30Pro where it had a bunch of pallets that were like literally just pallets, like Photoshop
0:27:34palettes, some kind of weird dockable palettes with big finger-sized things on the top of
0:27:38them. Would Apple reject that because it gives too much flexibility about where you put the
0:27:42palettes? I don't know, like, it seems like there is, there's something there where people,
0:27:47somebody is daring enough, because the ability to arrange the palettes the way you want in
0:27:51Photoshop or any other design application, that's a feature. Like, people have different
0:27:54tools that they want to use at certain times, and, I mean, it's not that the Mac versions
0:27:59of these applications are infinitely flexible, you're still kind of stuck with this set of
0:28:02palette and you can arrange them and make them skinny or wide or whatever but talk to
0:28:07any designer or watch them work.
0:28:08People have preferences about what goes where on the screen.
0:28:11Where is the layers palette?
0:28:12Where is the history palette?
0:28:13What's hidden?
0:28:14What's shown by default?
0:28:15Is it skinny or wide?
0:28:17What's docked here and there?
0:28:19Is it the full screen thing or is it the small window?
0:28:21These are just options within Photoshop.
0:28:24If there was an iPad Pro sketching application that gave similar flexibility, people would
0:28:29use that flexibility because maybe they want...
0:28:31is the thing that they always go to?
0:28:32They go to the color well frequently, they change brush sizes frequently, they don't
0:28:36have like a keyboard to hit the square brackets to make the brush size go up and down.
0:28:39So being able to sort of arrange their workspace within an application using things that I
0:28:44guess you kind of not call them windows to avoid getting rejected, but I really hope
0:28:48Apple wouldn't reject an app like that because I think that's a great idea for, and for all
0:28:52I know, because I'm not a designer, for all I know there are that perhaps that already
0:28:54do this, so if that's the case then never mind, it's already been done.
0:28:58But if not, that's definitely a direction that I think it's safe.
0:29:02It should be safe to go in that direction with design applications, for example, on
0:29:06the iPad Pro.
0:29:07And seeing this multitasking, to bring it back around, just makes me understand that
0:29:13much more why someone would really like an iPad Pro, despite the fact that I do think
0:29:19it is just comically large.
0:29:22I can see how it would be really, really useful to have all that extra screen real estate.
0:29:26So it's interesting.
0:29:27But I really, really like the new Retina iPad Mini.
0:29:32Two thumbs up for that,
0:29:33two thumbs up for the iPad multitasking.
0:29:35Really, really been digging it.
0:29:37- On the iPad Pro being comically large,
0:29:39I still, as I dwell on this,
0:29:42I think the problem is that it's not big enough.
0:29:43Not the problem, not that there's a problem with it per se,
0:29:46but like the reason it seems so large
0:29:47is because we are comparing it to like the, you know,
0:29:51the quote unquote full-size iPad.
0:29:53If it was really comically large, like as in 21 inch,
0:29:56No one would be comparing it to, like no one would think,
0:29:59oh, I'm gonna put this in my backpack.
0:30:00It would be for designers to work with at their desk.
0:30:03It's like, why is it even an iPad at that point?
0:30:05Why aren't you just, why isn't it just a Mac?
0:30:06Why, you know, well,
0:30:07'cause you draw on the screen with a pen
0:30:09and you don't do that with a Mac.
0:30:10And it's not indirect like a Cintiq
0:30:12where you got the Mac over here.
0:30:13You know, like I still feel like it's the direction
0:30:15we're going in, albeit at this point,
0:30:17we're going there at a snail's pace
0:30:18'cause it took this long to get us a stylus
0:30:21and a slightly larger iPad.
0:30:22But I think that will solve the problem of,
0:30:25"Whoa, look at the size of this giant iPad!"
0:30:27When it, you stop making that comparison
0:30:29at a certain point.
0:30:30When it becomes a thing that sits on your desk,
0:30:32I don't mean that you have to plug it in,
0:30:34although you could plug it in.
0:30:35But I mean, I think there have been people
0:30:37who have made these very large tablet size things
0:30:41like 21 inches or whatever,
0:30:42and they just haven't caught on.
0:30:45I just don't think the software is there for it yet.
0:30:46But in the same way that I feel like
0:30:49the iPad Pro features will go downscale,
0:30:51at some point you can make the iPad Pro even bigger.
0:30:54Like, why not?
0:30:55If it becomes a tool for designers,
0:30:58who wants to design things on something
0:31:00as puny as an iPad Pro?
0:31:02Like, why wouldn't you want something bigger?
0:31:04I think you would, naturally, eventually.
0:31:06Well, why did they stop making the 17-inch MacBook Pro?
0:31:10I think that is kind of like--
0:31:14because the laptop's role is to be portable, right?
0:31:16And I don't think the iPad's role is necessarily
0:31:18to be portable, especially for design things,
0:31:21because they just want to draw on the screen, right?
0:31:22I think Cintiqs are bigger than that size.
0:31:26- Well, I think the reason they killed the 17 inch
0:31:29MacBook Pro is probably because they just weren't selling
0:31:31enough of them to make it worth continuing to sell.
0:31:34So a larger iPad than the Pro might have that same problem.
0:31:38They might, you know, there is a maximum size
0:31:40above which it is just too specialized
0:31:43and not enough people will buy it
0:31:45to make it worth Apple making it.
0:31:46And for MacBooks, that appears to be 15 inches.
0:31:49So what is it for iPads?
0:31:50It might be the iPad Pro size,
0:31:52that might be bigger, who knows?
0:31:53- I don't buy into that because I think the generation
0:31:55that's throwing mice around the room
0:31:56wants something they're gonna touch.
0:31:58Like that's why I keep saying the iPad
0:31:59is the future of computing.
0:32:00It's not gonna be too specialized.
0:32:01What's gonna be too specialized
0:32:02is the PCs that you can't touch.
0:32:04So Apple is eventually,
0:32:05for those kids who are throwing those mice
0:32:07around the computer lab who are in kindergarten now,
0:32:09when they are 30 years old,
0:32:11I think they're gonna want a really big touchscreen
0:32:14somewhere in their house to do the type of stuff
0:32:17they can't do on their phones, like for sitting down.
0:32:19Like in the same way that we have an iMac
0:32:21or our laptops or maybe they'll just stick with laptops.
0:32:24I don't know.
0:32:24Like the 17 inch laptop, it's an old form factor
0:32:27and it's meant to be portable
0:32:28and a non-portable laptop is called desktop
0:32:30and we already have that.
0:32:32Like we have a massive 5K iMac.
0:32:33Like I don't, one fun thing to think about is
0:32:37what is the upper size limit on desktop computer screens?
0:32:4127 inches that like we went up to 30,
0:32:44is that like the limit?
0:32:46Or at a certain point it becomes you can't find
0:32:48like a desk space big enough.
0:32:50it starts blocking your view out of your home.
0:32:52And like, it's just, it's just, it's just too darn big.
0:32:55I have a friend who uses a television,
0:32:56like people who have a vision problems, you know,
0:32:59not that it's low resolution, but it's just massive, right?
0:33:02I guess, you know, maybe VR have sets come
0:33:05and make all this a moot point.
0:33:07But anyway, thinking about the sizes screens can be
0:33:11in the future, I think it's,
0:33:14there's lots of interesting possibilities.
0:33:16And I think a lot of our view today is colored by
0:33:19what we're comparing it to or where we slot it.
0:33:22You know, that's all just getting back to Casey's thing,
0:33:24it's comically large.
0:33:25And like in some respects it is.
0:33:27It's like the world's biggest iPhone
0:33:29or it's a comically large iPad.
0:33:31But in other respects,
0:33:32it's a comically small laptop screen
0:33:35detached from a keyboard.
0:33:36It's a comically small iMac that you can touch, right?
0:33:40I don't know.
0:33:41Anyway, that was an aside.
0:33:42- We are also sponsored this week by Blue Apron.
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0:35:18All right, so John, you had come up with a topic or theme perhaps for the remainder of
0:35:26today's episode.
0:35:27Would you like to introduce that and kind of kick us off?
0:35:29The last episode of 2015, that means you have a sort of a year-end thing.
0:35:32You could do a year in review.
0:35:34You could do predictions for next year.
0:35:37What I wanted to do was something kind of in between, which is a 2016 wish list with
0:35:43a set of rules.
0:35:44Of course, there are rules.
0:35:45So the first rule is that these are not predictions.
0:35:48So that gets us entirely out of the game
0:35:50of trying to predict what is actually going to happen
0:35:52in 2016, because that's fun to do sometimes.
0:35:55And it's easy to tell whether you're right
0:35:57for the most part, but I don't know,
0:36:00like I'm less interested in predicting what will happen
0:36:03than in talking about what I would like to happen.
0:36:06And for stuff that you would like to happen,
0:36:09you can't pick like blue sky stuff where it's like,
0:36:12if I could have a pony and a unicorn,
0:36:15this is what I would want.
0:36:16So the rules are not predictions and pick things
0:36:19that are plausible and feasible
0:36:22and that you wanna see in 2016.
0:36:24And I guess we'll have to just judge
0:36:25whether the thing you're asking for is a fantasy
0:36:28that's never gonna happen
0:36:29and has to be straightened from the list.
0:36:31But those are the ground rules.
0:36:33And I hope you guys did some semblance of homework.
0:36:36- I have a text file in front of me.
0:36:37- That sounds serious.
0:36:39- Does it have more than one thing in it?
0:36:41- It has 36 lines with text on them.
0:36:43- Well, including white space.
0:36:4536 lines.
0:36:46- All right, and this is, it's not even like top four,
0:36:48they don't even need to be ordered.
0:36:49This is an unordered list, UL.
0:36:51- So you might actually do okay with this, Marco.
0:36:53- Well, it was very hard for me to do this
0:36:56in a way that wasn't just predictions.
0:36:58- Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
0:36:59- Like, keeping it to plausible things was fairly easy,
0:37:04but making it not just a list of what I think will happen,
0:37:07or what I think is very likely to happen, that is harder,
0:37:10and I've definitely had a harder time with that.
0:37:13So my list is a little bit predictive.
0:37:15And well, to getting away from predictions,
0:37:17the reason I don't wanna do predictions
0:37:18is because that allows cynicism in the door.
0:37:20Because you could say, these dummies are gonna do this
0:37:22even though they shouldn't.
0:37:23And this is more just like, what do you want to happen?
0:37:25Like what, if you could make certain things happen,
0:37:29and you know, non-magical things,
0:37:31what do you wanna see in 2016?
0:37:33And it can be anything tech, I guess.
0:37:34I mean, we're probably all thinking of Apple stuff,
0:37:36but realize that it can be anything tech related.
0:37:38- And honestly, I mean, my list is actually pretty optimistic
0:37:43or like it isn't a pessimistic or cynical list
0:37:45because, you know, look, and my list is very,
0:37:48very Apple focused, I just wasn't really thinking
0:37:51of other stuff because frankly,
0:37:52the rest of the tech industry is kind of boring
0:37:54most of the time, to be honest.
0:37:56But, you know, for me, the Apple side of it,
0:37:59I am optimistic simply because I think Apple
0:38:03in 2015 and 2014 really did a lot of 1.0s.
0:38:08Like a lot of things are either brand new product lines
0:38:12or new product sub-lines like the iPad Pro,
0:38:16or new services like Apple Music and Photo Cloud stuff.
0:38:21There's a lot of restarts and 1.0s recently,
0:38:26in this past year.
0:38:27And so I'm really hoping that 2016 brings
0:38:32a lot of 1.1s and 2.0s, you know?
0:38:34Just like a lot of revision, a lot of maybe maturing
0:38:39of these lines and of these various new products.
0:38:41you know, just kind of a slow down in brand new cutting edge launches, because Apple's
0:38:46cutting edge launches have been all over the map in terms of quality and usefulness and
0:38:50everything. And so to have some time where that can be kind of calmed down and matured
0:38:56and stabilized and developed further rather than just more and more 1.0s of everything
0:39:03would be very welcome. And I think that's what will happen, and I hope that's what
0:39:08will happen. So that is my main theme of my wishes is just stop at the 1.0s for a little
0:39:15while and just take all these 1.0s forward to their next steps in their growth.
0:39:21There was a really good, well I didn't finish it, I only had time to read about the first
0:39:25half, but I think it was Nielle Patel wrote something on The Verge yesterday, I believe
0:39:32it was. It's entitled "2015 Apple's Year in Beta." And it very much echoes what you just
0:39:39said, that basically there's been a lot of half-cooked stuff that's been released in
0:39:43this year, and that's really kind of unfortunate. And I didn't get to the portion which actually
0:39:48sounds perhaps even more interesting to me, which is "New platform ideas in search of
0:39:54sticky user behavior." So for example, 3D Touch, which I find I'm using more and more
0:39:59over time, but I did not have the instant, like, "Oh my god, I'm using this always"
0:40:06experience that I was kind of expecting to, actually. So we'll link this in the show notes,
0:40:10but it was a little on the negative side, but I think it was pretty fair, all told.
0:40:15Yeah, I mean, you know, at this point in Apple's evolution, they are really throwing a lot
0:40:20more spaghetti at the wall to see what sticks, and whether that used to happen more in private
0:40:25and is now more public, or whether, as I said
0:40:28in a recent show, I think there's just been a lot
0:40:31of low-hanging fruit that has all been picked,
0:40:33and now in order to find the next big thing
0:40:36or the next success in the business, it's harder.
0:40:41And the successes are getting smaller, relatively speaking,
0:40:45and all the low-hanging fruit has already been picked
0:40:48in a lot of these industries, so it's just getting harder
0:40:50to find what's next and to find success.
0:40:52And so we are seeing things that come out that are kind of like, "Eh, really?"
0:40:58Or things that you're not really sure will work, and many of them don't, and many of
0:41:02them do.
0:41:03And it's happening more in public now with Apple than it used to, I think.
0:41:07Or maybe we're just remembering wrong, I don't know.
0:41:09But it does seem like we are seeing a lot more things come out of Apple that are not
0:41:14clear wins from day one.
0:41:16Obviously you can look back to the past and you can say, "Well, it was never perfect."
0:41:21And that's true.
0:41:22But I think if you look at the iPhone 1.0,
0:41:25or even the early iPods, and many of their earlier
0:41:291.0 releases versus today's 1.0 releases,
0:41:33I think the number of asterisks and downsides in the past
0:41:37was probably lower than it is today.
0:41:40And in part that's because they are a bigger company.
0:41:43I do think it has to do in part
0:41:45with Steve not being there anymore.
0:41:47And I think in part it is just because
0:41:48the products now are more complicated.
0:41:49as I just said, like, it's more challenging now to find new territory that will be a success.
0:41:55Yeah, from this piece that I was talking about, this is Neil A. Patel, and that's really the issue.
0:42:00We're not used to Apple being just fine. We're used to Apple being wildly better than the
0:42:04competition or sometimes much worse, but always ahead of the curve on some significant axis. But
0:42:10what we got in 2015 was an Apple that released more products than ever, all of which felt
0:42:13incomplete in extremely meaningful ways, ways that meant that their products were just fine
0:42:18and often just the same as everyone else's.
0:42:21- Yeah, I don't know if I buy the premise,
0:42:24because again, long memory,
0:42:25but one thing when I think of the problem,
0:42:28like the underlying thing,
0:42:29I keep coming back to my hobby horse,
0:42:32which is I don't know,
0:42:34like in a world where products increasingly
0:42:37have a backend service component,
0:42:41that works against Apple,
0:42:44because I don't know if they can make those things like,
0:42:46They're 1.0 their buggy or whatever like I just need one more year to work out the kinks when it was just software and hardware
0:42:52That shipped to customers that was true. They could work out the kinks. They'd make the hardware better
0:42:56But when it's server component things like I don't I don't see a lot of like there's some progress there
0:43:04But it's really slow and I that's why I don't have the confidence to like oh given
0:43:08Given a year or two like contact syncing will be a solved problem. You know how long Apple's been working on contacts
0:43:14I don't people don't have many contacts. I don't have many contacts to get like
0:43:17hundred or so couple hundred contacts, and I just want them to be the same everywhere and to be in sync and
0:43:22This should be a solved problem
0:43:26But it isn't and it like is it is it because Apple hasn't had time to work on contact syncing
0:43:30No, like it's just I feel like there is a fundamental
0:43:34Incapability of the organization to get past some threshold of quality and as more and more things they make have that component
0:43:42I worry that there's like a ceiling on how good those things are gonna be how good can Apple music be if there's necessarily a server
0:43:50component how good can Apple TV be if there's no you know I
0:43:52Don't know maybe maybe that's my imagination, but certainly it's true that more and more products
0:43:58Even if you just think of the watch where the server is kind of the phone more and more products
0:44:03Rely on something that is not inside the physical device to to do like their main job not as a frill or something right
0:44:11So I don't know if like, I don't know, iCloud is better than .Mac and MobileMe and all that
0:44:21other stuff and things have improved and they are going in the right direction.
0:44:25But boy, it feels like slow going and as that slowly evolves, the number of new products
0:44:33and new platforms for that matter that they introduced that rely on server infrastructure
0:44:37things to be reliable and fast and always available is outpacing the quality of their
0:44:43implementation of those things.
0:44:44So I don't want to be too pessimistic.
0:44:46I feel like it is a positive trend, but they are, Apple in this past year, if I had to
0:44:51characterize it, it would be a year in which they, a year or two in which they introduced
0:44:56a lot of new platforms and every new platform was kind of crappy in the beginning.
0:45:01And so if you introduced a whole bunch of new platforms, you're going to have a whole
0:45:03year or two of kind of crappy.
0:45:07you gotta give them time to get their feet underneath them.
0:45:09And every platform goes through cycles.
0:45:11Like the Mac has been a shaky platform,
0:45:13then solid, then shaky, then solid, then shaky, then solid,
0:45:15then totally in crisis, then really crappy
0:45:17for a whole bunch of years, that's the dawn of OS X,
0:45:20and then solid again, then shaky again.
0:45:21Like these things go in cycles.
0:45:23So I hope we'll be on an upswing with, you know,
0:45:25I don't know, are we currently in an upswing with iOS
0:45:28or a downswing?
0:45:29I can't really tell.
0:45:30I think we're kind of plateauing with it.
0:45:33Like, do you feel like iOS is in a downswing
0:45:36in terms of the quality as compared to like the golden age
0:45:39of what is that, iOS 4 maybe?
0:45:41- No, honestly, I think iOS is great.
0:45:44iOS on the iPhone I think is fantastic.
0:45:47iOS, even on the iPad, it is in many ways
0:45:52still pretty half-assed on the iPad
0:45:55like as its own thing versus the iPhone
0:45:58like versus just being a blown up phone OS.
0:46:00It still needs a lot of work to really
0:46:03stand on its own in the iPad.
0:46:04But iOS in general and iOS on the iPhone itself,
0:46:08I think the current version, which is 9, is very solid.
0:46:12I'm very happy with 9.
0:46:13- So like performance, UI, reliability, APIs,
0:46:18like it all just seems like is this a new,
0:46:20a good period for iOS where like the UI in 7
0:46:24has kind of had most of the kinks worked out of it, you feel?
0:46:27- Yeah, for the most part.
0:46:28I mean like, nothing's perfect,
0:46:30but I think iOS is pretty solid now.
0:46:34Design wise, obviously there's a lot that can use improvement with the iOS 7 design
0:46:38language and some of it I just think will not be improved.
0:46:43Some of it would require changing that design language in ways that I don't think the current
0:46:48software designers in power at Apple would ever allow.
0:46:52So I don't think it's going to happen.
0:46:54But overall, I think iOS and especially iOS on the iPhone is solid.
0:47:00There are some things that are weird.
0:47:01As you mentioned, anything that touches a cloud service
0:47:03can be weird.
0:47:04I don't know how many people out there with iPhones
0:47:08are very frequently asked to go reenter
0:47:11their iCloud password and settings.
0:47:13- Periodically asked.
0:47:14It's like rain, it's any dark sky app
0:47:17for when am I going to be asked for my iCloud password.
0:47:20Today you're gonna be asked 17 times,
0:47:22then you will not be asked again for three weeks.
0:47:25Why, I don't know.
0:47:27- In my case, I very frequently will wake up to a phone
0:47:30that I need to re-enter my passcode on,
0:47:32that hasn't rebooted, but it just says Touch ID
0:47:35'cause it's been more than 48 hours,
0:47:36and it's been like seven hours.
0:47:38And so, you know, there's little stuff like that,
0:47:42but in general, using the phone, the OS,
0:47:46in general, I would say both iOS and Mac OS X
0:47:50in their current versions of iOS 9 and El Capitan,
0:47:53I think both are pretty solid, pretty good releases.
0:47:58I would say that the Apple TV needs a lot of work.
0:48:02The actual, like, the OS level, like the core, you know, kernel and everything seem fine.
0:48:11The UI on the Apple TV, I think, needs a lot of work.
0:48:15It is very much a UI designed to look good in screenshots and ads, and very much not
0:48:21a UI designed to use well at all.
0:48:23And the only thing you need to do to see this is buy a TV show on iTunes.
0:48:27It's so bad.
0:48:29By a TV season on iTunes.
0:48:32Oh my god.
0:48:34It is so clearly not designed by anybody who ever actually has done this or needs to do
0:48:39this.
0:48:40It was designed to look good on the screenshot once.
0:48:42And it does seem like the print marketing group or whoever took over the software UI
0:48:48design, I think the new Apple TV is an example of how that can go pretty badly wrong against
0:48:55usability.
0:48:56I hope they see that and work on that
0:48:59because it is pretty rough right now
0:49:00in a few areas like that that are pretty common.
0:49:03And to the point where this Christmas,
0:49:06usually we give Apple TVs to our relatives here and there,
0:49:09and this Christmas we didn't give one to anybody
0:49:10because we don't want to support it.
0:49:13It's not in a good spot.
0:49:17- It's kind of ironic you blame that
0:49:18on the print design mentality,
0:49:20when really what they need is what print design morphed into
0:49:23which is web design.
0:49:24is when print warmed up to web design,
0:49:27they brought on the information architecture people
0:49:29to explain to them,
0:49:30it's not so much what your screens look like,
0:49:32it's what screens are and how they connect to each other
0:49:35and how the people get a sense of place about it
0:49:38and how many screens, you know,
0:49:39like plain old wireframe information architecture
0:49:41came in to combine with the print people to say,
0:49:44when you do web design, it's not a bunch of pages.
0:49:46You have to actually design the information flow
0:49:50and how it's connected and how it's organized
0:49:51in a way that makes sense to people
0:49:53allows them to get where they want to go in a reasonable fashion and not feel lost and
0:49:55all that other stuff. Whereas, yeah, I feel about the Apple TV, where a lot of the screens
0:50:01look really good, but they're not connected to each other in a sensible way and there
0:50:06seem to be too many of them. And a lot of time, I feel like I'm going through too many
0:50:11screens or I lose track of where I am. So that's just plain old, straight up O'Reilly
0:50:16polar bear book business.
0:50:17(laughing)
0:50:19Yeah, so that is one thing on my wish list.
0:50:21I really hope that the Apple TV gets just some UI tweaks
0:50:26to make it more usable, 'cause right now it is so
0:50:31poorly usable in so many little areas like that,
0:50:34and it seems like the fix is not difficult.
0:50:37It just takes some rethinking of certain screen layouts.
0:50:39And so I hope they do that.
0:50:42- So is that one item, maybe let Marco go first,
0:50:44is that counted as one item?
0:50:46Is he saying that he thinks what he wants to see is the Apple TV getting some reasonable
0:50:55improvements because it's a new platform and there's a lot of obvious things they can do?
0:50:58Yeah, and also, while I'm talking about the Apple TV, I would also say this has a brand
0:51:04new app store.
0:51:06The implementation of the store itself is pretty bad, and I would love to see that improved
0:51:11as well.
0:51:12in the area of apps for the Apple TV,
0:51:15you know, it's still very early.
0:51:16There are very few apps available for it.
0:51:19I would love to see, you know,
0:51:20whenever a new platform comes out,
0:51:22you have people, like on the Apple TV,
0:51:24I know Guy English has talked a lot about this
0:51:26on his podcast and blog,
0:51:28like you kinda wanna see like,
0:51:30not just porting iPhone apps to it,
0:51:33but we wanna see like what new kinds of apps
0:51:36does this make possible that we haven't thought of yet?
0:51:39And on the Apple TV, we haven't seen that yet.
0:51:41I'm curious to know if during 2016 we will see
0:51:45some new kind of app take off on the Apple TV
0:51:49that wouldn't work just as well or better on a phone.
0:51:51Like something that really takes advantage
0:51:53of it being a TV app.
0:51:54You know, so I would love to see that
0:51:56come from the third-party community.
0:51:58And I hope it does.
0:52:00I really do hope it does.
0:52:01And I also hope that the Apple TV becomes
0:52:03a first-class game platform to release on for iOS games.
0:52:07- I'm gonna hit the pie in the sky buzzer on that one.
0:52:11No, I know, I know. Obviously I'm not expecting console games to be launched to it, but I
0:52:18think games that are launching on iOS or that are having success on iOS, I hope that they
0:52:24get ported quickly to the Apple TV or launch simultaneously would be probably the pie in
0:52:28the sky goal for now. But it would be nice to see it get more gaming status because it
0:52:33is really fun to play good games on the Apple TV. But that I think, you know, if this was
0:52:40as a predictions episode, I would honestly predict
0:52:43neither of those things would happen.
0:52:44Neither it being a first party thing for games,
0:52:47nor us seeing some really amazing apps for it.
0:52:48I would actually say neither of those were likely to happen,
0:52:51but they're both plausible, and they're both things
0:52:54that I wish would happen.
0:52:56- So how are we summarizing the 93 points you just made?
0:52:59- Apple TV, Cullen, get better.
0:53:01- Yeah, there you go.
0:53:03He had some, definitely some plausible things
0:53:05that could be done to Apple TV.
0:53:06I think he drifted off into unicorns in the game.
0:53:09or you got a PS4 now, you don't have to worry about that.
0:53:11- Oh goodness, all right.
0:53:13- All right, Casey, your turn.
0:53:14- So I have a handful, and what do I wanna use first?
0:53:19Okay, I will use App Store improvements.
0:53:22App Store, colon, get better.
0:53:24I think that, and it's easy for me
0:53:28to make these sorts of wishes and hopes and dreams
0:53:33and decisions from the position of someone who really,
0:53:37this doesn't affect me,
0:53:38But for those friends that I have, like Marco, like Underscore, and so many others that try
0:53:43to make a living out of the App Store, I would really love to see things get better for independent
0:53:51developers.
0:53:52And I'm not really clear how.
0:53:53I mean, a lot of the standard answers like trials and things like that, that may or may
0:53:58not improve things.
0:53:59But whatever the answer is, especially what with the shakeup that we discussed either
0:54:04the last week or the week before,
0:54:06I'd really like to see, and I think it's plausible,
0:54:08to see the App Store get better,
0:54:11actually both for independent developers,
0:54:13which is how I was originally coming at this,
0:54:14but also for users, you know, see search get better,
0:54:17to see things like home sharing I've never tried
0:54:20because I'm petrified of trying it
0:54:22'cause I've heard it's terrible.
0:54:24All of that, can we just make that better, please?
0:54:27- That's a pretty vague item.
0:54:28I mean, it is plausible, definitely plausible.
0:54:30Like if you'd picked one thing, for example,
0:54:32say you'd picked upgrade pricing.
0:54:33100% plausible that it's merely a policy change.
0:54:36It could happen, you could have said,
0:54:37but instead you just kind of punted and said,
0:54:39I want something better to happen for the App Store,
0:54:41but you're not willing to say what that is.
0:54:43I can see that it's definitely a lot of plausible things.
0:54:45- Yeah, and I think the thing of it is,
0:54:47is that I'm not so convinced that all the things
0:54:50everyone's been whining about are the right answer.
0:54:53They may be, you know, upgrade pricing might help a lot.
0:54:57Trials might help a lot,
0:54:59but I'm not sure those are the silver bullets
0:55:01everyone says they are.
0:55:02And I haven't been able to come up with the silver bullet.
0:55:05And I'm pretty sure if I could,
0:55:07I would be much better compensated than I am,
0:55:10and I would probably be working at Apple.
0:55:11But whatever the answer may be,
0:55:14there's gotta be something out there.
0:55:15There's gotta be a way to make things better.
0:55:17Maybe it's more transparency.
0:55:19Okay, I'll go with that.
0:55:20Maybe it's just a little bit more transparency.
0:55:22Now you might have to hit the pie in the sky buzzer, but.
0:55:25- No, I think it's an easy one.
0:55:26To say that when app developers have their application
0:55:31review and they have just like a status line with a canned message that tells them what phase it's in
0:55:36or when it gets rejected like the fact that they can't immediately connect with someone to have a
0:55:44humane discussion about the issues at hand like that just it's like there's some misunderstanding
0:55:49that could be cleared up with a five-minute conversation with a person who is empowered
0:55:52to do something and that conversation can never happen you just you can send email you can wait
0:55:57for a response sometimes the response makes it clear that they didn't understand what you said
0:56:00and just like, I don't know if you call it transparency
0:56:03or like communication or like maybe it's a scaling problem
0:56:06where they just can't have individual people
0:56:07talk to individual developers about their problems
0:56:10with their applications.
0:56:11And a lot of it just has to be canned responses.
0:56:13But yeah, I think that could definitely improve
0:56:16even if you just threw manpower at it
0:56:18or woman power or human power,
0:56:20but just to just say hire more people to,
0:56:23you know, so there is someone, always someone available,
0:56:26a knowledgeable person available
0:56:28to discuss an app rejection to explain what the deal is, what needs to be done to fix it,
0:56:35if there's a misunderstanding going on. You know, because one of the ones I've seen a couple times
0:56:41is someone will submit an application and it'll get rejected for reading or writing files from
0:56:45a forbidden location, but the code that is reading or writing the forbidden files is from inside an
0:56:49Apple framework. It's not clear, like, did I use the framework wrong? Did I misconfigure it and
0:56:57and call an API on some kind of misconfigured object,
0:57:00and that's why it wrote in a bad place?
0:57:02Or is it a bug in Apple's own code
0:57:04where no matter how you use this API,
0:57:06it has the potential to write files
0:57:07in a forbidden place or whatever?
0:57:09And so developers who get that message,
0:57:12get that rejection, they're like, what do I do now?
0:57:14Can I not use that framework?
0:57:16'Cause it's like, as far as they're concerned,
0:57:17it's not their code that's doing it.
0:57:19And all they need is someone, whoever did this rejection,
0:57:21if Apple even knows, to say, oh yeah, no,
0:57:24I know it's our code doing it,
0:57:26but it's because you're using your API in the wrong way.
0:57:29You're using it like this, that, and that,
0:57:30and it causes it to write files here.
0:57:32If you use it in this other way, it won't do that.
0:57:33Or have someone have the conversation and go,
0:57:36"Oh, you're right, you're not doing anything wrong.
0:57:38That's just a bug in our framework."
0:57:39And those conversations either seem to happen
0:57:43way too slowly or not happen at all,
0:57:45and a lot of developers get frustrated
0:57:47by a rejection that's not actionable.
0:57:50Like they don't know what to do.
0:57:51They just throw up their hands and say,
0:57:52"Well, what am I supposed to do about that?
0:57:53Am I not supposed to use that framework?
0:57:54Am I doing something wrong?"
0:57:55In some respects, like, well, you know,
0:57:57it's not Apple's job to write your application for you,
0:57:59but I don't know, I've seen enough of those cases
0:58:02that I think a better, a more human connection
0:58:07with the faceless machine that is App Review
0:58:09could benefit all developers.
0:58:11- Yeah, I mean, to me, like, my 2016 wish
0:58:14in regards to App Store improvement is much more broad
0:58:18and vague because, honestly, I don't expect
0:58:22a lot of these things that you've mentioned to happen.
0:58:24My wish is simply show us a sign that things might be changing for the better because we
0:58:34got the fill taking over thing last week.
0:58:38Show us a sign of movement in the right direction in actual App Store status or behavior or
0:58:44policy.
0:58:45For years, the attitude of the App Store shown by both their communication and by their action
0:58:53or rather inaction for the most part, the attitude has been really nothing here needs
0:58:58to be changed, everything is fine. And the system we have now is good and works well.
0:59:03In reality the system they have now is okay and works okay, but I would not say that there's
0:59:11no room for improvement, whereas the attitude from them keeps being, by their own actions,
0:59:15keeps being we don't need to improve this, because they really just haven't. So I would
0:59:21would like to see just some sign that they believe, that they agree inside, that they
0:59:26believe that there are things that could use significant improvement and that they are
0:59:31working on them. Because we really have seen nothing of that sort so far.
0:59:35You just want to like issue an apology or make like a statement of purpose or make a
0:59:39mission statement to say, "We agree things are wrong and we will fix them somehow vaguely."
0:59:44No, I mean I would like to see action, but it doesn't have to be a big action yet. Just
0:59:48So like, some kind of action that shows that they are changing things in the App Store,
0:59:54that they are not satisfied with the App Store.
0:59:55Because that's the thing, they appear so incredibly satisfied with it.
1:00:00And just so little has changed about it in seven years or whatever.
1:00:03Like I want to see something that indicates that Apple truly believes this is not good
1:00:10enough.
1:00:11- Casey said that he didn't know, you know, like he didn't have any specific thing.
1:00:14Because maybe trials are in it, maybe upgrade pricing isn't in it.
1:00:16wasn't sure exactly what it was. Well, Apple's not sure about those same things. They're not sure
1:00:22that because if they were sure that upgrades would fix it, they would do it. If they're sure
1:00:25that trials would make things better, they would do it. So obviously they also agree with UKC that
1:00:28they're not quite sure what to do and so they're doing nothing. And like it's the same thing with
1:00:33Marco's request here. If you don't have a specific thing, like I know you want something to happen,
1:00:39but someone inside Apple would have to pick which thing it is and it's potentially dangerous because
1:00:44say you're wrong and trials makes the app store worse instead of better. I mean
1:00:48I guess that would kind of fulfill Marco's thing because at least it would be
1:00:51showing well we tried something at least instead of just saying oh we're you know
1:00:53like I think the impression you're getting Marco is like because if they
1:00:57don't do anything we just assume well I guess they must think it's fine because
1:01:00they never do anything and it doesn't change. Yes. And so it's like yeah and so
1:01:04them doing something even if it was the wrong thing would at least show that
1:01:08they have some internal dissatisfaction. It could be argued that the management
1:01:12reshuffle counts as something, even though it is not a change yet that affects developers.
1:01:17It does at least show that they think there is something amiss somewhere inside Apple's
1:01:21organization. Whether they think the thing that's amiss is the App Store or some other thing that
1:01:25was affected by the shuffle, we don't know. But I don't know. I can let that one slide by,
1:01:30because it is definitely plausible that they will do something, something vague that we will not
1:01:35specify. Hey, I had to skirt the system somehow just for you. All right, what's your first?
1:01:41Why you guys are getting big vague and big picture mines are just so super specific and so easy
1:01:48I want a new Mac Pro
1:01:50So does Marco so does everybody everyone's in who doesn't want a new Pro a Mac Pro in every pot
1:01:56It's a new Mac Pro with you know
1:02:00Thunderbolt 3 and and my sub item is a new 5k
1:02:04External display to drive off the thing like we all know we want it
1:02:08We know it has to be coming, just make a new Mac Pro.
1:02:11It is entirely plausible, 100% plausible,
1:02:13and it should come in 2016, and when it comes,
1:02:16I'll be excited 'cause I like that,
1:02:17and I might even buy one.
1:02:19- Yeah, I have that also on my list, of course,
1:02:23under a heading of just complete the Retina transition.
1:02:28And so what this would have to include
1:02:30is a desktop standalone 5K display,
1:02:34and the ability for the Mac Pro
1:02:38and the laptops to drive it.
1:02:40And maybe the Mac Mini as well, that would be nice.
1:02:43I'm not expecting much on that front
1:02:45because the Mac Mini is so rarely updated,
1:02:46but that would be nice.
1:02:47- People hook up screens to Mac Minis?
1:02:49- That aren't TVs, right?
1:02:52Yeah, so, yeah, I totally, and this is very plausible
1:02:55because this is going to be the year of Skylake.
1:03:00And we got like little trickles of Skylake so far.
1:03:042016 should be, if Intel has everything together,
1:03:07which is not a given, but if they have everything together,
1:03:09this should be the year of Skylake everywhere.
1:03:12So this should be the laptops, finally all of them,
1:03:15all the pros going to Skylake,
1:03:17the MacBook One going to Skylake
1:03:18and getting its USB-C port upgraded
1:03:20to also have Thunderbolt coming out of it.
1:03:22The MacBook Pro Retina line, I expect to be,
1:03:26not only upgraded to Skylake, but to also get a redesign.
1:03:29We've heard rumors here and there that it will,
1:03:31and I think the timing is right
1:03:32because the current design came out in 2012,
1:03:34and Skylake gives them an excuse
1:03:36to make the battery smaller. So I expect there to be a MacBook Pro Skylake refresh. This
1:03:41is, sorry, getting into predictions, but this is all just part of it. You know, like, I
1:03:46want this to be finally completing the retina transition in the Mac lineup because it has
1:03:52been partially complete literally since 2012. And we are so close, we're so close, and
1:04:00we're just not quite there yet until we can get Skylake that can drive, Skylake chipsets
1:04:05with Thunderbolt 3 that can drive external 5K displays over a single cable.
1:04:09And that is so close.
1:04:11We are so close to that.
1:04:12Do you want to see them get rid of the MacBook Air?
1:04:15So here's what I think will happen on that front.
1:04:17Not what you think will happen.
1:04:18Do you want them to get rid of it?
1:04:19Would you be happy if you could tell Apple what to do, essentially?
1:04:23Because discontinuing the MacBook Air is entirely feasible.
1:04:25So if you were in charge of Apple, you'd say, "You know what?
1:04:28In 2016, stop making the MacBook Air."
1:04:30First of all, I think that would be too soon.
1:04:33I would expect the MacBook Air to get updates from now on on a similar schedule to when
1:04:38the Mac Mini gets updates. I would expect that they wouldn't get rid of the Air without
1:04:43compelling things taking its place. So obviously on the low end you have the MacBook One. But
1:04:48the MacBook One really does not replace the Air in a number of ways because it is so much
1:04:55slower and so much more limited and has so many more compromises for that thinness than
1:05:00even the Air does. I do think though that when they redesign the Skylake MacBook Pros,
1:05:07the Retina MacBook Pro, I do think the newly thinner, lighter 13" Retina MacBook Pro will
1:05:14be so close to the 13" MacBook Air that I think it will make the MacBook Air far less
1:05:21relevant. So then on the low end you have the MacBook One eating into the 11" and then
1:05:27and then you have the new thinner 13-inch MacBook Pro
1:05:31eating into the 13-inch Air.
1:05:33And then I think the Air line is pretty much obviated
1:05:35at that point.
1:05:36That doesn't mean Apple will stop selling it
1:05:38because today's Apple does not stop selling anything ever.
1:05:40But I do think that both ends will then be
1:05:44adequately attacked and will be clearly replaced
1:05:48for most Air buyers at that point.
1:05:51- So Marco, you had said that you want a new Mac Pro
1:05:56and God help me for encouraging you to talk about this more,
1:05:59but why, what would this phantom new Mac Pro do for you
1:06:03that your, and I don't mean this sarcastically,
1:06:06beloved 5K iMac doesn't do?
1:06:10- For the most part, I'm not sure I would get
1:06:14the next generation Mac Pro, I might get the one after that.
1:06:17Ultimately, what I want out of my computer
1:06:20that the current iMac is not satisfying me with
1:06:22is just even more sheer CPU performance.
1:06:26Like that, I always want more CPU performance
1:06:29than what I have.
1:06:30And the way Intel's moving these days,
1:06:33new CPU performance does not come easily.
1:06:35It does not come quickly.
1:06:37Skylake is a substantial boost, not like twice as fast,
1:06:41but it's faster by a noticeable amount,
1:06:44and I would get way more cores.
1:06:46I would probably go eight core if I got a Mac Pro,
1:06:50maybe even 12, but that would probably be insanely priced
1:06:52so I would probably go with eight.
1:06:54As time goes on, my CPU needs just are increasing.
1:06:57You know, and now I'm taking way more pictures,
1:07:00and now that I have this awesome new camera,
1:07:02processing those pictures is insane.
1:07:04I'm shooting 4K video now with my awesome iPhone camera,
1:07:07and my fancy camera, but even more with the iPhone.
1:07:09You know, so I'm dealing with bigger video files,
1:07:11dealing with bigger photos.
1:07:12As I'm compiling more code,
1:07:14and I'll be transitioning to Swift fairly soon,
1:07:16all the CPU needs of everything keep going up
1:07:18for compilation and everything.
1:07:20So ultimately I push my computer to the limit
1:07:24fairly often in my work,
1:07:26and not for massively long sustained periods
1:07:30for the most part, but for brief periods of
1:07:32I just need all the horsepower I can get
1:07:34for the next two minutes kind of thing.
1:07:36And I do that kind of thing frequently.
1:07:38So I really would like more CPU power.
1:07:40And that is mainly what I'd be looking for.
1:07:43In all other ways, I'm extremely happy with the Time Act.
1:07:47And even CPU power-wise,
1:07:49versus the lineup that's available today,
1:07:51it is at the top for single-threaded.
1:07:54I guess the newer Broadwell-based one
1:07:56probably beats it by a few percentage points,
1:07:58but it is relative to the entire Mac lineup,
1:08:01it is one of the top couple or top three
1:08:04that have ever existed in single-threaded performance.
1:08:06And even in multi-core, it is pretty far up the list
1:08:10until you get into the very high-core count Mac pros.
1:08:13So it is really close to as good as you can get already.
1:08:17That's why I'm saying I would probably wait
1:08:19a generation of Mac Pro, but I don't know,
1:08:22if the generation's keeping two or three years long,
1:08:25that might change.
1:08:26So the Mac Pro has a timing issue,
1:08:27because the Xeons that it would use,
1:08:31that would go in an update,
1:08:33the Broadwell Xeons are coming out next week,
1:08:35but that chipset will not support Thunderbolt 3.
1:08:39So that chipset most likely won't be able to drive
1:08:42a theoretical 5K Apple display.
1:08:45But the Skylake Xeons are coming out,
1:08:47quote, later this year.
1:08:48that would be a way better chip to use
1:08:50in a Mac Pro update in theory
1:08:52because then you could rev the whole thing
1:08:53with Thunderbolt 3, USB-C ports,
1:08:56and the ability to drive a new 5K monitor.
1:09:00So I hope that's what they do.
1:09:02I don't know if that's what they'll do,
1:09:03but I hope they will wait for Skylake-E chips
1:09:05and give us a nice little update.
1:09:07And if they do, that would be a really interesting option
1:09:11for me to consider, but I would probably
1:09:14still wanna wait a generation
1:09:15just to get a bigger boost over what I have now.
1:09:18- You're talking like me now,
1:09:19oh I don't wanna buy this one, I wanna buy the next one.
1:09:21But the difference is historically
1:09:23is that you do buy this one, and also the next one.
1:09:25- Truth.
1:09:26- That's usually the case, yeah.
1:09:27Well once I learned how easy it is to resell Macs,
1:09:30it makes it a lot easier, 'cause then it becomes like,
1:09:32well, is it worth spending like, you know,
1:09:35a thousand dollars to use this computer for 18 months?
1:09:38And it's like sometimes the answer is yes.
1:09:40You know, if you can get like the best computer
1:09:42in the world for what you do every single day,
1:09:45buy it when it comes out and then sell it a year later
1:09:47for 500 to $1,000 less than what you paid,
1:09:51that's not that bad.
1:09:52That's pretty good, actually.
1:09:53- If someone wants to make a cottage business,
1:09:55you could be the only client
1:09:56and they could just rent you Macs
1:09:58like they rent you headphones and cameras.
1:09:59- Right, yeah.
1:10:00- So, I mean, I guess that's fine and makes sense and all.
1:10:04I'm surprised that you really are CPU-bound that often,
1:10:06'cause about the only time I'm CPU-bound
1:10:07is when I'm compressing video files
1:10:09that I've ripped from a Blu-ray or something like that.
1:10:12It's so rare that I'm CPU-bound on anything else that I do.
1:10:15I don't know.
1:10:16- All right, so whose turn is it now?
1:10:19Marco's, I believe?
1:10:20- I mean, it basically just,
1:10:21I stole John's Mac Pro topic.
1:10:23- Well, you had it on your list too.
1:10:24It was a duplicate.
1:10:25- Yeah, and it really is, you know, for me,
1:10:26it really is part of this kind of,
1:10:27this general thing of like,
1:10:29I hope it's gonna be the year of Skylake everywhere,
1:10:31and also finally finish the retina transition on Mac.
1:10:34Finally cover the whole product line with retina.
1:10:37- No, I know how Tiff feels.
1:10:38Marco cannot follow instructions.
1:10:40- No.
1:10:41- All's about what he predicts and what he--
1:10:42- No, that's a wish.
1:10:43'Cause that is not guaranteed.
1:10:46You know, like this 5K display might not actually come out.
1:10:50- Yeah, yeah, I don't know.
1:10:51- You know, like a new Mac Pro using Skylake
1:10:53might not come out.
1:10:54Or it might come out using Broadwell
1:10:56and not have Thunderbolt 3 for the next three years.
1:10:58We have no idea.
1:10:59- Yeah, like, my, actually, my items are two things.
1:11:02Like, I want a new Mac Pro,
1:11:04even if it's just the Broadwell one,
1:11:06and the sub-item is I want a new 5K display.
1:11:08And so if I get one of those, I get a new Mac Pro,
1:11:10yeah, I'm glad, because here's why I'd want a new Mac Pro.
1:11:13Even though it doesn't drive the 5K display,
1:11:15even though I've said that I'm not gonna buy it
1:11:17until it does, a new Mac Pro would signal
1:11:20that the Mac Pro is not on the Mac Mini update cycle.
1:11:23You know what I mean?
1:11:24- Right, right.
1:11:25- That it is a line of computers that they consider updating
1:11:28on something approaching a reasonable schedule
1:11:30based on the availability of the chips
1:11:32that everyone thinks they should put in.
1:11:33Unlike the Mini, which is like,
1:11:34eh, I'll skip a year or two, whatever.
1:11:37And then someone wakes up and goes,
1:11:38oh, Mac Mini, what?
1:11:38All right, here's a new one.
1:11:40And then goes back to sleep again.
1:11:42I would like to see some sort of solid story, I guess, around Swift on the server.
1:11:50Something that's considered, that's deliberate, that's well thought out.
1:11:55Some sort of nice Swift on the server package setup, framework, whatever adjective you'd
1:12:02like to use.
1:12:03I want to see Swift on the server.
1:12:04I think that would be cool.
1:12:05JE: From Apple or from somebody else?
1:12:07JF.
1:12:08Don't care.
1:12:09I mean, from Apple would be better, I guess, since it's first party.
1:12:11But really, if there was some accepted and understood standard, I would really love to
1:12:17see it.
1:12:19Not one of those situations like CocoaPods versus Carthage or anything like that.
1:12:23In honest to goodness, good, robust, mature as much as it can be, given this is all new,
1:12:30Swift on the server framework.
1:12:31I think that would be really, really awesome.
1:12:33I almost had an item like that on my list, but I didn't quite know how to phrase it,
1:12:36and I am obviously more demanding about avoiding vagueness
1:12:41than either of you are.
1:12:41But it was like, maybe, you know,
1:12:46do we just need a bunch of libraries for HTTP,
1:12:50for just handling the protocol,
1:12:51and then like, you know,
1:12:52sort of web frameworks on top of that,
1:12:54or another possibility is some standardized way
1:12:59to talk to databases from Swift, you know?
1:13:03Like, is there so many pieces,
1:13:04And I'm thinking obviously, quote unquote, web applications.
1:13:07So web applications may just be something
1:13:09that accepts and returns JSON over HTTP.
1:13:13Is that a web application?
1:13:14But just what we think of is when you say server side
1:13:16things, that's what we're all talking about.
1:13:18Not many people are making servers these days
1:13:20that aren't talking HTTP.
1:13:24And so I don't know if you need--
1:13:28especially in the first year, it's too much to ask, I think,
1:13:31to say, oh, there should be a giant proliferation of web
1:13:36framework things, and they should all duke it out
1:13:38until one clear victor emerges.
1:13:40Like, that's going to take like five years, right?
1:13:42So maybe we'll start smaller and say,
1:13:44how about just a standard for starting a server,
1:13:47listening on a port, dealing with HTTP,
1:13:50receiving requests, and sending responses.
1:13:52Sort of the bare bones, the equivalent of WSGI and Python,
1:13:57or PSGI plaque and Perl, or whatever.
1:14:00Like maybe we could start with that.
1:14:01That seems like a reasonable one year goal.
1:14:04And even there, I bet there'd be like
1:14:05five competing standards and they have to just duke it out
1:14:07and then the second year it'll be clear
1:14:08which one is the best support or whatever.
1:14:11But yeah, I would really like something like that too.
1:14:14I just didn't know how to phrase it.
1:14:15- Yeah, and I mean, people have started doing this.
1:14:18There's Taylor, which the chat room is linking me to.
1:14:21We'll put that in the show notes.
1:14:23I feel like there was something else
1:14:24with a really cheesy name.
1:14:25- There's one called Nest, I think.
1:14:27- Oh, I'm not familiar with that.
1:14:28Wasn't there one called like Perfect or something?
1:14:30I'm sure there's like 19 of them.
1:14:31Like, this is, you know, what we're asking for is like there to be one or two that are
1:14:36really good, well supported, debugged, that people are building things on.
1:14:41Like it's a tough year one goal.
1:14:43Like I mean, I think we'll be making progress on it, but anytime you sort of give this kind
1:14:47of playground to people, no pun intended, they're just going to, everyone's going to
1:14:51try a whole bunch of things.
1:14:53And there's, I don't know if you can really fast forward through that to get to the end
1:14:56part where we all decide on jQuery or whatever and then regret it because jQuery is too big
1:15:00and we have to do--yeah, I forget, I don't want to bring JavaScript into this, this is
1:15:03too painful.
1:15:04Oh, God, you and your JavaScript.
1:15:07All right, any other thoughts on this or should we move back to John?
1:15:10All right, John.
1:15:11All right, so my second, or third, if you count the 5K display item list, I'm going
1:15:17to throw this out there because remember this is not a prediction.
1:15:20Not a prediction.
1:15:21New file system.
1:15:22Ding, ding.
1:15:23for OS X and for iOS, sure they can have it too if they really want, it's fine.
1:15:29I think it's plausible. How long has Apple known they need a new file system?
1:15:33For a really really long time. They should have been working on this for
1:15:37years and years and years and years and years and they should have been working on it
1:15:40and they have been. Like they've worked out long enough to have a ZFS dead end
1:15:43many years back. Like I feel like it is plausible. I don't think it's gonna happen.
1:15:48I feel like if I had to predict I would say 2017-ish but it is plausible and
1:15:52And so when I sit down to watch WWDC, whether in person or remotely, in 2016, I am going
1:16:00to have a plausible hope, as opposed to this year, which was a slightly less plausible hope,
1:16:04that they announce a new file system. And I guess they would announce it in the context of the Mac,
1:16:09or maybe they wouldn't announce it at all. I don't even know. I just want it to exist.
1:16:12So again, this is not a prediction. This is a wish, and I believe it is. And if it's not plausible,
1:16:18shame on Apple. Because if you say, "Oh, it's too soon. We just started working on this project
1:16:22six months ago, you did?
1:16:23Did you really start six months ago?
1:16:25Anyway, new file system.
1:16:27- Yeah, good luck.
1:16:29All right, Marco, for you.
1:16:32- So I have this whole section here on the Apple Watch.
1:16:36I want the Apple Watch to find its way.
1:16:40By all accounts, the Apple Watch is doing decently.
1:16:43But by many people's estimations,
1:16:45looking at server logs and everything,
1:16:46it does seem like many of them were given
1:16:48as Christmas gifts this past week.
1:16:51And before that it seems like the Apple Watch
1:16:53was doing decently sales-wise.
1:16:55Not a massive, like, "Saturday Night on Fire" kind of thing.
1:16:59Not the next iPhone by any means, but doing decently.
1:17:03So sales-wise it seems like it's gonna be here to stay.
1:17:06It's a line that is working for Apple.
1:17:10I worry that it will have the same growth curve as the iPad.
1:17:15It will shoot up now as it's the new cool thing,
1:17:18and then a lot of people will just drop off,
1:17:21or the upgrade cycle will become very long,
1:17:23way longer than Apple wants it to be.
1:17:25I think the Apple Watch is a product
1:17:27that is like 75% good.
1:17:31It just needs a lot of refinement
1:17:35because everything it does,
1:17:36it does things that are incredibly compelling
1:17:39and it just does them all almost really well.
1:17:42So for the last few days,
1:17:44I have been wearing a mechanical watch.
1:17:46I have not worn my Apple Watch since,
1:17:48I don't know, a week ago or so.
1:17:50So I'm wearing a mechanical watch that I got as a Christmas gift and I'm learning what
1:17:54this world is like.
1:17:56One of the cool things about a mechanical watch, besides the fact that I think honestly,
1:18:00I'm finally understanding when the watch people said, when the Apple Watch launched, that
1:18:07that is just not a fashion item.
1:18:10When you compare the way traditional style watches look versus the way the Apple Watch
1:18:16looks, I think you can say in isolation that the Apple watch can look good. In many of
1:18:22its configurations I think it does look good, but when you compare it fashionability wise
1:18:27to a mechanical watch, I think it's honestly no contest. But it's not even in the same
1:18:34league, but that's okay, it doesn't need to be, it just needs to be good. But anyway,
1:18:38there are so many areas of it in which like the notifications, I do miss, now that I'm
1:18:42this watch, I do miss, like when Casey sent me a message earlier, my pocket vibrated and
1:18:49I glanced at my wrist and only saw the time. And I do miss like having to take my phone
1:18:55out does feel inconvenient now when I get a message to go try to read it and see what
1:18:59it is. But that feature of the Apple Watch is also very frustrating because for me it
1:19:04works most of the time but not all of the time. Every so often at seemingly random intervals,
1:19:11I will just stop receiving notifications on my Apple Watch.
1:19:14But my phone thinks it sent into the watch, so then just they get dropped on the floor
1:19:19and I just don't receive messages until next time I check my phone, which I'm not in the
1:19:23habit of doing anymore because I have the Apple Watch.
1:19:25I can look at all the Apple Watch's core benefits and they all work like 75% well like that.
1:19:32And it's frustrating.
1:19:33And yes, it is still its first year.
1:19:36And so yes, many of these things are like 1.0 bugs even though technically it's on software
1:19:39version 2.0 but that doesn't seem to mean what you would expect from a 2.0. I just think
1:19:45that this product has so much promise but it just needs to be better. And it needs to
1:19:53be better in ways that typically don't happen quickly. You know like if a product is launched
1:19:58and it's like almost really great, that almost is really hard to resolve and to remove into
1:20:04to just being really great.
1:20:07And I hope Apple can do that with the watch,
1:20:10because it really is a very compelling product
1:20:14in a number of ways most of the time,
1:20:17and it's just so frustrating that it isn't all the time.
1:20:20I am so happy having this thing on my wrist now
1:20:23these past few days that just,
1:20:25it doesn't do nearly as much as the Apple Watch
1:20:28by a long shot, but it does it every single time.
1:20:33Every time I look at my wrist, the time is displayed.
1:20:35Every single time.
1:20:37And that's what you want out of something like that.
1:20:39You want it to be that reliable.
1:20:41The Apple Watch isn't, and I hope it can be,
1:20:44and I hope it is.
1:20:46- I think there's some good hope for the upgrade cycle
1:20:48because if any device had fashion going for it,
1:20:52both it's got the tech thing,
1:20:53where this is the big fat version
1:20:54and surely they're gonna get thinner, right?
1:20:56So that will help because it'll make it feel less like
1:20:58a giant restroom trailer on your wrist.
1:21:00And it's got the fashion thing.
1:21:01Even if they had made it as thin as they wanted to make it and they were actually making it
1:21:06bigger again for fashion reasons, the way you get someone to buy a new watch next year
1:21:11is convince them this really is a fashion accessory and then make it look different.
1:21:16People are into fashion and fashion things want things to look different.
1:21:19They don't want to wear the same thing year after year.
1:21:22At the very least, it will have a motivator to shorten the upgrade cycle that the iPad
1:21:28doesn't have because no one is upgrading their iPad because their old one is not fashionable
1:21:31Yeah, I think that's true. I recently, I don't know, maybe it was a week or two ago, wrote
1:21:36an Apple Watch Revisited post on my site. And I agree with you, Marco, that I have very
1:21:43mixed feelings about the Apple Watch. And in fact, on the upgrade-ies, on Relay, this
1:21:49is with Jason Snell and Mike Hurley, they do their year-end kind of recap and, you know,
1:21:54a funny award show. And they had solicited feedback from any of the Relay hosts that
1:22:00felt like they wanted to participate. And I forget exactly what the categories were, but I had listed
1:22:06the Apple Watch both for the most disappointing device as well as the one that has changed my life
1:22:12the most. Because I really do feel both of those things are true. That I had such high expectations
1:22:19for the watch, which I don't think they've really, it's really met. But at the same time,
1:22:27you know, to quote myself from my site, you know, it's become, it's made my phone transition
1:22:37from being a personal device to a private device. And that's a really big change. It's now,
1:22:46my phone is only for me, and I'm not taking it out constantly unless I choose to.
1:22:53it stays in my pocket all the time unless I'm choosing to get it out. And that's very different
1:22:59than it used to be when it was buzzing constantly and I would take my phone out in order to see what
1:23:04was going on and triage it and whatnot. And I agree with you, Marco, that having notifications
1:23:08on your wrist, as long as they work, which 99% of the time it does for me, although occasionally
1:23:13my watch just kind of forgets that it's connected to the phone, as long as they work, it's phenomenal
1:23:18and it's really changed the way I interact with my phone. And so I agree with you. I'd like to see
1:23:23Apple Watch colon get better,
1:23:25but it is an extremely impressive device
1:23:28and I think I would really miss it if I stopped wearing it.
1:23:31- Yeah, I'm also, you know,
1:23:32on the UI side of the Apple Watch,
1:23:36I think that's another product where the UI needs
1:23:38a lot of help in certain areas.
1:23:40Like just, I mean, honestly, I don't think,
1:23:44I think this falls off the end of plausibility,
1:23:46but I would love to see a complete rethinking
1:23:49of the entire app launching paradigm on the watch.
1:23:52you know, make it more of a like clock face plus glances
1:23:56only kind of thing and get rid of the entire honeycomb screen
1:24:01and the idea of launching apps that way,
1:24:03get rid of that entire paradigm.
1:24:05Like I wanna see major rethinking of the watch UI.
1:24:10I also just like, it is a smart watch, it is a computer,
1:24:14be smarter, like the clock faces themselves,
1:24:17the watch faces themselves are in many ways
1:24:21still somewhat dumb. And I mentioned this before so I won't go too far into it, but
1:24:27just get smarter with what can be shown on the face, what you have to choose between
1:24:33the relevance of certain information, certain kind of like, you know, some kind of heuristic
1:24:39of like, you know, do I have to have the timer always showing on the face in order to have
1:24:44it show when it's counting down when I have one running? Like stuff like that. Just like
1:24:50the watch face is smarter. Why does the minute hand of the utility face ever cover up the
1:24:58date so you can't see what date it is? Like simple things like that.
1:25:02It's humorism, that's why. Right, like it's a computer. You can do smarter
1:25:07things. When you compare it to mechanical watches, now that I've seen this world a little
1:25:11bit, when you compare it to mechanical watches, the Apple Watch face isn't that much smarter.
1:25:17it has many of the same downsides as mechanical watches do. It's a computer, it has the
1:25:21ability to show anything, to be smarter, to be considerate and to be really, you know,
1:25:27intelligent and flexible in a way that the current Apple Watch face environment doesn't
1:25:33take advantage of it and doesn't really expose or allow. And I really hope to see
1:25:38more of that. And, you know, but again, I think this pushes the bounds of plausibility
1:25:43because a lot of that would require gutting and redoing and redesigning and rethinking
1:25:49much of the Apple Watch's existing UI. Honestly, I don't see Apple doing that. Instead, we
1:25:54have these rumors that the version 2 hardware will just be like a FaceTime camera added,
1:25:59and that sounds insane to me. Like, I hope that my, what I have listed on here is like
1:26:05second gen hardware. Please let it be substantially faster because the speed of the watch really
1:26:11impedes the kinds of usefulness that you can do with its apps. It would be nice if it was
1:26:15a little bit thinner. It probably won't happen. And then I have here, "FaceTime camera?"
1:26:20I hope I'm missing something. Because I really, I hope there's a good use for that
1:26:26camera that I'm not thinking of. Because I can think of one really bad use which should
1:26:31be FaceTime. So I really hope that's not it.
1:26:35- Somebody for Apple to sell nose hair trimmers
1:26:37in its stores.
1:26:38(laughing)
1:26:39- Oh my God.
1:26:40- 'Cause as soon as people start using that FaceTime camera,
1:26:43there's gonna be a run on nose hair trimmers.
1:26:46- You know, they could sell them right next
1:26:47to the hedge trimmers they need to trim,
1:26:50God damn it, I totally butchered that.
1:26:51- The foliage wall, we got it, we finished it for you.
1:26:54- God bless America.
1:26:55- Don't worry Casey, you almost get credit for that joke.
1:26:57- Yeah, we're just gonna have to cut all that out.
1:27:00Ah, goodness.
1:27:02All right, so does that make it, it's my turn again.
1:27:06To keep with the super nerdy topics,
1:27:10there's a Swift package manager for OS 10.
1:27:14I'd like to see that on iOS, which I'm sure it's coming,
1:27:16and I'd like to see that get adopted
1:27:19so the previously mentioned Carthage versus CocoaPods war
1:27:24just goes away.
1:27:25- All right, be careful what you wish for there,
1:27:27because, you know, (laughing)
1:27:29for all the faults you may find
1:27:31with the existing package managers,
1:27:32they're still more mature than this brand spanking
1:27:34new Swift one.
1:27:35So I don't know.
1:27:37I think what you're asking for is like unification,
1:27:39even if it's unifying around something that is less mature
1:27:42at this point and yeah, I think that would be good.
1:27:44I don't know if that's plausible for next year.
1:27:48'Cause yeah, that's like a forward looking thing where like,
1:27:50I would like to see this mess sorted out
1:27:52so that I don't have to deal with these differences.
1:27:54And there's just one way that everyone agrees on
1:27:57of doing this thing like, you know,
1:27:59Gem and Ruby or C-band and Perl or whatever.
1:28:02And having one thing is better than that one thing
1:28:06being particularly debugged or worked out or whatever.
1:28:08But I think we're in for a couple of years
1:28:11with more pain in that.
1:28:12- Oh, I think you're right.
1:28:13But I think if Apple made something really robust
1:28:16and really solid, I think it could kind of solve the problem
1:28:20once and for all.
1:28:21- For Mac and iOS, probably.
1:28:24But like then what are the,
1:28:26your previous thing about the server side of people,
1:28:27Maybe they come up with their own system, I don't know.
1:28:29- Yeah, that's all I had, well, for this one anyway.
1:28:34So John.
1:28:35- All right, the next item is another,
1:28:38see how simple and concise mine are?
1:28:40New Mac Pro, new file system, new 5K display,
1:28:43another concise one.
1:28:44Apple Pencil for iPad non-Pro.
1:28:47That's it, the regular, what we used to call
1:28:49full-sized iPads, I want one of those with pencil support.
1:28:53It is totally plausible and it would be awesome
1:28:55and I would probably buy one.
1:28:56- Yeah, and that honestly, that's pretty plausible.
1:28:59I'm pretty sure, I wouldn't expect to see it in the Mini,
1:29:04but I would expect to see it at least in the Air line.
1:29:08The next Air probably this fall or whatever.
1:29:10I hope they do that.
1:29:11- I mean that's probably the main reason
1:29:13I'm not buying a new iPad now,
1:29:15'cause my iPad 3, it's really chugging these days.
1:29:18Or it's slowing down, I don't know if it's iOS 9
1:29:20that's making it slow down,
1:29:21or just like I'm getting used to my iPhone 6 too much,
1:29:23I just can't, I'm doing much more on my phone
1:29:25using it as a really, really small iPad
1:29:28'cause I just can't stand going over to my slow iPad.
1:29:30And so I would have bought a new iPad this year
1:29:32except I couldn't get it out of my head
1:29:33that I don't wanna buy one this year
1:29:34and the next year they have one with a pencil
1:29:36because that would be cool.
1:29:38So yeah, I would like to see that next year.
1:29:40- All right, Marco.
1:29:43- I would like to see general maturing of the iPad Pro
1:29:47now that we're on this topic.
1:29:48The iPad Pro, obviously it's very new.
1:29:51It's like a month old or something now, so it's very new.
1:29:55The hardware seems really great.
1:29:59The software seems like it needs still a lot of time to bake
1:30:03and that's both first party and third party software.
1:30:05My worry is that this fall,
1:30:08before the iPad Pro is even out,
1:30:10we saw, as you mentioned earlier, Casey,
1:30:12we saw the launch of multitasking on the iPad
1:30:14and there are still so many incredibly useful iPad apps
1:30:19that have not been updated for multitasking.
1:30:22And this is not just some fluke.
1:30:25This is because it is not really worth developers
1:30:28putting a lot of effort into most iPad apps.
1:30:30And that's a big problem for the iPad.
1:30:33So I really hope that in 2016 we see
1:30:37enough worthwhile gains on the iPad market-wise
1:30:42to be worth developers updating their software.
1:30:44Because as any iPad Pro owner can tell you,
1:30:46it is really great when you're using apps
1:30:48that resize properly to the iPad Pro
1:30:51and support multitasking properly,
1:30:52and it's really rough when you're not.
1:30:55And it's bad enough on the 1024 by 768 iPad,
1:31:00the Air and the Mini, it's bad enough on those
1:31:02when you have something that doesn't support multitasking.
1:31:05But it's way worse on an iPad Pro
1:31:08when you have something that brings up
1:31:09that tremendous old keyboard
1:31:12because the app is being scaled up, it's really rough.
1:31:15That will hold the iPad Pro back until it is resolved.
1:31:19Right now, it doesn't appear as though
1:31:21that's going to be resolved easily.
1:31:24'Cause developers of many iPad apps
1:31:27are really not rushing to update them
1:31:29for these new capabilities because it has been,
1:31:33historically it has been so hard to justify
1:31:35putting more effort into iPad programming
1:31:38because the market has not rewarded it
1:31:41in a commensurate way for most app types.
1:31:44I really hope to see that change
1:31:45and to see a lot more iPad software
1:31:48get updated for modern devices,
1:31:50because if that doesn't happen,
1:31:52a year from now we're gonna hear a lot of
1:31:54really disappointed iPad owners talking about it.
1:31:57- I mean, I don't have an iPad Pro,
1:31:58so I have nothing to contribute to this,
1:32:00but it makes sense to me.
1:32:01- Well, but you just said,
1:32:02you do have an iPad now with multitasking support,
1:32:04and it does suck when you want to multitask
1:32:07with an app that doesn't support it.
1:32:08So this is all tied in.
1:32:09- Yeah, yeah, you're absolutely right about that.
1:32:11- Can we just lump in the lack of an Instagram iPad app
1:32:14in there just for the hell of it?
1:32:16Because things that will annoy every iPad aren't yet.
1:32:19It has always amazed me.
1:32:21The iOS applications that don't think it's important
1:32:24to pick your thing, to be updated for the iPhone 6 size,
1:32:29to do anything sensible on the iPad,
1:32:31to have an iPad app at all.
1:32:34It's tough when you're not number one,
1:32:35even just the number two iOS device platform.
1:32:38It's just that's a big drop off after the iPhone.
1:32:42- Yeah, and then while I'm on the quick iOS topic,
1:32:45or iOS device topic here, the iPhone 7,
1:32:49I have a quick little bullet point here of,
1:32:52iPhone 7's coming out this year,
1:32:53it's gonna be, if they follow the pattern,
1:32:55which they will almost certainly follow,
1:32:57it's gonna be a redesign year for the external casing
1:33:00of the iPhone this year.
1:33:02I'm not gonna wish for more battery life,
1:33:03'cause that's not plausible.
1:33:05- It is plausible, you could totally,
1:33:07yes it is, it is 100% plausible.
1:33:09You could say you want more battery life
1:33:11in terms of the number of minutes, or like wall clock time,
1:33:14or you could just say I want more milliamp hours.
1:33:17- You know what, I would actually,
1:33:19this is, I would like more milliamp hours,
1:33:20and I know they won't do that,
1:33:22because that would make it heavier and thicker.
1:33:23They just won't.
1:33:25The way Apple gets battery life these days
1:33:27is a combination of power saving parts
1:33:29as technology advances and software improvements
1:33:32to kind of reduce the idle draw
1:33:35and to get more into idle time.
1:33:38The problem I have with the modern battery life is,
1:33:42which I talked about to death,
1:33:42I'm going to go over it very quickly now, is that we have not seen significant advancement
1:33:47in the battery life of things that are under load, things that are, like processors that
1:33:53are being used. If you're playing, you know, a game or you're using GPS or you're streaming
1:33:58music over the cell network through Bluetooth or something, where things are not going into
1:34:01low power states, or if you're on a laptop, you're processing photos, you're compiling,
1:34:06you're doing, you know, you're doing hard work, you're making the computer work hard.
1:34:10So you're not seeing big changes in the battery life under load. We're seeing almost
1:34:15all the gains you've had in the last few years have been by stretching out idle time,
1:34:20by making idle time more efficient, and by making the CPUs enter idle time more often.
1:34:24So I want to see that top end be raised also. And I just think that's not going to happen.
1:34:30I think it's very obvious that Apple is content to mostly not address that, and to
1:34:35instead address the bottom end, because the bottom end can be addressed without bigger,
1:34:40batteries so I don't think it's going to happen but I would like my plausible
1:34:45thing my plausible wish list item on the iPhone 7 is to to somehow address the
1:34:51handhold ability and make it make it more handholdable without a case because
1:34:58the iPhone 6 is the first one I've used with the case I before that every
1:35:01previous iPhone I've used without a case because I just liked it I don't like
1:35:05having to use a case I like having an iPhone that just feels good enough and
1:35:08secure enough in my hand that I don't feel the need for a case.
1:35:11The 6 did not do that at all.
1:35:13It was way too slippery in both shape and finish.
1:35:16The 6S improved it a little bit in that it is still slippery in shape but the finish
1:35:20was less slippery, the surface itself.
1:35:23I would like to see the 7 design hopefully address the ability to hand hold it in a way
1:35:28that feels secure and that is secure because all the previous ones I thought were way more
1:35:34hand holdable.
1:35:36The sixth design I think was, is pretty rough in that way.
1:35:40I'm hoping the seventh will be better.
1:35:41Just the handholdability.
1:35:43The rest I know is mostly not plausible.
1:35:46But that I want.
1:35:47- I think you're not following my definition of plausible
1:35:50as in able to be done in the physical world
1:35:52without any magic, without saying,
1:35:53I want there to be five gigahertz CPUs.
1:35:55But anyway, for your gripability,
1:35:58you just need a foliage wall.
1:35:59They just need to put moss on the outside of it.
1:36:01(laughing)
1:36:02They're testing that right now, right now.
1:36:03The iPhone foliage wall.
1:36:06little just a, you know, it's like a chia pet. You just, you water it.
1:36:08Oh, God.
1:36:09Then you're going to use fuel cell technology to give Marco his increased battery life that
1:36:13he is afraid to ask for. And then it'll be like a chia pet because you'll fill it up
1:36:17with liquid and that'll run the fuel cell and the water vapor that comes out will help
1:36:21the little hydroponic moss grow and it'll be really grippy.
1:36:25That would be awesome.
1:36:27And it'll be green.
1:36:28Yeah, literally.
1:36:29- All right, my next one, hand on heart,
1:36:33as written in my field notes earlier today,
1:36:36is increased battery life for the new iPhone.
1:36:40- See, he has the guts to say it.
1:36:43It's plausible, you can just put more battery in there,
1:36:45you just make it thicker.
1:36:46It's straightforward, totally doable, could be done,
1:36:50you could say, and it would make you happy if it was done,
1:36:53and so there you go.
1:36:54- Yeah, and I mean, maybe the answer is just
1:36:56don't make the next iPhone thinner.
1:36:59Because to my memory, every single iPhone redesign
1:37:03has been just that little bit thinner than the last.
1:37:05Maybe you know what, Apple, you go really crazy
1:37:09and you just don't make it thinner this year
1:37:11and just add battery.
1:37:12- They should make it thinner,
1:37:13but then have a lump on the back where the extra battery is.
1:37:16(laughing)
1:37:18'Cause then they could say, look how much thinner it is.
1:37:21We made it so they could make it really thin
1:37:23and they just put it all in the lump,
1:37:24like, oh, don't count the lump.
1:37:25So we're not counting that in the thickness.
1:37:27- No, I mean, what this comes down to is that
1:37:30the thinness is not the main problem here.
1:37:33The main problem here is weight.
1:37:34Thinness is the consequence of that.
1:37:38They're not minimizing battery size to make it thinner.
1:37:42They want to make it thinner overall,
1:37:44and they're trying to hit a weight goal,
1:37:47and then the size of the battery,
1:37:50batteries are the heaviest thing in there,
1:37:51So the size of the battery is what lets them,
1:37:55if they can keep the battery small,
1:37:57that keeps the weight down,
1:37:59and then they can make the enclosure
1:38:00really small and thin around it.
1:38:03So this is really about weight,
1:38:05more than thinness by itself.
1:38:07I think thinness is a secondary consequence
1:38:10of reducing weight.
1:38:11So what we're really asking for,
1:38:14if we want bigger batteries,
1:38:16what we're asking for is to make the phones heavier.
1:38:18And that's why I'm not sure they would do it.
1:38:21- Did the iPhone 6 get heavier than the 5S?
1:38:23- I believe it did.
1:38:25- I thought that was the 6S versus 6
1:38:28because of the 3D touch stuff.
1:38:30- Yeah, but I just mean when the phone got bigger
1:38:32than the four inch screen, you know.
1:38:34- Well, but that's explainable even to a regular consumer
1:38:37because, oh look, it's bigger, thus there's more stuff.
1:38:40- I know, but it's not unprecedented to go heavier.
1:38:45Anyway, the amount of extra weight added by the batteries
1:38:48is minimal, but yeah, this is reversing a trend.
1:38:50they're making it thinner because they want it to be lighter, they want it to be lighter,
1:38:52you know, that's the direction they're going.
1:38:54But I still think for a list of plausible things, that that could go on the list.
1:38:58All right, that was my last one, so I'm tapped out from here.
1:39:02I got two related ones.
1:39:05One since we're talking about iPhone things.
1:39:07I don't even know if this is something that I really care about that much.
1:39:10I guess it gets more into prediction.
1:39:11I guess I kind of do care about it.
1:39:13OLED screens and phones has rumors about that.
1:39:17And for power efficiency reasons, and maybe because it will encourage more user interfaces
1:39:22that aren't all white, and maybe because they can make it thinner and lighter.
1:39:27I don't know all the advantages of OLED, but I feel like LCD on phones as a power draw
1:39:33source and just that technology, especially as they incorporate more and more things in
1:39:38there, like maybe if they ever let you use the pencil with the phone or something.
1:39:42I would like to see Apple take the next leap with their iOS devices and start transitioning
1:39:47to OLED everywhere because that seems to be the way things are going.
1:39:52And my related item, actually getting off of Apple stuff for a change, is I want to
1:39:56see more non-curved OLED televisions that concentrate on picture quality.
1:40:02This year has been the year that OLED TVs become a thing that you can buy for a reasonable
1:40:08price.
1:40:09They're the new picture quality king.
1:40:10A whole bunch of them are curved.
1:40:13But it's really early TV buying.
1:40:16This is not the year to buy an OLED TV.
1:40:18Unless you just want to buy it, like I said, people ask for advice, buy it with the idea
1:40:21that you're going to sell it.
1:40:22Because it's like the people who bought the Plasmas the first or second year they were
1:40:25out.
1:40:26That's fine.
1:40:27You get to enjoy a fancy new TV.
1:40:29But assume you're going to sell it in a year or two.
1:40:31Because in a year or two or three, the ones that come out are going to be so much better
1:40:34than yours for so much less money that you're going to have to be resigned to sell it and
1:40:40trade up to a nicer model.
1:40:42But I feel like next year is the year when OLEDs, hopefully they get rid of the stupid
1:40:47curve thing because I don't know who is buying these things with curves, who wants them with
1:40:51curves, I don't.
1:40:52There's no advantage to it, it's dumb.
1:40:54It needs to just go away.
1:40:56Yeah, flat OLED TVs that concentrate on picture quality.
1:41:01Because a lot of the OLEDs now, or a lot of TVs in general, usually don't concentrate
1:41:06on picture quality.
1:41:07smart TV type features or you know some other gee whiz thing or they just want to say this
1:41:12is the cheapest 4k TV you can get at this particular size I want the ones that actually
1:41:17concentrate on picture quality not that I would particularly buy one but I just you
1:41:23know I hate looking year after year at the TVs that are available and realizing I don't
1:41:27want any of these TVs and just praying that my poor partially burned in plasma just keeps
1:41:32working until I can, until someone makes a TV that I can replace it with.
1:41:37Ultimately you can just wish that that burned-in spot eventually wears out during 2016.
1:41:40Well, I mean, I was doing pretty well.
1:41:42I looked at the Cartoon Network logo the other day and it has faded substantially.
1:41:46The Destiny HUD is still kind of faintly visible.
1:41:49But yeah, the television logos, the channel logos, are honestly worse than Destiny now.
1:41:53There's not much you can do about the channel logos except for tell these television stations
1:41:58because guess what?
1:41:59OLED burns in two.
1:42:00So please, television stations, make your logos transparent.
1:42:03Or maybe don't show them on the screen the entire show.
1:42:06I get it, I understand what network I'm watching.
1:42:08Put it on for three seconds,
1:42:10and then you come out of commercial break.
1:42:11Or not at all, that should be a feature.
1:42:13Like, it should be like the luxury TV network.
1:42:15We never put our stupid logo on your screen.
1:42:18That would be a luxury.
1:42:19Pay us extra money and we never show an ad.
1:42:21That is a luxury, that's why people like HBO.
1:42:23Hey, let's watch an HBO show.
1:42:25It just plays and there's no commercials in it.
1:42:27And there's no breaks for commercials,
1:42:28it just plays straight through.
1:42:30That is a desirable experience.
1:42:33Who doesn't like that?
1:42:34Of course, you'd also like to get your television for free,
1:42:36so understand advertising is have to work.
1:42:38But for stations that, you know,
1:42:41I feel like it's a quality of life issue.
1:42:43For stations that have ads on them
1:42:45that just run plain old regular TV,
1:42:47they could advertise the fact
1:42:48that we never cover the screen
1:42:50with like a promo for an upcoming show.
1:42:52I guess they have to put the rating thing in there,
1:42:54you know, the TV, LSV, M, you know, whatever.
1:42:57I guess I watch shows with too many letters in them.
1:42:59Yeah, they're all HBO shows.
1:43:02But you know they have to put the little logo up on the screen?
1:43:05I don't know if you guys know this because I don't know if they're on iTunes.
1:43:09Anyway, they put that in the 4x3 frame.
1:43:14They don't put it in the corner of the 16x9 screen.
1:43:17They put it so it would be visible if you were watching 16x9 content with the sides
1:43:22cut off so it's 4x3.
1:43:24I was going through my pictures on my phone the other day and I had a good picture of
1:43:27when I was watching Sons of Anarchy back when it was on and back when it was actually kind
1:43:31of not terrible, where the logo, the TVMA/LSV whatever logo, was dead center over an actor's
1:43:40face.
1:43:41Like their head was a gigantic square.
1:43:45Like seriously?
1:43:46Like you can't even, and it's not like you can move that out of the way, it's not like
1:43:49when you rewatch that later that will be gone.
1:43:51That's it.
1:43:52That's, you're missing, you know, part of the show because of that.
1:43:54And the same thing when the promos for the upcoming shows come up.
1:43:57Anyway, yeah, I guess that's another bullet item.
1:44:00Television stations.
1:44:01It is within your power, both technically and policy-wise, to stop doing that.
1:44:06Stop.
1:44:07Please.
1:44:08Stop doing that.
1:44:09I'll pay you extra money to not put your logo on the screen and to not interrupt my program
1:44:11with other things dancing across the bottom of my screen.
1:44:15All right, Marco.
1:44:16I mean, I think my overall wrap-up here for my topic list, the lesson I have on here really,
1:44:23is for Apple to just show more focus.
1:44:26Focus has been, I think, the attribute
1:44:30that I've been missing the most in Apple's recent launches,
1:44:34because they are just getting so much more broad.
1:44:36They're addressing so many more kinds of products.
1:44:39The lines are bigger than ever.
1:44:40The services list is bigger than ever.
1:44:44It does seem like their focus is not where it used to be.
1:44:47And so I would like to just see more focus.
1:44:49And maybe that means ending some product lines
1:44:52or ending some initiatives that haven't worked out,
1:44:54like all the various kits on iOS.
1:44:58I think a lot of those have not quite worked out.
1:45:01Just like, they've started so much,
1:45:03a lot of it has fallen flat.
1:45:05Maybe they should end some things
1:45:07and actually increase their focus.
1:45:08So we'll see what happens there.
1:45:09I'm not really holding my breath on that one.
1:45:12- You may be saved because the car
1:45:14is not gonna come out in 2016,
1:45:15so you can pretend they're getting more focused.
1:45:17Then all of a sudden in 2018 or '19, guess what?
1:45:19We make a car, like, oh, Apple, what happened to the Focus?
1:45:22Yeah.
1:45:24And you'll buy one of the cars, too.
1:45:26That'll be fun.
1:45:26Probably.
1:45:27That'll be super fun.
1:45:29Do I want that?
1:45:30Do I want a 1.0 Apple car?
1:45:33Whether you want one or not doesn't-- it may appear.
1:45:36The Tesla lease will be up by then.
1:45:37You'll be looking around.
1:45:38You'll be restless.
1:45:39Yeah, we'll see.
1:45:40It's going to happen.
1:45:41We're already replacing your Tesla.
1:45:43It hasn't even arrived yet.
1:45:46Goodness.
1:45:47All right.
1:45:47I told you I'm done.
1:45:48So John, anything else or any closing thoughts?
1:45:51- No, the only other item I had on my list
1:45:53was like a vague one that I couldn't nail down.
1:45:56There are so many remaining bugs,
1:46:00so many sort of obvious bugs that,
1:46:03not obvious how to fix them,
1:46:05but obvious that something is not working correctly.
1:46:08And you always just hope that it's someone's job somewhere
1:46:12to fix those.
1:46:13And it's kind of, I don't know if this one counts as,
1:46:16This is vague and probably not really plausible because I don't know if Apple makes...
1:46:20I don't know how much extra value Apple adds by fixing these type of bugs, but we all encounter
1:46:26them from time to time and it just makes me wish.
1:46:29Like the only time I can feel like this wish is not fantastical or wishing for a pony is
1:46:36when like I know the developer who makes the application.
1:46:40It's like one person who makes an application.
1:46:44I know that if I report this bug, this one person will see that bug report and realize
1:46:51that they are embarrassed that this bug happens and they don't want their application to have
1:46:55this bug and that they'll fix it and then within a month or two it will be fixed.
1:47:02But that just doesn't happen with things that are made by Apple.
1:47:05If you find some small bug like that that's just kind of embarrassing where like text
1:47:09overruns the bounding box that it's supposed to be in, or clicking on this thing doesn't
1:47:14work until the second time you click it because of some event, you know, responder chain business
1:47:18or whatever.
1:47:19An individual developer who you know will want to fix that, because it doesn't seem
1:47:24like a big deal, and they're embarrassed that they have an application that you have to
1:47:27click a checkbox twice to make it, you know what I mean?
1:47:29Like it's not a crasher, it's not a data loss bug, but they'll fix it.
1:47:34Kind of just individual pride and craftsmanship or whatever.
1:47:38And it depresses me that the larger the organization gets, the less hope you have that those type
1:47:43of bugs will ever get addressed unless you just happen to catch somebody on a good day
1:47:47when they don't have anything else to do, you know, when they're not working on their
1:47:50P1s or whatever, that they just happen to go in and fix that.
1:47:53Because fixing that could cause some other problem, it could cascade into a thing that
1:47:56costs their multi-billion dollar company lots of money and reduces their customer sat.
1:48:01But an individual developer, they'll just fix it in their app.
1:48:04And I kind of like that and I kind of miss that from Apple.
1:48:07But that's getting into -- that's why it's not on my list.
1:48:12It's too vague or whatever.
1:48:13Anyway, to sum up my list, I have a bunch of simple, concrete things that could totally
1:48:17happen, that would make me happy.
1:48:20And by the way, I think most of them, if I had to predict, will these things happen?
1:48:23It's a pretty good shot for a lot of them.
1:48:25So I think 2016 will be a good year for me.
1:48:28>> Holding out hope for the file system.
1:48:31>> Well, maybe not on that front.
1:48:33I keep saying 2017.
1:48:34>> Not that good.
1:48:35>> Yeah.
1:48:36>> Oh, goodness.
1:48:37- Are we good?
1:48:38- Thanks a lot to our three sponsors this week,
1:48:40Backblaze, Casper, and Blue Apron,
1:48:42and we will see you next week.
1:48:43♪ Now the show is over ♪
1:48:48♪ They didn't even mean to begin ♪
1:48:51♪ 'Cause it was accidental ♪
1:48:54♪ Oh it was accidental ♪
1:48:57♪ John didn't do any research ♪
1:48:59♪ Marco and Casey wouldn't let him ♪
1:49:02♪ 'Cause it was accidental ♪
1:49:04And you can find the show notes at ATP.fm And if you're into Twitter, you can follow
1:49:11them @caseyliss
1:49:20So that's Casey Liss, M-A-R-C-O-A-R-M, A-N-T-M-A-R-C-O-A-R-M
1:49:27S-I-R-A-C U-S-A-C-R-A-Q-S-A It's accidental (it's accidental)
1:49:36They didn't mean to Accidental (accidental)
1:49:41Tech broadcast so long
1:49:45We did it!
1:49:47Clearly you need to give much more specific instructions for Marco and I.
1:49:50I thought I was so specific. I like, it was concise and specific instructions.
1:49:55And just I don't know maybe I should have given more examples
1:49:59Maybe I should have given more examples of what not to do. I don't know. This is where I get to wish for my
1:50:03my theoretical
1:50:0517 inch 4k MacBook Pro that with skylight might be around 5 pounds
1:50:1017 inch 4k MacBook Pro. Mm-hmm
1:50:15Think about it. It makes a lot of sense
1:50:18I think you'd be better off wishing for a 17 inch iPad Pro with a keyboard that is more firmly attached
1:50:24- And that'll be as fast as this guy like MacBook Pro
1:50:29in like three or four years.
1:50:31- Yeah, no I mean that's why it's a long shot stretch.
1:50:36I'm not even sure I would buy one.
1:50:37- Yeah, would you use a 17 inch laptop?
1:50:39I don't know.
1:50:40- Well.
1:50:41- It's like bigger than you are.
1:50:42(laughing)
1:50:43- 'Cause like when, I'm not carrying my laptop everyday.
1:50:47I bring it on trips when I have to get work done.
1:50:49And whenever I do that, I am always starving
1:50:52for more screen space.
1:50:54- There's just screen share to your iMac at home.
1:50:56- Wow.
1:50:58- It's all in your mind, man.
1:51:02- No, I mean like, we have not seen--
1:51:03- Screen space is just like your opinion, man.
1:51:07- I understood that reference.
1:51:08- You're using a 5K iMac, you're using a bigger screen,
1:51:12but it's on a smaller screen, but it's bigger.
1:51:15There's so many pixels, you won't notice the difference.
1:51:19- No, I mean like, we have, everyone's like always,
1:51:21oh, the 17-inch was this giant, heavy aircraft carrier.
1:51:24And yes, the last time we saw one, it was.
1:51:26But now, the 17-inch, I think last time we saw it
1:51:30was something like six pounds, right, something like that.
1:51:33But at the same time, the 15-inch was five or five and a half
1:51:38while the 17-inch was six or six and a half.
1:51:41So you can see the ratio there,
1:51:43it's not that much more than the 15-inch.
1:51:45Well now, since then, the 15-inch has gotten way smaller
1:51:49and lighter with the retina transition
1:51:51With the Skylake tradition,
1:51:52it's probably gonna be even more so.
1:51:54So I'm guessing it would be possible with Skylake
1:51:57to make a 17 inch that had reasonable battery life
1:52:00that is roughly five and a half pounds.
1:52:03And maybe even five pounds,
1:52:05depending on how thin they can go with the battery
1:52:07without having it be too small.
1:52:09So that is different.
1:52:13It puts a different spin on things.
1:52:14I mean, with the Skylake thing,
1:52:17I bet we're gonna see a lot more people saying,
1:52:19you know what, now that it's so much thinner and lighter,
1:52:22I might go 15 inch next time,
1:52:23where I would have gone 13 inch before.
1:52:25You know, I think we'll start seeing people
1:52:28justify going bigger.
1:52:29In the same way, like, look, all the iPad people
1:52:32just discovered, you know what, after all,
1:52:35having a much bigger one is more productive.
1:52:37Look at that.
1:52:38Like, the same thing applies with computers, with laptops.
1:52:41Like, as they're gonna get thinner and lighter,
1:52:43we're gonna see a lot more people say,
1:52:45you know what, I was gonna go Air,
1:52:46but now I'll go 13 inch Pro.
1:52:48I was gonna go with 13 inch Pro,
1:52:49now I'm gonna go with 15 inch Pro,
1:52:50'cause I felt one in the store
1:52:52and it was so much lighter than I expected.
1:52:54And wow, all this extra screen space is really nice.
1:52:57I can get a lot more stuff done.
1:52:59Like obviously this is not news to people using computers,
1:53:02whereas it seems like it's news to iPad people,
1:53:03but you know, that might happen now with the Mac line
1:53:06where if they have a bigger one, you know what?
1:53:08That actually is pretty nice.
1:53:11So I don't know, again, it's just a stretch
1:53:13and I'm not even sure I would buy one,
1:53:14but that would be really cool I think.
1:53:17- It's an opportunity for them to make up
1:53:19for the sins of the past and actually put
1:53:21a different keyboard on it than the one
1:53:22that's on the MacBook One.
1:53:24- Right, well and that's the other thing too,
1:53:25like I didn't mention the keyboards,
1:53:26but like I would expect all the new Skylitic MacBook Pros,
1:53:31if they're gonna be redesigned at all,
1:53:32which it sounds like they probably will be,
1:53:33I would expect them to get not the MacBook One keyboard,
1:53:36but the keyboard that's in the new standalone Apple keyboard.
1:53:39The Magic, is it called the Magic Keyboard?
1:53:41Whatever it is, the new standalone keyboard.
1:53:43I'm guessing it gets at that one,
1:53:44which is not nearly as bad as the MacBook One keyboard.
1:53:48It is in that style, but it is done, I think, way better.
1:53:53- I don't mean like in a key travel,
1:53:56I mean as in more keys,
1:53:58specifically the 17 inch,
1:53:59you have so much more room to put keys.
1:54:00So put full-size arrow keys,
1:54:02and put all the home and end keys,
1:54:04and page up and page down,
1:54:05instead of taking,
1:54:06remember, this was one of my early,
1:54:08I reviewed one of the non-unibody aluminum PowerBook G4s
1:54:13for Ars Technica and like a series of screenshots showing the same keyboard is on the 12 inch,
1:54:19the 15 inch, and the 17 inch. Literally the same keyboard. And you know, on the 12 inch
1:54:24it goes edge to edge. And on the 17 inch it's this vast sea of aluminum with this tiny little
1:54:28keyboard floating in it. It's like, you have so much more room. Add more keys, please.
1:54:34I don't know, I assume they wouldn't, which would be sad. It's just this giant, you know,
1:54:39because as thin as you make it, the aluminum area has to be the same as the size of the
1:54:43screen like you're not gonna make the bottom smaller than the top and so you
1:54:46have you have this huge area with which to put keys and you just decide this is
1:54:51tiny little island in the middle the size of the MacBook one it's the only
1:54:53area where you're allowed to have keys