296: You Wouldn't Believe The Stuff I Know

0:00:00[Music]

0:00:08From Real AFM, this is Upgrade Episode 296. Today's show is brought to you by Squarespace, Linode, and KiwiCo.

0:00:16My name is Myke Hurley and I am joined by Jason Snow. Hi, Jason Snow.

0:00:20Hi, Myke Hurley. How are you?

0:00:21Good. Big show today. New Apple products. We're speaking to Mark Gurman later on. We've got loads of stuff.

0:00:26Lots of stuff.

0:00:27But that doesn't mean we won't break from tradition. I have a #snowtalk question. Carlos wants to know, Jason.

0:00:33Still or sparkling?

0:00:34Oh boy.

0:00:35Like you can take this question however you want, really.

0:00:38Isn't this what they used to do when you went to a... what's the word I'm looking for? Restaurant?

0:00:44Well, I don't know what you're talking about.

0:00:46No.

0:00:46Is there like a rest stop? Like, is that what you mean?

0:00:48Yeah, yeah. The answer is... this is funny. So at a restaurant, I'm cheap.

0:00:56I will always just get like tap water. I don't want fancy bottle water.

0:01:01At home, I think it's probably fair to say that I drink more sparkling water than still water only because we have cans of, you know, La Croix basically or store brand, off brand, whatever, but like seltzer in cans.

0:01:18And I interleave that with my caffeine soda. But I also will just drink tap water and that's fine too.

0:01:26So I guess in a restaurant context, please bring me the tap water. In a cans in the refrigerator context, I will have your fizzy water.

0:01:35So I guess still is really the one that's out of the equation for you then.

0:01:38I don't see any purpose of buying a bottle of still water. That is... I'm not a believer in the kind...

0:01:47Oh, it tastes... Oh, this is water. This water came from Fiji. It's... it is still water. I'm just not one of those people.

0:01:54So that's what still means. It's still just water.

0:01:56Mm-hmm. Still is. I like that. That's good.

0:02:00If you'd like to send in a question to help us open an episode of Upgrade, just send out a tweet with the hashtag #SnailTalk.

0:02:06As you can tell, it could be about anything.

0:02:08I want to do a quick piece of follow-up for iOS and Apple regards to Coronavirus COVID-19.

0:02:16iOS 13.5, the beta came out last week. This was previously 13.4.5. This is like beta 3 of that release,

0:02:26but is now being referred to as 13.5. And many people are calling it the COVID-19 iOS release,

0:02:33because it is effectively completely focused on that, as well as I'm sure some other bug fixes.

0:02:38But it includes the Exposure Notification API for developers to be able to write their apps to,

0:02:45which we knew was coming, but also two fixes, amendments to iOS that clearly address

0:02:53some frustrations that people are having using their iPhones in different ways because of COVID-19.

0:03:00One is Face ID Mask Detection. So if you have a Face ID device and you're wearing a mask,

0:03:06the device will detect that you're wearing a mask. And then instead of trying to get you to,

0:03:12like, instead of trying to authenticate you a couple of times to Face ID,

0:03:15it will immediately show you the passcode on the first failed scan, which is great.

0:03:20I'm happy about that. That'll make that stuff faster. And in group FaceTime,

0:03:26when you have group conversations, the order of the group, like they're all in these little

0:03:33bubbles, basically, square bubbles, they move around and resize depending on who's talking,

0:03:38which seems like probably quite a nice demo, but most people found it very frustrating

0:03:43in additional use and additional focus on having FaceTimes in groups. So there's now an option to

0:03:49turn this off in 13.5. Yes.

0:03:52So I'm happy to see Apple doing this stuff, right? Like responding quickly to real life

0:04:00issues that are being caused because of the new world that we find ourselves in at the moment.

0:04:07Yep. Yep. I like to see that they prioritize this stuff and are trying to get it out fast.

0:04:12Yeah. Yeah, definitely. All right. I want to do a bit of follow out if you allow me,

0:04:17Jason, to a Relay FM members show called Backstage. It is both a behind the scenes

0:04:23of Relay FM show hosted by me and Steven Hackett. And also we are combining our 19

0:04:29years of joint experience in podcasting to help listeners start their own podcasts. So every

0:04:35episode is a monthly show for Relay FM members. We go in depth on each part of the podcast creation

0:04:41process. The first is about how to pick a topic. On our next episode, we're going to be talking

0:04:47about how you pick guests or co-hosts and what might fit for the show that you're trying to make.

0:04:52I kind of like the thought of if you're starting a show, you get a month's homework,

0:04:57right? Like work out this thing in a month and come back and get the next part.

0:05:00We've made the first episode available for free. There'll be a link to that in the show notes

0:05:05for this episode of Upgrade, but it's on our Relay FM B-Sides feed. So you can get a taste for it.

0:05:11Subsequent episodes will be, as I mentioned, for Relay FM members only. So if you're an existing

0:05:16member, you will get this in the Relay FM members feed. If you want to become a member, you can do

0:05:21that no matter what show you support or what plan you choose, you will get this benefit. But if you

0:05:26do choose to support Backstage and you sign up for Backstage membership, that goes towards supporting

0:05:33the day-to-day running of Relay FM. So you can choose to support any show, you can choose to

0:05:38support Backstage, it's completely up to you. You can choose to support Upgrade. And this is another

0:05:43moment, I think right now, just with everything that's going on in the world, directly supporting

0:05:49the content that you enjoy is important. And I don't mean that just for this show or for Relay

0:05:53FM. If you have extra money to give for content, you should support independent content creators

0:06:01because it is a difficult and uncertain time for all of us, like it is for everybody else

0:06:06in every type of job around the world. So I encourage people to think about that. Like find

0:06:12Patreons for you to support, YouTubers, you can join the kind of like, if there's a YouTube join

0:06:18button. And also if you like Relay FM podcasts, then become a Relay FM member, support your

0:06:22favorite shows. And this is the first of a series of things that we're working on over the next,

0:06:29maybe six months or so for Relay FM members. So it's a good time to start.

0:06:33Relay.fm/backstage to learn more. You were busy a couple of days ago.

0:06:41- Yeah. - Because it was Apple's Q2 results.

0:06:44- Yes, on a Thursday. Why? I don't know. Yes, Apple's results were out and it was weird because

0:06:52they had China things early and then China kind of came up late, but then the rest of the world

0:06:58shut down and there's a lot going on there. Revenue was up year over year, but this is the beginning.

0:07:05The way they put it was we had the first part of the quarter where everything looked great and we

0:07:10were gonna set records and beat our expectations. And then China shut down and then the rest of the

0:07:19world shut down and they've gotten their product pipeline kind of back up and running, but they're

0:07:24working at home and they gave no guidance for next quarter. And I think that's the big, actually,

0:07:30top line story here is that Apple has like $90 billion in cash. It's not hurting. It can go for

0:07:38a very long time. But in the short term, they said they can't even predict what their results will be

0:07:44for next quarter because nobody really knows how this is gonna go over the next few months. And so

0:07:52they are supremely confident in the long term and in the short term, they are not confident in their

0:08:00ability to predict how it's gonna go. So that's the short version of the results. It is a good

0:08:06time to be Apple and have $90 billion in a couch cushion somewhere. Yeah, because this was supposed

0:08:13to be, was originally gonna be like a really massive quarter, right? And then obviously,

0:08:18Apple had to change the guidance on it for good reason because they had no idea what was gonna

0:08:23happen, right? Like it was a surprise to everyone. But they still ended up beating in revenue.

0:08:30Services and wearables, of course, were up. iPhone, iPad, Mac, all down. But one of the things that

0:08:37was mentioned on the call, which you wrote about in a Macworld article, is they are actually

0:08:43expecting iPad and Mac sales to be up in Q3 because of remote working. So that's probably

0:08:48their champions of the next quarter for good reason. Yeah, they figure that people are settling

0:08:54into their remote lifestyle and realizing they need to upgrade their stuff and so Mac and iPad

0:09:00are seeing a boost. Whereas iPhone and Apple Watch, not so much. So that's one of the things

0:09:08they're looking at. As well as sort of, you know, Tim Cook says the supply chain is up in

0:09:14force, right? That they're rolling again on making things. I thought that it was interesting. He

0:09:19talks about people's perceptions of Apple's supply chain. And somebody basically said,

0:09:27"Boy, having your factories in China really bit you," in kinder words than that. But what Tim Cook

0:09:34said is, "It's not really fair to view Apple as a company that just makes everything in one place.

0:09:40Our supply chain is global. We're sourcing from all over. We assemble in China and a few things

0:09:45in the U.S. But we are sourcing this stuff and the fact is it's up and running. So it's pretty

0:09:51resilient." And then he said, "That said, of course, we are always looking at ways we can improve,"

0:09:57which is a classic line from him. I choose to read that as, you know, "Maybe we ought to have

0:10:03two places we can do a lot of key things in case there's a natural disaster or whatever in one of

0:10:10those places." But, you know, he's pointing out that this was a pretty severe situation and their

0:10:15global supply chain is actually up and running. So I think he's not in agreement with the people

0:10:23who think this shows that Apple's decisions are questionable because of, you know, this situation

0:10:30kind of getting them in the weeds a little bit. I don't think he feels that that actually happened.

0:10:34Yeah, I get that point about stuff being made all over the world,

0:10:39but the most important part is the manufacturing and that's by and large all done in China,

0:10:46right? And I think that that is a important thing that Apple need to, and they know they do now,

0:10:53they know they need to think about it, right? Like, yeah, I think that's what why I said,

0:10:57like, I chose to read into the "We always are going to contemplate ways we could do this better"

0:11:05as them not wanting to make any announcements. But, like, I mean, let's be serious here.

0:11:09You still have the issue of if you only have one provider, if you only have one location that you

0:11:15can build an iPhone, that if something happens at that location or to that provider, you're kind of

0:11:20out of luck. And Apple doesn't like being put in situations like that. Like, you know, we talk

0:11:25about Apple wanting to control its own destiny, but in terms of making an iPhone, they don't

0:11:31control their own destiny in the sense that they haven't kind of hedged against the assembly in

0:11:35China. So I would imagine they will continue to try to find other alternatives for that.

0:11:41Like that said, there are certain kinds of natural disasters and things like this pandemic

0:11:45that nobody can, you know, necessarily reinforce their systems to withstand. But their confidence

0:11:54surprised me a little bit. I expected them to be a little bit more hesitant, but Tim Cook was,

0:11:59he was acting really, like, vindicated about how great their logistics is, which it's his baby. I

0:12:05can see why he would feel that way. - Yeah, like if they are actually at a point where they're

0:12:10making stuff again, I mean, they're releasing new products that are definitely making stuff,

0:12:13he's got to feel good about that, right? Like that's his thing, you know? - Yeah. Oh, I mean,

0:12:19he was in his element. There was a question about component prices in the long run. And like,

0:12:23if some prices were going to be volatile or if they were going to go down, and if that was an

0:12:26opportunity for Apple, there was a very in the weeds question that I felt was certainly going

0:12:31to be answered by Luca Maestri, who is the CFO. And Tim Cook answered it. He was like, yeah, well,

0:12:36NAND prices are, you know, are going to be flat and this other component's prices are going to be,

0:12:41are going to be down a little bit. And he was going into the details. And then I thought,

0:12:45it is Tim Cook. Like, this is his stuff. This is what he is great at, is this part of the

0:12:53business. So of course, he's paying attention to that part. - All right, we're going to take our

0:12:59first break. And then after this, we're going to be joined by Mark Gurman of Bloomberg,

0:13:03which I'm very excited about. Today's show is brought to you in part by our friends over at

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0:14:04your next project. So that is linode.com, L-I-N-O-D-E.com/upgrade and the promo code

0:14:11upgrade2020 to get that $20 credit. Our thanks to Linode for their continued support of this show

0:14:16and all of Relay FM. All right, so we had the pleasure now of being joined by Mark Gurman. I

0:14:20was thinking before what I was preparing for the show today, like what kind of introduction,

0:14:25but you know like that it's that often used phrase of like you need no introduction because

0:14:30we whenever you write anything we talk about it on this show, so I think upgrade listeners are

0:14:36very familiar with you. So Mark, thank you so much for joining us today. No, thank you so much for

0:14:40having me. It's a pleasure. I listen to you guys from time to time, and I have a few close friends

0:14:47who are very religious listeners, and they tell me that you know Myke and Jason are you know always

0:14:54talking about my story, so you know maybe you should go on there and you know maybe talk about

0:14:57them. It's time to get it from the source. Yeah, it's after you pretty much Ming-Chi Kuo is our

0:15:03only other frequently mentioned person to get on, so that's funny. We're halfway there. 50 percent.

0:15:09You should try to get them. Yeah, and this is an interesting time. I mean I think this is one of

0:15:14the good reasons to talk to you right now because it's not only is this typically an interesting

0:15:19time of the year, and I'm sure that you know we're going to see from you I expect at some point soon

0:15:24a lot more about iOS 14. It tends to be your way of doing things, but I'll leave that surprise for

0:15:30you later on, but even more so than it typically being an interesting time of the year, it is an

0:15:36incredibly interesting time for everything right now including Apple, and I was wondering from your

0:15:43perspective right now, what do you think are some of the biggest products or initiatives that Apple

0:15:49have on the horizon for the next year? Because I know you've reported on a bunch of things that

0:15:53could be coming, but stuff's changed, so what do you think is like some of the most important,

0:15:58some of the things that they will be focusing the most on maybe over the next six to 12 months?

0:16:02Yeah, I mean that's a good question. I mean I know this is an obvious one, but you know all hands are

0:16:09on deck to get the iPhone out the door by you know late October, early November at this point.

0:16:15It's an incredibly challenging situation. It was already hard, and I don't think a lot of people

0:16:22realize this, before the the COVID-19 pandemic hit, Apple was already racing against the clock

0:16:28to get this phone out the door because of the entire 5G modem situation. Obviously these

0:16:34devices are in development for years on end, and they only really struck the deal with Qualcomm to

0:16:41get the modems working in this year's iPhones with 5G, so I think about a year ago, and that already

0:16:48makes it difficult integrating you know a custom antenna to go with the Qualcomm 5G modem, having

0:16:54different types of modems for different devices, standard 5G versus millimeter wave, so that whole

0:17:00situation was already going to be difficult. And then you throw COVID-19 in the middle and that's

0:17:05just another wrench in the in this situation. So I think they'll be on track to get the phones out by

0:17:10October, November, which is typically their normal time period, right? Usually they

0:17:16announce the phones in September, but you've seen the XR, you've seen the iPhone X released sort of

0:17:22late October, early November in the last few years or so, so I think they'll still hit it. But getting

0:17:28these phones out the door is certainly going to be a challenge they haven't faced in the past.

0:17:32In terms of longer term initiatives, right now 2020 is a really key period for development of

0:17:40products that's going to hit in 2022, 2023, so what you might see are some delays to future products

0:17:48that are not going to be released for you know for several years or several months on end, and the

0:17:53question is going to be is Apple going to be able to make up that lost time once they do return to work

0:17:59probably at this point in mid-June. Yeah, I was gonna go down that path with you a little bit.

0:18:05Last week Tim Cook said on the analyst call lots of positive things about their supply chain and

0:18:11how it's global and how they they feel like they're doing pretty well, but you you gotta think that

0:18:17that something has taken a hit. Is it too early to get a read on what might be the products that are

0:18:25or projects that are slowed by the virus's impact on the supply chain and also by the people at

0:18:31Apple who work on these products who are all at home now? Do you have a read on that or is it

0:18:36too early to tell? You know I think it's too early, but you know speculating probably any hardware

0:18:42product that was due to be released in the later half of 2021, anything in 2022, 2022 and beyond,

0:18:49I mean obviously I would say that it probably took a three four month development hit and the

0:18:54question is what does a three to four month development hit translate to in terms of release

0:18:59timing? Is that you know an equivalent if you lose three months of development time is that three

0:19:04months delay for a product launch or is it six months or is it a year right or does it really not

0:19:09have an impact? So you know it's still too early to tell but in terms of machining, prototyping,

0:19:16collaborative designing, those are all you know much more difficult in this environment.

0:19:22If you think about Apple's push into audio right so the smaller HomePod for later this year,

0:19:27the over your headphones, the next AirPods, those are probably all okay but the amount of time and

0:19:34effort that goes into the testing of those products in anechoic chambers and all that,

0:19:40that's a very you know intensive process so it's probably you're probably seeing a little delay on

0:19:45you know future iteration to those products. You know what about the iPhones in future years right

0:19:51the idea that you need to test those things in antenna labs for a long period of time right?

0:19:58So there is some sort of delay that's very possible but on the other hand we don't know

0:20:03what kind of overtime Apple's going to work to sort of make this up. Sort of like if your flight

0:20:08gets delayed the pilots like to say okay we're going to make this up in the air and we'll get

0:20:12you there right at the same time right? So you know I think it's very difficult to bet against

0:20:18Apple being able to do that so I wouldn't put a firm impact you know percentage of impact on this

0:20:27at this point. Every single day all of the websites that I read like the typical high volume Apple

0:20:35websites they have a different delay period for the iPhone right? Like every iPhone is delayed by

0:20:42a different period sometimes it's better sometimes it's worse. You mentioned about like October

0:20:47November do you expect that to be the entire line like what is your read on that right now?

0:20:52Do you think all iPhones will be delayed some do you think they will be staggered anyway?

0:20:57Yeah that's a good question I think there's going to be some staggering in between the low end and

0:21:03the high end so the 12 versus the 12 Pro but the reason you're seeing different you know

0:21:08indications of how long a potential delay is going to be is because there's two things at play right?

0:21:14There's when is Apple going to announce it and when is Apple going to actually ship it which as

0:21:19we know are two different things right? They could announce a phone in September and ship it in

0:21:23November. The other factor in addition to those two is not taking into account what a production

0:21:31delay means right? If Apple pushes production back for a device for let's say a month does that mean

0:21:38they're going to you know release it a month later or does that mean they're going to release it at

0:21:43the normal period but in smaller quantities and sort of ramp up to their normal set of quantity?

0:21:49So there's you know a lot of factors that come into play here and it just comes down to which

0:21:54decision is Apple going to make? I've seen both happen right? For the iPhone 10 they you know

0:22:02started producing it quite a bit later and then they released it you know about a month later

0:22:06than usual I remember the early November release in 2017 for the 10 but there's been other

0:22:11situations where they've actually released products in small quantities and ramped up.

0:22:17I remember there were iPhones in the past one that comes to mind is the iPhone I think 6 plus

0:22:22this is already six or seven years ago but that phone you know it was very very hard to get it

0:22:28for one to two months but what they did do is they released it at the same time as the regular

0:22:34iPhone 6. So they've shown both ways of doing things and it's just about which one they choose

0:22:39and I don't think those decisions are made until a lot closer. I mean remember we're still in May

0:22:44and so we're about four to five months away from any of those decisions. It doesn't feel like it's

0:22:48that far but it is very far still. It is quite a bit far and it actually does from a feeling

0:22:54perspective it does feel earlier and earlier each time right? I mean as soon as one iPhone is out

0:22:59the door the next one is already you know deep into development these things are finalized.

0:23:03Like the iPhone 12 they've finished development of that thing probably four or five months ago

0:23:09already. Yeah. Fully finalized and so it's just about a production thing and we're pretty much

0:23:14we're pretty close to these phones actually going into small scale production. It could have already

0:23:18happened for all we know. I wonder also about the not only just the supply chain but the delivery

0:23:24to customers aspect and how that will we don't know what Apple stores are going to look like

0:23:28in the fall and even if they're reopened around the world is Apple going to want people lining

0:23:35up at Apple stores to get iPhones or are they going to because you know traditionally it's been

0:23:43if you don't get your order online is going to be pushed out you can often go to a store and get one

0:23:48but I wonder you know will they rejigger that whole thing will they try to have everybody order

0:23:53online so they can just ship them direct rather than having them in in stores and we don't really

0:23:58know what stores are going to look like in the fall. No that's a very good question and I think

0:24:02it's too early even for the world to know or for Apple to know. I mean the very scary thing is I'm

0:24:06reading all these articles and following obviously like everyone else this Covid situation very

0:24:11closely and there's lots of fears of these second and third waves what what happens when you know

0:24:17at this point I would say the assumption is that Apple would have all Apple retail stores sitting

0:24:22here today reopened by end of June globally all 500 plus stores opened by end of June there's going

0:24:28to be a ton of them probably hundreds opening between now and the end of this month in fact

0:24:33Austria opens it opens tomorrow if you hadn't seen that and Australia will be I believe later next

0:24:39week and so what happens if a second wave hits in you know September, October, November right

0:24:45they have to close all the stores again you're back to where we were two months ago right so I

0:24:50think it's an extremely fluid situation and to Jason's point I think that could be a reason for

0:24:56sort of ramping up in the online retail focus maybe for this year they say if you want to get

0:25:00one of these phones you have to you have to you know push towards you know online retail when

0:25:05when Angela Ahrendts was in charge of retail up until the beginning of last year she had this

0:25:10really big push to the appointment only experience coming in when the phone is ready for pickup they

0:25:14text you when to come in and what the new retail chief Deidre O'Brien was sort of wanted to do was

0:25:20push back to some of the old school approaches bringing back lines bringing up hype not having

0:25:25to have an appointment to pick up a phone which you know in my personal opinion I think that

0:25:31approach is much smarter from a marketing perspective it's better for Apple and quite

0:25:35frankly I think the consumer likes that too they don't want to have to come in at a specific time

0:25:39they want to be able to show up and buy the phone when they want to buy the phone they want to line

0:25:43up etc etc but because of the coronavirus I to you know both of your points I think that's going to

0:25:49have to be you know held back probably for another year or so. How would they do a line now? It would

0:25:55go through the whole shopping mall down the street. All the lines across the globe would start

0:26:00intersecting at some point. Yeah I mean six feet you know and I'm no health professional but you

0:26:06know six feet is not much you know. Yeah those lines seem like a bygone era now a little bit.

0:26:12Mark I have to ask you this question which is what is the deal with air tags like seriously like you

0:26:18look at the U1 chip in the phones last fall and this persistent rumor about air tags as a product

0:26:26and it seems like a very strong suggestion that this product does exist we saw a mistake in a

0:26:33screenshot in a beta where they mentioned the product name and you know it's been almost ready

0:26:40to ship it seems in our minds for a long time now and it just hasn't happened you know where are they?

0:26:47Yeah so the air tags you're definitely a product this is probably one of the most discussed Apple

0:26:55products in recent memory that hasn't been released and it's to the point like you said where

0:26:59I feel like some people at Apple think that it already came out given the Apple

0:27:04support video from a few weeks ago but my belief is that they were delayed they were supposed to

0:27:11launch last year probably alongside the iPhone 11 line right that's integrating with the U1 chip and

0:27:18all that but they should be coming this year it should be a little bit later this year and I wrote

0:27:24it was recently that these things are going to be like all other Apple stuff you know it doesn't

0:27:28take a genius to tell you these are going to be high priced and premium and they'll be coming in

0:27:33like these little leather pouches they're primarily for keys but I think that they have a lot of good

0:27:40use cases is it really going to impact Tile? I think that's the big question I think to some

0:27:45extent yes but you know Tile has you know the subscription pricing I think at this point they

0:27:51have you can buy a stack of them for a pretty good price whereas these Apple ones are probably going

0:27:55to be more expensive I'm curious what do you guys think how do you think they're going to do it you

0:27:59think they're going to charge you know individually do you think they're going to do three five-packs

0:28:04what would you pay for one of them? We had a question about this a couple weeks ago where

0:28:11somebody was asking about it as a service and I thought I don't think it's going to be a service

0:28:14I think you're going to be able to pay but I do think it's going to be you know my rule of thumb

0:28:19is always what would you like to pay now increase that and now round it up and that's what it's

0:28:24actually going to cost the double increase so I kept saying like I don't know this is a three-pack

0:28:30for 50 or 75 or something like that I don't think it's going to be cheap but I think Apple's going

0:28:34to say but our system is better and you know their system is better assuming these things

0:28:39as we've read about the the COVID-19 stuff like they built a system where every Apple device in

0:28:45existence that's of a current OS generation will be able to find these things it should be an

0:28:50incredibly powerful system and they'll promote that and they'll say this is why you want to get

0:28:55our tracker and it'll have presumably ultra wideband in it so that it'll have the precision

0:29:00locations and I don't know I think you know expensive but probably not a service is my guess.

0:29:06What if they did both so what if they charged I don't know 29 or 39 or 49 per puck

0:29:13and then they you know made find my service where they're going to charge you I don't know

0:29:18$2.99 a month to use it I think it's possible. It's possible for sure. What do you think they

0:29:25would add like for that like if it was a service what would be different? That's a good question

0:29:31maybe you can use one for free but you're going to have to pay if you want to track multiple devices

0:29:36maybe. Yeah I also wonder they could also do something where if you're on a higher iCloud

0:29:41tier I've been waiting for them to do some of this where and actually I think the secure video

0:29:46feature is like this already the idea that if you're in a higher iCloud tier you get it and

0:29:50otherwise you got to pay some amount to have it. Oh that's a really good point okay so maybe they

0:29:56do that maybe they tie it to the iCloud account and this gets to the other thing you guys asked

0:30:01for like some bigger initiatives that they've been working on I mean this whole idea of bundling their

0:30:06services together is something that they were thinking of doing as early as this year so iCloud

0:30:12music Apple news you know tv plus all of those together but the other thing is I know Jason

0:30:17follows the the earnings calls very closely with his transcripts but Tim Cook's comment about how

0:30:22they're going to allow purchases other than the iPhone other Apple hardware purchases to be spread

0:30:27over your Apple card monthly payments. Right. So that's going to be that's going to be quite

0:30:33interesting. Speaking of which we should talk about the the MacBook Pro did you or I'm sure

0:30:40you guys are going to hit that in your. Yeah I mean we're gonna we're gonna talk about it later if

0:30:43you've got anything you want to talk about we can talk about it now we're gonna go into detail

0:30:46later on. Yeah I mean I found it interesting that they went with 13 inch versus 14 inch for this

0:30:53iteration. Do you have a rate on that because I feel like it seemed like it was obvious it was

0:30:58going to be 14. See I don't know I look at this and I think well this is an this is an interim

0:31:03step this is literally just how quickly can we get that old keyboard out of the line and in fact they

0:31:10barely did anything on the low end of those laptops but you know so that that's that's what

0:31:15it struck me I mean the MacBook Air is the same way it's it's largely the same computer with a

0:31:20different keyboard instead of it being like a whole brand new computer. Yeah that's exactly my

0:31:26read Jason that there is going to be a 14 inch a bigger redesign with what there's no wi-fi 5 on

0:31:33this one right and they're missing some of the the bigger features some of the features that even the

0:31:3816 inch MacBook Pro got it. Correct me if I'm wrong I don't know if this one even has the higher end

0:31:42speakers. I don't see that mentioned anywhere which means it probably doesn't because Apple

0:31:48really like to talk about those. Yeah that's true and the microphones right I'm not entirely sure

0:31:55that it has any of that stuff so yeah I think this is a very minor keyboard swap type of update

0:32:01and you'll see the 14 inch maybe end of year maybe early next year. Do you think that that could be

0:32:07I mean there's been a lot of talk about mini led do you think that they may wait to put that

0:32:11technology in this product do you think it's too early for that technology? No mini led is coming

0:32:17it's just a matter of when that could be something that's interrupted by COVID because anytime they

0:32:22make some you know massive supply chain transformation obviously that's that's a big

0:32:27deal I think that if they needed to push some stuff back they'd be pushing back some of the

0:32:32Mac stuff and prioritize the iOS device stuff for later this year speaking like of the iPhone and

0:32:39the accessories which is their biggest you know one of their biggest growth markets right now

0:32:43so you know mini led probably a next year thing that's obviously a across the line type of deal

0:32:51I think you'll see the next iPad get that too iPad Pro I don't believe there's going to be another

0:32:57iPad Pro this year I think that's also a next year thing so those will probably get mini led as well.

0:33:03Going back to the the call last week because yeah I absolutely do you know every now and then they

0:33:11put tidbits in there it's worth it's worth digging through it to find little things that they're

0:33:15willing to disclose and one of the things that I thought was fascinating was Tim Cook saying

0:33:20Apple shifting to an entirely work at home environment that some jobs and some groups are

0:33:27doing better than normal that like being remote has actually improved their productivity which

0:33:33I thought was fascinating and I immediately asked myself are you gonna insist that they all move to

0:33:38Silicon Valley and going forward or you might be more open to remote workers but he said some

0:33:43groups are not as productive and it's a mixed bag I'm just you know based on what you know I'm

0:33:51curious how is it working for the people working at Apple right now because they're all at home

0:33:57you know and I'm sure that there are tasks that are completely capable of being done remotely but

0:34:04there have got to be other tasks that are very hard and they've got a lot of secrecy stuff I

0:34:08would imagine there's a bunch of stuff that you're not supposed to ever see if you're not on campus

0:34:12that now people off campus have to see and that can be a security problem for them I just you know

0:34:18what's your what's your feeling about how they're handling you know not being in the building

0:34:23yeah that caught my ear as well in terms of stuff being productive and stuff being less productive

0:34:30that seems more like you know unplanned slip up they never say say stuff like that as you guys

0:34:35know in terms of more productive I'd bet you know marketing software engineering to some perspective

0:34:42all those types of things that you know you can really just hunker down in your room and

0:34:46you know get done on your computer in terms of less productive that takes you down to hardware

0:34:51now hardware is really split into and this is a really rudimentary way of explaining it but split

0:34:57into two parts right there's the the actual hardware perspective that requires you know

0:35:02hands-on work with screwdrivers and playing with things and you know building stuff with your hands

0:35:07and testing and labs and antenna work and all that and then there's the underlying

0:35:12CAD drawing software engineering component that goes into hardware right a huge part of chip

0:35:19development right is is software based right the software programming that goes into the chips

0:35:24that are you know you know embedded in the actual processors that go into the devices so

0:35:28I'd imagine the software component of hardware engineering CAD drawing analysis is going well

0:35:35there is so much stuff at Apple that really requires you to be in the lab be in a room be in a group

0:35:39that's just simply not happening that takes us back to the point in which you know why this work from

0:35:45home situation is so difficult for for so many companies and is this going to be stuff that Apple

0:35:50is going to be able to make up in the air and you know my perspective is yes right but at the same

0:35:56time if there's other additional waves that keep hitting you know who knows what's going to happen

0:36:02and another tidbit on this is that they they have had people working at you know the Apple offices

0:36:09right there are you know these I don't know if these qualify as essential workers in the

0:36:14terminology that that local governments use in terms of what's allowed to be open and not

0:36:18allowed to be open but there's people that need to be there to do some testing right this is a

0:36:22trillion dollar corporation and this is a global pandemic and it's a horrific situation obviously

0:36:29to say the least I don't need to to say more but they have a responsibility to keep going in some

0:36:34respects so those things are going to keep happening certain amounts of testing you have

0:36:40operations that need to keep going data centers etc etc that need to have humans there to keep

0:36:45these things up and running I think there's many companies that still have people going into the

0:36:50office maybe just a few people with strict social distancing and I don't think Apple's any different

0:36:54from that one on that note do you have any sense for what WWDC is going to look like

0:37:00yeah no that's a good question in terms of announcements I'll hold off on talking about

0:37:07anything I haven't written about but there was a an accessibility seminar a few weeks ago online

0:37:15they did it over the course of I think April in India they did a few of them in India they did one

0:37:21in the US I think two weeks ago or so where you were able to sort of send in questions and stuff

0:37:26like that so I think that's really what it's going to be I think there's going to be live

0:37:30integration with the viewer and this is in terms of the individual sessions I think you'll see

0:37:37you'll see lots of resources to be able to interact with online I don't know precisely how

0:37:42it's going to work my big question is how is the keynote going to go are they going to do a live

0:37:48streamed keynote that looks like any normal keynote and stream it with just no one in the

0:37:52audience are they going to do something a little bit more unique where they they pre-roll a bunch

0:37:57of videos are they going to do a full normal keynote but shoot it in advance and edit it

0:38:01I think it's going to be very fascinating to see it's sort of unprecedented for them and

0:38:07but personally I'm excited to see how it shakes out yeah they got a chance to reinvent it a little

0:38:12bit if they want to I mean they have to but it's also an opportunity to say why don't we do it

0:38:17this new way instead of just going through the motions of what we always do that's my fear with

0:38:23this is they may get some ideas that like like more than having these live like oh if we just

0:38:28edit this there can be no mistakes right I think that's what you're probably going to see I think

0:38:35you're going to see a mix of both I mean I think it's a resource thing right like getting these

0:38:39operating systems done and all that from home it's a very you know it takes a toll on all of

0:38:44these software engineers there's a lot of them who have been complaining about this and just like any

0:38:48other environment right you it's hard to do your best work when you're in a situation where you

0:38:54know with your family at home some of them have kids etc etc so it's definitely not easy for anyone

0:39:00but I think we'll get it done and my big question is when in June is this happening I think they

0:39:05were pretty specific and really only saying June versus a specific date because it's a little bit

0:39:10more fluid and because you're not having a physical location I think you have the right

0:39:15to be a little bit more fluid so I wouldn't be shocked if this was later in June than earlier

0:39:20and you know it's possible that WWDC is still like almost two months away right like we're in the

0:39:25beginning of May right now usually we're talking like the first week of June it's like a month away

0:39:29but you know very early May very late June that's about two months so we could a little we could be

0:39:35a little far off from this thing for sure we'll see though. I want to shift gears a little bit and

0:39:40talk about talk about you and your job and you made that you made the big move from 9to5Mac to

0:39:47go to working at Bloomberg and Bloomberg is a very large news organization I know a bunch of people

0:39:53who work at Bloomberg it's unlike a lot of other journalism outfits too because of the financial

0:40:00background and the terminal and all these things that if people don't know like Bloomberg is a

0:40:03different kind of place and you're working at 9to5Mac before doing these reports I think while

0:40:10you were going to school so what how has your job changed being a part of this large business and

0:40:21financially oriented news organization at Bloomberg are you obviously your bylines you are often

0:40:26sharing bylines now so I imagine there's a lot of collaboration going on that maybe wasn't there

0:40:31before have they challenged you you know I just it's a big open-ended question like how is your

0:40:37how is your process and your work changed working for Bloomberg? Yeah no that's a that's a good

0:40:44point I actually do know at least I won't get into personal names or anything I do know at least one

0:40:47of your friends there and he's very cool but Bloomberg for me it's like you said it's a big

0:40:52news organization it's a fantastic news organization the the resources are immense

0:40:59being able to you know travel and go to events the name has been very helpful you know for getting in

0:41:06the door with certain meetings and such but in terms of the news what I do specifically

0:41:11nothing has really changed to be honest with you I mean there's a lot of things that I don't

0:41:18immediately report like maybe very small minor things sometimes I'll you know save a couple

0:41:24things and bundle it into a story for example I had a story a few weeks ago that had details about

0:41:32the iPhone 12 the the timing the smaller home pod and the air tags instead of breaking that up into

0:41:39you know three four five stories where I may have done that in the nine to five Mac days that was

0:41:44one story about it all bundled together so that that is one change given being at a you know bigger

0:41:51news organization with the bar being much higher but in terms of you know the seriousness of these

0:41:57things I think I always took it pretty seriously in terms of accuracy and reliability so not a ton

0:42:03has changed from there it's a great organization and like you said there's lots of people that I

0:42:08get to collaborate with you know Debbie Wu who works in our Asia supply chain she's awesome

0:42:15and it's a big help to be able to have both perspectives on things right from the supply

0:42:21chain perspective but also from the you know the Apple corporate perspective and sort of blending

0:42:26it together and you know double checking things on both sides I think that's a really good way to get

0:42:30as much information into a story as possible we have people who you know focus on you know chips

0:42:36and processors and you know Intel understanding the Intel perspective of this big Apple transition

0:42:42is going to be you know important part of understanding the next you know six months a year

0:42:47of the Mac for Apple so you know it's important to have all these experts not that I you know I

0:42:52don't particularly know these things and I'm an expert in these things myself but it does it does

0:42:57help a bit to have you know additional people in the room who are like-minded and understanding of

0:43:02these topics and you know pulling it all together and it's a great team that I'm lucky to work with

0:43:08but you know long story short nothing has changed you know in terms of my process or anything like

0:43:13that and it's exciting to still you know work on this stuff I think that the difference is

0:43:19the audience is very financial oriented and it has been a balance trying to strike the you know

0:43:26writing for a financial audience but also for retaining that sort of online and Twitter audience

0:43:32I think early on I focused you know there was a lot of focus on the financial side but I think that

0:43:38we've really struck the the right balance I've been doing this for you know four years now

0:43:42and so I think it's great yeah I'm happy with it. Do you feel like especially with your access to

0:43:48people in in different industries Debbie Wu being a obviously a key collaborator of yours Debbie's

0:43:55you typically share buy lines and stories do you feel like it's changed your accuracy for reporting?

0:44:01Not no not really I don't think anything has really changed in terms of accuracy no I mean

0:44:09obviously when you're writing for Bloomberg you want an increased comfort level and you want an

0:44:13increased amount of people you talk to but before putting a story out because you know about the

0:44:17the financial impact. So you might corroborate a little bit more as such behind the scenes?

0:44:23Yeah not to get you know into deep into about the how the sausage is made but yeah the the standard

0:44:29to answer you know the first question the difference between 9 to 5 and Bloomberg the

0:44:33standard might you know the standard was always very high at 9 to 5 Mac but we would never put

0:44:37anything out that we weren't comfortable with or on very solid footing with so but the difference

0:44:44is is that the responsibility to the financial readership is it's a lot higher as you can imagine

0:44:49out of Bloomberg versus a 9 to 5 Mac so yeah yes you want to be as comfortable as possible and the

0:44:54more corroborations you get the better but I don't think the accuracy itself has changed.

0:44:58I think we're still doing pretty good yeah. I wonder about just being higher profile I mean

0:45:03you mentioned your your audience is different I've definitely noticed that you your stories have to

0:45:08put the information in a context that obviously 9 to 5 Mac I think your readers knew the context

0:45:14and in Bloomberg I can I can definitely see the effort going into placing the new information in

0:45:19the bigger story of Apple in a way that you didn't have to do before but I'm just curious being being

0:45:25at such a high profile place how has that in terms of your access in terms of your information that

0:45:32you get has it helped or hurt to be part of such a big brand? I think it's held tremendously right

0:45:40the Bloomberg news brand is you know synonymous with the financial industry right and it's

0:45:47extraordinarily well respected and well regarded I think there's a long tradition of being

0:45:53you know accurate and having a good understanding of the atmosphere and I think people really

0:45:59respect it and it makes it easier to you know get in the room with you know companies whether

0:46:04that's Apple or Google or Amazon and such to to really get their perspectives about what's going

0:46:10on to help inform your stories and find out about stuff early to be able to you know have stories

0:46:15prepared so I think it's been a huge boost and you know I really am grateful to work there and

0:46:21I appreciate the audience and you know the most pleasant thing to me was I think there was sort

0:46:25of this fear when I made the transition four years ago now that I may lose some of the you know the

0:46:30online audience and the people following along on Twitter and all that but that really has not been

0:46:36the case at all I think people really like you know Bloomberg and I hope that I've you know at

0:46:41least brought some of my you know former audience along to Bloomberg to understand you know all the

0:46:46great stuff we're doing not to sound like an ad or anything like that but you know I'm just you know

0:46:51I'm ecstatic about the work we're doing and you know it's very exciting every day to wake up in

0:46:55the morning and do this stuff and I also feel very grateful to be doing this right I mean I'm sure

0:47:00you guys are in the same boat but being able to you know write about technology talk about

0:47:04technology Apple for a living is is tremendous right I grew up as someone who was you know a

0:47:10massive you know Apple fanboy right I don't want to speak for you guys but I know you guys it's

0:47:15like Apple as well yeah so it's like being able to make that transition to someone who's really

0:47:20you know really interested and fascinated about a company and be able to turn that into sort of

0:47:27a job and on top of that I mean this community of people is tremendous right some of the people you

0:47:34see tweeting or you talk to on podcasts or comments and stuff people that email you

0:47:40the people who really follow this Apple stuff are some of the the smartest understanding kindest

0:47:46people and so being able to you know interact on Twitter and with with this community I think is

0:47:52uh it's it's been tremendous I wanted to ask again like without we're not looking for specifics here

0:47:59I understand that like the difficulties to some of this stuff with what you do

0:48:02I wonder if like do you do you feel like there's a lot of pressure with the information that you

0:48:09receive like I assume there are a lot of steps that you need to go to to keep stuff close to your

0:48:14chest is that like do you find that high stress have you do you deal with that a lot better now

0:48:20like has it like grown over time as more there's more kind of focus on you like I'm just intrigued

0:48:27in in what it's like to have access to the kind of information that you do and how it feels

0:48:31you wouldn't believe the stuff I know right now that I haven't reported now I'm just

0:48:37so well I mean am I joking I'm not joking I'm sort of joking I don't know you'll see

0:48:43early on it was very the line of work was very stressful you know looking back at it I don't

0:48:51try not to look back too much but it was the balance that was really challenging right being

0:48:56able to do this in high school right being able to do it in college while managing school work

0:49:02and and all that I think that might have been the most challenging part and difficult part

0:49:07I think that contributed to along with the you know the lot of the late nights early

0:49:11mornings sleepless nights etc etc worrying about not only you know this stuff but school work and

0:49:17all that whereas now I have a I guess before coronavirus you know the the singular thing

0:49:22I was able to think about was this now this is sort of you know messed with everyone a little bit

0:49:27uh made everyone a little stir crazy but you know other than that it's been much better is it

0:49:32stressful is it high pressure not gonna lie yes I think that if it was easier there'd be a lot more

0:49:40you know people doing it I think there's so many people who've tried to get into the space and

0:49:44obviously everyone tries to carve a different niche in sort of the you know the Apple news

0:49:50game right like Jason with with Macworld for so many years you know that was that was you know

0:49:55your thing with with reviews and running that organization and now with six colors your analysis

0:50:01and reviews and all that that's your thing keep scratching my chin that's what I do a lot of

0:50:06nodding and thinking and that's what I know that's my job now that's great you know Jason has his

0:50:12area right Myke with the whole podcast situation and you know you know obviously you guys know my

0:50:18area so I think everyone is just trying to do the best they can in their own individual area right

0:50:23I'll never be at the point in terms of you know analysis that Jason might be I'm not going to have

0:50:28a podcast organization like Myke right but I have my thing so you know everyone is just trying to

0:50:34do their best and I'm sure you know your environments are high pressure high stress as

0:50:38well for for your in particular the angles that you hit I gotta say I always I mean so the legacy

0:50:45at Macworld was that we didn't we didn't do a lot of um a rumor coverage a lot of trying to get

0:50:51sources to give us information about what was to come historically that was because Mac week

0:50:55existed for a long time and that was their bread and butter and that was how back in the I'm gonna

0:51:00go way back here back in the old days that was the firewall that they tried to create between

0:51:05at Ziff Davis between the people who were breaking stories and the people who had NDAs with Apple is

0:51:11Mac user had the NDAs and Mac week broke stories and we and and the two groups were not even in the

0:51:16same city for the longest time they kept them separate so that they could do both and I think

0:51:22that that even at Macworld because the Mac we came over as a part of the merger we we definitely had

0:51:29between that and especially when we were more magazine focused and less online focused it was

0:51:33just something that we didn't do and I remember thinking that's great because that's not a job I

0:51:40wanted so I have always appreciated people who do the job that you do because that's a lot of work

0:51:45and you gotta and actually there is a question here that I wanted to ask you which is something

0:51:49we talk about on this podcast a lot which is when when information comes over the transom or it's

0:51:55somebody that you're talking to as a source about something that's going on what I always say is

0:52:02ask yourself why they're leaking the information because oftentimes leaks will happen because

0:52:09somebody's motivated or somebody's mad that their project got killed or something like that like

0:52:14when the verge did that that Microsoft project that was the the the I can't remember the name

0:52:21of it now or is there fancy yeah yeah courier that was very clearly somebody whose project got killed

0:52:26and they were really angry and they gave them all the stuff like it was very clear sometimes it's

0:52:29not so clear and this is my question for you I mean I imagine that a lot of your sources are

0:52:34people that you know you know very well and and the information is clear and why they would know

0:52:39it is clear but I would also imagine that you get people coming kind of out of the woodwork and you

0:52:44know how do you apply your your own skepticism to information you're receiving because you have your

0:52:52name is on it when it gets reported in Bloomberg so right so what what is your without going in you

0:52:56know I'm not going to say who are your sources tell me your sources more like how do you apply

0:53:01skepticism to what you hear and what you decide is you're confident enough into report

0:53:08yeah I mean that's a good question I mean listen it's been 10 11 years now so you know there's been

0:53:14hundreds if not thousands of stories and news items over this period and you know everything

0:53:20is always different right so things have changed over over the years you know some stories come out

0:53:27for certain reasons other stories for other reasons and I to be honest I try not to get into

0:53:32the you know the machinations of why and all that and just focus on the actual news itself I think

0:53:38that Apple is one of the most discussed companies one of the most invested companies one of the most

0:53:44important companies do you get information though from sources where you're like I don't know if I

0:53:48I don't know if I believe this I don't know if I you know that level of it where you're like yeah

0:53:52this doesn't sound right and then I guess you have to cross check it with other people and say is this

0:53:55a real thing or is this made up because you don't want to go out with something that's from a source

0:53:59that that is you know okay or has provided okay information in the past but like that that you

0:54:05are not you know they tell you something you're like I don't know that doesn't really track yeah

0:54:10I mean I'll give you one example several months ago I got a tip about the magic keyboard for the

0:54:17iPad and trackpad support across iPadOS and my first reaction was like okay there is no way this

0:54:25is true like in what world is Apple going to turn the iPad into a you know into a laptop with the

0:54:32trackpad support and all that and obviously the standards for putting information out like let's

0:54:38say if that came from someone who I've worked with in the past you know I would understand that it's

0:54:42reliable okay let's do this right but if something like that came from you know a brand new source my

0:54:47first reaction was like okay wait there's no there's no way this is true unfortunately was not

0:54:51able to get enough corroboration in time before the you know the keyboard was announced and the

0:54:56news came out about that but yeah that is an example and I think that shows that you know how

0:55:03you know how high the level is right we're not going to just run something because someone says

0:55:06it it has to be something that you're corroborating with with multiple people and sometimes you're

0:55:11going to take the hit anyway because you're reporting about things that are coming down

0:55:14the road and sometimes they do the sands shift right sometimes you're reporting on plans is

0:55:19there this is the thing that kills me is when people are like aha you got that wrong and it's

0:55:23like I don't know plans do change sometimes you report on something that is the plan and then

0:55:28it changes and that that it's like oh well that that happens too yeah I mean I always include that

0:55:34line in there saying you know the plans could change blah blah blah and people like to say

0:55:39yeah and then like people say sometimes oh that's just a throwaway like it's a cover your know what

0:55:44line right but like it's actually true right there's plenty of situations where things do

0:55:48change whether that's timelines whether that's feature set there's a number of things that

0:55:54really can't change right but you know at the end of the day like apple could be having a keynote

0:56:00tomorrow the iphone could have this feature and tim cook could wake up and be like all right we're

0:56:05not including this feature in the iphone due to be announced tomorrow right and nothing stops them

0:56:10from just stripping it out of the keno and then you know removing it in a software update or

0:56:14delaying the shipping you know for a few months so I like to say literally anything is possible

0:56:20so I wanted just to wrap up you you mentioned uh hundreds to thousands of stories right that

0:56:27you must have published over time are there any that stand out specifically to you as favorites

0:56:34or things that were like particularly exciting like are there any when you think back of the

0:56:39stuff that you've published over the years that you that you remember specifically for a certain

0:56:44reason ooh um some good ones over the years was the uh ios switching from google maps to to apple

0:56:54maps this was back in 2012 that's old school yeah the 12-inch macbook in 2015 we had a quite detailed

0:57:02story on that um what other ones okay this was a good one the iphone 10 story we had a few weeks

0:57:10before the phone launched in 2017 or was announced 2017 sort of how the interface was going to change

0:57:16the more gesture focused interface the uh the the 12-inch macbook one stands out to me specifically

0:57:22as like a very very detailed incredibly accurate out of nowhere report like it was just like

0:57:29i remember that one that was i think you were a nine to five mac then i think that was a nine

0:57:33to five back report and i remember like it was so much detail about something nobody had spoken

0:57:38about before like i remember that one specifically thank you yeah that was that was a good one that

0:57:44was an interesting one yeah well before we let you go i want to uh make a request if i could

0:57:49which is please uh break as much news as possible on monday mornings because we love it when you

0:57:54give us stuff to talk about before anybody else gets a chance i'll keep that in mind no and i

0:57:59i really yeah i really love your podcast and all the work you guys do i mean i read six colors all

0:58:04the time i follow some of mike's podcast so uh this was really great and you guys have an amazing

0:58:10community following along too so that's what's really important and fun and i appreciate i really

0:58:15appreciate it so thanks we appreciate the work you do you definitely like you know there's often

0:58:20people out there with skepticism like oh mark irman and the rumors and all that like these are

0:58:24really reports not rumors like he's talking to people who know and he's really accurate so like

0:58:30i appreciate the hard work you do to like i said i thought about doing stuff like that and i was

0:58:35like wow that's not a job that i want to do it's hard work uh it's kind of on a on a tightrope a

0:58:41little bit sometimes you got to get it right and you know i basically people probably don't say

0:58:46this as much but i appreciate the work you do and thank you for doing it no thank you thank you guys

0:58:51really appreciate it so i guess uh at mark german is probably the best place to follow along with

0:58:56the stuff that you're doing right you would link to everything that you're writing and stuff like

0:58:59that and one of the things that i like about following you on twitter is there's sometimes

0:59:02some additional little details so it's definitely worth yeah getting that little extra that's the

0:59:08cutting room floor yes it you know what sometimes it is the cutting room floor that's a that's a

0:59:13good way to yeah i definitely notice it i'm like oh that's a tidbit that i could see why that didn't

0:59:17fit in the story but i i totally you know but for us we're like aha that's a tidbit that's a really

0:59:22nice little bit well thanks for being here yeah thanks for having me i'll see you guys this episode

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1:01:04of relay fm squarespace make your next move make your next website all right so new macbook pro

1:01:13it is a new macbook pro it's not the macbook pro that we were expecting uh we spoke you know we

1:01:19kind of mentioned this a moment ago with uh with mark but let's kind of i want to give a very brief

1:01:24overview of what this computer has and then we can dig into it a little bit so sure it has the

1:01:29new magic keyboard so the butterfly keyboard is no longer sold on any of apple's laptops so it's gone

1:01:34technically the butterfly keyboard exists in these smart covers for the ipad pro but it that works

1:01:41great because it's a covered mechanism it's fine so no more laptops are sold at a butterfly keyboard

1:01:46they're all the new magic keyboard this uh revision to the 13 inch includes the option for 10th gen

1:01:54intel processors the base model is 8th gen you're looking at 80 faster graphics 256 gigabyte ssd is

1:02:01standard you can go all the way up to 32 gigabytes of ram which is the first time on the smaller

1:02:07macbook pro and a four terabyte ssd which is wild if you pull all of that one of these things

1:02:13don't think it would take off um it is still the 13 inch no visual changes so it's not got a larger

1:02:20screen it doesn't look any different there are no internal changes from an architectural perspective

1:02:26i believe that the 16 inch had a new thermal architecture this one doesn't have that so

1:02:32what do you think jason i i think this is very clearly an interim step i mean i feel like there

1:02:40were so many rumors about a 14 inch macro pro you kind of got to put them out of your mind because

1:02:43those were rumors it was unclear they were really unclear about when they were going to happen we

1:02:48saw some conflicting things about a 13 and a 14 i think clearly even if they're doing something

1:02:53like that that is a that is a new product later they they this is a quick revision of the 13

1:03:00to get it to be um a more current design so the butterfly keyboard being out closer to the macbook

1:03:07air really isn't it than it is to the other macbook pro i wouldn't say that i wouldn't say that um so

1:03:12there are some substantial differences there first off i want to be clear there are two models here

1:03:17essentially just as there were the last time there is the low end model with two thunderbolt

1:03:23three ports and the high end model with four thunderbolt three ports so if you think about

1:03:28it back when we had the macbook escape that was a 13 inch macbook pro but it didn't have the touch

1:03:34bar they in the last revision they all got the touch bar but it was still like a low-end model

1:03:41and a high-end model and the high-end model costs a lot more than the low-end model and that is

1:03:46still the case they basically didn't change the processor and the low-end model the low-end model's

1:03:50difference is really a couple of things the keyboard is different and there's more base

1:03:58ram and there's more base storage so it went from 8 to 16 and from 128 to 256.

1:04:04price also went up to 1299 but i think that that is an effect where they are lifting the pro above

1:04:10the macbook air now because they can that there was a vestige there of the fact the macbook escape

1:04:15was kind of also a macbook air replacement just like the the uh 12 inch macbook was sort of trying

1:04:21to be a macbook air replacement now we have a macbook air so i feel like they're they're now

1:04:26kind of lifting this up but they're still keeping it at 1299 like this is still a uh price conscious

1:04:34pro laptop and that's why it's got the eighth generation processors that said even though the

1:04:42air has a 10th generation intel processor it is of a lower uh performance type so these are going

1:04:51to be faster than the macbook when i said more like the air i meant more in what they changed

1:04:56than like oh yeah sure right then closer to it like you're right they've actually thankfully

1:05:02pushed them further away from each other like the macbook air it is a small update but they

1:05:07but they're definitely also trying to pull these two away from each other and the air and my point

1:05:12about the air's processor is just it's really easy to say oh well this is a 10th generation processor

1:05:17this is an 8th generation processor the 10th is better but um i think the class of the processor

1:05:24matters and so uh even though the air is using a 10th generation processor it's using a low power

1:05:30version and then this is the much more powerful version that's in these i don't love that they

1:05:34didn't touch this processor um it feels very much like this 13-inch macbook pro is a is still like

1:05:43living the life of the low end lowest of the low end it's living the life of the macbook escape

1:05:50but that's you know the fact is if you wish that the 13-inch macbook pro was more you know modern

1:05:58and had more stuff it is also that right the top two models are four port and have the 10th

1:06:05generation processor and so you you know it's interesting that apple has decided they want a

1:06:11cheaper option in the 13 because there are people who don't want to buy a macbook air they want to

1:06:17buy a macbook pro and they need to make something available that sort of fills the gap between the

1:06:23air and the higher end 13 and so this is this product but it is definitely a mostly old tech

1:06:31product with some souped up defaults and the keyboard and you know again i think clearly the

1:06:37message here is we we got to get the keyboard out of there everybody like that's the number one thing

1:06:42the high-end one is updated and uh but it's an interesting story there so they've got the 10th

1:06:48generation processors um but if you go from a ninth generation processor to a like like the

1:06:55the high end has ninth generation processors if you go uh from the old processor to the new

1:07:00processor intel didn't really change the cpu power so it seems like you know you know the suggestion

1:07:08i've got having not tested this is that these new uh high-end 13s are going to be about the same

1:07:16cpu speed as the old models it's not a even though they're going to 10th generation processors the cpu

1:07:22power itself is going to be comparable but um the big thing that intel put in the ice lake generation

1:07:31of processors is graphics so the integrated graphics should be a lot faster i think apple's

1:07:37playing something like 80 right so that and the memory is faster and the um and then along with

1:07:44that they're you know are offering up to 32 gigs of memory for the first time so like there are

1:07:50there are some other benefits that come along with that uh uh pro display xdr support in the high-end

1:07:56model is a part of that it is worth noting as well just like because there is low-end and high-end

1:08:00but there's two configurations of each so it's like if you go to apple's website low-end model

1:08:06is the both of the 1.4 gigahertz quad cores and the high-end model is the two two gigahertz quad

1:08:14core processes but they sell them in like different configurations and it's 1299 1499 1799 and 1999

1:08:22and the and so it's when i talk about like the legacy of the macbook escape this is part of it

1:08:27it's really two computers right the 13-inch macbook pro is two computers and that it's not

1:08:33it's not one computer with four variations it's literally two different computers with two base

1:08:39model variations uh you because you normally apple wouldn't have one computer with four variations

1:08:45right but it doesn't really these are these are 13-inch macbook pro it's really two different

1:08:50computers the good news is that even the cheaper one has the keyboard change but it it doesn't have

1:08:58a lot more than that it's got upgraded specs i mean everybody's going to agree more ram more

1:09:02storage on the base model yes 128 gig storage on the base model it's not really acceptable

1:09:08i'm glad they boosted that i know that they boosted the price by 100 but you're getting

1:09:11more ram and more storage for that but really that is you know for those who remember that's the

1:09:17old macbook escape except now it actually does have a touch bar and they all have escape keys

1:09:21now because this has got the new layout because it's the magic keyboard it's got the inverted t

1:09:25for the arrow keys it's got the physical escape key it's got the separated power key next to the

1:09:31touch bar on the other side and it's still got the touch bar so this is not a revolutionary update it

1:09:36really is a for one of them an almost you know impossible to see update other than the keyboard

1:09:45and then on the other end it is a bit of what we i think we would call traditionally a speed bump

1:09:51although most of the speed bump is going to happen in memory and in gpu but at least it is a new

1:09:59processor kind of thing but we we all know bottom line is going to be that it's about the keyboard

1:10:05and that really i think i look at this announcement i think this is all about apple doing what everybody

1:10:11i would say everybody said since the 16 inch got announced which is they got to get that keyboard

1:10:16out of every other laptop they sell and if that was their priority was we could either ship a fancy

1:10:23new laptop in the 13 slot but it's going to take us another six months or in may we can get it out

1:10:29with this uh new keyboard and ship that first and then work on the next thing i i would choose get

1:10:36it out of the get the keyboard out like first thing you do get that keyboard out of there and

1:10:42and they have done that and that clearly was their priority they also you look at the 16 we talked

1:10:46about it remember when i went to new york and all of that they had the speaker upgrade the microphone

1:10:50upgrade none of that is in here either like it still feels to me like they could take this product

1:10:55and do what they did to the 16 or they did to the 15 and making it the 16 and that is a rumor and

1:11:01that product may yet happen but this isn't that this is just a uh i'd say welcome little update

1:11:11that gets the keyboard right after you know the dark times before and so now if you want a macbook

1:11:17pro with that with a keyboard and you did not want the 16 you're holding out um this product will get

1:11:24you that i think the fact that the things like the speakers and the microphones not being in this

1:11:32machine i think is a pretty clear indication that there is another one coming at some point in the

1:11:37future who knows when purely because like the macbook air has improved uh speakers and microphones

1:11:45right like because that was like a new design so they put that new tech in there and apple seemed

1:11:49really proud of what they did for the laptops with that stuff so even something that seems on the face

1:11:55of it may be quite simple that is more of a tell to me than the screen because they could keep they

1:12:01could redesign this product and keep the screen at 13 inches right like we don't know that the

1:12:06screen has to get bigger like they may may choose to keep it at 13 and make it a little bit smaller

1:12:11who knows right like if and when they do change this computer but there's just like a few like

1:12:16telltale things to me like that i was like okay uh that's not here suggests that there might be

1:12:24something more i do wonder i mean and there i'm sure there's a simple answer for this because

1:12:30and the answer being like because why not but it is interesting to me that they they they revised

1:12:36that 15 inch so aggressively like really did a lot to it and made it like a vastly better computer in

1:12:42so many ways i wonder why they did that then if they weren't going to do it to the smaller one for

1:12:49a while like that is just intriguing to me as a thing to do like i wonder if it was the original

1:12:55plan i would assume so because i can't you know i'm sure there may be some people like oh you know

1:13:00maybe because of covid 19 like that no no you have to do some real work to to get the new keyboard to

1:13:06fit in there it's not like they can just pop it out and swap it in again right like that's gonna

1:13:11gonna take some work this wasn't a thing that just came about a month ago because they they couldn't

1:13:15make the new one yep but it is just intriguing to me do you know what i'm saying they really have

1:13:22made a gap but in this line between those two products from a functionality perspective which is

1:13:28interesting but that is what that's where they are i you know whenever i'm able to go back to

1:13:37my studio i've said this before like i want to have a laptop right and and we recording from

1:13:42that laptop using the same one to travel i i have no idea what i'm gonna get out of this or the

1:13:49macbook air like there are there are benefits and uh disadvantages to both in my mind like i really

1:13:58i have the time to think about it but i'm gonna spend that time thinking about it because as i

1:14:03mentioned about the 16 inch i've really liked the touch bar i think that's a cool thing but i also

1:14:08really loved the speakers and how great they were um and yeah i thought it would be an easy decision

1:14:14for me because the macbook pro would get bigger and i didn't want bigger but that didn't happen

1:14:19so now i'm back in in unsure territory again but i think the key thing here the key message to take

1:14:27away is they changed the keyboard and they've done it and i think that's great like if there is a an

1:14:33update to the 13 inch maybe you know apple knew that they wanted to do something else with that

1:14:38they wanted to do something more with that and that was going to come later i'm pleased that

1:14:42they didn't wait before they updated this computer because the butterfly keyboard was a mistake

1:14:49apple knows it was a mistake now um i'm sure they had good intentions but it didn't pan out

1:14:56sometimes things don't pan out and replacing it finally like and now having all of the laptops

1:15:02have a much better hopefully more reliable keyboard like that needed to be done and i am

1:15:08really pleased that they have done it right like that's the good story here yeah yeah for sure

1:15:12jason you have had a tale you have wanted to tell for many weeks now and we kept bumping it we kept

1:15:18bumping it and we decided in fact i made a promise to you last week that no matter what happened

1:15:24today and what has happened is we had an interview and apple released a new laptop but i said no

1:15:29matter what happens you're going to get to tell your story this week so jason please tell your

1:15:34story oh boy no pressure the upgrade ends god i want to tell the story it just so what really

1:15:39made me laugh is i had this happen to me and then in in uh atp episode 372 a few weeks ago casey lis

1:15:45um had the same or a very similar thing happened to him um which is that we were recording episode

1:15:56290 so i guess you can place that at six weeks ago so the early days of the lockdown and as we're

1:16:06talking um dropbox starts listing every folder that i have that's shared and saying i've deleted

1:16:14this folder and and fortunately this was in the episode where you were talking about your 16-inch

1:16:22macbook pro yeah and so i could just not pay attention and wonder why all my files were

1:16:31being deleted uh for a while which was great otherwise i would have had to stop the show

1:16:35be like wait wait wait wait wait so i don't really know why this happened it seems that my

1:16:39what happened on my server which was also on my dropbox account is that my um my giant hard drive

1:16:47which is a drobo 5d died it died and so it was no longer mounted and i don't know why dropbox would

1:16:57do this but since the drop dropbox file was on that server it decided to interpret that as me

1:17:05deleting all of my files which doesn't make any sense so i good news is i can rewind my dropbox

1:17:13and i got all those files back and it wasn't that big a deal eventually i figured it out

1:17:17however my drobo died and i have like 10 terabytes of data on it it's gone

1:17:26i use that to store my podcast archives my works in progress things that i don't need to edit

1:17:34immediately but i do need to work on my whole plex library is on there my time machine backups are on

1:17:41there and when i try to figure it out what what i would do is i turn it on and it would do this

1:17:48thing where it lights up and it shows all the drives and then it has a little progress bar at

1:17:52the bottom and it kind of goes across and then it lights up and shows all the drives and then it has

1:17:59a progress bar that goes across and i thought oh no like it seemed like it was trapped in kind of

1:18:06a boot loop where it was trying to start up but it was failing so this is terrifying i ended up

1:18:15contacting drobo's support and they gave me some tips for free which was nice i didn't have to pay

1:18:22for uh i was going to pay for a service you know ticket but it turns out that they figured out what

1:18:28was going on and and and turned actually refunded my money i was gonna i already had paid them but

1:18:34they said okay reboot take all your drives out and reboot and then run this diagnostic and send us

1:18:40the files and the good news good in quotes that they came back with was your drives are probably

1:18:48fine but the drobo hardware is is bad something bad happened to it and i've had this for you know

1:18:54i don't know seven years something like that it's a long time okay so this is not good because even

1:19:01if i even if my disk disks are fine i can't get to them um i did have a backup the um i have a

1:19:14backblaze backup and that was intact so um about seven terabytes of data which is what i considered

1:19:24my essential files um i didn't have things like my plex library on there because the way i figured

1:19:30it and my rationale was why would i back up a movie that i ripped from a dvd that i have

1:19:36in my house so i could just rip it again um it also and i didn't realize that this at the time

1:19:42the uh i think by default backblaze doesn't do things like disk images so i had some like virtual

1:19:48machines for old versions of mac os and stuff that were also not backed up but um but it was

1:19:55seven that's fine you know stevens yeah it's 7.2 terabytes or something of data that i did back up

1:20:03to back backblaze and for those who don't know backblaze has this feature which i'd never used

1:20:07before which is you can order a usb drive with your backup on it and have it sent to you in the

1:20:15mail and then actually if you then wipe the drive and send it back to them they'll refund your money

1:20:20or most of your money so uh turns out there's a seven terabyte limit because it's an eight terabyte

1:20:25drive in there so i had to uncheck a few things and not restore those using the hard drive although

1:20:32that's fine because it was a few hundred uh gigs i could i could probably download that if i really

1:20:37wanted to but i i loaded it up with about seven terabytes worth of of my data and i pressed the

1:20:42button and what it does is it start sort of like does a backblaze restore um of seven terabytes to

1:20:51the hard drive and as you might imagine especially if you used backblaze and done a restore of any

1:20:55kind like that takes a while and i get the sense that it took days for that to actually like process

1:21:03so it was a while before i even got the note that said we've we're going to ship you your drive but

1:21:08i started that process i said please restore this because i i know that you've got this data i'm not

1:21:13going to download seven terabytes of data please put it on a drive and ship it to me also this is

1:21:17in the earliest days of the lockdown so there's this feeling of like you know when yeah let's do

1:21:23it now to see if they will give it to me will they even be working who knows um i have a second

1:21:28backup though which is really great i use arc which if people don't know is a it's basically

1:21:34a third-party backup utility and then you can point it at a data source where you want to save

1:21:39your backups and in my case since i have two terabytes of dropbox space at the time i actually

1:21:44had three i went down a plan on my dropbox i actually use a big chunk of that for an arc

1:21:50backup so it's files that i don't see i've turned them off on my uh on my mac so it doesn't sync

1:21:56them at all and arc just saves the backup stuff to dropbox and that was for my works in progress

1:22:04because what i wanted is i wanted a second backup like if i'm working on a project

1:22:09and it's not done it's more important than the archive project the archive projects are important

1:22:13but the ones that i i'm still working on and need to be done soon are more uh important so

1:22:21good news is um and and if i'm being honest i kind of forgot what the arc backup was doing

1:22:30or that i had it and then i was like don't wait a second don't i have another and i opened arc

1:22:34and it was like would you like to restore and i'm like oh yeah right great great i found i found

1:22:40that backup that i had forgotten i was even doing so thank you past me um however there was one

1:22:48project so that meant i could get those right off of dropbox immediately it was great i restored

1:22:52them to my mac and i had them fantastic um but one project i did that sunday before the monday

1:23:01where it died overnight um and it turns out that i i figured out when it when the the drive died

1:23:08because i had arc set to back up my works in progress folder at 11 p.m every day

1:23:17and the sunday project didn't get backed up ah okay so it died before 11 p.m

1:23:23and so that was a file that i i still had like some dropbox links from files people had sent me

1:23:30and i had some zoom files for this podcast project so i could kind of like reconstruct

1:23:35most of it although not all of it enough to do it enough to do the project but i was missing

1:23:41that project because it fell through the cracks so that was a bummer

1:23:46so now i'm sitting here and i'm like okay i've got i've got backblaze sending me a drive

1:23:50sometime from somewhere it's still kind of a mystery i've got my arc backup of a couple of

1:23:58things my work in progress folder less one project and a couple other folders on the server that i

1:24:03was able to restore the robot or not folder was there you'll be happy to know so i was able to

1:24:08continue my work producing robot or not um but now i've got a bunch of drives with data on them

1:24:17but only in drobo format and i did drobo 5d what do i do like and i decided first off

1:24:28that even though i said remember what i said earlier about how it's fine i don't need those

1:24:34movie files i'll just re-rip my entire movie collection from the discs again i decided i did

1:24:42not want to do that so i went on ebay and i found a drobo 5d and i bid on it um and there was another

1:24:54drobo 5d that was buy it now and so i put the buy it now price on the one that was on an auction and

1:25:02like a day later i got outbid for it and i just bought the other one i was just like no forget it

1:25:07just buy it now and it was a buy it now link and it was from a company that um it was uh free

1:25:13returns up to 30 days and i thought well maybe what i'll do is i'll buy it put the discs in

1:25:18to get the data off of it and return it and then get something else yeah and i felt a little bit

1:25:23guilty but yeah well i decided i didn't want i didn't want a used drobo because i figure it's

1:25:29probably gonna die because they're all of the same vintage more or less this model i see okay this

1:25:34this shows because i don't do any of this stuff and honestly listening to casey stories and your

1:25:38stories i'm pleased that i don't manage one of these things but you the drives that you had you

1:25:44they had to go back into another drobo 5d for you to get the data right airy raid like technology

1:25:51so you have to stick them in the same model basically or it won't they might have another

1:25:56model but like i just wanted to get the drobo 5d and read those read that data and get all my data

1:26:01back off it was if it was truly intact like they thought it was so i felt a little guilty about

1:26:05buying it from the place that said free returns because i thought i'm kind of abusing the return

1:26:09policy here i'm basically renting a drobo um although i would be paying shipping and i actually

1:26:14offered them like stuff that they didn't provide me when at the end of the story i'll tell you what

1:26:20happened there but um but i i ended up buying that so now i've got that part of it but i think i'm

1:26:26thinking to myself i don't want to buy a new drobo um drobo has a reputation i've actually been really

1:26:33well taken care of by my my drobo it lasted a while when a drive died i could pop it out

1:26:39put in a new drive it worked really well i was it was a five disk array so like i had a huge amount

1:26:43of storage and if one drive died all the other drives still had the data so you pop in a new

1:26:48drive it brings it up and you didn't lose anything and that worked i had like three or four drive

1:26:53failures over the course of the time i had it it always worked perfectly at the same time i thought

1:26:57to myself maybe what maybe what i should do this time this is an older piece of hardware is maybe

1:27:03i should just buy a a disk array of my own maybe i should just buy a raid and some raid you know

1:27:10raid hardware or raid software and just do it that way can i ask why that would be better

1:27:16why than a drobo drobo's super proprietary and also the older drobos are going to have a limit

1:27:26on the size of the drives i believe you can stick in them and there are bigger drives that are made

1:27:29now and i guess if you made your own if you've got an enclosure and then used software on the mag

1:27:37if this kind of thing happened again you wouldn't have to jump through the hoops that you had to

1:27:42jump through because nothing's proprietary right in in theory or at least the the software would

1:27:47be proprietary but i could get another enclosure and probably still read the data but you're

1:27:51controlling the software though yeah also it's cheaper also it's cheaper because the drobo

1:27:56hardware is expensive and drobo got sold and i don't you know like i don't i i'm not a believer

1:28:01in that in that company to be honest i like i kind of just don't want to be in that space anymore that

1:28:06it served me well i don't have an anchor toward robo that a lot of people have but i don't want

1:28:09to be like i only ever hear about Synology anymore like i don't hear about drobo anymore so here so

1:28:14here's the thing and i don't play in that world because i have a mac mini server i'm not interested

1:28:19in a nas a network attached storage a server not interested in it i want a big drive on my mac mini

1:28:25my mac mini is my server i already have a server so drobo makes uh nas and they also make or at

1:28:31least made attached storage which is what the 5d is the d stands for disk it's a disk it's not a

1:28:35server like the 5s um i don't want a Synology i don't want a Unix server i have a mac mini i bought

1:28:42a new mac mini a couple years ago that's my server not interested i i am comfortable with a mac having

1:28:48a mac as a server can do a lot of unix unixy things and it can be a mac that i attach to from

1:28:54my ipad when i want to so um so what i ended up doing is i bought a thunder bay which is a four

1:29:00disk enclosure from other world computing um i had i had a couple of drives that i had not even opened

1:29:11that were backup drives for the drobo that i just was keeping by in case a drive died i ordered a

1:29:18couple more drives um and then i set that up so i actually and it comes the thunder bay came with

1:29:28a soft raid license so i it's which is max software very straightforward it does it does

1:29:34raid with redundancy so that if one of the drives dies i can pop it out and pop in another drive

1:29:38it's the same idea it will rebuild it so you give up some space on each drive but if one of the

1:29:42drives dies one of the physical drives dies you just pull it out and pop a new one in plus i it

1:29:48gives me actually a little more control i feel like than than drobo did in terms of my different

1:29:52disk volumes and all of that so i got that set up so now i have a big disk with not a lot on it

1:29:56because i haven't gotten my my drobo back but i get the drobo from ebay oh there was a lot that

1:30:02happened this is why i want to tell the story before i forgot it i have a drobo from ebay

1:30:07um i plug it in it's like the moment of truth i put all the drives in you got to keep them in the

1:30:11right order put them all in in the right order turn it on this drobo didn't even have a power

1:30:17cord but i have my power cord for my other one plug it in it mounts all my data is there oh great

1:30:26by the way the day before this my drive and back place showed up yeah so i copied all that onto the

1:30:33thunder bay raid and then i got this and i thought well do i want to copy it all again um and i did i

1:30:40had to like find software to like compare so i could make sure that i got everything off the

1:30:45drobo before i wiped it how'd you do that um the software yeah what is that dan wrote about i don't

1:30:55have that in front of me okay if dan wrote about it i'll find it put it Dan wrote about one piece

1:30:59of software that's kind of ugly but uh it was like a file comparison tool and i used that for the most

1:31:05part i used two different ones both of which were kind of unsatisfying but did enough of a job for

1:31:10me to figure out what files were missing beyond compare beyond compare is one of them what a great

1:31:15name right um and i think i also used chrono sync and both of them were frustrating but also helpful

1:31:25um beyond compare feels like very much a unix like or like an open source tool that was ported

1:31:30to the mac in the 2000s but like you know for the for the job that you're wanting to perform what

1:31:35else to expect yeah it wasn't it's not super slick it feels it just it feels like a very first decade

1:31:40of mac os 10 kind of uh kind of app but uh so i i did all that uh and then and then i had it right

1:31:48then i've got and i've got the thunder bay set up and then i've got this drobo that's still got all

1:31:53my data and i think well what do i do now thunder bay makes me laugh every time you say it i know

1:31:57right well it's a it's uh ontario thunder bay ontario it's a it's a city in canada it's where

1:32:03paul shafer is from um so what do i do with the drobo and i decided i was i i like i said earlier

1:32:11i didn't want to be in the drobo business anymore i don't want to use the drobo as a backup for the

1:32:14thunder bay or the thunder bay for a backup for the drobo i just didn't want it anymore

1:32:18so i ejected all the disks and i packaged up the thing and it's actually kind of funny i went to

1:32:26the people who returned it who said we'll take free returns and i i said i would like to return

1:32:30it they sent an email saying sorry you can't return it it was sold as is and i reply back and

1:32:35i say well no actually if you look at this listing it was like an auto reply i said if you look at

1:32:39this listing you'll see that it was not sold as is it was sold with free 30-day buyer pays shipping

1:32:46i would like to ship it back to you and and i said i'll sweeten the offer i have the little front

1:32:52plate for it that you don't have and i have the power cord for it that you don't have i'll throw

1:32:57those in and you can just resell it and you'll you'll you'll make out you sell it for more and

1:33:02they say and their reply so i'm waiting to see what they say and i did not expect their reply

1:33:07because their reply was what if we refund a hundred dollars and you just keep it

1:33:15what literally they're like if you don't return it was like 350 i want to say that's bananas so

1:33:24they give you a 30 back if you just keep it they really didn't want it back and i was already

1:33:31feeling a little guilty about playing the i'm gonna buy it use it and return it game and so i

1:33:35was like okay fine fine give me your hundred dollars because i know what drobos cost on ebay

1:33:42now and i've got the faceplate and the power cable so i'm just gonna put those up on ebay

1:33:51and i'm gonna put them up for uh an amount that i think i will get and i actually put i'm i said

1:33:57a buy it now price and the buy it now price was basically um it would fund the entire thing

1:34:03completely start to finish i would end up ahead slightly actually if somebody pressed the buy it

1:34:10now button and i put that up and it's ebay you're selling things on ebay it's like you don't know

1:34:14how that's gonna go um and i thought is anybody gonna want this but i just lost an auction for

1:34:20one and then did a buy it now on another one and mine is better because it's the totally functions

1:34:26because i just used it that i got from these other people plus the power cable which they didn't sell

1:34:30plus the little magnetic faceplate that they weren't selling so mine's a better product than

1:34:34their product because it's got all the accessories right out of the box but you never know

1:34:40so i put it up on ebay it's like the fifth thing i've ever sold on ebay mike i'm expecting a week

1:34:48of torment as people bid on my my this drobo that i just bought that people gave me a hundred dollars

1:34:53not to send back to them in two hours somebody just did the buy it now and i made a profit on

1:35:00the whole thing i don't understand i mean i do have this vision that there's one drobo and it

1:35:08just goes from person to person to get their drive to get their files off of it and it gets new

1:35:13things loses new things gets new things i keep thinking that what what drobo should do is they

1:35:20should have loaner ones that they charge you 100 bucks for plus shipping or something to take to

1:35:25offload your data but they don't do that so ebay is where that happens so anyway yeah i ended up

1:35:30making a profit on buying a drobo using it to copy my data off and then immediately selling it

1:35:37again and and then i've got my old one that's broken here and it'll go to the electronics

1:35:42recycling oh by the way um there's a little door underneath the drobo that has an ssd in it that

1:35:48is used as a speed cache and i bought that like a year ago so i then bought a little enclosure on

1:35:53amazon a usb-c aluminum enclosure and now i have a 256 gig usb-c ssd attached to my that's actually

1:36:03backing up my boot drive on my mac mini now because why not what are you doing with the old drives

1:36:09so here's here's what happened uh the next thing i did is i bought a i bought a two disc enclosure

1:36:17old one it's actually got like e sata on it and and is it it's usb it's just usb 3 i think so

1:36:27it's an old model but it was cheap from other world computing two disc array and i just put

1:36:33i put the two big discs that were the same size two big discs that were in the drobo in there

1:36:41and i just made that a straight up um straight up array of those two discs added together

1:36:49and i'm using that as my periodic it's not plugged in all the time but like my weekly

1:36:55backup of the entire raid that i've got okay so i because those two discs are big enough

1:37:05and they're not redundant they're they're just purely kind of just summed in terms of data

1:37:11that i can use those and always know that i've got like another drive that's got all my old

1:37:16and comparable files on it or whatever and all my movie files um and i also updated the

1:37:24arc backup to back up every like four hours to dropbox instead of every day to reduce the chance

1:37:31that i'm going to lose something that's a work in progress and a failure um and so yeah i basically

1:37:39didn't lose any data but i could have so it made it taught me a lesson that i do actually need to

1:37:45back up that plex library because i don't want to rip every episode of buffy the vampire slayer

1:37:49again i don't want to do it every hd movie on blu-ray i don't want to do it i i want to keep

1:37:56those around in some way i was happy it turns out to pay a couple hundred dollars that i didn't end

1:38:01up having to pay because of making a profit on the drobo i was happy to pay that so i didn't have to

1:38:06sit here over the course of weeks feeding disc after disc after disc into my dvd player and

1:38:12ripping those in order to rebuild my plex library i was happy to just pay money to get it back so

1:38:18i'm glad i was able to do that turns out that was a decision i made that um that was wrong

1:38:23i don't need to cloud back up that stuff but i do want to like have a physical backup

1:38:27and basically i i it was almost like a smoke test for my um backup strategy where in doing this in

1:38:35the end i didn't lose any data but i did see all of the holes in my strategy and now i have that

1:38:41extra you know it cost me it did cost me because i had to buy a new raid and new drives but it

1:38:46didn't cost me as much as i thought i didn't lose any data i now have more data available for backup

1:38:53on my server than i used to and i was really happy that i used arc and if you're not doing

1:39:00this consider it if you've got extra cloud storage space on google or or on one drive or on dropbox

1:39:06and you've got key files it is an extra place to back things up and um i that saved my bacon

1:39:14for a bunch of stuff to have that arc backup available immediately on dropbox so plus i had

1:39:19i backblaze and i had stuff that i backed up on backplace and i could get it that way too so i

1:39:24but i was happy to have both of those options so yeah it was it was harrowing is what i'm saying

1:39:29i can't believe i made a profit on ebay i didn't lose any of my files in the end and now i have

1:39:36a new four disc monstrosity that is thunderbolt 3 as opposed to my old thunderbolt 2 five disc

1:39:46monstrosity from drobo so in the end that's my story i made money on ebay because they they paid

1:39:54me to not send the to drive back to the best bit i will say again like i will state again i am so

1:40:01pleased that i do not have something like this in my life to have to well the reason i do it is

1:40:09because i have i i need to store like 12 terabytes and i i've seen the argument on atp was why don't

1:40:16you just store that across um some a few drives i used to have a big stack of hard drives attached

1:40:21to my server and i hated it what i like about it is the redundancy which is instead of having like

1:40:26a big drive with my movies on it and a big drive with my podcast files on it and then another big

1:40:30drive that's the backup of the podcast files i mean that's essentially what i've got by having

1:40:34the raid is that i've got if one of those drives fails i've got redundancy and i i really like that

1:40:40because that's happened to me multiple times where a drive has failed and i haven't lost any data i

1:40:44like that and i like having a huge um just a huge giant pit in which i can pour files and i always

1:40:54hated it when i was like well i've got a terabyte here and a terabyte there and another terabyte

1:40:57there but now i have to move things around and split things up and i don't like that and with

1:41:01this approach i don't need to do that i just have a giant server full of files you see if i did have

1:41:0812 terabytes of data i would do something like what you and casey are doing my point is i just

1:41:15don't have it um i don't keep stuff like especially project files there's only one show that i keep

1:41:23uh logic projects for but i just keep them in dropbox and on time machine and a backblaze like

1:41:30that's it um i don't keep the logic projects on my other shows more than a couple of weeks

1:41:36because in 10 years i've never needed one so i delete i have a little hazel actions written

1:41:43uh and set up that actually do delete a bunch of shows after a while but some of my stuff is

1:41:53stuff i keep because i have gone back to it like the incomparable i absolutely do go back to those

1:41:59i have a clip show every year that i do and um i will sometimes have to reach way back in the

1:42:05archive and i've got most of other than the first like 70 or so episodes i've got all the files for

1:42:09those to a part of kill is the same way so those are the ones where i just have i'm going to keep

1:42:14those files and that's i could store those somewhere but those two shows together are

1:42:21about three and a half terabytes of archived material so i'm not going to put that on a

1:42:26like regular cloud service provider but i i totally get your point which is um if you don't

1:42:32store those files you don't you don't need that approach and then that leaves aside the whatever

1:42:37six terabytes seven terabytes of video files that i have on my plex server which again are replicable

1:42:43but i don't want to replicate them so what i will say though this is this is my addendum to this my

1:42:49asterisk i don't have any media files nor do i have any physical media right just don't just

1:42:56don't have any blu-rays i have a few like barely any blu-rays yep and i don't have a plex server

1:43:02or anything like that no you're you're you barely have any possessions at all yes i'm like i'm like

1:43:07steve jobs in that room you know with sitting on the floor with another i spent two days this week

1:43:11without any internet my wi-fi was down oh yeah how'd that go we couldn't watch anything yeah so

1:43:19that is like the this is the only thing where i'm thinking that like maybe there needs to be an

1:43:25introduction of something like into my life but i but i don't know what it is yet um of media in

1:43:32some description because also where we live lte isn't that good like you can watch youtube videos

1:43:40but we couldn't watch any disney plus stuff like that just would not work because we're trying to

1:43:45watch any apple tv right like i don't think the apple tv has any sense of uh not playing at full

1:43:52resolution i just don't think it could even comprehend such a thing because i could watch

1:43:58the same content on my phone but if i tried to watch it on the apple tv it would we just would

1:44:03not work so that made me realize that like maybe i need something but i don't know what it what it

1:44:11is right because like adina was like why don't you just watch some of the stuff you've bought

1:44:15and it's like well but i don't have it saved anywhere yeah right like it's just i bought

1:44:21it on itunes and it's it's up in the cloud what i do oftentimes is on my iphone and on my ipad

1:44:28i will occasionally just download something using either plex or using the tv app just to have like

1:44:35usually it happens when i'm on a going on a trip i'll download some movies for that for the

1:44:41airplane and then i will just keep them on there and then if i'm in a no connectivity situation

1:44:48those are still there and it's sometimes a delightful surprise like what did i download

1:44:51eight months ago my smaller ipad which is the one that i use when i'm when i'm traveling has some

1:44:58movies on it but like it's most it's like stuff i've seen like it it still isn't like that is not

1:45:03a solution which is long term or whatever like i need a if i want to do this it needs to be a

1:45:10little bit more considered than that which is just like a random crap shoot it's like yeah but

1:45:14you know if we had no internet for a week we would have turned to that but for two days we just played

1:45:18animal crossing like whatever um but it did make me realize i don't have anything which was just

1:45:23like an interesting thought but i will just say i'm happy that i don't save tons and tons and tons

1:45:28of data yeah well i i went through that a while ago where i took like i used to have everything of

1:45:36shows that were ephemeral um and those are all now you know is it's been 60 days or 30 days or

1:45:44something and it just deletes them um and with the shows that i'm keeping it actually goes through

1:45:48and it it archives them it like compresses them and saves them off um just to it takes up less

1:45:55space that way but still they're they're they're there because i do go back and uh and pull that

1:46:02stuff out and we end up being uncomfortable they're like recurring jokes and things that happen and i

1:46:06just want to keep those those i want to keep around i i've found that i've regretted losing

1:46:11the most of the first 75 episodes so i'm just not going to do that now are you happy that you got to

1:46:19tell your story i feel like you know if just for me now i've gotten it while i still remember the

1:46:25story it's still near and dear to me um with enough remove that some of the real pain of

1:46:30worrying if i lost you have those moments right you have that moment where you're like oh no right

1:46:35like and no is not what i said uh and so it's good uh to have a little removed from it it's all

1:46:42worked out um i would have been okay if the drives had been dead because i could have just re-ripped

1:46:49my plex library and that would have been annoying but i could have done it it taught me some lessons

1:46:54about holes in my backup strategy i i think raids with redundant discs are fun and awesome and i

1:47:02recommend them but also discs are enormous now and you could just buy a couple of enormous discs and

1:47:06use those all right this episode is brought to you by kiwi co kiwi co help get your kid to put down

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1:49:01upgrade our thanks to kiwico for their support of this show and relay fm hashtag ask upgrade

1:49:09to finish out today's show steven asks which streaming music services do you subscribe to

1:49:15and do you still buy music downloads or physical media apple music and no nothing

1:49:24occasionally there'll be an artist who i like who does like a kickstarter or has a rarities thing

1:49:33and i will buy that from them directly like something on bandcamp or something like that

1:49:40otherwise no i don't buy music anymore uh i subscribe to apple music and spotify

1:49:45my spotify subscription is like legacy at this point um it's still in i don't like i have like

1:49:54a few family members that use the login um and then also for me now like there's there is a

1:50:00podcast that i do listen to on spotify i remember that show the besties that i mentioned that went

1:50:06that was like a video game show that i like that went to spotify right i listen to it on spotify

1:50:11now like i thought i wouldn't and i have started it and now i listen every week um the way i get

1:50:18around this by the way like is like how do i remember i have an email newsletter which they

1:50:24post every time an episode comes out so i just leave that email in my saying later folder in my

1:50:28email and then i'll just when i when i listen to it i get rid of it and that's how i remember

1:50:33to go there because like i wouldn't remember otherwise so that's that um i do i don't buy

1:50:39music similar to you i don't like if if apple music's where i do my listening if i find an

1:50:45album that i like i don't buy it but there is still music that i buy for similar reasons like

1:50:49somebody who's not on streaming services but they have bandcamp or whatever right like then i'll buy

1:50:55it that way um like you know i have a couple of independent musicians that i like for for music

1:51:00and stuff for like that i work to louis zong is my favorite person i'll put a link to their bandcamp

1:51:05um in in the show notes because i know people will ask uh and so they they sell a bunch of music

1:51:11there and i'll just i buy it i buy that right like that's because they don't they have a few things

1:51:16on apple music but nowhere near their full catalog but that's the only reason that i will buy uh

1:51:21music these days either you know the occasional vinyl will find its way into my collection but

1:51:27that's rare james asked this is probably mostly for me jason but if you have any thoughts you can

1:51:32share them too of course i'd like to hear your take on the nhs's decision to not adopt the apple

1:51:38google contact tracing exposure notification uh option yeah so the nhs after previously saying

1:51:44that they would uh are now saying like lol no we're just gonna make our own contact tracing

1:51:50thing i'm really disappointed about this um you know there's there's more governments like i saw

1:51:55that like after everybody thought france was going to get on board and then they decided again like

1:52:01no we're not gonna like we're gonna do it ourselves even after praising apple's method

1:52:04the praise of apple's method made everybody think that they were gonna do it but they're just like

1:52:08nah don't worry about it uh i i find it just it's ridiculous i think that that it's very clear that

1:52:16apple and google's method is the best baseline to build upon because it integrates cross-platform

1:52:24it has deeper tie-ins with the system um i think it's honestly yeah i find it quite

1:52:30quite disappointing um and i hope that when it becomes more integrated into the system later

1:52:38down the line that a lot of these countries will will change their minds but i think honestly most

1:52:44governments want the data honestly that's what they want it for and so i mean when when the nhs

1:52:52launches their app like i i probably will go for it and even though i am opposed to their their

1:53:00thinking because i think it's important but i'm conflicted right like i'm i'm more conflicted now

1:53:11because i want the privacy that that google and apple were going to give but at the same time

1:53:17i also want to know if i'm coming into contact with people so i don't know but the jury's still

1:53:24out for me a little bit but like i am disappointed i think it's i think it's really ridiculous

1:53:28uh and and i wished that politics weren't getting in the way of this but they are stupid ask uk

1:53:37upgrade stephan asks uh i want to use my ipad and macbook pro at the same desk with the same keyboard

1:53:45at different times of the day so i'm looking for a keyboard that can switch between them easily what

1:53:49would you recommend do you have any recommendations i found one oh what do you what did you find the

1:53:55logitech craft uh i know that both john voorhees and david sparks use this uh it's a logitech

1:54:01keyboard i think federico uses it too actually it's a logitech keyboard which apparently is

1:54:06pretty nice uh but and it has multiple uh bluetooth uh profiles built into it with

1:54:13with dedicated buttons that you can tap and it will switch to different uh devices and i know

1:54:19logitech make good stuff logitech make good stuff and this one has this little wheel on it that

1:54:23people seem to like to it looks like a nice keyboard i don't own one but uh i know multiple

1:54:27people that do and they're happy with it yeah i haven't used one of these kind of keyboards in a

1:54:33very long time i used to rely on the logitech uh easy switch keyboard logitech has been making

1:54:38multiple bluetooth uh keyboards for a while now they know how to do it right like that yeah exactly

1:54:45uh if you want a mechanical keyboard that does that you get one of the keychron keyboards my

1:54:50key crimes on the way jason my keychron k6 that i backed on on kickstarter it's on the way yeah i

1:54:56have the i i have the two and the four i want to say i i but i've got uh i've got two keychron

1:55:02keyboards and although i prefer my um vortex race 3 keyboard and that's the one i use on my desk

1:55:07every day i have a keychron bluetooth mechanical keyboard that i use with my ipad and it's great

1:55:13and it's got a shortcut that lets you switch between multiple bluetooth modes so you can

1:55:17switch between devices um and there's even a um i got i got sent by a friend a wacky um

1:55:25there's there's this wacky bluetooth adapter that like will attach to any usb keyboard and turn it

1:55:32into a bluetooth uh keyboard and i think it's got a toggle but anyway yeah the simple answer is

1:55:37logitech makes some very nice keyboards that have switchable uh bluetooth things so check those out

1:55:42and jonathan asks if you could magic wand one feature into ios 14 what would it be

1:55:51i added not audio related into this because we always pick the same thing

1:55:57audio hijack or like more audio support for me there's an easy one which i've found more and

1:56:03more recently which is the ability to create my own custom keyboard shortcuts in ipad os so i

1:56:10could you know i could have a keyboard shortcut for this or that right like one to pull down uh

1:56:16one to like i don't know open this in split view on the left side or this one to like just you know

1:56:21hit the escape key just to take me to home right like that kind of stuff that's that's what i would

1:56:26want um it's something that i genuinely hope and kind of think they might do um it seems more

1:56:35likely now than ever ever i would say like the more keyboard shortcuts stuff and customization

1:56:41and i also well you could you could see how um and we talked about this when the magic keyboard

1:56:47came out that you could if you added some features for things like media controls you don't need to

1:56:52have that function row if i can map um a different key combination to play pause or next track or

1:56:59previous tracker brightness up or brightness down if i if i care then it's solved right like it just

1:57:06throw in things like executing a shortcut when you use a keyboard or uh it would be even better

1:57:15if you could do a prep it's certainly system-wide keyboard shortcuts would be good so i'm with you

1:57:19there i'm going to throw in another ipad feature here for my magic wand which is um full-on

1:57:24external display support so like if you plug in an external monitor it's a second screen like it is

1:57:29on the mac and you can use your mouse or trackpad and keyboard right now it's all just kind of

1:57:36mirrored it would seem now that we've got this full cursor support on the ipad the next step

1:57:41is to let people plug it in to a big display and use it like you would a laptop

1:57:46i again these are two things that feel possible like more and more possible now and i really hope

1:57:55that we see those in ipad os 14 which we could be four weeks away uh or as mark said like eight

1:58:02weeks away uh so that's that's actually a good uh time to thank mark german again for joining the

1:58:10show i was really really pleased to have that discussion with him it was fascinating and i

1:58:15really appreciated having him on the show so thanks again mark and thanks to you for listening

1:58:20as always thanks to our sponsors kiwico squarespace and linode for their support of the show uh you

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1:58:50go to sixcolors.com where you can find jason's work and jason is @jasonel j s n e double l on

1:58:57twitter i am i mike i am y ke and we'll be back next time until then say goodbye jason snow bye

1:59:08everybody

1:59:08[MUSIC PLAYING]

1:59:12Cool.