Connected

00:00:00 ◼   ► (upbeat music)

00:00:02 ◼   ► Hello and welcome to Connected, episode 227.

00:00:12 ◼   ► It was made possible by our sponsors,

00:00:14 ◼   ► TextExpander, Pingdom, and Luna Display.

00:00:17 ◼   ► I'm your host, Stephen Hackett,

00:00:19 ◼   ► and I am joined by my co-host, Myke Hurley.

00:00:21 ◼   ► How are you, Myke?

00:00:23 ◼   ► - Hi.

00:00:25 ◼   ► - You went first this time.

00:00:27 ◼   ► - Yeah, I know, I knew you were gonna do it.

00:00:29 ◼   ► Did you?

00:00:30 ◼   ► - Yes.

00:00:31 ◼   ► - Okay.

00:00:32 ◼   ► And we have Federico Vittucci, of course.

00:00:33 ◼   ► Hey buddy.

00:00:34 ◼   ► - Hi.

00:00:35 ◼   ► Hi, I'm not sure that I like this thing

00:00:38 ◼   ► where you're switching orders every single week.

00:00:40 ◼   ► It makes me anxious and it makes me preoccupied

00:00:44 ◼   ► with the beginning of the show.

00:00:46 ◼   ► I really don't like it.

00:00:46 ◼   ► - I think we need to draw up a treaty.

00:00:49 ◼   ► I think it's the only way forward.

00:00:50 ◼   ► - Like, this anxiety caused by the,

00:00:55 ◼   ► getting caught by surprise, it's really not good for me.

00:00:58 ◼   ► I feel like I need to meditate right after doing the intro of the show.

00:01:02 ◼   ► Like this is super.

00:01:03 ◼   ► Steven, we need to find a solution to this.

00:01:06 ◼   ► Please choose.

00:01:07 ◼   ► I'm fine with being second.

00:01:10 ◼   ► I think, I think Federico, I think, I think you're first.

00:01:14 ◼   ► Just as I think about the show, I think about you first.

00:01:18 ◼   ► Sorry, Myke.

00:01:19 ◼   ► Whoa.

00:01:20 ◼   ► Okay.

00:01:21 ◼   ► Thank you.

00:01:22 ◼   ► See you then.

00:01:23 ◼   ► I only like today landed right from coming from Seattle and decided that I would do this show.

00:01:29 ◼   ► That is my commitment to this show. I am on like three hours of half decent sleep because I had a

00:01:34 ◼   ► dream about a plane crash whilst on the plane going through turbulence. But yet here I am

00:01:39 ◼   ► being just discarded. It's just some like afterthought. I can't believe this.

00:01:43 ◼   ► Federico Federico, plug your ears. Maybe I'm saving the best for last, Myke.

00:01:48 ◼   ► No, you can't try and get out of it now. You just said when I think of the show,

00:01:53 ◼   ► I think of Federico. I don't know what I'm doing here. Why am I here? I cannot win. Oh my god,

00:01:59 ◼   ► stick with the surprise. It's fine. You put yourself in this situation. No one's gonna

00:02:05 ◼   ► help you out. Don't choose. Don't choose. It's fine. Please do follow up. Yes, please do follow

00:02:10 ◼   ► up. It's time for follow up. We're gonna talk about the iPad mini a little bit. We spoke about

00:02:15 ◼   ► rumors that it could be back from the dead. And some people are excited about that. It seems like

00:02:21 ◼   ► We got a couple tweets, a couple of emails from people talking about how they end up in deployments.

00:02:27 ◼   ► It's because they're small. This one tweet from Rogan says that their company basically installs

00:02:35 ◼   ► them with every conference room so you can see like if a room is booked, book a room who has it

00:02:42 ◼   ► booked, etc. Which is- I get an Instagram ad all the time for this like e-ink thing that you can

00:02:50 ◼   ► can put on a conference room door like yes constantly can't you get this one I

00:02:55 ◼   ► have seen it occasionally it's called Joan that's it like I'm caught this is

00:03:02 ◼   ► one of my most frequent ads and I don't know why and I also like I think to

00:03:06 ◼   ► myself like how useful I don't know how useful these things are like to buy like

00:03:10 ◼   ► a specific piece of technology but I bet it's cheaper than buying an iPad mini

00:03:15 ◼   ► that seems excessive. Oh actually no I tell a lie my god it's 449 euros for one of these things

00:03:22 ◼   ► it's a six inch e-ink screen how much money like to put one of these on every conference room

00:03:28 ◼   ► plus there's 449 euros right to buy one of the six inch ones plus an 8.99 euro a month fee

00:03:35 ◼   ► god why would you do this? Of course there is of course there's a subscription service

00:03:40 ◼   ► An iPad mini in every conference room is the popular slogan from the 90s.

00:03:44 ◼   ► It's the goal that this person has achieved.

00:03:49 ◼   ► Oh boy, it does seem excessive, but yeah, I've seen systems like this. And if you're at a big

00:03:56 ◼   ► company where you have thousands of people and they're all in open offices, so they want to

00:04:01 ◼   ► take refuge in a conference room, I could see where you could get there. We also got some

00:04:06 ◼   ► some feedback from people using iPads in education.

00:04:10 ◼   ► We actually had a really interesting Twitter conversation

00:04:12 ◼   ► with Fraser Spears who of course ran or runs

00:04:15 ◼   ► the first iPad like one to one on the planet,

00:04:18 ◼   ► which is really cool.

00:04:19 ◼   ► And how the Mini is fine size-wise for like little kids,

00:04:24 ◼   ► but as kids get older, you know,

00:04:26 ◼   ► they can handle something bigger.

00:04:27 ◼   ► Of course there's benefits to having a larger screen.

00:04:29 ◼   ► So some schools seem to split, like iPad Minis,

00:04:32 ◼   ► you know, maybe kindergarten or first grade or something,

00:04:35 ◼   ► and then as you get older,

00:04:36 ◼   ► transition to the 9.7 inch iPad.

00:04:39 ◼   ► But in that conversation, of course,

00:04:40 ◼   ► is the price thing, right?

00:04:42 ◼   ► That the Mini is noticeably more than the 9.7 inch iPad.

00:04:46 ◼   ► And Frazier felt pretty strongly on Twitter

00:04:48 ◼   ► that if it comes to pass,

00:04:51 ◼   ► the possibility we talked about,

00:04:53 ◼   ► the 329 iPad going up in price,

00:04:56 ◼   ► I think that's a bad idea.

00:04:58 ◼   ► Frazier thinks that's a bad idea too.

00:05:00 ◼   ► So I don't know if that's gonna happen,

00:05:01 ◼   ► but clearly there's some sort of relationship

00:05:03 ◼   ► between the Mini and the 9.7 inch iPad

00:05:06 ◼   ► that feels a little bit goofy right now,

00:05:08 ◼   ► maybe Apple can straighten that out.

00:05:10 ◼   ► 'Cause if there's anything Apple's good at, guys,

00:05:12 ◼   ► right now, it's making the entry-level models

00:05:15 ◼   ► in a product line really easy to understand.

00:05:18 ◼   ► I mean, just look what they did with the Mac,

00:05:19 ◼   ► it's perfectly clear, so.

00:05:21 ◼   ► - Oh yeah.

00:05:22 ◼   ► - I expect the iPad Mini and the 9.7 inch iPad

00:05:25 ◼   ► to be the same price now.

00:05:26 ◼   ► This is my new prediction.

00:05:27 ◼   ► They will both be $329, and you just have to figure out why.

00:05:32 ◼   ► I mean it does kind of feel like there could be a world where there's a relationship between

00:05:36 ◼   ► the iPad mini and the regular iPad like there is between the two iPad Pros, you know?

00:05:42 ◼   ► Like they're kind of the same, they're just different sizes.

00:05:46 ◼   ► I think it would be nice, but I'm still not holding out hope that there will be another

00:05:50 ◼   ► iPad mini.

00:05:51 ◼   ► It just, I don't know, I don't know how I feel about it.

00:05:54 ◼   ► It just seems, seems like a strange, it would seem like a strange decision, like I can't

00:05:58 ◼   ► out in my head what you would do to bring that product back.

00:06:05 ◼   ► So Myke, you were traveling, you were at PodCon.

00:06:08 ◼   ► I want to hear about that a little bit if you want to share, but you also, I think,

00:06:11 ◼   ► took some of Tyler's advice from last week's show about photography and you've already

00:06:16 ◼   ► implemented some of it.

00:06:17 ◼   ► So tell us about that.

00:06:18 ◼   ► Yeah, so I mentioned PodCon.

00:06:20 ◼   ► So it was a wonderful event.

00:06:23 ◼   ► It was the second PodCon.

00:06:24 ◼   ► I've been at both now and I've done some panels and some audience interaction type stuff.

00:06:30 ◼   ► And I had a really, really great time.

00:06:32 ◼   ► I thoroughly enjoyed PodCon.

00:06:35 ◼   ► I actually preferred PodCon 2 to the first one.

00:06:38 ◼   ► I thought that the group of people that they had was wonderful and there was definitely

00:06:43 ◼   ► more people there this time as well.

00:06:45 ◼   ► So that was really great.

00:06:47 ◼   ► It was wonderful to meet a ton of Relay FM listeners, which is great.

00:06:50 ◼   ► Because I love that events like this, they're focused mostly around a specific type of show.

00:06:57 ◼   ► Like PodCon focuses a lot on comedy and fiction type shows.

00:07:04 ◼   ► So it was really nice to me to meet a bunch of relay FM listeners as well.

00:07:09 ◼   ► It kind of felt like I was representing for what PodCon used to be, you know?

00:07:15 ◼   ► Like this.

00:07:16 ◼   ► Where they're not really like this anymore.

00:07:18 ◼   ► They're very different.

00:07:19 ◼   ► celebrities and stuff like that.

00:07:21 ◼   ► So it felt nice to me to be able to represent what we do.

00:07:26 ◼   ► And so I was honored to attend and it was really great.

00:07:29 ◼   ► And I was on a couple of panels that I really, really enjoyed.

00:07:33 ◼   ► One of them specifically was about podcast origin stories.

00:07:37 ◼   ► And so it was really great.

00:07:38 ◼   ► And you can-- no one's asked me to do this,

00:07:40 ◼   ► but you can buy a digital pass still for PodCon.

00:07:46 ◼   ► And if you do that, you get-- it's

00:07:48 ◼   ► called they call it remote attendance and you will get audio recordings of the

00:07:53 ◼   ► panels. So I think that there was some really interesting stuff in there and

00:07:57 ◼   ► I'm looking forward to digging into some of the stuff that I missed. So that's the

00:08:01 ◼   ► thing that you can do. But yeah I had a great time but I was in Seattle and I

00:08:04 ◼   ► was there for a few days and so whilst I was traveling I thought well this is the

00:08:06 ◼   ► perfect time to play around with some of the apps and tools that Tyler was

00:08:11 ◼   ► talking about on last week's episode. I really enjoyed that by the way you know

00:08:14 ◼   ► just as like a follow-up thing it was great to have Tyler on it I found it

00:08:18 ◼   ► really interesting. So I was playing around more with VSCO because their

00:08:23 ◼   ► editing tools, the filters and stuff, are way better. Like I have been playing

00:08:26 ◼   ► around, I really like darkroom but the fact that every time you apply a filter

00:08:31 ◼   ► it changes any other settings that you made was a little bit weird to me.

00:08:35 ◼   ► But I'm gonna keep playing around with them because VSCO's UI in places is such

00:08:40 ◼   ► a pain, right? Like some of the stuff is so weird but I was playing around with a

00:08:46 ◼   ► bunch of the filters and I found some favorites from the ones that Tyler

00:08:49 ◼   ► suggested so like from the A pack and the C pack and so I've been kind of like

00:08:54 ◼   ► tinkering around there so I posted a bunch of pictures that were edited to my

00:08:59 ◼   ► Instagram stories and stuff and I was getting a something I found really

00:09:03 ◼   ► interesting basically all of the edited pictures people are asking me if it was

00:09:08 ◼   ► taken on my pixel I found that really interesting so you know maybe if you do

00:09:15 ◼   ► some tweaking. People like the images more, I don't know, but I really like that.

00:09:20 ◼   ► There's also one of the other apps that Tyler recommended called Unfold, which is

00:09:24 ◼   ► an app for Instagram stories to kind of like, if you've taken a bunch of

00:09:27 ◼   ► pictures in a day, to post them to your Instagram stories afterwards in like a

00:09:31 ◼   ► curated fashion. I really like some of the templates that this app does, so I

00:09:37 ◼   ► want to play with that one a little bit more as well. So there were just a couple

00:09:41 ◼   ► of things that I enjoyed from spending some bit more time with some of these photo apps. So yeah,

00:09:48 ◼   ► it was really good. Cool beans. I'm glad you're back. I'm glad you had a good time. The pictures

00:09:53 ◼   ► looked awesome. So glad you made it to the West Coast and back in one piece. Despite your scary

00:09:57 ◼   ► dream, apparently. Yeah. Most of me is in one piece. I'll say that much. Psyche is forever broken.

00:10:06 ◼   ► All right, we have some topics this week, including, and I promise this is true this

00:10:12 ◼   ► time unless something happens when I read this ad, Federico is going to talk about his

00:10:16 ◼   ► second iPad Pro.

00:10:17 ◼   ► Breaking news!

00:10:18 ◼   ► Oh, I see.

00:10:19 ◼   ► Oh, there's a CNBC alert that Tim Cook has been fired.

00:10:24 ◼   ► So, um, we'll get to that after this break, I suppose.

00:10:29 ◼   ► We've got to move the topic to next week.

00:10:33 ◼   ► Bye!

00:10:34 ◼   ► [LAUGHTER]

00:10:35 ◼   ► This episode of Connected is brought to you

00:10:37 ◼   ► by TextExpander from our friends at Smile.

00:10:40 ◼   ► TextExpander multiplies your team's productivity,

00:10:43 ◼   ► making up-to-date shared knowledge available instantly.

00:10:47 ◼   ► So using TextExpander, all of your team's common responses

00:10:51 ◼   ► are accessible and searchable through simple abbreviations

00:10:54 ◼   ► and keyboard shortcuts.

00:10:56 ◼   ► And these can be written and edited by your best writer,

00:10:59 ◼   ► so all the grammar can be correct no matter

00:11:01 ◼   ► who is sending the email back to the customer.

00:11:04 ◼   ► Of course, it's available on multiple platforms,

00:11:06 ◼   ► Mac OS, iOS, Windows, and even the web,

00:11:10 ◼   ► and these snippets are updated

00:11:11 ◼   ► immediately everywhere when modified.

00:11:14 ◼   ► So if you're on a team,

00:11:16 ◼   ► TextExpander will change your working life,

00:11:18 ◼   ► leaving more time for you to do what you do best.

00:11:22 ◼   ► So common responses, common links you have to send out,

00:11:26 ◼   ► common language you need to share with customers or clients,

00:11:29 ◼   ► that can all be unified so you can get back

00:11:32 ◼   ► to doing what your job actually is.

00:11:34 ◼   ► And for larger teams, TextExpander supports single sign-on

00:11:38 ◼   ► so you can group accounts and make onboarding a breeze.

00:11:42 ◼   ► You can use TextExpander to master to-do lists,

00:11:44 ◼   ► post to social media, and even help

00:11:47 ◼   ► with Myke and Federico's favorite thing, time tracking.

00:11:50 ◼   ► Go check out the TextExpander blog

00:11:52 ◼   ► for these tips and more.

00:11:54 ◼   ► So at Relay FM, we use TextExpander for teams

00:11:56 ◼   ► to make sure that we don't misspell

00:11:58 ◼   ► any of our sponsors company names.

00:12:00 ◼   ► That's an important thing and some of them,

00:12:01 ◼   ► like TextExpander, has a capital E in the middle of it.

00:12:04 ◼   ► We wanna make sure that those details are always right.

00:12:07 ◼   ► So we have a shared library of snippets

00:12:09 ◼   ► that have all those names in there.

00:12:10 ◼   ► And so when I go to type something somewhere,

00:12:13 ◼   ► TextExpander just makes sure that I'm doing it all

00:12:15 ◼   ► neat and tidy and I really love it.

00:12:17 ◼   ► Visit textexpander.com/podcast

00:12:20 ◼   ► to learn more about TextExpander.

00:12:22 ◼   ► Our thanks to TextExpander from Smile

00:12:24 ◼   ► for their support of this show and Relay FM.

00:12:27 ◼   ► All right, Federico, your time has come.

00:12:31 ◼   ► - Well, not as Tim Cook's time.

00:12:33 ◼   ► His time has come.

00:12:36 ◼   ► - But first, this tweet just really made me laugh

00:12:42 ◼   ► from iStack on Twitter.

00:12:44 ◼   ► My 2019 pick, Apple will release AirPower

00:12:48 ◼   ► before Federico talks about his 11-inch iPad Pro.

00:12:51 ◼   ► That's really good.

00:12:55 ◼   ► AirPower is still not out, even though multiple rumor sites are saying that it's in production

00:13:02 ◼   ► and it's happening, but yes, I am going to talk about my new, well, it was new in December,

00:13:09 ◼   ► my 11-inch iPad Pro.

00:13:11 ◼   ► Okay, so, let me explain why I have a second iPad Pro.

00:13:19 ◼   ► I am not changing the iPad Pro that I consider my work computer.

00:13:23 ◼   ► I'm still working all day on the 12.9.

00:13:26 ◼   ► Nothing has changed there.

00:13:30 ◼   ► Nothing has changed in my setup.

00:13:32 ◼   ► The things that I wrote in December for the different setups of the iPad Pro,

00:13:37 ◼   ► I'm still doing all of that stuff.

00:13:39 ◼   ► So it was not a work-related thing.

00:13:41 ◼   ► So what happened is that I was doing my taxes and realized I had

00:13:49 ◼   ► saved more than I was expecting.

00:13:52 ◼   ► So yeah.

00:13:52 ◼   ► Yeah.

00:13:52 ◼   ► Yeah, the best thing.

00:13:55 ◼   ► That was a good feeling.

00:13:59 ◼   ► And with that in mind, a few days pass and

00:14:02 ◼   ► one of my resolutions for 2019 that I actually started in 2018

00:14:08 ◼   ► was to try and read more books.

00:14:11 ◼   ► So I was reading a book at night instead of playing with my PS4

00:14:15 ◼   ► or being sort of alternating between the two.

00:14:19 ◼   ► And I was holding the 9.7 iPad that I had, like the base iPad, the 2018 one.

00:14:27 ◼   ► Because I don't have the 10.5 iPad Pro anymore, Sylvia is using that one, I don't use it.

00:14:35 ◼   ► So if you remember a few months ago we talked about how I had a 9.7 iPad, the cheap one,

00:14:41 ◼   ► the $300 one, just to read stuff and to sort of play video games and watch videos at night

00:14:47 ◼   ► as a media device and I was holding that iPad and then one night I thought "man, he looks really ugly"

00:14:54 ◼   ► just I was looking at those bezels and I was like "this is so ugly" like this these bezels and this

00:15:02 ◼   ► home button and it doesn't feel right to click I'm not used to clicking anymore and I was reaching

00:15:10 ◼   ► the point where, for a couple of nights, I actually swapped the 9.7 iPad with the 12.9-inch

00:15:19 ◼   ► iPad Pro. Like, I loved the design so much that I sacrificed the comfort and the portability

00:15:26 ◼   ► of the 9.7 just to read on that screen with those bezels and the home indicator and, like,

00:15:32 ◼   ► a design that I could accept, visually speaking and ergonomically speaking, even though it

00:15:39 ◼   ► it was heavier. But the idea of "I don't want to click a button anymore, I don't

00:15:43 ◼   ► want to have these bezels in the way anymore" and so reading on the 12.9

00:15:49 ◼   ► iPad Pro in bed is not a good experience. After a couple of days I realized this

00:15:54 ◼   ► is not gonna work for me. And so I, you know, with the realization that I had

00:16:00 ◼   ► more money saved than I was expecting I went like "maybe, this sounds stupid,

00:16:06 ◼   ► but maybe I should get a base iPad Pro with no cellular, like the smallest

00:16:12 ◼   ► storage option available, and just use it for books, videos, and at this point games

00:16:20 ◼   ► because it's going to be an iPad Pro, so games are gonna look amazing on this

00:16:24 ◼   ► on this device. And so I bought an iPad Pro, I bought an 11-inch iPad Pro, the

00:16:30 ◼   ► 64 gig one with no cellular, just Wi-Fi, no keyboard, just a Smart Folio, and to

00:16:35 ◼   ► make it different from the work iPad, which is the 12.9 space grey one, I bought a silver

00:16:42 ◼   ► 11 inch iPad Pro with a white Smart Folio case.

00:16:46 ◼   ► I saw a silver one for the first time actually. I'd never seen a silver one before, I saw

00:16:52 ◼   ► it over the weekend because I signed a bunch of iPads during podcast which was incredible,

00:16:58 ◼   ► including Alex Cox's, I don't know why she did this to me, but I did it. Alex had

00:17:02 ◼   ► a silver one and I thought it actually looked really nice. Like, I like the way it looked.

00:17:08 ◼   ► It does. Mine's silver. I really like it.

00:17:10 ◼   ► So yeah, I bought an iPad that looked very different from the one that I have, I mean,

00:17:16 ◼   ► besides the fact that it was smaller. But also I intentionally didn't set it up for

00:17:22 ◼   ► work. So no keyboard, no, basically no work-related apps, no email, no calendar.

00:17:28 ◼   ► Do you use a pencil with it?

00:17:30 ◼   ► I don't use the pencil with it, it's always on the top of the 12.9.

00:17:35 ◼   ► And I use it for books, like the books app, Safari reading lists, YouTube, Plex, because

00:17:43 ◼   ► I have my own YouTube DL thing going on to download 4K YouTube content on my Mac Mini,

00:17:49 ◼   ► which I'm gonna write about, I know people are asking for this, I'm gonna write about

00:17:52 ◼   ► it eventually on Mac Stories, and for games.

00:17:56 ◼   ► So my home screen is full of these apps, books, safari, games.

00:18:02 ◼   ► I have Chunky Reader, which is a Jason Snell-recommended app for comics and manga, in my case.

00:18:10 ◼   ► So yeah, I set it up as a media device, and my personal rule is that the 12.9" iPad Pro

00:18:17 ◼   ► does not enter the bedroom at night.

00:18:20 ◼   ► remains charging in the other room and the 11 inch is on my nightstand or on my

00:18:28 ◼   ► desk if it's charging and it's the one that I use if I want to just catch up on

00:18:32 ◼   ► Twitter or just start reading if Sylvia is asleep or play a game.

00:18:37 ◼   ► So that was the idea by another iPad Pro because I couldn't stand visually

00:18:42 ◼   ► speaking and from an interaction standpoint I just couldn't stand the

00:18:46 ◼   ► sight of the bezels and the home button anymore and the screen with the with oh

00:18:51 ◼   ► man the screen with those sharp corners it's like this is this is just

00:18:55 ◼   ► prehistoric I'm not gonna use an iPad like this anymore so thank you you know

00:19:01 ◼   ► thank you me for saving more than originally anticipated and bonus your

00:19:07 ◼   ► Christmas bonus that was my Christmas bonus essentially yes that's what it was

00:19:11 ◼   ► so without make okay this is the obvious joke but like I'm not really saying it

00:19:15 ◼   ► to be a joke, but like this iPad is a consumption device only, right?

00:19:19 ◼   ► Yes, yes.

00:19:20 ◼   ► Like I'm not trying to, you know, like I'm making the reference, but I'm not trying to

00:19:24 ◼   ► make fun of it, you know, like, so you, you don't put like what, what app, what specific

00:19:31 ◼   ► apps are not on it that, that would be on it, if you know what I mean? Like, you know,

00:19:36 ◼   ► do you have a Twitter app? Do you have any like email apps? Like what, what things, what

00:19:40 ◼   ► are the obvious things that you have not put on this?

00:19:43 ◼   ► OK, so no Slack, no Tweetbot, just Twitter that I can use with the, you know, they added

00:19:52 ◼   ► the latest tweets option. So if I want to catch up on my timeline, I just enable that

00:19:56 ◼   ► and scroll back and catch up on Twitter. But no Tweetbot because I feel like if I install

00:20:01 ◼   ► Tweetbot it's gonna sort of allow me to spend more time on Twitter than I really want to.

00:20:07 ◼   ► So it's like I kind of hate the Twitter app, so that's a good way to not spend time on

00:20:11 ◼   ► Twitter, if you know what I mean.

00:20:12 ◼   ► Maybe it'd be even better if you just relegated yourself to using the web browser version.

00:20:16 ◼   ► Yeah, that's a good idea.

00:20:17 ◼   ► I think it's actually better than the iPad app.

00:20:20 ◼   ► No, no taking stuff, so no agenda, no keep it, no drafts, no email, no calendar.

00:20:31 ◼   ► I think the only slightly tangentially work-related thing is shortcuts, but not for work stuff,

00:20:39 ◼   ► because I have some media shortcuts that I use.

00:20:43 ◼   ► Like I have shortcuts to turn on my TV,

00:20:46 ◼   ► to turn on Netflix on my TV,

00:20:48 ◼   ► or to change the color of my lights.

00:20:50 ◼   ► And I like to have those available in the widget,

00:20:53 ◼   ► even though I wish there was a way to say,

00:20:55 ◼   ► only show me these shortcuts in the widget for this iPad,

00:20:59 ◼   ► but it's not possible to select specific devices

00:21:02 ◼   ► for the shortcuts widget.

00:21:04 ◼   ► And also I have, if you allow me,

00:21:06 ◼   ► I have a complaint about shortcuts in that a tragedy has occurred for me.

00:21:13 ◼   ► Yes, so it's been about a month, actually three weeks I think.

00:21:21 ◼   ► Shortcuts is crashing for me everywhere.

00:21:24 ◼   ► On my iPhone, on my iPad Pro, on the big one, and on the small iPad Pro.

00:21:30 ◼   ► Shortcuts it's been three weeks, it's crashing at lunch.

00:21:34 ◼   ► as soon as I open the app it crashes and I've been investigating this and it

00:21:38 ◼   ► appears that there's a problem with iCloud sync so if my devices have iCloud

00:21:43 ◼   ► sync enabled for shortcuts it crashes. If I disable iCloud sync...

00:21:49 ◼   ► So let me ask you do you think that maybe you've done this? Like one of these wild

00:21:56 ◼   ► shortcuts that you've written? I guess that was the problem. Yeah like there's

00:22:01 ◼   ► something corrupted in there, right? Like all like it's, you know, okay.

00:22:05 ◼   ► I deleted all of the shortcuts that I like, the advanced ones that I made,

00:22:10 ◼   ► like the home screen. Oh, good friend base64, right?

00:22:13 ◼   ► All those shortcuts, I deleted them from my account. And for those times when I managed

00:22:21 ◼   ► to actually sync, because I tried to like reinstall the app, install the beta, delete the

00:22:27 ◼   ► the beta, you know, do that entire dance. They're not syncing anymore, but it's still

00:22:32 ◼   ► crashing. So after a while the app starts to crash again and there's nothing I can do

00:22:37 ◼   ► about it.

00:22:38 ◼   ► Can you just not use shortcuts? Like, what is the ramification of this at the moment?

00:22:42 ◼   ► Can you... So I have to disable like out sync, which means anytime I'm working on a shortcut,

00:22:49 ◼   ► I need to remember which device I created the shortcut on, or if I make a change to

00:22:54 ◼   ► shortcut then I have to make the same change manually on other devices.

00:23:01 ◼   ► And this is just terrible because shortcuts never actually synced the order of the shortcuts

00:23:09 ◼   ► for me.

00:23:10 ◼   ► It never actually worked even when Apple said that they fixed the problem, but syncing the

00:23:17 ◼   ► order of shortcuts never really worked.

00:23:19 ◼   ► It's constantly broken.

00:23:22 ◼   ► So that was always broken, but not having sync for someone who writes shortcuts for

00:23:28 ◼   ► a living for mech stories and club mech stories is really problematic for me, because it means

00:23:34 ◼   ► I need to recreate them manually, I need to remember when I'm making changes, it's horrible.

00:23:39 ◼   ► And also I'm kinda...

00:23:42 ◼   ► I don't know if this is justified, it's just my feeling, but I'm kinda concerned about

00:23:46 ◼   ► the release schedule of shortcuts in that they started with this big bang on the App Store and

00:23:54 ◼   ► TestFlight betas and updates on the App Store. Then it's been a couple of months that we've seen

00:23:59 ◼   ► nothing in terms of TestFlight and in terms of App Store releases, and I very much hope that this

00:24:08 ◼   ► is not a sign of the shortcuts team sort of being assimilated into the big conglomerate

00:24:16 ◼   ► of Apple, the company, and now they're being told "No, no, you gotta slow down now. Enough

00:24:21 ◼   ► with these Test Flight betas, enough with these multiple apps releases, now you gotta

00:24:26 ◼   ► release updates on our own schedule, now we are going to tell you when to release updates."

00:24:32 ◼   ► Just my feeling, I hope that it's not true. Still, shortcuts is now crashing on all of

00:24:37 ◼   ► my devices. So, um, yeah, you see, like, I'm not really fussed too much about the lack

00:24:42 ◼   ► of updates. It's just not really something I've been thinking about, but you're hyper

00:24:48 ◼   ► focused on it right now because you're waiting for a bug fix, right? Like, so you'll, you'll

00:24:52 ◼   ► probably be paying more attention to it right now because I'm assuming just to stop people

00:24:56 ◼   ► telling you that you have given feedback through the appropriate channels about the issue that

00:25:00 ◼   ► you're having, right? Like, I'm sure that you've done that because this is one of those

00:25:04 ◼   ► instances where it probably is really useful to do it because you want to be able to provide

00:25:09 ◼   ► data, right? Because...

00:25:10 ◼   ► Yes, I have provided everything to all the people that wanted...

00:25:15 ◼   ► Which is the right thing to do in this situation, because this is a very unique issue to you,

00:25:19 ◼   ► I'm going to expect, because of how much you stress the application.

00:25:23 ◼   ► Yeah, but I mean, even that argument though, it's not like I'm...

00:25:28 ◼   ► I'm not saying it's justified, I'm just saying that like, if there are edge cases, you would

00:25:32 ◼   ► find them. Probably. Right? Okay. Yeah. I mean, but it's not just you. So like, this

00:25:38 ◼   ► is where I put a topic off. But I've been playing with an iPhone 10 R a little bit,

00:25:43 ◼   ► and I set it up and shortcuts crashed at launch, and I had to uninstall it, restart the phone,

00:25:51 ◼   ► reinstall it, and then finally it would open again. And then when it did, it scrambled

00:25:55 ◼   ► all my shortcut ordering, which is furious. Of course. So what we can say is like, I guess

00:26:00 ◼   ► the biggest thing that happened is... Don't buy new devices. I guess so, yeah, just keep away from

00:26:06 ◼   ► those. So yeah, it is frustrating and, you know, Federico, it seems like you've had just like a

00:26:12 ◼   ► history now of the last couple months of like issues with your iCloud account and, you know,

00:26:17 ◼   ► maybe it's time just to burn that sucker down and like... Did any of that get fixed? Yeah, it got

00:26:22 ◼   ► fixed. Like the reminders and stuff? Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, it got fixed, so I was very happy

00:26:27 ◼   ► about that. Anyway, back to the iPad. The only work-related thing that I have, I mean

00:26:33 ◼   ► besides files, which has my iCloud Drive stuff, is shortcuts. But the home screen and the

00:26:40 ◼   ► dock are dominated by media stuff. And I'm really, I can tell you that I'm really liking

00:26:50 ◼   ► the idea of not bringing my work computer into the bedroom at night when I just want

00:26:56 ◼   ► to relax. I mean, I've almost finished reading a book and I haven't read a book in five years,

00:27:04 ◼   ► probably more. So, yeah, I mean, what can I say? I love this screen, I love the device,

00:27:13 ◼   ► it's perfect for reading, it's so much lighter than the 12.9 and it looks nice in the silver

00:27:21 ◼   ► version and I just I have to be I would I would say that maybe the only downside

00:27:28 ◼   ► is that by I didn't want to spend a lot of money on this iPad so I I didn't buy

00:27:34 ◼   ► the one terabyte version again or any more expensive version I got I got the

00:27:39 ◼   ► cheap one because you know it just I felt bad getting yet another iPad and I

00:27:44 ◼   ► didn't want to spend money on storage so I guess I gotta be mindful of how many

00:27:50 ◼   ► games and videos I download on this device, but so far it's been okay.

00:27:55 ◼   ► So it's interesting hearing you talk about how you treat the home screens differently.

00:27:58 ◼   ► I sort of just a couple weeks ago sort of redid my iPad home screens where I had a bunch

00:28:06 ◼   ► of stuff that was sort of intermixed, like work and media stuff.

00:28:11 ◼   ► And now I basically have two home screens.

00:28:14 ◼   ► The first one is basically just all work stuff, and then the other one is games and video

00:28:20 ◼   ► And I kind of like the the separation, you know

00:28:23 ◼   ► I would have a bunch of work stuff and then Netflix on the home screen because I

00:28:25 ◼   ► Use Netflix on my iPad a good bit and having it separated and not on the two iPads

00:28:30 ◼   ► But even it's like two sort of home screens

00:28:32 ◼   ► Even that is kind of nice

00:28:35 ◼   ► You know, the dock does blur those lines a little bit, you know, you can see that I've got cycle messages, but

00:28:41 ◼   ► It it could be interesting just to treat the home screen to sort of like virtual spaces a little bit and see

00:28:47 ◼   ► see what makes sense where over time.

00:28:50 ◼   ► We have a lot more to talk about with iPads.

00:28:53 ◼   ► There's a topic in here that says secret topic from Myke,

00:28:56 ◼   ► which is very concerning.

00:28:57 ◼   ► You're going to be so upset with me.

00:29:00 ◼   ► It's going to be terrible.

00:29:01 ◼   ► Hold on, hold on, hold on.

00:29:03 ◼   ► Can we guess what it is before-- can we bet on it?

00:29:07 ◼   ► Can we--

00:29:08 ◼   ► Let's-- when we get there.

00:29:09 ◼   ► How about when we get there, so you two can think about it.

00:29:13 ◼   ► OK.

00:29:14 ◼   ► Did you buy an AirPower?

00:29:15 ◼   ► No, just kidding.

00:29:16 ◼   ► Just wait.

00:29:18 ◼   ► This episode is brought to you by our friends at Pingdom.

00:29:21 ◼   ► While you've been listening to this podcast,

00:29:23 ◼   ► how would you know if your website had gone down?

00:29:26 ◼   ► I probably put the fear in you now.

00:29:28 ◼   ► Sorry about that.

00:29:29 ◼   ► But you wouldn't know if your customers couldn't

00:29:31 ◼   ► click that important Buy Now button or access your content.

00:29:34 ◼   ► You could stumble across the problem by luck,

00:29:36 ◼   ► or you could have the worst thing happen, which

00:29:38 ◼   ► is someone tweets you that your website is down.

00:29:40 ◼   ► But that's not good.

00:29:41 ◼   ► You need a system in place.

00:29:43 ◼   ► You need something to tell you that everything

00:29:45 ◼   ► is running smoothly on your website,

00:29:47 ◼   ► and more importantly, when it's not.

00:29:50 ◼   ► You need Pingdom.

00:29:51 ◼   ► Pingdom will let you know the moment your site goes down

00:29:54 ◼   ► and whatever the best way is for you.

00:29:56 ◼   ► So I get push notifications and text messages.

00:29:59 ◼   ► That works really well for me.

00:30:00 ◼   ► And they're super smart.

00:30:01 ◼   ► It gets the information needed to solve the issue

00:30:04 ◼   ► sent to whoever needs it.

00:30:05 ◼   ► So if you're in a big organization,

00:30:06 ◼   ► you can kind of subdivide these up

00:30:08 ◼   ► to different people or different teams.

00:30:10 ◼   ► And if you're just like me, or just a single person,

00:30:12 ◼   ► I just get all of them.

00:30:13 ◼   ► It's totally fine.

00:30:14 ◼   ► Pingdom is dedicated to making the web faster and more reliable.

00:30:18 ◼   ► They use a virtual army of 70 global test servers that emulate visits to your site,

00:30:23 ◼   ► checking its availability as often as every minute.

00:30:27 ◼   ► All Pingdom needs is your URL, and they take care of the rest.

00:30:30 ◼   ► So don't risk being the last to know about something on your site being broken.

00:30:35 ◼   ► Start monitoring your site today.

00:30:37 ◼   ► Go to Pingdom.com/RelayFM right now for a 14 day free trial with no credit card required.

00:30:46 ◼   ► And then when you sign up, use the code "Connected" at checkout to get an awesome 30% off your

00:30:51 ◼   ► first invoice.

00:30:52 ◼   ► Our thanks to Pingdom for their support of this show and Relay FM.

00:30:57 ◼   ► So I've been using both iPad Pros since they came out, right?

00:31:04 ◼   ► And I wanted to know Federico, having now used the 11, what your recommendation is,

00:31:11 ◼   ► is the best one of these two for most people?

00:31:15 ◼   ► Because I think the 11 inch iPad Pro is the best iPad for most people.

00:31:20 ◼   ► I think it is the best, best iPad there has ever been.

00:31:23 ◼   ► I think that that is like the perfect one, because it is big enough without being too

00:31:30 ◼   ► big.

00:31:31 ◼   ► is like in the perfect sweet spot for size and screen real estate and everything else that comes with it.

00:31:36 ◼   ► So I wondered what your thought was on that, having used the 11 for a bit.

00:31:40 ◼   ► My only problem I guess is that I'm not sure, like my only problem is most people in the sense that

00:31:47 ◼   ► I'm not sure I understand most people and what they want, but I would say that I agree with you.

00:31:53 ◼   ► I think that if you want the big one you already know that. Like I don't think it's a question.

00:31:59 ◼   ► But like, is most people like folks who don't work on the iPad Pro or is most people people like me that want like want to work with better multitasking and more space?

00:32:12 ◼   ► Like, how do we categorize most people?

00:32:14 ◼   ► I think most people are not working on the iPad as much as me and you.

00:32:18 ◼   ► I reckon most people are probably doing a little bit of work and mostly consuming content.

00:32:22 ◼   ► But then why buy an iPad Pro?

00:32:24 ◼   ► Because it's the nicest one.

00:32:25 ◼   ► I guess.

00:32:25 ◼   ► For the same reason that you just upgraded.

00:32:28 ◼   ► But it's hundreds of dollars. Like, I just don't know if that's worth it for most consumers.

00:32:34 ◼   ► Well, I'm not talking about your... when I mean most people, I don't really mean like...

00:32:40 ◼   ► You don't really mean most people.

00:32:41 ◼   ► Your aunt, or like your uncle, or like your cousin, Bob, who has an android phone.

00:32:47 ◼   ► - Like... - Leave Bob out of this. Hey.

00:32:49 ◼   ► - I mean more like... - Leave Bob alone.

00:32:51 ◼   ► People listening to this show even.

00:32:53 ◼   ► Then I'm not sure. Would I recommend the 11" iPad Pro to most Mac series readers?

00:33:01 ◼   ► Probably not. I would say get the big one. But most people...

00:33:06 ◼   ► Yeah, see this is where me and you differ then, I think. I would recommend the 11" to basically anybody that asks me.

00:33:12 ◼   ► Yeah, I think it's trickier to answer this question than it was in the past, because the 12.9"

00:33:20 ◼   ► I mean, it's so much bigger than the 11 one, but still, what they did with this redesign,

00:33:28 ◼   ► I think it puts it closer to the 11 than it was in the past.

00:33:34 ◼   ► So if you ask me, I would not recommend the 12.9 to somebody like Sylvia, but then again,

00:33:40 ◼   ► Sylvia wouldn't buy an iPad Pro for her use.

00:33:45 ◼   ► She uses mine because we have it lying around in the house, but she wouldn't buy an iPad

00:33:50 ◼   ► Pro anyway, so I think it's trickier. If you buy the iPad Pro, for what I did for consumption,

00:33:56 ◼   ► which is ridiculous and I sort of, I feel kind of bad that maybe people were expecting

00:34:01 ◼   ► some sort of crazy workflow that I had, I'm not, I'm just using it to read books and watch

00:34:06 ◼   ► YouTube and play games, but if you're in that sort of market for buying the nicest iPad,

00:34:13 ◼   ► yes, get the 11.1, but if you absolutely, so my asterisk would be if you absolutely

00:34:19 ◼   ► need the best split view experience and the best multitasking at the big one. So that's

00:34:25 ◼   ► my only asterisk.

00:34:26 ◼   ► So I totally agree with you, but right, but like my kind of take on it is that that asterisk

00:34:31 ◼   ► is a very specific type of person, which is people like me and you.

00:34:36 ◼   ► It's a very, very specific type of asterisk also.

00:34:39 ◼   ► I use my 11 when I'm at home pretty much the same way that you do. It lives on my bedside

00:34:45 ◼   ► table. I never take the 12.9 because I always read or maybe even do a lot of work in bed,

00:34:52 ◼   ► but like the 11 is perfect for me. Sometimes I have all the same apps on mine. Like I don't

00:34:59 ◼   ► sequester it the same way that you do because if something comes in and I want to work on it,

00:35:04 ◼   ► then I will. But the 11 is mostly used for content consumption, like watching videos and

00:35:09 ◼   ► stuff like that when I'm when when I use it at home. But it is also my travel iPad. So like

00:35:14 ◼   ► on the trip that I just took, the 11 is the one that I take with me, it has, I have LTE in that

00:35:21 ◼   ► one, like that's what I use, so like I use them slightly different, but when I'm at home I use

00:35:30 ◼   ► my 11 pretty much the same as you do. Yeah, the only problem that I guess that I noticed is

00:35:38 ◼   ► not putting my note-taking app on that iPad.

00:35:43 ◼   ► And I'm probably gonna put Agenda on it

00:35:46 ◼   ► because I noticed that I had an idea

00:35:49 ◼   ► and I had the iPad in my hands.

00:35:51 ◼   ► - See, that's what drives me mad.

00:35:53 ◼   ► - I couldn't save that idea.

00:35:55 ◼   ► I had to grab my phone and open the app on the phone.

00:35:58 ◼   ► So I'm probably at least my note-taking app

00:36:01 ◼   ► just because I wanted to make sure

00:36:04 ◼   ► that it's easy for me to save ideas

00:36:06 ◼   ► if I think of something.

00:36:08 ◼   ► And that is something that I cannot turn off.

00:36:10 ◼   ► Yeah, like for me, at the very least, I would have to put Todoist on there.

00:36:13 ◼   ► Like if I have an idea for something, I would need to record it.

00:36:17 ◼   ► In the same way that you have reminders available to you, right?

00:36:19 ◼   ► See, I didn't put good tasks, but I have reminders anyway.

00:36:25 ◼   ► So, that's the advantage.

00:36:28 ◼   ► But yeah, Media iPad Pro. It's a thing.

00:36:33 ◼   ► And it's beautiful. Like, having just a screen, it looks real pretty.

00:36:37 ◼   ► And the book that I'm reading, if anybody's curious, that I'm almost done, I'm in the final chapter,

00:36:41 ◼   ► It's called "The Death of Expertise", and it's really really good.

00:36:45 ◼   ► Okay.

00:36:46 ◼   ► Now, I should read the fiction book next, but I'm not decided, so if you...

00:36:50 ◼   ► I'm gonna put out a call, and I'm gonna get a bunch of tweets now, I'm sure, but if you have any fiction recommendations for me,

00:36:56 ◼   ► Please send them on my way on Twitter.

00:36:59 ◼   ► I feel like you should try and narrow that down at least a little bit. It's way too broad.

00:37:05 ◼   ► So, let's see. I don't like...

00:37:07 ◼   ► Have you ever read a book? I would like to know what it was.

00:37:09 ◼   ► Yes.

00:37:11 ◼   ► I can tell you I like Harry Potter a lot.

00:37:14 ◼   ► Mhm.

00:37:15 ◼   ► Um...

00:37:17 ◼   ► I'm not an expert.

00:37:18 ◼   ► Do you like other types of fantasy though? Or do you just like Harry Potter?

00:37:21 ◼   ► Stuff like "Color of the Rings" for example.

00:37:23 ◼   ► I read it when I was a kid, like in middle school.

00:37:26 ◼   ► Um, and it's a bit too much for me. Like...

00:37:29 ◼   ► Right, you see. That's interesting.

00:37:31 ◼   ► Too heavy on lore or like pre-existing knowledge or like too much information.

00:37:37 ◼   ► I would prefer not to get into those types of books. I'm not a sci-fi guy but I would like to

00:37:46 ◼   ► be one so maybe it's something to get started in that sense like... Maybe you should look over the

00:37:52 ◼   ► previous winners of the upgradees. That's what I've been doing so I have the calculating stars which

00:37:59 ◼   ► which I think is this year's winner in my list. So probably that one. I also saw there

00:38:08 ◼   ► was a book from the author of The Martian, which I think it's called Artemis, if I'm

00:38:13 ◼   ► not mistaken. So I'm also considering that one. Yeah, Space Stuff. I would like to get

00:38:19 ◼   ► into Space Stuff. So we'll see.

00:38:22 ◼   ► Like Star Wars?

00:38:23 ◼   ► Yeah, like the Star Wars and the Star Trek, like the Star Treks.

00:38:29 ◼   ► All of the great Star Treks.

00:38:31 ◼   ► Yes.

00:38:32 ◼   ► So, what's this secret, Myke?

00:38:34 ◼   ► I've been thinking about this.

00:38:36 ◼   ► It's iPad related, and I guarantee that neither of you are going to guess what it is.

00:38:44 ◼   ► You bought another iPad.

00:38:46 ◼   ► You're up to three.

00:38:47 ◼   ► No.

00:38:48 ◼   ► Is it iPad software or hardware related?

00:38:53 ◼   ► It's not software related is what I'll say.

00:38:56 ◼   ► So you bought some kind of accessory.

00:39:01 ◼   ► You bought one of those stands, one of those weird stands for the iPhone Pro.

00:39:06 ◼   ► Well, I do have a new stand actually, but I haven't spoken about this yet, but I have

00:39:12 ◼   ► found the perfect stand.

00:39:14 ◼   ► That's not what I'm talking about today.

00:39:15 ◼   ► Well you can't leave that hanging, what stand did you get?

00:39:17 ◼   ► No I'm not going to.

00:39:19 ◼   ► I'll put it in the show notes and put it in the chat room.

00:39:21 ◼   ► It's called ClearLook with a K for some reason.

00:39:26 ◼   ► It is perfect.

00:39:29 ◼   ► It has a really high height, like it goes up to 18 inches in height.

00:39:34 ◼   ► Super secure on the base.

00:39:36 ◼   ► The mechanism for attaching the tablet is the easiest that I've used.

00:39:40 ◼   ► I found the perfect iPad stand.

00:39:43 ◼   ► Can it hold a roll of toilet paper?

00:39:46 ◼   ► I mean you could put one on there if you wanted to, yes.

00:39:48 ◼   ► it's just like a long spindle so you could just put one on there if you really wanted.

00:39:53 ◼   ► Good, good. That's important to people.

00:39:55 ◼   ► But I found it. I found the perfect stand.

00:40:00 ◼   ► It looks good.

00:40:00 ◼   ► What did you do? What is the secret?

00:40:03 ◼   ► So a few weeks ago on ATP, Marco was talking about screen protectors.

00:40:10 ◼   ► Oh, no.

00:40:14 ◼   ► And I am constantly getting ads for, and I have been for a long time, for a screen protector called Paperlike.

00:40:23 ◼   ► And I've always assumed that the Paperlike screen protector was junk. It was garbage, right? That was what I'd always assumed.

00:40:31 ◼   ► And then much to my surprise, Marco bought one and said it, and really liked it.

00:40:39 ◼   ► So I was like, really, though, like it can't be good was my thinking,

00:40:44 ◼   ► like because I just can't imagine a screen protector being good.

00:40:47 ◼   ► And plus the paper, like its selling point is that it's supposed to make

00:40:50 ◼   ► your iPad feel like you're using paper with the Apple pencil.

00:40:54 ◼   ► And I feel like I know a thing or two about paper.

00:40:58 ◼   ► And I know I just know that that's rubbish.

00:41:01 ◼   ► Like there's no way that it can make it feel that way.

00:41:03 ◼   ► But Marco kept talking about it like he really enjoyed it.

00:41:07 ◼   ► And then I got another Instagram ad and I was like,

00:41:10 ◼   ► you're so susceptible to these. What's I'm very bad for Instagram ads. Like,

00:41:15 ◼   ► I was like, what's the worst that could happen? So I bought one and I've had it

00:41:19 ◼   ► for like two weeks or something. Uh,

00:41:22 ◼   ► and today in my jet lagged fugue state, I applied it.

00:41:25 ◼   ► So yeah,

00:41:28 ◼   ► the application process is actually,

00:41:31 ◼   ► it's complicated, but they have really good video explanations.

00:41:36 ◼   ► So like it's not that hard to do.

00:41:39 ◼   ► And I think I've done a pretty good job with getting the bubbles out,

00:41:44 ◼   ► because that's like always a real thing.

00:41:46 ◼   ► But you know, that's the worst.

00:41:48 ◼   ► I think I've done a pretty good job.

00:41:50 ◼   ► I'm happy with the application.

00:41:52 ◼   ► There's like a tiny border around the outside, and it's not like completely centered.

00:41:56 ◼   ► You get two.

00:41:58 ◼   ► So like, I think the idea is like you apply one,

00:42:01 ◼   ► you see all the things you did wrong and then you take it off

00:42:03 ◼   ► and apply the other one. Right.

00:42:05 ◼   ► I think that's like the thinking.

00:42:06 ◼   ► So I've had this thing on my iPad for a couple of hours and I have some hot takes.

00:42:12 ◼   ► So, oh my God, okay.

00:42:15 ◼   ► The main thing that you get here is a matte texture, right?

00:42:20 ◼   ► So it looks like a matte screen and it feels like a matte screen.

00:42:24 ◼   ► And I will say that the feel is actually pretty nice, like even when using your

00:42:31 ◼   ► fingers. Like it just it feels different.

00:42:34 ◼   ► It kind of soft.

00:42:36 ◼   ► There is a word that keeps coming to my mind, but that doesn't make any real sense.

00:42:39 ◼   ► But there is more of a texture and I find the texture a little bit more pleasing than

00:42:45 ◼   ► the glass texture is because it's just different and it feels nice.

00:42:48 ◼   ► It doesn't at all feel like paper.

00:42:50 ◼   ► Of course it doesn't. Right.

00:42:51 ◼   ► Like it doesn't feel like you're using paper with the Apple pencil.

00:42:54 ◼   ► But what it does is adds more texture.

00:42:57 ◼   ► The texture feels different and I like the texture.

00:43:00 ◼   ► It feels a little more natural than when you're using glass because paper has a toothiness

00:43:07 ◼   ► to it.

00:43:08 ◼   ► That's a way to describe paper.

00:43:10 ◼   ► So when you use a pen on paper, there's resistance because the pen is dragging across the paper

00:43:18 ◼   ► and there's a toothiness there.

00:43:19 ◼   ► And that's what this does.

00:43:20 ◼   ► It adds a little more resistance and I like the feeling.

00:43:24 ◼   ► I think that it actually does feel really nice.

00:43:27 ◼   ► The problem is, the downside of it is it makes the screen look strange.

00:43:31 ◼   ► So again, trying to describe how it makes the screen look...

00:43:36 ◼   ► I mean anybody that's used a matte laptop or a matte screen on an Apple device knows

00:43:43 ◼   ► how this looks because that's what it looks like, right?

00:43:46 ◼   ► But I guess the way to describe it when you're comparing it to how the iPad usually looks

00:43:51 ◼   ► is maybe there's some kind of light interference, like a really light static is maybe the way.

00:43:59 ◼   ► Everything's just not as crystal clear or as crisp. It feels like maybe you're losing

00:44:03 ◼   ► some of the benefit of the lamination because it feels like the screen is just not as crystal

00:44:08 ◼   ► clear as it used to be. So I'm pretty much undecided right now if I'm going to keep this

00:44:13 ◼   ► thing on. Again, I've been using it for a couple of hours but I just thought it would

00:44:16 ◼   ► funny to talk about today. I really do like the texture. I like the texture on my fingers.

00:44:21 ◼   ► I like the texture of the Apple Pencil. But I'm not I just haven't decided yet if this

00:44:26 ◼   ► is worth the trade off of losing some of the clarity that comes with the screen. So this

00:44:33 ◼   ► is I would go insane using something like this. Like everything that you just said about

00:44:40 ◼   ► losing the crispness and it's not perfectly aligned and there may be bubbles.

00:44:46 ◼   ► The alignment issue I can fix though, right?

00:44:49 ◼   ► The alignment issue is just like, I didn't spend a ton of time applying it

00:44:53 ◼   ► because I just wanted to see if I would hate it.

00:44:55 ◼   ► And if I liked it, I would take it off and apply the second one.

00:44:58 ◼   ► So that's a mic issue, not a product issue.

00:45:02 ◼   ► However, I will say though, I know something you would not like Federico.

00:45:06 ◼   ► There's always going to be a border.

00:45:08 ◼   ► Like they actually make it slightly smaller than the screen.

00:45:13 ◼   ► I don't know why they do this.

00:45:14 ◼   ► is probably an application thing, right?

00:45:16 ◼   ► But you're always going to have a little

00:45:18 ◼   ► border there.

00:45:19 ◼   ► Honestly, like I'm expecting right

00:45:21 ◼   ► now that I will not be able to live

00:45:23 ◼   ► with this, but I want to give it a

00:45:25 ◼   ► college try because

00:45:27 ◼   ► I do like the way it feels.

00:45:29 ◼   ► But I and I also like and

00:45:31 ◼   ► again, one of the reasons that Marco

00:45:32 ◼   ► did this and it 100 percent

00:45:34 ◼   ► will stop this is fingerprints.

00:45:37 ◼   ► It won't attract fingerprints in the

00:45:40 ◼   ► same way.

00:45:40 ◼   ► What is the problem with

00:45:42 ◼   ► fingerprints?

00:45:43 ◼   ► Well, I don't like how fingerprinty my iPad gets and that was Marco hated how fingerprinty his iPad gets.

00:45:48 ◼   ► I just like just when you look at it.

00:45:50 ◼   ► Yeah, yeah, yeah.

00:45:51 ◼   ► Okay.

00:45:51 ◼   ► But like, this is not a thing that like, it makes it doesn't drive me crazy. But it was just something that's like, oh, man, I really wished it didn't get like that. Like, I didn't feel like I had to fix it. But I do look at it. I'm like, I really wish they were able to find some way to make the coating better. So it didn't get so like, fingerprinty. I kind of hate that it does that. But it's not that for me, it wasn't like, oh, I hate it.

00:46:13 ◼   ► so much that I need to get a screen protector. For me it was just like curiosity, right?

00:46:18 ◼   ► Curiosity killed the screen.

00:46:19 ◼   ► Does it improve legibility of the screen in any way?

00:46:24 ◼   ► No, no, it makes the legibility worse.

00:46:26 ◼   ► It makes it worse. It's not like you're actually turning your iPad into like an e-ink

00:46:32 ◼   ► sort of display.

00:46:33 ◼   ► No, no, no, no, no.

00:46:34 ◼   ► It's nothing like that.

00:46:35 ◼   ► Nothing, nothing, nothing. What it does is it just adds a nicer, it gives it a nicer

00:46:41 ◼   ► feeling in general use in my opinion like with my hands and with the pencil

00:46:46 ◼   ► it feels better but it doesn't look as good and I just haven't worked out yet

00:46:51 ◼   ► if I can get used to it because that might be a thing where it's like I'm

00:46:56 ◼   ► looking at it right now and it doesn't look right but if I use it for three or

00:46:59 ◼   ► four days will I stop noticing and then if I stop noticing and I prefer the way

00:47:04 ◼   ► it feels maybe it's a thing I'll keep but personally I'm leaning towards this

00:47:10 ◼   ► thing's gonna come off by the end of the week. I am very skeptical of you keeping

00:47:13 ◼   ► this thing also I think it will come off. Again like this this is purely like I

00:47:18 ◼   ► wanted to just try this and again I'm coming at it from a different place like

00:47:22 ◼   ► Marco had like a thing he really wanted to solve and I don't so like the

00:47:27 ◼   ► trade-offs don't speak to me in the same way right like I didn't do this because

00:47:32 ◼   ► like oh I feel like I have a problem I need to fix it was just like I wonder

00:47:36 ◼   ► what it will be like. And I do love the way it feels, but I don't think it is

00:47:43 ◼   ► gonna work out for me. And like the other thing is, I wanted to test

00:47:48 ◼   ► the theory that I have always had about this product, that their claim

00:47:53 ◼   ► is rubbish. And their claim is rubbish. It doesn't feel like a pencil, like a

00:47:57 ◼   ► pencil on paper. It doesn't feel like that. It just feels better than plastic

00:48:02 ◼   ► So it's called paper-like, what would you call it if paper-like is inaccurate?

00:48:07 ◼   ► Not glass-like.

00:48:09 ◼   ► It doesn't roll off the tongue as well.

00:48:11 ◼   ► It's not glass-like.

00:48:13 ◼   ► Because there are so many variables here, right?

00:48:17 ◼   ► It's never going to feel like paper because it's not paper, because it's not made of paper, right?

00:48:22 ◼   ► You should try and put some paper on the screen and see what happens.

00:48:25 ◼   ► Yeah, that would feel paper.

00:48:27 ◼   ► But then it's still not going to because the Apple Pencil doesn't feel like a pencil or a pen,

00:48:30 ◼   ► a pen because the tip is made of plastic, right? So like it's always going to glide

00:48:35 ◼   ► more because there's nothing that's going to provide the catching on the surface. So

00:48:41 ◼   ► I wanted to try it to confirm my theory, which is confirmed that it doesn't feel like paper

00:48:47 ◼   ► at all. But I am, I am, I will say that like this will never happen, but basically if Apple

00:48:54 ◼   ► were to make a matte screen for an iPad, that would be amazing, right? This is making, this

00:49:00 ◼   ► making me think that like, oh yeah, I might like that, right?

00:49:04 ◼   ► Yes.

00:49:04 ◼   ► You know?

00:49:05 ◼   ► So like, you know, screen protectors these days, they're not all bad.

00:49:08 ◼   ► Like those glass ones, like they're pretty fine.

00:49:11 ◼   ► But this isn't that, right?

00:49:13 ◼   ► Because a glass one is just adding another pane of glass onto the glass.

00:49:17 ◼   ► This is adding something like, that is not, that is like slightly opaque.

00:49:22 ◼   ► That's the word I was looking for earlier.

00:49:24 ◼   ► The screen protector for me has always been a recipe for anxiety.

00:49:28 ◼   ► Like, a couple of years ago, I was convinced by a friend of ours to buy this screen protector.

00:49:37 ◼   ► She was like, "I bought the screen protector, it costs a bunch of money, like 30 euros,

00:49:40 ◼   ► it's not cheap, but trust me, it's amazing, like, I applied it myself, it's super easy."

00:49:46 ◼   ► I was like, "Okay, so we, I'm gonna buy the screen protector, but you're gonna put it on my phone,

00:49:51 ◼   ► because I don't have the capability of dealing with these, you know, stickers and stuff."

00:49:56 ◼   ► So she was like, "Okay, we go to the store together, I'm gonna tell you which one it is, and we buy this screen protector."

00:50:01 ◼   ► So I go to the store, spent 30 euros on this thing, and I was like, "Okay, now put it on my phone because I don't want to deal with it."

00:50:08 ◼   ► She puts it on my phone, and I noticed like, it's like, ever so slightly misaligned, and there's a tiny bubble.

00:50:15 ◼   ► And she was like, "Ah, don't worry about it, the bubble is gonna go away after a couple of days of usage."

00:50:20 ◼   ► Well now, there you go.

00:50:24 ◼   ► Basically the next day, in a moment of rage, I ripped the screen protector off the screen

00:50:34 ◼   ► and threw it in the trash.

00:50:36 ◼   ► I just hate the idea of like, here's a protection that is not official, like it's not a thing

00:50:43 ◼   ► that comes with your phone, you just put it on top of it and it may not be perfectly aligned

00:50:50 ◼   ► or you may see something underneath the screen, but it's fine, you can keep using it.

00:50:55 ◼   ► It triggers something in my brain that makes me extremely uncomfortable using my phone,

00:51:03 ◼   ► or my tablet, whatever it is.

00:51:07 ◼   ► Putting unofficial things on top of screens, it just makes me feel weird.

00:51:12 ◼   ► It's also why I don't use third-party cases for my phone, because I feel that something's

00:51:17 ◼   ► gonna happen and I cannot live with that possibility of something's gonna happen with this case

00:51:23 ◼   ► and it's gonna ruin your phone or just knowing that it's not like an official thing, I don't

00:51:29 ◼   ► know. I cannot do it. It's also why as soon as AirPower comes out I will get rid of all

00:51:33 ◼   ► these third-party chargers that I have. Like the thought of...

00:51:37 ◼   ► I want the good Apple power, I don't want this junky power.

00:51:39 ◼   ► It's also why I could never ever use a Hackintosh. Like that's just, oh you can use macOS but

00:51:47 ◼   ► you cannot use iMessage or there are caveats. No, I want the official thing.

00:51:52 ◼   ► I don't want to worry about, you know, caveats.

00:51:55 ◼   ► Caveats ruin people. That is my...

00:51:57 ◼   ► Before you email us, because that email comes to me, iMessage totally works on

00:52:01 ◼   ► Hackintoshes. Just calm down, Hackintosh people.

00:52:04 ◼   ► Well, there's something that doesn't work. Something doesn't work, I'm sure.

00:52:07 ◼   ► Yeah, I feel like "totally" is maybe a stretch. Like, I'm sure you can get it to work.

00:52:11 ◼   ► Yeah, totally.

00:52:12 ◼   ► But it's not like "totally works."

00:52:13 ◼   ► Totally.

00:52:15 ◼   ► If you want totally, you get the official thing, which is a Mac.

00:52:18 ◼   ► So anyway.

00:52:20 ◼   ► Just email them directly.

00:52:21 ◼   ► I have some comments about the Paperlike website I would like to talk about.

00:52:26 ◼   ► Yeah, okay.

00:52:27 ◼   ► I was hoping you were going to do this.

00:52:28 ◼   ► I'm sure they're lovely people, but I have a couple of things I would just point out

00:52:33 ◼   ► that maybe I would have done differently.

00:52:35 ◼   ► The guy here is a little out of focus.

00:52:38 ◼   ► I'm not sure he's holding that iPad or if it's taped to his hand.

00:52:41 ◼   ► I don't even think that's an iPad.

00:52:42 ◼   ► Like that is the wrong answer.

00:52:44 ◼   ► It looks like somebody just...

00:52:46 ◼   ► It's no iPad is that size.

00:52:47 ◼   ► Somebody photoshopped.

00:52:48 ◼   ► All done.

00:52:49 ◼   ► Somebody photoshopped something.

00:52:51 ◼   ► I think, I think...

00:52:53 ◼   ► Computer enhance!

00:52:55 ◼   ► It is an iPad, but it's been badly photoshopped.

00:52:57 ◼   ► Like it's, no iPad is square like that.

00:53:00 ◼   ► It's badly photoshopped into his hand.

00:53:02 ◼   ► Yeah, it's weird.

00:53:04 ◼   ► If you look past it though, there's a poster of Steve Jobs, but not on the wall above the

00:53:08 ◼   ► table, on the wall below the table, which is just...

00:53:12 ◼   ► Who would do that?

00:53:13 ◼   ► Creepy.

00:53:14 ◼   ► Well, maybe it's a poster for dogs, you know, maybe the dog is really into Steve

00:53:19 ◼   ► Jobs.

00:53:20 ◼   ► Maybe.

00:53:21 ◼   ► Steve dogs.

00:53:22 ◼   ► Yeah.

00:53:23 ◼   ► So we have this photo which, you know, a couple issues.

00:53:26 ◼   ► The font they use for their headlines is actually, it looks like an image and iPad is all capitalized,

00:53:31 ◼   ► it'd be a lowercase i.

00:53:33 ◼   ► But my biggest complaint is that the known from section, so this is, okay, MacLife, TechRadar,

00:53:41 ◼   ► Cult of Mac wrote about this product. I would like to know what they said. These aren't

00:53:45 ◼   ► links, they're just pings of the website logos. Like, I can't click through and actually read

00:53:51 ◼   ► what any of these people think about this. So, that's not great. It's not awesome. Maybe

00:53:55 ◼   ► make those links in your markup. I think that's my primary concern. There's some copywriting

00:54:03 ◼   ► stuff.

00:54:04 ◼   ► They do accept Apple Pay though, which is nice.

00:54:06 ◼   ► They do. And Google Pay and Klarna? I can't believe you guys are tiny.

00:54:11 ◼   ► Oh yes, yes, yes. Klarna.

00:54:12 ◼   ► All the great pay.

00:54:13 ◼   ► Yes, yes.

00:54:14 ◼   ► Mastercard, PayPal, Shopify Pay, some... So Fort.

00:54:22 ◼   ► A couple of those. I think Klarna and So Fort, I think that they're like, and I don't know

00:54:28 ◼   ► why this would, why they would do this. It's like financing, but this thing costs £25.

00:54:35 ◼   ► Like, I'm not trying to...

00:54:38 ◼   ► And you need an iPad also.

00:54:40 ◼   ► Yeah.

00:54:41 ◼   ► I wouldn't worry about that too much, personally.

00:54:45 ◼   ► But you know, I guess you want to make sure people can pay you however they want to pay

00:54:50 ◼   ► you and sure, like go for it, I guess.

00:54:53 ◼   ► So anyways, I don't mean to be hard on these guys, but it's just, it hurt me a little bit

00:54:58 ◼   ► to scroll through the site.

00:54:59 ◼   ► They have a good product.

00:55:00 ◼   ► Like, I think they have a good product.

00:55:03 ◼   ► You just ragged on for half an hour.

00:55:04 ◼   ► I didn't. I didn't. I said I like it, but I'm just not sure if it's for me.

00:55:09 ◼   ► Right? But I'd like it.

00:55:11 ◼   ► Yeah.

00:55:12 ◼   ► Okay.

00:55:13 ◼   ► Don't hate on the Germans, Myke.

00:55:16 ◼   ► I'm not. You are. I'm not doing anything.

00:55:20 ◼   ► I'm not. It's just not for me.

00:55:22 ◼   ► I haven't said it wasn't for me. I've put it on. I said I'm giving it a try.

00:55:28 ◼   ► I know. It's fun though.

00:55:34 ◼   ► So keep us posted on that, I guess.

00:55:38 ◼   ► How that goes.

00:55:38 ◼   ► Let us know on Friday when you remove the screen protector.

00:55:41 ◼   ► I have not used a screen protector probably since--

00:55:48 ◼   ► I was trying to think.

00:55:48 ◼   ► Maybe like my iPhone 3GS, like sometime in there.

00:55:54 ◼   ► It's been a long time.

00:55:55 ◼   ► All right.

00:55:55 ◼   ► I wanted to tell you about our third sponsor this week.

00:55:58 ◼   ► This episode of Connected is brought to you

00:56:01 ◼   ► by our awesome friends at Luna Display.

00:56:04 ◼   ► They're the makers of the only hardware solution that turns your iPad into a

00:56:08 ◼   ► wireless display for your Mac.

00:56:10 ◼   ► That means you'll have the second display that's super portable with basically zero

00:56:14 ◼   ► lag and gorgeous image quality.

00:56:16 ◼   ► Even with the screen protector on it, setting up Luna display.

00:56:20 ◼   ► Couldn't it be easier.

00:56:21 ◼   ► You just take this little piece of hardware and it plugs right into your Mac.

00:56:24 ◼   ► I've got the USB-C one plugged in the back of my iMac right now, and you're good to

00:56:28 ◼   ► go and everything just works over wifi.

00:56:30 ◼   ► But if you're in a situation where Wi-Fi is not available,

00:56:33 ◼   ► you can connect it via USB as well.

00:56:35 ◼   ► In short, it's simple to set up, and you'll

00:56:38 ◼   ► love that extra screen real estate.

00:56:41 ◼   ► The best part is, Luna Display acts

00:56:42 ◼   ► as a complete extension of your Mac.

00:56:44 ◼   ► So you get external keyboard support.

00:56:46 ◼   ► You can use your Apple Pencil and touch interactions,

00:56:49 ◼   ► all with Mac OS.

00:56:51 ◼   ► It basically turns your Mac into a touchscreen device.

00:56:54 ◼   ► What a crazy idea.

00:56:56 ◼   ► I've had Luna Display for a while now.

00:56:58 ◼   ► I use it here in my office with my iMac, like I said.

00:57:00 ◼   ► I use it for two things.

00:57:01 ◼   ► One, I love having it open when we're recording podcasts.

00:57:05 ◼   ► So I have Audio Hijack and Call Recorder

00:57:07 ◼   ► over on my iPad right now, so I can see out

00:57:10 ◼   ► of the corner of my eye that things are recording

00:57:12 ◼   ► as I expect, that I won't have any surprises

00:57:15 ◼   ► at the end of our session.

00:57:16 ◼   ► And the newer use for me is to have reference material

00:57:19 ◼   ► up on it, so like doing the books or having

00:57:21 ◼   ► like a big spreadsheet where I'm trying to reconcile things,

00:57:23 ◼   ► having a PDF of a bank statement or something like that open

00:57:27 ◼   ► where I can still get to it from my keyboard and mouse

00:57:30 ◼   ► on the Mac, but having it just off to the side

00:57:32 ◼   ► is really pretty swell.

00:57:34 ◼   ► Listeners of Connected can get an exclusive 10% off

00:57:37 ◼   ► their Luna Display.

00:57:38 ◼   ► Just go to lunadisplay.com and enter the promo code

00:57:42 ◼   ► connected at checkout.

00:57:43 ◼   ► That's lunadisplay.com and promo code connected at checkout.

00:57:48 ◼   ► Our thanks to Luna Display for their support of this show

00:57:51 ◼   ► and all of Relay FM.

00:57:53 ◼   ► - So are we talking about the best Apple product

00:57:58 ◼   ► in 2019, hands down.

00:57:59 ◼   ► Are we doing this?

00:58:01 ◼   ► Are we talking about the only Apple product released in 2019?

00:58:06 ◼   ► It's also it's the only, but it's going to be the best one,

00:58:08 ◼   ► even when Apple releases the Mac Pro and well,

00:58:11 ◼   ► I guess AirPower may be the best one when it comes out.

00:58:14 ◼   ► But so far, this is the best one and also the only one.

00:58:17 ◼   ► But it doesn't matter.

00:58:18 ◼   ► You don't need multiple options for one to be the best and only.

00:58:22 ◼   ► That's my new rule.

00:58:25 ◼   ► The smart battery case.

00:58:26 ◼   ► I feel like you might be going into this one a bit hot, to be honest.

00:58:30 ◼   ► I am very, very happy that Apple released the Smart Battery Case for all the new iPhones,

00:58:38 ◼   ► which was a surprise.

00:58:41 ◼   ► But basically, here's what happened.

00:58:43 ◼   ► One day I was minding my own business and John Voorhis sent me a message saying that

00:58:48 ◼   ► the new Smart Battery Cases are out for the XS, XS Max, and XR.

00:58:54 ◼   ► And what I did was I clicked on this link, changed the URL to point to the Italian Apple

00:59:02 ◼   ► Store and bought the XS Max version in black in about 20 seconds.

00:59:08 ◼   ► Then I realized that it supported T-charging.

00:59:12 ◼   ► And this case arrived, I think it came out on Monday, it arrived on Thursday.

00:59:20 ◼   ► I put it on my phone and I never removed it and I love it.

00:59:25 ◼   ► It's amazing, it's exactly what I was expecting, but I want to hear from you guys because I've

00:59:30 ◼   ► always been like a die-hard Smart Battery Case fan.

00:59:34 ◼   ► I don't think Myke is.

00:59:36 ◼   ► I don't know what Steven's position is, so I want to hear from you too what you think

00:59:40 ◼   ► about this.

00:59:41 ◼   ► I think my feelings towards the Smart Battery Case are pretty similar to your feelings towards

00:59:47 ◼   ► screen protectors.

00:59:48 ◼   ► I don't know.

00:59:49 ◼   ► I don't, I don't, I don't

00:59:53 ◼   ► begrudge this product.

00:59:55 ◼   ► Like, I think maybe actually I'm kind of towards this.

00:59:58 ◼   ► Like, I think that if this is something that you need, like, great, like, you

01:00:02 ◼   ► could like, you know, go for it.

01:00:04 ◼   ► Like, that's awesome.

01:00:05 ◼   ► I did get to try one of these.

01:00:08 ◼   ► So Rosemary Orchard of Automators was at PodCon and she had one.

01:00:13 ◼   ► I'm super happy about it.

01:00:14 ◼   ► And Alex Cox was there as well.

01:00:16 ◼   ► She was super happy about it.

01:00:18 ◼   ► So I got to hold them and it's exactly what I thought it was going to be.

01:00:22 ◼   ► For me, it's way too thick and heavy.

01:00:25 ◼   ► Like I wouldn't want to have this on my phone regularly.

01:00:28 ◼   ► I know it would be uncomfortable for me and it's just more than I need.

01:00:32 ◼   ► Like maybe it would be good when traveling, but my 10S Max is totally fine.

01:00:38 ◼   ► You know, like I'll always plug it in somewhere when I travel,

01:00:41 ◼   ► but I feel like it's getting way, way easier.

01:00:43 ◼   ► Like most of the flights that I ever take now,

01:00:47 ◼   ► there's a USB or some kind of power outlet somewhere, you know, like

01:00:51 ◼   ► if I'm charging in the airport or like as well, like in a bunch of airports

01:00:55 ◼   ► in the UK now, they have power outlets built into the seats

01:01:00 ◼   ► in the waiting areas and stuff.

01:01:02 ◼   ► So like if I ever need to top up, I can.

01:01:04 ◼   ► But the thing is, though, I carry so many things with me

01:01:07 ◼   ► that I want to be charged that even if I had the battery pack

01:01:11 ◼   ► when I'm like traveling on a travel day, I'm still going to have

01:01:15 ◼   ► like an external battery because I have an iPad

01:01:18 ◼   ► and because I have a Nintendo Switch, right, or whatever.

01:01:21 ◼   ► Even like my laptop can be powered by these batteries now.

01:01:24 ◼   ► So I'm always still going to want to pack that.

01:01:26 ◼   ► So then why would I want to take the battery case like

01:01:29 ◼   ► do not begrudge this for people.

01:01:32 ◼   ► It just doesn't meet my needs.

01:01:34 ◼   ► I'm pleased that I got to hold one and try it

01:01:36 ◼   ► without having to pay for it because I wouldn't have wanted it.

01:01:39 ◼   ► It's just too much like it's too thick.

01:01:42 ◼   ► They made it like it's thicker than it was before, because like

01:01:45 ◼   ► least before at the bottom. The hump was uglier but was maybe easier because you had somewhere

01:01:51 ◼   ► to hold but now you're basically stacking two iPhones together. It's too much for me man.

01:01:56 ◼   ► I can see Federico's notes which I'm sure he's going to go through all this stuff

01:02:02 ◼   ► and I can tell that he really loves it and that's awesome. It's just not mine.

01:02:06 ◼   ► It just doesn't meet what I want from my iPhone.

01:02:12 ◼   ► That's too bad. So let me tell you why I love it.

01:02:14 ◼   ► I love it because it's it makes the iPhone and this was true with the iPhone 7 and it's true now, it makes the iPhone a true 24 hour battery iPhone, like it doubles the battery life of the phone.

01:02:31 ◼   ► I think I just don't party like you do.

01:02:33 ◼   ► You know, I just I don't think it's not that need.

01:02:37 ◼   ► I just don't I can't think of a time I've ever needed a 24 hour battery life

01:02:41 ◼   ► on my iPhone without charging at 11 at 11 p.m.

01:02:44 ◼   ► Myke at 11 p.m.

01:02:45 ◼   ► You don't get the 20 percent battery left alert from your phone.

01:02:49 ◼   ► So here's the thing, Federico.

01:02:51 ◼   ► I don't leave the house that much.

01:02:54 ◼   ► And every day I'm sitting down at my iMac to record a show.

01:03:00 ◼   ► And when I sit down to record a show, my iPhone goes into the charger.

01:03:04 ◼   ► Well, that's cheating.

01:03:06 ◼   ► - Okay. - But it's not cheating! I'm not cheating!

01:03:08 ◼   ► I'm just living my life!

01:03:09 ◼   ► For the purpose of this topic, you are!

01:03:11 ◼   ► No! No, 'cause it's... you know, I've...

01:03:13 ◼   ► But what I mean is, like, for my lifestyle,

01:03:16 ◼   ► I don't have this problem, so I don't need to solve it, you know?

01:03:19 ◼   ► Okay, so I have a problem where at 11pm, or...

01:03:23 ◼   ► Usually... sometimes 10.30, usually 11pm,

01:03:26 ◼   ► I get the red battery icon and the message saying 20% battery left.

01:03:32 ◼   ► And I hate that.

01:03:33 ◼   ► I hate that because I don't want to be...

01:03:37 ◼   ► I hate the thought of something's gonna happen soon, your phone is gonna die.

01:03:42 ◼   ► Don't worry, you still got a couple of hours, but eventually you will see this red icon

01:03:47 ◼   ► and it's gonna die.

01:03:48 ◼   ► I am more likely to hit that on my iPad every day, honestly.

01:03:51 ◼   ► And I think that that happens most days, that I will hit that on my iPad as opposed to on

01:03:55 ◼   ► my iPhone. And because I like, you know, after dinner, once I'm done working, I like to chill

01:04:02 ◼   ► with my phone for a bit. Like if I'm not using the 11 inch iPad Pro, I want to catch up on

01:04:06 ◼   ► Instagram or Twitter or just use the phone a bit. Right. And I don't want to be in the situation

01:04:12 ◼   ► where the phone and the icon, they remind me of battery life that is going to be done soon. So

01:04:23 ◼   ► I accept the fact that this case makes the phone thicker.

01:04:27 ◼   ► It's pretty much what I was expecting.

01:04:31 ◼   ► There's a couple of things that I like.

01:04:34 ◼   ► The texture is basically the same as the silicone case,

01:04:38 ◼   ► which is very nice, it feels grippy enough to me.

01:04:41 ◼   ► The lack of...

01:04:43 ◼   ► Like the previous design had a ridge between the bottom half of the phone

01:04:49 ◼   ► and the hump of the battery, now that's gone.

01:04:52 ◼   ► But I can still sort of put the phone on top of my pinky finger and use that as a sort of,

01:04:56 ◼   ► you know, to kind of hold the phone with one hand and use my thumb to interact with the UI,

01:05:03 ◼   ► which is fine. The best aspect of the Smart Battery Case, and as I mentioned I think last week,

01:05:12 ◼   ► is the integration with iOS and the fact that you don't have to manage anything. You don't have to

01:05:18 ◼   ► care about activating the case or charging the case separately. I just charge the phone at night

01:05:25 ◼   ► and now I can use wireless charging and I should mention that this case worked right away for my

01:05:31 ◼   ► Vulkan Boostup wireless charger and the native union wireless charger that I have on my desk.

01:05:37 ◼   ► I had no problem in terms of aligning the case with the with the charger. Everything worked

01:05:42 ◼   ► perfectly right away. The fact that I don't have to think about charging or

01:05:47 ◼   ► managing the source of power is the best aspect of this case. So again, it's what I

01:05:56 ◼   ► was expecting. I'm so happy that Apple released a new version for the XS Max.

01:06:01 ◼   ► I thought about, is this going to be a problem in the summer where you're not

01:06:06 ◼   ► gonna have pockets in your hoodie or in your jacket because you're just gonna

01:06:10 ◼   ► wear a t-shirt and some, you know, and some jeans. Is it going to be a problem to fit

01:06:15 ◼   ► it in your jeans? Probably, but then again in the summer I usually ask Silvia to carry

01:06:20 ◼   ► the phone with me because she always has a purse and I don't like the feeling of having

01:06:25 ◼   ► a big phone in my pocket unless I'm at WWDC. But in that case I also have a bag with me.

01:06:31 ◼   ► I'll carry it for you if you want. You can carry it with me, but I also have a bag with

01:06:36 ◼   ► me anyway, so when I ask Sylvia to keep my phone, I have my Apple Watch anyway, and also

01:06:42 ◼   ► my Apple Watch is now cellular, so even if Sylvia walks away from me for some reason,

01:06:46 ◼   ► maybe at the park, I still have cellular on my watch, so that shouldn't be a problem.

01:06:53 ◼   ► My only concern, to tell you the truth, is, is Apple going to break compatibility with

01:06:59 ◼   ► this case for the new iPhones in 2019. Probably, and I will be sad if they don't make a smart

01:07:07 ◼   ► battery case for those right away. Definitely. Yes. Yes, because the camera unit will change.

01:07:13 ◼   ► So my question will be, will they make a smart battery case for the new phones right away?

01:07:19 ◼   ► Oh, no, well they have never done that, right? Well, the last generation they just didn't

01:07:24 ◼   ► do it at all. The previous generation, which was the first one, they did similar to what

01:07:28 ◼   ► they did now is it comes out later.

01:07:30 ◼   ► And my feeling on that is always they don't want to be like, here's our new phone.

01:07:36 ◼   ► Here's what you need for it, which is more battery life.

01:07:38 ◼   ► That's my feeling as to why they don't put them out at the same time, which kind of

01:07:43 ◼   ► doesn't make sense. But it's the only reason I can think is why you would not sell this

01:07:47 ◼   ► product immediately.

01:07:48 ◼   ► I do have a query concern potentially over a product like this.

01:07:53 ◼   ► So I have a silicone case on my iPhone and it is doing what every silicone case has ever done for me

01:08:01 ◼   ► Which is currently the bottom right hand corner the silicones come off, right?

01:08:07 ◼   ► now

01:08:08 ◼   ► These cases are pretty expensive, you know, like 50 pounds or whatever. I would not be happy about my 130 pound battery case

01:08:17 ◼   ► starting to fall to pieces and I expect that it will be built about as well as these silicon cases are.

01:08:24 ◼   ► That would really really annoy me.

01:08:26 ◼   ► I don't think, at least for me, I don't think that will happen because for me the silicon cases

01:08:30 ◼   ► they always start to come off because there's an angle at the bottom because there's a cutout, right?

01:08:38 ◼   ► It's not like all the way across.

01:08:40 ◼   ► So by

01:08:43 ◼   ► - Oh, interesting.

01:08:46 ◼   ► - By using the case, you rub your hand against that angle.

01:08:50 ◼   ► - Or it's getting caught on my jeans or whatever every time.

01:08:53 ◼   ► But this one doesn't do that.

01:08:55 ◼   ► - That's where it comes off.

01:08:57 ◼   ► - Interesting.

01:08:58 ◼   ► - So I don't know.

01:08:59 ◼   ► It's possible, I would really hate it if it happens,

01:09:01 ◼   ► but I don't think it will.

01:09:02 ◼   ► - Yeah, so I picked one up on the way out of town.

01:09:05 ◼   ► We spent the weekend out in the woods doing a camping thing.

01:09:09 ◼   ► And it was kind of a perfect test case,

01:09:11 ◼   ► 'cause I basically, if the wind was blowing,

01:09:13 ◼   ► the right way. I had like one little dot of 4G, but basically like no networking. We've

01:09:20 ◼   ► all been in situations like that, or even like at a conference or in a sports arena

01:09:24 ◼   ► where the phone struggles to connect to the network, it warms up and then it just chews

01:09:28 ◼   ► to the battery. So it was kind of like the worst case scenario. And I had it on the iPhone

01:09:33 ◼   ► tennis Max, and it makes it way too big and way too heavy for everyday use for me. But

01:09:38 ◼   ► It did a really good job.

01:09:40 ◼   ► The phone lasted, I wanna say,

01:09:43 ◼   ► the case itself lasted 12 hours,

01:09:46 ◼   ► and then the phone was probably that again.

01:09:48 ◼   ► But the better part of the whole day,

01:09:53 ◼   ► the phone was fully charged

01:09:55 ◼   ► as the case was slowly depleting.

01:09:57 ◼   ► So that was really nice.

01:09:58 ◼   ► And I have one, I will use it when I travel,

01:10:00 ◼   ► but it's not something that I need every day,

01:10:03 ◼   ► nor is it something that I want to carry every day,

01:10:06 ◼   ► just because of the bulk.

01:10:07 ◼   ► And something that kind of actually bothers me

01:10:09 ◼   ► about the silicone cases, bothers me about this,

01:10:12 ◼   ► is that it's kind of grippy in your pocket and linty,

01:10:15 ◼   ► like it collects fuzz and stuff,

01:10:17 ◼   ► where the Apple leather case doesn't.

01:10:19 ◼   ► And that's just a personal preference for me.

01:10:21 ◼   ► I just prefer the leather finish over the silicone.

01:10:23 ◼   ► So that's not a deal breaker by any means,

01:10:27 ◼   ► but it is a little bit annoying

01:10:28 ◼   ► when something's kind of big and bulky

01:10:30 ◼   ► and it feels like it's stuck in your jeans pocket.

01:10:31 ◼   ► But I gotta say, having not had any experience

01:10:35 ◼   ► with the first one.

01:10:36 ◼   ► I never owned the first one.

01:10:38 ◼   ► I never even handled one.

01:10:42 ◼   ► The integration with iOS is really cool,

01:10:44 ◼   ► and this one does a lot of smart stuff.

01:10:46 ◼   ► It'll actually fast charge if you have

01:10:49 ◼   ► the USB-C power delivery, and if it's enough power,

01:10:53 ◼   ► it'll actually fast charge the case and the phone, both.

01:10:57 ◼   ► And so I had it plugged into my MacBook Pro adapter

01:11:00 ◼   ► to see what would happen,

01:11:01 ◼   ► and it was really, really pretty impressive.

01:11:04 ◼   ► So it's really, if you need this, it's really well designed

01:11:07 ◼   ► and you pay for that, but if you're the type of person

01:11:11 ◼   ► who needs this sort of thing,

01:11:12 ◼   ► or you always have like a USB battery bank in your bag

01:11:16 ◼   ► and you want to get rid of that,

01:11:17 ◼   ► this is a really nice option.

01:11:18 ◼   ► Probably the nicest option on the market, honestly.

01:11:21 ◼   ► So yeah, so I think that does it.

01:11:23 ◼   ► We have talked about a lot of stuff and it's--

01:11:26 ◼   ► - I really need to just go and sleep or something.

01:11:28 ◼   ► Like it's pretty serious.

01:11:31 ◼   ► The situation over here is deteriorating.

01:11:33 ◼   ► (laughs)

01:11:34 ◼   ► So we'll let you go.

01:11:35 ◼   ► - Thank you.

01:11:36 ◼   ► - See if I can blast through all this.

01:11:38 ◼   ► If you want to find links to stuff we talked about,

01:11:41 ◼   ► head over to the website, relay.fm/connected/227.

01:11:45 ◼   ► While you're there, you can get in touch via email

01:11:47 ◼   ► or you can find us on Twitter.

01:11:49 ◼   ► Myke is I-M-Y-K-E, and he's the host

01:11:52 ◼   ► of a bunch of shows here at Relay FM.

01:11:54 ◼   ► You can follow Federico on Twitter,

01:11:56 ◼   ► Evatici, V-I-T-I-C-C-I, and he's the editor-in-chief

01:12:00 ◼   ► of maxstories.net and battery case collector at large.

01:12:05 ◼   ► You can find me on Twitter @ismh

01:12:08 ◼   ► and I write 512pixels.net.

01:12:11 ◼   ► I think our sponsors, TextExpander,

01:12:13 ◼   ► Pingdom, and Luna Display.

01:12:15 ◼   ► And until next week, gentlemen, say goodbye.

01:12:18 ◼   ► (speaking in foreign language)

01:12:20 ◼   ► - Oh, cheerio.

01:12:21 ◼   ► That was gone, man.

01:12:22 ◼   ► - Oh my god.

01:12:23 ◼   ► (laughing)

01:12:26 ◼   ► - Adios.

01:12:27 ◼   ► (laughing)