0:00:00[music]
0:00:09From Relay FM, this is Upgrade, episode 466. Today's show is brought to you by Squarespace and Ooni Pizza Ovens.
0:00:18My name is Mike Hurley and I'm joined by Jason Snell. Hello, Jason Snell.
0:00:22Hello, Mike Hurley. I hope you're enjoying the Summer of Fun! Summer of Fun! I have a Snell Talk question for you.
0:00:32Okay, alright. This one comes from Brayden, who asks, "Jason, what is your preferred summer drink while you're at the D'Angle Town Surf Club?"
0:00:40Ah, oh yeah, out there on Thunderbolt dock. Mm-hmm. Preferred summer drink. I'd be interested in hearing what your summer drink is, so get ready for that.
0:00:51Preferred summer drink. I mean, there's many different choices here. I make iced tea in the summer, and I enjoy that.
0:00:59For an alcoholic beverage, I am not a mixed drink person, so I would say for an alcoholic beverage, these days I drink a lot of hazy IPAs,
0:01:09which are very sort of like summery and citrusy, so I like those. And then my classic, I would say that for the last few years, my classic summer drink is my own,
0:01:17I feel like I've said this before on this podcast, but I'll say it again, my friend Simon Jerry, when I was in England, told me about the Lager Top,
0:01:25which is literally just a lager with lemonade on top. Right, which in England, lemonade is lemon lime soda. In America, lemonade is lemon water with sugar in it.
0:01:38I actually have a funny story for you. One of the first times I went to America, what, the first time I went to America under legal drinking age, I think it was,
0:01:46and this is when I went to, I went to the first Portland XOXO festival that I went to, and I was in a bar with some friends, and I asked for a vodka lemonade,
0:01:58and the bar person was incredibly confused, which set me to be incredibly confused, because I felt like I went with the most basic drink that somebody could ask for.
0:02:10Like I purposefully did that because I was uncomfortable with what to order. Vodka and 7-Up is what you should have ordered. Or Sprite, right?
0:02:18But what they ended up giving me was like, I don't even know what it was, but it was like vodka and something and simple syrup, it was very confusing.
0:02:25Lemon juice and simple syrup. Yes, I think that was what they did, and it was absolutely terrible. An American lemonade.
0:02:33I love American lemonade, but it's not what the friends mean by lemonade. But it's not what I want in a vodka lemonade.
0:02:39Let me tell you, Mike, if you take a nice beer on a hot summer day and you put some lemonade in it, it's really good.
0:02:46It's really good. So that is one of my preferred summer drinks at the Doggle Town Surf Club. Lager Top, American style.
0:02:52Lager Top. I, this summer, have just enjoyed cold beers. I am not, I don't drink alcohol very much, for no specific reason, I just don't.
0:03:06I maybe have like a beer or two a week, pretty much. But there are these two beers that I've found to be very refreshing this summer.
0:03:16I kind of found them in my local supermarket. They're two brands. One is called Jubal, and they basically make beers with fruit in them.
0:03:24They brew them with fruit, which is very refreshing. And another one called Shandy Shack, which is essentially what we're talking about here.
0:03:32Shandy is the American word for the beer lemonade combo. Oh no, we have Shandy's too. Shandy is like one thing, and Lager Top's like another thing.
0:03:42Interesting. Well, it's because of your lemonade. Anyway, I'm essentially making a Shandy too. It's a good summer beer, for sure.
0:03:47And they make, this company just makes like a bunch of Shandy's, including an IPA Shandy, which I'd never had before. And I really like them.
0:03:55Lauren's Preferred is from a local brewery called Pitchers, and it's basically a grapefruit Shandy. And it's really good.
0:04:04Oh man, that sounds fantastic.
0:04:06It's really good. I know all the beer purists are like gasping. It's like, you know what, beer is good in lots of ways, including with other flavors in it.
0:04:13It's just, in the summer, it's summer. Fun, we just have fun.
0:04:17Yeah, I like an IPA, I like a Lager as much as the next guy. Well, maybe not as much as the next guy, but I also like fruity and weird beers too.
0:04:25So, not a Pimms cup then, is what you're saying.
0:04:29That's Zadina's summer drink. She loves Pimms.
0:04:33Right, well I mean that's the Wimbledon starting today.
0:04:36Oh, well then it's Pimms time. It's Pimms o'clock, as they used to say. That was the old ad campaign. Pimms o'clock.
0:04:42Yeah, it's Pimms o'clock now.
0:04:45This episode brought to you by Pimms. It's Pimms o'clock!
0:04:49It could be. My friend, friend of the show, he's been on, Scott McNulty, he's a Pimms cup guy, which has always surprised me as a Philadelphian, but he's very English in that way, I guess.
0:04:58Rebelling against his Irish background. And I would say, our English friends had us over for a summer party once and there were Pimms cups and I had one.
0:05:09And my review of it is, you can have it.
0:05:12Oh, I like it. Do you want to know another funny thing? Like, kind of wrapping this whole conversation around? We don't call it Pimms cup, we call it Pimms and lemonade.
0:05:20Pimms and lemonade!
0:05:22Pimms cup is not what it's called here. It's just called Pimms and lemonade, but it's the same thing. All the fruit and all that kind of stuff. Yeah, that's how it goes.
0:05:31If you would like to send us in a Snell Talk question, of course this is the summer, so summery questions are not advised, but recommended.
0:05:40Then you can send those in by going to upgradefeedback.com and thank you to Braden for that great question.
0:05:47We have some, just a whole cavalcade of weird follow up I think today, spanning the gamut of the last couple of weeks of shows. I think a lot of it actually is from last week.
0:05:58What weird show generates weird follow up?
0:06:01Indeed. We had many people, I think mostly Canadians, send us in a video called the House Hippo commercial. The North American House Hippo.
0:06:13Obviously in relation to Jason's desire for a tiny hippo. Can I, I'll tell you, I don't know if I told you this privately, but I'll tell you it now.
0:06:23We posted the clip, as we always do, you can find our video clips on our various social media channels. I'll tell you about those at the end of the show.
0:06:31I had two people from my life, like just my sister in law and one of my close friends who do not listen to my podcasts, contact me to tell me what small animals they wanted.
0:06:42Oh wow, see?
0:06:45Breaking out.
0:06:46Pretty good.
0:06:47We're breaking out.
0:06:48It's pretty good. I had a guy I play curling with say, "Hey, I was in an airport scrolling through TikTok and I saw you."
0:06:54Good. It's working.
0:06:56I love it. I love to hear about it.
0:06:58This Canadian House Hippo ad, it's adorable. It's just a whole ad that reads like it's a nature documentary about the small Canadian house hippo.
0:07:07At the end, and this is very late 90s, it's very 90s public service announcement, it says, "Of course this isn't real, but children believe things they see on TV.
0:07:16And they shouldn't. Don't believe things you see on TV. Ask questions and be critical kids." That's what that ad is for.
0:07:23It was commissioned by the Concerned Children's Advertisers, which is now called the Companies Committed to Kids.
0:07:30And from the actual House Hippo Wikipedia page, it says, "The stated intent of this piece is to educate children about critical thinking with regard to what they see in television advertising."
0:07:42And I was struck by, this was in 1999, this commercial. It's the same problems we're dealing with now about fake news and now we're moving into the AI deep fake generation.
0:07:59It's just kind of a funny thing. Kiwis, thank you for getting in touch with us.
0:08:04Yes, mostly me because you didn't want to hear from them, but we did hear from them.
0:08:09I'm back with a report. The short answer, so I think my theory was correct, which is Australians say beta, New Zealanders say beta.
0:08:18And we got many videos saying that the Kiwis say beta. A few people said they say beta, but almost everybody said they say beta, so I believe them.
0:08:27But here's the thing about beta and beta is New Zealanders change, this is what I thought would be the case, New Zealanders change vowels.
0:08:34So I think New Zealanders are actually trying to say beta, but because they flip their vowels compared to other English speakers, they say beta.
0:08:44But I think they mean beta, but they say beta. So a win for the beta pronunciation there.
0:08:50And I want to thank specifically the listener, listener Sam I believe, who sent in an audio clip that contrasts the word beta with an igbeater, which is an eggbeater, but in New Zealand.
0:09:06Igbeater, beta. They're different.
0:09:10Yes, I really love the way that you said that, which is very funny to me. What I would just like to addendum, what I hear and what I think is one of the key differences is they say beta.
0:09:24Beta, sure. There's more of a tap on the T.
0:09:26They pronounce the T more.
0:09:27And Americans tend to swallow the T's, yes.
0:09:29Yes. Or really, the way I hear it is Americans say T's like D's, right, where I would say water, but now I've conditioned myself to say water instead.
0:09:40Because I found myself, Jason, many times, again, earlier on in my travels, where I would say, could I have a glass of water? And they were like, what? And people couldn't understand me in a way that I just don't understand.
0:09:52So now I've conditioned myself, especially when Americans say water.
0:09:56I will tell you, when people say that Americans take their T's and turn them into D's, I get to do the John Saricusa thing where I can say, no, we don't.
0:10:04But what I mean by that is I can understand why it is not, you can't differentiate it, but I can differentiate it. There is a slight difference there, but it's very close. It's true.
0:10:14It's water. How would you say it?
0:10:18Water.
0:10:19Yeah, you see, that's a D to me. I understand what you're saying. I can't hear it any other way.
0:10:23My tongue is actually up in my teeth and making a T sound there, but it's very subtle. Because otherwise it's water. Oh, water.
0:10:31Hey, look, I'm swallowing consonants all over the place.
0:10:34I know.
0:10:35So like I'm doing it too, but I'm just saying it's a different sound.
0:10:39Igbeita.
0:10:40Igbeita. Anyway.
0:10:42Ig. Ig. Ig. You gotta say Ig. It's an Ig.
0:10:46New Zealanders, thank you and I'm sorry.
0:10:49Yes, we love you.
0:10:50No, we're not sorry.
0:10:53I'm sorry for what you've been doing in the last minute.
0:10:56No, no. I think I spent two weeks in New Zealand. I think I've sussed it out. I think I got it.
0:11:02Oh, you've sorted it now? You got the accent?
0:11:04Igbeita.
0:11:05You haven't spent two weeks there? You're like that person that goes on holiday and comes back with a new accent.
0:11:08Yeah, exactly. I start to call everything a car park.
0:11:11Everything. Like you get buildings. It's probably a car park.
0:11:16There's a car park in there.
0:11:17Hello.
0:11:18We spoke about the Vision Pro and the fact that there was a potential for it to not be shipping with health features,
0:11:25or they may have been postponed. This is from an information report.
0:11:29We had two upgrade-ins write in with some thoughts on this that I wanted to share. Ben wrote in to say,
0:11:34"I think that it could be possible that health-related features could be held for a 'Apple Vision Sport' model,
0:11:41maybe made of different materials like those used in Apple watch straps,
0:11:46based on how Mike described the weight as similar to the AirPods Max,
0:11:49I would imagine it might be uncomfortable to seriously exercise in as is."
0:11:55I don't know completely if I agree with the summary of my thoughts here.
0:12:03So the Apple Vision Pro is on the heavy side.
0:12:08I could imagine lots of forms of exercise that I could do wearing the Apple Vision Pro.
0:12:13Anything on a stationary machine, stationary bikes for sure, yoga I could imagine being possible.
0:12:20I would say even with the right head strap, I could use my rowing machine.
0:12:26Basically what I'm saying is it is on the heavy side, but you could work out in these.
0:12:32The same as I feel like I could work out in AirPods Max as well. I think it's possible.
0:12:37All headsets are weird to work out in, I think. I think this could be done.
0:12:42What do you think?
0:12:44I'm going to be… both of these comments, so I'm going to save it for the next one.
0:12:49I think this is one of those things that it's very easy to say no in order to try to justify Apple's reported design decision here,
0:12:58but I don't think that it's necessary to do that. I think that it can be done.
0:13:04I think that you can exercise in other headsets, so I don't think it's an issue.
0:13:10I just don't.
0:13:12Steve says, "It seems like a pragmatic choice given the weight of the headset, the lack of controllers and the external battery pack to not have these features.
0:13:19Until it's released, it's hard to say if there are other issues limiting its use as a fitness device.
0:13:24Mehta has worked hard to support users who are more active, but Apple's first headset may be better suited for sedentary use.
0:13:31Once Apple can field a lighter, cheaper, self-contained device, I'm sure it will support some fitness activities."
0:13:36Again.
0:13:38You're not going to be doing high intensity training in this, right?
0:13:43But I don't really feel like it's good for that for any.
0:13:47But I feel like any of these fitness apps that I've tried, you could use the Apple Vision Pro just as easily, I feel like.
0:13:54Yeah, again, I feel like this is a tendency that a lot of people have to sort of try to justify the report about what Apple's decided by saying,
0:14:03"Well, yeah, I can list a bunch of reasons why Apple just can't do this and they'll have to wait till the next time."
0:14:09And I'm very skeptical about it.
0:14:11And what I said last week stands, which is if Apple doesn't want to do anything fitness related in here, guess what?
0:14:17Third party developers will and they will succeed.
0:14:20And it might not be the same as the Mehta headset and it might not be everything you want and it might not be as good as if Apple was more committed to it,
0:14:26but they'll do it.
0:14:27And the external battery pack is not going to be the reason why it doesn't work.
0:14:32No, that one cable is very easy to deal with.
0:14:36Yeah, the lack of controllers are not going to be the reason it doesn't work.
0:14:41People have worked out for a long time with cabled headphones. It's the same deal, right?
0:14:46Like we all found a way to work out with our iPods. We all found a way to work out with our Apple headphones plugged into our phone.
0:14:54I understand if you listen to the way we've been talking to assume that the weight of the thing would preclude it. I don't think it would.
0:15:02I think maybe there will be things that each person might not want to do, but I could imagine multiple types of exercise that I do now that I could quite easily do wearing the Vision Pro.
0:15:13Sure.
0:15:14Amari wrote in to say, we're moving on now from that, to say,
0:15:18"I 100% agree with Mike on not having push notifications for news.
0:15:22However, I do want some news alerts.
0:15:24So a while ago, I switched them all to the scheduled summary feature and it's been an unmitigated success for me.
0:15:31I get a summary of all of the rubbish news that I get a couple of times a day and none of it goes to the watch.
0:15:38It takes 10 seconds and then I'm done. And it's never distracting me.
0:15:42So I thought this was a really smart thing to do and a use case of a thing that I've never understood why it existed, which was the scheduled summary notifications.
0:15:56If you have forgotten about this, you go to settings, notifications, scheduled summary.
0:16:00You choose the apps that you want to be in the summary and the times of day you want it to pop up.
0:16:05And I think this is a great way to get a news digest of notification focused stuff.
0:16:11So I just wanted to highlight that because I think Amari had a wonderful suggestion.
0:16:15See, it's funny because when you mentioned this last week, I remain silent, but I actually find the news notifications valuable one time of day, which is when I wake up in the morning.
0:16:25I kind of want to see if anything big happened, but I don't want them the rest of the day.
0:16:30So this is actually, I didn't even think about this feature.
0:16:33This is the right way for me to do it is to schedule a summary for the morning and then never have to deal with them the rest of the day.
0:16:39The reason no one thought about this feature except Amari is because it isn't really good for anything else.
0:16:45It's not super well implemented, at least in I/O 16. I don't know if it's been changed at all in 17, but probably not.
0:16:53This was part of Apple's goal to try and give you more control.
0:16:59The feature from this release that really was great is you can swipe on any notification and choose options and basically say, "Don't ever show this to me again."
0:17:07I love that feature. This was also a feature from that era of we want to give you more control over notifications,
0:17:13which is to say roll up all these notifications into a summary that you'll deliver at this time.
0:17:18For news headlines, I just had never thought of that. It's actually great to be like, "I don't want to be bugged with news headlines except maybe once or twice a day."
0:17:26Great idea.
0:17:27I'm going to put a link in the show notes to Federico's IOS 15 review that explains notification summaries if you want a bit more information about it.
0:17:36But yes, it's the first time I've ever heard of anybody using it for something I would like to.
0:17:40Also, I ranted a couple of weeks ago on, I think, Upgrade Plus, but I ranted about discoverability and in my Mac world column.
0:17:47I got a lot of feedback from people who, again, as expected, the features that we discussed in that segment and that I discussed in that article,
0:17:55they didn't know existed, like the shuffling between faces in the lock screen, not to mention the holding an app that's shaking with one hand while you swipe
0:18:05to quickly move it to another place and then drop it. People hadn't heard of that.
0:18:09I'll just point out that Lister Mike in the member Discord right now just said, "T-I-L, did not know this was a thing," to what we just talked about.
0:18:17So again, discoverability of new IOS features, it's a problem. It's a challenge.
0:18:22I might as well while we're doing this, I'm going to throw two features that I think people might not know about.
0:18:27You can delete apps from searches. So if you search for an app and long press on it, you get the options to delete it.
0:18:33So if you want to get rid of an app, that's a quick way to do it. And if you have folders on your home screen and you have the notification badge in the folders,
0:18:41if you long press on the folder, it will pop up and show you what apps the notifications are for.
0:18:46Good tips. We're a productivity podcast now.
0:18:49We sure are. Just for that 20 seconds.
0:18:52Apple News Crosswords. We spoke about this last time in the details.
0:18:57And we were wondering where they were coming from and we were sent an email that told us where they're coming from.
0:19:04And it was pointing to an Apple Newsroom piece that came out during WWDC, which I remember seeing, but I did not read,
0:19:12because it has like a thousand things in it. But in that Newsroom piece, it said,
0:19:17"We'll include a daily crossword, a mini crossword in partnership with the Puzzle Society."
0:19:24Now, the Puzzle Society on their website described themselves as,
0:19:29"The Puzzle Society is becoming a major yet shadowy player in the world's puzzling spheres, simultaneously in plain sight and invisible,
0:19:37like a word that is backwards and diagonal in a word search."
0:19:41I did a little bit more digging. For me to get the full information about the company,
0:19:46they wanted me to sign up for their email newsletter, which I wasn't going to do.
0:19:49But then I found a company called Andrews McNeil Universal.
0:19:56They are the pair—sorry, Andrews McNeil Universal.
0:20:01McNeil, sure.
0:20:02McNeil.
0:20:03Sounds fake.
0:20:04They are a "inclusive partner and home to a first-class roster of distinctive and powerful cartoonists, artists, writers, illustrators, game makers, and storytellers."
0:20:13They are like a conglomerate company, and one of the companies they own is the Puzzle Society.
0:20:19So Apple is going to deal with them.
0:20:20But then we also got some feedback from listener Adam, who says,
0:20:25"I am a crossword constructor," which is a fantastic job title,
0:20:29"with puzzles published in the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, and others.
0:20:33So Apple News Plus crosswords are definitely on my radar."
0:20:36Adam says they're in partnership with Puzzle Society, which is an existing online crossword service.
0:20:41But Apple is also hiring in-house crossword editors, including prolific puzzle maker Ross Trudeau and seemingly Eric Agard,
0:20:51who just resigned as the USA Today crossword editor and is widely hailed for championing diversity in crosswords.
0:20:59So yeah, Apple is pulling out the big guns.
0:21:02They are like, they're getting in the crosswords like all of the community.
0:21:07The crossword community is up in arms.
0:21:09Apple is leaning into the fact that they've always been a little bit puzzling.
0:21:13And secretive.
0:21:15And now they are actively puzzling.
0:21:19See, no other podcast is giving you this kind of analysis about crosswords.
0:21:24Well, I mean, there's probably a puzzle-related podcast that's all over this.
0:21:27But among your Apple podcasts, I feel like, which I think it's a bold move that,
0:21:32mere minutes after admitting that there was a whole Apple press release that we saw and did not read,
0:21:38we are now claiming the mantle of being your go-to experts regarding Apple and puzzles.
0:21:44We weren't immediately.
0:21:46Let's pat ourselves on the back.
0:21:47But now we are.
0:21:49Look, WWDC is very busy time for us. It's very busy time.
0:21:53We can't read all the press releases.
0:21:55What I'm going to say is if anybody does think, like, oh, you should read, just go look at this press release.
0:21:59It's like a million words long with loads of screenshots.
0:22:02And it came out on June the 7th.
0:22:04I was busy that day. You know what I'm saying?
0:22:07I ain't got time to read.
0:22:09But also it's called Apple Previews New Features Coming to Apple Services this fall.
0:22:14Yeah, it is a bit of a snooze.
0:22:15I scrolled through it, but I didn't even see the crossword.
0:22:20The Puzzle Society.
0:22:21It's in there, and I'm happy that it's in there.
0:22:24But it's like it's underneath Fitness Plus. I just figured it was a Fitness Plus.
0:22:28I'm just saying Puzzle Society owned by a shadowy conglomerate.
0:22:32I think the Riddler is behind this.
0:22:35You know, it would fit the Riddler's M.O., right?
0:22:37Right. Right. And so I just hope that Batman cuts a deal with Apple.
0:22:42Can I ask, new Riddler or old Riddler?
0:22:45Because, like, new Riddler is terrifying. Old Riddler is kind of fun.
0:22:50Well, it's the newest Riddler.
0:22:52The new Riddler's identity has not been revealed because they're hiding behind the Puzzle Society right now.
0:22:58OK, so it's a new new Riddler.
0:23:00I think so. We don't know. Probably, but we don't know.
0:23:03How could we know? We're not Batman. You know?
0:23:06It does make me kind of sad that in this scenario, I am Robin.
0:23:10Right? Sure.
0:23:12You are obviously Batman and I'm Robin, and there's kind of nothing I can do about that.
0:23:17Cheer up, chum.
0:23:18That makes me sad.
0:23:20Our 2023 member special is now available to all relay FM members.
0:23:24This includes those of you who subscribe to Upgrade Plus.
0:23:28You will find this in the crossover feed that we have available to all relay FM members.
0:23:33If you sign in to your account, your memberful account, you'll see the feeds there.
0:23:38It's very easy to subscribe.
0:23:39I will put a link in the show notes that you can just click on and you sign in and it will take you to your member exclusive podcasts.
0:23:46This is the third installment of our RPG crossover, where the two of us are joined by CGP Grey
0:23:53and our game master, Tony Sindelar of the Total Party Kill podcast.
0:23:58This is my favorite of the three of these that we've done.
0:24:02I think Tony did a really, really amazing job creating a very fun game mechanic that I'm very excited.
0:24:08It includes our first ever combat.
0:24:10That is the only spoiler that I will give for this special.
0:24:15Yeah, I would say I love...
0:24:18This one's really good. In fact, I've started to think about these three Tales from the Floating Vagabond adventures
0:24:25that we've done the last three years as three movie series or three episodes of a TV show,
0:24:34where each one of them is the one where this happens.
0:24:37The first one we go to the bureaucracy planet.
0:24:40The second one we go to the food company where there's a mascot and there's been a disaster.
0:24:47And then in this one, we get a new job that I take seriously and you two don't.
0:24:53No, because it doesn't really feel like it's necessary to take seriously, but it fits right within your wheelhouse.
0:24:59I completely embraced it, yep.
0:25:01Tony was targeting you, I think.
0:25:03I think so, yeah. I suspect so.
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0:26:09They have the Ooni Karu, which can be fueled by either wood, charcoal or gas.
0:26:14They have the Ooni Vault, which is their new electric pizza oven, which can also get as hot
0:26:19and can be used indoors or outdoors, which I think is a really awesome addition for them.
0:26:24They have Tonsday that you can check out yourself.
0:26:27But Jason, it is kind of a holiday season over in the US.
0:26:30I feel like an Ooni is probably pretty great for that.
0:26:33I made pizza in the Ooni last week, Thursday, Wednesday, I don't know, just a few days ago.
0:26:42Got it out, set it up again, easy to find a place for it.
0:26:46It's got little eggs.
0:26:48If you're worried about that heat, it's got these legs.
0:26:51I measured the temperature underneath the 700 degree oven and it was like 80 degrees Fahrenheit under there.
0:27:00There was nothing. So don't be afraid.
0:27:03You can put this on basically anything and it will be fine.
0:27:07I put it on wood, I put it on plastic, I put it on concrete.
0:27:10It's all good because all the heat is in the oven.
0:27:13And yeah, you get the little, it melts the cheese on top and you get the little kind of like burny bits on the crust.
0:27:20And the bottom of it is like a pizza stone, so you preheat it.
0:27:23That's my tip for you is, especially if you're like me and you struggle a little bit to get the dough thin enough,
0:27:29be sure to properly preheat it so that the pizza stone is really hot.
0:27:34Because then when you slide the pizza in, the flames on the top are melting everything and crisping everything up.
0:27:41But that pizza stone is radiating out the heat on the bottom, which is what bakes the crust and makes it crispy.
0:27:46So that's my tip to you.
0:27:48And I can make more than one pizza on it, which I love because it cooks so fast.
0:27:54I can have a little assembly line and have multiple pizzas.
0:27:57Whereas at home or inside on the, in the oven, I have to do like, you know, it sits in there for 10 or 15 minutes.
0:28:05And then I pull it out and then I have to put another one in and then the first one gets cold.
0:28:08So that's no good.
0:28:09So anyway, yeah, I love it.
0:28:11Listeners of this show can get 10% off their purchase of an Ooni pizza oven.
0:28:15Just go to Ooni.com, O-O-N-I.com and use the code UPGRADE2023 at checkout.
0:28:20They also have a range of great accessories from peels to cutters to oven tables to thermometers
0:28:24if you want to make sure you've got the good preheat going on.
0:28:27Laser thermometers, Mike. Laser thermometers.
0:28:30In the future.
0:28:31Ooni.com, O-O-N-I.com. Use the code UPGRADE2023 for 10% off to bring restaurant quality pizza to your own backyard.
0:28:39Our thanks to Ooni Pizza Ovens for their support of this show and Relay FM.
0:28:43It's Ruma Roundup time.
0:28:47Giddy up.
0:28:48Giddy up, partner.
0:28:49We've got, we're back.
0:28:50We're back on the Ruma Roundup train.
0:28:52It's been quiet on the Western Front over the last couple of weeks, but not anymore.
0:28:56The sheriff's back in town.
0:28:58Sheriff Mark Gurman, he's been, he's been in the corral this week.
0:29:02He's been rounding up all those rumors.
0:29:04He's got multiple jobs, the sheriff.
0:29:06He's also, he's also in the corral.
0:29:08Well, the rumors, I guess, are like criminals and so he's bringing them in.
0:29:11Yep. He's rounding them all up.
0:29:13He's rounding the criminals up and he's putting them in newsletter jail and he's, and he's now sending that out.
0:29:18AirPods. So Apple's working on a bunch of things for AirPods,
0:29:23including developing a feature to test hearing by playing a series of tones and sounds.
0:29:29A quote from Mark Gurman's Power On newsletter is,
0:29:32"The idea is to help users screen for hearing issues,
0:29:36not unlike how the Apple Watch ECG app checks for heart problems."
0:29:40Apple is exploring how they could better position the AirPods product line
0:29:45as a replacement for conventional hearing aids as well.
0:29:48So they currently have a selection of features that they've been introducing over the last few years
0:29:52for people who would like hearing assistance.
0:29:55Things like Conversation Boost and Live Listen are super features they've done here.
0:29:59But Apple does not have health regulatory approvals to claim that they are actually hearing aids with these features.
0:30:06Right. And, and in the U.S. that just changed where you can sell things that make hearing aid claims over the counter.
0:30:12So this is, and this is one of the ideas here that Apple seems to be staffing up and leaning into that
0:30:19now that they have a little more latitude to consider AirPods basically as hearing aids, at least in some modes. Yeah.
0:30:27A quote from Mark, "There's also engineering work being done on adding sensors to AirPods
0:30:33so they can determine body temperature via the Wear As Ear canal.
0:30:36This type of data is considered more accurate than wrist temperature, which is collected on the Apple Watch Series 8
0:30:42and Ultra models while users sleep."
0:30:44Yeah. Just more accurate for when you're wearing them.
0:30:47I mean, you're probably not going to wear them while you're sleeping and all that.
0:30:49But if you're wearing them, they can, they could track your temperature and it's going to be much more accurate, right?
0:30:54Because that's actually a way that they take people's temperature is in their ears.
0:30:59It's a pretty accurate reading. So that, that, it just makes sense because you've got a product that's already in there.
0:31:04And that would be super good because that feels like would be a feature where it could tell you if it's found something wrong
0:31:11or you could proactively check, right? And like you just have it now.
0:31:15Like you don't need an ear thermometer because you've just got AirPods.
0:31:19So you can just use those. And I think that would be an excellent feature.
0:31:25I think so. That I'd be super excited about.
0:31:27As always with these things, these features could take time to materialize in shipping products.
0:31:32You know, it could be like they don't, he doesn't know when it's coming because it's complicated,
0:31:36especially when if they're going to go for regulatory approval on either of these things.
0:31:40Yeah. But in the meantime, Apple is preparing to switch the AirPods product line over to USB-C,
0:31:47starting with the, like along with the iPhone this year, beginning with the AirPods Pro.
0:31:52The way he phrases this is really weird to me because all it means is that you do a new case.
0:31:58Yes. Right? Yeah. That's it.
0:32:00That's what's happening. Yeah. That's how I understood it and it's what I expect.
0:32:03And there is precedent for this, right? So when they did, was it wireless charging?
0:32:08When like they revised the AirPods wireless charging, you could just buy the case?
0:32:12It was wireless charging support. Right. And it was literally just the case changed.
0:32:16Yeah. Which I will be super excited about because like, you know, we're still in the throes of house decoration.
0:32:21Like one of the things I want to do is like work out a good couch cable set up,
0:32:26which by the way, if anybody has product recommendations for like good ways to get like USB-C cables
0:32:33in and around your couch, right? Without just cables all over the place.
0:32:37I want to know those. Send them in upgradefeedback.com.
0:32:41I am upgradefeedback.com. I am surprised that there aren't more products that are designed to like
0:32:47clip on or go over like the edge of a couch so that you've got them
0:32:55like nearby. Cause yeah, I ended up having, I have a USB adapter that is basically under the couch
0:33:03and then the USB-C snakes upward and is behind a cushion so that you can get it.
0:33:10But it's dumb. It's just cables everywhere.
0:33:12That's not, I want like a little, you know, I'm not buying furniture with USB installed, right?
0:33:18Like I'm not going to do that, but I would like the USB to be somewhere really accessible without getting in my way.
0:33:24And I know that's tricky, but like I am surprised that everything I find is a big block that you plug in the wall
0:33:31and then run cables.
0:33:33And wireless charging is not the solution here because I'm not just charging products that, like for example,
0:33:38Nintendo Switch, right? There's nothing.
0:33:41The beauty of having USB-C and what your point that you're making here about AirPods is,
0:33:45if you end up with a USB-C cable or two at your couch, you could charge anything there, right?
0:33:51Charge your iPad, charge your laptop, charge your AirPods, charge your phone, anything.
0:33:55So last night me and Edina were talking about this and I was like, I am going to find a solution to this
0:33:59because right now we just have like cables just like under the sofa and it's just ugly and it's not really great to grab them and stuff.
0:34:06And they're like trailing all over the place.
0:34:08And I was saying, oh, you know, when the iPhone goes to USB-C, then we won't even need the lightning cable anymore,
0:34:13which will make it easier. And she said, oh, but what about AirPods?
0:34:16And I was like, aha, here we go, we're going to get AirPods Pro the new cases and we'll be nice and happy.
0:34:23But if anybody has recommendations for how to do like good couch cable management,
0:34:29please send those in to us, upgradefeedback.com.
0:34:32Right, I would love to know if there's a thing that you can like hang over the back of the couch that is also an adapter.
0:34:38Like I've got a desk power strip that literally under desk power strip that I got with my desk
0:34:44and it's a power strip that's got like little clamps on it.
0:34:48So you can clamp it under your desk.
0:34:50And I thought, you know, I am surprised given all of the iPhone accessories out there that somebody hasn't come over like a super clever solution for this that is not,
0:34:59well, hide this brick on the floor and then get a long cable and stuff it behind the cushion.
0:35:05I'd really rather not.
0:35:09Mark is also reporting that Apple have "explored the idea of a finger-worn device that would work as a controller for the Apple Vision Pro, but rejected it."
0:35:20And Mark has heard that they are still not planning any hand controllers of their own,
0:35:25nor are they planning to support third-party controllers specifically for VR-focused experiences.
0:35:30They are all in on hand tracking.
0:35:32And the question is just how good is their hand tracking, right?
0:35:34I mean, it doesn't necessarily mean, what he's not saying is that they built like something you could stick on your finger and it like aided in the precision.
0:35:42And then they decided it was no good.
0:35:44I'm not sure that's the case here.
0:35:46It may be that they decided it was no good.
0:35:48It may be they decided that they didn't really want to go down that route.
0:35:51It's also possible that they looked at the hand tracking software they already had and said, "This is good enough."
0:35:55And whether that's good enough for games or anything else, I guess we'll find out.
0:36:00But it's interesting that this report suggests that Apple was exploring this idea and was like, "Nah, we don't want it or need it to pop something on your finger."
0:36:10I don't know.
0:36:11The jury is out.
0:36:13I am remaining hopeful.
0:36:15I'm making sure to stay hopeful about just there being new and interesting gaming experiences.
0:36:21I have found the current crop of VR gaming to be very focused around a very specific type of game, which realistically is just shooting games.
0:36:30Where you do not really move or you move in weird ways because you don't want to get sick.
0:36:38So what I'm hoping is that if Apple is saying, "No controllers," that it may encourage people to think a little bit more weirdly and out of the box and create some interesting experiences.
0:36:54I can imagine a lot of puzzle games that could come out of just hand tracking, moving things around.
0:37:01We'll see.
0:37:02Or maybe with really good eye tracking, what kind of gaming experiences does that create?
0:37:08So I'm going to hold faith in not Apple, but developers.
0:37:14That they will be able to, when pressed under certain constraints, come up with some new type of experiences.
0:37:20As Joe in the chat has said, "Puzzle games from the Puzzle Society."
0:37:23Puzzle Society, they're there.
0:37:25Haha, try to stop me now, Batman.
0:37:30And finally from Mark Gurman, Apple is working on "multiple next generation monitors."
0:37:36The interesting one here is one of these could include an integrated processor and software stack that could make a display double as a monitor for a Mac and as a standalone display, like a TV kind of thing, and a smart home display with a low power mode.
0:37:55I don't know about this.
0:37:57His story is basically like a larger external display that you can, I could sort of see it because it's the, it actually is the answer to the question, why do we have a studio display that has iOS inside it, but it's not visible in any way?
0:38:10And couldn't you use it to run tvOS?
0:38:13Couldn't you use it to be a TV on its own?
0:38:15It's got speakers, it's a screen, it's got software on it.
0:38:18Why is it only working when it's attached to another device?
0:38:21And this is sort of the answer to that, is what if they made one that was a little bit bigger that you could use as your standalone display, but it could also be, take other inputs and also have a smart home, low power mode.
0:38:33Yeah, but where's this display going in someone's house that it can actually serve as all of these things at once?
0:38:41It made me start to think about like iMacs where they say that sometimes you put a, you're in a limited screen environment.
0:38:48I don't think this is for like a living room TV, but like, could it be for other environments where there's really limited space and you can have it pull double duty?
0:38:57I don't know. It is an interesting idea of like where this actually fits and is it a product that actually has a mainstream use case?
0:39:05But they keep telling me that they sell a lot of iMacs that are just meant to be, you know, that people just plop them down in the middle of their home and everybody uses them.
0:39:14And I guess that could be for something like this. I don't know, it's weird.
0:39:17Yeah, I feel like these use cases and the product doesn't match up, right? Because this is obviously going to be more expensive than the current studio display because it sounds like it's going to be quite advanced.
0:39:29So let's imagine this is a $2,000 display, right? Let's just, I'm just throwing that money out there.
0:39:36I just feel like an expensive display doesn't necessarily match with this idea of like, I have just one room, right?
0:39:45Like those things, this sounds to me like it's an expensive display, so it's probably going to be bought by somebody who has at least a room where they keep their work computer, like they have an office, right?
0:39:55Where they have the computer. And then if it's in the office, it's not so helpful to be a smart display, smart home display because it's in the office.
0:40:01Yeah, some people do live in very small spaces and they could use this and I'm sure there are people out there who watch movies and TV shows on the same screen that they use, you know, to do their computer stuff.
0:40:14But I would imagine most people don't. They use a device to do that. They use an iPad or an iPhone or whatever.
0:40:20Or a laptop.
0:40:22And so, yeah, I wonder about that. I am going to dispute you on this is going to be powerful and therefore expensive.
0:40:28I think that the studio display could do this right now. I think it could. I think they made a decision to have it run iOS invisibly in the background in order to run the camera and run center stage.
0:40:43But like, I don't know, it's an A series processor running an OS. I think it's not a real leap to say that if it was a slightly more modern A series processor and they built it to run TV OS standalone from scratch, which they didn't do with the studio display.
0:41:06I'm not sure that that's a particularly more expensive product. Maybe the display is better and that makes it more expensive, but I don't think this is a lot of extra power.
0:41:13I think this is just designing it with that stuff visible versus invisible like on the studio display.
0:41:20I mean, I still think a $1600 display meets the same argument that I was making earlier.
0:41:26My point is, is there a market where you're sitting right in front of the screen doing computing work and it's also your TV?
0:41:32Right. And if there are markets for that, then great. But is that a market or is this an incredibly large display for a computer monitor that Apple thinks is sort of like it will work as a small TV or it'll work as a computer monitor?
0:41:48You decide. But you're right. There are lots of scenarios where you might be better off just buying a TV, right? Because TVs are cheaper than that.
0:41:54I don't know. It's an interesting idea. And they have the market research, but it does seem like a one-size-fits-all TV that is also a computer monitor.
0:42:07I feel like I know of a better display, which already includes an integrated processor and software that could double as a standalone display and small home display of a low power mode.
0:42:19It's called the iPad. Like, if this feels like it's better for an iPad, if they're going to put it in a product that's not like HomePod with screen.
0:42:30Look, this is such a nebulous rumor. We're really just like talking around a thing that we have no idea. But it's interesting to talk about.
0:42:39It could legitimately just be a Mac display that they've decided, why are we hiding the fact that we're running our operating system on it? Let people use it for a PlayStation.
0:42:49Let people use it as an Apple TV if they want when the Mac is not connected. And maybe they look at the use cases and think, you know, we got people connecting via laptops.
0:42:59They disconnect their laptop. The screen's just sitting there doing nothing. Somebody else in the home can use it for something else.
0:43:05Maybe this is a minor feature where it's sort of like, well, if we're going to make a smart display for that works with Macs, why not also make it be visibly smart?
0:43:15It's an extra feature. Because like I'm saying, the studio display as it currently exists basically is this, except they decided to hide it all.
0:43:23So maybe they just decided, let's not hide it. Let's put an HDMI port back there and make it an Apple TV and not hide it anymore. I don't know.
0:43:33So moving on, the Wall Street Journal is reporting that Goldman Sachs is trying to break out of their deal with Apple on the Apple card.
0:43:41Apparently, this is so weird to me, Goldman Sachs is in talks with American Express to try and convince them to take on the business.
0:43:49"Apple would have to agree to a transfer. The tech company is aware of the talks, which have been ongoing for months."
0:43:56It was reported in January that Goldman Sachs has apparently lost over a billion dollars on the Apple card.
0:44:03But in October, Goldman Sachs and Apple extended their relationship until 2029.
0:44:09My very cursory knowledge of this market suggests that Goldman Sachs probably doesn't want to be in the consumer credit card market anymore.
0:44:26They really tried to expand into this consumer banking area and they've lost a lot of money. They were really aggressive in it.
0:44:29There's nothing more esoteric than what investors in banks think. It's like double financial. It's investors in banks.
0:44:41That's the point where I generally pass out. They may have tried to expand and they're like, "Oh no, let's go back to our core business and let's unload all this stuff."
0:44:54I am fascinated about the fact that they're losing money on the Apple card. I guess that that is because they took on Apple's aggressive terms and so they're not able to make the money on it than they wanted to.
0:45:08It's head scratching to me, that report.
0:45:11Some of the stuff that I read today, because I was doing a little bit of research and trying to understand this loss that was reported, it was very nebulous because it was a loss reported in part of a bigger loss that they had and some people were trying to pull it apart and work out that this is what it was.
0:45:26There was some talk about the billion. It was hard for me to try and work out exactly how it was confirmed.
0:45:32I read an article on 9to5Mac by Michael Potok and they were talking about some of the potential ways in which Goldman may have lost money here. It could have been the cash back.
0:45:45It could have been the fact that they weren't charging lots of fees, which usually credit card companies would charge, which is something Apple didn't want.
0:45:55Also, they were much more aggressive in accepting people and therefore there would be more bad debt there.
0:46:06They were really excited about working with Apple because there's Apple Halo. I think there's this question about maybe Apple is really only good at making money for Apple.
0:46:17I do think this is very interesting in the context of why isn't the Apple card somewhere else? Maybe it's because nobody wants this business. Nobody wants to play by Apple's rules.
0:46:28Again, it makes me wonder about Apple setting up its own financial company. I don't know when Apple becomes a bank or not. As long as they've got partners, maybe they don't need to become a bank.
0:46:41Apparently, they're hiring for it. This is something we spoke about a number of months ago. They are hiring and looking more at becoming a financial service and taking on more of this stuff themselves.
0:46:52In some form or other, lots of regulation to deal with there. I don't know. The Apple card is a pretty good product. I think the question is, did Apple…
0:47:02Apple obviously was like, "We want to set the terms. We want this to be very different." They got somebody to say yes and that's great, but maybe in the end, it was a bad idea.
0:47:14As well as the Apple card, the relationship with Goldman Sachs is also powering Apple Card Savings and Apple Pay Later. They're really intertwined now.
0:47:24The Amex thing is interesting to me. It's obviously a very different business, American Express. They have the American Express card and that's going to be complicated.
0:47:34Well, I cannot envision Apple just declaring that the Apple card is an Amex card. If this deal is going on, I assume that the deal would maybe involve that as an option.
0:47:45But I just can't envision the Apple card going to Amex and being turned into an American Express card.
0:47:51But similarly, I can't imagine Amex taking it and not making it an Amex. Why would they not do that? They don't have to take this from Goldman Sachs. American Express are going to have their own needs and desires here.
0:48:06That might be one of the reasons this doesn't work. Maybe Amex say yeah, but it's going to be an Amex and Apple say no and it's like, "Well, back to Goldman."
0:48:15Yeah, I think the scenario I would say there, again, knowing nothing about this, so I'm just spitballing, would be Amex taking on that business, viewing it as an opportunity to get some of these Apple card holders to be Amex customers, Amex card customers over time, even if they're supporting the existing MasterCard customers.
0:48:38Because Amex is just not accepted in the same places that Visa and MasterCard are.
0:48:42No. I've seen some instances of Amex cards that have another card as a fallback.
0:48:51Yeah.
0:48:52And so maybe Amex would do that, that it would be Amex by default, but you have this fallback maybe if it didn't work and maybe they would work with Apple to find some kind of interesting way to make that work via Apple Pay. I don't know.
0:49:05But it would be really strange to me if I get Amex, "Yeah, we'll take this, but we're going to use MasterCard and pay MasterCard to do this."
0:49:14Yeah, well, hmm. Yeah, but remember the context here, Mike. The context here is companies who want to do business with Apple and are willing to do things that they would not normally do because they want to be in business with Apple. I'm not saying that it's smart. I'm saying that seems to happen.
0:49:29But it's weird though, right? If Goldman's like, "We're losing so much money on this. Will you take this from us?" I can't even imagine what the pitch is to Amex. Like, "Do you want this? We're losing a billion dollars. Who lost a billion dollars in 2020? Did you like this?"
0:49:45It's very strange to me. I would love to know more about what is going on there. Very strange. And I'm now fascinated to see what the next few years are for the Apple card because it seems like maybe it's not the business people want it to be.
0:50:00Goldman Sachs is learning one of those important lessons. Some days you just can't get rid of a bomb.
0:50:04It's a very Batman episode today.
0:50:07It is. I'm just sliding the Batman stuff in there, yeah.
0:50:10And the Financial Times is reporting that Apple has had to reduce their production forecasts for the Apple Vision Pro due to manufacturing complexities. These issues are stemming from the micro OLED displays that are found inside the two displays found inside of each Vision Pro.
0:50:26The Times is claiming that Apple is unhappy with the output and quality from their manufacturing partners and have now subsequently cut estimates to 400,000 units produced in 2024.
0:50:39It was previously reported that Apple was forecasting a million units in the first year. However, I have heard some conjecture that maybe it was misunderstood as a million displays, which would be half a million units.
0:50:52But nevertheless, there has been a change in Apple's forecasting based on the quality.
0:50:59The Financial Times is also claiming that Apple has further pushed back their plans for a more affordable Apple Vision headset. They were exploring mini LED displays instead of micro OLED displays for a cheaper device, but they were unhappy with the results of the mini LED displays when used that close to the eyes.
0:51:18It's cutting edge stuff. It's hard. They're going to sell every one that they can make, but they're not going to be able to make very many.
0:51:23It seems that way. It's going to be hard to get them. I'm not looking forward to that. It's going to be hard to get them.
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0:53:49Our thanks to Squarespace for the support of this show and all of Relay FM.
0:53:53For the summer of fun, I wanted to bring back Upstream.
0:54:00Oh.
0:54:01It's been a while.
0:54:02I remember Upstream. It has been a while. We can still do Upstream here.
0:54:05Yes. We just haven't, but we still can.
0:54:08Yeah, we can.
0:54:09But I kind of am always looking for a reason. And today when I open my RSS reader, I had like six stories, five or six stories, all related to Apple TV+.
0:54:20And so I thought, for the summer of fun, let's do Upstream.
0:54:24Let's do it.
0:54:25One of these was a link from you. We're going to talk about Pac-12 football again.
0:54:29Let's do it.
0:54:30So what's going on?
0:54:31Woo! We're a Pac-12 family. I went to Cal, Cal lifelong. My dad was a Cal season ticket holder. He went to Cal.
0:54:42My kids go to Oregon or went to Oregon, I guess I got to say now. My daughter is an alum now.
0:54:47Congratulations.
0:54:48You got the Ducks and the Bears, Pac-12.
0:54:50And they are the only college football conference that does not currently have a long-term contract.
0:54:55They're in discussion. Their contract runs through the end of or through next summer.
0:55:00So about a year left on it. But they've been negotiating for a year and there's this real question of like, are they going to be able to match some of the other conferences in terms of the money?
0:55:08And the presidents keep saying that they're very confident that they're going to be able to beat the Big 12 in terms of the money that they're going to be able to pay.
0:55:15And then there's some question about that. And this is all going on. They got a new commissioner. He was brought in to negotiate the media rights. That's why he's here.
0:55:22And so what's going to happen? And nothing has happened yet. They might expand.
0:55:26The reason this is relevant to the upgrade audience, and I'm not just bringing in your, you know, let me talk about how the Cal Bears are going to do this year.
0:55:32Go Cal.
0:55:33Disappointing as always. Is the answer or how the Oregon Ducks are going to do. Way more successful and my kids are spoiled.
0:55:41Anyway, this is the only American football contract that's out there.
0:55:45It literally is the only. The NFL has signed all its deals several years out with all of its partners.
0:55:52All the other college conferences have signed all their deals. This is it.
0:55:58So while it is the Pac-12, it is a smaller of the major conferences. It's not one of the two big ones. It's one of the three smaller ones.
0:56:07They are still a good source of viewers and a good source of content during college football season.
0:56:16And again, I'll just remind our non-American viewers, American football is by far the most successful sport in America.
0:56:24It is by far, by far, far like the highest rated television series for the last 15 years have been NFL games.
0:56:31Literally, it's always number one.
0:56:33So it's not the national pastime then? Like the national pastime is baseball, right?
0:56:38But that's not the most successful sport?
0:56:40People would argue that football is now the national pastime, I guess, but whatever. It is certainly the biggest entertainment property and sports entertainment property in America.
0:56:49And so the fact that the Pac-12 is still sitting out there is interesting because if you were a streamer who was trying to dip your toe in the water of more live sports events and you wanted to try it with American football,
0:57:04now Amazon's got an NFL deal, but that's about it. There's a little like NBC as part of their deal with the NFL has a Peacock thing where they're going to show some games on Peacock.
0:57:16But according to a guy who covers this for a living, John Willner from the San Jose Mercury News, as well as information from John Canzano who has a substack that I subscribe to is very good.
0:57:28Apple, Willner says, is the favorite for the bulk of the Pac-12 college football inventory beginning in the fall of next year.
0:57:40Willner's projection is that ESPN will probably take sort of like scoop up the cream of the crop, especially for Saturday nights and maybe other weeknights, like a Thursday night game.
0:57:51Those will be like marquee matchups on ESPN, but that's only about 22 regular season games, he estimates.
0:57:58There are 50 something other conference games that currently air on Fox or on the Pac-12 network, which is the conference's own TV network.
0:58:07The idea here from Willner is that Apple will probably just buy those.
0:58:13And they may even pick up the Pac-12 network which produces these games and use it as part of its sports production facility that would be owned by Apple.
0:58:23But that's a little unclear.
0:58:25Did you say it was Fox? Is it wholly owned by Fox?
0:58:28No, the 50 something games currently, some of them are on Fox, a handful, and then the rest of them are on the Pac-12 network.
0:58:35Which Pac-12 owns?
0:58:36Which Pac-12 owns, and Pac-12 owns the production company.
0:58:39So in the way that Major League Baseball is producing Friday Night Baseball for Apple, but that I believe Apple and MLS are producing or MLS is producing for Apple, I'm not sure exactly how that works, the MLS games.
0:58:50Pac-12 produces its own content and that's probably part of the deal.
0:58:55Anyway, Willner thinks that Apple is going to take those other games that ESPN doesn't take.
0:59:01And that it's possible that there will be another small package and he says maybe Fox will buy some games. The advantage the Pac-12 has is it's on the West Coast, which means that it can put games later on on Saturday night where the East Coast can't play anymore.
0:59:14And so it just extends the day and there's limited inventory of West Coast football games.
0:59:20So maybe Fox or NBC or Peacock on NBC or Amazon, but he thinks Apple's the favorite.
0:59:27I've heard other reports that Apple and Amazon were both talking to Pac-12 about this.
0:59:32So it's just as an Apple story, this is the idea that this may be Apple's best chance in the next few years to experiment with American football, which is our most popular sport.
0:59:43And I think it can't hurt that these are all institutions of the Pac-12.
0:59:47They're Western institutions.
0:59:49It's all along the West Coast and the Western US, which culturally is actually not a bad fit for Apple.
0:59:55The idea that you've got universities, one of them just down the road in Palo Alto, also in Berkeley and then Seattle, and Salt Lake City and Eugene and Tucson.
1:00:08I'm not going to list all the Pac-12 cities. There are a lot.
1:00:12And then they may expand to San Diego and even Dallas. It's possible.
1:00:15So just something to watch that will probably happen this month in July.
1:00:19And so we may get another Apple sports announcement, essentially.
1:00:25This would start next fall, not this coming fall, but fall of 2024.
1:00:28If Willner is right, and Willner and Canzano has suggested that there's a Pac-12 media day happening in a few weeks where they get all the coaches and players and stuff, and they do their big promotion for the year.
1:00:38And they said the last thing they want is for the TV rights to be undecided by the time they get there.
1:00:44And I think I may have mentioned this here earlier, but the reason this has taken way longer than most of these conference TV negotiations have taken is apparently because they're talking to non-traditional partners, namely Apple and Amazon.
1:01:03And those companies don't know how sports rights negotiations work.
1:01:08And even now, even though they've got some sports rights, the impression is when you're talking to Fox and ESPN, they've been doing this for ages. They know how it is.
1:01:17You talk to Apple, and they're not even quite talking the same language, which we heard about the NFL Sunday ticket negotiations, right?
1:01:24That there was this real head scratcher of a conversation going on there. And then I guess Google figured it out or just wrote a big check.
1:01:30So we'll see, but this would be another thing in the pile of all the different live sports that Apple is trying if Apple ends up picking up 40 or 50 college football games.
1:01:41So the thing that I could imagine of that same language thing is just cultural norms of Apple, "Well, we're going to take this and show it all over the world."
1:01:49And they're like, "No, you're not." And they're like, "Yeah, we are."
1:01:52So what I'm wondering from this is they may be the favorite, but can they actually get the deal?
1:01:58There's not much of a college football market.
1:02:00No, but can they get the deal they want? There isn't a large MLS market either, but they still do that.
1:02:06The advantage that they have here is that this is small enough, and it doesn't really have much of an international deal that they can basically, yeah, I think they would just take it and do it, even though outside of the US there isn't much of a market for this.
1:02:18But they can offer it and see what happens, right? It's an interesting idea.
1:02:24So I don't know how to read this because, like I said, I am a lifelong fan of a team in this conference.
1:02:29But I'm just saying from a larger issue, it's very interesting that Apple is at least reportedly the favorite to close this deal because it would throw some college football on the pile along with MLS and MLB.
1:02:42Apple have posted the first episode of their new, I'm going to say hit show, Silo on Twitter.
1:02:50I would call it a hit just because I've been seeing people talk about this show who are not in my tech circles.
1:02:58I've yet to see it, but I've got it on my queue. I want to watch it because people are saying it's really good.
1:03:04And so they just took the first episode and just posted it on Twitter so people can just watch it for free.
1:03:11Jungkook were out of good art core parts to put in the show notes, but it's interesting because you can do this already in the TV app. You can just go to the TV app and you can watch the first episode of all of their shows for free.
1:03:23But this is just interesting because they've done it on Twitter at what is, I think, a pretty contentious time to do anything new with Twitter, right?
1:03:32And it's only over the last week just gotten even weirder with the rate limiting and stuff like that now.
1:03:39As somebody who doesn't use Twitter now, I can't read any tweets because I'm not logged in anywhere.
1:03:44Someone sends me a link to a tweet and I'm like, I can't do anything with this because I can't bother to log in again.
1:03:50And it's interesting because I think there are two pretty decent arguments on this of one, it's weird to extend any kind of new relationship with Twitter right now from a political standpoint in all of the ways that you could take the word political.
1:04:05But people are still there. So that's the thing, right?
1:04:10We might not be, a lot of our audience may have moved on to new places, but most people who were on Twitter in the first place are still there.
1:04:19So it is a, honestly, I feel like I have good opinions usually on each.
1:04:25I feel like, sorry, I have strong opinions that I can make on things, right?
1:04:29Like I could feel definite about stuff.
1:04:31I don't know what the right decision is to make on this one if you're Apple, to be honest.
1:04:35It's marketing and there are a lot of people still using it and they've got an existing marketing relationship, so they're doing it.
1:04:40I'm a little surprised.
1:04:42So like CBS, Viacom put up, or I guess Paramount Plus technically, put up on the entire first season of Star Trek Strange New Worlds before, ahead of the season two premiere.
1:04:54For a limited time, but they basically like posted the whole thing and said, you can just watch, you can binge this and then sign up for Paramount Plus for season two.
1:05:02I'm a little surprised that this was a Twitter decision here, but again, they do have an existing Twitter relationship.
1:05:07They must find some value in it.
1:05:09I don't know. It's a marketing decision.
1:05:11The truth is marketing decisions are not made through any lens, but does this get us to our marketing goals?
1:05:16I think the idea here is they're trying to get people to see silo and be into it and then want to pick up Apple TV Plus and this is a place that they can do that.
1:05:25I think that in the end, a lot of the arguments about, do you want to be supporting this product and this company, ends up being, well, there's a lot of people there.
1:05:34Those people don't seem to care.
1:05:37Maybe they're not paying attention. Maybe they're awful people. Chances are they're not awful people.
1:05:41They just don't care.
1:05:43Not everybody cares about the things everybody else cares about.
1:05:45Exactly.
1:05:46I will admit that I rolled my eyes at a lot of the so-called controversy about this because most of the posts I saw about this were, how dare Apple, you know, with Twitter.
1:05:59I'm like, whatever. It's marketing.
1:06:01They're going to do it because there's a reach there.
1:06:03If there weren't people on Twitter, they wouldn't do it.
1:06:05They're not trying to prop up Twitter.
1:06:06They're trying to get people to watch their TV show.
1:06:08A lot of people have not quit Twitter in a huff like so many people in our community have.
1:06:13That's just the truth of it.
1:06:14The moment that it's not worth it for Apple to promote things on Twitter, they'll stop.
1:06:19Believe me.
1:06:21It is strange, though, because there are other places to put it, right?
1:06:25Yeah.
1:06:26And Twitter is rapidly becoming a worse place to be.
1:06:27Like you mentioned, in the last week, we've gotten this thing where Twitter is, are they paying their bills to Google Cloud?
1:06:33Are they paying their bills to anywhere else?
1:06:34Who knows?
1:06:35But suddenly they closed off the whole site unless you can log in and they rate limited everybody.
1:06:41It is rapidly decaying to the point where I almost wonder if Apple would make that same decision today that they made last week.
1:06:51But it is that.
1:06:53And YouTube, I don't know why not YouTube and why Twitter.
1:06:58I don't know.
1:06:59It's weird.
1:07:00It's a weird thing.
1:07:01But it's marketing.
1:07:02Their ways are mysterious.
1:07:03Also, it's possible that they had a deal with Twitter where they got the ability to do this and it was part of their deal.
1:07:09So they're like, "Well, we might as well use the coupon for this."
1:07:13We don't always know what the nature of these things.
1:07:15It may not be, "We can spend money to put a show somewhere. Will we put it on Twitter or YouTube?"
1:07:20They cost about the same.
1:07:21Maybe they don't cost the same or maybe literally you have a coupon for a free thing as part of your relationship with Twitter.
1:07:28And you're like, "Well, let's just see it. Let's try it. See how it goes."
1:07:32I don't know.
1:07:33I am surprised.
1:07:34I just went to look at the Apple TV YouTube channel.
1:07:36They didn't do it also on Apple TV?
1:07:38On the YouTube channel, sorry?
1:07:40On the YouTube channel, yeah.
1:07:41I mean, they're just afraid to upload it.
1:07:42Why didn't you just do that too?
1:07:44I don't know.
1:07:45They didn't.
1:07:46But this just feels to me like someone in marketing was just like, "Let's try this."
1:07:52Because that's realistically all they're doing.
1:07:55It's also not the tenth time they've done it.
1:07:57It's probably maybe even the first time they've done it.
1:08:00They're trying it.
1:08:01Marketing is all about, "Let's give it a shot and see what happens and get the results back."
1:08:05And again, I tell you, if the results back are bad, they won't do it again.
1:08:09And it doesn't matter.
1:08:11And it won't matter about the politics of it.
1:08:13Unless it totally blew up in their faces, like, "How dare you," which I don't think it actually will.
1:08:17I don't think that there's anything to that.
1:08:19What will happen is that if people have abandoned Twitter because it sucks or they've been rate limited or whatever the reasons are,
1:08:25and their marketing doesn't work there, they'll stop.
1:08:27That's it.
1:08:28Very bottom line-oriented, most marketing people.
1:08:31The Ted Lasso finale hit a series high in viewership for the show,
1:08:36delivering a billion total minutes of viewing across the entire show itself,
1:08:41according to Nielsen during the finale premiere time.
1:08:45The episode, the very final episode, hit 529 million minutes watched in a week,
1:08:51with the rest of those billion minutes spread across the show itself.
1:08:55So lots of people watched it, and it also drew people to watch the entire show.
1:08:59So it was a big high for Ted Lasso for its minutes watched.
1:09:05I just want to say, I feel like I saw so many articles bemoaning the final season of the show.
1:09:11I feel like people were taking pleasure in sharing them around, it almost felt like at one point.
1:09:15And to me, it all fell off the mark.
1:09:18I really enjoyed the final season of Ted Lasso.
1:09:21I loved the show overall. I loved the path it took, and I was very satisfied with the ending.
1:09:27My read on people not enjoying the final season, a lot of it was people wanted the show to be different than what the show was,
1:09:34rather than just enjoying it for what it was.
1:09:37People were like, "Hey, this show's sad now! I wanted a happy show!"
1:09:41It's like, but you can't choose. It's not up to you.
1:09:45Just enjoy the show for what it is, and I think it told an incredibly good story
1:09:50that would not have been effective if it was just three seasons of season one, in my opinion.
1:09:56I would also argue that season one is also not as happy as people remember it,
1:10:02and the show was always what it was, and it just wasn't what people--
1:10:07This is my-- Very briefly, I'll give you my tangent about Battlestar Galactica,
1:10:11which is, I think, one of the reasons people hated Battlestar Galactica's ending so much,
1:10:14is because they had decided what the show was, and ignored the stuff that they didn't want to pay attention to that was in the show.
1:10:22And then it turns out they got to the ending, and the stuff that they had ignored,
1:10:26that a certain kind of science fiction TV series viewer had ignored,
1:10:29because they didn't want to engage with that kind of the content, was the point of the ending,
1:10:34and therefore there was an enormous disconnect, and people felt really betrayed by it.
1:10:39Whereas, I had thought about that content all along as being super important to the show,
1:10:44given its origins, and given the previous version and its origins,
1:10:48and so when they got to the end, I was like, "Yeah, of course, sure."
1:10:51But other people were like, "I am so betrayed."
1:10:53And I think Ted Lasso's a little like that, where I think people--
1:10:56It's like pandemic, it was a comfort view, they're like, "Oh, yes."
1:10:59And it's like, "Oh, yeah, also he had a horrible panic attack,
1:11:01and it's getting a divorce, and it's super sad in season one."
1:11:04But people didn't really remember that part.
1:11:06I thought season three was weaker than the first two seasons,
1:11:10because there were some plotting problems,
1:11:12and there was a bunch of stuff that happened sort of in the middle of the season,
1:11:15like a lot of streaming shows that was kind of a mess,
1:11:17because they were kind of trying to get to their ending.
1:11:19The ending was great, I agree with you.
1:11:20I also think I noticed at least a couple of places
1:11:24where there were TV critics and TV writers
1:11:27who were doing the obligatory Ted Lasso write-ups
1:11:30because it got traffic, who never liked the show,
1:11:33and were really enjoying the fact that they were able to rip on it,
1:11:38which I don't really understand why you get somebody who doesn't like the show
1:11:40to write about the show, because the only people who are reading it
1:11:44are people who are watching it.
1:11:45Are there that many hate watchers out there?
1:11:47It seemed very weird and not a good way to live.
1:11:49But so be it.
1:11:50Anyway, if you didn't like it, that's fine.
1:11:52A lot of reasons not to.
1:11:53There was a lot of discourse about it.
1:11:55The fact is, lots of people watched it.
1:11:56Were they satisfied?
1:11:57I don't know, right?
1:11:58But they watched it.
1:11:59It was a huge hit, and I'm sure, again, that if they want to make more,
1:12:03Apple will back many trucks of money up to whoever's door is necessary
1:12:07to make more Ted Lasso after the writer's strike is over.
1:12:10I'm convinced they're going to.
1:12:11I still remain convinced.
1:12:13I think me and you were talking about this when we went to baseball.
1:12:16Don't make a show of course.
1:12:17Was it the Richmond Way or whatever?
1:12:19The Richmond Way or AFC Richmond, yeah.
1:12:21And that'll be with most of the cast, just not Jason Sudeikis,
1:12:25because the whole point of season three, spoilers for Ted Lasso, I guess.
1:12:28But Jason Sudeikis, his kids live in America,
1:12:30and he doesn't want to be making a show in England.
1:12:33And so the whole point of season three was saying it's not really about Ted Lasso.
1:12:38It's about everybody else.
1:12:40And I still think that they could and probably will make another season of Ted Lasso,
1:12:45and he's coaching some other sport or whatever.
1:12:49We spoke about this.
1:12:51I mean, come on, Apple.
1:12:53He's an MLS coach now.
1:12:55You've got it.
1:12:56You can make it happen, right?
1:12:58You don't even need to do the deals.
1:13:00It's just in there.
1:13:02Ted Lasso is the MLS coach.
1:13:03He's literally an MLS coach.
1:13:04Yes.
1:13:05A fictional character is going to be a coach in the real MLS now.
1:13:07It's true.
1:13:08It's going to happen.
1:13:09Just do it.
1:13:10Because they had that kind of power.
1:13:11Oh, I didn't mean that, but yeah, do that.
1:13:12It makes Jason Sudeikis the coach of an MLS team.
1:13:16No, no, Ted Lasso.
1:13:17Jason Sudeikis as Ted Lasso as the coach of an MLS team.
1:13:22Yeah, sure.
1:13:23Why not?
1:13:24The Morning Show returns in September with a 10-episode season.
1:13:28It's shifting to a Wednesday release, like most of Apple's content has.
1:13:32The first two episodes drop on September 13th.
1:13:35Jon Hamm is in this one, which was the perfect payoff to his whole commercial thing of Apple,
1:13:40please cast me, and they did.
1:13:41They put him in the Morning Show, which is, I think, whether the world agrees, Apple considers
1:13:48the Morning Show its premier thing, right?
1:13:50Yeah.
1:13:51This is their jewel.
1:13:52Star studded.
1:13:53Star studded, and yeah, it's got the prestige feel, whether people feel like it's got the
1:13:59prestige quality or not.
1:14:00I really like the Morning Show a lot, actually.
1:14:04I really liked the last season.
1:14:08Before this season even begins, it has been renewed for season four, which is a surprise
1:14:12to me.
1:14:13I just thought this would be the last one, but it's going to keep going for another season
1:14:17after this one.
1:14:18Okay.
1:14:19I still haven't watched season two.
1:14:20I know you liked it.
1:14:21I really liked it.
1:14:22I really liked it.
1:14:23I didn't like how season one ended, but really it's just we have to-
1:14:25Season two is better than season one, that is for sure.
1:14:28We're watching The Bear right now, so when that's over, we'll see what's next.
1:14:32Highly recommend The Bear, by the way, to all.
1:14:34Oh, yeah.
1:14:35I haven't seen The Bear yet, but I want to.
1:14:36I know how good it is just from everyone talking about it.
1:14:37So good.
1:14:38Right now, we're watching Abbott Elementary, which is fantastic.
1:14:39It's good.
1:14:40It's a good sitcom.
1:14:41It is the return of the 30-minute sitcom.
1:14:44Right.
1:14:45I can't believe that someone has made this show that now, and it works, and it's great.
1:14:53It's just a surprise to me that, is it Peacock?
1:14:56Where is Abbott Elementary?
1:14:58We have it on Disney.
1:14:59Is it Hulu?
1:15:00Yeah, it's Hulu because it's an ABC show.
1:15:02We have it on Disney Plus.
1:15:04Yeah, the reason I say is it Peacock because it just feels like the NBC 30-minute comedy.
1:15:08It is a surprise to me that something like that could exist again, but it's fantastically done.
1:15:14We are slowly going through that having finished Superstore, which was our last traditional sitcom, which is also great.
1:15:20That's a really good one.
1:15:21So we've got Abbott Elementary.
1:15:22The Bear, I will tell you this about The Bear.
1:15:24The Bear is not a sitcom.
1:15:25The Bear is very intense.
1:15:26However, the beauty thing about The Bear is that it's a very good sitcom.
1:15:31However, the beauty thing about The Bear is that it's a very good sitcom.
1:15:34However, the beauty thing about The Bear is that it's a very good sitcom.
1:15:35They're also half-hour episodes for the most part.
1:15:36So if you're looking to get something to fit into your life, because sometimes with an hour-long show, it's like, "Do I have an hour right now?"
1:15:42The Bear, it's mostly half-hours.
1:15:45No, see, Abbott's fitting in perfectly for a show while we're eating dinner or whatever.
1:15:51Sometimes you just don't want something that intense.
1:15:53And I feel like The Bear's not going to do that.
1:15:54No.
1:15:55No, I feel like The Bear's not going to do that.
1:15:56Do not eat dinner while watching The Bear.
1:15:58Yeah, I feel like any show where there's food as part of the show where it's not a cooking competition, I'm never going to watch it while I'm eating.
1:16:07No.
1:16:08I feel like I've learned that before.
1:16:09The Bear is sort of a cooking competition, but in the worst way.
1:16:12Okay.
1:16:13I love it.
1:16:14I love it.
1:16:15And in the middle of season two right now, it is legitimately one of the best shows on TV right now.
1:16:20And I know it to be the case just because of the way people talk about it, so I'm going to get to it at some point.
1:16:25Yeah.
1:16:26There's a silo on the list now, too.
1:16:27Yeah.
1:16:28Apple has also renewed their sci-fi show Invasion for season two.
1:16:32Don't know anything about Invasion.
1:16:34Hey, remember that?
1:16:35There's like aliens in an invader or something.
1:16:37I didn't watch it either.
1:16:38And they canceled their drama show High Desert.
1:16:42They don't cancel a lot of things, but they canceled this one.
1:16:46Yeah.
1:16:47And that's Ben Stiller, who is also doing Severance, was the executive producer of that.
1:16:51But they canceled that.
1:16:53Unlike all the other streamers, when Apple cancels something, they don't just yank it off the air.
1:16:57It'll live in the Apple catalog because Apple's catalog is really small and they want more stuff in it.
1:17:01I still find the yanking things off services to be weird.
1:17:04That is a very weird thing to me.
1:17:06It's real weird.
1:17:07We've talked about it on our podcast downstream, Julian Alexander and I host, which the pilot episode of that was a summer of fun episode last year.
1:17:16And we do talk about it.
1:17:18It is weird.
1:17:19There are tax purposes for some of it, which is really gross.
1:17:21And then also the idea is if it's not making money for you here, maybe you can sell it to someone.
1:17:26The short version of this is there was a period there where everybody was trying to gear up to fight Netflix.
1:17:32And everybody decided, all the studios decided, we're going to own our own streaming service and put all of our content on it.
1:17:37We're going to take our ball and go home.
1:17:39We're going to bring it all inside.
1:17:40Friends, Netflix is really successful.
1:17:42But you know what?
1:17:43Warner Brothers owns it.
1:17:44We're going to take it in and put it on HBO Max.
1:17:46That was the trend for a while.
1:17:48Then Netflix had a bad quarter.
1:17:49Everybody freaked out about how much money they were spending on streaming.
1:17:52And what ended up happening is people were like, say, you know that show that's not doing, like, Insecure is an HBO show.
1:17:59And it was on and people watched it.
1:18:01And now it's just sitting there on Max and nobody's watching it.
1:18:04Netflix will give us money to put it on Netflix where it will find a bigger audience and make more money for us and for Netflix.
1:18:12And so they sold it to Netflix.
1:18:14Like that is starting to happen.
1:18:16And that's what's going on with some of these things getting pulled off streaming services is they're going to get sold somewhere else for more, for incremental money.
1:18:25Basically the idea of like, well, we, everybody who'd watched it on our service has watched it now.
1:18:31So we're going to go put it on Netflix or we'll put it on Tubi or something like that.
1:18:35Like we'll put it somewhere where it can generate more money for us than on our own service.
1:18:40And that's a very different model.
1:18:41I understand why people feel whiplashed by it because like just literally a year and a half ago, we were in the land of like, everything's going to its own service and Disney's going to have a service and Paramount's got a service and Warner media's got a service.
1:18:53And that's what we're going to do.
1:18:54And then it all blew up.
1:18:56And now that's not going to be the case.
1:18:59It just feels like as a customer, like the rugs been pulled out from under me, like I was sold on the idea that I would sign up to all of these services so I could have all of the television and movies.
1:19:09And they would all be there and it's like, fine.
1:19:11All right, I'll sign up for this one.
1:19:12I'll sign up for that one.
1:19:13And now it's like, oh, it's all going to move around again.
1:19:15Viacom or Paramount Global, I guess is what they are now.
1:19:19The whole idea was we're going to invest in Star Trek because we own Star Trek.
1:19:24So we're going to be the home of Star Trek.
1:19:25They literally pulled one of the animated Star Trek show off, completely off Paramount Plus and are going to sell it with 20 unaired episodes somewhere else.
1:19:34So you're a Star Trek fan.
1:19:36You get all your Star Trek on Paramount Plus.
1:19:38Not so fast.
1:19:39It's akin a little bit to a Marvel show suddenly going on Netflix where it's like they did that back in the past, right?
1:19:47And they pulled it all off and put it on Disney Plus.
1:19:49Imagine if they're like, you know, on second thought, maybe we should just put Daredevil back on Netflix.
1:19:57Like weird, just weird.
1:19:58But that's where we are.
1:19:59I feel like Disney would maybe be the company most least likely to do this sell out thing, right?
1:20:04Least likely to do it.
1:20:05I agree.
1:20:05I think Disney's crown jewels are its franchise stuff.
1:20:08That's why the Star Trek thing is so shocking.
1:20:10It's a kids show.
1:20:11I mean, it's not.
1:20:12It's actually a very good show.
1:20:13Star Trek Prodigy.
1:20:14It's a very good show, but it's for all ages.
1:20:16It's like Doctor Who.
1:20:17It's a family show, right?
1:20:18It's appropriate for kids, but I think parents would like it too.
1:20:21Paramount Plus, not really great with kids' content.
1:20:25They've got some because everybody's got some, but like there's probably a better fit somewhere else.
1:20:30Like Disney, would Disney buy a Star Trek show?
1:20:32I don't know, but it would probably be a good fit.
1:20:34Maybe Netflix?
1:20:35We'll see, but it's just so weird, this idea that you would take some of your crown jewels,
1:20:40your intellectual property, this is a franchise we own, and say, "Eh."
1:20:43I don't know.
1:20:44It's weird.
1:20:45Weird times.
1:20:46Disney did remove shows, but the idea of selling them, it doesn't sit with me.
1:20:53Imagine if Disney was like, "Yeah, Obi-Wan, we're just going to make it disappear."
1:20:56Like, what?
1:20:57Or, "Obi-Wan's going to be on Max."
1:21:00No!
1:21:01Like, you wouldn't do that.
1:21:02Yeah.
1:21:03Weird.
1:21:04If you enjoyed this segment, go check it out downstream on Relay FM.
1:21:08It's a wonderful show, it's one of my favorites.
1:21:10Thank you.
1:21:11There's more of this stuff every two weeks.
1:21:13Every two weeks.
1:21:14If you would like to get more Upgrade, if you want more Upgrade, why wouldn't you want more Upgrade?
1:21:20Subscribe to Upgrade Plus.
1:21:21Go to getupgradeplus.com.
1:21:23You will hear more bonus content every single week.
1:21:26Today, Jason said that he wants to talk about celebrating a holiday.
1:21:30That's all I've got in the notes.
1:21:31I'm very excited to find out what that means.
1:21:33You'll get no ads.
1:21:35No ads for this show at all.
1:21:37In fact, what you're hearing right now, which is me telling you about Upgrade Plus,
1:21:41if you sign up for Upgrade Plus, you don't have to hear about that anymore either.
1:21:44Because this thing that I'm doing right now, where I'm talking about Upgrade Plus for like a minute,
1:21:48that will be cut, along with all of the avarice you've heard in this episode.
1:21:51That'll be gone.
1:21:52You won't have to hear it anymore.
1:21:53You won't have to hear this monkey.
1:21:55That seems worth it, right?
1:21:57No one wants to hear that.
1:21:59That's a terrible thing.
1:22:00Go to getupgradeplus.com.
1:22:02$5 a month, $50 a year.
1:22:04You get access to the Relay FM members Discord.
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1:22:10We have tons of other bonus content that happens every single month,
1:22:14as well as those member specials that we were talking about earlier on.
1:22:18So, tons of stuff available to you there.
1:22:20Go to getupgradeplus.com and you'll be supporting this show
1:22:24and the work that we do, to which we will be very grateful.
1:22:28Thank you so much.
1:22:30Let's do some Ask Upgrade questions.
1:22:34Alright, so, first question comes from Randall, who asks,
1:22:41"If you had to remove one category of Apple device, Mac, iPad, iPhone or Apple Watch,
1:22:47from your life forever, which would you choose?"
1:22:51Oh. Hmm.
1:22:54Forever.
1:22:56Forever.
1:22:58Apple Watch.
1:23:01I'm sorry. I like my Apple Watch, but it's the least.
1:23:05I can't imagine living without Mac and iPad.
1:23:08And, unlike most people, iPhone would come third in that list,
1:23:12but still, how do you not live your life without a phone?
1:23:15So, Apple Watch.
1:23:17Apple Watch.
1:23:19It's on the edge for me at the best of times, right?
1:23:24I don't have any other device where I'm like,
1:23:28"I wished Apple made something else so I didn't have to use this."
1:23:33I don't feel that about the Mac. I don't feel about the iPad or the iPhone.
1:23:36Like I said, I want Apple to put all of this stuff in a thing that doesn't have a screen on it,
1:23:40so then I can also wear a regular watch.
1:23:42I don't wear two watches. I don't want to wear two watches.
1:23:44So, I want the features they give.
1:23:48I don't want the device as much, where like the Mac, iPad, iPhone,
1:23:51I don't want any of the other competing products.
1:23:53I don't want Apple to significantly change the product in any way.
1:23:57And it's also just like what will make the least impact on my life
1:24:01from both work and enjoyment. It's Apple Watch.
1:24:05Although I do love it, but not as much as I love the others, you know?
1:24:10Exactly.
1:24:11It's like choosing your least favorite child kind of thing.
1:24:14Mm-hmm.
1:24:16Kerry asks, or Sari asks, what would you do? C-E-R-I.
1:24:20Sari.
1:24:21Sari. I'm not going to say.
1:24:24That could have set off phones all over the place.
1:24:27Do we know what Apple's EyeSight feature on the Vision Pro,
1:24:32this is where you see someone's eyes on the outside,
1:24:34will show for somebody that normally wears glasses?
1:24:37What do you think it might be if you don't know?
1:24:39Presumably since the initial scan is done without the headset on,
1:24:42one could be wearing glasses?
1:24:44I think they have you take the glasses off when you do your scan,
1:24:48and it will not show you glasses because that would be weird
1:24:51because you're wearing the headset sort of where your glasses would be,
1:24:54so it won't show them.
1:24:55And it would break the illusion, right?
1:24:59It would.
1:25:00They're trying to create an illusion, and so no.
1:25:02Glass is off for the scan, and you'll do the scan,
1:25:05and then you'll have just eyes in there.
1:25:07The headset are your glasses.
1:25:09And you won't look weird because the headset is going to provide the frame
1:25:14that looks like your glasses.
1:25:15I mean, would you look weird if you took, you know,
1:25:18if you have prescription like ski goggles,
1:25:20and you took your glasses off and put on the goggles?
1:25:22Well, no, because you're still wearing something that's framing your eyes.
1:25:24I am going to say, Jason, you will look weird,
1:25:27you're just not going to look weird in that way.
1:25:28You're going to look weird.
1:25:29Ah, it won't be the glasses.
1:25:30It won't be the glasses.
1:25:31The glasses won't make you look weird,
1:25:33the headset will make you look weird.
1:25:34Exactly.
1:25:35Differently weird, but weird.
1:25:37Okay, that's fair.
1:25:38Tom asks, how do you think environments will work in Vision OS?
1:25:43Will there be an environments app store where developers could create
1:25:46and share their own?
1:25:47This is the fully immersed thing, the mountains and that kind of stuff.
1:25:50Or will this be restricted to Apple adding through OS updates
1:25:54or even special environments such as things like the AFC Richmond locker room
1:25:58or Lumen Industries office?
1:26:00Yeah, I mean, my guess is that this is going to be Apple provided
1:26:06and there'll be a collection of them
1:26:08and that maybe one day third parties will be able to contribute,
1:26:11but not out of the gate.
1:26:13And the idea is that Apple will have these nicely curated kind of environments.
1:26:17Keep in mind, environments are like the desktop picture of Vision Pro, right?
1:26:23Like you're going to be, by default, you're going to be in augmented reality,
1:26:26but if you want to run multiple apps in an environment,
1:26:31you turn the dial on the digital crown
1:26:34and you can enter an environment that you can choose from what Apple is providing.
1:26:39But they're not the primary,
1:26:42and I think you'll still be able to use your apps.
1:26:45The idea here is you kind of close off from the world,
1:26:47but you can still have all your windows floating around and all of that.
1:26:49And then separately, apps can take over the entire interface
1:26:54and do whatever they want, but that's in their own app space,
1:26:59not in the space that's shared with lots of different apps.
1:27:02So I think that's going to be how it works for now at least.
1:27:06I'm sure. I heard somebody say this.
1:27:08I thought I might have seen it in an interview with someone at Apple,
1:27:12but maybe I didn't.
1:27:13Maybe it was just somebody who was making conjecture, but I agree with it.
1:27:17Basically, these will be like watch faces.
1:27:19Apple will make them.
1:27:20No one else can make them, and they'll update them when they want to.
1:27:24Probably, at least in the short term.
1:27:26Yes.
1:27:27The environments thing feels very technically complicated.
1:27:30My understanding is it is like a mixture between real imagery and 3D-generated stuff,
1:27:38which I could see was the case because in the image that I was in,
1:27:42like Mount Hood, there was this rock kind of not too far in the distance,
1:27:47and I could see that that was CGI.
1:27:49I could just see it looked like a texture to me.
1:27:51It looked video gamey.
1:27:52Some of it looked real.
1:27:54Some of it looked CGI.
1:27:56I asked if it was real or CGI or both.
1:27:58They did not have an answer for me.
1:28:00Also, I think they have the ability to do not only dynamic sounds and stuff in the environment,
1:28:04so you've got birds chirping and stuff like that.
1:28:06It was raining in the rain, and it definitely wasn't real rain.
1:28:10Again, I could see this looks like rain, but it looks like video game rain.
1:28:14Right.
1:28:15You could have probably over time it's rain, it's sunny, the clouds move in the sky,
1:28:20the reflections change on the lake.
1:28:23That kind of thing is part of it.
1:28:25It has to be.
1:28:26It's a whole experience.
1:28:28It has to be 3D generated graphics.
1:28:32It just has to be.
1:28:33There kind of isn't a way to do this, I think, in a way.
1:28:36Because the panorama didn't look as good as the environment when we did our demo.
1:28:41There was a panoramic image that we looked at, and it just didn't look as good.
1:28:45I was thinking Mount Hood itself could be basically photographic all the way in the background,
1:28:51but all the stuff that's being impacted by the effects.
1:28:55You're right, I think that this is the idea.
1:28:57If it was a desktop picture, or even one of those dynamic desktop pictures that updates every 10 minutes or something,
1:29:04it's not going to feel like a real space.
1:29:06You're going to be inside a photograph.
1:29:08That's not what they want.
1:29:09They want to add a very subtle amount of dynamism to it.
1:29:13It's subtle, because you don't want to be distracted,
1:29:17but it wants it to be soothingly an environment that has some background noise
1:29:24and changes a little bit, but super subtle.
1:29:28That's a lot of engineering work going on there.
1:29:30To talk a little bit more about what you are about,
1:29:33you can still create an immersive environment as a developer,
1:29:37like the space model, so you can have a full space.
1:29:41But you can only have your app, but you can have multiple windows in it.
1:29:46If you want to create a fully immersive experience, you're able to do this.
1:29:50If you were a developer and wanted to create your own mounting environment, you can,
1:29:54but users can only be using windows of your application inside of that immersive space.
1:30:00So it's like in the sizzle reel that Disney made,
1:30:04where you were watching Disney+ sitting inside of some--
1:30:06I think it was a TIE fighter--no, X-Wing or whatever,
1:30:10or a land cruise, speed cruiser.
1:30:12I'm just destroying this.
1:30:13Everybody loves Star Trek.
1:30:15Land speeder?
1:30:16Yep. Toyotan Land Cruiser watching Disney+.
1:30:19That would have been a full space if they make something like that.
1:30:23So you can watch Disney+ inside of an environment that they create,
1:30:26but you can't then also check your tweets.
1:30:28Right.
1:30:30James writes in and says,
1:30:32"As a software developer who listens to tech podcasts,
1:30:35I wonder how you would rate your software development skills,
1:30:38and if you've had instances where you've increased your software skills
1:30:41and found it has helped your journalism to know more about how the sausage is made.
1:30:45Are there other nonjournalistic skills,
1:30:47like maybe coaching a children's sports team,
1:30:49that have helped you in covering technology in large companies?"
1:30:52You know, what I always say about my software skills
1:30:56is I know just enough to be dangerous.
1:30:58Yep.
1:30:59I wrote a lot of Apple scripts.
1:31:00I write a lot of Python now.
1:31:03It has helped me in--
1:31:06and I learned how to do PHP,
1:31:08because I built the templates for Six Colors when we moved to WordPress.
1:31:11And I have to update that stuff when I'm doing them,
1:31:14all the membership stuff on Six Colors and the Incomparable,
1:31:17that involved--
1:31:18I had web designers work on the pages,
1:31:20but I had to do a lot of the implementation.
1:31:23I had some help, but I had to do a lot of it and understand it,
1:31:25and I have to maintain it.
1:31:26Writing Python scripts similarly,
1:31:28writing automations is fun and actually informs my writing,
1:31:31because I like to write about user automation
1:31:33and encourage people to try it.
1:31:35Beyond that, I mean, I wrote a one thing that I distributed to a bunch of people I know
1:31:41that's like an automator/AppleScript thing
1:31:45that's kind of like an app that you have to install,
1:31:47and it has a readme file.
1:31:48And certainly that was interesting in taking the mental shift
1:31:52from a tool that's only for me to a tool that's meant for other people,
1:31:55which is a big leap, as I'm sure software developers know.
1:31:58But the truth is, I talk to a lot of software developers,
1:32:02and I get their read on things, and I get what they care about,
1:32:05and that's how I cover that.
1:32:06And if I was a software developer, the danger would be that I would care only about
1:32:15the stuff that mattered to me for my app, and maybe not the bigger picture.
1:32:20But the good news is I'm not a software developer, and nor am I going to be.
1:32:23So the answer is I try to listen and talk to people who understand this stuff
1:32:29and gauge their reaction, and that's sort of how I do it.
1:32:33I've always viewed myself as writing from the perspective of the user of the software,
1:32:39so I'm less concerned.
1:32:41I'm more concerned about what happens with developers in terms of how it will impact the user,
1:32:46in terms of what software gets delivered.
1:32:48And that can mean developers are having a really hard time with this,
1:32:52but the point there is sort of like, so don't get your hopes up, essentially.
1:32:56I'm trying to view it from the user's perspective, because I am one,
1:33:00and also that's who my audience is.
1:33:02At least as I view it.
1:33:04Is there people who care about Apple hardware and software,
1:33:07and software that runs on Apple's platforms, and what that means?
1:33:10And I'm trying to find that by understanding how, to a certain extent,
1:33:16how the software development process works and what the developers care about.
1:33:20But I don't think if I was one, I would have a very different view,
1:33:26and it's not the view that I have or that I've kind of cultivated.
1:33:30So I tried learning Swift a couple of years ago, and just failed.
1:33:36It's just not a thing for me that I either have the skills for
1:33:40or that I care enough about to develop those skills realistically.
1:33:43I had an idea for an app.
1:33:45I wanted to see how hard it would be to make it, and also just learn something new,
1:33:51and also potentially give myself another feather in my cap
1:33:55to be able to talk about on shows and understand things a little bit more.
1:33:58Realistically, I came to a bunch of different conclusions,
1:34:01of which I will detail for you now.
1:34:03I have always been a very passionate user of technology.
1:34:06That's kind of the whole reason that I cared enough to start a podcast
1:34:10about technology in the first place.
1:34:12And for me, realistically, I feel like just talking somewhat intelligently
1:34:17about the user-facing features, how I feel about them,
1:34:20and listening to and consuming content in that way
1:34:23is more helpful for my job than learning how to program.
1:34:26And when it comes to my other skills that I think make me,
1:34:32or have been able to make me good at what I do,
1:34:35working in a very large company for many years helped my perspective
1:34:39about how large companies are run.
1:34:41I feel like some people are way too--
1:34:44They think of Apple as way too good,
1:34:48when realistically, it is a very large company run by lots of people,
1:34:53which is why we see things that you might not agree with,
1:34:56like, "Oh, why did they put that TV show on Twitter?"
1:34:58Like what we were talking about earlier is like,
1:35:00"Well, because the marketing team decided to try it."
1:35:02When me and you have either worked in or with marketing people
1:35:06who make that decision because ultimately that's their job
1:35:09and they don't care about cultural wars.
1:35:11-Right. -You know?
1:35:13-Yeah, that's it. -I also think one of the things
1:35:15that helps me is I consider myself to be pretty good at business.
1:35:20It's just a thing that I'm interested in and do,
1:35:22and I think that helps me talk about very large companies doing business.
1:35:26I also want to like-- I feel like I came to a conclusion at WWDC
1:35:31about who I am that I wanted to share,
1:35:33because James references journalism.
1:35:36I am not and do not consider myself to be a journalist.
1:35:41I don't think I ever really have, but I came to that decision,
1:35:45like it dawned on me while sitting in the keynote environment area,
1:35:50while I was sitting around media,
1:35:52and could see journalists all over the place and around me
1:35:55and the way that they were reacting to or not the keynote.
1:36:00And it's just like, "I'm not a journalist.
1:36:03I have settled on, I'm a technology entertainer."
1:36:07-That is what I do. -Okay.
1:36:09I make entertainment. I don't try and--
1:36:12I don't believe that what we-- from me,
1:36:15I don't believe that what I am bringing to this show is a journalism.
1:36:19Sensibility.
1:36:21I don't think I'm bringing it to this show or any other show that I do.
1:36:25I believe these podcasts are entertainment first.
1:36:28Like, that's what they are.
1:36:31From my perspective, that's what I set out to do.
1:36:34And so I consider myself just an entertainer with a focus on technology.
1:36:38Like, that's who I am. So I care and I get excited.
1:36:42And I don't try and be like,
1:36:44"Hmm, these are my serious opinions on this technology."
1:36:48So that's about it.
1:36:49I mean, I think that for podcasts, that's true of all of us to a degree.
1:36:53The original concept of upgrade, and I think it still holds,
1:36:57is that this is also a place where you help me get out the stuff
1:37:03that I've been thinking about and doing as a journalist who covers this space.
1:37:09So you're the--
1:37:11The primary role you have, it's not the only role by any means,
1:37:15is also to be sort of a facilitator of the conversation
1:37:22and bring out what I'm thinking about a lot of stuff.
1:37:25And honestly, that is the role that I have in downstream.
1:37:32Julia is brilliant.
1:37:34And we've been talking about CNN her ages.
1:37:37She wrote a piece in Puck News about CNN's business model quandary
1:37:43that people aren't talking about because they're talking about
1:37:45these high-level rumors and things.
1:37:47And she's like, "The problem is the business model."
1:37:49And then there was a report in Bloomberg that basically said,
1:37:52"Oh, yeah, Julia's story went around," or maybe it wasn't Puck,
1:37:55but it was, "Julia's story went around in the C-suite at CNN."
1:37:59And I just had that moment of like, "Woo!"
1:38:01And she said to me on the last episode that, yeah,
1:38:04she's had multiple high-level executives say, "I love downstream."
1:38:08I was like, "Wow."
1:38:09But again, my job there is to be a passionate consumer and user of the tech.
1:38:14I am the observer of some things, especially the sports stuff,
1:38:17because it interests me, but she's the expert.
1:38:20I'm trying to be a facilitator to get her expertise out.
1:38:24And that is sort of the role.
1:38:26Again, it's complicated, but that is a key role that you play.
1:38:30In the show, I think it's changed a bit over time.
1:38:34As my confidence grew, I now consider--
1:38:37Yes, you contribute much more.
1:38:39We have a conversation now rather than I used to just ask you questions.
1:38:42So, Jason, how about this? How do you feel about this?
1:38:44And you absolutely do, but you're right.
1:38:47Look, I am a passionate user of Apple products.
1:38:53I'm not writing this from a PC.
1:38:56I'm like, "Uh, Apple, but I got to write about it."
1:38:58These people say.
1:38:59Part of what I try to do is to understand it.
1:39:02I try to understand it.
1:39:03I am writing for an audience that includes me,
1:39:07mostly because I don't want that job.
1:39:10I've been very fortunate to not have to do the job of covering something
1:39:15I don't care about because that's what the job is, which, believe me,
1:39:18when you go into journalism, that's always the most likely scenario.
1:39:22That's not been a path that I've followed.
1:39:25But you're right.
1:39:29The aspects of what we do are more or less journalism versus entertainment.
1:39:34And you're right.
1:39:35There are those moments, I think, at those events where you can see the people who are viewing it.
1:39:40Because I still view everything through that journalistic lens.
1:39:43I still do that.
1:39:44There's no way you wouldn't because you did it for so long.
1:39:47But I feel like you still get excited.
1:39:50I don't feel like you're jaded in any way.
1:39:53Yeah, but I don't clap.
1:39:55I clap.
1:39:56And I whoop and I holla.
1:39:57I only clap at things that are laughably a thing that I've --
1:40:02like when they did Stage Manager, I clapped because I've been complaining.
1:40:06It's more like almost like an ironic clap of like, "Oh, yes, my feature. Yay!"
1:40:11But I don't do that.
1:40:13And that's -- everybody makes their own choices.
1:40:15But, yeah.
1:40:16No, I think this has been good.
1:40:17Thank you to the mysterious James for his question.
1:40:21I do -- we'll say one last thing on that.
1:40:23It's like I don't know if it was always this way, but I really appreciated Apple's designation as media rather than press.
1:40:29I feel like everyone always calls it press.
1:40:31I hear about press, press, press, press, press, press.
1:40:33But they call it media.
1:40:35I don't know if it's always been that way and people are just used to calling it press.
1:40:38But media makes more sense to me than press does.
1:40:41Because I don't consider myself as part of the press because there's no newspaper around here.
1:40:46There's no printing press in this podcast studio.
1:40:51If you would like to send us your feedback, follow-up, and questions for our various segments, go to UpgradeFeedback.com.
1:40:58Thank you so much to everybody that does every single week.
1:41:01I really appreciate it.
1:41:03You can check out Jason's journalistic endeavors at SixColors.com.
1:41:06You can hear his podcasts at TheIncomparableWorld.com and here on Relay FM.
1:41:11That includes the podcast we've mentioned multiple times because you should listen to it.
1:41:16That is called Downstream here on Relay FM.
1:41:19You can listen to my shows here on Relay FM too.
1:41:21You can check out my other work over at CortexBrand.com.
1:41:24We're on Mastodon. Jason is @JasonL on Zeppelin.Flights.
1:41:28Maybe you're new to Mastodon. You can go follow Jason.
1:41:31You can find me as @imike.
1:41:35You can find the show as @upgrade on RelayFM.social where you will see video clips posted.
1:41:40But you should go and watch them on the video clip platforms, TikTok and Instagram.
1:41:45We are @upgraderelay on both. Or you can find them on Mastodon as I said.
1:41:50Thank you to our members who support us with Upgrade Plus.
1:41:53Go to GetUpgradePlus.com to learn more.
1:41:55And thank you to our sponsors, Uni and Squarespace for their support of this episode.
1:42:00But most of all, thank you for listening.
1:42:02Until next time, say goodbye Jason Snow.
1:42:05Goodbye Mike Hurley.
1:42:07[Music]
1:42:18[ Silence ]