0:00:00Mark Gurman, so we haven't we've never spoken before right? Yeah, that's right. We haven't spoken before
0:00:05All right. Yeah for those who don't know mark is what you have a title you just reporter
0:00:11I mean I go by a senior editor not if I Mac but I
0:00:15Report that it right manage all sorts of stuff senior editor nine-to-five Mac. I
0:00:21How long have you been writing for nine-to-five Mac
0:00:26Since right when the first iPad was announced within give or take a couple weeks of that so early 2010
0:00:33It's about four years, right? Right and you are
0:00:36Only 11 years old. Yes, exactly 11 years old. No, I'm about double that. So 20. Are you really?
0:00:43No, how old are you funny? So you're still not even of drinking age, correct?
0:00:48You but you started writing professionally for nine-to-five Mac when you were 16 years old
0:00:55Yeah around 16 years old maybe in 15 actually
0:00:59depending on and
0:01:01Honestly, I don't even I'm not you know, this shows you how much research I do for the show
0:01:05Are you in college? Yeah, so I'm a sophomore at the University of Michigan. I'm in my apartment here right now
0:01:13Yeah, and yet you are and I mean this I'm not just saying it because you're a guest on the show
0:01:19But you're seriously one of the you know, most influential reporters on the Applebee
0:01:24Really appreciate it today, especially from you. Of course. I mean, I think you're the most influential
0:01:28So well, but I don't really do reporting and I think that'll make for an interesting conversation, you know
0:01:33Sure, and I you know and I think over the last few years
0:01:35I've even gotten further away from that where I sort of see myself more as a commentator on the reporting of others as opposed to
0:01:43someone who
0:01:44Does a lot of a rid, you know breaks a lot of original news. There's not too much news
0:01:48That's been broken on daring fireball recently
0:01:50Yeah, I mean your opinion is just so sharp and strong and matters so much
0:01:55So I guess you know either way you look at it whether it's original recording or you know original commentary, you know, either is great
0:02:01Well, thank you
0:02:05Hi, let's go back. So how did you get started writing for a nine-to-five Mac?
0:02:10So before the first iPad came out, I was doing some digging around on you know
0:02:16domain names and who his search is to see if Apple was snapping up any domain names
0:02:23having to do with tablets, because I remembered that someone spotted that they registered
0:02:28Macbook Air dot com or something like that before the first Air was announced in '08.
0:02:33And so sure enough, Apple had, under a shell company, registered iSlate dot com.
0:02:41And there was some New York Times executive who had some internal meeting in months in
0:02:49late 2009 talking about how, like he said, the impending Apple slate.
0:02:53So I mean, I figured they're not going to call it Apple slate, but you know, I slate
0:02:56made some sense.
0:02:58And I pieced it together and that really got me started with, you know, digging around
0:03:02and getting the news out there.
0:03:04And you know,
0:03:05Pete: Well, how did you put that out there?
0:03:07Do you have your own blog or did you use Twitter?
0:03:08I tipped Mac rumors actually funny enough
0:03:13And do you got credit for it though? Yep. Yep. Yep. They accredited me there and
0:03:19Kind of put me on the map a bit and then I talked to
0:03:23Set that nine to five and you know, we work something out and here we are today
0:03:27That's Seth
0:03:30Weintraub
0:03:31Yeah, who I guess he's the what founder of yeah. Yeah publisher nine to five whatever Empire
0:03:38Right, right. That's really really interesting. And I think that there's sort of a
0:03:43I wouldn't say a strong tradition. But so, you know, there's a strain though of
0:03:48Apple
0:03:51And I don't want to quite call it rumor reporting. We'll get back to that
0:03:54We'll get back to that art that the our word as I call it
0:03:56but you do break, you know a lot of and a lot of your better known stuff is for
0:04:01Breaking news about on you know stuff that's supposed to be secret right? Yeah more or less, right?
0:04:08So rumors is the is the wrong word and we can get back to that in a bit
0:04:11but sort of the wrong word, but there's a history of that though coming from
0:04:15Teenagers really I mean and I'm the example I'm thinking of and I hadn't thought of him for a while
0:04:23But Nick C or Ellie who was wrote under the pen name of Nick Diplume, right?
0:04:28Right in secret right on think secret now. This is weird though
0:04:32See, this is a thing where if you're 20 years old the think secret stuff must seem like ancient history to you
0:04:38Yeah, yeah, I was way before my time
0:04:40So you were not when that whole thing went down that was that was you weren't you were probably like
0:04:46I don't know 10 years old or something like that. Yeah, probably
0:04:48Exactly
0:04:51Yeah, if you go to think secret calm now, it's it's turned off. So think secret
0:04:56They were shut down like in the early iPhone days
0:04:59Founded in 1998. So that was Eddie that preceded even during fireball by four years and shut down in
0:05:072008 so yeah, I will you know, you must have been somewhat paying attention to the media though if by 2010
0:05:14You were breaking stories on domain registrations first that you know
0:05:18But you know, Nick Ciorrelli was you know, really young for most of the run of think secret, you know teenager
0:05:26And then I think he was at Harvard when this stuff went down with the lawsuit that effectively shut it down, right?
0:05:32Yeah
0:05:32That's pretty much what I remember as well
0:05:34Like he was in high school and then moved into college and that went down
0:05:37You know, I can't imagine being in his shoes going through, you know, the Apple lawsuit
0:05:41On top of you don't go to school, you know that I don't I don't envy him in that way
0:05:47Well, I don't know. I don't really envy you going to school and being effectively a full-time reporter
0:05:53When I was in school, I just sat around played video games. I
0:05:56Guess that's not really true
0:05:58I actually worked at the you know, did a lot of writing and editing at the student newspaper
0:06:02but you know, but it's it's you know, I was writing for an audience of
0:06:083,000 other students at Drexel University, whereas you're writing for an audience of I don't know
0:06:14I'm guessing at least a hundred thousand or more
0:06:16Readers of 9 to 5 Mac which is remarkable for someone who's you know, like I said still can't even legally buy beer
0:06:25Yeah, appreciate that
0:06:27Why do you think there's anything to that? I don't know to me there is something to the idea of like a truly enthusiastic
0:06:34Teenager who just has like an obsession with with this sort of stuff getting information
0:06:44that
0:06:47For lack of a better word older and more established reporters aren't getting right even though you're on the outside
0:06:53You're not even in the area, right? Did you grow up in Michigan?
0:06:56No, I'm from Los Angeles. So huh? Well, no, we're even close. Yeah, but still you're still not from the you know
0:07:03The valley or San Francisco. No, so not at all. No, where are you from there? No
0:07:08You know, I'm in Philadelphia now and I grew up in outside Philadelphia. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah same story for you
0:07:14But you know to your point there's a lot of talk about that
0:07:17I mean starting at the young age that I started at and what Nick think secret started at
0:07:23I mean, when you're working under 20 years old on this type of stuff, it's not really
0:07:29like the, for lack of a better term, the 9-5 day job where you get up every morning, do
0:07:35your stuff, finish up and then go home.
0:07:38It's more of a hobby.
0:07:40Like I didn't need to have that job luckily enough.
0:07:43I mean, it was just something that I really enjoyed and that gave me passion to run after
0:07:48it.
0:07:49No one was forcing me to do any of that and that takes a lot of the burden off of me allowing
0:07:53me to focus on what I like doing.
0:07:55Did you know, I mean, was it Apple specifically that you've always been interested in?
0:07:59Yeah, you know, I've always really been a huge Apple fan. Like, you know, waited in
0:08:03line for the first iPhone. I was just, you know, so thrilled. And I remember, you know,
0:08:10actually to show you how much you know, I really love Apple. I, when I was 13 years
0:08:15old and needing to be preparing for by bar mitzvah, the the rabbi was working with kept
0:08:19I mean you need to stop watching that iPhone keynote on repeat and get and know your stuff for the
0:08:24For the big event, so alright, so it wasn't like you were watching it because it was the day of the keynote
0:08:28You were just watching it repeated the the the videotape. Yeah
0:08:32obsessed yeah, I guess the thing that I did that strikes me as
0:08:37Interesting and I think it's also proof of sort of being in the modern internet age
0:08:43is
0:08:45that
0:08:46Where you are doesn't really matter that much
0:08:48I mean people I get that sometimes too where people are sometimes surprised that I'm in Philadelphia and that I'm not in San Francisco
0:08:53Or in the valley area and that you know, why you seem really tuned in, right?
0:08:58I don't know that it really makes a difference with you know, all of the messaging options you have and you know
0:09:03Frankly just good old email, right? Well, I can see how if it's a team I can see why teams
0:09:11Sometimes don't want to have remote workers depending on the style of collaboration and what what exactly the project
0:09:17They're supposed to be working on together as I can see, you know
0:09:19I understand I actually understand a lot why Apple doesn't have a lot of remote employees
0:09:24It's sort of have to get an exception to the rule to be at a remote engineer or designer at Apple
0:09:30But for the sort of stuff we do writing about them, it really doesn't make that much of a difference
0:09:36I don't think right, of course not like in terms of communicating with people
0:09:40You know, ten years ago this job would have been impossible living outside of the Valley,
0:09:46San Francisco, Cupertino area.
0:09:49But I mean, unless it was good old phone calls.
0:09:51But these days, you know, there's so many tools for talking to people.
0:09:56And in terms of, you know, like remote work, we don't have a 9-to-5 Mac office.
0:10:01I mean, there's just such great collaboration tools online.
0:10:04And, you know, in a way, doing this job, not sitting with everyone in the same room, you
0:10:09know, could be easier.
0:10:10I mean, I don't really have much to compare to but that's just how I look at it, right?
0:10:14It would you know, I'm of all the ways that nine-to-five Mac and nine-to-five Google might expand
0:10:20I'm sure opening an office space for you guys is probably not even on the list because you guys aren't even
0:10:24Do any of you guys work in the same?
0:10:27area
0:10:29Not no, not really
0:10:31I'm the only one on the west coast when I'm home for breaks in the summer everyone else that's in New York
0:10:38Jordans in Canada and everyone's mostly stationed on the east or in the UK. So
0:10:43They're pretty spread. I
0:10:45Do think for me personally in my you know experience and it's just crazy
0:10:51This is one of those things where it's crazy to me because I've been writing Daring Fireball for 12 years
0:10:56And so that means you were eight years old when I started I don't want to keep banging on your age
0:11:01No, it's as I'm preparing for this that must mean no tea. I'm guessing from your perception
0:11:07I've always been writing during fireball
0:11:09Always been writing variable
0:11:12And what do you is that is that how you see it that there's always been some guy Gruber writes this site during fireball about Apple
0:11:19You know the thing with thing with Gruber
0:11:21I mean classic Gruber in my opinion is the your story back in
0:11:262008 I think you called it contains spoilers where you sarcastically I
0:11:31Think pointed out all the features and all the new things are going out set that up
0:11:36Unibody MacBook event and everything turned out remarkably, correct? So I've been following your stuff for a long time and let's uh,
0:11:43Yeah, I mean, oh
0:11:46Cooper's been around a while. Yeah to me
0:11:48It still feels like it's a kind of a new site
0:11:51I still feel like during fireball is somewhat new and that's obviously not not the case
0:11:56But no, I mean that's what maybe that's what keeps it feeling like it's fun for me
0:12:00But it must be it's just crazy to me to think that you were eight years old when I started
0:12:04Yeah, that is pretty crazy. I have found though. I have found that and again, I'm not really in the the
0:12:11Breaking leaks game or the rumor game, whatever you want to call it
0:12:15Although I dabbled in it for a couple of years in the middle, right?
0:12:18And we could talk about that later, but I found though that I developed my best sources
0:12:24once I started going to things on the west coast, you know WWDC and Macworld Expo and
0:12:32meeting people and it wasn't because I had to meet them face to face to hear the information but it was that
0:12:38Having met them even just once face to face develops. There's a certain
0:12:43relationship you can sort of accelerate a
0:12:46circle of trust where they trust me and I trust them and
0:12:50Then you know future information might come in by email or instant message or something like that
0:12:56But having met them makes a big difference, but I get the feeling you haven't met most of your sources
0:13:02No, I think I'm pretty much in the same boat as you. I mean, I've been going to these conferences
0:13:07for a few years now. So I've met a lot of people through the, you know, good old face
0:13:12to face stuff. And I agree. It's extremely important.
0:13:15So you have that. No, it is. So I'm wrong. I was saying that that I my guess was you
0:13:19had not met them. But you're saying you have some?
0:13:22Yeah. Yeah. That's safe to say, right?
0:13:25Yeah. All right. Yeah. And it definitely helps. I think. I mean, like you said, just human
0:13:31Right, develop some trust. I mean, if you're just talking through instant messages, some
0:13:37text to another person, you don't really get a good idea if you should trust them or even
0:13:42if they should trust you and open up to you. But when you know someone in person, it's
0:13:45like you really get to know them, you can bond with them, and they'll feel more comfortable
0:13:52with you and you'll feel more comfortable with them. So it's really a big deal. And
0:13:56you said you don't have to you know fly out to San Francisco to talk to them
0:14:01every time there's some information there's other ways of communicating I'm
0:14:05trying to remember some of the old rumor sites I forget their names I have such a
0:14:09bad memory for stuff like that but in the old days like the late 90s I mean
0:14:14this is way before your time late 90s in the early years of Mac OS 10 2001 2002
0:14:21there are you know as always I mean Apple insider was around Apple insider
0:14:25is like the granddaddy, I think, of the sort of focus on rumors type stuff. But there was
0:14:33Think Secret from '98 on, and I forget some of the other ones, but they had such terrible
0:14:38track records. They still do. And it's a "spaghetti against the wall, see what sticks" approach,
0:14:50and then the one strand of spaghetti that does stick, they're like, "See? See? We got
0:14:54Right, and I always had this idea in the back of my head. Like what would it take to run an
0:15:00accurate
0:15:02Apple rumor site
0:15:04You know what? Why why are they all so inaccurate if you take them in the aggregate?
0:15:08Because it would just drive me nuts to have my name on something that was so wrong, you know wrong and regularly wrong, right?
0:15:15Yeah, I mean inaccuracy is the worst thing for someone and you know our positions of what we do
0:15:20I mean, why are people gonna read us if we're just you know, spitting BS
0:15:24S all day.
0:15:25Right.
0:15:26Or why are they going to believe your future stuff?
0:15:27Yeah, exactly.
0:15:28It's about gaining trust of the reader.
0:15:31And the way you do that is by consistently providing them what they're looking for.
0:15:36Kind of my problem, to your point about rumor sites being wrong, is there seems to be a
0:15:41lot of talk lately of people grouping all websites, even my work and how to find back
0:15:47into that category.
0:15:49I remember when I had the 64-bit A7 chip, someone tweeted—I think it actually might
0:15:55have been you—about how it was just spitting spitballs out the wall to see what sticks.
0:16:02So yeah, I don't enjoy when I see people grouping us all together. It kind of just
0:16:05makes all that hard work. I put in other accurate sites, put in like—come out bad like the
0:16:11rest.
0:16:12Yeah, well any other thing too that's it's a little bit problematic. I forget his name
0:16:18there was a guy at the unofficial apple web blog site who sort of did a
0:16:21I don't forget if it was a mark german scorecard or a nine to five mac in general scorecard, right?
0:16:27Must have been a nine to five mac in general. Well, what happened there was is
0:16:30uh, he
0:16:32Basically, you know noted that hey, we got all these stories, right perfect track record for 2013
0:16:38and then he grouped in all of our
0:16:41um quote unquote, you know noting or reblogging of stories from other sites into that overall track record, which
0:16:48I didn't think was very fair seeing that every apple rumor website works the same way
0:16:53I mean you can't like if you link to um, someone who reports something wrong
0:16:57and
0:16:59um, you know you link to it whatever and then
0:17:02People end up saying oh greeber was wrong, even though you're linking to some new york times or something
0:17:06I mean, how are you gonna feel about that?
0:17:08well i'm a little bit it's it's the difference in the publishing models
0:17:12there i i have to bear a little bit of respect with for me i have to bear a
0:17:16little bit of responsibility if i post
0:17:19a link to something that's go this is say some i'd like a lot of times you
0:17:23know let's say
0:17:24it's like a french-language max sight and they have pictures
0:17:29purportedly come from the asian supply chain right shows the back of this year
0:17:35is uh... new i've had many
0:17:37- Right, that happened last year.
0:17:39- Yes.
0:17:40- If I link to it, I sort of feel like
0:17:45if I link to something like that,
0:17:46and I don't link to stuff like that a lot anymore,
0:17:48but if I do, I feel like I'm on the hook
0:17:50to sort of say whether I believe it or not.
0:17:52Do I think this is legit or not?
0:17:55- Sure.
0:17:56- And if I say, I don't know, this looks fishy as hell.
0:17:58- Right.
0:17:59- That's different, whereas like what 9to5Mac does is,
0:18:04and like you said, a lot of other sites,
0:18:06You know, it's sort of that MacRumors.com model of, look, we're going to tell you what
0:18:13everybody's reporting.
0:18:14And you'll say, you'll credit, you'll say, you know, blah, blah, blah, dot fr, a French
0:18:18language Mac site.
0:18:20And you know, here's a link to the Google Translate version of their original report
0:18:24is saying that this, here's the picture, is the back of a thing.
0:18:30You're not saying, it doesn't say, our sources say, it's, you know, this site says this,
0:18:34here it is, judge for yourself.
0:18:36that yeah, and to our the to our report lumped all those in with what I believe to be mostly
0:18:42your work the the you know, Mark Gurman, yeah, reporting for nine to five Mac says, according
0:18:48to sources, you know, you know, here's a recent example. I don't I probably wasn't on the
0:18:542013 scorecard because this was 2014. But you had here's screenshots of the currently
0:18:59in beta health book app from iOS eight. Yeah, it's gonna be like passbook except it's gonna
0:19:05you know have integration with you know who knows what kind of devices and stuff but did
0:19:10you know iOS users will have this past our health book app right here it is and that's
0:19:15you not saying you know it didn't come from another site that you reporting with screenshots
0:19:20and information from you know somehow sources in the know yeah right and that's different
0:19:25and those stories and you know I say this this is one of the reasons I'm excited to
0:19:29to have you on the show your record for 2013 was pretty much spot-on appreciate
0:19:36it right I don't think you had any stories that really I know you know
0:19:40maybe some dotted eyes and mid-cross T's you know when you're writing about this
0:19:43stuff that's pre-release but probably but yeah nothing you needed to retract
0:19:47pretty good here I'd say yeah yeah nothing needed to be retracted I mean
0:19:52look I look at the I look at it as a necessary evil and not if I Mac can't
0:19:57exists as a site that only posts original content.
0:20:01It's impossible.
0:20:03It wouldn't destroy the website.
0:20:05It wouldn't destroy any Apple rumor website.
0:20:07It would just be...
0:20:08You would see, look, other Apple rumor websites, they can just aggregate everything from anywhere.
0:20:13Why would anyone read us just for the original content when they can just get the original
0:20:16content alongside everything else from another site?
0:20:18So it's something that we have to do it.
0:20:21But I agree.
0:20:22do a better job and we've been trying this a lot lately to say, you know, to use your
0:20:28words, this is fishy as hell, don't believe it. But people have the right to make their
0:20:32own decisions and we need to provide the readers what they want.
0:20:35That was more or less the conclusion I came to, you know, circa let's say 2008, 2007,
0:20:422008, 2009, when I posted a few more, I was more commonly posting sort of, I don't know,
0:20:52I'm not I think I got I got a kicks out of it, but it was the way that I broke rumors if I had something
0:20:59was always
0:21:01To be very coy about it instead of saying
0:21:04Hey, I have a source who says
0:21:07Apple's gonna rename I forget the old name. What was it called? I tools they're gonna rename it mobile me or something like that, right?
0:21:17Would do something coy and just be like wouldn't it be something if Apple renamed eye tools mobile me, right?
0:21:23Yeah, right and got the domain name me calm. Yeah, doesn't that sound like something Apple would do
0:21:29Or I did that. Oh, I remember and I did that with the Windows version of Safari. Ah, I
0:21:36Got that like the night or two before the W. I think it was a WWDC might have been a Mac
0:21:42Well, I right sometimes the Macworld Expos and WWDCs blur together. I think it was a WWDC keynote, right? I found out about
0:21:49Windows first Safari for Windows and then I quick
0:21:55crept through
0:21:57My server logs on during fireball and found a few
0:22:00hits from it from the night before because that was when they
0:22:05Flip the switch like up until like the day before they had had you know
0:22:10Some kind of I don't I think probably the user agent string just said that it was on a Mac
0:22:15But then the night before when they actually had the real build for it. I found a few ins I was like, oh bingo
0:22:21So I had it right but I didn't say hey, they're gonna do it. I think I again I said, wouldn't it be?
0:22:27Wouldn't it be a neat idea if Apple came out with a version of Safari?
0:22:30Yeah, giving a ice water to someone in hell. Yeah, I think one of the former's for engineers
0:22:36They wrote something about how they used fake user agent, or they routed it through Asia
0:22:42or something pretty sketchy.
0:22:44I thought that was interesting.
0:22:45But to your point, I always remember you in your early writing, never to be long form
0:22:50rumor, reporting, like I do and others do.
0:22:54It was always very coy.
0:22:57I remember the Wall Street Journal put out some post about how they said, "Oh, Apple
0:23:02is developing a CDMA iPhone and you're like, oh, they didn't even know about the retina
0:23:06display, the A4 multitasking.
0:23:08I remember that. I still do stuff like that.
0:23:11Yeah, you know, I wish I did that more. I mean, it's just so cool. But you know, the
0:23:16only way you can do that is if you build up a reputation for being accurate in the past,
0:23:20you can't just come out of the woodwork and say such and such coyly. No one's going to
0:23:24know to look for that, you know.
0:23:25Right. But the thing that I figured out, though, I really did figure out like breaking more
0:23:30rumors and trying to be as accurate as possible and I think I did but the truth
0:23:36is even when you're trying to do it if you're gonna be accurate as possible you
0:23:40you just don't get that much so you can't like you said you can't run a site
0:23:44where that's all you have right there's just not enough and it's not enough
0:23:48stuff to publish to have enough oxygen to breathe in terms of just having
0:23:53readers coming every day right gotta have more stuff I mean it's the constant
0:23:57views to the site and everyone coming for the other stuff that gives me and others the
0:24:03opportunity to step back and focus on getting the original stuff.
0:24:07You know?
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0:26:20Before we get into specifics, maybe later in the show we'll get into specifics and
0:26:22some of the recent stuff you've reported.
0:26:24Sure.
0:26:25But now that you've established a name for yourself, do you find that you get random
0:26:32stuff emailed to you or tweeted to you like privately or something like, "Hey, you
0:26:39know me, but I, you know, I happen to know and then insert some kind of blank blank blank scandal,
0:26:44you know, scandalous rumor here. And you've got to sort of judge, hey, is this thing on the,
0:26:51you know, not that you would run it just because somebody emailed it to you, but is it even worth
0:26:55looking into? I mean, I read all the emails and tweets that come in, etc. But I think I do a
0:27:02a pretty good job parsing out the signal from the noise.
0:27:07But do you get a lot of noise?
0:27:10Do I get a lot of noise?
0:27:11You know, the tip box sometimes floods up with stuff that's not true.
0:27:17Everything that I really report comes from sources that I've developed over the years
0:27:21who I trust immensely.
0:27:23I don't run anything from a first-time source ever unless it's corroborated several times
0:27:29over.
0:27:30where someone will come out of the woodwork and tell you something and then you know you ask the
0:27:34people you know you've known for a while you know what's up with this is this true and you know
0:27:38sometimes you'll get the uh you know the green light and you know there you go but i i found
0:27:44it i i don't and it was weird there was a couple of years back i got more of it and it seems like
0:27:49i get less now but i would say at least once a month or so and it wasn't just like one kook it
0:27:53was you know once a month or so somebody who i've never heard of before would send me email
0:27:57It still happens now, but maybe not as often as once a month.
0:28:00But and they'll just say, "Look, I happen to know that Apple is blah, blah, blah."
0:28:04You know, I'll tell you like an example that I got all that I'm sure I've got some probably
0:28:10sitting in my inbox on red right now. Is somebody saying that they know for a fact that Apple is
0:28:15going to ship the next iPhone is going to have a bigger screen, it's going to be inserts size here,
0:28:225.1 inches, it's gonna be 1080p, and I know this for a fact, blah blah blah blah blah.
0:28:29And then it's like, I don't know what they're, you know, and I know that I just know that they're
0:28:32full of it. Like I got, I've got these last year, like where there were people saying that last
0:28:36year's iPhone 5s was going to come in two sizes. And I knew that it was, I knew for a fact that it
0:28:41wasn't. And I always wonder, like, what is with these people? Like, what are they trying to do?
0:28:46They just trying to like, make a jerk out of me? Like, see if they can get me to go for it? Like,
0:28:50I don't see what pleasure they would get if I happen to run it or what they think I'm going to do.
0:28:56Jared: Yeah, it's a great point. I mean, I haven't really put too much thought into that. But of
0:29:00course, there's, you know, Darren fireball, huge site, huge audience, same with Notify Mac. I mean,
0:29:05I guess there are some people who might get a thrill out of, you know, sending something
0:29:08that's totally not true and seeing if it ends up going on the site. You know, yeah, I agree,
0:29:14I can think of some examples. There's like, and it's always from people who don't put their name
0:29:19on the email. It's like legohead67@gmail.com. Yeah, I'm just going to run that. It's like,
0:29:30have you ever read my site? It always strikes me as crazy. But then, who knows? There's
0:29:35a lot of crazy people out there.
0:29:36Yeah, and you know the best part, in my opinion, is when this happens, it's very likely that
0:29:40they sent the same BS to another site, one of the competitors. And then when you see
0:29:46another Apple rumor site, just throw it up there saying, oh, this comes from a source,
0:29:50blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And then you know it's clearly BS and they post anyways.
0:29:54It's always fascinating to see the processes of the competition.
0:29:58Yeah, I saw that. I actually saw that last year with some of the screen size stuff where
0:30:02I saw some second tier sites running at what I think was probably sent by the same person.
0:30:08Yeah, probably.
0:30:09And it's like, come on.
0:30:10I mean, I remember not really an Apple example because I can't really remember a huge Apple
0:30:15example, but there was some big thing about how there was an alleged Microsoft insider
0:30:21who sent out a bunch of details about the new Xbox that turned out to be the Xbox One.
0:30:27Some site ran it, said it's from a verified source, blah, blah, blah.
0:30:30And then a bunch of other sites came out and said, "Oh, we all got the same tip."
0:30:33And then the guy who sent it in made this little website or blog and said, "Oh, how
0:30:38he tricked."
0:30:39Oh, yeah, yeah, I remember that.
0:30:40I do remember that.
0:30:41Yeah, that was pretty good.
0:30:42Yeah, big deal.
0:30:43I can find that put it in the show notes
0:30:45right, it was I just yeah, it was and it became like
0:30:50Like the biggest it was like the top of the day on like Hacker News and tech meme
0:30:56It was like how to trick the press into running a rumor and you know
0:31:00I mean it was pretty sad for me because you know, I've spent so much time
0:31:04I know you have as well and other reporters in this industry spent so much time building up their brands
0:31:11Trying to convince people. Oh that you know, not every rumor site is just a rumor site and then another notable site comes out
0:31:18You know pulls this shtick just you know posts a random rumors and it's all verified and whatnot
0:31:23It kind of you know, just puts a bad taste in your mouth for the whole entire industry
0:31:27So I don't have it in front of me
0:31:29But as I recall the gist of it was he mailed it out and nothing happened right away
0:31:34But I think it was slash gear ran it and if I'm wrong and it wasn't slash gear my apologies to everybody
0:31:40at slashgear, but I think it was slashgear, ran it and they ran it with, you know, they worded it
0:31:47pretty accurately. They were like, look, this is unverified, but we have a source who says blank,
0:31:52blank and blank about the next Xbox. But as soon as they ran it, it became, other sites picked it
0:32:03up because then other sites case slashdot or slashgear, not slashdot, slashgear is saying
0:32:08The xbox has blank blank blank and then all of a sudden that doesn't seem anywhere near as sketchy
0:32:13Because it's not hey, we have this unverified thing from someone whose name we can't tell you all of a sudden
0:32:19That's the first hand report. It's that then the second hand reports actually sound better sourced because they say
0:32:27Slashgear, which is a real site that has a real reputation
0:32:30Sure is saying the xbox has blank and then all of a sudden everybody else and then it just it just pinballs all around the entire
0:32:37Techweb right because now everybody's reporting it now Mashable has it and
0:32:41You know tech crunch has something right and there's a few issues there in terms of the industry in general
0:32:47Like I mean the first issue would be whoever site this was
0:32:51I don't remember if he was slash gear not reporting something unverified from there to tips box in the first place
0:32:56I don't think I would ever do that or I don't think I've ever done that in the past
0:33:00You know the next issue is sites
0:33:03You know not taking into account the sketching nature of the original report. Another issue is them not linking out clearly
0:33:10To the slash gear so readers can you know make their own judgment?
0:33:13It would be like if somebody just dropped a sandwich off and at your door, you know, would you eat it? Yeah, right
0:33:20There's just a sandwich that you never asked for sitting in. Yeah your doorstep
0:33:24Yeah, and the whole broken telephone game with the reblogging, you know, you can start off saying oh, you know, this is complete
0:33:32We don't even trust it. We're just publishing it for discussion and then you know like a few hours later some blog can say oh
0:33:38Can the reports confirm such-and-such about the new Xbox so it's a shit show out there sometimes. Yeah, totally
0:33:45Let me take a break right here and thank our second sponsor
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0:36:56the talk show seven days free my thanks to them so let's get a little specific so here's
0:37:03here's one and this i have to say this is the story that sort of prompted me to invite
0:37:07you on the show i've had you on craig hockenberry was on a couple weeks ago we were talking
0:37:10about I think your health book report. We can get to that later.
0:37:15Sure.
0:37:16But last week you had a story on 9to5Mac. Let's see if I have it open here in a tab.
0:37:23The headline, "Johnny Ive shakes up Apple's software design group, iPhone interface creator
0:37:33Greg Christie departing." Now, first thing, I think that comma should be a semicolon.
0:37:38Okay.
0:37:39That's a comma splice. But let's avoid the grammar and stick to the details. And
0:37:48the first sentence of the report is, "Following friction between top human interface vice
0:37:53president Greg Christie and senior vice president Johnny Ive, Apple's hardware and software
0:37:58design is being dramatically shaken up according to sources familiar with the matter." So,
0:38:05things first you were the first just to report that Greg Christie is retiring
0:38:10from Apple yeah and so kudos to you for the scoop I congratulate you on Twitter
0:38:14I hadn't even heard that appreciate it apparently it happened a couple weeks
0:38:18prior did were you familiar with this timeline because I did a lot of research
0:38:22I didn't really write much about this afterward but I've done a surprising
0:38:26amount of work on this I'll come out here on the show I mean a couple of
0:38:30weeks before report it makes sense I mean I was trying to well I got a tip
0:38:34from a very reliable source who's provided reliable info for years that Christy was out.
0:38:42And the source told me that he's leaving, he told me the Johnny Ive stuff, and he's
0:38:50leaving by the end of the year.
0:38:52It would be around the developers conference in June.
0:38:57And so the couple weeks thing makes sense, but I didn't just run it after the reliable
0:39:01source told me.
0:39:02It took me a few days to confirm it with other people.
0:39:06I don't really run anything by a single source.
0:39:10So yeah, a couple of weeks, I think.
0:39:11Yeah, what I heard was that, and I don't think it was company-wide, it wasn't like
0:39:16to every single Apple employee, but it was at least announced entirely within the graphic,
0:39:19or not graphic design, but user interface design group that he'd be retiring.
0:39:25I think like three weeks or so, at least three weeks before your report came out.
0:39:30everybody within Apple who worked under him or knew him knew about it. And that to me,
0:39:35it shows just how tight a ship Apple runs that it took three weeks for anybody to get
0:39:41the news that he was retiring. Apparently it was open news, and this is what I've heard
0:39:46from a few friends. I did not go, I didn't make it out to Macworld Expo this year. But
0:39:52apparently it was sort of an open secret there among people who work at Apple and people
0:39:58who follow it, you know, the writer types who follow it that he'd announce his retirement.
0:40:02But it was always under the, you know, every discussion about it was off the record. So
0:40:07there wasn't, it wasn't like anybody knew about it and could have written it, but nobody
0:40:12had it.
0:40:13Right. I guess it's understandable. I mean, if you hadn't told me the off the record part,
0:40:17I mean, I guess my response would be if you're a writer and you heard that, you should have
0:40:21posted it. But, uh,
0:40:22No, it wasn't. Yeah, I don't think anybody had it and just sat on it. But I have to say,
0:40:26more I dug into this, I've got a surprising amount of pushback from, let's say, informed
0:40:32sources that the friction with Johnny Ive angle is, in the words of one of them, quote
0:40:39"bullshit." Now, that's not to say, again, I don't want to fight with him, because I
0:40:43don't know. I have not, I've never met Greg Christie, I didn't speak to him, he's not,
0:40:47you know, I don't have any first-hand information. I mean, I don't even know what the guy looks
0:40:50like can't find a picture of him on Google?
0:40:54I've seen him speak at WWDC, but it's very--
0:40:58I'm like the world's worst witness.
0:41:03He's a white guy somewhere in his probably late 40s.
0:41:07Yeah, I mean, I only know him as a cartoon from the Samsung Trail.
0:41:11But I have to say--
0:41:12and I think it definitely got a result. And you can't pin it,
0:41:19But you know there after your report your report came out and then I think the next day
0:41:25There was a report in the Wall Street Journal. Okay. I had a quote from Apple PR. Yep, and
0:41:32The quote from Apple PR
0:41:35Definitely downplayed or I don't know if you would say denied
0:41:40I don't know but but went against the grain that there was any sort of personal
0:41:45personality conflict between him and Johnny I've sure from the quote correctly something about like after 20 years Greg Christie is
0:41:53retiring
0:41:55and he worked closely with Johnny for
0:41:57Whatever a number of years
0:42:00So yeah, I guess I agree. It's borderline. It's not really a denial nor a confirmation, but you know Apple PR has a
0:42:07Has an agenda they're not gonna come out and say
0:42:10That there was friction, you know
0:42:13Well, but I it would depend on the record certainly made no effort whatsoever
0:42:19to downplay the friction with
0:42:23Scott for stall this is true. This is true
0:42:27In fact, I would say that the press release that they announced when for stall, you know
0:42:35I don't even know if they called it a resignation
0:42:38But the the you know the whole thing in the headline about increased
0:42:42Collaboration yeah, you know almost it's not explicit but implicitly is saying that collaboration was you know
0:42:50Wasn't working while forestall was there, right?
0:42:54So I would put a little you know, but there's clearly though it's in Apple's interests to
0:43:05It it not have Johnny I've perceived as a Machiavellian
0:43:10Wheeler and dealer like that goes against the public persona that he has and it doesn't serve Johnny Ives interests
0:43:18And let's just say for this is you know right now for this discussion whether it's true or not sure whatever degree it is
0:43:25It's not in Apple's interests to have Johnny I've perceived that way
0:43:30So if it is true if he is this Machiavellian character or has that slant to it and is sort of
0:43:37Creating a lot of friction in the user as he takes over more authority in the user interface
0:43:45Design and is pushing people out and if that's to say that you know if it were true that he effectively pushed
0:43:51Christie out which my report never said right right. That's true. That's very true. You know I and I'll emphasize that
0:43:59that but I think some people came away with from your report with that
0:44:05perception but if it is true it would be in Apple's interest or at least Apple
0:44:08PR's interest to downplay that at least try to downplay it or get people to walk
0:44:12it back sure and if it if it weren't true it would also be in their interest
0:44:18so the fact that Apple's PR you know either way whether it's the true or not
0:44:23or how whatever shade of gray it is right because the truth is almost
0:44:26certainly somewhere in the middle. But wherever it is on the shade of gray, really, really light gray,
0:44:31really dark gray, Apple PR would probably take the exact same response. And the quote that they gave
0:44:39to the Wall Street Journal probably would have been the same. So it is, what's the word,
0:44:43dispositive? It doesn't prove anything.
0:44:45Jared: Yeah, I mean, a couple points there. Going back to our early discussion, in terms of the
0:44:50broken telephone, I mean, my report could say one thing and then another site picks it up and says,
0:44:53at 9to5 says that I fired Greg Christie.
0:44:59So that's one point.
0:45:00Another point is, I mean, Apple, they $200 billion cash in the bank company, the iPad,
0:45:07the iPhone, all these products.
0:45:09You don't push out these devices and have a company this large with everyone holding
0:45:13hands and dancing around in circles.
0:45:16There's gonna be friction to get these products out the door.
0:45:19And Steve Jobs even said himself, "Johnny has more authority than anyone else at Apple
0:45:23This was in the biography, not Tim Cook, not Phil Schiller, not Scott Forsall back then,
0:45:28but you know, Johnny Ive, his spiritual partner.
0:45:31So I don't think it's too much to say or assume, not saying I assume anything, just talking
0:45:38as an industry watcher here, that you know, Johnny, if he wants something done, he gets
0:45:44it done.
0:45:45And I mean the story goes in terms of the friction that as they were working on iOS
0:45:50or when Johnny decided that iOS 7 was going to be overhauled with his design aesthetic,
0:45:57that Greg Christie was on board wanting to do this with him and within Federighi's group,
0:46:02but over time Johnny really overstepped the bounds there, reaching into the user interface
0:46:09team, really circumventing Christie's control and speaking to Christie's designers and engineers
0:46:16and just getting things done without Christie's approval, kind of just like stepping on his
0:46:20toes a bit.
0:46:22And I guess with 10.10 around the corner with this new design and the whole future of iOS,
0:46:28I guess Johnny and Christie and the other executives at Apple made the decision that
0:46:34it was time to just move all design under Johnny Ive, not just hardware, not Johnny
0:46:39providing influence and leadership and guidance to software, but literally putting software
0:46:44under his belt as well.
0:46:45The way I've heard it, and this is from multiple sources, and I think, you know, I think that's
0:46:50an interesting—I think you combine these two takes and the truth is probably somewhere
0:46:54in the middle.
0:46:55Right.
0:46:56But what I've heard, and all of this came to light—well, not all of it, but most of
0:47:00it is stuff that I heard after your report.
0:47:03And none of it—none of this is from Apple PR.
0:47:06This is from other people actually in, either in, formerly in, or somehow, as they say,
0:47:17familiar with the matter, but with User Interface Design Group, which used to be, I think, four
0:47:23different groups.
0:47:24I think there was the—it was a lot more scattered before the Johnny Ive is going to
0:47:31to take over software where there was like the iLife user interface group.
0:47:35I'm not quite sure if iOS and Mac OS 10 were two different groups, but the ones that were
0:47:40formerly more under Forstall, but like Forstall wasn't really in charge of like the iLife
0:47:46apps like iPhoto and iMovie and those.
0:47:48Those were separate.
0:47:49Right.
0:47:50People familiar with those things, let's just say.
0:47:53And who were definitely, there's no doubt in my mind, speaking not on behalf or prompted
0:48:00by PR. In fact, the opposite. And I don't know that Apple PR would disagree with the
0:48:05word they said, but I think if they found out about it, they could be in trouble. And
0:48:11there's a certain contingent of people out there who, it doesn't matter what I say, that
0:48:17they think Apple PR is all-knowing and all-powerful and that they see these conspiracies, and
0:48:22no matter what, if I say it's ground level employees,
0:48:27they're gonna say, well, it might be ground level employees,
0:48:31but somebody from Apple PR came and said,
0:48:33here, tell Gruber this.
0:48:35And that's not the case, it really is not.
0:48:37And that is not how Apple PR works.
0:48:39If Apple PR wants to say something, they say it.
0:48:43They're not duplicitous like that.
0:48:46But the gist of the Greg Christie story that I've heard,
0:48:51way I've heard it is it really wasn't friction. I don't think, I think there's certainly a
0:48:54case to be made that stylistically, Christie may not have been on board with everything
0:49:01related to the iOS 7 look and feel, but he was not opposed to it. It wasn't like he was
0:49:06pushed, you know, you know, you know how there's like a lot of people out there who really
0:49:11just don't like iOS 7 users. And I think that a lot of them read this and they see Christie
0:49:18Is seeing it their way and that Christie was a like an iOS 7 hater and that is absolutely not true. Yeah
0:49:24I don't disagree. I mean remember he had the whole
0:49:26WWDC session talking about it so profoundly and with such knowledge that you know, you can really tell that it was
0:49:32You know, he was a big part of it. So
0:49:35And you know that the hierarchy
0:49:38always went where Christie's group was in the engineering group and in the old days they were under Bertrand and
0:49:47eventually they were effectively under
0:49:50Forstall right that there was this there wasn't there was never much of a chain of command above
0:49:57Greg Christie's head at least I mean, I don't know about 18 years ago when he started but in though
0:50:02You know, let's say in the eye in the iPhone era
0:50:04You know Christie originally reported to
0:50:08Forstall and forced all of course only reported to Steve Jobs, right?
0:50:12And then even when Steve Jobs was dead the only person really above Christie was forced all
0:50:17Yep, at least for iOS stuff
0:50:19and
0:50:22So when they announced that shakeup when forced all was out and Johnny I've was taking over
0:50:26They didn't really change the org chart and yes, Greg Christie officially reported to and I guess I don't know
0:50:33Maybe he still does I'm not quite sure when that change is going to take but yeah until recently he reported officially to
0:50:40Federighi, right
0:50:42Because Federighi took over as head of engineering
0:50:47But it has never been the case that
0:50:49That that he really reported to Federighi because it's really you know, Federighi, you know, I think he's very popular
0:50:57I think he's deemed as being very successful so far
0:50:59But there is this complete separation now between design and engineering
0:51:04Where Federighi is not a forestall type person at all
0:51:08We're forced all if anything was more concerned with the design than the engineering even though he came up
0:51:15you know as a next pro next step programmer and certainly understood the engineering right that
0:51:19The org chart be damned ever since as soon as forestall was out and Johnny I've was named in charge of software
0:51:27Greg Christie had been reporting directly to Johnny I've the whole time and that there was no there's really no difference
0:51:34The only difference with what's been announced recently is making official on the internal org chart
0:51:40What had been the de facto?
0:51:42flow of
0:51:44authority ever since that announcement was made
0:51:47and what I've heard is
0:51:50That again, this is like third hand, but I believe it
0:51:54I really do that that after your report and that Apple had to go to the journal and stuff like that and
0:52:02and issued this thing that
0:52:04Christie was at least slightly
0:52:08Distressed by the whole thing because he saw it as so outside the truth that he really it really is the case
0:52:16I mean this sounds
0:52:18This isn't quite right
0:52:19But that he's really just a guy who's been there for 20 years and is tired and he's made an awful lot of money and just
0:52:25Wants to take some time to enjoy it
0:52:27You know like for all the people out there who have ever thought hey if I ever made like a couple million bucks and I was
0:52:32You know or a lot of million bucks and I was you know, I'm not gonna wait till I'm old to enjoy it
0:52:37Well, I think that's more or less where Greg Christie is but yet he's leaving and it seems like there's you know
0:52:42There's this bad taste
0:52:45now in the mouth that the story is he's leaving because he
0:52:48Disagreed with Johnny I'm and it's not the case at all
0:52:51Yeah, I mean I understand that perspective
0:52:56You know, I I agree with you. I mean, it's probably in the gray area there
0:53:02I mean, I don't think my report says that, you know, I've pushed out Christie
0:53:07I just I think it just stated facts and if people read it a certain way they read it a certain way
0:53:12But I didn't mean to come off as you know, Johnny pushed out
0:53:16Christie I mean there's been clear stories about executive
0:53:20Shakeups at Apple in recent years. I mean, I remember Bloomberg had a headline at the end of 2012 like, you know, eddie q fires
0:53:27Williamson who ran maps? I mean I didn't come out there and say
0:53:31I fires Christie over design differences right now and it's you know, but it's the way that people like you said like that the
0:53:38What's it? What do you say? What's it the broken telephone? Yeah, the broken tell that telephone game where yes, you know
0:53:44By the second or third telling it becomes a story of conflict and it's really not the case at all
0:53:50And the examples I heard cited too in terms of like that that there's almost proof that
0:53:57Christie is going out on on his own terms and on very good terms is
0:54:01That it was just a few weeks ago where Apple did something very very unusual
0:54:07Which was it was it was like the PR run up to the Samsung Apple
0:54:13trial
0:54:15retrial, yeah, what
0:54:17Where they gave NPR and I think the Wall Street Journal access to Christie
0:54:23and talk and let him talk and show the little lab where they'd end up the first version of
0:54:30The iPhone interface they showed like how they use I thought it was pretty cool the way that they use like
0:54:37So this was like 2006 while they were working on this they used like a three or four or five year old
0:54:43g3 power book
0:54:45To power it so that they'd have a device, you know that the that they couldn't cheat and have a CPU
0:54:51That was going to be a lot faster than what the iPhone would actually be able to have right really fascinating stuff
0:54:57It's always interesting in retrospect to see you know looking back about how certain things came to be
0:55:03But that was actually after like so when Apple, you know clearly let Greg Christie and this is how crazy some people are
0:55:10Is that I had a couple people write to me at Daring Fireball and say do you think that maybe they pushed?
0:55:16Christie out because he talked to the Wall Street Journal
0:55:20About the thing that you know that he broke the secret code about how they made the iPhone. I was like no no no
0:55:24You know, that's that is a total, you know
0:55:27That's a that's an exclusive that was authorized by right?
0:55:31Of course not something that great Christie went nuts and did on his own right and you know to your point about that
0:55:37I mean this Wall Street Journal interview in the whole
0:55:40Samsung trial stuff this was just in the last couple of weeks
0:55:44You don't find it interesting that
0:55:46There was no identification by Christie at the trial or in any of those stories that you know, he's not in charge anymore
0:55:52I mean
0:55:52I look back at the Wall Street Journal story clearly says that Christie and still in charge of human interface design at Apple after you know
0:55:59Working there for a number of years. So you think they would have identified that maybe oh, I'm not quite sure
0:56:05I don't think I follow what are you saying?
0:56:06So like who would have fallen like, you know, Greg Christie identified himself as you know, head of human interface design
0:56:13Just a couple weeks ago in the Wall Street Journal
0:56:15Yeah, and prior interviews, so I just found that interesting that he never noted that he's leaving
0:56:20No, but he but everybody at Apple already knew that he was and the interview. I mean obviously it was you know
0:56:28As a company that you know, the company's interest in those stories was to sort of emphasize look at the amazing
0:56:34Work we have to do to crew we had to do to create the original iPhone, right?
0:56:40And it's all in the context of you know, getting the company's side of this fight and Samsung out in the public
0:56:46but a corollary to that like a secondary thing was that
0:56:51Greg Christie is very here's the thing is he's a very popular guy. He's a really really well liked person within Apple
0:57:00Really seems like the type of person who gets along with a lot of people is
0:57:04Has had a very like you said if you can't find pictures you can try to find photos of them
0:57:09It's very hard to find photos of him. He's had a very low profile. Yeah, but he's been hugely influential
0:57:14You know spent a lot of time working directly with Steve Jobs on whatever, you know pet projects of you know
0:57:24whatever jobs that you know had his pants on fire for
0:57:26You know interface wise
0:57:29and a lot of people within Apple who saw him and knew that you know, he's not that well-known that is his his
0:57:36work is far, you know, outweighs his
0:57:40Renown
0:57:43We're really happy to set that up for him and have this thing where he got a lot more public credit than he's ever gotten
0:57:49before right and but and but now they're all a little like
0:57:53they think that the you know now the follow-up that it that that's being played as
0:57:58Conflict with Johnny I've and again, like you said you didn't use the word conflict, but clearly though
0:58:03There's that perception out there now sure in some of the second and third hand reporting that ah, man that stinks and now he's upset
0:58:10about I mean luckily even the Wall Street Journal heard from their own sources about how
0:58:13There was disagreements and design direction between Christy and I've so it's not like I'm the only person saying that
0:58:20Hey there. Yeah, can you hear me? Yeah, you know, I've got this I got a loose microphone
0:58:25USP cord on my microphone in it gravity just pulled it out
0:58:30what it what you were saying that the Wall Street Journal had something about the
0:58:33Conflict of a design. Yeah, the Wall Street Journal has a line in that story that you mentioned saying that going to you know
0:58:41a person familiar with the matter
0:58:43Greg Christie and Johnny I didn't always see eye to eye or they had disagreements over the right direction
0:58:48So yeah, and I think that that's really pretty much how all design works at Apple, right?
0:58:53I mean do you think like so here's a guy who spent most of his 18 years?
0:58:58Effectively reporting to Steve Jobs, right because Christy worked on the highest profile design stuff because he was you know
0:59:05The top of the heap and you know, it's not like every single pixel of every thing goes went through Steve Jobs
0:59:11but it was you know, what is Steve care about now and
0:59:14You know, that's where you know better call Christy and do you really think you know, does anybody think that there weren't disagreements?
0:59:21So for this, you know colors or font sizes or any detail working with Steve, you know, that's just the way it is
0:59:28I mean it seems that way.
0:59:29I mean Apple, a lot of people who are really just in love with the company, they seem to
0:59:33ignore or just completely disregard the fact that friction needs to happen.
0:59:37There needs to be disagreements for these products to be released.
0:59:40I mean the classic story of Steve Jobs pinning forestall against Tony Fidell against each
0:59:46other who can make the better phone and that team gets that.
0:59:49I mean you think forestall's team would have come up with something so innovative that
0:59:54Literally change the entire technology world and so many other industries if they weren't competing against something
0:59:59I mean if you don't have a your head against the wall, you're not gonna get much done
1:00:03Yeah, I totally agree with that
1:00:05and I think that you know
1:00:07I saw in the light of all this stuff and again a lot of credit to you because you're the one who broke that
1:00:12Christie's leaving but they got a lot I saw a lot of stuff on Twitter from readers who are saying that they're worried
1:00:17About the whole direction of Apple software under Johnny I've you know, this doesn't sound good
1:00:24Think that what you would worry me is if I heard stories that there weren't arguments about
1:00:30This stuff because if if nobody's arguing then nobody's really trying to push it forward. That's fair, right? I
1:00:37Mean, I don't think those comments make much sense
1:00:40In light of the Christie story, I mean if people didn't like iOS 7 design or their concern about I've those comments should have came
1:00:47What is it 10 9 months ago already? And I mean, I'm sure there there were lots of comments
1:00:52I remember all the hate about iOS 7 back then.
1:00:55So, I mean, this is what Johnny Ive wants
1:00:57the software to look like, so this is nothing new
1:00:59in particular.
1:01:00I mean, maybe people are forward thinking
1:01:02five, 10 years down the road, but you know,
1:01:04right now 10.10's gonna look like iOS 7
1:01:07and iOS 8, iOS 9 are gonna look like iOS 7.
1:01:10So, I wouldn't think of anything imminent
1:01:12and I think if Johnny Ive had even bigger ideas
1:01:15or wanted the software to look a completely different way
1:01:18than iOS 7 looks, that's what iOS 7 would look like,
1:01:21you know?
1:01:21He only gets one shot to revamp the whole look.
1:01:24- Yeah, and in terms of Christie going out on his own,
1:01:27what I've heard is, again, there's no date set,
1:01:30but I've heard that he's probably going to stay
1:01:32not just through WWDC, but probably more
1:01:36towards the end of the year, like the actual calendar year.
1:01:38- Interesting, it's very possible.
1:01:40I mean, I heard specifically around WWDC,
1:01:43but I could be wrong about that.
1:01:45- Well, we'll see.
1:01:46Well, actually, who knows, 'cause Apple's
1:01:48so goddamn secretive, I mean, the guy, you know.
1:01:51- A little birdie will tell you.
1:01:52- Right, well, yeah, we'll see.
1:01:54I do think too, though, that this is another one
1:01:56of those cases where Apple being so secretive,
1:02:00I feel like it can't be any other way,
1:02:03'cause either you're a secretive company
1:02:05or you're not a secretive company.
1:02:06You can't be, it's like being pregnant.
1:02:08You can't be, you know, kinda pregnant.
1:02:10- Right.
1:02:11- But it hurts them, I think, in terms of the way
1:02:14that most companies, when somebody of Greg Christie's
1:02:18internal stature announces his retirement.
1:02:21Not that they would make a big press release out of it
1:02:25and expect national news,
1:02:27but they would have announced it somehow.
1:02:30It's unusual for someone as influential
1:02:35like at a vice president level
1:02:37to be leaving on his own terms
1:02:38with no internal real unpleasantness.
1:02:41This is a guy who's had a great career, done great things,
1:02:44and is announcing it.
1:02:46Nobody inside the company says anything to anybody outside the company, right?
1:02:50And then they lose the ability to control the narrative on that
1:02:54Sure, and to that i'd say that they had a absolutely massive opportunity to get that information out there
1:03:00um
1:03:02in the wall street journal
1:03:04in the samsung trial
1:03:05With a npr and npr was you know a voice interview, too
1:03:08Yeah, they could have gotten that information out there if they wanted to they could have made it national news
1:03:13Yeah, I have to wonder why they didn't why they didn't say that I don't know if it has something
1:03:19You know that they thought maybe it would
1:03:21Lesson the weight of his testimony if it seemed as though he had one foot out the door
1:03:26You know perhaps one foot on his you know upcoming yacht or whatever. He's gonna do. I don't know
1:03:31I mean, I'm not sure if that was part of it or not
1:03:33And you know who knows it could have been one of those things where maybe they were like 51% one way
1:03:4059% the other like kind of had it written two ways and then at the last minute like yeah
1:03:44Let's just not say anything about it
1:03:45And then as soon as you know it the news broke that he was leaving and it didn't play
1:03:51The way they thought it should have played they're like god damn it. We should have you know, we should have announced it
1:03:56Yeah, I mean I wonder if Christie is who you know, everyone is making him out to be which I don't know such a you know
1:04:04Amazing figure inside the company, you know, the 51% probably should have leaned the other way, you know
1:04:09Yeah, if anything what I've heard is that he's got along better with Johnny I've then then, you know
1:04:15For stall. Yeah, I think so. I mean, that's probably not too surprising and I think it's mostly Johnny's personality
1:04:23You know and again and it's one of those things where who knows what they disagreed with in terms of hey
1:04:28What what color should this button be when you tap on it?
1:04:30Right, that's not that's the sort of thing where they could argue
1:04:33You know all week long and not come to an agreement and eventually Johnny might have to say, you know what?
1:04:38We're gonna have to do it my way and there's no hard feelings
1:04:41That's just that's just working at Apple and doing design but that they actually got along swimmingly and consider themselves
1:04:47You know good friends, right?
1:04:49Let me take a final break here and thank thank our last sponsor and then we'll get back and we'll talk about a couple other
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1:06:57So Mac OS 10.10, which I think is what they're gonna call it. Yes, they're gonna number it
1:07:03I've heard the same thing. In fact, it's you know, it's a done deal. Yeah, it's already
1:07:09April so there you know must have been hard at work at it, but I
1:07:13Have not seen it. I can honestly say that I haven't seen it. Nobody's shown me
1:07:18But in a nutshell that it's going to
1:07:23Look like iOS 7. Yep. Yeah, that's I've heard exactly the same
1:07:27It's quote-unquote
1:07:29Dramatic or significant so it's gonna be the perhaps the biggest new feature
1:07:3510.10 and they're calling it C raw after the the wine internally. I have no idea what the
1:07:40California spot will be but I have to yeah
1:07:44And I don't know the names like that are probably the best and tightest held secrets at Apple because I don't I think that there's no
1:07:51Reason for those, you know
1:07:53You know like you know like them, you know, you're talking about like the last one is Mavericks
1:07:58I've said they're all gonna be named after places in California going forward
1:08:01There's no reason for that sort of thing to go outside a very very tight circle. Absolutely
1:08:07You know probably like Schiller and Johnny I've you know at that level because at the you know
1:08:14They can brand that all at the last minute. Sure
1:08:16My guess and this is just a guess. I'm gonna go with Yosemite. Mmm, just because
1:08:23just because
1:08:25It's gonna be a big change because what looks big is big branding wise right, right?
1:08:31Even if you know like clearly the biggest up
1:08:34versions of Mac OS X were like the shift from PowerPC to Intel because everything had to be recompiled and all sorts of
1:08:42technical stuff had to change
1:08:44Snow leopard was a big change
1:08:48they added all this low-level stuff behind the scenes like Grand Central dispatch and
1:08:53really really big stuff like at a nerdy computer science study how the operating system level works and
1:09:00Famously they even bragged about it, you know marketing wise not many new features
1:09:06We're really working on you know, the behind-the-scenes stuff. So they gave it a name, you know, the previous version was leopard
1:09:13They said we're gonna call it snow leopard because it's leopard with you know, not many new features
1:09:18This because it looks new I think they're gonna give it a big push marketing wise as being new even if
1:09:25Technically, it's actually not that different. It's really just a new look
1:09:29Sure, Yosemite's my guess because I don't know what else, you know to me. It's the biggest that's a great name, too
1:09:35I totally agree
1:09:37In terms of like Yosemite being big and it's well known and it's pretty dramatic and that goes well with what the redesign is gonna
1:09:43Be you know, I'm a Southern California guy. So I'm hoping for something like
1:09:47Zuma or Malibu just like a beach that represents like, you know
1:09:51You always think of it in your head as like a sunset like a new beginning type of thing
1:09:54Yeah, now I could see Malibu the only thing is like I can't see them going back to a beach after Mavericks
1:09:59right away true I
1:10:01Don't know but anyway, and then you know in the whole telephone game
1:10:05I'm sure somebody's gonna listen to this episode and they're gonna say John Gruber says that the new version of Mac OS X will be
1:10:11Called Yosemite. Oh for sure like without a doubt
1:10:14I'm telling you those of you whoever you are out there who's already typing the headline into your wordpress.com
1:10:20Front end I'm totally guessing nobody. I don't know anybody who would tell me anything like that
1:10:26There's no like that stuff like that isn't in the seeds. That's you know
1:10:31Like you said it's what did they the internal code names are named after like wine? Yeah
1:10:36I'm curious. I'm really curious how they're going to deal with
1:10:44with drop shadows.
1:10:46And I know it seems like a weird thing to get hung up on.
1:10:48- Not when you're talking about Apple though.
1:10:51I mean. - Right.
1:10:52So the iOS 7 look gets rid of almost all shadows.
1:10:59I think to the point where some things look bad,
1:11:01like I always say popovers on iPad in iOS 7,
1:11:05to me look, they just look unfinished,
1:11:08like an unfinished design because they are over,
1:11:13they're popped over the content, but with no shadow,
1:11:16it just looks like this weird white round rectangle
1:11:19that's just drawn over your content.
1:11:21- Right, kind of like male in portrait mode on the iPad.
1:11:24I see what you mean there.
1:11:25Kind of looks like a split view,
1:11:27but that's not the intention,
1:11:28and the intention is going over the content.
1:11:31- Right.
1:11:32- So it's interesting, and like on the Mac,
1:11:33I mean the Mac is designed to have multiple windows
1:11:36open at once.
1:11:37- Exactly where I'm going.
1:11:38- Right, so if there's no drop shadows behind these windows,
1:11:41It's going to be a mess.
1:11:43So I think there's going to be a decrease there, but maybe not nearly as dramatic as
1:11:49iOS 7, but clearly the aesthetic is going to be there.
1:11:54And basically the gist of what I heard, new icon set, you know how the corners on the
1:12:00app windows are slightly rounded, they're getting rid of that so everything's more squared
1:12:06off and fine now.
1:12:08I think they're going to decrease the shade of metal across the OS quite a bit, more white
1:12:13space.
1:12:14We'll probably see some new translucencies, kind of where the dock is and notification
1:12:20centers.
1:12:21Yeah, it's a...
1:12:24I'm really curious to see how it goes, because like I said, in a nutshell, everybody seems
1:12:28to agree that in a nutshell it's the iOS 7 Look.
1:12:33But there's so much about the iOS 7 Look that to me doesn't work with layered windows.
1:12:38And you know, there's the lack of shadows and the transparency thing is another thing where you really and like wind
1:12:43and you know windows Microsoft really found this out with
1:12:46Was it Vista or was it I think it was Vista where they went overboard with the transparency
1:12:52Yeah
1:12:52But it really when you have overlapping windows the transparency becomes an unreadable mess if it's too transparent
1:12:59Right, like it works on iOS 7. I think because you never have more than one thing stacked on a time
1:13:07so like when you bring up one transparent thing like by sliding up from the bottom to get the
1:13:11What's that called activity view or what's it what's the thing you slide up from the bottom on what iOS yeah control center control center
1:13:20Yeah
1:13:21It works because it's only over one thing right whereas that sort of you know, frosted glass
1:13:27Look, you can't just have a bunch of windows with that floating over each other, right? You can't read anything
1:13:32So I'm curious how they're gonna do it and I'm really curious how they're gonna handle shadows because I was seven doesn't really have any and
1:13:38The current Mac OS X look and I think this is one of those things that hasn't really changed all the way back to Mac OS
1:13:4510.0 back in like 2001 is that the shadow size has always bothered me
1:13:51It's just way too big. It looks like each window is like an inch above the other one
1:13:57Even though there's no actual
1:14:01parallax of, you know, windows shrinking behind and stuff like that.
1:14:05Right, like I always notice that if you take a screenshot on OS X of a window and you just open up like in Quick
1:14:11Look or whatever, you can see that huge huge shadow. It's like an inch, right? It's yeah, it's humongous.
1:14:16It gets annoying too sometimes.
1:14:17Right, and it doesn't make any sense to me because it seems as though because windows
1:14:22Nothing gets smaller. So it seems like it's they're very thin like semantically
1:14:28They're very thin layers on top of each other very close to each other
1:14:31But yet there's these shadows that make it look as though they're all an inch apart and yet there's no
1:14:37There's no 3d parallax to it, right? I mean, I guess the
1:14:43Like removing shadows would be you know more detrimental on the Mac where lots of people still use it with multiple windows open simultaneously
1:14:50But as you know an iOS, you know
1:14:52See you lap at a time and I guess if OS 10 was the same way shadows wouldn't be as important there
1:14:57And there's also been a lot of talk about what a desktop version of the I/O 7 design
1:15:03would look like, and a lot of people pointing to the iCloud.com, they did that last year.
1:15:08I don't think that's the right way to look at it.
1:15:09I think iCloud.com is basically a web-based replication of the iPad apps, and that's always
1:15:15what it's been, even back to the first version of iCloud.com.
1:15:20The leather-stitched Notes app, calendar app, reminders, etc.
1:15:25And now it just looks like iPad apps.
1:15:28Yeah, and the other thing too is that they don't have to deal with layering, right?
1:15:32Because it's one thing at a time filling your browser window.
1:15:35Right.
1:15:36And so I don't think that's a good way to look either.
1:15:39And the timing doesn't work out either because the iCloud.com apps have had that look for
1:15:46many months now.
1:15:47They changed that pretty much shortly after iOS 7 came out.
1:15:51Right, right.
1:15:52that's the timeline where I feel like they were really hammering away on the fundamentals of what this
1:15:58New look for the Mac is gonna look like like she came out way too early
1:16:02They did you know, the Mac stuff wasn't anywhere close to being done totally agree
1:16:06Yeah, and from what I've heard like the design of 10.10 is really iterated a lot the last few months
1:16:11So like you said it wouldn't make sense look like I cloud calm seeing they did I cloud calm like alongside
1:16:187 in last September and now nearly a year later. It's not going to look the same that would make sense
1:16:22No, there's so many iterations
1:16:25I mean that's you know, if there's any if there's any one word that describes the Apple design process its iterations for sure that
1:16:32Here's a question about some of the your style then man, maybe it's not from you
1:16:38It's actually sort of nine to five Mac house style and it's very very common
1:16:43It's it's more or less. I think almost the standard for the industry
1:16:46which is
1:16:48That and I think correct me if I'm wrong
1:16:50But when you when you wrote about Mac OS 10.10 having this iOS 7 look and feel you included with the story a mock-up
1:16:59And not one that you commissioned but like here's here's some guy on the Internet's idea of what an iOS 7
1:17:05version of Mac OS 10 would look like sure and
1:17:08Another example and again, this isn't you but there's other sites ours does it everybody does it was somebody says
1:17:15rumor comes out that the new iPhone is going to have edge-to-edge glass, no bezel along the side.
1:17:25Yep.
1:17:26And then there will be a picture of a mock-up of an iPhone with edge-to-edge glass, but it's not a
1:17:34mock-up from the source, it's just we went out, we had to have, we had to have an illustration for
1:17:39this story, so we went out and found one that sort of fits.
1:17:41Right.
1:17:42that always bothers me as a reader and like as a sort of
1:17:46armchair
1:17:49Journalism critic because to me it's like you have a good story and it's an interesting source
1:17:55But then you've illustrated it with something that's just pulled out of the air. Yeah, I see what you're saying
1:18:00I mean in terms of that 10.10 example, I think you're referring to that roundup. I did
1:18:0410.10 I would say out of WWDC
1:18:09That was my decision to put that mock-up there admittedly
1:18:12I probably could have done a better job saying that that was a mock-up
1:18:15But I do think illustration is extremely important and also to be extremely honest if I had an exact idea of what?
1:18:2210.10 would have looked like I would have had my own mock-up made that would be you know
1:18:27Pretty close the real thing because I have been doing that right for several years when I know exactly how something's gonna look
1:18:34I'm going to take the time to get a great mock-up done
1:18:38I mean I did this with the retina MacBook Pro in 2012 all the iOS stuff the last couple of years didn't you do?
1:18:45I think you did it with some icons
1:18:47Yes, we also did that with the iOS 7 icons last year before yeah, and they came out pretty good
1:18:54You know like in that police sketch style way right like if police get says hey
1:18:58Here's the guy who robbed the 7-eleven and they catch him and you look and like hey, that's actually a pretty good sketch
1:19:04I would say that those icons that you commissioned were good in that sense
1:19:08Right. The thing with those icons, that was the night before WWDC. If we got those,
1:19:16the design of the icons a couple weeks before WWDC, we would have had stellar mock-ups that
1:19:21would look exactly like the icons on the homescreen.
1:19:23Well, that's why, to me, because you do that, and you, you know, if you know,
1:19:29and you can commission a mock-up based on what you know or what you've seen or what,
1:19:36like a sources scene, then when you do this, like, where you'll just say, "Well, I don't
1:19:40have that, but here's some other guy's, you know, guess as to what it could look like."
1:19:46To me, it takes away from when you actually have it.
1:19:49I agree.
1:19:50And I know, because I, you know, this circles back to like what we were talking about at
1:19:54the very beginning. I read your stuff very, very closely, and I note the exact words that
1:19:59you use, but most people don't.
1:20:01Sure, sure.
1:20:02Right you include that screenshot with your story and most people are going to who see it are going to think that's supposed to be
1:20:08What it looks like you're right. That's a good point because that particular story
1:20:12It was a mix of iOS 8 stuff and 10 points and all the ios 8 stuff those mock-ups and images up there
1:20:17That's what the real thing looks like and then at the bottom
1:20:19I put a totally bogus image of what template 10 will look like
1:20:22There wasn't a great call on my part. Yeah
1:20:24What do you what are you hearing about Mac OS or not Mac OS iOS 8?
1:20:29I would say hearing a lot. I mean the big feature is gonna be the health book, which is
1:20:33Basically pass book for your health. It's gonna aggregate lots of data like blood sugar
1:20:38Calories burned other fitness statistics. Yeah, but for most people it's not gonna have the blood sugar
1:20:45It's not gonna have my blood sugar because it's not gonna be able to read my blood sugar the phone
1:20:49It was course not it's gonna work with the I mean the big question here is is it gonna work with some Apple hardware?
1:20:55At first will it be like iTunes coming before the iPod?
1:20:59Will it just work? Yeah, good analogy. Yeah
1:21:01It I mean, I think the most likely scenario for the very imminent future would be hooking up to the plethora of health
1:21:10iPhone connected accessories that Apple's been hyping up for years
1:21:13You know, like I remember when they announced iPhone OS 3 way back in 2009
1:21:18They had that demo of the I don't I think it was a glucose blood sugar checker on stage
1:21:24And that was a huge deal and now there's Wi-Fi based scales blood pressure checkers all sorts of stuff
1:21:31pedometers that they could you know hook up and aggregate in a singular place
1:21:35Yeah, I that's how I kind of see it
1:21:38And and again there might be a you know
1:21:40I don't want to go on too much longer, but we can talk about the the wearable rumors and stuff
1:21:44And so clearly there's an awful lot of rumors that Apple is going to come out with some devices that are you know?
1:21:51Some sort of fitness health monitoring type stuff and they've made hiring they've hired people with backgrounds and that sort of thing
1:21:58So it certainly wouldn't at this point shock anybody if Apple came out with a peripheral
1:22:03that took some of these measurements and then you know synced by a
1:22:07Bluetooth to your iPhone and iPad with health book, right the smokes on there
1:22:12But I think a lot of this stuff though is going to be left to third parties and you know
1:22:17You know like for example like blood sugar
1:22:20So if you're you know, if you have diabetes, that's a huge deal, right, but they're gonna leave that to
1:22:25Medical companies and then let I you know more or less like what the App Store is to apps and yeah
1:22:32Apple does some apps and they have new apps, you know, and and they you know
1:22:37Obviously they care about things like email and the web and calendar
1:22:40But they don't worry about having every little thing
1:22:43Sure that they're happy to let thousands and thousands of developers fill in all those gaps and I feel like it'll be the same way
1:22:49with the medical devices.
1:22:51- Right, they'll fill in the software gap.
1:22:52They'll give it to every iPhone user,
1:22:55the opportunity to hook up their accessories to that.
1:22:57They'll have beautifully presented graphs,
1:22:59all sorts of data comparison features.
1:23:02So I think, you know--
1:23:03- Apple doesn't need to sell every diabetic
1:23:06a blood sugar monitoring device.
1:23:08It's more than enough for Apple if it becomes well-known,
1:23:12hey, if you have diabetes, you really wanna get an iPhone
1:23:15because if you do, boom, boom, boom, this is fantastic.
1:23:18Right, and even the design of the application, the name, Health Book, the icon, it all screams
1:23:23Passbook for Health. I mean, it's literally a duplicate of Passbook, but with health statistics,
1:23:28health data. So I think it's pretty clear that it's going to be an aggregator, at least
1:23:32at first.
1:23:34You had screenshots of the actual app.
1:23:36Yes.
1:23:37Do you wonder whether that is like a stand-in for pre-release? Because it looked... The
1:23:45One thing that struck me about it is it looked so much like Passbook, it almost looked confusingly
1:23:50like Passbook.
1:23:53More similar than I would think the two apps would look as two different apps.
1:23:57I mean, I kind of had the exact opposite opinion.
1:23:59I thought that it was extremely polished compared to the other stuff regarding iOS 8 that I've
1:24:06seen.
1:24:07So it seems definitely more polished than other parts of the operating system.
1:24:10They've clearly been working on it for a long time.
1:24:12Of course the design can and probably will change a bit, but I know that's the design
1:24:17that's been used and tested with iOS 8 for several months now.
1:24:22But it's like the real...
1:24:23You're sure...
1:24:24Yeah, again, not that it's final.
1:24:26Everything gets tweaked up until the end.
1:24:28But at the time that you had the screenshots, that was what the app was intended to look
1:24:33like at this moment.
1:24:34Yes.
1:24:35It's not like, "Hey, we'll gin up this thing that looks like Passbook while we show it
1:24:40to our partners because we don't want them to see the real thing.
1:24:43No, I didn't sit on that.
1:24:47It was pretty immediate.
1:24:48Do you hear anything else?
1:24:50I have not heard.
1:24:51I've heard much more about the visual changes to Mac OS X than iOS 8.
1:24:56I would say, yeah, I heard a bunch of stuff besides the health book, improved maps app,
1:25:02polished up data, better views of where streets are, and of course the transit mode, which
1:25:08I have heard they're having a hard time with in terms of sorting the data
1:25:12They don't want a repeat of the data aggregation problems from iOS 6 is launch
1:25:16so we'll see if transit will make it to the I've heard that transit is extremely hard because it's
1:25:22none of it is
1:25:24And it's almost like a hats off to Google for getting it as well as they do
1:25:27because none of it is
1:25:30regularized there's no standard for how a
1:25:34Municipal transit authority should put the transit info on the web. It's just it's almost like back to the days
1:25:42Before RSS feeds where people had to screen scrape HTML and parse the HTML and every site's HTML was different
1:25:49So you more or less had to like special case every single
1:25:53City, right or website for in the web scraping days
1:25:58But for transit now you pretty much have to do each every single transit authority
1:26:03you pretty much have to do individually because everybody reports the data differently.
1:26:06Right. And it's not like Apple went out and just created or took all this data for itself.
1:26:11This is a direct, what it seems on the surface to be just similar to what they did before,
1:26:15acquired a bunch of companies and data sources and they're mixing it up all together. And
1:26:20I think that at this point, following the, I guess, disaster of iPhone, iOS 6 maps, launched
1:26:26in 2012 is they'd rather pull the feature, even though they're testing it now, than launch
1:26:30something that's not ready to go.
1:26:32Yeah, especially in the maps out. I also think I think look and feel wise
1:26:36I think this is sort of that Johnny I've influence where I think Johnny I've
1:26:40in all aspects sort of goes for a sort of
1:26:44More timeless look like away from trendiness and even though it sounds ridiculous because flat design
1:26:51Became such a off to use term in the last 18 months or so Saturday
1:26:56right, but I don't think it is I think he sees it as as
1:27:01a more timeless style and maybe it went too flat I said I think I think maybe they'll dial back in a little bit more texture
1:27:08I hope but just a little just a touch perhaps
1:27:11I don't haven't heard anything to point to that but in the way that like, you know
1:27:16The Porsche 911 has looked like the same car for 50 years
1:27:20just as slowly evolved year over year in a way that especially starting with the
1:27:29The iPhone 4 that all iPhones since have been sort of Oh quick, you know
1:27:34You can just tell when somebody has an iPhone in their hand, right? It's great point
1:27:37Although the 5c, you know, obviously is its own unique thing, but that the unique in many ways
1:27:43Yeah, but the the ones with the you know more rectangular corners and this metal frame around the sign
1:27:49you know that I think that that we're done with
1:27:54Radical changes to the iOS 7 UI for years to come for sure
1:27:59We'll see tweaks year over year, but that this general flat look is
1:28:03To the software what the iPhone 4 shape was to the hardware couldn't agree more. I mean
1:28:10All indications from I always say it's just gonna be tweaks here and there to the user interface, but nothing in terms of the overall
1:28:16Philosophy or style behind it
1:28:19Of course, they're gonna fix up, you know, the screw-ups in the voice memos app in terms of it being confusing
1:28:24Simplified notification center a bit but no nothing to move away from the this aesthetic
1:28:31Yeah, they did a lot of that with iOS 7.1 really I mean and it's just one of those little things where they've got to
1:28:38be on
1:28:39The the OS has to be on the same
1:28:42Shipping schedule as the hardware and if right because the hardware had to have iOS 7, you know
1:28:47And whatever new phones and iPads they have coming out this year are going to be running iOS 8
1:28:54There's like they're gonna be devices that can't boot iOS 7. That's how it is every year
1:28:58Of course, so there had to be something called iOS 7 that shipped in September because that's when the iPhones came out. I
1:29:04Think that iOS 7.1 if iOS it was just software only and Apple didn't do their own hardware
1:29:127.1 was the first version that I think they would have shipped
1:29:17Yeah, it's not just about bugs. But also that they like you said they cleared up a lot of
1:29:23navigational
1:29:24Ambiguities for sure. Absolutely. I mean you can see how much care really went into the move from 7 to 7.1 in terms of design
1:29:32I mean forget the new more rounded slider and power offline, but even if you go into the weather app, I mean something as
1:29:38not important as the little glyphs to show
1:29:42The snow or the the rain or the clouds and like the days to come in like the week view
1:29:47Those have been changed immensely as well. So just a small thing that shows the level of detail. Yeah, I'm almost surprised
1:29:54I think they had to I think they felt like they had to because they know that I was seven because it was so much
1:29:58And so little time that you know that they really needed to dig in and do a pretty significant point one release
1:30:05I think it's probably the most significant point one release in iOS history
1:30:11Surprise because it took so long because it clearly was eating into the time where iOS 8 development was ramping up
1:30:17Right, that's why you know because they want to do these things annually
1:30:22They don't have much time from when they ship iOS 7 to where they've really got to have most of their engineers working
1:30:29You know all week long every day on iOS 8
1:30:32Right and you can see the shift there like every year the the fewer major point updates iOS like
1:30:40There was like iOS 4.3, iOS 4.3, that was three major point updates to iOS 4.
1:30:49I don't remember how far 3.0 went, maybe the 3.3.
1:30:53But now, I mean, like, we're going from 7.0 to 7.1, and the next big one's going to be
1:30:588.0.
1:30:596 to 6.1, 7.0.
1:31:015, 5.1, 6.0.
1:31:03So they're moving quickly.
1:31:07Last but not least.
1:31:08Let's say this. What do you have any inklings on?
1:31:10Apple's calendar schedule for the rest of the year, you know, I actually that's something I wanted to talk about and I
1:31:16Believe it was the second quarter the third quarter earnings call last year Tim Cook said hey
1:31:222013 we're gonna really do everything in the fall, but 2014 is gonna be a big year
1:31:27We have big plans for a cross and he said the word across
1:31:302014 and this was not only on the call itself, but in the press release -
1:31:35And here we are here. We are mid-april nothing or end of april almost and not a word not even
1:31:42So Latin in two years ago. I think it was two years ago
1:31:46They had a January event in New York for ebooks and education right and it was sort of a one-off. They've never followed it up
1:31:53But I kind of felt like it was a hey, we don't you know
1:31:56You know, don't forget about us while we're in the quiet period after the holidays
1:32:03Last year they didn't do anything until
1:32:06WWDC and they put that out there they kind of spread the word that hey
1:32:13We're not gonna you know, we're not gonna have anything to say until WWDC
1:32:19In this year, they just didn't say anything it is just let it go they've just let that that late March
1:32:28Early February or February and March timeframe where for a couple of years they were announcing new iPads
1:32:33They've just let it go without announcing anything like I kind of thought months ago if they had new
1:32:38product categories to announce like what the iPad was in 2010 and 2011
1:32:43That that would be the time when they would do it because they've moved the iPads to the fall
1:32:47That's when everybody expects new iPads this year again
1:32:50But it opens up that February March area for new product categories
1:32:55And I was thinking that the, I mean, I know that an Apple TV was planned for introduction
1:33:00in the first half of 2014.
1:33:02It could have been pushed back, it could have been delayed for who knows why.
1:33:06But I mean, with Tim Cook saying that there's going to be new stuff across 2014, including
1:33:12a new product category at some point during the year, you know, something had to go wrong.
1:33:18I mean, the CEO of Apple wouldn't say new products across 2014 and then not release
1:33:23New products across 2014. Yeah it or well, I wonder I'm maybe something slipped or maybe
1:33:30It's you know, we know the date for WWDC. It's the first week of June right that still leaves plenty of room
1:33:37I think for across the year where if you know, but I think it would require
1:33:41Hardware announcements at WWDC not just software announcements. Yeah, and I think that's a given at this point
1:33:47I mean that I don't know though given for what announcing what kind of hardware laptops at the very?
1:33:53Well, see, I don't think that counts. I think something that beyond laptops, I think
1:33:58Not that they have to not that they're going to but that to sort of hit that that definition of announcing new products across the year
1:34:06It has to be more than just updated MacBook Airs or MacBook Pros could be the best could be the watch, you know
1:34:13never know yeah, or
1:34:15and again, I don't think this is true because the the phone stuff is so
1:34:21substantial in terms of the ramp up in
1:34:23The supply chain that they can't they just can't keep it secret weeks in advance anymore, right?
1:34:30But you know, I thought before in theory what if they you know announced a new iPhone then what if the iPhone
1:34:37You know how like the two years ago they came out doing the first iPads with the retina displays the iPad 3 and then six
1:34:44Months later. They said here's the iPad 4 with a retina display and you know a better a a6 processor, right?
1:34:51I mean that does make sense in terms of the recent talk about how there is the 4.7 inch model on the 5.5
1:34:55Maybe the 4.7 will commit WWDC and later in the the year. They'll have the
1:35:00iFab lit I
1:35:02Don't know or maybe they just say here's the next you know
1:35:05Here's iPhone 6 and it comes out 6 6 months or 7 months after well
1:35:09I guess would be more like 8 months
1:35:10But there's no promise that you get it that if you bought your iPhone 5s on day 1 right that you are going to get
1:35:1712 months of
1:35:19This is the top-of-the-line iPhone, right? Yeah, of course. I mean, but I don't know Apple TV could be a WWDC announcement, too
1:35:26Yeah, I've thought the same thing that that could be
1:35:29I'm not hearing anything about it
1:35:32I'm just pulling stuff out of my hat and thinking what they could announce the only thing I know about
1:35:36Apple TV is I know that there are
1:35:39some amazing
1:35:41Engineers working on Apple TV like pressure type of engineers who there's no way that they're working on
1:35:48The Apple TV as we know it, you know course simple little up down left right select thing
1:35:55That there's some really good people on it
1:35:58I mean whether it's something that's coming this year or later or I don't know but could be two different products
1:36:04I mean, there could be a minor Apple TV refresh perhaps with the new software
1:36:09SDK iOS I mean look at the Apple TV interface is still stuck in the four cell days as well
1:36:15So, you know, they need updates on both sides of the coin. Okay, you know and having been at
1:36:20Microsoft's build conference two weeks ago and
1:36:23You know that they announced, you know, and it was so fun
1:36:27You know and I linked to a couple of pieces today from Brent Simmons and Justin Williams about how
1:36:31Because it was at Moscone West which is where WWDC is. It was like this bizarro
1:36:36world
1:36:38WWDC
1:36:39Where in so many ways it looked like WWDC and then so many, you know, then you just see oh my god
1:36:44But that is so weird, you know, and this is so weird
1:36:46and
1:36:48One of them, you know, not really weird
1:36:51But one of the ways that that struck me about build was this day of this
1:36:54But there I forget if they're calling them universal apps or whatever they're calling them
1:36:58But that there's one, you know way to write an app that runs on
1:37:01Windows PCs Windows phones
1:37:04tablets and
1:37:06Xbox now obviously the interface is totally different, but it's the same, you know developer tools and API's
1:37:13for shared stuff. So the stuff that could be shared is shared. But the thing that got me was that, you know,
1:37:21they're really, really, you know, right now Microsoft with the Xbox One and the current runtime and their developer tools
1:37:26is pushing, hey, you can write apps that run in people's living rooms on their Xbox One, you know, that's a ship that's taking off.
1:37:36Yeah, for sure. And the living room opens up so many different opportunities for apps, too.
1:37:40That just makes me think you know and if they're gonna do it if part of the story of a next generation
1:37:45Apple TV doesn't even matter what what the gist of the hardware is
1:37:49You know that if it's a TV with an integrate the actual TV set with an integrated thing
1:37:53Or it's a separate box that you plug in doesn't matter if it has has to do with apps and third-party apps in an app store
1:38:00WWDC is the time to do it. Yeah, because there's no other you know, they have to wait another year
1:38:05Otherwise, I mean not that they would that they couldn't release it in October and just release the developer info is stuff on the web
1:38:12But the perfect time to do it is a WWDC agreed
1:38:17I mean, I mean they have they have a keynote to fill to anything about it
1:38:20I mean
1:38:20They're not going to just have a keynote for iOS 8 which is not that big of an update and a new operating system
1:38:26It just has a new look and mostly the same features that as Mavericks
1:38:29I mean, there's a formula here the formula includes some hardware of some sort
1:38:33Well and the other thing too about Mac OS X
1:38:35I mean obviously Mac OS X is gonna have a huge part in the keynote
1:38:38but just because of the new look right gonna have all sorts of information and and
1:38:41You know how you're gonna get your apps to take advantage of the new look and still, you know run on Mac OS
1:38:4810.9 and all this stuff
1:38:50But the truth is the Mac and it you know in the Mac's a great business and I really do think Apple's heart is in
1:38:56It but it's just not big enough for Apple to be a centerpiece of the keynote anymore
1:39:00It has to be iOS or has to be a new product right for sure and like you said even like psychologically
1:39:06announcing updated errors and MacBook Pro's
1:39:09WWDC a wouldn't cut it for new heart, right?
1:39:12Because it's just not big enough business really isn't not that that won't get good time and that you know
1:39:17That they're not proud of it and it it certainly means a lot to the people who were in the room at WWDC
1:39:22because every single all 5,000 developers are
1:39:26Using max to develop their apps where they're writing Mac software iOS software. Absolutely, but it's just not big enough
1:39:33Will you be there at a WWDC this year? Uh, I expect to be yeah cool. Yeah, I'll be there too
1:39:39I mean, I don't have a ticket or a press pass or anything, but I'll be there during the week. So
1:39:43Yeah, well then you will have to get together. So that's a good question. I was gonna ask about that
1:39:49So you do you you've never gotten a press pass for the Apple event? I haven't only not gonna gotten a press pass
1:39:55I haven't gotten a press email reply
1:39:57So yeah, no relationship there with Apple at this point and you but you ask
1:40:05Yeah, yeah. Yeah, I've caught you ask do you ask each time like every time WDC gets announced you do you try to you know?
1:40:12Throw throw another request in to get a press pass
1:40:16Yeah last couple years or so. I haven't really gotten any replies
1:40:21For that or stories. I mean I asked them for comment on the Greg Christie story and they gave the comment to
1:40:26everyone else, you know, so I
1:40:29Don't know. I don't know, you know, but it doesn't seem like they really interact with the Apple
1:40:35Only websites. I mean during fireball is not an Apple rumor site. All right
1:40:41Fortune is not an Apple rumor site
1:40:43But I mean I'd be more concerned or more I guess I don't know if obsessed the right word because I probably wouldn't be upset
1:40:48either way but I'd be more concerned if like MacRumors was getting invited to
1:40:53those events which they're yeah so I don't think so either no it's a good
1:40:57point and part of it they do seem to have had a couple of years ago a sort of
1:41:03reflection inflection point where they they really all of a sudden opened up to
1:41:10online only publications like where previously they'd really only given top
1:41:17tier press access to print-based journalists so and it was a lot more
1:41:27limited so like the first couple of years iPhone review units only went to
1:41:33like pogue Mossberg Begley at the USA today
1:41:40Steven Levy while he was at Newsweek but that you know Newsweek you know went
1:41:44under. But it was really, you know, like the first iPhone I think only went to like four
1:41:49four writers, four or five. Yeah, Kogan, his famous video. And they were all had roots in print,
1:41:56you know, the Wall Street Journal, the New York Times, USA Today. And it seemed like they had a
1:42:00moment like where I started getting like I had press passes back then, but then I never had
1:42:05review units of anything. And then they really opened up and started giving a lot more review
1:42:11Units and the you know off-the-record briefings that go with them right not just to me. It wasn't like they elevated me
1:42:18Next to poggan mosberg, but that you know a lot of others too. What was her first?
1:42:23Review unit from Apple. Was it the iPhone 4 or 4s? Just kind of thing in the timeline. It's an excellent question. I
1:42:29Believe in fact, I'm almost certain that it was the Verizon iPhone 4
1:42:38Which is yeah a little interesting because it was
1:42:41Not a major event I
1:42:45Think I could be wrong, but I think that this is one of those things where my memory shot
1:42:52but I'm pretty sure that I was out on the west coast for Macworld Expo and
1:42:56it worked out that I could just swing down to Cupertino and get a briefing and sign all the NDA's and pick it up and
1:43:03You know
1:43:05Have it but otherwise I would have gone like from Philly up to New York because they they went you know
1:43:11They had a team go to New York to write distribute them to writers there
1:43:14But I think I'm almost certain that the that was when it started and I think I've gotten a review unit of every
1:43:20iOS device since and right if I missed anything, it wasn't anything major, right? Right. Right. Yeah
1:43:28Your reviews are always interesting three. I love how like the embargo lifts at a certain time and then you just post yours up
1:43:34Three hours later or the next day and everyone just jumps to read your opinion. I always try I try I
1:43:40Try to get I try to hit the embargo deadline, but I I never do. I'm really terrible with that
1:43:47I mean like who cares at this point, but I know but I think some people think I do it on purpose now that I
1:43:52Think you do it on purpose
1:43:54No, I don't and it used to be that I'd get you know that that they'd
1:44:01Call me or like email me and by hey what you know, where's your review?
1:44:05I'd be like, why am I reading and it wasn't like I was in trouble. There's no there is absolutely no
1:44:11Hey, you know there's there's a rule that says you cannot publish before nine o'clock on Thursday Pacific time
1:44:17There's no rule that says you have to publish by
1:44:19905 Pacific, you know
1:44:22I just think though that everybody else wants to publish right away that it never occurred to them that someone would
1:44:27Would miss it by four hours. Yeah
1:44:30Like it was like that. They just never it wasn't like they were angry
1:44:33They were just confused and wanted to make sure everything was alright. What's wrong with our phone? Yeah, right
1:44:38Before we wrap up. What do you think about the the watch? I
1:44:42Think that's interesting. I mean, it'll be interesting to see which direction they go into
1:44:47I mean based on all the recent hires
1:44:48It really seems like it's gonna be a medical appliance or have a medical medical. I think meta
1:44:54I don't think so. I think that's off because I think it's too limiting and it's no fun
1:44:57It's not I mean, I think it's one component
1:44:59I mean if you remember the iPhone, it was the phone, web browser, and iPod.
1:45:03I don't think it would be far-fetched to think that, hey, the watch is going to be your media,
1:45:07your health, and some cool mapping functionality, or something like that.
1:45:13I mean the hires, in terms of those from the medical space, it's really been a thing across
1:45:192013 and into 2014.
1:45:21You know, how the Apple product cycles work, I mean the iPhone was in the works two and
1:45:25a half years, three years before that launched.
1:45:27if they got all these medical hires over the last year or two or so, and we're talking
1:45:31about people's lives here, FDA regulations, I don't think they would be able to ship a
1:45:36device that does everything their newly hired engineers are capable of creating this year
1:45:42or even early next year.
1:45:44So all this health stuff could be for future generations and they could start off like
1:45:48you know the original iPhone not shipping with 3G.
1:45:50It could be just a few medical things here and there, some cool maps functionality, getting
1:45:56your notifications and then over time they could you know of all the product to be something
1:46:01much bigger.
1:46:03I do think and a couple people have been writing about it recently that it it doesn't seem
1:46:08to add up financially to be an iPhone or I even iPad style business now because iPhones
1:46:19from Apple's perspective accounting wise sell for six five six seven eight hundred dollars
1:46:24Yeah, you don't pay that when you go to the carrier, but the carrier pays Apple like you buy a new 5s
1:46:29Starts it like 650 bucks, right?
1:46:32iPads, you know now clearly you can get the iPad mini without cellular for you know
1:46:41350 bucks but the bigger ones, you know are four five six hundred dollar devices
1:46:46I don't think you can sell a thing you wear on your wrist for five six seven hundred dollars or you could sell it
1:46:51But it wouldn't be it wouldn't sell to enough people right? It all right. There's this ridiculous talk of the
1:46:57Thousands of dollars for the I watch. I mean, yeah, yes, that makes sense if it's gold or platinum-plated or something
1:47:03But that's totally not apples and johndas
1:47:06No, I was going back and forth with some people on Twitter the other day about it and somebody else I forget who but some
1:47:11Reader, you know type to chimed in and said sure lots of companies sell thousand dollar watches multi-thousand dollar watches
1:47:17But those watches are heirlooms you're expected if you go and buy
1:47:22Four or five thousand dollar watch or even two or three thousand dollar watch from Rolex or Omega
1:47:27Or any of the companies that make watches like that
1:47:30You're expecting to have a watch that you're gonna own for the rest of your life and that you can pass on to your children
1:47:36Yeah, that's still going to be
1:47:38You know useful and even better
1:47:41It's gonna be even better than it was right because if you had like your grandfather's Rolex and it still keeps great time
1:47:46It's gonna have this great old style
1:47:48It's gonna be timeless and you've you know got this connection
1:47:51Computer devices, you know don't worry, right?
1:47:55I mean, whatever the thing is three or four years from now things gonna be in everybody's desk drawer because it's gonna be three or
1:48:00Four-year-old technology. Yeah. Yeah, probably be useless by them too. I mean if you look at the Apple update cycle
1:48:05I mean even the iPhone
1:48:07What is it 3gs at this point? All right, I mean useless you mean again any latest software?
1:48:13So yeah, no, I think you got to think about it in terms of iPod
1:48:17Pricing I really do and I for sure I also feel like maybe the thing that we're all overlooking
1:48:22It's just the way that like the iPhone came out and had all these sensors that just nobody had ever really thought of before
1:48:28Not that the technology was amazing
1:48:29But that all together it was like a proximity sensor so that the phone goes off when you hold it up to your face to
1:48:35make a call so right cheek doesn't register as a touch and
1:48:38the
1:48:40accelerometer I mean
1:48:41Colorometer right and you know and they had the super monkey balls game right there on day one in the App Store taking advantage of it
1:48:47Coolest thing ever but now it's like a nothing right but it was the combination and you know that you could put on
1:48:53Any one of them maybe wouldn't be all that expensive and wouldn't be all that amazing, but you put
1:48:58four five six of these sensors in a device that you put on your wrist and all of a sudden maybe you do kind of
1:49:06Get an amazing array of you know fitness information about yourself, right?
1:49:11But I don't know and I also feel like display wise it's if it's anything
1:49:16It's got to be like some kind of like new
1:49:18Technology that nobody's thinking of like these devices that like Samsung's putting out that are like just take a take a 2014
1:49:25Cellphone and shrink it to two inches and put it on your wrist is got to be the wrong way of thinking about for sure
1:49:31Speaking of Samsung. I love that
1:49:33that tumblr of the original Samsung designs
1:49:36Samsung design tumblr.com. Yeah, I mean it took me admittedly like a minute to think about like why is this website playing?
1:49:43Who are you looking to this and I'm like, ah, I got it. I
1:49:47think that that's the
1:49:50That's all I did is last night. I tweeted I just I didn't have any context to it all I wrote
1:49:55I just pasted the URL and I think am I getting it right is it's done a quick look it up
1:50:00Sorry anybody listening and see it. I don't think I've that made. Yeah, Samsung design tumbler.com
1:50:06And then you go there and it just said I don't know who did this. It's not me, but it's brilliant. It just says
1:50:12Original designs by Samsung this blog is dedicated to showcase all the innovative and original designs by Samsung
1:50:20And then it says there are no posts yet. And did you see which Apple employee favorited that I did
1:50:27I saw you linked to it today you linked to a screenshot showing that
1:50:32Somebody I don't know who he is. He's like a some kind of marketing
1:50:37Or something named Phil Schiller favored it from his Twitter account. Yeah, how did you spot that?
1:50:43That was that's a good might be a good way to end the show that the thing that got me the thing that made me
1:50:48Interesting about that. It wasn't that Schiller favorited my tweet. It was that you saw that Schiller favorited my tweet
1:50:54Oh in the Twitter apps and tweets a car went off. There's an activity tab. It shows you all that kind of stuff
1:50:59Yeah, but what made you look no activity tab is like it's like a stream of people following favoriting
1:51:06And I follow both of you so it shouldn't that
1:51:10Technology huh? Yeah
1:51:14Well, Mark Gurman, thank you for being on the show. Thanks for having me. It was great. Yeah
1:51:20I've got to have you back but everybody can follow your your reporting and nine-to-five Mac where you are senior editor
1:51:27And then on Twitter you have a good Twitter account
1:51:29Mark with a K
1:51:31Germin G you are
1:51:33Man, yeah, you should follow it to John
1:51:36Do I not follow you? Yeah, when you DM me I couldn't reply says oh shit. Why didn't you tell me?
1:51:42Hold on a second. I couldn't tell you couldn't reply. Okay, here live live on the show
1:51:46I'm gonna I'm gonna follow Mark German quite the endorsement
1:51:49Everybody else as you listen, you should do the same thing mark German. Here we go follow
1:51:55Now I you know what I how many I don't I follow like four or five hundred people
1:52:00I just assumed that I was following you. Yeah, but now yeah, I mean, I'm very similar to Gruber it's gonna be
1:52:06Me talking about the Lakers and basketball over
1:52:09What's your team Phillies Yankees? Oh the Yankees Yankees. Sorry, but uh, I don't know if you like basketball and Apple
1:52:18Get a kick out of some stuff. Yeah shoulders a Red Sox man, so I doubt that he favorites many of my tweets
1:52:23(laughing)
1:52:26(laughs)