21: The Transitive Property of Nerdiness

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0:00:09[music]

0:00:13Linode, Linode, I hate... Linus, Linux...

0:00:18Linus... there's so many problems.

0:00:22[music]

0:00:24Are we allowed to do follow-up?

0:00:26Sure, why not?

0:00:27John, have you licensed the term to us?

0:00:29Yeah, you haven't been getting my bills?

0:00:32My rates are very, very reasonable.

0:00:34Funny, I've been getting them.

0:00:36Yeah.

0:00:37Alright, so this first bit is just somebody posted something on App.net whose username

0:00:41is J-A-S-T-E, but I don't know if that's the real name or handle or whatever.

0:00:45I believe it's pronounced "jaste."

0:00:47You think so, but who knows?

0:00:49This is about, it's an iWatch follow-up, and he thinks that the iWatch will be Apple's

0:00:54foray into identity, and this is an aspect of the watch that we didn't talk about in

0:00:58the last show and I think it's worth talking about, and the identity problem in general.

0:01:05The concept is that the thing that you wear on your wrist will somehow identify you to

0:01:11all the other things that you come in contact with. To your television set, I guess to your

0:01:16phone if you wanted to pay for something, at Starbucks you wave your wrist by it or

0:01:20or something like that. I don't think there's anything special about the watch that makes

0:01:27it more possible to be your source of identity than, say, the phone. We all have phones now,

0:01:32and if we were going to have some sort of device be your source of identity, it would

0:01:36have been the phones by now. And lots of people have tried to do that in various ways. So

0:01:40this idea is that maybe the phone is too big or too expensive, or the battery doesn't last

0:01:45long enough, or you have to dig it out of your pocket or something else, so this would

0:01:48be slightly more accessible than it would give us another crack at making this magical

0:01:51identity thing where our identification is securely carried around with us by this little

0:01:56physical dongle.

0:01:57And when you sit down at your computer, it detects that you are you because you're the

0:02:00one wearing the watch, and it automatically unlocks your screen and logs you in.

0:02:04And when you walk into a room, it plays the music that you like, and it puts things on

0:02:08your tab when you swipe it when you buy things at stores.

0:02:10This is the fantasy scenario.

0:02:11And I think the barriers to that are not technological.

0:02:16They're business-related, where there's payment processors

0:02:21camped out at every possible place

0:02:22that want to give you money.

0:02:23And maybe standards-related, where

0:02:26if you want the same little dongle to do all these different

0:02:28functions throughout your house, everything you own

0:02:29has to be created by the same company and purchased recently.

0:02:32Because even if Apple rolled this out,

0:02:34it wouldn't work with all past Apple hardware, probably.

0:02:37You'd have to get new stuff, or at the very least,

0:02:39you'd need to update software.

0:02:40So I think this scenario will continue to be a fantasy, but while nothing is actually

0:02:46announced, this is the time to indulge in that fantasy, I suppose.

0:02:50So this person basically just wants to enable the pictures on the wall from the movie Antitrust.

0:02:55Did you ever see that abomination?

0:02:57I did not.

0:02:58Oh, you should.

0:03:00It's Ryan "Phil-e-pe" Philippi or whatever, and Tim Robbins basically plays Bill Gates,

0:03:06and Ryan Philippi, Philippi, whatever, is a crack programmer.

0:03:10And so they go into quote unquote Bill Gates house and as he goes in between rooms like

0:03:16the the the lights dim to a certain level and the pictures on the wall which are all

0:03:21like LCD displays show different pictures and I think this was based on something that

0:03:25Jobs supposedly had in his mansion or excuse me not Jobs Gates had in his mansion but the

0:03:32theory being that this watch could kind of enable that.

0:03:35In other words it's always on you and just like you said it's always personalized to

0:03:38you.

0:03:39And it would be like lower power than a phone,

0:03:41so I guess it wouldn't run out of charge as easily.

0:03:45I don't really see this happening

0:03:47in that way with watches.

0:03:48I mean, rather, I don't see watches changing anything.

0:03:53I think, first of all, one big problem with this

0:03:56is that I think there's going to be a lot more phones

0:04:00than watches out there.

0:04:02And my theory from the last episode

0:04:05was that the watch would really just be a phone accessory.

0:04:10And that it wouldn't-- I don't know if I outright said it,

0:04:13but my theory here is that it wouldn't be anything by itself.

0:04:17It'd be like a Bluetooth headset with no device.

0:04:20It would just be communicating over Bluetooth, low energy,

0:04:24and it would just be a peripheral to your iPhone,

0:04:27or maybe iPad, and maybe iPod touch,

0:04:30which would be interesting.

0:04:31But for all the reasons why we don't yet

0:04:36have this magical automatic identity

0:04:38thing with these devices, I think all those same reasons

0:04:42are going to continue to make it impossible for us

0:04:46to have that with watches also, or rather impractical for us

0:04:50to have that with watches.

0:04:52All the same reasons apply.

0:04:54You have weird privacy and security issues.

0:04:58You have a big boil the ocean problem.

0:05:00You have a lot of just weird incompatibilities in reality,

0:05:05because in reality, it wouldn't be one company making

0:05:09all these things that all work together.

0:05:12Look what you have now.

0:05:13You have Apple doing pretty well with the iPhone,

0:05:15but then you still have Android.

0:05:17You still have Windows Phone.

0:05:18You still have all these other things.

0:05:21Of all the people who have iPhones,

0:05:23a small portion of them have Macs, but a lot more of them

0:05:25have Windows PCs.

0:05:27And some of them have iPads, and some of them don't.

0:05:29And people who have Macs sometimes have Android devices.

0:05:33People who have iPads sometimes have an Android phone.

0:05:35There's this giant, diverse environment

0:05:38that things would have to work in these days.

0:05:40And for something like Identity to work that well

0:05:43and to be that ubiquitous, I think

0:05:46you'd have to have one company so dominant in the field

0:05:50that it could make everything for almost everybody.

0:05:53And I don't think we're going to have that for at least

0:05:56the next decade and hopefully longer,

0:05:58because we're better off not having that.

0:06:01You know, this segues somewhat well--

0:06:03something you said a moment ago--

0:06:05segues somewhat well to a post that my friend Eric

0:06:08Wielander wrote.

0:06:10The post, which I'm pasting in the chat.

0:06:13Let me kind of take you on a little mental journey.

0:06:17So we talked last episode about what is the thing

0:06:20that this iWatch is solving?

0:06:22And also, what's the challenge of it?

0:06:25And the challenge is that there's really

0:06:27not a lot of input that can go into this and also not a lot of output that you can get

0:06:32from it.

0:06:33And so, you know, what already fixes that?

0:06:36And Eric pointed out, well, Siri could be a good answer for that.

0:06:40And I think part of the reason I'm bringing this up is because I'm so excited at the thought

0:06:45of a Dick Tracy watch, which I joked about at the end of the last episode.

0:06:48But the thought being, hey, you know, Siri could solve a lot of these problems about

0:06:54an input output for an iWatch.

0:06:56And the other thing that occurred to me that Eric didn't bring up was, uh, Eddy Q during

0:06:59the keynote at about an hour and 42 minutes said something about how, Hey, Siri's going

0:07:04to have a little more control over the things the phone can do.

0:07:08And the example he used, I think was things were things like brightness and, uh, one or

0:07:13two other things, maybe even Bluetooth, which maybe wouldn't be relevant in terms of an

0:07:17eye watch.

0:07:18But I thought it was an interesting idea that perhaps some sort of really Siri based integration

0:07:25could work well with a watch. Now on the other side of the coin, to argue with myself and

0:07:29with Eric, I don't know if a Dick Tracy watch as much as I joke and say I want it

0:07:33would be a really socially acceptable thing. I think that would be a little awkward if

0:07:37we all walked around talking to our wrists. But then again, we all walk around staring

0:07:41down at our crotches, so I guess it can only be but so bad.

0:07:45I guess my problem with so much of this is, you know, basically why don't we have this

0:07:50now? What's stopping us from doing this with phones already? Because really, when

0:07:55it comes to things like capturing input and having sensors and everything, the phone already

0:08:01covers pretty much all of this area. There's not a whole lot of ground that a phone in

0:08:06your pocket or bag or jacket doesn't really cover. And there are certainly some things.

0:08:13There's things like biometric information, pedometer-style things. Those are things that

0:08:17a phone either doesn't reliably have or just can't get practically.

0:08:23But unless you press against your naked leg all the time or something, that would be kind

0:08:28of…

0:08:29I'm sure somebody does.

0:08:30There's a lot of people with iPhones.

0:08:34For most of these things that we think of as, "Oh, will the watch allow us to do X,

0:08:38Y, and Z?"

0:08:40Almost all of them you could do with a phone, and we aren't doing with phones.

0:08:44think it's worth asking why and looking at it with some healthy skepticism of, "Well,

0:08:49if this isn't working with phones or if we're not doing this yet with phones, there's probably

0:08:53a really good reason for that." And it's probably not going to change if we have a

0:08:57microphone or some sensors or an E-Ink screen or anything else stuck to our wrist instead

0:09:01of in our pockets.

0:09:02The Siri thing is weird though because I don't see how it could ever provide an experience

0:09:08that's even as good as it is on the phone because it would have to communicate with

0:09:11the phone to do the Siri thing, so it would be like using Siri on your phone, which already

0:09:15is not snappy, only delayed by one more hop, because it's not like the phone is going to

0:09:19talk to the Siri servers itself, it's not going to have, you know, 3G wireless, it's

0:09:23going to be talking to the phone, the phone is going to be talking to the Siri servers,

0:09:26and then, you know, playing this little game of relay back and forth, and it has all the

0:09:30same problems as Siri, you know, say something, hopefully wait as you stare at it and wait

0:09:36to see how it interpreted or misinterpreted what you said, and then wait for an answer.

0:09:39It is not a snappy experience.

0:09:42It's not even ignoring the whole "how do you feel about talking to yourself" type of thing.

0:09:46I do not see people...

0:09:49People use Siri as a game when you're conversing with it, and then use it for very focused

0:09:53tasks rarely.

0:09:55And I don't see them, maybe they feel like they need to do it in private, but people

0:09:57tell me, "Oh, I use it to set reminders," or "I use it to answer text messages when

0:10:01I'm in the car," or whatever.

0:10:02Those are all times when they're not with somebody.

0:10:04All your friends are secretly using Siri when you aren't around.

0:10:07Yeah, because people feel more comfortable talking to their thing and using speech recognition

0:10:15when no one is in the room.

0:10:16Even when I do speech recognition to write my articles for dictation, it's more comfortable

0:10:20to do that when no one is in the room hearing you say fragments of sentences and issue voice

0:10:24commands.

0:10:25Oh, yeah.

0:10:26I would definitely say also that whenever I have to use Siri in public, I will usually

0:10:33try to use it as quietly as possible and often I will do the thing where I pick

0:10:37up the phone and put it to my ear because most people don't know that also

0:10:39triggers Siri with the proximity sensor and you can use then just

0:10:44talking to it like so it looks almost like you're talking to somebody on the

0:10:47phone like you're giving a command to your secretary yeah and a very stern

0:10:52voice we are by restaurants remind me to tell my wife I love her when I get home

0:11:02Yeah, it sounded like a goodness.

0:11:03[LAUGHTER]

0:11:07Anyway, so I mean, is there anything really new

0:11:10that we think about the watch now?

0:11:12One thing, we got an interesting article also by response.

0:11:15I got to put this in the notes because I lost it.

0:11:18But somebody basically outlined what Bluetooth low energy does

0:11:22and what it makes possible and why it's so much better

0:11:27in the context-- in response to our episode last week--

0:11:29context of the iWatch. And...

0:11:33I hope it's not called that. The name is already

0:11:37starting to sound stupid in my head. Anyway. Yeah, I agree.

0:11:41All those trademark applications, I thought iPad was stupid too. And MacBook, ugh, terrible

0:11:45name. So, anyway. I really do

0:11:49hope that if this exists, it's either

0:11:53a very small scale thing at first, like the Apple TV Now,

0:11:57now, which is like, you know, everyone was so excited, Apple didn't release something

0:12:00for TV, and then they released the Apple TV as we know it today, which is like, okay,

0:12:04it's nice, but it's a pretty small scale problem solver.

0:12:08And so, you know, if they make a watch, it could be that, right?

0:12:11It could just be doing things that are very similar to what the Pebble and the other things

0:12:16like that do now, which is basically showing notifications on the watch and maybe having

0:12:21some minor sensors like a Fitbit or fuel band equivalent, but not doing a whole lot at least.

0:12:27not having a microphone for Siri, you know, maybe they add those things later on,

0:12:31but just starting out with a nice simple problem set they can do really well with

0:12:35all the existing hardware and have great battery life and

0:12:39not be this giant bulky thing on your wrist, not look ugly, not look like

0:12:43a nerd convention happening on your wrist, and just do that

0:12:47really well. I hope that's what they do. Because I don't, you know, looking at everything else,

0:12:51all the things they could possibly do that would be all these crazy transformative ideas,

0:12:55It seems like for a lot of them they have extremely fatal practical or technological

0:13:02restrictions that would really prevent them from being good.

0:13:05Yeah, and the more I think about the iWatch, the more I keep coming back to, I feel like

0:13:10the only way it's going to be really interesting is if it aggregates sensors in a new and clever

0:13:19way.

0:13:20Let me give you a couple examples.

0:13:21as opposed to having to hit a button to rotate the screen from portrait to

0:13:26landscape it added an accelerometer in order to do that automatically in order

0:13:31to prevent cheek dialing somebody or cheek hanging up on someone it had a

0:13:36proximity sensor in order to turn off the display and turn off the touch input

0:13:41when the thing is up against your head and maybe that's not aggregation in

0:13:46the strictest sense but I feel like taking sensors that we have today like a

0:13:49a Fitbit or something like it and taking either new sensors or the existing sensors and putting

0:13:54that data together in a new and interesting way, that's what I feel like an iWatch would

0:13:59do that would differentiate it, but how specifically?

0:14:02I don't have the faintest idea.

0:14:04You know what Samsung would do with the iWatch?

0:14:06Copy everything?

0:14:08They would make it so that when you use the Samsung iPad equivalent, whatever that is,

0:14:13you could wave your hand in front of it without actually contacting the screen to do gestures

0:14:16because it would have accelerometer on your wrist.

0:14:20They already do things sort of like that with a single device, but once you have two of

0:14:23them you have to sort of start thinking like Nintendo.

0:14:25Okay, well, I've got a sensor on my wrist and there's a screen over here, and if I wave

0:14:29my hand, the sensor can recognize my gestures without me physically interacting with the

0:14:35other device and use it, you know, that type of thing.

0:14:38I assume Apple would pass on most things like that because non-contact UIs are not particularly

0:14:46nice feeling, but guaranteed Samsung would do it just because it's possible. They seem

0:14:50to try everything. Anything that's technically possible, try it out. Ship it on a device.

0:14:54See if people like it.

0:14:55Exactly. When they launched, what was the most recent one? The S3?

0:15:00S4.

0:15:01Okay. So whatever the most recent one was, remember, it had the hover feature, it had

0:15:06the tilt scrolling and all these crazy things.

0:15:09The eyeball tracking to see when you're looking at the video.

0:15:11Yes, yes, yes.

0:15:12You're not like, "If we can sort of do it, ship it."

0:15:15We heard a lot about those when it was launched. I haven't heard a thing about them or actually

0:15:19--

0:15:20Well, they have to be awful because if any of them had passed the threshold into being

0:15:26so reliable that they're really useful, they would quickly spread elsewhere. But if you

0:15:31don't see them everywhere else, it means that the technology to do that is not quite ready.

0:15:34So the eyeball thing, if that was reliable enough that it felt better than actually hitting

0:15:39a play/pause button, it would be everywhere. But it's not because it's not that reliable

0:15:42yet.

0:15:43Yeah.

0:15:44Well, let's go to things that are reliable.

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0:21:18Thanks, transporter.

0:21:19John, you mentioned last week in the after show

0:21:24strange ways that real people use iOS.

0:21:28I was wondering if you could expand on that a little bit.

0:21:30Sure.

0:21:31This is based on my recent vacation to see family.

0:21:36And since the last time I visited, it seems like all of them got iPhones, usually like

0:21:404S's.

0:21:414 is, you know, the less expensive iPhones.

0:21:44I didn't see any iPhone 5s.

0:21:46And I noticed a little bit of this at WOADC, strange ways that other developers use iPhones,

0:21:51but seeing how regular people use them, because they don't have any circle of people to give

0:21:56them sort of the social norms of how you use an iPhone.

0:22:01And here are the things that I noticed right away.

0:22:04The first thing, and this is the one I noticed at WWC as well, is I didn't see anybody who

0:22:10filled their screens with icons, the springboard screens.

0:22:14And up until very recently, everyone I saw filled their screens, because your first screen,

0:22:19you'd fill it with icons, and when you ran out of room, you'd go to your second screen

0:22:21and fill it from top to bottom with icons and so on and so forth.

0:22:25And that is sort of the—correct me if I'm wrong—but that's more or less the social

0:22:30norm of how you configure your iPhone.

0:22:34And then at WWC—go ahead, Gacy.

0:22:36I was going to say that's the norm, although I will use myself as an example of an odd

0:22:41way that people use their iPhone.

0:22:43For whatever reason—and I read this somewhere, and I've been trying to figure out where

0:22:46I read this—but I copied from someone on the internet that on their first home screen—only

0:22:53first home screen. Was it one of you? Was it you? Okay, so on Marco's first home screen,

0:22:59he leaves the row above the dock blank. And I don't know why that rang true with me, but

0:23:05I was like, "You know what? That's a really good idea." So on my first and only first

0:23:08home screen, I have the bottom row blank, but on every other screen of which there are

0:23:15generally a total of three, I use up every single space.

0:23:20Yeah, and that's that's the thing I started to seeing people intentionally leaving blank

0:23:24rows on

0:23:25a knot in the last page and like even having it on the first page and

0:23:28My question I guess for both of you since you're doing this is why why do you have a blank row above your dock on?

0:23:33first page well, I have a I have another whole complexity of my system also, but

0:23:38Which iOS 7 makes awesome actually?

0:23:40But the main reason why I have always done that was that like the very first iPhone like with version 1.0 before apps

0:23:48had, I believe, one icon in the bottom row or none.

0:23:53I'll have to look this up.

0:23:55So it was just kind of always what I was used to.

0:23:58It provides a nice kind of neutral swipe area

0:24:01to swipe between the two screens where--

0:24:02- You can swipe anywhere.

0:24:03- You can, but it's like a reliable area.

0:24:06You know you can swipe there

0:24:07and not accidentally launch something.

0:24:09- You will never accidentally launch something by swiping.

0:24:12It will not happen.

0:24:13- I bet it has happened.

0:24:14Anyway, so there was that kind of legacy reason.

0:24:18I also think it looks better.

0:24:19It looks a lot less crowded.

0:24:21And I also-- the bottom row is always

0:24:24like where my app in progress, which is usually Instapaper,

0:24:27would go.

0:24:28And so because at first, like in the early versions of the SDK,

0:24:33I think every time you installed the app on the phone,

0:24:36it would move it to like the default next application

0:24:38or something like that, which was always right there,

0:24:40something like that.

0:24:40Anyway, there was some reason with development

0:24:42would always have Instapaper and back when we used it, Instapaper free in that bottom

0:24:47row by themselves so that the second half of it was clear.

0:24:50The other thing I do that's weird that I recommend to anybody who wants to try this, I used to,

0:24:56you know, back when the Apps Script first came out I would have all these different

0:24:58pages of apps and it just sucked. Once folders came out I decided to do a different system

0:25:04which I don't, generally I don't like folders. I think they're very clumsy to enter and leave.

0:25:09and actually on iOS 7 I like them even less because they hold less per screen. You at

0:25:15least do have paged folders now, so folders have way more total capacity, but it moved

0:25:21from showing, what was it before, 12? It would show three rows or four rows?

0:25:26Let me look. I think you're right.

0:25:28So on iOS 6 I believe it showed either 12 or 16 icons in a folder.

0:25:31It is 12.

0:25:32And, oh, but you have the short phone, though. The big fat heavy one.

0:25:36Why do you have to be a jerk like that?

0:25:38- Yeah, you get 16 on the file.

0:25:41- Right, okay.

0:25:41- Is that true?

0:25:42Is that really true?

0:25:43- Yeah, you get an extra row.

0:25:44- God, you're so spoiled.

0:25:45- Isn't that great?

0:25:46But on iOS 7, let me double check here,

0:25:49just to make sure I get this right,

0:25:50I believe you only get nine.

0:25:52This is not against the NDA, of course.

0:25:55Yes, on iOS 7 you only get nine per folder screen.

0:25:59And you can have multiple screens, as I said,

0:26:01but it ends up that getting into the folder

0:26:05is already an extra tap,

0:26:07And so to have to page through a folder only seeing nine at a time is kind of clumsy.

0:26:11And you have no neutral swipe area inside folders. What do you do?

0:26:15That's a great question. I don't know. I just launch apps accidentally all the time.

0:26:19But what I do is, my very first page, I keep configured mostly the way the original iPhone

0:26:25always was configured, with everything in roughly the same spots. If I have a really

0:26:30awesome preferred replacement app, I'll put it in the same spot that the Apple app used

0:26:34to go. For example, I'll use Silver instead of Calculator. So Silver is the second row,

0:26:40rightmost spot for me because that's where the calculator was, I believe, in the original

0:26:43iPhone. Anyway, on the first page there's no folders. On the second page, that's where

0:26:50all the folders go. It can have individual icons also. The second page is where all folders

0:26:54go. And then I only have those two pages, which is really honestly great. I love having

0:27:00switched to a two page only standard because you always know where you are. You're either

0:27:07on your first page or you're not. It's very, very, very easy. And all the things that you

0:27:13want to bury for occasional use can go in one of those folders on the second page. And

0:27:17with iOS 7 now, now that folders can hold so much more in total, you can at least say

0:27:22like, you know, I used to have like games, new games, new games to test. Like three different

0:27:27folders for games because they wouldn't all fit in one, and now I just have one. I have

0:27:31a folder called Rare and Utility, and now I just have Rare. Anyway, I highly recommend

0:27:39doing a two-screen only setup and using as many folders as you need to on the second

0:27:42screen to do that. It really is awesome. And on the iPad, I even just do a one-page setup,

0:27:47which is even better. There's not enough room in the iPhone to do it.

0:27:49You don't have to swipe anywhere. Exactly. Thank God they moved Spotlight. I love that

0:27:57change in iOS 7. They moved Spotlight so that you have to pull it down from the top. It's

0:28:00no longer like a springboard page to the far left.

0:28:04I think one of the stupidest things in old iOS was when you were on the home screen,

0:28:08if you tapped the home button, that would be a shortcut to go over to the Spotlight

0:28:12screen. So many times I accidentally did that, and I've seen other people do it even more.

0:28:21In fact, Jon, you can probably tell me from your regular people experience, how many times

0:28:25do they accidentally go to Spotlight by hitting the home button too many times?

0:28:28I see that a lot, but I also think it's kind of like people hit the home button when they

0:28:32want to go back to the beginning and they understand that concept. And if they're already

0:28:36at the beginning and they hit it again, it probably means that they want to go back,

0:28:41backer to the more beginninger. And basically, they can't find what they're looking for.

0:28:45They're like, "No, just bring me back to the beginning beginning." And throwing the search

0:28:49field in their face is like, "Oh, all right. Well, I guess I can type here because I kind

0:28:54know what the name of the thing is that I'm looking for.

0:28:56So it's kind of like, look, this is the last resort.

0:28:59You press this button because obviously you're not finding what you think you're supposed

0:29:02to be finding, but we've already brought you to the place that this button press takes

0:29:04you.

0:29:05So by pressing it again, you're saying, "No, I'm still not satisfied.

0:29:08Here's the last resort.

0:29:09Go to search."

0:29:10But for me personally, it's just frustrating when I accidentally hit it because I don't

0:29:13notice I'm on the first screen or something.

0:29:15But for other people, I have to wonder if it's not an okay thing.

0:29:20And I kind of like the fact that it was to the left of the home screen.

0:29:22I especially like what they did with the little icons at the bottom.

0:29:26Maybe this is too subtle for most people.

0:29:28But the little dot icons, right?

0:29:30And when you're on the first page, there is one more dot to your left, but it's not a

0:29:33dot.

0:29:34It's a tiny, tiny magnifying glass, which is adorable.

0:29:37So I kind of like that.

0:29:39Go look at your iOSX device now.

0:29:41No, you're right.

0:29:42And that was a nice touch.

0:29:44But I have personally and I've witnessed so many accidentally invocations of Spotlight

0:29:50by that double home button tap thing that I have to imagine that's not worth it.

0:29:55So I'm very glad I got rid of that in 7.

0:29:57For experienced users, it's not a good experience.

0:30:01So what I saw for people using the iPhones was not just leaving a row blank, but wiping

0:30:09out every single icon except for one row of four on the top.

0:30:14And what I even saw on one person's phone was one row of four on the top on the first

0:30:19home screen page, all folders.

0:30:22Everything else basically deleted and wiped out.

0:30:26Some people had multiple pages where you go to the next page, one row of four at the top.

0:30:30Maybe not all folders, maybe all folders.

0:30:32Only a couple pages, maybe three or four pages, but only one row of icons at the top, and

0:30:36of course the doc on the bottom, because I don't know if they knew how to get things

0:30:39out of there or whatever.

0:30:43Before I spoke to these people, I just saw their devices or saw them using them or whatever.

0:30:47I'm like, "What's going on there?

0:30:49Why would you ever do that?

0:30:51It doesn't make any sense.

0:30:53Unless they're following the Marko philosophy, I just need a massive safe region to swipe.

0:30:57But that wasn't it, because these people weren't looking for a safe—

0:31:00So after speaking to them, the reason they're doing this—

0:31:03Can you guys guess before I reveal it?

0:31:05Do they think it saves battery life or otherwise it's performance-related?

0:31:08No, no.

0:31:09Too sophisticated.

0:31:10Casey, nothing?

0:31:11I don't even have the fan—

0:31:15Because they want to make sure they have the space for the expanded folder?

0:31:18No.

0:31:19That's a good one though.

0:31:20That's close, yeah.

0:31:21It's because they put a picture on their wallpaper and they want to see the picture of their

0:31:25kids or family or whatever.

0:31:27And the picture is like the top part of the picture is just background like trees or whatever,

0:31:32but the faces are in the bottom part.

0:31:33And it's people with pictures.

0:31:34People had pictures that were purposely like biased to the lower part so that people's

0:31:38faces were lower down so they could get two rows of icons because they want to see the

0:31:42people's pictures.

0:31:43That makes so much sense.

0:31:44And that is something that like, you know, adding...

0:31:46What did they edit it in?

0:31:47iOS 4 or 5?

0:31:48the ability to have wallpapers instead of just a black background.

0:31:54That's an unforeseen side effect of giving people the ability to put a picture in the

0:31:57background is that they're going to want to see it and they're going to clear out because

0:32:00they don't want some icons sitting on top of their kid's head.

0:32:02They're just going to move those things out of the way.

0:32:04What they're left with is a screen with nothing on it.

0:32:07Four folders at the top is like, "Well, when you only have one row of icons, you still

0:32:11want some minimum amount of stuff to be on page one, so then just shove it all into folders."

0:32:15It's incredibly inefficient.

0:32:16And it makes no sense to me, but this is how they choose to use their phones.

0:32:18And it just goes to show that features have unforeseen side effects, and the way you think

0:32:24people will use your device is very different from the way they'll use it in real life,

0:32:29because they have very different concerns.

0:32:31So I was fascinated to see this common pattern across all of you.

0:32:35And the other thing of this, I could have guessed, is that the people who delete everything

0:32:38off their phone, they could possibly delete because they don't know what it is.

0:32:41This is why it's actually good that you can't delete the phone app and stuff, because if

0:32:45You could, they would, and then wonder why they can't send a phone, you know what I

0:32:48mean?

0:32:49We're all annoyed that you can't delete calculator and stuff like that, and maybe

0:32:51you'll be okay to let those go, but people are just like, "Nope, I know how to use four

0:32:54things on this phone, I want to get everything else out of there."

0:32:57So their solution is just to move them off the other screen.

0:32:58That I would have predicted and have seen before.

0:33:01Don't tell them about parental controls.

0:33:02Oh yeah, no, that's too deep.

0:33:04I don't know if they knew what the settings app was.

0:33:07They deleted settings.

0:33:09Yeah.

0:33:10And these are the same people.

0:33:13One person really was annoyed about the Weather Channel on their new television service.

0:33:17And I said, "Well, you have an iPhone.

0:33:20There's eight gazillion weather apps.

0:33:22Find one that you like."

0:33:23But there's no good ones.

0:33:24You'll have the weather forecast.

0:33:25I'll check the weather space.

0:33:26No, you're right.

0:33:27You'll have the weather forecast right there.

0:33:30Even something like Dark Sky or whatever, saying if your whole obsession is when it's

0:33:34going to rain, there's apps with real-time radar.

0:33:36We have the technology that's better than watching the Weather Channel and wading through

0:33:40commercials and weather reports for areas where you don't live or whatever, having to

0:33:44go into the TV room, turn on the TV.

0:33:45I said, "No, I prefer to see it on TV.

0:33:47I want someone talking to me."

0:33:49Even though it involves watching commercials and watching weather for towns that are not

0:33:53your town.

0:33:55That's crazy to me, but old habits die hard, I guess.

0:33:59I will say dark sky is still one of those things that can blow the mind of any normal

0:34:04person.

0:34:05Yeah, no, I try to show them, but it's not impressive.

0:34:08I want a weather person on TV telling me the weather.

0:34:12I want that human touch.

0:34:14Anyway, all right, do you want to talk about this Dropbox

0:34:17thing?

0:34:19Well, is John done?

0:34:20Is that all you got?

0:34:21Yeah, I'll think of more later.

0:34:23But the two big ones were the home screen,

0:34:27so you can see the picture, and getting

0:34:29all the applications of the home screen,

0:34:30and then totally being unimpressed by applications

0:34:34that-- not just the weather, but any kind of applications,

0:34:36like things that we all know that you can do with your phone that you know you

0:34:39can do XYZ with your phone. That doesn't seem appealing. Now did you see a lot of

0:34:44people force quitting apps for no good reason? Because I still see that

0:34:48constantly. None of these people know how to do that. Well the really scary part is

0:34:51in 7, I don't know how much this was public I'll tread lightly, in iOS 7

0:34:56there's actually a really good reason to remove apps from the multitasking

0:35:01switcher. Now they have it in the movies yeah because you want to you want to get

0:35:05to get them out of there so they're not in your way.

0:35:08No, that's not it.

0:35:09Well, maybe that's part of it for some people.

0:35:11But in 7--

0:35:12I know what your thinking is.

0:35:14--the new backgrounding stuff-- I

0:35:16don't know if this is public or not.

0:35:18Well, let's see if anybody cares.

0:35:20The new backgrounding stuff in 7,

0:35:22where your app can be woken up periodically in the background,

0:35:25if your app has been removed from the switcher,

0:35:27it does not do that.

0:35:29So you can't get background updates,

0:35:31which is a change since iOS 6.

0:35:34Because with 6, even the new stand content available things

0:35:37would go through no matter what.

0:35:39But in 7, if your app's been removed from the switcher,

0:35:42you don't get any background wake up types.

0:35:44You can still get push notifications

0:35:46that alert the user, but your app will not

0:35:48run in the background at all if you've been removed.

0:35:51So there actually is a pretty substantial reason

0:35:55to manage or not manage the things in that switcher now.

0:35:59So come to think of it, that means that all these ill

0:36:03uninformed people who are constantly clearing out what is now their multitasking tray are

0:36:08actually kind of shooting themselves in the foot because now all of their apps that are

0:36:13not running in the background won't get up, well, running in the background so to speak,

0:36:17aren't getting updates and they're actually demonstrable.

0:36:20They were already demonstrably penalizing their own experience, but now it's even worse.

0:36:26There's even more reason not to do that.

0:36:28Or to do it.

0:36:29This is all just a sliver of-- there's

0:36:33the people who are tech nerds who know all the details.

0:36:35Then there's the aspirational tech nerds

0:36:37who know enough to force quit.

0:36:38And then there's the vast, vast majority of people

0:36:40who have no idea about holding down your finger

0:36:42to get the little red thing and who

0:36:44will continue to have no idea about swiping up

0:36:45to get rid of those icons.

0:36:46Because there's nothing there that

0:36:48indicates that that's possible, just like there's

0:36:50nothing there that indicates that you can press and hold

0:36:52on the multitasking switcher.

0:36:54And I have to think that the vast majority of people

0:36:56will never use either one of those features,

0:36:57and the phone will just manage it for them.

0:36:59So it's just this fringe of the people who know enough to be dangerous that are problematic.

0:37:03Right, the power users.

0:37:04Power users are the most dangerous users to support, or for anybody, for IT departments,

0:37:08for developers, for themselves.

0:37:10They're just always the worst type of user to support, because power users, they know

0:37:14enough to cause trouble or to cause headaches for themselves or others, but usually not

0:37:20enough to really fix things if they break them or have a really great environment.

0:37:25And they're usually the ones that are most susceptible to superstition and myths and

0:37:31crazy stuff like that.

0:37:33When I heard a lot of reports that geniuses, quote unquote, "geniuses" were telling

0:37:38people to force quit everything under the sun because that makes your iPhone run faster,

0:37:42which is just patently wrong.

0:37:44Even in iOS 6, that's just wrong.

0:37:46Right.

0:37:47Well, and again, geniuses, many of them are this type of person.

0:37:51the power user who they know enough to have that job,

0:37:56that doesn't necessarily mean that they know

0:37:57the intricate details of how iOS works

0:38:00and why that's a bad idea or why that does

0:38:02or doesn't do something.

0:38:03And almost any IT person that you're likely to run into

0:38:08in any kind of work IT department or anything like that,

0:38:12almost all of them are this type of user.

0:38:14There's some really good ones that know a lot more,

0:38:17but most of the people you'll run into

0:38:19in this kind of context are like the nose nuts

0:38:22would be dangerous power user.

0:38:24And that's one of the reasons why all these crazy myths

0:38:26like defragging, long after that mattered,

0:38:31all these crazy myths get propagated and live on

0:38:34because it's all these power users saying,

0:38:37oh, well, you need to do this and this and this every day

0:38:41to keep your phone clean or whatever.

0:38:43And nothing bad ever happens if you do that,

0:38:46so you just keep propagating it.

0:38:49You know, your platform has arrived when you get one of those because the Mac had a long

0:38:53sequence of them.

0:38:54I think it'd probably be the first one I can think of.

0:38:56It's like rebuilding the desktop.

0:38:57But you had zapping the PRAM.

0:38:59You had all those things.

0:39:01And then, like, the Mac OS X got repairing permissions.

0:39:04And then iOS, I guess, is the first one that iOS got was the force quitting apps.

0:39:08That's the only one I know of.

0:39:09I believe so.

0:39:10Because that was, like, one of the first things you could do as kind of, like, an amateur

0:39:15system administrator for your phone.

0:39:17It was like, there's not much else you can do.

0:39:19There is no iOS defect.

0:39:21Although there are.

0:39:22There have been crazy scam apps in the App Store

0:39:24that are like, maximize your battery life and stuff

0:39:28like that.

0:39:28And I always wonder how they get approved.

0:39:30Because then you read the description,

0:39:32you find out like, oh, well, it's actually just like,

0:39:34it's a joke app officially, or it's educational only,

0:39:38or it just has a list of tips and tricks

0:39:40that you're supposed to do.

0:39:42But there's a lot of apps.

0:39:43Even if you look in the top lists,

0:39:44there's a lot of apps that are selling really

0:39:46that are basically scams preying on this kind of mythology of like, "Oh, an app can compress

0:39:53your memory on iOS or can speed your phone up or save your battery life."

0:39:57Yeah, and somebody in the chat, I shouldn't share this person's name just to be safe.

0:40:04Again, from working in the Apple Store or at the Apple Store, the company would send

0:40:07out numerous memos reminding us that force quitting everything under the sun was wrong,

0:40:12But some of my colleagues would spread that lie and practice it themselves, which is kind

0:40:17of sad.

0:40:18But that's the nature of superstition.

0:40:21You can't be convinced by a presentation of evidence, the whole point of superstition.

0:40:25Right.

0:40:26And those things that spread so easily are the things like, well, if you do them, nothing

0:40:30bad really happens.

0:40:32And you can't really tell if anything good happens because it's too small of a difference

0:40:36if it "works."

0:40:38You don't need the feather.

0:40:39You just need to believe.

0:40:40I think that's a Dumbo reference. I haven't seen the movie in years.

0:40:44I don't know. Yeah, neither have I. So this episode is also sponsored

0:40:48by another return sponsor. It's Audible. Audible

0:40:52is the leading provider of downloadable audiobooks with over 100,000

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0:41:13Go to audiblepodcast.com/ATP to take advantage of this special offer.

0:41:19So once again, it's audiblepodcast.com/ATP to get a free audiobook with a 30-day free

0:41:27trial.

0:41:28Guys, do you have any audiobooks to recommend?

0:41:31You know, I haven't looked, to be honest, to confirm that this is on Audible, but I

0:41:35bet you it is.

0:41:37I was asked recently what my favorite movie is, and if you bear with me for a second,

0:41:40my favorite movie, if I had to pick just one, is probably The Hunt for Ed October.

0:41:44You can judge me on that and I won't be offended.

0:41:46But it's actually based on a Tom Clancy book, also, curiously enough, called The Hunt for

0:41:50Ed October.

0:41:52And the book, as with almost every book that's ever been written that was eventually turned

0:41:56into a movie, is actually considerably better than the movie.

0:41:59So I would recommend The Hunt for Ed October if you're into political thrillers based

0:42:03in the early to mid 1980s when we still hated Russia and Russia still hated us.

0:42:07Awesome. All right, well thanks a lot to Audible for sponsoring the show.

0:42:12Remember, go to audiblepodcast.com/atp. Thanks a lot.

0:42:16You're not even going to ask me if I have a pick?

0:42:18Do you have a pick?

0:42:19I have one. Maybe we should save it for the next Audible sponsorship.

0:42:22All right, save it. Be that guy.

0:42:25All right, so moving along. Is there anything we should talk about with this Dropbox thing?

0:42:33Actually, I don't know if you're being sarcastic or not, but I thought there was.

0:42:36You know, I'm so tired of platforms.

0:42:38Really?

0:42:39I mean, do we really need another platform?

0:42:41Well, I mean, it's an existing platform, though.

0:42:44Well, as Steve Jobs would say, it's not a platform, it's a feature.

0:42:46But anyway, Dropbox exists and is popular.

0:42:48And the reason we're interested in their data store, or at least I'm interested in

0:42:52their data store, is because it's from Dropbox.

0:42:55People already have Dropbox accounts.

0:42:58Many people already pay for Dropbox.

0:43:01the iOS applications already integrate with Dropbox using an existing API for file storage.

0:43:07So that's an advantage that many, many other things that are supposedly going to store

0:43:11your crap do not have. Even Google, mighty Google, comes with an API, but it's like,

0:43:17"Well, all right." And how many applications are already integrated with Google data storage?

0:43:21It's a bigger hurdle to overcome. Whereas Dropbox, you're already there. Your apps are

0:43:24already talking to it. This is basically the equivalent of, instead of just documents in

0:43:30in the iCloud storage, it's like their equivalence,

0:43:34kind of, sort of, not really, of Core Data Sync, where you're--

0:43:37I hope not.

0:43:38Well, you know what I mean.

0:43:39You're not just storing files.

0:43:41You're storing something that's not just

0:43:44a linear stream of bytes in a single named entity, right?

0:43:47That's basically where the similarity

0:43:48ends, because Core Data is this whole other sort of persistent

0:43:51object store thing.

0:43:52And this is much simpler.

0:43:53This is basically schema-less fields and basically tables.

0:44:00So you have a table that has records.

0:44:02The records have an ID.

0:44:03They have main value pairs in them.

0:44:04And you can do one small level of nesting underneath that.

0:44:07And that's it.

0:44:08I look at these things because I think

0:44:10it's interesting to see what kind of API

0:44:11are they going to offer.

0:44:13They're definitely not going the core data route where

0:44:15they say, just use your objects in memory,

0:44:18and we'll magically synchronize them with the persistence

0:44:20across all these applications.

0:44:22And the rest of your application just

0:44:23behaves as if it's using objects in memory,

0:44:25and we make everything work.

0:44:28it's not quite doing, you can just speak to a database over a wire and we'll do updates

0:44:34where it's like a server resident database. It's kind of in between. They want you to be able to

0:44:38store records in this thing and get notified when there are changes to these records,

0:44:44but they don't want you to have to implement your own conflict resolution. This is where the

0:44:50rubber root meets the road. It's like, "What if I do two different things on two different devices?

0:44:53they're both offline.

0:44:54They come back online and synchronize the changes.

0:44:57What do I do to sort these things out?

0:44:58And looking at their documentation briefly,

0:45:00it seems like your choices are minimal.

0:45:02All the conflict resolution seems to be automatic.

0:45:05And your choices are like biggest value wins,

0:45:07smallest value wins, sum of value wins.

0:45:09And that's about it.

0:45:10And it's like, well, that doesn't help me

0:45:11if I'm trying to synchronize an address book.

0:45:13None of those policies seem like they would be helpful.

0:45:17Local wins versus remote wins.

0:45:19There didn't even seem to be any date stamping type things

0:45:22in there where you can tell which one happened at a different time and synchronize based

0:45:24on that and resolve conflicts based on that.

0:45:26So I'm not sure what the target audience for this thing is, but like any kind of service,

0:45:31the real proof is going to be, is it reliable, is it fast, and is it easy to program for

0:45:37in a way that doesn't block my application when the changes don't come in?

0:45:41And in that respect, it looks like it has some advantages over iCloud coordinated the

0:45:47way it existed in that you don't need to be online.

0:45:51Your changes can take effect locally, and remote changes can come in whenever they want.

0:45:55In theory, you shouldn't be blocking as long as you can write to your local disk and as

0:45:58long as you can read from your local disk.

0:46:00So that's good.

0:46:03I also looked at the API and the documentation, and there were a couple of things that piqued

0:46:08my interest.

0:46:09Firstly, and this is outside of the documentation, quite obviously Dropbox is cross-platform.

0:46:15And let's suppose for the sake of argument that even core data in iCloud worked flawlessly,

0:46:21which is a pretty funny thought just to begin with.

0:46:23Well, it's still Apple-centric.

0:46:26And even though I speak for all three of us

0:46:29in saying we're all in on Apple platforms,

0:46:31not everyone is like that.

0:46:32We talked about that earlier in this very episode.

0:46:34And so Dropbox is cross-platform, which is really nice.

0:46:38So if I was psychotic enough to want to write

0:46:41not only an iOS app, but also an Android app,

0:46:43I could presumably use this Dropbox data store API

0:46:47in order to get data between them.

0:46:49Additionally, like you mentioned John, it's not straight SQL.

0:46:53And while core data, you'll get smacked on the wrist if you call it a database, it isn't

0:46:59a database, just like you said, it's an object persistence or object graph persistence mechanism.

0:47:06Generally speaking, behind the scenes, it's SQLite or SQLite or whatever crap it's supposed

0:47:10to be pronounced as.

0:47:12Whereas this, like you said, John, is a little more flexible than that, which is nice.

0:47:16Obviously there's caveats to that and that could be bad.

0:47:19But generally speaking, it's nice.

0:47:21But the other thing that was really interesting is they have a data store web inspector.

0:47:27And I glanced at it very, very quickly.

0:47:30And it appears that even regular people, not even necessarily developers, can go in and

0:47:35inspect the data source stores associated with their Dropbox account.

0:47:40And I think that's both very good and arguably maybe not so good because it allows developers

0:47:47to go in and see exactly what tables and records and things are stored in their own Dropbox.

0:47:53But that also gives some amount of visibility for user.

0:47:56Now it is read only through this web interface, but it's still more visibility than you may

0:48:02want.

0:48:03Now to argue with myself briefly, maybe that's a good thing after all in the sense that if

0:48:08somebody's storing a bunch of data that I don't want them to store, I could go see that

0:48:12and then remove that app.

0:48:14I don't know, it just freaks me out for the idea of users seeing exactly how I'm persisting

0:48:19data.

0:48:20Well, that's good because then you could shame people who start plain text passwords and

0:48:23stuff.

0:48:24It's true.

0:48:25That's exactly my point.

0:48:26Because regular users can go and see it, and so they can see, "Hey, you're storing my whole

0:48:27address book," or, "Hey, there's my plain text password for whatever service."

0:48:32It's interesting.

0:48:33The reason I put that link in the show notes is that it's interesting that they launch

0:48:36with that.

0:48:37Of course, of course it's going to be a web interface to see what's in the service.

0:48:40How can you develop an application if you don't have visibility into what we're doing

0:48:43in the data store. And their data store is so much simpler. It is just very simple and

0:48:49primitive compared to the amazing thing that Core Data is supposed to be doing for you.

0:48:53It's up to you to figure it out. No schema, name value pairs, lists. You're going to get

0:48:59a notification that something changed. We'll give you a list of record IDs. You figure it out. I

0:49:02don't know. Whatever. It's really primitive. And primitive things are kind of annoying. You have

0:49:07You have to write all your own logic to deal with the updates and stuff.

0:49:12But it's easy for developers to understand.

0:49:14Time and again, that's proved to be much more important than the amazing framework, especially

0:49:18if it doesn't work right.

0:49:19The amazing framework does awesome things to you versus the simple one that doesn't

0:49:22do as much for you, but what it does do is easily understandable by any developer.

0:49:25That gives even a novice or a mediocre developer a fighting chance of using your API to do

0:49:30useful work.

0:49:31Because maybe they use it inefficiently, and maybe they have to write a ton of code themselves.

0:49:35But conceptually, the way it works is simple enough that they can wrap their head around

0:49:40it, so they never get themselves into a situation where they have no idea what's going on.

0:49:43They just perhaps make inefficient code.

0:49:46So again, we'll have to look at their performance and how reliable their service is and stuff

0:49:53like that.

0:49:54But I think they have a big leg up on everyone else, simply because we already all have Dropbox

0:49:57accounts.

0:49:58And I think the first five megabytes per application that you use does not count towards your Dropbox

0:50:02quota.

0:50:03uses to store preferences or small amounts of state information, or you know, 5MB is

0:50:08actually a lot, as long as you aren't using it as your main data storage, that doesn't

0:50:13count towards your Dropbox quota.

0:50:14And of course, once you go over that, then you just start using the person's Dropbox

0:50:17quota, which is great for Dropbox, because then eventually if you're a free user, you

0:50:19hit your limit because you use some application, and you end up being a paid customer, and

0:50:23it's all a virtuous cycle.

0:50:24So I'm cautiously optimistic about this.

0:50:27Now, what are the implications for Apple?

0:50:30one could argue that this is iCloud, or Core Data iCloud, but not done by Apple and hopefully

0:50:38actually functional. So does this light a fire under Apple's keister and make them

0:50:42make Core Data and iCloud actually work, or do you think they don't care?

0:50:46Oh, they don't care. I mean, there are people there who do care, obviously. You know, the

0:50:50people who are on that team obviously do care quite a bit and are working their butts off,

0:50:54I assume. However, you can simply look at what Apple does, look at the results. You

0:51:00can tell that iCloud is really seen as an accessory in the company, and especially the

0:51:05iCloud developer APIs, the sync APIs and stuff that Apple themselves barely uses for their

0:51:12own apps. You can look at that stuff and you can very much see this is not a very high

0:51:19priority for the company. Again, I'm sure it's a very high priority for people working

0:51:23on it, but you can tell that it's not getting the resources it needs, it's not getting the

0:51:26priority it needs, because look at the last year, not much has really changed.

0:51:33Well, this was in the WWDC keynote, though.

0:51:35Didn't they have a section of the keynote that we can actually talk about where they

0:51:38said what their policy about iCloud Core data was going forward?

0:51:42That was not in the keynote?

0:51:44Maybe it was in the State of the Union.

0:51:45I don't remember.

0:51:46Well, they mentioned it in the State of the Union, which we can't talk about, but I

0:51:50believe it's safe to say that they basically said, "Give us another shot," in as many

0:51:55But I just don't see it.

0:51:59I mean, we see this with almost all of Apple's online services,

0:52:03especially the ones that Apple themselves doesn't really

0:52:07rely on very much.

0:52:08We see that they just don't really

0:52:11put that much effort into them.

0:52:13Well, even ones that are ostensibly

0:52:15flagship features, like messages,

0:52:18like that's Apple's application.

0:52:20It's an important Apple application.

0:52:22It obviously got attention because it was nicely

0:52:23redesigned yet it still doesn't perform its basic functions in a reliable manner.

0:52:27So even when Apple is totally using—not that I'm saying it uses iCloud Core Data,

0:52:30I don't know what it uses—but the point is it uses an online service that Apple implements,

0:52:35and it is a flagship application, and it still doesn't work.

0:52:39So them using it is not a guarantee that their online services work correctly, but it certainly

0:52:44helps.

0:52:45Right.

0:52:46But it just seems like Apple still has a lot of that tunnel vision that they are infamous

0:52:51where something gets a whole lot of attention, but then everything outside of the immediately

0:52:58obvious first interesting thing that they're working on gets pretty neglected for a while.

0:53:04And it's still a sign of Apple being a smaller company than their success and their money

0:53:12and their sales and their presence would indicate. They still are a very small company with very

0:53:18small teams relative to all the stuff they do.

0:53:22And so how they prioritize their resources, it still is very much a zero-sum game with

0:53:30them.

0:53:31They don't just add a brand new team to address brand new things they're doing.

0:53:36They move people around and deprioritize other things to prioritize certain things.

0:53:42They don't just buy more people out of nowhere and they have this giant department all of

0:53:45a sudden.

0:53:46And we've talked in the past about how Google is so good at just applying way more brute

0:53:53force engineering to problems than Apple usually does, especially in the services area.

0:53:58And I just don't see any evidence of Apple changing that anytime soon.

0:54:03So anything like this that is basically a major online service that's really tricky

0:54:08to get right and has lots of substantial design tricks, technical challenges, and service

0:54:16challenges and big data challenges.

0:54:18I don't see Apple ever doing well.

0:54:20Well, see, Apple's making their life harder here by — not Google — Dropbox has chosen

0:54:26to make a simpler API.

0:54:28It does less stuff for you.

0:54:30It is just simpler, right?

0:54:31Much simpler than iCloud Core Data.

0:54:33Far, far simpler, right?

0:54:34So that gives them a fighting chance of getting it to work correctly, having a small API that

0:54:39developers can pick up.

0:54:40And that's like a philosophical difference between the team that's responsible for

0:54:43for doing these kind of services for Apple, philosophically, I mean, part of it's philosophical,

0:54:47and part of it's like, look, they already had Core Data. People already have Core Data

0:54:50applications. What are you going to say to those people, "Hey, we want your applications

0:54:53to work with iCloud, but Core Data doesn't work with iCloud, so rewrite your thing to

0:54:58use something more like the Dropbox Sync API." That would have been a tough sell back when

0:55:03iCloud Core Data was introduced, which is why everyone's so excited. "Oh, but I have

0:55:06a Core Data application, and they tell me we'll work with iCloud. Yeah, I don't have

0:55:10to rewrite it. Because think if you told them, "Okay, well, you just have to throw out core

0:55:14data and use this new API that is totally unlike core data. Much simpler. You have to

0:55:19do a lot more coding to get it to work." But trust us, that's how online will work.

0:55:22And that's kind of like online companies know. Your APIs have to be small, simple, and semantically

0:55:27easy to understand, because that's the way to do it. If you try to make something big

0:55:32and complicated, your APIs are going to be big and complicated on the client side, and

0:55:36the server is going to be really hard to implement in an efficient manner and scale and all those

0:55:39other things, so don't do that. But Apple is, so far, sticking to their guns and saying

0:55:44where they do have key value store, and they could enhance key value store over the course

0:55:48of a year to basically make it match this Dropbox API and remove all their storage limits,

0:55:52because key value store is really just for tiny data. And they would have the equivalent

0:55:56of this. And by all accounts, key value store does work better, because it's simpler. It

0:55:59has to do less stuff, right? But they're saying, "No, we want to make core data work magically

0:56:05over the internet." And it's a big, complicated API with lots of corner cases, both on the

0:56:09client and the server.

0:56:11And if anything goes wrong, bad things happen and we need more debugging tools, and it's

0:56:14a really hard problem.

0:56:16And the size of the team that's doing the Dropbox data API is probably like one tenth

0:56:21of the people who are trying to do the core data thing, and yet they'll probably be more

0:56:24successful because they chose to do something simpler.

0:56:28The only thing that I wonder, and I didn't see specifically noted in the API documentation,

0:56:33is what about sharing?

0:56:35So I keep coming back to my example of sharing a grocery list with my wife, and it seems

0:56:41like this Dropbox data store API would be perfect for it, except that I didn't see

0:56:46any mention of sharing, but maybe I missed it.

0:56:48John, did you happen to notice anything?

0:56:50I don't think there's any sharing.

0:56:51I think it's kind of like, it's just a data store for your application.

0:56:55It's shared from that user on multiple devices, but not, like, there's no, like,

0:57:00server, you know.

0:57:01Well, there is one important part, though.

0:57:02there is a JavaScript API as well.

0:57:05And I haven't verified this yet, but I

0:57:08would assume that you could use that maybe

0:57:11from Node or the other server-side JavaScript

0:57:14interpreters.

0:57:15So you could probably run this server-side

0:57:19with their JavaScript API.

0:57:23Well, yeah, but you still need to authenticate as you

0:57:25to get access to your data store.

0:57:27So if I authenticate as me, I'm not

0:57:28going to see any cases of data stores.

0:57:30I guess you could copy it onto some other service then.

0:57:32Right.

0:57:33Like if you ran your own web service that used this,

0:57:37I would imagine you could whip that up.

0:57:39You could just have a few pages that

0:57:42do the bounce through authentication for you,

0:57:45and you authenticate your own people.

0:57:49Who's going to see what?

0:57:50Although if you're going to go through all that,

0:57:51you might as well just have your own sync service on your server.

0:57:54Yeah.

0:57:54That's what it boils down to.

0:57:56But since they have sharing for their file API,

0:57:59this is like their version one.

0:58:01So maybe the next version, they add--

0:58:04obviously, they know about sharing.

0:58:05They have some means for you to take the same file

0:58:08and share it amongst many people and revoke sharing

0:58:11and all that other stuff.

0:58:13It seems like that would have to come for these data

0:58:15stores because they have it chunked out into like,

0:58:16you have a data store.

0:58:17Data store have tables.

0:58:18Tables have records.

0:58:20They could do the sharing at probably the data store or table

0:58:24level, and it wouldn't be crazy.

0:58:25But maybe not for version one, right?

0:58:27Yeah, I doubt it.

0:58:30But all in all, I give this two thumbs up.

0:58:33I think this is definitely-- well, a

0:58:35tentative two thumbs up.

0:58:36I think this is definitely a good start.

0:58:37If it actually works, I think it's a very simple, yet at the

0:58:41same time, like you were saying, John, kind of robust

0:58:44way of syncing data.

0:58:46That's a very low cost of entry, both financially and in

0:58:49terms of effort.

0:58:50And so I think this is really cool.

0:58:51And although I'm not sure I disagree with you guys in that

0:58:56Apple won't care about this, it also makes me wonder,

0:58:59especially if adoption is really high.

0:59:00Marco said that, not me.

0:59:02Fair enough.

0:59:04But I hope and I wonder that if adoption of this Dropbox Data

0:59:08Store API is really high, if Apple will start

0:59:11to pay attention and really do something

0:59:12about iCloud and Core Data.

0:59:16I should also say that I know that there

0:59:18was a session or two about iCloud and Core Data at WWDC,

0:59:22but I've not yet watched them.

0:59:23So I don't know if that was just Apple groveling.

0:59:26I don't know if perhaps in iOS 7,

0:59:28There's going to be massive improvements.

0:59:30I truly, honestly don't know.

0:59:31But those of you who do have a developer account

0:59:34should go check it out.

0:59:35And I should take my own advice on that issue.

0:59:37I've seen those sessions.

0:59:38And there is news to be had there.

0:59:41Interesting.

0:59:42One thing we didn't mention to tie it back to topics

0:59:45from last week's show is what if a news reader decided

0:59:48to use Dropbox Datastore as its sync service?

0:59:51Obviously, you can't use it to get your feeds for you

0:59:53and give you your content.

0:59:54But just keeping track of which things you read and haven't

0:59:56like a fairly ideal, you know, so you don't want to make someone sign up for your own service,

1:00:01you want them to use the account that they already have that they pay for, you don't have to run the

1:00:05servers, you just have to store some state information about last read state and what

1:00:08articles have marked read and favorited or whatever random metadata you want to keep,

1:00:12like it's basically, you know, you make up the data story that you want, you still might need

1:00:17the service to fetch all your feeds and do all that other stuff, but that this other part of it

1:00:21for synchronizing which things are read.

1:00:24And even just having the applications themselves

1:00:26fetch the feeds, I know that's torturous,

1:00:28but in the old days, that's what things used to do,

1:00:29and hell, that's how I'm using that newswire now.

1:00:32It's possible.

1:00:33This could be a piece of people's reading API.

1:00:38- Well, and even more than that,

1:00:40what if you mix that with this new backgrounding stuff,

1:00:44where it could be a nice combination?

1:00:46I agree with what I think you're about to say, Marco,

1:00:49in that. I don't know if that's really sustainable, but it's a very interesting approach.

1:00:54Well, my big thing with it is that if you're going to run, if you're going to be having

1:00:59like feed syncing and stuff like that, there's a lot of advantages to running your own service

1:01:04to do that. There's not only things you can do in the background when the app isn't

1:01:09running, but you can also, one of the biggest things with feeds in particular is parsing

1:01:14that was parsing them and running

1:01:15into people's weird malformed feeds.

1:01:18Like if you can adjust your parsers on the server side

1:01:21immediately and have that apply to everything for everyone

1:01:25immediately instead of having to bundle them into an app update

1:01:28and ship the app update or have some kind of weird system

1:01:30where you have server-side definitions of what

1:01:32the app will interpret and then you

1:01:34have to add new things it can do to accommodate

1:01:37some crazy new feed condition, there certainly

1:01:40are a lot of reasons with readers in particular

1:01:43to still have a service.

1:01:45Plus, now we have like 15,000 reader services.

1:01:48- Well, that's what I was thinking of,

1:01:49is to say you make a reader, right?

1:01:50And you wanna let people pick from the umpteen

1:01:53other reader services that are gonna do the feed parsing

1:01:55for you and stuff like that, right?

1:01:56But you also wanna add value in your application,

1:01:59and you also want, say you have awesome ideas for features,

1:02:02but three out of the four feed things that you support

1:02:05for your aggregation and everything,

1:02:07don't support those features.

1:02:08You need some layer on top of that

1:02:10to add your own enhancements.

1:02:13So maybe one of them, three out of the four don't support favoriting or something like

1:02:17that.

1:02:18Well, you could store information about your favorites.

1:02:19Where?

1:02:20Do you want to run a whole service on that?

1:02:21Yeah, you could, but if it's simple enough, you could just use Dropbox as your backend.

1:02:25Dropbox and iCloud are two possible options for key value storage or whatever, depending

1:02:28on how much data you have, to enhance the backend features.

1:02:31Because otherwise, you're forced to do the lowest common denominator of all your services.

1:02:36So if one of them doesn't support folders or something, you're like, "Well, I guess

1:02:39I can't support folders because where would I keep track of my folders?"

1:02:42well, I keep tracking locally, but then it doesn't synchronize.

1:02:44Or it just synchronizes on iOS if I use iCloud.

1:02:46But if I want to have a web version, blah, blah, blah,

1:02:48well, there's the Dropbox Datastore.

1:02:50That's what I'm thinking, as an enhancement layer,

1:02:52so that your application can be better than the umpteen

1:02:55services that it supports.

1:02:56Maybe.

1:02:57But then it also has the problem--

1:02:58I wrote about this with NetNewsWire in particular.

1:03:01There's the problem then of you only

1:03:03get that benefit if you use that application on all

1:03:07your devices that you browse feeds from.

1:03:09And so if you only get, like if NetNewsWire adds features

1:03:13that only work in NetNewsWire,

1:03:15then you have to use NetNewsWire on Mac and iPhone and iPad

1:03:20if you read feeds in all those places to get those benefits.

1:03:23- But if you use Feedbin as your backend,

1:03:25then you can use any iOS reader that supports Feedbin.

1:03:27And yeah, you won't have those fancy features,

1:03:29but maybe you like a different reader better

1:03:30on the other platforms.

1:03:32And presumably you like it better for whatever reasons,

1:03:34but you're not tied, you're not like,

1:03:36you know, we were saying in NetNewsWire,

1:03:37you're not actually tied to use the same reader everywhere

1:03:39because the basics, the lowest common denominator,

1:03:42syncs everywhere because everyone uses Feedly or Feedbin

1:03:44or whatever your third-party services think the basics are.

1:03:47But on particular platforms, you have enhancements.

1:03:49And if they do a good enough job with their clients,

1:03:52maybe you'll want to use those enhancements

1:03:53on other platforms.

1:03:56Basically, you're saying, OK, if I

1:03:58want to use different readers on different platforms,

1:03:59that means that either the reader isn't available

1:04:01for all the platforms I want, or maybe I

1:04:02have different feature desires from one platform

1:04:04and the other.

1:04:05But if you have different feature desires,

1:04:06then you don't care that those enhancements

1:04:08that you use on your Mac don't work elsewhere.

1:04:10But if you do care about these awesome features in the Mac client, what you'll want to use

1:04:12is the iOS version of that same client.

1:04:15So nothing is going to give you everything you want, which is don't give me lowest common

1:04:21denominator features.

1:04:22Give me my choice of readers on every single platform and synchronize everything between

1:04:25them.

1:04:26That's never going to happen because it's just not.

1:04:28It's not a solvable problem.

1:04:30So you have to pick and choose.

1:04:31And I think this type of solution where you use a common backend for lowest common denominator

1:04:36functionality and then individual applications are free to enhance in the front-end using

1:04:40some other service, that's pretty close to ideal.

1:04:47I guess. It causes weird issues in other ways though. For instance, let's say BlackPistol

1:04:53ships NetNewsWire and it uses Feedbin or FeedWrangler or any of these other services, or it can

1:05:02use them, and then it does what you're saying, where it uses some other backend, whether

1:05:06it's their own or Dropbox or whatever, to add bigger things to it. And then, let's say

1:05:11Feedbin and Feed Wrangler add to their own services that capability, and then other clients

1:05:17add it. Does NetNewsWire then adopt that? Because then they're removing a competitive

1:05:22advantage they have over other feed readers by doing that. It'll cause weird situations

1:05:27like that if people really do this.

1:05:28Once we get real numbers, though, they'll be like, "Look, okay, I added support for

1:05:31these five backends, but in reality, 90% of my users use these two backends. So right

1:05:35way I can eliminate those other back ends from having to support them because it's

1:05:38kind of a pain to support lots of different back ends.

1:05:40And of the two remaining features, actually some of the stuff I was implementing myself

1:05:43is available in both of them.

1:05:44I think all developers would be happy to say, "Oh, great.

1:05:47Well, the two remaining ones that I support have this feature so I can shift it off onto

1:05:50them."

1:05:51But there's always that tension between how much of the value of my application is reliant

1:05:55on the value of a third-party service that I don't control.

1:05:58And it's great that you can have different clients in the same third-party service, but

1:06:01You are, in some respects, at the mercy of that third party

1:06:06service, like if they take away a feature that you were relying

1:06:09on.

1:06:09So it's good to have some place to--

1:06:11either if they take away a feature,

1:06:13you can shift it to your back end.

1:06:14And if they add a feature, you can take it out

1:06:16of your back end if it is now part of the new lowest common

1:06:19denominator that you decided to support.

1:06:21This is just an uncomfortable period

1:06:22now because people are just supporting as much as they

1:06:24possibly can.

1:06:25They don't know how things are going to shake out.

1:06:26But I have to think there's going to be-- instead of seven

1:06:29of them, there's going to be like two or three

1:06:31ones left standing after a year, right?

1:06:32Well, I think we're actually already seeing that shakeout happening now. I mean, I published

1:06:36my numbers earlier today from what I could get. It seems like Feedly is by far the most

1:06:43popular alternative, mostly because it's free. And I believe it's one of the only ones that's

1:06:48free. NewsBlur is second. I think NewsBlur is free but then has premium features that

1:06:52you can optionally buy. And NewsBlur has been around forever. It's been around way longer.

1:06:59I believe it was four years.

1:07:01It's been around way longer than these other services have.

1:07:05And then Feed Wrangler and Feedbin

1:07:07are basically neck and neck.

1:07:09They're very similar in that they're both paid services,

1:07:12run by very small teams.

1:07:14I believe they're both run by single people.

1:07:18Or Feedbin might have two.

1:07:19Anyway, very small teams.

1:07:22And then pretty much after that, there's a pretty big drop off.

1:07:27Like, besides that handful, like there's--

1:07:30literally my list is Feedly, NewsBlur, NetNewsWire,

1:07:35clients not even using a service, FeedWrangler,

1:07:37and Feedbin.

1:07:38And then everything else is like less than half of those.

1:07:41And it drops off pretty quickly.

1:07:44And so I think we're already seeing that very few services

1:07:47are showing up.

1:07:48Now, that being said, I don't yet

1:07:50have numbers for DigReader or AOL.

1:07:52And those are pretty-- I've heard a lot of people

1:07:56mentioning those.

1:07:57I don't know how big they are, but we will see.

1:08:00There's probably room for new entrants in this next year

1:08:02as well.

1:08:03Oh, sure.

1:08:03Because these are all--

1:08:04People who haven't come-- these are the guys who scrambled

1:08:06to get something ready because the Google

1:08:07Reader was going away.

1:08:08And in general, they tend to be small people.

1:08:10There's some bigger, slower moving entity

1:08:12entering this field.

1:08:13Who knows when they could land something that does this?

1:08:15Amazon could do it for all we know.

1:08:17They do crazy things all the time.

1:08:18And I would say Feedly is not likely--

1:08:22Feedly is likely to burn out, I think,

1:08:24because they have a very large staff and they're free.

1:08:29And I assume they're venture funded

1:08:32as a result of all these things.

1:08:34And generally companies that are on that trajectory

1:08:38don't stay in it for the long haul.

1:08:40Chances are Feedly is going to either shut down

1:08:44or way more likely get bought by somebody

1:08:47and possibly dramatically change the service as a result

1:08:50a year or two later or even immediately.

1:08:52- Yeah, they have to monetize it at some point

1:08:54and any monetization is bound to be annoying.

1:08:56- Right, so I'm guessing Feedly is gonna

1:08:59like explode quickly and then burn out.

1:09:01And then NewsBlur, FeedWrangler, and Feedbin,

1:09:05I think are all in it for the long haul.

1:09:07And we'll see what happens with them.

1:09:10And I'm sure there's always gonna be a free option

1:09:12from somebody that gets popular,

1:09:14whether that's Feedly or AOL or Digg, I don't know.

1:09:17I don't know what it's gonna be like in a year.

1:09:19But I bet the smaller services that are run by individuals

1:09:22have sustainable business models will last a long time, especially NewsBlur has already

1:09:26been around for like four years. So obviously, that's a stable product, right? So we'll see.

1:09:31I was pleased to see though that your subscriber numbers didn't plummet by virtue of Google

1:09:39Reader going away. And I think we all kind of figured that would be the case, especially

1:09:44for a site like Marco.org. I didn't figure.

1:09:47Well I think that there was hope at the very least and for Marco.org which caters to nerds

1:09:53I think you perhaps are seeing a kind of outside of the normal case situation wherein you'll

1:10:03get a lot of subscribers moving to other platforms because we're all nerds.

1:10:08I'm curious to hear for something more mainstream say like a CNN or something like that how

1:10:14things change. Because that's not catering to nerds, that's catering to normal humans

1:10:19who may or may not care about this.

1:10:21But only nerds use RSS.

1:10:23That's true. Well, I mean, that's not really true. Like, my wife uses RSS in a very odd

1:10:28and in a very different way.

1:10:30She's nerdy by a transitive property of nerdiness.

1:10:33She is. But I mean, I know regular people that use it, but to your point, it's very,

1:10:38very frequently a nerd that even has any idea what RSS is, and it's not very regular to

1:10:44to hear a regular person talk about it.

1:10:47- Yeah, I don't know.

1:10:48I mean, these numbers sure are big.

1:10:51You know, like I feel like RSS is one of those things

1:10:53that I'm sure it's much more talked about

1:10:58and maybe more actively used by nerds.

1:11:00And certainly of course there's a whole class

1:11:02of applications that are powered by RSS

1:11:06and that use it in some other way like Flipboard.

1:11:08And those tend to do way better than anything

1:11:11that just uses RSS kind of raw the way we use it.

1:11:13But even if it's just nerds, there's a lot of nerds.

1:11:18Like, I learned this with my apps.

1:11:23With the magazine, I tried to be less nerdy.

1:11:28I tried to broaden past nerds.

1:11:30And not only was it harder than I expected,

1:11:34but I think that was actually a fatal mistake.

1:11:36I think it would have done a lot better

1:11:39if I would have just really nailed the nerd market.

1:11:42You know, nerds are a massive market.

1:11:46And sure, we are the worst customers in the world

1:11:49because we're picky and we're needy and we are entitled

1:11:54and we're generally smart and we think we're really smart

1:11:58and so we will tell you how stupid you are for your app

1:12:01doing a certain thing or not having a certain thing

1:12:03or breaking in a certain way.

1:12:05I mean, nerds are really a terrible market to serve.

1:12:08However, if you are already in it by being a nerd

1:12:12and you are familiar with it,

1:12:14and you can appease the nerd market in some small way,

1:12:17there sure are a lot of them.

1:12:19And I've always been served very well

1:12:23by serving the nerd market.

1:12:25And whenever I've tried to break out of it,

1:12:27that's when I've had trouble.

1:12:28And I've done it.

1:12:29Like Instapaper was not used by all nerds.

1:12:33I mean, there were a lot, as my support email would show,

1:12:36there were a lot of regular non-nerd type people

1:12:39using Instapaper, and there probably still are.

1:12:41Actually, I know there still are.

1:12:44But you certainly can't go wrong.

1:12:47If you think something will only appeal to nerds,

1:12:51there's still a lot of those.

1:12:52And you're probably wrong.

1:12:55One thing that nerds do, which is kind of condescending--

1:12:57and I do it too, I've been guilty of this as well--

1:13:00is that we underestimate regular people's skills or desires

1:13:05or abilities.

1:13:06And certainly, there's reasons to sometimes do that.

1:13:11Like when you're designing an interface,

1:13:13or when you're writing the text of a dialog box,

1:13:16you want to write it so that it will work no matter how smart

1:13:19or not smart or engaged or not engaged the user is.

1:13:23And you want to really be inclusive there and assume

1:13:27nothing about the user's skills.

1:13:30But outside of contexts like that,

1:13:35we've got to give people credit.

1:13:37And a lot of times, I'm very pleasantly surprised

1:13:41by what non-nerds are able to do, especially

1:13:43with some of the crazy crap that nerds build for themselves.

1:13:46And we think no one else is going to use it.

1:13:48And then people do use it, and they figure it out.

1:13:51I'm always very surprised by that.

1:13:52And so I think we should be careful to not say,

1:13:57oh, this is just for nerds, because a lot of times

1:13:59it isn't.

1:14:00Go ahead, John.

1:14:03I was going to say, on RSS, it's not so much

1:14:06that there's anything inherently about RSS or what it does that is nerd-focused, but

1:14:14I think as Marco probably pointed out in one of his things that he wrote about, it's because

1:14:18it's an open standard not owned and controlled by a single company that these other companies

1:14:23flee from it because Google wants you to use Google+ and Facebook wants you to use Facebook.

1:14:27All these companies are like, "All right, so the web is great and RSS is great and all

1:14:30these protocols that no one owns is great, but what if we could do something similar

1:14:35but in a proprietary manner on servers that we control that locks people into our platform

1:14:39and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

1:14:41They all just want to do all these same things.

1:14:42So you've seen just everything flee from RSS, and it's not because people don't want the

1:14:46services provided by that technology, nor do they even need to know what RSS exists.

1:14:51If companies all embrace this the same way they've essentially been forced to embrace

1:14:54web browsers, and every single device you own came with a first-party, built-by-the-vendor,

1:14:59essential, got-to-be-awesome newsreading application, people would love it.

1:15:04love to use it. It's not like they don't like to read news, but it's because we didn't get

1:15:09past that critical threshold like we did with the web. We're like, "Look, if you buy a device,

1:15:12better have a web browser, or it better be a good web browser." And I don't care that

1:15:15you don't control the web because customers demand it. We never got there with RSS. We

1:15:20seemed like we were close when Apple was adding RSS to all of its things, but if we had gotten

1:15:24there, people would just spend all day in news readers because it's a great way to consume

1:15:27content on the web. It's not that news reading itself is nerdy, it's that the protocol didn't

1:15:33break through that barrier and now we're kind of, you know, they successfully

1:15:36marginalized it and are trying to bring us all to their stupid proprietary

1:15:40platforms to do all the similar things.

1:15:41Yeah.

1:15:44And the thing I was going to say, um, also going back a step is that the, the

1:15:50interesting thing about nerds is that once you hit about age 25 or so, more

1:15:55often than not, nerds are willing to spend some money and they're willing to

1:15:58spend some money on things that make them happy and, or at least that's the nerds

1:16:01that I interact with, which, granted, are all typically Apple users and stereotypes

1:16:07are true for a reason, or stereotypes are stereotypes for a reason.

1:16:12Most of my friends and family members have come to realize that a three, four, five dollar

1:16:17app is the cost of one of Marco's beloved Starbucks coffees, and they last a lot longer.

1:16:25Marco catering to nerds is often a lucrative thing because nerds are willing to spend some

1:16:31money on stuff that makes them happy. And that's a good thing.

1:16:35They're likely to be gainfully employed as well.

1:16:37Oh, so true. Presumably their nerdiness translates into

1:16:40some kind of marketable skill. Right, exactly. And Sam the Geek in the chat

1:16:44is offended that I said it's only the over-25 nerds, but that's just a ballpark. Some

1:16:50of the younger nerds can also pay for things too.

1:16:52The younger nerds jailbreak and pirate everything. Exactly. That's what I thought. That is

1:16:57very true. And on that bomb shot—

1:16:59you want to wrap it up? Alright, thanks a lot to our two sponsors this week, Audible

1:17:03and Transporter, and I'll see you guys next week.

1:17:06week.

1:17:13begin cause it was accidental. Oh it was accidental. John didn't do any research, Margo and Casey

1:17:20wouldn't let him cause it was accidental. It was accidental. And you can find the show

1:17:31notes at ATP.fm. And if you're into Twitter, you can follow them at CASEYL.

1:17:39You can follow them at C-A-S-E-Y-L-I-S-S

1:17:45So that's Kasey Liss M-A-R-C-O-A-R-M

1:17:49Auntie Marco Arment S-I-R-A-C

1:17:54USA, Syracuse

1:17:57It's accidental (it's accidental)

1:18:00They didn't mean to

1:18:02Accidental (accidental)

1:18:05So what are we doing about titles?

1:18:12Oh, I haven't even looked yet.

1:18:13I was saving it.

1:18:14It's like podcast dessert.

1:18:16I didn't get a chance to add my two cents on the Nailing the Nerd Market, the other

1:18:23big factor, which I think you probably talked about at some point, and back to work.

1:18:27Building Analysts, the reason you're going to have an easier time being successful in

1:18:32nerd market is because it's so much easier to make an application used by people who

1:18:35are like you, right?

1:18:36Oh, definitely.

1:18:37It's so much easier to empathize, right?

1:18:38So, you know, because you are a nerd and because, you know, presumably software developers have

1:18:42nerdy tendencies, yes, it's much easier, you know, to hit the nerd market with nerd applications

1:18:47written by a nerd who understands what nerds like and is a one-man shop and you know what

1:18:51I mean?

1:18:52So that's also a big factor in there.

1:18:54Oh, absolutely.

1:18:55But, you know, a lot of times, too, like, you know, nerds think of solutions to problems

1:19:01that most people don't even think they have.

1:19:04But a lot of times they do have that problem,

1:19:06and they appreciate the solution once they see it.

1:19:09- Well, that's engineering.

1:19:10It's solving a problem you didn't know you had

1:19:12in a way that you don't understand.

1:19:13(laughs)

1:19:14- Right, exactly.

1:19:16Exactly.

1:19:17And so I do think there's some value,

1:19:18and that's one of the reasons why a lot of nerd stuff

1:19:21does jump the gap into regular people,

1:19:24because, you know, I mean, some of the stuff,

1:19:26like, you know, if you're making some kind of web sync

1:19:30service to synchronize your Twitter posts onto the newest social network.

1:19:36So you cross post between Twitter and app.net.

1:19:39That is a problem that normal people don't have and are unlikely to ever have.

1:19:43And so that is going to be limited really only to nerds.

1:19:46Look at something like If This Then That, IFTTT.

1:19:50Great site, great idea, almost definitely going to stay with nerds.

1:19:54Because it solves a whole class of problems and desires

1:19:59that mostly only nerds have.

1:20:01But things like Twitter itself, that

1:20:04was something that started out pretty nerdy.

1:20:06But it solved a problem that a lot of people had.

1:20:09Just it first was only known about by nerds.

1:20:12And that's the kind of thing that can break out.

1:20:15That's another thing you can do with a Dropbox API.

1:20:17Synchronize my direct message red state

1:20:19so I don't have to use the Twitter official client, which

1:20:21is how I added that feature.

1:20:22But only as my understanding for the official Twitter

1:20:24client, which I don't want to use.

1:20:26Yeah, I totally understand.

1:20:27They didn't actually make an API for it.

1:20:28They used to add it themselves.

1:20:29Yeah, they just added it to the—right.

1:20:30So then it's like, well, fine.

1:20:32If I use Twitterific on both platforms, if they both talk to the Dropbox thing, they

1:20:37could also use iCloud key value storage, but that's not cross-platform.

1:20:39It has size limitations.

1:20:41So just use this.

1:20:42It's really easy to do with the Dropbox data storage.

1:20:44You're just—you have an identifier for the message, you just store a big list of them.

1:20:48If it's fast and efficient, go to town.

1:20:52So with regard to titles, I don't think I care, but I would recommend something that

1:20:55relates to Dropbox and not something that relates to iWatch.

1:20:58So I don't know what that would be, but whatever.

1:21:02I'm pretty bored of iWatch already, even though we don't know about it yet.

1:21:06Even if it's real or anything about it.

1:21:08Like I'm bored of everyone, including us, speculating about it, just because we have

1:21:15nothing to work on.

1:21:17And it could be something really cool, but that's really unlikely, and the most likely

1:21:22thing is going to be is really boring. And so I just, like, I just, I'm so burnt out

1:21:29from people talking about it.

1:21:30Yeah.

1:21:31And again, that includes us and me even. Like, you know, I say this with full self-realization

1:21:37that we just talked about it for like 25 minutes earlier. But it's just so, I don't know, we

1:21:44have nothing to work on.

1:21:45You'll be reinvigorated when it's not a watch but it's actually a necklace or perhaps an

1:21:49earring. Then what was I meant to talk about? I cannot wait to hear the story of Marco getting

1:21:54his ear pierced in order to wear the eye earring. The apple tongue stud. Oh god that'd be terrible.

1:22:03Think of the sensors they could get in there. Holy crap. I'm uncomfortable. Oh man. Hey,

1:22:11so in random other news, since Marco and his family came to visit this weekend, I've seen

1:22:17his new app and it is glorious.

1:22:19- The new one or the practice new one?

1:22:22- The practice new one.

1:22:23- The practice new one.

1:22:24- Yeah.

1:22:25- To be honest, I'm just trolling the chat room right now

1:22:28'cause they were begging for information about it

1:22:30and I'm not gonna give them any.

1:22:30- Well you know Underscore David Smith saw it too.

1:22:33- Are you releasing it or what?

1:22:34It's done right?

1:22:35- It's awaiting approval.

1:22:36It is officially shipped to Apple

1:22:39but it's awaiting approval.

1:22:40It's been about eight days so it's not totally unreasonable.

1:22:45I can tell from my Tapstream analytics--

1:22:49I'm trying Tapstream for the first time here,

1:22:51previous sponsor of my site, Disclosure--

1:22:54I can tell from their analytics that there have not been any new

1:22:57launches of the app since I submitted it.

1:23:00So as far as I can tell, it's not like hitting some wall

1:23:04that somebody has to ask someone about.

1:23:06Like, it's just waiting in the queue.

1:23:10So we will see.

1:23:10That's interesting.

1:23:11You should write a Mac app, because I

1:23:12keep hearing people getting their Mac apps

1:23:14through in like one day.

1:23:15I know, it's crazy.

1:23:16But that's such a roller coaster.

1:23:18Last year, it was like 45 days or something.

1:23:23It was ridiculous.

1:23:25So yeah, at least iOS is fairly consistent.

1:23:28iOS is pretty much always six to eight days.

1:23:31It's very rarely outside of those bounds.

1:23:34And when it is, not by much.

1:23:36So we will see.

1:23:38But yeah, I'm just waiting for that to be approved.

1:23:41And then I actually just today restarted work

1:23:44on the other big app that'll be out this fall, I hope.

1:23:47It's funny, I've decided that I'm

1:23:49going to require iOS 7 for the new one.

1:23:51But the question is, then, when do you release that?

1:23:56Obviously, it's great to get it out there early.

1:23:58But the earlier you get it out there, the fewer people

1:24:00can actually use it.

1:24:02And the more you're competing for press attention and Apple

1:24:05features, if you're trying to get out there,

1:24:07like the week of iOS 7's launch.

1:24:09I think you want to be out on launch.

1:24:11You definitely want to be out on launch.

1:24:13I know all the downsides, but the downsides all have nothing to do with the number of

1:24:18sales you're getting and everything.

1:24:20As soon as people get an iOS 7 device, they're going to want to put applications on it that

1:24:27show off iOS 7 and that are sort of iOS 7 savvy, to use the old System 7 term, and you

1:24:32want yours to be one of those things.

1:24:34Because I think that's a big foot in the door.

1:24:36If you think about all the people who were like that on day one on the iPad or day one

1:24:39in the iPhone app store. I think that's a huge advantage.

1:24:43Yeah, that's true. That might work. Yeah, I'll have to see.

1:24:47It's a nightmare scramble to do that. Right.

1:24:49You end up shipping something that is not in the state that perhaps you would want to

1:24:52ship it, but I still think you're going to work on the application. It's going to improve,

1:24:57even if that first version is new. People are just going to go through, like, "I just

1:24:59want to buy it." Like in the iPad launch, "I've got a new iPad. Which applications

1:25:03are iPad savvy?" Put them on here. I really do wonder also, though, how many

1:25:08people are going to hold off upgrading on 7 because it is so different. And certainly

1:25:12there's going to be a lot of backlash when it launches from people who want things back the old way.

1:25:16And so I wonder like

1:25:20I don't think it's going to be a big delay for people but I bet there will be something. I bet we'll hear it.

1:25:24Like every time there's a new iPhone

1:25:28or iOS release but especially a new iPhone release, every time there's some kind of stupid

1:25:32consumer report scandal about some part of it that everyone doesn't like and

1:25:36I think it's going to be iOS 7 that's following. I think that's going to be the big Apple scandal.

1:25:40It's like, "Oh my God, nobody likes iOS 7 and no one can figure out how to use it,"

1:25:44even though it takes a minute to get used to.

1:25:48Yeah, but all the five million people who buy the iPhone 5S or whatever the hell in

1:25:53the holiday season, those people are going to have to be stuck with iOS 7 and they'll

1:25:57buy your application.

1:25:58Yeah. We'll have to probably save this for next show. I am curious to talk about Apple's

1:26:01fall lineup. Yeah, let's save that for next show.

1:26:05All right.

1:26:06Because this looks like there's a lot coming, and possibly like all in the same month.

1:26:12If I were you, Jon, I would maybe get your review done for September.

1:26:18Yeah, no.

1:26:19I know all about it.

1:26:20I know all about it.

1:26:21I'm so angry.

1:26:22I can say, so slow going, so friggin' slow.

1:26:25I just look at it and I'm just—this is—I'm on the page where I'm like, "This is never

1:26:28going to be finished."

1:26:29It was literally never going to be finished.

1:26:30Jon, you know, maybe if you gave up on all your other podcasts and actually worked on

1:26:35It's not the podcast, it's the 9 to 5 job.

1:26:38It really takes time away.

1:26:40Let me tell you.

1:26:41I'm just giving you a hard time.

1:26:44So to continue darting around between topics, IceVix from a 16-year-old perspective says,

1:26:50from a 16-year-old perspective, most kids seem to like it except for the UI change,

1:26:54the main change, and there are very few that don't like it.

1:26:57So what is there that one would like that isn't the UI change?

1:27:02Because no normal 16-year-old has any idea what the hell.

1:27:04But 16 year olds don't write articles. It's grumpy old men who write articles in the stupid

1:27:08magazines that are like, "Ah, my phone changed and everything's all white. I can't read the

1:27:12text because it's too thin." And there'll be legitimate complaints mixed in with the

1:27:16fear of change mixed in with the blah, blah, blah. But I don't know if the back... Hopefully

1:27:19we're getting through all the backlash now. And by the time it ships, we'll be like, "Eh,

1:27:24we're used to it. It's all right."

1:27:26Do you want to pick a title? Oh, you know, one thing I do like, which John mentioned

1:27:30very quickly in passing, the transitive property of nerdiness. Is that too long? I like it.

1:27:36I do like that as well. You should Google that to make sure I use the

1:27:39right word. I guess back to my tweet about Googling embarrassing

1:27:45questions. Much better to Google the answers than to not.

1:27:49I'm pretty sure that's correct. Yeah, I'm pretty sure it's correct too,

1:27:52but this is exactly the type of thing. Yeah, I'm almost 100% certain it's correct, and

1:27:55yet the internet is sitting there saying, "Why don't you just ask me? I have the actual

1:27:59Like, why not double-check?

1:28:02That's why writing this freaking review takes forever, because every single thing I write

1:28:05in there, I'm like, "You know what?

1:28:06Let me check that.

1:28:07You know what?

1:28:08Let me check that."

1:28:09John, have you ever been wrong about anything?

1:28:10You know what?

1:28:11Let me check that.

1:28:12And you find out you're on a five-minute diversion to check some fact that you were 99.9% sure

1:28:13it's correct, but you have to prove it before you can go on with the sentence.

1:28:16Anyway.

1:28:17Have you ever been wrong about anything ever?

1:28:18No, that's what kills me, the reviews.

1:28:20All I see is the one fact that I didn't check that I got wrong.

1:28:27the name of this machine, the release date of this thing,

1:28:29or the price is off by a dollar because I didn't check it

1:28:31'cause I was just going by memory and it just kills me.

1:28:35- Here's the problem, John, here's the problem you have,

1:28:38is that that Retina MacBook Pro that showed up

1:28:40in Geekbench a few days ago was running Mavericks.

1:28:44Do you see why that's a problem?

1:28:46- I know, when they say fall, I try to be ready

1:28:51by the first day of fall.

1:28:52Like, I'm no dummy, I know how this thing goes.

1:28:55I don't assume it's going to be the middle or end of fall.

1:28:57I assume it's going to be on the first day of fall,

1:28:59and that's what I'm still shooting for.

1:29:01- I'm thinking we have two big events.

1:29:04We have an iOS event and we have a Mac event.

1:29:06I'm thinking those are separate events.

1:29:09The iOS event happens later, more likely November,

1:29:11because iOS 7 needs a lot of time.

1:29:14iOS 7 is nowhere near done.

1:29:15However, I'm thinking that the Mac event

1:29:18might happen as early as September,

1:29:21and that Mavericks comes out then,

1:29:24along with the Mac Pro, new Retina MacBook Pros,

1:29:29and maybe an iMac refresh.

1:29:31- I think they'll delay the Mac Pro,

1:29:33because like, well, the Retina screens aren't ready,

1:29:35so the Mac Pro will have more to say

1:29:37about that later in the year,

1:29:38'cause back to the old, they can't resist.

1:29:40It's like, you know what, screw those Mac Pros.

1:29:42We'll get it out in the fall, December 19th.

1:29:45Well, you know, because like, they're holding the Mac Pro,

1:29:48we all hope they're holding it with some monitors too, so.

1:29:51Even if they're not, they'll just be like,

1:29:52you know what, screw the Mac Pro.

1:29:53that one's gonna wait.

1:29:55We gotta hire all those Americans to build it or something.

1:29:57- Well, the Mac Pro right now, they can't release it now

1:29:59because Intel hasn't released those CPUs yet,

1:30:02presumably in volume.

1:30:03The official delivery date of those CPUs is September.

1:30:08And it's the same delivery date for many of the Hasselt parts

1:30:13in volume, I believe.

1:30:14I'm not sure on that part, but obviously they're holding

1:30:19back the Retina MacBook Pro for some reason.

1:30:21- The Mac Pro also has to wait till Mavericks,

1:30:23All these new Macs have to wait for Mavericks.

1:30:25They're not going to bother getting them to work correctly with Mountain Lion because

1:30:30there's no big rush in the Mac Pro.

1:30:31People have waited so long already.

1:30:32What's the big deal?

1:30:34Same thing with the Retinas.

1:30:36But that also means we're probably not talking November here.

1:30:39We're probably talking September.

1:30:40Yeah, I know.

1:30:41I'm planning on it.

1:30:42I'm trying to get done.

1:30:44Well, October is after September, last I checked.

1:30:48So you'll be clear about that.

1:30:49I never know because the wild card is maybe it's such a mad scramble for iOS 7, which

1:30:54is do or die, that they pull everybody off everything and it's like, "Everyone just get

1:30:58iOS 7 done," and then go back to what you were doing and then Mavericks get deleted

1:31:03just because due to sheer neglect.

1:31:05Because everyone was pulled off to work on iOS 7 because that is far from done and they

1:31:10have to get that done.

1:31:11Oh yeah.

1:31:12Well, honestly, I think they're just going to ship whatever the hell they have in mid-November

1:31:17or whatever it is.

1:31:18They're just going to ship it, period.

1:31:19Whatever they have at that point, that's what 7.0.

1:31:23You can do that with iOS 6 and 5 where they just cut off features, but they can't have

1:31:27a disaster where everyone gets their phones on Christmas morning and there's some fatal

1:31:30bug that they just can't have that.

1:31:32It's a problem.

1:31:33So they have to ship what they have, but they also have to make sure that what they have

1:31:37is stable, does not have any fatal flaws, and that's really hard to do when you're making

1:31:43a mad scramble like this.

1:31:44Well, they're already almost to that point, though.

1:31:47beta is two, I didn't use beta one much, but between beta two and three there's already

1:31:52a significant reduction in reboots.

1:31:54Well, a reduction in reboots is not...

1:31:57Well, with three I haven't seen one.

1:31:59With two I would see about one a day.

1:32:01With three I haven't seen any yet.

1:32:02I mean, I've only had it for a few days so far, but...

1:32:04It's not burning your battery, it's not failing to sync something, like so many things, yeah.

1:32:08It's so much easier when you're doing...

1:32:10Most of the bugs that remain in iOS 7 right now are just like minor UI problems.

1:32:16"Oh, this label disappears," or "The status bar appears rotated in the wrong way on the

1:32:22screen." It's minor UI quirks that, yeah, they suck, and they're definitely bugs, but

1:32:29if they ship with that, it wouldn't be the end of the world.

1:32:32Yeah, no data loss, no crashes, no phone reboots, and no failure to do some essential function

1:32:39like convey text messages or synchronize something or get mail or skipping mail messages.

1:32:46Right. No, I mean, I have no doubts that they'll be able to get something out there that is stable and doesn't have major bugs like that by November.

1:32:55I suspect that 7.0 is going to have still some weird little edge case UI bugs, just because there are so many new UIs and so many of them are not quite baked yet.

1:33:08But the the solid like you know like the kernel is fine. I'm sure like springboard will be pretty much fine

1:33:13You know like that all the really important stuff the the common stuff the underlying stuff that'll I think be fine

1:33:20By November because it's already almost fine now

1:33:23Well and plus yeah, I mean everything I've read on

1:33:27Twitter says that Mavericks is good to go immediately. You know that they're ready so even if there's a grant well

1:33:34Which means John you're I?

1:33:36I wouldn't say that. When I come back to my Mavericks laptop, it is after a night. I put it to sleep.

1:33:42I put the Mac laptop to sleep, and then I go to bed and come back down in the morning, and the thing is

1:33:47usually awake, fans on, but totally hard-hung. So, maybe it's not ready yet.

1:33:53Fair enough.