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Upgrade

405: Too Many Numbers

 

00:00:00   (upbeat music)

00:00:02   - From Relay FM, this is Upgrade episode 405.

00:00:12   Today's show is brought to you by Electric,

00:00:15   Text Expander and Trade.

00:00:17   My name is Myke Hurley and I'm joined by Jason Snow.

00:00:19   Hi Jason.

00:00:20   - Hi Myke.

00:00:20   - Oh, hello.

00:00:22   - Well, I mean, we're on a first name basis here.

00:00:23   It's very friendly.

00:00:24   You know, it's a podcast where we can--

00:00:26   - You sounded quite trepidatious to me.

00:00:28   - I think, well, you just said my first name,

00:00:31   so I wanted to counter,

00:00:33   and it got all personal in here, is what I'm saying,

00:00:36   and what better for a podcast?

00:00:38   - Are you saying I need to call you Jason Snell now?

00:00:41   Mr. Jason Snell, ask that.

00:00:42   - No, I don't.

00:00:43   I don't.

00:00:44   Just let's get tangential here

00:00:47   before we even do the Snell Talk question,

00:00:49   which is I just wanna point out

00:00:50   that in the ATP show notes last week,

00:00:53   they referred to Steven Hackett as Steven.

00:00:55   They referred to me as Snell,

00:00:56   and they referred to Jon Gruber as Jon Gruber.

00:00:59   And I don't understand what's happening over there.

00:01:01   - That's interesting.

00:01:02   - I prefer to be called Jason and not Snell

00:01:05   because it's more personal.

00:01:09   It's like, oh, it's our buddy Jason.

00:01:10   - We don't need to call you Snell

00:01:11   because there's not another Jason

00:01:14   in like that immediate group, right?

00:01:16   - Well, and I grew up, honestly, and I grew up with,

00:01:19   that you always had to specify which Jason it was.

00:01:22   So I get it.

00:01:23   But if it's clear, I'm just saying,

00:01:26   Why is Steven-

00:01:27   - 'Cause when I say I understand John Gruber, right?

00:01:29   Because there is a John on the show.

00:01:30   - There's so many Johns.

00:01:32   I get it, right?

00:01:32   But like Steven, incredibly common name.

00:01:34   And they're like, "No, no, it's Steven.

00:01:36   "You know, y'all know."

00:01:37   - You'll know Steven.

00:01:38   - It's like Sal who y'all know.

00:01:40   It's Steven who y'all know.

00:01:41   But then Snell with his story that he wrote.

00:01:44   So I don't get it, but hi Myke.

00:01:47   - Hello Mr. Jason Snell Esquire.

00:01:48   - Oh no.

00:01:50   - I have a #SnellTalk question for you.

00:01:52   It comes from Victor who wants to know,

00:01:55   Mr. Jason Snell-Asquire, how do you animate

00:01:57   the cycling six colors in the menu bar of your website?

00:02:01   - Well, I stand by the server and whenever a beep comes in

00:02:06   and it means that somebody is watching the site,

00:02:09   there's a crank, people don't know this,

00:02:10   but on the side of the Leno box,

00:02:12   there's a little yellow crank that you fold out

00:02:14   and you crank it and the colors change.

00:02:17   And that's how it works.

00:02:18   It's JavaScript and CSS and Krista Murgen did it.

00:02:23   There's not much more to it than that.

00:02:26   That's what it is.

00:02:27   - If you would like to send in a #SNELTalk question

00:02:30   for us to open an episode of the show with,

00:02:33   just send out a tweet with the #SNELTalk.

00:02:35   I use question mark SNELTalk

00:02:36   in the Relay FM members discord.

00:02:39   I have some real time follow up for you, Jason,

00:02:41   based on the ATP show notes for episode 480.

00:02:44   James Thompson is referred to as James Thompson.

00:02:47   John Gruber's name is crossed out.

00:02:49   Casey's referred to as Casey.

00:02:52   and uh... John Siracusa is referred to as John. Yes but that makes sense though right? John Casey

00:02:58   Marco that totally makes sense. Makes that track. Because they're the hosts of the show. Yep. But

00:03:03   but I'm Snell, Stephen is Stephen, and James is James Thompson. Yep. I don't know. I have some

00:03:10   real follow-up, well you do, the studio display firmware has been updated to quote unquote improve

00:03:17   the camera. Mm-hmm. That's what they said. And did they? So I was out running and I got

00:03:26   a text from Apple PR saying we're releasing a firmware update. I'm like oh boy. So I get

00:03:31   back to the house and I update the firmware on one of the displays but not the other one

00:03:36   because I have a review unit that I haven't sent back yet and I have one that I want.

00:03:39   Pretty great that you've got two displays right now, isn't it? Right? So I updated the

00:03:42   firmware on one and that took a lot longer than you thought you would think because you

00:03:45   you have to update to a beta of the OS

00:03:48   and then you have to update from the beta the firmware.

00:03:50   - When you say the OS, you mean Mac OS,

00:03:52   or you have to update to a Mac OS beta,

00:03:54   then it updates the monitor. - Yeah, to a developer

00:03:55   or public beta, and then it updates the monitor,

00:03:58   which is not great 'cause now I'm on a beta again,

00:04:00   and it broke stuff, it broke shortcuts,

00:04:03   it broke a bunch of stuff, so I'm not happy about that.

00:04:06   And the truth is, you could just,

00:04:08   all you need to do is update something,

00:04:10   some Mac to the beta, update the display,

00:04:13   And then it'll work the same on any Mac it connects to

00:04:17   'cause it's standalone software running on this thing.

00:04:20   Anyway, so is it different?

00:04:22   Yeah.

00:04:22   Is it better?

00:04:23   I guess.

00:04:24   Like in our show doc,

00:04:26   you've got like image looks a little better,

00:04:28   crop is better.

00:04:28   And I added question marks at the end of them

00:04:30   'cause it's like, what, what?

00:04:32   And it's hard to say,

00:04:33   but I had them placed as closely together as possible.

00:04:37   I did a bunch of video.

00:04:38   So I have one on an arm.

00:04:40   And so I had that one basically kind of spooning

00:04:44   the other one that it was right in front of it.

00:04:47   So that the cameras were very, very close.

00:04:51   One of them was about a half an inch higher

00:04:53   and maybe a half an inch back,

00:04:55   but they're as close as they could possibly get

00:04:57   to one another and not interfere with the wide angle camera

00:05:00   on either one of them, right?

00:05:01   Because when I was setting it up, I was like,

00:05:03   "Oh, that looks good."

00:05:04   And then I realized that I could see the top

00:05:06   of the other display.

00:05:07   So I had to adjust a little bit.

00:05:08   I got them as close as I could.

00:05:09   And as far as I can tell in my setup,

00:05:13   and of course every environment's different

00:05:14   'cause it is dynamically changing its settings

00:05:16   based on who knows what, what it sees,

00:05:20   it looked like they backed off on the crop a little bit.

00:05:24   So that gives them more pixels to work with,

00:05:27   which is kind of smart.

00:05:28   I think maybe the crop was too aggressive

00:05:31   and it seems to be maybe a little less aggressive

00:05:35   when it's moving around,

00:05:37   that it does that a little bit less.

00:05:40   But, oh, and key point, if you turn it off,

00:05:45   the crop, when you turn off center stage,

00:05:47   is a little bit lower.

00:05:49   It's still not as low as it probably should be,

00:05:51   but it's a little bit lower than it was before,

00:05:53   where you turn it off and it would be like

00:05:54   the top half of your head

00:05:56   when you were sitting in front of your display,

00:05:57   which is just terribly framed.

00:05:59   They seem to have moved it a little bit.

00:06:01   So is it better?

00:06:03   A little.

00:06:04   Does this solve all the problems?

00:06:06   Well, no.

00:06:07   I mean, it doesn't change the fact

00:06:08   that this is a wide angle 12 megapixel camera

00:06:13   that they also used in the iPad

00:06:14   and that it is not ever gonna provide,

00:06:19   the hardware wise,

00:06:19   it's just never gonna provide the same experience

00:06:22   as a camera that is devoting all of its pixels

00:06:25   to the perfect frame of you sitting in front of the display.

00:06:28   That's just a decision they made

00:06:30   that they thought it was more important

00:06:31   to forego some image quality

00:06:33   in return for getting center stage.

00:06:36   And as you pointed out to me privately last week,

00:06:40   and then also I think mentioned on Connected,

00:06:42   I am a big proponent of center stage on the Mac.

00:06:45   So it's my fault that this happened.

00:06:46   I apologize to everyone.

00:06:48   (laughing)

00:06:49   Myke literally wrote, you did this.

00:06:52   - It was very funny to me because

00:06:55   I don't remember what it was,

00:06:57   but I think at a moment you mentioned

00:07:00   like maybe center stage was a mistake.

00:07:02   I think we were talking about this.

00:07:04   and to which I said, "You, you for months, months."

00:07:07   And I was like, I think I went back

00:07:09   and found your first article,

00:07:10   like where you said like this must, you know.

00:07:12   - I'm in the bag for center stage.

00:07:14   So here's the thing,

00:07:15   three quarters of the Macs that are sold are laptops, right?

00:07:18   It kind of makes sense on a laptop.

00:07:20   You're doing a Zoom call, you put it on the coffee table,

00:07:23   you're sitting back, it auto frames you,

00:07:25   you know, you're talking to family

00:07:26   and a family member comes in,

00:07:28   like it makes more sense on a laptop.

00:07:30   I still think that there's a use case for it on an iMac

00:07:32   or something like that,

00:07:33   because it's sitting on a table somewhere

00:07:35   and you may be moving around or it's in the kitchen

00:07:37   or they've got all these different places

00:07:38   where you might use an iMac theoretically.

00:07:40   I have yet to see a kitchen iMac in the wild.

00:07:44   I'm sure they exist.

00:07:44   Anyway, a standalone display to sit at a desk and use

00:07:49   is probably the least likely Mac scenario

00:07:55   that requires center stage, but they ran with it, right?

00:07:58   - I think they made the wrong call.

00:07:58   I believe the studio display is collateral damage

00:08:03   in an overall product decision that Apple has made,

00:08:07   which is that all front facing cameras

00:08:10   will get center stage except the iPhone,

00:08:13   maybe the iPhone one day, but.

00:08:15   - I think you're probably right, and I think that,

00:08:17   although I think that our little corner of the world

00:08:19   is not necessarily representative of the whole user base,

00:08:24   for a standalone display, it's a lot closer, right?

00:08:29   Like the people who focus on Apple stuff

00:08:31   and listen to podcasts about Apple and stuff like that.

00:08:33   Probably not representative of all Apple users,

00:08:37   certainly all iPhone users,

00:08:39   probably not even of all Mac users.

00:08:41   But when you get down to the level

00:08:42   of the standalone $1,600 display,

00:08:45   that's for people who care about

00:08:47   the resolution of that display

00:08:51   and the fact that it's 5K at 27.

00:08:53   And that is actually kind of us.

00:08:56   And so seeing this reaction, it's very clear.

00:08:59   And I'll just say it.

00:09:00   Like, I'm not as strident about this

00:09:03   because I kind of don't care.

00:09:05   I like center stage and I can perfectly accept

00:09:08   that the quality is lower.

00:09:10   'Cause it's like, okay, you know, whatever,

00:09:12   but center stage is cool.

00:09:13   Like I get it, but it's clear, I think,

00:09:15   that most people just want a nice webcam that works

00:09:19   and that if Apple had built in a static 4K webcam

00:09:22   properly framed in a way that we have come to appreciate it,

00:09:25   that would be good enough.

00:09:27   And they didn't.

00:09:30   And I think that center stage still has its place

00:09:32   on the Mac, but one, they might wanna consider

00:09:36   upgrading the optics on it, like using a better camera.

00:09:39   And two, let's not, just to step back a second,

00:09:42   I still think the firmware is bad.

00:09:44   I still think that turn off center stage crop

00:09:47   is still wrong, it's better than it was,

00:09:50   but I think it's still too high.

00:09:52   I used it over the weekend for a D&D session

00:09:54   and I had to like lower my display and raise my chair

00:09:58   in order to try and get it to the right height.

00:10:00   I don't know, it doesn't seem like it's,

00:10:03   it still doesn't seem right.

00:10:04   So there's that.

00:10:05   And then I think if you,

00:10:07   people looked at like the white balance

00:10:09   and looked at a histogram of the image

00:10:10   and did some like contrast stuff.

00:10:12   And it's like, I also feel like

00:10:14   the software is making bad decisions

00:10:15   that make it look worse than it needs to,

00:10:18   even if the hardware is so limited.

00:10:20   So I think that the firmware shipped in an unfinished state

00:10:25   or an unacceptable state.

00:10:26   and that's unfortunate.

00:10:28   And then the big issue,

00:10:32   which is the Apple it just works black box kind of thing

00:10:34   is out there too, which is,

00:10:36   why is there not a settings panel somewhere for this thing?

00:10:39   Why can I not choose to reduce the color,

00:10:42   you know, saturation or change the contrast

00:10:45   or something, anything.

00:10:47   And maybe it's because they're using their image pipeline.

00:10:49   Maybe do we need photographic styles for our webcam?

00:10:52   I don't know.

00:10:54   This would also solve your problem, right?

00:10:56   Like a webcam settings app for a separate webcam,

00:11:00   frequently those have a little box that lets you say,

00:11:03   what's the refresh rate of your lights

00:11:05   so that it doesn't flicker?

00:11:06   And Apple's like, no, no, no, we got this, we got this,

00:11:10   you don't need any settings, but they don't got this.

00:11:12   - Not on the studio display.

00:11:14   So listeners may remember me saying that on my iMac

00:11:18   and on my MacBook Pro, the flickering issue

00:11:21   that I was having here at the studio

00:11:23   because of the overhead light and I have had gone away

00:11:26   that Apple seemed to have in Mac OS 12.3 fixed this.

00:11:30   The studio display is not fixed.

00:11:32   Weirdly, in about one in five attempts of me opening

00:11:36   and quitting an app like Zoom, it will fix itself,

00:11:40   but it is incredibly inconsistent.

00:11:42   So like I can open an app and it's flickering,

00:11:44   quit, open, quit, open, quit, open, quit, oh, it's fixed.

00:11:48   So I don't understand why I think I'm using

00:11:50   the current shipping firmware. I don't know if there's any change in the beta firmware.

00:11:56   But at the moment I'm having this annoying situation where I'm at my desk on my studio

00:12:00   display and I need to do a video call. So I need to go over to my iMac, turn on my iMac

00:12:05   and use that one instead because my iMac's camera is fine. Finally it's very frustrating.

00:12:10   I don't know why this is happening. It seems like it's, you know, if you can fix it in

00:12:13   one place why haven't you fixed it everywhere? And like Jason said, if they just allowed

00:12:17   me to change the rate from 60 to 50 Hertz or whichever way around it is, I could fix

00:12:22   this. Like I've been able to, like every Logitech camera lets me fix this.

00:12:25   Settings, settings, settings.

00:12:26   Yeah, just let me change it.

00:12:27   The default prop thing.

00:12:28   You can put this in system preferences. Just put it in system preferences. Like it's fine,

00:12:31   you know?

00:12:32   Like if you want to turn off center stage but you want to have the framing you want,

00:12:34   why is there not like a little interface with a little box where I can drag out how big

00:12:38   I want the frame to be and where in the frame I want it to be and have it be like I want

00:12:43   it to be a little bit lower. But Apple's like, "No, no, no, no, no, no, no. We got this."

00:12:46   And again, they don't, they don't got it.

00:12:48   And I can like setting aside the,

00:12:51   should they have put center stage on the desktop

00:12:53   and clearly from everybody in our sphere,

00:12:57   not everybody, a majority of people,

00:12:58   I would say in our sphere, the answer is,

00:13:00   no, it's not really necessary.

00:13:02   We really just wanted a good webcam that was solid

00:13:04   and that did its job.

00:13:05   People are pining for the iMac Pro webcam,

00:13:07   which is just a 1080 webcam.

00:13:09   It's nothing special at all, but it was okay, right?

00:13:13   And people are like, oh, remember that?

00:13:14   That's a bad sign, right?

00:13:16   But there is this whole other level,

00:13:18   which is if you're gonna do center stage

00:13:21   and you're gonna have it be like this,

00:13:23   software should be better.

00:13:25   Like the software should be better.

00:13:26   There's no doubt.

00:13:27   It doesn't look good.

00:13:28   And it looks like the software could do a better job.

00:13:30   And then separately, how about user settings?

00:13:34   How about letting me,

00:13:35   I get you want everything to be a default,

00:13:37   but like let me adjust a setting.

00:13:39   I would like to be able to say,

00:13:41   I did this on webcam settings

00:13:44   for my Logitech webcam all the time.

00:13:45   I was like, wow, it's too saturated.

00:13:48   My whole face is glowing red.

00:13:50   I would like it to be a little less saturated.

00:13:52   Can't do that either.

00:13:53   It just is what it is.

00:13:54   It's ridiculous.

00:13:55   - This Friday, May 6th, at 9.30 a.m. Pacific,

00:13:59   12.30 a.m. Eastern US,

00:14:01   and half past five British summer time,

00:14:03   I'm going to be voiding a warranty live on Twitch

00:14:08   at mike.live as I rip open a touch ID magic keyboard

00:14:14   with Mr. Jason Snow, Esquire's help.

00:14:17   And I'm gonna try and pull out all of the components

00:14:21   to get an external touch ID button.

00:14:23   So, and I don't think I told you Jason,

00:14:26   I've decided to drop it now.

00:14:28   My overall goal now is to try and embed this

00:14:32   in one of my keyboards.

00:14:34   - Oh man, imagine. - I don't know if or how

00:14:36   this is gonna be possible, but that's my like later goal.

00:14:40   But yeah, first I have to get it out of there.

00:14:44   So I've got all the iFixit tools,

00:14:47   and we're gonna have a blast this Friday, May 6th.

00:14:50   So come and join us, it'll be fun.

00:14:51   - Well, yeah, at the very least,

00:14:52   I would love for it to lead to a,

00:14:55   get a like a 3D printed enclosure or something.

00:14:59   - If I can't get it inside of a keyboard,

00:15:01   that's the plan, right?

00:15:02   Get a little box I can put on.

00:15:04   - So I will just be there to cheer you on,

00:15:06   I guess, as a guest star.

00:15:08   - Yep, and maybe to help me with the iFixit guide.

00:15:10   - Oh, sure.

00:15:11   Oh, help?

00:15:12   Love it, love it.

00:15:13   So instead of just sitting there going,

00:15:14   "Boo, you screwed it up, boo."

00:15:16   I can actually be helpful.

00:15:18   Wow, I don't know why I didn't assume

00:15:20   that I would be helping, but I did not.

00:15:21   So, okay.

00:15:22   - I'm gonna be able to shout at you.

00:15:24   And also, to contact the emergency services

00:15:26   in case of a thermal event.

00:15:28   - I dial 999, right?

00:15:29   That's what I do in the UK.

00:15:31   - Yep. - 999?

00:15:32   - If you were in the UK, yes, you would dial that number.

00:15:35   - Yeah, so I'll do one,

00:15:37   and then plus four four is the country code.

00:15:39   - Plus four four, nine nine.

00:15:40   - Nine nine nine.

00:15:42   And then I say, hello, UK emergency.

00:15:44   My friend soldered his hand to a keyboard.

00:15:48   - I have one rumor roundup item for you, Jason.

00:15:52   - It's a small corral.

00:15:53   There's only a couple of heifers in the corral today.

00:15:58   - And this is also kind of follow up

00:16:00   because last week we saw mock-ups

00:16:02   of the back of the iPhone 14 line, right?

00:16:04   So we got the kind of the sizes of the iPhones.

00:16:07   Now we are reportedly, we have images via MacRumors

00:16:11   of the displays.

00:16:13   These are again shared on Weibo.

00:16:16   What we can see here is the kind of,

00:16:20   the regular phones, the standard phones,

00:16:22   the iPhone 14 and the iPhone 14 Max,

00:16:24   looking pretty much as you would expect with the notch.

00:16:27   But the Pro phones now feature two cutouts,

00:16:31   one for the camera, like a hole punch,

00:16:33   and then a pill-shaped cutout for the Face ID sensors.

00:16:36   The bezels are slimmer across all of the phones,

00:16:39   but also apparently the Pro phones

00:16:41   have a slightly taller, giving them a revised aspect ratio

00:16:46   of 20 by nine rather than 19.5 by nine.

00:16:49   - So I read Mark Gurman's newsletter this weekend

00:16:55   and he's the sheriff of the room around up, of course.

00:16:58   He, by the way, I'm enjoying that newsletter a lot,

00:17:01   but I also have noticed that, you know,

00:17:04   when you have to write a thing every week,

00:17:05   instead of just when you've got breaking news,

00:17:07   he's ventured into our sphere of speculation

00:17:11   what I would like instead of here's what I report.

00:17:13   - Honestly, I think that's part of why it exists.

00:17:15   So he can do that, right?

00:17:16   'Cause you can't talk about,

00:17:17   he can't talk like that in a kind of like

00:17:19   official capacity, I guess.

00:17:20   - Right, here's a big Bloomberg story

00:17:22   about Mark Gurman speculating about

00:17:24   what he would like to see in the next, right?

00:17:26   They don't do that, right?

00:17:27   So no, it's fun to see him putting on his punditry hat.

00:17:32   What's confusing is where you start reading it

00:17:36   and you're like, is this a report?

00:17:39   No, it's just a dream.

00:17:41   It's just kind of wish casting.

00:17:43   And you just gotta keep those separate.

00:17:45   There was a Reuters, Reuters pushed out

00:17:49   an opinion column last week,

00:17:51   without getting into the subject more than this.

00:17:53   It pushed out an opinion column by somebody at Reuters,

00:17:56   you know, and it's a wire service.

00:17:57   So you can see why people sort of take it as like fact.

00:18:00   And the opinion column was,

00:18:02   I don't think the Elon Musk Twitter deal is gonna work.

00:18:05   and I saw that spread everywhere as like report.

00:18:09   Elon Musk's deal for Twitter is falling apart.

00:18:12   I was like, I read the story, it was an opinion column.

00:18:16   - So I don't know if they changed it,

00:18:17   but I think originally this went around

00:18:19   because the opinion column was called Breaking Views.

00:18:22   - Yes.

00:18:23   - Like Breaking News, so people just read it

00:18:25   as Breaking News. - Haha, fooled ya.

00:18:27   - But it's not, it's just--

00:18:29   - It's just an opinion column.

00:18:30   - It was a decent opinion, but--

00:18:31   - I would say, and I'm not criticizing Mark here

00:18:34   'cause I actually really like it.

00:18:35   But since we're so used to,

00:18:36   we're so trained that he's doing reports,

00:18:38   that when he starts talking about what he'd like to see,

00:18:40   that's not a report, right?

00:18:41   That's just what he'd like to see.

00:18:43   Unless it's coded, but I don't think it is.

00:18:45   I think it's literally just what he'd like to see.

00:18:47   While we're talking about the new iPhones,

00:18:49   I wanted to mention something that Mark Gurman said

00:18:52   this week, which was, I'm interested how you feel about this.

00:18:56   He said, yes, the notch will be replaced in this phone

00:18:59   with the little pill shape and the little circle.

00:19:02   And what he was addressing was like,

00:19:04   what are the benefits of that?

00:19:05   And his response was, there are no benefits.

00:19:09   All it really does is make it look different.

00:19:11   And so if you want to have a new phone and say,

00:19:14   look, aha, I have the new iPhone,

00:19:16   look how different it is.

00:19:17   It's got these two little dots instead of a notch,

00:19:20   then great.

00:19:21   But in terms of functionality, like that's a safe area.

00:19:24   You can't put anything up there anyway.

00:19:26   I thought it was good analysis.

00:19:28   'Cause I think that in the end,

00:19:29   while it is the goal is to make the notch disappear entirely

00:19:33   and the less stuff that's covered on the display

00:19:35   where you can have like background color and stuff,

00:19:37   the better, in terms of functionality,

00:19:39   it makes no difference because it's still in a space

00:19:42   where nothing can happen.

00:19:43   - I think it will be visually more appealing,

00:19:46   but I think this is just a step, right?

00:19:50   Like the step being to eventually hide all of this

00:19:54   behind the display, right?

00:19:55   Like that's the ultimate goal here.

00:19:58   lots of companies are trying and failing to make this work,

00:20:01   but like that's how all this technology goes, right?

00:20:04   The ideal here is that we don't have to see any of this.

00:20:07   The sensors are hidden behind the display,

00:20:09   the camera's hidden behind the display.

00:20:11   So I can imagine this being more visually appealing,

00:20:14   takes up less space.

00:20:16   We'll see though, I mean it could be more distracting

00:20:18   to have these two little like black dots

00:20:21   in the middle of your phone. - I don't know.

00:20:22   - I don't know, but-- - Somebody can create a game

00:20:24   with a bunch of little black dots and pills

00:20:25   all over the screen and some of them move around.

00:20:27   - The two of them don't.

00:20:29   - But I do agree with Mark Gurman's analysis

00:20:32   that this is purely to make the new phone,

00:20:37   at least the pro models, visually identifiable.

00:20:43   'Cause I think over time, what Apple has learned is,

00:20:46   that's when they have the big quarters,

00:20:48   when the phone looks different.

00:20:49   I mean, everybody knows this by now, right?

00:20:51   We've said it a million times,

00:20:52   everyone's said it a million times.

00:20:54   You can look at the charts.

00:20:55   When they change the design of the phone,

00:20:57   they see the biggest impact.

00:20:59   Of course, when they make physical changes,

00:21:02   I actually think that the iPhone 14's gonna do great anyway,

00:21:05   because like for this, and also the return of the large phone

00:21:09   that's not a pro phone.

00:21:12   - Large non-pro phone will sell a bunch of units.

00:21:14   - Between the two of these,

00:21:15   I think the 14's gonna be very good for them.

00:21:18   - And I love my iPhone mini,

00:21:19   and I'm probably not gonna replace it at all,

00:21:22   but I will say, even I feel the pull

00:21:25   when they create a pro level that's differentiated,

00:21:29   the more they do that, the more I'm like,

00:21:31   "Oh, I could get the pro, it's got all these features."

00:21:33   - Especially if this one's gonna have that camera, right?

00:21:34   The full game, like a picture camera.

00:21:35   - Well, this is the thing.

00:21:36   So they already added, they've got ProMotion,

00:21:38   they've got the third camera.

00:21:40   Now they're gonna do a camera upgrade,

00:21:42   there's a processor upgrade,

00:21:43   there's the replacing the notch with this stuff.

00:21:46   Like you were talking about a bunch,

00:21:48   like even more things are differentiated.

00:21:52   And that does have a gravitational pull, right?

00:21:55   That's gonna pull a lot of people who are like,

00:21:58   spec interested away from the cheaper model,

00:22:01   'cause they're gonna be like, "Oh."

00:22:02   Whereas when they were basically the same,

00:22:04   except for maybe like an extra camera, a lot less appealing.

00:22:07   But when they're like, "Oh, and the processor's better,

00:22:10   and like everything's better in it,"

00:22:11   it will be a little more tempting.

00:22:14   And so I agree.

00:22:16   Do you wanna hear my A16 speculation?

00:22:18   - Yeah, 'cause we have, I was thinking about this.

00:22:19   I don't think we've touched on this, right?

00:22:22   So the report is that from Ming-Chi Kuo,

00:22:26   the Marshall of the Roundup, I guess, right?

00:22:30   Is that what we decided?

00:22:31   - That's what we decided, yep.

00:22:32   - Ming-Chi Kuo said that the Pro phone will get the A16,

00:22:36   the regular phone will stay on the A15,

00:22:40   which is weird, right?

00:22:41   'Cause it's like, well, we upgraded the new iPhone,

00:22:43   but it doesn't have a new processor.

00:22:44   It's just got the A15 that you all know.

00:22:47   And maybe that's the case, but I had a moment of clarity

00:22:52   Because the challenge here is that,

00:22:53   are they committing then to having every year,

00:22:56   like next year, it'll be the A16 in the iPhone 15

00:23:01   and the A17 in the iPhone 16.

00:23:04   It's very complicated, right?

00:23:06   What if, just throwing it out there, just spitballing,

00:23:11   this is all it is.

00:23:12   What if instead of it being the A15 in the iPhone 14

00:23:17   and the A16 in the iPhone 14 Pro, right?

00:23:21   - Right.

00:23:22   What if Apple says, "Hey, the A16 is here."

00:23:26   And what the A16 really is,

00:23:31   is a very small improvement on the A15.

00:23:36   It's using new cores maybe,

00:23:38   but it is otherwise essentially the A15.

00:23:42   And then there's an A16 Pro chip

00:23:50   that's better that goes in the iPhone Pro.

00:23:54   And I say that because it allows them to claim

00:23:56   that the new chip is in both models,

00:23:59   but that there's a better chip in the Pro phone.

00:24:02   And I think from a marketing standpoint,

00:24:05   I think that's a better move than saying it's 15 in the old

00:24:08   and 16 in the new, is to differentiate

00:24:11   like they do on the Mac and say there's an A16

00:24:14   and an A16 Pro.

00:24:15   And then we all do the benchmarking on the new iPhone

00:24:18   that's got the A16 and we're like,

00:24:19   wow, this is really just basically an A15.

00:24:23   Uh-huh, it is.

00:24:24   - Maybe they do the binning of the graphics processes

00:24:27   like they've done in some of the devices.

00:24:29   - Maybe so, maybe it's, yeah, it's purely based on binning

00:24:33   and the cores are the same

00:24:35   or the cores are a little bit better

00:24:37   but you can't really tell or they save some efficiency

00:24:40   so it's more efficient but it's slower on the A16

00:24:44   but the A16 Pro gets to, I'm just saying,

00:24:47   the more I think about this,

00:24:48   and this is based on no reports,

00:24:50   I am literally just making this up.

00:24:52   If I were in that room at Apple,

00:24:56   I'd be like, can we make it different enough

00:24:59   that we can call it the A16 and the A16 Pro

00:25:02   rather than having last year's chip in this year's phone

00:25:05   and also this year's chip in this year's Pro phone?

00:25:08   Would that be a better look for us?

00:25:10   And maybe not, maybe Tim Cook's like, nah, it's fine.

00:25:13   It's a cheaper phone.

00:25:14   They're gonna be a step behind.

00:25:16   We're already more than a lap ahead of the competition,

00:25:19   so we can afford to do this.

00:25:21   But I just think, I keep thinking calling it the A16

00:25:26   when it's not particularly better or different

00:25:29   than the A15 just a little bit,

00:25:32   and then saying we also have the A16 Pro,

00:25:35   keeps everything in lockstep a little bit more.

00:25:37   Anyway, I also think it's very confusing

00:25:40   that we have these chip numbers and model numbers

00:25:42   and they're off by two.

00:25:43   That also drives me batty.

00:25:45   So to have it be three different numbers

00:25:47   that you have to keep track of.

00:25:48   iPhone 14 with a 15 and a 16, that also is a lot.

00:25:53   So, you know, they got issues.

00:25:56   But anyway, that's my completely idle speculation

00:25:58   is what if they, instead of having a 15 and a 16,

00:26:01   they had a 16 and a 16 Pro,

00:26:04   and the 16 was essentially the 15,

00:26:06   but you know, dressed up a little bit.

00:26:08   - Here's what, I'll just put this out there.

00:26:10   I don't think this is gonna happen.

00:26:11   I'm gonna put it out there.

00:26:12   what if they say that there's the A16 in the iPhone 14

00:26:17   and the iPhone 14 Pro has an M2 chip in it?

00:26:20   - Could?

00:26:21   - Now that's, I mean, okay,

00:26:24   so I want to just unpack that a little bit

00:26:27   'cause that's quite a thing I've said, right?

00:26:28   So what we could say is that the A16,

00:26:32   what we think of as the A16 is probably the base

00:26:37   of the next M chips anyway, right?

00:26:40   It's the expectation that we can make.

00:26:42   And you would say, well,

00:26:45   it's not gonna have a Thunderbolt port.

00:26:47   No, of course it won't.

00:26:47   And I think Apple could design it however they wanted to

00:26:50   and et cetera, et cetera.

00:26:52   And it's all branding at the end of the day.

00:26:54   What I'll say, the reason I would say this

00:26:56   as a possibility is just that the M line,

00:27:01   I think has a very good brand right now.

00:27:04   Maybe a better brand than the A line,

00:27:06   just like in general technology media

00:27:09   and like observation.

00:27:12   - I think the challenge is how much has the M

00:27:14   diverged from the A, right?

00:27:15   How much has it done?

00:27:17   I mean, is it really,

00:27:18   'cause the impression I've gotten is that

00:27:19   it really is appreciably larger and uses more power

00:27:23   and is more appropriate for an iPad and a Mac

00:27:25   than it is for an iPhone.

00:27:27   I see what you're saying.

00:27:29   And this is the larger point I really support

00:27:32   even though I'm not quite sure that

00:27:34   the calling it an M2 works,

00:27:36   is Apple, these are Apple's chips,

00:27:38   They can brand them however they want.

00:27:41   I just don't think that the branding of holding

00:27:43   the iPhone 14 back year in school to help the teacher

00:27:48   makes as much sense.

00:27:51   All of their other chips now are like coming,

00:27:54   you know, Pro and Ultra and Max,

00:27:57   and their phones are in Pro Max and all of that.

00:27:59   So why not just say, "Hey, here's our non-Pro phone.

00:28:02   It has the non-Pro chip, and here's our Pro phone,

00:28:04   and it has the Pro chip," and be done with it,

00:28:06   and call it the same thing.

00:28:07   Like that, that makes more sense to me.

00:28:10   - I agree with you.

00:28:10   'Cause pro is now in the chip lineup.

00:28:13   I will just say, you know,

00:28:14   in case I can stop people from sending their tweets to me,

00:28:16   I don't believe this thing about the M,

00:28:18   I just wanted to put it out there as like,

00:28:20   hey, it's a thing.

00:28:21   - 'Cause like, 'cause they can do what they want.

00:28:22   I mean, that's the bottom line.

00:28:23   They can call things what they want.

00:28:26   And that's fine.

00:28:28   Yeah, they can call it whatever they want.

00:28:30   - And this is why I mentioned that,

00:28:31   because as you said, like,

00:28:32   they might just call something the A16

00:28:34   that's not actually really an A16 at all,

00:28:36   but they've just decided to call it that

00:28:38   because they want to keep bumping the numbers up.

00:28:40   And so that's why I would say this, right?

00:28:41   That like, it can share some architecture

00:28:45   and they can just call it the M2.

00:28:46   I do like honestly, the idea of A16 Pro

00:28:49   because of the fact that they use Pro and Max and not,

00:28:54   like they have these names now that are like,

00:28:57   their branding can let you kind of forget

00:28:59   the confusing part, which is the number.

00:29:01   - Right. - And then, you know,

00:29:03   honestly, I think maybe it's time to rebrand

00:29:05   the A line of chips anyway, just because we're getting up into way too high numbers and there's

00:29:10   too many numbers now.

00:29:11   And the iPhones are also numbered, right?

00:29:13   Yes, exactly.

00:29:14   It's too many numbers.

00:29:15   Too many numbers.

00:29:16   That's all right.

00:29:17   That's our big analysis.

00:29:18   That's right.

00:29:19   Thank you, Apple.

00:29:20   Thank you for hiring us as your consultants.

00:29:21   Too many numbers.

00:29:22   That's what we say.

00:29:23   Also, I'll throw out there, you could also just call the A16, the A15 Pro and do it that

00:29:28   way if you wanted to.

00:29:30   If the A15 is literally no different and you're not putting a new chip in that base model

00:29:35   iPhone you could call the new thing A15 Pro instead of A16 because you can call it whatever

00:29:41   you want and say yeah this is the A15 Pro and then they're in lockstep again one number

00:29:49   ahead of the iPhone number by the way but there it is too many numbers.

00:29:55   This episode is brought to you by electric. When leading your small business it's not

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00:31:32   and Relay FM.

00:31:33   I got my Playdate!

00:31:35   Yay!

00:31:36   It arrived on Friday, so I've had like 3 or 4 days with this beautiful little yellow device.

00:31:43   I got one playdate with the purple pouch.

00:31:46   And I wanted to talk through some of my feelings

00:31:48   of you, Jason, and then maybe touch on some more games,

00:31:51   'cause obviously I've had two sets of games.

00:31:53   I think you've had three now.

00:31:54   - And I've had, I think I only have had

00:31:57   two sets delivered so far.

00:31:59   - Oh, okay. - Maybe today,

00:32:00   a third set has been delivered. - I think today

00:32:01   you're gonna get another two, I think.

00:32:03   You should if I've got my internal clock right there.

00:32:07   So the packaging is wonderful,

00:32:09   this beautiful yellow packaging.

00:32:10   - It is. - I did have to chuckle,

00:32:12   And it's a mean thing to laugh about, but I did chuckle that the copyright

00:32:16   date on the packaging is 2020.

00:32:17   Yeah.

00:32:19   That was the easy part.

00:32:20   Well, I mean, that just is, that's when they thought they were shipping it.

00:32:23   Right.

00:32:24   Just they printed it with 2020 on it.

00:32:26   I've been there, right?

00:32:28   I am there still with some products, you know, it's just how it goes.

00:32:31   And if people want to see the packaging and all of that, I did unbox it as you

00:32:36   chastised me about last week, cause I didn't know how to play the games.

00:32:38   I know how to play the games now.

00:32:39   Uh, but I hadn't played them yet.

00:32:42   Anyway, so there's a YouTube video where I take it apart

00:32:44   and I show you the packaging and it's adorable.

00:32:46   - Yeah, so I'll put a link to that in the show notes.

00:32:48   Yeah, it's definitely worth going to see

00:32:50   just 'cause it's cute, I'll say.

00:32:52   Like, they did a good job.

00:32:54   They've really, I think the branding

00:32:56   has been completely knocked out of the park overall

00:32:58   with the Play Date.

00:32:59   But yeah, we spoke a little bit about that last week.

00:33:03   My unit arrived totally dead.

00:33:04   The battery was 100% dead.

00:33:06   - This came up on the live stream.

00:33:09   I had to plug mine.

00:33:10   Mine was not so dead that the screen didn't show a thing

00:33:14   saying you need to plug me in.

00:33:16   - No, mine was 100%, nothing.

00:33:18   - But I heard from other people who had nothing

00:33:21   and it came out, I mean, we were thinking

00:33:23   'cause mine had to sit for quite a while.

00:33:26   And it came out that if you did plug it in

00:33:29   and you just waited a long time,

00:33:31   it would eventually get to the point

00:33:32   where it would be responsive.

00:33:33   They just, a lot of them had been sitting for so long

00:33:35   that the batteries were completely discharged.

00:33:38   Mine was like half an hour and it was ready to go.

00:33:41   But that was fine to be honest.

00:33:42   Like it wasn't an issue.

00:33:43   I'm just happy I saw this on the Playdate Twitter account

00:33:46   'cause I would have been pretty worried.

00:33:48   - Well, and they did that because it,

00:33:51   we were all figuring it out.

00:33:52   Like in the, those of us who got them right

00:33:54   in those first few days and this happened.

00:33:56   And then, and so then they're like, oh yeah,

00:33:57   we need to relay this to everybody that you may get it.

00:34:00   It's okay.

00:34:01   Just plug it in and wait.

00:34:02   - The setup process is great.

00:34:05   One of the things that I really enjoy is text input

00:34:08   with the crank. You don't have to intertext a lot. If you did this would be annoying.

00:34:13   But it's like a kind of like a slot machine. You have like these three drums and you can

00:34:18   just spin them with the... I like it. It's fun. Like you mentioned last week, it becomes

00:34:25   apparent very quickly that this device needs a backlight. It is the only thing that I have

00:34:30   negative to say about the Play Date. The screen is amazing. It's incredibly crisp and if you

00:34:37   have some light behind you it's fantastic and really visible but the problem is you

00:34:43   don't always like sometimes you know I kind of just I just hold the device at the comfortable

00:34:48   angle for me and now I've locked out the light you know and so like that is it's an issue

00:34:54   I hope somebody honestly I hope panic will I know why they might not but I hope that

00:34:59   they will just make a light accessory like we used to have for Game Boys.

00:35:04   light yeah. Just do it like it's fine right like embrace it and like you know I understand

00:35:09   what they're saying and I like the screen technology they chose with it being so reflective

00:35:15   cannot be backlit I get that. My question is why did you make that I'm really intrigued

00:35:22   as to why they made that decision anyway but it's where they went. You see it with Kindles

00:35:28   and things that they, you know, with a Kindle, they engineered side lighting, where basically

00:35:34   you add a little bit of thickness, but you've got lights on the sides that are, there's

00:35:39   like a little guide, a little light guide that shines the lights just down onto the

00:35:44   screen. And I guess that it's hard and it would make it thicker and like it's a first,

00:35:47   I get it, I get it all, but it is unfortunate that that is one of the things where you're

00:35:51   playing it and you get, you readjust your posture to be more comfortable and you can't,

00:35:56   suddenly you can't see what's going on on the screen. It's not great.

00:35:59   But I let it go because when you do have the right lighting the screen is like unfathomably

00:36:05   excellent to look at. It is just fantastic. It is similar to if you have played an analog

00:36:12   pocket which is the kind of the Gameboy machine right that is similar right the screen is

00:36:18   just like I can't believe how good this is. And so yeah as Zach has mentioned in the in

00:36:23   in

00:36:44   the music in every game that I've played so far is great which is which works really nicely.

00:36:50   I'm sure because of there being no lighting in it the battery life is great. I've been

00:36:55   really happy with the battery. I was playing the system a bunch over the weekend. I've

00:37:00   charged it once and it charges really fast. So overall like before I get into some of

00:37:07   the games and touch on those a little bit I just think like what I like about the playdate

00:37:13   is it pure fun.

00:37:15   Like, in a way that games aren't always,

00:37:20   or like playing games isn't always,

00:37:22   it's just like, it doesn't take itself too seriously.

00:37:25   It has a crank on it, which I've actually really enjoyed

00:37:30   the crank mechanic in the games that I've played so far.

00:37:32   A podcast that I was listening to recently,

00:37:37   one of the hosts, two of the hosts,

00:37:39   Blessing Erioya Jr. and Janet Garcia

00:37:42   on Kind of Funny Games Daily, they referred to the Playdate as this is a game system for

00:37:48   art kids and hipsters. And like, that is not, like I can hear someone hearing that, that

00:37:54   sounds disparaging, but I completely understand it. Like, the types of games that are on Playdate

00:38:01   are very artistic in their creation. Like, in a way that is not going to sell millions

00:38:09   of units but for people that have $180 to put down on a yellow thing which is tiny,

00:38:17   the size of a post-it note with a crank on it, those people probably want games for art

00:38:24   kids and hipsters because they are one of those two. You are a hipster game person if

00:38:29   you buy this and so the games should be focused on that. One of the games I'm going to mention

00:38:34   in a minute called Bloom is like that, which is a third-party game. But like it hits nicely.

00:38:40   - And, I mean, okay, so hipsters and our kids, right? Those are like stereotype terms and all

00:38:47   that. But I think what has struck me about it, and it's not just because we know the people

00:38:51   at Panic, although it is that too, is a group of regular people who love games and are techy people,

00:39:02   and they have a company, right, which allows them to do this, but they are not a giant

00:39:08   entertainment conglomerate. A group of techie people who love games said, "We're gonna make

00:39:15   a handheld game device." And they made it happen. And that's my favorite thing about the Playdate,

00:39:22   is that it is not part of a—although there is, I'm sure, corporate strategy involved,

00:39:26   and they had to spend all those years working with their factory in Malaysia and doing all

00:39:30   and all these things, right?

00:39:31   Like it is a corporation,

00:39:32   Panic's a corporation.

00:39:33   And they're trying not to, you know,

00:39:35   have this bankrupt them and maybe be successful.

00:39:37   - Panic is now a big company getting bigger all the time.

00:39:40   - Right, but I will still say,

00:39:42   Playdate is a product made out of love.

00:39:44   - Yes, and you feel it.

00:39:45   - And I defy you to find any piece of gaming hardware

00:39:50   or at least any piece of an original game device

00:39:55   that is made out of love.

00:39:57   I'm sure there are a handful out there.

00:39:59   And in fact that your--

00:40:01   - The analog pocket.

00:40:02   - Analog pocket is probably in that category.

00:40:06   But even there it's playing old software,

00:40:08   at least as one of the primary ideas here.

00:40:10   There's like Panic just wanted to make a fun piece

00:40:13   of hardware because they love games.

00:40:15   And again, it's more than that,

00:40:17   but like I just am trying to say the impetus

00:40:19   for so much stuff in the gaming world especially,

00:40:22   and really in the world is it comes from the top.

00:40:26   It comes from I'm a giant corporation,

00:40:28   what is our new product going to be,

00:40:29   and how do we compromise it,

00:40:31   and how do we tie it into all of these things.

00:40:33   And although the people who are working on that love games,

00:40:36   undoubtedly, it's not the same as making it out of love,

00:40:41   which is what Panic did.

00:40:42   - Yeah, and that's like, again,

00:40:44   like I wanna bring it back to what I mentioned, right?

00:40:46   The art kids and hipsters.

00:40:47   Like the art part is, and why I think this works is,

00:40:51   the Play Date, it's for people who love

00:40:53   the art of video games.

00:40:55   It's like that video games are a work of art,

00:40:59   and you feel that in this device where it's like,

00:41:02   we have a great appreciation for what video gaming can be,

00:41:06   and it can be this.

00:41:08   It doesn't need to be all black and gray

00:41:12   and army suits and guns, right?

00:41:15   Like it can be there's a little robot

00:41:18   and he's late for a date

00:41:20   and he can move forward and backwards in time, right?

00:41:23   - Yeah.

00:41:24   He gets kicked if he's too late.

00:41:28   Yeah, we'll talk about it.

00:41:30   Yeah, it is adorable.

00:41:31   - One of the games, Casual Birder,

00:41:33   which is one of the first games that you get.

00:41:36   Casual Birder is a joke about casual gaming.

00:41:40   And you are referenced as a,

00:41:42   oh, you're just a casual birder.

00:41:44   Like, the joke in this RPG about bird watching

00:41:51   is the idea of like, you are not a hardcore gamer,

00:41:54   which I enjoy a lot. - Oh yeah, I said this

00:41:56   last time, the mean kids come out and say,

00:41:58   what are you, some sort of casual birder?

00:42:00   - It's really good.

00:42:02   And so casual birder, I really enjoyed a lot.

00:42:07   It is a-- - I thought you would.

00:42:08   I thought that was the one where I thought

00:42:09   this is in my kind of game.

00:42:10   - That I was so in, I've finished the game.

00:42:13   I didn't 100% the game.

00:42:15   You can, you have to like take photos

00:42:17   of a bunch of birds around the environment.

00:42:19   and I think it was like 26,

00:42:21   and you can complete it earlier than that,

00:42:22   which I did if you solve enough puzzles in the right order,

00:42:27   because it's very much like an RPG in the sense of,

00:42:31   you can tell you need to do something,

00:42:33   but you don't have the thing to do it,

00:42:36   so you have to go around the environment

00:42:38   until you come across the key for that puzzle, as it were.

00:42:43   And it's hilariously funny.

00:42:45   I was having a great time with it.

00:42:47   The music is amazing.

00:42:49   is a really funny, weird, cute little game.

00:42:52   This is one of the first games along with White Water Wipeout

00:42:55   which is the surfing game, which I will say Jason,

00:42:57   I enjoy it, but I'm not good at it.

00:43:00   - I have gotten way better at it.

00:43:01   And I'm really enjoying it now that I figured out

00:43:04   how to play it, which you were very angry about,

00:43:07   but I've done some 360s, I've done some triple 360s,

00:43:12   whatever that is.

00:43:13   I've done, I'm still, I wish there was a like a help screen

00:43:19   Yeah, I have this with a few of the games.

00:43:22   Yeah.

00:43:23   And this one is like, there are controls in White Water Wipeout to help you get better

00:43:29   at the game and they tell you them through the game.

00:43:31   I would just like to be able to see them at any point.

00:43:36   I also don't know what they all do.

00:43:38   Like, they're like, try holding down left when you do a jump.

00:43:40   I'm like, okay.

00:43:41   Yeah, and I'm still not.

00:43:42   And it does something.

00:43:43   I think it moves the board quickly.

00:43:44   I don't know what it's-

00:43:45   Like, it helps you complete the move, but I'm not sure it does that.

00:43:48   - Like as a kid going to arcades,

00:43:50   if you stood in front of the arcade

00:43:53   and nobody was playing,

00:43:54   you stood in front of the arcade console,

00:43:57   it had like a little demo screen where it said,

00:43:59   "Here's how you play," basically.

00:44:01   "Press this to do this, jump over trees to stun them,

00:44:04   turn the ghosts blue and then eat them," right?

00:44:06   Like it explained how to play the game.

00:44:09   And that, if I have a criticism of these games,

00:44:13   it's that is I kind of want the little screen

00:44:15   that's like the help screen or the intro screen

00:44:17   or the, you know, press here to get some tips

00:44:20   and it shows you like, here's how to play this game.

00:44:22   And I get that maybe the argument is

00:44:24   the fun is figuring it out,

00:44:25   but I almost abandoned Whitewater Wipeout

00:44:28   because I could not understand how to play it.

00:44:30   And only--

00:44:31   - After you've told me them, let me see them then, right?

00:44:34   Like if part of it is like, I played a game,

00:44:37   I don't remember which one it was now,

00:44:38   one of the many third party games I've tried out,

00:44:40   when you pressed the kind of menu button,

00:44:43   like the little circle button that you press

00:44:45   to go back to the home,

00:44:46   like it kind of brings up like a pause screen first.

00:44:49   They had the controls listed on that screen,

00:44:53   which I just thought was like a smart place to put them.

00:44:55   Because there's another game, Boogie Loops,

00:44:58   which is in the second week,

00:45:01   where I do not understand what this game is

00:45:04   or what I'm supposed to do.

00:45:05   - I think it's a more like a software toy.

00:45:10   - I think, yeah, I think it just helps you make music, right?

00:45:12   But I don't know how.

00:45:13   - You make music and you get the characters to dance.

00:45:16   - I don't know how.

00:45:17   I don't get it. - I don't know how,

00:45:19   and I don't know what I'm missing.

00:45:22   And again, I get that the learning,

00:45:27   my son is obsessed with games, right?

00:45:30   I get that learning to play a game

00:45:32   is part of the game narrative, right?

00:45:34   Of like, we frustrate you, but then you learn.

00:45:38   But there is also a school of thought that says

00:45:43   You are not welcoming people who are not figuring it out

00:45:48   and are not gonna figure it out to your game.

00:45:51   You are excluding people by not being welcoming enough

00:45:55   that somebody who doesn't get your very potentially

00:45:57   esoteric gamers will get it,

00:45:59   other people won't kind of thing.

00:46:01   You don't wanna be that.

00:46:02   You wanna be a welcoming game.

00:46:04   You wanna be able to say,

00:46:06   "Oh, you're having trouble, let me help you."

00:46:08   And a game that doesn't do that or doesn't offer it,

00:46:12   Again, offering is something you can do

00:46:15   where you're like, no, I'll figure it out.

00:46:16   That's like every computer nerd

00:46:18   where they don't read the manual, right?

00:46:20   It's like, I don't need to read the manual,

00:46:21   I'll figure it out.

00:46:22   And then if you have trouble, you go get the manual, right?

00:46:24   That's how you do it.

00:46:25   But to not offer and to not have it

00:46:27   and just be like, good luck trying to figure it out,

00:46:29   I think it is a failure of game design if you do that.

00:46:33   And that's how I feel about that game

00:46:34   is that it doesn't want me to understand it.

00:46:37   And I don't like that.

00:46:40   I don't think that's my failure.

00:46:42   that I don't understand it and that you don't understand it,

00:46:45   I think that is the game failing to communicate properly

00:46:48   about how it works.

00:46:49   - But, you know, this is, so this comes back to it

00:46:52   of like that set, this game, I'm not into it,

00:46:55   like it's not for me, but I also got

00:46:57   Kranken's Time Travel Adventure today,

00:46:59   which is really fun.

00:47:00   This is the game they have used in most of the marketing

00:47:04   because of who has created this game.

00:47:05   This game, the idea of the game is,

00:47:08   and the design of the game is by Keita Takahashi,

00:47:11   who created Katamari Damacy and like the Katamari games,

00:47:16   legendary video game individual.

00:47:18   And it's, you know, Sean Inman helped with the pro,

00:47:21   like this is a, this game is like, oh, okay,

00:47:26   like serious people behind this game.

00:47:27   And I know that Cable Sasser is like a big fan

00:47:31   of the Katamari Damacy games and that whole franchise.

00:47:36   So like this was, I know this is a big game for them.

00:47:39   and it is the most crank heavy game.

00:47:44   It's like you are moving forward to backwards in time

00:47:47   as a way to solve puzzles.

00:47:48   - Okay, so it's not really,

00:47:52   even though it's called Time Travel Adventure,

00:47:54   you're not really moving forward and backward in time.

00:47:57   But that's part of the discovery of it.

00:47:59   I love this game, I think it's amazing.

00:48:00   I now understand why it took me a little while

00:48:03   to figure it out, but I figured it out

00:48:04   and the mechanic is so simple

00:48:05   that you can figure it out fairly quickly.

00:48:08   It's a good example actually of your failure

00:48:10   teaches you how to play the game.

00:48:11   - Yes.

00:48:12   - 'Cause I was like, I don't understand,

00:48:13   why do I keep failing this level?

00:48:14   I was like, ah, patience. - Why do the birds

00:48:16   or whatever keep killing me?

00:48:17   It's like, oh, I see what's happening.

00:48:20   But I'm a little baffled that it's not on the console

00:48:24   at launch, that it's week two.

00:48:25   I don't get that.

00:48:27   Because it's so inviting.

00:48:30   And it's brilliant.

00:48:32   I love it.

00:48:34   I love that it is puzzle solving.

00:48:36   And then for those who, I mean, the way I would put it is,

00:48:40   it's not really about time travel

00:48:41   because your enemies in the game,

00:48:44   if the obstacles in the game move in regular time,

00:48:49   what it really is, is your little robot guy

00:48:51   is on his animation loop.

00:48:55   And you use the crank to move him

00:48:58   to different places on his animation loop,

00:49:01   with the goal being that he gets to the end

00:49:04   and gets to his date.

00:49:05   but there are obstacles in the way

00:49:07   that are moving at real time and they're going to stop him.

00:49:11   And so you have to adjust his animation loop

00:49:14   to be in the right position at the right moment

00:49:17   to avoid the obstacles.

00:49:18   It's a really brilliant mechanic.

00:49:20   It makes me laugh out loud.

00:49:22   There is a moment that I'm not gonna spoil here

00:49:25   that I had yesterday where I laughed for minutes.

00:49:30   Like I almost was crying at how funny

00:49:35   the and I failed it was a failure how funny uh that failure was so yeah I I uh that that

00:49:43   that game is genius I love it. So these are all the games that have come uh with the unit right

00:49:50   so these are the ones so far now we spoke like last time about like how are people going to take

00:49:56   to this like is it the right uh thing like what if you don't like a game right I think that it

00:50:03   They are, I would say, not lucky.

00:50:05   I think it is very fortunate.

00:50:07   There are third-party games,

00:50:09   and you can just download them and play them now.

00:50:11   Like you can buy them on itch.io,

00:50:14   you can download them from places.

00:50:16   We included in the show notes last week,

00:50:18   the Playdate Wiki that has a large selection

00:50:22   of all of the games that are available right now.

00:50:25   And like software, like there's some stuff is not games.

00:50:28   It's just like software.

00:50:30   So I will put a link in the show notes to the Wiki.

00:50:32   because that's where I've been finding stuff.

00:50:34   And I found a game that I'd actually heard about already

00:50:38   called Bloom.

00:50:40   And Bloom is a $10 Playdate game.

00:50:45   And it is superb.

00:50:48   It is so good.

00:50:49   It's my favorite game on the Playdate so far.

00:50:52   It is exactly what I'm looking for.

00:50:54   So it is a really chill game.

00:50:56   It's played in real time.

00:50:59   You are playing a woman who has quit school

00:51:04   and wants to start a flower shop, and you're in Japan.

00:51:08   And you have not told your parents that you've done this.

00:51:13   And you've opened your flower shop, and you have rent to pay,

00:51:17   and you have flowers to grow, so you've got flowers to sell.

00:51:20   And you have a little phone, and on your phone,

00:51:22   you can exchange text messages with friends and family.

00:51:26   And you get to choose your responses.

00:51:28   and so there's some visual novel elements

00:51:30   as the story's unfolding.

00:51:31   But then there's also, you plant your flowers,

00:51:33   you water the flowers, and then you come back

00:51:35   later on in the day and pick the flowers and sell them.

00:51:38   So it's got that kind of mechanic of,

00:51:41   you see this kind of mechanic in free-to-play games a lot,

00:51:43   plant and wait, but the idea is,

00:51:45   because it's in real time, you're supposed to just,

00:51:47   throughout your day, just pop in, check in on Bloom,

00:51:51   and pick some flowers, and then plant some more flowers.

00:51:55   It's just beautiful.

00:51:56   The crank is used really nicely to move

00:51:58   between the elements of the game.

00:52:00   There's games within the game.

00:52:02   It is superb.

00:52:04   The writing is excellent.

00:52:06   The visuals are really great.

00:52:08   I adore this game.

00:52:10   Like for me, it's like, this is exactly the type

00:52:12   of experience that I'm looking for out of this device.

00:52:15   The idea of having these little games

00:52:18   where I can check in on them throughout the day,

00:52:20   as when I told Adina about this, she was like,

00:52:22   "Oh, you got a Tamagotchi."

00:52:23   and I'm like, oh my God, please let somebody

00:52:25   make a Tamagotchi for the Playdate.

00:52:27   (laughing)

00:52:27   You're saying that already, right?

00:52:29   This is the kind of stuff I'm looking for

00:52:31   out of this device that's so tiny

00:52:33   that I can just check in on these little things,

00:52:35   have a little game experience, and leave.

00:52:38   And so, yeah, if you have a Playdate,

00:52:41   if you're gonna get a Playdate, please try out Bloom.

00:52:44   It is a wonderful game.

00:52:45   There's a video, there's a bunch of information

00:52:47   on the itch page, so you can see

00:52:50   if you think it might be for you.

00:52:52   but like I am like smitten with this game.

00:52:55   I think it's amazing.

00:52:55   I love it.

00:52:56   - The other games that I'll mention

00:53:00   that I think I mentioned last week,

00:53:01   but the Bomber Panda, which is a Bomberman game

00:53:04   and it's funny and it's pretty well done.

00:53:06   I want a lot of like takes on old arcade games on it.

00:53:10   Cause I think that that's a fun sort of,

00:53:11   they'll a lot of them have very simple mechanics

00:53:14   that will apply well.

00:53:15   That's why I like Playtris,

00:53:17   which is he has a name now for the Tetris rip off.

00:53:20   And he's actually updated it a few times

00:53:22   and he fixed the, on my live stream I think I die

00:53:24   and you can see the frames start animating

00:53:27   at like one frame per five seconds

00:53:29   'cause he only built it on the simulator

00:53:32   and the guy changed the animation and fixed that.

00:53:35   And he's added a bunch of stuff to it.

00:53:37   So it's like, he woke up, he was like,

00:53:38   "Oh geez, people are getting play dates

00:53:40   and they're playing my thing

00:53:41   and it doesn't work that great, I better get back to it."

00:53:43   And he's done some updates to that.

00:53:44   So that's great 'cause I like having a Tetris on there.

00:53:48   And a joke that's worth 99 cents,

00:53:50   I've decided it's worth 99 cents.

00:53:52   It's actually a very clever use of the,

00:53:54   it's hard and you won't play it for that long,

00:53:56   but it's actually, it makes me laugh at how hard it is

00:53:59   'cause there's a song that plays

00:54:00   and the song continues to play every time you fail.

00:54:02   And so as you fail, you're like,

00:54:04   it goes, cuts right back to the song

00:54:05   and you're like, oh, song.

00:54:07   It's very funny and you use the crank mechanic.

00:54:09   - I've seen this game referenced a lot

00:54:11   and I was like, am I gonna enjoy this?

00:54:13   But if you like it, I'm gonna give this one a go too.

00:54:15   - Yeah, I mean, the idea is that you're bouncing a thing

00:54:17   on the crank.

00:54:18   there's a version of the play date on the screen

00:54:20   and the crank matches where you position the crank

00:54:23   and you're supposed to bounce a little baby actually,

00:54:26   but you're supposed to bounce a thing

00:54:28   that hits these stars that appear across

00:54:31   the different screen and every star advances

00:54:33   the joke one line.

00:54:34   So, you know, see, basically you try to see

00:54:38   how long you can keep the little baby bouncing

00:54:41   and how many stars you can hit.

00:54:42   And when you fail and the baby falls,

00:54:46   the song cuts right back in and it's hilarious.

00:54:48   I gotta say.

00:54:49   It's not a game that you're gonna play for a lot of hours,

00:54:52   but every now and then I get back to it and make,

00:54:55   yeah, well, I mean, it's telling the joke,

00:54:56   but it's also, is it worth 99 cents?

00:54:59   I like the animation is really good

00:55:00   and the whole mechanic of using the crank to bounce

00:55:05   is brilliant.

00:55:06   So yeah, it's totally,

00:55:08   and it's literally, it's a 99 cent game on itch,

00:55:10   so it's totally worth it.

00:55:12   - Okay, this is actually kind of funny too,

00:55:14   'cause it's like, it's $1 with a 1% off.

00:55:18   So it's 99 cents, but I also can't pay less than 99 cents.

00:55:23   (laughs)

00:55:23   - You have to pay a dollar on itch.

00:55:25   That's part of the thing that makes me laugh about it

00:55:27   is you have to pay a dollar.

00:55:30   - It's a joke that's worth 99 cents,

00:55:32   but you have to pay a dollar for it.

00:55:33   Yeah, I appreciate that.

00:55:34   I appreciate the commitment to the bit there, you know?

00:55:37   So what I will say, right, like,

00:55:40   I know they're working on it,

00:55:41   but they desperately need to get the catalog together.

00:55:43   so I can find these games and install them on my Playdate.

00:55:48   - Directly, yeah.

00:55:50   - The sideloading works really well.

00:55:53   Like I've just been doing the version where I upload it.

00:55:55   Like you download the file,

00:55:56   you just drop it onto the webpage

00:55:58   and then you just download it and it works really well.

00:56:00   And I think that whole thing is pretty simple.

00:56:04   But I wanna be able to go to one place and read stuff

00:56:08   and see like information about the games

00:56:10   and that kind of stuff.

00:56:11   But I will tell you, man, I have waited a really long time for this, right?

00:56:15   Like everybody.

00:56:16   And I've been really, really excited about this device.

00:56:19   And it has not disappointed at all.

00:56:22   I adore this thing and I'm so happy they did it.

00:56:27   And I I'm just like, I'm in like, I'm in for the next like 10 weeks.

00:56:32   I'm super excited every Monday to get my new games and also to keep an eye on what

00:56:36   the community is building and that kind of stuff like this is super cool.

00:56:39   I love it.

00:56:40   I really love it.

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00:58:33   Apple's Q2 results were posted last week.

00:58:37   Surprise!

00:58:38   There was a lot of money made.

00:58:39   Yeah, I mean that part is not surprising at all, is it?

00:58:43   No.

00:58:44   So here's a rundown.

00:58:46   $97.3 billion total revenue, up 9% year over year, which is another record quarter for

00:58:54   Apple.

00:58:55   This is the highest Q2 of all time.

00:58:57   $25 billion in profit. $50.6 billion of revenue for the iPhone up 5% year over year. $10.4

00:59:06   billion for the Mac up 15%. $7.6 billion for the iPad down 2%. That's two down quarters

00:59:14   in a row. I want to get to that in a minute. $8.8 billion for wearables, that's up 12%

00:59:20   $19.8 billion in services.

00:59:23   That is up 17% year over year.

00:59:25   This is the first sub 20% year over year growth

00:59:30   since Q4 2020.

00:59:31   So all of 2021 and the first quarter of 2022,

00:59:36   the year over year growth was over 20%

00:59:38   and now it's less than 20%.

00:59:40   Did you make anything of that?

00:59:41   Like that just really stood out to me

00:59:43   when I was looking at your wonderful charts.

00:59:45   - I thank you for the compliment about my charts.

00:59:49   It is, it didn't.

00:59:51   I mean, the truth is the numbers have been going up

00:59:55   for so long and there was a spike that was in the twenties.

01:00:00   So to have services cool down to 17, like, you know,

01:00:05   in 2020 and 2019, there was an extended period

01:00:09   where growth was in the teens and it's back in the teens.

01:00:13   And so I just, I kind of shrugged it off.

01:00:17   I think occasionally they have moments

01:00:18   where they have a burst of growth,

01:00:21   but to come off of that burst of growth

01:00:24   and then just go back to growing in the teens,

01:00:26   'cause you know, when you grow a lot,

01:00:28   it's harder to grow by that percentage again,

01:00:31   because the growth is so,

01:00:33   you're starting from a much larger amount

01:00:37   that you have to grow from, right?

01:00:38   Like it raises the bar.

01:00:39   And so for them to go off of that four quarters

01:00:42   in the 20s or 30s, back to 17,

01:00:46   where they kind of were before,

01:00:48   - Yeah, I mean, there are other things

01:00:51   you could complain about before you complain about that.

01:00:54   - Especially as well, and I know obviously,

01:00:58   services doesn't just include Apple TV+,

01:01:01   but from a Wall Street perspective,

01:01:04   services can mean for Apple whatever they need it to mean

01:01:07   at that moment, right?

01:01:08   But at a time where we've been speaking about

01:01:10   the past couple of weeks, right,

01:01:11   like Netflix and CNN+, not great.

01:01:15   And then for Apple to say, "Hey, we add growth,"

01:01:17   and they can in that growth talk about TV+ doing so well

01:01:20   at a time when it is critically doing so well, right?

01:01:23   Like it's good for them to have to continue

01:01:26   to be having growth is good for them.

01:01:28   And it's, you know, I guess probably Q3.

01:01:33   So the next quarter they will crack 20 billion

01:01:37   in the quarter for services

01:01:38   that just under now at 19.8, right?

01:01:40   So like that seems fair that maybe Q3 2022

01:01:45   will be the first $20 billion a quarter services revenue?

01:01:48   - Yeah. - Just keeps on going up.

01:01:52   - It's blasting up.

01:01:53   That's just, yeah, chart goes up, like they say.

01:01:58   - Yeah, so the only down, right?

01:02:00   The only down is our friend, the iPad,

01:02:02   which has had its second down quarter in a row,

01:02:04   as I mentioned.

01:02:06   What do you take from this?

01:02:09   - I just don't have, I mean, it was only down a little bit.

01:02:12   And as Apple has pointed out,

01:02:15   it is severely supply constrained, right?

01:02:19   Like it's severely supply constrained.

01:02:22   - Is that the only product

01:02:23   that's seeing these kinds of supply constraints?

01:02:26   - No, they're all seeing supply constraints,

01:02:28   but I think the idea was that the iPad was growing slowly

01:02:32   and got knocked down by it.

01:02:33   I just wouldn't worry about it.

01:02:34   The iPad is at a pretty good level.

01:02:35   It was only down 2%.

01:02:37   between supply constraints and Russia being cut off,

01:02:42   like, I don't know, I think you could over obsess about it

01:02:47   and I'm not particularly concerned about it.

01:02:49   It's at a whole new level.

01:02:53   It had that really burst of growth in 2020,

01:02:56   but I mean, last quarter was down 14 year over year.

01:03:01   This quarter it's down two, it's minor.

01:03:03   I just am not, I'm just not gonna sweat it

01:03:06   given the environment of--

01:03:08   - That's fair, minus 2%, like down 2%

01:03:11   is basically you have pretty much level, right?

01:03:13   Like, you know, it's not, obviously it's a lot of money,

01:03:16   but it's not hugely off.

01:03:17   We're like down 14%, that's a double digit,

01:03:19   like that's more of a concern, right?

01:03:21   - And they said very specifically

01:03:23   it was severely supply constrained.

01:03:24   So that's, you know, that's part of it too.

01:03:26   If people want them and can't buy them,

01:03:29   yeah, I'm just not gonna,

01:03:31   I refuse to do an iPad freak out.

01:03:33   - Fair.

01:03:35   The iPhone, 52% of the business for this quarter.

01:03:40   Services at 20, Mac at 11, wearables nine, iPad eight.

01:03:46   - Yep, Apple really has three really nice

01:03:51   40 billion-ish a year businesses,

01:03:54   30 to 40 billion a year businesses.

01:03:59   Wearables, home and accessories, Mac and iPad.

01:04:02   And then it's got services,

01:04:03   which is shooting through the roof.

01:04:05   and it's got the iPhone.

01:04:07   And services obviously is not unconnected

01:04:11   with all the others.

01:04:12   So it's kind of a different kind of beast,

01:04:14   but it is funny to think about

01:04:16   if you take services out of the equation for a second,

01:04:18   Apple's got these three similarly sized businesses,

01:04:21   Mac, iPad, and wearables,

01:04:23   and then it's got the iPhone

01:04:24   which takes up half the revenue.

01:04:25   And I think, and we've talked about it here extensively,

01:04:28   it is actually an interesting management challenge,

01:04:31   which is on one level,

01:04:32   you should just manage Apple for the iPhone

01:04:34   'cause Apple is the iPhone at this point.

01:04:37   On the other hand, how can you do that

01:04:39   when you have these three other very successful businesses

01:04:43   that you need to manage too?

01:04:44   And so we've seen that

01:04:46   and I think they're in a better place now, right?

01:04:47   But there definitely was a feeling that the Mac especially

01:04:50   was kind of not being paid attention to.

01:04:53   And I do think that's gonna be a continuing challenge

01:04:56   for Apple is the iPad is a great example.

01:04:59   Like calling an iPad OS, maybe was a stake in the ground,

01:05:03   But like one of the challenges is iPad OS is basically iOS

01:05:07   and it's, you have to will it that you will have iPad stuff

01:05:12   in your iOS product cycle.

01:05:15   'Cause there will always be more iPhone stuff.

01:05:18   And the iPhone stuff will always be a higher priority

01:05:21   overall because the iPhone is so huge.

01:05:24   And somebody has to have the discipline.

01:05:27   And it's not just like last year, it's every year,

01:05:31   every decision somebody has to have the discipline to say,

01:05:34   we're gonna do iPad stuff too,

01:05:37   because the iPad is an important product for our company,

01:05:41   even though it's only throwing off whatever,

01:05:45   only throwing off $30 billion a year,

01:05:49   whereas the iPhone is throwing off $50 billion a quarter.

01:05:54   I get it, but that's part of their challenge,

01:05:59   because otherwise they should just shut it all down

01:06:01   and be iPhone incorporated.

01:06:02   And they're not gonna do that.

01:06:03   But like that's, I'm fascinated by that challenge

01:06:07   that they have because that iPhone number

01:06:09   is always enormous and they have to acknowledge it

01:06:12   and do good things with the iPhone,

01:06:14   but they can't keep those other product categories around

01:06:19   if they devote themselves to the iPhone.

01:06:23   So it's always a back and forth.

01:06:25   You imagine the debate about,

01:06:27   do we implement this iPad feature or this iPhone feature?

01:06:30   and having it be like, how much gas does the iPad get

01:06:34   in this?

01:06:35   Because the iPhone will always win

01:06:37   every single individual argument.

01:06:38   So you have to balance it and say, no, no, no,

01:06:41   we need to do this much with the iPad,

01:06:43   even though that means we're not gonna be able

01:06:45   to hit everything for the iPhone.

01:06:46   And that's okay because it can't all be about the iPhone.

01:06:49   I just think it's fascinating.

01:06:50   - And that's because they have that real,

01:06:52   I think, you know, maybe somewhat unique to Apple problem

01:06:57   of the scale of its percentage and relative-ness, right?

01:07:02   Like 10% of your business, no matter what business you have,

01:07:08   it's like, that's a big chunk.

01:07:10   But this is $40 billion a year, right?

01:07:13   So it's like, well, yeah, the Mac or the iPad

01:07:16   might only be 10%, but the relative amount of money

01:07:21   and resources that can be brought through that money

01:07:25   is astronomically large in a way that I'm sure not a lot of other companies have to

01:07:30   think about with their products, right? Where like, as you say, it is that of like, the

01:07:35   iPhone is 50% and it's hundreds and hundreds, you know, it's like hundreds of billions of

01:07:40   dollars a year. But then you also have this other one, it's 40 billion, which is so much

01:07:45   money, right? And it's super weird. It must be very strange. Like, yeah, but it's only

01:07:49   a small part of our company. Yeah, but look how much revenue it generates, how many customers

01:07:54   we have in this like bucket, you know, it's really weird. It is very strange.

01:08:00   And you can't set off a division, right? Because Apple structure doesn't work like that. The

01:08:05   way another company would do this is it would say, look, the iPad division has its own budget

01:08:12   based on how much money it makes. The Mac division has its own budget based on how much

01:08:15   money it makes. Wearables. You're the CEO of Wearables Incorporated.

01:08:19   what Google does or like what Facebook does, right, where they kind of spin them out.

01:08:24   And Apple can't do it. Apple literally can't do it because all its products are intertwined.

01:08:28   The silicon is intertwined. The base operating system is intertwined. And then big chunks of

01:08:33   it are intertwined with other products. Like Apple Watch cannot be Apple Watch Incorporated because

01:08:38   Apple Watch is entirely dependent on the iPhone. And so you end up in a situation where of their

01:08:44   own making and it is greatly beneficial to them. But it does mean that they can't wall

01:08:49   it all off. Instead, you got to make hard decisions. I guess this is nothing new, but

01:08:53   this is my regular rant that I appreciate the fact when they do things for the Mac and

01:09:00   they do things for the iPad and the Apple Watch and AirPods and all these things, on

01:09:05   one level, I appreciate the fact that they are paying attention to these businesses because

01:09:09   I think they are very important businesses. And yet, if you think about it, the iPhone

01:09:14   business is more important than them each by about 5X. So, you know, if push just came

01:09:23   to shove, the easy thing to do would be to let them all kind of die on the vine. And

01:09:28   I think there are points in Apple's history where that has happened. And I think it's

01:09:33   going to be and has been a constant challenge

01:09:37   to thread that needle of what love do we give to the iPhone

01:09:41   because it's the engine that really runs this company,

01:09:43   but at the same time,

01:09:44   we don't want to screw up these other products

01:09:46   that are also by themselves

01:09:49   very large successful product categories.

01:09:51   It's tricky is what I'm saying.

01:09:53   - So in listening to the earnings calls as you do,

01:09:57   you were able to pull out some points that were interesting.

01:10:02   And there was a couple that I noted down

01:10:04   from your Macworld article.

01:10:06   One being that the iPhone is kind of interesting

01:10:10   that they were able to beat up year over year

01:10:12   because they were beating a very tough compare

01:10:15   - Tough compare. - in the industry.

01:10:17   Because the 2020 iPhone came out late.

01:10:21   So the sales were pushed further into Q2 of 2021

01:10:25   than they usually would be.

01:10:26   So most of the sales from the iPhone,

01:10:29   like the big bump, usually you see in Q1,

01:10:31   which is the holiday quarter for Apple.

01:10:33   But there were the, of the iPhone 12,

01:10:36   there were way more sales into Q2

01:10:38   than there would be otherwise.

01:10:40   So the fact that the iPhone 13 was able to beat 2021's Q2

01:10:45   shows the demand for the iPhone 13 is very, very strong.

01:10:48   - Yeah, yeah, that's, I will accept this statement by them,

01:10:54   'cause they're obviously gonna say whatever is self-serving,

01:10:57   but this is true.

01:11:00   Like it seems like a long time ago now,

01:11:02   but the iPhone 12 launch was late, right?

01:11:05   They spread it out, the Pro phones shipped a lot later.

01:11:08   And as a result, what they said is the buying cycle

01:11:10   was later and they made, you know,

01:11:12   they didn't have any in Q3 really.

01:11:14   It was really more of a Q4 thing

01:11:16   and then rolled into Q1.

01:11:19   So a year on the iPhone went back to the standard cycle,

01:11:23   which means that they're later in the buying cycle

01:11:26   than they were a year ago.

01:11:28   And so you'd expect that to be a tough compare.

01:11:31   But they still went up.

01:11:33   So that, yeah.

01:11:34   And there were also some supplies constraints out there,

01:11:37   I think too.

01:11:38   So again, it's interesting that like,

01:11:41   it's easy to write off,

01:11:43   obviously they get a huge bump

01:11:44   when they change the look of the product,

01:11:46   but the iPhone 13 demand has been pretty strong.

01:11:50   And they said as much,

01:11:51   and you can see it in the numbers

01:11:53   that like they're still selling iPhone 13s.

01:11:55   It's not like everybody got their iPhone 12s

01:11:57   and said, we're good.

01:11:58   they're still selling iPhone 13s and doing well with that.

01:12:00   - You mentioned supply constraints. There are "substantially larger supply chain constraints

01:12:08   on the horizon for Apple." It seems like there is a mood, as you referenced, that potentially Apple

01:12:17   are about to get hit by supply constraints in a way that they have been able to mostly shield

01:12:22   themselves for. - Yeah, there's two things that are affecting

01:12:27   Apple supply chain, right? There are the silicon, they refer to it as the silicon shortages or the,

01:12:33   you know, it's the legacy nodes. Tim Cook likes to talk about the legacy nodes. He's reached the

01:12:37   point now where he's like, "You all know about the legacy nodes." It's like, "Okay, thanks, Tim."

01:12:40   But the idea that, and that you see this throughout industries, there are all the stories

01:12:45   about the car industry having to struggle with this where it's like commonly available

01:12:49   parts for computers like USB chargers and Bluetooth chips and stuff like that,

01:12:54   commonly available, but what happened was COVID happened, factories shut down, then they had to

01:13:00   get restarted, and there's a huge backlog of orders for that stuff. And it has meant that the

01:13:07   just-in-time supply chain is still not back in shape where you've got to think, it's the story.

01:13:13   Yeah, it's not in time. It's out of time. Well, this is the story. My favorite example of this

01:13:18   is Tesla shipping cars without USB chargers in them and saying, "We'll fix it later."

01:13:23   And I actually love that idea.

01:13:25   And I'm sure there are other car makers doing it

01:13:27   where it's like, okay, we can either make all these cars

01:13:30   that we've sold and then not ship them

01:13:32   and not actually get paid for them

01:13:34   because of a legacy node somewhere,

01:13:37   or we can just ship without and say,

01:13:38   we will take the hit and we will,

01:13:40   you bring it into service and we'll install it later.

01:13:42   But do you want your car now or not?

01:13:44   That's where a lot of industry is dealing with now.

01:13:46   Now, Apple is not gonna be able to say,

01:13:49   "Hey, would you like your Mac studio without Bluetooth?"

01:13:52   We'll add it later, right?

01:13:53   They can't do that.

01:13:54   So it becomes a supply concern.

01:13:56   So that's been going on and they've dealt with it.

01:13:59   And they initially had a bunch of stock

01:14:02   that they were able to do to mitigate it.

01:14:03   But obviously there are still issues

01:14:05   where they've blown through their stock.

01:14:08   They said that last quarter

01:14:09   that they were kind of run out of that,

01:14:10   their padding that they had.

01:14:12   The other issue though is COVID.

01:14:15   And specifically a lot of Apple's products

01:14:19   are assembled in the greater Shanghai area.

01:14:24   And there have been lockdowns

01:14:26   and therefore shutdowns of factories in Shanghai.

01:14:29   And what Tim Cook said was their assembly plants

01:14:33   are coming back online,

01:14:36   but another term that I love is, but they have to ramp.

01:14:40   There's a ramp there.

01:14:41   The ramp, oh, the ramp, you know,

01:14:44   'cause you don't, it's not,

01:14:45   a factory doesn't just flip a switch on and off.

01:14:48   when you gotta get the factory back in motion again,

01:14:50   it's actually very complicated

01:14:52   and they don't start at full capacity

01:14:53   and it takes time for the factory

01:14:55   to reach full capacity again,

01:14:57   'cause you've got the stuff coming in

01:14:59   and then you have the stuff going out

01:15:00   and the people on the line and all of those things.

01:15:02   And Apple said that is a major factor

01:15:06   in their supply chain getting slowed down too,

01:15:09   is that they have had shutdowns.

01:15:11   And you can see it.

01:15:12   I mean, you can see it.

01:15:15   go to apple dot com and try to order a Mac studio with the high end

01:15:18   configuration and it'll be like you'll get this in July.

01:15:21   Um, like across the board, so many products are just not available

01:15:27   anytime soon, except in some configurations, mostly the base models

01:15:31   that are available, like at your local Apple store, you can get them pretty

01:15:34   soon. You're seeing this everywhere. And that's a big part of it is the

01:15:37   shutdown in the Shanghai region. Here's the big part though. And this is

01:15:42   part that made Wall Street go, "Excuse me, what?" And all the analysts on the call last

01:15:47   week were like, "Tim, can we talk about this a little bit?" is they think they will have

01:15:54   between $4 and $8 billion in product revenue that they will fail to fulfill in the fiscal

01:16:02   third quarter, which is going on right now, because of the inability to fulfill demand.

01:16:10   there are four to eight billion dollars that people are standing, you know, like the meme

01:16:14   with Fry from Futurama saying, "Shut up and take my money." Say, "Take my money, Apple.

01:16:19   I want your product." And Apple's like, "I don't have it for you." And that's what those

01:16:23   long lines on the Apple store are and all of that. And four to eight billion dollars,

01:16:30   even for Apple, is a lot of money. So I, and they didn't give any other like hints about

01:16:38   Like, we expect it to be probably a record or whatever.

01:16:41   They didn't say anything else about that third fiscal quarter.

01:16:43   So my guess is they're not going to have a great quarter next quarter,

01:16:48   not because of a lack of demand, but because of their lack of supply

01:16:51   and that they're, if they're sandbagging it,

01:16:54   they're doing a really good job of it because they seem pretty sober about it.

01:16:57   Like to call it out and say between four and eight billion dollars in product sales

01:17:01   that will just be bypassed because we can't give them the product.

01:17:05   And when somebody asked one of the analysts like, Tim,

01:17:07   about the four to eight billion.

01:17:09   What, what?

01:17:11   'Cause they were all like asking about it.

01:17:13   It was amazing 'cause it's a big number.

01:17:15   It's a scary big number.

01:17:16   And one of them was,

01:17:18   do you have an idea of how much of that

01:17:20   will just be deferred to the next quarter

01:17:22   versus lost forever?

01:17:24   You know, it's one of those kinds of questions.

01:17:25   And Tim Cook's response was, who can tell?

01:17:28   Probably both.

01:17:29   Little bit of A, little bit of B.

01:17:32   We don't know how many people want a laptop,

01:17:36   won an Apple laptop, can't get one,

01:17:38   and immediately have to have a laptop

01:17:40   so they go buy someone else's laptop

01:17:42   versus I can wait until July for that next studio.

01:17:46   It's fine.

01:17:47   Like they don't know.

01:17:48   So they were looking,

01:17:49   the analysts were looking for reassuring words from Tim.

01:17:52   Tim did not have reassuring words for them.

01:17:54   - And just again, like that's about,

01:17:57   could be about 10% of their revenue for the quarter.

01:18:02   You know, they probably would lock in

01:18:04   in a regular scenario between 80 to 85,

01:18:08   looking at previous history, like if all things were good.

01:18:12   So that could be, if we get up to that top end of that scale,

01:18:15   which probably won't,

01:18:16   but if we got to the top end of that scale,

01:18:19   that's like 10% of the revenue for the quarter,

01:18:21   just a lot right off, like that's no joke.

01:18:24   - And traditionally Apple's Q3s

01:18:26   have actually been a lot less,

01:18:27   they've been in the fifties to sixties.

01:18:29   So it could be a scenario here too,

01:18:32   where they're looking at 81.4 last quarter

01:18:35   and they're thinking,

01:18:36   wow, we were actually thinking it'd be down

01:18:38   and it'd be more like 70.

01:18:40   And now it might be 62 or something like that.

01:18:44   And like, again, in the grand scheme of things,

01:18:47   is Apple fine?

01:18:48   Apple's fine.

01:18:49   I got a very, my Mac world column posted with a,

01:18:53   sometimes they're inflammatory headlines.

01:18:54   I didn't mind this one so much,

01:18:56   but I got a very angry email from somebody who was like,

01:19:00   how dare you say that Apple is doomed?

01:19:02   I'm like, "Well, didn't say that."

01:19:03   And he's like, "They're so rich."

01:19:04   I'm like, "I did say that part,

01:19:06   but Apple must be defended at all costs."

01:19:08   We know that.

01:19:09   Anyway, my point was just like,

01:19:13   they're gonna be fine having $8 billion of extra demand

01:19:17   in one way is a good thing, right?

01:19:19   People really want to buy your products,

01:19:21   but if you can't convert that into sales, that's painful.

01:19:24   And I think what they're gonna do is,

01:19:25   I think they're gonna have a painful quarter

01:19:26   where they're gonna be down

01:19:27   and everybody's gonna freak out.

01:19:28   And then, you know, what's probably gonna happen

01:19:30   is that they're gonna have guidance for the next quarter

01:19:32   that say, oh, we're gonna be fine.

01:19:34   We're gonna get it all back.

01:19:35   That's probably what's gonna happen.

01:19:37   But I would say, I would expect that next quarter

01:19:42   will not be like the last kind of eight boring quarters

01:19:46   where they've just done great.

01:19:48   I think it's gonna be one of those,

01:19:50   yeah, let me tell you about the impact.

01:19:52   Maybe it'll be like great news everybody,

01:19:53   only 4 billion, but still 4 billion in lost sales

01:19:58   is not great.

01:19:59   And it's the supply chain.

01:20:00   It's just, this is how it's hitting Apple.

01:20:02   And everybody who's trying to buy an Apple product right now

01:20:05   and discovering that they can't get it for months,

01:20:08   they know, they have felt this very thing.

01:20:11   That you are, your money that you wanna put

01:20:15   toward an Apple product that you can't buy right now

01:20:17   is part of that four to eight billion.

01:20:19   Like you're in this story.

01:20:21   - Is my, like, if I paint a doom and gloom picture of like,

01:20:27   what if this issue carries all the way through to new iPhone?

01:20:32   Like that there are people in September

01:20:35   that go to the Apple store to like, you know,

01:20:37   they log online to go buy their phone

01:20:39   and they cannot get one until 2023, right?

01:20:43   'Cause that's like similar to what the Mac studio

01:20:45   has been like, right?

01:20:46   - Two things there.

01:20:47   One is, I do wonder if you're talking about the ramp,

01:20:51   if you're ramping up manufacturing of iPhones

01:20:54   and I don't know when that starts to happen,

01:20:55   but it probably will happen pretty soon, right?

01:20:58   - I mean, the fact that we've been seeing these screens

01:21:00   and as soon, right?

01:21:01   It's coming.

01:21:02   - So they're gonna start making this fall's iPhones.

01:21:04   They start in advance so that they can make lots of them

01:21:06   'cause they sell lots of them.

01:21:08   I do wonder if one of the things that may be going on here

01:21:11   is actually them saying,

01:21:13   "We have to prioritize building the iPhone

01:21:16   so everything else is going to kind of not ship."

01:21:19   - Sacrificing.

01:21:20   - And we're gonna take a hit this quarter

01:21:21   because we can't not have iPhones in the fall.

01:21:25   So that may be going on here.

01:21:26   That is a, and when analysts ask, like, do you prioritize?

01:21:31   Tim Cook does a very much, I mean,

01:21:33   he doesn't say we love all our kids equally.

01:21:35   He says more, more something like that's secret.

01:21:38   And if I told you I would have to kill you

01:21:39   is more of the line of his thing.

01:21:42   But it's, I talk about prioritization

01:21:45   and the iPhone being worth half of Apple's revenue.

01:21:48   Well, I'll tell you, if there's like,

01:21:50   does the Mac studio slide?

01:21:51   I'm not saying this is actually an issue

01:21:53   'cause they're probably assembled totally differently

01:21:55   in different places, but it's like,

01:21:56   you've got a choice that iPad Air sales

01:22:00   are gonna be held for a little while,

01:22:02   or we're gonna not have enough iPhones.

01:22:05   There's no decision to be made there.

01:22:08   Like we gotta have iPhones for launch.

01:22:10   We gotta have iPhones to sell.

01:22:12   It's our most popular product

01:22:13   and they sell all in the holiday quarter

01:22:14   and we've gotta make sure we make enough for that.

01:22:17   So it wouldn't surprise me

01:22:18   if that's going on in the background

01:22:21   and quite rightly so.

01:22:23   I also, the other thing hovering over this,

01:22:25   my second point here is COVID, which is okay.

01:22:29   Like in the United States, especially,

01:22:30   everybody's like, "Oh, we're over COVID now.

01:22:32   All the mask restrictions have been dropped

01:22:34   and stuff like that."

01:22:34   It's like, "Oh, we're over."

01:22:35   Except people still are getting COVID.

01:22:37   My favorite baseball team just had like five guys get COVID

01:22:40   and not be able to play for a week.

01:22:43   And they were all vaccinated and boosted,

01:22:44   but it's Omicron and it happens.

01:22:49   But like, look at China, and the lockdown's in Shanghai.

01:22:53   And it's serious.

01:22:54   It's like really serious,

01:22:56   'cause they have these zero COVID policy.

01:22:57   China being authoritarian state can just say,

01:23:00   "No, you stay inside now."

01:23:03   Whereas in the US, we're like,

01:23:04   "Okay, people are tired of it.

01:23:05   I guess it's over."

01:23:06   We move on.

01:23:08   China's like, "No, uh-uh, no, we don't want COVID cases."

01:23:11   And as a result, they've had very few COVID deaths.

01:23:13   But the result is that COVID is very much a thing

01:23:17   in a place that is super important for Apple.

01:23:20   Mark Gurman wrote about this in his newsletter this week.

01:23:25   It's like, this is one of Apple's issues.

01:23:27   We've talked about it here,

01:23:28   is like they are so dependent on China.

01:23:30   And in this case, it's not about the government in China

01:23:32   doing something that upsets Apple

01:23:34   as much as it is this knock-on effect

01:23:36   of the government in China saying,

01:23:37   "We're gonna be really serious

01:23:39   about controlling the spread of COVID in Shanghai."

01:23:41   But the net result is that the factory shut down,

01:23:44   and they're still dealing with those effects,

01:23:46   that's going to affect Apple to the state

01:23:48   of four to $8 billion.

01:23:49   Well, that's for this quarter,

01:23:50   but what it also says is,

01:23:54   how do you forecast when you don't know,

01:23:58   'cause it's COVID and it's the Chinese government's policy,

01:24:02   what if there's another outbreak in July

01:24:06   and they close the factories again?

01:24:08   That's, I think, the scariest thing from,

01:24:13   if you're Tim Cook, is,

01:24:15   okay, we'll take this hit now,

01:24:17   but what if there's another hit

01:24:18   that precludes us from manufacturing

01:24:22   and hits our supply chain even harder

01:24:25   and we can't get these things out there

01:24:26   and we miss the moment for the iPhone again,

01:24:30   like they did two years ago.

01:24:31   That's pretty scary if I'm Tim Apple,

01:24:34   I would be worried about that.

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01:27:15   and Relay FM. This is some #AskUpgrade questions to finish out today's show. This one leads in

01:27:21   from what we were just talking about and this comes from Crumble Door. I'm a wizard Harry.

01:27:26   Apple's CFO said they quote planned, this is Luke, actually they Apple quotes planned to add

01:27:33   new services that they're offering.

01:27:36   What services do you think they're gonna add?

01:27:38   What services do you want them to add?

01:27:40   - Oh wow.

01:27:41   - So the one I'm not sure.

01:27:44   What I think they'll do is that stuff

01:27:45   we've mentioned in the past, right?

01:27:47   So I think more around finances and personal financing

01:27:50   and also financing of iPhones, right?

01:27:54   So like that you pay every month and you get an iPhone

01:27:56   or you pay every month and you get an iPad every year.

01:27:59   You remember we were talking about that?

01:28:00   - Yeah, they're gonna bring the iPhone thing

01:28:02   that's out there now that's like a separate kind of loan

01:28:04   thing and they're gonna bring it and make it a service.

01:28:06   They built, they're building their financial system

01:28:08   for that.

01:28:09   They're building it for a pay in four, pay in three

01:28:11   kind of thing where they'll do that themselves

01:28:13   instead of using a partner.

01:28:14   I do, yeah, I do wonder if they're gonna just do that

01:28:16   for all their products eventually, right?

01:28:19   Where it's like you just, you're on the iPad Pro plan

01:28:21   and you pay and whenever there's a new iPad Pro plan,

01:28:24   iPad Pro, you just get it and you send in the old one

01:28:27   and they just kind of do that because some people want that

01:28:30   and they are happy to have your credit card

01:28:33   and charge you monthly.

01:28:33   Apple's all about that now.

01:28:35   I throw in sports.

01:28:37   I think there will be a higher tier for Apple TV Plus

01:28:40   if they get NFL Sunday ticket.

01:28:41   I think that they may end up creating

01:28:43   a kind of like a sports plus thing

01:28:47   that will be maybe in a bundle,

01:28:49   but it'll be something that you buy extra

01:28:51   or even separately, which I think would be interesting.

01:28:54   What if you don't want Apple TV Plus,

01:28:56   but you want the Apple TV Sports,

01:28:57   they could make it a separate thing instead.

01:29:01   I don't know, I think there might be-

01:29:02   - I think classical music is another one, right?

01:29:04   Like I know that that's coming,

01:29:06   are they gonna add that on?

01:29:08   - Right, is that an add on for some things probably,

01:29:10   for other things probably not.

01:29:11   Keeping in mind that it's not just what new services,

01:29:13   but it's also things that it could add to a bundle,

01:29:17   which is interesting 'cause then it doesn't necessarily

01:29:19   have to stand on its own.

01:29:20   It could be a sweetening of the bundle,

01:29:22   even if they offer it on its own.

01:29:24   It's also just like it makes the Apple One bundle

01:29:26   look nicer.

01:29:27   God, what else could they do?

01:29:30   - The idea of what would I want them to do

01:29:33   is the one that I find the most complicated.

01:29:35   'Cause while there are things that I want them,

01:29:37   they're just not gonna be able to do.

01:29:39   Like I want Apple to offer a service

01:29:41   where I pay them every month

01:29:42   and can watch a bunch of new movies from iTunes,

01:29:44   but like that's not gonna happen.

01:29:46   - Right, I'll tell, oh, I got one.

01:29:47   I got one that'll make people very angry.

01:29:49   Pro apps.

01:29:53   - Oh. - Yeah, like Adobe.

01:29:55   - Yeah, do it. - And Microsoft.

01:29:57   - Yeah. - Where you pay a monthly fee

01:29:59   for Final Cut or a monthly fee for Logic

01:30:02   or you pay a monthly fee for a bundle.

01:30:04   Right now their model is you buy it

01:30:08   and you use it for a long time without paying

01:30:11   and then they do a new version and you have to buy it,

01:30:13   which is very old school and I get why you do that,

01:30:17   but even the App Store now works with subscription models.

01:30:21   So I wonder if they will do a milestone update

01:30:25   of Final Cut and Logic.

01:30:27   And in addition to offering them as a, you know,

01:30:29   you can do a paid upgrade, maybe,

01:30:33   they'll just roll that into a subscription thing.

01:30:34   It would be something they could call subscription revenue.

01:30:37   And their model now, I'm always surprised

01:30:39   'cause as much as I like it,

01:30:40   I think it's a really good deal.

01:30:41   Like I buy Logic once and I use it for years

01:30:43   and never pay Apple for it.

01:30:46   And if I were Apple, I'd be looking at that saying,

01:30:48   can we get money out of this guy

01:30:50   who's using Logic all the time?

01:30:51   And the answer is yes, you can, you just have to do it.

01:30:54   So people will hate that idea,

01:30:56   but I think it's a possibility.

01:30:57   - Yeah, I mean, if it would bring,

01:31:00   I was gonna say more features,

01:31:01   but Logic does a really good job with that anyway, I think.

01:31:05   But like maybe we would bring iPad versions

01:31:07   and I would be keen.

01:31:09   - Sure, sure.

01:31:10   I also wonder, another wacky idea,

01:31:13   but I still think they should offer

01:31:17   an iCloud extension that is Mac backup,

01:31:22   which I know Mac backup is complicated

01:31:26   because there's a lot of extra data there,

01:31:28   but it just means you're selling people extra data.

01:31:31   I mean, again, I know there's a lot of competition

01:31:37   out there for backup,

01:31:38   but to have it be OS integrated time machine

01:31:40   that works over the cloud and it says,

01:31:42   "Sorry, you need to pay for an extra four terabytes

01:31:46   of backup data, whatever it is.

01:31:48   - I would love it if Time Machine

01:31:50   could just sync to the cloud,

01:31:51   like that I didn't have to have a drive anymore.

01:31:54   It just was synced to the cloud.

01:31:56   Like I would love that personally.

01:31:58   I use backblaze, but I would also like to pay for Time,

01:32:02   Time Machine to just be synced to the cloud,

01:32:04   like just go for it. - Time Machine in the cloud.

01:32:06   And again, does that feature already exist in competition?

01:32:11   Of course it does,

01:32:12   but the advantage of being the first party,

01:32:14   the fact that they already do it for their iOS devices,

01:32:17   I just, I think there's more money to be made there.

01:32:20   I would also say an internet security thing,

01:32:22   speaking of them just doing other people's business,

01:32:25   if they're not gonna build their own routers

01:32:28   or whatever like that,

01:32:28   they could totally do a VPN that was built in.

01:32:32   And again, this is the case.

01:32:34   Look, I'm suggesting a lot of things

01:32:36   that will make people very angry here.

01:32:38   I'm not saying that I love these ideas,

01:32:40   but like if you're Apple- - None of these are like,

01:32:41   yeah, I'll wear into it.

01:32:42   same as like charging every month for logical vinyl cut. We're not like, "Oh yeah man, great."

01:32:47   No. It's just like these are like good ideas for things we think Apple could do. Right,

01:32:51   and if I think I'm getting away with something then probably somebody at Apple's like, "We should

01:32:54   make that guy pay us." But VPN, consumer VPN, right? Not business VPN, but like there are a

01:33:00   lot of consumer VPNs out there and you know we've had them as sponsors and like there are a lot of

01:33:05   them out there but they don't have first-party advantage, right? They don't have the, "You trust

01:33:09   Apple and we've built it into our operating system and you flip a switch and they can't

01:33:13   do it like for everybody, but they could certainly do it. They've already, you know, they've

01:33:17   already had added some iCloud features to the OS that you have to be a paying subscriber

01:33:24   to get, right? The iCloud privacy stuff. It would be a logical extension for them to say,

01:33:29   we're actually going to enhance privacy further and if you pay us this, you can get a full-on

01:33:35   VPN that's run by Apple or at least vouched for by Apple. Not saying they will do it, it's just like

01:33:42   it's there for them to do. And I wonder, I think the real question is who at Apple is rifling

01:33:49   through the couch cushions essentially looking for places where they can find those, the loose

01:33:56   change. I don't know why I use the couch cushion metaphor, but there it is. - Dom asked, this is in

01:34:02   in relation to us talking about spatial audio.

01:34:05   How do you feel about Apple's spatialized stereo feature

01:34:09   being used when somebody listens to your show?

01:34:12   It dramatically changes the sound

01:34:14   that you obviously create deliberately,

01:34:16   so I'm interested to hear your thoughts on that.

01:34:18   So you can turn this on if you have AirPods,

01:34:21   if it's not already on.

01:34:22   Some apps turn it on by default, I don't know why.

01:34:25   But like you're listening to the podcast app right now,

01:34:27   you can long press on the volume

01:34:29   and there'll be an option called spatialized stereo.

01:34:32   and you can turn it on and it sounds like we're all around you.

01:34:35   Like it's a terrible feature, I think, honestly.

01:34:38   But how do you feel about people listening to upgrade

01:34:40   and spatialize stereo?

01:34:42   - The idea that we're creating it deliberately,

01:34:44   I mean, our podcast is mono.

01:34:46   I mean, the theme is stereo.

01:34:48   - That's not completely true, but.

01:34:50   - Well, but the theme is stereo.

01:34:51   You don't pan us though, right?

01:34:53   - No.

01:34:54   - We're both dead center.

01:34:56   - We're both dead center, we're both mono.

01:34:58   - So the MP3 file is stereo.

01:35:00   - Is stereo for the music.

01:35:01   But the only thing you ever hear that's in stereo is the theme song.

01:35:04   Uh huh.

01:35:05   Correct.

01:35:06   Right?

01:35:07   Everything else is just mono and it saves the space and it uses the bit rates to do

01:35:08   the mono because we're not panned or anything other than that episode where we took a walk

01:35:12   in the woods and that was all 3D with sound effects and people were angry about it.

01:35:15   And that's Summer of Fun's coming up.

01:35:17   I mean, Spatial Audio version of Upgrade, you never know.

01:35:19   Who knows?

01:35:20   But right now it would be less interesting because it's just me going back over here.

01:35:23   Hi!

01:35:24   Spatial Audio!

01:35:25   Oh, I'm back, Myke.

01:35:27   I left space behind there for a moment.

01:35:29   So I don't know.

01:35:30   - I don't think spatialized stereo sounds very good.

01:35:32   I think it just adds reverb,

01:35:34   which I find to be kind of odd.

01:35:36   But the thing is, I'm not gonna be precious about it

01:35:39   because people listen to us at 3X.

01:35:42   So like I lost that battle a long time ago, you know?

01:35:45   - Right.

01:35:46   Hello to those people.

01:35:50   - You know, like I've given up on that feeling ages ago.

01:35:55   - Yeah, hard to be precious about it.

01:35:57   I mean, what we always say is like,

01:35:59   this show is made to be at 1X,

01:36:01   and then you do what you want.

01:36:03   So if people wanna listen to us in a reverb space,

01:36:05   that's fine.

01:36:06   The truth is though, we're not supplying any information.

01:36:08   It would be different.

01:36:09   I would feel different about it

01:36:10   if we even subtly panned us left and right,

01:36:14   because then you would have this like,

01:36:15   "Oh wow, now I can see it.

01:36:18   "Myke is over there and Jason is over here."

01:36:21   But we don't even do that.

01:36:22   So anything that it's doing there is gonna be lackluster

01:36:25   'cause it can't pull us apart.

01:36:28   Like I already get what I want, right?

01:36:29   Which is this show is encoded

01:36:33   at 128 kilobit per second stereo,

01:36:36   which is not what people usually do,

01:36:38   but it's what I want to do

01:36:39   because I think the show sounds better.

01:36:40   Our voices sound better with a higher bit rate.

01:36:44   So typically upgrade,

01:36:46   or actually pretty much any show that Myke Hurley edits,

01:36:48   will be a little bit larger in size

01:36:51   than maybe some other people do.

01:36:52   But that's my prerogative as the editor of the show

01:36:54   and the other shows that I edit,

01:36:56   which is I like them when our voices

01:36:58   have a higher clarity to them.

01:37:01   'Cause I mean, for me, the reason for this is

01:37:03   when I edit, I hear our voices

01:37:05   and I hear them uncompressed.

01:37:06   - So everybody can go back to last summer

01:37:09   where we released the different versions of Upgrade

01:37:11   at the different bit rates.

01:37:12   If you wanna hear our high quality lossless

01:37:15   or lower quality bit rate voices.

01:37:18   But yeah, that's what we're using the stereo for is

01:37:21   we're actually not using stereo.

01:37:23   It's stereo 128.

01:37:24   It uses the way MP3 works.

01:37:26   It is using the stereo differences for the theme song.

01:37:29   But once the theme song is,

01:37:30   and I don't even know the theme song's not even

01:37:32   that stereo-y, but it is a little bit.

01:37:34   - It is a little bit, especially the one you use.

01:37:36   (laughs)

01:37:37   - Oh yes.

01:37:37   - It flies around your head like no one's business.

01:37:40   - The bonus stereo, but then it gets to us

01:37:42   and it's just using all that,

01:37:44   it's what, joint stereo or whatever.

01:37:45   So it knows that it's mono,

01:37:46   so it just uses the whole bit rate for us.

01:37:48   - Yeah.

01:37:49   - Yeah, well. - What episode was that

01:37:52   when we did the various versions?

01:37:54   I wanna find it for the show notes

01:37:56   in case people don't know what we're talking about.

01:37:57   We did an episode where we encoded and uploaded the show

01:38:01   in various bit rates.

01:38:03   - Yeah, including a lossless version

01:38:05   because people were, it's episode 360.

01:38:07   - Thank you.

01:38:08   - It's called Big Minimizers, great title.

01:38:10   And then we made it available in Apple Lossless, 56K, 8K,

01:38:16   which sounds like we are at the end of underwater somewhere.

01:38:20   - You gotta listen to the 8K version.

01:38:22   I did that one just for me

01:38:24   - Because it was just so, it's unlistenable.

01:38:26   - It is, it's nonsense.

01:38:29   - You can't hear us.

01:38:30   - But you can hear, and the regular one's 128.

01:38:32   So you can, that was our little ironic thing of like,

01:38:36   well, if you really want to hear us lossless,

01:38:38   you can for this episode and discover

01:38:40   that it really doesn't sound any different.

01:38:42   - No, and that is because genuinely,

01:38:44   like I encode higher than most people would,

01:38:48   and it's kind of like at the edge of where

01:38:50   I think you stop hearing any difference,

01:38:52   which is like 128 for voice.

01:38:54   So the lossless version of our show

01:38:57   kind of just sounds like the regular one,

01:38:58   but maybe at some other shows it would be different.

01:39:01   It would sound a bit richer.

01:39:03   - Maybe.

01:39:04   Anyway, Logic lets you now do spatial audio mastering.

01:39:08   So you know for now, I'll put that on our list

01:39:10   for the summer of fun.

01:39:11   Maybe we'll get there. - You can put it on the list,

01:39:13   but I do not want to learn these tools.

01:39:15   Yeah, so if the spatial audio version of upgrade

01:39:18   is gonna happen, which I would like it to,

01:39:20   I don't think it's gonna be me that puts that one together.

01:39:23   - I might do that or I might master it for you.

01:39:24   You do the edit and then send it to me

01:39:26   for spatial mastering, 3D mastering.

01:39:28   - Yes, what is it like mastered by Jason?

01:39:31   - Yeah, yeah, I'm a regular Bob Ludwig at Master Disc.

01:39:34   That's a reference.

01:39:36   - All right, finally today, Luke asked,

01:39:38   Jason, if I upgrade to the Mac Studio,

01:39:41   what can I do with my 2018 Mac Mini?

01:39:43   - You could sell it.

01:39:47   You could donate it to somebody in need.

01:39:50   family member or a local school. You could do what I do and use a Mac Mini as

01:39:54   a server. I like having a computer that's separate in my house that is a server

01:40:01   that is attached to extra storage. It does my time machine backup, it serves

01:40:05   some web pages, it does some scripts in the background, it does a whole bunch of

01:40:09   stuff. I've had a server in my house for like 20 years, more than 20 years now, and

01:40:14   it's just I always find some use for it of having a little computer that's

01:40:17   always on that's in a closet or in the corner or, you know, somewhere else in the house.

01:40:23   And I can run stuff on it. I can use screen sharing to control it. I know macOS, so I

01:40:28   prefer that to running a, like a, like a, uh, one of those network-attached storage

01:40:34   things, right, where it's like Unix with big hard drives on it. Like, I just have a Mac

01:40:41   running with a big hard drive attached to it, and then I can use the Mac, and I'm more

01:40:45   comfortable with a Mac. So I'm a big fan of using a Mac Mini as a server, but failing

01:40:52   that, you know, you really could sell it or hand it down or pass it off to somebody. Or

01:40:56   I'd say the other thing is if you're using a Mac Studio now, you're losing Intel support

01:41:02   if you ever use Windows or something like that, you could install Windows on it and

01:41:06   use it as a little Windows box. Again, if you use Windows Pro, you can actually just

01:41:11   keep it in the corner and use screen sharing to control it and then you don't have to worry

01:41:16   about it. You're just you've got a little local Windows machine that you control from

01:41:20   your Mac because obviously Apple Silicon has issues with Windows right now. So those are

01:41:25   my suggestions. Myke, do you have any?

01:41:27   - No.

01:41:28   - Okay.

01:41:29   - Like mine would have been the ones you mentioned at the start like find someone to give it

01:41:32   to or whatever. Like this is why I wanted to ask you this question specifically for

01:41:37   the server recommendation. I've never done any of this. Plex, you know, is I guess, you

01:41:43   can do that. You could do all kinds of stuff with it, but these are not really things that

01:41:46   I do or really have an inclination for. If you would like to send in a question for us

01:41:52   to answer in a future episode of the show, just send out a tweet with the hashtag #askupgrade

01:41:56   or use question mark #askupgrade in the Real AFM members Discord, which you can get access

01:42:01   to if you go to getupgradeplus.com. You can sign up to support the show and you'll get

01:42:06   ad-free longer episodes of Upgrade each and every week.

01:42:11   I think today in Upgrade Plus, I'm going to let Jason loose on the New York Times article

01:42:15   after Steve, how Apple became a trillion dollar company and lost its soul, which was not something

01:42:20   I really wanted to talk about on the show today.

01:42:23   And I was intrigued that Jason put it into Upgrade Plus as a potential topic today.

01:42:27   So you can sign up and you can hear Jason probably say some stuff about that article

01:42:31   in case you're wondering about it.

01:42:34   So go to getupgradeplus.com and you can sign up there.

01:42:37   Thank you so much to Electric, TextExpander and Trade for their support of this show,

01:42:42   but most importantly as always thank you for listening.

01:42:45   We'll be back next time.

01:42:47   You can find Jason in the meantime at sixcolors.com and @jasonel on twitter.

01:42:51   I am @imike and don't forget to join us on Friday May 6th at 12.30pm eastern time,

01:43:00   US time over at Myke.live where we will be working together to disassemble a touch ID

01:43:05   keyboard for funsies. Thanks so much for listening. We'll be back next time. Until then, say goodbye

01:43:10   just now.

01:43:11   Bye Myke Hurley.

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