0:00:00[MUSIC PLAYING]
0:00:03From Real FM, this is "Connected" episode 417.
0:00:13I'm your host, Federico Vitticci,
0:00:14and today's show is brought to you by some truly fine sponsors,
0:00:19Rogue Amoeba, Indeed, and Texas Panda.
0:00:22For this episode of "Connected," and for all the episodes
0:00:25of "Connected," it is my pleasure
0:00:26to be joined by Mr. Stephen Hackett.
0:00:29Hello Federico.
0:00:30Hi, how are you?
0:00:31I'm good, what about you?
0:00:33I am doing okay.
0:00:36We'll talk about how I'm doing later.
0:00:38We'll talk about that in a few minutes, yes.
0:00:43Your emotional wellbeing is tied directly to stage manager.
0:00:46Let's say that I'm doing, I'm doing.
0:00:49And sometimes you just freeze randomly.
0:00:51I am joined by Mr. Myke Hurley.
0:00:54Why hello there.
0:00:55How are you Myke?
0:00:56It's been a, I'm good.
0:00:58I'm so excited for today's episode.
0:01:02There's some big topics in here,
0:01:03and I think mostly I'm just gonna get to sit back
0:01:06and enjoy it as you two tell me a bunch of stuff
0:01:08about some things, so I'm looking forward to that.
0:01:10- So let's dive right in.
0:01:11We had a big pro show today.
0:01:14Federico, give people the elevator pitch
0:01:16for what you talked about on the pro show.
0:01:18- What if your phone was not a phone?
0:01:23What if your phone was like a shovel?
0:01:27And what if the apps on your phone were not apps?
0:01:30What if those apps were plants and your screen
0:01:33was not a screen, but it was a garden?
0:01:35In the Pro Show for Connected Pro members,
0:01:38which people can sign up for at getconnectedpro.co,
0:01:42we talk about note-taking, digital gardens,
0:01:45and the idea of using different apps for different jobs.
0:01:50- If you wanna hear what my brain sounds like
0:01:52when I find out what a digital garden is,
0:01:55you can sign up at getconnectedpro.co.
0:01:57This is not a phrase I knew until about 20 minutes ago.
0:02:00It's a really good pro show today.
0:02:02If you've been on the fence,
0:02:03you've not signed up for get connected pro,
0:02:06give this one a go.
0:02:07You can sign up, try it out, $5 a month,
0:02:09you just pay the $5, you can listen to it.
0:02:11If you think it's not for you,
0:02:11then just don't, you just get rid of it.
0:02:13But it's good, you get Discord,
0:02:15you get a bunch of stuff, getconnectedpro.co.
0:02:17I have some follow up on my iPhone 14 Pro.
0:02:22I think I spoke about this on this show last week.
0:02:24I tried that thing where like, I have been trying that thing where I turned off the notification
0:02:28previews until face ID unlocked to kind of help distinguish the difference between always
0:02:33on and not, you know, so like the always on screen just shows the name of the app and
0:02:37like one new notification or whatever when they pop up.
0:02:40I don't think I like it.
0:02:43I'm remembering why I turned this feature off before because face ID is good, right?
0:02:49But you kind of have to be in, you have to kind of give the phone what it needs for FaceID,
0:02:55right?
0:02:56Like it has to be directly in front of you, it has to actually get the scan.
0:02:58Because I feel like a lot of the time now I'm seeing that I have a notification, I'm
0:03:02looking at my phone, so I'm like "Okay, come on, do your thing!" and nothing's happening.
0:03:07And I have to like tap the notification, I'll swipe up again to get FaceID to do its thing.
0:03:13So I'm not sure if this is what I'm looking for.
0:03:16Steven, you said you were going to try this, did you try this?
0:03:19- Yeah, I've been running this way since last week's show.
0:03:23And while I agree with you,
0:03:25it's a bit sometimes frustrating
0:03:26where I just want to look at my phone and see what came in.
0:03:28And I've got to like catch face Eddie's attention.
0:03:31Overall, I think I like it more than you do.
0:03:35It's kind of nice from a privacy perspective
0:03:39'cause your phone is just always on, right?
0:03:41This place always just out there for people to see.
0:03:45I'm gonna stick with it for a little while longer.
0:03:47I haven't had many situations where it's like an actual problem, but I do notice that little
0:03:51bit of friction, like you said.
0:03:53I have actually just now turned it off because I didn't like it.
0:03:56Okay.
0:03:57So that's gone.
0:04:00I was listening to the talk show, and Neil Aptel was the guest, and this is something
0:04:06Neil Aptel mentioned in his iPhone 14 Pro review, and hearing him talk about it in more
0:04:11detail with Jon Gruber, I agree with him that the Dynamic Islands interaction is backwards.
0:04:18Having to long press on the widget, like long press on it to get the widget to pop up, that
0:04:24feels wrong. After having used this, I'm in the camp of you should tap it to get it to
0:04:29expand, long press to open the app. That's where I've come down on. Because all of the
0:04:35good stuff is behind the long press. I've definitely come down on the idea that it's
0:04:44the wrong way around. That a tap on the dynamic island should do whatever is happening within
0:04:49the dynamic island and then a long tap to reopen the app. Because hey, if I want a tap
0:04:54to open an app, I already know how to do that. I just tap on the app icon. Right? It doesn't
0:05:01need to be a quick launcher for me. It should be doing whatever it's doing as like the multitasking
0:05:06as its primary thing. And something Neil was talking a lot about was like, in all of the
0:05:11ads, they're showing like the Dynamic Island doing its thing. Like that's what they're
0:05:16promoting. So that should be the primary interaction, not the secondary one.
0:05:20Agree. I thought so. And reading the reviews before using the phone and now using the phone,
0:05:25I agree even more. It just feels backwards.
0:05:29I really hope that they add it as an option at least, but we'll see.
0:05:34I also just wanted to voice a grumble with the iPhone 14's camera.
0:05:40A grumble.
0:05:41Because I'm not super mad about this, but it's just like, it's frustrating sometimes.
0:05:45The macro lens switchover is happening so much more.
0:05:49It's because they changed the focal length, right?
0:05:51The focal length has changed.
0:05:52So now, photos where I just take a picture of something, which is relatively close but
0:05:57not super close, is changing over to the macro lens all the time.
0:06:02You can toggle it off and do the thing and maybe move the phone and focus.
0:06:05You know it is better now the ultra wide is better and blah blah blah blah blah so like
0:06:09these macro images are looking better than they ever have etc etc.
0:06:13Yeah it's just a little bit annoying.
0:06:16But I'm happy that I have the toggle.
0:06:18If you've not turned that toggle on in settings by the way I thoroughly recommend it.
0:06:22This is the thing that we were like, on this show especially, we were really asking for
0:06:26like because they didn't have it.
0:06:28Do you remember that?
0:06:28They didn't have it for a while.
0:06:29- It would just switch on its own.
0:06:30It's like, I got nothing to do.
0:06:31- And you had to like do a bunch of stuff
0:06:33to get it to stop.
0:06:34So if you have an iPhone 14 Pro,
0:06:37I recommend enabling that feature.
0:06:40But you know, for quick photos or something,
0:06:43like it's fine that I don't care what setting it's on.
0:06:45If I'm just like snapping something for later,
0:06:48like I'm taking a picture of something,
0:06:49I need to look at it.
0:06:50Like for example, a wifi code or whatever.
0:06:53But if I'm, I don't always want the macro mode
0:06:55for all things.
0:06:58So that's that.
0:06:58I have one more thing.
0:06:59Do you remember my iPhone 13?
0:07:01That was all scratched.
0:07:02Do you remember that?
0:07:03We spoke about this on the show a bunch of times
0:07:04and Apple refused to replace it under my Apple Care.
0:07:09Remember this?
0:07:09- I do.
0:07:10I do remember it.
0:07:12- Would you believe guys that I dropped my iPhone 13 Pro
0:07:16and broke the screen?
0:07:17- Oh, what a- - Could you imagine?
0:07:18- Oh, you did?
0:07:19- Oh man. - Yeah, I dropped it.
0:07:22I dropped it like four times and it was perfectly fine.
0:07:25One of those, like two of those times,
0:07:29I dropped it onto a corner of a piece of furniture
0:07:31and it survived.
0:07:32And I was like, incredible iPhone 13 Pro,
0:07:35you're doing your job.
0:07:37And then I dropped it onto something metal,
0:07:39which was like so unlucky
0:07:40that I dropped it like five times in a row.
0:07:42- Very unlucky.
0:07:44- And the screen broke way more
0:07:47than I would have necessarily wanted it to, but it broke.
0:07:51And so now I have done an Apple Care Express replacement
0:07:55thing, so they're sending a box to me
0:07:56and I'm gonna put it in the box and send it away.
0:07:58And apparently it will cost 25 pounds,
0:08:01which is cheaper than I was expecting.
0:08:02So we'll see what happens there.
0:08:03'Cause I thought it was 75, but I don't know.
0:08:06I'll let you know how that goes.
0:08:07But just as a long-term piece of follow up,
0:08:09my iPhone 13 Pro accidentally broke.
0:08:12- As someone who's never broken a phone,
0:08:15I'm very curious on how that repair goes for you.
0:08:18- Yeah, for sure.
0:08:20I have no experience with it.
0:08:22It was one of those things where, for some reason,
0:08:24I had forgotten--
0:08:25I don't know why, but my brain was--
0:08:27because it broke.
0:08:28And it also-- the screen is completely unresponsive.
0:08:32It basically put a hole in the screen.
0:08:34This accident will drop.
0:08:35And so I can't do anything on the phone, which is funny.
0:08:39It's like I can't erase it, because the phone was also off.
0:08:43So I can't put in a code so it won't connect to any wife.
0:08:46Whatever.
0:08:47Like, I don't care.
0:08:49It's just a silly thing that happened.
0:08:50But there was like a part of my brain
0:08:53which forgot that like the glass and the screen are one thing.
0:08:59That you don't just replace the glass,
0:09:01you replace the entire thing and the glass
0:09:02has a screen attached to it.
0:09:05I don't know why my brain couldn't work that out,
0:09:07but it was silly of me really.
0:09:10Silly to drop it, you know?
0:09:12I'm sorry you had an accident.
0:09:14It was terrible.
0:09:15This show is being recorded on Wednesday, September 28th.
0:09:19That means it's almost the end of the month
0:09:22and we are winding down our fundraiser for St. Jude.
0:09:26September is Childhood Cancer Awareness Month.
0:09:29And so every month we talk about the life-saving work
0:09:32of St. Jude, which is a cancer hospital
0:09:34and research institution that treats kids with cancer
0:09:38without regard to their family's ability to pay.
0:09:41That means treatment, travel, food, lodging.
0:09:44It's all covered by the donations
0:09:46that people make to St. Jude.
0:09:47And as we record this, we have raised this year $540,000
0:09:52for the kids of St. Jude, which is absolutely spectacular.
0:09:57That's over $2 million in the last four years,
0:10:02which is just simply incredible.
0:10:04The campaign is gonna close on Friday, September 30th.
0:10:08Myke and I are gonna be hosting the closing ceremonies
0:10:10where we closed down the fundraising.
0:10:14If you have a community fundraiser,
0:10:18which like almost 300 people have done,
0:10:20those will stay open until noon Eastern on Monday.
0:10:24So you have the weekend,
0:10:24if you're fundraising on your own to wrap that up.
0:10:27But just a huge thank you to everyone who has given,
0:10:31who has done fundraising themselves,
0:10:34who has talked about this on social media
0:10:35or people in real life.
0:10:36It's been a really awesome month
0:10:38for the Relay FM community to come together around this.
0:10:41- Yeah, it's been incredible.
0:10:43Passing that $2 million raised over the last four years
0:10:46was an incredible thing to have achieved together.
0:10:50And we've raised just a staggering amount of money this year
0:10:53and we're all so proud and it goes a long way
0:10:57and it does a lot.
0:10:57- This episode of Connected is made possible by Rogue Amoeba.
0:11:03You're hearing my voice right now
0:11:05because I'm using a bunch of Rogue Amoeba software.
0:11:07We'll get to that in a minute.
0:11:10But Rogue Amoeba Software is celebrating
0:11:12their 20th anniversary, which is just incredible,
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0:11:35Loopback gives you extremely powerful audio routing
0:11:38without needing cables or mixers.
0:11:40And SoundSource is the sound control
0:11:43that honestly should have just been built in to macOS.
0:11:46I've used AudioHijack every podcast I've recorded
0:11:50for like 10 years.
0:11:52It is amazingly powerful.
0:11:54The UI is really cool where you can move these blocks around
0:11:58and the signal will flow through them
0:12:00and you can see exactly what it's doing
0:12:01in a really visual way.
0:12:03All of Rogue Amoeba's apps look incredible,
0:12:06super well-designed, super easy to use.
0:12:10You know, sound routing stuff, it can be complicated,
0:12:13but audio hijack and loopback make it easy
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0:12:16I seriously could not do my job without their applications.
0:12:20Now look, Rogue Amoeba doesn't run
0:12:21constant gimmicky sales or discounts.
0:12:24They charge fair prices all the time.
0:12:26But in celebration of their anniversary,
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0:12:37There's no coupon code, there's no special URL, just go to MacAudio.com to
0:12:43save 20% on anything they make. This deal is only valid to the end of September so
0:12:48it's nearly over. You can download free trials and then buy online to receive
0:12:52the discounted price. A big congratulations to Rogamiba on 20 great
0:12:57years visit them at Mac audio.com now before the offer ends. Thanks to
0:13:02Rogan Mieba for their support of the show and Relay FM. Time to get ultra.
0:13:06Big boy. Big orange watch boy. Big wrist Steven over here. My wrist is
0:13:13170 millimeters I don't know if that's big or not. Y'all know your wrist sizes?
0:13:17I've never considered it because I've never had a watch where I needed to
0:13:21measure my... For me it's not something I've had to really consider either and I
0:13:26I had to go find Mary's like fabric tape measure.
0:13:30So it's like super bendy and one side was inches,
0:13:33the other side was millimeters.
0:13:35So anyways, I got my Apple Watch Ultra on its launch day,
0:13:38which was last Friday.
0:13:39So I've had it four or five days
0:13:42and I thought I could walk through
0:13:44some of my early impressions
0:13:46and answer any questions y'all may have.
0:13:48- I do have lots of questions, so.
0:13:50- Okay. (laughs)
0:13:52Let me start with the unboxing.
0:13:53Do y'all remember in the early days of the Apple Watch,
0:13:56Like I had like the series zero stainless steel.
0:13:58My first Apple watch was stainless steel.
0:14:00Remember the box that those nice watches came in?
0:14:03They were like cube shaped
0:14:05and they're like glossy white plastic.
0:14:07Do you have that ring of bell to anybody?
0:14:10- Yes.
0:14:11Yeah, the additions used to come packaged like that.
0:14:13- Okay.
0:14:14So the Ultra doesn't come in a box like that,
0:14:18but it does come in some pretty unique packaging.
0:14:20- My ceramic one came in a plastic box.
0:14:23It wasn't square.
0:14:24it was long, but it wasn't the paper boxes.
0:14:28It came in like a special thing.
0:14:29- Should have come in a ceramic box.
0:14:31- That would be quite expensive.
0:14:34- So for a while now,
0:14:35the Apple Watch and bands have come separately
0:14:38and they're just kind of like wrapped together.
0:14:40The Ultra follows suit with that,
0:14:42but the boxes are bigger and the inside print,
0:14:45instead of like colorful watch bands,
0:14:47I think because I have the Alpine band,
0:14:49had like a rugged mountain scene.
0:14:51And I think the interior printing is different
0:14:53depending on what band you get.
0:14:55But really nice box.
0:14:57It comes with this booklet that shows you all the features
0:15:00of the watch is like all color printed,
0:15:02like really big images of the watch.
0:15:04Just a very nice experience.
0:15:06Definitely nicer than I've had on Apple Watch
0:15:08in a long time.
0:15:10After the unboxing though,
0:15:11it's kind of funny how straightforward the setup was.
0:15:14Like it works like any other Apple Watch, right?
0:15:16I said, yeah, you know, take my old one,
0:15:19move it to the new one.
0:15:20In the setup process,
0:15:21there was an additional step where you could set
0:15:24what the action button does.
0:15:26And that can be changed later in the watch app on iOS.
0:15:31And you have a bunch of different options.
0:15:33You can tie it to a workout.
0:15:35You can have it run a shortcut, which I tried,
0:15:37but shortcuts are so slow to execute on watchOS.
0:15:41I kind of gave up on that.
0:15:42And I just have mine set to the flashlight.
0:15:44So I can light up the sky with my 2000 nit brightness
0:15:48Apple watch if I need to.
0:15:48- Do you do this a lot?
0:15:51I didn't know what else to, so let me read you the list.
0:15:53Okay, and I think you'll see where.
0:15:55- All right, all right, all right.
0:15:56- Okay, so workout, stopwatch, waypoint,
0:16:01backtrack, dive, flashlight, shortcut, and none.
0:16:06- Why is that to none?
0:16:07- I feel like flashlight was the most useful.
0:16:09Maybe none.
0:16:10- None sounds good.
0:16:11- And you can, you hold it and press.
0:16:13- Then it's a fidget toy.
0:16:14- Yeah, it is.
0:16:15You hold it and press to do the siren.
0:16:16So you can just click and it does whatever action
0:16:18you tied into it.
0:16:19- Oh.
0:16:20would be much more interesting if shortcuts were just faster on the watch, but they are not.
0:16:24Yeah, I mean, I don't know what I would go with. And you can use it in some apps to do things,
0:16:31right? Like, it's tied to actions inside of applications too, right? So you can,
0:16:38if you're in the workout app and you press it, it like does a new workout or like splits the
0:16:43workout or something, right? Right? Yes, but I don't think I've seen it in action anywhere else.
0:16:49It's just the workouts app right now and maybe that'll change with time. I think developers can do something
0:16:54But obviously no one's ready for that
0:16:56Yeah, and is the developer gonna take time to build support for a button that's on one watch? Yeah, but yes, right if this were
0:17:04Everywhere and we could talk about that a minute
0:17:07Like what?
0:17:08Will the regular Apple watch inherit from this watch in the future?
0:17:11The action button would be the top of my list for that. Obviously the biggest question here is size, right? It's a 49 millimeter case
0:17:18It's just one size there. It does not have the smaller and larger sizes like the regular series 8 does
0:17:24It's as big as I could go. I think again on my hundred and seventy millimeter wrist, you know watch size
0:17:31I think is something that's obviously very subjective
0:17:33like I was talking to a friend of mine last week before I got the ultra and like he
0:17:38Wears an Apple watch basically only when he runs and he had just gotten a new watch to where the rest of you know
0:17:45The rest of his life and he actually went smaller than what he had before so people just have different feelings on this
0:17:51The size works for me. But again, I don't think I could go any bigger. I
0:17:56Will say if you're wearing like long sleeves like today
0:17:58I'm wearing a jacket like you definitely notice it more than the other watches because of the size and I think because
0:18:05the edges aren't that sort of
0:18:10Rounded shape right so like your sleeve doesn't like glide over the crown as easily because it's got the big crown guard and the other side
0:18:17Is flat like you're just a little bit more aware of its presence. Maybe that will fade with time
0:18:22On it like a little bit a little bit
0:18:26I think it depends on like like these sleeves
0:18:28I'm wearing on this jacket have a little elastic in them and like I kind of had to like kind of pull it over it
0:18:33But right my guess is that that will become more normal with time like right now
0:18:39I'm very aware that it's bigger than my old Apple watch was
0:18:43Now in six months will I think that probably not like my brain will just adjust to this is what the Apple watch is
0:18:49But there is a little bit of a curve I think in getting used to the size
0:18:54But I'll say it's mostly about the size. It's not about the weight
0:18:57I mean everyone said this in the hands-on of their reviews and I'll echo it. It is not as heavy as
0:19:02it
0:19:03looks and I did not I meant to and I just ran out of time but I
0:19:07Meant to weigh my old watch with this one because my old ones also titanium
0:19:11It feels like it is heavier than my old watch but not by as much as it should be based on the size
0:19:18I don't know what they've done there, but you look at it or you see pictures of it online
0:19:22You think my gosh like that must be like a boat anchor
0:19:25It's really not and I think the titanium goes a long way to that because the titanium is way lighter
0:19:31Than the steel Apple watch even in the same size and it's one of the benefits of the materials they've chosen
0:19:36Could do you think you could wear this with like a collared shut? I think so
0:19:41Okay
0:19:43It may have to be a little like fur, you know
0:19:45I think you just be aware of getting the you know sleeve around it if the sleeve like buttons or you know
0:19:52If you're wearing like a sports coat or something, I think it would be okay, but I think you would
0:19:56Use be more aware of it than you would any previous watch
0:20:00So I just looked this up the 45 millimeter stainless steel the series 8 is
0:20:0651.5 grams
0:20:09The ultra is sixty one point three grams. So it's even heavier than the steel
0:20:14I guess the size helps it not feel as dense. I don't know. It's a weird trick
0:20:18They've pulled off here that it doesn't feel as heavy. Yeah as you think it would I can't see the titanium
0:20:23In that they don't have that information how much the titanium weighs just on their website. I'm sure we could find it but
0:20:30Yeah, it's heavier than steel. The design, I like the titanium. I liked the titanium
0:20:36Apple watch before I had a pick or risky or no is a flexi of like Apple moving to titanium
0:20:43on the side rails of the phone. I still think they should do that. But the texture like
0:20:47the finish is really different. The old titanium watches were brushed titanium. And you could
0:20:52see without I mean that close to it, you could see the brush marks in it and it looked really
0:20:57nice. This watch, the finish is not dissimilar from the aluminum, like silver
0:21:03aluminum Apple watch where it's kind of that bead blasted smooth look. It doesn't
0:21:08look like aluminum, like the color is a little bit warmer, but it is not brushed.
0:21:12It is sort of the satin finish that I think actually looks really nice with
0:21:16this design. I think if they had done the brushed it would have maybe
0:21:20been a bit too busy, and so it works for me the sort of flat matte look. You
0:21:26know, it diffuses light, it doesn't really have any strong reflections off of any
0:21:30of the metal. I think it's really nice. I think some people have have wanted it
0:21:35wanted Apple to have a darker version of this and I think that would be cool in
0:21:39the future. I know nothing about, you know, how you would color titanium like I
0:21:44don't know if it could be anodized like aluminum is, but at least with the raw
0:21:48titanium if I had to get a big gouge in it you're not gonna see a different
0:21:52color like poking out from underneath because it should be the same finish
0:21:55basically all the way through. And so I can see from a longevity, like roughness perspective,
0:22:01why Apple wouldn't want to do any colors unless the metal was colored all the way through.
0:22:06But if they had a dark one in the future, I think a lot of people would dig that.
0:22:09Is it comfortable to wear?
0:22:11It is for me. I mean, it sits squarely on my wrist. You know, the lugs don't overhang the
0:22:19sides of my wrist. I think again like it's all about wrist size. I do tend to wear my
0:22:24watch pretty close to like that bone that's at the end of your wrist like at your hand.
0:22:30You guys know what I'm talking about?
0:22:31The little bump?
0:22:32Yeah.
0:22:33The bumpy bone?
0:22:34The bumpy bone?
0:22:35The bumpy bone.
0:22:36Yeah.
0:22:37You definitely want it below that like if it's on top of that I think because the size
0:22:42kind of sits up on it in a little bit of a weird way.
0:22:44So you want it to the to the to like the left of the bumpy bone?
0:22:47Yeah, like the inside, like away from the hand.
0:22:49Vidit in Discord has said like the titanium was 45.1 grams in the series 7.
0:22:55Okay.
0:22:56So that's quite a difference.
0:22:59Yeah.
0:23:0061 grams to 45.
0:23:02Yeah, it doesn't feel like it's that big of a difference.
0:23:04Yeah.
0:23:05Pretty wild.
0:23:06I mean, I'm sure it's like your brain would tell you it would be bigger.
0:23:09Yeah.
0:23:09Like, would by looking at the thing.
0:23:11What do you think of the Crown Guard?
0:23:13I think it's fine.
0:23:15Like it's kind, I mean, it's definitely like the sore spot on the design.
0:23:20It looks tacked on in a way that I didn't really anticipate,
0:23:25but I've gotten used to it pretty quickly.
0:23:28I mean, I like that the crown is sort of flush with it.
0:23:33It's like the most prominent the side button has ever been,
0:23:37which is funny to me because the side button like
0:23:39it's it's had so many jobs over the years.
0:23:42Remember at first it was like the circle of friends thing.
0:23:44It's weird.
0:23:47But it is...
0:23:48Oh my god, yeah.
0:23:49It's fine.
0:23:50You know, it definitely makes it a bit more distinctive than the standard Apple Watch.
0:23:55Can we talk about the display?
0:23:56Yes, please.
0:23:57The thing that I have been struck with the most for the many people I follow online who
0:24:02have gotten one of these, so I was actually quite surprised how many people I'm seeing
0:24:06post their wrist photos with their Apple Watch Ultras.
0:24:12The flat display is the thing that I find to be the most visually attractive about this.
0:24:20To me I think it's just because it's different. Like it's visually very different from the
0:24:25odd Apple watches. And I just want to know like, what do you think? Do you like it? How
0:24:30is it to use it? And also like what is that, the like the lip around the edge? Like how
0:24:36does it feel to use?
0:24:37The lip is so minor that if I didn't know it was slightly raised by feeling that you
0:24:44can't really tell that it's raised.
0:24:46I mean it is, the glass is not sunken into the metal in any really perceptible way.
0:24:53It's very minor.
0:24:54I really like the flat look though.
0:24:56I mean obviously the screen is bigger.
0:24:58I think the flat display makes the screen look even bigger than it would otherwise.
0:25:03And all in all, like it's definitely the nicest screen on an Apple Watch.
0:25:08I like the, the flatness gives it sort of that modern feel like we've seen on some of
0:25:14Apple's other devices.
0:25:16And it doesn't do the thing that like, I think the Series 7 in particular, for me was kind
0:25:22of annoying at like the, you get like reflections and like light scattering around the edges
0:25:29of the display where it curved down.
0:25:32obviously you don't have any of that here because the screen is flat and then it's surrounded
0:25:35by metal and so it's just a cleaner look. It's less organic looking for sure but I really
0:25:44like it.
0:25:45It's aggressive the design I think but I don't think that's a bad thing. You know like especially
0:25:49like watch design. Watches get pretty bold. You know like sharp edges and big and chunky
0:25:56and stuff like I think it works visually it's but the using watch OS on that screen does
0:26:05it feel any any different like really no okay watch OS suffers from this I think even worse
0:26:12than iOS and iPad OS do where it doesn't really do anything to take advantage of the bigger
0:26:18screen everything is mostly just scaled up that's most noticeable I think on the watch
0:26:23faces like we can talk about that separately in a second but like the
0:26:28modular watch face that I used on my series 7 like I don't get any extra
0:26:31stuff with it on the new watch everything just a little bit bigger the
0:26:35space between everything's a little bit bigger I don't think it looks bad like I
0:26:39don't think it looks comical like like say the way the the way the home screen
0:26:46grid looks on the iPad mini right it's like so bad and so awkward I don't think
0:26:51there's anything that stands out there in a hugely negative sense but I do
0:26:58wonder if Apple can get away with watchOS basically just scaling forever
0:27:05or will there be at some point something different they do with this larger
0:27:10screen you know I get that it's the first one I get also that watchOS 9S
0:27:14support a pretty wide range of screen sizes and so just scaling it up and down
0:27:21is probably the easiest thing for them and their developers but it definitely
0:27:24leaves a little bit to be desired like you have this nice big screen and you
0:27:28can basically see the same amount of stuff as you do on a on a smaller watch.
0:27:34Yeah it kind of we'll talk about watchOS in a minute but it kind of feels like
0:27:38WatchOS 9 in general has had some redesign work done to it to like take
0:27:45advantage of screen space, which I think they maybe did that for the Ultra,
0:27:52but the other watches get it too, so it kind of doesn't really feel like you
0:27:54have any particular benefit. Right. I guess. Yeah, yeah, yeah, for sure, and I mean
0:27:59yeah, if you're reading a text message I guess you can see some more lines of text.
0:28:02I haven't actually compared it directly to my Series 7, but in using it it feels
0:28:07very much like the same experience just everything's a little bit bigger a
0:28:10little bit more spaced out. You mentioned watch faces. Yeah. What one are you using?
0:28:15So right now I've just brought my modular face over from the Series 7. There
0:28:22is a face that's specific to this watch called Wayfinder. Yeah it looks cool. It
0:28:27does look cool and you can adjust it where it works a little bit better in
0:28:31always on mode and of course it has the deal where you rotate the crown and it's
0:28:35all red so like protects your night vision if you're out stargazing or
0:28:39something. I have a lot of questions why other Apple watch faces didn't get that
0:28:42like couldn't they just do that without updating all the other watch faces like
0:28:46just apply some sort of filter to it I don't know it's weird that's not there
0:28:50my problem with Wayfinder is my problem basically with a lot of Apple's watch
0:28:54faces where I don't really care for the curved complication type because a lot
0:29:00of things just don't do well curve like Carrotweather's got a bunch of
0:29:04complications and I think it works pretty well. I can have like a little
0:29:06graph of high and low. To do is I get a little bar you know showing how many
0:29:11things I have back. But then if I want to see calendar events like they got to
0:29:16basically be one word long or they get truncated and that's true for a bunch of
0:29:20Apple watch faces where the complications are around the outside.
0:29:22And I've kind of just given up on getting one of those really the way that I like
0:29:27it and I like having you know my computer watch be a little bit more
0:29:32computery so I think modular is gonna be gonna be it I mean it feels like you
0:29:37could just complain about watch OS watch faces forever right yeah like it's like
0:29:43a constant thing have you like that night vision red mode thing on the
0:29:48Wayfinder do you have any particular thought like is it like good I mean it
0:29:54it's cool I guess yeah my bigger question is like why didn't they do it
0:29:58everywhere, like if it's this really important feature.
0:30:01- Yeah, well, I mean, clearly you're just not doing enough
0:30:03extreme things, so.
0:30:05- I know.
0:30:06- If you did more extreme things, you would way find
0:30:07and if you were way finding, you could more extremely
0:30:10look at it in the dark.
0:30:12- It's true.
0:30:13- You got a band too though, right?
0:30:15Which band did you get?
0:30:16- I got the orange Alpine band, which is the one
0:30:20with the loops on the outside and has this titanium,
0:30:23like kind of S hook, actually it looks like a six
0:30:26now that I'm looking at it and the hook
0:30:27is all on the outside, is awesome.
0:30:30The band's really comfortable, it's really lightweight.
0:30:33It's easy to find, 'cause like the little loops
0:30:36are pretty close to each other,
0:30:37so it's easy to find one that fits well for you.
0:30:39But it's definitely a little--
0:30:40- It's easy to put on.
0:30:42- It's not the easiest Well-Watched band to put on.
0:30:45- But you don't, it makes sense though,
0:30:47'cause it's meant to stay on, right?
0:30:50I feel like these bands are a little different
0:30:52to the other ones, so for like, no, this is purpose.
0:30:55Like this one is like meant to hold on
0:30:58when you're climbing up a mountain.
0:30:59- Right.
0:31:00- That's what it's for.
0:31:01- Yeah, I don't, I can't really imagine
0:31:03what I would be doing where this watch band
0:31:05accidentally comes undone.
0:31:09Right, like I think it would take my arm with it
0:31:11before the band came undone.
0:31:14I do have the black and gray trail loop,
0:31:17which is like basically like the sports,
0:31:21like the Velcro one.
0:31:23I got one of those on order
0:31:24because like the downside of this band is,
0:31:26and I mean, I like orange, like bright orange,
0:31:28but it's really noticeable.
0:31:30I'd like to have something that tones it down a little bit,
0:31:32but that doesn't ship until November.
0:31:34So I just have this for a while, but it looks great.
0:31:38And it is, once you kind of get the hang of how to put it on,
0:31:42you can do it relatively quickly.
0:31:44It just took me a couple of days to like work out,
0:31:46okay, what little spot do I want to put it in?
0:31:48And how do I manage it?
0:31:51It's, and it's comfortable.
0:31:54Like it's basically everything that touches you is sort of,
0:31:57it's not canvas, but it's kind of like a rid,
0:32:01like a ridged material.
0:32:04I don't know, it's hard to,
0:32:06it's very different from any other watch band
0:32:07I've had from Apple, I'll say that.
0:32:10And it definitely completes the look.
0:32:12And I think it's one reason,
0:32:14I should have said this at the beginning,
0:32:15is it the first time in a long time
0:32:17that someone has come up to me and said,
0:32:19"Oh, is that the new one?"
0:32:20like referencing an Apple product in my possession.
0:32:23I mean, I think the last time was like the iPhone 10 maybe.
0:32:28And I think the bright orange band honestly
0:32:30has more to do with it than the size.
0:32:31And-
0:32:32- I mean, the whole thing screams different, right?
0:32:35- Yeah.
0:32:36- Like it's very visually different.
0:32:39It's interesting like to me, like when I see,
0:32:41considering that it does share so many things
0:32:44with the other watches from like a design language,
0:32:47it is surprising just how different a product it looks.
0:32:51Does that make sense?
0:32:52I mean, you tell me, does that make sense
0:32:53what I said based on your experience?
0:32:55- Yeah, I think so.
0:32:56And I think with orange kind of being like the product,
0:33:00like if anyone's seen a photo of this
0:33:01just like float by on Facebook,
0:33:03it was probably the one with the orange band, right?
0:33:05It's the image Apple's using.
0:33:07And so, again, it definitely just draws more attention to it.
0:33:11And I think that's kind of funny.
0:33:13Like, this has been a while since I've had that happen,
0:33:15especially repeatedly, like over the weekend.
0:33:19So I got it Friday afternoon,
0:33:20I wore it Saturday to a football game,
0:33:24Sunday to church, Sunday to some family stuff.
0:33:27And even like last night I saw some people
0:33:30and they're like, "Oh, is that the new one?"
0:33:32Like, "Yep, yep, it is."
0:33:33And I think the orange,
0:33:35like the bold orange is probably what gives it away,
0:33:37at least from across the room.
0:33:39And I really like this band,
0:33:41but I'm also looking forward to kind of dressing it down
0:33:44little bit with the black grey trail loop. Now I have not tried the ocean water band
0:33:51which at least in the yellow looks like a bunch of like noodles stuck together.
0:33:56Yeah it's a weird one.
0:34:01Yeah I do...
0:34:01The colors are good like the yellow is nice.
0:34:03The yellow is nice. I think the white looks pretty sharp.
0:34:07Don't know about yellow and orange though that feels not good. Like the orange is always there.
0:34:12I think the white looks pretty sharp.
0:34:15Those you can actually, at least here,
0:34:16you can get them next day.
0:34:19So I may end up picking one of those up to try.
0:34:21I would like to compare the three of them at some point,
0:34:24but again, it's not till November
0:34:26when the trail loop shows up.
0:34:28And so maybe later in the year,
0:34:30I can review the three of them side by side.
0:34:33I did try a standard, you know,
0:34:37large Apple watch band on it.
0:34:40And it works, like it clips in and it's fine,
0:34:42but it definitely looks a little too narrow for my taste.
0:34:46You could do it.
0:34:47Say that I wanted to wear this someplace nice
0:34:49before the darker band shows up,
0:34:51like I would put a dark band on it and it would be fine.
0:34:55The other way around, I think works about as well.
0:34:59Like you can put this band on a Series 7.
0:35:02Like it's fine.
0:35:04It's a little bit weird.
0:35:07- I mean, there are a bunch of bands
0:35:08that don't have metallic lugs and you can use all those like the all the loops
0:35:15yeah yeah don't have metallic the the magnetic one which I love I recommend
0:35:20that to anyone by the way if you want a nice-looking well functional watch band
0:35:25the magnetic loop is your friend yeah now you can wear all those right and but
0:35:29yeah I know what you mean that it would be strange it's like I thought about
0:35:32like do I want any of these but now like no I'm not gonna put the silver lugs on
0:35:36my gold watch. That's just weird.
0:35:38More power to you if you do it, but that's not my thing.
0:35:42- Yeah, the lug mismatch, I don't like mismatched metals.
0:35:46I don't mind if like the lug is blue or black,
0:35:49you know, that plasticky, whatever material Apple uses.
0:35:52I agree with you.
0:35:53I think metal mismatch on the lugs is a deal breaker for me.
0:35:57You know, I saw some people trying it on their steel bands,
0:36:00which I think Apple still sells.
0:36:01I've actually never seen one of those in person,
0:36:04I don't think, or at least I've never handled one.
0:36:06That kind of works.
0:36:08It'd be kind of cool if Apple had a titanium version of that
0:36:10that matched, but they seem to have basically forgotten
0:36:14that that band exists.
0:36:16- Do you sleep track?
0:36:18- I do.
0:36:18- Could you sleep with this on?
0:36:20- You definitely noticed the size.
0:36:22- I can't worry about you moving your arm
0:36:26and just giving Mary big bros on the side of the hips.
0:36:29- She made some exact jokes.
0:36:30She's like, "Keep that thing away from me."
0:36:32(laughing)
0:36:33it's not as comfortable to sleep in as the smaller like the Series 7. What I've
0:36:38considered doing is... I cannot believe I'm gonna say this...
0:36:43Daywatch Nightwatch! Daywatch Nightwatch! Daywatch Nightwatch! The Series 7 I have on like the
0:36:49velcro fabric-y band, it's really comfortable. Uh-huh. It's obviously smaller
0:36:54like it also is rounded off like it doesn't have the weird protrusion on the
0:36:59side so I don't know like it's um I haven't gone through with that yet but I
0:37:04think that's where I may end up like look we haven't talked about like the
0:37:06battery life on this watch is oh yeah wild so yesterday I I was up early
0:37:14yesterday put the watch on first thing worked all day like you know in the
0:37:19office around the house etc yesterday afternoon I'm pulling it up in fitness I
0:37:24I went for a 2.77 mile walk.
0:37:29So I walked for just under an hour, came home, had dinner,
0:37:34was going to bed.
0:37:35We were going to bed and Mary's watch,
0:37:37which is the small series seven hit low power mode,
0:37:42you know, like the 10% thing.
0:37:44'Cause she had worked out for about half an hour
0:37:45that morning and it was in school all day.
0:37:47And I swiped mine up and control center said
0:37:49I had 74% battery life remaining.
0:37:51(laughing)
0:37:53- Oh my God.
0:37:54- It doesn't make any sense relative to what we know
0:37:59about Apple Watch batteries.
0:38:01Like it's just, it's really, really funny.
0:38:06- That's monster.
0:38:07- Yeah, so like I could sleep in it
0:38:09and I think I'd get like two or three days pretty easily.
0:38:11If we were going away for a weekend,
0:38:12like we were going camping,
0:38:13I wouldn't even bring an Apple Watch charger,
0:38:15like it would be fine.
0:38:16- Especially when they bring out that like,
0:38:19that wild thing that it does.
0:38:22and it says that it should triple the battery life.
0:38:26So there was actually some information from this.
0:38:28It was either in MKBHD or I just need to review
0:38:30'cause Apple didn't really give any information
0:38:32but I think I heard it there, Link.
0:38:35So battery optimization coming later this year
0:38:38and basically what it does is it's pinging GPS
0:38:42and the heart rate sensors less often.
0:38:44In doing that, it should triple the battery life
0:38:47and should get you around 60 hours of battery life.
0:38:50(laughing)
0:38:52See what I mean?
0:38:53Like, there's no reference to like this battery life
0:38:56and other Apple watches.
0:38:57It's so far beyond.
0:38:59And so if I was sleeping with like the series seven on
0:39:01would really just be about the comfort level,
0:39:04not about anything else.
0:39:06And that's probably what I'll end up doing because,
0:39:09you know, trade in on Apple watches is bad
0:39:12and selling them like, you know, you can do it,
0:39:15but you're also gonna take a bath and it's titanium.
0:39:18Like it's a nice watch.
0:39:19I probably would just hold onto it
0:39:20for sleep tracking purposes, but it's--
0:39:24Well, also like, you might not wanna wear the ultra
0:39:27if you're going for a nice meal.
0:39:28Sure, yeah.
0:39:30Right?
0:39:30But I'm also one that I won't,
0:39:31like if Mary and I were going out,
0:39:34like I probably would wear a traditional watch anyways.
0:39:37Or a real watch, yeah.
0:39:39Like my calculator watch.
0:39:40Like a gentleman.
0:39:41But it's--
0:39:42A Casio calculator, like a real gentleman.
0:39:45Tell them, yeah.
0:39:46Let me open the door for you
0:39:47and calculate our tip on my wrist.
0:39:49So I have two final questions. Okay, yeah, if you want to say more you can but these are my two last questions
0:39:53And it's like I'll ask both at the same time. Are you gonna keep it? Why are you gonna keep it?
0:39:58I am keeping it because
0:40:00Despite some of the weirdness around the size and like I'm basically committing to new bands even that I don't have to commit to new bands
0:40:07I really like it. I like the size. I like the I mean look I am
0:40:15Swearily in the like crosshairs of Apple's marketing for this thing. We're like, yeah, like I work out I do outdoor activities
0:40:22But I'm not like an ultra marathon or where this watch doesn't really meet my needs
0:40:25Right, like a lot of that what this watch can do it is totally aspirational for my level of fitness and activity
0:40:31But I like sort of the lifestyle side of it, right? I like kind of what the watch says and
0:40:38The size works for me like if this had been too big I would I was not going to force the issue because I didn't
0:40:44want to wear a watch it was like hanging over my wrist and like banging into
0:40:47things and again I think I'm just just within the parameters for the size if
0:40:55this watch were 51 millimeters or 52 millimeters I don't think I could pull
0:41:00it off but I feel like the size works for me I like the features and I like the
0:41:07way it looks and so for me it will be it'll be sticking around even if I never
0:41:12use it to you know hike across Scotland or whatever underscore is doing this
0:41:16week I I can't wait for him to talk about that he told me he's gonna write
0:41:20it up but like yeah I can't wait to hear about his experience maybe we should get
0:41:24him on the show underscore underscore join us on the show there he's been
0:41:30asked so I do all of our business I remember I said I wanted to go try one
0:41:37on I wanted to go to the Apple Store try it on I decided not to do that because
0:41:41you don't be tempted. I'm worried I'm gonna buy one. Yeah. So I'm not going I'm
0:41:46not looking I'm not I've refused to look. Adina tried one on I sent Steve a
0:41:50picture and it's one of the most ridiculous things you've ever seen. It's
0:41:53like it's like somebody put a watch on a twig it looks hilarious. It's like if I
0:41:57put a dinner plate on my wrist right like Adina is so petite in this watch I
0:42:01mean it was I seriously laughed out loud and like it's so funny and not making
0:42:06fun of Adina like I love Adina to death but this is so not the product for her
0:42:11she's 5'2 she's like yes and she was buying a series 8 so which she did and
0:42:17we've been setting up and she's pretty excited about that. Which one did she get?
0:42:20Starlight okay cuz quote silver it's less boring than silver yeah which is
0:42:26true I mean she's completely correct I got Mary's seven is starlight cuz I
0:42:31don't think they I don't think they did like the regular silver in the series
0:42:34and you can't tell the difference unless it's side by side with a silver watch
0:42:39and even then you're like maybe I mean it's very it's very subtle yeah I'm
0:42:45gonna find that image that she sent me and put it in yeah it's hilarious
0:42:50absolutely hilarious and it's worth it's definitely worth people seeing because
0:42:54you know it gives you the idea of like if you're if you're like slim five to
0:43:00like tiny person this probably is not gonna work for you? I mean I don't know
0:43:05you make your own decision but I don't think it...
0:43:07Probably not. I need to get
0:43:09married to try it on. I think it'd be a similar effect but yeah I mean this
0:43:13watch is an outlier right because of the size because of the look it means that
0:43:19it's just so people just aren't gonna be able to wear it and yeah and if you're
0:43:23someone who wears an Apple watch in a lot of different contexts this may not
0:43:27work, right? So if you go into an office day every day in a suit and tie or like
0:43:32you know a nice blouse or something like this doesn't dress up as easily as some of the other Apple watches now
0:43:40That may not be a deal breaker for you and for other people. It's a big deal
0:43:44Like there's just there's more decisions that go into this watch
0:43:47Than I feel like there's ever been with the Apple watch before and I think if you are
0:43:53Interested in it and you can get your hands on one in a store or something like that. I think it's worth
0:43:59trying it on first because
0:44:02It unless you're just like just you got, you know, big beefy wrists
0:44:07Like, you know, you like big watches and like yeah go for it
0:44:10But if you have any doubt in your mind and it's easy to get your hands on one, I think it's worth
0:44:16trying that because it is
0:44:20Surprisingly different from any other Apple watch we've had and we know we've had what two size increases over the years
0:44:26But there's way more ground
0:44:29You know way more space between this and the other Apple watches than all the other Apple watches
0:44:35Combined and I think that's cool
0:44:38Like I'm glad apples diversified the line and I'm glad like what they did works for me
0:44:44I think it's I think it's really cool
0:44:45I really enjoy it, but it does mean that they've built a product that's not for everybody in a way that
0:44:52we haven't really seen with the Apple Watch. I mean there are people who don't like the Apple Watch and there's people who, you know...
0:44:58There are people that the big one is already not, like,
0:45:01what used to be the big one was already not for them because it was too big, you know what I mean?
0:45:04Yeah. Everybody has their own taste.
0:45:06Yeah. You could be a tiny five foot two person and want this and wear it and like it and that works for you.
0:45:14But, you know, you kind of roll your own adventure on that one.
0:45:20But I think one of the things about this watch is like, as compared to other watches that
0:45:26exist in the world of this size, is like the Apple Watch, the bands kind of really come
0:45:32out of the sides and it makes the whole thing look bigger.
0:45:38Which is just the way they design it.
0:45:39But like, standard watches don't do that, right?
0:45:43come down from the lug way more. And maybe actually now Apple probably have some bands
0:45:48that might work like this. Or maybe you could get a third party band that the lugs are more
0:45:52detached and it kind of like has a different profile. But it makes the overall thing look
0:45:57so much larger. I will say with the Alpine band at least I don't think this is true for
0:46:02the ocean water one. But the Alpine band at least the fabric loops are can't go in any
0:46:09direction. Yeah. And so for me, yeah, the looks took out a little bit, but then the
0:46:13band basically goes straight down. I think one of the things that makes the image, which
0:46:17I've put in the Discord is the show notes of Adina wearing it. She's wearing the Ocean
0:46:21band, which is definitely, I think, the chunkiest of all of them, right? I think if I try the
0:46:28Ocean band, it may not work for that reason, but I guess we'll see. So yeah, it's just
0:46:35factors that go into deciding if the Ultra is right for you. There's also like
0:46:40price and these other things right but if you were someone who bought you know
0:46:44a stainless steel or ceramic watch or you're somebody who updates their watch
0:46:49every three years and you're looking at this one like I think there's also a
0:46:52longevity angle to this watch not necessarily because it's more rugged or
0:46:55extreme but like just the battery capacity alone means this watch could
0:47:01perform really well for years to come as the battery degrades right because
0:47:05you're starting with so much more battery life than anything else we've
0:47:08ever had in the Apple Watch and so those are all factors with this and for me it
0:47:13totally works but I think for a lot of people it may not and that's that's fine
0:47:16and on the price I am still surprised about the price so like you know the if
0:47:21you want to get a silver stainless steel with a sport loop the 45 millimeters
0:47:26seven hundred forty nine dollars yeah this is seven hundred ninety nine
0:47:31dollars so like I kind of can't believe that it's only fifty dollars more by and
0:47:38large then a like regular stainless steel one it's not that much of a jump
0:47:43so if you're in the market for an Apple watch this is definitely in the
0:47:48conversation now right like and you know let's not fitness shame right like you
0:47:54don't have to climb a mountain to wear this watch. Like if you just want it, get it. But
0:48:00maybe it'll be big on you.
0:48:01Maybe. It's still going to be orange though, which is the best part.
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0:49:48I wanted to take a moment to talk about watchOS 9.
0:49:52- Okay.
0:49:53- I had some thoughts on it that I wanted to share
0:49:55and maybe kind of fit symbol.
0:49:57So I mentioned like one of the things I'd noticed
0:50:00is they've definitely done something to,
0:50:03oh by the way, go read Alex Guido's review on Mac stories.
0:50:08- It's fantastic.
0:50:09- It's very good.
0:50:10Helps me with understanding all the things that I can do.
0:50:13So like I have noticed that there are definitely places
0:50:16in watchOS 9 where they're optimizing for screen space a bit better.
0:50:23Like the banner notifications are one of these, right?
0:50:27Like if you're using the watch, if the watch is active, notifications
0:50:33now appear as a banner rather than taking up the entire screen,
0:50:36which I definitely prefer.
0:50:38Yeah, I think that's pretty nice.
0:50:40It got ran the watchOS beta for the first time ever this summer.
0:50:44In the beginning of the summer, I wasn't so sure about the banner notifications,
0:50:49but I've come to really like them because if you're setting up a workout or you're
0:50:53reading a text message or you're doing something with the watch, the old
0:50:58notification style was basically modal, right?
0:51:00It would take over the whole watch and you couldn't do anything until you dismissed
0:51:04it or the animation went away.
0:51:06And now it's just like the iPhone or like the Mac where you can be working, be doing
0:51:10something, see it come in.
0:51:11you can go contend with it or you can just let it go and it'll be a
0:51:14notification center when you come back. So I've really come around around on
0:51:20this feature a lot more than I was earlier in the summer. The same as like
0:51:25the kind of varied sizing now in notification center I feel like they're
0:51:31doing a better job of like stretching and shrinking the notifications I think
0:51:36it looks cleaner except you know I can when you see the notifications pop up I
0:51:41I think they look better than they did before.
0:51:43Like just the overall look of them
0:51:44when you do get them full screen,
0:51:46except some apps they look incredibly janky.
0:51:48I don't know why.
0:51:49- Yeah.
0:51:50- Like the text is all wrong.
0:51:52It's like all wrong and I don't.
0:51:54- The to doest one, the text is like trying to escape
0:51:57the notification UI on the left side.
0:51:59It's bizarre, really strange.
0:52:02- I was really excited for the Metropolitan watch face.
0:52:05- Yeah, tell me about that
0:52:06because I spent a little time with it,
0:52:09but I definitely wanna hear your thinking on it.
0:52:11It's just a visual style that I enjoy.
0:52:14I own a metropolitan style watch, like a Nomos watch.
0:52:19And I just like the way it looks, like the visuals of it.
0:52:22I always end up in this situation
0:52:24with the colors of the watch faces.
0:52:27I don't like when the color dramatically changes
0:52:31from the always on mode to the active mode, right?
0:52:35So if you have like a white watch face,
0:52:38it goes dark, like really dark when it goes into always on.
0:52:42And I find that to be really annoying
0:52:45to see that transition occur.
0:52:47So I tend to run watch faces where I can have them be dark.
0:52:51So I have like on the metropolitan face,
0:52:54I'm using like the color is just the gray color
0:52:58because when it goes into the always on mode,
0:53:00it's then kind of still just a darker gray basically.
0:53:05But it does some stuff that I don't like.
0:53:07I don't like that it removes the numbers
0:53:09and it also goes a little too dark.
0:53:12It darkens the complications a little too much.
0:53:15And I was wondering how that was gonna be for me for a bit,
0:53:19like if it was gonna be annoying,
0:53:21but I've kind of come around on that
0:53:23'cause I really liked this face.
0:53:24It has one of the weirdest features of any Apple Watch face
0:53:28where if you activate it
0:53:30and you scroll the digital crown, the numbers change shape.
0:53:34Like they get larger or smaller
0:53:36and like the font changes.
0:53:38Very strange, but it's the thing that you can do.
0:53:41- Yeah, because like the California watch face,
0:53:43it has different styles for the time,
0:53:47but you change it in the edit.
0:53:50Like just scrolling through the crown doesn't change it.
0:53:53I just want more consistency
0:53:54across the way these watch faces work.
0:53:57Like the Wayfinder one.
0:53:58- Why, but you can, in the editing mode,
0:54:00you can also make customizations like the California.
0:54:04so you can choose how many numbers do you want to show up.
0:54:07So that's the same.
0:54:09But do you remember the one that they made
0:54:10for the Apple Watch Series 5, I think,
0:54:13where it looked like the time was melting off the sides?
0:54:16- Oh yeah, yeah, I do.
0:54:17- When you turn the digital crown without one, it moves.
0:54:21So they've done this a couple of other times.
0:54:23It's a strange thing, but it's kind of fun to play with.
0:54:26- Do you remember the feature,
0:54:28maybe Federica remembers what it was called,
0:54:30where you would rotate the crown and the time would move?
0:54:32- Time travel.
0:54:33Time travel.
0:54:34Worst feature.
0:54:35That feature sucks.
0:54:36Yeah, 'cause you--
0:54:37Sucked so bad.
0:54:38You hit your digital crown accidentally in your jacket
0:54:40and then you're late to a meeting
0:54:41'cause you think it's 3 p.m. and really it's 4.30.
0:54:44It's so strange.
0:54:45I understood what they were going for,
0:54:48but it was a bad idea.
0:54:50I like the medication app a lot.
0:54:52So I was using the medication feature on my iPhone,
0:54:56but it's way better on the watch
0:54:58'cause it has like the app is there
0:55:00and you can also just like say,
0:55:02"Hey, I took my meds from the watch notification."
0:55:05I really like it, so that's really good.
0:55:08Low power mode, very good to have.
0:55:10It came in handy when I was coming home from America.
0:55:14Like, my watch was getting down,
0:55:15and I could put it into low power mode,
0:55:17and I still get activity stuff that way.
0:55:20Because previously, you'd do it in that
0:55:22power saving mode or whatever,
0:55:24and it was basically like your watch didn't work.
0:55:27Talking about watch not working,
0:55:28I don't like the new interaction with the sleep focus mode
0:55:33where you have to hold down the digital crown
0:55:36to get to the watch.
0:55:37- Yeah.
0:55:38- That really annoys me.
0:55:40I don't like that.
0:55:40- It used to be that you spun it, right?
0:55:42To get out of.
0:55:43- Yeah.
0:55:44- Yeah, that's a bit weird to me.
0:55:45Maybe they had feedback that people's watches
0:55:48were coming out of sleep mode.
0:55:49It's like, I would think it'd be easier
0:55:51to accidentally turn the crown in your sleep,
0:55:53like dragging your arm across the pillow or something, but.
0:55:55- I don't know if it used to lock me out like this
0:55:58- Maybe it doesn't. - But yeah, that's a weird change.
0:56:00- You're thinking of the water thing,
0:56:01'cause they changed that too.
0:56:03- Maybe I am.
0:56:04- But with sleep mode, it used to just do what it does now.
0:56:06Like it turns the always on off.
0:56:08But then if you wanna use the watch,
0:56:10you have to hold down the crown,
0:56:13and I find that really annoying.
0:56:14I don't need it, I don't need that feature,
0:56:18and I don't like that they're making me do it.
0:56:20The last thing that I really love,
0:56:22really love about watchOS 9,
0:56:24is the keyboard when you're replying to messages,
0:56:27now has suggestions for words that you can tap like QuickType,
0:56:32where before you had to tap the word
0:56:34and scroll to digital ground to change the word,
0:56:36which was terrible.
0:56:37But now you can, it's better optimized for the things,
0:56:42which I actually, more than I thought I would,
0:56:45do I reply to messages using the swipe typing on my watch.
0:56:50- I didn't even mention that on the Ultra.
0:56:51On the Ultra, you can just totally just type
0:56:53with your index finger.
0:56:54Like it's so big.
0:56:55- Yeah, there's a ton of space.
0:56:56Yeah, yeah. It's that feature, like, man, it was built with the big Ultra in mind, for sure.
0:57:05So that's my thoughts on WatchOS 9. Let's welcome Federico Vitigi back to Connected.
0:57:10Hello Federico.
0:57:11Hello. I want to explain what just happened to me because, like, I'm honestly, like, shaking right now.
0:57:18And there's a tech angle to this.
0:57:22So as I was recording the show,
0:57:26I just watched my beach house being broken into by a guy via my security camera.
0:57:36Like, I got the alert and I just watched it.
0:57:41What security camera do you have?
0:57:43I have a Logi Circle 2 outside.
0:57:46Like, initially I, like, panicked.
0:57:50Yeah, I mean, of course.
0:57:51I was like, I thought I was like having like hallucinations, like am I hallucinating this?
0:58:00And I realized this is happening for real. And I texted you guys quickly and then I got
0:58:08up and I just spent the past 30, 35 minutes first on the phone with my mom, because obviously
0:58:17I'm in Rome and she's closer to the beach house than I am. Right. But then my mom immediately
0:58:21called the police and the police told her, stay where you are. Don't go there. Yeah,
0:58:26seriously. Yeah, of course. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, and also, you know, it's, it's, it's,
0:58:31it's dark now even like it well past, you know, 8 PM and I sent the, the police called
0:58:41me and I just had to describe this guy on the phone to the police like can you give us like
0:58:49can you tell us what it looks like and it's been it's been so weird to do this like as you like
0:58:57to watch a person break into your house and describe to a police officer on the phone
0:59:06what you were seeing and the details like what does it look like and then they asked me to send
0:59:12them the videos on whatsapp they gave me a phone number and the police officer told me can you
0:59:18quickly please send me these videos on whatsapp because we have two we have two cars with officers
0:59:27outside your home right now whoa and and it's been carabinieri baby they get it done yeah and
0:59:36And it's been so... I don't know, I'm shaking right now.
0:59:40I'm not surprised. It's a very horrible thing.
0:59:43The tech angle is that HomeKit Secure Video worked exceptionally well.
0:59:50I got the alert and it told me there's a person in your home.
0:59:56I opened the Home app and I selected the portions of the video tracks that I wanted to export
1:00:03and I just saved them as MP4 files in the files app
1:00:08and then also in photos,
1:00:10because it was easier to send them to my mom
1:00:13and to the police.
1:00:14And it was super easy.
1:00:16But yeah, my hope is that, it's been so weird,
1:00:20like I just watched this guy jump over the gate
1:00:24and go through my stuff with another guy outside,
1:00:29just covering him, I guess.
1:00:31It's, I don't know, it's the first time in my life that this happened to me.
1:00:36And, you know, it's not fun, but at least, you know,
1:00:41Yay passed me for installing a security camera.
1:00:46And also this is so weird, it's one of those coincidences, it's so weird.
1:00:49Last week, Sylvia and I were there.
1:00:54And we were like, "Should we take the security camera now that we're not at the beach anymore?
1:01:00Like, is there even a reason to keep it now?
1:01:03Nobody's here.
1:01:04- Oh, 'cause you're kind of locked down
1:01:06for the season now, right?
1:01:07- Yeah, we're not going there.
1:01:09We're not going there until next spring.
1:01:11And we're like, should we grab it?
1:01:12And I was like, yeah, I don't know.
1:01:14For now, let's leave it.
1:01:16And I had actually unplugged the Apple TV
1:01:21thinking I'm gonna take this one.
1:01:23But then I realized, no, well, if I'm leaving the camera,
1:01:25it needs a HomeKit hub.
1:01:27So before I left, I plugged it back in.
1:01:30and I ran the software update to tvOS 16 to make sure that everything was up to date on
1:01:36the Apple TV serving as the home kit hub and now as a turn of fate it was actually useful
1:01:44because of this. Geez, I don't know.
1:01:48I'm very sorry this happened to you. This is a terrible thing. Federico was texting
1:01:53me and Steven. We were like, so we were aware that it was happening as it was going down.
1:01:58Did it look like he got away with anything?
1:02:02- Yeah.
1:02:03This is so odd, but I actually don't think
1:02:10they stole anything of value, hopefully.
1:02:15So I don't think they were able to break in.
1:02:18We have a pretty heavy front door made of metal.
1:02:26It's one of those really old but sturdy metal doors.
1:02:31But outside, that's where we have the...
1:02:34And I know that it's a serious situation,
1:02:39but I can't help but laugh about this stuff.
1:02:42I think the guy stole the barbecue stuff.
1:02:44- No!
1:02:45- I know what you mean, like it's a horrible thing,
1:02:49but you can laugh about it if like it just feels
1:02:51like you just took a few things
1:02:52that aren't really that important, right?
1:02:53- I think this idiot stole my barbecue stuff.
1:02:57Like, I'm pretty sure that from the video
1:03:00he stole like the ax that I used to grab wood
1:03:04to, you know, light a fire.
1:03:09- Maybe he has some friends over
1:03:10and he can't light the barbecue.
1:03:12- Could be.
1:03:13- He stole my barbecue stuff.
1:03:15But like, I don't know, I'm calming down a bit now.
1:03:20Thankfully, like thank God we took the things of value last week.
1:03:26Oh, gosh. But yeah, this idiot stole.
1:03:30I mean, at least I hope he only stole my barbecue stuff.
1:03:34Yeah.
1:03:36But what else do I keep outside?
1:03:39There's nothing of value outside.
1:03:41I didn't even see these idiots.
1:03:44They didn't even see my camera because I got a very good look at the guy.
1:03:49Here's the thing, right, for a crime like this.
1:03:52This guy is a chancer.
1:03:54He's not like, you know what I mean?
1:03:56He's not like a master criminal.
1:03:57- He's not a rocket scientist.
1:03:59- I watched him climb that fence, Federico.
1:04:00He's not, you know what I mean?
1:04:02He's not smart.
1:04:04Like these people, they just--
1:04:06- You're not a pro.
1:04:07- You know, he's just seen an opportunity
1:04:09and he's jumped in and tried to grab,
1:04:11'cause he's obviously so stupid
1:04:13that his face is completely visible.
1:04:15He just walks towards the camera.
1:04:17- Yes, yes.
1:04:18Yes, yes. And he stole my toolbox, it seems. I'm taking a look at the video again. He stole
1:04:25my toolbox, my axe. Wow. Okay. I guess he needed some tools, I suppose. It was like,
1:04:31we're out of tools. Let's go steal some.
1:04:34He's building something.
1:04:35What else? He did it. Yeah. See, this is, this is the gross thing about this. Seeing
1:04:40a random guy go through your stuff.
1:04:41Yeah, it's a bad feeling.
1:04:42Even if you didn't take anything off. Like, if it feels weird and gross watching this.
1:04:47It's a violation.
1:04:48Yes, I feel violated. Yes, that's exactly what it feels like. I kind of feel like I
1:04:52just want to go there and throw everything in the trash right now. This is gross. Look
1:04:58at this idiot. Look at him go. He even looks at the camera at one point.
1:05:03Yeah, look at that. That's the moment, like, you know, it's like the anime to be continued
1:05:09moment when he looks at the camera. He's like, oh.
1:05:15This presents a unique opportunity to us to pivot Connected into a true crime podcast.
1:05:23Oh, yeah!
1:05:25Yeah!
1:05:26So, you know, if they find him, we'll have an updated episode, talk about his sentencing,
1:05:32etc, etc.
1:05:34We could, like, do this, like, "From Relay FM, a story of a stolen tools."
1:05:42and then like Federico. Federico give me a quote now just like say something, anything.
1:05:46I don't know what they stole but I can tell you for sure they grabbed my axe.
1:05:51Don't you say like this is how we like that's how you build the stuff, the crime story.
1:06:07Like a very serial style.
1:06:11He thought he was just jumping a fence, but instead he jumped into a wider story.
1:06:16The guy had no idea I would end up on an international podcast about Apple stuff.
1:06:22That's the thing about it.
1:06:23Let's get into Paul on this. He's just committed an international crime now.
1:06:30See, Cavalta, so through the history of the prompt and then connected, we've done our and
1:06:38discussed our fair share of weird things and topics, right? And we've said some silly things,
1:06:45some more serious things. We've seen the spectrum of the topics we can cover. I never thought I
1:06:52would end up watching my house being broken into and talk about it on the show as it was happening.
1:06:58as it was happening. That's the thing that kills me is we record two hours a week.
1:07:02Like this would have been strange no matter what time of day you send us these videos, right?
1:07:09Like yes, very upsetting, like all of that. But for it to happen on the show, it's just the
1:07:14universe telling us that, you know, it's time to pivot the company. Well it's just like I'm asking
1:07:19Steven, you know, "Does your watch band fit?" and Federico's sending me messages of a person
1:07:25and breaking into his house. I will say, this is what you get. Like, what other tech podcast
1:07:30has had a live house break-in? You know?
1:07:34Yeah.
1:07:35Fedorica, you have to go back and listen to see what I think about the Apple Watch Ultra
1:07:38though.
1:07:39I will do that. I will do that, actually.
1:07:41I'll provide follow-up next week.
1:07:42Okay.
1:07:43I think that we have now set the stage emotionally to talk a bit about Stage Manager.
1:07:49You got me right where I need to be right now. Yes.
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1:10:02So yesterday Apple gave a statement to Engadget. I will now read that statement.
1:10:09"We introduced Stage Manager as a whole new way to
1:10:13multitask with overlapping resizable windows on both the iPad display and a separate external
1:10:18display with the ability to run up to 8 live apps on screen at once.
1:10:24Delivering this multi-display support is only possible with the full power of M1 based iPads.
1:10:30Customers of iPad Pro 3rd and 4th generation have expressed strong interest in being able
1:10:37to experience Stage Manager on their iPads.
1:10:40In response, our team have worked hard to find a way to deliver a single screen version
1:10:46for these systems with support for up to 4 live apps on the iPad screen at once.
1:10:52External display support for Stage Manager on M1 iPads will be available in a software
1:10:57update later this year.
1:10:59Apple also delayed, uh, oh yeah sorry the external display support is delayed, yep,
1:11:04and then everything else is coming out whenever it comes out 16.1.
1:11:08Yeah, so it is a little confusing.
1:11:10So the 2018, 2020 iPads,
1:11:15no external display support for Stage Manager ever.
1:11:19The M1 is still getting it, but not anytime soon.
1:11:22And Federico, my question for you is,
1:11:25does getting rid of the external display support for now,
1:11:28does that fix Stage Manager?
1:11:29Was that the core of the problem?
1:11:31It was one of the crashiest parts of it.
1:11:37of it, but it doesn't fix the problem, unfortunately. I was hoping yesterday that it would fix the
1:11:43problem. So almost like, you know, cutting off a rotten limb. I'm sorry for the grim
1:11:52metaphor, but you're in a mood, you know, but no, it doesn't fix it. The problem is
1:11:59still there despite the, you know, dropping the the weight of of that part the problem persists.
1:12:08Yeah, it was quite interesting to follow along with Federico on twitter yesterday.
1:12:16It's been an emotional arc.
1:12:19And then it reminded me of the comedy in the tragedy masks which I found out are also known
1:12:26as "Sock and Buskin" which I did not know until I looked this up today.
1:12:31But where I was like, he was so happy and then immediately so sad.
1:12:35Federico, I would love you to give that kind of whole arc to the connected audience.
1:12:40So why were you happy about what Apple did and then why are you sad?
1:12:44Well immediately I was happy to see the recognition of the feedback from the community.
1:12:51and I was happy to see Apple being willing to compromise and saying, "Okay, we hear your feedback.
1:13:01We know that you really want to use Stage Manager on your older iPad, so how about this?
1:13:09We don't give you external display support, we give you a single screen Stage Manager,
1:13:14and you can use it on the 2018 and 2020 iPad Pros." I liked that. Immediately, I thought,
1:13:20that's a good sign. That's a company that's willing to listen. And I understand, and also
1:13:26right away, I felt optimistic because of the removal of the external display support, which
1:13:33has been frankly unusable, right? And I wrote about this in July. I have been extremely skeptical
1:13:41of all these folks who have done videos on YouTube showing "Hey, Stage Manager is perfect on my
1:13:47my external display where they're basically showing like a static screen for 20 minutes.
1:13:53Like yeah, if you leave an app running on an external display and you don't touch it
1:13:58and you don't move anything, it's not going to crash. But the moment you try to work with
1:14:02it, oh, it's going to crash. So those videos were funny. And so immediately I felt happy
1:14:09see a company willing to compromise and optimistic about, you know, maybe this is the time they're
1:14:19figuring this out. So I installed the beta and, you know, I thought, okay, maybe there's
1:14:28going to be more fixes, there's going to be more, you know, improvements on this front,
1:14:33things are maybe pointing in the right direction. I started using it for the first 30 minutes
1:14:39or 40 minutes or something, totally fine, totally okay. No crashes, no problems.
1:14:47And when I say problems, I mean of the technical nature. We can get into the problems of the design
1:14:54nature later. I mean, strictly, technically speaking, no problems, no crashes, no weird black
1:15:02bars, nothing. And so, okay, I'm thinking, this is great, this is nice. Apple is listening,
1:15:09they are changing their minds on this, the thing is not crashing for me. Maybe this is the beginning
1:15:15of an improvement, you know, maybe they are turning the ship around. I figured, you know,
1:15:23as maybe finally I tweeted this, maybe finally I can sit down and write this iPadOS 16 review,
1:15:32write about Stage Manager. And the moment I started using it for real "real work,"
1:15:39that's where the problems reappeared again. And once again I felt like in the span of just a few
1:15:48hours... This is like leaving the worst nerd version of Groundhog Day ever. Like, in just a
1:15:58matter of hours, I was right there where I started. Meaning I click an icon in the
1:16:04dock and my iPad reboots. Or I click a link to open a web page in Safari and my
1:16:12iPad reboots. And so I was like, "Okay, here we go again. It's crashing every few
1:16:17minutes." And I try to use drag and drop to drag in a window because they still
1:16:24don't have a proper shift-click behavior to add an app from the dock to your current workspace,
1:16:32so I'm using drag and drop. I use drag and drop and instead of seeing my app, I see a
1:16:37black rectangle. Like, "Okay, here it goes again, this bug as well." So I'm like, "Okay,
1:16:44here we go, the whole team is here. The crashing, the black box, everything is here once again."
1:16:50But then a new enemy appeared, so to speak. That enemy being the trackpad. Or, you know,
1:17:00the fact that when you switch, when you move between windows, and I'm struggling to describe
1:17:07this, because this is like the weirdest bug ever for a windowing system, you were expecting
1:17:14a windowing system to, well, take the pointer from one window to another, right? So you
1:17:21click on Safari, you interact with Safari. Notes is floating right next to Safari, you
1:17:28click on Notes, you work with Notes. That's exactly what people do with their computers.
1:17:32It's the point of a windowing system.
1:17:34It's the whole point of it. Like, you move the cursor, you click on Windows, you work
1:17:39with those windows.
1:17:40In the latest version of Hyper S16, I'm getting there, but I need to set the proverbial stage
1:17:47for this.
1:17:48I know, right?
1:17:52I am good with words.
1:17:54Yes.
1:17:55In the latest version of Hyper S16, I noticed that when I moved the pointer from one window
1:18:03to another, in the other window, my clicks would not get recognized.
1:18:09I would click to the new window. So you're in Safari, you move to Notes. Let's say I have
1:18:13Safari and Notes. I move to Notes, I start clicking around and the clicks do nothing.
1:18:17And initially I thought, well, something is wrong with my Magic Keyboard. So I do one of those things
1:18:23that, you know, folks do often like, let me detach and reattach my Magic Keyboard because maybe
1:18:30something got stuck. And nothing. I'm moving between windows and when I move again I click and
1:18:35the other window does not respond to my clicks.
1:18:37And so I'm like, well, let me reboot my iPad.
1:18:42So I shut it down and I power it on again,
1:18:45open Stage Manager, two windows, move between them,
1:18:49the clicks go nowhere.
1:18:50Until I realize that those,
1:18:55there's this bug in this version of Stage Manager,
1:18:59which is now in public beta as of an hour ago,
1:19:01so everybody can go in and test it.
1:19:03Oh, good, good.
1:19:05Yeah, go there.
1:19:06Fantastic.
1:19:06Clicks get the trackpad.
1:19:11So this only happens with the trackpad or, you know, the
1:19:15accessory that Apple sells you with an iPad Pro.
1:19:17Clicks get stuck when you move between windows.
1:19:22If you want to get it unstuck, you need to click the edges of a
1:19:29window or the three dot multitasking menu at the top of a window. Doing that will unstuck
1:19:38the window so your clicks will work again. So effectively interacting with either the
1:19:44resizing system in some way. Yes. And does this happen 100% of the time for you? 100%
1:19:55of the time. And so I thought it was so wild, I couldn't believe it. Like, I couldn't believe
1:20:00that they would ship a bug so bad that it would happen, right? I thought something was
1:20:07wrong on my end. So, out of sheer precaution, and just to make sure that I would have a
1:20:13proper response to the people, to the, you know, the reply guys on Twitter, would say,
1:20:19but it's your iPad. Recently someone told me that the problems I have with stage manager
1:20:27are due to the fact that my iPad is overloaded. Someone told me that.
1:20:32Steven used to cyberbully me with this, telling me to restore my phone. This was a thing.
1:20:38Yeah, so because I remember, because I know that I can get behind that argument,
1:20:43I've been using this iPad Pro for a bunch of weird things. Insert base64 joke here.
1:20:49I've been running a bunch of betas. It's a fair argument. So I wiped my iPad Pro.
1:20:57Not even the "erase all contents and settings". I'm talking DFU mode.
1:21:01Alright? Straight up DFU mode. Downloaded the software image from the Apple Developer website.
1:21:09restored my iPad Pro without a backup.
1:21:12Nothing, nothing.
1:21:14Fresh iPad Pro.
1:21:16I go in, enable stage manager, open two windows,
1:21:20click between them, my clicks got stuck.
1:21:23So that's when I gave up.
1:21:27Yeah, that's the moment when I was like,
1:21:30I'm giving up here, I'm done.
1:21:31Like.
1:21:33- I'm gonna go out on a limb here and say,
1:21:35I think we are in the worst timeline for stage manager.
1:21:38Apple prioritised the wrong thing and I was worried they would do this and they've done it.
1:21:44In my opinion, they have wasted the last two to three months doing the work to make sure that this will be enabled on the older iPad Pros
1:21:57and not getting it to a stage where it is reliable on the M1 iPad Pros.
1:22:04I feel like what they should have done is made this statement but said it will come in 2023 for other iPad Pros
1:22:13and spend this time making Stage Manager not even just better.
1:22:20We've been talking about a lot of "better" but it's clearly, as Federico is running into untold problems, right?
1:22:27I feel like they've prioritised the wrong thing.
1:22:32I know that Federico you are happy about the fact that they listen to the community
1:22:36I was away on the episode where you guys spoke about this and it was a great episode
1:22:41But at that time I would have said no
1:22:43They have to like that you did they did not need to ship stage manager
1:22:50At the same time on all devices if they had to do it all I know why it annoys people
1:22:56I get it, right? Like, you want to be able to use this feature on this device which otherwise runs fine.
1:23:02But like, this happens all the time, right? Like this is just the way that technology moves.
1:23:09And you can ask for it and if they give you it, they give you it.
1:23:12But now they have, I think, made the wrong decision because I think they have clearly spent a lot of time working on this
1:23:19because this is the first we've heard about this, right?
1:23:23like all of a sudden now like three months after an initial release three months after the outrage
1:23:31where apple said time and time again why they couldn't do this they've now said loljk we've
1:23:39done it right so it feels like they have had to obviously put a lot of work into making a version
1:23:45of this that can run on their other hardware even in a somewhat limited space but i think for most
1:23:51people they don't actually really want the external display support anyway like
1:23:56I think stage manager is at its best just like being a windowing system on the
1:24:00iPad I think like that is what it should focus on most and then the external
1:24:05display support is like nice if you have it nice if you want to use it etc etc
1:24:08but like that is really I think like stage manager is already a thin side of
1:24:13the wedge like external display support for your iPad is an even thinner wedge
1:24:17right like we're just like really going on like percentage of percentage of
1:24:21people at that point. But if we've gotten to this point and I mean we are anywhere between
1:24:29two to four weeks in theory of this thing shipping on an ideal timeline, right? It just
1:24:36doesn't seem like it is in any kind of state because you see there are new bugs and they
1:24:44haven't addressed any of the things that you want to make the thing better.
1:24:47Yeah, yeah. Yes. So what this isn't like is like Safari, right? I think a lot of people
1:24:53are going to compare this to Safari and people are going to say, oh, they changed Safari,
1:24:59right? But they changed Safari in good ways and made Safari from bad to good, where all
1:25:05they've done like for this one is just they've just made it available more devices, but it's
1:25:09still got all the problems it had.
1:25:11Potentially widening the user base of folks who are going to run into problems.
1:25:16Yeah, yeah. More people, more people get the bugs.
1:25:19Yeah, there's more people that will be upset.
1:25:22And with Safari, it took a couple of betas, but then we saw pretty good progress.
1:25:28Exactly, exactly. So that's where I wanted to go.
1:25:32So Myke, you said that I was happy about, you know, having be extended to more users.
1:25:38And, and yes, initially I was, but then this morning, you know, after sleeping on this,
1:25:44I was thinking like, I'm happy that they listened.
1:25:47But then I went back in and checked.
1:25:50We talked about this stuff on June 15th,
1:25:54three more than three months ago, three and a half months ago.
1:26:00And we're seeing this change now.
1:26:04And so that, first of all, says a few things about how slow moving this ship really is.
1:26:11Right?
1:26:12I mean, we are seeing now addressing feedback from three and a half months ago.
1:26:20I'm not sure how I feel about that.
1:26:26But even then, like, they have removed half of Sage Manager, right?
1:26:33And now I'm wondering, like, who's happy now?
1:26:41Because people like me, we wanted stability, we wanted a bit more configuration options,
1:26:49like a bit more flexibility from Stage Manager and polish, and we didn't get that.
1:26:55Other folks wanted external display support, and I know, I have seen some Mac Stories readers
1:27:01tell me, "I upgraded my old iPad Pro to the M1 because of Stage Manager, and now it's
1:27:08useless."
1:27:09are not happy and because it's been three and a half months right it's been a it's been people
1:27:15make decisions in three and a half months it's been it's a long time in in this day and age
1:27:21i would say like i know what you're saying about like the the length of time it takes
1:27:25the ship for the ship to turn and i understand what you're saying that if like if they make a
1:27:29decision how long it takes to act on it the one thing i would add to that is we don't really know
1:27:34just how truly big or smaller job it was to actually even get this to a point where they
1:27:39were willing to say they were going to do it. Exactly. It may have taken like completely
1:27:44redoing the thing. Exactly. So this is this is my problem a lot because like we've been
1:27:49talking about this and the reason I keep talking about it is that obviously I really want to
1:27:55use this. If this was something that I didn't care about I wouldn't talk about it. Like
1:28:02Apple News. I mean, no offense to who works on Apple News, but I personally don't use the product.
1:28:08I don't have a lot of emotions and feelings about it. I really want to use Stage Manager.
1:28:13And I can tell you... It's made for you. Maybe, right? But I feel like... I cannot imagine
1:28:21how much time and effort and, like, people working overtime has gone into making this possible,
1:28:28where this continues to be a product that, when you use your trackpad, it doesn't accept your clicks.
1:28:38Like, all the time and effort for this, and you look at what this actually is, and you start to
1:28:46wonder, was it worth it? And to me, this is like such a perfect example of the fallacy of sunk cost.
1:28:55this economic principle where you're basically invested so much into a thing that you don't
1:29:01want to give it up, whereas the more sage advice would be to cut your losses. And Apple is not doing
1:29:08that. They are continuing to insist on "No, we are doing stage manager," even though you start
1:29:15picking off the things. "Okay, so now we said we wouldn't do it on more iPads. We are doing it on
1:29:21or more iPads, but it's not ready yet, okay, so we are going to delay it.
1:29:27It's still not working well. What if we cut the external display support? At what point
1:29:32do you end up with something that doesn't even resemble what stage manager was supposed
1:29:36to be? Like, I think Apple needs to take a long breath here, and be like, "Okay, seriously,
1:29:46Do we absolutely need to ship this by October?
1:29:51Like, is it absolutely necessary?
1:29:54Because I continue to ask the question
1:29:56that I asked last week and two weeks ago.
1:30:00Who is happy about Stage Manager on iPadOS at the moment?
1:30:04Like, I want to know.
1:30:06Who's happy about it?
1:30:08Is there anyone who loves it?
1:30:11And I don't understand, because it's--
1:30:14I continue to look, I'm never gonna be the person
1:30:17who loses hope and it's like,
1:30:19I'm gonna stop using the iPad, I quit, I'm done.
1:30:23It's just not who I am.
1:30:27So I continue to hope that Apple can figure this out,
1:30:34but then that continuing to hope is just not backed up
1:30:43by reality at the moment.
1:30:45Because as time goes on, week after week,
1:30:48each week is more problematic than before.
1:30:51I mean, let's face it.
1:30:52Each week it gets worse.
1:30:54And I'm not saying this to be an Apple hater,
1:30:58or like, I want to use this thing.
1:31:01Like, I want to work with it.
1:31:03I want to use it.
1:31:04I want to write about it.
1:31:06Because when it worked, it was cool to have three, four apps
1:31:11at the same time.
1:31:12But let's face it, each week it gets worse.
1:31:15How do we get out of this hole?
1:31:17And I said two weeks ago, and I said it last week again,
1:31:20they're only digging a deeper hole each week,
1:31:24and that continues to be more true every single week.
1:31:28It gets worse on a weekly basis.
1:31:31And it's not like it gets worse, but you can see,
1:31:35oh, but they're doing this to make it better.
1:31:37No, they're cutting off things,
1:31:40and it continues to get worse.
1:31:42And that's not to mention all the things
1:31:47that stage manager does not have,
1:31:50or does not do by design.
1:31:52Like, we haven't even touched upon
1:31:56the design of stage manager.
1:31:58That's a whole different thing.
1:32:00I'm talking about this product that Apple gave to us.
1:32:03We're looking at it as it is, you know?
1:32:07Just look at what this is,
1:32:10because we could talk about design of stage manager,
1:32:13how I would like to see different decisions being made.
1:32:18There's a conversation to be had about,
1:32:20do we really need overlapping windows on an iPad
1:32:25as opposed to a tiling mechanism?
1:32:28But that's a different conversation.
1:32:31Let's just talk about the product, right?
1:32:34And it's just not there.
1:32:36Not for people like me,
1:32:38not for folks who wanted external display support
1:32:40at this point.
1:32:41So who is it for?
1:32:44And can it find a market
1:32:48within two weeks, three weeks?
1:32:52- I also find it interesting,
1:32:54like Apple knows what build is gonna go out as a beta, right?
1:32:59It's not a surprise and like,
1:33:00oh, that's what people are running.
1:33:03And the current version being so like,
1:33:05in some ways maybe the most broken version
1:33:08we've had in a while.
1:33:10I just, so much about it makes me scratch my head
1:33:13about what's going on with this feature.
1:33:15And is it something inherently broken?
1:33:19Like that in the way that this is being built
1:33:22that they can't quickly fix it, right?
1:33:24Is there some sort of technical or technical debt
1:33:27or some sort of legacy, something or other
1:33:29that is holding them back?
1:33:31Because it's not like the people working on this
1:33:32aren't some of the smartest software engineers in the world,
1:33:36but they seem to really be struggling
1:33:38to get this even close to where it needs to be.
1:33:41- Yeah, yeah, and I know for a fact
1:33:46that there are a lot of really, really,
1:33:48like really smart people working on this stuff
1:33:51who listen to Connected, who listen to Upgrade,
1:33:54who follow our work and listen to our opinions.
1:33:59And obviously we, from here in front of our microphones,
1:34:04we have no idea what it's like to work on this stuff, right?
1:34:08We have no idea about timelines, deadlines,
1:34:10product managers.
1:34:12These folks are optimizing this stuff for future hardware.
1:34:15We have no idea about the future hardware,
1:34:18but we are customers and we use the product
1:34:23that is given to us.
1:34:26And I think maybe Apple doesn't like it
1:34:30when their stuff is criticized.
1:34:33I mean, nobody likes a critic, right?
1:34:35Especially when you're the one making the product.
1:34:39But critics are necessary.
1:34:42Because in this case, I think that ultimately,
1:34:46Apple will be happy to have a better product, right?
1:34:51- Yeah.
1:34:53- That's why we talk about this stuff.
1:34:56Because--
1:34:57I mean, if they hated critics that much,
1:34:58they wouldn't have enabled it for third and fourth gen.
1:35:00Exactly.
1:35:01Like--
1:35:01iPads.
1:35:02It's the only reason they did it was because people were upset
1:35:04about it.
1:35:05And to be fair, they do listen.
1:35:07They ask questions.
1:35:09They have been more proactive in reaching out
1:35:12to the press and the community over the past few years.
1:35:17It's a very different apple from that point of view
1:35:20from, say, 10 years ago, 13 years ago,
1:35:22when I started Mac Stories.
1:35:24And they really want to have a conversation about this stuff,
1:35:27which is great.
1:35:28But then look at the results.
1:35:31If they're not there, I'm sorry, but they're not there.
1:35:35And this is where we are.
1:35:37I mean, look, we can only comment
1:35:39on what we can comment on, right?
1:35:41And what we can comment on is what we can see.
1:35:44And what we can see is that this thing is not
1:35:47good enough right now.
1:35:49Who knows what the next month might bring?
1:35:52There might be like, all right, look,
1:35:53we got all these fixes, but we had to get this version out first and then we can.
1:35:58I'm like, great. Nobody wants to be like, not necessarily proven wrong, but nobody wants
1:36:03to have to walk all this back and say like, hey, they fixed it more than us three. Right?
1:36:08Because we just want this to be good. I'll tell you right now, like I think people might
1:36:11listen to somebody's shows sometimes and think, oh, these guys just love to complain. I much
1:36:15prefer to be happy. I'll tell you right now, I much prefer to sit here and say to you how
1:36:20how much I love something, because I am an enthusiastic person, it's what I draw pleasure
1:36:25in. But if we take our job seriously, of like we talk about these things sometimes, it needs
1:36:33to be saying this isn't good enough. And like to echo what Federico was saying, I'm sure
1:36:37there are people who listen to this show, there might be people who listen to this show
1:36:40right now who work on this project, and my expectation is, well you know though right?
1:36:48don't want this to be doing what Federico is describing it's doing.
1:36:52No, surely not.
1:36:53So like, I don't feel like bad that we talk about this. I'm sure it like, if you welcome
1:37:01it it's frustrating to you, but we're not the ones making the frustration, like it's
1:37:05doing the same.
1:37:06Like, yeah, well like we're not making this up. Like, and I tried all the potential ways
1:37:14that I had to make this work for me.
1:37:17And it's not.
1:37:19- But I think that there is a management error
1:37:21that has been made in the development of Stage Manager
1:37:25during the beta process.
1:37:26- Probably.
1:37:27- And so I feel, honestly feel for some of the engineers
1:37:30'cause I'm sure that they have had
1:37:33their development focus changed.
1:37:36And I think that it was the wrong decision
1:37:40unless, unless, a bunch of stuff starts coming out
1:37:44in the next couple of weeks.
1:37:46- Look, and I'm still hoping, right?
1:37:48Still maybe the next one.
1:37:50Maybe we'll get it this time.
1:37:52But the one final thing I wanna say
1:37:57is that at the moment I feel,
1:37:59I gotta be honest with you guys and with the listeners.
1:38:03I honestly feel like all this kind of iPad energy
1:38:08has been sucked out of me.
1:38:11Like I, I feel exhausted for this stuff.
1:38:16And I, I, I'm again in the spirit of honesty,
1:38:21I have no plan for my iPad or S16 review at the moment.
1:38:25Like I, I'm, I've been waiting for like, oh,
1:38:29surely this afternoon inspiration will strike and I'll, you know,
1:38:34start writing. I'm not saying that I have writer's block because I don't,
1:38:38Because I just wrote something on Mac Stories today, I've been writing for weekly.
1:38:43I just, above this specifically, I don't know what I think because I feel like I haven't been put
1:38:51in a position to think and to understand, to form an opinion, right? So I've been trying to
1:39:01distract myself, I guess.
1:39:03Testing apps, writing about shortcuts.
1:39:09I'm gonna have a notes-themed week on MacStories.
1:39:14I wrote about notes on MacStories today.
1:39:16I'm gonna write about notes in the monthly log.
1:39:18I'm gonna write about notes in MacStories weekly.
1:39:21I've been trying to do other things.
1:39:22I've been playing Cyberpunk on my gaming PC.
1:39:25I have no idea.
1:39:27Honestly, I have no idea what I'm gonna do
1:39:29with this iPad OS review,
1:39:30because I feel like there's one big feature
1:39:32and I could write about it now,
1:39:36but what are the odds that what I write
1:39:39will be completely different in two weeks?
1:39:41Will it be worth it?
1:39:43How can I pre-write something that is
1:39:46on such a shaky foundation on a weekly basis?
1:39:51- I don't think you can write about it until,
1:39:54I don't think you should even start.
1:39:56Like, I think you should wait for another couple of weeks.
1:39:59you see if it changes, if it doesn't, I mean, what's the...
1:40:04- But then if I'm late, everybody's gonna be like,
1:40:06"Oh, where's your review, iPad guy?"
1:40:08- Well, I don't think there's anything you can do.
1:40:13- Yeah, well.
1:40:13- I feel like it's pointless to start writing it now, right?
1:40:19Because anything can happen in the next few weeks,
1:40:21you have to start all over again.
1:40:22- But like, imagine if I started writing this
1:40:24and I wrote about external displacement,
1:40:26Like, imagine all the work that it would have deleted.
1:40:31Oh my gosh.
1:40:32Yeah.
1:40:33- Yeah, I think that there's still too much instability
1:40:36for you to even begin.
1:40:37And so maybe it just comes late
1:40:39and it just comes late and that's it.
1:40:40- Maybe it's what it is.
1:40:41- Like basically what happened with iOS 15.
1:40:44- 14, yeah, 14 I think it was.
1:40:46- 14, it just comes when it comes, you know?
1:40:48- Yeah, well, yeah.
1:40:51I think that's what I gotta do.
1:40:56Because I feel like it would be pretty dishonest, actually,
1:40:59to have a review of Stage Manager,
1:41:02and I've only used it for two days.
1:41:04I mean, you can go look for that kind of content elsewhere.
1:41:07I'm sure there will be plenty of hands-on
1:41:09and things like that.
1:41:10It's not what I like to do, personally.
1:41:14So I'm waiting for, like,
1:41:18I feel like the guy waiting there be like,
1:41:20"Is this my chance? Is this my chance?
1:41:21Is this my chance now?"
1:41:22And every week I'm like, "Nope, nope, nope."
1:41:25So, hey, maybe next Tuesday, right?
1:41:28Maybe next Tuesday, it'll be better.
1:41:31I don't know, I don't know.
1:41:34We'll see.
1:41:36- In the meantime, if you wanna find links
1:41:38to stuff we spoke about, head on over to the website,
1:41:40relay.fm/connected/417.
1:41:44We also urge you, if you have not donated yet,
1:41:46go to stjou.org/relay.
1:41:49Go donate, the campaign winds down the end of this week.
1:41:53You can find us all online.
1:41:55You can find Myke on Twitter as I-M-Y-K-E.
1:41:59Myke hosts a bunch of other shows here on Relay FM.
1:42:02Find Federico at maxstories.net
1:42:05and on Twitter at Vitici, V-I-T-I-C-C-I.
1:42:08You can follow me online as ismh
1:42:11and I write over at 512pixels.net.
1:42:14I'd like to thank our sponsors,
1:42:15Rogue Amoeba, Indeed, and TextExpander.
1:42:18Until next week, guys, say goodbye.
1:42:21- Adios, achoo. - Cheerio.