0:00:00(upbeat music)
0:00:02Hello and welcome to Connected episode 378,
0:00:12our 2021 year end review.
0:00:17It is made possible by our sponsors,
0:00:19Amazon Music, TextExpander, Pingdom and SetApp.
0:00:23My name is Steven Hackett
0:00:24and I'm joined by Mr. Federico Vittucci.
0:00:26- Hello, hi.
0:00:27Hello, happy end of the year, my friend.
0:00:31- Happy end of another year that feels like last year.
0:00:35Yes, thank you.
0:00:36- Also joined from someplace over, you know,
0:00:40not in America, someplace else, Myke Hurley.
0:00:44- That is such a weird way to introduce someone.
0:00:45- Well, you were here and now you're not.
0:00:48- No, I'm not.
0:00:49- And you didn't see me when you were here.
0:00:51- That's correct.
0:00:51- Wow, that's harsh.
0:00:53- And now there's a pandemic again.
0:00:55(laughs)
0:00:56you're never gonna see each other again.
0:00:58- It doesn't seem like it.
0:00:59- That's the way that cookie crumbles, my friend.
0:01:02- Got your Omikron all over the place and ran away.
0:01:07So this is our 2021 year-end review.
0:01:11If you're not familiar with this episode,
0:01:12we do it at the end of the year every year.
0:01:14We walk through the months of the year
0:01:18and talk about some of the news that we covered
0:01:20and kind of see how it feels now.
0:01:23We should say there's a bit of a disclaimer on this
0:01:25that we're recording this episode early and out of order.
0:01:29So it's gonna be published after Christmas,
0:01:32but we're recording it on December 21st.
0:01:35So if Tim Cook announces the Apple car in four days,
0:01:39may not be in this episode.
0:01:40That probably would be.
0:01:41I think we would record something for that.
0:01:43But there may be some last minute news that we've missed,
0:01:47but we had to record this early for a bunch of reasons.
0:01:49So here we are, an episode, a little bit out of order.
0:01:51It's very strange.
0:01:52I had to be very careful with the episode number
0:01:54when I announced it.
0:01:55that it was actually correct, 'cause--
0:01:57- I mean, it wouldn't be the first time
0:01:59you've gotten the episode number wrong, so.
0:02:01- Well-- - You know,
0:02:02there's precedent for it.
0:02:04- Don't think we had to bring it up like that.
0:02:06(laughing)
0:02:08- Never let you forget it.
0:02:09- It's all right. - Yeah.
0:02:11Holiday scheduling's difficult,
0:02:12but the 2021 in review is an important episode,
0:02:15so we're just making the best of it.
0:02:17- That's right.
0:02:18And we're gonna do this typical round robin style.
0:02:22So we each were assigned four months out of the year
0:02:25to kind of pick what we thought.
0:02:27We also have some listener suggestions,
0:02:29so thank you for those.
0:02:30I'm up first with January.
0:02:32So, should we just dive in?
0:02:34- Yes, please.
0:02:35- Let's do it.
0:02:36- All right, so January 2021, big news at Apple
0:02:41with some executive team changes.
0:02:45So Dan Riccio is now on the roof with Phil Schiller,
0:02:49Apple Fellow stuff, I guess?
0:02:51- Roof stuff.
0:02:52roof stuff and he's actually, I stand corrected,
0:02:57Dan is not a fellow and he didn't work hard enough.
0:03:00He is a new project, working on a new project,
0:03:05is what Apple said.
0:03:07Don't know what that means.
0:03:09- So you don't wanna know.
0:03:10- He's working on the new mail app.
0:03:12And John Turnus, who we know, we were first introduced
0:03:17to him several years ago in context of announcing
0:03:20Mac hardware, he was named the Apple hardware engineering lead. So he's a
0:03:29member of the executive team, he oversees Apple's hardware engineering
0:03:31organization, Mac and I guess everything else. And so a little bit of a change.
0:03:37Dan has been with Apple for almost 25 years. And if you go back and watch
0:03:43old keynotes, like I do sometimes, he's all over the place. And now he is
0:03:48supposedly working on something...
0:03:52It's weird because like Riccio was removed from the executive profiles page.
0:03:57Like, so he's off doing who knows what but still reporting to Tim Cook.
0:04:02Yes. And then Turnus got added. I like to think of John Turnus as John
0:04:06will one day be the CEO Turnus. That's how I think of him in my mind.
0:04:10I think he will be the CEO one day. That's
0:04:14where I think he's gonna sit. I think that is a
0:04:17strong possibility. I really like what we've seen of him. You know, he's been at Apple since 2001.
0:04:22It was like totally in the shadows until I guess we've always started seeing him in like 2016,
0:04:272017 on stage. I think the first eyesore of him was on Mac Power Users.
0:04:33Right, you had him on Mac Power Users, didn't you? I don't think he's been on MPU.
0:04:39Hmm, he was on a podcast. I thought it was Mac Power Users.
0:04:44Finally searching my own archives. I know he introduced like the I Mac Pro
0:04:49And then the Mac Pro the year later and he's done a bunch of
0:04:53In one stuff, I don't think he's been on MPU we had
0:04:58We had the program manager for the Mac Pro a guy named Doug on but I think we've had John on okay for us
0:05:06All right, so
0:05:10Elsewhere in January
0:05:13rumors begin for hardware we would see later in the year.
0:05:18Smaller notches on the iPhone 13,
0:05:21which did pan out.
0:05:23They're not drastically smaller,
0:05:26but they're a teeny tiny bit smaller.
0:05:28- Yeah, they are smaller. - Kind of smaller.
0:05:30- Yeah, it's not the super tiny notch
0:05:34that people were hoping for,
0:05:35and that we still may see,
0:05:37but smaller notches on the iPhone 13
0:05:39and one that we all immediately gravitated towards,
0:05:43an 8.4 inch iPad mini with smaller bezels.
0:05:48That sounds like a good iPad to me.
0:05:51- Oh man, I can't wait.
0:05:52- I'm really excited to see if they released it,
0:05:54and I fell in love with it.
0:05:55- I can't wait to see what we'll do with it.
0:05:57- Can't wait to get that one.
0:05:58- Yeah.
0:05:59- It's been so long.
0:06:00- Mm-hmm.
0:06:01Also in January, those of us who observe
0:06:05marked the 20th anniversary of the "Titanium Power Book."
0:06:10And I only bring that up because it was such a big year
0:06:13for Apple notebooks later in the year.
0:06:15And so it's always fun when anniversaries kind of line up.
0:06:18I did this thing- - I think this is kind of fun.
0:06:19That's the one that everyone said looked like the new one.
0:06:21- Yes, yeah.
0:06:22- And then it celebrated its 20th year that,
0:06:25yeah, I actually didn't know that.
0:06:26That's really cool.
0:06:27- Yeah, and the article in the show notes for it
0:06:29is part of a series I did all year,
0:06:33looking back at the announcements from 2001,
0:06:36because Apple, that was a very busy year for Apple,
0:06:39and it was really when they were like,
0:06:41I think for the first time,
0:06:42really firing on all cylinders after Jobs returned.
0:06:45And so a lot of stuff in that 2001 time period,
0:06:50but I wanted to mention the TiBook because it's my favorite,
0:06:53and it has been in the conversation a lot more
0:06:57because of that new design that we have now.
0:07:00It's still a good looking computer.
0:07:06It is.
0:07:07I got at least two of them.
0:07:10Oh boy.
0:07:11At least two of them.
0:07:12You got a problem man.
0:07:14Wow this is...
0:07:15You don't even know.
0:07:16Do you know?
0:07:17Do you actually know how many are you saying you have to...
0:07:18Well so you all know this.
0:07:20I am in the middle of trying to organize my collection a little bit better and part of
0:07:27that is this new like giant shelving system I got to put laptops in and so my
0:07:34laptops are now just scattered in piles around the studio as I try to like
0:07:37organize that shelf and catalog things I know I have two. My laptops are scattered in
0:07:43piles. Do you ever hear yourself like do you ever listen to the things that you
0:07:49say I have many piles of laptops just everywhere you got to walk around them
0:07:57in here all right should we move to February yes please
0:08:04January wasn't that exciting I'm just gonna say if we're giving a rating I
0:08:08don't know if you ever done that before January wait are we ranking my way are
0:08:13we wait wait wait is there gonna be a month that wins this episode
0:08:19I think we should now do this.
0:08:21Yeah, so January...
0:08:23January...
0:08:25Bad one.
0:08:26Yeah, not great.
0:08:27How do we rank them?
0:08:28Well, I could just... I think we could just...
0:08:30It'd be difficult to do a number system until the end.
0:08:33I think we can maybe just do like higher and lower as we go through,
0:08:37like February better than January or whatever, and then we just...
0:08:40Okay, let's do... Okay, no, let's do bad, meh, and good.
0:08:45-Okay, but we want to pick... -Wait, we have a scale, y'all.
0:08:48Yeah, we could put it on the tichy scale, but we have to pick the best one at the end.
0:08:52Okay.
0:08:52But see, the thing is, the thing is that the worst part on the tichi scale was Nightmare, right?
0:08:58But January wasn't a nightmare, it was just boring.
0:09:01Yeah.
0:09:02Yeah, so maybe the tichi scale needs to be, like, we need to start at like a higher threshold,
0:09:09not from Nightmare. Nothing is a Nightmare here, I think.
0:09:12Yeah.
0:09:13I need a full image of the tichi scale.
0:09:14Because a nightmare month would probably be a good one, if that makes sense, for like
0:09:21its excitement levels.
0:09:23So we are judging them on excitement levels.
0:09:25Okay, so I got the tichi scale here.
0:09:28Okay, so nightmare inferior.
0:09:29I think we start at decent.
0:09:31Yeah, that works for me.
0:09:34Okay.
0:09:35Because we have nightmare inferior minus inferior, decent, normal, good, good, plus, best, I
0:09:39love you.
0:09:40I think we could start at inferior.
0:09:41January was an inferior month.
0:09:43Inferior month? Okay, so we skip the first two, we start at inferior.
0:09:48Well, I mean, we could do inferior. I forgot inferior minus was worse than inferior.
0:09:53Yes, inferior, well, it's minus, so... Yeah, but, see, yeah, okay. Let's say January was
0:09:59an inferior minus month, because I don't think there's going to be a worse month than that,
0:10:03like, they're just kind of... One of the things we spoke about was an anniversary of a 20-year-old
0:10:08products. I know it's important to you, but like, you know. Let's keep in track of
0:10:15these. I'm gonna write it in the document. Okay, perfect, thank you.
0:10:18Alright, February things start to pick up here. So in the software area,
0:10:26the big news is the introduction of the iOS 14.5 beta, which is a surprisingly
0:10:32packed one. As we're gonna see, there's a bunch of features that we discussed over
0:10:37the following months that were actually introduced in February with 14.5 beta. The most important one,
0:10:44Face ID unlocking powered by the Apple Watch. I forgot that this thing came out with 14.5
0:10:53like way after the original release of iOS 14 last year. Like I totally forgot about this.
0:10:59Do you guys still use it? I do. I mean it's not perfect but... Well we have to.
0:11:07Well, you can keep it disabled if you don't want to use it for whatever reason.
0:11:11Sure, I do use it because, you know, one of the good things for me is like, as of September
0:11:17I started wearing an Apple Watch all the time, right?
0:11:19So it's definitely one of the things that's held me on to the Apple Watch.
0:11:24I think it was a little bit earlier than September, but anyway, it's one of the things that's
0:11:26held me on to the Apple Watch, it was because I can easily unlock my iPhone.
0:11:32Now I haven't seen this myself, but also in 14.5 maps, received new hazard, accident,
0:11:40and speed check reporting features.
0:11:43I believe these are maybe US only.
0:11:46They were enabled in the Maps app, in Siri, in CarPlay.
0:11:51I don't have CarPlay.
0:11:52Steven has just put out a video about one, in fact, about a CarPlay unit.
0:11:57Fun video, Steven.
0:11:58Thank you.
0:11:59Yeah.
0:12:00So I haven't seen these features myself, but they launched with 14.5 last year.
0:12:05The other big feature that we talked about a bunch on the show a few months ago,
0:12:11the ability to pick a default music streaming service in Siri.
0:12:16- Ah, yes. - There was a whole conversation about this.
0:12:21So in 14.5, soon after installing the beta, people started noticing that when they asked
0:12:27Siri to play a song or an album, Siri would ask them to pick a music streaming service.
0:12:32The list provided by Siri included Apple Music, services like Tidal, and even podcast clients
0:12:39like Castro and Overcast, Apple Podcasts of course. Apple later clarified that, and this was
0:12:45very confusing, we had to revisit this topic multiple times on the show. Basically, Siri does
0:12:53have a system to associate a third-party music streaming service with your music playback
0:12:59requests. It also works for podcasts and for audiobooks. However, the process is completely
0:13:05invisible. We complained about this on the show. There's no settings page where you can
0:13:10see these associations being made. Siri would randomly ask you to pick a third-party compatible
0:13:18service that is installed on your device. There was a whole conversation about this.
0:13:23In February, Apple PR had to clarify to TechCrunch, I believe, what was going on. It was very
0:13:29confusing and we talked about it for a while.
0:13:32New Emoji. They were also released in 14.5 and it seems like we're gonna get a similar
0:13:38release of New Emoji, like a delayed schedule compared to a few years ago, pre-pandemic,
0:13:44with the 15 release cycle as well. So 217 I believe new emoji were added in total, you
0:13:54know, with the skin tone variations and all the different combinations.
0:13:58Yeah, I think if I remember rightly, this was a small amount of emoji, right? Like there
0:14:04was 217, but really there was only like 20 actual new things or something like that.
0:14:11And I believe that next year's release should be more of a full release.
0:14:17So I look forward to the Jeremy's.
0:14:20Also in 14.5, something that Steven was really happy about, specifically 14.5 Beta 2 introduced
0:14:28a green tint fix.
0:14:31Yay!
0:14:32I was pretty sure that we had agreed that we would not talk about this anymore.
0:14:37I have to because it's the year in review.
0:14:39Yeah.
0:14:40we don't have to review everything that happened in the year. It's the biggest news in iOS since iOS.
0:14:47Moving on, we're done with 14.5. I only mentioned this one because it's one of those things that a
0:14:55company announces and 10 months later it's still not here. In February Spotify announced Spotify
0:15:04HiFi, a HiFi tier for Spotify. Still nowhere to be found, Spotify. They finally released
0:15:12Realtime Lyrics last month, but the HiFi tier nowhere to be found. Basically, at this point...
0:15:19They purely announced it because they knew Apple was going to, right?
0:15:24Yeah. As we'll see later.
0:15:25They wanted to get out first. Yeah, it must have been.
0:15:29Lastly, we saw the, you know, some first rumors of a foldable iPhone with pencil support scheduled
0:15:38for 2023. This is a rumor from an analyst, I don't remember the name of the firm, but
0:15:45yeah, talk of a seven inch foldable iPhone for 2023. I don't know. It seems kind of early
0:15:51to me still. That feels super aggressive. It feels early. What I will say, I recommend
0:15:58people go and watch some videos about the Oppo Find N, an MKBHD video in the show notes.
0:16:04I think it's getting closer to these devices being more realistic.
0:16:11This device is like when it's closed, the dimensions are pretty similar to a regular
0:16:15phone rather than the Z Fold, which is like this weird, thin and tall device.
0:16:22It looks pretty cool, the Oppo Find N. And it's just like an example of like, "Hmm,
0:16:26stuff is getting better at a fast rate and I'm pleased that it's not just Samsung that's
0:16:32doing decent looking devices now.
0:16:35I don't think 2023 either but I don't know.
0:16:40But feels like things are getting a bit more realistic.
0:16:45Maybe that's what Dan's working on, you know?
0:16:48Dan Riccio?
0:16:49Yeah, they couldn't have had him on the executive page because they folded him up, you know?
0:16:53I mean, you might not be wrong.
0:16:56I guess so to go back to that we know it's not the car because many other people have
0:17:02been working on the car.
0:17:03Is it isn't uh what's his name the watch guy in charge of the?
0:17:07Kevin Lynch is working on the car now.
0:17:09Yeah and so I would expect it's either an AR or VR product or a folding phone.
0:17:18Mm-hmm it's probably one of those two.
0:17:21Yeah I don't know what else it would be because we haven't really heard about any other sort
0:17:25of like interesting far-off future projects unless he's just like literally
0:17:31deep underground with it you think they keep Dan underground I bet they do well
0:17:35he's secretly been fired his new project is uh you know springtime with his
0:17:40family anyway the last thing I want to mention is this six colors link from
0:17:45February about Apple launching a companion podcast for for all mankind
0:17:50And I believe this was the first version of these companion shows for Apple TV Plus original
0:17:57content, as we'll see later in the year, they did this a bunch of times.
0:18:03Specifically the one that I think is really, the one that I recommend is the Foundation
0:18:09podcast, the companion podcast for the Foundation TV show, that I think is really well done
0:18:14and really adds context to the experience.
0:18:16But yeah, for all mankind, which by the way, I cannot wait for season three.
0:18:22Do we know when season three is coming out?
0:18:24I don't think we do.
0:18:25I don't even recall any news of a filming date beginning.
0:18:31Oh no, oh no.
0:18:33They are doing it.
0:18:35Yeah, COVID on the moon.
0:18:36But it could be a 2023 thing. It might not be next year.
0:18:42And just to do a little plug here, Jason and I got to interview Ron Moore, the co-creator
0:18:49and writer on Liftoff.
0:18:51Oh my god, I forgot about that.
0:18:53Which was wild.
0:18:54That was a real get.
0:18:57That was such a good episode too.
0:18:59Thank you.
0:19:00I really loved it.
0:19:01You could tell how much he cared about it.
0:19:02Oh, he was fantastic.
0:19:04And that was really a fun interview.
0:19:07And so I got to watch a bunch of them in advance, but I couldn't tell anybody.
0:19:11It was very fun.
0:19:12Oh yeah, I forgot that.
0:19:14The two of you got to see the episodes early.
0:19:18Yeah, us and Dan Morin, we all got screeners.
0:19:21And I had my name floating around in space so I couldn't link screenshots.
0:19:27It was pretty cool.
0:19:28That was cool.
0:19:30Alright, so I would say, good?
0:19:34Yeah.
0:19:35Yeah. I mean honestly I would say best I love you because they fixed the green
0:19:40tent. No. See I'm only saying good because then we didn't need to talk about it
0:19:44anymore. Well at least that was my thought. Oh no it is good because green is the good color on there.
0:19:48Yeah all right. I'll go with good. Yeah I think it's a good month.
0:19:54Yeah good. Not good plus but it's a good month yeah. Good okay. Good plus. Yeah you
0:20:01- You gotta pay more for Good Plus.
0:20:02- Yeah, it's like, comes with a fee.
0:20:05- Oh, you know it when it's a Good Plus month.
0:20:07It's like, this is good,
0:20:08but it's got that extra kick to it.
0:20:10You know, it's Good Plus.
0:20:12- It's good, but it's ad-free.
0:20:13- Getgoodplus.com.
0:20:16I don't know where that goes.
0:20:17- Don't go there.
0:20:17- I don't know where that goes.
0:20:18- Getgood, getgood.plus.
0:20:21It's the fancy domain.
0:20:23- You have to pay a lot of money for those dot pluses.
0:20:26- Getgood, hold on, getgood.plus.
0:20:30while it's available.
0:20:32Alright, let's move on to March.
0:20:34In March we said goodbye to music memos.
0:20:37Apple recommended...
0:20:39Wait, what? Was it 2021?
0:20:41[laughter]
0:20:43Apple recommended that people used voice memos to record their music instead.
0:20:48I had forgot music memos existed.
0:20:51Music memos... There's a support document.
0:20:54Yep.
0:20:55Transition from music memos to voice memos.
0:20:58Yep.
0:20:59There's a whole thing.
0:21:00Music memos, don't know why that app existed, but it did and they got rid of it because
0:21:07it is ultimately superfluous.
0:21:11March saw lots of iPhone rumors, there were lots and lots of iPhone rumors including ProMotion,
0:21:16bigger batteries, smaller notches and better ultra-wide cameras.
0:21:20These basically all came true.
0:21:23There were even more rumors that were good from Ming-Chi Kuo.
0:21:27MacBook Pro to feature a HDMI port and SD card.
0:21:31We all lost our collective minds at that point.
0:21:33This is the, I believe the first time this was mentioned.
0:21:37And we were all very excited for what the year may hold.
0:21:40- I don't keep tabs on this year to year.
0:21:42I'm sure somebody does,
0:21:44but it really seems like the hardware rumor game
0:21:47was pretty on point this year.
0:21:49Like we knew about these MacBook Pros and iPhones.
0:21:51- Yeah, there's, I have some stuff later on,
0:21:54which is funny to look back on, but by and large.
0:21:57There was John Prosser's Square Apple Watch, but other than that, I feel like Ming-Chi Kuo,
0:22:03Mark Gurman, sort of that crowd, the serious ones, really, honestly, had a pretty good
0:22:08year.
0:22:09I think so.
0:22:10As well, in a year when there was a lot of stuff which seemed like there's no way, first
0:22:14time we heard it, right?
0:22:16Like the HDMI and SD card.
0:22:18In March, we said...
0:22:20Do you think they are friends?
0:22:23Like Mark and Ming-Chi Kuo?
0:22:24Ming-Chi Kuo and Mark Gurman?
0:22:26I don't know.
0:22:27I mean, if they combine forces.
0:22:31Do you think they're frenemies?
0:22:33I think it's like us and ATP, you know, like we like those guys, but colleagues, they're,
0:22:38you know, you got to keep them at arm's length.
0:22:41Arm's length at all times.
0:22:42It made me think of like, oh, you guys are never going to get this reference.
0:22:45Yeah.
0:22:46Someone, anyone in the discord, if you're familiar with Captain Tsubasa, the anime,
0:22:52the soccer anime, what's the name of the rival of Tsubasa?
0:22:57Seems like you're not very familiar with it either Federico.
0:22:59Well, I read the manga when I was like 12, so forgive me.
0:23:04Oh, I read the manga before I played it.
0:23:05Oh, I'm in Italy, on the beach.
0:23:07Oh, wait, you've just seen the anime?
0:23:10I read the manga, so, you know, I had to translate it all from Japanese.
0:23:13I saw the anime first and then I read the manga and then there's the remake.
0:23:17Anyway, yes, I believe Mark and Mingshiko are like Tsubasa and the other guy.
0:23:26What I like is nobody's given you this answer.
0:23:29No one's given you the answer in the Discord.
0:23:31Nobody has it for you.
0:23:33Someone will, on Twitter, once it reaches a wider audience, someone will know Captain
0:23:40Tsubasa and what I'm talking about.
0:23:42And someone will tell me, well, there's someone out there!
0:23:46I have heard of this, but I don't know anything about it other than it's a soccer-focused
0:23:51anime.
0:23:52Oh come on, you're trying to be too precious about it.
0:23:55You guys have seen this. Everybody knows captain subasa. Come on. No, I really don't. I really
0:24:01know who cardi B is. Matt says Hugo Google says so can I get back to March? Hold on.
0:24:10You got captain subasa. Yes, it's Hugo. Thank you, Matt. Uh, cause you're a, you got, thank
0:24:14you. I forgot about how many things were killed in March. Look at this. Could you, could you
0:24:19not spoil it? Let me do it. So in March, the people already lived through March. Yeah,
0:24:24but everyone forg- I forgot this both happened in March.
0:24:27Not in the context of entertainment, they haven't.
0:24:30That's true.
0:24:32Alright, so the iMac Pro comes to an end in March.
0:24:35What?
0:24:36At first it was like, "Yeah, I know, can you imagine?"
0:24:38I think they did like limited supplies and then it was goodbye.
0:24:41Yeah.
0:24:42The same happened to the HomePod.
0:24:43The original HomePod in March was also put to bed.
0:24:46I got the HomePod with Silver Cell for like four months.
0:24:49Like, kind of get rid of them.
0:24:50Do y'all think the iMac Pro name will come back?
0:24:53The further we go, I kind of think it will.
0:24:56I think this is what they're going to call the Big iMac.
0:24:58Yeah, iMac and iMac Pro.
0:25:00Yeah, I think they're going to do it.
0:25:01Follow became the word that we use to subscribe to podcasts and Apple podcasts.
0:25:08Do we do it? Like, is that a thing that we do now?
0:25:10Like, do we say this, like, follow my podcasts?
0:25:13I don't.
0:25:14I don't. Okay, cool.
0:25:16I'm pretty sure that you use the word follow on the App Stories website, though.
0:25:20Yes, I do. But like, out of spite...
0:25:22I chuckled at the time.
0:25:24Yeah, yeah, I do it because it's like the technically correct thing, but also I don't
0:25:30think it's, I don't like it.
0:25:32But doesn't it bother you that you have to say, "Follow on Apple Podcasts, subscribe
0:25:37everywhere else"?
0:25:38Yeah, that's what they, that's why they're doing it.
0:25:42So you put them in a different clause as everybody else.
0:25:44Well, no, they did it because they will get to this later on.
0:25:48It's because they got the subscription.
0:25:50Stop spoiling my month!
0:25:52Right, but you said something that needed to be corrected.
0:25:56So I've had to do it, I'm afraid.
0:25:58You spoiled my month first.
0:26:01They changed the wording, didn't they, because they needed to use the word subscribe for
0:26:06subscriptions.
0:26:07Apple's worldwide developers conference will return in its all online format was announced
0:26:11in March.
0:26:12Let's get ready for this March for it to be announced exactly the same.
0:26:18Apple's independent repair provider program expanded. So this was like a trend throughout
0:26:24the year that like Apple was doing more and more. And this was like the first part of
0:26:27that where they were making it easier for more companies to get more parts and to be
0:26:33accepted into the, um, into the AASP program. Is that it? Yeah. Apple authorized service
0:26:39provider. I didn't put this in here. I'm assuming Steven did. It was the 20th anniversary of
0:26:45the Mac OS X release.
0:26:46That's a big deal.
0:26:47- Is it a deal?
0:26:48- Oh no, it is.
0:26:49I'm just saying I didn't put it in there.
0:26:51- Yeah, 20 years, pretty wild, isn't it?
0:26:53- Yep.
0:26:54- What's really, really wild is we're not that far off
0:26:57from that with iOS.
0:26:59- No.
0:26:59- 2007, I mean it's what?
0:27:01- Oh my God.
0:27:02- Five years?
0:27:02- Wow.
0:27:03- What?
0:27:04No, oh God.
0:27:06This summer is the 15th anniversary of the iPhone.
0:27:09- Ooh, really?
0:27:11- Is that right?
0:27:122022 minus, yeah, this summer is 15 years.
0:27:15I feel like we just did the 10 years of App Store.
0:27:18Well, that's the pandemic for you, right?
0:27:21Because...
0:27:21Yeah, exactly.
0:27:22Well, see now Federico will open a text message to Jon
0:27:27and say, "Jon, you need to prepare a 15 year
0:27:31at the iPhone story."
0:27:32I don't need to do that because Jon is already listening.
0:27:35One true son.
0:27:36I don't know, but I can feel when Jon is listening live
0:27:40and I can feel that he is right now.
0:27:42I feel Jon's presence in this podcast tonight.
0:27:45Let's see if we are wrong, but I can feel Jon at the moment.
0:27:51Well, he has yet to say a word in any of our various channels.
0:27:57Jon, I am disappointed. I am disappointed.
0:28:01Jason's here, though.
0:28:02Oh, no.
0:28:03It's one of the three.
0:28:05One of the three.
0:28:06All right, so we need to now rank March on the tchiscale.
0:28:12I feel like March had more than February.
0:28:14Yeah, I would go a good plus.
0:28:16No, no.
0:28:18I was feeling like a decent to normal, maybe.
0:28:23I guess my rating was sort of based on
0:28:25these rumors came true,
0:28:26but I'm not sure that's how we actually should rate them.
0:28:29Well, but like, see, this is a month of goodbyes.
0:28:32So goodbye, Music Memos.
0:28:33Goodbye, iMac Pro.
0:28:34Yeah, but I think of it as like,
0:28:37maybe I think of it as
0:28:39How much content did I get out of that month?
0:28:42We got a lot of good content out of March from like
0:28:46all of the iMac Pro speculation and what are they gonna do with the HomePod
0:28:50and wow what if the MacBook Pro has all these ports and look at these iPhone rumors
0:28:54and WWDC is virtual again like there's a lot of content
0:28:58Okay but it's not it's not a good plus though I can I can go with good
0:29:02Good
0:29:03Let's just say good let's just say good I feel like maybe February and March were pretty
0:29:08I see what you mean, because we also got good content in February, so...
0:29:11I mean, there are like busier months ahead, and I don't want to use a good plus already.
0:29:18I agree with you. I would say March better than February, but not enough to get a good plus.
0:29:23Yeah, but also we can decide later, when it's like February against March,
0:29:27at the end when we gotta pick one, then we can do that kind of comparison.
0:29:32Yeah, and we can really duke it out.
0:29:34Breaking news!
0:29:34Breaking news!
0:29:37Sent with Siri from the One True John, I am listening and driving.
0:29:41Wow. I knew it. I can feel it. I can feel, you know, John behind the wheel, you know,
0:29:48driving around Illinois, John's got his hands on the wheel during this show.
0:29:52Hands on the wheel. Someone that's in the car probably right now listening to this.
0:29:57I don't know. Hi. Hello, One True family.
0:30:00We appreciate you. And John, if you're alone, we are your family.
0:30:05(laughing)
0:30:07- Don't, Erika, you've got to stop talking
0:30:11about Jon's family.
0:30:12- It's really upsetting.
0:30:13- I got a thing from Jon's family, right?
0:30:16I don't know why, I don't know why.
0:30:17Maybe it's the holiday spirit, maybe, I don't know.
0:30:20(laughing)
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0:32:21We are now in April.
0:32:25And in looking back over these announcements,
0:32:28for me, April holds one of the,
0:32:30actually one of the most surprising announcements from Apple
0:32:34and that is this Apple Arcade expansion
0:32:37where they brought in a bunch of games
0:32:41that were sort of known as like classics on the app store.
0:32:45And they have them sort of updated and remade,
0:32:48they're ad-free, all the monetization is pulled out.
0:32:51And we've gotten this like great library of games
0:32:54that we've loved over the last, you know,
0:32:5612 or 13 years resurfaced in Apple Arcade.
0:33:00And I think it's super cool.
0:33:02I mean, Federico, you and I both like have this shared love
0:33:06of software preservation,
0:33:08and this is like a cool twist on it.
0:33:10something that I really was not expecting.
0:33:13And Apple is doing it right.
0:33:14Like, they are picking select titles.
0:33:17They are working with developers to update them
0:33:20for modern CPUs, modern displays, multi-platform,
0:33:25iCloud save support, like making sure
0:33:29that this game can be played with quality of life features
0:33:32and graphical updates in 2021.
0:33:35Really surprising.
0:33:36I'm super happy about this.
0:33:37And it's also a clever business move
0:33:39because it allowed Apple to keep the momentum going
0:33:41for Apple Arcade releases by injecting older titles
0:33:46into the release timeline on Apple Arcade,
0:33:50which, as far as the originals go,
0:33:52has slowed down a bunch over the past year
0:33:56for obvious reasons.
0:33:57So bringing back classics and App Store greats
0:34:00are a great idea, yeah.
0:34:03- This is the best thing they've done with Arcade, I think.
0:34:08I think it's a smart business move.
0:34:09There's been a, you know, there are a bunch of games
0:34:14that I have replayed that I haven't played in a long time.
0:34:17And I also think it's good for people
0:34:19to get some of those games
0:34:20that they maybe otherwise hadn't checked out before.
0:34:22So yeah, really great.
0:34:24- All right, elsewhere in April,
0:34:27once we were all settled down from the app arcade,
0:34:31Apple Arcade stuff, of course we got an Apple event.
0:34:34We got the Spring event.
0:34:35This came with a couple of smaller things at the beginning.
0:34:39I really, in hindsight,
0:34:41this is such like a hodgepodge of things,
0:34:43but we got the Apple Podcast subscriptions.
0:34:47So you can pay--
0:34:48- Oh, this was the weird event.
0:34:49I totally forgot about this.
0:34:51- This was the jacked Tim Cook tight shirt event, remember?
0:34:56Remember? - Yes.
0:34:57- Was he standing outside?
0:34:58- Yes.
0:34:59- Yeah.
0:35:00- And like he's at the gym all winter.
0:35:02You can pay for extra content just within Apple podcasts.
0:35:06Apple of course takes their percentage
0:35:09and stands between podcasters and their listeners.
0:35:11So some people have opted into that, some haven't.
0:35:14We have not.
0:35:20Air tags.
0:35:21- I resent that implication.
0:35:22Like why is that, you know?
0:35:24Well, it's a--
0:35:27- It's just not for everybody.
0:35:28It just doesn't work for us.
0:35:29That's fine.
0:35:30- That's okay for some people as you see.
0:35:32- Air tags.
0:35:33(laughing)
0:35:35Air tags.
0:35:36After many, many, many months of rumor delay,
0:35:41air tags finally showed up.
0:35:43That came, remember there was that weird announcement
0:35:45about, "Hey, other stuff can talk to find my..."
0:35:48And then like three days later, Apple was like,
0:35:50"Yeah."
0:35:51- Hey, look at this really expensive electric bicycle.
0:35:54- Yeah, which I still want.
0:35:56- Oh, the van move?
0:35:57- Yes.
0:35:58- I remember that.
0:35:59has like a dog cow reference it's perfect that is a reference like I think
0:36:03that's accidental I don't think the accident the biggest thing honestly out
0:36:08of this event was the purple iPhone 12 and 12 mini that's I did that's not what
0:36:13I thought you were gonna say was for sale for like what six months and then
0:36:17went away I've only seen one of these in person in real life like somebody bought
0:36:21it updated Apple TV 4k with the revamped Siri remote or Apple remote I think
0:36:28whatever they're calling it now.
0:36:30- It's called the Siri Remote.
0:36:32- Still called the Siri Remote?
0:36:33- Yes.
0:36:33- It's a hundred times better, pretty close to perfect,
0:36:36especially after coming from the old terrible one.
0:36:40- It's not an exaggeration to say that a remote
0:36:43has made my life better.
0:36:45I think if anything, it's like a symbol of the pandemic
0:36:49and lockdowns to have this much affection
0:36:52for a remote redesign.
0:36:54I really love the new Siri Remote.
0:36:57It's like it has removed all that frustration.
0:37:00Like, it was like a small dose of frustration every single time I had to use the Siri remote.
0:37:08Like, it wasn't like I wouldn't get angry at it or really upset.
0:37:12It's like, you know, this is so frustrating.
0:37:14Like, it was like a tiny droplet of frustration dripping down inside my brain every single time.
0:37:21- Wow.
0:37:21- And now it's gone.
0:37:23And it's beautiful.
0:37:24It's like, I love this.
0:37:26I love this remote so much. I bought four of them and I've placed them in like two in Rome
0:37:32and two at the beach house. I really love this the new Siri remote. The best compliment I can give the
0:37:38Siri remote is I never think about it. Also I would like to jog your memory here guys.
0:37:44With the Apple TV remember when we all started calibrating our TVs with the tool that Apple
0:37:51released on the iPhone to place your iPhone against your television to calibrate. Yeah,
0:37:56that was April also. I didn't do that. I did, it was fun. No, I couldn't do it because my
0:38:04TV was good. Set to metric. No, it's like, you should only do it... I think if you use
0:38:12Dolby Vision you shouldn't do it or you can't do it. Yeah, you gotta disable Dolby Vision
0:38:18if you want to try it.
0:38:19Yeah.
0:38:20- Yeah, and I have no, do you know what I mean?
0:38:22It's like Dolby did it for me.
0:38:23I'll let Dolby do it.
0:38:24So, you know.
0:38:26- Okay.
0:38:27- 'Cause I update my TV.
0:38:29- This event, we also got the M1 iPad Pros.
0:38:33The 12 inch or 12.9 inch also got a ProMotion
0:38:38Mini LED display.
0:38:40It's pretty fancy.
0:38:41Not on the 11, but it's shown up on the laptop.
0:38:43So my assumption is Mini LED will be on the smaller iPad Pro
0:38:47maybe next time they get updated.
0:38:50But really amazing hardware.
0:38:51- I don't wanna think about that iPad Pro
0:38:54because that iPad Pro could tempt me away from the Mini
0:38:58and I love the Mini too much.
0:39:00- And then the 24 inch M1 iMac
0:39:04in a bunch of colors.
0:39:05Really the highlight of the event, at least for me.
0:39:09And yeah, we got fun colorful iMacs.
0:39:12Myke has one in his office.
0:39:14- I love it, love my iMac.
0:39:15- So that was the event.
0:39:16So, Apple podcast subscriptions, third tags, Apple TV stuff,
0:39:21purple iPhones, because reasons, new iPad Pro, new iMac.
0:39:25Okay, it's kind of a strange event, but also...
0:39:29- It was a bunch of good stuff,
0:39:32but like all thrown together.
0:39:34So here you go, take that. - It was a bunch of good stuff,
0:39:36some padding around them, pretty good event.
0:39:39Okay, what else was in April, Steven?
0:39:41- iOS 14.5.
0:39:44- Oh, okay, got released.
0:39:45Finally shipped with Mask Unlock, new Siri voices.
0:39:49Remember when people said, "Oh, Apple missed it.
0:39:50"We don't need Mask Unlock anymore."
0:39:53- Yeah.
0:39:54- Oh yeah.
0:39:55- At that time, we did say that on this show.
0:39:58- Probably.
0:39:59- I don't remember which one of us,
0:40:00but I know one of us said it, or a couple of us,
0:40:02where it was like,
0:40:02"Doesn't feel like we're gonna need them.
0:40:05"We need them so much longer.
0:40:06"It took them so long to do this."
0:40:08- Kinda regret that.
0:40:09- Joke's on us, I guess.
0:40:10- A couple sort of non-Apple things I just wanted to mention.
0:40:15April was when Lauren Goode over at Wired
0:40:19published her piece.
0:40:20I called off my wedding, The Internet Will Never Forget,
0:40:22talking a lot about how platforms
0:40:25and even like the photo widget bring up memories of people
0:40:27and relationships.
0:40:28And I think it was probably the best thing I read
0:40:31on the internet this year.
0:40:33It was fantastic.
0:40:34- Yeah, I think you might be right.
0:40:36- Really, really excellent.
0:40:38And we've talked to some about that on the show,
0:40:41but she really goes into it in a way that we didn't.
0:40:43And if you haven't read it,
0:40:44you need to make the time to do so.
0:40:47And last but not least, April 27th,
0:40:51Casey Newton at The Verge wrote a piece
0:40:54outlining the controversy at Basecamp.
0:40:59So this is--
0:41:00- I remember that.
0:41:02- This is when Basecamp management
0:41:06effectively told their employees
0:41:08that they could not use official company
0:41:11methods of communication to talk about anything
0:41:13but work, so no politics, no social issues, et cetera.
0:41:18Like half the company quit.
0:41:20We know people who left and just what,
0:41:24I mean, if we're gonna hand out trophies
0:41:25for like the biggest self-own of the year,
0:41:28Basecamp would get it.
0:41:29It's even now what, nine, eight months later or whatever,
0:41:34still totally ridiculous and pretty disgusting.
0:41:38So, go Basecamp.
0:41:42Yeah, good job.
0:41:44Okay, where does this rank?
0:41:46On the Teachy Scale?
0:41:48So, there's an Apple event, which of course,
0:41:52you know, that helps in terms of like giving us content, giving us enjoyment.
0:41:57Apple Arcade news is good, 14.5 release is also pretty good.
0:42:03Again, I don't think I want to give out a good plus for this.
0:42:11for this. This would be close to good plus for me. I mean like... Me too. That was a
0:42:18good event. We said it was weird but like you just spoke about your love for the remote.
0:42:24The love for the remote? Yeah, you're right. I think iPad Pro. Yeah, this is a good plus.
0:42:28Okay, this is a good plus. Yeah, remote iPad Pro, new iMac, AirTags. I'm honestly like,
0:42:33I'm low-key loving their tags also.
0:42:36Oh, I love them. I have 12 of them.
0:42:40Twelve? Did you say twelve?
0:42:42Yeah, I've bought three four-packs.
0:42:44Three four-packs, okay.
0:42:46I realised the other day I need more.
0:42:49Once you're really into it, you just want to put them on everything.
0:42:53Put them on your kids. Don't do that.
0:42:57April, congrats, you're now in the lead for
0:43:00Good. Best month of 2021.
0:43:03Just don't talk about it at work if you work for Basecamp.
0:43:06Yep, don't ever talk about April.
0:43:08All right, moving on to May.
0:43:10So we have the beginning of the Epic Games
0:43:13versus Apple trial.
0:43:15It began in early May.
0:43:18So wide-eyed and full of hope
0:43:20that it was gonna do something.
0:43:22(laughs)
0:43:23That it was gonna, you know,
0:43:27that this trial was going to lead to a practical conclusion that had a net effect for consumers,
0:43:34but nope. A big pile of nothing so far. So, yeah, we, John, the one through John, did
0:43:42an excellent overview on Mac's stories. I'm biased, but also it's a really excellent overview.
0:43:47If you don't understand legal, complex legal things, it's a good read still. And turns
0:43:55out John was right about basically all of it, you know, months before the verdict.
0:44:02Apple, in May, announced what was my risky pick from the annual Rickeys 2020. I got this
0:44:11right about five months ahead of time, because in May, Apple announced a new head of PR.
0:44:20And the new head of PR at Apple comes from Cisco. It's Stella Lowe. It's new head of
0:44:26PR at Apple. Former Cisco executive. Apple has been, you know, have been operating without
0:44:34a head of PR following the, you know, what's the name? Steve Dowling resigned a couple
0:44:42of years ago. I think it was before the pandemic.
0:44:44Yeah, this was Venkat for quite a while.
0:44:47Yeah, so, "Cello" announced in May.
0:44:52So May was an interesting month for music news,
0:44:55because we start seeing in early May
0:44:57the first rumors of a hi-fi tier for Apple Music.
0:45:03Remember, we talked about this on the show,
0:45:05how in the music industry, there were some early indications
0:45:11of the fact that Apple was going to do a higher resolution
0:45:14here for Apple Music, but also something with spatial audio, because spatial audio was already
0:45:19a feature for video content, but not for music content. At the same time, Deezer, a music
0:45:27streaming service, launched one of the few native HomePod integrations for a third-party
0:45:34music streaming provider on the HomePod, and Deezer also had high-resolution playback support.
0:45:42Was that rumor about Apple Music, was that the one that came from that website that also
0:45:50said the iPod was coming or something?
0:45:52Twenty years ago, yes, it was that website that we also talked about and linked in the
0:45:57show notes, yes, it was that website.
0:45:59And sure enough, a week later, I believe, Apple officially announced high-resolution
0:46:06playback in Apple Music and spatial audio, but they said it would be coming in June.
0:46:11So they sort of pre-announced the release.
0:46:15This was not an iOS 15 feature, it was an iOS 14.6 or 7 feature I believe, but they
0:46:22pre-announced it in May.
0:46:25The iMac embargo is up, we got the iMac reviews, very positive reviews and one really important
0:46:33comparison from Steven on YouTube comparing the iMac 2021 to the iMac G3.
0:46:40how many years ago Steven is the G3? That model is from 99 or 2000 sometime in there.
0:46:46All right. That was my first pre-release embargo hardware. The iMac. Nicely done.
0:46:54The iMac. You had a yellow one right? Yellow one. And I bought a yellow one.
0:46:59Yeah. This is a computer that I wish I had room for in my life because I love everything about
0:47:05the design you know maybe the 27 will follow in its footsteps but I think it's
0:47:10so friendly and fun I just don't need a small iMac that 27 is not gonna be
0:47:16colorful like this it's pros would be boring yeah it would be like space gray
0:47:22starlight graphite starlight midnight what they should do is a clear one then
0:47:29I'll be into it like a teenage engineering their earbuds oh yeah I just
0:47:35want it completely crystal clear. That would be sweet. Although, yeah, they look good inside.
0:47:41Apple designs them good inside.
0:47:42Oh yeah, man.
0:47:45Yeah.
0:47:46iPad Pro review embargoes are also up. I did one. It was fun. Basically, we all loved the
0:47:51display and we all pointed out how the performance was not, you know, this incredible performance
0:47:57with the M1 chip and 16 gigs of RAM, was really not justified by IPad OS 14, and spoiler,
0:48:06IPad OS 15 did not really tell a different narrative around that either.
0:48:12So really powerful and beautiful hardware, still somewhat limited by IPad OS.
0:48:18Now we see how Apple is starting to, again, continuing to pre-announce things before WWDC,
0:48:27of clearing the decks before WWDC.
0:48:29And one of the things they've done here
0:48:31is they preannounced all of the accessibility features that
0:48:35would come with iOS 15 and watchOS 8,
0:48:39including all these new memoji for more accessibility use
0:48:45cases, as well as this major new feature,
0:48:48Assistive Touch on the Watch.
0:48:51Assistive Touch in watchOS 8 with this entirely new set
0:48:55of gestures like clenching your fist and using your wrist to scroll up and down in lists
0:49:03on the Apple Watch. Really incredible demo. There's an official support document now on
0:49:09using Assistive Touch on the Apple Watch in WatchOS 8 and how that works, sort of all
0:49:14the different gestures that you can use including pinching, clenching, pinch to move, pinch
0:49:20wants to scroll down really incredible stuff when it comes to combining gestures and accessibility
0:49:27with assistive touch for a small screen like the Apple Watch. We also have a major announcement
0:49:33that honestly I can say with confidence changed our lives and it's why we are now so wealthy.
0:49:44because Apple released, officially launched an affiliate program for Apple
0:49:50podcast subscriptions. I don't know about you guys but we really, you know, we
0:49:55really hit the goldmine with this, you know, making all the great
0:50:01dollars with this affiliate program. Do you remember when it was like, it was like
0:50:07really good money that the App Store affiliate? It was really good money. I
0:50:13I used to work on Thanksgiving and Black Friday because it was really good money.
0:50:17Yeah.
0:50:18I got stories to tell about that.
0:50:20Some days.
0:50:21Some days.
0:50:22In the Federico Petiti memoirs.
0:50:25Yes.
0:50:26I kind of want to have like an official biography done at some point.
0:50:35That could be fun.
0:50:36Anyway, iOS 14.6 is out.
0:50:38Hang on.
0:50:39Hang on.
0:50:40Hang on.
0:50:41What would you call your biography?
0:50:45Oh.
0:50:46Oh.
0:50:47That's good.
0:50:48That's a good question.
0:50:51You know, I think it's got to be something about like food or life in Italy, but also
0:50:55technology.
0:50:56Yeah.
0:50:57Pasta and podcasts.
0:50:59No, something like something like...
0:51:02Like an Italian bite, but bite with a Y.
0:51:05Wow.
0:51:06Oh my God.
0:51:07That's good.
0:51:08Take a bite.
0:51:09a bite out of Italy. Nailed it. Well, some people run with that. Um, iOS 14.6 is out
0:51:23and it brings apple cart family and podcasts subscriptions. Apple cart family. Does anyone
0:51:30here use apple cart family? I haven't even got an apple card. Yeah, me neither. I don't
0:51:35it. Okay, all right, so 14.6 is not really that exciting. And honestly, the end of me
0:51:41was really fun for me because I was invited early, before the grand opening, of the beautiful
0:51:47new Apple Store in Rome via the Corso. At Palazzo Marignoli I was able to go there with
0:51:54Silvia. Silvia took some incredible pictures and I did a story featuring Silvia's photographs
0:52:00and sort of like this background story on this building, what it means for Rome, and
0:52:06what Apple did in terms of renovating this incredible place right in the heart of Rome,
0:52:12in the center of Rome.
0:52:14That was a really fun day.
0:52:15It was a fun day because I was able to do it all in one day.
0:52:20Like, we went to the center of Rome, we took the pictures, we came back, and I wrote at
0:52:23night, and I published in the morning.
0:52:26It's like, yeah, I was pretty happy with myself there.
0:52:29So yeah, this place is incredible.
0:52:32If you're an Apple fan and you're ever in the center of Rome, make sure to stop there
0:52:36because it's like...
0:52:37Like normally I would have advice against including an Apple store in your vacation
0:52:45plans because it's not that exciting for most people, but this one, honestly, it feels like
0:52:51a museum and it's absolutely stunning in person.
0:52:54So if you're that kind of person, make sure to stop there.
0:52:58And that about wraps up the month of May.
0:53:01I had forgotten how amazing this place is.
0:53:03I mean, I'm scrolling through these pictures now and it's like legitimately a breathtaking
0:53:08building.
0:53:09Very beautiful.
0:53:10It's really cool.
0:53:11Okay, how do we rank May?
0:53:15I would say normal.
0:53:17Because like, yeah, most of like the, even the hardware reviews were reviews for like
0:53:24prior announcements.
0:53:26And they were pretty much as expected. There was nothing surprising in those.
0:53:33The only, like, the thing that I really like is the Apple Music announcement with high
0:53:41resolution playback and special audio. But I don't think it's enough to, and of course
0:53:46the Apple Store, but the Apple Store is very localized to Italy, obviously. I don't think
0:53:51Apple Music alone is able to pull May out of a normal month.
0:53:56- Looks to me.
0:53:58- Yeah, okay.
0:54:00- This episode of Connected is made possible
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0:55:27All right.
0:55:28We're back with June.
0:55:29Now we know what June means is WWDC 2021.
0:55:33I didn't really want to dig into this too much.
0:55:36I've picked out a few of the things that were announced and kind
0:55:39of grouped them a little bit.
0:55:40I was 15 sore among other things, share play everyone's favorite.
0:55:44Some updates to FaceTime, which included like the audio and video
0:55:49stuff you could do and links for FaceTime calls, focus modes, live text and some of
0:55:56the new notification stuff like notification summaries and time sensitive notifications.
0:56:03As well as these, iPadOS 15 got a new multitasking method? What would you say?
0:56:11Paradigm?
0:56:12Paradigm, that's a good one.
0:56:14No, no, I mean.
0:56:15No, that's a bad one.
0:56:17like a new activation method. It has a new buttons. It got lots of keyboard shortcuts
0:56:26too, which is really good, especially for multitasking stuff. We've got widgets on the
0:56:30home screen and app library and quick note, which is the only place that this is actually
0:56:36useful. It's on the iPad, but yeah, it's everywhere. And macOS Monterey got shortcuts and I've
0:56:44Caught it continuity, but I think that's wrong. What is it called that you can universal universal control? That's what I was looking for
0:56:51Universal control I was announced. It's coming to Monterey watch OS 8 got I
0:56:58Knew I had to write something so I went to Apple's newsroom page and kind of was just like oh, yeah
0:57:09I didn't remember any of this
0:57:11WatchOS 8 Max stories.
0:57:13new workout types, which it always gets,
0:57:16and a mindfulness app on the watchOS 8.
0:57:20That's what watchOS 8.
0:57:22Also in June, the saga of Safari begins.
0:57:25This is where the next three months of conversation began,
0:57:31was New Safari.
0:57:33It had promise when it was showing off,
0:57:35and then we all realized.
0:57:37I was saying about this earlier on with something else,
0:57:39but I always feel this way with WWDC,
0:57:42where you see something on stage and you're like,
0:57:45"Oh my god, this is going to be amazing."
0:57:48And then you very quickly start to realize,
0:57:51once you play around with things,
0:57:54how it's not exactly what you thought it was going to be.
0:57:58Shortcuts is like this a lot.
0:58:00They show off some stuff in shortcuts
0:58:02and then you actually use it and like,
0:58:03"Oh yeah, but it doesn't work for this, this, this, this, and this,
0:58:06so therefore it's not at all what I thought it was going to be like."
0:58:09Yeah.
0:58:10So that was WWDC.
0:58:12Also in June, Apple employees begin pushing back against the return to office that Apple put out in
0:58:18an internal letter that they wrote to the company. Like a group of employees came together for that.
0:58:24And Apple published a 16-page report on why sideloading would be bad news for the security
0:58:31of their devices. Imagine. Imagine the horrors. This has really kind of been an undertone for the
0:58:37the last half of the year, Apple speaking out about what I guess they were afraid or
0:58:42what they expect courts and world governments to look at.
0:58:46At Craig Fitter, he gave a talk later in the year about this and I don't know, it comes
0:58:51across as so kind of pathetic and I still don't buy it.
0:58:57Like personally, I don't buy it because like if it's this, if this is so bad, does it mean
0:59:03that my Mac is not secure?
0:59:06Like if this is so bad, if this is so scary, why do you allow it on your computer?
0:59:12That's the flaw and they've tried to explain, I mean and they've said like, oh the Mac is
0:59:15secure just not as secure.
0:59:18Well like just, that's fine then right?
0:59:20It's fine.
0:59:21Do you always say, and Stephen, the other, one of the other trend for the last six months
0:59:25of the year is Apple employees talking back to the company.
0:59:28Yes.
0:59:29That's been a thing that's been coming up a lot.
0:59:31Most of it reported by Zoe Schiffer, which I believe that this original Verge article
0:59:35was also reported by Zoe Schiffer.
0:59:38So what did we give June?
0:59:41So there's WWDC and it shapes our, you know, basically it shapes the second half of our
0:59:47year in terms of coverage.
0:59:50I don't think it can be less than good.
0:59:53I actually think you're right.
0:59:54Whilst this wasn't like a blockbuster, there was some stuff in here that we just spoke
1:00:00like Safari that we got months out of.
1:00:05Yeah. Yeah. And shortcuts for Mac, which is like a new stream of content for us, at least.
1:00:15And like, normally I would say, oh, by default, you know, WWDC, we start a good plus. I don't
1:00:22think this was a good plus, WWDC. Kind of the smaller, on the lighter side of things.
1:00:30you know, even things that I thought would make a bigger impact, like Focus,
1:00:37for example, in iOS 15, I don't think it really is really resonating with
1:00:42consumers as much as I thought, but things like LiveText are. That's the kind
1:00:46of thing that I keep seeing, like, my, you know, non-techie friends mention.
1:00:51Because Focus is too complicated to set up. It's too complicated. That's one of my big wishes for iOS 16,
1:00:56that they, I don't think they'll do it, but that they'll make that a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a, a
1:01:26a good because there were things that you know when it's like all new multitasking
1:01:30and iPad I was 15 we had all these ideas for what this could be they delivered the bare
1:01:35minimum you know so I would say good yeah it's a good yes it's a good month yeah so
1:01:41that brings us to July I know I know what this is gonna be kind of a quiet time for
1:01:49tech news generally especially in the Apple world but on July 13th Apple published a press
1:01:55release outlining the 35 Emmy nominations including 20 for Ted Lasso
1:02:02that which apparently is a record for a new comedy series but Apple TV+ content
1:02:11very good and very well rewarded Myke you can probably speak better to this
1:02:15because I know you guys follow this on upgrade a good bit but this seems like a
1:02:20really impressive deal it was and it will come up later on in the show but
1:02:24that this was a very very big deal, the amount of nominations that they got in general, especially
1:02:31for Ted Lasso, but was not unexpected going into the Emmys because Ted Lasso had already
1:02:36started picking up awards before the Emmy nominations were announced, so it did look
1:02:40like it was gonna get pretty well nominated and awarded.
1:02:46We have Obsidian, this little iOS note-taking app that some people use, available on iOS
1:02:56and Android.
1:02:57It had been in beta for a while, and yes, you could, as a supporter or a subscriber,
1:03:04you could get access to it through their Discord, but free on the App Store.
1:03:09And if you are interested in Obsidian, definitely check out what Federico and Jon are doing
1:03:13on App Stories.
1:03:14y'all, I'm not, I don't use Obsidian, I don't particularly like it, but I'm fascinated by
1:03:18what it can do and how y'all are customizing it. So people can go check that out. July
1:03:26also marked the pretty annual arrival of iPhone dummy models. So MKBHD, amongst others, got
1:03:35his hands on these. These phones, for the most part, look and feel like the new iPhone
1:03:42is going to look and feel. Sometimes the weights off on these, I think some of the camera details
1:03:45were a little bit wrong, but it gives you an idea of what's coming and, you know, there's
1:03:49YouTube videos and articles about them, so I just always find that interesting that these things
1:03:53trickle out somewhere. Peak Safari 15 Angsten Sorrow. That's what I'm calling July.
1:04:02Yeah, interesting. At this point, people had been using it, and it was before Apple really started
1:04:10revising it. That was more in August if I remember correctly, but lots of... See this
1:04:16is what I would like to pose this to the group. I think this was, I don't know if this was
1:04:23the peak, I think the peak was when they did start revising it and people weren't happy
1:04:28with what was happening. No, I think July, I think though in July it's where they started
1:04:32doing the back and forth, because I believe it's starting with Beta 3 that they started
1:04:39So in July was really bad because it was changing like every other week basically.
1:04:45I withdraw my challenge.
1:04:47Yeah July was the peak Safari 15 sorrow.
1:04:51Okay so that was when that was happening.
1:04:53I lost track of when that was occurring.
1:04:55Then yes you were completely right.
1:04:57Yeah it was like basically every two weeks we would have like the segment what's new
1:05:02with Safari, what's different with Safari this time.
1:05:05Yeah.
1:05:06It got worse before it got better is what we're saying.
1:05:09Yes, very much so.
1:05:11And then I launched my first Kickstarter in July.
1:05:15So obviously a private, you know, not like news news, but it was a big deal and went
1:05:21amazing and was exhausting all at the same time, but launched that in early July.
1:05:28Big success.
1:05:29Yes, yes.
1:05:30Thank you all.
1:05:31I hope you greatly enjoy your calendars over the next year.
1:05:34Hopefully mine is coming tomorrow.
1:05:37Finally, hopefully.
1:05:39I really hope so.
1:05:40We had to, I mailed Federico a lot of things that I owed him.
1:05:44I just put them on a box and paid UPS a lot of money to take it.
1:05:48Oh, the big box is on the way, huh?
1:05:50Yes.
1:05:51Yes, it is.
1:05:52It's got your Ricky plush character.
1:05:55It's got, I put, I threw our Christmas card in there because Mary was doing those and she's
1:05:59like, what's Federico's address?
1:06:00Like, I'll just give it to me.
1:06:01I'll just, so there's like a, there's a Christmas card inside the box.
1:06:03Yeah.
1:06:04that for you. Yeah, it clear customs. So it should be pretty soon. Yes. Uh, okay.
1:06:10So Steven, uh, I know there's your Kickstarter and it's the only, I mean,
1:06:15Obsidian on iOS, like launching publicly publicly good news, but you know, folks
1:06:20who were interested in Obsidian had the beta months before. Uh, I think this is
1:06:26a decent month. I agree. Uh, July is just a tough month and our world, July is
1:06:34Maybe the worst month.
1:06:36Like, even going up against December.
1:06:40Because by the time July rolls around, there's not really any, there's no hardware then.
1:06:48And we've basically got everything we can get out of talking about the betas.
1:06:53Yes, so you have the calm down from WWDC.
1:06:57you've covered all the highlights and it's that transitional period where nothing new is happening,
1:07:04betas are coming out and I personally start feeling the pressure of like, okay,
1:07:09it's time to get to writing and see how quickly I can get it done.
1:07:14But at the same time you kind of want to go to the beach and you kind of, you know,
1:07:18you start thinking about September. What am I gonna do? It's a weird month. Nothing is happening. It's yeah, it's
1:07:25Not a good time. The only thing sort of making this month better are in this case Steven's Kickstarter and Sylvia's birthday
1:07:32So July, I'm sorry, but decent. Steven you didn't put Sylvia's birthday in the countdown.
1:07:37I didn't know it was in July. That is terrible. That's terrible. Now I do.
1:07:41Sylvia's birthday also in July, but unfortunately... Let her open the box when it shows up tomorrow
1:07:48Okay, so these two things do not save July from a decent
1:07:55Great agreed
1:07:56We now get to August which is the most important month of the year because my birthday is in August but beyond that
1:08:03This is surprising news that I don't know
1:08:07Maybe we should have expected but it still was you know made us raise our in a collective eyebrow
1:08:15if you will Apple acquired prime phonic a
1:08:18service dedicated to classical music and
1:08:24And not only that, but Apple also announced that they would make a dedicated app version
1:08:31of Apple Music just for classical music, based on the Prime Phonic...
1:08:35It has been crickets on that since.
1:08:38I saw a couple of weeks ago someone, maybe Joe Rossiniel from MacRumors, say that they
1:08:44saw something that Apple was still working on this?
1:08:48Well, they must be, right?
1:08:49Because they haven't announced it, so...
1:08:52is the kind of news that the moment I saw it, it's like I didn't predict this, but it
1:08:59made perfect sense right away. It's kind of funny because just a few weeks before we had
1:09:04done like this music series, not a few weeks, a couple of months before, it was in mid-April,
1:09:09we had done this music series on App Stories, and I talked for like 15 minutes about Primephonic
1:09:15and how amazing it was for classical music fans. They did a lot of really good work with
1:09:20curation, interviews, podcast integration. So it makes perfect sense to have Primephonic
1:09:27as an Apple acquisition, but it still was surprising at the time.
1:09:32Then Apple and developers sort of reached an agreement in the US. I don't really recall.
1:09:40That may be overstating it.
1:09:42Yes. So Apple, so let me rephrase this. Apple put out a press release saying that Apple
1:09:48and US developers agreed to App Store updates that will support businesses and maintain
1:09:55a great experience for users."
1:09:58Now I took out this quote from the press release.
1:10:01The agreement clarifies that developers can share purchase options with users outside
1:10:07of their iOS app, expands the price points developers can offer for subscriptions, in-app
1:10:13purchases blah blah blah and establishes a new fund to assist qualifying US developers.
1:10:20Has this really brought any change?
1:10:22No, because it didn't.
1:10:24This wasn't really any change.
1:10:27This was BS, this one.
1:10:29It was useless.
1:10:30Still a press release on the newsroom.
1:10:32Emojipedia was acquired.
1:10:34I totally forgot about this.
1:10:35Emojipedia was acquired by Zedge.
1:10:41smartphone company. And the connected podcast confirmed that the Jeremy's will remain the Jeremy's.
1:10:47Yes, they will. We were not gonna call them the Zeges, although I also do kind of want to do that.
1:10:54But we won't, but I still kind of want to. Zeg, give me a call. YouTube announced picture-in-picture
1:11:05would be coming to the iOS app. This is the best thing that happened in August, again, besides my
1:11:11birthday, Apple reverted the Safari design changes in iOS 15. They abandoned the single
1:11:20toolbar design at the bottom of the screen on iPhone, and they essentially implemented
1:11:26a concept that we had mentioned on the show before by Vidit Bhargava, the developer of
1:11:32Lookup. Vidit had done this concept in late July, showing this dual toolbar approach on
1:11:40the iPhone with the sort of toolbar with the buttons for navigation and share at the bottom
1:11:45of the screen and an address bar tucked above it. So two separate UI elements at the bottom
1:11:51of the screen instead of a single compact toolbar. And Apple did it. That's exactly
1:11:58the design that we got in iOS 15. And Apple also added back an option to put the address
1:12:05bar at the top, if you don't want to use it at the bottom. But honestly, this design refinement
1:12:11with understanding that a single address bar and toolbar at the same time was not gonna work,
1:12:18that did it for me. And I've been a huge fan of the new Safari design ever since, and I never
1:12:24switched back to the address bar at the top UI, because the new one totally works. So that was a
1:12:32fun time that sort of, you know, we had peak sorrow in July and the, you know, the new
1:12:38beginning. I was about to say new dawn, but that's a thing from Cortex. I cannot do that.
1:12:44New decades dawn again. I can't believe how ridiculous that thing is. New beginning for
1:12:52Safari in August. At Max Stories, we launched the new club Max Stories. That was the culmination
1:13:00of two years of work. Really, really happy with how that went and the response that we
1:13:06got and the really the foundation that we laid for Max Stories 5, which is going to
1:13:11be our next big project for 2022. Tim Cook also celebrated on a birthday.
1:13:16Became a Club Max Stories member. Tim Cook, long time Club Max Stories member,
1:13:22likes to read his newsletter every Friday. I can tell you that.
1:13:27Loves it. That's where he finds out what's going on.
1:13:30Yes, and so, oh, I see, I see. We have apps on the App Store. How interesting.
1:13:35Shortcuts is on the Mac.
1:13:37Maybe we should make money off of those apps from other developers.
1:13:41You're to blame.
1:13:43Tim Cook has been a CEO of Apple for 10 years.
1:13:47In August 2021, Steve Jobs resigned.
1:13:51In August 24, 2011, and so August 24, 2021,
1:13:59Tim Cook's 10 year anniversary at Apple,
1:14:02diverged a good story about sort of looking back
1:14:05at Tim Cook's Apple over the past decade
1:14:08and how the company's finances have skyrocketed basically.
1:14:12And lastly, most important news of the month,
1:14:16even more important than my birthday,
1:14:18you can now set up a custom domain for iCloud email.
1:14:22- Yeah, how long did you use that for, like four days?
1:14:24- Three hours.
1:14:28You know, I give it a try.
1:14:30So that's August.
1:14:32Obviously, not a lot better than July.
1:14:36- Decent.
1:14:39Yeah, I think decent.
1:14:40- Decent, right?
1:14:41- Decent.
1:14:42- This is a decent month.
1:14:43Again, we go through this every year
1:14:47and this year was no different.
1:14:48Like July and August, it's the big calm before the storm,
1:14:52even too much calm, so.
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1:16:25- Okay, we move into September.
1:16:28We actually forgot to mention in August
1:16:30that Apple unveiled their CSAM detection
1:16:34and child safety features.
1:16:36- It went very smoothly.
1:16:37- In September, they delayed that
1:16:39because it did not go smoothly at all.
1:16:45It was modeled and not very well laid out
1:16:49and then there was just a cascade of bad news.
1:16:52So then in September, they were like,
1:16:54"LOL, we're not gonna do that.
1:16:57Goodbye."
1:16:58So then, this is my favorite rumor of the year.
1:17:01There was a rumor in September that the iPhone 13
1:17:05would support satellite communication,
1:17:07allowing users to make phone calls and send texts
1:17:10without a cell signal.
1:17:12- Yeah.
1:17:12Your phones don't have that?
1:17:15(laughing)
1:17:17- It's just yours that has that?
1:17:18I don't know, I'm getting calls from somewhere.
1:17:21I don't know why, but when I read the word "satellite phone," I think of these movies
1:17:30from the late 80s or mid-90s with people having these satellite phones, usually criminals,
1:17:36like drug kingpins, having these satellite phones allow them to make phone calls anywhere
1:17:42at any time.
1:17:43Is that what a satellite phone does?
1:17:45Underscore has a satellite phone?
1:17:47Yeah, my brother does too.
1:17:48Oh.
1:17:50They're not criminals.
1:17:51Oh.
1:17:52(laughing)
1:17:53Oh.
1:17:54(laughing)
1:17:54Uh oh.
1:17:55Did they talk to each other on the satellite?
1:17:58They could, yeah.
1:17:58Your brother and underscore?
1:18:00Just say, "I'll see you on the satellite."
1:18:03Is that what they do?
1:18:04That's what they say, yeah.
1:18:05Yeah, let's take this conversation to space.
1:18:07South Korea writes law that requires Apple and Google
1:18:13will have to enable third-party payment processing
1:18:16for their app stores.
1:18:19Google has since kind of complied with this.
1:18:22Apple's like, "Nah, we're good."
1:18:24- I mean, what Google has done is said,
1:18:25"Developers, you can do this, but we're gonna take--"
1:18:28- Yeah, but it doesn't matter.
1:18:29- You owe us a fee if you do it.
1:18:32- I know, they did it in a smart way,
1:18:35but that makes them compliant with the law.
1:18:37Apple's like, "We're already compliant."
1:18:39(laughing)
1:18:40- So what, I don't see what the problem is.
1:18:43We're compliant. - This has been their response.
1:18:44Apple's response is, "We're already compliant."
1:18:46And I'm not really...
1:18:47It's like...
1:18:48That doesn't mean what you think it means.
1:18:50It's like, "Hey, you should change this.
1:18:53I have changed this.
1:18:54That's not true.
1:18:55I have changed this."
1:18:56No, you haven't.
1:18:58No, we are complying.
1:18:59Look, you can't just keep saying we are complying.
1:19:02It doesn't make it true.
1:19:03We're complying.
1:19:04We're complying.
1:19:05Totes comply.
1:19:07Apple comes to an agreement with the Japan Fair Trade Commission that will allow reader
1:19:11apps to link to external websites.
1:19:13I don't think this has been implemented yet either.
1:19:16Of course, nothing has.
1:19:18Honestly, I think this is a WWDC thing with some changes to the App Store.
1:19:25I do think that that, just because I feel like I have to retain some hope that they're
1:19:30not just going to be so pigheaded about this forever.
1:19:34September Apple event included the iPhone 13, 13 mini, 13 pro and 13 pro max, the Apple
1:19:40Watch Series 7, a new iPad and iPad mini.
1:19:44Yes.
1:19:45Yes.
1:19:46Apple wins a ton of Emmys for Ted Lasso. They won loads and loads of Emmys
1:19:51iOS 15 and iPad OS 15 launch. Federico has a review
1:19:56Johnny Ive announces that he will be designing expensive things for Ferrari. It's just I love to
1:20:04Man, Johnny Ive's living his best life
1:20:07I know right?
1:20:08He is living his best life and I'm happy for him and the relay FM community raised seven hundred and one thousand dollars
1:20:16dollars for St. Jude Children's Research Hospital.
1:20:18-Woo! -September.
1:20:20-What a month. -This is a good month.
1:20:22I would say a good plus month. -This is a...
1:20:24This is a good plus for sure.
1:20:27-It's a good plus for sure.
1:20:29-I kind of think it could be Best I Love You.
1:20:31-Leaning toward the upper edge of the good plus.
1:20:34-Yeah, see, I...
1:20:36Best I Love You is that's...
1:20:38I don't want to just give something that, but, like, I would say...
1:20:41-Yeah, but we have 701,000 reasons to do it.
1:20:45Yeah, but this is the best good plus.
1:20:47And there's the iPhone 13 Pro.
1:20:49Which is very good.
1:20:50And there's the iPad mini.
1:20:51I think it's, I think,
1:20:53I think this goes all the way to the top.
1:20:54Plus we have the funny thing
1:20:56when we talk about satellite phones, so.
1:20:58I mean, look at all these things, right?
1:20:59I mean, besides the CSAM rollout.
1:21:03You put your review out on time?
1:21:05I put my review out on day one.
1:21:08Tony, man, it's best I love you.
1:21:10And I also did a review of the iPad mini.
1:21:12Let's do best I love you.
1:21:14(bell ringing)
1:21:15Yeah, there we go.
1:21:17Like, this is the best, personally speaking,
1:21:20it's the best September I've had in a while,
1:21:22and I think the same is true for the relay community.
1:21:24- Yeah.
1:21:26- Of which you are a part.
1:21:27- Yeah.
1:21:28- But like, no, I was saying like personally for my review
1:21:30and like hitting day one, you know, that kind of stuff.
1:21:33And then there's a whole other aspect of, you know,
1:21:36the relay community pulling together for St. Jude's
1:21:38and the Apple event.
1:21:40We also did, it was $701,000 and $1.5 million
1:21:45raised in three years.
1:21:48Thank you, September.
1:21:49- October, the Apple Watch Series 7 orders open.
1:21:54They still haven't redesigned it between the event and this,
1:21:56so Prosser was still wrong.
1:21:58We got another Apple event.
1:22:01This, you know, I didn't really think about it
1:22:03until we lay it all out like this.
1:22:04This was very much the bookend to that weird April event.
1:22:07So we got the Apple Music voice plan, which just launched like last week.
1:22:13These two events are the Spider-Man meme pointing at each other.
1:22:16It's the April event and the October event.
1:22:19No, you're the weirdest of it.
1:22:20It's like they both have it.
1:22:21Like half of it is like, "Here's a bunch of random stuff we've done."
1:22:25And then the other half is like, "Here's all the stuff you want."
1:22:27"Here are some really good computers."
1:22:30Colorful HomePod minis.
1:22:32The orange ones are very good.
1:22:33AirPods 3, which, you know, we talked about on the show,
1:22:36none of us were particularly enthusiastic about it.
1:22:39I had the same problem Sylvia had
1:22:41where they don't really fit as well as the AirPods 2 do,
1:22:44but the AirPods 2 are still for sale, so that's good.
1:22:47But the big news of this event, of course,
1:22:52are the new M1 Pro and M1 Max 14 to 16-inch MacBook Pros.
1:22:57It's spectacular.
1:23:03I think all three of us have them in our working lives.
1:23:06And the 14 inch in particular, I got the M1 Pro.
1:23:11I've been so, so happy with this laptop.
1:23:14It's impressive in every way.
1:23:16They fixed and added things
1:23:17I never thought they would fix or add.
1:23:20And just seriously like all around great job
1:23:22on these laptops.
1:23:24- I think 66% of this episode is being recorded
1:23:28on that laptop.
1:23:30- I am.
1:23:31- Yeah, I am, and Federico is.
1:23:33So like 66% of this episode is coming to you
1:23:36from a 14 inch Mac.
1:23:37- I use this old Intel Mac, you know.
1:23:39- That's why that 33% sounds worse, yeah.
1:23:42- Yeah, well, also like, Stephen's on like a different,
1:23:46like he's gonna be a little bit slower than the rest of us
1:23:48because his computer is slower than ours.
1:23:51- Only in some things.
1:23:52- But all the things that matter.
1:23:54- Episode 366 of this show will go down
1:23:59in the all time greatest connected episodes.
1:24:02- It is the most infamous, I think, episode of "Kanaboon."
1:24:06- Look, it is the one where we let Peacock-
1:24:09- Oh my God, yep.
1:24:11- Dice by Peacock.
1:24:12- Dice by Peacock.
1:24:13I wrote it backwards in the document.
1:24:14I wrote Peacock by Dice, but that's not right.
1:24:17Peacock by Dice.
1:24:18We let Dice by Peacock pick the order of all the topics-
1:24:23- And the ads.
1:24:24- Follow up and the ads, and it picked the ads last,
1:24:27and Myke freaked out, and it was hilarious.
1:24:29Just one of my favorite episodes we've done in a long time. Really enjoyed it.
1:24:34Good Easter egg for that episode is on the web the show website page.
1:24:40Dives by Peacock is listed as guest star. Yes. That and a couple others. Anytime
1:24:45that we've relied on it heavily I mark it as a guest star now. Mm-hmm. Four appearances.
1:24:50A couple others. Federico was in the New York Times about the polishing cloth of
1:24:56all things. The return of Mr. Vitici. That's right, your second time in the New York Times.
1:25:01Glorious return about a cloth. Yes. Mm-hmm. Lastly, but not leastly, leastly? Leastly?
1:25:10Leastly is the Mac OS Monterey. Now Monterey has been, I think, a really solid release.
1:25:17They've had one big update to it already, which fixed a lot of things for those new notebooks.
1:25:22I know Myke you had the Wi-Fi issue
1:25:24Other people were having SD card issues and some other things
1:25:27so I think Monterey's in in pretty good shape going into the new year and
1:25:31It made its way out the door in
1:25:34October oh
1:25:36My god Matt just linked in the chat. No Christian Selig
1:25:40the creator of
1:25:43Apollo bought
1:25:4526 polishing cloths with the
1:25:49Yeah, he used the DTK coupon.
1:25:53The DTK coupon.
1:25:55So good.
1:25:57That is incredible.
1:26:02That is top level.
1:26:05That is so good.
1:26:06Wow.
1:26:07Bravo.
1:26:08So for context, the DTK is the, what was it?
1:26:12A Mac.
1:26:13Developer transition kit.
1:26:14Developer transition kit that Apple provided to developers last year and developers had
1:26:18to give it back to Apple, but Apple gave them a coupon that they could use.
1:26:23Do you remember the coupon? Initially it was like $200 you have to use it within the next
1:26:27like two months and it can't be used on this, this or this.
1:26:30There was a whole controversy around the coupon as well.
1:26:33It was so stupid. It was just so stupid. Like here's $250, which is less money than you
1:26:38paid. You have to give us the computer back in an indeterminate amount of time starting
1:26:43from now and you can only use this money within like the next two months, which is before
1:26:48any good machines are being released. It was just like every possible way they could have made it
1:26:52bad they did and then they were like "uh sorry it's 500 dollars use it on whatever you want whenever
1:26:56you want please never talk to us again." And so Christian has a lot of cleaning cloths coming to
1:27:02his house. So um I think I look I think without the MacBook Pros October would be normal.
1:27:12I think with the MacBook Pros, it's good plus.
1:27:16- I would say good plus.
1:27:17- Yeah, good plus.
1:27:19- Federico.
1:27:20- Yeah, I can go with that, yeah.
1:27:21- It's the computers, the MacBook Pros really do it.
1:27:24- The MacBook Pro does all the work here.
1:27:26- Yeah, it does all the work.
1:27:28- This episode of Connected is brought to you by Setapp.
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1:28:54- All right, we get to November.
1:28:55Bunch of different news here.
1:28:57So the HomePod Mini with different colors
1:29:00is available for sale.
1:29:01Steven, you have how many?
1:29:02Three, four, two?
1:29:04- Well, I had three orange ones.
1:29:05now I just have two I gave one away. Two, okay. Orange. Orange. Orange you're glad I don't have four. Yes. Thank you. Thank you for that.
1:29:16Apple unveils the much beloved Beats Beat Pro. We talked about the Beats Beat Pro.
1:29:23There's a, you know, there's a major surprise. Major surprise. Major surprise
1:29:31involved in the BitSuite Pro in the Pro Show for Connected Pro members.
1:29:35Myke, where can people get Connected Pro?
1:29:39GetConnectedPro.co
1:29:41See? That was easy. And it's also easy to go there and sign up.
1:29:45BitSuite Pro, so they are kind of a surprise release. They have a new design.
1:29:50We talked about this. We had a special episode with Mary Hackett about the
1:29:57the Beats with Pro as well, so go listen to that, it's linked in the show notes.
1:30:01Twitter officially launches after months of rumors, Twitter Blue, the subscription service
1:30:08that gives you access not to add free timeline, that is not a feature, but you get a bunch
1:30:14of stuff, really. You get additional icons for the app, you get a reader mode for Twitter
1:30:21threads, you get the ability to customize the tap bar of the Twitter app, and you get
1:30:28ad-free access to articles from select publishers. Anything else I'm missing?
1:30:35And that's through, what is it, Scroll that they bought? They bought a company that basically
1:30:39already had that feature.
1:30:40Yeah, I believe it's through Scroll.
1:30:42And they also bought Nozzle.
1:30:43Oh, you get the article.
1:30:45Yes.
1:30:46And you get the article summaries, you know, powered by Nozzle, basically.
1:30:51So that's TwitterBlue. You can sign up on iOS and then you also get access to the web
1:30:57because you're logged into the same account. I tried it for a month and then I went back
1:31:01to Tweetbot and that was it. Apple launch is hooked, which is another original podcast,
1:31:07but what makes this different and the reason why we're linking it is that it doesn't have
1:31:12any ties to other properties. Like, Apple had done original podcasts before, but they
1:31:18were always related to something else, like they were the companion podcast for something
1:31:25else, like we mentioned for Allman Cand.
1:31:27They did something called The Line, which there is a TV+ thing coming, and then there
1:31:34is a podcast, but it's not a companion, it's two different ways of telling the same story.
1:31:41But then Hooked is like, it's just a podcast and it's just like a content thing.
1:31:48I mean, they have Apple news today, but we kind of put that to the side.
1:31:51I don't even know if that's still happening.
1:31:54But Hooked is like, here is a thing that we made that is detached from anything.
1:31:58It's been winning some awards I saw too.
1:32:01So it seems to be pretty well regarded.
1:32:02Wait, there's podcast awards?
1:32:04Why don't we have any?
1:32:06Because all of the tech podcasts in the, all of the various podcast awards are none of
1:32:11tech podcasts that anybody who enjoys tech podcasts listen to.
1:32:15So here's the big news. We are pivoting connected to talk about true crime.
1:32:21Well, let me tell you, I mean, well, yes, we could do that. Let me tell you my issue.
1:32:26Unfortunately, Steven, you have pressed on a sore point for me.
1:32:30I know you won a trophy. I know you want to be awarded for your work.
1:32:34I do. One of the biggest issues of awards is you have to pay to be included.
1:32:39Oh yeah, like the stream is that way. We just got a bunch of emails about that.
1:32:42The stream is the webbies. Every year the webbies, emails, every single podcast on Relay FM's
1:32:47email address and it's like, "Hey, you could win one of these, just give us some money and then you
1:32:54can be nominated." Isn't that a Ponzi scheme? Yes, straight up. Anyway, if we ever pivot to a crime,
1:33:03true crime show season one could be about the heart rate monitor that might
1:33:07so
1:33:11i'm just saying we could do it we could have a we could have a connected
1:33:16crime spin-off why is it called true crime what if the version was innocent is it false crime
1:33:21no it's because these are real stories of crime because people here don't ruin my dad joke stop it
1:33:29You've had a... we've let you away of a lot of dad jokes today to be honest.
1:33:32Yeah. Like especially in 2021, like we let you run free with the dad jokes,
1:33:37that's changing, my friend, in 2022.
1:33:40Yep. Good comedy only.
1:33:43Now is your chance to let out your system now if you have any more dad jokes in you for 2021.
1:33:49Anyway, okay. The self-serve... honestly this is the biggest surprise of November.
1:33:56The self-service repair program is official.
1:33:59Very surprising.
1:34:00We talked about this a couple of times on the show.
1:34:03Soon, you will be able to repair iPhones and iPads yourself
1:34:08by buying tools and a kit from Apple.
1:34:13- And Macs.
1:34:14- And Macs.
1:34:15There's gonna be a store dedicated to like,
1:34:17like a section of a store to, you know, to get the parts.
1:34:20And in iOS, Apple is adding support
1:34:23for this in iOS 15.2 beta as well,
1:34:26because the beta will show you which parts you have replaced.
1:34:31Yeah, like you will have that info in settings.
1:34:35You will see--
1:34:35- It's like merit badges.
1:34:38- Yes, kinda like, hey, this iPhone survived a broken display.
1:34:42(laughing)
1:34:43- I put a new chip in this thing.
1:34:46- Yeah. - Go me.
1:34:48- Let's see what else do we have here.
1:34:50Apple, Suze, the Anisoc Group.
1:34:53So the Anisotope group is this company that they made the Pegasus hacking tool to basically
1:35:02spy on activists, journalists, politicians in multiple countries based on a series of
1:35:09really advanced techniques.
1:35:11I've seen some technical breakdowns of what Pegasus was doing behind the scenes, really
1:35:15wild stuff.
1:35:18But Apple has decided to sue the Anisotope group.
1:35:20So we'll see what happens there.
1:35:22Speaking of iOS 15.2 beta, which is still ongoing, I believe we are waiting for...
1:35:29No, we are now on 15.3, I'm sorry.
1:35:3215.2 launched, and 15.2 launched with a macro button.
1:35:38So iOS 15.2 beta 2 came out in November, and it added the long-anticipated macro button
1:35:47for macro photography on the iPhone 13 Pro.
1:35:49Love it.
1:35:50Yeah.
1:35:51button. Yes, it's a good button. It does what it's meant to do. And yes, we are now on 15.3
1:35:59beta. 15.2 was last month. So you're so 15.2 beta. Macro button, you are just so 15.2.
1:36:09Beta 2. What's it all about now? What's in 15.3? 15.3? What's in 15.3? Fixes. Cool.
1:36:18Cool. No, no. Hold on.
1:36:20"Fixes for shortcuts."
1:36:22It is the new TV app, right?
1:36:25No, that's 50.2.
1:36:28No, but honestly, like, more shortcuts fixes.
1:36:32Those are good for me, both on iOS and Monterey.
1:36:35On iOS, they finally fixed --
1:36:38used to be that you couldn't reschedule a reminder.
1:36:42Like, you would say, "Reschedule this tomorrow,"
1:36:46and it would say, "Done."
1:36:48but then you went looking and it was still due today.
1:36:51It's like, no, you haven't done anything here.
1:36:53So that's, you know, these things happen.
1:36:56- No you didn't.
1:36:59- No, you really didn't.
1:37:01This is like Apple, we're complying, no.
1:37:03- Please reschedule, reply to that.
1:37:08- I rescheduled it, no, I rescheduled it.
1:37:10- I've rescheduled compliant.
1:37:13Yup, compliant rescheduling.
1:37:17But that's fixed now.
1:37:19So maybe Apple in South Korea also needs a bug fix, maybe.
1:37:23Tidal announced a free tier
1:37:28and a new payment model for artists,
1:37:31which I know that we have poked fun at Tidal before.
1:37:34I mean, everybody has, but what, yes.
1:37:38- Sorry.
1:37:39- Tidal, the music streaming service.
1:37:40- The jokes are just, they're just, you know.
1:37:44- You gotta get them out.
1:37:45- Coming in like the waves.
1:37:46Look, we told you now is your time.
1:37:48- Yes, not now, it's never.
1:37:50I imagine if it wasn't Federico doing the month of November,
1:37:55this piece of news would have not made it back in.
1:37:57- No, no way.
1:37:58- I wanna mention this because I think it's a cool thing
1:38:00that they are doing and that they will also do,
1:38:03like there's another, like there's a second part to this
1:38:06that they will launch in January.
1:38:08So for now they are showing you where $2,
1:38:12so basically the aggregate money from your subscription
1:38:15where it's going, but starting January they will show you an exact breakdown of, based
1:38:22on what you listen to, which artist is getting paid and how much for how many streams from
1:38:29your account. And I think that sort of transparency is good for the industry and it's something
1:38:34that I wish that other companies would do.
1:38:36However...
1:38:37So that's why I mentioned that.
1:38:38I think there is a weird part to it. You sent me a screenshot of like, I don't know, you
1:38:43give like $2 to Adele or something like that.
1:38:45Right? There is a part of her, it's like, Adele doesn't need my $2.
1:38:50I know.
1:38:50That's this other part to it, where it's like, this only really works in the feel-good part of indie bands.
1:38:59Which is why I don't think anyone else would do this, because Tidal has that feeling to it of like,
1:39:05the music lovers music service.
1:39:07You know, like Spotify, Spotify do it, or Apple Music do it, it's just like,
1:39:11"Oh, my four dollars went to..."
1:39:14Like, everyone's four dollars goes to the same people.
1:39:17You know what I mean?
1:39:18Like, it works way better for people who experience lots of music.
1:39:22I don't know.
1:39:24Federica, do you think I'm off-base?
1:39:25No, I think, you know, the title definitely has that sort of feel to it.
1:39:32That it's like, this is the service you go to for, like, these lesser-known artists
1:39:36and therefore it makes sense to see where your money is going
1:39:39because you're directly supporting those artists. I get that. But at the same time, I know that
1:39:47Adele is like, you know, wildly rich, but still, she deserves the money for her art.
1:39:56I agree with you. I'm not saying she doesn't. I know that I could come across that way of
1:40:01what I said, but yeah, I guess like there are worse millionaires in the world than,
1:40:08Of course. But if there is a weirdness to it, I do think there's a weirdness to it.
1:40:13But yeah, I don't know, it's complicated. Speaking of music, Spotify finally gets real-time lyrics,
1:40:19also a feature that was announced way back, I believe it was like 2020 maybe. It was a long
1:40:24time. It was a long time ago now. That means that Spotify HiFi will come in like February of next
1:40:32year and then they will be within their usual time frame of announcement to release.
1:40:37I think so, that could be. And lastly a judge orders Apple to allow in-app payments, like
1:40:50external payments on the App Store. But does anything change here?
1:40:56No, there was more news in December that Apple basically doesn't have to do it yet.
1:41:01So there's an announcement.
1:41:02Yeah. So judge Gonzalez Rogers is part of the epic case said, no,
1:41:07you have to comply by my ruling and you must allow external payments in the app
1:41:12store. And then Apple appealed it.
1:41:15And I'm going to get to that in a moment. All right.
1:41:20So how do we rank November?
1:41:21Normal.
1:41:24I'm not super enthusiastic about any of it. It's not all right.
1:41:28It's normal. It's not bad.
1:41:30self-service repair was a nice surprise, macro button is cool
1:41:35we had hardware to talk about even
1:41:38normal, yeah normal
1:41:40alright so we get to the worst month for recap
1:41:43which is December because all this stuff literally just happened
1:41:48air power rumors come back from the dead
1:41:51it never dies, you know
1:41:55nope, universal control
1:41:58officially delayed because the year's about to end so it's even now or never
1:42:04the max story selects awards for 2021 announced yes we're not delayed right on
1:42:13time right on time well I don't know this could be one of those things where
1:42:16it's like we were never told when it was gonna happen no it was literally not
1:42:21delayed like it was if I can tell you that it was not delayed by the time
1:42:26people hear this but not as a time of recording the upgrade is will have been
1:42:29announced to not not familiar with those they're good they're a really good one
1:42:33they've been going for eight years so that's good that is god man a couple of
1:42:38years it's a decade of the upgrade ease that's a horrible thing to think about
1:42:42pretty pretty wild that means wait it means what you think it means that in
1:42:47two years your company will be ten years old.
1:42:50Yep.
1:42:50Ooh.
1:42:51Yeah.
1:42:52Don't...
1:42:52Ooh.
1:42:54Yeah.
1:42:55Yeah, that's the point.
1:42:56That hit me in a quite significant way.
1:42:59So, okay, fair enough.
1:43:02Apple wins a stay in the Epic case
1:43:05and won't have to implement App Store changes.
1:43:07So Apple took it to the Court of Appeal,
1:43:09to like the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeal.
1:43:11The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeal said,
1:43:13you don't have to do anything until this whole trial
1:43:15was wrapped up, basically,
1:43:17which means nothing's going to happen because Apple will win their appeals probably.
1:43:22The information reported that Tim Cook secretly signed a deal worth $275 billion for China
1:43:30back in 2016. So very good report. Not a great look. Yeah. Well, I mean, it's very mixed
1:43:36and varied and weird. I think the fact that Apple, what I don't like about this whole
1:43:40thing is that Apple never said it. That's, that's really my main problem. Yeah. What?
1:43:45Yeah, that's that's like maybe there's a legitimate reason, but why haven't you said it there isn't a legitimate reason
1:43:51Yeah, the reason is they don't want the bad press right they think it will cause because I said this an upgrade I say here to
1:43:58Apple would 100% not stop talking about this if it did it with the American government
1:44:03Oh, yeah, well, I mean and they did they did a lot of that under the previous administration
1:44:08Which is all about like go America go like oh, we're building Mac
1:44:14Allowing allowing the idea that that Donald Trump was responsible for the Mac Pro to exist
1:44:20I don't love that. They were totally fine with that. They were fine with that. They'd never questioned it all do you think he touched mine?
1:44:26It's probably mean it's not impossible
1:44:29You definitely got to sell it now and finally Apple delays corporate return to offices
1:44:36indefinitely
1:44:38Yeah, they've been kicking the can down the road and there's like a whole bigger theme of
1:44:44choose with employees at Apple and I don't think they've handled them all particularly
1:44:49well but the work from home I think is the biggest and the most prominent because it
1:44:53affects the most people and they have said we don't know what we're doing and here's
1:44:59a thousand dollars to buy a chair.
1:45:01Hopefully they gave people money for work from home offices well before now.
1:45:06I don't think they did.
1:45:07I don't think they did either.
1:45:08No I think this was the first time that they've given money because now they kind of like
1:45:13for whatever reason, they have accepted it.
1:45:15How do we rank December?
1:45:17Inferior.
1:45:21Inferior.
1:45:22Inferior.
1:45:23I wish you mentioned that Swift Playgrounds 4 also came out.
1:45:26Yeah, with a bunch of core abilities missing.
1:45:31In that purchase, can't do it in there.
1:45:34So the best month of the year, September.
1:45:37Yeah, that feels good.
1:45:38Could've guessed that.
1:45:39Could've guessed it, right?
1:45:40Like if we would've all made the guess.
1:45:42Congratulations September, you won the best month of the year.
1:45:46Now I do want to pick a few other ones here.
1:45:48Worst month of the year.
1:45:51January.
1:45:53No, January. Let's see. Hold on.
1:45:55January got inferior minus.
1:45:57Oh my God. Nothing else was.
1:45:59Wow. I feel like we were harsher on January than we should have been.
1:46:02Well, because no, cause January was a trash month when nothing happened.
1:46:06I mean, look at this.
1:46:07Look at this. There's nothing here.
1:46:09Nothing happened in January.
1:46:11Like, whilst December was like, I don't know, it's been quiet.
1:46:15It's like you, it's like you writing about the PowerBook and Dan Riccio doing things
1:46:21at Apple.
1:46:22And you couldn't even remember what Dan Riccio was doing!
1:46:25So, like, you know.
1:46:27Okay, so, congratulations to January, you're the worst month of 2021.
1:46:33That's the month my birthday's in.
1:46:35And mine, but nevertheless.
1:46:37What I think is interesting is picking a runner up.
1:46:41So think about it this way.
1:46:44If for whatever reason we as a society decide that we need to change our calendars and so
1:46:49we're cutting a month out of the year and we're cutting September out of the calendar
1:46:54year.
1:46:55So like September doesn't exist anymore.
1:46:57It's late August and suddenly it's October 1st.
1:47:01So if we wouldn't pick September, what would we pick?
1:47:03It's between April and October.
1:47:06They both got good plus. So April and wait, are we trying to kick the worst? The second
1:47:12worst one now? No, no, no. Federico was quite confusing in the way imagine September doesn't
1:47:18exist. Okay. What is the best month that is left? Yeah. I mean, I think, yeah, I think,
1:47:25I think October. So April was the grab bag apple event. Yeah. I guess between the two
1:47:34grab bags the best product of all of them was the the max the macro pros
1:47:40yeah yeah yeah and and the and the apple polishing cloth memes in October yeah
1:47:48and that connect yeah so okay okay if September is not around October is the
1:47:56second in command I can basically okay man you used a lot of different
1:48:02metaphors for this. I know. He's a poet. I am. I'm a writer. I'm Mr. Vittucci. I wear
1:48:11many hats, so to speak. They're all jaunty. Mr. Vittucci's hat. Mr. Vittucci's hat. I'm
1:48:18not a hat person, honestly, myself. I don't think I can pull off a hat. Mostly because
1:48:22I think I got a big head. So I don't think... Hats don't fit me well. They just... No hats
1:48:28look good on me. It's very upsetting. Yeah. Yeah. Steven, you could pull off a hat, right?
1:48:34Yeah. Oh, Steven does. Steven, Steven like is a multi hat person. I just got like one
1:48:42hat from Steven's got that. Like Steven has that hat head. Like you see Steven said, like
1:48:48this is a hat. This is a head for a hat energy over there. You got, you got that. You got
1:48:55the flexible, like, you have a versatile head, you know?
1:48:59Please stop.
1:49:00All right, let's actually stop. How about that?
1:49:04Yes. If you want to find links to about a thousand things we talked about, longest show
1:49:09notes of the year.
1:49:10Hey, look, if you want to find links to what we've spoken about, do your own work and go
1:49:14through the year like we did. It's all in there.
1:49:16No, I'll put him in the show notes.
1:49:19All right. You're just too good to these listeners, you know that. People don't know what they
1:49:23got with you around.
1:49:24I love them all individually.
1:49:25I know all their names.
1:49:28Federico knows where they live.
1:49:29It's great.
1:49:30Those are at relay.fm/connected/
1:49:34Actually you know where a lot of them live.
1:49:38That's true.
1:49:39You sent them Mac trickies.
1:49:40I know.
1:49:41And calendars.
1:49:42Wait, what about GDPR?
1:49:44I'm not sharing it with anybody.
1:49:46Can people now email you?
1:49:48But you're supposed to delete the info.
1:49:50No.
1:49:51Only if they ask.
1:49:54you can hold it. Only if they ask. Yeah. Interesting. If you want to ask for your
1:50:00info to be deleted, email kc@kclist.com. That's right. He'll answer immediately. He's outside your home now.
1:50:09Please delete. That's it. So you got a time to do any and he'll do it for you.
1:50:12So the show notes are relay.fm/connected/378. While you're there, you
1:50:19can get in touch via email. You can sign up to become a member of Connected Pro
1:50:23Connected Pro is a longer ad-free version of the show that we publish each and every
1:50:29week.
1:50:30Thank you so much to our members this year.
1:50:31You all have really made this year a lot more stable and less scary financially for all
1:50:36of us.
1:50:37So thank you for your ongoing support of the show.
1:50:39And if you're not a member, go join.
1:50:42Go join Connected Pro.
1:50:44You can find us…
1:50:45I was going to say there's never been a better time, but there was a better time.
1:50:48Yeah, it is like…
1:50:49Last week.
1:50:50But, oh well, if you missed it, you know, you missed it.
1:50:53like we didn't tell you about it. You can find us all online. You can find Federico
1:50:57on Twitter as Vitici, V I T I C C I. He's the editor and chief of maxstories.net. You
1:51:04can find Myke online as I M Y K E. Myke hosts a bunch of shows here on Relay FM. I'm like
1:51:10halfway through the Cortex yearly theme episode and it is fantastic. So go check that out.
1:51:15You can find me on Twitter as ISMH and I write over at 512 pixels.net. I'd like to thank
1:51:21our sponsors Amazon music, TexExpander, Pingdom, and Setapp. Until next time guys, say goodbye.
1:51:28Adios e chu. Happy new year. Bye y'all.