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Connected

87: Ticci on the Scene

 

00:00:00   [Music]

00:00:07   From relay FM this is Connected episode number 87. Today's show is brought to you

00:00:13   by Arc and Memories. My name is Myke Hurley. I am very sleepy and will explain why shortly

00:00:20   and I am very happy to be joined by Federico Vittucci. Hi Federico.

00:00:24   Hello Myke. And Steven Hackett.

00:00:26   Hey boys, how are y'all?

00:00:28   Yeah, good. So I have just arrived home

00:00:32   about two hours ago from Atlanta.

00:00:36   How's that feeling?

00:00:38   I feel like I'm still in Atlanta, but there's part of me that's here as well.

00:00:44   I feel very peculiar right now. I'm drinking juices and waters, but

00:00:50   I kind of feel like I'm very disorientated right now.

00:00:54   So we'll see how that goes.

00:00:56   You fly a lot, Myke.

00:00:58   Do you usually kiss the ground when you land back in the UK?

00:01:01   No, I think only the Pope does that.

00:01:04   Well, okay.

00:01:05   I thought it was a usual gesture.

00:01:11   Not for me, man.

00:01:12   Not for me.

00:01:13   I'm used to flying now, like I have that whole thing down, but I just don't think there's

00:01:19   anything you can do to prepare yourself for a time change like this.

00:01:23   At least Eastern time is way easier to recover from than Pacific time.

00:01:31   But I was in Atlanta for the Pan-Addict episode 200.

00:01:36   Nice.

00:01:38   How did it go?

00:01:39   It was fantastic.

00:01:41   It was very emotional.

00:01:42   It was very exciting to have a bunch of people together and we recorded the show in front

00:01:47   of a live audience.

00:01:48   And I would recommend people if they've never listened to the show before, just go listen

00:01:52   to this because it's fun to hear and maybe you know and you're and we're going

00:01:56   to talk about something in a little bit which makes this even more fun to listen

00:02:00   to but Stephen came down to with his brother and they recorded a video for

00:02:07   our Kickstarter backers and Stephen wrote a really great post about the

00:02:12   setup that he used as well we're into follow-up now by the way yeah we sort of

00:02:16   eased our way into it yeah I think I stumbled into it yeah no it was a great

00:02:21   weekend the pin show is is always fun and it's it's great for me at least and

00:02:26   I've said this before the places but it's always interesting to see like a

00:02:29   parallel nerdy universe there's so many things that sort of describe and define

00:02:35   like the Apple community like those traits are true in a bunch of other

00:02:40   places including the pin community it's just the the best group of people lots

00:02:45   we talked to lots of people all weekend about the shows and what we're doing and

00:02:48   It's just nice to get out and see people and talk to people and it was a lot of

00:02:53   fun so thank you to everyone who came out and saw the show. I'm glad it all

00:02:58   worked. Yeah, thank you. There was stress around that but it was a lot of fun and it's always

00:03:05   good to do something new and exciting. I wonder how hanging out

00:03:11   with Steven's brother is like. In my mind it's like hanging out with a non-Mac

00:03:15   version of Steven. Is that what it's like? That's basically right. They're very

00:03:20   similar. Like they look the same, they talk the same, they're very

00:03:25   similar. Both very lovely people. One just doesn't collect old Max. Exactly.

00:03:32   That sounds amazing. We also have some very serious corrections that we need to

00:03:38   make from last week's show. There's a couple of very important things that

00:03:42   that many people let us know about.

00:03:44   So we were laughing about ananas, right?

00:03:48   - No, ananas.

00:03:49   - All right, ananas, okay.

00:03:51   So yeah, I guess pronunciation's important.

00:03:54   We were laughing about that word

00:03:56   and it turns out that pineapples are called ananas,

00:04:00   basically everywhere else except in English.

00:04:03   It's like every other language

00:04:05   has some kind of variation on ananas,

00:04:09   except for English, which is hilarious,

00:04:12   that we were just like, "Ha ha ha, how silly that sounds.

00:04:16   "It's like bananas."

00:04:17   Well.

00:04:18   - Turns out.

00:04:19   - Turns out world was right, Myke was wrong.

00:04:22   - No, see, in this instance, you got the fruit wrong, Myke.

00:04:27   - Yep.

00:04:28   - It's true.

00:04:29   We also need to correct the pronunciation

00:04:31   of the first color iMac.

00:04:34   Thank you to the entire nation of Australia for writing me

00:04:36   to tell me that it is Bondi.

00:04:38   I have learned in the last few days that Bondi Beach is clearly very important to Australians.

00:04:46   It's obviously something of quite national importance for them.

00:04:50   So I would like to issue an official apology on behalf of Connected for calling it.

00:04:56   And really the British Kingdom.

00:04:59   Yeah.

00:05:00   Yeah.

00:05:01   Yeah.

00:05:02   Just like Johnny Depp apologized to the nation of Australia, we are officially apologizing

00:05:06   to the people of Australia for getting the Bondi Beach wrong.

00:05:10   Yeah, Bondi Beach. And we will try our utmost to never get that wrong again because we don't

00:05:16   want those tweets again. That is true. Sorry everyone.

00:05:23   While we're apologizing, Federico, you are ruining someone's marriage apparently.

00:05:27   Am I really? I guess it depends on how it turns out. Did

00:05:31   Did you see this tweet?

00:05:34   So John Downing on Twitter let us know that his wife

00:05:38   and he are having a little bet between them

00:05:41   about Federico getting a smaller iPad Pro

00:05:45   at Myke's suggestion.

00:05:47   And John thinks that you can hold on.

00:05:49   I think his wife thinks that you're gonna end up

00:05:50   with a second iPad.

00:05:52   - Okay, because I read the tweet wrong initially.

00:05:55   I read that as well, having a little bet

00:05:57   on Federico getting a baby.

00:05:59   didn't see baby pro that was kind of creepy that's a very different kind of

00:06:05   bit that's a very different kind of bad and I couldn't imagine how I was

00:06:09   ruining their matter their marriage with that but I know I'm still not getting

00:06:14   into baby pro and I got a bunch of tweets from people last weekend when I

00:06:19   tweeted a picture of my old iPad air 2 that I was setting up as a camera and

00:06:25   people are like so you're gonna you're gonna switch to the dual iPad setup no

00:06:29   it's just a camera. It's my old iPad Air 2, it's sitting on a shelf unused. So I

00:06:34   thought, you know, I'm paying for a many thing subscription, which is this service

00:06:38   that lets you monitor your house with iOS devices, and I set up the iPad Air as

00:06:43   a camera. So that's about it, still using a single iPad Pro. So we have about

00:06:48   five months and a half at this point, so we'll see.

00:06:50   Myke has a whole flight to convince me. Yeah, I take your iPad away and just

00:06:57   replace it with mine. And I won't notice. Sure. So for many reasons it's a big week

00:07:04   this week. One of them is we have a new show on Relay FM called Disruption.

00:07:10   Disruption is the next evolution of Isometric, which was a show that we have

00:07:17   and have had on Relay FM for a while about video games hosted by Brianna and

00:07:22   Steve and Micah in Georgia, but now they've wanted to kind of take the show

00:07:26   in a new direction, they want a fresh look and a new format, so we have Disruption, which

00:07:30   has a great kind of new attitude to it. I love the music, the music is the most epic

00:07:36   of all music. And Disruption now, as well as kind of video games, also focuses on technology

00:07:41   and culture. And they also have a really interesting call-in element. So like many shows on Reel

00:07:47   AFM, they have a hashtag for sending in questions and comments over Twitter. But they've also

00:07:53   set up a phone number that you can call and leave a question for the hosts and you can

00:07:59   kind of have fun with that. So that's something really different and I'm really excited to

00:08:02   see how it turns out. Disruption is as fun and wild as you would expect from this group

00:08:08   and you can check it out over at relay.fm/disruption. Even if you just tune in to listen to Micah's

00:08:15   like disclaimer at the start, he has potentially the best voice in the world. So you should

00:08:21   at least just listen for that.

00:08:22   Yeah, and it's probably the craziest show on Relay.

00:08:26   Oh, yeah.

00:08:27   I love it.

00:08:28   Yeah, so go check it out.

00:08:29   That's at relay.fm/disruption.

00:08:32   And continuing the theme, Federico, you have something that you're working on this week

00:08:36   that you can't yet talk about, but for people that listened before the 20th, right, you

00:08:42   want to kind of just tease that you're working on something.

00:08:44   Yeah, for the past couple of months we've been working, me and another person who shall

00:08:50   not be named yet. We've been working on this big project, it's something I've never done

00:08:56   before, and it's finally done, and it seems like all the stars are aligned, we're going

00:09:03   live tomorrow, there's going to be a video involved, and I'm really excited, I'm really

00:09:10   nervous and stressed, I'm at the point where - and I was just talking about this on our

00:09:15   Telegram channel a few minutes ago - I'm at the point where I no longer know if what I've

00:09:20   done is good or sucks or it's terrible or it's amazing. I think it's good work.

00:09:26   I've shown it to a few friends and the feedback seems to be positive, but you know, at that

00:09:32   point you're just gonna go live and see what happens. And in addition to that, which is

00:09:37   gonna be a video, there's going to be an article, we're also working on this site feature for

00:09:43   Maxories. It's a new feature, it's gonna be quite nice, and it's just a way to celebrate

00:09:49   which turns 7 tomorrow, so it's our anniversary and I always like to do

00:09:54   these little surprises or new features, new articles for our anniversary.

00:09:58   It's a nice way to celebrate the occasion, so definitely check it out on

00:10:03   Mac Stories tomorrow. Fingers crossed everything goes smoothly.

00:10:07   In China, 7 is a lucky number. Oh yeah? Yeah, so this is gonna be your lucky year.

00:10:12   Nice, nice. It's also the number of books in the Harry Potter series, so I like that.

00:10:19   that. Of equal importance I guess. Yeah it's a magic number, it's a magic number, we'll

00:10:25   see. This week's episode is brought to you by Arc. We all know that offsite backups are

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00:11:06   So maybe in your Google Drive, Dropbox or OneDrive account, you can use those to set

00:11:11   up your own encrypted backups of what lives on your machine.

00:11:14   You could also backup to AWS or a Google Cloud Storage account as well.

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00:11:24   all versioned, so you can go back in time and grab a file that's changed or has been

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00:12:03   possible Stephen, do you think? Like if you really knew what you were doing?

00:12:06   >> Yeah, I think so. >> Okay, great.

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00:12:29   So Siri went rogue yesterday.

00:12:31   Yeah, this is a strange story, right?

00:12:35   Yesterday, midday, 9 to 5 broke the story

00:12:39   that if you asked Siri when WWDC was happening,

00:12:42   it would tell you.

00:12:43   And so a bunch of people took that as sort of official word

00:12:48   and bought plane tickets, et cetera,

00:12:50   including the three of us.

00:12:52   And then it wasn't until like six hours later or so,

00:12:56   Apple finally got the developer page updated.

00:13:02   And, I mean, who knows what happened.

00:13:06   Either the Siri team jumped the gun

00:13:07   or maybe the developer page wasn't ready

00:13:11   or the web team had some issues

00:13:12   or having some more issues today it looks like,

00:13:14   which we'll get to in a second.

00:13:15   So, either way, it's just not like an awesome way

00:13:22   to announce your dates.

00:13:23   And especially for an event that is so expensive

00:13:27   and, you know, coming up really,

00:13:30   in like what like eight weeks now seven weeks and it's not until several days

00:13:36   from now that you actually know if you won the lottery so just I think the

00:13:39   whole thing happens way too late in the year and they should announce it earlier

00:13:42   but that's just me but um anyways I guess the bigger news is that dates have

00:13:47   been announced and I have to say this developer.apple.com page is gorgeous

00:13:54   it's really pretty. I just want to go back to the Siri thing real quick.

00:13:58   Sure. Is someone at 9 to 5 Mac just sitting and asking every five minutes? Like how did they know?

00:14:04   It's strange to me because in the morning I saw

00:14:08   someone from 9 to 5 Mac

00:14:11   tweet a screenshot of the same question

00:14:14   But there was no answer in the morning and a few hours later they broke the news

00:14:19   So it seems to me that they knew it was gonna happen. They knew to ask

00:14:25   Yeah, yeah, yeah, because in the morning I was just waiting in my car

00:14:30   I was waiting for my girlfriend and I saw this tweet with with the screenshot

00:14:34   I thought why would you ask and a few hours later? I saw the news and I was like hmm. Maybe they knew

00:14:39   Wouldn't surprise me because they know everything so yeah

00:14:44   I mean, you know

00:14:45   You just got to know someone on a team somewhere who can say to you all you should be asking

00:14:49   but it seemed like maybe as Steven said like it

00:14:53   Siri shouldn't have been the way that this was done and I don't think Apple wanted that to occur in all honesty.

00:14:59   It's my guess.

00:15:00   It just didn't, the page doesn't really

00:15:03   link to that. Like the page, as you say, is beautiful and it's clearly much more focusing on

00:15:09   code, right? Like this is what it's showing here. If the page was covered in Siri elements

00:15:14   then it would look like that they were kind of doing it to be fun, but I don't think that was the case.

00:15:19   But Siri was enough

00:15:22   to make me go ahead and buy plane tickets

00:15:25   So I was sitting in an airport in Atlanta buying more plane tickets I called Federico Federico, why did I call you?

00:15:36   Why did you call me? Mm-hmm?

00:15:39   Because you wanted to do it on the phone because I'm buying tickets with you cuz you're coming with us

00:15:46   Yes, I'm sure first WWDC. Yes

00:15:51   It's crazy after after seven years of mixed stories and what five years we've known each other

00:15:57   Probably four or five. I'm finally going to be there and I'm you will be my my what's the word my my chaperone?

00:16:05   Yeah, yeah, I'll be a chaperone or Sherpa, you know, I just take care of everything for you

00:16:09   Yeah, you know, it's about right. You're a good friend Myke. Hey, I want to look after you

00:16:14   So Federico's coming to London

00:16:16   We're spending the night in London and then we're flying out to San Francisco together

00:16:20   and we're going to spend a lovely week.

00:16:23   And it's going to be very fun and we're doing something special.

00:16:25   We've been planning this for a while and we're very thankful that the dates turned out to

00:16:30   be what we expected.

00:16:33   We're doing so Atlanta was the first ever RelayCon event and it was practice for this,

00:16:40   which is RelayCon San Francisco.

00:16:43   We have hired out an event space and we have tickets on sale now.

00:16:47   They are very limited and we will have a link in our show notes where you can go to find

00:16:52   out more and hopefully get yourself a ticket and you can come join us.

00:16:55   We're going to be doing Connected Live and we're going to have some of the guests, Serenity

00:17:01   Caldwell and Jason Snow will be joining us as well.

00:17:04   And lots of your favorite relay hosts will be in attendance.

00:17:07   And we're going to have a bar, an open bar for a few hours so we can do some shows and

00:17:13   hang out and it's gonna be amazing and I'm very excited.

00:17:17   - Yeah, it's a big deal.

00:17:19   I mean, like you said, Atlanta's been a practice run,

00:17:23   but we have been wanting to do something at WWBC for,

00:17:26   I mean, it really seems to be started.

00:17:30   I'm super pumped.

00:17:31   It's great to see tickets flying off the shelves.

00:17:34   I'm really excited to be on stage with the two of you

00:17:37   and do a show.

00:17:38   - I'm probably gonna cry.

00:17:39   - Yeah.

00:17:40   - I want to cry a little bit last week,

00:17:42   I'm gonna cry again. Gonna get emotional? Okay. Should I bring tissues, Myke? Yes, please.

00:17:48   Okay. Okay. Well, the good news is there's going to be beverages. If we cry, we can,

00:17:56   you know, lift our spirits afterwards. We can replace the liquids again. There you go.

00:18:01   So let's go back to talking about this WWDC page. What do you think about it, Federico?

00:18:08   looking at the, you know, we know the design is beautiful, but it's, you know, it's always

00:18:13   fun I think to kind of try and read the tea leaves of this stuff. What does this design

00:18:20   say to you? What do you think Apple are looking at here?

00:18:23   So I usually don't try to be one of those conspiracy theories kind of people. But three

00:18:32   Three things turned out to me.

00:18:35   The first one is the heavy focus on Swift and programming.

00:18:40   I mean of course it's a developers conference, but the Swift theme throughout the webpage

00:18:45   and all the design, it's different.

00:18:48   And the second aspect is the dark theme of the webpage design.

00:18:54   And third would be what appears to be a monospaced version of the San Francisco font.

00:19:00   So right now Apple has two versions of San Francisco, text and display.

00:19:05   And this monospace variant, I've never seen that before.

00:19:10   I'm pretty sure it's San Francisco.

00:19:11   I've seen a gif on Twitter from someone who's overlaying the regular San Francisco typeface

00:19:17   with this new monospace version.

00:19:20   And if I were to come up with a theory myself, I would say two things.

00:19:26   Maybe three, actually.

00:19:28   New San Francisco font for programmers, some kind of dark theme, either for iOS or Xcode,

00:19:36   and my long shot Xcode for iPad.

00:19:39   That's what I would read if I were to say, you know, this is a conspiracy.

00:19:44   I'm probably wrong, but I don't know.

00:19:46   It's interesting web page design, for sure.

00:19:51   I've been thinking this for a little bit, and we've spoken about it.

00:19:56   I would say that I would make a prediction that we could see Xcode for iPad.

00:20:01   I think because it could be one of those things that could be a swift level surprise.

00:20:07   No one knew it was coming because it was just being worked on internally.

00:20:12   I wouldn't be surprised if it was like, "We're working on it, it will be ready in six months."

00:20:17   Because I can't even imagine how big a project it would need to be, right?

00:20:22   Because I'm assuming like if you're gonna have Xcode on the iPad, you also need to be

00:20:27   able to compile on the iPad?

00:20:31   That's the question, right?

00:20:32   Because when we first heard about it, I think John Gruber and I separately heard the same

00:20:38   thing.

00:20:39   There was an Xcode prototype of sorts running on an iPad.

00:20:44   I heard it was an iPad Pro, John just heard iPad.

00:20:49   And we don't know if it was a full-on Xcode IDE, you know, like the full app, you can

00:20:53   build apps, you can write code, or if it's just a playground only kind of a...

00:20:58   I wouldn't say demo, but maybe slimmed down version of Xcode for OS X.

00:21:04   That's a big question.

00:21:05   Are you gonna be able to compile, to write apps, to test apps on an iPad?

00:21:08   Is that even gonna be possible?

00:21:09   Is it gonna be iPad Pro only or just every iPad?

00:21:13   to me like a full Xcode replacement or maybe a full featured version, maybe with just a

00:21:21   few features not available on iOS as a starting point, but that you can try apps, you can

00:21:25   build apps, you can compile, you can test them live on a device. It seems to me like

00:21:30   it would be a big project and the kind of reveal, just like when Apple revealed those

00:21:34   with two years ago, I can not only imagine the audience, the reaction, what would it

00:21:38   be like. But we don't know if... First, we don't know if it's actually happening. I'm

00:21:44   positive that the prototype exists. We don't know if it's happening. We don't know if it

00:21:50   happens, what kind of Xcode it'll be.

00:21:53   Yeah, because I can imagine... Let's say you were going to really restrict it, right? I

00:22:00   could imagine you would maybe be able to do something on the iPad Pro, the 12.9 inch,

00:22:06   iPhone, right, because you could maybe have a simulator as well, because the

00:22:10   resolution is so massive, right? But it would be very interesting to see if they do

00:22:15   this, what constraints Apple would put on it, because it's not gonna be able, and

00:22:20   I'd be very surprised if right now it could do it. Like, you know, there's maybe

00:22:25   a way that you could plug two iOS devices together and you run the

00:22:32   simulator on another device. That would be crazy. Right? Like that, I mean, that could be a way to do it. I don't know. It's, it's an interesting thing to do. But I really do believe they have to do it at some point. Like if Apple are serious about making the iPad a future computing platform, you need to be able to make apps for it on it. Like that's when I mean, that seems fair, right? That's when like a

00:23:02   computer platform has kind of made it when you can make more on it for it,

00:23:08   make more for it on the device. Right. It would definitely be a big shift and it

00:23:15   would be interesting to see, like you said, how you do the simulator type stuff

00:23:19   but I think they also have to solve some sort of, you know, sharing, you know, file

00:23:27   sharing and code sharing system where you could pick up a project from Xcode on

00:23:31   the Mac and bring it over to the iPad and put it back and forth and so what I

00:23:36   think about immediately is is the limited way that the file system is

00:23:40   visible now on the iPad enough for something like Xcode where you're

00:23:44   dealing with all of your code but you're also dealing with assets you're dealing

00:23:47   with images and various types of files and I just wonder if if you know Xcode

00:23:54   for iPad what it would mean for iOS in general is some of that stuff going to

00:23:58   be more exposed or they just gonna do it in a weird way within Xcode and and not

00:24:03   really deal with it elsewhere so it's a lot of stuff to to consider here but I

00:24:09   think I agree with you Myke that it is a big milestone in the maturity of a of a

00:24:14   platform and one that you know I would imagine the iPad Pro is is powerful

00:24:21   enough to run it's just you know is now the time or not but San Francisco being

00:24:27   in mono space. Again, like Federico, I try not to read those tea leaves too much, but

00:24:33   that seems a pretty interesting change of pace. So I guess we'll see.

00:24:42   That's definitely. The keynote State of the Union, the Design Awards, and the Bash are

00:24:48   at the Bill Graham Center. Yeah.

00:24:50   Just like they said at Moscone. They're splitting it across both places.

00:24:53   Yeah, so I've got a pair of thoughts about this.

00:24:57   I mean, one, the Bill Graham Center is largest, where Apple did their September event, if

00:25:03   you recall.

00:25:04   And it could be that they want more people to be able to attend those events, and so

00:25:10   this would give them space for more press and for more developers and for more employees,

00:25:15   more of everyone.

00:25:17   But also, what I wonder is if they're not going to be using that large room at Moscone,

00:25:22   maybe that room will be divided up into more sessions and labs. And so it may be

00:25:27   that they get to use more space in Moscone for this as well. You know, for a

00:25:33   long time it's like WSC is it's clearly not big enough. They clearly can't meet

00:25:38   the needs of the community. Even going to this lottery system they've been using

00:25:43   for a couple years now, they still can't serve everybody. And if this, you know,

00:25:49   this adds some transportation issues to people who are attending but if it gives

00:25:54   them the ability to have more attendees then I think that's a I think it's a

00:25:58   fair trade-off.

00:26:01   Yeah and it seems like they're gonna provide some kind of travel between the

00:26:06   events. I just wonder why they've done it right? Is it a scheduling

00:26:11   conflict? Do they just want the space? Yeah I can't imagine a scheduling

00:26:15   conflict. My guess is it's about the number of seats. Yeah, I guess

00:26:20   especially for the designer awards, now that they're doing designer awards for

00:26:26   four platforms, which means all kinds of developers in the same room at once,

00:26:31   whereas I guess with sessions developers are split, you know, some go to one

00:26:36   session about, say, watchOS, other developers go to iOS and OS X

00:26:42   sessions so it's easier to manage I guess the different conference rooms but

00:26:46   for these you know the keynote and the state of the unit and the designer words

00:26:51   where everyone is gonna be in the same place at once maybe they just want some

00:26:55   room. Yeah I mean we'll see. That could be the case. We'll see. Maybe they wanted to

00:27:03   just make sure they could get everyone in right because it does it have a

00:27:07   bigger, is it much bigger than Moscone? What's the room that they use in

00:27:12   Moscone? I believe it is but that's where I think that it's more about the extra

00:27:18   room at Moscone where they if they don't use that big room because those

00:27:22   rooms can be configured in a bunch of different ways and if they don't need it

00:27:25   for a big event hall then maybe they can divide it up so you know either way it's

00:27:32   it's an interesting detail but I think it's it might give them like more space

00:27:36   for labs and stuff like more of them.

00:27:38   Yeah, yeah.

00:27:38   Right, because they don't have to move all the walls around in Moscone or whatever.

00:27:42   Right, so I think it's a good thing.

00:27:44   Set it and forget it.

00:27:45   Yep.

00:27:46   Anything else on WWDC? I'm excited now.

00:27:49   Yeah, man.

00:27:51   It's going to be an interesting year, you know.

00:27:54   With four platforms, there's going to be a lot of stuff to do.

00:27:58   Including maybe hardware.

00:28:01   It's going to be, I think we're going to be in for another two hour keynote.

00:28:05   it's gonna be a long one. Hopefully without the Apple Music segment. Yeah no

00:28:10   kidding. Just something just to mention because I see a few people get...

00:28:14   Look, they asked me this question and I'm not gonna try and get a ticket. None of us

00:28:18   are entering the lottery. We just go to be there and be around everyone that's

00:28:23   there. Well I don't... I still don't know. What, if you're gonna enter the lottery

00:28:29   for the developer lottery? I really would like to attend the sessions. Hmm okay.

00:28:34   Yeah, I know I'm not a developer, but the iOS 9 review that I did last year, I spent

00:28:40   hours going through the session videos.

00:28:42   But you can still go through the videos.

00:28:44   You'll still watch the videos.

00:28:45   Yeah, but talking to people in person, it's another, you know, it's different.

00:28:50   Well I will speak for myself and Steven then, not in that room.

00:28:54   I'm still thinking about it, because, you know, I feel like it would be a real benefit

00:28:59   to be able to know what's going to change

00:29:04   at a technical level.

00:29:06   Because a lot of people have told me,

00:29:08   next year we would like to see even more

00:29:10   from your iOS review.

00:29:12   We wouldn't mind having something

00:29:13   a little more technical in places.

00:29:15   And so I've been thinking about it.

00:29:17   I've been listening to the readers.

00:29:18   They told me, there were a few technical sections

00:29:22   in my iOS 9 review.

00:29:23   And I thought about cutting those last year.

00:29:27   And I actually left them in.

00:29:29   and people really responded well to those sections.

00:29:32   For example, I took a look at the code for the,

00:29:36   for example, the API for the shortcut bar

00:29:38   in the iPad keyboard or San Francisco,

00:29:41   and I eventually left them in those more technical sections

00:29:45   and people told me, you know, we wouldn't mind

00:29:47   if you went a little more crazy with the technical aspects

00:29:52   because we found them interesting.

00:29:54   So I'm thinking about it for this year.

00:29:56   I wouldn't mind having access to, you know,

00:29:58   to a proper way of taking notes and talking to people.

00:30:01   I'm still considering, so I don't know.

00:30:03   I don't know.

00:30:05   - Well, I mean, I guess that's why John Siracusi

00:30:07   used to go as well, right?

00:30:08   - Right.

00:30:09   - Yeah, yeah.

00:30:11   You guys told me a while ago that, you know,

00:30:13   John went to the sessions for the same reason.

00:30:15   And I mean, those are big shoes to fill,

00:30:17   but John has been an inspiration for me,

00:30:20   the way that he approached the technical review,

00:30:22   the pros aspect and the technical aspect.

00:30:24   And I would like to do,

00:30:26   I would like to do something similar in the future.

00:30:28   I feel like I've started doing that with iOS 8

00:30:31   and eventually iOS 9.

00:30:32   And I would love to do something even deeper this year.

00:30:36   I don't know.

00:30:37   Again, still thinking about it.

00:30:39   - Well, it seems like more of a reason.

00:30:41   There is no reason for me to do it.

00:30:42   Like I would just be taking somebody's ticket

00:30:45   and wasting it if I was to go.

00:30:47   'Cause I wouldn't understand anything that was being said.

00:30:50   And I wouldn't be able to do anything afterwards.

00:30:52   - That's kind of how I feel.

00:30:54   but I, you know, in my Western reviews,

00:30:56   I go watch the videos that are appropriate

00:31:00   for what I need to do.

00:31:02   I have this ritual every year that on the flight home,

00:31:04   I watch the State of the Union.

00:31:06   If you're a developer, it's sort of the keynote

00:31:10   behind the keynote a little bit.

00:31:12   It's usually two hours long,

00:31:13   but it gets into more technical things.

00:31:15   Last year, they said, "New system font, San Francisco,"

00:31:18   and in the State of the Union,

00:31:19   there's a 15-minute thing about how it works,

00:31:21   and then you go even deeper,

00:31:22   and there was a whole two sessions about how it works.

00:31:26   So it's sort of the intermediate information.

00:31:29   It's always a good watch.

00:31:30   - Yeah, the primary problem in my mind

00:31:34   is that I kind of feel terrible for,

00:31:37   if I do get a ticket,

00:31:39   there's going to be another developer

00:31:40   who doesn't get a ticket.

00:31:41   And I'm not a developer and I feel bad about it.

00:31:46   But I also kind of think about those people who emailed me

00:31:49   after my iOS review and how useful they found it.

00:31:52   And I feel like maybe if I could be there,

00:31:57   I could save the time.

00:31:59   I mean, last year I spent two weeks just watching

00:32:02   the videos at home and talking to developers over email.

00:32:05   And to be able to take notes during the event

00:32:08   and to talk to people there would save me a lot of time

00:32:10   and would allow me to do an even better, more in-depth kind

00:32:14   of review in September or October, whenever.

00:32:17   So I feel terrible, but maybe it's for the readers

00:32:21   and for the technical knowledge, maybe it's worth it.

00:32:23   I don't know.

00:32:24   - And they are going, as underscore points

00:32:26   on the chat room, they are gonna live stream

00:32:28   the sessions this year.

00:32:29   But I totally get what you're saying about

00:32:31   the ability to go and talk to people.

00:32:33   I mean, that is the, really what you're paying for with this

00:32:38   because I mean, for a long, for years and years now,

00:32:40   you could have seen session videos,

00:32:42   they've gotten better at getting them up quicker.

00:32:44   But it's really the labs and just the communicating

00:32:47   gets to do, not only with the developers,

00:32:49   with Apple as well. Apple engineers are there. That's something that is unique to WBCC. So

00:32:55   I understand where you're coming from and I guess we can add that to follow up for next

00:32:59   week and see if you did it or not.

00:33:01   Yeah, see what happens.

00:33:02   Alright, should we take a break?

00:33:05   Yeah.

00:33:06   This week's episode is also brought to you by Memories. We spoke about this last week,

00:33:11   right? We all remember that Everpix flashback feature that we loved so much. We spent so

00:33:14   much time talking about that back in the day of our photo management ongoing segment. This

00:33:20   was something that many other services have tried to do as well, but when you're putting

00:33:25   these photos up into these cloud services, you're never sure if they're around. But I

00:33:29   think one that we can kind of think is going to be around for a long time is Apple's solution,

00:33:33   iCloud Photo Library, because it's not pivotal to Apple's business, it's just a part of their

00:33:38   overall features. So an app like Memories that allows you to take advantage of your

00:33:43   I have

00:34:03   to tell you how many memories you have that day.

00:34:05   And you can quickly see them in the Love Today

00:34:07   view widget as well if you just need that quick fix

00:34:09   of a stroll down memory lane.

00:34:11   You could also very easily use the date picker

00:34:14   to go and select a date that's specific

00:34:15   if you want to go and find something

00:34:17   from a date in the past, which is really cool.

00:34:19   So maybe, you know, WWDC's coming up,

00:34:20   you want to look at your photos from previous WWDCs,

00:34:23   you can do that too.

00:34:24   Memories makes it easy to then share these photos

00:34:26   and if you come across something that you'd rather forget,

00:34:29   it's easy to remove them as well.

00:34:30   Check it out right now and learn more

00:34:32   at memories.land/connected.

00:34:35   That's memories.land, L-A-N-D, slash connected.

00:34:39   So just before the show today,

00:34:44   Apple threw us some more news, which is nice of them.

00:34:47   - Yeah, they know we were recording,

00:34:49   so they checked it out.

00:34:52   - That's why Tim had to rush his tweet.

00:34:53   - Oh God.

00:34:55   So let's do the news first,

00:34:56   and then we'll make fun of Tim Cook.

00:34:57   The 12 inch MacBook, USB-C, single port,

00:35:02   Chrome and Keyboard laptop got updated today.

00:35:06   I think the high point from the technical end

00:35:08   is that it's got Skylake Intel Core M processors.

00:35:12   Now the clock speed is basically the same.

00:35:15   These max out at 1.3 gigahertz.

00:35:18   But the Skylake chip is seemingly

00:35:22   a lot more power efficient than the previous Core M.

00:35:27   And so this thing is supposed to get,

00:35:28   what they say, up to 10 hours of battery life,

00:35:30   so all day battery life like the MacBook Air.

00:35:33   It also has new Intel HD graphics,

00:35:35   which should also be faster and easier on the battery.

00:35:39   And they updated the SSD speed.

00:35:42   So basically this whole machine should be quicker.

00:35:44   It's quicker on the processor front,

00:35:45   it's quicker on the GPU front,

00:35:47   and it's quicker on the SSD front.

00:35:48   And I've got one of these machines in my household,

00:35:52   now the previous one.

00:35:56   And for everyday use, I mean, it's not, in my opinion,

00:36:00   it's not unusable, but it's definitely slower than

00:36:05   the MacBook Air, especially when you're doing really

00:36:08   performant heavy tasks.

00:36:10   So like, when I installed OS X El Capitan on it,

00:36:14   it was unbelievably slow.

00:36:15   It took ages.

00:36:17   And of course, that is not only a disk intensive,

00:36:20   but also obviously processor intensive.

00:36:22   And so I'm curious to see how much faster this will be.

00:36:27   It's hard to tell by just kind of the reading of this

00:36:30   because the Core M, I'm not super familiar with it

00:36:33   and of course it's only used in this product by Apple.

00:36:35   But the rest of the machine is the same.

00:36:39   It's still a single USB-C port.

00:36:42   The people who wanted a second one

00:36:44   aren't getting it apparently.

00:36:46   It's still the 480p FaceTime camera.

00:36:49   It still includes a headphone jack

00:36:51   and it still does not have Thunderbolt.

00:36:55   And my understanding of this is that

00:36:57   that is a side effect of using the Core M.

00:37:00   That the Intel Core M does not support Thunderbolt

00:37:04   the way that the full-size processors do.

00:37:08   And so this thing is still just USB-C,

00:37:11   whereas when they eventually update the MacBook Pro,

00:37:13   if they ever do it, Apple, take my money.

00:37:16   That those USB-C ports will be compatible

00:37:19   with Thunderbolt 3, but that is not true on this machine.

00:37:21   So all in all, I think from a tech perspective,

00:37:25   it is an update to the machine that we had.

00:37:26   It is not a new machine.

00:37:28   This is not a radically different take on the MacBook.

00:37:33   This is just what we've had improved.

00:37:36   And you know, it's still not for me.

00:37:39   I think for people who the MacBook was for yesterday,

00:37:42   it is still the machine for them today.

00:37:44   I don't think this is going to bring a bunch of people

00:37:47   who have been on the fence about this computer

00:37:50   into the fold. I still think the limitations that were there yesterday

00:37:52   are there today. But I am glad to see Apple moving the ball forward with the

00:37:58   with the performance and the battery life. Rounding out the tech stuff, the

00:38:03   MacBook Air still around. It survived today's updates. Both the 11.6 and 13

00:38:08   inch are still around. Same price points. The only difference being the 13 inch

00:38:11   now comes with 8 gigs of RAM across the board. Before you could go to 4 gigabytes

00:38:16   of RAM on the entry model you had to upgrade to 8. That's still true on the 11

00:38:19   but the 13 is all eight gigs,

00:38:22   just like the MacBook Pros are all 16 gig.

00:38:25   That's a welcome improvement,

00:38:26   but the MacBook Air still wanders on.

00:38:29   I kind of view the MacBook Air as like,

00:38:33   you're watching a movie and you know the character's dead,

00:38:35   you know that they're going to die,

00:38:36   but the character doesn't know it yet.

00:38:38   It's kind of how the MacBook Air feels to me.

00:38:40   - Aw.

00:38:40   - But it's still here and still around.

00:38:42   It is sad, I like the MacBook Air,

00:38:44   and I understand, like some people on Twitter

00:38:46   were talking earlier, the MacBook Air still has a place,

00:38:49   right or Apple want to be selling it. It's a price point they can't hit with

00:38:52   the MacBook. It is a much more all-around notebook where you got Thunderbolt and a

00:39:00   couple USB ports, better battery life, and I truly believe this is the machine the

00:39:05   13-inch Air is what is being sold in the enterprise as far as Macs and education.

00:39:10   I mean this is a very well-rounded computer in a lot of ways it's the most

00:39:13   well-rounded computer Apple makes and until the MacBook can close that gap or

00:39:18   or the MacBook Pro gets updated

00:39:19   and comes down in size and weight.

00:39:21   I think the Air's place is safe for now,

00:39:24   but I do think its days are probably numbered.

00:39:26   - I didn't think that it would exist past WWDC.

00:39:30   You know, honestly, I thought that the air was over,

00:39:32   that the MacBook would be taking over.

00:39:34   But that's clearly not the case, right?

00:39:36   Because they wouldn't update it now

00:39:38   if they're gonna kill it in two months time.

00:39:41   - Yeah, yeah, I kind of feel the same way.

00:39:43   And I think the update says something.

00:39:46   You know, we've seen this in the past where Apple kind of does the update but not really

00:39:50   an update and then it sits.

00:39:52   So it may be that the MacBook Air is sliding into Mac Mini territory where for a long time

00:39:57   the Mac Mini just sat and got very minor updates very infrequently and just sort of held the

00:40:06   line.

00:40:07   And you know, I think I would feel differently if the MacBook Air got Skylake today.

00:40:13   It may be that once they update the MacBook Pro with Skylake, that the MacBook Air comes

00:40:19   along for the ride.

00:40:21   The chips used in the Air and the Pro are much more similar than those in the Air and

00:40:25   the MacBook.

00:40:26   So, I don't know, maybe there's another shoe to drop here, but my sense is that the MacBook

00:40:33   Air is on its way to pasture.

00:40:37   So the new MacBook, what has been updated with the Intel Core M and stuff, where does

00:40:44   this put it?

00:40:45   Can you kind of give me an idea as to what this thing could potentially be like now?

00:40:50   Because I know it's been sluggish, right?

00:40:53   Yeah, I mean, like I said, I'm not super familiar with this line.

00:40:57   My guess is that it's going to feel more like the MacBook Air of maybe just a couple of

00:41:04   years ago.

00:41:05   equate the old MacBook to like a 2010-2011 MacBook Air.

00:41:10   That's about where it benchmarks.

00:41:11   And so maybe this will move it into like 2012-2013

00:41:14   MacBook Air sort of placement.

00:41:17   I mean my guess is that it's gonna feel a lot better

00:41:19   in day-to-day use, but I really, it's hard to tell.

00:41:24   I mean this is sort of just a, at least for me,

00:41:27   a little bit of an unknown processor,

00:41:28   but I would hope that it's a big jump.

00:41:31   I don't think it's gonna be like the first-gen MacBook Air

00:41:34   Garrett of the second, you know, where they redesigned it.

00:41:36   I don't think it's going to be that,

00:41:37   but I do think that it will probably be noticeable

00:41:39   for most people.

00:41:40   - Okay, and I mean, additional hour of battery life

00:41:46   is good, right?

00:41:47   Always nice to have more battery life,

00:41:50   but what's it missing?

00:41:51   - I mean, I think Thunderbolt is a big deal

00:41:56   for people like us.

00:41:57   I don't think normal people,

00:42:00   like my wife has never complained

00:42:01   and a Thunderbolt in our laptop, right?

00:42:04   I do think the most limiting thing about the MacBook

00:42:09   is still the single port,

00:42:11   and clearly that's a line that Apple's gonna hold, right?

00:42:13   If they're going to do it, now would be the time to do it.

00:42:16   And I think that's really just a matter

00:42:21   of getting used to it, you know,

00:42:22   of buying the adapters if you need them,

00:42:25   buying a USB-C to Lightning cable,

00:42:27   like we spoke about a couple weeks ago.

00:42:30   And for me, when I look at the MacBook,

00:42:33   that's really the reason I don't really consider it.

00:42:37   I don't love the keyboard, but I could get used to it.

00:42:40   I love the screen on it.

00:42:41   I mean, I love using my wife's computer.

00:42:42   The screen is unbelievable.

00:42:44   But for me, it's that I still have to plug a lot of stuff

00:42:47   into my computers.

00:42:48   And the single USB-C port wouldn't really cut it for me.

00:42:52   And so, I don't know.

00:42:53   It's a machine with a bunch of interesting compromises.

00:42:55   And I think, depending on what's important to you,

00:42:57   There are different reasons why it may or may not work.

00:43:01   - So what did Tim do?

00:43:02   - So Tim tweeted as he does,

00:43:05   and his first tweet he mistyped the MacBook URL.

00:43:10   I don't know why he didn't copy and paste it.

00:43:13   And it 404'd, and that's sad.

00:43:15   He tweeted again, and now the store page 404's,

00:43:19   not because of his tweet,

00:43:20   but the Apple website is broken at this moment

00:43:23   at 10 a.m. on the 19th.

00:43:25   I'm sure it'll be fixed by the time you hear this.

00:43:27   You know, Apple used to put the sticky note up and say,

00:43:30   "The store will be back."

00:43:32   And they've gotten rid of that,

00:43:33   and maybe they didn't need to get rid of it,

00:43:34   'cause obviously they're struggling today to get it right.

00:43:37   It's just sort of a little bit of a ham-fisted launch.

00:43:40   But I'm sure it will all be sorted out in due time,

00:43:43   hopefully.

00:43:44   - And, I mean, Federico, you tweeted about this,

00:43:51   and you said that you would get one of these, maybe.

00:43:54   Maybe. My main problem, the only reason why I'm talking to you on a MacBook right now,

00:44:00   is that I cannot record podcasts on an iPad. So if the situation doesn't improve this year

00:44:07   with iOS 10, I really feel like my MacBook Air is dying and we've been observing its

00:44:15   slow, painful death for a few months now, and it's only getting worse. The keyboard

00:44:21   it's basically going to die within a couple of months, I think. So if at WWDC I don't

00:44:28   see any audio API announcements, I feel like I should buy one of these MacBooks. If only

00:44:35   because it means I will need a Mac until next year, and that means that this MacBook Air

00:44:43   is not gonna make it, and I might as well just buy a MacBook with these new processors

00:44:47   and with more battery life right now, rather than ending up one day with a dead MacBook

00:44:54   Air and I have to text you guys and say I cannot do the show today.

00:44:59   So I'll see what happens at WWDC.

00:45:01   If there's no solution for podcasting on iOS the way that I like it, I know that there's

00:45:08   workarounds etc.

00:45:10   But if there's no changes, I'm gonna get one of these MacBooks.

00:45:14   Because I have to.

00:45:15   No, because I want to.

00:45:16   Because I have to.

00:45:17   I think for someone like you who's not using a Mac for very much anymore,

00:45:24   I mean it's a great machine and when you do need to travel with it obviously it's

00:45:28   like the thinnest and lightest thing you can get. I think it makes sense to me.

00:45:32   You know you can get the adapter and plug in your interface and plug in power

00:45:35   and you'll be all set. Yeah and I already got the power with the 29

00:45:40   watt adapter. Yeah buddy. It's basically an iPad.

00:45:46   I said like I'm interested in trying to get something thinner and lighter for when I travel.

00:45:53   I'm gonna wait though and see what the MacBook Pros look like before I consider this at all,

00:45:59   you know. But even then I'm not set on whether I would do it. But it's just because I use

00:46:04   it so infrequently that it annoys me that it's so much heavier and thicker than my Mac.

00:46:09   My Mac is so much thicker and heavier than my iPad and I have to put them both in my

00:46:12   bag if I want to edit in Logic. But I want to see what the MacBook Pros look like before

00:46:17   I consider anything because if you can still get something really powerful and it's thinner

00:46:21   and lighter than what the current one is, which you'd assume, then that's going to be

00:46:24   an upgrade for me no matter what.

00:46:26   Yeah, I think that's a fair way of looking at it from your perspective. I would think

00:46:31   if you're on the fence, at least wait until the Pro eventually is announced.

00:46:36   So we'll see. Did we want to touch on this strange story that came out from Bloomberg?

00:46:47   Yeah, sure.

00:46:48   Federico, could you sum this up? What's going on here?

00:46:52   Last week Bloomberg posted this story on a team of people within Apple, I think a hundred people maybe,

00:47:01   Not clear if it's people from the iAd team or some kind of mixed team with old members and new members.

00:47:09   Anyway, there's a team within Apple exploring the idea of having paid search results on the App Store.

00:47:16   So, there's no details of how it would work, but the basic idea is developers will have a way to buy spots in search results,

00:47:27   Similarly to how they can buy results on Google search.

00:47:31   I assume, this is totally my assumption,

00:47:35   you can define an amount of money that you can pay

00:47:39   and then your app will show up for some

00:47:43   keyword results or relevancy, we don't know.

00:47:47   This report from Bloomberg, basically the people

00:47:51   who observe Apple and the App Store went crazy on

00:47:55   tech blogs and Twitter. And the main cause of concern here is that the App Store search

00:48:03   is in need of so many improvements and none of those is a new paid advertisement business model.

00:48:10   And I think John Gruber summed it up quite nicely. App Store search needs to work better. It doesn't

00:48:17   need paid search results. And it's so odd to me, this story, this possible idea. The

00:48:27   story I would be curious to know how it came about. Because my feeling is, someone within

00:48:34   Apple got a hold of this idea, they really didn't like it, and they licked it to a publication.

00:48:42   So they went to Bloomberg, and they were like, "You know what's going on within Apple? It's

00:48:46   this thing, because they knew that people would react badly to this rumor. But I also wonder,

00:48:53   like, is this really something Apple is considering? Because it's so un-Apple. It sounds so not like

00:49:01   Apple to me. We know how iAd kind of failed for many developers. We know that Apple is not an

00:49:12   an ad company, Apple is not Google in that regard, and the App Store needs so many technical

00:49:18   improvements. We're not talking here about conceptual ideas or principles, we're talking

00:49:25   about technical problems that Apple needs to fix, especially with App Store search.

00:49:33   And to have this kind of non-feature paid search results, which only benefits Apple

00:49:41   generate revenue of advertisements in search on the App Store, it's really

00:49:46   strange. It sounds really, really not Apple-like to me. I can see the path to

00:49:54   how it could have occurred, right? Like the idea of the iAd team was disbanded

00:50:00   to do this because there's a kind of an overlap and then you can see the path of

00:50:05   like someone who thinks that this is wrong would then would then kind of try

00:50:11   and leak it to try and get it kiboshed or whatever.

00:50:14   - Yeah, or internals advertise.

00:50:16   - Yeah, and I can't wrap my head around

00:50:22   what I think about this, 'cause it seems like,

00:50:24   it seemed like a way to kind of put a band-aid

00:50:30   over a bigger problem, right?

00:50:32   Like they're just kind of like,

00:50:34   well, we know it sucks, the search sucks,

00:50:36   but there's kind of nothing they think we can,

00:50:38   like, you know, there's nothing we can do about it,

00:50:39   are we going to do about it? So they're kind of just like, well, we could have people pay,

00:50:44   like, you know, and I feel, I don't know, I feel like it's, I can see how they might have got

00:50:50   there. I think it's a terrible idea. But I can, you know, I can kind of like see how you end up

00:50:56   in this, in this thinking. I don't know. I mean, I can see how someone from the IAT team, it's

00:51:07   really upset that they're no longer doing iAds. And now they're like "what should we do next? Let's

00:51:12   do App Store paid search results." Like I can imagine how that team must feel like. And it's not fun,

00:51:19   you know, to have your team disbanded and not work on anything. So I can relate to that feeling of

00:51:24   finding what's next. But from an outsider point of view, from a user's point of view really,

00:51:30   I feel like it's a terrible idea. I mean, if AppSource Search were amazing,

00:51:35   if it worked correctly every time, if there were no issues with caching or with apps that don't show

00:51:43   up or with results that are not relevant, if AppSource Search was incredible, I could see

00:51:48   Apple saying "well, maybe we should monetize that in some way". But the fact is that AppSource

00:51:55   search is really possibly the worst, one of the worst aspects, probably top five worst aspects of

00:52:01   the App Store. So having that now be sort of cluttered with ads and with paid results,

00:52:11   I feel like it's really not a good time. Fix whatever is wrong with App Store search before,

00:52:18   then maybe we can talk about monetizing App Store search. Because right now, I mean, it's already

00:52:24   bad and I feel like people would feel even worse about it if it were, you know, clattered

00:52:29   with search results nobody's asking for.

00:52:34   What if this comes along with bigger changes? Like what if this is part of like a massive

00:52:42   overhaul and could it make sense there, right? Like let's say they really kind of make huge

00:52:48   changes. Would it then work?

00:52:53   I mean, we're talking here about a lot of changes, especially when a developer releases

00:52:59   a new app and you cannot find that app in the App Store. That's a big problem. And the

00:53:05   fact that you cannot filter results by relevancy or release date, there's all kinds of improvements

00:53:13   that you can make to the App Store and to App Store Search. But let's play devil's advocate

00:53:20   here and let's say that Apple is working on a major change to the App Store and a major

00:53:25   new look for App Store search. Would it be beneficial to allow developers to have paid

00:53:31   search results? I could argue that maybe if Apple were really strict about it, there could

00:53:37   be some kind of more analytics that they could offer to developers to monitor the performance

00:53:44   of search, how their apps are discovered, there could be maybe an improvement to App

00:53:48   analytics. But maybe there could also be some kind of, I don't know how to describe it,

00:53:54   but maybe some kind of way to make sure that scammers or spammy developers don't show up

00:54:04   with their paid search results for apps that are really not relevant and for search queries

00:54:10   that are really not relevant to their product. And it could maybe even be beneficial to small

00:54:15   to medium teams and indie developers to spend a little amount of money and to have their,

00:54:22   you know, indie app show up in search results maybe next to the big time folks. For example,

00:54:30   I can imagine, I don't know, you Google -- you search on the app store for word processor

00:54:36   and instead of having the top search results for only four pages and word and some other

00:54:41   scammy developer, you also have a very fine, very indie-crafted word processor from an

00:54:48   indie developer who spent a couple of hundred dollars on App Store paid search results.

00:54:53   That could be the upside in an optimistic scenario, I guess.

00:54:58   The problem is, first I don't really have a lot of trust in Apple's IAD performance,

00:55:07   I want to say, you know, I really... I still struggle to see AIAD as a real

00:55:15   Apple feature, real Apple product. Always felt kind of wrong to me. But let's say

00:55:21   that it's perfect and that's where the conceptual part of me comes into play.

00:55:27   I really don't feel... I don't feel good about it. I guess I'm always...

00:55:36   In my idealistic scenario, I see the App Store as a playing field open to everyone and to

00:55:44   allow the highest bidder to show up in paid search results to the detriment of an indie

00:55:51   developer.

00:55:52   It doesn't sound nice to me, but maybe there's a good way to go about it.

00:55:57   Maybe there's a right way to implement this.

00:55:59   I don't know.

00:56:00   Because what I'm just wondering is, if you assume there is a world in which they fix

00:56:04   every single problem that exists in the App Store, is this an okay thing to do? That's

00:56:11   what I'm trying to wrap my head around. Because I think the argument that everybody's post-pasting

00:56:16   right now is just like, you shouldn't do this when you've still got tons of bugs and weird

00:56:20   features of the App Store. But is that the reason? I don't think that's the reason. I

00:56:24   think it just feels weird to have people pay. Because you mentioned like, oh, an indie app

00:56:31   paid an amount of money. If you're in a big category you won't be able to afford

00:56:35   it because if it works anything like the way that Google would work it's bidding.

00:56:39   And you know if you're making a word processor you're never going to outbid

00:56:45   Microsoft. Yeah I mean that's the inherent problem with Google

00:56:52   AdWords and for me it's what offsets that is that with AdWords those results

00:57:00   are placed next to organic search. And that would be fine if the organic search in the

00:57:07   app store worked, but it just is terrible. So I agree with you guys.

00:57:12   So that's what I'm thinking, right? Because if it works, if everything's fine, I mean

00:57:16   I care about it as much as I care about paid ads in Google, which is not that much.

00:57:20   Yeah, I mean it's got to be part of a bigger scheme, right? It can't be this is the only

00:57:25   going on or it just doesn't work. But there's the part of me too that just

00:57:32   wonders like could Apple pull this off like this is really new territory for

00:57:36   them and unless they're bringing people on from someplace like Google they're

00:57:42   not gonna you know have the the knowledge base that Google has acquired

00:57:45   over the years of how this works how it can be scammed different ways people try

00:57:49   to cut corners and so I think if they do it they've got to do it really well and

00:57:54   and it's got to be part of a bigger change.

00:57:56   But I think if those things are true,

00:57:59   then this article is just a part of the story, like you said.

00:58:03   -Yeah, and I mean, there's all kinds of possibilities

00:58:05   that Apple could explore.

00:58:06   For example, they could use their own algorithm

00:58:12   to monitor what people search for,

00:58:14   and if they discover that you search

00:58:16   for a particular product,

00:58:17   they could use the system to recommend an app to you

00:58:20   that's been also paid for.

00:58:22   And I mean, if it keeps Google afloat, the search business,

00:58:26   the paid search business and the ads,

00:58:28   there's obviously money to be made from paid search results

00:58:33   done somewhat right.

00:58:36   And the key aspect seems to be that those results would

00:58:39   have to be clearly indicated that they're paid search

00:58:42   results, they're not traditional search results.

00:58:45   And they would have to be accurate.

00:58:47   I mean, if I search on the App Store for, let's say,

00:58:51   markdown. I don't want to end up with a paid result from some flappy bird clone that paid

00:58:57   money to have a markdown tag in their search keywords, you know? So they would have to

00:59:04   be done right and maybe, if I were to be positive about it, I could see, you know, having developers

00:59:12   pay a certain fee and have their apps magically show up for people even when people were not

00:59:20   Exactly looking for them, right? I don't know. I don't know. Yeah, I don't know

00:59:25   I mean it I guess part of me is excited that at least this is in the news that

00:59:29   Something is going on that people are paying attention

00:59:31   You know

00:59:34   Schiller hasn't been over this very long

00:59:35   So part of me thinks like it are were these changes underway or see just really hit the ground running with the stuff since

00:59:41   There's been what like two months and say now it's that change

00:59:43   But either way I think that someone is paying attention to the

00:59:50   App Store, it's good, right? Like it just has sat for so long without any changes.

00:59:55   And for now at least I'll give them the benefit of the doubt that under this new

01:00:00   leadership they could maybe make some improvements. But I agree with you

01:00:04   guys, there's lots of potential traps here they could fall into.

01:00:10   It would be really interesting if Apple were to decide to do this but with some

01:00:14   caveats, such as for example you can only pay for showing up

01:00:19   in search only if your app has been updated for the latest version of iOS and for the

01:00:24   latest devices. So in a way that maybe a developer that made a crappy app two years ago isn't

01:00:30   able to just put in their credit card into the Apple webpage and say "I want to pay for

01:00:35   this terrible app to show up." There will be, I imagine, some kind of rules that you

01:00:40   have to follow, and having technical rules such as you have to support iOS 10 or you

01:00:45   have to support all of the latest Retina devices, that would be interesting.

01:00:52   Yeah, I think it's... the whole thing is just interesting to think about because for so

01:00:56   long at least I felt that the App Store is kind of like a fixed thing, like it is what

01:01:02   it is and it's been that way for a long time. And that's... you know, maybe that's changing.

01:01:09   Do you think the 30% will ever change? I know infinite timescale blah blah blah blah.

01:01:17   Should it change? That's the question, maybe.

01:01:20   I guess it depends, right? Like, if Apple start to do more, like if they start to make

01:01:25   things better then it probably shouldn't change. Because you're paying it and you hate it.

01:01:31   You hate, so many developers hate so much about the App Store. If they fix a bunch of

01:01:35   those things. It makes the 30% easier to stomach, right? Because you're already paying it anyway.

01:01:41   If they give you more and it gets better, then it makes it worth paying it.

01:01:45   I guess the problem here would be, let's say that Apple cuts the fee to 15%. Maybe there

01:01:52   would be a huge difference for an indie developer, to go from 30% to 15%. But would Apple prefer

01:02:01   to be more helpful for those indie developers than to lose 15% of fees from Clash of Clans

01:02:11   and the Kardashian games? Which kind of option would they prefer? The money from the big-time

01:02:20   developers who bring in all the billions every year or sort of changing the livelihood of

01:02:28   smaller studios and developers. I don't know.

01:02:34   There have got to be some changes, right? There's going to be something. I'm interested

01:02:39   to see if this is something that sneaks in, and if it does, I wonder what is the whole

01:02:45   story around it. That's what interests me. Because I can see this occurring at some point

01:02:52   in the future and I just wonder how they would go about pitching that.

01:02:59   Well the good news is Myke, they have a developer event in two months and there's going to be

01:03:03   a whole audience to pitch this to.

01:03:06   That's the stage.

01:03:08   I mean, imagine if they announced this feature and all the developers started yelling bad

01:03:15   words at the stage.

01:03:17   That would be interesting.

01:03:20   So I think that brings it to the end of this episode, right?

01:03:22   Yeah.

01:03:23   I think so.

01:03:24   We've pretty much sold out of the San Francisco tickets.

01:03:28   Like they're nearly all gone.

01:03:30   So thank you to everyone that bought them during the show.

01:03:32   I wanted to have a post on Mac Stories after the show.

01:03:36   You can still post about it, but I don't know if there will be any tickets left.

01:03:40   I mean if there are no tickets, people are going to be upset at me.

01:03:42   They're a handful left.

01:03:43   You just got to do it quick.

01:03:44   Okay.

01:03:45   Yeah, I don't have the time because I got to talk to you guys.

01:03:49   So well, thank you people for buying the tickets.

01:03:52   I'm really sorry for everybody that missed it.

01:03:56   You should, by the way, members found out about this the evening before, so that's why

01:04:02   you should be a member of Real AFM.

01:04:03   We let members know about this stuff first, so if you were a member, you would have known.

01:04:08   Is it true, Myke, that only members can touch your beard at the show?

01:04:15   We can try and make that happen.

01:04:16   about a beard touching coupon to members. And there is, I should clarify, there is a

01:04:25   waitlist on the event so if it is sold out when you go to it you can

01:04:29   opt-in to the waitlist and I'm sure things will shuffle around, people

01:04:33   finalizing travel plans and so maybe you'll get in. So I would definitely

01:04:36   encourage you to hit that waitlist button if that's what you are presented

01:04:40   with on the Eventbrite page. Yeah you can never know what might happen so put

01:04:45   your name in there and hopefully we'll be able to get some more tickets out. We'll see.

01:04:52   Alright thanks so much for listening to this weeks episode. You can find out show notes

01:04:54   at relay.fm/connected/87. If you want to find us online there's a few places you can

01:05:00   do that. You can go to maxstories.net which you should be going to this week. Federico

01:05:03   has got some great stuff planned. You can also follow Federico on twitter. He is @vittici

01:05:08   Stephen writes at 512pixels.net and he is @ismh on Twitter and I am @imyke

01:05:18   Thanks again to Memories and ARK for sponsoring this week's episode.

01:05:22   Thank you for listening and we'll be back next time.

01:05:24   Until then, say goodbye guys.

01:05:26   Adios derti.

01:05:27   Adios.

01:05:27   Adios.

01:05:29   [ Silence ]