156: Average Content

0:00:00Alright, we did it! Between last episode and this episode, we watched Lord of the Rings!

0:00:06Return of the King for our bonus member special episode that you can go sign up and listen to

0:00:13to discover if Mike liked the ending of The Lord of the Rings, right? Who knows?

0:00:19Who knows what his experience might be, but we did get him all the way through until the very end.

0:00:26All 9, 10, who knows? Many, many hours of it.

0:00:31I think it's closer to 12.

0:00:33It might be closer to 12, you're right. Plus also all the behind the scenes content.

0:00:3860 hours of Lord of the Rings content, which I was definitely very, very happy to rewatch.

0:00:46It's super interesting and I'm really glad that we finally did this for the members episode.

0:00:51Like a thing that we have been talking about for years.

0:00:54So all 3 of these episodes are available now for more Texans.

0:00:58You can go and find out more at getmoretex.com and you'll not only get access to these specials,

0:01:03all our previous specials that we've done, the RPG specials, the Tex Adventure specials,

0:01:08and longer ad-free versions of every episode of Cortex, including an entirely ad-free back catalogue.

0:01:15There's a lot of content there for you and I think this is a perfect time to jump in to go and get

0:01:20our 3 part membership special. I thought about saying something, but I will say nothing about what I thought

0:01:26of Return of the King and I really think people should go and check it out for themselves.

0:01:30I'm really happy with how those episodes came together and I'm really pleased we decided to do it.

0:01:34Yeah, I feel like we had a really, really interesting conversation.

0:01:38Again, for me especially, you were perhaps the most interesting person to talk to about this

0:01:44as someone who had just never seen them before.

0:01:47But not only that, very little of the cultural osmosis had made its way into you.

0:01:53So yes, throughout this whole thing, I really enjoyed Mike's fresh eyes on the trilogy.

0:01:59Fresh baby eyes.

0:02:00Fresh baby eyes on the Lord of the Rings trilogy.

0:02:04Go listen to us discuss it. Many, many hours of bonus content over at getmoretex.com.

0:02:11Can I enlighten our listeners a little bit to a question you asked me a couple of days ago?

0:02:17Oh no, what are you going to do? Sure, yes, I don't know what you're going to do though.

0:02:20You're on a great occasion right now. I think that's okay to say.

0:02:23That's fair. Yeah, we can disclose that.

0:02:25And you said to me, I'm pretty off the grid right now. I have not seen the WWDC keynote yet.

0:02:31And obviously we'll talk about it on the episode. Do you think it would be far more interesting

0:02:36if I didn't watch it and you tried to explain to me what happened?

0:02:40And I said to you, especially for this one, couldn't be a worse idea.

0:02:45And now I just, I'm assuming you have seen it because you were like, I will go watch it.

0:02:50Do you understand why I said this?

0:02:52Okay, so for the record, Mike, it's not that I thought that it would be a good idea.

0:02:58I just wanted to, since you had seen things, raise the possibility.

0:03:02Because sometimes it's interesting to see when people are surprised by things.

0:03:07Like I vaguely knew the rumors sort of that there was going to be like,

0:03:12some Apple AI stuff was probably what's going to happen this year.

0:03:15I guess what I was thinking was, oh, there's the possibility that what it will be is

0:03:21there's not much except for one big thing to talk about.

0:03:27And so I was kind of thinking like, oh, if it is just one thing,

0:03:31then that might be more interesting to kind of go in blind about.

0:03:34But, oh boy, even putting Apple intelligence aside, like watching it,

0:03:39I was like, I cannot believe that this was the year I proposed this to Mike.

0:03:42Because I even felt like the rest of WWDC, all of the regular stuff, was also very bitty.

0:03:50Some years you feel like there's an overall cohesive theme.

0:03:53And this year for the other operating systems, it was like,

0:03:56we've like just changed a bunch of individual things,

0:03:59but there's not like a clear overarching principle for all of this.

0:04:03So yes, it may have been the worst possible WWDC to have tried to attempt to explain to me what happened,

0:04:10because you would have just had to enumerate 20,000 individual things.

0:04:15So yes, it's a good thing we did not do that.

0:04:18I mean, hearing a lot of people say that like, oh, you know, they had all of the Apple intelligence stuff at the end,

0:04:25and then like squeezed everything else into 45 minutes and there wasn't much there anyway,

0:04:29so it was fun to do that. And I could not disagree more.

0:04:31Yeah, that's not my take.

0:04:32There were two WWDCs, they had two.

0:04:34Like I think in another year, if they would have just shown us all of this stuff,

0:04:39I think that that on its own was enough.

0:04:42Like we may have said, it's on the lighter side, but I have definitely been to WWDCs

0:04:47where they have shown less new features than in the first 45 minutes of this WWDC.

0:04:53Yeah, it could totally have been two different presentations.

0:04:56I mean, I did quite enjoyed, I picked up on how many times they used the word "intelligence" in the first half,

0:05:03and I was like, I see what you're doing, guys.

0:05:05Like I see you setting things up over there.

0:05:07Don't think I haven't noticed the wild uptick in frequency of this particular word,

0:05:13but without a doubt it could have been two separate events.

0:05:15I'm not sure if you picked up on this, because you mentioned about the fact that it's intelligence and machine learning,

0:05:20but everything in the first half that they showed, none of that is powered by Apple intelligence.

0:05:26Yeah, yeah, that makes sense. That was all just like the feature stuff.

0:05:29Which is a good way to do it, because they have a lot of stuff in there that's machine learning based,

0:05:33like Math Notes, which Math Notes might be my absolute 100% favorite thing that they've shown off in all.

0:05:39Math Notes is my maps, I think.

0:05:41Wow, that's unexpected, okay.

0:05:43I am like freaking out about how much I love Math Notes.

0:05:47People are like, "Oh, this is cool," but I'm like, "No, you don't understand. This is going to change everything."

0:05:52I'm like so excited about this feature, and I think it's incredible.

0:05:55Okay, we have to hold that for later, because I just like, I think if you had asked me to rank order everything in WWDC,

0:06:02from like, what do you think Mike is most excited about, to least excited about,

0:06:06clearly Math Notes would have been like at the very, very bottom,

0:06:10like only ahead of like stuff that was just obviously inapplicable to you.

0:06:15I would have ranked the maps hiking trails higher than Math Notes for Mike.

0:06:20So I'm like very clearly wrong about that.

0:06:22But I guess what I was trying to just think of is, I don't remember when they talked about it,

0:06:27but the dividing line was clearly when they mentioned like, "Oh, we've been working on Apple Intents,"

0:06:32the like the behind the scenes stuff that allows apps to talk to each other.

0:06:36And that felt like, "Oh, okay, right, this is everything related to intelligence,

0:06:41this is related to like the Intents framework, and everything that doesn't have the Intents wasn't."

0:06:46But like I said, I don't think there was an overall theme.

0:06:50The only thing that I did feel was very light, and I knew straight away, felt like,

0:06:55"Oh, it's not good news," is when they said like, "First up, Vision OS."

0:06:59And it's like, "Oof."

0:07:00That was the only one I can say I was like, "Ooh, a little disappointed in how light Vision OS is."

0:07:06But all of the other ones, like yeah, there's just a ton of features.

0:07:09I just screenshotted those little slides they put at the end of like the details of all the new stuff

0:07:13just as like an overview, and there's like there's a lot of things.

0:07:16So obviously, whenever we do this every year, which is a tradition of the show, right,

0:07:21that the June episode is some form of WWDC content,

0:07:25we'll either try and talk about all of it chronologically, we'll pick out our favorite features.

0:07:30And we could do that, but really, I think the thing I want to speak to you about the most is Apple Intelligence.

0:07:38Okay, what do you want to talk about?

0:07:40Well, I want to get your sense for it.

0:07:42Like I want to know overall, what do you think of it?

0:07:45Are there any things that interest you?

0:07:47Are there any things that you're angry about or upset about?

0:07:52Ooh, that's intriguing.

0:07:54That raises the question of what the internet could be angry about.

0:07:57I think my like, okay, obviously, we're always talking about Apple on the show

0:08:04because we're using Apple for our whole production lives, and we have like many things that we complain about with Apple,

0:08:12but obviously that is overshadowed by the many things that we like about the platform.

0:08:16It's why we've continued to use it over these years.

0:08:19And Apple as a company sometimes has things about what I feel like must be its internal structure

0:08:28or its internal ways of making decisions that really shine through in external products.

0:08:36That is a thing I like about the company.

0:08:38I feel like the company is opinionated about the way that it wants to do certain things.

0:08:43And obviously, many times that is annoying, but I appreciate their opinionatedness in many things.

0:08:50And watching the Apple intelligence section, I was really impressed by how fast it seems to me like

0:09:00Apple has absorbed a very rapid technology change.

0:09:07Like, no matter how much they said, like, "Oh, we've been working towards this for a long time."

0:09:11It's like, I just refuse to believe that you weren't slightly surprised at the speed of this development

0:09:16like almost everybody else on earth.

0:09:18I feel like very few people really knew how this was coming.

0:09:21I just don't think Apple really structurally did.

0:09:24So I was very impressed by this massive change to functionally all technology has happened in the last 18 months.

0:09:34And they managed to onboard it and think about how to do it in a way that really felt very Apple.

0:09:46Like the decisions that they were making about the privacy structure of it, how they were thinking about it,

0:09:53interacting between the devices, building on top of the intent system for shortcuts,

0:09:58even just like little things about the way the interface worked, the language they were using, I also thought was great.

0:10:06Like I made a note of like, they talked about like personal intelligence at the start

0:10:11and I was like, "Ah, A+ phrasing for whoever made that."

0:10:16So yeah, as always with these things, the real question is how does this work in execution?

0:10:21But from a pure presentation perspective of Apple showing about how they are thinking of having AI be integrated onto their platform,

0:10:33I was hugely impressed by how much they had done and also felt like they have created something that is taking advantage of all of the stuff they've already done before

0:10:46and integrating it and also like the privacy focus is like, "Boy, do I feel like that is paying dividends for Apple over the years of like whatever it was they decided that they really wanted to make this one of the key things."

0:10:59I feel like this is also one of those places where that value is really paying off.

0:11:06So in the context of knowing nothing about how this was received, I was very impressed with it.

0:11:12I'm completely baffled about what people could be angry about.

0:11:16So I'm curious, but how does that take sound compared to your take and how people are receiving it?

0:11:22So I feel the same as you except for one part that I'll get to in a minute.

0:11:28So at least what they have shown at WWDC is impressive that they could have all of these ideas and have some level of execution for them within the last year,

0:11:37which I think really is the maximum amount of time that they would have really thought that this was something that they needed to do.

0:11:44Obviously, our AI tools have been around for longer.

0:11:47You know, Check GPT has been around for, I don't know, nearly two years now.

0:11:50Two whole years. Yes, yes.

0:11:53And I think it's worth remembering the context of last WWDC, we were impressed that Apple said Transformer when they were talking about the new spell checking feature.

0:12:02So the idea that like then that everybody was on mass demanding that they must have AI in their products,

0:12:10I really don't think that that was the case a year ago.

0:12:13We were not saying Apple was doomed.

0:12:15However, if they would have this WWDC not had some AI story, I think there could have been more of an Apple is doomed narrative that played out.

0:12:24Right.

0:12:25And while I don't think that that is accurate, I don't necessarily think it's far off because, you know, we're going to get back to AI in general and in a later episode.

0:12:33But I think, you know, like it or not, it is the future of computing now.

0:12:37So if they would not have had a story this year, I think that that would have been telling in a not great way.

0:12:42And, you know, a lot of these features, they are coming out over the next year.

0:12:47Right. And they're being a little cagey about which is which.

0:12:50But some stuff will be available at some point during the beta.

0:12:54Some stuff will ship in the fall.

0:12:56It will only be in US English, but it can be used anyway.

0:12:59You just have to set your device to US English.

0:13:01And some of these features will roll out over the next year.

0:13:04I don't really know what will be what yet, but there'll be stuff.

0:13:08And I think a lot of what they showed is exactly what I would have wanted them to do.

0:13:12And a lot of the stuff around notifications, especially I'm really excited about.

0:13:16A lot of the stuff they're doing with email, I actually think is fascinating.

0:13:20And there's some good stuff there.

0:13:22The place where I think that they really messed up and I'm quite disappointed with them is the image generation.

0:13:29Oh, yeah. I mean, that part, I just felt like it was lame and I hate it.

0:13:36But I just kind of hate that in general. I feel like that's not their problem.

0:13:41It's lame and I hate it.

0:13:42Right. But this is the thing. I agree with you.

0:13:45And I think in general, I would say that AI imagery, especially in the style that Apple showed,

0:13:52their imagery has become kind of gross.

0:13:54Like the imagery that Apple was displaying on their website and the thing that has become a meme,

0:13:59which is like the woman dressed as a superhero.

0:14:02Oh, yeah, it's terrible. It looks awful.

0:14:04It's like weird, like gross, Memoji slash human style where it's like this a Memoji face,

0:14:11but with like human skin texture. It looks really weird.

0:14:15So the reason that I'm frustrated at them is these tools, these parts of it is overshadowing, I think,

0:14:23the good work that they have done because lots of people, including me, are a little bit too focused on this

0:14:29because I don't like that they did image generation in the first place.

0:14:34And I especially don't like it because they didn't even do it well.

0:14:38And so at that point, I don't understand why bother.

0:14:42And the thing that frustrates me and upsets me about it the most is that you are able to,

0:14:48as baked into the system, create these images of other people.

0:14:51I think that that is a huge misstep from them and one that I'm surprised that they made.

0:14:56That like, just because I have pictures of you, I can create these AI art pictures of you.

0:15:03And I think that that is such a strange thing that I kind of can't believe they will ship.

0:15:11It seems like a very strange feature.

0:15:13It's funny, like again, the timescales of technological change are so fast,

0:15:18but all of their imagery has a very like Dali a year ago look to it.

0:15:25I did find it very strange that they had like picked predefined styles.

0:15:30And yes, that cartoon style, I mean, it's one of the things that I just, I hate.

0:15:36It's like this weird uncanny valley Pixar is the way that it feels to me.

0:15:40It's like I just don't like it.

0:15:42It's like it's someone's art project of like, what if you took a Pixar character,

0:15:46but they were human and had the same proportions, like how would they look?

0:15:50It's kind of what it looks like to me.

0:15:52I don't know if you've ever seen it, but like there was somebody made this thing

0:15:55where they made like a human looking Lego head.

0:15:58Oh yeah, I've seen that. It's horrifying.

0:16:01And this is what this image reminds me of.

0:16:03Yeah, I could see that.

0:16:04The terribly named Jenmoji is as far as they should have gone for me.

0:16:09Like, let me make emoji.

0:16:11Agreed.

0:16:12But like even some of those just didn't even look very good.

0:16:14They didn't even look like Apple's emoji, but it's like, you know, whatever.

0:16:18But I just think stuff like that, it's just I'm not sure what the thinking was behind this.

0:16:24And then as well, the secondary thing, which is making a lot of people in the media industry,

0:16:30which is obviously where a lot of my friends are upset, is that it has come out since like

0:16:36how have Apple built their models?

0:16:39And they have said it and they've published papers about it.

0:16:43They scraped the open web.

0:16:45And they also licensed some content, but they scraped the open web.

0:16:49And they said, by the way, you can now just add this tag to the Apple bot search

0:16:53because Apple's had this thing for years where they scraped the web like Google does

0:16:57for spotlight searches and stuff like that.

0:17:00Right, right.

0:17:01And to help them with Siri results.

0:17:02And so people put this thing on their website because, well, wouldn't you? That's great.

0:17:06But now that same bot has been scraping the open web to build their LLM.

0:17:12And now Apple is saying, oh, if you don't want us to do this, you can just add the secondary tag.

0:17:17It's like, well, a bit late now, though, isn't it?

0:17:20Because you've already done it.

0:17:22Right.

0:17:23Look, maybe the situation is the only way you can build an LLM is to do this.

0:17:27I'm not sure that's the case.

0:17:29But even if we just presume that, maybe that is it and that's why they did it.

0:17:34But I just felt like with stuff like this, with the image generation

0:17:38and with the way in which they took data to build their LLM,

0:17:44I think I was just hoping for better from them.

0:17:47And I think that this is another symptom of them being behind,

0:17:51that they did not get the ability to give themselves enough time

0:17:56to think through the Apple way of doing something.

0:17:59They spent a lot of time when it comes to privacy in doing that.

0:18:02Right.

0:18:03And they have built some incredible looking technology.

0:18:06When it comes to actually the way in which they've built the tools

0:18:09and some of the tools that they've decided to use,

0:18:12I expected from them a little bit more respect for content creators

0:18:16than what I think they've shown.

0:18:18So that's interesting because when I saw the image generation

0:18:22and when I said it looks like an older version,

0:18:25I automatically assumed it was because they just had a much smaller data set,

0:18:31that that would be the problem.

0:18:33It's not that Apple can't get their hands on the compute.

0:18:35It's that they're limited by data.

0:18:37So that is a very interesting piece of information that they scraped the open web.

0:18:41Again, I'm not an expert on this,

0:18:43but my understanding is very strongly that functionally it is impossible

0:18:50to build the LLMs that people want without just,

0:18:54I don't know any other way to say it,

0:18:56stealing the combined work of all of humanity.

0:18:59That's what it is.

0:19:00Yeah, I've been thinking this too,

0:19:02because I've been seeing people say,

0:19:04"Well, couldn't you just do it based on Creative Commons licensed stuff?"

0:19:08And I just think that the data sets probably can't be large enough.

0:19:12Yeah, no, the licensable stuff is going to be incredibly tiny.

0:19:16So the fundamental problem is this technology seems like it can't happen

0:19:22without just taking everything human civilization has made for yourself.

0:19:29It's kind of astounding to me that companies are getting away with this.

0:19:35I find it quite breathtaking when you really think about the scale of it,

0:19:39but of course lots of people disagree and just think,

0:19:42"Oh, well, it's on the web. I could have read it."

0:19:45It's like, "Hmm, sort of."

0:19:47But yeah, it's a different kind of thing.

0:19:49So I've come to a little bit of a rule of thumb on this,

0:19:52because somebody asked me,

0:19:54because obviously I've been talking a lot about this recently,

0:19:56and the film was like, "Well, you are a fan of emulators.

0:20:00Isn't that just stealing too?"

0:20:03And there are a couple of caveats, which is, one,

0:20:05I only emulate games that I do own.

0:20:08I have bought these games,

0:20:10so I feel like I have exchanged with the maker of the game

0:20:14the whole point of doing this thing, which is I gave you money,

0:20:17I have the game.

0:20:18Now, however I play it, I think could be up to me.

0:20:21But the thing is, in this scenario,

0:20:24if we say that somebody steals a Nintendo game to play on their iPhone,

0:20:29that's where it ends, right?

0:20:32With this content, so we'll use Apple,

0:20:35Apple have stolen the contents of the internet,

0:20:38which they will then continue to profit from bigger and bigger and bigger.

0:20:41And the data that they took from, they get none of it.

0:20:45That is starting to become a bit of a rule of thumb for me.

0:20:49And I'm at a very different place to where I was

0:20:51when we first spoke about this stuff.

0:20:53Some of these things, I'm accepting from what they are,

0:20:57this is just where we are and it's happening,

0:20:59and I'm trying to find what I find interesting about all of this technology.

0:21:03But that still seems to be a fundamental part to it,

0:21:07is that what you're saying, it's all based on an element of stealing.

0:21:12And I'm just disappointed.

0:21:14I'm disappointed that Apple did it too.

0:21:16I hoped better for them because of their background

0:21:19and the ways that they speak

0:21:21and that they always try to do these things and dah, dah, dah, dah.

0:21:24But no, here we are, they just did the same thing as everyone else.

0:21:27But they also, their results, not as good.

0:21:30So I don't really know why, at least for the image stuff,

0:21:33why they bothered with it.

0:21:35And that's kind of the thing that I'm getting stuck up on.

0:21:37I think the answer then very clearly

0:21:39is that it's more evidence of them starting late,

0:21:42despite their claims otherwise.

0:21:44Like who knows where ChatGP T5 is currently,

0:21:48but these training runs for these systems can take a year,

0:21:52a year and a half.

0:21:54And so knowing that they have all of the data

0:21:58from all of everything humans have ever done,

0:22:01then the answer is obviously yes.

0:22:03They didn't have enough time for their training run.

0:22:06So they're using some six-month-old version of an LLM

0:22:10and they're not using an 18-month-old version of an LLM

0:22:13trained on the same data.

0:22:14But even if the image stuff looked good,

0:22:17I still don't think they should do it.

0:22:19And just their fundamental ideas

0:22:21for how you will create imagery of other people,

0:22:23I think is just very misguided.

0:22:26I think that that is such a strange thing to do.

0:22:28I don't think any of their competitors are doing this,

0:22:30that like you can say, "My friend Gray,

0:22:34make a picture of him in the rain," or whatever.

0:22:37I'm like, "I can do that and send it to you."

0:22:39And I find that to be a really weird choice.

0:22:42I'm not really sure why they decided to do it.

0:22:44And that's the thing that is kind of getting me down about it.

0:22:48This is the interesting thing about watching something

0:22:50and then just not knowing the reaction or the follow-up.

0:22:52It's like, "Ah, right."

0:22:54The extra details always really matter,

0:22:56or the little implications that just go by very fast

0:22:58that you don't catch.

0:22:59But yes, countdown to how fast can people make

0:23:04borderline inappropriate images of other people

0:23:07with the AI generation stuff.

0:23:09It's like, even if it is family-friendly,

0:23:12you can still have people doing things

0:23:14they will be very unhappy about in your AI-generated imagery.

0:23:17I mean, honestly, I imagine a lot of inappropriate stuff

0:23:21happening by accident.

0:23:22And I have no doubt that they have done a very good job

0:23:25with their guardrails and all of that kind of stuff.

0:23:29And they're talking about that, too.

0:23:31They care about these things.

0:23:32That's why they've limited the ways that you can create

0:23:35these images that, by and large, you're selecting buttons

0:23:38and words rather than typing your own stuff.

0:23:40But there are a lot of things that you can get wrong

0:23:43in somebody's complexion, in their skin tone,

0:23:45and in their facial features that could be very offensive

0:23:48if you don't get them right.

0:23:50You've only got to be a little bit off,

0:23:52and it could be very wrong.

0:23:54And so, you know, I hope they're ready for this.

0:23:57They decided to do this, and so we'll see what happens.

0:24:00- Yeah, I just did not pick up on the fact that it's like,

0:24:03"Oh, of course, they make that image of Mom

0:24:05because this phone has photos of Mom."

0:24:08Like, that has to be where it's coming from.

0:24:10I just didn't really think about it, yeah.

0:24:11- Yeah, they said that anyone in your photo library

0:24:13is someone you can make Genmoji of them,

0:24:16and you can create art of them in Image Playground.

0:24:20They're the two art things.

0:24:22But you know what?

0:24:23I feel like I'm just gonna keep spiraling.

0:24:25- Okay, but backing up to even though my first impression,

0:24:28like, my main feeling of, like,

0:24:30the thing that is strange here to me

0:24:32is there is something that feels like it's from Bizarro world

0:24:37when I hear the presenters say things

0:24:40in the context of generated content of like,

0:24:43"Oh, it's helping you express yourself.

0:24:47This image will help you express yourself."

0:24:50Or, "This rewriting of this email

0:24:53will help you express yourself better."

0:24:55I just find that, like, so odd.

0:24:58It's like, but it really isn't.

0:25:00It's not expressing anything about you.

0:25:03Like, you kind of have nothing to do with this.

0:25:06What it's actually doing is taking your content

0:25:10and making it more like an average sort of content,

0:25:15which is, like, what you would want under many circumstances.

0:25:18You want to write a professional email.

0:25:20Like, by definition, you're trying to pull it closer

0:25:23to, like, the norm of what an email is.

0:25:26But yeah, like, that's the thing that caught on my brain

0:25:28a number of times.

0:25:29It's like, "Oh, we're helping you express yourself

0:25:31by writing this email better."

0:25:33And it's like, "I don't think that's what's happening."

0:25:35Guys?

0:25:36- Well, an expression has been had, right?

0:25:41But it's not yours, right?

0:25:44You're not expressing yourself,

0:25:46but you are expressing in some way, I guess.

0:25:49- Again, language is hard around this

0:25:51because this is literally a kind of technology

0:25:53that has never existed before, which again,

0:25:55I will, like, in brackets say comma

0:25:58because we built a terrifying machine that can think comma.

0:26:01So, like, it's just different.

0:26:03You cannot analogize this to something else.

0:26:07But it is particularly weird.

0:26:10Like, the part I really was like, "Ah, of course,"

0:26:14is in the email section where they're like,

0:26:16"Hey, AI will help you write this email."

0:26:18And then, but like, on the flip side,

0:26:20when you get the email, AI will help summarize the email

0:26:24so that you don't have to, and it's like,

0:26:26"What is happening here?"

0:26:28- Look, basically, even five years,

0:26:31nobody sends email anymore and email apps

0:26:33are just talking to each other all the time.

0:26:35- It's so clear.

0:26:36That's like where we're going very fast.

0:26:39- That's the end state.

0:26:40Like, and look, I'm going through my own email journey.

0:26:43Kind of want that future.

0:26:45Like, if just the email was happening

0:26:47and I wasn't involved, fantastic.

0:26:49But then I've got to wonder at that point,

0:26:52what's the point of it?

0:26:53And like, that's the thing that we haven't worked out.

0:26:56Like, if the email is written by an AI

0:26:58and the email is read by an AI,

0:27:01maybe that just says something different

0:27:03about the way in which we communicate over email,

0:27:06which is that it's too long, right?

0:27:09Like, people say too many words.

0:27:11Like, one of my absolute favorite features

0:27:14that they announced was the, when you get an email,

0:27:18instead of it showing you the first two lines of the email,

0:27:21it shows you a summary of what's inside of that email.

0:27:24That is great technology.

0:27:26Because it made me realize in that moment

0:27:29that that like preview of the first two lines

0:27:32is absolutely pointless.

0:27:34- Yeah, I've had that turned off my entire email life

0:27:37because I felt the same way.

0:27:38It's like, I would rather see nothing

0:27:40than see the first two lines of the email.

0:27:42- Because there is zero help gotten out of,

0:27:47"Hi, Mike, hope you're doing well."

0:27:49Like, just over and over and over again, right?

0:27:52Like, you can imagine at a certain point

0:27:54in the creation of email apps, that did make more sense,

0:27:57that maybe people communicated in a way

0:28:00that that was beneficial, but now it isn't.

0:28:04And so the idea that I could have an email

0:28:07and it's got that, or even just like a really long email

0:28:09and it gives me the TLDR,

0:28:11those features I would benefit greatly from, I think.

0:28:14And this is kind of how I feel

0:28:16about basically all of Apple intelligence.

0:28:19When they are doing something

0:28:22which takes things on your device and summarizes it

0:28:26or helps you get something done quicker,

0:28:28I think it's fantastic.

0:28:30But it just falls down for me at any point

0:28:32in which it is making something up.

0:28:36- Yeah, I mean, I think that's the fundamental problem

0:28:41of like what these new AI systems are,

0:28:45is their ability to generate is strange

0:28:49and really changes things.

0:28:51I think particularly with the email section

0:28:53where it's like, oh, Chan-CPT is gonna help you write

0:28:55these emails, it's like, I am just aware of,

0:28:57in my working life, like more and more coming across messages

0:29:01where it's like, I don't know if I'm right or not,

0:29:04but it just feels more like,

0:29:06oh, I'm just getting emails from an AI

0:29:08and it's like, why is this even happening?

0:29:11And now it's just like, a year from now

0:29:13we're basically guaranteed that that's what's going

0:29:15to be the case if you just build it into the system.

0:29:18But I do think they fundamentally have to

0:29:21because otherwise they just know people are copying

0:29:23and pasting out to other systems

0:29:26to write their messages anyway.

0:29:28But yeah, there's a thing that happens here

0:29:30which I always feel like some important part

0:29:34of thinking is lost here, particularly with some

0:29:38of the people I work with quite closely.

0:29:40At the start of Chan-CPT, I was like real harsh sometimes

0:29:44when I got a list of ideas and it was like,

0:29:46did you get this from Chan-CPT?

0:29:48I never f***ing want that ever again.

0:29:50Like, I want to know what you think.

0:29:52I have no interest in like what this machine thinks.

0:29:55Like, do not get into this lazy habit of doing this.

0:29:59It's real bad long-term if the first thing

0:30:02that you turn towards is like the thing to help you think.

0:30:06But it's like, it's very easy to do.

0:30:09Like, I'm even aware of, you know,

0:30:11like when I'm working on the scripts for my videos,

0:30:14some phases of writing I should be just trying to like write

0:30:18and some phases I should just be trying to edit

0:30:21and those are two different things and it's always better

0:30:23like the more that you keep your mind separate from those two.

0:30:26But even for me, I've been aware of like,

0:30:28oh, there's now a third thing that I have to be aware of

0:30:31which is when am I ever asking Chan-CPT for anything

0:30:36while I'm working on this?

0:30:37And like most frequently for me, that's just asking

0:30:40for like to have it function as a thesaurus.

0:30:43But even there, I still feel like something different

0:30:48is happening here when I ask it to give me like a list

0:30:53of thesaurus words.

0:30:54Oh God, so hard to say.

0:30:55- Ask Chan-CPT for a different word for thesaurus.

0:30:58- Yeah, I should be saying synonyms, right?

0:31:00When I ask Chan-CPT for synonyms,

0:31:02the reason I would like I'm using that though is like,

0:31:05I cannot pin it down but there is something different

0:31:09between using the actual like built in Apple thesaurus

0:31:14versus asking Chan-CPT for synonyms.

0:31:17And I'm aware of like, oh, when I am writing,

0:31:21I can use the Apple built-in app

0:31:24for like quick alternate suggestions

0:31:26in a way that it's like, ooh, Chan-CPT is just different

0:31:31in this somehow.

0:31:34And I think that like affects people over the long run.

0:31:38So even for this, like I've been much more like cautious

0:31:40about how much I use it,

0:31:41even for minor like typographical suggestions.

0:31:44Maybe I'm very sensitive to this

0:31:47or maybe I am the vanguard for this,

0:31:49but I do look at a lot of the generative stuff for work

0:31:54and feel a little bit like what is even happening here

0:31:57in the long run?

0:31:59Like when people get real used to the machine

0:32:01just writing an email for them,

0:32:03like what are they even thinking about?

0:32:05What they're thinking about is getting it done real fast.

0:32:07They're not thinking about whatever the message

0:32:09is supposed to be about.

0:32:11And email's already bad,

0:32:13so I can see it being significantly worsened by this.

0:32:18But yeah, it's like, it's not Apple's fault.

0:32:20I think this is just a byproduct

0:32:21of the generative content at all,

0:32:23particularly for words.

0:32:25And this kind of stuff, especially in business,

0:32:28it's like a weird kind of food with no nutritional value.

0:32:33Like that's what these messages tend toward

0:32:35over the long run.

0:32:36But nonetheless, I still think Apple did the right thing.

0:32:39It's like, hey, if people are going to do this,

0:32:41let's try to build it into the system

0:32:44in the best possible way.

0:32:46I don't like how all these AI systems are there

0:32:49to just like try to suck out all of your data.

0:32:52That does feel a little bit different

0:32:54knowing that Apple started from like,

0:32:56well, we have to take all the data first,

0:32:58but going forward, we won't.

0:33:01It's like, okay, I guess that's better.

0:33:03- I know what you're saying,

0:33:04but like the difference is like,

0:33:06there is just an inherent privacy thing from that.

0:33:10Like when they're making the LLM,

0:33:12if something's publicly available on the web,

0:33:15I think there isn't really an assumption of privacy, right?

0:33:18But when you're using these models

0:33:21and you're using these apps,

0:33:23do you really know if and how much information

0:33:26is stored and associated to you,

0:33:29especially if it's free, right?

0:33:31- Exactly.

0:33:32We can feel very confident, I think,

0:33:34that Apple is not going to do that.

0:33:38In a sense of,

0:33:39it doesn't make sense for their business anyway.

0:33:41Their business model does not care

0:33:43for your private information.

0:33:45And also they have, I think,

0:33:46gone to great lengths at trying to establish

0:33:49how and why they will be different

0:33:51and having it being like publicly verifiable

0:33:54in a way that people will definitely want to check on

0:33:57because they'll have to catch them.

0:33:59And I think Apple knows this,

0:34:00and so they get the opportunity to do that,

0:34:02and I'm really happy about that.

0:34:04But look, I agree with you, right,

0:34:06that they kind of got to do it, and so fine, right?

0:34:09And the text stuff that they've done,

0:34:11I think I've not been able to read enough examples

0:34:14of things that they've made to decide

0:34:16if I think it's good or not,

0:34:17but it just doesn't have the same fundamental concerns

0:34:20and frustrations I have about the image stuff,

0:34:22which is mostly around that they don't look good

0:34:25and it's other people you can do it for.

0:34:27But what I'm happy Apple have done

0:34:29is what I wanted them to do,

0:34:31which is they have used this technology,

0:34:36large language model technology,

0:34:38to underpin their systems, right, their assistant systems,

0:34:43and then also to build it out in such a way

0:34:46that you should be able to use,

0:34:48if it works the way they talk about,

0:34:50Apple's devices to operate for you.

0:34:55That is the key to me for why I'm excited

0:34:59for what this future could be,

0:35:01is if it provides me with a way

0:35:03to be able to have a dialogue with my computer

0:35:07in a way that it can then act tasks

0:35:10like an actual assistant would.

0:35:12That is where I can see where we're going

0:35:16and where I actually do believe at this stage

0:35:18is the real benefit.

0:35:21Like, it's great that we can have text written for us,

0:35:24that's not enough for me.

0:35:26Like, I don't think that's it, right?

0:35:28Like, I don't think this stuff is the huge change

0:35:34that this technology will bring,

0:35:36this is just the first thing

0:35:38that has highlighted its potential.

0:35:40The idea of being able to have the operating system

0:35:44that you use on your device actually understand you,

0:35:49communicate with you,

0:35:51and take actions, because we had a meeting beforehand, right?

0:35:55Before today's episode, we were talking about some products.

0:35:58And I needed to find an image.

0:36:00I couldn't remember where I put that image,

0:36:02but I knew what it looked like.

0:36:04Now, what I want to be able to do is say like,

0:36:06"Hey, Mac, I took a picture the other day,

0:36:09it was of this, it looked like this,

0:36:11I think I sent it to Gray, but I don't know where I sent it.

0:36:13Can you just find it for me?"

0:36:15That's what it should be able to do in theory, right?

0:36:17And I think they're showing the beginnings of this stuff,

0:36:20that is like, yes.

0:36:22I don't care that it's not going to work great first time, right?

0:36:26But we got to get going on this,

0:36:28and they're getting going on this.

0:36:30And for me, that is what I am absolutely so excited about,

0:36:34is like, my iPhone,

0:36:37understanding me, knowing what's on the iPhone,

0:36:40and being able to act upon that information and my command,

0:36:44yes, that's the dream.

0:36:46- Yeah, it's like my feeling is this is what people always wanted Siri

0:36:55and all of these assistants to be,

0:36:57and that they have always just fallen so far short of.

0:37:01- And we know why now, right?

0:37:03Because the technology didn't exist until now.

0:37:05- Yeah, I'm not 100% convinced that is the reason,

0:37:08but yes, like we have a thing now,

0:37:10which is extremely flexible.

0:37:13And it's going to be, I think, quite wild to see what systems

0:37:17that are trained to be like,

0:37:19you are the AI for this phone,

0:37:22just like learn everything about this phone

0:37:25are going to be able to do.

0:37:27I'm just so aware of, again, on my phone,

0:37:30I have the action button set to like talk to ChatGPT.

0:37:33And I am aware of like, boy,

0:37:35the number of times I hit like talk to ChatGPT versus Siri

0:37:39has got to be like,

0:37:4150 to one.

0:37:43And when I'm talking to Siri,

0:37:44it is almost exclusively to run shortcuts

0:37:47that I have made in advance.

0:37:49Like that's what I'm having Siri do

0:37:51is really just be a shortcut launcher.

0:37:53And the huge advantage there is like,

0:37:55ChatGPT, even if it could only remember

0:37:59like the previous sentence that I had said

0:38:02would already be so useful.

0:38:04They showed that off at some point here of like,

0:38:06yes, you see, and I'm like,

0:38:08everyone do it, like they start to talk to Siri

0:38:11and then realize halfway through their sentence

0:38:13that like they actually want something else.

0:38:15And it's like even just the ability to do that,

0:38:18to realize like,

0:38:19I changed my mind halfway through

0:38:20about what I really meant,

0:38:22completely game changing for the actual ability

0:38:25to interact with Siri.

0:38:27And yeah, if I could,

0:38:28like a big checklist of items

0:38:30that I'm like working through

0:38:31and like the routine of what a perfect day to look like,

0:38:34and here's my like calendar of what I want to do,

0:38:36like how should I block out my time?

0:38:38Like I've got all of these things,

0:38:39but also sometimes I wake up and I'm just like,

0:38:42today it is not going to happen.

0:38:44I need to take a break today.

0:38:46And I would love to be able to just ask Siri

0:38:49to like clear my daily calendar

0:38:51and tasks of all of this stuff

0:38:53and just like have it understand what I mean

0:38:56and just like, whoosh, take all of that away.

0:38:58Amazing, without having to like programmatically say

0:39:01what each individual item is.

0:39:03Or even then I would take that a tiny step further, right?

0:39:07Where you could say,

0:39:08but tell me what are the things

0:39:10that I absolutely can't skip today?

0:39:12Yes, yeah, yeah.

0:39:13Right, because it's not just like,

0:39:15oh, just perform that action,

0:39:17but like understand context, understand me.

0:39:20That's a really good point.

0:39:21You know, I have,

0:39:22how many items do I have left on my task list today?

0:39:24How long is that going to take me?

0:39:25Do I have enough time before six o'clock

0:39:27to get this stuff done?

0:39:28Like this is what I want it to do.

0:39:31How long is it going to take to get there?

0:39:33I have no idea, a long time probably.

0:39:35But we at least feel like we're more on a path

0:39:38which would suggest that that time is coming

0:39:41rather than the last 10 years

0:39:44where it was like, oh, it did this one thing

0:39:48and then it just didn't really do much more.

0:39:50Yeah, it felt like they were just building in

0:39:52individual pieces, like,

0:39:53and now you can ask it about sports scores.

0:39:55It's like, great.

0:39:56Can we add in every other thing that we need?

0:39:59Can we add in every other conceivable thing

0:40:02in the universe one at a time?

0:40:03Probably not.

0:40:04And it's also like something like the sports scores thing.

0:40:07It's like one of the things where it's like,

0:40:09you couldn't do this before?

0:40:11Like it just kind of has always felt like that over time.

0:40:14It was like, and now spotlight is better.

0:40:16Wasn't spotlight better last time as well?

0:40:18Like what is going on?

0:40:20Or like how many times I feel like

0:40:22there was an element of like,

0:40:24it felt like for many years,

0:40:26every year they would talk about,

0:40:27and Siri will learn from you and recommend apps

0:40:30that you can use throughout the day.

0:40:32And it's like, we've done this before.

0:40:34I have very many times thought like,

0:40:37look, I'm not Apple,

0:40:38but I'm convinced if I spent a week on it,

0:40:41I could write a shortcut that would better select for me

0:40:45the things like the button that I most want to press

0:40:48than Apple's Siri suggestions

0:40:50based solely on just like do a frequency count

0:40:54of what hour of the day is it

0:40:56and what button do I press most?

0:40:58Like how on earth are you so bad at these recommendations?

0:41:02But yeah, like the large language model stuff

0:41:05does have the promise of actually being able

0:41:08to improve those kinds of suggestions.

0:41:11And I feel that way because of the places

0:41:14where I have seen that already work in limited ways

0:41:17where systems like barely know anything about me,

0:41:20but are already like surprisingly good

0:41:22at trying to predict like what is the thing

0:41:24that I actually want here.

0:41:26But yeah, so as always, it'll be like,

0:41:30how does this work in reality?

0:41:32But I do think it just looks so promising as a system.

0:41:37And I feel like because of it being built

0:41:40on top of the intense stuff,

0:41:42it does feel to me like they're not trying

0:41:44to pull this out of nowhere.

0:41:45They have a pre-existing framework

0:41:48that they can point the AI system at

0:41:51and say like, learn that.

0:41:53Like learn this system that is already the underwriting way

0:41:57to like interact with all of these apps

0:41:59and talk with things and figure out what the apps are up to.

0:42:02- So as is usually the way with like your closeness

0:42:06to WWDC, there is always the what do you think it is?

0:42:11What does it end up being?

0:42:12And so the situation to which I understand it now

0:42:15a few days in is it's mostly the same system.

0:42:19It will require work from developers to update

0:42:23to a newer form of the intense system.

0:42:26And there's more that it can do, but of course it's limited.

0:42:31I think Apple said that their model is trained

0:42:34on something like 12 groupings of intents.

0:42:38And this year there are two of those that are available,

0:42:42but inside of those two,

0:42:43there's lots and lots and lots of actions.

0:42:44And this is like, you know, like what type of app are you?

0:42:48Will you be able to work for this system?

0:42:50And then what kinds of things within your app can you do?

0:42:53Like for example, send a message is one of them, right?

0:42:56Like, you know how it used to be back in the day

0:42:57where it's like, oh, and Siri can do things for you

0:43:00only if you're a banking app and a restaurant app.

0:43:03- Right, right, right.

0:43:04- You know, so it's that kind of thing,

0:43:05but it's definitely more broad.

0:43:07It's not as broad as you'd want it to be,

0:43:09but I would say obviously we haven't been able to test it yet,

0:43:12but even to this point with like more information coming out,

0:43:14I'm still like, oh, okay, right?

0:43:16Like this seems promising,

0:43:17but it's like how long into the summer,

0:43:21even if it is this summer, is any of this stuff available?

0:43:24Like that's going to be the interesting part, but yes.

0:43:27- Yeah, of course.

0:43:28Like I did not think that this was the intent system,

0:43:30like as it currently exists, like of course,

0:43:33there is no way that they're not going to have to like

0:43:36double the size of the API for that system behind the scenes.

0:43:40To me, it's just more like they're not trying to build a thing

0:43:43out of nowhere just for the AI.

0:43:46Like they have a thing that is a very convenient thing

0:43:49to start from, which gives me a lot more hope

0:43:51in like how is this going to go along?

0:43:53It also just feels like it continues on of like,

0:43:56oh, my favorite Apple acquisition ever is like a workflow

0:44:01is like still paying off now with this AI announcement.

0:44:04It's like goes back to that acquisition. Great.

0:44:06(chime)

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0:46:49Are you ready to tint your app icons?

0:46:53So Mike, it's not the tinting I'm excited about.

0:46:56A little thing flashed by so fast

0:46:59but it caused my heart to skip a beat.

0:47:02Did you notice that they have an option

0:47:04to make the app icons larger?

0:47:07But when you make them larger, you know it goes away.

0:47:12The words, the words on the bottom go away.

0:47:17That might be one of my top three things for this year.

0:47:21I was like, "Oh, thank the Lord."

0:47:24Like I don't have to see these stupid words.

0:47:27I hate them so much.

0:47:29Like large app icons, that may be the first setting

0:47:33that I flip when I get the new operating systems.

0:47:36Words, goodbye, never want to see them again, whoosh.

0:47:40I think the phrase for me is,

0:47:42"I'm looking a gift horse in the mouth,"

0:47:44where I also want to get rid of the names of apps and widgets.

0:47:48I really don't like the big icons though.

0:47:50What I want is regular sized app icons and no words.

0:47:54Like I want everything, but I don't know if we're gonna get that.

0:47:57I just think I've played around with it on an iPad

0:48:00and I've seen lots of screenshots of iPhones.

0:48:02The icons are just way too big.

0:48:04It looks like, you know, you can get those phones

0:48:07for like your grandparents.

0:48:09- Yeah, oh yeah, yeah.

0:48:10- Whether the buttons are really, really big,

0:48:12that's what it reminds me of.

0:48:13- The thing is that like I'm less concerned about that

0:48:16because at this point,

0:48:17all of my various home screens are 90% widgets anyway.

0:48:21And so I feel like it looks less dumb

0:48:23if you just have a bunch of widgets.

0:48:24It's not even really about the apps.

0:48:26- I've seen some examples of some of Apple's widgets

0:48:29that they actually also get a little bit bigger.

0:48:32And like I think the weather widget

0:48:34gets like one more piece of data on it because of that.

0:48:37Like it's a slightly larger canvas.

0:48:41I've just seen that, I think it was on threads.

0:48:43So I don't have details on that yet, but I saw it.

0:48:45So, you know, must be true.

0:48:47- Listen mate, we can tint our icons now.

0:48:50We can make them giant to smush out of the words

0:48:53and we can put them anywhere on the screen.

0:48:57That was the one where I was like, wow,

0:48:59only took what, 15 years.

0:49:02But yes, now I can put the icons on one side of the screen.

0:49:07Look at all these gifts they have bestowed upon us, Mike.

0:49:10How could you be ungrateful?

0:49:11- All of this stuff as it was happening,

0:49:13I was like, oh, Grey's gonna love all of this,

0:49:15but I'm not really happy with any of it.

0:49:17So, okay, the tinting only looks good

0:49:21if you want black and white.

0:49:22Like I have yet to see an example of a tint

0:49:26with a color that looks good.

0:49:28Because as well, you have to tint everything.

0:49:30You can't do the individual things,

0:49:32which I think is very strange.

0:49:34But if you want black and white, which I'm sure you will,

0:49:36that actually does, I think look pretty good.

0:49:38- You don't know me.

0:49:39- And they have dark, Eastbourne receding.

0:49:43They have dark mode icons as well

0:49:46where I'm hoping they will tweak them

0:49:48because they've just taken everything that was white

0:49:50and made it pure black

0:49:51where I think there can be some shades of gray in here

0:49:54would be not too bad.

0:49:56But I think dark mode icons, I do like the idea of.

0:50:00But the free placement thing in theory is really great,

0:50:05but my home screens are full

0:50:07because I've been so used to filling the home screen.

0:50:09So like, I don't know what to do with them.

0:50:11It's like, I'm so happy I can do this,

0:50:13but where does everything go to make the spaces?

0:50:16That's not what I'm sure about yet.

0:50:18- No, no, I agree with you.

0:50:20There's a funny thing that has happened,

0:50:22which it just, I think this is because the apps fill in

0:50:26from the top bottom, as it always has occurred.

0:50:29The phones have gotten bigger and bigger over the years.

0:50:32So Apple has basically trained you

0:50:34that the things you are going to use the most

0:50:36you want at the bottom of the screen,

0:50:38which means you have to fill up the whole screen

0:50:40to get them there.

0:50:41And so yes, it's like, I have to unlearn 10 years

0:50:44of behavior of like, well, I might as well fill up

0:50:46this whole screen.

0:50:47- Right, 'cause then I put all my widgets at the top, right?

0:50:50Because I can't reach up there.

0:50:51So now it's like, well, where do the widgets go now?

0:50:55- Yeah, I know.

0:50:56It is totally the case of like,

0:50:57this feature has arrived at exactly the moment

0:51:00where I couldn't care less about it.

0:51:02But I was like, I'm still glad it's here.

0:51:04It is very funny to see.

0:51:06It's like, I won't use it on the phone.

0:51:07I probably will use it on the iPad

0:51:08just because I don't actually fill up my whole iPad

0:51:10screens, but on the phone, it's like, Apple,

0:51:12you trained me to use every millimeter of this space.

0:51:16And now you tell me like,

0:51:18look at all this free space you could have.

0:51:20It's like, where were you 10 years ago when I wanted this?

0:51:24Nowhere to be seen.

0:51:25- I'm not gonna say from me that the jury's completely out

0:51:28yet because when widgets came out,

0:51:31I had a similar feeling of like, well,

0:51:34my home screen is full of the apps that I use.

0:51:36I don't have space for widgets.

0:51:38Like I especially don't have space to get rid of eight app

0:51:41icons for one widget or whatever it is.

0:51:44But over time I did do that.

0:51:47And I have fewer app icons on my home screen

0:51:50and more widgets.

0:51:51So I could imagine a scenario where maybe on my first screen

0:51:56is just a couple of widgets arranged nicely.

0:51:58And then maybe my second screen has some apps on it

0:52:01arranged nicely.

0:52:02Right now I'm like, I don't know what I would do with this,

0:52:04but I'm not gonna say that like,

0:52:06I definitely won't use it because I know that my kind of

0:52:09habits have changed over the last couple of years with the

0:52:12introduction of widgets.

0:52:13So I got kind of got used to them.

0:52:14- And also the other thing that I was quite excited for was

0:52:18the control center customization.

0:52:20- Yeah.

0:52:21- That was also like, oh my God, so good.

0:52:23And legitimately could be one of those things where a lot of

0:52:26stuff that exists on my home screen,

0:52:28it's like, I don't really want that app.

0:52:30I just want to do a thing fast.

0:52:32That's why it's here.

0:52:33So it's like, oh boy,

0:52:35I may be shoving a bunch of stuff into control center,

0:52:38but like I was completely blown away by it's like, oh,

0:52:42not only are we going to be able to customize control center,

0:52:45we have these multiple pages that I thought they had a clever,

0:52:48like quick way to swipe through the different pages to get to

0:52:52it fast.

0:52:53I was like, wow, look at what control center has become.

0:52:56Like this is very exciting to play around with.

0:52:58- I'm not sure if you caught it.

0:53:00I don't know if they did a good job of showing it in the

0:53:02keynote, but you can add more pages.

0:53:05- That's what I was figuring, right?

0:53:06Is it looked like you could just have more stuff.

0:53:08- No, cause they have the one that's like the original,

0:53:10then they have media, then they have home,

0:53:12but then you can add another page where you can just put

0:53:16more controls in it.

0:53:17Like you can just add more pages with more controls.

0:53:20If you want to do that.

0:53:21- Just controls everywhere, all of the controls.

0:53:24- I've seen lots of great memes already because you can add

0:53:27the same control over and over again.

0:53:29So like I've seen people just have a page of just the volume

0:53:32indicator and every time you change one, they all change.

0:53:35It's like, this is great.

0:53:37You can just keep changing the volume.

0:53:40I just want my volume page wherever I touch on this screen.

0:53:43I want to be able to control the volume.

0:53:45- But you know what?

0:53:46I could actually kind of see that being useful if you want

0:53:48to be real sloppy about it.

0:53:50Yeah, I literally want to press anywhere and just change

0:53:52the volume.

0:53:53Don't worry about it.

0:53:54- And you'd be able to change the flashlight and camera

0:53:56thing on the lock screen.

0:53:57- Can they become any control center control?

0:54:00I wasn't sure what that was.

0:54:01So that's what it is.

0:54:02Like anything in control center can go there instead.

0:54:04- Any small one because you can get some that are big.

0:54:07And I don't know if like maybe some that are big,

0:54:09they're just always big.

0:54:10You know what I mean?

0:54:11Like, but anything that can be like a single unit

0:54:13can go there.

0:54:15- Right.

0:54:16- But only two.

0:54:17- Yeah, I'll take it.

0:54:18The camera one is the one to go.

0:54:20It's like, I don't really need you.

0:54:22- Especially because the rumor is that the next iPhone

0:54:25gets like its own camera button.

0:54:28- Oh, is that what Rumor Roundup says?

0:54:30- That's what Rumor Roundup is saying.

0:54:32Like where the, on American iPhones,

0:54:34they have the millimeter wave antenna for 5G.

0:54:38It's gonna kind of be in that.

0:54:39So you would essentially be holding up your phone

0:54:41and it's like a shutter button for a camera,

0:54:43but that it would also launch a camera.

0:54:45So you don't need the lock screen thing anymore

0:54:48if you've got its own button.

0:54:49- Are you saying the rumor is, I'm looking at the phone now,

0:54:52the same side as it has the lock button,

0:54:54but on the bottom, is that what you're saying?

0:54:56- Yep.

0:54:57- Oh, great.

0:54:58That's exactly where I would want a button.

0:54:59- Exactly.

0:55:00Imagine if you were taking a picture of your iPhone

0:55:01as if it was a digital camera.

0:55:03Where would you put the button?

0:55:04That's where the rumor is they're putting the button.

0:55:06- Oh, right.

0:55:07Yeah, I know what.

0:55:08If they're gonna do that, that also totally makes sense.

0:55:09Like why have they now done it?

0:55:10That you can change the camera thing on the front?

0:55:12- Yep.

0:55:13- Of course.

0:55:14- 'Cause there'll be an even better way

0:55:15to get to the camera.

0:55:16- Yep, makes sense, makes sense.

0:55:17- The rumor is as well, it's a capacitive button.

0:55:18So you'll be able to do like the thing

0:55:20where you can press it gently to focus and press it harder

0:55:24to take the photo, which if they actually do that, oh man.

0:55:27- Yeah, although I wouldn't want to be peak design,

0:55:30trying to design the case ahead of time

0:55:33for a capacitive button.

0:55:35Good luck, guys.

0:55:36- Oh, I hadn't even thought of that.

0:55:39What do you do in that scenario?

0:55:42- I think you have to have a little cutout.

0:55:44Like that's what you just have to have.

0:55:45- Yeah, but then you gotta be able to squish your finger

0:55:47into the cutout.

0:55:48- Yeah, if I was them, and if it is a capacitive button,

0:55:51I feel like you just have to make a real big section

0:55:53on the phone where it's not covered

0:55:55and you have the thinnest little connecting guard rails

0:55:57you possibly can on either side.

0:55:59That's what they need to do.

0:56:00- Man, if honestly, if I was peak design,

0:56:02I just wouldn't bother this year until the phone comes out.

0:56:05Like, you know, this seems terrible.

0:56:07- Boy, I have never been gladder

0:56:09that Cortex brand does not make phone cases.

0:56:11- We're never making phone cases.

0:56:12- We're never making a phone case and this is why.

0:56:15- It's like the one thing I am 100% dead set

0:56:18that we will never ever do is phone cases.

0:56:21- Right, people go like,

0:56:22"Oh, will you make a toaster one year?"

0:56:24It's like, "Probably not, but who knows?"

0:56:26"Are you gonna make a phone case?"

0:56:27"No, never."

0:56:28- 'Cause the only way that I would make a phone case

0:56:31is in a way that nobody wants it,

0:56:32which is it will come out the year next.

0:56:34You know, just like, "Oh, the iPhone 15,

0:56:37"we have our iPhone 14 cases ready."

0:56:39'Cause it's like, how long it will take us

0:56:42to get the phone and then test it

0:56:44and see if it feels good.

0:56:45Oh man, phone case, wow, what a thing.

0:56:48Can I just tell you why I love Math Notes?

0:56:52- Okay, hold on.

0:56:53Why is Mike so into Math Notes?

0:56:58I have no idea.

0:57:00I just cannot conceive of why you're,

0:57:02I was like, "I'm gonna try to come up with my best guess."

0:57:05But I have no idea.

0:57:08So please tell me, why are you so excited about this?

0:57:11- I'm not sure what type of learning type

0:57:13this would fall into.

0:57:15But when I'm trying to solve a problem of any kind,

0:57:19I like to write it out.

0:57:21And sometimes this is on incredible paper products.

0:57:25Sometimes this is with an Apple Pencil and an iPad.

0:57:29But I will try and write these things out, right?

0:57:32Like it helps me work through a problem.

0:57:34Sometimes these are number things.

0:57:38This can be measurements or it can be financial stuff

0:57:41that I will try and write it out.

0:57:43- Hmm.

0:57:44- But then what I have to do is get a calculator

0:57:47and add up the numbers because my mental arithmetic,

0:57:51in fact, my written arithmetic is not good

0:57:54because I went to school a long time ago.

0:57:57- Oh, yeah, yeah.

0:57:58- Math Notes does the calculation for me.

0:58:01It's absolutely incredible.

0:58:05It is an incredible system.

0:58:08It also works by typing, by the way.

0:58:10You don't have to use a pencil.

0:58:12So you can do this by typing into Notes.

0:58:14- Oh, okay, that changes it. Interesting.

0:58:18- And I've been doing it in the Notes app,

0:58:20but you can do it in the calculator app, too,

0:58:23but this will work on any of the platforms you have Notes on.

0:58:25- Wait a second, have you been trying this

0:58:26with the developer beta?

0:58:28- Oh, yeah, I have the beta on my iPad and my Vision Pro.

0:58:30- Oh, God, okay, all right, I'll ask you about that later.

0:58:33- Well, I put it on my iPad Mini, so my old iPad.

0:58:36I put it on there and I put the Vision Pro beta on, too.

0:58:39So I'm taking my Apple Pencil and I'm writing out sums,

0:58:44and you just write equals, and it will just pop the answer in.

0:58:48And you can go back to the sum, you can delete something,

0:58:51you can change the numbers, it updates it.

0:58:53It's fantastic.

0:58:55It really is just like, it feels like magic.

0:58:59And you can do things like, you can make a list.

0:59:01You could write, like, notebook equals this amount,

0:59:05pen equals this amount, hat equals this amount,

0:59:09and then you could write underneath it,

0:59:11hat plus pen plus notebook equals,

0:59:13and it will sum up the amounts that you defined above.

0:59:16It's exactly what I want from something like this,

0:59:20and I had no idea that I could even get something like this,

0:59:23because so many of the ways in which I calculate things

0:59:28are in this way, that I will start writing it out

0:59:31in handwriting or in a table or something, in Notes.

0:59:35Do you remember we were having this conversation

0:59:37about Obsidian and calculations a long time ago?

0:59:40Right, because it wouldn't do calculations

0:59:42in a way that made any sense to me.

0:59:43- Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

0:59:44- But this is exactly what Math Notes does.

0:59:47And then some of the things that you can do

0:59:49are like some of the things I've shown in the keynote,

0:59:51things I'll never do,

0:59:52but they were just so incredibly impressive.

0:59:55I was watching the keynote of Idina and she was like,

0:59:57"Oh man, would this have been good

0:59:59if I could have done something like this?"

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1:03:06And then I was like, "Yeah, I would."

1:03:07And then I was like, "Yeah, I would."

1:03:08So I was looking at that and I think my hesitation was a little bit like, as is often the case with these things, there's some not obvious way that you have to do it for it to work that doesn't come across in the demos because you're not aware of whatever the limitations are.

1:03:24So it's real interesting to me to hear that you have used that and feel like, "Oh, it is useful."

1:03:30Like you can just write it out in the way that you want to and it actually works.

1:03:33I think that's like in the back of my mind, I was feeling like, "There's got to be some catch here for this."

1:03:39But if you're not finding that that's the case, then it's really impressive.

1:03:43Yeah, there's some stuff that I think it maybe doesn't do or can't do or doesn't do yet.

1:03:48But it's not stuff that's difficult.

1:03:50Like for example, what I haven't been able to do is like take two numbers, multiply them and then get an answer.

1:03:56And I haven't been able to reliably then take that answer and manipulate it further.

1:04:00Right?

1:04:02So like 100 times 1000 divided by 17 or whatever.

1:04:07It's not like a two-step process probably.

1:04:09But then sometimes I have been.

1:04:11So it's like it just feels like maybe one of those things that's going to be worked out

1:04:14because I've sometimes been able to manipulate it and sometimes not.

1:04:18And maybe I just haven't learned the right incantations for it or whatever.

1:04:21Or it's also developer beta one.

1:04:23Exactly.

1:04:24And so I saw it and thought it looked cool.

1:04:27And it was still one of the things that I had no idea how much I loved it until I tried it.

1:04:30And was like, wow, that's amazing.

1:04:32So it felt really cool.

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1:06:41So you put the developer beta for Vision OS on your headsets?

1:06:47I gotta just say, Mike, I feel like that might be one of the most risky beta installs in your entire career.

1:06:56I agree. I wouldn't have done it if they would have done more to it.

1:07:00Right, okay.

1:07:02Really, Vision OS 2 is closer to Vision OS 1.5.

1:07:071.3, yeah.

1:07:08No, no, there's a lot in here that makes the experience much nicer in my experience.

1:07:15I've been playing around with it in the last couple of days, and especially when they actually ship all of the stuff that they spoke about,

1:07:21because it's stuff like the panoramic Mac display, which looked great, that's not coming in the initial release.

1:07:27That will be later on in the year.

1:07:29So there's stuff like that I'm excited about.

1:07:32But look, there's lots of refinements throughout the system, a lot of the animations feel smoother,

1:07:36there's tons of new tools for developers, that's actually where the majority of the story is,

1:07:40but it's a lot of stuff I don't understand.

1:07:42But there is a lot of stuff going on for developers, and how you can attach UI elements to objects now,

1:07:50and if you move the objects around, the UI moves with it, that kind of stuff.

1:07:54There's a lot going on in the APIs, and especially in the way that a lot of 3D stuff is being done.

1:08:03But there are things like the gestures that you have of your hand now to bring up the home screen,

1:08:08and bring up Control Center, is a vastly better way of doing navigation in VisionOS than in VisionOS 1,

1:08:16where you're either pressing a button on the headset or looking up to the heavens.

1:08:20Being able to access these things quickly is really easy.

1:08:24Keyboard pass-through is fantastic.

1:08:26I wish that it supported all keyboards, and not just Apple's keyboards,

1:08:30because I definitely think they could have done this, but they didn't do this, at least not yet.

1:08:34But it's great that with my Magic Keyboard, if I'm in an environment, I can see the keyboard, which is helpful for me.

1:08:40They added a new environment, which is a beach, which is lovely. It's probably the highest quality one.

1:08:46I'm not sure if I want to be working at the beach, though, that's just not my thing,

1:08:50but for hanging out, me and Jason had a persona call yesterday, and we were sitting on the beach.

1:08:55I think actually the most impressive feature that I have used is the ability to turn 2D images into spatial images.

1:09:03Oh, does that work well?

1:09:05It works so well, and it is incredibly effective.

1:09:10It works with images that weren't taken on iPhones.

1:09:13This is purely using machine learning to establish the depth,

1:09:18and I have photos that were taken on DSLRs years ago of live shows that I've turned into spatial photos,

1:09:25and they look incredible.

1:09:27Really, to me, to my eyes, look as good as they do from the iPhone.

1:09:31The effect is there. It's actually very cool.

1:09:34The animation and the sound design that they've done is really great when you do that.

1:09:39Everything shimmers, and you see the things separating, and it does these computery sounds.

1:09:45It's like analyzing the image. It's really good. It's really, really good.

1:09:49I think stuff like swiping around the app screens is in a higher frame rate now, so it feels more natural.

1:09:55There's lots and lots of little touches throughout the operating system.

1:09:59Safari profiles has been added, which is amazing for me, because I can finally use Safari properly on VisionOS.

1:10:05I'm glad to hear that, because I was really aware of the lack of them saying that.

1:10:09It was like, "I'm not hearing the word 'profile' anywhere, guys," so I'm happy to hear that that's there.

1:10:15It's not listed anywhere. I just found it, because it's the first thing I look for every time there's an update,

1:10:21because it's so important for me, because I jumped on that bandwagon, and I couldn't use Safari on my Vision Pro effectively.

1:10:28And then also guest mode, it saves the last person, which is a great idea.

1:10:33That is a great way of solving the technical issue, I think, to just have it saved. It's great.

1:10:39Because also as well, realistically, outside of a bunch of people coming over,

1:10:44really it's just the other person in your household that might want to use it.

1:10:48Whoever's using it most, they would just also be able to use it.

1:10:52There's lots of little touches and improvements throughout the OS, which is what I will say is, as a minimum, good.

1:11:00Basically, what's happened in the last year is VisionOS went from being the next thing to not being the next thing,

1:11:06because now AI is the next thing. So I could have imagined a scenario where VisionOS got nothing,

1:11:12and I don't think that's the case. It still feels like they're putting effort into it.

1:11:17It has mouse support now too, which is good, so when I'm sitting at my Mac, I can use my mouse to control everything.

1:11:23It's not getting any of the Apple intelligence features.

1:11:27I did find that quite interesting. I don't really know what to think about that, but it was something after it was over.

1:11:33I was like, "Oh, it's quite notable that it's not present in this system."

1:11:39So for everything I've been able to work out, it's technically capable.

1:11:44And from the things that I've been told is it would be silly if Apple wasn't bringing this stuff to all of their platforms.

1:11:52But where I'm getting that information is maybe the important thing.

1:11:56Also, that they are planning to bring this stuff everywhere, they have prioritized.

1:12:01Yeah, and that makes sense.

1:12:03But it's good to have actually been told that information, rather than, "It can't do this."

1:12:08Rather than speculating it, yes.

1:12:10My concern was at first, "Is there a technical limitation?" Because Apple is being pretty particular.

1:12:20If you have anything older than an iPhone 15 Pro, it will not work. It won't. None of these features.

1:12:27Oh, wow.

1:12:28It's M series, Macs, all of them. M series, iPads, all of them.

1:12:34And iPhone 15 Pro, that's where it cuts off.

1:12:39Wow. That's got to be one of the most aggressive cutoffs ever for a feature.

1:12:43Yes. And this is, again, another scenario where you can see this isn't the way Apple likes to usually do things.

1:12:48They see this stuff for years, so they don't have to do this stuff.

1:12:52And the best theory I've heard is that it is a RAM issue.

1:12:56Oh, huh. That's very interesting.

1:12:58I was wondering, because what I was kind of speculating is, oh, they're doing on-device training stuff.

1:13:05They must be doing some kind of version of a training run on the device.

1:13:09Kind of like how Photos does all its machine learning when the phone is real sleepy and the conditions are just right,

1:13:15and then it will churn through all of that stuff.

1:13:17I figure, oh, they're probably doing something like this.

1:13:20But that makes much more sense, because if it was a CPU issue, it could be like,

1:13:24oh, this will just take two weeks until you can have this feature.

1:13:27But if it's a RAM issue, yeah, then that's different.

1:13:30No, it is the amount of RAM needed to hold the model.

1:13:35And I believe in Apple's papers, they said that they've been able to compress their model down to 3 gigabytes.

1:13:41It's pretty big, though, but, yeah.

1:13:43So apparently, you need about 8 gigabytes of RAM as a minimum.

1:13:48And if you kind of look across the products of where they're cutting things out,

1:13:53that actually looks like that's how they've done it, because they don't talk about RAM.

1:13:57But where does the RAM change?

1:13:59Where does the RAM change?

1:14:01The iPhone 15 Pro is the first iPhone to get 8 gigabytes of RAM.

1:14:05And all of the rumors are suggesting, which makes obvious sense, that the iPhone 16 will run this.

1:14:10Yeah, they'd be crazy not to.

1:14:11So all iPhones, right, will get it.

1:14:13Because as well, the other thing, the actual device, which I think maybe needs it maybe more than Vision OS

1:14:19and isn't on here, and I have no idea what they're going to do, the Apple Watch.

1:14:22Much bigger product, right, than Vision OS and the Vision Pro.

1:14:26That's not getting any of this either.

1:14:28And I'm keen to understand how that's going to work,

1:14:32because they did so much on untethering the watch from the phone,

1:14:36and now I can't see a scenario other than they have to tether the watch back to the phone more again

1:14:41to get this stuff to do anything.

1:14:42Yeah, they're just going to have to.

1:14:44Yeah, it feels like this goes back to the early days of the watch,

1:14:47like for the intelligent stuff for a few years.

1:14:49They'll have to re-tether it.

1:14:51Or maybe the watch just communicates with the cloud all the time for this stuff.

1:14:56Because you can maybe do that, that maybe the watch goes up to the cloud when it can't get to your phone.

1:15:02And also as well, because the way Apple's doing this with their cloud stuff,

1:15:06which is all really interesting, and we haven't got the time to get into the security aspect of it today,

1:15:10but it looks good, and I urge people to go and look at the information they've provided,

1:15:14because it is quite fascinating what they're doing.

1:15:17They're apparently not going to be clear to the user what is happening and where.

1:15:25Like, if something goes to the cloud, you're not necessarily going to know that,

1:15:29which I actually think is the right way to do it.

1:15:31I don't want you to be involved in the decision making.

1:15:33The device should just do it for me.

1:15:35But there doesn't even really seem right now to be a set of features that will go to the cloud or not.

1:15:43Which I think is interesting.

1:15:45Yeah, or it could just be like, there isn't a set feature list that goes one place or the other.

1:15:49It's just dynamically about what's happening in the moment.

1:15:52But look, all the Apple intelligence stuff is real interesting,

1:15:57but I too also feel like I'm happy for them to prioritize these little quality of life improvements for Vision OS,

1:16:05because, boy, having been on the road, I have been spending a ton of time in Vision OS,

1:16:13just like a huge portion of the day.

1:16:16That's why I was real keen to see what do they have for Vision OS,

1:16:19and a little sad was like, "Vision OS is up first!"

1:16:22It's like, OK, it's not going to be a lot, but I'll see what they have.

1:16:25Better than the iPad got, you know?

1:16:27Yeah, no, better than the iPad.

1:16:28And honestly, I will take a new environment over all of the Apple intelligence features,

1:16:34just because this is the way that I'm using the headset.

1:16:37I think the thing that I check every time there's a settings update,

1:16:41so I'd love you to look through the developer beta for me,

1:16:44is like, in the settings, is there somewhere in the keyboard to turn off that stupid predictive hover thing?

1:16:50I hate it so much.

1:16:52I always have to move it.

1:16:53It's like, go away? I just don't want to see you?

1:16:55That's the thing that I'm always looking for straight away.

1:16:58Like, please can I get rid of this?

1:17:00I don't even understand how it's supposed to be helping me

1:17:03when I have this keyboard in front of me that I'm typing on.

1:17:06It's the worst.

1:17:07I don't know. I don't like the quick type bar, I think they call it.

1:17:10I haven't looked. I'll take a look for you.

1:17:12Saying about the environment, though, my favorite thing is that Bora Bora,

1:17:16which is the beach environment, was one of the coming soon environments.

1:17:20The other one is still there, and it still says coming soon,

1:17:24and I find that to be so hilarious.

1:17:27Why did they not take it out?

1:17:29Why is it still there, but it's still there?

1:17:32I don't mind the coming soon stuff.

1:17:34I know a lot of people were saying that's silly when it first came out,

1:17:37but I don't know, I kind of like it.

1:17:39Well, it was indicated to me that it shouldn't have shit like that.

1:17:42The thing when I saw the Bora Bora environment listed as a feature on Vision OS,

1:17:47it kind of made me think about how Apple has used the new emoji sets

1:17:51as an encouragement to upgrade.

1:17:53I was like, "Oh, that's what they're going to do with the environment."

1:17:56It's like they're going to hold an environment until they want to really encourage people to upgrade.

1:18:01That makes total sense.

1:18:03But I am a little bit disappointed because of those two little images that you can just barely see.

1:18:07It's like I was more interested in the other one, which looks like this swampy one,

1:18:12because my one complaint is I do feel like, I mean, this is just Apple's design aesthetic,

1:18:16but everything is always too bright.

1:18:19It's like I want things darker.

1:18:21And so I was looking at that other one.

1:18:23I was like, "Oh, this foggy one might be a more dark environment."

1:18:27Have you tried the night modes of the environment?

1:18:29Oh, yeah, yeah, no, of course.

1:18:31That's how I'm using things most of the time.

1:18:33Okay.

1:18:34Just think about it for a second.

1:18:36Even the night modes, most of them have a lot of brightness to them.

1:18:40Or they're a night mode for a thing that was white during the day,

1:18:45and I just like, I don't love that.

1:18:48So it's like the Yosemite one and also the beach sand one.

1:18:53Both of those are functionally white environments that you're in.

1:18:56So even at nighttime, I just don't visually like it.

1:18:59So those two are just straight out for me.

1:19:01I just will never use them.

1:19:03But anyway, I'm happy to see all these little updates.

1:19:07Of course, I will just perhaps die of happiness when that bigger Mac virtual display rolls out

1:19:14because that's, again, that's what I'm doing 90% of the time in the headset itself.

1:19:19I also thought it was just interesting how much they focused on that

1:19:23because I just kind of wonder,

1:19:25I would suspect if they have any kind of analytics on how people are using it,

1:19:29that is the actual answer.

1:19:31That for the people who are finding it useful to spend multiple hours a day using the headset,

1:19:37the thing they're doing is mirroring their Mac display.

1:19:41That feels like that just has to be true.

1:19:43So anyway, I'll be curious to see that roll out.

1:19:45But I told myself I'm not going to install Vision OS,

1:19:49but maybe I will when the public beta comes out

1:19:52if there's a bunch of little improvements

1:19:55because it does feel like the system could use that.

1:19:57So we'll see.

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1:22:15So you teased before that you've got some thoughts about email.

1:22:18Do we have some follow up from your email, I don't know, crisis of faith two episodes ago?

1:22:25What was going on? Tell me, what's going on with that?

1:22:27So, as a refresher, I was frustrated with email, frustrated with notifications.

1:22:32I wanted to talk to you about them. It ended up being an entire episode a couple of months ago, right?

1:22:37It was April's episode, I think.

1:22:39Because the problem wasn't with email or notifications, the problem was with your life.

1:22:46That's what it felt like, that's why that episode exploded.

1:22:49And essentially the key things that came away was no email on my phone anymore, right?

1:22:54Like the email app has to go, and notifications off.

1:22:58And I did all of those things.

1:23:00Really?

1:23:01Yep, and I will say the combination of notification management and email changes is maybe one of the best things I've done for my work life in like half a decade.

1:23:13Ah, I feel so victorious at this moment. Great.

1:23:17I'm loving it right now.

1:23:19So I want to start with the Slack stuff because it's smaller.

1:23:22So what I've done with Slack is I've set that from 7pm on workdays and all weekends, I don't get notifications.

1:23:29And you can do that inside of Slack itself, you can set that.

1:23:32At first I was frustrated because while it doesn't send notifications, it does still increase the badge count.

1:23:41Oh, I didn't know that.

1:23:42So if people are sending me messages, the badge count goes up.

1:23:46And at first I was like, "Oh, I don't like this."

1:23:49But I have actually, it's turned out to be a pretty good thing because I'm not getting the notifications, so they're not disrupting me.

1:23:58So like people can't blow up my watch or my phone if I'm like having dinner or whatever.

1:24:04But if I'm checking my phone and I can see that the count is pretty high, maybe there's something that I want to dip into and check.

1:24:12So like I actually think that that balance has actually worked out pretty well for me.

1:24:17I wanted to give it a little bit of time and see.

1:24:20My assistant listened to the episode and she recommended that I use downtime, which is like a hilarious thing to consider that's come back around again.

1:24:30Huh, okay.

1:24:31But downtime would solve this problem.

1:24:34Like downtime can remove the application badges completely.

1:24:38But the problem with downtime for me is the same as it was, which was, you know, what they have never done with downtime is do what they did for focus modes.

1:24:46Where with focus modes they swapped it so you could say, you know, like exclude these.

1:24:52Where with downtime you have to add everything that you want to get notifications about.

1:24:56Oh, right.

1:24:57What I want is the opposite.

1:24:58You know, that's terrible.

1:24:59But I thought about it, but I decided let me just see how it goes.

1:25:01And it's actually turned out for me to be pretty great because the thing that was bothering me the most was getting the notifications as opposed to seeing that something was happening.

1:25:10And I think that that balance has been pretty good so I can like if I can see I have 20 notifications in Slack, maybe I should just peek, you know, and that tends to be like I'm already on my phone.

1:25:20I'm doing something.

1:25:22So that's been fine.

1:25:23So I think it's something that the people in my life that I work with, my colleagues, are all trying to get used to in their own way.

1:25:32This was one of these things where I was aware of the fact that the first anybody heard about this was listening to the episode.

1:25:40So I appreciate my colleagues.

1:25:43You know, we're all getting used to it.

1:25:45What a funny way to softly notify all the people in your life about a change that might be happening.

1:25:52Yeah.

1:25:53That's very funny.

1:25:54I don't think that's good behavior, but it was the behavior.

1:25:55And everyone's kind of worked with the good thing about doing it in Slack, though, actually, is that Slack does tell the person.

1:26:02So like if someone's DMing me, it's like Mike has his notifications paused.

1:26:07Would you like to notify him?

1:26:09And so I think people are aware of that.

1:26:12And then they can make a choice.

1:26:13They can make the choice.

1:26:14Or if it's in a group chat, like sometimes someone might text me and say like, can you just pop in Slack?

1:26:19And I think that that's fine because that's how I want people to treat me if they think there's something I desperately need to see.

1:26:25I can go and look at it and then I can make the decision as to whether I want to engage or whether I want to say like, I will come back to this.

1:26:32I think, yeah, the Slack thing is a good boundary.

1:26:35It actually sets good boundaries with people by making it clear.

1:26:39What I think if I could make a suggestion to Slack, one of the many suggestions I have for Slack,

1:26:44I think it would be good to make it clear to people inside of a group chat that somebody has their notifications paused

1:26:53because they do a really good job of it in one-on-ones but not in groups.

1:26:57So there could be like three people and they want to know what I think about something,

1:27:01but they don't know that I'm not getting the notifications.

1:27:03Oh, right, right. Okay, yeah, yeah, that makes sense.

1:27:05There could be a way to do that, which could be cool.

1:27:07But otherwise, this feature is very simple, hasn't had really any ramifications to it from my perspective.

1:27:13And I'm fine with it.

1:27:15The email has been, as I have written in my notes here, a huge, massive, incredible change.

1:27:22Oh, I'm so glad to hear that. I'm so glad to hear that.

1:27:24Listeners, let me tell you, to not get push notifications for every email that comes in is really good.

1:27:31It's a really good thing.

1:27:33I don't need to see or want to see them in my notification list in the morning when I start my day.

1:27:40I don't want to get bothered by notifications when I'm working on something else, and that's all gone away.

1:27:48Email has a significantly weaker hold on me than it has ever in my working life.

1:27:55I check it periodically through the day, and it's usually, for me, if a thought just pops into my mind,

1:28:04I'm like, "Oh, I haven't checked email." And that's usually how it is now.

1:28:07It's like, "Oh, I haven't checked email." Like, two months into it, that's how I'm still feeling.

1:28:11Let me go check it. And that will happen a few times a day.

1:28:14I took the Spark app off my iPhone. That's been fantastic.

1:28:19One of the harder things for me here is from the day that we did this, the next day,

1:28:27there was then an email that I was waiting on that was very important to me, which was like a real trial by fire.

1:28:36And I got myself into a little bit of a habit of just opening the mail app and peaking.

1:28:41Not doing anything, but peaking.

1:28:43Yeah, yeah.

1:28:44And so then I was realizing that it was appearing for me in Spotlight, like in the suggested apps.

1:28:50And so I turned that off, which is a thing you can do.

1:28:54You can go into certain apps and say, "Don't suggest this anymore." So that's been pretty good.

1:28:57And what I'm finding now is a few times a day, if I'm not at my computer,

1:29:02I might just open the mail app, see if there's anything that I'm needed for, and close it again.

1:29:10And that is actually great for me.

1:29:13Like, to be real about who I am, the idea that I would never look at email on my iPhone is not realistic.

1:29:22But I am so much closer to that than where I was before.

1:29:26And the biggest thing is I do not get any notifications at all for my email, and I don't manage my email on my iPhone.

1:29:34Those are the two things that's happening.

1:29:36I periodically check to see if there's anything that I need.

1:29:40And it's usually around when there are things that I'm waiting on.

1:29:44Like, for example, the thing that it was was Apple had their event at Battersea, and I wanted to go.

1:29:51And I was hoping to get an invite, and I did.

1:29:53But I very quickly got over the feeling that something bad could happen.

1:29:59You know, that was the first couple of days.

1:30:01I was like, "Oh, but what if something bad happens?"

1:30:03And it's actually fine.

1:30:05What I have learned is that it is incredibly rare that something bad is going to happen that I need to immediately know about through email.

1:30:12Usually bad things happen, but they don't need my immediate attention.

1:30:16And so let me spend a little bit longer in my life not knowing that thing and not being distracted by that thing before I eventually find that thing.

1:30:25So it's been amazing, man.

1:30:27Like, the impact on work distractions in the evening, as the combination of these two has been fantastic.

1:30:35I've often felt, I had this feeling of like, it feels quiet.

1:30:39Like that's like a thing I've had in my mind.

1:30:42Not even really pining to what I'm referring to, but just, "Huh, it feels quiet."

1:30:47And I'm not even necessarily thinking that like, "Oh, it's work that's quiet."

1:30:51But just in general, quiet.

1:30:53Right. Yeah.

1:30:55You have some space in your brain for, oh, I don't know, the whole rest of your life.

1:31:01Or nothing, right?

1:31:03You know, like in a combination of anything in the middle.

1:31:06This has been such a huge change for my work-life balance and my general happiness.

1:31:12Like, I feel more in control.

1:31:14I feel like I'm doing things more on my own time and like, my attention is not being like, demanded.

1:31:21I'm so happy that I brought this like, throwaway topic to the show because it has made my life so much better.

1:31:28I could not be happier to hear that.

1:31:32I felt like it was, like I was really giving you a hard sale last time on a thing that was like a big change.

1:31:39But I mean, again, like a huge thing.

1:31:42It's just like how much your life and the nature of your work has changed over these many years.

1:31:48Like, I think that that's the whole thing.

1:31:50Like, if your job was still what it was 10 years ago, you couldn't do this.

1:31:55But like, the role has completely changed.

1:31:57And yeah, now you like, you need to have brain space.

1:32:01You need to have periods of time where you can just be looking at a sheet of paper and thinking about how to arrange dots on it.

1:32:08Like for like, the product that's coming out.

1:32:11Like, all of these things you need to have.

1:32:13And I am forever convinced that people dramatically underrate how disruptive to thinking even minor notifications are.

1:32:26That's why like, people who've listened to the show over the years.

1:32:29I know I sound like a lunatic for all of these times.

1:32:33I'm like, I'm trying to make downtime work with me.

1:32:35I've made myself my own child accounts, right, to try to eliminate all this stuff.

1:32:39But it's because I just think people don't appreciate it.

1:32:42And it's very hard to even see how valuable that is until you actually experience it directly for a little while.

1:32:53So like, I'm so glad that that's what you're doing right now.

1:32:56And you're seeing like, oh yeah, my brain feels different.

1:33:00What is this feeling? It's quiet.

1:33:03That's what that feeling is.

1:33:05So good. I'm so happy, Mike. I really, really am.

1:33:08I couldn't be more pleased and more proud that you did it.

1:33:12Well, look, thank you for pushing me.

1:33:14I appreciate that you heard what I had to say and you gave me the tough love that I needed to actually do this.

1:33:21Like, I needed it and I genuinely hope that people maybe can hear this, go back to that episode and re-listen to it and then do what I've done.

1:33:31Because I am convinced and I would like to convince others this is a better way to live.

1:33:37Like, we should not be getting notifications for email. It can wait.