00:00:00 ◼ ► Last year, we created the term Stacked September, and it was summing up kind of what that time of the year was like for me last year.
00:00:14 ◼ ► Oh wow, wow. I feel like through words we created a thing. We made it true. This is the stacked-est September yet.
00:00:26 ◼ ► Well, last year was worse. I feel confident in that. And I think this year's September for me so far has been easier because it was so surprising last time.
00:00:41 ◼ ► So like last year, it was a similar thing to this year because September is always a time where a bunch of stuff's going on.
00:00:48 ◼ ► So we're raising money for St. Jude and we're doing the podcast a ton that we'll talk about in a bit.
00:00:52 ◼ ► Apple events. We are again putting ourselves in the situation where we're stocking up heavily on Cortex brand products for the holiday season.
00:01:02 ◼ ► Like we didn't learn a lesson. And I'm also away for an even longer portion of the month.
00:01:09 ◼ ► Like I actually re-listened this morning to the start of that conversation. And I was like, "Oh, I'm away for a third of the month. Well, this time I'm away for half of the month."
00:01:18 ◼ ► Which is different. But I think being aware of it and being aware of how busy September has become and continues to get more busy, I think has helped me kind of keep my head in the game a little bit this time around.
00:01:34 ◼ ► Sometimes there is just being aware and confronting an issue can help you prepare for it mentally in the future. And I think that that has been the case.
00:01:42 ◼ ► Obviously there has been a functional change this year, which is that less of my time has been given to the fundraising campaign from an administrative perspective because me and Steven did a divide and conquer thing with the live show.
00:01:56 ◼ ► July was definitely worse in September, I think, in kind of like my emotional state during that period of time. I think it's been much better for me this September than July was.
00:02:07 ◼ ► I've had some wobbles, there's been planes sailing, but I think I'm in a better spot. And I do also attribute Year of People to that a little bit.
00:02:13 ◼ ► Like having people around to help do things or even to help me do more with less work has also been very helpful.
00:02:23 ◼ ► But yeah, I just wanted to, as I was thinking about today's show, I was like, "Oh, it is actually strikingly similar to this time last year." But I do feel better about it, which is good.
00:02:34 ◼ ► I'm really glad to hear that you're feeling better about it. I had such a strong reaction because I was thinking it's Stacked September between the two of us.
00:02:43 ◼ ► It's definitely way more, I was thinking across both of us, but you were prepared because Stacked September was all about what was going on last year, primarily with your stuff.
00:02:56 ◼ ► But that's what I bet by I feel like, "Oh no, we've given a thing a name, it's like come into existence."
00:03:02 ◼ ► And I did not even realize, like all year long, I've been like preparing for September because for me too, it's like, "Oh boy, busy time, unexpectedly busy in a bunch of ways."
00:03:14 ◼ ► I did not even realize it's like, "Oh, why does it feel like something September this way comes?" Because it's Stacked September. That's why.
00:03:26 ◼ ► It is a function of the more things that get added into the month, it becomes like a magnetic effect that draws more things towards it.
00:03:37 ◼ ► It's just a function of this time of year because if you're in the tech orbit, it's the busiest time of the year.
00:03:49 ◼ ► And now that we are in the product world, it's what we need to do too. If we want to have things on sale for the end of the year, we need to start committing in September at the latest.
00:04:02 ◼ ► Yeah, that's totally the case. And it's like, "Oh yeah, the YouTube business has some mild cyclicality too, which is around September."
00:04:13 ◼ ► And that's why, I guess, I too feel like I'm getting really pulled into the orbit of Stacked September. I'm very aware when, like just when talking to people, everyone's always surprised about like, "Oh, to get ready for Christmas, you really need to like know what you're doing by summertime."
00:04:31 ◼ ► And then that's also why in my head, it's the same thing of like, "Ah, all final decisions like by September, like they really need to be made. Otherwise it's going to be too late."
00:04:42 ◼ ► You know what? I just had this like flash all of a sudden, as I've just realized once again, it's like everything old is new again.
00:04:49 ◼ ► My whole life, because of being in school and then working as a teacher, it always feels like September is the real turnover, right?
00:04:57 ◼ ► Summer is when time ends. Summer is when I'm always thinking of like wrapping up my Thebes and it's like the new thing.
00:05:03 ◼ ► It's like, but here we go again. It's like September really feels like I can never get away from it actually being like the most important month of the year, no matter what I'm doing.
00:05:18 ◼ ► But now it is also this funny thing with our incredible content calendar that we have now.
00:05:24 ◼ ► It also really like September becomes weird too, because it's like we have stately apps and yearly themes.
00:05:30 ◼ ► Like, you know, it's like there is this weird thing that is just happening at this time of the year for us more and more where like the fourth quarter is just like set in stone.
00:05:44 ◼ ► Yeah. But also like I could feel myself doing the very thing that you're just mentioning, which is like I know that we can't, but I still, I have always wanted to move up the theme episode to around this time.
00:05:54 ◼ ► It's like, "Hey, Mike, can we do the theme episode in September too?" Right? I think that would be a great idea.
00:06:04 ◼ ► Perfect time. We could just put something else in September. What could possibly go wrong?
00:06:14 ◼ ► And that is why for the last five years, we have been coming together as a community at Relay to support the work, the lifesaving work of St. Jude Children's Research Hospital.
00:06:24 ◼ ► When we opened this year's campaign, even the first couple of days, we hit a new incredible goal that we have in these five years raised over $3 million together since 2019.
00:06:40 ◼ ► We have absolutely smashed through it again because of the generosity of the community.
00:06:45 ◼ ► I'm not sure if I had told you about this actually. So maybe you'll find out about this as you tell our listeners.
00:06:50 ◼ ► Now that we've passed $3 million, St. Jude is going to be recognizing Relay on a wall inside of the hospital that highlights corporations and organizations of exceptional fundraising efforts.
00:07:03 ◼ ► You know, like you've seen these kinds of things before. It's like a wall of thanks essentially.
00:07:07 ◼ ► And it is for various companies and organizations. And Relay is going to be a pretty incredible company.
00:07:14 ◼ ► And so there's going to be an unveiling of that. I think it's late this year or early next year. And so we'll be sharing pictures of that when it happens.
00:07:20 ◼ ► But because of the continued support of our community, I am very confident that Relay's name will remain on the halls in St. Jude for years to come.
00:07:29 ◼ ► I also realized there's something else that I didn't mention that I wanted to tell the cortex about because it's very important to me.
00:07:39 ◼ ► We spoke about that a little bit in the last Moretex episode, like in the Moretex segment.
00:07:45 ◼ ► But St. Jude came to that and they awarded Stephen and I and Relay with the St. Jude Creator Achievement Award for the work that we have done.
00:08:01 ◼ ► So there's one other content creator that's received that award. And so that was very special.
00:08:06 ◼ ► And look, all these awards, incredible, but ultimately the result of what everyone has done for this.
00:08:17 ◼ ► It's really just like, you're receiving an award, but it's on behalf of thousands and thousands of people who have helped do this.
00:08:26 ◼ ► That is exactly it. Nothing makes me feel more like our listeners or a community than the work that we do for St. Jude.
00:08:40 ◼ ► Like we raise for the last few years, the best part of three quarters of a million dollars every year, like three million dollars raised in five years.
00:09:01 ◼ ► That is what I'm so proud of in our campaigns, that we were able to raise all this money because of the generosity of our listeners who join us.
00:09:13 ◼ ► One of them is my co-founder, one of my best friends, Stephen Hackett, his son Josiah's life was saved by St. Jude.
00:09:25 ◼ ► Stephen was lucky enough to be living in Memphis, so he was aware of St. Jude and the hospitals there were aware of St. Jude and so they referred them.
00:09:39 ◼ ► Who knows what would have happened about them, but what we know is that the efforts that they do on a daily basis save the lives of thousands of children.
00:09:50 ◼ ► And it's not just in the US. So St. Jude is a hospital in Memphis, Tennessee. There's one place and that is where they treat children from all over the world.
00:09:59 ◼ ► But they are also a research institution and they share what they learn freely with everyone.
00:10:06 ◼ ► And talking of freely, every child who is treated at St. Jude, their parents pay for nothing.
00:10:12 ◼ ► They do not pay the medical bills. They do not pay for food. They do not pay for shelter.
00:10:15 ◼ ► They pay for nothing because all St. Jude care about is when a child is under their care that their parents focus on nothing except the family.
00:10:24 ◼ ► That everybody is just focused on the healing nature of being a family and not worrying about trying to find the money to pay for the child care, to even pay for the lodging if they've come from somewhere else.
00:10:39 ◼ ► 400,000 children every year are estimated to develop cancer and nearly half of them are never diagnosed.
00:10:46 ◼ ► In the US, more than four out of five children survive cancer. But in many countries around the world, this statistic is reversed with fewer than one in five developing cancer surviving.
00:10:57 ◼ ► The most significant predictor of a child will survive cancer is where they live, which is why in March of 2018, St. Jude became the first and only World Health Organization collaborating center for childhood cancer.
00:11:09 ◼ ► The goal of this global initiative is to raise the survival rate of six common childhood cancers to 60% by 2030.
00:11:17 ◼ ► In 2021, St. Jude and the WHO launched the global platform for access to childhood cancer medicines.
00:11:24 ◼ ► It aims to provide free chemotherapy medicines in the next few years to as many as 120,000 children around the world.
00:11:37 ◼ ► And we have a global audience. And that's what I am so proud of and why I like to relay this message.
00:11:43 ◼ ► You all just seem from all over the world. If you go to stjude.org/relay and donate, that is an incredible thing.
00:11:53 ◼ ► Our community has consistently blown us away with the support that it gives. And we're asking for you to do it again.
00:12:00 ◼ ► So please go to stjude.org/relay. There's so much information there. You can find how to donate.
00:12:13 ◼ ► Because if you're a company, if you work for a company that does corporate donation matching, you can double the amount that you donate, which is incredible.
00:12:25 ◼ ► But you can also increase the amount of your donation by signing up to fundraise alongside with us.
00:12:30 ◼ ► So all the information at stjude.org/relay, you can sign up and then you can spread this mission as well with your friends, your family, your co-workers, and increase the amount of money that we can all collectively raise together.
00:12:43 ◼ ► There is incentives for people who fundraise. We have the best incentives we've ever had. Like the campaign art this year is unbelievable.
00:12:50 ◼ ► And also similarly, if you make a donation on your own, we have some fun things that you can redeem like stickers and screensavers or wallpapers and all this kind of fun stuff.
00:12:59 ◼ ► In this year, which is Relay FM's 10th year and our 5th year working with St. Jude, I truly feel stronger than ever about us all being this community of people who care about things, whatever they are.
00:13:14 ◼ ► We care about similar things, which is why we all listen to these podcasts and like to make them and we share that together.
00:13:21 ◼ ► And I also hope that this can transfer into people believing in this cause that we believe in and give a dollar, ten dollars, a hundred dollars, whatever you can give, it doesn't matter.
00:13:33 ◼ ► It all helps. Because when we rally for that cause, we become more than a community, we become beacons of hope.
00:13:41 ◼ ► So that is why we are asking you once again to join us with the Relay for St. Jude campaign for Childhood Cancer Awareness Month because truly, together, we can help cure childhood cancer.
00:13:57 ◼ ► And don't forget, we're going to be doing the Podcastathon for St. Jude on Friday, September 20th from 12pm to 12am US Eastern Time, live from the campus at St. Jude at youtube.com/atrelayfm.
00:14:14 ◼ ► We're doing it on YouTube this year for the first time, which is, in my opinion, a better live streaming system.
00:14:19 ◼ ► But also you can, I'll put a link in the show notes where you can go and you can set a reminder up so YouTube will let you know when we're going live.
00:14:25 ◼ ► We're going to be live for 12 hours, it's going to be bigger and better and more bombastic than ever before.
00:14:30 ◼ ► So I hope that you'll come and join us as we raise even more money for the kids at St. Jude.
00:14:35 ◼ ► Behind the scenes, Mike has a very grueling travel schedule to get there to make it happen.
00:14:40 ◼ ► So dedicated and obviously every year I always love all the stuff that they're doing with research, but I didn't realize how they were expanding it with these global goals.
00:15:12 ◼ ► I feel like I have rarely had so many thoughts after an Apple Christmas as this one because I feel like there's a very strange theme here that makes me wonder,
00:15:28 ◼ ► "What's going on over there, Apple? What's going on? Strange year. Strange year across all products? Why?"
00:15:42 ◼ ► What strikes you as strange? Is it Apple Intelligence? Is that what makes it weird or is it more than that?
00:15:51 ◼ ► I actually watched it with my mom and it's kind of like as family tech support, it's like upgrade year for my parents.
00:15:59 ◼ ► And so I was kind of like thinking more about the whole product line than I normally would.
00:16:25 ◼ ► Because the way I would describe it is like the thing that Tim Santa did this year was he raised the low-end products.
00:17:21 ◼ ► And the regular iPhone really moved up to be almost indistinguishable from the Pro for 99% of normal consumers.
00:17:41 ◼ ► I think often people like cynically assume that companies will always like put new features in the high-end products to like cause more people to buy that product.
00:17:55 ◼ ► But I think another reason that companies do it is because when they have more margin on the high-end products.
00:18:07 ◼ ► It's a way for specifically tech companies to try out or like do the first run of something that they eventually want to bring to the entire line.
00:18:27 ◼ ► And I cannot remember any other time where across the whole line the top end didn't move or it moved in lockstep with the bottom end.
00:18:39 ◼ ► I've been noodling over this for the past few days just trying to think about like what could be the reason?
00:18:51 ◼ ► I have a bunch of vague ideas but it's just really notable to me as different and unusual behavior from Apple.
00:18:58 ◼ ► So that's kind of like my high-end thoughts with what was going on with Apple Christmas.
00:19:14 ◼ ► So like I have knits to pick in it which is that this conversation is easier to have looking at the phones.
00:19:25 ◼ ► And I feel like a significant reason for a lot of the similarities between the 16 and the 16 Pro is Apple intelligence.
00:19:34 ◼ ► Like that there are features that they have added to these phones that have kind of brought them closer together.
00:19:41 ◼ ► Because if they believe in this they need to get the most amount of devices available as possible that can support these features.
00:19:49 ◼ ► Which includes the camera control which has its own story in the Apple intelligence part.
00:19:54 ◼ ► Right being able to use it to point your phone at something and say what is this right?
00:20:02 ◼ ► But you if you want to have that as being one of the key features of Apple intelligence.
00:20:24 ◼ ► And realistically the differences between the regular one and the Pro one of the new stuff that they added is just some additional camera features.
00:20:43 ◼ ► Right yeah like I found it really interesting like going line by because I was really thinking like did I get that sort of like the wrong impression.
00:21:19 ◼ ► They are aimed exactly at like professional photographers and professional videographers.
00:21:47 ◼ ► So what they call promotion and always on the regular phone doesn't have either of those features still.
00:22:03 ◼ ► I think that is obscene that there's it should be 90 if they want to have a difference.
00:22:07 ◼ ► And then the actual biggest change that I'm pretty excited about is that the ultra wide camera is a
00:22:16 ◼ ► Because I have been over the course of the last year increasingly unhappy with the vast
00:22:27 ◼ ► Because anything that is close up it switches to the ultra wide because the focal distance
00:22:36 ◼ ► So they switch to what they call their macro mode and that lens is significantly worse.
00:23:13 ◼ ► Of I'm just trying to mentally model like oh my family everybody needs a new phone this year.
00:23:24 ◼ ► probably makes sense to get like the highest end phone because they're going to wait several
00:23:29 ◼ ► But as I was watching and just more and more I was like now I think I think like I'm getting
00:23:55 ◼ ► And the positive spin on that is well now the $800 phone is a significantly better deal
00:24:04 ◼ ► Which is great when you're in the scenario that you're in right of like making recommendations
00:24:36 ◼ ► It's like I like them but obviously Apple's going to rev them soon like dot dot dot for
00:25:00 ◼ ► Love these headphones would use them more if they were just a tiny bit better in a whole
00:25:05 ◼ ► I was so excited I took a picture of watching the Apple event with the headphones to like
00:25:16 ◼ ► And then it was like oh no like I'm listening to like the actual description of what it
00:25:37 ◼ ► Like the thing that really shocks me whenever I go to the gym I don't know what it is but
00:25:50 ◼ ► I'm seeing them more and more and more which also makes this whole thing more ridiculous
00:25:53 ◼ ► that people have decided to start buying them and then they decided that their update would
00:26:36 ◼ ► New watches nice thin whatever but it's more like I just find myself quite intrigued about
00:26:53 ◼ ► So your your idea I think is sort of like a plausible one right it's like Apple intelligence
00:26:59 ◼ ► is the thing that caused this to happen but I have a hard time understanding like maybe
00:27:05 ◼ ► but did they pull people from like the headphone team in order to make sure that Apple intelligence
00:27:14 ◼ ► Well I mean you know AirPods 4 with the active noise cancellation is a pretty big deal like
00:27:20 ◼ ► I didn't think that that would be possible like people were rumouring it and I was like
00:27:23 ◼ ► I don't know how you can do that without creating a seal in the ear but like just for whatever
00:27:28 ◼ ► reason they have decided that the AirPods Max is a product that remains in their lineup
00:27:34 ◼ ► I can't work that one out everything else I feel like I can kind of come up with something
00:27:40 ◼ ► but this one is like I just don't know why you'd bother like at all it's very strange to me.
00:27:46 ◼ ► My best guess on there is I don't know they're just doing it for some like EU compliance reasons
00:27:56 ◼ ► Yes that is true but the USB-C EU rule that I understand is only if you only have to do
00:28:09 ◼ ► Oh I didn't realize the grandfather's in stuff okay okay so that doesn't make sense but yeah
00:28:13 ◼ ► again like I will agree like the noise cancelling on the regular AirPods is like actually very
00:28:18 ◼ ► impressive it makes me consider buying them because there are times I really don't want
00:28:22 ◼ ► to have like the full seal for comfort reasons I often want I wear I'm wearing headphones
00:28:27 ◼ ► all the time and I want to shift the different kinds that I'm wearing but I've got to have
00:28:31 ◼ ► noise cancelling so it's very interesting it's very impressive but I'm still just saying it's
00:28:35 ◼ ► like it's interesting to me that in the high end like AirPods Pro 2 there wasn't an AirPods Pro 3
00:28:44 ◼ ► AirPods Pro it's off schedule for that so it's typically like a two-year refresh and so it would
00:28:52 ◼ ► But I still say everything AirPods Max the watch the Ultra Watch didn't move up it's like oh are
00:28:58 ◼ ► they off cycle for that and they're off cycle for the AirPods and both of the phones got
00:29:03 ◼ ► closer together I don't know uh like something's up I want to go to Apple headquarters and
00:29:07 ◼ ► start poking people and be like hey hey what's going on guys what you doing do people move
00:29:12 ◼ ► around did priorities move around you got something big coming and you just missed it a
00:29:16 ◼ ► little for this year is this just a coincidence that happens sometimes I'm full of questions
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00:31:55 ◼ ► down to the pro fund this year. I'm not getting a pro max. I'm getting the small screen.
00:32:06 ◼ ► It's even bigger. It's basically larger and the screen is bigger. But I've been thinking
00:32:11 ◼ ► about it. One of the things that I've mentioned previously was part of my email thing was I would
00:32:25 ◼ ► more to a bigger screen to do work and so then that is like an extra decision that needs to
00:32:30 ◼ ► be made. It's like, "All right, do I really want to do this right now? So I'll go get my laptop or
00:32:35 ◼ ► go get my iPad? Am I going to do that or can I just not do that right now?" So then in thinking
00:32:41 ◼ ► about this a bit more, my wife has the smaller pro phone and I've just been kind of playing around
00:32:46 ◼ ► with it and to be able to use just one hand to do everything on my iPhone is really nice.
00:33:02 ◼ ► The only thing that I would be losing out on is a little bit of battery life but because they
00:33:08 ◼ ► increase the battery life on all the phones again this year, it would be like one to two hours
00:33:14 ◼ ► maximum that I would lose from my 15 Pro Max. So I'm going to give it a go this year. I'm going to
00:33:19 ◼ ► go with the 16 Pro and I want to see what it's like. So we've talked a couple of times about
00:33:25 ◼ ► your changing habits around particularly email on your phone. Is that behavior sticking for you?
00:33:31 ◼ ► Like you're still doing email less on the phone? Yeah, very much so and I think I would like to
00:33:36 ◼ ► push that towards working, like trying to work on my phone less. And when I say trying, it's like
00:33:44 ◼ ► what I mean more is I find myself sometimes trying to do things that are just like complicated to do
00:33:50 ◼ ► on my iPhone, like looking at a spreadsheet, like all of these kinds of things and I try to make it
00:33:55 ◼ ► do. And so I think I would like to try and encourage myself to do less of that and I think
00:34:02 ◼ ► that having a smaller phone would help but this phone would still be big enough, easily big enough
00:34:08 ◼ ► that I would be able to enjoy all of the things that I enjoy on my iPhone like watching YouTube
00:34:13 ◼ ► videos and stuff like that, playing games. Like this screen is more than enough for that while at
00:34:18 ◼ ► the same time being easier to go in my pocket, easier to be in my hand. You know, I've been
00:34:23 ◼ ► thinking about the camera control thing, right? Oh yeah. I think it would be really nice if you
00:34:28 ◼ ► could kind of just hold your phone in one hand and take a picture. I can't do that with the big one,
00:34:33 ◼ ► like in a way in which I feel comfortable, like I've been playing around with it and it's like
00:34:37 ◼ ► it doesn't feel very secure. Like you know the way I would hold it like two-thirds of this phone is
00:34:42 ◼ ► just like out there, just like suspended in the air. Oh I didn't even think to try that. Yeah,
00:34:47 ◼ ► okay so yeah even on my phone it's like ooh I wouldn't want it much bigger before I would feel
00:34:52 ◼ ► even on like the regular size phone. Like this is uncomfortable to try to one-hand a camera. I
00:34:56 ◼ ► wasn't thinking of like one-handing the camera but yeah I would not want to do that on a max size
00:35:00 ◼ ► phone, no way. No. So I'm willing to give it a go this year and I think it would be like a fun
00:35:06 ◼ ► change for me because I have been biggest phone since the iPhone 6 plus. I was like since there
00:35:12 ◼ ► were big phones basically right? Like you've been a big phone boy the whole time? For me it wasn't,
00:35:18 ◼ ► I feel like I always wanted the biggest screen but I don't necessarily always want the biggest screen
00:35:24 ◼ ► if that makes sense. Like I just want a screen that is what I feel big enough and I think we have
00:35:28 ◼ ► passed that now. I think we've definitely gone past big enough. Like if this phone just kept
00:35:34 ◼ ► getting bigger and bigger like I don't want to, I don't think I want to do that. What's that meme
00:35:38 ◼ ► where like the grim reaper is going from door to door and like and you just see like the blood
00:35:43 ◼ ► pouring out from each door? I had that feeling watching the pro thing which was like oh boy it
00:35:50 ◼ ► feels like someone at Apple is the grim reaper for professional camera features that other companies
00:35:57 ◼ ► have and they are just like going down the list of like what can Nikon and Canon do that we can't?
00:36:04 ◼ ► And that's what that presentation really felt like was like just oh this? We do that too. The half
00:36:10 ◼ ► button press? Got it. Subject lock? Nailed it. It'll be better than what they do. And I just like
00:36:16 ◼ ► when I was watching with my mom at one point they were like going through the professional photo
00:36:20 ◼ ► studio even like the whole they built a whole new set which was like look at our pro photography
00:36:25 ◼ ► set and I kept having this feeling like they built that set to show you how you don't need
00:36:29 ◼ ► any of this stuff with their phone. But I turned to my mom at one point and I was like if I was the
00:36:34 ◼ ► CEO of Canon cameras I would be throwing up into a bucket right next to my desk right now like
00:36:39 ◼ ► this presentation is just brute like as someone who is familiar with like what are the features
00:36:46 ◼ ► that real pros use I would be sick if I was in the camera business and even the fact that they
00:36:54 ◼ ► made the big one like a really big screen it's not a specific feature but I was so aware they
00:37:02 ◼ ► kept showing like those little like gripper things for the big phone if you want to be filming videos
00:37:07 ◼ ► I thought like yeah that's why they're making the screen even bigger because it's not a phone it's a
00:37:14 ◼ ► view screen for filming like that's what they're doing with that Pro Max phone like I think they
00:37:19 ◼ ► are going to push that thing closer and closer to basically being a film camera replacement
00:37:26 ◼ ► and then that's why they can push up the size because the people buying that aren't one-handing
00:37:32 ◼ ► it they're locking it into a filming system like it is a genuine professional level everything
00:37:39 ◼ ► camera so yeah I guess that makes sense like yeah at some point right even if it wasn't this year
00:37:45 ◼ ► I feel like yeah my prediction is they're going to keep inching up that screen size and at some
00:37:49 ◼ ► point you might have found yourself going like well this is just ridiculous uh having this
00:37:53 ◼ ► Gigando phone so boy it's a real end of an era though with you not buying the biggest phone
00:37:58 ◼ ► yeah it is it's the thing I am most excited about oh really oh that's great yes because it's like
00:38:03 ◼ ► it's new right like that's going to be completely new for me and I'm excited about that like part
00:38:09 ◼ ► of my life is trying technology and interesting ways to be able to have things to talk about
00:38:16 ◼ ► and like this will be a new thing for me to talk about like that I'll be experiencing a smaller
00:38:20 ◼ ► phone for whatever that might end up being like for me so I'm excited about that I do want to
00:38:25 ◼ ► talk about the camera control real quick though because in state of the hardware every year we
00:38:30 ◼ ► lament phone case companies for the challenges of being a phone case company and this year might be
00:38:39 ◼ ► the worst it's ever been and I think they all know it but no one knows how bad it's going to be it's
00:38:45 ◼ ► like the phones aren't out yet reviews aren't out yet but like the thing that sealed it for me was
00:38:50 ◼ ► when apple said our phone cases have another piece of sapphire crystal in them so that we can read
00:38:57 ◼ ► all of the gestures easily and I was like well pack it up hold please I need to send you the
00:39:05 ◼ ► notes that I was taking during this apple event because I just I need you to see the writing that
00:39:09 ◼ ► I did when I wrote this one thing okay so here are the final three notes on my ipad and you can
00:39:16 ◼ ► put this you can put this in the show notes for people the second they said that that thing about
00:39:24 ◼ ► the sapphire crystal man we thought last year was bad for oh I'm in the phone case business
00:39:30 ◼ ► it was again one of these things like did apple just make a decision where they're like
00:39:34 ◼ ► hey all that money for all these cases we want all of it give us all your phone case money because
00:39:43 ◼ ► we're making this thing it's like oh god uh it's awful so I have a fun little theory about this
00:39:50 ◼ ► so last year they replaced the leather cases with a new thing called fine woven right which was them
00:39:57 ◼ ► trying to make a high quality case didn't that not go well though didn't people know those cases did
00:40:03 ◼ ► not age very well okay unlike leather the patina ring looked bad it didn't go very well they're
00:40:11 ◼ ► gone okay this year apple is producing just silicone cases but they have produced the only
00:40:19 ◼ ► case that's going to work perfectly with the brand new feature so if at any year they're going to be
00:40:25 ◼ ► like all right we're just going to get out of the high-end case business do it at the year where
00:40:30 ◼ ► really you should only be buying apple's case if you buy this fun oh okay I see what you're saying
00:40:35 ◼ ► right it's a way for them to like kill that if you're going to cut your losses on it cut your
00:40:39 ◼ ► losses on it now in the year where you're most likely to be able to sell the most cases so you
00:40:44 ◼ ► kind of just like let it go that's a good observation that's really good because fine woven
00:40:49 ◼ ► is not completely gone like there are apple watch bands made of it because they can't make a leather
00:40:54 ◼ ► like something although that's like leather so they're still making those the same as wallets
00:40:58 ◼ ► the wallets are made of leather and they're keeping them but they instead of trying to come
00:41:02 ◼ ► up with something else to replace the high-end leather case or like to try and make fine woven
00:41:07 ◼ ► better it seems like they've just cut their losses and it's like an easier year to do it because
00:41:11 ◼ ► if you want to use the camera control the only truly satisfying case to use it with is going
00:41:16 ◼ ► to be apple's case because it will be just like using the camera control because i started poking
00:41:21 ◼ ► around and looking at everybody's cases the third-party companies even the third parties
00:41:26 ◼ ► that apple's selling on their store so the ones that you expect apple gave information about the
00:41:31 ◼ ► dimensions to like autobox they all have cutouts right and there's two styles of cutout you've got
00:41:37 ◼ ► the big cutout where it's like a big like u-shape or something where you see some of the frame of
00:41:42 ◼ ► the phone right and then the button or you've got the one where people have gotten the schematics
00:41:47 ◼ ► somehow or they're going to very quickly get them and they're cutting just the shape of the button
00:41:52 ◼ ► out of the case so you've kind of got to reach down inside of it kind of like what a lot of
00:41:57 ◼ ► people did for the action button but i am convinced that is going to be a disaster to use because
00:42:03 ◼ ► yeah there's pressure sensitivity right in this button and there's swiping and i don't think any
00:42:08 ◼ ► of that's going to feel good with those cases so like yeah no way being a case manufacturer this
00:42:13 ◼ ► year is nightmarish and because i started looking at a few cases all of my instagram ads for the
00:42:19 ◼ ► last week has been phone cases which i'm very happy about because i'm seeing how everyone's
00:42:23 ◼ ► doing it and by and large not good now i'm really intrigued for like if there is going to be a way
00:42:31 ◼ ► for third parties to do this like i'm sure that at some point some of them will just be able to
00:42:38 ◼ ► reverse engineer what apple's doing and just do their own i could imagine a scenario where maybe
00:42:43 ◼ ► apple puts this into the made for iphone program so you can pay them a fee and you can get all of
00:42:48 ◼ ► the information and all the parts for that little piece of sapphire crystal to put in your own case
00:42:53 ◼ ► but as of right now the companies that are trying to say like hey you buying a phone next week buy
00:42:59 ◼ ► your case now they all have some kind of cut out and i just don't think it's gonna feel very good
00:43:08 ◼ ► to use i could be wrong but i'm not convinced and and all i know is again i would not want to be one
00:43:16 ◼ ► of these companies because i just can't see a scenario in which you'd be confident right now
00:43:23 ◼ ► that you're going to be able to make your customers happy that's very interesting i feel like we're
00:43:27 ◼ ► getting dangerously close to upgrade territory here with like the business details but i'm trying
00:43:32 ◼ ► to ask like so the made for iphone thing it's like i forgot that program exists where apple gets like
00:43:39 ◼ ► the licensing fee do you know am i correct in thinking that case manufacturers currently don't
00:43:44 ◼ ► do that like there's no licensing fee with apple they don't have that certification right for the
00:43:50 ◼ ► cases like you just make a case because you know how big it is it's just an object in the world
00:43:54 ◼ ► well if you want to say that you're magsafe certified then that's with apple but i think
00:43:59 ◼ ► for cases you need to worry about that so much yes that makes perfect sense ah it's like with
00:44:04 ◼ ► our fantastic sidekick notepad where it's hand assembled in the united kingdom and like in order
00:44:08 ◼ ► to be able to say that we have to like demonstrate a bunch of properties about the way that the
00:44:13 ◼ ► notebook is made and so if you want to say that your phone case is magsafe if you want to like
00:44:19 ◼ ► use that word or the phrasing like magsafe compatible then you do have to pay the licensing
00:44:24 ◼ ► fee to apple so they've half done that so yeah for sure it's going to have to be right that they have
00:44:32 ◼ ► to do it through the main through iphone thing if they have the camera case oh wow that is devilish
00:44:40 ◼ ► that is absolutely devilish i never thought of that apple's just looking everywhere for
00:44:47 ◼ ► money where can we hoover up all the money all these pennies uh ours amazing this is actually
00:44:54 ◼ ► from apple's website cases that don't integrate made for iphone components like non-electro
00:44:59 ◼ ► are not part of the program iphone battery cases and magsafe enabled cases are part of the program
00:45:06 ◼ ► okay yeah so if you want to say that your case is magsafe compatible you were part of the m5 program
00:45:12 ◼ ► yeah i was just thinking like i'm aware of this when i buy the magsafe chargers because
00:45:16 ◼ ► the real ones also send out like the unique id thing so that your phone has some sense of like
00:45:22 ◼ ► which screen should it always show for the always on so it does different things in different rooms
00:45:26 ◼ ► if you're using but like if you're using a like the generic charger they don't broadcast like the
00:45:31 ◼ ► id in the correct format or whatever it is boy fascinating uh what a delicious detail you have
00:45:36 ◼ ► brought to me mike uh i love it it's so funny uh and it's just the worst thing ever cortex brand
00:45:41 ◼ ► will never make a phone case never ever never ever let's do some ask cortex questions ask cortex.com
00:45:51 ◼ ► uh yes so if you do have a question for a future episode you can go to ask cortex.com and you can
00:45:55 ◼ ► submit it but there's always a link in the show notes to do that too jabki asks how often do you
00:46:01 ◼ ► take breaks during work and for how long i've been writing my thesis and have found that the pomodoro
00:46:07 ◼ ► technique is working for me but i wondered how you both do it it's a funny question for me i've
00:46:12 ◼ ► been thinking about people who write like phd theses a little bit this summer it's like
00:46:17 ◼ ► tangentially related to the like the thing that i'm currently working on but yeah this summer has
00:46:21 ◼ ► been like uh for me it's been one of the biggest stretches of like tweaking and sort of working on
00:46:28 ◼ ► like what is a good routine what is the optimal number of breaks this has been like real top of
00:46:33 ◼ ► mind for me lately i have tried the pomodoro technique and i find it doesn't work for me at all
00:46:39 ◼ ► okay let me say this for anyone who is giving this a try if it works for you where you do it's like
00:46:44 ◼ ► 25 minutes and then five minutes i think is the like the pomodoro one so 25 minutes of work and
00:46:49 ◼ ► five minutes of break and then like you repeat it a bunch of times i think that can be really good
00:46:53 ◼ ► for administrative work like i tend to realize like oh yeah 20 to 25 minutes is actually really
00:47:00 ◼ ► good for like clearing emails kind of work or like getting back to people kind of work but for
00:47:07 ◼ ► something like a phd thesis i would be concerned that the pomodoro technique is like interrupting
00:47:13 ◼ ► you at exactly the moment you're really getting going and something i really kind of settled with
00:47:20 ◼ ► over the summer and like i even wrote it on my like i had it like pop up on my computer to remind
00:47:24 ◼ ► me as like a thing which is the first 20 minutes is always hard that like when i'm getting into a
00:47:33 ◼ ► writing block the first 10 to 20 minutes you shouldn't expect that it goes easily like it is
00:47:39 ◼ ► always the hardest bit it's like the slowest bit and it feels like you're trying to get this train
00:47:44 ◼ ► going and so that's why for my work i wouldn't use something like the pomodoro because it's going to
00:47:50 ◼ ► interrupt me like right as the flow starts so for me the way that it's really worked perfectly is
00:48:04 ◼ ► 30 to maybe 40 minutes if i'm really on a roll but that's about optimal for me it's like i'm
00:48:11 ◼ ► going to plan on each little block of work is like an hour and 20 minutes and then i'll take a break
00:48:18 ◼ ► and then do another like block of an hour and 20 minutes and especially for that very first one
00:48:24 ◼ ► it's like oh the first 20 minutes of the first hour and 20 minute block i've just been like nope
00:48:29 ◼ ► that's the hard one sitting here and like feeling like the train is just like barely pulling out of
00:48:35 ◼ ► the station is part of that process then you get like a good hour take something like a 10
00:48:41 ◼ ► to maybe 15 minute break and then do like another one of those so that's kind of what my rhythm is
00:48:49 ◼ ► and depending on how hard i'm pushing myself is like how many really good hour and 20 minute
00:48:56 ◼ ► sessions can i get in a day that's like the hard limit and the thing that i was experimenting with
00:49:02 ◼ ► which i actually found worked kind of great it's like another layer to think about on top of this
00:49:08 ◼ ► is like the way i was phrasing this in my head is like oh a block of time it's like up or it's down
00:49:15 ◼ ► which means am i like sitting down and working during this block is this editing and typing
00:49:21 ◼ ► writing or am i standing up so am i talking it out loud and a thing that i feel like i i stumbled
00:49:29 ◼ ► upon but that works really well is trying to alternate like up and down blocks so it's like
00:49:35 ◼ ► oh the first block in the morning of an hour and 20 it's like standing up and talking and then the
00:49:41 ◼ ► next one is down i'm sitting at the computer and i'm writing now for the next hour and 20 minutes
00:49:47 ◼ ► and then the thing that's nice is i can then squeeze in like an exercise block counts as an
00:49:55 ◼ ► up block so it's like oh do two sessions of work the second session was down then do exercise for
00:50:03 ◼ ► like about an hour that counts as like an uptime and then go back down like sitting at the computer
00:50:09 ◼ ► and writing some more so that's where i currently am with like rhythms that work deep work hour 20
00:50:16 ◼ ► to an hour and 30 and i'm trying to think of this higher level of like alternate being up or down
00:50:23 ◼ ► and then it can also just even count for taking like a walk where i would think about the project
00:50:27 ◼ ► like that counts as an uptime of like okay i'm gonna go for a walk and deliberately think about
00:50:32 ◼ ► the thing that i'm working on and smaller administrative stuff is like a 20 to 25 minutes
00:50:37 ◼ ► pomodoro technique like that's totally fine i know people have success with the pomodoro technique
00:50:42 ◼ ► but there's just something about it that always makes me just a little a little suspicious how to
00:50:47 ◼ ► put it this way ideas can be successful because they feel good not because they are effective
00:50:56 ◼ ► and so i just have this little bit of a worry of like oh the time that the pomodoro wants you to
00:51:00 ◼ ► take a break at is exactly the moment when you would kind of get like most relief from stopping
00:51:06 ◼ ► like you've just gone through the hard part of warming up i don't know i'm a little suspicious
00:51:11 ◼ ► of it but if it works for you like that's great any thoughts mike you have like a very different
00:51:15 ◼ ► working situation than i do so i'm not even sure like how much this even applies to you this kind
00:51:20 ◼ ► of idea is so alien to me i was kind of feeling that as i was talking it's like this is nothing
00:51:24 ◼ ► like mike's life no i take a break when i'm done doing the thing i'm doing yeah yeah like that is
00:51:30 ◼ ► more what i do is like all right i'm gonna do a task time tracking goes on i do the task and then
00:51:36 ◼ ► maybe i'll take a break before i'll do the next thing or if i'm working on something long usually
00:51:43 ◼ ► something will force me to take a break like i need to eat lunch or i have a meeting and i'll
00:51:49 ◼ ► come back to this thing later on so like so say i'm working through a show prep which might take
00:51:55 ◼ ► me two hours let's say it is very unlikely that i would have like a two-hour gap where something's
00:52:01 ◼ ► not gonna pull me away from it for a period of time and then i will take a break before maybe
00:52:07 ◼ ► going back to the job again you know so are you saying you just like sit down and crank it out
00:52:11 ◼ ► over two hours is that what you're saying or you're saying something naturally comes up that
00:52:14 ◼ ► causes a break it's usually something that will come up and will naturally cause it let's say for
00:52:18 ◼ ► example that i'm sitting down on monday morning to do my prep for upgrade like it is likely that i
00:52:24 ◼ ► will start it and i will work for a period of time and then i want to have lunch so i'll have lunch
00:52:28 ◼ ► and then i'll take like an extra break before going back into the work or right something that
00:52:38 ◼ ► typically happens now is i'll start the upgrade prep then i'll need to have that meeting but
00:52:42 ◼ ► before i go back to prepping i might take a break after that or what is usually the thing that
00:52:47 ◼ ► occurs to me is i start on a task and that task takes 20 minutes or 30 minutes and then before
00:52:53 ◼ ► i start the next one maybe i will open my phone and watch a youtube video for 10 minutes or
00:52:59 ◼ ► whatever or like play a game or something for like 10 15 minutes before i'll go back into the next
00:53:04 ◼ ► thing i kind of just like i don't really think in such strict terms because that really wouldn't fit
00:53:11 ◼ ► like for example if i decided every hour i should take a break well then like most of my shows and
00:53:17 ◼ ► so i'm just gonna go away for a bit now because like i work very frequently for multiple hours
00:53:23 ◼ ► at a time like it's very normal for me like four times a week to like sit down for two hours and
00:53:31 ◼ ► i don't get up like i sit down two hours do the thing and then i can go away and do something else
00:53:36 ◼ ► but like the most intense work that i do doesn't have breaks in it like that is kind of the inherent
00:53:43 ◼ ► thing that occurs so i don't really think that my brain is wired like that anymore on a meta level
00:53:50 ◼ ► right i don't think it's a coincidence that this question is coming from someone writing a phd
00:53:54 ◼ ► thesis because like even having to think about this there's a question of like the more external
00:54:01 ◼ ► structure there is in your life the less you even need to really think about this in some way it's
00:54:06 ◼ ► like you have a lot of external structure because you have appointments with people to record
00:54:11 ◼ ► podcasts like that's what has to happen and that kind of imposes like a structure on your life in
00:54:15 ◼ ► a way whereas i think something like writing a phd thesis especially if your advisor is not on
00:54:22 ◼ ► top of you you really do have the problem of like oh i have four years to six years maybe to do
00:54:31 ◼ ► something it has to be really big and there isn't a defined schedule for this because the thing that
00:54:38 ◼ ► i'm doing is inherently new that's what writing a phd is and so it's not surprising then that
00:54:45 ◼ ► someone trying to do a task like that has to think more rigidly about what are they doing because
00:54:51 ◼ ► there's just a complete lack of external structure really in what their day-to-day life is like and
00:54:56 ◼ ► yeah between the two of us like i'm not writing a phd thesis over here but my life is more toward
00:55:02 ◼ ► that end than it is towards your end which makes sense it's like oh why do i have to think about
00:55:06 ◼ ► this a bunch and like even with the timer because i will set like a timer for uh you just set it for
00:55:13 ◼ ► like an hour and 22 minutes is what i tend to do and say oh why do i set the timer right why would
00:55:18 ◼ ► i do that if i'm also saying like oh i'm suspicious of the pomodoro technique because i think it
00:55:22 ◼ ► stops you at the wrong time because like oh i've learned from experience that if i try to push a
00:55:29 ◼ ► block too long it impacts the possibility of later good blocks in the day like i've just learned that
00:55:36 ◼ ► of like man if i just tried to intentionally sit down for two hours without getting up and just
00:55:43 ◼ ► doing the writing for two hours straight without a single break it's like oh the average quality
00:55:49 ◼ ► would be worse over the course of a day by a lot so it's like oh yeah at about an hour and 22 or
00:55:54 ◼ ► about an hour and 20 i just want like a little ping to remind me like if there's a breaking point here
00:55:59 ◼ ► take it if you're really on a roll keep going but if you don't have that feeling take a break come
00:56:05 ◼ ► back in like 10 minutes and like go again after you've walked around or done whatever it's always
00:56:09 ◼ ► funny because you mentioned this it's again a difference between our work but it absolutely
00:56:18 ◼ ► like playing a game for 10 minutes like that is like so inconceivable to me the ability to do that
00:56:24 ◼ ► is like i i would be absolutely incapable of like i'll just watch a youtube video on a break for a
00:56:29 ◼ ► little bit it's like no that would never happen my breaks they're little treats they're little
00:56:33 ◼ ► treats for mike i know he's been a good boy he did a bunch of emails so now he gets to watch a youtube
00:56:38 ◼ ► video you know i'm genuinely envious that you could do that that's interesting so what are your breaks
00:56:42 ◼ ► just like walking around like what are you doing on the break like what is happening one of the
00:56:46 ◼ ► most productive things is actually just minor tidying up in a way it's like something physical
00:56:52 ◼ ► and slightly mindless you know like i've been traveling around this summer so it's like i'll
00:56:56 ◼ ► take a walk around wherever i am or i'll just like step outside for a little bit and come back
00:57:01 ◼ ► it has to not be mentally engaging in any way that's the characteristic of what the break is
00:57:09 ◼ ► that's why when you say like like a video game in particular is amazing to me because it's like
00:57:13 ◼ ► top tier mental engagement mode which is why it's like impossible for me to even think of something
00:57:19 ◼ ► like that i but like see this kind of work though like i'm engaging a different part of my brain to
00:57:24 ◼ ► what you are like my creative center is being engaged now right and so like when we're done
00:57:31 ◼ ► here i'm like done you know like i'm like done like that's it for me you know and i have noticed
00:57:38 ◼ ► in myself actually this year i think especially it is getting harder for me to do more than one
00:57:44 ◼ ► show a day i have a theory about this but go ahead okay i don't know if i want to hear it but
00:57:49 ◼ ► wednesdays is the day where i always record two shows so i record the pen addict and then when
00:57:55 ◼ ► that's done i have about an hour and then i record connected and that is getting harder and harder
00:58:01 ◼ ► to do over time that like that one hour in the middle i never feel when i when i sit down to
00:58:08 ◼ ► start connected i do not feel like i am ready for it the good thing about that show is its structure
00:58:15 ◼ ► gets me ready quickly because it is just three of us just kind of goofing around yeah and so like
00:58:22 ◼ ► that builds my energy back up quickly i think if i was doing something more serious i don't think
00:58:29 ◼ ► i would be able to keep doing the two shows with the proximity that they are together at that time
00:58:34 ◼ ► but that would be complicated yeah that's so interesting that you pick a day with connected
00:58:39 ◼ ► as well because like okay so this this plays right into my theory right my theory about why
00:58:44 ◼ ► you're finding this to be the case it goes straight back to our conversation earlier about being
00:58:49 ◼ ► better i think in subtle ways over the years you have cranked up the dial on what you consider to
00:58:55 ◼ ► be like a quality podcast in a very natural way yeah and like connected i think is a perfect
00:59:00 ◼ ► example of that like that show has gotten better and better over the years as someone who's like
00:59:05 ◼ ► who listens but also makes podcasts i'm very aware like oh it takes a lot of concentration and like
00:59:12 ◼ ► doing a thing really well to make something sound quite relaxed and so you often have this experience
00:59:19 ◼ ► of like oh the listeners and even you can like trick yourself into thinking of like oh this is
00:59:22 ◼ ► like a casual fun time it's like yeah but you have to be really good at what you're doing to make it
00:59:26 ◼ ► casual and fun and enjoyable for listeners so like connected has clearly gotten better over the years
00:59:33 ◼ ► and i just think the result of that is that like takes more out of you yeah it's the same with
00:59:39 ◼ ► everything of yours that i listen to it's like your shows over the years in small ways that are hard
00:59:44 ◼ ► to notice season to season they have gotten better so i'm not surprised to hear that you're finding
00:59:50 ◼ ► it more and more difficult to do more than one show in a day yeah they do take more and more effort
00:59:56 ◼ ► to produce like that is definitely a thing like it is getting harder and harder to make the shows
01:00:01 ◼ ► yeah and you're setting a higher bar for what your performance is during the show in a way like
01:00:06 ◼ ► performance is a funny word to use but that really is like you're just more aware of like what do you
01:00:12 ◼ ► want the show to be how do you want it to sound how do you want it to be good like you have
01:00:16 ◼ ► better thoughts about this over the years and so your brain is always running like a background
01:00:20 ◼ ► meta process on this and so i just think it is more tiring it's always been just a funny
01:00:26 ◼ ► difference between the two of us because like i'm just aware of how many podcasts you do but for me
01:00:32 ◼ ► whatever it is cortex day like i cortex day blocks out my whole day on the calendar i can't conceive
01:00:38 ◼ ► of doing anything else on the day we record cortex it's like i get up i'm thinking about cortex
01:00:44 ◼ ► preparation we record cortex we do like pre-talk before we do more text afterwards get more text
01:00:50 ◼ ► calm and then the show is done and that is like i am a mental slug for the rest of the day because
01:00:57 ◼ ► i just feel like i want to give this all of my attention and it is just always planned like
01:01:03 ◼ ► nothing happens after the cortex recording and nothing can be scheduled before the cortex
01:01:08 ◼ ► recording so it's always been kind of funny to me over the years of like how much you do
01:01:12 ◼ ► in comparison to me but i think you you have just like turned up your demands for yourself for
01:01:19 ◼ ► quality and you've made it harder for yourself in a way so that's why this is happening i think i'm
01:01:22 ◼ ► slowing down which is fine you know like i don't think you are no like as in i think my ability to
01:01:31 ◼ ► produce a lot of content in a day is becoming less but that could be a function of different
01:01:36 ◼ ► things right that like i'm quote unquote slowing down not because i'm necessarily getting older
01:01:41 ◼ ► but because it's becoming harder to it takes more out of me to produce the content because
01:01:45 ◼ ► like whatever reason it is right but i've been getting myself into a rhythm i don't even know if
01:01:50 ◼ ► i mentioned to you about we're like with the day we recall cortex usually on thursday right when now
01:01:56 ◼ ► thursdays is always cortex like that is my goal and so that includes cortex brand like i try and
01:02:04 ◼ ► like put that work on a thursday so like i'm always in that mindset like always for thursdays
01:02:12 ◼ ► that's like a thing that i've tried to do in the last few months i've done very well at it so far
01:02:16 ◼ ► but like it's something i'm working on it's difficult to do because the rest of the world
01:02:21 ◼ ► doesn't want that from me but i'm trying to make it happen well as your business partner in cortex
01:02:28 ◼ ► brands like i could not encourage more an entire day dedicated to cortex and i think like it's
01:02:34 ◼ ► what like people sometimes think i'm weird and obsessive about this but it's like i cannot convey
01:02:39 ◼ ► the psychological difference between a day where there are no appointments and a day where there is
01:02:45 ◼ ► one appointment yeah it is like such a difference and it does not matter how small or inconsequential
01:02:52 ◼ ► the appointment is it locks down some creative part of your brain it really feels like some part
01:03:00 ◼ ► of your brain true or not as soon as there's something on the calendar is then always able
01:03:05 ◼ ► to go like well we can't really get into it we can't really do this now because later uh we have
01:03:14 ◼ ► to do this thing later we have to mail a package it's like brain is something gonna take us 10
01:03:18 ◼ ► minutes at this like yeah but we can't like properly do the thing so that's why i'm always
01:03:24 ◼ ► very encouraging of you trying to do like a cortex day because like i think you will find
01:03:29 ◼ ► in an unexpected way you are more free to think about product design in that kind of environment
01:03:37 ◼ ► than you are in an environment where there's anything else that's why i'm trying to do it
01:03:42 ◼ ► and like having the design table that i've put together in the last few months has helped that
01:03:47 ◼ ► because basically like on a thursday i could just go sit at that table and just see what happens
01:03:52 ◼ ► like sometimes it's just picking things up and putting them down like it was a lot of that like
01:03:57 ◼ ► just pick this up put it down what is this again it's very tactile and i like it and it encourages
01:04:02 ◼ ► me to start thinking in that way but i do want to mention on the the one thing in a day it kind of
01:04:07 ◼ ► sounds like it's in contrast to what i just said but something i am trying to do is to stop that
01:04:15 ◼ ► from happening like if i'm going to have an appointment in my day that that day shouldn't
01:04:21 ◼ ► have just one appointment yeah yeah like if there's going to be appointments which can be
01:04:28 ◼ ► podcasts or it can be a meeting of some description there should be at least one more on that day i'm
01:04:34 ◼ ► really trying to stop the there's one thing because it frames my day in a way that i don't like
01:04:41 ◼ ► like it either gets in the way or it forces the flow towards it like a couple of days ago there
01:04:50 ◼ ► was nothing i could do about it but i had a meeting at 8 30 p.m that day sucked because the whole day
01:04:56 ◼ ► i was thinking about the 8 30 p.m meeting yeah like i i couldn't relax or anything right like
01:05:03 ◼ ► i'd stopped the rest of my work i'd stopped at four but from four to eight thirty all i was doing
01:05:08 ◼ ► was thinking about the meeting and it didn't need me to think about it but i just couldn't unwind
01:05:14 ◼ ► because that meeting existed so like i'm trying to stop this like there is one thing on the calendar
01:05:21 ◼ ► kind of days so similarly like if i'm gonna do a podcast if i have another podcast to do that week
01:05:30 ◼ ► it should go on the same day as another one it's like what i'm trying to do but like maybe
01:05:34 ◼ ► spacing them out i don't know it's like it's this weird balance of like doing more than one makes it
01:05:41 ◼ ► harder to do but i prefer that feeling to the i can't put anything else in this day because
01:05:48 ◼ ► there's this one it's like a weird trying to balance these two things together which is which
01:05:52 ◼ ► has been interesting recently but yeah i mean you have the additional difficulty of like coordinating
01:05:56 ◼ ► a ton of people here but like i think your instincts are totally right in rhythm wise and
01:06:02 ◼ ► it's funny i'm just realizing like oh uh so i've known that you you're trying to do like thursday
01:06:08 ◼ ► is cortex day which makes sense because this is the day that we record the podcast and that we
01:06:13 ◼ ► we've been talking about how like oh because cortex brand is doing like all this stuff we
01:06:17 ◼ ► need to have like since thursday is when we record anyway and it's every week ideally your day that
01:06:24 ◼ ► you're spending on cortex like we should have a check-in call and like see what's like make sure
01:06:28 ◼ ► every week uh we're up to date on like what's going on in cortex but it's like it's just a
01:06:33 ◼ ► funny thing to realize like oh this has caused already for me the plan going forward for the
01:06:39 ◼ ► rest of the year it's like has caused the opposite effect where i have so few appointments that the
01:06:46 ◼ ► thursday cortex one then naturally becomes for me the exact same thing of thursday either the
01:06:53 ◼ ► whole day is dedicated to recording the show but if it's not that thursday is going to be my all
01:07:01 ◼ ► appointments must be on thursday day right so it's like ah it's like it's the opposite thing but it's
01:07:07 ◼ ► for the same reason so it's just funny for me to think like in a couple of months if both of us
01:07:11 ◼ ► have our rhythms really down it's like thursday will be your most relaxed day and we will talk
01:07:16 ◼ ► about what's going on in cortex but also thursday for me will be like the only day that everything
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01:09:37 ◼ ► squarespace for the continued support of this show and all of Relay. And speaking of product design
01:09:43 ◼ ► there's a good question for you Mike here from Jonathan. Jonathan asks I'm at the earliest stage
01:09:49 ◼ ► of designing my own product I know nothing about product design other than my own opinions on what
01:09:54 ◼ ► makes something good now that you're a couple of products in what advice do you have if you were
01:09:59 ◼ ► to start again? Well that is my path right like I have strong opinions on what I think makes a good
01:10:07 ◼ ► product but I don't know how to design one right I can explain and I've gotten better at that over
01:10:14 ◼ ► time I can explain to people what I'm looking for I can sketch what I like I recommend like I did
01:10:19 ◼ ► that short college course I recommend something like that if you can find something like that
01:10:23 ◼ ► I wish I had done that sooner because it would have given me more confidence earlier on. I will
01:10:29 ◼ ► recommend to you the things that I did which was one try to find someone that you trust who has
01:10:36 ◼ ► a little bit more skill in this area that you can communicate to who can help you bring something
01:10:41 ◼ ► to life like that helped me a lot and this can just be somebody who maybe is a designer or
01:10:47 ◼ ► somebody who has just more knowledge in a subject area like I have a lot of friends who are even
01:10:54 ◼ ► more versed in paper than me and I could ask them questions and they could help inform and give me
01:11:00 ◼ ► some ideas. I will say to you that when you get to the point where you want to try and take this
01:11:05 ◼ ► product to a manufacturer expect rejection everywhere this is very normal but people don't
01:11:12 ◼ ► think that it's going to be the case because why would they reject business there are actually lots
01:11:17 ◼ ► there are lots of very good reasons why a company will do this but it is surprising when you first
01:11:23 ◼ ► encounter that and I think really the best thing is that you feel confident in your own opinions
01:11:30 ◼ ► because I believe that some of the best stuff can come from someone who doesn't know the constraints
01:11:36 ◼ ► of what they're trying to do because they're less willing to be told no and are less held down by
01:11:48 ◼ ► the knowledge that they already have. If you don't have any preconceived notion of something
01:11:53 ◼ ► then you're not going to necessarily design it under those circumstances. I just read a
01:11:58 ◼ ► there's a lot of pieces going around at the moment like articles being written about Johnny Ive
01:12:03 ◼ ► because he is working with the high-end fashion brand Moncler on making a line of clothing
01:12:10 ◼ ► unbelievably so his design company Love From has been hired by Moncler to create this like jacket
01:12:17 ◼ ► system where it's like a thin jacket and you attach things to it and like what is getting so
01:12:22 ◼ ► much attention about this is they redesigned a button fastener like he's like Johnny Ive made a
01:12:28 ◼ ► new button is like a good headline but it's like this like magnetic attachment system and I've
01:12:34 ◼ ► mostly skimmed over them right now because I'm leaving them for next Thursday because I want to
01:12:38 ◼ ► read through these in more detail as part of thinking about products but he actually talks
01:12:43 ◼ ► about one of the things that he finds interesting in fashion is he doesn't know anything like this
01:12:51 ◼ ► is not his world and so he is able to kind of decouple himself from what he thinks he should
01:12:57 ◼ ► know or what other people know to kind of follow his inspiration but then also he can use this as
01:13:02 ◼ ► an opportunity to learn too so he'll go out and he'll he'll try and get as much as he can
01:13:08 ◼ ► information from people but if he wants to create something from Fresh it helps him to not come to
01:13:13 ◼ ► it with these preconceived notions so if Johnny Ive says it then maybe you can take that advice
01:13:28 ◼ ► I appreciate Steve Jobs for everything he is but like if I look to someone and I'm like who do I
01:13:38 ◼ ► most look up to professionally then it's Johnny Ive and everything that he created which I think is
01:13:44 ◼ ► contentious a lot of people have a lot of things to say about Johnny Ive but I just think the man's
01:13:49 ◼ ► body of work is an undeniable thing like you cannot argue with it in my opinion you might
01:13:55 ◼ ► not like every decision that he made but like is there a designer in history that has a better body
01:14:00 ◼ ► of work than Johnny Ive like I'm not sure I could argue that like people will look at Braun and like
01:14:08 ◼ ► sure I understand but no designer in history has produced products that have been used at such scale
01:14:15 ◼ ► surely right like if you think of the things Johnny has made the things that he has designed
01:14:21 ◼ ► and then the scale in which they have been used and all of the issues that come from that like
01:14:26 ◼ ► yeah as time is going on and especially like I've read this book called After Steve from
01:14:31 ◼ ► Trip McCord the New York Times and it is a book that tells the story of Tim Cook and Johnny Ive
01:14:38 ◼ ► from Steve Jobs' passing onwards lots of people don't like this book namely my co-host Jason
01:14:45 ◼ ► Snell on the upgrade podcast he hates this book I loved this book like with all Apple things you're
01:14:50 ◼ ► not actually talking to these people but he's there he did a lot of investigating around them
01:14:55 ◼ ► and just hearing Johnny Ive and like everything he went through especially around the Apple watch and
01:15:00 ◼ ► like the burnout that he went through and how that led to him leaving it like all of that stuff was
01:15:06 ◼ ► just humanize the man even more for me and like kind of I think set the groundwork for me to be
01:15:12 ◼ ► like yeah that's the guy like I he's the guy I look up to most so if Johnny says that you should
01:15:17 ◼ ► try and go out there and learn some stuff and not be held down by what you don't know I think that's
01:15:23 ◼ ► about as good advice you can get. Jesus asks what is the last great fiction book that you have read?
01:15:29 ◼ ► Is this a tricky question for you Mike? Yeah I mean yes look I've said this before I mean let's
01:15:35 ◼ ► listen to the show notice actually we have gotten a lot of people been asking via the feedback form
01:15:40 ◼ ► to do another book club I want to do another book club I don't know if it will happen this year
01:15:46 ◼ ► but if not next year and I have a book that I want to do I won't say it now in case we don't do it
01:16:00 ◼ ► Seven Habits or whatever so I do want to do one but of all of the shows that are the hardest for
01:16:07 ◼ ► me to do it is these because I'm just not a person who enjoys reading. Yeah this question
01:16:13 ◼ ► of what makes me hesitate for you because I always have this tiny bit of a feeling like I don't want
01:16:17 ◼ ► this question to feel like mean right it's like have you read but like there's nothing mean about
01:16:22 ◼ ► it's like people don't have to read books it's one of these weird things though that like I don't feel
01:16:28 ◼ ► like you're making fun of me but like people do find it very strange and like like there's
01:16:33 ◼ ► something wrong with me that I don't enjoy reading but like I just don't like I just don't like it
01:16:39 ◼ ► I guess why am I hesitating about this it's one of the very few things people ever ask me about you
01:16:48 ◼ ► which is why is why it comes up yeah and it's like it is kind of phrased I guess that's that's why I'm
01:16:56 ◼ ► having this reaction to a book question is it's like it might the words not but might be this but
01:17:02 ◼ ► they're sort of asking like is it that Mike doesn't read or can Mike not read kind of feels like what
01:17:10 ◼ ► they're asking and so I feel like I have defended as like uh first of all Mike can read he just he
01:17:19 ◼ ► just doesn't and like there's some kind of just like weird cultural expectation around reading but
01:17:26 ◼ ► it it is the only thing people ask me about you because I feel like if people know about you they
01:17:32 ◼ ► know about you through the podcast that they like you are very open on the podcast like there's not
01:17:37 ◼ ► I feel like uh it's not a lot of mystery this is the one thing where people are like you can read
01:17:44 ◼ ► right but this is the thing I see it like if I actually couldn't read that might be something
01:17:49 ◼ ► that I'm not open about right yeah how incredible would it be if I'd kept that a secret I mean
01:17:55 ◼ ► it would be amazing that would be that would be quite a thing to have done he doesn't like email
01:17:59 ◼ ► why doesn't he like email is it because he can't read series actually been reading all your emails
01:18:04 ◼ ► all these years to you oh it's so funny if I could nail down why I think I don't enjoy reading I
01:18:10 ◼ ► think there are two things one I do think I am a visual learner like I think that is part of it and
01:18:14 ◼ ► two I know there's a phrase for this but I don't remember what it is when I read I read aloud in my
01:18:20 ◼ ► head yeah I do the same yeah so I think for me it makes reading very slow and I don't like that
01:18:27 ◼ ► I'm a slow reader yeah and so like for me I don't like particularly enjoy it it also takes up a lot
01:18:33 ◼ ► of time that I would prefer to be doing other things with yeah that's actually a good point
01:18:40 ◼ ► because I always find it a bit mysterious when people read and they don't hear something in
01:18:43 ◼ ► their head but there's a hundred percent of correlation with those people are faster readers
01:18:48 ◼ ► than if you hear something in your head it does just slow you down and so yeah I'm the same way
01:18:53 ◼ ► I'm very aware like I'm a slow reader which just means like I have to like a thing a lot more to
01:19:00 ◼ ► read it and I think even for me it's like oh the amount of books that I've read is like definitely
01:19:05 ◼ ► diminished over the years and part of that is it's like I'm doing the exact same thing you're doing
01:19:09 ◼ ► it's a kind of trade-off calculation of reading this book is going to take a dozen to a couple
01:19:16 ◼ ► dozen hours and I would just prefer to put that time into so many other things yeah but I have
01:19:23 ◼ ► read more fiction this year than I've read in any year in my adult life because I've been reading
01:19:28 ◼ ► lots of comics like lots of comics okay and that's fantastic for me I think like comics fit like
01:19:36 ◼ ► very well for me they're mostly visual right and so like I really enjoy that experience and I have
01:19:43 ◼ ► been reading hundreds of comics this year I want to recommend two full series of comics one is
01:19:53 ◼ ► Nick Spencer's run on The Amazing Spider-Man I will put links in the show notes to these
01:19:59 ◼ ► specific comic runs one of the problems of comics is trying to find whatever people are talking
01:20:06 ◼ ► about can be so complicated even in like so I read all these in Marvel Unlimited which I think
01:20:12 ◼ ► is an incredible service it's basically Netflix for Marvel comics they're all there and they add
01:20:19 ◼ ► new comics on like a like one to two month delay for like the most modern stuff but I'm going back
01:20:25 ◼ ► and reading like historic runs of certain comics I have actually found AI tools like chatgpt to be
01:20:32 ◼ ► really good at recommending comics to me because this is another thing where like googling this
01:20:38 ◼ ► kind of information is very hard you just get to a lot of lists and so I'm able to go and be like
01:20:42 ◼ ► I like this and I like this and I like this whatever comic shall I read or like so one of
01:20:47 ◼ ► them that I'm going to mention is a Daredevil comic too I wanted to read a Daredevil comic
01:20:51 ◼ ► and so I was able to describe the types of comic series that I'd enjoyed previously and like what
01:20:56 ◼ ► is a good one to start with and I found that to be really helpful but so Nick Spencer's run on
01:21:01 ◼ ► The Amazing Spider-Man Spider-Man is my favorite fictional character of all time I love Spider-Man
01:21:08 ◼ ► so much and this run is just incredible most people recommend Ultimate Spider-Man which is
01:21:23 ◼ ► difficult emotional things that are occurring it's it's absolutely fantastic I read the whole thing
01:21:33 ◼ ► super fast and was really sad when it ended it is truly brilliant and I would say similarly about
01:21:41 ◼ ► Chip Zdarsky's Daredevil which is a very dark story and I really liked the two together actually
01:21:47 ◼ ► where Spider-Man even when emotional still tends to be pretty upbeat where Daredevil is really down
01:21:56 ◼ ► and dark and so I found these two comic runs to be just truly truly fantastic and in reading these
01:22:13 ◼ ► that line from Spider-Man right you know you're a familiar so great power comes great responsibility
01:22:18 ◼ ► of course that's not the actual line it's not the original line so that that version was said in the
01:22:24 ◼ ► token of wire movie the actual line is with great power there must also come great responsibility
01:22:32 ◼ ► I find that to be more impactful it's better yeah the original implies no agency in your life it's
01:22:39 ◼ ► just like if you have power you also have responsibility but everybody knows that's not
01:22:43 ◼ ► how it goes and I find it to be a more impactful thing to think about in my own life that with any
01:22:49 ◼ ► kind of power there must also come responsibility but you kind of have to be the one to work out on
01:22:55 ◼ ► your own so I think as a better there's a much better allegory for Spider-Man too like uh
01:23:01 ◼ ► than just just because he's powerful he's also responsible to someone like that yeah it's a
01:23:06 ◼ ► better line it's a better line particularly for Spider-Man and the sort of like classic origin
01:23:10 ◼ ► for him of like originally choosing not to be responsible but I think it's a better line
01:23:15 ◼ ► because um it feels like it has the implication of what the villains are built into that line
01:23:22 ◼ ► yeah like the villains have great power but they don't accept responsibility in some way
01:23:27 ◼ ► it's like yeah it's a much better line and that's the difference between superheroes and supervillains
01:23:31 ◼ ► they all have power they all have equal power in some instances but the ones that choose to be
01:23:36 ◼ ► responsible are the heroes and the ones that don't become villains that's really good I have a dumb
01:23:40 ◼ ► question as someone who hasn't read comic books like since college so when you're saying like a
01:23:44 ◼ ► run yeah is there like a clearly defined limited series because like I remember reading The Amazing
01:23:51 ◼ ► Spider-Man as a kid but it's like oh The Amazing Spider-Man number one like it can't possibly be
01:23:55 ◼ ► number one now no but it like does it have a clear start and end is that what's happening is it a
01:24:00 ◼ ► limited series or like Daredevil here you've given the years like should you only read the ones in
01:24:04 ◼ ► those years like if yeah I guess I'm trying to say like if someone wanted to do this is it clear where
01:24:09 ◼ ► to start and clear where to stop so with the links that I've put in the show notes yes and when I'm
01:24:14 ◼ ► referring to run I am talking specifically about the lead writer's time on this okay so okay this
01:24:22 ◼ ► is The Amazing Spider-Man 2018 number one is the beginning of Nick Spencer's run on Spider-Man but
01:24:29 ◼ ► it's it's like it's something like The Amazing Spider-Man 804 or something like that actually
01:24:34 ◼ ► because they just keep rebooting it and putting new years on it or whatever but okay when I'm
01:24:38 ◼ ► saying a run I'm specifically talking about the like so The Amazing Spider-Man 2018 that comic
01:24:44 ◼ ► continues past Nick Spencer and it's still good but it's different so like you can stop reading
01:24:49 ◼ ► when Nick Spencer finishes if you want to and that is a full complete story but yeah a run would be
01:24:56 ◼ ► that person's time on that book is is how I'm referring to it oh okay so it's like a showrunner
01:25:02 ◼ ► on a correct so who's the showrunner for or whatever during this time oh okay all right
01:25:06 ◼ ► and The Amazing Spider-Man past Nick Spencer is also still really good and I really like it and
01:25:11 ◼ ► I'm still reading that comic because it's still currently ongoing like I've caught up and
01:25:15 ◼ ► continued but it's just a different book it's different set stories like Nick Spencer had a
01:25:19 ◼ ► very particular story he wanted to tell for Spider-Man and he did that but yeah this is
01:25:24 ◼ ► like just another thing in what makes it so complicated I'll also say is like someone who
01:25:29 ◼ ► is a more recent comic reader at this degree like because I've read like collected books before like
01:25:36 ◼ ► trade paperbacks and they tend to be like a one pair when you're reading a book which are like
01:25:42 ◼ ► a series that is running over multiple years it's very rare at least in the stuff that I have read
01:25:49 ◼ ► where the same writer and artist will continue for the whole time period yeah it could be really
01:25:55 ◼ ► jarring when the art changes just stick with it though because you get used to it it can be really
01:26:01 ◼ ► weird like when when you open the next page like the next book and Spider-Man is a different face
01:26:07 ◼ ► it's like a weird like Peter Parker looks different because the artist is new and they're
01:26:13 ◼ ► bringing their own style to it yeah I'm trying to think like the very last time I think I was
01:26:17 ◼ ► reading a comic book was I think it was The Walking Dead because people were really recommending it
01:26:23 ◼ ► and I do remember that that same kind of phenomenon of like at some point it's like the
01:26:26 ◼ ► writer stayed the same but the artist changed and it was like this weird like relearning phase of
01:26:31 ◼ ► like oh what do the characters look like but yeah it's it's totally fine it's just one of these
01:26:36 ◼ ► things is like yeah if I'm recommending people read it like in both of these books the artist
01:26:41 ◼ ► changed multiple times just just stick with it though actually for my recommendation I will also
01:26:46 ◼ ► have a heads up for anyone who gives it a go so um yeah I feel like my fiction reading has dropped
01:26:53 ◼ ► off a lot in the last many years and it is this problem of like I just have a harder time finding
01:26:59 ◼ ► things that feel like they are worth the time and that they are good but I particularly like this
01:27:04 ◼ ► question because it's like what's the last great fiction book you have read and if I'm not trying
01:27:09 ◼ ► to think about like oh what's something I've read that I would recommend but what's the last great
01:27:13 ◼ ► one that's like a such an easy question for me and it is the three body problem I think it's Amazon
01:27:19 ◼ ► or it's Netflix like it's currently a tv show um but when I think about like fiction books that I
01:27:25 ◼ ► have read it's like boy this is at like the top of the list for like great books in like a decade
01:27:32 ◼ ► but it's it has also caused the problem of like oh I liked it so much it makes it harder to read
01:27:37 ◼ ► other things because the key thing to me about the three body problem is like oh one it's pitched
01:27:45 ◼ ► exactly to me because it's like the author took every interesting idea in physics and crammed them
01:27:52 ◼ ► into three books so it's like oh I know all these things and the author is using them in an
01:27:57 ◼ ► interesting way so it's like fun as a reader it's like right up my alley but the second thing is
01:28:03 ◼ ► I feel like I have almost never come across a book in fact yeah now I'm gonna say it this is like
01:28:08 ◼ ► because it's the first of a trilogy these three books I have never read anything where the density
01:28:14 ◼ ► of ideas is so high it's like the author just keeps like introducing new idea after new idea
01:28:22 ◼ ► after new idea and you keep feeling like you know in most books there's this very natural structure
01:28:27 ◼ ► like you're introduced to the world and like now you know what the story is taking place in and
01:28:32 ◼ ► it's like this book just like never runs out of interesting things like small and big throughout
01:28:36 ◼ ► its course it's like very very satisfying read but just like you warn about the artist for anyone who
01:28:42 ◼ ► attempts to read this book I will give you the warning that was given to me which is like you
01:28:47 ◼ ► need to know that the first hundred pages are terrible it's like oh my god I cannot like I had
01:28:57 ◼ ► tried to read this book several times and it is only because many people I highly respected their
01:29:05 ◼ ► opinion on were like you have to get past the first part and man I was like but it's so boring
01:29:12 ◼ ► it's I don't care at all they're like they just said like look it's like a hundred pages like
01:29:17 ◼ ► keep reading something will happen you'll know when it happens and that's when the book really
01:29:23 ◼ ► starts and it's like I had several false starts with this but when I finally made it over that
01:29:29 ◼ ► hump I was like god damn like without a question this trilogy is like the best books I've read in
01:29:34 ◼ ► a decade so I really love them it's just sort of thinking of it now because it's kind of like when
01:29:39 ◼ ► we talked about poor Amazon trying to make the doomed rings of power it's like I haven't seen the
01:29:45 ◼ ► Netflix show and I will like I will not watch the Netflix show for the three-body problem because
01:29:50 ◼ ► it's the same thing where it's like oh god the source material that you are working with amazing
01:29:56 ◼ ► book doomed as a tv project just like absolutely doomed cannot possibly succeed do not collect
01:30:05 ◼ ► 200 go straight to jail there's no way you're going to adapt this in an interesting way so
01:30:09 ◼ ► I would highly recommend those books but it's like they are a challenging read but boy were
01:30:17 ◼ ► they worth it so three-body problem that's my recommendation imagine telling me read this book