[VIDEO] There’s something special about being able to shoot video of the water, from in the water itself. Add in the physics and spiritual nature of surfing, and these two videos really are magical. Both are embedded in the main Loop post.
The second is a “behind the scenes” video, but it stands on its own.
[Video] Juli Clover, MacRumors:
Vizio yesterday launched a beta version of its updated Smartcast software, which allows iPhone owners who have a Smartcast-enabled TV to use AirPlay 2 and HomeKit integrations for the first time on a third-party television set.
We picked up a compatible Vizio television set (which includes the recent P and M series models at the current time) and were able to take a look at how AirPlay 2 and HomeKit work on a non-Apple device.
Fascinating video (embedded in main Loop post – definitely worth watching). Early days, obviously (This is a beta). But there’s a lot of functionality here. Netflix not working is no surprise. I’ll post about that in a bit.
Patently Apple:
This week the US Patent & Trademark Office published a patent application from Apple that relates to new protective coatings being added to Apple devices in the future that will prevent damage to housing structures, transparent members associated with optical component windows and displays, and other device structures.
And:
The protective coatings may include a binder material such as polymer (sometimes referred to as a matrix or polymer matrix) and may include particles embedded within the binder. The particles may have high hardness to enhance the durability of the protective coatings.
Better living through chemistry.
DigiTimes:
TSMC has announced delivery of the complete version of its 5nm design infrastructure within the Open Innovation Platform (OIP). This full release enables 5nm systems-on-chip (SoC) designs in next-generation advanced mobile and high-performance computing (HPC) applications, targeting high-growth 5G and artificial intelligence markets.
To give you a sense of how much of Apple’s current product line is built on the current 7nm process, here’s the opening paragraph from the Apple A12 Bionic Wikipedia page:
The Apple A12 Bionic is a 64-bit ARM-based system on a chip (SoC) designed by Apple Inc. It first appeared in the iPhone XS, XS Max, XR, and 2019 versions of the iPad Air and iPad Mini. It has two high-performance cores which are claimed to be 15% faster and 40% more energy-efficient than the Apple A11 and four high-efficiency cores which are claimed to use 50% less power than the energy-efficient cores in the A11.
Apple’s A12 Bionic chip was built by TSMC using a 7nm process. A move to 5nm means more transistors on each chip. Way more.
Tim Cook called in to the Paul Finebaum Show on ESPN to talk Auburn making the Final Four. Love this.
https://twitter.com/espnpr/status/1113956165187252226
[VIDEO] This is a pretty great explainer (embedded in main Loop post) for why multiple coil Qi chargers run into problems and, perhaps, one physics wall ApplePower ran into.
Oh, and you might want to take a look at this tweet.
To get your head around this headline, watch the video embedded in the tweet below:
https://twitter.com/wu_shengzhi/status/1113284624355135489
This is a fantastic proof of concept. Though the prototype was developed for Oculus Rift, I see no reason this couldn’t be done on iPhone, or any AR wearable Apple produces.
Patently Apple:
Today the US Patent & Trademark Office published a patent application from Apple relating to a smart charging system for a portable electronic device. The smart charging system includes a magnetized connector and a charging component that can be configured to dynamically attract and repel the connector to and from the portable electronic device.
“Dynamically attract and repel”. That’s very interesting.
And, of course, you had me at MagSafe.
My immediate thought here is that Amazon still does not have a phone. They will never be a first class citizen on iPhone.
Sure, if you have an Alexa device in your kitchen, AmazonPods can rival AirPods in every way possible. But when you leave the house, that picture changes.
AmazonPods won’t have the pairing snappiness of AirPods when Amazon does not own both sides of the connection. Imagine you want to go for a run. Will AmazonPods pair with Apple Watch? Certainly, the connection with iPhone, Apple Watch, etc., will never be as easy as with AirPods.
I suspect AmazonPods will be cheaper than AirPods and will offer advantages when Alexa hardware is on the other end. Will those advantages be enough to pull Apple users from the comfort/snappiness of the ecosystem? We’ll see how this plays out.
CNBC:
Ian Goodfellow, one of the top minds in artificial intelligence at Google, has joined Apple in a director role.
The hire comes as Apple increasingly strives to tap AI to boost its software and hardware. Last year Apple hired John Giannandrea, head of AI and search at Google, to supervise AI strategy.
What does Ian bring to the table?
Goodfellow is the father of an AI approach known as generative adversarial networks, or GANs. The approach draws on two networks, one known as a generative network and the other known as a discriminative network, and can be used to come up with unusual and creative outputs in the form of audio, video and text.
GAN systems have been used to generate “deepfake” fake media content.
I’m assuming the “deepfake” reference here is a red herring. But it does make me wonder how this tech will fit in with Apple’s AI pursuits.
This is a pretty big get for the Mac App Store.
Here’s a link to the official press release.
The Mac App Store version of BBEdit follows a subscription-based pricing model, US$3.99 per month, or US$39.99 per year.
You can also pursue a perpetual and/or multi-user license directly from Bare Bones, so pick which works best for you. No matter the path, you’ll get the exact same experience.
Either way you choose, BBEdit still doesn’t suck.
[VIDEO] Nice detailed review from The Verge. If you are considering buying the new AirPods or prefer the noise-muffling benefits and fit of in-ear earbuds, spend some time reading through this review.
The Powerbeats Pro are pricey at $249.95 and shipping in May.
As an aside, the main Loop post embeds a new commercial showing off the goods.
Oregon Live:
Two Oregon engineering students from China face federal charges in an alleged counterfeit Apple iPhone scheme that cost the company hundreds of thousands of dollars, according to court documents.
The men are accused of importing more than a thousand counterfeit iPhones, then sending each phone back to the company, complaining it wouldn’t power on, in exchange for a new phone under Apple’s warranty process.
An incredibly ambitious scam. Wow. Two people returning more than a thousand iPhones. They will pay the price, while the people who ran the ring will no doubt get off scot-free.
Never got a HomePod? Thinking about a second HomePod? Now might be the time.
Farhad Manjoo, New York Times:
Since becoming the first trillion-dollar corporation last summer, Apple has battled a souring assessment on Wall Street. The iPhone is the most profitable product in the history of business, but more than a decade after its debut, pretty much everyone on the planet who can afford one already has one, and many customers see little reason to upgrade.
So now, instead of selling better stuff to more people, Apple’s new plan is to sell more stuff to the same people.
And:
As I watched Apple’s event, I felt the future shrink a little. In its gilded middle age, Apple is turning into something like a digital athleisure brand, stamping out countless upscale accessories for customers who love its one big thing, a company that has lost sight of the universe and is content merely to put a ding in your pocketbook.
Yeesh. Farhad really doesn’t like Apple. While the picture he paints might ring true to many, it purposely misses the remarkable in service to the complaints.
Apple’s health efforts alone deserve prominent recognition. The Apple Watch is an incredible piece of hardware and it has saved many lives by putting a low-end ECG on every buyer’s wrist. That is no small thing.
Add in all the health-related research that Apple’s health initiatives made possible. This is certainly a ding in the universe, a ding that is destined to grow significantly.
How about the remarkable AirPods, with that H1 chip and Hey Siri, small enough to fit in your ear. Again, tip of the iceberg of what’s coming.
And think about all the doors Apple has opened, all the tech folks Apple has birthed and influenced. iPhone begat Android, have no doubt.
Yes, it’s true that the MacBook Keyboard is a stumble. There are other examples where Apple has lost its way. But let’s not lose sight of the fact that shareholders demand growth at all times. That Tim and company have kept their commitment to privacy and continue to develop some remarkable technology while continuing to serve the ravenous growth demands of Wall Street is no small thing.
[VIDEO] Came across this on Twitter (embedded in main Loop post). Can’t think of a more appropriate video to follow that previous Loop post.
So there’s an article that’s been making the rounds, with the inflammatory title, The MacBook keyboard fiasco is way worse than Apple thinks.
From the article:
Apple keep insisting that only a “small number of customers have problems” with the MacBook keyboards. That’s bollocks. This is a huge issue, it’s getting worse not better, and Apple is missing the forest for the trees.
The fact is that many people simply do not contact Apple when their MacBook keyboards fail. They just live with an S key that stutters or a spacebar that intermittently gives double. Or they just start using an external keyboard. Apple never sees these cases, so it never counts in their statistics.
I struggled with whether to post this article and, if I did, finding the right take. My issue with the article was the small sample size.
But, I’ve experienced exactly what this article focused on: The “r” key on the very MacBook Pro on which I’m typing this occasionally refuses to work. But it happens so rarely, and responds to my hammering the key back into normalcy, that I just live with it.
Enter John Gruber. From the linked post:
Hansson used the headline “The MacBook Keyboard Fiasco Is Way Worse Than Apple Thinks”, but I suspect it’d be more accurate to say that it’s way worse than Apple admits. They don’t need to look at the number of support incidents from customers. Almost everyone at Apple uses MacBooks of some sort. They know from their own use of the product how problematic reliability is.
And there’s the crux. Apple eats their own dog food, as the expression goes. Numbers being what they are, they must be acutely aware of this problem.
So what’s next? Will we see a MacBook event later this year with a new keyboard? One based on an entirely new (or old and reliable) keyboard design? Time will tell.
Not sure I’d use this bit of open source, but I do think it’s a fascinating concept. I wonder if Apple would ever consider adding this to the Mac’s Touch Bar preferences.
We’ve posted about this before, but one of those things that’s good to be aware of, worth the refresh.
I’ve spoken with a few people who’ve had the issue. One comment:
https://twitter.com/donmcallister/status/1113439274098208768
Hopefully, this is a software issue introduced by the latest iOS update.
Not a fan of Apple not acknowledging hardware issues. Once an issue surfaces more than a few times in forums, that should be enough for Apple to address it in some way. I get that there’s a liability issue for Apple, that taking responsibility can affect the outcome of future lawsuits. But if a user brings in their iPad Pro with a stuttering issue, and a link to the linked MacRumors article, shouldn’t that be enough for:
As is, many hoops were jumped through.
Straight from the horses mouth (an article in the Times):
The New York Times and The Washington Post did not join the effort, despite intense lobbying from Apple. Mark Thompson, the chief executive of The Times, said the problem with the app, from his perspective, was how it “jumbled different news sources into these superficially attractive mixtures,” making it difficult for users to know which publication they’re consuming.
And from this Vanity Fair article:
Publishers hope they’ll get exposure to new audiences. But any potential new or existing direct subscriber to a publisher will no longer be willing to pay a healthy monthly fee to occasionally access that top content while supporting the rest of the newsroom. They’ll just cherry pick what they want via News+, and Apple will shave off a few cents for the publisher while owning all the data, customer relationship and power.”
And:
That would appear to be the primary concern of the two major News+ holdouts: The New York Times and The Washington Post. Apple badly wanted to lock down at least one of them, and it began a vigorous courtship of the papers last spring, not long after the Texture deal closed and Apple’s plans for its content bundle were beginning to materialize, according to people familiar with the matter. “They put a tremendous amount of pressure on,” one source said. “Eddy Cue was in and out of their offices really trying to woo them.” Cue’s elevator pitch, according to people familiar with the discussions, was, “We’ll make you the most-read newspaper in the world.”
And:
“We’ve been pretty deliberate about saying that the best place you can experience journalism is through a relationship with a news provider,” Meredith Kopit Levien, the Times’s chief operating officer, told me. “So far for us, that has meant a direct relationship with users. The more we have a relationship with users, the better we think our business will be, and the better the experience that we can provide to them.” Kris Coratti, a Post spokeswoman, said, “Our focus is on growing our own subscription base, so joining Apple News+ did not make sense for us at this point. Apple has been a very good partner—we will continue collaborating with them on other ongoing projects and expect to do many things with them in the future.”
My issues with Apple News+ all feel solvable. Like a great piece of hardware saddled with early beta software, you know a better experience is just an update away.
I think Apple News+ has huge potential. At its core is a commitment to privacy and the avoidance of fake news. Every single issue I have relates to interface.
Obviously, the issues keeping the Times and Post at arms length go beyond interface, to user data sharing and revenue split.
As Apple evolves the interface design, I think they’ll see an influx of new users. As that installed base of paying users grows, so grows Apple News+’s leverage. You’ll know they’ve truly succeeded when both the Washington Post and the New York Times come to the table.
[VIDEO] This is fantastic video (embedded in main Loop post). I wish I had seen this yesterday. Great work.
Zac Hall, 9to5Mac:
New AirPods pair just as easily as the originals which still feels neat. Upgraders will probably want to rename the new AirPods though. My original AirPods were called ‘Zac’s AirPods’ so the new AirPods defaulted to ‘Zac’s AirPods #2’ since the new ones were paired before the old ones were removed.
I removed the original AirPods from my Bluetooth device list, then dropped the #2 from the new AirPods.
In my experience (colored by a run down battery, no doubt), the new AirPods paired much more quickly and consistently than Gen 1.
As to renaming, I went through the same process Zac did, but added Gen2 to my new ones to keep both around, each with a distinct name. Why? I know I will use the old ones at some point and want to avoid the name collision.
“Hey Siri” support is the most noticeable new feature of second-gen AirPods for upgraders. Activating Siri before required a double-tap on an AirPod or using Hey Siri on a paired device. Activating Siri with a voice command on AirPods is really natural and fast.
And:
“Hey Siri” on new AirPods even works with the Apple Watch when you’re away from your iPhone as long as there’s a network connection (like Wi-Fi or LTE). I’ve been testing this with indoor and outdoor runs and I’m hooked.
And:
Being in motion and activating Siri with a voice command without breaking your stride or worrying about where your wrist is positioned is just one less point of friction.
Hey Siri on AirPods is a home run feature for me. That, snappier connects, and way longer talk time made the new AirPods well worth the cost of admission.
Side note: AirPower or not, I am happy to have the charging case. Plenty of Qi options to choose from.
The Verge:
I will say that for $10 a month, News Plus is the most comprehensive magazine subscription service on the market. (Scribd is a very solid alternative for non-iOS users.)
If you’re thinking about subscribing, that — and only that — is what you should be focused on: getting a service designed mostly for magazines.
I have to agree here. If you are into magazines, Apple News+ is a tremendous value.
But as a news source? Early days still.
Don’t get me wrong. I do think there’s a lot of high-value, news-related content on the site. But the user interface makes getting to those stories a challenge.
Part of the issue is the primitive search features. And the like/dislike/block functionality being hidden in the kitchen junk drawer that the share icon has become. [UPDATE: Swipe right to dislike a story. Not obvious to me, given the multiple columns, but it’s there. And also in the junk drawer.]
My sense, also, is that the News+ interface is constrained by what cross-platform features are currently supported by Marzipan.
Add in the complexities of Apple News+ being one step removed from the news cycles. My sense is that breaking news has to wait to make an appearance until the next sync cycle between Apple News and the news origin.
As I said, it’s early days still. If you are into magazines, the value is clear. If you are looking for breaking news, or want a highly tunable experience, stay tuned.
Thinknum:
What does Siri really know about sports, the weather, and stock? Not too much, and that’s a problem for Apple. There’s nothing worse than asking a digital assistant the score of a game only to get a wooden answer that you could have Googled in half the time.
Well, no. I would definitely be more than happy with a wooden, but correct, answer. But that aside:
Based on hiring data tracked over the past few months, Apple appears to know this. That’s why the company is hiring writers and engineers with a focus on particular subject matters to help make Siri more interesting and enticing to use.
I think that last little bit is on the mark. Apple wants Siri to be more interesting and entertaining. And, I think, more human.
The new positions suggest that the company is putting together subject-focused teams of both engineers and writers to not just improve Siri’s knowledge base, but do so in a way that’s editorial and entertaining with a particular voice.
No matter the reasons, good to see Apple’s Siri hires trending upwards. Interesting article.
I’m guessing they had a backup plan in case they lost: “Got Swatch?”
CNBC:
Apple has cut prices for several of its most important products on its official Chinese online store by nearly 6 percent. The price cuts affect products including iPhones, iPads, Macs and AirPods, according to Apple’s online store in China.
The original CNBC headline was “Apple slashes iPhone prices in China”. The price cuts were less than 6 percent. Significant and newsworthy, yes. But slashes seems an overreach to me.
Hope King, Cheddar:
This week was my third time attending an Apple media event at the Steve Jobs Theater in Cupertino, California.
This time, Apple announced its streaming video plans along with subscription services for news and games. You’ve probably already read the recaps and taken in all the hot takes.
Now take a look at what it’s like to cover the event in person as an invited journalist, which is always a privilege.
An interesting take (mostly in photos) of last week’s Apple Event. Don’t miss the shots of the media riser and the teardown at the end. Interesting perspective.
If you were holding out hope that AirPower would ship, that ship has now sailed, and without AirPower.
So what to do? Here are a few links to well-thought-of Qi chargers and best-of lists:
9to5Mac: Now that AirPower is dead, here are some of the best wireless charger alternatives
GearBrain: AirPower alternatives
Apple’s online store sells a single Qi charger: Belkin BOOST↑UP Wireless Charging Dock for iPhone + Apple Watch
WireCutter: The Best Qi Wireless Charger for iPhone and Android Phones
The price of these Qi chargers ranges from $13 up to $160. Part of this cost disparity is the number of devices handled, support for fast charging, support for Apple Watch charging and, of course, design.
Personally, I don’t care about Apple Watch support, since my Apple Watch never needs a top-off during the day, so dropping it on the Apple charger at night is all I need. That simplifies the equation greatly. Can you make do with a single device charger? Alternate between your iPhone and AirPods?
Also personally, I do not want a light on my charger, especially if it will live in my bedroom. And if I have to have a light, make it subtle.
Another design alternative to consider is flat-on-the-table vs angled.
Take a look through the links above to get a sense of what the reviewers find useful, develop a sense of what features are important to you, then hit the net and look for best bang for your buck.
CNET:
Gerard Williams III, senior director in platform architecture, departed Apple last month after nine years, according to a person familiar with the matter.
While not well known outside of Apple, Williams led development of every Apple processor core from the A7 — the first 64-bit processor for mobile devices — to the A12X, the chip powering Apple’s latest iPad Pro devices.
And:
Williams isn’t the first notable Apple engineer to leave its chip business, which is led by Johny Srouji. Two years ago, Apple SoC architect Manu Gulati left for a similar role at Google. After Gulati left Apple, Williams took over his role overseeing SoC architecture.
Hard to know how much of an impact Williams leaving will be. Feels like Apple’s chip design process is mature enough that no one is irreplaceable.