Jason Snell:

For a few years now, it’s seemed that any forward movement macOS might make was coming in lockstep with Apple’s other platforms, most notably iOS. What was new to the Mac was generally something that was also new to iOS, or was previously available on iOS.

With macOS Mojave, available today to the general public as a part of a public beta, the story is different. macOS Mojave feels like a macOS update that’s truly about the Mac, extending features that are at the core of the Mac’s identity. At the same time, macOS Mojave represents the end of a long era (of stability or, less charitably, stagnation) and the beginning of a period that could completely redefine what it means to use a Mac.

Is macOS Mojave the latest chapter of an ongoing story, the beginning of a new one, or the end of an old one? It feels very much like the answer is yes and yes and yes.

This is a remarkable walkthrough of the macOS Mojave beta: well written, well organized, and nicely peppered with illustrations and animated GIFs. Terrific job by Jason Snell.

Brian Heater, TechCrunch:

Users who’ve downloaded the smart assistant on iOS will be able to ask the app for assistance starting today. It’s not baked-in natively, of course (turns our Apple’s got a smart assistant of its own it’s pretty fond of), so that interaction requires a tap of the button.

From there, however, you can ask Alexa questions, listen to music, access skills and control smart devices — you know, the standard Alexa fare. Queries like weather, sports, calendar and movies will also offer up a visual component in the app. The update will be rolled out to users in “the coming days” as a free download.

Key to me is the fact that Alexa is playing on Siri’s home turf. Alexa will never have access to the Home button, or to a gesture at the top of the iPhone interface. Same story on Android, where Alexa takes a back seat to Google-person.

Amazon tried to enter the phone market with Fire Phone back in 2014, but (from the Fire Phone Wikipedia page):

The phone received mixed reviews. Critics praised the Dynamic Perspective, Firefly and, to a lesser extent, the packaged headphones, but derided the build, design, Fire OS version of Android, specifications, and exclusivity to AT&T. Amazon did not release sales figures for any of its devices, but based in part on its quickly declining prices and an announced $170 million write-down, analysts have judged it having not been commercially successful. Amazon ceased production of the Fire Phone in August 2015 and discontinued sales soon after.

They’ve since relied on their own in-home devices, to great success, but they’ve conceded the mobile space, forced to hide Alexa in an app.

Will this matter in the long run? I think it will, assuming Siri continues to improve and that Apple matches Amazon’s in-home solutions over time. For example, Amazon has a low priced in home speaker. Apple does not.

Amazon makes a TV box that can be controlled by Alexa, hands-free. AppleTV is a better product, no question, but it does not, out of the box, allow you to use your voice to control your TV.

As an example, once you’ve set up your Fire TV Cube, you can ask Alexa to change the channel, to lower the volume, or go back 2 minutes in the movie, all with your hands immersed in some messy cooking project. HomePod does not yet offer that sort of control.

If and when Siri and HomePod add the capabilities demonstrated by Amazon, I see Amazon’s lack of a phone as an advantage that will tilt the playing field in Apple’s direction.

Variety:

Mark Rober, who is best known for his YouTube videos of spectacular science stunts, has been quietly working as an engineer for Apple’s secretive special projects group, Variety has learned. Rober’s work for Apple includes contributions to the company’s virtual reality projects, with a focus on using VR as on-board entertainment for self-driving cars.

And:

In March, Apple filed a patent application for an “immersive virtual display” as well as one for an “augmented virtual display.” Both describe VR systems that could be used by passengers of self-driving cars, who ostensibly weren’t needed to observe traffic anymore.

To get a sense of Mark’s work, and why Apple would make this move (assuming Variety is correct), check out the video embedded below. Amazing work.

The gradient is a powerful design technique, and with great power comes great responsibility. When used improperly, gradients spell out a design disaster. They can muddle a layout, distract the user, and ruin an interface’s entire aesthetic. In this article (with the help of my trusty team of UX designers), we reveal the secret to crafting a gradient that elevates your interface to the next echelon, rather than remind the user of 1997.

It’s so true—a proper gradient is very pleasing, but when done wrong, you just cringe.

Scrolling through these images, I just had to laugh. Cleverly uncomfortable design.

Federico Viticci lays out his favorite new iOS 12 shiny. All worth reading, but my favorite:

Previously available only on 3D Touch-enabled iPhones or with a two-finger swipe on the iPad’s keyboard, trackpad mode can be activated in a much easier way in iOS 12: just tap & hold on the space bar until the keyboard becomes a trackpad. This mode (seemingly inspired by Gboard and other custom keyboards with a similar implementation) gives owners of iPhones without 3D Touch a way to more precisely control the cursor in text fields.

This is one of my favorite new features and, to me, feels much more responsive, the cursor much easier to control.

This is a long read, with an accompanying long video. I truly don’t know how Rene Ritchie finds the time to do all this, but he does, and it’s good stuff.

I’d start off by scrolling down, just a bit, to the section titled iOS 12 In Brief. Rene breaks down his review into 12 (cause iOS 12, get it?) key takeaways. Read those, and you’ll have a good sense of what’s coming, can cherry pick your way through the rest of the piece, dive deep into the areas that interest you.

Nice job, Rene.

I’m running the developer betas. My experience is that iOS 12 beta is very solid. I’ve not run into any issues that get in the way. Not crazy about the change to the camera icon in Messages (explained in this tweet), but that’s design, not a beta issue.

As always with beta software, make sure you have a solid backup (in iOS, make sure you archive the backup, so it doesn’t get overwritten) before you make the move.

Here’s the link to Apple’s beta program page.

Fortune:

Fortune’s CEO Initiative, an invite-only event that takes place on June 25 and 26 in San Francisco, is devoted to the topic of companies doing well by doing good. The theory is that infusing businesses with a broader purpose can help with recruiting, attracting new customers, and improving corporate images.

You can watch a livestream of mainstage sessions with top executives on this page.

Tim Cook is scheduled for 6:05 PM PT today (Monday).

Vinnie Paul, drummer and founding member of the metal band Pantera, has died, the band announced on Facebook.

“Vincent Paul Abbott aka Vinnie Paul has passed away,” the band said.

So sad. R.I.P brother.

The Verge ran a review of their favorite phones. Top of the tops, the iPhone X.

Here’s what they had to say:

Apple’s latest iPhone isn’t just the most interesting iPhone in years, but it’s easily the best smartphone ever made. The iPhone X has almost everything you could think to ask for in a smartphone: blazing-fast performance, a gorgeous display, top-of-the-class cameras, loud, clear speakers, reliable battery life, and a head-turning design. In addition, the X is water resistant and can be recharged with a wireless pad. The main thing that most people will miss is a standard headphone jack.

Apple’s extensive support system, through both its own and carrier stores, is another incredibly important point in the iPhone’s favor. There’s simply no other company that provides as much support for a smartphone after you purchase it. On top of that, since it’s an iPhone, the iPhone X enjoys the broadest support of accessories and cases.

Doomed!

A few weeks ago, we posted about Amazon’s new voice controlled Fire TV Cube.

Think Apple TV married with Amazon Echo. No remote required, just ask Alexa to turn on your system, change channels, pause, jump to a specific location, all via voice.

The ultimate hands-free utopia, right?

Trevor Daugherty, 9to5Toys:

Fire TV Cube looks to cure that with an all-in-one solution centered around its Alexa voice platform. In our hands-on testing, it delivered as a means for sorting through content but fell short as an intuitive hub for home theaters. The potential is there, but don’t count on it changing the game just yet.

Dig through Trevor’s review. While some of the issues raised are easy to get past, many of them are enough to spoil the value of the experience. Judge for yourself but, if you are even considering a purchase, read the whole article to learn what you are in for.

From the Apple press release:

The 2018 Midterm Elections section helps readers follow the latest on the elections with breaking news, exclusive highlights and analysis from reliable sources selected by Apple News’ team of experienced editors. Readers can quickly get up to speed on the most relevant topics and candidates by accessing the new section in the Apple News app from a banner across the top of the For You tab, as well as through Top Stories and the Spotlight tab.

Curated. That’s key. The question is, can the curation team do their work in an unbiased, balanced fashion?

City Lab:

Call them Little Vehicles—not just bikes and scooters, but e-bikes, velomobiles, motorized skateboards, unicycles, “hoverboards,” and other small, battery-powered low-speed not-a-cars. Nearly all of them look silly, but if cities take them seriously, they could be a really, really big deal. Little Vehicles could significantly erode private car and ride-hail use, and play a key role in helping cities achieve their as of now unattainable environmental and road safety goals.

Great piece on the inevitable rise of “Little Vehicles”. Many city residents would be much better served by various combinations of LVs, especially if cities are redesigned away from cars.

Munchies:

The story of wine coolers’ rise and fall fits almost perfectly into the pocket of Reagan-era America. The first wine coolers were sold in 1981. At their peak popularity, in 1987, wine cooler sales topped a billion dollars annually, and accounted for 20 percent of all wine consumed in the US.

This history of (disgusting) wine coolers is actually interesting. Sadly, it seems wine coolers are making a comeback.

The Verge:

As the only US border town located in the shadow of a major Canadian city, Blaine’s economy is uniquely dependent on the relationship between the two countries. It’s a position that also leaves the town vulnerable to the vagaries of e-commerce trends and exchange rates.

For the past decade Blaine has flourished, thanks to the discrepancy between the explosion of e-commerce in the US and the still-developing e-commerce network in Canada. Blaine’s handful of residents have grown accustomed to a regular stream of Canadians who come to town specifically to pick up their US packages. For these Canadians, Blaine is simply a mailing address: the nearest, cheapest, and most convenient way to order packages from Amazon and other major US retailers.

I’m one of those customers. The difference in price and availability between Amazon Canada’s offerings and Amazon US is staggering, even when you include the exchange rate.

The United States Supreme Court issued a ruling on June 22 stating that police must first get an official warrant before they can use cell tower data to track someone’s location.

This is an interesting development for law enforcement, one I’m sure they’re not happy with.

The safety driver behind the wheel of a self-driving Uber car in Tempe, Arizona, was streaming a television show on her phone until about the time of a fatal crash, according to a police report that deemed the March 18 incident “entirely avoidable.”

Vasquez could face charges of vehicular manslaughter, according to the report, which was released late on Thursday in response to a public records request.

It’s amazing to me that people continue to watch video, text or otherwise cause themselves to be distracted while driving a vehicle.

Open Culture:

Born out of evening reading of spooky stories on a rain-soaked holiday, Mary Shelley’s 1818 novel Frankenstein has resonated through the years into pop culture, a warning against science and technology, of how the thirst for knowledge can literally create monsters. If you’ve been binging Westworld or loved Ex Machina you are seeing Shelley’s legacy, both filled with scientific creations that question their own reason for existence.

Just like those works are products of our era, Frankenstein did not just arise from a dream state—-Shelley was influenced by the concerns, events, and news of her day.

Therefore this annotated version of Frankenstein, called Frankenbook, should make a topical and important read this summer.

I haven’t read Frankenstein since college but I’ve been poking around this annotated edition and I might just make the time to curl up with it over the weekend.

From this John Wickham tweet:

Don't use the Markup highlighter on your iPhone to censor information in screenshots. Multiple strokes don’t make it opaque, and you can really easily reveal what’s beneath it. pic.twitter.com/Gm43aYz0LY

— John Wickham (@thejohnwickham) June 20, 2018

Check the pic on the left and on the right. See the difference in the blocked text?

My followup to John asked how he got from one to the other. In other words, how did he reveal what’s under the marker.

His response:

In the Photos app, tap Edit, then open the levels (dial icon in the toolbar). Tap the disclosure arrow for Light, then crank the Brightness slider all the way up.

Yup. This is really good to know. I believe a filled rectangle will work. Nice find, John!

In a nutshell, this article talks you through the process of using Time Machine to fetch an old copy of your history file.

Take a look, file away for that future need. Good stuff.