Upgrade - 231: The Upgrade Cycle Is Extending

Episode Date: February 4, 2019

What Apple's quarterly results had to say about iPhone sales and prices, Apple reaches a fork in the road when it comes to keyboard design, and just after the official opening of 2019 iPhone Rumor Season comes the official opening of 2020 iPhone Rumor Season.

from relay fm this is upgrade episode 231 and today's show is brought to you by text expander fresh books and ero my name is mike curly and i am joined by jason snell hi jason snell hi mike curly i have a snell talk question for you, Jason Snell, that was delivered to me via audio form after we recorded Connected last week. Federico Vatici wants to know, Jason Snell, do you rename the internal drives on your Mac? This is a fascinating philosophical question.

I used to, back in the olden days back in the olden days in the olden days when your mac hard drive was on your desktop like everything else i used to say macintosh hd right like right there on the desktop i used to rename it and uh often get info on it and paste in like an icon that i enjoyed like a custom icon right that was like how you personalized your mac right yeah i used to do that this is that thing like again like i know i'm a very ios person i've been using max for like 15 years at this point right like i i'm not you know like i used to do that right i used to use a candy bar right that was an customize all that stuff you could customize all the icons and stuff yep so uh at some point

probably like a decade ago now a few things one i don't actually have my local hard drive on my icon on my desktop anymore i don't do that os 10 i think by default doesn't show it and you can choose to show it or not um i don't show it i don't see it um and then also in when i was at macworld especially but it's true even now, uh, but back at Macworld, I would get, um, I'd have different computers at different times cause I'm reviewing stuff. So I would like migrate everything to, I cannot tell you how many laptops I used because I would literally like, here's a new laptop to review, migrate all my stuff to that laptop,

use that for a while, write my review, then migrate back. Or maybe I'd keep that and then there would be a new one. And then I migrate to that I did a lot of moving around of data. And I think partly it was that also, I started writing like little scripts and stuff where you had to, we didn't have to, I was bad, because I'm bad at Apple script, I would often hard code my scripts to my file path. And you don't have to do that you can actually say like the home folder you can get your path and get what the volume is

but the combination of those two things at some point I just decided or those three things the icon on the desktop too I just decided it wasn't worth dealing with it that I would give my computer in the sharing control panel I would give my computer a name but that the internal hard drive I decided I just didn't want to deal with it, that I would give my computer in the sharing control panel, I would give my computer a name. Yes. But that the internal hard drive, I decided I just didn't want to deal with it. It was the internal hard drive. And as such, for the last decade, my internal hard drive has just been Macintosh HD. I think that makes perfect sense. So I'm over it. I choose to put my personalization schemes in other places. I have a custom desktop.

I name my computer so it isn't just Jason's iMac, parentheses, nine, close parentheses. It's not any of that. But the hard drive is just Macintosh HD. Isn't it interesting that they still call it HD? Isn't it interesting they still call it Macintosh well that's true actually yeah this is gonna be one of those things they just it's like too much work to change right i think for the same reason that i said i think it's probably a similar reason which is like why would they go into the effort to change it? Maybe changing it changes a lot of things.

What would they call it? You know, would they have it be different for every model? Would it just be like Mac OS drive? Like, I think they just decided it's a classic. It's been there forever. And there's no reason to change it because by default nobody really cares and if you want to change it you can so um yeah i i i maybe it also gives me a little bit of nostalgia when i do see macintosh hd that's like oh yeah right like every default hard drive

ever on every mac for ages now yeah i can only assume only assume some stuff is hard-coded somewhere. It may be. It would just break so much stuff if they changed it. Yeah, some summer intern was like, let's not call it Macintosh HD anymore, and then he worked on that the whole summer,

and at the end they're like, yeah, this breaks everything. Sorry, Billy. Goodbye. I would like to thank Federico for his question. If you record a podcast with me and would like a question asked to Jason,

just tell me after our recording on Skype. I will. It's probably better for you to send a tweet with the hashtag Snell Talk because that's how the majority, the vast majority of these questions are provided for us to open the show. So I wanted to do some follow-up because a lot of stuff happened last week, but the news cycle has moved on and nothing really changed. So it's not really worth massively getting into as a full topic,

i.e. having to describe the whole thing and then do all of the follow-up for it. So listen to episode 228 of Connected and episode 89 of Download if you would like to hear mine and Jasonason's thoughts about apple's facetime bug and the facebook enterprise certificate thing um the facebook thing basically what happened has happened right like it's resolved now and the facetime bug has yet to be fixed but apple apologized that's effectively what's changed since we spoke about these things and they turned off group facetime entirely in the meantime until they fix it which they're going to do they say this week yeah yeah exactly so you know they they there's episodes are there and they include most of if not all of our thoughts on

those subjects but we just didn't think it was worth talking about them specifically today but we wanted to record that they'd occurred they that's right. Let the record show that these things had occurred. Yeah. My only thing I wanted to mention about this at all, which is kind of a meta thing, when the Facebook thing happened, where that story came out saying Facebook was distributing, using their enterprise certificate,

distributing apps to people outside of Facebook, non-Facebook employees, and that it was this Onivo thing that already got banned from the App Store. I saw a lot of people on Twitter and in Slack in various places say that Apple wouldn't do anything about it. And I think that what's interesting about that is that it shows how, I think, maybe beaten down a little bit, but certainly cynical people are about how Apple treats big companies like Facebook versus small developers. We all know the stories about how Apple is incredibly by the book sometimes when it comes to little developers. They will point at the letter of their rules, even though it's not in spirit, and demand changes that are ridiculous. I had a friend who

was trying to release an app update and wanted to mention that it fit the new iPhone sizes and the new iPhones had been announced but not released yet. And his update was rejected because you weren't supposed to mention unreleased products, even though they had been announced. It was like, we hear stories like this all the time. It's better since Phil Schuller took over control of the app store, but you still hear them. And I think it's really interesting how it has gotten ingrained in a lot of people's minds that Apple is going to behave like a jerk when it comes to small developers, and it's going to give big developers with power a pass. And I get that. And yet, when that was going on, I kept saying, no, I think they're going to come down on Facebook here. Because everybody hates Facebook right now. Facebook's

in the news for doing, uh, for doing bad stuff. And, uh, it's very on brand for Apple to say, no, no, we care about this. You broke the rules and Facebook is trying to steal people's data and we don't like it and we're going to put you down. And that is what they did. So I'm, I, I, not to say that hashtag Jason was right, but I just I reading the tea leaves there. It's like when if if you if there was never when would there be a better time to come down hard publicly on Facebook for some bad behavior? It did now seems like the perfect time. And indeed it was. And they did.

And they also rebuked Google a little bit, too. And, you know, they didn't delete their accounts forever and remove Facebook from the App Store or anything like that. But they did do something. And I'm not surprised that they did because, again, I think it makes Apple look good that they are seen publicly chastising Facebook for what is perceived as a breach. You know, more information-hungry brokering happening by Facebook, which fits that narrative pretty well. Yeah, I think I kind of had two points on what you said there. One is like, well, I understand why people would have felt that way, and Apple only really probably did something here

because they had a convenient punishment for them, right? Like if it wasn't a situation, if the situation was all they could do was remove facebook from the app store there probably would have been no punishment because that hurts apple as well as hurting facebook right so i think it would have been very unlikely in that situation that we would have seen them do anything um and the other is like how much of a punishment was it really though it's like two days and then they got their certificate back it was a slap on the wrist it was a don't do this it was at least a public slap on the wrist

which is a cool thing to do and also it was sending the message that we're not going to allow this to continue right like like you need to because it wasn't just like they slapped him on the wrist and then they turned everything back in two days they slapped him on the wrist and said that thing has to go away and it went away and google meanwhile was like well uh we have we have one of those don't hurt us don't hurt us and meanwhile was like well uh we have we have one of those don't hurt us don't hurt us and they're like well we're gonna slap you on the wrist too i also expect that like in the intervening time with what what we didn't see was all of the very very high level meetings that occur between facebook and apple right i mean i doubt it was

very much a oh we're gonna get rid of this and in two days we're gonna give it back i assumed that there were conversations that happened yeah no i'm sure i'm sure that they basically said you're in violation it's revoked and then at that point somebody at facebook has to call apple basically and they're like what are we we're so sorry we apologize it won't happen again this was a rogue group we had no knowledge of it i'm shocked that there was gambling in this establishment all of that and then that's a reference and uh. And then Phil Schiller gets on the phone probably and is like, okay, here's what's going to happen. We'll give this back to you. But, you know, we're aware of everything you register.

And, you know, whatever the conditions are, we'll be watching you. You can't ever do this again. You know, there are reasons we do this. I'm sure there was some conversation back there. But it struck me. Facebook has power. And you're right. Apple's not going to shoot itself in the foot by turning off the Facebook app for everybody who has an iOS device.

That said, I feel like Apple had the upper hand here. Because what's Facebook going to do? Walk away from iOS? No, they're not going to do that either. They're not going to do that. Besides which, there's the website. So you can use, I don't have Facebook on my phone. When I go to a Facebook link, it just loads in my web browser and it's fine. So like there are, uh, I felt like, yeah, yeah. Apple ultimately doesn't want to be the phone platform that doesn't have Facebook, but one there's the whole uh web thing and then and then two facebook also

doesn't want to give all those uh great high value facebook users away so yep uh yeah yep what what a what a huge mess i'm sure facebook has lost some of the leniency that they may have had well that i think if we can hope for anything from this entire thing it's that right which is which is uh facebook i think that's what apple was really trying to do with facebook and google was send a message like you need to police your own people because if this i mean if it came from the top it came from the top but like if you've got a group that's doing this research and they just decided we don't care we'll do whatever it has impact on the rest of facebook right even if the executives were okay with it like every facebook employee who couldn't order their meal or get picked up from the bus or whatever is mad at those people now because they got they became acutely aware

of the things going on inside of their company because it impacted them yeah done that was it was a good message, I'm sure, but I doubt literally anything will change for Facebook's just general ways of doing business. Anyway, let's move on to Upstream. It was the Super Bowl yesterday. Super Bowl! Super Bowl, and of course... It was the most boring of all Super Bowls.

That was what I saw. Sorry, as somebody who watches football, it was a lousy all super bowl that was what i saw as somebody watches football it was a lousy lousy lousy game yeah i tend to watch the super bowl but just didn't this year for no specific reason and woke up this morning and was very pleased you didn't miss you didn't miss anything i i yeah it was it was not a good game. And I'm not talking about the outcome. Both local Bay Area quarterbacks, actually, which is kind of funny. And the Rams quarterback, Jared Goff, went to Cal. I saw him play all the three years that he was at Cal.

And he is from my place. He's from Marin County, where I live. He grew up here, went to Marin Catholic. So were you for the Rams then? And they're running back C. anderson also a cow guy so yes although there are two cow guys on the patriots too i you know we cow fans have to take victory where we can find it and it's not in berkeley so uh anyway but it was a it was a lousy game at least there were commercials i actually thought most of the commercials were kind of lousy too

although i have a couple of favorites okay i don't know what they are i've seen i think i've probably seen one of them okay so bud light has this ad campaign which i hate which is like a king and a bunch of soldiers and and they added this character that's like a knight who speaks in this weird process deep voice who is he's literally like duff man he is a laughable kind of character but you know beer marketing in the u.s especially with the major brands literally has gotten to the point where they they um it's all about things that don't matter and all the marketing is also becoming like we know that anybody who really cares about the flavor of their beer is buying like micro brews so they're leaning into the whole idea that their brand is for people who don't want fancy beer for people who don't care

what their beer tastes like essentially right like just go with what you got right like if i was in the cmo of a uh of a beer chain that's probably what i would do i mean i laugh at it because they're literally it's like our beer is crappy uh but you don't care so drink it but what they also do because then how do you differentiate against your competitors? And so they pick out things. So famously, one of these guys, was it Bud Light? It was somebody who was saying, our competitors are made with corn syrup, but we're not, which is hilarious, because one of the competitors then immediately on Twitter was like, we don't use corn syrup.

What are you talking about? And the corn growers got very angry with him. And they're like, that's American corn. I did see that ad, though. I found it quite funny i did find that was really funny and then my my favorite is that the coors light ads are all about how they keep it cold everything they do is cold and i asked uh somebody i know who's involved in beer does it matter at all if the beer remains cold in all of these points and he says no that's marketing they refrigerate this place and do this all just for marketing so that they can say it makes when you think of us think cold. So they've got cold going for them.

Anyway, beer marketing is fascinating. But this but I so I hate these Bud Light ads. They're really annoying. And this there was a new one. I was rolling my eyes and they're like, oh, the Bud Knight, which is the guy, the Duffman. The Bud Knight is going to do a jousting contest and i and i jokingly said oh like uh like like game of thrones because there's famously a jousting scene in an early in the first season i think of of game of thrones and um and then he the joust happens and the bud knight is hit and knocked off his horse onto the ground. And I think, well, that's weird. Why would he be on the ground? And then a large knight stands over him and Lauren says, well, that's the mountain. Like this literally, I'm like, they're doing Game of Thrones. That's really funny.

rips the head off of the bud night and i'm like oh my god they killed their mascot what is happening at which point uh the dragon one of the dragons from game of thrones appears and sets all of the other characters in the annoying bud light commercial on fire and uh the text comes up saying uh the last season of game of thrones premieres whenever april whatever and i laughed And I laughed and laughed because that required HBO to work with Budweiser to allow them to basically murder all of their characters and mock them in this horrible way. But it was brilliant because, and my other commercial that I liked was very similar in that you think you're seeing something, but you're not. You're actually, you've been fooled into seeing something else. And I was congratulating myself on the fact that they were making references to game of thrones and then it turned out oh no it's actually a game of thrones commercial so it was really good i was impressed and i i hate those commercials so i think that was part of it is that i enjoyed um

the annoying king and soldiers and and the the stupid bud knight being killed horribly in their own commercial it was great so i uh i saw a quote on the Wall Street Journal, which I love, because obviously HBO and Anheuser-Busch had to get together to work on this, right? HBO's chief marketing officer, Chris Spadaccini, said very clearly the Bud Knight had to die. Like they were only doing it if the night dies like that's the whole idea right oh we just because it's game of thrones yeah like the night has to die because they're going up against one of our characters like and and again it's one of the things game

of thrones is a show where people die yeah yeah and hbo know that that they don't need this bud ad right like they don't need that like this is bud's thing but like hbo will get some headlines for a couple of days out of it but so i love the idea of like no no your character dies if we're going to be in your ad yeah it was good uh and the other one i liked which was obviously only uh in the u.s because it's for uh cbs all access so cbs all access um is doing a they announced this last year um uh jordan peele is doing a relaunch of the twilight zone and that was a really good ad because it starts as um with the cbs announcers and a shot of the of the stadium it's as they're coming back from commercial and so it's like we're back here and then it glitches out um and oh very nice says cbs is is off the air and then and you're and then you hear this narration

and you eventually are on the field of an empty version of the stadium um as jordan peele is walking down the uh down down the middle of the field, and it's revealed that he is giving the narration, and there's basically a door standing in the middle of the field, which he opens and steps through and disappears, because it's the door to the Twilight Zone. And I thought that was just very well done, because people didn't, unless you were reading the news,

people didn't know that CBS All Access was bringing back the Twilight Zone, and that it was Jordan Peele. And it was also it got your attention because it acted like they were coming back to the broadcast. So everybody like turns back. I found that a lot that I am so I am so tuned into ignoring commercials. And then during the Super Bowl, I'm like, no, no, no, no. Pay attention. Pay attention. The commercials matter because as soon as they go to commercial, my brain goes somewhere else because I'm like, I don't care about these commercials and I have to force myself back. But this was the reverse of that where it's like, oh, oh, the game's coming back. Oh, it's an ad. So. So, yeah. But I like that. I like that. I thought that was really appropriate in getting the message out about them relaunching the Twilight Zone.

in getting the message out about them relaunching the Twilight Zone. So according to a report from The Information, Apple has been telling various studios and networks, quote, whose offerings will be available through their service to be ready for launch by mid-April. Now, so this is a report basically stating April is the date or within a few weeks of April is the date for the launch of apple's tv streaming service which i think is a date that me and you had pegged out like early spring um it's funny because april is when disney is going to be demoing their service so like that's kind of fun

right like they're like sticking the knife in a little bit ah here is ours now i want to just that quote specifically, because of the way it's written, has I think led to a lot of speculation from different people about what actually is going on here. And we're going to get to a little bit more of that later on when we talk about Apple's Q1 results. So the idea of studios and networks whose offerings will be a part of this on the face of it make it sound like back catalog stuff right but that's not necessarily the case right based upon the kind of the information that we know about how this stuff works and i haven't followed it for so long that it might not be as clear-cut as that yeah i i still feel like the most likely scenario is that

they're just going to offer originals. Me too. But who knows? But networks and studios are producing this content for Apple, right? Like that. So, you know, it might just be like... Here's the question. Studios and networks are different. I mean, even though they're often owned by the same people. Like studios make content for clients.

And networks are the broadcasters. And really the studios own the rights, although that's where it gets mixed up because a lot of times the network is the studio and the rights are with both of them. So I think that this is going down a rabbit hole of like, we don't know. But I'm just going to assume for now that it's all originals, original movies, original TV shows. I still think it's just originals. Original movies, original TV shows. I still think it's just originals. We seem to be entering an era where all the studios have their own owned and operated TV networks and all their owned and operated streaming services, and they're not licensing content anywhere. But I wouldn't put it past them.

I think we said this last year at some point to license some additional content that's related to the material that they're putting on. material that they're putting on so like my example was like ron moore like uh would they cut a deal with uh universal for battlestar galactica or something like that uh so that they could be like you know if you like the ron moore sci-fi show check out that we also have his battlestar galactica something like that might be the case but um you know i i kind of doubt it i think it's i think it's just going to be originals it's nice and simple that way all right today's episode is brought to you by ero with ero you can build a wi-fi system perfectly tailored to your home considering the high bandwidth world that we live in right now like for example you're probably streaming content in many places in

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This is a really good discount. Eero doesn't always do discounts, so this is definitely worth jumping on. That's Eero.com slash Ahoy and the code Ahoy to get that offer for upgrade listeners. Our thanks to Eero for their support of this show and RelayFM. Apple's dramatic Q1 results. We were expecting them. We knew what they were going to be

by and large in some areas. But I still want to go through some numbers, Jason. $84.3 billion in revenue down from $88.3 the year before this was the stuff that we kind of had our idea we knew was going to go wrong um but as it's worth pointing out this is apple's second highest revenue quarter in history uh they did 20 billion dollars in profit down from 20.1 now we have this is the first quarter as well where we do not have unit

sales anymore, but we do have revenue figures. So services revenue is $10.9 billion up from 9.1. Wearable, home, and accessories which is a new category which was previously called other products.

But they've now kind of categorized what other actually means which is very useful. It's $7 Yeah. But they've now kind of categorized what other actually means, which is very useful. It's $7.3 billion, up from $5.5. Mac revenue is $7.4, up from $6.8. This was Apple's best quarter for Mac revenue, up 9%, fueled by new Mac Minis and MacBook Airs. This was a quote from Apple, right, that that was where that came from, the Mac mini and the MacBook Air. We could have guessed it, but it's good to know. iPad revenue was at 6.7 billion, up from 5.7 billion.

So iPad revenue is up 17% year over year, which is the highest growth rate in almost six years because of the new iPad Pros, which is fantastic to see. It turns out that if you release new products, you make more money. Turns out. The Mac and the iPad taught us that. I guess the better they are, the more you'll make, right? Because we've seen new iPad Pros in the past,

but these new new iPad Pros are amazing. And more expensive. But they have both of those things going for it. And pent-up demand is also a big part. But it'll be interesting to see how this resets over time and whether there's a big spike and then it goes back down a lot or just a little bit and what the levels are for the Mac.

Best quarter ever for Mac revenue is pretty impressive. That's wild. Right? The Mac's been around a long time and they've never sold as many dollars-wise Macs in a year, which is pretty incredible. And iPhone revenue is at $52 billion down from $61.1 billion which is the third highest though. Third highest right so it's the second highest quarter of revenue ever for Apple but iPhone revenue, it's actually not only down

from holiday 17, it's actually down from holiday 16 a little bit. So definitely a big bump. It really, Mike, it's really reminding me of the year after the iPhone 6 came out. And I think, you know,

I think there's a lot here about buying cycles that goes beyond just sort of like iPhone up, iPhone down. That has to do with like the iPhone 10, which was a completely new phone after years of the same phone. And it sold pretty well and enough to keep the sales growing and to have a record sales quarter for iPhone last year. But this year, the XS is not appreciably different than the X. It is different. We know the details, but it looks exactly like it. And what we learned with the 6 and the 6S is that there was pent-up demand for the bigger

phone, the 6 Plus, and there was pent-up demand for a new-looking iPhone after the years of the 4 and 5. And they had a huge year for both of those things. And then the next year was tough to live down as we lived through it and talked about it. Like year over year, they just took the hit for three consecutive quarters because year two didn't have the pent-up demand

and the phones weren't as exciting. And so the XS, very much like that. What's interesting here is I think that Apple said the XR was their best-selling phone and the XS Max was their second best-selling phone. And what's most notable about those things is neither of those phones had an analog last year. So they were both new that probably addressed some pent-up demand, right? The XS Max had some pent-up demand from people who wanted to be plus club. But had no choice, really. Had no choice if they wanted the X, but the XS Max fulfills something that wasn't there before. And the XR, obviously, being not cheap, but cheaper, bringing those X features down into this price range that wasn't available last year.

And those were the two best-selling phones. So I think, and we don't know for sure, but my read on that was that this is that effect as well. It's not just the maturing of the smartphone market or they're related. I think they're interrelated, but there's this idea, I mean, especially in China, but I think overall that when you have a new iPhone that looks new, that's appreciably new and different and wasn't on offer last year, um, more people will buy. And as the, as the life cycle of a phone lengthens and

you hold a phone even longer, you need a reason to get a new phone. If your phone is still lasting, but it's getting old, everybody's playing the do I sit out this year or not game. And if there's something new, like the XR or the XS Max, you say, oh, okay, I'll jump in. I can't tell you how many people I've talked to who are like, yeah, I have a X. It's fine. I don't need the XS. And it's like, you know, buying a new phone every year is not something most people do anyway, of course. But I do think that there's something more to that, which is also it's an incremental increase and therefore less exciting, which doesn't mean people aren't buying the XS.

People coming from the 7, 6S, 6 might be buying the XS. But in terms of like the big volume of like, oh, the phones are growing, you need kind of all of the things to align at once. So my guess, my gut feeling here is that the XR and the XS Max actually helped this number be better than it would otherwise have been if this was a straight up, you know, what they used to do, which is just slightly advance the ball in year two, you know, go from the seven to the eight. Well, they added the 10 then, but go from the success to the seven,

right? Like if it was one of those years, I think the sales would have been way worse. It also makes me wonder then if we leap off from that this weird year where apple had like the three phones um if that's something that apple is going to try to keep in mind where it's always got some model that is fresher so that even if they can't do a completely refreshed line every year which i'm not sure they're capable of we're completely refreshing it where they all like look different and are different sizes like i don't think that's possible um i do wonder if their strategy is going to be like let's move it around and you know make sure that there's something there's always something intriguing and new and interesting in the product line

for people who are um waiting for and looking for a reason to jump yeah but as we know we're going to talk a little bit about later on today we're not going to see that in 2019 because it's too late right like they definitely found this information out just too late in the iphone design process so we were most likely to expect from 2020 to see differences if any from a hardware perspective right like because it just feels like it would be way too late in the development of the 2019 iphone before they could have made that decision. Like, that product must have been pretty much locked down from a hardware design perspective

when they found this information out, which was, you know, like, October, probably, when they found out that this thing wasn't going the way they wanted. So, yeah, but super interesting. I hadn't thought about that, about the XR and the Max being like a pent-up demand type thing, right? Like even maybe hiding the crimes more,

even though it already looks bad, right? But like if they would have had the XR and the Max last year, that this year could have been a real, real disaster, right? Like if they only had iterations or if they didn't do the max and the R, like they just did the 10S and the 8S or whatever, or the 9 or whatever they were at.

I can't even remember the numbers anymore. It feels like so long ago that maybe it would have been even worse for them than it ended up being. At the end of last week's episode, we both predicted that they would say more about their streaming service plans. They did, but not to the level that we thought. So there were a couple of quotes of interest. So Apple spoke about working with TV manufacturers and the reason that they're doing this and integrating AirPlay and or content into these TVs because they want to make it easier for their customers to consume the video that Apple makes

available. Like they were being a little bit coy, right? They were kind of just making it sound like, oh, no, not just our content, like everyone's content. And on that, Apple spoke about trying to push more on selling third party TV services. And I wonder what that means. My read on this, Jason, is either damage control or response to Netflix pulling out. I wouldn't be surprised to see some kind of business model changes from Apple for this type of content going forward. That maybe they want to try and do something to bring Netflix back and stop other people from wanting to do this type of stuff. To leave the App Store for subscriptions. Well, yeah, for subscriptions is the key there. It's not leaving the app store.

It's just leaving the app store for subscriptions. And I think what they want to do is make the TV app the center of the attention. And at that point, it's the Amazon channels model, which is you want to be in our TV app because this is where, um, this is where everything is going to be. It's, it's basically saying, forget this app store stuff on Apple TV. Uh, what it's really about is video stuff channeling into the, uh, in the TV app. And you want to be in there and you want to be in there with all of the other stuff. And, and, uh, you want to let, let us be, be a reseller and sell your subscriptions there. And maybe there's a deal that goes with that where it's a dramatically increased percentage

that Apple takes as a reseller of channels. I don't know. I don't know. Because when you think about it, I mean, even if there's an app behind the scenes that's doing it, living in the TV app is a little bit different than living in the app store and selling a subscription in the TV app maybe is a little bit different too. So I'm sure that they're going to do this because of course they are. My favorite thing about what Tim Cook talked about in there

was just his, I think, restating of something that he said before, which is the idea that we are undergoing a shift in how people, I mean, it's huge changes in customer behavior, he said, that will accelerate as the year goes by to the breakdown of the cable bundle that's been talked about for years.

And I think that'll very likely take place at a much faster pace this year. So we're going to participate in that in a variety of ways through Apple TV, AirPlay 2, as you pointed out. He says to the analysts, we've got third-party TVs and we're excited about that.

And third-party video subscriptions. That's going to accelerate in the future, he says. And then original content, we will participate. I'm not going to extend that conversation beyond that point. We hired some great people and they're working really hard, which he said before said before so but I like that he listed them all and they also called out the Oprah deal again right which is the one they've done before yes because we already

mentioned Oprah so that they mentioned Oprah again because you gotta just keep mentioning Oprah uh the uh but that I like that because he sketches out like like we're doing all of these different things in this area because we do think that this is an opportunity because of the huge changes in customer behavior. And he's not wrong. Whether Apple can ultimately capitalize on it is an open question. But he's not wrong. The customer behavior is changing rapidly. I think it's interesting that he believes it will accelerate as the year goes by.

I think that's also accurate how fast it accelerates. The rate of acceleration is the real question but since 2019 is the year where all of these streaming services are being announced and launching um or coming you know early 2020 for nbc universal but like it's it's gonna happen really fast so uh apple will participate but beyond that they're not talking yeah i i genuinely like if i'm looking at reading the tea leaves here i think that there are big changes coming to the apple tv um and like for example if there were if apple were going to start saying you know be in the tv app like don't worry about your app as much and we'll we will give you a sweet cut and then they just have a device that doesn't have apps it has tv and it has the itunes

store and you can sign up for netflix right? And Netflix is just there in the TV app. Like you don't have to get the Netflix app anymore and kind of simplify things. I don't know, but like it feels like that they're putting a lot more emphasis on the idea of being an over-the-top cable provider than an app store, right? Like it feels like there's like a change in the wording that they're using. Like, way more focusing on, like, we're going to help third parties sell their TV services, which is a very different way of talking about things than what they've done in the past.

So, I don't know. I'm keen to see what they do there. Peter Kafka put it quite nicely. He said, like, so if you take everything they said, put it all in one place, speed it up, what you get is we're going to sell a bundle of app of other people's tv shows and movies we're going to add our own and make sure you can watch it anywhere you want yep so but i'm keen to see what the

the other people part looks like because i i don't feel like i have a great handle on if or what they're going to change in that to make it more amenable and maybe less about the app store, if anything. So I'm keen to see what they do there. But we learned a bunch of other stuff from the call. So a couple of things on pricing, obviously pricing, something that a lot of people are thinking about right now. Pricing is a reason that a lot of people are saying Apple maybe missed the mark here in some areas. So Apple believed the XR is priced right as it was in the middle of where the entry iPhone 8

and entry iPhone 8 Plus had been priced. So Tim Cook, this is a Tim Cook quote, says, actually a pretty small difference in the United States compared to last year. Yeah, so yeah, this is... This sucks Tim Cook quote. Says, actually a pretty small difference in the United States compared to last year. Yeah. So, yeah. This is. This sucks as a quote.

I rolled my eyes here. So bad. So they literally asked him point blank in the Q&A. And there weren't that many questions because Apple kind of, I think, strategically took most of the call just reading their statements, their prepared statements. So there was very little back and forth in the call, few analysts in the analyst call. I think that's telling too. Somebody should chart how much time they take

with their prepared statements. That would be a funny thing to do. And correlate it with the earnings. With the results, sure. Or with the stock price move on the after hours. So they asked point blank, do you think that the iphone is priced too high in the u.s or a price too high period and and and tim cook given the opportunity

to say yeah yeah we did that he he didn't he said no it's fine he said and his his logic was uh poor i'll say because what he said was well know, the XS is priced the same as the X. She's like, okay, the X set records. It was the most expensive iPhone ever when you put it on sale last year. So you just kicked that back a year, but it's still, let's ask that question. And you know, the XS Max is just $100 more than that. And then he moved on. I'm like, but okay, so you just said that doesn't answer the pricing. It's like, yes, it's more. It costs even more than that. And then he moved on. I'm like, but okay, so you just said that doesn't answer like the pricing. It's like, yes, it's more. It costs even more than the phone you introduced last year, which was the most expensive iPhone ever. And then on the XR, he gives this answer

where he's like, well, if you average the price of the 8 and the 8 Plus, it's right in the middle of those. So it's fine. Which again, uh, the eight, the eight itself was more expensive than the seven. And of course the eight was cheaper than the 10 R, uh, because people don't buy an average price. They buy a phone, one or the other. And that was his best way of trying to explain the 10 R being a low price phone is that it was basically between the 8 and the 8 plus. And this is a non-answer. It's obviously a coached non-answer. It is his way of saying, we're not going to change the prices. We think that they're great in a way that is just kind of, it's like nonsense marketing words. And I was a little disappointed because I just rolled my

eyes. It's like, come on, man, just say that they provide value and the sales in the US were fine and it's fine. He did go on to admit that they've really gotten hit overseas in a lot of places, a lot of territories with this, because in addition to the high prices, I will say that he won't say, of these phones, there were foreign exchange issues, which made them even more expensive than they were last year even by tim's comparison with the iphone 10 and in a little bit of an announcement i think i don't think apple had said this somewhere they were they were actually undertaking some repricing in different markets in january in order to get the prices to be close to or to match what the price was last year, which is basically that they're eating into their margin or they're eating some of that foreign exchange consequence in order

to get the phone this year to cost what the phone cost last year, because it was more expensive because the dollar was too strong. I have not been able to find any evidence of price changes. I have not been able to find any evidence of price changes. I've spent some time looking for this today. I don't know if they are available to people yet. It may not be. Yeah. And Tim's view of what happens in January might be we agreed to do it, but who knows if it's actually been done.

Because I can't find it. But that's what they're talking about. The idea that if you're in some territory where it used to cost X of whatever your currency is last year for the 10, and then the 10S comes out and it costs X plus some number, and you're like, oh my God, they raised the price. And they did it because of foreign exchange. It might be that they go back to X or close to X in the near future, because they do believe that that was a drain. So basically the USs it's priced fine according to apple but it's just everywhere else where you take apple's high prices and then you

add on foreign exchange that it's too high priced apparently i sincerely doubt that they will um give anybody gift cards like they did when they reduced the original iphone's price uh remember that like if you bought the iphone yeah they gave people gift cards i don't know if it's for the full value or like no i don't remember but like no they cut the price like two or three hundred dollars and gave everybody a hundred dollar gift cards i sincerely doubt it's not gonna happen we're gonna get gift cards in europe for our expensive iphones um so one of the reasons that they spent talking some time about why iPhone sales could be slowing is because the phones are lasting longer. So they're trying to take a negative,

turn it into a positive. I'll read a quote from Tim. Some people hold on to those for the life of the product and some people trade them in. And then that phone is then redistributed to someone else. The upgrade cycle has extended. There's no doubt, no doubt about that where it goes in the future, I don't know. But I'm convinced that making a great product that is high quality is the best thing for the customer and we work for the user. And so that's the way they do believe it. And if they don't change anything because of these results changing, it feels like a good thing, right? Like make the best thing you can make. It is, I feel like it's Apple kind of surfing with the conditions, or maybe it is, I don't know,

skating where the puck should be. We don't have ice here in California. But look, the upgrade cycle is extending, right? So what does Apple do? And I think the argument here is that Apple would much prefer if everybody bought a new phone every two years. And the old cellular plans in the US, at least, basically when you got to the end of your second year with your phone, you were throwing money away if you didn't get a new phone. You essentially were throwing money away because you were still paying a subsidy that was no longer funding your phone. You were just paying it and it was just profit for the carrier. That used to be how it worked. It was ridiculous. And as a result,

like with all those two-year cycles, everybody would get a new phone every two years. Well, that's not happening anymore. There are a bunch of other places with subsidies like Japan where it's going away. It's going away. And so now Apple is not going to sell as many iPhones, right? That was really good for business. So they're going with this new world we live in and saying, all right, if the average phone is being used for three or four years or five years, here's what we need to do. We need to make sure that they last and that they work well for that whole period of time so that in the end, people have a positive experience, they continue to be our customer, they stay in our ecosystem, and ultimately they get a new phone when they're ready. And so it's that combination. It's like when Apple talks about privacy. It is a combination of a good business decision, a smart business decision, and also I think the belief that it is the right thing to do, that they didn't come on the line with the analysts and say, well, our goal is to make

our phones break after a year and a half so that people just have to buy a new phone. We're going to make them as poorly as possible and unreliable so that they'll have to buy a new model. Because the argument is, and Apple has made it, that if you make the phone really bad and it breaks really soon, why would they come back to you? Why would they not go to a competitor? So I don't think this is Apple's great largesse in saying, hey, everybody, stop buying iPhones so often. You don't need to do that. It's wasteful.

That's not what they're saying, right? They're saying, oh, you're buying them less often. We need to change our approach here. And that approach is maybe make them last longer. People know about the battery program, so that's going to make them last longer. They're going to charge more for them, but they're going to put kind of like more expensive parts into them. And they're going to make the OS survive on old hardware longer. And that's their strategy now.

But I think it's probably fair to say that it's a strategy born out of the fact that buying cycles are lengthening and not sort of like trying to create that reality. That reality already exists. They're just going with it. Part of this new reality is talking about the installed base on earnings calls. Now, we hear these numbers every now and then thrown out at like WWDC. They use like a version of these numbers sometimes. But this is talking about them. And they're kind of being a bit loosey but this is talking about them and they're kind

of being a bit loosey-goosey about how often we're going to hear about this um this is not a thing we're going to hear about every time apple will tell us this either a when they need a good news thing or b when it goes up um and so the installed base is how many uh iph iOS devices. Is it iPhones? Well, so here's the thing. So they gave a global install base, and I think they've talked about iOS install base before. They have not talked about iPhone install base on its own before.

This is a new number. And they said, we will, this is their, this is their like throwing a bone to people who are complaining about not having numbers for iPhones, which is occasionally we'll tell you about this number about all iPhones and you use, which is, I was going to say a made up number. It's probably not a made up number because they, um, they get the, the, you know, all iPhones that are activated are passed through the system. And so they actually probably have a, a number of active iPhones that they can measure.

We always used to estimate the Mac install base back in the old days at Macworld and Macuser as a way to explain to people like what the, you know, what the size of the market was and for advertising, they would do that. And I always felt like it was kind of made up because you're basically trying to do some math about, well, how long does a Mac stay in service? And then you age them out and you build it up. And it's the total number. So it's how many iPhones in this case are being used right now. They're currently in use.

And Apple says it's 900 million, which is a new number, which means that probably in the next year or two, we'll get a press release from Apple saying a billion iPhones in use. That'll probably be the next time we hear about this number could be longer because it only grew by 75 million in the last year yeah well yeah next year or two like i said i think yeah i think if it grew 75 million in the last year then then in 2020 there'll probably be a billion iphones in use very true so they said it's up year over year in all markets um which i mean if you it's like

at first glance i was like huh really but it's like oh well yeah of course because people that have their iphone to keep in them so exactly the people that are only buying not only but like a larger amount of people that are buying them are probably new iphone users so yeah so how do you show growth if your year over year growth isn't going up and your buying cycle is extending? And the answer is quote the installed base, because that if that is still growing, then you can quote that. And it's still growing, which means what what's happening is people are keeping their iPhones and then they're selling new iPhones. But people are also, you know, a lot of people are keeping their iPhones and then they're more net iPhones in service at any

given time. But this is where Apple is now, right? Like that's where they need to show install-based growth. It fits into their services narrative because those people are all theoretically eligible to be paying Apple money for services as well. But it is also the, maybe not the last refuge, but a refuge of a company that can no longer point to sales figures or even right now revenue figures and show growth on their most important product so uh china china's a problem for them right now and it's going to be a problem for a while i think um apple have put so much effort into china like even in the hardware you know they created the dual sim for china uh they've put but they're not reaping the rewards right now

it's down 4.8 billion euro a year uh china is a big reason it's not the only reason because the numbers don't add up like i still don't get the idea of where they said in that press release like oh it accounts for the entire revenue drop it counts for the entire shortfall yeah but it's like their estimate but the iphone still would have been down, because the iPhone was down like $9 billion. So anyway, so yeah, like sure, I feel pretty vindicated in that, right? Because it was like, it didn't feel right when they said that in that press release. And it's like, yeah, maybe the overall revenue but there were lots of things that were up the iphone was still struggling which means the iphone's issues

extended beyond china right and this was something that we believed and that is confirmed now that the iphone's issues were not just a china problem it was an issue in many other places so yeah that we can see that now because we have those numbers but that is continuing to be an issue for them it's probably going to continue to be an issue for them which is i expect why guidance for q2 they are guiding another down quarter apple's guidance is three percent down year over year which is wild right that like this is the first time in who know in many many many many many many years that they have put their guidance it down right like we had a record last with this quarter where it's like oh and they had to adjust it the next one is like all guidance is

down uh carolina milanesi who is a frequent um contributed to the download podcast on relay fm um predicts that this is because of, she thinks, will be poor sales for Chinese New Year. And if the TV service is launched, Carolina believes that this might be something saying that it could be US only, because maybe they're not going to see that. I don't think appreciable TV service revenue is going to happen this quarter, regardless of when they launch it,

because they'll probably do it with a free trial. So there'll be no revenue there. Good point. The reports are that they're going to launch this quarter regardless of when they launch it because they'll probably do it with a free trial so there'll be no revenue there and good point the reports are that they're going to launch it quickly uh elsewhere and i tend to believe that because they're probably the contracts are probably in place that they own worldwide rights to all this stuff and we'll just it's just a matter of rolling it out and maybe marketing it in different countries and also if there are different laws in different countries about like having local content and things like that if they've got some european content coming little bit later, they might wait to launch it in Europe until that comes out. There's, you know, there's a bunch of stuff, but I don't think it tells us

anything about the TV service. I do think though that, you know, it does mean Apple is battening down the hatches in terms of iPhone sales. And keep in mind also, you know, they're not going to have a new iPad in this quarter and they're not going to have new, probably new Macs in this quarter, maybe new iMacs or something. But like this quarter is already a month gone. And so those numbers are probably going to recede a little bit, and then the iPhone is going to stay down, and that means they're going to be down year over year. So it's not surprising. down year over year so it's it's not um not surprising of course uh from a wall street perspective the most important thing probably is that they now hit this guidance right like the guide correctly because that nobody wants to be surprised so they're there it'll be something

to watch about whether they're sandbagging this a little bit and it actually ends up better or whether they are really trying to hit um the you know what they actually think it's going to be because it would be nice if they could be like oh we're it's better than expected i will be shocked if they are guiding this uh accurately like i would i would i mean that they like at least just eek over that's that right like that they're just on the top end or just above the top end of their guidance um because that's a better story like they've at least got to be on the top end of that guidance you would hope but they guided wrong last time so we'll see right like this could hit them even harder than they're expecting for all we know we don't know however even though this is a quarter full of drama apple feel real good

right they feel great tim feels great tim is uh bullish as it was very bullish the apple innovates like no company on earth they're not taking the foot off the gas uh they're confident as ever in the fundamental strength of the business strong pipeline of products and services with some exciting announcements coming later this year well and and the message that he sent about um about economic instability oh which i i appreciated which is exactly what he should have said which is we're not taking our foot off the gas we'll keep investing through near-term headwinds as we always have and we'll emerge stronger as a result and this is the thing that that baffled me about all that talk about like,

oh, Apple, Apple is doing hiring freezes and reducing staff and limiting their hiring because they think there's going to be a recession. It's like, no, no, no,

no, no, no, no, no. Apple has all the money. Apple does exactly what Tim Cook says here is you got the money. You keep,

you keep investing. Your competitors are getting hit by the headwinds. You get to go push through it. And when the wind shifts later, oh, you've been working on all this stuff in the meantime. And everything is actually stronger now because you were able to weather the storm. That's the way to approach it.

You are in the prime position, right? When everybody else needs to make cutbacks, you can go harder and faster than ever before. This has got to be the way that they that they roll right like you would just you can only naturally assume that because otherwise what are you doing with the money right like exactly what are you doing if you're not buying companies with it like like huge companies with it you're just sitting on it he's got a war chest this is what the war chest is for it's for war yeah right like war is time of austerity that's what you're in exactly and there is nobody i think

demanding that apple show like demonstrate for show that they're concerned about the economy right like you should lay off some people just so it makes it seem like you care that you're worried or something it's like no no no no people hire all the laid off people exactly Hire all the laid off people. Exactly right. And you get them working on your stuff that's critical because you've got the cash. You can do that. And then you're going to come out stronger.

And that is what, like Tim Cook went out of his way during the analyst call to say that. And I thought that was good because that's, again, yes, that's what Apple should be doing here

is just keep on. You invest through the downturn or as he said, through the near term headwinds because they love the wind metaphors and uh that's the right thing to do i knew this was going to be a dramatic quarter and it was right like as soon as we got that news i knew it was going to be fun to talk about and and i had fun talking about that and i now can't wait for the next one. I'm really excited now. What is it going to be? We don't know.

We've got some turbulence now. It's fun. Yes. Today's episode is also brought to you by TextExpander from our friends at Smile. Copy and paste is not a good way to keep track of the things that you need to type over and over and over again because if you're anything like me,

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Oh, patents! Patents, you say! Now, we very, very... I mean, I kind of make it a policy to not talk about patents in general because you talk about one, you'll talk about all of them and you'll talk about them forever. But this one is funny to me uh it's keyboard keyboard patent um where either apple's trying to a find a solution or b uh flip the bird everybody um by by patenting a solid glass

keyboard for laptops um just a pane of glass with a... No, it's not... It's not quite... They already... In fact, I wrote an article about this last year, I think, at Macworld. We can put it in the show notes about them patenting basically the touch bar,

except it's the whole keyboard. Yeah. And this one is a little different in that the idea here is that it's a glass panel, but that the the key areas are all raised so they feel like keys it has a little flexibility to it too apparently and and i'm sure uses uh the force touch technology and all that kind of stuff or 3d touch or i'm sure that and and there was some speculation that ultimately it might be something where they could

put a display underneath it where you know you could remap the keys and they could change in context and all of those things while still offering kind of physical and this if you look at that patent too um clearly somebody at apple and and who knows where and who knows why but clearly somebody at apple has been investigating ways of taking essentially touch screen technology and merging it with keyboards and the first attempt was their big touch bar that was a whole keyboard. And this one seems to be, well, we need it to be more tactile. People need to be able to feel where the keys are. They need to be able to press down and feel some sort of feedback. And the reason we mentioned patents, because patents are silly, right? Patents can be totally what Apple's doing,

and it can be a thing that apple's totally not doing but that they invented so they're going to patent it because why not that's how patents work it's not a it's not a product rumor it's it's something completely different um but everybody's angry about well not everybody but lots of people are angry about keyboards lots of people are already freaking out in the chat room as well uh but we're here i think to put put people's minds at rest today are we i'm going to i'm gonna try all right i'm gonna try okay now i'm i'm not i'm gonna ruin this so you go first and then i'll ruin what you say please everyone calm down i think that this is a good thing now Now, let me tell you why. Before you tweet at me and tell me how bad it would be for a touch typist, this patent, I believe, is a response to the current laptop

keyboard situation, because I think that this shows that people at Apple are getting together and they are trying to work out how to fix their keyboard problem. And this was one of the wild ideas that they had, which they're not going to do anytime soon, if ever. But it shows that conversations are happening about how can we make our keyboard problems better? Like, what can we do to stop dust from getting in under the keys? Well, what if there was no under the keys? That's interesting.

They put it on a board, they file the patent because someone had the idea, and then they lock it away, and they maybe never come to it again. But I think what it's showing is that they are talking about the keyboard issue. It's better to see stuff like this for them to go, nah, it's good. I think that this is a wild idea. It's probably not going to come to the Mac whilst wild idea it's probably not going to come to the mac maybe ever i think that this is a not mac product this is a future computer product right like the idea of this plane this is i look at this it's like that seems interesting but seems so futuristic in what they would need to build and probably quite difficult that is many many many many years into the future before you'd get something like this, which means is probably for some other touch-based product

that we may see as a result of the merging of the OSs. That would be my view on this. It seems like it's probably not anytime soon. But I think what it shows is people are trying to get together to talk about changing their keyboards. Try and see the silver lining, hopefully, maybe. Okay, so you're right in that it shows that somebody, some group at Apple is trying to

think about the keyboard. And there's no doubt that Apple has heard that this keyboard is a problem from users. They've seen the issues. They keep trying to put Band-Aids on this existing keyboard design. I think it's clear that they're going in a different direction. What is interesting to me about this

is that there is this fork in the road. And I think there are people at Apple who tend toward, you know, do you go left or right? One direction is, you know what? We got to go backward. I know that Apple hates going backward, but like our old keyboards were pretty good. We've learned some things about designing this keyboard that we can apply to a new keyboard. But what we've learned is people want, you know, people are concerned about the reliability and we didn't do a great job and

we're still kind of band-aiding that. And then there are also, you know, there's this feeling about, about travel and sound and we've done better because I do believe that third generation keyboard actually is way better. They have improved it a lot in terms of sort of getting the balance of it. It sounds like things are happening when you press keys, but it's also not crackling like, uh, like, uh, some, some, uh, like snap crackle and pop with the rice crispies when you, which the second generation

keyboard were like, it was this crazy sound. Like the third generation keyboard is better there. The ingress stuff is better, but it's not perfect. Like they made, they made advances. So they're like, all right, we're going to, we're going to do a new one, knowing what we know, learning what we've learned. And this one's going to be better, and it's going to move backward in some ways and forward in other ways, and it's going to be a more traditional keyboard in a lot of ways because we want it to be a crowd pleaser. We want it to please everybody as much as possible because it turns out we made some assumptions that were wrong. I think that's one approach here, which is like we're going to back up a little bit in some areas, and the next keyboard we're going to do is not going to be more extreme.

It's going to be less extreme, but with all of our lessons learned. The other direction is honestly to keep plotting what Apple keeps doing, which is reducing key travel and introducing touchscreens to things. And that's what I wrote in that Macworld article, which is, you know, that patent about just having a whole flat glass touch bar thing that is your keyboard. Like that is the direction Apple is going now. So, so what we have to ask ourselves is, is there somebody Apple who's like, whoa, we went too far or is that person who's like, well, they didn't like this keyboard because we didn't go far enough.

And where's your dust now? this keyboard because we didn't go far enough and well as you said right well we can't get dust under the keyboard if there's no keyboard it's just glass and maybe it's bumpy glass but it's just glass now i i also believe uh you know that what they would do is they would put in haptics and they would have textures on the keys so you could feel your way around. And when you press, it's going to give a little vibration. And this patent suggests maybe even a little bit of physical movement to fake it and have them be like, no, no, no, no. This is going to be better. This is going to be way better.

It's going to be completely reliable because there's no way dust can get under there. Let's do it. And that is, you know, it and uh that is you know it's possible that they would do something like that i um and my wacky idea that i threw out in the macworld article uh last year was uh that they once they put in like uh face id cameras and stuff into laptops when they gets that stuff there they can just like they can just put nothing down there and they'll just look at your fingers and know what letters you're typing. It'll be entirely a camera-based keyboard.

Oh, Jason, why are you going to do this? Right? Right? So to me, that is the core of this, which is Apple is always – Apple takes pride in reinventing things, right? And sometimes in inventing things, but reinventing things. And in their core is this, like, why do we have to do it this way um this actually came up uh was it on liftoff last time i it was in a space context it is the wherever i talked about this it's the idea that like after the capsules of the of the early part of the space era uh for the spatial project they're like we're gonna make a plane and it's gonna land like a plane and go up with a rocket

and it's gonna be totally different and it had lots of issues that came out of that design and all the modern uh things that are being designed are capsules again like they were in the 60s and it's like oh yeah it turns out that there were like there were lots of advantages in the old way of doing things that we hadn't really thought about. And then having explored this new way of doing things, maybe the old ways are best, as John Syracuse would say, as well as, you know, a modern take on the old ways. Apple really doesn't like that, right? Like Apple wants to be new, wants to be perceived as like pushing everything forward. That's why the touch bar exists is like, how do we use our multi-touch technology on a

Mac in a way that, you know, maybe makes sense, maybe doesn't. And so I think that is the real question with this keyboard is which Apple is going to win, which Apple is going to win out here is that the practical side of Apple. It's like, you know, guys, we didn't have these problems when we just kind of went with the flow and made a really good traditional keyboard. And I like your idea, actually, Mike, of why don't we save the really wacky keyboard ideas for an iOS keyboard for that next generation iPad, where we're going to allow, you know, we're going to offer a new version of a keyboard, smart keyboard, that's a little more like a trackpad, or a little more like a trackpad or a little more like a, like a second screen, something like that. Um, but you know, again, there's the other people

at Apple who are like, nah, these people are just, uh, afraid of the new let's give them an all glass keyboard and see what they, they do. Anyway, we'll see. We'll see. All we have to do is, is wait and see what Apple does, but, um But it will require for them, it will require them to swallow, if not their pride, a little bit of their corporate culture of moving forward versus just continuing to push us in this direction they've been heading all along, which is flatter and flatter and flatter until there are no keys left. flatter until there are no keys left i am still gonna hold on to my theory all right that we're gonna we live in hope mike we live in hope all right okay i think that it just shows they're talking about it and i think that that's fun although i do find it that the thought kind of hilarious that they're just gonna keep making it until there's no this is no keys on the board it's just a board at that point it's just bored it's a war on the war on war on buttons taken to its extreme why would there be keys anymore who needs keys just bored bored mark german debbie woo reporting for bloomberg that apple

plans to launch iphones with 3d cameras as soon as next year, among other things. But let's start with the headline feature here, 3D cameras. Now, it is worth noting that apparently the 3D cameras are a 2020 product. Yes. There are some 2019 phone details, but the kind of the headline thing here is 2020 iPhones to get 3D cameras. And I'm sure you may think to yourself, oh, Mike, 3D photos. We don't want to go there again. No, no. 3D camera. Terrible name to give. I really don't think that they did a good job of explaining what a 3D like the idea, like calling it 3D camera.

What it is, this is for AR. So if you imagine the camera scanning your environment and helping you place things so it gives you a good range rather than what it's doing right now, which is I think mostly using software with ARKit and machine learning to kind of understand the environment that's scanning your face for Face ID, scanning the room instead. So Face ID uses the IR blaster to map your depth and the features of your face. This works up to 50 centimeters. But this new 3D camera, which would be on the back of the 2020 iPhones, would have a 15-fe feet range using laser scanning technology, according to Bloomberg, to scan your environment. So I don't know why anyone will particularly want this. I don't think that AR has gone the length that Apple wanted it yet,

but maybe this would help. I think it's AR accuracy is what they're going for here. The idea that once you've got the power, the processor power, and you've got the sensor detail, you can start you know really augmenting that space because you know exactly where the carpet is and where the table is and where the person is and where you know and they're turned towards you or away from you and you can overlay information on all of that and i that that to do that in a way that is real, you need accuracy. And they've decided, because I imagine Google is looking at a lot of this and thinking we can just use machine learning to

interpret what we're seeing. And Apple saying, well, we can use our hardware skill to get much better data, ultimately probably to put this in a pair of glasses or something, right? But they're not there yet. So they're also going to put it in phones where you can hold it up and see what's going on. And iPads too, because the rumor is this might actually come to the iPad before it comes to the iPhone in 2020. But yeah, I think that's what they're going for here, is that their goal is not to necessarily do 3D photos, although I'm sure that they would take that detail in terms of portrait mode and things

like that, that extra detail. But it's an interesting idea. This is far off, but obviously Apple plans hardware far off. So, you know, looking at ways of getting better depth information and being able to use that for AR, which Tim Cook has said repeatedly, Apple thinks is a big future direction. I think AR is a curiosity right now, repeatedly, Apple thinks is a big future direction. I think AR is a curiosity right now, but I think Apple is just investing a lot in it because they think that ultimately there will be a payoff and it will probably be something like glasses more than it will be like just in holding our phones up, but it's early days yet. So I think it's an interesting idea that they believe in this enough that they're working on this 3D camera stuff.

And for 2020, again, for 2020, this is the – I was excited last week that the 2019 iPhone rumor season is open. I guess I'm excited this week because I guess the 2020 iPhone rumor season is now open too. I don't know about the iPad thing. That seems strange to me, like that it would me, that anything would come to the iPad first. Apple likes doing AR demos on the iPad because it's got the big screen, and there's a big screen and there's a lot of room in there. I don't think it's unreasonable at all. I don't think Apple would have a problem unveiling a piece of tech like that in the spring of 2020 on an iPad Pro and then bringing it to the iPhone in the fall. I don't believe that Apple would be like, oh, no, no, it must debut on the iPhone. I think it actually would be, maybe kind of even make sense for the iPad because the iPad does have that big screen.

And they demo those all the time, right? Where you're playing an AR game and you're holding up an iPad. So Apple believes that the iPad is a good AR platform too. Yeah. ipad pro has only been released in the spring once so that's kind of one thing where i'm like i don't know maybe that's when they do the device upgrade but like it's mostly in the fall one time in the spring one time yeah i don't know i mean the argument here may be that they feel like uh at this point they want to go from a two-year cycle for the ipad pro to an 18-month cycle and so then it goes in the spring of 2020. I don't think that's unreasonable. I don't expect that we need a new iPad Pro this fall.

Maybe it's always been 18. I think it's mostly been 18 months. It's complicated, right? Because the big iPad Pro came out in the fall. And then in the spring, they did the little one. And then it was, I think, 18 months after that. Then the following June, then 18 months later, September, like October. So yeah, maybe like initially the 18 months just falls into spring.

So maybe they do do it then. The 2020 iPhones could also have, if there's going to be design changes, it will be then. And it may be to accommodate 5g networking capabilities as the 2019 iphones won't have 5g and they won't um they won't have design changes 5g by the way is not a thing we've covered on this show yet but at some point we will um kind of like what 5g is and why we think it might be a while we may yeah we may have a year and a half to talk about that. Yeah, so at some point we're going to talk about 5G. I have it in my notes that we will get to it at some point,

but we haven't yet, but we will. So if those are 2020, what's happening in 2019? So according to the report from Bloomberg, there will be a new 10S and XS Max. I actually want to say this, right? So follow me here. There will be new XS and XS Max sized phones. They say there will be new phones.

And then they say, and there will also be an update to the XR. I don't know what that means, but they did separate those two things. New colors? Yeah, it might not be hardware related we don't know maybe not right right we it's entirely possible that apple is going to treat the 10r like the se then again as its best-selling phone there is this question of like do you want to keep uh pushing it forward do you just change the colors do you put in a new processor do you lower the price what do you do with the 10r because that's something they could do is keep making the 10r change the colors their margins have gone up on it and they

cut the price a little bit um and keep selling it as their kind of like base model essentially right well because they might have to scramble because they didn't expect it was going to be the best selling phone right could be could be and that's something i think they could do in in this kind of time frame in a year is what can we do to refresh the XR for 2019? I don't know. But it is the idea that there's a – I would call them iPhone 11 and 11 Max, basically. Yep. Which, again, is just going to be kind of more of the same, right?

It's this three-step process it's the the you know what was a four with six six s seven and eight right where it was just sort of like the same phone not the same but like the same look for four years yeah the uh 11 max is looking to introduce a third camera which also introduces again to the OLED phone generation, a difference between the Max and the regular size phone. All the Plus Club people can lord that third camera over the rest of us. And it is most likely that the third camera would then come in 2020 to the R and the regular, what would be the 11S at that point, which would then probably be the 3D camera system

would be the third the 3d camera system would be the third camera um the new camera system in the max though would give a wider field of view and enable a better zoom so a quote from the article which i think was kind of fun it will also capture more pixels so apple software could for example automatically repair a video or photo to fit in a subject that may have been accidentally cut off from the initial shot according to people familiar with the plans it must be a fun demo right that you take some photos like oh you missed johnny and then you but you can just bring johnny in because whilst you were taking a regular portrait mode photo the wide camera was there the whole time so we can just crop it and there you go that's brilliant so that'd be really fun it's a

very appley thing to do yeah that's a lot of clever things that involve, you know, running the camera when you haven't run it and having things on the edges that you don't see or that can be added later in order to fix, you know, because we're dumb and we make dumb decisions. And if the phone is smarter and it's got room to spare to like always shoot video so that when you you know press record you've always got the option of going back like a second or two before you press record or a foot or two wider outside the frame that's

all it's all very clever stuff that they could do with a combination of hardware and software which is apple's thing um the also live photos was looking to see an update. The video portion will double to six seconds. It's great. I love live photos. I'd love to see more. I actually could imagine that idea of being able to bring more people in could be a live photo-y-like thing, right? That seems similar in that what live photos is doing is doing more than what you expect the camera's doing when you take the picture, right? It's's also taking videos so maybe there's some kind of like links there with what that's with what's happening um of course we're going to see a faster processor uh and also a better face id sensor i wonder if this is going to be the actual face id too right that we were

hoping for because it's it appeared right like like after teardowns and from information, that the Face ID sensor in the XS was unchanged, and that any differences were coming from the machine learning capabilities of the system on a chip. So maybe this will be some updates to the Face ID sensor to maybe make Face ID better in some way. Apparently, Apple is testing USBbc for the iphone of course they are but that's not going to be 2019 um the report also confirms rumors we've seen elsewhere of a 10-inch ipad and a new ipad mini on the way i already have

a lot to say about that um like i don't get the iPad mini though. I think when we see it, we will get it because I think it's going to be... I think Apple, because the iPad has done so well and really defines the tablet market, and I think Apple made some smart decisions last year with their low-cost iPad. So doing a new version of the low-cost iPad that maybe has a little bit bigger screen, doing an iPad mini that will also be in the low-cost category. Basically like saying, here are our education or for kids, low-cost iPads. We've got the pros and we've got these. I think it's fine. I think this is like doing an iPhone SE kind of thing where it's like it's good to have the product line differentiated.

And if they do a new iPad mini, it's probably because they realize that there is, you know, why hasn't it gone away? It's because there is a market for it. It's not a huge market, but there is a market for it. And so keep it alive. Like, why not do that? I think it's not going to be an earth shattering product, right? It's this is low end iPads, but low-end ipads are a thing and they do pretty well for apple you know so i think uh i i i think when they put it in context

you'll be like oh yeah okay like what they price it at and how they describe like what its positioning is i i i'm prepared to understand what they're doing there i think it's my can when i say like i don't get it it's like why did it wait so long and then do it you know like that's what just seems so strange to me i mean that that's like why do they wait so long for the mac mini too i think it wasn't a priority and then at some point they realized okay if we're gonna we we can't put this off any longer if we're gonna keep this around we need to right do an update and then we have to kill it for another four years if we don't want to kill it we have to do something okay yeah but that seems like such a i mean okay but it's like really all right but anyway anyway uh there was some ios stuff that

came out in this report um which i expect is just the beginning of what we will see of a larger report from german later in the year as he would tend to do leading up to WWDC. But before we get to that, let's talk about FreshBooks. FreshBooks make my life so much easier because I am a person who sends invoices. FreshBooks will be able to make your life easier and save you time because they offer great tools to help simplify big things in your life, stuff like invoicing, expense tracking, and having the ability to get paid online for the work that you do. FreshBooks has drastically reduced the time it takes.

For their over 10 million customers to deal with their paperwork. Freelancers. Small businesses. Self-employed people. If you ever send invoices. You should be trying out FreshBooks. Their tools are so simple to use. I am barreling up Jason. you should be trying out FreshBooks. Their tools are so simple to use.

I am barreling up, Jason, on my 2,000th invoice sent in FreshBooks over the near five-year history of our company. I think I would have lost my mind if I was trying to do all of those in pages or something. I'd done that previously

with some other stuff and hated it. And as soon as we set up a company, we signed up for FreshBooks immediately. And it's one of the best decisions that our business has ever made. FreshBooks makes it super simple to send out invoices and to keep track of them. FreshBooks can automatically send out late payment email reminders for you if you don't want to have to waste time chasing invoices and payments. But also, every time you log in to FreshBooks, you can see what's changed since the last time you were there. So you can take note of something that's delayed

or you can take note of a payment that's come in even. FreshBooks has a ton of integrations with other services, which is amazing. I absolutely love FreshBooks. They are offering an unrestricted 30-day free trial for listeners of this show with no credit card required. All you have to do is go to freshbooks.com slash upgrade and enter upgrade in the how did you hear about us section and you can get your hands on that 30-day free trial. If you're listening to the

show and youayFM. So shall we talk about iOS 13 stuff here? So dark mode and improvements to CarPlay is what we'll see on the iPhone and across everything. So dark mode sounds great. I've wanted a dark mode for a long time. Yeah, I think we knew this was coming when they added it to the Mac, right? Why would you not put that on your other devices devices and that means that app developers will be able to you know sense which mode it's in and all of that and that'll be uh nice uh

improvements to carplay i don't really i'd never use carplay but like improvements to that system would be great because it seems like maybe it's getting long in the tooth now i don't recall apple making a big song and dance for carplay in quite some time so yeah you know again i don't think either of us are well versed enough in carplay to say much about it but like great no i had another rental car with carplay in it two weeks ago that was exciting and uh yeah it it's still carplay new ipad home screen. Now, this is something I'm very excited for the thought of this. Just something to break up that grid of icons, right? Like, you know, and I'm sure we're going to spend a lot of time over the next few months as we lead up to WWDC

thinking about what this is going to look like. And hopefully, maybe, who knows, some more details might come out. But that is something that definitely needs some work. And I will be very excited to see what that could look like. You know, my hope would be, you know, shortcuts and widgets and files and everything all living there. Like this big mix between what iOS and the Mac can give you from a desktop would be super fun. iOS and the Mac can give you from a desktop. It would be super fun.

Something I'm really struggling to get my head around is the ability to tab through multiple versions of a single app, like pages in a web browser. I don't really get the, I, the idea of the tabbed interface anyway. I don't really, I can't conceive much of what this is going to give me other than multiple instances of like Google sheets,

which would be great. But like, I feel like i haven't fully got my head around what this could mean yeah i feel like this might be their new take on multitasking which is that you have uh you can have multiple items in tabs and then you can have um tabs in a couple different configurations. That's my guess. So you can have three or four apps together in a tab set and tab between them to move between different apps that are all up together but you could also pull out a tab and put it next and then you've got split view and that you could do that potentially with multiple instances of an app so that you

could have, you know, a text editor up with a couple of different documents and different tabs or put them side by side, and it's the same app. It's all in the details. There have been so many different ways that you could implement this. But that's kind of my question is, are they going to do tabs and multitasking? Or is tab the multitasking where you have instead of having sort of like two app windows like we have now, you instead have two tabs side by side, which would allow them to build into that kind of like Chrome, that application Chrome, I guess it wouldn't be browser Chrome, the ability to indicate which one is at the front, right? Like all these other issues that we have with the current iPad multitasking. So it may be that, which is they've decided to, what's the metaphor we can use that probably

they'll extend to the Mac at some point too. That is, you know, multiple instances of an app. So basically multiple windows, as well as quick switching between different apps that you're using, and then the ability to have them on the sheer, sheer space on a screen, whether that's, you know, a two up, or whether you even have the ability to, you know, put three tabs at once, or, you know, a tall tab and two wide tabs on a on a landscape display or something like that. Lots of different questions here about this tab metaphor stuff, but it may be that they've just decided like the tab metaphor,

everybody gets it, everybody loves it. And we can use that as the metaphor for having different instances of apps and having apps running together. I don't know. Improvements to file management. Tantalizing, isn't it?

Tantalizing idea. Improvements to file management. The app continues to frustrate me greatly every day. So I would love some improvements. I use it and I'm amazed at I have that moment when I use the Files app where I'm like, it is amazing that I can finally do this on the iPad. And then I have that moment

where I step back again and I think, but this is like a very small cup of water to somebody who's dying of thirst in the desert. It is way too little for what it should be. It's better than what it was, but still I have those moments where I'm like,

oh, I've got a file somewhere. How do I get it here? And it's like, I'll launch this app and then I go to files and I navigate here. And it's just, it's better, but it needs to be way better. And this also encompasses all the other things we've talked about in terms of external storage devices and network storage devices and other stuff like that is just not good enough yet. That they're down the path, but they need to get way further down.

So improvements to file management could mean anything, but I'm going to choose to be optimistic that it means everything for now because it's February. In June, I'll be much more cynical about it, but in winter, I will still dream of a summer with good file management on iOS. Should we do some hashtag ask upgrade questions?

Let's do it. Napali says, HomePod annoys me when I'm using Siri on my phone and HomePod kind of jumps into the request. Instead of saying, ahoy telephone, I think it should be like,

ahoy HomePod to avoid confusion. Do you agree? I think maybe it should be an option because I have this happen too. I would love the option. But I know why

Apple's doing it this way. Apple is trying to build a system where all your devices have the same trigger and then based on the context, it's choosing the right device to execute your command. And I have to say, I've been using it the last few months and have felt like after initially this

not being the case, that in my house when I shout out a command to the HomePod I see my watch fire i see my phone turn like light up every device lights up in this house and then and then the home pod answers when i'm talking to the home pod um and that has in the last couple of months that has worked really reliably and i don't know what they're doing exactly, but they're trying to do what Apple's goal is, is they want the lady to be, you know, the, the, the, or the British gentleman, the assistant to be everywhere and available from every device. And they don't want you to think about the context. They don't

want you to have to talk to a specific device for a specific context. They want you to say it in the air and the right device will tell you what to do based on your body position and where your wrist is and where your phone is laying down and if it's been used recently and how you're talking to the HomePod and all of those things get integrated together. It does some very quick judgments

about who you're talking to and then that device picks it up. I think that is the right goal for apple i think it should be that i think that they need to keep working on it but i think that ultimately you should just talk to the assistant in the air and it should figure out what it needs to do like to the point where if i if if the iphone says oh you want to play music but i'm laying down and i'm charging and i think maybe it's doing this already it's like you probably don't want me to play the music, right?

There's a HomePod in this room. You're almost certainly talking to the HomePod, right? It should be smart enough to do that. That said, I do think that putting power in the user's hands to say, you know what? I just want to address the HomePod separately from my phone. And I want to change the trigger word to be different. Like, you should be able to do

that you should you should because i have a thing sometimes where it's like i have like a shortcut and i want to run and i know the home pod's going to jump in and it's not going to work right or like i have a question i want to ask or a thing i want to do and the home pod's going to say you have to do that on your iphone it's like well i knew that but i can't right right like i know this iphone it's like well i knew that but i can't right right like i know this right i know this it should be smart enough to know oh this command isn't for me let's try it out on the iphone right and it doesn't always do that like it's a good goal and maybe they'll get there eventually but in the meantime yes i think you should be able to just talk to the homePod and say, maybe even in addition to, maybe it's a specific wake word

that you can demand the HomePod to process instead, while it'll also listen to your Ahoy telephones. I don't know, but I feel like being a good, friendly device for the human beings who use it, it would be a nice feature for Apple to add. So last week, Apple and American airlines announced that you'll be able to listen to Apple music for free without paying for their wifi when you're in the air.

So Doug asks, do you think American airlines will also allow free streaming of Apple's video service? Absolutely. Yes. Because the, the, the catalog of video is much smaller than the catalog of music so they can

preload all of those onto the onto the planes yeah and and the video service is more tantalizing for when you're on a plane the music right you want video video is what you want so like apple becomes the in-flight entertainment for american airlines that's like you want that like because a lot of you see netflix on a lot of these too right like i've seen this like you get on i think maybe british airways do this like you can just watch netflix i know i've seen it i've seen or maybe it's virgin i've seen this on a on a airline that i've used where like we have wi-fi but you don't have to pay for the wi-fi if you have a netflix account to just watch Netflix, which is brilliant, right? Rather than having to just,

then you have a screen you know is going to be good, right? And it's not, you know, so you could just watch your content and be awesome. Chris asks, do either of you use Apple Pay Cash? I've been hesitant to link my bank account to it or find another way to fund it, and I don't tend to do peer-to-peer payments, but I like the idea of using it as I would cash.

Now, I can't because I still because it's still not available here, which is still a surprise, remains a surprise to me. But do you use Apple Pay Cash? Occasionally. I haven't used it in a little while. It's mostly when I'm around a bunch of other nerds and like at your bachelor party, right? Where I was Apple Pay Cash sending to people

because it was like super easy to do. All I had to do was link it to my debit card at that point i can move cash on and off of my bank account through the debit card interface and uh i find it convenient i wish more people had it but i mean that is it um when i'm in a context when i can use it i love it because i don't it's another way i don't need to use cash and it's like easier than saying i'm gonna send you a paypal because you don't't need to use cash. And it's like easier than saying, I'm going to send you a PayPal or something like that. Yeah, because you don't even need to open an app, right? You just do it in text messages,

which is brilliant, right? Yeah, so it's like Casey List, I need to send Casey List $48 and there it is and it's gone and he's got the money and he can do with it as he pleases. And that's nice. I wish, you know, this is one of those things where it's just like Apple Pay adoption has gone fairly well in the US

because they added that latest round of stores, you know, Taco Bell and Target and things like that. But it's nothing like it is in the UK. And I would really like it to be something I could count on here. And then you've got the Apple Pay Cash thing, which is like, that would be great too. But, you know, it's just, it is not, it's a slow pickup, I think, for people. So I'm glad it's there. But, you know, so I do use it occasionally, but only very occasionally. And finally today, Will asks, since I got a Kindle, Amazon has been trying to sell me accessories for the Kindle.

Most often the top recommendation from them is a case. Jason, do you use any Kindle accessories? And if so, what would you recommend? Jason, do you use any Kindle accessories? And if so, what would you recommend? So I have tended to not use a Kindle with a case, especially because so many of the Kindles now are small and light. Like I've got the second generation Oasis.

The first generation Oasis comes with a case. So I used it. And it was nice because, you know, it turns on when you open it and closes. When you close it, it turns back off. And the first generation Oasisasis you could actually pull the case off and it's like a battery case and then it was super thin and light the second generation oasis doesn't come with a case it's bigger it's a little bit heavier but it's still thin and light i um i used a slip case for a long time so when i traveled i would have basically like an ipod sock but for kindles uh like neoprene case that i'd slide the kindle into so it wouldn't get beaten up while I was traveling.

But I just pull it out and read it without a case. I just bought, though, like three weeks ago, I bought a Kindle Oasis case. I think the Amazon Kindle Oasis case, which is basically you snap it into a little plastic shell and it's got a cover on it. you snap it into a little plastic shell and it's got a cover on it. And, um, I did that because, uh, my current, uh, slip case for the Oasis, I don't really like it. Um, and I saw the value of maybe having something that would be really easy to take out of my bag and just flip open the cover and read it, um, and then flip it closed and put it back in the bag. So I did buy one and I like it, but not enough to keep it on the Kindle most of the time. So when I'm at home, I don't use that case. I tried it for a while and it's like, it makes everything thicker, makes it more awkward

to hold. I prefer just the naked robotic core, but when I'm traveling, I'll put that case on it. So, and that's the standard. I think it's the Amazon standard case for the Kindle Oasis. So it depends on how you use it. If it never leaves home, I don't see why you need a case on it. But for travel, I would recommend at the very least some sort of slip case, if not a full-on cover for travel so it doesn't get beaten up. I want to recommend PopSockets for Kindles. I use PopSockets a lot and love them i use one on my iphone it's the

popsocket is that little little disc that you can pull out and hold on to right it's got the little like steps that it goes to connect you pull it out push it back in you probably have seen these maybe didn't know what they were uh go to popsockets website it'll be in the show notes you can see what they are and you'll be like oh i've seen those everywhere and now you know what they are this is how i was when i discovered popsockets like i feel like i've seen those everywhere i didn't know what they were um i got a kindle to to read a book for cortex a while ago and i found i found the kindle whilst super thin super, to just not be light enough for one hand. Like, it was so close, but, like, just, ah, it just wasn't light enough.

PopSocket, like, perfectly solves this for me, because it just gives you a better way to hold it. You're holding it, like, in the middle, right? Like, and you're just putting it on your hand, and you don't really, like, grip it. You just kind of rest it, and it's secure. So that is what I recommend. I put a PopSocket on my Kind Kindle and I'm very happy with it. So that is what I will recommend to people to try.

So pop sockets, they're brilliant. If you would like to send in a question to help close out an episode of Upgrade, all you have to do is send out a tweet with the hashtag AskUpgrade to do that and it may be selected for a future episode of this show please keep sending them in i have a great backlog of questions here so we're a little bit behind jason but we're going to get to them we just have so much good stuff to talk about

i know i know we'll have to do a special expanded ask upgrade at some point yeah we're gonna have to because i've got some great ones building up hopefully no news will happen in the next week yeah there'll be nothing nothing will go on mark german is going to go on vacation and sit on a beach somewhere and not write about rumors and apple's not going to announce anything and we're already already through the earnings and like literally nothing is going to happen in the next week and then we can do our ask up rig grade uh special episode and then maybe tech companies will stop doing terrible things and then like maybe we can maybe it seems unlikely though check in next week and find out

if you want to find the show notes for this week's episode they should hopefully be in your podcast app of choice but if they're not there there's always a place you can go go to relay.fm upgrade slash 231 and you can get those you can go to sixcolors.com for jason's work you can go to incomparable.com as well for many wonderful shows about lovely pop culture all the great shows all the great shows some of the great shows also exist at relay.fm slash shows where you can find stuff that both me and jason do hey follow me on instagram i'm i mike i m y k e on instagram i'm also on twitter as well so it's jason He's at jsnll.

We'll be back next time. Thanks so much to our sponsors, FreshBooks, Eero, and Smile. Say goodbye, Jason Snell. Goodbye, everybody.