Upgrade - 312: Outgrade

Episode Date: August 24, 2020

Jason and Myke take a walk in the woods while discussing Apple and Epic, the latest Apple TV+ news, the speed potential of Macs with Apple silicon, and how the pandemic has changed their working lives.

Oh, it's good to get out of the house. I know, right? Well, I mean, you sit inside for so long, and you're at your desk, you're talking into a microphone. It's good to get out, out in the outdoor spaces and move around. Mm-hmm. I mean, I've been stuck inside for a while. It's nice to spend some time together. I figure, you know, while we're actually just here together anyway,

I guess we could basically pretty much just do something like Upgrade anyway. Yeah, I mean, if you and I go somewhere and we have a chat for an hour and a half... It's always Upgrade. Isn't that really just an episode of Upgrade? It always is. It doesn't matter. From RelayFM!

Upgrade 312. This is a weekend outdoor edition. Sure. I hope there aren't any breaking news items over the weekend while we're out here. I know. Could you imagine that? All right. Should we see what's on the radio?

We'll get this thing started. Yeah. We'll get some tunes. Let's get some tunes. Look at some tunes. oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh

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oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh, I'm a good, I'm a good, I'm a good, I'm a good, I'm a good, I'm a good, I'm a good, I'm a good, I'm a good, I'm a good, I'm a good, I'm a good, I'm a good, I'm a good, I'm a good, I'm a good, I'm a good, I'm a good, I'm a good, I with a Snell Talk question now anyway, so I guess I'll just ask you one. I saw a question from Peter who wanted to know what your favorite board game was. I mean, anytime you ask me a question, is it a Snell Talk question? If a Jason answers the question in the woods.

Wow. That's a strange way to think of it i do have i guess a favorite board game this is a hard question i i really like carcassonne which isn't quite a board game because it's a it's like a tile laying game but it's you know you're basically making a board game making a board on a tabletop so you tabletop game. That's the better phrase now, isn't it? Rather than board game, tabletop game. Because it encompasses all that stuff. We have a bunch in rotation with my family. Ticket to Ride is still pretty popular.

Love that one where you've got to make chains of railroad routes across the country. I don't know. What else? We've had a lot of good ones over the years but you know carcassonne is the one that i always want to play and that nobody else wants to play with me and that it probably suggests that it's my favorite so i'm gonna say that one but there there are there are lots of great board games we've been playing um cryptid a little bit which a really, really fun game that's kind of like Mastermind, except way more complicated. It's a deduction game where basically there's a map, and everybody's been given information about a piece of unique information. And if you put the pieces together, you can find out where the Cryptid is on the map. pieces together uh you can find out where the cryptid is on the map there's a there's a hidden monster or animal or something that's in only can only be in one space on the map and there

are different solutions every time they give you a whole like set of these these solutions and so what you have to do is by observing the answers that all the other players give to your questions you have to start to deduce what they know what the rule is that they know and then if you put the rules together you know where the cryptid is and it's it it takes a little bit to understand how the game works but once it works like it's it works really well because you can you can figure it out and it's one of those games that as you start playing it you're like i don't even know what i'm doing here and then there's a moment where suddenly you're like oh i'm starting to figure it out and then somebody somebody figures it out and

they win so cryptid is a it's a good one that's in rotation right now i always feel like i would enjoy more board games but never play board games or tabletop games yeah yeah i i'm surprised we haven't done more of it during the pandemic here since we have all four people at our house. But it just has not happened as often. I think part of it, it's nice to do it, but also everybody's just kind of stressed out and sad. It doesn't always. We get together for dinner, and then usually the only other family activity that we engage in is watching episodes of Taskmaster, which is good, or an occasional movie.

But the board game doesn't happen as often as maybe I wish it did. Because I guess with the kids, it's like most people these days, they're just looking to try and have interactions with the people they would normally be interacting with, right? Yeah. But we're all like over-socializing digitally to try and make up for the in-person yeah yeah they got they've got stuff to do and and they you know my daughter is is a cop i mean it's summer she would be home but she's a college student and she's had this six month period where she can't be a college

student essentially and is living in a house with her parents, which is the worst. So I don't know. It's definitely a challenge. We should talk about that maybe a little bit later about our pandemic lives and what's been going on with that. That's worth talking about on the trek. We'll have time. We'll have time to talk.

Just going to be two guys walking around. Are we nearly there yet? Yep. All right, well, let's get going. You got any more thoughts on Epic and Apple? Is this like follow-up, Mike? Is that where we are? Sure. Are we still doing upgrade here? Is that what's happening?

We're in like follow-up Grove or something right now, right? All right. I like this idea. I like this idea. It's outdoor podcast. But again, this is why every conversation between us is an episode of Upgrade. Because what else would we be talking about, right? Of course this is what we're talking about.

Well, so what's funny is that on the last episode, you started editing the show. I went for a run. I came back drenched in sweat to find you saying breaking news that Apple has threatened Epic with kicking them off of the platform entirely and invalidating their developer accounts and stuff like that. And I think that's where we are. We'll see. Hopefully nothing breaks over the weekend. We're not going to know anyway. We won't know.

We're going to be secluded. We're going to be out here in the middle of nowhere. We won't know. But I don't know. I don't consider this... I feel like this is the logical next move for Apple to make, and I wonder if Epic... I assume Epic kind of knew.

I'm curious to see how Epic responds, because I think Apple's move is basically to say, take the bad version... Revert your app. Revert your app and take the bypassing of the in-app purchase system out of the store. And then you're, then you're fine. And I know that, you know, for me, I look at that and I think there is a fairly straightforward way for this to move forward, which is for Epic now that it's sort of made its point to revert its app and continue its lawsuit and say, look,

we tried to do this. They prevented it. They told us that they were going to invalidate all of our stuff. So we took it off. The lawsuit proceeds and they get to have their day in court and they get to have this conversation and, uh, and it continues on. I will see if epic does that right like i i don't know they they are they're certainly going to make hay while they can right because they've got this whole they're

going to do this whole uh like free fortnight thing which is like i've been saying up to now that this has all been publicity now now it's becoming marketing yeah yeah they've got like a whole thing going on uh and have been doing it this like the weekend that we're going into now like they've got like it's called the free fortnight cup because it's basically i think it's like next week sometime they're going to have the new season of fortnight which won't come to to iOS because they won't need to update the app for the new season. So they're treating this as like a last hurrah for iOS players is the way that they're kind of treating it. Because it's like, well, because of Apple, you're not going to get the next season. So we're going to do this big competition and they're doing hashtag free fortnight merch and

they have like the um the tim cook apple head guy right tart tycoon is a fantastic name by the way uh i think that's very funny so that's like a skin that you can get in the game for participating um i think i think apple is going to hold them to we're going to kick you out right like in a week but i think epic will go to the 11th hour before they make the update because they are using this still as a tactic in trying to turn public opinion i mean we spoke about it last time and the thing that that is irresponsible on on epic's part is the ramifications or the nervousness that could be felt by their development community for the unreal engine you know and and so you've got to assume, because you're right in what you said, right? Like, this is the obvious move for Apple.

So you have to assume that Epic has guessed that this would happen, right? Like, we have to make that assumption because otherwise they were not thinking enough steps ahead when it seemed like they were thinking steps ahead for themselves. Like, they should have planned the whole thing out. So my hope would be that they have an update, that they are ready to submit, but they're going to wait until the final moment so they keep everything in the store.

And then you're right. At that point, they have another thing where they can go, oh, look, and they forced us to do this because we care about our community, that kind of thing. But the fight goes on. The fight will continue. Also, they're trying to get a restraining order, right? us to do this because we care about our community, that kind of thing. But the fight goes on and the courts... Also, they're trying to get a restraining order, right? So you want to have that play out because if you don't have to

do it, if the court forces Apple to keep their developer accounts alive in some fashion... And that's like wins all around for Epic because they keep making more money which they are. I think they said like half of their transactions over the last little while have gone through their own system and not the ios system so they're making a ton of money out of this uh and then it's like more fuel for the fire right

because a court stepped in and said that's not fair apple that's what they want to happen right and if the court doesn't step in then um the question is, what will they do? Because they've made the fact that they're marketing that this is the end, basically. But again, that may be completely disingenuous. I don't believe anything Epic says, right? Because they are playing a game here. Yeah. And their marketing is part of the game.

So I don't actually believe when they say, oh, this is the end. I don't believe them. It may be, and that may be their strategy, but I certainly don't lend it any extra credence. So they think, you know, I don't know. The risk to them is pretty great. And I don't believe them relenting changes their argument at all in terms of their court case, which is we tried to do this.

They forced us to back out of it. All of these things still apply. I don't actually think it it makes an appreciable difference to the case that they're trying to make. If in fact, it may strengthen their case to say that we had to relent because apple threatened all of these other things if we went through to it and but i also think it's the only card apple has to play is what they did and and and if this is a bad analogy but um if i own a chain of grocery stores and you shoplift in one of my grocery stores i don't just ban you from the one store, right? I ban you from all my stores. I don't want you, if I have jewelry stores

and you rob one of my stores, you don't get to come back in the other stores. And I know this is an imperfect analogy, but like, what is Apple supposed to do? One of their developers specifically, antagonistically, knowingly broke the rules as as the rule maker and again apple hides behind its rules a lot and i think it's often very disingenuous because it says well we're just enforcing the rules but they make the rules they're responsible for the rules

but to have somebody roll in and say we're just going to ignore your rules, try to stop us. I think you have to respond. I think you have to say no, like because it's not just even Epic. It's like literally everybody else if they don't do it. And so this is the only move Apple can make is say, look, if you are going to ignore our rules, we're going to lower the boom. But I think it's really important that Apple said all you have to do to solve this is turn is revert you don't have to drop your lawsuit you don't have to do any of these other things you need to revert to the version that doesn't break the rules that's it that's that's all and i think that's i think that's apple's essentially last move and then it's either up to the courts or Epic to make the next move

which I think is not great right because you know we spoke about my point still stands I think Apple Apple should make changes and they should it should look like it's coming from them rather than them being forced one way or another but I actually I agree

like this is what they should do because what you can't have other developers see that if you break the rules you can get what you want like you can't that that's not how rules work you can't do that like and again like i fundamentally disagree with the rules like the rules need to change now but for as long as the rules are what they are, well, Apple have to make a point of anybody that willingly, openly, and for...

Is it flagrantly or fragrantly? Fragrantly. I can't say that word, though. I can't say it with the L. I just found that one out. Interesting. It's good no one can hear me say this. We're all alone in the woods.

If Mike says a word in the woods, does it actually does anyone hear it? Nobody, luckily, except you and you won't make fun of me. No, I am making surreptitious title suggestions on this tree over here. Carving an exclamation point S.

So, like, because they are breaking them so publicly. Fragrantly. So, so fragrantly. Yeah, what are you supposed to do? You have to. Again, I don't love Apple's rules, and I do think Apple needs to change. I'm not on Apple's side in the sense of everything Apple does is good.

But, like, if you're the rulemaker and you've got all these people and somebody breaks your rules, if you ignore the rules, like, why do we even have the rules at that point? And it's either you're selectively enforcing the rules, which is really bad, or there are no rules, which is also bad. So I think they had to respond. And I think that the reason it's worded the way it is, which is just revert your app to before you had the in-app purchase thing that breaks the rules. That's in there for them to say, we're not asking you to do anything else. We're not asking you to stop suing us, right? Like they could have said, drop all lawsuits and we'll, but, you know, they didn't. So is it a threat?

Yes, it is. Is it, you know, they were saying that this is retaliation. And I don't think it is. I don't think it's retaliation. I think it's cause and effect. Yeah. And that's the difference. Like, I don't think Apple is retaliating in the sense that, oh boy, because you sued us, we're coming to get you.

um they're because you sued us we're coming to get you i think apple is trying to look like they are following what would happen in any situation like this even though it's not problem is i don't i can't remember any like case law quote unquote of this like where because developers have broken the rules you remember all those like the facebook thing facebook uh uber and and apple's never publicly said we're going to kick you out of the app store i think i think with uber maybe that did happen i think maybe i think there was a report of stuff that like tim cook said on the phone right like the issue the difference right the issue the difference is apple gave this as a press quote to press outlets right this is all happening publicly but i think that the the hammer is back there and i would be unsurprised if it has not been been wielded at times in those phone calls those unpleasant phone calls that you get from somebody high up at Apple who says, look, you've got to cut this out.

Because Apple does hold the hammer. It's not like Uber won't work on the iPhone through a web browser, but you don't want to use the web browser. You want to use the app. Or maybe it doesn't work. I don't know. Facebook will work on a web browser if it comes to that. But you've got to have rules, right?

You've got to put your foot down if you're Apple at some point and say, because we can and should debate the rules. Because you and I both said, I don't like the rules. I think Apple's rules are too restrictive. And I think that Apple's visibility here in their PR visibility is really bad. At the same time, the system is what it is right now. And I think Apple has to say, look, you're violating the rules.

And that's not an unreasonable thing for them to do to say you're violating the rules and essentially stop violating the rules and continue to sue us essentially. Right. Because I do think that the lawsuit should continue to sue us essentially right because i do think that the lawsuit should continue regardless because it essentially epic is has been prevented from doing the thing they wanted to do by apple and potentially apple's response with bringing the hammer it has given them more fodder for their lawsuit and i think that's fine but at the same time like epic is

putting i don't really care if fortnite comes back in the store or not. That's up to Epic. But it is putting its development partners at risk. And as several people have pointed out in the last week, the possibility that Unreal Engine is compromised in terms of Apple's platforms is going to cause a chilling effect among some developers. So the longer this goes on, the more harm is done to part of Epic's business. I do wonder, since Epic seems to be very sneaky and has lots of different plans and ploys, I do wonder if they have a plan

to like spin off Unreal Engine in a separate company or something in order to separate it from what epic is doing that i'm surprised they right and just say like no no they're separate they're not related to this because again if i was a client of theirs and relied on them for my business and i cared about apple's platforms i would be really mad at them right now there's blood on the water though and this is this is something Apple doesn't want, right? Like I think this is one of the reasons that they're lashing out.

And as somebody who wants change, I'm, I'm, I'm glad that, that this is happening because this is how, this is the only way you're going to get Apple to change anything is either force them through laws or regulations or make it so bad that they have to change to save face.

And so that part of it, I'm actually kind of great about because this is the only way it's ever going to happen, it seems. There's many reports of companies getting disgruntled, but one of the ones that at least has been public is there's a trade group of newspapers that are saying that they want the cut to be 15%, like they want the Amazon deal.

And it's funny because the wall street journal is in there, which it's just like a funny parallel from, I think we were talking like a week or so ago about them being apparently really super happy with Apple news plus, even though the Apple news plus cut is like 50%. But this is about these newspaper developers not wanting to pay 30% on their subscriptions that they get with their users in their own apps, right?

They want 15% all the time, not just after the first year. And they're saying Apple is like, quote, preventing them from investing in quality journalism. Well, I mean, if you've got a payment dispute with Apple, now is the time to get it out there. Yeah, now's the time. Because it maybe is the only time in recent memory where the average person would even be aware of the fact that Apple takes a cut from developers. Because Fortnite's big enough that it may have gotten into more people's purview. Right.

So every great walk, in my opinion, deserves breaks. I like to take a break every now and again. I think we're getting up to the creek here, which is where I wanted to stop instead of camp. So, yeah, we're getting close. We're getting close. We take a break. Okay. Then I'll talk to you about ExpressVPN.

Oh, good. Just for you, Jason. ExpressVPN lets you access the internet as if you're from a different country. Lots of different streaming services and websites have content that are only available depending on where you are. And with ExpressVPN, you can unlock thousands of new shows and movies from streaming libraries around the globe. There are hundreds of VPNs out there, but ExpressVPN is incredibly fast, so you can stream everything in HD quality with zero buffering. ExpressVPN is available on every device, your phone, your laptop, your tablet, and even on smart TVs as well.

ExpressVPN also works with all the streaming services you're going to want to use, Netflix, Amazon Prime, iPlayer, YouTube, many more, and you can choose from almost 100 different countries. Super simple to use. You just fire up the ExpressVPN app, change your location, hit connect, and refresh the page and the show or the movie that you'll want to watch will magically appear, as well as video content. I've also found this useful for written content. Being in Europe, there are some websites that never bothered to comply with GDPR,

so you try and visit them from a European country, and they're like, nah, you can't do that, and so you can turn on ExpressVPN and read what you want to read. I've also done this to get Japanese Netflix as well to watch a show that I wanted to watch. So yeah, it's out there. This is something that you can do. It's very easy to do. And you can try it out for yourself right now.

Just go to expressvpn.com upgrade and you can get an extra three months of ExpressVPN for free. That's expressvpn.com upgrade and thanks to expressvpn for their support of upgrade and relay fm hey mike i'm not actually here anymore i've used a vpn to put me over there by that tree oh sorry it's very clever look at that i can get tree netflix now i wish that you had a better pun than tree Netflix, you know, like some kind of like, or maybe like fishing Netflix.

Fishing Netflix. Yes. There you go. Look at our same brain. We are at the stream. We're at the stream now, right? Okay. We, while we're setting up camp, we might as well, you know, talk, but we'll get the

tent out. Like, let's do this. All right. And we'll do some fishing net flicks. And we are up stream. So let me tell you about some stuff that I've been reading, Jason. It's a couple of Apple TV Plus things. They've picked up a movie from Idris Elba.

It's a spy movie. Even though this is kind of a strange one because Apple have a first look deal with Idris Elba. it's a spy movie. Even though this is kind of a strange one because Apple have a first look deal with Idris Elba. But this wasn't that. They won this movie in a bidding war. It's being produced by

Elba and Simon Kinberg and Audrey Chun. There's not really anything known about this movie right now except that Idris Elba's in it and it's a spy movie. Spy movie with romance oh what a peculiar mix what a twist so you know i think finally you know finally a spy movie with romance finally long last this is what we can count on with apple some real innovation i haven't watched it yet by the way but i've seen lots of uh people saying

that um ted lasso is really good it's so good are you seeing some of it i've watched the first three episodes and if we weren't out here i would be watching episode four right now it's so good it's really good it is i think everybody's surprised looking at the trailer i thought maybe it would be right in my wheelhouse because it is, you know, it's funny, but it seems like it's got heart. And they're kind of headed for the uplifting story about sports team coming together kind of thing. But it's also really kind of warm and genuine. And it's got a lot of the great kind of culture clash things between the American and all the English people. And then it's also like American sports versus English sports culture

clash um it's funny it's sweet it's yeah it's really good if you if you haven't tried it because you thought why would I ever watch a show that's based on a on a commercial although to be fair those commercials were based on a character that um that they had come up with um before and it just as a comedy kind of character. And then NBC was like, we have this idea for these promo bits. And they said, well,

we could use this character that we've joked about. And that was where it came from. But you know, in the end, it's a bunch of very talented comedy producers and writers. And, and they made this 10 episode Apple TV, which has now been picked up for a second season.

Oh, how's that? Oh, yeah. Yeah. Apple already picked up for a second season. Oh, how's that? Oh, yeah. Yeah. Apple already picked it up. I feel like those, those are almost a fait accompli that those Apple TV shows are going to get a

second season, but, but they did after like a week of Tett Lasso being out there and the reviews have all been really good, including from some, you know, sports related places that would generally, you know,

probably frown on fictional um sports shows that are that are silly but it's it's good i like it ted lasso yeah people should check it out i have a conspiracy theory for you oh okay so uh an upgradian tweeted it was both and said they liked it and jason's today cuz faved the tweet like the tweet oh but this isn't the first time that i've seen this so i believe it was karen pitman who played mia jordan on the morning show i think it was i think it was her similar thing happened somebody tweeted or i tweeted about it and she faved it. I wonder if Apple has some kind of like

like some kind of like thing going on here where either they recommend people do this or they gets people to do it because I then went to Jason Sudeikis' Twitter account. Jason Sudeikis doesn't tweet at all.

There's no tweets on Jason Sudeikis' Twitter account, Jason Sudeikis doesn't tweet. At all. There's no tweets on Jason Sudeikis' Twitter account. But there are lots of likes that don't mention Jason Sudeikis. They just mention Ted Lasso. So I wonder if this is like a guerrilla marketing campaign type thing.

Or these people could also just be super pleased about the fact that people like the show. But it's a funny thing to me because I've noticed it happen multiple times now. Because it was a similar thing for me the last time, which is I didn't mention anybody in the tweet. I think I just tweeted about how good the morning show was and saw people that were on the show faving the tweet. So I don't know, but I think it's a funny little thing that happened.

Yeah, something's going on there. Yep. But I'm looking forward to that one. Oh, production has resumed on For All Mankind. There were two episodes left and they're finishing them off now. I think it started last week or something. And this is shot in the US.

It's shot in Culver City on the Sony lot. So they are apparently... Again, my theory is just everybody stay in spacesuits the whole time. When I see this stuff about like TV and movies, my feeling on it is just like it is a close our eyes, cross our fingers. Yeah, I think there's some truth to that. Although I read an article about it that said that this is a lot of – it's what you used to think of as a closed set. Yeah. Which is like for love scenes and things like that. They would do that.

Right. Essential personnel only basically. But now that's just what the sets are. So, yeah, just like with sports actually, they've kind of grouped everybody together. I get the impression that in hollywood um everybody wants to be on the set and like if you can get near the set you get on the set and so what they've done is they've said okay um we know we have a culture of allowing people to go various places but now that's going to change and so there's like the people who need access to the set and the people who need access to the set like when it's shooting and the people who are going

to be here and and you know we're going to handle the food this way and we're going to handle the makeup this way and the wardrobe this way like in order to make it safer so whether it's safe or not is anybody's guess but i think it's interesting that uh by all accounts they are trying really hard to change the way that this stuff is done to minimize the number of people yeah who are in any particular environment presumably everybody who is not on camera is masked as well. And that there's way fewer people than there used to be around the sets. And I've seen some actors say it's actually a little bit eerie that there are so few people around because you're used to this kind of like a big bustling set. But that's the whole idea here is to minimize the exposure and all that.

But you're right. I think there's an aspect of this which is really crossing your fingers and hoping for the best. But that's true. I here is to minimize the exposure and all that. But you're right. I think there's an aspect of this, which is really crossing your fingers and hoping for the best, but that's true. I mean, true of everything. That's true of sports too, right? Where it's like, well,

let's see, let's see how this works. And nobody really knows the answer, but I suppose somebody has to go first and somebody has to give it a try. And this is an interesting one because it's not even a long shoot. They like literally, they have two episodes left and then they can wrap the season so i can see that especially as wanting to get over the finish line i'm expecting we're going to get this show within kind of the time frame we would have

expected i think so if they can if they can cap off because presumably they have edited and probably you know edited and and done the effects for the rest of the eight, right? Or at least are on schedule to do that because that was all before it shut down in March. They've had since March to continue post-production on that stuff. And some of the post-production stuff is slower, like music especially is slower because if you used an orchestra to do your music before, you can't get the musicians together. So they are doing virtual orchestras where everybody's recording their parts separately and then they have to edit it all together which is really hard but still they've got time to produce it so now with these last two episodes

um i wonder if they're going to be able to fairly easily kind of uh start rolling them out remembering that it's also apple tv so it's's weekly. So even if they drop the first three episodes, they've got another seven weeks. So they've got another, whatever, five weeks, six weeks before they get to these two episodes. And if they're lucky enough that these episodes are late in the season, it gives them more pattern. I bet they don't for the second season.

I would be surprised if they if they dropped multiple ones i think they might have done that just at the start because the service was new yeah except that they still have done it like ted lasso dropped three episodes oh really but but for a season two i think you're right like that's the question is for season two do you need three episodes and we haven't had a season two on apple TV, have we? Really? No, there hasn't been one yet. So I think that's the question is, will they drop one episode? If I were them, I would

because I want to ration these live action episodes that I don't have that many of. If it's going to be weekly, I don't need the first three now. Well, we watched the first three Ted Lasso's over the course of three or four days and then I was queuing up episode four and oh, it's not there yet because it drops on Friday. And this was like we watched like Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, and then Thursday comes around.

And like that episode isn't there. I'm like, oh, right. This is a weekly show. So they trained me into watching it on demand whenever I wanted. And then they had to retrain me into watching it weekly. So I will say I really actually ended up enjoying a lot. The waiting for, for all mankind and from the morning show.

I love it. I think, I think I know that some people like to watch in a binge, but the beauty is if you wait, you can watch it in a binge, but I love the idea of rolling something out initially with that week, uh, between episodes, because you get

to build suspense and people talk about it. I couldn't have watched the last half of that season in a bench. It would have been too much. I liked having the room to breathe. Reese Witherspoon's next project for Apple TV Plus is a music competition show called My Kind of Country.

Wow. Reality TV, huh? That sentence was a surprise to me when I read it. I don't really know enough about Reese Witherspoon. I guess that she's a big fan of country music would be my assumption here. And again, if you're confused about whyese witherspoon is attached to this this is all through her production company hello sunshine which has multiple projects in the works with apple tv plus uh right by now um she's from she's from nashville so you know that's music uh city usa didn't know that but then that's probably makes sense but yeah so i mean witherspoon has been doing just

great work here right but like the amount of things that she's been able to to get going with apple and others so like i'm intrigued about this it's a you know like we talk about this a lot like having a breadth in your catalog to meet lots of people where they are and this kind of reality show is something that people love right like music reality shows um i don't know if they're being a popular country music focused reality show so maybe this is a niche to get into um and i guess it's it makes sense in a way for Apple to want to have content like this but I guess it will just remain to be seen

if it will work out for them this kind of show feels like a big investment to do right yeah and whether this kind of show works on on Apple TV Plus right this is it's a funny thing Hasan Minhaj's show got canceled on netflix

yeah and a lot of people i saw some stories that were like why doesn't uh why doesn't the timely talk show work on netflix because they tried it a bunch and they've all kind of flopped and i think the answer is that it doesn't fit with netflix's algorithm or with its audience or it's not what people want from netflix and i i think that there's some truth in that like just because there's a kind of tv show that is successful doesn't mean it'll be successful everywhere no like like you know john oliver's show is very successful on hbo as far as i can tell and people talk about it and like it and i like it a lot if that was a netflix show i think they would have canceled it after two years or a year and a half and i don't think i I think it's that simple. It's like Netflix,

it's programming to maximize Netflix's subscriptions and Netflix's audience. And what Netflix looks for is not necessarily what other places look for. Netflix viewers, not only are a different group of people, but they're looking for something in particular from Netflix. I don't think people go on netflix thinking i want to see this week's episode of a news comedy show i just i don't think they do i don't think people think of next week's anything on netflix and that has to do with netflix and who what we want out of it so i say this to to say that apple doing a reality competition show of a kind with My Kind of Country, it's going to be interesting to see, is that what Apple TV's viewers want from Apple TV Plus? I don't know. And at this point, it may be so early in the lifespan of this service that nobody knows or that they're cultivating an audience and they're trying to bring in an audience that's going to watch this.

But I think it's a question of what works and what doesn't work on Apple TV Plus in the long haul. Because I do think that the same show put on a network, put on a cable channel, put on HBO, put on Peacock, put on Apple TV Plus, put on CBS cable channel put on hbo put on uh peacock put on apple tv plus put on cbs all access like we'll have a different outcome on every single one of those and it'll be a spectrum dependent on the content that you have that surrounds those shows right so because i can never even really think about how you use them going to netflix to watch a movie like i don't really think about that right like for me netflix is seasons of stuff right like that i can watch all of right now yeah and that that's the part that i think doesn't get considered enough which is it's not even necessarily that netflix doesn't like these kinds of shows because they keep trying them i think netflix would love one of them to be successful but that netflix is fighting against its own brand identity like it that that

netflix is not the best vehicle for a weekly news-based comedy slash satire show i mean it seems like patriot has probably been their best one so far because they've kept it around like they kept renewing it it's like what i was like six seasons i think no well it's six six batches but they only went eight episodes past the initial order they ordered like 32 episodes and then at some point uh like six months ago they added eight more and then and then they dropped it so so they they made a big commitment up front but they really didn't fulfill much beyond the initial commitment and that is actually what happened with the joel mckale show which is a uh a very different kind of show and yet also kind of timely that's that's was his revival of the soup that he used to do which is basically picking up like reality

tv shows of the week and making fun of them and i love that show i thought it was hilarious but they picked it up for one little season. It was like a new show to me. Yeah, well, I mean, essentially, except on Netflix. And it didn't work for Netflix. Clearly, they did order six more episodes,

dropped them as a binge, which was very weird. I think as an experiment of like, what if we did it and it wasn't timely and we dropped a whole season of it? And then they're like, yeah, that didn't work either.

And then they walked away. So I think Netflix would love for something like this to work. I think they would love to have something like a john oliver or a or a daily show where people came because they wanted to see and it was buzzworthy and all of that and i think i think this is a case of netflix maybe a victim of being a victim of its own success where it's so good at binge watching TV seasons, that that's what people come to Netflix for now. And there are turns out there are limits to that. And that there's some things that you don't people don't want to get from Netflix. So it's

kind of funny because Netflix is the is the Death Star of TV right now. But this is an interesting example where maybe they just, you know, they can't't do it they can't they can't fit this one into their brand i have some exciting news for you jason uh-oh our text adventure is ready it's done the cortex upgrade text adventure oh yeah we did that we did the text adventure a little while ago um but you've been working on it yeah i know you keep sending me versions of it here's the latest yep so but it's completed i listened to the final one today it's ready to go uh august 29th we're going to have it available for real afm members so this coming weekend this next weekend next weekend which is a great way for people to if they haven't given upgrade plus a shot yet but they love to text adventures every year you can sign up to be an Upgrade Plus member

and you'll get both Upgrade Plus and the crossover feed, which is where the Texas Venture will be found. So we have this feed, it's called Real AFM Crossover, and it includes tons of great content from over the

years, where we've done these specials every year. If you don't know what a Texas venture specials are, then you can find out. I'm also going to play a trailer at the end of this episode that doesn't exist. Oh, good. Is that a,

is the, why did I was wondering why you brought the cassette player out? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I'll play you a train in your backpack, hanging off your backpack like that,

but it's got the text adventure on it. I get it now. I get it. So the text adventure is available in the crossover feed where there's lots of other wonderful content um i'm already a member mike why do you keep telling me these things well if you're not and if you don't know where to get it we got one you go to get upgrade plus.com jason you can do that right now if you want to hear that birds get upgrade plus.com and if you've signed up and you're already a member

and you wonder where the crossover feed is, there'll be a link in the show notes where you can just tap that, sign in, and you can immediately subscribe to Crossover. I put that link carved on the bark of this tree over here, which is what I'm calling the show notes. This tree we call show notes. It's really fun. There'll be a trailer at the end of the episode.

And if you want it, go to getupgradeplus.com and sign up. If you're already a RelayFM member, you can get it too. And thank you so much for your support. Also, I know you're really excited about fishing Netflix, but I've got a better idea now. Okay. Tree PN. It's a tree-based VPN. Right.

I'd prefer fishing Netflix. Okay, fine. That was funny. Not that Treepn wasn't funny too of course jason sorry sorry 3pn was great it was the best i don't need your pity uh i have one other thing jason i'm really excited about right now you may remember we raised a ton of money last year for st jude children's cancer research hospital do. We're doing it again. We're partnering with St. Jude once again. We're going to be raising money now

and throughout September, so as we get into September, you can expect to hear much more about that and about St. Jude's mission and the cause because that's something that's near and dear to all of us, and September is Childhood Cancer Awareness Month. But you can donate or

people could donate now so you might want to carve into another tree jason st jude.org relay i have written that down here already as you were talking with pebbles i've just spelled it out here along the bank of the creek people can see it so the next people who come by will see see the pebbles that say st jude.org slash the the slash is a stick. It's just relay. Yeah, you'd be efficient. stjude.org slash relay. And we're doing the podcast-a-thon again on Friday, September 18th from 2 to 8 p.m. Eastern at twitch.tv slash relay.fm.

It's a virtual podcast-a-thon, right? Because you aren't allowed to travel. Yeah, but the only difference is me and Stephen aren't in the same place. Everybody else was virtual last time. So it's actually allowing us to do some new and very fun things. We had already been working on the podcast-a-thon. I'm not even kidding, like from before COVID. Right.

We started working on it then. But we hadn't started too much. So we didn't have to like bin a bunch of plans. We were able to adapt a bunch of stuff and we're able to still do things this year that we'd hoped to do last year, but couldn't get together in time. We're doing them this year, even though it's all virtual.

So I think it's going to be really fun. And what I also like about, uh, doing the podcast on now is I think people will have more time to spend with us to watch it. Right. This is something we're getting more used to. So also made a little bit earlier in the day because i'm going to be in london

um i didn't want it to go until what would have been i think three or four in the morning for me so we're doing two to eight p.m eastern time which ends still one in the morning one yeah but one i can do three would have been that would have i would have gotten a little bit loopy towards the end there and are you going to dress up? Of course I am. Okay. Me and Adina were talking today about what we were going to wear. Got to dress up. Got to dress up.

No, it doesn't take that away. But anyway, stjude.org slash relay. We're going to talk about this a bunch, but please go there now. It's right there. Donate what you can. We want to do it again. We want to raise $315,000, which I know is a huge amount of money, but we did it last year, so let's do it again. want to raise 315 000 which i know is a huge amount of money but we did it last year so let's do it again let's tap on the on the stick tap on the stick on the bank of the

creek and uh you'll go there do you see that over there uh what looks like a little cave or something see that well we could we could check it out let's let's i mean it's a bit of a hike we're gonna have to walk i think down there and then cross over the stream but we could check it out. I mean, it's a bit of a hike. We're going to have to walk, I think, down there and then cross over the stream. But we could do that. I think we should do that. All right. I mean, it's not nightfall yet. You know, we got time before we have to turn in.

So, sure. You know, thinking about that, like going into a cave after having been inside my own little cave. Oh, but it's a new cave. It's a new cave. It's a new cave. New a new cave new caves are exciting right outdoor cave yeah because i am in a new cave most of the week now back like i say back i'm in and recording from mega studio like four days a week i'm working i'm recording from there now the only day i don't record from mega studio is, or work from Mega Studio is Mondays,

because I'm still working out how I'll do this show from there. Because we record, I mean, I have a couple of shows that I record around the same time in the day that I record Upgrade, which is like around 5 or 6 p.m., but I don't edit them. So I'm still trying to work out that process. Because I'm usually done with upgrade around sometime between 9 and 10 p.m. Which would then be difficult for coming home and having dinner. It's a tad late. So I'm still working out. We've got some ideas.

That could just be a night of the week where we get takeout because we have great takeout options at the studio would you do something like record upgrade and then just take the files home i thought about that but eventually at some point i don't want to have any gear at home for like properly sitting down and recording so i want to work out the process yeah i guess i'm just saying if you could if you could just take the files home and edit at home after dinner instead i don't know yeah i mean i've already told you i'm not getting up any earlier though no and this is it was never a a thing to move it earlier i would never have asked that wasn't the the thing it was just about

me working out my process because i know there's a way to do it i just sure i've got i've got a couple of options and i just haven't yet worked out which one i want to take but there isn't like an immediate need because it's like my original plan for the studio is that like we would have been by now all moved in i would have no gear here except like emergency travel gear right i'd have like a laptop a microphone an xlr cable and a zoom recorder which is like just what i would put in my bags whenever i would go uh away and would record from outside of home but exactly and i never got to do that i mean it was kind of funny right where like now i can look back on it. I think we'd had the studio lease for like three or four weeks and then went into lockdown. So just, you know, we've only been, I've been recording from there for a couple of weeks now, right?

Like in going there like three or four days a week. And I'm trying to stick with at least four days a week now. So that's nice. So how's it going to get out and and have a have a place outside because this isn't just the lockdown i mean before the lockdown before the pandemic you you could go out and do things but your work was constrained in your house in in mega mega office um which it seems less mega now i would imagine it's like mini mini office so you know leaving the pandemic kind of aside for a minute believe it or not and just looking at your work routine you're you're going for the first time in a long time you're leaving your home

for you know several hours several days a week to go somewhere else and and and work that's a big change because that was it was the thing right like my out of home studio was not informed by lockdown like i'd made the decision way before then and it was because i wanted i'd been i've I have been working from home for five years, and I have come to realize that was awesome, but I want a bit more structure again. I've done it for long enough now where I wanted to change it up, and it may be that in another five years, I want to work from home again, but we'll be in a larger home maybe.

In a larger home. Right, so it will be easier. Like, we only have three main rooms in this house. We have, like, our living room and kitchen, which is one room. Then we have two bedrooms. And one of the bedrooms is occupied by the studio. And so that means that, like, all I am in is one of those three rooms all the time basically right and i felt like i needed more room to breathe plus adina is working with me now

like so i have a uk company as well um which is like a whole thing. But I'd work on other projects with my UK-based company, and we'd run that together. And it was becoming trickier and trickier for us to both be able to have enough space to work. So we'd made the decision that we would get an out-of-home studio. So we'd have more space to expand,

and I wanted it to also be like a comfortable place to be because if we were going to do it i mean some of my work days will begin at 10 in the morning and end at 10 at night so i wanted it to be a space where we could be comfortable in for long periods of time as well because i have like these weird holes in the middle of my day sometimes right where like i've got all the stuff i need done for the morning but then i'm not recording anything for like another three hours so having somewhere comfortable to be during that waiting period of time would also be good you have like i assume like coffee or tea making things and i don't know do you have a little refrigerator or something in there? We don't yet, but that's the plan.

We just haven't gotten there yet. We're now, even though we've had the lease on this place for six months, we're back to week seven. Right. The main thing was, before we could start really filling it out

of everything else we needed, it had to be recording ready, and it is now. Hey, that is a big cave. That is a big cave. This is bigger than Megastudio. I mean, hey. Hello! Ho, ho, ho.

Wow. We could explore this cave a little. I mean, let's walk into the cave while we're talking. I mean, it's huge. It's barely even a cave this far out. This is spectacular all right no you were saying sorry um but yeah so it's been we're still kind of feeling it out still working out what we need but like it's been a great change for me mentally now to have

this place it's given me renewed energy for work i'm putting more activity into my day like which i think is helping with my energy right um and it's it's forcing structure for me in a different way and i'm having way more of a feeling of like being home which i haven't had in a long time in the idea of like i'll do that tomorrow i'm home now oh yeah yeah right and i i'd lost that like i really lost that um and so i i like having that feeling again that that's nice this is one of the reasons believe it or not this is one of the reasons why i shut down my computer when i'm done for the day and then i i can close the garage door yeah the door you know not the big rolling garage door but the door to the to the rest of the house in the garage and on a weekend depending on what i'm doing like there are weekends where the computer never comes

on and people send me things and i'm like i'll do that when i'm back at the computer and it's just it's not as as dramatic as having it be home and office but putting any barrier between the one and the other can really pay off mentally i think in in forcing you to section your time and and say that's that goes in the other bucket i'm not going to deal with that right now it's just going to wait until later yeah i i don't know exactly why or how but like i just got not good at separating all that stuff apart you know yeah it's hard it's hard when it all mixes together and you're not leaving the house and it's all just kind of running together and it's it's you know kind of more efficient in many ways to just be able to ping pong back and forth, but I think that it takes a toll mentally. You mentioned having everyone at home again.

Is that changing your work? You know, I'd say as much as I talk about my home office and being out here in the garage and having this be my place, my domain, I use the rest of the house more than I thought. And that has been the biggest change for me is I used to do, you know, to take a break. Like I've talked about that iPadad setup i have right where i've got this ipad stand and the keyboard and all of that that's not something i do in the garage that's something i do in the house i i take it into the house to the by the kitchen and i stand at the bar and i do it well i can't do that because there's people all the time there's always somebody around whereas i used to be able to do that and there was nobody else in the house but me.

So that has been a challenge. In the summer months, when it's a nice day, I can go in the backyard and work. And that is still, you know, that's still a great kind of like place shift for me when I'm capable of doing that. So that's been nice when I can do that but I've realized that yeah I definitely took advantage of the emptiness of the house to expand my my workspace and different options also the pandemic has closed down another one of my place shifting tricks which was going to Starbucks and writing my column which I did a lot um just to get it gets me out of the house and puts me in an environment I didn't think I knew you did that

oh yeah yeah I've been I've been writing at a you know writing the Macworld column especially at Starbucks not every week but I was doing that a lot

we used to have a Starbucks within walking distance and it was great and I would just walk over there and then they closed it and I was very sad but I still went maybe every other week

ish to one that I could drive to. Um, but obviously pandemic is the end of that. And the good thing about that is that you're there and it's like, well, I'm here. I went to all the effort to come here.

It would be awfully stupid if I didn't do what I came here to do, which is write my column. And it, it, it sort of like forces me to focus on doing the job, which I find that I find that very, not only am I a different place and I'm, there's kind of like the hubbub of people.

And I've also kind of like forced my own hand of saying, you know, you will feel really stupid if you leave here, having spent an hour sitting here and done nothing. And it totally works. Like I would sit down. That's definitely part of the effect that I'm getting at the studio. Yeah. So I would sit down, like I'm not of the effect that I'm getting in the studio. Yeah.

So I would sit down like I'm not going to waste the time that I'm here because otherwise why am I here? And so I would sit down and I would write, you know, a thousand words or whatever in a fairly short amount of time. It was great. Finish my hot chocolate and leave. Maybe pop into the supermarket and then go home. And I've lost that. Yeah. Paying a rent on a room really gives you that feeling.

More than a hot chocolate at starbucks yeah for sure yeah yeah yeah no but that but it is that is one of the effects of that so anyway that's one of the ways that it's affected me is i i'm largely unaffected by this because i work at home but uh that and i feel very lucky to have my setup here and be very comfortable in it. Um, but, uh, there are definitely,

you know, having a lot of people in the house has definitely added, added some, some complications to that. It's great. It's great having my daughter home. Um, you know,

it's tough because my son is now doing online classes every day. And he is, that's not, we bought him a new chair, but he's sitting at a desk watching Zoom lectures. Burr. Yeah. But that sounds kind of terrible for him,

but better than being in school, maybe? I think so. I think so. Yeah. I know it's a very different situation for lots of different people, but I can imagine that for many parents, if they have the choice available to them, that's the choice that they would want to be able to take, right?

Right. Well, I'm really glad that you're using your studio, because, I mean, you got up right to the precipice and then everything locked down. And it's got to be, I mean, you're essentially going to another space that you control. So it's got a lot less stress than if you were going into an office with lots of people. It really is your space. Yeah. And it gives you, you know, you've essentially expanded your house in a way, right?

Yeah, that is what it feels like but it's another another home another workspace whatever however you want to describe it it's a place that you both can go and um it's not the place that you've been and it probably puts you in a context that is a you know more of a even when you're in one of those holes in your schedule, you're still at work, right? Incredibly difficult to buy office furniture right now, though. I bet. You try and buy a chair, right? Like a good chair or a good desk.

Super difficult to do. Really very, very difficult to do. Huh. Hey, what is that? Do you see that? Over there in the corner, do you see that? It's kind of dark over there. It looks, I just saw something shining.

Like it looks like a door or something. Let me turn on my flashlight. I didn't know you had one of those. It would have been useful if you could. Well, it's my phone. It's not an actual torch. Sorry, torch. Who would want an actual flashlight?

Am I right? I think Casey Liss. Okay. But, yeah, I think that, I mean, it's super rusty, but how could there be a door in the back of a cave? That's crazy. What is? I don't know.

I feel like we should dash over to that door. Oh, let's, let's, let's do it. Let's dash to the door. And while we dash to the door, let me tell you about DoorDash. Yes, please. You've got plenty on your to-do list. Laundry, emails, errands, goodness knows what else. Yes, please. safely outside your door with their new contactless delivery drop-off setting. With over 300,000 partners in the US, Puerto Rico, Canada, and Australia,

you can support your local go-tos or choose from your favorite national restaurants. Jason, can you tell me a little bit about your DoorDash experiences? Just to me, of course, I personally want to know. Well, I mean, you know that my daughter has done some driving for DoorDash, which is hilarious, and she goes to all these places and gets great food from some of the great restaurants here that it can't serve people more or less anymore in inside so they instead uh people order out and we've definitely done that for we did that for indian food we did that for chinese food um we did that for a local Mexican restaurant.

And then it just comes to your door. There's a happy driver that might be my daughter. My babe. Also, it's changed the context of asking my daughter to go out and pick up a takeout order for us. We say, Jamie, you're going to DoorDash for us. She does not appreciate that. She does not appreciate that. Sure she doesn't. But, yeah, it is.

If you are wanting food and you want somebody to literally bring it to your door from a nearby restaurant, that's what it's all about. It's great. Listeners of this show can get $5 off and zero delivery fees on their first order of $15 or more by using the code UPGRADE.

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Our thanks to DoorDash for their support of Upgrade and all of RelayFM. Yeah, it is a door. All right. It's like a ring or something. Let me pull on this. Stand back. Hold the light on me.

Let me... All right. What is this? In a cave? I mean, this is finished. That's just a rough cave, but this is just a... Why would there be a storage room? I mean, this is finished. That's just a rough cave, but this is just a... Like a...

Why would there be, like, a storage room inside a... I mean, I guess cave monsters need storage rooms too, right? Don't even say cave monsters. Okay, sorry, sorry, sorry. Or in a cave. Although this is more like a basement monster. Would be in... Check this out.

Like, there's a layer of dust. No one's been in here. Check this out. Like there's a layer of dust. No one's been in here in a long time. Oh man. Man, look at this old computer. Can you imagine how much faster an Apple Silicon Mac could be from this computer? It's mind boggling.

I mean, even a new chart, maybe, maybe I will. I've got a whiteboard over here, right? See this whiteboard? I want to draw for you, Jason, a chart that I saw on your very fine website. Do those pens, do those dry erase pens even work? No, that's good enough.

All right. I mean, I suppose it could be a permanent marker. They're not going to know we're here. But yeah, sure. Draw me a map. Draw me a chart. So I've got an x-axis for you here which is power consumption and a y-axis which is performance this was a graph that was shown at a wwdc session and so we have typical

desktops we're going to put in a box here and typical notebooks we're going to put in a box here and basically the way that i outline this on the graph is saying that a typical desktop is going to consume more power and perform better right and typical notebooks will have less performance and consume less power we know this already right yes this is this is the way like this is the two computer classes they are displayed on a graph in this way yeah you're doing you're doing that the apple wwc uh slide yeah Yeah. But now I'm just going to take a big pen, and I'm just going to draw a big hazy area up the top left. Oh. Least power consumption, most performance,

and we're just going to label that max of Apple silicon. Okay. Right? Just nebulous in this top corner here. Right? So this is what Apple was trying to show people. They're trying to say that, like, I guess every Mac of Apple Silicon will perform well

and not consume a lot of power. Like, what is going on here, do you think? Well, it's a Bezos chart, in a way. It is a Bezos chart in a way. It is a Bezos chart. It is. Good point. It's just good is here and good is here and bad is here. Yeah.

What I find fascinating is that Apple seems to be suggesting that the Macs with Apple Silicon are going to be faster than existing notebooks, but that some will also offer lower power consumption. It's a whole, like there's a lot unsaid here, and I'm sure it's based on reality, but it's also like rub that little upper left thing to make it even more kind of hazy, right? Like just take off some of the pen there. But it's intriguing, right? Because it's all positioned above notebooks in terms of performance.

And it's all positioned to the left of desktops in terms of power consumption. So this is Apple not making any promises while also promising that they're going to have this whole line that's going to use less power than all their desktops and that is going to be more powerful than almost all their notebooks. Yeah, like what they're basically trying to show with this is what our hopes and dreams are, which is every chip is better than the one it replaces for what it's supposed to do. Okay, let me draw you a chart then. How about that? I'm going to use this part of it.

I'm going to erase this. Is that a skull? I don't know. I'm just going to erase it. I don't know what they're drawing on here. It doesn't matter. Okay. Let's, okay, I'm going to draw you a chart of Apple processor performance.

So we're going to start here, bottom left. I like that you have this all in your brain, all these numbers. Well, of course I do. This is pretty simple, though. It's like just the processors, the A10 and the A11 and the A12 and the A13, right? Basically a straight line tracking up and to the right.

So we can assume from that that like an A14 would just kind of continue up yeah so the a14 would be the next chip that we'd find in say the next iphone the next ipad maybe yeah and maybe that chip is um faster than we expect that it's gotten faster the pace of of speed boosts have gotten faster maybe but let's just assume it's kind of on on pace now i'm going to draw a little circle here under the a13 which is the processor that's in the iphone 11 okay what's that right or is that or is that the iphone 12 i can't i can't read my own writing sometimes it's the iphone 11 11 because the iphone 12 is the next one the iphone 12 is the next one that

will have the a14 in it right so a13 iphone 11 this little circle below it that is um that is the top of the line imac from last year okay so i can draw another little circle above it and it would probably be the top of the line iMac for this year. Right. They're in the ballpark. So hovering around on, what is this, single core geekbench? This is single core, right? Well, okay. So first off, let's just call it what it is.

The fastest iMac is basically as fast as the fastest iPhone. Okay. At single core. Which is ridiculous, but that's where we are. Mm-hmm. Okay. iphone okay at single core which is ridiculous but that's where we are okay so first thing i'm going to do is say if the a14 is in you know maybe the a14 is the basis of not only the iphone 12 but the new ipads and whenever they come a new ipad pro And they have a certain number of processor cores. And there's also a speed boost.

And we'll get to the processor cores in a second. But, like, is it unreasonable to think that there would be a Mac variant of this that would be faster? Because presumably the Macs are going to have cooling in a way that an iPhone and an iPad couldn't. So potentially here in single core, you could have, like I'm going to draw another big circle up here, way above the A14. For the M14, I'm going to call it that. Don't try to stop me. Like, okay.

So already, even if the new Apple Silicon Macs only have an A14, which they won't, it's already faster than the fastest iMac that's just the just just the trend line of a single core but then let's throw in let's throw in multiple cores because you know these these iOS processors that Apple's doing are multi-core and probably one of the ways that Apple will make them more

conducive to the Mac is at least at the high end is adding more cores to them yeah so if i if i move you know we keep that line kind of more or less the same but we say that it's multi-processor performance now multi-core performance and i can draw in like the mac pro is going to be way up here like the macro 28 core mac pro is going to be the king of the hill okay but the like an eight core iMac 10 core iMac eight core MacBook Pro 16 you know they're all faster than the A13 because they have more cores more performance cores um so okay fair enough but I think if you if you I draw a line through from the iPad. An iPad Pro with the number of cores in an A14X, let's say, on an iPad Pro, it's in the ballpark. It's faster than the MacBook Pro already.

Yeah, because the current iPad Pros are running the A12Z, which is faster than the A13, though. Right, but a generation behind. Exactly. So we would assume that, I mean, if you follow those trend lines too, an A13Z, if that ever is made, we don't know. Or X. Or X would probably be in the region of that MacBook Pro 16 inch.

Right, and then if you take it to 14 and use that as the basis and add cores and call it the A14X, it's going to be even faster. and use that as the basis and add cores and call it the A14X, it's going to be even faster. And again, and here's the possibility is, imagine now that Apple, what makes it a Mac processor instead of an iPad processor is that they add more cores. Once you start adding more cores, it's very easy to kind of conservatively extrapolate that a Mac, an 8-core, 8-performance-core Mac M14 processor is faster than all but the very fastest build-to-order Mac Pros and iMac Pros.

Right? And that's the chip that could go in an iMac or even a MacBook Pro. So, you know, when you look at my imaginary charts and Apple's imaginary charts, I think it's just, everything we do about Apple Silicon is speculative. But if you look at the trends

of Apple's processor speed growth over time, and then you consider that a Mac variant would probably have more cores, it's really hard to imagine that the Apple Silicon Macs won't be way faster than Intel Macs. And I think that's interesting. Like, again, it's all made up. We're making a lot of – it's back of an envelope. I mean, I'm doing it on a whiteboard here, but it's essentially the back of a napkin kind of calculation. But once I did this calculation,

it became apparent to me that like, we should expect spectacular performance from these systems. I think especially the desktops, because the laptops will still i reckon and i'm sure you do too follow the high efficiency and the performance core model that we see in the mobile devices right although if it's a if they do if one of the first apple silicon max is a macbook pro yeah that'll have a cooling system in it that

i think yes i think you could put in an imac and a macbook pro you could put in the same processor which is which is one that's got more cores maybe than is in the ipad pro whereas something like a macbook or a macbook air might might have the ipad class processor in it i don't know but yeah so you're probably you're definitely right there right there'll be a scale that because laptops I don't know. and we can draw these charts but like i think until i saw some of these trend lines that you've been putting on this board here for me to see it didn't really it hadn't clicked for me about the fact that like well this is this is this kind of performance that they are getting are from chips that would not be taken and dropped into these new computers because we're looking at different types of architectures, right?

Like you are looking at fans. You are looking at permanent power. I mean, and in the case of a laptop, a product that people used to plug in so you can ramp up and ramp down if you need to, you can end up with very different speeds like this these charts these trend lines that can be blown out of the water and and let's it's important to remember the developer transition kit that's out there that's that mac mini with apple silicon in it i believe that is the a12z

that's in there so let's just keep in mind that is essentially again the x and the z the difference is one gpu core is turned on that wasn't before it's essentially the a12 from 2018 it's not even last year's a13 it's an a12 so the developer transition kit is not a great guide to what performance is going to be other than to say that's what performance is in a computer that essentially we would think of as being almost two years old um so i would imagine that apple silicon in max is going to be based on the a14 architecture and get all of the benefits of that so it's going to be way way more probably than we expect now you know they're going to apple's going to balance it apple they're you got to balance battery life and power consumption all that but because they've got their efficiency

cores and because they've got their performance cores and that's not something that intel processors have that leads to some really interesting potential for them to add a lot of power and use it when it's plugged in or has a fan going, but also drop a way down and get the battery life when you're in

other situations. I don't know. I think when you extrapolate out what the growth of the speed of the processors on the iOS side has been and then imagine that it's going to be that and then probably a little bit more on the Mac side it gets really exciting like like almost every I would imagine that every Apple Silicon Mac will be faster by a lot than the model it replaces. But I think it might also be safe to say all of them will be faster than all but a handful of existing Intel Macs.

And all at the highest end, right? I think they'll all be faster than everything but the iMac Pro and Mac Pro and maybe the highest end iMacs. everything but the iMac Pro and Mac Pro and maybe the highest end iMacs. But as we know, like, but at some point they will have something to replace that as well. Right. Well, and they say there's a two year transition. I think that's exactly it is that probably the idea of building, they put off the ability, the idea of building a multi, multi, multi, multi core monster processor until later right like get the reasonable eight core eight performance core processor out the door and then down the road build your 18 core whatever it is monster that goes in the mac pro just like a bag full of arm chips

just put them in there. There you go. Speaking of monsters, did you hear that? Yeah, I did hear that, and I don't want to talk about monsters. It could just be an animal or something. I mean, this is clearly some sort of abandoned research station. I mean, probably it's just an animal, right? Something that opened the door from the cave?

No? Don't like the sound oh wait look hold on a second there's a there's another door over there it looks like stairs i like that and then that is an exit sign that's not lit up it's right above it yeah why don't we um let's see where the stairs go maybe and close the door behind us yeah i want to get out of hero and talk about hero these. These days, your house isn't just your home. It's an office, it's a school, it's a movie theater, it's a restaurant. All these activities and

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A-H-O-Y. A thanks to Eero for their support of this show and all of RelayFM. Did you hear there's something mechanical going on? Get down, Mike! Whoa! Wow. Well, I guess it's time for Ask Alfred. I guess, what else would we do?

Never make fun of lasers again. I guess you never should. You've learned the hard way. Kenneth. Kenneth might be able to help us. Kenneth has a great question, actually. People that have listened from episode one, would we consider them to give them the title of founding Upgradians?

I don't know. What do you think? I like the idea of a distinction for people that have been here since the very beginning. Sure. But the problem is, how do you prove it? Maybe if you were, yeah, you were mentioned on an early episode. That makes you. So on the TV Talk Machine, which we did for, Tim Goodman and I did for years, and he did for years before that, we would have what we just called the OG listeners who had been there.

And the reason we knew that they were OG listeners is because they had been on an early episode. Like they had a letter read or something. And that helps if you can tie it back to that. Like if you invented the word Upgradian, then you're definitely an original Upgradian. I'd say original. I'd say original Upgradians. Original's good.

More than founding. We are the founding Upgradians. We founded, yeah, Upgrade, and then you were original Upgradians, maybe? I don't know. Yeah, I like that. Yeah, if people can prove to us that they've been around since the beginning

or very close to the beginning they can get the title original upgrade all right we're gonna we're gonna go to the next uh stairwell there's a break there's a pattern in the lasers there's a break in it okay on my signal ready yep now okay okay while we're sitting here i'm ready for another question ian says when reviewing videos and films like media basically for podcasts do you do it in your office or do you watch in your lounge i i don't know what a lounge is i don't have one of those okay uh what do you call the room where you have your tv and your the living room living room okay living room do you not the room where you have your TV and your... The living room. Living room?

Okay, living room. Do you not lounge in the living room? I lounge wherever I am. Wherever I lay my hat is my lounge. Mostly it is in the living room, sometimes not. And sometimes I will force it on my family. Well, I rarely force the homework on my family. I sometimes force it on my my family well i rarely force the homework on my family i sometimes force it on my wife yeah but usually it's good stuff the bad stuff i sort of

have to watch by myself and that was an advantage you know when when there was nobody in the house speaking of where like i would just come out at lunchtime and i'd watch the thing that i needed to watch i i sometimes these days will do like I watched an episode of a TV show in the backyard the other day because that's where I was and the other spaces in the house were being taken up by other people and that's fine too.

But I'm mostly, when I'm reviewing stuff for a podcast, when I'm doing the homework, it's mostly in the living room on the big tv yeah same for me i i still want to be able to relax to watch the program so i can actually like watch it properly right like i want to be able to relax and watch it so i'm in the right frame of mind even though i might be taking notes or have like a different thought process while watching the show or the movie i still want to be comfortable with the best sound system with the best tv right like it's just to get the best like experience out of

the property it is yeah i always joke about like oh i watch this movie as the director intended on an iphone like no they don't want that at all and you should try to get it in the in the ideal kind of circumstance okay we're going to the next level now ready mike ready now okay what's the next question luke says what features would you like to see in a consumer apple display and what kind of price point do you think it should sit at oh wow um i want i mean features i want it to be a uh 5k or above display i wanted to have a uh a camera a good camera in it yes iphone level or higher no lower i want it to be a um thunderbolt or whatever is the state of the art when it comes out hub so that you can connect a device to it and then connect a bunch of things to the back of the display and have them be connected like with

the old thunderbolt display face id i would love it if that that camera also was a face id capable kind of sensor that would be spectacular if that was the case and i would like like pro display kind of design right like you know or whatever the future apple design is right but like really look like what the redesigned imac looks like whatever that is yeah yeah that's a good point yeah uh vaso mounting sure optional to optional to vaso mount it for sure and a nano texture option nano texture option is great yeah and then in terms of the price point, I would say find a comparable monitor of that size and have it be a bit more than that, but not too much. Because it's never going to be the cheapest option because it would be an Apple display.

But I'd like it to not be too overpriced. That's always my dream with Apple products is please don't overprice it so much that it's impossible for me to buy what's got to be cheaper than an iMac that's true right so I mean I guess the ideal price point is 13 to 1500 like when I say ideal it's like what do we think they would charge and how much can they charge and the imax starts at 1800 and yeah i mean the lg ultra fine 27 5k is 1299 so it's got to be around there like 1400 maybe 1500 yeah that's about as much as you could get from it because like is that you it gets ludicrous right like if you have a display that costs more than a computer when it's consumer grade right like obviously the pro display costs more than everything depending on what you're buying apple's argument might be

that you should most people should just buy an iMac and that this is for everyone else but um you also have something like that real like yeah there'd be some kind of realisticness to it still i would also argue that if it's got an integrated hub and all of that like they could make it and and a good camera and all of that that it would be like the competition but more expensive but also better in some ways i don't know i hope they do one but i'm still not convinced that they are all right should we go up another floor? We're nearly at the top of the staircase. Maybe we can finally get out of the way from those lasers.

Yeah, before we do that, I want to say, if touch is supported on the Mac, I want touch on that display, and I want it to also connect to iOS devices so that I could also attach an iPad to it, and it would do touch. Yes, yes, and yes.

All right, let's go. Now. All right, let's go. Now. James asked, what's your typical setup for video calls? Which camera do you use? Which microphone do you use? Wow. I'm using my iMac Pro FaceTime camera

because it's 1080 and it looks pretty good. And in fact, I've got the Logitech external camera and I don't think it looks as good and in fact i've got the logitech external camera and i don't think it looks as good i don't think the framing is a good i don't think the the metering the the white balance i don't think any of it is as good so i don't which one i'm not really using it you know which logitech camera you have it's an old one old 1080p one that i bought like five years ago and used with my other devices but i started using it with as i i mac pro but i just don't as much anymore unless I need something that I can point in a different direction or Mount in a different way.

Right. Yeah. And Mike, I, I use, I use my mic that I use for podcasts and my headphones that I use for podcasts. So in my case,

that's a sure, um, SM seven B. I think. So when I'm at my desk, I use my microphone, which is a Neumann KMS 105. Love that thing.

I now have a webcam, the Logitech Brio. There's a bunch of different models of the Brio, but it's a 4K webcam. Looks really good. Really helps to have a bit of light, if you can get a bit of light on you, but that's pretty much the same with all cameras,

but if you can get a bit of external light, it really helps, but I do like that camera. That one does a good job, and I use that, or I also will take video calls on my iPad Pro with its camera and using my AirPods. They're two different ways that I'll take video calls on my iPad Pro with its camera and using my AirPods. They're like the two different ways that I'll take video calls. I actually did an experiment and I used Camo. I've heard about this.

Camo Studio. Yeah. I did a podcast where I was, my iPhone camera was my camera. And that's Reincubate has this app called camo studio and you plug your iphone in to your mac and you run camo studio on your mac and now you have a webcam that is your iphone doesn't work with all apps but it works with zoom and i used it on zoom and it totally worked and i was able to do some stuff that um you know you can like manually kind of zoom it to the right zoom level and all that and because you're using such a high

quality camera the you can zoom in a little bit and it doesn't have any impact on on the quality of the image and i was pretty impressed with that it's a bit to set it up i actually i actually bought a little clip it's like an iphone stand clip. So it's clipped back behind my iMac, and then I can have it. I can clip the phone into it and kind of hang it over the edge of my iMac and use it as a webcam. And I have used that, and that's actually pretty cool. It looks great. It's fiddly, and it's a bit of work, but it does actually look really good because that's a way better camera than any other camera you're going to get for your Mac. Especially if you use the back camera

all right we're almost at the top here all right one more level right one more one more dash are you ready go well all right Lonnie asked and then we'll get out here how do you organize windows on your mac do you use an app like betterTool or something like that for snapping them? Or do you let them all overlap? Lonnie, I use my windows as Apple intended. I just use them. I don't know what to say. Do you move stuff around to specific places though?

Like in your mind, do you have like your own kind of like model of where the windows go? Yeah, Slack goes in the upper left and Audio Hijack in the lower right. And yeah, I mean, I have places for some of this stuff stuff to go but i just put it there and i don't have any i don't have any app to move i mean i've got the apps i just never use them to move things around or snap them do you don't work that way use multiple desktops i do not okay i am i am opposed

to multiple desktops they're great for other people people, but I'm not interested in them at all. Okay. Interesting. Two desktops I use. Huh. I have all of my recording stuff on one. So I have Audio Hijack. I have Discord.

When we're live, I have Safari and Skype. Yeah. And then on the other one is all my other apps. So like if I was doing work on the Mac, if it wasn't in a web browser, so like all my communication apps are here. So like Messages is here. Slack is here.

Email is here. I have Notes. I have OmniFocus. I have Toggle. They all live on the other desktop. And they all overlap. And I hate it. I don't, I don't like windows, right?

Like I like, it's one of my favorite things about iOS. Like I've really liked the simplicity of iOS. Like I can either be in one app, I can be in two apps. Sometimes one can come in from the side or I just go to the other apps. Like I actually really like that. I like that model. I don't like the way that split screen and full screen work on the Mac. It's too big.

So I will use Windows, windowing, but it looks messy to me and I don't like it. I don't like all these things overlapping. And yeah, it's not my favorite thing about the mac to be honest yeah i i can see that i i think this is one of those cases where i'm just going to admit to being an old school mac user and i like multitasking i like having a bunch of different apps because i use a bunch of different apps on the ipad i feel differently about it obviously that's just how but on the mac i like having my different things also i've got this huge 27 inch screen i might think differently about it if i had a smaller screen but the screen is so huge and there's almost

nothing i do that uses the whole screen so instead i've sort of put different things in different places and then the dead center is my work space, basically. I know you don't like windows, but that's a window right there. I think we can go out of it and get out of here. Well, I don't like this window so much I want to get away from this window. Okay, well...

I'm on the other side of it. All right, mind the glass and step on out. It's fine out here mike it's fine yeah we didn't get eaten by a monster we didn't get killed by lasers so that's a plus in my book yeah minor vandalism we wrote on their whiteboard whatever that was for and broke a window oh this window opens so i didn't need to break it at all oh well send me a bill whoever government research facility. Well, at least we're out.

There's still some light out. It's not totally dark yet. I bet we can orient back to the campsite from here. Yeah, I reckon so. While we're on our way, I guess I could play you that Tex Adventure trailer, right? On my cassette player? Oh, yeah. Press play. Press play on the cassette

player. Mike. Mike. Gray. Welcome to Z-War. Uh oh. Uh oh. Oh no, it's a zombie. Oh no.

You're at the hospital entrance. You're outside the hospital where your sister was admitted nine weeks ago. You may enter to the north. The hospital grounds continue east. Okay, I've already got to redo my map. Okay, wait a second. That didn't last very long.

You read the poorly spelled email you received this morning from your sister. Halp. Zombie. Apocalypse. X apocalypse xoxo Francis. Looks like you, right Mike? It's zombie time. The only real piece of information that we need is what kind of zombies are we dealing with here? Are they like zombie zombies or are they 28 days later zombies? If they're zombie zombies, zombie zombies aren't that big of a problem. I'm hoping it's zombie zombies. You have a fire extinguisher. If we have to use this fire extinguisher

to extinguish a fire, I'm going to be very disappointed. It turns out this is just a lesson in fire safety, this whole adventure. I guess typical style, we check this floor, right? Like, let's not leave the floor like you and i we're like a we're like a SWAT team here we're gonna cover our corners we're gonna take it floor by floor we're gonna fire extinguisher just like a good SWAT team

the theater is filled with the shuffling bodies of zombified patients and staff members there are too many zombies here to fight upon seeing you they become agitated and start to close in get out close the door close the door don't dead open inside reference acknowledged zombies begin to enter the kitchen we're this round we shouldn't have opened that door huh the zombies attack you and bite you and kill you and you die. The end. All right, okay. Fine, fine, fine. You open the heavy door and find a chef. Say hello. She says, you didn't eat anything, did you? The chief of staff told me to add vitamin Z to the meatloaf.

After that, everything just went to hell. No, no. I'm going to turn the dial, okay? No, but what I'm saying is that we need to do that right now. You have no sense of exploration, Mike. You guys may not remember the past text adventures, but we've had this conversation before. Set dial to high.

The machine hums and the zombie thrashes around. But something goes wrong. The machine starts to smoke and the electrodes catch fire. The zombie's eyes burst from their sockets and the power goes out. Are we in darkness? I can't see anything. It's dark. I guess this is where we use the bullet on ourselves and start over.

Or you could just, you know, load your save. You manage to escape Z-Word with your life, but you'll never forgive yourself for the loss of your sister. The end. Boo! Okay.

Okay, all right. Reload save slot two. I think that's the most judged we've been by Stellatron. If you want this text adventure, it's available for all RelayFM members in the crossover feed. You can become a member today at getupgradeplus.com. This is the world's most ambitious text adventure crossover event. It's not that ambitious, but still. Oh, that was pretty good. Sounds good sounds good right that's the end of the tape i guess can you flip it over what's on the other side anything good on the other side oh it is something great on the other side

oh i see what you did there song of the summer it is summer fun Summer of fun! You hear that, bears?