Upgrade - 531: Notifications in My Eyes

Episode Date: September 30, 2024

from relay this is upgrade episode 531 for september the 30th 2024 today's show is brought to you by squarespace delete me and krcs my name is mike hurley and i am joined by jason snow hi jason hi mike we're back in our respective studios now. We are back in our home countries of UK and California. California. Yes. Fifth largest GDP. It's probably not that anymore.

Or maybe it is. Maybe it's number one. Maybe it is. Who can tell? Who can tell? But yes, we're back in our regular places and not in Stephen's air conditioned pod cabin cold cabin it's fine cold it's very cold in there I have a snow talk question for you comes from Mark who wants to know how often do you change the wallpaper on your devices the answer is not very often not very often I My current wallpaper is a shot from Milford sound in, uh, New Zealand.

So that was my trip from a year and a half ago now. And, uh, I did catch, I think it was Steven. Was it Steven or was it you? Uh, I think it was Steven who saw it and was like,

Oh, Oh, that's a live picture because this is why i kept it is i had a really nice it was you it's like it's a nice picture of from the boat in milford sound of the beautiful sound which basically a fjord and the water is splashing on the boat and stuff it's splashing around um and you can make live pictures into wallpapers and every time my phone wakes up it plays the little water splash and then it's the beautiful picture and i i saw that and i was like well this is great and so i've kept that even though i i should probably what i like to do is set it after like a big vacation and actually my

there's a good example my ipad wallpaper my ipad wallpaper is now uh from scotland from our trip there and lovely and um i showed you that last week, probably while off mic and creating very low quality audio for the listeners, but sorry. Sorry about that, by the way. We were distracted. We did a bad job last week. We didn't have headphones and we were off target and it was a thing. Anyway, I had that Scotland picture and it's doing the little thing where the time goes behind the mountains and then I discovered that when you flip up, the time raises up out from behind the mountains and goes off the that when you flip up the time raises up out from behind the mountains and goes off the top of the screen was like that is totally unnecessary but

it's beautiful anyway so that's a lot of it it's so it's really when i mostly when i take a vacation and i end up with beautiful vacation shots that i can use as my wallpapers so for me that's what it is yeah i usually do vacations and at most i change mine once a year um but i do use you know like i use the photo shuffle face in certain focus modes um on my phone nice uh just so i can kind of see that you know like if i'm doing uh whenever i'm recording um i change my lock screen to photo shuffle and so i get to see more that way sometimes i'll use the photoshuffle thing in standby too um and yeah so and and as i've mentioned before i adore the new uh photo face for apple watch but the actual my lock screen and my kind of uh like my standard lock screen and

my standard home screen once a year at most all right right. Lauren does the, she does the photo shuffle and it's constantly delightful of mostly, I think it's pictures of our kids. Yep. And it's great. So, but I mostly just kind of keep it. I find that, I actually find that a little distracting. It's that thing of like, I like to see the photos,

but I also find it distracting to see the photos but I also find it distracting to see the photos because then I end up looking at the photos instead of doing whatever I was doing before so I tend not to do that yeah I see that but I like it too if you would like to send in a question for us to answer on a future episode of the show

just go to upgradefeedback.com and send in your Snell Talk question this is the last day of September, which means this is the last time that we're going to ask you to go to stjude.org slash relay where you can consider donating to St. Jude Children's Research Hospital

and helping us in the fight against childhood cancer. But today, which is September 30th, is a monumental day, as today our campaign for this year passed a million dollars raised for the kids of saint jude uh i yeah can't believe it i did it it's beside myself right now we all did and when i say we i mean literally everybody in this community yeah did this yes it's truly an incredible achievement to pass this monumental number and it always means

so much to us you know steven always will do a better job of explaining what this campaign actually means and i will put a link in the show notes to a post that he put on his website today that that touches on that a little bit you know like obviously we do this in honor of the work that St. Jude did for his family. But now over time, I just think we've all gotten such a connection to this place and the work that they do. We now do it for the institution too. But to have achieved this in the fifth year of our fundraising and the 10th year of relay to have done this monumental thing to a past $1 million raised is incredible. I do believe that by the time this campaign ends, which we're actually closing at the end of the week this week, we will also pass $4 million

raised lifetime over the last five years. Yeah. Because we started this month getting ready to go over 3 million. And now you go a million and you reset the clock and now you're getting ready to go over 4 million. That's how counting works. that one of the things that I think is important is for people to know that none of us take you for granted. I can tell you, Mike and Steven are sweating every year about this. They are working hard and concerned and want to earn your goodwill to donate to this. And so I'll say that it seems like there's more money being raised every year by Relay and there is, but again, everybody involved here realizes that it's asking a lot for people to donate money. And these days in this economy, no, I mean, it really is. Everything expensive and like it's asking a lot and we take we make no assumptions none of us and i was sitting with steven right before the beginning

of the podcast-a-thon and you know steven i don't know if you know this mike steven sometimes has some anxiety yes i'm aware did you did you know that i know that yeah and he and steven incredibly successful person who's raised a lot of money for St. Jude, sending him for the podcast. He was legitimately worried. He's like, what if it doesn't go well? Maybe we're going to do this whole podcast-a-thon thing, which I'll just point out broke the record for the podcast-a-thon. And he's like, what if nobody donates it? That's not quite what he said, but I could get the vibe, which he's like, he's really worried.

but I could get the vibe, which he was like, he's really worried. And I find that, um, actually incredibly charming because I think it says something important, which is we don't take your interest in this for granted. We appreciate every dollar that somebody has earned doing something else. And then they're going to just give it to St.

Jude instead of putting it in their pocket. That is, that is something that needs to be earned. That's something that you need to actually feel like it's something that you want to do. It's something we put a lot of work into trying to get visibility for you so that you will consider it and you should still consider it for the rest of the week. But like, thank you is what I'm saying. And we don't take this sort of thing for granted. We are blown away. I mean, I will also say you could sort of take a business-like approach or Casey Liss, who called this the bag, the big audacious goal when he suggested it. And we're like, no, that back in the spring, like, no, big audacious goal, a million. I'm like, no, Casey, no, quiet. But like, we are, it's because we know that this is hard and we don't take for granted granted like, oh, it's going to be bigger next year and it's going to be bigger next year. No, I will tell you, we are legitimately blown away that we broke a million.

It is not just a, well, yeah, aw shucks. No, we are legitimately, I can't believe it. This is a dream. Thank you. Like this is a dream for us. Yes. can't believe it so it's a dream thank you like yes this was this is a dream for us and yes once again our incredible community has helped us live dreams it happens it happens all the time and i'm so thankful but you can still give any amount uh stjude.org relay as well if you've given uh you should check if your company will match your donation that's why we keep the campaign open

for a few extra days past the month to make sure that we collect in any corporate matches. And you can go to stjude.org slash Relay to learn more. Also, I'll put a link in the show notes. Today, when things were picking up steam, me and Stephen decided to jump on Twitch. And so if you want to see the road to a million and the moment that we hit it,

that is now on the Relay YouTube channel. So you can go and check that out if you want. you so much seriously if you've given if you spread the word even if you just listened to us talk about this over the last month we're all a part of it together thank you thank you some follow-up so in the last episode which when we recorded i mentioned uh that i would have loved for the camera control to have the option to switch to the selfie camera because you can choose between the cameras as one of the camera control options. That was then added in the iOS 18.1 beta. So there is now a selfie option for switching with the camera control. And I think that's great.

So you can go switch between all of the cameras that are on your phone now. So that's very good. I'm happy that they added that that i put 18.1 on my phone by the way i figured now's the time yeah i think i'm on 18.1 every or 0.1 everywhere now because that's where we are now is that's coming soon jeff johnson has made a mac app called amnesia its purpose is to disable the permission prompts for screen recording apps. I thought you'd be happy to know that such an app existed. I have heard

through the grapevine that the permission thing is even a lighter touch than we thought. I haven't been able to, because it takes time, I haven't been able to actually get the ability to see this. But I've heard through the grapevine that it may be the case now that if you continue to use an app after you grant it permission, it keeps kicking the permission down the road.

Interesting. I've only had it pop up once for me. So if that's true, so Matt, if this is true, and again, this is secondhand and I can't verify it and I haven't been able to verify it, but if it's true, it's actually a pretty good solution, which is you approve it for 30 days and you keep using that app. And every time you use that app, it just kicks it out to 30 days further, which means you never see it again if it's an app you use every day. to 30 days further, which means you never see it again if it's an app you use every day.

It's only if it's an app that you haven't used in a while and then it'll ask you again. Is that the right compromise? I don't know, but it would be a better compromise to not get in your face constantly. I think that's good. If you don't use an app frequently,

maybe it could just say like, hey, are you sure you want to do this? I think that is the right way to do it. But yeah if you're using it like a few times a week or whatever then it those systems should just interpret like oh this person is a user of this application they must know what it's doing yeah i mean and there are arguments you know for other approaches here for and against but um but it's good yeah so people found out that there's and this is feels very much like a loophole that out that apple will close but um there's a a p-list or whatever or a database that you can set literally set the expiry date to be like 20 years in the

future yeah and then who cares so it's great that this exists well this mac rumors uh uh post says it's not working on point one but that might just be because the app isn't but like who knows because any any malware that would take advantage of that will just set it to later right yeah presumably yep you think so so for now i don't know this This app exists. Do you remember Massimo? This is the company that Apple are embroiled in a fight with about the blood oxygen sensor in the Apple Watch. Well, Massimo's founder, Joe Chiani, has resigned as the CEO after he was forcibly removed from the board. Yes. Interesting.

So Chiani is a real character because he founded this company and he's a real believer and he was very angry at Apple and is convinced that Apple has ripped him off and ripped his company off and hired away its people

and, you know, and there's some truth to that, right? But like, he's also, he's just, he's a very, very grumpy man. And maybe rightfully so.

Again, not really trying to make a judgment here i i do think it's interesting so what happened here is that he only owns about seven percent of the company and uh what happened is that there were people who are unhappy with his leadership of the company on like shareholders and they did a board election and his, Keanu's slate lost and the other board people, the other slate won. And so basically he lost control of the board. And even though he's the chairman of the board, he lost control of the board because these other people were put on without the people he wanted there. Apparently his policy was that, let's just ignore the board. That was his CEO. He was like, the board's going to tell us to do stuff.

We're just not going to do it. Well, you're not supposed to do that. So what happened is the board removed him from the board, at which point he quit. You can't fire me. I quit. As CEO, he quit as CEO, but he had lost the power. He lost the power struggle. Basically, the owners of the company who are the shareholders decided that Joe Chiani and the path he was going was not one they wanted to go. And that's how you lose control of your company that you founded is you don't own a majority of it and the other people can turn against you and kick you out.

I mean, it's got a little Steve Jobs energy to it, just a little bit. I'm like, but I made this company. Yes, but you're fired. So we'll see what happens because I think what's interesting from an Apple perspective, because this is not a podcast

about blood oxygen sensors in general yet. But it is a question about what will happen with Apple's presumably negotiations ongoing or stalled with Mossimo over the fact that because of various cases that Mossimo has won, blood oxygen sensor in the Apple Watch is turned off in the US. And the reason that I think that there might be something here is just what corporate boards do, right? What does Joe Chiani care about? Joe Chiani cares about his legacy. He cares about Massimo and not being pushed around by big guys like Apple. And he's going to take it to them and he's going to show that they're wrong. And I don't

know whether he was being unreasonable in his dealings with Apple or refusing to cut a deal with Apple. And that's why we are where we are. But I think it's a strong possibility. It sure seemed from his statements that it was very personal. And if I know anything about a board of directors put up by a slate of shareholders is I don't know the details of this particular move and exactly why. I don't know all the politics of Massimo internally, but I would say shareholders just want the stock price to go up. I mean, you could argue this is a problem with the public company model that we have, that in the end, their priorities are not aligned with

righteousness and truth and all the things that Joe Chiani talks about, but they're just like, can we just get the stock price up? But I'll tell you, if making a deal with Apple and calling a truce and being able to declare some sort of victory is perceived as being something that will raise their share price, they will make the deal. So I wonder if this will just kind of clear the log jam and allow a deal to be made because maybe it won't be quite as personal. I think undoubtedly it was more personal with Joe Keanu than it will be with any other CEO or board. Even if they believe that Apple is still ripping them off and all of those things feels like maybe there's a chance to make a deal here and it's a little less personal we'll see that's a very good take on all of this uh my take is silly uh which is fun for me like i imagine that like apple got to the board you know and like gotten to push him out that That's my fun alternate history. It's like succession style kind of stuff going on here.

I don't believe that happened or did it. I don't, or do I? There's a really good column from Matt Levine in Bloomberg about this called Massimo Has a New Boss. But he's like, if you're a founder and CEO of a tech company and you take the company public and it has a single class of stock and you own 9% of it, you work for the shareholders stock and you own nine percent of it you work for the shareholders right you're the ceo you answer to the board but the shareholders don't like what you're doing they can fire you even as the founder and ceo and chairman of the board and if you don't like that don't take your company

public like if you don't like that idea you shouldn't do that or if you have enough leverage be mark zuckerberg and and sell stock or uh google right and sell stock that can't kick you out which is the way to do i don't know why people don't do that i really don't know why more people i think they don't have the leverage i think i think that um you you've really got to have the leverage to do that because people are going to be more skeptical more skeptical of an investment that doesn't contain governance, I think. I want to provide a quick correction from a friend of the show, Dan Morin. Hi, Dan. Dan says, I don't think it was Jeff Johnson who wrote Amnesia.

I think he came up with the terminal commands that enabled it. Geordie Bruin, who worked on Mac Whisper, created the app Amnesia. I misread the Macromas article. All right. Got to give a correct attribution you know yeah thanks to thanks to terminal commands thanks to people who put terminal commands in apps i wanted to give a couple of thought more thoughts that i've had having used my iphone for a week like my iphone 16 pro um i have switched over to the gold photo style this is actually one of the photo style photo styles rather than the like you know like the the mood ones um yeah the cut the

undertones rather than the moves spanned out ballet playing in my head now go ahead go ahead go ahead always believe in you and it does a really good job of getting images to look the way that i want but what i've been very happy with is, so even in these photo styles, I am finding that if I take pictures of people indoors, they still look like they have gray skin, which is a problem I was having before. But now the tone adjustment fixes it.

Oh, interesting. So this is all I want. I want to have the ability to be able to take photos that I like and be able to easily edit them. i was the problem that i was having before is even taking these photos into editing apps i was always dealing with the baseline bad skin tone issue that i was having it was putting too much shadow and too much like uh i don't know what it was doing but i didn't like it it was putting a lot of shadow on people and making them look like 10 years older.

And I'm able to adjust that now, and it adjusts the actual image, the base image, right? Because it's in the pipeline. So just basically like just fiddling with the tone setting of the photos gets rid of this issue. So this is all I wanted. You know, the phone's going to do what the phone's going to do. Most of the time it does a great job, but when it doesn't, I now have even better tools to deal with it. Also, the ultra wide camera, it does produce better high quality images of things that are closer to my phone, right? You know, because it will always switch over to the macro mode still doesn't look as good as the main lens but good

enough better better is what i wanted that's how i kind of feel about this whole camera thing it's like this is actually all of it is a lot better and for me and what i like and the photos that i take this is actually quite a meaningful system over year over year change like for me and the photos that i take the iphone 16 pro is the best that it's been for many years so i'm very happy with it nice i have been enjoying my series 10 watch and the new watch os features as well um i like the watch it it feels uh i really like how it feels thinner and lower down onto my, on my wrist. Um,

big screen is nice. It doesn't feel appreciably bigger to me on my wrist. It really doesn't, but it's always nice to have a little more room. You know, I still have those. I still have the thoughts we had last week about the fact that I have a, I have a watch face that doesn't tick,

um, second by second, even though I've got a screen that can do that. That's just, they got to fix that, but it's really bad. But, um,

the, I'm really enjoying the fact that, uh, live activities on my phone appear as widgets on my watch. I turned off the feature where it automatically scrolls up to that view when that live activity is running on my watch. I turned off the feature where it automatically scrolls up to that view when that live activity is running on my phone, because I find that kind of annoying. I like though I can just scroll up and see all of those things that are going on, even though I'm not looking at my phone. And that's really nice. And the other day I was somewhere where I didn't have

my headphones and had a minute and it was just me, but I had a minute where I had to wait somewhere. And I played part of a podcast through the speaker. Oh. And it's not super loud, but it was audible. It was good. I listened to a little bit, just a little tiny bit. Nobody was around. Not annoying.

Anyway, it was like a weird use case. But suddenly I was like, wait a second, I could just play this through the Apple watch and it actually worked. Went to a concert this week, use the five X camera. Cause you know, I tested the five X camera on the pro max last year, but I did not use it regularly. Right. Because, um, I don't carry a pro max around you know i bought the pro so i didn't have the 5x like continually um so i was at a concert and i was like oh yeah 5x camera let's do that and it just dazzles me like it the 5x is so nice the the photos looked really good um i was i just continue to be impressed. And I know that that's not news for people who have the Pro Max, but it's a really beautiful camera. I continue to

be a little puzzled by camera control. I'm still not sure how I feel entirely about it. I like the premise of it. I don't love the added complexity of the extra stuff. I feel like maybe it's a little too hard to push it down. Are you using your phone in a case or not? No, no case. No case. Okay. No case. I'm not really getting used to that. And then here's the other thing. And I don't know if Apple is doing something to counteract this or not, but I will tell you, I can hold my phone perfectly steady and tap the shutter button on the screen. And especially when you're zoomed in at 5X. When I'm holding it by the edges and I push down on camera control, it moves a little. The act of pushing in a button shakes

the camera, the phone a little bit. Tapping on the front of the touchscreen doesn't do that. And I don't know if Apple, I haven't done this systematically to determine whether Apple is doing something intelligent, like going back to the moment before I push the button or finding a frame in there where the phone isn't shaking. But if the act of pushing the button makes me not get as good a photo, that's not good. And that's a thing that I've noticed is literally it is harder to keep the camera steady when I push the button than it is to tap on the screen. And maybe the answer is, well, in that case, tap on the screen. But like, okay, but what's the point of the capture button then if that's what's happening,

the camera control button? So I don't know. I'm still thinking about that one. I'm hoping to write review-like stuff this week. We'll see. You know, I'm in that same point that I was last year where after the embargoes drop and everybody's got their phones, you know, I've got review units, which is great. But, like, everybody's got their phones and all the reviews are out. So I need to i need to take some time and kind of consider what i want to write about it so i'll get there i'm hoping

maybe this week to do that but it's a really interesting collection of things that seem good and some things that seem like curious choices but i'm glad they're trying this stuff i think we've said on this podcast many a time that what we want apple to do is is try things right that like give it a try and you'll learn some things and maybe you'll have to fix things later and maybe you know some things will be seen as a mistake but you should give new interesting things a try and they've definitely done that in a bunch of areas this year yeah i wonder about the the pressing of the button like if they're doing something to counteract it i don't know because i don't know i wonder if they do that for everything you know like i see right family members they just press

they just press the shutter button too hard yeah and i know they're moving their phone so tapping the phone i feel like apple i you know i would like to believe that in the computational photography pipeline they can use information from the accelerometer to understand if the phone has moved. That would be my hope. Right. And I don't know if the data is worse because the phone was shaking or if it managed to do it, but it was a thing I noticed, is that

I was zoomed in at 5x and pressed the button. That's when you'll see it. And as I pressed the button, the phone jiggles. And I thought to myself, well, that's not good. And I switched to tapping the screen. It's like, I don't know. Is that what we are supposed to be doing here?

It doesn't seem like it. It doesn't seem like it should be that way. So I don't know. We'll see. Because the reason they have to do it this way is that the camera starts out flat to the side. And then you depress it deeper into the phone. And on a regular camera, the shutter button sticks out. And you depress it deeper into the phone. And on a regular camera, the shutter button sticks out and you press it down.

So it's a little more complex of a gesture. And I get why you don't want to have that button sticking out. Okay, but I don't know. We'll see. This episode is brought to you by Squarespace, the all-in-one website platform for entrepreneurs to stand out and succeed online. Whether you're just getting started or managing a growing brand,

you can stand out with a beautiful website, engage with your audience and sell your products, services or the content that you create. Squarespace has everything you need all in one place, all on your terms. You can make the most of design intelligence from Squarespace. It combines two decades of industry-leading design expertise with cutting-edge AI technology to unlock your strongest creative potential. Design intelligence empowers anyone to build a beautiful, more personalized website tailored to their unique needs and craft a bespoke digital identity to use across one's entire online presence. And Squarespace Payments is the easiest way to manage your payments in one place.

Onboarding is fast and simple. You get started in just a few clicks and start receiving payments right away. Plus, give your customers more ways to pay by choosing from popular payment methods like Klarna, ACH, DirectDebit, Apple Pay, Afterpay, and ClearPay, depending on where you're located. HANA, ACH, DirectDebit, Apple Pay, Afterpay, and ClearPay, depending on where you're located. You can keep track of stats that matter to you with Squarespace's analytics. You can measure your end-to-end online performance with powerful website and seller analytics, get insights on top traffic sources, understand how your reach is growing, track sales metrics, and learn where to focus new engagement. It's all the data you need to scale your brand or business fully integrated and clearly displayed. Squarespace has so many incredible functions and features. I have been a huge fan of them and I have used them for so many projects

over the last 15 years for a very good reason. They know what they're doing and they have all of the stuff that I'm going to need to make the most out of any website project that I want to produce. But don't just take my word for it because you can just go try it. Go to squarespace.com and sign up for a free trial today. You can build your entire website and see just how easy it is to do. And when you're ready to launch, go to squarespace.com upgrade. You'll save 10% of your first purchase of a website or domain. That is squarespace.com

slash upgrade, and when you decide to sign up, you'll get 10% off your first purchase and show your support for the show. Our thanks to Squarespace for their support of this show and all of Relay. Room around up time. Yeehaw! 9to5Mac is reporting

that Apple has requested samples of displays for an upcoming Apple Vision headset that are about half the resolution as the Vision Pro. Some of this information comes from the Elec. We're going to talk a little bit later on about AR devices. But my expectation and the expectation of these reports is that these are for a cheaper version like the vision but i i'm also like but is this a new version of the vision pro and they're just trying to make it cheaper like what is this product actually going to be i don't know right i don't know and what's their the big question is what's their strategy and we can talk about this later

but like what what is their strategy here what are their long-term goals for this kind of this product line um are they trying to get something cheaper that that more people will actually buy because there's a real chicken and egg problem in terms of the content and the uh apps and the whole platform really so you know are they better off making a new Vision Pro that's just as expensive? Or are they better off trying to make something that is, you know, $1,000 instead? Keeping in mind that their competition, which is Meta, scrapped their more expensive headset. And they're like, we're not going to even do that. And they're more expensive.

In fact, they just released a cheaper one, right? And they released a cheaper one. So, yeah. do that and they're more expensive they just released a cheaper one right and they released a cheaper one so yeah Ming-Chi Kuo claims that Apple is developing a second version of Vision Pro potentially for release in late 2025 that features an M5 chip the report claims that this will enable higher power Apple intelligence features but there are still expectations from others that the current version of the Vision Pro will see some Apple intelligence features next year, probably a Vision OS 3. Right.

Same question, right? Which is, what are they doing with this product? Yeah. Like, are they, because they have the ability to just soldier on and keep updating it and keep working on the software and thinking, look, it doesn't matter that it's selling in incredibly low volumes because it was always going to do that. With the price that it's got, there was no way that this was going to be a product that sells in high volumes. But we've got our eyes on something in the future that grows this. And I felt for a while now that what they're really trying to do

is get to the AR glasses that they just can't make right now. But, you know, the, the real question is what are they willing to invest in this platform that is not very large, but might be important in the future? Well, now they're out in public, but like, what are they willing to invest to, to take it there? And that includes getting more users and putting more content on it and um is that another high-end model uh is that a low-end model i you know low-end model is going to be expensive too but it might be more affordable um and will people buy that like i do they view this as mostly a uh developer system that is about pointing the way to the future or do they think that there's a chance for them to sell a lot of these if they can get the price down um i don't know system that is about pointing the way to the future or do they think that there's a chance

for them to sell a lot of these if they can get the price down um i don't know with new reporting from mark german here is an updated timeline for apple intelligence features so all right ios 18.1 which we know is coming in october that's going to have siri understanding you more clearly uh we'll have writing tools, you know, like the writing summaries and the changing of text, notification summaries, cleanup and memory movies and photos, suggested replies and messages and mail. The suggested replies and messages are written by someone who's not me. They are so bad. I don't understand why they're this bad. I never speak like this. I don't know why you think I would speak like this. Terrible. To call that intelligent, I don't understand what you're doing.

Phone call transcription and the reduce interruptions focus mode. That's all coming in October. Okay. 18.2, we think probably December, available in more countries and languages. This is when we'll get image playgrounds and genmoji genmoji by the way is a feature i do want i've been thinking about it recently like there is like it was raining the other day and i thought it would be funny to make an emoji with a rain cloud over the top like that makes sense i would still just prefer if it was just like they take two emojis and put them together rather than generate them. But if they look good, then that makes sense to me.

Image Playgrounds, hate it. Can't wait to complain about it more. And then also ChatGPT integration is expected in December. Then early 2025 is an expectation for iOS 18.3. The new information is Mark Gurman believes

this is when we could actually now see the beginning of enhanced Siri features, but we're not sure of which ones. Now, these enhanced new Siri features could include the personal context awareness, on-screen awareness, so Siri can see what's on your screen, and the deeper control of third-party apps via intents. If this doesn't come in early 2025, or not all of it, the expectation is then 18.4, which is pegged for maybe March of next year, is when these final features for the Siri integration will ship and be available in more countries.

That is our current timeline. Right. And I would say that the core of what we will think of as Apple intelligence is actually personal context, on-screen awareness, and deeper control of apps via intents. The rest of this stuff is sort of like coloring around the edges with some AI sprinkles, but your phone understanding or your Mac or your, or your iPad, understanding your personal context and having it's on board LLM, be able to search through your stuff. This is, I mean, Apple's already running ads with this, right? This is the, these are those ads that are, that are, uh, I don't know if you've seen any of these, but they're things like, Oh, what was that guy's name? I met him at this place.

any of these but they're things like oh what was that guy's name i met him at this place and it says oh that was this guy and the person's like oh that's a relief right that's that's what it is this is but they have available to them to absolutely make a massive massive impact if it works right like everything else as you're saying everything else they're doing nothing original it's just in the operating system right yeah and it's and it's stuff that i think wouldn't Like everything else, as you're saying, everything else, they're doing nothing original. It's just in the operating system, right? Yeah. And it's stuff that I think wouldn't even be branded as a thing. This feels like it's, this is, to me, this is what Apple intelligence is.

Is personal context, on-screen awareness, deeper control of apps. And yeah, a Siri that understands you better and can do a give and take. I would throw that in there. But a lot of this stuff is like some summarizations over here a transcription over there like in in a different environment those might just get released as os features and wouldn't be given any special names right but instead it's been rolled into apple intelligence but like this is the stuff that gives them, like you said, something that might, if they do it right, vault them ahead because they will be able to know lots and lots of things about you based on the data on your phone and use that in actionable ways. And that

has a huge amount of potential if they do it right. Yep. Yep. We'll see. Yeah, but that's an interesting rollout, right? Like just if you don't like what's there in this version, just wait because there's more. They're just going to keep rolling this out. But this is what we said back in June. I will be very impressed with them if they're turning out features every two months.

I will be very, very impressed with them. And I hope that it teaches them something about what their operating system can actually be like. It doesn't all need to change just once a year. And they've obviously been moving more down this path over time as they

show off stuff and then it comes later. But this feels like the biggest example of that idea, if things just continuing to get updated over a longer period of time. And we're going to get, you know, in a few weeks, 18.1 is going to ship. And you know, the very next week, there's going to be an 18.2 beta, right? And it's just going to roll like that too, where the betas are going to preview what's going to ship to customers.

And it'll just keep going. And they have public betas, right? Which I think they're encouraging people to get on at this point. Thomas Buckley and Lucas Shaw at Bloomberg are reporting that Apple has once again made changes to how it's going to be releasing movies on Apple TV+.

I'm going to read three quotes from this article on Bloomberg. Apple will now focus on making about a dozen movies a year, most of them produced for less than $100 million because it is worth noting that many of their movies are significantly more than that, as we've spoken about on the show, making about a dozen movies a year, most of them produced for less than $100 million, because it is worth noting that many of their movies are significantly more than that,

as we've spoken about on the show before. Apple's commitment to spend a billion dollars annually on films won't change, but the makeup of the company's movie slate and release strategies will. And Apple will still aim to take one or two big theatrical swings a year with films exceptionally

approved for higher budgets right this sounds like a significantly better strategy uh buckley and shaw compare this more to netflix like they're doing more what netflix is doing rather than what they have been doing which is spending a quarter of a billion dollars on a movie that shouldn't have had a quarter of a billion dollars spent on it yeah i like the idea that they're still going to take a couple big swings that allows them to make deals with creators that they want to make deals with and maybe get this f1 movie which i do think is going to be a success for them provided that it's good but it has the hallmark of the ability to do that but you can't make that movie without spending a lot of money on it that's kind of the point of the movie and if you do the math what that what you realize is if they're going to make about a movie a month most of them less than 100 million it says

and about a billion annually well i mean you can do the math there and you're under 100 million but what i like about this is they'll take a couple big swings and the rest of the movies are going to be mid-priced movies right they're going to be like $50 million budget movies, $40 million budget movies. And I really like that. I think that that's a category of movie that is good, which is it's not meant to be a blockbuster. And I think maybe your chance of having success creatively and maybe even finding audiences for that stuff is higher. I liked the idea. I like the idea that rather than saying we're only going to make three or four blockbusters a year,

they're saying, no, we're going to make 12 movies a year and they're going to be two blockbusters and they're going to be 10 kind of like mid to lower budget movies that we're going to do. And I like that. I think that that's actually healthy almost.

I mean, we'll see how it goes for them. And in his power on newsletter mark german reported on some more details about apple's home products initiatives so quote the most significant product development i put this quote in here for you jason is a tabletop device code name j595 that combines a robotic limb with a large ipad like display where's the robot mark i thought you said it was a robot. It is a robot. He seems to be off the robot train now. You can't spell robotic without robot, all right?

With a robotic limb. Yeah, but now they're not making a robot anymore. They're making a robotic limb. No, he's getting off. It's like he's on the methadone now, right? It's a robotic limb. Eventually, it's just going to be, it's got an arm that adjusts. Articulating arm.

Yeah, right. I mean, eventually, it's going to come down to's got an arm that articulating arm yeah right i mean eventually it's going to come down to just be an arm that moves uh and it's not going to be a robot in any way but he's got to get off of that very slowly so it's he's backing off of it's a robot to being a tabletop device with a robotic limb and we'll go from here but they're they're they're it's it's fine like this is a product that we've imagined and it seems reasonable and i think what's also encouraging uh is the that he said yes they're also working on a non-robot that is is basically like an echo show or a google home that is a screen yeah uh quote the low-end smart display is designed to run apps like calendar notes and home and will

include an interface optimized for controlling home appliances and quickly seeking information apple imagine the device magnetically attaching to walls or sitting atop a desk so yes this is a echo show a google yeah whatever if you want to think of it this way, because I think there's a lot of mashing up going on here. Imagine a standby phone, a phone that's in standby mode, but bigger and with access to more widgets and control center and probably some apps like Apple TV kind of apps. It feels like they could assemble this out of pieces of software that they already have. Right. That's how we felt all along. These new products will both run Home OS, which is adapted from tvOS, and Mark Gurman expects that these two will combine.

So that Apple TV will run Home OS. Yeah, makes sense. This is the strategy, Apple. You're doing the thing, making a robot, which we all want. Yeah, we all want that robot. J595, the robot. I'm really happy that we have a little bit more detail about the first thing, which could come next year.

I want this device in my home, and so I hope that they actually do it. Well, we talked about that robot a while ago, and I said it felt over-engineered, right? It felt very much like the original HomePod, where like, oh, it's got an arm, and it moves it moves and it follows you and it's all these things and it costs a thousand dollars and everybody goes nope and that's the end of it and so the idea that they're gonna have this awesome high-end articulated arm thing and also a you know a

screen that's kind of like what we've always heard right it's an ipad with a speaker that you can put somewhere and like great like whatever whatever that thing is smart display i think maybe they're going for also the home control thing here which i know that google and amazon do that and i find it completely uninteresting but maybe there's an audience for this but i find it uninteresting the idea that um oh you can put this thing on your fridge or on your wall and it's a touch screen that controls your lights and your yeah but also it's a product that exists that you can speak commands to oh sure sure i just again that is important i kind of like, yeah, I don't know. We'll see. We'll see how it fits in the home and what use cases they're really trying to hit on. It's a good question, right? Because I get benefit out of asking questions to a voice assistant and playing audio through a speaker. I don't find myself, like if I want to control the lights in my house, I'll just use my phone or my watch or my iPad. I won't go over to my Google Home and go through the, or back in the day, my Echo Show and like, oh, show me the Alexa interface with the things.

And I just don't do that. But maybe some people do, and maybe there's some use cases there. It'll be interesting to see what use cases they're actually trying to address with these products. This episode is brought to you by Delete Me. Privacy is important to us. Privacy is important to me. I live my life on the internet, right? So there is information that I want to be available to me. I am a business person. There are ways that I want people to be able to contact me. But that doesn't mean I want all of my personal data out on the internet. There are email addresses, for example, that maybe I don't use anymore and I don't want them out there. Or other pieces of information.

Delete Me helps you take care of this. Let me ask, do you ever wonder how much of your personal data is available on the internet? It's an uncomfortable thought, especially when you consider having too much information. is available on the internet. It's an uncomfortable thought, especially when you consider having too much information could lead to identity theft attempts, phishing, harassment,

unwanted spam calls, just stuff you don't want in your life. But now you can protect your privacy with Delete.me. Having your personal information can feel a bit like leaving doors open, but Delete.me can help close and lock that door

and keep it locked and keep your information safe so you don't need to worry about having to wake up one day to find out that your information has been compromised. And it's why I use Delete Me. It removes the personal information that I don't want online and it makes sure it stays off. I love that I'm able to tell them exactly what I want to be removed and they take care of it. Delete Me is a subscription service that removes your personal information from the largest people

search databases on the web and in the process help prevent potential ID theft, doxing and phishing scams. Delete.me does the hard work for you. You get a personalized regular privacy report that shows what information they found, where they found it and what they removed. I really do love the transparency of that. So I always know where we are in the process. It's not just a one time service that Delete.me, they're in your corner monitoring regularly on your behalf take control of your data and keep your private life private by signing up for delete me now a special discount for offers for listeners of this show so you can get 20 of your delete me plan today when you go to join delete me.com upgrade 20 and use the promo code upgrade20 at checkout. The only way to get that 20% off is to go to j-o-i-n-d-e-l-e-t-e-m-e

dot com slash upgrade20 and enter the code upgrade20 at checkout. That's join deleteme.com slash upgrade20 with the code upgrade20. A thanks to Delete Me for the support of this show and Relay. So last week at MetaConnect, which is basically Meta's WWDC, Meta unveiled a prototype product called Orion. They showed this off to a

selection of journalists and content creators. Orion is their ultimate take so far on AR glasses. Essentially, you put these glasses on and you can see content. It's a dream.

It's Tim Cook's dream. It's the dream. It's the dream. They have displays in them. They have technology in them. You can see apps. You can make calls. It is what all these companies

have been fighting for, like what they're working for. It is essentially, these companies have been fighting for, like what they're working for. It is essentially, imagine the middle ground between Meta Ray-Bans and the Vision Pro, right? That's what this product is. It's a prototype. It is not going to ship in this exact form. The prototype consists of glasses,

a wristband that detects wrist movements for interaction, and a wireless compute puck. There's a wireless connection between it and the glasses to do a lot of the computational work. They have an OS. They have various apps and game experiences. Meta have said they are many years away from shipping a product like this. This was a product they were working on, this exact one, but it was going to be too expensive to make, so they decided they would show it as a prototype. Meta has said, sorry, Meta hasn't said this, but it has been said in the reporting of this

that it would cost like $10,000 if they were to sell it in this form today, which is why they have decided that that they would wait longer but they wanted to show it off very impressive work and and what they have shown i think is really cool and i i am of the thinking there are lots of takes here uh i i liked your piece a lot i would just want to put my thoughts out there and then we'll talk about it in much more detail. Okay. I think this was a smart marketing move from Meta because they have established themselves as...

In the game. In the game. They are not just in the game. To the world, they're leading because no one knows what anyone else is doing, right? To the world, to their investors. And I'll mention a detail that I thought was a core detail of what they were talking about, which is, they said, we've got custom optics and custom silicon that we're building in

this product. Yeah. You're like, okay, they're boasting, right? But it's more than that. They're also saying, we know what Apple can do, but we can do it too and i think that's important right because i think with apple you just assume like of course they're going to have custom things and they're going to build their own chips and they've got that's a huge apple advantage is their custom silicon and so meta saying no no we're doing that too is kind of blunting they're

trying to blunt one of apple's perceived advantages about this, while also taking advantage of the fact that Apple's never going to pre-announce a product or show a tech demo to the public. They don't do it. They just don't do it. So they've got some advantages there. But I think that them boasting about their custom stuff is also sending that message to everybody, including, again, the investors who are looking at this and saying, you're spending what on Reality Labs? How much money are you pouring

into this? This is why we're doing this, is because we think that this is going to be a product people are going to want in, I mean, and they didn't say this part too loudly, but in the 2030s, because that's what this is about. But I am also in the camp of people that believe that Apple has a version of this in a lab somewhere. I cannot imagine a scenario where Meta has done this and Apple have not done this. Maybe that makes me a fanboy. I don't know. And maybe Apple's isn't as good, but I just can't imagine a scenario where

Apple haven't gotten to something. That would be weird to me. This is what makes me mad about this story and and i my piece i am trying to be super balanced i point out that i own multiple meta headsets yeah i think you did a good job i i i think that there's a lot i think what meta did was smart for them and that they're taking advantage of an area where apple doesn't have uh you know they will not show something like this three, four, five years in advance.

They just aren't going to do it, right? Never would they do that. And you could argue, in fact, maybe they should, but they don't. They're not going to do it. But what bugs me is when people are like, well, look how much further Meta is ahead because Meta has this and Apple still got the Vision Pro.

And it's like, okay, well, the Vision Pro was announced more than a year ago and shipped earlier this year. And you can go take one off the shelf right now for $3,500. This thing costs at least 10 grand and doesn't exist and won't ship ever. And whatever it like, it will ship. Even Meta says three to five years, which I just say, okay, 2029, 2030 is what we're talking about here. So it's not like you have to compare it to what Apple has. And we don't know what Apple has because Apple's not going to tell us. And so could this mean Apple is behind? It could, but it doesn't necessarily mean that. And what I would say, and I'm not, look, we have been very critical on this show of Apple's sluggish attention to vision OS as a platform. If it's supposed to be this big future thing,

why are you not pouring more visible resources into it? And maybe the answer is because they're pouring more resources into the hardware behind the scenes, or maybe they're lost and they're confused. And it's certainly a possibility that that's the case. However, what do we know? We know that Tim Cook believes that they're on a path for an ar product like that's the whole reason they did this the goal was never to build a vr there the goal was to build an ar product air glasses just like what was shown it's really mind-blowing to me that like i feel like there are people that i believe should know better to understand apple is not building a vr they have built a vr headset yes but like it's an ar product so obviously but they can't do it yeah it's weird here's the so look ben thompson

got to use this he was blown away by it and and and i believe him at how amazing the experience was i believe him i think and i think that has power we know how blown away we were when we put the vision pro on like i get it it sounded a lot like that right like the people that saw this it sounded a lot like how we were and then think about it in vision pro you've got your kind of limited field of view and it's with those pass-throughs and on this thing you're just seeing the world and the things are overlaid on it it's pretty amazing right but what bugs me about ben's take is that he's like oh apple apple spent he's kind of conflating what Meta's doing with one product with also what they're doing with the Quest, which is like, oh, Apple invested so much money in pass-through and all these big cameras and you can still see the pixels and all that. But to me, the reason the Vision Pro is so focused on pass-through is because Apple's acting like it's an AR product.

Apple's acting like it's an ar product apple's acting like it's glasses and the reason they're doing that is because that's the product they want to make they don't want to make a vr headset they don't want to make something that closes you off from the world it's why they have the dumb display with your eyeballs on i do believe they also want to make that but i think i think ultimately these are two separate devices. I'm not entirely convinced that they, in the long run, even want to make something that's VR. Although, ultimately, it doesn't matter. They've made a really good product, though. Like, the VR stuff is actually really good.

Like, the environments and stuff like that. I could imagine them still making something that does that. And it's possible. But I would say, if you look at what the CEO's vision is, the goal of all of this, you may get a computer that you can wear that's higher performance than the glasses that you wear at home, or it's just another thing that happens when the technology improves that you can shut out the world if you want to. It's like the sunglasses in The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy that blackout your vision when something scary is in front of you. So you don't have to see it.

It's, you know, you could do stuff like that. That's true. But I think the, the primary goal of this whole project is to get to the AR glasses, literally what this Orion prototype is. So if we're talking about like, does Apple have something like this? I'll also point out, and I linked to it in my story, in January of 2023, Mark Gurman reported that they had the AR glasses project at Apple and they set it aside to ship Vision Pro because they decided that it was not a product that they could ship right now. And by right now, I think we literally mean like by now, by 2024, 2025, they realized they couldn't do it. And what I pointed out in my story is Apple and Meta learned the same lesson, right? Which is this is not a product that's ready yet.

We don't have the technology to make this a product that people could buy. And the difference is that Apple went and made a product that is also unreasonable for almost anybody to buy and incredibly expensive, but at least sort of like it gets their platform out there, which didn't exist before. And, you know, there are all the issues that we've detailed with a vision pro, but it's interesting that they kind of did that. What meta did again, I would say for understandable reasons is show it to the world and say, we can't ship this, but imagine. And I see two companies going to the same place and racing each other there, but they just take different paths. And the fact is, a lot of people, because they want a fun narrative or because they, I don't know,

I don't know. Let's not even say why. A lot of people repeatedly throughout decades have looked at a promised product that doesn't exist and isn't going to ship for years, if ever, and compare it to what Apple is shipping and say, look, Apple is behind. But the problem is that Apple is not playing that game. Microsoft used to do this. Everybody has done this where they know Apple's not going to release anything. So they announced something that's never going to ship, but say, look how cool we are. And then eventually something ships and it's way more expensive and way less useful. And many more years later. And I mean, you can even go back to something like, is Apple behind?

Apple missed the boat on big phones, right? It was 10 years ago now that they finally made larger iPhones. They missed the boat where Samsung had big phones for a couple of years and they didn't, but that was something where they, they, they missed. They, they weren't having a big skunk works project where the CEO was convinced that big phones were the future and two years pass. And like, it doesn't matter. Like it doesn't matter because apple ships big phones and they do really well and there's a whole history of apple being behind and then they ship something and everybody the iphone i don't know if you remember this mike but for like three

years before the iphone was announced people were like where's the apple phone apple's falling behind trey is out there you know uh sony's got their thing. Like Apple's missing their opportunity here. And I'm not saying that that's going to repeat itself necessarily. Again, I'm just saying it's a little frustrating that people read Apple's silence as that they've got nothing. And I think with Apple intelligence, we can read it now and say, ah, they kind of got caught flat footed. But Tim Cook has been talking about AR forever,

and all the reports suggest that this kind of product is Tim Cook's dream. They set it aside in order to ship something because I think they felt that there was a value in shipping something and getting the platform warmed up. But even when you look at Vision Pro, I think you can see this is from a company that wants AR and is less concerned with VR than they are AR, which is why they focused on the pass-through.

And all of the apps that they make, right? Like they make apps that are Windows and these Windows sit in the real world. And that's an advantage that Apple has because they have a platform with all the kind of productivity apps and not VR games, which is interesting that, you know, now Meta is embracing Android apps because it gets them that, which I think actually makes a lot of sense for them too. I think both these companies are doing things that make sense for them. But if Mark Gurman is reporting early last year that Apple had already decided that their AR glasses were not going to be shippable in the next couple of years, doesn't that sound familiar? The difference is they didn't tell anybody except, I guess, Mark Gurman. Somebody said something to Mark Gurman about it. But both these companies know that this is where they want to go and they think there

might be something there and it's not practical today. So what I got out of this is I do hope that Apple has kept its eye on the prize. The kind of lackadaisical approach that Apple has taken to Vision Pro since they launched it. And I know nobody's buying it, right? I know it's a very low volume product, but I, dead and there's tumbleweeds rolling through it. So that that's all true, but like they are going, they seem to be going to the same place, uh, just doing it in, in, in private. And then the, the details of this meta thing are really interesting right like it's hard not to look at the puck in the pocket that does all the compute and the thing on your wrist that does all of the sort of like detection of movement so that you can control the interface and not think i mean

apple has products that do that today right that's an iphone and an apple watch and i'm not saying that that apple ar glasses would uh require an ip an Apple Watch. But I mean, they totally could. The Apple Watch requires an iPhone. Why not have the glasses require an iPhone and an Apple Watch to do that? Like Apple has a lot of this tech already. They just don't have the glasses because nobody has the glasses because they're not a thing that anybody can ship at any price. So what I get out of this is one, I'm disappointed that people look at a prototype and overhype it as something.

And I'm not saying like Ben Thompson did this. He disclaimed everything. But there's so much of like, let's compare this thing that Meta has that's not a thing and they don't have it, right? It's not a thing they can ship. And if they could ship it, nobody would buy it because it would be too expensive. And there are lots of pieces of it that are probably not even there in terms of the demo. The software is not in a position to ship to consumers or anything. It's a tech demo.

So let's take it for what it is. But they didn't do it. What it is, yeah. But if we take it for what it is, what it is, is by all accounts, incredibly impressive. It makes me think that this product category is more likely to exist sooner than i thought it would be i thought it would be more like a decade before a product like this really shipped and now based on what meta is saying because apple's not going to talk about it i think oh maybe end of this decade is more realistic for it although and i'm excited by that i think it's a really cool idea the idea that you would have an interface their interface

is very vision pro like as well and um the idea that you would have an interface, their interface is very Vision Pro-like as well. And the idea that you would just have little Vision Pro windows kind of hanging around wherever in your vision as you move around the world, but you're seeing the actual world, like, of course, that would be way better. I just want to put,

as enthusiastic as I am about that, though, I got to put a cap on it, which is when this thing ships, when these things ship, they're going to be really expensive. And there's going to be a lot of controversy and think pieces about like do we really want overlays on the world and all of that yeah i and i i still i'm still maintained i'm still in that camp like i'm not i'm not sure i need notifications in my eyes in my face all the time i don't know if i want okay i mean we'll see we'll

see maybe your ai agent will take care of it and it'll be fine i mean but maybe though right like maybe i mean this is the thing right so i mean i've been talking about for a while right like when vision pro was coming it was like well this i'm not sure that this is what people will want but this is the thing that technology companies have identified as the place they can go to, right? Like, we need to continue making the next iPhone. So what is it? Well, let's make VR, AR products, right?

Apple was doing it, Meta was doing it. Then AI came around, and it seemed like everyone was like, oh, forget about that. We're going to go over here now. But now having seen Orion, the conclusion that I have drawn, like others have, is actually the next thing is the combination of these two pieces of technology. agent that's voice driven or that you can control with your hands if you don't want to speak out loud. And it's going to all be AI enriched. So it's all going to have, you know, the dream of, and I know AI is very divisive, but I will just say the dream is that you have a personal assistant that understands you and can do your tasks. And that's where Apple's trying to go with the

personal context is that same thing. It's like, it knows everything about you. It's private on your device. It, you know, it's It's an interface to draw things up for you. You don't have to do as much drudgery in terms of manipulating apps. And being glasses and the way that these products work, it can see what you see. That is very, very powerful. Yeah. Oh, absolutely. Super important.

That's why I think Apple should make the equivalent of the Meta Ray-Bans is you pair those with an iPhone and you've given your AirPods essentially a camera. And there's so much more you can do if the device can see what you see and know what you're looking at and know where you are and all of that. Anyway, my wet blanket comment here is even if they ship this thing and it costs three thousand dollars or twenty five hundred dollars or four thousand dollars and it's 2029 or 2030 whoever ships it i think it'll be it'll be more expensive than you want it to be and it will be a 1.0 product i mean i think that that the truth is that meta and apple are both shipping existing vr platforms now so that they can do the software development for this in public, right? That's essentially what they're both doing is it'll be based on their OS's Horizon

and Vision OS, and it will come. And even then we'll have all those think pieces and the battery life will be bad and it'll be weird and it'll be expensive. And if it is going to become a hit product where people actually want these things. I haven't even mentioned the fact that a lot of people are resistant to wearing glasses if they don't wear glasses. Well, I wear glasses. But glasses for me are an item that I want to be fashionable. Sure. And I have the Meta Ray bands.

I really like them as sunglasses. But from how I want to look, they are not what I want to wear as glasses. Right. So there are some fashion challenges, even if you are willing to wear glasses, are you willing to wear these glasses? There's a lot going on.

What I'm saying is, if this is the next iPhone, my most optimistic guess that this would become something that would really have momentum and that lots and lots of people were buying it, my optimistic guess would be 2035. And my realistic guess would be 2040. Long time away. I think that's just the way it's going to be. And I'm saying that as somebody who's enthusiastic about this product category.

So it's just going to take time. And the truth is we live in an era where companies have so much money that they can preemptively work on future products because they don't want to get beaten in a key product category. They have so much money that they just want to make sure that they win or don't lose. And that's what Apple's doing. And that's what Meta's doing. So because Meta missed the smartphone revolution and they don't want to do that again. They want to be there. And right now, it's shaping up like they're the strongest players because they are willing to spend the money. Apple's willing to spend the money.

And if this product category is a hit, they will both benefit probably for decades to come. It's worth the investment, I think. I don't know that Meta has or Mark Zuckerberg has new marketing and pr people but i really think that he does because like since threads came out he is a different person his image the way he speaks everything seems a little less weird everything's less weird he seems like more of a normal dude yeah he was very very howard hughes like where it's like oh weird rich dude gets weirder by the year and now it's sort of like oh yeah it's zuckerberg he's a character right just like steve jobs is a character yeah but but you know yes yeah i agree there there has been a

little bit of a shift there i think this is part of it where they're like oh why don't we now just establish ourselves uh as a market leader and they did it in a great way too, I think. I would say that what Meta has that Google also has is a core business that is incredibly profitable. That doesn't make a, you know, it's like, like, it's not cool. It's boring, but it's incredibly profitable. And you use that money to fund your other things. And Meta, for a long time i felt like kind of didn't do that they were like a business that was incredibly profitable and just kept doing

the same thing or buying other people's things but they are they seem to have turned the page a little bit now where with the vr stuff and what their vision is for for ar stuff and the ray bands and threads and like i feel like they are, they feel, I mean, when Steven and I were doing Download, it was during all of the kind of Facebook controversies and all of that. And it was so dispiriting and crushing. And I felt like Facebook was just a force

to make the world terrible. And now, and I'm not saying they're a force to make the world good, but I'm saying now they feel like a tech company. Now they feel like a tech giant. It's a different blood. They don't feel like a parasite that's just trying to ruin the world while it generates money for its owners. They feel like Google.

They feel kind of like that. They've got products, and I look at some of their decisions, and I go, well, that's real weird. But others, I go, oh, that that's very interesting and i see how from a meta perspective that makes sense so so they yeah there's interesting pivot there i think the main thing that changed for them is they don't really seem to talk about facebook anymore oh that's absolutely true that's absolutely true is meta which great rebrand for them they talk about instagram they talk about threads and they talk about the the horizon product horizon the horizon labs reality lab like i'm sure they spend time

talking about facebook when they need to but like sure the amount i am very plugged in to technology right obviously and i listen to you know a lot of interviews that Zuckerberg gives. It's so rare for them to really spend time talking about Facebook. And I think that that is key to the company. I think they're trying to move beyond Facebook. And what he has clearly wanted, and I think during their struggles over those years, and the reason they didn't invest in stuff like what they're doing now, is he was flailing trying to find a platform right like he wanted his iphone and i think he's found it now whether

he can convert that that's what i mean but like i think he has found the thing that he thinks he can do right legitimately where he's not following i mean honestly the the ai stuff they're doing is also very interesting yeah um where they might they might be more of a player there than people understood i think it's interesting um you're right i as silly in some ways as the meta rebrand was i actually think that it's been pretty successful and that it allows them to not not be facebook and not talk about facebook and it's successful in a way i want to just draw a parallel here successful in a way that Google's wasn't. I was just going to say that, yeah.

Because Google wants to be Alphabet or wanted to be Alphabet, and they're not. They're still Google, which means that everything else that goes on is seen through the lens of Google and Google Search and Google Ads and all of that, which is totally not what they wanted, right?

They wanted it to be like a bunch of different products, including Google, so you could not think they wanted, right? They wanted it to be like a bunch of different products, including Google. So you could not think about Google if you didn't want to and thought about just this amazing tech company that has Google as one of its products. And they failed at that. And I would make the argument that they failed at that for a very Microsoftian reason, which is in the Steve Jobs, sorry, Steve Ballmer era, developers, developers, developers, Steve Ballmer era of Microsoft, everything had to be Windows. And it was destructive to Microsoft's brand because everything had to be tied to Windows, even if it wasn't related to Windows.

And Windows was very successful, but it was distorting microsoft strategy and its brand identity and with google i see a similar thing not only are their product development things all over the place and they keep destroying you know they launch things they shut things back down makes people very sad and very angry but they can't let go of google like they they just they can't let go google as a brand so there's so many things that are just, it's Google this, like they bought nest. What is nest now? It's it's Google. It's Google, Google home.

It's Google. And like Android, it's like it's Android, but it's, it's, it's Google. They didn't create a different brand. They didn't lean into Android. They just, they, they, so it's interesting that Google tried to get out from under google and then it just gave up it seems to me it just gave up meta even though ai turned out to be more important than they thought and that the metaverse original idea with mark zuckerberg had which i think was more vr oriented has sort of faded into the background as he's become more interested in this AR with Orion.

Meta seems to have done a better job of bearing, probably because they're not as proud of Facebook as Google is of Google search, right? That would be my guess, is Facebook is just an embarrassing product that is nothing but controversies. It's old media. It's social media for old people. It's very profitable, but it's kind of embarrassing. And then they've it's very profitable but it's kind of embarrassing and then they've had numerous scandals and they kind of want you to forget about it and google like microsoft with windows like oh no no this is core to who we are you don't you can't forget

windows you can't forget google or meta is like facebook oh i suppose that's a name i haven't heard in quite some time right i i suppose that's still a website that's available that we uh own but we're focused on all these other products too and uh you know i guess kudos to them to try to skate away from that one overall though i like what they did here i think they i think this is good i think it's exciting and interesting and i'm not saying they should but if i was at apple i would at least consider it like more than before you know like would it be beneficial to do to give someone an exclusive to be like this is what our vision for the next 10 years i don't know i don't know it's it's what i ended up saying in the piece is a lot of different ways to play this game met is playing

by one set of rules etc rules apple's playing rules. Apple's playing by its set of rules, but they're playing the same game and game on. Although really game on is when somebody ships a pair of glasses, because otherwise it's all pregame. It's all like everybody jockeying for position. They're setting the rules of the game right now. There isn't actually a game. But like it's on, it's on.

And I think that's good. There was a time before Steve Jobs came back to Apple where Apple would occasionally do kind of exclusive things where they would show you some of the stuff that they were doing. It was a bad time for Apple, and it felt like they were kind of trying to justify the existence of their R&D labs by showing you ridiculous things that would never ship. And it's not very Apple. I do wonder, though, if there is a discussion to be had. At this point, it would almost sound like a Me Too with them is the thing. But I wonder if there's a marketing discussion to be had of like, why wouldn't we maybe next year at WWDC do a session that's like a special preview of where VisionOS technologies are going that drops a bunch of really heavy hints about what Apple's got in its lab, just to make it clear what Apple's vision is for Vision OS. Because that is, you know, they'll be two years on from announcing Vision Pro with maybe no new announcements other than Vision OS updates.

It might be useful for them to either under their own control or with a friendly media partner do a kind of what's Tim Cook's idea of where Apple is going with these products that allows them to kind of counter the perception that Meta's on this, is Apple doing this or not? I would maybe go a little further in my ideal. The reason being is the Vision Pro is partly out there to encourage development, right? So that as Apple continues down this road, they will have a very good suite of products, like software, for people to produce. It's not happening, right? For reasons of detail, for many reasons, it's not happening. Yes.

Another way to maybe get this to happen is to be like, oh, by the way, there is a really good reason why you might want to consider developing for this platform. So you'll be ready for the next one. Because look, I think Apple's usual desire to keep quiet, this is maybe one of the only times when I think they've been pushed hard enough that it might be worth responding. In some way. In some way. Last point, and then we'll move on from this.

Obviously, the big thing here is what Matter has produced is a pair of glasses, a wristband, and a compute device. The issue they have here is that is Apple Glasses, Apple Watch, iPhone. That's what that is for Apple, which is why if both companies produce this technology and it's the same idea, Apple has a significant leg up because a lot of people already have both of those things. That is the uphill battle that they're going to fight. Yeah. Unless Meta, and this is an interesting question.

Like, in the long run, does Meta partner with Android phone makers to be the compute device for it? Possibly. Or that I hope the Department of Justice can sort that out for me. Well, I was going to say, if you could tie into the Apple Watch because there's some sort of API thing where they're forced to open it up, then maybe. But you could also just use Android smartwatches and Android phones and create a kind of an alternate path. Because yeah, I think Apple has an advantage in that people have iPhones and

Apple Watches already and they could use those, they could build those. And it's not unbelievable at all to imagine that that would be what Apple would do is this works with your iPhone and your Apple watch. And then you put these glasses on and they're like our, our old glasses, you know, the ones that, that just had, had a camera and speakers, but these now have an overlay, right? Because presumably at that point, they'll have a product like that. And then, then this one has the AR overlay, but they're there, you know, cause any other glasses, any minute Ray meta Ray-Ban style glasses that Apple did would almost certainly work with iPhone and Apple Watch, right?

And that would all be part of the equation anyway. A friend of the show, Austin Evans, got one of these demos and he produced a video. And he had a detail in his video that I'd not seen anywhere else. So he sat down with Andrew Bosworth. So Boz meant the CTO. And it sat down with Andrew Bosworth, so Boz, meant the CTO, and as part of their conversation... We're going to give him a Jaws-Boz battle. Jaws-Boz versus Boz fight.

As part of the conversation, they're looking at a previous prototype version, which is also the translucent plastic. And Austin picks up the compute model and he's like, is that a camera? And Boz is like, oh like oh yeah we were thinking about maybe doing other things with this but we're not doing that now and i was like oh so there was a previous version of this where they tried to put more technology in the compute thing so like you could use it obviously one of these

was like should we make a phone again i I expect. Also, it's a phone. It's a phone without a display. I mean, it's a phone, right? It's a compute. Oh, a module that has lots of computing power that you carry in your pocket. What could that be, right? Mark, don't make a phone. Don't do it. I know the

temptation is there, but don't do it again. I don't think you can make that work. But you could maybe try and find a way to make this work otherwise. This episode is brought to you by KRCS, one of the oldest Apple premium resellers and your one-stop shop for all things Apple here in the UK. Mac is easy to love and easy to own. And if you're one of our UK listeners, you can spread

the cost of any Mac over 6, 24, 36, or 48 months of Klarna and KRCS. That means you could buy a MacBook Air M2 from just £22 per month. You can make your Mac truly yours, having the exact specification you want with pricing you won't find anywhere else from KRCS. Or you can choose from popular in-stock models and spread the cost with more affordable monthly payments. With free next working day delivery on any in-stock items ordered before 3pm, there's never been a better time to get a Mac at KRCS, your local Apple experts. Get more information at krcs.co.uk slash podcast, or click the link in the show notes. Representative 9.9% APR, 18 plus subject to approval and T's and

C's apply. Please spend responsibly. Borrowing beyond your means could seriously affect your financial status. Ensure you can afford to make your repayments on time by the due date. Our thanks to KRCS for their support of this show and all of Relay. Let's finish out with some Ask Upgrade questions. Prathamesh asks,

should the iPad get the camera control? Oh, interesting. I am not a big fan of the controls on the ipad in general i very rare i mean i'll use the volume button to make sure the volume is down or up but like i i don't even use the sleep wake button that much because i have a cover on it so i don't know i mean i guess i mean i guess something i mean i don. I mean, iPads are used. I'm trying to think of how you'd hold it and it seems like not great.

I would prefer an action button on the iPad sooner than I would want a enough photos of my iPad. And I do take photos with my iPad when I'm doing design work. I do it. But I just think with the way in which, especially the 12.9, the way I've got to hold that device to take a photo, I just don't think the camera control would be ergonomically good. In the way we were talking about it earlier, imagine that. You're holding this big iPad screen and and you're like trying to get your hand up just so you can like yeah i don't think that would work no steven asks mike how is your

search going for new headphones since the disappointing non-announcement for airpods max so i did a little googling around and basically where i landed is the sony's are the the sony over ear noise cancelling headphones are the product that everybody likes. But they haven't had a new model in a while, it seems like. So I think now I'm going to wait for whatever is deemed to be a really great pair of over-ear noise-canceling headphones. And I'm going to jump in on those. I love my AirPods Max. When I was traveling, I was watching those. I love my AirPods Max. Like when I was traveling,

you know, I was watching them. I find those things very comfortable. I love the Apple's noise cancellation and transparency. I love how easily it connects to all my devices, but it just feels like a product in the lineup. And I don't really necessarily want to be on that, especially with the flimsy cable that I have to use. And I want to be able to use a pair of headphones more easily. So for example, when I travel, my over-ear headphones also become my podcasting headphones. And so I'm looking for a pair of headphones that actually do a better job for that

than the AirPods Max do. Like the way that you have to connect the lightning cable to the 3.5 millimeter, like I just don't like that. I actually had a cable die on me on this last trip. Luckily, I have a spare for just in case this happens. So these are definitely on the way out for me, but I'm not sure where to go yet.

I'm waiting for a product revision i did have my eye on the sonos ace actually they they look interesting but i want to wait for sony because sony have always been market leaders in this category and so i want to see uh what happens there just got a good question in the discord that i wanted to bring up actually from tony who asks if i brought my vision pro on the trip to memphis uh didn't even think about it and was really annoyed that i didn't think about it right because you got solo international flights you could have brought it and like watch movies and stuff i was on my own on this trip and so in the evenings it would have been great to watch movies and tv on my vision pro but i didn't even think about it i was really

annoyed about that i won't make that mistake again on a trip like this because I did really want it, but I forgot about it because I'd never done it. I watched a college football game in my hotel room on the Vision Pro. See, this is what I wanted to do. It's just like for context, this is the first time I got on a plane since I bought it. I have not taken any more trips this year.

And so it didn't even cross my mind right but next you keep it at work and you were at home and so it was like exactly because i i i wasn't at home for i'm sorry i wasn't at the studio for like three days before i left so like you would have had to think that far in advance about taking it and you didn't do it and all that no i brought my i didn't use it on the plane I did think about using it on the plane and on that long flight back. I, but the fact is what I discovered is a long flight is a great time to watch a movie. But for me, you're not, you're, you're not going to believe this, Mike. It's a great time to read a book. No way. I read like four books on my trip to and from Memphis. Like it's a great, and that's my, I think that's my happy places. AirPods in, noise canceling on, music playing, reading a book on my Kobo. I very rarely watch movies and TV

shows on planes. And so even though I had my Vision Pro both ways, I didn't bother because I was just enjoying reading a book. So, but I did enjoy watching the college football game in my hotel room. That was great. I mean, it was was it was bad in the sense that my team lost okay but it was great that it was like a huge screen and i was able to watch you know the big screen uh just on the wall of my hotel room that part was great i still don't know if i could bring myself to wear a vision pro on a plane i don't think i could do that yet yeah i'd be too embarrassed that guy i'd be too embarrassed yeah could be question comes from pat do apple watch series 10s outside the u.s have blood oxygen sensors yes they do all apple watches

have blood oxygen sensors do they still because this is a question i wanted to ask you i believe believe that they do, and it would make sense that they do, but I don't know. Apple doesn't make a special version. They're just not turned on in the US. They're non-functional. Because they are given different model numbers. I think it's still in there. I don't think they did any re-engineering. I think Apple has hopes that they will eventually be able to turn them on.

Right. I was checking this out in the tech specs. They're like, oh, if it's got this model number, it means it's disabled. But I think it's just a way that they... Because they've, I guess, hard disabled it with software, right? The firmware.

Yeah, I think if it's that model, then it doesn't connect to the... But I believe that there is nothing to say that a software update in the future couldn't re-enable this. I think that's my understanding, yes. And Duncan asks, a question on photographic styles of the new iPhones.

If you take a photo with an iPhone 16 Pro and view it on an iPad, can you adjust the photo style from the iPad, or can you only adjust the style on the phone? I often view and manage my photo library on my iPad. It's much easier with the bigger screen. So I tried this out today and you can. I have an M4 iPad Pro

it's running iOS 18.1. I don't know if any of these things are limiters. I think it's all 18 if you've got 18 or 15, I should say 15 Sequoia on the Mac too. It's just like all the other features that they've added to the phone.

They then backtrack and put them in on other devices too. So yeah. But I don't know about iPhones though. Because I know you can't shoot photos or photographic styles on previous phones. I think so. I think so.

I would be surprised if that weren't the case, that you can edit those photographic styles if you're running iOS 18. Okay. But you can't. I think so, yeah. You can't take the pictures, but you can edit them. No, it's basically the Photos app senses that you are using one of those photos that's got the extra stuff. Yeah. And that extra data, because it was shot on a 16, and then you can make those decisions. Yeah, I'm looking at a photo I shot on my Mac right now.

And yeah, I absolutely have the ability to do. It's got the different presets and then it's got the little box and you can like use your mouse and click around and make it do what you want. Yeah, it's pretty cool. If you would like to send in a question for us to answer in a future episode of the show,

very easy to do. You can send in your feedback, follow-up and questions at upgradefeedback.com. You can check out Jason's work at sixcolors.com and you can hear his podcasts at theincomparable.com and here on Relay.

Or you can listen to me too and check out my work as well at cortexbrand.com. You can find us online. Jason is at jsnell, J-S-N-E-L-L. I am at imike, I-M-Y-K-E.

You can watch video of this show on TikTok, Instagram, and YouTube, where we are at Upgrade Relay. Thank you to our members who support us with Upgrade Plus, and thank you to our sponsors, the fine folk over at Delete Me, KRCS, and Squarespace.

Don't forget to check out stjude.org slash relay. Thank you so much to everybody who has donated this month. And most of all, thank you for listening to this week's episode. We'll be back next time. Until then, say goodbye, Jason Snell.

Goodbye, Mike Hurley.