Upgrade - 576: Resting Tim Face

Episode Date: August 11, 2025

From Relay, this is Upgrade, episode 576. Today's show is brought to you by FitBod, eCAM, and Factor. My name is Mike Hurley, and I'm joined by Jason Snow. Hi, Jason. Hi, Mike Hurley. I have a statement I'd like to make at the beginning of today's episode, Jason. I think it's important for the context of the rest of today's show. So this is upgrade.

Yeah, last week, I threw my back out pretty bad. And today, I mean, a lot of pain, Jason, as long as I'm going to say. Okay. It started to get better today. So it's actually the worst it's been, worse than the day when I did it. I figure that's important because, you know, I might be grumpy later on in the episode. Yeah, yeah, you might be grumpy. You might be a little low energy.

And viewers of our YouTube stream will notice that you're a little slumpy too. Yeah, the viewers of the YouTube video will notice. that I'm leaning back in my chair today, which I don't usually do. He's hanging on by a thread, folks. Spend a bit more time sitting up straight. But no, today, I've got the full lean back going on. Yeah. This is just like, if you listen to things that I say today and you're like, damn, I need

to disagree with Mike. Let me tell you, don't. Just keep it to yourself for this week. I would love you if you do that. Just let it fly. The boy is grumpy, you know? He's doing the best he can. He's here.

He's grinding. Thank you for this opening statement. It's like, it's a hard. it's a hard week for you. It's a hard week for me. Sorry that you hurt your back. And ironically, or cruelly, while picking up your baby. It was actually putting it down. I was putting it down. Oh, putting down your baby. So it's part of love. It was an act of love. It felt like an explosion occurred in my middle, in the middle of the lower back. And then yesterday, it started to feel better. It's like, great. I'm going to, because we're supposed to be going away this weekend. Now we're

not sure we're going to be able to do that. It's like, it's all terrible over here. And so. I'm seeing a physiotherapist. Don't worry. Like, I'm not. not just toughen it out. Not just gutting it out? Yeah. Except for right now

where you're getting it out. Right now I am. Yeah. Right now I am. I have a snow talk question for you, Jason.

We actually got two questions this week and they were very similar to each other. So I thought, I don't know why this has happened. So I'll ask both of them. Duncan says,

California is famous for it surfing. Jason, do you own a surfboard or buggy board? And Logan said, do you have any thoughts on paddleboarding? Do you own a paddleboard?

I so this reminds me of when I was a kid and on the computer bulletin boards and there were these kids in Fargo, North Dakota who are like, whoa, do you go surfing every day? And I said, I'm a hundred miles from the ocean, friend. The do I own a surfboard? No. Have I ever been on a surfboard? No. Does my father-in-law serve? Yes. My, my now elderly father-in-law is a, he's a surfer, but I, I have never done it, and I have no interest. My balance is not very good. I can't even water ski. I fall right over. So, boogie board, have I been on them? Yes. Do I own one?

No. That's a thing you have, like, at a, if you're staying somewhere by the beach where there's some waves, you can, like, rent one, and we've done that, rented a boogie board at snorkel bobs for the week with my kids, pretty much for my kids. But, you know, then you go in with your kids and you do that, then everybody has a good time, I guess. You can hear my ambivalence And paddleboarding I have never done it It looks fine

We were at a lake In the Midwest a few weeks ago And I thought about doing it But it didn't come up Lauren's done it a few times Jamie's done it a few times We had a great kayak trip Speaking of other things that go in the water

That I have done A kayak trip when we were in Kauai a while ago A few years ago And Jamie did a Jamie wanted to do stand a paddleboard so she did paddle board on the way out and then she fell in the water and then she and lauren switched and i think lauren did paddleboard coming back and jimmy went in the kayak my i have i have constantly thought about getting a kayak uh we are not far from the water here at all

but it's too far to just carry a kayak so the investment in having a place to store the kayak having a way to put it on my car, which I don't have a way to do that. Take it over to the very short drive to the place where you would put it in. It has been too much, even though our friend, friend of the show, Dr. Dr. Dr. Dr. Drang, introduced me to the idea of the folding kayak. Because Dr. Dr. Drang, our friend, he's in the Midwest, where there are gentle lakes, and he likes to kayak on them. and he has a folding kayak. I think, is it Oro Kayaks, I want to say? oru kayaks

O-R-U-K-A-K-A-K-A-K-com He has a lake kayak. Wow, how is this possible? It's like origami. You basically unfolded in like five minutes and it's a kayak. Look at this thing. So you're going to get one of these then? So because I live on a bay

I would need a more expensive and heavier one than what Dr. Dr. Dr. Dr. Dr. Dr. Rang uses. Because there's more of a current isn't because there's more potential waves and stuff than on a lake, I think. even though it's a gentle kind of inlet of the bay they do have the bay they do have the bay i assume that one's for you oh boy you got really want to do this you got to want to do it yeah yeah yeah it's

it's not it's not a hundred dollars let's just say it's got a zero on but uh i've been tempted i've thought about it um so that that's my thing is like wouldn't it be fun to go just over not far uh and uh put in unfold that kayak and put it in because i could do this this is the thing is my it might my my My interest in kayaking is never going to be enough for me to find a place to store it here, put a rack on my car, figure out how to mount it on the car, mounted on the car on a regular basis and take it over it. It's just not going to happen. Yeah, but why would you do that when you can fall one up and put it in a bag? Yeah, well, that is the counter argument. So I've thought about it. But that's so I've hijacked this to talk about kayaks because I'm much more interested. I've done kayaking. And we just did kayaking on the Wailua River when we were in Kauai the last time. it's pretty chilling up here in Richardson Bay by the Mill Valley Dog Park and like out and around like there's lots of there's lots of like pretty easy stuff to paddle around in Marin County where you know there's there's little inlets here and there and that would be kind of fun to do the problem then is that I'm doing it by myself unless I get another kayak for Lauren now it's even more money so we'll see maybe we'll see maybe we'll one day I'll get a kayak.

If you would like to send in a question of your own to help us open a future episode of the show, please go to UpgradeFeedback.com and send in your own Snow Talk question. Maybe you'll match with another upgradian. I think Duncan and Logan could be friends if they don't know each other already. They sound like characters on a soap opera set in California. Duncan and Logan are fighting over the same girl. Is this literally the plot of Veronica Mars? I don't know.

Anyway, let's move on. Let's do some follow-up. I had a question that came from Amar who wants to know. How does Apple know when someone is a, quote, first-time Apple Watch user or a first-time iPhone user when they talk about this in their earnings calls? Is it just information from their Apple IDs? This is an excellent question. So, yeah, on the earnings call, they said half of Apple Watch buyers are new to Apple Watch.

I don't know. I think the idea that they're looking at Apple IDs that have never been paired with an Apple Watch as one of their signals is probably pretty good. I kind of assume they also do a sales follow-up survey. I don't think they need to do that. You know what I feel like they have that data. Like Apple absolutely knows this information.

I would not be surprised if they've got a group that does a, tries to do a statistically valid sample sales follow-up survey to get demographics of what's going on with their purchases and things like that. But yes, there's probably a technological solution here as well. You also, I mean, there really may also be multiple streams where they've got the Apple ID data, but they've got, the thing, the thing about doing a survey is it gives you a different data set from your, what if your Apple ID data data is actually flawed in some way? It skews high, it skews low. You don't know. But if you have a second data point, then you can compare it to that.

Well, if somebody knows, I would love to know, because I don't, I don't know the. extra answer of actually how they know this. I know some people who may know the answer, but then those are people who used to work at Apple and probably can't. Maybe, maybe could tell me. Maybe not. But anyway, if somebody knows what's the method that Apple uses to get this kind of thing. I would love to know just for curiosity's sake. I'm not sure it's a trade secret or anything. I would be. I'm not inducing a trade secret here. I would be shocked if they just didn't have the data. And yes, what they could do is, as you say, they could also do surveys and overlap them, like, to make sure that that data

statistics matches. Yeah, it's validation, right, to make sure that the number that you see. Because it could be that, like, when you do Apple, if you did a survey, you might realize, oh, we do Apple ID matching about 10, it's a little, it's a little high. It's 10% high or whatever. And then you know that and you can, that helps you guide, you know, right, and get a

better idea of what the real number is. Because you're like, oh, you know, 0.6% of people set up a new Apple ID every time they get a new product for whatever reason. You know, you can just kind of like work stuff out that way. Well, that's how they get that's how they get you is if you're just always moving

always shifting your apple I can catch me I'm on my I'm on my sixth I'm a ghost in the system no one can catch me no one can catch me

I also just wanted to mention that Jason joined connected last week if you want more of us but with Stephen flavor and also more hijinks which is just typically

is the way that the show goes for For example, during the show last week, I logged into Stephen's Cotton Bureau store and changed the colors of the t-shirts that you have for sale because I wanted something specific. And I discovered that one of the hard drives on my raid head was going to die. During the show. Because Soft Raid has a spooky feature where it says, expected to fail in the next 60 days. And so I had to, I bought a hard drive while we were on the show.

So that was fun. Connected is a very different show to upgrade, even though we ostensibly talk about the same things. When we let it be. There is that moment where you and I start talking and it just becomes upgrade, as you mentioned, during the show. It just suddenly becomes upgrade. And then we have to say, oh, Stephen is also here. Let's round up some rumors, Jason. It's time for rumor roundup.

Iha. Mac Rumors is sharing a report from Digitimes that suggests that the A18 Pro MacBook Hair could have a starting price of between $599.99 to $699. It would feature a 12.9 inch display, which is smaller than the current 13.6 inch MacBook Air, and according to the manufacturing timelines that they have seen, there still would expect a targeted late 2025, early 2026 release. You'll love to see it. What do you think about that price? You'll love to see it. You'll love to see it. Well, I mean, we I think in our conversations about it, we've been talking about it

in terms of the M1 MacBook Air at Walmart. Yep. Which has been, like, I think it's been like $6.99 and $6.49, and I think I've seen it at $5.99. So, I mean, okay. Well, first off of what we want. It doesn't bear out.

I know, but if you're thinking of what slot does it fit in because Apple kind of likes their slots, I will say Digitimes is a supply chain. story more than it is a marketing story and so price is not like what they're doing is they're estimating based on maybe somebody has said we want the price you know the bill of materials to be this because but like i don't think anybody well i think that's why they're given a full one hundred dollar range yeah there is a range there but like i figure it is not incredibly complicated if you on if you see apple bill of materials all the time that if you get a new one you can

probably estimate what you would expect it to be priced at. And it's going to start high and then it's going to go low, probably depending on what they use. I mean, I love the price. I think this is it. I think this is what they want. I think what they want is something that's like the Walmart M1 Air. I think that they found that there is a value in a product that is, I mean, what we said the last time, and I really do believe this is I think Apple in the Intel era felt like Apple's very comfortable, obviously, not going down to be the low price leader. That's a thing I used to say all the time.

Apple is not your low price leader. People would be like, why is Apple not competing with this low price of tech product? It's like, it's not their job. Like, they don't want to do it. They don't want to do it. They want to make money. They want to make products that make money. And I think it's fair to say that Apple has some standards about quality and that they

may be there. And look, they're higher than other companies. They are. Apple's like, we think that the best thing is here and we won't go below it. even to chase users because we don't like the experience there. You can like it or dislike it, but I think that's true that Apple has just decided they're going to make these products that are nice

and they don't want their brand to be like, well, I got a crappy Apple. Like, nobody wants that. Nobody wants that. So, you got it. So I think with Apple Silicon, they have realized, and with the M1 Air still being viable, I think they've realized

Apple Silicon completely changes where that line can be drawn and that allows them to go down below $999 for the air. So I think that's what's going on here. And I think it's great because I do think there's a market down there who would love to buy a Mac laptop and doesn't want to buy a Mac laptop for $999.

And they've found with their experimentation with Walmart especially and maybe with some education pricing on the MacBook Air and things like that. So great. I mean, I think it would be great if it's $599 or $6.99 or $6.49. I think that would be, I mean, right. I mean, right now to get a Mac laptop in education, it's $8.99. I mean, there's a lot of space there for something cheaper that's still viable.

And the fact is that, yeah, it's going to also be an upsell product. They're going to say you can get this, but it doesn't have Thunderbolt, and it doesn't have this, and it doesn't have that, and it screens a little bit smaller. because the rumor is it's a 12.9 instead of a 13.6, so it's just a little bit less. What do you think there's iPad screens? Like, what was that coming from? Because I just looked, the M1 was 13.3. So the last screen that I confined, which was a 12.9, was like the old iPad Pro screens. Yeah, yeah, exactly. Also, I'll say this, the M1 was the last of, wasn't the M1 the last MacBook Air to have the, like the, didn't the bezel?

shrink with the M2? Yeah. I mean, it doesn't have the silver bezel anymore. That was the previous non-retemate. The bezel shrunk before that. They did it on the Intel. Okay. Well, so my other feeling here is if it's 12-9, it may actually be physically smaller.

Yeah. Like that is, and there are, you know, some rumors to suggest that it's meant to be thinner and lighter and smaller and whatever. I mean, the fact is getting a little, a little board with a system on the chip on it and some basic I.O. is that thing is tiny in the MacBook Air it would be tiny in this too

there's not much computer in a computer these days so they can make a real small if they want to yeah the well I should say the bezel shrunk on the MacBook Air yeah the Intel one it was the last change that they made

and I think they made the whole thing smaller because it was always a 13.3 inch display so you used to have the big thick silver display and then they made that one final update to the MacBook Air when they were like okay, we actually can't get rid of this product. They did the retina.

They put the retina back in it. And it got like a thin black bezel and got rid of the silver bezel. Yes. And my expectation, I'm trying to look through the, you know, we'll have their old comparison tool. I expect they made the whole thing smaller. Yes, they did. They made the product smaller.

So we'll say, I mean, it could be a smaller computer or it could be just a bigger bezel because for that price, maybe you just get a bigger bezel. on a smaller screen, sorry. And that gives them the upsell, right, to say, look, you know, you don't want the $6.99. If you're, if you're thinking of a $999 MacBook Air and you go, well, you also make this thing for $6.99 and you look at it, they want people to feel like they're losing something, right? Because you want to be able to prevent them from going down and also, you know, give a reason to go up off of $6.99 if you're shopping. And one of the ways that Apple communicates price, if you ignore the minute, is screen size like the other products like with the phones and stuff you want a bigger screen

you pay more money you pay more money you get a bigger screen it's probably one of the reasons that the iPhone menu didn't work out because that just didn't work in people's minds

even in the air there are the smaller and larger screens and you pay more you just do so sure 12.9 why not I mean I love that price

I think it's great I think we who knows who knows how the market will react But my just gut feeling is having another product down there, another laptop down there, is going to reach people. That's why I like that Walmart MacBook Air story so much, is they're reaching people who maybe wouldn't have bought a Mac before. Speaking of screen sizes, Mac rumors is also reporting on evidence found in the code of iOS 26 that suggests that the Apple Watch Ultra will be getting a bigger screen this year. The resolution appears to be increasing from 410 by 502 to 422 by 514.

Very specific resolutions on the Apple Watch Ultra. Of course, this follows the Series 10, which got a bigger screen. It is unknown if the watch itself will get bigger, hopefully not, or they just increase the screen size, which I reckon they'll do. Because the case bulges out to the sides, right? They could open it up kind of what they did with the Series 10. We'll see. but yeah, it looks like the Ultra 3

is an actual product change instead of just, you know, case change, and they're actually going to make something meaningful this year. 11,000 more dots on that little tiny screen. It's a lot of dots, Jason. It's a lot of dots. And Mark German is reporting in his newsletter

about Apple's progress with the new app intense feature that will power some Apple intelligence features. So as a recap, Apple's vision that was unveiled at WWDC 2024 would see a user being able to communicate with Siri to ask their phone to do something. So you've got the personal context. That's the thing we focus on the most, right? Like Siri knowing stuff about you, but this is also, say, for example, you could ask your iPhone to find a photo from your photo library, crop it and

email it to a contact, right? And it would just be able to go ahead and do all of that for you because the phone understands the actions that a app can do and can kind of pass them together and you can even work across different applications, right? So you, well, with photos mail, that kind of thing. Gohmann reports that Apple was now planning to ship this alongside the bigger personalized Siri overhaul that is currently set for spring of next year. However, there is concern internally about a few things. One is developer adoption, which would hold the feature back, obviously.

And this could be through disinterest. Or Mark actually positioned some security issues, like banking apps and health apps, for example, might not want from customer. from a risk perspective to have anything exposed to the system that they're not confident in. Apparently Apple, there are people inside of Apple

that are also hoping that a better Siri overall, right? So like this big rebuild that we've been talking about could lead to less misunderstanding of user intent because obviously

if you ask your phone to do something for you, it's much more destructive if the command is misunderstood, right? If you ask your iPhone right now, what's the time of the Super Bowl and it gets that wrong, that's one thing. If you ask it to archive an email for you

and archive your entire email inbox, different, you know? Not as good. Yeah, exactly. And to make sure of doing this correctly, Apple is working on launching it with their own apps and some third-party apps as well. It seems that they want to be able to control the experience to some extent initially.

And some of the partners that Mark mentions is Uber, YouTube, Amazon, and a bunch of meta apps, which was interesting to me. and some games, my kind of read on looking at Mark's report here is this feels very much like a fingers crossed kind of feature rollout. Like maybe if developers are working and hopefully if series better, this will maybe work. Like I don't, I don't feel very confident in this reading this report. Well, I mean, my re-aid on it was that this isn't that big a thing and that a lot of this

is kind of a rehash by German. Because this is Appintense. I mean, the way the piece is pitched is very much like, oh, Apple could change everything. But that's a very pundit kind of take built around what we already know. I mean, he's got some new scraps here. But like, what we're talking about is app intents. App intents are used in shortcuts. App intents are used in the new spotlight on the Mac to be able to, you know, that's how

you can send a message from Spotlight. is you're using an app intent there. So app intents are supposed to be used with new Siri to let new Siri do stuff. It is the, you know, it is the idea of letting AI stuff, you know, have tools to perform actions for you by knowing there are apps at controls, right?

So that's sort of, I mean, I think if you went back to our podcast for WWDC-24, we talked about this then, right? Like this has always been the promise of this feature. And you're right, it is very much fingers crossed because this is a thing that haven't been able to ship and the stakes are high. I do wonder, I mean, he mentions banking apps and that makes a lot of sense, although I wonder like, if I'm a bank, which is, I'm not a bank, I'm a human,

but if I was a bank or a person who ran a bank and they were talking about tools to automate, let other apps control your banking experience and do stuff with your banking app, I would just say no, right? And that wouldn't be, here's the thing. Like, that isn't about Siri. Like, if you said what we want to do, the boffins come in, right? And come to boffins. Bring in the boffins for your bank, your old bank that you used to work at. They bring in the boffins to the app office, right? And the boffins are like, we got great news. We got this app intense thing. We're going to be able to automate everything. And our customers are going to be able to, like, check. their balance and I'd say yeah yeah great great great and transfer money and I'd be like

hmm and and take without money be like mm and they'd say whether you know it would be automated it would be like they could write a script that does it they could have a spotlight thing that did it or the AI on the system would do it I would just say no and it wouldn't be about the AI it would be I'm a I mean these bank apps have you I don't know how your bank app works But my bank app, like, if you leave it or leave it for a moment, it's like, well, you're locked out. That's it. We're done because they're deathly afraid of security issues with it. You know, there are other apps that treat security that way that I laugh at.

I was logging into an airline website and was reminded that this particular airline thinks it's a bank. And it's like, answer these security questions. I'm like, you're an airline. What are you doing? but banks it actually matters because money is on the line here so I don't know I I think he's right to say banks would be concerned and Apple might want to say like we don't want this category using this stuff but is that category really going to embrace this I mean maybe you're saving them from themselves at that point if you're Apple because I think putting automation tools on things like transferring money and stuff is probably just a bad idea in general you should have to do that yourself in my opinion this episode is brought to you by FitBod. If you're looking to make changes to your personal fitness, it can be really hard to know where to start. That's why I want to tell you about FitBod, the easy and affordable way to build a fitness plan that is made for you. Because everybody

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All right, let's go on a little journey. It's time to lawyer up. I think this is a good decent lawyer up segment. Oh, a little journey. You got me excited, but now you're bringing me down, I think. We're going to go on a little journey. So we're going to start off Wednesday morning of last week, where Apple makes two announcements.

An announcement number one, they increased their investment in U.S. manufacturing. Apple would previously committed to $500 billion to be spent over the next four years. They added another $100 billion onto that. So we're now up to $600 billion committed to improving U.S. manufacturing. With that, they have launched the American manufacturing program with the aim to move more of their manufacturing needs to the USA. As part of this, they are increasing investment in companies that can help them produce, let's just say chips in the U.S. it's like chips for all kinds of stuff. I'm genuinely like across the gamut.

Like from Apple Silicon down to like tiny little chips that they need to, you know, regulate displays or whatever. But trying to produce more stuff and they're investing in a bunch of companies across the stack that could help them do that. There's even one reference in there to like a partnership with Samsung over some brand new technology that they're very cagey about, but it would be produced in the US. At a factory in Texas, yeah.

Which is really interesting. But the big recipient, of the increase goes to Corning. This is like a specific press release, the second one, because this is actually quite monumental. Apple is expanding its relationship with the glass manufacturer to see 100% of iPhone and Apple Watch glass

to be produced in the USA. And I'll read from the press release here. Corning is creating the world's largest and most advanced smartphone glass production line at the Harrodsburg facility. Corning will now dedicate this entire facility to manufacturing for Apple, which will increase Corning's

manufacturing and engineering workforce in Kentucky by 50%. And this is worldwide. Originally I was like, oh, is this just the watch, the glass for iPhone and Apple Watch for the US? No, all of the ceramic shield and stuff, everything is going to be produced

in the USA. So I thought like this part, it's cool. On the face of it, if you can do this, why would you not do this? Right? Yeah, I think I think the idea that there definitely is a feeling in the United States and it's not actually one party. It is both parties. It is

lots of people. It's gone through the last few administrations. A feeling that our shift away from manufacturing in the U.S. was a mistake and that they want more manufacturing back in the U.S. That's why the Chipsack passed in the last administration, a bipartisan act to make more chips in the U.S. Apple has always sort of proudly pointed at portions of the products that are made in America. And so, you know, if the environment is generally trending in the way of the United States would really like it if American companies like Apple would make more stuff in America, just like how there are lots of non-American car manufacturers who assemble their cars for the U.S. market in the U.S. it's the same kind of idea. So this is not unreasonable. It's different for Apple in some ways,

although Corning was always one of Apple's great partners. Apple has, you know, Apple and Corning have been making iPhone glass since basically the beginning, and it's been a fruitful partnership for them, and so it's not surprising that they would... Like they developed ceramic shield together? Yeah, for them to reach out to Corning and say Corning is a place that we can...

You know, we can connect with them first off. Like, that's an easy one for them to say, let's just go all in on Corning because they have such a good relationship. In the press release, it says that 100% of the cover glass were made in the U.S. for the first time. So while they were working with Corning, my expectation is maybe some of it was being produced in other countries with Corning's IP, et cetera, et cetera, right? Or Corning's factories somewhere else. I don't know if Corning is 100% in the U.S. right? Great point. Great point. Later that day.

And then, give it. So, all good news, right? Later. Because, like, you can feel whatever you want to feel about the American administration, right? Like, you can feel whatever you want to feel about it. But I just think the idea of

Apple investing in American manufacture is not a bad thing. Like, I don't think that is inherently a bad thing. It's, right? It is a thing. It will create jobs in America. Sure, there'll be disruption in other places, but, like, I don't mean to start whatever. But, like, I think it's fine, right?

Like, to me, on the face of that, it's like, fine, why not? Later that day, Tim Cook appeared at a White House media briefing where President Trump got to speak about the increase in U.S. manufacturing. There was also this, like, you know, you can see, Tim, if you look at the imagery or the videos and stuff, I have some links in the show notes. There's some colorful language in some of the posts that I'll include in the show notes, just some of why I, but they'll be in there because they're...

Because the president used some colorful language during that. Yes, he actually also used. is some colorful language, which that is all, that's very interesting to me that keeps happening, but that does keep happening. Like, Tim is standing in front of these like boards, which are some of the graphics that they use in the

the poster. Like, obviously, he'd been presenting apples increase, da da, da, da, da, da. And then, so later, it's, so yeah, so Trump could speak about this increase as well. At this event, Tim Cook presented Trump with a commemorative trophy.

it was made of glass from Corning and it was displayed on a quote 24 karat gold base know your audience the trophy was presented in a box of a big apple logo on it that Tim Cook struggled to open which I thought was hilarious

yes and struggled to assemble yeah oh he really did didn't I forgot by that he did yeah cook mentions that he struggled so much to assemble it that some of the late night comedy shows did a fast wipe like we gotta take three seconds out here because this is going on too long

they just did a fast video wipe and I had already seen the full video and I was like, oh, yeah, Tim. They're not going to show Tim struggling to get his trophy assemble. Put together. Tim mentioned that the trophy was designed

by somebody used to work in the Marine Corps. He used to be in the Marine Corps. He used to be in the Marine Corps. Cook also makes a presentation. And then there are other clips where Tim Cook is like hanging around. Like he's just, he's there. He can't escape.

Well, he can't escape, right? Because he's part of the briefing, right? So like, Trump's on one side, Vance is on the other side. There's like people in the middle and Tim Cook. And Tim Cook is pinned in

up against the wall in the Oval Office. He cannot escape. Then there's a part where Trump is taking questions from the media. And Tim Cook is like, you know, he'll look to Trump

when he's talking and he'll look to the media when they're talking. And you can watch him just looking backwards and forwards as the media is asking the president about his ties to Jeffrey And Tim Cook is just standing there, looking side to side, side to side with his, I would say, at this point, patented straight face that he is shown in many images and video over the last six months.

The resting Tim face. Yes, it is. We all know it. Later in the day. We're not done. Later in the day. The journey continues. President Trump announced that there will be a 100% tariff on chips and semiconductors imported in the U.S.

like if you're importing them in any product that has them unless you are manufacturing in the US Not those chips because those chips are coming from outside the US but if the US

has decided you are a friendly company that makes things in the US and overseas then they will waive the tariff For example If you make glass for your iPhone then you can import as many semiconductors for that iPhone

as you like and you will not be tariffed on those. Oh, that means if you make 100% of them, then you would be able to import for all of them. I don't actually think it is... No, I don't think there's math in this. I don't think there's math in this. I think this is literally, if the U.S.

says so. You a friend who is doing things in the U.S., you are then waived of the tariff. Yeah. So it's, you know... So right now, and I will state, right now Apple doesn't need to pay any of these new tariffs because they're doing all this work in now I the thing is like surely five hundred billion dollars worth of investment was

enough but they've added another hundred billion onto the top of that and I guess Apple's also getting to do some of the things that they want to do in the meantime like I'll also link to a piece that John Gruber wrote where there is a part of that which I we're going to get into obviously the big thoughts of this but like we should do agree of John which is like Tim Cook probably wants Apple to be producing more stuff in America anyway, and now he is being pushed to do that because that is diversification

of the supply chain, which they've been doing. So if there are parts of the supply chain that they can diversify and it is effective for them, they can do it. And one of the ways, I guess it becomes cost effective is, would the product price increase if you didn't do it?

Right? So like it's going to be more expensive. My assumption is to produce all of your glass in America. Otherwise, why wouldn't you have them doing it before? But if now all of the products that have that glass would otherwise be more expensive because they're tariffed, it makes it an easier thing to do. So, exactly. It serves a couple of purposes, business purposes. But the news of the week is the trophy. That's the actual news, I think. More than anything else, I think the thing that people are getting really hung up on is the trophy. I guess we'll call it

trophy. I don't really know what else you would call it. It's a commemorative item which commemorates Apple's commitment to American manufacture presented to the president, signed by Tim Quirk of a big Apple logo on it. I will say, ugly trophy in my opinion. Don't actually think it looks very nice. I think there's lots of different designs that they could have made for that trophy, irrespective of the gold. I just don't think that the disc. I'll say it's very easy to create your own gem moji of this trophy and send it to all of your friends to grief on them, which I've been doing for the last few days. What do you think about

the trophy, Jason? I mean, I think it's tricky because you're trying to, you're essentially trying to please a guy and you don't know whether this will please

him or not, right? I think Apple, you know, did its best here to, we got a box and we're going to assemble this trophy and it's got gold and it's got corning and, you know, I don't think, you know, they wanted something symbolic. It does definitely feel like what is it exactly you need us to do? How do we need to debase ourselves in order to get you to give us what we want? And I've said it before, and I'll say it again, what politicians in general, not just Trump, but politicians in general want,

is to have victories that make them look good and so if you're trying to please them you try to give them ways that make them look good and whether that's the I mean one of the reasons the trophy looks like that is because they wanted it to be corning glass because they wanted corning to be involved in some way and then somebody said and gold because he likes gold

yeah yeah yeah yeah let's do that we'll put some gold on there too um look I mean, this is, this is Tim Cook grovelling, right? This is Tim Cook

debasing himself because he feels he, because he needs to. Because, and this is, okay. All right, I, I will. How many fourth starts are the two of us going to go through? All right. Well, I'm just, I'm, it's like a pillow. I'm just creating a soft pillow for this

that I'm going to say here, Which is, well, I've seen a lot of people who've said stuff like, obviously Tim Cook loves Trump, I defy you to look at Tim Cook and think he enjoys being there. I think Tim Cook and everything he said, I think he hates this. But I think I think he has the CEO of a incredibly valuable publicly held profit generation corporation, capitalist corporation, feels like he needs to do this for the business. that making an enemy of a president of the United States who has infinite ways of punishing enemies and ruining their businesses is not a thing he's interested in doing.

He wants to kind of go along to get along and you can not like that. I don't like how he has grovelled. I don't like how he has debased himself here, but I understand why he's doing it. And so if you want to be mad at him, be mad at him. If you want to be disappointed in him, I think you can absolutely be disappointed in him.

But what I keep coming back to is what I view as misplaced anger. Because Tim Cook groveling in the Oval Office and giving the president a gaudy bobble is a symptom. It's not the disease. It doesn't, the trophy doesn't mean anything. It is all part, and this is what I liked about. Gruber's piece is this is all part of the failure of

America. Yes. The fact that it is a system so corrupt If you don't mind, Jason, don't hate the play and hate the gang. I mean, so one, it's a corrupt system and it's a corrupt administration. They want, you know, they're enriching

themselves. They will do whatever they want and they want everybody to play ball with them. They've been given basically kind of freedom to do whatever they want by the courts, which they control, the legislature they control. So essentially, you'd give them what they want or they hurt you. And that is, is that a corrupt unjust system? It is. But again, I can be disappointed and hate the, you know, what Tim Cook did.

But I think if where I pile my anger is Tim Cook or Apple, I am piling my anger in the wrong area. Yeah. And then second, I will also say, let's also, so now that we've talked about the government, let's also talk about capitalism. Because, so, you know, everybody get out your notebooks and it's no. What I said before, Tim Cook is a CEO of a profit seeking corporation. And that is something that we, I think, I thought everybody got reminded at earlier this year. But like, Apple is a giant capitalist enterprise who's designed to maximize shareholder revenue.

and generate enormous profits. And as you pointed out, quite rightly, building things in America instead of getting 100% tariff is a thing that makes financial sense. And so you do it. Making the president of the United States a trophy that is worthless and maybe he doesn't even care about, but it allows him to feel good

and move his attention away from Apple to someone else so that Apple can continue to throw off enormous profits every quarter is the goal for them. And you don't have to, again, none of this is things that people have to like. You can like it. You can dislike it. Your feelings are yours,

and I think they're perfectly valid. But I think let's keep in mind what the problem is here. And I have seen some people who, in my opinion, are acting like Tim Cook is the problem. And Apple is the problem. And I'm not happy about Tim Cook. cook having to do this. But I do kind of think he had to do it. I don't blame him. I don't

blame him. I just don't. I can't. I don't know what you're supposed to do. I wouldn't want that job. No. I wouldn't want to do it. I wouldn't want to do it. I remember I had a, I was told to do something once that I absolutely hated in one of my previous jobs. And I mean, and I was, I was young. And, you know, for whatever reason, I basically said to my boss, you got to order me to do this because I'm not going to you need to basically say you have to do this and then I'll do it and even then I you know I wanted to keep my job so I did it and I hated every bit of it and I still think about it right but it was a thing that that like came down from on high and it was like this is a thing that this organization has to do and if you're going to work here you have to do this thing

and like you could say well Tim Cook shouldn't have done it I guess what I would say is Tim Cook was always going to do it because he's the CEO of Apple I think Tim Cook hates every minute of it, but I think Tim Cook is thinking, my job is to keep Apple going and being successful. And I've spent the bulk of my entire career, which is running out of time now, whether it's five or ten years, whatever, on Apple. And Apple's success. And the president of the United States, hating Apple, because of the supply chain that I set up, is bad for Apple. So I need to do whatever is possible to get him. him off my back. And if I need to eat

I will do it. And, uh, and he, and that's what he did. You can bleep that part. I will. I've written a note to all right. Thanks, Jim. It's a very rare, I'm not going to, I'm not going to sugarcoat that. I mean, that's what he did. He was eating shit. There it is. Again, Jason. Um, sorry, it's extra work. You can take this whole part out then. Whatever. No, that was good. It's good. I like it. Keep going. I keep going. I. But like, right? So, so, so that It's like, I don't like it. He doesn't like it.

He thinks this is his job. Maybe you say, oh, I wouldn't do it if I were him. Well, you're not him. And if you rose to the level of a CEO of a company like Apple, either you would do it or you'd never get that job because that's the job of being a CEO of a company like that. Everybody has to do things at their job that they don't want to do. Everybody has to do that. That is a thing that you can. Now, is it at the level of play K.

the president. No, it's not at that level. But there is a thing and I just think that like here's one of the things that I've been wondering if I was going to say. And if this makes you mad, then blame my back. Don't get mad at me.

And this isn't, this isn't even speaking to our entire audience. Because I know that there are people in our audience that don't care about this and or support the president. I think it's fine. So they, so it doesn't bother them. if Tim Cook gave some kind of award to a democratic president, would you be as mad? And like, and my point to this is, you're annoyed at the system.

The trophy is unimportant. Like, the fact that he gave him a trinket, it's, there is no point being mad at a trophy. Don't be mad at a trophy. It's a symptom of the, of the disease. The diseases here. Or you have a CEO that is motivated because of the way that capitalism works, because of the way that publicly held companies work. He's motivated in doing the right thing for his corporation to maximize their profits and value. And then you're also mad at the political environment in the United States where the government of the United States is controlled by a bunch of people who are breaking a bunch of norms and want what they want and are willing to threaten all sorts of corporations in order to get.

investments in the United States and to abandon foreign manufacturing as much as is possible. And, you know, you have to decide how it is. So, you know, I'm not saying, again, I just want to say, I don't like it. I thought it was terrible. I thought it was embarrassing. I thought it was real bad. You know, I said bad words unupgraded. They had to bleep. But, and I wouldn't want that job. I would not want that job. But I understand why it happened. It's because of those other things. I'm going to bring in a question from the Discord. And this came in while we were alive in it comes from Trevor. Because I actually think this is a good question. I'd like to hear your thoughts about how Apple approached the San Bernardino FBI story compared to how Apple was approaching Trump

today. Very quick, prime for people that don't remember this. This was a, I don't even remember when this was, but there was a score shooting and the FBI wanted Apple to unlock. Was it a shoot? It wasn't school? It was just a shooting. No, I think it was just a shooting. Thank you. Uh, yes. So was a shooting in San Bernardino. Is it terrible that my mind always goes to school shooting as like the first place? Yeah, this was, I think, a non-school shooting, but it was, yeah, this guy shot a bunch of people. Yeah. Or shot out a bunch of people.

The FBI wanted Apple to unlock the phone, and Apple said no. And it became a big, big deal. Here's the thing. This isn't the same. That is not the same. Because the scenario that the FBI and I guess the government were asking for was for, was for a back door to the iPhone. Apple just denied another backdoor to my government, right? And that became like a whole thing, which that has just continued working its way out,

in a sense of like, we will leave the business in the UK if you keep pressing us for this. If the American government now asks for that, then we can compare those two things. I do not think that that is similar, right? Like in the idea of like we hold Apple to distance. I have never had any feeling about Apple and their view towards capitalism, because that's what this is, right? Like, they're willing to, I don't really know if they're actually paying anyone off. Like, they're just doing what the president wants, right? Which is to invest in American manufacturing. It's not like, well, it does not appear that Apple is done here. It's like what a bunch of other companies are doing where they're where they're actually paying the president

right they're giving money to the library now if we get to that point then we've gone to a different scenario but like i just think that this is this is just an example of one of the biggest companies in the world doing the things that they've always done they're doing in a different way which is they are doing the thing that makes them the most money the easiest and causes them to have the less aggravation from the companies that they operate in. Like, look at Apple in China is probably worse than Apple in America, right? Sure.

And like we've always looked at that as like, well, this is a bad mark on the company, right? And I think that the things that they do to placate China are worse than what they're doing. That ride hailing, according to the Apple and China book, that ride hailing investment they did, where they put an enormous sum of money into some ride hailing. That was because the Chinese government made them do it. And they never saw anything from it. No. And it was literally give us money.

Yeah. To show your fealty. Now, is it not great that we're comparing government relations in the U.S. with the People's Republic of China? I would say it's not great. No. But what I would say is about to go back to San Bernardino for a second, I'll just say. San Bernardino happened in a complex web of what the FBI wanted, what the government wanted more broadly, what was legal, what Congress could do, what the judges might rule. There was a whole kind of framework about it. What's happening with tariffs is fiat. It is literally the president of the United States can destroy your business with a stroke of a pen. It's not a complex interaction between lawyers and judges and is this legal and does Congress need to pass a law and there's this surveillance court over here. And like,

That's not what's happening here. And that's, to me, that's the biggest difference is if the, if the, if applicants put in a position where they need to decryp something and the argument is we're going to slap you with an enormous tariff on all your products, unless you decrypt something, we'll see what they do, right? That's different, though. That's a much more kind of cataclysmic thing. And again, you know, there's comments in our, in our Discord right now that are like, well, you know, I just want them to stand up. I want them to stand up for what's right. And it's like, again, Apple's not interested in standing up for what's right. Apple is interested in doing what's right for Apple as a corporation that generates a lot of money and has a lot of shareholder value. And, you know, be disappointed in that if you want to be. Yeah. And maybe, maybe suggest that maybe they never were that company. You just thought, we just thought they were. Apple, I would say, and we've talked about this a lot, Apple is among trillion dollar in. highly profitable companies, a company that has made some interesting choices because they want to

think long term, they want to think about the big picture, they want to think about how they serve their customers, and they think about what benefits them in terms of being viewed as a company that has values. All those things are intermixed. They aren't, you can't pull them all out. You can't say, well, this means Apple has no corporate values. They do have corporate values. However, the corporate values that they espouse are balanced with generating enormous profits and shareholder value. And also, the arguments are often by the executives, including especially Tim Cook, the arguments are, we do these things because we can afford to have a, think about the bigger picture about the world. And they're, you know, their carbon neutral promise and their use

of recycled materials. And I'll point out one great example of this, which is Apple has been committed to recycling materials in iPhones for quite a while, especially. especially since Greenpeace called them out. They've had their little eco-checklist and they've moved toward having more recycle material in their devices as well as the move toward being carbon neutral. Well, that was questioned by some people

as being kind of green and wasteful and what were they doing. And Apple says, well, we're thinking of the big picture and we think that recycling the materials is a good idea. And then you get in a situation where China says, we may not give you rare earth minerals

that you need for your smartphones. And Apple is like, well, we've been working on lots of rare earth recycling and we just made a deal with a rare earth mineral company in California and we're going to you know that's going to be part of our strategy so a lot of times it's been borne out that the big the long term big picture thinking that they do that is seen as corporate values ends up being valuable to them but like it's a it's you can't pick and choose it's all part of the same thing and if there was a corporate deeply held corporate value that would destroy the company's valuation in the stock market, it would not be so deeply held for very

long. That's just the truth of it. And it's like everything else, you just, if you think they've changed, well, let's wait until these scenarios come up. Like, there's someone in the Discord who makes like a great point that like there are a lot of people inside of Apple, a lot of queer employees, trans employees who they're being undermined by the government. But as far as I'm where, Apple doesn't seem to have made any changes to its DEI policies like many other companies have. So while you don't necessarily feel like the actions of the president are, sorry, the actions of Tim Cook are making you feel like it's a company that outwardly, at least the president

is like, you know, not against him. It seems like the infrastructure inside of the business has not changed. And so, like, maybe you need to look at that and be like, okay, at least Apple is not removing my protections, where if maybe I worked at Disney, they would, right? And so, like, nothing's perfect here, right? If everything's far from, I think that we're both saying it's disappointing to us. Like, no one wants to see this happening, but it's not surprised, I am not surprised by it in the way that it seems like a lot of my colleagues. seem to be. It is not surprising to me. Right. Right. I would say, yeah, disappointing for sure. But we've been talking about this for a long time. This is, look, Tim Cook is trying to navigate a difficult

environment. That's what he's trying to do. And if you view this environment as being the last days of America and that it's all going to be taken over and that they're going to, you know, and it's the worst case scenario and it's going to be this just enormous disaster that happens and that Tim Cook will be judged as a collaborator. You can do that. And you might be right.

You might be right. But I would say that, I would say that from Tim Cook's perspective, as a CEO of a giant profit-seeking company, he's trying to navigate through this and do what he needs to do and no more.

And as you pointed out, Mike, there are some side benefits because he is kind of trying to diversify out of China. And this gives him a really good reason why he has to do some of that to invest in America. And also I would say,

yes, investing in America for a giant American company like Apple is not bad. And political pressure from both parties, by the way, to invest more in America is a thing that they're reacting to.

But in the end, there's going to be, you know, more than half a trillion dollars, depending, you know, as Apple calculates it, coming into the U.S., including a whole bunch of new people hired in Kentucky to work on a Corning. So, like, there are positives, but, you know, in the end, it's about Tim Cook trying to navigate difficult circumstances in a way that keeps Apple as much Apple as it can be in these circumstances. And again, if you want to be disappointed in that, please do. but I would say don't lose sight of why he has to do that.

And I would again argue that he has to because he wouldn't be the CEO of Apple if he wasn't willing to do that sort of thing. It's about the rest of it. It's about his role and Apple's role as a giant profit seeking corporation. And it's about where we are with the government and the way that it's been, you know, taken over. And the way force is being applied by it to American institutions. That's where we are. Again, if you haven't, if you've maybe not heard completely, we said a lot, we both think this absolutely sucks, right?

But I think that, I think, this obviously my opinion, so of course I think this, I think we're able to take a more level-headed approach to what is actually going on here, I think. Yeah, there's, and what I would say is there's both. We have been talking for a long time about, you know, Trump comes in the first time and they're like, oh, whatever it was, 300 billion for America. Biden comes in and they do the CHIP Act and they're like 400 billion for America. Trump comes back and they're like 500, 600 billion for America. This has been going on a while and you look at that and you're like, okay, like, I see what's going

on. It's politics. It's been politics for years now about making the U.S. government feel like Apple is an active participant in America and in the American economy. And it's why Apple does all those self-serving press releases about the app economy. And we've enabled so many app developers, and they take credit for all the app developers who are employed anywhere in the United States as part of Apple's great economic boom, which we can argue about. But they do that. Like, all of that has been going on forever.

So that's not surprising at all. I will say what is new and unique about this situation is that Apple felt the need or the White House felt the need or whoever felt the need for Tim Cook to come to the White House and kiss the ring. and that's unpleasant and unfortunate and says something not just about the system we live in, but the times we live in and the people who are running my country. And that's just how it is. It's happened before politicians, presidents, laying industry low when it serves them.

It's happened before. I think it's really unfortunate. So I would say that's the difference for me is there's the, we'll throw another $100 billion on the pile. I mean, they're over half a trillion dollars in commitments now, right? Like, they're spending a lot of money here. There's that. And then there's the, yeah, but you also have to go to the White House and kiss the ring.

You have to base yourself in public, express your, you know, admiration for the great man and then sit there and smile while they ask him and J.D. Vance about Jeffrey Epstein. So that's the part that, again, I wouldn't want that job. It pays well, but I wouldn't want that job. And they wouldn't give it to me because I wouldn't execute it like Tim Cook does. That's just it. This episode is brought to you by e-cam. If you're looking to get into video, you need e-cam.

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our thanks to ECAM for their support of this show and relay I'm going to do it again what we're doing it again

we're doing another blind ranking oh no and I've worked harder this time at trying to stack the items to make it

harder for you to make your decisions we'll find out if I actually succeeded this time jason i have a list of 10 bad apple products okay bad determined by you yeah i will give you one at a time you have to put them on your one to 10 list i will give you no indication of which is better than the other you can only put one product in each slot so it's a list of 10 you don't know what they are i'm going to start giving them to you and we're going to see where you end up with your

blind ranking list I know you understand but do you understand yes so I have to go one to ten and they're gonna

they're gonna go where they're gonna go you pick 10 bad Apple products I have one question is one the worst Apple product one is the most bad yes one is the most bad most bad

to less the most bad bad. Okay. You could also think of this as flops or fails, you know? Okay. We can think of it like that.

But they're products. They're not events. They're products. Okay. Products, and I would just say it's hardware and software products, but like products. Okay.

Great. We're going to start out with from 2015 the Apple Watch edition, the $17,000 gold Apple Watch. Okay, I have a question for you. Yes.

Are these 10 products that you consider to be 10 really, really bad products, or did you put some good products in with it? I didn't put any good products in here. Okay. Yeah. I don't know if you're supposed to do that.

Apple Watch, the gold watch, speaking of gold things. Yeah. So this wasn't an Apple Watch that did nothing different except be gold. And you got a big box. Series Zero, but gold. I think it's dumb, but I don't think

it's super offensive. It's just dumb. I'm going to put it in ninth. Oh. Okay. All right. My second item for you. Okay.

Is the hockey puck mouse. So this was a, was this for the G3? This mouse? The IMAQ, yeah. The IMAQ, 3. It was a round mouse. Perfectly round. Very hard to understand how to use it correctly because you weren't sure what direction

you were pushing it in. And you move it right and the cursor goes up because you don't know what it is, where it is. They made, they literally made things that snapped. onto it that were oval. And didn't, didn't they do, like, an apology mouse, essentially? They're like, you can have this. The clear, the clear oval one was the, basically the apology mouse from 2000. Did they give those away to people?

At McRold Expo 2000. Yeah, so they were like under your seat kind of thing. We have a, we have a mouse for you. I mean, I've literally, yeah, I've literally got one on my desk. They, yeah, they made a good one and they put it, they put it in a box under everybody's seats at Macworld Expo, New York, 2000. Yeah. And it was very much like a Steve, one of those, this will come back many years later when Steve Jobs had to give away a bumper case to everybody is the idea of like, hey, well, here you go.

What I'll tell you is that, what I tell you is everybody, what it meant is that for every Mac World Expo after that, everybody looked under their seat the moment that they went in, which there was never anything under their seat again. Because Apple never screw it up ever again. I'm going to say hockey puck mouse is three. Oh, okay. I'm going to say a name I've not said in a long time here for your third line.

Obi-Wan. iTunes Ping. Oh, iTunes Ping. Yeah. Oh. I was around when Ping was introduced and I know its name

and it comes up as a joke. In preparing for this episode I had to actually remind myself with the functionality of Ping like what it actually did because Apple have released other products like kind of in the years

since where it's like, do you remember, I think there was Apple Music Connect was a thing where if you were an artist, you could like post little updates on your artist page. But Ping was essentially Facebook inside of iTunes, but only about music. So you could automatically, as a user, have your Apple Music purchases shared with your friends and your friends could comment on them. Music artists could post status updates that you could also comment on. And you could also, in theory, I don't know if this actually ever really worked, like buy concert tickets inside of Ping.

I'm going to put it fifth. Okay. It was bad but harmless. Can I just say, so we're three items in. Am I doing about a job than I did with the other one so far? It's all, I mean, it's all to play for. I don't know. Maybe.

We'll see how frustrated I get is. slots fill up and I have to put things in places I don't want to put them. All right. Well, let's see how you feel about this. Number four, air power. Oh, air power. Uh-huh.

This was so failure. This is such a failure, I should say. It never actually shipped. Uh, so this was the Apple charging mat where in theory, you could put your products anywhere on this mat and it would charge. And what made that unique was there wasn't a product like that. And they kind of still isn't really. And in fact, this product was such a failure.

It wouldn't have worked when MagSafe came along a few years later, right? Like the air power would have just been... Maybe they never would have done MagSafe, although there were a bunch of other reasons why MagSafe is good. But, like, essentially, you could put it wherever you wanted. The Apple showed it off. They were like, look how cool we are. We could innovate.

Look at this. Incredible product. It's coming soon. We can't wait for you to do it. And this is in 2017. It got canceled in 2019. because the story goes It kept catching fire

And those things were overheaten Because there were so many coils In there Where does air power go on your ranking? I'm going to put it sixth And my reason is again It was kind of harmless In the sense that it never actually shipped

But it was a flop Number five Okay mobile me mobile me was Apple's original cloud service it launched so poorly

they had to do it all over again with iCloud so this was what this was like mail uh what is it like at mac right email addresses contact calendar sync

that kind of stuff and it had the the me yeah and it did it have an at logo yeah it's like the app that was in there as well Mobile Me, I will say, so Zoe is saying it's in the Discord, I agree, I have mobile me and never had any problems with it. I had no issues with Mobile Me, but lots of people did. Things were broken. And I think this was the thing where Steve Jobs, there was like

this, this had come up recently. There's like, when talking about the Apple Intelligence stuff, I think this was when Steve Jobs said, like, you've ruined Apple's reputation. Is there something in an internal meeting? Where does MobileMe rank for you? This, it was, the ramifications, like you said, some people had a fine experience with it, but it was slow, it was unreliable. And the ramifications of it were large, not only internally, but also I would say that not, I mean, first off, I cloud existed because they couldn't call it mobile me anymore. They had to call it something else. It was such a stinker that they had to change the name. Yeah. And I think even I cloud, to this day, some people resist using Apple Cloud services because of, I would argue, how bad mobile. me was. What a bad impression it left. I'm going to put it second. You know, I'm going to say, no matter what you say, I feel like I'm doing a better job this time because I feel like you're having to actually deliberate where last time you just was like had no problem. Things were just flying into the grid, left, right and center and you had no problem. The list was on hard.

Yeah. Also, I made some good guesses about what was in the list. And with the exception of like maybe one thing, I have no idea what you've decided is in this list. So I'm struggling with that. All right. Number six. So in the early two, thousands. People love their iPods. People love playing music from their iPods and something that they loved was to insert their iPods into what was a growing market of speaker products that existed on the market. There were brands that I don't remember their names now, but I know I would, like, maybe like in motion or something. It was like one of these kinds of brands. The Bose sound dock is what you're looking for. But those things were popping up that front

and center. So Apple was like, I want to get myself a slice of that pie. So they decided. to unveil in 2006 for the cool, cool price of $349, the iPod Hi-Fi, which is well known to long-time listeners to this show, because I think you still use one. It's right behind me. I don't use it right now, although I might. Who knows, but it's right behind me. I'm currently using a couple of Sonos play ones on opposite sides of my office. The iPod Hi-Fi sounded fantastic, but nobody wanted something that was so big.

And had an oxen, it was big, but the speakers were really good. Steve Jobs told us how good they were. Wasn't this? This is one of my favorite Steve Jobs, classic things, is that he threw away all of his multi-thousand-dollar hi-fi equipment at home to replace it with the iPod Hi-Fi. And just did the iPod Hi-Fi. Yeah, that's what he said.

That's what he said. This is also the weirdest press event because they had like a dorm room. or something that they had set up upstairs of town hall with an iPod hi-fi in it and it was all like they're like yeah we'll dress these rooms with lifestyle scenes containing Apple products it was so weird one year before before before the iPhone which I just think is like just timeline wise it's just so fascinating product like this to exist no I'm putting it at 10 because I think the only problem with the iPod hi-fi was the price that's because you love it

you love it that's why good sounds good and unlike the HomePod has an ox in so you could use it years after the iPod was irrelevant, which I did. I'm moving things around here because I think this would be fun to just do it now. Okay. From 2018, The HomePod. This was not at this point in the list, but I think it's too fun not to put them together. The HomePod, too expensive, unreliable, left and wrecked wooden tables, if you remember, the original one. Oh, yeah, good times.

But they've the rings on the wooden tables. I got one of those right next to me too. If you've mentioned the past episodes that, you know, everybody's dies. Mine haven't. I don't know if yours have, but everybody's dies. I have lost a couple. I actually am sending one in to get repaired. There's a guy who's figured out how to fix home pods.

He figured out what breaks in them and you can just send it to him and he'll fix it. I'm going to try it with one. What a tiny contage industry. Yeah, it's just some dude who thinks you can make some money fix on iPods or Homepods, whatever. I'm going to put it, um, so the thing about the HomePod is like the iPod high-fi is overpriced and, and over-engineered as well. Mm-hmm. Sound was pretty good. They were never really that reliable.

Um, but I still have one and maybe two again soon that I use. so of the original HomePod It's a mess though I'm gonna you know These are products that don't deeply offend me I'm gonna put it eighth Okay So we have three items left on the list

You have spots one, four and seven open Yes You've got a good spread across the board here I'm gonna throw out one to you here It's gonna be interesting to see where you put this Ranging from the years of 2015 to 20, the butterfly keyboard oh butterfly keyboard apple's thinnest keyboard apple's most unreliable keyboard destroying computers left right and center where is it going to put it forth and i'm going to do

that this is you can pat yourself on the back i'm going to reserve number one i'm hoping something really really bad is still lurking um and so i'm going to put it forth i thought about putting it but I'm going to reserve I may regret this later but that's where I'm going to put it because it's a blind ranking I have to do it I'll put a fourth it's bad

that's very bad I'm excited now I'm excited this is fun all right so I'm going to go with now Apple Maps the original launch in 2012 so bad

yeah axed Scott Forstall Tim Cook had tuition apology it resulted in iOS 7 because Johnny I've got to take over you know where's that going to go is it going at number one? Is it going at number seven? It goes at number seven.

I mean you've got to start somewhere they felt they needed to do it right then they weren't quite ready unlike MobileMe where they had to like change the name and move to a different country and put on a hat and some sunglasses, album maps has just kind of continued on. I think there still exist people who will refuse to use it because they had an initial bad impression, but generally I think

that they've recovered from that. So I don't think it has a lot of longstanding damage. I'll put it seventh. So we've only got one spot left. Yeah. So I saved number one for what I think I wouldn't put it number one, but we'll see. What do you think it is? I think it's the G4 cube. Oh, interesting. Okay. That's an interesting guess. From 2000. 2009. Oh. The third gen iPod shuffle. Oh.

Horizontal buttons. I love this, Mike, for me. I love this for me. No, no. Well, unless I got the gen wrong. Oh, no, the iPod show. The buttonless shuffle. No buttons.

Look, they're too bad. They're the two worst iPods. And so you pick one of the two worst iPods. Yes. I'll put it number one. I'll do it. I'll defend the indefensible. I'll just go with it.

Yes. And let's put all the other bad iPods up there too. This, no, this one, see, the one, the other iPod shuffle that clipped on with the buttons, that one, I like that. That was a great one. I love that one. And they brought it back. This is, this is, Mike, this is the product so bad that the next generation iPod shuffle reverted. Yes.

To the previous design. Yes. When does Apple do that where they're like, oh, never mind. We're going back to the old model because this was such a bad idea. So this shuffle. So this shuffle only worked with voice control. So you had to use. they are kind of

earbuds from Apple or ones that had a microphone and you could only control all of your iPod by speaking to it well that's not that's not entirely true because it had

if you had the headphones with the clicker on it the clicker would do play pause and volume good point good point and if you had only one playlist on the iPod shuffle which a lot of people just did

you could just press play and it would shuffle and that's fine and I think there was maybe a switch on it to put it in non-chuffle mode but yeah it's I have one in a drawer over here it's a terrible idea for a product

yeah it was just it was just too far because like yes you know it just required it just wasn't it just wasn't the thing it just wasn't the thing otherwise they would have kept it that way wouldn't they if that was thing I think there was a stainless steel one of those though which was nice

I mean probably so let's go let's see what your list is at and then I'll give you the opportunity If you'd like to re-rank, you can re-rank. So at number one, third-gen iPod Shuffle. At number two, mobile me. At number three, the hockey puck mouse. Number four, the butterfly keyboard.

Number five, ping. iTunes Ping. Number six, air power. Number seven, Apple Maps. Number eight, the home pod. Number nine, the gold Apple Water Edition. And number 10, the iPod Hi-Fi. Would you put those in any additional, in any reverted order,

had the opportunity to do so. Hmm. I think I'm happy with this order. If I had to make a change, I think philosophically, my question would be, would I, no, no, actually, you know, I'm okay with it. I'm okay with this order. And my reason is, I think the top four or five are legitimately. bad real products I think

you know iTunes ping legitimately bad they had to overcome it some people thought it was fine uh

you know iTunes ping no no so the top four are bad five six ping and air power are kind of harmless because they didn't ship yeah

Apple Maps got better home pod got better and was fine as a product, it was just mispriced and misconceived. Watch Edition Gold was a... That's the one I might lift up because that was a misfire

in a few different ways that were representative. But at the same time, it just was a very expensive Apple Watch, series zero, whatever. And the iPod, high-fi, again, like the HomePod, a perfectly okay product

that was mispriced and misconceived, very much like the HomePod. So, again, I might lift up the watch edition gold and put it further up all the way, maybe even all the way to fifth. But I feel like I've got a good,

I'm actually very happy with my top four because I think those are, those products are the worst. I don't, I'm sorry, it's your list. I'm happy, you're happy with your list. I don't, I don't think that that iPod shuffle was the worst. I think the butterfly keyboard would be worse than that

because like you couldn't avoid the butterfly keyboard really. It's true. It's true. You just didn't have. to buy that iPod shuffle right mobile me you kind of couldn't avoid that the hockey puck mouse you kind of like these these were bad and they were forced upon you because it's other decisions you wanted to make and it was kind of no way i mean if i made this list from scratch yeah i probably wouldn't put the button in the shuffle as the greatest crime ever committed um but i also hate that

product and i don't feel bad about it being number one because i think it's such a bad product you know does that make any sense it does make sense are there things that are worse here um yeah Yes, you know, I could reorder them, but also I look at where everything is and I don't feel, like, I don't look at at the numbers that I gave them and say, oh, no, I've made a horrible mistake. You've driven me into, you know, picking a perfectly good product as number one worst of all time. So that's fine. I would have felt that way about the G4 cube because that was, that was a problematic product, but it wasn't the worst of all time. No. And you have a soft spot for that one.

I mean it's pretty but it was also a disaster so yeah this episode is brought to you by Factor summer often means having a fun a summer of fun in fact but also summer of busy schedule when it comes to eating before heading out again you might only have two minutes to spare and that's where Factor can help you you can eat smarter with tasty chef prepped meals that a dietitian approved delivered right to your door

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Yeah, Lauren, when we get those Factor boxes in, she takes them to work with her and leaving very few for me. But that's fine because she's the one who has to leave the house and has to have a lunch. every day, whereas I have a whole kitchen to work with. And my mom wasn't, I think, eating as well as we like, she doesn't really want to make food for one person. It's kind of hard. And so she was having, you know, maybe not as much nutrition as we would have liked. And so we started giving factor meals for her. And she, in fact, I just got in an email, like, she just had her, her factor meals delivered, you know, last week for. Coming in great. Yeah, yeah. So definitely, this is something that we're using ourselves because they, uh, they taste really good. And, uh,

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to get 50% off plus free shipping. Get delicious ready to eat meals delivered with Factor and the link is in the show notes. Our thanks to Factor for their support of this show and Relay. It's time for some ask, upgrade questions to finish out today's episode of the upgrade program. First, we'll go to Nathan, who asks, when a new beta is released, do you have a specific order that you update your devices, or is it random? And I will say, beta 6 came out while we were recording.

While we were talking. I guess we're now on the weekly, because we're hurtling towards the release of this hot off the press, I think, version of iOS when it originally shows. But do you have a specific order or do you just do whatever you feel like? I don't have a specific order. The watch comes last because it takes forever

and it's really unreliable and I think I've got my watch on the public beta. So it does an overnight update and I don't worry about it. I do the iPhone and the iPad usually first but that's mostly because those betas tend to come out before the Mac beta comes out. Yeah.

But I don't have any particular order beyond that. And then the watch is last, obviously. And I haven't even done the Apple TV because I fear the consequences of that. Yeah, I don't do the watch or the Mac, like, ever. I just don't do that. I decide I've reached the point where I need to do the watch. I generally hold that off until late. And so I just did it with the public data.

Yeah, if I was ever going to do it, I'll do public, but I just don't do the watch. Yeah. Typically for me, I will always start with an iPad, so that's the only what I'm doing. Then when I bring my iPhone into it, my iPhone is the one that I go for first because that's what I'm using the majority of the time. So that's what I go for first. Yeah. Sometimes it's really whatever is closest. I have my iPhone on my desk today.

And so I have, it is rebooting right now. My iPad is in the bedroom. And so I'll have to go do that after the show. And then I obviously can't do the Mac. Whenever it comes out, I'll do it after the show and not during. I'm not going to update during the show because that would be. That would talk more about that. Maybe an upgrade plus a little bit about the way that's and how those are going.

Darren wrote in and said A lot of talk about The Finder in this year's Mac OS Baters I happen to notice how everyone calls it The Finder instead of just Finder. No one ever says the photos or the shortcuts or the messages to refer to these but it's always The Finder.

Do you have any idea where this comes from? Yeah. Funny story. I have always called it the Finder and when I got to Macworld I discovered there was a real clash

with the copy desk because the copy desk I think at Macworld and not at Mac user also wanted it to just be Finder in Finder because Finder was an app so you say in Finder

and I guess that's also an Apple style guide too that you would call Finder Finder not the Finder Finder is just an app so you wouldn't say in the files I think is a better example

you'd say in Files in the files app you would say but not the files but we often will say in the Finder and not in the Finder app or in Finder. I don't know all the details,

and it would be interesting to hear what my pals who are, remember classic MacOS days, would say. I think colloquially, in classic MacOS, we called it the Finder. I think that was a place you could go. It wasn't the desk,

there were things on the desktop, but like the Finder was like the, the, the, first, off, you know, what is it? It's the finder. It does finding. It is the place you find things. So I think it was all colloquial. I think that early on, it was perhaps officially, certainly, you know, among a lot of users, they would refer to it as the finder. Everything else was different. Although there are a couple other examples and I think it maybe goes back to the fact that it's, it is a part of speech where it is a thing that does a task because there was also back in the day. So now we have. a way you use the settings and you bring up the print utility and you choose what your printer is. And you bring up the network settings in the finder or finder and you do file sharing.

Back in the classic macOS day is how you did both those things was it with an app that we called the chooser. Which I suppose you could call chooser if it still existed today. Was it actually called chooser? Choozer. I've never heard of this. Oh, Mike. You sweet summer child. The chooser.

Maybe this just hasn't stuck in my brain, but I feel like I've never heard chooser. The chooser. Oh man, the chooser was a classic. The chooser is an application program for Macintosh using classic macOS. It's a desk accessory

and became a standalone application. It allowed users to connect to Apple share file servers, enable or disable the network access and select which printer to use. Yeah, that's what I just said. This is where you get. this is where you went

to connect to a file server via Apple Share and this is where you picked your printer it was a little you can read the Wikipedia page it had on the left side a bunch of printers you could choose from

and then on the right side sort of like other interfaces where there was like set up and do you want to print in the background background printing mic was if you print something and you want to just watch a dialogue box as it sits there and prints

and communicates over your very slow serial port and then and you can't do anything else until it's done or I think in system seven you could turn on background printing and it would print while you did other things what a revolution that was anyway you know what I'm saying so so and I'll say the Wikipedia page for chooser says the chooser and then bold's chooser

because while chooser is the name it's referred to as the chooser and the finder similarly in the Wikipedia page for finder says the finder I think it was

that there were things that were tools that did tasks and that's how it started and so it was like the finder finds files the chooser chooses printers

yeah that's what it is and so you started to think of it that way even though they were called finder and chooser finder's not an app like finder's not an app only a maniac would say well I need to change my printer I will go to chooser like nobody would have said that nobody would have said that so I think that's where it comes from and I think we have moved on and that like if you're a real stickler the right way to refer to finder is as finder but a lot of us from the old school still think of it as the finder because there was the finder and there was the chooser and that's just I think that that's where it comes. from. Sounds like Batman.

So I'm talking about Batman villains now. The chooser, the riddler, the penguin, the finder. Yeah, the finder. The Economic. The Joker. Yep. Rob writes in and says, do you feel it strange that it's been nearly 18 months since Apple stopped selling Apple Watches in the US with a blood oxygen functionality? And there seems to still be no progress or resolution

in bringing its functionality back. I am an original Apple Watch Ultra owner and like the functionality, and I won't be purchasing a new Apple Watch to replace my current to resolve, what are your thoughts? So I did some research today. The most recent update that we have is actually from the beginning of last month, where Apple was still talking to U.S. appeals courts about getting this overturned. It doesn't appear that this is going to change. I mean, there was an executive change. I think the CEO of Massimo got pushed out, and I think people thought that was going to suggest that a deal was going to be done. But it still seems

like Massimo is not backing down and Apple's still trying to make their case to get the import ban lifted. So, you know, just as I know in case people aren't following it super closely, like outside of the US, dysfunctionality still exists. Like if I bought an Apple Watch Series 10, I would

have a blood oxygen sensor in it. And it's interesting to kind of go back to the beginning of this show. We were talking about the Apple Watch Ultra getting an update this year too. And I could imagine that maybe Ultra users specifically want these kinds of sensors, because it's more data about their body

and the things that they're doing. It's fascinating that this has not been resolved and that we're still at this point. And yeah, so I honestly think Apple will want to win this case, however they're going to do it, and they're not going to bring it back until they're willing to do it

because they don't want to give Massimo whatever it is Massimo wants, money-wise, for each watch. It is strange. It is strange. I do wonder sometimes if, if, here's the question. I mean, if people are asking questions about Tim Cook, if you're Apple, you could probably go to your friends in the White House and say, what can we do to fix this?

And I wonder if they're not interested in doing that because it seems too gross for them, even though that this would be a benefit. That could be said about a bunch of things, right? That they don't seem to be doing. Like, it doesn't appear that the U.S. government is putting a lot of pressure on worldwide governments around, like, steering stuff. stuff or whatever, right? Like, it doesn't appear that that is happening. Yeah, you're right. Why can't this just get squashed?

Well, maybe they're just not asking. Yeah, I think this is another example of Apple's go for broke legal strategy. Like, you know, this is, we're going to push this all the way to the end. And if at the end they still find no resolution, maybe they negotiate something. But. And I guess maybe they're willing to do the box and sense of, because that is of all of the sensors in the Apple Watch, the most useless, realistically, for most people,

because Apple has not done anything daring with it like they have with the heart rate monitor, for example. Right. Or even the sleep apnea censoring and stuff like that. Which they're not using oxygen for at all because they're using machine learning based on movement. Yep. So, yeah.

If you'd like to send in a question of your own or any feedback or follow up about the show, you can always go to UpgradeFeedback.com. Don't remember. Don't forget, sorry, there was the amnesty over my bad back about being mean to me. Please. His back is very sick. Very sick. Thank you to our members and supporters of UpgradePlus.

You can go to getupgradeplus.com and you'll get longer ad-free episodes of the show every week. Today we're going to hear about the sad, sad stories of Jason and his Maca West Tahoe Beta 5 experience, which has been very sad for Jason. you can find us on YouTube by going to Upgrade Podcast if you go there and find us on YouTube you'll see Jason's been doing a lot of work on his studio

and he's got a beautiful display behind him and you'll also I think you were probably holding up your mouse at one point during today's episode during the show

yeah that did happen at one point so people can see that I would like to thank FACTA ECAM and FitBod for their support of this week's episode

but most of all I would like to thank you for listening until next time say goodbye Jason So, goodbye, Mike Early.