Upgrade - 597: Our 2026 Wish List

Episode Date: January 5, 2026

From Relay, this is Upgrade episode 597 for January 5th, 20206, happy new year from us. This episode is brought to you by Century FitBod SquareSpace. In fact, my name is Mike Hurley. I'm joined by Jason Snell. Happy New Year, Jason. Happy New Year, Mike Hurley. Good to be back.

Back on the swing of things. I think everybody, you could justifiably call last week and the week before weird weeks because there were holidays in them, but it's over now. This is just a week. Just a, we're back in it. An old boy, we're back in it today. Today's episode is like, what if we just do all of the stuff that happens? Uh-huh. That's where we are. But I have a snow talk question for you that comes from Jim, and Jim wants to know, Jason, how do you feel the list of books that you want to read and how do you decide what you want to read next? Oh, man. That's a good question. listener jim um so one way we do it people who listen to the incomparable know this we have a book club where we read all of the nominated like shortlisted books on the hugo and nebula award list so that's fantasy and science fiction best novels of the year and so um when those come out that's my

reading done for a while and i actually i read all the the shorter fiction too the novellas and the and the short stories uh and so that that will generate a long list with lots of podcast homework and we end up doing like a bunch of episodes each of which contains three books or two or three books like it's a lot it's a highest homework to podcast ratio of the year too because you have to read three books in order to do one podcast

but that's what we do I've been doing that for years it means that I'm very well read in the genre and I know like all of the ones that people are talking about and that's great when that's not happening I sort of part of me feels adrift because I don't have somebody assigned a mean person assigning me things

I'm the mean person. And I also have a queue of things that people have recommended or that, you know, things I've heard about. End of year lists are really great. And what I, the other thing I do, in addition to like the series and authors and stuff that I follow where I'm just going to read their new thing whenever it comes out and I often pre-order those things is when I hear about a book that people like, what I do is I use Libby and I add it to my library queue. And so a lot of those books, you know, they get on the best science fiction books or even the best books of the year lists. And I add them.

It's very funny. The New York Times does their best books of the year list and there's a book on there that I'm interested in and I add it. And it says, oh, well, this is available at the San Francisco Public Library. And implied is because it's been on a New York Times bestseller list or best books of the year list, you are 98th in line or 145th in line. but you know what I like it I actually kind of like the vibe of

I get a recommendation from somewhere a best of list you know people a friend says they liked it or whatever I put it in the library hold queue and then that's like a popcorn machine like they're all bouncing around in there and then one will just fly out and be like hey

this book is ready I'll be like great and I do that a lot how long do you have to read it when it gives you the record like says oh your time Libby it's generally 21 days. Okay. Okay. So there's plenty of time. And you can, and if you, and if it offers to you and you're not ready, you can just, uh, you can say defer and it goes to the next person and you stay at the top of the line. So you can manage it pretty well, do a little bit of juggling, um, and keep those going. So it's good. Um, and so I do that a lot. And that, that helps manage my queue. I also have like eight books on my cobo right now. So I finished, I just finished a book the other night. Um, it's great. I've read two books. I finished two books this year already and they're both bangers. They're both five

stars on Goodreads for me. So I love it. I love it. Non-stop bangers this year, Mike. What a whole to wool? Non-stop bangers. So but then I had that moment of like what am I going to read next and it's very interesting because in this e-reader era, I'm basically

looking at what's on my e-reader being like what's next? What's next? What do I have? What do I want to go? And I've got like whatever five, eight of these books sitting there. It's like, what strikes my fancy? And then I, you know, I pick one and then I go. So that,

some of it is that too. Like, I'm in a mood for something. Sometimes I'm in a particular mood for a particular genre. There's a long-running mystery series that I really like that I've recommended a bunch

and I'm on book 12 or something of that. And like, I've got it sitting there. I always make sure that the next one is sitting there and sort of like, if I'm in a moment where I'm like, you know what? I think it's time to go back.

And I'm not going to try to blast through that series, but I'll be like, oh, I'm in the mood to go back and do that. So it's really kind of this whole big compilation of them. But you got to do all that because in the end, I read 93 books or whatever last year.

So they come from all over. But the library is a help because it creates a little stack that is randomly going to offer me a book. And that leads to very funny experiences where I will say to myself, why did I, what book is this and why did I put it in? And sometimes it's like, I don't know. I mean, obviously I put it in there. So there was a reason for it. And that happens and is kind of delightful sometimes too.

I put a link in the show notes to your good reads. list if people want to see what you're reading and what you think is good if you'd like to send in a question to help us open a future episode of upgrade please go to upgradefeedback.com and send in your own snow talk question we have some follow-up from the last couple of episodes the first piece comes from craig who says mike in regards to your comments in episode 595 about what the finder icon represents i have always understood it to be you smiling at your computer and your computer smiling back at you. The light blue slash white face is you smiling at your computer, while the dark blue half face together make the screen of your computer. So, you know, your computer's there as the

dark part and you're there as the light part, which is in your computer is smiling back at you. The Mac is friendly and easy to use, and as a result, you are left of a smile on your face whenever you use it, simple as that. My response, Craig, is that is ridiculous in the year of 2025, honestly. I think, what are we doing? This is not like a simple thing. This doesn't make any sense. Computers don't look like that. Nobody looks at their computer from a side angle.

It's ridiculous. I don't care, honestly, about the reason. It shouldn't look like that. It should just be a blue folder, and it should just look at the finder's icon. I stand by. Wow, you've drained all joy out of it. I do actually think, it's funny.

They, so this icon came about in, I want to say macOS 8 or 7 era where it was John Syracuse is yelling at me right now as he listens to this. They need to create a logo to represent macOS because macOS

licensing happened and they needed something other than the Macintosh. They needed something to do MacOS because there were going to be computers that were not from Apple that ran macOS. And it has remained like it got repurposed. It was kind of beloved it and recognizable and it's cute and so it has remained and it turned into a

representation ultimately of the finder icon, part of the Macintosh desktop experience, right? I'm I like it from a sentimental point of view, but what I would say is it's kind of a riff on the Happy Mac, the Susan Care

Happy Mac, just as the face ID icon and when you do a face ID unlock, the face ID animation is a riff on the Susan Care Happy Mac icon as well. It makes sense to me in the face ID, by the way, because it's like, you just scanned my face. So show me my face.

There are no faces in the finder. Given the state of the Tahoe icon design as we went through in our tier list, I'm reluctant to say this, but I will say, I think somebody could probably come up with a representative icon that was whimsical that could be used

and references Apple history and Mac Hill. history that is more than just the files icon, but it doesn't have to be this icon that's been with us since the 90s. I'm not sure it does. But yeah, people would scream bloody murder if they just replace the finder icon with the files icon and rename the finder icon to files. I mean, look at how some people reacted when they changed the finder colors. You know what I'm saying, Jason. Yeah. I know some people who will remain nameless. Some people really took That one's a lot.

So I wanted to, I would have mentioned, so we were talking about this in Discord. Yeah. And if you're a relay member, you can be in our Discord. And I realized that the, so there's the hug emoji, which I generally don't like. Terrible emoji. I looked up Apple's one today, like while we were preparing for the show. I really think people should just look at the Apple emoji for hug, because the hug that they have, it looks threatening. It looks like.

The person who is giving that hug, it's like in a, in like some kind of telenovela kind of thing. We're like, they're having a look over the shoulder, you know, and it's like, ha, ha, ha, I've got him. That's how it looks. We've got to get our friend Jeremy involved, former retired emoji historian. So first of, I hate the hug emoji because it's not like any other emojis in that it's mostly monochrome silhouette of two heads. and kind of like a body torso area. And the Apple one, there's like, they're slightly embossed so that you can sort of see.

There's way too many arms. I know it's the correct amount of arms, but there's too many arms. And I'm sure Emojopedia details why it's this way, but like I hate it. I hate it because emoji are a, it's a cartoon show about a series of emoji people. And these aren't them.

This is like, is this is like the bathroom symbol this is like if there's a room at the airport where you can get a hug it's got this symbol on it right and it's like I just no no no no no no no

I think it's a mistake I think it should be emoji people giving a hug in a cartoonish way not whatever this orthopedic hug diagram is trying to get across it's a disaster but but I mentioned this because unlike Apple which created these two

embossed figures. And I can tell just from the way they did it that whoever was put in charge of this one is like, whoa, this is a stinker. What am I going to do to make this scan at all? Because it's so bad. Discord did it differently because Discord uses a different emoji set. And the Discord emoji is a darker blue person hugging a lighter blue person. And while it is again very hard to scan from a distance, which makes it, I think, a failure, it is better than Apple's icon, which I don't generally say about the Discord emojis, because it is more cartoonish and because there is some contrast between them. However, as I stared at it, because somebody emoji reacted in Discord, the more I realized that with the dark blue person hugging

the light blue person, it's literally just the reverse angle of the finder icon. It's hugger, right? It's like, well, yeah, the finder icon is just the other side. Like the camera just turns around and these two faces are embracing. So anyway, what I'm saying is, the finder icon doesn't make sense but it is kind of cute I'm glad that they didn't just rip all the fun out of the finder which is the most fun app on the Mac by the way

because who doesn't like clicking on icons and looking in folders and the discord and the hug emoji is bad I'm not a crackpot thank you for listening to my TED Talk thank you for your attention how about that

David wants to know Jason where can we get the recipe for your cinnamon rolls the famous cinnamon rolls The answer is the show notes of this episode of Upgrade, or you can just search for Alton Brown overnight cinnamon rolls because it is from the TV show Good Eats. Alton Brown still has it on his website. The Food Network still has it on their website.

That's the recipe. It's great. It takes a lot of work, but they're really good. And also you had some follow-up to your E-Rida, the X-T-E-N. What is it? Do gently do not go into the Kidna or whatever it's there. The XT ink. So this came up last time that I was disappointed with this e-reader

because everybody was like, oh, you should look at it and it's cheap and it doesn't have a backlight, which I don't love, and the software was really bad. And one of the things I actually specifically didn't mention, but then, of course, everybody asked me about it is one of the things that I've discovered is that there are what they call community firmware

We're basically, so it's like an ESP 32. This is a much less sophisticated device with very little capability and very little RAM than even like any Android-based or whatever-based e-reader. It's super light. That's why it's cheap. That's why it's small. So somebody out there built an alternate firmware for it. And I think I didn't mention it because my product review brain says, if it ships it, bad, it's bad. And if it's so bad that the community has to fix it, that open source,

you know, randos on GitHub are going to make a better version of the software, that the product's a failure. And I can't, here's the thing. And I can't recommend it to people. Because I don't feel like I can recommend a product where I have to say, well, the product is it ships is terrible. But if you download some hacked together firmware from a GitHub page, it's not as bad. And it also doesn't change the fact that's got too many buttons and they're very confusing and all that. That all said, Dan Morin sent me a link to this firmware called Crosspoint Reader for this e-reader. It's a GitHub page. The thing, and link to from the GitHub page, this is the part that blows me away is you can do serial access from a web browser. So you can literally go to a page

and plug your XT Ink reader into your Mac and open the page in like Chrome and click a button and it just installs this firmware, this third-party open-source firmware. A little thing comes up and says, oh, serial port access to this e-reader that's connected to your Mac. Do you want to grant it? And you go, yes. And it goes, great.

And it updates the firmware and it reboots. And that's it. And now it's running firmware that is, I have to admit, much better. Because there are so many buttons on this thing, it actually puts, the interface actually puts like little labels down at the bottom of the screen telling you which button does what, which is really

necessary because it's two different rocker buttons, so it's really four buttons down at the bottom that look like two buttons, plus buttons on the side, it's crazy. Anyway, I wanted to mention, if you've got this XT ink reader, or if you are, as dad pointed out to me, somebody who's just having fun with a gadget,

check out the cross-point reader. We'll put a link of the show notes, because it's vastly better than whatever garbage the XT ink software is. And it's more readable. and more usable. It's still not great,

lots of issues with it, but it's more functional as a gadget. But I like the idea of small e-readers, small cheap e-readers, and I want there to be more of them. And also it's just a trend, as I mentioned last time, where there are these Chinese manufacturers

that are like, we can assemble from parts, interesting products like e-readers, and the challenge is always that they're not very good at software. This happens a lot in like, handheld gaming consoles and stuff. Yeah.

They say the impression I get from the NPC podcast. They're always talking about like third party OSs. The handheld, the retro handheld that I bought, the first thing I did is flash

Onion OS, I think it's called, which is a third party thing and then it works great. And I bought that thing knowing I was going to flash it with Onion OS. I just, again, as somebody who talks about this on a podcast and writes about it on a website,

I'm reluctant to recommend anything that is so bad that you have to replace it software with someone else's software. But in this case, it was actually, first off, amazing that you could do it with one click from your web browser. That's incredible. Yeah, that's pretty great, right?

That's, that's real nice. It was a good, it was a good update. And I like the idea, again, I like the idea of companies, especially in China, who have access to all these parts and are like, this is interesting. We can reach a smaller audience, but we could do it with pieces that are just like the chaff of smartphone world, right? Like it's just like the extras. And they're like,

but we could put them together in a different way and it would be interesting. And this is what books has done. Like they've got the Palma, which is like a phone, but it's an e-reader. Like, I love that.

And what I've seen with books is the first thing they sent to me was the hardware was perfectly fine and the software was just a nightmare. It was a weird, weird modified version of Android. And like, they're still doing a modified version of Android,

but it's like night and day between what it was like and what it's like now. It's closer to just Android. now with some stuff, right? It's closer to Android with some stuff, and you've got to do some modifications to apps in order to get them to behave well on E-ink, but

like, you don't want them to scroll, you want them to page, but over time they've gotten better at it, and that's why, although I think the XT Inc reader was kind of like overhyped because it looks so cute and it's so cheap. The MagSafe, too, is a big thing. And the MagSafe, which doesn't fit on any modern iPhone, I'm sorry,

it's too big. So, but I like the idea of this stuff. It's just, we're not And I love the idea that there is somebody out there who is making better firmware for it. That's awesome. Would it fit if your phone had a case, or is it just it overlaps? I think the challenge is that if the iconic plateau on the back is too big and too low down, then the XT Inc won't be able to get fully on your phone because it's too tall.

But it's a nice idea. This episode is brought to you by our friends over at Century. I am a lover of good applications and good experiences in those apps. When I use an app for the first time or any time, I want to be able to get in and get out with the thing that I want from it. I want it to work. I want it to be smooth. I don't want things to break. I don't want to hit bugs. It can turn me off new apps if I come to things in their buggy. This is what Century will help you all developers with because they make sure that your apps are going to run great. because when it comes to finding issues in your code

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We really appreciate it. They're a great supporter of the show, and I think you're going to love it. Thanks to Century for their support of this show and Reli. It is time to lawyer up. Clunk, clunk, clunk. There's been a lot of movement over the holiday break.

in the world of alternate app marketplaces. Oh, boy. What a world. So Apple has announced that they will be complying with the Mobile Safety Competition Act, the MSCA is another acronym for us to learn, which is Japan's offering. This is the Japan kind of bill.

And Apple is going to have a suite of changes to how the app store works. A lot of this you've heard before, some of it is actually new. So they're going to offer autochievous, App marketplaces like Altstore. In fact, Altstore have already announced that they're in Japan. They're now available in Japan. Altstor are ready for this. I mean, they were talking about this a couple of weeks ago. They expect a bunch of countries to have this available this year and they're going to be ready in all of them. But in Japan, there will be no website loading. That is not a part of this bill. So you won't be able to just download an app from the web like in theory you can in the EU. There will be new payment options. So alternative payment processes in app for digital goods, but it must be offered alongside Apple's in-app purchase method. And there will also be links to pay outside of the app available to developers.

There are some commission changes if you want to do anything outside of Apple's systems. So, it's a 10% base commission for the various programs that exist, small business, mini-apps, that kind of thing. And first year of subscriptions are at 10%. It's 21% for digital goods and services otherwise. then it's 15% is paid if for purchases made when linking out. So they're the kind of the three things. So if you're doing stuff inside of the new terms and you want to offer different things,

it's 10% if that's your base, if that's what you do, 21% for digital goods and services. Otherwise, and then 15% if it's for anything where you're linking somebody outside of the store. And that's going to be that whole thing where you have to keep your own books and report them to Apple and they may audit you at any time. plus the core technology commission of 5% in all sales. So you get up towards 26% for most people very quickly. There are also some iOS changes requested as part of this. Alternate browser engines is one that we've seen before.

The ability to swap the side button for voice assistants. So you could use a different voice assistant instead of Siri. And also interoperability requests where you can say to Apple, or we make a smart watch and we would like to have access to this or that, you can make those that will be a formalized process for it. Also in the MSCA is a bunch of rules about how this applies to children.

So apps in the kids category cannot offer links to pay outside of the app store for purchases. Any app that has in-app payments from a third party must add a way for parents to approve purchases. So if somebody is, I believe it's under 18, they receive a 16.18, they have to have the, you know, with Apple's system, they're in a family group, right? And they say, like, I want to buy this. And then the parent get a notification. And they say yes. So even if you're using a third party, this has to be implemented. Apple is apparently working on tools to make this work for third party payment providers.

Apple has been taking shots at the DMA when talking about this. Here is a quote. For instance, similar regulatory changes in Europe. have enabled types of apps that were previously unavailable on iOS, including pornography apps. This quote comes from a transmitter at 9 to 5 Mac. I do find this point kind of strange, because do you think the EU would have a problem if Apple said, like, we can have these kids' things? I think one of the things they are talking about is the fact that there's no website loading, but nevertheless, they could still do some of the stuff.

No, because there was that one pornography app that was in an old. alternative app store, I think, yeah, I think what they're suggesting here is that based on their interpretation of the rules, they can't do this in the EU because this is a control they're not allowed. I'm not sure if that's true or if somebody at the European Commission might say, well, you could totally do that. My feeling is assumed we would not let you do that. If you feel like you can only do things via your interpretation of the rules, which I think has absolutely been Apple's modus operandi so far with the DMA, hence what I've had to completely overhaul. they're offering two or three times at this point.

But I just, you know, I've had it frustrating. John Gruber points out that in his communication with Apple, they seem to better respect the decisions here in Japan and feel that it more closely aligns with some of the elements that they feel are important, stuff like child protection, privacy and security, and getting Apple paid for their intellectual property. Gruber notes that there is no announcement of features being withheld

for Japanese users like they are in the EU with the DMA, right? and he's saying that like oh you know we're not withholding anything i do wonder i mean i don't know if he's had specific conversations about this but well there aren't any new features yet right like this happened after ios 26 what if we see what happens of ios 27 but this does feel much more focused what japan is wanting to do is much more focused on the store with a couple of extra things where the dma is more wide it i also think i mean i i i agree with john that It seems like Apple is less adversarial with Japan. Yeah.

But when you detailed what is going on here, Japan is asking a lot less of Apple. Yes. I feel like if Apple were to roll its own international open standard rule set, it would look like this. Yeah. It would be alternative app marketplaces without side loading, which I think is consumer hostile and backward. Because what it's saying is Apple so believes. in the idea of monolithic app stores that control everything

and that have a strangle hold on what the users want to do that the only way you can get software outside the app store is from a different monolithic app store that somebody controls and that Apple can then lean on. Remind me, I don't know if you

remember this, but you know, how these things are, apps that are side-loaded, are they not notarized? They are notarized. Okay, then I don't understand. On the Mac, they're notarized, and I believe if it's,

that allowed in the EU now that they are, that they follow that same system. But this is, anyway, I'm going to, we're talking about this in a later segment, but I'm just going to say again, I actually find it kind of offensive, the idea that the solution to one monolithic control choke point app marketplace is more of them. More of them, yeah. Instead of letting people install software on their device from wherever, like you do on a computer, I hate it. I hate it.

I hate the idea that it's like, oh, great, they're free in the EU now, except you've got to get Riley tested to approve your app instead of Apple. It's like, okay, Riley's more likely to approve my app than Apple. But like, why do I need Riley's approval? Well, and also Apple do still need to approve it anyway, right? Like, they still have to do that anyway. Like, there is still a let, we've seen it. I can say time and time again at this point that they are rejecting apps. There's still a process.

There's still a process there, but, you know, this is what I'm saying is that I hate that. I hate that you're just replacing, to use a phrase that Steve Jobs liked a lot, you're just replacing one orifice for another. And the whole idea is freedom instead. So I hate that. But like, yeah, you talk about the commission charges. Of course Apple likes this. Because Apple's recouping almost all the money. They're getting all of it.

In the guys of freedom, their tax just moves around and is the same. And in fact, Judge Yvonne Gonzalez-Rogers would not allow this, right? Like, this is not what she would consider reasonable. she considered these levels basically contempt. So of course Apple is more happy with what Japan is doing here because this feels like Japan felt like there was a need to do something to appear like they were being consumer friendly, but ultimately probably with even consultation with Apple

came to a set of rules that are not strict at all. This is the Don't Throw Me in the Briar Patch version of Apple being regulated, which is like, oh no, we can, oh no, we have to allow pay payments on the outside, but we tax them at the same rate that we take. I mean, like, it's just, this is real gentle, folks, real gentle. I forgot the 5% payment processing fee for Apple's in that purchase as well, which is also a higher number than they've quoted in other places. Yeah, again, would be considered contempt in the US.

So no wonder Apple is like, who, dodged a bullet there in Japan. Well, it's happening in Brazil now too. So they're also going to be alternative app marketplace system payment options. in Brazil the commissions will apparently be 25% for digital goods and services if not in one of the 10% schemes then a 5% fee for payments so getting you back to 30%

or a 15% fee for payments outside of the app and a 5% core technology commission if you do alternate VAT marketplace stuff so basically these numbers are what Apple wanted with the DMA right like these were the ideal numbers got you all the way back up to 30 and similar what they wanted

with the epic stuff. I don't know, man. I don't know. It's great. Things are happening in Brazil. I'll just say that there's a great movie that is the I think it's basically a documentary about the app store process.

It's called Brazil by Terry Gilliam. So just check that out. It'll tell you all about the very normal way that apps are approved and rejected by Apple. That's a joke. Of course. If you'll watch it. It's a good movie.

Rumor roundup time. Yeah. Over the past week, Jason, I don't know if you've been seeing this, but lots of people have been 3D printing a mock-up of what the iPhone fold could look like. So this came from a 3-D model designer Sub-Z on Maker World, who created this model based on rumors of screen sizes and overall specs of the device from some allegedly leaked CAD drawings. The front screen of the iPhone fold based on this would be 5.4 inches,

is about the size of the iPhone mini so it's small the inside screen will be 7.6 inches which is smaller than the iPad mini but bigger than any iPhone and it'd have a 4.3 aspect ratio so a lot of people have been talking about and I was struggling to get my head around this wider than it is tall this is a phrase that was being used a lot to describe the iPhone fold and I was really kind of my brain's like I don't think I understand what that means and then seeing these images I'll put some leaks in the show notes. Mac Room has had an article and there was made a video about it. It makes it look like a strange phone when it's closed, like a weird little passport phone, but much more of a tablet when it's opened. Like a little mini notebook? Yes.

Yeah. Like a squat little mini notebook. Yeah. Not a computer like a paper notebook. Sorry. Yeah. A small paper notebook. A small paper notebook. Basically this is essentially, appearing to prioritize the open part rather than the closed part. So it's not going to be a big phone, like the pixel fold or the galaxy fold, that you can unfold to an even bigger phone. It is more like a little phone that you can unfold to a big phone or mini tablet. It is four by three, which is, that is helpful in hoping that potentially it's iPad OS or something closer to iPad OS on the inside.

Because the iPad historically was a four by three. device. So it's sort of in that ballpark. So, but I still don't know I don't know where I land on what the operating system is going to be. I think I want it to be iPad OS but I feel like

it might not be but then what is it like it? Very odd. I think they'll call it iOS and it'll have some of the multitasking features of iPadOS but they'll call it iOS because iOS is just iPadOS anyway. That's a great point. If you think about it, it's really iPadOS is just iOS with certain features enabled

on certain kinds of hardware. And that's just, I imagine it will be like that. Some features will be enabled on this hardware. And maybe it'll be some special things, or maybe it will be very similar to iPadOS. But I think this is interesting because I look at this and I kind of dig it because it's this, I think the shape is kind of interesting. It does not shape, it is not shaped like an iPhone, right, when it's closed.

And so so many, I know this from using the iPhone mini, there are so many apps that just make assumptions about the size and shape of your iPhone and that even for the mini you would run into apps that just don't understand

that your screen is that small. This happened back in the day when I was using the 11 inch 11 inch MacBook Air that there would be Mac apps that be like surely your your screen is not that small and it's like it is.

This is a computer Apple cells. So I wonder about like apps being appropriately sized for that closed screen that's so short but as somebody who had an iPhone mini I don't mind that idea I also this this honestly

this demo makes me a little more skeptical about how successful this product will be yeah it's going to look weird isn't it yeah I mean it's going to look different but I think I get the idea here, which is Apple saying, if this is all true, Apple is saying, well, the reason you buy this phone is because you can open it up and it's an iPad. And therefore, what's important, and again, intellectually I can see this. What's important is not what it is when it's closed. Because if you just want to worry about it closed and prioritize that by a different iPhone, what's important about this is that it's usable when it's closed and when it's open, it's got a huge screen. Yeah. That's like an iPad. I do wonder, though, given the track record of phone sales, which always is favoring, you know, these bigger, taller phones, if people are just not going to be interested in something, this squat, even if it opens up into a big iPad mini kind of shape.

Yes. I'm intrigued by it, but I'm a little more nervous about it in that regard of like, is this going to end up being what people want? And like, are we going to end up with an iPhone air again? Where I was like, this is so impressive, but nobody's buying it. Maybe. We'll come back to the fold. Regardless of how good or bad it is, it's going to be, because it's going to be expensive and it's going to be weird, people are going to, it will, like, I've said this before. It will simultaneously be the best selling folding phone ever and will be like the least selling iPhone.

Because iPhone, right? And maybe it picks up speed over time, but the more weird it is, I don't know, maybe it doesn't matter. Maybe I'm sure Apple will have an interesting story to tell. And like I said, I can see from an argument standpoint the idea that having it be a really great device when it's unfolded is the most important thing. Otherwise, why would you buy a folding phone at all? But I do wonder if people will be turned off by the fact that when it's closed, it doesn't seem right in terms of how we've sort of. defined what a smartphone looks like. Yep.

Samsung, there are reports that Samsung will be looking to release a, quote, wide fold of their own in September of this year with the same screen sizes. Yeah, Samsung's making the screens. Samsung's making the screen. So they're like, and it kind of is like, well, this is their prerogative for doing the work.

It's like, all right, well, we'll do one then. Yeah. So there you go. Yep. And Ming Chi Quo is reporting that the iPhone fold could initially be limited due to challenges in production. Development is a little behind where they would want it to be, so it may be into 2027 before it's easy to buy. This to me feels like the very standard way that a new iPhone launches. I can't think of like a new design, like a radical

new design where this wasn't a talking point. I would not be surprised if they announced this in September and say that the pros are available in a week to order and ship in two weeks and that the fold will be available to order in October and we'll ship later this year, right? It would not surprise me at all if that's what they say. And even if they make it available, they may sell out very quickly. This is one of those products where it's not really,

I wouldn't say it's not cannibalizing anything, but it's like it's not like, you know, if they were to announce like the iPhone Pro and then it doesn't ship for like three months. It's like, well, that's a problem for iPhone. pro sales but maybe people that were going to buy the iPhone fold like you kind of got them anyway I don't know it's odd because it's kind of not an iPhone but it is an iPhone it's weird

it depends on how they how they view it too because they could they could make it available and then it'll just sell out and those dates will just drift immediately far back which I think they're fine with it is probably fine too so something to watch for sure any one of his research firm trend force is expecting apple to release the a18 pro powered macbook in the spring of this year they are also expecting competitive pricing on this model and a 12.9 inch display great so more stuff out of the supply chain maybe yep more on this later but yes great and nine to five mac is reporting on rumors that suggest apple is still working on adding infrared cameras to the air pods pro and may ship a model of the AirPods pro three so the current model this year year that has this feature. So Mark German had previously reported that these cameras would use Apple intelligence to help provide more information to you and the world around you. But now, instant rumor like leak, I think it's a wave-out account, Instant Digital, is reporting that with this feature, Apple would look to remove the pressure-sensitive buttons on the AirPods

Pro 3 in lieu of hand gestures for controlling AirPods Pro. I don't know how I feel about that. I don't know. One, I don't know if I believe it. Yeah. But two, I also don't think I want it. But I want it. But I wanted to bring it up because I thought this was a weird, weird rumor. It is weird. But like there is precedent for doing this. Sure, they didn't slipstream. They did the USB case and there were some internal changes too because they had the different audio for Vision Pro.

And that was all in Pro 2. So they could do a slipstream Pro 3 and still call it Pro 3. They do the noise cancellation and non-noise cancellation versions of the regular. Airpods, right? So, like, they have, you know, you could imagine AirPods Pro 3 vision or something like that or whatever they would call it. Yeah, whatever, just with a different set. AirPods Pro 3 with Apple intelligence is actually probably what they would call it, which is horrible. Maybe. Yeah, so, so interesting. We'll see. This episode is brought to you by our friends over at FitBod. It's a new year.

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at FITBOD.mee.mee slash upgrade. Once again, that is FitBod.com for 25% of your membership. A thanks to FitBod for the support of this show and relay. So it is a new year. I want to talk about what we want from Apple in 2026. This was inspired by a blog post that you wrote, which will be one of the things that we get to in a little bit. But let's go back to talking.

I'll kick this off. and we'll start talking about the folding iPhone. So I am really excited this year to get something completely new from Apple in regards to the folding phone. So like the iPhone, this year's, so last year's iPhone line up, brilliant. Like, top to bottom, excellent. There was a new iPhone. That new iPhone is great. The iPhone air is a wonderful device, super interesting, super weird.

It potentially is a harbinger of things to come. or not hard to tell at this point but just a really interesting cool phone with a cool story to it.

This thing or on a whole new level like it's going to be really interesting to have another year where I have to make a choice about what phone I want to be using every day

because the folding iPhone is going to be really intriguing but it is just looking at the information that we think we know about this device it is absolutely not going to be an easy call, I think, right? Two cameras instead of three cameras. And who knows how good those cameras are going to be? That tiny screen on the front, I'm probably going to be using

my phone mostly that way. Am I going to like that? Like, what software am I going to be able to use on the inside? They're going to make developers kind of have to redo some stuff, which means that a bunch of apps aren't going to work. And then the biggest thing, honestly, one of the biggest things for me is the touch ID thing. I think that's not going to be nice to use all the time. Like, I'm really used to using face ID and I think it would feel very weird to take a step back to touch ID you know like authenticate

via a button on the phone so I but I think this is going to be a really interesting story for the end of this year is what Apple are able to produce how impressive is it or not right like is there no crease is there a crease like what are the other details

about this device that make it interesting one way or another. This is great to do this segment here in the first show of 2026 because I'm just going to say now you're going to hear us say a lot of this stuff again and again over the next 52 weeks, right?

Like this is going to happen. But I'll say it now. One of the things that's going to be really interesting about this product, which is all about the new hardware, is the software. Because Apple has the ability. And I know like Google does it,

Google has a folding phone and Google does Android and Samsung does some tweaks with their stuff too. But like Apple has the ability to differentiate how this phone works, to make decisions about how this phone works differently than every other iPhone or iPad, they can, they can make feature by feature decisions about this. So when we look at that 3D printed model in the hands of the guy in the Mac Rumors video, let's say. You get that visceral, like, oh, it's different.

It's shaped different. But what we don't see is because it's a salivaplastic is what's on that screen. And, like, Apple can make decisions about the lock screen, about how the home screen works, about gestures, about what happens on the inside, about what happens when you've got an app open on the outside and then you open it and where does it go on the inside? And what's the window, is there windowing or tiling? Does it feel like an iPad? Like, there are so many decisions they have to make because this. product is basically a tweener. It is neither an iPhone nor an iPad

but also kind of both. So what are those decisions? I'm excited to see because we look at a 3D printed model and we're like, oh, look at that. But like Apple has had this thing inside for you know, more than a year at least, probably.

And their designers and developers, the whole OS group, like they've been able to think about what this this thing, how this thing should work and get creative about it. And I would, I would honestly be disappointed if it's just a bog standard iPhone on the outside and then you open it up and it's a box standard iPad mini.

Like they, and that's not what they do. They, they try to integrate the software experience and the hardware experience at what makes Apple what it is. So that's what I really want to look at here is not just, yes, how is this invisible, perfect hinge, whatever that they apparently say that they have cracked. and all of that, and how to make those claims. But also, like, they, this is a unique time for them to define how iOS and iPadOS features behave on a device class like this. And that's going to be really interesting.

There's also, like, a question I want them to answer, which I don't know thou have an answer for, which is why are you making this phone? Yeah. Like, why? Like, what is the reason. Since what we want, what I'll say is, what I want out of this. product is I want Apple to say the iPad is the best tablet and it's not even close. They'll say the iPhone is the best smartphone and it's not even close. One of the things is the iPad is so great and yet more people, a lot of iPhone users don't understand that or

don't use an iPad as much. Some version of basically we think this is amazing because it's it's an iPhone that turns into an iPad when you want, and that the world opens up, essentially, just like so much opportunity opens up when you open up this device and have the bigger screen. And I believe that because I'm an iPad user.

I love my iPad. And I look at this device and I think, could this become my primary device? Because I use the iPad more than my phone, but the phone is obligatory. Is there a world in which I no longer have to have a phone that I also put in my pocket when I leave the house, but mostly I use the iPad, could this be that

product? It is my iPad and it's my iPhone, you know, at once. So if they can make a case like that that it's like, this is also the iPad, I would love to see that. What's first up for you? And this is not a draft, we should say. We collaborated. We're round robin and we're, we're, we collaborated beforehand on what these are. I'm going to say what I want from Apple in 2026 is, a succession plan. Tim doesn't have to quit as CEO this year. Although I think it's greater than 50% that he will. Because, and why do I say that?

I say that mostly because of that FT story. I don't think that FT story exists if he's not going to retire in 26, which is a year that we're in, by the way. I'm so used to saying 26 is the future. It's the year that we're in. This year. I think it's greater than 50% because of that FT report. But at the very least, what I want is he needs to become chairman if he's going to do that.

He needs to send a clear signal that transition planning is going on. He probably needs to say this is where we're going and, you know, and there are going to be more changes, but we have a plan and we're instituting it. And whether he names a replacement this year or in advance or whatever it is, like, I don't need all of the boxes to be. be checked in 2026, but I want the list and I want the boxes to begin being checked. So succession plan is how I phrased. I know that we were beforehand when we were collaborating on this, yours was more specifically like, give me a new CEO. Yeah, I want a new CEO.

I can see that. I backed off of it a little to just say, look, I just want the plan that leads to a new CEO. I don't necessarily personally need the new CEO this year, although I think it probably makes sense not to linger, but I certainly want to see that list. to see movement and know that we're going in a direction

where Tim is going to either leave or elevate or whatever. No, I think it's time. Like, I think it's overdue time for change at the top for Apple, I think at this point. I think that

the company has maybe gotten stuck in some spots and some shuffling could change it. Like, I would hope that bringing in someone with a fresh outlook could make some different

structural changes, different priorities, like if it's going to be who we think it is, John Turner's like I would hope that this would refocus the company to continue advancing in hardware. Like I'm making that like a priority. Like there's been there's something going on which means that they're able to

last year, this year and I think next year and the year after like completely new iPhone designs. It's like why is that? Like why now can we do that? Like why can we keep doing really interesting iPhone designs year after year, why can't we always do that? Would it be like that if you had someone who really cared about hardware as the CEO? Like, is that what it would look like? And not just so, yeah, the one is every CEO can't, is their own person and cannot, every CEO is informed by their

background. Yeah. Because they can't be everything and everywhere and they have to rely on people, but they are informed or informed by their background. So that matters that it's not Knops guy. It's a hardware guy if it's John Turnus, but it's a different person. And then two, and we've talked about this quite a bit, is it's the excuse for change, that if you're a person X and you've been in the job forever, and there's like a whole bunch of little things that maybe you could do different, but like this is the way you do it. You just do it that way. And it's hard. I'm not saying that's right.

I always am asking myself, like, could I do things differently? But I think it's human nature to be like, I just do it this way. This is the way it is. And then when you get the new person in there, they're like, oh, I don't want to do it that way. That was always a thing that I thought we should do differently. And now I'm going to do it because I'm in charge. And, you know, the example that I gave is the employee matching from Tim Cook. Like, Tim Cook revered Steve Jobs.

And on day one, he said, yeah, if you give charitable donations, we'll match you. Which is like, I mean, what he's essentially saying there is, I don't know why Steve didn't like that. And he was kind of a jerk. But we're going to change that because it's the right thing to do. and because I'm the new guy I give myself permission to be different and I think you'll see some of that regardless of who it is

that just the fact that it's not Tim anymore means not that even Tim would be opposed to it it's just like it was just not on Tim's radar or whatever and the new person gets to say yeah I'm gonna do this because this is the thing we should do and at that point Tim Cook doesn't get to say no

so yeah I think that'll happen And also like if you're a executive middle manager that kind of thing ultimately you're trying to please the boss right like that that's what you're doing that's what a lot of people are doing not everybody but a lot of people are doing in their job they want to get on they want to they want to please the CEO so it is better to bring to the ops charts CEO something that's going to increase his charts like he's going to be most excited when you say this new idea i have for services is going

to increase the you know like that is what they're going to want to see maybe somebody with different priorities you would you would bring to john turnus this really cool idea that you have for hardware. I mean, I don't know that he is like this. I'm just assuming, right? He's just making a million assumptions here. You come to him and be like, I have this idea. It's not necessarily going to make

us the most money, but I think it would be really cool and it would make it something we could lead on. And he's like, you know what? Go for it. Right? And that might be the like basically I just I will, I think it's, the other thing is selfishly, the main reason

I want this to happen is I would love to be able to talk about something like this on the show. Like, I've never had the chance to cover this, right? Like, I wasn't doing this when Tim Cook took over. The idea of Apple having a new CEO is like, it's tantalizing to me because also it feels like it's so close, like it's going to happen in my professional career. And I want to talk about that. Also, I would say it will be interesting to see, not that Apple, because it's a big ship,

It would take a lot of time to change it, even if they wanted to change the direction, it would take time. But I would say emphasis will be an interesting thing to watch, too, because I feel like a lot of times coverage of Apple talks about design and about the synthesis of software and hardware and services. And then there's also this kind of narrative about Apple's operations ability that they ship so many of these and all of that. I feel like Apple could lean more into the narrative that nobody makes the hardware like Apple does. that Apple is a leader in Silicon. And they talk about it, right? But like, does, if you have a CEO who's more oriented on hardware, not to say he's going to give short shrift to software,

but like, do you reemphasize the fact that Apple has all of these advantages because they are so good at making hardware? Not that it changes the strategy, but just that it's a thing that comes out a little bit more in the narrative. They could choose that or not. And it's not just, it's not just CEO, right? If they change, you know, Greg Jawswiak has been at Apple for a billion years, too. If he is no longer there, if he retires in the next year or two, what happens?

And again, I don't know. I mean, I guess I've sort of known Jaws for ages now. But what I would say is generally you get used to having one boss and now you've got a different boss. It's a good time to step off the treadmill. And if that happens, then the people making marketing decisions change. And that is interesting because that's all. about emphasis and how products get marketed. So marketing and PR change as well as just the from the top emphasis.

So I mean, again, I don't think either of us is saying we're bored with Apple being, you know, what it is. Let's see change. But the fact is that change is coming and change will be interesting. And I am interested to see how a company as successful as Apple that has had such a run deals with change. Yeah. Right? unavoidable change because human beings don't stay, right?

So what happens next? It is also like for, you know, I would say for like maybe the majority of people that work at the company they have only worked for this guy. Yeah. Right? And like what is that going to be like?

What is that going to feel like? Again, it's going to be fascinating and I would love the opportunity to talk about it and I hope that this year is the year that it happens. Okay. Here's another thing. Prove me wrong on Apple Intelligence and a good Siri. Like, I want it.

I just don't have faith that it can be done or it will be done this year. Just a basic point. Like, I was thinking about this yesterday morning where I was trying to make a coffee and the baby is crawling now. I don't know if I mentioned this on the show. So my life has been turned upside down. And she was crawling towards me. So I had to deal with that.

And something popped into my head about like something I wanted to do. And I thought, I would love to be able to just in plain English, just talk to my phone. I remember what it was. I used the app due a lot. And I'm a big fan of it. And it was reminding me about something. I think it was to do some, like wash her bottles or whatever before I left for the office. And I wanted to be able to just say to my phone, snooze that notification.

for 30 minutes, which is just not a thing that I can do right now, but my computer should understand what I want. Like, it's not a complicated thing to ask. And I feel, like I was thinking about it. Like, I feel like if I asked chat GPT that, it would understand it and would do it, right? Like if I had some kind of task or reminder in chat GPT and I was like, tell me about this in 30 minutes, I feel like it would understand it well enough to be able

to execute on that command, right? Yeah. My iPhone can't do that. Can I want to give you? I want to give you, and I don't know if Apple Watch is where this is going to happen, but you know, for a while, but I'm going to give you an example that I think talks about the expectation regular people have about this stuff and why we just wanted to be good or at least better.

My prediction that I made on a podcast recently was, I think by the end of this year, Siri will be better, but we will still be dissatisfied with it. Yeah. Right? I'm a very typical Jason kind of prediction, which is like, it will be better and you'll still be unsatisfied, which I think is probably the most likely scenario, right? They will not not try to make it better, but they will also probably not totally succeed where everybody's like, yay, Siri's the best now.

Like that seems very unlikely just because of human beings, not just because of Apple. Anyway, my example is, we have had loads of rain here. and it's also astronomically the king tides, the highest tides. And what happens is the water flows down from where the rain has been coming out of the mountains and it pours into creeks and drainage areas and all of that. And meanwhile, the tide gets really high and is pushing the other way. And what happens, there's flooding. We got a lot of flooding here.

Mostly it's in places where floods happen. Like, we know where the flooded areas are. There's an underpass near my house where there's a parking lot and a bus stop down there. And, like, everybody knows you don't park there if it's going to rain because it's going to flood. Like, you don't park there. There's an exit off the freeway north of us that is always flooded when it rains. And it's high tide, especially. Like, it happens.

You know about it. This was worse. Lauren ended up getting caught in about a foot of water on the road when she was trying to take Julian to the airport and had to come back. She actually came back through San Francisco instead of our usual path. to the Oakland Airport because they closed the freeway down. So that's a big deal. But it's all about high tides, which is why I say this.

Lauren says to me, the Apple Watch is so dumb. I asked it, how dumb is it? I asked it when high tide was. And it said, here are some websites that will tell you where high tide, when high tide is, which is great when you're on an Apple Watch

and you can't view websites. I asked ChatGPT this and it actually said you need to tell me where you are which is funny because like your device knows where you are I could share that with you

you could ask me for it but you didn't so that's frustrating but here's the thing that stopped me I was thinking about it she's like she asked her Apple Watch when High Tide is and I thought

wait a second there's a Tides app on Apple Watch and I scroll I take her Apple Watch and I like scroll down and like there's Tides and you open it up

up tides. Geolocated. It's like, oh, this is the closest. Rodeo Beach is the closest to you. Tap. Beautiful interface showing the tides. And I did not know this. I was it.

I'm looking at it like, wow, I didn't know this is it. Well, I mean, unless you're like surfing or boating or whatever, you maybe don't care about the tides up. But it's there. It's there. When they made everything waterproof and they did the ultra and all of diving and all there, there's a tides app. Why in the world would a question for Siri on an Apple watch about

tides not open the tides app why but it doesn't just a failure it would be a great actually Lauren would have discovered talk about discoverability Lauren would have discovered that the tides app existed maybe the Apple watch also doesn't know that there's a tides app you know like it's that's what's why

like Siri just doesn't know about it but this is the problem right is like the person should not a regular random person should not even know that the tides app is there But if you ask about tides, it should be like, oh, let me tell you, you need to look, I'm opening the Tides app. Yeah. Did you know? And it'll tell you. And then she would have been like, oh, I didn't even know there was a Tides app.

But instead, I had to tell her because I am a person who writes and talks about computers and know that there's a Tides app. So, yeah, what are they doing? Anyway, could be better. Yeah, I just, I want, I want to get the things that. They showed me, but I don't think I'm going to get them, and I want them to come and be good. And I just don't have a lot of faith for it to happen this year. Yeah, I feel like there is, there's so much, this is why I predict what I predict. There's so much room for them to catch up.

Yeah. To just be better. Yeah. And I don't need them. I appreciate that what you want is them to solve this problem. I actually don't need them to solve the whole problem. I want to see them make a lot of progress. I want to see them headed in the right direction.

Sure. Because the problem is that Siri has been lingering for so long and it's still just sitting there. Yeah. And like, I just want forward motion. I want to know that you get it. And this is a problem with Apple as a company is that Apple never wants to admit that something is bad. They never do that. And I want, honestly, this is talking about CEO transitions and things.

like, I get why there's no PR benefit in talking about the Mac Pro until you have something to say about it. But like, it sits on the, or the, or the, um, Pro Display XDR. But you have these products that sit on the price list forever and their prices never go down and they're outmoded, but they're still being sold. And I think it's kind of offensive that they exist and that they don't really even acknowledge that that's the case. Um, but this is a great example where like, a little humility maybe.

Like, the only humility they've shown here. is that they made a promise that couldn't keep. Like, that's not the, a little humility about how Siri isn't good. And, like, I would like some of that. Like, we have made it better. We know it needs to be even better.

But at the very least, throw me a bone here. Make it better. I don't need the whole thing, but I need to know that you're on the case. And they can tell us we're on the case, but I don't care. I want to see it. I want it to be better.

if it's not great. Please just make it better. Why don't you tell me about the thing that started this whole topic? Yeah, a better display strategy. I want in 2026 to see Apple to understand Apple's display strategy a little bit better. So I mentioned the Pro

Display XDR. It's been years. That product should not be for sale anymore. Yep. Really, the studio display should probably not be for sale anymore. They are old tech. Very old tech. that should be replaced by new tech.

If you're going to do displays, you need to actually do them every so often, and it's been too long that both of those products have sat there. So I want them to update those products. I want them to use modern technology. Could they be higher frame rate? Could they be properly HDR on the studio display? Could it be maybe OLED, whatever,

but like a more modern competitive to other displays on the market today display solution? They need to talk about it and say, here are our products and ideally commit to doing a better. There's a, you know, I know Apple's got a lot going on, but like, if you're going to be in a category, you need to be in that category. And this feels very 2010s to me, Apple, 2010's Apple, right? Where it's like, maybe it'll come back. Maybe it won't. Like, that's got to stop.

That stuff's got to stop. If you're in a category, be in it. Otherwise, get out. And I don't want them to get out of displays. No. But I want them to be in it. And this kind of, I'm not really in it. We make a product that's really old and shouldn't be sold anymore, but we're still there.

And so it shows we care. It doesn't show you care. It shows you don't care. You don't care enough to, any time you leave a product lingering this long, you don't care about it. So I want them to care and I want them to be responsible as a company that participates in the display ecosystem to ship displays. And if they can't, quite frankly, I remember how bad it is when there isn't an Apple display. out there for people to buy. But quite frankly, if they can't do that, they should get the hell out of this business. Because what are they doing? Why are they in this? Why are they making

displays and then just letting them sit there for years? It's stupid. It's bad business. It's bad strategy. Get out. Because you could make more money. If you made more displays, if you refresh the displays, people will buy new displays. How many people would buy a new one to replace their studio display or their pro display xDR if you made another one that would still be overpriced compared to the competition etc etc but people still buy it because it's nice and it's apple and yet it sits there yes there is an opportunity cost going on there um but i just i hate that they like let's be clear that when the studio display shipped it's basically using the display from the maybe second generation 5k iMac it's ancient it's like 10 9 year old tech now yeah it needs to be updated yep okay

And while I'm yelling, I'm going to say related to that on the display front, there's that rumor that they might do a larger iMac, whether it's an iMac pro or whatever. And of course, the iMac is sitting out there. Yep. When the 5K iMac came out 11 years ago, they took away target display mode because they really kind of couldn't implement it. It was hacked together to do 5K on an internal display, and they were not at the point where they were willing to. to do something like that. But the time has moved on and Thunderbolt exists

and you can, I'm driving a 5G display right now via a Thunderbolt cable, right? It's the studio display. Yeah. They got to bring back that feature because computers with embedded displays

or embedded displays with computers, I guess, the computer doesn't last as long as the display. That's the bottom line. Yeah. My,

I have an IMAX pro behind me. That display is perfectly good. You see YouTubers who gut these things and put in these weird third-party controller boards so they can still use their retina iMac as an external display. It makes a perfectly good studio display, right? Also, the studio display is run by Apple Silicon. It is running a version of iOS inside of it. There is no technical reason.

I'm sorry, there's no technical reason why you couldn't make a version of that, essentially, that runs on whatever the existing software is on an iMac, that you can just put it in that mode. and it becomes a studio display at whatever range. And the reason I say this, and I know a lot of people will say, well, yeah, but this way they can sell more whatever's. Like, okay.

But I'll say the other part of this, which is Apple claims to be a company that cares about the environment. And bottom line, if you're a company that claims, that claims to care about the environment and e-waste, et cetera, et cetera, making a disposable display

that could long outlive the computer that's in it, but refusing to make it work that way completely invalidates your claim that you care about the environment and about e-waste because you should be able to take an iMac, a 24-inch iMac, and your customer should be able to buy a Mac Mini

and attach it to it in display mode and use it as a studio display instead of buying a whole other iMac and taking that iMac to the recycler. Yeah. and and so you know I'm getting the this this whole category is Apple at its worst basically like Apple Apple Apple at its best is in categories it cares about but what when I said they should they should do this do it right or get out what I really mean is if you can't live up to your

standards in a category don't do it right and and abandoning like it just makes me so mad abandoning target display mode was really weird and you know for a lot of of reasons. But like, once you've got Apple Silicon inside your displays, I refuse to believe that you couldn't put an Apple Silicon computer in a mode where it just emulated a studio display and sat there. And if there's some engineering you would need

to do to make it happen, what I'm saying is do the engineering to make it happen or because otherwise I don't believe you. Every IMA Apple Silicon IMac that's been sold is basically an affront to Apple's environmental policies because they're disposable computers at a time when they

should be better than that. Yeah. Yep, I absolutely agree. And about that, like, you know, if you're going to be in a market, do it. I absolutely agree with that. Like, you've proven in the past that you're willing to let it go, and then you're like, oh, I want to come back to it. And I think there's another product we're going to talk about later on, which is the same thing. Either be in it or don't be in it, when you leave your foot, like, half in it,

you're not helping yourself and you're not helping your customers. Right. Because a lot of your happiest customers, you know, people who are going to, going to buy the Mac Studio, right? They want an Apple display to hook it up to. They do. If you're not going to give them one, stop pretending so then they can look at other options.

Yeah. Right? Because you're not helping them out if you're not going to commit to it. Now, I believe that they will, but the studio display has lived for too long. Way too long. Way too long. And the other problem is Apple is a giant.

And Apple's presence in a market kills off competition because nobody wants to compete with them. Yep. And being half in and half out means that if you're a consumer who cares about that category, you're, you're kind of wrecked. You're, you're in trouble because Apple's thing is, you know, half baked. And other companies are like, we can't even compete with Apple. So we're not going to, we're not going to make a product in that category.

And this goes to software and it goes for hardware. Like, get in or get out. But if you're in, you have a responsibility to actually. be in, especially if you're a company as giant as Apple. So I hope that on some of these fronts in 2026, Apple shows that it is going to embrace

displays. But when I say I want a better display strategy, admitting that you aren't going to do it and getting out would still be a better display strategy than what their current strategy is. This episode is brought to you by Squarespace,

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customizing it to your heart's content. Go and check it out for yourself, though. Don't just take my word for it. Go to Squarespace.com slash upgrade. You can sign up for a free trial and build your website. Then when you're ready to launch it to the world, use the offer code upgrade and you'll save 10% of your first purchase of a website or domain. That is Squarespace.com slash upgrade the code upgrade to get 10% of your first purchase and show you support for the show. I thanks to Squarespace for the continued support of Relay into this new year and of the Upgrade podcast as well. Let's continue. Please, Apple, give me, please give me a home device of a screen.

I tell you what I want. I want a good looking photo frame that pulls my images from Apple Photos that I can operate home kit things from and get good answers to questions. Is that too much to ask? I don't think it is. Yeah. Set up a visual timer or something like. I mean, yes, I, this is one of those categories. It's fun.

I like talking about this category because there are a lot of categories where I think the implication here is we're in the Apple ecosystem. Yep. And so we want Apple to do something because we're in the Apple ecosystem and we would prefer it. Yes. And that people could say, well, you know, they make this and they make that. Sure. And our answer is, oh, yes, I know they make that, but it's not in the Apple ecosystem. As somebody who has used, the other products in this category,

I can say it's not just because we're in the Apple ecosystem. It's because all the other products in this category are terrible. Terrible. Terrible. I have had Echo shows. I have a Google Home. They're not good for lots of different reasons. And so for Apple to do something where I can have that.

Because I, you know, about the only thing the Google Home gets used for anymore is that it's cycling through. a photo library I created in Google Photos for it, and I see those and they're still nice, although I don't update them because I would have to remember where that photo library lives. So yes, I would like a nice screen to show things from my photo library or other widgets and to maybe display visually what my timers are

and let me control home things. And I mean, like, I'm actually, I think we're not asking for a lot. It's like I want something from Apple in this category because I've already done all the work, right? Like I've used products from other companies and the problem is I have to do the work, right? So like I had an echo product for a while. But then as I changed my home automation system and did the work that I needed on my iPhone, I then needed to do it on the Amazon system as well.

And it's like, oh, I have a new light. We're now going to add it in three places. It's just like this is, I don't want to do this. I mean, it's true. I think both of these things are true. that it would be nice if you're in the Apple ecosystem to just be able to be in the Apple ecosystem. It would also be really nice

to have a product that's decent in this category because what the other guys have is not great. Full of ads. Like Amazon's full of ads. It's so bad. So I will make a corollary to this, which is I would like a visible

home strategy with real products. So this is one of them. But are they doing a doorbell? Are they doing cameras? Let's get it going. And again, to come back to my previous point, if you're going to do this, if you're going to have a smart home strategy,

you're one of the key vendors in the tech space. You have let your home strategy just sort of sit there. Dan Morin and I have been writing articles about how Apple needs to embrace home tech and build more home products for like a decade now. And they just sat there. And it's only, I think, because the wearables home and accessories category

has stalled out that there's finally been some corporate movement to actually try to get in here, and yet it still hasn't happened. So I guess what I'm saying is let's get it going. Let's go, as my kids would say, because I, like, get, again, get in or get out. If you're going to do this, if you care about the home, get in there, do something resembling anything.

Yeah. Thank you. Yeah, absolutely. And if you're going to do it, similar to the displays thing, actually do it. Oh, don't. Like here's the Where it got cameras now

One camera is 2K And one camera gets updated For you know Not updated for five years Come on Yeah I mean Honestly I think there may be there's a A cultural problem at Apple

Because a home pods are a great example of this I know the home pods don't sell incredibly well But like If you're gonna have them You gotta update them You gotta put some effort into them And I think what happens is like Let's do it

And they do it And then they look at the numbers And they're like Oh they didn't sell all that well. They did okay. We just won't update them for a long time. It's like, no, no, no, no, no. You're in it. You're in it. You're in it. You update them. You're maybe don't update them every year, but you got to update them. The Apple TV is the same way. Like, if you're going to make this product and you're going to commit to making it, you have to be a responsible company and update that product. Like, I don't, I hope there's nobody at Apple who looks at the pace of HomePod development and says it's fine. Yeah. Homepods are fine. They're doing fine. They're not doing fine. And if they don't sell up to you, your standards, fix the product and keep shipping it and show your commitment to the category because you showing your commitment can help that category grow for you. But if they're kind of, they ship them and then forget them for years, this is a problem

out a lot of products that are outside the focus, the spotlight of Apple, they're in this weird place where we're like how Final Cut on the iPad doesn't support the background API or the what is it the iwork icons iwork hasn't been updated i think for 26 doesn't have the dark icons and stuff like again they're just a little outside and they just kind of like hang there and like if you're going to do them do them and home is a great example of that if you're going to embrace this category put people in charge of it and embrace it and have them care about the category because uh i know apple is all about like oh well we don't do we don't have a home division and all that. But it's like this is the downside of that kind of corporate structure is there

doesn't seem to be a corporate will to be good at this category just to be present in it. And that's, I would argue, contrary to Apple's corporate ethos. If you're going to be in it, try to be the best and try to win it. And I don't see that. So I hope they will get there. You know, I feel like this is a very Lucy pulling the football away from Charlie Brown thing. It was like, this year for the home strategy. But this is a wish list, not a predictions list. I wouldn't, I don't, I don't want to predict it, but I'm going to wish it. Hey, Jason, speaking about being in categories. Yeah, I mean, I didn't realize this was the theme of this, but it really is.

So my, my wish list, next wish list item is, I would like a resolution of the Apple Silicon Mac Pro saga. It feels to me like the Mac Pro is dead, but it's still available for sale as an M2 released three years ago talking about old products that have been sitting around. Now, I would argue that the Mac Pro doesn't make sense in the Apple Silicon era, that the way Apple Silicon is engineered with GPUs that are integrated and shared memory, that the idea that you would have this big expansion case to do things like loaded up with RAM and all of that has kind of fallen by the wayside.

And when I ask people what the MacPro case is for, because it's really just about the case now, they say, well, expansion. I say, what expansion? They're like, well, you can put some hard drives in it. Like, you can put hard drives attached to a Mac Studio. Well, you can put a card in it. Well, most cards don't work with it because most cards are graphics cards.

So it's like other cards that you can put in. It's like, well, okay, at that point, there should just be a box, and they do make breakout boxes that use Thunderbolt, and then you can put the card in there. But you probably, that's almost nobody at that point who's doing that. Or like, oh, it needs to be rack-boundable.

Well, you know, make a Mac Studio rack-mount adapter. They already have them. I just don't see why this product makes sense. The Mac Studio does everything people need. The speedy Thunderbolt connectivity on it is enough. releasing a whole Mac product and keeping it up to date, which they aren't doing,

just because some people want their hard drives on the inside instead of the outside is ridiculous and should not happen anymore. But that all said, Mike, if Apple is going to keep doing the Mac Pro, do it. Don't just let it sit there for three years

being at least one ultra generation back. Kill it or fix it. Tell us what you think the mac pro is four because the last time they updated this they released it simultaneously with the mac studio which had the same specs and they did a very poor job of explaining why the mac pro existed when the mac studio was right there they tried they didn't do a good job and i would argue that's because they did the best they could there's no expectation so either give me a i'm open to this give me a strategy for the mac pro that makes sense embrace tell us tell us oh you know what we're actually

doing a new chip for the Mac Pro. And it's going to be different. And it's going to embrace the high end in a way that the Mac Studio can't. And that's why the Mac Pro exists. Great. Give me a reason for the Mac Pro to exist. And if you can't kill it, that's it. I think listeners of the show know how I feel about the Mac Pro at this point. I just don't think it needs to exist anymore. I don't think we're in that world anymore. I think that the Mac Studio is a fantastic computer. And so are the MacBook Pro, right? Like your headline, a Mac Pro in your backpack, right?

I think that was the title for the MacBook Pro review. And it's like, the needs that have shrunk so much for that computer and also so many of the needs are handled by Thunderbolt. So why are we still doing this?

We have this computer cost so much money. What are we doing? And yeah, I think it's time to get rid of it. Now, I don't necessarily think we should put Pro Chips in IMAX as like something else that we should do, but we'll see, I guess. Speaking of Pro Max, I would like an amazing MacBook Pro update that is light enough that I'm willing to swap out my air because I would love a touchscreen MacBook Pro. That's maybe something we're going to get this year. and I think I love my

Mapware I have an M2 MacPWare it's my favorite computer I've ever owned it is unbelievable it's getting a bit long in the tooth now I'm having some RAM issues

I have 24 gigs of RAM in it I have as much RAM as I could have put in it when I bought it and it's been struggling one of the apps I think hilariously one of the apps that is a problem

for me is Safari Safari is using too much RAM which I don't think it's supposed to do and everybody says Chrome is the problem but Safari is a problem for me like I'm just having some RAM constraints and I think a computer of a bit more power

would I could use it for much longer because I absolutely do not want to replace this laptop but I think I could only get like another year out of it like it is at the point where like command tabbing apps is visibly lagging. Like, I'm watching the apps kind of like jutter in. And I'm using nice that menu

to try and work out what's going on. So I found out Safari was a RAM problem. So I can now only have one Safari window open if I want my Mac to work well. Because I'd have like multiple Safari windows open. I'm a Safari profiles user. I liked having one window of each of my three profiles so I could just tap between it.

But now I can't do that anymore because my Mac gets too slow. But I would only want to move to a MacBook Pro if it was a bit lighter than the current MacBook Pro is because I love how thin and light my MacBook Air is. And the reason I am at least hopeful

I might get this is one of the rumors suggested that the MacBook Pro may also get a little thinner and lighter as part of a big redesign. That would be amazing. People freak out because they're like, no, no, no, no, no. The MacBook Air is for thinner and lighter. The MacBook Pro should not be thinner and lighter. What I would say to that is, over time,

everything gets thinner and lighter. Because technology advances. Also, the way Apple designs their hardware is they're designing around the thermal envelope that's required for their chip roadmap for the next few years, right? That's the thing that they got caught out on with the trash can MacBook, Mac Pro. They're mindful of that. So chips are getting more efficient. Chip cooling methods are getting better. So you can get a thinner and lighter MacBook Pro. And what we're talking out here is also like the enclosure because it's a new enclosure with the with the m6 presumably if they're thinking about what chips they're going to put in that over the next few years

and again a thinner and lighter MacBook Pro is good it just can't be so thin and so light that it's not pro anymore right that's the line they have to walk but they can make it like today's MacBook Pro is more like the MacBook Air than you know a power book was it back in the day, right? Like, it is thinner and lighter. It obviously got thinner and lighter. And so, uh, that's what that they got to walk the line there and they don't want to mess it up, but I have faith in them now that they, they know. Because they've, they've made the right decisions with the laptops, I feel like, especially. I think they know. I think they know that like, if you want this new MacBook Pro to be like the, the start of the next edition of the MacBook

pro, you can't, you can't screw that kind of thing up because this is supposed to be what you put all your R&D budget in and then make it back over the next 10 years or whatever, right? Like, or five, 10 years or whatever it will be. Like, don't take all the ports away. But, like, you know, they're saying that an OLEB, you may be able to get whoever small battery and, you know, da, da, da, da, da, da, like, there's some, it would be interesting to see what they do there. But I just, I'm intrigued about this computer because it might be able to get me

even more of what I want in an interest in form factor, and trust in package, so we'll see. Okay, I'm going to keep rolling with the laptops and say, I want to see this year the cheapest Mac laptop of all time. Yeah. I am a believer that they're going to do an A-chip version of a laptop of a MacBook that's going to be below the MacBook Air on the price list. The MacBook Air is $999.

Now, it is sold as low as $7.49. in some configurations in some places on sale. And as a result, what I'm talking about the cheapest Mac laptop of all time is, one, the list price will be lower than any Mac standard retail list price, right, which is not the price that you see on a sale. It's the standard price. So currently $9.99.

And then it will be discounted from there, just as the MacBook Air is discounted from there. And the things that it will be discounted on will also be the cheapest Mac laptop ever. What about the Walmart MacBook Air? Well, I mean, it's kind of an old laptop being sold in a weird channel. So maybe or maybe not it will be the same price as that. But what I'm saying is there's going to be a street price that's going to be the lowest that a current Mac laptop has ever been. We've done the math.

You can make an A-series chip that in single processor performance is faster than the M-1 and that in all the other cases is basically the same as an M-1. And Apple Silicon makes it possible for Apple to reach this price point with a product that's still, has Apple product quality, and that means that they can reach an audience for whom Apple products seemed like bad buys because they're too expensive and still have it be a good product, not a cheap plastic. I mean, the competition in this area is kind of lousy PC laptops and Chromebooks, and Apple being present there will reach people who I believe don't otherwise buy Apple laptops. So I think it's a really great way for Apple to, you know, Apple, Apple doesn't compete at lower end product levels because they think it's contrary to their,

what do they call it the quality bar? I mean, contrary to their brand, but Apple Silicon makes it not contrary to their brand to be down there. And the M1 MacBook here proves that. So, you know, Apple's quality will shine through at that price point, even if all of us, or tech nerds, turn our noses up at that product because it's going to be slow and limited and probably not, you know, configurable in any way because if you want to do that, you should just get a MacBook Air. But, like, I want to see it.

I want to believe it. I would love to see Apple make a much more affordable laptop. What is the Walmart MacBook Air out right now? Trying to look. 599, 4.9, maybe? This is options from 409. I don't know what that means. Oh, wow.

Look at that. I think that might be like a refurb one. It's hard. that's a restored. Yeah. 599, I think it is right now. The new one is 599, and then they're offering restored for like 400 bucks. Yeah.

So what do you think is going to cost? If the M1 is 599, I mean, look, the air is 999. So I think a list of 699 and then discounted. That's $300 less than the base air, right? $300 less. So it might even be $7.99, but I like the idea of it being $6.99. Do you think that $699 fulfills what you're looking for, though? Like the ability of like, here's people coming in,

they think Macs are too expensive, da-da-da-da-da-da. No, but if they discount it like they've been discounting the $999 air, then it's not $6.99, right? It's $4.59 or, you know, $4.99 or something, at which point it is the right price. I just don't know if they will. The question is like, what game do they want to play? If they're selling this on Apple.com,

they'll probably sell it for $7.99, just like they sell the MacBook air on Apple.com for $9.99. But then if you know where to go and you go to Walmart or Amazon or whatever and you can get a deal and it's on sale or Best Buy or wherever you get these things when they pop up on sale and it'll be much more affordable there. So it's more affordable by $300 than any other laptop on Apple.com and at Costco or Walmart or wherever, it'll be discounted from that. If it's always $6.99, then it is kind of a disappointment because they're currently selling a new MacBook Air for $7.49 in some places at some times. but I don't think that's what we're talking about here. We're talking about it being $300 less than the MacBook Air, including maybe $250 less than it is at its list price of $6.99, right?

So, you know, that's, to be down there at $4.49, $4.99 as a commonly viewed price, I think that's the, I think the cheapest Mac ever was the original Mac Mini at $499. that was a list price but that was also the price I would love to see it before 99 gosh wouldn't that be amazing I just don't know I genuinely don't know if that's even possible anymore I just don't know if they can do that

I think that they're honestly I think they're partners in this space their retail partners want to put it on sale so you set the price at 699 and then you let them put it on sale at 599 or 540 it also lets them test the prices right you put it at 699 on apple.com Walmart can say okay

the sales really go up at 549 and Apple's like great let's do that and I'm like well we're going to trial it at 499 it's like great let's see what happens like it allows lots of experimentation among the retailers to find out what people want to pay for that product while because again the MacBook Air is 99 but you do not need to get it for 99 if you find a deal at a retailer for a new version of it like they're for sale for a lot of less than that. And they're on sale. And so you've got to think of it that way. Zoe also mentions the education discount, which would be a big thing. Of course, which is a hundred down. Right. Yes, the $9.99 error is $8.99 for education. So he's $6.99 would be $5.99 for education. But if you're thinking about like this is your first Mac kind of thing, you're going to school, like $599, brand new from Apple is like, ooh. That's a good price. That is a really good price but imagine if it was imagine if it was 499

yeah well I just I think so I think we could run away with this and the rule of Apple pricing applies which is it's always a higher price than you want it to be but then there are discounts so I think it'll be seen

I think it'll come out for a disappointing price of something like $699 but then the discount prices will be bizarre and fascinating we'll see This episode is brought to you by Factor. You might be thinking about keeping health top of your mind as we head into this new year, but you might not have the time for cooking.

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and recovery. Factor meals are always fresh, never frozen, and ready in about two minutes. It's no prep, no stress. Is that right, Jason? So is it no prep, no stress? Yeah, super easy. We got a reason delivery. And yeah, we were doing a bunch of meal planning for the holidays and it was really hard to, we're like, oh no, what are we going to do for lunch? And, you know, what do we have? We've been prepping this big thing for later, but we don't have anything for now. And easy for Lauren to pop one of these in her bag and take it to work or for me to kind of wander out from the garage here and find one in the fridge, a couple of minutes. And they've got detailed instructions.

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This is something I spoke about in the Upgradies. It's one of the reasons I love the athletic app. I want them to take the data that I have in the health app and just show me things that I should be focused on. And also, let me talk to the health app and ask it questions. You have all this information. Surely you have the knowledge and the skills to build a pretty decent foundational model with this stuff, let me talk to the health app and say, what should I be

focusing on? What does this mean? You show me trends. You're like, oh, look at this. It's trend and I'm like, wait, is that good? Like, I don't know. I don't know what it means. Like, I just want to be able to ask basic questions of the app, which isn't currently giving me that information. So like, say like, how, okay, great. I'm not doing good right. I'm not doing good right Now, how was I doing three years ago? You know, like, is it better? Like, what do you think about this? I would like to be able to have a dialogue with my computer.

I will say one of the things that large language models have taught me is the pleasure in being able to have a dialogue with the computer. To ask the computer questions, this works for me as a person, to be like, no, but what about this? Yeah, okay, but what about that? Like to have this kind of natural conversation with the computer is something I enjoy. And it helps me get things done. It helps me understand things in a way that I find to be more understandable.

Like it just helps me be able to get to what I want. I would like to have this kind of dialogue with the health app. I can't disagree. Yeah. Yeah. What else have you got? make some worldwide policy changes that ease the tension, right? Like, can we lower, if you're Apple, can you lower the temperature?

This is a thing that we've talked about a lot. Lower the temperature by making some worldwide policy changes that make it less likely and make other regions and governments less interested in regulating you. Yep. And this is us saying Apple needs to be strategic, about being proactive, about understanding the general, we now have a really good idea of generally what regulators want in terms of modifying Apple's behavior.

So, why don't you roll out, instead of being angry and rolling out specific policies in specific countries, why don't you roll out some worldwide policy changes? They've done this with a couple little things, but like roll out worldwide policy changes that just take the edge off this whole. situation and ease tension. Change the rules everywhere for external purchases and what percentage you take and linking.

And if there's some categories, some companies or countries where you can't do that, some regions where you can't do that, so be it. But like everywhere else, you're like, these are the new rules. Ideally, they'd be similar to rules that already exist in some countries. But like make new rules that diffuse some of this. And if some of this has already happened, do more of it. everywhere, not just region by region. I would like to suggest, as I mentioned earlier,

one way you could release a lot of pressure in a few ways is, and I'm going to do my Mac as the model thing here, allow notarized individual apps, not alternative app stores worldwide, using the Mac model. And the reason I know this is hard, But first off, you don't want to say, I want everybody in the world to set up their own app store.

Like I said, I think it's actually a bad model. I don't like it. Do what the Mac does. I mean, you can have an app store. You can side load an alternative app store. That happens on the Mac. That's fine. But just let that happen.

Not just because that will, I think, release a lot of the tension of freedom and the app store forces me to do this and all that. But also because it, it, eliminates the tension, or at least reduces the tension, of things like a government coming to you and saying, I don't like this app. Why don't you get rid of it? Now, they could still say, we don't like this app and they're a registered developer. They're a notarized. You notarized it. Stop that. But it's a lot easier to say, well, you know, legally, you know, you need to go to them, not us.

they are following our guidelines, et cetera, et cetera. They could still be forced to do it, but it puts that, it moves that to a different place than right now, which is if there's only an app store in the U.S., let's say,

and the U.S. government says, take that app off the app store. And they say, okay, we'll do it. That app is gone and can never, ever, ever come back. Now, I would like it if you could jump through a few security hoops and install anything, as you can on the Mac.

Because then Apple can really say, look, we can put up barriers here, but if somebody wants to install software on their iPhone, that's their decision, not ours. I think that's incredibly beneficial to Apple as well as users. And most users don't do this. Very few users are installing side-loaded apps without notarization on the Mac. It's not happening. I have a couple.

The hoops you have to jump through are much worse than it ever used to be, but you can do it. And I think it would be better for Apple. I think Apple needs to not be the only, what is that terrible saying, the only throat to choke? Well, they get choke now. Yeah, people say that. People say that in a positive way,

which is so like, yeah, you're... They say that in a positive way? You know, yeah, it's like, I just want one throat to... There's a business term. Yeah, I want one throat to choke on this, which is basically like, I want one person to be responsible.

It's like, no choking, please. Are you Darth Vader? Surely there's a different. Surely there is a different thing. Surely there is a better metaphor. There has to be. That has to be. This is, if, if Darth Vader comes to you and

says, you know, I find your lack of app store control disturbing, you need to be able to say they're not in the app store. There's nothing we can do about it. So I think some changes there that are proactive worldwide that are like, look, you could do this and we'll let you and we don't care. Might actually lower the temperature in a bunch of different places. Yeah, I just want to, I want to stop the piecemeal approach that we're having that we already mentioned at the top of the show, right? Because this is going to keep happening. Why don't we just deal with it? Just make it the worldwide policy because it's making everyone's lives harder doing this. So much development time inside of Apple has been lost to this, right? And continues to be lost to this. What are the

things that we as users are not getting because iOS development is having to implement alternative of app marketplaces, right? Like, and have to keep tweaking and tweaking and tweaking because they're trying their best to get just, just within the rules, right? So like, instead of just opening it up or making it like obvious and clear and simple, they're like, you know, oh, but what if we do? What about, no, just making everyone's lives harder, more complicated. It's going to keep doing it.

They're going to keep, like, having to shut off. and shut down different countries and doing all kinds of nonsense and then you're going to end up with these scenarios that you do in the EU where it's like, yeah, but we can't offer that feature now. We don't want to offer this feature now because we want to make people feel bad and like da da da da da and now here we are. I just don't want it, right? Like I just don't want this anymore. It's one of the things that I hope a new CEO would change. Like my hope would be a new CEO is like, I don't want to deal with this. Like I am not. is not what I want to do. I do not want the company to be here. I don't want to go to court

over this. Like, let's just change. I don't, yeah, I don't know what the result is of it. Like, and I don't, and like, you know, if somebody, if somebody would tell me, right, they will lose $20 billion a year if they do this, all right. Like, I understand why you're doing it, but I just don't think that's going to be the case. Like, I just don't think that's the case. Like, I think that they are holding on so tight to something that isn't as big a problem as they think it might be. But maybe they don't know better than me. I don't know. But yes, I just don't want to keep doing this anymore, right? Like, I want it to be simpler and I want it to be fairer. It's not fair, in my opinion. It's just not fair. The way that the app still works. I've been saying this

for years, it's not fair to developers. Apple takes way too much and they give too little in return. My last thing, Jason, is I want some action in wearables. So, I've got two things here. Some kind of smart glasses product really just focused at least around cameras and audio. And that's got, in my opinion, that has to happen in 2026 because my word, they're going to be behind if they can't start getting this stuff together. If they care about it. And I think they do care about it. and an Apple Watch redesign.

I want the Apple Watch to look different. I think that the Apple Watch is not good looking. It's a good looking smart watch. It's not a good looking watch. I want a round one, but I don't think I'm ever going to get it. But I would like something visually different in the Apple Watch lineup. I thought it was really cool when they made it much thinner. That was nice.

but it's still got the same silhouette. And I would like that silhouette to change. I mean, the Apple Watch is now over 10 years old, and it has essentially had the same design language that entire time. Like, if you look at a series one and a series 11 next to each other, it's like, yeah, that's essentially the same thing. Pretty much the same. Like, it's gotten a little bit bigger and thinner,

but like that's the same thing. And I just, you know, I don't know if that is what we should say we're doing at this point. I feel like we could do something. We could do something. Like, even the Ultra, right? Like, it just, it looks like the Apple Watch has just got a big thing on the side of it, the Crown Guard. But it still just looks like the Apple Watch. And I want something different there.

I made a case in a MacRole column last year that Apple could do another Apple Watch that has a different look and still sell the Apple Watch with the classic look. They can have more than one product, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah. The iPhone has many, many products now. They can make another Apple Watch that has a totally different style. Yeah. And still also sell the other Apple Watches.

New bands, if you have to do it, right? Like, you know, just do it. Like, you sell different forms of different cases. And continue to sell series and Ultra and then have a new one that's got a different look and give it a different name and it's part of the Apple Watch family. I think that there's nothing wrong with that. And then on the wearables or the smart glasses, like, yes, this is the thing. last year where I said, you know, if I were at Apple, I would just say, we got to ship

something like the Meta Raybans by the end of the year. And that didn't happen, but they better do it by this year because they're going to be, I mean, they're way behind. Because as has been well documented, they decided that they would go from the top down with Vision Pro and poohed the bottom up approach. And they need to do both. And I don't think it's really getting a lot of attention because I don't know how good a product is really, but meta is currently shipping shipping to customers a product that has a display in it

the glass is out of a display in them and it's very limited right like it's very limited to meta services and that's fine like whatever like they're not walking around saying it's the best thing ever I don't think but they are already shipping a product that has a projected

display inside of it so so Apple just needs to get on the on the train and start doing this I have they have all the pieces they just need to put them together in a compelling way and I will just say every time I see an ad for a meta product and they're like it's so cool I can say things to my glasses and I say hey meta this thing and I think wow I dislike

that company because I hear the phrase hey meta and I'm just like no I never want to talk to that company I never want them to hear me I never want to use that that product at all and I know I've got a I've got a quest that I will use but I'm still never I'm not happy about it like I and that's the danger is like they make a product so compelling that you're willing to forego your feelings about how they treat your information in society and everything else because oh well you know this is what I have to do to do this cool thing like and and that the frustrating thing really is that Apple has all the pieces for this they just didn't think it was a thing and now by all accounts wild because they do the Vision Pro was clearly the beginning to try and get to AR glasses, but why did they not want to go from the bottom? They just only want to go from the top? I mean, I would love to hear somebody inside tell me that, but my guess is AirPods exist and they thought, well, AirPods are good enough. And do we want glasses that are not as good as, you know, people are much less likely to be forced to wear glasses than they are to just pop in earbuds, you know, or, you know, these AirPods and that gets you most of it. and you've got a camera in your pocket with your iPhone,

and do you need a camera on your glasses? And I get it, I get it, but at the same, so I think that was what it was. There was a, we've already got products that are in this category that do these things. Why would anybody want this thing? And they poo-pooed it. And then it turns out some people are like,

actually it's kind of cool to have this. So they should have been experimenting with that. And my guess is they were experimenting with it, right? Internally. And I think that there were some senior people are like, this category doesn't, this category doesn't make sense. And I'll tell you,

meta pushing the category, probably fed into that argument, right? It's like, this is just meta. They suck. They're doing this thing out of desperation. It's no good, whatever. And I think they got a little too prideful and a little too dismissive.

Because it's not like they couldn't, it really drives me crazy when I see people talk about this story and they're like, oh, Apple totally missed the boat on this. It's like, well, they'd miss the boat, but like sometimes I see the analysis that's like Apple is behind. And it's like, honestly,

if you look at all the stuff that Apple's doing in this category, technologically Apple is ahead they just refuse to ship a product and that's vision that right that's a tactical mistake like the AirPods are so good and so far ahead in so many different ways

and their ability to miniaturize cameras and devices like they've got all the pieces they just chose not to go there I think out of some weird kind of like why would we confuse our other products it's a real innovator's dilemma kind of thing in a way which is like the AirPods are so good

that this is like adjacent enough to it that we think maybe they're in conflict and why would we want to do that when we've got this other great thing so we talk up our great thing so much that we decide to disparage this thing and it's from a competitor we don't like

so we disparage it further and so we can't possibly make that product instead of thinking why don't we try that and I'm sure somebody at Apple made this argument was shot down and that was a mistake yeah I could imagine

that there was that like institutional thing of like, oh, Mehta's making this, no one's going to want this, and they just kind of ignored it and didn't expect that it would become, and I don't think anyone expected, including Mata, actually, expected it would become a popular product, but they ended up finding some interesting things that it could do, and it's become a popular product. And I think now they're moving forward on this, because it's actually somewhere where they, people seem interested in something that they're making in a hardware perspective, which is something that they've

not really had before. And so they're moving down that world. now it's left Apple in a situation where if AR glasses are the thing, matter is clearly closer and do they want to be in that position? There is a world where they could say, yes, they're fine being in that position.

But I don't think that they do want to be in that position, right? Because I think they, Tim has spoken for a long time about AR and Apple has been putting AR in everything for years and there has not really been anything to show for it. And the expectation was always because one will be wearing it on our faces. And right now, meta is actually shipping a product that has

some of the stuff built into it. Is it what you want? Is it got everything? No. But you can actually walk around in the streets and get directions from a mapping service that they built, which is like, that is like the thing that you show off of AR, right? Like you could walk down the street and you can say like, turn left. It's like, wow, look at this. And you're at your, you can do that today with the meta just view display or whatever. It's called meta raybans display. There's a product that you're shipping. Apple doesn't have anything. And it's most likely based on reports if we do get something this year is cameras and AirPods, which is nice, but that's still not enough, I think. So they've got to do it this year. They're going to do anything. And I would

quite like that. Again, I would like that. I would like my sunglasses to be Apple glasses rather than meta glasses. I would prefer that personally, just because of where everything sits for me and the choices and decisions that I've made. Yep. Yep. Yep. I'm not sure I would even want this product, although I do. I mean, I wear sunglasses every time I go outside, right? Yep. And AirPods. I definitely wouldn't want it for my vision glasses. But for sunglasses, I would consider it. Yeah. Yeah. Something like that. Yeah. I think that's it. Let's do an Ask Upgrade question to finish out today's show, though, because we're otherwise going to skip it, but I want to do one. Mark asks, sorry, please, please.

Yeah, one laser. That's it. That's all you get. Mark asks, how long do you leave your Christmas decorations up for? Okay, for me, generally, it's the end of the weekend after New Year's Day. So yesterday, we move the tree outside, it will go out to the curb on our trash day. We, you know, took all the lights off, took all the ornaments off, put everything in the big plastic bin that contains our Christmas stuff, Christmas stuff, Hanukkah stuff, Thanksgiving stuff. It's all in the same box. And that's it. The only exception to that is Lauren really likes putting the holiday cards we get up on the hall door. And we leave those up. I demand that they be removed once it's February. But not until then. um i would have liked to have had our christmas decorations all put away by the end of the day yesterday as it stands right now i have no idea when our christmas tree will be put down uh maybe next weekend let's see look you you're on baby time yeah time is different baby time is different

But I'll say, like, our daughter went back. Hi, Jamie. Our son went back. Everything is like reverting. And honestly, that's another thing. So Julian went back on Saturday. And it was like, well, like, I mean, the house is, it was full and now it's empty. So it seemed like a time to reset the house to its prior condition, right?

It's pre- Thanksgiving condition, essentially. And although I miss having the decorations up and all of that, I also like having my house back to the way it usually is. Like we have to move stuff around. I have to move a bookshelf and a bunch of chairs to fit the, to make space for the tree, where the tree goes, like all of that. So it's kind of nice that we, you know, Lauren and I shot into action yesterday in the late morning and we did all of this and then vacuumed and got all the needles out and all of that.

And suddenly it's like, oh, yeah, it's our house. We got our house back. So that's kind of nice too. Even though I do like, I love, I mean, we get a tree every year. I love having the Christmas tree and the Christmas decorations and all of that. I am enjoying it. It makes it special. But I've got to take it down.

But getting rid of it is part of making it special, is that it's only for a certain time of year and then it goes. If you'd like to send in a question for us to answer on a future episode of the show, it's very easy to do that. Please send in your Ask Upgrade Questions by going to UpgradeFeedback.com. this today again just too long of an episode to do more ask upgrade questions thank you to our members to support us with Upgradeplus you can go to gadupgradeplus.com and you can sign up to become a member you can find us on YouTube by searching for Upgrade Podcasts on YouTube and I would like to thank our sponsors of this episode that is Factor Squarespace FitBod and Century but most

of all thank you for listening we'll be back next week until then say goodbye Justin Snell goodbye Mike Hurley Thank you.