Upgrade - 617: Image Playgrounds Is My Roman Empire

Episode Date: May 25, 2026

From Relay, this is Upgrade, episode 617 for May 25th, 2026. Today's show is brought to you by Century, FitBod, and Mercury Weather. My name is Mike Hurley, and I'm joined by Jason Snow. Hi, Jason. Hi, Mike. Welcome back. Thank you so much. Thank you.

I love being a listener of the show, and last week's episode was especially good. I want to thank Stephen and interviewee, Jeffrey. Yeah. For being on the show. It was really good. I'm going to talk a little bit about that in a minute. So, very excited about that. But there's no time for any of this,

because I have a Snell Talk question for you. Oh, I see. And the Snell Talk question comes from a Maher who says, when using Mac OS on a desktop, do you keep Safari four screen, or do you keep it smaller in size? If it's smaller, do you have it maxed out vertically or horizontally?

Oh. Well, first of all, this is a very technical question for Snell talk. We usually, this feels like more of an ask upgrade, but I'll take it. I'll take it. Hey, look, this is what Amar wanted. They wanted this specifically in Snow Talks. Yeah, okay.

I don't run anything full screen. Yes. Anything. Yeah, I agree. Ever on my Mac. Never, ever, ever, ever. Safari is probably somewhere between a third and a half my screen width wide on my 27-inch display. And it's usually probably three quarters of the screen tall. because I like to have like room for other stuff to move around.

And I don't need, unless I have to resize the web browser window for it to be especially bigger or smaller because of something in it. I, I'm a big fan of like having windows be fractional sizes of my screen so I can have Discord over there and Slack over there and notes over there and Safari over here and like just have them all. That's why I like using the Mac with multiple windows and all of that. So, I mean, that's my answer is generally, I'm sure there's a size. At some point, I had an automation, I think, that automatically resized it to the exact right size that I like. But I can't be bothered. If I resize something and then I make a new window and it's the wrong size, I just grab the corner and make it the right size.

And then I move on with my life. So I have a Moom shortcut to resize a window. And it's set on how big I like my safari window to be. and it's about four-fifths of the screen that I'm using, but centred, you know, so there's like space on the other side, so I can grab other things if I want it. But it is full vertical height. Because for me, if I'm in Safari, I'm like doing stuff.

But then I have a bunch of other Moom shortcuts. If I want to be doing other things, I'll throw it over to the side. It can go, you know, occupy any amount of horizontal real estate. So if I need to use Safari with other apps, I have many shortcuts to do that. But by and large, when I'm using Safari, I'm just surfing the web, man. You're just scrolling. I'm surfing and scrolling.

Okay. Thank you to Amar for that technical snow talk question. Yeah, very much. The first designated technical snow talk. Whoa, no. Hang on. Too soon. If you would like to send in the question of your own for a future episode of the show,

technical or not, go to upgrade. Trade Feedback.com and sender them. We have some follow-up. So Aaron writes in and says, congratulations, Jason, on the E-Mate 300. A word of warning. I briefly had a side hustle repairing these back in 2008.

The grease on the hinge clutch, springs started drying out in the early 2000s, and as a result, the springs would not appropriately adjust when the lid was open or closed and would ultimately snap and sometimes tear the display cable.

Yes, this is a known issue. I kind of don't care. I looked up, I thought, oh, well, you need to do some work on the springs to make the hinge work better. And then I found a video where somebody explained what you need to do. And I got to the point where he said, now you have to desotter these two cables off the board. And I thought, nope, that was it.

Yeah, that's not surprising, like in listening to last week's episode, it's very funny that you were just like, I brought this one tool because at the exact moment anything more than this one tool was needed, I ain't the one to do it where Steve was like, oh,

Steve would fill up his truck with tools and other computers to maybe do open heart surgery on those old Macs. Oh yeah, yeah, yeah. Whereas I brought, I brought blues guzzey and whatever else to a keyboard and a mouse

and that's it. Stephen would have, yeah, Stephen would have had, but he has more of that stuff than I do. That's part of the point here. Yes. It does work.

I did reset it. I got the power cable for it and reset it and the e-mate does work. I don't really have any plans to do anything with it, but it does, it does function. And yeah, I mean, if I did not have a no-sodder policy or I had a friend who had a, was very pro-soddering, we, you know, might desodder it and re-sodder it and do all of those things. But I'm not doing that. I'm strong policy, just strong policy against. So it will remain as it is.

And hopefully it will be. remained functional. I have a question for you, because I was not on the last episode, so I couldn't ask it. But I think this is actually, you've partly answered, at least, at least, to the e-mate. But all of the old computers that you have been collecting, do you ever boot them up and do anything with them? Well, I take pride in the fact that the computers behind me all work. And as I mentioned last week, the only one that I have that's really severely not working is the Mac portable.

So I take pride in the fact that they work. But I, so as a part of the 20 Max for 2020 project in thereafter, what I decided to do at one point is I wanted to have the ability to boot different versions of OS10 on different machines, because I thought that that would be interesting from a historic perspective to have that. And so I do. I have a quick silver Power Mac G4 over here that has a hard drive in it, with partitions for like every OS 10 version it boots. And so I can boot into all of those.

And I like having that. The truth is that emulation is so good that a lot of, like when I needed a screenshot the other day, and it was much easier to just run an emulator and take a screenshot than figure out one, how to get that thing running on a, on an old computer, and two, then get the screenshot off of it. So the truth is it's more vague that I like the idea that they can run and that they function than it is that I actually use them for anything.

I mean, that's the truth of it. It's more like a little preservation, a little just set dressing and a little pride that I've got some of them functioning. But the reality is, in most cases, if you want to look up what was something that was going on in Mac OS in 2009 or whatever, 2007, 2002, whenever it is, you can probably either emulate it by running it in, you know, an emulator on your Mac or even in a web browser because of Infinite Mac. So it's less, it's less useful. It's mostly, I mean, unlike Stephen, I think, who, who really, really is collecting them at a completely other level. My big motivator was 20 Macs for 2020 and then building this shelf behind me so that if I'm on a various podcast like MacBrick Weekly every week, I've got a nice selection of interesting

looking computers behind me. So it's also just set pieces. So we're going to jump back a little bit to a couple of weeks ago talking about Apple and Intel and such. Henry wrote in and said, on the topic of Apple's chip strategy, I wanted to mention that other Apple products like Apple Watch, AirPods,

potentially smart glasses and the like, have chips that aren't on the most advanced process node. These chips could be manufactured by Intel and Samsung because they aren't as high volume as the A or M series chips. Even Apple's cellular and Wi-Fi Bluetooth chips could go into them. They don't have to make the most cutting-edge chips. These are the legacy nodes.

And it's true, and I expect that they will do that. But what I will also say is that doesn't solve the problem of the A&M series chips all being made in Taiwan. It can get you started, right? That like maybe the beginning of your partnership with somebody else, they're producing things that are less important. But the whole point of the discussion we're having and the whole point of doing this is to do the important chips because that's what actually matters. Yeah. In the long run, you just don't want to have a single source in Taiwan. one for your most important chips.

But this is an absolutely true point that the older nodes are going to be easier to manufacture elsewhere. It's like the India iPhone building strategy, right? It began with the SC. Then it became the regular phone, but months later. And now they started building the pro phones immediately there. Also, I want to point out,

I don't think TSMC is building all of Apple's chips now anyway, right? I think they get chips from other... fabs that are running on old nodes. That was the whole, that's where legacy nodes came to be a refrain for Tim Cook is he was talking about the, you know, getting a Wi-Fi chip from Broadcom or whatever and wherever they manufacture. I know Apple does that themselves now, but I actually don't know for a fact that TSM sees their partner on that.

And they certainly don't need to be, although again, it depends what process they're using and all of that. So this is a good point. It just doesn't, there's lots of business they could bring to, places that are on older technology nodes, they just, part of the strategy that we're discussing is also just making a more diversified source of iPhone and NAC chips. So say the Apple Watch, when it gets a new system on a chip, is that considered a legacy node? I don't know enough about it.

I mean, they don't boast about the Apple Watch being on a three nanometer process, do they? So the answer is probably not. Yeah, so it's like they're probably using some technology. that was used somewhere else at some point that they've now been able to get into this. But yes, you say, it's not the, probably not on the most cutting edge, you know, or the chips that are going inside of the, the AirPods or whatever. It's not like an A19 pro in there, right? It's like it's something different. But yeah, it's interesting. An anonymous, anonymous question, answer, right? Oh, I've got real time follow up. Oh, real time follow up. Apple, so thank you, thank you, thank you to David Schaub for

sending this. The Apple Silicon page on Wikipedia does list the processes, and the latest S-series chips, which are for the Apple Watch, are four-nanameter process. And the previous S-8-8-7-S-6 were a seven-nometer process. So yes, these are legacy nodes. And the Apple C-1 cellular is also on a four-nometer process for the baseband. So that, I mean, yes, that makes sense, right? These are on older processes, and that's yes. So, of course, if they're not using

other partners, they certainly could be, it just doesn't solve the other problem. Anyway. Coming back to an anonymous person wrote in the said, on the recent episode discussing Steve Jobs in exile, you were talking about Jobs' motivations, that he was not an enterprise guy. I was wondering what you thought about if part of that

could be that, although you can get rich selling to the enterprise and to government, you're not going to get the And I think of love from the enterprise and the government. And maybe that was what Steve really liked. I think that what I think that's a little bit of the cart before the horse. I think jobs conceived of consumer products. I think that is how he thought.

Is it also true that what excites him about that is the idea that the general public is going to, use them and love them, sure, they go together. But I don't think it's, look, we're psychoanalyzing Steve Jobs now. I don't think, I don't think, which we could do it. I think he's more motivated by pursuing a vision of making products out of technology that regular people will like, putting them in the kitchen, you know, putting them in your home, putting them on, you know, in your pocket. I think he's more focused on that

than he is on how do I get adulation but I do think they are connected in the sense that yes the NS well it's not entirely true I mean the NSA will show you some love but it's going to be secret love mostly in money

yeah big institutions are are just going to I think he's a counter I think he was a counterculture guy very countercultural influenced guy grew up in the 60s I think he had a suspicion of big institutions and made the mistake, in part because Next was kind of designed to not step on Apple because Apple was threatening and suing Steve Jobs. They ended up in a niche that was exactly the wrong niche for Steve Jobs's mindset. Okay.

That makes sense. I just wanted to say you wrote a review of Steve Jobs in exile. on six colors, which are, we'll put in the show notes. I realize all I had done is interview the author on Upgrade, but I hadn't actually written my review. And this is one where I asked, actually I asked the Wall Street Journal book editor if I could review that too after I finished my David Poe book, and he said,

I just assigned it, so you can't. And so the Wall Street Journal, very nice review of it. So I realized, oh, geez, I need to do that. The book's out now. So I did write that last week. So I had planning to read this book. I was interested in it. but the interview I enjoyed so much, I started reading it immediately.

And so I'm working my way through it now. I will say the UK or the Europe cover, I prefer to the US cover. I've put a link in the show notes to at the Amazon UK listing. But it focuses, like, color-wise, much more on the next colors and has a little cube in there and stuff. Oh, nice. I like the cover a lot. I don't know why they do that, like why different markets get different covers. I'm sure someone could tell me that.

I'm sure you have many friends that could tell me that. I think it comes down to different publishers, and different publishers and different markets have their method of selling books, and they know what works. I think that's kind of how it is. Yeah, and this one I just like it. I think it shows Steve more on the cover in it. But anyway, something I found so fascinating,

reflecting on the book so far, is the full realization that Jobs was fully, fully gone from Apple before I was born. But I am so, I was so aware of him as a kid before he returned. It's like, I don't, I don't know why. You know what I mean? Like, when he came back to Apple, I was aware of how big a deal that was, but I had never known, I'd never seen him there prior, you know?

Like, in kind of the exile years, he still was able to capture. this allure, and I'm looking forward to reading more about that, even though he was failing, he still had this allure. It is the legend. I mean, I think a lot of what drove him and the currency that he was able to spend in being the legendary founder of Apple and the legendary creator of the Mac. And even though he left before the Mac really became successful, all the success kind of accrued to him.

Yeah. Right? Like, I mean, that's the truth is we can talk about a subject for another time, perhaps, Jean-Louis Gasse and John Scully and where they took the Mac after they kicked Steve Jobs out, basically. I mean, they kicked him to Siberia, basically, and then he quit. But it is ironic that I think as they made the Mac more and more successful, it just built the legend of Steve Jobs. Yeah. I think that's true.

The, I think Toy Story definitely did something. Like, yeah. Yeah. No, I mean, the flip side of it, right, is Pixar, where he was successful, where he was more hands-off, was like the positive lesson for him while he was getting the crap kicked out of him at next. Does Steve Jobs and Exile have anything about Pixar in it? It's got a little bit. Okay. It talks about it a little bit. Sure. Not in the incredible detail that it does about Next, but there are stories about him going up to Pixar and Ed Catmull runs, writes the afterward to the book.

Oh, cool. I really like the forward by Dan Alouin. That was a really great story. It's very clear that Dan Alouin, who is one of the prime movers in Next, was also a prime mover in making Steve Jobs in exile. He's a key source. You can tell. You can tell. This episode is brought to you in part by our friends over at Century. Most AI tools that are out there can help you write code. But Sear is built for when code. breaks. SIA is Century's AI debugging agent, and because it's built right into Century, it has your full context, your errors, traces, logs, replays, and code all in one place.

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Our thanks to Century for their support of this show and relay. It's time for Upstream, Jason Snell. Oh. I brought it back. It's back, everybody. Downstream, downstream died so

upstream could live is where we are. I guess so. Welcome back to our fallen friend. Apple broadcast an MLS game live on Saturday using only iPhone 17 Pro cameras.

All of the footage of the game was shot on iPhone, assume it, that it was there in Briggs. I saw an Instagram real today. where they showed off some of the production rigs that they were using. I assume it's like the ones they used at the MLB games that they've had on an iPhone camera app, where it's basically like tied into a breakout box that is, you know, mounted with the camera on the tripod and all of that.

And I'm assuming also similar to some of the stuff that they've used to shoot the keynotes, right? We've seen imagery of that where it's like it essentially looks like a full production camera, but it's just an iPhone in the middle. It's got all the rigging and all the gear All the gear around it and stuff Apple said with the cameras positioned throughout the venue The broadcast will deliver pristine video quality Alongside dynamic new perspectives that bring viewers closer to the action

Made possible by the small form factor of the iPhone Jason was this your experience? Did you watch it? I watched some of it It really is amazing if you look at the There's the Brian Tong went and did a TikTok where he's got, like, he shows one of these enormous cameras, and then at the back of it, there's an iPhone. Right, like, so it's there, as we knew from the MLB thing,

what they're doing is they're putting it in the context of modern TV production equipment, and then it's just a piece of the puzzle. It looked perfectly normal to me. They had some shots. They had cameras, you know, sometimes, I don't know whether they always have, like, little gold cameras and all that. I think they do. I mean, the advantage is that they can put those, you know, they can put those cameras everywhere, but the primary cameras were probably with really, you know, the extra optics like that camera that was in the TikTok video where it's, you know, it's not, it's just like when we talk about a movie shot on iPhone. Like, it's not like the iPhone is just in somebody's hand and they're in video mode, right? Like it's, there are professional tools that augmented. It's just a piece of the puzzle. But it's part of their marketing to do it that way. And I think it is impressive that like at its.

heart the iPhone camera is good enough that it can do broadcast quality with accrued remands right that's that's always the catch yeah it's like if you can watch this game and don't feel like it looks bad that is an incredible achievement on its own right like if they can do you're like oh this looks good it's like that's iPhones you know it's and yes they're in all of that gear but it's still an iPhone and so I think I think it is an impressive thing to do. I wonder what the goal of this is, if there even is one. Go!

Hey! There he goes. Yeah. I think it is just like with the MLB stuff, I think it's just like the shot on iPhone with movies. The point is to say the iPhone camera doesn't have compromises.

And it's so, and it's in some ways it is the iPhone camera is so pro that you as a regular person don't need to worry about it's going to be great. Yes. Even though, yes, all of it is true. It's like all these things are on iPhone, but obviously if you're a professional

cinematographer, you're going to have a different rig, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. All that is true. But in the end, it boils down to marketing and it boils down to sending a message of a quality level. Apple stuff is so good that you could shoot a movie with it and they have. And you could shoot an entire sporting event with it. And they have. So don't worry about it.

You're going to get the best when you get an iPhone pro. I think that's it. I think that's the entirety of a message is. you can do all of this. It's like when we say pro, we mean it. And like this is them kind of putting their money with their mouth is kind of stuff. We know you're not going to do that, dear consumer. But you know, your phone is the same one that shot that movie.

And your phone is the same one that shot that soccer match? You know, it's like when you're on a plane, it's like, is there a doctor on board? It's basically like, you know, you're in the football stadium. It's like, does anyone have an iPhone? We need to shoot this game? And you'll be like, oh, we need an iPhone 17? I'm good. I'm equipped.

and now I can jump in if needed. Talking about Apple and football, they just released a Real Madrid documentary and immersive video on Vision Pro. This is a quote from you here. Apple's immersive productions are really benefiting from the larger selection of immersive cameras now that Black Magic is apparently cranking out

its Ursa Cini camera in volume. Do you think there's a connection here? They said there were more than 30 cameras that they used for this and it was mostly capturing one game. Okay. That's significantly different to what we've seen on other. stuff. Those early Vision Pro ones,

you could tell they had one camera, maybe two. You could, you could tell. And they said they had more than 30. They're all over the, the match, but they're also like watching the 90-year-old man

who's watching at home, and they're with the taxi driver who's watching from his cab, and they're with the bar where the bartender is the president of the supporters club. And like that level of, they just couldn't do that before,

because they didn't have the cameras for it, and now they do. And it makes a difference in terms of how something gets shot. And so it shows immersive video having more moves than it did when there were no cameras to shoot. That said, a lot of the moves are very similar. It's still a lot of, like, sports highlights interspersed with, you know, music and inspirational quotes from soccer players as they practice,

and then they show them making goals in the game. and you know it's you know but the soccer action was great and I think one of the things I noticed about like there's a there's a high up angle that I thought was actually really great in understanding kind of soccer tactics in a way that I I don't normally get from watching on TV and there are some closer shots where you see again I don't know if it would work for live soccer but for highlights like what I always think when I watch high level soccer is the technical skill of the play. is astounding. And it's all about like where they put their feet and stuff. And if you're watching a shot that's covering half the pitch, it's real hard to see that stuff. And so you're just like watching little, you know, little stick figures bobbing around out there.

And then you see a detail and you're like, these people are so incredibly like that. How did that guy get free? And the answer is a wild series of steps to fake out the other person. And in immersive, that comes through. and is very impressive. So there's a bunch of impressive things there. But again, it's a 20-minute thing.

It's about a match that happened six months ago. And it's the same old story, right? Which is, it's interesting. It's an interesting immersive short sports doc that makes you feel like you saw this match, which is great. But I keep wondering about actual live sports. And all we've got so far is the NBA demos. But I do think that the big story,

honestly, for me, is that you could see that they had lots of cameras this time. Like the kind of camera setup that you would have for a professional documentary that was normal. And the old immersive videos weren't like that. Because we have a camera to shoot all of this or maybe two. And it feels like to get that, to get what we want, which is like more kind of more action stuff, you need more cameras. And so this is, you know, the more movies and documentaries and stuff, they can be made with people managing 20, 30 of the.

things, the more likely it is to get to a point where somebody could be managing that for a live production, too. Yes. Yes, for sure. I mean, that's why they were able to do those Lakers games, is they had enough of the Blackmagic. It's not quite the same camera because it's Black Magic Live. So it's obviously a different setup for live capture, but I'm sure a lot of it is the same kind of pathway, the same camera physically. And the more of those there are, the more chance that there will be a, there will be an experimental something. But the challenge is what we've debated about those Lakers games, which is

what's the right way to do it? And the only way to find out is to try. So I hope they try more. A saddle up for a roundup, Jason Snowell. Yehaw. The sheriff Mark German is reporting on some planned Apple intelligence features for iOS 27. These include new writing tools,

which would work similar to kind of like a grammally style grammar checker. So I'm going to read from Mark German, the system appears in a translucent menu that slides up from the bottom of the screen and displays original text alongside suggested revisions. And then Mark says you can kind of like approve specific changes or accept them all or say, go away. I would like this. This sounds great to me. It's all in the details, right? Because like, because I have grammarly. I pay for grammarly. And I do it because I don't have copy editors. And it is an extra layer between me

and the stuff I post. And what it finds generally is, this is a correctly spelled word, but it's the wrong word because it's a typo and you typed into another word. And it knows the context, so it'll correct that. Or you omitted a word here.

Or you actually were not paying attention. And before that parenthetical, the verb tense, it was a plural. And you were thinking of the singular that's in the parenthetical. And so you use the wrong tense. That happens all the time to me, where it's just like,

I'm not thinking far enough back in the sentence. And it can do that. What I like about Grammarly is that there is a mode where it brings up a little box. And it lets me step through its suggested changes and go, yes, no, no, no, because there are a bunch of them that I don't agree with, that it's misreading what I'm doing. And I go, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. What I don't like is having to play hunt with hunt the underlines and click on them, which is what it wants me to do. So, and my experience with the writing tools and Apple's tools is similar, which is, this sounds good. I hope it's got a UI that makes it usable, because that's the trick, is I need to be able to step through my document using its suggestions and agree or disagree as I go.

And do I lose, does it lose context? If I click out to do a manual edit, is it gone or does it stay? All of these are my questions. One of the problems with writing tools, and I know we talked about this when it shipped, is Apple's got a whole, like, existing spell check infrastructure, and then they have writing tools. and they do very similar things, and they're completely disconnected from each other because they rushed writing tools onto the platform. So it's like, you should integrate all of these things

into one interface that users can feel comfortable using. So I hope that's what they do. So you said about it's all in the details, and this one sounds good to me, but the details of this that we have so forth, the next part, don't. Apple apparently want to try and elevate writing tools even more across the system,

this time looking to add a write with Siri toggle at the top of the keyboard and a Help Me Write button that can appear when working in a text field. This sounds like too much to me. I think it depends on who you are. I am not interested in this and would like to turn it off already and it's not even beta. But, you know, maybe some people want this. I don't know. I don't know. I'm trying to take the approach with AI-based writing stuff that I'm a writer.

And so I want to be understanding that a lot of people really struggle with writing and that technology may help them get their message across in a way that they're not able to do. So I want to be open to it depending on how it's implemented. It comes back. Again, it comes down to that. How do they do it? Do they do a good job at it? Is it something that doesn't feel heavy-handed and annoying? Or is it just like, you know, clipy-like just getting in your way?

when you just want to write something. That I don't know. Mark reports that Apple is also looking to advance shortcuts of a prompt-based approach where the user describes what they want and the system will go ahead and build it somewhat reminiscent of what our friend Federico released last week. He's been basically making this on his own. It's called Shortcuts Playground. People should go check it out. There'll be a link in the show notes to that. And, you know, Federico was assuming that he could potentially be Sherlockton. That was why he wanted to get out before WWDC. I wonder about this. Like, you know, because it's like, what happens when people inevitably ask for a thing that shortcuts just doesn't do? Like, what happens?

It's just like, I can't do that. Yeah, I think so. And then, you know, my concern of a feature like this is if you, if you give somebody a prompt in, like, field, these days, people kind of just get what they want from these tools, right? Right. Like, if you're like, give me an image, give me some text, like, what is this? It's going to give you the answer. shortcuts is a limited system. And you could ask for something that you think is quite simple.

But like, so, for example, you could say, download the audio from a YouTube video. It's a thing that people wanted to do with shortcuts for years and have done it in weird and hacky ways, but it seems like something your computer should be able to do for you. I don't think shortcuts is going to give you an answer to that. And then at that point, how useful of a system is it to people? It would be interesting to say.

Well, yeah, I mean, I think the goal is that especially it'll be for relatively simple functionality that you could say, you know, for example, this is an automation that I actually use,

which is when I connect to my Bluetooth shower speaker, I would like my phone to go in to Do Not Disturb. Okay. I built that as a shortcut. But like, it would be better for 99% of users

if they could just say, hello, shortcuts, when I connect to my Bluetooth shower speaker, I want you to set my focus mode to do not disturb. And when I disconnect, I want you to set it back to off. And have it do that.

Like, I had to figure that out. And I have no problem doing that because I know how to use shortcuts, but most people don't. But the functionality is there. It's just, it's too complex, even now.

So more complex stuff, it is going to say, oh, I don't think I can do that or I tried and it didn't work and all of that. I would think that also. So I would hope that some of this will motivate Apple because there are things that are part of the system that seem very logical to be automated

that Apple doesn't allow you to automate. And I wonder if part of this process has also been, they run a bunch of testing of these things and they're like, oh, geez, we really need to add access to that, don't we? And actually get their own stuff together. I think that would be great. So we'll see how it goes.

But you're right, it will be interesting because it's not going to be able to do everything. The goal is like, can it do some basic stuff to make people happier? because telling them how to build a shortcut and stuff is a lot. But if they can just tell the phone, can you do this and have it give them an automation that actually works? That's awesome. I love that idea. It's like for people like us, it's like the reason that Federico could build this tool and it makes sense is that we have an idea of what shortcuts is capable of doing.

Right. Sometimes it can just be a pain. It's like I need it to do this one thing, one time maybe. and I could spend 20 minutes setting up the shortcut. It's like, I don't really want to do that, but it would be very convenient for me to have this shortcut right now.

And it's like, but do I want to go through all of the things that I have to go through? So it's like you can, for us, it's like this could be a very good native feature to have as well. Also, Apple is working on a feature to let someone generate wallpapers for their devices

powered by Image Playgrounds. Okay. Speaking of ImagePriorit. playgrounds. In his power on newsletter, Mark reported that both Gen Moji and Image Playgrounds are going to get, quote, a major visual quality upgrade.

And this is actually coming from Apple apparently having improved their own models, not just having access to third-party models. Yeah. My lack of enthusiasm for the last two minutes has been because I don't like

AI-generated imagery. No. I think Gen Moji is okay, although it's not as good as I wanted, but it's okay. It's a great idea. Yes, it's a great idea that needs to be much better than it is. It doesn't really go the way that you want it to. So I'm hoping that this model may actually produce better options there. That would be good.

And I know people use, you know, procedural or AI-generated art. Like, I know they do, but like I don't. And I don't like it, and I don't like how it looks. and I have a hard time being enthusiastic about it. It's one of the things I don't like about. In addition to LLM, you know, writing, just being not good and being overused. Also, the imagery is not great, and I don't like it.

But great. My biggest skepticism here is that it's like Apple's models. It's like, okay, you're using Apple's models. Not Google's models? Because I bet Google's models are better at this than Apple's models are. So why are they? Are they using Apple's models? Apple's models, really?

Or are those Apple models that they call Apple models, but they're actually white-labeled Gemini models? I don't know. I guess we'll see. I just, this is, I know that this is going to be a real tangent here, Mike, hold on tight. I know that in the papal encyclical about AI released today, that the Pope said, Man, I don't know about this.

And so that sentence, I was like, what's he talking about? Yeah, yeah. Okay, carry on. One of the things the Pope said is, essentially, I know that we can look at AI and say that there are ways to use the tools ethically and ways to use the tools unethically. But he also said, however, if fundamentally the thing that is creating, the tools is unethical, we must consider that most of all. That if AI, his, you know, it's his typical Pope saying don't enjoy things because he's the Pope. But, you know, he's saying basically like, you know, basically you can't use an unethical

tool ethically. Even if you're trying to use it for good, if it's a fundamentally unethical tool, it's unethical. And so while acknowledging his holiness, I will say, I prefer, I prefer using an unethical tool ethically to using an unethical tool unethically. And I just, I just find a lot of this, this, this generated content, um, gross and like distasteful in a way that saying make me a, make me a shortcut or build me a playlist or write me a Python script. Those are the things that I find not distasteful. But I also want to acknowledge that there is an argument to me,

to be made that they are all kind of fruits of a poisonous tree. But I'm never going to get hyped about image playgrounds. It's just never going to happen. No, I was thinking about this when I was on my vacation last week. I was thinking about image playgrounds. As you do. As you do. Some people think about the Roman Empire.

Some people think about Image Playgrounds. That's just how it is. Image Playgrounds is my Roman Empire. Like, absolutely. I was thinking about it having just listened to Connect because those are not unconnected week before last now. And they were talking about image playgrounds

and about it being advanced. They were talking about it with other models, which is apparently another thing, right? You may be able to put Gemini in there as well. You can just choose who you want to make your images. Just there will be a story one day, I believe, about just how much of a massive mistake, and disaster this tool was because it's just so bad, right? And it was so bad,

quality-wise, from day one, let alone all of the ethical problems with it, let alone the thing that frustrated me the most and continues to is that, like, its whole proposition is make fake images of people in your life, which is like, just like, to me, a terrible thing to do. And, but now they're in it now. And so they're just continuing. continuing down this road for God knows how long. Sorry, Pope. For gosh knows how long, you know? Pope might be listening.

I don't know. So I don't, you know, at this, I would love one day to know the story about Image Playgrounds because I don't think it was a good one. No. No, definitely not. This episode is brought to you by FitBod. If you're looking to change your fitness,

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That is FITBOD.mee slash upgrade. That is one last time, FitBOD.Me slash upgrade for 25% of your membership and do get your customized fitness plan. Our thanks to FitBod for their support of this show and Relay. So we are two weeks away from WWC. No. No, no. We are drafting next week.

No, it can't be. I had originally set, I set a task to do the draft prep, you know, like to start building it together. I set this task for the second of June. That would have been the day after the draft. So that's not the right day to do that. I've now said it for tomorrow. Because I lost a little bit of track there in the old calendar. So I wanted to, you know, because we do the draft and the draft is what it is, it's a game

and we're not necessarily representing what we think and feel about WWC. I kind of wanted to get a bit of a vibe check with you about WWDC this year. Wow. I think that WWC 2024 set a weird precedent that now I can. kind of feel like I never truly know what my emotional state will be after WWDC, where previously it was always either I'm really excited or, ah, there just wasn't what I wanted. And WWT24 gave me a shell shock feeling and I'm upset and angry, which is not really a thing that I'd had before. And so now I kind of feel like I, you know, it's nice to kind of, where are we? Are we feeling good?

what things are we already questioning, maybe have concerns about. So overall, how are you feeling right now about the WWDC on the horizon? I feel like this is upgrade on hard mode because you're just asking me for feelings. Yeah. Oof.

You know, I love them. I know. I know you do. You eat them up. I will say, my WWDC experience is different from yours and this is because I've been covering it since the 20th century.

since the 90s. And so on one level, I just view it as coverage time, content, you know, gathering and writing and recording. And I, it takes me a while to step back from like just, it's a lot of work.

And then it's also setting my agenda for the next summer and fall and year to think about it. Because another little Apple is going to do what it's going to do. But if I look back and I say, what's my table setting for this? I would say this is where Apple, like last year Apple had to make good on its promises. That was the goal, right? It was make good on our promises because we failed that the year before.

Okay. this year it's more like they have to deliver, right? They have to deliver a coherent AI strategy. They have to deliver what they failed to deliver in 2024, whereas 2025 was like, we need to deliver anything to show you that we will fulfill our promises. This year, they're back to 24 where they actually have to deliver AI strategy that they punted on more or less last year.

Yeah, like you're saying about the promises, In 25, it was, you've got to deliver on the promises you make here, right? I think is what you're saying, right? Like, the promises you make at WWC, you have to deliver them. Everything they announced last year at WWDC, they shipped because they didn't announce anything that they weren't confident was going to ship because they wanted to say, we're sorry we broke that promise last year. But what they didn't do is fulfill the promises from 2024. And that's what 2026 should be about. They need to deliver an AI strategy.

I still do not believe. They're renewing their vows. Yes, they're renewing their vows. It's a beautiful way to put it. Because what they're not going to do is ship all the stuff that they announced in 2024. No? I think there were things in there we will never see. They will be memory holed away and never spoken about again. The guy in charge of AI in 2024 is gone.

Yes. The person in charge of the Siri team is gone. Yes. There's new people in charge of AI and, And, you know, Craig Federigi is now officially in charge of this whole kind of, like, effort. I don't expect that they'll be held to the promises of their predecessors, but they will be held to the expectation that they will make important strategic announcements. And so on that level, I think it'll be interesting. And I think we will want to see what they want, what they are willing to promise.

And I think this comes back to the conflict between 24 and 25, because 25 is about what's doable. very pragmatic. In 24, they got ahead of their skis. The problem is, I think there's a real risk, especially since they always come out right after Google I.O. I think there's a real risk that Apple takes it carefully and doesn't overpromise. And as a result, the net effect of WWDC is a bit of a disappointment because they're being too restrained and they're perceived as being behind. Now, on one level, that, not doing that is what got them into trouble, into trouble in 24, right? Like, this is literally, they felt the pressure and they made some bad decisions. At the same time, you're, you know, it's not a positive outcome to say Apple announced a bunch

of things that they're willing to ship in the fall, but they're not interesting, right? Like, they need to show that armed with their Gemini partnership and two years of rethinking this, that they're going to do Appley stuff with AI that will allow their platform to be relevant. And again, they're not necessarily going to be, I mean, people will judge them however they will. But like, in the end, it's their customers who need to judge them. Is it useful? Is it a thing I want? am I looking longingly over at what's happening on Android?

Or is this all just a lot of yelling? But in reality, my iPhone does everything I want and I'm happy with it. You're right. They don't have to match what Google does, but they do need to use AI technology in places that make the experience better. And that's going to be an interesting balance for them to walk, I think. Yeah, I feel like this year is the real. Apple Intelligence Year, right?

Like, this is the actual one. 2024 was a bit of a fake out. They gave us the name and not really much else. And this year is like, okay, we gave you a year off. Now what are you bringing to the table? Yeah. And Siri, I mean, that's the other thing is that

Siri at the center of this, they need to fix it. And what does that look like? And again, they're going to make promises. So there will be skepticism. And there should be. Anytime Apple says we made Siri better, everybody should be like, really? I'll see.

I'll believe it when I see it. But they have to do it. They have to have a unified strategy. They need to. Here's the thing. 2024 was panic. They panicked. They were late.

They felt they were late. They slapped a bunch of stuff together that wasn't up to their standards. The stuff that did ship felt slapped on. A bunch of stuff. stuff didn't ship. It was a disaster. Okay. They took the loss. Twenty-five was about repairing people's trust in them a little bit that they're like, we get the message we need to deliver what we promise. Twenty-six really is, you've had two years. What you need to give us is well-thought-out functionality, not a new collection of slap together features. And that's one of the things

that I will definitely be looking for is does this feel coherent in a way that 24 didn't? Because I'm telling you, we can overfocus on the stuff that didn't ship. The stuff that did ship wasn't very good. It was very standalone, not well integrated. You had a bunch of things that were running alongside of other things that were very similar, like the writing tools thing, because they didn't have time to integrate everything. They didn't have time for a big plan. they just slapped it in there because it was a thing they thought they could ship.

I want to see what they do when they've had at least a little bit of time to actually think about this and that there are new people in charge who are thinking about this as a high level and thinking sort of like, what can we do as Apple to use this technology to create things that people want? So I want to see a lot less panic. I want to see a lot more thoughtfulness and utility. I don't want them chasing the edge cases that the, cutting edge AI companies are doing, I want them solving for iPhone problems, using AI tools where it's relevant to fix things that their customers want to have fixed. And that means Siri

working better. It does. And having a more familiar interface to do text conversations and all that with Siri. Like, yes, it's that. It's the shortcuts generation is a great example. That's, solves an issue, which is this is an incredibly automatable platform, but it's also just a phone. Like, nobody really wants to do programming on their phone, even in shortcuts. But if I could tell it what I wanted to do and it's capable of doing it, that's pretty cool, right? I could see a lot of people, not everybody, but more than the tiny fraction of people who use shortcuts. And shortcuts becomes like an infrastructure for this higher level, a one level, even further abstracted. But that gets more users, that's a victory. But that's, in general, that's what I want to see, is I want to see them.

I want to see features that make sense as a user, not that makes sense in order to placate critics in the industry or in the investment community who don't really actually understand what Apple is all about and are just hoping that Apple, like, there's so many people who just want Apple to act like everybody else. And this has always been the case. And Apple doesn't succeed when it acts like everybody else. It succeeds when it acts like Apple. But that's the question.

Is it going to do that? Does it have a good, appropriate Apple response to the last two years in terms of the progression of AI? Okay. So there is this technology that exists. Great. How do you integrate it into the operating systems in a way that feels natural, helpful, and as you say, cohesive overall, right?

It's like, okay, great. great, you have this technology, but what are you actually going to do to enable your users to have a better experience with it? Because if you say, the tools that they have shipped, they're disjointed. They're so disjointed.

It wasn't a strategy. No, not all. They called it Apple Intelligence, but it was like an umbrella term for a bunch of stuff that they just jammed in there at the last minute out of desperation. And they need to turn the page.

And, you know, they need to show a thoughtful set of features. and my concern is that they won't. My concern is that they're still going to be kind of like just, you know, firing a hot dog cannon at the OS. And like, there's a hot dog over there and there's one over there. And like, I don't want that. I want them to think about it all.

Like this new, this Mark German's report about the grammar checker and it's all that. Well, you need to revisit your entire writing stack and have the grammar checking and spell checking and all of that be in one interface with, you know, and be thoughtfully constructed. A team needs to have built that whole thing. Instead of, well, we've got this thing laying around that's been there for 15 years and now we're going to jam this other thing over here. Like, you can't do that. You shouldn't, that's not what the Apple experience should be like.

So really, it's like, yeah, how fearful are they or how concerted have they been? Now, you know, what I, given the recent few years of Apple software side, I'm concerned about this. However, I will say, and I know I've been talking about this about staff turnover in general at Apple, but like never underestimate the power of having new people in charge. And if like Mike Rockwell and Craig Federigi, who did not have as much control over this two years ago as they do now, they have the opportunity to say, you know, we're going to step up. We know what happened that was wrong. And we're going to fix it.

And we're committed to fixing it. And they have the credibility, I would think, within the organization, to tell the people working on this, okay, turn the page. Let's do this right this time. So I have some optimism because there's new people in place, along with some skepticism because of Apple's recent track record. Do you think, I mean, our conversation so far has basically been all AI. Yeah.

That's what this year is, right? Like I'm not really expecting much other big stuff. Yeah, I think the best way to think of this is, and the German report suggests this, is imagine this being the proverbial snow leopard year, right? This is a year where what they seem to be trying to do, reportedly, is look at performance, look at stability, fix some bugs, make some nice quality of life improvements

around the edges and finally roll out how they're going to use AI technologies in ways that fit with their platform. That seems to be what it is. If you're totally turned off on AI stuff, I think WWDC is going to be a lot less interesting to you. Although, I will point out again,

Snow Leopard had like hundreds of features. Yeah, big ones. They don't talk about that. Like, there will be little bits. Like, I'm fascinated to give you one example. And it is AI related, but like Spotlight and Siri and how those all fit together on the Mac as well as on the iPhone and iPad. Like a proper rethink of how all of that kind of type in a box and find things works on your computer could be really good. It could also be really bad.

but it could be really good. So we'll see. I mean, look, I don't think they're going to do anything but refine liquid glass on iOS. I hope that they, I hope that they do some cleanup on the Mac, right?

Because the Mac really just kind of needs to be cleaned up. The Mac is a mess. But I think, you know, liquid glass is still going to be there, but I think that they are trying, like everybody else yells and they're like, I hate it. And they're like, well, we're not going back.

So a competent qualified designer, and the designers are new too, right, will say, what makes you hate it? What about it do you hate? What about makes it harder for you to do what you want to do? And they take those and they internalize those and they figure out how to make changes, not to throw away liquid glass, but to make changes to the design so that it sands off all of those rough edges so that things are, they solve the problem, right? You're not, the recommended solution, which is don't do liquid glass, that's not going to happen. It's not helpful. But if they've listened to the reasons why people feel that way and they can make that better so that it's a more functional design system, you know, that's what I would expect to see is that. When Apple unveils kind of like big new initiatives, usually, you know, it's like, oh, here's a thing and we're going to use it.

and then maybe the next year developers get to use it. That's like a pretty standard thing that they do. Classic. Do you think that if they have a big AI initiative that they will take this approach or do you think there might be more developer involvement this year because of kind of the quote unquote delay of it all?

I think that exactly what you just said. Because we've known and developers have known about the app intent strategy and I am kind of assuming that that continues to be the strategy is app intents is basically the new version of scriptable apps on the Mac back in the Apple script days. App intents is, I'll give you an example. BB Edit 16 just came out. Yep.

And the old BB Edit shortcut support was really not anything. It's very Apple scriptable, but not very shortcutsable. But the new version of BBeddit has a bunch of app intents in it. And the app intent. are functions of the program that just get offered to the system, which means that Siri and shortcuts and anybody else can use process lines containing, sort lines. They don't even need to open up a BB edit window. In fact, if BB edit's not open and you run a shortcut that is using one of those appintents,

you don't even see BB edit run. It does launch hidden, but you don't see it. It just uses the code in BB Edit to hand off this job, and BB edit does this great, BB had in addition to being a text editor is a great text utility, hands it back to you. And then you move on. That's the promise of app intents is that, is that app developers are also kind of like bringing their features into the system, which gives the system more power. It solves one of your problems that you mentioned, Mike, where you said, what if we run up against shortcuts not being able to do something? Well, if it's smart enough to understand that you've got BBED installed, then it says, oh, I do know how to do that.

let's use that. And I'll use, I can use that feature from BB edit or any other app that does this. So I think that's the answer is that because they were laying a lot of this groundwork for developers, I'm sure there will be some new areas, but because they're laying all this groundwork for developers, and also because I think they're aware that there's a lot of scrutiny of them rolling out features that are only privileging first-party apps in places like Europe, that they will be, I think it will be a more open for developers' story than it is some years. Yeah, because obviously we had the, if you say, I had the app intents that nothing really happened with, you know, like action across apps, and that kind of stuff.

But also the foundation models are a thing that have existed. And private cloud computers are a thing that exists. I would like to see, you know, developers get access to private cloud compute. But more importantly, significant updates to the foundation models. So these are things that can be run on device that developers can take advantage of to do interesting things in their apps. Right. That is true. Foundation models,

which it sounds like are not going to be based on Google's models, but these are the on-device models, but we'll see what their story is, and we'll see what their story is with private cloud compute. But it is true. One of the things to follow up on is you can do app,

you have access to Apple's models in shortcuts, but app developers don't have access to Apple's models. Apple's, you know, private cloud compute. I think they have access to the on-device models, but not private cloud compute. And probably what, they need is a payment method, right? That they'll probably be like an API charge for apps that want to use

private cloud compute because that's a tangible resource. And if you want to use it, and it's like, it's there on every system, which is not the case, like, because the model with OpenAI and stuff like that is that, I mean, mostly it's, you want to use that feature. You need to log in with your OpenAI account. This would be like they do with WeatherKit, where if you want to use an Apple model, you know, you build that into your subscription. fee for your app. And you, Apple will send you a bill every quarter or whatever for your

API usage of all your users. And you just have to build that into the economics of your app. And they should do that. I hope they do that. The only way I think they don't do that is if the future of private cloud compute is in flux a little bit where they're like, we don't really know if we want to let people have that because is it going to stick around or is it really going to be kind of, is it hosted only on Google's servers or is it on our servers too? And what, There's some lack of clarity there that might be a problem. But I hope so because, I mean, private cloud compute actually is very helpful in some of my shortcuts that I'm writing. And for me, it's free, which is even better.

So, yeah, I hope developers have access to it, even if they have to pay some. So we're talking about 24 a lot, obviously, and trust. Do you think Apple will do anything differently with either demos, part of the presentation or demos afterwards because they know that everyone is going to be looking at them and saying, yeah, but really, though? Especially the media.

If Apple show off new features coming to iOS 27 that are incredible Whizbang AI model features, everyone's going to say in their articles, yes, but do we really know? Yes. Do you think they will? I think they will. I think they're going to.

I think they're going to say this is, you know, they're probably saying in their presentations, this is actually running. Yep. And then I think in their briefings and stuff like that, I think that they're going to give more, they're either going to show it running or they're going to say, yes,

that is what you're seeing there is code that's actually running. I think they'll do some of that just to reassure people. But I would not be surprised if I'm in a briefing and there's an iPhone that they show us and say, this is it running. Look at it. you know, we're doing this now. I would not be surprised at all.

Yeah. That would think, you know, it would not be a surprise to me if people leave their briefings and they're like, I did it. They gave me a phone and I did it, you know, to kind of really kind of like hammer home. You know, don't do something that's going to break it, but a guided kind of thing. Yes. In fact, Federico's going, right? Yes. So I would be shocked if Federico isn't given the opportunity to.

to tell a generative shortcut builder to do something. Yes. It would be surprising, wouldn't it? If he did not get the ability to say that I agree. I mean, it's possible that that's like, you know, but they don't want to say, oh, that's not working yet. If they promise that feature.

If that feature doesn't exist, then they won't show him that feature. But if that feature exists, I have a hard time imagining that either he will be able to do it or they will have a sit with him and an iPad and do it while he can watch it happening, right? I feel like that that is, they got to do more of that because they know they do,

because they know they need to prove that this is stuff that's actually functional, even if it's in beta. I also think that a lot of this stuff, they're going to lean towards shipping it in the first developer beta, even if it's weird and buggy, because I think they're going to lean more toward, it's okay if it's weird and buggy, it's worse if it's not there.

Yeah. Yeah, let's just show we have something. Yeah, In the developer betas, they will often like, well, it's not really there in, in developer one, but it's there in beta two or beta three. And I'm sure there will be some of that. But I think that they want to, yes, after 24, I think they're inclined to show people that it's real. Do you think expect any hardware this year? I don't. No max. I never, I never do. Okay.

I don't think, given the state of affairs in the world, I think, I think it's unnecessary. And no. I mean, they've got enough to talk about. I don't think they need. I mean, it would be a nice to. distraction, I suppose. But like, I don't know. I mean, they could, they could do some new Macs and stuff, but like, it's WBDC. If they want to make developers happy and they have the ability, they can announce the, you know, high-end Mac studios and stuff. But it sounds to me like they have a hard time getting the chips, so maybe they shouldn't. And last thing, Tim Cook and John Turner's, what do you think is going to happen? Do you think they're going to have any kind of torch passing one way or another, are they going to acknowledge this? Is Tim going to have a thing where it's like

this is the last one? I think, I don't think that. I think Tim and John Ternis and Craig Federigi will come on stage at Apple Park before the video to say hi to the crowd. Assuming it's staged like it is, it has been the last few years, which I just assume it will be. And I assume that in the video it's possible Tim will say something about this is you know

I've been doing this for all this time and this is my last one but it's still going to be the same video regardless it's going to be it's going to be this is Tim

we got a bunch of great stuff let's get into it and that they will make a point of having John Turness be involved somewhere in that video even though he's

you know the hardware guy he's also now the new CEO guy maybe they do it together they do the intro together. I could imagine them doing something together,

intro or outro or whatever. Kind of just be like, hey, everybody. I don't know if it's important, but show the united front of it all. Right. You know, like we're all good. I will say, if they could swing it in terms of availability, the best thing to do is announce Mac Studios and maybe Mac Minis using M5

because that's a thing that John Turnus could do. Yes. And it would be a message to developers and they could talk they boast about the AI performance on those systems. I just don't know

if they can ship them. Yeah. I mean, you know, saying that thing for John, John Turnus can do anything now. Like, they don't need to do Max to have Turner's as a part of this.

He's going to be the CEO in three months. Yeah, yeah, but as CEO, I don't think he wants to eat Craig Federigi's lunch, right?

Like Craig needs to do a bunch of software stuff. No, I mean, like he can appear in some portion of the, keynote without they're needing to be hardware. Like he can show up at the beginning at the end or whatever.

I don't know. I just don't know what that is. Maybe, maybe, but an easy way to get him in would be to announce some new hardware. I just don't. Normally, I would say it actually sounds pretty good as a time to introduce, since they aren't out yet to introduce the Mac Mini and the Mac Studio, or at the very least the Mac Studio at this, because that's a developer product, basically. and it's got a good AI story

but do they have them? If they do, then having John Turnus be involved in that way is easy. That's an easy answer. But yeah, I'm sure we'll see him. And maybe,

yes, maybe Tim Cook opens it and John Turner closes it. Maybe that is the way it'll go. I would be really disappointed if Tim does not acknowledge it. That is his last one. Yeah.

I think that would be a shame. I think it's more likely than not that he will. Yeah. I think it would be a real shame. This is my last WWDC as CEO. It's such an honor to talk about this, you know, at the beginning or the end. But I think that'll be it. It'll be a little bookmark, a little tag, something like that.

There's a button on this. Are you eager, excited, interested? Like, what is your overall kind of feeling for WWDC? Do you have one? Because I'll say I'm excited. I'm excited like I am every year. I look forward to this. Similarly for you where you say like it sets your year, I have that feeling, but mine comes from the like being generally enthusiastic.

I am excited for what I am to be excited about for the next three months. Like I like that about WBC, right? It's like setting what can be my tone. Sometimes I am excited to be annoyed. You know what I mean? I'm excited about the fact that I'll be angry about image playgrounds for the next three months. That was 24. Then last year, I was really excited about liquid glass.

I thought it looked right. I thought it was going to be really interesting. It was really interesting. And this time, I am very excited about what I think will be some very interesting, sticky and kind of in-depth conversations that we will have between June and September of like, how good is this stuff? What does it do? Is it worthwhile? These are the kinds of things that I'm eager about kind of going into WWC. Yeah, no, I get it. It gives us a lot to talk about and we really do prefer talking about the details of things that exist and not sort of imagining what

might be the strategy that leads to things that might exist. So having some reality will be great. But, you know, it's the same story that I said before, which is for me, I approach every one of these as a as a content challenge as a work challenge because it's been my job for so long. I think about, you know, here we go. We're going to go into the grind. I'm going to, you know, I'm going to go down to the South Bay. I'm in a hotel for a couple of days because it's a very busy time. I'm going to have a bunch of logistics. I'm going to see people. I got a bunch of briefings, presumably. I don't have my calendar, but I assume so. We got to find a time to record upgrade. Like, I, and then what happens later in the week? And then I have the added logistics of at

the end of that week, I'm going to Oregon for my son's college graduation. So there's a lot going on. And so I'm thinking a lot of it is about just plans of, you know, where am I going? What am I doing? How do I get the work done? How do we get everything we need to do? And then after it's over, it's definitely picking up the pieces of like, what does this all mean? You know, that week after I'm down there for a couple of days, the rest of the week, Wednesday and Thursday, it's a lot of watching videos because there's a lot to be gleaned from those developer videos that get released that have offer way more details about what is going on than what was said in any of the videos on stage. So then you're,

and then you're like, your brain is kind of like processing everything because it's so, it's overload in the day, the day of. And then for me, I'll get briefings and there'll be even more information overload from that. And then there's the videos. And so for the rest of the summer for our one post,

uh, post keynote episode, the following week. you know, you're starting to process what you've seen. And then that is a process that lasts all over the summer. So, yeah, I'm looking forward to it because I like that whole thing. But I think going into it, it's very hard for me to express anything other than the kind of like, it's not even trepidation. It's just like prep.

It's like getting down to business. I have tried to compartmentalize all of that, you know, planning and anxiety and all of that as, you know, it's part of the job. So I will feel more enthusiasm when we're talking about it afterward. Yeah, me too. I think. Yeah. As a footnote for me too as well, last year at WWC, I had just started working with Crossford on Widget Smith and Podometer. This year, I'm very involved now. And so I have additional things that I will be looking for as a quote unquote developer as part of a development company that will be, exciting and interesting to me alongside of everything else.

So that I'm pretty eager about. Like of a WWD from that lens as well of like there are things that I will care about and will pay much more attention to than I would have any other year. Yeah, I think that's interesting you and Stephen having this other secret life perspective about developing.

Well, you're developing perspective. Yeah, developing perspective. But yeah, I mean, I am excited for that too, because there will be, like, I'm sure there will be sessions that I will watch that I otherwise wouldn't have cared about because there'll be something marketing related or, you know, things they're doing for the app store and all that kind of stuff that will be of genuine interest to me now that I wouldn't have really thought or given too much of a look at prior because it just wasn't my world. Yeah. And that, that I think, as long as we, you know, we disclaim where need be, but like it gives you a different perspective that you can bring to the show, which is also kind of. one. Yeah. Yeah. This episode is brought to you by our friends at Mercury Weather. Mercury Weather is a thoughtfully designed weather app that shows all the essential weather

details at a glance. It has a gorgeous, colorful interface that dynamically adapts to the conditions of a warm orange palette on a sunny day, icy tones on a cold day, or deep blue on a rainy night. Let me tell you, Jason, Mercury Weather for me right now, very orange. Very orange indeed, because it's incredibly hot in London. right now, we're experiencing a bit of a heat wave. So I'm getting to see those very, very bright oranges in Mercury weather. It also has a glancable chart layout to present the hourly and daily forecast in a way that feels intuitive to you right away. And I want to mention, again, the very cool feature they have for travellers. Mercury's trip forecast feature automatically

shows the weather at your destination right in your daily forecast timeline. So you always see the weather for where you'll be, not just where you are. And again, super helpful. for me when I was coming back from Romania. When we left for Romania, the weather was very different in London to when we returned. And so I opened Mercury weather the day before we were traveling. And I could see it was actually going to be warmer in London than it was in Romania. So it's like, oh, that is very helpful for how I'm going to dress for this trip home. So it was really helpful to see the weather for where I was going to be as well as for where I was at that moment. When the weather gets serious, Mercury offers storm and hurricane tracking with maps, live positions, forecast path, cones and intensity plus widgets so you can keep tabs on a specific storm or the closest one

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it, use the standard features for free and then upgrade to Mercury Premium to unlock everything. Go to Mercuryweather.com slash upgrade to download Mercury Weather Now. Use the link in the show notes, so let them know that you came to them from this show. That is Mercuryweather.com slash upgrade. Try it out for free. Get all of the standard features for free

and then you can upgrade to Mercury Premium. Our thanks to Mercury Weather for their support of this show and all of Relay. It is time for some Ask Upgrade questions. That's one comes from Holly, who wants to know. This is kind of going back to conversations that you and Stephen were having last week about the original sin of Apple and the app store.

What if Apple were to split how it handled App Store apps? My proposal will be that games continue with the firm 30% cut of all revenue and a requirement to use the App Store. But all other apps get reduced to 10% and have the ability to be listed externally after security review by Apple. This keeps 90% of Apple's

app store revenue, still lets them hold a firm position against Epic. This separates the iPhone as a gaming platform from its computing platform. I mean, this feels very much like the John Gruber argument. I've seen him make a similar argument. I don't know. I think

we're too far down the road now. I think Apple's saying, but wait, we're actually just a games platform. Not only is the group that's pushing this the most company that makes games, But I think that I think it's too far gone. I think I think the argument is if it's unfair, it's unfair regardless of it doesn't. Segmenting out one kind of app doesn't change the fairness of it.

I think it's too late. There was a time that this could have worked. That time was long since past. And I think if we, if they had done it this way after they hit the magical Phil Schillabillion, the Schillian, never do that again. After they hit that level, I think if they would have done something like this, we would be having different kinds of conversations.

Sure. And I think it would not have affected Apple to a significant... I think even if they did this now, it would not affect them to a significant degree. I think the vast majority of money at the App Store brings in is game-related revenue. It must be. Just because of the way that games monetize.

They monetize completely differently to other types of apps. and you know what, for some reason, people pay that money where they don't pay it for regular apps. They will pay coins and gems and all that kind of stuff. So, like, you know, this is a model

that would probably have worked, but they needed to make that decision like 10 years ago. They didn't. Yeah. Yeah, I agree. Prem Right Sinner says, given how well Max are doing as machines to run AI agents,

like Claude Code, Codex and such, do you think Apple may release any new features to make them run better in the next version of macOS. I'll broaden this question out, in case it's a little too specific, Jason, which is, can you imagine Apple providing Mac-specific features to help them be better for coding agents in some way or, you know, these like agents or computer use agents? Do you think Apple may, like, focus on the Mac as the AI platform? Honestly, the Mac is so successful at this already.

I would imagine that if Anthropic or Open AI is coming to Apple and saying, look, we have a problem where our popular coding agents have this one thing that they can't do because there's an OS limitation that Apple would probably be like, let's fix that, right?

But I'm not sure that's a feature for the end user because this has been successful. I would say what I want to look for here is Apple's story about this. And I know I mentioned this on a podcast. I'm not sure if it was this one or not. but like there was a a friend of mine

who was observing who's vibe coding apps and observing that X code is completely inscrutable and this was an actual friend of mine not me although I will say I tried to vibe code a Mac app

last week in an afternoon and it stunningly was it worked but XC I mean most of my questions to Claude were how to use

X code because X code is impenetrable. And so I think, obviously, number one is Apple should continue and their developer team has been doing this. I've gotten some really good briefings from the developer team at WWDC over the years

and outside of it about what they're doing with coding stuff. Like, they want Xcode to be super integrated with whatever models you want to use, and they're going to continue that. I think they're going to be very aggressive on that front. But I think they need an easy mode, for Xcode because it is so powerful to use these agents to build Mac apps and maybe even iOS apps and Xcode, right?

But Xcode is hard. I'm a long time Mac user friends and I look at Xcode and I have no idea what I'm even looking at. And I have had developer friends walk me through where you have to click and it doesn't make any sense. There's no logic to this. It is so weird. where you do things in Xcode.

And so that's what I think, like, the number one. I bet that is if you asked a developer open logic, right? You said a bit like logic pro and be like, use this. Edit podcast. It's like, I don't know what to do, man. And that's why garage band exists. And I'm not saying they need to create, you know, a playground's version of the app,

although they could do that. But I'm saying, what if you built a mode into X code? Or, okay, or you built you built, a separate app, but it needs to be able to do everything Xcode can do, which is why you probably just need to build a mode into Xcode. That is more, because the bar has lowered on who can use Xcode now.

Yeah. Who can develop apps now. And who wants to use Xcode, that has really broadened. Because now there are people that want to build apps for themselves and they want them to be iPhone apps. And they have to use Xcode for that at some point. Yes. And so they're now complicated. You know, for lack of a better term, essentially a vibe code mode of Xcode.

Just make this simple or build it so that the tool that I'm already using could just talk to Xcode and do what needs to be done in the background. Right, right. Maybe it's a helper app that is like the super friendly. Maybe it's a mode in Xcode. I don't know. But I feel like that's a thing they need to lead into. If there's anything they need, anything they can do to make kind of agenic stuff on the Mac work better, then great. If they want to build some of that themselves, then great. I think that the Mac's already been seen as a pretty good platform for all of that kind of stuff. But that's the one that has come up to me a few times is that Apple's developer tools are incredibly opaque. And a lot of people are out there trying to create software for Apple's platforms using these tools. And it ends up being that the hardest part is just dealing with Xcode. So maybe there's something there that could be addressed. Amar wrote in

and this is the person who asked the technical snell talk question as well they see they had an ask upgrade already I couldn't put them in twice do you think the random nature of when Apple releases a new M series chip

and an even more random nature of which device gets it first and which device doesn't even get it at all is a problem with Apple having complete control I would have hoped for a more predictable release cadence instead you get an M3 Ultra when an M4 has been out for half a year

and you get an M5 on on an iPad when even the Mac Studio doesn't have it. Okay. I don't think it's a problem and I don't think that this is accurate. Sorry. I do think that Apple's release cadence is pretty predictable. They do one and then two and then three and then four and then five. The M3 Ultra is a weird use case.

But I mean, what I would say is nobody, almost nobody cares. It's an incredibly weird thing that happened. It may happen again. Yeah. But it's the exception that proves the rule. because saying M5 on an iPad when even the Mac Studio doesn't have it yet, I mean, Apple, I feel sometimes like,

and I understand the motivation here, which is everybody wants everything really neat and clear. But the fact is Apple can't literally ship every chip and every computer that uses that chip at once. They can't. So they have to pick. And sometimes it's about availability of the chips

or availability of the hardware designs. But like, in general, when you're in the M5 era, everything that's going to ship new is going to have an M5 in it if it's at the level that it uses that chip. They also roll down like the iPad Air with an M4 in it because it used to have an M3. It's last year's chip because it's, I don't think it's that big a deal.

The new stuff all gets it eventually. They choose where it comes first. Sometimes an iPad comes first, sometimes a Mac comes first. You got the MacBook Pro at M5, but no MacBook Pro high end at M5. because that high-end M5 chip wasn't out yet. And then it came out and they all updated.

I think if you view it as a wave of products and chips that get released, I think it actually is pretty predictable and at a pretty understandable cadence. They seem to really want it to be kind of every year. It's not always quite that, but they're kind of viewing it as a model year thing because it's going along with their A-series development. And sometimes maybe it's more like 18 months, but I think it's perfectly reasonable.

The M3 Ultra is a weird outlier. It is an outlier on the flow chart. It's also an outlier as a chip. It's just very weird. But I think it's the exception that proves the rule that they're actually pretty straightforward about how they do this. And if you're sweating the details of, well, but why is it one and not the other? And why are Mac Studio and Mac Mini still at M4, even though there's an M5 out now? I think you're sweating unnecessarily.

And I think most people don't care. And also, most importantly, it's not possible. They literally can't make all the chips, make all the computers, and then ship them at once. And that's why any time Apple tries to get their product house and order, it takes time and it's never quite perfect. Because one wave crests and ends and then the new wave comes in and it's always going to be a little bit messy. I think when the intel to Apple transition happened, I think that there were people that were hoping it would be very orderly in a way that made sense to them, right? If like, okay, so one, and everything gets it and then we go to M2 and everything gets it. But it just, as you said, it just doesn't, there are many reasons why it doesn't work like that.

because all of the computers aren't ready or they don't feel it's necessary, right? Like, we don't need to revise the iMac with every chip generation. It's just not necessary, right? And so, like, there are things that don't fit a spreadsheet super clearly, but that's just kind of the way that it goes. But I can see that there were people that hoped that Apple being in full control of its silicon would have given them that reality. But it's just, there are many reasons,

not just because it's Intel, of why that was the case. Yes, how soon we forget that this is so much more, I'm going to just come back to these phrases, a predictable release cadence than it was when you had Macs using Intel chips. Yes. So much more predictable. An anonymous person wrote and said, After listening to Upgrade Today, I went out for an evening walk.

Several miles in, I heard the faint sound of Upgrade play. again. The cause of the noise was revealed when a tandem bicycle zoomed past, loudly broadcasting the part of Snow Talk, where Jason discussed MacSE hard drive disposal. Does Jason ever play podcast over a speaker while walking or biking or is he strictly a headphones man? What is this question? Did this happen? I don't think this happened. I don't know, man. I don't know why you would write to create a weird story that then leads to their question. I don't know why you'd write this if it didn't happen. My favorite thing is that this person felt that they needed to ask a question as well to get this read out. Like there was no question needed to me to read this. Why is it a tandem bicycle?

You see, the fact that it's a tandem makes me believe this story is real, because I don't think that's how they get you. That's how they get you. They put an unbelievable detail in there to believe it. You don't need it to be a tandem for me to want to read this. Dear upgrade listener who listens to upgrade on a speaker on a tandem bicycle, please write in. Yes. Who are you? Okay. Now, look, I don't know how we can prove this, but if you did that,

I know you listen every week, right? Like, if you listened out loud on a tandem bicycle to the show, you are listening to this show all the way to the end. Like, you are in it to win it. We need proof of this. I don't know how If you can take a picture of a tandem bike

With the show I don't know In front of it I'll believe it That's enough who has tandem bikes I yeah I want to know more about this Yeah my answer is Now that we've done that

I'm going to insult the person That we just asked to help us Because I'm going to say no of course I don't play podcasts over a speaker When I'm out in public I use headphones But I will say For safety reasons

You shouldn't cover your ears with headphones when you're riding a bicycle. I guess you could use those like bone conduction. I guess they're good for that, right? Because then your ears aren't covered. I will, when I'm on roads with my bike, I have one headphone in and the other one not. Although honestly, with transparency mode and in AirPods, it doesn't really matter. I don't hear any better with them out of my ears.

But yes, for safety reasons, don't do that. What I will say, though, maybe the one scenario on a bike where you would list and something out loud is a tandem because you are sharing the experience of another person. Get yourself a bike companion who wants to listen to upgrade with you while you bike places.

Incredible, right? Like, I just, I need to know more about this. Please, please explain. Please, please explain. But if we're, again, as another angle to this, this is not the tandem angle, which is, if this is true,

can you imagine being this person that you've just listened to the point? podcast and you're out for a walk and a tandem bike goes by also listening to the show. Now, that's weird, right? That is weird. That's really weird. I would be really like unsettled if that happened to me. Fantastic. If you would like to send in a question of your own or you've got any follow up or feedback for the show, please go to UpgradeFeedback.com. I would like to thank our members as well as to UpgradePlus. Go to GetUpgradeplus.com. You get a longer ad-free show every week. On this

edition, we're going to share some information about something that we're working on that we're very excited about that everyone's going to know about next week. Yes. Or maybe in the coming days. But Upgradians are going to hear about it from our mouths. Upgrade Plusians will hear about it from our mouths first. That's right. That's not what they're called, but okay, yes.

What would they be called then? I don't know. I don't know. Described to Upgrade plus. Yes. Upgradians plus? Upgradians plus. Maybe.

Maybe. It's just the people who listen to that part of the show on their tandem. bicycle. You can find us on YouTube if you would like to watch us by going to the Upgrade podcast on YouTube or searching for say. You'll see that we're wearing matching shirts today. Two-person podcasts are kind of like the tandem bicycle of the ears or the mind or something. Yes. Tandum bicycle of the mind. We are a tandem bicycle of the mind. In podcast form. Yeah. Of the mind. I feel like we have to keep getting the of the mind. Tandum bicycle of the mind. That is this podcast. I would like to thank our sponsors for this week's episode. That's Mercury

weather, FitBod and our friends over at Century as well. But most of all, thank you for listening. We'll be back next week for the draft and some exciting news. Until then... Say goodbye, Jason Snow. Can't believe it's already June, Mike Hurley,

but next week it will be June. See you then.