Upgrade - 76: You're Part of My System

Episode Date: February 15, 2016

Myke probes Jason about his personal organization system, or lack of one. Then we speculate on Apple’s future as a TV producer, following the news that it’s creating a series starring Dr. Dre. Finally, we discuss favorite (and least favorite) words.

from relay fm this is upgrade episode number 76 today's show is brought to you by squarespace and backblaze my name is mike hurley and i am joined by mr jason snell i am back sir fully refreshed and renewed welcome back i'm glad you're feeling better you sound great you sound normal you said you don't sound like your sickly self that you apparently were. I was in a bit of a state, I have to say. It was not good for a while, but I'm okay now. I had a throat infection, which is one of the two worst illnesses that I could receive, I think.

That and laryngitis. Yeah, you've got the valuable pipes that need to be protected your podcaster pipes yeah i've been wondering if there is such a thing as insurance on this just specifically on my voice rather than just like disabilities insurance or whatever i feel like i should look into that at some point but that that feels like a big grown-up thing that i can't be bothered to do okay i. I still get those things, you know? Like, there are these things that pop up. Like, I need to...

I'm going to get so many people shouting at me right now. I need to get a pension sorted. I had a pension at my bank job, which still has some money in it, but I haven't yet got one as a self-employed person. There's part of me that's just like, oh, that just feels like such a grown-up thing to do. There's part of me it's just like ah that just feels like such a grown-up thing to do that's part of me it's just like doesn't want to do it but anyway some random

diversion you're in risk of becoming the guy who's like oh oh his voice is so valuable that it is insured the lloyds of london we would make money we would make fun of you for that and then somebody will try and attack me to get the insurance money. I was going to say somebody's going to punch you in the throat at that point. Jason, where are you? You are on location today. I am on location in Southern California. Sunny, hot, actually, Southern California.

I'm down here in LA at my wife's parents' house and looking out over some lovely trees and flowers and things. I've been here a few times. We did the first Upgradees. Actually, I was in this room for that. I've been here a few times before. So that's where I am. I was down in LA. They had the big Doctor Who convention at LAX. And I know so many Doctor Who podcasters that, quite frankly, I don't need to buy a ticket. I can just go stand in the lobby and talk to like 10, 12, 14 people I know for the weekend and hang out. And there was, you know, there was some... We did a podcast, actually. We did an incomparable game show that will go up later this week.

I haven't actually even listened to it, hopefully, if it's audible, if it recorded properly. And that was a lot of fun with... It's basically with podcasters i met joe steel did you in person for the first time so i can verify he is a real human being or he has a very talented actor he's taller than you'd think isn't he he is taller um yes he is taller than than one might expect but that happens my wife has commented several times that i have um all my friends are tall apparently that's what she said she keeps meeting people from the internet and finding that they're they're far too tall like you dan moran yep and joe steel would be in that category because he is surprisingly tall he's taller than me even so he's a tall guy still so is it gallifrey one yeah that's it you're right yeah i've heard of that i think just

through you and the other incomparable people that i i follow on the internet yeah it was it was a lot of fun and doing the podcast was fun and just hanging out and talking to people was a lot of fun a lot of different subjects i was on a panel about um about podcast stuff which was kind of fun yeah it was yeah it was a it was a a good time um and uh my family gets to hang out with uh my wife's mom and dad down here too so they were they were doing some stuff over the weekend while i was up at the convention center and they'll probably be doing stuff right now while while i'm doing a podcast it's like i'm i'm here but i'm kind of not here but that's okay we're and we're going back home tomorrow so we have a follow-up that we need to address uh the first thing is i just wanted to

underscore the fact that we have merchandise on sale right now t-shirts and hoodies they are only available until february the 19th so as we are recording and when the episode will be released you have four days from the day this is released there are hoodies and t-shirts um i am very happy to see that people are buying them i'm very surprised that we're selling more hoodies and t-shirts um i am very happy to see that people are buying them i'm very surprised that we're selling more hoodies than t-shirts but i'm happy and as we have said before those of you who will buy a hoodie there is a special surprise in the hoodie and you will be very happy that you bought the hoodie that's all i'm going to say uh but the brain board t-shirts they you should be getting some of these we have the regular t-shirts in men's and women's

there's a couple of different styles of those and the beautiful raglan t-shirt which was my only way of imagining this shirt existing with in the old uh kind of baseball sports style so if you want them they are only on sale for another four days via our friends at the cotton bureau and we all have links in the show notes to those um if you don't get them they're gone and then that's it so you want to make sure that you pick up some lovely upgrade merchandise well done well done i'm glad you're back to talk about the the merchandise one last time since you missed it last week i did i'd missed it indeed so you can go and go and pick that stuff up.

I also wanted to address something from a few weeks ago. There was a few people that pointed this out to me and they are 100% correct. You know when we were talking about our superpowers that we would like, that we desire. I mentioned the ability to control time, to stop time and start time. And a few listeners from the uk all tweeted at me and mentioned a show called bernard's watch as my inspiration for this and they are 100 correct

bernard's watch was a show uh on tv when i was a kid um on citv on channel three where this kid called bernard he had a stopwatch and that stopwatch allowed him to stop time. And so as kids of a certain, oh, people of a certain generation all wanted this power, as I do, because of Bernard and all of the things that Bernard could do. And we're all very jealous of Bernard and his ability to stop time. I've put a link in the show notes to the Wikipedia article for Bernard's Watch if you'd like to find more. I've put a link in the show notes to the Wikipedia article for Bernard's Watch if you'd like to find more. And Americans of my generation will remember the television movie, perhaps, The Girl to Go Watch and Everything, which was also that premise. Although that one was a little more, well, it was on TV, so it wasn't that adult, but it was about adults with it. And so there were sort of like crimes and there were sort of some, some suggestive parts in it too.

And actually there's a, Oh, what's the name of the movie? There's a really, um, there's a really good movie. Oh, I can't remember the name now. It's a,

have we talked about it before? There's a, there's a, uh, an independent English movie about a guy who is able to concentrate and stop time. And he's a grocery clerk. I am Googling, frantically Googling. Cashback?

Cashback. That's it. That's a similar thing. So, I mean, this premise has been done before. So, there's lots of precedent when I'm saying, like,'s lots of precedent for your your superpower that you're going to get so yep you know that's good maybe that's useful if there's a court case about your superpower i don't know working on it um and i also wanted to uh follow up on something that you were talking about last week in the uh ask upgrade segment and it's in case people haven't noticed uh i've i've

started a little trend of the last Ask Upgrade question being a little bit off the wall. And we have another one of those today. And last week's was, very sadly, I put it in the document, forgetting that Stephen cannot eat anything pizza related. So you were really trolling him.

Yeah, really, really kind of sticking the knife in. You mentioned pepperoni and pineapple pizza, which upset many people. And delighted others. Yes. I just wanted to say that that sounds fantastic to me, and I want it. Well, I think you can just order it. You know, I probably can. Many pizza places have pineapple as one of the available toppings.

Because of Hawaiian. Most pizza places, you can just, exactly. And it essentially is a Hawaiian pizza, except I like pepperoni better than Canadian bacon or whatever bacon-style pork thing that they put on that, they call Hawaiian in the UK if they have such a thing. Yes, they do. So if you go to a pizza place or order from a pizza place

that has those two toppings as options on pizzas, you can ask them to just do that together. And I've done it where I've substituted and said, can I have the Hawaiian with pepperoni instead of Canadian bacon? They said, sure. I hadn't thought that I can just customize a pizza from somewhere. Yeah, that's the way to do it. So I am going to do this because I like pepperoni.

I like Hawaiian. So together. Yeah, if you like a Hawaiian pizza, it's basically the same thing. And some people don't like the idea of sweet and savory together, and I totally get that. But I like the... With the pepperoni and the pineapple together, I think it's a really good combination. I chanced upon it. I don't even know why, how I discovered it.

But that is my favorite combination because it's a... Yeah, it's just a... It's a really good combination i i chanced upon it i don't even know why i how i discovered it but that is my favorite combination because it's a yeah it's a it's just a it's a party it's got everything what more what more do you need in a pizza than those two things also on last week's show you kind of kind of challenged me a little bit i think um when talking about task management systems i did in mentioning you don't have one uh i don't and we're going to address this just after this break it's going to be an intervention it's going to be i i just i just need to understand i just need to understand maybe i do too this week's episode is brought to you by our friends over at Backblaze. Backblaze is personal and business backup for Macs and PCs. With Backblaze, you will get yourself unlimited online backup

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slash upgrade podcast. So I'll put that URL in the show notes, of course, maybe you're already backing up with Backblaze, right? I know that a lot of people have heard about this, a lot of people have signed up, but Backblaze have something new as well that I just want to mention. This is something for IT professionals. It's called Backblaze B2 Cloud Storage. If you're building an app and need cloud storage or want to be able to command your own backups with CLIs and APIs, this is for you. Backblaze B2 Cloud Storage is one-fourth the cost of Amazon S3 at just $0.005 per gigabyte. The open beta is available now, so go to backblaze.com slash upgrade podcast and check out B2 Cloud Storage as well.

Thank you so much to Backblaze for their support of this show. Yay! So, Jason, task management. I just want to address this for a little while. Let's look at our document that we have where we keep track of what we're going to talk about on upgrade. That's one of the ways that i do task management yeah help me mike have you ever tried any getting things done systems you know apps like omni focus or things or anything like that have you ever tried these apps? I tried things. I'm not sure if I ever tried OmniFocus.

I think I had it. And I think I opened it and was intimidated by it. But I did use things for a while and ended up not using it anymore. Yeah. That's it. What turned you away, though? did it just not stick for you i i don't like i don't get like why you would a lot of people switch around right so they use things and they go to omni focus or to do list or something like that but it's i think you get

less people who kind of just stop using these sort of uh? I guess, I think the overriding thing for me is that I want something that is so frictionless. And I feel like a lot of these apps, like things had like categorization features, and it had sort of specific reminder times, like remind me here and recur there. This is like the anti-cortex, isn't it? This is the cerebellum podcast or something. Gray is very very into um you know very into organizational structures and i guess for me um i felt repelled by a lot of that detail because it felt um it actually reminds me of uh some stuff merlin has talked about before about how every minute minute you're organizing your index cards is a

minute that you're not doing any of the things on the index cards. And I always felt very strongly to me like that, that while I needed to remind myself of things to do, and I needed to have some structure for that, that a lot of these apps seem to have a level of, you know, you can be a power user of organizational tools. And I felt like that my job is not to run an organizational tool. Right. And that I don't want to be a power user of organizational tools because every minute I spend becoming a power user of organizational tools is a minute I don't spend working. So for me, I always felt like that's like, wow, that's really fiddly. Yes, I can categorize all my to-dos. Yes, I can send myself little notifications. Yes, I can fiddle around

with this and build this whole system, or I could just get back to work. so i understand that that that thought and because these apps can be very complex i use i just scratched the surface of omni focus i've been all in on me focus for a long time and i use it very basically you know i put tasks in at certain days at certain times you know so i'd be like you know i put something in today to make sure i wanted to order more upgrade merchandise um i want to have some as you should stuff so i've put in a i just threw it in today at seven o'clock to remind me to do that and then i can just check it off or i can move it to another day that kind of thing and that's how i run my system basically i just put in these little items with their due dates and times, and I move them around as necessary. I have some that repeat

because I know that I do them every week or every X amount of days. And my system runs like that. And there are people that, you know, I don't use any of the context stuff. I don't use any of the project stuff. It basically is for me just a to-do list as opposed to a getting things done system. And there are lots and lots of apps that have to-do list functionality. I use a couple of different apps for different things, but my main to-do stuff goes in OmniFocus. And I do that because it works the way that my brain thinks, because I'm pretty embedded in the system. Just certain buttons and certain functions are in OmniFocus.

They work in a specific way, and I like them for that. It just makes sense to me. It is fully updated always. It's on all of my platforms. It's in active development. It's the app for me. There are things that things does that i don't like and their

development has always been a bit slow um and todoist works in a very different way to me from like with reminder times and stuff like that so i'm kind of embedded in this system so i agree with you completely i don't go into the majority of the functionality that are in these applications but in the same vein that hasn't turned me off completely from using this type of app so something different happened in your mind where you were just like i don't want this i don't like this it goes away well if if i well and some of it is what you said, which is I was using things also at a point where their syncing was really problematic across devices. And because they were slow to do syncing and it was kind of strange manual-ish syncing and it would get out of sync. It was local network syncing for a while.

Yeah, it was a disaster. I think they've resolved it all now. But when I was using it, that was – and given the level of detail that I wanted – I mean, it was neat. I could tag, like, these are writing tasks and these are these other tasks. But also you have to subscribe to their notion of how notifications work. So you've got sort of like eventual and on a particular day. And I have a lot of tasks where it really is not I need to do this. Like everybody, I've got a task that is next Tuesday.

You need to do this by next Tuesday. But most of what I do is a list of things I have to do. And it's just a list. And I don't have to do them by any particular time. And I think my memory is that one of the problems I had with things was that it was – it really wanted to have this concept of sort of like classified and un was like lists where I expected to see things I needed to do, but they weren't there because I hadn't, I hadn't put them in the box of eventually or unordered or something. And I, and I felt like, um, with that in the sync issues, um, and you know, the, the metaphor that it was trying to use that I didn't want to bother being involved in, I was better off using reminders because reminders syncs and is just a list of things.

because reminders syncs and is just a list of things. And so that's part of my kind of homegrown and not quite an organizational system now. And I'm also not claiming that this is the right thing for everybody, nor am I necessarily claiming it's the right thing for me. It's just sort of where I am right now. This is my non-system system. And part of it is i have several reminders lists although mostly i am in one list which is basically where i write down things that i

think i should write about so this is what i wanted to just find out because in my mind there was no way you couldn't have had anything like you had to have something and you might not necessarily consider it your task management system, but it is it. So you use reminders to keep track of stuff. Because I just can't imagine someone who does the amount of work that you do, with the amount of projects and dependencies that you have. I just couldn't imagine that you have nothing, that you try and keep it all in your brain. Well, so it's a combination of things. It's actually funny.

I was talking to one of my fellow podcasters this weekend, and she was saying how everybody, her name's Deb Stanisch, and she loves spreadsheets. And we had a little high-five spreadsheet moment because I realized that, you know, that's part of my organizational structure. My organizational thing that has sort of not been in an app and is home grown and it was not something I consider a system is, yeah, it's reminders for story ideas. It's calendar, right? I have a calendar. And if I have a story, so like Serenity, let's say Serenity contacts me and says i'd like

you to write an i'm more column uh on uh because i write one for them sort of every month and i'd like it on the 25th um i will put an event on the 25th an all-day event that is i'm more column i will do that so you put it in your calendar then? I put it in my calendar. Okay. And I also have, I actually created a calendar. I think I mentioned this on, maybe even on this podcast. I created a calendar called,

I think I call it writing, but it's basically like sort of self-direction, sort of like goals of when I would like to be doing certain things during the week because I do have a cycle of like, I have a Macworld column every week, and I've got time I need to block off to write for Six Colors and other stuff that I want to do, whether it's writing or podcast editing, actually.

And I created a calendar for that, that's separate from my, like, you know, doing this podcast, which is a must-do, you know, we do this every week. That's more of like a, this is when you should target doing that. Don't forget to do this. So it's sort of like a reminder. So I do have calendar items and they help remind me of things that I need to do in a way. Um, although I can kind of move those around, but they do serve as a reminder. And then for a lot of my planning stuff like podcasts podcasts and the Six Colors subscriber stuff and all of that kind of thing, I do have a lot of spreadsheets. Like I was saying, I have a lot of Google Sheets, like the incomparables topic list and scheduling list is entirely done in a

Google Sheet. And that's where it all goes. And then when we schedule something, it goes on a shared calendar and it's on my calendar and I can see that it's happening. So all of those things are organizational tools, but they're all kind of scattered and they're not something I would call a system, although I suppose anything is a system if you are functioning inside it.

The calendar thing is interesting to me because for me, the way that I think about calendars is calendars are for appointments. Calendars are where things go at a certain time from a certain time. Because the way that I look at it, and many people disagree with this, and that's perfectly fine. Each to their own. But the idea of writing an article feels like a task to me. And the task should be completed at a certain point. Because for example, let's say something comes up that day, and you haven't written the article, what do you do? Do you move the calendar?

I do. I do. And in fact, and the way I think of this, and maybe this is me, but the way I think of it is, it takes me two hours to write this story. And I need to leave or to just work on Six Colors that day. Leave two hours or three hour, leave it in a block because a block is good. I want to make sure I have space and that during that time or some time I do it. And so like with the Macworld thing, when is my Macworld column due? Maybe my Macworld column is due sometime on Thursday. But what I've decided is Tuesday afternoon is actually the best time for me to fit in the Macworld column because Dan's writing a little more on Six Colors that day. So and I've got a space where I'm not doing any podcasts or anything like that. And so Tuesday afternoon is when I'm going to write more color.

I'm going to do it then. And I'll slot it in. And so instead of, so my target is sort of like, I'm essentially assigning myself a time and saying, I think you should write it then. And it's not the due date of the thing. It's when I think I can do the thing. And that's why I use a calendar. Because you risk, and I know this is, I mean, for me, it basically is like, if you have five things that need to be done on Thursday, you can't just create five to-dos for Thursday. In my mind, that just doesn't work. Saying, by the end of the day on Thursday, you need to do these five things, that doesn't help me. What I need to do then is triage and prioritize and say, well, if I need to do these five things by Thursday, I'm going to do this one here and this one here and this one here and this one here. And that's how I'm going to get it done. And that's, um, that's why I, I think in terms of the calendar, because I need to actually, um, find when I have the time to do those tasks

and then, and then basically tell myself, this is when you do it. So then I'm sitting, we finish a podcast sometimes and I think, oh, now, okay, now what do I do? And then I look and I'm like, oh, you know, I need to do that thing right now. And then I do it. Because this is what I expected, is that our systems, like the way we think about them, are basically the same. We just record them in different ways.

So I don't block things out on my calendar, but I know how long things take me to do. So when I look at my to-do list in the morning i plan my day out based on it and i set the due times and move the times around based on the fact of how i know it's going to run throughout the day and then move things to a different day if i know that they're not going to get done but we both we use different types of tools to get that stuff done and the funny thing is what i also find interesting is that we both think that the other way is just wouldn't work like i just don't think putting things in a calendar for me like that would work because i don't look at my calendar in that way right and the difference is that we're and this is the beauty of this is that we're different people who think of, who conceive of the world differently. And so it probably

wouldn't work for you. And it totally works for me. And that's fine. But it is, yeah, for me, that's how I want to manage my time, is I want to have it, I want to be able to say, you know, it's going to take me this long to do this, and so I'm going to try to do it here, rather than just try to keep in my mind, well, I've got five things, and they each take this amount of time. I do that with some things. It's not like totally like every single move I make is in a calendar. That's not the case. It's more that there are things that I do that require blocks of time where I concentrate, and I need to be sure to get those blocks or I'm going to be in trouble. Those are the ones that I try to mark out.

I don't usually put in, you know, edit total party kill or something like that. Sometimes I do or edit the incomparable. Sometimes I do because I feel like I need to put a, you know, like put a stick in a doorway or something like that and be like, you know, this needs to be propped open because if I don't prop this open, I'm never, I'm going to run out of time. I need to, you know, I need to say, if i don't prop this open i'm never i'm gonna run out of time i need to you know i need to i need to say uh if you don't do if you don't edit that podcast now it won't

get done in time because of all these other things you have to do that sometimes happens but usually that stuff's just in the back of my mind i've got although even then like when i have to post a total party kill there's an all-day event on that day that says post total party kill there's an all day event on that day that says post total party kill. So what happens then if me and you are talking and I say to you, Jason, I need you to get me that copy by Wednesday. What do you do with that? Do you do anything?

Does it go in reminders? Where, where do tasks like that go? Well, I don't know what copy it would be, but yeah, let's say we we need to do new um new say we need a new bio for the show right yeah okay or something like that you know like we need a new thing we need some updated writing or like when we were doing the t-shirt

stuff and i you know i would say to you i could you get me this or whatever or you were managing it where does that sort of stuff go i probably had a reminder uh it's it could have been a calendar item but it probably would have been a reminder just saying you know write that blurb for mike cool so it goes in reminders and that that was what i wanted to see because there's a couple of different types of tasks right especially like when you're looking at your system you have the things that are this is a thing i need to do for a certain amount of time but then then you also have the, I just need to send that email to someone on Wednesday. Yeah.

So that sort of stuff goes in reminders. I suppose, although a lot of that stuff, I just try to do it at the time. Like if I need to send an email to somebody by Wednesday, then that's different. But if I need to, you know, I need to wait until Wednesday and then send that email, then I will probably leave a reminder for myself. Probably. I understand your system. I can see how it is the way it is, but there's still, because it's not my system, there's still this part of me that's thinking, I don't know how he gets anything done. It's a great mystery.

But you've at least put my mind at rest a little bit. I feel a little bit better now because I know that there's something going on. Were you envisioning like I have a little piece of paper with some things written on it in pencil and scratched out and little scraps of paper? I just thought you were trying to keep it all in your brain. Some of it's in my brain. I mean, some of it I do.

In fact, if I'm being honest, if you said I need copy on Wednesday for something, I would probably just not do anything and just think, okay, I'll do that by Wednesday. That probably I would keep in my brain. Although, you know, I'm 40, I'm 45. So as time goes on, I need to learn to write things down more because I'm not going to remember as many things as I could remember back in the day. Over the time that we've worked together, I have got that impression. You never don't give me anything, but I always feel like when I ask you for something,

you just remember, which is weird. But I think because for some people and the way that I do it is I just don't want the burden of my memory. So I dump it out into OmniFocus because I probably could remember a lot of this stuff. I do remember a lot of this stuff. I do remember a lot of this stuff. Like I know that every Monday morning

I have to prepare for upgrade. I know that, but it's in OmniFocus. Oh, interesting. Yeah, I don't have anything like that. I would say if my incidence of failure of storing things away in my brain was higher, I would rely on the tools more and and um and it's not like i don't forget things but i don't forget very many things

yeah and um so it isn't a problem if it was a problem i would start i would start writing it down i mean that that that that is part of it though is that some of it is just like yeah i know you know it's like i don't have a i don't have an item for when we're done with the show that says write a blurb for the episode. Now, sometimes you will ask me for the blurb for the episode because I'm distracted on something else. But I do know that I need to do that for you before you post it. Yeah. And also sometimes I use you as my reminder. So that's good.

Yep. That's the thing. You rely on people. You're part of my system. I'm part as my reminder. So that's good. Yep. That's the thing. You rely on people. You're part of my system. I'm part of the system. All right. Let's talk about one other little thing quickly. All right.

Which is just, it just caught my interest. And I wonder what you think about it. The Hollywood Reporter has broke some news detailing that Dr. Dre is currently filming Apple's first financed television series. So there's been some rumors recently that Apple is going to be getting into the Netflix Originals game and creating their own original content, which will be placed somewhere. We'll get to that in a minute. Now, this first series is going to be starring Dr. Dre, and it's kind of a biographical piece.

It's fictional, but drawing on events from his life. And one of the reasons this is interesting is because the content itself sounds very un-Apple-like. This is a quote from The Hollywood Reporter. It is described as a dark drama with no shortage of violence and sex. This doesn't sound very Apple, but they are financing it. What's going on here, Jason? It's weird, right? Like, it just sounds really weird.

There is this part of me that wonders and and i don't know if this is speaking out a ton but it kind of feels like dr dre is an executive at apple now and he's kind of just doing what he wants to do and and apple's kind of just like okay or or dr dre or eddie q or or or Jimmy Iovine or somebody. No, you know, there's been so much speculation about if Apple would do their own content service. And this report actually makes me feel better about it because when this report says, and this is a good report. It's a Hollywood reporter. This is a legitimate news agency.

And one of the people in the bylines, Leslie Goldberg, who writes a of uh good news stuff for them um i do a podcast with their tv critic so i am tied in to them and i'm inclined to believe what they say um they uh it sounds like an apple music thing to me i think that's the really interesting thing here and we've seen this like there's the taylor swift concert that was um an apple music, and it's a video. But it was an Apple Music exclusive for Apple Music subscribers, I believe. And so I think what's interesting about this is that this sounds to me like an Apple Music thing. That like they're going to make a TV show, and it's going to be for Apple Music subscribers. Just like Amazon gets you to sign up for free two-day shipping,

and then they also provide you with video. This is sort of like not Apple's TV service, but part of Apple Music. And it's, you know, if it's a show about the life and times of Dr. Dre, then that fits with, you know, he's a a music guy and it sort of fits and and yeah it's um a dark drama and people are like oh that that you know is that something apple would do apple likes to be squeaky clean but you know apple also sells and rents every movie that is available i mean i guess they don't there's no porn section of the itunes store but there's plenty of they have erotic books and such in the iBooks store, though.

And they've got plenty of R and unrated versions of movies in the movie store, the iTunes store. So I don't think it's that big a thing. And yeah, this would be content from Apple or from Apple Music or from Apple Studios or something like that as a producer of it. Yeah, that's the difference. sort of music themed content it also may be just an interesting experiment because they've got dr dre on the payroll and you know why not try this and see what it's like within the context of apple music not within a larger context about apple's video distribution plan that's i mean that's my guess because there is like saying about dr dre being on the payroll like it's a it just feels like to me like somebody said said dre like dre, Dre, what do you want to do here? Like, what are you going to do? He's like, well, I'd like to make a TV show.

And I'm like, great. There's a project for you, Dre. Because it feels like I don't really know what he does. We don't really hear about him. And I forget quite frequently that he is an Apple employee. And it's just a really interesting thing. And now he's making this TV show I mean

and also Apple Music it seems weird to me to put a television series in the music brand section thing like for example I think is it the iPad app I think it is the iPad Apple Music

app doesn't show full screen video and or is it the uh yeah and well on the podcast and the podcast app as well i and i think i think the music app is the same it could be corrected if i'm wrong but this feels like this should be one of the things that comes with the over the top apple tv service rather than putting it in the music subscription service. That's the way that I look at it. These things just feel different. A concert makes sense. Music videos make sense.

A TV series created by a rapper, which doesn't seem to be about necessarily the music industry. It's just stuff that happened in his life. Maybe it is, maybe it's not. But I don't know, it feels a different, it just feels different to me. It doesn't feel like something a music subscriber would expect.

Well, it's not, but I think it's an interesting experiment. I guess part of the reason that I'm kind of open to it as an experiment is that I like that idea better than the idea that Apple is gearing up to, you know, create a slate of original material that they're going to sell as a subscription service. But given Apple's talk about subscription services and making more money from their existing customers as a place of growth for their business, maybe we should all just sort of accept that that's probably going to happen, whether this is part of it or not.

And part of me thinks that. I mean, Apple's got a lot of money. We know they've got a lot of cash in the bank. We know that we act startled when we hear that Netflix is spending a billion dollars probably on original content this year. So worth it, though, because everything they make is fantastic. Apple could do that. Apple could spend a billion dollars on content. I mean, they would need to get up to speed with it. And they wouldn't start with a billion. They would

need to build it like Netflix built it. But could they? Absolutely. They would probably need to hire some smart programmers who have been working elsewhere. And they would need to invest a lot of money. And they could also invest, you know, Netflix is going to spend about $6 billion on content in general. So it's also licensing other material. So if Apple wanted to create an Apple video service that was akin to Hulu and Netflix and Amazon Prime video, they totally could. And I'm not sure this is evidence for that. But when you think of, in television terms, you look at Netflix spending $6 billion, and you think, wow, that's a lot of money.

And then you think about Apple, and you think that's nothing for Apple. So on that level, if I'm thinking Apple, it's interesting. If you think Apple wants growth, Apple's investors want growth, they're a little nervous about the iPhone, and Apple is starting to trumpet their success

with services that why the heck not do a video service, right? Why not do it? They can invest money in it, and it'll show growth. And even if it's not profitable, at least initially, it will show revenue growth that they will be making inroads into a new market, and that will excite their investors. So it's an interesting idea. I think this would be weird if this is the kickoff of that service, which is why I feel like maybe it's an experimental thing that they're going to tie into Apple Music so they can do it now, and perhaps also test what the experience is like of going through and doing uh you know producing a dramatic series yeah i i think i'm aligned with your thinking this to me feels like apple's first step in that realm but it would i i don't know why but it just feels like this would be a very strange one to start with because dr dre he is incredible at what he does i don't know if he's known for his acting um i've never seen him in any in any acting roles he could be but i've never seen him

in any and i think that maybe this wouldn't be the show that you would launch your your thing with you know right you know maybe maybe apple would partner with disney and do something you know yeah uh it's it is an interesting thing i mean it will have appeal to his audience but yeah it is a little surprising in the sense that you would want um perhaps you would want something with with uh broader appeal if such a thing exists but perhaps everything is a niche now and this is just one of them this is what it makes sense for me, again, is that the music part of it, which is at least you can say, you know, he's an interesting figure in music. And that's why we decided to do this. And Apple Music subscribers can watch it.

And you should be an Apple Music subscriber if you're a fan of Dr. Dre, because you can watch his show and you can listen to his music. Maybe, you know, that I think that's a fine story to tell. Yeah, that tie-in works. It doesn't seem like a long-range plan. that's a fine story to tell yeah that that time works it doesn't seem like a long-range plan and yeah if you were launching a streaming service with uh that was going to be a competitor to netflix you would probably want to go out with more originals that cover a bunch of different uh areas so that a broader uh swath i mean of audience than than one show than any one show could handle but um who knows this could also just be the first trickle that they

that uh somebody from the hollywood reporter knew somebody who was producing this thing and or was on the crew for this thing or whatever the story is and this is the one that we know about when in fact there are several more things i get the sense that hollywood is a um is about as leaky as the uh as the apple supply hardware supply chain there's too many people involved people people talk at Hollywood. So my guess is that Apple won't be able to keep this a secret if they decide to go down this path. But yeah, it's not beyond the realm of possibility

that this is really a test of what do we think about this, what's involved with this, and then what do we budget, and what's our plan if we want to make our own service. Yeah. But why would you not? If you were Apple, I mean, I'm coming around to this make our own service. Yeah. But why would you not? If you were Apple, I mean, I'm coming around to this as we talk, because it's like, why would you not? Given the costs of doing this, yeah, it's going to be hard, and Netflix is already established,

and HBO is established, but... You mean you got all the money. What does it matter? You've got the money, and you want to find ways to do growth of services, right? I mean, this is a place that even though there are some established players, it's a very young market. And it's a hot market. And it is, yeah. And they're spending a lot of money.

But there's a lot of excitement in this right now. You know, so many of these companies and Apple's competitors, you look at Amazon, they are putting money into creating original content. And Amazon is winning awards left, right and center. And I think Apple might want a piece of that pie because it is now becoming part of the pie, right? Like people sign up for Amazon Prime for multiple reasons now, and they get a bunch of different things. And maybe that is the type of thing that apple would like to have in the future yeah i think so i mean the question is whether they'll offer just like you know a stream apple video apple music just like a whole bunch of things that you have to subscribe to and suddenly

you've gotten boy wall street would love this if suddenly you know it turns out that all these people who buy iphones also are are are essentially spending $100 a month on Apple services that come along with it. And that just goes on forever. Whether that's realistic or not, I think, is a good question. And there's a lot of competition. But it's, why would you not? I think even something like Apple Music, you could say this, is Apple Music doesn't have to be the number one music service, but for every Apple Music subscriber, Apple is reaping more cash from their relationship with those people. And if you're Apple, on one

level, perhaps you look at it and say, why would we not do that? Why would we not offer that and make that attempt? And not everybody's going to sign up with us, but some percentage is going to sign up with us. And we're going to be able to offer an experience that's a little more tightly integrated because we're the platform owner. And we'll make, you know, and we get to make more money out of services, which definitely seems to be, I mean, it was, that was a clear message of their, their latest analyst call was that services is a target for Apple. The Apple wants to make more money from its customers beyond what they buy on hardware. That just, period.

That is happening. That is going to happen. That is a future Apple strategy for growth, is us spending more money. I mean, I'm already spending whatever, $10 on iCloud Photo Library, you know, storage right now. And I'm spending $15 a month on the Apple Music Family Plan. So I'm already spending $25 a month on Apple.

And it can only go up, right? That is it, right? If you're not selling more devices, which we've been over this, it looks like that's going to be the case, right? That we're kind of reaching the amount of devices that can be sold. What do you do?

You sell into that market more. You give them things. You give those device owners, You give them things. You give those device owners, you give them stuff. And that comes in the form of cases and accessories, but also software and services. That's how you get more money out of people.

Yeah. And services are potentially a lot easier because you've got a renewing, recurring payments and it's all digital delivery. And then you also can control your rollout of your hardware, like plan for a 4K box or an Ultra HD box, let's say, and make sure all your content is in that, which is what Netflix has done a very good job of that, of rolling out their ultra hd content with uh the availability of boxes that can play ultra hd and say and making it a uh a differentiator and getting people to upgrade to a higher uh subscription tier in order to get access to it so it's one to watch i think

yeah i think this year i i would hazard a guess that this year we're gonna see more of this type of thing from apple i think it i i cast my mind back to the video ipod when apple announced the video ipod and they had a very very small selection of shows uh mostly disney stuff right um and and abc things like disney yeah i i personally think that that's what we going to see, that they'll start with a very small selection of shows, including their own original content and build out from there. Because I think the entertainment industry doesn't like Apple, right? Because they own music, or at least they owned music for sales for a long time. And I think they get scared of that, which is why they had so many problems with Apple Music. But eventually they will give in if the market demands it. think they get scared of that which is why they had so many problems with apple music but eventually they will give in if the market demands it so that's what i think we're going to see and the

and it is now an expected thing that if you have a over-the-top subscription service you have original content which is excellent that goes inside of it like that is just a thing that we expect now like i saw today the hulu have something right with uh stephen king and jj abrams yeah yeah 11 22 63 which is um the based on a really good stephen king book that we did an incomparable about and i'm looking forward to seeing it and that's a about a guy who goes back in time uh to stop the kennedy assassination but it's actually way more complicated and interesting than that simple premise.

And it's very good, but that's a Hulu original. And they're doing something not Netflix-like. They're rolling it out weekly. So they're doing a premiere today, but they're not dropping the whole season today.

They're dropping it weekly on Mondays. I think I kind of like that. I like both. I do too. I like both. I like that I can binge, but I also like that they're piecemeal. I like that kind of thing. I like that I can binge, but I also like that they're piecemeal. I like that kind of thing.

I like that I can binge things, but I don't like the fact that nobody can talk about these bingeable shows because everybody's in a different place. And that's frustrating to me because I like to talk about TV shows and you're like, oh, where are you? Well, I'm only in episode four of Jessica Jones. It's like, well, tell me when you get to episode eight and then we'll talk about it. It's just not the same. At the same time, I do like being able to just completely binge them. So I don't know what the solution is, whether it's just we just have to deal that this is how it is, or if they could break the bump into blocks where they have smaller sort of subseasons and they drop, you know, they drop five episodes now and then in a month they

drop the next five or whether you know i or or and they're and they're all experimenting so what hulu is doing is this weekly release um and uh we'll see we'll see but i'm looking forward to seeing it so everybody's got this stuff this is this is why we're at peak tv now is is uh you know anybody can be a tv outlet and many are trying all right this week's episode is also brought to you by our friends over at Squarespace. You can start building your own website today at squarespace.com and use the offer code

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Squarespace, you should. It's time for us to upgrade. All right. All right, Billy writes in. Will 3 time for us to upgrade. All right. All right, Billy writes in. Will 3D Touch come to the iPad via pencil force sensitivity? I was thinking about this a little bit. And at first I was like, that sounds like a good idea, right? How would you put 3D Touch functions into an iPad?

It feels like a really difficult thing. The screen's real big, especially the iPad Pro. Imagine you're holding it in one hand and you're force touching in the other hand, and then your iPad slips out of your hand, right? Like I can imagine that type of thing happening. I still think that we're a revision or two away from 3D Touch on the iPad. I don't think that we're going to see that in a couple of weeks on the iPad Air 3 in really i i just don't see it right now um i'll ask you jason in a moment what you think about that but i started thinking more about like could the pencil work as a way to do 3d touch it is another way you can push down on the pencil a lot easier than you would be pushing down your finger because it's a lot more sensitive it works that way and or just

pressing the pencil could activate a gesture like that but then the more i started to think about it i was realizing what it would do it was it would require that everybody has a pencil which i don't think is something apple's going to want to do it would mean that all ipads would need it which also they're not going to do that and you would always have to have the pencil in your hand to make this work because the way that 3d touch and force touch actions work is that they're intended to work in conjunction with regular touches like you don't mode shift to do them you kind of it's like for example the keyboard shortcut you press down you move and you start typing again if i had to take my pencil out press down move to put the cursor

around and then start typing again i don't think i'd like that. So whilst I do feel that in theory it sounds like it makes sense, the more I started to think about it, I don't think that's going to work. I think Apple will just, they will put 3D Touch in the way that it is on the phone, but I just don't think they're ready for it yet. Jason, what do you think? I think that it's uh i think it's okay if it's not on every ipad because 3d touch isn't on every iphone i think that um the core of this is the uh apple's commitment to the pencil as a ui interaction mode instead of just a uh sort of an input mode and that's what you know we've been seeing and you and Gray talked about it on Cortex, that the 9, what is it, the 9.3 beta?

Yeah, the 9.3 beta removes the ability for you to use the pencil as a finger replacement, basically. So the upset and anger of many iPad Pro, Apple Pencil users, and we talk about that in Cortex 22. So if Apple truly believes that the pencil is supposed to be useless for anything except drawing, which excellent arguments have been made that it's a mistake, and you should, yeah, I refer you to that episode of Cortex. Gray did a great job, supported by you, of railing against this decision.

And I agree with it. I think it's a mistake why like turn off functionality maybe there's a reason where they're having some issues with the the most important parts of the pen so not behaving right because it's looking for these UI interactions okay maybe but it seems like a bad idea that it's actually removing functionality that people use and like, and that isn't mandatory. But if they remove it, then this is a moot point because it won't do it, right? Because this is a UI interaction.

If they decided, though, it's okay to interact with the UI this way, I don't see why you wouldn't do this since 3D Touch is in the operating system and it's never a must-use feature. It's always optional because so many devices don't have support for 3D Touch is in the operating system, and it's never a must-use feature. It's always optional because so many devices don't have support for 3D Touch that I would actually advocate that they do it because it's already in other devices,

and you have a touch-sensitive device that you're using. But my gut feeling is that it's already too complicated for them as it is, which is why they're backing away from it, and so it won't happen. But I wouldn't say it's necessarily a bad idea if they decide to embrace what you and Gray use the pencil for in 9.2, which is as a substitute finger, so you don't need to keep taking your pencil out of your hand

in order to do UI interaction and then put it back in your hand to continue doing what you were doing with your pencil. So, yeah. All right, next up we have from Dylan. Dylan wanted to know, Jason, I've just updated to El Capitan and started using Photos. Can I delete iPhoto or will that delete my photos? Short answer is deleting the iPhoto app has no effect on your photos. You'll still have an iPhoto library that is kind of hard linked to your new migrated photos

library. You can also delete your iPhoto library if you haven't reopened it since you migrated to photos. And it will warn you actually, if you try, it'll say you already migrated this to photos, you probably shouldn't do anything more over here because these changes won't be reflected it will warn you actually, if you try, it'll say you already migrated this to photos. You probably shouldn't do anything more over here because these changes won't be reflected in your photos library. That, that it, it throws up that warning. So if you've migrated to photos and you're ready to go using it, yeah, you can delete iPhoto and you can even delete your iPhoto library because you should now have a photos library that is a migrated thing. You won't, you won't save a lot of space in doing either of these things, but you could delete them if you really wanted to if you just

don't want it around maybe if you don't want to don't want to see it and you don't want that photo that eye photo icon in your face anymore yeah you could totally do that it's fine get out of my face i photo uh prompted by my absence last week angelo wrote in and wanted to know what technology comforts us when we are not feeling very well uh for me well definitely what comforted me last week was netflix lots of video i watched all of making a murderer um and some other like just random shows and stand-up comedy things and stuff like that because when you're in bed and you're awake for a long long period of time because you feel crap uh things like netflix are a great option yeah and i agree with that i think i think please distract me it's always what i'm thinking when i'm sick so uh netflix uh tivo i've got so my dvr

is loaded up with shows just put on some tv uh or uh or like kindle i I have a hardware Kindle and that's great too because I can just lay in bed and read. And if my concentration fades, which happens when you're sick, from a book, from like a novel, I can flip over and read a nonfiction book

or I can read the newspaper because I get a daily newspaper on my Kindle. And so that's a good thing too. And then I guess I would say like Slack and Twitter a little bit too, just because those are nice distractions when you're feeling, you know, isolated and you're just in bed and you're cut off from the world and feel terrible that sometimes it's nice to see what your, what your, your friends and your, and your people on Twitter are talking about. and your people on Twitter are talking about.

Yep. The last point today comes from Chris. And Chris wants to know, what is your favorite word and least favorite word? And Jason, I see you've noted this. And this is something that I picked up on as well. This is from Inside the Actor's Studio. This is the questionnaire, which is based on the actor's studio this is the questionnaire which is based on the

the pivot yeah the French host and then it is itself based on Proust Proust I think it's Proust Proust who knows you say Proust I'll say Proust

no I said Proust you said Proust i'll say proust uh i no i said proust you said proust whatever or tomato tomato um i went through a period of time a couple of years ago of binging on this series uh on youtube someone uploaded a lot of inside the actor studio to youtube and i love it and i actually took a lot of my i took a lot of tips and skills um for the interview shows that i had done uh i think that it is an absolutely incredible series and james lipton is a fantastic interviewer so i took took some thoughts from him and one day i thought about this a lot that maybe me and you or whoever should go through the whole list of questions but we'll start off today with the favorite and least favorite words all right um i go back and forth on this quite a lot but i put some thought into it

and my favorite word this is definitely one of my favorite words i think it's difficult for me to think of what is my exact favorite word, but the word colossal. I love the way colossal sounds because colossal sounds big. It sounds big. Yeah, even though there's no onomatopoeia to it, but it has the feeling. The word colossal sounds like something that's big.

And I'll give you a little insider secret this was the name that i was pushing quite heavily for relay but oh interesting uh steven did know uh and one of the reasons that it's good that he said no is even i having loved it and owning a bunch of domains always spell colossal incorrectly he's spelled with two l's two l's or one s so it always goes okay but i like colossal because it's nice have you ever seen the amazing colossal man no it's a great title it's a bad uh 50s sci-fi movie but it's a great title amazing colossal man yeah he's he's got a lot going for him he does one one of my one of my least favorite words is when people refer to podcasts as pods.

That is a pet hate of mine. Podcast is a terrible word for what we do. I try and say it as little as possible. I'm not going to create a new name uh but i refer to what we do as shows is available i wasn't gonna mention that uh yeah i show shows programs i say shows broadcasts i try and say that stuff i i am a podcaster we make podcasts i just don't really like the word so i try and replace it wherever possible uh but it's it just yeah it's like pods is a like nails on a chalkboard to me yeah um like when somebody says i i listen to your latest pod yeah that's the yeah that's

the worst i i um i only use pod in in uh occasionally i will say and it is intended humorously i will say i gotta go cast some pods. But only in that phrase of the casting of pods, because literally a podcaster would be one who casts pods. So that's the only time I'll use it, and I use it ironically and am making fun of it. So I'm with you there. It's not a pod. Jason, what's your favorite and least favorite word? So I opened this this morning after spending the weekend at this convention talking to all these friends of mine. And I was completely unprepared for this.

And my brain waking up and drinking tea and trying to think of it. I really struggle with this. I'm sure that after this is over, I'm going to have, for the next week, I'm going to have words that I love popping into my head and thinking, why didn't I say that word? That's why we have follow-up. Maybe that is. But I took a shot just for fun. So my favorite word, I put down dude. I like dude. I don't use it a lot, but what I love- I don't think I've ever heard you say it.

Oh, dude. That's not true at all, dude. Here's why I like Dude. I like Dude not only because it is kind of... It seems very Californian, and I am Californian, but I like its versatility. And there's a class of words that can be used, including some four-letter words, like Dude. It's a four-letter word, actually, that can be used in lots of different contexts.

And I like that about it, that you can refer to somebody as a dude. But you can also exclaim, come on, dude, and have it be this. You can be a cool dude. The dude can be like somebody who's not paying attention. You've got the Jeff Bridges connot uh the um the jeff bridges connotation which is kind of fun um and like if you're on the freeway and somebody cuts you off you can just say dude and it is a it is like uh great like an insult to a person to say it so i just find it i find it a versatile nonsense word and i love it and uh i should probably use it even more but i do

i do like it so i it so for now that is my current vote just because I thought it would be fun to say what's up next I don't know dude my least favorite I again I'm sure there are actually a lot of

a lot of I don't I'm sure there are actually a lot of a lot of I don't I'm happy to use expletives from time to time I don't do it a lot I try to use it tactically yeah it's always a surprise when you hear Jason swear

it happens but it's always surprising sure I know all those words and I can use them but I choose to use them in very specific contexts and very specific times. And not just, I find that they're much more effective when used tactically rather than just sort of spouted every other sentence. And that's just me. That's the way I live my life. And there are some words that I really love that are swear words. And there are some that I really hate. I'm not going to get into the ones I hate now,

but there are some that I kind of despise. And I think they're bad words. They're like, not just bad words. They're bad. My favorite curse word is a, is a word that I think is hilarious because it mixes two swear words. Ah,

but I can't say it to American people. Right, yeah. Because one of the two words that it mixes together It's a tripwire. makes Americans explode into a ball of flame. Yeah. So I'm going to go with a different word, which I'm actually going to go back to my graduate school.

The guy, journalism teacher I had in grad school was the guy named Vince Cosgrove. He was the city editor of the New York Daily News, I want to say, in the 80s. During the Ed Koch administration, he had moved to Berkeley. He ended up writing for, what did he do? He was an editor at TV Guide for a while. He did some entertainment journalism stuff. He wrote a novel.

But anyway, he was my journalism professor in grad school. And his perspective and the sort of tabloid in a journalism school enmeshed in the idea that the New York Times was the most exalted form of journalism was this guy from the New York Daily News, which I just thought was the best. And I loved it because, you know, he would insult the Times. He'd be like, they're writing for the history books. We're writing for the people who live today and stuff like that. I thought that was great. This is like a more kind of fierce tabloid, proud, we're not the New York Times kind of attitude, which is so refreshing because you never get that in journalism schools. But anyway, one of the things that was one of his pet peeves,

and I really loved it, it has stuck with me all this time, is when you write a story about a politician, don't call them a lawmaker. If you call them a lawmaker, it sounds like Moses, you know, coming down with the tablets with the Ten Commandments. These are amazing priests of our nation who invent beautiful laws that are there to help us all. And he said, that's not it. They're politicians. Politics is a dirty business. Call them politicians. Don't give them the authority and credit for creating laws. It's their job. It's all backroom deals. It's all special interest based. You do people a disservice by making politicians seem exalted. And it's always stuck with me.

It's like, it's kind of, I agree with that. That is a word, lawmaker, it's too good for them. Quite honestly, it's too good for any politician. They are not lawmakers. That's not their job. They're politicians. They're playing politics, and that's fine. that it's a political system it was built that way but please don't they're not the gray the gray-headed wise ones who come down from the

mountaintop and proclaim important laws for all of us that's not how it works so lawmaker i don't like it we have a word draft mike or draft just draft words forever all the words we'll just draft them all one by one me and you alone and then so basically we'll have to do the show like i'll start a sentence you finish the sentence because you own one word and i don't yeah well maybe the goal of the word draft is to make the best sentence so like we'll do a noun round and a verb round this is a terrible idea anyway you bet it's i know it's one that you are thinking about a lot now because you love a draft that is i do love a draft everything can be drafted everything can be made better if things are within it are drafted in sequence by people

yeah it's true there you go maybe that's what we should do some kind of draft for our uh special real afm members episode oh that's. Oh, that's a great idea. That's a great idea. Let's write that one down. Now, Mike, where should I write that down in my reminder management system? You don't need to because I have a note in the notes app, which is called member episodes ideas. And now I am writing upgrade some kind of draft in there.

That's one of my organizational systems there. Some kind of draft. So that about wraps it up for this week's episode. If you want to catch our show notes, you can head on over to relay.fm slash upgrade slash 76. But this should be in your lovely podcast app of choice. If you would like to find Jason online, go on over to sixcolors.com,

theincomparable.com, and relay.fm, where he hosts many podcasts and writes many words. And you can find him over at at jsnell on Twitter. I am at imike, I-M-Y-K-E. I also have a little website now,

mikewasright.com. Right now, you can go there and see pictures of Ghostbusters Lego, if that so floats your boat. Thanks again to our lovely sponsors this week, the fine folks over at Squarespace and Backblaze. Don't forget to buy Upgrade merchandise.

T-shirts and hoodies are on sale until February 19th. Thank you so much for listening to this week's episode. We'll be back next time. Until then, say goodbye, Mr. Snell. Dude! Dude, where's our podcast? Where's the pod?

Dude, where's my pod, I think? Just mixing the worst and the best. The Amazing Colossal Pod.