Of all the comparisons in Luc Luxton’s text, the one that I find most telling is how bloated the New York Times’ homepage has become in the past nine years. At Macworld 2007, the Times took about 40 seconds to load; now, it takes over two minutes, yet it looks pretty similar.
Kevin Hayes of AgileBits:
At the last WWDC, Apple announced some changes to CloudKit, the technology that enables an app to sync with iCloud. As many of you know, it was previously impossible for non-Mac App Store apps to sync with iCloud. The changes that Apple made to CloudKit have opened up some really exciting possibilities, and today, we’re happy to announce that we have been able to implement iCloud sync in the AgileBits Store version of 1Password.
That’s pretty open for an Apple framework. What’s the catch?
Dave DeLong of Apple clarifies:
The policy is that you can use the WS [web services] as long as you have a comparable app in the stores.
So not entirely open, but arguably open enough. This doesn’t appear to be platform-dependent; that is, you could conceivably have an iOS app available and use CloudKit web services to sync to a desktop app not available in the Mac App Store. But one could not use CloudKit for syncing with, for example, a Mac-only app that doesn’t have an App Store version.
AgileBits says they’re going to ship a developer-friendly implementation, and it appears to be quite clever. Hayes again:
In order to talk to Apple’s servers, we needed a mediator. Adam Wulf and I created a class that takes native CloudKit API calls, translates them to web service API calls, and translates the responses back to native Cocoa code. The 1Password sync code is now completely ignorant as to whether it’s connecting to native CloudKit or CloudKit web services. This means that 1Password can find your data in iCloud, whether you’re using the Mac App Store version or the AgileBits Store version.
I know a lot of developers who are going to be pleased with this, especially considering the current state of the Mac App Store.
Summarized neatly, in a single paragraph, by Kirk McElhearn writing for Macworld:
iTunes initially came into existence because of “a music revolution” guided by Steve Jobs, who, as we know, loved music. Over the years, as digital content matured, iTunes became the hub for all that content. That’s not a bad thing in and of itself; lots of people love to call iTunes “bloated,” but I disagree. The problem now is that those who want to use iTunes for its original purpose, music, find themselves stuck in a morass of features designed to sell, sell, sell product from the iTunes Store.
I am a longtime, traditionalist, boring iTunes user. I have an enormous collection of painstakingly-catalogued local files and not much else in my library. For my use, iTunes has become steadily worse over the years, as I’m regularly pushed to purchase more from the iTunes Store and place all my music in iCloud. Neither of those things appeals to me. Yet, I’m compelled to continue using iTunes partly because I sync my iPhone in the old-fashioned way, and partly because I’ve never found a compelling replacement for it.
There is a part of me that hopes I never find a replacement; I simply wish for a vastly-improved iTunes. I have a hunch that I’m not exactly the target demo any more, though.
Lots of really nice features coming to iOS, particularly for educational iPad users. Stephen Hackett, quoting Apple’s education preview page:
When a 1:1 student-to-iPad ratio isn’t possible, Shared iPad offers an elegant solution that lets students enjoy the benefits of having their own iPad in whatever classroom they’re in. They simply log in to any iPad, and their content is ready to go.
I have a million questions about this. My assumption is that the students’ “home folders,” to borrow a Mac phrase, are being loaded onto the iPad on-demand, but it’s unclear at this point from the public webpage. I’m sure Caching Server is playing a big role here.
I’d love to see some of these features be available on iOS in a broader way, especially the multi-user support.
This seems like a halfway point between the single-user iOS of today and a multi-user option for, say, iOS 10. Multi-user support isn’t new to mobile operating systems, but the way Apple has implemented it here appears very clever, including providing younger users with a simple four-digit PIN to memorize instead of a username and password.
Federico Viticci previews some changes to the Health app:
… iOS 9.3 will include third-party app recommendations in the Health app, where users will also be able to see move, exercise, stand, and goal data from a paired Apple Watch. In the individual category pages, Health will highlight apps for tracking specific metrics – such as weight or steps – linking to the app’s product page on the App Store.
The Activity integration in Health looks a lot like an embedded Activity view, and the Activity app itself gained a specific Workouts view in addition to History and Achievements. But those could easily be added to the Health app, leading me to question why both apps exist. Activity is Watch-specific, but I’m not sure I understand why it needs to be, or why Health should be treated separately; the distinction seems fuzzy.
Apple will also Sherlock f.lux in this update, which should appeal to those who hate seeing things with the correct colour palette.
There will also be new companion versions of tvOS (9.2) and watchOS (2.2) available approximately alongside iOS 9.3.
The world is a little bit worse today, with an empty hole in place of David Bowie. The speed of life would always have arrived too soon for an artist that was constantly reinventing himself and exploring new ground. What an irreplaceable talent.
Despite my longtime love of his music, I never knew about BowieNet. Keith Stuart of the Guardian:
In the summer of 1998, a strange press release made its way out to technology and music publications throughout the world. David Bowie, the legendary musician and cultural provocateur, would be launching his own internet service provider, offering subscription-based dial up access to the emerging online world. At a time when plenty of major corporations were still struggling to even comprehend the significance and impact of the web, Bowie was there staking his claim. “If I was 19 again, I’d bypass music and go right to the internet,” he said at the time. He understood that a revolution was coming.
Fascinating.
Remember that Macotakara report from November that ignited the headphone jack removal rumour?
Apple seems to plan removing the headset jack from the next iPhone 7, according to a reliable source.
Screen shape such as radius will be kept, however, it will very likely be more than 1 mm thinner than the current model.
Supplied Ear Pods will equip a Lightning connector, which means a DA (Digital to Analog) converter is required. The DA will be built in the Lightning connector without sacrificing the size, according to the source.
As I pointed out at the time, Macotakara’s singular source would have had to be a very senior Apple staffer to know all of the details of this move, which made the entirety of the report untrustworthy. But the thrust of it — that Apple was removing the headphone jack from the next iPhone — seems to be gaining momentum.
Mark Sullivan of Fast Company said yesterday that one of their sources also confirmed the removal of the headphone jack. However, John Gruber noted that Sullivan’s report breaks down when it comes to the details:
Some media reports have suggested that Apple will include a set of Lightning-connected EarPod earphones in the box with the iPhone 7. It’s more likely, our source says, that Apple will sell a more expensive pair of noise-canceling, Lightning-connected, earphones or headphones separately — possibly under its Beats brand.
This is madness. Beats will almost certainly sell a wide assortment of Lightning headphones if the iPhone goes Lightning-only, but Apple has to include a pair of Lightning or Bluetooth earbuds in the box. It would be madness not to.
Unlike Sullivan, Mark Gurman has a reputation for accuracy and detail. He reports:
As has been previously rumored, sources confirm that the iPhone 7 will not include a standard headphone jack and will instead require headphones to connect via the Lightning connector or wirelessly over Bluetooth. The ability for headphones to connect over Lightning has been included in iOS since 2014, and new EarPods will support this.
This is already causing ripples among my shit-disturbing acquaintances, but I don’t expect it to be an issue in the real world — most iPhone users that I know use Apple’s EarPods anyway.
I, however, do not. And, much as I had hoped that Apple’s replacement for the headphone jack would not be a proprietary solution, I knew deep down that it would be. At the very least, that presents an opportunity for Apple to redesign their surprisingly good IEMs, as well as introduce something new. Gurman, again:
With its resources from the 2014 acquisition of headphone maker Beats Electronics, Apple is prototyping a completely new set of Bluetooth earphones with the potential of launching the accessory alongside the iPhone 7 this fall. The new earphones are said to be completely wireless, which is to say that they do not even have a cable connecting the left and right ear pieces.
I’ve promised myself not to form any opinion on these until they launch.
Update: Another good article from Peter Kirn at Create Digital Music:
There are two common misunderstandings of the news. One reading (from Apple critics) assumes this locks you into proprietary Apple headphones. It doesn’t. The other (from Apple fans who don’t know that much about audio) assumes higher audio fidelity from “digital” headphones. It probably doesn’t mean that, either (there are some benefits to putting the digital-to-analog converters off the device, but no indication yet that will necessarily mean better sound).
I wonder what will become of the headphone jacks inside Macs, too. Do they get a Lightning port?
Biz Stone, writing on Medium, explains the new Jelly, which is a lot like the old Jelly except, somehow, newer:
Twitter has always inspired me when it highlights the fundamental goodness in people. Jelly is born of this inspiration. We have an audacious grand plan—the complete reimagining of how people get answers to everyday stuff. (For anyone who remembers Jelly, yes, we took a break but we’re back 100%. Silicon Valley types might call this an, “un-pivot.”)
No, you might call this an “un-pivot”. I call it “a spectacular PR strategy for a reboot of a long-forgotten product”.
It looks like this new version is going to behave more like a search engine, and it’s going to work on the web in addition to having smartphone apps. I liked the original Jelly, despite — or, perhaps, because — its lack of a business model and generally subdued user base. I hope this is more of the same.
Shana Kimball of the New York Public Library (via Kottke):
Today we are proud to announce that out-of-copyright materials in NYPL Digital Collections are now available as high-resolution downloads. No permission required, no hoops to jump through: just go forth and reuse! […]
To encourage novel uses of our digital resources, we are also now accepting applications for a new Remix Residency program. Administered by the Library’s digitization and innovation team, NYPL Labs, the residency is intended for artists, information designers, software developers, data scientists, journalists, digital researchers, and others to make transformative and creative uses of digital collections and data,and the public domain assets in particular.
Huge move from the NYPL, with some breathtaking and legendary photos from the Farm Security Administration and Bernice Abbott. The residency that the library is offering looks like a fantastic opportunity; if you’re an artist, you should apply. I would, but I can’t be in New York for the duration of the residency, sadly.
Julia Bluff of iFixIt:
In New York City, a student at the Ethical Culture Fieldston School (ECFS) stuck his head through the doorframe and gave Jeannie Crowley, the school’s Director of Technology, an inquisitive look. “I heard you guys are fixing phones,” the student said. “No,” Crowley replied. “You’re fixing the phone — but we provide parts and support.”
The student’s face lit up. “Really? I’ve always wanted to be able to do that,” he said. “But I’ve been too nervous to do it on my own.”
I think most kids would have their eyes opened at just how straightforward it is to snoop around inside many of today’s tech products. I replaced the SSD in my MacBook Air this past weekend and was pleasantly surprised at how much easier it was than replacing the hard drive in my mid-2007 MacBook Pro. It took just ten screws to remove the back panel and a single screw to remove the drive, as opposed to the far more screws and clips required to remove the top case of the Pro.
But, while iFixIt’s wish that everyone can swap parts well into the future is well-meaning, it’s sometimes at odds with technological progress. I don’t mind that the RAM in my Air is soldered onto the logic board — even though it prevents it from being upgradable, it reduces the likelihood of clips or mechanisms breaking inside, and allows it to be thinner and lighter — all important things in a daily-carry laptop.1
Likewise, while I think that it should be fairly simple to replace a smartphone’s display, I disagree with their negativity on laminated display glass — users should not have to put up with a sub-par display in the off-chance they break its cover glass. I’m also not disappointed by the merging and reduction of device components; the smaller the device, the more it requires consolidation.
More kids should try opening up their devices and peeking inside. It somehow makes it both less and more magical — less, because all of the components are laid bare; and more because a CPU looks much smaller in real life than in pictures, and it’s baffling to consider how much happens inside of that little chip.
Compare and contrast Graham Spencer’s five-year Mac App Store retrospective with the numbers in this press release:
In the two weeks ending January 3, customers spent over $1.1 billion on apps and in-app purchases, setting back-to-back weekly records for traffic and purchases. January 1, 2016 marked the biggest day in App Store history with customers spending over $144 million. It broke the previous single-day record set just a week earlier on Christmas Day.
“The App Store had a holiday season for the record books. We are excited that our customers downloaded and enjoyed so many incredible apps for iPhone, iPad, Mac, Apple Watch and Apple TV, spending over $20 billion on the App Store last year alone,” said Philip Schiller, Apple’s senior vice president of Worldwide Marketing.
That works out to over $14 billion paid to developers in the last year alone. Wild. That’s a collective number; I’d be very interested in seeing a breakdown by product.
Graham Spencer, MacStories:
In the years since 2012, about the most newsworthy events that took place relating to the Mac App Store were the announcements from high profile developers that they were removing their apps from the Mac App Store (a few listed below). […]
Apple has let the Mac App Store stagnate and become a second class citizen to the iOS App Store and too many developers are leaving or avoiding the Mac App Store. When important apps leave the Mac App Store, it makes the store as a whole less enticing and customers have one less reason to open the Mac App Store.
High-profile developers like Microsoft, Adobe, and Panic can sell apps themselves and don’t need the App Store. Valve’s Steam store has become synonymous with gaming, and EA’s Origin is doing much of the same. Even lower-profile developers can sell their own apps fairly flexibly with the proliferation of content management systems that support selling stuff. The Mac App Store simply doesn’t compete.
That’s a sad reality, especially when it would be preferable to restrict less experienced users’ GateKeeper access to App Store apps only — that way, it’s analogous to their iPhone or iPad and their system is bound to be secure. But when few high-profile apps are available from the Mac App Store and the Store is cluttered with lots of really crappy apps, it’s hard to recommend it.
Kurt Wagner, Recode:
Twitter is building a new feature that will allow users to tweet things longer than the traditional 140-character limit, and the company is targeting a launch date toward the end of Q1, according to multiple sources familiar with the company’s plans. Twitter is currently considering a 10,000 character limit, according to these sources. […]
Twitter is currently testing a version of the product in which tweets appear the same way they do now, displaying just 140 characters, with some kind of call to action that there is more content you can’t see. Clicking on the tweets would then expand them to reveal more content. The point of this is to keep the same look and feel for your timeline, although this design is not necessarily final, sources say.
Apple has Apple News, Facebook has Instant Articles, and this product feels like it will be in the same vein. Twitter is, after all, uniquely journo-friendly in a way that Apple and Facebook are not.
On the other hand, why not just buy Medium?
Update: Jack Dorsey has confirmed that this is something they’re working on, but that they’ll still be “focusing on conversation and messaging”.
In a broadly-unrelated aside, I’ve long harboured a hunch that they’re working on a DM-only messaging app, too.
With the grid of four main products, it was easier to decide which machine was right for you. Do you need a portable or prefer a desktop? Need all the horsepower you can get, or is budget a bigger factor? Depending on those answers, it was easy to walk into a store and buy an iBook, PowerBook, iMac or Power Mac.
Just looking at the Mac, that’s not as clear cut as it used to be. The Mac Pro is more marginalized than ever, allowing the high-end iMac to become the default desktop machine for a lot of consumers and professionals. On the notebook side of things, its just as confusing. While I need the power of a MacBook Pro when editing audio, lots of people with similar needs can get by on i7 MacBook Air easily.
I think Apple’s computer lineup has remained fairly — even remarkably — simple, considering that its growth has consistently outpaced the rest of the industry for the past several years or more. It’s no longer the simple four-cell grid of consumer vs. professional and desktop vs. portable, but it’s not much more complicated than that. I would argue that it has simply gained a column: it’s now consumer, professional, and specialist, the latter of which contains the Mac Mini and the 12-inch MacBook.
The overlap in functionality, meanwhile, is not an entirely new issue. The iBook and PowerBook both did everyday computing tasks, and you could run some of Apple’s pro apps — like Logic — on an iBook. Not well, mind you, but you could.1 This overlap has been exacerbated by technology’s relentless strides in capability compared to what we’re actually doing on our computers: we now have way faster computers but we’re still editing HD video, for the most part.
The iPad lineup follows a similar formula: the iPad Air is the consumer device, the Pro is the professional product, and the Mini is the specialist product.
But throwing a wrench in both of these lineups is the continued existence of legacy products. For the Mac, it’s the ongoing sale of the 21-inch non-Retina iMac and the bafflingly-popular 13-inch 2012 MacBook Pro, the “TI-83” in the lineup.2 On the iPad side, it’s more confusing because the iPad Mini 2 and iPad Air (1) are not visibly different than their newer successors, nor are they named differently.
All of this is a roundabout way of getting to Hackett’s main point:
Like some others, the inner nerd in me is uncomfortable with the problem of choice Apple’s given us. There’s part of our community who can’t believe someone would cool on the Apple Watch, or not be excited about the 12-inch MacBook. However, the reality is that Apple has grown, its audience has as well. The company must offer a wider range of products to sustain its size.
The Apple of today provides more choice in device types, but I’m not sure it’s become more difficult to make a decision for iPhones, Macs, or Watches. All of them perform broadly similarly to each other as far as average consumers are concerned, so they’re going to pick mostly on price and form factor. For iPads, it’s only more complex because of the similar naming and form factors.
Us nerds are overthinking Apple’s lineup. I doubt most people compare Macs or iPads on the same parameters as we do; those that do compare on specific functionality usually already know what they’re looking for.
Ultimately, Hackett is right: Apple’s lineup is broader and, therefore, fewer products will likely appeal to a given person. And that’s okay.