A Mac Pro in Every Pot
Casey:
But I did see Star Wars last night.
Casey:
We can talk about that for a while.
Casey:
Yeah, it's old news.
Casey:
Oh, man.
Casey:
I missed my chance.
Casey:
The Marco scene, it's old news.
Casey:
It's all downhill from there.
John:
do you want to do some follow-up sure we actually have some one person is not i this i don't know if this person lives in dubai or just knows about the apple store in dubai but i'm trying to think of a reason why this person is not like every single person in the united states uh on vacation and not sending us any follow-up but in episode 149 we talked about the foliage walls and the apple model store things from the 60 minutes uh television show they showed like oh here's a
John:
a store where we try out all the different ideas we have for apple stores and they have this one wall of the store that had plants like real living plants just sort of cascading down the wall and i thought that would be funny if they actually put that in a store well apparently they have uh it just goes to show that everything they show in 60 minutes has to be something that already exists so there no secrets are revealed and the apple store in dubai they have a foliage wall so there you go that's super exciting that is a definite reason to visit there
John:
to just pet the foliage well i wonder how that like i mean i guess they have to have people keeping the plants alive but like why don't we get full if it's a good idea why isn't it a good idea everywhere why is it only a good idea in the desert i don't know beats me it struck me as a little weird although i really did like and i think john you had briefly mentioned uh mentioned this when we talked about it
Casey:
I really liked the display case for all the cases, the iPhone cases, where the case is on the outside of what ends up being a drawer.
Casey:
So you grab the case and pull the case, and then there's a drawer of these cases behind it.
Casey:
That was a terrible word picture, but hopefully that makes sense.
Casey:
I thought that was really clever, and I don't recall having ever seen that before.
John:
Someone did write in, I misplaced their either email or maybe it was a tweet, and said that those pull-out drawer things actually exist in stores too.
John:
So basically, there's nothing in 60 Minutes that they showed you that doesn't already exist in an Apple Star, which is not surprising.
Casey:
Not surprising, but a little bit sad.
Casey:
That's okay, though.
Casey:
All right.
Casey:
So any other follow-up we need to talk about?
John:
That's it.
John:
Everyone's still on vacation, including us.
Casey:
So not only California, but everyone is on vacation.
Casey:
Well, California is always on vacation.
Casey:
That is true.
Casey:
Do you want to tell us about something that's awesome, Marco?
Marco:
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Casey:
So the Christmas time has come and passed, and Casey has some new toys, ladies and gentlemen.
Casey:
It's exciting.
Casey:
So we have talked about the new Apple TV.
Casey:
I now have a new Apple TV.
Casey:
And now I will make everyone sit here and listen to my oh-so-outdated thoughts about the Apple TV.
Marco:
That's all right.
Marco:
I'll talk about the Mac Pro later, so I'll get you back.
Marco:
Oh, God.
Casey:
If you're serious, then I will happily forgo the Apple TV talk if that means you will forgo the Mac Pro talk.
Marco:
Well, I have to tell you about the new Mac Pro I got.
Casey:
Oh, dear God, I hope you're kidding.
Casey:
I don't have any alcohol nearby, so this is going to be a long night for me.
Casey:
Well, on a happier note, setup via Bluetooth on my new Apple TV, flawless.
Casey:
No issues whatsoever.
Casey:
So let's just be a lesson, children.
Casey:
That you never actually do want to have the fear of missing out that I have a chronic case of.
Casey:
And you do actually want to wait just a little bit to get something new.
Casey:
Because I had no problems with Bluetooth setup.
Casey:
I had no real problems with the remote app.
Casey:
Although it took me a minute to realize that I needed to do the software update in order to get it, if memory serves.
Casey:
Speaking of software update at 7 o'clock, I think this was Christmas Day, 7 o'clock in the evening on Christmas Day.
Casey:
Flawless, no issues.
Casey:
I connected via Ethernet, which might have made things a lot easier, but that was really nice.
Casey:
Oh, that's what it was.
Casey:
It wasn't that the software update screwed me up for the remote app.
Casey:
I actually did take notes.
Casey:
I just didn't read far enough.
Casey:
It took me a while to remember that the remote app is paired to your home sharing account.
Casey:
And I had not yet set up my home sharing account in the Apple TV, even after I'd done the update and all that.
Casey:
So for the life of me, I couldn't understand why the remote app wouldn't see the Apple TV.
Casey:
And then I forget how I figured it out.
Casey:
But somehow or another, I realized, oh...
Casey:
No, I need to sign into home sharing.
Casey:
And so once I did that, that worked no problem, which was really nice.
Casey:
The control receiver or the remote in general, having a Bluetooth remote is wonderful.
Casey:
I've learned that from the Fire TV stick.
Casey:
But it's really great having that Bluetooth remote on the Apple TV as well.
Casey:
I also really, really liked, and maybe we talked about this and I just had a brain fart or something, but I really liked that it gave me the option of instead of controlling volume on my TV via HDMI CEC or whatever magic it uses...
Casey:
I could program an IR remote that it would emit that same IR to change a different thing's volume, which is exactly what I needed to do because I have my receiver doing the speakers and all that.
Casey:
And so I had the remote learn my receiver's IR profile or whatever you want to call it, and that worked no problem.
Casey:
And so now the volume controls the receiver, which is really awesome.
Casey:
I didn't even know that was a thing.
Casey:
I didn't like that I had no idea how much battery power the remote has.
Casey:
And at some point or another, I saw some dialogue or something that said, oh, we'll tell you when the remote needs charging, which is an Apple thing to do, and that's fine.
Casey:
But it was weird that I couldn't even see it when I went digging into the remote setting screens.
Casey:
Yeah.
Casey:
I didn't like and I don't like that there's no native Spotify app.
Casey:
Yes, I am aware that there is such a thing as AirPlay.
Casey:
That is what I've been doing with my Apple TV for a long time now.
Casey:
But it seems to me like there's no reason why I couldn't select songs or do whatever in a native app.
Casey:
Or just have some sort of scenario wherein the Spotify app on my phone controls an instance of it on the TV.
Casey:
Because that's the way Spotify works is I can control the playback from my computer from the Spotify app on my phone.
Casey:
And it's kind of like the remote app works.
Casey:
And it's really, really awesome.
Casey:
And I'd like to not have to have my phone be beaming all that data to the Apple TV when it could just do that on its own.
Casey:
And on a final note, surprising precisely no one.
Casey:
Oh my God, you guys, Plex is so good.
Casey:
It's so good.
Casey:
It's worth the cost of admission just for Plex.
Casey:
But to that end, I have like four apps on this thing.
Casey:
I have Plex, I have Netflix.
Casey:
I think I put the ESPN app on there and I think that might be it.
Casey:
And so I'm not really seeing what's so great about the App Store yet, with the exception of Plex, of course.
Casey:
But there's been no other killer app that I've thought to myself, man, I really, really, really want to download whatever.
Marco:
Well, to be fair, I mean, like, the kind of device that it is, where, you know, this is like this TV-connected box.
Marco:
I mean, how many apps do most people really use in that kind of context?
Marco:
I mean, to me, like...
Marco:
It is useful to have a large selection of apps, but to any one person, any one user of this device, they might only ever use two to four apps, and that might be perfectly fine enough for them.
Marco:
For you, it might be Plex and Netflix.
Marco:
For me, it might be a game and Netflix, and maybe... I probably won't use Plex.
Marco:
I will use the iTunes Store stuff, and then maybe down the road, I might get HBO...
Marco:
now go whichever one is one that doesn't use cable that you know one of those like you know it's like it's the kind of thing and and if everything works well which is still debatable but if everything works well then i think that's enough you know you don't need it is it isn't a phone you know you don't need to be doing tons of different apps all the time on your tv i think most people are going to pick like three or four at most you know
Marco:
So wouldn't it be a good enough device and a valuable purchase even if you never use any other apps for it than what you use now?
Casey:
I think you're absolutely right.
Casey:
And, you know, as you were talking, I was thinking to myself, well, why am I, I don't know, not bummed out, but I can't think of a better way to describe it.
Casey:
But why am I a little disappointed that I don't have 305 apps on this thing that I was really excited about?
Casey:
And you know what I think a part of it is, is that it looks so paltry and silly compared to the prior gen Apple TV, which had like, what is it, 40 or 50 apps and new ones just spawning like rabbits constantly.
Casey:
But to be fair, you're exactly right that I really never used any of those.
Casey:
And so in the end of the day, it was really clutter.
Casey:
But because it feels like I have fewer things now, it feels worse, even though in reality, it's actually probably a lot better.
John:
You should put some other sort of staples on there.
John:
Like, I think you should probably put the YouTube app on there.
John:
And maybe... Does Amazon have, like, free video?
John:
Maybe the Amazon Video one if they have some things for free?
John:
Or if you have Amazon Prime?
Marco:
No, I don't think there is the Amazon Video app.
John:
That's kind of the whole point of that whole thing.
John:
No?
John:
I used the Siri thing recently where I...
John:
i i think you have to say show me i don't know it sounds so dumb to say show me but i said show me and then spoke a movie title and i was impressed by two things one that it actually transcribed what i was saying as i spoke it uh three things two that it properly title cased the title of the movie in real time as i spoke it wait which proper title casing that just you know the regular one
John:
so like did it capitalize prepositions and articles in the middle of the title and stuff like that uh it doesn't matter it was it was my son wanted to see the maze runner so all those words are capped right but i said show me the maze runner and the was capital maze was capital and you know in real time as it as it spat it out so that was impressive and three it gave me a bunch of options for where to watch it one of which was because i was if i had done it let me put it this way if i had done it with the old apple tv uh
John:
I would have been like, we don't have the Maze Runner, so let me just look to see if it's available on iTunes and either buy it or rent it based on how likely I think we as a household are to want to watch this again.
John:
But instead, I said, show me the Maze Runner, and I put it down there as an option, and I clicked on it, and it was available on HBO Go.
John:
so i just played it for free and so that's that's a pretty flawless victory for the new apple tv over the old one because it took less time because i just picked up the remote and spoken to it it did the right thing and it let me watch for free uh you know because i already paid for hbo it didn't have to go uh rented from itunes so thumbs up there
Casey:
Yeah, something I haven't tried, but I'd really like to, and I just didn't think about it until you said that, is, you know, can I get into my Plex library through Siri from like the home screen?
Casey:
And I believe there's APIs that allow that to happen, but I don't have the faintest idea whether or not Plex supports it.
John:
Yeah, I had some Plex, a couple of run-ins with Plex.
John:
I was trying to watch, I forget I was watching, trying to watch something that I had available in many different ways.
John:
And my TV, due to weirdness of HDMI and misguided attempts at copy protection, if I play through the DLNA client on my television, very often it only wants to output stereo down to my receiver.
John:
Even though it'll be fed 5.1 from my DLNA server in the basement,
John:
that 5.1 goes into my television but it never gets to leave what comes out the back of it instead is like even though it's on the audio return channel but anyway i fought with it for a while and like bottom line is if it goes if i have my the television itself the smart tv feature do it sometimes i don't get the high quality audio so i'm like well this video has high quality 5.1 audio i want to get that directly but i didn't want to turn on the playstation which also would have worked because it's noisy so i said it's time for the apple tv to do it
John:
And then I did like a search, like, is there a simple DLNA client for Apple TV?
John:
And there are a bunch of them.
John:
But I said, you know, let me try Plex because I have the Plex server set up on Synology.
John:
So I did.
John:
And the thing was there.
John:
And for whatever reason, it just wouldn't play off of the Synology.
John:
I don't know if the Synology couldn't transcode it because it was too high a bit rate or didn't understand the codec or something.
John:
But then I remembered, like, I have Plex all over the place.
John:
So I just started Plex on my wife's new iMac, pointed it at the same, you know, I had already had it set up there.
John:
I just mounted the Synology there.
John:
And my wife's iMac had no problem transcoding it, and I played it from there.
John:
So Plex kind of came through for me there, like halfway.
John:
I mean, it was flexible enough that if it didn't work off of my NAS, I could just run it on the much more powerful Mac, and that did work.
John:
So...
John:
Kind of thumb sideways there.
John:
But anyway, it let me play the video I wanted to play and the quality I wanted with 5.1 without having to hear a fan.
John:
So it's good.
Casey:
Yeah, and it's funny because I moved the now old and busted Apple TV from the family room to the bedroom.
Casey:
And I had on MTV Unplugged or something like that this morning.
Casey:
I forget specifically what it was.
Marco:
I hope it was the Alice in Chains.
Marco:
That's the best one.
Casey:
No, I don't think I have that one.
Casey:
I'm sure whatever one it was, you would judge me for, and we don't need to go into that.
Casey:
We'll save that for the after show.
Marco:
Many of them are very good, including the SEAL one that you gave me that I don't think is available legally anywhere.
Casey:
I believe that's right.
Casey:
And that was one of them that we watched.
Casey:
It was an MTV Unplugged Morning.
Casey:
Maybe we can argue about that in the after show, since that appears to be what we do these days.
Marco:
I mean, everyone loves the Nirvana one, and the Nirvana one is very good, but I think the Alice in Chains one is better.
Casey:
Yeah, I feel like I've heard it at some point, but not any time recently, so I should take a note to listen to that again.
Casey:
But anyway, so I was trying to—the point of the matter is I was trying to play Plex onto the old Apple TV, which was wired via Ethernet, now is Wi-Fi, and is the way the crow flies, so to speak, through the house.
Casey:
Yeah.
Casey:
Probably like 15 to 20 feet away from my airport extreme.
Casey:
Now, granted, that's through like two or three walls.
Casey:
And oh, my God, the new Apple TV.
Casey:
I don't know if it's because of Ethernet.
Casey:
I don't know if it's because I'm not doing AirPlay hop.
Casey:
I'm sure it's a combination of both.
Casey:
But it was so much nicer watching this stuff on the new Apple TV than it was AirPlaying from the Plex app on the old Apple TV.
Casey:
Anyway, but so, yeah, I'd say at least one thumb, probably two thumbs up for the new Apple TV.
Casey:
The Plex experience just is everything to me, and it's wonderful.
Casey:
I mean, there's a couple of minor issues I have here and there, but overall, really, really like it.
John:
I think the Plex UI on Apple TV looks plain to me.
John:
I know on Plex you can pick a background for the things, and they have all these background images that people have made.
John:
I remember the Mac Plex client had all these fancy backgrounds, and the UI looked all different.
John:
The Apple TV one...
John:
It's kind of boring, especially if you view by folder.
John:
I use Plex, by the way, to watch Harmy's Despecialized Editions.
John:
My parents wanted to see the first three Star Wars movies before going to see the seventh.
John:
Not the first three, episode one, two, and three, guys.
John:
Relax.
John:
And New Hope, Empire, and Jedi.
John:
And I wanted to show them Harmy, and it was the same situation.
John:
I could play it off my PlayStation, but then you'd have to hear the PlayStation fan.
John:
so and i wanted to get all you know the the multi-channel sound and everything and so uh plex to the rescue again it could it could play them and it played them correctly and i didn't have to hear a fan but when you view by folder went into my little star wars folder and navigated to it it was kind of boring looking it was just like a list of words and you know a cover art off to the left i don't know i i just expected plex to be fancier like not that i demand it to be fancy but uh
John:
I don't know.
John:
It seemed to be not up to the standards of the other Plex clients I can remember.
John:
Same thing with the PlayStation 4 client, by the way.
John:
But that's the least of my concerns.
John:
If it just gets to the video and plays it, I'm happy.
John:
So Plex is rising in esteem in this household.
Casey:
No, I agree with you.
Casey:
I think that the UI is good.
Casey:
I would not say it's great.
Casey:
And I think it could definitely use some massaging here and there.
Casey:
However...
Casey:
It is so much a better experience than having to have some iOS device sitting around air playing everything that even with the world's ugliest UI, it could still in many ways do no wrong in my book because, oh my goodness, it's so nice having that natively on the Apple TV now.
John:
You should share your Plex library with me.
Casey:
I would be happy to.
Casey:
I should do that.
Casey:
Okay, or both of you.
John:
I don't think I can share it with you because my NAS is not exposed to the internet at all.
John:
So I don't think I can share it with you, but that doesn't matter.
John:
I just want to get your stuff.
Casey:
Are you running Plex on your Synology?
John:
Yeah.
Casey:
Really?
Casey:
You can do that?
Casey:
Well, yeah, you can.
Casey:
But I found it was, whenever I tried to transcode anything live, it was a disaster.
John:
Well, that's what I was saying.
John:
I couldn't watch the, one of the things I wanted to watch just didn't play at all and I had to use the iMac.
John:
But Harmony Specialized Editions played fine.
Casey:
Hmm.
Casey:
You know, I think what it might be is if you have it format, it formatted as like, I'm going to get this wrong video nerds.
Casey:
I apologize.
Casey:
But if you have it in some Apple friendly format, let me just be vague.
John:
No, I don't.
John:
I do not pre transcode anything like so.
John:
Whatever I downloaded the harm he says, that's what they are.
John:
I refuse to like throw them into handbrake and reconvert them because then you're getting you're going double lossless.
John:
Right.
John:
So if it won't play exactly as it was downloaded, then I find something else to play it.
Casey:
Completely agree.
Casey:
I've lamented in the past that the Synology that we all have, which is an 1813+, does not have a quick enough processor to do transcoding.
Casey:
And a lot of people, when I've complained about this in the past, have said, oh, we'll just transcode everything and make it all in whatever magical Apple format I need.
Casey:
And I completely agree, John.
Casey:
That's just a bunch of work.
Casey:
Whether or not you have the double lossy conversion, it's just so much work that I just don't want to have to do.
John:
And I found my Synology does transcode a whole bunch of stuff on the fly in a reasonable speed for me.
John:
All it needs to do is be able to keep up with real time, and it can in a lot of cases.
John:
But other cases, it just doesn't matter.
John:
That's why I threw the iMac at it, which didn't break a sweat.
John:
It can transcode anything on the fly because it's super-duper fast and makes my Mac Pro feel bad.
Yeah.
Casey:
And that's why I have my old platter-driven MacBook Pro sitting on constantly.
Casey:
I'd probably never use this thing if it wasn't for the fact that it is my Plex server.
Casey:
So yeah, I'll invite you guys after the fact to see my Plex stuff.
Casey:
And so you can stream all of the things that I have.
Marco:
Legally.
Casey:
Totally.
Casey:
Well, I mean, you can only stream it.
Casey:
You can't download it.
Casey:
I'd like to talk about another gift I got, but do you want to talk about something else that's awesome or do you want me to just keep on trucking?
Marco:
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Casey:
So the other thing that I received this Christmas, which I know everyone is so excited about the accidental look at me in a humble bragging podcast, is Erin got me a new Retina Pad Mini.
Casey:
She got me an iPad Mini 4 with Retina and cellular, and I am really into this device.
Casey:
I've always loved my iPad minis.
Casey:
This is my fourth iPad.
Casey:
I had the original.
Casey:
I had the iPad 3, which was the first with the retina, which is what you are still rocking, John.
Casey:
Is that right?
John:
Yeah, still.
John:
It's getting long in the tooth, man.
John:
I don't know how long I can keep it up.
John:
It's getting heavy in the tooth.
Yeah.
Casey:
too um then i had the original um original retina mini and now the ipad mini 4 and the last two both minis have been cellular in the last couple of months i've given up on my at&t unlimited plan and so now i can actually tether i'm not entirely sure going cellular was the the most right choice but so far i've liked it and the apple sim is actually pretty cool and
Casey:
I put a post on my site about some random things that I've discovered with regard to the Apple SIM.
Casey:
And so you can go check that out if that's interesting to you.
Casey:
The short, short version is it's a single SIM card that you can use with multiple carriers, which is really kind of fascinating.
Casey:
I don't have too much to say about the device other than why did somebody tell me that this iPad multitasking stuff was really cool?
Casey:
Like I wish Federico said something or something like that because this is kind of exciting.
Yeah.
Marco:
I love that this episode is like, Casey discovers after Christmas what everyone else in Apple community discovered in the fall.
Casey:
It's been talking about for months.
Marco:
Welcome to October.
John:
And he saw Star Wars, too.
Casey:
Yeah, and I saw Star Wars just yesterday, actually, as we record.
Casey:
So anyway, I won't go on about this like I did about the Apple TV, but suffice to say, it genuinely, I'm not trying to be funny, it genuinely changes how you use Apple.
Casey:
the device when you can genuinely do more than one thing at once well on the old mini i could do i believe it's slide over where you can just slide something in and interact with it and then you have to make it go away because they wouldn't let you do a full-on two-pane multitasking
Casey:
I could do picture in picture, which by the way, quick aside, Plex on the iPad actually does support picture in picture, even though it doesn't have the same UI that everything else on the planet does.
Casey:
As it turns out, if you just hit the home button while you're playing something, it will automatically kick on picture in picture, which is really awesome.
Casey:
Um,
Casey:
So anyway, so I really, really have liked having multitasking on it.
Casey:
And I can't think of any specific thing that I've done that has been amazing.
Casey:
But just the ability to be able to, say, hang out in Slack while catching up on Twitter or what have you has been so awesome and genuinely changes.
Casey:
I know I've said that word like 18 times, but it really does.
Casey:
It changes the way...
Casey:
I think about my iPad and it makes me feel like even my mini is so much more capable.
Casey:
This new mini is so much more capable than the mini that came before it for me.
Casey:
And I'm really excited to be able to dig into using this a little more, not for work stuff or anything like that, but just to be more, I don't know, productive or efficient, maybe is the word I'm looking for, while even just goofing off.
Casey:
And so I'm really stoked with it, really pleased with it.
Casey:
And so far I'm excited that I got a cellular one.
Casey:
And I now understand Federico's rage over people, over apps that don't support the two-pane multitasking because it is really annoying.
John:
marco were you the one who tweeted or retweeted something showing uh some person saying you know guys it doesn't take too many changes to ui window to make it into like they had they had like windows yeah steve ts did did like just like a little like mock-up uh like a working mock-up demo of like multiple ui windows on screen at once with draggable edges and draggable title bars
John:
and this is on the ipad and what they're basically how to look like is os 10 windows but with really big finger sized widgets for the little stoplight widgets right and it looked it looks silly and i'm gonna say this is probably not the way you should go but people are mad with power now basically like split view it is wait a second the cpu is capable of doing more than things at once i need windows and i need to arrange them they're just you know recreating
John:
Oh, they're recreating my desktop on their iPads, which is probably not what they want.
John:
They're not ready for that.
John:
But it's, you know, I guess someone could do that.
John:
Maybe Apple would reject it because they're kind of like that.
John:
Oh, this tries to make a new, you know, windowing environment.
John:
I don't know.
John:
I'm sure Apple would find some way to reject it because like imagine an app.
Marco:
Yeah, well, there's been a rule forever against apps that try to create their own desktop-type environments inside themselves to have any kind of multiple widgets inside of one central app.
Marco:
And it's a very vague rule, but that's been there since the very beginning.
John:
It's like the one that got status board rejected, but then not, because it was ridiculous to reject status board.
John:
But definitely making actual Windows, because I don't even know how you would... What would you put in those Windows?
John:
Well, think of it this way.
John:
Maybe if someone did...
John:
like a sketching application for the iPad pro where it had a bunch of pallets that were like literally just pallets, like Photoshop pallets, some kind of weird dockable pallets with big finger size things on the top of them.
John:
Would Apple reject that because it gives too much flexibility about where you put the pallets?
John:
I don't know.
John:
Like it, it seems like there is, there's something there where people, somebody is daring enough because the ability to arrange the pallets the way you want in Photoshop or any other design application, that's a feature.
John:
Like people have different tools that they want to use at certain times.
John:
And yeah,
John:
i mean it's not that the mac versions of these applications are infinitely flexible you're still kind of stuck with this set of palettes and you can arrange them make them skinny or wide or whatever but uh talk to any designer watch them work people have preferences about what goes where on the screen where is the layers palette where is the history palette what's hidden what's shown by default um is it skinny or wide what's docked here and there like is it the full screen thing or is it the small window like these are just options within you know photoshop
John:
if there was an ipad pro sketching application that gave similar flexibility people would use that flexibility because maybe they want like what is the the thing that they always go to they go to the color well frequently they change brush sizes frequently uh they don't have like a keyboard to hit the square brackets to make the brush size go up and down so
John:
being able to sort of arrange their workspace within an application using things that i guess you kind of not call them windows to avoid getting rejected but i really hope apple wouldn't reject an app like that because i think that's a great idea for and for all i know because i'm not a designer for all i know there are ipad perhaps that already do this so if that's the case then never mind it's already been done but um if not that's definitely a direction that i think it's safe it should be safe to go in that direction with design applications for example on the ipad pro
Casey:
And seeing this multitasking, to bring it back around, just makes me understand that much more why someone would really like an iPad Pro, despite the fact that I do think it is just comically large.
Casey:
I can see how it would be really, really useful to have all that extra screen real estate.
Casey:
So it's interesting.
Casey:
But I really, really like the new Retina iPad Mini.
Casey:
Two thumbs up for that.
Casey:
Two thumbs up for the iPad multitasking.
Casey:
Really, really been digging it.
John:
on the ipad pro being comically large i still as i dwell on this i think the problem is that it's not big enough not problem not that there's a problem with it per se but like the reason it seems so large is because we are comparing it to like the you know the quote unquote full size ipad if it was really comically large like as in 21 inch no one would be comparing it to like no one would think oh i'm gonna put this in my backpack
John:
it would be for designers to work with at their desk it's like why is it even an ipad at that point why aren't you just why isn't it just a mac why you know well because you draw on the screen with a pen and you don't do that with a mac and it's not indirect like a cintiq where you got the mac over here you know like i i still feel like it's the direction we're going in albeit at this at this point we're going there at a snail's pace because it took this long to get us a stylus and a slightly larger ipad but
John:
I think that will solve the problem of, whoa, look at the size of this giant iPad.
John:
You stop making that comparison at a certain point.
John:
When it becomes a thing that sits on your desk, I don't mean that you have to plug it in, although you could plug it in.
John:
But I think there have been people who have made these very large tablet-sized things like 21 inches or whatever.
John:
um and they just haven't caught on i just don't think the software is there for it yet but uh in the same way that i feel like that the ipad pro features will go down scale at some point uh you can make the ipad pro even bigger like why not if if it becomes a tool for designers who wants to design things on something as puny as an ipad pro like why wouldn't you want something bigger i think you would naturally eventually well why did they stop making the 17 inch macbook pro
John:
I think that is kind of like, because the laptop's role is to be portable, right?
John:
And I don't think the iPad's role is necessarily to be portable, especially for design things, because they just want to draw on the screen, right?
John:
I think the Cintiqs are bigger than that size.
Marco:
Well, I mean, I think the reason they killed the 17-inch MacBook Pro is probably because they just weren't selling enough of them to make it worth continuing to sell.
Marco:
So a larger iPad than the Pro might have that same problem.
Marco:
There is a maximum size above which it is just too specialized, and not enough people will buy it to make it worth Apple making it.
Marco:
And for MacBooks, that appears to be 15 inches.
Marco:
So what is it for iPads?
Marco:
It might be the iPad Pro size.
Marco:
It might be bigger.
Marco:
Who knows?
John:
I don't buy into that because I think the generation that's throwing mice around the room wants something they're going to touch.
John:
That's why I keep saying the iPad is the future of computing.
John:
It's not going to be too specialized.
John:
What's going to be too specialized is the PCs that you can't touch.
John:
So Apple is eventually, for those kids who are throwing those mice around the computer lab who are in kindergarten now, when they are 30 years old,
John:
I think they're going to want a really big touchscreen somewhere in their house to do the type of stuff they can't do on their phones, like for sitting down, like in the same way that we have an iMac or our laptops, or maybe, maybe they'll just stick with laptops.
John:
I don't know.
John:
Like the 17 inch laptop, it's an old form factor and it's meant to be portable.
John:
And a non-portable laptop is called desktop.
John:
And we already have that.
John:
Like we have a massive 5k iMac.
John:
Like I don't, one fun thing to think about is what is the upper size limit on, uh,
John:
desktop computer screens 27 inches that like we went up to 30 is that like the limit or at a certain point it becomes you can't find like a desk space big enough it starts blocking your view out of your home and like it's just it's just it's just too darn big i have a friend who uses a television like people who have a vision problems you know not not that it's low resolution but it's just massive right
John:
I guess, you know, maybe VR headsets come and make all this a moot point.
John:
But anyway, thinking about the sizes screens can be in the future.
John:
I think it's there's lots of interesting possibilities.
John:
And I think a lot of our view today is colored by.
John:
what we're comparing it to or where we slot it you know that's all just getting back to casey saying it's comically large and like in some respects it is it's it's like the world's biggest iphone or it's a comically large ipad but in other respects it's a comically small laptop screen detached from a keyboard it's a comically small ipac that you can touch right i don't know anyway that was an aside
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Casey:
All right.
Casey:
So John, you had come up with a topic or theme perhaps for the remainder of today's episode.
Casey:
Would you like to introduce that and kind of kick us off?
John:
The last episode of 2015, that means you have a sort of a year-end thing.
John:
You could do a year-end review.
John:
You could do predictions for next year.
John:
What I wanted to do was something kind of in between, which is a 2016 wish list with a set of rules.
John:
Of course, there are rules.
John:
So the first rule is that these are not predictions.
John:
So that gets us entirely out of the game of trying to predict what is actually going to happen in 2016.
John:
Because that's fun to do sometimes, and it's easy to tell whether you're right, for the most part.
John:
i don't know like i'm i'm less interested in predicting what will happen than in talking about what i would like to happen and for stuff that you would like to happen you can't pick like blue sky stuff where it's like if i you know if i could have a pony and a unicorn this is what i would want so the rules are not predictions and pick things that are plausible and feasible and
John:
And that you want to see in 2016.
John:
And I guess we'll have to just judge whether the thing you're asking for is a fantasy that's never going to happen and has to be stricken from the list.
John:
But those are the ground rules.
John:
And I hope you guys did some semblance of homework.
John:
I have a text file in front of me.
John:
That sounds serious.
John:
Does it have more than one thing in it?
Marco:
It has 36 lines with text on them.
Marco:
Well, including white space, 36 lines.
Marco:
All right.
John:
And this is, it's not even like top four that only need to be ordered.
John:
This is an unordered list.
John:
You will.
Casey:
So you might actually do okay with this Marco.
Marco:
Well, it was very hard for me to do this in a way that wasn't just predictions.
Marco:
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Marco:
Keeping it to plausible things was fairly easy, but making it not just a list of what I think will happen or what I think is very likely to happen, that is harder.
Marco:
And I've definitely had a harder time with that.
Marco:
So my list is a little bit predictive.
John:
and well to getting away from predictions the reason i don't want to do predictions is because that allows cynicism in the door because you could say these dummies are going to do this even though they shouldn't and this is more just like what do you want to happen like what yeah if you could if you could make certain things happen and you know non-magical things what what do you want to see in 2016 and it can be anything tech i guess i mean we're probably all thinking of apple stuff but realistically it can be anything tech related
Marco:
And honestly, I mean, my list is actually pretty optimistic or like it isn't a pessimistic or cynical list because, you know, look, and my list is very, very Apple focused.
Marco:
I just wasn't really thinking of other stuff because frankly, the rest of the tech industry is kind of boring most of the time, to be honest.
Marco:
But, you know, for me, the Apple side of it, I'm optimistic simply because I think Apple in 2015 and 2014 really did a lot of 1.0s.
Marco:
Like a lot of things are either brand new product lines or new product sub lines like the iPad Pro or, you know, new services like Apple Music and Photo Cloud stuff.
Marco:
There's a lot of restarts and 1.0s recently in this past year.
Marco:
And so I'm really hoping that 2016 brings a lot of 1.1s and 2.0s.
Marco:
Just a lot of revision, a lot of maybe maturing of these lines and of these various new products.
Marco:
Just kind of a slowdown in brand new cutting-edge launches because Apple's cutting-edge launches have been all over the map in terms of quality and
Marco:
And usefulness and everything.
Marco:
And so to have some time where that can be kind of calmed down and matured and stabilized and developed further rather than just more and more 1.0s of everything would be very welcome.
Marco:
And I think that's what will happen.
Marco:
And I hope that's what will happen.
Marco:
And so that is my main theme of my wishes is just...
Marco:
Stop with the 1.0s for a little while and just, like, take all these 1.0s forward to their next steps in their growth.
Casey:
There was a really good – well, I didn't finish it.
Casey:
I only had time to read about the first half.
Casey:
But I think it was Nilay Patel wrote something on The Verge yesterday, I believe it was.
Casey:
It's entitled, 2015, Apple's Year in Beta.
Casey:
And it very much echoes what you just said, that basically there's been a lot of half-cooked stuff that's been released in this year, and that's really kind of unfortunate.
Casey:
And I didn't get to the portion, which actually sounds perhaps even more interesting to me, which is new platform ideas in search of sticky user behavior.
Casey:
So for example, 3D Touch.
Casey:
which I find I'm using more and more over time, but I did not have the instant like, oh my God, I'm using this always experience that I was kind of expecting to actually.
Casey:
So we'll link this in the show notes, but it was a little on the negative side, but I think it was pretty fair all told.
Marco:
Yeah, I mean, at this point in Apple's evolution, they are really throwing a lot more spaghetti at the wall to see what sticks.
Marco:
And whether that used to happen more in private and is now more public, or whether, as I said in a recent show, I think there's just been a lot of low-hanging fruit that has all been picked, and now...
Marco:
In order to find the next big thing or the next success in the business, it's harder.
Marco:
And the successes are getting smaller, relatively speaking.
Marco:
And all the low-hanging fruit has already been picked in a lot of these industries.
Marco:
So it's just getting harder to find what's next and to find success.
Marco:
And so we are seeing things that come out that are kind of like, ah, really?
Marco:
Or things that you're not really sure will work.
Marco:
And many of them don't, and many of them do.
Marco:
And it's happening more in public now with Apple than it used to, I think.
Marco:
Or maybe we're just remembering wrong.
Marco:
I don't know.
Marco:
But it does seem like we are seeing a lot more things come out of Apple that are not clear wins from day one.
Marco:
Obviously, you can look back to the past and you can say, well, it was never perfect.
Marco:
And that's true.
Marco:
But I think if you look at the iPhone 1.0 or even the early iPods and many of their earlier 1.0 kind of releases versus today's 1.0 releases, I think the number of asterisks and downsides...
Marco:
in the past was probably lower than it is today.
Marco:
And in part, that's because they are a bigger company.
Marco:
I do think it has to do, in part, with Steve not being there anymore.
Marco:
And I think in part, it is just because the products now are more complicated.
Marco:
And as I just said, it's more challenging now to find new territory that will be a success.
Casey:
Yeah, from this piece that I was talking about, this is Neil Patel.
Casey:
And that's really the issue.
Casey:
We're not used to Apple being just fine.
Casey:
We're used to Apple being wildly better than the competition or sometimes much worse, but always ahead of the curve on some significant axis.
Casey:
But what we got in 2015 was an Apple that released more products than ever, all of which felt incomplete in extremely meaningful ways, ways that meant that their products were just fine and often just the same as everyone else's.
John:
Yeah, I don't know if I buy the premise because, again, long memory.
John:
But one thing when I think of the problem, like the underlying thing, I keep coming back to my hobby horse, which is I don't know, like in a world where products increasingly have a back end service component.
John:
That works against Apple because I don't know if they can make those things like, oh, they're 1.0, they're buggy or whatever.
John:
Like, I just need one more year to work out the kinks.
John:
When it was just software and hardware that shipped to customers, that was true.
John:
They could work out the kinks.
John:
They'd make the hardware better.
John:
But when it's server component things...
John:
Like, I don't I don't see a lot of like there's some progress there, but it's really slow.
John:
And that's why I don't have the confidence to like, oh, given given a year or two, like contact syncing will be a solved problem.
John:
You know how long Apple's been working on contact syncing?
John:
I don't people don't have many contacts.
John:
I don't have many contacts.
John:
You got like 100 or so couple hundred contacts.
John:
And I just want them to be the same everywhere and to be in sync.
John:
And.
John:
this should be a solved problem uh but it isn't and like is it is it because apple hasn't had time to work on contact syncing no like it's just i i feel like there is a fundamental incapability of the organization to get past some threshold of quality and and as more and more things they make have that component i worry that there's like a ceiling on how good those things are going to be how good can apple music be if there's necessarily a server component how good can apple tv be if there's you know