In the News

130: Depressurized iPhones and a Visionary Date

Episode 130

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Watch the video!
https://youtu.be/nTGrJqpg6fw

In the News blog post for January 12, 2024:
https://www.iphonejd.com/iphone_jd/2024/01/in-the-news709.html

00:00 We Don’t Need Roads Where We’re Going!
10:17 Clicking Into Place
15:13 Charging in to CES
18:52 Sparky Productivity
22:09 Non-Linear Shuffling Grief
237:28 Finding Our Limits (and Wallets!)
34:27 Magic Update
36:28 Where Y’at? Segment - Depressurized iPhone
42:48 Masters of the Air
46:20 Brett’s iTip: Switch between iPad apps on external keyboard with Command + Tab
49:26 Jeff’s iTip: Keep iPad video playing in background using Stage Manager

Apple Vision Pro: pre-order on Jan. 19, demo and buy in stores starting Feb. 2

Dan Moren | Macworld: Vision Pro is already changing everything we know about Apple

Nick Wolny | CNET: This iPhone Physical Keyboard Case Works Better Than You Might Expect

David Sparks: MacSparky Field Guide on Productivity (affiliate link)

Jason Snell | Six Colors: Grief and a Photo Shuffle

Jeff Review: Eufy SmartTrack Card vs. Rolling Square AirCard -- two ways to add Find My to your wallet

Oliver Haslam | iMore: Apple released a critical Magic Keyboard firmware update to fix a Bluetooth security flaw that could let someone snoop on your keystrokes

John Gruber | Daring Fireball: Passenger’s iPhone Survived, Intact, 16,000 Foot Fall from Alaska Airlines Plane

Brett’s iTip: Switch between apps on the iPad (with an external keyboard) using Command ⌘ + Tab. I use this shortcut ALL THE TIME on either Windows (Alt + Tab) and Mac (Command + Tab) and really appreciate that it’s available on the iPad as well (as long as you’re using an external keyboard).

Jeff’s iTip: Keep iPad Video Playing in the Background Using Stage Manager. For the times when you cannot Multitask with Picture in Picture

Support the show

Brett Burney from http://www.appsinlaw.com
Jeff Richardson from http://www.iphonejd.com

[MUSIC PLAYING]
Welcome to In the News for January the 12th, 2024.
Still a brand new year here.
I am Brett Burney from appsinlaw.com.
And this is Jeff Richardson from iPhoneJD.
Hey, Brett.
Good morning, Jeff.
Hey, I put February 2nd on my calendar.
And I bet you don't even have to look at my calendar
to know why I'm planning to visit an Apple
store on that day.
You had a great write-up about an announcement
from Apple of when the Apple Vision
Pro is going to be available.
Aren't you surprised it's this early in the year?
I was thinking like April or something like that.
But they are ready.
March at the earliest.
I know.
So many surprises about this.
Number one, I'm surprised it's so early in the year
that it makes you think that they almost could have shipped
it for Christmas, Hanukkah and stuff like that.
But they decided to hold it a little bit longer.
Second of all, I'm surprised-- and this
is the thing I've been thinking about a lot-- that there was
relatively little fanfare.
Because it was a press release.
That's it.
I know.
A press release saying, hey, you can--
one week from today, January 19th,
you can pre-order an Apple Vision Pro.
And I certainly plan to do so.
But that was it.
I mean, it wasn't any additional details
that we did not learn last week, including, for example,
there really are details that you need to know.
Like people like me that have glasses,
what do you need to know for ordering prescriptions?
Can you just order it online?
You would get an iPhone.
Or are you going to be required to go into a store,
or even encouraged to go into a store to get a special fit?
Because people have different head sizes,
and there's different things for that.
I'm actually surprised how much we don't know about this.
And there was an interesting story--
I think I linked to it today by--
yeah, in fact, I think you have here--
by Dan Morin, where he was sort of talking about it.
Yes, here it is.
Think back in time, right, at the times
that Apple has introduced products.
And you and I have been watching all of these.
You think about the Apple Watch, for example, big product.
But in retrospect, I think everybody
would agree that that first year, the first model
was really underpowered, right?
It was really slow.
And it took a while.
I don't even think that Apple really
understood what the Apple Watch was going to be useful for
in that first year.
They were talking about everything
from sending your heartbeats to drawing something,
like draw a little fish with your finger
and send it a picture.
And nobody uses an Apple Watch that way.
But then over time, we figured out, hey,
it's really about notifications and fitness
and stuff like that.
And you could say the same thing about the first iPhone.
I didn't get the first iPhone.
Exactly.
I was just thinking that.
Did you get the first iPhone, Brett?
Not the very first one, no.
Not the very first one.
The first iPhone had no email support for corporate email.
It was incredibly slow with Edge.
It was expensive.
No apps, just the Apple apps.
Yeah, that's right.
That's a big one.
There was no app store.
So if you think back in time to these major new--
go back to the original Mac in 1984
and how much of a leap forward there
was between the first Mac and the Mac
Plus, which came not that much later,
and then, of course, the Mac SE.
And yes, every product improves over time.
I realize that.
But many times, that first product, in retrospect,
we realize that that's just sort of getting something out
there so we can figure out what it's all about.
Now, that's not always true.
I mean, things like AirPods were instantly useful.
I think the iPad was instantly useful.
So it's not always true.
But for this Vision Pro, I think--
and this was Dan Morin's sort of theory--
is that Apple might be just trying to be humble about it.
This is a brand new thing.
Let's not have the huge, splashy introduction.
We did a little bit of that last year.
And the quantities, if you believe the rumors--
and who knows if they're true or not--
the quantities are going to be very limited.
And so what maybe Apple is thinking is, look,
we're just going to have a press release.
Just tell people it's out there.
The early adopters are going to go for it.
And it's going to build over this first year.
There's not going to be that many in the first place.
And then we will see-- we meaning Apple--
we'll see how people are actually using it,
what apps are being developed by developers.
And so then maybe--
it would not surprise me if this model actually
stays the model for the first year or two.
But maybe when Apple--
close to the holidays this year, for example--
they may have more of a sense of why people are loving it,
if they are, and what they want to promote on it.
And so just-- but for now, sort of testing the water.
So I think that's an interesting theory.
And I think that it explains why Apple has been--
or Apple, at least--
relatively low-key about this.
I don't think we're going to be getting the Super Bowl
commercials about this.
We certainly didn't get the product introduction videos.
So that's that.
Now, having said that, I'll say one last thing.
I'm so excited that we're finally here, Brad,
that this brand new platform that we're going to be--
people are going to be using it in just a matter of weeks.
Oh, so exciting.
I just continue to think, looking back over this last--
I mean, because this was announced in summer, right?
It was-- isn't this--
I mean, we sort of anticipated it.
It just seems like it's been a very premeditated trickle
of information to very specific people from Apple.
Like, we've kind of gotten notice
that Jason Snell and John Gruber and several of these folks
have been to private visits.
I specifically remember at WWDC, it
was a very planned out presentation.
For each journalist went through the exact same kind of a thing
with the Vision Pro.
Like, people at Apple have really
been planning this out, I think, to every single detail
on how it's sort of getting noticed,
how it's getting released, controlling the message.
I mean, even a little bit differently
than I think in some of the other platforms
that they have--
so anyway, it just seems to me, again,
it's going to get better.
We know that.
And I think you're totally on point with, like,
this is the way it's going to be for a year.
But that's a good thing.
It's good to see exactly how this is going to be used.
We're going to get some of the people that we all follow up.
You know, Marcus Brownlee, all of those guys and gals
that we follow.
You know, iJustine, how are they using it?
What are some of the uses?
And we're going to think about this over this next year.
And then it's going to be even better.
I mean, I even predict maybe Christmas 2024,
perhaps maybe they would have a second model.
Maybe that'd be too early.
But I think by that time, we're definitely
going to have some ideas of how the general public might
be using some of this.
I think that's a little early.
I really do think that this model is
going to be the model for all of calendar year 2024.
Again, that's just my sense.
I could be wrong.
And I'll also say, when you talk about what's the same
and what's different from other product announcements,
one thing that I do expect to be the same--
and I think I actually saw a story on this on Bloomberg,
or there was an early leak--
but apparently next week, select reviewers
are going to get units.
Who knows who they are?
And some of the people--
Under an NDA, I'm sure.
And then I'm sure, if it's going to be February 2nd,
that you can actually walk into a store and buy one.
My guess is that sometimes during that week,
like maybe January 30th or 31st, then
that will be the embargo lift.
And we're going to start to see.
And that's going to be fascinating, Brett,
because it's going to be the people that-- of course,
they're going to have their hand held by Apple
to have the best experience possible.
But these will not be people using it
for 20 minutes in a controlled environment.
These will be people taking it home,
actually using it for more than a week, hopefully,
and really putting it through its paces.
And so that's going to be fascinating to see those
reviews in approximately two weeks.
And then one other thing to say about other models is--
we talked about this last summer when they announced it,
but Apple is calling this the Apple Vision Pro.
But I believe that the platform is just called Apple Vision.
And my personal guess is that we're
going to have this model for a while,
and that whenever we get the next model,
it will probably just be called something
like the Apple Vision or the Apple Vision 1
or the Apple Vision something else.
But it will be a non-Pro model that will be less expensive
and maybe use fewer of the features.
Or maybe it will simply be that all of the pre-searches that
are in the Pro will push themselves down
to a cheaper model.
And then maybe eventually we'll have something new.
So I think that the features that we're
getting with this Apple Vision Pro,
they're going to be around for a while.
I don't think this is going to be one of these cases
that you get it and you feel like, oh, they came out
with a new one six months later.
I really don't think that's going to be the case.
Interesting.
I cannot wait.
It's really exciting stuff.
Just neat.
What kind of apps are we going to see?
What's the experience going to be like?
Is it going to be something because the--
will you only be able to wear it for a limited amount of time
before it makes you feel nauseous?
Or is the fact that Apple has spent so much money
in making sure that the quality of the image
is just so high that you actually
can wear it for an extended period of time?
So many questions I have.
But what I do know is that that video
that they had with the introduction, that
was actually pretty cool.
Because it is such a throwback to the video
that I know you remember too from the original iPhone
where everybody from all the movies and TV shows
was saying, hello, hello, hello.
This is just a cute, cute little ad.
So many goggles.
Oh, I love it.
There's so many goggles in this video.
Including Back to the Future, Snoopy,
the licensing department, I'm sure, was very, very busy
on this.
But oh, what a great video.
Star Wars, everything else.
And you link to it in your story.
This was a separate post that you did earlier this week.
And I'll make sure that people get access to this.
So just so everybody knows, so Apple
announced that the pre-orders for the Apple Vision Pro,
if you're ready with your credit card,
they start on January 19.
That's next Friday?
One week.
Is that correct?
One week from today, yeah.
And then you can demo and buy in-store starting
on February 2.
So just so that everybody knows, and I'll
link to your story about that.
I was just thinking, Jeff, we were just
looking at the calendar, you and I. I'm actually
going to be in New York on February 2.
I'm just thinking we should do--
my family and I were just there.
And I said, in addition to going and seeing
the Rockefeller Plaza and Empire State Building
and all of the sites, Times Square,
that you would do in New York, I also told my kids, I'm like,
well, we have to visit the Grand Central Station Apple
store as well as the Apple Cube on Fifth Avenue, which we did.
We got to both of them.
So it's like, that just shows me what a geek
I am about when I go as a tourist.
But I'm just thinking, hey, I love those stores, right?
You and I both love those stores.
Those are some of the absolutely stalwart stores
in the Apple physical store lineup.
But we got to do something from there.
If nothing else, I'm definitely going
to go there and do some video or something.
Maybe I'll include that in the podcast, something else.
There was another event going on this past week, CES,
the Consumer Electronic Show, which way back in the day,
Apple was a pretty big presence at the CES.
They haven't been over the last several years.
CES is not what it looks like.
I've never actually been, but obviously, every year
at this time, I follow it very closely of all the stories
coming out.
And something that we talked about last week
was kind of a star of the show.
This is the Klix case for the iPhone, which is like,
it's new, but it's a throwback to put in a physical keyboard
on a brand new iPhone.
CES is interesting because it's a mix of things
that are futuristic that actually never end up shipping.
Yeah, good point.
And real products that people want to introduce.
And this is an example of the latter.
We talked about the Klix keyboard.
And I think I told you last week, Brett,
that when I first saw this announced, I'm like,
oh, come on, ha, ha, ha, a keyboard.
But then the more I looked at it, I'm like, well,
maybe there's a value here.
And this review by the reviewer at CNET
was fascinating because although he only had 20 minutes with it,
he's like, this actually makes sense.
It's so easy.
You just slip in your iPhone and it works.
So anyone can use it.
And I thought it was sort of funny that he was amazed.
He's like, oh, and they have all these cool commands.
Like you can do command space and you can do a search.
And I'm like, that's not a Klix thing.
That's just built into the iPhone.
You know, any external keyboard with the iPhone,
you could have used an external keyboard with the iPhone
back in 2010 and had some of these same tricks.
But regardless, it just shows that people don't think
of an external keyboard for the iPhone
the way they do for an iPad.
But the reality is that both the iPhone and the iPad,
but the iPhone has been able to use an external keyboard
for a very, very, very long time.
And so, you know, it actually works pretty well.
And so, you know, this, the more I think about this,
I do think that there's a segment of the population
that's gonna say, it's so simple.
You just put your phone in there
and then you can use a real keyboard.
And unlike, you know, the old days of a BlackBerry
where the keyboard takes up half the screen,
you can see your entire screen.
And that is actually one of the advantages
of using an external keyboard of any kind,
including this with the iPhone,
is that it takes that software keyboard off the screen.
So you have a big, big screen
that you can see everything there.
You know, and there are times that I use my iPhone
with an external keyboard 'cause it just makes sense.
So it was really interesting to see.
And again, this was, you know, to call this a review,
he only used it for 20 minutes
standing at the back at CES.
But at least it's somebody from the outside
putting their hands on the product
and he says, it's the real deal.
- Well, it's just the immediate response
or the immediate, you know, reflection that he had on this.
And it's exactly what you said.
This picture speaks a thousand words right here
because you don't even think about it.
When I'm going to do a text message or, you know,
put some text on a picture, like in what this picture
is showing here, I don't even think about it.
The keyboard, the on-screen keyboard has always been there.
It always takes up half the screen.
I just don't even think about it.
But when you see it next to his iPhone
with a Klix keyboard on it, it's like, whoa, like, yeah,
that's so much more screen real estate.
And for his first impression,
that was the immediate thing that grabbed him,
which I just thought was great.
And then the other thing, quickly to your point,
you know, I use a Bluetooth keyboard
with my iPhone as well, fairly often.
I have one of these keyboards just like you do
where I can switch between, you know,
using it on the Mac or on the iPad or on the iPhone,
that kind of a thing, and switch around.
But those are all Bluetooth keyboards, Jeff.
And so, you know, it may take a second or two,
sometimes a little bit longer, sometimes not.
I mean, it's not that bad of a deal
and I've gotten used to it.
But I just liked what he said in this, who was this?
Nick Wolny.
What he was saying here is like, it's immediate
because it's a physical USB-C plug in the,
well, the bottom of the opening on this Qliks keyboard.
And so as soon as you plug it in, everything's works.
Like everything's there.
You don't have to do a special keyboard shortcut
or anything to switch over.
It's all right there.
And I like that.
Like, I want it to work that way.
In other words, without having any kind of a delay
or anything like that.
And he was actually even good.
My next question was, okay, well,
how easy it is to get it in and out of this keyboard?
And he says, it's surprisingly easy
because the top apparently is like a rubbery
type of a quality.
Anyway, just what he was saying.
He was answering all the questions
that I really would have had if I was standing there
for 10 or 20 minutes on this.
And I just thought he did a good job of covering that.
And the more I talk about this and look at it,
the more I want it.
I've even, you know, my outer circles of connections
and contacts, Jeff, that people that don't care
about technology as much as you and I do.
I even had one or two other people this week say,
hey, you know, this is the funniest thing.
Did you see this?
There's like a physical keyboard for your iPhone.
And I'm like, how did you hear about it?
The fact that I'm hearing it from like my other connections
like that, Jeff, tells me that they've been doing a very,
number one, they're doing a good job on the marketing.
Number two, this could really appeal to a greater audience
than maybe I initially thought.
- Yeah.
- Good stuff there.
Speaking of CES, something else that I liked
that you talked about here was two other companies
that you and I both like, Anker, A-N-K-E-R,
and Mophie, M-O-P-H-I-E.
They are offering some new products as well.
The Anker products really intrigued me here,
most notably because of this very compact,
what are they calling this one here?
Three-in-one foldable charging station.
This might be the next one I get.
- Yeah, there are so much variety in the market,
whether it's portable chargers or things that you plug
into a wall, but you can charge multiple devices at once.
And I just love that we have some really good companies
like Anker and Mophie that are out there coming out
with lots of different designs.
And so you can decide,
and some of these won't be as popular as others,
but some of them I'm sure are gonna be hits.
And so they came up with some of their new ideas.
This idea of charging multiple things at one time
is sort of a big deal right now.
A lot of people are finding those useful.
I love them in my life.
And so I'm glad to see the Anker solutions, like you said.
So it's cool.
And the Mophie one's neat too, because the Mophie one,
I remember that when Mophie had their juice packs
way back when, it was the first time you could just throw,
it was, I guess the original ones were sort of iPhone cases
and that they would add the extra power to your iPhone.
And then Apple got in the market with its MagSafe thing.
And now Mophie's come back into it.
And so there are, which is nice
since Apple's not selling right now, their battery pack.
It's nice to have all these different charging options.
At the same time that our iPhones do a better job
of holding the charge longer and longer,
there are always times when you need to have that charger
in the go for your phone, for your iPad, et cetera.
So these looks like some nice chargers.
So anyone that's out there that's thinking about,
I need to get some sort of a charger.
This is a great time of year, right?
Because these new things are being announced at CES.
Some of them are immediately available.
Some of them are gonna be coming out soon.
And so you have a lot more choices now
than you did just a month ago.
- The other thing notable about both of these announcements,
Jeff, is the new Qi 2 form factor.
Qi is in Q-I, right?
This is like the wireless form factor
that has been around for a long time.
We just call it the Qi wireless charging.
But apparently up until this time,
it only provided a very low wattage,
like what, 7.5 watt, I believe?
And the Qi 2 form now offers 15 watts,
which still doesn't sound like a whole lot,
but that just means bigger, better, faster, right?
And some of these wireless chargers now.
- And that, I mean, Apple has offered
the 15 watt charging for a while now.
If you get something that is MagSafe certified
to work with Apple, then you get the full 15 charges.
But I have some portable chargers, some wireless chargers.
I'm sure you do too, Brett, that are just Qi compatible.
So like you say, it's half, it's 7.5 versus 15.
And it makes a difference.
None of the wireless charging
is gonna be as fast as plugging in a cord.
If you wanna charge your iPhone as fast as possible,
you always wanna plug a cord in.
But even if you're gonna use wireless charging,
why not have it charge twice as quickly
as it otherwise would?
So it's great.
And now, I didn't research this before today's show, Brett,
but I'm pretty sure, I have a vague memory
that the reason that Qi 2 supports 15 watt
is because Apple actually donated its technology
to the Qi consortium.
I'm fairly certain I remember that.
And I apologize if I'm speaking out of school.
- I remember something along those lines, yeah.
- But I do vaguely remember.
So I don't think it's just a coincidence
that this is as fast as Apple.
I think Apple has actually encouraged,
and again, this is just good for the general ecosystem.
Yes, it means that Android can use it too.
But I mean, why not have more and more products out there
that have just a better job with wireless charging?
- It's possible that our good friend, David Sparks,
maybe was at CES, but then again, maybe not,
because he has been very busy working on yet
another Field Guide in his wonderful,
fantastic Field Guide sets
that he has been doing for a long time.
In fact, he even has the Max Sparky Field Guide's
wall of love here.
You link to a brand new one that he just announced,
what, I think maybe just within the last week or so.
He's been working on this for years.
You and I both know him pretty well.
And he's always been, I guess it would be very safe to say,
and probably David would be proud to know
that he is a productivity nerd, right?
He has been nerding out on this for a long, long time.
And it is finally available, the Productivity Field Guide.
I'll link, you have an affiliate link,
which is just great because, I mean,
these are absolutely worth it.
You can actually go, and I think he has
a 30 minute video down here.
Yeah, where you can get a lot of the topics and stuff.
It was just great to see David again.
You and I have watched him so long,
so many times as giving presentations.
Just good to see him delivering some of this information
after he's been putting it into play for so long.
- David started doing regular books.
Like he wrote the book called "iPad at Work"
that's over a decade ago.
It was one of the first books on using an iPad
to get work done.
- That's right.
- And over time, there you go, that's the book.
And it went from being physical books
to he was one of the original people
that were doing iBooks.
But this latest iteration he's been doing for a year now,
the Field Guide, I feel like this is the perfect sweet spot
because it's an online thing.
You can watch it on your iPad or your computer
or whatever you want.
And you watch the videos and they have the text there
if you want it.
And he's just, the quality of his video presentations
are amazing.
And so he has done these guides over the years
about using an app or using a service like Obsidian
or something like that.
- Use them all.
- This one is hilarious to me because at its core,
what David has always been about
when he was practicing as a lawyer
and now that he's just sort of a technology person,
productivity, he is so fine tuning.
And I have to admit, this is not me.
I am not the ninja for productivity.
Thank God I can get through what I get through.
But David really has it down to an art.
And I've heard him talk about this for years.
And so when somebody who has been so passionate
about a topic finally takes the time
to put all of their thoughts down,
let's get it organized, let's get it into a teachable form,
you know it's something special.
And so this just came out this week.
I've just sort of looked at bits and pieces of it so far,
but it looks like it's gonna be powerful.
So if you're looking to get some tips
for being more productive, I know about,
he talks about things like his micromanaging
where you're really very specific in your calendar,
like really ultra precise on how much time
you're gonna allocate to tasks
and a million other things
that he's been working on over the years.
All of us could probably use some productivity help
and you know that he uses a lot of technology
to be productive.
So, thumbs up to David for getting this out there.
- I'm probably a little biased 'cause I like David so much,
but just even watching the video and him talking,
it just calms me down.
- He is very calming, I completely agree.
- I can do this, thank you, David.
It's like, you're so good at just putting me at ease.
So if nothing else, I feel more productive
just even watching the video.
Even if I don't put it into play.
Thanks, David, for putting out some additional
fantastic quality videos here.
I like that.
How about some photo shuffle?
I thought this was a great,
you and I have talked about the photo shuffle option
on your iPhone lock screen,
which I gotta tell you, that's my default.
I mean, I'll change it every once in a while.
Like if I go to New York,
I like to have it in New York lock screen.
If I go to Chicago, I like to have a Chicago picture,
you know, as my lock screen.
But my default is the photo shuffle.
And I usually have it between people, places,
and I think the third category is like nature, right?
Or something like that.
- And there's also pets too.
- And pet, yeah, okay.
Well, I put my pets aside.
I put the people first, but I'm just saying,
like I have it all and I love it
'cause every time I pick it up, Jeff, just as you know,
it's like a different picture
and it could be something recent
and it could be something from the past
and it just puts a smile on my face.
And I'm glad that not only are you and I
the only ones doing this,
but Mr. Jason Snell is as well,
as well as Charlie Watzel that he linked to here.
This was a great little article.
- Yeah, you know, there's so many different,
I mean, this idea of take the pictures
and to a certain extent videos too
that you have over your life
and surface them for you in various times,
whether it be in a widget on your iPhone or iPad screen,
or whether it be when you open up the photos app
and you look at the memories feature,
or in this case, when you pick up your phone
and you look at the screen,
I really like this type of approach
that Apple has had over the years
because we have so many pictures and Jason points this out,
you always have that like great picture of your spouse
or this really fun picture of your kids
that's maybe it's so good that you printed it out
and you've got it in a frame.
But there's also a million other pictures
and some of them may not even be the best quality,
but they record a moment in time
that just brings back this happy memory to you.
And when it just sort of shows up at random
and you haven't seen this picture in a decade,
you're like, oh yeah, I remember that.
And it just brings a smile to your face.
And so I love the serendipity to it.
And of all of the different methods that I've just described
the feature that's been out for what,
about a year or so now, two years,
the one that it comes out on your screen,
that one's really nice because every time I pick up my phone
it's like I look at it and it's,
the picture changes I don't know how frequently,
once every five, 10 minutes, whatever it is.
- I do it every time I pick it up is why I'm making changes.
You can do it, you can change that if you wanted to, yeah.
- Mine stays on for a little while.
And the reason for that is because the way the feature works
is it finds a set of,
and I used to know what this number is.
I want to say it's like maybe 20 pictures
and it rotates between them.
And so I found that for me,
if the picture changes every time I pick up my phone,
I find myself seeing repeats a lot.
I prefer to sort of have one picture on there for 20 minutes
and then later on in the day, it'll be another one.
But I'm looking at one right now.
It's just a silly picture of my daughter
when she was little on a bike,
turning around and waving her hand at me.
And again, there's nothing special about the picture,
except it just reminds me of those times on the weekend
when I would take my kids to the park
and we would go ride bikes
and they would ride their tricycles.
And those were such great times.
And I would not have had that nice little memory
if it wasn't for me picking up my iPhone just now.
So great feature, bravo.
If you're not using the photo shuffle feature
on your iPhone, and you do have pictures on your iPhone,
gosh, I really encourage you to try it.
- Absolutely.
I would just look in here.
So you have to tap and hold
to go into the customize function of your lock screen.
And then you can select.
Now I only have the categories, people, nature, and cities
is the shuffle categories that I have.
I don't know if I can add more on that.
But the other thing here is that you can,
there's a three dots on the right side
and it says the shuffle frequency.
So you can have the shuffle every day.
So you can have the same picture like once a day.
You can have it shuffle every hour.
I have mine shuffle on lock.
So as soon as my iPhone locks,
it'll change, then the next time I pick it up,
it'll have a different picture,
but you can also shuffle it on tap.
And I just like the way that I can customize that,
'cause sometimes I will pick it up and I'm like,
oh, I like that picture.
And I was gonna go show my wife, but then it locks.
And then the picture's gone.
So I have to go and change that.
So anyway, it's good to make sure
that you have some of those changes there.
- I'll tell you, Brett, that when I look at mine,
my categories that I can choose between
are people, pets, nature, and cities.
So maybe you just don't have enough pets pictures
on your phone or something like that.
But it does. - That could be possible.
- And again, it only works because the iPhone
has used its artificial intelligence
to determine what is a picture of something from a city.
What is nature?
What is pets?
And then for people, we should point out
that you can actually select people.
And so I have mine with my wife and my two kids,
but you could select another specific person
and you could say, you know,
maybe you just wanna have pictures of a family member
that's passed away to bring back
some nice memories about them.
Or maybe if it's somebody's birthday,
you can change it whenever you want.
- And I guess what you're saying, yeah.
I mean, you could put specific pictures on there,
obviously, right?
This is a very specific option of the lock screen here.
And then the reason we're talking about this
is the article from Jason Snell.
Maybe I do need to put my pets on here
because I just love this little picture
that he linked to, this story he linked to,
I think it's in "The Atlantic," right?
Where Charlie Walsall, Walsall, Walsall is the author here.
And he said that the iPhone has helped him
through his grief of losing his dog.
Because the iPhone would change his wallpaper
and home screen to an image
that it had grabbed from the camera roll.
And so at the end, he says,
"Grief is not linear and neither is photo shuffle."
So over the next few months,
I watched the photos change in and out of random,
always with the dog in focus.
And I don't know, I just thought that
that was really kind of nice
and sentimental way to do it there on the photo shuffle.
So thanks Apple for helping us do that.
Well, in some cases, if you are prone to losing things,
like maybe your iPhone,
or definitely something even more so as in like a wallet
or something else like this, a couple of stories,
one that was from you, Jeff,
and then Apple announced they have increased
the find my limit to 32 items.
I didn't even know that there was a limit.
And I think you were the same way before this,
but I'm glad to know I can put more
find my items in here now.
- Yeah, I've got like four AirTags
and I've got a couple other items in there.
So I wasn't even, I think I'm less than 10 right now.
- Right. - But it's nice
that you can add more and more of items that you do
because it's not just AirTags,
it's third party options that use the find my network.
Which is the reason that I linked to these cards this week.
- Yeah. - Is that,
AirTags are great, but an AirTag is so thick
that it's really tough to put in a wallet.
Now there are some third party products out there
that they do try to shape the wallet around an AirTag,
but I really think that makes it a little bit too bulky.
The real answer is you wanna get something short,
something really thin.
So the one that I'm holding right now
is the Yuki SmartTrack card. - Ooh, look at that, yeah.
- But like, it's so thin
that you can just slide that in your wallet
and you really don't notice it.
And it's so light, I mean, you can't tell, Brett,
but like, as I'm picking this up,
it really feels like a business card.
You know how a business card
just got like basically no weight to it at all?
- Yeah, yeah. - So it's not gonna add
a lot of bulk to your wallet. - Really?
- It's not gonna add weight.
I just slip it in my wallet and it's done.
And now it's in my wallet.
And if I can't find my wallet,
I can find it using this, just like an AirTag.
If I leave it behind at a restaurant
or at the gym or someplace else,
it will give me an alert, you know, a couple of blocks away,
hey, I noticed that your wallet's not with you anymore.
And you're like, oh, okay,
let me go back and get it real quick.
So it's a nice, you know, again,
one of these things that you hope
that you don't need it all the time
because you don't wanna be losing things,
but if you do lose something,
it really is nice to have it.
And when I linked to this article,
so I had originally bought the Rolling Square card
for about 30 bucks. - Okay.
- In fact, it was maybe even a little bit more than 30
when I got it through Kickstarter.
And I really, really liked it.
And then I saw the eufy on Amazon.
And because it was just a little bit lighter
and because I really like eufy's products
and I sort of liked the slick look of it
and stuff like that, I'm like, well,
let me try this one too.
And at the time that I linked to it,
it was only like, I don't know, 18 bucks.
It's now gone back up to 30 bucks.
Oh, there you go.
That's still, maybe it's still 18 bucks.
- It's 20 right now.
- Good, so it's still a great deal.
Okay. - Yeah, yeah.
- Regardless, whatever you get for it,
whether you spend 20 bucks or 30 bucks,
what I'm here to say is I wasn't sure
about this product category,
but I've been using it for,
I don't know if it's been quite been six months,
but it's been many, many months now
that I've been using them and they're great.
Like it's totally, you stick it in your wallet
and you really don't notice it at all.
Even if you put your wallet in your back pocket
and certainly if you keep a wallet in a purse
or something like that,
then you're not gonna notice it at all.
So it's thin, it's light, it's great.
Now I'll also mention that these products,
although I think the number one use is for a wallet,
the Eufy one actually comes with a little,
I don't think I have it at my desk here.
It's like a thin little clip.
And so it adds just a tiny bit to it.
But if you wanted something really thin
to clip to the side of another object,
you could use it that way too.
Like clipping it in a briefcase or something like that
as opposed to throwing an air tag in there.
So you can use it for other purposes,
but again, what it's really designed for
is to slip in a wallet because it's so thin.
And it's nice, buy it once and then don't worry about it.
The battery lasts for a couple of years
and then you can't replace the battery.
You have to get a new one.
But I cannot strongly enough encourage you to have it
because we all lose our wallets.
And you're trying to go to work,
you're trying to leave your house.
It's like, I can't find, somewhere, where is my wallet?
Is it in, is it, leave it on the TV?
Where did I put it?
And you can use this and you can quickly find it
and get about your business and it's great.
- I think a long ago when this was a first
kind of a product category, right?
This is not the first time that we've come out
with these kinds of cards like this,
but in the past, they were so bulky.
I'm just like, ah, okay, that's not for me.
And then when the air tags came out,
I remember there was always some kind of wallets,
we talked about a few of them,
that would have like a little pocket
in the top of the wallet, right?
So you could put an air tag in, but it was just so bulky.
I'm like, okay, I'm just gonna give up
on this product category.
I don't think it's for me.
But you have convinced me, my friend.
I mean, this was a great review you did this past week
of both of these devices, the Eufy Smart Track Card
and the Rolling Square Air Card here.
Yeah, I think I'm sold.
I mean, I like the fact that you said
you gave the exact dimensions.
It's the exact same dimensions as a credit card,
but it's thicker.
It's like you said, I think in here,
like the thickness, two or three credit cards.
Okay, well, you know, that's not a big deal.
I mean, I'll do that to make sure
that I got the security aspect on there.
But just one quick question.
- Yeah, yeah, go ahead.
- I wanna say something about the product category
before you get to the question
that the reason this works so well,
because I remember those early products
like you're talking about
that you have to be really close to them.
It's because of Apple's Find My technology
because Apple has it that if I leave this at a restaurant
and I leave, as long as anybody within like 40 feet
of my thing has an iPhone,
that's the cool thing about it
is that every single iPhone in the world
will sense objects that are around it.
And so even though I'm no longer at the restaurant,
some stranger that I don't know,
his iPhone notices my card
and anonymously gets that data to Apple that then tells me.
So I have no idea who that person is.
He has no idea who I am, but thank you for helping me out.
And because iPhones are basically everywhere,
that's why this works so well.
And again, this is not unique to these cards.
This is how AirTags work and everything else.
But I just wanted to point out,
that's why we now live in an age when this technology works
because all iPhones support it and so have it.
But anyway, you had a question, I'm sorry.
- So both of these will work.
I can, in other words, if I get one of these
and put it in my wallet, Jeff,
I can see these in the Find My app on my phone, right?
I can register as an item there.
In addition to it, it sounds like,
I think you mentioned in here, you use the Eufy app as well.
So you can look in both areas, correct?
- Right, so it's just up to you.
If you wanna use the Eufy app,
then you can use the Eufy app to find it.
Or if you wanna use the Find My app,
and you can do either one.
Like when you first set it up,
I just use, I set it up with the Eufy app
and you get one or two extra features that way.
But then I separately set it up with the Find My app
and chose to do that.
But you basically get all the advantages of both of them.
There's a few things,
I put this in review and I'm forgetting it
now that I'm saying it.
There's one or two things that you can do.
Let's see, you can, yeah.
So for example, through the Eufy app,
you can actually have, if somebody finds it
and they scan the QR code on it,
they could get a notification to you.
That would occur through the Eufy app
as opposed to the Find My app.
- Okay.
- But you don't have to use--
- But you just turn on notifications, okay.
- Right, yeah, you don't have to use the Eufy app.
You literally could buy this thing
and use it 100% of the time with Find My app if you wanted,
and that would be fine.
- Oh, that's fantastic.
This really should fit in our where you at segment,
but we got something better for where you're at.
But real quick, how about a public service announcement?
I'm glad that you linked to this.
If you use a Magic Keyboard, is it just the keyboard
or is it the Magic Mouse as well?
These are the--
- I think it's just the keyboard,
but again, this device has been around for,
gosh, over a decade. - A long time.
- Long time. - So these are these small
little chiclet type keyboards that Apple has been,
like it's been selling for a very long time,
many years, like you said, Jeff,
that the, I mean, they work great.
Mostly they're used with a Mac,
although some people will use it
with a Windows computer on there.
But if you have one of these,
you might wanna just read this story
that we linked to here to make sure
that it has been updated to the latest firmware update.
There is no way to actually make the update happen,
but you can go and check in your Bluetooth settings,
especially on a Mac,
to make sure that the update has happened.
In other words, the update happens automatically,
and you can just go in and make sure
that it actually was applied because it fixes,
looks like it's a little bit of a scary security
potential patch here that it fixes, which is good.
Thanks for linking to this today.
- Yeah, there was this flaw in Bluetooth
that if somebody noticed how to exploit it,
they could actually see your keystrokes.
So I mean, you're sitting there in a coffee shop
and somebody that's close enough for Bluetooth range
could actually see your keystrokes,
and that's the last thing that you want
because that's basically seeing everything that you type.
So it is an important update,
and I'm glad that even though this product
has been around for a while, I still use one.
I have, and I've mentioned it in the past,
I have a small one that I think originally I got it
from one of my Apple computers years and years and years ago,
and I no longer use it with the Mac,
but I just use it as my portable keyboard for my iPad.
And I have it in this case that sort of folds up
and makes it into like a stand, but I use mine.
And so even though I posted about this today, Brett,
I have not yet updated mine.
I need to do that this weekend
before I start to use it for real.
But I want to get it updated and get it nice and safe.
- Yeah, and like I said, we'll link to it
so that it just shows you exactly how to go through
and make sure that that patch has been applied there.
Now let's talk about the where you at segment.
Well, we got a doozy one today.
(laughing)
And this one's been all over the news.
- I was just going to say,
I think everybody is fully aware of the,
it could have been so much more of a tragedy.
Was it, this is now on Monday, right?
Or maybe it was last week?
- It was one week ago.
It was on a Friday.
- Okay, yeah, you tell it.
- So one week ago, this Alaskan Airlines flight
is leaving out of Portland,
and 15, 20 minutes into the flight,
the door panel, whatever sort of comes out,
and so suddenly the plane's depressurized.
And you know, me, with my limited knowledge
of plane accidents from like, you know, bad B movies,
I just assumed that everybody'd be sucked out of the plane.
But fortunately that did not happen.
All the people stayed in the plane and were safe,
but some items were sucked out of the plane.
So, I mean, the good news is that, you know,
the pilot was able to land the plane,
go turn around, get back to Portland.
Thank goodness they're doing an investigation of this
because the bolt that fell out,
apparently this is an issue in other planes as well.
And we'll come back to this in a second.
So, I mean, it's a, I guess it's either a horrible story
or a great story.
I love the FAA statement was something like, you know,
this is not supposed to ever happen.
It's like, yeah, I think that's not supposed to ever happen
that the door just flies off a plane.
But the interesting thing,
the reason that the iPhone angle, of course,
one of the things that was sucked out
was somebody's iPhone,
and the iPhone falls down 16,000 feet
and lands in the grass unharmed.
Like it wasn't even scratched.
- It's fine. No problem.
Nothing to see here.
- Apparently in that area,
the FAA or whoever it was had put out a little statement
saying that if anyone wants to sort of walk around,
what they were trying to find was like the stuff,
that like the bolts that was supposed to hold the door in,
which they did actually find
from people sort of walking around looking for it.
And so this guy figured, you know, I'm in the area,
I'll just walk around and see what I see.
And sure enough on the ground, he found this iPhone
and he's like, there's no way
this could have fallen from the plane,
but then he picks it up
and the person did not have a passcode on their phone.
He was able to open up the phone
and he sees it to like someone's email
with like the baggage claim number for this flight.
He's like, oh my goodness,
this must've come from the flight.
And so he turned it in
and it was able to get back to the owner, I'm sure.
But gosh, I would never thought
that if you drop an iPhone 16,000 feet,
it could actually survive it.
But wow.
- Yeah, I mean, so many things are amazing here.
Number one, nobody was injured
other than just bare some minimum injuries.
I mean, no one was sucked out, let's put it that way.
Number two, the pilot was able to turn it safely.
Number three, the iPhone survived this drop.
But to me, this is where my mind is going.
The most incredible part of the story is like,
how can you not have a passcode on your iPhone?
I mean, come on.
I mean, I guess I'm glad that they could see it,
you know, the fact that there wasn't a passcode,
but it's like, who in their right mind
doesn't have a passcode on their phone today?
That's the lesson I take away from it.
But, you know, just incredible.
I mean, I'm glad that they were able to find it.
And, you know, I know for me personally,
when I travel, I have flighty
and, you know, the United Apple will have notifications
on the front screen without even me
having to unlock the screen.
So I would just thought when I first saw this, Jeff,
that maybe just somebody, you know,
saw the notification and they could tell what it was.
But John Gruber and others have confirmed like,
no, there was no passcode.
And I'm like, come on, like what day are we in?
Okay, either way, going back to the flight,
this is just a miracle in and of itself.
I mean, first of all, I believe the flight
was completely full, except for the two seats
right by that exit sign.
- I actually did not hear that part.
- I could be wrong, but I believe that those two seats
that were right in that exit row,
which first of all, an exit row being empty
in and of itself is just amazing.
But those two seats close to that area were not,
nobody was even in there.
Otherwise, just some incredible stories,
like one of the tray tables was just completely sucked off.
It sounds like a little kid in a couple of rows back or so
had their shirt sucked off of them.
- Oh my goodness gracious.
- And the mother was like having to hold this kid
in the seat, you know, and put the oxygen mask on
and everything.
I mean, just some incredible stories coming up.
But yeah, many things were absolutely sucked out
of this plane because of this door coming off.
And one of them was this iPhone.
But truly it was just a miracle.
And I've heard several reports about the pilots
just completely staying calm.
Apparently when that happens, the pilot door flies open
'cause it just opens up, you know,
so that everybody, I guess from security aspect,
I don't know why, but the pilots were completely calm.
They did everything they were supposed to do.
They returned it intact and safely, just crazy.
But I gotta tell you just quickly,
if anybody is traveling, this was a 737 Boeing Max 9.
And my heart goes out to the Boeing folks
'cause I know this is not gonna be easy,
but United apparently has one of the largest fleets
of 737 Max 9s.
And I had to travel this past Monday
and my first flight was canceled, Jeff,
because the plane coming in was a Max 9.
And so I know there's been other people
that have been just having to fit to be tied this week
about having some delays.
And some of that is due to the fact
that all of the 737 Max 9s have been grounded
so that the FAA can obviously inspect them
a little bit more.
- My goodness.
I was just looking one last thing that,
and I can't find her name,
but there's an article about the pilot that I guess,
like they have their audio record or stuff like that.
And apparently she is cool as a cucumber
throughout the entire thing.
It's like, this is what you want your pilot to be.
It's just under the worst possible pressure.
And she was just perfect.
So it's nice to see some good stories.
- Exactly.
- Could have been a tragedy, but.
- Yeah, I know.
I think another link that you linked to was that,
some of the passengers are filing a class action,
which I guess I really can't blame them
against Alaska Airlines.
- It's actually against Boeing, not the airlines.
- Oh, Boeing, okay.
Boeing against Boeing.
- As you were saying, Brett,
it's a bigger issue than just the airline carrier.
It's the plane itself apparently.
But anyway.
- I just want to give props to this pilot.
You know, similar to,
I remember when that plane had to land
in the Hudson River, right?
Remember that several years ago?
- Sully, whatever his name was.
- Yeah, exactly.
We all know, 'cause there was a movie made of him
and everything for crying out loud.
- This might be the next big movie.
- I was going to say,
let's get another movie for this pilot.
I mean, she did absolutely fantastic.
Speaking of depressurizing when you're in the air,
this is a series, a television series
that I have actually been very much looking forward to
called "Masters of the Air."
This was your little video vignette
at the bottom of your post today.
I've been looking forward to this
because I think just like you,
very big fan of "Band of Brothers,"
also a very big fan of "The Pacific," right?
That was the Pacific Theater series that went on,
which was absolutely excellent.
- And these are the same people,
Steven Spielberg and Anne Lynn and Robert-
- All the same folks.
- Yeah, exactly.
- I got to tell you just real quick,
here's a quick New Orleans link here.
One of my favorite airplane,
World War II movies was "Memphis Belle."
Do you remember "Memphis Belle?"
It starred Harry Connick Jr. in there.
And I just, I love that movie.
It's old, I don't even care to tell you
when the year that it was, but I always enjoyed it.
It was about, this was the like,
the 100th flight of this plane, right?
I think 'cause after a hundred flights,
then the crew gets to, they can stop flying, I think, right?
All these dangerous missions.
Anyway, I just have always been fascinated by that movie.
And so I've been looking forward to this "Masters of the Air"
and this is coming direct to Apple TV+, is that right?
- It's an Apple TV+ show.
So even though "Band of Brothers" was on HBO way back when,
and I'm pretty sure the Pacific was too,
'cause I saw that one as well.
- I think so, yeah.
- But Apple got the rights to this one instead.
So it's gonna be great.
It starts later on this month.
It's gonna be, I think like a eight or a nine point series.
And yeah, when you said the New Orleans link,
what I thought you might say
is one of the fantastic things we have here
in my hometown of New Orleans.
- Oh yes, that was my next one.
- Yeah, the National World War II Museum,
which is a truly Smithsonian class.
I mean, it is a fantastic museum.
- Absolutely.
- Worth the trip to New Orleans.
It's incredible. - Definitely.
- They've just expanded it.
So, but they have all sorts of things from World War II,
including this one place.
I think it's actually called the Boeing building,
but it's got all of these incredible,
the actual full-size planes on top of you.
It's much like when you're in
the National Air and Space Museum in Washington, DC,
except these are all World War II.
And it's just, I'm just fascinated.
You see these vehicles and you read the stories,
the people, I'm sure, which will be featured in the show,
of what they went through in World War II.
And it's just amazing, amazing stories.
- I'll even go one better.
- I'm really looking forward, go ahead.
- 'Cause if you remember a year ago, I was in New Orleans.
We did our podcast in your office, which was just fun,
but I had the family there.
And I remember you telling me,
he's like, "You cannot come to New Orleans
"unless you can go to the World War II Museum."
We only had, I think, maybe three or four hours,
and that was a pitiful time to go,
because we could have stayed there the entire day.
But Jeff, I will tell you exactly,
I remember that building so prolifically,
because you're exactly right.
First of all, you can go up multiple stories.
- Right, so you're right there.
- So you can look at these planes under, over, to the side.
And I remember specifically one,
because I think my wife's grandfather,
he was a bombardier in one of these,
I forget what the plane exactly was.
But in this World War II Museum there in New Orleans, Jeff,
they have a cutout where you could see
exactly how this bombardier had to contort their bodies
to fit into this scope.
And you can see movies, and you can see videos about this
until you fall asleep, but being there and seeing it,
and being able to, not necessarily touch it,
but go into the cockpit and just see that,
that is, it's a fantastic, fantastic exhibit there
at the World War II Museum.
So yes, I can't underscore that enough.
So yeah, there's two New Orleans links there for you.
Love that.
All right, in the know.
So we were talking about the iPad.
One of the things that I like to do
is use my magic keyboard for the iPad.
And we've talked about this.
I know you don't have one,
but you do have a keyboard that you use with the iPad.
I keep my iPad here with this magic keyboard,
but this will work for any Bluetooth keyboard
that you can connect to the iPad as well.
When I'm on the Windows computer or a Mac computer,
when I need to switch to an application,
I am always using the Alt + Tab function in Windows
and the Command + Tab function on the Mac.
I do this all the time, even to the point
when I'm sitting with somebody and they're using a computer
and they don't use this, I kind of look at them like,
what's wrong with you?
Like, why are you moving your mouse all the way down
to the taskbar and selecting another app?
Just Alt + Tab right over there.
Well, it was so ingrained in my muscle memory
that as soon, the first time that I had an iPad keyboard,
or even I do this with Mac or any other computer,
I will immediately, just muscle memory, just Command + Tab.
I am happy to say, and this is kind of an old tip,
but the Command + Tab works exactly the same on an iPad.
And so even, again, when I'm sitting with somebody
and I'm looking at them, watching their iPad,
and they're like going all the way to the home screen,
and then they're finding the app to open,
I'm like, just Command + Tab.
Now, this only works if you have an external keyboard,
either via Bluetooth or you've got a Magic Keyboard
that you're using with your iPad.
But if you are switching back and forth to apps
on your iPad, Command + Tab on an external keyboard,
it works beautifully.
You know, you can do a four-finger swipe, right?
A gesture to go back and forth.
There's multiple ways you can go into like,
what do they call that, mission control,
you know, to where you can select
all the apps that are open.
But Command + Tab is something that I'm constantly using.
And by the way, you can also do Command + Shift + Tab,
which will go backwards.
So Command + Tab, you can just go tab, tab, tab.
I usually hold Command down with my thumb,
and then tab, tab, tab, tab, tab with my finger,
and then it goes to the next apps there.
And if I hold Shift down and tab, tab, tab,
it'll go backwards on there as well.
So that's my tip for the day.
- Yeah, it's a great tip, and it's a good reminder
of using a keyboard with an iPad, or an iPhone,
but with an iPad especially,
it's not just that you can type faster,
although of course that's true,
but it truly, it changes the experience.
Because when you can switch apps so much more quickly,
just using, like you say, Command + Tab, tab, tab,
that is different than having your fingers on the screen
and going back and forth.
And it allows you to be much more productive.
And again, I don't like using a keyboard
with my iPad all the time.
Most of the times when I'm using the iPad,
it's not something that's appropriate for,
but when you're in that mode,
like if I'm typing something in a Word document,
typing emails, and going back and forth between documents,
you get to a different level of productivity
with an external keyboard because of shortcuts like this one.
- Good way to put it. - Command + Tab.
And other ones too, like Command + H
to go back to the home screen,
and Command + Spacebar to do a search,
and other ones like that.
These are, it's just a different experience.
And so if you haven't tried it,
it really is important to try it.
It's really nice. - Good points.
- So that's a great tip.
My tip today has to do also with the iPad,
but this is one of those times
when you are not using an external keyboard.
If you're just watching a video.
Now, I love, sometimes I'll be watching a video,
and then I want that video to sort of play off in the corner
and there's this great feature from Apple
called Multitask with Picture-in-Picture,
where it works great with the Apple TV+ app, of course,
but it also works with you.
Over the years, there have been times when it does
and does not work with YouTube.
As I'm speaking today, it does work with YouTube.
- It does, today it does.
- If you're watching a YouTube video and you go full screen,
and then you sort of swipe up from the bottom of your iPad,
that YouTube video goes into a little corner
and you can move it around what corner you have.
And so you can have it off to the side.
So you can be doing one thing,
even if it's just sort of a casual,
I'm sort of half listening to a YouTube video for fun
while I'm doing a crossword or I'm doing the word all
or going through my emails.
And it's nice to do back and forth.
My tip today, however, is not that,
although hopefully you know about that one.
- Yes. - My tip today is,
there are unfortunately some apps
that don't support the picture in picture.
I wish they all did
because then you wouldn't even need this tip.
But every once in a while you have one,
and I'll give you two examples that I have.
For my, my quote unquote cable television is DirecTV.
And in addition to using DirecTV through a satellite,
I can actually watch DirecTV channels on my iPad
using the DirecTV app.
Another example I have is I have this thing
that I've mentioned a long, long time ago
that called the HD Home Run,
which connects to my computer upstairs.
And it allows if I'm at my house,
I can actually watch live television.
So for example, the other night I was sitting downstairs
and Stephen Colbert was on, you know, the show was on TV.
And I just sort of wanted to half listen to his monologue
while I was doing something out.
Those apps don't support picture in picture.
And so you're either watching the video or you're not,
but there's a workaround.
And the workaround is this.
If you use Stage Manager, you know, just the regular,
you have to turn on the multitasking Stage Manager feature
for your iPad.
It allows you to have apps that are sort of layered
on top of each other.
And so then what I can do is I can, you know,
open the video app and then using Stage Manager,
I can then take another app.
This is the way that all Stage Manager apps work
and just sort of drag it from my dock up on top of it.
And so then for example, I can be, you know,
going through emails or whatever,
and it covers up the video app,
whether it be the HD Home Run app or the DirecTV,
whatever it is, but you can still hear the video.
And it doesn't pause the video.
Whereas if I completely left the app,
then the video would stop playing.
So it's a way that you can, as a workaround,
have a video continue to work,
even though the app doesn't want to give you
that functionality, you're getting it anyway,
because you're basically running two apps simultaneously
using the Stage Manager feature.
So it's, and I know that not everybody
has Stage Manager turned on
because it's a different way of multitasking.
And it does take a while
to sort of get Stage Manager to make sense of your brain.
I completely understand it.
But if you don't have it turned on now,
and you do find that there are times
where you want to play video
in the background on your iPad,
this is a good use for turning on Stage Manager.
And it works well for me.
And I was just doing it the other day,
and I was thinking, you know, this,
I'm so glad that I can do this
because before Stage Manager, I really couldn't do it.
- So here's the thing, Jeff,
that's exactly what I was going to ask,
because I did know this because I do like Stage Manager.
We've talked about this before.
Is this enough to put you into Stage Manager?
Because typically you don't do Stage Manager.
- Oh, no, no, no.
Actually, I am Teams.
I did not used to be, you're right.
But ever since Apple updated Stage Manager last fall,
- I remember we talked about this.
Okay, okay.
- And the reason I did is because
- You're on the team.
- They finally made it that you can, you know,
actually adjust all sorts of different sizes
and stuff like that.
So I have, you're right.
I was a holdout for a long time,
but for the past however many months now,
I've been using it.
And you know, Stage Manager
is one of these things, Brett, you know this,
I'm telling this to other people,
that once you start using it,
over time you find more and more uses for it.
And you're like, this makes sense.
This is why this makes sense.
I, you know, another example is I,
sometimes I will be logging into some of my firm resources
and I'll be doing my timesheet.
This is just an attorney type thing.
But like, as I'm switching back and forth,
being able to sort of,
you can see things on top of each other
and I can tap to the screen or tap to,
- Exactly.
- There's something, and again, I know,
I'm talking about overlapping windows.
People have been doing that on the computer since the 1980s.
So I realize I'm not talking about anything
that's very, you know, profound,
but to do it on the iPad is profound
because we didn't have that capability until recently.
And there are times when it really, really does make sense.
- Yeah, okay.
I remember this now because we've talked about this
over the years about the fact,
especially like Frederico from Mac Stories,
you know, he was not happy about it.
And Apple has made some very smallish,
incremental type changes,
but they've all been in the right direction, I feel like.
And you're right, you're exactly right.
I've been using it now for quite a long time, Jeff.
And even now, still today, I will find like,
oh, wait, what if I can resize that?
And I mean, I will sometimes have four windows open
'cause I've got my Spotify, a very sliver,
small sliver window of a Spotify listening over to the side,
but I've got my newsreader,
but then sometimes I wanna go into my browser.
So I'll have that on there as well.
And sometimes there's a PDF on the side.
And you're, I mean, every once in a while
it gets just a little wonky just because, you know,
I'm maybe trying to do too much or so.
But yeah, once you start using it,
I think you said it very well, Jeff.
It's like, you start understanding
like how this really works on there.
So good.
I'm glad you're on the stage now.
So that's good.
All right, my friend.
Wow, lots of good stuff to talk about today.
Boy, I can't wait.
Maybe next Friday,
you'll have your Vision Pro ordered already.
- I will at least have a report
on whether it was successful or not.
Let's put it that way.
- All right, good.
Then we'll talk to you next week, Jeff.
See you then.