Welcome to In the News for March the 28th, 2025.

I am Brett Burney from Appsinlaw.com.

And this is Jeff Richardson from iPhoneJD.

Hey, Brett.

Jeff, I am a man on the scene, a man on the cube, as it were.

I appreciate I was featured in today's In the News post at iPhoneJD.

There is a special Apple store that I say special to both of us because you have history here.

I have history at the Cube Apple store.

We call it the Cube.

I guess officially it's the Apple store on Fifth Avenue.

Right.

But it is so iconic.

I remember when it opened.

You were there in 2006 when it first opened.

In fact, here you are in line in the I'm glad you wore a red shirt that day.

I know it makes me stand out a little bit.

I know we can find you right there.

It really is just such a unique store.

I remember even going with other folks when I've been here in New York City over the years, and it's one of those things that like I'm going to go and visit.

In fact, I remember we talked on the Friday when the Apple Vision Pro was released.

That was a year ago, and I was in New York City on that day.

And there was a Vision Pro, like a glowing outline on the Cube, and that was fantastic.

Well, so the other night, since I'm in New York, New York City here for the Legal Tech Conference or the Legal Week Conference, I was walking by there going to another location.

I didn't actually go to the Cube.

And I stopped and took this picture that you posted today.

There is like a covering.

It's it looks like a carport.

It's like somebody should should park their Apple cars.

Maybe maybe that's what they're doing.

It covers the whole thing.

I was so distressed about this, Jeff, because it looks horrible to me.

I mean, the great thing about the Apple Cube is it a big, huge glass cube.

You actually go in the door and you go downstairs.

I don't know why they put this over, but I had to snap a picture and send this to you because I'm like, I I can't believe they did this.

Like it just takes away the whole the idea, the concept of going to the Cube for me.

So when I first looked at it, when you sent it to me, and of course you sent it to me in a text message, I was on my phone.

So it looks small.

Right.

Like this looks permanent to me just because it was so nicely done.

But as you and I have been talking about it, I now see that inside of the Cube, there's all the scaffolding.

So and I had heard that they were in the process of redoing, you know, everyone every couple of years, they do something to the Cube to sort of fix it.

Yeah, they have to.

The Cube, the Cube today is not put some more glue on it or something.

When I saw that, when and so it's occurring to me that maybe this is just to protect the construction workers.

And of course, knowing Apple, they're not going to have something that looks sort of shoddy to protect the construction workers.

They're going to have the nicest protective covering.

And so maybe this is all it is, because I actually looked at after you sent me this picture, I looked on the Internet to see if I saw any posts about, oh, you know, new design for this Apple store.

And I didn't see anything posted by anyone else, which makes me think that this is just a very nice temporary cover.

It's incredibly well lit, as you can see.

But it's just fascinating to me.

But again, the store itself, it's an interesting store.

But what what's most iconic about it is just the way that it looks on Fifth Avenue.

It's you know, ever since the day it was first erected, it's just been so cool.

And of course, it's it's directly across from the corner of Central Park.

So it's an incredibly busy part right next to the Grand Hotel, you know, the Plaza Hotel.

Excuse me.

It's just it's it's a very iconic part of the city.

And and it's an iconic cube there.

So, you know, it's it's part of the New York culture now, really.

So it's I'm always interested in it, even aside from the store part.

Once you're in the store, I guess it's sort of interesting.

It's just one big open space.

There are more interesting Apple stores when it comes to the looks of the inside.

True.

But from the from the outside, nothing beats this.

So I guess it's temporary.

I hope it's not permanent because I hope I like it.

But it was I'm so glad that you posted the picture because I hadn't seen anyone describing what it looks like right now.

So thanks for sharing that.

Well, I think I told you this when I was going to the the other location I was heading to.

This is on 58th Street and Fifth Avenue, I believe, is the location here.

So I was walking on 58th going going east, going to another another location, another event.

And I just snapped the picture and I had to keep going.

Well, a couple of hours later, I was coming back by the same area.

And if you zoom in on this picture that I sent you, you will you see, like you said, there are there is scaffolding inside the cube.

Now, there was nobody on the scaffolding when I was walking there.

But when I was coming back, there had to be at least a dozen workers like up and around the scaffolding.

So, yeah, yeah, I hope you are correct and that this is temporary.

But boy, it is one of the nicest temporary is it's one of the most permanent looking temporary structures I have ever seen.

But maybe that's OK.

By the way, also, I don't know if you notice because it was just a picture.

It wasn't like a video, but the cube has the Siri, the new Siri glow around the outsides of that.

And it actually the lights are going around in the glow if you walk by, which I just thought was really cool, too.

It is cool.

And I believe I saw it reported that they started that last fall when I when the new iOS with Apple intelligence and the new Siri.

So I think that that part's actually been there for a few months.

But I agree with you.

It is cool.

And I love all the I mean, we could sit here and it's a silly thing to talk about.

But I can talk about the cube all day.

Apple's done very.

I know.

I know.

Since they came out.

Well, thank you.

Thank you for the reporting on it.

You know, that's absolutely.

Well, tell me, tell me just real quick, what were you?

You were there on 2006.

Like this is the day it was open.

Is that where this picture was?

You just wanted to go visit the store.

I happened to be, you know, after Hurricane Katrina in 2005, you know, everybody was that place in New Orleans.

Yeah.

And I was working for a client and that had me sort of was nice enough to have me sort of work in house.

So I worked in house in New York City from October 2005 through about May of 2006.

And so since I was in New York, my wife and I were living there together.

We didn't have kids yet at the time.

You know, we were just footloose and fancy free.

And so if there was something going on in the city, it's like, I might as well go do it.

And so when I saw that they were opening up the cube, I'm like, well, you know, I might as well go check it out.

So I got there early in the morning.

In fact, the this picture was taken by Apple.

They had like a camera that was just taking pictures.

Oh, it was like, you know, freeze frame of the crowd moving.

And I just sort of froze this this one image, which is why the quality of it's not that great, because it's from a video.

Also, it's from, you know, 20 years ago, a long time ago.

But when I first got in line, even though I got there super early in the morning, I was all the way around the back of that tall building.

And so I just waited in line just to see what.

So the picture that shows here, I had already been there for an hour or two because I was I've already read the front.

And in fact, I posted before an iPhone, JD, that when I was behind the building, just waiting in line, David Pogue, who has spoken at Tech Show in the past and was used by the writer for The New York Times, he happened to be walking by.

And so he was there and I stopped and we chit chatted and I have a picture with him and stuff.

And because I was the camera that's sort of around my my shoulder right there.

My shoulder is a Nikon camera that I had purchased on his recommendation along with a lens.

So we're just talking about cameras and computers and Apple and stuff like that.

And it was just sort of really interesting.

So it was a fun day.

I mean, you know, anytime that you go to an Apple store opening, it's always a little bit of excitement, but it was a ton of excitement for a store like this.

So I was it was it was fun to be there.

And for a for a total Apple geek like me.

And it's fun that there's a picture.

So I have pictures that I took of the event.

But this is a picture that the camera took that just happens to show me in it.

So funny.

Well, this has not been the only legal technology conference.

I know for all those that are not legal side, I we apologize.

It's just this happens to be the world that Jeff and I live in.

But Jeff and I are actually going to be together next week in Chicago at the American Bar Association Tech Show.

Not only are we going to be both speaking, we're not speaking together, actually, except we're hoping to do a recording next Friday of this podcast right there live in person at the ABA Tech Show.

Actually, we are speaking, Jeff, you're doing a couple of sessions.

I'm doing a couple of sessions.

I'm even talking about the iPad and for using it for trial presentation.

You've got a couple of sessions, one on the Vision Pro and which is going to be exciting enough.

But another one that you're doing is just like all kinds of productivity tips and hacks for the iPhone and the iPad.

Yeah, no, I'm very excited about it.

But with presentations, the Vision Pro one is going to be great because we're talking about the Vision Pro, which I know not a lot of people own.

But we're also sort of talking about the bigger picture of, you know, what does this mean for the future?

How could lawyers be using this in the future?

And so it's really fascinating.

And, you know, I've been going to tech show on and off for a very long time now.

In fact, this will be the 40th anniversary of the show.

And it's interesting because I remember when I was at Tech Show, when the iPad first came out, I was at Tech Show shortly after the Apple Watch.

You know, all of these things I'm going to sessions of, you know, what will lawyers be using Apple watches and what does that mean?

And so, you know, it's always fun to sort of look at new technology right as it's coming out and start to, you know, peer into the future about how we might be using it.

So that's going to be a cool session.

And then the other one is maximizing your productivity with an iPad and iPhone.

And this one is just going to be nonstop.

I am just trying to throw in every tip I can think of on using your iPhone, your iPad.

So these two sessions that I'm doing are going to be great.

The ones that you're doing are going to be fun.

And as I'm looking at the calendar, because they now have the app that you can get, what's it called?

It's the ABA events app that you can download.

Exactly.

Yep.

And they have I mean, as I'm going through the sessions, I mean, the problem with tech show is they have like what, five tracks going on at once.

And so at every hour, it's like, OK, well, I want to watch two or three of these.

And how am I going to choose?

I know.

So anyway, it's exciting.

I'm looking forward to it.

Anyone listening to this who's going to be there in Chicago?

Absolutely.

Try to find us.

Hey, maybe even try to find us while we're recording next Friday.

So anyway, I'm looking forward to it.

It's going to be awesome.

Yeah.

And not only that, as part of this conference, we actually have like little dinners where the speakers get to take, you know, go out with some attendees.

And you and I are going to be doing that next Thursday evening.

I think that's already full, as you commented in your post today.

I mean, that filled up immediately almost.

And we are so excited.

Jeff and I have been doing this for a long time.

For us, just being able to talk to folks, you know, hear new about new apps or new tips and tricks and share things back and forth.

That's always what is so valuable to this.

So, yeah, looking forward to seeing you, Jeff, next week.

And yeah, anybody else that can come by, we always enjoy talking.

So looking forward to that.

We're also looking forward already to June because Apple announced the Worldwide Developers Conference that is going to be happening.

Let's see.

What are the dates here?

It is June 9th through June 13th.

It's usually like a whole week, right?

Although most of the time, folks like me and Jeff are just really interested in an hour or an hour and a half of that first day, because typically Tim Cook and other executives give a keynote address to open up the entire conference.

And boy, I feel like this one's going to be an interesting.

There's going to be a lot of people watching this year, Jeff, just because of what happened from last year.

Things didn't get followed through on.

So I think it's bold that Apple is already saying, hey, we're getting ready for this June.

It's a really going to be interesting year.

You know, as you said, if you're a developer, it's interesting because you get to learn how to make things for the iPhone and the Mac and everything else.

Yeah.

What we're really interested in is that first day, Monday, June 9.

If Apple follows course, there is going to be, like you said, a keynote event.

Of course, in years past, this used to be an in-person event for the past few years now.

Ever since Covid, it's now almost exclusively an online event.

However, there is going to be that that initial session.

I think some people, you know, select members of the press and stuff like that will be invited to attend that in person and watch it.

But but it's just going to be a video pre-recorded video is what we expect.

But that pre-recorded video that starts it off is going to be interesting because we always see the next version of the iPhone, the new technologies that Apple is working on.

And as you pointed out, Brad, it's almost controversial in a way, because for a number of reasons, I suppose.

First of all, last year at WWDC, Apple announced Apple intelligence and many people feel like Apple was behind the game in AI and felt rushed to announce something.

And sure enough, many of the things that they announced last year, Apple admitted we talked about this before about a month and a couple weeks ago.

Apple said, you know what, we're not going to have that ready, you know, when we expected, which is just so rare for Apple to announce something and then not follow through on it because they just can't do it.

And so are they going to reference it?

You know, in this one, are they going to be more guarded about what they preannounced from an AI standpoint as a result of, you know, just being a little gun shy from last year?

So that part of it alone is interesting.

And then additionally, there's this rumor that there's going to have a brand new look.

And in fact, even just the logo that you were just showing your screen a second ago, WWDC, you know, it's a very clean, it's a very bright, you know, that sort of bold, clean look that's reflected in the logo.

There's a number of people like Mark Gurman at Bloomberg and others that are saying that this is actually going to be the whole new look.

And you can, according to the rumors, if you use a Vision Pro, back to the Vision Pro, the Vision Pro itself has a slightly different look from the iPhone, the iPad, the Mac, and that it's sort of it's cleaner and it's the way it looks.

And I just assumed that that was because it sort of has to be because it's an interface that you look at with your eyes as opposed to something more precise.

But what people are saying is that, well, actually, that's part of a new design language that Apple is going to be bringing to the iPhone and the iPad and the Mac.

And so, I mean, we'll see.

It's these rumors right now.

The rumors are not all consistent.

So who knows what's going to happen?

But, you know, it's not that often that Apple completely revamps the look of the of its operating systems.

And, you know, many of us remember when Apple did a big change for, was it iOS 7 way back when?

Right.

Yeah. iOS 7.

Yeah.

And so that was back in 2013.

And, you know, that's the one where Johnny Ive had the idea that everything was really thin lines and, you know, it was almost too much of a change initially.

But then Apple sort of dialed back from there.

And so so we'll see.

So, you know, the rumors may not be true, but they could be true.

I mean, there's enough smoke here that I think that maybe there is a fire.

So we might get a whole new interface.

We might hear some interesting things on AI.

And then, of course, there's all the other announcements about the changes that are coming up on the iPhone.

So I'm very much looking forward to it.

It's early June.

We're about to be in early April, April, May.

Oh, so we're just a little more than two months away.

So exciting.

That's that's crazy, because I know WBC is always, you know, in the summer.

I'm like, oh, well, you know, that's down the road.

Like, we'll get to it.

But man, like that's almost two months away.

That's pretty amazing.

And, you know, I keep thinking about this.

And by the way, if you go into this into their page, there's like a little animation here that people like, you know, we're always trying to read into what does this look like?

But you've already alluded to it like it just has a cleaner look.

It's a little I mean, it's almost like you got to see it right to understand.

But I like it initially, at least looking at it.

And I liked how you also talked about you wrote about this back in twenty seven twenty thirteen about Iowa seven.

And sure enough, like look at that little logo there.

It's just that little thin line.

And then you talked about like it seemed like it did OK.

It was initially sometimes it's a little startling.

People don't like to change all that much.

But, you know, I don't I think it's arguably like you get used to it and then it becomes like that's the norm.

And then you look back to like the old days of like skeuomorphic.

Right.

And you're like, how did we even use something exactly once upon a time?

And it just becomes part and parcel of what we're going to be doing.

Well, OK, that's good.

That's iOS 19 that we were kind of talking about there.

Right.

And that typically is previewed in the summertime and then come maybe September or depending on when Apple decides that it's time to release the new iOS.

That's when we actually get it in the phone.

Right.

They announced iOS 18 last summer, and now we have been working through all of the iterations of iOS 18.

In fact, this is coming.

What very soon?

I'm not sure exactly when 18.4 is coming out, but we've been talking about it for a few weeks already.

And there's a few things that you link to today that that gets me even more excited that we knew this was coming out.

But it looks like that it's getting closer.

I mean, it could even be a week or two right away from being released now.

Yeah.

Typically, Apple does not tell you when these point one point two point three point four releases come out.

But Apple broke that tradition recently.

They actually told us that some things were coming out in April.

So we do know for sure that's coming out next month.

And of course, next month is just a few days away because we're at the end of March right now.

And then additionally, Apple releases, you know, the beta versions for the developers to work on.

And they just released what they call the release candidate one or whatever it is.

So which is usually the one of the last things they do before it comes out.

So it might come out as soon as April 1st.

April Fool's Day is next Tuesday.

It is theoretically possible that this will come out next Tuesday.

And if it doesn't come out next week, it might be the week after that.

But I think it's I think it's pretty close.

I think it's going to be early April, not late April.

And when it does come out, you know, even though this is just a point one type of update, it's going to have a couple of things that are interesting.

You know, this one rumor article from Mac Rumors identifies a couple of the top ones, priority notifications, which means that not Siri can sort of a Siri already can summarize using Apple intelligence your notifications, but it can actually put the more the ones that it thinks are more important up front.

So it'll be interesting to see if that's useful.

The updates to the visual intelligence, which is currently a feature that I have on my phone, right, where if I just press the camera button on my phone, it opens up the camera app and I can take a picture.

So here's a picture of you.

Smile.

There you go.

But if I hold down the camera button for a second or two, it gets into this visual intelligence mode where it can tell me something about the world around me and using artificial intelligence.

So we can say, you know, this is a restaurant.

Here's the hours of it.

Here's the phone number or this is a plant or that is a cocker spaniel or whatever it is.

And so if you're trying to learn things about the world around you and of course, it's interesting on an iPhone.

I've always thought that this visual intelligence feature would be particularly interesting in a future future version of like the Apple Vision Pro.

If Apple could get them as small as a pair of glasses.

Exactly.

I'm just looking at something with my Apple glasses and it tells me, oh, that over there is such and such.

I'm going to get there.

Be interesting.

So we're in the early stages of this and it's got some changes.

In fact, one of the changes that you and I were talking about before we hit record this morning is that you have the iOS 15 Pro.

I'm using the iPhone 15 Pro.

Correct.

Right.

Yes.

Which which came out not last year, but the year before.

And it's correct.

You as we stand here today, you can't use visual intelligence in your phone, but that's going to change next month.

Is that you're able to use it?

So which I think is the fact that Apple is making more people have the option to use it, I think means Apple has more confidence in it and more people using it.

And then on that confidence point, the last point is the next thing that's pointed out in this article is that the new emoji is going to come out.

And again, I always say this is significant because when Apple releases new emoji, they know a lot of people don't update their phone until the new emoji come out.

And then they want to get it right.

You want to be able to see.

And so when Apple announces new emoji is going to be in an operating system, that's Apple's thumbs up.

That's they're saying this is the one that we really want people to get.

And so, you know, sometimes you get this in like the point one or the point two.

This time we had to wait all the way to the point four for it.

But so for all of these reasons, I think point four, it's I mean, yes, it's a minor update, but Apple thinks it's a more significant update.

And so I think that tells you something.

If you have been pining for a radish emoji or they call it a root vegetable emoji, this is it's a radish.

This is your day to shine.

I know I just can't write it quickly.

Can I just go back to the visual intelligence?

Because number one, that is Apple intelligence.

I know.

I know that we've all been talking about the Apple aspect and they're behind this in you know, they're behind the eight ball on this.

But this is powerful.

Now, this isn't brand new.

Like Google Lens has been doing this and I'm sure there's others.

But the idea that you can use that visual intelligence and I don't know how much you've used it already, Jeff.

I haven't used it because I don't have it right now, even though I have Apple intelligence.

Well, to the extent that you have Apple intelligence right now in my 15 pro, I can get access to it.

But the fact that you can pull this up and I've seen stories, in fact, here, I think I've got a story from from seeing that where she's in Japan and she's just pointing it at a restaurant at a menu.

And we can manually kind of like have a translation app.

But this visual intelligence just basically looks at the world around you and gives you that information.

That's pretty amazing.

Again, it's not brand new, but the fact that it's all built in into a device you're already holding in your hands already is going to is is is very cool.

And it's just going to get better on some of that.

Let me also say and I use this example quite a bit right now in my 15 pro and probably several other phones.

I'm not exactly sure there is that magnify app, right?

That's that's in the iPhone.

And it is a state.

It is an Apple app that's been there for a long time.

And it's meant to help folks.

I can't see quite as well.

You can magnify things.

I use it a bit, but there are there are options in there.

And one of them, I think, is called detect mode or detection.

And it literally will do this.

You can pull it out, point it at objects, basically, and it will describe what it is.

Now, again, that's in that's Apple intelligence.

Maybe not to the extent that everybody wants to see it, but because of the neural engine that's already built into iPhones and to other platforms right now that Apple has been doing, they have that capability.

And we've been arguing this for a while.

It's already allowing that technology to be available, whether or not it's been turned on yet or we've got the right interface from the front end is debatable.

And of course, Apple is still working on that.

But anyway, I just wanted to kind of highlight that because I'm pretty excited.

The fact that I'm going to be able to use visual intelligence now in my 15 pro once that comes out, because I don't have a camera button on there.

Yeah, that'll that'll be cool.

One more thing that's going to be part of 18.4 is ambient music.

And so what this is, is oh, nice.

It's very popular nowadays.

You know, people will load YouTube videos or people will go to music just to have a low fly along on.

It's incredibly popular.

And, you know, they just want to.

And, you know, I do this sometimes, too.

Sometimes when I'm working, it's nice to just have something in the background.

I don't want something with words because I'm going to start.

Yeah, you don't want to listen.

I just want like, you know, sometimes I put on like movie soundtracks or the Apple classical music app.

And so they're going to have this new feature that you can choose a sound category, you access it through the control center, which you were just talking about.

And you can choose from sleep, chill, productivity, well-being.

And then it will play a selection of music.

And it's not computer generated music.

It's like real music by real artists.

But it's just sort of like background music.

And this is the sort of thing that I think people might turn on and just like leave on all day and just listen to it while they work.

And so it's nice that Apple recognizes that this is something people like using.

So let's make it easily accessible for them right there in the control center.

So, you know, it's just another example of Apple seeing what people enjoy doing and then making it easier for people to do it.

So big thumbs up.

I'm going to call this the spa music feature.

Yeah.

Other than, you know, productivity may be a little bit more upbeat, right?

I like a little bit the sleep and the chill and the well-being.

I feel like I'm just going to like go in and, you know, feel comforted on there.

Another story you link to from Julie Clover, always really good.

And Mac rumors just going through another kind of a list on some of the things will be what she's talking about, the visual intelligence here, it seemed like, oh, yeah, here it is.

A hidden iOS 18.4 features you might have missed going through a lot of the same things we were just talking about.

But, you know, while you were just highlighting some of the major additions for 18.4, this is a good story that goes through some of the smaller ones that might be coming as well, which like even things like pausing downloads in the App Store, which I felt like we were able to do at one point.

But now we're able to do that again.

You know, just those little tiny things like that, which is going to be.

Yeah, like one little tiny things.

I don't currently have a robot vacuum, you know, like a Roomba or something.

But apparently you do.

You will be able to start to control those in HomeKit.

So I mean, that's, you know, for some people, that's something that they've been waiting for for a very long time.

Oh, here it is.

I knew it was down.

And so.

Yeah.

Yeah.

So there's, you know, all these sort of little, little bitty tweaks in here.

This is a good post to come back to once you update to 18.4 and you've been using it for about a week.

I'm going to come back to this post and say, oh, yeah, look at this little feature.

I haven't seen it yet.

And let's not forget the Apple Watch watch OS 11.4.

I kind of like this feature because just like you, you were writing today.

I like having my Apple Watch just gently tap me on the wrist to wake me up easily without the spa music going on either.

But in some cases, I have slept through that.

If I've been really tired, I stayed up too late the night before.

And now there's an option that you can allow the Apple Watch to break through silent mode so that it can be the nice little tiny taps as well as some sound to go along with it.

Yeah, which makes sense.

A lot of people like me always keep their Apple Watch in silent mode.

Now, a couple of weeks ago, I did actually turn on the noise and I had it on for a couple of weeks because it was interesting.

And I still might turn it on again in the future, but I usually keep it off.

I happen to have it turned off right now.

So my Apple Watch is pretty much completely silent.

If it wants to get my attention, it taps me.

And that works great during the day.

And it actually does work for me to wake me up in the morning.

I don't use it all the time, but when I do use it, I usually just have my Apple Watch next to me and I mean, my phone next to me.

And it makes noise to wake me up.

But if you want to have your Apple Watch wake you up and you want it to do more than just tap you, you can now turn on this.

Like you say, this breakthrough mode.

So it will make noise to wake you up, even if it's otherwise in silent mode.

Makes perfect sense to give people this option.

And so it's just an example of it's a tiny thing, but it's going to make a big difference in certain situations.

And so it's great to see Apple at it.

Now, typically, along with iPhone, you know, 18.4 watch OS Mac, the Mac OS will probably get updated.

I haven't seen just a whole lot about that, but this was an interesting story.

You linked to today where it was Mac focused.

But as you said in your post today, Jeff, this is probably applied to iPhone and iPad.

This was Lando Loic at.

Where are we make use of great website, by the way, just using the Apple productivity apps for a while.

I'm assuming that means pages instead of Microsoft Word.

He's using notes, the notes app instead of other apps.

I just thought this was a great all around story.

And somebody, you know, like, let's see if we just went truly all in on Apple.

Can it be successful?

And I felt like it was it was pretty good.

Yeah.

I mean, it's a good reminder that, you know, I don't use Apple's calendar app very often because I use fantastic cow.

You know, I don't use I don't use.

Actually, I do use reminders quite a bit, although for my four sophisticated things, I happen to use an app called Things for my reminders.

But this is just a reminder that Apple's built in productivity apps are pretty good.

And if you wanted to just use them, they especially the ones that have been around for a while now, as they get more and more and more features to it, they're pretty full, you know, full service.

So you can get by with the built in apps, which is great because they're the ones that are free and there's a standard.

And then, of course, that also pushes developers of third party apps to make their apps even better because they want to be able to compete with what Apple does and they end up having more features.

So it's it's you know, this combination of Apple has its own app, but there's a there's a vibrant third party community.

I can understand how in theory it might seem like that's not going to work.

But in practice, it actually has worked quite well.

So so it's nice to have a reminder that the built in apps are, you know, have a lot of power there.

The one thing that stuck out to me, and I think we've talked about this, the notes app.

I love them.

I think that's all my kids use right now, like whatever they have.

You know, we used to use drafts app and, you know, I would have like a text files.

I remember way back in the day, that was Merlin Mann, right?

He had like text files.

I forget the the system that he used on that.

But it's like any time that my kids like want to capture a thought or they're always going to the notes app, typically on their phone, but they know that it synchronizes.

And I keep a whole heck of a lot in the notes app as well.

And so that was the one that sort of, you know, popped out to me like he calls it here, my personal knowledge hub.

And I would I would agree with that.

Good.

Yeah, me too.

In fact, I've used a lot of this third party notes apps that you talked about.

But I don't I don't use any of them anymore.

I have come back to Apple notes is now more than good enough.

It does everything I need.

Anything I want to remember, you know, it's an extension of my brain.

You know, if it's something that I might my this brain might forget.

But my iPhone brain is going to remember it because I put it in the notes app.

Very useful.

And talk about an app that has improved.

I mean, we have seen this evolve quite a bit.

I mean, literally, Apple has really put a lot of work into it.

And I think, you know, that almost is like the other way around.

There is great other apps like Obsidian and Bear.

Like there's so many other note taking apps.

But it's it's it's interesting that Apple has continued to watch that third market part, you know, the third party market.

And then they have made some improvements on there as well.

Yeah, there is a certain little gadget that I know you have talked about over the years, Jeff, called the Airfly.

I have never purchased this, but I know you have been a fan.

In fact, you link to a review you did here.

Let me pull it up.

What year was this that you reviewed this?

Twenty eighteen.

Twenty eighteen.

The Airfly by twelve south.

Honestly, I don't think I've ever had it because I don't know exactly why I would use it.

I know that the the most routine example is when you're on the airplane.

You can plug this in right to like it manually, plug it in with a little headphone jack into the backseat when you're watching some entertainment.

But that will create a Bluetooth connection that you can use with your AirPods.

Am I am I correct on that?

Yeah, that's what it is.

I mean, this is the first generations in my hand.

Oh, there it is.

You got it.

Yeah.

The one that I article the link to, you know, so this is their first and they have changed it many times over the years.

The size is better.

The buttons are better.

They have a version.

You can't even buy the first generation anymore if you want the cheap version.

It's now called the Airfly S.E.

And it's like only 20 or 30 bucks.

But then you can go up to the more expensive, you know, the pro version, which allows you to have two people connected to it.

And you're right.

The prototypical example is to be on a plane.

You know, you take from my version, you plug this in the top and you take this cord and you plug it right in to the headphone port on and on the back of your the seat in front of you.

And then you can use your AirPods or whatever other Bluetooth device you have to listen to whatever it is that you're watching.

Personally, when I'm flying around, I I tend to either look at my my iPhone or my iPad.

Yeah.

And actually lately, right.

Sometimes I actually use my vision pro on a plane because then I get like a big widescreen TV and stuff.

So I very rarely do listen to the the built in entertainment systems on planes.

But if I do, then this is the device to use or, you know, mine still works all these years later.

But but they have nicer versions.

So if that's something that you do, plus there's other uses, too.

Like if you have an older car that doesn't have CarPlay or something, you just have an audio aux jack.

You can plug this into it.

If you have an old stereo system at your house that doesn't support Bluetooth, but it has like an aux jack, you can just plug in this device and listen to it.

And the air flight and the newer versions of it, I think actually work in reverse to that.

You can.

I'm trying to think of how to how to say this.

You can it can be it can be a Bluetooth receiver as well as a Bluetooth sender.

Oh, OK.

So it's it's it's it's it's it's such interesting stuff that it can do.

It's really, really neat.

I like that they even say a piece of gym equipment.

And that's true.

Sometimes I get on the treadmill and great example.

You know, they they have the plug there.

And I'm like, who even has wired?

I'm sure many people do.

Right.

Like, why would you want to do that?

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

You wouldn't want something like that.

Yeah.

This is from Ed Hardy, a cult of Mac, the Airfly Pro two, which apparently is only like 60 dollars on Amazon right now.

But that's when we're talking about this, because they came out.

I mean, 12 South has always been a revered third party company that makes, you know, different devices and gadgets for the Apple ecosystem.

And this this looks really good.

I mean, this is even smaller than what you were showing, Jeff.

This is a nice one here.

Yeah, if you if this isn't if this is an area that interests you, this is the device to get.

It's not something that I personally use very often, but apparently people are buying them because they keep coming out with new versions of it.

Well, if you get the Airfly Pro two, you probably won't need to use it if you have an AirPods Max.

But you were talking today.

Apparently they made yet another little improvement to the AirPods Max today.

Jeff, they were announcing it.

This this is this is kind of a quirky thing because the AirPods Max have been out for a while.

They updated it what several months ago with really just putting in a USB C connector instead of a lightning connector.

But now apparently I didn't even realize this.

There was an update that was needed, I guess, for some higher end audio capabilities.

And so I think that's what they're putting in.

I don't even really know.

I don't follow the AirPods Max all that closely.

Although I see a lot of them out on the street.

Yeah.

Yeah.

You're right to be confused about this because OK, thank you.

AirPods Max came out.

It had a lightning on a connector on it if you want to plug it in.

It's Bluetooth, of course.

And it had been out for years and years and years.

Apple never changed it.

Last year, they added USB C, but nothing more.

And people were like, why did you update it and do nothing more than put USB C?

And I think the answer to that is because to comply with EU regulations, they had to sell something that had a USB C connector.

But they didn't add any new features with the USB C connector.

And so now, months later, they have actually added the feature that I assume that should have been there last year when it came out, which is that although they are Bluetooth speakers, you can also connect them using a cable.

Of course, it'd be a USB C cable.

And as Jason Snell points out in this article in Six Colors, if you use the cable, you can now have a lossless mode, you know, ultra low latency, which in theory gives you the much better quality because, you know, services like Apple Music, I don't think Spotify has this yet.

But Apple Music allows you to listen to music lossless.

Now, I will tell you that in theory, lossless is better quality than, you know, MP3 and AC and the regular ones.

In practice, however, you've got to have really, really good hearing and a pristine listening connection to hear the difference.

I personally can't.

When I have tried in the in the past, I mean, I guess maybe, you know, I've gotten up in age enough that, you know, my ears are not what they used to be.

And I literally cannot hear the difference between lossless.

But hey, if you have younger, better ears and you can hear the difference and you have the AirPods Pro Max, the AirPods Max, excuse me, then you can use this cable and get that pristine quality that you can hear a pin drop in your recordings.

So it's a little you know, the real story here is just why didn't Apple do this?

I guess it takes time to get things done.

But well, I guess better late than never, though.

So better late than never.

Well, maybe when you are listening to the Apple music classical app, you can tell a little bit of a difference.

I'm not really sure we've talked about this Apple music classical app, which is not the Apple music app, even though I now can see items that I listen to from the Apple music classical app in the Apple music app.

Jeff, it feels I feel like there's some kind of a bridge there or something.

Anyway, I still like having both of the apps separate because there are times when I just want to go into the classical and I kind of like the interface that they have there.

And you had a story from nine to five Mac from Ryan Christoffel where they're going to add a couple of more features now to this Apple music classical app.

Yeah.

And they're going to focus around like more recommendations and listening guides and stuff.

And although I don't listen to Apple classical a lot when I do listen to it, it's often because I'm looking for that background music that we're talking about a few minutes ago.

Exactly.

I will admit, you know, I don't know classical music, Brett.

I don't.

So, you know, I might do something like, you know, look for like Beethoven or Bach or just generic things that I know.

But so I welcome the idea that if I'm going to get into the app, I would love to have somebody who really knows what they're doing.

Give me some recommendations of, you know, you should try out this.

And here's a guide of things you can listen to.

And like, that's pretty cool.

In fact, when the Apple class, when the Apple Apple classical music app first came out, there actually were a few guides on there of people that would say, you know, here's a good example of this type of music.

And here's an example of this type of music.

And I listen to them and I'm like, oh, this is I feel like I'm learning.

So they were good in a class.

Yeah.

So it was interesting.

So I'm in favor.

You know, I'm in favor of doing this sort of stuff on any music platform.

But I think that it's a uniquely good idea for classical.

So, you know, bravo to Apple for continuing to make it better.

Let's go from music to in the show.

A couple of things you link to today.

Some movies coming out.

I got to tell you, I remember hearing about this F1 movie with Brad Pitt.

And I'm like, OK, you know, I'll I'm sure it'll be fine.

But boy, I watched the trailer today, Jeff, and I am like, I'm out.

I'm all in.

I'm ready to get in the cockpit.

Let's go.

Hopefully it's a good movie because they had a lot of cooperation with F1 and the actual F1 drivers.

And, you know, it's got all the ingredients of being something really good, sort of a high adrenaline, a big star with Brad Pitt, you know, fast moving cars.

I'm hoping it's going to be a good movie.

And apparently Apple must think it's going to be a good movie because the the director of it, who is Joseph Kosinski, they have already signed a deal with him and Jerry Bruckheimer and some others to come up with a movie about UFOs.

And who knows when that will come out?

I'm sure I mean, it's just in the development stages now.

But so if nothing else, I see it as a good sign that Apple is excited enough about the team behind this to sort of sign them up for the second movie months and months before the first movie has been released.

And that's good because Apple does not do a lot of movies for Apple TV Plus.

And of course, you know, they will sometimes release them in the theater and then it'll come to the service.

Sometimes they have movies that come straight to the service.

Like they had that one that came out recently called The Gorge, which was simple and fun.

I enjoyed it.

It was fun to watch.

And so so that was so interesting stuff.

So the latest in Apple movies.

If comedy is more your style right now, the studio is the name of the newest comedy from Apple Music.

I think you said you haven't had a chance to watch it.

I haven't either.

It's Seth Rogen stars in it.

It looks like it could be pretty good.

Yeah, it's I mean, not only stars with it, but it was sort of his idea.

You know, Seth Rogen.

Oh, OK.

Famously, he was involved in that movie with Sony Pictures years ago that was called I forget the name of it, but it had to do with North Korea.

And you may remember that North Korea was so upset about the movie that they ended up hacking into Sony and releasing emails.

And it was a thing.

Oh, and it actually they convinced Sony to pull back the big release and to sort of have a more limited release to, you know, given to the demands of the North Korean dictatorship.

And so you can imagine that that left a little bit of a sour taste in Seth Rogen's mouth.

And so with that background and everything else he's done dealing with the studios, he came up with the idea for this show where he himself plays the studio executive.

But it's supposed to be a very ambitious comedy that the reviews of it have been fantastic.

And not only does it have, you know, stars like Catherine O'Hara and Catherine Han, both of whom I love, but apparently it's full of cameos.

And there was an interesting article in Variety magazine that it's a very long article that goes through all the behind the scenes.

And they say that when Seth Rogen pitched it to Apple and like he had in the in the script that we're going to have all of these cameos and Apple apparently told him, well, this sounds great, but you're not going to be able to get all these people to show up and do it.

And he's like, no, no, no, I will.

And apparently he has.

So like people like Martin Scorsese, Wow, cameos and everyone else.

The Variety article says the only person he was not able to get was was Leonardo DiCaprio.

And so the role that he had, the cameo that he had written for him, they gave to a different actor.

But apparently this is going to be a show that you're going to see a lot of a list and perhaps B-list actors show up throughout the series.

But, you know, on top of everything else, it's supposed to be really funny.

So I'm looking forward to it.

I'm going to watch it this weekend.

And, you know, now that we've just finished Severance, it would be awesome, you know, great for Apple.

I know if, you know, they finish up one hit and then they start the next, you know, what this one article calls the best new comedy of 2025.

You know, wouldn't Apple love to have one hit right after another?

So I'm excited.

I can't wait to see it.

Hopefully it's good.

I am I'm currently waiting for a reply text from my wife, Jeff, because if I'm not mistaken, I believe she went to high school with Catherine Hahn.

Are you serious?

Oh, yeah, I just got I just got confirmation.

Yes.

So already my mind is going.

It's like next week, not only are we going to be together in Chicago, but I'm going to have my wife contact Catherine.

Maybe we'll have Seth Rogen on the show.

It'll be OK.

No guarantees.

Oh, yeah.

She just said maybe we should try watching the show.

So that's funny.

What part of the if you don't mind me asking, what part of the country did your wife grow up in?

So in Cleveland, Ohio.

So Catherine, I believe in Ohio.

I want to say that.

Yeah, they were in.

They were in high school together here.

I'll just do a quick little Wikipedia.

So this this will this will be awesome to see.

Catherine Hahn, let me go into.

While you're looking at Wikipedia, I will tell you that Catherine Hahn has been a million good things.

But the most recent thing I saw her in Disney Plus show called Agatha All Along, which I thought was excellent.

It was so good.

She is amazing.

All of the other stars are really good.

I it was a really, really fun show.

And she's done a million other fantastic things, too.

So yeah, it doesn't say she was apparently born in Illinois.

But yeah, my wife just confirmed like because like you said, she's been in several things.

And every once in a while, we'll just be watching something.

And either Catherine will have like a small piece or part in it.

And she'll like, hey, that's Catherine.

OK, so good.

Who knows where that's going to go on that?

OK.

And for the tail end here, I just thought, well, we have a behind the scenes blowout, not of our podcast, although we're happy to tell you anything you want to know behind the scenes.

But Jeff, you had two great little things that one I have watched and the other I am saving because I've I've seen the severance.

Let's go to the first one.

Last year, last week, we talked about this new video commercial called Someday that starred Pedro Pascal.

And I got to tell you, I I've been thinking about it, but not just because I've been thinking about it.

It's because as you predicted, they cut down that like what is it like a five or nine minute little vignette into a 30 second chunk and a 60 second chunk.

And I have seen this ad now everywhere on the on the Web and on the Internet.

But I loved first of all, I love the little vignette.

But they have a video they put out where they went behind the scenes on how Pedro was like dancing, how they created some of the scenery.

And it was even more almost even more fascinating than watching the actual vignette itself.

The video itself is a visual delight when he goes between, you know, the cold winter and to this, you know, bright red and yellow summer.

And I thought a lot of that and I'm sure some of it was CGI, of course.

But I thought a lot more of it was CGI because they have these seamless transitions between real life and like this wintery scene.

And then when you look at the behind the scenes here, you see, oh, no, no.

This is a set that they did this.

And it was just perfectly, you know, the sets are amazing.

The choreography is incredible.

And it's so fun to watch the the actors and the dancers sort of practicing and stuff like that.

It's really it's a really fun behind the scenes.

So I definitely if you haven't seen the original video, go watch that first.

It's really fun.

And then behind the scenes, totally, totally worth watching.

It's really good.

So I mean, it's like even how much because we were we were commenting last week on how Pedro like obviously he can sing and he can dance and he can move.

But there's a lot of work that goes into that.

And it's just fun to kind of watch it.

In fact, yeah, right here at the very beginning, you know, they're showing a bit literally behind the scenes where Pedro is like talking to the dancer behind him.

And they're like going through like the count structure because he just wants to make sure he gets it right.

But so much work goes into all of that.

That's the big, you know, since I'm not in the industry or you either, you know, we just look at the final product and think, oh, that looks right.

But when you look at this, you're like, oh, so much work went into this.

So much planning, so much money, so many people.

It's just really impressive.

The second behind the scenes, the one that I have not watched yet, not because I don't need the spoilers, I finished severance and who boy, uh, so good.

But this is like it's almost like it's like a 12 minute behind the scenes.

But it goes deep into that final episode and like how they shot it.

I mean, you're like sitting in the seat with Ben Stiller and the editors and you're going through everything.

So I've seen little snippets of it, obviously.

That's why I understand that.

But it's like I stopped it because I'm like, OK, no, I want to sit down for 15 minutes with no other distractions.

And I want to see this from beginning to end.

And they take some of the iconic scenes from the finale of season two, which I'm not going to spoil and mention, but you totally these are big scenes.

And it's so fun to see the behind the scenes part where you can see, you know, Ben Stiller talking to the actors and putting them in position and the people practicing their moves and everything else.

And there's like five different parts of the finale.

And they show and of course, they're showing behind the scenes.

But the theme of this is it's supposed to be a promotion for Mac computers.

And so they're showing the editors sitting there using their Mac minis and stuff like that.

And you talk about having appreciation for how films are made.

This one, you know, when you look at it and you when you watch the whole thing, you'll see it when you get to hear the editors describe.

Here's the choices we made.

We could have shown it this way, but then we decided, why don't we show it this way?

And it really makes me feel like, you know, the actors and the writers always get a lot of acclaim, justifiably so.

But editors might be the most important part because something is edited poorly.

It doesn't have the effect.

But when it's done very well and very dramatically, it has you on the edge of your seat.

And when you watch this, I just have I mean, not that I didn't know that they were important, but I just have this newfound respect for the artistry of editors.

The decisions that they make.

Totally agree.

You also get to meet the person who's I mentioned his name before.

And it's slipping my mind right now.

But the guy that did all the music for Severance, who is just a genius.

It's fantastic stuff.

Oh, really?

They have a scene that they show him and they show this one iconic scene from the episode in which they have the original music they were going to use.

And then they like, oh, no, we decided to go a different direction.

And when you hear the second music, you're like, oh, it is so much better with that music.

So it's so much fun.

OK, good.

So anyway, I it's if you're a fan of Severance, you absolutely have to watch this very, very much worth watching.

Except do not watch this video.

No.

Until after you have seen the finale, because you do, you will get spoilers galore in this.

But yeah, don't do that.

And I saw this posted the other day as well.

But you link to John Gruber, where, you know, if you really, really get into the Lumen scenario, this is now the Lumen Terminal Pro.

This is brilliant.

I love this.

It comes complete with a trackball.

Even it's great.

It's very cute for Apple to sort of do something very tongue in cheek on their website alongside all of the Apple computers that they sell.

The Macs.

You could also, you know, supposedly purchase the Lumen computer.

I think it's it's a very clever cross marketing technique and they did it well.

It's fantastic.

I want one.

It's great.

It's brand new.

You can choose between a new MacBook Air or the Lumen Terminal Pro.

In the know, I thought, because we're going to be together next week, Jeff, could you give us your session is going to be productivity hacks and tips and tricks for the iPhone and the iPad.

Could you give us just a little bit of a teaser, a hint of some of the things you're going to be covering?

I thought that'd be fun to go through if you wouldn't mind.

I would love to do it.

And I will tell it to you this way.

Here's what I'm going to do right now.

I have been doing I have been looking for really cool tips and tricks.

Really, ever since I first got my iPhone in 2008, I had my first iPhone was the second generation one in 2008.

And one of the very first posts that I did on iPhone JD, I started the website.

Here it is in November.

And then later that month, in November of November 24th, 2008, I came up with a list of all of my favorite iPhone shortcuts.

And this was an interesting place for me personally, because after I posted it, there was a link to it by John Gruber on Daring Fireball.

This was a brand new website.

I was basically talking in the wind.

And so I I, you know, had very, very few visitors to the website.

And then suddenly there's a link on this major website during Fireball.

And suddenly I was looking at my little statistics and I went from like, you know, two people a day to, you know, 15000 people a day.

I'm like, what in the world?

So it was fun for me.

A lot of people first learned about my website way back when because of that, which I'm grateful for.

But what's the reason I mentioned this today is because as I have been thinking about all of the shortcuts and the tips and everything to to share next week and I have a great set of them, I actually went back to this post because this first post from 2008, how many years ago was that?

Some of these minutes are still really good ones.

And I'm going to mention three, three of them that were great tips in 2008.

And they are still great tips in 2025.

Now, some of these don't work anymore, but these still do.

The very first one that I listed is called the comma shortcut.

And again, you probably heard about this in the past.

But if you haven't been typing, so you're using your iPhone keyboard and like let's just say you're using your iPhone and you're typing a text message or you're typing a an email and you want to have a comma, the slow way to do it is to tap the one, two, three button or whatever and get to the symbols and then type the comma and then tap the letter button and go back to the letter keyboard.

But the quick way to do it is if you just put your finger on the one, two, three button and then without lifting your finger, you slide over to the comma and release.

It will insert the comma, bring you right back to the main keyboard.

And again, this tip is as old as the hills, but it was a great tip way back when, and it still works today.

It will still save you time today.

So that's one that I wanted to mention.

Another one, speaking about keyboard tips, is number five on this list is called Hold On, which is when you're using the keyboard.

There's a lot of things that you can just hold down on the key and you will see other things.

For example, if you're in Safari and you're typing a website like iPhone, JD, instead of typing dot C O M, you can just hold down on the period and it will show dot com as the initial choice and then the other ones as well.

And so it's just a quick one.

And so if you don't know that tip, it's it saves you some time and you're typing a website, but it's not just there.

You can also use it.

In fact, I don't even think I mentioned it in here, but you can also hold down other keys to get like alternative symbols.

So like, for example, if you have like the letter E and you want to have the E with a little accent grub or another accent on it, you can hold down the letter and you'll get those things to pop up.

That tip has been working for years and years, and it's still a really good tip.

So that's one that's that's still good.

I'm going to give you two of my favorite just in that.

Go, go, go.

We don't need we don't need the cent symbol anymore.

But if there is the dollar sign symbol, if you tap and hold on the dollar side, you can get the cent symbol.

I show I used to show that to people and they were kind of like, why would I need to type cents anymore these days?

And then one specific one that I know that, you know, because this is specific into our career, into our profession, the section symbol, like we talk about the paragraph symbol.

I don't know the paragraph symbol is actually hidden on anything.

I haven't found one.

I use a keyboard replacement for that.

But the ampersand, yep, you know exactly where I was going.

The ampersand, if you tap and hold on the ampersand, the hidden symbol there is the section symbol.

And I remember we used to show that, Jeff, on presentations that people would be like, oh, that's wonderful.

Like, it's great.

It's right there.

I like those two.

Yeah, that that one still works.

And it's been around for a long time.

The last one I'll mention that was on this list is number nine on the list.

You know, at this point, you know, this is the this is the iPhone.

3G was the new phone.

And sometimes your 3G signal would not work very well.

And my tip to you is nobody wants to use the slow edge network, which, by the way, doesn't even exist anymore.

Brett, but did back in 2008.

But we've all had a situation where you're just not getting that good self-cellular signal.

And so my tip back in 2008 was if you turn your iPhone into airplane mode for a second, wait a second and then go turn airplane mode off, which means you'll sort of refresh getting that Internet connection.

And I still to this day will have times where I'm either in an area that has poor cell phone coverage or I'm in an area that has a ton of people like New Orleans, Mardi Gras or Jazz Fest or something.

There's just so many people that it overloads some of the cell phone networks.

And I find that if you're if you're just not getting a signal, if you go into airplane mode and you wait a couple of seconds and take it out of it, you will sort of get a good, a better signal, at least for a short period of time.

And then sometimes it doesn't last very long.

But if you're just trying to send that text or send that email, it is that it will often be the trick.

And so and some of these other ones on the list are still good.

But that just shows you that there have been great tips that have been out there forever.

And of course, there have been a million that have come along in the 17 years.

Oh, yeah.

Sixteen plus years since this post.

So that just a little preview, a taste of some of the many, many, many, many, many tips that I'm going to be sharing next week at Tech Show.

If you can get there, we would love to see you, although I'm going to say, Jeff, I'm going to go out on a limb that you'll probably have a couple of follow up posts right after Tech Show where you'll be sharing because I that's what I always enjoyed.

And I remember all those years ago, we would go and put like the 60 apps in 60 minutes and we would post about them after, you know, so that we have a record of them and everywhere.

But anyway, if you are in Brown, Chicago at all next week, Jeff and I will be around and we'd love to talk with you.

Say hello here, what you are working on these days and what are what's important for you.

And yeah, we'll find out where we're going to be next.

Next Friday morning and look forward to that.

So I look forward to not just talking with you next Friday, Jeff, but several times throughout next week.

Thanks, as always.

Thanks, Brett.

See you next week.

Bye bye, everybody.