Welcome to In The News for November the 6th,

2026.

I am Brett Burney from AppsinLaw.com.

And this is Jeff Richardson from iPhoneJD.

Hey, Brett.

Jeff, I feel like, is this, what did Apple release this week?

This is what our podcast has become.

It's like every week that Apple is releasing something.

Okay, I don't think there was actually anything new announced this week.

You tell me if I'm wrong.

But I liked how you mentioned it this morning that it's basically been an avalanche of Apple news.

And really, we have an avalanche of new products, as you mentioned today,

that there are new products that are releasing today,

right?

For people that pre-ordered, I think, or so you can go into the store and get them.

I mean, I just did a quick little rundown list that we can go through here.

But today,

how did we get here?

Yeah, remind me how we got here first.

So it's been a journey.

Okay, well, I'll start off with my thought.

The grounding dates for me,

usually,

Jeff, are the iPhone release,

right?

So we're talking about it in August.

That's when the iPhone 18 was released,

right?

What was the exact date?

It goes back earlier than that, though, because in August of this year,

that's when Apple announced the Mac Mini.

Oh,

that's right.

And I got one of those.

The phone is September.

Because Apple announced the new Mac Mini M6.

Yeah, I know. You can't eat your truck. It was the Mac Mini M6 and then the new Mac Mini M5 Pro,

which I actually purchased because I was ready for an upgrade of my Mac Mini at home.

And so I

bought it in August.

And I understand why you forget about it because it didn't even come out

until,

I don't know, like a month or so later.

It's like they wanted to get that,

you know,

they wanted to clear the decks on that before we got into iPhone mania.

Before iPhone.

Okay.

Yeah, we had that. And then of course, if you got the high-end Mac, you got the Mac Studio.

So that

was all announced in august so now where were you you're saying in september we had the iphone

september was sort of the ground i mean this is what we normally think of every year is the new

iphones right this is when we expect the new iphones are introduced and we got that in september

the iphone 18 the i the 18 pro max actually it's not even the 18 right again i'm tripping over

myself it was only the 18 pro and pro max there was no iphone 18 am i correct in that yeah and

And just to put a pin on that, I mean, the rumor is that this is the first time that Apple is separating the non-Pro upon the Pro.

So the rumor is that there will be an iPhone 18 next spring.

But coincidentally, this past week, Apple had its quarterly earnings announcement.

And,

you know, big surprise,

Apple made more money than ever, right?

But one of the things that I'm wondering, you know, we all know that the iPhone is half of Apple's revenue.

It's huge for the company.

And this year,

if you wanted to get a new iPhone,

you know,

for the holidays or for the fall or whatever,

you had to get the – well, either you got the Duo,

which was super expensive starting at $2,000,

or you had to get the Pro or the Pro Max.

So people that normally would just get an iPhone 18 this year,

they had to decide, do I spend a few hundred dollars more to get the Pro version with all the nicer camera and everything else?

Or do I wait with the hopes,

fingers crossed,

that in the spring there will be an iPhone 18?

Or do I buy the iPhone 17,

but that's been out for a year?

So it feels like sort of old news.

And some people buy iPhones,

they don't read the Apple news like you and I do, so they don't know.

But for people that were in the know,

you would know, hey, the iPhone 17,

although it's a fantastic iPhone,

don't get me wrong,

it's been out for a year.

And so it was just an interest.

So Apple had all the reasons that they wanted to do it, but I do wonder if it had an impact on our finances.

So anyway,

as we're discussing, in September,

we have the 18 Pro Max,

which is a nice little incremental upgrade with the nicer cameras and some other features.

And then, of course, the iPhone Duo,

which just blew everybody away because it was so – but then that wasn't all.

Because on September, we also had the announcements of the Apple Watch Series 12, which I'm wearing on my watch right now.

In fact, I'm going to talk about that a little bit in my tip today.

The new Apple Watch Ultra 4,

which was a nice upgrade for people like you.

And then AirPods 5,

iOS 27 comes out.

So that's September.

So then what's in October?

October.

Oh, my goodness.

And these are all kind of the surprises,

right?

The October thing was really right.

We just didn't have any clue that they were coming.

I mean,

we had been talking about there was a rumor because I guess we had been rumors.

There had been rumors of Apple doing something in the home for a long time.

But when they came out with the home view,

you know,

it was nice to finally get the confirmation of that.

And by the way, that home view that was announced in early October comes out one week from today.

And what was that?

Friday the 13th, right?

So Friday, and I have one on order.

So mine's going to show up a week from today,

Friday the 13th.

Oh my goodness.

And then,

you know,

there's also the HomePod mini too,

which we're going to be talking about in a second

because that's now,

I guess it's now available.

There's the Apple TV 4K,

not a big selection there.

The Apple home collection,

which is interesting.

And then that sort of brings us to,

there's the new iMac and that brings us to today.

So the things that were announced a few weeks ago,

but are in the stores today,

which is sort of where we started,

which is we have the new iPad mini.

which is really cool.

And then some MacBooks,

including a really nice OLED screen,

which also happens to have touch for the first time ever.

So it's just,

and then, and then,

like you said, we have more things coming.

And when we started the podcast,

Brett, you said,

oh, well, Apple didn't have any new announcements this week.

Well,

I mean, no new product announcements,

but the beta version of iOS 27.3 came out and we're going to be talking about that today too.

So it's been nonstop. So anyway,

now that we've sort of placed ourself in context of the avalanche,

I feel like we're getting closer to the end of it, but it's still overwhelming.

You want to start with the iPad that came out today?

Yes.

Let's do the – well, the iPad mini, right?

iPad mini.

So, again, I think we covered sort of like the MacBooks with the touchscreen and everything because,

of course, I don't even think that they've shipped yet.

I mean, I think the preorders were available for that.

But,

okay, what we do know that is launching today is the iPad mini.

And I think for us and for our listeners,

that might be maybe the most interesting kind of a thing that is going to be out.

Because we've talked about the iPad mini off and on so many times.

Both you and I have had an iPad mini in our iPad career and life lifespan.

And it's back.

And I feel like I don't know that I would have blamed Apple if they had just let the iPad mini die on the vine.

I kind of.

But it's always been there, right?

They've always offered it.

But it's been several years old.

I feel like, you know, it's never been new.

They haven't really injected a lot of life into it.

But that changed.

And now we have an iPad mini.

that from most of the relinks that you had today,

people are pretty happy with it

if you really want an iPad mini.

If you don't want an iPad mini,

it's not going to matter.

But if you do like the iPad mini,

people are saying it's a good one to go with.

As you say, Brett,

the iPad mini has had an interesting life,

right?

Because at one point,

when the iPad mini first came out,

of course it was small.

That's always been its signature thing

is that it's going to be small.

Small and cute.

But what does that mean?

Because originally it was small,

but it was also less expensive.

And that's when you and I first got one.

Right, right, good point.

That it was a cheap little, I'm looking right now from,

when was it?

It's been, gosh, it's been so many years ago that they had the iPad Mini.

I can't even find out.

Here we go.

The first iPad Mini was announced in 2012.

Goodness,

14 years ago,

a very long time ago.

And I'm seeing now that it looks like I actually, yeah, I bought one.

So I bought that original iPad Mini in November 26,

2012.

So almost exactly 14 years ago,

I was reviewing it.

And at that point, it was cute because it was small,

but sometimes it was nice to sometimes

sound small and portable,

but it was also less expensive.

And so you would almost think of it as you're getting something small, but you're paying

less.

And then as you say, in the 14 years since then, we've had periods of time where Apple

all but ignored the iPad Mini for years on end.

But now it's back.

And the newest iPad Mini is a different type of iPad Mini because the signature feature

is still there.

It's still small,

which means it's more portable.

but it's no longer really inexpensive it's more expensive right what it starts at now um $699

$699 price now seven and then if you add more memory you're going to easily be up to 800 you

could very easily be over a thousand dollars with it but the thing that the reviews have said and

and this just speaks up to me is this is a full featured ipad you know if you are using your ipad

to do multitasking and to do complicated things and like i was talking to somebody just yesterday

he was telling me that he has an iPad mini. He's one of the attorneys in my office.

And he says,

he plugs his iPad mini into an external monitor at his home because the iPad can run monitors,

right? And there's iPad apps.

So like you can, a lot of people,

and I've done this before,

but I don't do it all the time,

but like an iPad can be a true workhorse when you connect it to an

external display.

And if you have like an external keyboard and stuff, it's almost a computer-like

and the iPad mini,

I mean, it's got the latest A20 processor that's in the latest iPhones and

stuff like that, it is no slouch.

I mean, it can do stuff.

Yes, the screen is small,

but you can

do everything with it. And so if you want to have a no compromise,

all the features iPad,

and you want a really big screen,

well, then maybe you want to have the iPad Pro like you and I have.

But if you want to have a full feature to all the stuff iPad and a small screen,

that's what the iPad

mini is. I actually think Apple could have called this the iPad Pro mini.

And that actually would

have been accurate because there's a few things,

you know, one of the nice things on the new iPad

mini is it's got this beautiful OLED screen.

It's not quite as nice as what's on the iPad Pro.

For example, it doesn't have the ProMotion,

which when things are moving on the screen,

makes things a little bit smoother.

Although I will tell you that the reviews have said that

because the pixels are smaller,

because the screen's smaller,

they say,

you know,

it doesn't bother you to not have ProMotion. It would be nice to have 120 megahertz refresh

instead of 60, but it's not a huge deal.

And although the screen is not quite as nice as the

iPad Pro,

it is much, much better than the former iPad mini used to be.

So you get what is a really

nice screen,

incredibly powerful,

can do all the work you want to do.

It's even got some new cool

features. Like for example, it's the first one that they actually have as we discussed the waterproof

and the dustproof rating.

So although Apple is not telling you to go swimming in this thing,

for goodness sakes.

But, you know, with its rating,

you know,

if it dropped into,

you know,

a swimming pool and you picked it, I mean, technically I think it can be underwater for

30 minutes. Not that Apple would recommend that because if water gets in, that's going to avoid

your warranty.

But like if water got on this thing,

if you're sitting there at the beach and somebody

splashes a whole bunch, you know, one of your kids splashes you full of water and your iPad gets wet,

this iPad mini,

it's totally fine. You know, that's what it's made for. It's just like, you know,

we've all heard stories of people that have an iPhone,

which also have similar good ratings on

them.

And if the iPhone,

you know, drops into the ocean and you pick it up quickly,

you know,

of course the salt or something might hurt it,

but the water itself,

it's going to probably be fine.

So,

so this is a nice device.

Now it's no longer the cheap device.

So it's no longer the thing of,

oh, just go buy your kids an iPad mini because it's a few hundred bucks.

That, that, that,

those days are over.

But for people that wanted to get work done with the iPad mini,

this is a nice device.

Now, again,

it's not for me because the screen is just too small for my eyes

as I'm getting older.

I really want a big screen

versus a small screen.

But, you know,

I know

because you and I both owned them.

When you walk around

with that tiny little thing

in your hand,

it's the same reason people

love the iPhone Duo right now.

It's nice.

I mean, it is nice

to have something

so small and light and portable.

So I do get it.

I do get it.

I'm seeing here

at Apple's website,

the iPad.

So we have the iPad Pro.

Then we have the iPad Air.

What does the Air start at here

for pricing wise?

Does it?

Let me see.

okay so the air starts at 7 49 the ipad nothing you know apple still has a very very basic level

ipad that's the one you get for your kids right right that's the one you get for the kids because

this starts at 4 49 so 450 you could get a full size ipad right don't don't they sell this in 11

and and uh in 12 let me see what the the specs are well no i think it actually just comes in one

size for the small size for the regular iPad.

And I joke, I say for your kids, but I mean,

the reality is it's also good for the person who just does not need any of the features. I just

want to be able to look at Safari or look at my email.

You know, I don't need anything complicated.

I usually tell attorneys,

you know,

get the iPad Air because it's got enough extra features that I

think it's worth it.

But look,

don't get me wrong. If you get that entry-level iPad,

even to do some

work on, as long as it's nothing taxing,

if you're looking for something for your parents,

your

grandparents you get you know this is a great ipad i'm glad that apple has it um but it's not

impressive yeah yeah the point that i was getting to here i mean this starts of an 11 inch ipad is

449 and the ipad mini now is 6.9 it starts at 6.99 it's just it just it works weird to my mind

that it's like a smaller screen you would think a smaller device should be a smaller price point

but anyway and then getting back to your point here this regular ipad or ipad nothing uh i think

gone on record to say they still have this because it is very popular like for education site oh

very popular right yeah and the idea that you don't need a pro even an air and frankly i guess

you don't need an ipad mini now for a lot of those sort of applications on that but i just i i find

that to be um uh to be interesting from the the price side i also like that you had a link to um

jason snell who did an interview with a couple of executives from apple he was asking questions

about the ipad to your point um he's jason was like well people now think because we have the

water resistance with the ipad this is perfect for sitting in the bathtub and reading a book

and he got he said that the executive kind of you know squirt squirted their face a little bit

because it's like it's not oh here using it in a bathtub was definitely not a grounding

recommendation for us they said on there but they don't want to say to use it because if does if it

does have water, then that's going to be a problem.

But the reality is it would probably be fine.

I'm

not recommending it,

but like if you're sitting there in your bubble bath and you have your iPad

now I will say this, if what you really want is an e-reader,

you might want to actually get like

just a simple little Kindle paper or something like that, because that's totally fine.

And you

know,

if you're just reading,

maybe the Kindle is enough.

But if you want that full feature device

that can either be your Kindle or run multiple monitors and look at all your exhibits and modify

things.

And heck, I mean, you could like edit podcasts and videos and stuff like that.

It's

got all the, I haven't priced out Kindles in a while. I wonder what,

I mean, I know that there's

some very inexpensive Kindles, right. But if you wanted to get like, I think they call it the

paper white at some point. I mean, you know, some of them are pretty fancy now.

Some are more,

but you can get the simple,

you can get a simple Kindle for not that much. You can get a very

simple one yeah i understand i understand on that but i was just i was just wondering because it's

like well you know if if if a kindle that you really wanted is getting close to four hundred

dollars or so i don't know sure then it's like why not go a couple more you know two three hundred

dollars more and that way the thing i like about the ipad is like okay what if you got a notification

or you just wanted to check your email or you wanted to do a text message right i mean you can't

do any of that on the kindle at least not on some of the base level kindles and it's like that to

me would be maybe worthwhile it's like yeah this mini is going to be primarily like a reader for

me but just in case i wanted to check something that you know i i feel like i could i could uh

i could justify that this is why the ipad mini tickles me so much though brad i know i know i

know that i skew towards more professional users you know lawyers and you know doctors people like

that but like i like having a full feature like really powerful device and the ipad mini is that

I mean, it is just about as powerful,

almost as powerful as an iPad Pro in a tiny form factor.

And so for some people, they're like,

this is perfect.

This is perfect.

Yeah,

yeah.

In fact, one of these articles even talked about like doctors,

like,

you know,

a medical

professional uses an iPad and the fact that it can fit into like their white coat pocket

is pretty amazing.

Okay, a couple of things.

Lastly,

quickly, I wanted to ask you about this.

In this article by Harry McCracken, this review,

he's got a picture with an iPad mini and an Apple Pencil because this iPad mini supports the Apple Pencil.

I think maybe the former ones may have,

but this one definitely supports an iPad.

And this one supports the Pencil 2.

The Pencil 2, exactly.

It's got all the gestures on it.

It can attach magnetically to the side of it.

So it's perfect for that.

You know,

in contrast,

for example,

you know,

the iPhone Duo,

which is not quite as big as the mini, but they're getting close,

right?

So it's a little bit smaller of a screen.

And when you unfold that iPhone Duo,

you do have an Apple,

an iPad mini-like experience.

But it doesn't work with Apple Pencil 2.

It works with the Apple Pencil USB-C,

which means that you don't have a place to, like, attach it to it, which is so – and you don't have the gestures.

Whereas this is so nice because it just attaches magnetically.

I mean, my, my,

my,

my,

I know yours too.

My pencil always is attached to my iPad.

It's so convenient to have it there.

And for the mini, it's nicer because it's, it's almost,

you know, right there on the side and almost the full size.

Okay.

So a lot of people are going to love that.

I'm going to throw this in for you, Jeff,

because I know how often you use your iPad and your Apple pencil to take notes,

but you've got a big fat iPad pro.

What if you could take notes and good notes on this iPad mini with your Apple pencil,

knowing that everything will sync because it's just a smaller form factor.

It's almost like to me, it's like the difference between a full size legal pad,

right?

A yellow,

yellow legal pad versus those little mini ones, you know, that you can get from the office supply stores.

Does that make sense?

It's like, yeah, well, you know, there are times when I want a full size legal pad.

There are times when I want the little mini pad notepads.

And to me,

that's where this iPad mini would come in to play.

So not only does it make sense.

I mean, I have done this.

There have been at least two times in my life, like the original iPad mini that I bought,

and I think you may have bought that one too.

And then a couple of years ago,

I had another iPad mini that our firm had purchased and

we weren't going to use them for like six weeks until I used it.

And I had that, you know, that multi-iPad lifestyle where both iPads had all my data on it, were

synced,

and I would just use whichever one was appropriate for the task at hand.

And I got to tell you,

it was nice because like you say, there are times where you just

want to have something really small in your hand.

Now,

for me,

would it be worth me spending $1,000 to have like an extra iPad in most instances?

No.

But,

you know, back in the early days,

like when I had my first iPad mini, this was long before we had big iPads.

So it was just like a regular 11-inch iPad.

There were times where like I would be traveling.

And you know how you're traveling and you're in the hotel room and you're trying to get work done.

I would have my regular size iPad at the time,

11-inch.

And that screen would not quite be big enough for multitasking.

Plus, we didn't have the multitasking we have today.

So I would set up the iPad mini next to me and I would have, for example,

you know,

a PDF document on my mini and then I'd be writing Microsoft Word on my iPad or I'd have like, you know, my email on my mini.

So there are times that using both together makes sense.

There are times that using one at a time makes sense.

You just pick the best one for the job.

For me, it's a little extravagant.

So it's not something I would do nowadays,

but there are probably some people that will.

And it's nice that it can do so much.

All right.

Last thing I want to ask you about this.

This kind of goes back.

Maybe I think are related to the what Jason Snell calls the dust in ingress.

There's no speakers on this iPad mini,

at least no physical looking speakers.

There are speakers,

but they did something unique in this.

What do they call it?

They say acoustic display.

So there's like small tweeters is what as what Jason said.

There's two ultra small tweeters are tucked just at the two narrow edges of the display.

And then there are drivers for mid-range and base that are on the inside of the iPad coupled to the display itself.

This is fascinating.

I don't think we've seen this technology in anything else.

No.

Apple has not yet.

And that's why it's waterproof because it doesn't have that speaker grill.

There's no holes.

I'm sorry.

I exaggerate when I say waterproof.

It's just more water resistant.

I should be more precise.

Okay.

But that's why.

And, you know, and I've heard some people have said it sounds just as good.

Some people have said it doesn't sound quite as good.

But, you know, the thing is for an iPad,

oftentimes,

I don't think I'm too privileged to say this.

Like oftentimes if you really want to listen to something, you're going to put on AirPods or whatever your –

Or a Bluetooth speaker or something.

Or whatever Bluetooth speaker.

And for most of the time when I'm using my iPad and just using the built-in speaker,

audio fidelity is – it's just a YouTube video.

I just want to hear somebody speak.

Right, right, right.

And so it's totally fine.

I don't need perfect,

you know, pristine audio quality.

If I wanted that, I would put in speakers.

So I think that Apple made the right decision here.

Even if it sounds just as good, great.

But even if it sounds a tiny bit less, and some people say maybe the bass is not quite as much,

I think that's fine.

I think that's fine.

And the advantages that you get of having more water resistance,

I think that's worth it.

Agreed.

I guess I'm thinking ahead maybe even to laptops and to other iPads.

Jason Snell says the vibrations that comprise these frequencies,

which is because the speakers are behind the screen,

move through the display glass,

which transmits them into the air.

That sounds ridiculous because I don't want my glass to be shaking, but I guess it doesn't.

He says your whole iPad mini display becomes part of the sound system.

I just I guess I'm just thinking ahead,

like if Apple is testing this kind of technology out with an iPad mini,

could that come to potentially the larger iPads?

maybe even the iPhones.

Would that be silly?

Because then if you can get rid of,

at the bottom of our iPhones,

we've got these little holes

for the speakers and the microphone.

If we could get rid of some of that,

I feel like that would be interesting.

Okay, that's where I was going with that.

I suspect that that's where Apple,

I think they're trying it right now

on this iPad mini.

And if it works,

I would not be surprised

if in a year or two,

we see the same thing on the iPhone.

I agree 100%.

Let's stay on the topic of audio fidelity.

and jump to the HomePod Mini,

which is another device that is getting released this week.

I remember I asked you the last time we talked,

you did not order a HomePod Mini.

You did get a HomeView,

but let's talk about the HomePod Mini,

which is amazing to me because I know you're a fan of HomePods.

You've got several of them around, but you didn't want to upgrade to the Mini 2.

I thought the only reason to really upgrade was to have the Siri AI support,

which don't get me wrong, is nice.

And I still hold out hope,

or not hope, but is there a chance that a HomePod Mini 2 is in my future?

Like I would replace one of them that I have just to have the Siri in it?

Maybe.

Think about it.

But as I mentioned,

if you buy one of these today,

you cannot yet use the new Siri on it because Apple hasn't released that yet.

My guess is that's coming in December.

So for whatever reason,

Apple is still figuring out the software on that.

So if you get one today,

I was thinking,

oh, there's not going to be a difference at all.

I was actually surprised that what two different reviews that I linked to said that the iPad

Mini 2 actually has better audio quality.

Now, it's not going to be as good as a bigger speaker,

right?

It's not going to be as good as the regular AirPod that's, you know, bigger and stuff

like that.

But they've said that it was noticeable audio quality.

Now,

would I personally notice the audio quality in my house?

I don't know.

I mean, I'm not an audiophile.

It doesn't have to be perfect for me.

But it is nice to know.

And I've also heard speculation that part of the reason that the audio quality is better is not because of anything inherent to the hardware,

like tweeters or subwoofers or something like that.

But instead,

because it has a much more powerful Apple processor inside,

it allows it to do,

you know, more,

you know, calculations and stuff with it to make it better.

And so regardless of the reason,

whether it's the upgraded processor or whether it's upgraded

hardware,

it's nice that this new HomePod mini sounds even better.

I found this interesting.

Ed Hardy in Cult of Mac talked about the fact that a HomePod makes much more sense for a

Mac,

iPad,

or iPhone users than a Bluetooth speaker,

which I guess I'd never really thought

about the HomePod in that way.

Because I think of,

I guess I think of the HomePod as if I wanted,

if I really had things in my house that I wanted to make smart,

right? Like you've got a bunch of

lights in your house,

you've got other things that are in your smart home.

And so to me, I feel like

the HomePod is more of a smart home hub,

which it is.

But I guess I've always,

it's like,

that's a pretty expensive Bluetooth speaker.

Although I've paid, I think maybe $200

for a nice JBL Bluetooth speaker

because I do like having very good audio.

I just never really thought of the HomePod

as maybe a replacement for that.

But I like Ed's comments on here and he likes it.

To your point, just like you both,

like you said on both of these,

the HomePod is still tiny,

but this is, who is this, Tyler at CNET, my test found powerful

upgrades.

So anyway, again, I feel like this could be,

this could have been maybe another product

that,

you know, if Apple had just let it be,

many people would have noticed.

I just don't see in the

wild a lot of people asking me about HomePods,

Jeff. I mean, I know you like them and you've been

a fan of them.

I've just never felt a need for them.

And I just, I don't see that it can't be

that big of a market,

but it's at least big enough that Apple did want to make this, make this

upgrade,

which is good.

Yeah.

I will tell you, Brett, I think,

cause I've heard you say something

similar in the past.

I, I,

my sense is that because you've never had a HomePod mini,

you're

not really,

you know,

right.

Yeah.

Yeah. I feel like you speak, you speak about them more negatively.

I actually know quite a few people that have HomePod, not so many HomePod, like the big

are more expensive. And I don't know a lot of people with those,

but the HomePod minis, I actually

know quite a few people with them and people tend to be happy. I mean, it's, it's a nice way to have,

I mean, it's when, when I was younger,

the idea of having audio in every room of your house

required you to have special speaker cables.

And, you know, that was a big thing. People,

you know,

the rich people would have that sort of stuff.

But nowadays anybody can buy one of these,

or if you buy two of them, you get a stereo pair. So it's even nicer and,

you know, set them up in a

couple of your rooms,

set it up in your dining room, your living room,

your family,

you know,

and the next thing you know, you've got for essentially home,

you know, whole house sound.

We had it yesterday.

I came home from work. It was really nice. My wife was playing some

George Winston, who's a piano player,

famous piano player.

And she had some nice George Winston music.

And I walked in my house and the music was playing. And then we walked over to the living

room and it was playing.

And it was actually really nice just to sort of listen to that music.

Okay. All right.

So I'm a big fan of the HomePod minis.

Well, in a similar way that I was talking with Ed Hardy,

Tyler here at CNET said at his conclusion,

his conclusory paragraph,

instead of asking,

do I need a HomePod upgrade?

He says, I suggest asking, do I need an audio upgrade?

The HomePod Mini 2 looks the same.

And of course, the Siri AI features, which are not available quite yet there,

but that could help.

He goes, I found the Mini 2 has massive audio improvements compared to the Mini.

So here's my question,

Jeff.

If somebody came up to you and said,

hey,

I'd like to play music,

you know, from my iPhone,

would you point them to a HomePod mini 2 or would you just point them maybe to a Bluetooth speaker?

No, absolutely.

No reservation.

Absolutely.

HomePod mini 2.

Oh, really?

OK.

All right.

Because everything that you would get from a home from a from a from a regular old Bluetooth speaker,

you're going to get from this.

And you get more because you get the Apple features and you get to integrate it.

And don't get me wrong.

I mean, I do have, for example,

I think it's made by JBL.

It's like, it sort of looks like a little like a boom box,

you know, like you turn around.

And it's a very nice sounding Bluetooth speaker.

I mean, the sound is wonderful.

But because it doesn't, you know, work with the Apple Home sort of stuff,

like if I'm playing music on it, that's all it's on.

Whereas I love that the HomePod minis talk to each other and you've got room from house to house.

And I've told you this, sometimes when we're having a party,

I will actually take one of our HomePod minis and bring it outside.

And plug it into like a USB charging bank.

So it'll run for 12 hours,

certainly longer than our parties ever go.

And that way,

the same music is both inside

and outside the house.

You don't want to do that if it's raining outside

because it's not waterproof,

but on a nice day, it works.

I mean, I just,

I really am a big fan.

What they do is simple.

It's just playing music and letting you

rock stereo and stuff like that.

But it works really well.

So I'm a big fan of it.

And now it glows.

Am I right?

Is that right?

That part makes no difference to me.

In fact,

that's a feature that you can enable on the first generations that I have.

Oh,

really?

Okay.

And I haven't even turned it on because I never,

ever, ever look at the top of my HomePod Mini.

I could care less whether it glows to the music or it doesn't matter to me what it does.

But, you know, Apple wants to make that feature.

Why not?

All right.

That means nothing to me.

Okay.

The iPad Mini, we've got that.

We've covered the HomePod Mini 2.

You mentioned also that this week was sort of an announcement, I guess if there was a kind of an announcement,

That 27.3,

I believe,

is that the number that is getting ready to come out.

Yes.

I'm always excited about any kind of upgrades,

as small as they might be,

for iOS 27 and iPad OS 27.

Typically, that comes with an Apple OS,

a TV OS upgrade, a watch OS upgrade.

But let's talk about the watch here because this is something I remember a lot of people were talking about in the summer

when Apple had the presentation for the Worldwide Developers Conference.

And there was,

I feel like it was maybe three minutes long inside this presentation that they were,

maybe it was longer,

that they were announcing some very specific,

I call them like recording features on your Apple Watch.

You're going to do a much better job of explaining this.

But you've linked to a few stories today about Siri Recap and Live Rewind

that are coming in this watchOS beta.

You're going to get it because you have an Apple Watch Series 12.

I'm still on an Apple Ultra 3.

I haven't upgraded to the 4,

and those are the two that you need

if you even want to try some of these features here.

But,

yeah, this is going to be an interesting couple of months here

when this starts getting rolled out and people start using Siri Recap and Live Rewind.

Yeah,

let me mention one thing before I talk about the feature,

which is that, and this was not an original thought,

I heard Jason Snell of Six Colors, who you're showing right now, mentioned this in a podcast

earlier this week.

Not that many years ago,

when Apple released beta versions of software,

there was sort of

an unwritten rule that it's just the beta,

you're not really talking about it, that sort

of stuff.

That has changed over the years.

And nowadays,

when Apple releases a beta,

everybody talks about it.

You know, so much so that now,

when this beta is out, Apple itself was talking to different

people about it.

So like everyone's so, you know, we're no longer in the, is it okay to talk about the

beta?

Yeah, everybody talks about the beta.

And so we now know this is going to come out in December, who knows when, but, you know, before Christmas,

presumably,

we're going to have this 27.3.

And,

you know,

if you want to install the beta device on your own device,

you know, the beta software, you certainly could.

And developers are installing it so they can update,

get ready for it.

Yeah, the beta is out now, right?

The beta is out this week.

The public release.

And so, okay.

The public release.

And so that's why, you know, Apple,

you know, when I say it was sort of an Apple announcement,

it wasn't, it was sort of a, something like an Apple announcement because they are starting to talk about it a little bit.

So with that,

it's going to have a lot of features.

And this is unsurprising, right?

We see this every year.

Every year, Apple comes out with the new iOS and all the other OSs in like what, September,

right?

And then at first,

like there's some sort of bugs, you know, maybe they get it all worked

out.

And then usually by like the 27,

but whatever the number is, you know,

X.2,

then it actually

starts to get interesting.

Like you start to get new things added to it.

This year it's X.3 and that's because they had a special version for the iPhone Duo,

but whatever.

It's going to be called 0.3.

But,

you know, that December release,

sometimes the January release,

is the ones where you

really start to see the new operating system move forward.

They've got the bugs,

you know, fixed out, you know, the kinks are gone,

and they're

really advancing it.

And that's what 27.3 is going to be.

So with that in mind, as of setting the stage for the Apple Watch and the phone, because

they work in connection when you have this feature,

this live rewind feature,

and I think

perhaps even more importantly, is the Siri recap feature is going to be interesting.

Because what it means is that your Apple Watch, which you're presumably wearing all the time anyway,

is going to be listening to the world around you.

And when you speak or when someone's speaking with you and it has some algorithms to just make sure that it's your conversations,

it's not recording.

You know, if somebody at the table next to you is talking and understands that that's not you, we'll see how accurate that is.

But if you're involved in a conversation,

it will hear it and it will – it doesn't really record the audio.

I mean, it listens to the audio and then very quickly puts it into like this little transcript.

And then that transcript is summarized.

It's a complicated process where there's a transcript that's summarized and then the

transcript is immediately discarded.

And then the summary is processed on the iPhone itself.

And then you have to have your iPhone with you.

If I'm walking in the park and all I have is my Apple Watch and my iPhone was at home,

this is not going to work.

But my iPhone is close by.

So some of it's on the iPhone.

And then the iPhone takes its sort of summary and sends it up to the private cloud compute,

which are those Apple servers that are incredibly private,

you know,

really keep your information completely anonymized.

Nothing is saved, you know, lots of security.

And then basically creates like organized summaries.

And so this all happens apparently,

you know, instantaneous.

And so the end result is that at the end of the day,

you're like, gosh,

you know, this afternoon,

I remember that I had lunch with Brett and he was recommending to me that this book or he thought that there was a feature.

Like, what was that?

I can just look at Siri on my watch if I want or on my iPhone,

wherever.

And I can just see,

you know, what's the recap from the day?

And it'll be, oh,

yeah, like there was a point where y'all were talking and he recommended

that you do such and stuff.

I was like, gosh, that's what it was.

Yeah.

Or,

you know, whatever feature.

Or maybe I had a meeting with somebody and I was talking with the contractor that was

talking about the things he needed to fix on my air conditioning.

What was it he wanted to do?

And he said it was going to cost how much?

You could just look back and have those recordings of it.

I shouldn't say recordings.

It's not a recording.

It's an AI summary.

And because it's an AI summary,

we all know that AI makes mistakes.

So it's not going to be 100% perfect.

It's going to miss some things that were talked about.

It's not going to include some things that,

you know, or maybe it's going to say something

wrong.

So you're going to have to like trust but verify.

The verify part is critical.

But it will be just a little aid, something that you could look at.

And there will maybe see circumstances where it triggers a memory for you or it has the

information like, oh,

thank you.

I'm so glad.

Like that's what I was trying to remember because my brain just cannot,

I don't have a photographic memory.

I cannot remember all the details.

Just real quick,

I'll interject here because you linked to another story at Apple Insider.

And this is a story from Wesley Hilliard.

But there's a video here from, I think it's Andrew O'Hara who does this.

But look at this screenshot here.

And I thought this was interesting when I watched this video.

This is an excellent example.

He had the beta version of 27.3 on his Apple Watch and he had his iPhone.

He took his four-year-old to the doctor's office.

And so I remember in the video, he says,

you know,

with this transcript summary now,

I could be in the moment listening to the doctor instead of trying to write everything down.

Right.

And so at the end, he's showing that when he got back to the house,

he was able to go into his Siri app on his phone.

He's got a very nice iPhone duo here.

And it's the four year pediatric checkup.

And it's like it's got the vitals, the vaccinations that were administered,

the diet and post visit treat.

I mean,

I until we'll get into some of the skepticism that surrounds this.

But until I saw Andrew show this, I'm like,

that's great,

because there are times when I don't want to be taking notes when I should be taking notes in some kind of a meeting or conference or something.

But I just want to be in the moment.

But this would be wonderful if after the fact,

to your point, Jeff,

that I could go back and sort of rewind or recap maybe what was happening at that time.

OK, anyway, I just want to interject that because to your point, I thought that until I saw him use that,

I still kind of been leaning toward I don't know if I really want this to be recording all the time.

So let's go into the negative.

So the article that you're discussing right now from Wesley Hilliard,

he used it for 24 hours,

the beta version.

And his,

you know,

you know,

very quick snap response after 24 hours was I don't think you need this.

I don't think it really helps me that much.

He said controversial and unnecessary.

Yeah,

and the controversial part is obvious because even though it's not really technically recording,

you know, you can debate,

you know, what does recording mean?

Because it doesn't keep the audio transcript or anything like that.

But there are certainly people that would be uncomfortable about recording the conversations they have.

I mean, I heard somebody say, what if my spouse and I happened to get into a TIF and then somehow it was listening to it?

Like, I don't like that, you know.

I don't want to recap about that.

And then, of course, you know,

attorneys,

you know, doctors,

people that are in confidential situations,

you know,

are you concerned about that?

So I understand the controversial nature of it and that other people might feel,

you know, even if you personally are comfortable with it,

maybe somebody else is not as comfortable with it.

These are going to be issues that we're going to have to deal with as a society.

I understand that.

Much like we're dealing with so many other things as a society with AI and everything else.

There's just a lot to deal with on that stuff.

And then there's the question of how useful it is.

You know, he said that he thought in his very initial tests,

you know, it wasn't really all that helpful.

Although, like you said, he embedded a video from somebody who talked to the doctor.

Now, in theory,

in theory,

every time I go to the doctor,

I always get one of those reports afterwards from my hospital.

Yeah,

that's true.

Like everything happens.

And in fact, many times some of the doctors I have actually use AI technology to record our camera,

to do the same thing from there on, right?

Same.

And so you could argue,

I don't need my Apple Watch to do this because the doctor is doing it already.

And if the doctor is giving you good doctor's notes,

everything that you forgot,

you know,

did you say I take this or that?

It's going to be that.

So in theory,

but,

you know, we can all imagine there's no question in my mind that there will

be situations in which it can be useful.

Does that usefulness outweigh whatever controversy,

creepiness,

et cetera?

I honestly do not know.

And I look forward to finding out when it's enabled for me next month.

And I'm suspected I'll play with it and like some controlled environments.

And then I'll decide.

And you can have settings on it.

Like, for example, you can say,

I want this feature to only be turned on when I'm at the

office,

but not when I'm at home or vice versa.

I don't want it to ever be turned on when I'm at the office,

only when I'm at home.

All sorts of interesting uses.

I just don't know.

You know, when I, I'm going to be talking about this in my tip, but like when I go to

court,

I will often turn off my iPhone because I don't want any risk that it's going to,

the phone's going to ring or there's going to be an alert or anything.

Even though I have all that stuff turned off, I just don't want to rest.

So I turn it off.

But I keep the Apple Watch on because I want to see what time it is.

I sometimes have my iPad on because I'm using it to look at documents and stuff like that.

If my Apple Watch is on and I'm in court and the court does not allow,

you know, quote unquote

recordings,

are they going to have rules that you can't have a summary?

You know, goodness knows,

I literally just had an oral argument before an appellate court

on Wednesday.

And afterwards,

I was trying to think about the questions that the judges asked me.

And

there's no transcript in Louisiana state courts,

unlike federal court, where there actually is a

recording of it in the Federal Office Circuit,

at least.

In Louisiana state courts, there's no

recording. And I was using my memory of what do the judges ask me.

In theory,

this technology would

allow the AI to tell me, oh, here's the questions that you were asked.

Having said that, our judge

is going to say, you're not allowed to do that, because that is so close to the idea of recording

that we don't want to allow it.

These are all the questions that are going to have to be.

And to tell you the truth,

I'm probably not going to risk it and turn it on.

But,

you know, these are all those societal questions

that we'll have to deal with.

And yet It

is bigger society. That

even comes with quickly, just

with like,

you know,

the meta glasses,

right? I

mean, that was

Oh,

same idea. We had

kind of the idea,

like it's always recording.

This isn't

necessarily new.

It's just

not as widespread,

I don't think.

But I will

tell you I heard somebody say

the other day

at one of these

Comic-Cons,

like some of these

Comic-Con events will now say,

you are not allowed to ever wear Meadow Arabian glasses.

Yeah, right,

right.

People are like, you know,

recording with consent is always,

just the one that you and I were at a year ago.

Remember they had all those signs that like,

you have to ask people for consent

before you take their picture.

Like they are so into that,

rightfully so,

that they're like, you're not even allowed

to wear something that's recording you all the time.

And so I'm sorry to interrupt you,

but that's just an example.

No,

no,

because I mean,

this is just a personal opinion

and maybe it's because I watched

too many science fiction movies.

It's inevitable.

I mean, we're getting to a society where you just have to expect and anticipate because

it's going to be glasses like what we wear,

Jeff,

like that,

you know,

are pretty much

harmless.

But,

you know, eventually we're going to have cameras and recordings probably within the

within the glasses.

People are wearing pins all the time that are recording.

The phones are going to record.

So,

I mean, I'm not saying that I like it and I want to be there necessarily.

I just feel like that's it's inevitable from from that aspect.

OK, I didn't mean to get philosophical there.

Well, I mean, enough said that's where we're going.

this conversation until next month because next month it'll be out i'll be trying it more people

will be trying it okay people are starting to try the beta but it is it is real quick though

discussion go ahead that's siri recaps right so that's one of the two technologies that most

people are focusing on and you don't spend a whole lot of time on this but wesley here said that's the

recaps how does he say he goes live rewind is even worse but this is just slightly different right

than what we're talking about with recaps.

So Live Rewind is a transcript of the last 15 seconds.

And, you know, the example Apple gave is

the waiter comes by and tells you the specials

and they walk away and you're like,

what was that special?

You can look at it again.

I don't, I'm not sure how useful Live Rewind will be

because just getting the last 15 seconds a transcript,

I mean, my memory is not,

I don't have a photographic memory,

but I can usually remember the last 15 seconds, right?

I don't know.

I don't know.

I don't know about this one.

I understand why Apple Relief is going to include it.

We will see.

Maybe Wesley's right that this one's useless.

Or maybe I will find uses for it.

I don't know.

So apparently on this one, and like you said, you're going to test this.

Wait, are you going to download the beta?

You're not going to put the beta on your watch.

I've never put a beta on my watch.

You're not going to get it until December.

Because the rewind is basically this does work on your watch,

and you have to double-click the digital crown

to actually see that transcript of the last 15 seconds on there.

And I just somebody said it.

I don't know if it was Wesley or somebody else.

It's like,

that's going to be awkward.

Like if I'm talking to you and I'm like, wait, what did Jeff just say?

I'm not going to like double press my credit.

So,

OK,

well, like you said, we'll table it.

We'll come back to it.

Obviously, a lot of people are going to be talking about it between now and then.

Those people that are willing to put their beta on their Apple Watch,

it will happily let them do that.

Just real quick,

as you have alluded to,

those are the two biggies.

people are going to be talking about from iOS 27.3,

but there is a lot of other things.

You already mentioned this.

iOS 27.3 expands Siri AI with many new capabilities across Apple apps.

Benjamin Mayo at nine to five Mac talks about all of the other things that

they're doing.

And then you even had one last little article about Apple fitness feature is

coming,

right?

It has a gym strength or like customized gym schedules that you can put in.

I mean, these are all really cool stuff too.

Yeah,

the AI one's interesting because,

you know, I could see a world years ago where Apple would introduce a big technology like Siri AI,

and then they would wait another year for the next WWDC to like have the new version of it.

But Apple's not doing that.

It looks like in 27.3,

we're going to have substantial new Siri AI capabilities that work with Apple's own apps,

you know, new features and photos and messages and everything else.

And it goes through here that, you know, it's just going to be able to find.

And I'll just give you a one tiny example.

In Safari,

if I'm looking at a website on my iPhone,

I can ask Siri AI a question about what's on my screen,

you know, literally just the part that's on my screen,

which is what, like three or four paragraphs?

But in 27.3,

it will actually be able to see the entire web,

see,

you know, understand the entire web page.

So if you have a huge webpage that scrolls down,

you know,

15,

16 iPhone screens,

you'll be able to ask Siri, you know, load up the article and then ask the question,

you know, what does this webpage say about,

you know, what was the entree that this guy really recommends that I order at this restaurant?

And it will say, oh,

you know, near the end of the article,

that's where the food critic said,

you know, the thing you need to get is the XYZ.

So that's sort of, so that's like, it's a tiny little thing,

but it's expending the use of it.

And then, or, or photos,

you know, you can actually ask it to do more sophisticated things

with your photos to save you time.

So this is going to be nice.

And then,

so I'm glad this is coming out in December.

And then the rumor is that Apple is going to also start to allow developers to do things

with Siri AI and their apps.

And I'm sure I think we'll see that in the spring.

So as you said, that's a cool thing.

And then the other one that you mentioned was just the fitness plus.

I really enjoy using fitness plus.

If you go to the gym where you're like, go from machine to machine,

you know how people

will often pay money for a personal trainer to help them.

Like at this machine, you want to do

this at this machine. You wanted that last time you did 20 pounds that we're going to move it up

to 25 this time or whatever it is. Right.

And so those sorts of things,

this is,

this is what the,

as I understand it, this is what gym training is going to do. It's going to,

you know, work with

you for different machines.

I think the minimum machine is dumbbells. So like if you, if,

even if

you're not going to it, like if you,

if you have your own gym at home,

maybe you can use it with

that.

Just let it know what, what equipment you have.

Um,

even if all you have are dumbbells,

that that's like the least equipment that it uses. You have to at least have dumbbells for it.

So it's just another way that fitness plus is getting better.

So it'll be,

it'll be curious to see how it works.

Jeff, I know you canceled your pre-order for the iPhone duo.

There's other folks though,

that I'm guessing did keep their pre-order,

but they don't have it yet

because they may not be getting it until January at this point.

We have often said to folks, you know,

you could maybe try and check with your Apple store every day,

show up there at like 9,

you know, 45 and like put your face on the glass

and say, do you have any?

Can I get,

can I pick one up?

I think those are the only two options that I had seen before

to be able to get a phone.

I had never heard of this suggestion from our friend,

David Sparks at Mac Sparky

that you can sign up for store stock checker alerts.

This is just absolutely brilliant.

And I assume maybe you read into this just a little bit more.

I'm assuming what this is doing, this is not from Apple,

even though this looks like an Apple website here,

that they are scouring all of the inventory around the Apple stores

so they can tell you which Apple store actually has the iPhone duos,

like the limited number that they can sell every day,

which is typically how they've set it up.

And David got his.

His original ship date wasn't until November 9th,

which is because I think he signed up almost immediately.

But he's been playing with it for a week.

He signed up for the storage stock checker alerts.

I think they started at $5.

Maybe he was submitting $10 a month to get this.

I mean, that's just a brilliant little service.

This type of website has been around for a while.

The first one that I remember is it was either when the original AirPods came out

or the AirPods Pro.

I forget.

but there was a website that was called something like,

is it in stock that was doing the same thing?

It was scouring the Apple webpages.

And so as soon as it was like, you know, alert,

alert,

that, you know, there's one of them at the Apple store

in, you know, Paramus, New York,

whatever.

And if you can, you know, quickly buy it.

And so that's what this is doing.

And so you can get an alert.

And I think it's like a text message

and it'll say,

you know,

if you act quickly,

there's apparently one of them at your local Apple store.

And then you jump in the website and maybe it's gone,

which is what happened, David Sparks.

But then he went the next time he did it

and it was there and he bought it

got it.

So if you are, I think it's nice that the service exists.

Like you said, you'd have to,

you'd have to pay something for it, but you can just like pay for like one month for a $10 or

whatever, or $5 starting.

Yeah. Two alerts at one time.

It may be worth it for you. If you are

really anxious to get the iPhone duo,

and I'm sure that these types of websites will exist in the

future for hard demand products.

It's nice.

It's nice that it's there.

I will tell you, I mean,

you were sort of, I don't know,

a little bit making fun of me, which is fine about my iPhone

duo review.

I'm not the only one. I mean, just this week I was listening to the Mac break of

weekly podcast.

And I was listening to,

what's her name? She works at GitHub.

Oh my goodness. I know exactly what you're talking about, but I forget.

It'll come to me in a second.

But she was saying,

she did the same thing. She ordered an iPhone duo.

She said, her review was so similar to mine.

Like this is revolutionary.

It's so cool.

And yet it is totally,

totally Christina Warren. Thank you.

Christina Warren said the same thing.

She's like, you know what?

This is just,

this is not practical as an iPhone.

You know,

if you want an iPhone,

get an iPhone.

And so some people are in the same camp as me of like,

this is a totally fun toy,

but it's an expensive toy and it's not going to be as good as your iPhone.

And then other people are like, get out of town,

Jeff,

this is the best thing ever.

I never want

to use a regular iPhone again.

So,

and it all makes me happy because it just shows that we

are all different and we all have our own little desires.

And I love it.

Well, when you do sign up

at store stock checker and you get that brand new iPhone duo,

I love that you linked today.

We've been seeing these come out all over the place.

Apps designed for the iPhone Duo,

which doesn't sound that fun until you start running down this list

from John Voorhees over at Mac Stories.

The Duo box, I think I saw, didn't Joanna Stern have one of these apps

that basically you can turn your iPhone Duo into an accordion?

You can open it up and use an accordion.

I used to have one of these for my iPad when it first came out.

Pocket microwave, I don't get that one as much.

This is probably one of my favorite down here was PopFold.

So, you know, like a greeting card when you open it up and it's like a pop-up book.

Oh, my goodness.

Apparently,

this is like you can close the iPhone,

but when you open the iPhone Duo,

it turns that picture into like a pop-up book.

I mean, that's just brilliant on some of this stuff.

Anyway, great little article,

a great little list here from John Voorhees.

I love this.

Those are fun, fun things.

I love the creativity of developers.

In the know.

In the know.

Here's my little my little tip is sort of like a reminder because I had to remind myself this has to do with live text.

Right.

So for a long time now, I think it was maybe the iPhone X.

I mean, it's been out for a while that you could have a picture on your iPhone or iPad.

And in the bottom right corner,

typically,

at least for me,

there is a little live text icon that will show up if this picture has text on it.

right?

You can tap that little live text and it basically will highlight the text so that you can

copy it and paste it into something else.

I've liked this.

What I didn't know, and this is my

tip for today,

is that this will also work on video.

So I was at a conference recently and I

was doing just a little bit of a recording of the speaker and I got some of the text in the screen,

you know, that they were showing their presentation.

And I wanted to basically take some of that text

and copy it and put it into something else.

So I was watching the video.

It happened to be a video, not a picture.

I was watching the video.

You can pause the video.

And if the video is paused where there's text showing,

that little live text icon will appear.

And you can just I

did not know that.

I

didn't either. That's

what I'm saying.

I just

had not thought about the video.

Typically,

if I was even taking a video,

I would

take a separate picture

if I

knew that I wanted to copy the text at some point.

But just

take a video.

And if

you pause the video,

That little live text icon will show up and then it'll highlight that text.

You can copy and paste it into something else.

So that's my tip today.

Just make sure that I think that live text is typically turned on now.

But if it's not,

you could go into your settings and it's a weird place where they stuck this.

Although it kind of makes sense.

You go to settings,

general,

and then under general,

there's a language and region section,

which is where you turn on if you want,

you know, 12 hour clock versus a 24 hour clock or Fahrenheit versus Celsius.

but there is a little toggle there that you can turn on live text.

I think that's turned on by default,

but if it's not, you don't see it.

You can go in and make sure that that's turned on.

That's cool. I had no idea.

Thank you for telling me that.

There may be times where I have a video and I want to get,

because like you say,

there's just,

you have something on the screen and you want to just capture it and like

paste it into notes or an email or something like that. That's very cool.

Very cool.

My pick is a repeat pick.

So only folks who have been very long time listeners, the podcast will remember it,

But back in In the News podcast,

episode number 30,

where were you for episode number 30?

That was almost five years ago today,

December 10th, 2021.

My tip of the week was an app called Micro Browser.

And instead of the word micro,

M-I-C-R-O, it was the little symbol,

like a whatever,

scientific notation symbol for micro.

So it sort of looks like a U.

So it looks like it's U Browser, but it's actually Micro Browser.

And this is an app for the Apple Watch,

which is a web browser.

And the idea of a web browser on an Apple Watch, I know when I mentioned it five years ago,

people were probably laughing because they're like, oh, my goodness, that screen is so tiny.

The watch is so slow.

How could that possibly be useful?

Why not just use your iPhone?

And look, obviously,

99% of the time when I want to access the web,

I'm going to use my iPhone or my iPad or computer or whatever.

Yes, agreed.

But every once in a while, you are in a situation where either all you have is your watch,

or

maybe you're in a situation where it would be,

it would just look more awkward to be using

and it would be inappropriate for you to be taking out a watch and looking, I mean, to

taking out your phone and looking at your big screen.

But I can just sort of very casually look down at my watch.

I can, you know, open up the micro browser app and I can go to a website and look,

it's

a tiny screen,

but it actually works incredibly well to be able to like either,

you know,

manually type in, you know, iPhoneJD.com or whatever.

Or if you've been there previously,

you can, you know, pick it up from a history list or

you can have favorites, stuff like that.

But you can go to websites on the watch and get information.

And it's actually useful.

And I was thinking about it.

I mean, I don't know how often I use this.

Maybe once a month, not more than that.

But earlier this week, I mentioned earlier that I was in court on Wednesday.

And so I had my,

I was waiting to argue.

Other people were arguing and I'm just sitting there in the audience waiting.

And I saw somebody else in court.

Your phone is off.

recognized.

My phone is off because I didn't want any risk at all of my phone ringing and me being

sanctioned by the judges before I stand up to give as my argument.

So my phone is off.

Um,

but I had my Apple watch on and I saw somebody, I saw another attorney in the room and I'm like,

I think I know who that, like,

what, what is that person's name? I was just trying to remember.

And I'm like, Oh, you know what?

Normally if I'm trying to remember something about another

attorney,

like every law firm has a website,

right? And so you can just go to the law firm website and

look them up.

And so I just pulled up micro browser on my watch.

And, you know, especially

now that I have the Apple watch series 12,

which is much faster than, you know, every year the

watches get faster.

It actually,

it was pretty speedy and using just my cellular connection,

it was able to jump on the internet.

I went to the law firm website.

I very quickly saw who the

attorney was. I could see like, you know,

picture and, you know, the bio and stuff like that.

And I'm like, this is actually really, really useful.

And so it's,

there are times when,

Or you just want to like get something information out or,

or heck, I mean, gosh, this week you're looking for election returns.

You want to quickly load the New York Times or whatever it is.

You know,

there are times you want to quickly load something from a web page and you can do it on your Apple Watch.

And I also noticed while I was thinking about this,

that the app was just improved a few weeks ago.

It's now up to version five.

Right.

It's been around for a while now.

And one of the cool things of version five,

now that we have all the Siri AI and stuff built in,

is you can click a little button in the bottom right.

It looks like sort of an AI sort of like look and button.

And if you click on that,

you can then select one of the recent websites that you have loaded

up and you can ask an AI question about the website.

So for example,

if you loaded up a webpage about,

you know, let's just say my example

that I loaded up a lawyer's bio.

And then I just want to say, no, at this point I would probably be speaking.

So I wouldn't have done this in court,

but I just want to ask it a question about it.

It can use the AI.

I think technically it sends this to Apple's private cloud compute servers,

but it gets

it back incredibly quickly.

And so I can say, like, where did that person go to law school?

And rather than me scrolling up and down on my tiny Apple Watch screen to find that part of the bio that describes where the person went to law school,

I can just ask the AI feature of microbrowser.

And using the Apple's Siri AI technology,

it has the full text of the page.

It will find it.

And I'll be like, oh, well, you know, that person went to, you know, LSU law school or

whatever it is.

And I'm like, oh, OK, well, thank you.

And so it's just a nice little way to have,

because of the limitations of the small screen,

you don't necessarily want to have to read every word,

but all the words are there.

And so the AI can look at them and it can give you information about it and it can answer

a question for you.

And so, again,

this is not going to change the world.

But the app costs three bucks.

I mean,

even if you just use it every once in a while, like me,

it's one of those nice

tools to have because you never know when there's going to be a situation where you want to get

some information.

You don't have access to your phone or your computer or your iPad or whatever,

but your

watch is there.

It's right there on your wrist.

And you can get the information that you need.

So I love that this app is still around five years later.

It's still being developed.

And I do use it from time to time.

And every time I do, I'm like, I'm just so happy I have this on my watch.

So I would recommend if any of this appeals to you and if you own an Apple Watch,

I recommend that you try a micro browser.

It's a cool app.

I am so thrilled that you mentioned this because we talked about this,

like you said,

many,

many podcasts ago.

I download I bought it.

I downloaded it.

And then I found that I really ever used it.

And so I deleted it until today.

I just downloaded it.

And oh, my goodness,

it already is much speedier.

In fact, I don't know that I've used it on any of my Apple Watch Ultras.

I think I had this on some of the original Apple Watches, you know, like my Vive.

But,

oh, my goodness, this is so much better than it used to be.

And there's the –

And, Brett, on your Apple Watch Ultra where you have like a nice bigger screen,

and, of course, my Series 12 has got a bigger screen, it's more useful.

I mean,

you don't necessarily – hunting and pecking on the keyboard on an Apple Watch screen is not ideal.

But it does work.

I'm almost surprised how well it does work.

But then, of course, you could also just say something.

And you can search too.

Like as soon as you open up MyProRyco browser,

you can just,

you hit that search button and I can just say,

for example,

you know,

John Doe with the John Doe law firm.

And it will, it will use either DuckDuckGo or Google or whatever you want it to use.

And it will find the website for you and bringing up.

So like you don't have to do a lot of typing.

You can just talk to it or just say one or two things.

So cool.

The only thing I found now it's in my list of apps.

And, you know, I have my apps on the Apple watch in a list, right?

I don't have like the honeycomb.

We call this micro browser,

but it's not under M.

It's at the very bottom of my list because it's that, is it a mucro?

I forget what it is.

I can't remember what that is.

Whatever that Greek symbol is.

But I actually think that that is a feature.

Here's my pitch for that.

It's going to always be,

when you're very long list of apps on the Apple Watch,

it's going

to always be at the end, right?

Because I seriously doubt, unless you install an app that's called like, you know,

Zeta

Browser or something like that.

It's going to always.

So I actually like that even though I don't use it very often.

So, you know, when you go into the apps on your Apple Watch,

you have like,

this is something

brand new in the Apple Watch 27.

Your most used apps are at the very top there.

And often it will not be micro browser for me, but that's okay because I can just scroll,

scroll, scroll, scroll.

So I don't have to pay any attention to where I'm scrolling.

When I get to the end,

it's going to be there.

And I've been using it this way for years on those rare times that I want it.

I love the fact that it has this bizarre name.

Is it called the Moo Letter?

I think you're showing.

right now letter new letter i did not know what it was mu but it's because of that it's always at

the end of my list which makes it that's true i thought the same thing yeah okay very good well

thanks joe i mean like i said i remember using this before and i'm like okay well that's cute

but i'm just never gonna have that enough patience to like sit there and wait for it to load it because

it was so slow before it was maybe a little bit slow but uh the other point that you had is that

I think it will work even if your Apple Watch is not connected via cellular.

You were just using cellular because you didn't have the iPhone.

Right, but if I had Wi-Fi, it would have, yeah, Wi-Fi would work too.

Okay, I just wanted to make sure on that because I do have cellular on mine,

and it's like,

boy, that could really be useful in a time when maybe I just don't want to get my iPhone out of my hand.

But okay, anyway, I'm glad that you brought that up.

That's a nice little tip there.

Okay, lots that we covered.

And as I said,

as we said, the 27.3 will be out.

More people will be doing the beta.

Maybe more people will have their hands on the HomePod mini, the iPad mini.

So there'll be plenty to talk about next week.

So we'll talk with you then, Jeff.

Thanks, Brett.

Bye-bye, everybody.