The security benefits of passkeys at the moment are also undermined by an undeniable truth. Of the hundreds of sites supporting passkeys, there isn’t one I know of that allows users to ditch their password completely. The password is still mandatory. And with the exception of Google’s Advanced Protection Program, I know of no sites that won’t allow logins to fall back on passwords, often without any additional factor. Even then, all but Google APP accounts can be accessed using a recovery code.
This fallback on phishable, stealable credentials undoes some of the key selling points of passkeys. As soon as passkey adoption poses a meaningful hurdle in account takeovers, threat actors will devise hacks and social engineering attacks that exploit this shortcoming. Then we’re right back where we were before.
This is a great and thorough look at this technology, disheartening as the truth of it is. The fundamental problem is that while the idea of passkeys is excellent, the implementation of it has been a mess. Every platform and site seems to have its own different way of handling the process, and what should be simple has instead become extremely confusing.
The passkey portability standard should help part of the problem, but overall there needs to be some standardization on how the passkey logins are implemented so that users aren’t befuddled.
And I’m not even restricting that to non-tech-savvy users. I’ve run into multiples sites where I have set up a passkey and it doesn’t work correctly. Just last night I was trying to log into iTunes Connect on my iPhone: iOS showed I had a passkey and offered to use it, but for some reason, the site kept throwing an error. Maddening.
That said, there are plenty of places where passwords vary in their implementation. (Please stop putting username and password fields on different pages, thank you.) We’re in the midst of a painful transition period, and while I’m glad to see so many sites and services embrace passkeys, the fine details are going to take longer to iron out than I’d hoped.
As a sports fan, I’m besieged with ads for gambling these days. Sports media is full of experts that are happy to claim they know who’s going to win and who’s going to lose, but of course, if they really had all the answers they’d be rich and not flogging their predictions.
What I’m saying is, nobody knows anything. And while I’ve been covering Apple since time immemorial (okay, the 1990s) and predicting in this space for a decade, let’s just say that nobody’s perfect.
Still, it’s fun to think about the blank canvas that 2025 offers us. Here are my predictions for what’s to come in the next year. As always, no wagering.
As we boldly venture forward into a brand new year, it’s a good time to update you on our pledge to make Apple carbon neutral by 2030. I have to admit, this seemed like a lock at the time, given that we had deprecated Carbon back in 2012, but I appear to have deeply misunderstood what I was promising. Thanks, Craig, for the clarification.
Regardless, we’ve made great strides in the last year, introducing a carbon-neutral version of the Apple Watch Series 10; releasing our first carbon-neutral Mac, the new Mac mini; and eliminating spaghetti carbonara at Caffe Macs. We’re not sure if it had carbon in it, but better safe than sorry.
We’ve also cut our overall greenhouse gas emissions by 55 percent since 2015, which may not seem that long ago, but that is the year in which Marty McFly traveled to the future and it’s now the past, which is really doing my head in. Remind me to talk to Phil about the status of our flying car project.
None of this is to pat ourselves on the back: there’s still a lot of work left to be done. While we’ve accomplished a lot over the last decade and a half, eking out those last few bits of carbon is where the pedal really meets the (hopefully carbon-free) metal.
Unfortunately, the most significant remaining source of carbon in our business is the one that may prove most difficult to mitigate: our people. Despite our best efforts, 100 percent of Apple employees remain carbon-based lifeforms.
We’ve had a number of high-level meetings on this topic, and have discussed many bold ideas, from outfitting all employees with solar-panel-equipped headwear to encouraging them to utilize treadmills during the workday to power their devices. I have had to inform Johnny Srouji multiple times that we cannot simply replace them with Apple Silicon-based employees. He’s…uncomfortably enthusiastic about the prospect.
So this does present a challenge for us, one that we must all rise to confront, although more the rest of Apple’s workforce than me personally. Reducing carbon is a necessity, something that we must undertake in order to save the environment that we have ruined, and the only way to do that is to remove ourselves from the equation, as dispassionately as possible. I have personally promised that starting in 2025 I will replace my personal jet trips with Spatial FaceTime calls via Apple Vision Pro. Or, failing that, conversations conducted entirely via Genmoji. And Apple Park already isn’t stocking my preferred Diet Mountain Dew—we tried to decarbonate it, but frankly, it was disgusting. Not, as it turns out, unlike regular Diet Mountain Dew.
But this isn’t something I can do alone. 2025 will mark the year that we finally begin this latest transition. Fortunately, we’ve been through plenty before: from 68k to PowerPC to Intel to Apple Silicon, from Mac OS to Mac OS X to macOS to iPhone Software to iOS to iPadOS…you get the picture.
Ultimately, it comes down to a choice: we can either choose to foster our lifelong commitment to Apple intelligence or our 2024 commitment to Apple Intelligence. I know which one I’d choose, and I think you do too. Yes, it’s definitely the one you’re thinking of. We all agree.
So, a happy new year to you all, and thanks for all the hard work that you’ve done for both Apple and this world that we all share, even if I get to see much more of it than you do—have I mentioned my private jet? I look forward to a revolutionary 2025 with those of you that embrace our new radical decarbonization process. Well, those that survive anyway.
Best,
Tim
[Dan Moren is the East Coast Bureau Chief of Six Colors, as well as an author, podcaster, and two-time Jeopardy! champion. You can find him on Mastodon at @dmoren@zeppelin.flights or reach him by email at dan@sixcolors.com. His latest novel, the sci-fi spy thriller The Armageddon Protocol, is out now.]
It’s time for the 11th Annual Upgradies! Myke and Jason discuss their favorites of 2024, take the input of many Upgradians, and hand out awards in numerous categories! Only the finest will walk away with the most coveted of titles: Upgradies Winner.
A surprise hit, this Vince Vaughn vehicle on Apple TV+ is based on a Carl Hiaasen novel of the same name, following Florida cop Andrew Yancey—suspended from duty for…reasons—as he gets embroiled in a fishy case after a fisherman finds a severed arm. This is one of my favorite sub-genres of crime stories: darkly funny, wildly eccentric, and full of colorful characters. There is a monkey, but it’s not about the monkey…or is it?
Standout performances go to Jodie Turner-Smith (also electric this year in the much more uneven Star Wars show The Acolyte) as the Dragon Queen and Meredith Hagner as the “bereaved” widow Eve. There’s also a great sub-plot involving Saturday Night Live veteran Alex Moffat as a floundering real-estate agent.
While this season tells a perfectly concluded story, I’m glad to hear that the show will be returning for season two…my only question is whether or not the monkey will return too.—Dan Moren
Star Trek: Lower Decks Season 5
I do feel bad for Star Trek: Prodigy which had its second, and potentially final season this year, and Star Trek: Discovery which also came to a kind of sputtering finish, but Lower Decks is the one I love the most. Yep, a 2D animated cartoon by one of the Rick and Morty guys. Little did I know how much I would miss it. If you didn’t get the chance to check it out there’s five great seasons, with only a handful of episodes that could have been better. That’s an outstanding run for a Star Trek show, or any show for that matter. The fact that it’s an animated show means they can also do things that the live action Treks can’t. Something they’ve taken full advantage of over the years, and especially this season.—Joe Rosensteel
Silo
The first season of Apple TV+’s adaptation of Hugh Howey’s viral self-published “Wool” series was unexpectedly great. Season two is a change of pace, quite literally, as the outcome of the first season leads to a split storyline for season two. While some might resist the natural slowdown in pacing—parceling out two stories necessarily means slowing things down—the intrigue continued, new characters came to the fore, and the mystery of the Silo deepened. Rebecca Ferguson, Tim Robbins, Common, and Steve Zahn (!) all gave great performances this season.—Jason Snell
Superman & Lois
The fourth and final season of the CW’s take on the man of steel also marks the end of the Arrowverse, the twelve years of DC comics shows on the network. (Even though Superman & Lois itself is technically only Arrowverse-adjacent—don’t at me.) It seems appropriate that a venture that started depicting a B-level, powerless vigilante should culminate with the most iconic and powerful of superheroes.
The last season is heavy on the pathos and family drama, while also doing its own spin on one of the most infamous Superman storylines. But one of the show’s strengths is its humanistic portrayal of Clark, a refreshing antidote to the distant and seemingly unfeeling god of the recent DC movies. There’s also an excellent menacing performance by Michael Cudlitz as a decidedly different kind of Lex Luthor, and the show is, as always, anchored by fantastic performances from Tyler Hoechlin and Bitsie Tulloch as the titular couple. If you don’t find yourself getting weepy in the show’s closing minutes, then you may be carved of stone.—DM
Shōgun
The show of the year might be FX and Disney+’s Shōgun, a sprawling epic of feudal Japan. That it was this good is something of a miracle, given that it’s an American adaptation of a James Clavell novel previously adapted into a popular (but questionable) 80s ministeries starring Richard Chamberlain. But by leaning heavily into Japanese creators and collaborators, the show really blossomed. Hiroyuki Sanada’s character of Toranaga becomes the true central character, with the Anjin (Cosmo Jarvis in the Chamberlain part) and Mariko (the unforgettable Anna Sawai) not having to carry the weight that the characters did in the original adaptation. I read the book, watched the original miniseries, and wondered why they bothered trying to make this. But the creative team, led by Rachael Kondo and Justin Marks (the creator of all-time classic Counterpart) nailed it. What a wonderful ride.—JS
Monsieur Spade
A one-off miniseries following Dashiell Hammett’s iconic sleuth, Sam Spade, who has retired to France in the 1960s. Having taken up the pastoral life, he’s dragged back into his old profession after a brutal murder at a convent leaves him watching over one of the only witnesses, a teenage girl with whom he has a past. The story unfolds in traditional convoluted film noir fashion, interspersed with Spade’s own personal demons and—surprisingly enough—French politics of the era.
If all of that isn’t enough to get you in the door, the show’s anchored by a great performance from Clive Owen as the retired sleuth and the behind the scenes creators include Scott Frank (Oscar nominated for his screenplays for Out of Sight and Logan) and Tom Fontana (Homicide: Life on the Street, Oz). It’s an absolutely fabulous looking show too; shot with a cinematic look and feel to it. And with just six episodes, it’s tightly constructed—taut with not too many frills, appropriate for Spade himself.—DM
The Traitors U.S.
The Traitors is a reality competition show that’s shot in a Scottish castle, with a host who comes dressed in kilts, tartans and tweeds. How is that reality? Well, what we call reality TV is anything but, and I mostly give the genre a pass. But this show, whose second US season aired this year, is fun, suspenseful and delightfully campy. The Traitors divides contestants into “faithfuls” and “traitors.” No one knows who is who, and it’s the faithfuls job to find and evict the traitors, one by one, all while the traitors gather as a group to “murder” one faithful each night. It’s hosted by the spectacular Alan Cumming, playing his part as lord of the manor to the hilt. This year’s installment brought together reality contestants from Big Brother, Survivor, the Bachelor, the Real Housewives franchises, and more, to murder and be murdered, scheme and play silly games. The first season featured a mix of normies and reality stars, but leaving out the civilians this year turned the drama and charisma on display up several notches. I know it’s true because I was only familiar with two of the contestants, as they’re past players on the only other reality show I watch, Big Brother (which also had a great 2024 season). I had no idea I would be rooting for a Real Housewife to win the game. The Traitors is an international phenomenon, with franchises in the UK, Canada, New Zealand and Australia, all reputed to be great fun. The new US season, with more reality stars already announced, debuts next month on Peacock.—Shelly Brisbin
Movies
Man’s Castle
The May release of Man’s Castle (1933) on Blu-ray says everything about why I collect physical media. I’m a classic film obsessive, and streamers can’t be trusted to show some movies I want to see. And when a rare gem like Frank Borzage’s Man’s Castle gets restored because an intrepid film historian found nine previously deleted minutes of the film, physical media is where I’ll be able to see those new scenes. It’s a 4K restoration from the original 35 mm nitrate negative, and it looks and sounds great. Man’s Castle is a precode film, so when it was rereleased in the post-code late 1930s, these minutes were very sloppily edited out, because of racy dialog and even some suggestive images of the leads skinny-dipping. The film is a Depression-era saga of a couple, living hand-to mouth, under a bridge. He is the youngest Spencer Tracy you’ve probably ever seen, and she is the winsome Loretta Young, who you will root for throughout. Beautifully and sensitively directed by Borzage, it’s a true discovery that you can’t see on your favorite streaming service.—SB
Books
Karla’s Choice
It’s one thing to fill the shoes of a literary giant—it’s another when it’s also your dad. Noted sci-fi author Nick Harkaway switches genres to pick up the mantle of his father, legendary spy scribe John Le Carré, who passed away in 2020. The result is Karla’s Choice, which brings back Le Carré’s most indelible protagonist, spymaster George Smiley (most memorably portrayed on TV and in film respectively by dual icons Alec Guinness and Gary Oldman).
Set in the previously unexamined period between Le Carré’s breakout hit The Spy Who Came in From the Cold and his equally acclaimed Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy, the book finds Smiley, haunted by the fallout of the former story, having left the employ of British intelligence agency the Circus and attempting to patch up his tempestuous marriage. When a would-be assassin shows up to kill a seemingly random literary agent, Smiley is pulled back into the shadows. The result is a labyrinthine tale of loss and secrets, conjured in an impeccable Le Carré style—with just enough of Harkaway’s own tone injected to play to his strengths. —DM
Service Model
I’m picking Adrian Tchaikovsky’s Service Model. It can be picked up as an ebook, which makes it technology, but I really wanted to highlight it for the subject matter, which is also technology. More importantly, the use (or misuse) of technology in a former, stratified society. The book is from the perspective of a robot valet that needs to go on a quest through the decaying, dystopian remains of human civilization. You wouldn’t believe it from that bleak description, but it’s also very funny.—JR
[This was also my favorite book of the year. —JS]
Penric & Desdemona series
This year I ripped through the 12 novellas and one novel of Lois McMaster Bujold’s Penric and Desdemona series. These are high fantasy stories, which aren’t usually my favorite, but Bujold is such a great writer—her Vorkosigan Saga series is must-read sci-fi—that I had been meaning to jump into this series, and I’m so glad I did.
The simple version: Penric is a young man who, largely by accident, ends up being inhabited by a demon, which he eventually names Desdemona. Demons aren’t fundamentally evil in this world, and Penric and Desdemona end up as both sides of an buddy action/comedy duo in a single body as they navigate a world of violence, magic, and tragedy. Just as Bujold sketched the lives of her Vorkosigan series characters from youth through old age, she also lets us watch Penric grow from callow youth to well-seasoned veteran. And since most of these stories are novellas, they’re bite sized, so you can read as many as you want. Me, I couldn’t stop. I read them all.—JS
Grave Expectations
I like a good mystery with some supernatural elements, and Alice Bell’s debut novel Grave Expectations manages to hit both of those genres with a solid dose of hilarity. Claire is ekeing out a paltry living as a medium, “haunted” by the ghost of her friend, Sophie, who disappeared when the two were in high school. She’s hired to do a seance at an English country house for a particularly eccentric family, and is surprised to discover the grounds are haunted by the ghost of someone murdered there the previous year.
Naturally, they investigate. If you were to wonder if hijinks would ensue, yes, yes they do. I honestly found this one of the funniest books I’ve read in years—it’s pretty rare that I laugh out loud while reading, but I did during this book. Several times. It’s the perfect cross of ghost story and murder mystery, not too dark despite its subject matter, and Claire is an appealing if flawed protagonist.—DM
Podcasts
A Very Good Year
How do you talk about movies from every era of cinema? If you’re the hosts of A Very Good Year, you organize each podcast episode around a guest and a specific year of moviemaking, from the ancient classic era, to modern times. Jason Bailey and Mike Hull are enthusiastic movie fans, but they rely on guests, who range from filmmakers and actors to critics and film bloggers, to choose five films from the year they’ve picked, and explain why they’re great, or just favorites. The top fives are surrounded by a short news segment for the chosen year, and a lightning round where the group chews over award-winners and other significant films of the year. The format is lively and engaging, and the hosts have lots of opinions, both good and bad, about the movies they cover. And they can be kind of foul-mouthed, too, if you care about that. The guys at A Very Good Year retired the show this year, promising a new show in 2025.—SB
The Rest Is History
Late last year I discovered Goalhanger’s The Rest is History podcast and the rest—well, you know. It became my most listened-to podcast of 2024. Hosted by two British historians, it’s podcasting exactly the way I like it: two personalities who feed off one another as they tell gripping stories from the past. Both Tom Holland and Dominic Sandbrook have good senses of humor (“That definitely happened, didn’t it?”) and pick a refreshingly broad range of topics, including wonderful series about Montezuma and the Aztecs, the roots of the French Revolution, Custer and the battle of Little Big Horn, and the conquest of Britain by the Romans. I can’t recommend it highly enough.—JS
Apple teases an Apple TV event of some kind, but new hardware won’t be coming until later in the year. And for a company that loves accessibility, it sure seems determined to make iPhone screens too big for a lot of people to use comfortably.
Remember, remember, the fourth and fifth of Janvember
Apple’s images have a tagline that says “See for yourself,” but it isn’t clear what Apple has planned.
Could it be another “day we’ll never forget”? Eh, probably not. And we already kind of forgot that one, to be honest. Speculation revolves around either a free trial period for TV+ or a preview of upcoming shows. Personally, I hope it’s an open draft. Put your name in and you can be cast in Severance, Slow Horses, Silo or one of the other hit shows on Apple TV+ that starts with an ‘S’.
I’d love to be a sec unit in an upcoming season of “Murderbot”.
But, yeah, it’s probably just a preview.
Apple TV minus
Speaking of Apple’s TV offerings, the current batch of rumors indicated that we can expect to see a brand new Apple TV device some time in 2025.
Did they add another K when I wasn’t looking? I can’t even use all the Ks I have now. Not with my eyesight.
It’s actually not entirely clear what a new Apple TV would provide. Mark Gurman has speculated it would have a faster Wi-Fi and Bluetooth chip and possibly a built-in camera. That doesn’t seem like it’ll drive a lot of upgrades.
But what if it also had a faster chip? That, presumably, would be capable of running Apple Intelligence? Picture this: Image Playground on the big screen!
Nah, I’m good.
OK, fine, how about a cheaper Apple TV? Ming-chi Kuo says he believes Apple will once again ship a sub-$100 Apple TV unit. As long as it doesn’t run Apple Intelligence, I’ll take ten.
If you see a Pop Socket, they blew it
Apple may have canceled its truly small smartphone, but it still somehow makes the best small smartphone, according to some.
Just imagine how much better of a best small smartphone of 2024 it would have been if it had been even smaller. Say… mini, for example.
I know. It’s a ridiculous idea. Whoever heard of a small smartphone?
What’s hilarious to me is that I distinctly recall a bunch of people trying to argue that Apple used a large-handed hand model to advertise the original iPhone in order to make it look smaller, because people were arguing it was too big. Now everyone wants phones the size of dinner plates.
Well, at least Apple is surely taking this success as a sign that it got it juuust right and can slow down on relentlessly making the next iteration of every iPhone ever bigger and bigger.
The iPhone 17 could measure in at 6.3 inches, up from 6.1 inches…
PFFFFFFFFT.
iPhone sizes will continue to increase and morale can get bent, apparently.
With the iPhone 17 Air expected to be in the 6.5 to 6.6-inch range, that jabs the thumb even further into the eye of those of us who prefer smaller phones. Come 2026, the smallest phone Apple will be selling is likely to be the 6.1-inch iPhone SE 4.
Looks like I picked a bad year to get back on the Upgrade Program.
And to stop sniffing glue.
Ha, like I could stop sniffing glue.
It’s only Elmer’s, though. I just love the smell of it.
[John Moltz is a Six Colors contributor. You can find him on Mastodon at Mastodon.social/@moltz and he sells items with references you might get on Cotton Bureau.]
My thanks to 1Password for sponsoring Six Colors this week.
The folks at 1Password recently attended the RSA conference in San Francisco and were struck by how infatuated everyone was with the promise of new, shiny solutions to fix new, shiny problems.
But there are a lot of non-shiny, foundational problems still out there. In the 2024 Verizon Data Breach Investigations Report, accidental breaches caused by human error or victimization in phishing attacks was the number one cause of breaches. The same was true last year, and the year before that, and the year before that. The single biggest culprit in breaches continues to be weak and stolen credentials.
“Raiders of the Lost Ark” is one of my favorite movies (and Steven Spielberg’s best, in my opinion), but I never knew about this “loose end” until I read about it in a compilation of deleted scenes:
A plot element involving the Ark of the Covenant was cut from the film and is only hinted at during the finale when the Ark is opened. Basically, there were 2 rules about the Ark not mentioned in the final cut of the film:
If you touch the Ark, you die.
If you look at the Ark when it is opened, you die.
This is first explained in additional dialogue for the scene when Indy and Sallah visit Imam. Before translating the writings on the headpiece that give the height of the Staff of Ra, Imam warns Indy not to touch the Ark or look at it when it is opened….
Notice that nobody ever touches the Ark throughout the rest of the film until the finale.
This scene is screenwriting 101 in that it properly sets up the rules of the Ark, so that when Indy shouts, “Don’t look at it, Marion!” at the film’s climax (spoilers for a 43-year-old movie, I guess) we understand why.
But Steven Spielberg had gone way beyond Screenwriting 101, even in 1981. He knew there was literally no need to include these rules, which turn the Ark from an unknowable supernatural object into something more mundane. And so that scene is cut out, and at the fateful moment when the Ark is opened by Belloq and a crew of Nazi officers, noted archaeologist Dr. Indiana Jones just knows that he and Marion need to close their eyes and not look upon the fiery judgment of the God of the Old Testament.
Here it comes, barreling down on us full steam: 2025. Somehow we’ve already burned through a quarter of this century. It’s been a good twenty-five years for Apple, to be sure, and from all the early indications it seems like the next year will continue the trend, insofar as such things can be predicted with any certainty.
While there are plenty of rumors about what Apple might do in the next twelve months, the simple truth is that the company only has so much time and so much money. (To be fair, it is a lot of money.) Not everything can be a priority, and not everything that gets talked about will actually end up happening.
Even amongst the things that do happen, there are always some that will stand out in terms of their impact for the company—and for its customers. In looking ahead to 2025, there I’m thinking of a few that are most likely to be the kind with ramifications that move the needle—even if, in some cases, it may take a little time for the true effects to be felt.
Our likelihood of investing in smart home tech with Apple’s entry, our technology goals for 2025, our end/start of year tech rituals, and predictions for how technology will improve the world in 2025.
Down the chimney comes Tim Goodman, reuniting with Jason to discuss his super-secret insider TV reviews, streaming’s influence in the rise of international TV here in the U.S., and Jason’s top TV shows of the year.
One of my persistent quests over the years has been making it easy to access all my devices no matter where I am. I’ve played with everything from SSH and SFTP to remote screen sharing and VPNs. 2024 was the year I added a new tool to the mix: Tailscale.
The idea of Tailscale is that you create your own little network that all your devices can connect to (it accomplishes this using VPN technology). You can also set up any of your devices to be an “exit node,” so, for example, if you’re surfing the web from a café, you can set it up so that your connection is routed through your Mac mini sitting at home. Plus it lets you access any of the machines on your little network, so it’s easy if you need to retrieve a file or do something on your home Mac.
Tailscale is free, works with any platform—including everything from your iPhone to your Apple TV to your Synology—and is relatively easy to set up. As someone who has more devices than is probably wise, it’s a great little utility for making sure they can always talk to each other. —Dan Moren
Shareshot
For a couple of months each year, framing iOS screenshots is a major task on my to-do list. My book about iOS accessibility features 175 or so. I’ve used various shortcuts over the years to place device frames around the shots I take. Some worked better than others, and most performed the basic task of framing one or more screenshots, hopefully allowing me to create an easy workflow from phone to computer to book document.
This year, I was happily surprised to come upon Shareshot. It’s an iOS app (not a shortcut) that frames your screenshots according to several parameters, and based on the device that took the screenshot. Employ a shadow, a simulated spotlight, a small, medium or large amount of white space – there are many ways to make your screenshots look just the way you want them. It’s a slick, professional app.
Since the product is new, there are features that have yet to be implemented, like support for placing multiple screenshots side-by-side. But the current version has already come a long way in the few short months it’s been available. A surprise bonus for me was the innovative way the developer supports VoiceOver accessibility. Any app can tell you which settings are on and off, as you flick across them. But with Shareshot, tapping your screenshot gives you a full description of everything you’ve done to it within the app. That’s very innovative.
It’s also worth mentioning that when I reached out to the developer about some screen contrast issues I had with Shareshot, he quickly responded, and sought further information about my issue. Two thumbs, way up.—Shelly Brisbin
Sleeve
I discovered quite a few nifty Mac utilities this year, and Sleeve remains in constant use on my desktop. It’s a $6 utility that displays what’s currently playing in Apple Music or (if you prefer) Spotify. I’ve permanently parked a widget on the bottom left corner of my display, showing the currently playing tack. Sleeve also adds global hotkeys for play/pause and volume control, and even scrobbles to Last.fm! I just like seeing pretty album art and song information on my desktop, though.—Jason Snell
A Better Route Planner (ABRP)
My husband and I began our electric car journey this year. We started, as nerds naturally do, by hunting down apps we could use with our new Kia EV6. One of our favorites is ABRP, which will plan routes, based on charging locations between your starting point and destination, and the range of your specific car. You can set parameters, like the speed or provider of a charging station, and you can save routes for future use. This year, ABRP got a big boost in CarPlay integration, making it easy to follow routes from the driver’s seat. You’ll also get efficiency data for your charging and driving experiences, which is especially welcome if you’re just getting comfortable with how measuring EV efficiency differs from the same task for gas-powered cars. There are also all sorts of live data feeds you can use to connect to other EV drivers, if you want them. ABRP was acquired by Rivian late last year. So far, that’s meant rapid feature improvements, no matter what EV you drive, but there are a few Rivian-specific features that seem interesting, too.—SB
SwiftBar 2
On January 2, one of my very favorite Mac utilities got a 2.0 update: SwiftBar. This utility lets you put anything in your menu bar, making it a great place to stash ambient data. The 2.0 update added support for plugins fed by Shortcuts, making it even more accessible to people who aren’t comfortable feeding data via pretty much anything that runs via the command line. I use SwiftBar to display my local weather data, my solar data, and even my podcast live-stream stats. But it can pretty much do anything you want. And it’s free and open source.-JS
Runestone
2024 marked the release of the Apple Vision Pro, and while I don’t think I’m going to award anything to a $3500 developer kit, I do want to praise it as a tool that’s remarkably good at certain tasks, including letting me write in complete isolation. On iPadOS, my text editor of choice is 1Writer, but it only works on the Vision Pro in iPad compatibility mode—and the text rendering in that mode is inferior to native visionOS apps.
Enter Simon Støvring’s Runestone, an open-source visionOS (and iOS and iPadOS) text editor that supports Markdown. It’s pretty bare bones, but it does the job. I’ve written thousands of words on my Vision Pro, and almost all of them have been in an immersive environment while using Runestone.—JS
Star Wars: Outlaws
For me, it’s not a year-end list if there’s not something Star Wars on it. For years I wanted an immersive Star Wars game, one where I could run around on a planet, dealing with stormtroopers or scoundrels, then hop in my starship and take off for space-based combat. Star Wars: Outlaws finally delivers on that, all couched in a fun story about minor criminal Kay Vess and her journey to becoming a serious player in the galaxy. Is it wonky at times? Sure, though patches have fixed a lot of the most egregious issues. And it does, as many AAA games do these days, suffer a bit from over-collectible-ization, but nothing has come closer to the feel of being immersed in a galaxy far, far away.—DM
Balatro
I spent most of this year playing Marvel Snap, but the release of Balatro on the iOS App Store and Apple Arcade broke me out of that rut in a hurry. Balatro is a card game that’s modeled on poker, but that doesn’t do it justice: it’s a roguelike game where you face increasing challenges that you can only surmount by modifying the rules with a series of jokers, and by using your earned cash to change your deck and alter the payout math. Once you lose, all that work is wiped clean and you must start again, which isn’t as bad as it sounds since it basically leads you to explore different winning strategies based on the jokers that come your way. It’s exactly what I want from a game: you can play a session pretty quickly, but there’s always another challenge the next time you sit down to play.—JS
Disney+ for Vision Pro
I feel like I need to praise the third-party visionOS app I’ve probably spent the most time in: Disney+. There are other streaming apps for visionOS, but none (other than Apple’s own TV app) offer the breadth of 3-D content that Disney+ offers. (C’mon, Max, where are the 3-D movies?) Disney also offers some pretty amazing immersive environments for you to watch movies in, including Marvel and Star Wars worlds. My only real complaint is that they’re so good, they should be available as environments throughout visionOS… but Apple is the one who needs to make that visionOS feature happen.—JS
To celebrate the season we discuss Christmas lights, tech gifts, favorite holiday food items, holiday TV and movies, and answer some holiday-themed listener questions. Happy holidays to all Upgradians!
The rumor-mill crystal ball could use some polishing, nobody wants AI, and Apple canceled a new way to take your money? Does that sound right at all?
Outlook hazy
You love your iPad, right? You would never do anything… unnatural to it. Like… folding it, would you? Seems like shenanigans like that would void the warranty.
DSCC also expects an 18.8-inch foldable iPad Pro…
That’s a big iPad. No wonder it needs to be folded. The rumored device is expected in either 2027 or 2028. So probably more like 2029. Or never.
Also, did we say it was an iPad? That may not be right.
Rumors have been unclear on whether the upcoming foldable device will be an iPad or a Mac, but either is feasible depending on what operating system Apple opts to go with.
Used to be when you had rumors of an Apple product they at least knew what the product was. These days, they make the rumors out of nothing. Just like the burgers.
I just imagine Apple working on stuff and going “Is this anything?”
Tim Cook: “Oh, wow. What is this?”
Johny Srouji: “It’s an iPad.”
Tim Cook: …
Johny Srouji: “Or… or a Mac. Um… what do you think it should be?”
Well, at least we know what the iPhone 17 will look like.
Finally, rumors say new Vision products, both Pro and the non-Pro version which I’m calling “Vision Amateur”, will be coming in 2026. And, get this, both will feature lower prices, not just the Vision Amateur, as Apple broadens its list of parts suppliers. Turns out those economies? They scale. Who knew?
Yes, it’s a survey run by a site that buys and sells used phones. Which is not always the best place to get reliable information. But it’s probably at least directionally correct. So, why aren’t people excited about AI? Despite Tim Cook’s repeated insistence that he loooves the summarization feature and uses it all the time, not everyone is as enamored.
OK, yes, Apple Intelligence did suggest that the alleged murderer of the CEO of United Healthcare killed himself. But what about all the people it didn’t incorrectly say killed themselves? No one ever mentions them.
According to Bloomberg, Apple would have charged you directly for your iPhone on a monthly basis instead of using a loan issued by a bank. Tim Cook will have to look for other ways to satiate the god he pledged his undying fealty to all those years ago.
While Apple will not be directly servicing those loans, at least it appears it also won’t be directly impacted by tariffs imposed by the incoming administration, according to Deepwater Management.
Make no mistake, increased tariffs are coming for many manufacturers, but Apple and Tesla will be spared high tariffs – Trump doesn’t want Tesla to lose to BYD or Apple to lose to Samsung.
Oh. Yayyy. Turns out sucking up pays off. Thank goodness the system works.
[John Moltz is a Six Colors contributor. You can find him on Mastodon at Mastodon.social/@moltz and he sells items with references you might get on Cotton Bureau.]
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[As the year comes to a close, those of us who write for Six Colors have decided to share some of our favorite things of the past year. First up: our favorite hardware.]
iPhone 16
Apple’s most advanced features always debut on the high-end phones, differentiating them from the rest, and tempting buyers to upgrade as soon as, or even before, their budgets might dictate. But the speed with which Apple lets features trickle down, even from one year’s Pro/Max iPhone lineup to the very next year’s non-Pros, tells an interesting story for those who keep a phone for two years or more, and/or who opted for an iPhone 16 or 16 Plus this year..
Let’s make a short list, shall we? If you own an iPhone 13 or 14, the non-Pro 16 models give you all of these hardware upgrades at once: USB-C, the Action Button, the Dynamic Island, and Camera Control. Of course, the chips are faster, the cameras are better, and you’re all set to take spatial video, too. Even if you got an iPhone 15 last year, and buttons are your thing, Camera Control and the Action button would be new for you this year, but the upgrade certainly is a mite less compelling than the two+ year cycle.
Let that sink in for a second. That’s two years worth of formerly Pro updates packed into a phone that’s cheaper than this year’s Pro by hundreds of dollars, with a physical size and weight that reminds some of us why the non-Pro phones feel better in hand or purse. And if you’re a die-hard Pro user whose upgrade cycle is more than a year, the 16 Pro or Max still packs a pleasing punch, what with a lighter titanium frame, and many of the hardware updates already mentioned. —Shelly Brisbin
iPhone 16 Pro
I’m in complete agreement with Shelly that the iPhone 16 series is a great one. I know it’s less exciting, year-over-year, for people that update their iPhones often, but I went from an iPhone 13 Pro to an iPhone 16 Pro. The only way to go was up. The promised features of Apple Intelligence didn’t play a role in my decision to purchase, but the ability to edit the new Photographic Styles after taking a photo has been a huge benefit. Like a lot of people, my iPhone is the primary camera in my life, and this is the best iPhone camera that they’ve ever made. Camera Control is not exactly delivering on its promise, but it really doesn’t hurt what I would otherwise be doing an iPhone. It’s a really great piece of hardware over all, despite what my complaints about software would indicate. —Joe Rosensteel
Mac mini
When I bought my M2 Pro Mac mini in 2023, I felt confident that it would be good enough to last me for several years to come. But that longevity has proved to be a double-edged sword as I found myself extremely envious of this year’s M4 Mac mini. It’s compact, it’s powerful, and it has ports on the front. All of a sudden, that old M2 Pro Mac mini is an albatross hanging from my neck! Which would be much easier if it were an M4 Mac mini, because it’s so much lighter.
Apple doesn’t update the Mac mini very often—this is the first major form factor redesign in more than a decade—and it’s good to see the little computer get some attention. With the M4 version, Apple’s made what is likely the best (certainly most versatile) desktop Mac in years. The good news is that if previous incarnations are any indication, this form factor’s going to stick around. —Dan Moren
M4 MacBook Pros
Has there ever been a time when Apple has been as on top of its game with Mac laptops as right now? The Macbook Air is great, yes, and this year’s M4 MacBook Pro is also spectacularly good at what it does. After two updates last year, the MacBook Pro got another update this year, and it really shines. The slight holdover flaws got corrected: The stripped-down base model MacBook Pro is no longer the Space Gray sheep of the family, as it’s got the same color options and flexible ports (Thunderbolt on both sides is key) as the higher-end models. The M4 chip is fast enough for it to be truly called “pro,” too. At at the high end, the chip performance just kept getting better. My ultimate endorsement: I bought my first MacBook Pro ever this year, and it was the M4 Max model, which is now my primary computer in all contexts. -—Jason Snell
Magic Keyboard for M4 iPad Pro
Nothing was so transformative to the iPad’s productivity cred as the introduction of the original Magic Keyboard for iPad in 2020. But it had flaws, most notably the omission of a function key row. The 2024 Magic Keyboard for iPad Pro adds that row, and a matched aluminum keyboard frame for a more premium laptop feel. Most of the summer, I’m writing things in my backyard with the iPad Pro perched on my lap, and this keyboard is the perfect companion for the thin M4-powered iPad Pro. Apple’s ultimate portable productivity machine isn’t the MacBook Air, it’s the iPad equipped with this accessory.—JS
AirPods Pro as OTC hearing aids
Are a built-in hearing test and the ability to function as hearing aids the mark of a new product category, or simply a tacked-on feature for a popular set of earbuds? Well, that depends on whether you have noticeable hearing loss, and it especially depends on whether you learned about that hearing loss from taking a test with your AirPods Pro 2. Apple rightly touts these hearing features as an important move into a health category that matters tremendously to more and more people. And many of those people are self-conscious about advertising their hearing loss with a hearing aid, or they’re wary of spending thousands of dollars for a prescription model. This is the landscape Apple entered this fall when hearing features came to the already-available AirPods Pro. So if you had a pair, as I do, you simply waited for the software update and took a hearing test in the privacy of your home.
AirPods as hearing aids somehow feel like the most tangible medically-adjacent feature Apple provides. Your Apple Watch might save your life one day, but that’s an abstraction until something happens that forces you to focus on a scary experience. Many more people, with significant hearing loss and not, will take the AirPods Pro hearing test and learn something about their health. And maybe they’ll recommend these relatively inexpensive hearing aids, disguised as earbuds, to a friend or family member who struggles with a hearing loss they’d rather not talk about. Bonus: even if an AirPods Pro hearing test finds a very small hearing loss, the earbuds can tune themselves to make media listening easier, based on whatever hearing limitation you do have.—SB
Beats Studio Buds+
No, the “+” does not indicate a streaming service, and it wasn’t even released this year, but I did buy it on sale this year. As a kid that lived through the translucent plastic era of consumer electronics, how could I not? The Beats Studio Buds+ kind of sit between the regular AirPods and the AirPods Pro in certain ways. The active noise cancellation has been a dream when I need to run my desk fan, or drown out other noises that never cease.—JR
Lutron Caseta Diva Smart Dimmer
We did some work on our house this year, including adding a screened-in porch, and one thing I insisted upon for the porch lights and fan was HomeKit-compatible controls. We’d previously put in Lutron Caseta switches when we did our renovations after buying the house, and while they’ve been great, my one complaint was they look a bit nerdy with all the various buttons. Good news: Lutron is now also offering the Diva Smart Dimmer, which works just as well as the classic Caseta switches, but looks like your standard “paddle rocker” switch. I love these; they’re way easier to use by feel and they have a far sleeker look—they even work with the Pico remote if you need to control a light from multiple locations. I’d consider redoing all my lights with them if they weren’t a bit on the pricey side. (If you don’t need the dimmer functionality, the Claro gives you the same switch style but just for on and off.) —DM
Zoom HEssentials audio recorders
The Zoom H6essential audio recorder I wrote about in April is the rare sequel that improves on a great product. The H1Essential, H4Essential and H6Essential all take what were already excellent, affordable devices and give them a boost in features and usability. The recorders in the Essentials line are all handheld, and the H4E and H6E support connecting microphones, musical instruments, or plugging into a sound board. But all three offer pretty good stereo mics of their own, too. In these details, the Essential models are a lot like the devices they replace. But for around the same money, you now get 32-bit floating point recording, which prevents you from recording clipped audio. It’s a major value breakthrough for recorders at these price points. There’s a redesigned and simplified set of hardware buttons, and menus that are simpler, and easier to read. There’s also a talking interface if you need it, to make the devices more accessible. —SB
Eve Energy
Yes, I’m picking a Matter smart plug from two years ago. I feel like there’s very little incentive to rush out and buy new smart plugs when they’re released. We don’t ask much of our existing smart plugs, just that they work. Which is why when my WeMo plugs started misbehaving, I decided enough was enough and I treated myself to a couple 2 packs of Eve Energy smart plugs and haven’t looked back. I also replaced the old iHome plug that I used for my seasonal Christmas tree. Merry Christmas, you filthy smart home animals.—JR
