Ars Technica’s Dan Goodin has an excellent (if technical) rundown of a recently unearthed security vulnerability in Apple’s M-series processors. Basically there’s a system that tries to predict what memory addresses are going to be used in order to speed up processing, but Apple’s version can accidentally leak data:
The attack, which the researchers have named GoFetch, uses an application that doesn’t require root access, only the same user privileges needed by most third-party applications installed on a macOS system. M-series chips are divided into what are known as clusters. The M1, for example, has two clusters: one containing four efficiency cores and the other four performance cores. As long as the GoFetch app and the targeted cryptography app are running on the same performance cluster—even when on separate cores within that cluster—GoFetch can mine enough secrets to leak a secret key.
This particularly affects M1 and M2 series chips, with the M3 providing an option to disable the predictive system—albeit likely with a performance hit during cryptographic operations. Because the system is implemented in hardware, it can’t be patched by Apple—rather, apps that are performing cryptography would have to add additional layers of security in order to protect against it.
While the researchers only demonstrated the flaw on four different encryption algorithms, that’s enough to suggest that other cryptography is likely affected as well.
Ultimately, it may be up to Apple to mitigate this functionality for its M1 and M2 chips in software, though the company has not yet publicly commented on the flaw.
The U.S. Department of Justice, 15 states, and the District of Columbia sued Apple on Thursday. While I am not a lawyer, I’ve written extensively about Apple for 30 years and just read all 88 pages of the full complaint. Here are some initial reactions:
Defining a “monopoly.” Before we get to some of the details of Apple’s specific anti-competitive behavior, it’s worth noting that this suit is charging Apple with violations of the Sherman antitrust act, which is meant to specifically regulate monopolies. Things that are legal for regular companies to do become illegal when monopolies do them.
Part of this document, then, has to establish that Apple holds monopoly power over a specific market. Given that Apple’s share of the U.S. smartphone market is about 60 percent, how can it be called a monopoly? The DoJ attempts to square this circle in a few different ways:
It uses revenue instead of unit sales, pointing out that Apple and Samsung combined hold 90 percent of the U.S. smartphone market by revenue.
It creates a new sub-market, the “Performance Smartphone,” which pushes Apple up to about 70 percent of the market in terms of unit sales.
It accuses Apple of attempting to create a monopoly through its various business tactics, which is also illegal.
Questions I would ask about this approach: Can you add in Samsung, find a number starting in ninety, and declare something a monopoly? Is revenue share how monopolies are defined? Can you draw borders on a product category in a beneficial way in order to declare it a new market?
Apple’s position in the U.S. market is certainly strong, but regardless of how you view its behavior, it will be interesting to see if the DoJ can make a convincing case that Apple is actually a monopoly, given the presence of Samsung and Google in the market.
Suppressing cross-platform technologies is key. One of the DoJ’s primary arguments is that Apple has reduced competition by making it hard for developers to deploy cross-platform software—in other words, software that works the same on both iOS and Android. This, in turn, makes it harder for iPhone users to switch to Android, which reduces competition.
Among the examples it cites:
“Super apps,” which provide multiple kinds of functionality and mini-apps within a single app container, written in HTML and JavaScript. WeChat is never named, but its ubiquity in China is alluded to, and the argument is that it’s a reason that Chinese users can switch phone platforms more easily.
Cloud streaming games, which make the power of smartphone hardware less relevant, thereby freeing consumers to buy cheaper, low-powered phones and still play games.
Messaging apps not being able to have access to incoming SMS messages. (Yep, I was surprised too.) The argument is that because incoming text messages come to the Messages app, Apple is feeding users into its own chat app ecosystem and putting other messaging apps at a disadvantage.
Smartwatches, specifically access to the iPhone for non-Apple smartwatches. The DoJ says that by not allowing third-party watches access to messages and the ability to maintain consistent connections to the iPhone, Apple is suppressing competition in the smartwatch market and making it harder to switch. In theory, if you could buy a competitor to the Apple Watch and use it on the iPhone, you could then later switch to Android without a penalty.
Digital wallets. By controlling the iPhone’s digital wallet tech, the suit alleges, Apple has increased “friction” in moving to a different smartphone platform, and denied users access to alternative wallets provided by their banks.
Apple’s total control is an issue. It’ll be familiar to anyone who has been following Apple’s adventures in Europe with the Digital Markets act, but another argument here is that Apple exerts its power over its platform to limit developers and users. This comes in numerous forms, including capricious and self-serving App Store policies and the failure to offer third-party access to APIs that Apple itself uses in its apps.
Apple’s only concerned about user security when it’s convenient. The document alleges that Apple talks a good game when it comes to privacy and security, but that it favors them when it’s convenient and not when it’s not. It calls Apple’s privacy and security justifications an “elastic shield that can stretch or contract” to serve Apple’s interests. The examples in the document include continuing to rely on the insecure SMS protocol for cross-platform texts and letting Google be the default search engine when more private options are available.
Lock-in will be on trial. Many of the DoJ arguments come down to this: Every feature that Apple builds that makes it harder to switch to an Android phone is fundamentally anticompetitive. It’s clear that the DoJ envisions a competitive smartphone market—or, if that doesn’t work, performance smartphone market—as one in which there’s as little friction as possible when jumping between platforms.
This would mean Apple offering third-party app access to features it currently keeps for itself. (One could argue that Apple’s behavior has already begun to change due to pressure, as it launched its new Journal app alongside an API that gives other apps access to the same data as its own app.) It also suggests that policies against game streaming and web apps would also come under scrutiny.
The DoJ congratulates itself. For me, the most unexpected part of the document was the DoJ’s explanation that Apple’s success as a company largely stems from… the DoJ itself. It points out that Apple’s resurgence early in this century was due to the release of the iPod, which only became a hit when it arrived on Windows. The DoJ argues that the iPod’s presence on Windows was only due to Microsoft being under a consent decree from the DoJ for monopolistic behavior.
I don’t know enough about the specifics of the Microsoft consent decree to weigh in on the idea that an unconstrained Microsoft would have made it impossible for Apple to make the iPod compatible with Windows. It’s a pretty big hypothetical, and I’m skeptical, but I’m impressed that the DoJ would try to place its current case within the larger DoJ Connected Universe.
A few howlers. Some arguments in the document seem silly. A section describes how Apple will use its sinister market powers to dominate the automotive industry by… inflicting CarPlay 2.0 on users? Not only is Apple struggling to get CarPlay into cars by major American manufacturers, but I’m not sure how better integrating our phones (which we love) into our car infotainment systems (which we frequently do not love) is some sort of tragic outcome. (Update: Nilay Patel of the Verge suggests the implication is that Apple won’t let carmakers support CarPlay in the future unless they let Apple take over the entire auto interface. That would certainly be a power move, but the DOJ will need to prove that for it to become more than another scary story told around a campfire.)
And then there’s the danger of Apple, tech giant, affecting “the flow of speech.” How, you might ask? The answer is Apple TV+, where Apple has committed the grave sin of “control[ling] content.” Be right back, gotta find some pearls to clutch.
United States v. The People of the United States. What strikes me most about this document is that people… like using the iPhone? This suit (joined by 16 other attorneys general, mostly of blue states) has a political element to it, in the sense of trying to send a message that your government is looking out for your rights and protecting you from big, bad tech companies.
What happens when that collides with a product that has extremely high customer satisfaction ratings? Those of us in the know are well aware of all the ways that Apple plays hardball, and understand that the company is so powerful that really the only way it will be convinced to change its ways is under threat of government intervention. But will American iPhone users feel like the government is on their side, in taking on an American tech giant that makes a product they actually enjoy using?
I doubt most regular people will get into the weeds with this stuff, but some of the depictions in the lawsuit really are topsy-turvy. Imagine trying to sell regular people on the idea that they’d be better off with a bunch of different banking apps implementing NFC payments in random ways, rather than using the Wallet system Apple built. No doubts the banks disliked it, and they certainly despise that Apple skims some money off of every transaction, but there’s no denying that Apple’s approach actually did favor the user… and that Apple used its power (or “monopoly power,” if you’re the DoJ) to force the banks to play ball.
This one issue seems like a microcosm of the entire case: Apple undoubtedly has huge market power, owing to its success in the market. Apple uses that power to make decisions that frequently benefit its users and enrich itself. (Sometimes it’s one or the other, but usually it’s some degree of both.) Is it illegal for Apple to use its power to improve the user experience? What about when it cuts itself in for some sweet Services revenue along the way? How do we tell the difference between real user benefit and phony benefit that’s really designed to allow Apple to exert its power and increase its profits?
It’s complicated. There’s some danger that Apple will no longer be able to make judgments that favor users, and that will degrade the user experience. But this is the same company that acts as if buying things on the Internet with a credit card is the height of dangerous behavior, when in fact it’s commonplace and safe. By mixing exertions of its control and power with notions of user benefit, it risks losing all of it.
What’s next? Again, not a lawyer. What I’ve learned in observing three decades of government interaction with tech is that the most likely outcome is one that doesn’t make a whole lot of sense. I could create a list of Apple behaviors that I consider to be anticompetitive and unfriendly to consumers, but many of them are barely touched on in this document.
So my prediction is that this will be a long, drawn-out process that will end up with Apple changing some of its policies. Some of those changes will be substantial and will alter how the company operates; others will be pointless and cause no appreciable effect; and still others will degrade the experience of iPhone users without increasing competition. Meanwhile, other Apple policies that stifle competition, degrade the user experience, and cost users money will just go on as usual, unchanged and unchallenged.
When I wrote about Apple’s new Sports app, I heard from several people who pointed out that maybe Eddy Cue had done his job a little too well. Apple’s SVP of Services told me that he was prioritizing speed, right down to measuring the lag between the scoreboard at the Warriors game he was attending and the current score in the Sports app.
The problem with that lag is that while radio and TV broadcasts are often a fraction of a second behind live action, streaming radio and TV broadcasts tend to be far, far behind the action. So far behind that Apple Sports was indicating made baskets in NBA games while the team was still coming up the floor with the ball. (I experienced this myself when a friend texted me to give condolences about the Super Bowl about 30 seconds before Kansas City scored in overtime to win it.)
Streaming lag is real. So real, in fact, that I just discovered a new setting in the Major League Baseball app that I had never seen before. Under Notifications, there’s a setting for Delayed Gameday Notifications. “Turning this on will delay live Gameday notifications by 30 Sec.,” reads the legend under the setting.
This is hilarious, and absolutely necessary. Many times, I’ve had game audio playing for an MLB game, only to notice that the Gameday play-by-play was way ahead of the action. It’s… not great!
In the long run, it would be nice if MLB could use some more advanced technologies to ensure that its data feeds and media feeds were running at the same pace—maybe take a page from what Apple’s doing with podcast transcripts? But offering to delay the data by 30 seconds so that the media stream can catch up is a great first step.
How we search online, our tips for minimizing vehicle data tracking, the GenAI features we’d like to see added to Apple’s platforms, and what features we’d want to see in a future iPad.
The M3 Air also adds support for Wi-Fi 6E, while the older M2 models only support Wi-Fi 6. The difference is real. On my home Internet connection, I was able to get 931 Mbps down and 813 MBps up via Wi-Fi, which is more or less the same speed as my wired connection to my router. In the same spot, my M2 Air could only manage 618 up and 700 down. I wouldn’t buy a new laptop just to have faster Wi-Fi—and keep in mind that you need to upgrade your router and possibly your home internet to take advantage of these speeds—but that’s the fastest Wi-Fi connection I’ve ever experienced.
Jason didn’t get that speed boost from an Apple-made wireless router, because Apple got out of making those long ago. He didn’t get that speed from a wireless router currently for sale at the Apple Store because the only two options are the Linksys Velop AX4200 WiFi 6 Mesh System, and AmpliFi Alien Router (with optional mesh extenders). Linksys does make a version of their Velop mesh network with 6E, but it’s not for sale through Apple.
Jason used an Eero 6E router, and wasted half a day trying to change his network topology to allow for it so he could see that speed difference.1
It seems like a great time for Apple to sell a friendly 6E router.
The thinking at the time was that Apple wasn’t really competitive in the market, just like they weren’t competitive in external displays, so why bother expending resources on such a thing? Other companies had the market covered, and most home Internet routers came with Wi-Fi, so why bother?2 Let Apple reserve its magic dust for something other than commodity hardware with thin margins.
I never agreed with that line of thinking, because networking underpins everything that Apple does care about. Every Mac, iPad, Apple TV, HomePod, Vision Pro, and most importantly every iPhone. The iPhone is a cellular device, but when you’re at home, you’re on your Wi-Fi network. If your iPhone and your wireless router aren’t playing well together than you are an unhappy person.
The performance, reliability, and ease of use of your home network really matters a lot to you, and everyone you share your home with, along with all of their devices. Just start counting everything in your home that’s on your Wi-Fi network right now.
When my AirPort Extreme died in 2019, I needed to replace it, and I didn’t need a mesh network, so I went with a terrible Wirecutter pick, the Netgear Nighthawk R7000, which would just periodically stop being on the internet until I hard-rebooted it. The Nighthawk’s design wasn’t from the Apple-aping school of rounded corners—it was presumably made by and for men who were Very Serious About The Internet, which is why it looked like something you might find in the Batcave.
When I moved to a home that needed a mesh solution, I was again disappointed in a product: the Eero, which occasionally has undiagnosable flaky moments, and always bumps one of my smart plugs off the network when it restarts after a software update.
We all love AirPort security
Let’s not forget about how your router figures into your security and privacy, which are both things Apple cares about. To get around sketchy networking, Apple has added iCloud Private Relay to operate on any network inside and outside your home. However, sometimes iCloud Private Relay doesn’t get along with a network, or a service. You have no recourse but to toggle it off, and see if the site works. Wouldn’t it be nice if there was a blessed Apple router in your home that iCloud Private Relay would always play nice with?
Apple also obfuscates your devices on a network, which is a great feature on untrusted networks. However, when I am at home, it sometimes decides to play Cold War spy games with my Eero router. Occasionally a handful of devices will simply be “Unnamed Device” and I have no idea what each one is. What if an Apple-blessed router could be consistently entrusted with my device names?
While I don’t have any little tweens getting into trouble online, I know that parental controls are a big deal for some people, and they have to set those parental controls on Apple IDs and on routers, and etc. What if that was unified?
Home is where the hub is
Putting aside the absolute mess of the software side of Home, let’s discuss the networking side of Home. Apple leans heavily on Apple TVs and HomePods to provide the networking backbone for all the connected smart home devices you have.
I’m not sure that’s a useful strategy because when there are issues with your home network, the device designated as your Home Hub loses the game of musical chairs, and a device you do not want to be Home Hub is selected. You want a device that has robust connectivity, which is usually the most modern Apple TV you have (except the $129 one they’re selling without a Thread radio, and without Ethernet).
The device that has the most robust connectivity in my home is my Eero wired to my fiber connection, and its affiliated Eeros. Eero’s Thread network is not compatible with Apple’s approach to Thread, which is just great. Some day Matter might deliver on its promise, but I’m not holding my breath.
What if Apple shipped mesh network devices? Devices that could be the backbone for a Home initiative that Apple allegedly cares about?
Bring back spinning disks!
I’m just kidding about enthusiasm for spinning disks, but one of the strengths of Apple’s AirPort line was that you could shove Time Machine backups somewhere that wasn’t wired to your Mac. Time Capsule was a slow hard drive crammed into the white plastic of your internet router. There was also an option to hook up an external drive to your AirPort Extreme over the USB cable. It was a good idea, because it took something hanging off of your Mac and moved it somewhere else where it could be quiet. Also not everyone wants to build and maintain a NAS.
Yes, backing up a Mac via Wi-Fi back then was slower than doing it over a wire, but wireless networking was also slower back then. I would be interested to see what Apple could do with a 6E router. Surely it’ll never be blistering speeds, but it could be a quiet, competent solution.
And just think of how much they could charge for that embedded solid-state storage! They’re leaving money on the table! Bleed us dry, Tim! Sell a line of them: AirPort Express mesh nodes, AirPort Extreme with ports, AirPort Ultra with Time Capsule (just skip the titanium finish).
Step 4: Profit
I know that it’s still easy to argue that Apple doesn’t need to make wireless routers. They won’t make enough money to make it worth the effort. Whatever “enough money” means is so flexible when you think about all the various things Apple does make. Those networking boffins are better allocated to other products, rather than making commodity hardware.
The return of Apple to the monitor market illustrates how effective Apple’s integration can be when it comes to supposedly superfluous product categories, especially when those products complement or support the products Apple already makes lots of money on… like the Macs it sells that use those displays. It’s called synergy, people.
Designing networking solutions in every device to work around the one component Apple doesn’t want to make is a lot of effort. The R&D can’t cost more than a self-driving, bread-loaf saloon, and the benefits of an Apple wireless router will lift all of Apple’s products. It’s time to head back to the AirPort3.
[Thanks for generating more content out of this expensive and time consuming purchase, Joe.—Jason] ↩
[I edited this piece minutes after installing an Eero router at my mom’s house, because her ISP-supplied router provides slow, unreliable Wi-Fi.—Jason] ↩
After years of the market complaining that Apple is “behind” on artificial intelligence, the company is poised to make a big push in the technology with its platform updates this year. In a rare move, that’s been confirmed by no less than CEO Tim Cook himself, who said in the company’s most recent financial results call that the company would “share the details of our ongoing work in that space later this year.”
Of course, the company’s not really a stranger to this space: Apple has spent plenty of time deploying machine learning technology in a variety of areas for years, from photography to autocorrect. But the industry’s focus of late is on generative AI, the technology that underlies the products that have captured the zeitgeist, from chatbots like ChatGPT to image creation tools like Dall-E and Stable Diffusion.
The big question that hovers over all of this is how Apple will bring those technologies into its existing operating systems, what choices it will make in rolling them out. The company tends to be on the judicious side when it comes to deploying new features, but there are still plenty of places on its platforms where generative AI—contentious as it may be—might find a foothold with users.
Since 2021, Six Colors has been compiling an annual report card focusing on how Apple’s doing in large organizations, including businesses, education, and government. We formulated a set of survey questions that would address the big-picture issues regarding Apple in the enterprise, and we ask them every year.
If you’re part of the Apple IT community and would like to participate in this year’s survey, it’s a click away. Results will be posted in April.
Developer Steve Troughton-Smith watched all of today’s workshop between Apple and the EU on the Digital Markets Act and posted some highlights on Mastodon.
Of particular interest was an exchange between Apple’s representatives and Riley Testut, the developer of AltStore, an existing third-party places to get apps for jailbroken iPhones. Testut has already announced that AltStore will be available as a third-party app marketplace in Europe under the DMA. I’ll embed the post with the video below because it’s worth watching, but 9to5Mac has transcribed it as well.
During the workshop, Testut used his time to ask about the Core Technology Fee. Under Apple’s new business terms in Europe (required for apps looking to be distributed via non-Apple app marketplaces or the web), there’s a €0.50 fee per app install over the first million. Testut rightly points out that a free app, such as the one he made in high school, that becomes popular could easily accrue enough costs to ruin a young developer’s life.
Apple VP of Legal Kyle Andeer responded sympathetically, saying that the company is continuing to try and find a good solution, and to “stay tuned.”
Obviously, we’ve already seen plenty of alterations in Apple’s original DMA plans, including the late addition of Web Distribution, but this certainly seems to suggest that further changes are coming.
The CTF has been a point of contention amongst developers; it certainly provides a potential disincentive for those looking to distribute apps outside the App Store—especially in cases where those apps derive revenue from other places, such as subscriptions not available via in-app purchase or advertising. (And yes, to be clear, that is exactly why Apple is putting that fee in place.)1
But free apps in particular seem to be the biggest sticking point. When the App Store debuted with the commission model, it was a relatively simple matter to say that if an app made no revenue, then Apple charged the developer nothing. But not all free apps are created equal, as the boom for in-app ads and subscription services have shown. That’s a bed of Apple’s own making, but it shouldn’t be surprising the company is trying to course correct to close those loopholes—that same impetus has been at the heart of a lot of its questionable App Store policy decisions over the past decade-plus.
Still, apps that are completely free—including open-source apps—certainly don’t seem like they should be subject to the Core Technology Fee. The question, from Apple’s perspective, is how to police that? What about, say, an app that’s distributed for free outside the App Store but has a big Patreon community that brings in a lot of money?
That in turn leads to the root of the question: does Apple deserve to get a cut of apps not distributed from its marketplace? There’s no arguing that the company has benefited from the huge ecosystem of software available for its devices, especially the iPhone. And as the CTF is currently structured, it could very well lead to a chilling effect amongst young developers who can’t risk the downsides—a category of people who Apple has made a big deal of specifically championing
I’m skeptical the entire CTF will end up discarded, but I do suspect that there will be additional carve-outs to come, especially for free/open-source apps (or perhaps Apple will greatly increase the amount of installs before the CTF is triggered, thus even more specifically targeting its biggest rivals). It’s been almost a week since the last changes, so keep your eyes peeled to see if a new batch is incoming.
As a poison pill, it seems particularly aimed at other big tech companies who might be tempted to go a third-party route to have more control over their own apps, but pay nothing under the current terms. Hi Spotify and Meta! ↩
[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 next novel, the sci-fi adventure Eternity's Tomb, will be released in November 2026.]
Apple Inc. is in talks to build Google’s Gemini artificial intelligence engine into the iPhone, according to people familiar with the situation, setting the stage for a blockbuster agreement that would shake up the AI industry.
The two companies are in active negotiations to let Apple license Gemini, Google’s set of generative AI models, to power some new features coming to the iPhone software this year, said the people, who asked not to be identified because the deliberations are private. Apple also recently held discussions with OpenAI and has considered using its model, according to the people.
As I said on Upgrade this week, these are the early days of large language models and there are a lot of competitors in the market. While Apple may continue to build its own LLM—it may one day become a major competitive advantage for Apple to control this technology, as it is for so many others—right now it’s probably far more reasonable for Apple to partner with one of the existing companies in the field. (As Ben Thompson noted on Monday, Apple probably couldn’t get the Nvidia GPUs it would need, regardless.)
On top of all that, a big LLM alone will not help the iPhone. Apple’s secret sauce will come from integrating A.I. assistant features with its voice assistant, with its own apps, and with third-party apps on its platform (presumably via methods like App Intents, used by Shortcuts). If Apple can build a new version of Siri that is smart enough to use disparate sources to serve the user, and one of those sources is a Google Gemini LLM, that’s all good.
Put another way, I’d much rather have Apple technology mediating my relationship with various APIs and A.I. models. If Apple can build a great intermediary, it won’t matter so much to users about what technologies are powering that experience.
Is Apple working with Google on its A.I. strategy? We break down what that might mean for the future of Apple’s platforms—and why it might make a lot of sense. And in Europe, Apple continues to alter its App Store rules.
The fun never stops with Apple, which is great for job security and at the same time so exhausting. Apple’s experimenting with a new twist on the ad market and asks the perennial question “Will it fold?”
Getting apps on the down-low-d
In a surprise turn of events, something happened this week. We go live now to the thing for a live report in real time (previously recorded).
If you had that on your bracket for Apple and the EU, then you are probably either Apple or the EU, possibly both. Either way, you’re not eligible to play this game. Your $5 buy-in will not be refunded.
This move does not come without some major caveats. Developers must have more than one million installs in the EU over twelve months, have been in the developer program for at least two years, and probably be able to show at least three forms of ID.
If you thought that was all the EU-related Apple news one week could handle, well, don’t close this tab yet!
While Apple is appealing the EU’s $2 billion decision against it, it is apparently not doing anything with the app update Spotify submitted. Hey, I get it, Apple. There are a lot of things I haven’t gotten to either. Just a lot of good TV on right now.
Ad nauseum
Apple appears set to succumb to peer pressure and bring an ad-supported tier to TV+.
If Netflix, Max, Paramount+, Amazon Prime, uh, the one with Poker Face and, uh, the other one all jump off a bridge, I guess Apple will, too.
Remember when you could just buy an ad-free episode of TV in iTunes? Steve Jobs made a big deal about it when he announced iTunes 6. Sure, you can still buy episodes of shows in the TV app, but probably not the ones you want to watch. This is not the future we were promised.
OK. OK. Look, no one like ads. But what about—are you ready?—ads with AI?
Apparently this new technology would start on the App Store but “could lead to new ad placements across Apple’s properties”.
Oh. Great. That’s great.
No travel keyboards
Well, let’s talk about things you’re sure to like. Sweet, tasty Apple rumors, fresh off the vine of the imagination. What’s cooking in Tim’s kitchen these days?
Apple does have an iPhone SE 4 in the pipeline, though if you’re hoping to get one of these affordable devices you’re going to have to wait until next year. Purportedly leaked CAD renderings show the device as being the same size as the iPhone 14 but with a single rear camera.
And ads. It’ll have ads.
No, not really.
I don’t think. But who knows?
In wackier rumors, Ming-chi Kuo suggests that before Apple releases a foldable iPhone or iPad, it will unveil a 20.3-inch foldable MacBook. Of course, all MacBooks are foldable (even twice, if you’re really committed to it) but these would be all-screen.
Apple appears to be saying “You didn’t like the butterfly keyboard? FINE. We’ll just take your keyboards away.” Somewhere Jony Ive was overcome by a wave of indescribable pleasure, though he did not know why. Kuo says these could enter mass production by 2027 but I’ll believe it when I see it.
Possibly not even then.
[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 Kolide for sponsoring Six Colors this week.
None of us are as good at clocking deepfakes as we think we are. Even your mom, or your boss, or anyone in your IT department might not be able to tell the difference. We all think we’re clever enough to spot a fake, but in real life, people only catch voice clones about 50% of the time.
But the good news is that we can be trained to look past our vulnerabilities and recognize a suspicious phone call, even if the voice sounds just like someone we trust. Kolide has a blog post all about it. It’s a frank and thorough exploration of what we should be worried about when it comes to audio deepfakes.
Regulations and ceiling fans
Apple’s EU rules are now changing weekly; Jason has a smarter heater and Dan’s looking for a smart fan. [More Color/Backstage members get 10 more minutes, including why Subscribe-and-Save services are so frustrating.]
Hugo Barra, former head of Oculus at Meta, has a lengthy review of his Vision Pro experience that’s well worth reading. Don’t let the somewhat inflammatory first headline (of four?!) put you off:
But in the case of VR at Oculus, we also never really felt like the world had a Northstar that could truly capture human hearts and minds, and without that it would be impossible to transition VR from being a niche gamer tech to the incredible spatial computing paradigm that we always thought it potentially represented…
The Vision Pro launch has more or less done exactly what I had always hoped for, which is to build a huge wave of awareness and curiosity that elevates the spatial computing ecosystem and could ultimately lead to mass-market consumer demand and a lot more developer interest that VR has ever had. Now it’s up to the industry to create enough user value and demonstrate whether this is in fact the future of computing.
Barra makes some smart observations about the hardware—most first-generation hardware is over-engineered because it’s being built before the final needs of the product are clear—and when he’s impressed by what Apple has done, he is very impressed.
Barra also makes a point similar to the one I’ve been making for a while now: For all of Mark Zuckerberg’s protests and insistence that his own product, the Quest 3, is “better” than the Vision Pro—I mean, it’s his product, of course he’s going to say that—the truth is that the Vision Pro is great for Meta:
Wile working at Meta/Oculus I used to semi-seriously joke that the best thing that could ever happen to us was having Apple enter the VR industry…. I knew Apple would do the best job of any company making people really want VR through its unparalleled brand, design and marketing…. For Meta, the Vision Pro launch is the best marketing tool for Quest VR that the company could have dreamed of but could have never achieved on its own.
The Vision Pro validates Meta’s interest, makes more people aware of the category, helps establish the strengths and weaknesses in the format, and helps give Meta a competitor to focus on. Similarly, Meta’s existence in the category will hopefully prevent Apple from getting complacent.
Sticky scrolling through a Python project in Nova, complete with a terminal tab and an SFTP sidebar.
I’ve been writing scripts in Python for a few years now, and it’s taken over a lot of my remote automation. I’ve got a calendar in my kitchen driven by a bunch of Python scripts, and numerous automations running on a remote linux server for Six Colors and The Incomparable.
Up to now, I’ve been doing all of my Python work in BBEdit, an app I use as my default tool for so much of the work on my Mac. But to be accurate, I have to say that I do all my work in BBEdit and Terminal, because these are scripts running on remote devices that I need to be able to control.
The other day it hit me: While I think of Panic’s $99 Nova as a web development tool (I used it when I moved Six Colors into WordPress, which required rebuilding the site’s entire theme using PHP), it’s also a code tool, with SFTP and a terminal built in. An hour later I had created Nova projects for all my remote Python tools and was happily able to access remote directories and the command line from a single tabbed window. Nova also has some pretty great code editing features of its own that go a little bit beyond BBEdit, including sticky scroll, which helps me know what function(s) I’m inside of while editing.
I know a lot of people swear by Microsoft’s free Visual Studio Code, but every time I look at it I realize that it is made for people who are not me. Nova’s outside my comfort zone, but it’s closer—and seems to want to work the way I work.
This will show you how much of a sicko I am. A recent Nova update added support for debugging features, which I’ve only ever used in Script Debugger, the definitive AppleScript development tool. That’s right, programmer nerds, my only debugging experience ever is with AppleScript.
Anyway, I can’t entirely understand how to set up debugging (and remote debugging?!) in Nova, but I’m going to give it a go because it would be nice to stop debugging by printing various things to the log and waiting for things to break.
I’m sure I’m still only using a fraction of the tools available to me in Nova, but for my projects writing scripts on remote Linux servers, it’s found a place in my tool chest.
The Europe-mandated tech changes we’d like to see in the US, circular vs. square smart watches, how often we completely reset our devices, and the extent of our home automation pursuits.
If Apple had its way, it would never open the App Store to competition, never offer sideloading of apps, never allow app developers to link to outside websites, and probably never reduce its cut of all App Store purchases from the original 30 percent tariff. For the last 15 years, Apple has had its way.
That’s all changed, now, by the force of the European Union’s Digital Markets Act (DMA), along with the results of a few legal matters in Japan, South Korea, and the Netherlands. This is a new era, where Apple can’t just have its way—instead, it has to abide by regulations specifically targeted at its own preferred business practices.
The company’s reaction to this era has been occasionally combative and passive aggressive. Some have called it “malicious compliance,” a label that I don’t think quite encompasses Apple’s approach. As events this week have shown us, Apple’s approach to responding to regulation is is incremental and iterative—kind of like its approach to designing and updating products.
The question is, what’s going to be the cost of Apple taking this approach?
