Apple vs Meta: Who Actually Innovates? TikTok Ban Update, Sonos CEO is Out, iPhone 17 Thick
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Can't innovate anymore, my...

And Mark Zuckerberg is calling out Apple, saying they don't innovate anymore. So we're going to talk about what has Apple done to innovate since Steve Jobs. This episode is brought to you by Notion and you, the members who support us directly. I'm one of your hosts, Stephen Robles. And joining me, as always, from Narnia, my friend Jason Aiton. How's it going, Jason? It's cold, but it's good. Jason posts a photo pretty much annually about the snow. Huge snow surrounding his office, which is a shed in his backyard.

And that's very nice. I have one social media stick that works. And it's just every year when we get our first big, as if I've never done it before, I just post about how we're now entering our Narnia era. No, no. You have popular social media posts when you say controversial things and then people troll you. That's true. But there was nothing controversial about my Narnia post. No, no. It's just nice to know. I forgot to ask you about the movie quote last week.

So I have to do that in a second, but obviously you know where the quote is from this week. Yeah, it's not a movie quote though. It's not a movie quote. It's Phil Schiller, and wasn't he referring to the Mac Pro maybe? That's right. Which is ironic considering how stagnant that product is. That is true. Anyway, that's for the second half of the show. But last week I had a quote. I said, you wake up at SeaTac, SFO, LAX, O'Hare,

Lose an hour. Yeah, do you know what it's from? Fight Club. Ah, there you go. Yeah, you got it. I've actually never seen it. I'm going to be honest. I have to see that. As someone with a movie podcast, it's probably required. Yeah, I would actually... It'd be worth the membership I pay for Mott's to just hear you two talk about Fight Club. Really? Okay, I'll tell you. There's so...

I would love to hear Nate talk about Fight Club, to be honest. I have to... Okay, but before we get into the news, Jason, I have to tell you something that's been weighing on my mind, and I just have to get it out. Okay? You have no idea what I'm about to tell you. I did a big USB microphone review for Riverside. I had like 12 microphones that I ordered off Amazon, and I was going to return them all yesterday, packed them all up in boxes, got all the things, and...

I realized once I got home that I forgot to put one of the microphones in the box. So this is the Yeti studio.

And when I got home and sat back at my desk from the UPS store, my heart just sank. And Jason, I don't know what's going to happen. Am I going to go to jail? Are there going to be people come to my door and I don't know what's going to happen. I'm so scared. It's all I can think about. Hold on. Hold on. You paid for this microphone? Yes. And you sent back an empty box? Apparently. That was not my intention. I've returned many things to Amazon over the years. You're way, way, way overthinking this. You just own it now.

Well, I'm just saying you bought a mic. You paid for it. I don't want it though. I don't want it. So I'm, I don't know what happens. I guess Amazon will send me an email like, Hey doofus, like you didn't put this in the box. Oh, you ordered it from Amazon. Yeah. You're, you're probably fine. They're going to just give you the refund and be like,

I'm so scared. I'm so scared because they're going to open this box and go, this man is a criminal. No, I think they'll just not give you a refund. I know. I know that's... And there's also three other mics in that same box. So hopefully they will see like, okay, he's at least partially honest. For our listeners, what Steven is doing right now is he's trying to create a public record of... So later...

Later when he's going, this is going to be introduced as evidence in whatever happened. The Supreme Court's going to hear the TikTok case and then it's going to be me right after it talking about this microphone I didn't put in the box. I'm so scared. Anyway, we'll see what happens. We have lots of stuff to talk about, but also five-star review shout outs. New for 2025, BeMe07 from the Netherlands. Battery percentage on, which can I just say, I was testing a MagSafe battery the other day and I turned battery percentage on to monitor it.

Looks terrible. I don't know how anybody does it. I'm sorry. I still don't like it. Jason's just staring at me. But anyway, percentage on. Doc, I don't know what he meant by that. But anyway, thank you, BeMe07, for the five-star review. SunnyWorld85 from Canada. He says he agrees with you, Jason, that the dots should be off in macOS. Listen, this is one of the... Some of the things we talked about I just don't care about, but I have just told you what it is I do, right? But this one I feel like...

I was surprised that...

To the extent at which people still have the dots on. Like, it feels completely foreign to me, the idea that people would want that. Not that, like, not that it's, I mean, I don't know, like, the percentage on your phone and stuff or which pocket you carry, those feel like just, like, preference things, right? And they just develop over time. Whatever one you did for a while, you just keep doing it. But having those dots there is so inferior of an experience that I just don't understand it. Like, and I mean that, like,

I don't mean that insultingly. You mean it because you care. You care for people. I mean like anybody who still has them on and feels passionately about it

I would just tell you, if you could make it two weeks with them off, you would never turn them back on. I mean it. Like, you would never. It's like someone who drinks cream in their coffee forever, and they just decide, I'm going to just try just black coffee. If you could make it through two weeks, I don't think you'd ever put cream in your coffee again. Is this how I become an old man? I have to turn the dots off and then drink black coffee? I think it's how you ended up buying a Tesla, right? It's like, just try it, man. Well, what's funny is I have the dots on, but I also hide the dock. So it's kind of like...

I don't see him anyway. All right. Yeah, there you go. But GJ from the UK, the third five star review said we're entertaining and insightful tech chat. So thank you, GJ. Also battery percentage on dominant hand pocket personalized ads off, which we didn't ask for that, but I guess he turned that off on his iPhone. So, and he says, yes, good job. He said toe fungus ads, not present.

I feel like we can all agree on this one. There should be no debate. Does anybody want those ads? No, but I also, I don't want a bunch of screenshots of people saying I get the toe fungus ads. Although I'm curious if anybody else besides Jason gets them because maybe they are targeted. Jason, we don't know anyway.

let's get into the news listen i think apple heard our discussion the marketing team specifically and they probably have different marketing teams for different things but the marketing for apple tv plus original content has stepped up the game they had a severance pop-up glass cube in grand central station earlier this week to advertise the second season of severance i just have to say

Amazing. Amazing marketing. This is a little video. I'll link to it. And yeah, I just, okay, you did it. That's amazing. It was amazing. Also, I'm kind of surprised because isn't it Grand Central Terminal? Listen, here's the thing. The station is within the terminal.

Well, that's what this was. But the terminal is the building. No, no, no. The station is literally the subway station, right? Grand Central Terminal is where the trains are. Grand Central Station is this, where people walk around. I thought the station was where you got on and off the trains, and the terminal was the building. Okay, I'm not going to argue. I think I'm right. People can let us know in their five-star rating interview. But anyway, they did that, and there was also a silo character at a basketball game. Did you see this? Someone dressed up in the...

I want to go out. Oh my gosh. That's terrifying. It is terrifying. Uh, this was on a Mavericks. It was at a Mavericks basketball game dressed up in the, in the silo suit, which is wild. I do have to say, I watched me and my wife started the second season of silo. The first episode. Did you watch it? Do you watch silo? I have watched every episode. Now I binged all the way through the middle of the second season and then got really mad. This is why I don't watch things while they're dropping. I wait because I, yeah, yeah. Listen, I,

I understand why they do this. I'm going to pay for Apple TV Plus forever. Just give me all of the things at once. I'm not like Netflix has it right. Just drop it all, please. Well, I watched the first episode of the second season of Silo and that dude that looks through the little window at the end and says, please. Yeah.

I don't know his name yet because I've only seen the one episode of the second season. But he says, don't try to open this door again or else I'm going to kill you. I was too scared. I couldn't keep watching. You got to watch it. Did you like season one? Yeah, I loved it. Season two...

is good it it is it sort of like takes the momentum and energy of season one and it sort of stretches it out a bit like it doesn't feel like it's moving quite as fast but but the reason i think it feels like that is it's like getting into the really good stuff it's like i mean she's in another silo like that's a big deal like all these things and it's like

Okay. Maybe that's the reason why. Also, my perspective is a little warped because I literally watched all of season one and the first half of season two in like a weekend.

And now I have to, now it's taken me four weeks to get through the next four episodes. Right, right. Well, I did really enjoy it. So I'll keep going because the marketing is good. It's so good. We have to talk about the TikTok ban because this might be happening Sunday, January 19th. I'm going to put an article to an Axios timeline. They actually have kind of the dates and what's been happening, all of that. But the fate of TikTok is,

We've talked about it, I think, in the last couple episodes, what we think is actually going to happen. But this Sunday is the deadline. It's not a ban, quote-unquote. TikTok is supposed to sell or divest. ByteDance is supposed to sell or divest TikTok. And if they don't, then the U.S. companies like Apple and Google will have to remove TikTok from the app stores. Basically, as it stands right now, as we record Thursday morning, come Sunday, if nothing happens, which we'll talk about possibilities...

TikTok will be removed from the app stores. If you have TikTok installed on your phone, it will work for a while, but it'll be like one of those things where you had an app on an old Apple device, like an old iPad or iPhone that couldn't get updates anymore. You know, the app just kind of slowly dies over time. That's what would happen if you already have TikTok on your phone, but you won't be able to update it.

If you upgrade your phone, you won't be able to install it, and it will be essentially a ban. There's a bunch of TikTok creators doing goodbye videos on the platform right now. There's a couple things that could happen. The Biden administration said that they are trying to work to extend the deadline so it wouldn't go into effect this Sunday, and also the Supreme Court could rule before Sunday to extend on its own. So the Biden administration could do something. The Supreme Court could do something. Trump has said he was going to...

Was it an executive order to extend? Yeah, he was going to issue an executive order to say things. To say things, but he's not president until the 20th.

So he could not, that could not go into effect obviously before this Tik TOK ban. So we'll see what happens Sunday. We will know for sure what happens and, but it's looking like, and you are putting your money Jason on it happening. Well, okay. I don't know what it happening will be, but a couple of things. One, it's weird that the Biden Biden administration wants to extend the deadline on a law that he signed. Like you signed this law and the entire reason why,

that they picked that date was because it was the day before the next presidential inauguration. Like all of this was intentional. All of this was done exactly the way that like they had like designed it. And so it's sort of weird and it feels like this is what politicians do.

They literally just want to kick things as far down the road. So it's someone else's problem as possible. And then they get to the deadline. Like this happens with the debt ceiling every couple of years, right? They just, they just, that's what they do. I think I said on a recent episode, a previous episode that I don't think the Supreme court's going to overrule this. And it does not just extend it. They're going to uphold the law as constitutional. I believe that.

And I think that the oral arguments, was it last week? Bear that out. They do not seem inclined to overturn this law. Overturn this law. Different branch of government does that. Sorry. Anyway, they don't seem inclined to do that. So I think that the Supreme Court is not going to overturn the law. I think that on the 19th, the ban will go into effect. What happens after that?

I think it's super unclear, but TikTok has said that they will basically turn it off if that goes into effect, even though that's not what the actual ban says. Because the other piece of it, the way you described it is sort of true, except for that the law does two things. It prohibits them from distributing it in the app store, so it's really focused on Apple.

Apple and Google, but it also prohibits like ISPs and CDNs from, from basically posting and sharing the content. So it's like, yes, the Apple open, will there be anything in it? Unless it's like already cashed into there. So like the timeline of stops working could be a lot quicker than, than people might think. So, and I don't know, like what,

can the incoming like it's so weird because this can the incoming president just issue an executive order to say we're not going to enforce this law because then that will get challenged by someone i don't know who because it was the government to pass the law so who would have standing it's very weird it's very weird i'll also mention lastly on this the there's another app now called red note it is a

Chinese app like even the like description and stuff in the English US app store is in Chinese and it is people are flocking to it I say flocking lightly there's a few people being very vocal about like well I guess we're going over here and they've created accounts and are trying to use red note as a tick tock replacement this is too far for my blood like this is I'm not going to download this app and pretend it's a tick tock replacement I don't know if I would recommend it uh

But also, isn't it? Isn't that the one? There's several of these that have popped up, at least one of which is also basically the Chinese version of TikTok owned by ByteDance, the company that owns TikTok. Like, if you are worried that TikTok is going away, a Chinese owned replacement is really not going to be the best place to go. Because what do you think will happen?

Yeah. It's going to get bad. Like it's the same thing. Yeah. It's just kind of kicking the can down the road. So anyway, we'll see what happens on Sunday. We'll cover it next week. Whatever the official thing was. Also, Sono CEO is out. So after their failed app launch earlier this year and just not doing well as a company, Sono CEO, Patrick Spence is leaving. And there's been a several other leavings, several other exits or oustings. There's the Sono's chief product officer is leaving. Uh,

Also the chief commercial officer, which was a newish title I was not familiar with.

And now there is a new interim CEO and she wrote an article about, but just they're having a tough time. Sonos is trying their whole new leadership now and we'll see what they do in this next season. But you wrote about it and the new, is it an interim CEO or is it like he's interim? He's interim, but I think he wants to be not interim. It's pretty clear, but here's okay. A couple of things. Can I ask, I have two questions for you. First of all, without looking anywhere before he was the CEO of Sonos,

Sonos Patrick Spence he's the guy that just resigned right what where did he work what is he most known for I feel like not audio right it wasn't audio really okay correct yeah yeah yes that's correct uh I don't know I'm gonna say uh PayPal I mean that would have probably been better no he worked for a company called RIM do you know what they're famous for

Is that the restaurant thing? No, they made the Blackberry. Oh, RIM. A product that could not- Sorry, listen. Wait, wait, wait. Before I lose all credibility, let me just say, I know RIM. I had a Blackberry. Saying it as R-I-M, it threw me off. Well, Research in Motion was the name of the company. Research in Motion, yeah. I know it was Blackberry. Anyway. Okay, so this guy was like the head of sales for Blackberry. Yes.

A product that no longer exists. They stopped making them in like 2019 or 2017 or something. I don't even remember when. They don't make BlackBerrys anymore because they could not figure out a way to respond to the iPhone. This guy was not a product guy, right? He came into... Actually, he came into Sonos as the head of sales. He was the chief commercial officer when he came to... And he eventually became the CEO. And I just think it's kind of bananas because...

This is like a company who built an incredibly loyal audience based on being essentially people would call them the Apple of audio. And the reason is they built products that just worked. So my question to you, I wanted to ask you because I don't have any Sonos stuff. I do have respect for them. I like good sounding things, but I just don't have any Sonos stuff. Did you download the new app and did it break all of your stuff? No.

I downloaded the new app just so I could see it, but I never used the Sonos app. Okay. And I think that may be one of the...

The difference is an experience where if I, most of my Sonos gear is just set up with a TV. And so in the bedroom, I have a Sonos beam, I have a Sonos arc on another TV and I don't typically use them as music players. I just, they're the TV speakers. And so I just don't. And if I ever do want to play something to it, I'll use AirPlay. I go to Apple music, I play, and then I AirPlay it.

I opened the app and I had to use the app when I was reviewing the Sonos ACE headphones. And it was clear that this thing was janky and it was not great, but I don't typically use the app. Okay. And then my other question was going to be, maybe this is a, you've already sort of answered this because you don't use it to play music necessarily. But my understanding is Sonos stuff sounds great, but it sounds really good, but that isn't actually the main draw of Sonos stuff. Can you explain for people who don't have Sonos stuff, uh,

why people are so devoted to it beyond just it sounds really good because there are a lot of things that sound really good that you can be home pod sound really good like yeah but i mean i will say sonos sounds better than home pods like i did an entire video when the home pods 2 came out and said like the sonos beam and a sub mini which is their like middle of the range speakers that combo sounds better than home pod 2s there's just more bass you know standalone sub

So if you just want better sound and that's something that's important to you, Sonos wins. If you're, if you're going that and the air compared to home pods compared to home pods. Yeah. I mean, you could get probably both systems. You can get your own powers and Wilkins system, spend $12,000. That's going to sound better than Sonos. Yeah. But when it comes to, I think sounding better, but not crazy expensive, like it's expensive, but not like, you know, over $10,000.

I think Sonos was a good option. And I do think the experience, it feels very Apple-like. It feels very like the packaging is Apple-like. It feels new and modern. And typically the setup is pretty easy. You open the Sonos app, you plug in a speaker, the little card comes up, which feels like an Apple-like little card for AirPods or HomePods. And yes, working together, if you want multi-room audio, that was its specialty because the Sonos app, the previous version,

used to do that pretty well like you see your speaker groups in your rooms and if you were playing something you could throw it to all the speakers to some adjust the volume of each room individually and it worked pretty well I didn't do that and you can also just do that with AirPlay you can also just adjust the volume of different speaker sets because that's how they appear in the AirPlay but yeah I think it's just the hardware feeling felt premium like Apple it wasn't tens of thousands of dollars it was thousands and

And it did sound really good. Great. I was just curious because I, again, not having any Sonos stuff, I understood that it was like, people are very passionate about it. And just for any of our listeners who don't have Sonos stuff, and I don't, I don't not recommend it by the way. Like I think if somebody wanted to send me Sonos stuff, I'll replace all my HomePods today.

Jason asking for it. Yeah. Okay. I'm just saying. Yeah. Yeah. But, but you wrote an article about the new interim CEO, which what's it, what's his name and what did he write? Tom Conrad is a new CEO. So Tom Conrad was, he's a board member. He was also a part of Pandora. So he does understand music and he, I think he was maybe at Pinterest. I think so. This is a product guy is my point.

So one of the reasons you're seeing this exit of people in the leadership is one, they eliminated the chief product officer role because he's like, that doesn't make any sense. The product team is just going to report to me. I know product. So we're just going to do that. But he, at the end of the first paragraph there that I, that I shared, he talked about how, when it all works together,

it's absolute magic, which is the thing that Sonos, like you just described, that it was known for. The problem is when it doesn't work, it just messes up everything that people are using, right? It's like if AirPlay stopped working because Apple updated the music app,

people would be really, really, really angry, right? Like we know that people get angry whenever something that they're used to working. And it's like, it seems like Sonos had lost sight of the fact that if you're going to update a product, it has to make the experience either better or neutral for people. Like you can't make it worse and then spend a year saying we're going to fix it. It's like, it didn't have to be broken. You just, it didn't have to be broken. Well, I think the other thing is like Apple has a lot of software things that are buggy. We complain about on this show, like Scratchpad,

screen time and just in general bugs but

the thing with Sonos is the audio and speakers is literally all they do. Like that is right. They're very hyper specialized company, totally focused on audio and that experience. And so when that one thing is buggy and doesn't work, it really feels like, well, this whole deal is not good. Like the whole Sonos deal. So yeah, we'll see what they do. I'm, I'm also hopeful, curious if Sonos actually tries to release more products. Like,

Like they really don't release a lot of hardware. They released the Sonos Ace headphones. They released the Sonos Arc Ultra and a revised sub, which as a Sonos owner, I have the previous Arc and the previous sub.

I have zero desire to upgrade because they still sound great. And this might go to our personal tech segment later about what's our oldest tech that we just don't care to replace. So I do think they need to innovate on that. Like, obviously, they're a hardware company. That's where they make their profits. There's no subscription service. You don't pay for Sonos as an app or anything. So there probably needs to be some innovation there when hardware release some products. So we'll see. We'll see what they do. All right, ChatGPT, it can now do reminders, Jason.

So not for the free play. Yeah, tasks. Excuse me, excuse me. So now if you have a ChatGPT Plus account, you can ask it to remind you of things, but ChatGPT is calling them tasks. And this is for Plus team and Pro subscribers. I think, Jason, you pay the $200 a month for ChatGPT Pro, right? No. Yeah, no, no. I don't pay the $200 a month. No, no, no. I pay it for Plus. I pay the $20, but that's it. It's worth it for that, but it's not worth it. $200.

But yeah, you can tell it now to remind you of things. It's extremely limited. It can only do a maximum of like, I forget what it is, 10 or 20 tasks or something like that. There's like a maximum of what it can do.

It's, you know, you do have to actually go into the app and ask it to remind you. You can start a voice conversation if you want, like you can map that to your action button on the iPhone or create a shortcut with that. But I think it's interesting that ChatGPT is trying to become almost like an ecosystem. I feel like this is the first foray in ChatGPT being like, maybe if we can do tasks and then maybe calendar that they can be positioned as almost like a productivity suite for

in addition to just a chatbot, which I think is an interesting move. They also already have a search engine. They already have a web search. I feel like, I don't know, I see this ecosystem coming into focus. Does it feel like that's the direction? I think if you... Well, I think there's two pieces of context here that are helpful. So I meant to like...

Think more about this to write about it because I, Chad GPT sent me their release, but I haven't had the time, but yeah, it's 10 active tasks at a time during the beta period. And the goal of this is really to try to figure out like how people will use this. I think it's interesting to think of this in the context of what Apple is trying to do with its voice assistant, which is to use your personal context to inform the types of things that are happening. And so if you're Chad GPT,

Right now, none of the things that Apple is talking about doing in terms of using your personal context to inform, say, Siri, Dingus, whatever you want to call it, the thing that we aren't allowed to talk about. Dingus. The Dingus. Yeah, exactly. What's his name? He who shall not be named or whatever. He who shall not be named. Yeah, exactly. So, yeah.

Anyway, I literally can see his face and I actually can't think of the name, but it doesn't matter right now. Harry Potter's nemesis. Oh, no. It's Harry Potter's nemesis. That's right. That's right. Voldemort. Voldemort. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Why did I say thank you? There's a voice in my head that just told me who it was. Anyway, this is the best podcast of all time. So I think that if you think about it in that context...

right now chat GPT has such a lead on what Apple's trying to do, but what they don't have is the ability to take all of that kind of context. But now if you're feeding all of your tasks into it, it's developing that sort of thing. And, um,

So like I'm sort of of two minds. One, I think that it would be amazing to have the chat assistant that you use or the AI assistant that you use have all of this context and information about you. But also you're just helping chat GPT train all of this information about you and about other things. And so you just kind of have to decide how you want to do that. I'll definitely be giving it a try to see like how it works. Because yes, I do pay not the $200 a month, but I'm going to be interested to see like what it does because you're

Most people, like we're talking about apps that don't work.

If there is a single thing that people depend on most more than I think even their email, if you rely on a task manager or like a calendar type thing, it has to work all the time or you will just jettison that thing into space because once it fails you, because there are a lot of people who they've just organized their life around that and depend on it. Like I do. I depend on looking at my watch and seeing what does it say next on my calendar or my tasks? Like that's it. That's how I, that's how I operate. So.

I did see, I just want to mention, I was trying to find it real quick, but I think it was a nine to five Mac article that they are,

thinking it's not that this was discovered or that it's in the beta but with the ios 18.3 that they think maybe the contextual and semantic index dingus might be coming in that next big version 18.3 or maybe 18.4 which would mean it's might be coming this year and like not 2026 like we've heard right which mark german was saying that might not be coming to late 2025 or 26 so

I'm curious if and when that beta comes out with contextual Siri, I will get back on the beta train. I've not been on the beta train because I like my less bugs. You like battery life. You don't want to have to worry about your battery percentage. So you just want all of the battery life. I have such... I love battery life. Look, I got MagSafe batteries over here. I got this battery over here. This one, I actually did this video that I actually...

Scheduled a video to publish right now. As we're recording, it recorded right now at 9 a.m. Or published right now at 9 a.m. This is a retractable USB-C cable, Jason. Look at this thing. You know what that is? Something else they could break. Listen. Oh, but also, you see this handle? You see this little handle right here? Also, USB-C cable.

Okay, I want to say something about this real quick. First of all, best Christmas present I got all year came off of Stephen's referral recommendation list. Actually, I don't know if this is the best one, but I also got the car mount. I got the car mount too. Oh, yeah, the car mount. That's right. But...

I want to say built-in cords to charging battery things. I get it. I understand why they do it because like, what good is it to have a battery? If you don't actually have a cord that you can charge from and then you're like, is it USB-C or USB-A or whatever? Nope. I think it's a terrible idea because it is one of the, it's just one more thing that can go wrong. And, uh,

I want my three meter cable or whatever. Not three meter, three foot, one meter cable, like, or whatever. I don't want, I don't, I don't like cables built into batteries. It's a bad idea. Two quick things. Jason held up the anchor 10 K ultra slim Chi two mag safe battery pack and

In the video that I just published right now, I say that's still my favorite one. It's still the best one. So good job. I still think this one is my favorite one, but that's just because it sits on a chart. Like it sits on a stand. So this one actually is a stand. It's an anchor one. I don't know what it's called. Steven can probably tell you from memory, but I really like it. And

Which is true of this one as well. But this one, if my kids need to use this battery and they don't have a MagSafe phone because one of them still has an SE, they can just plug in a USB-C cord and plug it in and it'll charge. So it's kind of nice. Well, I'm going to show you one other thing because you say you don't like built-in cables. This is not even on our list, but anyway. No, this is another MagSafe battery. This is the Romos. You might like this. This one can charge an Apple Watch because it has a little indent right here.

Did you do a video on this? I did. Did I see this? Okay, I feel like I've seen this. Yeah, you can charge your phone and Apple Watch, but it comes with this tiny little cable, but it's not built in. You can take it out. But if you want to charge your phone wired, because that will always charge faster, less heat, you can still mag save it to the back of your phone, but then plug in the USB-C cable just like that. Pretty slick.

Pretty slick. Throwing it out there. You don't like retractable cables. I have some AA sitting here too that I have to put on my keyboard in a little while. In your keyboard? We'll talk about it in personal tech. Okay, that's coming personal tech. One last thing before we talk about Zuckerberg's interview on Rogan trashing Apple saying they don't innovate anymore. We don't typically do rumors, but I thought this was interesting. The Samsung Galaxy S25 apparently is leaked and it might be

showing off a super thin design when it comes out. Now, Samsung unpacked the event is January 22nd. So next Wednesday. So we're going to see this in less than a week. Samsung is going to announce whatever.

But I think it's interesting because there's also been many rumors, I don't think we've talked about them yet on this show, about the iPhone 17 having an Air version where they will have an ultra-slim version of the iPhone. Whether or not that'll be the Pro or non-Pro or something in between remains to be seen. It's curious that companies, the two biggest, I mean Samsung and Apple, might be going slim this year instead of adding bulk, which...

would I think be less battery apropos because we just talked about battery life. But I don't know. I mean, if you see a slim iPhone this year, but maybe it's not pro, does that tempt you at all? No. Yeah, me neither. Slim? Well, who cares? I've heard people talk. No, I mean, sincerely, I'm going to save this for personal tech because I don't understand the... That's cool, but the...

killer feature of the new iPad pros is not that they're thinner. The iPad pro is like ridiculous no matter what it doesn't, but it just doesn't matter. Like that is, I mean, there's a threshold. If it was the thickness of my MacBook pro, that'd be bad for a tablet. Right. Right. But the threat, the killer features are tandem OLED or M four, or they finally put the camera in the right spot. I don't care how thin it is. I just don't care how thin it is.

Yeah, I mean, I'm going to take my phone out of the case for a second. Oh, which also in my videos, I'm not just pumping my video today, but I will say Ryan London leather case. First one with a camera control button in the leather case. Okay, then if I was, if you want to use camera control leather case with that, you still have a logo on the back though.

no logo on the back no okay that's good because i i don't i don't like there's a logo on the side on the very bottom it's very discreet but the one thing i love about the nomad cases is they are they don't do any no branding on the outside at all are you still using the suti back only

Yeah, it's nice. It is nice. I really like the leather texture better of the Nomad one, but this one has held up really well. And I think the reason why, and also like the Nomad one has microstructure on it as well. And this one doesn't. And I try to figure out how are they getting away with not having it? And I think it's because it goes around the, it snaps around the cameras, whereas the Nomad one just has a cutout for that whole area. So I think that that's, they got it right. I don't, I don't know if I love this feel. It's, it's, it's like,

It's not fine woven feel, but it is a little bit, but I like the leather better. So, but I'm going to keep it. I still, I had my suit T I was using it for a while and then I dropped my phone twice and I have a screen protector on it, which I don't typically do, but since I've been using the backs, I have a, I'm actually using anchor screen protector now, but I do have a couple scuffs along the corners of my phone now. Cause I dropped it. I don't think you'll be able to see it. I mean, they're into like it,

indistinguishable do you have scuffs no but this is the nomad one oh yeah that's kept like coming apart here yeah i definitely like to feel better it's it's very nice i like to feel better too listen i didn't think we're gonna hear about this is the worst podcast episode no no this is why you need to go to youtube.com slash at primary tech show

I'm about to sneeze. Hold on. This is actually what the people love about what we do. Steven is we're just real. We just talk. We just give our opinions on all of this stuff. I don't know what's happening. I don't know what's happening. I'm gonna drop a mark. We don't care about the slimness of the phones. We're moving on. Oh, that's what the whole reason I took the case out was because I wanted to talk about the thinness of the phone. Yeah.

Okay, so listen. I mean, thinner than this, I mean, it's really not that big. I don't understand. I mean, lighter maybe would be nice, but it got lighter with titanium with the F-150. I think it's fine. I agree. Yeah, thinness is not the thing that they need to worry about. I agree on the Pro 1s.

make it lighter, use aluminum. No one cares. Titanium is great, but like just stick with, because like the only thing that's noticeable is the difference between the base, the 16 and the 16 pro. I, when I take that 16 that's sitting up there, I won't do it right now because it's my camera. It's like these two things are not even the same species. Like this is ridiculous. Well, and also I think it would be amazing if Apple like did this as an experiment, but it would never happen. If they released an iPhone 17 air,

That was super thin, but obviously got worse battery life because of the form factor and released as iPhone 17, like thick. And it was like double the thickness, but you got like three days of battery. I guarantee you 90 something percent of people would buy the thicker phone.

100 yep i think you're right thank you i'm glad we could finally agree on something jason yeah finally now speaking of things we can agree on i know we also agree on today's sponsor because today's podcast is brought to you by notion notion is literally what we use every week for this show when jason and i are looking at it right now even when they're not sponsoring we're just staring at notion the entire episode because that's where we have our run of show it's

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sponsoring this episode and powering our podcast for a year now, over a year. All right. Does Apple still innovate? This was a big interview. Mark Zuckerberg went on the Joe Rogan podcast and they talked for 18 hours. No, I think they talked for three hours, which still sounds like an exaggeration, but no, it was literally about three hours. Yep. And Mark Zuckerberg said a bunch of things. He said things like Steve jobs, admitted the iPhone. And now they're just kind of sitting on it 20 years later.

Wild statement Zuckerberg also said quote that Apple has thoroughly hamstrung the ability for anyone else to build something that can connect to the iPhone in the same way as like air pods there would probably be much better competitors to air pods out there Zuckerberg said.

We're going to address all this in a second. Also, this is on the heels of news coming out. This is the Wall Street Journal saying that Meta is about to cut 5% of its staff because Mark Zuckerberg says he wants to raise the bar. And these job cuts are going to be coming February 10th. And Wall Street Journal and others are calling this a Trump-friendly transition. Remember last week we talked about Meta changing its policies, removing fact-checkers, leaning on community notes, inviting more political content on the platforms.

And I'll also throw to daring fireball and link to this. John Gruber had lots of fun things to say about this interview and about meta saying that, you know, what they've innovated and versus Apple and things like that. So innovation and app, first of all, let's talk about just Zuckerberg's claims saying that first, hold on. First of all, there's something even more important. We have to address a week before COVID.

Mark Zuckerberg announced that they're going to lay off 5% of their staff or whatever. And in the announcement where he was essentially saying, we're no longer going to pay all these third party content moderators. He's wearing a $900,000 watch. By the way, that's not an exaggeration. It's a $900,000 watch that he was wearing. Just Google Mark Zuckerberg watch, you know, content moderation video or whatever. It's a custom made, the company that makes them only makes like

three or four of them a year or whatever. And so it's just, it's like, dude, how out of touch are you that you're wearing a $900,000 watch in an Instagram reel where you're announcing like all of this stuff? So it's just, it kind of blows my mind. But I mean, I'd love a $900,000 watch, but I don't have any. So like the...

Whatever. Okay, wait, wait. Just so our people know that this is real. This is a Guardian article. Yeah. Mark Zuckerberg sports a $900,000 watch. Yeah, a Gravel 4C. Listen. He wore a Grubel 4C handmade one, which retails for $895,500.

which you know i rounded up just slightly but yes anyway amazing i did not know that yes people who pay attention to watches caught this immediately because they're like oh look at his new watch anyway because well those are extremely hard to get because they only make a couple of them a year so anyway i think it's really interesting and i think it points out like there's a lot of stuff going on with mark zuckerberg you know and i think it started with the

accepting a fight with Elon Musk. Remember when there's supposed to be a cage match between those two? There was supposed to be a cage match. That's right. Yeah. And I just think that he is, I don't know if this is what a midlife crisis looks like for a hundred billionaire, you know what I mean? Like, but clearly like he can just do whatever he wants and there's no one in his life that will tell him no. And you know, whatever that's worked. Mark Zuckerberg has been more successful than, I mean, if,

than almost anyone in the world, right? There are like less than a hundred people in the world, in the history of the world that have achieved the kind of success as him. Okay. So Mark Zuckerberg is 40 years old in case anybody was wondering, I was wondering, so maybe you were wondering too. He's 40 years old. What did Mark Zuckerberg... You're taking issue with my midlife crisis? No, no, no, no. When you said that, I was just curious. I was curious how old he was. What has Mark Zuckerberg created?

Mark Zuckerberg created Facebook from a college dorm room or whatever, and it was based on

whatever a rating system to gauge how attractive hot or not it was basically a knockoff of hot or not that's basically what he created and it became a social network and that that is what he has built now after this interview many people pointed out if you look at meta the landscape of what meta is today whatsapp is a massive part of meta instagram now threads

You could say threads might've been a product they invented, but a lot of those things are things that meta acquired meta acquired Instagram, and then added a bunch of features that copied Snapchat and Tik TOK, namely stories and reels. WhatsApp existed before meta. It was just acquired. And I don't know if anybody's opened WhatsApp recently, but,

I don't prefer the design and I don't really, I wouldn't say that that is some, a beacon of innovation messaging apps. Well, okay. I will say this about WhatsApp. It is the best group messaging app that there is.

group messaging that's fine but it's also not changed in the last 10 years like five years maybe maybe five years is more accurate like has there been any like new anything about anything innovative about whatsapp in five years i mean how innovative do your group messages need to be exactly exactly that's my point i'm not saying it needs to be i'm saying like we're talking what has meta innovated uh the ray-bans meta which one ray-bans is making the glasses and

It's just Facebook. It's Facebook software. And that's one of the things I feel like this entire interview was, I feel like it needs to be said. Meta is a basically 100% software company. Like they don't make hardware. The Meta Ray Bans is made by Ray Bans. They tried to make a Facebook phone, if someone remembers, like 10 years ago, and that failed.

I mean, am I... The headsets. They make the headsets, Quest. Again, acquired, right? But I'm just saying they do make them. They make those now. I just want to be clear. The MetaQuest, MetaQuest Pro. Okay, fair enough. Yeah, they make the headset hardware. Again, of all the technology categories, probably the least... But they did not invent it, right? Yeah, go down the list. They did not invent it. They did not invent stories. They copied that from Snap. They did not invent Reels. They copied that from TikTok, right? Yeah. They bought WhatsApp, which...

Both WhatsApp and Instagram, you got to give him some credit because they are extremely successful. They're multi-billion user platforms. I feel like the one thing that...

I can give Mark Zuckerberg credit for unequivocally is that he understood what a good product was, even if he didn't make it. And he knew what might be a competitor to what he was trying to make. And rather than compete would just buy it. Like that's WhatsApp or copy it. Like he could see, for example, like what he saw from Instagram was, Oh, there's an idea there. But what we have is we have the social graph. We have the platform. We have the user base. Um,

And that's how that's why stories basically cut off Snap is because it was a great idea. It's just that Instagram already had the user base that Snap was never going to get to even their most recent announcement community notes. He made it clear like we're just copying this directly from X. He even said it right and let's and let's remember Facebook was also not the first quote unquote social network.

There was MySpace before that. And there was other weird things like LiveJournal and stuff before that. But Mark Zuckerberg. Tumblr. And the Tumblr's still around. So that's, I think, the picture of meta. Now, his claim, Steve Jobs invented the iPhone and now they're just kind of sitting on it 20 years later.

I just made a short list here and you have another list. What is your list? I forget. Well, hold on. I want to just be clear. The reason that the iPhone 17 is not going to get any thinner is because Apple is just sitting on it and we know that they bend. Bend gate was iPhone 6 plus. But yeah. Now,

Yeah, my list was of all of the inventions at Facebook. I think that the Ray-Bans is probably the most... Is probably the example that you could give them credit for. Yes, they partnered with somebody and somebody else is actually manufacturing them. But there really wasn't a category, a consumer product category of that type of a thing. I do think it's important to mention Apple has, I think...

set the iPhone aside because it's the most successful consumer product in the history of whatever, which is why Apple hasn't made another product like that because it is the most, like no one will ever make a product that beats the iPhone. It's just, it's not going to happen. It was the quintessential personal computing form factor, but AirPods,

Apple watch, iPad, all bigger businesses, home pods, bigger business. The Apple watch straps are a bigger business than the meta Ray-Bans. The quote about Steve jobs specifically. I feel like that's such a easy, like I'm going to drop Steve jobs name here and it automatically like, I don't know, it's some kind of takedown or whatever, but Steve jobs passed away in 2011. I still remember where I was was it's weird, but

So he passed away in 2011. That was also the year of the iPad release. Am I correct? No, no. I've had, I think that was a nine. I've had released original. I've been able to original iPad. Sorry. I'm trying to fact check myself here. The original iPad was 2010, excuse me, 2010. So right the year before he passed, because he introduced the iPad on stage. That was probably the last big product announcement that Steve jobs did after the iPad. And after he passed in 2011, he,

What was next? You could say the Apple Watch was 2015. Steve Dobbs probably knew about it, was aware, probably was not. It didn't have a huge hand in it because it came out four years after he passed. You have the Apple Watch in 2015, AirPods, I believe, in 2016, 17. And I would say AirPods, pervasive technology. And I want to talk about Zuckerberg's claim about Apple locking things in and there would be more innovation if they allowed whatever. But anyway...

I think AirPods, especially the quality of AirPods Pro 2 now, I mean, that is, I think it leaps forward. The 2019 Mac Pro, which again, I said, I started the show with Phil Schiller's quote talking about the 20, what was the, what was the Mac Pro where he said that? What was the year? It was the...

2013 2013 trash can wasn't it the trash can mac pro was in 2013 and that's when phil schiller and i feel like it was the first time apple ever directly addressed claims that it wasn't innovating it was 12 years ago and it was phil schiller when they announced the mac pro trash can said can't innovate anymore my ass so anyway he had that but i think the 2019 mac pro i think that was

Pretty amazing product. The Pro Display XDR, again, quality-wise, for the time, still very expensive. But if you want to talk about innovative, the M-series chips. I feel like everybody forgets about this as a product that Apple makes. Once Apple started making its own silicon, which actually started with the iPhone, let's be honest, like the A4 chip and all of that way back when, the Apple silicon revolution, which has been kind of a slow progress over the last, whatever, 10, 15 years, that is

That is incredibly innovative. The fact that you can buy an M3 and M1 MacBook Air and it is as powerful as it is, that's incredible innovation in hardware. So the M series chips, plus Apple then released the Mac Studio a couple of years ago. Again, the studio display, but Apple Vision Pro also, you can say what you want about its popularity or whatever, but it is amazing technology. And again, post-job. So, I mean, those are just a few things to say

I mean, to say that Apple has just been sitting on the iPhone, we've talked about before how many products are kind of iPhone related, like Apple Watch. You need an iPhone to set it up. AirPods. You need an iPhone basically to set it up. Apple Vision Pro. Also kind of an extension of your Apple ecosystem, all that. But I mean, it's kind of disingenuous to say that Apple has not innovated since Steve Jobs. Well, and to be clear, Apple,

He didn't. That's not exactly what he said. He said, what have they invented since then? Now, and here's the thing. There's a little bit of a difference that I think is worth make. You know, Steve Jobs invented the iPhone and now they're just sitting on it. Right. Okay. I think the important piece there is that. Okay. Two things. It's weird that Mark Zuckerberg, someone who it's unclear what he's invented.

would be knocking another company. So then you have to look and be like, why? Why is Apple living rent-free in Mark Zuckerberg's head to the extent that it is? It's true. Tim Cook just tweaks him constantly somehow and the two don't ever even talk. It is just... I've never seen a person that is seemingly more obsessed with a different company than Mark Zuckerberg is of Apple. And here's why.

Because for almost all of Facebook's meta's existence, it has been at the mercy of Apple, right? Because it is, Facebook exploded when it was on mobile, on the iPhone, right? It exploded because it was like, you can have it anywhere. They made it, you know, remember, because remember for the beginning of,

The iPhone, there was no, Facebook's app came later. Remember, they didn't even do a mobile app at first because they're like, no, people just use this on their computers, whatever. And so you have to just kind of ask yourself why. And he reveals it like he was, he is very, very sour that the experience of connecting the Ray-Bans is not the same as the AirPods. And to be fair, he has a point.

If you take photos with the Meta Ray Bans, they should just end up in your photos library on your iPhone. And the fact that they don't is completely ridiculous and is completely on Apple and they should do better. But you can use a DJI drone. And when I fly the drone and take a picture, those pictures end up in my photo library.

But they go through the app. They have to go through the app, but they'll go to the photo library. Yeah, I don't have any of their Meta Ray Bands, but the point is you don't get the same kind of connection as you do with both the audio and with... You can't use...

The voice assistant, I don't believe with the metarabians. Like, I don't think you can summon the voice assistant doing that the way you can with AirPods. And so I just feel like, so there is a point there. But that has nothing to do with whether they've invented anything. I mean, think about it. Like, the AirPods alone would be a Fortune, what, 100 company? Right. The iPad and the Mac alone would be Fortune 500 companies. Right.

right? All of these things, like it's kind of, it's, it's amazing. We don't think of them because all of them are at the mercy of being compared to the scale of the iPhone. And yet on their own, those are huge business. And you could argue like the AirPods wouldn't exist without the iPhone. Obviously the watch wouldn't really exist without the iPhone. It's just, it's, it's the iPhone is a singular example. You can't compare it to things because it is so, so, so unique in its, in its sense. So saying like, well, the watch, there are other fitness watches, but,

I don't know anyone who was wearing a fitness watch before the Apple watch came out. Now I'm talking about people who maybe aren't using Apple watches, but like the galaxy watch, the pixel watch, all those things came really after the Apple watch became popular. So they invented a lot. They invented a lot. I also think talking about why does Apple live rent free in Zuckerberg's head, the app tracking transparency and the change, I forget what iOS version it was that introduced 0.5. What was it?

14.5 was when it actually went into effect because this is when you and I met. Oh, yeah. And the ask app not to track. I mean, that significantly affected Meta's business because what is Meta's business? It's advertising. Because Meta doesn't sell hardware products.

They don't charge for their services. You don't have to pay to use Facebook or threads or Instagram. They are a ads business. I mean, it is the same with Google. They're an ads business. And so why is Mark Zuckerberg, whatever? Uh, yeah, it's because his entire business is based on where can my ads be shown? And a vast majority of them, especially here in the U S is on the iPhone. And so when the iPhone changes, how it, uh, treats apps and tracking, uh,

And it directly affects Mark Zuckerberg's business. Yeah, I think he's still bitter about it. I think so. When it comes to like, does Apple's closed system prevent other companies innovating? You know, you could say I recently talked about the Beyerdynamic Amaron headphones. They're Bluetooth wireless headphones. I actually really like them. They sound great. They actually fit better in my ears than AirPods Pro 2.

And you could argue that due to Apple's tight reins on the iOS and macOS ecosystem, it's a worse experience because they don't auto switch. I can't auto switch between my iPhone, my iPad and my Mac as seamlessly as my AirPods. And it maybe won't integrate as tightly with whatever other things. Honestly,

Companies can still make really innovative products like Beyerdynamic did, and I will use them even if it doesn't have that slight integration. But also, there's other platforms out there, and the biggest Android is bigger worldwide than iPhones.

And so companies could try to innovate based on the Android operating system, which is more open. And if that innovation succeeded, then I think there would be a more of an argument to say, if Apple were more open, then this innovation could come to the iPhone as it has for Android. But it seems like no one's really doing that. And maybe you could say the, the meta ray bands. Yes, there could be a slightly tighter integration there. Take a photo. It shows up in your photo library, whatnot. But I, I,

The iPhone is not the only platform that companies can innovate for. It is not the biggest platform worldwide. It is the majority here in the United States, but to hyper focus on it. Yeah, I think it's not a, not a great argument, I guess I would say. I agree. And I, I just, as far as the, is meta transitioning to be Trump friendly, I think like, I think that is probably true.

And I think that that makes sense. We talked about this before. I think that like they're all of these companies are preparing for an administration that is far more transactional than and I'm going to like use a contrast. I don't want any of our listeners to think I'm passing judgment on either of these things.

But they are there. It's transactional versus principal. And I don't mean to say that there will be people in the new administration who have no principles or that the old administration was better because it was principled. What I'm saying is like in the past, you had to like fit into a set of principles. And now it's like, if you say nice things and like me, then you're more likely to get. So like, of course, these companies are all saying nice things and trying to like, cause they want to be on the right side. And to be clear, like,

you, whether you like it or not, that is the responsibility of those CEOs. And it's very easy for someone in, in who is not in that situation to be like, but you shouldn't curry favor with bad people. If that's how you feel about the new administration. But if you are the CEO of a publicly traded company worth $3 trillion, it is your obligation to make sure that you are protecting those hundreds of thousands of employees, all of that shareholder value, all of the people who like, here's the thing, like, uh,

you know, putting tariffs on goods from China, uh,

Tim Cook was able to prevent that from happening to Apple in the last Trump administration, right? And it's absolutely his top priority because the iPhone is like the lifeblood of a multi-trillion dollar worth of economy. Also, he doesn't want to be laying off thousands of employees because suddenly the products get more expensive or the costs go up or these different things happening. Or you've got companies like Meta who they need the administration to help them

with like the EU, for example, the EU passed data restrictions, which require America, like I said, that says that American companies can't basically export their data back to face, like to the United States, which makes it really hard to run a global platform, social network, right? In the past administration, excuse me, the current administration, uh,

We watched the EU just pass regulation after regulation. USBC is required. Now you have to open up to sideloading. And the current administration didn't do a single thing to stick up for American companies. And you know that they want... All of these leaders are trying to make sure that the next administration does not follow that same path because they need their help. Facebook needs the administration's help to negotiate with the EU over data privacy protection. And the only way that's going to happen is say nice things. And...

I think we remember the Department of Justice. There's still a case against Apple that we'll be seeing more of, I think, later this year. And a lot of it is like the Apple Watch exclusivity on the iPhone and connectivity there. You know, sideloading and stuff in the EU might one day come to the US due to some of these laws. And one of the reasons I think Mark Zuckerberg goes on a podcast on the biggest podcast in the world is

and says these kinds of things is this is not the, hold on. I was, you promised me this was going to be, that's right. Mark Zuckerberg went on the second biggest podcast in the world, right under primary technology and says these things because he wants these ideas. I think in people's heads, in lawmakers heads who, and we've talked about it before. A lot of times when you watch these hearings, maybe the DOJ, uh,

It's hard to believe that these people intimately understand the technology and what's actually happening behind the scenes. And so saying these things to hopefully maybe the Department of Justice case later this year might have some sway. They can call back to these things that Mark Zuckerberg said or whatever, as they may regulate Apple in the future. So and speaking of, you know, tech CEOs, again, having to work with this new administration, Tim Cook and a bunch of other tech CEOs are going to be at the inauguration on January 20th.

And John Gruber had one of the biggest takedown lines in Daring Fireball where he said, rings don't kiss themselves. So that's why he's a good writer. He's a good writer. So anyway, we'll see.

We'll see. We'll see what Meta invents in the next year or two. I can't wait for it. Lava, let's talk about personal tech. You had a great personal tech segment. Maybe before we get to that, I just want to mention this Tim Cook interview as a personal tech. Tim Cook's personal tech personal life. Actually, he did this interview. It was with

Was it with the UK? It was while he was in the UK. He was in the UK. It was the Table Manners podcast with Jesse and Lenny Ware for a new interview. So just talked about kind of his personal life and his ideas about retirement, which of course, you know, he's still going to be doing things. He's not going to sit around. Says he gets about five to 600 emails a day, which, and then during product, you know, new big events, it becomes way more. His first job was flipping burgers at 14 or 15 years old. Worked at a place called Tasty Freeze, which I think, I think,

I think that still exists today. I'm making a dollar 10 an hour. That's, that's amazing. Dollar 10 to be one of the, I mean, yeah, well, the wealthiest companies in the world. He also says he doesn't really cook that much. He just eats cafe max. He

which is the restaurant at apple park which you had food from right you've been there yes that's true yep i've been in the i've been in the so there's a cafe max in the ring that there's probably multiple ones but i've been in the big one and then there's also a sort of cafe max ish i think i think they actually call it that but it's in the visitor center across the street so i've even had both of those it's good it's it is good food i don't need fancy and it's a slightly more fancy than i need but it's it was really really good like yeah hoping to try it this june we'll see

Uh, cook's favorite meal growing up was fried chicken. He's a big fan of chocolate, especially dark chocolate. His favorite wine is Kistler Chardonnay. Personal favorite wine. His favorite Palo Alto restaurants is Ethel's fancy. And apparently apple makes jam from fruit trees planted in apple park. I think that's amazing. That's amazing. That's awesome. And they asked him about Jen Moji.

I think this, this is good. This is, this is like Marcus Brownlee asking him about magic mouse. It's like along the same lines saying like, do you use this product? And Tim Cook said he was working on a gen Moji yesterday when he said this, he said, I love Christmas in London. It's like the ultimate Christmas city. He was trying to create a big Ben with a tree out front, a no reveal on it. If he ever got it to work, but what, what, what does that mean? That London is like the ultimate Christmas. Like, yeah, I don't understand what that means.

There's a lot of Christmas markets in Europe and I feel like Austria, you know, Vienna. They got, they got some serious Christmas markets. I don't know. New York city. Londoners. I, we have listeners over in the UK and London. Let us know is, is London the quintessential Christmas city or is this just pure pandering? Yeah.

London is a product in our lineup. That's curious. So anyway, I'll put it, I'll link to that interview in the show. You know, I can't believe though that they didn't ask him about the most pressing question, which is if diet or if diet Mountain Dew is your drink, uh,

Why don't you have it at like he remember he said that he's like I diet Mountain Dew is my favorite soft drink, but I can't have it because you know, Apple Park is a Coke place, which that's great. I think every place should be a Coke place to be honest with you. But if you're the CEO of a $3 trillion company, I don't think it matters what the contract says. I think if you want a little cooler in your office with diet Mountain Dew, you should be able to have it. I think Tim Cook could have a mini fridge with whatever he wants in his office.

Is it for, wait, is there, is there a deal with Apple and Coke or something? Well, every single place that serves soft drinks will have a deal with a distributor. Like you have to get it from somewhere. And so you'll like have a distributor that'll bring, you know, all those boxes of syrup that get put, whatever. It has to be one or the other. Like you're either a Coke place or. Well, first of all, I don't think that there's, I don't know of any places that are not like bowling alleys or bars that have both. Right. But like, or like speedways or whatever, but yeah, most places have one or the other. So interesting. Okay. Yeah.

I would love to know some under the table deal with Apple and Coca-Cola. I'm sure he could just go to the local Safeway and buy cases of Mountain Dew and put them in a fridge. I don't think that violates the contract. No, no, it probably doesn't. All right. And you had a great personal tech question. Why don't you lay it on me? Okay. I want to know, we talk like, listen, people in our situation, um,

And by situation, I just mean nerds who like gadgets are constantly thinking of like upgrading to the next thing to the net, whatever it is. And sometimes I was thinking about this and I'm like, I don't, I don't know if that always makes the most sense. And what spurred it for me is I love the M4 iPad pro fantastic. It's probably the, it's definitely the best iPad they've ever made. Of course, like it's the most recent one. They fixed the things that were wrong. They have a tandem OLED. They put the camera in the right place. All those things are great.

But it does not work with the best accessory they've ever made for the iPad, which is the Smart Folio keyboard. And I find myself wanting to go back to my M2 iPad Pro because it just is so much more convenient to throw in my bag, be able to pull it out. It's way lighter than putting a Magic Keyboard on it. And I like the Magic Keyboard. It's great.

And so I was thinking about what is the oldest piece of tech that I own that I still use on a regular basis. And it's not the M2 iPad Pro. That's not that old. But the impetus is like, is there something that is just so... I think about like Marco Arma and his keyboard or John Syracuse and his mouse. You know what I mean? Like something that is... And if you... Like you can just tune into any episode of ATP and there's a good chance that they'll talk about either of those things just to like... Right. Just to... If you don't know what I'm talking about.

But is there something that you still use on a regular basis that is just like so dependable and reliable that you just continue to use it? And so I have, I have a couple that I'll just throw out there. I'll get to the best one in a minute, but like we have several, uh,

Apple TVs that we've never needed to upgrade because it's like on a auxiliary TV somewhere. It's like, I don't even know. I think this is probably a 4k one. Maybe it's not, maybe it's just an Apple TV HD, but it's, it's on a, it's on like an old Samsung TV. That's an LCD, not even 4k. So like, what, what am I going to upgrade that for? It's fine. Like it just works, right? It still shows the things I needed to show. I don't need to do anything else. And we, and I have some, I actually have some hard drives that,

that are like eight or 12 terabyte hard drives that are just, they just keep doing their job. They just keep sitting there. Right. Like what do I need to like, until I have, they're all backed up. So if one of them dies, I'll deal with that, but I'm not going to just go buy a 12 terabyte SSD to replace them just because it's exciting. So the tripod I have for my camera, in fact, I used it, sorry,

this is a little bit stream of consciousness so i apologize but i used a nikon dslr well into the mirrorless age i was a big fan of the d 700 and then the d750 and i i use them well into the mirrorless age because they were just so good and they still i love them so much because they get such better battery life like you could shoot an entire wedding

And then the battery would still last for like a couple of weeks after that. Whereas on a mirrorless camera, like you, you're replacing battery on a pretty regular basis because it's, it's, it's, there's so much more like you have to, there's the electronic viewfinder. There's all these different things. So anyway, but the oldest product I own that I still use on an every single day basis. Oh, he's getting this. It makes him so mad, but it's this Apple keyboard. It's a ridiculous.

No, it's not ridiculous. It's not, though. Well, hold on. I'm not even saying this is the best product I use every day, but this is 14 years old, Stephen. That's pretty old. And I have no reason...

to i mean i have multiple other magic keyboards sitting here but these are all been sent to me like with review units like i would not buy one of these there's no chance i do have um what lot i have one of those logimic master keys things it's great it's great but i it's not better than this like i wish i had bought five of these

Jason's talking about the magic keyboard with double A batteries. Oh yeah. Sorry. I should have told people because not everyone can see this. Is not as good as the newer magic keyboard with touch. No, it is. It's better. Touch ID. Jason, you can have touch ID. Who cares about touch ID? It's faster. I have an Apple watch on. Guess what happens every time I need to unlock my computer. It just does it. I don't need touch ID. And, but here's the thing about this, this keyboard, aside from the fact that I have to replace double A batteries, uh,

pretty regularly it is the feel of it the angle of it is so so much better it's just everything about this is is better than the ones that they're making of those low profile low profile ones right now and i i'm

There are definitely drawbacks. Like you can't pair it by just plugging it into a lightning cable. I get it. Like all those things are true, but this thing is like, this keyboard is, I think literally like 14 years old. That's pretty good. I'm actually a little jealous because I was trying to think, do I have anything that old? And my thing is, you know, we, we built this house and we moved in. It's going to be three years in May.

So, and that was kind of like a big reset because we moved out of our house of 10 years and then into this house and I built this studio with that house. And so there's so much that is pretty much new that we got with the new house. There actually might be a couple Lutron switches that are like almost 10 years old that were in the old house first because we didn't have neutral wires in the wall. And those are one of the few switches that actually worked.

So there might be some Lutron switches that are old, but

I will say I really, there's a feeling you get when you know you've bought something that you can use forever and never think about again. Like there is a comfort in, in that. And there's a couple items. It's not, it's tech adjacent, but there's a couple items like that. And I do have some old Apple TVs that I don't update. Although when new Apple TVs come out, I do the rotation thing where I put the new Apple TV in the main room and then whatever the one piece, one piece of gear, it's probably my oldest.

It might be approaching 10 years old, but it's a Denon home theater receiver. And it was like at the time, it was one of the only ones that did Dolby Atmos and did 4k at two zones. And I still use it today. It's 7.1. It does all the things I want it to do. It's a little quirky. And I honestly was looking to upgrade it because there are receivers that have Apple home kit built in. And so I was curious about it, but yeah,

it's one of those things where it's hard to justify the cost when the receiver we have right now still works great. And so the receiver is one to this, like microphones as a content creator, podcaster, there is a thing where like when you find the microphone that just works for you, that's one of the technologies that like,

it does not change at the pace of other things. And like a lot of times, especially in the audio world, sometimes older is like just longstanding. I don't know. Unbeatable. So I've used this microphone for five or six years now. This is the earthworks ethos for podcasting. I love it. And it's one of the few things that I don't feel an urge to upgrade. And then the mic I use for videos, uh,

This is the Sennheiser MKH 416 expensive microphone. It's like a thousand dollars, but it was the first shotgun microphone that once I bought it and set it up, I have zero desire to even look at other microphones. It sounds great. I want nothing more from it. It is just ideal.

And that is, that is a feeling like priceless might be an exaggeration, but sometimes it is worth it. If, especially if it has to do with your work or something you use all the time to just know, like, this is the final form of this thing. And I don't, I have no desire to upgrade. My microphones are one, my whole theater receiver ish. I was going to, I do have a TV that's 10 years old. It's a 4k LG LCD.

uh but i was actually looking at oleds recently so i can't i don't know if i could say it about that you know what okay i have two more i'm sorry i know we gotta please don't go that i just realized the we have a samsung plasma tv in our bedroom that's that we got what roughly around the same time we got married and we've been married for 17 years and you know what it says it's 720p

It's a 55 inch 720p. It looks amazing. Like we literally just use it to watch friends. Like it's not like this thing gets a lot of like use, but plasma TVs, those things hold up like, and guess what? I never, I never get a notification asking if I want to update the software on it because you know what? There's nothing smart about it. You just plug it in. And then the other one is you, I still use, I keep these in my bag. These are the Bowers and Wilkins C5.

And so when I need wired earbuds, these are from like 2013 or 14. I can't remember when they came out. I've never, I've they, they're new enough that they had the, you know, Apple at one point, remember when at some point you had to decide whether the headphones you were going to get had this little thing. So you could use a microphone or click on it to do stuff, right? Like that was a thing. And these ones were one of the first ones, third party that came out that didn't,

that had that that were like really they're bowers and wilkins they're really good earbuds and i use these when i'm traveling like if i'm on a plane and i need to plug in you know the headphone jack or if i'm traveling like when when i've done our podcast traveling i just use those as the in-ear monitors and stuff and they're just but like i'm never gonna buy another pair of wired earbuds ever in my life like why would i do that these are gonna work forever

I will say I had a pair. This is, I had a pair of Vizio earbuds, which I don't even know if they still make earbuds. Did they whisper ads in your ears when you listen to things? This was before it was like that. It was its own company, but it was these earbuds and I think I still have them, but it had like the flat cable instead of round. So it would tangle less and they had the silicone tip. So they went in the air and they actually sounded surprisingly good. I think they were like 30 bucks and I use those for like,

10 plus years whenever I needed a wired headphone situation. And I would probably still be using them right now, except, uh, they're dynamic sent me these in your headphones that I use, but those were like surprisingly good. I don't know why, but the Vizio headphones from like 15 years ago, those were really cool. Jason's getting something else from his bag. Well, I'm not gonna, I'm not gonna be able to find them in time, but I was going to ask you because those, those bars and Wilkins replaced for me, uh,

Going off camera again. Well, do you remember Apple used to make a premium pair of in-ear earbuds? Yes, with the silicone tips. I loved those. I still have them somewhere. Yes. Okay, so this is the thing we would love to hear from you. When you leave us a five-star rating and review an Apple podcast, or if you've already done that, you don't have to do it again, maybe the best place, comment on the post on our

in our community, social.primarytech.fm, or you can just tag me and Jason on threads, blue sky, mastodon, wherever. Let us know what is the oldest piece of tech that you still use all the time, every day that you just don't want to or need to replace. And I would love to hear about it. And if it's a TV, I don't think that counts because the old TV has lasted a long time, but yeah, he was a long time. But, but I think the audio gear, I

I was going to also say my camera, this is the Sony a seven four. I got it three years ago and it is another piece of tech where I

I have no reason to upgrade until eight K becomes pervasive and actually a feasible like storage wise and YouTube and all that kind of stuff. I have the bandwidth for it, if you know what I mean, but, but I have no, I have no desire to upgrade that because it's like, it's fine. Oh, and one, and one other piece of gear, I have to say that I will never upgrade the humane AI pen. Well, I'm, I'm glad to hear you'll never upgrade it.

It's not that old. I can't even use it anymore. Anyway, let us know. What is your oldest piece of tech? That was a fun segment. We're going to go talk about the Starbucks new policy in our bonus episode because Jason wrote about it. And yeah, got some thoughts. So if you want to listen to our bonus episodes, which have bonus episode every week,

I'll also reveal a special thing I'm doing next week. I'll reveal it in the bonus episode because I don't know if I can even talk about it publicly. So I'll do the bonus episode. I'll tell you there. And we're going to talk about Starbucks. So you can do that. Listen to our bonus episodes by going to primarytech.fm and click bonus episodes. You can support the show there or you can support us directly on Apple Podcasts. You don't get chapters if you do that. Not my fault. It's on Apple. But if you want the chapters and all the good stuff,

Go to primarytech.fm, click bonus episodes. You can support the show there. You get an ad-free version and access to all those bonus episode catalog. Thanks for watching. Thanks for listening. We'll catch you next week.