Michael DeGusta

@rjonesy @irace (Unless the TV is older, I should say.)

@rjonesy @irace I have multiple of my elders setup like this without issue - never use it for music, never touch app etc. Note that both Beam and Arc require HDMI-to-optical adapter so really no benefit of using optical vs straight HDMI in my experience.

Sonos people. If I hardwire TV → optical SPDIF → Sonos Beam 2 plus 2 wireless rear Sonos = all are synced to TV volume/remote. No app, no extra remote, no input changing, no additional volume control. Just simple dummy-proof “surround sound” right?

@rjonesy @irace Esp. with 30% off, I think most people would find the Arc Ultra worth the ~$300 over the Beam 2, even for limited dialog-centric uses. I would not get bigger rears - Era 100 is plenty for normal folks.

@irace Should I spring for Arc Ultra or bigger rears? The room is massive, but he’s literally just gonna care about football announcers voices coming from behind him. If we are being honest.

@neilcybart @charlesarthur But no reasonable person is actually arguing the reversed version is literally a better ad (nor that it's bad an iPad can do all these things). The point is it demonstrates Apple could've done the reverse -concept- (& surely done so in a way that sold more iPads than objects).

@charlesarthur Problem with video in reverse is it ends up selling the physical objects, not the iPad. It's the exact opposite message.

Few additional thoughts about the new iPad ad (and I honestly can't believe literally no one has mentioned these today): - Add the total cost of the objects found in the image below: $50,000? Most are available in one form or another on a <$1,000 iPad. This is part of the democratization of creative tools that has transformed society for the better. Nothing wrong with continuing to use these physical tools and even displaying some of them in your home. But important to recognize how limiting many of them are to the masses. - The imagery associated with a collection of tools that wouldn't fit in many people's homes, fitting into something as thick as poster board is powerful. Again, democratization of content creation tools. - Computers are content creation tools. They are just as much cultural artifacts as musical instruments, paint, brushes, and chess boards. - Not to get too meta, but notice how there weren't huge pieces of broken piano or TVs left after the press crushed the physical objects. Instead, they were figuratively "crushed" to create the iPad - at least that seems to have been the intent. Message being the physical objects will live on in digital form. It's clear consensus is not seeing the ad in this way with many letting nostalgia ("I hated seeing the stuff get crushed") get the best of them. That's OK. Paradigm shifts are inherently uncomfortable. - If you think this stuff is controversial (it really isn't), just wait for the very intriguing spatial computing battles that will come. So many earthly possessions that we own, collect, and use don't really need to exist in physical form when you have "enhanced" vision.

@sama It's sunset on New Year's Eve on Sydney harbour. A speedboat zooms under the Harbour Bridge, and past the Opera House while multi-colored fireworks shoot overhead. The boat launches off from the water, flies through the sky, & into outer space, passing the moon.

don't hold back on the detail or difficulty!

we'd like to show you what sora can do, please reply with captions for videos you'd like to see and we'll start making some!

@sscheirey @BenBajarin I can actually confirm that he (unsurprisingly) absolutely hated it. :) He raved about the (large, right-side-up) Sony logo on Judge Ito’s computer display in the OJ trial. (And from the first iMac to today’s, there’s been an Apple logo on the back…)

@BenBajarin Lol I wonder what Steve thought of that

Fun fact: My first Mac laptop, the logo was upside down when you had the lid up :).

@stratechery @benthompson 2 pedantic notes re Vision Pro & "media consumption on the go": you can't download 4k from Apple (or Disney) - it's HD only, & AVP's horizontal pixel count is actually less than a 4k TV. It might still look amazing! But it seems like offline will be HD scaled-up to less-than-4k.

The Apple Vision Pro's Missing Apps The Apple Vision Pro is missing some important apps, and it seems likely that Apple's App Store policies played a part. Might the company respond by doubling down with Disney? stratechery.com/2024/the-apple…

Extending actual -verification- to everyone who wants it makes sense. Extending an automatic blue checkmark to anyone willing to pay $8 seems pretty dumb.

@rjonesy @kevinclark My best guess at an explanation is that the reason Lutron was finally willing to introduce this new Diva for Caseta is -because- they now have the clearly superior Sunnata for their higher tiers.

@kevinclark I don’t get it because they already have the solution. Paddle switch (no physical state) and led touch slider (no physical state). Guh.

@kevinclark JFC, they added a physical slider, just so it could get out of sync?! Omg. youtu.be/bHxIi79tRG0

Sorry Apple, you can't argue with The @Verge Score: the iPhone 14 Pro is the worst flagship phone you've ever made.

It’s pretty amusing that everyone thought Android was going to become the Windows of mobile, but what actually happened is Windows became the Android of PCs.

What the Wall Street Journal considers a “Breaking News” push notification…

@counternotions It’s available next Friday for $1,300, for suckers…

$800-$900 MacBook SE comes out when? a) 2023 b) 2024 c) 2025 d) 2026 e) 2038

@gruber @om @stevesi @mjtsai The only other combination Apple ought to make but currently doesn’t is size > perf > price, which is what the original Air was, and hopefully this new 12” will be.

@gruber @om @stevesi @mjtsai I always think of it as: the 3 meaningful laptop characteristics are size, performance/capability, & price, with their ranking defining the machine. The Pro has always been perf > size > price. The plain MacBooks were price > size > perf, which is what Air has now come to mean.

If the MacBook Air lacks the wedge that made it the Air (remember that envelope schtick) then is it really a MacBook Air? Why is it not a MacBook? I am confused. Thoughts @stevesi @gruber @mjtsai

@chornbe @hardie Apple's reported numbers are that both M2 MacBooks are "up to 1.4x" faster than their M1 counterparts, which would strongly imply the gap is the same or at least similar in this generation. not way higher.

So the new 13” MacBook “Pro” is nearly identical to the Air except that it’s heavier, louder, has a smaller screen, a worse camera, fewer ports, and it costs more. One of the more embarrassing products Apple has released - I’d love to hear a charitable defense of its existence.

@DavidWrites1 That is legitimately as strong of an argument as any I can think of, sadly.

@degusta When it absolutely positively has to have … a touch bar? 🤷🏼‍♂️

@hardie My understanding is that the difference was extremely minor in M1 version & only in very particular use cases. At least that one had a better screen, same camera, and same ports as M1 Air, whereas the M2 “Pro” is worse in all 3.

@degusta Maybe it goes faster because it’s louder? (active cooling)

@reneritchie But why isn’t Apple ready to cancel it? Presumably because people really want it, but why should anyone actually really want it? If it didn’t have “Pro” in the name and a higher price tag, I think basically everyone would assume it was lower end & less “Pro” than the Air.