The Latest from Comfort Zone, MacStories Unwind, and Magic Rays of Light

Enjoy the latest episodes from MacStories’ family of podcasts:

Comfort Zone

Matt has a lot of feelings about podcast players, Niléane has gone on an adventure where the sounds are just warmer and somehow better but she can’t quite explain why, and Chris tries to make an all-out war break out.


MacStories Unwind

This week on Unwind, Federico and I offer a peek behind what it’s like to wait for an Apple press release to drop, Federico critiques an Italian’s recommendations of what to buy at Costco and shares a videogame pick, and I have a new movie for listeners.


Magic Rays of Light

Sigmund and Devon check in after the Netflix “bug” that briefly enabled integration with TV app. Then, they highlight the return of Surface, share their thoughts on the Apple TV app coming to Android, and discuss the new iPhone 16e.

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Jony Ive on the BBC’s Desert Island Discs

Jony Ive has often been a mysterious and guarded personality, and any insight into his mind has always been interesting. So Ive’s appearance today on the BBC’s ‘Desert Island Discs’ was sure to be appointment listening.

Ive touches on some interesting subjects, including the first time he experienced using an Apple Macintosh:

The joy of being able to type on that and to see a page on the screen and then use a laser printer and also choose the sounds. This was the first computer that let you actually change the alert chimes, and I was shocked that I had a sense of the people that made it. They could have been in the room, and you really had a sense of what was on their mind and their values and their sort of joy and exuberance in making something that they knew was helpful and reminded me of how important design was.

He also talked about his feelings and the subsequent responsibility he felt for helping kickstart the smartphone revolution with the first iPhone:

The nature of innovation is there will be unpredicted consequences, and I celebrate and am encouraged by the very positive contribution, the empowerment, the liberty that is provided to so many people in so many ways. Just because the not-so-positive consequences weren’t intended, that doesn’t matter relative to how I feel responsible and is a contributor to decisions that I have made since and decisions that I’m making in the future… You need a very particular resolve and discipline not to be drawn in and seduced… but we’ve [Ive’s family] worked very hard to recognizing [sic] just the power of these tools [and] to use them I think responsibly and carefully and like everybody I find that difficult.

Ive also understands his life-long association with Steve Jobs, to the point where even he often asks the question many in the tech community still do:

I remember he used to say, ‘I really don’t want you to – when I’m not here – I really don’t want you to be thinking, well, what would Steve do?’ And every time I think, ‘I wonder what Steve would do?’ I think, ‘Ha! I’m doing exactly what you didn’t want!’

Ive also chose a wide range of records to take to his ‘desert island’, including Simple Minds, U2, a track from the Wall-E soundtrack, and a performance of ‘Singing In the Rain’ by his son, which Ive recorded on his iPhone.

The conversation covers a wide range of topics, from working with his father, a silversmith, to joining Apple and ultimately leaving to form LoveFrom. He also talks about working on the failed Newton MessagePad and his impression of meeting Jobs for the first time (‘Steve understood what I thought and felt’). It’s a fascinating interview, so I’d encourage you to listen to the full episode.

You can listen now in the BBC Sounds app. The conversation with Ive will also be available in one month via the Desert Island Discs podcast feed.


Recipes Are Coming to Apple’s News+ Service

Source: Apple.

Source: Apple.

Apple continues to layer new features into its News+ service. With iOS and iPadOS 18.4, the company says the service will add recipes from well-known publishers including Allrecipes, Bon Appétit, Food & Wine, Good Food, and Serious Eats:

With the new Food feature, users will be able to find stories curated by Apple News editors, as well as browse, search, and filter tens of thousands of recipes in the Recipe Catalog — with new recipes added every day. The beautifully designed recipe format makes it easy to review ingredients and directions, and a new cook mode takes step-by-step instructions to the full screen. Users can also save their favorite recipes for later and access them offline.

Source: Apple.

Source: Apple.

Interestingly, Apple’s press release makes no mention of the Mac. I’d rather use my iPhone or iPad in the kitchen, but a Mac is a great place to browse recipes, so hopefully News+ Food will be brought to the Mac eventually.


Vision Pro to Gain Apple Intelligence, Spatial Gallery App, and Companion iPhone App

Source: Apple.

Source: Apple.

Apple announced today that visionOS 2.4 will add some big features to the Vision Pro.

For starters, Apple Intelligence is coming to the Vision Pro. When I was at WWDC, I was surprised when there was no mention that Apple Intelligence would be added to visionOS. Since then, visionOS 2.0 and three subsequent releases have debuted without any sign of Apple Intelligence. However, that will change with the release of visionOS 2.4 in April.

Apple says visionOS 2.4 will include:

  • Writing Tools;
  • ChatGPT integration;
  • Genmoji;
  • Image Playground; and
  • Other unspecified features
Spatial Gallery. Source: Apple

Spatial Gallery. Source: Apple

In addition, visionOS will debut Spatial Gallery, a new Vision Pro app that Apple says will feature “a curated collection of spatial photos, spatial videos, and panoramas from artists, filmmakers, photographers, and more,” including new Immersive video titles.

Apple is also releasing a Vision Pro app for the iPhone that adds:

a new way to download apps and games from the App Store; discover experiences from Apple TV, Spatial Gallery, and more; easily find helpful tips; and quickly access information for their Vision Pro. Enhancements to Guest User make it easier than ever for users to share apps and experiences with family, friends, and colleagues using a nearby iPhone or iPad.

The Apple Vision Pro app. Source: Apple.

The Apple Vision Pro app. Source: Apple.

Apple says you’ll be able to queue a download from your iPhone for your Apple Vision Pro. I gave up trying to share my Vision Pro with my family almost immediately because it was such a cumbersome process, so better sharing will be welcome. If it works as promised, this sounds like a much better approach:

With new enhancements to Guest User in visionOS 2.4, users can start a Guest User session with their nearby iPhone or iPad. When their device is unlocked, they can choose which apps are accessible to their guest and start View Mirroring with AirPlay, making it easy to guide a guest through their Vision Pro experience.

It’s great to see Apple continue to push the Vision Pro forward with better user experiences, new content, and additional ways to enjoy its unique features.


Apple Intelligence to Expand to New Languages, the EU, and Vision Pro in April

Apple has announced that its personal intelligence system dubbed Apple Intelligence will debut in additional languages in April when iOS 18.4, iPadOS 18.4, and macOS 15.4 are released.

In addition to the currently supported languages, Apple will add French, German, Italian, Portuguese (Brazil), Spanish, Japanese, Korean, Chinese (simplified), and localized English for Singapore and India. Developers running the latest betas can start testing their apps in these languages today.

The updates in April will also bring Apple Intelligence features to the iPhone and iPad for EU users and Apple Vision Pro users.

It’s great to see that Apple Intelligence will expand in so many ways soon. For the feature to be widely adopted, localization is important, as is availability in the EU and on as many devices as possible, including the Vision Pro.


Apple Vision Glasses Will Be Irresistible

I found myself nodding in agreement from beginning to end with this story by Lachlan Campbell, who, after a year of Vision Pro, imagines what future Apple Vision glasses may be able to do and how they’d reshape our societal norms:

I’ve written about my long-term belief in spatial computing, and how visionOS 2 made small but notable progress. The pieces have clicked into place more recently for me for what an AR glasses version of Apple Vision would look like, and how it will change us. We don’t have the technology, hardware-wise, to build this product today, or we’d already be wearing it. We need significant leaps in batteries, mobile silicon, and displays to make this product work. Leaps in AI assistance, cameras, and computer vision would make this product better, too. But the industry is hard at work at all of these problems. This product is coming.

The basic pitch: augmented reality glasses with transparent lenses that can project more screen than you could ever own, wherever you are. The power of real software like iPad/Mac, an always-on intelligent assistant, POV photos/video/audio, and listening to audio without headphones. Control it like Apple Vision Pro with your eyes, hands, and voice, optionally pairing accessories (primarily AirPods and any of stylus/keyboard/trackpad/mice work for faster/more precise inputs). It’s cellular (with an Apple-designed modem) and entirely wireless. It combines the ideas of ambient computing that Humane (RIP) and Meta Ray-Bans have begun, including a wearable assistant, POV photography, and ambient audio with everything you love about your current Apple products.

I may be stating the obvious here, but I fundamentally believe that headsets are a dead end and glasses are the ultimate form factor we should be striving for. Or let me put it another way: every time I use visionOS, I remember how futuristic everything about it still feels…and how much I wish I was looking at it through glasses instead.

There’s a real possibility we may have Apple glasses (and an Apple foldable?) by 2030, and I wish I could just skip ahead five years now. As Lachlan argues, we’re marching toward all of this.

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One AI to Rule Them All?

I enjoyed this look by M.G. Siegler at the current AI landscape, evaluating the positions of all the big players and trying to predict who will come out on top based on what we can see today. I’ve been thinking about this a lot lately. The space is changing so rapidly, with weekly announcements and rumors, that it’s challenging to keep up with all the latest models, app integrations, and reasoning modes. But one thing seems certain: with 400 million weekly users, ChatGPT is winning in the public eye.

However, I was captivated by this analogy, and I wish I’d thought of it myself:

Professionals and power users will undoubtedly pay for, and get value out of, multiple models and products. But just as with the streaming wars, consumers are not going to buy all of these services. And unlike that war, where all of the players had differentiating content, again, the AI services are reaching some level of parity (for consumer use cases). So whereas you might have three or four streaming services that you pay for, you will likely just have one main AI service. Again, it’s more like search in that way.

I see the parallels between different streaming services and different AI models, and I wonder if it’s the sort of diversification that happens before inevitable consolidation. Right now, I find ChatGPT’s Deep Research superior to Google Gemini, but Google has a more fascinating and useful ecosystem story; Claude is better at coding, editing prose, and following complex instructions than any other model I’ve tested, but it feels limited by a lack of extensions and web search (for now). As a result, I find myself jumping between different LLMs for different tasks. And that’s not to mention the more specific products I use on a regular basis, such as NotebookLM, Readwise Chat, and Whisper. Could it be that, just like I’ve always appreciated distinct native apps for specific tasks, maybe I also prefer dedicated AIs for different purposes now?

I continue to think that, long term, it’ll once again come down to iOS versus Android, as it’s always been. But I also believe that M.G. Siegler is correct: until the dust settles (if it ever does), power users will likely use multiple AIs in lieu of one AI to rule them all. And for regular users, at least for the time being, that one AI is ChatGPT.

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Apple to Eliminate Advanced Data Protection for iCloud Accounts in the UK

A couple of weeks ago, I linked to a report from The Washington Post, which said that the UK government has demanded that Apple create a back door to access the encrypted iCloud data of Apple’s customers. Today, instead of creating the access the UK demanded, Apple announced it will remove Advanced Data Protection for its UK customers, which is the feature that allows users to end-to-end encrypt their iCloud data.

In doing so, Apple told 9to5Mac:

Apple can no longer offer Advanced Data Protection (ADP) in the United Kingdom to new users and current UK users will eventually need to disable this security feature. ADP protects iCloud data with end-to-end encryption, which means the data can only be decrypted by the user who owns it, and only on their trusted devices. We are gravely disappointed that the protections provided by ADP will not be available to our customers in the UK given the continuing rise of data breaches and other threats to customer privacy. Enhancing the security of cloud storage with end-to-end encryption is more urgent than ever before. Apple remains committed to offering our users the highest level of security for their personal data and are hopeful that we will be able to do so in the future in the United Kingdom. As we have said many times before, we have never built a backdoor or master key to any of our products or services and we never will.

This is a real shame to see and something I hope doesn’t spread to other countries, but I’m not optimistic that will be the case.

UK users who have enabled Advanced Data Protection will need to disable it to continue using their iCloud accounts. More details on the process and time frame for doing so are expected from Apple soon.

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My Latest Mac Hacks Column: Using Google Gemini with Read-Later and Listen-Later Services for Research

A Google Gemini report on the Sony PlayStation Portable.

A Google Gemini report on the Sony PlayStation Portable.

Yesterday, I published the latest installment of my Mac Hacks column, an exclusive perk of Club MacStories+ and Club Premier, covering how I use Google Gemini combined with read- and listen-later services to do preliminary research for projects.

What started as a way to reduce distractions when doing research with the help of Google Gemini quickly evolved into something more. As I explain in the conclusion:

The result of this workflow is that I can generate a Gemini report for an ongoing project and then read it at my leisure somewhere other than at my desk, whether I’m using my laptop, an iPad, or an e-ink device. I also have the option of heading out to my local coffee shop for a change of scenery and listening to a report as I walk. On a busy day, it’s a nice way to get some exercise and knock out some research at the same time. That flexibility, combined with fewer up-front distractions, has proven to be a great productivity boost.

Research is a universal task that touches every sort of project. It’s also a place where it’s easy to get bogged down. If you’re interested in streamlining the process, don’t miss the latest Mac Hacks.

Discounts are just one of the many Club MacStories perks.

Discounts are just one of the many Club MacStories perks.

Mac Hacks is just one of many perks that Club MacStories+ and Club Premier members enjoy, which also include:

  • weekly and monthly newsletters,
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  • customizable RSS feeds,
  • bonus columns,
  • an early and ad-free version of MacStories Unwind, our Internet culture and media podcast,
  • a vibrant Discord community of smart app and automation fans who trade a wealth of tips and discoveries every day, and
  • live Discord audio events after Apple events and at other times of the year.

On top of that, Club Premier members get AppStories+, an extended, ad-free version of our flagship podcast that we deliver early every week in high-bitrate audio.

Use the buttons below to learn more and sign up for Club MacStories+ or Club Premier.

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