Jean-Louis Gassée:

Does the world need a new credit card, especially one without any outstanding perks? The answer lies in the way the Apple Card works rather than in the number of miles or the cash rebate percentages.

And:

For a sufficiently large number of Apple customers, the new payment system is a classic How vs What proposition — and the “How” wins. The Wallet app offers complete control over purchases, payments, rebates, timing, and security, all in one place. As for security, three different card numbers track purchases made with the physical card, with a card number on line, or with Apple Pay on your Watch or iPhone. No need to use a special third party app, such as the excellent Mint. Everything is built into the Wallet, itself built in every iPhone and iPad.

A great take on Apple Card. One interesting tidbit was the reveal of two different on-boarding processes for the physical Apple Card. This tweet shows both side-by-side. Anyone know the why on this?

UPDATE: The answer appears to be NFC support. My iPhone XR supports NFC, which was used to activate the card. Brigitte’s iPhone is likely an older pre-NFC model, no auto-activate magic.