Apple

Bloomberg:

Apple Inc. shipped 10 million iPhones in China during September and October, based on Bloomberg’s calculations from government data on overall and Android device shipments… it shows iPhone shipments up 6% from a year earlier, according to the China Academy of Information and Communications Technology, which is run by the country’s technology ministry.

And:

Apple took major strides to increase battery life in its iPhone 11 and 11 Pro devices while lowering the starting price by $50. After years of stagnation in cameras, the company overhauled the iPhone’s image quality this year, catching up to category leaders Google and Huawei. This approach drew an overwhelmingly positive critical reception.

And:

Beyond new device sales, Apple’s other major challenge there will be to make available more of its lucrative subscription services. As the company transitions to a business model more reliant on recurring fees — such as via iTunes Music, Apple TV+ and Apple Arcade — their unavailability in China becomes increasingly a hurdle to growth.

Interesting to watch Apple’s slow, thoughtful chess moves in one of their most important potential markets.

Reddit:

My friend and I both were on a flight but not seated together. Instead of just sending a note through AirDrop back and forth, I had this weird idea… we both have AirPods, so we traded just one each, both turned on Live Listen, and had a little chat! We only tried it to see if it worked. Wasn’t trying to be those guys who talked the whole flight.

This is a pretty interesting idea. Not practical, perhaps, but a fascinating proof-of-concept.

For folks unfamiliar with Live Listen, here’s Apple’s official support document that explains how it works.

Bloomberg:

Apple Inc. is considering bundling its paid internet services, including News+, Apple TV+ and Apple Music, as soon as 2020, in a bid to gain more subscribers, according to people familiar with the matter.

The latest sign of this strategy is a provision that Apple included in deals with publishers that lets the iPhone maker bundle the News+ subscription service with other paid digital offerings, the people said.

And:

If Apple sold Apple News+ as part of a bundle with Apple TV+ and Apple Music, publishers would get less money because the cost of the news service would likely be reduced, the people said.

As I’ve said before, the bundle seems like a great idea. A money saving win for consumers, especially for those who would subscribe to all of Apple’s offerings anyway. And a win for Apple, as a bundle would help boost subscriber numbers for, say, Apple News+, a service that people might use if it was part of a bundle, but not if they had to pay for it as a standalone product.

Walmart:

Earlier this year we announced a new way to make Online Grocery shopping even easier for customers – Walmart Voice Order – a service that gives customers the option to add items to their Walmart Online Grocery Cart by simply saying the words.

Today, we’re proud to announce that partnering with Apple, we’ve made Walmart Voice Order available on Siri.

What I find fascinating about this is the mechanics of this deep integration. It’s done using a custom Shortcut:

We are introducing a new Siri Shortcut for Online Grocery. Customers simply ask Siri to start adding items directly to their Walmart Online Grocery cart after they’ve paired their accounts. It feels a little like magic on an iPhone, iPad, Apple Watch, Mac, HomePod or in the car with CarPlay.

There’s a video that shows how all this works. It seems really well done, seamless. And it makes me wonder if this corporate integration was what Apple had in mind when they acquired Workflow (the app that became Shortcuts) in the first place.

Goldman Sachs, responding to the wave of accusation that their credit assessment algorithms are sexist, posted this official follow-up:

https://twitter.com/gsbanksupport/status/1194022629419704320

The key line in all this:

We have not and never will make decisions based on factors like gender. In fact, we do not know your gender or marital status during the Apple Card application process.

If true, that’s a pretty strong defense against arguments of sexism. Regardless, this has turned south for both Goldman Sachs and Apple. Will this pass as quickly as it ramped up? I suspect it depends on if New York’s Department of Financial Services decides there’s more to this.

The internet is a fast acting place. This tweet appeared on Thursday:

https://twitter.com/dhh/status/1192540900393705474

It was a tweet. But it got the attention of the internet and, eventually, of New York’s Department of Financial Services.

From Reuters:

Hansson, who is the creator of web-application framework Ruby on Rails, didn’t disclose any specific income-related information for himself or his wife but said they filed joint tax returns and that his wife had a better credit score, the report said.

And:

New York’s Department of Financial Services confirmed that an investigation was being conducted.

Next up, this tweeted reply from Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak Woz:

The same thing happened to us. I got 10x the credit limit. We have no separate bank or credit card accounts or any separate assets. Hard to get to a human for a correction though. It’s big tech in 2019.

And, finally, this public response from Goldman Sachs:

We wanted to address some recent questions regarding Apple Card credit decision process.

With Apple Card, your account is individual to you; your credit line is yours and you establish your own direct credit history. Customers do not share a credit line under the account of a family member or another person by getting a supplemental card.

As with any other individual credit card, your application is evaluated independently. We look at an individual’s income and an individual’s creditworthiness, which includes factors like personal credit scores, how much debt you have, and how that debt has been managed. Based on these factors, it is possible for two family members to receive significantly different credit decisions.

In all cases, we have not and will not make decisions based on factors like gender.

Finally, we hear frequently from our customers that they would like to share their Apple Card with other members of their family. We are looking to enable this in the future.

• Andrew Williams, Goldman Sachs Spokesperson

Thinking about this, it could be that there’s truth to these accusations, but it could also be the case that there’s logic to these assessments that we can’t see.

But even if the latter is the case, it does seem to me that Goldman Sachs could do a much better job communicating the logic of their assessments. I suspect, given the public scrutiny, they will reevaluate their process.

Get them while the pricing lasts. That’s a pretty significant discount.

This is a charming take on the Airpods Pro. Truly written from the heart.

Fast Company:

Apple is introducing a policy that will give new parents a four-week grace period after returning from leave. During that time, they will continue to be paid like full-time employees but will have the flexibility to work part-time and set their own hours with their manager’s oversight.

And:

These benefits extend to Apple’s retail workers, as well, who account for nearly half of the company’s employees.

That last bit is especially interesting. Cool that retail workers get this benefit, interesting that they account for almost half of Apple’s employees.