Apple

New York Times:

California legislators approved a landmark bill on Tuesday that requires companies like Uber and Lyft to treat contract workers as employees, a move that could reshape the gig economy and that adds fuel to a yearslong debate over whether the nature of work has become too insecure.

And:

In California, the legislation will affect at least one million workers who have been on the receiving end of a decades-long trend of outsourcing and franchising work, making employer-worker relationships more arm’s-length. Many people have been pushed into contractor status with no access to basic protections like a minimum wage and unemployment insurance. Ride-hailing drivers, food-delivery couriers, janitors, nail salon workers, construction workers and franchise owners could now all be reclassified as employees.

This might seem like a yawn, but this could bring seismic change to tech. Companies that have pushed work out to contractors have avoided having to provide benefits, even with some contractors working full time.

Those same companies have avoided paying for unemployment insurance. And that last bit is perhaps the most complicated part of this puzzle, since the program is a unique marriage of both state and federal laws and feels certain to be challenged.

Pay attention to this one.

Apple:

Apple today announced three unprecedented medical studies, in partnership with leading academic and research institutions, that will reach more participants than has ever been possible. The studies will be available on the new Research app.

The studies:

• Apple Women’s Health Study: In partnership with Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health and the NIH’s National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences (NIEHS), Apple has created the first long-term study of this scale focused on menstrual cycles and gynecological conditions. This study will inform screening and risk assessment of conditions like polycystic ovary syndrome (PCOS), infertility, osteoporosis, pregnancy and menopausal transition.

• Apple Heart and Movement Study: Apple is partnering with Brigham and Women’s Hospital and the American Heart Association on a comprehensive study of how heart rate and mobility signals — like walking pace and flights of stairs climbed — relate to hospitalizations, falls, heart health and quality of life in order to promote healthy movement and improved cardiovascular health.

• Apple Hearing Study: Alongside the University of Michigan, Apple is examining factors that impact hearing health. The Apple Hearing Health Study is the first of its kind to collect data over time in order to understand how everyday sound exposure can impact hearing. The study data will also be shared with the World Health Organization (WHO) as a contribution toward its Make Listening Safe initiative.

The Research app will be available as a free download in the App Store later this year.

Follow the headline link, scroll. It’s hard to capture the cool look of this colorful treatment in just a single image. Too bad it’s only temporary.

Bloomberg:

For its latest report, CLW said undercover investigators worked in Foxconn’s Zhengzhou plant in China, including one who was employed there for four years. One of the main findings: Temporary staff, known as dispatch workers, made up about 50% the workforce in August. Chinese labor law stipulates a maximum of 10%, CLW noted.

And:

Apple said that, after conducting an investigation, it found the “percentage of dispatch workers exceeded our standards” and that it is “working closely with Foxconn to resolve this issue.” It added that when it finds issues, it works with suppliers to “take immediate corrective action.” Foxconn Technology Group also confirmed the dispatch worker violation following an operational review.

Given the two callouts above, is the headline fair? Did Apple break the Chinese labor law? If the problem is brought to their attention, and they address it, is it right to hold them to the same account as Foxconn?

China Labor Watch:

“Apple has the responsibility and capacity to make fundamental improvements to the working conditions along its supply chain, however, Apple is now transferring costs from the trade war through their suppliers to workers and profiting from the exploitation of Chinese workers.”

And Apple’s response:

“We believe everyone in our supply chain should be treated with dignity and respect,” Apple also said in a statement. “To make sure our high standards are being adhered to, we have robust management systems in place beginning with training on workplace rights, on-site worker interviews, anonymous grievance channels and ongoing audits.”

The headline is a bit leading, Betteridge’s Law and all.

But the article is still worth reading. Jason Snell does an excellent job in laying out the state-of-the-union on Apple and leaks.

The leaks are almost impossible to miss, but somehow, every Apple event still delivers in terms of surprise. As Jason says, it’s all in the details.

So much looking forward to tomorrow.

When I saw the New York Times headline, I immediately went straight to skeptical. But.

Follow the headline link, then start scrolling, slowly. You’ll start with:

If you opened the App Store on an iPhone in May 2018 and typed “podcast” in the search box, you would have seen something like this.

No surprise, it’s Apple’s podcast app. Fair enough. But keep scrolling.

On some days, you would have had to scroll through as many as 14 Apple apps before finding one made by a different publisher.

It does seem logical for Apple’s podcast app to come first in search results. It’s free and it’s from Apple. But the follow on results make the Times’ case here.

Presented with the results of the analysis, two senior Apple executives acknowledged in a recent interview that, for more than a year, the top results of many common searches in the iPhone App Store were packed with the company’s own apps. That was the case even when the Apple apps were less relevant and less popular than ones from its competitors. The executives said the company had since adjusted the algorithm so that fewer of its own apps appeared at the top of search results.

The two senior execs are Phil Schiller and Eddy Cue.

The executives said the company did not manually alter search results to benefit itself. Instead, they said, Apple apps generally rank higher than competitors because of their popularity and because their generic names are often a close match to broad search terms.

Next, the article posts an interactive search for the term “music” over the years:

• Before Apple Music arrived in the App Store, Spotify was for years the first result in searches for “music.”
• Shortly after Apple Music was released in June 2016, it took the top spot. By then, Spotify had fallen to fourth place.
• In Feb. 2018, Apple apps suddenly appeared in the top six results for “music”
• By the end of 2018, there were eight, some of which were unrelated to music. At this point, Spotify was the 23rd result.

There’s a lot more detail in the article, all very interesting. A final bit:

Over the past several months, Apple engineers said, they began noticing how the algorithm was packing results with Apple apps. First, they stopped the algorithm from doing that for certain searches. In July, they turned it off for all Apple apps.

And:

Mr. Schiller and Mr. Cue said the algorithm had been working properly. They simply decided to handicap themselves to help other developers.

I’ve long wished for Apple to take the side of developers, given them precedence over Apple, help make it easier for indie developers to make a living on the App Store.

But there’s a flip side. Should Apple not include a built-in flashlight to avoid stepping on developer toes? I can absolutely see the logic in Apple wanting to build in a certain level of functionality to compete with Android. And Spotify. It’s a bit of a balancing act, one that’s getting trickier all the time.

Start off with this Bloomberg article, titled: Apple Plans Return of Touch ID and New Cheap iPhone.

Some fascinating rumors there, including:

Apple is also working on its first low-cost iPhone since the iPhone SE. That could come out as early as the first half of 2020, the people said. The device would look similar to the iPhone 8 and include a 4.7-inch screen. The iPhone 8 currently sells for $599, while Apple sold the iPhone SE for $399 when that device launched in 2016. The new low-cost phone is expected to have Touch ID built into the home button, not the screen.

Now switch gears to this Daring Fireball take:

The SE debuted about 6 months after the iPhone 6S, with the same A9 chipset. If Apple follows the same playbook, this new iPhone would have the A13 chip we expect to see in next week’s new iPhones — the iPhone 8 has an A11 that will soon be two years old. Makes a lot of sense — none of the X-class phones are going to drop to $400 in 2020, but it would be good for Apple and for users if there were a $400 iPhone with A13 specs.

Totally agree, and good analysis. But:

The only downside of this report is for people holding onto hope that Apple will make a new SE-sized phone with a 4-inch display. I would expect this rumored phone to look as much like an iPhone 8 as the SE looks like an iPhone 5S.

Based on many conversations with SE lovers, I believe the small SE footprint is an important driver here. People with smaller hands and small (or no) pockets love the SE, find it a perfect fit. I’d hate to see Apple abandoning that smaller form-factor, though it does feel like that’s the way that particular wind is blowing.

Side note, this thread on a name for such a device. Pipe in with your own thoughts.

Old news to anyone who’s followed Apple for any length of time. So old, that the concept has its own Wikipedia page (scroll down to the section “Sherlocked as a term”).

What’s new though:

Developers have come to accept that, without warning, Apple can make their work obsolete by announcing a new app or feature that uses or incorporates their ideas. Some apps have simply buckled under the pressure, in some cases shutting down. They generally don’t sue Apple because of the difficulty and expense in fighting the tech giant—and the consequences they might face from being dependent on the platform.

The imbalance of power between Apple and the apps on its platform could turn into a rare chink in the company’s armor as regulators and lawmakers put the dominance of big technology companies under an antitrust microscope.

Not sure I see a solution though. Do we add a rule that Apple can’t build something similar to something already in the App Store? Should Apple be forced to compensate a developer whose business they’ve just made irrelevant?

I struggle with the idea of some government oversight making things better. More likely, it’ll just make an already complicated universe even more complex.

Craig Hockenberry:

The months since WWDC in June have been a terrible experience for both customers and developers alike and the literal center of the chaos was Apple’s iCloud syncing service.

Lest you respond, instantly, with, “But it’s a beta”, read on.

It all started with customers reporting lost Linea sketches in their iCloud Drive. Initial investigations led to a common factor: all of the people affected had installed the iOS 13 beta release.

And when I say lost, I mean really lost. Entire folders were either gone or corrupted. Apple’s mechanism to recover deleted files was of no help. The customers with weird folder duplicates were the “lucky” ones.

The key is Apple’s traditional beta culture: Use the beta on a device you can afford to be without if things go south.

But this year there’s a new, critical lesson. Make sure that test device is not connected to your main iCloud account. Which limits the testing value of a beta, since it will not be able to test in as many real world scenarios, with real world data stressing all the systems.

Read Craig’s writeup. No need to be a developer to follow along. But if you are a beta tester, public or dev, take the time to read it. It’s an excellent cautionary tale.

Variety:

Variety has learned from sources that Gordon-Levitt is set to star in, write, and executive produce a drama series currently in the works at the nascent streamer titled “Mr. Corman.” It is said to follow an elementary school teacher grappling with adulthood in Los Angeles. Gordon-Levitt would produce under his HitRECord banner with A24 also producing.

Another top show, added value for Apple TV+. Though it might take some time for Apple TV+ to develop a catalog with enough heft to even begin to compete with Disney+ and Netflix, I have no doubt they’ll get there over time. Like opening a restaurant, the key is having enough money to make it through the early days, and Apple has that in spades.

Neil Cybart, Above Avalon:

Over the years, iPhone naming has had its ups and downs. There were the awkward names like iPhone 3GS and iPhone XS Max, and then there were strong industry-defining names like iPhone X. Based on the latest rumors, Apple appears to be in the early stages of moving away from an annual iPhone naming cadence altogether.

Interesting read, digs into a pretty complete history of iPhone naming, and follows with possible paths for the coming iPhones. Pairs well with the John Gruber take posted earlier.

I’d like to see Neil take on the entire Apple product line, with thoughts on a global branding strategy.

John Gruber:

Here’s why I think an “11 / 11 Pro / 11 Pro Max” naming scheme makes perfect sense. First, I hate Roman numerals with an irrational passion, so I’m not even going to get into the idea that Apple might have even considered “iPhone XI”. Just no.

And, on the suggested dropping of the 11, leaving iPhone, iPhone Pro, and iPhone Pro Max:

In the abstract, such a naming strategy would be better. It would match Apple’s other product lineups — MacBooks and iPads — where higher priced models are Pro and lower priced ones are not. MacBook Pros and iPad Pros don’t get numbered sequentially by product generation. When new ones come out, they’re just called “MacBook Pro” and “iPad Pro” and Apple uses model years (e.g. “late 2019”) to specify exact models in support documentation — but never in advertising or product packaging.

Read the whole thing. To me, this is one of the most compelling storylines of next week’s event. Where is Apple heading on branding? Will the Mac, iPad, and iPhone branding schemes converge?

And this does raise one more question for me:

What if Apple does ship an iPhone SE update in the Spring? How does that fit into the overall scheme?

iPhone mini?

Solid explainer from Ben Lovejoy, 9to5Mac.

In a nutshell, Apple is fighting any mechanism that allows an advertiser to recreate your browsing history and/or track your browsing across platforms.

The ad industry is proposing an anonymous (they promise) token that is your key to all sites. What could go wrong?

9 News:

Police are on the hunt for a gang of six men wanted over daring smash and grab robberies on Perth’s two Apple stores.

The thieves got away with a $300,000 haul of products, mostly Apple iPhones, prompting a warning for customers buying off the black market.

Follow the link, there’s video of the actual smash-and-grab. Pretty incredible.

Per usual, no value for the stolen gear as-is, only as black-market parts or for sale to folks unaware of the uselessness of stolen iPhones, etc.