A proposal to stop observing daylight saving time in British Columbia was narrowly approved by Union of B.C. Municipalities delegates Sept. 14.
The resolution said daylight saving time and the resulting time changes twice a year no longer serves a purpose and affects people’s health when time changes.
It may just be my imagination but I’m seeing more and more discussion about this recently. It will still take many years before getting rid of daylight saving time is a widespread talking point but its time may be coming to an end (see what I did there?).
At a certain point, you think you have a good grasp of what to expect from weather graphics. A color-coded map, a five-day forecast with a sassy cloud. Which might be why the Weather Channel’s 3-D, room-encompassing depiction of the Hurricane Florence storm surge took so many by surprise. It doesn’t tell, it shows, more bracingly than you’d think would be possible on a meteorological update. Here’s how they did it.
If you haven’t seen the graphic yet, take a moment to watch the segment below.
The new iPhone Xs Max is the biggest yet from Apple with its 6.5-inch screen, which is all very well for those with big hands, but the rest of us – particularly women – will run the risk of a shattered screen every time we use it one-handed.
This hasn’t gone unnoticed, and Apple is facing a backlash for making phones that are too large to fit in the average woman’s hand. The tech giant also recently revealed that it would be discontinuing its 4-inch iPhone SE, which drew ire online.
My wife has small hands and has an issue with the size of her hand-me-down 6 Plus. But does Apple have a “responsibility” to make phones that fit every hand size? Where does it end?
An unusual visitor has been hanging out in the St. Lawrence River for the past three years: A narwhal, more than 1,000 kilometres south of its usual range.
But the lone narwhal is not alone — it appears he has been adopted by a band of belugas.
The narwhal — thought to be a juvenile male because of its half-metre-long tusk — was filmed in July playing among a pod of young belugas, thought to be mostly or all males.
I attended Apple’s iPhone event on Wednesday and spent a little time with the new products after everything was announced. I wanted to give you a few thoughts on the products and my overall feeling of the event.
First, I think you have to give Apple executives some credit for coming onstage and acting like the company didn’t make some massive mistakes by leaking images and the Apple.com sitemap. That must have been devastating for them, but they kept their heads high and soldiered on.
iPhone
The iPhone Xs is precisely the iPhone upgrade you would expect from Apple in its “s” year. There’s a new color, water resistance has been updated, and the CPU is more powerful. For people that want the latest and greatest iPhone with a 5.8-inch Super Retina HD, the iPhone Xs is clearly the one you want to buy.
The iPhone I was most interested in seeing was the iPhone Xs Max. The Max comes in the same three colors—Silver, space gray, and gold—as the iPhone Xs, but it features a 6.5-inch Super Retina HD display.
At first, I thought maybe that display would be too big to fit in your pocket comfortably, but it’s not. The Max is noticeably larger than the Xs, and you can see a lot more information when you load an app or a web page, but it’s not a crazy big form factor. Basically, it’s all screen.
When introducing the Max, Apple said it was the same physical size as the iPhone 8 Plus, but the screen is 1-inch larger. That’s a lot of screen.
Holding and using the Max presented no problems for me, although we will come to a point where some tasks will need two hands. To be honest, I didn’t have enough time to get a feel for that.
There is no doubt in my mind the iPhone Xs Max is the iPhone for me.
I’m not at all worried about the larger size, and the larger screen means I won’t have to use my glasses quite as much as I used to with smaller iPhones.
The iPhone Xr is an exciting product. There is no doubt that Apple wants its customers to upgrade to one of the newest models, so they gave them an option that is cheaper, but still looks and acts like a modern iPhone.
The Xr has a 6.1-inch Liquid Retina HD display and comes in a variety of colors, including black, white, blue, coral, yellow, and (PRODUCT)RED.
There is no doubt that those colors are going to appeal to a lot of different groups of buyers, from young people to consumers who just want to be a bit different.
All of the new iPhones come with the latest A12 Bionic chip, Face ID, and wireless charging, among other features. You will be giving up some high-end camera technology and a Super Retina display, but the Xr will move you into a modern iPhone.
While all three phones offer their own benefits, depending on what you’re looking for, as I said above, the iPhone Xs Max will be my choice.
Apple Watch
I have loved my Apple Watch from the day I put it on my wrist, and it keeps getting better. The first thing I do in the morning is put it on, and the last thing I do at night is take it off.
When I first put on the 44mm Apple Watch Series 4 after the event, I commented that the screen wasn’t as big as what I thought it would be. Then I held the 40mm watch next to it—the difference was huge.
The amount of information you can see on the 44mm watch is impressive. When looking at it onscreen during the keynote, I thought it was going to be a bit gaudy because it was so big. It’s not that way at all.
Where you’ll see the most difference is when you look at the watch face. Using the default face, you can see a lot of information at a glance. I’ll probably still have to use my glasses to see all the detail, but those are just my eyes. I suspect an average person will be able to see everything with no problem.
Series 4 comes with a 64-bit dual-core S4 processor that is twice as fast as the last generation processor. It also comes with an updated optical heart sensor and a Digital Crown with haptic feedback (which is cooler than you may think).
The real highlight of the series 4 is the new Electrical heart sensor (ECG) and fall detection.
Apple has found a new way to help millions of people with the Apple Watch—health and fitness. They have done great things with every version of the watch to get people exercising more and be able to communicate with their doctors with accurate information.
We would never have thought a few years ago that Apple could make a watch that could produce an ECG. We may have hoped for it, but delivering on that is quite an accomplishment.
I’ve talked to many people that are buying one of the Apple Watch Series 4 for a parent, spouse, or partner for that feature alone.
The fall detection is another feature that people have swooned over since the announcement. Basically, the watch recognizes when you fall and will offer you the option to call for help. If you are incapacitated and can’t call for help yourself, the Apple Watch will do it automatically for you after a set period of time, if you don’t move.
That’s brilliant and will help a lot of people.
Like the iPhone, I’ll be going with the larger 44mm Apple Watch.
What about…?
Rumors were swirling around about new Macs and iPads for the event, but neither of those products were announced. I wasn’t too surprised by that, to be honest. I thought there was a chance of an iPad, but a small one at best.
The fact they weren’t released says nothing about those products. The September event is usually focused on watches and iPhones, just as this one was.
The one product I was truly surprised that we didn’t hear about was the Apple AirPower. Announced over a year ago, we have yet to hear anything about Apple’s wireless charger.
I’m not sure at this point if the product is dead or just further delayed, but I wish Apple would let us know.
Bottom Line
Apple had a successful launch of two primary product categories, iPhone, which rules the company right now, and the Apple Watch.
We’re coming into the holiday shopping season in the next month or so and from what I’ve seen, iPhones and watches should be flying off the shelves. All of the products have been updated at a variety of price points, so there should be something for everyone that wants to get into the Apple ecosystem for the first time or upgrade.
To say pitching a new idea to (Steve Jobs) could be intimidating would be an understatement. Just ask Ken Kocienda. The software engineer and designer worked at Apple for over 15 years and during his time there brought several demos to the CEO, including the autocorrect touchscreen keyboard for the iPhone. In this interview, Kocienda describes exactly what it was like to pitch a prototype to Steve Jobs.
The best product Apple offers is intangible, yet far more valuable than a flagship smartphone. The best product Apple has–and the single biggest reason that consumers should choose an Apple device over competing devices–is privacy.
And:
It has only been in the last few years that the perils of online privacy have made their way to the forefront of national conversation, thanks to the Cambridge Analytica scandal and a seemingly unending string of data breaches and hacks. Such events have left consumers rightly worried just how the data tech companies are collecting about them are being used and abused. Yet Apple seems to be the only major tech company that had the foresight–and the will–to begin tackling these issues before they reached a crisis point.
And:
In iOS 12 Apple is also introducing anti-fingerprinting technology in Safari. Fingerprinting is a tracking technology advertisers and data firms use to identify your movements online. They do this by recording characteristics about the device you are using–such as hard drive size, screen resolution, fonts, installed, and more–and then recording a log of that device’s movements.
And:
Apple makes its hundreds of billions every year by selling physical products that have a high markup. Facebook and Google, on the other hand, have a business model built around advertisers who want as much data about users as possible so they can better target them. This is why, for example, Google would never build the types of anti-tracking and privacy protections into the Android OS that Apple has done with MacOS and iOS. Google–and Facebook–aren’t going to cut off their access to all that black gold.
This is a terrific article. The callouts above are just the tip of the iceberg. One key point, to me, is that Apple is able to offer privacy because it makes its money from high margins and money gained from services. Though I wish we could have Apple’s great design and ecosystem for less money, I truly appreciate Apple’s, and Tim Cook’s privacy stance.
During the highs of BatteryGate, Apple reduced official battery repairs to $29 each through 2018, down from $79. Apple has now updated the page with details of what will happen from January 1st, 2019.
The prices are going back up, but not quite to the level that they were. Battery repairs for iPhone X, iPhone Xs and iPhone Xs will cost $69. Repairs for all older iPhones will cost $49.
This is a fascinating Reddit post that looks at screen sizes. Take the op-ed parts with a grain of salt, but if you are considering the iPhone XR, this is worth your time. One excellent point:
The XR will show exactly the same amount of actual content as the XS Max, just slightly smaller and less sharp. If both phones were opened to a site in Safari, they’d show exactly the same chunk of webpage. I think that’s pretty nice, PPI be damned. This is the most compact Plus phone ever made. I’m on board.
I will say, I do find it amazing that $749 represents the new price of a budget phone. Wow.
I do wish Apple would consider updating the iPhone SE for folks with smaller hands, and smaller budgets. Same with a smaller Apple Watch for people with smaller wrists. It does feel like some part of the Apple loving crowd is being left behind.
First things first, I am blown away by the Apple Watch Series 4. As I mentioned in this post:
The leap from Series 3 to Series 4 reminds me of the earlier leaps in iPhone technology. For example, the jump from the iPhone 3GS to the iPhone 4 was like night and day. Though the case looks very similar, the case size (thinner, larger), display, internals, and sensors are a huge leap forward.
One of the big features highlighted in Wednesday’s Apple Event was the addition of AFib detection to Apple Watch. There’s been a lot of discussion on just what the Apple Watch AFib capability really means.
Although the watch can detect changes in the patterns of a person’s heart rate, these changes really only show a user if she has a heart rate that is too fast, too slow, or beating irregularly—signifying AFib. The watch won’t necessarily give the full picture a doctor would need to diagnose a medical issue.
And:
While the watch can legally be marketed to say that it’s able to detect these changes in heart rate and alert the user or her physician—if she so chooses—this doesn’t mean it’ll be nearly as good as an actual medical diagnosis.
While the Quartz piece is certainly correct, the headline is terribly misleading. Many, many lives have been saved by the Apple Watch pointing out a life-threatening condition. Just because the Apple Watch can’t diagnose every such condition, doesn’t mean it doesn’t have tremendous value when it does catch something.
The most comprehensive ECG is known as a 12-lead ECG.
This ECG uses 10 electrodes, 4 on each limb, and 6 in a specific orientation around the heart in order to represent 12 separate vectors across the heart. In some ways you can think about this type of ECG as almost a 3D measurement of electrical activity in the heart.
And:
The Apple Watch ECG is a single lead ECG, measuring Lead I. This is great for measuring the rate and rhythm of the heart which can be very useful for the screening of atrial fibrillation.
There’s a saying about cameras: The best camera is the one you have with you. In the same way, the Apple Watch ECG is the ECG measuring device that you have with you at all times. Though it is no substitute for the 12-lead ECG you’d get at the hospital, it is an amazing screening device that is on your wrist at all times. To use it, you don’t have to make an appointment, take time off from work, and pay a fee for the screening.
Past as prologue, as people start to buy and wear their Apple Watch Series 4, I believe we will start to see a wave of lives saved by this tech. True, the Series 4 ECG is no substitute for a hospital grade 12-lead ECG, but it is the one you have with you.
Apple included a spare dongle in the boxes of the iPhone X, 8, 8 Plus, 7, and 7 Plus phones, but it isn’t so generous this year when it comes to including a 3.5mm audio dongle in the box.
The 3.5mm dongle is no longer a free accessory and the new iPhones won’t ship with Apple’s own fast Lightning to 3.5mm audio jack adapter. This includes the iPhone XS, XS Max, XR, and the iPhone 8, which used to include the free dongle.
I understand both sides of the argument but still – I wish Apple would continue to include it.
Buried in Apple’s official Apple Watch Series 4 site is this page of videos, all worth a look.
One interesting bit, buried about 47 seconds into that last video, in a faint grey font. Take a look:
There’s a reference to the 5s, which might suggest that this is sourced from older video. And I don’t see the “not a medical device” warning in the other videos, even those that talk about heart rate and the ECG sensor.
That nit aside, these are fantastically produced videos, just gorgeous. Give ’em a look.
Warning: Rene Ritchie’s enthusiasm for the brand new Apple Watch Series 4 is contagious. That new display is just gorgeous.
The leap from Series 3 to Series 4 reminds me of the earlier leaps in iPhone technology. For example, the jump from the iPhone 3GS to the iPhone 4 was like night and day. Though the case looks very similar, the case size (thinner, larger), display, internals, and sensors are a huge leap forward.
Nice job by Rene Ritchie laying all this out so quickly.
A bit lost in all the hoopla yesterday, HomePod got some new shiny.
Here’s the list, from Apple’s press release:
Search by lyrics: In addition to asking Siri to play a particular song, artist or genre, now it’s easy to ask Siri to “play the song that goes like this…” or ask Siri to “play the song that goes ‘I’m a rebel just for kicks now.’”
Set multiple timers: HomePod now supports multiple named timers. Set a timer for the cake, another one for lasagna and another one as a reminder to dim the lights — using just your voice.
Make and receive phone calls: Conveniently use HomePod to make and receive phone calls for crisp and clear audio quality. To make a call, simply ask Siri to call someone from Contacts or say the number to call. Incoming calls are automatically directed from iPhone to HomePod — just ask Siri to answer the phone — and for missed calls, it’s as easy as asking, “Hey Siri, who just called?” Using the audio picker on iPhone, calls can be moved from HomePod to iPhone at any time.
Find My iPhone: The popular Apple Watch feature comes to HomePod, so users can ping any of their nearby devices to find them.
Siri Shortcuts: Shortcuts opens up a world of apps to work on HomePod. As Siri learns routines and suggests ‘shortcuts’ on iPhone and iPad, these same shortcuts are now accessible on HomePod. Personalizing shortcuts for HomePod with a series of tasks is easy with a new Shortcuts app. For example, “Hey Siri, good morning” could run a morning routine and order coffee from a coffee shop’s app, turn on the kitchen lights from the Home app and share the first few calendar appointments for the day — all with one simple, customizable command.
HomePod also added “support for Spanish in the US, Spain and Mexico, and expands support in Canada with Canadian French.”
As of this writing, the new update has not yet shipped. I suspect we’ll see the update with the official rollout of iOS 12.
As to the ability to make and receive calls, I wish I’d seen that before Jim and I recorded the new Dalrymple Report. We’ve been long arguing about this feature. Next week, for sure.
Now you can purchase AppleCare+ with Theft and Loss protection. Costs $100 more than traditional Apple Care+ but will cover the theft of your device. Nice catch by Wil.
It’s now been a full year since Apple announced it would release its first wireless charger to go along with the first iPhones that could be wirelessly charged.
But at an event that included the announcement of three new iPhones and an updated Apple Watch, that didn’t happen.
At the time of its 2017 announcement, Apple described the AirPower pad as capable of charging three devices at the same time: an iPhone 8 or iPhone X, an Apple Watch Series 3 and AirPods via their charging case.
Since there are already wireless chargers available today capable of charging three devices at the same time, an obvious question is: Why is it taking Apple so long to come out with its own charger, especially since it will use the widely adopted Qi-charging specification?
I said on last week’s Your Mac Life show that, if Apple didn’t announce a release date for the Airpower, it would be the biggest embarrassment of this event. I stand by that. Shameful for Apple to not have even mentioned it even though, as John Gruber tweeted, the new iPhones would really benefit from it.
Apple CEO Tim Cook sent ripples of concern across the Internet when he sent a seemingly accidental (and now-deleted) tweet eight minutes before the 2018 Apple keynote event on Wednesday. The tweet appeared to be a tweet that was meant to be a direct message that read: “No. Who can get it here quickly?”
Once the Apple event was in full swing, however, it was clear that Cook’s “accidental” tweet was actually a gag. The opening video for the keynote depicted an Apple employee who ran the length of the company’s campus to bring a mysterious box to Cook, which he alluded to in his tweet.
It was pretty damn funny when I realized what he’d done. Bravo, Tim Cook!
The iPhone XS and XS MAX feature a newly designed dual-camera system with new sensors on the backside. There’s a 12MP wide-angle camera with optical image stabilization (OIS) and a 6-element f/1.8 lens. The telephoto camera is a 12MP one with OIS and a 2x optical zoom with its 6-element f/2.4 lens.
One of the major focuses with this new generation is computational photography, or combining AI technologies to improve and enhance photo quality and capabilities.
The new A12 bionic processor in the iPhone does image signal processing every time you snap a photo, and the iPhone combines those functions of the processor with the neural engine for a whopping 1 trillion operations per photo. This opens to door to new features.
The bokeh slider is an interesting effect but I wish they had used a better example than in the demo.
At its “Gather round” event on Wednesday, Apple announce the release dates for its operating systems: iOS, macOS, watchOS, and tvOS. The company has slated September 17 for the release of iOS 12, watchOS 5, and tvOS 12. MacOS Mojave 10.14 will be released on September 24. The upgrades are free.
Along with the hardware announcements, this is expected and welcome software news.
Apple introduced Apple Watch Series 4 on Wednesday during its “Gather Round” media event. The new smart watch models come in 40 mm and 44 mm sizes instead of 38 mm and 42 mm, and include new watch faces with more detailed complications.
The new watch faces include a slew of new complications, along with several animated faces such as Breathe, fire, and water.
The display is 30% larger, and the watch body is thinner overall. The built-in speaker is 50% louder, and the microphone is now on the opposite side of the case from the speaker.
I’ve never worn an Apple Watch but today’s announcements have made me seriously consider getting one – they are that good.
Apple executives took the stage at the Steve Jobs Theater today to announce the company’s new iPhone lineup: the iPhone XS, iPhone XS Max, and iPhone XR. The company’s newest phones look a lot like last year’s iPhone X.
The iPhone XS and XS Max will arrive first, with pre-orders starting September 14 and shipments starting September 21. The XS will start at $999 for its 64GB model, and the XS Max will start at $1,099 for the same capacity. The iPhone XR will arrive later, on October 26, and will start at $749 for the 64GB model. All three phones will also come in 256GB and 512GB storage options.
The naming convention is as annoying as I thought but the price points seem pretty aggressive.
Making the rounds on Twitter today was a series of data reveals from Apple’s own site. Some terrific detective work from the usual suspects.
Interesting to me how this new way of digging for information, what I would call “sitemap spelunking”, has become the norm. I think, in part, this emerged because Apple tightened the screws on their employees surreptitiously sharing info with reporters. But at the same time as security has tightened, data mining has become big business, and those techniques are hard at work here.
One particular approach I’ve seen used here, is to search a sitemap for obvious URLs, the use the URL form to guess at non-obvious, hidden URLs. So if you encountered a file called …/iphone_X, you might try loading a file with the same path, ending in …/iphone_Xs.
I suspect that next year’s Apple/journalist whack-a-mole game will change, with Apple doing a better job making URLs harder to guess, and journalists developing a new set of tools to unveil those URLs.
Follow the headline link to learn the latest from 9to5Mac, or just hold off until Apple reveals things for themselves.
Sir Paul is 76 years old, and still has some new material. If you are at all into Beatles history, this is a fascinating read. A bit long, with equal measures of sex, drugs, and rock and roll.
