Yesterday Apple killed the IDFA (Identifier for Advertisers) without killing the IDFA, by taking it out of the depths of the Settings app where almost no-one could find it — although increasingly people were finding it and turning it off — and making it explicitly opt-in for every single app. If an app wants to use the IDFA, iOS 14 will present mobile users with a big scary dialog box.
This is actually a genius move by Apple. Marketers can’t really get upset about losing the IDFA capability, because technically it’s still around. Apple gets to burnish its privacy credentials while not taking huge amounts of flack from brands and advertisers because, after all, who can argue with giving people more rights with their personal data?
And make no mistake: this is a great move for user privacy.
But it’s also a huge problem for a massive industry.
While I’m generally loathe to link to anything coming out of the Forbes Contributor Network, this is a well-done piece. Let’s all shed one single solitary crocodile tear in false sympathy for an industry that did everything it possibly could to abuse users.
John and I get together every year for a special podcast during WWDC to talk about the announcements. Despite the distance between us, this year was no different. John and I talk about the Mac transition, iPadOS, iOS, macOS, and even the lack of any major tvOS announcement.
It is easy to get wrapped up in debates about specifics, excited by tweaks or surprises, even an occasional scandal, or to wonder about the quality (is this is a good beta?). Under the hood, is a team that over time has done more and executed better than any I can name, ever.
Quite simply, what we’re seeing is some of the most remarkable product engineering over time in history.
High praise from Sinofsky, a guy who has lots of experience with this kind of stuff.
Steve Jobs said it would be bigger than the PC. Some dubbed it the most hyped product since the Apple Macintosh. An era of secrecy bubbled up in the year 2000 about an invention that would change the world as people knew it. People speculated it was a hydrogen-powered hovercraft, or a device that would break the rules of gravity itself.
Instead, it was a two-wheeled, self-balancing personal transport device called the Segway. Now, less than 20 years after the first Segway’s release, Fast Company has learned that the Segway brand will retire the last Segway as we know it.
Segway had originally planned to sell as many as 100,000 units in the first 13 months; the company only ever sold around 140,000 vehicles total.
Riding a Segway is gloriously dorky. I’ve ridden them in a warehouse in Nashville, and on tours in San Antonio, Rome, and London and always had a blast. But they were doomed as soon as various big city governments banned their use on city streets.
Apple’s new App Clip technology lets people load transient mini-apps without installing through the App Store. Users don’t have to authenticate or authorize the mini-app. It just downloads and works. Whether scanning a code (think QR code) or detecting an NFC tag, iOS users can download and run these pre-vetted packages that represent a light, typically transactional, view of a larger app experience. I went through some writeups and video today and thought I’d share a mental dump of my thoughts.
App Clips are designed for transaction. As an app, rather than a web page, they integrate seamlessly with the store ecosystem, allowing users to purchase goods and services from an instant menu and integrate with features like Apple Pay.
Honestly, there’s nothing an App Clip can do (maybe other than something like Apple Pay) that a reasonably designed web page cannot but it’s that charm and an eye towards lowering the transaction barrier that makes the Clips so compelling. With Clips, end-users can point, pick, and pay with an absolute minimum of effort.
Short but good description of the possibilities of App Clips.
With Back Tap, you can perform various action by double or tripple tap on the back of your iPhone. Here’s one I set double tap to take screenshot. pic.twitter.com/uZKv4Cjorf
At first blush, Back Tap seems wonderfully geeky but useless. Thinking on it some more, I can see some advantages but also some disadvantages as well. For example, would it be invoked easily, say while bumping around in a jacket or purse?
Apple, which has been the target of sharp criticism over its App Store policies and the power the company holds over developers, says it’s establishing a new process to hear the complaints of developers who disagree with its app-approval policies.
The tech giant announced two changes that it will roll out this summer for the app review process. First, Apple said, developers will “not only be able to appeal decisions about whether an app violates a given guideline of the App Store Review Guidelines, but will also have a mechanism to challenge the guideline itself.”
In a second change, Apple said, for apps that are already on the App Store, “bug fixes will no longer be delayed over guideline violations except for those related to legal issues.” Instead, the company said, developers will “be able to address the issue in their next submission.”
How the new policies will be put into practice remains to be seen, but Apple is at least trying to show that it’s willing to hear out the complaints of disgruntled iOS developers.
It will take some time to tell whether this is an olive branch or lip service to developers. On the face of it, it sounds like Apple is making some accommodations in the wake of the Hey email app kerfuffle.
In huge news within the camera industry, it has been announced that Olympus Corporation will be divesting its imaging business to a Japanese private equity fund.
We spoke to Olympus, which is eager to stress to customers that it is very much business as usual, and that “this is the right step to preserve our brand’s legacy, the products, and the value of our technology”.
I wonder if this is just the first shoe (of possibly many) to drop? According to the story, “JIP specializes in restructuring loss-making businesses to make them profitable before reselling them.” So this is likely the end of Olympus as we know it which would be a huge shame. I’ve used their M1 and TG brand cameras and like and recommend them.
This is an excellent explainer, soup to nuts, about Apple’s move from Intel to ARM. Per usual for Rene, this is packed with detail, but is ultimately rewarding.
Absolutely worth your time. One question remains for me: Does Apple need a Windows story anymore?
It wouldn’t be WWDC without a little music. Bring Khalid and The Killers into your living room and create your very own musical conference experience with the WWDC20 playlist collection, now available on Apple Music. The opening WWDC20 playlist features great artists like Glass Animals and Alicia Keys, and includes Aurora from this year’s opening video.
In addition, Apple Music is celebrating the powerful connection the development community has to music with a new “Music to Code to” series, which features several multi-hour playlists featuring different musical styles and genres.
If you are on an iOS device, follow this link to get to the official WWDC music playlist page.
Interestingly, if you follow the link on a Mac, you’ll get to an XML dump, but no musical joy.
The Verge’s Dieter Bohn takes the iOS 14 beta through its paces. Pretty watchable, and he covers a lot of ground, with sections on widgets, jiggle mode, editing app pages, app libraries, and much more.
Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Lindsey Graham (R-South Carolina) and U.S. Senators Tom Cotton (R-Arkansas) and Marsha Blackburn (R-Tennessee) today introduced the Lawful Access to Encrypted Data Act, a bill to bolster national security interests and better protect communities across the country by ending the use of “warrant-proof” encrypted technology by terrorists and other bad actors to conceal illicit behavior.
This is breathtaking. At least they’re being somewhat clear here: they’re proposing outlawing all end-to-end encryption. Encryption that is “warrant-proof” is everything-proof — there are no decryption keys in the middle. Encryption that can be undone at the behest of a lawful warrant can also be undone by anyone with access to the keys.
The way I read it, this would require device manufacturers (like Apple) to build in some mechanism to allow them to (as the result of a warrant) break encryption. This is no small thing. This would break Apple’s privacy foundation.
Apple is cracking down on what it allows other companies to know about you. The company announced on Monday that iOS 14 and macOS Big Sur will feature a host of improved privacy features that will give users better control over their data and knowledge over what apps and websites know about them. This is great for users who don’t like the idea of, say, a period tracker app sending their data to a company they’ve never heard of. It’s bad news for that company they’ve never heard of.
Over on iOS, the mobile operating system that powers iPhones, apps will now have to get your permission before they can track your data, which is used to target ads to you based on that behavior. Apps often come loaded with secret trackers that send data, such as your location, device type, or usage time, to big companies like Facebook or Google or to the lesser-known brokers like Unacast or Cuebiq. These companies usually have their trackers in several, even thousands, of apps, allowing them to track your data across all of them. Your identity is typically anonymized and hidden behind a unique advertising identifier assigned to your phone. Privacy experts, however, will tell you that nothing is truly anonymous, and we’ve seen how it’s possible to re-identify someone.
If nothing else, Apple is making users more aware of the security issues surrounding web browsing. What the user does with that information is up to them.
First things first, that’s Serenity Caldwell doing the voiceover on that video. Great to hear her in her new role at Apple.
As to the video itself, it’s fantastic. To me, it’s like a 15 second, quick cut, high energy iPhone commercial, stretched out to almost 2 minutes. And every bit as enjoyable.
Rene doing what he does best: Talk through a bunch of detail, this time on iOS 14. Lots and lots of detail, worth watching all the way through.
One bit that struck me, albeit more for the macOS implications than what it does for iOS. Rene raises the issue of Safari changing codes, from H.265 to AV1. Question is, will I be able to finally see 4K YouTube videos in macOS Safari? Seems likely.
Anyway, lots to process in the video below. Good stuff.
Apple outlined several failsafes to ensure as few bumps along that road as possible. It will ship Rosetta 2, an emulator that will let ARM-based Macs run Intel software from any lagging developers. It will allow for virtualization of Linux, although Apple has been mum as to whether Macs will continue to be able to load Windows through Boot Camp or virtualization software. Most intriguingly—and unexpectedly—iPhone and iPad apps will be able to run natively on a Mac.
And, on the Roseta 2 emulator:
“It translates the apps when you install them so they can launch immediately and be instantly responsive,” said Apple senior vice president of software engineering Craig Federighi during Monday’s keynote. “Rosetta 2 can also can also translate code on the fly when needed, like web browsing. It even handles the most complex pro apps and their plug-ins.”
And:
There’s also a question of at what point certain apps, in particular those that aren’t actively maintained, simply stop working on ARM-based Macs.
Terrific article. I’ve been watching developers download and install macOS 11 Big Sur (yes, it’s macOS 11), then jump through the hoops to build ARM versions of their existing apps. Without the actual Mac mini Developer Transition Kit in hand, hard to know if the ported apps actually work, but (grain of salt) assuming the ports do work on ARM hardware, this looks like a reasonably pain free port for mainstream apps.
I’ve got an app in the hopper, waiting to try for myself.
Today at WWDC20, Apple surprised audiences with a first look at “Foundation,” the highly anticipated Apple Original drama series based on the internationally revered and award-winning Isaac Asimov novel series of the same name.
In the teaser trailer, showrunner and executive producer David S. Goyer unveils a glimpse into the making of the epic saga, which chronicles a band of exiles on their monumental journey to save humanity and rebuild civilization amid the fall of the Galactic Empire.
For folks new to Isaac Asimov’s all-time great science fiction series, spend a bit of time on the Foundation Wikipedia page.
This Apple TV+ series has vaulted to the top of my can’t wait list.
Lots of interesting comments, but this one struck me:
People who rely on running Windows apps on their Macs, however, will not find a comforting story. Apple made a point of highlighting virtualization features that are built into macOS Big Sur running on Apple Silicon, but these seem to be for virtualizing operating systems built for Apple’s processors, not for emulating an operating system built for a different processor. I would imagine that, eventually, there will be a way to run Windows on ARM Macs–but it may take a while and it may be a slow, frustrating experience when it does arrive.
The fact that Apple demoed Linux running on an ARM Mac, and showed off Office apps but not Windows, was certainly noticeable. I’d love to know if there’s a plan in place to install Windows on an ARM Mac, or if that’s a dead path.
iOS 14 brings a fresh look to the things you do most often, making them easier than ever. New features help you get what you need in the moment. And the apps you use all the time become even more intelligent, more personal, and more private.
Check out some of the goodies Apple has in store for iOS 14.
Today Apple kicked off its all-online Worldwide Developers Conference bringing together millions of developers and fans from across the globe for the Special Event Keynote and Platforms State of the Union. The day was filled with announcements and innovations that will push the experience of Apple platforms and products even further. From macOS Big Sur, featuring the biggest design upgrade since the introduction of Mac OS X, to watchOS 7, the new App Library in iOS 14, and enhanced handwriting capabilities with Apple Pencil in iPadOS 14, here are some of the most groundbreaking features and app development tools unveiled at WWDC20.
How many of these are not necessarily innovative (that can be subjective) but features you want to use?
It was a massive day for Apple and its developers, and an excellent start for WWDC ‘20. New operating systems for all of its platforms and a transition from Intel chips to Apple silicon for the Mac.
When Apple does significant updates to its operating systems, I look for a couple of things to determine their usefulness: What problem are they solving and how easy are they to use. Several things caught my eye during the keynote that satisfied both of those criteria for me. Many of the features may seem small, but anything that helps use my devices more efficiently is a welcome change.
I love the idea of App Clips. I’ve been in situations where I wanted to do something and didn’t have the app on my device. Now, it’s not that much of a problem to login to the App Store, download the app and then pay for the service, but with App Clips, I’ll be done by the time you log in to the store. It just pops up when it’s needed, and you’re done.
App Library Is going to give me a way to hide all of the app pages on my iPhone that I never look at and still be able to find all of the apps I need. I use search quite a bit on iOS because I have no idea where the apps are on my device, so it’ll be interesting for me to see if I continue to use search or use App Library.
There are going to be some companies that will hate the enhanced privacy features in iOS (Facebook), but anything that Apple does with privacy is okay with me. As a user, I rely on Apple to help keep me safe or at least let me know what I’m getting into when I download an app.
Both iOS and iPadOS feature improved widgets, which I happen to use quite a bit. Having them update automatically and be available on the Home Screen is a significant improvement.
I’ve had a lot of trouble sleeping for many years, so having the Apple Watch track sleep for my is going to be incredible. I’m looking forward to the insights it may give me about a longstanding problem.
I was hoping for more with Apple TV. I mentioned on Twitter last week that this is one area where I hoped Apple would make some significant changes. I’m actively working with Apple TV and trying to cut the cord, so it’s of particular interest right now. No new Apple TV Channels or mention of new ways to organize media in the interface.
The big thing for me with macOS is the consistency in design. I like that Apple is making it easier for users to move from one device to another and have the design and overall characteristics of the device to be familiar. I’ve been using macOS for a lot of years now, and I love it, but it’s also comforting to be able to use anything made by Apple and feel like it belongs in the ecosystem.
Of course, the big announcement of the day is Apple’s transition to using its chips in the Mac. The biggest question for me surrounding the transition has been what it will mean for developers. If the software isn’t there, the transition will be more difficult for users. Apple has made the transition seem more straightforward than the last Intel transition, but we will have to wait to hear from developers to see precisely how seamless that will be.
One thing we do know—these new Macs will be extremely powerful.
In a historic day for the Mac, Apple today announced it will transition the Mac to its world-class custom silicon to deliver industry-leading performance and powerful new technologies. Developers can now get started updating their apps to take advantage of the advanced capabilities of Apple silicon in the Mac. This transition will also establish a common architecture across all Apple products, making it far easier for developers to write and optimize their apps for the entire ecosystem.
Apple today also introduced macOS Big Sur, the next major release of macOS, which delivers its biggest update in more than a decade and includes technologies that will ensure a smooth and seamless transition to Apple silicon. Developers can easily convert their existing apps to run on Apple silicon, taking advantage of its powerful technologies and performance. And for the first time, developers can make their iOS and iPadOS apps available on the Mac without any modifications.
There it is. The biggest day in Apple history in the past 10 years. It’s going to be fascinating.
Apple today previewed macOS Big Sur, the latest version of the world’s most advanced desktop operating system. macOS Big Sur introduces a beautiful redesign that is entirely new yet instantly familiar. Safari is packed with new features, including a customizable start page, elegantly designed and more powerful tabs, quick and easy translation, and a new Privacy Report. The updated Messages app lets Mac users send and receive more personal and expressive messages, and easily keep track of and interact within group messages. Maps also offers an all-new experience with immersive features for exploring and navigating the world.
“macOS Big Sur is a major update that advances the legendary combination of the power of UNIX with the ease of use of the Mac, and delivers our biggest update to design in more than a decade,” said Craig Federighi, Apple’s senior vice president of Software Engineering. “With its modern and clean look, huge improvements to key apps including Safari, Messages, and Maps, and new privacy features, we think everyone is going to love the breakthrough experience that macOS Big Sur offers.”
Lots of design features I’ll turn off immediately.
Apple today previewed iPadOS 14, with new features and designs that take advantage of the unique capabilities of iPad and its large Multi-Touch display. iPadOS 14 introduces an all-new compact design for incoming FaceTime and phone calls, Siri interactions, and Search to help users stay focused on the task at hand. Apps have new sidebars and toolbars that consolidate controls in one place, making them more streamlined and powerful than ever. New Apple Pencil features, including Scribble for iPad, deliver a whole new way to work with handwritten notes, and ARKit 4 delivers a brand new Depth API that allows developers to create even more powerful features in their apps.
“With iPadOS 14, we’re excited to build on the distinct experience of iPad and deliver new capabilities that help customers boost productivity, be more creative, and have more fun,” said Craig Federighi, Apple’s senior vice president of Software Engineering. “With new compact designs for system interactions and new app designs specifically tailored to iPad, even better note-taking capabilities with Apple Pencil, and more powerful AR experiences, iPadOS 14 delivers an amazing experience that keeps it in a class of its own.”
Apple today previewed iOS 14, introducing the biggest update ever to Home Screen pages with beautifully redesigned widgets and the App Library, a new way to tap into the App Store with App Clips, powerful updates to Messages, and more.
The new widgets present timely information at a glance and can be pinned in different sizes on any Home Screen page. Users can create a Smart Stack of widgets, which uses on-device intelligence to surface the right widget based on time, location, and activity.
Some interesting new features in iOS 14. No name change though.
