mmatz

I’ve owned a set of Bose wired noise-cancelling headphones for probably 10 years, and like them.  I bought them for use while traveling on airlines, a niche they fill pretty well.  My first set went bad out of warranty and Bose offered a decent price for replacement/upgrade, so I went to the next generation.  The ear pads on my second set eventually wore out, and I found a decent replacement pair for cheap. I added a microphone cord, and now use them as often for phone calls as for listening to music. But, as Chasm points out, the sound quality doesn’t match the noise-cancellation quality.

If Apple came up with wireless, over the ear, noise-cancelling headphones that I could use for phone calls, and with the quality of sound I’d expect from Apple, then I’d likely buy a set.  

Huh. Well, I’m glad that Samsung has some new offerings. Competition is good, for driving innovation and providing alternatives.

Reading this article, and recently talking with a friend of mine who has a Pixel (I know, not a Samsung) and who has decided to switch back to an iPhone, both reinforce my decision to stay in the Walled Garden. 

My newish iPhone X is a neat bit of technology.  The Face ID works well, with the occasional minor hiccups. And I’ve come to like the swiping gestures for navigating, rather than hitting the home button. Perfect? Not really. But then I don’t expect perfect from any technology. It mostly just works, and works pretty damn well.

My newish Apple Watch Series 3 GPS only is also quite impressive.  Can’t imagine not wearing one.

Count me as a satisfied Apple customer.

wemclaughlins said:

What was the point of this article? AI: I like your site, I use your app often, but I’m “just not that into you” ...not enough for me to want to read articles about how pretty and wonderful you are. Stick to the facts, not the sympathy requests. And the fact remains that the iPhone X is underselling. Doomed for failure? No, but too expensive and too ugly? Consumer spending is saying “yes”. There’s your story, sans pity.

Well, you and I have different perspectives on this. Mine is that it’s one of the better articles I’ve read in quite awhile.

Why? Because even though it’s about the reported life cycle of a simple luxury item, it does a pretty good job of illustrating one of the major challenges facing us as a society today: the frequently inept and sometimes malicious handling of information by those we rely upon for providing information.

From tech to politics, what the author describes and comments on is all too common.  And destructive on a number of levels.
Information is now disseminated in orders of magnitude of volume and speed greater than we’ve evolved to process it. And because of this critical thinking is arguably more important now than in the past.  So I’m pleased whenever I see an example of someone in the media (or anywhere, for that matter) thinking critically.

I don’t mind at all the author’s laying out the process by which AI does its job.  Doing so actually helped me appreciate this site a bit more.

Thanks for the article; I found it helpful.  I particularly liked being introduced to the concept of the naked robotic core, which I'd never heard of.  It's a different way of looking at the iPad, which makes sense to me. And I'm looking forward to reading the next article in the series, focusing on software.

Back in 2019 or thereabouts, I sold my MacBook Pro and decided to buy a Gen III 12.9 iPad Pro with an Apple Keyboard for my mobile computing needs. I found that I was using my MBP less and less frequently, sometimes going a month or more without starting it up. So I took the plunge.

My desktop is a 2020 Mac Mini i7, with a 32" monitor. The combination of Mini and IPP seems to work well for me. I really don't need a laptop when I'm out and about. Admittedly my needs are modest, and I have iPadOS versions of the MS Office apps, a CAD app that does maybe 80% of the desktop version on my Mini, plus the usual stuff like Safari, Mail, Files (which works well, for me, btw), Google Earth, etc. Only very rarely do I find myself wishing for more powerful software on the IPP. If there's something more involved that I need to do, like building complex spreadsheets, or working on a major document, I do it on the Mini. And I can view such content on the IPP, and do minor editing if need be.  I find that the IPP is good for being able to have content available in the field, where I can refer to it, update it, take notes, or whatever.

Sadly, my IPP needs replacement, as I dropped it and it no longer works as it should. Having to do constant restarts is annoying.

I almost sent it in to Apple for replacement, for $650. Then the new M4 IPP came out, and I'm now leaning hard in that direction. It's expensive, but as a consultant I can depreciate it for tax purposes, and I think the display quality would be worth the premium over the iPad Air. Plus I'm thinking there may be iPadOS software improvements coming out of next month's WWDC. We'll see.

Pretty simple. Hire the most qualified candidates for the roles. In technical roles, most qualified = most able and willing to do the job most effectively.

Race/gender/sexual preference have nothing to do with being able to do the job effectively.