doggone

A headless Mac that is not a Mac mini really needs expandability.  So a shorter, smaller version of the MacPro would be cool.  An overweight Mac mini does not fit the bill. 

Mango Mussolini - that's a good one. Hope it's okay to use that in the future.

Sadly I suspect he will win the election in Nov.  Correction he will win the electoral college but will lose the actual vote tally.

On taxes - Trump's policies will reduce the tax burden for the wealthy whilst the poor sods that voted him in will get shafted.  

On the meandering comment, I wonder if the media or Democrats can may some hay with that.  It is possible to convince the electorate that Trump is simply self obsessed and has no real idea how to make the US great again.

I don't quite get it.  
#1 Leather is a by-product of the food industry.  I doubt that any more cows were needed to make the cases.
#2 A recent study showed that leather watch straps hold significantly fewer germs.  I imagine that same goes for the cases.
#3 Leather ages well, forms a patina and stays clean well.
#4 Leather is water resistant.

The form factor for the iMac has bothered me for years now.  The chin on the display is unnecessary and apple should be placing the circuit boards behind the screen.  Essentially all you should see from the front is the screen with the bezel just big enough to house the camera.
I agree that the iMac is on its last legs.  It has limited utility as an all in one for young kids, schools and maybe kiosks or receptionists.  Any other use is better served by a laptop that you can easily hook up a display to when you want to work at a desk.
I agree on the pricing for SSD and RAM and the miniimum configuration really needs to be 16GB RAM and 512GB SSD. Unfotunately that is where Apple makes free money so i don't see it ending. Personally I just by the model that has the configuration I want.  It generally is cheaper than doing a custom configuration and the delivery is faster.

As a consumer, I will continue to only use the Apple App Store. Security is a critical issue for me and I don't want to lose my financial and personal information just because I downloaded an app from a site that does not do the type of due diligence that Apple does.  Other app stores will have to cut corners and I'm sure their verification process will be part of that.  

The ability to upgrade a Mac would definitely be useful. I understand that this is a cash cow for Apple since it means people have to choose the model that will meant not only their current needs but possibly their future needs too. 
In many ways it would be good to buy a base model and overtime upgrade the memory and SSD if that is all you can afford at the time.  I've certainly done that in the past for Mac desktops, minis and even MBPs and its extended the usability of the device for several more years.
With Macs now being extremely powerful, the CPUs are able to handle OS upgrades for years.  There used to be a time where a new OS upgrade would significantly slow down a machine.  This M1 MBP that I got in 2021 is still speedy and will last several more years.  I purposely got a model with 512GB SSD because I know that 256 can be very limiting.  I also got 16MB of RAM which though less important for me, 8GB could become a bottleneck.

This might sound silly but I have never figured out why the pencil isn't allowed to work with an iPhone.  I don't an iPad but I would like the ability to jot stuff down on a phone by writing rather than typing.  

blastdoor said:

I’d love to see intel regain the process lead and win apples foundry business. 

Seriously.  Intel have been falling over themselves to screw up.  They've relied on the old X86 business to keep themselves going.

I would like to see Apple be more competitive in pricing.  Not for the high end Macs like MBP, Studio etc but for the low end Mini's and Air.  They could do this by having an M2 version available at the lowest price (i.e. 499 for a mini) and have the regular pricing for the M4 versions.  This would pressure other PC makers to lower their prices and make them less competitive.
Apple did this very successfully with the MP3 player market.  First the mini enabled them to dominate the market and then the shuffle killed it off.  

The AppleWatch Afib feature saved my life back in October 2020.  Started noticing irregular heart beats and could see it on the AppleWatch.  Then it started getting worse and the AW issued an Afib warning so went to the emergency room. I told the doctor and they put me straight on a EKG and a shot of medicine to slow my heart rate.  Spend 5 days in hospital whilst they found the right medicine and I've been under control since then.  Only need to take the medication on an as needed basis now.
Thanks Apple and AppleWatch.