john-useless

DAalseth said:

I’ve thought the same for a while now. It’s one thing to produce a system that is used in other people’s cars, and making the whole thing yourself. The latter involves setting up a dealer network, service and support systems, dealing with warranty claims and more. 
Why reinvent the wheel, when they can make something to go on other people’s products. Far less hassle and far more money to be made in the latter. 

I agree. Apple famously is not the first to enter markets — think MP3 players, smartphones, wearable tech. But when they do, they tend to do it better than the others, redefining those markets as Apple's entries mature. And Apple also prefers to dominate the product categories in which they compete.

Is there enough that needs to be redefined in the automotive market? Even if there is, how could Apple possibly dominate a product category like that? Apple can afford to attempt to compete in certain product categories (e.g. WiFi access points, expensive smart home speakers) and then to simply walk away from those products when market conditions change. It was not embarrassing for Apple to discontinue their AirPort routers or the full-size HomePod speaker — disappointing to some customers, yes, but not to investors or shareholders.

But the incredibly high startup costs of building a new car company? And the ridicule they would get if they started making cars but then had to discontinue them in, say, five or even 10 years? I don't see Apple wanting to do that.

I will certainly be happy, though, if Apple finds a way to get some of the mainstream automakers to partner with them to improve the entire in-car experience (the software, the controls) and/or even help the automotive industry advance its efforts toward safety and autonomous driving.

Before the 12-inch MacBook from 2015 through 2019, Apple did also sell an 11-inch MacBook Air from 2010 through 2016 … so that's almost a decade of offering a size smaller than 13.x inches.

I think a 15-inch MacBook Air would be a perfect addition to today's lineup at around $1,499 (slotting it around midway between the 13-inch Air and 14-inch Pro prices). If they could also offer a new 12-inch model for, say, $799 or $899, and close to 2.0 pounds in weight, the product might indeed find a segment of the fan base who are looking either for low price or low weight.

I just want to take a moment to lament the passing of the tapered thickness (thinness) that has, until now, always been associated with the MacBook Air name.

I can't argue with Apple's decision to reimagine the M2 MacBook Air as a uniform 0.44-inch thin design, especially given that they shaved a full 20% from its volume as compared to the M1 MacBook Air. But I will still miss the wedge-shaped design of all previous-generation Airs, which became absolutely iconic and influenced the shape of thin-and-light notebooks throughout the industry for well over a decade. Apple didn't invent the wedge shape for notebooks, but they perfected it with the Intel- and M1-based Airs. The design certainly earned a revered place in computing history.

I'll tell ya what, though: Speaking of iconic designs, I would be willing to pay a (slight) penalty in thinness if it meant we could still have a glowing Apple logo.

amar99 said:

For those of us who have spent years with a traditional Mac / Windows icon grid layout, the new interface can seem simplistic, or even patronizing. Instead of showing all of your top level options on one screen, it sacrifices this for the sake of showing more detailed "second level" options of whatever top level option is already selected. 

I agree with your analysis that Ventura's use of space in System Settings is perhaps less visually efficient than the traditional System Preferences grid — but even so, I'm really looking forward to this change. I have been a Macintosh user continuously for 38 years since buying one of the original models in 1984 and have thus used every single version of the operating system's preferences, from the first Control Panel on up.

If memory serves, is it was with the initial introduction of Mac OS X that for whatever reason my ability to develop "muscle memory" for finding various settings seems to have diminished; every time I'm in the Preferences panel, it takes significant time to find the location of various controls — perhaps because they're not in alphabetical order (or in any order with a logic that I can discern) and because we don't tend to tweak those settings on a regular basis. It has definitely been a frustration.

We don't yet know whether the new System Settings design in Ventura is the best possible one … but this is an area in macOS that has been long overdue for improvement, in my view. I hope Apple keeps iterating on it.

This has been one of my favorite shows since its beginning — and given that there are several other Apple TV+ shows that I also enjoy ("Severance," "The Morning Show," "Dickinson," "See," and "Ted Lasso" all come to mind), "For All Mankind"'s quality helps me feel like the annual price of Apple TV+ is a high-value bargain.

Back when season one first came out, my feeling at the time was that space exploration is so expensive that humanity's actual return to the moon and eventual exploration of Mars would most likely be accomplished by international cooperation. But given the real-world news events of the last several months, I now wonder if a version of the fictionalized conflict in space portrayed on "For All Mankind" is what's in store for us in the real world in the decades to come. If "Star Trek" (the original series) was moral commentary on then-current events, "For All Mankind" is perhaps serving in a similar role — both for current and possibly future events.

I'm not trying to get political here. It's just darn good television.