doggone

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.  

It is amazing how backward the US is in this regard.  It is also surprising due to the amount of credit card fraud here.  
My best guess is that the banks and the vendors do not want to spend the money on upgrading.  Interestingly it is often the smaller businesses that have embraced technology faster using devices like Square since they provide a seamless process for payments.  
About 4-5 years ago we finally got chips in credit cards.  It took a while before vendors had consoles that could recognize them.  Now most places can do contactless payments with a card in hand.  Availability of payment via Apple Pay has improved significantly but it can be a bit kludgy sometimes.  It is definitely easier to use it in Europe.

Having lived now in the States for over 30 years (previously from the UK) I would have to say that the reason for slow change is that the country is so huge.  For organizations that are nationwide, making changes is hard as rolling out new systems is a lot of work.  Also because of the size of the country, each region has its own way of doing things.  Consider how diverse Europe is in its way of doing things in general.  The US is the same size as Europe and in many ways is as diverse as Europe in how the various regions operate.  Sure the language is the same but Californians live and think very differently from someone on the East Coast.

I somewhat sympathize with Netflix but in reality they created the situation by allowing multiple streams to help drive usage and acceptance.  
Apple have the perfect solution with their family plans.  This allows multiple Apple ID accounts to use the same subscription.  Why can't Netflix do that?
It will eliminate those who got the password from friends and would not be a major issue.  The other thing Netflix could do is force a password upgrade.

The recording feature is a useful bonus.  But I guess this is really for people who want to play their vinyl with only a small amount of investment.  Most albums I have on vinyl, I can get digitally.  Of course you don't get those wonderful clicks and noise that makes a record sound alive. 

At some point I will want to get a turnable to listen to vinyl again.  What would be neat is to have it integrate with a very good sound system.

retrogusto said:

Question for watch owners: do you find yourselves wishing it were bigger in daily use? For me, the benefit of having multiple devices that can perform similar functions (desktop, laptop, iPad, phone, watch) is that ideally each is optimized for specific use cases, which for the watch means being as compact as possible but always readily available on the wrist. I’m not looking for more functional overlap at the cost of reduced optimization; I don’t need or want to read the news on my watch while lying on the couch at home, if it means that the rest of the time I’m carrying around something bulkier than it needs to be. 

I generally go for new features.  The very first Apple Watch had to run app which finally allowed me to put my phone in a pocket and leave it there (bluetooth headphones also helped.
Now it is more about health apps.  A later generation helped me understand I may have afib and when it started getting really bad I got to a hospital.  
The larger sized screen is better because I can fit more complications.  So a bigger screen maybe compelling to me.  
Battery life is okay for me since I wear a previous gen watch for sleep monitoring so I can charge the main one at night.

I will evaluate whether an additional 4mm is worth it.  That decision will be based on the new features and if they are only available in the pro version and there are worth it to me I will probably get one.