Apple in 2021: My Report Card

March 20, 2022
6 min read

For a couple of years now, Jason Snell at Six Colors asks people in tech to rate Apple in different categories. I like this idea to look back and give my opinion. I started last year and decided to keep a tradition (albeit a bit late).

Mac

Grade: B

Don’t get me wrong – M1 Max and M1 Pro are great for someone who needs it, but Apple didn’t do any hardware for me. Those 14” and 16” are too heavy, over-powered, and expensive for what I do. I still love my MacBook Air with M1, it is a great laptop, but we are still waiting for a redesign.

I like how iMac with M1 looks, those colors are great, but it’s small, so I’m still waiting for something bigger. Or for Apple display that doesn’t cost like a used car.

I think B is a good score, but compared with the year when the M1 was first introduced and the improvement the new MacBook Air was, it doesn’t compare favorably.

iPhone

Grade: B

Again, solid year for an iPhone, but I was so much in love with 12 Pro Max the year before that feelings from iPhone 13 Pro are much more neutral, comparatively. It is a great phone, better in some ways, but the telephoto lens is still a hit or miss. With 12 Pro Max, I loved shooting with it, this year, not so much. The rail is all scratched up, although the previous phone looked like a new one after a year of use.

iOS 15 didn’t bring many new features. It works, and the Live Text feature is spectacular, but that is mostly all the progress for the year. And I find myself restarting the phone pretty often, because of some small bugs.

iPad

Grade: B

The first category to improve year after year. Maybe the issue is with me, not with Apple, but I hear a lot of similar sentiment in Apple centred podcasts – I finally use the iPad for what it is, a remarkable consumption device. Before, I’ve set out to replace my laptop with an iPad Pro, and it worked. But was a bit worse in numerous things. Last year iPad mini came out and oh boy it is great. Yeah, the screen is lacking a bit, but otherwise it is a fantastic device. Small, but with the screen large enough to be comfortable, looks great, fast. And it finally allows an iPad to be the best iPad it can and not attempting to be something else.

Watch and Wearables

Wearables – Grade: C

Watch – Grade: B

I’m still waiting for the AirPods Pro update. The ones I have are already dying after just one year (the regular AirPods worked for 2 years). The battery doesn’t hold anymore, and the case glitches all the time, attempting to connect, even though it is closed. The AirPods Max are still too expensive and not comfortable to take with you.

Apple Watch on the other hand (sorry) is a different story. I don’t agree with those saying that this is a small update. I like my Series 7. I love the bigger screen and improved sensors (compared to my previous Series 5). But I have to mention that software is lacking a lot. All the watch faces are bad, each in their own way. There are not many apps. It becomes too passive device for such a price.

Apple TV

Grade: E

I don’t think anything changed much. Yes, the remote got updated, but it is still the same overpriced box, that I can’t recommend to anyone, but Apple fanboys.

Services

Grade: F

This is a bit emotional grade, but where do I start? First, it is a year 2022 and the best tier of Apple One is still not available in Latvia. That means I’m overpaying for the storage because I have to pay for Apple One Family and additional 2 TB of storage, since I have a bit more than 400 GB stored in iCloud. Apple needs to add the Premier tier everywhere or give more options for storage upgrade.

Apple News+ and Apple Fitness+ are still not available in Latvia, as in most of the world. Apple Music apps are a joke. Everyone is enraged with 1Password going Electron, but Apple Music is so much worse.

Activity app on Apple Watch is making things worse, not better. I’ve been wearing Oura ring and after comparing the two, I can’t believe I’ve listened to those prompts. Apple Watch is constantly trying to push you – more, faster, more effort. Regardless of how you feel. I’ve had COVID-19 and Apple Watch expected me to close all the rings every day. While I woke up a bit under the weather with Oura ring, and it noticed and recommended I take things easier, maybe even take some rest days. I think Apple Watch Activity can be harmful.

HomeKit

Grade: D

It’s the app that exists. I love my colorful Hue lamps, but I mostly use them through Hue app. If you want a HomeKit enabled camera, you’ll have to look around for some time.

Hardware Reliability

Grade: A

Although I mentioned problems with AirPods Pro, this is the product from before. I don’t see any major issues with the offered hardware. I don’t even remember any of the new “gates”, which says a lot.

Software Quality

Grade: B

As I said, I’m restarting my phone quite a lot, the software is okay, but can be much better. I think there is a lot to cover and Apple needs some time and resources, and it will get better.

Developer Relations

Grade: E

Whatever you think of the Apple vs Epic conflict, it appeared only because Apple is bad at “relations”. Sony and Microsoft have both even worse deals in their stores, but nobody says a thing because they manage it much better. Apple, on the other hand, thinks only developers have to pray to them. But it is a two-way street, and there is no App Store without developers. The sooner Apple will understand that the better. Otherwise, they will be dragged through all the courts all over the world and the result will be much worse than if they made the changes themselves.

Environmental and Social Issues

Grade: C

Apple still is dependent on China. I don’t think anything changed or can be changed in the nearest future. So, no change in the grade year over year.

Homescreen – 2021

January 21, 2022
6 min read

As I first did in 2019, then in the middle of 2020 and at the end of 2020, I’m sharing my Homescreen. It is fun to go and take a look at how it changes (or stays the same). During 2021 there were quite a few changes, actually. Here is a look at 2021 edition (although a bit late).

2021
2021

Widgets

If previously there was only one stack of widgets which combined both Fantastical and Carrot Weather, now I have two separate, but smaller. First, is still Fantastical, which is a Stack of plain calendar with a heat-map and events view (similar to what I’ve had before, just separated in two widgets). Second, is Photos. I’ve previously had it on the left of the homescreen, but realised, I don’t go there often, and I wanted those memories to show up, so now it is promoted to the homescreen.

Stayed

Probably the most consistent apps are Messages, WhatsApp, Mail and Safari. I use those not even daily, but hourly. From entertainment, there are Music and Overcast – with Apple One it is harder to justify paying for Spotify and there is nothing better than Overcast in terms of sound (I don’t care for the design, so this was the year I’ve tried a couple of competitors, but nothing comes even close). The only change is that Overcast was demoted from the dock, but as I have only one homescreen, it’s not a big deal.

Now that I’ve exchange my bigger Pro Max for a plain Pro, I find myself not reading as many books on the phone. Still, Books app is still there whenever I find time. As is Audible, but again, that might change because I mostly listen to the audiobooks in the car and I launch the app from CarPlay there.

I’ve stuck with Reeder as my RSS app of choice, as well as read-it-later service. I intend to try Matter (I did before, but didn’t like it, now that it is more established, I want to give it another go).

Although there is a Photos’ widget, I still kept the Photos app icon just because it opens the Library, saving at least one tap compared to the Widget.

A bit more boring category – two finance apps are there as well – MoneyWiz and Revolut. Still use them daily, although I’ve changed icons for both.

Craft is my app of choice for notes, and it was “promoted” to the dock. Briefly, I tried to move writing there as well, but I didn’t like paragraph breaks for that, so returned to Ulysses, which is also still here.

Removed

I don’t use Telegram as often for personal communication and there are just two channels I like reading, that is why I started using it on a laptop more, so it was one of the first apps to go.

I also don’t watch a lot of Netflix on my iPhone anymore (the difference in screen size between Pro and Pro Max iPhones is small, but in watching videos – very noticeable). Similar with YouTube. The size of the screen is less of the issue here, it’s just I didn’t open it daily.

In 2021, I posted less to Instagram (and it feels like I took fewer photos), so wasn’t using Lightroom on my phone at all. I still have a subscription and use it from time to time, but not as much.

Replaced

TickTick – Todoist

As I’ve mentioned last year, I chose TickTick, but still searched for something better. Somehow, it never really clicked with me. So, this summer I’ve migrated to Todoist, which I’ve used a couple of years before, and I love it. I can’t put my finger on it, but something changed. I didn’t like Todoist last time I’ve tried it, but now it became good.

Tot – Brain Dump Shortcut

I also mentioned last year that I don’t think Tot would survive 2021, and it didn’t. I’ve deleted it from all my devices and replaced with nothing at first. I’ve had Craft for note-taking, but it didn’t have a simplicity of adding something random. Closer to the end of the year, I created a shortcut which opens the text input field and saves whatever you write in the Brain Dump note in Craft. This method is surprisingly good. It is fast. You can type, paste something. If you want to save it or expand on your thought, you can create a document out of the paragraph in Craft. It is still a work in progress, and I am also considering using Drafts for that. So look forward to the update next year.

Added

As we spend more time at home and winter days are very short, Philips Hue app found its way to the homescreen. I have a couple of smart lightbulbs and love them a lot. If price was lower, I would change all the lights in my house to Philips smart ones.

Surprisingly, the Camera made its return to the homescreen. I didn’t have it before because I was launching it from lock screen or Control Centre. Recently, though, with a more active child I sometimes found myself loosing precious seconds trying to open Control Centre and finding a small icon, thus losing the shot. So, I’ve added Camera icon to the dock (in the same place it is on a Lock Screen, for muscle memory).

I’ve returned Duolingo to the homescreen (and my phone), since I want to try to learn French. I’m uncertain if I’m ready to pay for the service, so trying to make my piece with thousands of ads in the free version.

My wife gave me Oura ring for my birthday. Now every morning I open the app to check on my sleep, that is why I like having it right there on the homescreen.

Conclusion

As is always the case, the homescreen is a work in progress. But as you can see over even a couple of years, there are some apps that took a strong hold, and it is hard to imagine they wouldn’t be there next year. Although, again, as life shows, nothing is certain and anything can happen.

Some Thoughts On Apple Event – September 2021

September 18, 2021
2 min read

It was yet another Apple event during the pandemic. I’m sure if you’ve watched at least one you will have a feeling about how it went.

iPad

Although updating the “no description iPad” iPad is great – it is an astonishing value for money, what surprised everyone was an updated iPad mini. It got an iPad Pro like design – doesn’t have home button, supports 2nd generation Apple Pencil and is available in a couple of different colors. This is iPad I’ve been waiting for and will definitely be getting one.

Apple Watch

It’s funny how wrong rumor sites were. It’s a nice upgrade with a bigger screen, I actually noticed a couple of months ago how big the bezel around the screen is in the current version and it looks like the Series 7 will solve that.

What I don’t like are the colors. I need to see them in person, but from the photos I only like stainless steel ones and they are either not available in Latvia or are ridiculously expensive.

I think Apple Watch is a perfect device for a two year upgrade. The battery in my Series 5 is sure ready to be replaced. I just need to choose the version.

iPhone

Although it might look like nothing much on the outside, it seems to be totally reworked on the inside. I love the bigger battery and updated cameras. I didn’t care much about Cinematic video, since it looked like the first Portrait mode version (not good).

The blue Pro looks okay, but I will need to see it in person. Pink non-Pro model looks amazing, I would get it if I was buying one.

I will be upgrading to the 13. This time just a regular Pro, since Pro Max doesn’t offer anything better in terms of camera. 

I know a lot of people are somehow disappointed by the event, but I thought it was a strong one. There were no boring demos or store updates, we’ve got some new devices and even a surprise. You can count it as a success in my book. 

MagSafe Wallet Review

August 27, 2021
3 min read

I’ve been a fan of minimalistic wallets for a long time. My last wallet before MagSafe was ETRO card holder, where I had 7 cards and a bit of cash at all times.

My previous ETRO card holder

The cards in the wallet were – ID, driver’s license, insurance card, 2 credit cards and one to get into the office, oh and also one loyalty card.

Apple MagSafe Wallet

MagSafe Wallet on the other hand holds only 3 cards without cash. Turns out – it was easy to get rid of the 4 cards. Office card goes to the backpack, since I don’t go there without it. I don’t need a driver’s license, because police can check my ID. I’ve had credit cards just in case, mostly to get cash at the ATM, since everything else accepts Apple Pay, so I just removed one – they are similar in fees (as there are none). The loyalty card turns out was available in the app for a long time.

So after a short management of cards I was ready to rock the new Wallet and I love it. Of course the quality is great and it feels nice. The way I hold it on my iPhone 12 Pro Max actually allows it to function similar to the pop socket.

MagSafe Wallet with Apple Silicone case

The cards are very easy to get out, now I use my ID a lot, because you have to show it together with a vaccination certificate and it is pretty easy even with one hand. It holds very well on the case, but it doesn’t feel too secure with just the naked phone. I think magnets are a bit to far when the phone is naked and glass is too slippery. When you put a case in between – magnet from the case itself is much closer and silicone gives it a much needed grip.

What I love is that it goes very easy on and off, so in the office or at home I just take it off and use my phone without it and when I go out just snap it on.

I use it for almost two months and love it. I’ve never even considered “wallet cases” before, because they are bulky, heavy and a lot of the times look bad, but this is just perfect. If you can manage with just three cards and some cash in the pocket (I finally have a reason to use my fancy leather money clip).

Bonus photo – here is how it looks on the iPhone 12 Mini. It perfectly aligns with the sides and adds a lot of bulk in comparison, but it’s still manageable.

iPhone 12 Mini with a MagSafe Wallet\

Apple Podcasts Subscriptions — Not Good

July 5, 2021
3 min read
IMG_3975.jpeg

I wrote just a paragraph regarding Apple Podcasts Subscriptions in my post about April event as there were not many details. After hearing and reading more about the service, I think that in the current form, it is bad both for podcasters and users.

On the good side, premium podcasts will be available world-wide. Apple Podcasts is the biggest player in the world, so you’ll have a big audience. Apple has probably the best chance of charging users because they’ll always have a current card on file.

On the other hand, this is only limited to Apple Podcasts app, which is not available on Android. On iOS, many people are using 3rd party apps, and they won’t be able to listen to those premium shows. The 30% cut is pretty big, I don’t understand why podcasts with the audience will use the system, since they are the ones bringing all the customers so why pay Apple so much.

As a podcast listener, when I choose to support the creator, I want him to have as much money as possible, as most of the time those prices are quite low. I’m currently paying for a couple of podcasts around $5 each, in this scenario $1.5 from monthly transaction will go to Apple. Why? I learned about those podcasts from different means, they themselves created value for me to pay, I’m happy with a current model, so I don’t get what Apple is providing that is worth 30% apart from credit card processing which costs much less.

What’s more, when you subscribe through Apple, you become their customer, not podcasters. So, the creator doesn’t know a thing about you, he just knows how many people subscribed. He can’t communicate with the listeners, offer additional perks — like community in Discord or a coupon code for merchandise drop. Sure, he can give information in the podcast itself, but how would he check if you are paying?

One of the podcasts I’m paying for is Dithering. It was actually the very first podcast I paid for. I had doubts at first, but still subscribed pretty early on and enjoyed it very much. Once the card I used expired, and I got a short podcast episode in Overcast with Ben informing me about that. It was outstanding, I went to the website, updated the information and the episodes kept coming.

I’m not sure what Apple can provide me as a user. I love Overcast audio processing too much to switch or even to use in parallel another app, so I can’t think of a single thing that would force me to install Podcasts app back.

Hollywood Is In Trouble And Why Friends Reunion Was A Bad Idea

June 24, 2021
3 min read

The creators of Friends decided to end the TV show on the most positive note — Chandler and Monica had their babies, Phoebe planned one with Mike, and Ross and Rachel were back together. The only one left out, actually, was Joey, as he didn’t become a superstar or met anyone.

It was only natural that there were no new episodes after that, although based on the success of the show, I’m sure it was tempting. That is, until the pandemic.

This reunion showcased the bigger problem for Hollywood. It loses everything right in front of our eyes. They are loosing production to tech companies. Can you imagine? Some Silicon Valley nerds are now kings of movies and TV shows. If you want something made you don’t go to the establishment, you go to Apple, Amazon, or Netflix. And nobody cares about the stars anymore. With the growing popularity of TickTock and Instagram, influencers are the new kings.

And it was only accelerated by the pandemic. First they started to complain about how hard it is for them, in their mansions. Then they tried to show their life and this is when the wall broke down. Before it was something magical, something people craved peaking in. The whole paparazzi industry was created. Now you could just see it all in the open, and people stopped caring.

I knew about Friends TV show because local station put on some episodes when I was a kid. Now, when I try to remember, it seems that there were a couple of episodes that were shown over and over, but still, I liked it.

Only when I was about 20 years old, I’ve decided to watch the whole series and I fell in love. The most shocking thing was the end — all this time watching random episodes, I didn’t know how it ends (as an aside — don’t watch the end of Tom and Jerry). But even binge-watching this TV show, I got invested in the characters, in the story, in the relationships.

After that, I’ve watched the whole series about 4-5 times. Every time knowing what will happen next, but I didn’t care. I loved the show, I still do.

The first minutes of the Friends Reunion made me cringe. That is until Matthew Perry came out, at that point I couldn’t believe somebody thought it would be a good idea. They risk losing the perception of those young fun people living in New York. You see them getting old, Matthew at times couldn’t even say a sentence. Even Joe Biden looks more alive.

I know that time passes and even Jennifer Aniston can’t stay perfect forever (she is close though still), but that is why humans invented fiction. So, we can go to that happy place, to see our favourite characters at their best, not as fucked up by drugs old people.

Friends Reunion is breaking that magic. If you didn’t see it already, my advice — don’t. There is nothing to gain and everything to lose.

WWDC 2021 — It Is Not About the OSes

June 12, 2021
5 min read

It’s that time of the year again, when Apple shows all the new things in all the different OSes. This year though, the presentation was a bit light on narrative, but pretty packed with features.

What became obvious pretty fast — it doesn’t make sense to divide this presentation by OS and I think in the future Apple will just talk about services and apps because everything works everywhere.

Since we are not there yet, they still talked about each OS separately, but more often than not it ended with a “feature is available on all other platforms as well”.

FaceTime

Even if all those features were announced last year it still would have been a bit late, not to say — fall of 2021. But better late than never. I was surprised how janky the Voice Isolation demo sounded, but I hope it will be good in the released version.

SharePlay is an interesting feature, but I don’t see myself using it much. We’ll soon have cinemas opened for vaccinated people, and I’m not a big fan of watching TV shows with friends. But there are probably people who want this. I could see myself watching sport events like that, but I don’t think local TV providers will support this feature soon (or at all).

Focus

In 2021 Apple re-invented profiles which you could’ve found on Nokia phones 20 years ago. You can now create Focus modes for work, home etc. It allows you to make different home screens for different modes and allow notifications only from certain apps or people. This also means, that you can put multiple launchers for one app.

There is Summary for notifications, which will show only the most important ones and Do Not Disturb will show a message when someone tries to reach you via iMessage (similar to Slack).

iCloud and Privacy

You can add people you trust for an Account Recovery, so when you forget your password, you will be able to restore it with their help. You can also choose people as legacy contacts, so they can access your Apple account in case of your death.

On a lighter note, Mail now has an option to hide your IP, location and whether you’ve opened a message, basically rendering tracking pixels useless.

Privacy Report which was introduced last year in Safari for websites will now be available for apps. It will show how often an app has accessed Location, Camera, Contacts, Photos in the last 7 days, as well as all the domains the app is contacting.

Siri has on-device speech recognition, which for me is not so much a privacy improvement, but a massive improvement in speed.

Paid iCloud is now iCloud+ with Private Relay — which encrypts Safari traffic (almost like a VPN). It will also let you hide email, by creating random one for forms on websites.

Safari

Safari got a redesign on all platforms. Tabs are now very compact and in line with the address bar. There are also tab groups, which you can name, and they sync across devices. On iPhone, the most significant changes are — address bar is on the bottom, you can now slide across tabs with the same gesture as you do sliding across apps and web extensions will be available on mobile.

QuickNote

On iPad, you can swipe from the corner with the Apple Pencil and a small Notes window will appear where you can make a note. If you do it on a website, it will show you the note next time you visit it. The QuickNotes sync and work across devices.

Universal Control

This was probably the best demo of the keynote. You can use a single mouse and keyboard to control all your devices. Just put your iPad besides the Mac and you will be able to move the cursor from Mac to the iPad without any setup.

My mind was blown, when Craig added the iMac on the left of the MacBook and used the mouse to go all the way from the iMac to the iPad through the MacBook in the middle and dragged the file across three devices just to drop it on the iMac.

iPadOS 15

This actually is a bit of an exception, since there were a couple of iPadOS-specific features. First, as everyone could have guessed they added Widgets, with some bigger options (up to a quarter of the screen). App Library is also available on the iPad now and is accessible with an icon in the dock and by swiping to the last page.

The multitasking is rethought… again. It is more visual, with buttons and hints.

It is possible to develop and submit iOS and iPadOS apps to the App Store from Swift Playgrounds.

Miscellaneous

  • Apple Maps are even more amazing in San Francisco.
  • Government IDs, house and hotel keys and work ID in Apple Wallet
  • Low-power mode on macOS.
  • You can AirPlay to the Mac (both the video and sound).
  • Multiple timers on Apple Watch (but only on Apple Watch).
  • Conversation Boost — focuses AirPods Pro on the person talking to you. You can reduce the amount of ambient noise in the settings.
  • Shared With You — things shared with you in iMessage will appear across multiple apps (Music, News, Podcasts, etc.)
  • Live Text — you can copy and paste text from the photo (seems to work flawlessly in the demo). And it can recognise objects.
  • Shortcuts for Mac, which will replace Automator.
  • Health Sharing — you can see data of your parents or kids. Alerts, like for heart rate or steadiness. Apple doesn’t have access to this information.

Purple iPhone 12 mini

May 20, 2021
2 min read

When iPhone 12 mini and 12 Pro Max came out, it was very hard to get the latter on the first day (believe me, I jumped through all the hoops possible to get it), while the smallest one was in abundance in every store. I handled it at the store once and loved the size.

So, when recently my mom decided to upgrade her iPhone 7, I recommended the all new 12 mini in purple. She asked for help to set it up, so I had an opportunity to use it for a bit in a non-stressful environment of a masked-up store.

It fits perfectly in the hand, I was a proponent of bigger screens when the Plus size phones came out, but maybe it’s an age thing, or device fatigue, but the mini size feels perfect.

I even seriously considered changing my 12 Pro Max for 12 Mini, but I use my phone for photography a lot and I can’t say I am a great photographer, so whatever help I can get from better technology — I’m up for that.

I actually checked using Smart Folder tip from David Smith and 31% of photos were taken using telephoto lens. And this year I feel like I use it even more, so the absence of this lens would be very noticeable for me.

In a perfect world, where iPhone mini gets a better camera system and iPad mini gets updated with Pro-like design, the combination of M-series 13” laptop, iPad mini and iPhone Mini would be perfect, but now, I still have my gold iPhone 12 Pro Max and massive iPad Pro.

Apple Event — April 2021

April 20, 2021
5 min read

Long time since the last event and finally, we got one in 2021. There were many rumours, so let’s see what came true.

Services

The first and the most boring thing announced — Apple Card Family. You can now share credit as a couple and you can order a card for your 13-year-old. If you are in USA, that is.

Apple also announced Apple Podcast subscriptions. There were no details shared, except that you will be able to subscribe for ad-free listening, early access and more. What’s good — it will be available in 170 regions and countries from the start, which will be next month.

iPhone

Apple
Apple

It was surprising to hear “iPhone” as a part of the spring presentation, but there is just the new purple color for iPhone 12 and 12 Mini. Looks good and I like the precedent of updating colours. They did this with red before, but this is more similar to seasonal Apple Watch band additions.

Find My — AirTags

AirTags are released. Finally. Although not sure if many people are waiting for them. They use Find My network, you can personalise them with text or emoji. There are cases, including $300 — $400 Hermes ones.

If you have iPhone 12 with U1 chip, you can use Precision finding which shows you the precise location of the tag and navigates you to it. They cost $29 for one and $99 for the pack of four. Available April 30.

What’s good is the battery is standard and replaceable, so after more than a year of promised battery life you still will be able to use your AirTags.

Apple TV

Apple TV+

The only TV show trailer was of course for Season 2 of Ted Lasso, which can’t come soon enough. Apple shared the date of the release of the second season — July 23rd.

Apple TV 4K

Update to the same old Apple TV box. Now it will have A12 Bionic, which will enable to play High-frame rate HDR content.

They also added a cool Color Balance feature, which uses camera and sensors on your iPhone to calibrate the picture of Apple TV.

New square-sided remote, with a 5-way navigation click-pad, which is also touch enabled and has a circular gesture for rewinding (like an iPod). There is a power button to control TV and Siri button is on the side now.

It still costs $179 for 32 GB which is too much.

iMac

Apple
Apple

When they showed the new iMacs with M1, the first thought was — why did they leave the chin?! We’ve quickly learned that the whole computer fits into the chin, but I would rather have a thicker device and a display with a smaller bezel than this.

There are seven different colours, muted in the front, joyful in the back. It has an iPad Pro inspired design which makes it very thin, wiith 24” screen size in just a bit bigger body than 21.5” iMac.

1080p camera, together with M1 image-processing potentially will produce a great picture. New 6-speaker system is able to support Spatial audio.

I don’t understand why a desktop computer needs a magnetic connector, which is also attached such that it would be inconvenient to put it against the wall. On the other hand, ethernet port in the power brick is a nice touch.

There are also some new accessories. Magic Mouse and Magic Trackpad are now white with color accents matching new iMacs. Magic Keyboard on the other hand, got the biggest update. It also matches the color of the iMac, but now it comes in three versions. First, similar to the old one, but with a couple of new buttons (like emoji-picker). Second, with added Touch ID and third with Touch ID and number pad.

There are two main configurations — $1299 which comes in 4 colors and $1499 which comes in 7 colors. But it is not the only difference, the more expensive one has 8-core GPU instead of 7, two additional USB 3 ports (lower-tier has only Two Thunderbolt ports) and it comes with Magic Keyboard with Touch ID.

iPad Pro

The most surprising announcement was that iPad Pro has an M1 in it, which makes it 50% faster than previous iPad Pro. It also has a higher tier 8-core GPU and new 2 TB configuration. New Thunderbolt port with USB-4 now supports Pro Display XDR in full 6K resolution.

Speaking of the display, 12.9” iPad Pro will now have the display similar in performance to the Pro Display XDR. It uses Mini-LED technology and now has both outstanding brightness and contrast ratio.

Of course, it has 5G, so you can have fast internet access whenever you go (in ideal conditions).

Moreover, a big update to the front facing camera, it now has Ultra-Wide sensor. Apple presented the Center Stage feature, which keeps you in the center of the picture and if you move it will crop accordingly. Looks nice in the demo.

It will be available in the second half of May for $799 for 11” and $1099 for 12.9”.

Now that iPad Pro is more powerful than ever, there still is a question of software. Even with M1 in May, it will power iPadOS 14, which won’t be able to use all this power. Some hope for the WWDC in June?

And at the end, I will leave you with two questions which popped to mind when they announced M1 in iPad Pro:

  1. How long until we see macOS on an iPad?
  2. When will Apple add 5G to the laptop?

Facebook: It’s Time

April 12, 2021
4 min read

Everyone and their mother wrote about the recent Facebook user data leak. If you didn’t notice or decided not to care because it’s yet another fuck-up by the blue app, who can blame you? But what is interesting, as Wired reports, is that it’s hard to find where this data actually came from. Facebook just says it’s from 2019 leak and now it just got published. Nothing to see here. But there were a couple that year. Surprise.

In short, the leak available online contains data on roughly 533 million users. E-mails, phone numbers, Facebook IDs and a lot of other information. The leak included information on various politicians and Mark Zuckerberg himself.

You can easily check if you are affected on HaveIBeenPwned website. It’s actually a good resource to keep at hand because it checks all the available leaks. My data wasn’t in this one, but there were a couple of others to worry about.

Regardless of the result I started wandering, what information Facebook has on me. I went to Facebook settings (actually opened Facebook for the first time since November) and requested a download of all the information from my profile. After a couple of hours I got a link for around 500 MB of data.

It starts with the obvious — all your posts, friends, likes, comments, photos and videos. There are also devices, IP addresses and locations you’ve logged into Facebook. If you’ve used voice features, there would be recordings (not for me).

There are also some things that Facebook tries to guess about you, like for example your interests (which were pretty meh for me):

Or life stage description of your friends:

It also keeps every profile you’ve visited and when, what you were searching for and what languages you might speak.

Then there is a list of companies who uploaded your contact information to Facebook to spam you with their offers — almost every popular app or store you’ve registered in.

The most interesting is your activity outside of Facebook. In my case, among others there was a local bank Luminor which reports to Facebook every time I open the app.

I know it’s automatic, but let it just sink in, a bank in Latvia is telling a social networking company in the US about every time I’ve opened their app. Just why?

There is much more activity from another bank — Citadele, but I found it hard to understand what it corresponds to.

You can actually turn off this activity outside Facebook “feature”, but as Facebook itself warns before you do, it’s not actually turning it off.

Although I know it’s hard to actually delete information from the Internet and there are shadow profiles on Facebook, I still think this is the only logical step. As I mentioned, I wasn’t using the social network for six months, so I don’t think I will miss it.

Surprisingly, the process of deleting the account looks fairly straightforward, you just choose Delete:

It even reminds you to download all the information (which I already did):

After that, you have 30 days to reinstate your account, which I did once accidentally.

If you log in to Facebook by mistake in those 30 days, it will just … log you in, without even asking and the “deletion” process will be stopped. So, you have to be careful. I had to go through the deletion procedure for the second time.

There are still Instagram and WhatsApp installed on my phone. I’ll have to decide about those later. Although moving from WhatsApp is impossible now because of work, I already started minimizing the number of chats I have there. Instagram on the other hand I think will have the same trajectory as Facebook, I will use it for some time and at some point I just won’t.