Columns

We predict obvious and silly things, but look right past the big ones…

Epic and Spotify sure seem to like to taunt Apple in front of the EU…

Forget MacBooks, the ‘Copilot+ PCs’ played themselves, quite literally

Some thoughts on the Clicks physical iPhone keyboard

Which is great, but one year in, what needles Threads?

Apple entering OpenAI’s boardroom is all sorts of interesting and wild!

Seemingly every investor I talk to these days is struggling with the same basic thing: they believe AI is going to be one of the most transformative technologies of the past several decades – and perhaps ever – but they have almost no idea how to invest in the space. And yet

Mark Zuckerberg takes on the sinners in the hands of an AI God

An acquisition by any other name…

The EU would like Apple to roll out their products, just not their version of their products

Amazon owned the AI assistant space -- until the space changed

Hollywood has morphed around the great actor

Can a stripped-down, less expensive headset save ‘Spatial Computing’?

The ActivityPub work being done by Ghost and others is getting compelling…

Apple and the EU enter the next phase of the DMA battle…

The questions mount about the viability of Apple’s Next Big Thing™

Technically, Ilya Sutskever’s new startup is called ‘Safe Superintelligence’ but come on, this is anti-OpenAI.

NVIDIA becomes the most valuable company in the world

A 2017 profile of Jensen Huang is even more incredible in 2024

A 10 step plan to save the movie theater business

“There’s a mantra we all have to remember: Corporations are pussies.”

Dancing with the ‘vaporware’ devil…

The countdown to ‘Microsoft Intelligence’ feels on. Sorry, OpenAI.

‘The Acolyte’ looks to be in trouble…

AI’s performance arms race yields to the product arms race…

How new Siri parallels old Siri…

Can Siri meet the moment this time?

Apple is doing “AI” their way, in ways likely good and well, TBD

Has the game stopped?

‘Apple Intelligence’ is a good name, but it is a good narrative?

Perhaps Apple’s best hardware, forced to use limited software

AI will change Hollywood -- for the better

NVIDIA hits $3T market cap and soars past Apple

To inject ads you cannot skip into your eyes. JFC.

As money pours into AI, can NVIDIA stay ahead?

“The Daily Show” ratings surge where they didn’t for Apple…

A sense of tension between the two sides is inescapable

Hollywood keeps fighting the change needed in movie theaters, but it’s inevitable

Will slow but not fully steady win the race?

It’s both a good movie and a spectacle yet didn’t resonate in theaters

Apple is playing catch up, but doesn’t need to sprint

The AI madness needs to settle to reach its potential -- and it will

The curious case of Scarlett Johansson’s voice…

Unleash the feeds

Professional users hunt for a Mac-like Safari…

...to usher in Copilot+ PCs and take on Apple

What is going on at Cannes and *who* is counting?

A slimmer $1,500 ‘iPhone Ultra’

The future of computing remains frustrating

or: You Are Not Your Fucking iPad

Streaming services have a name type, you might say…

StreamSaver! I cannot believe Apple and Netflix agreed to this name…

No sarcasm, just enthusiasm for GPT-4o

Must AI life imitate art about AI?

Apple leaves the door slightly ajar for an iPad running macOS…

Alexa and Siri look towards the sky and see their doom…

The inevitable marriage of the largest sport with the largest streamer…

Apple needs to read the room in which they find themselves…

Disney Lets a Hundred Bundles Blossom

Might John Ternus succeed Tim Cook at Apple?

The time Instagram wrongly banned me and threatened to destroy my life. “Oops. Our bad.”

The new iPad Pro is awesome. And a bit silly.

Thoughts on Apple’s “Let Loose” iPad Event

Well, they just Osbourne’d the Switch... What now?

Pearl Jam’s latest album matters

The ‘Star Wars’ movie rankings in 2024

Apple, let us boot iPadOS or macOS on the iPad

The relative calm before the “AI, AI, AI, AI, AI” storm…

Some decidedly unhelpful thoughts about investing in AI startups…

MKBHD on the annoying trend of half-finished products launching

Apple really should have released the Vision Pro as a dev kit

If you squint, you can see a path to an M4 iPad to boost Apple’s AI narrative leading up to WWDC…

The NBA streaming deal seems smart -- I’m surprised Apple didn’t push harder for it.

Wall Street loves to reward arms race spending -- until they don’t.

Ban or not, this is the end of TikTok as we know it

With sales looking weak, what is Apple’s strategy here?

It’s driven by AI and it’s all PR anyway…

Can ‘Horizon OS’ be the Android to visionOS?

The case to re-release the three-year-old iPhone models elsewhere

At least via the Trump trial in NYC, which may not mean much -- still…

We’re working our way back to the cable bundle…

Will the latest social thing be the next big thing?

Will the rise of AI lead to new consumer hardware?

Amazon to Stop Paying Developers to Create Apps For AlexaAmazon.com Inc. will no longer pay developers to create applications for Alexa, scrapping a key element of the company’s effort to build a flourishing app store for its voice-activated digital assistant.BloombergMatt Day End of... well, something: Amazon.com

Film Fans Keep Splurging on Blockbusters in Imax, So Why Hasn’t Wall Street Gotten on Board?How Imax has quickly become the goldstandard in theatrical experiences.VarietyBrent Lang It’s easy to overthink it. With all the concerns about the future of cinemas – as in the actual buildings where you

Game Of Thrones Jon Snow Spinoff Series No Longer In Development At HBO The Game of Thrones Jon Snow spinoff series is no longer in active development at HBO, Kit Harington confirms in an interview. Screen Rant Adam Bentz We will continue to know nothing... more about Jon Snow, it

How Tech Giants Cut Corners to Harvest Data for A.I. Meta debated buying a publisher like Simon & Schuster for AI training data... The New York Times Various There is a lot in this NYT report – bylined by five reporters: Cade Metz, Cecilia Kang, Sheera Frenkel, Stuart A. Thompson and

I’m not the least bit ashamed to admit that I hate April Fools Day. First, I’m someone who values high quality information above all else.1 Second, it’s stupid. Yes, I’m a grinch or whatever. I just don’t find any of the jokes – especially the jokes by tech companies – funny.

Apple’s Immersive Video problemOn Thursday Apple debuted its first immersive video since the Vision Pro launched, a five-minute-long compilation of highlights from the MLS Cup playoffs late last year. Without even seeing the vid…Six Colors Earlier this week, Apple finally – and I do mean finally, it took them

Exactly 10 years ago I sent the tweet above. First and foremost, it’s wild that it has been 10 years. So long ago, that they were still called “tweets”.1 Second, my god what a decade Satya Nadella and Microsoft have had. On that day, Microsoft held an event in

At its core, the DoJ’s case against Apple seemingly would seek to undo a lot of what makes the iPhone the iPhone. Which is equal parts worrisome, weird, and wild. And so at the highest level, of course Apple is going to fight back against this. At the same time,

The recent reports that BeReal is struggling with either a fundraise or growth or both, is a bummer. I have no actual information about the round or company – nor am I even a regular user (I had sort of been there/done that with Front/Back back in the day!

Microsoft Agreed to Pay Inflection $650 Million While Hiring Its Staff Microsoft doesn’t want its plan to hire two of Inflection AI’s co-founders and most of its 70-person staff to be seen as an acquisition... The Information Jessica E. Lessin, Natasha Mascarenhas, & Aaron Holmes Just to follow-up on

U.S. Sues Apple, Alleges Tech Giant Exploits Illegal Monopoly The US DOJ sues Apple, alleging the company blocked its competitors from accessing iPhone features, made switching to non-Apple devices more difficult, and more... Techmeme Various Headlines With the very large caveats that I’m not a lawyer – let alone an

“Whatever You Think The Acolyte Is, It’s Not”: Star Wars Series Creator Leslye Headland Revels in the First Teaser TrailerThe showrunner behind the Star Wars Original series, debuting June 4 on Disney+, talks about her film influences and love of Legends lore.Disney NewsKristin Baver Feels a little weird

ESPN Boss Jimmy Pitaro’s Chaotic Race to Remake the Sports Giant Cable TV’s collapse is forcing the Disney property out of its comfort zone, from hiring risky talent to a streaming gambit that ticked off the NFL Isabella Simonetti & Robbie Whelan Just in case you were wondering when

OpenAI’s Chatbot App Store Is Off to a Slow Start Last fall, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman sought to capitalize on the raging success of ChatGPT by launching an app store... The Information Stephanie Palazzolo You get why everyone wants to build an “app store” – everyone wants to be a

Microsoft Hires DeepMind Co-founder Mustafa Suleyman from Inflection to Run Consumer AI He’s reporting to Satya Nadella and bringing on most staff from his Inflection AI startup... Techmeme Various Headlines So many questions about this Microsoft/Inflection deal. Wait a minute, strike that. There is no deal. Well, there may

Aaron Taylor-Johnson Offered James Bond Role Reportedly will “sign contract this week” The Sun Howell Davies & Ellie Henman At last, some spy news on Spyglass. With the very real caveat that I’m linking to a UK tabloid (owned by News Corp) and that even they are couching this news with

Once More With Feeling: Banning TikTok Is Unconstitutional & Won’t Do Shit To Deal With Any Actual ThreatsOver the last few days, we’ve had a few posts about the latest attempt to ban TikTok in the US (and to people who say it’s only a divestiture bill: there

TikTok Turns to Creators to Fight Possible Ban Dozens of popular figures on the app have traveled to Washington to urge lawmakers to oppose a bill that could result in the platform being blocked in the United States. NYT Sapna Maheshwari & Yiwen Lu Riddle me this: if you’re a Chinese-owned

Apple finds itself in a weird spot at the moment. They long ago relinquished their beloved underdog status but now they’re nearing the full transition to “big baddie” in the eyes of many. “You either die a hero or live long enough to see yourself become the villain,” and all

Major Pay TV Operators Shed 5 Million Subscribers in 2023 - TheWrapThe figure brings the industry’s total net losses in the past five years to over 20 million, according to Leichtman Research GroupTheWrapLucas Manfredi Everyone knows by now (finally – I wrote this almost a decade ago) that cable TV

Epic says Apple will reinstate developer account, clearing path for Epic Games Store on iPhone - 9to5MacAfter a whirlwind of events, Epic Games says Apple has reinstated their App Store developer account. The move clears the…9to5MacZac Hall Well, someone got to Apple. Either it was the EU or, perhaps

And now, I must repent. Last week, after my midnight viewing of Dune: Part 2 I noted that while this new film is great and an absolute spectacle, I felt as if I still liked the first film more. Well, I just watched it for a second time, at a

The EU Commission Fines Apple €1.8B for Stifling Music Competition iPhone maker hit by first-ever Brussels fine as competition watchdogs step up scrutiny of Big Tech Techmeme Various Another day, another EU v. Apple situation. This fine, while more than triple what was expected, is not what matters here.

A revolutionary new productivity tool. A truly amazing gaming device. And an insanely great content viewer. These were not three separate products,1 but instead, the promise of one product: the Vision Pro. Unfortunately, at least for now, it sure feels like only the last of those experiences is the

Apple Ponders Whether to Develop Smart Glasses, Fitness RingApple has explored the idea of developing new wearable devices — including a fitness ring, smart glasses and even AirPods with cameras — to broaden one of its most important business areas. Also: Hear the latest on a HomePod with a screen, Apple’s

If you start me up If you start me up, I’ll never stop. The Rolling Stones song, incidentally the one used to launch Windows 95, is stuck in my head. Because it’s what I keep thinking about while trying to start using the Vision Pro. And I do mean “trying”

Tech Leaders Fled San Francisco During the Pandemic. Now, They’re Coming Back. Founders and investors who moved to Miami and elsewhere are returning to a boom in artificial intelligence and an abundance of tech talent. Wall Street Journal Berber Jin & Angel Au-Yeung San Francisco is back! In 3 to

The Verge had at least four articles focused on Microsoft’s Xbox announcement last week – there’s a joke in here somewhere about one for each of the whopping four games they’re bringing to other consoles – and upon reading each one, I still can’t quite parse what on Earth the strategy is

❗Warning: Spoilers ahead for True Detective: Night Country I loved, loved, loved the first season of True Detective.1 The second season was, as everyone knows, pretty bad, despite a great cast. The third season was better, but nothing that I can honestly say I remember too much about. The

Uber Isn’t Worth $17 BillionEarlier this month, investors poured $1.2 billion into Uber, a tech company whose smartphone app connects taxi drivers to passengers. The share of the business …FiveThirtyEightAswath Damodaran One thing I’ve done for well over a decade: bookmark posts and takes that I find ridiculous

Here we go again: “I don’t just think that Quest is the better value, I think Quest is the better product, period.” Look, I actually don’t disagree with Mark Zuckerberg’s overall stance here. Meta’s Quest, as it stands right now on February 13, 2024 is a better overall product

Now that a couple days have passed since the seeming bombshell sports streaming announcement which would further blow up the cable bundle dropped, a slew of new little details have come along, as you might expect. First and foremost, the timing of that announcement was pretty clearly to get ahead

Earlier tonight, I joked about Bluesky moving up in my social media power rankings. To position number 4 of the 17 sites and services that I now need to update in order to reach the audience that has now completely dispersed since Xitter shit the bed. This is actually not

TechCrunch+ Termination Layoffs hit TechCrunch... Lux Capital Danny Crichton With the unfortunate news of layoffs at TechCrunch last week, this post attempts to look at the why – and in particular, what went wrong with “TechCrunch+”, the site’s premium tier. With the large caveat that I was at TechCrunch a decade

The year is 2024, and I’ve just been kicked out of a cafe for using a laptop. Well, technically I wasn’t kicked out, but rather was asked to put my laptop away because with the new year, they’ve decided to implement a no-laptop-policy. So I was effectively kicked out. I

Historically, I’ve used the start of the new year to post a screenshot of the homescreen of my iPhone. Each year, I’m late in doing so. And each year, I get asked when it’s coming. This year, I’m later than normal in doing so – sorry, I’ve been busy spinning up

Happy Vision Pro Week to those who celebrate. The device ships on Friday.1 But we can expect the first official reviews to drop tomorrow. Those will be an interesting read for sure. Normally, reviews of Apple products are entirely predictable. This is not a knock on anyone who does

Earlier today, I laid out why I thought Apple might end up taunting the EU with any changes they implement to comply with the Digital Markets Act (DMA) laws set to take effect in March. And after a roughly 30 minute honeymoon period when folks thought Apple may actually be

I said my second post would be another “meta” post, but I lied. The truth is that it’s late at night here in London and after a few hour delay launching this site earlier today (thanks for the help, Ghost), and during a “midnight feed” of a baby, I found