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The PR-Problem Edition Monday, February 15, 2016

Apple’s Elephant In The Room, by Alexandra Mintsopulos, Medium

There is a massive disconnect between the enthusiasts and Apple’s broader customer base on the perception of Apple’s software quality. That is a PR problem for Apple to solve, not a software one.

iPad: The Last Frontier, by Jean-Louis Gassée, Monday Note

With its control over software and hardware, Apple is positioned to evolve the tablet genre. The iPad mini seems destined to stay a pure tablet, but more muscular members of the family will steal business from laptops, Apple’s and others’. “It’s better to cannibalise oneself than let others do it” has, rightly, been Apple’s position.

As the first iPad Pro shows, we’re not there yet — the iPad is still best used as a tablet, the Mac isn’t going away any time soon. Some of us are habituated to our Macs, but habits aside there are graphics and video apps and hardware configurations— large screens as an example — that require more power than the Apple-designed AX processors can offer.

Stuff

Airmail Might Be The Perfect Email App For Your iPhone, by Mat Smith, Engadget

Airmail's appeal on the iPhone is simply how much freedom you have to customize the app. This is particularly true for things that I constantly do.

6 Essential Tips For Working Smarter With Slack, by Jason Snell, Macworld

The chat app Slack can replace meetings, reduce email, and blend productivity with silly GIFs, all day long.

Develop

Why Use A Paintbrush When You Can Make Mind-Bending Art With Code?, by Sam Lubell, Wired

Computer code underpins many aspect of our lives. Usually we know exactly what we want that code to do—but what if we didn’t? This is the question posed by Los Angeles software artist Casey Reas, who employs code to form abstract, bewildering, and literally unexpected creations.

Notes

Why Is The UK Still Printing Its Laws On Vellum?, by BBC

"In many circles there's still a real discomfort around digital archiving, and a lack of belief that digital can survive into the future," explains Jenny Mitcham, digital archivist at the Borthwick Institute for Archives at the University of York.

The whole concept of digital storage is a relatively new innovation, and the path by which it could survive through the years is not clear.

"We don't have the ability to look back and say we know for a fact in 200 years time we'll still have this stuff," reasons Mitcham. "We can't prove that fact without a time machine."

Bottom of the Page

Just like Steve Jobs famously demostrated the iPhone by following a carefully crafted script that avoided known bugs, I have changed my own behavior to avoid triggering the nastier aspects of Apple's software.

For example, I've deleted all my own music from iTunes and only listen to streams from Apple Music. This was because when I previously had mixed in my own music, adding new music to "My Music" and downloading music for offline listening became unreliable.

I've also stopped creating my own playlists in Apple Music, and only listen to albums nowadays. That's because I can't understand the UI to manage playlists, especially for offline listening.

I wonder if Apple's own internal metrics did logged these bugs for me, or is Apple classifying me as a happy customer.

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Did something bad happened to the Mac App Store again? A few of the apps that I was using refused to launch today. Deleting them and re-downloading them from the App Store seemed to solve the problem for now.

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Thanks for reading.