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Welcome to Comfort Zone, a podcast all about pushing your hosts, well, outside of their comfort zone.

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I'm Christopher Lawley, and each week I'm joined by two incredible co-hosts.

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As always, I'm joined by big business boy Birchler himself, Matt Birchler.

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How are you in your collared shirt today, looking all fancy?

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It is, I think it really speaks to my casual nature that simply wearing not a t-shirt is like notable.

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Look, I got a collar, but it's open. Like, I'm all casual. Yeah, yeah, yeah. You're a cool guy, Chris. We get it.

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I'm self-employed. Like, I don't got anyone to impress here. Like, yeah. But don't worry too much, though.

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I'm currently drinking a bubbly, and I'm drinking one of the Mario Galaxy movie tie-ins.

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So I got little starry guys on there. So you're going uber big business boy, Birchler.

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You're promoting another movie that you're probably getting dollars on the back end for. I see how it is. Okay.

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Yeah, yeah. And we're also joined by Neil Leon. Milian, how are you? Yes, I'm doing well. Speaking of our looks,

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humble brag, I went to the National Assembly recently and I was stressing all week,

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not about the event itself that we had to organize there, but about how I was going to dress.

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And on the day, I wore just a shirt, but I kept it open with a plaid pattern.

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on it and it looked i thought it looked fancy but the people around you were all very much fancier

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uh in any in every way you went with the me plaid shirt open look i like it yeah but you know i've

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it felt like i was just some random person coming here and not in charge i i did so i did this thing

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a couple of months ago and it's not interesting what it was but i definitely should have been

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dressed very nice for it like suit level but i don't really have a suit that's not like a super

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fancy wedding or funeral suit i don't have like a casual business suit so i literally just showed up

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in exactly what i'm wearing now ford hat and oh boy did i get looked i didn't care i was like what

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I was like, what are you going to do? I don't care. But we have a show, and it's not about fashion, thank God.

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We got some tiny topics. Yes. That we do. We got a few Apple Watch notes, so feedback from folks.

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Listener Matt, a great name, wrote in saying that he's had the same feeling with the Apple Watch, the overload.

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And he also mentioned that back in the day, back when we were all installing crazy Android ROMs,

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he had some custom ROM that lets you basically rate limit how quickly it would deliver you notifications per app,

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which is very cool and very Android ROM energy, which I like.

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And then listener Rodrigo wrote in to say that he doesn't know how it works in every app,

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but WhatsApp has a way to kind of limit how quickly, If you get too many notifications too quickly,

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you can start to quiet them for a while. I know iMessage does this as well, but I think it only works on the phone.

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I feel like in the phone, in the stack of notifications, you'll see a thing that'll say, you're getting a lot of these.

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Do you want to pause notifications for an hour? But I don't think I've seen it on the watch itself.

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I've never seen that on the phone. I had no idea WhatsApp had this, and I can't find it.

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I don't know how you can figure that. That would require people to use WhatsApp, and nobody uses that. And we do.

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I don't talk to anyone on WhatsApp, so, you know, whatever. But, you know, regarding the Android ROMs,

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there's a saying, you know, that Android ROMs, they invented everything. Like, everything was already invented

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by an Android ROM in the 2010s. Yeah, this makes sense. I don't get comments on my videos every single WWDC.

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Oh, Android did this two years ago. I don't care that Android. I genuinely do not care that Android did it 10 years ago.

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But it did, Chris. Yeah. Every feature can be found on the XDA forums from 2010, 2011. It's there. Someone invented it.

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Absolutely. I've also got some tiny topics. The first one is I've uninstalled Raycast.

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And the reason why is it's become too cringe to keep on my Mac. I can't keep it. I'm cringing too hard.

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And there's a certain level of cringe that I can bear with, but this is too hard.

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They released a new product called Glaze, and it makes you create apps on the fly with prompts and no coding.

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And sure, everybody does that. But then it's also the sugar on top that's too much.

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It's the AI-generated icons that look extremely AI-generated.

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It's the vibe of the CEO guy who makes the videos to present all of it. I don't know. Everything feels extremely off.

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I'm cringing too hard. This is my official excuse for ditching Raycast. I'm done with it. I'm done.

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I haven't installed it. This is my statement. What are you using instead?

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Right now I'm using a combination of Spotlight, an emoji peeker that maybe I will talk about

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that I found on GitHub and I forked. This is a rabbit hole. And a base bot for the clipboard manager,

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which are basically the only things that I used Raycast for at this point. Like the third-party extensions,

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I did not use any of them anymore. I'm not missing any of that. So the three things is launching apps,

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searching for files, and clipboard manager, and emoji picker. And I found an alternative for each.

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Spotlight is better than when Tahoe launched, because when Tahoe launched, I tried it like everybody did

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because it got a bunch of new features, but it was super slow for me. Like, absurd. It was absurd how slow it was.

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And now it's pretty snappy. Like, it feels a lot snappier than when Taho was released.

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So for now, I'm using it and it's fine. But we'll see. And Rob Knight, yes, made a blog post about this.

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It's a short one where he's just angry and I like it. I like when he's angry and I share the sentiment. So there you go.

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I've put a link for that. Another more positive thing. By the way, people are saying that I complain too much.

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Have you seen this on the interwebs? No. That's weird. I don't get it. No, I don't complain too much. No, no.

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I complain just enough. But... Chris is broken. Yes. Here's something positive that I'm not complaining about.

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I found, no, I did not find, I did not find, somebody recommended to me in our feedback form.

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But it was weeks, months ago now. And I put it in a sticky on my Mac desktop and never looked at it again.

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And then looked at it again like a week ago. It's an app called mood.camera.

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And this is a camera app that you shoot pictures with your iPhone.

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and it's one of those camera apps that lets you add like analog filters on top film like

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gives a film like appearance to your photos and i've been loving this app like it's it's really

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well made it's snappy um the filters are really nice uh the one i'm using i think it's maybe the

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default one it's called prologue 400 and this is the one i'm using i'm pretty sure it's the default

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one it's i've tried a bunch of them but this i've come back to this one it's awesome and i've been

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using like this app on and off ever since it was on the sticky on my desktop but like only took a

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couple of pictures and forgot forgot about it uh but now i'm using it all the time and you you know

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why the reason why is because it got updated and now it supports camera control you can launch it

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with camera control, which you could not initially. So now, because I've become so accustomed

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to pressing camera control to take pictures, and now it just launches.

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I don't have to think about launching it to take pictures. And since the photos, they look so cute and grainy

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and really nice and very different from the usual iPhone photos, it makes me want to take more pictures again,

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which I really like. However, it does not shoot videos, and I shoot videos often,

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and now I can't do it by pressing camera control. So what I've done is I've added one of the two controls

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that you get on the lock screen. One of those launches the default camera app in video mode directly. It's a shortcut.

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It's a one-action shortcut.

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there you go i'm positive about something see i'm not complaining nice and now i can come back to

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complaining rcs i need to talk about rcs um so rcs now it works on the iphone since last year

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it's good nice well well well um and you know how supposedly the reactions that you do with rcs

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on RCS messages, they're supposed to work with people who at least have like Google messages

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on the Android side. If they use Google messages, it should work, the reactions. By the way,

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no, no, no, it does not work. It does not work. No idea why. I think maybe it's because it's,

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I talked about this already, but I want to mention it again because it's been months and still not

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fixed. I think it's maybe because we are in our devices are in French and I'm pretty sure

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the way they're making the reactions work is by parsing the raw text that says reacted to this and transforming it into

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an actual reaction and I don't think they've done the work for all the languages. I don't think it works if your

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device is in French. That's crazy. That's weird. It totally works for me. because I speak one very special language.

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This is my theory. I think they only did this for English. I think you are 100% right. Is your phone fully in French?

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Are you mixing? Okay, I have no idea. I have some apps in English because you can do that on iOS now. It's really nice.

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And I do that for most, by the way. By the way, indie app developers have, like, something to say. We all like you.

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Who's the guy you like to joke on once again? Charlie Chapman? Oh, yeah, Charlie Chapman.

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Yeah, yeah, including that guy. We like them all. There's one who's called Matt Birchler, but yes.

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So, indie app developers, here's my statement. People may not all agree about this, but here it is.

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If you are going to localize your apps, do it or don't do it.

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Don't be in the middle and use AI or whatever to do the translations for you, to do the localization for you. It sucks.

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Like we are on GPT 72.0, Gemini 70. None of those can do the translations right still in 2026.

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I can tell when I install one of your apps and it's all in weird French. Like it's some middle, middle-aged French.

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I don't know what kind of French it is, but it's not real French. It's not 2026 French for sure. And I can tell.

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So either you hire someone who speaks real French and can do the translations for you, whose job it is to do this.

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Or don't do it. Leave it in English. Okay? We can speak English. You can leave it in English.

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So this is my take on this. Anyway, so you had one bonus complaint here. Well, thank you.

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I was getting a little uncomfortable. What I'm hearing is in the prompt where you ask it to translate,

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you just have to say, use 2026 French, and you get it. Makes sense. No, this is not what I said.

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Or you tell it to just translate everything as if it's in Les Miserables. Oh, my God. I mean, that might work.

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No, it might not. This is actually the reason I stopped doing translations in my apps. My apps are all English-only.

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Quick Reviews actually has a lot of the UI translated, but it was automatically done.

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I don't know with confidence how good it is, and so I didn't feel great about shipping that,

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so I stopped doing it after that first app.

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My experience as a user, at least, is I can tell 90% of the times when it's been done automatically and without review.

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And if you can tell, it's not good. And if you want to be in that 10%, just make your prompt better and it'll work.

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Translate this as if you were in Les Miserables. Like I said, you will suffer the same fate as Raycast

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and become too cringe to remain on my device. Oh, boy. We need to do end of the year highlight reel

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of Neilian's cringe apps of the year. Yeah. A little compilation. This week on Cozy Zone, we tier listed app icons.

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Not the apps themselves, but app icons.

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And for those that aren't aware, Cozy Zone is our members-only episode or show where we put out an extra episode every single week.

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So you get us twice in one week. I mean, like, I don't know who else gets.

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I think that Danielle, she gets to hear me twice, more than twice every single week.

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But she doesn't get to hear Matt and Elion. So it's like the only opportunity to hear all three of us twice in one week.

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If you like my complaining, you can subscribe and hear even more of my complaining. It's great.

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Including the fact that this was such a weird selection of app icons. It was definitely a range. It was a range.

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Weird selection. All right. Let's get to the main show. Neilion, you're first up in the document.

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What do you got for us? Yes. We talked about Discord two weeks ago.

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We had a really interesting conversation about this, about the age verification stuff and all of that.

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But I'm not going to resath all that. This is kind of a sequel topic. So what do we do now?

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And I can answer from my side. So at my work, we are an association, like a small organization of mostly volunteers.

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Actually, all volunteers except one employee as of now.

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and we used we use discord to organize and we've been using discord to organize and

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like to do our like everything to we to coordinate everything we use discord and we've been using

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discord for the past five or six years i'd say like since the pandemic dang yeah and so and we

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still like all our meetings on discord and we combine that with google workspace we have a google

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plan that we use a ton for documents and file sharing and everything in Google Workspace we

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take advantage of. And now, of course, we've come to the point where there's this problem with this

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code hanging over our heads. And we can't just deal with it. And like, because remember, the issue

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is Discord will impose age verification globally sometime soon. They initially announced that it would come in March,

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but they've backtracked on that and they're saying they've postponed it. So now it's happening later in 2026.

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But it's still happening. And our association is like our members are all trans members.

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Like not all, but the majority are trans members. So we can't possibly keep using Discord,

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a tool that will ask our members to provide their IDs. This is not something that we can keep doing.

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So we had to start looking for alternatives. And so far, we are test driving. That is, we have not migrated yet.

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We are test driving it just like a small group of us.

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slack as an alternative this was recommended to us because slack is like

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it's a bit like discord but not at all but also it feels like it it it feels like most of the

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purposes that we're using discord for um so this is what i'm doing today i'm going like i have a

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small comparison to make and maybe you can talk about it. Do you already use Slack in any way,

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both of you? We all use Slack because the Mac Stories team moved over to Slack and out of Discord

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and into Slack because it was felt a little more business-y. Actually, I don't know if that's the reason why.

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I don't remember why we did it, but we did it. Yeah. Oh, yeah. I use Slack all day, every day at work.

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It is the main app I use. I could have guessed, yes. Literally, the Mac Stories one is the only Slack I'm in.

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Yeah, that was my case until this. Yes, I only had installed Slack just to join the Mac Stories Slack.

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That was my only thing.

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So here are the main differences that we are noticing about the differences between Discord and Slack.

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But just to paint you a picture, how we're using Discord currently. Imagine like Matt. No, not Matt. He's too businessy.

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Chris. Imagine Chris, you have free time. What? This is why Matt can't be the subject of this thought experiment.

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So Chris, you have free time. You want to get involved politically and want to fight for trans rights. So you find us.

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You go on our website. So you speak French. You're a French person, obviously. Oui, oui, mon ami. Yes.

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So you're able to read everything. You understand. So you click join on our website. You want to join the association.

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You want to become a member. You follow the process. Joining is free, by the way. There's a free price.

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You can pay, but you don't have to. So obviously you're rich. So you decide to donate $1,000 euros.

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I just put a new roof on my house. Not rich at all. You're donating a roof? Okay, sure. We can take a roof. Yeah, sure.

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You can have my roof. you join the association and here's what happens currently you get an automatic email

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that tells you welcome to the fam welcome you chose to participate in your organization here's a discord link

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discord is where we do everything basically we organize and we plan stuff and yeah so you click the link

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you join our discord server and on our Discord server, you can't see anything. You're in a waiting room.

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There's just one channel that you can see. You're in a waiting room.

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And that's the reason for this is because we want to approve manually every new member just to make sure.

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Yeah, that makes sense. You don't know who could join. Yeah. Exactly.

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So basically what we do is we just double check who you are, maybe cross-check your pseudonym with social media.

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But we don't dig in anything. We're just checking you don't have an Atsy avatar, basically,

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online or anything like that. And we mostly check your email address

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to make sure that the email address that you're providing in Discord, because when you join the waiting room in Discord,

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we're asking you for your email address that nobody else can see, just us.

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And we'll double check that this email address is the same as the one you joined with on the website. Okay. Makes sense.

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And if all of that goes well, we give you a role in Discord, basically a member role.

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And now you've got access to everything in Discord. So you can join working groups. That's how we organize.

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We have different working groups on different topics. so like if you want to only get

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involved like maybe you want to help on the designs like the visuals social media and all of that

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you can join a specific group for that and to do that we've had we've been using a bot in Discord that

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makes custom buttons in the welcome channel and that you can click on the buttons that you're interested in so in your

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Okay, so you're interested in social media, so you click the social media working group button, the custom made button that we made.

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And that gives you a social media role.

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And now you can also see the social media working channel, the channel in Discord on the left side.

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So you can now start working with us in that channel and join in future meetings and all that.

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So this is how we use Discord, basically. This is the model. You join. You've got access to nothing.

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We have to approve you, give you a special role, and then you get given additional roles

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depending on what working groups you want to join. And now, compared to Slack, it seems like for five years,

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we have hacked our way into just replicating how Slack works by default in Discord. because Slack, you join Slack,

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by default, you've got access to everything, but you're not in every channel. You have to manually join the channels

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that you are interested in. This is how Slack works by default. This is amazing for us.

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Because we had to create a special bot that creates special buttons.

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We had to create special roles to attribute to special people just to make sure you have access to only specific things.

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Slack? No, you just you join Slack, you're a member and you choose what channel you want to join.

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Yeah, it doesn't necessarily surprise me that Slack is built this way because it's built for more enterprise stuff.

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I was rolling out Microsoft Teams at my IT job, and it's essentially a Slack clone. It's filth. Absolute filth.

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I know, I know. But it's essentially a Slack clone.

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But it was really easy to set up who has access to what, especially from the admin role.

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It was really incredibly easy for me to be like, okay, these are our salespeople. This is our HR team.

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This is our accounting team and stuff like that. Like, it was incredibly easy for that.

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And as far as I'm aware, Slack is very similar to that. Yeah. Yeah, it is.

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And Slack has, like, private channels if you want until I carry a private channel. And then so they join.

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They can't see that channel, but maybe they can be let in if you wanted. Just personally, Discord just scares me.

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And this is just me being old. But, like, when you join a Discord server, you get everything. And it's horrifying.

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And they all have unreads. And if it's a popular server, they have zero unreads. And then they quickly all light up.

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And it's all work to be done. And they're for things I don't care about. And you have to go and it's a whole thing.

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I'm a Slack guy, I guess. And like with Discord, they get so big and so overwhelming. Like trying to keep up with that.

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Like I just, I don't know. Yeah. Like my experience with Discord and Slack is very limited.

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But I definitely like Slack way more than Discord. And maybe that's me being an old man,

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but also I just feel like Slack is more organized and easier to keep up with as opposed to Discord. Yeah, that's true.

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And you're right. It's because it's not the same product. It's not targeting the same kind of people.

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But of course, the reason why did we go for Discord in the first place?

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Because we are a public-facing small association, and we want people to join. And the easiest people to get on board

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is to use a popular tool that people already know and are familiar with and already have an account on.

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And especially during the pandemic, that was Discord. And still is, for a lot of people,

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Discord is still like, in terms of a tool where you can organize and create tons of channels,

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This is the most popular option.

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But yeah, now that we're searching for an alternative, Slack really looks like it's better suited to what we need.

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And of course, Chris, you remember, you had to be manually approved. I do remember.

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To see all the channels in our Discord.

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Slack, we've investigated over the past two weeks how that can work in Slack, and it cannot really work in Slack.

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basically you join Slack and the way it's made you've got access to everything and the only thing you can do is

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like Matt said you can create private channels that you reserve to some groups of people but you can't just

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have a member that's not able to access anything until you do an action on it. And the only option to do that

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is to create a group of, maybe you call a generic group that you call members, just like the member

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role that we have in our Discord, and you put everyone in that group, but already this is too much

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because Slack, it doesn't let you easily add everyone, every single one person into one group.

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So that would be really annoying to

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maintain really quickly. So yeah, Slack doesn't have an option like that. So what this is going

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to force us to do if we do go with Slack in the end, we do migrate to Slack, is we're probably going

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to move the verification step off of that platform entirely. Like do it some other way,

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over email probably like when you join chris instead of a an email that tells you here's a

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discord link to get involved to start working with us maybe instead you get an email from us that tells

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you hey how here's how we work uh maybe let us know what you're interested in uh like maybe we

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ask a couple of questions first to see who you are and then we invite you to our slack so we do

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the verification step before you get onto the Discord. You could do the verification step in like a Google form.

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You could set up a Google form of like, hey, give us your social media handles and here's all this stuff

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so you can verify that. Yeah, we could do that. But like, yeah, that could be a way. I think

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so far, we've not made a definitive decision on that, but so far I think maybe what we're going

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to do is maybe set up just just a one time email exchange like maybe send back some info about yourself

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what did you join for and what are you interested in and that's probably a little less friction

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too for the person signing up because if like I was like oh I'm curious about this thing you know maybe I

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want to join like I want some more info and if I signed up for their thing on the website

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and they immediately emailed me back

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hey here's this google form i'd be like i don't know if i want to do that yeah yeah yeah and just

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like like just like in a single email exchange i could be like okay yeah no i can reply to this

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stuff like it's just that little it's one less barrier i think so yeah yeah um there's one other

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thing um slack has way more collaboration tools and that makes sense um but like you can create like

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iPads inside of the channels in Slack. You can have files stored in the channels as well to easily reference.

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The way pinned messages work makes way more sense than in Discord.

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In Discord, if you pin something, good luck finding it. You will tell me, okay, there's a pin icon.

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Just click the pin icons in the top right corner in Discord and you can see all the pinned messages.

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But here's the thing. Nobody knows that it's there, this pin icon. Nobody knows.

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Like, if I tell you right now, you know there's a pin icon in Discord?

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I'm pretty sure you had no idea before I told you. But yes.

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In Slack, they highlight it, and it's easier to reference as well.

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So it's a bunch of small things like that that seem really fitting for Slack.

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And the final thing is, obviously, I'm worried that if we do migrate to Slack, we are going to lose people.

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We have, like, I would say right now, maybe 80% of our members, like people who are officially part of the association, are on our Discord server.

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But there's the thing where... So they are on the Discord server,

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but only a small portion of those people are actually active.

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So I think this small portion of people who is actually active,

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they will come over to Slack or whatever else we migrate to when we do. But the rest won't come.

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And even though they are not active, we still need to talk to them. We still need to do internal communication, right?

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To do announcements organization-wide, to announce events,

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maybe the next plenary assembly that we do a handful of times a year.

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All of those crucial information that we gave out to members right now,

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We exclusively do that in Discord, which is not great. But it works because everybody's on Discord.

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Almost everybody's on Discord.

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If we do move to Slack, there will only be a small group of active people that are on Slack and the rest will not be.

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This is why the conclusion is, I think, we will have to reinvest in email.

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And I think this is an important thing to acknowledge.

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I think as time passes on and those platforms that we've come to depend on get more locked down and as legislation strengthens, especially like in terms of even if it's not just the age verification stuff, but more.

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Maybe we need to go back to the fundamentals. A small organization like us, we need to invest back in email.

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And that means don't make all the announcements just in one app, in the Discord or in Slack.

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Do all of that in email, like organization-wide emails. Invest more in emails.

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And this is sad to say because emails suck, but it works and everybody has email.

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So you're sure to touch more people this way.

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So, yeah, this is my first breakdown of the kind of analysis of the migration that we need to make to make this happen.

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Right now, Slack is looking good and it's likely that we'll move to Slack. But, yeah, it's hard.

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One thing to mention is Slack. They have this thing where you get the pro plan for free

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if you are a non-profit organization. Oh, nice. So you have to apply, they have to review,

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and this took a lot of back and forth as well, but in the end, we got the approval,

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and so we got that plan for free, which is great. Nice. Just like Google Workspace, we also got that for free

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because Google Workspace, you can also get it for free if you're a non-profit and you apply. Yeah. Nice. That's awesome.

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Yeah. But also Slack is made by Salesforce and those people suck. There you go. All right. Anything else on that?

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I think that's it. Yeah. Okay. All right. Well, so at the time of you're hearing this,

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reviews have probably all been out for all of the latest Apple products that were announced the week before,

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and the embargoes have dropped. The products actually would have already been shipping

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because this comes out on Thursday, and they're all coming out on Wednesday.

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So not exciting news, but I have had the N4 iPad Air. Sorry. It's not the MacBook Neo. It's not the MacBook Pro.

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The iPad Neo. It is not the fancy new studio display. I've had the M4 iPad Air. I got it.

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So it was announced on Monday of that week. I got it on Tuesday. And it is a boring update. It's not exciting.

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In fact, my topic is not really about it, but I will run through the changes really quick. It has an M4 chip.

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It is the Bind M4 chip, so it only has the 9-core CPU.

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It has the N1 chip, so that brings Wi-Fi 7, Bluetooth 6, and thread radio to it.

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It also has the C1X cellular modem, so if you get the cellular version, you get the C1X chip.

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That is actually pretty nice. When I did the testing, when the M5 iPad Pro came out, because it also had the C1X chip,

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when I tested it against the M4 iPad Pro, both of them were on the cellular connection.

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The C1X chip actually outperformed the older cellular chip, whatever that was, by a lot.

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It actually was a significant update. So that is kind of nice if you use a cellular iPad.

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But it still uses the old-style Magic Keyboard, which is very disappointing.

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The new one is just so much better in every metric. And it's a $30 price difference.

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That kind of feels like rubbing salt in the wound or sand in the wound? Salt in the wound. Yeah, salt and lime.

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Sand wouldn't be pleasant either. So $30 compared to what? So it's on the 11-inch one.

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So if we're comparing the 11-inch one, it's $270 for the old one, $300 for the new one.

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So it's a lot of money right there. So for the Magic Keyboard. For the Magic Keyboard.

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And for the 13-inch one, it's $320 versus $350. $30 difference when you're at that price point is negligible

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because the new one, and Matt, I think you and I have talked about, the new one is just so significant.

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The new Magic Keyboard is so significantly better than the old Magic Keyboard in just every Magic.

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Build quality, viewing angles, bigger trackpad, just so many things. Yep. And if you're spending $270 on a keyboard,

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you're someone who can spend $300 on a keyboard. Yeah, $30 more is not going to cause you to lose your house.

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But why are you comparing? Because the new one doesn't work with it, right?

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So I'll get to this, but the new Magic Keyboard does not work with the new iPad Air. You have to use the old iPad Air.

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So my point, basically what my point overall is going to be,

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is if you're interested in an iPad, just look at the iPad Pro.

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Like literally don't, the iPad Air and the base iPad are, but let me get there. Hang on. Let me get there.

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Let me get there. Yeah. Just let me get there. Okay.

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So before we get into that though, I just want to say we have not had an interesting non-pro iPad update in a long time.

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I looked up all the numbers. The last really interesting iPad Air update was in 2020.

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Everyone since that has just been a spec bump.

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And by interesting, I am not meeting design change, though these happen to be design changes.

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I would count the M4 iPad Pro as an interesting update, but it wasn't exactly a design change.

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It just got thinner and lighter, which wasn't really a design change. It's a design change. Sort of.

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I mean, it's not a triangle, but it's a design change. It's not as dramatic as the 2018 iPad Pro was.

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If you put the M4 iPad Pro next to it, yeah, but it's not a dramatic design change. I think we can agree on that, right?

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The iPad mini hasn't had an interesting update since 2021. It's only had one other update since then. The jelly release.

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Yeah. The base iPad got its redesign in 2022, and since then it has been a spec bump,

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and it still does not have a laminate display. at all. But this brings me to the point I think you guys

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both want to get to. The other thing that was released or announced this last week and released this week was the

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MacBook Neo, which is a $600 MacBook. 256 gigs for the $600 one, and you can $100 more, you can

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get a 512 gig one and that has touch ID. So, and in this economy... Let's first do like a round. What do we think

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of the name? I think they should have just called it MacBook. I like it. You like it? Oh, you changed your mind.

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I read your blog. I didn't change my mind. It should have been the MacBook Mini, you said. I think that MacBook

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Mini would be fun, but I think Neo's. Anyway, people always get mad when an Apple tries something.

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Anytime they go against the grain. I'm not mad. I just think MacBook would have been a simpler name, but

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it's fine. Stop yelling. You don't need to be so mad. Will the dads stop fighting? For goodness sake.

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I think it's cringe is my take. She is the young one out of us. The children are wrong. Let's save the MacBook Neo

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discussion for next week. Okay. One of us might have one next week. There may be one of us, two, who knows?

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Some people may have some next week. I already have one. It's right here. It's an iPhone 16 Pro. Oh my god.

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Now we've entered the Macs are just big iPhones. So, okay. So, what I'm kind of getting at

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MacBook Neo starts at 256 gigs, starts at 600 bucks. I'm just going to round up to the even numbers.

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I hate the whole like 599 thing. I'm just going to round up to the, the, the base iPad for 256 gig,

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the base one with the non-laminate display is $449, $450. So $150 difference.

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If you add the keyboard to the base iPad, it now becomes $700. If you add the keyboard, technically 690.

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So what you're saying is. Hang on. Okay. I'm getting there. Just let me get through these numbers.

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Let me get through these numbers and you can pop off. The iPad Air, the 11-inch iPad Air for the 256-gig model,

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and the older Magic Keyboard is $970. Can I make this even worse? Real quick. Yeah.

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If you're an education buyer, anyone with a.edu email address, so any college-age kid or younger.

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Technically, you don't even need that intent. So, the base Neo is $499, $500.

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The 11-inch Air with the Magic Keyboard with education pricing is $900. Jeez. Okay.

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So we've established the MacBook Neo for 256 gigs is $600 if you just buy it regularly or $500 if you get it with the education discount.

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So if you were to similarly spec out an iPad Air, which is the first iPad that comes in the same screen size, a 13-inch screen size, 256 gigs, and add a keyboard, it is now $1,218.

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you can buy two MacBook Neos for the same price as that iPad Air.

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Now, obviously, there is a much better chip in the M4 iPad Air than there is in the MacBook Neo. Obviously. Obviously?

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My social media feeds are full of people suggesting that the A18 Pro is actually as good as an M4.

359
00:44:35.600 --> 00:44:44.139
Well, I'm also seeing the A18 Pro is the same as the Intel 12-inch MacBook, so that it's going to be the same.

360
00:44:44.620 --> 00:44:51.260
And that Apple is going to underperform it because it doesn't have a fan. People are all over the place of this.

361
00:44:51.489 --> 00:44:55.580
Clearly, because all of the iPhone 16 Pros had fans in them in order to perform properly.

362
00:44:55.949 --> 00:45:01.280
A lot of strong opinions from people who don't have the device. Mine has a fan. Look at this. Thanks to Matt.

363
00:45:01.280 --> 00:45:09.739
Oh, my update, Neilian. That's right, the MagSafe fan. Yes. So, now, here's the thing.

364
00:45:09.850 --> 00:45:15.439
Okay, so the iPad Air has the M4 chip. But it also has a much more limited OS.

365
00:45:17.060 --> 00:45:25.300
The MacBook Neo basically makes it impossible to recommend the lower end iPads. The iPad and the iPad Air.

366
00:45:25.840 --> 00:45:32.020
Unless you really want a tablet, a convertible, or you're doing something with the Apple Pencil.

367
00:45:32.020 --> 00:45:37.300
Like something really specific to that. Like it basically makes it impossible.

368
00:45:37.580 --> 00:45:43.540
Now, there is an asterisk on all of this, this whole discussion before we get into it, before I let Neleon pop off.

369
00:45:44.040 --> 00:45:52.199
None of us have tried the MacBook Neo yet. Mine is coming. I ordered one. I'll just spoil it right now. I did order one.

370
00:45:53.219 --> 00:46:00.159
I didn't get a review unit of it. So none of us have tried it. There is a chance that it's a big whiff and it sucks.

371
00:46:01.060 --> 00:46:08.580
But I highly doubt that. I'm putting that at a 2% or 3% chance because Apple rarely misses.

372
00:46:09.399 --> 00:46:15.459
Apple rarely puts out a bad product. I think I can probably name a couple of bad products

373
00:46:16.100 --> 00:46:21.399
off the top of my head in my lifetime of just being an Apple fanboy and getting Apple products

374
00:46:21.409 --> 00:46:30.280
that were actually bad Apple products. iPad 3, Trashcan Mac Pro. By bad, you mean terrible performance?

375
00:46:31.520 --> 00:46:38.260
Bad by just general, this is a bad product. Let down by the hardware. Not the software.

376
00:46:39.459 --> 00:46:42.739
Yeah, not being like, oh, I don't like this thing or something like that.

377
00:46:42.899 --> 00:46:49.459
But genuinely, Apple released this and it was a bad hardware. Not liquid glass. Yeah, not liquid glass.

378
00:46:49.469 --> 00:46:50.699
We're just talking hardware right now.

379
00:46:52.000 --> 00:46:58.540
So I really do think if somebody comes to me now and is like, hey, I need to get a computer for my kid.

380
00:46:58.699 --> 00:47:00.860
Or, oh, hey, I'm looking at a computer.

381
00:47:01.159 --> 00:47:06.959
Like we did just buy my grandma a base iPad because she likes to do those like coloring apps with an Apple Pencil and stuff like that.

382
00:47:07.379 --> 00:47:11.899
That's a perfect thing for the base iPad. That is perfect because that's what she wants to do with that thing.

383
00:47:12.199 --> 00:47:13.600
She wants to do those coloring things.

384
00:47:14.040 --> 00:47:27.199
But if somebody comes to me and is like, hey, I just need a laptop to do like my tax documents and like general normal stuff, it's going to be hard to recommend an iPad now for that stuff at all.

385
00:47:28.379 --> 00:47:34.360
Like, I mean, MacBook Neo has full-blown macOS. You can do things like Cloud Code.

386
00:47:34.649 --> 00:47:43.360
You can do things like have unsandboxed apps, have access to the file system, like all the macOS stuff.

387
00:47:43.620 --> 00:47:50.679
So my conclusion at the end of this week and what will be probably in my video that was released

388
00:47:50.899 --> 00:47:57.340
is the iPad has to become cheaper and the iPad has to run macOS. Okay, pop off.

389
00:48:00.380 --> 00:48:06.760
i've been saying it all you did say it all but i i'm i'm fully on board i think apple's gonna

390
00:48:07.120 --> 00:48:10.879
kill ipad os of course they're gonna do that by making it better and making it run on the iphone

391
00:48:10.899 --> 00:48:19.439
and therefore be their most important platform but anyway um listen yeah it is uh i think yes the

392
00:48:19.600 --> 00:48:26.539
price of this is crazy i think i i did some math this morning if you adjust for inflation because

393
00:48:26.560 --> 00:48:33.760
when the iPad came out uh it was um that was the netbook era there was like some pressure on Apple

394
00:48:33.919 --> 00:48:39.419
Apple's got to release a netbook they can't just play at the high end anymore and they didn't they

395
00:48:39.560 --> 00:48:45.060
released the iPad and the iPad's been very successful uh but I mean the iPad killed the

396
00:48:45.120 --> 00:48:51.419
netbooks like let's be honest for a minute the iPad killed the netbooks but if you compare the

397
00:48:51.439 --> 00:49:01.239
price today the six or 599 price and adjusted for inflation for 2010 prices this is a 399 device

398
00:49:02.520 --> 00:49:08.080
which is the macbook neo the macbook neo so it is that's like they basically released a 400

399
00:49:08.979 --> 00:49:13.620
so cheaper than the ipad was which was already cheaper than we thought it would be like that's

400
00:49:14.379 --> 00:49:21.399
that's it's so cheap compared to anything apple's ever made like by an enormous margin and

401
00:49:21.419 --> 00:49:23.399
And yeah, like you said, it runs macOS.

402
00:49:23.699 --> 00:49:30.959
And I think for a lot of people, the A18, even though it's going to be less powerful than the M4, you can do more with it.

403
00:49:31.080 --> 00:49:38.780
Your Google Chrome tabs aren't going to force close themselves when you move it to the background and lose your progress and everything.

404
00:49:39.100 --> 00:49:42.760
Like, there's just a bunch of little things like that. You can use it in business.

405
00:49:42.860 --> 00:49:46.620
You can use it in school to join video calls and share a portion of your screen, not the whole screen.

406
00:49:47.959 --> 00:49:54.739
yeah it makes if you just need a computer this is this is more compelling i think and especially

407
00:49:54.850 --> 00:50:01.899
now that it's cheaper as well than the air i fully expect to be able to edit short form videos on the

408
00:50:02.000 --> 00:50:07.659
macbook neo i would be shocked if i can't edit short form one to two minute vertical videos

409
00:50:08.080 --> 00:50:15.139
on the macbook neo i do not think i would be able to edit my next ipad os walkthrough on the macbook

410
00:50:15.159 --> 00:50:21.739
Neo, I think that would literally cause that thing to catch on fire. But I think short form videos,

411
00:50:22.280 --> 00:50:26.320
this is going to be one of the things I test. And I know it's going to be the obnoxious thing,

412
00:50:26.419 --> 00:50:31.739
the YouTuber is testing video editing on the MacBook. But it's a good way to see like kind

413
00:50:31.739 --> 00:50:37.760
of where this thing comes in. Like if you are a short form creator, can you graduate from editing

414
00:50:38.239 --> 00:50:44.139
on your iPhone to something with a little more real estate? For 600, I impulse bought this thing.

415
00:50:44.600 --> 00:50:49.699
I was refreshing the page Wednesday morning, and it got to the point where it was very clear

416
00:50:49.820 --> 00:50:55.080
that they weren't going to drop the newsroom article before the store went live, so I went to just refreshing the store,

417
00:50:55.439 --> 00:51:00.199
and I just impulse bought the thing. I picked blue, I picked the base one, and just hit buy,

418
00:51:00.639 --> 00:51:03.840
because I didn't need to buy a bunch of other accessories like I would with an iPad.

419
00:51:04.030 --> 00:51:11.260
I didn't need to buy a $300 keyboard. I didn't need to buy a $100 pencil. I just spent $600 on this thing. No problem.

420
00:51:11.520 --> 00:51:19.600
It'll be here Wednesday. I traded in an Apple Watch, and I got mine for half price. Nice. Like an Apple Watch.

421
00:51:20.439 --> 00:51:27.139
That's crazy. Really quick, what color did you get? I got the blue. I chickened out on the neon one. Same, same.

422
00:51:27.580 --> 00:51:32.840
Because everyone was like, it doesn't look as good in person. And I was like, I don't know. I'm getting blue.

423
00:51:33.560 --> 00:51:38.080
I kind of wish I would have got the citrus one, just because I think it would have looked good in thumbnails.

424
00:51:39.239 --> 00:51:46.239
I wish I would have. I'm disappointed that none of you got the citrus one. I thought I would be letting you down

425
00:51:46.469 --> 00:51:53.360
by getting Citrus. Matt, was yours available for pickup at the Apple store? I don't know. Oh, mine was not.

426
00:51:53.620 --> 00:51:57.020
Literally, there was no stores in California that was available for pickup.

427
00:51:57.189 --> 00:52:04.060
I don't know if I was just too early or what. Interesting. I need to be allowed to pop off as well. Okay, please go.

428
00:52:06.459 --> 00:52:17.080
I think this highlights that iPadOS should die in the fire. there's two things there's two ways to look at it

429
00:52:17.320 --> 00:52:29.439
so you highlighted the iPad Air and the base iPad to me this shows that those iPads should have the A18 Pro or whatever

430
00:52:29.820 --> 00:52:40.719
similar chip and not M anything why does the iPad Air has the M4 chip no one can take advantage of it because of iPadOS

431
00:52:44.020 --> 00:52:50.239
No, you can't. Your browser tab will freeze if you switch away for some reason.

432
00:52:50.639 --> 00:52:59.580
There's one thing that is a technical limitation that makes the M-series chip in the iPad Air make sense. Yeah.

433
00:52:59.919 --> 00:53:07.100
External display support. But even that? The A-series chips are not designed to work with external monitors.

434
00:53:07.679 --> 00:53:14.399
The M-series chips are. That's why the M-series iPads have support for the studio displays,

435
00:53:14.979 --> 00:53:19.179
and the MacBook Neo can't drive anything past a 4K display at 60 hertz.

436
00:53:19.280 --> 00:53:27.699
And I have a feeling the macOS is doing a large portion of that. But also, why, okay, unless you're Christopher Lawley,

437
00:53:28.439 --> 00:53:36.479
you are not going to plug in your base iPad or iPad Air into a 5K monitor. This does not make sense.

438
00:53:36.820 --> 00:53:44.600
Like, this is not a criteria to me. And also, so this highlights that maybe the chip,

439
00:53:44.979 --> 00:53:50.399
this is the wrong chip in those iPads. And also this highlights that, yes, iPadOS should die on a fire.

440
00:53:50.919 --> 00:53:59.080
And the reason why is, so you said, Chris, I will try this and that to see what can be done

441
00:53:59.360 --> 00:54:07.719
on the MacBook Neo with the A18 Pro. The answer to that is it can do anything. Because it runs Mac OS, it can do, no.

442
00:54:08.199 --> 00:54:17.699
There is going to be a performance limitation. But that's not a limitation. That's like a condition of how it will work.

443
00:54:17.909 --> 00:54:24.500
But it will work. And that's how those operating systems, like classic desktop operating systems,

444
00:54:24.590 --> 00:54:34.419
are designed to do and be, is that they can tank stuff. Those OSs are designed to tank stuff.

445
00:54:34.939 --> 00:54:40.179
If you do too much on them, they will slow down to a crawl. Yeah.

446
00:54:40.659 --> 00:54:45.560
And the worst thing that can happen is maybe the app can't handle it and it will crash.

447
00:54:45.760 --> 00:54:49.280
Maybe some system service can't handle it and it will crash.

448
00:54:49.699 --> 00:54:57.679
But you have to go really hard to come to a crash on that system. Otherwise, it will do the tasks.

449
00:54:58.000 --> 00:55:03.639
Maybe it will take three hours to render a small five-minute thing or whatever. I don't know. But it will do it.

450
00:55:04.360 --> 00:55:11.800
Unlike another OS that will not do it if it is too much for it.

451
00:55:12.739 --> 00:55:17.399
I do think, Chris, with your camera, you're at the very high end.

452
00:55:17.469 --> 00:55:23.139
I think with your cinema camera, this computer will struggle. I think it will turn into a barbecue.

453
00:55:23.489 --> 00:55:31.600
I told John Voorhees, I can guarantee you I could melt a MacBook Neo with my camera. I guarantee you I can do that.

454
00:55:31.770 --> 00:55:33.120
But here's the thing.

455
00:55:33.379 --> 00:55:41.739
And the thing I really think is important is I think my 4K YouTube videos would edit fine on this machine.

456
00:55:42.639 --> 00:55:48.239
I think so too. I have shot 4K. I don't shoot log. I just shoot regular video files.

457
00:55:48.750 --> 00:55:55.360
And I know this because I was editing on a 2012 Mac Mini 4K videos. And it wasn't as good as it is today.

458
00:55:55.590 --> 00:56:01.280
It wasn't as fast as it is today. But this machine would just absolutely blow that 2012 Mini away.

459
00:56:02.219 --> 00:56:08.360
it would destroy it in every possible performance metric. And you'll be able to do that.

460
00:56:08.540 --> 00:56:11.959
And kids will be able to do that. And they'll be able to be creative. And they probably will just make shorts

461
00:56:12.159 --> 00:56:18.060
because their attention spans are destroyed. But they can make longer form content on here.

462
00:56:18.879 --> 00:56:22.100
And like Neil, you said, they are completely unrestricted.

463
00:56:22.659 --> 00:56:26.199
There's no artificial restriction on what they can or can't do with it.

464
00:56:26.879 --> 00:56:32.800
If they can find a piece of software, as long as it's not... I don't know if these have Rosetta on them. but

465
00:56:33.879 --> 00:56:39.000
because I know that's going away. I think isn't Rosetta going it's still here but it's being

466
00:56:39.179 --> 00:56:44.600
deprecated I think next year. I wasn't sure if the A18 does Rosetta or not.

467
00:56:45.760 --> 00:56:50.159
This was my question for the briefing if I was in the briefings. Yeah I didn't get a briefing so I don't know.

468
00:56:52.280 --> 00:57:03.840
But anyway I mean sorry the developer kit it had an A12Z and it had Rosetta. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.

469
00:57:03.929 --> 00:57:09.080
So I guess it could. I mean, to be fair, the A series and the M series share a lot in common.

470
00:57:09.300 --> 00:57:18.179
Like, it's more of a marketing thing than anything. Like, it should theoretically be able to run. Yeah. Yeah.

471
00:57:18.679 --> 00:57:19.820
This is my big question as well.

472
00:57:20.060 --> 00:57:25.719
I am so curious because when I test, like, different things, like, between my iPhone and my Mac,

473
00:57:26.500 --> 00:57:31.520
There are some things that the Mac, even though theoretically the single-core performance is the same

474
00:57:32.179 --> 00:57:38.520
or even the iPhone's quicker, the iPhone just can't keep it up. It can't keep that performance level for as long.

475
00:57:39.060 --> 00:57:44.179
And so I wonder how it's going to be on this computer. So I have no idea. Maybe it'll be great.

476
00:57:44.340 --> 00:57:49.919
Maybe it'll run into issues. But I'm certainly not saying until I actually have it in hand. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

477
00:57:50.139 --> 00:57:53.899
Like, I legit don't know how this thing is going to perform. I bought this.

478
00:57:54.120 --> 00:58:03.580
Like, I bought a MacBook the day, me, the iPad guy, bought a MacBook the day, and it became available and wasn't even interested in the iPad that came out.

479
00:58:05.300 --> 00:58:09.139
Because this thing is, I am fascinated by this computer.

480
00:58:09.260 --> 00:58:13.060
And the price point, just, like, everything about this computer, I think, is great.

481
00:58:13.280 --> 00:58:19.219
Yes, I've seen the people complain that it's not the 12-inch MacBook with an M4 chip in it. Like, you know what?

482
00:58:19.419 --> 00:58:28.520
That's what the MacBook Air is. That's what the MacBook Air is, people. Like, I don't know. I'm excited.

483
00:58:28.889 --> 00:58:35.040
I think we've already spoiled it. Matt and I will have one next week. So it'll probably be our just topic.

484
00:58:35.780 --> 00:58:41.479
It'll probably be our shared topic for next week. And we'll just go off on it. You never know.

485
00:58:41.489 --> 00:58:47.459
The new Samsung phones come out next week as well. Who would buy one of those?

486
00:58:48.179 --> 00:58:53.100
You're both going to just walk out of frame for that. I'd just be like, we're going to put that topic second.

487
00:58:53.340 --> 00:59:02.500
So we can just get the talking out of the way. I can go take a nap. I want Matt to review the privacy screen thing. Yes.

488
00:59:02.679 --> 00:59:10.320
I have had two quick things. Number one, I've had multiple people in my regular life who know that I'm the tech guy

489
00:59:10.459 --> 00:59:17.100
and that I get phones, and they want to see that privacy screen. I've had multiple people ask about this. Yes.

490
00:59:18.860 --> 00:59:27.919
The second thing, my wife, who has an M3 MacBook Air, she's had it for a couple years, likes it a lot. She wants a Neo.

491
00:59:29.140 --> 00:59:38.199
Oh, why is that? Because it's colorful. This is a very real thing. When I told her I was getting one,

492
00:59:38.399 --> 00:59:41.860
first she was like, why are you getting another computer? Then I explained the trading thing,

493
00:59:41.919 --> 00:59:47.580
and anyway, she got a little happier about it. And then she was like, you got the yellow one, right? And I was like, no.

494
00:59:49.600 --> 00:59:54.179
and so then she was mad at me about that but yeah the colors really appealed to

495
00:59:55.320 --> 00:59:59.979
her and i presume lots of other people i i think if i would have got the yellow one after i was done

496
01:00:00.030 --> 01:00:03.739
with the testing danielle probably would have stole it from me so that's probably another reason why i

497
01:00:03.820 --> 01:00:08.439
got the blue one i'm actually genuinely excited about this computer and like turning it into are

498
01:00:08.439 --> 01:00:19.820
you telling us you really don't want your girlfriend to have a laptop no she has my she has my m2 2 terabyte ipad pro

499
01:00:20.379 --> 01:00:28.139
or 1 terabyte whatever the max came in that thing is no we established the ipad air and the base ipad is

500
01:00:28.139 --> 01:00:35.719
do not bespoke my beloved ipad pro but i am really excited about this macbook neo guys like i like

501
01:00:37.000 --> 01:00:43.020
i also really want the studio display but i didn't want to spend that kind of money right now on the studio display

502
01:00:43.280 --> 01:00:55.739
xdr but 120 hertz mini led yes please yeah sounds lovely all right i i think i i yeah so i think i think

503
01:00:55.739 --> 01:01:02.979
the point of my topic is look at the if you really want an ipad look at the ipad pro but you know

504
01:01:03.159 --> 01:01:06.379
really ask yourself what you're going to be doing with this because unless you're going to be doing

505
01:01:06.860 --> 01:01:14.739
tablety stuff or apple pencil stuff maybe just get a macbook neo and that's coming from the ipad guy I think so yeah

506
01:01:14.879 --> 01:01:23.580
this year is going to break Chris it's like a vicious cycle I'm right back where I was last year at this time pre-WWDC

507
01:01:23.939 --> 01:01:31.300
but like now that iPadOS has been fixed and I'm going to put air quotes on it but like the fundamentals

508
01:01:31.439 --> 01:01:38.540
of like some core big core issues of iPadOS have been fixed now I'm looking at the app

509
01:01:38.919 --> 01:01:46.139
system and especially like what's happened this last year for Mac apps I'm just like the iPad can't ever get this

510
01:01:46.500 --> 01:01:53.800
it's now also you're more focused on the bigger picture since all the front facing issues are gone

511
01:01:54.340 --> 01:02:02.419
yeah it is exactly that it's a bigger picture issue and like I don't know if I really talked about this on here but

512
01:02:02.639 --> 01:02:10.479
I've had to kind of like slowly roll back editing on my iPad and start editing more on the MacBook Pro because of

513
01:02:10.540 --> 01:02:19.199
my new camera because It just, it's so slow on the iPad Pro. It takes forever. And I have to put the playback quality,

514
01:02:19.479 --> 01:02:23.439
I have to turn the playback quality into performance mode so everything's a really low resolution.

515
01:02:23.459 --> 01:02:30.300
Oh, yeah, you told us. Oh, okay, I did. Okay, yeah. It's actually kind of rough to edit on. What are the chips?

516
01:02:32.459 --> 01:02:38.719
Anyway, so that brings us to the challenge. Is it the same chips? So it's the, I have the M5 iPad Pro.

517
01:02:38.939 --> 01:02:47.780
I have the M5 2TB iPad Pro. Okay. with 16 gigs of RAM. Which one is it in the Mac? Well, to be fair, the MacBook Pro

518
01:02:47.919 --> 01:02:58.840
that I have is the M4 Max non-Bin the 4.1 with 128 gigs of RAM. So there is a pretty big difference between that. Wow.

519
01:02:59.500 --> 01:03:06.399
Well, I got it when I was in that phase of like okay, I'm done with the iPad. And then WVPC.

520
01:03:06.399 --> 01:03:11.959
You go hard when you're in the phase. Midlife crisis has hit us all differently.

521
01:03:12.800 --> 01:03:18.800
Being a fan of the iPad is like being on a roller coaster. Constantly ups and downs. That's true.

522
01:03:18.840 --> 01:03:22.320
Up and down, up and down. It is a rough life. Yeah.

523
01:03:22.479 --> 01:03:28.100
And I, look, I love the iPad, but I think I'm finally coming around to what the iPad is good for,

524
01:03:28.280 --> 01:03:35.520
and that is what I'm using it for as a focused productivity admin device that can do some creative tasks.

525
01:03:36.060 --> 01:03:38.280
And the Mac fills in the rest for that.

526
01:03:39.340 --> 01:03:44.939
Chris, I'm so curious because we're expecting an iPhone that folds out to 8 inches this year

527
01:03:45.409 --> 01:03:50.219
when there's inevitably the max version of that that goes out to like a 10 inch or 11 inch tablet.

528
01:03:50.979 --> 01:04:01.340
What are you going to do? That... Oh, he's thinking. He just crashed. He's running iPadOS.

529
01:04:02.179 --> 01:04:06.520
What if your iPhone Pro Max folded out and was a 10 inch iPad?

530
01:04:07.379 --> 01:04:12.159
If that was the case, I think I wouldn't have a traditional iPad.

531
01:04:12.389 --> 01:04:16.399
I think my iPhone would be my iPad, and then I would have a Mac. And that would be...

532
01:04:16.399 --> 01:04:20.820
Oh, so iPhones would run the same OS as iPad. They would just call it iOS, and they'd kill iPadOS,

533
01:04:21.060 --> 01:04:26.000
and my prediction would come true. And you'd all be wrong for doubting me. Yep, yep.

534
01:04:26.280 --> 01:04:31.580
Look, what was it that you got called on Upgrade, a rascal? Yeah, somebody's got to be a rascal.

535
01:04:32.260 --> 01:04:41.100
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. So, look, you're in your rascal phase, and I love it. I'm in my rascal era.

536
01:04:42.000 --> 01:04:50.879
I'm in my, like, oh, I don't know what to do phase. I think I'm at the part where I'm just like, you know what?

537
01:04:51.080 --> 01:04:58.300
Each device has their needs, and I'm just going to cover them the way that seems best. Yeah, the way God intended.

538
01:04:58.719 --> 01:05:06.000
I love the iPad, but it's just, yeah. Meanwhile, my face is just uninstalled Raycast because it's too cringe.

539
01:05:07.379 --> 01:05:14.659
Which you can do with a keyboard shortcut in Raycast. Wait, what? Although, can you uninstall Raycast from Raycast?

540
01:05:14.659 --> 01:05:21.479
You can uninstall other apps. I don't know. I put it in the trash. Inside the building. I put it in the trash.

541
01:05:24.439 --> 01:05:32.219
The classic way of uninstalling something. Okay. All right. We should get to our challenge. And it was Matt's challenge.

542
01:05:32.750 --> 01:05:38.300
It was my challenge. A challenge that made, I feel like you two were very upset about this for some reason.

543
01:05:39.040 --> 01:05:46.139
But it was find one nice thing to say about a password manager that you don't use every day.

544
01:05:46.600 --> 01:05:52.600
So for me, that was say something nice about something other than one password. I think the same for you, Nealian.

545
01:05:53.219 --> 01:05:56.699
Is that correct? Yeah. And Chris, besides Apple passwords.

546
01:05:58.620 --> 01:06:04.459
So I can start, and this won't be a super long one because it wasn't switched for a week, deliver a full review.

547
01:06:04.800 --> 01:06:12.360
Just find a nice thing. Thank God. And the nice thing I have to say is about Apple passwords.

548
01:06:13.360 --> 01:06:19.679
And it is also a mean thing to say. So the nice thing to say is I use one password.

549
01:06:19.899 --> 01:06:24.040
I keep my passwords in there, my two-factor codes, and my passkey's in there. Great. Works wonderfully.

550
01:06:25.179 --> 01:06:31.719
There's one website on earth that restricts what apps you can use to create a passkey. And that website is apple.com.

551
01:06:32.800 --> 01:06:37.979
Apple does not let you create a passkey in any other app besides Apple passwords. Of course they don't.

552
01:06:38.060 --> 01:06:42.860
This is insanity. And Apple should feel bad about this. It's insane.

553
01:06:43.419 --> 01:06:49.379
So all of my passkeys live in one password, except for my Apple passkey, which lives in Apple passwords.

554
01:06:50.300 --> 01:06:56.340
It's crazy that that's still the case. I can't believe it. I know. It's nuts. And you can't create multiple.

555
01:06:56.639 --> 01:07:03.239
But anyway, it's a whole thing. But in non-Safari browsers, I don't know if this is a Tahoe thing

556
01:07:03.290 --> 01:07:10.820
or if this came last year, but in non-Safari browsers and Safari, you don't even need to have

557
01:07:11.100 --> 01:07:18.919
the Apple Passwords extension installed. If you have a passkey for that website, it can present itself in the browser,

558
01:07:20.120 --> 01:07:24.239
which is great. So I use one password for everything, and I go to Apple,

559
01:07:24.500 --> 01:07:27.979
I click sign in with passkey, and I get this little system modal that just says,

560
01:07:28.030 --> 01:07:32.919
hey, do you want to sign in with your passkey from Apple passwords? And I'm like, yeah. And it works.

561
01:07:33.479 --> 01:07:39.840
And so I think that's really nice. Because I don't want to install their god-awful Chrome extension. Yeah. Yeah.

562
01:07:41.300 --> 01:07:48.919
So that's nice. It's great. Nice. It's stupid I have to do this, but it's nice that there's an easy workaround. Nice.

563
01:07:49.679 --> 01:07:58.280
Yeah. Yeah. Well, so I was struggling with this one, but then I was thinking back to the old days,

564
01:07:58.810 --> 01:08:03.580
you know, the good old days, but not really good because I hated this part. But I was thinking back to my IT career

565
01:08:04.320 --> 01:08:07.120
and I was thinking about what we use there. And there is an application.

566
01:08:08.079 --> 01:08:13.919
I'm going to doubt either one of you have heard of this. Can I guess? Maybe Neelion has. Go for it. Okay.

567
01:08:15.580 --> 01:08:23.680
For the meme, I will say stickies, but it's not that. No, no, no, no. but my real guess is KeePass. Yes. Okay.

568
01:08:23.979 --> 01:08:27.379
I was like, I started saying neither one of you would know this. I'm like, no, Neilion's going to know about it.

569
01:08:27.580 --> 01:08:34.879
KeePass. Okay. KeePass is where you go when you are either a tinfoil hat person and you're

570
01:08:35.100 --> 01:08:39.919
worried about security or you work in a place that like you, you have to have really good security.

571
01:08:40.319 --> 01:08:48.779
KeePass is the idea of KeePass is it is an open source password manager. And it just creates a database file.

572
01:08:48.859 --> 01:08:55.560
And KeePass itself is basically the viewer of this database file. Matt looks puzzled. Matt looks so confused.

573
01:08:55.720 --> 01:09:00.240
I've gone to the website. It is shocking. Yes. Everyone should go to the website.

574
01:09:00.600 --> 01:09:04.299
Again, this is a perfect slam on your brakes in the middle of traffic and look at the website.

575
01:09:05.879 --> 01:09:11.839
So KeePass is kind of the viewer for this database file. The database file is the thing.

576
01:09:13.180 --> 01:09:17.020
In KeePass, there is no cloud syncing. You do not sync to anything.

577
01:09:17.540 --> 01:09:21.740
Where you store that file, however you store that file, that's what can access it.

578
01:09:21.939 --> 01:09:27.620
So in my IT career, we had a file server. We had a special folder that only the IT group could access.

579
01:09:28.180 --> 01:09:32.379
You had to have the correct permissions to access that. That's where we put the KeePass database.

580
01:09:33.160 --> 01:09:37.959
But then when you get into that, it's an encrypted database. So it's crazy encrypted.

581
01:09:38.180 --> 01:09:42.299
This is where the KeePass application comes in. That unlocks it, and you can view everything in it.

582
01:09:42.299 --> 01:09:45.279
And you can do all like passwords, SSH, all that stuff in there.

583
01:09:45.339 --> 01:09:50.799
I have no idea if it does pass keys or anything like that. In fact, I would doubt it does. I don't think so. Yeah.

584
01:09:51.399 --> 01:09:57.279
It's all off. I don't think this is certified for Y2K. Like, this is. Oh, yeah, it is. Oh, baby, it is.

585
01:09:57.299 --> 01:10:02.060
It's still maintained. This thing, whenever I would get audited in my IT career,

586
01:10:02.200 --> 01:10:06.799
they'd be like, okay, how do you guys store your passwords? Key pass, okay, you're good. Like, yeah.

587
01:10:08.080 --> 01:10:12.740
This thing, we had like a 50-character password to get into the database. It was a sentence.

588
01:10:13.399 --> 01:10:23.060
My last IT job, so that was four years ago, three years ago, four years ago, we were using KeePass still. Nice. Yeah.

589
01:10:23.600 --> 01:10:28.240
Yeah. And so KeePass is technically the Windows application, but I put a link in there that

590
01:10:28.370 --> 01:10:33.040
like there's iOS versions and macOS versions and stuff like that that can access it.

591
01:10:33.049 --> 01:10:39.459
These are all open source and stuff like that. So you can access it. There's web. There's all sorts of different things.

592
01:10:39.790 --> 01:10:48.120
And you just access that database file. So you put it in your file server. You could put it in a cloud file thing,

593
01:10:48.120 --> 01:10:56.180
but that kind of defeats the purpose of using it. I have a recommendation. Yes. It's called... Oh, boy.

594
01:10:56.759 --> 01:11:05.200
I pasted the link. It's called Strongbox. Okay. Strongbox. And it's... So it's password manager.

595
01:11:05.379 --> 01:11:15.459
It supports pass keys I'm just seeing now. my understanding of it is it supports key pass database. Oh, nice.

596
01:11:16.899 --> 01:11:24.140
So it looks like maybe you can have pass keys in key pass after all. See, I'm not sure. Okay, I wouldn't recommend

597
01:11:24.620 --> 01:11:30.180
using, if you're somebody that needs like a shared key pass vault and stuff like that, don't do

598
01:11:30.859 --> 01:11:38.660
pass keys because it's based on bio. That's going to make things hard. But that's a whole separate deal. Yeah, no.

599
01:11:39.180 --> 01:11:44.060
KeyPass is if you want to go full tinfoil hat, you go KeyPass. Yeah.

600
01:11:44.339 --> 01:11:49.939
And Strongbox is like, I've seen people recommend it a lot. This actually looks like a couple of weeks.

601
01:11:50.220 --> 01:11:54.500
It's a native Mac app as well as iPad and iOS.

602
01:11:55.680 --> 01:12:04.620
So it integrates with the built-in password management stuff in those OSes. And it looks pretty decent. I've tried it.

603
01:12:05.060 --> 01:12:09.339
It looks pretty good. I'm just looking at the screenshots. Yeah, like you, I haven't tried it,

604
01:12:09.459 --> 01:12:17.379
but it definitely gives me those KeePass feels. It's giving me the flashbacks to KeePass. But native to Mac OS.

605
01:12:17.859 --> 01:12:26.379
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, it's got OTP and all that. And it's also on the iPhone, iPad and Apple Watch.

606
01:12:27.259 --> 01:12:32.919
It's not just on the Mac. And Apple Watch. And Apple Watch. Well, probably, I'm guessing

607
01:12:33.129 --> 01:12:39.439
the 2FA stuff is on the Apple Watch. Yeah. Yeah, in fact, that's exactly what it is. Oh, and passwords, too.

608
01:12:39.640 --> 01:12:47.720
Wow, that's wild. And fast keys and everything. Yeah, yeah, no. But yeah, that's what I got for you this week.

609
01:12:48.479 --> 01:12:54.520
What was the nice thing you had to say about it? It's crazy encrypted and will pass any IT audit you get put through.

610
01:12:54.770 --> 01:12:59.060
Crazy encrypted, all right. Crazy encrypted. That thing, you ain't hacking that.

611
01:12:59.220 --> 01:13:04.359
As long as you have a strong password into your vault, you ain't hacking into that thing.

612
01:13:04.520 --> 01:13:08.299
Like I said, we had a 50-character sentence that couldn't be used.

613
01:13:08.779 --> 01:13:12.479
Like if you tried a dictionary attack against it, it wouldn't work against it.

614
01:13:12.859 --> 01:13:19.979
Like it was a very particular sentence that had curse words in it and other things. It was fun to type.

615
01:13:20.220 --> 01:13:22.660
Very quick tangent. My wife's a teacher.

616
01:13:23.100 --> 01:13:26.819
Her school recently, their IT policy switched to they need passphrases for their laptops.

617
01:13:28.540 --> 01:13:33.020
It went over so poorly, the IT just gave up. And they're like, now you can go back to passwords.

618
01:13:33.740 --> 01:13:40.399
So they disabled biometrics. So no login with your fingerprint. What? You must key in. That's insane.

619
01:13:41.299 --> 01:13:49.459
So I did implement a 20 character minimum password thing at my last IT job. And people were so mad at me.

620
01:13:49.779 --> 01:13:57.799
And I was like, I don't care. I really don't care. I'm tired of having to deal with weird security things. This is it.

621
01:13:58.120 --> 01:14:01.859
This is what the auditors want. I don't care. You can be mad at me all you want.

622
01:14:02.580 --> 01:14:08.680
50% of my last IT job was resetting people's passwords. Yeah. Yeah.

623
01:14:08.879 --> 01:14:13.100
I was the network admin, and that was still 50% of my job. Yeah. All of us.

624
01:14:13.520 --> 01:14:22.620
All of us in our team, we just kept spending our time resetting passwords. Yep. Okay. So, my turn.

625
01:14:23.600 --> 01:14:36.399
So, my pick is Bitwarden. Oh. It's an often recommended alternative to one password. It looks... So, okay.

626
01:14:36.640 --> 01:14:45.060
I will get out of my system all the bad things so I can come to the one nice thing. So, it looks bad. Oh, yeah.

627
01:14:45.419 --> 01:14:54.339
I hate it. The UI is not great. The icon is not good. This is the most terrible shade of blue they could have picked.

628
01:14:56.100 --> 01:14:59.779
But they picked a shade of blue and that's what's important. There's that, I guess.

629
01:14:59.919 --> 01:15:10.140
It's kind of a Facebook blue, but weird. I don't know. Yeah. But besides from that, it's got all of the things.

630
01:15:12.160 --> 01:15:20.839
All of the features that you would expect, including OTP, so 2FA stuff, PASC support.

631
01:15:22.259 --> 01:15:29.759
It's cross-platform, so just like one password. You got all the browser extensions. You got a Mac app.

632
01:15:30.919 --> 01:15:39.359
You got the mobile apps. It integrates on iOS with the autofill features. So all of that is covered.

633
01:15:40.339 --> 01:15:48.040
It's just that the UI sucks if you go into the app. But you can bear with that, I guess. It's cheaper than one password.

634
01:15:48.359 --> 01:15:58.439
It's got even a free plan. The free plan is pretty bare bones, which means you can store your passwords and all of that.

635
01:15:58.540 --> 01:16:07.919
but you can't have OTP. I think you do have passkeys but you can't have OTP in the free plan. I'm pretty sure. Okay.

636
01:16:08.200 --> 01:16:15.500
So see, I'm coming to the nice stuff but the one nice thing that I picked is that you can self-host it.

637
01:16:17.439 --> 01:16:28.140
So the server component, so you can just be a newbie user. You can sign up and pay for a plan and start using it.

638
01:16:28.200 --> 01:16:35.779
just like one password and the others. But if you are a techie and you want to own your data or whatever,

639
01:16:36.979 --> 01:16:41.560
and you have a server, you can install the server part on your own server.

640
01:16:42.560 --> 01:16:50.379
And when you're signing into the app, you put in your own email, not email, your own domain name, and that's it.

641
01:16:50.459 --> 01:16:52.439
Your account points to your own server.

642
01:16:53.299 --> 01:17:06.859
And that means that it's basically like it's free for the people that can manage this because you get all the full breadth of features.

643
01:17:07.089 --> 01:17:11.919
I'm pretty sure you can access everything, but you have to self-host it.

644
01:17:13.359 --> 01:17:22.319
And I think that's pretty cool that you can self-host a password manager like this, which means you can still benefit from.

645
01:17:22.680 --> 01:17:27.279
It's a bit like KeePass, I guess, but KeePass, you manage the database itself,

646
01:17:28.180 --> 01:17:33.759
and Bitwarden is still like a proprietary thing. You can still import and export stuff,

647
01:17:34.240 --> 01:17:39.479
but it's not really the database that's portable. But still, you can self-host it,

648
01:17:41.799 --> 01:17:49.680
and yeah, I think that's pretty nice in this day and age that you can self-host your password. Yeah, that is nice.

649
01:17:50.740 --> 01:18:03.979
Is it wrong for me to think that, like, KeePass is kind of like Obsidian, where it's this, like, standard set of files, but it's a database, and then you can have, like, different apps that access it?

650
01:18:05.180 --> 01:18:08.979
I would say that's a fair way of putting it. I think, yeah, that's fair. Okay. Yeah.

651
01:18:09.459 --> 01:18:14.740
And Bitwarden is more, it is open because you can run it yourself, but it's more of a package.

652
01:18:15.939 --> 01:18:24.819
It's more of a package, yes. It's more like you install Plex. Okay. Maybe not. I don't know.

653
01:18:24.919 --> 01:18:33.419
But you install the whole thing. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. All right. Bitwarden is always the one that comes up

654
01:18:33.720 --> 01:18:39.319
whenever people hint the slightest distaste with whatever password manager they're using.

655
01:18:40.819 --> 01:18:53.040
You can only guess that I've received hundreds of recommendation to switch to Vidwarden over the past two weeks

656
01:18:53.169 --> 01:19:05.160
because I've complained about 1Password. So yeah. That makes sense. For now, I'm still 1Password. Yes. So, Matt,

657
01:19:05.259 --> 01:19:15.759
who wins? I mean, I think I win. Obviously. And, I think I win. Yeah, yeah. We do now. We don't do democracy.

658
01:19:16.680 --> 01:19:26.540
Okay. Yeah, that's your thing over there. Okay. I want to do dictatorships. Yeah. All right. So that brings us to

659
01:19:26.819 --> 01:19:32.759
the new challenge. And the new challenge is Nileance. What do you got for us this week? Yes. Easy and simple.

660
01:19:33.560 --> 01:19:42.160
Straightforward. Oh, God. No. Use Vivaldi and pitch it on Mastodon. Pitch it on Mastodon! Like I said, straightforward.

661
01:19:42.759 --> 01:19:50.560
Easy and simple. you are working for Vivaldi this week am I getting a paycheck from them?

662
01:19:51.080 --> 01:19:58.520
I am getting one, I don't know about you too you do realize as an influencer I don't do anything for free oh wow

663
01:19:59.939 --> 01:20:04.200
maybe you will have to that was the most obnoxious sentence I've ever said in my life

664
01:20:04.779 --> 01:20:13.099
that is hands down the most obnoxious thing I've ever said I hope everyone knows I was joking and not being serious

665
01:20:13.759 --> 01:20:21.600
it's good you clarified yeah it's good yeah it's good that you clarified so yeah use Evaldian pitch it on Mastodon

666
01:20:22.180 --> 01:20:31.240
that's it you can pitch it as a whole or just one thing that you want to pitch about it I don't know like

667
01:20:31.939 --> 01:20:39.839
what are you writing I'm just clarifying in our show notes I'm clarifying the text of the I already wrote this yes

668
01:20:40.240 --> 01:20:43.080
you're having sync issues I think you're

669
01:20:43.100 --> 01:20:51.080
no okay well thank you maybe vivaldi can help you with that yeah again there's a there's a setting

670
01:20:51.220 --> 01:20:58.520
for that there's a setting for everything oh god i would honestly not be surprised if they have like

671
01:20:58.700 --> 01:21:02.720
in the guinness book of world records there's some record some record for most settings in a

672
01:21:02.830 --> 01:21:09.399
single app and vivaldi has been holding for years all right well that brings us to the end of the

673
01:21:09.419 --> 01:21:13.020
show and we've had this end of the show question for a while but i'm gonna put us to put a time

674
01:21:13.080 --> 01:21:17.080
limit on it because i know this could this could have easily been a whole topic on its own but

675
01:21:17.560 --> 01:21:21.700
alex sent in this question if you have any uh any of the show questions you'd like ask we have a

676
01:21:21.819 --> 01:21:26.419
feedback form please send them in there uh but alex asked if you're starting from scratch what is some

677
01:21:26.520 --> 01:21:32.899
smart home items you'd add to your life that you don't have today we recently bought a house and

678
01:21:32.959 --> 01:21:38.719
needed to install blinds so i chose to buy the switch brought switch bot roller shades i absolutely

679
01:21:38.740 --> 01:21:43.640
love them but would never have added them to my setup or never have otherwise added them to my

680
01:21:43.720 --> 01:21:51.160
setup i can't read today so for some reason um alex it really depends on who you live with when i

681
01:21:51.279 --> 01:21:56.500
lived by myself in my condo everything was smart homed i smart home the heck out of that house

682
01:21:57.520 --> 01:22:02.260
now that i live with danielle and her mom stays with us sometimes the only thing that's really

683
01:22:02.279 --> 01:22:14.600
smart home is my studio everything else is dumb yeah my answer is blinds as well uh i i would have

684
01:22:14.959 --> 01:22:23.700
so we're moving into our own house soon and maybe this will come up but yes the blinds have them

685
01:22:24.439 --> 01:22:30.399
come up at night and come down at night and like my dream would be able to wake up

686
01:22:31.500 --> 01:22:38.620
with the daylight just because the smart lines come up on the schedule i would really love that

687
01:22:38.839 --> 01:22:47.080
because i hate waking up to sounds uh so to an alarm clock or whatever wait i hate wearing a

688
01:22:47.180 --> 01:22:54.540
watch as well. So, um, waking up to the daylight, I would love that. Uh, and this is like only for

689
01:22:54.700 --> 01:23:02.100
this, I would get smart blinds at least in my room. Okay. Uh, I'm going to be, I have, I have two

690
01:23:02.250 --> 01:23:07.080
answers because my first answer is super boring. Uh, I, the thing I don't have now that I want is

691
01:23:07.259 --> 01:23:13.400
smart blinds for my kind of like front room in the house. It'd be really nice if those could go like

692
01:23:13.439 --> 01:23:19.419
down when the sun goes down uh because i have to go around the couch it's a whole thing um but then

693
01:23:19.600 --> 01:23:24.839
buying them would be expensive so i don't want to do it um and then what i would recommend everyone

694
01:23:25.180 --> 01:23:31.040
who's moving into their own home you should get smart lights for whatever outdoor lights you have

695
01:23:31.620 --> 01:23:37.601
like your front door your garage if you have it like those sorts of lights get smart lights set them

696
01:23:37.620 --> 01:23:43.500
on a routine to turn on at sunset and off at sunrise and you'll never have to think about turning

697
01:23:43.640 --> 01:23:50.620
those on or off ever again. It's wonderful. So like in the garden, what kind of outside lights?

698
01:23:53.819 --> 01:24:01.680
In the US, if you have a house you typically have a light right outside your front door and then lights on both sides

699
01:24:01.680 --> 01:24:07.700
of your garage. You might have a spotlight outside your garage or something for like when you pull up.

700
01:24:08.189 --> 01:24:17.339
Like some people have motion sensor lights and stuff. Because there's criminals in our country everywhere. I don't know.

701
01:24:18.240 --> 01:24:25.500
But also you don't have fences in the front for weird reasons. We do not have, almost never do we have fences

702
01:24:25.640 --> 01:24:31.479
in the front. There's some places where we do. If you have a fence in the front of your house, you're hiding

703
01:24:31.660 --> 01:24:38.859
something. Like that's what we're judging you. We all have fences. yeah okay the one thing I will say

704
01:24:39.339 --> 01:24:48.899
smart garage door opener and don't get a Mikey one those guys get a home kit one but anyways

705
01:24:49.299 --> 01:24:53.000
that brings us to the end of the show thank you all so much for listening thank you to Backstories for having us

706
01:24:53.000 --> 01:25:05.080
we are a Backstories podcast after all and have a great day bye