Early adopting super geek, musician, father, resident tech guru.
We’ve all seen the leaks and hints from Apple about the next iOS. What if the big thing is Apple providing an AIKit to every single third-party Apple developer? Wouldn’t that be something?
Apple Spending a ‘Tremendous Amount of Time and Effort’ on AI, Details Coming ‘Later This Year’
I’ve said this before, and I’ll say it again. It is insanely frustrating that Google and Netflix refuse to integrate with the TV app across Apple’s platforms. There is no reason YouTube TV and Netflix cannot integrate. It is a product decision that they are making intentionally. At a time when seamless integration is an expectation, these product decisions make absolutely no sense to me.
While more expensive than its competitors, the Apple TV device is by far the best streaming device available on the market. Once a user adds all of their favorite apps and services, the TV app becomes a valuable tool to surface, aggregate, and organize shows, movies, and sporting events. Why a content provider would intentionally choose to not use every channel available to them to get their content in front of as many eyes as possible is completely illogical to me.
The reality is that my family searches the Apple TV app first, YouTube TV second, and Netflix third. I have noticed this behavior with each family member. So, if the content is available directly on another app, YouTube TV and Netflix lose those streams. Admittedly, Netflix is on notice at our house. I’m just not sure we need it anymore.
Learned something pretty cool about the Sonos Roam today. Apparently, it supports wireless charging. Who knew? Not me!
Discovered an annoying difference between the Fire TV and Apple TV versions of the YouTube TV apps this morning. I wouldn’t be so annoyed if the feature wasn’t so helpful.
On the Fire TV, the Select button takes the user back to the previously watched channel which can be super helpful when trying to check in on a couple games without using Multiview.
On the Apple TV, the Select button pauses the current show which really does not make a whole lot of sense to me. Like the Fire TV remote, the Apple TV remote also has a Pause button so why use the Select button to perform a function that already has a dedicated button? It’s not great UX design especially for those households that have streaming devices from multiple vendors.
Being a solution manager myself, it is somewhat relieving that even Google makes mistakes like this from time to time, but it is a great opportunity for the two product teams to get together and create consistent user experiences.
Starlink’s biggest issue is not going to be its technology. Its success will come down to trust of its leadership of which there is very little in the population as a whole.
SpaceX details Starlink-for-phones plan, launching in 2024 | Ars Technica
I delayed applying for an Apple Card until recently when Apple introduced their savings account with 4.15% APY paid monthly but accrues daily.
The features of the Wallet app for Apple Card are outstanding! It is easy to keep track of your spending and has a visual indicator of the categories with the most spending. Most importantly, it is easy to pay your balance daily if you so desire.
Apple should consider creating some sort of WalletKit or API so other banks can make it so easy to really control credit card spending. The Apple Card already has great features that differentiate it from other cards. Consumers will continue to use it even if other banks are able to enhance their user experience with an enhanced Wallet app.
I would like to see Automattic enhance the architecture of their Jetpack app so that if a plugin adds options to the compose page, those options are also displayed in the app. Seems like something that should be possible and would benefit all users.
Hey Apple! I have a great idea for you.
Why not make iMessages available on the web as part of iCloud+? There is even a spot just waiting there on the iCloud site for the iMessages icon. The assumption that iOS, iPadOS, and macOS users will always have access to an internet connection on their device is short-sighted and flawed.
It is important for people to stay in contact wherever they are on whatever device they are using. Why limit access when it is really not necessary?
NPR quits Twitter after being falsely labeled as ‘state-affiliated media’
This is something NPR had to do. When Musk first took over Twitter, I questioned whether or not it made any business sense for another business to use it – whether or not a business could trust the platform. I would wager that NPR and PBS are only the beginning.
Let’s set the stage. You are a risk executive at a large commercial bank, and you receive a news alert that Silicon Valley Bank and Signature Bank are going into receivership.
You immediately turn to the device at your desk or in your hand or on your wrist and ask it to create data visualizations in Power BI showing your bank’s commitment and outstanding balance exposure to those two banks in relation to your overall portfolio.
You then ask it to embed those visualizations in a PowerPoint presentation with your notes from the meeting that just ended with other senior executives at the bank. You also ask it to write an executive summary, attach your presentation, and create and send an email with the two outputs to the executive team.
Knowing that you and the team will need more details, you then ask Microsoft Excel to create spreadsheets with information like which borrowers are impacted, what are the commitment details for facilities in the top 10 impacted industries, and what are the outstanding loan balances by loan officer and risk rating.
With the additional details in hand and the executive team on the same page, you ask Microsoft Teams to schedule a high-priority meeting with heads of each business unit that appeared in the Excel output to bring the wider team into the loop.
Today, this kind of response would take many hours and more likely several days to organize and complete, but if the promise of Microsoft 365 Copilot holds true, all of this could be done in minutes. Talk about a game-changer!
Of course, for all of this to work, the information you use to train the AI models must be well-defined in the context of your business. Each data point must have a business definition that is specific and unique, and these definitions need to be accessible to the models.
This is where I see one of the biggest challenges for making data from online transaction processing systems available to AI modeling tools. In my experience, very few systems have consistent naming conventions and certainly do not include detailed business definitions within the product’s metadata. Without those business definitions, it is difficult enough for a human to understand the data they query from a system. How can we expect anything more from a AI model? This change in system design should begin immediately to take advantage of what looks to be an incredible shift in the way we are able to work.
This former Microsoft Office programmer could not be more excited about what we are going to be able to do with Copilot. Let’s go!