Sparky and I are recording the next feedback episode several days earlier than normal, and we’d love to answer your questions. Fire away below:
Do you gents ever get sick or bored talking about this stuff?
(You don’t ever come across that way, to be clear. Just wondering.)
Do you think Apple devices will get a lot more expensive soon?
(Trying to ask what is the impact of the tariff turmoil without getting into politics or PhD economic theory!)
1 Like
OK. I will bite.
Apple has never been seen as a strong competitor in the high-powered computer realm for the science and engineering fields. Has the switch to M chips instead of Intel chips essentially cemented this message – When you want to do high-level science or engineering, buy a Windows machine, not a macOS machine?
Specific Example – Igor Pro (Wavemetrics) started on Apple. It expanded to Windows. It will soon drop macOS support because developing for the M chips requires too much investment to revamp their existing base of high-performance code.
Perhaps stated otherwise … How long will Apple sustain its translation base from ARM to Intel for software that requires Intel chips? Will things only get worse rather than better in this direction (i.e. forget the future of running Windows in a virtual machine because Windows will be too darn slow or simply not supported).
–
JJW
Other than for evaluation/review purposes, do you think you would consider a foldable iPhone for your normal daily usage?
If you had a redo on your workspaces, would you make them the same sizes? Anything else you’d change?
1 Like
How much “support” and direct “engagement” should your US$1.29 per month subscription get (or even your free app that you don’t pay for)?
Something that seems quite timely is a discussion about small team indie app development & peoples expectations. Specifically I’m seeing across multiple communication channels (ie Slack and Reddit) a openly hostile and combative Overcast user population who appear to demand every bug to be fixed or a timeline to fix, along with features/function or UX choice that align with their own desires/thoughts/needs. Also of note is the demand for weekly/monthly updates, all year, that seems unsustainable to me.
Not to mention, many of the people posting are using a free app without taking up subscription yet getting quite vocal and angry.
I’ll admit, I’ve been guilty of some of these failings from time to time, however try to remain balanced.
I’m afraid the balance has gone here, what do you think?
(I’m scared that indie devs, including the likes of Marco, will just walk away and we’ll all be worse off)
Would you prefer to fight 12 duck sized horses, or one horse sized duck.
8 Likes
What is the app you really wish existed, but doesn’t?
2 Likes
If you could recreate the iPhone and iOS from zero – no hardware or OS legacies to deal with – what would you want the new build to be?
Katie
Have you ever seriously considered leaving the Apple Ecosystem at any point?
2 Likes
Does David still use all the calendars?
2 Likes
What about the current state of Plex with the “New Experience” forced upon all mobile and Apple TV users on the 1st of April. At first everyone was thinking it might have been some kind of April Fools day prank gone wrong.
Sadly they have chosen to re-launch the Plex on Play and App Store, and it really is nowhere near ready to replace the app that most people have now lost totally (due to auto updates).
https://www.reddit.com/r/PleX/
In a spectacular doubling down on this own goal, Plex also increased the price of Plex Pass from $119.99 to $249.99.
I didn’t realise the pathway to success is:
Step 1 - Alienate almost all of your users into hating the Mobile and TV app (Android, iOS, iPadOS & TVOS)
Step 2 - Increase prices, in the case of Plex Pass more than double, shortly after you achieve Step 1
Plex have been anti user for some time now, with unstable app that lack key modern features (like Picture in Picture on Desktop or the ability to run without crashing), this is a new level of terrible.
1 Like
I named my home wi-fi “Obi WAN Kenobi” just for laughs. What’s @MacSparky thoughts about this and has he adopted a themed wi-fi as well?
3 Likes
Don’t know about David, but you’re my new role model.
(for the top quality dad joke, not the Star Wars reference)
1 Like
I named mine TROJAN64.EXE – none of my neighbors ever try to connect.
5 Likes
Ooohh this is a good one.
1 Like
this joke is a risk; I hope it’s taken in the spirit in which it’s intended
As mentioned in another thread, Plex works great for me and I don’t understand all the online criticism toward it and its developers. tongue in cheek
Tying this together with SteveMac’s previous post, I do think there’s a very interesting topic here: what’s a developer to do about “moving forward” when at least some portion of their user base will see it (perhaps rightly so!) as also being a big step backwards. This isn’t a developer’s podcast, so maybe it isn’t the right forum for it, but it comes up a lot.
Sonos is probably the best example? Apple has done this is the past with some of their applications. Plex and a certain podcast app have come up recently on these forums. Developers want to do things like “new codebase,” “updated design language,” “enable new features,” which seem like reasonable positions to take. Developers also claim (I have no reason to doubt them) that getting new users requires regular updates to make the app feel recent and high priority. Existing users just want (mostly) bug fixes and carefully added new features that work well from the outset.
I’m not even sure what the questions for this topic would be or what the discussion would accomplish, but it seems like a lot of us on this forum are caught - depending on the app and our own experience with it - between frustration with things that used to work well being enshittified and not wanting to pile our unreasonable expectations on developers.
3 Likes
A question for both of you. What are your top-ten podcasts, if you still have the time to listen to them?
A question for Stephen. Did you improvise your guitar solo in the song Firth of fifth or did you compose it? Were you guys listening to King Crimson at the time? I know you must be tired of all the requests, but could you play it on MPU? Dave could accompany you on the saxophone. Pretty please with sugar on top! 
3 Likes