(Preview) Two Paths for Apple and Its Users, More on Amazon and Advertising, OpenAI and 722 Mathematical Manuscripts

Andrew and Ben begin with reflections on Ben’s changing relationship with the Mac and two markets that may ultimately be impossible to serve with one product and operating system. Then: Why Apple’s plans for your living room make sense, reactions to the Duo, and the near-term outlook for humanoid robots in the home. From there: More specifics on why agents put certain types of advertising at risk, thoughts on Amazon adopting a YouTube Premium model, and a question about product pricing that spawns a lesson in advertising, generally. Then: Reactions to OpenAI’s math progress, anxiety among mathematicians, inter-disciplinary skills, joining forces on Machine Intelligence Island, and a reminder that equating raw IQ with value is a bad idea. At the end: Grading Ben Affleck’s AI knowledge, Mike Tomlin’s Minecraft habit, and a digression on IBM, Compaq, and the decompilation of video games (and why fair use is not a viable defense for hackers).

• 0:00Speaker 00

  Hello and welcome to a free preview of Sharp Tech.

• 0:09Speaker 00

  Hello and welcome back to another episode of Sharp Tech. I'm Andrew Sharp and on the other line, Ben Thompson. Ben, how you doing?

• 0:19Speaker 01

  A little groggy, um, little not super sharp, not super clear. Um, the only way to honor your baseball team, drinking a lot of beer in the clubhouse is drink a lot of beer yourself. So we'll, we'll see how it goes, but um, good.

• 0:36Speaker 00

  Groggy but victorious, triumphant here on Sharp Tech. You know what I love? I love that there was an entire first round series played in about six days. As somebody who's been through a lot of first round playoff series that take two and a half weeks in the NBA, I like the MLB keeping it nice and tight.

• 0:55Speaker 01

  Well, uh, it is actually the second round because there was the wild card round first.

• 0:59Speaker 00

  Oh, I don't count that. What? First real playoff series.

• 1:03Speaker 01

  It's actually one of the craziest things about the playoffs in baseball is it is over fast and it has, because part of the whole thing is you need to be tested on your pitching court, right? And so you need to be playing every day. That's part of the whole thing of do you have a good team or not?

• 1:18Speaker 00

  Ah, sure.

• 1:19Speaker 01

  And so, but the end result is the games like you're super excited.

• 1:23Speaker 00

  Blink and you might miss it, you know?

• 1:24Speaker 01

  And then it's done. So my condolences to the Padres. Uh, I like that team a lot. Uh, we have a good friend who's a big Padres fan. Alas, someone has to lose if the good guys are gonna win.

• 1:34Speaker 00

  You had to do what you had to do. The Brew Crew taking care of business. Here we go.

• 1:39Speaker 01

  I mean, well, speaking of fast, last year, uh, we lost four over the Dodgers. Uh, it was very ugly. It was over quick.

• 1:45Speaker 00

  Talk about blink and you miss it. Yes, indeed. I recall.

• 1:49Speaker 01

  We'll see what happens.

• 1:50Speaker 00

  Well, nowhere to go but up from that performance. Uh, as for the show, we will kick things off with a handful of questions on Apple. On Monday, you wrote about news from Apple. Late last week, I believe it was Friday, the company announced, "We will introduce additional controls to ensure that Mac users who genuinely wish to grant an app full disk access can only do so with very explicit user action." And of that news, which was sort of ambiguous, you wrote, "To say that I'm nervous about what Apple's solution will entail is a massive understatement." And that was part of a much larger article. We're not going to spend that much time on the article, but as a reader, I was curious.

• 2:33Speaker 00

  Why specifically are you nervous and will Apple's decisions actually affect normal people or just you and other weirdos? What do you think?

• 2:43Speaker 01

  It's always, it's always funny how you get feedback on what you wrote. Um, with you, it's like, we're not going to spend much time on that.

• 2:48Speaker 00

  But it's very technical. Um, we're not coding to the metal here on the podcast.

• 2:55Speaker 01

  Unfortunately, you can't control me. We're gonna be talking about the article. Because I don't know, it's kind of a self-reflective period over not just the last few weeks, but the last few months, I think for me and my relationship with computing and AI and agents and all these sorts of things. And the extent to which I am excited and enthused about this sort of stuff, I'm pretty sure it's coming across as I am very excited and very enthused. Are you getting that impression on the podcast?

• 3:26Speaker 00

  I am, I am. And every now and then I see tweets about guys in their 40s who may have AI psychosis and I think of you as a friend.

• 3:35Speaker 01

  Absolutely. Like, uh, this is, I've been trying to be very sort of, oh, self-aware and be concerned, you know, do I have AI psychosis? And maybe sometimes just the answer is yes and being honest with yourself, but.

• 3:46Speaker 00

  Yes, lean into it.

• 3:48Speaker 01

  It's fun. Like for sure, it is fun in a way. I've called back to this, being back in like the 90s and building your own PC and like understanding all this stuff works. And I think it's been, I, this is my current rationalization justification is I think it's been very positive for my work because I do feel the extent to which I understand this stuff is much higher, like, that it was even previously. And fortunately, I feel like a lot of my intuitions I had before were pretty accurate. But now just, I think the depth is definitely gotten much greater. The more you get into this, understand their strengths, understand their weaknesses, what works, what doesn't, what is going to work, what is always sort of going to be a challenge, et cetera.

• 4:32Speaker 01

  Anyhow, the reason why the Apple angle though, is particularly interesting is when I was at Apple University, the biggest challenge that I perceived with the Apple University concept, and I was there right when it first started, Joel Padone was there, I think he might still be there, but it was, the, the concept was we're going to create this sort of program. Apple famously has this like top 200. It's like they have this annual retreat, the top people in the company go there. It's not necessarily the top 200 by like, if you look at the org chart, it's like the 200 people that actually matter in terms of building stuff. There might be some random guy that was reporting to anyone, it's like, what's he doing over there? Actually, he like understands the entire thing. It's all in his head. Uh, and, but the idea was, how do you maintain culture?

• 5:16Speaker 01

  How do you, you know, what makes Apple, Apple? And how do you sort of keep that going? And my number one chief concern, which I think remains the biggest problem with something like that, is once you start writing that sort of stuff down, you're gonna get a certain level like sort of ossification and like, it, that becomes rigid and you don't sort of change over time. And predictably, I think Apple University in the soon years, it's still around as like a brand name, but it's like an HR program. It's like you could do these like cool classes and trainings and stuff like that. I think there is still the what makes Apple, Apple sort of presentation and, um, and, which is fine, you know, like, Apple is a massive company and there's real value way larger than when I was there.

• 6:01Speaker 01

  Like I was there in 2010, like, like, and it already felt bad, I can't remember how much bigger we are than a few years ago. Now it's like multiple times the size and there's value in, you just sort of have to preach to the troops, right? Like, this is what the company is, but the fact that it's rigid and ossifying is just a fact of life when you're sort of as large as that may be.

• 6:24Speaker 00

  Mm-hmm.

• 6:25Speaker 01

  The other issue that I had when I was there was, there were a few people, I think particularly my direct manager, that I thought had drunk just a bit too much Kool-Aid. Like they're, like, Apple could do no wrong and they were, Apple came out with some absurd product when I was there. I want to say it's some sort of like fancy charger. I don't know, someone go back in 2010, what was the most ridiculous product Apple released that year? This person bought it first day and it was like raining about it. I'm like, relax. It's not, it's really not that big of a deal. Uh, it's like.

• 7:01Speaker 00

  Was it, was it a bad product or just a mundane product?

• 7:04Speaker 01

  It was just a mundane product. I want to say it was like a battery charger or something. Uh, I can't remember what it was. That, it's sort of vaguely.

• 7:11Speaker 00

  But this manager was all in.

• 7:13Speaker 01

  Well, but that was, that was sort of pervasive and it was a bit of a wake-up call for me because I was definitely an Apple fanboy. And I got my, I wasn't a lifelong Mac user. I had been a ticker, building my old PCs and I finally got a Mac in around 2004, I think it was. I wanted to play with GarageBand, uh, like I was, I love music and, and it was like, seemed super approachable and easy. It was so great. Like, and the experience was so good. I was sick of dealing with Windows stuff, like, does this work? Drivers troubleshooting? It just worked. Like all the cliches were there and then on layered on top of that, you had this incredible

• 7:52Speaker 01

  story, Steve Jobs leaving, coming back, beautiful design, they're top of the world in the 2000s, a very easy and attractive sort of train to hop on. And going to Kellogg, uh, business school, Windows rules the roost, which it still does. Excel and Windows is still much better than anything else. But like, I was the, I think I was the head, I think I created like the Mac Club or something like that. Like, how do you actually like use a Mac in business school? Much tougher back then than it used to be now, like, and like.

• 8:23Speaker 00

  Let's work together. Pool all our nerd impulses here, sure.

• 8:27Speaker 01

  Right, but it, but the Apple nerd was like a specific type of nerd. It was like, no, we're a nerd that actually cares about design. Like, like we're, we're not, we're making fun of the people obsessed with speeds and speeds.

• 8:39Speaker 00

  The Apple nerd was a particularly insufferable brand of nerd way back when.

• 8:43Speaker 01

  Absolutely. You know what? And I wore it with pride. So, uh, that, that was, so that was, it's like, I remember I went to Apple University and it was a bit of a wake-up call, like, um.

• 8:53Speaker 01

  Actually decided by, and I'm glad I did this because I don't, people have gone to business. It's like this very, I think it's filtered down to undergrad now at this point. Everyone's just thinking about what's my job, what's my job, what's my job? And it's like this very sort of dystopian FOMO sort of environment. But I, but before I finished at Apple University, I told someone, I do not want to come back here to work. Even though I thought I had my dream job, like not only was my dream to work at Apple, but also I was doing like strategy, like, uh, like all these sorts of things that are at least adjacent to that. I wasn't actually doing Apple strategy, but I was like, I was actually interacting with Apple executives. Like we were actually talking like particularly the

• 9:32Speaker 00

  Also a pretty good company to join in 2010, if we're looking backward.

• 9:36Speaker 01

  Oh, for sure. Yeah. I'm probably much richer, uh, but, but there was

• 9:39Speaker 00

  Cost yourself some money with that decision.

• 9:40Speaker 01

  Well, I'd say the with Microsoft to be honest as well, but, uh, but the, um, but what it bothered me at the time, I'm like, I feel this has been an amazing summer. I've learned very deeply and fundamentally how Apple works, I think, in a very tangible way. That augmented things that I'd known before. And also there would be no value to me intellectually to come back here. And actually I would worry, I'm just be becoming a member of the choir. Like preaching to the choir is not useful. I actually want to learn new things. Uh, I rationalized or framed my going to Microsoft above and beyond. They, they actually gave me a job, which was great. Let's go somewhere totally different, the exact opposite. I think that actually did play out and turn out.

• 10:24Speaker 01

  And, and so all that to say, that's a long dystopian story.

• 10:29Speaker 00

  No, but an interesting personal history. I'm not mad at it. So where are we today?

• 10:34Speaker 01

  I've been waiting for years for this touchscreen MacBook Pro. Uh, I actually think touchscreens are cool. I was at Microsoft when they were first coming out. Uh, they're surprisingly useful in ways you wouldn't expect. OLED screens are amazing, like the, you know, if you've seen like the Dell XPS.

• 10:52Speaker 00

  They're so amazing that every time I see a new OLED screen, I just want to buy the product. Like the new iPads, the new iPad mini, the MacBook, like all, I want all of it.

• 11:01Speaker 01

  And then Mark German comes out and says, not only is the long awaited MacBook Pro with an OLED screen, OLED touchscreen coming out, it's also significantly lighter because they completely reworked it, all these sorts of things. Like this has been the computer I've been dreaming about, like for years and years and years and years. And, um, I don't think I'm gonna buy one.

• 11:25Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 11:26Speaker 01

  Maybe I'll buy one eventually, but I'm gonna wait and see. I have a bunch of Mac minis that I've accumulated from like channels and things like that. The experience, as I wrote about that article of operating a headless Mac mini is so bad. It's like, it's one of the biggest pain points in my life. Like, sorry, that overstates it, but in my computing life, I bought a, I spent a significant amount of money buying a new server that runs Linux.

• 11:51Speaker 00

  Will run on Linux. Yep.

• 11:52Speaker 01

  Uh, there's this whole thing like the, you know, David Heinrichsen, this whole movement. And I'm like, Omar G Linux. I don't know Omar G. I can't remember what it is. I'm, I don't know if that's the answer, but what I know is I, the future for me is denominated by agents. Like in the, the level of capability it gives you, the things you can do. And for me, every new thing that I can do makes me want to do 10 more things. Like what, like you see, we talked about the holes in your life, that software sized holes. There's like, once you start seeing them, you see them everywhere and you can fix them. You can get them done right now. And it, it is, I'm so excited and enthusiastic about it.

• 12:32Speaker 01

  And I feel a twinge of regret, like I got over my love for Apple in part by being there, in part by writing about them. There's a, when you write about tech, it's kind of like you talk to people who write about sports teams. They kind of, one of the sad effects

• 12:47Speaker 00

  Demystifies it. Sure. Yeah.

• 12:49Speaker 01

  You kind of end up not really being a sports fan. I think you've done a pretty good job, like Bill Simmons. This is actually what an underrated thing Bill Simmons has done. Is somehow he's been in sports media for 30 years, 40 years, and he still is a diehard fan.

• 13:04Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 13:04Speaker 01

  Because you talk to a lot of people who, you talk, your favorite podcaster that covers your local team. If you talk to them in person, they don't really care if they win or lose.

• 13:15Speaker 00

  Totally. It's a real skill, being able to manufacture the enthusiasm year after year, decade after decade, and your Apple enthusiasm has waned over the years.

• 13:27Speaker 01

  Oh, no, dead completely. Not, and not in a, I bought a bunch of Macs because I understood Mac OS very, very well. I was, my workflows were very highly attuned to it. I knew exactly what I did. I don't like messing around with that. And, but it was, it for years I've been an opera, uh, like an OS version behind. I, you know, I dread buying a new computer because it's such a pain to set up a new one, right? Like the, it, it's the, but then also just covering a company. I'm not cheering for any of these companies. I'm trying to analyze them as best that I can. But there is a bit, I was deep down in my soul, way down there. If you peel off all the layers, there is an Apple fanboy.

• 14:09Speaker 01

  And this is, it's not a company for me anymore. And that doesn't mean they're doing wrong. It's just, it's not you, it's me.

• 14:20Speaker 00

  Fair enough. Well, and the thing is they still make incredible hardware and make it at an unbelievable scale and deliver it to millions and millions of people all over the world.

• 14:31Speaker 01

  I, my, my, we're recording or I, all my stuff's wired up to my MacBook Pro.

• 14:35Speaker 00

  I know. Everybody on this podcast is using a Mac for everything.

• 14:38Speaker 01

  I can't wait for the, or two. And so just to be clear, this isn't an Apple is doomed. I'm throwing up the air. I'm not doing the like, I'm going Omar G or whatever, or like, like I, I actually love Linux. I, I, once you have an AI agent with Linux, it's unbelievable. Like, yeah, like the command line is perfect. It's great. Um, the, so no, this isn't a, it's more the, am I going to buy this new computer? I'm going to think about it a little bit, you know, maybe I'll get it.

• 15:05Speaker 00

  Sure.

• 15:06Speaker 01

  Um, but

• 15:07Speaker 00

  But also a willingness to explore other options that hasn't been there for most people um, over the last 10 or 15 years is interesting and is a shift. And I think there's a dispassionate respect for Apple, but also mounting frustrations with various aspects of being an Apple user. I will however, return to my initial question as the host of the podcast. Will Apple's changes affect me or just people who are hardcore users like you? Because what I've been worried about, it seems to me, Apple could restrict access in various ways and degrade what's possible for various AI applications that we want to use over the next five to 10 years.

• 15:50Speaker 00

  And they could do so in the name of security, in the name of protecting data, whatever it might be, all of which would also help Apple maintain control and Apple's own primacy. And I mean, going back to the very early innings of OpenAI and their hardware experiment with Johnny Ive, that was one of the animating concerns that made that idea potentially not crazy. So are we worried about them potentially doing that to Macs going forward? And changing the way agents operate on our computers? Or is that not really what the issue is? Okay.

• 16:25Speaker 01

  No, 100%. I mean, so they've been going down this road for a while, not with agents in mind, just in general. Like I've been complaining about this for a very long time. This isn't a new complaint. I've brought up the headless Mac, these stupid permission dialogues that come up that, and like they all, there's a reason for them. Like apps were, can abuse sort of the access that they have. If you brought up a, a permission dialogue that can be accessed via software, then malware could just click okay for you. Like there's a, there's a reason why it's completely separated such that the agents on my computer don't know, stuff's just not working. They don't know why. Oh, gotta log in.

• 17:09Speaker 01

  Yep, there it is. There's a dialogue. By the way, Golden Gate, way worse, way more dialogues. It's a big pain in the rear end. Uh, the, um, oh, by the way, I have a, uh, sort of additional complaint.

• 17:20Speaker 00

  Okay.

• 17:21Speaker 01

  So I updated, I'm like, I maybe all we have updated all the way. Um, if you update a headless Mac, even if you have the permission set that on restart, it should automatically log in, which is kind of essential because you don't want to have to go to a login screen for this computer.

• 17:36Speaker 00

  Headless Mac? Sure.

• 17:37Speaker 01

  Uh, once you update Golden Gate, it does not log in automatically. You have to go in and you have to like physically log in or have a KVM switch.

• 17:46Speaker 00

  Okay.

• 17:46Speaker 01

  Which by the way, that's why I didn't have checked, apply updates automatically. Now I think that doesn't cover Completely new OS is like, I think it's because you went to Golden Gate. It was a major upgrade, but I don't know for sure. I didn't want to risk it, so I just checked. Update security patches. Now, the other thing I want to add.

• 18:06Speaker 00

  Okay.

• 18:07Speaker 01

  It's my fault I got hacked. I had 5900 port 5900 open. That was dumb. There, there, there's. So I, I do take full responsibility, but there's. We were in this weird middle ground where Apple is so insistent on taking care of security on my behalf. That I let my guard down. I let my guard down and trusted they were sort of taking care of it. Like when I have a Linux computer, I'm super diligent. I think very carefully about how that, like the security there, because I know I'm on the hook. Right? There, there's this enabling aspect to using Apple's stuff where they're so insistent. It's kind of like a codependent relationship. Like let us take care of it. We will do it.

• 18:52Speaker 01

  Don't worry, we got it. I'm like, okay, fine. I'll, I'll, I'll leave the port open. Like I'm sure you'll take care of it. You'll update it. And then like, right? And so.

• 19:01Speaker 00

  And what's interesting to me as a normie is it is indivisible from the Apple value proposition. When you look at how much better the Apple computers have worked than PC, well than Windows over the last 20 years. Like it is a night and day experience from what I remember. Maybe Windows has gotten better. I haven't felt the need to try because Apple just works and is more secure from a virus standpoint and everything else than anything I experienced previously.

• 19:31Speaker 01

  Yeah. And I think the brilliant thing about the position of the back, just to go back to that, that program article that I cited, is it also was a Unix workstation. Like you had the command line, you had full access to the entire toolset that, you know, back in the day before we got like containers and things like that. Like it was the closest thing you could get to working in the same environment that was up in the server. Like it was the perfect developer machine. So they were in this sweet spot of being the perfect developer slash hacker machine and also being the best machine for normies. And what's happened over the last few years is as they have leaned more and more into the best machine for normies.

• 20:13Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 20:14Speaker 01

  Which I like trying to make it more and more like an iPhone or an iPad and adding in all these sort of protections and permissions dialogues and all these sorts of things. It is making it worse and worse for a hacker or a developer or anyone who wants to use it sort of the way I want to use it. And that's where it's not you, it's me. I don't want to go down the normie road. I'm so excited about this other road. And I just don't think Apple serves both anymore. There, and I don't know that it's possible to serve both anymore. And if it's possible, Apple's not doing it.

• 20:49Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 20:49Speaker 01

  And that's why, and it's, it just, it is what it is. It's not, it's not 2004 anymore.

• 20:55Speaker 00

  There you go. Uh, well, you mentioned this other news that we had with Apple. Mark Gurman reported, Apple's upcoming push into smart home devices will include a doorbell, thermostat and other accessories developed through an unusual partnership with LG. The products will be part of an ecosystem of devices that work with Apple's new smart home hub, as well as an upgraded HomePod Mini and fresh TV set top box, according to people with knowledge of the matter. And Gurman on Twitter added, the accessories are meant to outfit Apple's major new smart home ecosystem, all with Siri AI at the center.

• 21:34Speaker 00

  Um, as a normie, let me just say, I don't, like, none of that sounds appealing to me. And I don't know whether I'm crazy, but I don't want a smartphone, a smart home. I don't want more stuff in my life that is connected to the internet, more appliances. I don't want any of these AI assistants, like even the charms don't really have that much appeal to me. Am I wrong for feeling that way? Are you excited by the possibilities here? Is there upside that I'm leaving on the table?

• 22:04Speaker 01

  I love this approach by Apple and I kind of wish I had known about this before I wrote my article because it really is the counter. The counterpoint to what I was trying to express. I think my article comes across as too negative to Apple.

• 22:17Speaker 00

  Mm hmm.

• 22:18Speaker 01

  When what I was trying to describe is there is a, that moment when a Mac was great for hackers and great for normie people was a weird moment in time.

• 22:30Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 22:30Speaker 01

  The actual expectation is there's sort of two paths for computing. I am so excited about this one path of writing software for everything.

• 22:40Speaker 00

  On the frontier.

• 22:41Speaker 01

  Yeah. Like, and getting a 3D printer and getting sort of like soldering circuit boards and like all this, there's so much stuff. The number of ideas I have.

• 22:52Speaker 00

  Man, let's do it.

• 22:53Speaker 01

  So vastly outweighs my time to do them. And yet even then, because of AI, I've accomplished so many cool things in the last few months that it just, it blows my mind. And so I'm so all the way down this path and that, that path doesn't include Apple products. Just like that's not, because it's an insecure path. It's a dangerous path. It's a risky path. It's a fun path. That's the path I want to go down. That's not Apple's value prop anymore. And that's, oh, that's okay.

• 23:21Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 23:22Speaker 01

  The other path is, the reason to do all this stuff is a lot of stuff is actually pretty great. Like having an actual, like, a lot of the smartphone, smart home concepts are really good concepts. The reason you don't want to do it is your assumption that it just all sucks and it's going to be a pain and actually make your life more difficult.

• 23:43Speaker 00

  Like I have an LG television that insists on connecting to the internet. You finally told me, just disconnect it from the internet because I just want it to be a TV. I don't want it to be constantly updating its software and hitting me with all these different prompts. Just, it's a phenomenal TV. Best TV I've ever owned.

• 24:01Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 24:02Speaker 00

  And the issue is that the software is a pain in the ass and it doesn't need to be a connected device.

• 24:09Speaker 01

  Right. And so I, that is, all those are, right now, the smart home ecosystem stinks. I have a bunch of stuff. It kind of works together, like my wife, it just drives her up the wall. She can't stand any of it. I'm totally sympathetic to that. And like, this was my concern about like Apple's announcing a new home device. And I put in Monday's article, not really excited about this because the whole ecosystem stinks. The only way I think to get the ecosystem to work is you have to do it yourself. You write all the software, you get your agent to work and then like you'll get this experience that's sort of like bespoke and custom to you, but also super cool, which is not like.

• 24:49Speaker 00

  Nobody's going to do that.

• 24:50Speaker 01

  I do it because it's fun.

• 24:51Speaker 00

  A 10 of a percent. Yeah.

• 24:52Speaker 01

  Yeah. 100%. And then this announcement drops about all these devices. I'm like, aha, actually really smart. Hmm. If there's two paths, it follows those two paths should kind of be the most opposite they can be.

• 25:08Speaker 00

  Mm hmm.

• 25:08Speaker 01

  Such that if one makes sense, kind of the exact opposite also makes sense. If one path is hack everything, write your own custom software for everything, do it all yourself. The other path is let Apple do everything. The reason why the, the smart home stuff stinks is everyone's trying to, I'm going to do the core piece, like the Google Home thing or the Amazon thing, or whatever Apple is going to propose. And then we're going to have an ecosystem where developers can plug in and do all their bits and pieces. And the problem is there's a lowest common denominator problem here. Like you're, this, no one else does it, does it well enough, does it good enough?

• 25:51Speaker 01

  We tolerate bad apps on our phone. When it comes to having a bad thermostat, you're like going to throttle someone. It's like, like that, it's just a different. And so the opposite of wanting to hack everything is trusting one company to do everything. It's like the Microsoft approach to enterprise software. Like that, for a lot of businesses, it has always made sense just by all the Microsoft stuff. It might be kind of mediocre. It might not be as good as best of breed, but it all kind of has to work together.

• 26:25Speaker 00

  Interoperable, which has also been an Apple specialty.

• 26:28Speaker 01

  If it doesn't work, you know who to blame. All right. One throat to choke. This makes tons of sense for Apple. The opposite path from me is the Apple does it all path. And it doubles down on their commitment to privacy. Like the LG thing, LG TV is spy on you. Like I trust if Apple's in charge of the LG thing, that's not going to happen. Like they actually have a critical, credible sort of a story to tell there. I don't want to integrate third party software. The end of the day, I don't want an app for my thermostat. If there's an app for these thermostats, they've failed. What I want is to tell Siri to turn the temperature down, set X, Y, Z. That's how, there's like this whole middle layer.

• 27:12Speaker 01

  Applications have been this middle layer that is going away for almost everything outside of like where they make a ton of sense. Like if there's an app for your smart device, it's probably going to suck. I want direct from AI to the hardware. And you're only going to get that number one, if you do it yourself, or number two, if one company does it all.

• 27:31Speaker 00

  Integrated. Yeah.

• 27:33Speaker 01

  That's, that's Apple's value proposition. Do it all. Now, this is second party. They're not making their own thermostat, but I think it's a middle ground that potentially makes sense.

• 27:45Speaker 00

  Okay.

• 27:45Speaker 01

  Apple are going to stand behind these, put them in their store, be on the hook for making sure their software works for it. I can see that path. Now we'll see if it works, but it makes a lot of sense to me.

• 27:57Speaker 00

  Rational and coherent. Okay. Yes. Well, and to Apple's credit, going back to you and your Apple nerd club at business school, they do still make elegant products and well-designed products. And so I'm sure this will be cool. I just don't personally feel like I need it, but maybe that's because I just haven't experienced what a good version of this could look like with a smart home. But keeping it moving, another Apple initiative that we have not discussed at all on the podcast. Rahim says, hi guys. Ben recently said he wasn't interested in the iPhone Duo as he mostly uses his iPhone one-handed and that the current form factor suits him well.

• 28:38Speaker 00

  Isn't the whole point of technology to see what new use cases a new form factor might unlock? With an iPhone Duo, you get an iPad-esque experience in places you've never had it before. Waiting rooms, the food court, your kids' baseball games. Yes, even on the can. Is Ben making the same mistake as Aswath Damodaran made with valuing Uber? Not accounting for the new rides that would take place now that a convenient service such as Uber existed. P S, if Ben got a Duo and shared it and shared his experience, it would help those of us on the fence justify spending the astronomical $2,000 on the iPhone Duo or 3K for those of us in Canada.

• 29:22Speaker 00

  Any thoughts on Rahim's push to get you on the Duo bandwagon?

• 29:26Speaker 01

  Yeah. This is a ridiculous email for lots of reasons. Um, number one, as a note, I should have noted this. I was like, oh, Apple didn't raise prices that much. Um, Apple raised prices like crazy all over the world. Like, uh, so in Taiwan, the iPhone Duo is going to be like $500 more than it is in the US or $400 more, something like that. And, and I think that's the case in lots of places. Um, number two, uh, the, this comparison.

• 29:52Speaker 00

  To Uber. All right. And that is the end of the free preview. If you'd like to hear more from Ben and I, there are links to subscribe in the show notes, or you can also go to sharp tech.fm. Either option will get you access to a personalized feed that has all the shows we do every week, plus lots more great content from Strategery and the Strategery Plus bundle. Check it out. And if you've got feedback, please email us at email at sharp tech.fm.