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Apple is more than just the iPhone manufacturer. This $2 trillion company's decisions impact many facets of technology, financials, and everyday life. When the company is rumored to be getting into something new, the entire world pays attention. And since 1997, AppleInsider has been covering this fascinating electronics maker from every possible angle. From details of the next-generation iPhone and MacBook to key indicators expected to drive the company’s stock price, AppleInsider Daily has you completely covered on a daily basis.
Welcome to the AppleInsider Daily podcast for Wednesday, February 14th, 20-24. I'm Charles Martin, and we begin today with ... Valentine’s Day!
Wednesday is Valentine’s Day around the world, whereas for some people Thursday is Deeply Discounted Chocolate Day — but no matter how your Wednesday or Thursday is going, Apple has tried to set a mood with two new discovery-style Apple Music stations — one for Love, and one for Heartbreak. As with some of its other algorthmically-powered stations, each one will play you a mix of songs you've heard before on the appropriate theme, along with some songs Apple thinks you'll like. Listeners need an Apple Music subscription to listen to them, but at least the monthly cost is less than a bouquet of roses.
But perhaps some artwork is more your style to express your feelings, and Apple has also got you covered there. Researchers at the company have developed an app called Keyframer, a test generative AI app that lets users describe both an idea for an image, and then how it wants the image to be animated.
The developers have published a research paper on the topic, called “Empowering Animation Design Using Large Language Models.” Keyframer is not yet public, but uses an innovative iterative dialog model, where the initial idea for an image is written out, and once the image is generated, users can continue the dialogue, suggesting additions or removal of elements and how to move them.
A small group of professional animators involved in testing the app expressed a mixture of admiration for what Keyframer could do, along with some anxiety about their own job security in a humorous way. Adobe’s Firefly AI is an available app that works sort of in the same way, but is limited in its prompting by comparison.
In Quick Notes, people retire from Apple after long and successful careers all the time, but we thought we’d mention one notable one: Bart Andre has been part of the design team at Apple since 1992, and is preparing to leave the company, presumably into retirement, after 32 years of service.
Andre was one of Ive’s top lieutenants, and has been in a leadership role in the team since the departure of Evans Hankey in 2023. He’s certainly seen a lot of changes, and been involved in a lot of products over the decades, and we wish him well with whatever he does next.
In rumour news, a code reference in the latest beta of tvOS 17.4 has turned up a new product codename not previously seen, Zed-314. Because the referenced device would be running tvOS, which both the hardware box and the HomePods use for their operating system, it’s notable that the beta includes SwiftUI frameworks, as well as a debugging tool used in iOS apps.
These clues have led to speculation that a long-rumoured future HomePod with a small screen may finally be in the works, running an A15 Bionic chip. It is imagined that such a device could live up even more fully to the name “HomePod” by providing smart-home control functions, among other possible functions. We’ll have to wait and see if anything actually develops from this tantalizing teaser.
Speaking of “wait and see,” the former head of sports for Apple TV+, Pete Distad, is now in the running to become the CEO of an as-yet-unnamed sports streaming network that will combine efforts in those areas by ESPN, Fox, and Warner. Distad left Apple in May 2023 and according to his LinkedIn profile, has not accepted another position since then.
While at Apple, Distad helped secure the 10-year, $2.2 billion dollar deal with Major League Soccer for Apple TV+. The new streaming sports network will allegedly bring 14 sports networks under one roof, and is predicted to cost around $50 per month, covering a little over half of all US sports rights.
In other tech news, for Linux fans we have the news that the ah-SA-hee Linux project for Apple Silicon Macs has added support for OpenGL 4.6 and OpenGL ES 3.2, surpassing Apple’s current support level. This is big news for those using graphics-intensive apps like Blender, Ryujinx, and Citra, particularly in the jump from Apple’s support OpenGL 4.1 to OpenGL 4.6. The group says it will work on bringing Vulkan, a graphics engine like Metal, to Apple Silicon Macs.
In Apple Vision Pro news, Meta’s Mark Zuckerberg has tried out the Apple Vision Pro, and believes his own Meta Quest 3 is the better product, to the surprise of absolutely nobody. He’s right in some ways, of course, starting with price. For starters, it’s way cheaper — and Zuck has had years of lead time to build an immersive content library, so he’s got a point on that front as well. Funny that he didn’t mention the relative levels of data collection between the Quest and and the Vision Pro, though.
The Meta Quest 3 also weighs a good deal less, and doesn’t require an external battery because the battery is right there strapped to your head. AppleInsider’s own Andrew O’Hara has done a video with a … let’s say *less biased* … comparison of the two headsets, so head over to AppleInsider’s YouTube channel to see Andrew’s pros and cons of each headset.
Speaking of deception by omission, Amazon has definitely made its customers aware that they are hiking the price of the Prime Video service if you want to keep it ad-free, and that has already set off a storm of protest. What the company didn’t mention, however, is that in addition to putting ads into a service you are already paying for, you’ll also be losing Dolby Vision HDR support as well as Dolby Atmos surround sound unless you pony up the extra $3 per month for the ad-free tier, reports The Verge.
Of course, most Prime Video viewers are Amazon Prime members, which costs $15 a month or $139 per year, but you can subscribe to Prime Video by itself for $10 a month for the ad tier, or $13 a month for the ad-free, Dolby vision and sound tier. Apple TV+, by comparison, costs $10 a month — the same as Amazon’s ad-riddled, lo-fi tier — but has never had ads and includes Dolby technologies and 4K resolution. Just sayin’.
Finally for today, a 22-year-old bug that still isn’t squashed. It turns out there has been an audio balance bug that has been around for an astonishing 22 years -- since the days of the Powerbook G3 -- and has lasted longer at Apple than of its chief executives, except -- barely -- Steve Jobs himself.
Basically, the bug allows the left-right stereo balance can "wander" on Macs when listening on headphones. AppleInsider readers first reported the issue to us back in 2002, and a user going by Fabian on X/Twitter pointed out yesterday that it's still not fixed, meaning he has to use a free app called Balance Lock -- which itself is coming up on a decade of service -- to correct the problem.
We should point out that Rogue Amoeba's Soundsource app also fixes the issue, but it is a paid app with plenty of additional features like support for plug-ins and an EQ, and fine control over sound inputs and outputs, with separate volume, balance, and output controls for specific apps, just as an example. The point, though, is that Apple could perhaps celebrate its 22nd anniversary and finally fix the bug before the year is out ... please?
You can hear more news and analysis from AppleInsider on the WEEKLY AppleInsider podcast that’s out every Friday, as well as our HomeKitInsider podcast that's out every Monday -- links to both shows are in the notes for this one.
If you would like to support the AppleInsider Daily podcast, we are now accepting sponsorships. Contact information can be found in the show notes.
I've been Charles Martin, and THIS has been the AppleInsider Daily podcast for Wednesday, February 14th, 20-24. Thank you for listening