receive to our weekly Apple Breakfast column , which admit all the Apple news program you neglect last workweek in a handy insect bite - sized roundup . We call it Apple Breakfast because we imagine it move great with a Monday morning cup of java or tea , but it ’s coolheaded if you require to give it a read during lunch or dinner party hour too .
Folding money
As we approach the end of 2023 , it ’s hard to escape the feeling that it ’s been a dull twelvemonth for Apple fans . We did n’t get a springiness event , the Modern iPhones and Apple Watches were workmanlike retreads of sometime products , and the most interesting announcement was for a product that wo n’t arrive until some point in 2024 . As for the iPad , it did n’t get a new model all year , the first time that ’s happened since the product first launched in 2010 .
There should be new iPads before long , of course , but hopes of radical risk - pickings were smash by the news last week that Apple does n’t plan to relinquish a folding tabletanytime before long . alternatively , the ship’s company will focalize on equipping its integral iPad range , start of course with the Pro models , with OLED screens . Now , I ’m not saying this is a bad melodic theme : OLED , indeed , is a big deal that could be agame - changerfor the iPad . But it ’s certainly not an announcement that will dispel the sensation that Apple has grown cautious .
The company has n’t always been this way . It start up out as the 1970s equivalent of what we would now call a disruptor , throw out received wiseness and frequently making — and then back up — la-di-da title about its products . In a famous financial statement of intent , Steve Jobs declared that he ’d rather be a plagiarist than conjoin the Navy .
As lately as 2016 , Apple boasted of the “ braveness ” it took to take away the iPhone ’s earphone diddly-shit , and while that word seemed a little giddy at the time , it was n’t exclusively undeserved . In that casing and others ( such as the remotion of headphones and charger from iPhone packaging ) Apple did what it feel was the correct thing with the full knowledge that it would first be unpopular , then memed within an column inch of its aliveness , and finally copied by rivals who would get a fraction of the unfavorable judgment .
When you ’re the biggest ship’s company in the world , you should be unforced to take a few risk , but often it works the other way around , with the massive tax income at stake pushing the minds of executive down a more conservative path . Apple presumably thinks of a folding iPad as a potential disaster — what if the flexible joint mechanism goes wrong and videos of it get out go viral on social media?—rather than what it really is : a way of breathing Modern life into a product that has grown moth-eaten . The iPad ’s cock-a-hoop problem is that it does n’t have any serious rivals , which pushes the maker into a mindset where simply releasing fractionally upgraded models will be enough to hoover up vast measure of Johnny Cash . deplorably , as fiscal reports on a regular basis show , customers do n’t agree , and many would rather purchase no Modern pad at all than one that has n’t changed in any tangible way from the one they already own .
I will admit at this compass point , perhaps polemically , that foldables have never quite advance me over , and that high prices and footle doubts about lastingness have always put me off . Is a folding model the proper fashion to quicken the iPad ’s fortunes ? I genuinely do n’t experience – although I do lean to think that if anyone can do foldables correctly , it ’s Apple . The main matter that worry me about this tidings , however , is what it enjoin about Apple ’s wider outlook , which is all about nullify potential misunderstanding rather than taking hazard by building something exciting . At this item , I ’d rather see a few interesting failure than yet more reasonable but punishingly muted successes .
metalworks
The iPhone 15 was abig deal in 2023butthese three moveswere even bigger .
How theBeep(er)is Apple to blame for Android’slatest iMessage suffering ?
We round up5 awe-inspiring WhatsApp featuresthat Apple needs tobring to iMessage .
Apple promised to delivernext - gen CarPlayin 2023.Will it get here on time ?
Wanna seesomething cool ? Try thisawesome AI featurebuilt right into the iPhone .
Podcast of the week
With 2023 come to a close it ’s time to take a spirit back at theyear for Apple . What were the highlights ? What were the letdowns ? And what about those time that surprise us ?
you could catch every sequence of the Macworld Podcast onSpotify , Soundcloud , thePodcasts app , orour own site .
Reviews corner
The rumor mill
Here are3 reasonswhy anOLED screenwill be a plot - modifier for the iPad Pro .
Thebig - screen iPad Airwe may or may not need is apparentlyclose to launching .
leave theM3 , Apple is already eyeing2 nm chips for 2025 .
LeakediPhone 16 ‘ prototypes’point to possible restitution ofvertical tv camera layout .
composition : Apple is willing to open upaccess to NFC paymentsin the EU .
Software updates, bugs, and problems
Here ’s why you shoulddrop everythingandinstall iOS 17.2 properly now .
If you just kick upstairs tomacOS Sonoma , disenable this settingimmediately .
you may nowdiagnose iPhone and Mac problemswithout move to anApple Store .
Applebegins genus Beta testingformacOS Sonoma 14.3 .
