Last year, I reviewed an app called Deliveries that makes it easy to keep track of packages that you sent or that you should be receiving. Like most Amazon Prime members, I buy lots of items on Amazon, and I’ve been using the Deliveries app almost every week since I reviewed it last year, not only for Amazon but also with other online retailers. This week, the app was updated to version 7, which adds lots of new features. For example, you can now select a tracking number in an email and add it directly to the Deliveries app from within the Mail app, making it faster and easier to add items to the app. And if you have an iPhone 6s or iPhone 6s Plus, you can use 3D Touch actions to press lightly on an item to get more details. It’s a nice update to an already great app, and since I suspect that lots of iPhone J.D. readers buy items online, I encourage you to check it out if you don’t have the app yet. Click here to get Deliveries ($4.99): And now, the news of note from the past week.
Ed Silverstein of Legaltech News talked to me and a few other attorneys about iPhone sales in 2016.
Farhad Manjoo of the New York Times explains that, even though some analysts had hoped for more from Apple’s earnings call this week, Apple is doing just fine.
And finally, there is a new solitaire game on the App Store from an unlikely app developer, former Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld. The app is called Churchill Solitaire, and it is based on the version of solitaire that Winston Churchill used to play. In an article on Medium, Rumsfeld explains why he decided to develop an app at age 83. After Obama leaves office, I wonder if he or any of his cabinet members will create iOS apps? Here is a video showing off the game:
Yesterday, Apple released the results for its 2016 fiscal first quarter (which ran from September 27, 2015 to December 26, 2015, and did not actually include any days from calendar year 2016) and held a call with analysts to discuss the results. This is typically Apple's best quarter of the year because of holiday sales. It was actually Apple's best quarter ever, with revenue of $75.9 billion (compared to $74.6 billion one year ago and $57.6 billion two years ago) and record quarterly net profit of $18.4 billion (compared to $18 billion this time last year and $31.1 billion two years ago). Apple also set a new record for iPhone sales.
If you want to get all of the nitty gritty details, you can download the audio from the announcement conference call from iTunes, or you can read a rough transcript of the call prepared by Seeking Alpha, or Serenity Caldwell and Jason Snell prepared an almost verbatim transcript of the call that is posted on iMore. Apple's official press release is here. As always, however, I'm not as concerned about the financial details as I am the statements of Apple executives during the call that are of interest to iPhone and iPad users. Here are the items that stood out to me:
iPhone
During the past quarter, Apple sold 74.779 million iPhones, the most that Apple has ever sold in a fiscal quarter. It just barely beat the previous record, which was set this time last year when Apple sold 74.5 million iPhones. Remember that it wasn't that long ago (fiscal 2011) that Apple sold 72.21 million iPhones in a full year, and now the company is selling more than that in a single quarter, for two years in a row.
By my count, as of December 26, 2015, Apple had sold over 896 million iPhones since they first went on sale in 2007. It looks like at some point in 2016, Apple will sell its 1 billionth iPhone. Apple said yesterday that it now has an active user base of 1 billion devices, which is the total number of iPhone, iPad, Mac, iPod touch, Apple TV, and Apple Watch devices that have been engaged with Apple's services within the past 90 days.
Regarding the record number of iPhones sold last quarter, Apple CEO Tim Cook said yesterday: "To put that volume into perspective, it's an average of over 34,000 iPhones an hour, 24 hours a day, seven days a week for 13 straight weeks. It's almost 50 percent more than our Q1 volume just two years ago, and more than four times our volume five years ago."
Cook talked about the number of iPhone buyers who were switching from Android, and said that he was "blown away by the level of Android switchers that we had last quarter. It was the highest ever by far, and so we see that as a huge opportunity."
According to a recent customer survey survey by a third party (451 Research), there is a 99% customer satisfaction rate for the iPhone 6s and iPhone 6s Plus.
Apple CFO Luca Maestri said that there is a strong demand for iPhone among business users. "Among corporate buyers planning to purchase smartphones in the March quarter, 451 Research found that 79% planned to purchase iPhones. That is the highest iPhone purchase intent in the eight year history of the survey."
iPad
iPad sales have not been increasing like the iPhone. In the past quarter. Apple sold just over 16 million iPads, compared to just over 21 million this time last year. I thought that demand for the new iPad Pro might result in more iPad sales this quarter, although I know that they were in limited supply.
By my count, as of December 26, 2015, Apple had sold 308 million iPads since they first went on sale in 2010.
Masestri said yesterday: "Recent data from NPD indicates that iPad has 85% share of the U.S. market of tablets priced above $200. And the latest data published by IDC indicates that iPad accounts for 67% of the U.S. commercial tablet market, comprising enterprise, government, and education."
Here is a chart showing iPhone and iPad sales to date, by fiscal quarter. The two highest columns in the chart illustrate that Apple sold approximately the same number of iPhones in this past quarter and in the year-ago quarter, but saw fewer iPad sales in this past quarter.
Etc.
Although it was a record quarter for Apple, Cook said that it would have been better but for the challenging economic conditions in many major markets including Brazil, Russia, Canada, Southeast Asia, Australia, Turkey and Europe. Two-thirds of Apple's revenue comes from outside of the United States, so Apple feels a hit when times are tight around the world.
Apple predicted that this upcoming quarter (the one that we are in now) will see less revenue than normal. In part, this is because of the economic conditions in other countries.
Cook said that there are now over 3,600 apps for the Apple TV.
The Apple Watch is now being sold at almost 12,000 locations in 48 countries. Apple didn't release specific numbers, but did say that it sold a record number of Apple Watches last quarter.
Of course, Apple wasn't going to announce any new products yesterday, but Cook did say that Apple is "continuing to invest without pause" in R&D and that Apple has "some great things in the pipeline."
Jason Snell of Six Colors notes that the Mac Plus had its 30th birthday this week. Although the Mac Plus debuted on January 16, 1986, it remained in production until October of 1990, making it the longest produced Mac ever. The Mac Plus was the first Apple product that I bought with my own money; I spent a few weeks after my Freshman year of college teaching at a workshop for high school debate students, and then in August of 1988 I used my earnings to buy a Mac Plus and 20MB external hard drive. (No, “20MB” is not a typo.) I was a little jealous of my roommate, who had a faster Mac SE/30, but I loved that Mac Plus and I used it until I was in law school. I’ve been a Mac user at my house ever since. And now, the news of note from the past week:
Massachusetts attorney Robert Ambrogi reviews Citrix ShareFile, a service that you can use to securely share documents. I use this service too in my law practice, and it has an app for iOS.
Zac Hall of 9to5Mac describes the latest update to Microsoft Office for iOS, which adds 3D touch actions for those who have the newest iPhones and adds an Apple Pencil ink function for those who have the iPad Pro.
Apple has been in the news latest for defending encryption of data on its devices, and it sometimes seems strange that Apple is the only tech company being vocal on this issue. Security expert Rich Mogull explains why Apple is in a unique position in an interesting article for TidBITS.
Apple has also been in the news for assembling its iPhone in China, especially when people like Donald Trump make idotic statements this week about getting Apple to instead assemble in the United States. John Gruber of Daring Fireball wrote a good article on why Apple assembles in China.
Joe White of WatchAware reviews an app called Complicate It that you can use to add text to the watch face of an Apple Watch. Sounds like a good way to save a reminder — the modern equivalent of a string around your finger — or have easy quick access to a number.
Joanna Stern of the Wall Street Journal reports that New York is replacing telephone booths with fast, free Wi-Fi. Her article gives you great tips for using public Wi-Fi, including using encryption and a VPN service such as Cloak (which I reviewed here). Her article is worth reading whether you are using free Wi-Fi in New York, an airport, or your local coffee shop.
Speaking of security, Daniel Taroy of Fast Company reports on the 25 most popular passwords of 2015. If you are using any password on that list, CHANGE IT CHANGE IT NOW NOW NOW.
And finally, if you play music — especially piano or guitar, although it works with other instruments too – Apple released a really cool, free app this week called Music Memos. The app gives you a place to quickly record a snippet of music, so that when you come up with a cool idea for a song you can record it, and then later can go back and hear it again. Of course, you could always just use the built-in Voice Memos app to record something, but Music Memos makes it even better by analyzing your music, determining the key and tempo, and then letting you tap a button to add a bass guitar and drums to give your musical idea a little more depth. I play piano, and I think this app is incredibly cool. Here is a great review of the app by David Pogue of Yahoo Tech — a tech reporter who used to be a Broadway conductor — and I’ve embedded below one of his videos showing how the app works. I love that Apple would release such a cool app for free, even though it probably don’t have a very large audience. But I know lots of attorneys who are also amateur musicians, so if you put yourself in that category, you’ll want to get this app right now. Click here to get Music Memos (free):
I’ve used and reviewed a larger number of styluses over the years, but this is the first time that I have reviewed a stylus since I started using the Apple Pencil with an iPad Pro. As I noted in my review, the Apple Pencil is far superior to any other stylus that I have tried, and while you could use another brand of stylus with the iPad Pro, I don’t recommend doing so. The iPad Pro and the Pencil are made to work together, and they work together incredibly well. But if you don’t have an iPad Pro and you want to use a stylus, then you still have lots of options. A few weeks ago, the developer of the Stilo stylus sent me a free review unit for me to check out, and I have been testing it for the last few weeks. It’s a very good stylus.
If you don’t use an iPad Pro and you are looking for a stylus, you’ll have to decide if you want a traditional stylus that doesn’t require power, or if you want an active stylus which uses power to send radio waves around its small tip to trick the iPad into thinking that something larger, the size of a fingertip, is touching the screen. I usually prefer a traditional stylus because it works 100% of the time; active styluses (other than the Apple Pencil) can have hiccups, and many models have trouble drawing diagonal lines. There are lots of great non-active styluses, but some of my favorites include the Adonit Jot Pro and the Wacom Bamboo Stylus duo. But active styluses have a lot going for them too, including incredibly small tips. If you are looking for an active stylus, then there is a lot to like about the Stilo. It has a fantastic tip, and it works pretty well — not perfect, but good enough, and it has fewer problems with diagonal lines than other active styluses do.
The Stilo has an interesting design. The barrel of the stylus is somewhat thick. It has to be to accommodate the single AAA battery inside. A button on the side turns the stylus on or off.
It comes in two colors: white and black. The developer first sent me a free review unit of the white model, but it didn’t work correctly. The developer than quickly sent me a black model, and it has been working great.
What makes this stylus stand out is its tip, which is long and thin. I’ve never used another stylus with this long, thin design, and I really like it. It makes it very easy to see the tip of the stylus as you are using it.
Maybe it was just an illusion, but that long tip made me feel like the Stilo was much more precise than other active styluses. It’s a nice feature.
The Stilo comes with a cap, to give additional protection to the tip of the stylus when you are not using it.
The tip of the stylus is 1.9 mm, which is very small enough to seem similar to a pen tip. I tested it with an iPad 3, iPad Air and iPad Air 2 and the performance was good, certainly as good as any other active stylus that I have tested. In other words, most of the time it worked great, but sometimes I would make a stroke and the iPad would miss it, so I’d have to make it again. It is also worth mentioning that many active styluses have problems drawing diagonal lines on an iPad Air or iPad Air 2. The Stilo wasn’t perfect, but it did better with diagonal lines than many of active styluses — especially on the iPad Air, where it worked particularly well. There was a little more waviness in diagonal lines on the iPad Air 2, but it wasn’t that bad.
One feature that I had not seen before on another stylus is that you can twist the tip to make it longer or shorter, the idea being that you can find the optimal distance from the stylus to the screen to get the best radio wave connection. In my tests, twisting the tip didn’t change the performance very much, but I suppose it is nice that you have the ability to fine tune the performance if you need to do so.
The developer encourages using the Stilo with another product that it sells called PrecisionFilm (sold separately). The developer says that using this film on the screen of your iPad with the Stilo makes it feel more like writing on paper. The developer sent me a free review sample of this clear film so I tried it. It does add a little more friction, which I suppose makes it feel more like paper, but frankly I thought that the Stilo worked just fine without the film. If yo don’t normally use a screen protector film, I wouldn’t get one just because you have a Stilo.
One feature lacking on the Stilo that exists on some other styluses is a physical button that you can press and which uses Bluetooth to communicate commands to specially-designed apps, such as a command to switch between a pencil and an eraser. I don’t consider this a major omission, but look elsewhere if that feature is important to you. [UPDATE 1/25/16: For what it is worth, here is what the developer told me about the lack of Bluetooth: “Stilo wanted to make as accurate a fine-tip, active stylus as possible without requiring the hassle of Bluetooth pairing, as it’s sometimes inconsistent and a pain to connect/keep connected. Many styli use Bluetooth to offset imprecision as well as to add button functionality, but Stilo was designed to be as precise as a Bluetooth-connected stylus without requiring the connection.”]
I still have mixed feelings about active styluses because they don’t work 100% of the time; sometimes the iPad just doesn’t register a stroke. (A notable exception is the Apple Pencil, which does work 100% of the time with the iPad Pro.) It is nice that active styluses have such small tips, but it is frustrating whenever they don’t work well. That’s why my top stylus recommendation for the iPad Air and iPad Air 2 remains the 2015 model of the Adonit Jot Pro. But if you do want to use an active stylus, the Stilo is a very good one. It’s long, thin tip makes the stylus especially nice to use, and sets it apart from other active styluses.
Contact management is important for attorneys (and anyone else who works with lots of people), so I’m always on the lookout for apps with tools for working with contacts. Interact is a new app released this month that provides some advanced tools for working with contacts. It is currently $4.99, but the developer says that is an introductory price; I don’t know when the price will increase or how much it will go up.
There seems to be two main features to this app. First, the app has advanced tools for managing groups of contacts. For example, you can create groups specific to a project or a topic, and then it becomes easy to select members of the group (or the entire group) and send an email or a text message. Unfortunately, this feature does not work if you use Microsoft Exchange for your email. Like so many other law firms, my law firm uses Exchange, so I cannot try out this feature of the app. However, you can learn more about the group features in Interact by reading this recent post by California attorney David Sparks.
Today, I’m focusing on a second feature of the app, the ability to create contacts from email signature blocks. This feature works just fine for Exchange users, and this single feature is useful enough to me that I think it was worth spending $5 on the app.
Creating contact information from an email signature block is not a new feature. When iOS 8 came out in the Fall of 2014, it added many improvements to the iOS Mail app, as I discussed in this post. One improvement was the ability to detect contact data in an email message, so that if an email contains a signature block and iOS senses that you don’t already have the contact (or that your contact information is incomplete), iOS offers to add the information from that signature block in the email. It is a great idea that reduces the need to manually enter contact information on an iPhone or iPad. Unfortunately, I find that it doesn’t always work. Sometimes I will look at an email and see the indication at the top of the screen that I can create or update a contact, but more often I’ll look at email with a perfectly good signature block and the Mail app on my iPhone just ignores it. Fortunately Interact seems to work well with all emails, so it can pick up the slack when the built-in Mail app falls short.
To show how this feature works, I’ll use a real life example. Last week, I received an email from an attorney I know who just recently moved his law office to the same building where I work. He sent me an email so that I would have his contact information. I opened the email, and unfortunately Mail’s built-in data detector didn’t notice the signature block. But now that I have Interact, I can create a contact entry myself. Here’s how. First, select the signature block.
In the menu that appears above your selection, tap the Share… button. That will bring you a number of options, one of which is Create Contact. Note that Create Contact will show up only if you first do a one-time step: tap on More… and then add the option Create Contact. Once the option is added, you can hold down on the icon to drag it to be the first option, like you see it on the following screen. Again, you should only need to do this setup step once, and then in the future you can just tap Share… and then Create Contact.
Tap Create Contact and Interact’s Contact Scratchpad will launch. On this screen, you will see that Interact has placed in bold all of the information that it recognized and knows how to handle. In this example, Intereact was able to understand everything except the company name. But it is easy to add the few items, if any, missed by Interact. Just tap the field at the bottom of the screen (or tap more… for additional fields). So in my example, I tapped “company” and then I typed “Pandit Law.”
Screenshot
Screenshot
[UPDATE: In a comment to this post, Ciaran Connelly points out that if you move your cursor right before the company name and then tap the company name button, it should automatically add the name without you having to type the company name again. That tip didn’t work for me on the contact depicted in the images above, but it did work for another email that I received. So try that first to potentially save yourself a few key taps.]
Tap the Next button at the top right of the screen when you are done. This brings you to a screen where everything is entered for you. Tap Create New Contact at the bottom to create a new contact, or you can choose to update an existing contact with this additional information.
Screenshot
Tap the selection to either create or update a contact, and then your contact is created.
In my example, I still needed to manually type two words — the company name, which was missed by Interact. I also had to manually change the second number, which Interact thought was a phone number, to a fax number. I guess Interact didn’t understand that (f) next to that number meant fax. But otherwise, Interact did all of the work for me. First name, last name, email address, phone numbers, and physical address were all entered by the app. Not only did that save me a bunch of time, but it also increased accuracy. If I have to manually enter a number or an email address on my iPhone, there is a decent chance that I’ll have a typo along the way. And of course, a phone number or email address with a single incorrect character is useless.
If you ever find yourself creating contact entries from emails on your iPhone or iPad, then Interact is a useful app. It saves you time, but more important than that, it improves the accuracy of your entries. If you don’t have an Exchange account, then the app may be even more useful for you because of the group features. But even without that feature, I’m happy to have the Interact app on my iPhone and iPad as another useful tool for managing contacts.
This week, Apple posted a page to their website describing new features in the next incremental update to iOS called iOS 9.3. One of the new features is Night Shift, which changes the color on your iPhone when it is close to bedtime to reduce the blue light from the screen. If you use your iPhone late at night, studies have shown that the blue light can make it harder for your body to go to sleep. Apple also added the ability to add a lock to a Note, which you can unlock using your fingerprint, handy if you use a note to store confidential information and someone else is using your iPhone. Apple is also letting schools put multiple user accounts on an iPad, so that a student can pick up any iPad and see only that student’s files. Apple hasn’t announced when iOS 9.3 will be available, but my guess is March. And now, the news of note from this week:
ABA TECHSHOW is March 17-19 this year. Unfortunately, there is no track dedicated to iPhone/iPad users this year, but there is one iOS-related session on the morning of March 19th, and I’ll be one of the panelists for that session. If you want to learn about legal technology and get CLE credit, I hope to see you in Chicago.
Jeff Benjamin of iDownloadBlog looks at signs that Apple might come out with a more powerful power charger for the iPad Pro, a 29W charger instead of the 12W one that it ships with. This would let the iPad Pro charge even faster, although you might need an upgraded Lightning cord for it to work. I hope that this rumor is true. One of the few features of the iPad Pro that I don’t like is that it takes so long to charge.
Phil Dzikiy of iLounge reviews the Apple Smart Keyboard for iPad Pro, and he isn’t a big fan of how it feels when you type on it. I only tried it for a few minutes in the store, but that was my impression too. Still, I’ve heard from others who like it.
If you use your iPhone in rugged outdoor conditions, you might be interested that Scosche this week announced the goBAT 12000, a $99 external battery in a rugged, waterproof and dustproof case that can recharge an iPhone about six times. You can currently get it on Amazon for about $64.
Elizabeth Cohen of CNN explains how a doctor used an iPhone with Google Cardboard to save a baby’s life.
I love using HomeKit devices to control lights and other appliances in my house. They work great … except when they don’t. Nick Bilton of the New York Times explained what happened when his Nest Thermostat stopped working due to a software bug.
As noted by Zac Hall of 9to5Mac, 1Password was updated this week. If you use an iPhone 6s or iPhone 6s Plus, the app now supports 3D Touch for quick actions. A password manager is a must-have app, and I love that the fantastic 1Password app is frequently updated with great new features.
And finally, with the Steve Jobs movie getting some Oscar nominations this week, don’t we need a Broadway musical about Steve Jobs? Well, need it or not, we are getting one. Jon Blisten of Rolling Stone reports that a musical comedy about Steve Jobs and Bill Gates will open on Broadway at the Longacre Theatre on April 21st. The show is called Nerds, and it was first presented in Philadelphia back in 2005. Here is a video from when the show played in Philly:
Using a pay parking spot on a street is traditionally a bit of a pain. You need to have coins to put in the meter, or for newer systems you need to locate the central meter machine location on the block, walk there from your car, pay for a paper receipt, then walk back to your car and put the receipt on your dashboard. And of course, if your time expires then you risk having to pay a fine. But fortunately, a number of cities now have parking that works with an iPhone app so that you can pay for parking directly from your iPhone. Not only does this make it easier to pay for parking in the first place, it also means that if you go longer than you had expected in a meeting (or restaurant, etc.), you can press a few buttons in the app — from right there in your meeting, or in the restaurant — to extend your time on the meter without having to actually go back to your car. It makes parking much more convenient.
I live in New Orleans, and my city used to have a system run by PayByPhone, which currently works in about 40 U.S. cities and in some others around the world. For just over a year, we’ve been using a system run by Parkmobile, which works in hundreds of cities. (Here is a map showing where Parkmobile works.)
The Parkmobile app is free, but to use the app you first need to create an account and provide a payment method, such as a credit card or a PayPal account, and also provide the license plate number for your car. Next, when you go to park, look for the number of the parking zone where you are parking. You can find this number either on a sign, or on the front or side of the parking meter machine. You will sometimes see a QR code next to the number, and the app also lets you scan that to save you the trouble of entering a few numbers.
You don’t have to actually do anything at the parking meter machine — you just need that number. If you cannot find the number on the street, the Parkmobile app even lets you find the number associated with each block. For example, here are the streets around the Louisiana Supreme Court / Fourth Circuit building, located in the French Quarter in New Orleans. Tap on any zone to see the associated number.
Screenshot
Once you have the number, tap the Parking tab at the bottom left of the app and enter the number.
Screenshot
If you park in an area frequently, you can designate a zone as a favorite, and even assign your own name to the entry. That way, in the future, you don’t even have to look for the number. In this next example, I designated a zone as the place where the taco truck parks near Lee Circle in New Orleans:
Screenshot
Next, decide how long you want to park. The app even lets you select the maximum park time for that spot. Next, the app asks you to confirm how much it will cost to park. If that looks good to you, press the button to start parking.
There is a transaction fee for using the app which varies from city to city. In New Orleans, it is $0.35 per transaction, although if you pay Parkmobile $1 a month for a preferred membership, the transaction fee drops to $0.30 per transaction.
Once you have paid for a parking spot, you can look at the app at any time to see how much time you have remaining on the meter.
The app sends you a notification (if you have notifications for the app turned on) and an email to let you know when your parking session is about to end. For Apple Watch owners, it is handy to get the notification right there on your watch.
Extending the meter is simple; just press the Extend Session button in the app. And as I mentioned above, this is one of the best parts of the app. You never need to worry about being far from your car when it is time to feed the meter. As long as you are someplace with an Internet connection, you can extend your session quickly and easily. (Note that in some areas, there are limits on much you can extend your parking.)
Because the app knows where you paid to park, the app can help you find your car if you forget where you parked. Just tap the Find My Car button at the bottom of the app.
Screenshot
Note that when you use this app, you don’t have to put any receipt on your dashboard. The parking attendant knows that you have paid based on the license plate number that you have entered in the app; the parking attendant equipment won’t issue a ticket during the time period that you have paid to park. You can add multiple license plates to the app so that you can use the app with other vehicles.
If you are in a city that works with Parkmobile or a similar system, you should definitely take the time now to download the app so that you have it when you need it. For only a small transaction fee, it is faster and easier to start the meter running, plus you can see exactly how much time you have left on the meter and add more if necessary. Perhaps most importantly, this app can help you avoid a parking ticket, which I guarantee you will be much, much more expensive than the transaction fee.
Florida attorney Katie Floyd and California attorney David Sparks record the Mac Power Users podcast, and Episode 297 was all about the apps that they use to get work done with their iPads. As we all start a new year with the desire to be even more productive with our technology, I appreciated all of the great tips in that episode and I’m sure that many of you would like it too. And by the way, congrats to David and Katie who are about to record their 300th episode, an impressive milestone. And now, the news of note from the past week:
Boston attorney Victoria Santoro writes an article for Law Technology Today saying that she enjoys her Apple Watch but laments that is does not yet offer any real value for lawyers. She starts by saying that you cannot respond to email, but that’s wrong. Using the current watchOS 2, you can respond to emails, and I do it myself many times every week. You can either select a preset response (that you can set yourself using the Apple Watch app) or you can dictate your email. She says that she doesn’t like dictating a text message response when someone else is nearby and can hear her, and I agree, but that’s why it is nice that you can customize your preset responses to, for example, let someone know that you will respond to their text in just a few minutes. She also complains that you cannot create a calendar entry or a tweet on the Apple Watch, but I’ve never seen a need to do that. On the other hand, I love using the Fantastical complication on my Apple Watch face; I can always just glance at my wrist to see my next appointment. That’s a lot faster than pulling out my iPhone or iPad or switching to the calendar in Outlook on my PC at work. Santoro does like notifications and the fitness features, and so do I. She concludes by saying that if you are a lawyer and don’t have an Apple Watch yet, hold off buying one for now because of the lack of features. While I don’t agree with that rationale, I do believe that Apple will introduce a new model of the Apple Watch at some point in 2016. If you made it through nine months of the Apple Watch being on sale without deciding to buy one, maybe you should wait a little longer to see what the second generation model will include. But in the meantime, I love using my Apple Watch, and I wear it and use it every single day.
Apple announced this week that the App Store had record-breaking sales this past holiday season. January 1, 2016 was the biggest day in App Store history, with $144 million spent on apps and in-app purchases. And during the two weeks that ended on January 3, customers spent over $1.1 billion. Apple also announced that it has paid app developers nearly $40 billion since 2008, with over a third of that generated in the last year alone. The most popular app categories were games, social networking and entertainment.
If you are looking for some great pictures to enjoy on your iPad — or even better, on the larger screen of your iPad Pro — Pete Souza, official White House photographer, posted his best pictures of the year on Medium. Souza is an iPhone user, but it looks like these were all taken with a DSLR camera.
And finally, Swiss watch maker Moser created a 38mm mechanical watch that looks very much like an Apple Watch, and then created an Apple-like commercial to advertise it. Even the name is similar to the Apple Watch: it is the Swiss Alp Watch. It costs $24,900, but it is made of white gold; for comparison, the 38mm Rose Gold Apple Watch with the Modern Buckle costs $17,000. Benjamin Clymer of Hodinkee writes about the Moser watch, and here is the video:
I know that many folks have started using an iPad Pro recently, including those who found one under the Christmas tree. If that includes you, then I’m sure that you are currently looking at accessories that work with this larger iPad. When it comes to carrying my iPad back and forth to work every day, I’ve long been a fan of a messenger style bag, and for several years now I have used the 11″ size of a Tom Bihn Ristretto bag (reviewed here and here). That bag was the perfect size for an iPad, but is too small for an iPad Pro. Thus, I have been researching larger messenger style bags, and for the last few weeks I have been testing two models: the Field Muzetto by WaterField Designs ($169 for the small size that I tested) and latest model of Tom Bihn’s Ristretto bag ($140). Between the two, I prefer the Ristretto because it can store more items, it is easier to get to the items in and out of the bag because of the way that the zippers work and because of the useful o-ring system, and I prefer the look. But if you carry around fewer items, the Field Muzetto may work well for you. [UPDATE 2/2/2016: Here is my review of the Ristretto.]
Look and feel
My personal preference is to use a messenger bag that is black. Thus, when WaterField reached out to me to send a free review sample of one of its messenger bags, I originally asked for the Muzetto Leather Bag, which comes in a variety of colors: black, copper, flame, green and pine, all with either black leather or grizzly (brown) leather on the outside. However, review units of those models were not available at the time, so WaterField instead sent me the Field Muzetto, which is made of brown cotton canvas.
Under the flap, there is a chocolate-colored full-grain distressed leather panel. It doesn’t do much, and you don’t see it when the bag is closed, but I like the nice leather feel and look.
Although the look and feel of canvas is not my personal preference, the materials used are very strong, and the bag is obviously put together very well. Although I have only been testing this bag for a few weeks, I have no doubt that this bag would hold up very well over time. Indeed, for years I have seen other reviewers rave about the quality of other WaterField Designs products.
If you like its canvas look and color — I suppose it is sort of an Indiana Jones look — then the Field Muzetto will be great for you because it is cheaper than the leather version. But if you want the look and feel of leather on the outside of the bag, plus the ability to select from a variety of colors, then I suspect that you’ll want to spent the extra $60 or $70 for the leather model, which looks very nice on the WaterField website.
iPad Pro compartment
The Field Muzetto comes in small, medium or large. I used the small size, which the company says is best for an iPad Pro or a 12-inch MacBook. (The medium size is good for a 13-inch MacBook and the large size is good for a 15-inch MacBook.)
The iPad Pro fits in the padded compartment at the back of the bag. The height of the compartment is perfect for the iPad Pro. There is still about an inch and a half of extra space on the side when the iPad Pro is in there, which does make the bag feel bigger than it needs to be. (The Ristretto has a similar problem.) But I definitely felt like my iPad Pro was very safe in this compartment.
Flap
Like other messenger-style bags, the Field Muzetto has a flap over the front. But unlike some other bags, there is no buckle or other connector, so you rely on gravity to keep it closed and flat when the bag is upright.
In my tests during the last few weeks, that design has worked fine, but I’ll admit that it made me uncomfortable that the flap could easily open; I was worried that the contents would come out. I didn’t take a plane during the last few weeks, but I know from past experience with my old Ristretto that between going through security and sliding it under the bottom of the seat in front of me, a messenger bag can find itself in lots of different positions during travel. I have some concerns about using the Field Muzetto in these situations. But again, for walking around and generally using the bag over the last few weeks, I never once saw the contents start to fall out.
Content and capacity
In addition to the back compartment for the iPad Pro, there is a main compartment. The size is fairly generous, about a maximum of 2.5 inches side on each side, and it can get even larger in the middle.
On the front side of the main compartment, there is a zippered area, inside of which is one main section and two smaller pockets.
Then there is a smaller front compartment which is padded and which also has two smaller, padded pockets.
On the back of the bag, there is an open-topped compartment that is deep and wide enough to hold a magazine or something that is letter-sized (8.5″ x 11″). You could also put a legal-size pad in there, if you don’t mind it sticking out a little.
This sounds like a lot of compartments and pockets, but I actually found it difficult to put all of the items that I had been carrying for years in my smaller 11″ Ristretto. Part of the problem is that I missed the numerous customized compartments that one can create in Tom Bihn bags like the Ristretto by using the o-ring system, which lets you attach smaller pouches can be easily removed from a Ristretto to make it simple to locate and access specific items.
Additionally, when I had a number of items in the Field Muzetto, I often found it difficult to find the item that I needed because you can only reach down for items from the top. On the Ristretto, the front pouch opens with a wrap-around zipper so that you can see a large area from the front, instead of needing to look down from the top.
I will admit that perhaps I just carry too much stuff — charging cords, connectors, backup batteries, and lots of other items. If you carry fewer items, the Field Muzetto’s compartments may be perfect for you.
Conclusion
After trying it out for the last few weeks, I don’t think that this is the bag for me. That is partially because I don’t personally care for the look and feel of the brown canvas, but I can understand how someone with different tastes might feel differently. I also don’t like that the flap doesn’t have a way to stay closed (other than gravity when it is in the upright position). And while it has a number of storage compartments, I preferred the storage compartments on the Ristretto.
Having said that, the Field Muzetto is a well-made bag. It fits the iPad Pro fairly well, and gives you space to carry other items too. It seems to be pretty durable. If you like the look of brown canvas, then this could be the bag for you and your iPad Pro.
And now, the news of note from the past week.
