If you are looking for a present idea for anyone who has an Apple Watch (a growing population), I recommend finding a way to give someone an Apple Watch band—or, perhaps an Apple gift card so that they can pick out a specific color. Which band should you give? I recommend the Solo Loop, which I reviewed earlier this year. At $50, it is one of the least-expensive bands made by Apple, but it is also one of the best. I love wearing my Milanese Loop band at work and when I want to dress up, but after work and on the weekends, the Solo Loop is my go-to band because it is so comfortable. This week, Eric Brain of Hypebeast released an article based on his interview of Stan Ng (Apple’s VP of Product Marketing) and Evans Hankey (Apple’s VP of Industrial Design) to discuss Apple Watch bands. Hankey specifically praises the Solo Loop, saying that it is “without a doubt the most simple and most ambitious watch band we have made” because “[f]or possibly the first time in the history of watchmaking, we have eliminated all buckles, clasps, and the excess material necessary for size adjustment” and thus it is “the most comfortable band we’ve made.” I agree with this 100%. I love how comfortable this band is, and because there is no clasp, it feels incredibly secure on my arm. And now, the news of note from the past week:
- Although Apple has been winning most aspects of the lawsuit filed against it by Epic arising out of Epic’s bait-and-switch (the company secretly added in-app payment options in violation of Apple’s rules), there was one aspect on which Epic prevailed, and because the trial court declined to grant a stay, there was a risk that Apple was going to have to change certain aspects of its in-app payment system this month. But as John Gruber of Daring Fireball reports, the federal Ninth Circuit granted a stay until the merits of that part of the trial court’s ruling are reviewed on appeal. if you haven’t been following this lawsuit closely, all that you need to know is that, for now, nothing is changing.
- This one is really just for the appellate lawyer nerds like me, and this one has nothing to do with the iPhone (except that I learned the news while reading this tweet by Prof. David Ziff in the Tweetbot app), but Ziff reports in that tweet that the West publication Federal Appendix ceased publication this year after a 20-year run, with 861 being the final volume. Whether you cited it as F. App’x or Fed. Appx., it was nice to have a short and official-looking citation for those unpublished federal opinions. On well, now we have to use the long WL and LEXIS cites. (As Ziff also tweets, it doesn’t appear that West published an official announcement of this. So yes, that means that the decision to end the F. App’x is, ahem, unpublished.)
- Speaking of Twitter and appellate nerds, I can’t stop laughing at this video by Alexis Gay praising the em dash.
- OK, let’s get back to the iPhone. One of the features that Apple announced for iOS 15 is the ability to use your iPhone or Apple Watch as a room key at a hotel. Benjamin Mayo of 9to5Mac reports that the feature is now starting to rollout at a few Hyatt Hotels. This reminds me of the early days of Apple Pay, and I look forward to this feature being widely available.
- Alan Sepinwall of Rolling Stone picks the 20 best TV shows of 2021, and it made me smile to see For All Mankind Season 2 grab the #1 slot. Ted Lasso gets all of the (well-deserved) acclaim on Apple TV+, but For All Mankind is truly excellent. There are lots of other good shows on his list, plus quite a few that were not previously on my radar screen.
- Juli Clover of MacRumors reports that Apple has updated the maps for Australia in the Apple Maps app. It looks like a nice improvement.
- Jonathan Bell of Wallpaper wrote an interesting article—featuring great photographs by Jason Schmidt—of the inside of Apple Park and some of the design folks who work there.
- Ed Hardy of Cult of Mac reviews the Adonit Dash 4, a stylus that works with both the iPad and the iPhone.
- Nicole Nguyen of the Wall Street Journal (Apple News link) compares the Apple Watch to other wearable devices to track your body’s trends over time.
- Zac Hall of 9to5Mac shares tips for using an Apple TV to create a digital fireplace.
- The iPhone J.D. award for the craziest MagSafe-compatible accessory goes to the Razer Phone Cooler Chroma ($59.99 on Amazon), which adds a 7-blade fan to the back of your iPhone to keep it cooler even as you push the iPhone’s processor to the limits, plus 12 colorful LED lights to give your iPhone some bling. Thanks to Michael Simon of Macworld for noticing this critical product.
- And finally, I love using asking Siri to perform certain functions in my house, such as turning on the lights on my Christmas tree. But I never expected to see Siri control a VCR. However, Siri can do that too, as this video from the Will It Work? channel demonstrates.