In a rare interview with the New York Times:
My advice to other disabled people would be, concentrate on things your disability doesn’t prevent you doing well, and don’t regret the things it interferes with. Don’t be disabled in spirit, as well as physically.
Patrick Rhone and Ben Brooks have been talking this week about minimal computing.
More specifically, about applications and minimal computing.
The most minimal Mac is the base model MacBook Air. At 11.6 inches with just 2GB of RAM and 64GB of storage, operating one seems to be a practice in minimalism in and of itself.
I’ll be honest — I love the small MacBook Air. I’m often tempted to order one, as it would be a great fit for me. At home, I have a beefy 27-inch iMac, and a super fast 15-inch MacBook Pro at work. Those machines aren’t minimal, simply because of what I have to accomplish while using them. However, I would love a third machine — the little Air — as a machine to use primarily for writing.
With such a machine, I could live without the CS5 suite, QuarkXPress, Aperture and many of the other tools I use at home and at work on a very regular basis.
So, what software would I have on such a Mac? For one, I would re-install OS X with no printer drivers, no language packs and no iLife.[1. I never use iLife, even on my current machines.] Doing so would save some space. Here’s the list of what I would install, in no particular order:
That’s not a lot of software. While I wouldn’t want to lug around a USB drive with music on it, I think I would have plenty of space for 5 or 10 of my favorite albums in iTunes. Hell, maybe I’d just play them in QuickTime X.
Looking at this list makes me really, really want to pull the trigger on a new laptop. Right now, I use the iPad or my work MacBook Pro as my mobile machine, and I’d love to leave the MacBook Pro at work each evening. Too bad I have real things to pay for first.
Ed Bott at ZDNet, talking about malware on Macs:[1. via Daring Fireball]
Now I am seeing evidence that the next target is OS X. That’s potentially very bad news for Mac owners who have abandoned their PCs in the belief that switching to a Mac somehow immunizes them from malware.
Security experts know, of course, that there’s nothing magical about Macs when it comes to security. They just haven’t been targeted because Windows has been such a big juicy target for so long.
Oh man, this is good stuff. Clearly, Bott’s article — and the others listed in Gruber’s aptly titled article — isn’t entirely accurate.
To date, there have been very few security threats made against OS X users. I can count them on one hand.
The malware attempts that have been made have made in the form of trojan horses — applications that aren’t what they seem. The most famous examples are Background on OSX.Trojan.iServices.A & .B, which was some dormant malware hitched to a hijacked, stolen copy of iWork.
(I wrote about this in depth back in April 2009 if you want to know more.)
In that article, I wrote about what Bott and many others have written about — that the Macintosh is safe because worldwide, Apple’s market share is very small. It simply makes more economic sense to invest in malware that can hit a much wider base of targets.
While the Mac is growing, this continues to hold true, but Bott spoke of the technical end of things.
In that April 2009 piece, I also wrote this:
OS X requires the user to enter their admin password to install software. The iWork trojan horse gets around this by simply adding another package to the payload for OS X’s Installer to process. This is probably how future trojan horses will work as well, since it is so simple and elegant. Very, very few people log at Installer’s log files during or after an installation, letting the additional files to be installed right before their eyes without them knowing.
This is a very important piece of the puzzle. For many Windows years, most Windows users ran as a Local Administrator, allowing malware to be installed without their expressed permission, as older versions of Windows didn’t require the user to enter their password to install software. Windows 7 and Vista, however, require it. Today, if I want to install something on my work PC (running Windows 7), I have to enter my password, even though I’m running as the administrator user.
The Mac, of course, has had this in place since OS X launched 10 years ago.
While I think anyone running anti-virus on a Mac is probably the same type of person who I could sell some snake oil to, there are some things that every Mac user can do to make the world a little bit of a safer place. The biggest thing is to not allow Safari to open “safe files” upon download.
But the single biggest thing you can do to stay safe? Use common sense. Don’t install pirated software, and don’t believe everything guys like Ed Bott publish.
RIM seems to have two distinct problems: the first is that it doesn’t seem to adapt quickly to a changing market, and the second is that when it finally does make a move, the results too often feel half baked. The company and its leaders seem almost indignant about the fact that they no longer lead in a field which they clearly feel they created. The unfortunate reality for RIM is that it’s in the process of trading first place for third, and in an increasingly crowded market, it’s not battling to win, it’s battling to stay alive.
Agreed.
The Omni Group has lots of goodies on the way.
Be sure to listen to the end, when Josh shared his terrible idea about how Apple could allow “true” multi-tasking on the iPad.
The new iMacs released yesterday have some extremely impressive CPUs at the high end. The Sandy Bridge architecture in these iMacs, and the recent MacBook Pros, is so good that they’re competitive with the Mac Pro in some benchmarks.
So why buy a Mac Pro instead of an iMac or MacBook Pro?
That’s a great question and one that is increasingly complex.
The Mac Pro used to be the obvious choice for anyone who needed power or expandability. It really was a no brainer. If you need brawn, Apple’s only tower was the only choice.
Clearly, the first factor has become less of a differentiator as iMacs have become increasingly powerful. There are very few things that an iMac can’t do smoothly at this point. While some still need all 12 cores that the muscular Mac Pro offers, the Sandy Bridge chipset in Apple’s all-in-one is enough horsepower for just about everyone. People that just barely needed a Mac Pro for the power would be fine getting an iMac now. The new desktop can even support two displays out, something that only the Mac Pro could boast until this week.
Expandability is still the Mac Pro’s biggest selling point. It is the only Mac that can take PCI Express cards, multiple internal hard drives and more than 16 GB of RAM. With Thunderbolt on the horizon, external drives should gain tons of speed, making the additional slots in the Mac Pro less vital for some users. However, the Mac Pro’s ability to address more than 16GB of RAM and its PCI Express slots are vital to those in the professional realm. Other features like dual Ethernet ports and loads of USB and FireWire 800 ports are just bonuses. There is simply no equal anywhere else in Apple’s lineup for those who need to hook up audio or video interfaces to their machines.
While the Mac Pro is expandable, it’s not super upgradeable. There are few options for video cards, and the processors can’t be swapped out for better, faster chips.
I can see a future in which Apple streamlines the Mac Pro line, losing the low-end, cheaper models. This would allow Apple to focus on the niche users who need loads of power, and have loads of cash to spend. Those who are torn between the iMac and the Mac Pro would have the decision made for them, if the low-end Mac Pro were to go away.
Now, I’m not sure Apple would ever pigeonhole the Mac Pro by leaving just the super powerful one available for sale. But is is something to think about.
According to one analyst’s check with sources along Apple’s supply chain, Apple plans to refresh the rest of its Mac lineup, which would include the MacBook, Mac Pro, Mac Mini and MacBook Air, “in upcoming months.”
Analyst Shaw Wu with Sterne Agee issued a note to investors on Wednesday claiming that all Mac products that have yet to see a refresh this year are “due for refreshes” soon.
Not included on Wu’s list are the MacBook Pro, which underwent a refresh in February, and the iMac, which saw a new version on Tuesday. Both products saw a transition to Intel’s new Sandy Bridge processors and the addition of the new high-speed Thunderbolt input/output port.
My initial reaction to this was a giant “No, shit, Wu. No. Shit.”
Are investors really so dumb that they don’t think Apple will release updated models this year? It’s the beginning of May, for crying out loud. I’m pretty sure Apple has some more new computers prepped to go in the next 7 months.
I just don’t understand how guys like this get paid big bucks to come up with this stuff.
Here’s some more of the article:
Wu believes the MacBook refresh is especially important because the entry-level notebook represents roughly one-third of Apple’s portable business, which itself has grown to 73 percent of all Mac sales. The last update for the MacBook came in May 2010.
The MacBook is important, but again, it is clear that it is due for an update. However, most MacBook sales, from what I can tell, are to schools. In fact, I predict that at some point, this low-end, white machine will go education-only, like the eMac of old.
Anyone want to hire me as an analysts? I promise I won’t assume investors are dumber than rocks.
Apple’s latest ad wants you to buy a $500+ tablet computer to run App Store apps on. Apple wants to sell you shiny things to make money.
Google’s latest ad wants you to store personal details about your child’s life, from birth, on their servers. Google wants your data so they can sell it (aggregated and anonymized, of course) to others to make money.
Taken in that context, Apple’s ad might be obnoxious and highly commercial, but Google’s is downright creepy.
I’m increasingly uneasy about Google.
This time around, I’m talking with Myke Hurley, one of the guys behind three great podcasts — The Bro Show, Enough — The Minimal Mac Podcast and 11 Minutes. He also tweets and writes at The Podcasting Project.
Myke: Hello Sir! Thanks for inviting me to take part. I’m honoured and in such great company!
I’m Michael Hurley from London, UK. Online you’ll know me as a Podcaster extraordinaire! Currently I am a co-host of The Bro Show, Enough — The Minimal Mac Podcast and 11 Minutes. I write on my personal blog The Podcasting Project, in which I document my journey in Podcasting and I also submit (far too lengthy) iOS reviews for Macgasm.
I also post random things to my Twitter account.
Myke: Well it’s something I’ve been interested in for many years. Back in 2006 I recorded something in GarageBand. But it was just me and at the time I didn’t really know what I was saying or doing. However, I knew it was something I’d like to pick up one day.
Then in March 2010 I was talking with Terrence on the phone and we were ruminating over some Apple rumours and the latest lawsuits. Then we had the idea that other people may actually want to hear it. Terry hadn’t been very geeky until then so I jumped at the chance of being able to spend a couple of hours every week talking about my favourite subject.
We were planning things for a few weeks, making sure we had a format and a website ready, before recording and releasing the first episode of The Bro Show on April 9th 2010.
Myke: I agree! I consider myself very lucky to be able to do what I do now. We are close to making money from the shows and they are really growing. Where money isn’t the ultimate goal—it’s what aids further growth and pays for any costs and future equipment.
Me? Geeky? Oh you bet!
I know no programming languages – i’m not that smart when it comes to that stuff. But I love what I love—products and the businesses that encapsulate them. I’ve been a religious Mac user since 2005 and haven’t looked back since. I have a real thirst for tech news; I love to know what’s going on in the tech world and recently, the relationships that technology is able to build.
Myke: Oh definitely. The Internet has changed what a relationship can be. People can be heavily involved in someone’s life without ever having any face-to-face interaction.
However I do have a dream of taking a massive American road trip at some point in my life where I can stop off and say ‘Hi’ to these people that I talk to every day and consider close friends.
Myke: We’ve been extremely lucky to speak to the people we have. And what’s even greater is that a lot of our guests have become friends and are happy to be a guest again. It’s something I have always found hard to wrap my head around.
I am a fan of every person we have had on the show, so getting to talk to these people is always awesome for the geek inside me.
Our first guest was Mr. Patrick Rhone. I reached out to him on Twitter and he was very gracious to agree to be a guest. He spoke very nicely of us after being on the show and this brought us in to a close circle of people whom we interact with daily. These are the people who have mainly made up a lot of our guests since. As we started to bring on more people (Dave Caolo, Brett Kelly, etc) it showed to their collective fans that they enjoyed what we did. It was like a stamp of approval.
Any other guests we have had who are out of this circle (which now mainly consists of the Read & Trust members) have just come from me reaching out. On the whole any others have just come from reaching out and appealing to people’s kind natures. We are always extremely grateful of the time they give us.
Myke: Most definitely. The work that those guys are doing is awesome and is surely inspiring many others to put their fingers on a keyboard and create something. The work that they do inspires me to create more shows and better content with a level of quality that people can enjoy.
A lot of the work that I put in to The Bro Show is actually on the days when I’m not recording. Before we first started doing the shows I used to skim the news and Twitter, picking up on things as I went along. But now I have to pay a lot more attention to stories, ensure I am reading them fully, checking over multiple sources and making notes—as this is the material I will be referencing later and talking about for an hour.
My iPhone is probably the machine I do the majority of work on, I use Reeder to pick up all my stories. I send the links and articles in to Evernote (as I can access it everywhere and both me and Terrence can email stories straight to it) and I write up a basic outline of what we’re going to discuss in Simplenote. It’s really important that I can access these services on my iPhone, iPad and Mac as I will use all of them to collect data before the show and have them on hand for reference during it.
When recording the show I keep notes of what we have discussed and any links mentioned for when I type up the show-notes later on. These notes are written in to a Moleskine notebook and I have used the same one for every episode we’ve recorded so far. I’m sure this will be a collectors item one day!
We record The Bro Show using Skype and when we’re finished I chuck it in to Garageband, trim the edges and add the music—before throwing it through a couple of other apps for post-processing and leveling. If you’re interested in finding out about my crazy set-up with this I have written about it in more detail here.
The other shows (11 Minutes and Enough) are completely different and require entirely different processes of their own. Enough is simpler as Pat does a lot of the thinking and the typing – I just edit and produce the show – whilst 11 Minutes can take hours. This comes from finding the exact points to include, trimming down the three tracks (each individual) and putting it all together.
It’s safe to say that my evenings are rather busy, but I wouldn’t change it for the world at the moment.
Myke: Thanks man. It’s hard work but I do enjoy it.
All of the shows are being adapted now to accept sponsorships. We have reached the point where to continue allowing the shows to grow we need to start making money. I will always ensure that our content is not harmed by the advertisers and we will only take ads from good companies. We have a great partner who will be delivering the ad sales for us and I’m really positive about where this will take us.
Obviously there will be some people that object to us putting ads in the shows — but I just hope that the majority of people will understand that without it the shows may not be around forever. Additionally I hope that one day I’ll be able to take this full time. So earning money is a big factor.
All of the shows are constantly evolving. Originally The Bro Show was just me and Terrence talking about tech, movies and video games. It has changed dramatically in to a show with a guest mainly discussing about Apple news. We are also starting to bring more guests on Enough. Having guests can be useful as it brings other viewpoints to topics, ensuring that our listeners don’t just hear my opinion over and over again.
I don’t have any other specific plans about how to adapt the current shows, but I keep an open mind—they will evolve naturally and I’m happy with that.
I do have some ideas for other shows that I’m working on. Hopefully the first of those will have begun by the time this interview is published.
Myke: In to the other shows? Why not…
Currently I am working on getting a show off the ground with Joshua Schnell over at Macgasm. This will be a show centered around iOS apps and games. I’m a big fan of the fruits of the App Store so I’m looking forward to this one. At the moment we are still fleshing it out, but it should be out very soon.
I have a couple of shows I’d love to do in the future. They’re basic ideas but maybe by sharing them I could get some great feedback from any readers.
They’re the shows I have locked in my brain at the moment. I sure hope nobody steals these ideas…
Myke: Haha! I certainly hope so.
Stephen, thanks for inviting me to be a part of this series. I’m a big fan of the site and it’s a pleasure and an honour to be a part of it.