Every year, the new version of macOS ships with at least one new default wallpaper. macOS 27 Golden Gate continues that tradition.
I like this wallpaper; it has some Mac OS 9 vibes.
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WWDC26: Apple Watch Ultra 1 and SE 2 Dropped from watchOS 27
As spotted by MacRumors, the system requirements for watchOS 27 are pretty steep:
Apple today confirmed that watchOS 27 will not support the Apple Watch Series 9, Apple Watch Ultra (first generation), or Apple Watch SE (second generation), effectively drawing a line at devices equipped with the S9 or S10 chip.
The only Apple Watch models compatible with watchOS 27 are the Apple Watch Series 10, Series 11, Ultra 2, Ultra 3, and SE 3. Despite the fact that the Apple Watch Ultra 2 contains the S9 chip, the Series 9 which contains the same chip will no longer be supported.
WWDC26: Tim Cook’s Closing Reflections
Today’s keynote didn’t include a formal handoff between Tim Cook and John Ternus (who wasn’t even in the video), but Cook did offer some closing remarks. As is his style, it was more about Apple than himself:
On a personal note, some of the greatest highlights of my time as CEO have been events like this. Sharing powerful new tools with all of you and then seeing what you create with them has been a constant reminder has no limits. Over the years you have helped people connect, create, learn, and experience the world in extraordinary new ways, and with the incredible capabilities we introduced today, and so many more still to come, I truly believe the best is still ahead.
WWDC26: A New Kind of Keynote
The WWDC keynote just wrapped up, and it was startlingly different. For years, Apple has gone through each of its operating systems, highlighting features it was bringing to each one.
That had broken down over time as more and more features were cross-platform. For example, Apple would announce something in its iPadOS section just for it to popup in macOS. Something in Reminders on the iPhone would also be present on the iPad.
WWDC26: As Foretold, macOS 27 Golden Gate Drops Intel Support
Apple had previously announced that macOS 26 Tahoe would be the last release to support Intel-based Macs:
macOS Tahoe will be the last release for Intel-based Mac computers. Those systems will continue to receive security updates for 3 years.
Rosetta was designed to make the transition to Apple silicon easier, and we plan to make it available for the next two major macOS releases – through macOS 27 – as a general-purpose tool for Intel apps to help developers complete the migration of their apps. Beyond this timeframe, we will keep a subset of Rosetta functionality aimed at supporting older unmaintained gaming titles, that rely on Intel-based frameworks.
Anthropic Calls for Pausing Frontier AI Development as It Files for IPO⇢
Marina Favaro and Jack Clark, in a very long article on Anthropic’s website:
The technical trends discussed in this piece suggest that AI systems are going to become much more capable in coming years. These trends have huge implications. AI that can build itself would be a major development in the history of technology—one that could bring enormous good for the world in science, healthcare, and beyond. But full recursive self-improvement also might increase the risks of humans losing control over AI systems. If systems are capable of fully building their own successors, the ways we secure them, monitor them, and shape their behavior all grow much more important.
Google Joins Anthropic in Leasing Compute from SpaceX/xAI⇢
SpaceX has lined up another compute deal ahead of its historic IPO, this time with Google. The company announced the deal in a regulatory filing on Friday.
Under the terms of the deal, Google will pay SpaceX $920 million per month from October 2026 through June 2029 for access to “approximately 110,000 NVIDIA GPUs, CPUs, memory, and other related components.”
The deal is similar in length and scope to the one SpaceX announced with Anthropic in late May. As part of that deal, Anthropic agreed to pay SpaceX $1.25 billion per month through 2029 to rent all the available compute from its Colossus 1 data center near Memphis, Tennessee that xAI — now part of SpaceX — originally built for its own artificial intelligence efforts.
Save the Date⇢
Akash Wadhwani has put together something really cool — a full history of WWDC invites.
The Fitbit Air’s Sleep Tracking is Trying to Keep Me Up at Night
I’ve worn an Apple Watch for sleep tracking for ages, using our very own Sleep++. Over the last couple of weeks, I’ve also been wearing a Fitbit Air, slowly taking notes for a full review.
So far, the data it tracks is roughly similar to that of the Apple Watch, except for sleep. If you wake up at any point, Google Health stops tracking sleep for the night and gives you a horrific sleep score:
Connected 606: The Rickies (June 2026) - I Quit the Show That Helps⇢
WWDC26 is almost here, and on this jam-packed episode of Connected, we each made a set of predictions about what Apple will show off next week.
We also changed the Bill of Rickies again.
Ah Yes, Engagement
In the wake of Twitter dying, I’ve found myself using some combo of Mastodon, Bluesky, and Threads. The first is where all the nerdy folks hang out, and Threads has become more newsy for me. As much as Threads wants you to forget that it is owned by Meta, its true nature sometimes comes out. The most recent example is how it handles message previews.
Here’s a post I went to share with my brother:
Microsoft Killing Office 2019 for Mac⇢
Microsoft will prevent Office 2019 for Mac owners from editing their documents from July 13, a restriction the company is attributing to the productivity suite’s expiring digital certificate.
The Office 2019 apps affected include Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook, and OneNote. Once the certificate used to confirm the suite’s license expires, these apps will drop into what Microsoft is calling “reduced functionality mode.” In other words, users will still be able to open, view, and print existing documents, but creating, editing and saving documents will be disabled. The same restriction will apply to iPhone and iPad apps that can’t be updated, according to Microsoft.