S1E154 - Essential Apple Podcast 154: Tim, sort the Apple ID servers!

Recorded 3rd November 2019 If you’ve downloaded this episode expecting a Ghostery special I am afraid Pete Knowlton has had to postpone for family reasons. He promises to come on soon. Never mind, it has been one hell of a week, AirPods Pro soft launched and reviewers went mad for them - even at what Simon considers an eye-watering $250 US. The earnings call was more of the usual “we made a little bit of money, I think we’ll get by” stuff. Meanwhile the Apple ID servers have been playing Simon up again and he’s a bit put out about it. Apple TV+ launched and we are all a bit unsure about it. Underwhelmed seems the overall opinion. Nick and Simon discuss all these topics and more... <h4>GIVEAWAYS & OFFERS</h4> Listeners of this show can claim $10 off purchases of Luminar and/or Aurora HD 2019 use the coupon code EssentialApple at checkout for your extra discount! Get Donny Yankellow's 2FunDads iMessage stickers for FREE Why not come and join the Slack community? You can now just click on this Slackroom Link to sign up and join in the chatter! Slacker @MacJim has a family friendly Flickr group for listeners to share photos because the Darkroom channel in the Slack has become so popular - if you're interested head over to to the Essential Apple Flickr and request an invitation. On this week’s show: <h4>NICK RILEY</h4> @spligosh (https://twitter.com/spligosh) on Twitter very occasionally. Sometimes appears on Bart Busschots' Let's Talk Apple <h4>APPLE</h4> Apple released AirPods Pro – Apple Apple TV+ goes live – Apple Apple TV+ Series Review Roundup: The Morning Show, See, Dickinson, and For All Mankind (https://www.macrumors.com/2019/10/28/apple-tv-plus-show-reviews/) – Mac Rumors 7 shows - “meh” – Simon Apple's HomePod now supports multiple users, but it's a buggy mess — VentureBeat iOS 13.2: iPhone users angry as new update features strange bug affecting apps — The Independent Earnings Call – Apple Notes of interest from Apple's Q4 2019 earnings report and conference call – Apple Insider <h4>TECHNOLOGY</h4> IBM Says Google’s Quantum Leap Was a Quantum Flop – Wired Microsoft unveils new Edge browser logo that no longer looks like Internet Explorer — The Verge Buying Fitbit won't save Google's failing Wear OS – Android Police <h4>SECURITY & PRIVACY</h4> Windows ‘BlueKeep’ Attack That U.S. Government Warned About Is Happening Right Now – Forbes This Invisible Photo Filter Protects You From Facial Recognition Software – Digital Trends Why encrypted email service ProtonMail is open-sourcing its mobile apps — VentureBeat <h4>WORTH A CHIRP / ESSENTIAL TIPS</h4> Vivaldi 2.9: Adding more to the Vivaldi Menu – Vivaldi This is the affordable Apple Pencil rival you’ve been looking for — Cult of Mac <h4>JUST A SNIPPET</h4> For things that are not worth more than a flypast A critical analysis of scroll bars throughout history – The Verge NEMO’S HARDWARE STORE (45:47) Kanex USB C, iPad Pro docking station $100 US – Amazon £97 UK / Not apparently in the US Store... Essential Apple Recommended Services: Ghostery – protect yourself from trackers, scripts and ads while browsing. 33mail.com – Never give out your real email address online again. Sudo – Get up to 9 “avatars” with email addresses, phone numbers and more to mask your online identity. Free for the first year and priced from $0.99 US / £2.50 UK per month thereafter... ProtonMail – End to end encrypted, open source, based in Switzerland. Prices start from FREE... what more can you ask? ProtonVPN – a VPN to go with it perhaps? Prices also starting from nothing! Fake Name Generator – So much more than names! Create whole identities (for free) with all the information you could ever need. Wire – Free for personal use, open source and end to end encryted messenger and VoIP. Pinecast – a fabulous podcast hosting service with costs that start from nothing. Essential Apple is not affiliated with or paid to promote any of these services... We recommend services that we use ourselves and feel are either unique or outstanding in their field, or in some cases are just the best value for money in our opinion. Social Media and Slack <h4>You can follow us on:</h4> Twitter / Slack / EssentialApple.com / Spotify / Soundcloud / YouTube / Facebook / Pinecast Also a big SHOUT OUT to the members of the Slack room without whom we wouldn't have half the stories we actually do – we thank you all for your contributions and engagement. You can always help us out with a few pennies by using our Amazon Affiliate Link so we get a tiny kickback on anything you buy after using it. If you really like the show that much and would like to make a regular donation then please consider joining our Patreon or using the Pinecast Tips Jar (which accepts one off or regular donations) And a HUGE thank you to the patrons who already do. Support The Essential Apple Podcast by contributing to their Tip Jar: https://tips.pinecast.com/jar/essential-apple-show This podcast is powered by Pinecast.