Let’s Talk Apple – Ep. 20 (April 2015) 2

Panel:

• Bart Busschots (host) – @bbusschots
• Allison Sheridan from the NosillaCast Podcast – @podfeet
• Chuck Joiner from MacVoices – @chuckjoiner
• Gazmaz from the My Mac Podcast – @gazmaz

It was a busy month in Apple news so the show jumps straight into the main stories, starting with some first-hand experiences with the Apple Watch, then moving on to Photos, then the Q2 earnings call, and then quickly finishing up with some Apple Pay news and some news from Microsoft’s Build conference.

You’ll find detailed show notes below the fold, and if you enjoy this free show, please consider clicking on the donate button at the top of the left side bar – the show is free for you to listen to, but not for Bart to Produce!

Links:

Main Stories

1. The Apple Watch Hits the Market (online only, and only in some countries)
   • Apple watch sold out in less than 6 hours – www.macrumors.com/…
   • Preordered ESTIMATED to be 2.3million, but very much supply-constrained – appleinsider.com/…
   • A leaked Apple memo states that there will be no in-store Apple Watch sales until after May – www.telegraph.co.uk/…
   • During Apple's Q2 earnings call, Time Cook said the Apple Watch would likely be available in more countries in late June – www.macobserver.com/…
   • Apple's rollout of the Apple Watch has been unusual, and Apple are coming under some fire for it. In a leaked video to Apple employees, Angela Ahrendts explains Apple's reasoning for the unusual launch – www.macobserver.com/…
   • While developers are allowed to develop for Watch Kit, there are limits on what developers can do.
     • 3rd party watch apps (as in apps that present a watch face) are not permitted – nakedsecurity.sophos.com/…
   • Consumer Reports scratch-test the Apple Watch – sapphire is stronger than glass, but both are very scratch resistant – www.loopinsight.com/…
   • iFixit teardown shows that replacing the Apple Watch battery is easy, but replacing the brains of the device is not – arstechnica.com/…
   • Unconfirmed reports suggest manufacturing problems with the taptic engine are behind Apple watch shipment delays – apparently two factories were supposed to manufacture the components, but those made by one of the factories were found to be unreliable – www.macobserver.com/…
     • Reportedly, the problem was discovered before any watches were shipped to customers – daringfireball.net/…
   • Ship Dates for Apple Watch Sport slip to July – www.macobserver.com/…
   • The sensors on the back of the Apple Watch don't appear to be able to see through tattoos – www.cultofmac.com/…
2. Photos Is Released – www.macobserver.com/…
3. Q2 2015 Earnings Call: Apple reports record second quarter results – www.apple.com/…
   • The Numbers:
     • Revenue: $58Bn ($45.6Bn YAQ)
     • Profit: $13.6Bn, or $2.33 per diluted share ($10.2Bn, or $1.66 per diluted share YAQ)
     • Gross Margins: 40.8% (39.3% YAQ)
     • International Sales accounted for 69% of revenue
     • 61.2M iPhones sold (up 40%)
     • 12.6M iPads Sold (down 23%)
     • 4.6M Macs Sold (up 10%)
   • To put all this on context, Kieran Healy from Duke University released a great chart showing Apple Sales numbers since mid-2006 – this long-term view helps to separate the signal from the noise – kieranhealy.org/…
   • Apple increases dividend by 11% (to $0.52 per share) and expands shareholder returns to $200Bn – www.macobserver.com/…
   • During the call Tim Cook said Apple plans to be part of coming big changes in media – www.macobserver.com/…
   • RELATED – Samsung released a new investor forecast projecting a 30% drop in Q1 profits (this is being spun as good news because the rate of decline is shrinking) – appleinsider.com/…
4. Apple Pay News:
   • Discover coming to Apple Pay this Fall – www.macobserver.com/…
   • Best Buy to accept Apple Pay, despite allegiance to CurrentC/MCX – arstechnica.com/…
5. Microsoft Build Conference
   • Microsoft to update their developers tools to allow Objective C and Java code to be used when building Windows 10 apps – the idea being to allow iOS an Android apps to be more easily ported to Windows – social.techcrunch.com/…

Quick Stories

• Apple Staff Changes:
  • Randy Ubillos (of iMovie & Final Cut fame) retired from Apple this month – daringfireball.net/…
  • Steve Dowling promoted to VP Communications (he had been acting since Katie Cotton's retirement) – www.apple.com/…
  • Natalie Kerris leaves Apple PR – www.macobserver.com/…
  • Dolby VP Mike Rockwell has joined Apple – www.macobserver.com/…
• At least one Russian politician is still not over the Apple U2 giveaway – he wants it investigated as a pro-gay propaganda (you really can't make this shit up) – www.macobserver.com/…
• A bug un American Airlines software flight bag app results in delayed flights (and a lot of people and media blaming the iPad and/or Apple for bad software written by others) – https://nakedsecurity.sophos.com/2015/04/30/ipad-crash-grounds-dozens-of-american-airlines-flights/
• Apple & IBM's partnership continues to expand:
  • IBM intros Watch Health Cloud with Apple HealthKit support – www.macobserver.com/…
  • Japan Post team up with Apple and IBM to improve their service for monitoring the elderly by giving them iPads running IBM software. This is part of a paid service the postal service runs to check in on elderly people while they are on their rounds – www.macobserver.com/…
• Mark your calendar – WWDC 2015 will run June 8 through 12 – www.macobserver.com/…