Spring is in the air, so you know what that means: developer conference season. Apple held its Worldwide Developers Conference this week and used Monday’s keynote address to announce a bunch of new software updates for iPhones, iPads, and Macs. (Oh, and there are also two new MacBooks.) These kinds of events are good indicators of where the tech industry is headed, so we like to check out all the forward-looking software and hardware Apple unveiled at WWDC. This year's event was an in-person affair, though it mostly entailed watching a prerecorded video while sitting in an outdoor theater.
This week on Gadget Lab, WIRED product writer Brenda Stolyar joins us to talk about Apple’s grand strategy for ruling the universe and what it was like on (and under) the ground at WWDC.
Show Notes
Read more about the new features coming to iOS and iPadOS and Apple’s MagSafe chargers. Check out everything Apple announced at WWDC. Here’s more about the EU’s ruling that manufacturers must make mobile devices have uniform charging ports.
Recommendations
Brenda recommends Season 4 of the Netflix show Stranger Things. Lauren recommends asking your smart speaker to play ocean sounds while you sleep. Mike recommends the podcast Why We Run.
Brenda Stolyar can be found on Twitter @BStoly. Lauren Goode is @LaurenGoode. Michael Calore is @snackfight. Bling the main hotline at @GadgetLab. The show is produced by Boone Ashworth (@booneashworth). Our theme music is by Solar Keys.
How to Listen
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Transcript
Michael Calore: Lauren.
Lauren Goode: Mike.
Michael Calore: Lauren, are we actually back to in-person tech conferences now?
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Lauren Goode: Sort of. I mean, if you consider going down to Cupertino, California, home of Apple, for a viewing party, then yeah. We were in person.
Michael Calore: So it was sort of a vibe shift.
Lauren Goode: I don’t know if I’d call it a full vibe shift. We did’t hear anything announced at WWDC that was like “MacOS Vibe Shift,” but there’s still a lot that happened this week that we should talk about.
Michael Calore: All right, well, let’s get to it.
Lauren Goode: Let’s do it.
[Gadget Lab intro theme music plays]
Michael Calore: Hi everyone. Welcome to Gadget Lab. I am Michael Calore. I’m a senior editor at WIRED.
Lauren Goode: And I’m Lauren Goode. I’m a senior writer at WIRED.
Michael Calore: And we are also joined in person by WIRED product writer, Brenda Stolyar. Brenda. Hello.
Brenda Stolyar: Hello.
Michael Calore: Welcome.
Brenda Stolyar: Thank you. It's very exciting to be here in person and not on Zoom, where I am unmuting myself every five seconds.
Lauren Goode: We are thrilled to have you in-studio here.
Michael Calore: Well, this week on Monday, Apple delivered its big keynote address at its annual worldwide developers conference. And like almost everyone else, I watched it on my computer at my desk. I had two screens going. I had the video on one screen and all of my feeds on the other. There were two new MacBooks announced, a new homegrown chip, a bunch of updates to iOS and MacOS. And we’ll talk about all of that on today’s show. But first I wanted to ask about the event as the two of you experienced it, because unlike all of us plebians, you were both actually there in person at Apple headquarters in Cupertino.
Lauren Goode: Yep. We were there in person. It was interesting. It was kind of this indoor/outdoor space. They opened up one of the giant glass walls of the spaceship at Apple Park. And so we were sitting in Cafe Max initially having some breakfast, and then you could sort of roam out into this seated area. It was kind of like being at a music festival, but a lot nicer and fewer people going to the bathroom directly on the grass.
Michael Calore: And the worst music.
Lauren Goode: No, music was OK. You know, the intro music always kind of gets you jazzed up. But this was my … I don’t know, I've been to WWDC many times before; it was Brenda’s first time. So I actually want to hear from Brenda what your experience was like.
Brenda Stolyar: First of all, Apple I know is probably listening to this podcast episode. So I would like to thank them for inviting me before I move forward in what I’m about to say. But no, it was really cool to be there in person and to finally experience what everybody’s been talking about, and what my fellow reporters who have gone to the event before have always described to me. I will say, and I was telling Lauren this as we were walking through Apple park, that it really felt like a summer camp because there was a lot of the good energy all around with people that were working there. They were clapping for us while we were walking through. They were screaming things at us to get us hyped, and everybody was in a super good mood. So that was really cool. Because these tech events can be a little bland at times. So it was nice to get that good energy flowing.
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But I will say, I think everybody probably heard Lauren and I start dying laughing when they started playing the prerecorded event. And we both were live-blogging the same thing at the same time, which is that I flew from New York to California to watch WWDC on a giant screen—
Michael Calore: Outdoors.
Brenda Stolyar: Outdoors.
Michael Calore: In a lawn chair.
Brenda Stolyar: In a lawn chair, with the sun just beating down on us. And Apple definitely tried to tell us that they warned us ahead of time after the fact.
Lauren Goode: Yeah, a couple people said, “Oh, we called it like a viewing event, or a viewing party.”
Brenda Stolyar: A viewing party.
Lauren Goode: And I was like, “Really?” I just didn’t remember that.
Brenda Stolyar: Yeah, for lack of a better word, they were gaslighting us for sure. They were like, “You didn't know it was prerecorded?” And I was like, “Absolutely not.”
Michael Calore: Yeah.
Brenda Stolyar: I would’ve seen that in the email. And they were like, “Oh yeah, we definitely mentioned that.” And I was like, “Mm, I probably would’ve thought twice maybe, maybe my editors would’ve thought twice.” I don’t know. But regardless, I am very grateful that I got to experience it in person because I really didn’t think that was going to happen once the pandemic started.
Lauren Goode: Yeah, I think you really have to have a sense of humor about these things, both because of the pandemic and because it’s Apple. I, for one, thought it was pretty worth it to be there in person. And I think the most important thing is that we got to see some of the new stuff in person, even though as Brenda pointed out, the majority of our experience was sitting pretty far back from a stage, and watching things on video.
Michael Calore: Right.
Lauren Goode: So we watched the keynote prerecorded on video. But then afterwards we did have a few minutes to go to the Steve Jobs theater and see some of the new hardware. Not a lot of the new software was on display. We got briefings about that afterwards. But we did see some stuff.
Michael Calore: And Tim Cook did a pop-in.
Brenda Stolyar: Oh my God. OK. So, Brenda really got to kick out of this. Something that people really forget to mention when they come back from Apple Park is the difference between above ground and below ground at Apple Park. When they had taken us downstairs into the theater, all the walls were actually doors and they were swiping their badges. And then all of a sudden, the wall turned into a door, and then it’s like this labyrinth and you’re going through all of these different areas. And it gave very sci-fi vibes, very Stranger Things vibes, which explains the whole Tim Cook thing—where Lauren and I were, where you can go hands-on with the MacBook Air and the MacBook Pro.
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Lauren Goode: We were determined we were going to leave.
Brenda Stolyar: Oh.
Lauren Goode: We were like, “OK, we’ve been here long enough. We're going to go to the visitor center now.”
Brenda Stolyar: Yes.
Lauren Goode: And we start to head toward the door.
Brenda Stolyar: We started to head toward the door and there’s this crowd, and Lauren and I look at each other and we’re like, “What is happening?” And it’s Tim Cook that walks in, and he walks into the center of the circle. And I looked at Lauren, and I was like, “What if we just left, right now, during this moment?” Because everybody was just like … You know, obviously eyes drawn to Tim Cook. I mean—
Michael Calore: Sure. CEO of the most powerful company in the biggest company in the world.
Brenda Stolyar: Right. Everyone was waiting for him to show up, and they start clapping for him. And then it just gets silent, and he starts walking around in a circle, and he had just had the peace sign thrown out.
Michael Calore: Oh. So it was like a photo op?
Lauren Goode: Yeah.
Brenda Stolyar: I guess so.
Lauren Goode: At one point, he was standing hands on hips and … You know.
Michael Calore: Yeah.
Brenda Stolyar: I looked at Lauren and I was like, “What is happening?”
Michael Calore: Yeah. And this is a moment when you see the segmentation of the press too. Because there’s the press who were there to ask a lot of questions and report back for our audience and basically try to get to the bottom of some of these major changes that Apple is making in its software strategy. And then there’s press there that are more content creators or influencers. And so they just want to get the video for their TikTok or Instagram. There are photographers there who are just snapping photos for the wires. And so it’s just their job to stand there and snap photos. And so Brenda and I are like, “We got to get to the visitor center and start filing our stories.” And there’s just this scrum around Tim Cook. Like an odd silence just staring at him. And we’re like, “Oh right, this is weird.”
Brenda Stolyar: That was something that is forever burned into my brain. I was not ready for that.
Michael Calore: So, speaking of the announcements of all the things that we saw, I think probably the one that’s going to make the biggest difference to most people is iOS, because it runs on iPhones and there are a billion iPhones in the world. Tell us what you think are the biggest changes coming to iOS that people should know about.
Lauren Goode: I think some of the biggest changes, in my personal opinion, coming with iOS 16 are changes in messaging. There are still no away messages, which I’m obviously a proponent of, but in iOS 16 you are going to have the ability to mark messages as unread, which is great for just triaging and managing your messages. You’re going to have the ability to edit words. Apple gave a very funny example on stage of someone saying, “Hey babe, can you send the documents?” And then they edited it to say, “Hey Gabe,” because presumably “babe” is a coworker. Also, you're going to have the ability to unsend messages, errant messages, within a few seconds of sending them. So those seemed pretty significant to me. Of course, all of this is between messages, users—and by messages we mean iMessages. And by that we mean people using iPhones and iPads and that sort of thing. So I’m sorry, Mike, I’m still going to be sending inappropriate text messages to you on your Pixel and not be able to edit them.
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Michael Calore: And I will be responding with a green bubble.
Lauren Goode: That’s right. You will be.
Michael Calore: Thank you very much.
Lauren Goode: Yes. Brenda, what stood out to you from iOS?
Brenda Stolyar: I think there was a huge emphasis on collaboration across all the operating systems. So you have shared group tabs, iCloud shared photo library, SharePlay in Messages, share button for Apple’s apps like Keynote and Pages. And then you also have the free form app that’s coming, which is also supposed to be this collaborative shared experience.
And it just feels like Apple really wants us to really beam in on what everyone is doing together, which makes sense during a time like the pandemic, because we are still in a pandemic and during our briefing they explained that it does make minor things a little bit easier when you're working remotely. Like when you send over a document and you don't know what changes were made in the new version, or you don’t know which version was sent over.
So minor things like that, you don't think about on a daily basis, these really solve those problems in a way that’s seamless and easy to navigate. But yeah, it feels like Apple just really wants us together, but remotely on our devices.
Lauren Goode: Right, right. It’s kind of their version of a social network because Apple has never been successful in developing a formal or official social network. A lot of you will remember Ping, something like that. But the connective tissue between all of these apps, that is their social network.
Brenda Stolyar: Yeah. Yeah. And it does feel like a lot, like they threw a lot of collaboration at us during WWDC.
Michael Calore: Yeah. You know, I sort of felt watching it that the emphasis on office style productivity felt a little odd just because I don’t necessarily think of Apple software as office collaboration tools. I think of it as managing personal life. Right? Like, maybe you’ll use email or you’ll use a spreadsheet for something. But when we show up at the office, we’re using the tried and true legacy enterprise tools, like Microsoft and G Suite. Right? I’m sure there are offices out there that use all of these collaborative tools that Apple makes. I just have not worked in any of them.
Brenda Stolyar: 100 percent, that is very true. I think Apple definitely picks up on the fact that there is a gap to be filled with being taken seriously in office settings, because it is a very common consumer product for just the average person at home or for fun or socially. It’s easy to use, but I feel like there is room for it to grow in the office space, and the office setting.
Michael Calore: So we don’t have time to talk about everything obviously, but Lauren, I wanted to get your take on what we saw that’s coming to the iPad with multitasking. They showed off some new multitasking features. There’s been a lot of chatter about this over the last couple of weeks on the internet. I know that you’ve been following this. What did you think of what they showed?
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Lauren Goode: I had high hopes for iPad, you might say. iHope for iPad.
Michael Calore: You might.
Lauren Goode: You might.
Michael Calore: You might.
Lauren Goode: I might. I might. iHope for iPad. Yeah, not so much. So I think with the latest iPadOS, there’s going to be a tiny bit more flexibility around windowing. This is going to be called Smart Manager, and it’s a way for you to run multiple apps on your home screen at the same time, and have the ones that are not actively in use easily available to you. But even calling it “flexibility” isn't quite accurate because it’s still Apple controlling how you multitask on this screen. So over the past few years, we’ve seen the merging of iPad and Mac laptops a little bit, both from a hardware perspective, because some of them share a chip now, and from a software perspective, as we've seen things like Docs appearing on an iPad, and that’s traditionally on a Mac, and that sort of thing.
But this to me is still one of the biggest differences between those two experiences that on MacOS you still have full control over how you control and set your windows, versus iPadOS. And then on MacOS, which is called MacOS Ventura, not Mammoth, as we had thought. Honestly, this stood out to me least on Monday. I’d love to hear Brenda’s take on this because there were some changes in mail that look exactly like what Google has been doing for years.
Michael Calore: Yeah.
Lauren Goode: You know, preferences in the Mac has now been changed to system settings. And it looks a little bit more like iOS, the settings app. We’re also getting to the point where some of the software updates on MacOS are not going to work for a lot of machines that people are still using, like here at Conde Nast where we know people who still have 2013 MacBooks.
Michael Calore: There’s one in this room right now.
Lauren Goode: That’s right. Yeah, Brenda, what did you make of this?
Brenda Stolyar: Yeah, so just give us the option to use MacOS on an iPad. I know that wasn’t going to happen, but just having something that is so, so similar to MacOS, but they can still call it iPadOS, and we didn’t get that. We just got one feature called Stage Manager. And we did see a demo during our virtual briefings. But I really have to just try it for myself. And I just feel like already based on how it’s explained, based on what I’m seeing visually, I can’t grasp it easily. And that I think is already saying something, where I’m like, “Is this how you do it?” Or like, “You resize windows, you can group things here, but is this going to feel like an extra step, or is this going to feel intuitive like MacOS does?” And something tells me it’s not.
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And then with MacOS Ventura … Yeah it’s funny that you said nothing really stood out because I had to look at the story that we wrote before this podcast. Because I was like, “Wait a second,” because it’s all blending together. But I think the biggest thing that stood out that was different from that was continuity camera. That Apple is just like obsessed with the ability to use your iPhone camera as a webcam. They love it.
Lauren Goode: They’re very excited about this.
Michael Calore: Yeah.
Brenda Stolyar: They think it’s like—
Michael Calore: I’m sure a lot of people out there with iPhones and new Macs are excited about it too.
Lauren Goode: Well, this is the physical representation of Apple’s strategy to get us just using all Apple products. Right?
Michael Calore: Yeah.
Lauren Goode: It’s kind of like when Apple Watch came out and they’re like, “Here’s the world’s best smartwatch, but also you need an iPhone for it.”
Michael Calore: Mm-hmm.
Lauren Goode: Those two things have to be paired. And like, in order to have this great camera feature, you must have an iPhone tethered to a … And now I’m calling it an iMac. It's all just becoming the same product.
Michael Calore: It is.
Lauren Goode: Yes.
Michael Calore: So we should mention that all the things we’re talking about, all these new features coming to iOS, iPadOS, MacOS, they’re all going to show up in the fall. Apple usually puts out all of its new software in September after showing it off in June. So we just saw a preview. We haven’t used it yet. And you’ll be able to experience it all in just a few months, on all your devices. So let’s take a break right now. And when we come back, we’ll talk about things that are available much sooner than that: the hardware.
[Break]
Michael Calore: OK. So, we should definitely talk about the new hardware and Apple’s new chip that made its debut on Monday, the M2. Now Brenda, you are our MacBook reviewer and you got an in-person briefing on the new laptops. After the event, there was a MacBook Air and a MacBook Pro announced. Which one should we start with?
Brenda Stolyar: I think we should start with the MacBook Air, which is clearly Apple’s favorite child of the moment. It’s almost like, “MacBook Pro who?” is how I felt during the keynote, and also during our briefing afterwards. I’m going to quickly run through all of the new things you’re going to get with the MacBook Air. And then I’ll run through what you’re getting with the MacBook Pro because you’ll see the difference.
So let’s see. We have a bigger and brighter display, MagSafe charging, a boxier frame instead of that wedge design, a 1080p camera, new color options, thinner bezels, speakers are integrated into the keyboard, and of course an M2 chip. So it feels like the list goes on and on. And they really packed as much as they could into the MacBook Air, as far as new features and new design. And then the MacBook Pro, that has an M2 chip and a touch bar.
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Michael Calore: And a touch bar, which nobody wants.
Brenda Stolyar: No, apparently Apple is convinced though, they’re keeping this around because there are people that want a touch bar, according to them.
Michael Calore: Sure. And I think you probably also get different graphics performance on the MacBook Pro than you would on the Air. Right? There’s like different memory … It’s just like Pro features, things that take it up one notch. But as far as the hardware design goes, it feels like the Air is more advanced as far as Apple’s design thinking, all went into that machine. Right?
Brenda Stolyar: Right. So of course you are going to get that extra processing power. There’s an eight-core CPU and an up to 10-core GPU on the M2, which is two extra GPU cores than the M1. So you are going to get that extra processing power. The M2 is … it’s really worth noting for anybody that’s looking into it. I really want to stress that this is still considered an entry-level chip in their lineup because you do have the M1 Pro, the M1 Max, and the M1 Ultra. And that is not better than the M2.
Michael Calore: Got it.
Brenda Stolyar: So it’s basically just an upgrade to the M1.
Lauren Goode: Huh.
Brenda Stolyar: But it’s called the M2, which is certainly a way to sell MacBook Pros.
Michael Calore: And it is an upgrade. And if you’ve been looking for a laptop for a while, and you’ve been holding out, then just get the Air with M2 because that seems like absolutely the machine to buy, at least to my eyes.
Lauren Goode: Yeah. It sounds like what Brenda is describing is that the gap between this new MacBook Air and the MacBook Pro is closing. The gap is closing and the price points are not that different either. So they don't really feel like totally separate lines of laptop.
Brenda Stolyar: No. Especially when they couldn’t even just upgrade … you’re getting a 1080p camera on the MacBook Air and a 720p camera on the MacBook Pro. You’re also getting just an old design, and with the M1 MacBook Pro and the M1 MacBook Air, that was my big criticism. And I’m sure it was a lot of people’s thoughts, where there was no differentiation aside from their fans. Their active cooling system.
Michael Calore: Right.
Lauren Goode: The literal fans.
Michael Calore: Yeah.
Lauren Goode: It’s not the fans who shout at you when you enter Apple Park? “Welcome!”
Brenda Stolyar: Right. So obviously the MacBook air has … Not, obviously, I’m not sure everybody knows this, but the MacBook Air doesn’t have fans. The MacBook Pro has fans. And for the “Pro user,” that active cooling system is likely super useful for them when they’re editing super intense projects and heavy workloads.
Michael Calore: Yeah.
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Brenda Stolyar: So that could be the one defining thing that keeps them from getting an Air in a Pro, but it just feels like a crime that they’re selling this MacBook Pro with a 13-inch and didn’t even throw in any additional Pro features that they have on the 14-inch and the 16-inch. Like ProMotion, or maybe an extra port, or really just anything that can help make the case for it. Because at this point, maybe just look into the 14-inch MacBook Pro. You want to feel like you’re getting something for your money. And I know I still have to use it and get my experience with it, but honestly, I feel like I should just be telling people to get the M1 MacBook Pro at a third-party retailer for cheaper.
Michael Calore: Cheaper, yeah.
Lauren Goode: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
Michael Calore: I’m most excited about MagSafe, actually. I’m a MagSafe adherent. I love the design of it, where you can just pop it out without having to worry about messing up the cable or messing up the computer. It’s also safer. And we should know that the MacBook Air has both MagSafe and USB-C charging available on it. And maybe the reason it has USB-C charging is because of the recent ruling in the EU, that everybody knew was coming, that said that laptops are going to be required to have USB-C charging. Apple still wanted to put MagSafe back onto the Air. It had taken it off. It was still available on some MacBook Pros. And now it’s back on the MacBook Air. I think it’s a great addition. I love that. But I also love the flexibility of being able to choose. So you can keep one charger at home and the other charger at the office, and just always be able to charge your laptop. It’s kind of nice.
Lauren Goode: So the EU ruling was for both laptops and phones.
Michael Calore: The EU legislator has passed a law this week saying that all mobile devices, that’s like phones, tablets, laptops, headphones, Kindles, have to use the same charger by the end of 2024. So manufacturers who have not made the jump to USB-C are going be required to put USB-C on their devices by the end of 2024.
Lauren Goode: Right on.
Michael Calore: It’s a good thing for everybody.
Lauren Goode: It sounds like it.
Michael Calore: Except for the lightning adapter on iPhones.
Brenda Stolyar: Except when you’re Apple and you make proprietary charging standards and ports.
Michael Calore: Yep.
Brenda Stolyar: Yeah.
Lauren Goode: Cool.
Michael Calore: So Lauren, any final thoughts on the computers?
Lauren Goode: So Brenda did have the chance to go hands-on with the new MacBook Pro. I did not. I saw it from a distance in the hands content capture area. I have to say I was a little bit surprised that Apple announced the M2 because, as Brenda pointed out, some of the specs feel a little bit more like a boosted M1, but they couldn’t keep announcing the M1 forever, and Apple plans these chips years and years in advance. I’m very certain they’re already planning the M4 chip. This is all Apple’s custom Silicon, which is a big move for the company because they had been designing their own custom architecture for the iPhone for years. But we kind of knew this was coming for Macs, and now it’s in Macs. So from a timing perspective, this was probably the right timing for them too. Plus, it feels like maybe they had some excess MacBook Pro inventory and, you know, they had to sell it somehow. Next year’s chips are probably going to be a little bit more impressive because that’s when TSMC’s 3 Nanometer fabrication process, like the way that they actually make these chips—
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Michael Calore: This is the factory in Taiwan that builds the things.
Lauren Goode: That’s right. That’s right. Supposedly these chips are going to be ready next year, and that’s going to offer a lot of boosts in terms of performance, power consumption, just the area for computing. Like, that’s going to be an impressive leap, but it just hasn’t happened yet. So Apple’s continuing the march, with the MacBook laptops, but to Brenda's point, this maybe isn’t the biggest leap in chips that we heard about this week.
Michael Calore: Right. All right. Well, that seems like a good place to end it. So let’s take another break. And when we come back, we’ll do our recommendations.
[Break]
Michael Calore: OK, this is the last of the show, where we all recommend things that our listeners might enjoy. Brenda, as our guest, you get to go first. What is your recommendation?
Brenda Stolyar: Stranger Things. Specifically, Season 4 I haven’t finished it yet. But, if you are the … I don't know, probably the only person on the planet that has yet to watch Stranger Things, just do it. You’re not cool if you don’t watch it. So far, I mean, I’m loving it. I know you’re also like—
Michael Calore: Yeah.
Brenda Stolyar: … on Season 4.
Michael Calore: Yep.
Brenda Stolyar: And the one thing about the show that I will say is every time a season comes out, I say, “This is my favorite season.” And I'm starting to think that Season 4 might be my new favorite season.
Michael Calore: It’s a lot stronger than I was expecting it to be.
Brenda Stolyar: Yeah. I mean, what is it, $30 million per episode?
Michael Calore: That’s how much they’re spending?
Brenda Stolyar: Yeah.
Michael Calore: It feels like it.
Brenda Stolyar: I’m almost like 99.9 percent sure that it’s $30 million. So Netflix is just throwing money at this show, and I’m here for it.
Michael Calore: At least a million of that is going to Kate Bush because they play her song on a loop throughout the entire season.
Brenda Stolyar: Oh my God, yes. She probably just woke up one morning and had it all—
Michael Calore: A good check.
Brenda Stolyar: Yeah. Had a lot more money.
Michael Calore: All right, well you know, also the episodes are really long. Each one is over an hour. So each episode feels like an installment in a film series, which is kind of nice.
Brenda Stolyar: Yes. Literally, usually I binge-watch. And this one has taken me … I'm embarrassed to say I haven’t finished it yet because I usually just watch it in one sitting. And these are taking me a little time.
Michael Calore: Yeah.
Brenda Stolyar: Like five hours go by and I’m not done.
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Michael Calore: Yeah. Yeah. And I mean, it is a horror movie, so there’s a lot of blood and violence and trauma and disturbing images and stuff. So I think if people haven’t seen it, maybe it’s just because they don’t like horror movies.
Brenda Stolyar: Yes. Trigger warnings for sure. There are many. So yeah. It’s definitely not an easy watch. But it’s worth it, if you can watch.
Michael Calore: And Netflix did the fun thing where they’re showing the concluding episodes in like a month.
Brenda Stolyar: Yes. I didn’t know that when it came out, and I was ready to just like … I also thought Season 4 was the last season. It’s not. Season 5 is.
Lauren Goode: Oh.
Brenda Stolyar: So I was ready to say goodbye. Like I was preparing, because this is like literally one of my favorite shows of all time. And I was really preparing myself emotionally and mentally to say goodbye. And they’re like, “Nope, we got one more.” Like, “We’re coming back.”
Lauren Goode: That’s pretty exciting.
Brenda Stolyar: Yeah.
Lauren Goode: I must be very uncool because I don’t watch it. Oh my God. No, it’s totally OK. I am uncool, we know this.
Brenda Stolyar: No, no, no. We should—
Lauren Goode: I watched the first season. I couldn’t get into it.
Brenda Stolyar: You’re still very cool.
Michael Calore: That’s OK.
Brenda Stolyar: I promise.
Lauren Goode: Oh, thanks for that.
Brenda Stolyar: I did not know that. People make fun of me for not watching Game of Thrones, so it’s fine.
Lauren Goode: Oh, I’ve never watched that either. Yeah. Wow. No, but Stranger Things, I gave it a chance and I’m not often into supernatural series in movies. So there was that. Like the whole underworld thing just didn’t grab me.
Michael Calore: Right.
Lauren Goode: I thought it was a little bit of over-manufactured nostalgia, but I know people love it. I think Millie Bobby Brown is super cool.
Michael Calore: Mm-hmm.
Lauren Goode: You know? Like I get the appeal. Also. Here’s the thing. I just canceled Netflix.
Michael Calore: Nice.
Lauren Goode: Yeah.
Brenda Stolyar: Wow.
Lauren Goode: I hadn’t watched it in so long, and people kept talking about Ozark. So I think if I were going to go back, it’d probably be for Ozark, but I’ve been using Hulu and Apple TV+, and HBO Max.
Brenda Stolyar: I will say, I think that a lot of people are going to cancel … This might be a whole other episode, but I think a lot of people are going to cancel Netflix after Stranger Things, to be completely honest. Because you’re not the first person that said this. I've heard this multiple times now.
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Lauren Goode: Yeah. It was like 15 bucks a month. And I was like, “I’m just not using this.”
Brenda Stolyar: Yeah. Yeah.
Lauren Goode: Inflation.
Michael Calore: All right, Lauren, here’s your chance to redeem yourself—
Lauren Goode: OK.
Michael Calore: … by telling us what your recommendation is. So you can say something cool. So we all think you’re cool again.
Lauren Goode: Oh no. I’m just going to bury myself deeper.
Michael Calore: No, please.
Lauren Goode: So Brenda and I were chatting this morning before we came into the office, and I was like, “I don’t have a recommendation this week.” And she said, “What are you into?” And we kind of … You know. And I just said, “I don’t know. The only thing I’ve been doing is sleeping and listening to ocean sounds at night.” So, this is actually something I’ve been doing for quite a while. I have a Google Nest Hub, one of Google’s smart displays, in my bedroom. It does not have a camera. It has a little radar sensor. And every night I say, “Hey G …” I'm not going to trigger all of your smartphones. “Hey G, play ocean sounds.” And it plays ocean sounds all night long. I take a melatonin and I go to sleep. And I highly, highly recommend this. Brenda, you said you use rain sounds?
Brenda Stolyar: Yeah. On my Nest Mini. I used to live above a punk rock bar in New York. My apartment was right above it.
Lauren Goode: Wow.
Brenda Stolyar: And that was the only thing that got me to sleep. So I had to set a routine on my Nest Mini where all I said was, “Hey G, goodnight.” And it would turn my light off. It would start the rain sounds. I would take a melatonin. And that was the only way I could sleep.
Lauren Goode: We’re in agreement.
Brenda Stolyar: Yep.
Lauren Goode: Yeah. Every everyone who’s listening right now should … Now we're just shilling for Google hardware. You know? “Go out and get a Nest Hub Mini. It’s going to listen to everything you say.”
Michael Calore: It works on all the smart speakers.
Lauren Goode: Yeah, it does. Any smart speaker. You can say, “Play ocean sounds,” and typically it’ll pull from whatever music service or streaming service it defaults to. But if you have a subscription to one of the streaming services, you can also set it to default to that one. I think this one, I’m probably just using YouTube or Google Play Music, because I’ve never directed it to Spotify.
Michael Calore: Yeah. There is no Google Play Music anymore.
Lauren Goode: See?
Michael Calore: It’s all just YouTube.
Lauren Goode: What am I even doing? Why am I even a tech reporter? I don’t even know. Really? There’s no … OK. No, actually that’s Google’s fault, because yes. Because Google changes names and services all the time.
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Brenda Stolyar: It’s very confusing yeah.
Lauren Goode: But yeah. If you just need a little relaxation before bed at night, a little white noise, or you need to block out the punk rock band that’s jamming below you, play ocean sounds. “Hey G play ocean sounds.” Take melatonin. Drift off. Actually don’t take medical advice from me. I’m not a doctor. Check with your doctor, not the internet, before you take anything before bed. But that’s my method. Mike, what’s your recommendation this week?
Michael Calore: My recommendation is a podcast. It’s called, Why We Run, and it’s interviews between a running coach and people in her world that run. And there’s a personal connection here. Because first of all, the host of the show is the running coach, Beth Baker, who is one of my oldest friends. I met Beth in 1989.
Lauren Goode: Oh, so you guys were babies.
Michael Calore: 1988.
Lauren Goode: Mm-hmm.
Michael Calore: Yes. We’ve been friends our whole lives, and she’s a delightful person. And she runs a running coach business up in Seattle. And she’s had this podcast for a while, and she used to run with her guests. So they would mic up and go for a run and talk while they were running. Pandemic kind of shut it down. She shut it down at the end of 2019 and didn’t start it back up. But now it’s back. There’s a new season and one of the guests is me. I was on the show.
Lauren Goode: Wow.
Brenda Stolyar: Wow.
Michael Calore: So I just want to give a quick plug to the show. There’s more guests coming, but the only ones that are up right now are the ones where she interviews me. And then one where she interviews the writer, Merna Valerio, which is a great episode. So it’s a lot of fun because it talks about how we got into running, and she asks about advice or problems, and how you overcame those problems. Advice that you got from people. What was good advice? What was bad advice? And then she also offers her own advice as a running coach to the guest, that the listener can then take and apply to their own running program.
Brenda Stolyar: And what advice did she give you?
Michael Calore: Well, she was at my house a couple of months ago and … I talk about this in the show. But I was telling her that I was preparing for a 10K and I had this whole system worked out where I was building up distance over a period of time, and she just shut me down. And she’s like, “You could just run the 10K tomorrow.”
Lauren Goode: Huh.
Michael Calore: It’s all mental. Once you’re past a certain point, it’s all mental. So that’s the best advice she’s ever given me, is like, “It’s all in your head.” Which is mostly true, as long as your conditioning is up. It’s mostly in your head.
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Brenda Stolyar: Yeah. That’s what I hear a lot about people who run marathons and triathlons and all that. They always say it’s mental. It’s really good.
Lauren Goode: Hmm.
Michael Calore: Yep.
Lauren Goode: That’s really great. Mike. I cannot wait to listen.
Brenda Stolyar: Yeah. Same.
Lauren Goode: Is this part of your foray into fitness influencing? Like, next episode are you going to be like, “And I just want to talk about these new sneakers from On, a Swiss company. Boy, are these sneakers incredible”?
Michael Calore: I mean, I don’t want to get into Sponcon.
Lauren Goode: Oh, OK.
Michael Calore: But I do wear those shoes and they are great. And I talk about them a lot. So thank you for calling me out.
Brenda Stolyar: Oh, you could try the watchOS9 feature.
Lauren Goode: Oh, you could.
Michael Calore: I was a little bit jealous.
Lauren Goode: We didn’t talk about that.
Brenda Stolyar: No.
Lauren Goode: Yeah.
Michael Calore: I was a little bit jealous of iPhone people when I saw that at the WWDC keynote, the fact that it does stride length and all that. But, you know, I’m not a big metrics person. I just basically look at my heart rate and my distance and that’s about it.
Brenda Stolyar: And you wear a Garmin watch.
Michael Calore: I do.
Brenda Stolyar: Which is very much runner-approved because the battery life lasts a really long time.
Michael Calore: Yeah. I only have to charge it once every four runs. So take that, Apple Watch. Anyway, that is our show for this week. So Brenda, thank you for being here.
Brenda Stolyar: Thank you for having me and for letting me crash the San Francisco office.
Michael Calore: You’re always welcome.
Lauren Goode: Please come back again.
Brenda Stolyar: I would love to.
Michael Calore: And thanks to everyone for listening. If you have feedback, you can find all of us on Twitter. Just check the show notes. Our producer is Boone Ashworth, who also runs. Goodbye. We’ll be back next week.
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