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The Never-Overuse Edition Tuesday, June 26, 2018

Tim Cook Speaks Out At Fortune’s CEO Initiative On Hot-button Issues Like Immigration, by Catherine Shu, TechCrunch

Despite increasing media coverage about the overuse of devices and potential links to depression and a recent activist shareholder letter calling on Apple to research the impact of smartphones on children, Cook said the company’s actions weren’t “in response to a specific point that was made.”

“But I think it’s become clear to all of us that some of us are spending too much time on our devices, and we’ve tried to think through pretty deeply about how we can help that,” he added. “Honestly, we’ve never wanted people to overuse our products. We want people to be empowered from them and do things they couldn’t do otherwise, but if you spend all your time on your phone, then you are spending too much time.”

Two Keyboards At A Bar, by Michael Lopp, Rands in Repose

APPLE EXTENDED II: Lonely times, man. Lonely times. First, it was scissors then butterflies. Do you want to know what I miss? Electric Alps switches. That was the dream, right?

MACBOOK PRO (nervous, staring at the bar, napkins in both hands): Did you clean up before I sat down? It looks clean, but…

Beta Track

Apple Releases First Public Beta Of iOS 12, by Juli Clover, MacRumors

Those who want to join the beta testing program can sign up on Apple's beta testing website, which gives users access to iOS, macOS, and tvOS betas. Before installing a beta, make sure to create a full encrypted iTunes backup or an iCloud backup and be sure to install iOS 12 on a secondary device because beta software is not always stable and can include bugs.

iOS 12 Beta: Why You Should (And Shouldn't) Download It, by Jason Snell, Tom's Guide

Our smartphones are vitally important to how we lead our lives. Beta software is inherently unstable; while reports about iOS 12 are good so far, Apple could release a new build with bugs that render your iPhone useless. iOS betas are best installed on devices you can afford to be without, which means you might want to find an older phone or an iPad rather than jump in with your daily carry.

And even if iOS remains stable, changes in the code could mean that third-party apps you rely on every day might be unusable. Before you install the beta, do some Google searches and see if anyone has reported incompatibilities between your go-to apps and the iOS 12 beta.

Eye Tracking In ARKit 2 Introduces A Need For New Permission In iOS, by Russell Holly, iMore

ARKit apps have to ask you for permission to access the camera currently, but eye tracking goes above and beyond what most people think the camera on their phone is capable of. This technology is a door to a whole lot more information than whether you have your tongue out for MeMoji, and by design doesn't involve you even having the camera UI open to really understand what is happening on the computational end of the experience.

Stuff

Apple Releases Its Free Schoolwork App To Teachers, by Dennis Sellers, Apple World Today

Apple says its free Schoolwork app is now available for teachers, allowing them to create assignments, collaborate one-on-one with students, tap into the power of apps for learning and view and understand student progress.

5 Ways The BBC Sounds App Will Change How You Listen To BBC Podcasts And Radio, by James Peckham, TechRadar

BBC Sounds is set to launch on both platforms later today (as well as the Amazon App Store) and as well as making it easy to listen to live shows, it'll look at what you listen to and tailor recommendations for other audio from the BBC.

We're Baking Have I Been Pwned Into Firefox And 1Password, by Troy Hunt

I'm really happy this initiative furthers that objective and does it in a way that puts privacy first. The leverage these two organisations have to drive positive outcomes in the wake of data breaches is massive and I'm enormously excited to see the impact they both make in partnership with HIBP.

Develop

Tetris For Applesoft BASIC, by Paleotronic Magazine

In an era where games were becoming increasingly more complex, the simplicity of Tetris was seen as a breath of fresh air. Tetris would inspire a number of other “falling block puzzle games” such as Sega’s colour-matching Columns, and the three-dimensional Welltris. But Tetris would always remain king (tsar?) of the arcade puzzle game world, with sequels, clones and variations being released for virtually every console, computer, and operating system worldwide.

Notes

How To Read A Privacy Policy, by Ashley Carman, The Verge

We haven’t been able to avoid privacy policies in our post-GDPR world, but figuring out what these legal documents are trying to tell us isn’t easy. They’re typically filled with legalese and boring chatter about data and how it’s handled. I get why no one wants to spend time reading them.

So to save us all some effort, I called a couple lawyers — Nate Cardozo from the Electronic Frontier Foundation and Joseph Jerome from the Center for Democracy and Technology — to learn how they read and process tons of policies. They’ve given me a few tips on how we can essentially skim through a privacy policy while still learning something about how our data is handled.

Here’s The Clearest Picture Of Silicon Valley’s Diversity Yet: It’s Bad. But Some Companies Are Doing Less Bad, by Sinduja Rangarajan, Reveal

Even in some companies with more diverse workforces, women and minorities – especially black workers – were overrepresented in support positions such as administrative assistants, customer service and retail.

[...]

More than half of Apple’s Latino and black employees worked in retail or administrative support.

Bottom of the Page

I was tempted to download and start using the iOS beta because I think I will enjoy having Shortcuts on my iPhone. Then I remember that the Shortcuts app is not available yet, and none of the third-party apps that I am using daily has updated to take advantage of Shortcuts. So: troubles averted.

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Thanks for reading.