If you’re a regular reader of this magazine, you probably don’t need to be convinced of technology’s enormous potential. Popular Mechanics has been covering that for more than a century. But if there’s one thing I want you to take away from these stories, it’s that while the potential of technology is virtually limitless, its impact is ultimately a reflection of the values that guide the people who create and use it.
Tim Cook: [...] We believe in putting groups of people together focused on solving some problem for a user. You pick diverse teams that look at the problem through different lenses.
We debate about things that we do and do not do, because we know we can only do a few things well. You have to debate and say no to a lot of great ideas so that you can spend your time on the ones that are truly unbelievable.
Apple today introduced its second Impact Accelerator class — a cohort of 16 Black-, Hispanic/Latinx-, and Indigenous-owned businesses working on the cutting edge of environmental services and solutions. Part of the company’s Racial Equity and Justice Initiative, the Impact Accelerator will provide training and mentorship to help propel the selected businesses toward the next stage of growth while advancing a shared goal of creating a greener world.
I've had my fair share of App Store rejections in the past [...] But I wasn't prepared to be rejected because my app is "not good enough" for the App Store.
Back in 2018, Apple acquired a music industry startup called Platoon, which was co-founded by a former iTunes executive. Four years later, Apple has launched a new “Platoon for Artists” app on the App Store, which it says will help up and coming artists manage their careers with things like social tracking, reporting features, and more.
When the day comes to an end and you finally crawl into bed, it is not always so easy to shed the pressures of the day and find sleep. Noise machines have grown in popularity over the years due to people wanting to precisely control the ambient sounds around them in order to sleep better. However, actual white noise machines can be difficult to travel with due to their size and power needs. As an alternative, there are now white noise apps that offer simple functionality and excellent performance.
Cord-cutting is still the present and the future, but the sum cost of even just a few big streaming sites, let alone all, is about the price of cable. With the messiness of streaming right now, it’s hard not to feel a little nostalgic about the expensive pay-TV-bundle model that once dominated.
“Buy now, pay later” companies say they don’t win when customers fail to pay—they make a much smaller percentage from fees—and as such they’ve built systems that help people succeed financially, avoid long-term debt, and remain reliable customers.
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And yet, stories abound of people who, like Rawls, found themselves buying more than they could afford once they started to use “buy now, pay later.”
I do not use any white noise apps, but when I have difficulties getting to sleep, or problem getting back to sleep, I listen to BBC news. :-)
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Thanks for reading.