Linked List: August 8, 2018

Wednesday, 8 August 2018

Dylan Byers Reports Tim Cook and Eddy Cue Decided to Remove Alex Jones’s Infowars Podcasts From iTunes, Facebook and YouTube Followed Apple’s Lead 

Dylan Byers, in his Pacific newsletter:

• Amid mounting public pressure to address Jones’ hate speech, Apple’s Tim Cook and Eddy Cue met over the weekend and decided to pull five of Jones’ podcasts from their platform, sources familiar with the matter told me.

• Cook and Cue decided to let Jones’ InfoWars app remain available in the app store because they felt it did not run afoul of their policy. […]

• Zuckerberg only moved to remove these pages after learning about Apple’s decision, Facebook sources said. That is why the pages were removed at 3 a.m. Pacific Time.

• YouTube’s Susan Wojcicki and Spotify’s Daniel Ek similarly moved to ban some of Jones’ content only after learning about Apple’s decision.

• There was no coordination between Apple, Facebook and any of the other tech firms, sources familiar with the matter said. The decisions were made independently.

Assuming Byers’s reporting is solid, there we have it: Apple led the way.

Logitech Introduces $70 ‘Powered’ Charging Stand for iPhones 

Logitech:

Logitech is changing the way you charge your iPhone with today’s introduction of the Logitech Powered Wireless Charging Stand. Designed in collaboration with Apple, Powered is a wireless charging stand for iPhone 8, iPhone 8 Plus and iPhone X that makes it easy to charge and use your iPhone at the same time. […]

Powered delivers up to 7.5W charging for iPhone 8, 8 Plus, and X only and up to 5W charging for all other Qi-enabled devices.

“Designed in collaboration with Apple” is interesting, especially since Apple’s own AirPower charging mat still isn’t shipping. This is the second recent Logitech product co-designed by Apple, after this year’s Crayon stylus.

Wired Gets Hands-On With Magic Leap 

Jessi Hempel, writing for Wired:

In retrospect, Magic Leap CEO Rony Abovitz realizes that all the hype was a big mistake. “I think we were arrogant,” he says.

You don’t fucking say.

The problem, we figured out, was the fit. Each set of goggles comes with five nose pieces and the ability to add prescription lenses. Magic Leap’s experience is so closely linked to a person’s physiology, these goggles will need to fit perfectly to work. This is a challenge for a company trying to introduce a new type of tech. So, Magic Leap has contracted with former Apple executive Ron Johnson’s startup, Enjoy, which sends customer service people to deliver new tech gadgets and help users set them up. Enjoy representatives will deliver every Magic Leap headset, fit it, and provide a tutorial on how it works.

Yeah, that sounds like something that will scale well.