Linked List: October 26, 2019

Saturday, 26 October 2019

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Both their website and iOS app are very well designed, their Apple Watch integration is perfect for the DF audience, and you can try Future risk-free for your first 30 days.

The RCS Messaging Thing Is Working Out as Well as I Expected, Which Is to Say Terribly ★

Dieter Bohn, writing for The Verge:

All four major US carriers — AT&T, Verizon, T-Mobile, and Sprint — have each issued the same joint press release announcing the formation of “a joint venture” called the “Cross-Carrier Messaging Initiative” (CCMI). It’s designed to ensure that the carriers move forward together to replace SMS with a next-generation messaging standard — including a promise to launch a new texting app for Android phones that supports the standard by next year.

Yes, an Android-only app created by a consortium of the four U.S. carriers will surely be a good app, and will surely succeed worldwide.

Google was unable to immediately provide comment on the CCMI. That in and of itself is telling — as is the fact that the word “Google” appears precisely zero times in the carriers’ press release.

Bodes really well for the quality of that Android app.

If you’re not familiar with all the ins and outs of RCS, let’s quickly catch up. There are four critical problems with RCS:

Not enough carriers have adopted it.

Those that have adopted it sometimes did so without adhering to the international standard for interoperability called the “Universal Profile”.

It is not end-to-end encrypted, so it’s easy for governments to demand the contents of text messages sent using it.

Apple has had precisely zero to say about it, which everybody has interpreted as code for “lol we have iMessage good luck with that RCS thing bye!”

1 and 2 can be fixed by time and effort. 3 sucks but SMS isn’t encrypted either. Ideally an SMS successor would be E2E, but I don’t think it’s a deal-breaker that it isn’t. 4, though, is a deal-breaker. The role of SMS as the standard platform/carrier-independent mobile messaging system isn’t going to change if Apple doesn’t support RCS.

Congress Looking Into Anticompetitive Behavior in the Digital Library Market ★

Something’s clearly wrong here: “Amazon” is mentioned 11 times and “Apple” not even once.

WeWork’s Adam Neumann Is the Most Talented Grifter of Our Time ★

Derek Thompson, writing for The Atlantic:

By 2016, Neumann was telling friends that he was intent on becoming the first trillionaire. Perhaps, he said, somewhere along the way to eternity, he might become the “president of the world.”

With his ignominious departure from WeWork this week, Neumann’s Earth-emperor ambitions may have taken a blow. But he can find solace in suddenly becoming one of the richest people on the planet. On Tuesday, Softbank offered to pay him a king-size ransom in exchange for wresting control of the company. The Japanese conglomerate offered to buy up to $1 billion worth of Neumann’s WeWork shares in addition to giving him a short-term loan of $500 million to pay off a credit line from several banks. Finally, Neumann will receive $185 million over the next four years in exchange for his advice.

At $46 million a year, Neumann’s annual “consulting” fee alone is higher than the total compensation of all but nine public CEOs in the United States.

Like a legalized ponzi scheme. Meanwhile, the company is so cash-strapped that it delayed laying off thousands of employees because it doesn’t have the money to pay them severance.

United Airlines Suggests That Apple Is Helping Design Terminal Upgrades at SFO ★

Juli Clover, writing for MacRumors:

The plan is for Apple to help United reconfigure areas in the airport, though what that specifically means is unclear. Linda Jojo, executive vice president of United Airlines Holdings, mentioned spots Apple employees specifically visited as a hint to what might see a redesign.

“The Apple team in San Francisco has been in our baggage hold areas, customer service and the lobbies,” she said. “I’m being deliberately vague,” she added.

Earlier this year, United Airlines accidentally revealed that Apple is its biggest customer in San Francisco, spending $150 million on airline tickets each year and purchasing an average of 50 business class seats on flights to Shanghai on a daily basis.

Reading between the lines, my guess is that Apple wants to redesign every bit of the experience from curbside to boarding for United passengers out of SFO. They might even be able to improve the security line — SFO uses a private security contractor, not TSA. Should be nice.

Tim Cook on the Five-Year Anniversary of His Coming Out as Gay ★

From an interview with Armando Correa for People en Espanol:

Correa: I remember when I read your column, one of the sentences that most surprised me was: “I’m proud to be gay, and I consider being gay among the greatest gifts God has given me.”

Cook: Yes, I strongly believe that. I think there’s many meanings behind this. One is, it was his decision, not mine. Two, at least for me, I can only speak for myself, it gives me a level of empathy that I think is probably much higher than average because being gay or trans, you’re a minority. And I think when you’re a majority, even though intellectually you can understand what it means to be in a minority, it’s an intellectual thing. It’s not intellectual for me to be in a minority. I’m not saying that I understand the trials and tribulations of every minority group, because I don’t. But I do understand for one of the groups. And to the degree that it helps give you a lens on how other people may feel, I think that’s a gift in and of itself.

Christopher McQuarrie: ‘Focus Entirely on Execution and Not on Result’ ★

Christopher McQuarrie:

After twenty five years in the craft, I’ve learned the secret to making movies is making movies — starting with little movies no one will ever see.

The secret to knowledge is doing and failing — often and painfully — and letting everyone see.

The secret to success is doing what you love, whether or not you’re being paid. The secret to a rewarding career in film (and many other fields) is focusing entirely on execution and not on result.

McQuarrie is writing from the field he knows best — movies — but I really do believe this advice is universal. You want to be a writer? Write. You want to make apps? Create apps.

There’s not much similar between football and filmmaking, but I recently heard Alabama head coach Nick Saban give the same advice to a younger coach: focus on execution, not results. The results you deserve will follow from the quality of your execution.