Linked List: December 12, 2020

Saturday, 12 December 2020

Craig Federighi’s Keynote at the 10th Annual European Data Protection & Privacy Conference ★

It says a lot about Federighi’s stature at Apple that he’s the executive delivering a talk not about engineering, but about the company’s culture and values. This YouTube clip is the entire morning session from the opening day of the conference, but my link should jump you to the start of Federighi’s keynote at the 49:00 mark.

Jonny Evans has published a transcript of the talk, but again, I suggest listening to Federighi. It’s worth it.

Tim Cook on the Outside Podcast ★

Outside:

In this extended conversation with Outside Podcast host Michael Roberts, Cook talks about both the incredible promise of technology to enhance our well-being and Apple’s duty to help us use our devices more wisely.

There’s a transcript, but I strongly suggest listening to the podcast — it’s excellent. Off the top of my head, this is the most open and relaxed I’ve ever heard Tim Cook in an interview, and his inflection brings weight to his words. His personality comes through, and he offers some genuine insight into his priorities — both in his own life and in how he’s leading Apple. Most interesting to me is how often the conversation turned to privacy. Roberts does a great job with the interview, and the soundscape is interesting too — they conducted the interview while strolling through Apple Park.

Highly recommended.

‘Let’s Skim! The Slack/Salesforce Press Release’ ★

Paul Ford annotates the announcement of Salesforce’s acquisition of Slack:

The events of this year have greatly accelerated the move by companies and governments to an all-digital world, where work happens wherever people are — whether they’re in the office, at home or somewhere in between. They need to deliver connected experiences for their customers across every touchpoint and enable their employees to work seamlessly wherever they are.

Man, this says absolutely nothing specific about anything. The raw hot synergy coming off this paragraph could merge lead into gold. Let’s keep going.

I do love me an annotated press release. There’s well-warranted snark about some of the language, but also some astute analysis of why this deal makes sense for both companies:

Maybe this is a bet on a kind of post-GUI future where everything is a stream of conversation and “work” flows in and out of the channels, as opposed to a document-centric view of the world. And then you move like a freight train, or a Benioff-faced Thomas the Tank Engine, into more and more of ERP, eating away at SAP and Oracle, roping in more of the big consulting firms to your very own vision, and it’s playful, and a little dude in a bear costume keeps dancing and dancing, forever.

The Talk Show: ‘Half of the Bikini Emoji’ ★

Matthew Panzarino joins the show to talk about Apple’s new AirPods Max headphones and the future of the Mac on Apple Silicon.

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‘An Indelible Stain’: How the G.O.P. Tried to Topple a Pillar of Democracy ★

Jim Rutenberg and Nick Corasaniti, reporting for The New York Times:

The Supreme Court repudiation of President Trump’s desperate bid for a second term not only shredded his effort to overturn the will of voters: It also was a blunt rebuke to Republican leaders in Congress and the states who were willing to damage American democracy by embracing a partisan power grab over a free and fair election.

The court’s decision on Friday night, an inflection point after weeks of legal flailing by Mr. Trump and ahead of the Electoral College vote for President-elect Joseph R. Biden Jr. on Monday, leaves the president’s party in an extraordinary position. Through their explicit endorsements or complicity of silence, much of the G.O.P. leadership now shares responsibility for the quixotic attempt to ignore the nation’s founding principles and engineer a different verdict from the one voters cast in November. […]

And it meant that Republican leaders now stand for a new notion: that the final decisions of voters can be challenged without a basis in fact if the results are not to the liking of the losing side, running counter to decades of work by the United States to convince developing nations that peaceful transfers of power are key to any freely elected government’s credibility.

It takes your breath away.

Josh Marshall: “Accepting the results of free and fair elections is now prima facie evidence of not being a Republican or lacking the willingness to fight which is required of Republicans. […] This isn’t a disagreement about voter fraud. It’s a general retreat from democracy by an entire political party.”

Orlando Sentinel Editorial Board Apologizes for Supporting Michael Waltz ★

The Orlando Sentinel editorial board:

During our endorsement interview with the incumbent congressman, we didn’t think to ask, “Would you support an effort to throw out the votes of tens of millions of Americans in four states in order to overturn a presidential election and hand it to the person who lost, Donald Trump?”

Our bad.

Trust us, some variation of that question will be asked of anyone running for Congress in the future, particularly Republican candidates whose party is attempting to upend the way we choose a president.

Apple’s New Map, Expansion #10: Canada ★

The level of detail Justin O’Beirne documents in these comparisons between old and new maps is just extraordinary.