Linked List: April 22, 2021

Thursday, 22 April 2021

One more AirTags first-look, from Dieter Bohn at The Verge:

From a design perspective, an AirTag is classic Apple. It’s a white and shiny silver little button, and you can have custom emoji or letters printed on the plastic. They are as cute as the buttons they resemble.

However, you’ll soon find the plastic is scuffed and the chrome on the back is scratched. Sincerely, do not expect these to stay looking pristine for long — not since the weird early days of the iPod nano has an Apple product gotten scuffed this easily.

I noticed this too — very gentle handling but the one on my keychain is already scratched. That’s fine by me — maybe not so fine by the folks spending $300-450 on the Hermès accoutrements.

Speaking of Rene Ritchie and AirTags ★

Good interview with Apple’s Kaiann Drance (VP product marketing) and Ron Huang (senior director of sensing and connectivity).

One Day With AirTags ★

One more from Matthew Panzarino:

With you, by the way, means in relative proximity to a device signed in to the iCloud account that the AirTags are registered to. Bluetooth range is typically in the ~40 foot range depending on local conditions and signal bounce.

In my very limited testing so far, AirTag location range fits in with that basic Bluetooth expectation. Which means that it can be foiled by a lot of obstructions or walls or an unflattering signal bounce. It often took 30 seconds or more to get an initial location from an AirTag in another room, for instance. Once the location was received, however, the instructions to locate the device seemed to update quickly and were extremely accurate down to a few inches.

Same experience here. Takes a little longer than I’d wish to get the initial signal — sometimes — but once it has the signal, it’s accurate to within inches.

My quickie review: AirTags are a nice size. Bigger than a quarter, smaller than a Snapple bottle cap. They’re lighter than I expected. I still don’t know where I will use them, as someone who almost never misplaces his keys and prefers to carry just two keys on a very small ring. Apple’s AirTag keychain is bigger and weighs more than my two lone keys. I guess I’ll put one in my laptop bag, but I had a Tile tracker in there for years and never once used it. I figure putting an AirTag in my bag is a good way to guarantee an anti-Murphy’s Law result, and never lose it.

Here’s the other weird thing. Apple sent reviewers five AirTags: a standalone unit, and a 4-pack of custom-engraved ones. In the 4-pack, one of them was blank. My other three were: a 👍 emoji, “JG”, and “RJT”. The emoji and “JG” I understood. “RJT” I did not. I asked a bunch of friends, checked for slang I might be too old to have heard, and no one could figure this out. I asked a few fellow-reviewer friends, and none of them got one with their initials. I broke down and asked Apple, and they claimed it was random. I just lucked into a kit with “JG” as one of the engravings.

That seems hard to believe, but Rene Ritchie got his kit today (blame Canadian customs), and his 4-pack was identical to mine: blank, 👍, “JG”, and “RJT”. Other reviewers got different combinations, but apparently a bunch got the same ones I did. I’m just lucky enough to have the right initials.

The Purple iPhone 12 ★

Matthew Panzarino:

This is a great color.

Apple sent me one yesterday, along with the new purple silicon case, and I agree: very nice colors. (In previous years, Apple has used the spring mid-cycle update to introduce the Product Red iPhone, but Product Red was in the initial fall batch of colors.)

We Found the Guy Who Is Opposed to the Color iMacs ★

David Goldman, writing for CNN Business:

The only problem is you have to look at your new iMac when you’re using it.

Ugh, those colors. It comes in Easter egg blue, green, yellow, pink, orange, purple and (thankfully) silver. If the colors weren’t bold enough, Apple added sorta faded complementary colors to the stand, which is an … interesting design choice.

I feel like this argument is from 1999 — except in 1999, there were only brightly-colored iMacs. There’s a neutral silver this time, which makes Goldman’s argument rather baffling unless he just wants to be known as Mr. No Fun.

How Europe’s Super League Fell Apart ★

“The inside story of how a billion-dollar European soccer superleague was born, and then collapsed, in less than a week.”

India’s Descent Into Covid Hell ★

Hannah Ellis-Petersen, reporting for The Guardian from Delhi:

Dr Amit Thadhani, director of Niramaya hospital in Mumbai, which is only treating Covid patients, said he had given warnings about a virulent second wave back in February but they had gone ignored. He said now his hospital was “completely full and if a patient gets discharged, the bed is filled within minutes”. Ten days ago, the hospital ran out of oxygen, but alternative supplies were found just in time. […]

Thadhani said this time round the virus was “much more aggressive and much more infectious” and was now predominately affecting young people. “Now it is people in their 20s and 30s who are coming in with very severe symptoms and there is a lot of mortality among young people,” he said.

The haunting blare of ambulance sirens continued to ring out across the capital almost non-stop. Inside Lok Nayak government hospital in Delhi, the largest Covid facility in the capital, overburdened facilities and a shortage of oxygen cylinders meant there was two to a bed, while outside patients waiting for beds gasped for air on stretchers and in ambulances, while sobbing relatives stood by their sides. Some sat with oxygen cylinders they had bought themselves out of desperation. Others died waiting in the hospital car park.

More here from The New York Times. It’s breathtaking how quickly COVID can erupt — India had just 11,000 cases a day in early February. Yesterday they set a record with over 310,000 cases.