Linked List: April 28, 2021

Wednesday, 28 April 2021

Apple Q2 2021 Quarterly Results ★

Record-breaking all around, but I’ll point to one number: Mac sales went from $5.4B to a record $9.1B year-over-year. Not bad for a 37-year-old platform.

How Pfizer Makes Its COVID-19 Vaccine ★

The New York Times:

It’s the start of a complex manufacturing and testing process that takes 60 days and involves Pfizer facilities in three states. The result will be millions of doses of the vaccine, frozen and ready to ship.

The scale of this operation is awe-inspiring.

Project Kiwi: Disney’s Free-Walking Robot Project ★

Speaking of Panzarino, he had another killer feature last week — a behind-the-scenes look at a robotic baby Groot from Disney Imagineering:

And even though the expressive eyes are already impressive — the team is not done. Up next on the agenda is a sensory package that allows Kiwi to more fully understand the world around it and to identify people and their faces. This becomes important because eye contact is such an emotive and powerful tool to use in transporting a participant.

Even without the sensing software, I can tell you that the experience of this 2.5ft Groot locking eyes with me, smiling and waving was just incredibly transportive. Multiple times throughout my interaction I completely forgot that it was a robot at all.

Incredible stuff.

Matthew Panzarino Interviews Greg Joswiak and John Ternus About the New iPad Pro ★

Matthew Panzarino, writing for TechCrunch:

“We’ve always tried to have the best display,” says Ternus. “We’re going from the best display on any device like this and making it even better, because that’s what we do and that’s why we, we love coming to work every day is to take that next big step.

One thing I noticed watching the event last week is that Apple never describes iPads as “tablets”. They compare performance to “other devices” or, in Ternus’s words above, “any device like this”. I get why Apple is reluctant to call iPads “tablets”, but it’s hard to dance around it.

Panzarino mentions this reluctance to use the T-word in this bit, about how Apple sees the dynamic between Macs and iPads:

If you follow along, you’ll know that Apple studiously refuses to enter into the iPad vs. Mac debate — and in fact likes to place the iPad in a special place in the market that exists unchallenged. Joswiak often says that he doesn’t even like to say the word tablet.

“There’s iPads and tablets, and tablets aren’t very good. iPads are great,” Joswiak says. “We’re always pushing the boundaries with iPad Pro, and that’s what you want leaders to do. Leaders are the ones that push the boundaries leaders are the ones that take this further than has ever been taken before and the XDR display is a great example of that. Who else would you expect to do that other than us. And then once you see it, and once you use it, you won’t wonder, you’ll be glad we did.”

Joanna Stern Interviews Craig Federighi About Privacy and Ad Tracking ★

Sharp, smart interview.

The Twitter Hate Machine ★

“Maple Cocaine”, in a now famous tweet over two years ago:

Each day on twitter there is one main character. The goal is to never be it.

Twitter is a machine for directing self-righteous anger, and it fires all day, every day, whether the targets are deserving or not.