AirPod Case Styled Like a Classic Mac

Elago has a rather stylish looking AirPods case that is designed like a classic Apple monitor. It has an anti-slip coating and is made of flexible, impact-resistant silicone material. The case is compatible with Apple AirPods 1 and 2 and supports wireless charging of the Airpods Wireless Charging Case. It costs $13.99

2020 Will be a Big Year for Apple, and AR

It is fairly common that Apple is not the first mover with a technology, but it then subsequently takes that technology into the mainstream. Mark Gurman at Bloomberg Businessweek thinks that with Apple set to release its smart glasses, that could be the cases with AR. It is looking like 2020 could prove to be a very big year for the company indeed.

The coming year will be critical for Apple Inc. Consumers should expect its most impressive hardware rollout in some time: The iPhone is due for its first major update since 2017, including 5G support, a much beefier processor, and a rear-facing 3D camera. The latter will give the phone a better sense of where it is in physical space, improving the accuracy of object placement in augmented-reality apps, which overlay virtual images on the real world. That could make it easier for users to model, say, the placement of pictures on their walls.

Should You Warn Your Guests About Smart Devices?

David Murphy asks if people are morally obligated to inform their guests that their home contains smart devices like HomePod, Amazon Alexa, and Google Home. Given the fact that these devices can listen to you, should you post a sign in your house that says, “Warning: This Area Under Surveillance?”

If you’re simply sporting a smart speaker, I think announcing its presence is less of a deal—overkill, really. But if a camera is recording me at any point, and that’s something you can view later, I think it’s the friendly thing to do to let me know before I start gossiping…or worse.

What do you mean by worse??

Google to Fix HEIC Photo Backup 'Bug'

Redditor u/stephenvsawyer found that HEIC photos were given unlimited backups to Google Photos because they are smaller than JPGs. If Google tried to compress them the files would actually get bigger, which would be a waste of storage space. But Google calls it a bug and says it will fix it.

However, what that means remains unclear. Would Google start charging for HEIC images stored in Photos, even if they’re small and don’t take up much space? Would it forcibly re-convert those pics to compressed JPEG, or compress them further under the HEIC format? And will the fix apply to all HEIC images or just iPhones?

I’m not sure how Google will fix it unless they just check if the file extension is .HEIC and arbitrarily limit these files (arbitrary since converting them would increase their size).