A One-Word Email From Tim Cook That Sums up His Leadership

Tim Cook’s leadership style, and the contrast with that of Steve Jobs, is much discussed. Inc picked up on an email from the Apple CEO responding to the complaints of a developer that was made public as part of recent antitrust hearings and rather summed up his style and emotional intelligence. The email only contained one word.

How would Cook respond to the lengthy message?  He forwarded the email to three of Apple’s highest decision makers, senior vice presidents Eddie Cue, Phil Schiller, and Craig Federighi, with a one-word question: “Thoughts?” On the surface, you may think there’s nothing special about that type of email. After all, it’s a single word.  But let’s break it down. First, Cook, the CEO of one of the most valuable companies in the world, could have dismissed the original message as a small-time complaint coming from a programmer who didn’t understand Apple’s overarching goals and strategy. But he didn’t.

Apple Music 1 Shows Writing on The Wall For Beats Brand

Speculation has been rife for a while that Apple would retire the Beats branding at some point in the near future. There was certainly a step in that direction on Tuesday with the rebrand to Apple Music radio, notes Brian M. Wolfe on iMore.

As the shift from Beats 1 to Apple Music 1 shows, any current Beats product name change would be seamless and probably won’t come until new models arrive, perhaps as early as this fall. Some name changes would be easier to make than others, however. The BeatsX, urBeats3, and Beat EP are probably history, while the Powerbeats and Powerbeats Pro could live on with “Apple” in each product’s name. Something tells me the Solo Pro, Beats Solo 3 Wireless, and Beats Studio 3 Wireless will all ditch “Solo,” and rebrand with “AirPods” in the name. Finally, the Beats Pill+ is likely to morph into a lower-priced HomePod. We should find out whether Apple retires the Beats name entirely soon enough, as the company is expected to begin announcing new products starting next month and into October.

Batch Rename Files on iOS Using This Shortcut

One task that was always easier on macOS was to rename multiple files at once using Automator. The Files app on iOS/iPadOS doesn’t have a lot of bulk actions. But I finally cracked it with Shortcuts to let you batch rename files on iOS and iPadOS. My shortcut lets you do three specific things: prepend text, append text, and replace text in a file name. If I think of more things to do with file names in the future, I’ll update the shortcut.

Pennsylvania to Launch COVID-19 App Based on Apple-Google API

Pennsylvania is to launch its COVID-19 tracing app in September, built on the Apple-Google framework, AppleInsider reported. The app is set to be called ‘COVID Alerta PA’, according to the state’s Secretary of Health Dr. Rachel Levine.

COVID Alert PA will be interoperable with neighboring state Delaware’s app, as well as two other states yet to be named, according to 6 ABC. “The app is about Pennsylvanians helping Pennsylvanians, it’s about as a community being able to let each other know and track each other’s exposure so we can keep each other safe,” said Health Department spokesperson April Hutcheson. The app will notify people who have potentially been exposed to the coronavirus. The app uses the Centers for Disease Control guideline of being within six feet for at least 15 minutes.

AI Company ‘Cense AI’ Leaks 2.5 Million Medical Records

Secure Thoughts worked with security researcher Jeremiah Fowler to uncover how Cense AI leaked 2.5 million medical records, which included names, insurance records, medical diagnosis notes, and a lot more.

The records were labeled as staging data and we can only speculate that this was a storage repository intended to hold the data temporarily while it is loaded into the AI Bot or Cense’s management system. As soon as I could validate the data, I sent a responsible disclosure notice. Shortly after my notification was sent to Cense I saw that public access to the database was restricted.

1: Burn this company down. 2: Sounds like most of the data are from patients in New York.

Some Developers Use TestFlight as an Unofficial App Store

Writing for Protocol, David Pierce shares stories from developers who use TestFlight as an unofficial App Store.

TestFlight is not an alternative to the App Store, it’s a staging ground on the way there. Developers told me Apple doesn’t review TestFlight apps very intensively, other than to make sure they’re not fundamentally broken or obviously malicious. And if Apple’s already reviewed, say, version 1.0 of your app, they say it won’t even look at 1.0.1. It doesn’t think of TestFlight as a long-term home for apps.

A cool, clever workaround to the App Store’s strict rules.

This ex-Apple ad Manager Created The Ultimate Golf Cart

Brad Payne is a former digital advertising manager for Apple News. Fast Company revealed the story of how he created the Walker Trolley golf cart. You can certainly see the influence of his time at Apple in the story.

Golf cart design became mainly focused on “how tight can I fold it. Put a knob here, another hinge there. Put a racing stripe on it!” Trying to create the smallest folding pushcart is, according to Payne, “a fine goal. A very utilitarian goal. But because of that, the industry kind of converged around a similar design. Everybody kind of copied everyone else.” The starting point for the Walker Trolley, Gibson says, was not how the thing was going to look in the trunk of a car. “Should it fold simply? Yeah, but that shouldn’t drive the design. We want it to present your bag in a beautiful way, using the materials that respect the past.”

Instagram: Please Give Us Your Government ID

Instagram will start asking “suspicious accounts” to verify their identity with a government ID. Instagram claims this will help users understand when accounts are “attempting to mislead their followers” although it’s not clear what kind of behavior the Facebook-owned company thinks is suspicious. One reason is shared: If most of your followers are in a different country than you.

IDs will be stored securely and deleted within 30 days once our review is completed, and won’t be shared on the person’s profile as pseudonymity is still an important part of Instagram.

Tidbits Managing Editor Josh Centers (#7) - BGM Interview

Josh Centers is the managing editor of TidBITS, as well as the author of many Take Control Books: Notes, Home Automation, Apple TV, co-author of Take Control of Preview. He also published Take Control of iOS 13 and iPadOS 13. And he’s recently joined The Prepared as an editor.

In his seventh appearance on the show, Josh explored the new faetures of iOS 14 and what he likes most—as he prepares for his forthcoming Take Control book. The App Libraries feature was at the top of his list. In segment two, Josh and I discussed a major, impressive research article he recently wrote about the often contentious relationship between developers and Apple and its handling of the App Store. We finished with thoughts on a next gen Apple TV 4K.

iPhone Production Begins in India

Indian iPhone production has begun with Wistron looking to hire 10,000 staff, as Apple looks to reduce its reliance on Chinese manufacturing. 9to5 Mac has a nice roundup of the current situation.

India’s importance to Apple as a manufacturing center has grown considerably since the first Foxconn plant back in 2016. The goal at that stage was simply to make older and lower-end iPhone models for local sale. Apple’s primary production capabilities remained firmly centered in China. Things have changed rather dramatically since then. Apple’s increasingly uneasy relationship with China has highlighted the risks of being overly dependent on a single country for the vast majority of production. The substantial tariffs imposed by the Trump administration on Chinese-manufactured products made diversification of manufacturing a much more urgent matter. Apple reportedly responded by asking suppliers to price up the cost of moving 15-30% of production out of China. That seemed an ambitious goal at the time, with one reported failed attempt to manufacture the current flagship models in the country. However, the importance of having iPhone production much more widely dispersed around the globe was underlined when the coronavirus hit China, shutting down iPhone production in the country.

 

Secret Service Purchased ‘Location X’ Product to Track Phones

A Secret Service document reveals the purchase of “Location X” a product that uses location data harvested from apps. The product is from a company called Babel Street. If that name sounds familiar it’s because two employees left the company to form “Anomaly Six” another location tracking company.

“The purpose of this modification is to add 1 licenses [sic] to CLIN 0003 and incorporate the Master Subscription Agreement and Locate X Addendum as attached,” the contract document reads. Motherboard obtained the document through a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request.