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John Gruber

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John Gruber

Apple Pulls Dating Apps Tea and TeaOnHer From the App Store

techcrunch.com/2025/10/22/apple-confirms-it-pulled-controversial-dating-apps-tea-and-teaonher-from-the-app-store/

Sarah Perez, TechCrunch: Reached for comment, Apple confirmed the apps’ removal, saying it removed Tea Dating Advice and TeaOnHer from the App Store because they failed to meet Apple’s requirements around content moderation and user privacy. The company also said it saw ...

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John Gruber

Signal Moves Ahead on Post-Quantum Computing, But Still Sucks Ass When You Switch Phones

arstechnica.com/security/2025/10/why-signals-post-quantum-makeover-is-an-amazing-engineering-achievement/

Graeme Connell and Rolfe Schmidt, writing earlier this month on the Signal blog: We are excited to announce a significant advancement in the security of the Signal Protocol: the introduction of the Sparse Post Quantum Ratchet (SPQR). This new ratchet enhances the Signal ...

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John Gruber

Ke Yang, Apple’s Head of ChatGPT-Like AI Search Effort, Was Poached by Meta

bloomberg.com/news/articles/2025-10-15/apple-s-newly-tapped-head-of-chatgpt-like-ai-search-effort-to-leave-for-meta

Mark Gurman, reporting for Bloomberg last week: The executive, Ke Yang, is leaving for Meta Platforms Inc., according to people with knowledge of the matter. Just weeks ago, he was appointed head of a team called Answers, Knowledge and Information, or AKI. The group is d...

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John Gruber

Nikkei Asia: ‘Apple Slashes iPhone Air Production Plans, Boosts Other 17 Models’

asia.nikkei.com/spotlight/supply-chain/apple-slashes-iphone-air-production-plans-boosts-other-17-models-sources

Lauly Li and Cheng Ting-Fang, reporting for Nikkei Asia: Production orders for the iPhone Air have been cut nearly to “end of production” levels, despite it only becoming available in China last week, due to weak demand in other markets, multiple sources briefed on the m...

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John Gruber

1.5 Miles of Aluminum Foil Is, in Fact, No Big Whoop

daringfireball.net/linked/2025/10/20/london-phone-theft

Here’s an update I just posted to yesterday’s piece on organized phone theft rings in London:

I forgot to apply one of the core tenets of Brian Kernighan’s wonderful book Millions, Billions, Zillions ($19 in hardcover from Amazon; BookShop.org link to indie booksellers): always do some back-of-the-envelope double-checking of the math in news stories. 1.5 miles of aluminum (or even aluminium) foil from Costco is just 12 rolls at 200 meters each. I wouldn’t blink my eyes at someone with a dozen rolls of foil in the cart at Costco.

Link: daringfireball.net/linked/2025/10/20/london-phone-theft

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• Daring Fireball Department of Commerce

[Sponsor] WorkOS: Scalable, Secure Authentication

workos.com/?utm_source=daringfireball&utm_medium=RSS&utm_campaign=q12025

With WorkOS you can start selling to enterprises with just a few lines of code. It provides a complete User Management solution along with SSO, SCIM, and RBAC. The APIs are modular and easy-to-use, allowing integrations to be completed in minutes instead of months. WorkOS simplifies MCP authorization with a single API built on five OAuth standards.

Today, some of the fastest growing startups are already powered by WorkOS, including OpenAI, Cursor, and Vercel.

For SaaS apps that care deeply about design and user experience, WorkOS is the perfect fit. From high-quality documentation to self-serve onboarding for your customers, it removes all the unnecessary complexity for your engineering team.

Link: workos.com/?utm_source=daringfireball&utm_medium=RSS&utm…

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John Gruber

Electron Apps Causing System-Wide Lag on MacOS 26 Tahoe

mjtsai.com/blog/2025/09/30/electron-apps-causing-system-wide-lag-on-tahoe/

Michael Tsai, back on September 30, compiled a roundup of links regarding Electron apps causing systemwide lag on MacOS 26 Tahoe. The reason, seemingly, is that the Electron framework was overriding a private AppKit API. Of course.

Tomas Kafka wrote a shell script to find un-updated Electron apps on your system. Craig Hockenberry took Kafka’s shell script and turned it into an easy-to-use AppleScript application.

So, yes, Theo Browne, “software dev nerd”, Electron really is “that bad”. It’s actually, if anything, worse.

Link: mjtsai.com/blog/2025/09/30/electron-apps-causing-system…

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John Gruber

When Design Drives Behavior

world.hey.com/jason/when-design-drives-behavior-49baf157

Jason Fried:

So what’s the net effect of this tiny little design detail that the owner may not even understand? Well, it looks like the watch is already half-way out of power after the first day, so it encourages the owner to wind the watch more frequently. To keep it closer to topped off, even when it’s not necessary. This helps prevent the watch from running out of power, losing time, and, ultimately, stopping. A stopped watch may be right twice a day, but it’s rarely at the times you want.

Small detail, material behavior change. Well considered, well executed, well done.

Link: world.hey.com/jason/when-design-drives-behavior-49baf157

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John Gruber

Apple Lowered the Price of the New MacBook Pro for Most of the European Countries Where It No Longer Ships With an Included Power Adapter

pxlnv.com/linklog/macbook-pro-charger-brouhaha/

Nick Heer, at Pixel Envy: First of all, the dollar is not the currency in any of these countries. Second, the charger in European countries is €65, which is more like $76 right now. Third, Apple is allowed to bundle an A.C. adapter, it just needs to offer an option to no...

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John Gruber

More on the Lack of an Included Charger With New M5 MacBooks in Europe, Including the U.K. and Norway

daringfireball.net/linked/2025/10/16/m5-mbp-no-power-adapter-in-europe

While poking fun at EU regulations leading Apple not to include a power adapter with the new M5 MacBook Pro across Europe, I wondered why the U.K. — which left the EU five years ago — was affected. DF reader C.A. wrote, via email: We did indeed leave the EU, but remain a...

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John Gruber

How London Became a Global Hub for Phone Theft

nytimes.com/2025/10/15/world/europe/london-police-phone-theft-china-gang.html?unlocked_article_code=1.u08.0dqv.RfHSG9CDuk4i&smid=url-share

Lizzie Dearden and Amelia Nierenberg, reporting for The New York Times (gift link): For years, London’s police assumed most of the phone thefts were the work of small-time thieves looking to make some quick cash. But last December, they got an intriguing lead from a woma...

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John Gruber

Kickstarter Campaign for Ben Zotto’s ‘Go Computer Now!’, a Book on Sphere, the Nearly Forgotten Personal Computer Company

kickstarter.com/projects/bzotto/go-computer-now-the-story-of-sphere

Ben Zotto: Name every pioneering personal computer you can think of from the 1970s. The MITS Altair 8800. The Apple-1. The IMSAI 8080. You may even know about the SWTPC 6800 or Processor Technology Sol-20. There’s a computer missing from that list, and it’s an important...

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John Gruber

Counterpoint Research Claims iPhone 17 Sales Are Up Year-Over-Year in the U.S. and China

cnbc.com/2025/10/20/apple-stock-iphone-17-us-china-sales.html

CNBC:

Apple shares rose 4% on Monday as a new report showed iPhone 17 sales off to a strong start in the U.S. and China.

The iPhone 17 series, which dropped in September, has outsold the iPhone 16 series by 14% in the U.S. and China within its first 10 days of availability, according to data from Counterpoint Research.

Just because a research firm claims iPhone 17 sales are up 14 percent doesn’t mean they are up 14 percent. These are estimates, not hard numbers from Apple — and Apple doesn’t share actual sales numbers with anyone. Some headlines get this right, but most don’t.

Link: cnbc.com/2025/10/20/apple-stock-iphone-17-us-china-sales…

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John Gruber

Mux: Video API for Developers

mux.com/video-api?utm_campaign=fireball&utm_source=DF

My thanks to Mux for sponsoring last week at DF. Modern video should be simple to ship and scale. Mux makes it easy to build live and on-demand video into anything from websites to platforms to AI workflows.

Upload a video, get back a playback URL. No transcoding headaches. No CDN setup. Go further with the building blocks of your video: thumbnails, transcripts, and storyboards. Use them to create exactly what you want.

Future-proof your video stack with infrastructure trusted by Patreon, Substack, and Synthesia. Get started free, no credit card required. Use the code FIREBALL for an extra $50 usage credit, when you need it.

Link: mux.com/video-api?utm_campaign=fireball&utm_source=DF

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John Gruber

United States Mint to Release Commemorative $1 Steve Jobs Coin

usmint.gov/news/press-releases/united-states-mint-releases-2026-american-innovation-one-dollar-coin-program-designs

I’m not really into commemorative coins, and I have to say I suspect Steve Jobs wasn’t either, but it’s a nice little recognition. No mention of it from the Mint, but the $1 value of the coin is the same as the salary Jobs drew from Apple.

Link: usmint.gov/news/press-releases/united-states-mint-releases…

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John Gruber

Matthew Belloni Interviews Eddy Cue on ‘The Town’

theringer.com/podcasts/the-town-with-matthew-belloni/2025/10/14/apples-true-intentions-in-hollywood-with-top-exec-eddy-cue

Speaking of Eddy Cue, he was the guest on Matthew Belloni’s excellent podcast, The Town, this week. (Overcast link.) Just a great interview in general. Cue doesn’t do many interviews but he’s my favorite Apple executive to hear speak, because he’s the least rehearsed and mos...