FeedCity

Other Mac-related news from OpenAI last week:

Sky is a powerful natural language interface for the Mac. With Sky, AI works alongside you, whether you’re writing, planning, coding, or managing your day. Sky understands what’s on your screen and can take action using your apps.

We will bring Sky’s deep macOS integration and product craft into ChatGPT, and all members of the team will join OpenAI.

Two of the founders of Software Applications Incorporated, the company behind Sky, are Ari Weinstein and Conrad Kramer, who a decade ago co-created Workflow, which Apple acquired in 2017 and turned into Shortcuts.

Federico Viticci got an advanced look at Sky and wrote a glowing preview back in May.

Washington, October 2025.

From the video Life on the road: moments from the PNW.

Most people’s primary computing devices are their phones — and even for people whose primary devices are desktop computers, their phones are much-used satellite devices. And on both iOS and Android alike, people live their mobile digital lives through native apps, not websites.

I checked out Elon Musk's answer to Wikipedia by going to the pages on his site that Wikipedia mangles the most. It looks like they basically copied Wikipedia, so it's no better or worse. They'll probably be able to improve it, because ChatGPT tells a much closer to actual-events story. Getting the story right, is more important imho than keeping democracy open to trolls.

Joe Kissell, writing at TidBITS: For more than a year, we’ve heard scattered complaints: problems with Nisus Software’s website, particularly the user discussion forum; slow or absent responses to support requests; assorted bugs; and other issues. But earlier this week, ...

Great coffee takes care. Family-owned since 2005, our slogan “Live Slow” guides our every day in and out of our roastery. From sourcing small-lot single origins to blending coffees for balance, we small-batch roast our award-winning coffees in Salem and Tokyo. For the at-home coffee drinker, we roast to order and pack the same coffees brewed and served in all of our cafés. For the office worker, Jaho is proud to be a wholesaler with select partners across the nation and in Japan. DF readers: take 20% off with DF.

Fresh beans shipped nationwide.
Give up bad coffee for good.

The trip to Canada really changed my perspective. Spending more time thinking than developing new stuff. One thing is for sure, we're going to depend on FeedLand more as we go two-way in WordLand. I've been here before. Have to let my mind mull things over before the movement resumes.

Made good progress on a FeedLand performance issue. The new version is running on feedland.org. We're getting ready to try it on other systems. On the way I hit a problem with the wpcom package that implements the WordPress API in Node.js. Apparently the new version depends on babel/runtime, but it isn't listed as a dependency in their package.json file. I worked around the problem by adding that dependency in wpidentity's package.json file, and that fixed the problem. Had trouble getting this report in their issues section.

The best time to adjust the rules of the App Store — its exclusivity on app distribution for the entire iOS platform, the exclusivity of Apple’s IAP for purchasing digital content, the commission percentage splits on IAP — was over a decade ago. The next best time to make those adjustments is now.

Oregon, October 2025.

From the video Life on the road: moments from the PNW.

Joe Rossignol, MacRumors:

Apple might be preparing iPad apps for Pixelmator Pro, Compressor, Motion, and MainStage, according to new App Store IDs uncovered by MacRumors contributor Aaron Perris. All four of the apps are currently available on the Mac only. A quick overview of each app:

• Pixelmator Pro: Professional image editing app acquired by Apple earlier this year
• Compressor: Final Cut Pro companion app for compressing audio and video files
• Motion: Final Cut Pro companion app for creating 2D/3D titles, transitions, and effects
• MainStage: Logic Pro companion app for live performances

There is already a less-capable Pixelmator app available for the iPad and iPhone.

Interesting though that — just like Final Cut and Logic — these new pro apps are reportedly iPad-only, with no support for iPhone.

Also: still no Xcode, even for iPad.

Joe Rosensteel, writing at Six Colors, regarding the demise of Apple’s Clips app: It’s not that it was completely inept, but it was an aimless showcase to demonstrate what Apple could do. It withered over the course of eight years before it was quietly killed. At no poi...

Mark Gurman, in his weekly paywalled Power On column for Bloomberg: I reported a few years ago that Apple was working to bring more advertising to iOS. Well, now that effort is gaining traction — with a plan to start the ads as early as next year. The company is focusing...

Dian Zhang and Ignacio Calderon, reporting for USA Today: Even before Terry Rozier dropped out of the 2023 NBA game in which he’s accused of rigging his statistics, computers at an “integrity monitor” firm flagged a flood of bets that did not match a mathematical model o...

Adobe Design profiles Adobe’s new Premiere app for iOS, and interviews Christopher Azar, group design manager for Adobe Video, regarding the thinking behind the app and its design: What was the primary goal when you set out to design Premiere on iOS? Christopher Azar: O...

A few magical moments and images from my days in the PNW.

Washington, October 2025.

From the video Life on the road: moments from the PNW.

For your weekend listening enjoyment, a new episode of America’s favorite 3-star podcast, with special guest Dan Moren. Topics include Atlas, ChatGPT’s new web browser (or anti-web browser) for the Mac; Apple’s loss in a “landmark” regulatory lawsuit in the UK regarding App Store commission rates; multiple reports of poor sales for the iPhone Air; and Apple’s M5 product announcements: MacBook Pro, iPads Pro, and Vision Pro.

Brought to you by these fine sponsors:

• Squarespace: Save 10% off your first purchase of a website or domain using code talkshow.
• Factor: Healthy eating, made easy. Get 50% off your first box, plus free breakfast for 1 year.

Worth a re-link, following up on my post yesterday linking to Stephen Hackett’s “Boring Is What We Wanted”, here’s Rogue Amoeba co-founder Quentin Carnicelli, writing back in 2018: At the time of the writing, with the exception of the $5,000 iMac Pro, no Macintosh has be...

Yours truly on Friday, regarding the news that Meta is going to ban rival AI chatbots from WhatsApp: Perhaps because I’m only a light user of WhatsApp, I had no idea that rival AI chatbots had accounts there. I just tried it with 1-800-ChatGPT and it seems pointless. It’...