CultCast #315 - Best TV of 2017!

Ho Ho Hooo! This week on a very merry CultCast:

• Next-day delivery of iPhone X is a sprinkling of Christmas magic
• Updated AirPods are supposedly coming in 2018
• How the iPhone almost never was
• HOT Tips:
  • How to listen to Youtube videos when your iPad or iPhone screens are off
• • How to picture-in-picture Youtube videos on your iPad
  • And how to keep those pesky ads out of your Youtube videos for free
• And we wrap up with our favorite shows of 2017!
• To all our Cult friends, meeeeerry Christmas, happy (belated) Hanukkah

 

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Thanks to Kevin MacLeod at incompetech.com for the great music you hear on today's show.

 

@erfon / @lkahney / @lewiswallace

 

Next-day delivery of iPhone X is a sprinkling of Christmas magic

• It’s a Christmas Miracle!
• All models are available in the U.S. Apple Store, marking something of a Christmas miracle for Apple — when you consider that the majority of pre-release reports suggested that the iPhone X wouldn’t be shipping to most customers until some time in 2018.

 

Listen up: Updated AirPods are supposedly coming in 2018

• Did you know AirPods are among the most beloved new products that Apple has launched in years, with around 98 percent of customers describing themselves as either “very satisfied” or “satisfied” with Apple’s wireless buds.
• Apple is planning to release an updated version of its AirPods wireless earbuds in the second half of 2018, respected Apple analyst Ming-Chi Kuo claims in a new note to clients.
• While he doesn’t share too many details about what the new AirPods will do differently, he does suggest that they will adopt a smaller quartz component — quite possibly making them even smaller than the first-gen model currently available.

 

Today in Apple history: iPhone may have to seek new name

• The original iPhone wasn’t an iPhone at all. 
• Back in 1998, a company called InfoGear showed off an “iPhone” at CES. Costing $499, with extra charges for internet access, the device made very early use of touch technology, visual voicemail, basic apps and more.
• Even though it got good reviews, it didn’t sell well, but it peaked Cisco’s interest, and they bought InforGear and the iPhone trademark in 2000.
• Fast forward to 2007. Apple announces their iPhone, and they did it knowing that Cisco owned the trademark.
• Steve Jobs wasn’t going to let something silly like the law stop him from using the name he wanted for Apple’s new device.
• Despite Cisco owning the name, Apple nonetheless went ahead and introduced the iPhone in January 2007. The following day, Cisco filed suit against Apple. As Adam Lashinsky revealed in his book Inside Apple:
• • “[Charles Giancarlo, a Cisco executive at the time] fielded a call directly from Steve Jobs. ‘Steve called in and said that he wanted it,’ Giancarlo recalled. ‘He didn’t offer us anything for it. It was just like a promise he’d be our best friend. And we said, ‘No, we’re planning on using it.’’ Shortly after that, Apple’s legal department called to say they thought Cisco had ‘abandoned the brand,’ meaning that in Apple’s legal opinion Cisco hadn’t adequately defended its intellectual property rights by promoting the name
  • The negotiation displayed some classic Steve Jobs negotiating tactics. Giancarlo said Jobs called him at home at dinnertime on Valentine’s Day, as the two sides were haggling. Jobs talked for a while, Giancarlo related. ‘And then he said to me, ‘Can you get email at home?’ Giancarlo was taken aback. This was 2007, after all, when broadband Internet was ubiquitous in homes in the US, let alone that of a Silicon Valley executive who had worked for years on advanced Internet technology. ‘And he’s asking me if I’m able to get email at home. You know he’s just trying to press my buttons — in the nicest possible way.’ Cisco gave up the fight shortly after that.”
• Apple later repeated this somewhat underhanded move by borrowing another trademark owned by Cisco — the name “IOS” (which Cisco used for “Internet Operating System”). As a make-good, Apple and Cisco announced that they were teaming up to “explore opportunities for interoperability,” although this never happened.

 

 

 

The Deuce

 

The Leftovers 

 

Silicon Valley

 

The Detectorists

 

The Crown

 

 

 

Walking Dead!

 

AVDChina

 

Joe Rogan Experience