Who Wants To Pay Fees In a Commodity Market?

Apple Working on Plan to Allow AI Agent Apps on the App Store:

Some developers are hesitant to work with Apple to integrate their apps into ‌Siri‌ because they are worried about providing new ways for Apple to collect commissions. Apple is telling some developers that it does not plan to charge commissions during the early stages of the partnership, but that fees are a possibility in the future. Apple has held talks with Baidu, Alibaba, and Tencent about ‌Siri‌ integration in ‌iOS 27‌, but the companies do not want to end up paying fees to Apple.

In the early days of the App Store, every developer aspired to be part of it because it was the ultimate platform. Today, the difference is stark and disheartening. I hope some people at Apple recognize that something is amiss. Developer adoption of the Apple Vision Pro has been hesitant, mainly due to concerns about the market size. This is an area where Apple could improve by adopting new strategies. Fees and potential fees are major obstacles that Apple can easily control or eliminate, and doing so could significantly boost perceived value.

I Want To Beleive But... No, I Can't.

Meta AI App Gets ‘Incognito Chat’ as OpenAI Faces Lawsuits Over Stored Chat Logs:

Zuckerberg also said that Meta AI’s incognito mode is the first major AI product where there is no log of conversations stored on servers. Zuckerberg likened the feature to end-to-end encryption, and said no one will be able to read the AI conversations, not even Meta or WhatsApp.

There is nothing incognito in Meta. I don’t believe him. Do you?

iOS 26.6 Betas: No Thank You

Dear Apple, I don’t want to see a new round of betas, skip iOS 26.6 entirely, and focus all your energy on iOS 27. Since iOS 26.0, I’ve seen many bugs that are still not fixed, nine months later, so I guess iOS 26.6 won’t do it either. I don’t know why some glaring bugs are still among us, poor iPhone users, but it is what it is. I hope that pouring all your efforts into iOS 27 might be the best strategy if coupled with a maturing use of AI to help your engineers in their journey. Who knows. 😑

Open Web + People = ?

Reddit Starts Blocking Mobile Website, Pushing Users to App Instead:

Social network Reddit recently began blocking mobile visitors to its website while pushing them to download the official Reddit app, and it’s fair to say that the move is not going down well with users.

Two things come to my mind about how Reddit was even possible in the early days: the open web and people. Now, Reddit put the first part of the equation in the trash. The second part might already be happening, thanks to AI.

Where is the right balance?

The pace at which I prepare and send my newsletter is slower than I would like. The attractiveness of this newsletter is probably affected by that. So I get anxious about it. Conversely, if I were very consistent, my newsletter could become much more popular. In that case, I would probably also feel anxious, thinking I need to maintain this high publishing rate. There must be a right balance, where anxiety doesn’t rear its head.

Apple, Copy This!

Bauhaus Clock for iPhone and iPad:

Bauhaus Clock for iPhone and iPad is a design-first, utility-second sort of app. It’s simple, doing nothing more than tell the time in one or two locations. But how it tells the time — with its gasp-worthy combination of visual, haptics, and audio features — make it one of those delightful apps you’ll love to have on your device.

I wish Apple offered more stylish and easy-to-read watch faces for the Apple Watch. While the hardware has been lagging a bit, perhaps Apple could improve the watch experience through a better time-reading experience.

An Update About Me

Just in case you didn’t know, I maintain an extensive “Who Is Numeric Citizen” page, built with Realmac Software Elements and hosted on their hosting service, Elements IO.

In recent days, I made a lot of tweaks and updated some details about me and my digital journey. It’s a bit overwhelming, but I guess it’s reflecting what I’m doing online! 😜

Sometimes I wonder if it is a good practice to put so many details about myself online. In the age of AI, I can imagine bad actors using AI and this website to build malicious impersonation tools.

The RODECaster Video: A Downgrade?

Another morning spent digging into RODEcaster Video S setup and configuration. I’m starting to get a better picture of what this device will help me improve, but also what I’m leaving behind if I drop Mac-only video production. One example is the lack of flexibility in dynamically framing the Mac desktop to hide or show the Mac menu bar. High-resolution video recording (4K @ 60 FPS) is also something I must leave behind when using the RODECaster Video; it’s not a surprise, but a reality check.