Essential Apple Podcast 173: Don’t y’all forget about me!

Simon Parnell Essential Apple Podcast Leave a comment

Recorded 27th April 2020

This week I am joined once more by MacJim and Mark and somehow we totally forget to mention that Uncle Tim appeared on the BBC Big Night in and pledged a “significant donation” as we get sucked into the ARM Mac thing (again), the downsides of annual OS releases (again) and CV-19 contact tracing (again), plus a few other rabbit holes.

GIVEAWAYS & OFFERS

  • Glenn Fleishman’s Working From Home book is completely FREE and can be downloaded here
  • You can get Ghostery Midnight free for 3 months with the coupon code ‘workathome’
  • Steve at Geeks Corner will be having more giveaways in the near future. Keep an eye on the site or follow him on Twitter @GeekCorner_uk
  • Skylum are giving away Luminar 3 for free – just sign up for their e-mail newsletter and claim a copy here

Why not come and join the Slack community? You can now just click on this Slackroom Link to sign up and join in the chatter!

Slacker @MacJim has a family friendly Flickr group for listeners to share photos because the Darkroom channel in the Slack has become so popular – if you’re interested head over to to the Essential Apple Flickr and request an invitation.

Listen to the show:

This and other episodes are available at:

iTunes | Overcast | Essential Apple | My Mac | Pinecast | Spotify | Soundcloud | YouTube | RadioPublic | PlayerFM | TuneIn | Google Play | Direct Download | RSS

On this week’s show:

MARK CHAPPELL

JAMES ORMISTON

APPLE

  • Tim Cook joins BBC pandemic relief event, promises significant Apple donation – 9to5 Mac
  • Here’s why you shouldn’t charge your MacBook Pro on the left side – Digital Trends
  • Apple’s First ARM Mac to Launch by 2021 With 12-Core Processor – Bloomberg
    • Apple will reportedly sell a new Mac laptop with its own chips next year – CNet
  • Apple Music Launches on 2018 and Later Samsung Smart TVs – MacRumors
  • Two Apple Mail vulnerabilities being used to target iPhone, iPad users – Apple Insider
  • New iPhone text-bomb bug: Just receiving this Sindhi character notification crashes iPhones – ZDNet
  • Apple and Google will release COVID-19 contact-tracing tools next week – Engadget
    • Switzerland, Austria align with Google and Apple’s contact tracing approach – IT News
    • Germany flips on smartphone contact tracing, backs Apple and Google – Reuters

TECHNOLOGY

  • The first ever YouTube video was uploaded 15 years ago today. Here it is – CNN
  • Australia will make it a crime to use coronavirus tracing data for non-health purposes – Reuters
  • Windows 10 update bug deletes your personal files: What to do now – Laptop Mag

SECURITY & PRIVACY

  • Hackers are exploiting a Sophos firewall zero-day – ZDNet

WORTH A CHIRP / ESSENTIAL TIPS

  • Zoom tip from Glenn Fleishman – @GlennF
  • Don’t buy a webcam. Use your phone instead – CNet
  • Working from home and need a scanner? There’s a free one built into your iPhone – Mashable
  • We’re making GIF Creator â–¡ Premium totally free, just to see what happens – Medium

JUST A SNIPPET

For things that are not worth more than a flypast

  • ProtonMail for Android goes open-source, passes security audit – Android Police
  • Vivaldi browser gets built-in tracking blocker, goes GA on Android – Tech Crunch

NEMO’S HARDWARE STORE

  • Nemo is taking a break for the obvious reasons.

Essential Apple Recommended Services:

  • Pixel Privacy – a fabulous resource full of excellent articles and advice on how to protect yourself online.
  • Doug.ee Blog for Andy J’s security tips.
  • Ghostery – protect yourself from trackers, scripts and ads while browsing.
  • 33mail.com – Never give out your real email address online again.
  • Sudo – get up to 9 “avatars” with email addresses, phone numbers and more to mask your online identity. Free for the first year and priced from $0.99 US / £2.50 UK per month thereafter… You get to keep 2 free avatars though.
  • ProtonMail – end to end encrypted, open source, based in Switzerland. Prices start from FREE… what more can you ask?
  • ProtonVPN – a VPN to go with it perhaps? Prices also starting from nothing!
  • Comparitech DNS Leak Test – simple to use and understand VPN leak test.
  • Fake Name Generator – so much more than names! Create whole identities (for free) with all the information you could ever need.
  • Wire – free for personal use, open source and end to end encryted messenger and VoIP.
  • Pinecast – a fabulous podcast hosting service with costs that start from nothing.

Essential Apple is not affiliated with or paid to promote any of these services… We recommend services that we use ourselves and feel are either unique or outstanding in their field, or in some cases are just the best value for money in our opinion.

Social Media and Slack

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  • Also a big SHOUT OUT to the members of the Slack room without whom we wouldn’t have half the stories we actually do – we thank you all for your contributions and engagement.
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  • If you really like the show that much and would like to make a regular donation then please consider joining our Patreon or using the Pinecast Tips Jar (which accepts one off or regular donations)
  • And a HUGE thank you to the patrons who already do.

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