OMG Apple is revealing something

@gumtreertmug

I have more than one smartwatch, because I like to play with them.

Currently have a Pebble 2 HR (which I love!!!) hooked up to android and a Garmin 235 (also love) hooked up to the iPhone.

I have a ZenWatch 2 and an Apple watch I need to start playing with.

I also have a Fitbit but I don’t do notifications on it.

@f00l

You like the ZenWatch 2? I have it on my radar.

@gumtreertmug

Grabbed ZenWatch 2 off eBay for less than $50.

I haven’t played with it yet. It is big. The smaller version does not have an external speaker. The larger version does have one. I have the little one.

A lot of space for the ZenWatch 2 is wasted because the bezel is somewhat bigger than it should be.

In part I like the Pebble and the Garmin because you get days and days of battery life, in spite of step counts and pulse reads.

But they don’t have touchscreens or as sophisticated a smartphone interface. (The Garmin is awesome for sports and training, tho.)

@gumtreertmug which wrist watches as Swiss wrist watches? Say that 3 times fast.

@capguncowboy

http://www.fromtexttospeech.com/output/0217501001505261853/28007045.mp3

@f00l

So you bought the ZenWatch 2 just to say you own one?

I mean, I dunno how long you’ve owned it, but…

@gumtreertmug
Owned the ZenWatch a few weeks. .

I tried android wear (refurb) when it first arrived and didn’t like it much. No battery at all.

Then I thought give it another shot. And I found an absurdly cheap ZenWatch in eBay. Way less than $50. It arrived a few weeks ago. Then stuff happened in life. I’ll get it setup soonish and see if the battery life decline vs the Pebble is compensated for by functionality.

I understand you can put a full swipe kb on Android wear. I wonder how awful that is in use. Am imagining typo city.

As for the apple watch, it’s a tryout. A family member upgraded and asked if I wanted to try it and possibly buy it.

@f00l I was motivated by your plethora of smart watches to seek out a ZW2 on eBay yesterday. Just under fiddy bucks with shipping.

Although I don’t love the styling (I’m more attracted to the traditional styling of the LG, or the Fossil (or the Tag if I won the lottery). I’m curious to try it out with iOS.

@ruouttaurmind

If the (lack of) battery life for Android Wear drives you nuts, you can get some similar functionality on some Fitbits and Pebbles.

Caller ID. Answer/hangup (does not interfere with BT headphones). Music control. Notifications. On some devices, step and pulse monitors. Weather alerts. Etc.

They have their uses. To me, $50-100 or less for something pretty decent is about right.

I do like the look of the Huawei watches. But I won’t pay that much.

@f00l I was tempted a few times by the dirt cheap Pebbles, but I don’t anticipate they’ll be functional soon into 2018.

I do like the Huawei. I’m still enamored by the LG Urbane, though I’ve read the majority of it’s functionality goes out the window with iOS.

Mostly, just I want notifications (text, email, apps). I don’t get many phone calls, so Caller ID, answer/disconnect doesn’t mean anything to me. Music control would be mildly useful, but since I only play audiobooks, and only in the car where I have easy reach to the BT adapter for controls, that’s not really important either. Really just notifications I guess. It would be nice to change watch faces, but I recall reading that’s not possible on iOS. Maybe that’s changed with AW2? Dunno.

@ruouttaurmind
I’m not sure what functionality you get using Android wear with iOS.

Also not sure what functionality you get using pebble or Fitbit with iOS. Never experimented enough.

I’ll experiment a little and report back.

Re pebble and the future:

The Pebble steel & time watches, the Pebble 2 and heartrate watches are quite nice if you don’t mind the lack of a touchscreen.

What I have read is that anything installed on a pebble now (before end of year) should continue to function next year. But prob new stuff and updates will no longer be available.

We’ll see.

The apple watches are just way too high. The pricing, and the ready and eager adoption in spite of watch pricing, have fed a lot of apple and sheeple jokes.

@f00l

The pricing, and the ready and eager adoption in spite of watch pricing, have fed a lot of apple and sheeple jokes.

Aside from the Apple Watch being overpriced, I find them to be aesthetically unattractive.

/giphy fugly

That hurts my eyes a little.

@f00l I was inspired by you earlier this week and bid on a ZenWatch 2 on eBay. It arrived yesterday. My initial impression so far:

The first thing it did when it began the setup process was to download and install Android Nougat and Android Wear 2. That part took a few minutes, but the remainder of the process was pretty swift.

I’m using it with a iPhone, so I know I don’t have access to all the AW 2 bells and whistles, but much of the gee-wiz stuff does work (text-2-speech, Google assistant, gesturing). Battery life for the phone and watch remain to be seen, but I’ve started my day with a full charge on both devices, so I’ll be curious where batteries will be at 10 or 11 PM.

I have to say, I’m quite impressed with the quick charge for the watch. From about 15% to full charge in around 40 minutes.

@ruouttaurmind
Did you get the big one or the little one?

@f00l Big one. 41mm.

@f00l I’ve been using this new-to-me (used) ZW2 since Saturday. Android Wear 2 installed on my iPhone 6 Plus and constantly running in the background (required for the watch to work). The watch is paired with my phone via BT, as well as my home and office wifi networks.

I started Saturday morning with a fully charged watch and iPhone. I used to get 3 days between charges, but it looks like now I might be down to 2.5 days between charges. I was below 20% battery by Monday afternoon (below my comfort zone).

The battery on the watch looks like I’ll get an easy 2 days of service between charges. I started Monday morning with a full charge on the watch, and right now I have about 45% remaining. I should have no problem making it through the day, even if it’s a bit of a long day. Though there’s no doubt I will have to charge tonight when I go to bed, the watch accepts a full charge in under 40 minutes, and you can get a quick refresh of 25%-30% or so in just a few minutes.

Functionality is better than I expected, though well less than an Apple Watch would provide, or the ZenWatch would offer if I was using in an Android environment. I receive all my notifications for a variety of apps, including Gmail, Google and Apple calendars, texts, SkyBell, Honeywell thermostat, even the MyQ garage door controller.

I can read most of the content of all the notifications. I can reply to Gmail messages, but not text.

Of course all the usual basic features are there. I can control my music player from the watch (in my case the Audible app). Create calendar events, reminders, set timers or alarms. There’s even a Google Maps app for the watch.

One of the gee-wiz features I didn’t expect is the Google Assistant. ZW2 has a mic and speaker. I can set Assistant to listen for “Ok Google” and activate with voice commands. “Ok Google, set a calendar event for October 2nd at 2pm” or “Ok Google, create an alarm for 6:20am”. Assistant can also read my messages and notifications via the watch speaker. Although I can answer calls from the watch, I can’t conduct the call via the ZW2 mic and speaker.

For less than fiddy bucks, I fancy this one as a bit of a bargain.

Oh ya, another unexpected feature: The watch has selectable ring tones, and “rings” via the internal speaker with incoming phone calls, alarms or timers. I only expected vibration, so this was a surprise.

@ruouttaurmind

What do you think of the on-screen keyboard?

@gumtreertmug HA! For my fat, callused fingers? Not a chance! But the Google speech-2-text feature is surprisingly great. So I just talk to the hand.

@ruouttaurmind

The keyboard looks unoptimized for that display due to wasted space.

Grr!

@Thumperchick, I don’t suppose you know why the forum rotates my photos sometimes? When I preview the direct link:

https://res.cloudinary.com/mediocre/image/upload/v1505842111/uy5iu7o418i9lmw2vcst.jpg

the photo is oriented properly, but once it’s planted into the post it gets switched up. Sometimes.

Is this something I’m doing wrong??

@ruouttaurmind

@gumtreertmug Thank you! How’d you get it to work for you??

@ruouttaurmind

@gumtreertmug Like on Android phones, you have the option of downloading alternate keyboards. I haven’t searched for one that works with ZW2 because that’s outside my intended purpose for this device. For the rare event when I do feel the need to reply from the watch, I can just use Google speech-2-text I guess.

@ruouttaurmind blame @kidzandliz

@kidzandliz, STOP SCREWING WITH MY PHOTOS!!!

@ruouttaurmind @kidsandliz

Apologies. Only so much I can do while waiting for something without lots of free time to play.

@gumtreertmug Fair one! LOL!

@ruouttaurmind Sheesh I’m only trying to help. Maybe these were more what you had in mind.

@Kidsandliz I like!!!

@ruouttaurmind So it is an unblame now? Yes?

@ruouttaurmind

Getting pix uploaded right-sided in the forums with an iPhone:

This has I think started to work for me

I can’t promise it’s the solution, but give it a try:

Take photo. Or you already have one downloaded or in your gallery

-’

Go to the Meh forum.

Turn phone counterclockwise 90 degrees (so that home button is by the right hand

Set entry box to upload photo by clicking on that mountain/moon things.

Do not un-rotate phone!

*Keep phone rotated so that your right hand is still by the home button while you do all of the next! do not rotate phone back to portrait!

After you punched the vupload images button, choose the photo from the gallery, upload it, save it. All while phone us still rotated!

Save the post.

One the final post is saved, you can rotate the office back to portrait.

I think you image will now show rightside up on non-ios browsers.

The ios safari browser auto-corrects photo orientation when the photo us uploaded using ios v it must be reading some let’s data or something.

So you can’t check orientation on an iOS device. You can check on a non-ios device or machine, or ask someone using s non-ios device or machine to check for you.

If you use Firefox or chrome or dolphin or whatever alt browser pon Ios, those are just custom user shells for the ios safari rendering engine. apple makes this a rule in the app store

All app store browsers must be based on native safari/webkit rendering orwhatever. No independent rendering. Not for a browser in the app store.

So if your photo upload is not right-sided up, you will not be able to use those browsers on an iOS device to check orientation. You have to use a non-ios device or machine to check.

How that helps. Let me know if it works.

@Kidsandliz UNBLAME

@f00l Thank you for the tip. Interfacing with the forums from my iDevices has always been challenging.

That photo was taken with my iPhone, transferred to Win10 PC, cropped, enhanced, saved, then uploaded with Win10 Chrome.

Puzzled by the fact that directly accessing the photo via the cloudinary link displays correctly.

@Kidsandliz

You know, that’s plus Excellent!

@ruouttaurmind Why thank you. Also I have to take photos from my phone, drop them into iphoto, rotate them, export them, then upload them. Then they reliably come up right side up on this site for me. Of course sometimes I am too lazy to do that and figure people can either tilt their laptop or their head LOL.

@f00l cheated and used a free online site to manipulate them.

@Kidsandliz

@narfcake That’ll work. They have exorcist head to swivel enough.

@narfcake Owls are awesome.

In the southwest we have wee little flufballs called Burrowing Owls. They hang out mostly on the ground (they nest in subterranean burrows) and spend as much time running around as flying.

@sgrazi iPhone 8, 64GB starting at $700, iPhone 8 Plus 64GB starting at $800, iPhone X 64GB starting at $1000.

Apple Watch 3rd Gen starting at $330.

@sgrazi
@ruouttaurmind

I must be a smartwatcher! I won’t buy any of them!

@f00l I never had any intention of buying one. I have a used Motorola that I paid 20.00 for and that is more than enough for me.

@sgrazi

Never thought most people here would rush to buy.

I just wanted to make s terrible smartwatch pun.

I wonder if Apple, with all their history of success in designing and marketing expensive and beautiful personal tech products, will find that with there Iphone X they have finally pushed the general consumer market as far as it will go.

Perhaps the X will sell, but only as a very very expensive, fashionable, “desirable” pair of sneakers or a luxury watch sells, not as a new gen Apple product often sells.

It would be ok with me if that industry discovered that there are limits to what people will pay for luxury tech that is mostly additional held and whistles, rather than game-changer innovation.

I suppose it has been inevitable that phones would get face recognition tech, but it’s not s feature I want. I don’t use fingerprint ID.

@f00l Well, they do seem to have learned something from trying to sell $10,000 gold Apple Watches, which was probably “We should have said it was $9,999.” (I’m still waiting for those to show up on Meh, incidentally .)

@TheFLP

They should have marketed:

*"it isn’t a mere 24K gold version of an Apple watch, it’s a special Cupertino Golden Apple Watch, endowed with special Apple Gold Dust from Apple Labs!"

Then I suppose people would stand in line for it.

@f00l As the iPhones are already $700+, and a lot of their customers are well-off, I think the iPhone X may well sell out for some time (bearing in mind they probably won’t be able to make as many of them as fast as the others).

Even for myself, I think there’s about a 1/3 chance I’d go for one, if my current phone spontaneously combusted today (though… I don’t think I could pay more than $1000. They didn’t say how much extra you have to pay for more storage).

@InnocuousFarmer

I think Apple will control the release of the X and supple lone so that they sell out.

Apple ain’t no version of stupid about stuff like that.

And if Apple markets the X properly, the price will be a plus to the intended audience. Like Lamborghini’s and Birkin bags and fashionable sneakers.

*Hey, look what I can afford!

So me, the iPhone sweet spot for purchasing for most of us who want Ios is either the 6s/6s+ or the SE.

@f00l I tend to think Apple would rather sell more phones faster, and only constrain their supply of phones deliberately with the aim of keeping inventory low, as opposed to trying to create artificial scarcity. The numbers are insane–it’s not hard to think that whatever group of highest-end manufacturers in China can only pump out xx million sufficiently color-accurate OLED screens, or whatever component, per month.

Remember that time they couldn’t manufacture any white iPhones?

Regarding iPhones as status symbols, ugh, gross. You’re probably right.

I’d definitely recommend an SE to anyone not heavily into phones or computers–it’s the best iPhone for value, by far. It’d be the one I wanted if it had the newer camera, screen, and internals. (Microphone and speaker stuff would be nice, too…)

@narfcake i’d click your star 12 x for that but doesn’t help

@narfcake Do you know anyone who fits the mold of that comic’s depraved caricature? (I don’t. Just curious.)

@InnocuousFarmer Thankfully, I don’t.

@mtb002 I’m not a tax expert but the way I understand it, when you “write off an expense,” that just means you don’t pay taxes for that item. If you buy a $1,000 phone and you’re able to write it off in a full year without amortizing it, then you can save 15-33% of that amount depending on your tax bracket. This is all assuming your itemized expenses are greater than your standard deduction.

My enrolled agent will take items like that and only give me partial deductions for the next 5 or 10 years. Other non product business expenses like travel expenses are taken all in the year they were spent.

The way I see it, you can write off $10,000 in expenses but you would have received $6,350 anyway with the standard deduction so you are only saving tax on $3,650. You’re not paying 15-33% tax on that $3,650 so you don’t really save that much to justify buying a new phone just because you can deduct it as a business expense.

@cengland0
I have a lot of buisness expenses this year, so my itemized will definitely be more than the standard, and if I can get a new toy that counts towards my deductions, I’m in a position that I can do that.

@PocketBrain Apple went from OS 9 to OS X. Every release since then has remained at OS X but sub versions like:
OS X 10.0: Cheetah.
OS X 10.1: Puma.
OS X 10.2: Jaguar.
OS X 10.3 Panther
OS X 10.4 Tiger
OS X 10.5 Leopard
OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard
OS X 10.7 Lion
OS X 10.8 Mountain Lion
OS X 10.9 Mavericks
OS X 10.10: Yosemite
OS X 10.11: El Capitan
macOS 10.12: Sierra

This is 16 years of Version 10 (or . I suppose they keep it named that way because it sounds good as OS X. But I do think Sierra changed to MacOS and finally got away from the OS X name.

@cengland0 referring to iPhone 8 to iPhone 10 compared to Windows 8 to Windows 10. Both skipping 9. Of course, as you point out, they both seem to be determined to stay stuck on OS version 10. Of course, that’s not as weird as Microsoft’s versioning of the Xbox. I’m sure the next version will be Badger or creme fraise.

@PocketBrain How about when Microsoft Word was v3.0 and then suddenly jumped to v6.0. I suspect it was because Wordperfect was at 5.1 and 6.0 sounded like it could be a better product.

@PocketBrain um, because it celebrates the 10th anniversary of the iPhone?

@PocketBrain they did want to keep people away from the idea that the “iPhone X” is mere increments better than the 8. (I.E. reality)

I honestly think the biggest difference in practice is going to be the screen in the less-big form factor. Basically getting a smaller 8-plus.

Apple wouldn’t go and call it an “8-plus-mini”, they’d include all their fanciest whizz-bang, tell everyone to remember that this is the dramatic bold future, and drive up margins.

The reason it’s not just “the new 8-plus” is probably A. Toying with the more expensive features / price point generally, and/or B. being unable to produce some of the components in quantities large enough to meet demand. (Going off some blog post I read a while ago.)

@InnocuousFarmer Since somebody else already bumped the thread recently, ( ) I should point out that the plus-sized phone is still wider, screen “points”-wise. The non-plus 8 has the same UI width (not pixels, but logical UI points) as the X, while being physically smaller (and having fewer pixels).

So… man, I don’t want the new high-end phone at all, aside from the camera. I guess the screen is a little nicer, but who cares.

@thejackalope Giphy is opening a portal to the future so we can observe a release party of the latest phones 10 years from now…

@thejackalope do you wear girl pants? None of the iPhones announced today are any larger than the iPhones released over the past three years.

The non-plus iPhone versions fit pockets well without looking like lunch trays in the pocket. And the X, even tho it has a screen larger than the Plus models, is overall about the same size as the non-plus 6 thru 8 models.

@thejackalope have you looked at the iphone SE? all the tech of a iphone 6S crammed into a 4in form factor . only $140 new at best buy https://www.bestbuy.com/site/at-t-prepaid-apple-iphone-se-4g-lte-with-32gb-memory-prepaid-cell-phone-space-gray/5792701.p

after 6 months, att prepaid will unlock it for use on other carriers (except for sprint due to LTE band issues)

@communistjack

Have you checked re sprint? Someine told me that all iPhones originally made for the US market in the last several years would work in all major cell carriers.

@communistjack

Ok, I get it. I found explanation and lists of supported bands here:

http//www.everymac.com/systems/apple/iphone/iphone-faq/differences-between-iphone-se-a1662-a1723-a1724-models.html

@RedOak Nope, no girl pants. But I’m still using an iPhone 5C. And that’s even pushing the boundaries of too big.

I had also misread the specs on the X. I saw the bigger screen and assumed yet another size boost, but it’s actually smaller than the plus, just with less non-screen space.

@communistjack Yes, I really want to upgrade to the SE. Gonna check on my carrier’s pricing of the larger storage options once they come out. Was hoping that there would be an updated specs version of the SE with this announcement, but alas!

@thejackalope

Swappa?

@f00l
I almost just replied with ?
But I see what you mean now. Definitely something to consider!

@thejackalope
Oh. Should have explained.

Ouch sorry.

Is you go that way (Swappa), pay attention to the modeled numbers

The A16xx model is for Verizon, T-Mobile, ATT networks. Will not do as well on Sprint, missing some transmission bands Sprint uses. Also lacks some international bands.

The A17xx is for Sprint and international. Might have a few problems due to missing some alt big carrier domestic bands.

@thejackalope

I’m still using an iPhone 5C. And that’s even pushing the boundaries of too big.

If the 5C is too big then you are indeed in trouble since that (and the 5/5S/SE) is the smallest mainstream phone out there!

I have an iPhone 5 still in service which has the same guts as a 5C. The only reason I’m still using it is it is less than a year old after being replaced for various reasons 3 times by Apple since I first got it 5 years ago.

iOS 10 was the last OS upgrade for it so it will soon be abandoned by app developers.

In fact the (now dispicable) Weather Channel recently abandoned the iPhone 5 even tho it is running the latest OS!?! I’m a bit surprised Apple with its detailed support requirements would allow The Weather Channel to do that.

Gotta love that an Apple device will always be offered the latest OS that can run on it… even 5+ years later. No carrier interference.

@thejackalope
@communistjack

The SE is an interesting option for those folks who want a smaller screen since it shares mostly the same guts as the 6s.

That Best Buy deal is amazing - epecially if you are already an AT&T or AT&T GoPhone user since you can immediately use it without contract and no need to unlock.

GoPhones can be a really cheap way to get a smart phone without contract for your AT&T service since they are interchangable.

The really excellent aspect of that Best Buy deal - AT&T corporate got smart about post paid customers buying cheap GoPhones and now requires you buy a $45 GoPhone sim card (which you’d throw away). The Best Buy deal does not appear (online) to require service! (at least most of the way through the checkout process)

I’m close to jumping on the SE but might watch what happens to the 6s with deals. The Apple prices dropped nicely on the legacy iPhones - 8/7/6s/SE $699/549/449/349. Especially with holiday promo rebates around the corner.

The SE might actually drop to $99 at third parties. At $99 or even $139 we might take our “suffering” daughter out of her Microsoft/Nokia 640 Windows phone… if she can go a couple days without sassing Gotta also check Sam’s today…

@thejackalope
@communistjack

OK, so just visited a Best Buy store (the experience reminded me why I detest Best Buy)… and talked to AT&T corporate customer service…

The bottom line is while an AT&T prepaid (“GoPhone”) phone is physically fine on AT&T postpaid account, in order to use it immediately on a postpaid account, you have to buy it directly from AT&T - either online or at an AT&T corporate store.

Reseller (Worst Buy) prepaid AT&T “GoPhones” are IMEI locked to prepaid service for 6 months, even against AT&T postpaid accounts.

Kinda sucks but understandable since AT&T has to cover that third party commission. No deal on the BB $139 iPhone SE for us… awaiting an AT&T corporate price drop…

@RedOak

Reseller (Worst Buy) prepaid AT&T “GoPhones” are IMEI locked to prepaid service for 6 months, even against AT&T postpaid accounts.

thats something that AT&T says

according to many people at slickdeals, in practice, the $140 att gophone iphone SE works on normal att accounts immidently without the 6 month wait

https://slickdeals.net/f/10548396-at-t-prepaid-iphone-se-32gb-139-99?v=1

Will work with a post-paid AT&T SIM right away- as long as Best Buy has notified AT&T of the sale. If not, please send a copy of your receipt, IMEI and your tel# to gophonesolution@att.com or attprepaidsupport@att.com. Otherwise, the phone may appear to be working but in fact doesn’t display the LTE logo on top (i.e. no cellular data), and outgoing calls would be directed to AT&T device restriction department.

@communistjack OK…

We have been buying GoPhones at the corporate ATT store for years and immediately using them on an ATT postpaid acct.

Because when I talked to AT&T, they made it sound like this (the 6 mo. Lock on postpaid ATT accts) might be a recent change, we’re not eager to risk Worst Buy’s $35 restocking fee on it.

@RedOak

the (now dispicable) Weather Channel

???

What did TWC do?

@f00l they abandoned the iPhone 5 even tho it is running the current iOS 10. Never seen any app do that. They tend to abandon an OS level, not the hardware underneath. I had been running it without trouble before. Come on, it’s a silly weather app - how much power can it require?

(Back story: like many apps, they offer no “clear cache” function to free up their app’s storage hogging. Typical solution: delete the app and re-install it. Fail in the case of TWC. Deleted Facebook app to clear its cache… and didn’t regret not reinstalling it.)

@thejackalope
@communistjack

So today visited a corporate AT&T store and the iPhone SE prepaid is $149 there but they also still force you to buy a $45 SIM card (to throw away when you use it on post paid acct).

Really amusing in that across the isle they sell the post paid SE for $349!

The sales person says believe it or not even when some people see that oddity they still buy the post paid SE on the Next plan where they’ll be paying it off at $349/24 months!?! Apparently they simply can’t afford $195 up front.

So I went to a Best Buy and stumbled on an amazingly sharp Mobile associate. No bullshit, straight answers, no $35 restocking fee on prepaid phones and "yes, this prepaid SE should work fine on your postpaid acct immediately. Simply swap your sim in and throw the one that comes with it in a drawer.

$139 later, a beautifully easy restore, and I’m happily using iPhone 6s guts in a 5/5s case.

Might go back and get another as backup or for another family member. Buying AppleCare might not make sense after deductible at that price for a backup.

Guessing we might see these IPhone SEs at $99 around the holidays at this rate.

@RedOak

After these locked to ATT and the cell companies that piggyback their signal?

@f00l 'Not clear to me what you are asking?

(Off grid camping with my son so my brain is turned down to relax mode so it might be my issue.)

@RedOak

After those iPhone SE’s at BB and ATT locked to either ATT or some variety that piggybacks on ATT capacity?

If they are locked, can they be unlocked?

No desire for an ATT account.

PS happy camping trip! Hope it’s great! What region are you camping in?

@f00l given the Apple price is $349, clearly there’s some AT&T subsidizing going on. Therefore it is reasonable they’d lock them to the AT&T network.

Since some folks report difficulties even swapping in an AT&T post paid sim, I wonder if AT&T does some kind of automatic background acct evaluation before allowing the swap to work.

We’ve been on AT&T since the Cingular days (still have a great employer discount) and have four phones out of contract. They’d not likely want to “stir our pot”.

The general experience I’ve seen with AT&T prepaid (used to be “GoPhones” until recently) phones is if the subsidized phone is used on their network for 6 months then they’ll unlock it. (To any non-AT&T network, sssuming it is compatible.)

I’m guessing you could buy a cheap AT&T prepaid sim, put it in the phone, and let the phone sit for 6 months. But that would require more patience than most folks have.

Not sure whether a similar strategy could work on other prepaid phones since I’ve seen the SE subsidized down to $129 on other prepaid carriers.

My comfort with regularly getting these GoPhones has been they in the AT&T family.

We camp off grid at hillly wooded average we own in NW Michigan on a ridge with a valley view. God’s country. Especially in September when most of the tourists have gone home. 80 degrees and blue skies! Lake Michigan holds its summer heat into mid to late October. The night sky is huge and carpeted with stars (you can very clearly see the Milky Way) due to little light pollution.

@RedOak

Take some pix of our home galaxy for us, if you’re in the mood.

@f00l I wish it were so easy to photograph with a phone! I should bring our DSLR up one of these trips - might have a better chance of success.

@katylava Old and gimmicky on an Android=amazing new and beautiful feature on iPhone.

@katylava c’mon over here and help yourself to this free, refreshing kool-aid. then you’ll understand everything…

@katylava to be fair, chances are high that Apple did a better job. They needed to have something to replace Touch ID, functionality-wise, and the bigger screen stole the spot where that fingerprint scanner would go.

@InnocuousFarmer it wasn’t that it didn’t work, it’s that i like to keep tape over my camera and also use my phone in the dark.

wait, they replaced Touch ID???

@katylava maybe it has IR lights so it works in the dark. Also, tape over camera? Just wear clothes while using your phone for a change. Problem solved.

@katylava in the “iPhone X”, yeah (not the iPhones 8 ). FaceID is replacing having a fingerprint sensor on the front of the phone. Some of the home button stuff has gone to gestures, and the rest has gotten loaded into the power(ish) button.

It does work in the dark, uses a bunch of IR. Pays attention to whether or not your eyes are looking at the phone.

If it helps, iPhone-wise, I don’t think there is any provision for apps to record from the camera when they are not in the foreground. So you’d have to be hacked pretty seriously for it to be an issue on an iPhone. (As far as I know, at least for now. I can’t imagine Apple adding that as an API without giving you a switch in settings, either.)

@katylava
Supposedly Apple’s facial recognition tech works in the dark.

This whole area creeps me out a bit. I suppose we had better get used to it, tho.

I don’t use thIs tech. In the wonderful future, I may not have a choice about it, I suppose.

@InnocuousFarmer those are pretty good points. fwiw i’m a mac os and ipad user, just prefer android for my phone for the deep google integration.

i’ll be curious to see what people think once they start using the new iphone, and if it’s easier for snoops/pranksters to trick you into unlocking it.

one thing i did hate about the android version was having to see my own face on the screen while unlocking it. does the iphone show you what it sees?

still, i feel like the price point is going to make apple lose more customers than they gain.

So if i were to use those skin-care mask that meh sold a while back, I wouldn’t be able to use my phone while wearing it? Deal breaker.

@katylava heh, interesting. That’s the primary reason I avoid Android, but if I was on Android, I’d have nothing to do with Apple.

They’re still selling the more incrementally improved phones at $700, I think, for the cheapest one that’s not an iPhone SE (personal favorite. Hoping to get one of those the next time Apple updates them.) I’m not sure whether that’s the same price or not as the previous iPhone 7.

It doesn’t show you your own face, as far as I’ve seen in the demo video. That doesn’t seem like a very Appley thing to do, either.

@MrMark actually, you probably can. 3d laser scanning is used for facial identification. I’m not wild about iPhone stuff but the x has some neat looking tech. For 1000-1150, though, it’s priced out of reach for many.

@djslack Dammit, now I almost want to spend 1k just to find this out.

So if it doesn’t work, just try your backup $1000 iPhone…

@MrMark Worst case scenario, you actually enter your passcode to unlock it. It happens occasionally anyway when you haven’t used TouchID for a while and you wake up to your phone requesting your digits.

@medz I actually hate pinch-to-zoom, find it very frustrating when apps don’t offer double-tap to zoom instead. In fact, swipe-from-edge is one of the only gestures I’ve actually found to be fairly natural and smooth, pretty much anything ‘multitouch’ annoys the hell out of me.

@TheFLP camera is #1 most important thing for me in a phone, and the only reason i occasionally think of switching. my samsung edge 7 takes decent photos, but they still look like phone photos to me.

though i defintely have trouble keeping the lens clean on camera phones.

@katylava
@TheFLP

How do you take memorable and aesthetically lovely photos using your phone, photos that don’t look like just snapshots made using any old phone?

I suppose it might have something to do with personal artistry and mastery. Huh.

Perhaps I ought to study and work at something once in a while. I suppose I might actually get better at it.

My phone photos always look like updated versions of old photos from a Brownie or an Instamatic.

@f00l I do some heavy Photoshop work to get the kind of look I like — even photos straight out of my DSLR look like snapshots most of the time. (I’ve also been developing my HDR techniques, but that calls for a whole other level of commitment.) Phone photos don’t hold up as well in my post-processing routine because of the noise, so I’m curious to see how much progress they’ve made in that area.

@f00l

How do you take memorable and aesthetically lovely photos using your phone, photos that don’t look like just snapshots made using any old phone?

still trying to figure that out.

@thismyusername I want to star this 1000 times. @dave I need more star power

@thismyusername LOLOLOLOLOL

@mfladd Hells yeah. I have Android Oreo. The picture-in-picture google maps navigation is pretty slick.

@medz

I use PiP mostly for Chrome videos.

@thismyusername Hahaha!

@cranky1950

This?