Among the highlights on the Club MacStories+ Discord: Federico went to the farm! Mariken shared their new, very clean desk setup. Did you fall for this? Louise got a delivery of some huge speakers. Want to join the Club MacStories+ Discord?Upgrade toClub MacStories+ or Club Premier, then visit theAccount page....
Weather Up: The Interactive Weather Widget I’ve Been Looking For
After several years of non-interactivity, widgets became interactive again last year in iOS 17. What we mostly saw emerge were widgets with buttons – either huge, chunky buttons like on the Shortcuts widget or small buttons like on the Reminders widget. Those are great and all, but some developers decided to push those boundaries. The...
Bongos, Map Comparisons, and Projectors
Among the highlights on the Club MacStories+ Discord: FlohGro asked some questions about replacing a home TV with a projector. Of course, Sigmund had lots of great advice. Federico had a short message for the Discord this week. Niléane shared a nice side-by-side comparison of the road markings and other details in Apple Maps vs....
Going Blindly Into Python Scripts to Move TV Time Tracking to Sequel
I consider myself pretty knowledgeable about technology in general, but one area where I have a real weakness is coding, scripting, and the like. I’ve played around with it before, but despite some attempts to learn languages like SwiftUI, my efforts have always petered out. That meant the challenge my wife gave me this week...
Dave Lee Reveals the Old-School Technology and Flaws Behind the tinyPod→
Announced back in May, the tinyPod is a plastic case that turns your strapless Apple Watch into an iPod-like phone. The company claims the case can make a cellular Apple Watch your “phone away from phone” with core apps like Messages, Phone, Music, Maps, and more. You can even use an app like μBrowser – which I talked about on this week’s AppStories – to stay connected to the web as well.
When the tinyPod was announced, I wasn’t sure whether this was incredibly silly or genius, but I was certainly intrigued to hear how it worked out. Units have now started appearing in the wild, and YouTuber Dave Lee (aka Dave2D) got ahold of one to test out.
Unfortunately, it seems like the quality of the case is poor, and the button in the middle of the scroll wheel is non-functional. Going back and looking at the promotional videos, I can now see that this was a deliberate choice.
What’s most intriguing about this accessory, however, is the mechanism the folks at tinyPod constructed to allow the scroll wheel to turn the Digital Crown. I’ll let Dave show you in detail, but suffice it to say it’s weird, old-school, and flawed – but I kind of love it. Crucially, though, it’s not enough to make me want one.
While the tinyPod seems like a no-go, I do admire people trying crazy ideas like this because every now and then, one of them sticks the landing.
Cameras, Art Fights, and Markdown Editors
Among the highlights on the Club MacStories+ Discord: Mariken showed off their beautiful Lumix camera, shared why they’ve moved away from the iPhone for photography, and recommended a nerdy YouTube channel focused on cameras and lenses. Marty Day made me want to visit Baltimore so I could attend an incredible-sounding event called Super Art Fight...
Tech Anxiety and Dealing with the News Firehose
 | Unsplash](https://cdn.macstories.net/laptop-on-surface-1730481152722.jpg)
Source: Ales Nesetril | Unsplash
I don’t think I’m the only one who’s recently had the feeling that tech news is becoming more toxic – that more and more product releases have this semi-political commentary or opinion attached to them. What is a photo? Is AI making a positive difference? Should we have more choices regarding what apps we put...
PDF Readers, Alarm Clocks, and Foldable Keyboards
Among the highlights on the Club MacStories+ Discord: Member bbech asked about apps to read and annotate PDFs, and the community suggested some options. TC-Guildy laid out the benefits of to-do app Godspeed, which is now available with a Setapp subscription. WJ12P is testing out the hot new alarm clock everyone’s talking about. Tim had...
OneTap : A Versatile Clipboard Manager Tucked Under Your Keyboard
The clipboard manager category has always been popular on the Mac but never really got going on the iPhone. That’s partly due to Apple’s restrictive multitasking system, but it’s also because on the iPhone, unlike the Mac, you can’t have another window hovering next to the app you’re using or hit a key combination to...