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Apple Announces a New, More Affordable Apple Pencil That’s Coming in November

Source: Apple.

Source: Apple.

Today, Apple unveiled a new, more affordable Apple Pencil that charges via USB-C and supports many of the features of the two previous-generation Apple Pencils, but not all of them.

The new USB-C model looks a lot like the second-generation model, except it doesn’t charge wirelessly. Instead, the end of the Pencil can be pulled back to reveal a USB-C port for charging. However, like the second-generation Pencil, the new model attaches magnetically to the side of compatible iPads, which puts the Pencil into sleep mode to preserve battery power.

The latest Pencil also supports tilt sensitivity and hover, which was introduced with the latest iPad Pro models, but pressure sensitivity and double-tap to switch tools are not supported. Apple isn’t offering free engraving, either.

The new Apple Pencil is $79 ($69 for education) and will be available beginning in early November. According to Apple’s press release, the accessory is compatible with all iPad models that have a USB-C port, including iPad (10th generation), iPad Air (4th and 5th generations), iPad Pro 11-inch (1st, 2nd, 3rd, and 4th generations), iPad Pro 12.9-inch (3rd, 4th, 5th, and 6th generations), and iPad mini (6th generation).

Announcing the Club MacStories Fall Membership Event and Discount

Today, we’re announcing our first-ever Club MacStories Membership Event and Discount. I’ve got more details below, but the highlights include 20% off on all annual Club MacStories plans plus special columns, a live Discord event, giveaways, deals, downloadable content, and more every day through October 31st. There’s a lot going on, so let’s look at the details.

To take advantage of the discounted plans, please use the coupon code CLUB2023 at checkout or click on one of the buttons below.

Join Club MacStories:

Join Club MacStories+:

Join Club Premier:

Visit our [Plans page](https://club.macstories.net/plans) for more details on each Club option.

Visit our Plans page for more details on each Club option.

Club MacStories has become a big part of MacStories. The Club has grown steadily every year since it was started in 2015, and every plan is packed with more of what you love about MacStories. With this month’s event, we want to accomplish two things:

  • Thank our current members with two weeks packed with what makes the Club special
  • Offer a special 20% off on annual plans to grow the Club further and make switching to a higher-tier membership more affordable for existing members.

The support of Club MacStories members is the foundation of MacStories. It’s given us the freedom to expand, focus on our in-depth stories and reviews, and build a closer relationship with readers. And most recently, while websites are shutting down and laying off staff due to plummeting ad revenue, we’re growing and have plans to do even more in the coming year. That wouldn’t have been possible without the Club.

What’s unique about Club MacStories is that it’s the perfect complement to MacStories.net. If you’re a fan of the site, you’ll find that the Club is a natural extension of what you already love, with more of everything.

Our Club Discord community has become a fantastic resource for Club MacStories+ and Premier members.

Our Club Discord community has become a fantastic resource for Club MacStories+ and Premier members.

That’s been the case since the Club launched over eight years ago. We didn’t hide MacStories content behind a paywall when the Club was started. Instead, the Club has always been designed to supplement MacStories with more app coverage and complex automations, longer podcast episodes, and more. Then, with the introduction of Club MacStories+ and Club Premier, we built on that model further with a vibrant, respectful Discord community of app and automation fans who help each other get the most out of their technology.

Club newsletters are available in our fully-searchable web app for Club MacStories+ and Premier members.

Club newsletters are available in our fully-searchable web app for Club MacStories+ and Premier members.

We know that folks are inundated with subscriptions these days, which is why we work hard to offer what we think is a great value at every tier of the Club. Our eight-year track record of consistency and content, which includes nearly 500 issues of our newsletters, speaks for itself, but we also realize that committing to an annual plan is still a lot. So that is why we’re excited to offer the biggest discount on Club MacStories plans we’ve ever done. Here’s a breakdown of each tier and the discounts we’re offering through October 31, 2023:

Normally Through Oct. 31
Club MacStories $50/year $40
Club MacStories+ $100/year $80
Club Premier $120/year $96

If you’re not familiar with the Club, you can learn more and compare plans side-by-side here and read our FAQ page.

These discounts are available to anyone signing up for one annual Club membership for the first time, reactivating an expired plan, or upgrading a current plan.

To take advantage of the discounted plans, please use the coupon code CLUB2023 at checkout or click on one of the buttons below.

When you change a monthly plan to an annual one, you'll get credit for the remainder of your current month's subscription.

When you change a monthly plan to an annual one, you’ll get credit for the remainder of your current month’s subscription.

Join Club MacStories:

Join Club MacStories+:

Join Club Premier:

As a thank you to members, we’re also rolling out daily content, giveaways, deals, and more over the next two weeks, starting with a new addition to our Club MacStories+ and Club Premier app discounts page, which we’ll reveal tomorrow on Mastodon and Threads. Then on each day for the next two weeks, we’ll have columns, giveaways, a special Discord audio event, eBooks, and more, so keep an eye on the MacStories and Club MacStories Mastodon accounts and the MacStories Threads account every day to hear what’s coming next. We’ll be sure to keep any giveaway entries open throughout the fall Membership Event, too, so no matter when you join, they’ll be available.

Thanks again to our many loyal Club MacStories members, and welcome to everyone joining for the first time. You’ve all helped us grow MacStories, launch new projects, and build MacStories on a strong foundation while staying independent and true to our editorial values. We look forward to bringing you even more of what makes MacStories special for a long time to come.

Obsidian’s Popularity Explained→

It’s been nearly three years since I first started using Obsidian. The app has come a long way since then. The app’s core functionality has expanded, its vibrant plug-in developer community continues to go strong, and more and more users have been captivated by its flexibility. According to Jared Newman, writing for Fast Company,

Obsidian estimates that it has one million users, and its Discord channel has more than 110,000 members, who use the app for everything from task management and bookmarking to organizing their daily thoughts.

That’s remarkable growth for an app originally developed by just two people and with a team that still stands at under a dozen members.

Newman’s story, The cult of Obsidian: Why people are obsessed with the note-taking app, does an excellent job capturing what makes Obsidian special and even attracts fans of native apps like Federico and me:

John Voorhees, the managing editor at MacStories, started using Obsidian a couple of years ago after being drawn to its local file structure, and both he and MacStories founder Federico Viticci have written extensively about their Obsidian setups since then.

Obsidian is on [sic] some ways the opposite of a quintessential MacStories app—the site often spotlights apps that are tailored exclusively for Apple platforms, whereas Obsidian is built on a web-based technology called Electron—but Voorhees says it’s his favorite writing tool regardless. He and Viticci have even commissioned some bespoke plug-ins for their Macstories [sic] workflows.

“No matter what your writing needs are, there’s probably a plug-in to satisfy them,” he says.

There are a lot of other reasons I use Obsidian, including its use of local, plain text files formatted in Markdown, but it’s the plug-in system that has made it indispensable to my work. The app simultaneously serves as my text editor, note-taking app, and database all at once, allowing me to move effortlessly among projects and tasks, thanks to the portability of plain text.

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MacStories Unwind: AV Club Edition, Only Murders in the Building

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In this month’s special AV Club edition of MacStories Unwind, Federico, John, and Jonathan discuss Season 3 of the Hulu Original, Only Murders in the Building.

  • iMazing 3 is coming, macOS and the public beta is available now.

MacStories Unwind+

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Game On: An Upcoming Game Release Check-In

Ever since WWDC 2022, when Apple showcased Resident Evil Village, the company has been eager to highlight console and PC titles that are coming to its platforms. Sometimes, it can be a little hard to keep track of what’s coming, so today’s Game On focuses on recent big-title release news as well as other recent updates in the world of Apple gaming.

Before looking at the titles coming next to Apple’s platforms, let’s take a quick look back at one of the all-time classic iOS games: Machinarium. The game, from Czech studio Amanita Design, which was followed up a few years ago on Apple Arcade by Pilgrims, started on the Mac and other platforms, but was also an iPad gaming pioneer, debuting on the tablet in 2011, with its unforgettable hand drawn style.

However, like a lot of games, Machinarium hadn’t seen an update in a long time. According to Touch Arcade, the game hadn’t been touched since 2019 but was updated last week with controller, Metal rendering, and Core Audio support. If you love puzzle games and haven’t played Machinarium, you can buy it on the App Store and play it on iOS, iPadOS, and tvOS for $5.99.

Source: Capcom.

Source: Capcom.

Skepticism about whether Apple will be successful in attracting console and PC-level games to its platforms is warranted, given the company’s track record with such games. However, they continue to push back, with Tim Cook recently telling The Independent in the context of an interview about the Apple Vision Pro that:

There’s significant excitement about our role in gaming, and we’re very serious about it. This is not a hobby for us. We’re putting all of ourselves out there.

Apple’s last self-proclaimed hobby was the Apple TV, which took a very long time to graduate from that role but is now part of the company’s videogame strategy.

Also, just before iOS and iPadOS 17 were released, Jeremy Sandmel, Apple’s Senior Director of GPU Software, and Tim Millet, Apple’s VP of Platform Architecture, were interviewed by IGN and emphasized the advantage of Apple silicon and its Metal framework across the iPhone, iPad, and Mac as a unified gaming platform:

So we really look at these many generations of SoC architecture across the phone, across the iPad, across now, Apple Silicon Macs. And we’d see that as part of one big unified platform, a graphics and gaming platform in particular.

Fort Solis. Source: Dear Villagers.

Fort Solis. Source: Dear Villagers.

And judging from the announcements, the pace of top-shelf releases is beginning to pick up and include the iPhone more often than in the past. Among other notable upcoming releases:

There may be other big releases coming that I’ve missed, but that alone is a pretty healthy lineup to go with other titles that are already available. It will be interesting to see if others are added to the release roster in the coming weeks.

MacStories Unwind: Flora and Son and Federico’s Latest Tech Discovery

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This week on MacStories Unwind, I recommend an Irish family drama on Apple TV+, while Federico has been out exploring new corners of the tech world.

  • Kolide – It ensures that if a device isn’t secure it can’t access your apps.  It’s Device Trust for Okta. Watch the demo today!

John’s Pick

Federico’s Pick

Federico recording AppStories using the XREAL Air.

Federico recording AppStories using the XREAL Air.

MacStories Unwind+

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MacStories Unwind: Road Trips, Casino Heists, and Apple Podcasts

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This week on MacStories Unwind, Federico and I compare road trip notes and somehow wind up talking about Federico’s fascination with casinos, before turning to the latest content updates to Apple Podcasts from Music and News.

Kolide – It ensures that if a device isn’t secure it can’t access your apps.  It’s Device Trust for Okta. Watch the demo today!

Road Trips

John’s Pick:

MacStories Unwind+

We deliver MacStories Unwind+ to Club MacStories subscribers ad-free and early with high bitrate audio every week.

To learn more about the benefits of a Club MacStories subscription, visit our Plans page.

AppStories, Episode 352 – Widgets Everywhere→

This week on AppStories, we take a look at some of our favorite apps with interactive widgets for iOS 17, iOS 17, and macOS Sonoma.

Sponsored by:

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[Subscribe here.](https://appstories.net/plans)

Subscribe here.

On AppStories+, we reflect on the end of the busiest part of review season at MacStories.

We deliver AppStories+ to subscribers with bonus content, ad-free, and at a high bitrate early every week.

To learn more about the benefits included with an AppStories+ subscription, visit our Plans page, or read the AppStories+ FAQ.

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Apple Announces ‘Meet with Apple Experts’ for Developers

Apple announced a worldwide series of events for developers who want to improve their apps through a combination of online and in-person resources.

The program includes more than 50 workshops, consultations, labs, and other sessions focusing on a broad range of topics, from developing for each of the company’s OSes to business and marketing assistance. For example, Apple’s developer website currently lists one-on-one App Review consultations, an in-person Apple Vision Pro event, and an online session on app discovery and marketing, as well as a wide variety of other topics hosted from several cities around the world. Sessions are offered in multiple languages and incorporate what was previously part of programs like Ask Apple, Meet with App Store experts, and Tech Talks.

The new Meet with Apple Experts events look like they’ll be a fantastic resources for developers. I especially like the blend of in-person and online resources. It’s hard to beat the kind of one-on-one interaction that used to happen in WWDC labs, but in-person events impose a lot of constraints that make them hard to host and attend. With a mix of in-person and online events, Apple should be able to reach a wider developer audience, which is great to see.