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I must have visited Apple’s user-driven Apple Support Community a million times.
I’ve used it to troubleshoot all kinds of problems, from clearing space on my hard drive to zapping the PRAM.
Written by Apple users themselves, some of whom were incredibly knowledgeable, the support forum often provided the right answer.
Trouble is, to get to that answer, you usually had to sift through dozens of less-helpful comments, most of them other users saying they, too, had the same problem.
And now Apple is shutting down the Apple Support Community. I have mixed feelings. On the one hand, it could be super-helpful. On the other, it could also not be. And these days, who has the patience for user-written forums when LLMs instantly spit out a solution?
Cult of Mac’s Lewis Wallace did a nice job of looking back at the forum’s history and the mixed reactions to its imminent demise.
Also in today’s newsletter:
Everyone has the same question about the new touchscreen MacBook Pro: How does its OLED panel actually light up the glowing Apple logo? Finally, we have the answer.
This new app from Apple — still under development — for hooking up all your Macs to make a virtual super Mac for running local AIs sounds incredibly interesting.
If you see your email, phone number and other sensitive information in Google or ChatGPT, you can actually get it removed. The easiest way is with Incogni, which automates the process. During the Black Friday shopping season, you can use code CULTOFMAC to slash a whopping 58% off Incogni’s Unlimited plan.
🔥 DEAL OF THE DAY: I’ve been wrestling with a dying car battery and an old lead-acid battery jump-starter that’s unreliable and weighs half a ton. It’s time to upgrade to a modern, lithium-ion model, like this kinda pricey but great-looking one from Fanttik, which is almost 20% off in the run-up to Black Friday. #affiliate
I love news posts like this that validate my wise life choices, like using an iPhone instead of Android.
There’s new AirPods firmware out. I just updated my AirPods Pro 3 and, to my surprise, the instructions for getting a quick update actually work.
I know that readers of this newsletter tend to be AI skeptics, but I was still a bit shocked by the results of yesterday’s poll about what AI agents everyone uses — see below. The top X post today offers an amusing illustration of why.
— Leander Kahney, EIC.
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A message from the Cult of Mac Deals team
Big changes: Cult of Mac podcast #40
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One more thing ...
Here's to the crazy ones. The misfits. The rebels. The troublemakers. The round pegs in the square holes. The ones who see things differently.
Today’s poll
How do you feel about Apple Support Community shutting down?
Results from yesterday’s poll
Best reader comments
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