My 25-year-old son is a photography fanatic — but he flat-out refuses to take pictures with his iPhone.
He’s a digital native — he grew up with iPhones, iPads, game consoles and the like — but he disdains digital photography.
Instead, he carries a heavy old film camera everywhere — a Nikon F3 35mm. It’s part of his small collection of old analog cameras, many of which outdate even old-ass me.
When he needs the film developed, he takes it to one of the last few photo labs left in San Francisco, which charges an arm and a leg. It’s so pricey, he scrutinizes the negatives and only prints the one or two pictures he deems worthy. In the old days, you just printed the lot and discarded the rubbish ones.
“It’s funner to shoot film,” he texted me. “You have to be patient when shooting film vs taking a million shitty pictures in digital.”
He’s also scornful of the perfection of modern iPhone photos, preferring the distinct aesthetics of prints. “Film looks better,” he said.
In fact, his whole generation — Gen Z — seems to scorn digital perfection. It’s why the iPhone 4, a 15-year-old handset, is a surprise hot item among the young.
Also in today’s newsletter:
Wow. The adoption numbers for iOS 26, and its much-hated Liquid Glass user interface, are truly shocking.
Even though I hate Sam Altman and don’t trust OpenAI one whit, I just joined the waitlist for ChatGPT Health. The privacy protections sound reasonable to me.
What’s going on with AirPods Pro and all the record-low prices? Won’t be long before they’re free! (JK: Tim Cook would never allow that!) Great price for great earbuds.
I use most of the apps in this roundup of handy built-in Mac apps, but, sheesh, I didn’t know half of what they could do. Time to bone up.
I remember scratching my head at this weird partnership back in 2004, when Hewlett-Packard started selling HP-branded iPods. Apple was selling them just fine on its own, and what kind of lamo wanted an HP-branded music player? Could anything be less cool? Turns out, it looks like the deal was a clever bit of Steve Jobs chicanery!
— Leander Kahney, EIC.
A message from the Cult of Mac Deals team
A message from the Cult of Mac Deals team
Cult of Mac’s buyback program
Tweets of the day
Wallpaper of the day
One more thing ...
I don't think much about my time of life. I just get up in the morning and it's a new day. Somebody told me when I was 17 to live each day as if it were my last, and that one day I'd be right. I am at a stage where I don't have to do things just to get by. But then I've always been that way because I've never really cared about money that much. I guess what I'm trying to say is that I feel the same way now as I felt when I was 17.
Today’s poll
What do you think of old iPhone 4 photos?
Results from yesterday’s poll: What Steve Jobs auction item interests you the most?
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