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Have you ever been chatting at a dinner party or noisy gathering when you suddenly hear your name mentioned from across the room?
The so-called cocktail party effect is a well-studied phenomenon. It shows how your brain can filter out distracting noise, but unconsciously, it’s constantly listening for important or relevant stimuli.
Your iPhone can do something similar: It’ll listen for potentially important or dangerous sounds, like smoke alarms, ambulance or fire engine sirens, or breaking glass.
While the iPhone’s Sound Recognition feature is ostensibly for accessibility, it’s also super-handy if you constantly wear AirPods or headphones, or perhaps even if your TV is turned up loud.
You can set Sound Recognition to listen for cats or dogs, babies crying, car horns or water running, and a lot more. You can even train the system to listen for your own name.
In my experience, it can be a remarkable attention grabber — it alerts me to sirens when I’m cycling while wearing AirPods with ANC turned on. But the potentially lifesaving feature can get annoying if you don’t spend a few minutes setting it up properly — here’s how to do that.
I think Apple has chosen important, but somewhat depressing, sounds. Apple should add some joyful sounds to the list — children laughing, birds singing, AC/DC guitar riffs, babies babbling, stuff like that.
Also in today’s newsletter:
Early reviews of the new M5 MacBook Pro and M5 iPad Pro have just been published. The iPad reviews are rave-y, praising the new chip’s raw speed. The MacBook Pro reviews are more subdued, noting the upgrades are incremental. Nonetheless, one of the best laptops ever got even better.
If you want one of these new machines but the cupboard’s a bit bare right now, take a look at Upgraded’s monthly MacBook financing plan, which can now be used to buy an iPad Pro, too.
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AirPods Pro are hard to beat, but if anyone can dethrone them, it’s German company Sennheiser. Here’s a roundup of the storied company’s best earbuds for iPhone users.
Today’s the day in Apple history that the modern laptop was born. The PowerBook 100 series is arguably the most important line of laptops in company history.
— Leander Kahney, EIC.
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Tweets of the day
Nomad just released a new Stratos Apple Watch band that is now easily my favorite. It's titanium, but with flexible links.
nomadgoods.com/collections/st…— #Aaron Zollo (#@zollotech)
4:52 PM • Oct 21, 2025
Apple set up over 100 cameras during the Real Madrid vs Juventus match to test new virtual reality technology.
It’s likely part of their upcoming experiments with immersive sports broadcasting for the Apple Vision Pro.— #Rafael Torres ᯅ (#@mundoxrbrasil)
3:47 PM • Oct 21, 2025
me, my daily driver, and a peaceful corner of the internet
— #Karri Saarinen (#@karrisaarinen)
3:57 PM • Oct 21, 2025
Wallpaper of the day
This Wallpaper Gives a Classic Retro Vibe 🔥
High Resolution File at
t.me/androidwalls/3…— #WallPapers 🔥 (#@Papers_app)
1:32 PM • Oct 21, 2025
One more thing ...
You build a company that will still stand for something a generation or two from now. That’s what Walt Disney did, and Hewlett and Packard, and the people who built Intel. They created a company to last, not just to make money. That’s what I want Apple to be.
Today’s poll
Do product reviews influence your buying decisions?
Results from yesterday’s poll: Will you be turning off Liquid Glass?
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