Rene Ritchie has been covering personal technology for over a decade. He currently hosts his own YouTube channel where he provides news analysis and insight on Apple and related technologies and culture. He also co-hosts MacBreak Weekly on the TWiT network and writes a column every Monday for iMore. He is the former Editor-in-Chief of iMore. Rene and I discussed an incredible range of Apple topics: the MBP’s awful 720p FaceTime camera, the aging iMac design, the future of iMac Pro, the...

Antony Johnston is a New York Times bestselling writer and podcaster. The Charlize Theron movie Atomic Blonde is based on his graphic novel; his Brigitte Sharp thrillers are critically acclaimed; and Dead Space, his first videogame, redefined its genre. He also hosts a writer’s podcast. Antony told me about how he transformed his career as graphics artist into successful graphic novels and video game scripting. Later, on his Mac, he delved into novel writing (with Scrivener), most notably...

Victor Fiss has had a distinguished career leading teams to implement, integrate, and manage enterprise wide systems. As Director of Sales Engineers, he oversees coordination of pre-sales and post-sales delivery for Parallels solutions. He is responsible for the team’s goals and initiatives with sales, product management, development, and worldwide customer support. Victor and I explored everything about Parallels Desktop (PD) on the Mac. What it is, how it works, supported OSes, support for...

Kelly Guimont is a long-time podcaster, Contributing Editor for The Mac Observer, the host of the Mac Observer’s Daily Observations podcast, and a tech support guru. In her 11th appearance, Kelly and I chat about our favorite TV shows of the 1980s as well as some of our favorite, recent movies. I open segment #1 with a fond recollection by both us us for Miami Vice (Starz), then similar feelings about Hill Street Blues (Hulu). A Kelly favorite along with me was: Magnum P.I. (Amazon). In...

Chris Matyszczyk is the President of creative consultancy Howard Raucous LLC. He advises corporations and individuals on content creation, advertising and marketing. For the last 13 years, he has also written the Technically Incorrect column first for CNET and now for ZDNet. He also writes the Absurdly Driven column at Inc. Chris has a witty, irreverent, playful writing style at times. Over the years, several of his articles have caught my attention for my Friday column, Particle Debris, and...

Dr. Jud Brewer is the Director of Research and Innovation at the Mindfulness Center and associate professor in psychiatry at the School of Medicine at Brown University, as well as a research affiliate at MIT. As an addiction psychiatrist, Dr. Jud has developed and tested novel mindfulness programs for habit change, including both in-person and app-based treatments for smoking, emotional eating, and anxiety. He is the author of The Craving Mind: from cigarettes to smartphones to love, why we...

Dr. Craig Hunter is an aerospace engineer at NASA Langley Research Center in Hampton, Virginia with research experience in experimental, theoretical, and computational fluid mechanics, aerodynamics, and aeroacoustics.  He has developed technology-enabling software tools and analysis methods for computational fluid dynamics (CFD) simulation, aerodynamic design, and jet noise prediction. In 2008, Craig founded Hunter Research and Technology to create innovative and compelling apps for the...

Rosemary Orchard describes herself as a geek, nerd, and programmer. She works full time as a developer of web applications, but her real loves are automation and productivity. She’s also a book author and podcaster. Rosemary told me the story about how she started with computers and programming. After a bad experience with a Toshiba notebook and Windows Vista, she bought a MacBook Air for her university work—and loved it. At this point, she was still pursing human languages, but in time...

Christopher Moore is the author of 17 novels, including Lamb, Coyote Blue, The Serpent of Venice, The Stupidest Angel, and NOIR. Chris published his first novel, Practical Demonkeeping in 1992, and his latest novel, Shakespeare For Squirrels, will be released on May 12th. We chatted at length about how Chris came to be a very successful novelist. I asked about the influence of author Harlan Ellison as well as his favorite and best selling novels. We explored his writing technique as we delved...

Bob “Dr. Mac” LeVitus is a writer, book author and raconteur. He writes for the Houston Chronicle and The Mac Observer, and he specializes in the “Dummies” books about Apple products like the Mac, the iPad and iPhone. In this episode, Bob and I focus on the practice of working from home. We covered work strategies and techniques, workspace and hours, software vs. paper tools, clothing and eating, task management, multitasking vs. single focus and more. We delved into microphones and cameras...

Charlotte Henry is a London-based technical journalist. A self-described media junkie, she writes about Apple — and now for the Mac Observer as well as our UK Associate Editor. She has also written for City A.M., Computer Business Review, the Independent on Sunday and CapX. Her new book is: Not Buying It. In this episode, Charlotte and I discuss the impact of COVID-19 on the TV entertainment and streaming industry. We look at the diversion of theatrical releases to streaming, whether indoor...

Kelly Guimont is a long-time podcaster, Contributing Editor for The Mac Observer, the host of the Mac Observer’s Daily Observations podcast, and a tech support guru. In her 10th appearance, Kelly and I chat about our favorite streaming TV shows of late. I open segment #1 with a critique of Amazing Stories: “The Cellar” (Apple TV+), then rave reviews for a shared favorite, Star Trek: Picard and a Kelly favorite: Westworld S3 (HBO). In segment #2: Kelly: The Expanse (Amazon), Wynonna Earp...

John Nastos is a multi-instrumentalist, music composer and improvisor, saxophonist, an iOS app developer, book author and is currently on faculty at Portland State University as a Jazz Saxophone Instructor. John is one of those special people who is an accomplished jazz musician, iOS developer and author. He tells a fascinating stoy about how he got started as a jazz musician and the people who mentored him. Along the way, he also fondly adopted the Mac, and that stood him well when it came...

Dr. Genevieve Guenther is a scholar and author. She is affiliate faculty at the Tishman Environment and Design Center at The New School in New York and the founder and director of End Climate Silence, an activist organization helping the news media cover the climate crisis. How should climate scientists use effective language skills and storytelling to convey scientific research? How can they speak effectively to both fellow scientists and the lay public? How can they avoid what’s called...

Sascha Segan is PCMag.com’s Lead Mobile Analyst. He has reviewed more than 1,100 smartphones, tablets and other gadgets in more than 15 years with PCMag. Sascha is also a multiple award-winning travel writer. We chatted about how he got started in computing, and it was a familiar story. “…published the high school newspaper, literary magazine and foreign language magazine on an SE/30.” Along the way, Sascha discovered that he loved helping people and showing them how tech works. We talked...

Bryan Chaffin is the co-founder and Executive Vice President of The Mac Observer. He is also our Editor-in-Chief. He’s been working lately as co-author of a new edition of iPad For Dummies, and so I enlisted him to discuss the future of the iPad. We chatted about how the iPad has made enormous gains in CPU and graphics power over the last 10 years. But iOS and then iPadOS not so much. In the early days Apple wasn’t quite sure where the iPad would go, and that’s perhaps a factor in its...

John Kheit is a New York attorney and a regular contributor to The Mac Observer. We share many common interests, including the 4K/UHD/HDR TV revolution, 8K TV and displays, Wi-Fi/5G technologies and the state of Apple. In this special edition, I interview John about his new 2019 Mac Pro. I asked John about the configuration he ordered, what substitutions he made (graphics card), his add-on SSD, and whether he bought the Pro Display XDR. John shared lots of technical tidbits: a changed initial...

Charlotte Henry is a London-based technical journalist. A self-described media junkie, she writes about Apple — and now for the Mac Observer as well as our UK Associate Editor. She has also written for City A.M. (London’s daily business tabloid,) Computer Business Review, the Independent on Sunday and CapX. Her new book is: Not Buying It. In this special episode, Charlotte and I discuss the various streaming TV services: Apple TV+, Netflix, Amazon, Disney+, CBS All Access, Britbox, Peacock,...

Dr. Kiki Sanford makes her eighth appearance on Background Mode. Kiki is a neurophysiologist with a B.S. in conservation biology and a Ph.D. avian neurophysiology from the University of California. She’s a popular science communicator and creator/co-host of This Week in Science (TWIS) podcast and radio show. In this episode, we spend the entire first segment discussing the coronavirus. Kiki fills us in on the details you don’t hear about on the nightly news. In segment #2, Kiki tells us the...

Dr. Howard Oakley is currently a developer of Mac software and is the founder of The Eclectic Light Company. Howard started life keenly interested in medicine, attended Oxford, and spent most of his career with the British Royal Navy as a doctor, ascending to the rank of Surgeon Commander. Along the way, he became heavily involved with computers and programming. His first encounter with a Mac SE and MPW hooked him for life. We chatted about his life and times as a navy physician, his parallel...

Kelly Guimont is a long-time podcaster, Contributing Editor for The Mac Observer, the host of the Mac Observer’s Daily Observations podcast, and a tech support guru. In her 9th appearance, Kelly and I chat about our favorite TV shows and movies of late. We open in segment #1 with a shared favorite: The Mandalorian (Disney+). In segment #2: Kelly: Dr. Who (BBC), The World According to Jeff Goldblum (Disney+). John: Star Trek: Discovery (S2) (CBS), Virgin River (Netflix) and Downton Abbey...

Josh Centers is the Managing Editor of Tidbits.com and has published many Take Control (TC) books. He’s the author of Take Control of Apple TV and Take Control of Home Automation. He’s been writing the Take Control books for iOS since version 8, and his latest book is Take Control iOS 13 and iPadOS 13. In his sixth appearance on the show, Josh and I explored what’s in store for Apple in 2020. We started by looking at the iMac Pro and its possible fate. Then we turned to the mythical xMac, and...

Dr. Andrew Friedman is an astronomer, cosmologist, and data scientist. He’s currently an NSF funded Assistant Research Scientist at the University of California at San Diego Center for Astrophysics & Space Sciences. He is also a Research Affiliate in the MIT Program in Science, Technology and Society. He holds a Ph.D. in Astronomy and Astrophysics from Harvard. We chatted about the apparent, seemingly contrived conflict between science and religion. We explored some of the sources of this...

Jeff Gamet the former managing editor of The Mac Observer, a position he held for 13 years. He’s also a book author and noted podcaster. About a year ago, Jeff left TMO to become the Smile TextExpander Evangelist. With a year at his new job under his belt, I asked Jeff about his accomplishments, challenges, and ongoing change in perspective being an evangelist for a major software company. We chatted about being deep on macOS, the TextExpander transition to macOS Catalina, the change being...

Charlotte Henry is a London-based technical journalist. A self described media junkie, she writes about Apple – and now for the Mac Observer as well as our UK Associate Editor. She has also written for City A.M. (London’s daily business tabloid,) Computer Business Review, the Independent on Sunday and CapX. Her new book is: Not Buying It. In this special holiday edition of BGM, Charlotte and I chat about our favorite Christmas movies and what makes them so great for us. There are also some...