Tim Cook says Apple ‘desktop’ PCs still count, but will they be Mac Pros?

Is the desktop Mac dead? Tim Cook stays cagey

Apple CEO Tim Cook is in the news today for some comments he told Apple staffers during a recent Q&A about the future of the Mac and president-elect Donald Trump. According to a transcript obtained by TechCrunch, Cook responded to a question about updating Apple’s only pure desktop PC, known as the Mac Pro – which was last updated nearly 3 years ago – that the “desktop is very strategic for us.”

He also said “we have great desktops in our roadmap.” What he didn’t say was whether those “desktops” would be Mac Pros, leading to speculation the line could come to an end in favor of, perhaps, an iMac Pro, or something altogether new. Also, Cook was asked why he met with Trump last week at the big “tech summit,” when he’s not a Trump supporter and photos showed him looking clearly less than pleased to be there.

His response in a nutshell: it’s better to engage with the new administration and try to shape policy than stand on the sidelines.

Old name, new game

Blackberry, the once all-powerful titan of the cell phone industry that as of late seems to be in constant orbit of the proverbial drain, is striking out for new territory, according to Fortune.

The hopefully new happy place: developing and testing autonomous and connected vehicle technologies. CEO John Chen announced the company has developed the “QNX Autonomous Vehicle Innovation Center”, or AVIC, in Ottowa, Ontario. The $75-million facility will develop advanced software for self-driving vehicles and also improve how they talk to each other out on the road, Chen said.

Blackberry has actually been involved in automotive electronics for a decade, but the AVIC facility marks a much more public face for that segment of the business, and perhaps marks the beginning of the end of their involvement with the cell phone industry.

Know what a turtle is?

We couldn’t pass up a chance to give you a quick peek at the first Blade Runner 2049 trailer.

Harrison Ford is back as Rick Deckard, a android-hunting cop that apparently has been on the lam for the last 30 years after fleeing a gritty, overcrowded Los Angeles with his replicant lover, Rachel, back in 2019. In the short trailer, new Blade Runner “K”, played by Ryan Gosling, tracks Deckard down after walking through a couple of appropriately nasty environments, one in a city and another in what looks like a bone-dry and deserted desert area.

Blade Runner 2049 is helmed by director Denis Villeneuve, whose most recent movie was the sci-fi flick Arrival, which was critically praised. Johan Johannssen, who often works with Villenueve, is scoring the film, although the trailer used a reworked clip of the iconic soundtrack by Vangelis from the original movie. Ridley Scott, who directed the original Blade Runner in 1982, is executive producer this time around.

Perhaps no other sequel so far is as fraught with peril as this one, as Blade Runner is considered by many as one of the best and deepest sci-fi films ever made. Still, this small taste of the sequel seems to strike the right tone; all we can say is keep the trailers coming. Blade Runner 2049 hits theaters next year (2017, not 2019) on October 6^th.

from Planet GS via John Jason Fallows on Inoreader http://ift.tt/2h9wadS
Bill Roberson