331: Reflection

Welcome to Under the Radar, a show about independent iOS app development. I'm Marco Arment. And I'm David Smith. Under the Radar is usually not longer than 30 minutes, so let's get started. So, I don't know if you remember what you were doing on November 4th, 2015. necessarily, but I can tell you what you were doing, and that was launching this show. So we have now celebrated our 10-year anniversary of Under the Radar, which I guess, congratulations to us.

It's a long time to do anything, I suppose. And it was a bit wild this morning. I listened to our very first episode, and we were remarking about the launch of the Apple TV App Store. Oh, my God. Goes to say just how long we've been doing this show because that is a long time. And we also finished the episode somewhat amusingly, both talking about how we were about to start working on our first Apple TV apps, which I don't believe either of us ever shipped. I mean, I started it.

That was true. Sure, that was true. You started it. I think I'd spent two hours on it, maybe. Most of which was spent trying to get it to build. So, I mean, the world is a very different place, I suppose, than it was, I think, about 10 years ago when we started doing this, when we started, you know, sort of you had been coming from Build and Analyze.

And I think you'd started ATP, but we were sort of looking for a more developer-focused outlet. And I had a show, Developing Perspective, which was a solo show that I'd been doing for... several years, that was 15 minutes or less. And that's how we ended up on the 30 minutes or less. And that was sort of how we got started with this. And so reaching 10 years, and it's one of those things that there's no easy way to necessarily say this, but this is...

This is the last episode of Under the Radar. We're winding down the show and leaving it at sort of 10 years being a good run for it. And I think – I very much appreciate many of the people I think who – listened to that very first episode 10 years ago are probably still listening now. In many ways, almost necessarily our most core audience are the people who started 10 years ago and are probably still with us now.

I wanted to, A, say thank you for listening for 10 years, but also I wanted to talk a little bit about why... Because behind the scenes, I think I was the one who sort of started the discussion around whether it was around the 10-year anniversary would be a good time to wind down the show.

And so I can take the blame and the credit or whatever way you want to look at that for that. Or at the very least, I feel somewhat responsible to explain where I was coming from and why I feel like now is the right time to wind it down. Really, at its core, I think I found being online and having an online presence and sharing your opinion and commentary and having opinions on the internet.

is a complicated thing, or at least it should be in some ways a complicated thing. It should be something that you're thoughtful about, I think. And if you are, you can avoid all kinds of pitfalls and challenges. And honestly, or just... At a fundamental level, I think if you're thoughtful about it, you can make your online presence something that is additive and beneficial to the world in a way that is hopefully a good goal or something to look forward to.

And something that I've found for myself is I've kind of had to develop like, I don't know, like principles or guidelines for myself that I try and live by that help me stay sane, having an online presence. And like rule number one is that.

you don't need to have nor should you have an opinion on everything that you don't have to always comment or react to anything that's happening in the world you can just choose not to and that's great too and sharing an opinion is something that you should typically try to do and these are shoulds that i'm talking to myself not to the world like maybe it's useful for you but this is these are the things i tell myself is that

I should only be sharing things where I feel like I can meaningfully contribute and generally only when doing so is helpful to the broader discussion that I'm doing things that I feel, you know, talking about things in a place that I feel like I can make a meaningful contribution. And two is the publicity of my opinions should be directly proportional to my expertise in the subject that I'm talking about. And so for something that I'm sharing widely and publicly.

I should have a relatively strong area of expertise. I should know what I'm talking about rather than talking about it if I don't know. And if I don't know, if I'm still working something out, like, that's great. But those are conversations that become less and less public. You know, in some ways, the...

This is in our years of recording the show. One of the funny things is like there's two shows. There's the show we have out here and then we hit stop recording and you and I will often chat and talk and that conversation.

We're sharing different opinions and at different levels, and we were able to do that because it's not public, right? And so it's having that area of expertise and that strength in your belief in what you're saying, I think, is a – useful prerequisite for sharing things publicly.

The thing that I found is probably starting maybe six-ish months ago, I was finding that both of these were becoming more of a struggle for me around Under the Radar, around my general sort of contribution and feeling that many weeks we were... searching for something to talk about rather than feeling like there was something urgent and meaningful that we sort of needed to share that and some of this is just coming from the age of like and the focus of the show where

We have in some ways, I think, literally covered every core topic in iOS app development over the last 10 years. There are times where it is somewhat comedic when I'm like, oh, have we talked about this? And it's like, yes, we have. Yes, we have. I can go and talk about it because... That's the nature of having a show for 10 years with a very relatively narrow topic. But I think also the world of iOS app development has sort of...

contracted and has less novelty and newness to it. And so it's hard sometimes to find meaningful contributions to feel like we're still having. And then on the other side, like the second rule, I think... What's challenging is that because most of the topics that are most topical and most pressing in many ways to iOS app developers are things like AI and EU regulation and big fights between trillion-dollar companies.

And I'm not an expert in that. I don't feel good necessarily having public commentary on some of those topics because I don't have expertise in that. And that feels precarious and not great. And like, I don't feel like I'm not at all bashful about saying that I'm an expert in iOS app development. Like I completely straight up, like I'm humble about many things. I'm not humble about that. Like I am an expert and I can talk publicly about that, but you know, you want to talk about.

the impact of AI or different AI systems or antitrust regulation and compliance and all this stuff. And I'm not an expert. And nor do I particularly enjoy talking about it. I mean, I think this year in particular, there's been a lot of challenging topics. that I did not look forward to having discussions about, both because I'm not an expert and because I just, I don't like them. They're not nice. It's not positive. And there were fewer and fewer places where, you know, we were able to just...

talk about the parts of it that we like and have it feel relevant and meaningful. And so like those two things together were sort of the kernel that got started in my mind where I was like, I feel like it might be time. And you and I talked about it. And I think in the way we've talked about, like, how do you wind down an app and how do you know when it's time to do that?

I think that was, you know, the classic thing if we talked about it and we let it sit for a while, we let it kind of marinate. And then, you know, kind of at some point we settled on, you know, 10 years felt like a nice round number. It's a meaningful contribution, hopefully, to a lot of people who have learned things about app development. And I know from people I've talked to that many people got into it based on our discussions and have launched apps and built things as a result.

It's always so wonderful and heartwarming to hear those kind of stories. But I think now is the time to sort of wind it down. And I'm sure both of us will continue to be online and both of us will continue to.

have have commentary and things that we do it but this particular format in this particular way um felt like it's it's time had come yeah um you know as dave mentioned you know he was the one who kind of brought this idea to us but as soon as he said it i started thinking i'm like yeah that actually That feels right. It feels right to end the show at 10 years. For many of the reasons that you mentioned, after so long –

There were so many weeks, as Dave said, where we would just come to the show and be like, what do you want to talk about? And I was like, well, I could talk about this, but I'm not really done with it yet. I could talk about this, but I don't really want to share that. right now or i don't want to share that at all um or we could talk about this other thing but we talked about that seven years ago three years ago and one year ago and and so it does kind of feel like

We have done it all. We've covered everything that this show has been meant to cover. It doesn't feel like we're ending at the wrong time. It doesn't feel like we're cutting it off too soon. It feels like this is right. This was a good time. And there's no... There's no other drama behind this. Dave and I like each other a lot. We're still going to have these Zoom calls every so often and just have basically the secret show, which honestly was often better.

Because we could talk about things like confidential numbers and things going on. We could talk more honestly with each other because we're just two friends talking without the audience. So we're great. Don't worry about anything there. And this show has been...

remarkably consistent over the years like we we launched and we we pretty quickly settled into a number of downloads every every episode that we basically have kept almost the same for 10 years like the show didn't really grow or shrink over that time it was it's been like exact the same audience for 10 years. We don't get a lot of feedback, but the feedback we do get has been very consistent.

Everything has been very consistent. Relay has been a very consistent network for us the entire time. The ads have sold like the entire time and very consistent. Like everything has just been consistent and stable and like unchanging. the entire time. It will feel kind of weird not to do this show, but it has kind of felt like a struggle to come up with what to talk about for all the reasons that we mentioned.

And so it feels like a good time to end the show before it feels like a burden and at this nice round number. This was a good time. Let me first get the sponsor out of the way. We are brought to you this episode for the last time by Sentry. So.

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Our thanks to Sentry for their support of this show and Relay. Yeah, and it's a weird thing. You and I were talking a bit before we started recording of how I woke up this morning and knowing that this was going to be the day that we record the last... the last episode. And it was like this, you know, the classic combination of feelings where it wasn't that I was, I wasn't necessarily sad in the sense that it was, you know, I was regretful.

that we were ending it. It was more sad that just like, yeah, this thing that has been a meaningful part of my life that essentially every two weeks for the last 10 years, you and I have had a conversation on, you know, that we posted about... ios development and we've talked about all kinds of topics over those times like we've launched you know like five years ago widget smith happened and like completely changed my

you know the my developer life you've launched major updates and all kinds of things our lives have gone through all different directions and like it's been interesting in some ways through the various changes that have happened that Like the show is always just sort of this consistent background thing. And I really like that it exists as a snapshot of some of those things. Like I think one of my favorite episodes is that episode you and I recorded right after Widget Smith.

had its crazy viral moment and went crazy. And we had talked about it. We had a venue to talk about it. And we had all of the background and the discussions. On Under the Radar that summer before, I remember calling out, how sort of like a challenge to the world, but I was going to win the widget game. which is a bit of an unusual thing for me to do. But I was like, man, I feel like no one's going to out-widget me. I've got this. And you did. That was true. It's a fun thing.

It is one of the privileges of having a platform to talk about these things, that you end up with that record. You end up with these kind of details. Because I think so often... in life it is easy for things to just sort of happen and then fade away and that they don't necessarily have a record in a milestone and I love that I can go back and listen to

that episode or the first episode like I did this morning, you know, when we didn't know what we were doing and have a record of that. And so I feel very sort of thankful to our audience who has stuck with us for.

you know, for 10 years to allow that to be something that made sense because, you know, it isn't one of these situations where we're winding down the show because our audience has collapsed and, you know, no one's listening anymore. No, it's like the same number of people are listening now as they did before. which is remarkable in its own way, but it's much more, you know, it's lovely to have that people, group of people who care about what we have to say, I suppose.

You know, it's funny. There's things about the show that I will miss. And some of it is like completely silly things. So we're like, I love whether or not it's true or not. Several WWDC videos, I feel like start with. So let's get started. They'll have an introduction and they'll say, so let's get started. I don't think this is actually true. But in my mind, every single one of those people...

is an under-the-radar fan. And it's our little subtle shout-out. And it'll be sad that when that happens, it'll be like, oh, that used to be our thing. Now it's not our thing anymore. Or just little details. And being able to run into people who feel like...

they've you know who know us and have benefited from the show and have that be a thing that happens obviously people can still come up to us and talk to us um subsequently it's not like they had the show has to be ongoing for that to be the case but i don't expect it would be the kind of thing that has quite the the ongoing pattern to that. But yeah. So like it's, there's, it's like that nostalgic kind of.

bittersweet feeling is sort of where I am on it. But yeah, it feels like it's the right time. And I think it'll be interesting to see what that does. It's like I'm wondering sometimes if there'll be more developer topics on ATP now or things like that where there's...

There's things that previously their outlet would be for you and I to talk about them, and now both of us are going to have to find other outlets when we have the truly meaningful, constructive commentary or opinions or ideas or experiences to share.

We're going to have to find a different outlet for them. Yeah, and I think that will be an interesting path to explore for both of us. When you end something like this, you create a vacuum. Not only like in the audience potentially. I mean that gets filled pretty quickly with other stuff. But like you create a vacuum in your own life, in your own creative output, in your public output and in your time. So even though this show has never taken a lot of time.

ever it's always been remarkably fast and easy to make um but you know It still frees up like, oh, as you mentioned, like, oh, maybe I'll talk more on ATP. Maybe you'll make more videos or make more blog posts. Like, you know, there's other outlets that we have that, like, eventually an idea is, you know, gets lodged in our heads and we have to get it out.

We want to talk about it in some form. I've had a couple ideas. I wonder if I could maybe do this weird YouTube format or something. I don't know. I have all sorts of weird ideas that I'll probably never get to. But one or two of them I might get to. And you have the same thing. And so it is going to be interesting to see kind of where this goes. Because, you know, and we both have. you know audiences in different places like you know you have obviously the entire you know app

universe at your disposal. Plus, you've cultivated a blog and everything. And I have ATP and my blog. And so we have ways that we can reach people and try out new things. I think it'll be interesting.

And I think also the world of indie app development, first of all, I don't know how much of that world is left. I think it's probably bigger than we think, but it's no longer... like the community that we thought we were in when we started it's way it's both way bigger than that and way i think way more diverse than that which is good it needed to be um but also it's more it's more spread out it's more disparate and and so

There are a lot of indie developers out there, but I don't think many of them are like people who used to follow the old Mac blogs and made Mac software back in the day. I think that community... has largely dispersed or in many ways retired or gotten absorbed by other things. There's not a whole lot of that community left in a coherent form anymore. But who makes apps today?

It's a whole bunch of people that we've never heard of. And that's a good thing. That means the world has gotten bigger and broader. It's also a lot of younger people.

maybe don't even listen to podcasts. Their world is YouTube and other places. And so there's this whole world out there of developers, but it's a very different world now than... what we started the show for and kind of the world that we considered ourselves coming from and and the world that we know and it's not that our world is gone i think it's just it's a much smaller part now of a much bigger a much bigger thing that like

Most of that world has never heard of us, will never hear of us, probably wouldn't seek out development-focused podcasts even to begin with. Maybe it's better off that we kind of step aside and let the world move on without us, as if it needed our permission. Obviously, it doesn't. But it does feel like we are kind of a relic of a past era.

And not that we're leaving this world. We're still in it. But it feels like this hasn't been the real mainstream world of iOS app development for a very long time. It's now a very different world. It has been for a long time, and I don't know how much there is more to say about it from our perspective, like from our version of this world.

Yeah. And I think there's definitely two, I think something you said that really jumped out at me was the sense of just, I think so much in life, and this is beyond just like the show or development or whatever, but just like, if you don't know what will fill... avoid until you create the space in the first place. That like, if in life you are too busy all the time and you're running around and your schedule is packed and you're always busy and everything's always going on.

you will be operating out of inertia rather than out of intention. That's the nature, at least in my experience, of when I feel like that, when I don't have space, when there isn't margin or slack in things, that you're just sort of... you do whatever you've been doing before because you don't have the space to create new things. And I think what's interesting about now is it's like, I,

One of the things I'm excited about is, just like you were saying, it's creating space. It's creating space for you and I. Not that it was a huge amount of time, but it was certainly something that we were doing. And there's only so many somethings that you can have on your mind.

at once and it also potentially creates space for other people like if they're if we were talking to a particular niche or a particular audience maybe we're creating space for other things to come in and fill that that space but the only way that you can discover what's in that space is by creating it in the first place and so in some ways like i'm excited for what would come

next for you and I, as well as for what winding this down and creating potentially some more space in this niche. Like, who knows? But it's, you know, it's like I think we did an episode a couple ago about rest and how it's like you never know you need a break until you actually take one. And I think in some ways it's like I'm just really intrigued to see what happens, not having this particular outlet.

be the thing that i bottle up a lot of my thinking and opinions and things that i want to share like for a long time it's always been sort of like save it for the show bundle it up and put it in there um and so creating a space where That's not, you know, that's not the default. That's not something is like, they'll be creative. They'll be interesting. And, you know, I think that is something that is genuinely exciting to me to not know what that is and that not knowingness.

is the fun part is the interesting next couple of months years i don't know like you know i don't think when we started recording this well i know for sure i didn't 10 years ago i think we would be doing the show still um i think we decided to start the show on a whim you and i were just like having a phone call like just chatting and then we're like hey what if we did a podcast and then i believe we recorded the podcast like 10 minutes later this is how many podcasts begin

And so like, it was not something that we were starting with a 10 year, you know, 10 years in mind, but it worked and it was great. And I think it works because, you know, you and I are the same, but different. I think works really well. It's like part of our dynamic is like, we're both doing the same thing, but in like completely different ways in very like, just, you know, I, when we, when we, when we launched.

under the radar i did in the first episode i think i mentioned that i launched like 54 apps or something we launched two yeah it's like it was it's like these totally different things but it works for both don't forget don't forget the magazine and bug shot my greatest hits Yeah, yeah. And did you have a nursing calculator? Oh, yeah. Nursing clock. That was short-lived. Yeah. I forgot about that.

But it's just – I think that's one of the things. And like I just – as a person, like I really have appreciated our conversations, Marco. Like it's been – it's because we're the same but different in a way that I think is really complementary and that works.

that we both want, I think, at a high level to make good things. That's like... overriding and that works well we can talk about that the way in which we define and go about doing that process of making good things and like doing good work is completely different and I could not work Like I could not work with you and I don't think you could work with me like, you know, in that way of I think I would drive you crazy with the way that I develop and sort of the chaos and.

sort of pace of it whereas I would be probably very frustrated by the sort of the Intentionality and pace at which you do things. Oh, yeah. You work on things. They get really, really good. But they get there by being really methodical and taking a lot of time with things. And that's different. And that's great.

Overcast exists. Widgetsmith exists. There are many reasons why you and I each work alone in the programming department. Exactly. Yes. I'm not sure either of us would work well with anyone else. No, I don't think so. Not as a programmer, at least.

We're putting the independent indie app development in that way. I fear sometimes the thought of becoming – this never happened, but honestly, 10 years ago, I definitely thought it was much more of a – likely probability that at some point I was going to have to get a jobby job like work at a big company, you know, working for a bank and making their iOS app or something. And I just think sometimes I think about that and I was like, oh man, I would be the worst.

I know how to make apps. I do not know how to make apps inside of a big company. That would have been a whole adventure that I'm very fortunate and glad that I never had to explore. Not so far, anyway. Have you seen big company apps? You'd be fine. I'd be fine.

I just worry that I'd be a little bit ungovernable in a way of like, you know, someone assigns a JIRA ticket to me and I'm just like, no, I don't want to work on that. That doesn't sound interesting. You build a whole system to avoid working on it.

Exactly. Yeah. It's like, no, I did this whole other thing instead. Isn't this great? It's like, no, that's not what we wanted you to do, Dave. But anyway. And it would be great and it would be the better solution, but it wouldn't matter. It wouldn't be the thing.

Well, we can close by saying thank you, everyone, for all these 10 years of listening. We really appreciate you. We appreciate your support and your time all this time. It's been a really good run. It's been a great experience doing this show, both for me and Dave individually and us together. And it's been great for our friendship to develop a lot over this time as well, to have all these calls and all these secret afterpodcasts.

podcasts that were even better. It's been a great time. It's been great for us. I just want to thank you all for being here this whole time. I don't really know how to, how to end this. You can give it a shot. Yeah, no, and I think, yeah, I think I'll just, I mean, I think the best place to end something like this is just with gratitude. I'm very grateful for.

the time that you've invested every two weeks talking to me. And I think for all of the people who have listened to this, to Mike and Steven and the Carrie at Relay, who, you know, hosted and put up with our slightly ungovernable approaches to things. And just generally, yeah, it is not an easy thing to have the support of a network and of an audience and of each other. It is a wonderful thing that I'm very grateful for.

you and I haven't fallen out over the last 10 years. Like that is always those kinds of things. Like you could be winding down a show because you know, you and I get in a fight or something. And it's like, instead we're still, we're still friends. We're still doing this because. In some ways, partly why I kept doing the show is because I loved having the excuse to talk to you every two weeks. And I think that...

is something that is wonderful. And I'm sure you and I will continue to talk and we will continue to have that. But there was something reassuring about the consistency of it that I very much appreciated. It's cool to think of the many things, the opportunities that having under the radar opened up for both of us. I think it's amazing and wonderful for how many years we did an interview at WWDC and we were one of the few.

podcasts and people who had that opportunity. And I think there are people who we've talked to during those interviews who, as far as I know, we're the only kind of show they've ever talked on. We're not on the PR.

the PR junket side of it where we're talking to engineers about engineering. And I felt very grateful that Apple trusted us with that, that they clearly had listened to the show and they knew what we were about and they knew the kind of people we would be and the kind of conversations we would have.

And, you know, that was very gratifying and very encouraging that, you know, that was just nice to have those kind of milestones of support. And so, yeah, I think at the end, we can just end the show with, you know, being... Being grateful for that, being grateful for what we've had, and looking forward to what this space will create in our lives, in our audience, and who knows. But when something winds down, it...

just creates that space for new things to grow and you never know what they are, but that's exciting in its own way. So I guess I'll just wind up by saying thank you. Thank you to you, Marco. Thank you to the audience. And, you know, thank you for all the people who went, you know, sort of worked. behind the scenes at Relay to make this work for us for the last 10 years. Yeah. See you out there, everybody. Thank you for listening. Bye.