UNDERDOG of PERFECTION

“Upgrading” from the iPhone 13 mini to iPhone 16e is a lateral move, at best

Yesterday Apple announced the iPhone 16e, and I briefly considered trading in my iPhone 13 mini for one.

Bear in mind, the name I chose for my Personal Hotspot on the phone is “You can pry my iPhone 13 mini from my cold, dead hands.”

So, is the iPhone 16e worth abandoning that bold stance? Uh… no.

There are definitely some ways it’s better that I would appreciate: faster CPU, better battery life, USB-C port.

There are ways it’s “better” that are either irrelevant to me or actually a downgrade, from my idiosyncratic perspective: a larger screen (too big to reach across with one hand, and too big for my pocket), Apple Intelligence. (I suppose as a “techie” I should care, but I am utterly disinterested in AI in general, and in “Apple Intelligence” in particular.)

There are ways it’s clearly worse, but that I don’t care about, most specifically MagSafe. I like MagSafe in concept, but I don’t have a MagSafe charger and am indifferent about getting one.

And then there are ways it’s worse, that I very much do care about. Again, the size. My eyeballs would appreciate a bigger screen but no other part of me wants my phone to grow. Even the 13 mini is slightly larger than my ideal phone size.

But above all, the real deal-breaker, is the camera situation.

I am not heavily invested in the iPhone for high-end photography. Obviously I’m not, or I wouldn’t still be using an iPhone 13 mini. But I do shoot all of my YouTube videos on my iPhone, and there are two specific features of the iPhone 13 mini camera system that I use extensively: Cinematic Mode, and the 0.5x zoom, wide-angle lens.

The iPhone 16e lacks both of these camera features. Without them, I would be giving up too much.

Of course, I actually own two iPhone 13 minis. (I inherited my dad’s when he died.) So I could trade in my 13 mini and upgrade to the 16e for my day-to-day phone, while still using the spare 13 mini for shooting video.

I considered it. But… back to the size thing. I don’t want to carry a larger phone. So until Apple makes another small phone, or until it just stops working altogether (a far more likely scenario), you can pry my iPhone 13 mini from my cold, dead hands.

I’m afraid to click on that banner ad

As I mentioned yesterday, I’ve joined ReverbNation in a perhaps futile effort to promote my music. I was just having a look at my pages on that site when I was assaulted by the piercing, fearsome visage of some guy named John Anthony. (He’s probably a much more well-established musician than I am, but I’ve never heard of him, so he is therefore “some guy.”)

His icy stare is compelling me to CLICK THAT LINK but no, I will not! I will muster all the will within my soul to do anything other than click that link. Begone, John Anthony! You are almost as terrifying as the Hypnotoad.

OK, I clicked it.

Wow, he really does sound like Dennis DeYoung. And… um… that’s about all I have to say about that. My only other comment (before I must leave the site in haste, lest I become hypnotized) is that I think he must have stolen away Paul Todd‘s webmaster. In fact, the Paul Todd similarities seem to go deeper than the bitchin’ website. He really needs an animation that morphs between a photo and cartoon of himself, though.

Freeway to Hell

As a resident of a major metropolitan area (presently it’s Atlanta, although in the past I’ve called both Los Angeles and Minneapolis home as well), I naturally spend a more-than-desirable amount of time dealing with less-than-desirable circumstances of living in close proximity to millions other people. Granted, the daily frustrations of urban life are an easy target for a rant, and I am striving for creativity here. Consider this a purging of the system so I don’t have to bring this up ever again.

The most obvious nuisance of life in a large city, particularly if it’s a city whose population grew significantly after the advent of freeways is, of course, traffic. I could veer off into a dry and potentially-controversial, were it not so mind-meltingly boring, treatise on the ills of our society that have led us into such a situation, but I believe a rant is not really a rant if it carries a relevant (or for that matter, even a merely coherent) message. So on to traffic.

I have ridden in cars before with drivers who, as incomprehensible as it is to me, do not seem to care about getting to their destination in absolutely as short a time as possible. I always suspect they are newcomers to “big city” life, but chances are they just possess greater control over their emotions than I do. At any rate, the time I spend nervously twitching in their passenger seats is split in roughly equal proportions between a somewhat ironic jealously over their apparent zen-like state, which I by my very nature seem destined never to attain, and a deep, visceral compulsion to lunge across the parking brake and push the accelerator to the floor with my bare hand.

Anyway, since I (naturally) have little patience for riding with people who have more patience than I do, my encounters with these parkway pacifists usually come when I am behind the wheel, in the form of my rapid approach to their rear bumpers. This is my real frustration with traffic… there are just some people on the road who don’t care about keeping pace, no matter how much those of us behind them tailgate, flash our lights, blast our horns, raise certain fingers in colorful gestures, or turn on our cruise control, climb out our driver-side windows, jump onto their trunks, climb in their passenger-side windows, and indulge our deep, visceral compulsions to lunge across the parking brake and push their accelerators to the floor with our bare hands.

All of this staring at rear bumpers during rush hour seems to have a secondary, interesting effect, at least on me. I have developed a completely relative sense of speed. I really, honestly, have no sense of how fast I am driving anymore, except in terms of my speed relative to the other cars on the road. And I have one simple goal: I need to be going just a little bit faster than any other car I see around me. This can become truly dangerous at times of lighter traffic, such as this past Saturday morning, when, headed southbound on I-285, I looked down at my speedometer in utter amazement to discover myself driving 92 MPH. (Did I mention the 55 MPH speed limit on that road?)

Alas, I’m learning too late that one small rant cannot possibly contain all of my obvious, clichéd frustrations with the transportation woes of modern urban life. I’ve barely even scratched the surface of my own mild affliction with terminal road rage. Once the boiling blood in my brain and sour bile in my throat have receded enough for me to be able to see and comprehend the computer keyboard again, I will file another installment.