AirPods, Touch Bars, and the rest of Tim Cook’s legacy

We knew at some point Tim Cook would step down from his position as Apple’s CEO. Over the last year, it has become increasingly obvious that John Ternus was his likely successor. The news this week was still a surprise, though — and this year’s succession could lead to some important changes at the most influential company in tech.

AirPods, Touch Bars, and the rest of Tim Cook’s legacy

On The Vergecast: What’s next for Apple, the Xbox is back, and the Mythos mythology.

On The Vergecast: What’s next for Apple, the Xbox is back, and the Mythos mythology.

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On this episode of The Vergecast, David and Nilay are joined by Daring Fireball’s John Gruber to talk about their reactions to the news, the (mostly) smooth transition Apple seems to have pulled off, and what we should really make of Tim Cook’s legacy as a product person. Really, the question is: Do we blame Cook for the Touch Bar, or do we blame him for not trying hard enough to make the Touch Bar great?

After that, David and Nilay check in on Microsoft’s ongoing gaming ambitions. The company is back in on the Xbox brand, it appears, and is making big promises about making it easy for gamers to play anything, anywhere. That won’t be easy, though — and Microsoft’s going to need some legal help to pull it off.

Finally, in the lightning round, it’s time for another round of Brendan Carr is a Dummy, the latest on Anthropic’s Mythos model, a deeply confusing BMW, and much more.

If you want to know more about everything we discuss in this episode, here are some links to get you started:

- Tim Cook’s departure is the start of a new era at Apple

- Tim Cook was an innovator — just not the Jobs kind

- The AirPods are Tim Cook’s most underrated achievement

- Tim Cook: “I am healthy. My energy is high, and I plan to be in this new role for a long time.”

- From Daring Fireball: Another Day Has Come

- ‘We Are Xbox’: read the memo defining Microsoft’s gaming future

- Xbox Game Pass Ultimate gets a price cut but loses new Call of Duty games

- Microsoft says the ‘idea’ of an Xbox mobile store ‘is not dead’

- Brendan Carr is going after kids programming featuring trans stories

- Anthropic’s Mythos rollout has missed America’s cybersecurity agency

- Anthropic’s most dangerous AI model just fell into the wrong hands

- BMW’s flagship 7 Series gets its ‘Neue Klasse’ upgrade

- Seriously, what is this photo?

- Insta360 is putting screens on its next wireless mics to show logos or images

- Now Meta will track what employees do on their computers to train its AI agents