iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

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Will Oremus @willoremus.com · 12/07/2026

I set out to understand why AIs love negative parallelism. The answer wasn't just surprising—it was illuminating. www.theatlantic.com/technology/2...

theatlantic.com

The Most Famous AI Writing Tic Is Also the Most Mysterious

Why chatbots love “it’s not X, it’s Y”

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FT Edit @ftedit.ft.com · 21/04/2026

As Apple celebrated its 50th anniversary last month with a private Paul McCartney concert at its California HQ, @patrickmcgee.bsky.social delved into the story of the iPhone-maker's rise to superstardom. With the announcement of Apple's next CEO, don't miss this two-part series on #FTEdit 👇

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Andy Orrock @andyorrock.bsky.social · 03/04/2026

If you were fortunate enough to read the extraordinary “Apple in China" by @patrickmcgee.bsky.social, then you will immediately recognize this piece as something that could only come from him. The absolute riches of being a subscriber to the @financialtimes.com! giftarticle.ft.com/giftarticle/...

giftarticle.ft.com

Apple at 50: how Asia fuelled its rise to the top

Japanese industry and Chinese manufacturing prowess played roles in the tech giant’s success, with consequences for both

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FT Edit @ftedit.ft.com · 02/04/2026

Behind the star products, Apple's success has hinged on Japanese industry and Chinese manufacturing, with companies experiencing mirror-image trajectories based on how they fit into Apple's empire. Today's Big Read is on #FTEdit 👉 Apple at 50: how Asia fuelled its rise to the top ft.trib.al/VGp4kdi

Grid showing key Apple products over time: iMac G3 (1998), iPod (2001), Mac Mini (2005), iPhone (2007), iPod Classic (2007), MacBook Air (2008), iPad (2010), and Apple Watch (2015), illustrating a timeline of major product launches.

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Hetan Shah @hetanshah.bsky.social · 02/04/2026

Fantastic part two by @patrickmcgee.bsky.social which shows how Apple extracted knowhow from artisans in Japan through hardline IP, but how China is now evolving its role from manufacturing to innovation, aided by Apple. Industrial strategy in big waves www.ft.com/content/95fd...

ft.com

Apple at 50: how Asia fuelled its rise to the top

Japanese industry and Chinese manufacturing prowess played roles in the tech giant’s success, with consequences for both

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Tom Hannen @tomhannen.ft.com · 01/04/2026

I feel like I know the story of Apple at 50. Endless podcast pundits etc... The thing about @patrickmcgee.bsky.social is that he can find angles and stories about the most-written-about tech company that nobody else thinks of. Highly recommended (first 300 clicks free): as.ft.com/r/014d4500-c...

as.ft.com

Apple at 50: the roots of a tech revolution

[FREE TO READ] How a little-known yet highly influential management course in postwar Japan paved the way for Steve Jobs’ obsession with quality

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Dave Lee @davelee.me · 09/03/2026

No exaggeration to say a judge holds Anthropic's future in his or her hands. This case could be a long, drawn out process, but if the judge feels Anthropic is likely to prevail, a stay preventing the order from being enforced would seem to be in order. www.bloomberg.com/news/article...

bloomberg.com

Anthropic Sues Defense Department Over Supply Chain Risk Label

Anthropic PBC sued the Defense Department for declaring that the artificial intelligence giant posed a risk to the US supply chain, after a dispute with the Pentagon over safeguards on the company’s t...

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Dave Lee @davelee.me · 02/03/2026

For a while, Anthropic was the Lyft to OpenAI's Uber -- a company with a better reputation but ultimately doing the same thing. Now the line dividing the two leading AI firms glows bright red. My @opinion.bloomberg.com column this morning (🎁) : www.bloomberg.com/opinion/arti...

bloomberg.com

OpenAI Steps Over a Red Line Anthropic Refused to Cross

After announcing a sudden and surprising deal with the Pentagon, OpenAI co-founder Sam Altman moved quickly this weekend to show he had won meaningful concessions from military leaders.

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Pierre-Yves Baubry 博磊 @pybaubry.bsky.social · 04/02/2026

Quite an interesting choice: the Mandarin translation of “Apple in China: The Capture of the World's Greatest Company” by @patrickmcgee.bsky.social is among the many books bought by Taiwan’s President Lai at the opening of the 2025 Taipei Book Fair.

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Blaise Agüera y Arcas @blaiseaguera.bsky.social · 29/01/2026

2. “Apple in China: The Capture of the World's Greatest Company” by @patrickmcgee.bsky.social. I’m not generally a fan of business books, but this is an extraordinary and gripping story with major geopolitical implications.

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The Little Red Podcast @littleredpodcast.bsky.social · 19/01/2026

How has Apple become dependent on China to manufacture its products? To what extent has Apple shaped supply chains in China? In our latest episode @patrickmcgee.bsky.social and Jianggan Li answer questions of how interdependent China and Apple have become. Listen here: omny.fm/shows/the-li...

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Soumaya Keynes @soumayakeynes.ft.com · 01/01/2026

Apple in China by @patrickmcgee.bsky.social I learned *so* much from this book, and enjoyed myself immensely in the process. You can't really ask for more than that in a book tbh. www.simonandschuster.co.uk/books/Apple-...

simonandschuster.co.uk

Apple in China

*** THE NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER *** * WINNER OF THE SABEW BEST IN BUSINESS BOOK AWARDS 2025 FOR BUSINESS REPORTING * ‘Absolutely riveting’ Peter ...

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Prospect Magazine @prospectmagazine.co.uk · 17/12/2025

📚 Politics & Reportage winners 📚 GET IN by Patrick Maguire and Gabriel Pogrund BETWEEN THE WAVES by @tommctague.bsky.social BUCKLEY by Sam Tanenhaus APPLE IN CHINA by @patrickmcgee.bsky.social EMPIRE OF AI by @karenhao.bsky.social

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Melissa Chan @melissakchan.bsky.social · 28/11/2025

A good review by @michael-feinberg.bsky.social of Patrick McGee's book APPLE IN CHINA: THE CAPTURE OF THE WORLD'S GREATEST COMPANY, with some extra insights from Feinberg (given what his previous role at the FBI was):

lawfaremedia.org

Commerce and Moral Compromise in Contemporary China

A review of Patrick McGee, “Apple in China: The Capture of the World’s Greatest Company” (Scribner, 2025).

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Patrick McGee @patrickmcgee.bsky.social · 19/11/2025

A great book with a great title about this: Red Carpet.

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James O'Malley @jamesomalley.co.uk · 14/11/2025

Just finished “Apple in China” by @patrickmcgee.bsky.social – holy shit it was a brilliant read. A densely researched story of how Apple drove the rise of China’s tech industry and advanced manufacturing capability, creating a tonne of geopolitical risk in the process. (Sent from my iPad.)

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Nieuwsuur @nieuwsuur.nl · 20/09/2025

Niet zo lang geleden betekende 'Made in China' vooral: goedkoop. Tegenwoordig staat het juist voor kwaliteit. Een cruciale factor in China's tech-succes is, verrassend genoeg, het Amerikaanse megabedrijf Apple. Hoe dat zit, zie je hier:

youtube.com

Hoe Apple van China een technologische supermacht maakte

YouTube video by Nieuwsuur

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Ian Dees @iandees.bsky.social · 21/09/2025

I spent most of the day in the car listening to Apple In China by @patrickmcgee.bsky.social and it's wild how much money, talent, and intellectual property was shipped to China by Apple over the last few decades. Imagine if that had been spent here. Highly recommend the book!

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Casey Liss @liss.bsky.social · 27/08/2025

“Apple in China” by @patrickmcgee.bsky.social is easily the best book I’ve read about modern-day Apple. By a mile. ★★★★★ I say that as someone who makes a living talking about Apple.

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Karlo Basta @karlobasta.bsky.social · 25/08/2025

Great book and fantastic read by @patrickmcgee.bsky.social, w lots of impressions. For varieties of capitalism nerds, a really interesting insight into incremental improvement in production process over time - something more appropriate to coordinated market economies than liberal market ones...

simonandschuster.co.uk

Apple in China

*** THE NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER *** ‘Absolutely riveting’ Peter Frankopan, author of The Silk Roads‘Disturbing and enlightening’ Chris Miller, a...

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Patrick McGee @patrickmcgee.bsky.social · 22/08/2025

Solid review from a fellow Calgarian 🍁

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Patrick McGee @patrickmcgee.bsky.social · 04/08/2025

*New* podcast about APPLE IN CHINA with Jaya Bhattacharji Rose for the The Times Of India: open.spotify.com/episode/0A1o... @jbhattacharjirose.bsky.social

open.spotify.com

Apple in China: Patrick McGee Unpacks a High-Stakes Global Story

TOI Bookmark · Episode

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Joseph Torigian @josephtorigian.bsky.social · 01/08/2025

China book recommendations for summer and fall according to Table.Briefings: new work by @evadou.bsky.social, @patrickmcgee.bsky.social, my own "The Party's Interests Come First: The Life of Xi Zhongxun, Father of Xi Jinping," and others table.media/en/china/fea...

table.media

Book special: China book recommendations for summer and fall

The first half of the year saw some exciting new books about China hit the market. Our editorial team read, discussed, and selected them intensively. Find out w...

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Patrick McGee @patrickmcgee.bsky.social · 01/08/2025

Read the whole essay here: unherd.com/2025/08/time... And, of course, much more in my book: AppleInChina.com

unherd.com

Time is running out for Tim Cook

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Patrick McGee @patrickmcgee.bsky.social · 01/08/2025

So it’s disconcerting that 15 months after the announcement, a personalised Siri still doesn’t exist, the ads promoting it have been pulled, and Apple has been forced to acknowledge it doesn’t know when the features might be ready.

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Patrick McGee @patrickmcgee.bsky.social · 01/08/2025

If Apple can make it work, it could offer 1.5bn users a compelling reason to upgrade their device every 24 months, as on-device chipsets improve. That would justify Apple’s high valuation. But, says Craig Moffett, “that whole logic disappears if Apple ends up capitulating to a cloud-based model”.

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Patrick McGee @patrickmcgee.bsky.social · 01/08/2025

When Cook unveiled “Apple Intelligence” last year, the promise was an assistant that could mine texts and emails to deliver personalised answers — not by taking data from the cloud, but mining for data “on device”. That’s something ChatGPT can’t do on the iPhone, because apps are sandboxed.

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Patrick McGee @patrickmcgee.bsky.social · 01/08/2025

Apple’s AI missteps are the most glaring. Siri, once a pioneer among voice assistants, now feels “as dumb as a rock”, to quote Microsoft’s Satya Nadella.

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Patrick McGee @patrickmcgee.bsky.social · 01/08/2025

Apple killed its decade-long electric car project just as Chinese rivals Huawei and Xiaomi expanded their own. Apple’s only meaningful new product this decade is the Vision Pro, a tech marvel lacking content. Apple has superb tech capabilities, held back by a lack of strategic vision.

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Patrick McGee @patrickmcgee.bsky.social · 01/08/2025

Today the tired criticism resonates. Cook achieved growth, but innovation has tanked. The iPhone’s design has barely changed since 2019, when Jony Ive departed as design chief (a position that remains vacant).

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Patrick McGee @patrickmcgee.bsky.social · 01/08/2025

Fringe murmurings that Cook might no longer be the right CEO have moved from fringe Internet forums to investment bank notes and news segments on CNBC and Bloomberg TV. Their main criticism — that Cook isn’t a product visionary — has always rung hollow; his mandate was always to scale

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Patrick McGee @patrickmcgee.bsky.social · 01/08/2025

Apple’s market valuation is still enormous, at $3.1 trillion, but it has inched up less than 5% in three-and-a-half years.

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Patrick McGee @patrickmcgee.bsky.social · 01/08/2025

But Apple has since stagnated: Annual revenue growth in the past three fiscal years averaged just 2.3%, versus 11% to 14% for Alphabet, Amazon, Meta and Microsoft, 24% at Tesla, and 80% at Nvidia.

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Patrick McGee @patrickmcgee.bsky.social · 01/08/2025

The idea that Cook, who was appointed CEO in 2011, might step down was anathema in January 2022, when Apple first reached a $3 trillion market valuation. Profits during his tenure had soared 3.7 times and shareholder returns had increased twentyfold.

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Patrick McGee @patrickmcgee.bsky.social · 01/08/2025

They could also highlight Cook’s statesmanship. Trump, in 2016, said he’d force Apple to build products in the US and once urged his supporters to boycott Apple. But Cook gained his ear, achieved important tariff exemptions, and avoided backlash from Beijing even after Washington attacked Huawei.

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Patrick McGee @patrickmcgee.bsky.social · 01/08/2025

Supporters of Cook, when challenged, used to be able to point to Apple’s unmatched supply chain, the success of the Apple Watch and AirPods, and the enduring dominance of the iPhone.

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Patrick McGee @patrickmcgee.bsky.social · 01/08/2025

Meta shares just hit an all-time high as the company talks up “Superintelligence.” And Nvidia, the chipmaker powering the AI boom, is sprinting so fast it’s now worth $1.2 trillion more than Apple.

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Patrick McGee @patrickmcgee.bsky.social · 01/08/2025

The bear now has a name — artificial intelligence — and it is defining the next computing era. Microsoft, mocked in Apple’s “Get a Mac” ads, now leads in valuation, profitability, and product vision. Alphabet has pulled ahead in earnings.

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Patrick McGee @patrickmcgee.bsky.social · 01/08/2025

If you and a friend are being chased by a bear, you don’t need to outrun the bear — you just need to outrun your friend. In 2017, Apple’s former head of software used the metaphor to defend Tim Cook. Innovation was slowing, he acknowledged, but “they are staying ahead of the competition.”

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Patrick McGee @patrickmcgee.bsky.social · 01/08/2025

Today marks a milestone: Tim Cook is now Apple’s longest running CEO. Steve Jobs: Sept 16, 1997 to Aug 24, 2011: 5,090 days Tim Cook: August 24, 2011, to Aug 1, 2025: 5,091 days Is his time up? A thread 🧵

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Patrick McGee @patrickmcgee.bsky.social · 30/07/2025

Live on @npr.org On Point in 1min to discuss APPLE IN CHINA @wbur.org

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