Apple has announced that John Ternus will become CEO on 1 September 2026, with Tim Cook transitioning to executive chairman—Adam Engst analyzes what this leadership change means for Apple’s future. This issue also marks TidBITS’s 36th anniversary and 1800th weekly issue, with Adam reflecting on the importance of community and asking longtime readers to share their stories. Sadly, Adam also bids farewell to Mac writers John Martellaro and Chuck La Tournous, both of whom died recently. In security news, an impersonation-based malware attack on SlackBITS has forced us to shutter our decade-old Slack group and move real-time chat to Discourse. Finally, don’t miss Adam’s VidBITS interview with Matt Sephton about his simultaneous release of 18 capable but tiny apps, most of which are small enough to fit on a floppy disk. Notable software releases this week include Final Cut Pro 12.2, Compressor 5.2, and Motion 6.2, Lightroom Classic 15.3, and SpamSieve 3.3.
TidBITS is celebrating 36 years and 1800 issues of continuous publication. Rather than rehash past anniversary themes, Adam Engst uses this milestone to focus on the importance of community and invites readers to share how TidBITS has affected their lives.
Apple’s leadership transition puts hardware chief John Ternus in the CEO role while Tim Cook moves to executive chairman, where he’ll continue navigating the company’s complex political landscape.
The Mac community has lost two longtime writers in recent weeks: John Martellaro and Chuck La Tournous. John wrote once for TidBITS in 1996 before settling at The Mac Observer, where Chuck was also a contributing editor.
A convincing impersonation of TidBITS contributor Glenn Fleishman on our public Slack group fooled an experienced IT professional into installing the OSX.Odyssey infostealer. Because Slack is designed for internal groups, its identity controls and logging aren’t sufficient for safe public use, so we’re shutting down SlackBITS and moving to Discourse Chat.
When Matt Sephton told me he was releasing 18 apps on the same day, I knew I had to talk to him. Our two-hour VidBITS conversation covers everything from his tiny utilities—most of which would fit on a 1.44 MB floppy disk—to classic Mac preservation to AI coding experiments.
Watchlist
Maintenance updates for the professional video apps. ($299.99/$49.99/$49.99 new or $129.99 annually with Apple Creator Studio subscription, free update, various sizes, macOS 15.6+)
Updates the desktop-focused photo cataloging and editing app with feature and performance improvements. ($9.99/$19.99/$59.99 monthly Creative Cloud subscription, free update, macOS 14+)
Brings several helpful changes to improve spam filtering accuracy. ($39.99 new, free update, 61.5 MB, macOS 10.13+)
