John moves to the guest chair for a change and sits down with Charlotte Henry on her podcast Media+, where they discuss new shows on TV+.

You may have noticed a gap in your Background Mode feed. John has been unable to record new episodes, so we are featuring some highlights. Maybe not "new" but maybe "new-to-you!" Aside from hosting Background Mode, John also regularly shows up as a panelist on the TMO Daily Observations podcast, and was recently a guest on Charlotte Henry's new show, Media+. John and Charlotte chat about upcoming shows on Apple TV+, and the Oprah/Obama interview.

Dr. Jessica Hebert is a postdoctoral fellow in the Department of Anesthesiology and Perioperative Medicine at the Oregon Health & Science University. She earned a Ph.D. in Biology from Portland State in 2018. When not sciencing, Dr. Hebert is an international, award-winning public science communicator and an Science Communication Fellow at the Oregon Museum of Science and Industry.

Jessica got turned onto science watching Star Trek: Voyager with her father — along with reading the works of scifi author Robert Heinlein. While she pondered becoming a physician, she quickly realized her passion is biomedical research. We chatted about her Ph.D. work on the human placenta, and it was fascinating. She also shared some important details of preeclampsia. Jessica does science communication at the Oregon Museum of Science and Industry and is a member of the folk band, The PDX Broadsides. This is a wide-ranging, energetic, exciting interview.

My Background Mode interview with Jessica Hebert

• Jessica on Twitter.
• Jessica's publication page.
• Oregon Health & Science University.
• Background on Jessica (during Ph.D.).
• The PDX Broadsides band.

_______________________

• Support TMO when you buy your Apple gear from Apple.
• The story of my Background Mode podcast.
• Inside TMO’s Background Mode podcast.
• TMO Background Mode Twitter feed.
• Archive of all Background Mode Shows.
• Background Mode at iTunes.
• Send your comments to observations@macobserver.com or marty@macobserver.com

Kelly Guimont is a long-time podcaster, Contributor for The Mac Observer, the host of the Mac Observer’s Daily Observations podcast, and a tech support guru. In her 14th appearance, Kelly and I chat about our favorite streaming TV shows and movies of late.

As is our custom, we alternate. I open with a very positive review of the 2020 series The Right Stuff (Disney+). Kelly was up next with Penny Dreadful (Showtime). John then raves about the movie and then series Mystery Road. (Amazon). Kelly chimes in next with extreme praise for The Mandalorian S2/E1 (Disney+) and, later, an update on Lovecraft Country (HBO Max). John delves into the fabulous The Hundred-Foot Journey (Amazon) and scifi/romance Tuck Everlasting (Disney+). And there’s more! Join us as we explore together what’s great about these shows.

Today our sponsor is Linode.

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With Linode you can build distributed applications, hosted services, and websites featuring native SSD storage, a 40 Gbit network, and industry leading processors.

Visit linode.com/bgm to learn more and sign up.

Thanks Linode for being our sponsor.

My Background Mode interview with Kelly Guimont

• Kelly on Twitter.
• The Right Stuff [Disney+]
• Penny Dreadful [Showtime]
• Mystery Road movie and series.[Amazon]
• Lovecraft Country [HBO Max]
• The Mandalorian [Disney+]
• The Hundred-Foot Journey (2014) [Amazon]
• Tuck Everlasting (2002) [Disney+]
• One Day at Disney [Disney+]

_______________________

• Support TMO when you buy your Apple gear from Apple.
• The story of my Background Mode podcast.
• Inside TMO’s Background Mode Podcast.
• TMO Background Mode Twitter feed.
• Archive of all Background Mode Shows.
• Background Mode at iTunes.
• Send your comments to observations@macobserver.com or marty@macobserver.com

David Shayer worked as an Apple software engineer for 18 years. He worked on the Apple Watch, iPod, and Radar, Apple’s bug tracking system, among other projects. He was an independent Mac software developer for a decade, and clients included Apple, Microsoft, Symantec and the U.S. Navy.

David told about how he learned to program, some of which was on an Apple II and some on a Mac in the 1980s. He went on to tell me about how he was hired by Apple. Twice. The second time he worked on the iPod file system and database. In the process he learned how Apple products are designed, and that included some great stories about Steve Jobs, his design sense, and the iPod team’s interaction with Jobs. There were other fascinating Steve Jobs stories. We finished with his revealing article about how Apple OS software development works.

My Background Mode interview with David Shayer

• David's email.
• David's author page at TidBITS.
• Six Reasons Why iOS 13 and Catalina Are So Buggy
• Four Reasons Why We Won’t See Third-Party Apple Watch Faces.

_______________________

• Support TMO when you buy your Apple gear from Apple.
• The story of my Background Mode podcast.
• Inside TMO’s Background Mode podcast.
• TMO Background Mode Twitter feed.
• Archive of all Background Mode Shows.
• Background Mode at iTunes.
• Send your comments to observations@macobserver.com or marty@macobserver.com

Dr. Rebecca Wragg Sykes is an archaeologist, writer and creative professional. She earned her Ph.D. in Archaeology from the University of Sheffield (UK) in 2010. She is the author of the just published book Kindred which is about Neanderthal life, love, death and art.

Dr. Sykes attributes her interest in Archaeology to “mucking around in the dirt in the backyard” as a child. But also her parents took her to historic sites on holidays. Then she started devouring books about the ancient Egyptians. By and by, she became keenly interested in the reality of life in the past. Rebecca humorously explained how “Archaeology is like Anthropology but for dead people.” In segment two, we explored her new book about the Neanderthals, and it was mesmerizing. For example, new findings have proven that there was interbreeding with Homo sapiens. There is much more in this delightful show.

Today our sponsor is Linode.

Whether you’re working on a personal project or managing enterprise infrastructure, you deserve simple, affordable, and accessible cloud computing solutions that allow you to take your project to the next level.

Simplify your cloud infrastructure with Linode’s Linux virtual machines and develop, deploy, and scale your modern applications faster and easier.

Get started on Linode today with a $100 in free credit for listeners of Background Mode. You can find all the details at linode.com/bgm

Linode has 11 global data centers and provides 24/7/365 human support with no tiers or hand-offs regardless of your plan size. In addition to shared and dedicated compute instances, use your $100 in credit on S3-compatible object storage, Managed Kubernetes, and more.

Visit linode.com/bgm and click on the “Create Free Account” button to get started.

Thanks Linode for being our sponsor.

My Background Mode interview with Rebecca Wragg Sykes

• Rebecca on Twitter.
• Rebecca's home page.
• About Rebecca.
• Rebecca's new book: Kindred.

_______________________

• Support TMO when you buy your Apple gear from Apple.
• The story of my Background Mode podcast.
• Inside TMO’s Background Mode podcast.
• TMO Background Mode Twitter feed.
• Archive of all Background Mode Shows.
• Background Mode at iTunes.
• Send your comments to observations@macobserver.com or marty@macobserver.com

Dr. John Hawks is a Distinguished Achievement Professor of Anthropology at the University of Wisconsin, associate chair, and undergraduate advisor. He earned his Ph.D. in Anthropology from the University of Michigan in 1999. His interests include Biological anthropology, Paleoanthropology, and Anthropological genomics.

John took us through the evolution of humans from a cultural and genetic viewpoint, starting about 3 milion years ago. In recent years there’s been an explosion in the fossil history of our ancestors that has greatly improved our understanding of Homo Sapiens. We spent some time covering the newest thinking about Neanderthals, including how Homo Sapiens interacted with them starting 100,000 years ago in Europe — and the mysterious disappearance of the Neanderthals. John provides fascinating details of our human evolution. Don’t miss this one!

My Background Mode interview with John Hawks

• John on Twitter.
• John's faculty page.
• John's home page and blog.
• John's Wikipedia page.
• John's book: Almost Human.

_______________________

• Support TMO when you buy your Apple gear from Apple.
• The story of my Background Mode podcast.
• Inside TMO’s Background Mode podcast.
• TMO Background Mode Twitter feed.
• Archive of all Background Mode Shows.
• Background Mode at iTunes.
• Send your comments to observations@macobserver.com or marty@macobserver.com

Dr. Mario Juric is professor of astronomy at the Department of Astronomy of the University of Washington. He holds a Ph.D. in Astrophysical Sciences from Princeton University. His research is at the intersection of astrophysics and computer science and engineering: developing systems and algorithms for use with large data sets to answer questions about the Universe.

We chatted about how Mario was inspired to become an astronomer, and one notable name came up: James T. Kirk. That’s all it took. Oh, and also Isaac Asimov and Arthur C. Clarke. Most of the show, however, centered around two things: mapping our Milky Way galaxy and and his work on the Vera C. Rubin Observatory project, previously the LSST. Starting in 2021, this telescope will capture panoramic images of the entire visible sky twice each week for 10 years, building up our deepest, widest, image of the universe. The result: hundreds of petabytes of imaging data for close to 40 billion objects. One mission: planetary defense!

Today our sponsor is Linode.

Linode helps you design, develop and deploy in the cloud.

You can build dedicated CPU, distributed applications, hosted services, websites, and CI/CD environments. If it runs on Linux, it runs on Linode.

Linde is focused on simplicity, service, and value. Built using the most up to date hardware and a next generation network backbone, Linode allows users to comply with in-country data protection requirements while taking advantage of all Linode’s technology and tools.

Featured are native SSD storage, a 40 gigabit network, and industry leading processors. Simplify your cloud infrastructure with Linode’s Linux virtual machines.

You’ll be able to deploy and maintain your infrastructure SIMPLY and cost effectively.

Plus, Linode’s tools make it easy to provision, secure, monitor, and BACKUP your cloud.

Whether you’re working on a personal project or managing enterprise infrastructure, you deserve simple, affordable, and accessible cloud computing solutions that allow you to take your project to the next level.

Get started on Linode today with a $100 in free credit for listeners of Background Mode. You can find all the details at linode.com/bgm

Linode has 11 global data centers and provides 24/7/365 human support with no tiers or hand-offs regardless of your plan size. In addition to shared and dedicated compute instances, use your $100 in credit on S3-compatible object storage, Managed Kubernetes, and more.

Visit linode.com/bgm and click on the “Create Free Account” button to get started.

Thanks Linode for being our sponsor.

My Background Mode interview with Mario Juric

• Mario on Twitter.
• Mario's faculty page.
• Mario's research.
• Vera C. Rubin Observatory.
• LSST website.
• The Virgo Stellar Stream.

_______________________

• Support TMO when you buy your Apple gear from Apple.
• The story of my Background Mode podcast.
• Inside TMO’s Background Mode podcast.
• TMO Background Mode Twitter feed.
• Archive of all Background Mode Shows.
• Background Mode at iTunes.
• Send your comments to observations@macobserver.com or marty@macobserver.com

Steve Silberman is an award-winning science writer, award-winning book author, public speaker, TED talk speaker, sometime record album producer, and a life-long Mac user. His writing on science, culture, and literature has been collected in a number of major anthologies including The Best American Science Writing of the Year and The Best Business Stories of the Year.

Early in his life, Steve fell in love with science fiction, especially the works of Ray Bradbury. Later, he studied under poet Allen Ginsberg and learned about both effective research and the power of language. We chatted about his early writing at Wired and The Well, and that led him to discover the deeper story of autism. The result was a major, influential article at Wired, then his important, award-winning book NeuroTribes .

My Background Mode interview with Steve Silberman

• Steve on Twitter.
• Steve's home page.
• About Steve
• Steve's book:NeuroTribes.

_______________________

• Support TMO when you buy your Apple gear from Apple.
• The story of my Background Mode podcast.
• Inside TMO’s Background Mode podcast.
• TMO Background Mode Twitter feed.
• Archive of all Background Mode Shows.
• Background Mode at iTunes.
• Send your comments to observations@macobserver.com or marty@macobserver.com

Mike Loucks is the CEO of Space Exploration Engineering (SEE), which he co-founded in 1995. He received a BA in Physics/Astronomy from Whitman College, WA in 1985 and an MS in Aerospace Engineering Sciences from the University of Colorado in 1991. He co-founded SEE corp. in 1995 after working as an operations and trajectory planning expert for Orbital Sciences Corporation.

The NASA Apollo missions and science fiction by Robert Heinlein got Mike interested and space and astronomy. Early on, he pondered becoming an astronomer but later decided that aerospace engineering was his true passion. We chatted about the founding of SEE and his work there. Mike then told me about the kinds of computer and software tools he uses for orbital and celestial mechanics and the role Macs have played in his life. Mike finished with some great advice for students who want to pursue a career in aerospace engineering.

Today our sponsor is Linode.

Linode helps you design, develop and deploy in the cloud.

You can build dedicated CPU, distributed applications, hosted services, websites, and CI/CD environments. If it runs on Linux, it runs on Linode.

Linde is focused on simplicity, service, and value. Built using the most up to date hardware and a Next Generation Network backbone, Linode allows users to comply with in-country data protection requirements while taking advantage of all Linode’s technology and tools.

The goal is to maximize the benefit you receive from your cloud by making it cost-effective to deploy robust compute, storage, and networking services that meet your ever-changing performance needs.

Featured are native SSD storage, a 40 Gbit network, and industry leading processors

Pick from any of 10 worldwide data centers including the newest in Toronto.

Pay only for what you use with hourly billing across all plans and add-on services. Plus, 24 x 7 live customer support is always just a phone call away.

You’ll be able to deploy and maintain your infrastructure simply and cost effectively.

Plus, Linode’s tools make it easy to provision, secure, monitor, and back up your cloud.

To learn more, visit linode.com/BGM. All new customers will receive a $20 credit.

My Background Mode interview with Mike Loucks

• Mike on Twitter.
• Space Exploration Engineering
• About the SEE team

_______________________

• Support TMO when you buy your Apple gear from Apple.
• The story of my Background Mode podcast.
• Inside TMO’s Background Mode podcast.
• TMO Background Mode Twitter feed.
• Archive of all Background Mode Shows.
• Background Mode at iTunes.
• Send your comments to observations@macobserver.com or marty@macobserver.com

Dave Hamilton is the co-founder of The Mac Observer, publisher, and co-host of the legendary Mac Geek Gab (MGG) podcast, having done over 800 shows with our John Braun. He’s an Apple—and router—guru.

Dave and I opened the show with an extensive discussion of Apple succession planning. Who would replace CEO Tim Cook on an emergency basis? Who might succeed him when he retires? Who on the executive team is qualified? In segment II, Dave explained Wi-Fi 6 and its presence (and lack thereof) on various Apple products. That got us into new routers that support Wi-Fi 6. Finally, we looked at the ever-changing UI of Apple OSes, discoverability of features and the continuing need to remain practiced with each OS. As with his MGG, Dave is both informative and entertaining.

My Background Mode interview with Dave Hamilton

• Dave on Twitter.
• Dave the Nerd's bio page.
• Mac Geek Gab podcast.

_______________________

• Support TMO when you buy your Apple gear from Apple.
• The story of my Background Mode podcast.
• Inside TMO’s Background Mode podcast.
• TMO Background Mode Twitter feed.
• Archive of all Background Mode Shows.
• Background Mode at iTunes.
• Send your comments to observations@macobserver.com or marty@macobserver.com