10 MACWORLD MARCH 2020
MACUSER APPLE’S HOME STRATEGY NEEDS NEW HARDWAREor thermostat. Those ancillary products are
exactly the sort of thing that third-party
hardware companies are great at. What
Apple provides is intelligence at the very
center of the experience—and that means
the home and the home network.
The elimination of AirPort wasn’t a
mistake. The real mistake was not
replacing it with a next-generation product
that could be the hub of a home network,
a secure bridge to the rest of the internet,
a device that connects a constellation of
smart-home devices together and makes it
all work together and make sense. It’s time
for Apple to return to the center of our
homes. ■the company’s security and privacy focus,
why not offer an automatic VPN service?
Not only could it release a software
update to allow iPad, iPhone, and Mac
users to automatically connect when
they’re away from home, but the Apple
Home itself would encrypt all the data
flowing into and out of the house, keeping
it cloaked from any attempt to analyze the
traffic or use the IP address to track users.
Apple gets to protect its customers and
charge them a monthly fee for the privilege.
APPLE AT THE CENTER
No, Apple doesn’t need to build a security
camera, or smart lock, or video doorbell,
Apple TV