Hi and welcome to the A16Z podcast. In this hallway conversation episode, Benedict Evans and Steven Sinovsky discuss Apple's September 2018 keynote event and share their thoughts on the new innovations and lessons that stick out. What are the changes that really matter? And where are we now with something that's gone from being a toy to a phone to fashion statement and has now pivoted to a health monitor that

can actually save lives. How closely aligned is health to the overall value proposition of Apple?

And what are some of the characteristics of how Apple innovates as a company as a whole,

from components and building blocks to how it all comes together?

So I'm Steven Sinovsky. I'm Benedict Evans.

So yesterday was a pretty exciting day in the world of Apple in the sense that there was an event.

And a lot of people showed up at the Steve Jobs Theater. And they surprised, surprise, had some new phones for us to talk about.

Yes, I'm thinking about translating Californian pretty exciting into English, which would be okay,

it was kind of okay.

Is that English where all the words are spelled wrong, like defense and things like that?

Well, the Apple, every Apple event is we're all tremendously excited.

We're super excited.

Super excited.

Yes, I forgot it.

Sorry, right.

Well, so the way I kind of think about this is we're now kind of on the upper slopes of the S-cur for smartphones.

There was a period when like the first smartphones were amazing and then there's a period of very, very rapid improvement.

The screens get better. The devices get amazing.

Every year or every other year you think, oh my God, this is so much better than what I've got now.

I think we're now kind of at the point where most of those easy wins are done.

The iPhone X was Apple's implementation of the edge-droid screen.

This is kind of a decent deal.

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