Optional Handling of Canceled Events

Online calendar software such as Outlook and Google Calendar always removes canceled events, once you accept the cancelation notification. That's often reasonable and fine. But sometimes, especially for recurring events, it is helpful to see an explicit notice of the cancellation. E.g., I don't have to get to work early next Thursday, because the weekly coffee club isn't meeting.

It is a somewhat esoteric feature, and probably tricky to design the UI for, but it really could be nice, for some of my use cases. One way I can think of to implement it is for the calendar to ask you, when you accept the cancellation, whether to hard-delete or logical delete. And then it could include an option for "don't ask me this in the future".

EU USB-C Mandate: Compromise via a Sunset Provision

With the advent of USB-C, the device world has been approaching common-standard nirvana. To-date, Apple has remained the stubborn holdout ruining the fun. Maybe Apple would have cleaned up their act this year on their own, but it's hard to know, since the EU did it for them, with a 2024 mandate to standardize on USB-C.

Very few people, I think, disagree with the outcome of this particular regulation, but you do hear various degrees of concern about prescriptive mandates. I.e., maybe a company would innovate and produce a superior connector, better to let the market decide.

I think building a sunset provision into regulations like this would be a pragmatic compromise. E.g., let the regulation expire in 4 years. That leaves a reasonably foreseeable time horizon where USB-C is completely adequate, so by the time any hypothetical innovation is mature, the path will be clear for testing it in the market.

At the same time, the arrangement should remove any motivation to game the system. E.g., after switching to USB-C, Apple isn't likely to switch back when the regulation expires.

Podcast App Feature: Skip Intro/Outro

Some podcasts have annoyingly long intros, or ads at the beginning. Lots of podcasts are padded with ads at the end. Both are annoying. If you are in a position to fast-forward, they can easily be skipped, but if you tend to listen in "hands off" mode (driving, exercising, doing things that get your hands dirty like cooking), this isn't a good option. 

A killer feature for a podcatcher would be to allow, on a per-podcast basis, a user-configurable setting for skipping intro and outro.

Bluetooth Needs a (Don't) Connect Automatically Option

It has to be a common family scenario (in the car-centric US, anyway) for a couple to have 2 cars, with each paired to both spouses' iPhones. That's definitely the case in my household. And you know what happens? When one of us starts the car, while the other is connected to Bluetooth (Airpods, etc), the car instantly steals the connection. Super-annoying.

The solution seems so simple and obvious...Bluetooth needs an option, like wifi, where you can set whether to Connect Automatically, or not. Another approach would be a delayed connection.