440: ‘Flush a Radar’, With Brent Simmons

Episode Summary

Executive Summary: Brent Simmons discusses retirement, lessons from five years at Audible, and the launch of NetNewsWire 7 for Mac and iOS 26. The conversation centers on software simplicity, the dangers of bloat and A/B-test-driven product design, RSS as a healthier alternative to social media, and Brent’s pushback against Tahoe’s UI choices—especially menu icons everywhere and grayed-out keyboard shortcuts.

Main Topics: Brent’s retirement and Audible experience (Priority: 5/5): Brent explains retiring from Audible after just over five years, the scale of working inside Amazon/Audible, and the lessons he learned about corporate software culture, promotions, and maintaining simplicity in large codebases. NetNewsWire 7 release and design philosophy (Priority: 5/5): Discussion of the new Mac release and upcoming iOS version, including the move to Liquid Glass, Swift structured concurrency, fewer settings, and a more opinionated, less anxiety-inducing RSS reader. Software simplification and code hygiene (Priority: 5/5): Brent describes deleting massive amounts of Objective-C, reducing frameworks, and eliminating warnings to keep a large, long-lived app maintainable and stable. RSS, unread counts, and the 'phantom obligation' (Priority: 4/5): The hosts discuss a Mike Swanson essay on unread counts and how feed readers can create anxiety; Brent contrasts RSS’s calm utility with social media’s attention traps. Critique of modern product management and A/B testing (Priority: 5/5): They analyze how data-driven experimentation can replace product vision, with Swanson’s essay used as a launching point to argue that metrics often steer software toward shallow optimization rather than quality. Pushback against macOS Tahoe UI decisions (Priority: 5/5): Brent and John criticize Apple’s new practice of adding icons to every menu item and graying out keyboard shortcuts, arguing that NetNewsWire’s code demonstrates a better, clearer alternative. Apple leadership, politics, and corporate signaling (Priority: 4/5): The conversation turns to Tim Cook, Apple’s recent political posture, and concerns that decision-making is becoming overly numeric, cautious, and vulnerable to the influence of the current administration.

Key Arguments: Small-team instincts—simplicity, minimal dependencies, deleting code—remain valuable even inside huge corporate environments. A zero-warnings policy is essential for maintaining long-lived codebases that must survive platform transitions and frequent contributor turnover. Promotions and corporate politics are a major hidden driver of software behavior in large organizations, often shaping priorities more than users do. RSS readers should minimize anxiety; fewer settings and a calmer default model are better for many users. A/B testing can hollow out product vision by rewarding what performs statistically rather than what is genuinely good. Menu icons should be used selectively when they clarify meaning; putting icons on every menu item creates visual noise and reduces readability. Apple’s UI choices in Tahoe show a break from longstanding Mac conventions, and third-party developers should push back through better shipped examples rather than only filing feedback. Social media is optimized for engagement, not human attention or understanding; RSS and blogs offer a healthier model for news and conversation. Tim Cook’s reliance on numerical/metric-based reasoning may make Apple more cautious and less visionary over time.

Data Points: Years since last podcast appearance: 6 years - John notes Brent had not been on the podcast in about six years. Last appearance episode/date: Episode 262, August 31, 2019 - Referenced when looking up Brent’s previous appearance. Audible tenure: Just over 5 years - Brent retired from Audible after a little over five years. Team size at Audible: Half a dozen SDE3s plus 30–40 SDE1/SDE2s - Brent describes the scale of the iOS team. Warnings in Xcode at start: 999+ - The codebase had so many warnings that Xcode stopped counting. Warnings after cleanup: 0 - Brent says the warnings were brought down to zero. Objective-C reduction: From about 25% of app to a couple percent - Brent led a major effort to remove Objective-C from the app. Code removed: Hundreds of thousands of lines - He says large amounts of unused code were deleted. NetNewsWire 7 platform requirement: macOS 26 Tahoe - The Mac version requires Tahoe; John remains on Sequoia on his main machine. iOS 26 adoption concern: StatCounter reported ~15% - John cites a misleadingly low iOS 26 upgrade figure caused by a user-agent issue. Common iPhone upgrade rate expectation: 60–70%+ by Dec/Jan - John says typical iPhone OS adoption is usually much higher than 15% by winter. NetNewsWire age: 2002 - John references the original NetNewsWire launch year while discussing RSS history. Mike Swanson essay length: 3,700 words - John praises the essay as long but tightly written. Talk Show sponsor credit: $80 free credits - Sentry offer for listeners using the show code. Squarespace trial: 30 days free - Sponsor offer described during the episode. Squarespace discount: 10% off first purchase - Discount for listeners using code TALK SHOW.

Pivotal Quotes: "I retired last summer, which, you know. Great personal news, of course, as the rest of the world's just absolutely fucking falling apart." — Brent Simmons: Brent introduces his retirement while joking darkly about the broader state of the world. "We went from about a quarter of that app by the time I left down to just a couple percent... We just deleted hundreds of thousands of lines of code." — Brent Simmons: He describes the major simplification effort at Audible and his philosophy of removing unnecessary code. "But when experimentation becomes the primary decision-making tool, a strong product vision becomes optional." — John Gruber quoting Mike Swanson: A key passage from the discussed essay about the dangers of A/B testing and metric-driven design.

Implications: Developers should favor simplicity, selective UI conventions, and product vision over metric-chasing. For users, NetNewsWire models a calmer, more humane alternative to social media and overcomplicated apps. For Apple, the episode is a warning against design-by-consensus and number-only decision-making.