[yazaddaruvala]

Seems unlikely but I’m very hopeful about Apple sneakily creating the world's largest mesh network. Slowly, but surely adding functionality to the mesh.

First, tiny packets piggy- backed through wifi/wireless carriers. Seamlessly sharing wifi passwords with friends.

Next, peer-peer downloads without any network. Specifically for sharing public, location sensitive, and cacheable data through UWB without any network involved. e.g. Apple Maps, Weather, News, Offline Translations, Stocks.

It seems even less likely Apple would expand the capability further, but maybe.

I hope they don’t open up the API though, or do a crazy good job to bake in privacy. It’ll be too easy to track people near each other. I’d be ok with an app permissions model of Wifi/Data XOR Mesh Data Transfer.

[joshka]

> Seems unlikely but I’m very hopeful about Apple sneakily creating the world's largest mesh network. Slowly, but surely adding functionality to the mesh.

In your hypothetical, I'm curious how you'd see this comparing to Amazon Sidewalk in size?

[yazaddaruvala]

Disclaimer: I work at Amazon, but not at all related to Sidewalk, or devices.

Amazon seems to be roughly in the ballpark of 1 BB devices sold based on [0] and [1]. Meanwhile, Apple seems to be in the ballpark of 3 BB devices sold (iOS + watchOS + macOS).

> I'm curious how you'd see this comparing to Amazon Sidewalk in size?

Their future growth curves (regarding devices "in the wild") are not very clear to me. Although, it seems to me devices stuck in homes (i.e. Amazon's), will be less effective at finding lost items, transferring data, etc; compared with devices that locomote with their humans (i.e. Apple's).

Ideally, I hope they create a standard and create a single giant network. After all, Ring data eventually needs to hit an iOS device.

Note: These are all legacy articles, so I did a reasonable projection. I'm probably overestimating for Amazon, and underestimating for Apple, but I have no idea.

[0] https://www.vox.com/recode/2020/1/21/21070402/amazon-ring-sa... [1] https://www.businessinsider.com/amazon-reveals-alexa-sales-2... [3] https://appleinsider.com/articles/18/09/13/how-apple-has-hit...

[shostack]

Am I missing something or is this potentially causing me to get charged for nearby people's traffic on my connection in your described future end state?

[yazaddaruvala]

You've typically already cached the data.

e.g. Driving around a city. Many people have Apple Maps open, to navigate, and the maps data is already downloaded on Phone A. When Phone B starts Apple Maps (or auto-load it without opening the app) transfer the data from Phone A to Phone B (instead of using A or B's network). Continue the propagation for all phones C through Z. Eventually refresh Phone B's data through the network, transfer the data to Phone A. Its a symbiotic relationship for all the neighboring phones.

e.g. Traveling to a foreign country. Staying at a hostel/hotel. You need to download Offline Translations for "English to X". Someone else at the hotel, Phone A, has already downloaded it. When Phone B requests to download it (or auto-refresh it), Phone B gets the data from Phone A (without any online network access). Again symbiotic, because Phone A could have gotten it from some Phone Z, or downloaded the same data it would normally have.

The same types of scenarios work for Yelp style reviews and menus, Weather data, App downloads, etc. Any data that is public, location sensitive, and highly cacheable.

You could think of it as turning every iOS device into a Torrent seeder for certain data sets.

At most each phone is paying some extra battery life. Likely negligible given its just data transfer over UWB/BlueTooth, and made up for by using less battery life because of less network access at other times.

[karmelapple]

I would hope Apple would work something out with carriers to be able to mark this data not originating from your phone to be free somehow... but I haven’t heard anything about it.

[mrkramer]

They have total control over their OS they can do whatever they want until they cross the line and someone sues them.

[sitkack]

I forget, does Apple and SpaceX get along? Seems obvious.

[lathiat]

I feel like the lack of CarPlay on Tesla says no. But I have no actual idea.

[cromka]

They also don’t support Android Auto.