AI prompt:
Apple iPhone Air. Just received regulatory approval to sell in China. Lots of stories at odds with each other. Some say that the iPhone Air is not doing all that well in the US and Europe, but yet the iPhone Air sold out in China in hours. What's our assessment of how the iPhone Air is doing? Or does it really matter, since it's a huge pie with iPhone Air, iPhone 17, Pro, and Pro Max all occupying a quarter of the large pie?
ChatGPT: again, a long reply. Requested a one-page PDF. Here it is:
This is very, very interesting. It leads to another AI prompt:
This is very, very interesting. In the big scheme of things, the Apple iPhone Air did at least two things for Apple: the Air inserted itself into a new niche among cellphones -- extreme thinness -- a must-have fashion statement -- wards off other competitors beating them to that niche; and, second, the Air was a huge marketing "tool." "Everyone" was talking about the Air even if they didn't end up buying it. Free advertising, as it were (just as the ORANGE iPhone did the same thing). I can think of other reasons for the Air but those two seem to loom large in my rear view mirror.
A long reply, but a nice brief summarizing PDF:
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The Book Page
Wow, what a great day.
So much blogging accomplished with regard to technology over the past two days, but I was also able to complete the scaffolding of the 2023 book of British history by Joanne Paul who provided the definitive biography of the House of Dudley, important during the reigns of the three step-children of King Henry VIII.
I assume in the big scheme of things, this is not a very important story but it connects a lot of dots and fills in a lot of empty spaces in this period of time.
This is the framework / timeline of the period in question:
Three periods:
- the Wars of the Roses, which culminated in the House of Tudor (first, Henry VII, and then Henry VIII)
- preceded by the House of Plantagenet; divided into two rival branches
- the House of Lancaster
- the House of York
- Henry VIII and the transition following Henry VIII's death -- the House of Dudley -- the period of time covered by Joanne Paul in her 2023 biography / history.
- "Queen" Jane Grey (9 days),
- King Edward VI (6 years),
- Queen Mary 1 (five years),
- Queen Elizabeth 1 (44 years -- the Golden Age of Britain -- 1558 - 1603).
- the era of Elizabeth 1 -- the Elizabethan / Shakespeare age) (her namesake Elizabeth II, 70 years, 1952 - 2022)
- On a completely different note but because Elizabeth II was mentioned, let's remind ourselves of the Indian Raj: 1858 - 1947
- Queen Victoria: 1858 - 1901
- Edward VII: 1901 - 1910
- George V: 1910 - 1936 -- WWI
- Edward VIII: small part of 1936
- George VI: 1936 - 1947 -- WWII
Back to Henry VIII and his three kids:
- Henry VIII: 1491 - 1547 (55 y/o)
- Edward VI: 1537 - 1553 (reigned 9 - 15 y/o) (died at 15 years of age, mostly likely tuberculosis)
- Mary I: 1516 - 1558 (reigned 37 - 42 years old) (death, possibly uterine cancer; died during epidemic of influenza)
- Elizabeth 1: 1533 - 1603 (69 years of age when she died; reigned for 45 years -- Golden Age
- James VI / James I: son of Mary, Queen of Scots; a great-great-grandson of Henry VII. Mary Queen of Scots, 1542 - 1587 (44 years of age); reigned 1542 - 1567
So, pretty much an exact contemporary of her "cousin" Queen Elizabeth I who was alive and reigning to the south at the same time as Mary, Queen of Scots.
Queen Elizabeth I and her cousin Mary, Queen of Scots had a tense, rivalrous, and ultimately fatal relationship. They never met in person, and their conflict was driven by religious differences and a competing claim to the English throne, which ended with Elizabeth ordering Mary's execution
