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Hey {{first_name|there}}!
Happy Thanksgiving if you’re celebrating this week!
Here’s what I have for you today:
An easy way to keep holiday music from overtaking your Apple Music recommendations and replays
Poll results and reader comments
An important episode of Basic AF talking about Jeff’s recent stroke
And as always, my hand-selected news roundup
Let’s go!
🎶 Keep Holiday Music From Wrecking Your Apple Music Recommendations
I love the holidays and festive tunes will be getting some pretty heavy rotation in Apple Music over the next month. But come January, the last thing I want is Christmas playlists clogging up my recommendations.
Understanding how Listening History works helps you keep Apple Music tuned to what you actually want to hear.
Listening History tracks the music you play in Apple Music to populate your Recently Played and Replay lists, shape the recommendations made to you, and share what you’re listening to with your followers and friends (if you have set up a profile).
Typically, I want all of those things. But there are times I don’t, like with holiday music.
This is also a great way to keep the kids’ road-trip favorites from taking over your recommendations, or to explore new genres without it impacting your recommendations right away.
It’s easy to turn off Listening History.
On iPhone and iPad:
Open Settings
Tap Apps > Music
Toggle off “Use Listening History”
On Mac:
Open the Music app
Go to Music > Settings > General
Uncheck “Use Listening History”
Bonus Tip: Automate it with Focus
If you want an even easier way to toggle Listening History off and on, without digging through Settings, you can automate it using Focus.
Focus is a feature that can be used to manage notifications, customize Lock Screens or Home Screens, and configure how apps and your device work. If you’ve ever used Do Not Disturb, you’ve used Focus.
Here’s how to create a simple Focus that turns off Listening History on your iPhone or iPad (this isn’t supported on the Mac):
Open Settings
Tap Focus
Tap + in the upper right
Tap Custom
Name the Focus (ex: Turn off Listening History), choose a color and icon, and tap Next
Tap Customize Focus
Near the bottom, tap “Add Filter”
Tap Music
Make sure “Use Listening History” is off
Tap Add
If you want to customize the Focus further, you can. On devices that support Apple Intelligence, “Intelligent Breakthrough & Silencing” can handle important notifications. Otherwise, you can choose which people and apps are allowed to notify you. You can also schedule the Focus to turn on automatically at certain times, locations, or when an app opens, if that fits your workflow.
Once it’s set up, just enable your new Focus whenever you want to pause Listening History. The quickest way is to swipe down into Control Center, tap Focus, and choose the mode you created. Turn off the Focus to enable Listening History again.
📈 Poll results: Box keepers?
In the last newsletter, I confessed to being a hoarder of Apple product boxes and asked if you did this, too. The results: the majority of voters did at one point, but not any longer (47.62%).
Reader comments:
“I just pull out all the contents and chuck it out right away.”
“And my hubs dares say I am THE pack rat!?!??” (Yes, this is from my wife… 🤣)
“The Apple boxes are so well designed and constructed that it to me seems like a part of the device housed in them. I assume a pristine Apple box is worth some sort of monetary value, but I consider them as treasures to be kept. They really are NICE!!!”
“The exception is cases for displays or iMacs in case I need to take them to a store.”
“I have no reason to but they are in my home office closet!”
🎙️ Basic AF: Stroke!: An Account of Jeff’s Symptoms, Recovery, and What You Should Trust in a Medical Emergency
Episode 75
This episode starts with listener feedback on window management in iPadOS 26, then Jeff opens up about his recent stroke. He walks through the initial symptoms, the frustrating EMS response, his time in the hospital and rehab, and what recovery looks like day-to-day. He also shares Siri's surprisingly helpful response when he asked about stroke symptoms.
Here’s the screenshot we discussed during the show of Gentler Streak indicating Jeff’s stroke, recovery, and rehab efforts.
Listen to and follow the show in Apple Podcasts, Spotify, all the other podcast apps, as well as on YouTube and YouTube Music.
📣 News to Know About
Here’s a quick rundown of noteworthy things that I’ve hand-selected just for you:
