You can forgive Apple for getting so focused on its Apple Silicon update that it really believed we'd all get that " Peek Performance " was about looking at the incredible M1 Ultra performance promises and the hardware they've built around it.

That's it. The head fake of the Greg Joswiak Tweet notwithstanding, this event on Tuesday, March 8, was a signal that Apple was narrowing its focus even further. Where once it was obsessed with hardware design and the various ways you can bend and flex steel, glass, and aluminum, it's now focused on the silicon you can't see but will surely feel the impact of all the systems Apple builds around it.

The silicon road ahead

The company has never been shy about its Apple Silicon plans, promising us two years ago that it would eventually migrate all its Intel-based Macs to its own SoCs. Today it has nearly made good on that promise, with all but one system (the Mac Pro, which will likely get there this year) now running an Apple M-class chip.

The 5-nanometer M1 Ultra's specs, 114 billion transistors, 128GB of unified memory, 8000 GB/s memory bandwidth are all exciting and for pros and creatives a mouth-watering proposition.

Still, Apple’s new Mac Studio design, which is milled from a singular block of aluminum, is almost perfunctory. The story is not how this little box looks – it's what it can do.

Same with the updated Studio Display which doesn't appear much different from previous designs, but is now running essentially a tiny iPhone or iPad on the inside (it even has Center Stage for FaceTime).

Apple's other major announcements were for a frozen design iPhone SE and a fixed design iPad Air .

The iPhone gets Apple's bespoke A15 Bionic mobile CPU (not officially Apple Silicon) and the iPad Air gets the M1.

That's the excitement. That's the moment. That's the answer to the question: How many places can Apple put its own homegrown or custom-built silicon?

Performance matters

For Apple, the answer to that question is enough to excite. Design flourishes are, essentially, just that: flourishes that no longer mean much.

If Apple thinks that the iPhone SE is enough because the phone now has a much more powerful processor and 5G, then it's willing to cede a little bit of its design leadership to others (not that anyone has really picked up that baton).

The Mac Studio is not a showpiece. It's an insanely powerful system that will use its specialized air channeling system to keep it quiet during heavy workloads, letting the 3.5-inch x 7.7-inch box fade into the background.

The 27-inch Studio Display is flashier, but only because of the gorgeous screen and whatever you'll run on it.

We did get a brand-new Mac, which is an exciting development, especially if you were itching for another option and wondered if the mini could be embiggened (size-wise and in performance) to take on truly herculean tasks. But we didn't get a new category, which would've called for a completely new design, even design language, to consider. We got more variations on the known and a lot more Apple Silicon.

What Apple is fast becoming is a company that produces fast systems and thrilling, expansive services. The designs that used to elicit stares and barely-hidden obsession are no longer special.

Apple will still thrill with the M1 Ultra and Mac Studio. It will succeed in the marketplace when people rush to snap up these new systems, but this is a different Apple than the one I've known for 20-plus years. I guess I should get used to it.

You can't buy a cheap mirrorless camera because a perfect storm blew them away

The last two years have been a bonanza for professional photographers. But for those of us who want an affordable mirrorless camera? Not so much. The good new options, like the Sony ZV-E10 or Fujifilm X-S10 , are often frustratingly difficult to find in stock. And the cheaper mid-range classics, from the likes of Canon and Nikon, haven't been updated in years.

The obvious explanation – the global chip shortage – is only part of the problem. It's been whipped into a superstorm because manufacturers, particularly Sony and Canon, have seemingly given up on affordable mirrorless cameras. While professional, full-frame systems get all the love, those who want their smarts in a less financially-bruising package have been left feeding on relative scraps.

Not that it's impossible to buy a cheap, modern mirrorless camera – stock shortages vary by region, and fine new options like the Nikon Zfc are widely available. But our temperature check of the big manufacturers and retailers in the US and UK shows that the 'enthusiast' market is probably less-than-enthused with the options you can currently buy.

Still, it's not all doom and gloom. While this perfect cyclone of chips shortages and market shifts continues to rage, this isn't the end of entry-level mirrorless cameras, despite the radical improvements of smartphones. In fact, there are reasons to believe that the clouds will part later this year and the sun will again shine down on photographers who want the best mirrorless cameras for less than the cost of their car.

Waiting games

How bad are the shortages of cheap mirrorless cameras? It depends on the brand and country you're shopping in, but it varies from 'very bad' to pretty frustrating. The worst affected for cheap and mid-range options are Sony (in both the US and UK) and Fujifilm (in the UK). Which is a shame, because both have made some of the best affordable mirrorless cameras in recent years.

In Sony's official stores in the US and UK, the entire mid-range A6000 series (that's the A6000, A6100, A6400 and A6600) are out of stock, along with the new Sony ZV-E10. This isn't too surprising, as Sony Japan announced in December 2021 that it was temporarily suspending orders for the Sony A6600 , ZV-E10 and A7C , and permanently shuttering the Sony A6100 and A7 II .

Clearly, the situation hasn't improved since then. But this means the cheapest mirrorless camera you can currently buy in the Sony store is the $1,999 / £1,750 Sony A7 III . Not exactly affordable for most non-pros right now. That camera is also the perfect example of recent pricing trends – while it arrived in 2018 as an entry-level full-frame option, its Sony A7 IV successor has ascended to a different price stratosphere of $2,499 / £2,400 / AU$$4,299 (body-only).

The Sony situation is also mirrored by Fujifilm in the UK. Of the 15 sub-£1,500 camera options in Fuji's store, only six are in stock. Sadly, this means that most of the kit options for the excellent Fujifilm X-S10 and Fujifilm X-T4 – two of the best mid-range mirrorless cameras around – aren't available. We've asked Fujifilm for comment, but it's likely that the twin winds of global chip shortages and Brexit-related issues are causing the pain there.

It's possible to find some of these cameras at retailers, but online stores aren't collectively fairing much better. Two of the biggest in the US are B&H Photo Video and Adorama. From B&H's range of 130 mirrorless cameras in the sub-$1,500 price bracket, a massive 54 models (or 41%) are out of stock. At Adorama, 34% of its sub-$1,500 cameras (that's 66 out of 192) are unavailable to buy.

The situation is even worse for UK retailers. In the sub-£1,500 mirrorless camera bracket, Park Cameras has a huge 72% of its range marked as either 'out of stock' or 'awaiting stock'. At Wex Photo Video, 62% of its range in that category have the dreaded 'awaiting stock' red marker. In other words, the majority of cheap mirrorless cameras are still unavailable to buy in UK photography stores.

Old school

But it's not just about chip shortages. While stock for Canon and Nikon's affordable mirrorless cameras is generally better, you'll probably have to blow dust off the boxes, as neither as shown much willingness to launch new models.

In the last two years, we've only seen two 'cheap' mirrorless cameras from those camera giants – the impressive Nikon Zfc and the disappointing Canon EOS M50 Mark II . Yes, smartphones are a big reason why, along with the launch of the new full-frame Nikon Z and Canon RF systems. But with dwindling stock of older models like Canon EOS M100, your options are increasingly limited, unless you widen your search to include DSLRs.

So is this all simply the shifting sands of a market realities, the new normal for cameras? To an extent – it's no secret that camera sales have been on a scary rollercoaster drop for the last decade, and that's prompted manufacturers to migrate to the safer lands of professional cameras. Computational photography is good, but you won't see rows of iPhone 13 Pros on the sporting sidelines anytime soon.

But it also isn't true that there's no viable case for cheap or mid-range mirrorless cameras anymore. According to BCN , which gathers data from around 40% of Japan's market, the top ten best-selling cameras in 2021 were all exclusively in that bracket, with no full-frame cameras or DSLRs in the list.

Okay, the Japanese market is different from the US and Europe and BCN's data isn't the most comprehensive, but being a photographer clearly also doesn't have to be a binary choice between a smartphone and a professional full-frame camera. And fortunately, the signs are promising that the affordable mirrorless camera space will get a much-needed injection of new models later this year.

Signs of life

For photographers who prize smaller and more affordable mirrorless cameras than the Nikon Z9s of this world, this year has got off to a promising start. We've seen the arrival of two Micro Four Thirds in the form of the Olympus OM-1 and Panasonic Lumix GH6 . Neither could be classed as 'cheap', but their systems have historically been havens for amateur photographers and videographers – so the arrival of two new flagships is a promising sign.

But the really exciting stuff is likely to come later this year. It's going to be a big year for Fujifilm, which has long occupied the sweet spot for those who prize value as highly as dynamic range. Its X-Summit conference in May is expected to see the arrival of the flagship Fujifilm X-H2 . This is again unlikely to be a budget model, but we could also hear news about updates to its more beginner-friendly models (and hopefully an easing of those stock issues).

Perhaps the biggest news, though, is that Canon is rumored to be launching three affordable EOS R mirrorless cameras in 2022 . These are expected to include a new APS-C model, the Canon EOS R7 , and a long-awaited successor to the full-frame Canon EOS RP , which offered incredible value when it landed back in early 2019.

This all means that the deflated budget space in the mirrorless camera world, exacerbated by chip shortages, could well start to inflate again by the end of 2022. As much as we like the value offered by cheap cameras like the original Canon EOS M50 and Fujifilm X-T200 , we're very much looking forward to seeing some successors that pack some of the tech seen in their pricier siblings.

This tiny mechanical keyboard started out as a joke, but it captured our heart

When we first heard about The Key, a miniscule mechanical keyboard with just three keys, we resolved to get our hands on one.

Imagined into existence by coding forum Stack Overflow with the help of designer Cassidy Williams, The Key has just one purpose: to copy and paste. A noble calling, if ever there was one.

The only problem was that The Key didn’t actually exist. It was all just a cruel joke, an April Fool’s stunt par excellence.

However, sensing the team had inadvertently come up with a rather good idea, Stack Overflow secretly commissioned Drop to manufacture a small number of boards. And in September last year, The Key eventually went on sale for the first time, priced at $29.

Joke’s on you

The core philosophy behind The Key is simple: everyone copies sometimes, and that’s nothing to be ashamed of.

“They say good artists copy, but great artists steal. They were wrong. Great artists, developers, and engineers copy. Then they paste,” wrote Stack Overflow, when The Key made its debut.

“Every day, millions of innovators and creators across the globe move society and industry forward by copy-pasting code. But for too long, this process has been stuck in the past. Say goodbye to cramped fingers, sore wrists, and wasted movement. Say hello to The Key.”

The Key is first and foremost a joke at the expense of developers, who regularly steal code snippets from Stack Overflow to use in their own projects, but for whom being called a “copy and paste programmer” would be a mortal insult.

On April Fool’s Day itself, Stack Overflow threw up a pop-up every time someone tried to copy material from the platform, telling them they had run out of free copy-pastes and must purchase The Key to unlock more.

Separately, though, The Key is also a joke about gadget culture. Stack Overflow knew all too well that people like you and I wouldn’t be able to resist a piece of kit as eccentric as this one, even if we had no real use for it. That’s why there were plans in place to manufacture the device from the beginning, even before the April Fool’s joke went live.

The fact that The Key went out of stock almost as quickly as it came on sale is testament to the unhealthy thirst for gadgetry, especially when it comes to novelty products on a miniature scale.

“Not only can it copy, but it can also paste!” exclaimed one delighted customer. “It’s just great at what it does,” wrote another.

Surprising depth

Although it may look like The Key is good for one thing only, it’s actually relatively easy to reprogram for functions beyond just copy and paste, courtesy of its QMK firmware.

It’s not the most straightforward process ever for the novice, but if this writer can do it, you certainly can too. And Drop provides an excellent walkthrough that holds your hand the whole way.

There are plenty of possibilities, when you start to think about it; you could reconfigure the three keys to act as mute, volume up and volume down buttons, or play/pause, previous track and next track. The real power users, meanwhile, may want to set up each key as a macro, whereby a series of commands are executed with a single keystroke.

In other words, while The Key is a perfect copy-and-paste machine straight out of the box, there’s more to this little board than meets the eye, especially for anyone clever enough to figure out how to tap into its full potential.

As for the build quality, we were pleasantly surprised. Sure, the keycaps feel a little cheap, but they look great and the Kailh Black Box switches deliver a pleasing “thunk”. The machined aluminium case has a nice weight to it too, so the keyboard won’t slide around your desk when you get carried away with your copy-pasting.

The only obvious design problem is that you have to remove the backplate with a tiny screwdriver to access the button that lets you load up new key bindings, and some people were disappointed there’s no opportunity to change the switches themselves, even if the keycaps are easy enough to swap out.

But otherwise, Drop has done a stellar job. We doubt anyone would have expected so much care to have gone into a product that is, essentially, a joke.

Frivolous, but intentionally so

To be clear, we’re not here to argue that anybody really needs The Key. When we were testing the board, we forgot to use it half the time. If anything, moving the hands over to another keyboard to perform a quick copy and paste took longer than it would with a normal setup.

However, asking whether The Key is useful enough to warrant a purchase is rather missing the point. This keyboard is a celebration of hobbyism, meme culture and novelty, not reason and pragmatism.

In any case, those who discover they can’t find a way to integrate The Key into their workflows will find it makes for an excellent shelf ornament for the home office, or gift for a nerdy loved one.

The greatest shame is that The Key is so difficult to get hold of at the moment. It’s unclear when Drop will make another batch available, so we had to ask Stack Overflow very nicely for a loaner. But this year’s April Fool’s Day, in three weeks’ time, would be as good a time as any for a relaunch, wouldn’t it?