Rant Time: News Networks are Failing Us!
This rant is a long, long time coming. News network media has been in serious decay for going on at least a decade. Recently, however, news networks are now a danger to the United States and, specifically, to the world… just as the GOP is decaying democracy itself. The whole country is in a state of decay… entropy, if you will. News media is not an exception to this state of decay. In fact, news media is ONE cause of it.
Let’s rant!
Cable News Networks
The vast majority of news is now obtained by viewers using one of the 3 main cable news networks, CNN, MSNBC and Fox News, with broadcast news sources like ABC News and CBS News leaning into this same exact problem. Even audio podcast sources like NPR, Reuters and the Associated Press are also throwing their hat into this same overkill ring.
You might be asking, “But aren’t there now 4 cable news networks?” Yes, the newest addition to cable news, [NEWSNATION] (formerly WGN), is also making a play for a slice of the cable news audience. However, [NEWSNATION] is still still too new to be considered fully. Yet this up-and-coming new channel is making all of the same mistakes as the incumbent news channels. Nothing news to see here, move along.
[NEWSNATION]
Let’s discuss this newest addition to cable news, [NEWSNATION]. This news company, which was born out of WGN in the long past, is now trying to resurrect an older WGN national news idea into NewsNation (note, the caps, formatting and brackets will be dropped for the remainder of this article).
NewsNation claims to offer a more fair and balanced approach to news reporting. Yet, NewsNation is falling into the same exact unbalanced and nonsensical news traps as every other cable news network. One only needs to watch NewsNation to understand its imbalance and unfairness in its reporting. If NewsNation cannot get itself on the right track when the rest of the news networks are doing these same exact wrong things, then 24 hour news networks cannot and will not survive.
I had hopes that NewsNation would take a different tack from CNN, MSNBC and Fox News. Unfortunately, NewsNation management has decided to adopt all of the same wrong postures and same failing strategies that the rest of the so-called news channels have adopted. Come on guys, try something different!
National Politics vs War
All of these news networks get so deep in the weeds with tunnel vision, that they cannot understand how unbalanced and unfair their news reporting actually is. These channels all seem to think their reporting is fair and balanced. How balanced can news reporting be when EVERY SINGLE NEWS CHANNEL focuses solely on one story 24 by 7 to the exclusion of all else?
It would be one thing if only one of these news channels chose to delve deep into a topic. When every single one of these channels simultaneously choose to dive deep and focus their entire 24 hour news cycle to a single topic, that’s called myopia or tunnel vision.
What’s worse is that this Israeli conflict is a regional conflict that has existed for decades. There is absolutely nothing new about this conflict. This conflict had been in hiatus most recently, but that doesn’t make this conflict new. It is different in how it began this time, yes, but it’s the same old religious arguments rehashed all over again. And yet, CNN, MSNBC and the rest are reporting this conflict as though it’s never existed before (said in total surprise). There’s nothing surprising or new about any of this conflict.
This specific Israeli clash also isn’t the problem behind this national news reporting crisis. It’s simply a victim of and catalyst for just how crappy, inane, unintelligent and one-tracked our national news cycles have become.
Gaza Strip Reporting
As of this article, Israel is now at war with Hamas over, once again, the Gaza Strip. The Gaza Strip is a contentious bit of “holy” land that both the Palestinians and the Jewish claim for their respective religions. This small bit of land, which is approximately twice the size of Washington D.C., has always been claimed by both religious sects as “holy land” under their religious doctrines. As a result of these two separate religions claiming this same small piece of land, tensions erupt, tempers flare and eventually missiles get launched. Any person who chooses to live on this contentious bit of land must choose to live with the consequences of that decision. You could choose to live anywhere else safer, but CHOOSING to live on the Gaza strip comes with it the very real possibility of death and destruction for you, your family and your loved ones. This most recent Israeli and Hamas clash proves this point out.
Each side believes the other shouldn’t be entitled to live on or inhabit this piece of land. That the land exists to serve only one of the two religions. Because both sides tend to wholly believe in this claptrap, this war will never truly end… a war over a silly little piece of real estate that, may or may not at some point in the past been used by any specific religion. Any holy nature of that land is long, long past. Yet, both the Palestinians and the Israelis feel the need to continually lob missiles at one another, killing and wounding many… all over this smallish piece of real estate.
Why is this historical backdrop important? Because the war over the Gaza strip has never, ever ended. It may have gone into a brief (in historical terms) remission, but it has never firmly ended. More than this, it can never truly end so long as both factions remain.
Tunnel Vision Reporting
News networks are treating this Israeli vs Hamas war as though it’s brand new, like it’s never ever existed before. Anyone with half a brain knows the insincerity of this reporting. Additionally, someone (stupid) at each one of these news networks mistakenly believes that the Gaza strip conflict is something that America needs to know about and watch 24 by 7 around the clock for days on end. Hint: we don’t need or want this.
Instead, what we as viewers are being treated to (no, being tortured with) is a tunnel vision news reporting. Worse, every single news outlet is doing this same exact thing. Instead of reporting (f)actual news around the United States, news which is way more important to United States viewers; instead we’re getting play-by-play, missile-by-missile, Israeli-by-Palestinian reporting with boots on the ground in Israel. This is reporting that doesn’t directly impact most Americans, except for Israeli-American or Palestinian-American compatriots or for those few military enthusiasts. If you’re that much of a military aficionado, go hop a plane and head over to the Gaza strip. Enjoy your up close and personal view. No one is stopping you. For that matter, if you’re that much of a military enthusiast, go hop another plane and head to the Ukraine front lines.
The entirety of the Jewish population is a demographic that accounts for just 4.5% of the entire United States Population. Israeli-American immigrants might account for as few as 140,000 in total (0.0424% of the entire US population). The Palestinian population numbers around 170,000 (0.05152% of the entire US population). Who knows how many are military enthusiasts there are… but news networks shouldn’t ever cater their news reporting to this small group of macabre viewers.
Why are these numbers important? They’re important to identify the total possible number of people who might be interested in watching news on this topic AND who live IN the United States. MSNBC, CNN and Fox News are primarily news networks targeting United States viewers, a total population of around 330 million, with a much smaller number watching. CNN additionally offers a broader and separate CNN International news channel designed specifically to showcase international news across the globe. CNN, if you want to broadcast international 24 by 7 coverage, use your CNN International channel instead.
However, every last one of these news networks has decided to devote 100% of their 24 by 7 coverage to this age old Israeli + Palestinian conflict, choosing to ignore all other important news reporting (save the occasional political snippet). It doesn’t matter what time of the day or night you tune in, you can be guaranteed that within 5 minutes or less, the news host will speak or the chyron will display the word “Hamas”, “Israel” or “Gaza”.
THIS is tunnel vision news reporting. There is also nothing fair or balanced about operating tunnel vision reporting, especially when EVERY SINGLE NEWS CHANNEL is doing this. When you can tune into a news network and hear about Hamas at 8am, 12pm, 7pm, 11pm or 5am, news reporting is in tunnel vision mode; a mode that is to the detriment of the United States and its viewers. It might even be considered a national safety problem.
Demographics and Viewership
When the biggest audience you can expect over this conflict is perhaps 5% of your total viewers, including both Palestinian-American immigrants, Israeli-American immigrants and the broader Jewish population (a sub-population who might or might not hold interest in that area’s conflict), you’re barking up the wrong tree by devoting 24 by 7 tunnel vision reporting to Israel. Even then, America has ~330 million total population, but only a small portion of those viewers are actually watching 24 by 7 cable news.
Fox News claims to have the biggest audience share at 1.57 million simultaneous viewers. Unfortunately, we also know that Fox News lies like a cheap rug. Any viewership numbers that Fox News claims are likely falsified, either because the Murdochs have paid off the statistic gathering company or they own that company allowing them to fabricate any numbers they wish. The point is, Fox News very likely has way fewer than its purported 1.57 million viewers claimed. Fox News has proven itself to be untrustworthy. Yes, that would also include fabricating its viewership numbers.
The point here is that even if 1.57 million viewers is anywhere close to real (and we know that it isn’t), 5% of that is 78,000 simultaneous viewers.
This means that any news network that chooses to devote 24 by 7 news coverage to Israel, does so to appeal to, at most, 78,000 Americans. Even then, that number is likely drastically lower… perhaps even as low as 10,000 – 20,000 people. Seriously, 24 hour coverage solely to interest around 20k viewers? Are news producers really this insane? I guess so.
And yet, these news networks wonder why we are seeing…
News Reporter Hostages and Deaths?
Hello! You’ve devoted your entire 24 hours of news cycle coverage into an age old, no-holds-barred, Geneva-convention-breaking set of warring factions… all for the benefit of less than 50,000 viewers? These factions have been warring for as long as everyone today on this planet has been alive… longer even. This is a Jihad, a holy war, a religious conflict. Do you think that either of these two sides legitimately believe in such things as the Geneva convention? While many of these spokespersons state that they uphold this convention, what they say and what they do are two drastically different things.
It’s easy to state that a given nation state upholds the Geneva convention, it’s an entirely separate thing to actually do it. You need to look at their actions, not at their words. Words are easily empty platitudes, especially from that area of the world. When ages old religious wars recur, specifically in that specific area of the world, the war, devastation and death toll to the other side is what’s important, not upholding some arbitrary convention that neither side agreed to when the war originally began.
When reporter hostages are taken and when some of these reporters are summarily executed, you can’t then wonder why it happens. You can blame them. You can point fingers at them. You can even yell at them. However, the fault here is on the news network management team for insinuating THEIR staff into a dangerous age old conflict. Your news network chose to insert people into a very dangerous situation and then you wonder why some reporters die? Get with the program.
Should News Networks Report on the Israel conflict?
Yes, but do so with an appropriate amount of designated time based sanely on the demographics who might show interest in watching. 24 by 7 coverage of ANY event needs to be considered carefully. Yet, it’s entirely clear that no producer or management team member at these organizations is questioning this decision.
Let’s understand why it’s important to temper coverage. First and foremost, this is NOT an American conflict. The United States has no stake in the Israeli “war”. While America is an ally to Israel, that ally status doesn’t include the United States immediately jumping into this age old conflict nor should we become directly involved in that nation state’s religious conflicts.
America has no interest or stake in Israel other than our ally status. While the American military can help Israel in small ways, it is up to Israel to fully manage its own conflicts, in the same way as Ukraine must manage its own conflict with Russia. We can give aid and support (whatever hands-off form that takes) to Israel as an ally, that doesn’t and shouldn’t include American military boots-on-the-ground or planes-in-the-air support against Hamas. That conflict is all on Israel.
News Networks and Ukraine
News networks have long given up 24 by 7 coverage of the Ukraine war. It started out with 24 by 7 play by play coverage, but soon (within a month or so) gave way to United States news coverage. The Ukraine war coverage is now placed where it should be… with maybe 5-10 minutes of coverage every one to two hours.
This is the amount of coverage Israel should be given right now. In other words, the news networks are giving too much coverage to the Israeli conflict. It’s not like this conflict started just recently. This conflict has been in progress for years and years and years. Sure, it’s once again erupted recently, but it’s a conflict that’s been ongoing for many years.
TOO MUCH COVERAGE!
Here we have finally arrived at the entire point of this article. News channels are now beating a dead horse with the unnecessary and improper choice of sweeping 24 by 7 coverage over situations that honestly warrant at most 10 minutes of coverage once an hour… and they’ve been playing this over-reporting game for several years. Not only are they beating this specific story to death, they’re bludgeoning every single story like this into dust. News coverage must be tempered. Tempered with good taste. Tempered against the demographics watching. Tempered against the interest by viewers (i.e., ratings). It must be given the seriousness of coverage that all news is given. BUT… news coverage must not preempt all other news for days on end, especially when that coverage is over a situation that is not in the United States AND a situation that is an ongoing conflict that has roots in years long past.
While all of us in America grieve for those affected in this unfortunate Israeli-Hamas situation, there’s a substantial difference between grieving and spending so much time in a news cycle that news networks beat their news coverage to death.
News producers need to take a long hard look, not only at themselves, but at their news networks. By having tunnel vision reporting over events like this one; events which ARE serious, but are also not alone worthy of 24 by 7 news coverage, news networks are now failing America hard.
By preempting news stories of equal import within the United States solely to cover a situation outside of the United States with excessive coverage, Americans are being left in the dark as to what’s happening in their own states. That’s not news reporting. That’s neglect. That’s wilful abandonment of each news network’s responsibilities to cover ALL news equally and fairly.
There can be no equal and fair when news networks willfully abandon coverage of domestic news in favor of Israel… a country that has almost nothing to do with America.
NewsNation, MNSBC, CNN and Fox News are all negligent in their willful abandonment of America, and American News. It’s actually been this way for a long time, but this story illustrates just how quick and wilful news services are to abandon their jobs of reporting ALL news… and worse, arbitrarily elevating minor news stories by self-labeling them as “major”.
Political Coverage
Prior to the Israeli coverage, these news networks have long had tunnel vision over all things Washington D.C. Again, instead of covering important news around the United States, these 4 networks have willfully abandoned this coverage in lieu of Donald Trump, MAGA and Joe Biden. Almost every word that has come out out of any of these network’s news anchors mouths in the last 12 months has been to do with one of those 3 topics: Trump, MAGA or Biden… until Hamas diverted them and Ukraine for a short time before that.
American news coverage doesn’t revolve around Washington D.C or politics or Israel or Ukraine. When the Israeli situation hit, all of these networks full-bore moved their political reporting firehose to the Israeli conflict and away from politics. What that now means is that D.C. politics might see 10 minutes of coverage in a day compared to the remainder of the 1430 minutes devoted to Israel (less their excessive commercial breaks).
Turning the News Off
When I tune into a news channel and within the first 5 minutes see the word “Hamas”, I tune out and go do something else. How many times can a news network say the same thing or reiterate the same point? At this moment, these news networks are now repeating the same diatribe over and over and over and over summed up to the following… “Israel good, Hamas BAD.”
Once you, as a news producer, can condense 24 hours worth of news into 4 small words, you’ve got a major problem to resolve. How many ways and times can a news network say the same 4 words?
Human Interest
Here’s one sickening turn of events in news reporting. A turn of events where news networks are also now failing us hard. When news networks can no longer figure out a way to say those same four words, they decide to vomit up some tear-jerker family story about the death of a loved one. We get it, people died in the conflict. We also grieve for their loss.
Instead, news networks feel the need to consume a large swath of their 24 hour OVER coverage with incidental and mostly irrelevant human interest stories. Oh yes, let’s pick a family and focus on THEIR story. Let’s understand how the mother and father became a shield to block gunfire for their children. It’s a terrible story, we get it. It’s human interest. Unfortunately, it exploits these family situations for ratings BY that news network. What the news network is doing to and with this family is far, far worse than anything else these news networks do. It exploits these unfortunate situations and those people involved to further a news network’s ratings, not help out the family. Human interest stories involving death should NEVER be considered news and should never be part of the news cycle.
Human interest stories have a place, but only when strictly labeled as human interest. Human interest stories should never be inserted in replacement of news coverage, especially in times of conflict reporting.
24 Hours In A Day
There are approximately 17 hours available for a news reporting day (subtracting the approximate 7 hours of commercials). Each of these news networks break their reporting up into blocks of hours using specific news hosts. You’d think that at least ONE of these hour blocks could give us a break from the Hamas cycle and report on (f)actual news around the nation. Instead, you’d be wrong. Every single block with every single news host CHOOSES to report on Israel and Hamas or Washington DC or Ukraine. Insanity!
When these channels go into tunnel vision mode, every single news program and news host rehashes the same exact information that the previous news host has already stated. It’s a vicious cycle that never ends. Until a news manager or producer decides to finally kill this news cycle entirely, we must suffer through this insufferable, constant barrage of the repetitive information, hour after hour after hour, day after day after day, maybe even week after week.
As a viewer, you could tune in and within 5 minutes get all of the information you need about that situation. You’d also be good for the remainder of that 24 hour period.
What this news over-coverage problem ultimately causes is viewers tuning out because of this repetition problem. It further means that real breaking news gets lost because fewer and fewer people are tuning in regularly. It also means that news viewers must turn to radio news or other alternative sources of news to avoid watching this homogeneous liquefied and over blended news coverage.
Will news channels ever get back to sensible coverage?
I can’t predict this. At some point, the pendulum may swing back. When it comes to commercial news networks like these, it’s sink or swim. The ratings will need to drop so low that the news producers have no choice but to begin making drastic programming decisions; decisions that will need to run counter to the news programming cycle being regurgitated on the other news networks.
Just because another news network chooses to do something stupid, that doesn’t mean every news network needs to do the exact same stupid thing and/or run the same exact amount of coverage. In fact, it’s better if not all news networks are doing the same thing. Let some of the channels deep dive into specific coverage, let others remain on a normal news cycle, reporting on ALL stories around the nation, interspersed with international news occasionally.
Fair and balanced reporting means reporting on all stories of interest, not latching onto one single story and tying it to your network 100% of the time. It seems incredibly stupid for every single news network to jump into tunnel vision reporting on one single topic. Yet, here we are.
News producers need to rethink this tunnel vision strategy going forward and grow a backbone. Producers need to stop torpedoing their own news channel’s ratings (and jeopardizing their own career) over this insane tunnel-vision single-news-topic round-the-clock stupidity.
PLEASE, finally get this memo.
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What does Reset Network Settings in iOS do?
If you’ve experienced networking issues with your iPad or iPhone, you may have called Apple for support. Many times they recommend that you “Reset Network Settings.” But, what exactly does this operation do? Let’s explore.
What’s included in this Reset Network Settings process?
This is a complicated answer and how it affects you depends on several factors. What this process does, in addition to resetting a bunch of locally stored device settings on the iOS device itself, it also deletes network settings stored in your iCloud Keychain. If you have only an iPhone and own no other devices (i.e., no iPads, no Macs, no iPods, no Apple Watches, no Apple TVs, nothing else), resetting these settings will likely work just fine for you.
However, if you own or use multiple Apple devices and these devices participate in iCloud Keychain, things can get complicated… very, very complicated. The “or use” statement is the one that makes this process much more complicated. If you have a work Mac computer that’s hooked up to your Apple ID and is participating in iCloud Keychain, performing “Reset Network Settings” on an iPhone can become problematic for your work computer. How? First, let’s find out more about iCloud Keychain.
iCloud Keychain
What is iCloud Keychain? This is an iCloud network service that stores sensitive passwords and credit card information in a secure way. This iCloud service also lets multiple iOS, MacOS, tvOS and WatchOS devices participate and use this data as part of your Apple ID. If you own multiple Apple devices, they can all share and use this same set of sensitive data without having to enter it individually on each device (convenience).
Your iCloud Keychain is specific to your Apple ID which is protected by your Apple ID login and password. The iCloud Keychain was created as both a convenience (all devices can share data), but also secure in that this data is protected behind your Apple ID credentials.
When you “Reset Network Settings” on any iOS (or possibly even MacOS, tvOS or even WatchOS) device and your devices participate in iCloud Keychain synchronization, a “Reset Network Settings” can cause networking issues for all of your devices. Why?
The iCloud Keychain stores WiFi access point names (SSIDs) and passwords. Not only that, it also stores credit cards that you might use with Apple Pay (this becomes important later). When you run “Reset Network Settings” on any iOS device, it will wipe all access point SSIDs and Passwords from your iCloud Keychain.
You might be asking, “Why is this a problem?” This will become a problem for all devices participating in iCloud Keychain. All of your Apple devices share in using this SSID and password data from your iCloud Keychain. This important to understand. Because of this level of sharing, it only takes one device to learn of an access point for all Apple devices to use that network when in range. For example, if you bring your Mac to a convention and log it into an access point at the convention, your Mac logs this access point data to the iCloud Keychain. Your phone will immediately pick up on this new access point addition and also connect to that access point using the newly stored password as soon as it finds it… automagically.
Likewise, it only takes one device to wipe an access point and all devices lose access to it. It’s a single shared location for this networking data. One device adds it, all can use it. One device deletes it, all devices forget about it. Is this a good idea? You decide.
Reset Network Settings and Multiple Devices
Here’s where things get complicated with iCloud Keychain. If you are having network troubles with your iPhone, you might be requested by Apple Support to “Reset Network Settings”.
If all of your MacOS, tvOS, iOS and WatchOS devices participate in iCloud Keychain and you actually perform “Reset Network Settings” on your iPhone, it will wipe not only the current access point, but every access point that every device is aware of. It returns your network settings on iOS (and in iCloud Keychain) to a clean slate to start it over. It does this to try and clear out any problematic network settings. It also deletes known access points from the iCloud Keychain. This wipes access to this data for ALL of your Apple devices, not just the one you performed “Reset Network Settings” on.
What this means is that every device participating in iCloud Keychain will lose access to ALL access points that had previously been known because they have been deleted as part of “Reset Network Settings”. If your iOS device knew of all access points, they will ALL be wiped from iCloud Keychain. This means that every device will immediately lose access to its current access point. It also means that every Apple device you own must now be touched to reselect a new access point requiring you to reenter the password for that access point… On. Every. Apple. Device!
For example, I own two Macs, two iPads, three iPhones and two iPod Touches. A “Reset Network Settings” from a single device means I will need to go and manually touch 9 different devices to reconnect them to WiFi after a single iOS device performs a “Reset Network Settings” operation. It requires this because every device has lost access to even its home network which means no access to iCloud Keychain… which means, touching every device to get them back onto a WiFi network.
For me, it was even more complicated than the mere hassle of setting up WiFi on every device. It wiped known access points created by my employer on my Mac which were put into my iCloud Keychain… access points where I didn’t know the name or passwords. Thankfully, I was able to recover this data from another co-worker’s Mac and get back onto my corporate network. Otherwise, I’d have been down at my IT team’s desk asking for them to fix my Mac… and all as a result of performing “Reset Network Settings” on my iPhone.
Horrible, horrible design.
Avoiding This Problem
Can this problem be avoided? Possibly. If you turn off iCloud Keychain on your iOS device BEFORE you perform “Reset Network Settings”, it may avoid wiping the data in the iCloud Keychain. I say “may” because after you take the device out of iCloud Keychain, then reset the network settings and then rejoin it to iCloud Keychain, it may propagate the differences at the time the device rejoins. Hopefully, not. Hopefully, the newly reset device will ONLY download the existing data in the iCloud Keychain without making any modifications to it. With Apple, you never know.
The secondary issue is that removing your iPhone from iCloud Keychain may remove stored credit cards. This may mean reentry of all of your credit cards after you have “Reset Network Settings” and after you have rejoined your device to the iCloud Keychain. This may also depend on iOS version. I just tried removing iCloud Keychain, then performed “Reset Network Settings”, then rejoined iCloud Keychain and all my cards are still intact on the device. If you’re on iOS 11 or iOS 10, your results may vary.
Why is this a problem?
First off, I don’t want to have to go touch many devices after a single device reset. That’s just stupid. Second, removing the device from iCloud Keychain to perform “Reset Network Settings” will wipe all of your current credit card data from the device and likely from the iCloud Keychain. Third, Apple needs to fix their shit to allow more granularity in what it wipes with “Reset Network Settings”. In fact, it shouldn’t even touch iCloud Keychain data. It should wipe only locally stored information on the device and then see if that works. If that doesn’t work, then wipe the data on iCloud Keychain, but only as a LAST RESORT!
I understand that Apple seems to think that wiping all network data (including what’s in iCloud Keychain) might solve “whatever the problem is”, but that’s just a sledgehammer. If what’s stored in iCloud Keychain were a problem, my 8 other devices should be experiencing the same issue as well. It’s basically, stupid Apple troubleshooting logic.
As I mentioned, disabling iCloud Keychain may unregister your credit cards from your device (and from the Keychain). I know this was the case in iOS 11, but in iOS 12 it seems to not require this any longer. I definitely don’t want to have to rescan all of my credit cards again onto my iOS device to restore them. It takes at least 30 minutes to do this with the number of cards I have to input. With the Apple Watch, this process is horribly unreliable and lengthy. It can sometimes take over an hour diddling with Bluetooth timeouts and silly unreliability problems to finally get all of my cards back onto the Watch (in addition to the iPhone).
Such time wasting problems over a single troubleshooting thing that should be extremely straightforward and easy. Horrible, horrible design.
Representatives and Suggestions
If you’re talking to an Apple representative over the phone about a networking problem and they suggest for you to “Reset Network Settings”, you should refer them to this article so they can better understand what it is they are asking you to do.
Neither Apple Support, nor will any of your phone carrier support teams warn you of this iCloud Keychain problem when requesting “Reset Network Settings.” They will ask you to perform this step as though it’s some simple little step. It’s not!
Whenever Apple asks me to perform the “Reset Network Settings” troubleshooting step, I always decline citing this exact problem. Perhaps someone at Apple will finally wake up and fix this issue once and for all. Until then, you should always question Apple’s troubleshooting methods before blindly following them.
How to disable iCloud Keychain
To disable the iCloud Keychain on your iOS device, go to …
Settings=>Your Name=>iCloud=>Keychain
… and toggle it off. Your Name is actually your name. It is located at the very top of settings. Once toggled off, it will likely unregister your credit cards stored on your iOS device, but I guess it’s a small price to pay if you really need to reset these network settings to your restore networking to 100% functionality. Of course, there’s no guarantee that “Reset Network Settings” or jumping through any of these hoops will solve this problem. There’s also the possibility that “Reset Network Settings” could still screw with your iCloud Keychain even if you disable it before performing “Reset Network Settings”.
With Apple, your mileage may vary.
How to Reset Network Settings
Settings=>General=>Reset=>Reset Network Settings
If you own multiple Apple devices and they are using iCloud Keychain, don’t perform this step first. Instead, disable iCloud Keychain first (above), then perform this step. If you only own one Apple device, there is no need to disable iCloud Keychain.
Network Problems and Quick Fixes
In my most recent case of being prompted to “Reset Network Settings”, my phone’s Wi-Fi calling feature simply stopped working. I first called T-Mobile and they referred me to “Reset Network Settings” (based on Apple’s documentation) and they also referred me to Apple Support. Because I already knew about the iCloud Keychain problem from a previous inadvertent wipe of all of my network access points, this time I opted to turn off iCloud Keychain before attempting “Reset Network Settings.” Suffice it to say that “Reset Network Settings” didn’t do a damned thing, as I full well expected.
In fact, I tried many options prior to “Reset Network Settings”. These included:
- Disabling and enabling Wi-Fi calling
- Joining a different access point
- Restarting my Comcast modem
- Restarting my network router
- Restarting my Apple Airport
- Restarting my phone
- Hard restarting my phone
- Disabling and enabling Wi-Fi
- Dumping Sysdiagnose logs and digging through them
- Killing and restarting the Phone app
I tried all of the above and nothing resolved the issue. No, not even “Reset Network Settings”.
Then it dawned on me. I had recalled reading a year or two back that sometimes Airplane Mode can resolve many network connectivity issues. I’m not sure exactly what Airplane Mode actually does under the hood in detail, but it seems to modify and/or reset a bunch of config files after disabling all networking including Cellular, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth and anything else that performs networking.
Once Airplane Mode is enabled, allow the phone to sit for 30 seconds to make sure all components recognized Airplane Mode. Then, disable Airplane Mode. Almost immediately, the phone’s menu bar now shows ‘T-Mobile Wi-Fi’. Wow, it actually works.
If you’re having networking problems on your iPhone, I strongly suggest enabling then disabling Airplane Mode instead of using the very sledgehammery “Reset Network Settings”. At least, it’s worth a try before resorting to disabling iCloud Keychain followed by “Reset Network Settings”.
If you’re having a specific problem with Bluetooth or WiFi, then I suggest taking a step back and trying this next idea. For example, if Bluetooth is having troubles, turn off Bluetooth, reboot the phone, then turn it back on after a reboot. This troubleshooting step is somewhat less reliable than using Airplane mode. Airplane mode doesn’t necessarily require a reboot also and works more often than this single device troubleshooting.
iOS 11 vs 12
The first time I experienced my issue with the iCloud Keychain and “Reset Network Settings”, I was using iOS 11. I’m firmly of, “Once Bitten, Twice Shy.” This means, I haven’t tested this on iOS 12 to see if Apple has changed their ways. It’s very doubtful they have and very likely this problem still persists even in the most current version of iOS.
iCloud Keychain and Passwords
One last caveat about the iCloud Keychain. Ever more and more credentials and passwords are being stored in the iCloud keychain, including Safari’s credentials, possibly even other browsers and even app credentials. As we become more and more dependent on using TouchID or FaceID to unlock access to our favorite apps and sites, the credentials behind these unlocks are stored in the iCloud Keychain. If you use ‘Reset Network Settings’ without first removing the phone from the iCloud Keychain, you may find all of your browser and app passwords have also been deleted.
This then means having to go into all of your favorite websites in Safari and phone apps and reentering usernames and passwords all over again. If you don’t remember these passwords, you may end up having to reset a bunch of them. Be very careful when using ‘Reset Network Settings’. This feature doesn’t yet warn you of these dangers and it also doesn’t offer to remove the device from the iCloud Keychain before proceeding.
This may go even deeper. As stated above, iOS apps also store their user credentials in the iCloud Keychain. These apps may also require reentering credentials after performing ‘Reset Network Settings’.
In fact, even Apple phone reps don’t fully understand the dangers here. They tell you that you need to ‘Reset Network Settings’, but then fail to warn you of the consequences of not removing your device from the iCloud Keychain first. Since this is a critical step, Apple needs to not only warn you of the dangers of not disabling iCloud Keychain, the ‘Reset Network Settings’ mechanism needs to suggest the user disable the iCloud keychain before proceeding.
Beware!
Design Rant Mode On
Apple seems to be under the delusion that we’re still living in a one-device-ownership-world. We’re not. We now own Macs, Apple TVs, Watches, iPhones and iPads that all rely on their multi-device services, such as iCloud Keychain. To design a feature that can wipe the entire data shared by multiple devices is not only the very definition of shit software, it’s also the very definition of a shit company that hasn’t the first clue of what the hell they’ve actually built.
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Rant Time: Xbox One and PS4 automatic downloads
So, I have reasonably fast internet service. It’s not the top speed I can get, but it’s fast enough for most general purposes. I’ve clocked it on wireless at about 18-20 Mbps down and 6 Mbps up. If I connect a device wired, it will be somewhat faster. With wireless, it’s not the fastest, but it’s definitely sufficient. The wireless is obviously for convenience, but it works well the majority of the time. However, when the PS4 or Xbox One get going with their automatic downloads, it absolutely kills my network connectivity. And so starts my somewhat shorter than usual rant. Let’s explore.
Automatic Downloads
I always turn off automatic downloads whenever possible, no exception. When there is no ability to shut off automatic updates, then I unplug the device. There’s no need to have devices automatically downloading at the most inopportune times. In fact, several months back I explicitly disabled automatic update downloads on my Xbox One. Yet, just yesterday I find my Xbox One automatically downloading again. I’ve finally had enough of rogue network devices and out of sheer frustration, I’ve finally just unplugged it. I also unplugged my PS4 for the same reason. No more rogue network devices. If these systems cannot respect my wishes when I explicitly turn off automatic downloading, then they’re going to remain unplugged until I decide to use them. Worse, these devices would also decide to randomly begin downloading updates at random times (usually in the middle of the night, but it could be any time).
The primary problem is, neither the Xbox One nor does the PS4 limit its download speeds. In fact, both try to download as much as possible, as fast as possible. If both of them get going at the same time, it’s a disaster on my network. Even just one of them downloading is enough to cause problems. If I try to ask Siri or Alexa a question, I get no response or I get the Echo’s dreaded Red Ring (no connectivity).
Rant
At least Apple respects disabling automatic downloads on its devices. These devices dutifully wait until you click update before beginning any downloads. Unfortunately, Microsoft does not honor its no auto updates setting. Instead, it just overrides that setting and dutifully starts downloading whatever it wants whenever it wants. I just can’t have rogue devices like that on my network. Rogue devices need to go away and Microsoft needs to understand that making rogue devices needs to stop. If your software can’t respect the owner’s wish not to download automatic updates, then you really don’t deserve a place in the home.
I haven’t yet determined if the PS4 overrides my no download wishes, but I recall that it, at times, the PS4 will also do this for system updates. Updates which, again, should not automatically update unless I explicitly ask it to update.
Just say no to rogue network devices like the Xbox One. For now, the Xbox One and the PS4 will remain unplugged until I decide I need to use them. Though, in the last few months, there really has been a substantial lack of game titles on both platforms. I’m really finding that the spring and summer to be a dead season with new game titles. Instead of overloading us with too many fall titles which we can’t play that fast, why not spread them out throughout the year and let us have adequate time to play each? This, however, is a whole separate rant topic in itself.
Random Thoughts - Randocity! 
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