While you were watching “Monday Night Football” or just getting your beauty sleep, Apple CEO Tim Cook sounded off on the auto industry, divulged Apple Music’s user numbers and more.

Cook — seated on a stage in Laguna Beach, Calif. — took part late Monday in a Q&A at WSJDLive, an annual tech conference run by The Wall Street Journal, MarketWatch’s sister publication.

Read on for the Apple Inc. AAPL, +1.57% chief’s take on cars, TV, government dysfunction, corporate culture and other topics.

Apple’s CarPlay system is seen in the touchscreen console of a Ferrari. Bloomberg News/Landov

‘Autonomous driving’ will be ‘huge’

The auto industry “is at an inflection point for massive change, not just evolutionary change,” Cook said, according to multiple media reports.

Self-driving cars, electric vehicles and software’s growing importance are the key components of this big shift, according to Apple’s boss.

In the short run, Cook said his company is focused on improving the information and entertainment system in cars through its CarPlay service, a WSJ article on the Q&A said. It’s aiming to offer an “iPhone kind of experience in the car.”

He declined to talk about Apple’s interest in making an electric car, but he made it clear that the industry upheaval gives outsiders an opportunity to break into the business, a Financial Times report on Cook’s comments said.

“Autonomous driving becomes very much more important in a huge way in the future,” Cook said.

Watch the video: Apple’s Tim Cook talks about the future of cars

Musician Elvis Costello is shown with Apple CEO Tim Cook. Getty Images

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Apple Music’s growing reach

Cook disclosed the latest numbers for Apple Music, the streaming service that launched during the summer.

It has 6.5 million paying subscribers, and 8.5 million customers on three-month free trials — for a total of 15 million users.

How does 6.5 million paying subscribers rate? That’s about one-third as many as the total for market-leading subscription music service Spotify, which has 20 million paying customers and a total audience of 75 million.

Cook said “people love the human curation” aspect of Apple Music, as he tried to highlight a feature that separates the service from Spotify. But the WSJ live blog noted that Spotify also “has a number of people curating music behind the scenes.”

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Give Watch a chance?

Cook didn’t seem to hit it out of the park with his comments on the Apple Watch.

He responded, “Give it a chance” when his interviewer — Wall Street Journal Editor in Chief Gerald Baker — said he doesn’t “find the watch indispensable.”

“Cook says the Apple Watch gave him late-breaking updates about the Canadian elections tonight. That could be worth your $400 right there, gang,” quipped tech-news site The Verge in its funny and irreverent live blog of the Q&A.

The CEO also said Apple Watch users “love being reminded that they’ve been sitting too long.”

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Cook on corporate culture

Cook made a few telling comments about Apple’s corporate culture, which was long defined by Steve Jobs.

“We want to give back. Our culture is to leave the world better than we found it,” Cook said, according to multiple media reports.

The tech titan’s boss also cited his predecessor, according to The Verge’s live blog: “Steve formed Apple to change the world. This was his vision. He wanted to give technology down to everyone and empower everyone to use it. He wanted to take it out of the glass house, the corporations, the rich people that had the technology. ... That is still our drive.”

Cook’s silhouette seen as he exits the stage at an Apple conference in June. Bloomberg News/Landov

Government dysfunction and surveillance

Cook indicated he’s well aware that Washington, D.C., seems to work about as well as the much-mocked Apple Newton.

He also suggested that corporate America needs to step up when Washington doesn’t.

“The government isn’t working that well. When there is a stalemate, businesses have even more responsibility,” Apple’s CEO said.

Cook and Baker also “tangled” over balancing privacy and national security, as the WSJ live blog put it.

“No one should have to decide privacy or security. We should be smart enough to do both,” Cook said.

Cook introduced the latest Apple TV device in September. Getty Images

Sales of new Apple TV start next week

Cook revealed that the latest version of the Apple TV will go on sale on Monday (Oct. 26), as he blasted traditional TV viewing as a “terrible, broken process.”

The new media player, unveiled last month, is slated to feature Siri capabilities, a glass-touch remote and apps from third-party developers. Apple had previously said the gadget would become available in “late October.”

“It’s almost as if you step in a time capsule when you go in your living room and you turn on the TV,” Cook said late Monday. He talked up the Apple TV as “the foundation of the future of TV.”

Watch the video: Tim Cook says Apple TV is the future of TV