Emotional time zones

This week on Vergecast, Dieter and Nilay bring back Paul Miller to talk about this week in tech and gadgets, as well as science reporter Arielle Duhaime-Ross to discuss what it was like to spend four days with a biohacker while he tried to kill and then replace his body’s bacteria. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:04Nilay Patel?

  Hello. Welcome to The Vergecast. It's May 5th, or probably in your temporal area. Is that a science phrase, temporal area?

• 0:13Speaker 01

  Sure, it can be.

• 0:15Nilay Patel?

  It's probably not May 5th. But anyway, this is The Vergecast.

• 0:19Speaker 02

  Your time place?

• 0:20Nilay Patel?

  Your time place.

• 0:21Speaker 03

  I mean, your emotional time zone. They are related.

• 0:24Nilay Patel?

  Is emotional time zone a phrase? If I was gonna write a self-help book, it would be called, it would be called "Solving Your Emotional Time Zone."

• 0:30Speaker 02

  Yeah, yeah. And like, it could be like jet lag analogies.

• 0:34Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 0:35Speaker 02

  Sunrises.

• 0:37Nilay Patel?

  You really wanna follow the sun approach to happiness?

• 0:40Speaker 02

  Mm-hmm.

• 0:40Nilay Patel?

  Much like an international corporation or news.

• 0:42Speaker 02

  I'd read it in an airport.

• 0:44Nilay Patel?

  Yeah. That's... My god, this is the flagship podcast of The Verge. The Vergecast is sponsored by Scissor Vodka. I have a light-up scissor vodka bottle.

• 0:54Speaker 01

  You do.

• 0:55Nilay Patel?

  Scrolling. It's a fake vodka brand that, honestly, at this point, there's so much media made for it. All I want is someone to just give me vodka.

• 1:03Speaker 01

  Somebody will launch it.

• 1:04Nilay Patel?

  I mean, we could, we could, we could start printing out PDFs of labels tonight and gluing them on like, like an indie band in the early 2000s with CD-press.

• 1:13Speaker 01

  You know what? Scissor vodka should become like an Eater Prize.

• 1:17Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 1:17Speaker 01

  Like the Eater Awards. Should just be bottles of scissor vodka.

• 1:20Speaker 03

  If we make the vodka ourself, though, we're gonna have to change the tagline from "Cut Through the Night" to "You Probably Won't Go Blind."

• 1:25Nilay Patel?

  Exactly. Well... It still has an air of mystery about it. Anyway, I'm Neelai Patel. I'm here. Dieter's here.

• 1:34Speaker 03

  Hello, I'm Dieter.

• 1:35Nilay Patel?

  Ariel's here.

• 1:36Speaker 01

  Hi.

• 1:37Nilay Patel?

  Paul Miller in the hype seat.

• 1:38Speaker 02

  I'm Paul.

• 1:39Nilay Patel?

  Just trying, just trying it out over there.

• 1:42Speaker 02

  I didn't know this was called the hype seat until today. So I feel like there's a lot of pressure on me. I thought this person was just hanging out.

• 1:48Speaker 03

  The hype seat sits at the hype desk, where you'd make hype checks.

• 1:51Speaker 02

  Right. Hype checks.

• 1:53Nilay Patel?

  Yeah, so I'm like the new iPhone.

• 1:54Speaker 02

  And you guys, and you guys cash the hype checks?

• 2:00Speaker 01

  If you want to go that way, you can. You get to create your own scale.

• 2:03Nilay Patel?

  Oh.

• 2:04Speaker 01

  So if you want to change things up, you can.

• 2:07Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 2:08Speaker 01

  Doesn't have to be one to 10.

• 2:10Nilay Patel?

  It rarely is.

• 2:11Speaker 01

  It rarely is.

• 2:12Nilay Patel?

  Anyway, I have some housekeeping notes. A big announcement for Vergecast listeners. Dieter is, this is Dieter's last day in the New York City Verge office.

• 2:21Speaker 03

  That's right.

• 2:22Nilay Patel?

  It's very emotional for me. My emotional time zone, I would say, is like a mountain. The worst of the time zones.

• 2:32Speaker 03

  No, the worst of the time zones is that like South Bend, Indiana time zone.

• 2:35Nilay Patel?

  Oh, the one that's like lonely.

• 2:36Speaker 01

  Oh, yeah.

• 2:37Nilay Patel?

  Yeah, that's that one. The loneliest time zone. That's where I'm at right now. Anyway, Dieter's moving to San Francisco. We obviously cannot have a Vergecast without Dieter. And, you know, we've done 200 episodes of this thing in this exact format. So here's what we're gonna do. We're gonna take the next two weeks off after this show.

• 2:54Speaker 03

  Yep.

• 2:54Nilay Patel?

  Maybe we'll run some like highlights in the feed just to keep people feeling it. And then we're gonna come back and we're not gonna do it live anymore. We're gonna have Dieter on Skype. It's actually gonna be a podcast. You know, we're gonna try to actually make a podcast out of this thing.

• 3:08Speaker 03

  That you would want to listen to.

• 3:09Nilay Patel?

  Yeah. I mean, whatever this is, is great.

• 3:12Speaker 03

  I was gonna leave it more mysterious about what the plan was. Maybe we'll be naked.

• 3:18Speaker 01

  No, that's fine.

• 3:18Nilay Patel?

  But you won't see that.

• 3:19Speaker 01

  I'm good.

• 3:20Nilay Patel?

  Right? You'll just have to listen for it.

• 3:23Nilay Patel?

  The Vergecast rebooted. Listen for the nudity is, is, that's our new tagline.

• 3:29Speaker 03

  You'd have scissor vodka Foley.

• 3:34Nilay Patel?

  It's just scissor sounds.

• 3:37Nilay Patel?

  Anyhow, that's the plan. I am very eager. We're only gonna take a couple of weeks off just to give Dieter some time to move and set up a studio and all the stuff we need to do out west and figure out how we're gonna make it. Something that we should do, I think. So just take a couple of weeks off, just chill. Then we're gonna come back bigger and better. And we're really, we're gonna, we're gonna make a podcast. I, we've been trying for five years. We might as well try again. Anyhow.

• 4:05Speaker 03

  I believe.

• 4:06Nilay Patel?

  I believe too. Just a, just a lot of silence right now.

• 4:09Speaker 03

  Yeah. No, I'm going to see, oh, our YouTube, our live YouTube commenters are.

• 4:13Nilay Patel?

  Yeah, they're gonna be sad.

• 4:15Speaker 03

  They're a little sad.

• 4:15Nilay Patel?

  What's their emotional time zone?

• 4:18Speaker 03

  Their emotional time zone is boo.

• 4:21Nilay Patel?

  Not a time zone.

• 4:23Speaker 03

  It's gonna be better.

• 4:24Nilay Patel?

  Wait, would Greenwich Mean Time be like totally neutral?

• 4:28Speaker 03

  Yes, except not at all because Greenwich is, you know, set as the mean time because they couldn't figure out what it should be. And so like, ah, screw it. We're imperials. We'll just put it in somewhere in the UK.

• 4:38Speaker 01

  I feel like this metaphor.

• 4:41Nilay Patel?

  Cannot possibly work.

• 4:42Speaker 01

  Really working.

• 4:43Nilay Patel?

  We're just gonna go for it. We're gonna, we're gonna push it until it breaks even farther.

• 4:47Speaker 03

  Because latitude, you can set the center at the equator very easily. You know where that is, but there is no way to know what the, what the center longitude, base longitude should be.

• 4:55Nilay Patel?

  Right.

• 4:56Speaker 03

  And so they had, just had to pick one.

• 4:58Nilay Patel?

  Yeah. So you're saying the emotional.

• 4:59Speaker 03

  Of course they picked.

• 5:00Nilay Patel?

  GMT as an emotional time zone is sort of arrogant.

• 5:05Nilay Patel?

  It's literally, it's mean time.

• 5:06Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 5:11Nilay Patel?

  See Ariel? You gotta stick with it and then it, and then it happens.

• 5:15Speaker 01

  At some point it opens up.

• 5:17Nilay Patel?

  It begins to unfurl. So a strange week of news. I was putting.

• 5:22Speaker 03

  We're gonna talk about news in this show.

• 5:24Nilay Patel?

  We're gonna try.

• 5:24Speaker 03

  Okay.

• 5:25Nilay Patel?

  And we're gonna interlace it with jokes about emotions. Just a strange, a bunch of stuff happening. Paul's running a gadget blog at full tilt. Ariel wrote an incredible feature, months in the making, about a guy who literally replaced, or at least attempted to replace all of his bacteria.

• 5:44Speaker 01

  Yep.

• 5:44Nilay Patel?

  So we got a lot of stuff to talk about, but I, for whatever reason, have decided to start with cars. Let's talk about some cars. So there's two pieces of car news that I think are interesting this week. Tesla announced a software upgrade for the Model S. The Model S comes with a 75 kilowatt hour battery.

• 6:04Speaker 03

  It's Model S70.

• 6:06Nilay Patel?

  But they sell it with five kilowatt hours.

• 6:09Speaker 03

  Since the, they refreshed it sometime in the recent past, they started putting in 75 watt hour batteries instead of 70 watt hour batteries in all of them because they figure what the hell, it costs the same for us to make it, or it costs more, but whatever, we want to make it available or something.

• 6:26Nilay Patel?

  Right. So then you can pay like $3,500, push a button and get more battery.

• 6:31Speaker 03

  Get more range.

• 6:32Nilay Patel?

  Get more.

• 6:32Speaker 03

  You have, you unlock.

• 6:34Nilay Patel?

  You have the battery. You just get to use all of it. So is that super cheap? That feels super cheap to me.

• 6:40Speaker 03

  What? $3,000?

• 6:41Speaker 01

  To like, no, to like, put the capacity.

• 6:44Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 6:45Speaker 01

  To like, be a better car and not turn it on?

• 6:47Nilay Patel?

  Yeah, just a weird, like, if I bought a laptop, so this is, and I could, I could pay more for the battery to last longer, I'd be like, screw you.

• 6:55Speaker 03

  Yeah, but if you bought a laptop and you wanted to pay more to like, get a new piece of software, you're fine. It's the, the fact that it's tied to the hardware that you just bought, that's weird. And I've been like racking my brain to try and come up with some sort of corollary in the tech world where, you know, there's often in the tech world, you'll get a gadget that has like a thing in it that's not turned on. And maybe they'll turn it on later, but they just put it in there because it was easier, it was like already built into like the chip. But to make you pay to turn it on, I don't, I can't think of an example of that.

• 7:24Speaker 01

  I mean, the last time Tesla did something like this and they weren't paying was when they turned on, like you can auto drive, like you don't have to drive, right? Didn't they do that at some point?

• 7:31Speaker 03

  But nobody flipped out about that because that's a software update.

• 7:33Speaker 01

  Right.

• 7:34Speaker 03

  You, you, you're happy to pay for software, but are you happy to pay to have access to the thing that you bought?

• 7:39Speaker 01

  And I guess my question is also, are you already sort of paying for it? And then you're just only getting like a discount on the upgrade?

• 7:45Speaker 03

  The car is cheaper.

• 7:46Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 7:47Speaker 01

  I know, but like, we don't know their pricing scheme.

• 7:49Speaker 03

  So from Tesla's perspective, their argument is like, look, it costs us something, I don't know, less than $32.50 to, for the extra five kilowatt.

• 8:00Nilay Patel?

  It's, it's like hard to talk about.

• 8:02Speaker 03

  But we know that like some people are going to upgrade and some people aren't. And so it nets out to like being the right price when you look at our entire customer base. So it doesn't help anybody that just bought the thing and.

• 8:12Speaker 01

  But what if you're a customer who's like, okay, I'm not going to turn this on?

• 8:15Speaker 03

  Then you're good.

• 8:16Speaker 01

  But in, in terms of their like, how are they paying for this is by making people who are turning it on overpay?

• 8:22Speaker 03

  Right.

• 8:23Speaker 01

  That's my question.

• 8:24Speaker 03

  No, no, no, no, no. That's, that's what's happening.

• 8:26Speaker 01

  Like that has to be.

• 8:27Nilay Patel?

  You're overpaying by like $200 versus the price if you just bought the bigger car.

• 8:31Speaker 01

  They don't like, probably people who buy Teslas will turn it on. So like, let's be real here, but if hypothetically speaking, people decided, like half the people decided that we're not turning it on, they must, that must be built into the pricing scheme somehow.

• 8:44Speaker 03

  Yes, that's exactly right.

• 8:45Speaker 01

  So they're screwing people a little bit.

• 8:46Speaker 03

  A little bit.

• 8:47Nilay Patel?

  So there's the S70 and the S75, right? You can, I think they think they can price the S70 cheaper. Yep. Which is what they're doing. So you buy the S70. It has the same physical battery, but they sell it for cheaper because less of that capacity is available to you. Then if you say, oh crap, I should have bought the S75, you can pay the three grand and they will.

• 9:11Speaker 01

  And it's in there.

• 9:11Nilay Patel?

  It's in there. It'll unlock the extra capacity and then you can drive it to a Tesla dealership and it'll actually change the badge to say S75.

• 9:17Speaker 01

  Well, that's.

• 9:18Nilay Patel?

  So that's like, which is hilarious.

• 9:19Speaker 01

  I get what you're saying, but I'm just wondering, like, if it's in there, then they have to pay for that hardware that is in there that they may not or may not have turned on somehow.

• 9:26Nilay Patel?

  So I think Tesla's saying it's easier, cheaper, more efficient for us to buy one kind of battery instead of two kinds of batteries. And we can variably price the battery. Right.

• 9:35Speaker 02

  I like, I like the wording that Chris used. All likelihood buyers of the 75 kilowatt hour car are effectively subsidizing.

• 9:44Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 9:45Speaker 02

  And I think subsidizing is a, is a term that you're pretty familiar with electric cars. And so putting it more directly, it's still weird and kind of messed up.

• 9:56Speaker 01

  It's probably more cost effective for them than to have to like actually physically change a battery. Like that's the point, right?

• 10:01Nilay Patel?

  Right. So the only other analogy I can come up with is if you buy like a regular car, if you buy like a sports car, you can go buy an aftermarket chip for that car and like put it in and your car, it'll change the performance nature of your car. Your car will make more horsepower, but maybe it'll last longer or last less long or something. Here's my analogy. That's not, that doesn't feel at all the same to me. Here's my analogy. Yeah. You're driving in your car, you're about to run out of range. You know that there's more, another 19 miles in there and you really need it. And you're like, oh God, what do I do? What do I do? You pay $3,000? To get that extra 20 miles because you need it. Oh. It feels a little bit like when I'm playing Where's My Water 2, you know, about to beat a level and then the timer on the free to play time runs out. I'm like, oh God, I could pay this dollar.

• 10:45Speaker 02

  You're buying gems.

• 10:46Nilay Patel?

  Right?

• 10:48Nilay Patel?

  And that's it. That's the future of all, all business, buying gems. Everything Tesla does is fascinating in this way because they're just trying to make new ways of buying and selling cars.

• 10:59Speaker 03

  What if you could buy a car for like $500 and it had like a 10 mile range?

• 11:04Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 11:05Speaker 03

  And then you could unlock all the other mileage.

• 11:07Nilay Patel?

  I mean, Intel does this. Someone made this comment and, and someone made the comment earlier in the version. Someone's doing it in the live comments that like, Intel will make a giant die for a chip or a giant thing of chips. And then when they cut out the ones, like the cheaper ones are the ones that like, just disable parts of it.

• 11:22Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 11:22Nilay Patel?

  But it's like, it all comes from like the same thing.

• 11:24Speaker 03

  Right.

• 11:25Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 11:25Speaker 03

  It's still not the same because you can't buy a cheaper one and like pay Intel money to make it go faster.

• 11:29Nilay Patel?

  Right.

• 11:30Speaker 03

  There's something here that is just deeply, I don't want to say wrong.

• 11:34Nilay Patel?

  I wanted to like,

• 11:34Speaker 03

  It's confused.

• 11:35Nilay Patel?

  Yeah, I already have rage out on it, but I'd like, there's some like weird like bloop. That's like, there's like a, an argumentative bloop that I can't take account for.

• 11:46Speaker 03

  I made a terrible mistake. I'm failing the hype desk. I, I said crisp, but it was Jordan. Jordan wrote this one.

• 11:51Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 11:52Speaker 03

  I'm sorry, Jordan.

• 11:53Nilay Patel?

  Paul, I think you know what you have to do.

• 11:55Speaker 03

  I'm so sorry.

• 11:56Nilay Patel?

  You have to write him a hype check. You have to write him a hype check. All right. So that's that. It's just, to me, that was among the most interesting, it's small news, but it has such a weird, because one day all electric cars could work this way. Or like Paul's saying, you could, you could push the button to extend it for a while. Or you could just not have a car and use Uber everywhere.

• 12:17Speaker 03

  I don't know. What's going to happen is people are going to start rooting the car. Like you root Android to hack into it to get the extra mileage.

• 12:24Nilay Patel?

  Tesla jailbreak.

• 12:26Speaker 03

  Tesla jailbreak, but the Tesla jailbreak is going to take advantage of fundamental security flaws in the software. And so now not only do we need to worry about cars getting hacked, we need to worry about crazy people, not crazy, but you are crazy. This is, becomes a real problem, hacking their cars to get the extra features that they would normally have to pay for, suddenly becoming more vulnerable to hackers that want to do crazy things to people in cars.

• 12:47Nilay Patel?

  This is great. This is very exciting.

• 12:48Speaker 01

  Really fun.

• 12:49Nilay Patel?

  It's great.

• 12:50Speaker 03

  It's great.

• 12:50Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 12:50Speaker 03

  Hype.

• 12:52Nilay Patel?

  Is that hype?

• 12:52Speaker 03

  Hype.

• 12:53Nilay Patel?

  All right. Hello. All right. And the other piece of car news, God on the nose where I picked this car. Google and Chrysler are teaming up to make self-driving Chrysler Pacificas. Minivan. I have to say, I didn't realize how universal. So the Pacifica. Yeah. Is a brand they had that went away. And then Chrysler decided that their Town and Country minivan, they're going to rebrand it, relaunch it as the Pacifica. Yeah. Which is fine. By the way, you know Chrysler only makes like two cars? Yeah. You would think they made like a lot of cars. Well, FCA. Fiat Chrysler. Fiat Chrysler, but the brand Chrysler, they make. The 300. The 200, the 300, a minivan. That's it. Yeah. I thought they had like a whole range. No. And Drake just dissed the 300. So that's over.

• 13:38Nilay Patel?

  He said it looked like a Bentley. That's, I mean, whatever. There was a. I really like their made in or built in Detroit. Yeah. Ad campaign. Yeah, but. Not enough to buy a Chrysler, but. Yeah, I can't. Anyway, so here's what I, so today, our video team was like freaking out over the Pacifica because every video person I know loves Town and Countries. Yeah. Cause when they go on shoots, they have to rent a minivan and they get real sad when they get the Dodge Caravan, but the Town and Countries, a nice surprise. Yeah. And it's, they all love them. Who knew?

• 14:06Speaker 03

  The number of people in like the Verge newsroom, especially on the video side, that are like shocking dads who like love minivans and have deep thoughts about minivans.

• 14:15Nilay Patel?

  Trey Shalhoub. Yeah. Wants to buy a Pacifica.

• 14:19Speaker 01

  I have no thoughts about minivans.

• 14:20Nilay Patel?

  It's really hard to have a thought about a minivan. But if you go, I go, I can't, I've been in a minivan. But anyway, they're full of screens. Yeah. Like wireless headphones.

• 14:29Speaker 01

  That's true.

• 14:29Nilay Patel?

  They're, they're like gadget spaceships. So I can say this because I'm basically 40 now. Here's what I'll say about a minivan. It's a more honest SUV for most people. Mm hmm. Like, you know, right? Just.

• 14:39Speaker 03

  But SUVs look cool.

• 14:40Nilay Patel?

  Yeah. Just putting that out there. Okay. Minivans. Says the man who's about to buy an SUV.

• 14:45Speaker 03

  Almost certainly about to buy this.

• 14:46Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 14:47Speaker 03

  It won't look like a bar of soap. That's like the main reason I'm going to buy it.

• 14:52Nilay Patel?

  I want to buy every car. Can I have every car? The show's so sad. My emotional time zone is I want to buy every car.

• 15:01Speaker 03

  So the reason that they, I mean, they're these, these Pacificas are going to be like the things that they were doing with the Lexus RX, whatever, whatevers before, which it's, it's part of the test fleet. So they're gonna load it up with the LiDAR and all the other things that hang off of it. And they're gonna go testing with it. This doesn't mean that you can go buy a self-driving Pacifica. It means it's a much bigger test fleet. And the thought is, I think that because it's a minivan, they can actually cram real humans into it, not just, you know, car testers and actually start shuttling people around, like college campuses or whatever.

• 15:35Nilay Patel?

  Interesting.

• 15:35Speaker 03

  So we can make fun of minivans all day long, and that's fine. But like, for self-driving cars to become a thing, like, we're waiting for the government to allow them on city streets and freeways. But you know where, who can let self-driving cars on their thing are like enclosed places, like, like a college campus, for example, or, I don't know, you're fenced in super yuppie neighborhood, wherever you can make your own rules. And in those kinds of things, something that can seat more people means that it can actually function as a proper shuttle.

• 16:03Nilay Patel?

  Right.

• 16:03Speaker 03

  Instead of, you know, a rich person thing that you buy.

• 16:06Nilay Patel?

  Well, Google's like making its own little, little happy car.

• 16:10Speaker 03

  Yeah, the little guy.

• 16:10Nilay Patel?

  They are making the cute little guy.

• 16:12Speaker 03

  Right. But they've been looking, Google has been searching for a car partner for a long time.

• 16:17Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 16:17Speaker 03

  Like at CES, all the rumors are there was gonna be Ford. So they find, they found it. And Fiat Chrysler, they will just kind of do anything. They're, they're that company right now. They're, they're just like, anything to make us seem cool.

• 16:28Nilay Patel?

  I really like the Fiat 500.

• 16:30Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 16:31Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 16:31Speaker 03

  Which surprisingly, looks like Google's cute little car.

• 16:34Nilay Patel?

  Yeah, a little bit. There's a lot going on there.

• 16:36Speaker 03

  Yeah, that's interesting.

• 16:37Nilay Patel?

  I can't wait to have a self-driving car. Are you, are you deep on self-driving cars? Cash that hype check. I don't know if that's the right phrase.

• 16:43Speaker 02

  I don't, I don't really like cars very much.

• 16:46Speaker 01

  Oh, I'm with you.

• 16:47Speaker 02

  Yeah, just, especially in the city, get in a car and you feel trapped.

• 16:51Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 16:52Speaker 02

  In danger.

• 16:54Nilay Patel?

  You feel in danger in a car in the city?

• 16:56Speaker 02

  Yeah, the other day I was in like an Uber ride and, no, it was a yellow cab. It was definitely a yellow cab. And the guy just kept on falling asleep and running red lights. And it was just terrifying.

• 17:06Nilay Patel?

  Wouldn't it be better if a robot was driving it?

• 17:08Speaker 02

  It would be. Yeah, I'm excited for this self-driving car future. But like, all the little cars along the way.

• 17:14Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 17:15Speaker 02

  Just like, just like stepping stones to me.

• 17:17Nilay Patel?

  Yeah, you're waiting for the big, big shift. All right, that's car news. Next.

• 17:21Speaker 03

  We're just, you just gotta.

• 17:22Nilay Patel?

  Moving right along.

• 17:23Speaker 03

  All right.

• 17:23Nilay Patel?

  Moving.

• 17:24Speaker 03

  Yeah, so I'm holding in my hand. I gotta get through this emotional journey.

• 17:30Speaker 03

  I'm refusing to have emotions. That's what that's my move.

• 17:33Nilay Patel?

  Dieter remains both Germanic and from the Midwest.

• 17:36Speaker 01

  Holding something that I have a crush on.

• 17:38Nilay Patel?

  Yeah, that thing is beautiful.

• 17:39Speaker 03

  It's a Kindle Oasis. You can't just leave that out there for the audio listeners.

• 17:43Speaker 01

  It's the new Kindle Oasis. I really, really like it.

• 17:46Speaker 03

  Yeah, so Katie Brett just reviewed this. So the first thing you need to know is it's just an e-reader. It's like functionally not any better than a Kindle Voyage, which is itself $200. This thing is $280.

• 17:58Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 17:59Speaker 03

  If you buy the top end one, your price comes out to like 380 plus tax. So you could spend upwards of $400 on a Kindle.

• 18:07Nilay Patel?

  Yeah, but it's beautiful.

• 18:08Speaker 03

  Here's it's got this battery cover. It's like a battery pack and then a leather cover that is like actually really nice leather. And then the thing, the weight goes from like seven-ish ounces to like four-ish ounces. And but all of that weight is in a on the right side or the left side, depending which side you hold it on. So it all sits in your hand and the rest of it's super thin. And so like

• 18:30Nilay Patel?

  You want it.

• 18:30Speaker 03

  It just feels incredibly light.

• 18:33Nilay Patel?

  Let's be clear, Dieter bought this.

• 18:35Speaker 03

  Yes.

• 18:36Speaker 01

  It just, as somebody who has no intention of buying it because, oh my God, $400 for an e-reader.

• 18:42Speaker 03

  It's ridiculous.

• 18:43Speaker 01

  It feels so good in your hand and it just like, you know, I have like this gigantic Kobo and it just, it just like, it's not comfortable. It's not fun to hold.

• 18:51Nilay Patel?

  Kobo. Oh, there's good reasons to buy a Kobo.

• 18:54Speaker 01

  I have feelings about this. Do you want to hear them?

• 18:56Nilay Patel?

  Yes, yes.

• 18:59Speaker 01

  I

• 19:00Nilay Patel?

  Why else do I come?

• 19:01Speaker 01

  I keep, so I have one of Dieter's old Kindles, but I keep going back to my Kobo because it has pocket integration. And that is like this killer feature that I will like use the Kobo, even though the store sucks, the interface sucks. Everything about the Kobo is terrible, except for the fact that you can just drag and drop EPUBs and just put them in there. And that's super fun. But other than that, the Kobo sucks. And it's waterproof. That's also nice, but it's pocket integration. Like, send to Kindle is the worst thing that I've ever experienced with anything. Like, I, I almost feel like, I know, I was gonna say I would almost buy like a Fire Phone over that. That's just false.

• 19:39Nilay Patel?

  You should not do that.

• 19:41Speaker 01

  It's send to Kindle is bad. The Instapaper linkage is bad. Everything like reading the web on a Kindle is excruciatingly bad. And I don't understand why they haven't fixed that yet because the Kindle is so good.

• 19:52Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 19:53Speaker 01

  At everything else.

• 19:54Nilay Patel?

  But why do you, why do you read web articles on the Kindle?

• 19:56Speaker 01

  Well, long form pieces, it feels like, I love reading long form Verge stuff on the Kindle. Like, it's so good.

• 20:04Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 20:05Speaker 01

  It's just so good. You don't lose where you're at. You just like, you get to, you know, the distractions are gone. It just feels way more zen and way more like I can actually focus on something.

• 20:14Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 20:15Speaker 01

  And I go through my pocket queue list way faster.

• 20:18Nilay Patel?

  Really?

• 20:19Speaker 01

  Oh, it's ridiculous how much faster I go through it because I'm actually paying attention to what I'm reading.

• 20:22Nilay Patel?

  Interesting.

• 20:23Speaker 01

  Um, and it's not like, I just wish Amazon would fix it and then Kobo would just like be out of my life entirely. Yes, please.

• 20:30Nilay Patel?

  I'm gonna throw this in the, in this pond. Oh, it's waterproof.

• 20:32Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 20:33Nilay Patel?

  So the Oasis is not waterproof.

• 20:34Speaker 03

  Not waterproof. What, what is the deal?

• 20:37Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 20:37Speaker 03

  How hard is it?

• 20:38Nilay Patel?

  They have to do.

• 20:39Speaker 03

  To waterproof an e-reader.

• 20:40Speaker 02

  I didn't know everybody was so hung up on waterproofing their e-readers.

• 20:44Nilay Patel?

  Well, because you want to use them in like, by pools and beaches and like.

• 20:48Speaker 03

  The tub.

• 20:48Speaker 01

  My e-readers waterproof and it's great to use it like at the beach and just not worry about anything. You know, my hands can be wet and it's fine.

• 20:56Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 20:57Speaker 03

  It's the thing. Everybody wants waterproof Kindle.

• 20:58Nilay Patel?

  But like, what they've delivered instead is a $400 Kindle.

• 21:02Speaker 03

  They've delivered a luxury device.

• 21:03Nilay Patel?

  Beautiful piece of art.

• 21:05Speaker 03

  For the same reason you buy an Apple Watch Edition because you're like, yo, this makes me feel, you like, can show it off to somebody just like you'd show off your fancy watch. And they'd be like, is that Apple Watch? You're like, no, this is a $10,000 Apple Watch. Same, same reason.

• 21:17Nilay Patel?

  Really want to be that person.

• 21:18Speaker 03

  I mean, whatever.

• 21:19Nilay Patel?

  I gotta say, the one thing about this is that isn't luxury at all. The Amazon logo on that cover.

• 21:24Speaker 03

  Yeah, it's pretty bad.

• 21:25Nilay Patel?

  The Amazon logo on the cover literally looks like, like Mickey Mouse is yelling at you.

• 21:29Speaker 03

  Like it is not a cool logo. It's not sleek. It's, it's just the Amazon logo.

• 21:34Speaker 01

  Yeah. Didn't they also get rid of the like adjustment for the eyes, like the lighting?

• 21:39Speaker 03

  Yeah. So they got rid of the ambient light sensor, which in principle on the voyage, it's great. In practice, like it works a little bit, but what it's, what the ambient light sensor on the voyage is supposed to do is you're looking at it in the dark and it starts at like a five. And then over the course of the next half an hour, it ratchets itself down to like a four.

• 21:58Speaker 01

  Right.

• 21:58Speaker 03

  Or a three. So it gets dimmer as you read it in the dark because your eyes have adjusted to the relative darkness. So it's not just that you turn the lights off and the thing gets dimmer, but it does that. It's you turn the lights off, think it's dimmer, and then it slowly gets even dimmer because then, because you don't need that much brightness. So it's like really good for going to sleep.

• 22:17Speaker 01

  It's interesting to me that like in a $400 device, like 300 baseline, that they just like got rid of that. I mean, it was probably like not used a lot.

• 22:26Speaker 03

  Amazon's line is like, nobody noticed. They, they, they like tested it with and without, and the people who like, people just didn't notice. And they're like, okay, whatever.

• 22:33Nilay Patel?

  You're not supposed to notice.

• 22:35Speaker 03

  Yeah, I know.

• 22:35Speaker 01

  Yeah, I just, I just feel like they could have, you know, gone that extra step for something like that. Like if you're not going to waterproof it, if you're not going to finally let people read the web, like at least, at least do that.

• 22:48Nilay Patel?

  I just use Pocket on my phone. It's like a weird, I'm thinking about this. I gotta buy a COBO.

• 22:54Speaker 03

  COBOS are great.

• 22:54Nilay Patel?

  Awful.

• 22:55Speaker 03

  Also, COBOS are like friendlier with EPUB and they're like better for, you know, the idea of not DRM'd content. Amazon is all about DRM.

• 23:05Speaker 02

  Well, but Amazon's becoming like famous with Alexa of being the most interoperable and like having a relatively open API and like allowing lots of new content from all sorts of places to come in.

• 23:18Speaker 01

  They're closed off for everything else.

• 23:20Speaker 02

  Right.

• 23:20Speaker 01

  Yeah. I don't know why that is. It makes no sense to me.

• 23:23Nilay Patel?

  It's not. Amazon Kindle DRM is the foundation of their business, right? I mean, they.

• 23:29Speaker 03

  Well, I like leave the Kindle DRM on your Kindle stuff and, but I don't know, let me, let Pocket develop an app for it, I guess.

• 23:36Speaker 01

  Yeah, or, or like create a Pocket clone, like. Please just do that. I don't care.

• 23:40Speaker 03

  They also make it really hard to like, send like, other EPUB stuff to it.

• 23:44Nilay Patel?

  It's the two things that I think are interesting about this conversation are the Pocket clones are coming. So, Facebook is like, 200 million people use Read Later on Facebook.

• 23:54Speaker 01

  I don't know anybody who uses Read Later on Facebook.

• 23:57Speaker 03

  Google just added it to inbox.

• 23:58Nilay Patel?

  Google added it to inbox. It's, Paul's saying he uses it in Safari.

• 24:02Speaker 03

  Yeah, it's been in Safari for a while.

• 24:04Speaker 02

  I literally, right now, my workflow is, um, I'm using Chrome for work. So, cause Chrome's got the little, um, fabricons. But then if I find a link I want, I open up Safari. And then I paste it in, and then I click the little plus button, and then I never read it.

• 24:24Speaker 03

  Just use Pocket. What are you doing? You should, you should, uh, you should check out Chuzi.

• 24:28Speaker 02

  Chuzi?

• 24:28Speaker 03

  It's a, it's a little utility. It's buggy as hell, but it's a little utility that lets you dynamically change web browsers, like when you click links and stuff. And you can also set certain, certain websites to certain web browsers.

• 24:40Nilay Patel?

  I've been trying to use Chuzi for like-

• 24:42Speaker 01

  That seems like having a lot of apps open at home.

• 24:44Speaker 03

  Oh, you spend, you spend an eternity configuring it, and like, once you have it, you just keep on reconfiguring it. But like, once every two weeks, there's this moment where like, it just magically does exactly what you want, and it's great.

• 24:59Speaker 02

  Well, I live for those moments.

• 25:01Nilay Patel?

  You're like, this weird workflow hack worked this time.

• 25:04Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 25:06Nilay Patel?

  Chuzi's been around for a long time. That thing has always been a mess in my mind.

• 25:09Speaker 03

  Yeah. No, so there's that. There's the, the, the idea that the reaction to the flood of content that we all get is for every service to build a save it for later function.

• 25:19Speaker 01

  Yeah. I mean, you just gotta pick one. I honestly will like, click through on Facebook to, just so I can finally get Chrome, so I can finally save something to Pocket, cause I can't handle, like, I'm never gonna look at the save for later on Facebook.

• 25:30Speaker 03

  I think you should go all in on Facebook's save for later.

• 25:35Speaker 01

  You upset me.

• 25:36Nilay Patel?

  That's such a bad idea. Okay, so there's that.

• 25:38Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 25:39Nilay Patel?

  And then there's the dynamic screen thing, which obviously took out of the oasis. But it's, it's interesting to me. Apple's doing it now in one way with night shift. They're doing it in a bigger, more important way.

• 25:51Speaker 03

  True Tone.

• 25:52Nilay Patel?

  With True Tone on the iPad, on the one iPad Pro.

• 25:56Speaker 03

  iPad Pro 9.7.

• 25:58Nilay Patel?

  Just don't like saying the name.

• 25:59Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 26:00Nilay Patel?

  It's just an uncomfortably stupid name. Um, anyway, so doing it there, it's, it feels to me fairly obvious to do it on an ex phone.

• 26:06Speaker 03

  They oughta.

• 26:07Nilay Patel?

  I, I just like the idea that, and whether or not the science works, I think the science of night shift is pretty shaky, but I love night shift. I think it's great. Every, like, I like, look forward to my-

• 26:16Speaker 01

  It makes you feel good?

• 26:18Nilay Patel?

  Yeah, like I look forward to my screen turning yellow in the evening. And then when the low power mode comes on and you, it gets like super blue. I'm like, how have I been looking at this this whole time? It's awful. I just like the idea that someone is thinking all of the screens that we're surrounded by should actually adapt to the way that we should see things.

• 26:36Speaker 03

  Right.

• 26:37Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 26:37Nilay Patel?

  Is really powerful and interesting. And then Amazon's like, what, what about a $400 Kindle that doesn't do that?

• 26:42Speaker 01

  I have to say, I never turn on my light on my e-reader unless I really have to and like-

• 26:47Nilay Patel?

  What?

• 26:47Speaker 01

  Cause I use a lamp next to my bed.

• 26:49Nilay Patel?

  Really?

• 26:50Speaker 01

  Cause like, that's less damaging for your eyes. Like why-

• 26:53Nilay Patel?

  Do you use a steam engine in your car? Sorry.

• 26:55Speaker 03

  Is it because you're afraid of the blue backlight? And you think that's why it's less damaging to your eyes?

• 26:59Nilay Patel?

  Lamps.

• 27:01Speaker 01

  Okay. I don't know. I just feel like having light in your eyes, it bothers me. I prefer just having a lamp, right? Like a lamp is good.

• 27:09Speaker 03

  I like lamp.

• 27:10Speaker 01

  Lamps are good.

• 27:11Speaker 03

  Lamps are good.

• 27:12Speaker 02

  Lamps are good.

• 27:13Speaker 03

  I love lamp.

• 27:14Speaker 02

  Eli thought he could slam you. It's like, you old timey people and your lamps.

• 27:22Speaker 01

  Which like, alright.

• 27:23Speaker 03

  I just went for it.

• 27:24Speaker 02

  Look all around you, Eli. You're surrounded by lamps.

• 27:30Nilay Patel?

  Lamp is coming. It's funny because it actually is a big lamp.

• 27:34Speaker 02

  It's a big lamp.

• 27:36Nilay Patel?

  Lamps.

• 27:39Nilay Patel?

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• 28:22Nilay Patel?

  Every member of the customer care team is an experienced Squarespace user working in a Squarespace office. No matter how technically your problem or trivial seeming your question, someone is available to help you. So start your free trial today at Squarespace.com and enter the offer code VERGE to get 10% off your first purchase. That's offer code VERGE.

• 28:42Nilay Patel?

  We're back.

• 28:42Speaker 02

  Welcome back.

• 28:43Nilay Patel?

  All right, Ariel, let's talk about your feature a little bit.

• 28:46Speaker 01

  Sure.

• 28:47Nilay Patel?

  Because it's crazy. So just set up what it is and then let's get into it and like talk about your experience actually reporting it out.

• 28:53Speaker 01

  Yeah, okay. So I published a big feature yesterday about a man, Josiah Zainer, who performed a microbiome transplant on himself. The microbiome is like the composition, like the bacterial composition that's of your body. Like your body is a habitat and there's bacteria on it and that's a microbiome. And your bacteria does a bunch of stuff for you. They produce vitamins, they help you digest food. It's this, this whole thing. And this guy, he has a lot of gastrointestinal issues. He and some other stuff. And he wanted to try and get rid of that by doing a transplant on himself that included a fecal matter transplant. So essentially eating poop and also trying to change the bacteria on his skin, nose, mouth.

• 29:37Nilay Patel?

  You just, you just rolled right by the lead there.

• 29:41Nilay Patel?

  I'm not gonna say I'm an expert on the fecal transplant.

• 29:44Speaker 01

  Sure, sure, sure.

• 29:44Nilay Patel?

  I was under the impression that was generally done in the other direction.

• 29:48Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 29:48Speaker 01

  Oh, you mean like an enema?

• 29:49Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 29:50Speaker 01

  Oh, the other direction. We're really gonna like, just like, dance around those words?

• 29:57Speaker 03

  I always thought it was like surgical somehow.

• 29:59Nilay Patel?

  No, I don't know.

• 30:01Speaker 01

  So, in the last couple of years, there's been, it used to be mostly enema, there's also nasogastric tubes, so through the nose, down to your stomach. But in the last couple of years, there's been a lot of research about taking poop pills. Some of them are like frozen, some of them are not, but essentially like a fecal matter transplant is done in a doctor's office specifically if you have a C. diff infection, which is a terrible infection that can be life threatening, and if it's recurrent, if nothing else is working, then they'll give you a poop pill. And that poop has been screened, and donors have been screened, and things are very, very safe. And they'll give you 30 of these pills that you'll take over the course of a couple hours, maybe up to two days, depending on the researcher that you speak to. And that is 90% effective at curing you from recurrent C. diff.

• 30:44Nilay Patel?

  Wow.

• 30:45Speaker 01

  Josiah does not have C. diff, the Zayner, the guy who did this, he does not have C. diff, he tried to, there's no proof that this would ever help him with his gastrointestinal issues. He may have IBS or IBD, ulcers, he's not clear on his diagnoses, but he has, you know, he has some issues, and he wanted to try and fix that, even though there's no real research that would ever kind of support the idea that this would help him. But to him, it was intuitive, he wanted to try it. He did something that was very, very dangerous, don't do this at home.

• 31:18Speaker 03

  Yeah, or anywhere else except a doctor's office.

• 31:21Nilay Patel?

  But you can't even do it in a doctor's office.

• 31:23Speaker 01

  Just don't do it, no, don't do it. The FDA really regulates it, like, human shit, when it is administered by a doctor, is a drug that is very tightly regulated. So, it's really, actually, really hard to get this treatment.

• 31:36Speaker 03

  Well, like, to be clear, like, one of the reasons they're regulated is human shit is legitimately dangerous.

• 31:42Speaker 01

  Right, I mean, there are so many different types of outbreaks that have been cholera, through shit, you know, there are so many, hepatitis, there are so many different things that you can get through feces. Um, so you know, just take you just seeing your friend and being like, hey, let me take a sample from you a stool sample and let me ingest that is is a really, really dangerous thing to do. He did it.

• 32:04Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 32:05Speaker 01

  He.

• 32:05Nilay Patel?

  You were there.

• 32:06Speaker 01

  I was there through the entire process.

• 32:08Nilay Patel?

  You gotta read this feature. You gotta see the photos. We sent one of our directors Verin with a camera. I mean, it's like, you gotta, you gotta read it. But so you were there.

• 32:16Speaker 01

  Yeah, I was there. He, um, I was even there during the just wasn't in the piece, but I was there even when the we collected the samples from the donor. Went over to his house. Um, and you know, he, he came out with like a huge jar, uh, covered in aluminum foil. So that we wouldn't see it. And you know, we brought that home in a hot car. Like a really, really long drive in a hot car. And I was like, there and there was like Josiah and me in the backseat and with the poop jar. Um, that was in his bag, but it was there. Uh, it was just a really, really interesting experience. And then that afternoon, we go to his apartment and he tries to make poop pills. And it was hilarious. The whole thing was hilarious because the capsules that he got, he bought gelatin capsules.

• 33:01Speaker 01

  Um, to do this and he was trying to, uh, and gelatin capsules. When you put them in your stomach, they dissolve because they hit liquid.

• 33:10Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 33:10Speaker 01

  But Xander's idea was to, to try and, you know, kind of make like to inject the poop into the capsules. So to create like a saline to like mix poop with saline solution and then inject it in there. But the minute that they hit the capsules, they started dissolving in his hands. And you know, he, it wasn't something that he thought about, which, you know, you gotta think about it and he, he just didn't.

• 33:31Nilay Patel?

  Well, give his back, we're making him, he's like a brilliant guy, right?

• 33:35Speaker 01

  Yeah, he has a PhD in bio, he's incredibly intelligent. He has a PhD in biophysics, incredibly charming and sweet. And just an all around interesting guy, uh, who did something that was dangerous and just so happened that he didn't get sick. And that is very, very lucky for him, but don't do it at home.

• 33:50Nilay Patel?

  On Reddit tomorrow.

• 33:51Speaker 01

  Yeah, he is. He's in our comments. Yeah, he was in our comments. He was answering questions. He, yeah, no, he's, he's incredibly interesting. He actually is the inventor of an instrument called the chroma chord that I'm, he, he explains it better than I do. But essentially there are some bacteria that if you shine light on them, depending on the intent, like depending on the light that you're shining on them, they will vibrate at certain intensities and you can control that. And because they vibrate, you can translate that into sound. So he created a kind of whole interface to translate whatever, you know, the vibrations of the bacteria into sound. So he plays bacteria.

• 34:24Nilay Patel?

  What?

• 34:25Speaker 01

  And it sounded.

• 34:26Nilay Patel?

  I remember this, so, yeah, yeah.

• 34:28Speaker 01

  We actually wrote about it years ago.

• 34:29Nilay Patel?

  Whoa.

• 34:30Speaker 01

  Katie Drummond posted something about it years ago.

• 34:32Nilay Patel?

  That's crazy.

• 34:33Speaker 01

  Um, and that is actually like the, the whole, like the, my first interactions were with Josiah were around that.

• 34:39Nilay Patel?

  That's incredible.

• 34:41Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 34:41Nilay Patel?

  So.

• 34:42Speaker 01

  He's really, really brilliant.

• 34:43Nilay Patel?

  So you, you were in a room with him, he scrubbed the room down.

• 34:47Speaker 01

  Yeah, with Clorox wipes, which.

• 34:49Nilay Patel?

  Which is incredible.

• 34:50Speaker 01

  Um, not quite sure how effective that must have been. He also was, he, he flushed his nose out with antibiotics that he, that like, like powdered antibiotics, um, with a neti pot, uh, and scrubbed his entire body down with the, the diluted antibiotics, trying to kill the bacteria on his skin. I spoke to some researchers and they told me that that would not like be effective. And in fact, if you tried to kill the bacteria on your body, if you killed all of it, whatever you did would probably kill you first.

• 35:19Nilay Patel?

  Wow.

• 35:19Speaker 01

  So that was kind of an interesting thing to hear, but you know, that was the idea to try and kill his bacteria. He'd also been taking antibiotics for two days, which is very, very dangerous. Because disrupting the balance in your gut can actually, like, if you have pathogens that are dormant in your body, like C. diff, doing that can actually make you sick.

• 35:37Nilay Patel?

  Oh.

• 35:37Speaker 01

  So the possibility of him making himself sick, not even from the poop, but from the taking of the antibiotics was very, very real.

• 35:46Nilay Patel?

  So why, why did he do it? He had, certainly he knew all these dangers.

• 35:49Speaker 01

  Yeah, he, he definitely was aware of the dangers. Um, we talked about them at length a couple of times before he did it. I wanted him to, you know, I wanted to make sure that he knew. And he did. He did it because, you know, there are a lot of people who are like under, like under a lot of pain. And I think that when the healthcare system just isn't working for you, people go to great lengths, regardless of whether it's dangerous, to try and find some sort of relief. And that was one of the things. He also wanted to do it to teach people about science, which I have some like ethical questions about that, because if you're trying to teach people about science by doing something that's dangerous, and then also, also maybe like, some people might copy him. Then I think that's, that's

• 36:33Speaker 01

  a questionable choice, but that was his choice and his way that he wanted to frame it. So yeah, it, he's just a really, really interesting person.

• 36:40Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 36:40Speaker 03

  And what, how long will, before we know if it was effective?

• 36:43Speaker 01

  Right. Well, okay. So I'm gonna, I'm gonna say he believe, he thinks it's effect, it was effective, because he has gotten some relief.

• 36:50Speaker 03

  Right.

• 36:50Speaker 01

  I will say that there is absolutely no way to know if it's effective. There, it's impossible. And I will say that because what he did was, was, if that is what is making him feel better. Because he didn't do the experiment in a controlled situation. We don't have, you know, somebody, something to compare it to, to see like, hey, he did this.

• 37:10Speaker 03

  Right.

• 37:11Speaker 01

  You know, somebody who wasn't doing the transplant, for instance, but living under the same conditions. There is absolutely no way to know. He did some sequencing of his gut bacteria. Some independent researchers sequenced the, the, his microbiome. And, you know, it does seem like the transplant had some sort of an effect, but it's, even then, I don't know if that effect is significant, because this, there are so few samples that it's impossible to know if that's statistically significant, to do the kind of analyses that a researcher would do, to find out if this is actually effective. Like, there's no way to know. So, you know, it's really just based off of how, what he says and how he feels.

• 37:45Speaker 03

  And he felt

• 37:45Speaker 01

  And that's not science, that's an anecdote.

• 37:48Speaker 03

  Awful before, right?

• 37:48Speaker 01

  Yeah, he felt really bad. He'd like poop like upwards of, of, you know, five times a day, kind of debilitating. And he says that now he only poops once a day, which, you know, fine, it's, it's, it's, which is really good for him. Like, I'm, I'm happy about that. But it's hard to know, it's impossible to know if that's why. And, you know, that's why researchers, like, it's, it's, it's interesting to see that, because, in a way, it gives you like, an appreciation for, for hard science. Because that is why we do the things that we do. And that is why research takes a long time, is because you can't just like, try something on somebody and say, hey, this works. Like, that is not how science is done.

• 38:25Speaker 03

  Theranos.

• 38:29Speaker 01

  Right. I mean.

• 38:31Nilay Patel?

  I've created a revolutionary blood testing regime. Just trust me.

• 38:35Speaker 01

  Sure.

• 38:37Nilay Patel?

  Please, I'll give you your money. That's incredible. So you got to read the story. There's a great line in the story where he didn't like sweet foods before. He didn't like sweets. And then he, now he like loves sweets. And I think that it's just one of those things where it's like, is this real? Are you, did you just convince yourself?

• 38:53Speaker 01

  There's, I mean, there's some research to indicate that like your bacteria can dictate some of your food preferences.

• 38:57Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 38:57Speaker 01

  So yeah, he suddenly has a sweet tooth. He lost some weight. He suddenly has a sweet tooth. There's no way to know, but maybe.

• 39:03Nilay Patel?

  Don't do this at home. I think it's a real message that we need to send here.

• 39:06Speaker 01

  A hundred percent do not do this at home.

• 39:08Nilay Patel?

  Yeah, but it's incredible. You got to read it. It's a credible story. And he seems like just a fascinating guy.

• 39:12Speaker 01

  He really is. He really is.

• 39:13Nilay Patel?

  All right. Read the story. All right. Anything else? We covered it. Let's begin our lightning round with sort of a leisurely open. Paul, what do you use to listen to music right now?

• 39:22Speaker 02

  Apple Music.

• 39:24Nilay Patel?

  Yeah, I thought so. Tell me about it.

• 39:26Speaker 02

  Hate it.

• 39:29Nilay Patel?

  Spotify got redesigned like yesterday.

• 39:31Speaker 02

  Really? Yeah, I'm a, I'm a audio expat.

• 39:36Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 39:36Speaker 02

  And so I feel like, like, Apple Music is like self-flagellation to like feel, feel the pain.

• 39:44Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 39:44Speaker 02

  Of losing audio.

• 39:45Nilay Patel?

  Yeah, it's grief. It's your grief.

• 39:47Speaker 02

  But what, there's a redesign or something?

• 39:49Speaker 03

  I don't have the Spotify redesign yet.

• 39:51Nilay Patel?

  Oh, I have it. It's fine.

• 39:52Speaker 02

  But there's a redesign of Apple Music as well.

• 39:53Nilay Patel?

  So yeah, so the news is nine to five Mac, which is excellent. And Bloomberg, I would say also excellent.

• 40:00Speaker 02

  Absolutely.

• 40:01Nilay Patel?

  I'm just doing a little media criticism on the side.

• 40:04Speaker 02

  Name some other excellent websites for me, Eli.

• 40:06Nilay Patel?

  Yeah, The Verge.com, one of my faves. Circuit Breaker. Pretty good. Pretty good.

• 40:12Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 40:13Nilay Patel?

  Anyway, both of those sites, Bloomberg and nine five, report that probably at W W C, I think that's probably what it's leaking at now, there'll be a complete head to toe reboot of Apple Music. And that, you know, if you look at Apple Music now, it's very much just the existing iTunes mess. And then Beats music just like glued on to it.

• 40:32Speaker 01

  Do they still have the like whole like connect? Like here's the, here's whatever the artist.

• 40:36Nilay Patel?

  Oh, it's still there.

• 40:37Speaker 01

  Feed.

• 40:38Nilay Patel?

  Oh, it's still useless.

• 40:39Speaker 03

  I never see it because I turn on the parental controls to disallow the feed, which means I get to use that button for playlists.

• 40:45Speaker 01

  That's, that's

• 40:47Nilay Patel?

  Literally saving yourself from yourself. Dieter's like, I also turn on all the explicit lyrics filters.

• 40:52Speaker 02

  Dude, that

• 40:53Nilay Patel?

  No, it's a hack. Okay.

• 40:54Speaker 02

  I know this is a tangent.

• 40:55Nilay Patel?

  It's my favorite hack.

• 40:56Speaker 02

  Update the Mac OS Twitter app. I'm like so excited. I mean, finally see Twitter polls. What are, what are these all about? And in between the home button and the mentions button, the two, two buttons I ever push. Moments.

• 41:11Nilay Patel?

  Moments.

• 41:12Speaker 02

  Just, just there to trip me up.

• 41:14Speaker 03

  You know what's better than, you know what the best part of the, um, the Mac Twitter app is? If you, I don't, I haven't checked on the new version, but you can put highlights into the notification bar. And highlights is the best feature Twitter has ever made. And it's only available on Android phones and in the notification bar on Macs.

• 41:31Speaker 01

  Wait, you can finally do that? Hmm. Cause really I just, I just want.

• 41:36Speaker 03

  Highlights are like the best tweets from the people that you follow.

• 41:39Speaker 01

  I just want highlights to replace the moments tab in the like mobile app, like so badly. I don't even know why moments exists.

• 41:47Speaker 03

  So here's my thing about Apple Music. iTunes bad, Beats bad. They put them both together. Super bad. So like, we're going to fix it. We're going to refresh it. Tell me why I should believe that Apple has the chops to figure out the user interface problem of Apple Music. Tell me, give me the evidence of the software that they have created in the past, call it year, call it a year and a half. Give me the evidence that Apple is able to solve a thorny UI problem.

• 42:14Nilay Patel?

  The thorniest.

• 42:15Speaker 03

  What thorny UI problem has Apple solved recently?

• 42:17Nilay Patel?

  Paul's shaking his head.

• 42:18Speaker 02

  Really like Apple Maps.

• 42:20Nilay Patel?

  There you go. Wait, on a phone or on a desktop?

• 42:22Speaker 02

  I use it on both.

• 42:23Nilay Patel?

  You really use the desktop Apple Maps app?

• 42:25Speaker 01

  Seriously?

• 42:25Speaker 02

  Yeah. If I get like, if I get like a link in iMessage and it's an address, I click on it. It opens up an Apple Maps or, but sometimes I like plan my route, you know, I don't have like cell phone service. So I plan my route before I leave the house. But that's the one that, that the primary Apple app I can think of right now that always does what I think it's going to do.

• 42:45Speaker 03

  Yeah. And they, it's like way better. They've, they've like basically fixed it.

• 42:49Nilay Patel?

  Yeah, it's gotten better.

• 42:50Speaker 03

  But like.

• 42:50Speaker 01

  And I switched to Android, so I don't, it was bad when I switched.

• 42:55Nilay Patel?

  I mean, we could talk about the watch.

• 42:56Speaker 03

  Thorny UI problem.

• 42:57Nilay Patel?

  I mean, the label for this entire section is, uh, I've labeled it quite controversially. Peak Apple.

• 43:05Nilay Patel?

  Because they had a real bad quarter.

• 43:06Speaker 03

  Yeah, I mean, okay, I mean, real bad for Apple. They had a real bad for Apple quarter. And the big problem was they they missed their own guidance, which they never do. But they still made so much money that like it's obscene.

• 43:20Nilay Patel?

  No, I disagree. The real problem and Bloomberg, another, again, excellent Bloomberg piece, did a whole breakdown of how Tim Cook talks about the company.

• 43:30Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 43:30Nilay Patel?

  And he was a year ago, when the iPhone six came out and the sales exploded. He was like, this is great. This is what they're going to be like forever. It's not unusual. Three months ago, when the six S came out, they they he was like, it's fine. It's on the same curve. You know, S models traditionally sell better than the regular models. Sales that did not happen.

• 43:50Speaker 03

  Nope.

• 43:51Nilay Patel?

  And he's like, last year was so unusual. And I think the question is, is there a trick to make you buy another iPhone that isn't just a bigger screen? Because a bigger screen was a great reason to buy another iPhone.

• 44:02Speaker 01

  That was a huge driver.

• 44:04Nilay Patel?

  And then I think that that whole thing is related to what you're talking about, which is the stuff isn't very good. And we can talk like, that's real bad.

• 44:15Speaker 03

  Like this Apple Watch band is really good. This band is great.

• 44:18Nilay Patel?

  Yeah, the band is awesome.

• 44:19Speaker 03

  The new nylon bands that they made.

• 44:20Nilay Patel?

  Those are cool. And I think there's the, do you guys talk about this in the show last week?

• 44:25Speaker 03

  What?

• 44:26Nilay Patel?

  Apple at all?

• 44:26Speaker 03

  A little bit.

• 44:27Nilay Patel?

  Yeah. I don't want to.

• 44:29Speaker 03

  People want to hear what you think, Neela.

• 44:30Nilay Patel?

  Mm hmm.

• 44:32Speaker 03

  I knew it. What's your what's your mood zone on Apple right now?

• 44:35Nilay Patel?

  Sorry, emotional time zone.

• 44:36Speaker 03

  Emotional time zone on Apple.

• 44:37Nilay Patel?

  We're in the dark.

• 44:40Speaker 03

  Rutabaga.

• 44:41Nilay Patel?

  Where is?

• 44:44Nilay Patel?

  You know, wherever it's it's the it's the land of always winter. That's my emotional time zone.

• 44:49Speaker 03

  Okay.

• 44:49Nilay Patel?

  I'm pretty sure that's a Game of Thrones reference. No, it's I think that's it. It's just there's a lot of negativity around the company because they claim the watch sold better than the first iPhone, which is a totally unfair comparison because the first iPhone was available in 18T in the United States. The watch was available around, oh, it was singular at the time.

• 45:09Speaker 02

  And it wasn't subsidized.

• 45:10Nilay Patel?

  And it wasn't subsidized. It's like, yeah, it was a brand new thing from a company that was much smaller on a totally limited market. The watch was rolled out worldwide with like celebrities running through Africa. Like, literally, that was a video they showed, right?

• 45:24Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 45:25Nilay Patel?

  And they were like posting Apple Store pop-ups in like fashion markets in Paris. Like, it was just a, it's a different scale. Of course, they sold more. It's Apple. They can't help it. But if you, but is the thing good is a really important question. I have always thought it's a seven. Like, that was the number we gave it in the review. It's fine.

• 45:45Speaker 01

  When is the reboot of the watch set for? Is it for the summer? Is it later, like in September?

• 45:49Speaker 03

  We don't know, but the latest rumors, I think from the Wall Street Journal, are probably in the fall on the inside the iPhone. And it's like, oh, man, they're gonna fix it. What are they gonna do? They're gonna put a faster processor in it. Fine. And maybe they'll have an LTE version.

• 46:04Nilay Patel?

  You think that's it?

• 46:05Speaker 03

  That's what the WSJ had.

• 46:07Nilay Patel?

  Right.

• 46:08Speaker 01

  They really need a round watch.

• 46:09Speaker 03

  What I want is not a faster processor. I want like, you know, fewer apps. I want the screen on all the time.

• 46:15Speaker 01

  Way simpler, like.

• 46:17Speaker 03

  I want to, I want to, I want to.

• 46:19Speaker 01

  Pebble in essence, but not in actual interface.

• 46:22Speaker 03

  What the buttons do.

• 46:24Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 46:24Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 46:24Speaker 03

  I want this connect button.

• 46:26Nilay Patel?

  What are you gonna, who?

• 46:27Speaker 03

  Will you just describe?

• 46:28Nilay Patel?

  A faster processor and a cell modem mean a huge battery.

• 46:32Speaker 03

  Yep.

• 46:32Nilay Patel?

  Right? Are they gonna run a cord up your arm? That would actually be amazing if Apple was like, the new Apple Watch with battery sleeve and you were constantly wearing a battery sleeve.

• 46:40Speaker 03

  I've got all these people that I'm like scrolling through my contacts on the watch.

• 46:43Nilay Patel?

  When was the last time you sent your heartbeat to anyone, Dieter?

• 46:45Speaker 03

  Never.

• 46:45Nilay Patel?

  If you have a heart.

• 46:46Speaker 03

  Definitely the only person here that I know for sure is wearing an Apple Watch right now on my Apple Watch contact list is Chow on our product team. Definitely gonna send her a heartbeat.

• 46:58Nilay Patel?

  There you go.

• 46:58Speaker 01

  That's ridiculous.

• 46:59Nilay Patel?

  Anyway, I, so there's that, and then there's this like Apple Music reboot. I am so excited for the Apple Music reboot.

• 47:06Speaker 03

  I want to use Apple Music. That's what I've decided.

• 47:09Nilay Patel?

  If they can just make it so it looks like a store where everything is free and then playback is simple, that's all I want.

• 47:15Speaker 02

  Right. If I want to listen to a song and I know what it is, then it's easy to get there.

• 47:20Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 47:20Speaker 02

  If I was just listening to something, it's easy to get there.

• 47:23Nilay Patel?

  Oh my god.

• 47:24Speaker 02

  If I wanted some suggestions from some dude that Apple pays a lot of money to tell me what's cool, I'm like, whatever, they can put that in there if they want to.

• 47:34Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 47:34Speaker 02

  But just don't make it hard.

• 47:36Speaker 01

  I'm just personally like very upset about the whole like exclusives on this platform and exclusives on this other platform.

• 47:43Nilay Patel?

  That's not going away.

• 47:43Speaker 01

  I, I know and I hate it so much.

• 47:47Nilay Patel?

  You know everything's available? BitTorrent.

• 47:51Speaker 01

  We don't talk about that. I, I really like to pay for stuff.

• 47:56Nilay Patel?

  I do too.

• 47:57Speaker 01

  I just don't want to pay, like I don't want Spotify and Apple Music and Tidal and, and you know, I just got, I just, I can't, I can't do it. I don't want to do it.

• 48:07Nilay Patel?

  Music app that lets you have a locker where you can upload your own music and then you're good.

• 48:12Speaker 01

  Right. So I should do play music is what you're telling me.

• 48:14Nilay Patel?

  You can do play music, you could do Apple Music, or you could do Amazon Music.

• 48:17Speaker 02

  Do Amazon Music.

• 48:19Speaker 01

  I think it's what I think it should be, play music.

• 48:21Nilay Patel?

  For the official position of the Verge cast. You should keep using your Kobo, use Facebook, save for later and go all in on Amazon Music.

• 48:31Nilay Patel?

  The worst life.

• 48:33Speaker 01

  Oh my god, every single time the Echo tries to play something, like the Echo Dot tries to play something from Amazon Prime, I get so upset at it because I never want to play something on Amazon Prime. Never.

• 48:43Nilay Patel?

  No. Alexa, play my Amazon Prime music.

• 48:47Speaker 01

  So terrible.

• 48:50Speaker 02

  What, what, what if it, if it went like further like this? Cause right now you can pay 10, just call it $10, cause it's always around $10. $10 for Hulu, $10 for Amazon, $10 for Netflix, $10 for HBO.

• 49:08Speaker 02

  And $10 for Showtime? I don't know.

• 49:11Speaker 01

  You won't even pay for a cellphone. Like, why? This is not sustainable.

• 49:16Speaker 02

  Yeah, yeah. Well, I don't pay for all of those anymore. But I've had most of them at some. I never paid for Showtime. But like, those have a small overlap of content. And then primarily, the draw is exclusive. I'm not saying this is a good idea for music, but what if music went even more like that?

• 49:35Nilay Patel?

  Well, what's it?

• 49:35Speaker 02

  What if you had your title for listening to Jay-Z's friends' music?

• 49:40Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 49:40Speaker 02

  And then you had Apple for listening to Drake and Taylor Swift? And then you had Spotify for listening to, like, European dance music?

• 49:49Nilay Patel?

  But you see.

• 49:52Nilay Patel?

  That's what it's for. But you see what's happening in the TV market?

• 49:54Speaker 02

  That's terrifying, I know, right?

• 49:55Speaker 01

  I'm just gonna cancel everything and go back to Pandora.

• 49:57Nilay Patel?

  No, but with TV and movies, what's happening is-

• 50:00Speaker 03

  Pandora's got a smaller library than anybody.

• 50:02Nilay Patel?

  All of the device vendors are building universal search on top of those services to disintermediate-

• 50:08Speaker 03

  Yeah, but that's that universal search stream is never, it has yet to come true on any platform. Universal search on every single platform, whether it's phone, TV, or tablet. The only place where universal search hasn't been a disaster is the web with Google. Everywhere else, it gets interrupted by bad indexing and the fact that, like, you need to cut deals with the peoples whose apps you're indexing.

• 50:31Nilay Patel?

  Right.

• 50:31Speaker 03

  And those two things put together mean that, like, every single universe, universal search thing I've tried has always been a disaster, especially on TV.

• 50:39Nilay Patel?

  Right.

• 50:40Speaker 03

  And so, yeah.

• 50:41Nilay Patel?

  Apple TV is fine.

• 50:43Speaker 03

  It's a seven.

• 50:45Nilay Patel?

  It's a seven.

• 50:45Speaker 03

  Just like the Apple Watch. It's Apple Watch quality search.

• 50:48Nilay Patel?

  Yeah. Yeah. That's a hard burn.

• 50:50Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 50:51Nilay Patel?

  It's slow. Nobody knows how to use it. What are these buttons for? It's constantly touching you. There's force touch for some reason. When was the last time you forced touched your Apple Watch? I guess just now.

• 51:02Speaker 03

  Just now, because it took me, it took me five minutes to send my heartbeat to somebody because I kept on drawing instead of sending the heartbeat force touch. Also, the fact that I just sent somebody a heartbeat, they definitely think I'm, like, creepy now. Because like, nobody, nobody has sent a heartbeat with the Apple Watch in literally three months in all of America.

• 51:19Speaker 01

  I don't know why they ever thought that was gonna be a thing.

• 51:21Speaker 02

  That was my favorite thing about the Apple Watch. It is the thing that most of all made me want to get one. And I don't know who I would send heartbeats to.

• 51:28Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 51:28Nilay Patel?

  But you thought it was in real time, right?

• 51:31Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 51:32Speaker 03

  Right. As soon as I discovered it wasn't in real time, the dream was dead.

• 51:35Speaker 02

  I feel like you could really make some sort of connection with somebody.

• 51:38Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 51:39Speaker 02

  Not like super mystically, just like literally thinking of you right now. Hey, here's my BPM.

• 51:50Speaker 01

  Our idea of like, I know, I know.

• 51:54Speaker 02

  There's a connection there.

• 51:55Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 51:55Speaker 02

  What, just send somebody a winky face?

• 51:58Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 51:58Speaker 03

  Or like a smiley with a tongue hanging out.

• 52:02Nilay Patel?

  I guess Apple's weird idea is that I connect with people. Anyway, let's go lightning round.

• 52:05Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 52:06Nilay Patel?

  We got some TV stuff in Light Round. We should talk about it. Hulu and YouTube confirming plans to start streaming live TV. I think this is the future. All these, the thing that you were talking about, Paul, where you pay $10 to a bunch of different services, that's going to get wrapped up into one of these skinny bundles streaming over the top.

• 52:22Speaker 03

  Yeah, but they're all going to be different.

• 52:23Nilay Patel?

  Apple wants one.

• 52:24Speaker 03

  Sling's going to give you a certain set of channels. Hulu's going to give you another set of channels. Apple's going to give you a third set of channels. So if you want.

• 52:30Speaker 01

  I'm just waiting for the perfect combo.

• 52:31Speaker 03

  NBC, ABC, like the fat bundle. The only way to get the fat bundle in the near future is still going to be to just get cable.

• 52:36Nilay Patel?

  Yeah. Do you pay for TV or?

• 52:39Speaker 01

  I desperately want cable. I want it so badly.

• 52:42Speaker 03

  It's weird, right?

• 52:43Speaker 01

  It's, I feel like it's the point, like it's the point where I suddenly just like am crossing over into actual adulthood. Like I want cable all the time. Like I just, with the election season, I just want cable so badly.

• 52:56Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 52:56Speaker 01

  I, I want to be able to like watch RuPaul's Drag Race in my apartment and not search, like not go to a bar. I want to be able to listen to Rachel Maddow every night. Like I just want cable. I just want cable.

• 53:08Nilay Patel?

  I'm just going to put this out there. Cable is available.

• 53:16Speaker 01

  Now that I am planning a wedding, cable is going to have to wait.

• 53:20Nilay Patel?

  Yeah, congratulations.

• 53:23Nilay Patel?

  Fair. I was, I don't know if this is still possible. When I was in college, I was very adept at stealing cable.

• 53:29Speaker 01

  I, really, I just need a cable login. If somebody wants to give me their MSNBC login real bad, like I just want to be able to watch Rachel Maddow.

• 53:36Nilay Patel?

  Wait, please just make that happen.

• 53:37Speaker 03

  But the, the cable apps, even if you have a cable login on like Apple TV or a few, or the web, it's maybe a little bit better, but like, it's not a great experience yet. When Comcast's like, hey, we'll just do apps. Like, yeah. Soon as you start doing apps well, I'll trust you. In the meantime, give me like a free cable box.

• 53:54Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 53:54Speaker 03

  Or open cable box.

• 53:56Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 53:56Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 53:56Nilay Patel?

  All right.

• 53:57Speaker 03

  Okay.

• 53:58Nilay Patel?

  Anyway, it's coming. You're gonna, you're gonna, one day, instead of saying, I want cable, you're gonna say, I wanna watch these channels, and you're gonna pay YouTube, or Apple, or Hulu, or somebody, and get a series of channels.

• 54:09Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 54:09Nilay Patel?

  And that will disintermediate all this $10 a time chunking.

• 54:13Speaker 02

  TV's, TV's dead.

• 54:15Nilay Patel?

  The United States has banned vaping for people under 18.

• 54:19Speaker 02

  Mm-hmm.

• 54:20Nilay Patel?

  How do you feel about that?

• 54:20Speaker 02

  I thought that was already...

• 54:22Speaker 01

  No, they weren't even classified as tobacco products, until recently.

• 54:25Speaker 02

  What?

• 54:26Nilay Patel?

  It's the Wild West.

• 54:27Speaker 02

  I, I saw some of the other things that they're gonna, vape manufacturers are gonna have to be approved. Is that correct?

• 54:35Speaker 01

  Yes. I think they have like a two-year window.

• 54:39Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 54:39Speaker 01

  Um, to like, kind of like, develop a plan and make sure that they are compliant. Um, but yeah, that, that's the thing. They're gonna have to get approved.

• 54:46Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 54:47Speaker 01

  Anything after, that was made after 2007, so like, all vapes, really, are gonna have to get approved.

• 54:52Speaker 02

  Saw something about like, a million dollars to get through that process.

• 54:57Speaker 01

  Uh, I, I haven't seen any estimates. It's probably gonna be expensive for them.

• 55:00Speaker 02

  Bad government, just messing things up, because they don't like people having fun.

• 55:07Speaker 01

  Kids having fun, specifically?

• 55:09Speaker 02

  Don't worry, Trump will, Trump will fix it.

• 55:10Nilay Patel?

  This is gonna be a really hard thing for them to regulate, because a vape isn't a singular thing, like a cigarette. There's the battery, there's the heating element, there's the kind of stuff, there's the kind of liquid. There's like, 50 parts that go into making a vape.

• 55:22Speaker 01

  Yeah, it's, and you know, the FDA has like, very little like, power, like, like manpower, people power, people. They don't have a lot of people, so...

• 55:31Nilay Patel?

  What do they have?

• 55:32Speaker 01

  People.

• 55:34Nilay Patel?

  Also, real weird shortage of lamps.

• 55:36Speaker 01

  So it's gonna be, it's gonna, it's gonna be tough for them, uh, but hopefully, they'll, they'll, they'll try and figure that out.

• 55:43Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 55:43Speaker 01

  Uh, it's gonna be a weird transition, I think, and there's gonna be, uh, but like, it's, you know, kids probably shouldn't be vaping.

• 55:50Nilay Patel?

  So it's really interesting. Do we, I think we wrote this too. In the UK, their health agency is like, vaping is the best. Straight up, they're like, we have, we have learned that it helps people...

• 56:00Speaker 01

  Let's, let's frame that slightly differently. They say vaping is the best, because it is better than smoking. Vaping, in the grand scheme of things, is still terrible for your health.

• 56:07Nilay Patel?

  We think.

• 56:08Speaker 01

  We think. Yes.

• 56:10Speaker 02

  No, it, it, the...

• 56:13Speaker 02

  Negative health ramifications of nicotine are very well studied.

• 56:16Speaker 01

  Right.

• 56:17Speaker 02

  And you're getting a lot of nicotine in your body when you vape. So that is not.

• 56:22Speaker 01

  The idea is that you just get less of the other stuff.

• 56:25Speaker 02

  Right.

• 56:25Speaker 01

  And then maybe that means that it's better.

• 56:28Nilay Patel?

  Are they going to regulate the vapes that are like zero percent nicotine?

• 56:32Speaker 01

  Uh, I mean, it has to be a tobacco product.

• 56:34Nilay Patel?

  Do they regulate like those like herbal cigarettes that you can get? Like those cigarettes that are like zero nicotine? I don't know.

• 56:40Speaker 01

  Um, I don't know. I don't know if that falls under tobacco products. If they're not making a health claim, like the only vapes that were regulated before were vapes that made health claim, health claims.

• 56:51Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 56:52Speaker 01

  Um, so if you didn't, then you were fine. Um, I don't really know the intricacies of that.

• 56:57Nilay Patel?

  Yeah. Your next great feature is finding a person who's building the world's biggest vape. Just go into that apartment.

• 57:04Speaker 01

  Well, isn't the whole point is that it's super portable and like you just want to have it be?

• 57:08Speaker 02

  The whole point is to make sick clouds.

• 57:13Speaker 01

  Sure.

• 57:14Nilay Patel?

  All right.

• 57:14Speaker 03

  So every, when I walk on the streets of New York, every day, like the vape batteries get bigger.

• 57:18Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 57:19Speaker 03

  They're not getting smaller.

• 57:20Speaker 02

  There's this guy on my block in like the, um, in Soho and I call him the vape king.

• 57:27Speaker 03

  Does he know?

• 57:28Nilay Patel?

  You should definitely call him vape lord.

• 57:30Speaker 01

  The vape king.

• 57:31Nilay Patel?

  He should be vape lord.

• 57:33Speaker 02

  Well, whatever. Anyways, he's this like very well dressed person who like runs this like fashion store and he, and he walks out like probably every two hours. And he's got like a brass vape stick thing. And then it's just the most amazing cloud. It's just so, so good.

• 57:53Nilay Patel?

  All right. God only knows. Tortilla pods, Paul Miller.

• 57:57Speaker 02

  Yeah, somebody made a crig for tortillas. I'm so happy that that happened. Seventy nine cents per tortilla, which is probably the most you could ever pay for a tortilla.

• 58:10Speaker 01

  Did they also supply you with the like dough ball?

• 58:13Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 58:15Nilay Patel?

  It's a dough ball inside a little plastic.

• 58:17Speaker 02

  That you have to like keep refrigerated. Seventy nine cents. You can get different flavors.

• 58:21Speaker 01

  Lance did this article and my only like positive impression of this is that at least it was a woman of color in the like video, but like otherwise seems like such.

• 58:31Speaker 02

  What about, what did you think about the all caps headline that I ran through the verge editorial process?

• 58:39Nilay Patel?

  I gotta say, this is one of our best headlines. The headline is just the word tortilla pod.

• 58:44Speaker 01

  That's hilarious.

• 58:45Nilay Patel?

  I have to say, this is like, we're gonna go back to old school blogging. Who gives an F? We're just gonna go and we're gonna have some fun. Paul's like, I got it, tortilla pod.

• 58:55Speaker 02

  Tortilla pod.

• 58:57Speaker 01

  Oh my God, I'm just gonna treat this right now.

• 58:59Nilay Patel?

  That's real good. Are we getting one of these?

• 59:01Speaker 02

  I, I, well, apparently they're in Williamsburg. Hopefully you can track, hopefully we can track them. It's a Kickstarter, it might not ever be real. They've got like $80,000 so far. But if they've got a demo unit in Williamsburg, we're gonna track this down.

• 59:14Nilay Patel?

  Of course.

• 59:15Speaker 01

  The tortilla in this video doesn't look very like normal.

• 59:19Speaker 03

  They have 27 days ago, they had, as of this recording, they have brought in $86,973 in pledges so far.

• 59:28Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 59:29Speaker 03

  They say they only need 50 grand to make this thing, which is pretty.

• 59:31Nilay Patel?

  I have a feeling everyone's pledging this thing, just, just, just so we can get one in the office.

• 59:38Speaker 01

  I, you know, if you really love your homemade tortillas and you really don't want it to go through the labor intensive aspect of this. And if it actually makes a good product.

• 59:46Speaker 03

  Putting it on a pan.

• 59:46Speaker 01

  No, but like, there are rice cookers that are like, super expensive, right? Like, you can get like a $500 rice cooker.

• 59:51Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 59:52Speaker 01

  Because it makes perfect rice and it times it everything and it like, does everything for you.

• 59:57Nilay Patel?

  Do you have a $500 rice cooker?

• 59:58Speaker 01

  No, I used to have a $10 rice cooker and I liked it a lot.

• 1:00:01Nilay Patel?

  Yeah. Where would you put the $500 rice cooker on the scale between not having it and cable?

• 1:00:06Speaker 02

  Ooh.

• 1:00:06Nilay Patel?

  What would you get first?

• 1:00:08Speaker 01

  I mean, cable. I don't even have a rice cooker anymore, so like, the question is kinda.

• 1:00:12Nilay Patel?

  So I haven't, well, in terms of things, you just sounded so reverent.

• 1:00:15Speaker 01

  Of buying, rice cookers are amazing.

• 1:00:20Nilay Patel?

  I don't know if you noticed, there's a native ad for rice cookers going on right now.

• 1:00:25Nilay Patel?

  Big rice cooker has made its way into the Birchcast. I have, I have, not, it's not $500, but I have like a fancy rice cooker that I was. This is what weddings are good for. Get ready.

• 1:00:36Speaker 01

  I know. I, yes, I'm very excited about all the new cookware.

• 1:00:39Nilay Patel?

  We were given a fancy rice cooker when we got married and I make rice better than that rice cooker and faster in a pan.

• 1:00:45Speaker 01

  Yeah, rice cookers are a little slow.

• 1:00:47Nilay Patel?

  They're way slower. Dude, it takes, it takes 20 minutes, 20, 30 minutes max to make perfect rice in a pan.

• 1:00:53Speaker 02

  Kurg is not about the best cup of coffee.

• 1:00:57Nilay Patel?

  Right.

• 1:00:58Speaker 02

  Kurg is about living the Jetson life and having a little pod that becomes coffee.

• 1:01:04Nilay Patel?

  And this is about a little pod that becomes a tortilla.

• 1:01:07Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:01:07Nilay Patel?

  When is somebody gonna make the pizza thing from Back to the Future? Right? That's the one I want. A little pizza and you push the button and it becomes a big pizza.

• 1:01:15Speaker 02

  I'm, I'm sitting here waiting.

• 1:01:16Nilay Patel?

  Get to work Kickstarter. All right, you got one more and this one's important, Paul. PiMessage.

• 1:01:22Speaker 02

  PiMessage. Uh, this is just a call to arms. Everybody get on GitHub, start contributing to PiMessage, which is like my number, I wanna try more Android, but I'm very dependent on iMessage. And this is literally a hack that, that scrapes all your iMessages off of a Mac and then blasts them over the internet in a super insecure way to your Android phone. This guy made like the scraper, he made a server, he made a really slick Android app for all this, like this guy did a lot of work and I just wanna push this over the finish line.

• 1:02:00Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 1:02:00Speaker 02

  And, and have iMessage on Android.

• 1:02:02Nilay Patel?

  But don't you need to run a Mac somewhere at all times?

• 1:02:04Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 1:02:06Nilay Patel?

  Just to be clear.

• 1:02:07Speaker 02

  On a relatively stable IP address.

• 1:02:09Nilay Patel?

  Yeah, right? Oh yeah, the, the stable IP address is a tough one.

• 1:02:12Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:02:13Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 1:02:13Speaker 01

  I mean, yeah, it would be great if you could just have like an iMessage app and just like be able to communicate with people who's focused solely on that, but like Apple's never gonna do it and that seems incredibly inconvenient, so.

• 1:02:25Speaker 02

  I feel like, I don't know, maybe Apple, to say they're sorry for missing earnings. To put out an iMessage app for Android, because that's really, I just think that there's something about that, like, you know, Google and Microsoft sometimes feel a little desperate. Like, Google still feels maybe that they've got to keep mind share in iPhone land, or they might become irrelevant to those. And so, Google does a really good job of putting its apps on iOS. Microsoft is scared of becoming irrelevant in all ways, and does a really good job putting its apps on iOS and Android. Apple has been pretty comfortable.

• 1:03:03Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 1:03:04Speaker 02

  Didn't feel the desperation, and...

• 1:03:07Speaker 01

  I mean, for a long time, like, that was a puke selling point, right?

• 1:03:10Speaker 02

  It is, I mean, it is a selling point. It is a good point of lock-in. Good for them. But if you think about what would truly make people happier, yes, you're gonna lock in more customers. How are you doing it right now?

• 1:03:21Speaker 01

  These companies don't want to make people happy. You're funny.

• 1:03:23Speaker 02

  I think you get a lot of mileage out of it. I mean, this was always my, one of my old-timey metrics was if you put Bing as your default search, you don't care about your customers.

• 1:03:32Nilay Patel?

  Right.

• 1:03:32Speaker 02

  Because there's, I understand, you can make a $10 million deal with Microsoft and have Bing as your default. I don't know what the actual deals go for.

• 1:03:42Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 1:03:42Speaker 02

  But it says something about your company that you're less concerned about their happiness than your businesses' success. But your business succeeds ultimately, I think, if your customers are happy.

• 1:03:55Nilay Patel?

  Or if you get that sweet Bing money.

• 1:03:57Speaker 02

  Or if you...

• 1:03:59Speaker 01

  Right.

• 1:04:00Nilay Patel?

  What's your business model? Uh, Bing. Desperate, desperate Bing.

• 1:04:05Speaker 02

  I'm hoping to trick people into using Bing.

• 1:04:09Nilay Patel?

  We gotta start an app. Finally, Paul, we've got an app.

• 1:04:13Speaker 02

  It's called Shenanigans.

• 1:04:17Speaker 02

  And you just open the app, and you see how long you can use the app without performing a Bing search.

• 1:04:25Speaker 01

  I'm into it.

• 1:04:26Speaker 02

  This is great. This is good.

• 1:04:30Nilay Patel?

  That's, that's got to wrap this one up.

• 1:04:31Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:04:32Nilay Patel?

  We've had our share of disasters. It's good. It's been good. It's been a good run of live Verge casts. Right? What's happening?

• 1:04:38Speaker 03

  I don't know.

• 1:04:39Nilay Patel?

  All right.

• 1:04:39Speaker 03

  Close my laptop.

• 1:04:41Speaker 01

  It's a very cute laptop.

• 1:04:42Nilay Patel?

  I love that laptop. Oh, you want to talk about the review Lauren put up? Real quick. Lauren put up the review of the new MacBook. But you have, that's your old MacBook.

• 1:04:48Speaker 03

  This is the old MacBook. The new MacBook is faster.

• 1:04:51Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 1:04:52Speaker 03

  Yeah. We talked about it this last time.

• 1:04:53Nilay Patel?

  Yeah, I bought one.

• 1:04:54Speaker 03

  It's a good review. You should read it. Charleston degrade versus comparing it to a MacBook Air.

• 1:04:58Nilay Patel?

  Which one?

• 1:04:59Speaker 03

  Doesn't matter. I mean, it was like a 2014.

• 1:05:01Speaker 01

  Yeah, it's a great video. It's really funny. She does a great job.

• 1:05:04Nilay Patel?

  Yeah, that's just wait.

• 1:05:06Speaker 03

  I just, all MacBook Airs are the same. But can we just admit, like, some of them are a little bit faster? But like, if you, if you have a 2000, any, any MacBook Air from like, late 2012, whatever that last model was, up to today, they're the same.

• 1:05:18Nilay Patel?

  They're the same.

• 1:05:18Speaker 03

  They're the same.

• 1:05:19Nilay Patel?

  I put cloud ready on the, Becky's old MacBook, your old MacBook.

• 1:05:23Speaker 03

  Oh, did you?

• 1:05:23Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 1:05:24Speaker 03

  It's slow. Yeah, I tried to put it on my old MacBook Pro and it destroyed it.

• 1:05:30Speaker 03

  It doesn't work anymore.

• 1:05:35Nilay Patel?

  What's amazing, I tried to partition the disk, which is like a weird thing to do mentally with an SSD, I guess. And it just wasn't having it. It's like, the only way you can install this OS is by blowing out the disk. And I was like, what if I just put it on this part of the disk instead and just wouldn't?

• 1:05:50Speaker 03

  Nope, nope.

• 1:05:51Nilay Patel?

  But now I have, now I have a little, little Chromebook.

• 1:05:54Speaker 03

  That's real slow.

• 1:05:56Nilay Patel?

  That's fine. The I O P never worked out either.

• 1:05:59Speaker 03

  If we keep going, I'm going to start talking about USB C adapters and you do not want that.

• 1:06:03Nilay Patel?

  I bought so many USB C adapters out of fear.

• 1:06:06Speaker 03

  I have gone, I have gone through three docks and the fourth one is waiting for me at my apartment because they're all garbage. Every single one is garbage.

• 1:06:13Speaker 01

  That's unacceptable.

• 1:06:14Speaker 03

  Yep.

• 1:06:14Speaker 01

  Like, that's really unacceptable.

• 1:06:15Nilay Patel?

  That's a new technology.

• 1:06:19Nilay Patel?

  Technology.

• 1:06:20Speaker 01

  The whole like Apple build it and they will come situation is just like.

• 1:06:25Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 1:06:26Speaker 01

  Unacceptable.

• 1:06:26Nilay Patel?

  That happened with the first USB too. Every first, the, all the USB devices that came out around in the first iMac were garbage. And they were all for some reason, clear blue. They were all made of clear blue.

• 1:06:36Speaker 02

  The iMac was clear.

• 1:06:37Nilay Patel?

  Yeah, but they never matched the color correctly.

• 1:06:40Speaker 02

  Oh, right, right.

• 1:06:41Nilay Patel?

  Like the iMac was at like aquamarine.

• 1:06:43Speaker 01

  Right, right, right.

• 1:06:44Nilay Patel?

  Bondi blue. Uh, and all this stuff was like, yeah, it's close enough. Like they held up the Pantone scanner to like a computer screen. Like, ah, we got it. Anyway, a sad note to end the show, I think.

• 1:06:57Speaker 03

  Melancholy.

• 1:06:57Nilay Patel?

  A melancholy. What is the emotional?

• 1:06:59Speaker 01

  Tortilla pods.

• 1:07:00Nilay Patel?

  What is the emotional time zone of melancholy?

• 1:07:02Speaker 03

  We need to make Vergecast pods. You just put one in a machine that plays a single serving Vergecast.

• 1:07:07Nilay Patel?

  Yeah. What's the?

• 1:07:08Speaker 03

  If they're DRM, they cost $25.

• 1:07:12Speaker 02

  No, they only cost $2, but they're single use and then you have to throw them away.

• 1:07:17Nilay Patel?

  What's the most melancholy place? What's the time zone of that place? That's my emotional time zone. All right, I'm done with this show.

• 1:07:24Speaker 01

  Albany? Albany?

• 1:07:27Nilay Patel?

  I will say Pacific time is the worst time zone.

• 1:07:29Speaker 03

  No, the worst time zone is central.

• 1:07:32Nilay Patel?

  This is over. Okay, look, that was for better or worse.

• 1:07:36Speaker 03

  Worse.

• 1:07:36Nilay Patel?

  It's probably worse. This is the worst Vergecast we've ever done. That was amazing because Ariel was here. It's true. You're the only good thing about this show. The lamp truck was good.

• 1:07:47Speaker 03

  The Vergecast is brought to you by lamp.

• 1:07:50Nilay Patel?

  I will say, the lamp truck fucking killed.

• 1:07:55Nilay Patel?

  Anyhow, that's Vergecast. There's so many better podcasts that you can listen to on theverge.com. Liz and Emily do Verge ESP, which is great. Chris Plant does What's Tech, which is wonderful. Walt and I do Control Alt Delete, which is good only because of Walt Mossberg. We talked about email for 40 minutes yesterday. Get in there. It's nuts. And then there's a bunch of Recode podcasts. Recode Media, Lauren Good does Too Embarrassed to Ask. It's wonderful. And Kara Swisher does Recode Decode.

• 1:08:23Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 1:08:24Nilay Patel?

  So just listen to that stuff for the next two weeks. Tell us what you like, what you don't like. And in two weeks, we'll be back.

• 1:08:29Speaker 01

  There's also what's tech. Did we say what's tech?

• 1:08:31Nilay Patel?

  We said what's tech.

• 1:08:31Speaker 01

  Okay, alright.

• 1:08:32Nilay Patel?

  But let's say it again.

• 1:08:33Speaker 01

  What's tech is great.

• 1:08:34Nilay Patel?

  What's tech twice. You can use those pods twice.

• 1:08:37Speaker 03

  If you haven't, you should follow Circuit Breaker on Facebook, facebook.com/circuitbreaker. If you have, you should tell three friends. And if you don't, then Bill Gates will kill a baby. And if you do tell three friends, everybody gets a free chicken.

• 1:08:52Nilay Patel?

  It's so, it got so dark.

• 1:08:54Speaker 03

  Just.

• 1:08:55Nilay Patel?

  This is why we can't be live. Dieter starts threatening people, promising chickens.

• 1:08:59Speaker 03

  If you don't forward liking the Circuit Breaker Facebook page. Bill Gates is not going to give away free money to everybody.

• 1:09:07Nilay Patel?

  I was at a conference last week and I literally walked around the conference taking people's phones and liking Circuit.

• 1:09:14Speaker 01

  You should also follow Verge Science.

• 1:09:17Nilay Patel?

  You should follow Verge Science.

• 1:09:19Speaker 03

  Yep.

• 1:09:19Speaker 01

  On Twitter.

• 1:09:20Nilay Patel?

  Verge Pop Entertainment.

• 1:09:21Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 1:09:22Nilay Patel?

  Verge Cars, I believe is also one. And then the main Verge channel, just unfollow that one.

• 1:09:27Nilay Patel?

  Balance it out.

• 1:09:30Nilay Patel?

  Alright, we're done. Thank you for listening. Thank you to Squarespace. Thank you to Dieter for breaking my heart.

• 1:09:36Speaker 03

  Oh.

• 1:09:37Nilay Patel?

  Break my heart. Goodbye. Paul.

• 1:09:38Speaker 03

  Paul.

• 1:09:38Nilay Patel?

  Paul.