Planet of the Apps, Verizon unlimited, and Sonos audio

Hey, y’all. This week’s episode of Vergecast is the first in our new studio. And our heroes (Nilay, Paul, and Dieter, in case you were unaware) are still getting used to it. But you can’t see them while you’re listening, so it doesn’t really matter! It’s a new look but it has the same great taste. Topics on this week’s show include: lots of TV talk, including Apple TV and Caavo; more unlimited data plans; a bit of consumer audio speak; and a few anecdotes and reviews sprinkled in. And Megan Farokhmanesh stops by briefly to talk about her experience using a new dating app called Hater. Does she love it or hate it? Tune in to find out. 02:17 - Code Media 03:23 - Apple headlines, iPhone 8 rumors 09:58 - TV stuff 14:34 - Planet of the Apps 21:54 - Caavo 33:32 - Verizon’s new unlimited data plan 40:52 - Hater app with Megan 46:48 - Paul’s weekly segment “Dieter wouldn’t let me make a slurping noise for the name of this segment” 49:08 - This Belle doll will dance for you, but only if you attempt to code 53:08 - Sonos news / consumer audio talk 1:02:28 - Android apps on Chrome OS 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.

• 0:00Nilay Patel?

  Just hit record. Everybody shut up.

• 0:05Nilay Patel?

  Hello. Welcome to the Vergecast, the flagship podcast of verge.com. We're in a fancy new studio. Dieter Bone is here in person. Hello. Which is amazing. Does this volume knob work? Yeah. Yeah. What does this button do? Paul Miller's here, just literally just turning all the knobs and pushing all the buttons. This is a mute. Oh. Yeah, he can be like, ah.

• 0:30Nilay Patel?

  This is for like coffee, right? Yeah, it's a cough button. This is great because I cough. I will say that it's our first episode in our brand new professional studio and we're acting like we're five. But that's fine because we all hopped up on our custom vodka brand, Scissor Vodka, cut through the night. Yep. Snip, snip. Yes. Anyway, it's the Vergecast. We're gonna talk about a whole bunch of stuff. We should get into it. A lot of news this week. Yeah. News all over the place. Just follow. It's just everywhere. I think if you've been listening to the show for some time, you will know that basically all I care about is television. You being Eli Patel. The host of this, the Vergecast. I just don't think we did intros. Well, I said your name.

• 1:15Nilay Patel?

  He said my name. Really? Yeah. He introduced this podcast as a flagship podcast of verge.com. Yeah. He mentioned Scissor Vodka.

• 1:24Nilay Patel?

  All right. I'm just making sure we're checking all the boxes. All the things. Sorry if I like zoned out. I'd like to apologize to our audience. I know you're in your car right now, probably, zooming down the highway. Yeah, looking for adventure.

• 1:38Nilay Patel?

  Looking for love. Whatever comes my way.

• 1:44Nilay Patel?

  It's just been, it's been a really long week. Yeah. It's, you know, every day is an endless wait for a nuclear apocalypse to take hold.

• 1:55Nilay Patel?

  And we're just gonna be a little silly this week. But there's news. There's like a lot of news. Okay, let's go. I'm really sorry I derailed. Please go. Yeah, you derailed by reintroducing me, which is one of, I would say, the most undermining derails of all time. Like, oh, you're about to begin. Hey, what is your name again? I'm sorry. Who are you? No, I'm sorry. Who, who, who are you?

• 2:14Speaker 01

  I'm Paul Miller.

• 2:15Nilay Patel?

  Can you, okay. News.

• 2:17Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 2:17Nilay Patel?

  Lot of news. Code Media was this week. Big show produced by friends over on the Recode side.

• 2:23Speaker 01

  Yeah, a big Code Media this year.

• 2:24Nilay Patel?

  Big Code Media. I was talking to-

• 2:25Speaker 01

  Crazy.

• 2:26Nilay Patel?

  I was talking to Lauren Good last night. He was covering it for us. And she was pointing out the guest lineup from last year to this year broadly similar, right?

• 2:35Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 2:35Nilay Patel?

  There's a guy from Facebook and a guy from Google and an editor of a big thing and like, but the context of all of those people has changed so radically.

• 2:44Speaker 01

  Yep.

• 2:44Nilay Patel?

  The similar answers to similar questions have outsized meaning.

• 2:48Speaker 01

  Yep.

• 2:48Nilay Patel?

  Right? So Dan Rose from Facebook, we gotta do something about fake, or, no, I think his answer was fake news is not like our thing to do. But then Eddie Q from Apple, we gotta take on fake news head on. Google, same answers. Uh, Marty Baron, really, everyone should go watch this interview with Walton Kara. Like, he is exactly the character portrayed in the movie Spotlight.

• 3:11Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 3:11Nilay Patel?

  Like, kinda growling about journalism in that way that you want in old school. Like, he was missing like a glass of scotch and a cigar. Like, you should watch it. It's great. But I wanna focus on the TV stuff that happened there. And a bunch of Apple stuff in general. So let me just read this list of Apple headlines from this week.

• 3:27Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 3:27Nilay Patel?

  Uh, Apple announced WWC 2017 for June 5th.

• 3:30Speaker 01

  San Jose, the Canada of California.

• 3:33Nilay Patel?

  The Canada. Yeah, that's great.

• 3:34Speaker 01

  Everybody forgets it's there. Everybody's really nice. It's really big. It's really spread out. It's actually like surprisingly good living.

• 3:40Nilay Patel?

  I thought Vancouver was the Canada of California.

• 3:42Speaker 01

  Drive away.

• 3:43Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 3:43Speaker 01

  Really far.

• 3:44Nilay Patel?

  Okay.

• 3:45Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 3:45Nilay Patel?

  But anyway, so it's there. Uh, Mark Gurman, big scoop about how Apple can't get their TV stuff together.

• 3:51Speaker 01

  Yep.

• 3:51Nilay Patel?

  Says the next Apple TV will have 4K. He didn't say HDR, but he said a more vivid color palette.

• 3:57Speaker 01

  More beautiful colors, vibrant colors, which means HDR.

• 4:00Nilay Patel?

  Has to mean HDR, cuz you have to build a TV to do anything.

• 4:03Speaker 01

  I got so many thoughts about that TV, about Gurman's article.

• 4:05Nilay Patel?

  Oh, yeah. We gotta talk about that in general. And then Eddie Q at Code Media was like, the future of television for us is interactivity, which is crazy.

• 4:13Speaker 01

  Oh, shoot, I missed the cough button.

• 4:17Speaker 02

  I was choking on my own disbelief at that strategy.

• 4:24Nilay Patel?

  Yeah. Uh, and then there's some rumors the iPhone 8 will have like a function row at the bottom.

• 4:30Speaker 02

  Dude, dude.

• 4:31Nilay Patel?

  Definitely will be a.

• 4:31Speaker 02

  Dude, don't even, don't even.

• 4:33Nilay Patel?

  So, and then, and then Apple showed a trailer for Planet of the Apes.

• 4:38Speaker 02

  Oh, God.

• 4:41Nilay Patel?

  So, just a lot, just like a lot of things. So, we're, uh, let's start, let's start with the iPhone. Cause I know Paul, you have a lot of thoughts about this iPhone.

• 4:49Speaker 02

  Yes.

• 4:49Nilay Patel?

  And Dieter just wants to like basically play his old pre-review.

• 4:52Speaker 02

  It's.

• 4:53Nilay Patel?

  But Paul, why don't you begin?

• 4:55Speaker 02

  Okay, here's the thing. I never know if these rumors are bullshit or not. I'm really bad at keeping track of all the different analysts and their track records and all this stuff. But like a couple of weeks ago, I saw this really cool concept that I kinda like. It's like one of those like edge to edge screen iPhone concepts. And then it puts a contextual button on the screen at the bottom of the screen where the home button is. So imagine the circle around the home button still exists, but now there's various icons. And then like some of the, the, these mockups have like, you can like swipe over for different tools. Or maybe the other tools are just along the bottom. I don't know. It's like, it seems interesting.

• 5:38Nilay Patel?

  Like very touch bar. I mean, they're doing this on the Mac, right?

• 5:41Speaker 02

  And, and so what I'm imagining though, is that you would tap to use that. And then you could still click it to go home.

• 5:49Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 5:49Speaker 02

  And I've been trying to think if that would be confusing and bad and maybe overloading functionality right there.

• 5:55Nilay Patel?

  I already think.

• 5:56Speaker 01

  There's already 80 things that you do at the home.

• 5:58Nilay Patel?

  Unlocking the iPhone is the worst right now. It's not great. It's really bad.

• 6:02Speaker 02

  I've finally gotten used to it, but it took me a while. But I still every once in a while try to double tap when I'm, when the phone is locked and I wanna switch apps. But I forget that it's locked and I double tap and then it goes to the pay thing.

• 6:14Nilay Patel?

  Yeah. And then you're just paying people. You're just shooting your credit card waves at people.

• 6:18Speaker 02

  I've lost a lot of money that way.

• 6:20Nilay Patel?

  That's why I always tail you with an NFC read.

• 6:24Nilay Patel?

  It's just I got one. No, I think unlocking the phone, like, side unlock was pretty iconic. And I get that it's faster with Touch ID and you want more security, dah dah. But it's a little, if it's laggy at all, it's very confusing.

• 6:36Speaker 02

  Well, how do you guys feel about the home button doing anything more?

• 6:41Speaker 01

  Like, no, the home button does too much now.

• 6:43Speaker 02

  Being the home button for the app if you tap it, is that's bad?

• 6:46Speaker 01

  That's bad.

• 6:46Speaker 02

  That's too many things.

• 6:47Speaker 01

  The, the, hitting the home button should take you home. That's like, the reason the iPhone was a successful, like, UX experience, user experience.

• 6:54Speaker 02

  Right.

• 6:55Speaker 01

  UXX.

• 6:56Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 6:56Speaker 01

  The UX experience.

• 6:57Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 6:58Speaker 01

  It's like the ATM machine, but it's UXX.

• 7:00Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 7:01Speaker 01

  Uh, but was that, you hit the home button, you went home and you, you could dump out of whatever confusing screen you're on, no matter what.

• 7:06Speaker 02

  Right.

• 7:07Speaker 01

  They need to maintain that somehow.

• 7:08Speaker 02

  And I'm saying that could still happen. It's just that if you lightly tapped it.

• 7:12Speaker 01

  Then that's Touch ID. That's like, that's, that's how you do your fingerprint. And if you double tap it, it does this. And if you long tap it, it's Siri.

• 7:19Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 7:20Speaker 01

  The button does like 50 things.

• 7:21Speaker 02

  Does a lot of things.

• 7:22Speaker 01

  Um, I just, if you listen to the show, you know me, you know, I'm gonna bring up Palm. I'm just gonna do it really fast.

• 7:28Speaker 02

  Just get through it. It's fine. I don't mind.

• 7:29Speaker 01

  The two things we've heard about this phone is it gonna, it's gonna have inductive wireless charging. So you set it on a charging pad, Palm Pre.

• 7:36Nilay Patel?

  Mm-hmm.

• 7:36Speaker 01

  Uh, and this gesture bar thing on the bottom. Palm Pre.

• 7:42Nilay Patel?

  The Palm Pre's gesture bar is like, it was, it was weirder than this, though.

• 7:46Speaker 01

  It did, you could swipe up on it to.

• 7:50Nilay Patel?

  To bring up that weird, the wavy bar.

• 7:51Speaker 01

  The card view. You could swipe up halfway to bring up the wavy bar.

• 7:54Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 7:54Speaker 01

  To immediately launch something from anywhere, which, by the way, you still can't do on an iPhone.

• 7:59Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 7:59Speaker 01

  Um, and then you could swipe to the left of it to go back, or you could swipe to the right on it to go forward.

• 8:08Speaker 02

  Right. And that's the rumor? It's a gesture bar?

• 8:11Speaker 01

  Well, it's a multi-function bar. So we don't know what those multi, multi-functions will be.

• 8:15Speaker 02

  I don't want mysterious, not that, I, I love the, I love the Pre. I don't want.

• 8:21Nilay Patel?

  Also, you can swipe up on the whole of the new iPhone to reveal a hardware keyboard.

• 8:25Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 8:28Speaker 02

  It's a hard swipe.

• 8:31Speaker 02

  I don't like mysterious functions. That's why the thought of something happening in the home button, because the home button is now also a screen, is more interesting. Like, I have always very much disliked the context menu on Android. Also, right-clicking things is still often mysterious to me.

• 8:52Speaker 01

  Yeah. Well, it's worse on the Mac now, because there's right-click and then there's force-click.

• 8:57Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 8:57Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 8:58Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 8:58Nilay Patel?

  I know. Look, they're obviously going towards this, like, bezel-less screen thing.

• 9:04Speaker 02

  Yeah. If the screen goes all the way.

• 9:06Nilay Patel?

  Right.

• 9:07Speaker 02

  It's not, you're not gonna just use it when you're watching videos in some wrong aspect ratio. Like, it's, they're gonna make something happen down there.

• 9:17Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 9:18Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 9:18Speaker 02

  And this is our chance to say what we want that to be, so then later we can be disappointed.

• 9:27Nilay Patel?

  I think they're just trying to reduce the bezel size of this thing, and the size of the home button creates a bezel size.

• 9:31Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 9:32Nilay Patel?

  So they've gotta do something to make all of the rest of that useful to you. It's not just extra bezel. And I bet Johnny Ive is just not having the idea of a smaller top bezel and a big bottom bezel. He's like, "I can't."

• 9:44Speaker 02

  No.

• 9:44Nilay Patel?

  He's like, "Tim, I can't. I couldn't possibly."

• 9:47Speaker 02

  But you could have a screen.

• 9:48Nilay Patel?

  And he storms away, but the building's a circle, so he comes right back.

• 9:56Speaker 02

  Such a complaint.

• 9:58Nilay Patel?

  All right, let's talk about TV stuff. So that's the Apple TV thing. So, obviously, the Apple TV has been a bit of a mess.

• 10:05Speaker 01

  Yeah. The way I put it is, uh, their, Apple has tried plans A, B, C, D, and E.

• 10:12Nilay Patel?

  So this rumor-

• 10:12Speaker 01

  They've all failed, and now, what we're looking at now, the thing they sold was Plan F.

• 10:16Nilay Patel?

  Right. And Gorman says the current generation Apple TV had been prototyped with coax cable jacks in the back, which I do not understand how that would have worked at all.

• 10:26Speaker 01

  Why not?

• 10:27Nilay Patel?

  Because you can't decode cable without cable card.

• 10:30Speaker 01

  Maybe they would have done a virtual software cable card, and that was one of the deals they were trying to score.

• 10:35Nilay Patel?

  Yeah, maybe, but it's, that's like, it doesn't indicate anything that you put those jacks back there. So like, I get it, maybe, but that's a tough call. You certainly can't be like, buy this and then buy an over-the-air antenna. That's insanity. So they obviously moved towards some cable deal thing. They still haven't been able to get- Any cable single sign on deals for the TV app.

• 10:59Speaker 01

  Yep.

• 10:59Nilay Patel?

  They haven't been able to get Netflix in the TV app.

• 11:01Speaker 01

  Yep.

• 11:02Nilay Patel?

  They haven't been able to get an Amazon app on the Apple TV. Although Eddie Q said it would be coming hopefully soon.

• 11:07Speaker 01

  Really?

• 11:08Nilay Patel?

  He hopes it's soon.

• 11:08Speaker 01

  Hmm, he hopes.

• 11:10Nilay Patel?

  Yeah, but you know.

• 11:11Speaker 01

  You know, it turns out Eddie Q could like make it happen soon if he wanted to.

• 11:15Nilay Patel?

  Yeah, we just he'd have to cut the 30% rate.

• 11:18Speaker 01

  Right.

• 11:18Nilay Patel?

  That's what they want.

• 11:19Speaker 01

  Mm-hmm.

• 11:19Nilay Patel?

  And they're never gonna do that for anybody.

• 11:21Speaker 01

  They have, they do it for everybody on subscriptions after the month. It goes from 30 to 15.

• 11:26Nilay Patel?

  Oh, really?

• 11:27Speaker 01

  And the TV does the stuff with the thing and the.

• 11:29Nilay Patel?

  Yeah, yeah, they're never gonna do, not for, not for Amazon, right?

• 11:33Speaker 01

  I just feel like.

• 11:34Nilay Patel?

  They're never gonna do it for Microsoft and Office.

• 11:36Speaker 01

  Apple's been trying to do this long enough that I don't really need them to do it anymore.

• 11:41Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 11:41Speaker 01

  It's like, my TV situation is pretty much fine. Watch Netflix every once in a while, watch some Hulu.

• 11:48Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 11:48Speaker 01

  Watch some HBO.

• 11:49Nilay Patel?

  Do you have a Roku?

• 11:51Speaker 01

  No, just like Chromecast and web browser and. But like, there's this sense that. Xbox.

• 11:58Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 11:59Speaker 01

  Apple is.

• 12:00Nilay Patel?

  Oh, so this is the other thing.

• 12:01Speaker 01

  Possibly getting out innovated by Amazon right now. By everybody.

• 12:05Nilay Patel?

  By everyone. Uh, the other stat in this Bloomberg report was that their, their sales are falling.

• 12:11Speaker 01

  Yep.

• 12:11Nilay Patel?

  So they don't break it out because it's in other devices and quarter reports, but the CFO of Apple said year over year, Apple TV sales are down.

• 12:18Speaker 01

  Yep.

• 12:18Nilay Patel?

  Um, so then if all they do is come out with a 4K one, which they are easily two years behind them doing.

• 12:24Speaker 01

  Mm-hmm.

• 12:25Nilay Patel?

  Because you, you even like $500 TVs now are like 4K TVs.

• 12:29Speaker 01

  Mm-hmm.

• 12:30Nilay Patel?

  So everyone has one of these panels now if you're buying a TV. And if you're buying a new TV, you might be buying a new box. Right, so you, I understand why you'd still sell the 1080p one because there's a lot of 1080p TVs out there, but everybody buying a new TV wants a new box. So they're gonna do that and they're gonna do HTR and that's it?

• 12:44Speaker 01

  I mean, look, here's what is gonna happen. They're gonna end up hunting and just doing a streaming bundle package, just like Sony D U and just like Sling. It's gonna be disappointing, but they're just gonna do it and it's gonna do fine. They've learned that with like Apple Music, for example, that.

• 13:00Nilay Patel?

  I gotta write this piece.

• 13:01Speaker 01

  It doesn't have to be a game changer for it to be fine for them, like.

• 13:05Nilay Patel?

  I think Apple Music has gotten really good.

• 13:08Speaker 01

  Maybe you should write that story.

• 13:09Nilay Patel?

  I've been wor- it's been in the back of my mind. But it's just, is this it? Is this all they could do? After all that promise?

• 13:16Speaker 01

  Well, so when I saw the, the thing that they're gonna release a 4K HDR Apple TV, I'm like, okay. You know what I'm not expecting from Apple anymore? Like Paul? Like, mind blowing, game changing innovation. Like, I don't expect them to disrupt anything anymore.

• 13:31Nilay Patel?

  Comcast put out an app this week. The Comcast Xfinity Stream App. Which brings live TV in your DVR to your phone.

• 13:38Speaker 01

  Uh huh. Is it an app or is it an operating system?

• 13:43Nilay Patel?

  No one knows.

• 13:44Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 13:44Nilay Patel?

  If the CEO of Comcast could call me and explain to me what he thinks an operating system is, that'd be great. By the way, disclosure, somewhere at Comcast, there's a person who puts some money into Fox Media. He's very sad because every now and again, we talk about Comcast. But anyway, um, it's on the phone. No Xfinity app for the Apple TV.

• 14:01Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 14:02Nilay Patel?

  Which is insane to me.

• 14:04Speaker 01

  Yep.

• 14:04Nilay Patel?

  Right? If Comcast believes the Xfinity X1 platform is an operating system that is expressed through apps. Which is insane, but that is their belief. And it is not on what I would say is probably the most powerful TV set top platform that isn't a game console.

• 14:20Speaker 01

  Right. I was just gonna say that isn't a game console.

• 14:22Speaker 02

  But Apple has probably the least streaming partners, right?

• 14:26Nilay Patel?

  Yeah, well, they, they don't have-

• 14:27Speaker 02

  Also, it's not that powerful, cuz it, the processor in it can't handle 4K.

• 14:31Speaker 01

  Right.

• 14:31Nilay Patel?

  But that doesn't matter for Comcast, right? They're not gonna be in 4K for all. So then, Eddie Q's on stage at Co Media. Peter Kafka's interviewing him. They run the trailer for Planet of the Apps. Which, I will just tell you, you should watch it. What's the word for contact embarrassment?

• 14:46Speaker 02

  Contact embarrassment?

• 14:47Nilay Patel?

  No, there's like an actual word. Chris Grant at Polygon is always on it. But there's some actual word for it. You know when like someone else is-

• 14:51Speaker 02

  Like a contact high but for embarrassment?

• 14:53Nilay Patel?

  Yeah. There's a word for it. But it's so embarrassing.

• 14:56Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 14:57Nilay Patel?

  Right? And like, the Apple-

• 14:58Speaker 01

  And I've, I've seen people trying to apologize for it, like, oh no, it's just like, you, you watch, I don't know, Master Chef, Top, Top Chef Time Cooking Show, Game Show.

• 15:08Nilay Patel?

  That's nothing like being a chef.

• 15:10Speaker 01

  Yeah, therefore, this is, this is the same sort of idea. And you have it- No.

• 15:16Speaker 02

  My pro- I haven't watched the trailer because I have no interest in this show, but my problem.

• 15:20Speaker 01

  Do you watch Shark Tank?

• 15:21Speaker 02

  Is that what? No.

• 15:22Speaker 01

  Have you ever seen Shark Tank?

• 15:24Speaker 02

  Glimpses.

• 15:25Speaker 01

  Imagine Shark Tank.

• 15:26Nilay Patel?

  It's not a tank of sharks.

• 15:28Speaker 02

  I know.

• 15:28Nilay Patel?

  Have you ever seen a tank of sharks?

• 15:29Speaker 02

  I know, no.

• 15:30Speaker 01

  Imagine Shark Tank.

• 15:31Speaker 02

  I tried to find one in Vegas.

• 15:33Speaker 01

  Like, equally corny, equally low rent.

• 15:37Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 15:37Speaker 01

  Um, but the judges are like slightly more famous people who are just on the other side of the prime of their celebrity career.

• 15:46Speaker 02

  Right.

• 15:47Speaker 01

  And.

• 15:47Nilay Patel?

  And one of them is Will I Am.

• 15:49Speaker 02

  And they're judging apps.

• 15:50Nilay Patel?

  Right. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no.

• 15:52Speaker 02

  Is that what happens?

• 15:53Nilay Patel?

  No, no, you got it. It's a little bit backwards. It's a combination of Shark Tank and the voice for nerds.

• 15:59Speaker 01

  Yeah. No, I'm, I'm trying to describe the, why it's embarrassing to watch.

• 16:04Nilay Patel?

  So you go.

• 16:05Speaker 02

  But what you just described sounds pretty great because if all the people had their chairs turned and then you just listened to someone code.

• 16:14Speaker 02

  Then you hit the big button.

• 16:15Nilay Patel?

  So you go.

• 16:16Speaker 02

  Like, that sounds like a good coder.

• 16:18Nilay Patel?

  So the developers go.

• 16:20Speaker 02

  Is that touch typing?

• 16:21Nilay Patel?

  They have to do an escalator pitch while they go up an escalator.

• 16:24Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 16:25Nilay Patel?

  Then they present their idea to a panel of coaches. Who, uh, include Will I Am.

• 16:33Speaker 02

  Mm-hmm.

• 16:33Nilay Patel?

  Who has literally never made a good gadget in his life and I believe is still the creative director of Intel.

• 16:37Speaker 02

  Uh.

• 16:38Nilay Patel?

  It's bad, which is just bad.

• 16:39Speaker 02

  Yep.

• 16:40Nilay Patel?

  Gwyneth Paltrow, who runs Goop, uh, which literally only sells garbage. Uh, Jessica Alba, who runs the Honest Company, which is actually like huge success, except they keep getting sued for lying about not like, not being full of chemical. Well, whatever. Uh, but she's like, that's like probably the highest one.

• 16:56Speaker 01

  Wait, who's the, who's the fourth? It's a, it's a, it's a VC, right? It's a.

• 17:00Nilay Patel?

  Uh, Gary Vaynerchuk.

• 17:01Speaker 01

  Yeah, yeah.

• 17:01Nilay Patel?

  Who runs VaynerMedia. I don't know. He was like a wine vlogger.

• 17:04Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 17:05Nilay Patel?

  He's obviously much more successful than that, but I just like calling him a wine vlogger. So then you pitch your app to them and then they're like, come be on my team. So then like you have to go spend more time with Will I Am.

• 17:16Speaker 01

  Right.

• 17:17Nilay Patel?

  Right. And he's like, add more beats to your product or whatever Will I Am says in meetings when he's a creative director of Intel.

• 17:21Speaker 01

  Because.

• 17:22Nilay Patel?

  And then you go and pitch your, after all the coaching, you go and pitch your idea to a group of investors from Light Speed Capital, who say things like, what's your burn rate? Because that's what VCs always say in every meeting. And then if you win, you get featured placement in the App Store.

• 17:37Speaker 01

  And then the, it's called Planet of the Apps. So the, this, this, the season finale will be out on a beach with a giant statue of Tim Berners-Lee, and the winner will have realized that they destroyed the open web. And he'll scream, you maniacs!

• 17:52Speaker 02

  This is my thing. If you're gonna use a pun for the name of a thing, it can't be like one letter off like that. It's just too confusing. Every time I see headlines, like, oh, there's another Planet of the Apps movie? Is James Franco in it?

• 18:05Nilay Patel?

  So then there's that and there's Carpool Karaoke and they're doing that. So those are the two shows they're doing. That's their big attempt to take on Netflix and Amazon.

• 18:14Speaker 01

  It's just like, but there's like a rumor that they were gonna buy Ron Howard's.

• 18:18Nilay Patel?

  Sure. I mean, there's rumors, but you know what exists? Planet of the Fucking Apps.

• 18:21Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 18:22Nilay Patel?

  And if that's how you're planning to take on House of Cards and every Marvel Defenders movie and transparent, like, that's not gonna work for you. And then Eddie Q is like, the future of this is interactivity. Right? Like, we're gonna do CNN and people are gonna vote on their iPhones about whether they like various executive orders. And it's like, that, A.

• 18:43Speaker 02

  You know what that sounds like? Multimedia.

• 18:46Nilay Patel?

  That's how, first of all, it sounds like American Idol, like.

• 18:49Speaker 02

  Like, I got a copy of Macromedia Director, guys.

• 18:52Speaker 01

  Right? That's some CD-ROM shit right there.

• 18:54Nilay Patel?

  No, like, I did a video when Microsoft's doing Xbox One. I remember this distinctly because it was mind blowing the way he was talking about it, Xbox Live back in the day, like, we're gonna, we're gonna bring TV to Xbox One. And, you know, their vision was, American Idol is the world's biggest video game. Right? You watch an hour-long cutscene. There's an interactive portion, and then you watch an hour-long cutscene. And if we can bring that truly to the Xbox, da-da-da-da-da. He's like, these are video games. Three years later, Apple's like, we're gonna do voting online.

• 19:25Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 19:26Nilay Patel?

  With the Apple TV. And it's like, I don't think that you are. Like, I don't, those are video games. Right? If you want to make your thing a video game console.

• 19:34Speaker 01

  Right.

• 19:34Nilay Patel?

  You should just make a video game console.

• 19:36Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 19:37Nilay Patel?

  That's interactive TV. Like, that's how people interact with their TVs all day long.

• 19:41Speaker 01

  I do it frequently.

• 19:45Nilay Patel?

  Uh, so I just don't know what they're up to.

• 19:47Speaker 01

  Voting on the Apple TV, can the first poll be, do you know which way is up on your Apple TV remote?

• 19:53Nilay Patel?

  Yeah. Everyone's like, no, they're like, get it wrong. Uh, it's just like, it was just a very, I just think about TV all the time. And Apple has been talking about TV. It's been a hobby. They think it's such an area of intense interest. Like, they keep saying these things about it.

• 20:08Speaker 01

  Mm-hmm.

• 20:09Nilay Patel?

  But they're just landing at the same place Microsoft was three years ago.

• 20:15Speaker 01

  Yep.

• 20:16Nilay Patel?

  Which is, we can't get the deals, we'll sit next to it, everyone else's apps can be on our thing, and we're gonna chase after some activity. They have the scale to do things in a way that no one else can do, but their product is not as good as a Roku right now.

• 20:31Speaker 01

  Apple TV is Apple's Windows phone.

• 20:35Nilay Patel?

  Whoa. Boom. And this show's over. I'm just hitting this mute button right now. Sorry.

• 20:42Nilay Patel?

  It's poor Andrew.

• 20:42Speaker 01

  It's got a tile interface?

• 20:44Nilay Patel?

  Yeah. No, it, the German, his report, everyone should go read on Bloomberg. They said they tried big new interface ideas and they didn't break away from that.

• 20:52Speaker 01

  I bet you can get Angry Birds on Apple TV.

• 20:55Nilay Patel?

  I don't know. It's just, to me, it's a thing. And then, there's all the big, there's all the big TV news at code, which is, I'm obsessed with.

• 21:02Speaker 01

  Right. You should read an ad before we get into this thing.

• 21:04Nilay Patel?

  I should read an ad?

• 21:05Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 21:08Nilay Patel?

  But anyway, today's episode of The Vergecast is brought to you by Crizal No-Glare Lenses. If you wear glasses and you have fingerprints, smudges, scratches, and glares, it can be a constant obstruction to your vision, a huge distraction. Sometimes you're focusing more on what's on your glasses than what's going on around you. That's why everyone should love Crizal No-Glare Lenses. They give you the clearest vision possible by offering resistance to glare, scratches, and smudges. That means no more blinding glares from the headlights of oncoming traffic while driving at night, no more fingerprints from taking your glasses on and off, or scratches from cleaning your lens on a shirt. And because Crizal No-Glare Lenses stay clear and reduce distracting glare, your friends and family can actually see your eyes, not just your glasses, and then know what's in your heart. Look better, feel better, and most importantly, be prepared for whatever comes your way with clear vision. Go to Crizal.com to learn more. That's C-R-I-Z-A-L dot com. Start living life in the clear.

• 21:54Nilay Patel?

  Alright, so this Kavo thing.

• 21:56Speaker 01

  Kavo. Game changing something.

• 21:58Nilay Patel?

  Kavo? I said it was game changing.

• 22:00Speaker 01

  How many As in Kavo?

• 22:01Nilay Patel?

  Two As.

• 22:01Speaker 01

  Kavo.

• 22:02Nilay Patel?

  Two As, one O.

• 22:03Speaker 01

  Kavo.

• 22:03Nilay Patel?

  A lot of people think it's Kavo, which is actually just a delicious sparkling wine.

• 22:07Speaker 01

  Right.

• 22:07Nilay Patel?

  That's the end of that.

• 22:08Speaker 01

  Kavo. It's a big, wide, flat box. Imagine a coffin. Well, it's like, I don't know.

• 22:14Nilay Patel?

  It's not a coffin.

• 22:16Speaker 01

  It's like two feet wide, like three inches thick, right?

• 22:18Nilay Patel?

  When Dieter said, "Imagine a giant box," you went to coffin?

• 22:24Speaker 01

  It has a word picture. HDMI inputs. Imagine a rebound board. IR blaster. Made out of wood. And some other, a couple other inputs. And it does a bunch of stuff that you expect a TV box with HDMI inputs to do. So like, you plug in an Apple TV, it knows it's an Apple TV. You plug in-

• 22:41Nilay Patel?

  You don't expect other TV boxes to do that.

• 22:43Speaker 01

  You can identify it over HDMI CEC. It's like, oh my God, they're doing all this stuff with HDMI CEC. Wait a minute. HDMI CEC is a garbage standard. Almost nothing supports it. No, actually, a lot of things support it, but they support it in like inaccurate, non-standard, weird different ways. The Xbox One doesn't support it at all. Most graphics cards don't support it. So-

• 23:01Nilay Patel?

  I'm just gonna-

• 23:01Speaker 01

  You look at it and they, they create an interface that controls everything. A single interface for all of your boxes. And you're like, how the hell do they do that? And then Neelai knows.

• 23:10Nilay Patel?

  I do. So the way to think about this is actually not that it's a box. I think they screwed up really bad by saying to anyone that it was a box, by revealing the box, any of that.

• 23:21Speaker 01

  It's not the box.

• 23:22Nilay Patel?

  It doesn't matter. Yeah.

• 23:25Nilay Patel?

  And then Gwyneth Paltrow's head. It's really weird. Really weird demo. Walt and Lauren, we're just so disturbed.

• 23:33Nilay Patel?

  A great movie, that's seven. And then Kevin Spacey was there.

• 23:36Speaker 01

  You know, you know what's gonna happen when they want to make the Kavo 2?

• 23:38Nilay Patel?

  What's that?

• 23:39Speaker 01

  They're gonna want to put more HDMI ports in it, and they're gonna resurrect the Taco Bell dog.

• 23:44Nilay Patel?

  Oh my God. Okay.

• 23:45Speaker 01

  And he's gonna say-

• 23:46Nilay Patel?

  Here's what they should have said to people.

• 23:47Speaker 01

  We need a bigger box.

• 23:49Nilay Patel?

  This is the worst episode that we've ever done. Here's what they should have said to people. "We built the world's best universal remote. It costs $400, which is $100 more than the Harmony Elite, but it can control everything in Iraq with 100% accuracy." It can do search, it can find content anywhere that you want, you can use all your regular remotes. It's the world's best remote control. That's all they should have said. Sure. Because all that's happening is that, you know, this huge box they built is just a big input switcher. Mm-hmm. And then you can like search for things, it puts up loading screens while it operates the interface for you in the back. How does it work? They didn't want to tell anyone and they went down this other line about search and discovery.

• 24:32Nilay Patel?

  But it's doing this crazy thing where I called them at 9:30 at night and I basically yelled, I figured it out, you have to tell me. And they very sheepishly told me that they are monitoring the HDMI stream of every input, recognizing what's on the screen and then issuing commands intelligently based on what the system sees. So they're doing like AI control of these devices. So it has an IR blaster, it has HDMI-CC as API control. But literally their, their interface is like clicking around and watching the interface move and reacting to it just like a person. Mm-hmm. Which is amazing. So like if you've been listening to the show for years, you know that I don't like IR blasters.

• 25:14Speaker 02

  I, that's why I'm so surprised that you're...

• 25:17Nilay Patel?

  Cause why do, why do you not like IR blasters? IR blasters are state-based devices. So I have a regular Harmony, I push the button, it fires a macro. So like it just fires a macro off of my TV, it turns on the receiver, sends an input code to the receiver, it turns on a TV. And then it's, it, it thinks, no matter what else happens, the remote believes that it's on, it's set to, set up to watch TiVo. If I screw something up, the remote's broken, right? This is a big problem with IR blasters. Or you have an Xbox One, it controls your cable box, it fires off a channel number, it misses one channel, the channel number's screwed up. You gotta, this is the reason it's bad.

• 25:52Speaker 02

  So you don't just hate the idea of blasting IR, you hate the end result.

• 25:56Nilay Patel?

  As a human being, holding a remote, you're, you know, you're like a meatbag IR blaster.

• 26:01Speaker 02

  So here's my...

• 26:02Nilay Patel?

  But it works because your brain can like compensate for the failure of IR as a, as a, a reliable communication channel.

• 26:09Speaker 02

  This is technically very impressive and I'm so happy for them.

• 26:13Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 26:14Speaker 02

  But there's something to me that feels like if you got to this point... Kavo didn't do anything wrong, but somewhere.

• 26:21Nilay Patel?

  The whole industry did something wrong.

• 26:23Speaker 02

  Somewhere, somewhere along the line, really messed up.

• 26:26Nilay Patel?

  Like you, it's easier and more, you know, they have investors, I'm sure their investors want some return, blah, blah. It's easier and potentially more lucrative to deploy machine vision and television surveillance into American homes. Than to fix IR blasters and like.

• 26:42Speaker 01

  Or to make a deal with Comcast.

• 26:44Nilay Patel?

  Or to make a deal with Comcast.

• 26:45Speaker 02

  Or to make HDMI CEC work.

• 26:47Nilay Patel?

  Yeah, you don't need all this stuff. If Apple has deals to get TV on their box, right? To have Amazon on their box. Everyone else runs into the deal problem. Everyone else runs into the control problem. We're just gonna deploy Skynet. And that'll fix it. And like, that's where they've gotten and it looks brilliant.

• 27:02Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 27:03Nilay Patel?

  So I, you know, I talked to them at length. They're like, they're not ready to launch the thing. They're a little sheepish to admit that they're doing this vision. I think they have some data and privacy problems.

• 27:11Speaker 01

  You think that Apple's gonna like.

• 27:12Nilay Patel?

  How do you block it?

• 27:13Speaker 01

  Uh, you can block it with HDMI, you know.

• 27:16Speaker 02

  An HTTP?

• 27:17Speaker 01

  HTTP shit.

• 27:18Nilay Patel?

  You can't, so you can't, right? Like I, my receiver can do.

• 27:22Speaker 01

  No, it'll only play to content, it'll only play on devices that support HTTP.

• 27:27Nilay Patel?

  No, it's fine. So it's in the HTTP chain. I asked him this question.

• 27:30Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 27:30Nilay Patel?

  So my, I have a Pioneer receiver, right? Everything's plugged into HDMI. It passes HTTP, but it can do picture tuning.

• 27:37Speaker 01

  Sure.

• 27:38Nilay Patel?

  Right? It can modify the HTTP signal because it's in the chain.

• 27:42Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 27:43Nilay Patel?

  And the only output of the chain is a protected device.

• 27:47Speaker 01

  Ah.

• 27:49Nilay Patel?

  Right? So you can't break HTTP and send it somewhere else, but you can sit in the protected chain.

• 27:55Speaker 02

  Wait, isn't this gonna screw up like latency for video games?

• 27:58Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 27:59Nilay Patel?

  Um, it depends. It's, it, it just depends.

• 28:02Speaker 02

  Like almost every smart TV, like they recommend you basically go through, turn off every setting.

• 28:08Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 28:08Speaker 02

  So that it doesn't do anything, get the minimum latency.

• 28:11Nilay Patel?

  I think for most people, they might not notice, for super hardcore gamers, you're still gonna want your console plugged into whatever special input your TV has.

• 28:17Speaker 01

  I wonder if it'll.

• 28:18Nilay Patel?

  Yeah, I mean, there's also, they're like HDR, like I, I actually can't use PSVR because it ruins HDR because it can't do HDR through the PSVR.

• 28:25Speaker 01

  Oh my god.

• 28:25Nilay Patel?

  Um, so, so, okay, but like, Apple could like, they could literally like.

• 28:30Speaker 01

  Glitch the screen in a way that a human eye can't see, but it would screw up the machine learning like they could do some like-

• 28:34Nilay Patel?

  There's a million things. So the Apple one is particularly, Paul, like you're like, how did we get here?

• 28:40Speaker 01

  Hmm.

• 28:40Nilay Patel?

  There's no API for the Apple TV. There's no way to pass a link to like Netflix and the Apple TV.

• 28:45Speaker 01

  Right.

• 28:46Nilay Patel?

  So when you say, I want to watch Netflix and you've set the Apple TV as your default Netflix provider, it literally puts up a blue screen that says loading and then behind that screen starts furiously clicking around the Apple TV interface for the Cavo app that you have preloaded.

• 29:04Speaker 01

  Hmm.

• 29:04Nilay Patel?

  Finds it, opens it. That app doesn't do anything except wait for a deep link sent to it from the Cavo cloud, which it then passes to the Netflix app on the Apple TV. That is the hackiest hack, right? Like-

• 29:17Speaker 01

  This is Chromecast.

• 29:18Nilay Patel?

  Yeah, but like that's where they've had to go.

• 29:20Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 29:21Nilay Patel?

  It's insanity and that's where they are and it works better. It works pretty fast. You can watch the video. Walton Lauren did the demo on stage. You can watch it. It works pretty fast, but that's where we are. And I think it might be the single best remote-

• 29:35Speaker 01

  You're getting one of these.

• 29:36Nilay Patel?

  I'm absolutely getting one.

• 29:37Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 29:38Nilay Patel?

  I have, I haven't upgraded my Harmony one to a Harmony Elite because I think the Harmony Elite is so bad.

• 29:42Speaker 01

  Yeah, it is not good.

• 29:43Nilay Patel?

  So I have this like decrepit Harmony one and I keep buying refurbished batteries on eBay for it.

• 29:50Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 29:50Nilay Patel?

  Cause they're still NiCad batteries.

• 29:51Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 29:52Nilay Patel?

  They die really fast. So like if I'm going to spend 300 bucks on a Harmony one, I might as well spend $400 on like the future and have Terminator.

• 30:00Speaker 01

  Until it gets broken.

• 30:01Nilay Patel?

  I don't think, how do you break it?

• 30:03Speaker 01

  You did, you find ways. I don't know, man. Somebody will feel like they're going to get sued.

• 30:07Nilay Patel?

  If you break it, then you are effectively breaking a human being's ability to operate your system too, right?

• 30:13Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 30:13Nilay Patel?

  Right? They're just watching the screen and issuing IR commands, which is what people do.

• 30:20Nilay Patel?

  Like they it I think I think they are the reason they were so unwilling to talk about it is because they have so much power. That what they want is deals, but they don't want everyone to be mad at them.

• 30:30Speaker 01

  Oh, they just they want to be built into the next Samsung TV.

• 30:33Nilay Patel?

  Yeah, I think there's a million potential or they want to be the next Apple TV.

• 30:37Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 30:38Nilay Patel?

  And Apple, this is a reason for Apple to actually make a TV. Right?

• 30:42Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 30:43Nilay Patel?

  You can plug everything into it and you can just talk to Siri and Siri will find it for you and you're done.

• 30:48Speaker 01

  Oh, man, yeah.

• 30:49Nilay Patel?

  Right? Like, that's pretty wild. It's very hacky. It's very un Apple in that way because it's not integrated.

• 30:54Speaker 01

  Right.

• 30:55Nilay Patel?

  But it's smart.

• 30:56Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 30:56Nilay Patel?

  By the way, every smart TV.

• 30:57Speaker 01

  They made Sherlock once.

• 30:59Nilay Patel?

  But every smart TV already does this kind of content detection.

• 31:02Speaker 01

  Yep.

• 31:03Nilay Patel?

  So, you know, if you're LG or Sony or whatever, and you're already like, know what's on the screen, it's like kind of a short jump. To this.

• 31:13Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 31:13Nilay Patel?

  Although Walt says you talk to them and they have like 54 patents.

• 31:17Speaker 01

  Maybe that's enough.

• 31:18Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 31:18Speaker 01

  I mean, who knows?

• 31:19Nilay Patel?

  I think it's genius.

• 31:20Speaker 01

  You see this idea and then you do sort of look at like Samsung and LG and Sony be like, why didn't you think of that?

• 31:26Nilay Patel?

  Well, why didn't you figure this out forever ago?

• 31:27Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 31:28Nilay Patel?

  Um, but you know, sometimes you gotta be bold.

• 31:31Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 31:32Nilay Patel?

  It's I think it's one of those ideas. It's so obvious. It's like, I was saying to Walt yesterday, like the reason I'm so excited about this is not because I really want another universal remote or I think everyone should get it or whatever. It's just the first application of machine learning and vision to a consumer product that seems so smart. It's like a new thing. It's a totally new idea.

• 31:52Speaker 01

  It's true. You know what? I'm sorry I was skeptical.

• 31:54Nilay Patel?

  Right. It's just, how often do you see wild new products like this? Like usually we're like the phone, the button is going to be a wider button.

• 32:02Speaker 01

  I mean, this is literally a robot that helps you watch TV.

• 32:05Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 32:05Speaker 01

  By watching it for you and doing all the button clicking.

• 32:08Nilay Patel?

  And then tracking everything that you watch.

• 32:10Speaker 01

  This is like the older brother. Can it look at the screen on Titanfall and make me good at that video game?

• 32:16Nilay Patel?

  That'd be amazing, right?

• 32:18Speaker 01

  You'd also get banned because that's called aimbot. God damn it.

• 32:21Nilay Patel?

  Yeah, but that's like wild, right? Like, ah, anyway, I'm super into it. They're coming out in June.

• 32:26Speaker 01

  Mm hmm.

• 32:27Nilay Patel?

  Are there pre orders in June? They're only going to sell 5,000 this year because they're going slow. I think they're slow rolling because they know how much power they have. I'm telling you. Also, it's $400, which is insane. But I think if they just said, "We've built the first true universal control for television."

• 32:40Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 32:40Nilay Patel?

  They would have changed everything about how they're perceived.

• 32:44Speaker 01

  And you can hook it up to your Alexa, and like, you just tell your Alexa to do the thing. So you don't have to use their stupid little remote. You can do the thing that Apple originally was supposed to do on the Apple TV and didn't, which is just bark commands into the room. And this time, it might actually work in the way that it never really worked that well on the Xbox.

• 32:59Nilay Patel?

  Yeah. I gotta say that-

• 33:01Speaker 01

  Why doesn't Microsoft support HDMI-CC?

• 33:04Nilay Patel?

  Ah, never mind. Cause, uh, the TVs that people call Xboxes into don't have it. Only 40% of TVs have it.

• 33:10Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 33:11Nilay Patel?

  But Scorpio, they put out invites for E3. Project Scorpio's coming.

• 33:14Speaker 01

  They're doing their, uh, their keynote a day early, I think.

• 33:17Nilay Patel?

  Yeah. So those happened this week.

• 33:19Speaker 01

  Yep.

• 33:19Nilay Patel?

  4K Xbox.

• 33:20Speaker 01

  And WWDC got invites for that.

• 33:23Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 33:23Speaker 01

  We got like, all the June events, man.

• 33:25Nilay Patel?

  It's good. It's fucking February, people. Let us breathe.

• 33:29Speaker 01

  I'm planning for CES again.

• 33:30Nilay Patel?

  I hate it. Alright. Did you tell me about unlimited data plans?

• 33:34Speaker 01

  No.

• 33:37Speaker 01

  Uh, Verizon finally like capitulated and said, "Alright, we're doing unlimited data." And I was like, "What?" Uh, and-

• 33:45Nilay Patel?

  By the way, I just coughed for real and didn't hit the mute button.

• 33:47Speaker 01

  Yeah. Verizon's unlimited data plan seems fine.

• 33:52Nilay Patel?

  It's 22 gigs?

• 33:52Speaker 01

  It's 22 gigs, and then they may or may not throttle you. It's 10 gigs of tethering, and I think video is capped at 720p.

• 33:59Nilay Patel?

  And it's like 85 bucks a month?

• 34:01Speaker 01

  And it's like 85, 75, 85 bucks a month. Or 45 per line on for a family, you know?

• 34:05Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 34:06Speaker 01

  Stuff.

• 34:06Nilay Patel?

  Numbers.

• 34:07Speaker 01

  Cost of money of things.

• 34:10Nilay Patel?

  You know, 80 for a single line.

• 34:12Speaker 01

  What's more interesting is Verizon did it, and then all of a sudden, everybody else that had been doing their unlimited plans started to fall in fucking line. T-Mobile changed their policies regarding, um, HD video and I think tethering.

• 34:26Nilay Patel?

  They got rid of the day passes.

• 34:28Speaker 01

  Yep. And then Sprint, uh, cleaned up a little bit of it after first, well, the first thing Sprint did was send out a catty press release saying, "Well, our unlimited plan is better." Um, and then they actually changed it so that it was better.

• 34:39Nilay Patel?

  Well, it's like a limited time promo.

• 34:40Speaker 01

  So we're getting a, yeah, we're getting like a standardized- Set of unlimited wireless features. The only real problem with which I have is 720p cap on video. But, okay, we could talk through that.

• 34:53Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 34:53Speaker 01

  And I also, somewhere deep down in my body, get annoyed that they treat tethered data differently from untethered data.

• 35:02Nilay Patel?

  Yes. Data is data. Bits are bits.

• 35:04Speaker 01

  Bits are bits.

• 35:05Nilay Patel?

  Free the stream.

• 35:06Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 35:06Speaker 02

  I thought I was gonna switch off of T-Mobile, maybe.

• 35:08Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 35:09Speaker 02

  Because it wasn't doing very well for me. And I didn't think I liked this new unlimited thing.

• 35:14Speaker 01

  Mm-hmm.

• 35:15Speaker 02

  But then I realized, like, just recently, that I have not stressed about my data cap in so long, and it feels really nice.

• 35:25Nilay Patel?

  Huh. I don't stress about mine.

• 35:27Speaker 01

  I don't stress about mine, but I do stress about the fact that I pay 150 bucks a month for my single line on Verizon, which is bonkers.

• 35:33Nilay Patel?

  Guys.

• 35:33Speaker 01

  What?

• 35:34Nilay Patel?

  I literally have breaking news from the New York Times. Samsung's vice chairman was arrested and jailed after being accused of paying 36 million in bribes in exchange for political favors. Literally, the Times.

• 35:44Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 35:44Nilay Patel?

  A minute ago, just hit me with that.

• 35:45Speaker 01

  Wow.

• 35:46Nilay Patel?

  I don't know how else to react to that, except it's just not, not a great, like, string for Samsung.

• 35:52Speaker 01

  Well, they narrowly avoided having problems with their president.

• 35:55Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 35:56Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 35:56Nilay Patel?

  I mean, they're just gonna bring down the government of South Korea. Look, it's the end times.

• 36:00Speaker 01

  Mm-hmm.

• 36:00Nilay Patel?

  Can we be clear?

• 36:01Speaker 01

  Mm-hmm.

• 36:01Nilay Patel?

  Doesn't matter how many fake screen buttons you put on your phone.

• 36:04Speaker 01

  Let's be clear, "The World Is Over," sponsored by Crisal.

• 36:09Speaker 02

  At least it's not smudgy.

• 36:12Speaker 01

  What about?

• 36:13Nilay Patel?

  Obviously, the end times.

• 36:14Speaker 02

  What about "Cut Through the Apocalypse"?

• 36:16Speaker 01

  Ooh.

• 36:18Nilay Patel?

  Hey, you know, vodka, one of the easiest booze is to make.

• 36:21Speaker 01

  Mm-hmm.

• 36:22Nilay Patel?

  Scissor vodka, you can make it out anything. You got a pair of old boots.

• 36:27Speaker 02

  Scissor vodka is like the soylent of vodka as we publish our recipe.

• 36:32Speaker 01

  There's all these, like, flavored vodkas out there, but scissor vodka's flavors are, like, hobo.

• 36:37Nilay Patel?

  Boots. Garbage fire. Oh, my God, it tastes just like, just like this barrel fire that I was at during the end times. Cut through the night, because you have no choice.

• 36:49Speaker 01

  Snip, snip.

• 36:50Nilay Patel?

  It's always night now.

• 36:53Speaker 01

  Because we haven't seen the sun in four years.

• 36:59Nilay Patel?

  It's just really, it's just not a good episode of the show. Anyway, uh, so that's unlimited data plans.

• 37:05Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 37:05Nilay Patel?

  Um, I will say, uh, uh, thank you to all the listeners who have been tweeting at Ajit Pai.

• 37:11Speaker 01

  Please continue to do so.

• 37:12Nilay Patel?

  Keep doing it. I think this week I'm gonna start retweeting all your tweets if you tweet.

• 37:15Speaker 01

  Are you retweeting? I've been faving. Cause I'm hoping he gets the fave alerts. Someone liked the thing, because it's a little bit less aggressive than retweeting.

• 37:23Nilay Patel?

  I'm just going for it.

• 37:23Speaker 01

  You're just gonna go for it?

• 37:24Nilay Patel?

  I've been emailing the FCC basically like every day. Um, he's gonna go on Fox Business.

• 37:28Speaker 01

  What?

• 37:29Nilay Patel?

  He just announced it today. His first interview as chairman will be on Fox Business News. He had like a weird little radio interview today.

• 37:34Speaker 01

  But FM radios that are built, like, so every phone for the last whatever has got an FM radio in it. And sometime, they used to turn them on like back in the early mid 2000s. Uh, you could like plug in a set of wired headphones into a 3.5 millimeter jack.

• 37:48Nilay Patel?

  And listen to the radio.

• 37:49Speaker 01

  How an Aquarian who would ever plug headphones into a smartphone.

• 37:53Speaker 02

  I feel like the only phone-

• 37:54Speaker 01

  They served as the antenna so you could listen to FM radio.

• 37:56Speaker 02

  Oh, that's right. Yeah, I feel like the only phones that ever had FM radio turned on were phones that did not have 3.5 millimeter. Because we all remember, there was a, there was a phase where smartphones did not have 3.5 millimeter.

• 38:08Nilay Patel?

  Time is a flat circle, except for when time comes to a swift and decisive end. And we're drinking our boot vodka in the eternal night. Uh, it's fun. Um.

• 38:19Speaker 01

  Anyway, if you, if you, if you ask- That's the secret, Mr. Ajit Pai to come on the first cast. It's like a really easy, really easy retweet from us.

• 38:28Nilay Patel?

  Yeah, if you're ever looking for that, do it. Um, I will say, I, there's so much happening in the Trump administration lately. That I think Pai trying to wade into the net neutrality title two debate. I, if I were him, I would just be like, you know.

• 38:44Speaker 01

  I'm just gonna hang out.

• 38:45Nilay Patel?

  I'm just, I'm just gonna pull back for a minute. We're gonna let the AT&T Time Warner thing happen. Right, there's like, there's enough going on. And I think the cable, like the carriers are, they're happier with stability than instability.

• 38:58Speaker 02

  Yeah, it's already a bit of a policy change that like, you know, like, hey, we decided not to go after this or look into that.

• 39:04Speaker 01

  Yeah, they're like, they're cool zero rating.

• 39:06Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 39:07Speaker 01

  But so in a sense, there's already a bit of a rollback in that.

• 39:10Nilay Patel?

  And, and Paul, to your point.

• 39:12Speaker 01

  Hang on, maybe he wants to kill net neutrality before the apocalypse so that he's got that set.

• 39:17Nilay Patel?

  And he's got the one, he's got the one antenna with like the radio wave.

• 39:21Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 39:21Nilay Patel?

  And he's got the wall around him and everyone's like, I just want to send him that.

• 39:24Speaker 01

  Wait, that's why he wants the antenna, the FM antennas turned on in smartphones. Because when the end comes, it's the only way we're going to be able to get any information.

• 39:33Nilay Patel?

  It's the only way that we'll be able to contact Will Smith on the deck of the Intrepid.

• 39:37Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 39:38Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 39:38Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 39:39Nilay Patel?

  That was an I am legend reference.

• 39:40Speaker 01

  I got you.

• 39:40Speaker 02

  I got it.

• 39:41Nilay Patel?

  Do you know that movie?

• 39:42Speaker 02

  There's a dog.

• 39:43Nilay Patel?

  He's the vampire.

• 39:49Nilay Patel?

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• 40:34Nilay Patel?

  no matter how technical or trivial. So start your free trial today at Squarespace.com. Enter offer code VERGE, you get 10% off your first purchase, plus a free domain. That's VERGE, V E R G E, for 10% off your first purchase. Squarespace, make your next move, make your next website.

• 40:53Speaker 01

  What's in the box?

• 40:54Nilay Patel?

  What's in the box? Okay, we're gonna get back in the show, but Meghan just stopped by, crashed. She's super, she's about to go see Logan's, she's super excited about that. She's super into this app, where you date people that hate things you do. Meghan, what's up?

• 41:08Speaker 03

  Um, okay, so I wanna talk about this app called Hater that I just started using. It's a dating app, so think of like Tinder, but instead of just swiping on people's faces, because you don't actually read their profiles, you just don't, um, you're swiping on different topics. So it'll be like, hey, what do you think about bees? And you can be like, I hate bees, I love bees, I like bees, or I dislike bees. So, uh, the idea is that it, it matches you based on things you hate, with the idea of like, hey, you'll probably bond faster with things that you both dislike, rather than like, both like this one shitty band, or whatever. Um, but I really like it because, uh, the app has a level of cultural literacy that I've never seen in any other dating app. So it's really nice because it'll have things like the 2016 election, or it'll ask you like, what do you think about All Lives Matter? And so I found, I know, it's, it's some deep shit.

• 41:49Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 41:50Speaker 03

  Um, but no, it's great because people can, on apps, identify as Republican, Democrat, religious, not whatever, but that doesn't really tell you much about like what they actually believe, or things they might disagree with that fall into the general umbrella of whatever their party is. Um, but, by having access to something like, like locker room talk, like what that phrase means to you, it's a really easy way to weed out assholes, honestly. No, I'm just like, let's see, this guy, like, I literally got a guy who's like-

• 42:14Nilay Patel?

  Oh yeah, assholes and racists, this would be great for reading out assholes and racists.

• 42:17Speaker 03

  Exactly, so I swiped on this guy, so like, once you, um, you answer a couple questions, then you can actually start swiping on people once it starts matching you. Um, and so then you have to actually go into their photos, you can see what they like, love, hate, all that shit. Um, but yeah, so I, I found this guy who's like, I love the patriarchy, and All Lives Matter, and Donald Trump, and I was like, I have never rejected a man faster in my life than that man. Yeah, but it's, it's been really great, like-

• 42:40Nilay Patel?

  But he found some like, you know, cheerleader-

• 42:43Speaker 01

  So, hang on, how does this app make money?

• 42:45Speaker 03

  Uh, unclear, it literally just launched, so-

• 42:47Speaker 01

  Okay, so it's collecting some like, deeply personal information about you. So either, it's gonna be totally innocuous, and instead of swiping whether you love or hate, you know- Donald Trump, it's gonna have you swiping whether you love and hate like egos.

• 43:03Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 43:04Speaker 01

  Right?

• 43:04Speaker 03

  I mean, there is some stuff already in there like that, like they have like-

• 43:07Speaker 01

  They know they're gonna be able to do like targeted advertising to you in a way that like Facebook could never do.

• 43:12Nilay Patel?

  Finally, that targeted All Lives Matter advertisement.

• 43:14Speaker 01

  I'm just saying.

• 43:15Speaker 03

  They do have other stuff, like it has like if you like Tinder, if you like Twitter, Facebook, all that stuff is actually in there too.

• 43:21Nilay Patel?

  Interesting.

• 43:21Speaker 01

  Hmm.

• 43:22Nilay Patel?

  So you just started using it? Have you, have you, have you gone on any physical dates yet?

• 43:26Speaker 03

  No, um, I will say that you have to actually try a lot harder than with like Tinder, so like that's just like, you're hot, let's go out. With this, it's more like you really have to sort through and be like, are you a terrible person? Can we actually talk? And then once you actually match with somebody, you can kind of play card games. So you can send them a card and it'll be like a random thing, so you can be like, oh, this card says, uh, I love you like Kanye loves blank. And then they like choose from a list of what they want to say back. It's really cool. But it's nice too, because that way you're not opening every conversation with just like, hey.

• 43:54Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 43:54Speaker 03

  Which is the worst.

• 43:55Speaker 01

  It's literal dating mad libs?

• 43:58Speaker 03

  Pretty much, yeah.

• 43:58Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 43:59Nilay Patel?

  Alright, well you gotta report back when we're all done with it.

• 44:01Speaker 03

  Oh, for sure. I'm gonna find my future husband or wife on there, so.

• 44:05Nilay Patel?

  Based on things you, I will say my relationship with my wife is mostly based on things that we hate together.

• 44:11Speaker 03

  What is the weirdest thing you guys both hate?

• 44:13Nilay Patel?

  It's a lot of things.

• 44:16Nilay Patel?

  I will say the thing that we both collectively hate like the most together as a family, uh, is people who are slow in a left turn lane. Like if you wanna rile us both up instantly, it's that thing. It's like we're in the car.

• 44:32Speaker 01

  Slow in the left, like they, they take the turn too slowly?

• 44:35Nilay Patel?

  Yeah, like the light clicks over.

• 44:36Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 44:36Nilay Patel?

  And they don't go, and both of us are just like off to the races. We're like, we're pulling handguns out of the second compartment. It's, I, I don't know. It's like, if you had to ask me what that, I mean, there's obviously a bunch of politics stuff and all that stuff. But if you, you had to just really drill it down to like, how can you turn this couple into psychopaths? It's that thing.

• 44:57Speaker 01

  Hmm.

• 44:58Nilay Patel?

  What about you?

• 44:59Speaker 01

  Yeah, I don't know. We have nothing that.

• 45:02Nilay Patel?

  Well, you and Lisa hate proprietary platforms.

• 45:04Speaker 01

  We hate proprietary platforms, that's true.

• 45:05Nilay Patel?

  Yeah, as a family.

• 45:06Speaker 03

  That's so dorky.

• 45:08Nilay Patel?

  I mean, have you met them?

• 45:09Speaker 03

  It's really beautiful.

• 45:10Nilay Patel?

  It was just their anniversary and Dieter posted a picture of him and Lisa. It was, I won't say it was posed, because I think it was very natural. But they're hugging, he's in his tux, she's in her wedding dress, and they're looking at phones over each other's shoulders.

• 45:22Speaker 03

  I think I've actually seen this.

• 45:23Nilay Patel?

  It's like the cutest picture.

• 45:25Speaker 03

  Yeah, it's perfect.

• 45:25Speaker 01

  Happy anniversary, Lisa.

• 45:27Nilay Patel?

  Yeah, you're great.

• 45:27Speaker 01

  We both hate puke. I don't know, man.

• 45:29Nilay Patel?

  You hate puke?

• 45:30Speaker 01

  Everybody hates puke.

• 45:31Speaker 03

  I don't know, this app would probably beg to differ, because they're always, like, you can click and see.

• 45:35Nilay Patel?

  Someone's like, I love puke?

• 45:37Speaker 03

  I haven't gotten puke yet. I'm sure it's all.

• 45:39Speaker 01

  When I say hate, I don't mean like, we hate puking, like, Lisa hates that puke exists in the universe. That's a thing that God allowed to happen at all.

• 45:50Nilay Patel?

  Huh.

• 45:50Speaker 01

  And I just don't like it very much, so we share that.

• 45:53Speaker 03

  I think it can be funny sometimes.

• 45:53Nilay Patel?

  Deeply hilarious. And that's a good SNL vomit tube skit? It's gold. You kidding me? Like, they had, like, there was that, like, two or three seasons where they're like, you know, we built these vomit tubes? What if every third sketch ended with, like, a guy holding his hand up to his mouth? All right, Megan, I need to get a run. You're gonna go see Logan.

• 46:17Speaker 03

  I am, yeah.

• 46:18Nilay Patel?

  It's a thing you're gonna do, and then you're gonna come back and tell us all about it.

• 46:20Speaker 03

  And judge it. It's gonna be good.

• 46:21Nilay Patel?

  Yeah. I mean, I have high hopes.

• 46:22Speaker 01

  Please make it good.

• 46:23Nilay Patel?

  I have high hopes.

• 46:24Speaker 03

  I'll do what I can. We'll see. I do love Hugh Jackman for some reason.

• 46:28Nilay Patel?

  Who doesn't?

• 46:29Speaker 01

  He's the best. His Twitter feed is the best.

• 46:31Speaker 03

  Really? Okay.

• 46:32Speaker 01

  He is unrelentingly happy, positive, and kind on his Twitter feed.

• 46:36Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 46:37Speaker 03

  That's so sweet.

• 46:38Nilay Patel?

  And then in the movie, he stabs people with his hand swords. So that's a thing that he does. All right, go see the movie, come back next week and tell us all about it.

• 46:46Speaker 03

  Okay, bye.

• 46:47Nilay Patel?

  Bye. All right, Paul, every week you do a segment.

• 46:50Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 46:51Nilay Patel?

  What's it called, buddy?

• 46:52Speaker 02

  It's called Dieter Won't Let Me Make a Slurping Noise for the name of this segment.

• 46:58Nilay Patel?

  That's true.

• 46:59Speaker 02

  McDonald's is coming out with a limited edition straw.

• 47:03Nilay Patel?

  Do you have to look up the stats on the straw?

• 47:06Speaker 02

  Well, I mean, I could explain it to you.

• 47:09Nilay Patel?

  Isn't it like just a curly?

• 47:10Speaker 02

  Yeah, it's like, it's got a swoop to it. And the basic idea is, so, so imagine like an upside down, like, imagine a J, the letter J, or an upside down peppermint stick.

• 47:22Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 47:23Speaker 02

  Right?

• 47:25Nilay Patel?

  I'm sorry. What?

• 47:28Speaker 02

  Imagine like a candy.

• 47:30Nilay Patel?

  Imagine a hollow J.

• 47:34Nilay Patel?

  How did you learn the alphabet, man?

• 47:37Speaker 02

  There's a hole in the bottom, right? And that's probably where you're gonna get the majority of the milkshake that you're drinking. But also, it snorkels up and there's like more holes because there's apparently a limited edition or like a like a secret menu item that's like mixes the like multiple flavors at the same time. So this allows you to drink two flavors simultaneously. But here's what I, my problem is with Java chip frappuccinos.

• 48:07Nilay Patel?

  Oh my god.

• 48:07Speaker 02

  Where I always get the Java chips stuck in the straw. And I think this could be a way possibly to improve on that, but there's just a limited round of them.

• 48:17Nilay Patel?

  Let me just ask you a question.

• 48:18Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 48:18Nilay Patel?

  Does this count as a gadget?

• 48:20Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 48:20Nilay Patel?

  Okay.

• 48:21Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 48:21Nilay Patel?

  Why?

• 48:22Speaker 02

  I don't know.

• 48:23Nilay Patel?

  Alright.

• 48:24Speaker 02

  Just define gadget.

• 48:25Nilay Patel?

  As long as we're clear that.

• 48:27Speaker 02

  I think, you know what? There's a lot of, a lot of the stuff on the circuit break are clever solutions to problems.

• 48:32Nilay Patel?

  No, I see.

• 48:33Speaker 02

  But they're not always serious problems.

• 48:35Nilay Patel?

  Right.

• 48:37Speaker 02

  And I feel like you can approach technology coverage with, you know what, I'm only gonna cover things that are for serious problems. But sometimes I like covering things that aren't necessarily.

• 48:46Nilay Patel?

  Like J stripes, straws.

• 48:48Speaker 02

  Yeah, for J stripes, yeah.

• 48:52Nilay Patel?

  It's not a phrase you can say out loud. Try it.

• 48:54Speaker 02

  The other thing.

• 48:54Nilay Patel?

  Wait, wait, wait. Everyone in your car, and you're driving along, just try to say it.

• 48:58Speaker 02

  Say what?

• 48:59Nilay Patel?

  J shaped straws.

• 49:00Speaker 02

  J shaped.

• 49:03Nilay Patel?

  J shaped straws.

• 49:04Speaker 02

  J, J shaped straws. I got that one. That's good.

• 49:09Nilay Patel?

  Alright, alright.

• 49:09Speaker 02

  The other thing I want to talk about, there's a, um, so the toy fair is coming up.

• 49:13Nilay Patel?

  Oh yeah. Love toy fair.

• 49:14Speaker 02

  And, uh, there's gonna be a lot, everything's for STEM. Everything is helping kids be so smart all the time. And, uh, but there's this, a, a Belle doll, because there's a new Beauty and the Beast movie coming out.

• 49:27Nilay Patel?

  Uh huh.

• 49:28Speaker 02

  And she teaches you how to code.

• 49:31Nilay Patel?

  Into it.

• 49:32Speaker 02

  So you, you use the app and learn how to code and by coding good, she'll dance.

• 49:38Nilay Patel?

  What?

• 49:39Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 49:39Nilay Patel?

  Okay.

• 49:40Speaker 02

  And I thought this was really anachronistic because in the olden times, when Beauty and the Beast is ostensibly set, even though it's a fantasy setting, they didn't have.

• 49:52Nilay Patel?

  Yeah, but like the teapot comes to life.

• 49:54Speaker 02

  Heim told me that to improve the women empowerment situation of Beauty and the Beast, she's gonna be the real inventor in the movie, not her dad.

• 50:03Nilay Patel?

  That makes sense. I like that. I'm into that.

• 50:05Speaker 02

  She's the mind, the great mind behind the.

• 50:08Nilay Patel?

  I'm into it.

• 50:08Speaker 02

  So that's cool.

• 50:09Nilay Patel?

  Can you coat up a talking teapot in kind of like a saucy French chandelier thing?

• 50:14Speaker 02

  Probably. So here's my thing. Here's my thing with coding.

• 50:17Nilay Patel?

  J-shaped candelabra.

• 50:18Speaker 02

  Yeah. I don't think there's a talking chandelier in the movie.

• 50:21Nilay Patel?

  No, it's a candelabra.

• 50:21Speaker 02

  Yeah, it's a candelabra.

• 50:23Nilay Patel?

  Yes.

• 50:23Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 50:24Nilay Patel?

  His name is Lumiere.

• 50:27Speaker 02

  Kind of like Lumen. So, so this idea with coding apps, I think they're awesome. And I think that's a wonderful thing. I just want to, I feel maybe I've even talked about this before.

• 50:38Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 50:39Speaker 02

  Any app that teaches you the concepts of programming, but does not teach you how to actually make a website or an app, like, is good for the mind in the way that playing Scrabble is good for the mind, or any sort of puzzle, or, you know, it's, it's good, it's teaching the sort of logic paths that you do solve in programming.

• 51:03Nilay Patel?

  Mm-hmm.

• 51:04Speaker 02

  But the, I've noticed in my own journey, that's been very, very slow in learning to program, is that some of the basic concepts are obviously very important and need to be learned. Things like loops and variables, objects and classes and stuff like that. But APIs are what are very difficult to learn.

• 51:25Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 51:25Speaker 02

  So, I'm gonna try to write something about this. I gotta form all my thoughts about it. This is my new, my new thing. Like, how, we kind of are learning now how to teach kids about logic branches and loops and stuff like that. But how do you teach kids about how shitty it will be to read half-done documentation for, for core image service?

• 51:50Nilay Patel?

  No, but that's like.

• 51:52Speaker 01

  Because that's so much programming it's really about.

• 51:55Nilay Patel?

  Is like, I think it's right. Isn't the goal more to teach kids like, if you make your brain work this way and understand the systems that are built on these core concepts.

• 52:06Speaker 01

  Hmm.

• 52:07Nilay Patel?

  If you are then so inspired to pursue this career, you will have a foundational knowledge to understand it better.

• 52:14Speaker 01

  No, it's not like, it's that, sure, but I think it's also like, play this game.

• 52:20Nilay Patel?

  Mm hmm.

• 52:21Speaker 01

  And you will get a small reward that will fire off your little pleasure synapses. And then your brain will be trained to enjoy doing this activity. And then you'll be more likely to want to do it for a job because you'll be addicted to code.

• 52:36Nilay Patel?

  Which, which I think. What you will quickly learn in that career is that no one dances when you're done.

• 52:40Speaker 01

  That's right.

• 52:41Nilay Patel?

  They're like, it's buggy.

• 52:42Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 52:44Nilay Patel?

  The ads are too big. That's all they're ever gonna say to you.

• 52:47Speaker 01

  As a parent. So that was a, like, um, scrum joke with like the.

• 52:53Nilay Patel?

  Yeah, I got you.

• 52:53Speaker 01

  User story.

• 52:54Nilay Patel?

  Uh huh.

• 52:54Speaker 01

  User story.

• 52:55Nilay Patel?

  I got you.

• 52:55Speaker 01

  But I forgot the other part of the user story.

• 52:58Nilay Patel?

  What the parent wants. No, I like this thing. I, look, I love this stuff. I think it's cool. We gotta get one. Yeah, I want you to review more Learn to Code gadgets.

• 53:06Speaker 01

  Yeah, I will.

• 53:07Nilay Patel?

  Okay.

• 53:07Speaker 01

  I will.

• 53:08Nilay Patel?

  All right, we got time for one more thing. Dieter, you interviewed the CEO of Sonos. That's why.

• 53:11Speaker 01

  Yeah, Lauren Gooden and I did, uh, talked to him. Um, his name is Patrick Spence. He had, um, been there a long time. And so when the former CEO was like, you know what? I'm done. Uh, it was like not a convulsive moment for the company. They're like, okay. Well, we knew Patrick was gonna do this anyway, so he came in and did it. And he used to be at BlackBerry way back in the day. So I definitely had the moment where I, you know, he's like, I'm not worried about, uh, Alexa and Google Home because that just creates more interest in speakers and a rising tide, you know, lifts all boats. I was like, huh, I've definitely heard that before from a company.

• 53:46Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 53:46Speaker 01

  He's like, ooh.

• 53:47Nilay Patel?

  That's what you say right before you die.

• 53:48Speaker 01

  Right. The thing that I will say about Patrick Spence and about Sonos in general right now is when you talk to them. They are very, very smart. They are very good at understanding home audio on the high end without turning into snobby assholes. And they also understand what's happening with Alexa, like, very clearly.

• 54:13Nilay Patel?

  How do you, what gives you that impression in particular?

• 54:16Speaker 01

  Oh, just like, think about if you want to use Alexa to control a Sonos. What do you want to do on a Sonos? You want to listen to Apple Music, or maybe Spotify. So you need to tell Alexa to tell the Sonos to tell Apple Music to play the music, which then needs to play on the Sonos in your living room, but not your bedroom.

• 54:36Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 54:37Speaker 01

  Because Alexa doesn't talk to Apple Music.

• 54:38Nilay Patel?

  Right.

• 54:39Speaker 01

  Right? So they need to, they need to build this, like, intersection of services and apps and make it completely invisible to you so you can say a thing to Alexa and not have to remember a million code words. And like, I start explaining, or like, describing that kind of problem to him and he finishes my sentences like, like, he knows exactly what he needs to do.

• 54:57Nilay Patel?

  Right.

• 54:58Speaker 01

  He knows, you know, he was able to work with all of these different, you know, music streaming companies.

• 55:03Nilay Patel?

  Right.

• 55:03Speaker 01

  And they all work with Sonos now. So, like, in terms of understanding the problem space and being smart about what the right solution ought to be, Sonos is very good at that. But they're bad at is shipping products.

• 55:15Nilay Patel?

  Yeah, so I have a bunch of Sonos stuff.

• 55:17Speaker 01

  But they're bad at is actually implementing those solutions.

• 55:19Nilay Patel?

  Um, they don't, wait, they don't have the mic arrays they're gonna need. It's great that you can buy an Echo Dot and make it work.

• 55:24Speaker 01

  Well, so this is, this is Sonos's problem is they're, they fundamentally don't have any illusions that anybody's gonna buy more than like, one Sonos every four or five years, once their house is kitted out. Like, you're not gonna replace your Sonos on the same cycle you're gonna replace your Alexa speaker or your smartphone.

• 55:40Nilay Patel?

  Oh, that's interesting.

• 55:41Speaker 01

  Or maybe even your TV. So, they're actually kind of doomed, because, well, not doomed, but like, they're in a tough spot because they have a big install base that they want to continue to serve. There's an expectation that there's gonna be software updates that will make the thing continue to work. Like, do you remember the old, like, the first Sonos remote?

• 55:55Nilay Patel?

  Well, they're a profitable company.

• 55:56Speaker 01

  No, do you remember that first Sonos remote?

• 55:58Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 55:58Speaker 01

  The, like, big, chunky thing?

• 56:01Nilay Patel?

  I think about it all the time.

• 56:02Speaker 01

  Right?

• 56:02Nilay Patel?

  I look at them on eBay all the time.

• 56:04Speaker 01

  Yeah. Well, if you bought a speaker with that thing, that speaker, today,

• 56:08Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 56:09Speaker 01

  works fine.

• 56:10Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 56:10Speaker 01

  It, like, will let you do your Apple Music on it, you don't have that remote, you've got your phone now. They, they do a really good job of supporting existing products.

• 56:16Speaker 02

  That's actually pretty impressive.

• 56:18Speaker 01

  But, they, though, that existing install base that they need to continue to support does not have Farfield microphones in them. The, you know, I have a playbar.

• 56:28Nilay Patel?

  Well, this is a great time to get everybody to upgrade their speakers.

• 56:31Speaker 01

  You would think.

• 56:32Nilay Patel?

  But so you have a playbar. I want to buy a playbar.

• 56:35Speaker 01

  Mm-hmm. Don't. I mean, do, but don't.

• 56:37Nilay Patel?

  But it doesn't support DTS.

• 56:38Speaker 01

  Don't have to tell you. Doesn't support DTS, doesn't have Farfield microphones.

• 56:41Nilay Patel?

  Yeah, like, why would I buy a play? And it's super expensive.

• 56:43Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 56:44Nilay Patel?

  So like, just like, just update that product to be minimally competitive.

• 56:49Speaker 01

  Yep.

• 56:49Nilay Patel?

  And I'll be happy. I don't think they're gonna do it.

• 56:51Speaker 01

  Yeah, or actually release the thing you're promising to release with Alexa, and I'll just buy a bunch of Echo Dots and stick them around my house.

• 56:58Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 56:58Speaker 01

  Right?

• 56:59Nilay Patel?

  I know. So I, I mean, I, again, I have Sonos in my house. It's great. I like using it, but I'm just waiting for them to finish this part of the puzzle. I did think the one thing he said in his interview, which was interesting, was every musician has Sonos in their house.

• 57:15Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 57:15Nilay Patel?

  So when they go to the streaming services, they're like, you have to have this because Jay-Z is literally name checking us in his songs.

• 57:21Speaker 01

  Right. Well, this is like, the, the, the fundamental thing that I just kept on pushing him on is he thinks that in a beautiful future world, Sonos speakers are going to allow you to walk up to it and say, Alexa, buy me a t-shirt. Hey, Google, buy me a, whatever you buy from Hey Google. And the microphones will listen to, for both of those services. It'll listen for whatever the hell, whenever the hell Apple puts Siri out there.

• 57:47Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 57:47Speaker 01

  And all of the Apple and Amazon and Google are all gonna be just pleased as punch to coexist on the same set of microphones all the time.

• 57:57Nilay Patel?

  Hmm.

• 57:57Speaker 01

  Do you believe that Apple and Amazon and Google are willing to like, play ball with each other on the Sonos speaker?

• 58:04Nilay Patel?

  I think once, I think Amazon is super happy. They're already in the game.

• 58:08Speaker 01

  Amazon will do it.

• 58:09Nilay Patel?

  And I think once Amazon is sitting there and the Sonos, like, community is there.

• 58:16Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 58:16Nilay Patel?

  Google's gonna have to show up for the ride.

• 58:18Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 58:19Nilay Patel?

  And if Apple puts anything out. I think Apple executives have a bunch of Sonos speakers in their house.

• 58:24Speaker 01

  That's true.

• 58:24Nilay Patel?

  I think that's why Apple Music is there for them. And I think they're gonna say, well, we're not gonna put out a bunch of distributed speakers and try to get Jimmy Iovine to like drive up with a truck to Drake's house and be like, I'm changing all your speakers out.

• 58:37Speaker 01

  Right.

• 58:37Nilay Patel?

  I think there's like a tipping point here for those kinds of services.

• 58:41Speaker 01

  Yeah, but the thing that Sonos...

• 58:44Nilay Patel?

  Can you imagine if Apple was like, screw Sonos for putting out the iPod Hi-Fi?

• 58:48Speaker 01

  Yeah, right.

• 58:48Nilay Patel?

  Like, I think people are happy with Sonos.

• 58:50Speaker 01

  And they are, you're right, they are profitable, they don't want to get bought, they're doing, you know, presumably fine. I mean, this is the CEO talking, so of course he's gonna say that. But like, here's the other thing with Sonos. I have an Alexa speaker and a Google Home speaker.

• 59:05Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 59:06Speaker 01

  And I have a Playbar. And you would think when I come home, I should want to listen to music on the Playbar, but I can't be bothered to deal with the interface. And so I just yell at the room, play some music, and I play some music. And I'm doing most of my music listening now on a relatively shitty speaker, and life is fine. I should, I should, you know, get a Play One and do the stuff and figure it out. But, you know what, whatever. And so, all of a sudden, there are a bunch of people filling their houses up with cheap speakers, and they're fine. And Sonos believes that they're gonna want to step up and get a Sonos, like upgrade to Sonos someday. But, you know what, I got a speaker in my house, listen to music on it, it's fine. That's like a real danger for them.

• 59:47Nilay Patel?

  Never bet against people being fine with 128 kilobyte per second MP3.

• 59:54Speaker 01

  Exactly. That's exactly right.

• 59:56Nilay Patel?

  I'll make, I'll make that bet. I won't, but...

• 1:00:01Speaker 01

  I was gonna say, come on.

• 1:00:02Nilay Patel?

  It's hard.

• 1:00:02Speaker 01

  Let's talk about the Pono's that you listen to.

• 1:00:04Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 1:00:04Speaker 01

  Right?

• 1:00:05Nilay Patel?

  Pono's. It's Pono.

• 1:00:07Speaker 01

  Pono. Well, whatever. No, you have more than one of them.

• 1:00:10Nilay Patel?

  Nearly, I was gonna say.

• 1:00:10Speaker 01

  You love high quality music so much, you bought more than one Pono. Tell me about your Pono's.

• 1:00:18Nilay Patel?

  Just come and take me. Just let this night begin.

• 1:00:21Speaker 02

  Turns out, turns out.

• 1:00:23Nilay Patel?

  No, like, so the overwhelming push over, I would say, the past 20 years of music has been convenience over quality. Right? The iPod and streaming services, I think there's a little bit of swing back, right? I think title, like Sonos users, like, they're all like, you should switch to title because uncompressed music sounds better over the service.

• 1:00:45Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:00:45Nilay Patel?

  Like, you go on the Sonos forum, there's a lot of talk about how.

• 1:00:48Speaker 02

  But if you really cared that much about sound, I feel like you wouldn't even be.

• 1:00:51Nilay Patel?

  There's a reason, um, you know what often, what one of the number one electronic products on Amazon is? Fucking turntables. It's really weird. Like, people do that. Like, there's.

• 1:01:02Speaker 02

  I, I love good sound, but like everybody.

• 1:01:05Nilay Patel?

  This is the beginning of one of the worst infomercials ever.

• 1:01:08Speaker 02

  Like.

• 1:01:08Nilay Patel?

  I'm Paul Miller and I love great sound.

• 1:01:10Speaker 02

  People who buy turn, okay, sorry, people of a certain age and income that I happen to know who buy turntables, buy bad turntables, or they plug them into bad speakers and they, they have scratched up records or it's like, it's never a better, I just feel like it's not about sound quality. Turntables are not about sound quality.

• 1:01:33Nilay Patel?

  Paul's right. Paul's right. Light up some hot wax.

• 1:01:36Speaker 02

  Paul's right. I believe you. There are sound.

• 1:01:38Nilay Patel?

  I don't even know if that's a phrase.

• 1:01:39Speaker 02

  There are audiophiles who.

• 1:01:41Nilay Patel?

  Do audiophiles say, let's light up some hot wax?

• 1:01:43Speaker 02

  Absolutely.

• 1:01:43Nilay Patel?

  Cause they should start.

• 1:01:45Speaker 02

  And who care very much about sound and achieve very great listening experiences from vinyl. I'm just saying the hot market for vinyl is not that.

• 1:01:53Nilay Patel?

  But no, but the only reason, the only reason, yeah, it totally is. And they're selling bad turntables, particularly the Croxley Cruiser, whatever.

• 1:02:01Speaker 02

  Damage records.

• 1:02:02Nilay Patel?

  Uh, yeah, because of the track. I think about this all the time, but all I'm saying, that data point is not about audio quality. It's about convenience. Like, people are picking less convenient things, which is interesting.

• 1:02:17Speaker 02

  That's true.

• 1:02:17Nilay Patel?

  So I just think like, maybe there's a little bit there. Like, you fill up your house with cheap speakers and I don't know, you get a better job, you get a promotion, you're like, I want a nicer stereo. And like, Sonos is there waiting for you.

• 1:02:28Speaker 02

  Can I say one last thing? One last topic? I know we gotta end.

• 1:02:31Nilay Patel?

  And then Pono's is there waiting for you in the car.

• 1:02:35Speaker 01

  Google can't make Android apps for big screens. I don't know what the problem is.

• 1:02:41Nilay Patel?

  Oh, you reviewed the Chromebook Pro Plus, Pro Plus.

• 1:02:43Speaker 01

  I reviewed the Plus. I refused to review the Pro.

• 1:02:46Nilay Patel?

  First look at the Pro because it was so buggy.

• 1:02:47Speaker 01

  Right.

• 1:02:47Nilay Patel?

  One of the harshest Dieter lines I've ever seen, by the way. This is the nightmare before the dream.

• 1:02:51Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:02:52Nilay Patel?

  I felt the venom coming out of you.

• 1:02:54Speaker 01

  That was bad.

• 1:02:55Nilay Patel?

  Yeah. That's also how I feel about this.

• 1:02:56Speaker 01

  But the Plus is great and the Pro is good as long as you never let Android apps anywhere near it. It's not coming out until April. There's, I actually have a lot of thoughts. Like, the processor on the Chromebook Plus is like incredibly fascinating.

• 1:03:09Speaker 02

  Do you want to go through it?

• 1:03:10Speaker 01

  I don't.

• 1:03:11Nilay Patel?

  Okay.

• 1:03:11Speaker 01

  We'll do it later. We're out of time.

• 1:03:13Nilay Patel?

  I don't think-

• 1:03:13Speaker 01

  It's a tease for next week or the week after.

• 1:03:15Nilay Patel?

  I don't think material design is well-suited for a mouse interface.

• 1:03:19Speaker 01

  It's not a material design issue. It's not even a mouse interface issue. Like, they could solve those problems. Those problems, like, Google would be lucky to have those problems. Right now, they just have got a bunch of third-party apps and first-party apps from Google that are just designed for a phone and are awful on a big screen because they just get blown up.

• 1:03:38Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 1:03:38Speaker 01

  And not blown up in like, "Oh, it's fine," but like, blown up at like, the thing that's supposed to be like in portrait mode ends up in landscape mode, but every, all the interface pieces still assume it's in portrait mode. So like, you've got like an email that goes all the way across the screen.

• 1:03:53Speaker 02

  That's my nightmare.

• 1:03:55Nilay Patel?

  What are they doing?

• 1:03:56Speaker 01

  I don't know.

• 1:03:56Nilay Patel?

  Fuchsia.

• 1:03:57Speaker 01

  And that's, that's even on top of, oh, we're not talking about that. It's even on top of the fact that like, right now, the Android apps are in beta, so you can't resize the windows yet. Like, I will forgive, the reason I didn't actually review the Pro is Android on Chrome OS is still in beta, so you can't do certain things, like have apps not crash or, you know, resize windows.

• 1:04:18Nilay Patel?

  This was gonna be their year.

• 1:04:19Speaker 01

  Yep. It's just not, we'll see in April. If, if it's still bad in April, then it will be the nightmare before the nightmare. The nightmare before the bigger nightmare.

• 1:04:27Nilay Patel?

  It's just, I don't, they, I don't know. I want them to succeed.

• 1:04:30Speaker 01

  Yep. Also-

• 1:04:31Nilay Patel?

  That they just don't.

• 1:04:32Speaker 01

  Fuchsia is not Andromeda. Andromeda is not a thing. Stop it.

• 1:04:37Speaker 01

  But Fuchsia's still really cool. Fuchsia's cool.

• 1:04:39Nilay Patel?

  For the few DroidLife readers out there who are listening to this podcast, Dieter just personally yelled at you.

• 1:04:44Speaker 01

  But stop it with Andromeda.

• 1:04:46Speaker 02

  I got some guy on like Reddit or something.

• 1:04:49Speaker 01

  Stop it with Andromeda.

• 1:04:50Nilay Patel?

  I mean, I read DroidLife, I'm just saying.

• 1:04:52Speaker 01

  It's not DroidLife.

• 1:04:52Nilay Patel?

  Who is it?

• 1:04:53Speaker 01

  Well, so it was a guy who like misunderstood, like misunderstood the connection between Andromeda and Fuchsia. And everybody like reblogged, "Oh my god, he saw, he saw through the code." It's like, no, he didn't. Andromeda's not a thing.

• 1:05:05Speaker 02

  And the kernel they're building could theoretically run Android on top of it.

• 1:05:08Speaker 01

  Yes, this is true.

• 1:05:09Speaker 02

  You could take the Linux out of Android, run-

• 1:05:11Nilay Patel?

  But you can't take the Android out of Linux.

• 1:05:17Speaker 02

  It doesn't make any sense, but it was a good one.

• 1:05:19Nilay Patel?

  It makes no sense at all.

• 1:05:21Speaker 02

  You could run-

• 1:05:22Speaker 01

  Yes, and that might happen, but I don't think it's happening-

• 1:05:26Speaker 02

  No, it's not a near-term thing at all, and it's not, I mean, it's not a unifying project. But they're, they're, they're very much, they've got Flutter.

• 1:05:35Speaker 01

  Yep.

• 1:05:35Speaker 02

  So many exciting things with Fuchsia.

• 1:05:37Nilay Patel?

  So many code names that aren't products that work.

• 1:05:39Speaker 02

  Inter-process communication.

• 1:05:41Nilay Patel?

  Oh my god. I just want them to ship good products that work.

• 1:05:43Speaker 01

  I just want them to pull a Microsoft and back up a dump truck full of money at a bunch of app developers' houses and say, "Hey, make these apps better on a big screen and assume that you have a real processor behind them."

• 1:05:56Nilay Patel?

  You know, you can't pay for the love you need to make that work. Microsoft found that out. No one has ever pulled that off. Ever. You have to, the developer has to want to make the app. You can't just pay him to do it. Think about it.

• 1:06:08Speaker 01

  Fine.

• 1:06:08Nilay Patel?

  Has anyone ever gotten that to work? BlackBerry tried it, Microsoft tried it.

• 1:06:12Speaker 01

  But Microsoft-

• 1:06:12Nilay Patel?

  You can tell.

• 1:06:13Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:06:14Nilay Patel?

  There's that air of desperation in the app.

• 1:06:16Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:06:16Nilay Patel?

  Yeah. Anyway, I'd like to thank Crizal No-Glare Lenses for sponsoring the show today. If you wear glasses, then you know fingerprint, smudges, scratches, and glares can be a constant obstruction to your vision and a huge distraction as you try to escape our inevitable doom. That's why you should wear Crizal No-Glare Lenses. They give you the clearest vision possible, offering resistance to glare, scratches, and smudges, which you will need because glasses will not be available in this upcoming eternal night. So, you won't be blinded by the glares of headlights from oncoming traffic as you wander down the highway searching for food. There'll be no more fingerprint searches from taking your glasses off, scratching your lenses on your shirt. You'll look better, you'll feel better, most importantly, you'll literally be prepared for whatever might come your way with clear vision, which you will need.

• 1:06:56Speaker 01

  It's zombies and vampires.

• 1:06:58Nilay Patel?

  In order to survive this again, our eternal life. So go to crizal.com to learn more, that's C-R-I-Z-A-L dot com. Start living life in the clear and at least in some amount of safety. Some tiny, tiny amount of safety.

• 1:07:10Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:07:11Nilay Patel?

  Can we just all go read Cormac McCarthy now? Because that's where my head is. That's our show. I apologize. I think all of us do to you, the listener, for that experience.

• 1:07:21Speaker 01

  Please tweet at Ajit Pai on...

• 1:07:23Nilay Patel?

  Tweet Ajit Pai, A-J-I-T-P-A-I-F-C-C. Tell him to come on the show. We'll try to behave ourselves, have a reasoned conversation about net neutrality with him. It's a thing that we very much want to do. So tweet at him, tweet at us. Paul is at FuturePaul. I'm at Reckless. Dieter's at Backlon.

• 1:07:41Speaker 01

  Yes, I am.

• 1:07:42Nilay Patel?

  Love that stuff. You can follow at Verge on Twitter. You can follow Verge on Snapchat. You can go on Instagram. Instagram popping off lately.

• 1:07:48Speaker 01

  Check that out.

• 1:07:49Nilay Patel?

  It's good. Good stuff. I'm just making clicking noises. You can listen to Control Out Delete, which is, I would say, at least a better organized show. There's at least one professional on it, and then I'm there.

• 1:08:00Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:08:01Nilay Patel?

  You can listen to Lauren Good's Too Embarrassed to Ask.

• 1:08:03Speaker 01

  Yep, very good show.

• 1:08:04Nilay Patel?

  Great show.

• 1:08:04Speaker 01

  She's got Joanna Stern coming on pretty soon.

• 1:08:07Nilay Patel?

  Hey, look at that. So at least one professional on that show, too. It's Lauren Good.

• 1:08:11Speaker 01

  There it is.

• 1:08:11Nilay Patel?

  Hey. Kara Swisher has Recode Decode, which is great. Peter Kafka has Recode Media, which is actually going to be replays of all his interviews from Code Media, so that'll be amazing this week. There's all this kind of stuff going on. Go to iTunes.com slash The Verge, leave reviews for us. Tweet at us. Just talk amongst yourself. Tell a friend. Maybe don't play this episode, but a different, better episode for one of your friends this week. Think about it. That's it. Goodbye. Paul. Rock and roll.