Is kale more interesting than the iPhone SE?

This week on Vergecast, Nilay and Dieter bring in news editor Jake Kastrenakes to discuss happenings at the Apple event this week as well as Vizio's new products and initiatives. Racked style editor Nicola Fumo again joins us to helm the hype matrix. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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

• 0:04Nilay Patel?

  Hello and welcome to The Vergecast, the flagship podcast of The Verge.com. I am Neelai Patel, the Underchief of The Verge. I'm joined by Jay Castrenakis.

• 0:13Speaker 01

  Hello.

• 0:14Nilay Patel?

  Dieter Bohn.

• 0:14Speaker 02

  Hi.

• 0:15Nilay Patel?

  Fumo's back.

• 0:16Speaker 03

  Hello, all.

• 0:18Nilay Patel?

  The Vergecast is brought to you by Scissor Vodka, which is a vodka brand that I made up and that I will introduce the show with every week until someone gives me a contract to produce this vodka.

• 0:25Speaker 03

  We're close.

• 0:26Nilay Patel?

  Scissor vodka, cut through the night. So it's a big week. How's it going? Dieter's back.

• 0:31Speaker 02

  Safety vodka, Safety Scissor vodka.

• 0:32Speaker 01

  No one wants to drink something called Safety.

• 0:34Nilay Patel?

  It's vodka for children.

• 0:35Speaker 02

  It's water.

• 0:36Nilay Patel?

  Right.

• 0:37Speaker 03

  Tangy water.

• 0:38Nilay Patel?

  Vodka's not supposed to be tangy.

• 0:41Speaker 03

  Well, you know what it means, like.

• 0:43Nilay Patel?

  Let me ask you this.

• 0:44Speaker 03

  Okay.

• 0:45Nilay Patel?

  Is non-alcoholic flavored vodka just vitamin water? No, vitamin water has a bunch of sugar in it.

• 0:53Speaker 03

  But yeah, what are you talking about? Like a pre-mixed?

• 0:55Nilay Patel?

  But like a flavored vodka has sugar in it.

• 0:56Speaker 03

  You're right. Yeah, like a cran, vodka cran is just a vitamin water when you take alcohol out, right?

• 1:02Nilay Patel?

  And Vergecast is done for the week, everybody.

• 1:04Speaker 03

  All the problems are solved.

• 1:06Nilay Patel?

  We've accomplished all that we can accomplish. Anyway, huge week. Dieter was gone.

• 1:11Speaker 02

  Yeah, I was.

• 1:12Nilay Patel?

  Last week.

• 1:13Speaker 02

  Where was I?

• 1:14Nilay Patel?

  I don't know where you were. But where were you?

• 1:17Speaker 02

  I don't remember.

• 1:18Nilay Patel?

  But now there's this pink phone, you've got a weird computer in front of you.

• 1:21Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:22Nilay Patel?

  You've got a whole new life happening.

• 1:23Speaker 02

  Yeah. Anyway. Oh, I was gone last week because you wouldn't let me on the show because you were talking about the Michelle Obama piece.

• 1:28Nilay Patel?

  Oh, right.

• 1:29Speaker 02

  I was right here, Neelai.

• 1:30Nilay Patel?

  Oh, I was setting up the fact that you were at Apple.

• 1:32Speaker 02

  Oh, well, that was later.

• 1:33Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 1:34Speaker 02

  That was early this week, and I have the iPad Pro in front of me.

• 1:37Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 1:38Speaker 02

  And the keyboard.

• 1:39Nilay Patel?

  Yeah, so tell me about this event.

• 1:40Speaker 02

  So it was at Apple's Infinite Loop in their little town hall venue.

• 1:46Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 1:47Speaker 02

  Theater.

• 1:48Nilay Patel?

  It was like emotional. They were like, this is the last time we'll ever be in this room.

• 1:51Speaker 02

  Probably.

• 1:52Speaker 01

  Are you gonna, is it a good room?

• 1:53Nilay Patel?

  No, it's an awful room, actually.

• 1:55Speaker 03

  Read the room. The Verge review of this room.

• 1:57Speaker 02

  It fits like 75 people.

• 1:59Nilay Patel?

  Yeah, no, it's tiny little theater, so I don't.

• 2:02Speaker 03

  This isn't where The Weeknd played?

• 2:04Nilay Patel?

  This is not where The Weeknd played. The Weeknd played at Moscone Center, which is like this massive conference thing. Apple's Town Hall, so you drive, when you drive into Apple, you actually drive down Infinite Loop, and you make a left, and there's like four very bland buildings. Like, Apple's current campus is not like.

• 2:22Speaker 02

  Particularly Right. exciting. And so they're all and they're all like beige. Mm hmm. And they all have little signs and numbers. Yep. So it's two or three. Dial four. Infinite Loop four is where Town Hall is. Oh, it's Town Hall. Oh, and yeah, so. You park at like. Infinite Loop one at the main entrance to the lobby next to like the official, like, Apple campus, Apple store, which, by the way, Apple, um, what's the phrase ruined?

• 2:50Speaker 02

  They did. I know exactly what you're complaining about. The old phrase.

• 2:56Speaker 02

  Look, look, I've never bought anything from the Apple campus, Apple store, but like, tourists like to go to at the Apple campus to like, say, I went to the loop. Yeah, there's always people taking. Like, people take selfies in front of the sun. And they want to buy.

• 3:07Speaker 01

  Cheesy t-shirts?

• 3:08Speaker 02

  Yeah, they want to go buy a cheesy t-shirt that says. Yeah, there is. But like, there's a store that like the tourists can go to that's like, I went to Apple and all I got to see was this t-shirt and like little baby socks and beanies and all this like, Apple swag. It's the only place on earth where there's like official Apple swag. Yeah. And they decided, nope, not anymore. They cut the store in half and they they only sell like, six t-shirts now.

• 3:28Speaker 03

  The school store.

• 3:29Speaker 02

  The rest is a regular old Apple store. Yeah.

• 3:32Speaker 01

  Is there like, is it a cafe?

• 3:33Speaker 02

  Or? No. No. Well, they don't want people like hanging out that long. They want them to show up, take their picture, buy an Apple t-shirt and then get the hell out. Right. But they used to be, it used to be full of stuff. Yeah. Like cool Apple stuff. And like particularly like a hilarious collection of t-shirts. And that has been reduced greatly.

• 3:51Speaker 03

  Ooh, is that resale? Is that flip can become hot now? You got one of those like, 2014 Apple.

• 3:56Speaker 02

  I got, I got, I got an official Apple bib, y'all.

• 3:59Speaker 03

  Yeah. Value goes up 6,000%.

• 4:02Speaker 02

  So you drive in and you park there and then you they buzz everybody through a press entrance.

• 4:07Speaker 01

  I actually forgot we were talking about that.

• 4:10Speaker 02

  I mean, that's kind of the nature of the event, right? So, uh, then you walk down the song thing. Yeah. And then you go into a door and it's this long hallway and on one side is a photo of young Steve Jobs. Yep. And another size of photo of old Steve. And there's also Steve Jobs quote. There's a piano that Steve Jobs bought for the engineers or designers or something in the early Mac days to show them that you could combine art and engineering to create an instrument. Oh, this is the whole thing with you. Yeah. Yeah. Anyway, um, and then you, and then on the left side, there's like the theater and um, just across the hall is. A room? It's, it's a tiny room where the hands on happens. The size of your, your, the living room in a McMansion. It's not that big. Yeah. Um, and it, that room just gets insane. Yeah.

• 4:55Speaker 02

  Just absolutely. Well, they, they rate limit how many people are allowed in, which means like you go in, you do your stuff and then you leave and then you've got to wait like a half an hour to get back in. Yeah. It's very confusing. But so the event, it was like at the town hall. So it wasn't like a million people. It was relatively a small group and we were tight, tight in there, packed in there really tightly. Um, and I don't know if you guys watched the keynote. I know you guys watched keynote, but if you didn't watch the keynote, typical, a typical Apple keynote starts with like, it's like numbers. It's like, and then this, and then this, and then they just go through it. And this one was different. Instead of starting with like, hey, we X billion, X million, this, that, they did a little bit of that. And then usually

• 5:35Speaker 02

  the next thing is we open another, you know, we opened our 432nd, uh, Apple store in this town in China and look how great it was. And here's a little, uh, cool demo reel. Instead, they showed a video of like 40 years of Apple products flashing on the screen in text. And then we went into a brief bit about privacy because that's the big Apple story, which we were probably going to talk about later. And then, um, Lisa Jackson? Yeah. Environment. Came and talked about the environment and how they're trying to get to a hundred percent renewable. And they showed off a little robot called Liam that like disassembles iPhones. Um, and she was actually great. She was really, really good on stage. And then after environment, they did, what was the third thing? Health. Health. Yeah. They did a bunch of care kit stuff. Um,

• 6:20Speaker 02

  So like this whole beginning section of like, it was only like a 45 minute event, like a solid 20 minutes was like, Apple, we're going to protect your privacy. We're going to fight the US government. We're really good about the environment and we're going to like save your life. And then they'd be like, oh yeah. By the way, we've got some new products.

• 6:36Nilay Patel?

  Yeah. And it was just very low key.

• 6:39Speaker 02

  Yeah, it was super low key.

• 6:40Nilay Patel?

  Yeah. I would say the juxtaposition between them saying the government shouldn't have your data, but please give us all your healthcare data was very interesting to me.

• 6:47Speaker 02

  Yeah. Well, I feel like one was designed to like set up trust for the other one.

• 6:51Nilay Patel?

  Yeah. Yeah. I mean, we, I mean, we, we should do the products, but we should talk about the F. But like, Apple is clearly repositioning itself as not just a gadget company. Right. They

• 7:02Speaker 02

  Well, they've always, they've never thought of themselves as just a gadget company. What do you mean?

• 7:06Nilay Patel?

  Yeah, no, they, but they have been, right? They've been the forward thinking technology company. Right. And they, they put out new products to change your life.

• 7:14Speaker 02

  Right.

• 7:14Nilay Patel?

  And they are a product company. They make products.

• 7:16Speaker 02

  Right.

• 7:17Nilay Patel?

  And now what Apple's saying is like, we will help you cure Parkinson's disease.

• 7:21Speaker 01

  Which is also a lot of what we're seeing Google do. Google is way more diversified than Apple is at this point. Apple is purely consumer technology. And it seems like it's trying to, well, it still seems like it's trying to be consumer focused, but it is entering that health sphere in a big way.

• 7:36Nilay Patel?

  Yeah. Yeah. But they're, but Google, Google's way of doing it is spinning off Cali. I mean, Google's like,

• 7:42Speaker 02

  Yeah. Google's like, we're going to help you live forever. Apple's like, we're going to help you count your steps. And well, actually that's actually, they're also like, well, help you cure Parkinson's.

• 7:49Nilay Patel?

  Yeah. But it was just a very somber event at the beginning, which set up a very set of low key, a set of very low key product announcements. So let's get into them. So we've got it here. The iPhone.

• 8:02Speaker 02

  We start, do we start with the iPhone five or the Apple Watch bands?

• 8:06Nilay Patel?

  I mean, are we starting in escalating order?

• 8:10Speaker 02

  The only thing I want to say about the Apple Watch bands is like, there's a new nylon one. There's the black Milanese, which is whatever. But what the interesting thing to me is they, they just said, this is our spring lineup. This is our spring line, which is. Unless I'm dumb.

• 8:23Nilay Patel?

  But then I asked them today. I asked them today, are you doing fashion cycles? And they were like, no.

• 8:29Speaker 02

  Oh, well, I I got told yes. I got told yes, we are doing fashion cycles.

• 8:32Nilay Patel?

  They clearly. What'd they say to you?

• 8:34Speaker 03

  Um, yeah, I thought it was interesting because I was like, okay, so so this is just new bands. And I was like, but I was like, but other like third party manufacturers can make bands, right? And they were like, yeah. And I was like, okay, so so you made them, you made these new ones and but everyone can make them. I don't know. It was just, I felt like I didn't have the right questions to ask. I was like.

• 8:55Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 8:56Speaker 02

  No, I I was clearly told like.

• 8:57Nilay Patel?

  But they gave you some bands.

• 8:59Speaker 03

  Yeah, I picked out a nylon one. I was more interested in the nylon one in person because it actually has four levels of weave. So it has this like three dimensional effect in person. It's kind of cool.

• 9:08Nilay Patel?

  It's very nice.

• 9:10Speaker 03

  But it's just, I don't know. It's not really me. I wish I'd picked a leather one. I made a bad choice.

• 9:14Nilay Patel?

  Yeah, they gave me the black Milanese. I asked for a black nylon one and they gave me two.

• 9:18Speaker 02

  Podcasts. Oh.

• 9:20Nilay Patel?

  Yeah, so we've got one. It's very nice. It's nice. They're nice. They're bands. I don't know. What's interesting to me is they didn't discontinue any of the old bands.

• 9:27Speaker 02

  Oh, that's really?

• 9:28Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 9:29Speaker 02

  Man, whoever I talked to just lied to me left and right because they definitely told me that eventually like other bands are gonna like go out of season and not be around.

• 9:34Speaker 03

  I really thought they were gonna.

• 9:35Nilay Patel?

  Wow, we did not have radically different previews.

• 9:38Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 9:38Speaker 03

  I thought they were gonna announce like a designer collaboration or something. And I'm still waiting like for the Met Gala in early May. I'm like assuming.

• 9:45Nilay Patel?

  Because Apple's sponsoring. Explain what the Met Gala is. Apple's sponsoring this big event.

• 9:49Speaker 03

  Uh, the Costume Institute at the Metropolitan Museum of Art has this like, well, they have a big show every spring. And this year it's kind of the intersection of technology and fashion. Um, it's a little complicated, but um, they, there's like a huge like red carpet event the night before that's like the biggest night in fashion. It's the Oscars of fashion. In case the Oscars didn't have enough fashion. So yeah, so Apple's the solo sponsor of this fashion technology crossover event. Um, and I just assumed there was going to be like a big designer announcement, or I really was hoping it would be like watch two. And then they would have everyone on the red carpet wearing the watch two, but it seems like that's not happening.

• 10:29Speaker 03

  So, I mean, for them to be commanding this much attention in this space that they've been trying to penetrate for so. I mean, they are, they have penetrated, but trying to stay like top of mind. I, they gotta, there has to be something else coming like there has to be another more exciting shoe to drop around. Matt Gala, otherwise it's like you have this platform and you, you gotta do more with it, right?

• 10:51Nilay Patel?

  I mean, so this is the, I mean, overarching theme for Apple right now is you gotta do more.

• 10:56Speaker 03

  Right?

• 10:57Nilay Patel?

  I mean, Walt wrote a column yesterday and his column, and if you want to listen, Walt and I talked about it for 45 minutes on his podcast. The next iPhone has to be spectacular, right? Was his column.

• 11:10Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 11:11Nilay Patel?

  And I just think it's great. So what they told me was that all the bands will stay available. But the systems that you can buy, the watch plus a band will change out.

• 11:21Speaker 02

  Apple, why do you lie to me?

• 11:23Speaker 01

  But it doesn't make any sense. Why can't you just buy it with the band that you want?

• 11:26Nilay Patel?

  Yeah. Why can't you just buy a watch and a band? But no, there's, there's systems.

• 11:30Speaker 02

  Hmm.

• 11:30Nilay Patel?

  So I saw all the systems that they will currently sell. So a bunch of the existing systems are going to go away. But the whole complete array of their bands will remain.

• 11:39Speaker 01

  That's exactly what I'm looking for. Fewer choices when making, buying something that I'm going to wear around all the time.

• 11:45Nilay Patel?

  Well, I think their thing is to, to make it seem like if you don't, if you're interested in watching, see a combination you want, you better buy it. Cause otherwise you'll have to buy one you don't like in a band that you do.

• 11:57Speaker 01

  I mean, I'm totally, if they start doing like seasonal bands, I'm super into that. Cause this feels like a spring collection. These feel like springy designs.

• 12:06Speaker 03

  They start at $49. An easy way to change a, that was the version I got.

• 12:10Nilay Patel?

  Really?

• 12:10Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 12:11Nilay Patel?

  Oh, that's so not the version I got.

• 12:13Speaker 03

  Yeah. Like an easy way to update your watch or $48.99.

• 12:17Nilay Patel?

  No, definitely not the version I got. I got, I tried very hard to ask them, like, are people using the apps? What are people doing? Are you going to update the watch? And they're like, we have new bands.

• 12:26Speaker 02

  Yeah. Because it's, because it's like, they, they think of it as a fashion thing, not as a smart watch anymore.

• 12:33Nilay Patel?

  Anyway, so that's the Apple Watch. Um, I think we're all sort of in agreement that the people who like Jake's wearing one right now.

• 12:39Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 12:40Nilay Patel?

  Nick, are you wearing one? No. Yeah. Dieter wrote a column today.

• 12:44Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 12:44Nilay Patel?

  It's like, these aren't ready yet. They're, they have no focus. Go through it.

• 12:48Speaker 02

  I don't think smartwatches are ready yet. Neither Android Wear nor Apple Watch. I think that the main thing is that nobody, they're not focused enough. They're too slow. They designed, uh, the watch they want to have, the dream watch, and the processors are too slow to make stuff happen. And so only a couple of things work. And then there's a bunch of other crap you don't need. And the crap you don't need makes the things you actually want like harder.

• 13:11Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 13:11Speaker 02

  All the extra stuff on the Apple Watch means doing the basic stuff I want slower and more of a hassle. And so it's just not focused enough. And because I'm old, I compared it to PDAs in the late 90s when Palm Pilots were simple. They were dumb. They, they didn't, they weren't powerful. They had stupid 160 by 160 green screens. And they were fast and they worked.

• 13:33Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 13:33Speaker 02

  And Pocket PCs were like, we're a computer. And they're big and heavy and bulky and slow and tried to be Windows and they were just too much.

• 13:40Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 13:40Speaker 02

  And turns out both died. Both got killed, you know, the iPhone. But everybody that's making these smartwatches are thinking in terms of like big computers on your wrist. And they should be thinking about like narrowing down the focus to just the things that they want you to do, that you want to do.

• 13:56Nilay Patel?

  I feel like everybody is very confused or got very confused by Dick Tracy. And I blame Dick Tracy for this problem. How often? He is a jerk.

• 14:06Speaker 01

  Do you?

• 14:06Nilay Patel?

  That yellow slicker man?

• 14:08Speaker 01

  Press any, press anything on your watch. I never leave the main screen. If it's not going to show it to me, um.

• 14:14Nilay Patel?

  No, I think that's because it takes too long. I think there's an interaction model there, but I think a lot of people have this vision of Dick Tracy in their mind where this was, this was the thing.

• 14:24Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 14:24Nilay Patel?

  And he solved every problem by fucking with the thing.

• 14:26Speaker 01

  Okay, I can't log into my watch right now because I entered my password wrong three times.

• 14:31Speaker 02

  What?

• 14:31Speaker 01

  I entered my password wrong because the buttons are too tiny and now I can't log, I, I had to wait five minutes. I think I can log in again.

• 14:37Nilay Patel?

  Why'd you have to log in at all?

• 14:38Speaker 02

  You look ridiculous.

• 14:40Speaker 01

  You have to tap a code in in order to start doing the

• 14:44Nilay Patel?

  But you can unlock your phone.

• 14:46Speaker 01

  Yeah, okay, but I'm I'm using an Android phone right now. So

• 14:49Nilay Patel?

  Were you using Android phone with an Apple Watch? That's that's impossible.

• 14:53Speaker 01

  But let me tell you this.

• 14:54Nilay Patel?

  Let's get into that.

• 14:56Speaker 01

  I've been switching between a Moto 360, a Gear S2, and Apple Watch, both of which sync with my Nexus. Worse experiences than just an Apple Watch on its own.

• 15:06Nilay Patel?

  Wow. Really? Yeah. Wow, I completely disagree. What does an Apple Watch on its own do?

• 15:12Speaker 01

  Tell you the time.

• 15:12Nilay Patel?

  Yeah, if you like wave your arm around like a crazy person.

• 15:15Speaker 01

  So, okay, so I do have my phone with me, but it's like up upstairs. And so as long as I'm within range of my phone.

• 15:21Nilay Patel?

  Your iPhone, you mean?

• 15:22Speaker 01

  Yeah, as my iPhone, I get notifications and it tells me the weather. That's all I want.

• 15:27Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 15:28Speaker 03

  That's all I want.

• 15:28Speaker 01

  It's ideal.

• 15:29Nilay Patel?

  Yeah, notifications, weather, step counts. Wait, you switch songs?

• 15:33Speaker 03

  On my little Pebble, which is a little bit dumb and I like that.

• 15:37Nilay Patel?

  The Pebble is the Palm Pilot of smartwatches.

• 15:39Speaker 03

  Yeah, because it has hard buttons. You can't swipe anything.

• 15:41Nilay Patel?

  You know that they just laid off 25% of their staff?

• 15:43Speaker 03

  Why?

• 15:44Nilay Patel?

  Because they're gonna lose.

• 15:46Speaker 03

  Oh, no.

• 15:46Nilay Patel?

  Because they don't have deep integration with the operating system and because they don't have like huge, massive manufacturing and design resources to make, you know, an insanely

• 15:54Speaker 03

  Yo, I've sold a lot of Pebble time rounds for personal one to one.

• 15:58Nilay Patel?

  Really?

• 15:59Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 15:59Nilay Patel?

  You're the Rico rate.

• 16:00Speaker 03

  Um, I should get an affiliate link because I'm out there and girls are like, what is that? And I'm like, it's a watch. It's smart. Let me tell you about it. And then I've had girls buy it on their, I'm buying right now on their phone, right in front of me. And I'm like, this is, this is special. What's happening here?

• 16:15Nilay Patel?

  Did you sound like, do you give them a free shot of cinnamon vodka?

• 16:18Speaker 03

  Or something, scissor, scissor cinnamon. It's like a woman specific, you know, how women like different vodka.

• 16:24Nilay Patel?

  Becky and I were, we were buying wine. Is this true?

• 16:27Speaker 03

  No, I'm being, I'm being like sexist.

• 16:29Nilay Patel?

  Yes. It's not like sexist.

• 16:32Speaker 03

  I mean, like, I mean, like liquor companies being sexist.

• 16:35Nilay Patel?

  We went into our wine store in our neighborhood the other day to like buy the things we usually buy. So Becky buys a bottle of wine and I'm buying my little bottle of bullet. And there's the poor woman there selling, trying desperately to hand out shots of cinnamon tequila. Oh, God. And Becky, sure, whatever, we're gonna do it. So we're like, take the shots. And she's like, will you take a selfie with me for engagement? And I was like, no. And she's like, that's okay. I've been taking them with the store employees because no one cares.

• 17:02Speaker 03

  Oh my god.

• 17:03Nilay Patel?

  She's like, I have to do it.

• 17:05Speaker 03

  She said for engagement.

• 17:06Nilay Patel?

  She said, she was so broken down.

• 17:09Speaker 03

  The words are getting crazy out there.

• 17:11Nilay Patel?

  It was, it was a very somber moment because what the company and she's like, I don't care. I don't really work for this company. It's just an agency, but they want me to hand out shots and take selfies with people. So they share them. And I was like, I, I understand all the mechanics of what you just said, but I'm not doing that. And she's like, no one does. And then she took another selfie with the cash register.

• 17:33Nilay Patel?

  I think they're counting the number of photos that she took.

• 17:36Speaker 03

  Probably.

• 17:36Nilay Patel?

  Wow. It's, this is our life. This is the future. You can get free.

• 17:40Speaker 03

  For engagement.

• 17:41Nilay Patel?

  If the tequila also grows, but scissor cinnamon delicious.

• 17:45Speaker 03

  Delicious.

• 17:45Nilay Patel?

  For the.

• 17:46Speaker 03

  For ladies.

• 17:48Nilay Patel?

  No, it's for men.

• 17:49Speaker 02

  Maybe scissors, all of scissors flavor should be like healthy spices instead of.

• 17:54Speaker 03

  Oh, like turmeric.

• 17:55Speaker 02

  Instead of like.

• 17:55Nilay Patel?

  Cardamom.

• 17:56Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 17:56Nilay Patel?

  Scissor cardamom.

• 17:57Speaker 02

  Scissor, scissor kale.

• 17:58Nilay Patel?

  Ooh, that's not a flavor. That's kale, not a healthy spice.

• 18:02Speaker 02

  I don't know.

• 18:03Nilay Patel?

  Uh, no, no one sprinkles kale.

• 18:05Speaker 02

  It's pretty bitter.

• 18:05Speaker 01

  I've really come around to kale lately and I think that people just need to give it a second chance.

• 18:10Speaker 03

  Hey, I'm big on it. I'm big on kale, but you know.

• 18:13Speaker 01

  Nicola is enlightened.

• 18:17Speaker 03

  If you cook it.

• 18:18Speaker 01

  Throw, throw a few pieces of kale in the oven.

• 18:21Nilay Patel?

  I want to ask.

• 18:21Speaker 01

  Sprinkle some salt on it.

• 18:22Nilay Patel?

  I want, I want the listeners to tell me via Twitter, if this conversation.

• 18:26Speaker 02

  Should we continue talking about kale or if you're talking.

• 18:28Nilay Patel?

  Yeah, is it more interesting to talk about kale? Or should we talk about the iPhone SE? And it is an open question in my mind, which of those two things is more interesting?

• 18:38Speaker 01

  No, I think kale is actually one of the new watch strap colors.

• 18:42Nilay Patel?

  Oh yeah, no, I received an green iPad case. I think that's mint though. Are you scrolling with a pen?

• 18:47Speaker 02

  Yo.

• 18:48Nilay Patel?

  All right, let's talk about this iPhone. So Nicola.

• 18:50Speaker 03

  Yes.

• 18:50Nilay Patel?

  The only real notable difference in the iPhone line is that this one is now rose gold. Are you seeing what?

• 18:58Speaker 03

  And it's little.

• 18:59Nilay Patel?

  It's little.

• 19:00Speaker 03

  But it does all the stuff.

• 19:01Nilay Patel?

  But like they sold an iPhone six S.

• 19:03Speaker 03

  Six S guts, five body, six S in the sheets, five in the, I don't know.

• 19:08Nilay Patel?

  Five in the street.

• 19:09Speaker 03

  Five in the streets.

• 19:11Nilay Patel?

  Yeah, six S in the streets, five in, five.

• 19:14Speaker 03

  No, it's the other way around because the insides are the six S.

• 19:17Nilay Patel?

  Six S in the sheets.

• 19:18Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 19:18Nilay Patel?

  Five S's.

• 19:19Speaker 03

  Five S's in the streets.

• 19:24Speaker 02

  Just the worst.

• 19:25Speaker 03

  Anyway, here's my five. I brought it.

• 19:27Nilay Patel?

  You brought it. But have you seen this?

• 19:29Speaker 03

  Yeah, I played with it today.

• 19:31Nilay Patel?

  What did you think?

• 19:32Speaker 03

  Um, I'm not a little phone person. It makes me feel real big and I don't like that I can put the whole phone in my hand.

• 19:38Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 19:38Speaker 03

  It's gonna drop like this one did.

• 19:40Nilay Patel?

  Yeah, that one's real broken.

• 19:41Speaker 03

  It's my shattered five.

• 19:42Speaker 02

  So what it's it's got NFC so you can do Apple Pay. It doesn't have everything that the success has. So it doesn't have

• 19:51Speaker 03

  Hard touch.

• 19:52Speaker 02

  Faster.

• 19:53Speaker 03

  Force touch.

• 19:54Nilay Patel?

  3D touch.

• 19:55Speaker 03

  3D touch.

• 19:56Speaker 02

  Hard touch.

• 19:57Speaker 03

  Yeah, you press hard.

• 19:58Speaker 02

  Hard touch, by the way, worst Steven Seagal movie.

• 20:03Nilay Patel?

  The sequel was Force Touch.

• 20:08Nilay Patel?

  Okay.

• 20:08Speaker 02

  And then Force Touch 3D, which was just, most people just call it 3D touch.

• 20:14Speaker 02

  Sorry.

• 20:16Nilay Patel?

  Have you never seen a Steven Seagal movie?

• 20:17Speaker 03

  No.

• 20:18Speaker 02

  Really?

• 20:19Nilay Patel?

  All right, go home and watch Under Siege.

• 20:22Speaker 02

  Oh, yeah. Under Siege is great.

• 20:24Speaker 03

  Do you think I'll like it?

• 20:25Nilay Patel?

  Yeah, I mean.

• 20:26Speaker 03

  All I like is Scandal.

• 20:27Speaker 02

  Do you like it? It's like the wrong question. You don't, you don't like or dislike a Steven Seagal movie. You just experience.

• 20:33Nilay Patel?

  They just occur to you.

• 20:34Speaker 02

  Yeah. At you.

• 20:36Speaker 03

  Alright, seems like a Thursday.

• 20:37Nilay Patel?

  Have you ever seen Die Hard?

• 20:40Nilay Patel?

  Oh, my God.

• 20:40Speaker 02

  Don't even put those in the same category.

• 20:42Nilay Patel?

  But Under Siege is Die Hard on a boat.

• 20:45Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 20:46Nilay Patel?

  It's a hundred percent Die Hard on a boat.

• 20:47Speaker 02

  Yeah, except like, but Bruce Willis is so much better than Steven Seagal.

• 20:51Nilay Patel?

  Yep.

• 20:52Speaker 02

  And the script is, okay.

• 20:53Nilay Patel?

  But it is fundamentally Die Hard on a boat.

• 20:57Nilay Patel?

  Just like. Speed is Die Hard on a bus. Every movie is Die Hard in a different vehicle.

• 21:01Speaker 01

  They have Speed on a boat.

• 21:02Nilay Patel?

  Huh?

• 21:03Speaker 01

  And there's Speed 2. There's.

• 21:05Nilay Patel?

  Yes, it's called Speedboat. Yeah, I know. But Speed 2 Cruise Control, which is a movie I believe you're referencing.

• 21:10Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 21:10Nilay Patel?

  It's a garbage movie.

• 21:11Speaker 01

  Speed on a boat, but.

• 21:12Nilay Patel?

  But Keanu Reeves wasn't in that movie.

• 21:14Speaker 01

  Still speed in the title.

• 21:16Speaker 02

  All I know is Die Hard is a perfect movie. And so to compare it to any other movie doesn't like mathematically doesn't work. Cause it like on a scale of one to 10, Die Hard is infinity. And so like, you know, on a scale of one to 10, you know, a Steven Seagal movie is like a three. So like, what's three divided by infinity?

• 21:33Nilay Patel?

  I see what you're getting at. Yeah.

• 21:34Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 21:34Speaker 01

  Die Hard one or Die Hard three?

• 21:36Nilay Patel?

  Die Hard four.

• 21:38Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 21:39Speaker 02

  Die Hard 3. No, I mean, Die Hard 1, obviously, but then after Die Hard 1 comes Die Hard 3.

• 21:44Nilay Patel?

  Okay, here's what I need everybody to do. Tweet at Nicola and tell her which which sequence of Die Hard movies she should watch.

• 21:50Speaker 03

  Yeah, I'll do it.

• 21:50Nilay Patel?

  It's difficult.

• 21:51Speaker 03

  I don't have other stuff to do.

• 21:52Nilay Patel?

  Die Hard 1.

• 21:53Speaker 02

  Oh, no.

• 21:53Nilay Patel?

  You should, okay.

• 21:54Speaker 02

  The sequence is 1, 1, 3, 1.

• 21:59Nilay Patel?

  Yeah, skip 4 entirely.

• 22:00Speaker 03

  Okay.

• 22:01Nilay Patel?

  Although he does launch a car.

• 22:01Speaker 03

  I have to watch the whole Fast and the Furious series, though. I hear that's more important.

• 22:05Speaker 02

  It's Die Hard on a Road.

• 22:06Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 22:06Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 22:11Nilay Patel?

  Every movie is Die Hard, but with slightly different. Because every movie fundamentally is about going into a space.

• 22:19Speaker 03

  Mm hmm.

• 22:19Speaker 02

  Uh huh.

• 22:21Nilay Patel?

  Missing your family.

• 22:22Speaker 02

  Yep.

• 22:22Nilay Patel?

  And having to overcome some obstacle.

• 22:24Speaker 02

  Uh huh.

• 22:25Nilay Patel?

  To find your family again.

• 22:26Speaker 02

  And you're secretly a cop.

• 22:28Nilay Patel?

  You're secretly, and it's Christmas, but that's not really important.

• 22:31Speaker 02

  Oh, it's super important.

• 22:33Nilay Patel?

  No, the whole point of Die Hard being Christmas is not important. It's just around.

• 22:37Speaker 02

  No, it's just the, it's the best Christmas movie.

• 22:40Nilay Patel?

  No, I agree with you. It's the best Christmas movie, but it's not actually integral. It's just Christmas is an ambiance to Die Hard.

• 22:44Speaker 02

  Okay.

• 22:45Nilay Patel?

  Have you ever seen a, um, uh, Kiss Kiss Bang Bang?

• 22:49Speaker 02

  Talk about these.

• 22:50Nilay Patel?

  We're doing everything we can to not talk about the iPhone.

• 22:53Speaker 02

  By the way.

• 22:53Speaker 03

  Rip the Band-Aid. Let's talk about it.

• 22:55Speaker 01

  They announced an iPhone this week.

• 22:56Speaker 02

  It's missing 3D Touch. It doesn't have the fast touch ID.

• 23:00Speaker 01

  First of all, is it really missing 3D Touch?

• 23:01Speaker 02

  Yeah, nobody's missing 3D Touch. Um.

• 23:04Nilay Patel?

  Everything we can.

• 23:05Speaker 02

  It's, oh, it doesn't have a barometer.

• 23:08Nilay Patel?

  3D Touch is a Die Hard.

• 23:09Speaker 01

  Oh, I use the barometer every day.

• 23:11Speaker 03

  I used the compass yesterday, actually.

• 23:13Nilay Patel?

  Wait, what'd you?

• 23:14Speaker 03

  I used the compass yesterday.

• 23:15Nilay Patel?

  The compass is great. You use the compass all the time, whether or not you know it.

• 23:18Speaker 03

  Yeah, that's true. That's true.

• 23:20Nilay Patel?

  Like uses the compass.

• 23:21Speaker 03

  Well, I use the hot, the real.

• 23:23Nilay Patel?

  Were you on a ship?

• 23:24Speaker 03

  Compass app.

• 23:24Nilay Patel?

  What were you doing?

• 23:25Speaker 03

  I was like, I'm southeast on this corner, but I was like, Manhattan's all funky. I want to know what direction I really am. I was due east.

• 23:31Nilay Patel?

  Hmm.

• 23:31Speaker 03

  That's all.

• 23:32Nilay Patel?

  Does the compass actually work in Manhattan? Because it often doesn't work here.

• 23:35Speaker 03

  What? Why? What do you mean it was off?

• 23:36Nilay Patel?

  There's buildings. There's metal all around you.

• 23:38Speaker 03

  Oh, well.

• 23:38Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 23:39Speaker 01

  Okay, I feel like the most important thing about this phone is that it costs only $400.

• 23:42Speaker 02

  It's also super fast.

• 23:44Speaker 01

  Ever expect Apple to go that low.

• 23:46Speaker 02

  Oh, yeah. I mean.

• 23:47Speaker 01

  Really? Okay, the 5C was $550.

• 23:50Speaker 02

  They already had literally like, I don't want to say that they just had the stuff in a parts bin.

• 23:55Speaker 01

  The 5C was a worse version of the 5, and they charged as much.

• 24:01Speaker 02

  Yeah, but you can get a Nexus 5X for

• 24:03Nilay Patel?

  Well, exactly, but I feel like Apple would totally just ignore that for no reason.

• 24:07Speaker 02

  So I think it costs them literally nothing to develop this phone.

• 24:12Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 24:12Speaker 02

  It's the same screen as the 5S, I'm assuming.

• 24:15Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 24:15Speaker 02

  I don't think they did. I don't remember them doing any changes there.

• 24:18Nilay Patel?

  They obviously had to repackage it.

• 24:19Speaker 02

  They had to make it hard.

• 24:20Nilay Patel?

  I think what's the most interesting thing.

• 24:22Speaker 02

  I think to get a slightly bigger battery than the 5S had.

• 24:24Nilay Patel?

  I think the most interesting thing to me, this is across all of Apple's line now, is they're no longer delineated by screen size or capability. It's some weird matrix of both. So.

• 24:37Speaker 02

  This is the SE, which stands for special edition.

• 24:40Nilay Patel?

  Right.

• 24:40Speaker 02

  Which means they'll never do it again?

• 24:42Nilay Patel?

  I guess.

• 24:43Speaker 02

  I don't know.

• 24:43Nilay Patel?

  But it's, so you can buy the 6S internals with the small screen, the 6S internals with the big screen, but you can buy a big screen that is worse than both because you can, you can still buy the 6 and the 6 plus. So that's very confusing because that means, and I asked, like, are, do you see people who are just prioritizing screen size? Because that is a thing. And like, we don't know, people just like this phone. I was like, are you sure they don't just like cheap? Because that, people like that too. And like, we, some people really love this. So that's like one question. I think the other big question, particularly with the iPad, is it's all over the place. So iPad mini doesn't mean anything.

• 25:21Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 25:21Nilay Patel?

  It just means a screen size, but iPad Pro doesn't mean anything. It just means a stylus and a keyboard. But then the smaller iPad Pro has a better camera than the big iPad Pro. It, it is just all over the place. And it has the, the, the True Tone screen. Two-tone?

• 25:39Speaker 02

  True Tone.

• 25:40Nilay Patel?

  True Tone.

• 25:40Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 25:41Nilay Patel?

  The two-tone screen.

• 25:41Speaker 02

  Two-tone, true tone.

• 25:42Nilay Patel?

  One, one side of its black.

• 25:43Speaker 01

  And always on Hey Siri.

• 25:45Nilay Patel?

  Hey Siri.

• 25:46Speaker 01

  Somebody sent me a very serious email about that, saying we need to get to the bottom of why this one has Hey Siri. The other one does not.

• 25:53Nilay Patel?

  Really?

• 25:54Speaker 02

  No.

• 25:54Nilay Patel?

  Huh.

• 25:56Speaker 03

  What do you mean, hey Siri?

• 25:57Nilay Patel?

  You could say, hey Siri. We're just trolling phones everywhere. Yeah. Do you see this story?

• 26:01Speaker 03

  Uh-uh.

• 26:02Nilay Patel?

  NPR is doing a story about voice assistants and they triggered everybody's Alexas. Yeah, to like buy stuff. Which is a thing that we do on purpose because we're terrible trolls.

• 26:12Speaker 03

  It's funny. Man, I got Alexa drama in my life.

• 26:15Nilay Patel?

  What's happened? Did you get one?

• 26:16Speaker 03

  I ordered it and it's been stuck in USPS limbo, so I just had them return to sender. I feel like it doesn't want to come home.

• 26:25Nilay Patel?

  Right. Why don't you just buy it from the Prime Now app?

• 26:28Speaker 03

  Well, it came to my house, but they didn't leave it. And then they grabbed it again and they didn't leave it.

• 26:35Nilay Patel?

  Why don't you get it delivered here?

• 26:37Speaker 03

  Um, because I just wanted to have it at my house, you know, where it was going to go eventually.

• 26:40Nilay Patel?

  Oh, yeah.

• 26:41Speaker 03

  So, you know.

• 26:42Nilay Patel?

  Disappointing. Really disappointing. I ordered all of them. For some reason, all of them are on their way to my house.

• 26:48Speaker 01

  How many Echoes do you have?

• 26:51Nilay Patel?

  So, we have the main one. I don't have the other ones yet. I don't have a shit yet. But then I bought the Dot. What's the other one called?

• 26:57Speaker 01

  The Tap.

• 26:58Nilay Patel?

  The Tap. Dot and Tap. It's the Echo Dot and the Amazon Tap. Very confusing.

• 27:04Speaker 01

  Man.

• 27:04Nilay Patel?

  Anyway, so the iPhone SE.

• 27:07Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 27:07Nilay Patel?

  Here's a phone.

• 27:08Speaker 01

  It's cheap. It's cheap.

• 27:10Nilay Patel?

  I think even Apple struggled to say things about this phone, to be perfectly honest with you.

• 27:15Speaker 01

  Okay, it's super boring, but I actually think that it's like, a ton of people are going to buy this thing.

• 27:19Nilay Patel?

  I mean, I'm thinking about it, which is crazy, but like, I'm thinking I'm going to need to be like the person who lives in a two-phone world and I'm... Oh, I see. Yeah. That's something. That's a good... This is like, the thing that I would be willing to do with this thing that I wouldn't be willing to do with the six is like, roll with it in my back pocket. Yeah, actually, when I was walking down here, instinctively went in my back pocket, which I haven't done with this six plus in a long time. Yeah.

• 27:42Speaker 01

  I was carrying a Gear S2 in my back pocket, super broke.

• 27:45Nilay Patel?

  Isn't that a watch?

• 27:46Speaker 01

  Well, yeah.

• 27:49Nilay Patel?

  All right. All right. Let's talk about this iPad. So the iPad far more interesting.

• 27:53Speaker 02

  Yeah. So it's all the same. Well, everything, all the same stuff in the big iPad Pro. Actually, the naming, I want to get back to the naming thing doesn't confuse me like the iPhone naming thing confusing as hell. Don't know. Yeah. But it's clear that where they're moving with iPads is they wanted to just mirror their Mac names. Except the Mac names are not confusing too, because now there's just the MacBook. It's all confusing. You're right. I'm wrong.

• 28:18Nilay Patel?

  I just want an argument with Peter that same word. Because he just said the name of Apple's products.

• 28:26Speaker 02

  No, I hear what you're saying. Like if you ignore the iPad mini, then you've got like the air and the Pro and like that's clean and simple for iPads. But then you throw the mini in and then you're like, huh? And then you're like, oh, wait, Macs aren't clean between air and Pro either because there's other stuff. So never mind.

• 28:43Nilay Patel?

  I mean, how do you live in a world where every iPad doesn't have a smart connector for a keyboard? Why is that a pro feature? I don't understand that at all. I understand why the stylus is a pro feature, but that's not in the box. Right. So to me, it's just there. They've made this delineation and the Pro was the big one and they're like, you know what? A lot of people want the regular size one because that's the most popular one. We need to establish the ecosystem of pencil apps and keyboard accessories and na, na, na, na, na. So we're going to bring it to the most popular size. But now the air, how can you make an iPad? What is the iPad?

• 29:14Speaker 01

  It seems like they're, I mean, all of that stuff is in this

• 29:17Speaker 02

  Air 3 is.

• 29:18Speaker 01

  Super awkward, like a growing phase where the, the lines are just hard to distinguish. There's no distinguishing features between them like.

• 29:29Speaker 01

  And I'm guessing within a couple of years, we're going to start to see more pro features in the Pro. They're going to be significantly faster than the other ones.

• 29:35Speaker 02

  Yeah. And then they start like, and then they start kicking stuff down to the air. Like if I were Apple, I don't, I don't release an iPad Air 3 till. What is an iPad Air 3?

• 29:45Speaker 01

  I mean, it's just a slower iPad Pro without a couple of features.

• 29:49Speaker 02

  I think they don't bother. I'd straight up think they don't bother.

• 29:52Speaker 01

  Right.

• 29:53Speaker 02

  Like, this is $5.99 for the 32 gig. I think next year they'll drop, they'll drop the price to $100. They'll like, then they'll just have the Air 2 sitting around for whatever reason.

• 30:03Nilay Patel?

  Don't they need a cheap one for, I don't know, real estate agents?

• 30:08Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 30:09Nilay Patel?

  You know, people who just like, a lot of people use iPads just as like point of sale terminals.

• 30:13Speaker 02

  Right.

• 30:13Nilay Patel?

  Or, um, people, like, this thing is supposed to replace a computer.

• 30:18Speaker 02

  Right.

• 30:18Nilay Patel?

  Right? When I, the reason I said real estate agents is like, I went to look at houses the other day and all she was using it for was to show pictures.

• 30:26Speaker 03

  Where are you buying a house?

• 30:27Nilay Patel?

  Don't worry about it.

• 30:28Speaker 03

  Ooh, wow.

• 30:30Nilay Patel?

  It's a thing. It's a thing I'm thinking about. I'm gonna stock it exclusive with iPads.

• 30:34Speaker 03

  Of course.

• 30:34Nilay Patel?

  Yeah, it's a thing. Uh.

• 30:36Speaker 02

  Okay, so.

• 30:37Nilay Patel?

  No, we're just like, we're just looking.

• 30:39Speaker 03

  Was that an upstate motion?

• 30:41Nilay Patel?

  It was a, it was a direction.

• 30:42Speaker 01

  Did you neglect houseboat?

• 30:46Speaker 03

  I was looking at houseboats and they exclusively had iPads.

• 30:49Nilay Patel?

  That'd be great. I'd buy a houseboat iPad. If you had a boat, and I think about this conceptually all the time, you would not want to allow laptops on a boat.

• 30:57Speaker 02

  You know, if I had a boat, I'd go out on the ocean.

• 31:00Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 31:01Speaker 02

  And if I had a pony, I'd ride him on my boat.

• 31:03Nilay Patel?

  Oh, my God. The show is so off the rails.

• 31:08Speaker 02

  No, no, no.

• 31:09Speaker 03

  I don't get it. I don't know.

• 31:11Nilay Patel?

  Conclusively.

• 31:12Speaker 02

  Everybody look up me on my pony on my boat and, uh, feel terrible for yourself for not knowing a lot of it's on. iPad Pro has all the same features as the big iPad Pro, except it doesn't have as much RAM.

• 31:23Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 31:24Speaker 02

  Whatever. Except the new things it has are a camera bump for its big 12-megapixel camera, which I guess.

• 31:32Speaker 03

  You can make pictures of fireworks. You know, you're at the fireworks. You got the iPad.

• 31:36Nilay Patel?

  No, they, they showed me a bunch of stuff people.

• 31:38Speaker 02

  Scan documents.

• 31:39Nilay Patel?

  Because it's for, it's supposed to be a laptop.

• 31:41Speaker 02

  Uh huh.

• 31:42Nilay Patel?

  That is actually, the camera bump is ugly and everyone should be ashamed, but the idea of a high-resolution camera in an iPad, very powerful because it's not for taking photos of vacation.

• 31:55Speaker 02

  It's so you don't have to buy a scanner?

• 31:56Speaker 01

  Oh, no. I saw people taking vacation photos with the large iPad Pro.

• 31:59Nilay Patel?

  Oh, yeah. No, of course. And that's great for them, but this is for. Again, and it just keeps coming up like architects who go to job sites and they just, they're doing stuff on their big screens and they just want to take a photo. Or again, real estate agents who do like AR walkthroughs of rooms. It's like this thing is supposed to be your main computer that you use when you're working. That's their idea.

• 32:22Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 32:22Nilay Patel?

  So you get the feeling that IBM, who's their enterprise software partner, was like, our customers, what's happening? They have a Ciservaca account. They're amazing.

• 32:31Speaker 02

  I didn't know.

• 32:32Nilay Patel?

  They're doing, I don't know who they are.

• 32:33Speaker 02

  There's a Ciservaca Twitter account.

• 32:35Nilay Patel?

  Cut through the, wow.

• 32:36Speaker 01

  What would make you actually use an iPad Pro as your computer?

• 32:39Speaker 02

  Uh, I'm trying it, uh, for the next few days.

• 32:43Nilay Patel?

  Okay. A good browser.

• 32:44Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 32:45Nilay Patel?

  I, this, this, Mobile Safari is fine. It is a good browser, but it is not as good as Safari on a laptop.

• 32:52Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 32:53Nilay Patel?

  It is not as good as Chrome.

• 32:54Speaker 02

  Well, and this thing, this small one in particular, doesn't have enough RAM to like have as many tabs open as I need. Like eventually things start to go, huh? And the other thing that I need, honestly, like this thing you can, you can't get every single app in split screen, which is like starting to get annoying for the ones that don't support it.

• 33:10Speaker 01

  I thought you could just.

• 33:11Speaker 02

  No, you can do slide over, but some, both apps, both your main app and your slide over app, need to support split screen in order to get the split screen to happen.

• 33:19Speaker 01

  That's ludicrous.

• 33:20Speaker 02

  It's ludicrous. But my main problem is I'm realizing that like, I'm a three app person, person kind of guy. Three app kind of guy. I need like Slack, a browser and Twitter.

• 33:30Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 33:31Speaker 02

  Right? Or I like, I need, I, I, I can get down to two, but getting down to two makes me feel bereft.

• 33:37Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 33:38Speaker 02

  But three, I think I could do with.

• 33:39Nilay Patel?

  I've given up Twitter.

• 33:40Speaker 02

  I'm getting there.

• 33:41Nilay Patel?

  Twitter for, for Mac is so bad that I often just quit it because it's beach trolling.

• 33:46Speaker 03

  I took it, I took out my dock. I was like, nah.

• 33:48Speaker 02

  I'm done. Yeah.

• 33:50Speaker 03

  I miss a lot of stuff, but it keeps ticking, you know?

• 33:53Nilay Patel?

  No, I have Slack. Anything that happens important on Twitter, someone will talk about in Slack. This is my, my new theory. And I can like click on the link and Twitter opens and like, that's the experience I'm having.

• 34:02Speaker 02

  I want to talk about one more thing.

• 34:03Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 34:04Speaker 02

  The True Tone screen.

• 34:05Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 34:06Speaker 02

  Thought I would hate it, love it.

• 34:07Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 34:07Speaker 02

  It's like, you turn it off and all of a sudden the screen is like, yo, I'm super blue and like garish. I'm like, ah, this is terrible. Wait, this is what I've been looking at for the past five years.

• 34:17Speaker 03

  So can you tell when it's active?

• 34:18Speaker 02

  And you turn it, yeah, like.

• 34:19Nilay Patel?

  Yeah, well, I just watched it happen. It just got a little bit yellower.

• 34:22Speaker 02

  Blue. Yellow.

• 34:24Speaker 01

  That does look more pleasant.

• 34:25Speaker 02

  And we're actually really white light right now. So this is really subtle. It's super yellow light. It's like maybe a little bit much.

• 34:31Speaker 01

  Mm hmm.

• 34:31Speaker 02

  Um, but if you just leave it on and forget about it, all of a sudden you're like, oh yeah.

• 34:37Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 34:37Speaker 02

  This is good.

• 34:37Nilay Patel?

  I noticed this was night shift. I turned it on night shift yesterday.

• 34:40Speaker 03

  I literally just learned about that and I just turned mine on and I cannot wait for it to happen.

• 34:45Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 34:45Nilay Patel?

  You can.

• 34:46Speaker 03

  No, I just set it to sunset sunrise. So at seven thirty, you know.

• 34:49Nilay Patel?

  There's, there's no science behind this, by the way.

• 34:52Speaker 03

  I like to pretend there is.

• 34:54Nilay Patel?

  Liz Lopato is, I think, currently investigating very deeply.

• 34:57Speaker 03

  Really?

• 34:57Nilay Patel?

  The, the fundamental lack of science behind this. There's some.

• 35:00Speaker 02

  There's some science. There's definite science that like a screen, a blue, a screen with blue light is bad, but there's less science about whether just turning off the blue light helps is my understanding. But I could be wrong.

• 35:11Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 35:11Speaker 02

  I shouldn't say these things.

• 35:13Speaker 03

  I feel like they're making it more okay to play on your phone until you close your eyes.

• 35:16Nilay Patel?

  That is almost certainly true.

• 35:17Speaker 02

  Mm hmm.

• 35:17Nilay Patel?

  But I love it. So that's.

• 35:21Speaker 03

  I'm excited.

• 35:22Nilay Patel?

  It's definitely more pleasant to look at.

• 35:23Speaker 03

  I mean, yes, I could just.

• 35:24Nilay Patel?

  And what's funny is that I hate flux on my laptop.

• 35:27Speaker 02

  Well, I, my, my wife, uh, does the, the assistive, the assistive thing where you can like triple click the home button and it reverses the screen.

• 35:36Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 35:36Speaker 02

  And like sets it white to black. She does that at night.

• 35:39Speaker 03

  I just pressed, I just didn't, I just did it and I love it. This orange screen. But now Instagram is going to look weird, huh?

• 35:46Nilay Patel?

  Well, no, because you get used to it.

• 35:47Speaker 02

  Hmm.

• 35:48Nilay Patel?

  It, it's like, it's more like looking at paper. The idea is it will have.

• 35:52Speaker 02

  It more accurately reflects the light in the room. Well, no, that's night shift.

• 35:56Nilay Patel?

  She's looking at night shift.

• 35:57Speaker 02

  Yeah, but True Tone actually reflects the color in the room.

• 35:59Nilay Patel?

  Right.

• 36:00Speaker 02

  By like sensors.

• 36:01Speaker 01

  Does True Tone work alongside night shift?

• 36:05Nilay Patel?

  They're right there. I was wondering.

• 36:06Speaker 01

  Or does it negate the need for night shift?

• 36:07Speaker 02

  You can have both and you can adjust the power of night shift, but True Tone is either on or off. It's cool. And okay, I have one more thing to say. Do you want to add? Cause I have one more thing.

• 36:16Nilay Patel?

  Just say one more thing.

• 36:17Speaker 02

  The little keyboard is really good. I thought, I thought I was going to be, eh, it's too small and the keys are really far separated and I don't know. Um. But like, maybe it's because I've like, accepted that keys don't need to have as much travel because I've been using the Mac stuff. But it took me maybe forty-five minutes to just be flying on this thing.

• 36:39Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 36:39Speaker 02

  It's like it was a regular full-size keyboard. I've never had that experience on a keyboard this small before.

• 36:43Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 36:43Speaker 02

  It's really good.

• 36:44Nilay Patel?

  I mean, I think this is what I'm saying. All of them have to have this connector.

• 36:47Speaker 02

  Yeah, except the angle, the one angle.

• 36:49Nilay Patel?

  I was in a meeting, yeah, but they're gonna make other, like, other.

• 36:52Speaker 02

  Yeah, but it won't be as good as.

• 36:54Nilay Patel?

  I was in a meeting the other day, and it was just the, like, the funniest thing happened, and I don't know why I think this is hilarious, but like, the people came in the meeting, and the one person was like, "I'm gonna take out some notes. I'm bringing my laptop." And they brought out an iPad mini with a folding keyboard case, and they just opened it up, and like, it was their laptop, and I was like, I don't.

• 37:10Speaker 01

  That's super weird.

• 37:11Nilay Patel?

  I'm not ready for this reality at all.

• 37:13Speaker 01

  I, you should actually question their judgment on whatever they proposed in that meeting. That is not a laptop.

• 37:19Nilay Patel?

  Trust me, it is. That's what I do in meetings. Um, I'm gonna read this. Oh, I have one more question.

• 37:24Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 37:25Nilay Patel?

  And I forgot what it was.

• 37:26Speaker 02

  Oh, God.

• 37:27Nilay Patel?

  Oh, no, you, so you have a MacBook.

• 37:28Speaker 02

  Yep.

• 37:29Nilay Patel?

  You're using this thing.

• 37:30Speaker 02

  Yep.

• 37:31Nilay Patel?

  They're getting ever closer together.

• 37:32Speaker 02

  Yes, my MacBook is severely underpowered, and this thing is severely overpowered.

• 37:36Nilay Patel?

  Yes. Are they, what's going on with the Mac? Do you think that they're just, I mean.

• 37:42Speaker 02

  No, I think.

• 37:43Nilay Patel?

  They don't seem to know what it's for.

• 37:44Speaker 02

  Yeah, I think that you shouldn't assume that they have, like, a grand plan that is mysterious. You should just assume that, like, there's the Mac, and it's doing its Mac thing, and the MacBook is basically waiting for a good Skylake processor to.

• 37:55Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 37:56Speaker 02

  Get, update that thing, so it's not dogslow, and then they're gonna push the hell out of it, and hopefully they release some more USB-C adapters, so that you can actually do more stuff with it.

• 38:03Nilay Patel?

  They have to make one with two ports, right?

• 38:05Speaker 02

  They have to.

• 38:06Speaker 01

  No, they don't. Dude, it's Apple.

• 38:08Nilay Patel?

  They've gotta make one.

• 38:09Speaker 01

  They will not give in to you.

• 38:12Nilay Patel?

  They, they always do.

• 38:13Speaker 01

  You have five years, there'll be zero ports. You're nuts if you think they're gonna add a port.

• 38:18Nilay Patel?

  They're gonna add a port to the other side.

• 38:19Speaker 01

  They're gonna cut the battery in half, they're gonna take out the headphone jack, that, you're gonna have to be using a wireless battery.

• 38:26Nilay Patel?

  Dude, you've been walking around after watching Backpocket. I understand what you're saying.

• 38:31Nilay Patel?

  No, I think that they proved the idea. The MacBook Air is proof of this. They put out the original MacBook Air.

• 38:37Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 38:37Nilay Patel?

  It was ridiculous.

• 38:39Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 38:39Nilay Patel?

  And then they refined it into the most utilitarian computer available.

• 38:42Speaker 02

  Yep.

• 38:43Nilay Patel?

  With ports on both sides. They will add another port to the other side of that.

• 38:46Speaker 02

  There you go.

• 38:47Nilay Patel?

  They're not dumb. They're just, I think that their, their big leap models are there to prove the point. This only has one port. You gotta figure it out. If you want to talk to this thing, you gotta figure it out. Okay, everybody figured it out? No, here's another port.

• 39:00Speaker 02

  I gotta tell you, the-

• 39:01Nilay Patel?

  There's a sign in Apple somewhere.

• 39:02Speaker 01

  Do you really think they couldn't already fit a second port?

• 39:06Nilay Patel?

  I don't know. I just know that this is how they do things. They, they force everybody to, to figure it out and then they, then they open up.

• 39:12Speaker 01

  I feel like out of stubbornness, they were just like, screw all of you. One port.

• 39:18Nilay Patel?

  Maybe.

• 39:19Speaker 01

  I, I just don't see them adding a second one.

• 39:22Nilay Patel?

  I mean, presumably they have to make a MacBook Pro with USB-C ports.

• 39:27Speaker 01

  That will have two ports.

• 39:28Speaker 02

  That is what it's pro about it. It's a second port.

• 39:33Nilay Patel?

  How many ports do I have? Is it three?

• 39:35Speaker 02

  You've got a million ports on that thing.

• 39:36Nilay Patel?

  It's a lot of ports. I enjoy the number of ports.

• 39:38Speaker 01

  You will get a power cord if you're lucky.

• 39:40Nilay Patel?

  Michael, do you ever plug any USB stuff into your MacBook Air?

• 39:42Speaker 03

  Hella. Yeah, so many. I've got the ethernet cord.

• 39:46Nilay Patel?

  Oh, wow, you're hardcore. You plug your phone in?

• 39:50Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 39:51Nilay Patel?

  I never plug my phone in my computer.

• 39:53Speaker 03

  Charge it.

• 39:54Nilay Patel?

  Dieter, I borrowed Dieter's lightning cable somewhere until he just bought me a charger.

• 39:57Speaker 03

  It's nice. And now I got my, you gotta charge my job, you know, all kinds of stuff.

• 40:04Nilay Patel?

  So you use it as a gigantic battery?

• 40:06Speaker 03

  Yeah, it's my big battery.

• 40:07Nilay Patel?

  You don't ever, like, do connectivity, except for the ethernet adapter?

• 40:09Speaker 03

  What would I connect to it?

• 40:11Nilay Patel?

  So, that was, that was my question. And you use the ethernet adapter because our office wifi is a little shaky.

• 40:17Speaker 03

  Yeah, it's not great. It's not a great look for Vox Media.

• 40:19Nilay Patel?

  Oh, hey, burning the mothership.

• 40:21Speaker 03

  Kevin's got it.

• 40:22Nilay Patel?

  Now burning Kevin.

• 40:23Speaker 03

  No, Kevin's got it under control.

• 40:25Speaker 02

  Is he?

• 40:26Nilay Patel?

  But I'm saying, the num- everybody stop.

• 40:29Speaker 02

  Stark.

• 40:30Nilay Patel?

  Everybody stop. Kevin, you're a welcome part of our family. Vox Media, your wifi situation, A+.

• 40:36Speaker 03

  It's great. We're so connected.

• 40:39Nilay Patel?

  Oh, my God, everybody.

• 40:40Speaker 03

  Slash's never gone.

• 40:41Nilay Patel?

  Oh, God. Slash's never gone.

• 40:45Nilay Patel?

  You know what makes cooking awesome meals at home easy and fun? Plated. You don't have to do any meal planning. You don't have to do your shopping. You just make the most out of every moment in the kitchen and at the table with Plated. Here's how to get started. I bet you know. You go to plated.com/theverge right now for a fantastic offer with first plate delivery. You can choose from exciting recipes that change weekly, designed to fit a wide range of tastes and preferences. Then you get a hand-packed insulated box, which you can reuse for many things. With fresh produce, antibiotic-free meats, everything you need to cook a delicious dinner delivered straight to your door. It's all pre-measured, because you are, you know, you don't have time to measure. So you don't even waste any food. You just like, put it on the pot, cook the pot, eat the food. You're like, thanks, Plated. Just usually, you follow the step-by-step recipe cards, you get ready to be impressed, you impress others. That's great.

• 41:29Nilay Patel?

  You don't even, and then you take pictures of your iPad, put it on Instagram. Think about that. You don't need to be a pro. You just need Plated. You're not home for your delivery? That's most of you. They're just gonna leave at the door, take it away. Everything in Plated box stays fresh until midnight on the day it arrives. That's a solve. So, prepare chef-quality dinners right at home in a few simple steps. Hurry over to plated.com/theverge right now and get a free dinner for two with your first delivery. That's a free dinner for two. It's free with your first plate box. Go to plated.com/theverge, you'll see some terms and details, then push the button, then get some food at your house. Plated.com/theverge. All right, let's talk about Vizio.

• 42:03Speaker 02

  I feel like this pencil doesn't.

• 42:04Nilay Patel?

  Are you just coloring the whole screen?

• 42:06Speaker 02

  Well, I'm trying to, but the pencil seems to kind of not want to do it at the edges.

• 42:10Nilay Patel?

  All right, so, I wrote a feature this week.

• 42:12Speaker 02

  Vizio.

• 42:13Nilay Patel?

  That I've been working on for a long time, actually, because I've known about this plan for a while. But Vizio, which I think most of us don't think of as a big tech company, but they actually sell the most amount of televisions in America, which is a strange thought.

• 42:28Speaker 01

  They also made like a phone once.

• 42:30Nilay Patel?

  They made a phone.

• 42:31Speaker 02

  They made a bunch of tablets.

• 42:32Nilay Patel?

  About their laptops. They've tried to expand it many times. Those expansion plans have never gone off.

• 42:38Speaker 01

  They were all pretty nice.

• 42:40Nilay Patel?

  They made two generations of laptops. They stayed in the laptop market for about two, three years, and then they were like this. Then they were like, oh my God, we decided to make laptops. So they, they tried to make much stuff that didn't, but they have constantly sold TVs, tons and tons and tons of TVs.

• 42:52Speaker 02

  They sell more TVs in America than anybody.

• 42:54Nilay Patel?

  Than anybody.

• 42:54Speaker 02

  And that's because they are really good at selling TVs in like, what, Walmart and Best Buy?

• 42:59Nilay Patel?

  They're cheap.

• 42:59Speaker 02

  They're cheap.

• 43:00Nilay Patel?

  But they're very high quality. So right now, highest rated TV on CNET, second highest rated TV on the Wirecutter for M-Series. Gamers in particular love their TVs.

• 43:10Speaker 02

  Because they, they ship with motion smoothing off by default?

• 43:13Nilay Patel?

  The new ones do, the old ones didn't. They love them because they particularly source, I've got a whole lecture about this, low latency HDMI ports. So gamer and the screens are faster. So like video game nerds buy Vizio TVs.

• 43:29Speaker 01

  Wow.

• 43:31Nilay Patel?

  But that's not why you should buy Vizio TV.

• 43:34Speaker 01

  Vizio, supported by gamers.

• 43:37Nilay Patel?

  Do you need a low latency HDMI?

• 43:38Speaker 01

  A ringing endorsement.

• 43:40Nilay Patel?

  Yeah, it's great. No, they buy them. The Polygon staff, for example. Lots of Vizio TVs on Polygon staff. Anyhow.

• 43:48Nilay Patel?

  They, they're smart. All smart TV platforms are garbage, I think is something that we can agree on.

• 43:53Speaker 01

  Yes.

• 43:54Nilay Patel?

  Just generally. They're fine. They can play Netflix at you and that most people are happy to accept that in their life.

• 44:00Speaker 01

  The best smart TV platform to date is the one that tried the least to be a smart TV platform.

• 44:05Nilay Patel?

  Which one's that?

• 44:06Speaker 01

  That would be WebOS TV.

• 44:07Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 44:08Speaker 01

  It was an interface and the whole interface was just there so that you could sling web streams at it.

• 44:12Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 44:13Speaker 01

  Which is basically what Vizio is doing.

• 44:14Nilay Patel?

  Vizio just took it to the final conclusion. So Vizio's platform, smart TV platform until now was based on the Yahoo Internet Widget platform. It's a true fact.

• 44:24Speaker 01

  In what world did anybody propose that idea?

• 44:28Nilay Patel?

  Well, they picked it seven years ago. So they've been running with it for seven years.

• 44:31Speaker 01

  That's.

• 44:32Nilay Patel?

  I'm like, I'm deep in this story with them. So they picked seven years ago.

• 44:35Speaker 01

  How many years ago did they realize they should stop that?

• 44:37Nilay Patel?

  Like two years ago.

• 44:39Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 44:39Nilay Patel?

  So, but seven years ago, there was no Android TV. There was no real, like the Apple TV as a platform wasn't really available. Samsung wasn't doing Tizen. You know.

• 44:48Speaker 01

  Yahoo was an up and coming startup seven years ago.

• 44:52Nilay Patel?

  It was probably the cheapest one ever because their whole thing is they sell really good TVs for low price. Anyway.

• 44:58Nilay Patel?

  So two years ago, the Chromecast came out and they went to Google and they said, we're going to rebuild our entire smart TV platform around Google Cast. So we're going to take all of the interface off of the TV. And we're going to put all on a tablet that will ship. So they didn't go Android TV. So Android TV is. An operating system for your television. Yeah. They, it's just Cast. So like, conceptually, it's the same as having a Cast dongle plugged into your TV. But in reality, there are no picture settings on the TV. There's no volume. You can see the volume meter, but everything happens on this, on their app, on a tablet they ship with

• 45:35Nilay Patel?

  the TV. So the simplest way of saying is you can now get a 50 inch 4K HDR TV from Vizio with a 6 inch 1080p Android tablet for $1,000. Which is like, kind of like, good combination of things. But the more interesting thing to me is the idea that that TV is just an accessory for your phone. That like, you want to change the brightness, you want to change the volume, you want to do all the stuff, you've got to like, use an app on a phone somewhere. Also, the app runs on everything. There's an iOS app, there's an Android app, and any other Cast app can send things to the TV. So YouTube can Netflix. So they don't have a smart TV operating system anymore. They just have Cast. I think this is like, a revolutionary idea. And then I was reading our comments, and people are like, so it's just a, it's a guess.

• 46:19Nilay Patel?

  It's, it's like, kind of hard to explain.

• 46:21Speaker 02

  Yeah. But, but, but if they sell a ton of these, and I hope they do, it might make, like, I, I'm, this isn't like, a pro-Google thing, but Cast as a standard is really good idea. And I think it's, in general, better than AirPlay for playing stuff on the web. Because instead of like, da-da-da, through your phone, da-da-da, you're just like, this thing is on the internet, TV, play that thing that is on the internet, or internet, put that thing on my TV, and then it just streams to your TV, and like, you're done. I just wipe my hands, podcast listeners.

• 46:50Speaker 01

  But isn't this only good because smart TV interfaces are bad? Like, if we got an actually good interface, wouldn't that be superior to this, that feels like a stopgap? Like, nobody's nailing this right now, so.

• 47:04Speaker 02

  Well, yes and no.

• 47:05Speaker 01

  At least we're not gonna screw this up.

• 47:06Speaker 02

  The thing about this is like, you know that, like, the, the likelihood that Cast, assuming that it, you know, manages to hang on, is, you're going to need to, it's gonna feel slow and crappy and out of date in five years, is way less than whatever magical interface you have on your, a smart TV right now. It'll hold up better, because all it is, is saying, play this stream that the Internet is pointing at me. The thing I don't like about it is when I'm sitting down on the couch with other people and we're like, what should we watch? The move is like you grab the remote and then you like throw up the interface on the big TV screen that you can all see. And then you like poke around and someone's like, oh, that one. Like on a tablet, a little tablet, it's like all the navigation happens there.

• 47:48Speaker 02

  That social like, let's figure out what we want to watch together thing kind of goes away.

• 47:52Nilay Patel?

  I find that to be one of the most panic inducing moments of all time.

• 47:56Speaker 02

  What?

• 47:56Nilay Patel?

  The, what the hell are we gonna watch?

• 47:58Speaker 02

  So do you just decide?

• 48:00Nilay Patel?

  I don't know. I don't think I watch TV in groups that way.

• 48:03Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 48:03Nilay Patel?

  I guess that like, you know, people.

• 48:06Speaker 01

  Even like if you're, if you're sitting down with your wife, you to pick something out.

• 48:09Nilay Patel?

  What happens in that situation is that I watch 90 trailers and then she passes out. But I think that's like a normal. But yeah, they're like, let's click through the Apple TV interface, but like it's a tablet. If I'm just sitting there, her. Like we can just look at the gigantic tablet. Don't you think?

• 48:25Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 48:25Nilay Patel?

  You're talking about like a large group of people, but I find the large group of people, it's all stare at a screen just to be anxiety inducing.

• 48:32Speaker 02

  Right. No, that's fair. But like two people, you think you just gotta sit next to each other, which.

• 48:37Nilay Patel?

  You can play the trailers on the tablet.

• 48:39Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 48:40Nilay Patel?

  I mean, are you, are we all reading the reviews together? I don't know. I don't know how people do things. Here's what I have.

• 48:44Speaker 02

  Plus it comes with a remote.

• 48:46Nilay Patel?

  Oh, but yeah, the remote is, I think that's the like pacifier.

• 48:50Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 48:50Nilay Patel?

  Right. The remote is if you're worried that you won't have a mute button or volume, or you just want to turn the thing off. There's like, here are some buttons to do those things. They're not really there to do anything else.

• 49:01Speaker 02

  But don't you think people are gonna like just hang on to their pacifier? Like, you know, when you see those like five year olds who still have the pacifier?

• 49:07Nilay Patel?

  Yeah, but I think that's why it's there.

• 49:09Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 49:10Nilay Patel?

  I mean, the thing to me that is more interesting is right now. The smart TV platform landscape is a disaster. Right? It's Samsung runs Tizen, Sony runs Android TV. Apple has its own platform. LG runs WebOS. Insignia runs the Roku OS.

• 49:31Speaker 02

  Panasonic has a thing.

• 49:32Nilay Patel?

  Panasonic, yeah.

• 49:33Speaker 02

  Firefox.

• 49:34Nilay Patel?

  Is it Firefox? Panasonic runs Firefox. There's no way you can introduce something new into that landscape and get Netflix to support you.

• 49:42Speaker 02

  Yep.

• 49:42Nilay Patel?

  There's no way that you're gonna have the first-class app on any, like, none of them can guarantee that their app is better than anybody else. Like, it is a race to the bottom. So you get a commodity app that gets ported to 50 platforms. That sucks. Like, to me, that sucks. My Panasonic TV has the pre-FireFox Smart TV OS, and it is just the hottest garbage in the world. And I don't know anybody who, like, loves their smart TV operating system. Even, even the Apple TV, which is probably the best of the breed, and we get, I gave it a great review, is like a mess. It's just a mess. And that remote, you cannot hold it in your hand and know which way is up.

• 50:20Speaker 02

  I don't use it.

• 50:21Nilay Patel?

  I don't use it. I use my Harmony and click around, just like the old Apple TV, and it never occurs to me that I should use apps on this platform. And I get a lot of tweets from people who are like, "I put duct tape on my remote, and now I know which way is up." This is a thing.

• 50:33Speaker 01

  That's insane.

• 50:34Nilay Patel?

  Putting, people putting tape on their Apple TV remote has become a real thing.

• 50:38Speaker 01

  Hmm, seems bad. Yeah, I mean, I'm still, I didn't upgrade from the old Apple TV because it didn't, I mean, it's the exact same interface, only now there's a bunch of apps I'm not gonna use.

• 50:47Nilay Patel?

  Yeah. I wish there was one.

• 50:49Speaker 02

  It's also, it's also less stable than the old Apple TV.

• 50:51Nilay Patel?

  Really?

• 50:51Speaker 02

  It crashes.

• 50:51Nilay Patel?

  Alright, it's crashy as hell.

• 50:53Speaker 01

  That's awful.

• 50:53Nilay Patel?

  I don't think they, like, have a real plan for that thing. Although, literally, as we're going to air, Apple announced that it's gonna do its first original series about app developers. Yeah, yeah.

• 51:02Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 51:03Speaker 03

  A scripted?

• 51:05Nilay Patel?

  I don't know.

• 51:05Speaker 01

  No, it's a reality show about app developers.

• 51:07Speaker 03

  Wait, really?

• 51:07Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 51:08Speaker 03

  Wait, really?

• 51:09Nilay Patel?

  It literally is, we're going to air.

• 51:10Speaker 02

  I didn't see that.

• 51:11Nilay Patel?

  Apple, this is in the post. Apple's first original TV show will be about app developers.

• 51:15Speaker 03

  And it's a reality show?

• 51:16Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 51:17Speaker 03

  I think I'm gonna love this.

• 51:19Nilay Patel?

  Ben Silverman created a new TV show based on the world's app developers, designed to boost interest in Apple's App Store while making Hollywood interviews with producers and studios.

• 51:30Speaker 03

  It's gonna be hot. It's gonna be sexy. It's gonna be real.

• 51:33Speaker 01

  This is why Apple Music just took off.

• 51:36Speaker 02

  It's gonna, man, there's like, there's way higher priorities for the App Store than promoting it via an unscripted TV series.

• 51:42Nilay Patel?

  Yeah. Well, I mean, they're making an Apple Music show with Dr. Ray called Vital Signs. Yep. This is real. It's real. Think about it.

• 51:49Speaker 03

  Man.

• 51:49Nilay Patel?

  Vital Signs with Dr. Dre. I think a lot of people are gonna think that he's a real doctor and that's a show about like healthy living.

• 51:56Speaker 03

  Why not make some kale smoothies, you know?

• 51:58Nilay Patel?

  Yeah, Dr. Dre dishing healthy living tips.

• 52:02Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 52:02Nilay Patel?

  Yeah, how to improve your blood pressure.

• 52:04Speaker 03

  Almond milk.

• 52:04Speaker 01

  Actually.

• 52:05Nilay Patel?

  Blend it up.

• 52:06Speaker 01

  I would watch Dr. Dre showing me how to make a great smoothie.

• 52:09Nilay Patel?

  How do you sit around in a group and pick what to watch?

• 52:11Speaker 03

  Uh.

• 52:12Nilay Patel?

  Does that happen? Am I the only person who thinks this is like a worrisome?

• 52:15Speaker 03

  Well, because you know, socializing in New York is weird and you know, socializing in New York is weird and you almost never have anyone to your house. So like, but when you do, at least in my case, it's usually a pre-romantic interaction. So that's really nerve wracking because like, I don't know what you like. I don't like, I want to watch this, but I'm not gonna eat. Do you like Broad City? Like, what do you want to watch? You know?

• 52:34Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 52:35Speaker 03

  It's nerdy. I'd avoid it.

• 52:37Nilay Patel?

  I guess I don't have that particular attention.

• 52:39Speaker 03

  We all got our own little.

• 52:41Nilay Patel?

  Yeah. Cause if you get it wrong, then it's like wrong.

• 52:44Speaker 03

  Oh, man.

• 52:45Nilay Patel?

  And watching something that you think is funny with somebody who doesn't think it's funny when you're just watching them is the worst.

• 52:49Speaker 03

  Oh, the Aziz one. I watched the first two episodes with a boy and he didn't like it. I didn't think it was funny. And I was like.

• 52:55Speaker 02

  You kicked him to the curb after that, right?

• 52:58Speaker 03

  We actually never saw each other after that. I was like, it was just like, you're off. He's too much of a stoner. I don't know. He didn't think things were funny.

• 53:05Speaker 01

  Wow.

• 53:05Nilay Patel?

  Well, you should watch this app to know for sure.

• 53:10Speaker 03

  Nah, he's out.

• 53:11Speaker 02

  So Vizio TV isn't completely dumb. It still has creepy tracking software on it, right?

• 53:16Nilay Patel?

  So this is like a real thing. Nobody talks about it at all.

• 53:19Speaker 02

  Oh, all, all smart TVs have creepy tracking software on them.

• 53:21Speaker 01

  What are they tracking? Are they watching?

• 53:23Nilay Patel?

  Yeah, totally. They totally track what you watch.

• 53:25Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 53:25Speaker 01

  What do they do with it?

• 53:26Nilay Patel?

  Uh, so Vizio is filing to go public. Um, so what they're gonna do with it, they're starting a rating service called Inscape. They have eight million TVs out in the world. They collect a hundred billion data points a day. So they can recognize linear television. Right? That's the thing that they can, it's Shazam for your TV. So you watch stuff on a Vizio TV or Samsung TV or basically any smart TV has ACR content in it. Automatic content recognition. So it knows what you're watching. Because they have no other way.

• 53:56Speaker 01

  Targeted ads?

• 53:57Nilay Patel?

  Yeah, that's like part of it, like, but the real thing they want to do is sell the data up the chain and be like, people are actually watching this because Nielsen doesn't really know.

• 54:05Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 54:05Nilay Patel?

  Especially with streaming, especially all the stuff.

• 54:07Speaker 01

  Am I supposed to be upset about this?

• 54:09Nilay Patel?

  Yeah, it's hard to know. Cause in, in their IPO filing, they're like, this is going to be your next business.

• 54:13Speaker 01

  I don't care if they know what I'm watching.

• 54:15Nilay Patel?

  Really? I think people really care if they know what you're watching. What I think, what I think the big difference is, is Apple will confidently tell you, we know the rates of app crashes on our phones and which apps are crashing. They know what apps you're running. Absolutely, they know in big aggregate and nobody cares. But if you tell.

• 54:32Speaker 01

  Why would I care?

• 54:33Nilay Patel?

  But if you tell people, they know what show you're watching, people freak out.

• 54:37Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 54:38Nilay Patel?

  I think that as long as you're anonymous is like, that's a big out. TiVo knows what you're watching. Part of TiVo's business is they, every TiVo box reports what you watch to the mothership in an anonymous aggregate way. And then TiVo does ratings data. But Netflix knows what you're watching, but you don't really care, right?

• 54:54Speaker 01

  I mean, I love that they know what I'm watching because then I get recommendations.

• 54:57Nilay Patel?

  Right. So this is, this is in every one of these things. I think it is very worrisome down the line that everyone wants to track you so everyone can deliver you a slightly more custom experience at every turn.

• 55:07Speaker 01

  Okay, but do you, does, do you really hate targeted ads? You know what? I got a targeted J. Crew ad yesterday, told me there was a 50% off sale going on. I was pumped.

• 55:16Nilay Patel?

  Yeah. Would you buy anything?

• 55:17Speaker 01

  Um, no, because I had just previously bought a bunch of J. Crew stuff when it was 40% off.

• 55:22Nilay Patel?

  I would have been mad. You should have held out.

• 55:24Speaker 01

  Well, okay.

• 55:24Speaker 02

  But this would be a secret.

• 55:25Speaker 01

  This was for J Crew outlet and I was like, well, you know.

• 55:28Speaker 02

  Well, you know that the outlet is not the same thing.

• 55:30Speaker 01

  Exactly. That was why.

• 55:31Speaker 03

  Ooh, deep racked reporting on this. If you're looking for the information.

• 55:35Speaker 01

  I actually did read the reaction.

• 55:36Speaker 03

  Great. Wonderful. Um, I don't know how I feel about actually like custom things. I'm like worried that.

• 55:42Speaker 02

  Just in general?

• 55:43Speaker 03

  I'm worried that like getting fed.

• 55:45Speaker 02

  All custom things.

• 55:46Speaker 03

  No, no, I'm worried about getting fed back things that are like, you'll like this. We'll lean to like, but what if you never expand your mind and you just wind up living in this bubble of like, I like this. I like this. I like this. It's four stars. It's five stars. Four stars. Five stars. You never see anything that changes your mind on anything.

• 56:00Speaker 01

  That's ideal. If I could live in a bubble of happiness.

• 56:02Speaker 03

  But don't you want to see stuff that like makes you be like, whoa, what is that?

• 56:05Nilay Patel?

  Do you know how you live in a bubble of happiness? You buy yourself a 3DR drone.

• 56:10Nilay Patel?

  3DR is America's largest drone maker. The Solo Smart Drone is the first drone optimized for your GoPro. You can get live HD video straight to your mobile screen and full control of the camera from the ground. 3DR made Solo Smart because flying has gotten easy. But getting cinematic shots still takes a lot of practice. Solo has an extra onboard computer that turns that practice time into software. Solo works like your automatic personal camera crew. The Hollywood toolkit at your fingertips. The Solo drone is basically an aerial motion control rig in a backpack. Smart shots guide both the drone and the camera to automatically capture smooth and cinematic shots that not even pro cinema pilots can get. There's a cable cam for shooting a story with multiple frames. There's an orbit mode that flies around you in circles. You get towering, mind blowing spirals that no other drone or pilot quite frankly can imitate. Humans obsolete. Just tell Solo where to go, push play, Solo does it all.

• 56:55Nilay Patel?

  Even will follow you around and kill your enemies with beautiful cinematic.

• 57:01Nilay Patel?

  3DR gives a solo away every month to one of the most subscribers. So please, my God, sign up today to learn more about drones at 3dr.com/verge. No, it's just verge.

• 57:10Speaker 01

  Just verge.

• 57:10Nilay Patel?

  Always just verge. 3dr.com/verge.

• 57:15Speaker 03

  Yo, I saw a drone in Williamsburg at nighttime, like a nightlife drone.

• 57:19Nilay Patel?

  Did it have a gun?

• 57:20Speaker 03

  I hope not.

• 57:20Nilay Patel?

  Wait, a nightlife drone?

• 57:22Speaker 03

  Well, it was nightlife time.

• 57:24Nilay Patel?

  It was what?

• 57:25Speaker 03

  Like, it was like midnight in South Williamsburg.

• 57:27Nilay Patel?

  Have a little cup of bourbon in Williamsburg?

• 57:29Speaker 03

  Well, you know about the vibe drone, you know?

• 57:31Nilay Patel?

  The vibe drone?

• 57:32Speaker 03

  Yeah, to go check out what the vibe is before you go.

• 57:34Nilay Patel?

  Oh, yes.

• 57:34Speaker 03

  And I was like, oh, man, this is like the vibe drone, but it was just a guy and it felt weird. I was like, man, really, you're doing this right now, right here?

• 57:41Nilay Patel?

  A vibe drone. We gotta get in on this.

• 57:43Speaker 03

  Did you see Portlandia had an episode that was kind of basically the same thing?

• 57:47Nilay Patel?

  No.

• 57:48Speaker 03

  Where they sent a drone to a festival so that like people like aging, aging festival goers don't actually have to go and experience the festival. And the whole episode's about the drone goes to the festival for them and then you get a certificate that says he went to the festival at the end of it, but then of course the drones get in trouble and they caught up a biker and it's a great episode.

• 58:05Nilay Patel?

  All right, I got, I never really got into Portlandia.

• 58:07Speaker 03

  What?

• 58:08Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 58:08Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 58:09Speaker 03

  What?

• 58:10Speaker 02

  I try. I try, I try super hard.

• 58:12Nilay Patel?

  It might be too real.

• 58:14Speaker 03

  Oh, man, it, yeah, it's close.

• 58:16Nilay Patel?

  All right, landing round.

• 58:17Speaker 02

  All right.

• 58:18Nilay Patel?

  Kindle emergency update. If you don't update your Kindle, it goes off the internet.

• 58:21Speaker 02

  Actually, it's already, it's already done.

• 58:22Nilay Patel?

  It's already done, whatever, whatever. Windows 10 mobile update promise broken. Nobody care.

• 58:26Speaker 02

  I mean, who's shocked by this?

• 58:28Speaker 01

  They did it twice.

• 58:29Speaker 02

  I still remember I exclusively reported that they were breaking the promise to Windows Phone 7 users that they wouldn't get 8 and the entire Microsoft internet got super pissed at me.

• 58:38Nilay Patel?

  People were mailing him knives.

• 58:39Speaker 02

  Yeah, this time everyone was like, yeah, that's what we deserve.

• 58:42Speaker 01

  Jesus, justifies the Lumia 1020 score.

• 58:45Nilay Patel?

  Every Lumia score we've ever given is super justified.

• 58:48Speaker 01

  You know that ecosystem score? There it is.

• 58:51Nilay Patel?

  Yeah, and Apple Watch score, super justified. Ask me tomorrow what I'm, but just ask me. Anyway.

• 58:59Speaker 03

  Can't wait till tomorrow.

• 59:01Nilay Patel?

  Google making an iOS keyboard. Would you use Google's keyboard on your iPhone?

• 59:04Speaker 02

  It has, it has Google search built into it. So from your keyboard, you can do a quick Google search and then go back to your other thing.

• 59:09Speaker 03

  No.

• 59:10Nilay Patel?

  Gentlemen.

• 59:11Speaker 01

  All third-party keyboards on the iPhone are awful.

• 59:13Speaker 02

  That's the only reason I wouldn't use it.

• 59:15Nilay Patel?

  The Gawker verdict. Hulk Hogan wins porno ruined forever.

• 59:20Speaker 02

  That's not true. I just, it just makes me sad.

• 59:22Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 59:23Speaker 02

  Like in like four different ways.

• 59:25Speaker 03

  I don't, you know, don't put some sex tapes online.

• 59:28Nilay Patel?

  Yeah, that's right, fair.

• 59:29Speaker 02

  But, I mean, he, he didn't, okay.

• 59:32Nilay Patel?

  No.

• 59:34Speaker 03

  Keep it real simple.

• 59:35Nilay Patel?

  I feel like the Gawker Mean Kids Club just hit the wall of what they're allowed to do. Uh, Facebook no longer supports BlackBerry.

• 59:42Speaker 02

  This is this lightning round is all over the place.

• 59:43Speaker 03

  I can't believe it. I thought BlackBerry is hot for a comeback. The people are ready.

• 59:47Speaker 02

  I can't usually. You tried. You tried to sell it.

• 59:50Speaker 03

  That's true.

• 59:50Speaker 02

  You tried, man. Usually Facebook is on the ball and this time they're like way late.

• 59:54Speaker 01

  Facebook supported BlackBerry in 2016.

• 59:57Speaker 02

  That's true.

• 59:58Speaker 03

  Wow, the jinx spin.

• 59:59Nilay Patel?

  Jinx spin. Uh, GDC just happened. Uh, PSVR feeling.

• 1:00:04Speaker 01

  Awesome. Cool.

• 1:00:05Speaker 02

  Gonna be the winner by the end of the year. At the end of the year, PS, the PlayStation VR is gonna be the, the most important VR, uh, beginning of 2017.

• 1:00:14Nilay Patel?

  Interesting. I'm definitely buying a PS4 for it, which means I think I'm out a thousand dollars because I don't currently have a PS4.

• 1:00:19Speaker 02

  Yep.

• 1:00:20Speaker 01

  Yeah, but it's cheaper than buying everything else, all other VR, right?

• 1:00:23Nilay Patel?

  That is very true.

• 1:00:24Speaker 01

  Which like, probably gonna be a ton of games.

• 1:00:27Nilay Patel?

  Have you gotten in that cave yet?

• 1:00:29Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 1:00:30Nilay Patel?

  What do you think? What's your VR situation?

• 1:00:31Speaker 03

  Um, I played the one where you're in the office.

• 1:00:34Nilay Patel?

  It's super fun.

• 1:00:35Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 1:00:36Nilay Patel?

  Yeah. Well, you were saying on the vibe.

• 1:00:38Speaker 03

  And then I also did the where you can draw and you can be inside of your drawing. It made me worried because it's like, what if people get, what if you're a kid and, you know, being a teen is hard and then being inside of there is better. And then you're like, I don't want to leave here. And then you go into the real world and I can't wait to get home and just go back into the place where I feel good. It's worrisome.

• 1:00:56Nilay Patel?

  Yeah, that's definitely the, the worry with VR, but nothing about VR at this moment makes me feel that worry.

• 1:01:01Speaker 03

  It's too, it's too expensive to get into how the teens even gonna get it.

• 1:01:04Nilay Patel?

  I mean, they're gonna get it.

• 1:01:05Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 1:01:06Nilay Patel?

  I, I don't think teens are gonna be dissuaded from a $400 PlayStation accessory or $99.

• 1:01:10Speaker 03

  They got grandma. They got Dairy Queen job.

• 1:01:13Nilay Patel?

  Yeah, Grams and Dairy Queen together at last.

• 1:01:15Speaker 03

  Between the two, those kids are never leaving the other reality.

• 1:01:19Nilay Patel?

  Uh, both Sony and Microsoft rumored to be upgrading their consoles in various ways.

• 1:01:24Speaker 01

  Uh, that's, yeah, that's cool. Not.

• 1:01:27Speaker 02

  It's, the, the upgrade rumors happened a little bit faster than I expected, but yeah, it's, everybody knew that eventually this would happen.

• 1:01:33Speaker 01

  How does it work with consoles though? Cause I thought like.

• 1:01:35Speaker 02

  They upgraded the 360. They, they, this happens with every major console.

• 1:01:38Speaker 01

  They didn't upgrade the like core hardware, right? The, the graphics didn't get better, didn't get a faster processor. They just, they just changed the body.

• 1:01:46Speaker 02

  No, they upgraded, they, they upgraded the internals on the 360 for sure.

• 1:01:50Speaker 01

  I feel like it was like wifi or something, though.

• 1:01:52Speaker 02

  No, they did some other stuff. Um, I'm not surprised by this. I'm also not stressed about it.

• 1:01:57Nilay Patel?

  Well, we put all GDC coverage here on this list, so all GDC coverage.

• 1:02:01Speaker 02

  That's just, it's just a lot of GDC. I wanted you to like peruse it and see if there's anything that interested you.

• 1:02:06Nilay Patel?

  Oh, I see.

• 1:02:07Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:02:07Nilay Patel?

  I'm gonna spend more time preparing for the show. Anyway, that was the Vergecast. It was a hot mess, but I'm happy that everyone's back.

• 1:02:14Speaker 01

  Check out all GDC coverage at theverge.com.

• 1:02:16Nilay Patel?

  Jake, do you want to do our engagements? You have to say three social things that they should, they should follow us on.

• 1:02:21Speaker 01

  Follow us on Snapchat at Verge.

• 1:02:25Speaker 03

  Yes.

• 1:02:26Nilay Patel?

  Yeah.

• 1:02:26Speaker 01

  Nailed it. Nailed it. If you're following, the real Verge is no longer the real Verge. Um, follow us on Facebook, facebook.com slash Verge and youtube.com slash Verge. Very important, we just hit 1 million subscribers.

• 1:02:41Nilay Patel?

  We literally pop bottles of champagne in this office.

• 1:02:43Speaker 01

  Most of the champagne spilled on the floor.

• 1:02:46Speaker 03

  Don't you want to be like a million other people?

• 1:02:49Speaker 02

  Get out, man.

• 1:02:50Nilay Patel?

  Get out. Well, yeah, follow Ract instead.

• 1:02:54Speaker 03

  Yeah.

• 1:02:54Nilay Patel?

  To be like slightly fewer people.

• 1:02:56Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:02:57Speaker 01

  Ract had a, a very nice feature on Banana Republic today.

• 1:03:03Speaker 03

  Mm-hmm.

• 1:03:03Nilay Patel?

  Oh, really?

• 1:03:04Speaker 01

  And, uh, yeah, and how they like screwed up trying to be edgy.

• 1:03:06Nilay Patel?

  Yeah, do that. Give me, give me two minutes on how, how, how the banana fucked it up.

• 1:03:10Speaker 03

  Well, they hired a creative director and she's fancy, but not fancy enough that the regular people knew about her. Her name's Marissa Webb. You know her?

• 1:03:19Nilay Patel?

  Nope.

• 1:03:19Speaker 03

  Probably not. Um, but some people did, you know? And they tried to go up high and it just like was just not, they just didn't hit it right. And the people didn't like it. And now they're back to.

• 1:03:31Nilay Patel?

  That's what Banana Republic is for.

• 1:03:33Speaker 03

  Well, but J. Crew did it. So it's like this, this tempting thing where it's like, ooh, a mall brand managed to climb higher. And like, maybe we could do that too. But it was too like, it was too like following in the exact same footsteps as J. Crew, so it didn't.

• 1:03:46Speaker 01

  Wait, didn't J. Crew like almost go bankrupt because they screwed up a sweater or something?

• 1:03:51Speaker 03

  The Tippy or whatever.

• 1:03:53Nilay Patel?

  What?

• 1:03:53Speaker 03

  That's the name of this.

• 1:03:54Speaker 01

  Fashion world is bewildering sometimes.

• 1:03:56Speaker 03

  There's not that much money there. So things just go crazy. That's one weird thing about fashion. There's not that much money there.

• 1:04:02Nilay Patel?

  Yeah, but you could put out a nylon sport band every three months.

• 1:04:07Speaker 03

  Fashion.

• 1:04:08Nilay Patel?

  Fashion. Anyway, that's our show. There's many other shows to listen to, most of which I have to say far more focused and with far fewer references to the Hulk Hogan sex tape. You can listen to What's Tech every Tuesday with Chris Plant. You can listen to Control Alt Delete every Thursday with me and Walt Mossberg, The Verge SP, which sleeper hit of The Verge lineup with Emily Ishida and Lizzo Pato, one of my favorites. That comes out on Fridays. Lauren Good has Too Embarrassed to Ask over on the Recode Network. Recode itself has Recode Decode, probably one of the coolest podcasts with Kara Swisher, a lineup of luminaries, and Peter Kafka has Recode Media, where if you really want to get deep on Hogan stuff, that's what's happening.

• 1:04:50Nilay Patel?

  But you should actually just delete all those and just listen to the show because you are a masochist and you enjoy unstructured technology conversations. That's it. Please go to iTunes.com slash The Verge and give us.

• 1:05:00Speaker 02

  Please give us one star on iTunes for every single time we diverge from what we're supposed to be talking about.

• 1:05:06Speaker 01

  No, but additive stars, so.

• 1:05:07Nilay Patel?

  Yeah, add them every time.

• 1:05:09Speaker 02

  Yeah.

• 1:05:09Nilay Patel?

  Another thing you should do is prepare an amazing dinner at home, thanks to Plated. Visit plated.com slash verge and choose from recipes designed for a wide range of taste. You'll receive a hand-packed refrigerated box with fresh produce, antibiotic meeks, everything you need to cook an awesome dinner, delivered straight to your door. I don't know why I'm moving my hand this way, but whatever. Get a free dinner for two with your first delivery. That's plated.com slash.

• 1:05:31Speaker 03

  Verge!

• 1:05:31Nilay Patel?

  That's it. Get some food in your mouth from a box. Plated.com slash verge. We're out. Rock and roll.

• 1:05:37Speaker 01

  Later.