Better Offline - Better Offline CES 2025: Day 5 - Pt. 1

Episode Date: January 10, 2025

Welcome to Better Offline’s coverage of the 2025 Consumer Electronics Show - a standup radio station in the Venetian with an attached open bar where reporters, experts and various other characters bring you the stories from the floor. In Part 1 of our 5th day covering CES, Ed Zitron is joined by writer Ed Ongweso Jr, David Roth of Defector, Cherlynn Low of Engadget and Health Physicist Phil Broughton to talk about men and their lack of vulnerability about sex, the sex toy industry, age tech, exoskeletons…and lasers! Ed Ongweso Jr.: https://bsky.app/profile/bigblackjacobin.bsky.socialThe Tech Bubble Newsletter: https://thetechbubble.substack.com/ David Roth, Defector: https://bsky.app/profile/davidjroth.bsky.social Defector: Defector.comIt’s Christmastown Podcast: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/its-christmastown/id1407429849Cherlynn Low, Engadget: https://bsky.app/profile/cherlynn.bsky.social https://www.engadget.com/about/editors/cherlynn-low/Engadget’s Best Of CES: https://www.engadget.com/ces/ Washington Post story about AVNs: https://www.washingtonpost.com/style/of-interest/2024/02/25/ai-porn-avn-industry/See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

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I'm your host, Ed Zittron. I am well slept. I ate two meals yesterday. My feet feel great. I look fantastic. I'm having a hell of a show, but it's the last day, sadly. But only the last day of the show we have today. And then we have tomorrow kind of a positive masculinity day.

We're getting massages. We're having brunch. We're going to have a wonderful podcast and talk about our feelings. It's going to be amazing. But today, we have an incredible cast with us. To my left is Edward on Grasso, Jr. my wonderful correspondent. Hello, how's everyone doing?

I'm great, as I just said. Clearly, I was thinking of something else. But over to my right, I have the wonderful Sherlin Lowe, the deputy editor at N. Gadgett, Sherlin, thank you so much for joining us. Thank you for having me. And to my right, David, J. Roth. How are you?

I'm good, how are you? Oh, wait, no, you already said. There we are. I'm the only one that didn't ask? Yeah, it's good. Well, you were paying attention. I wanted to know how everyone was doing. Oh, okay.

Well, I didn't ask, though. Anyway, until now. Shirling. Yes. So how many CES is this for you? I've lost, well, a few enough that I'm not, like, as seasoned as people who have done this 25 years. I think I'm under 10. I think I'm nine or eight.

That's still a lot. Yeah, that sort of still seems high to me. This is my first and Edward's first. Oh, how does it feel? Oh, surreal. Yeah. Oh, yeah? Is it everything you expected?

Anne Moore. I want to know about Anne Moore. I want to know about Anne Moore. Most of what I got in terms of expectation setting was from Ed and it was like I kind of expected it to suck more than it does. Okay. Like because he was more or less, you know, trying to get me. I don't know if it was just that's how you get me motivated. It was like you have no idea how depraved it is.

Like you're going to see things down there. And it's like, it's a trade show. Like, I mean, it still kind of stinks, but there's, it was more normal for the most part, which made the stuff that was like ridiculous and dystopian pop that much harder for me. I enjoyed it pretty well. I wish it were more depraved. I'm sorry to say. Yeah. Was there a version of it that was?

I feel like it... Okay. This CES is like surprisingly, I feel like Las Vegas as a city has figured a lot of its shit out. Can I swear? Yes. Oh, crush. Great. Uh, fuck.

Uh, don't do all the swears. Oh, okay. Just some. All right. Low level. Okay. You can do the brown word. You can say damn, but not, you know, but no, I don't want to do that stuff.

No C words. Yeah, I think that's the one. Yeah, okay, gotcha. So, chicken. Right. So how do you mean? You think that like Vegas has like assimilated this? Yeah.

So, I mean, you can see all the construction happening. But they've managed to make it so the construction is not impeding a lot of the getting around, which they have done in previous years. The traffic, I'm sure you know, has been awful. Living here and being at CES is like a double punishment. Oh, God. I don't know why you chose to do that to yourself, but you did choose to do this to yourself. I make many.

decisions. The West Hall is beautiful. The fact that the weather is extremely beautiful this week makes everyone feel better when they're outside. I've been here when there was the rain

and the snow. And then one year, everything, all the power went out and all of the boots at the same time and I was on stage doing like a panel, hosting a panel, interviewing Sony's head of hardware or something. And we were like vamping on stage for a minute while the power came back on.

So there's been like, like CES as past where like things haven't been as nice or I I to me this has been nicely run and fairly sweet. Yeah. The one thing I will say that worries me about Las Vegas is for like a solid decade we lost the flappy guys. The guys who have the the cards yes that they flipped together to offer escorts. Those guys disappeared for a long time but for the first time since like 2014 I would say they're they're back but there's not many of them they just kind of kind of I saw them when I was last here really when I saw you the first. The first That's the first time that we met.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. But they were, like, outside of the insurance convention that Jason had been. The right place to be. Yeah. Maybe they're just, like, looking at the people that are going to CES and are like, this is not an escort crowd. Yeah, they just, they have a meeting beforehand, and they have, like, an Excel spreadsheet they all work through.

And, like, well, really, the odds are. Let's make it happen during Avien again. No, no, no, no, no. No. Maybe they're like, these guys can build their, own escorts, you know, like the robots that we saw this year. Oh my goodness. Yeah, there was a Taem Hunter, Washington Post, an article about that where it was like the conversation with the guys about that and everyone's just like, I don't know, man. I'll link to it in the thing. But I do think

the tech industry reporters do kind of need to look at AVM more and kind of broaden out from this stuff because as much, and I do apologize to female listeners who feels like who said stuff about being gross a few times on this, but I will say, sex, perversion, all that is a part of society and one can be puritanical about it, but that area needs more coverage. And we've kind of talked about seeing the various dildonics manufacturers around here. Sounds better when you use the technical term. Dildonics. Advanced dildonics. Advanced dildonics functions. It's a lot more consonants than you'd expect, right? Yeah, like dildonics. But I feel like that is a weirdly left out part.

A little jet age. I think, I can't speak for it. I can't speak for all of the tech media. But for Engadget, it's like we've got to prioritize. He has such a huge show. We've got the cars, the drones, the robots. We do cover sex tech. Like this year, there was the motor bunny or motor fluffy. Motor bunny powered, or no,

something powered by fluffer. I haven't written down. Yeah, thank you. That was when I went back down to the floor for what I'm writing. It is motor bunny powered by fluffy. Thank you. And then there's another low vents is the one that's across from it. That was the one where they actually

like, I was there with a guy who's like a producer for other podcasts, like friends of ours that were also here and has like, it's sort of like a running gag in those podcasts that this guy's life is just completely feral and like he doesn't know that I had to take care of himself. And I saw him like blush while getting just instructions on how this thing sinks with that at the Lovins thing. I didn't go to the motor buddy powered by Fluffer bit just because. Do you know the news there though? No.

Like they're making a, I believe, Adelodonik that's powered by G. game control or a minute. So there was a game. The game is called Fappy Bunny. Yeah. Fappy bird.

Yeah. Fappy bird. But it's the sort of thing like you, there's a limit. No one expects me to do really rigorous journalism. I'm a sports writer and I'm here

because there's a fold-out bed and everything. Great. I enjoy hanging out with my friends. Also for the podcast. Yeah, also for the podcast. But the idea of like having to look

someone in the face while he says like fappy bunny to me like it's a normal thing to say to a guy. I think, do you think it's odd because you're both men may presumably cis hetero men

in the same space. Because I cover this from the woman's angle to your point that like in tech, especially a space that's not predominantly friendly to women. You know, you notice the CTA has been notorious for not wanting to showcase sex type for women.

And has that been a consistent theme? Yeah. So I mean, since the big hoo-ha, I think four or five years ago, Laura DeCarlo really went out and said like, why are they allowing us. They rescinded our innovation award. They made a smart vibrator, I believe, and were granted an innovation award in sort of the health category and then had it rescinded like weeks before the show started. I can't remember how many years ago this was. Yeah. And they like didn't let them display at the

actual show floor area. I remember even before Laura DeCarlo did all of that. I was covering this company. And who was Laura DeCollo? I'm sorry, Laura DeCarlo is a sex tech company that made a smart vibrator with a focus on women and women's sexual health and empowerment. I have, I interviewed them for a piece back then and I haven't kept in touch as much. And so I've completely forgotten, like my brain's ram has run out. Right. But I remember very well another brand Lioness who makes also a smart vibrating dildo. And they had to like show at an offsite sort of non-official, non-sanction CES event in Vegas.

Right. That they have made orgasm art. So they have a smart vibrator with sensors in it, right? And it would like tell you when you've had an orgasm based on the vibrations. That actually feels like that might be. It is actually useful because the pitch back then, and you know, men when you have erectile dysfunction, for example, it could be an indicator that something's wrong with your heart health. It could be something that's wrong somewhere else in your body. It's like a check engine light. Right. And for women, it could be similar. Like, we don't have enough data. And that was step one on collecting the data. So the lioness smart vibrator was very impressive to the point where like on the Engadja team, like we gave it like one of the, it was a nominee for an award in the health category that year that we were awarding this. CTA's Best of CES Awards and it is it does like you do your point Ed we were just talking before the podcast started that we need people in the space who are like aware and familiar and the CTA

was gatekeeping some of this or it was like not open to because it was squeamish I get it makes people screamish to be like you put this inside you yeah but I think that you raised something with David men in general do not discuss sex thank you and men have a very hard time talking about like arousal they talk about lust they're very good at discussing like oh I'm horny and all that. It's almost like, oh, sex is something we do in a dark room and we hide from it despite men also craving it. So the discussion with men about sex is actually quite rare.

I never talked about having sex with you guys, not literally doing it, but also having had sex in general, which is the one rule we have here does not happen at CES. That's a choice. But nevertheless, it's like men don't have these discussions about sex in general. So the idea of a man being able to go up to, and it's a challenge, it's especially if it's outside of your coverage, to go up and be like, hey, so how do you use this? But also, not feeling a little vulnerable.

Because with men, especially with sex toys, at least in my experience of discussing with them, they're scared of the idea of using it with a partner. Like male or female, the idea is it's like giving up, even though from my experience, whatever gets the job done, the woman tend to be pretty happy. But even then, even saying this out loud, I'm like, yeah, this is a conversation I wouldn't have with guys in general.

Yeah, yeah. I think we should be talking more and more about it. Like, I just, from you bringing that, Z, and I was like Zed, I was like, oh, yeah, men probably don't even talk about because I have for a large chunk of my life been like, like, we need to talk more about sex, just amongst women. I think we need to talk about what gets you off, what an orgasm feels like, like, what is all this stuff? Because there's people that are not having it, and that's just depressing. And they're like, I don't know what that's get me off or not, but have I had to know or not? Like, it's. And there's joy in it.

There is so much joy. And the intimacy you can have with someone with having a detailed, meaningful conversation about what gets you. both off. It's something you can work with. And you need to talk to your partner about it. Exactly. What are you going to do? Or talk to yourself about it. Figure yourself out. And then talk to your partner or partners or whatever you want to do with people about it. Like, you should be experiencing joy in every, and I get that as we're talking about this, people are already feeling squeamish. Like, I'm sure listeners are like uncomfortable with the topic. It's not like. They want to know how we're going to integrate AI and all this.

The listeners are demanding. Did the CS try to overcrut? Because I feel like when I looked at the Innovation Awards when I first, not overcrime. But have they tried, have there's, has their response been like, oh, we don't want that backlash or, oh, we are like changing our mind about it? Because I, because I didn't realize that they had given an innovation award and removed it. They had an innovation award to a vibrator to a smart, I think, dolphin or, you know, vibrator toy in general. But that was the only one that I saw. And most of it, it, it makes, I'm curious about whether it's like, okay, since that, since they had this. scandal. They're like, okay, we'll just do a sort of small carve out and that will be enough as a

sort of superficial move, but we're not actually going to talk about it, change attitudes about it, integrated more. Kind of like lip service, kind of like just giving you your, you have that, have this and like don't bother us anymore. I think it's like thematically relevant as well because there's a real irony about it. Because the reason they're probably not putting it front and center is they're like, I was just giving into inequity. All these people will just be talking about sex. So instead you do the thing that's well known with sex that you should do, which is repression. Yeah. When you just hide it all versus, and you talk about people being uncomfortable talking about this, we're not talking about the actual stuff. Actual acts of it, no. But also,

there is joy and happiness within this. In the same way that not real problems are being solved all the time here, sex toys are actually solving them. I know. Beyond the, and I can't speak to how squeamish or not squeamish CES is because they don't know very much about it. But it feels like this is a dynamic that we've kept coming back to in these, which is like, this is a product that solves a problem that people experience. It's like a thing that like enhances your life in some way. And it feels like much of, for me, I guess like the balance of the stuff that you see here is not that. It is either like it's do dad stuff to a certain extent. But then also there's this like pie in the sky shit about like it's a house that like empathizes with you and helps,

yeah, it helps you pick out your clothing for the week. Yeah. Right. Yeah. Whereas in this case it's like The stuff that I was impressed with down there was stuff that was basically like that felt like an invention. It felt like an invention that had become a product that could then be marketed and sold. And it doesn't, I don't know to what extent, and this is something people that have been to more CES

than me that could speak on. Like, has the, was there a time when it was more of a place that sold products or has it always been a place where like LG promises to fix your life? I can't speak for like more than 10 years past. But yeah. Yeah, I guess.

I mentioned this recently. It started as feeling like the home entertainment LG show along with some like laptops and Harrybutts sprinkled around. I gather there was an auto show era. Yeah, there was one year where it was the car show. And then now it is the AI show. But then you still have like,

I think South Hall has always been filled with like gadgets that feel like doodads from like other parts of the world. And then I think as CTA continues to expand its space and its scope, you've got more and more. of like people feeling like they can pay $5,000, get a table, come here and show their can, like, what's that term for something that does something to? Like a, there's a term for it.

Like something that does something that some other brand does. Anyway. Like a clone? Pretty much, like, yeah, exactly. So anyway, clone substitutes like dupes of like, my gosh, I saw so many Dyson hair dryer dupes this year, you know. I saw so many different kinds of the same battery pack. Thank you, yes.

But I also love battery packs, so I can't really. I saw so many smart rings. I saw so many. You know, one year there was massage chairs everywhere, and now it's like their transformer massage chairs everywhere. It is to an extent always that kind of show. Somewhat pivot here,

but one of a piece of Vengett's coverage was about these new, like vacuums, the rubble vacuies with the arms. Can you walk me through what the hell that is? Yeah, I mean, you had Carissa on your show recently. She's covered a lot of things for us. I thought you covered it. Carissa Bell.

It's all good, yeah. I'm very unfair to Miss Bell. Yeah. Tell me about this. So it started with Robo Rock. I'm going to paint a tale for you here. Robo Rock is one of the most well-known names in the RoboVac space. And, you know, those spinning robot vacuums that go and clean your floors for you.

The innovation in them has in the past, or in recent years, been combining the vacuum and mopping features. Now they're like, how else do we innovate? Well, Robo Rock builds a robotic arm into its disc of RoboVAC. And the arm can come up. And it has obviously sensors and stuff like that that can detect obstacles in front of it and be like, oh, this is a sock. I need, like in the past, the robot vacuum would get tripped up and maybe not, you know, continue to vacuum. Right, or go somewhere else.

And now if it can pick up the sock that's in its way or a toothbrush or a hairbrush or whatever is in this way, it can put it away and then continue to clean the path that it was on or, you know, put it somewhere else. So somehow everyone was like, hell yes, this is the thing that I wanted. life, which makes sense. This is a real-world application of something that- And does it work though? Well, in the limited demo, yes, right? Like it did work. It did seem to go up to a sock, pick it up, and put it in the laundry basket. Pick up objects up to 300 grams a little more than half a pound. Yeah, so Robo Rocks vacuum only has that weight limit. And then the funny thing is with CES, we were just talking about this, every other RoboVAC company was like, we also have arms. Here we go. Dreamy, for example, was supposed to So only debut, it's like stair climbing robot, which also is another obstacle in these homes, decided to show off its arm, but it's a more sodded-looking clamp situation that seems to be able to handle, like, way more weight.

So, yeah. Yeah, exactly. I'm like, good for you. You go to the gym. But, you know. I love my yoked out, robot vacuum. I don't know what you would call that, the transformer of vacuums, the Optimus Prime of Vacuums, maybe. Yeah.

Yeah, but yeah, I mean, look, it's nice to see these companies innovate and then copy the heck out of each other. Yeah. But that's CES. That is CES. There's always a theme. Yeah. It also has like a, you know, it's sort of reassuringly concrete relative to some of the area or stuff. Like, not only can you see what problem they're aiming to solve, but you can like sort of watch the process of competition playing out in terms of that.

Whereas the thing that I felt, and you were, you saw like actual crypto guys talking. today, like what is the maximum amount of abstraction allowable in the language, where you're just kind of like, I don't even understand what you're fixing for me here. Beyond like a comprehensive reimagining of my life that removes any personal agency and replaces it with your proprietary algorithms or whatever. So on the subject of robots, though, what else have you seen? Yeah, a lot of the robots we saw and liked anyway. We did a roundup at Engadgett.

mostly were these cute emotional support robots like everyone's talking about these and I've been mocking them but it seems that everyone actually likes them we like them because they're cute right and they're like some of them are like 80 bucks it's like 80 bucks yeah why not like I would get I'm a person who has some form

of self-diagnosed OCD which is I don't like pets because they mess up my place right and so I still want the warmth and tender love of a cute little furry creature that can do its own thing but not poop and they the idea of a furry robot

that has warmth that can simulate So it generates warmth? One of them does So the Another UKai engineering The ropet The ropet does generate warmth

And so It sort of feels comforting Right? When you have it on you The other one that we saw Is the UKai engineering's Mirumi It's something that

Stairs at you Yeah, that was one that curse I really don't I have not seen this thing yet But the idea of something Staring at me Really freaks me She seemed to do it though

I don't know I think it's a character personality type thing? The Tombot that we saw. Yeah. What was that? There's a dog for people with dementia that, I mean, at first glance,

also did feel and look like a dog, right? It's kind of just programmed where it's like, you know, maybe you would benefit from having the companionship, but your dementia is too progressed for you to be able to take care of a dog. See, that's a really good use case. Did you talk to them at all? Because the only question I have there is, If in the latter stages and experiences I've had mostly through friends is,

wouldn't they forget about it? Would it not be jarring? But I honestly, I really am rooting for them because that sounds lovely. That sounds like something that actually solves a problem of. You can't really do contiguous care when you, yourself, are kind of out of sync with the world due to your condition. See, this is the thing. As we roll to the end of this show, it is nice to have a conversation where it's not entirely just, yeah, I don't know what. a con man and another con man were conning each other in front of me.

It's just Vegas. No, exactly. Yeah, there is that feeling of, that's like the bit of it that has, when I felt overwhelmed by this, beyond the volume, like, the physical challenge of just, like, walking for whatever, 20 miles over this. There's the sense sometimes of, like, you're trying to take in the entire spectrum of, like, free market fuckery in one bite, you know, like, from, like, the white label cable manufacturers on the bottom of things to the, you know, whatever, like Amazon or like just little,

you know, globe-bestriding giants on the other one, that it's like you see the plankton and you see the whale sharks and like every single thing in between is like, it's a lot to sort of hold in your head. Yes. It makes the, to me at least, it makes the actual products that seem to have actual use cases feel that much more valuable or welcome because there's, you know, it's like I sort of know what it's about. There's a lot of this stuff that is impossible for me to parse.

So how long have you been here as well? How many days? Oh yeah. I landed January 4th, Saturday, and today is what Friday? And I'm leaving tomorrow. I have big plans to go explore the desert or something and I am here. Like, to go and get on an ATV or something and go like just because today, officially everyone's flying home from my team. And so, yeah, not y'all. You ever been to a salt bank? Or an salt bed, I guess.

A salt bed I think it's You know Oh oh the flat like Gotcha no I haven't Go for a hike Yeah I want to do that after this Which is why when you ask me to stay for longer

I was like Ed not that long Yeah I gotta go I have to go visit a canyon TPD I have to do something I'd get lost in the mountains If you would never hear from me again

You want to be very lost Just be me So So far What is your favorite thing you've seen I say so far as we talk about the end Yeah hard to choose

Can I say what is not the favorite thing I've seen? Absolutely. I've seen this video making the rounds now that I finally had some time to get back on my social media like binging habits. And on Reddit and on a lot of social media platforms, this video of this AI sex robot? Yeah, the $170,000.

Yeah, the one with the dark hair, dark long hair, looking like they're falling off a chair basically. Yeah. When we're, we'll hit the break in like eight minutes and I'll show you a picture. But it is really funny because I love that there's always one company that does something like this where they just everyone experiences the uncanny valley at once.

And they're like, but we got a ton of press out of it. Every article is just like this horrifying thing a company is made. These evil people, they talk about them like one of the bad guys from full metal alchemist. Like the monstrosities they have summoned and they nailed it. I saw something that kind of reminded me of this where it was, and it was this humanoid robot and it was very loudly clearly saying

I'm a text-based AI do not have a body and it's fully embodied and I was just like okay this is a good gimmick because that only comes up I stood there for about 10 minutes it only comes up like once every seven minutes

for a while the rest of the time you can do the little gimmick where you're talking to it and it's speaking and you just don't hear that it's like probably just literally a chatbot speaking out of the speakers but you finally tuned it.

It looks human. Right. And you got a chance to advertise whatever AI platform that it is that the company was connected to, which is Ways. It's like W.A.I. Oh, that's a tough one.

Hey, baby. It's German. How are you doing? Turn left. I somehow missed the hall of uncanny humanoids, which is like, thank goodness. I still had a couple hours left. I guess I could go down.

I saw a robot with like a Donald Trump mask on, took a picture, then immediately deleted. because I know when someone's trying to get coverage. I know when someone's just being like Donald Trump. Did you sense that was the case

with the sex bot that they were just basically like I mean, we got mentioned in the Wall Street Journal they called us the embodiment of everything that's wrong with contemporary culture. Yeah, no, I think to your point

it's refreshing for me to see the PR angle of this that you're thinking of and I'm just there like oh right, yeah this is a cheap method to employ. I didn't get that vibe. We didn't even cover it.

It was not even on our radars. Good. Good. Yeah. Because don't encourage them. But also, back to the earlier theme, it's like a thing made by someone who is not actually interested in people having sex or meaningful, honest, direct sex relationships. It's like, what are these ugly pigs that never have sex want? Oh, a horrible robot that looks kind of like a woman so they can have their horrible sex in a locked room. Criminalizing sex, treating it like this ugly thing that we should hide from the world.

while also kind of making fun of people who aren't that way. Making fun of their target audience, which is the irony of that is so strange. Versus empathy and joy and honesty about sex, which is like a meaningful thing that people should explore. It's part of life. Yeah. Disagree. It's how we got here. Listen to Protestants were onto something. I love it. We seem to be 50-50 split on this.

It's pretty normal about it before I came to Las Vegas. Now I'm taking a hard stance. We've got to get this shit out. Sex is out in 2025. Before I came here, I was a freak, and I'm leaving with some changed miles. No more of an AI guy. I hear about crypto, apparently. What, you're a convert now? Oh, yeah.

You know, I think sex should be on the blockchain, I think. Oh, gosh. Oh, God, you know someone's done. Yeah, I was going to say. Like with these unutterable horrors that has, now that it's been uttered, who knows what's going on? The Wall Street Journal, C.S. Abomination of the Year. Yeah, I bet money is someone I know, like, them are afraid.

is making it right now. Oh no. They should be making something else. They should. Like getting their affairs in order when I find, no. That's it. So as we approach the break here, is there anything else you're going to see on the show or are you just done? Okay.

So I'm here for personal interest now. Last night, I was supposed to already be done working, but I went to the Venetian Expo and I saw some, like, last minute, accessibility-related products. That's always been, like, a topic I pay attention to myself. we actually am very proud to say this and Gadget's like best of CES winner like the best in show best of all the things we saw was a smart cane for the blind

so we talked about this and it's good because my worry with it was A it needs an internet connection if it's got a GPD thing but it works it worked yeah and in the busy like convention floor where like you assume the Wi-Fi is like clogged as shit right and I did not clarify

or verify what type of internet connection was using was it on device? I bet it's not because it's a very thin, like well-made device. Like they folded it up, unfolded it, showed me. I held it in my hand and used it a bit. It seems to work really well.

What's the weight like on it? It is slightly heavier than I think your conventional, like folding cane for people who are visually impaired, but not too much heavier. Now, to be clear, this is like the second generation of an existing product. The first one was a bit heavier, so they've refined it. They've made the handle a little easier to hold.

They've replaced like a touchscreen sort of button situation with tactile buttons, which should have been. the first one, right? Like, why didn't you think of this? So they have made improvements, continue to, and he have a pretty legitimate partner in TDK, who's like a bigger, more established company to see this through.

Look, to your point, Zed. Zed. That's what I'm going by now. I'm Zed. Zed, Theddeb, baby. To your point, this thing, at least if it dies, if it runs out of battery, it's still just a cane. This is what Carissa, I believe, said about it.

It's like it still functions as a device. It's just the Wi-Fi thing is what it's free. Because if the whole thing is a model... Well, but it's not entirely like a chat GPT only. I mean, the turn-by-turn navigations is something that is quite important to the concept here and the fact that it will... That has a speaker on board to answer questions and stuff like that. So those are important things, but it's also got like a flashlight on board.

Those sorts of things that don't require internet, right? For example, so that's something we should definitely clarify. We have the contact information of the people. can get in touch and find out. I would love to know. Yeah, I'll find out. So as we come towards the break, Edwardongu, and Graysow, Jr., where can people find you? Newsletter, the techbubble. That substacks.com, podcast, this machine kills, and then Big Black Jackabin on Twitter and blue sky. Sherlin, where can people find you? It feels like every social media app is closing, so C-H-E-R-L-N-N-B-Sky-Sky.Social is the safest one to say, and email, C-H-H-G-R at

Engadgetter.com or just engadgette. And of course, Engadgett. I'll be putting the links to the best of the show in the notes. Don't worry. Mr. Roth, where can people find it? Defector.com and the Distraction Podcast. And also, it's Christmas Town Podcast. I'm Ed Zetron.

You can find me everywhere. I'm not allowed to add that. Everywhere. You just Google, takes biggest, nastiest baby. And that's what I pop out of past. Now, if you were a big, nasty baby, and you love products because you're,

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Listen to Kingdom of Fraud on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. And we're back. So Sherlin, we talked just before this about this infrared mask. Now, I say this for both personal and professional reasons. What was this and why does the infrared mask thing do? Okay, so it's not just infrared.

This is sharks cryoglough. And it debuted at CES 2025. It is the latest in a string of like full face, like light-based mask devices. You've probably, maybe you've heard of their faces. Oh no, I'm going to be completely honest. I've been targeted with these things. These masks you put on the kind of do something to you. And just being so, because I have like gaunt eyes.

I look like I'm Polish-British. It's not. You're too mean to yourself, but go on. I am, but that's part of the show. But for real, though, what do these things actually? Why do you use them as a? person. Okay. So red light therapy when used with effective components, it's supposed

to help like anti-aging, help reduce fine lines, or signs of aging, signs of aging, fine lines wrinkles. The blue light is supposed to help with antibacterial, so it's good for acne purportedly. Infrared is helping with some level of rejuvenation under the skin as well. It's penetrating the layers of the skin. I know this is because of the facials that I take and I include the light therapy

in the salon. I feel like they work, but I go for the like salon grade one, so that's like probably going to work better and than any of these home treatments. I've been very skeptical of devices like the solar wave, which is a smaller one with smaller components. The LED bulbs don't seem as effective. And as a no, Phil, our bartender, who is a laser safety specialist, is currently he's just got his head in his hands. So Sheldon, please keep talking. Yeah, I'm not sure how effective, right? Like it's so hard to tell with these things, like when you have to use them for six months to, like, see any results. Phil is now walking away.

Oh, no. No, don't worry. He doesn't deserve your shame. I mean, I don't think they're completely unsafe or useless, right? He's not saying that. He's just going to, he would come over and say something about how lays this. Just sorry, Phil, come over. Why are you complaining?

Grab a chair. Grab a chair. Ed, please share your microphone with him so he can have his party. I wasn't complaining. You had your head in your hands, sir. Now he's taking a nape because he has a national anthem. No, this is just when I once again would like to take a moment to really give thanks to the deeply overworked, put upon, and underfunded folks at the Food and Drug Administration, specifically for the Center for Device and Radiologic Health. Yeah, I agree.

For whom none of these products ever get to them, nor do they get approved. Are they not like home? I feel like there have to be like home versions of this stuff outside. Yeah, and that's kind of what you're looking at. There are, yes, exactly. And what did the cryo one do? So the cryo part of it were these two metallic plates under the eye, and they were just cold, and it was so comfortable.

That felt great. And that's very useful for skin. Exactly, exactly. The important thing that having had products like this come through where I work at exceptional expense, because they have successfully managed to sell them to NFL teams, I've had to stop people from spending hundreds of thousands of dollars for you have gotten an IR hot red light therapy unit. What it's doing is providing heat. How is that different than the hot lamp at McDonald's is considerably cheaper or alternatively the thing we have literally been using since time immemorial hot water bottles?

Now, in a face mask form, it's to get it where it needs to be. Right. That is valuable. Putting an IR diode in it is not. Okay. So nothing wrong with the face mask then. No, other than do not sell this is a medical product. Do not try to make a claim.

Do not allude to a claim, which many people are on the floor are fine to let you make that assumption for not. And if they're feeling really good, they'll actually put a disclaimer on their product. So I don't have to report them to the FDA. No, no, no. You need to do that. I have some Sotil as well, please. Absolutely. Bartending is coming up? So, this mask, so you have the cold bits.

So is that to help with eyebags? Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's just to help with, like, yeah, exactly tightening the skin back up or just, you know, feeling fresher when you've had a rough night. And so the heat, and you use these. I've used it for like a minute, so don't. But you've used the masks in general, though. Oh no, the other two, no, actually. Well, no, I mean just the infrared masks in general.

I have used the salon grade ones, not the at-home ones. And what do they do? Like, it's just the heat kind of... Yeah, you're supposed to put them on your face and then turn on like a four minute, eight-minute, six-minute session. And then, yeah, the not heat necessarily. The IR ones do have heat. The red light therapy just shines the light on you.

There's the blue light depending on which is the treatment you selected. And the cold for me was the only thing I could really walk away from the experience having felt. But it sounds good though. It sounds as, I was so good. I was very pleased with it. I will tell you, I have come around on these devices. I used to be hugely skeptical

because I always thought they were ineffective. Like, how can you get a tiny light bulb to do anything? Right. And to like the same point we're making everyone, yeah, exactly. Like it's heat. It's, why do you need an expensive device that their body like devices $600? The competing Dennis Gross, Dr.

Dennis Gross device is 455. This is 349. And that's part the reason I was intrigued. It's like, okay, you're bringing it down. You're doing something different with the cryo. There's a lot more, I think, I mean, I quoted the SVP of product development from Shark on this in my article, which is, I was like, the terer body one vibrates and, you know, to massage your skin. And I think the company probably tout some benefits to vibration.

And I was like, well, I think I know the answer to this, but this is the Shark cryo glow vibrate. And they're like, there's no vibration. This is a skincare device. vibration does nothing for the skin. And I was like, you tell me, girl, you tell me, you know, I was like, I need this. That's all I needed, yeah. Exactly. And it's like, I think as we see more competition in this space where hopefully we'll see

more people focus on what's actually going to work in this sort of device where there's a lot of, like, junk science, there's a lot of like, and my brain is so not working, but like stuff that doesn't quite work. Yeah, it's, they make these claims and they do it at the show where everyone's making. some wobbly claims. It's such a challenge to parse through all of it. Can I ask it just as a editorially?

Yeah. Like how do you, I know that you know the short answer is you work with a bunch of smart people and know their fields and stuff like that. How do you know like, because there's, we saw multiple smart canes. I don't know if we saw the one that you all awarded.

Like, how can you tell if it's good or not? That's kind of a remedial way of phrasing it. My brain's also not. Honestly, not the best. Same. Same with you. Yeah. But we can just whatever, make our little dolphin sounds back and forth.

We're there. Yeah. Trying to communicate. I think it's partly because Engadget has had such a history of covering CES, we have the process down pat. We start the process the second we get the full exhibitor list for shows like Unveiled and Petcom. Can you actually walk us through the process?

Yeah, of course. Yeah. So, yeah. This was my first year like fully running the show for the team. And I started later than I wanted to. Like since July, I've been like, we need. to start planning CES, right? And we at least get the travel

and accommodation booked ahead of time. But this year we started like November, which was late for us. And it was very late. I was very nervous. But the CTA also didn't have a lot of the directories ready for us to parse through until the week before Christmas.

So we spent all two weeks, I didn't take time off during the Christmas break. And I just spent it looking at exhibitor list and we Google every single name that is an exhibitor. We find out what they do. And if we don't, we'll reach out. We'll find their PR email address. we'll reach out and be like, what are you showing at CES?

Then we'll do the research of like, what is this, what is in the space, what else is already in the space? Is it new? Is it like expensive? Is it junk? Right. And then the process actually happens before we fly off to Vegas. When we do get here, then we make the assignments of like we're going to unveil, we're going to pepcom, we're going to these booths. These are the things that actually look interesting. We'll go and look at them. These are things that we don't know if they're good or not. We need to investigate them. We have a tag internally called investigate. And so we go look at. at the thing on the show floor, we have our reporters go out, talk to the company.

And then also, because we're in Vegas, the research is going to be limited to what we can Google within two minutes, right, to make a call on whether this is important. But yes, we try to match the people

with expertise in the space to the product. So at least they have a wealth of information. Like Billy Steele's audio and... Oh, my God, he's so good, right? But that's the thing. You have specialist people. Yes, we have so much...

Yeah, so Billy Steele is our specialist on audio. I mean, Davindra was here. He's our chip guy. Oh, he was talking invidia. Oh, yeah. NVIDIA all day and NPCs as well. I mean, we have a bunch of chip people too which I'm so grateful for

and we have multiple experts on some categories and they can trade information. I wish you would get a chance to see the debates that happen in our room sometimes. Next year, next year I'm serious. We'll have you in here. Next year, this will be the Engadgett podcast. Basically, we'll have like the Engadget top of the experts. We've had three of you on

them. I'm happy to have more. I'm glad you've had so many I mean, there's such a diversity of voices and opinions on the team too which I really like. And when they fight it out, that's my favorite because I'm like, Yeah. We can agree to disagree. But also I've been quite critical of some of the tech media on here. And I really, this show was not about like just CES. It's about kind of explaining how the tech media functions because it's very easy to,

and I don't mean this is a specific insult to end gadget. You could put it at the C net or even the verge and definitely tech crunch. It's you think, oh, they just turn up and then they go, where it's the big company or go look at big company. Right, right. When there is actually quite a refined decade or more process. that's gone into it. And also covering this show is insane.

That was the bit that was like interesting to hear for, I mean, obviously it sucks that you had to spend your entire holiday season parsing a list of 2,500, 3,000, how many companies are. But it seems like it's so patently unmanageable. Yeah. Like it is unmanageable for us to, I don't know, you probably did see everything ever because you were here longer than me or came close to.

No, you still never see anything. Today I discovered that there was a cryptopavilion that had been going on for the entire time. And I felt like I had, I didn't see it. I looked everywhere, you know? I accidentally stumbled on it because I was like, what are they doing in Germany? You do. You do. Yeah.

And that is like, I don't know. I mean, I guess that's like sort of what happens with a show like this. Like, you know, the idea is that, you know, for them, I guess the business is, you said, whatever it is, $5,000 a table for starters. And then it's probably significantly more. Exactly. It's like, yeah. So you don't say no to anybody unless it's like a women's health sex. I guess.

Yeah. But we don't do that. But the idea of trying to manage something this size, it's impressive. That's like a, you know. I have so much self-doubt. So I'm always like, did we cover everything? Did we miss something? And you're always going to.

So that's why I had to like, I led the team pep talk with this. Like, we're here. Number one, we made it here. Some people missed their flight. Some people were sick, right? Number two, something's going to go wrong. And we'll just have to accept it now. That was the first thing I said to feel while planning this.

There you go. Something will go wrong. Exactly. So we cannot get hung up on like, I miss this thing. If I do that to myself at this show and to my team, we will just never walk away from this feeling like we've done our jobs. And your coverage is being great. And I say this like truly as a reader of Engadgett for 15 plus years, like a long long time. We just turned 20 something.

20? Yeah, that makes sense. And it's like, this is a mammoth show to cover. And it's hard to. And I've had the same thing running. This is my first CES I've run better offline on. And it's like, yeah, I'm like, shit, I miss this. I'll see an article going out and I'll be like, I'm the worst, I have failed the show, I've endangered the mission.

And it's just impossible to do. So I'm going to change tech because you actually, and this is a miss of mine, can you tell me what the Samsung baily, what this robot is? Because I've seen the articles and I did not get a chance to look at it. Well, I don't know that it's even here at CES 2025. Well, someone's been showing pictures of it. Yeah, Bali. Bali's actually been at CS 2024. Well, it was debuted at CS 2024,

but the concept of this like rolling robot that Samsung makes has been around for like, what, five years I want to say, at least, if not longer. And it's like most mature iteration, the one that's going on sale, it's this bowling ball-sized yellow robot that rolls around your house. It's got a built-in projector.

It's got speakers built in. It listens to you speak. You can talk to it and be like, oh, turn, you know, open the shades or like the oven or whatever. It talks to your smart home appliances.

It can beam like your screen on the ceiling, on the wall, on the floor, wherever makes sense for you. The pitch was like, it's this AI fitness companion, but it's also your home assistant,

all of these things. The news, the CES, because last year was when they showed it off, this CES is that it's supposedly going to be available in the first half of this year. I will caveat that

when they first announced Bali properly in CS 2024. They did say it will be available in 2024. So it's like Samsung, are you really going to push this out this year, you know? More of that claims. Be cute, I guess.

Send vibes. I do that for free. I was going to say seeing the pick, like again, I don't, there's a part, every time somebody has talked about like being like, yeah, it follows you around, it can project stuff. It's not a good question, but the thing that's in my head is just like, really? Like, are you sure? That sounds really hard.

That said, it is a cute little guy. And if you think, this is like something that I sort of picked up, I guess also from Chris, that does seem to be like one of the themes of the CES is cute little guys. So this fits. This is like, you know, it doesn't just blink at you. It follows you around. It turns your

stove on. I say this with my Bengal cat Babu, who is my familiar, and he follows me around and he meows at me. He wants to be on eye level. I feel screaming at you. I really enjoy the videos. That's his sister Poki. I will post it. Go to my socials. Poki's his little sister my beautiful screaming queen, who loves.

to scream at me. She just wants affection all the time and who doesn't. Babu is the beautiful, svelt, Bengal who's mostly just up and he has a meow. Anyway, I guess that's why I don't need this thing because I already have something amazing to follow me, but at the same time putting that aside,

why do I need a robot following me? To what end is it following me? Oh, it's going to project something. What is it going to project? Right. I also ask when did the shift to like affectionate intelligence to keep the devices happen? Yeah, that's actually a good point. Yeah. I mean, have Is that been something you guys have detected over the past few years?

My opinion is, I mean, the Ibo has been around for a very long time. And it's piqued everyone's interest. But it never really took off. Nobody really sold them. But robotics, if you really look at the space in the real world, where is robotics? Robotics isn't manufacturing. Robotics is in warehouses. They don't need to be humanoid robots.

None of them needs to be. They just need to be arms that repeat and action over and over again and do it so. And this is a great deal of value in that. Exactly. Do the things that we don't want to do. These things, you know, I think we are collectively learning that the humanoid robots don't quite make sense other than to impress people, to shock and awe. Created movies. Remind people about The Terminator, exactly.

And the actual helpful robot arms in those manufacturing spaces are not as sexy and not as appealing visually. So what else is appealing? For some, they might be. Anyway. For something they might be, right? Sure. But then, like, what is the next space? they saw, they looked to Aibo, they looked to the cute ones, they realized people want cute.

I mean, I think they looked at Pepper as well. There is, I think, function and use for some of them in specific spaces once again, which is, I think, in the hospice care space, there's room for, like, telepresence robots. There's room for, like, sort of some sort of health care, like, robots. I go to this place called Kura revolving sushi. Oh, a conveyor belt place? Yes, exactly. That was her number one shit, all through our 20s. that was the forever, like, whatever her birthday,

yeah. Like, it was different places. Yes. You did not say that. Oh, did I? You just said her. Her, her. Don't worry about it.

Sure. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, Scarlet Johansson's voice, my long time companion. Do you remember Tommy Hackman? My wife loves the, you know, like, whatever, a piece of Negeri slowly approaching you, and you get to be like,

oh, I don't mind to badoo. Honestly, that sounds great. It's my favorite thing. Kura revolving sushi has a robot that brings you your drinks when you request for it, right? All the servers have to do is place your drink on the tier. When I was in career

at the beginning of last year, there was a dish wash, a dish bot. And it worked. And it seemed to actually work. These, like, robotics is here. Yeah. But like many things at CES,

it is not that exciting. Well, this comes back to something that we were talking about yesterday. Like, if the actual applications for a lot of these robots are like, like you said, it's like either elder care or accessibility and stuff like that,

that seems like it's, the case for a lot of this stuff, a lot of of this sort of like augmented reality is if that's the term for it. I don't know if it's AR or whatever. Not the thing like the brain implant. What do you call that? You're a link. Oh, you mean the non-invasive one? Yeah, yeah. But the jaw one that was made up.

Oh, so like gesture, control of devices. Gotcha, gotcha, yeah. It's like all of that seems to be about helping people who have these and yet like it seems like with this robot like you make it cute because and you show when you're like demoing it for people, you don't want people to think about being sick. I guess that's not good for

advertising. But you show them instead this thing that like I'm not sure that people really want to be like followed around their house. Like I'll turn my own stove on honestly. Like I don't want anyone else to be. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But the it's, there's something funny about the idea of like inventing this thing that actually is useful actually could add value to people's lives, but you can't sell it in a way that actually reflects its utility. I again, another thing I've ranted about for a couple years now is how much we're failing people in terms of elder care, long term care for people in late stages of life. And the reason we do that as a society is because I think companies and corporations don't

see value in providing this sort of care or more products in this space, right? And so that's why they don't want to tell you that this is better suited for like outer care caregiver situations. Even though there are companies that will come out and say that bigger companies won't want to do it because like a PR, I'm thinking this is a PR conversation. I don't know that they want to say that we're investing in this thing that serves a very niche audience that might die off in a few years. And there is a reason and that absolutely is it because you don't get a growth market.

Exactly. And it's the growth mindset that sucks. Exactly. And you also don't get growth out of things with elderly people other than being a private equity firm that buys old people. Yes. I mean, this is one thing I think of with the care economy, which is like the growth of it has been decided largely by the consequences of private equity firms laying waste to infrastructure. They're seeing services they can build into it. And then the evaporation of resources for facilities leading to these firms,

these on-demand firms coming in and applying the Uber model to them and saying, look, we will create a marketplace where the nurses will bid each other to the lowest possible price. They'll come in without training. I mean, training in the sense that because they're not employees, they're not told where things are, who to take care of, how to operate things. Like that like itinerant nurse like traveling nurse economy

type of. And that and this makes me think of what we see sometimes with some of this technology that's being offered and that you know some of the things that we've seen

would be very good and very useful and should be durable, sustainable businesses just offering care to help people are not able body to help people who are incognitive decline to help people who need care

and yet when we would talk with some of them. You could see, like, that's not always the first way they think or talk about it. They're also talking about, like, oh, like, this firm would love this application that we have. And it's like, okay, but like, that's not real. The thing that is real is

this care, this way you would have to be able to help people who need care. But you're, you're kind of using it, some of these firms feel like they're using it to bootstrap into the growth. Yeah. But you have to, like, bang. It's such a bizarre thing for me, too, especially when you consider like what amazing,

I mean, for the ones that actually exist. Like, not everything that we saw, you know, exists in any sort of real stage yet. But, like, the idea that you have to,

like, bang on the sort of fantastical growth possibilities instead of the actual... Service. Yeah, that you have created a thing that can, you know, provide this very necessary service. Right. With this remarkable bit of technology you did. There's no further ways to monetize the old person.

I'm not... I like that is funny. whatever, well, not for me because I'm like the Joker, because I laugh at the sad things. But it's this sense of, well, there's not, why am I investing in these people? Like, why would I invest in the old person? They're going to die soon anyway.

Because we live in a society. We live in a society. That's the part that's kind of weird about it, because it's not wrong to say that this is like a niche marketplace. Yeah. Correct. And yet it's like, it's also not. It is also like one of the least niche experiences possible is getting old and needing help. Like that's a pretty universal

human, I mean, for those of us that are lucky to make it that far, like, yeah, it's weird. I mean, I guess this is, like, sort of a, I'm going to be a recurring theme anywhere that you go to, like, a trade show where people are trying to make a billion dollars. To that end. I was very encouraged to see this year. There has been quite a lot more attention in this space, right? We saw the AARP head, I mean, I saw, I stopped by the H-Tec Pavilion on the show floor. Tell us about, we really haven't heard about this.

Yeah, so I went there and the H-Tagpavilion, presented by AARP, I guess, is just a a space in the show floor. They have so many of these dedicated spaces carved out. They had a speech where they presented four special products. I believe, well, the one I saw and I tried on were this pair of pants by Arcturix and a company called Skip

that they've worked with. This pair of pants is like a robotic powered pants situation where you put them on and they have sort of almost like an exoskeletons to help you move and climb better. And we're at the point with products that are

design for improving life for people with mobility issues where it's not, you don't have to be, it's not binary, right? You don't have to be a full-on paraplegic and it's not crutches and wheelchairs. This is for people who have some pain, struggle with painy pain, that sort of thing. And often these people are maybe thinking of someone in my family, refuse to get any fucking help because they are like, I'm not, I'm not, I'm not, nothing's wrong with me. I'm just in constant pain and have mobility issues. But these things sound kind of magical for that. These are going to be great, but these are because they're art director and outdoor like apparel brand and that sort of thing.

They're designed for like hiking and this. So it's more like if you're at a stage in life where you're so burdened by some like leg pain or body pain that like going outside seems like such a pipe dream anymore like climbing a hill, right? You can walk around but you can't really be active. Exactly. Like challenges like scaling like elevation and whatnot. This is what this pair of pants is designed to do. And were they powered by anything or were they just there was a battery pack in the back of the pants. in the waistband.

And what did they do? Did they support the knees or the leg? Yeah. So the one I tried by Arcturix had three like braces, one around the ankle, one around the knee and one around like the thigh. And then the robot arm would just kind of propel you in those. What as the joints moved around? Right.

And it's design. My demo, we had to go to like stairs because that's where you would demonstrate the effectiveness more. Yeah, it's supposed to push you up. I tried to do speed squats right in those. I don't, I'm not the target market clearly. But I was like, yeah, I was like trying to see speed squats. And I think when I tried them, they weren't on.

but they're supposed to help you get from like the bent knee position to the up position more easily, which is where I think a lot of people struggle with pain. Well, I, in the last few, in like the last year, I've really got into yoga. And I would say a year ago, I'd have trouble getting on and off the floor. Right. And I'm decently able, like, I'm decently able, but I don't have something wrong other than the fact that I was deeply inflexible. Being able to do that now is magic. But that took a shit ton of effort to get.

But also, I didn't have any mobility issues that would have precluded me from doing yoga. Yeah. So this, do you know how expensive these are? It is expensive. How expensive we talk? I mean, you know the Octoric brand. I was going to say, like, the stuff that they have that doesn't have robot arms in it is still like expensive. So how much we're talking?

Yeah, I think, so they have no like actual info. Yeah, but the ballpark figure that I'm hearing is like 5,000. And I was like, are you going to talk to insurance providers to get the subsidized? They were like, they want to consider it. I don't think this is a product. The insurance providers have to decide whether to cover it. They barely cover medicine. Exactly.

There you go. I don't want to get into it. But also, I can't imagine you're like anybody's pants. Like, you're not selling a lot of stuff at MSRP when it's $5,000. Exactly. I would be honest, though, secretly. This is the stuff I'm most excited about. Because, like, the idea of just putting on a suit that makes you able-bodied for anyone is kind of magical.

Yeah. Like, I don't know. Like, I was a very heavy kid growing up. I was like 325 pounds. And that alone, like, didn't mean I was strong. which is very embarrassing when you're large, I will add. But nevertheless, even when I got thin, I still felt quite weak.

I still had, like, some joint issues, even. And it's, like, the idea that we can kind of level the playing field other than the fact it's $5,000 is kind of cool. You want to hear something? Absolutely. After I saw those, I walked downstairs to have the Kickstarter booth, and the Kickstarter booth had a company from somewhere in Asia, I think Taiwan or China, I can't remember,

called HyperShell, and they make, like, a non-pants version of this exoskeleton. it is between $800 to $1,500, depending on the material carbon fiber. When you say non-pants, how does that? Yeah, so it's this sort of brace that you strap on around your waist to start, and then you strap like two things to your knees, and they're basically an exoskeleton. The reason is not Onengadja.com, yes, I haven't written it up yet. I'm still technically working, I guess, but chilling.

And, yeah, and so they do the same thing the Arctorex pants do, except for an exoskeleton that you strap around your clothes. This is so cool. I love this. Actually, I'll show you a video right now. I don't know if you can... When will you write up your story? Just send me the link. I will send you the link.

Yes, I'm hoping to do it tomorrow and have it up over the weekend on our website. And I just, I think that this is what I wish CS all was. Because if you think about what makes technology actually magical, it's stuff that makes you stronger, connect with people quicker, allows you to explore who you are and who other people are in an honest way.

And when it gets worse, it's when people interfere with that process. Or slap AI and everything. Or slap AI and everything. So as we go, as we sadly come to the end, we've got four minutes left. Was there anything you were like your favorite, favorite thing? Was there something you miss? Is there anything you really missed that you truly liked or despised?

I can't, something that made me laugh, but I kind of liked it. Sold. Okay. So we started noticing a trend at CES 2025. Carissa might have talked about it. But Dan Cooper on our team was the first one to crystallize this idea with this term. I mean, I crystallized the idea without this fancy name that he came. up with it. Classic Dan.

Great term. The Hawk Tour show. Oh god, yes. What are you told? I want to know. There were so much like saliva sensing, saliva detecting tech. Oh boy. On that thing, huh?

On that thing. I mean, look, when we walked into CES Unveiled, which is the first show on Sunday night, I already knew there were two saliva-based devices there. I was not expecting the most popular booth at CES Unveiled. us unveiled where crowds of people were around them the whole time. I couldn't even get into a demo. This thing called salt spoon. Have you heard of it? Everyone was licking it.

It was like everybody's putting things in their mouths at this show. I was like, I don't know. I got to, so I don't want to touch a surface. It's a cool idea. They were not letting people put it in their mouth at that point. There was like a video. They probably ran out. Maybe. They was giving away disposable ones at unveiled. Yeah. Yeah, there were like a couple of them sitting on the counter and I like picked it up and I was like, I don't know, feels good.

Like a spoon more of us, but stranger. But then there was like a video of a guy eating ramen with it. Yeah. But you know, you had to guess. What is this? What is this?

It's the one with the electromagnetic things to make you taste the saltiness. Yes, exactly. So think about it. If you're trying to consume like less sodium in your life, but you still want to have salty foods. This food is, if you use a spoon, it'll turn everything you put in your mouth

by tricking your taste buds into something that's like, thinking that's something salty or saltier than it is. So I learned about this from Jesse, Ferrar where I get all of my scientific information. This is apparently the same technology that people use for saltwater pools. That it's basically a way of making something salty without like dumping a bunch of sodium into. So the idea is you will shy away from things that have a certain level of salt because they'll taste even more salt. I can answer this because I've had a lot of emails when we last mentioned.

I want to apologize to the people we kind of turn on those up at this. It turns out there are people who have like real physical problems with. salt. They have to, it's not like I should have less salt. It's, if I have too much, I will be in physical pain. And this is magical for them. It's like, I want to, like, as this show goes on, as we approach the end,

anything I really mess up, I will try and fix. But apparently, like, this is a big deal for those people. You can, like, have salt. Yeah, it's not just like a diet thing too, right? It's like some people have irritation, inflammation, or I don't know if there's a salt allergy in the world, but... Hypertension. Right, hypertension. So you want, hypertension is a

diet-based thing that I'm considering as an issue, right? Like for healthy reasons, you still want to be able to taste salty foods. It's not about making something taste so salty that you will avoid it. It's more drinking bland things that will then taste salty because of the using of the spoon. And as I just gathered it, it was like you also get the, you can kind of like dial in the experience to like what you want. I think because there's, isn't that right that it's like you can go from like one to four and how salty it is? I walked the periphery of the booth the whole time because I couldn't get inside to Tesla. What was the other saliva-based stuff?

Yeah. There's like one thing you could spit on. Yeah, there were two things you could. We call it the thing. We call it the thing. Yeah, I have no knowledge of this thing. I, uh, here we are giggling about it. But it is weird.

It is. There are two devices. One is called the cortisense and the other is called hormometer. We're not fans of the, yeah. Sorry, homometer. Like hormone meter. Sounds good. No, that's just a really funny and good name.

It's a great portmanteau, I think. Hormometer is slightly further along, in my opinion, the process. Basically, these are at-home tests that you can use on your saliva, and they'll tell you how much like cortisol is in your system. Okay, so I think the problem is the labeling, because everything you've described is wonderful. Exactly. And could also have not been described as saliva-based?

Well, that was to me the way it came off, and that was my vibes. I mean, yeah, that's, that is saliva-based. Yeah, but I get some faint Theranos-t taste. Theranos tasting notes. Interesting, interesting. I like it because I'm really into like getting data about yourself. Right. But I don't want blood testing all the time.

I don't believe in the photo scanning of your face to tell you your face age. I want you to actually use, I guess, bodily fluids to know what is up with me. And this seems smart, right? Like it's non-invasive. It's an easy way. And there are so many ways that we can avoid going to the doctor, I guess. It's not like going to a doctor is a bad thing. It's that like people want to know more about themselves.

People have been strapping glucose monitors on themselves just to understand their blood sugar levels when they don't have diabetes, right? So there's so many reasons people could benefit from analyzing their saliva in my opinion. For a thermometer, they do both cortisol and progesterone levels. And what would those be just for the less than myself? Yeah, cortisol is the stress hormone.

So the levels of cortisol are higher and higher stress. and then progesterone is something that people can use to track, I guess, fertility-related things or cycle-related or there's so... I'm not velversed enough in the science here to tell you what else progesterone's about. That makes all of us. And sadly, we have to come to the end of this part of the show.

Ed, where can people find you? The tackbubble.com, this machine kills and big black jacobin on Twitter and blue sky. Shirlin, where can people find you? I think I'll still be on the meta-ups for a bit. So Sherlyn, Instagram, C-H-E-R-L-N-N-S-T-H-E-R-A-M. Defector.com, The Distraction Podcast,

it's-Christmastown podcast, and David J-Roth. B-S-K-Y dot social. Though I realize many of you plot my end, and indeed when you hear I'm hurt, you cheer and laugh and squeal and o-ink. Nevertheless, if you don't want to cause me misery, you'll follow the following ads

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drinks at this point. We're not all right. It's not to destruction. It's just a little bit. Triple fisting is a beautiful thing. Okay. Well, we've already had complaints about the language. So let's just move on from that one. So we're once again joined by Mr. Phil Broughton, the health physicist. Just let's reintegrate that and reintroduce you to the show. Allow me to introduce myself. Okay. So I'm Phil Broden. I'm a health physicist, which is a radiation safety professional.

I'm also a laser safety officer. So I take care of the full electromagnetic spectrum of radiation. I also am the weird shit guy. And your bartender. Phil is here at CES showing the laser mask that he made that people can work. It's not FDA-approved. I hate that product. So you have seen that.

Have you seen the laser bra as well? No, is that really? Is that real? That is real. What does it do? What are you talking about? You haven't been on the floor. No, this wasn't on the floor.

This is just why the internet exists, my sons. So Phil is someone I torture. Yes. We've been friends for 15 years. Sorry, I also missed something out. Mr. Edongueso Jr. is to my right. The wonderful. Hello.

I'm Ed now. He's Z. Yeah. So, Sherlin has been calling me Z. You haven't a laugh. You're taking a pitch, mate. You're having a laugh. Mr. Zitran.

I'm like searching my head. Can I do any accent? You have the islands? Go ahead. Try it out. Beans on toast. Oh, one time I did have an English breakfast and I felt like I was going to die. That's sweating.

That's just how it feels to be British. Yeah. Oh, my God. Okay. All of your British levels maxed out. Yeah, the British saliva tested. I know. All my Kenyan ancestors were like, what is this?

Don't let them win. Oh, God. Oh, boy, there's so many directions. But back to Phil. So why does this show frustrate you so? We've gone over the fire martial aspect, but just the general milieu of CES does appear to torture you so.

So a lot of what vendors are coming to CES with are not, despite the fact it says consumer electronic show, many of the things are not aimed for consumers, never meant for consumers. or these are not products that are actually on the market, not going to get to the market. And it's terrifying how many people who have come on the show in talking to me separately at the bar

have said that they've met people at the stalls who asked them, so what do you think our product should do? No, that's not what you do. If you have a product you're going to sell to someone, you really better know what it does so it can be sold legally and safely. Or so that it could do it.

Oh, well, there's that too. Is that part of the... Again, be asking an ignorant question, maybe. Okay, you were days in. You need to stop leading in with the item no. I'm not saying that... I don't know a lot about C. I mean, I know something about like

what this one is like and how it feels, maybe. That seems... That does strike me as strange, the idea of showing up with something that's like halfway done. Like, the idea of me just like publishing a draft with a bunch of TKs in it and being like,

I'm really interested. did in anybody's feedback on how you think this story should conclude. Well, listen, brother, after this, we're going to drive out west to a little place I like to call Palo Alto where you get to see a whole world that is built on stuff. Probably less developed. Shipping the prototype. Well, it's like Pete Alonzo just made an offer a three-year deal to the Mets, which is news I'm giving to David Gross.

You're allowed to do that? Yeah. Like, it's much like that. Like, what will you do, Peter? And that is actually a good question for the Mets at this point. But nevertheless, I'm happy to field that one if you want. Oh, please. Should we do some that stuff?

Lasers, shoot them all with lasers? Handle the Mets real quick. It couldn't hurt. No, the Alonzo thing, as sentimentally as a Mets fan, I hope he returns. I think he's declining. Right. The Mets seem to think he's declining. Right.

If he's making offers to them, maybe he thinks he's declining. Right. Whatever. He seems very happy to be on the Mets, and I think that that is rare enough that I hope he stays. That's a completely straight-faced answer. One app to baseball question. Pete Alonzo has. who don't know, what are the Mets?

The Mets are, so they're one of the, that's a great question. That's such a me thing to say, thank you. Obviously, you haven't been down to the eureka level. They are a, it's an AI-enabled baseball team. The Mets are a private equity firm owned by a billionaire that ostensibly sells baseball-related services.

They only recently updated their terms of services to allow for baseball-related success with the acquisition of a company called Juan Soto. They're on a subscription, model like a lot of these guys. You got to keep paying if you want them to well, whatever. We're not going to talk about the National League East. Yeah, I just realized we have gone fully

into the Mets, so we need to move. That was beautiful. I am so sorry. But Phil, we're putting the Fire Marshal stuff aside. What is it with lasers and these people? Like, what is it? Why do they love to bring up lasers so much? Like, what do you think it is? Okay. So,

this would be several decades of career experience and just watching people and what they do. there's something in the human psyche that gets very excited about whatever thing there is in the world, what if I put a laser on it? Right. That will make it better. Or alternatively, this thing that already does the thing it normally does, would a laser make it do it better?

So, do they know what a laser is also? Often not. Great. What is a laser? Light amplification by a simulated emission of radiation. I didn't know. It was an acronym. It is.

I thought it was just something that it was cool. And I didn't realize it was an acronym until you asked that question. Yeah, this is amazing. I have an IQ of seven. But the more exciting thing and the reason why I get excited about it and products that happen is how we regulate lasers in the United States of America. This is your important asterisk that goes in the post of these rules and regulations only apply in the United States of America. In your jurisdiction, they may be different.

when lasers became a thing that weren't just stuff nerds played with in the national laboratory, the very first market they hit, the first consumer is very relative product was for ophthalmological treatments where you're doing laser cotteries zapping to fix... In the eye. in the eye to cauterize off new veins growing in the retina to save people who are losing their vision from glaucoma or other diabetic retinopathy. because the first application of lasers that really hit the consumer market was a medical application is the reason why lasers are regulated by the Food and Drug Administration's Center for Device and Radiologic Health, which means any consumer product that incorporates a laser is supposed to have been vetted

and compliant with the federal laser product performance standard that the FDA promulgates, and they only get one chance to catch you is when you release your product into commerce. And that has a very specific regulatory meeting. Which is? Oh, God. You actually want to know. Yeah. Yes.

Well, I'm assuming for our purposes here, the stuff that's downstairs, a lot of the places have, as you pointed out, they'll be like a little tagline or this has not been shown to the FDA yet. No, not. They do not. They do not.

Not approved by the FDA. Yeah, all right. Or is being used under basically the Funsies code of the regulation. But when you have something at CPS, even if you have a prototype on it, it has not been released into Commerce. Is that correct? Correct. Okay. So, Commerce's specific meaning

is you have a laser product that you have made more than one of, is being, and or is being used somewhere other than the place where it was initially built and or

by someone who was not the person who originally built it. Which means, if you listen to those three statements, at no point does money have to exchange hands. So they only have to build two? The moment you hit two, you have made a laser product. Versus people reading this as commerce, meaning it's on Amazon. Which is what most people think it means. Sweet. That's how the regulation covers it. To try to cover tricks like people think, oh, well, just you're a friend. I'll make you a second one of these setups and I'll ship everything that I just did over to you at your other laboratory, you have no idea how the very specific quirk of,

I have duct tape sitting right here on this setup to protect that beam from going out that will blind me. Also, it takes so very little laser power to actually be blinding. But also, that feels like a valuable point to this, which is just because they've made two, doesn't mean they've made two safe ones. Like, if there are little workarounds, like when you release something under these regulations you're discussing,

I imagine you probably want to think of a more rigorous housing than tape. Correct. That's when I mentioned the Federal Laser Project Performance Standard, aka the flips. It specifies the components that your laser should have to be a legal laser product that could be sold into commerce. They're not just, you have to be eye-safe levels of power, which is defined as less than 1-millimeter per square centimeter on the retina. It also has things like you have interlocks so that if you pop open the housing, it turns off. Or it drops a shutter. And these are things that people don't classically put in the first version?

Not classically, no. Good. Also, other things like there's indicator lights. There's switches. There's key interlocks. All the things that sound like buttons. Things that vanish from the design of products the moment you catch Apple disease

and decide that every single product should be a smooth tablet of silicon that you wave your hands at and they do magic, rather than what is my product doing? So how does this manifest into problems at CES? Well, first, you have handed products often to sales people on the floor to go set up and talk about and try to make a sale. Well, most certainly not. The engineers who built it.

Or laser safety officers. Correct. The other thing is bringing a laser onto the floor, and let's take this back to the fire marshal chat, that constitutes one of the hazards you actually have to let the CTA know about so they can tell the fire marshals because that changes the occupancy of the room. Also, they have a safety personnel they call to come evaluate setups. So if you say you're bringing a laser to the floor,

a laser safety officer will come. Oh, you should put an enclosure around that product you bought brought because you don't actually have one. Now, this defeats the purpose of you're trying to show your product. Now they can't see it through the enclosure that protects people from it. That should indicate that maybe your product is not great. Yeah, but I want to see the product. You won't not see at all.

You won't see anything at the end. That's disturbing. And that's where that's the hand of Big Brother in a lot of ways trying to keep you from being blinded by a laser. Yeah, Big Vision got you. under a hotel. What does it? Move fast, blind, quick? Yes, that's pretty much.

So, but I just want to actually, here's a really good thing for the listeners. What are the consequences of not following these things? What do these products do to you as a person in the event these regulations are not followed? Blinding. Fires. And is that bad?

Fair question. That is a good question. I'm glad that we have a balanced group here. So just a quick rundown. If you go look at your product that has a laser in it, odds on favor, you have one. It's probably a printer in your home. Right. If you go look on it, there will be a little yellow sticker on the box that says class one laser device.

Right. That means it is safe for use under any viewing conditions. You have no access to a hazardous laser beam. You don't need eye protection or anything like that. You do not. Because the housing that's in there will protect you. Mind you, most laser printers are actually. class four lasers,

which are absolutely blinding and capable of setting fires, if you took all of the housing that makes the printer off of it. Okay. So there is a much more powerful laser that is dangerous to you hiding inside of it.

One of the other things that happens at CES and other shows like Photonics West, where I will be in a couple of weeks, is people try to get around some of the consumer protection standards by rather than selling you a finished product,

they sell you parts as original equipment manufacturers. If you go buy OEM parts, which you are free to do because America, everyone salute. He is saluting. I'm saluting right now, of course. Thank you, everyone. If you go buy a laser, OEM laser product and integrate it into your system, because you thought this stuff is great. This bangs.

All it needs. is a laser. Yeah. The moment you add a laser to it, you just turned the thing you made into a laser product. A finished one is subject to all of those rules like enclosures, lights, housings, interlocks. You just became a laser manufacturer and you didn't want to be. And at that point... But shouldn't we be supporting entrepreneurs with that sort of initiative?

I agree with Edwitt's question. It does feel weird. This is like the, it's like a 3D printer-y type scenario where there's like, it seems like the, the 3D printers. But like the distance between reach and grasp here is like actually a matter of life and death. Like the idea that like I could by doing a few different things that more or less involve following instructions become a laser manufacturer. Like I don't even like brush my teeth before 11 in the morning a lot of days. Like I shouldn't be trusted with being able to do stuff like that. No, and that's the, that's actually was a very good point, which is what Phil is described.

is how easy it is to do this insane shit. Very. And to bring it back to the FDA, their control point is releasing a product into commerce, after which the FDA doesn't really have control of it anymore, because it's now in. The only other thing that a laser manufacturer is required to do as far as the FDA is concerned is maintain a log of injuries

associated with their product and recalls. I have to do that with the podcast. Yeah, several listeners Just to my heart recalling bits recalling bits or entire systems We after close examination we've realized that bit number 76C

from episode 2053 Was problematic Could cause emotion The effort to injury to listeners So Phil On the floor over the years What are the manifestations Specifically of this thing

What are the things that you have seen and heard of that you can terrorize my good friends, Mr. Roth and Mr. Anguaiso with. So let's go back to the laser bra. Okay. Please. This was actually a club item where the idea was you could be your own laser light show. Not just you put out the laser emitting product to go with the music, but it will actually react to your dancing and will change the brightness,

change the color as you dance. though. If it's an LED situation. Because lasers make everything better, also LED also can stand for laser emitting diode. They don't sense things. They do things. They can also emit. Right, but... Are you saying that they use lasers to emit light? Yes. On the fucking bro-dozen of them. We have lights. No, but they could be lasers to shine in very visible beams across the entire room. Okay, I'm not the lazy set. Lazy, Jesus Christ. This slip of the tongue happens constantly. laser safety expert here, but I think the idea of shooting a bunch of lasers out of one's breasts where people might be looking.

It's fun. It may be, but it also might... Fun and flirty, a great look for the season. 30, flirty and thriving. That feels dangerous. You have all very pain looks on your faces at the very idea. Not me, I feel no pain like the Zohan. I'm thinking about whether it would be worth it, you know.

Like literally risking it all. Risking your ability to proceed. What sort of party could I go to it? That was fine. Yeah, I got blinded. I pretty much got what I paid for. Philly's like desperate to actually. There's also totally been the laser butt plug

that showed up at Defont. No, no, no, no, no. But same thing, dropping trout to... Much like... What's the name of the manufacturer? So we can... No, this actually was someone... Make fun of them more effectively?

But the one that was most relevant that actually did show up at CES, And it has shown up dozens of times on hacker news and other interesting maker websites. Someone who had made a laser-based bong. Now, this is a problem. Because, again, you've taken a concept of a totally workable product that already exists. Bongs. We have known how these work for a very long time.

And we have made them so that people who maybe under the influence can operate. It can even offer them. Maybe not safely with a torch, but, you know. So a certain kind of mind looks at and goes, man, I can make that so much better with a laser. And the problem is lasers are not necessarily hot burning enough to actually properly combust your weed to then inhale. Incomplete combustion is a problem because, okay, now what did I break down on my plant material too? oh, it's every organic molecule

you possibly could break it down to some of which are carcinogens. So there's a good? No. So your reefer becomes something even more dangerous but you don't even really

get the enjoyment of doing go out. I am genuinely asking what is the consequences of the carcinogens? No dumb questions. You just said the word carcinogens. No, no, but explain. Please.

Cancer-causing agents. Thank you. Some of which are just straight up toxic, not just carcinogenic. Do you not go... Do you get high at least? Yes, good question. So just to be clear, though, when you break

away all this stuff. But you're also... This part of the show is about... You are... You're also effectively wasting weed. You're not completely... Okay, now I'm taking this very seriously.

Not that I ever have. But the specific thing I'm saying here, though, is so the laser is not even efficient as a heating system. It's not a good answer for it. It's just, cool, I used a laser. Do you not regularly burn carcinogens when you You do, like, weed that you smoke in a bong, for example. You often get full combustion.

The goal is to get full combustion to get the THC out. Does that get the carcinogens out? Are there less? You don't make them in the first place. Okay, so the idea of using a laser in this case creates new problems that makes weed less healthy. Again, it's time for another brand new acronym for you. LJax, laser-generated airborne contaminants, which is something we regulate under... And why do lasers create those?

So anytime you have a laser interacting with material, they start burning things off of it. Sorry, if it has enough power to start burning things off it, it will make fumes, it will do micromachining of surfaces. And you start getting nanoscale particulates, which are very exciting, very... They sound cool, yeah. But no.

So normally you put on a respirator to protect yourself from particulates, when you're doing woodwork and savage, which you already mentioned, the laser cutters and burners. When you use those on your wood, rather than just making simple smoke or sawdust, you were making nanoscale particulates that go right through your respirator,

and rather than getting stuck in your sinuses with all your mucus there, some may, to your lungs, some may get stopped there. Suddenly, the target organ for smoke is your liver, rather than your lungs. See, this is the thing. This is, and I'm so happy you put this down,

man, it has been like eight years of doing this. We've never actually got you to run down where your actual expertise lies here, and it's wonderful to do. No, I fucking love it. It's wonderful. The show has been amazing. But the thing is, it's like a classic CS-style problem

where it's like, ah, have we got the solution to something. But you have so many more problems. Yeah, we may have created some more problems, but did we create a solution? I don't know. Do you think we did? Did you come up? Can you tell us if we,

what do you think? Can you buy this and then give us an idea? Right, that's the bit that I kept waiting for you to get to. Because a lot of it is like, especially with, you know, like the idea of a laser bomb.

Like this is, it's a worst way to address a problem that has been pretty comprehensively solved. But it's cool. But it's sold in a way that stoners would absolutely buy. Yeah,

that somebody's like, well, this is like maybe this is cool enough that we could sell it even if it's delivering like, just a, of, not even 25% of the experience.

Like you're getting all the carcinogens and none of the PHC. You're getting an extra 100%. I don't know what percentage. It feels like when I was in high school and we were out of weed and our plug was out of town. And so we'd scrape our bowls to get plastic together to smoke out of some PVC pipe. You know, like to. Okay, I was maxing out the dirt bag standards. I was going to say you were in good shape there right up until you said PVC.

I mean, yeah, I'm trying to maximize the unhealthy, horrible, damaging carcinogenic element. And there you go, you know British culture. So to correct you though, David, it's not you get all of the carcinogens that were there. It's you made some that weren't there in the first place. Yes, my bad. You made a new problem for your not solution.

This is like the thing where like, I don't think this is like not a novel observation, but the like the ways in which like a commercial consideration, just the most basic. commercial consideration. Like, can I sell this? Can I make this thing and bring it to market? That is the highest hurdle for any of these products. The technological stuff, the magic, the shit that you need like advanced degrees to be able to do, doesn't often seem to be a problem. The bigger problem is trying to find some way to either invest in it or to find a way to sell it.

And that's how you, that's like when these things get bad. And then the fill destroying ones are where they fail both. Yes. Where they're just like, well, do we have a product that people want? no do we have a product that works absolutely not however we do have a name we have science and we technically do have science that's one thing your wokeness can't take away Phil they do have science

get a med technically now the problem is do they understand the science and that's the big one and this is the thing I think or rather they understand their specific incredibly narrow niche and have never picked their head up

to look and acknowledge there are other humans around them Why would they do that unless they're consumers? Because some of them are customers. Okay. No, no, no, no. Consumer. Oh, sorry. You are not there to be happy.

You're there to consume. And this is CES, baby. It's just a series of people from the top of the people who actually release things all the way down to the people releasing the laser bomb. The other thing for CES is... Sorry. They move in fads. Well, I said there's something in the human spirit that says,

You just got to attach lasers to things. Not according to the people have gone to the floor. Not this year. People were not excited to staple lasers on the stuff. But in past years, absolutely. And that first time we visited C. well, together to CES in 2015, I actually did go to the floor.

2011? First time we went together. Which year was that? First time we went together. The DJ Woo Kid year? No, I wasn't with you for that. Nice you were. We met in the Californian.

Right. but I didn't get to meet DJ Wu kid. No, no, no. You left me out. It's one of my cool friends by which I mean a guy emailed like a year ago. The first time we were here together and I went to the floor in 2015. There was a whole bunch of post-disaster Fukushima tech where people were developing so many new apps for your phone for integration into the radiation monitoring networks. There was no radiation monitoring network to integrate into.

Wait, they just like made up a... Well, we're going to have to have... some detectors that you can log into really, would you like to buy some detectors, by the way, to add... For the inevitable future. For the full network that you want to be. Of course, the thing that will exist. Or a detector you can plug into your phone. No, your phone doesn't generate enough voltage to actually run that detector to do it.

There was a whole lot of radiation related. I am terrified of a Fukushima in my backyard across the entire Pacific tech that got rolled out, which vanished the following year. There's cycles. We were talking about this this morning, too, and I think the thing that was kind of interesting about what you said about that, too, was that, and this, again, you know, I kept sort of having this feeling down there.

You were describing as basically, you know, people wanted this, you know, spectrometer or whatever the term is. You got it. Is it good. I saw Craig Madsen's Chernobyl miniseries, and I took copious notes during it, so I know a lot.

I loved that. I thought it was good, actually. But. If people expected it, me to hate it. I too had like a t-shirt on that seemed to be like Chernobyl, by the way. Yes, Chernobyl Day baby right here. Really?

April 25th, 986. I think the time zones work out with Russia. Two disasters the same day. You were alive for the last Mets World Series one. That's beautiful. Three disasters. The collapse of multiple dynasties. Anyway, but what you were saying about this is that like all of these things were,

you know, not just flawed in the ways that you described, but they were like successful products in so far as they would generate a number with a decimal point in it. That you could then look at and be like, oh, that seems high. Or that seems low and fine. But as in the miniseries, but I think just in general, like this was the point that you made is generating a number for somebody,

you know, by way of an app or by way of, you know, some sort of device that, you know, it's chargeable via USBC or something, is not the same thing as informing them of anything. It's just producing a number. Like, it's an outcome, but that's that.

It was, every time someone comes to, I have this new detector, is this good, Phil? Or is this worth the money? I go, okay. You have to know how to use it, right? I ask the questions, what are you trying to detect?

Does the detector actually detect that? Do you know how to use it? And a lot of the consumer products in spaces like this related to environmental health and safety, emergency response. No. Most people buying stuff I Amazon have no idea how to fucking use it, much less what it actually sees or how it was. works. And that's why I get angry constantly. As we wrap up more things to upset you, we'll go into more of this tomorrow, I think.

So you can just buy illegal shit on Amazon just to wrap us up? As I regularly send you, it is the largest gray or black market in America. There was a really sad time. The other show I come to Las Vegas to go to is DefCon. COVID Central. I describe coming to CES as a chance to see the things I'm going to have to contend with when cheap professors buy stuff and bring it to me. Going to DefCon, I describe as a vacation to other people's problems because infosec problems are analogous to radiation and laser safety ones, but not actually mine and need to fix. But the stuff I can learn.

One time I was there, I caught three senior Amazon. engineers at a bar and I was aimed at them by a friend who said, those are the Amazon people. And I went over and at angry cocktail point laid down, you are the largest black market, an illegal importer of dangerous laser products and other things in the world, specifically, America. Really like, yes, do you want our card or something? To which, to their credit, thank you. To their credit, they looked ashamed at their shoes and said to me,

I could fix this with a code push at midnight if anyone with the very heavily implied a certain bald owner cared. Professor Charles Xavier's being very unfair. Very nasty and unfair He doesn't listen to Magneto anymore.

Cerebro. It's gotten to his head, folks. Get out of my mind. Having shared this story with contacts at the FDA, the FDA, they haven't quite surrendered to Amazon. but they do not have the staff, they don't have the bandwidth,

they don't have the funding to try to deal with a problem like Amazon and instead are doing their best to work with Amazon, which is something you've written about, talked about, which is regulatory capture. What would happen if we gave guns to the police? I was going to say anything that it is about to say

is not reflected. It's Ed not the other ad Yeah, Edward on Guaoso Jr. Some of you who cannot tell the difference Between our voices Yeah, because we sound so fucking similar. I'm seeing double. For Edd's.

For a price of one. Shit, I thought it's too, yes. In a way, we are the same, you know, Britain, Kenya, what's, you know, we're connected by it. And is also wonderful and I'm so happy he's been in it. Anyway, please stop saying the thing that is legally actionable if you could. It's not legally actionable because I'm asking, I'm actually asking a really good question.

What I'm asking is what would things look like if regulatory agencies actually had the ability to enforce and not just to like litigate? You know, like what, you know, I think one example just being, you know, if they were able to enforce in the way that an A.T.F. for a DA might when it comes to illegal, harmful goods and services proliferating in an open-air black market like this. So that was a funny question you asked me the other day of, do I think any government agencies are working well? And I had to take a long, sad pause and go, the problem is I know how they're supposed to work. I also know how they are working. the DEA and ATF don't work nearly as well as we would like them too. But I feel like they're much more robustly funded.

There's nothing else than that federal trade commission is like six guys in an office with a week in the ceiling. Like if we gave, I'm sure if we gave like Lena Kahn and her advisors, you know, like a Ruger. Yeah. We could get some things to happen. Actually, the people that we would be most excited to have. work to do this in association with the FDA, because the FDA, they do not, they don't get guns. Yeah.

They review things to see if it's safe for people to use and consume. Right. The interdiction point is the United States Postal Inspection Service, which are the mail cops. Shout out, shout out to the mail cups and the column staff. And they are actual, like, please. Do not fuck with them. Yeah, what's their conviction rate?

It's like 99% of it. Yeah, they're just arrest in packages, though, mate. Stop resisting. Like a padded envelope. But again, there's not many people, many of them to do interdiction and investigation. Similarly, for customs, which had got stapled together to Customs and Border Patrol under the Department of Homeland Security, when it was an independent agency, they inspected everything. They were looking for illegally transported crew.

They were looking for illegal cloth because specific. Weaves and contents are trademarked. They're looking for that. They were looking for fake tech. An iPhone that actually just has a piece of cardboard in the middle of rather than chips. Customs used to look at all of this. We got no support time for anything other than drugs. So on that note, I'm afraid we have to come to the end of this 90-plus minutes show.

David J. Roth, where can people find you? Defector.com. It's the website. I do a podcast there. That's the distraction. I'm on Blue Sky, David J. Roth is the handle there. And that is all I have to say for that. Mr. Broughton.

So you can find me on Blue Sky at Funranium. You can find me on my blog, funeraniumlabs.com. If you would like to learn more about me being angry about laser products, go to the adventure and radiation part of the blog or reference rants. Tell them about your coffee product. Yeah, go on. The other thing I do is I make a constant. concentrated coffee called Black Blood of the Earth.

That is what I had to make in order to drink coffee again without adding sugar and cream to it. We're going to talk more about this tomorrow. It rocks. It does and it's actually how. Wholehearted endorsement. How Phil and I met. And by the way, tomorrow's episode, which I'm about to talk up and we'll talk about more later, is going to involve Phil a lot and talking about that.

Mr. Anguaso, Jr. I was debating whether to do a Nelson Mandela accent. I've been thinking about it all week. I really have. Don't find that you must go to the tech bubble. Yeah, that's what I was afraid of. That's my newsletter. My podcast is that this machine kills.

And I'm on Twitter and blue sky at Big Black Jacobin. And you can catch me outside. How about that? That's what I wrote down in my notes there. I'm Ed Zittron. You have been so generous. your time. Thank you for listening. I am so grateful and love all of you. And we'll say that a few more times as we go. We're approaching the first episode at the end of the first episode of the last day of

CES proper. You'll have another one after this. I have been joined by so many wonderful people. I want to thank everyone who's been on so far. This has been an incredible trip. Please listen to the totally canned message after that. I'll get one of you little pigs emailing me and being like, Edwin, you need to update it. I've done like 10 and a half flipping hours of audio. I've done like 10 and a half flipping hours of audio on this. What more could you want from me? I'm online. You can email me. I always email you back. Jesus Christ. I'm just kidding. I adore you. Sir, let's get you home. Okay, I am home. I'm in a Venetian hotel room. This is where I live. Let's get you a drink. Thank you for listening to Better Offline. The editor and composer of the Better Offline theme song is Mattersowski. You can check out more of his music and

audio projects at Mattisowski.com. M-A-T-O-S-K-I.com. You can email me at easy at betteroffline.com or visit betteroffline.com to find more podcast links and of course my newsletter. I also really recommend you go to chat. Where's YourEd.orgat to visit the Discord and go to our slash Better Offline to check out our Reddit. Thank you so much for listening. Better Offline is a production of Cool Zone Media. For more from Cool Zone Media, visit our website, Coolzonemedia.com or check us out on the IHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Another podcast from some SNL late-night comedy guy,

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