The Vergecast - Alexa, play Vergecast

Episode Date: December 11, 2015

This week on the Vergecast, Nilay is joined by Casey Newton, Chris Plante and Nicola Fumo (who is keeping Project Figure Head in full effect). The panel discusses the iPhone battery case and Nicola tries to put together the Google Pixel C. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hello, welcome to the Vergecast. It is December 10th for the live viewer, for the vast majority of you, it's most likely December 11th or some date thereafter. You know we have people who read the back catalog and the version? They're like listen to the whole thing. Oh, yeah. Like, we're at 182. Somebody asked me on Twitter, like, hey, where can I download Vergecast 69?

Because it's missing. And I was like... I'm at all never work. Yeah. So 110 weeks ago. I have no idea. But if you listen to them, you know, consecutively, it tells a person. powerful story.

There's struggle and change. Yeah. That's how I would listen to it if I were just getting into the verge. I mean, we had a long period of the game where these shows are like three hours long. I can't even imagine. Any first of ours were in this intro. God damn it. Anyway, something very exciting is happening.

I want to introduce my friends here. You may have recognized her beautiful voices. So as you may know, I am Neil Appetal. I'm Casey Newton. Your friend, Casey Newton is here. And Chris Plan is here. Hey! Now, that is, I think, unprecedented on the show.

Right. Have we never been in the same place at the same time? People thought we were the same person? Well, we've had a lot of bad blood between us, and we sort of had to clear the air before we had agreed to sit down on the same table. It's true. But we put that all behind us now.

Chris and Casey, there's a reason they're in town, and that reason is they are coming to my birthday party. I made them come. Oh, no. He doesn't know yet. Oh, God. Are you not coming? I hate you.

No, all of the Virges editors, the section editors, are in town this week. We're all meeting for a couple days to talk, basically like high five about how cool 2015 was, and then plot out a scheme of world domination for 2016. Sounds good. And I have to tell you, Field and Stream magazine, you were fucking going down.

What do we ask who we just picked? So totally random. I would not want to be the editor-in-chief of a boy's life, right now. Anyway, so Chris is here, Casey's here. I'm very excited to have them here. If you are following our many social feeds, you might notice that Liz Zapato is also in town. Thomas Shirk is in town.

Who else will be fine? Is that it? I think. Yeah. Anyway. And then, as always, my friend. As newly always. As newly always.

I think of you is the Virgis friend from a cooler part of town. Nicola for most here. From Racked. We just figured this out. Nicola is coming to CES with us. Yeah. It's true. Which is going to be crazy.

I'm so ready for it. That's going to be nuts. And I'm going to be your birthday. Are you? Well, you're better than Chris. Wow. I'm gone. I'm done, though.

Have you already talked about how her sticker game is like so much better than ours? Yeah. I'm not going to say. She's talking about the laptop. I know. It's like really nicely coordinated. Well, she's got a trapper keeper that's next level. That would be amazing.

You know, a trapper keeper that was covered in stickers. Trapper keeper. Well, what else do you? put stickers on. It's a laptop lid. Your locker. Do you put a have a sticker on your phone?

No, I don't, but it could. I just think adults peel off of your phone because you use it so much. I just think adults put stickers on one thing and it's laptop lids. Like when you're an adult, that's the only place that you can put a sticker. Maybe a bumper.

A bumper sticker. Yeah. Not like the huge inflatable things at bowling alleys. I often go to the local bowling alley and apply for stickers to the bumper. That's true.

So bumpers and laptop loads. There's nowhere else. I have a friend that did an entire sticker door in her apartment. Ooh. It's pretty cool. Oh, bar bathrooms. Bar bathrooms, great place for stickers. Yeah.

I actually love people who get... This whole show, by the way, it's just a list of places where as adults you can play stickers. Nicholas, sticker talk. I love when you see people, people are printing out their Snapchat QR codes and putting them around. Did I use QR codes right? Yeah, you did. Okay. You did a great job with that.

Thanks. Yeah, no, I see those. around and I'm like, that's great. I mean, why not add that person? I don't know if QR codes, I don't even know if the overwhelming power of Snapchat thirst can make QR codes a thing. This is my 2016. Have you ever used a QR code in your life? Oh my God, no. I'm everywhere. I don't know. I don't know what happens. I have definitely added people on Snapchat by snapping their ghost. Yeah, I've done that. There's something about, yes. You have to, that's like a, brand of There's something about the fact that it's a ghost that makes you forget that you're scanning a QR code.

It's like an ingenious bit of hiding like the nerdiness. Except for it being a giant QR code in the middle of the ghost. But it's funny and cute and you're a GIF inside of it. That's true. I haven't done that yet. Maybe I should do that. So we should talk about a few things. Yeah.

We've had a big week. Star Wars is coming out next week. That's true. People are already in line, of course. Isn't it? Yes, in L.A. 17th. Never heard of it.

A week from today. This is why we made you move to Austin. Thank you. A week from today, nobody will be watching the Vergecast because they will be seeing the Force of Wages. No, they won't because there won't be any tickets and they won't have them. I'm actually just going to sit here and narrating a leaked script. It's weird. I've already cast Deidorus Kylo Ren.

He wasn't happy with it, but that's the part I had. We had a big week. There's big stuff coming next week. A lot of stuff happened this week, and I want to say the weirdest thing that happened this week. Do you have it on your phone, Chris? Oh. Well, Apple released this like battery case. This?

Rarely has a random bad accessory blown up our website in despair the way that this $99 piece blew up our website? It is not good. Can I tell you something? I'm going to be real honest. So this is, wait, we just tell you what it is, and then you can be real honest. So if you didn't see it in the world for some reason, if you didn't run away from Donald Trump coverage into the waiting arms of our battery case coverage. Apple released a $99 battery case for the iPhone 6, and I guess 6S.

Not this plus, just the 6th. It is the smallest battery case on the market. It's 18, what, 1,800, 87 million-power, I think is the right number. The Mofi Juiceback Air is like 2,500, so it doesn't even charge the battery all the way. And it has what Lauren Good referred to in her review as a badunkabumpabump. It's adorable. It's a good word. And it's just really weird. Yeah, I mean, I tweeted that if you want to make your phone look like it's pregnant with an iPhone 4, like this is the way to go.

Or an iPod. The bump is, it is exactly the size of a fifth generation iPod. Yeah. So, like, if you imagine Apple's a regular case and then there's, like, an iPod, like, glued on the back. That's what it looks like. What are you going to say, Chris? I thought I wanted it, maybe. Because I'm, this is before I even read anything about it.

I was like, it kind of looks slim, I guess. And I was kind of like convincing myself that like, well, it doesn't look as bad as like my dad's charger. You know, like what a doofist for having his phone in a different charger. But then you handed it to me right now. And what's really, it's really does not feel good. Like. Well, that's how the silicon. You mean the bump?

Yeah, well, no, but my half, because you have the bump, right? So then my hand, my fingers, my pinky goes in under the bump. which lifts it, and then it's like counterweighted. And every time I, like, want to, like, lift it to press the bottom, I feel like I'm going to, like, drop it out of the top of my hand. Like, it feels designed, like, a bad seesaw. Well, like, I'm going to drop every time I want to use. There's this, like, a joke.

I need to take it out. People, like, make fun of tech criticism because, like, we have this, like, stock line that we use in reviews. We say, oh, it feels really good in the hand. What do you mean? Well, now we actually have, like, we know what that means, because we have felt the Apple battery case. We know what feels terrible.

in the hand, and it's given us a new sort of frame of reference. So they released this thing. Nicola, have you seen this thing in person? You see a picture of it? I haven't seen it in person. I've seen pictures. Will you hand it to our friend? I'm always very curious to see what Nicola thinks of these objects. So they put out this thing.

The internet goes nuts. Lauren writes her view. She's like, why would you do this? It has a lightning adapter on the bottom, so you don't need a new cable. The LED is on the inside of the case, which is amazing. This is how I lost my mind. Because this is the detail that you just sort of never see Apple getting wrong, right? So there's an LED indicator that tells you, I believe, when it is charged, like, when it's charging. When it's charging.

And maybe it turns green when it's fully charged, I think. So you have to remove the phone from the case. But you can see it on the phone. Okay. But still, why would you hide it? Like, why would you build an indicator that is hidden 90% of the time? Because you can see it on the phone. Okay. But why even build it anyway then? Yeah. Because maybe sometimes you charge, am I the only one that kind of understands this? I literally don't. Please explain. So, okay, so most of the time you'll have it on your phone, and you'll just plug it in, and the phone on the screen of the phone

will tell you if it's, like, just as your phone currently does not have an indicator light. Sure. You just, like, push the button. You're like, oh, it's charging, and you, like, walk away and, like, live your life. Now you push the button and it shows you the case and the phone is charging.

Right. But if your phone's not in the case, the light is displayed to you. But why not have it on the outside? Why? Because you don't need it. Because it's duplicative. Well, except that,

this way you would be able to tell when your phone was fully charged without having to turn on the screen. Yeah, that feels like an overthinking. That's one of those things that's like, we got so much. This thing to me, I just keep imagining Johnny App being like,

we've designed it so much, we didn't design it at all. And he's like, smokes a perfect bond. Like, he's like, on a perfect Swiss couch. I, and he's like, what if, what if we design nothing? If I've ever wanted to see Johnny Ive in his white room,

tell me why Apple did something, it was for this product. Like, give me it, Tell me a story, Johnny. Help me understand what this thing is. He's like, come here, Sally. Sally Hive. Sally Hive.

Come here. She's actually just like a dust that like blows in. He's like, have you reinvented steel again? That was your first test, Sally. I think what I'm really learning here is none of us do a good Johnny. All right, Nicol, what do you think of this thing? Okay, unpopular and career smashing opinion. I don't hate it that much.

No, I think it's fine. I think some people really like it. It doesn't. Only because, okay, only because I can't think of how I would do this better. Have you ever seen a Mofi in your life? Yeah, but like, I mean, so that already exists. Why would they make the same thing that exists? Also, Mofi's are a patented hell and back, which I wrote about.

Yeah, so like, it wouldn't make any sense for them to like. Much consternation ensued. Imagine that Verge article. If they copied a Mofi. Yeah. So Tim Cook. Apple copies. Can I do a little medium.

criticism. Let's do it. I've noticed our friends at Mashable often get defensive Apple quotes printed in Mashable. It seems to be a go-to move for them. That is all I will say. Anyway, so Tim Cook was in Nashville yesterday talking about the battery case. Like, just imagine you are the CEO

of the richest company in the world and you release basically an existing product with like a battery glued to the back of it. And like the internet blows up so badly that you are forced to like issue a quote about it on the same day that you're like promoting girls learning to code. Like you have to take a break from like the day of code to say,

as you probably know from being a user of this, one of the real insights was, have you ever used other cases in trying to get them on? That's the quote. If you make this solid all the way across, said Cook, indicating the spots where Apple's case embedded battery stops and you just have the soft flora amostomers casing,

in order to get it on, you'd find it very difficult to get on and off. So the guys had a great insight to put in a bend without making it a smart case. I have no idea what those words. I've read this quote a thousand times and all I can say is I think he's saying it's nicer because it's bendy.

It's nicer because it's bendy. And that's it. That's easy. Is it easier to get on and all? So I had this conversation with Walt and I had this conversation with Dieter. It's fine. It's just fine. And that's the thing. It's just fine.

Which is much less than fine, period. You think it's less than fine. I think it's less than fine. I mean, I'm sure some people might listen to this and be like, ah, these guys are just, you know, taking any opportunity to rag on Apple or whatever. But the thing is, like, Apple makes, like, a lot of really nice cases, right? I mean, like, you know, the smart covers for the iPods are great. I use a leather case every day.

The normal case that they use, like, I have one on my phone. Like, it's fantastic and it's, you know, it's very simple. It's very elegant. Like, there's no extraneous details, right? Like, so this thing comes out and, like, it feels like neither like a bold statement nor an elegant solution. It's just sort of like halfway in the middle. So isn't the elegant solution like making the iPhone a battery battery battery? We're putting a bigger battery in the iPhone. Ding, ding, ding. And what are they doing instead? Making it, you know, like six microns

are thick in the next iteration of the iPhone apparently. Yeah, it's a piece of paper. It is. You just wrap it around your face. I'm making a phone call. No, I think that's like, do you guys remember when the iPad too came out like the big cool thing was the case? because they're like, we engineered the thing together. It's got magnets in it. You clip it on now it's great. This is so obviously not engineered together. It has all of the same problems as every other battery case.

Like it adds an inch of thickness to the bottom of the phone. You can't, if you have beats headphones, the plug doesn't fit in the thing. Like, it has... Think about that, though. Like, these are the details that we rely on Apple to solve for us, right? Like, this is why we have so much goodwill toward Apple generally. is because they think of these things and they design around them

and they make our lives simpler. This is not that thing. Right. And it's also, you can, man, I'm in a particular moment of like Apple Media criticism because you can, this case, I think,

drove the wedge into what publications are like totally buying it and what publications are like. So any publication that describes it as the audio porthole, which is a hole for the sound from the secret come through.

Yeah. They covered up the speaker so they had to drill a hole in the bottom. I mean, but every other, that's the audio porthole. It's acoustically designed for maximum sound reflectivity. There's also a passively coupled antenna on the back, which is just an antenna that is on the back. It's like passively coupled means so it touches the phone. I thought passively uncoupled is when you got dumped. That's like Gwen of Paltrow.

I hear you over there. Yeah, goopin. Are you guys goop buddies? We're huge goop. That's probably the pen diagram of us, one of the items inside of there. Do fashion people use battery cases? Oh my God, yes.

There's two groups of people in my life that I found, but it's so fashion people, like, everybody. Because they're always, like, in weird places, right? Yeah, because you're never some one place with a plug. Always running around. What do you see the most of? Mofi. Right.

And, like, you can understand why Apple would want to be in this market, right? It seems like Mofi has a nice little racket for themselves. designing these cases. He has its business. And I was like, what if you don't have your business anymore? Yeah. Yeah. So it's like, it totally makes sense. You just, it's like exactly what you said.

Like, if they had only, like, engineered them together, this would have been such a beautiful thing. Do you think it's the month of December? Christmas is coming. I do think it's the month of December. They were like, we need to get this out. So at a certain point when they would have maybe done all those checks, like, make sure beats headphones work with an Apple product.

they were like, yeah, we could do that, but like, we're already coming in hot. We're just going to do this. Johnny, stop designing. He's like, I don't know. He's like, I never even started. He drew the top of the rectangle and he just like drew question marks. That is like the next step is for Apple to come out and admit that this was a hack week project. And it just got way out of hand.

And they're just like, we don't know what happened. They started building it. The supply chain just took over at some point. The supply chain is so efficient. It just can't not make products from Johnny Designs. That'd be incredible. He sent the file. He emailed it to the wrong address.

And he produced 10 million. Whatever we do, don't make this. The wrong dropbox, Walter. This is the thing we don't want to do. He's like, oh, shit, I started my Gmail. 10 million of them have been produced in Shenzhen. I have to tell you,

wacky mix-up, still the best explanation for the Apple Battery case of record. So then we wrote, so we wrote this. And then we, Nick Statt did a great job of essentially taking a tweet that had gone viral yesterday with a picture of the battery case, a picture of the Apple pencil in artfully charging and plugged into the iPad, a picture of the new, the mouse with the charges on the bottom. There's another one. There's like a handful of like

total design flubs from Apple or just like really weird choices. Yeah. And it's like what happened to Apple this year, and I just don't know the answer. Like, the pencil, I, there's the only one that I think is, like, kind of defensible. Because it charges in 30 seconds, and it lasts for like four hours or something. So, like, that makes sense. Just like, here are the available things that you can charge this with. Like, you don't have to plug it in, you just plug it in, you wait, take a breath, and it's fine. Everything else is like, why? Like, why build a mouse that you can't use while it's charging? It's like, you know, unlike so many other Apple products, they were the ones where you feel like at some point during the design process a couple people are like yeah I guess this is fine I guess like let's just move on

you know like it just they didn't get to that like fit and finish stage well you know there's like there's a there's a theory that like some Apple hate which is like Steve Jobs is the editor right and so like ideas ideas he is and he'd be like my taste is supreme and like I'll make these decisions and now I don't know who the editor is like presumably it's Johnny Ive but like he could just be working on the very like he's always always also in charge of the stores and the architecture of the new campus. Yeah.

Like his portfolio was big. He's a fan... Do you think he looked at this? Johnny Ive is a fantastic editor, but I think it is open question whether he can't just edit everything. You know, one of the things that struck me about this was I remember the days not all that long ago

when Apple would brag about how all of their products like fit on table. Do you remember this? Because they really only made like six basic things. But now they're just kind of starting to pile stuff on top of them. And, you know, they've always prided themselves on saying no to so many things. this really does seem like something

where they could have said no to it, right? Like this is probably not a billion dollar business for them. Maybe it is, like at the outside. But they could have not done this and just focused on a lot of other things. Wait, so here's my, here's the really harsh question. And this is probably not true. So I'm looking dead in the camera

and the listener in the car, I'm speaking directly into your ears. Probably not true. Do you think that they were just worried that their holiday was going to be down, so they put out something to goose their holiday revenue. I heard the best theory about it.

You want to hear what it is? The reason that they released it is because it's an accessory and it will go into the same line item on their financial reporting as the Apple Watch. So it will confuse people about how many Apple Watches are being sold.

Like, it's a misdirection play because they could sell 100,000 units and it'll create certain amount of revenue and people have no idea how many watches they sold. That was the most convincing insane theory that I heard.

I mean, that is insane. Like, that is like, like, cuckoo crazy. Yeah, but it's fun. I will say Apple Watch down to 249 at Best Buy. They cut $100 off of it. We're six months away from them just, like, giving them away when you open a checking account, you know? Well, the rumors are that the new ones...

When you're at a baseball stadium, they're like, if you sign up for a credit card, you get one of these. Or it's Apple Watch tonight at the Rockies game. Incredible. If, like, the Warriors are like, did you know that you can pay for everything here with an Apple Watch? watch, well, now I do because you have one. Look under your seats.

People don't even bother. That's a lot of worse. Do you see Apple Watches in Austin, Texas? Wherever the hell it is that you live? Two of my friends in wherever the hell Texas bought Apple Watches. One works, he's a gym at a restaurant, and the other works also in publishing. Both of them return them within five days. And they were like hype.

Like I was like, I don't know. I think you might want to reconsider. and they were like up that creek and it ended up being shit creek. Yeah. Yeah, I mean, I, every person I ask, I dare you tell you the one excuse I've been given to like why you should buy an Apple Watch. This is absurd. This is from a VC person in Austin. And he's like, I don't really like him for me.

I like him from my wife because then I know that she hears me whenever I call. Okay, so they're having some weird issues in their relationship. Yep, and it was like, well, his defense, because I was like, that sounds awful. And he was like, no, I think you could get them. I think like they'll sell for people who don't have phones on them. So like, my wife keeps her phone in her purse and my kids don't carry their phones. They're in their backpacks. And if I strap an Apple Watch to them and I text them, I know they see it.

Yeah, you can also implant a chip directly into your wife's body to know where she's at all times. It was, it wasn't the best lunch. Are you still have any interest in this thing? Okay. I had lunch just now next to someone who had one. And I had the first tug of my heart where I was like, I want that thing for the first time. Really? What happened?

He had the weather? And I know, I know. And I like saw his little homescreen with like all the items that he selected to have on it. And I was like, oh, yeah, it would be cool to know the weather when I'm getting ready instead of like looking at my. phone. I just scream at Alexa. You gotta get an echo. I really want one of those. Do you know one of my favorite inside jokes with myself right now? I don't have one of these in my house. Maybe I already referenced this. Alexa, play Freakow. One of my favorite future songs right now. Wait, you just yell at not exist. That's a joke that I make with myself at home, yes.

I'm setting up a Kickstarter to get you an Alexa or get you an Echo. That's it. That's the whole Kickstarter. Is we buy $150 Echo from Nicola? Yeah, please. I bet we could make that happen. What would you rather get for Christmas? An Echo or an Apple Watch? Probably this Echo. Chris? I mean, I have an Echo and I like it a lot.

Casey. What was the question? Echo or Apple Watch? Echo, but I suspect that I wouldn't use it very much. You'd be surprised. What else can you ask it? I don't like voice interfaces. I like it for...

You can get it to play that one future song. Okay, I hate on the commercial when it's like, he's like asking her a bunch of, to do a bunch of things. And it's like, play my road trip playlist. And it's like, why are, you're in your kitchen? Why do you want to listen to your road trip playlist? I hate that. Every time it plays, it makes me so angry.

Hmm. You're like, play future damage. The script does. Not that he, not the object. The script does. So when the Echo commercials on, my Echo starts doing all kinds of shit, which is hilarious. No, really? Yeah.

It's like when the Xbox Connect commercials would like turn off Connects. Yeah. And it's like, uh, great. Yeah, my Echo's like, it's like it's fucking possessed. It's like bad. Like, hey Siri. Somewhere in cars across America, Siri has lit up. I'm like many people's friends.

Hey, Siri, tell the time. It's like, you can just troll people. If, like, you, if you speak into a microphone and you know your voice will go out over speakers, hey, Siri, tell me a joke. Then, like, somewhere in someone's car right now, fucking Siri's doing it. You've just caused, like, 11 car accidents across America. No, I haven't.

I've just made Siri tell people delightful jokes across America. I hate Siri. I am a robot. Keep your eyes on the road. No, so, um, you can tell it, obviously you can tell it to add for the weather. The music stuff is really weird because it only connects to Amazon's weird music service. So you have to have Prime and then you're like, Amazon, play me some morning music.

And it's like, EDM hits from 2008. And it's like, that's what you got. It also works as a Bluetooth speaker. It does work as a Bluetooth speaker. But yeah, it's like then you have that already. It's like no fun. You can ask for the news, which is fine. you can

measurements you can ask over measurements we set kitchen time like basically it has replaced Siri in my day to day like if I'm at home the fact that you can just like yell for information

it'll just like do it for you which is cool no I mean I like mine I also like my thermostat and then Chris Ziegler has like a house full of like hulites

including I'm just getting into it for Chris throw a son of a bus Apparently he has like light strips under his bed So he can just like yell scenes And then like the lights in his house Including lights under his bed will like turn purple

If I did that right now with my phone It would change all the lights in our home Yeah I have an app My hue app does it So I can change all the lights in my living room And really freak my wife out right now This is like every day I just slowly turn the heat up in my parents' house

I feel like the theme of this episode is like how to mess with wives With technology Yeah I mean that's Which isn't 2016 goals like that No not Not in there. No. But my wife is screwed.

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They love those calls. They still won't ask you any questions, though. They'll just, whatever, McWaldon. They'll be nice to hear, sir. Look, anyhow, McWaldon's underwear, socks, and shirts, so you look good. They perform well, which is an interesting thing to say about underwear. I've never thought about my underwear's performance.

But if you buy this underwear, that is an option that you have in your life. It's good for working out. You can go to work in it. You can go on dates. You can throw it at your wife and say, I harassed you with technology. You can put stickers on it? You can put stickers on your underwear. Do you want to know some socks trivia?

Yeah. Sox was the name of Bill Clinton's cat. You can go to macwellden.com and get 20% off of these socks and underwear. Using our promo code, which, as you may have guessed, is Verge. That was it. That was the underwear ad that I read today. And a presidential pet fact. Don't get those all the time.

What is, what is, Obama has two dogs. What are the names? Bo and other dog. The beef sock is that too dog. All right. So we gotta talk about, there's another big thing to talk about. Nicola has it.

I don't even know what this is. I was told not to touch it till now. Yeah, because I want you to, to play with it. So Dieter and Walt both reviewed the Google Pixel C. That is an Android tablet with an optional keyboard cover. And I would like you to figure out

how to attach the keyboard cover without any instructions. I'm going to point out that what I have not given you is the sheet of paper with a double-sided instructions for attaching the keyboard to that object. You have to talk out loud because it's a radio show, so describe what you're doing. I pulled two pieces of metal and screens away from each other.

There's a slot. I feel that this one piece should go in this slot. So I'm pressing and it's not going. There's no way to slide it from the side. I wonder if something bends. No. This is great. We should do this every week.

Oh. No. Trying to turn it around. Okay, let me tell you that magnets are involved, but not in the orientation that you might expect. Okay, how else? Wait. Oh, it's flat on the ground. It's flat.

Does it bend up? Try bending. See what happens. Is it bending? It's never going to happen. So that is a pixel C. I think that we've just described the essential experience of the pixel. C to you.

So it's, here's, Nick, I have the biggest phone now. Okay, now pull it up. You got it, you got it.

Now pull the screen towards you. It's a hinge. You got it. Oh, God. Oh, God. That doesn't feel right. It's nice and little though.

What a great size. Yeah. So that's Pixel C. Here's what happened. Google, they're bringing the Chrome team, the Chrome OS team and the Android team together.

That is very political. And we've talked to on the show before. When they announced it, everyone thought they were just folding ChromeOS and Android, but they claim it or not. It's much weirder and more complicated. Yeah.

There's some deep weirdness in there. What they are claiming publicly is like, why do we need two sets of Bluetooth engineers? We'll just have one. And then at the end, it's going to like, why do we need two operating systems? Like, it's clear where that slippery slope lies. Anyhow, so I did that.

Oh, I just turned on somebody's echo. Alexa, set a timer for 30 minutes. Then play free coat. 30 minutes. Alexa, set a timer for 27 minutes. The worst idea you've ever had. So much fun. Yeah, I'll get our kicks.

What? Yeah. Hey, Siri, what's the weather in Milwaukee, Wisconsin? All right. Anyway. So they brought the teams together. The Chromebook Pixel, which is a beautiful product that I love very much, actually. The team that built that tablet that runs.

Android. So that's a weird mashup. Those teams were previously separate. Now they're together. The Chromebook team is building hardware for Android. Google traditionally has never built its own Android hardware, except for the Nexus Q, which was garbage and they didn't release. So there you go. But they didn't change Android at all to run on a tablet. So they built this like Surface Pro looking thing, this like iPad pro looking thing. But literally none of the software was changed. So it's just a gigantic phone basically. And like Android tablets, how long have Android tablets It's like 2011

when the Motorola Zoom came out and they still suck. Do you have an Android tablet? Do you know any human being with an Android tablet? I mean, like there was a point where the Nexus 7s did get into just like giveaway mode where you would just

like walk into a bar and somebody would hand you one, at least in San Francisco. I'd buy an Apple Watch. Yeah, exactly. So I do have a Nexus 7 that I probably last turned on 18 months ago. I have two Nexus.

I have the original one with like the weird leather back. Yeah. Like it feels like racing gloves. and it's like, okay, that's a choice that you made. And then I have the cooler, a new one, which David Pierce gave like a 10 out of 10 once it was the best tablet, and we ran him out of town.

Good riddance. We didn't do that to him. We ran him out of town. What do you think of that thing, Nicola? I'm still setting it up, but I don't want to. I just want to play with it. What are you setting up? It wants me to log in to everything.

And give you it social security. It actually said, this can take a while. And it's proving true. You're wreaking havoc. A lot of Alexis and a lot of series have gone off of shit. That's awesome. That's really funny. Imagine if you use your powers for good, Milai.

Hey, Siri, remind me to donate to charity. Alexa, put donation to Red Cross on my shopping list. You've really done it. The stupidest thing we've ever used to show. What would you do? What would you have the Alexis of the world there? You know, I think to the extent that they continue to open it up as a development platform, it gets way more interesting, right?

If I can play Spotify using it, it's way more interesting to it right away, right? But Amazon is the most locked in of the services. Well, I don't know. I mean, like, what I'm hearing from them is that they're actually pretty excited about turning it into a real development platform. And they should because they have an opportunity to move much faster than Apple can. I mean, we've seen how fast Apple is open up Siri, right? just like basically like what one new partner a year it sort of feels like um so there's a lot more

that they can do on that little speaker and uh and i think they should because like that's all blue ocean for them right now i've never seen that is the first amazon hardware product where they enter the market first with a very obvious riff on a product that everybody else has and they like have blown it away like it's it's i like it's what would you do the thing i mean Spotify is like is the big thing. I feel like it's the service that everybody uses at this point for music. I mean, whatever.

I'm sure there's a few title users out there and whoever figured out how it is their Apple music, I guess they use it. Yeah, but the title user's weeping in there, they're like Cameron exclusives. Oh, my $10,000 headsets will never work with Amazon Echo. Also like and forgive me, but like they don't have like

open table integration, right? Or like, you know, Domino's integration. Because if you could just like yell at your speaker like, hey, Get me a large pepperoni to my house. Like the on-demand pizza thing is always used as an example by tech people. Like, I think Ziegler was trying to tell me that like the killer app of Apple TV is seamless. And which I know, I don't buy that at all because if you have people over, you're not going to stop everyone watching television and be like,

oh, let's look at a menu for 15 minutes while people debate what they're going to order. But like the on-demand pizza thing, I remember with like Windows 95. It was like you can order dominoes from your computer through your modem. And when you do it, it ejects the CD drive and you can put your Pepsi on it. Like, they were like that type of... It just feels like the thing that's always thrown around, but I don't know who actually uses it. I mean, the reason is because that the home delivery pizza market is insanely big. Like, it's more than $10 billion annually.

People spent in America on getting pizza delivered to their houses. It sounds like you're in the middle of VC pitch and you're about to tell me how you're to disrupt home. Neil, I'm about to change your life right now, and here's why. No, I got nothing. Do you ever read that? There's like a fake fee. It was like an old secret.

Do you remember secret? The app that was around only just a year ago. They grew up so fast and then they die so fast. There's an obituration, right? There was like my favorite secret ever was like the cash you market in America is worth a billion dollars. Pistachios are like underserved. I have just raised $10 million. to bring it was like hilarious like that's the structure of every pitch is like the size of the

anyway well that's all i mean vc's one of the best let's quit and start a pizza company unless what would you name your pizza company phuma pies that's about perfect too fast i mean the best the best the best app name for pizza was already taken it's push for pizza and the app was just a button that you pushed and pizza came to you let's talk about the pixel see you're right you're right push for pixels push for pixels so wait now you've been playing with what do you think yeah i i i dig this little thing, okay, it turned off. But we're coming back.

Yeah. We're on. I dig it. It's fun. It's cute. It's a great size. Yeah. It's weird that the keyboard doesn't light up. I guess we can't get everything yet that we want. I mean, so Dieter and Walt like both pretty much hated it. Really? Yeah, because the software is not optimized that screen.

It's just a gigantic phone. Which is like Dieter's, if you read Deeter's review, Wals Review is like, great. It's like a Watt Review is like, Deeter's review is like, theater has been desperately trying to live in the future and not have a laptop and had this like touch keyboard hybrid experience. Oh really? So he like did a surface for a while and then he tried the iPad Pro for a minute and he was all over that.

And he's just like we're bloated. Like literally the first line of the series was like, we're botching it. Like these are all botched products. Like nobody really understands what to do with a touchscreen and a keyboard at the same time. Do you think after Windows 8, everybody's like, yeah, we're not going to make those mistakes?

And they came in like, ah. Damn it. Well, it's just like the, it's weird because Apple has its two big platforms. And Apple, actually, you know, we were talking about earlier, like they've made so many big bets this year that it kind of feels like everything's half done. Like Apple put out the watch this year. They haven't like really said a word about it. They put out watchOS too.

Great. Nothing happened, right? They put out a TV product that runs a new OS called TVOS. They put out 3D touch on the iPhone. and the list goes on and on and on, and they're waiting for any of them to hit. And then they're like, oh, by the way, we added a pen and a keyboard to the, like,

and they're waiting for it to hit. Like, it's just this endless series of big, big bets from Apple. And it's like, but none of them really answer the question of like, how does the iPad replace your laptop? And then with Microsoft, it's the same thing. Like, Tom just reviewed the Dell XPS 13, and he's like, you know, I don't need all this other stuff. I just want a great laptop, and here it is.

I love it. And then there's this thing. and it's like Google could build the next the third platform like they're the only company they can do it right you've got Apple and it's two big platforms iOS and OS 10 you've got Microsoft and Windows and they've got a different bet to spread it all across and then you've got Google doing that

thing and it's like but you didn't do any work like you just like put it on a different screen size and like literally stuck a keyboard on the bottom with a cool hinge and like is that this is the future and it's like not a cool hinge that nobody knows how to instinctually use She figured it out Yeah with some coaxing from literally experts

I don't think everyone at home is like All right where are those three guys It comes to the double-sided sheet of paper With like I would say very confusing pictograms Are there any other kind Do you ever see a pictogram Like I know exactly what the heck I'm gonna do right now? You open up like the IKEA box

You're like oh this is so easy to understand These arrows and lines completely make a bookshelf. I don't even know why they bother including these pictures. It's so intuitive. What was the last piece of IKEA that you built? I think it was like a futon in 2006. Oh, I had a bookshelf in college, and it broke immediately, and then I decided to never do that to myself again.

We had a very, when I saw it an office in this office, which was like a long time ago now, with like a blue couch from IKEA, and it was so, I don't know, furniture offices gets abused, and it literally just like snapped in the middle. So now they're like shopping for new couches upstairs and they keep showing me these like various like West Elm, CB2,

like we just need to buy a lot of couches. And I was like, they're all going to break. They're not going to last a minute. All we can have are these like orange sponge couches that literally cannot be destroyed because I'm so worried that everything will break. It's bad. Bad news.

Did you know that with just a few lines of code you can send text messages that include alerts, reminders, order updates, SMS marketing campaigns and instructions for app downloads. It's true, Casey Newton. With Telecommunication System Incs Cloud Messaging Center, developers, includes all of us, you can easily integrate text messaging into your mobile applications, backend, or website. As a company, TCS, I like to call it TCS, handles up to 670 billion messages per year. That's an average of 1.8 billion messages per day.

Again, just a few lines of codes. their CMC Rest API, Casey, allows you to send messages for alerts, reminders, and order updates. You can also use it to send SMS marketing campaigns to drive app downloads or increase user engagement by just war texting everyone in your email database. Don't do that. The Rest API allows you to perform messaging collections

such as sending, receiving, scheduling messages, securing delivery seats, and creating groups and contacts. TCS offers intercarrier messaging across all U.S. wireless carriers because it's 2016, for God's sake. And the pricing is flexible based on the quantity of messages you need. Featuring Pays, you go monthly plans. So I want you to consider what a next level URL is for a service like this. And I want you to know in your heart that it's cloud messaging.gourou.

And I want you to go to cloud messaging.org. Go in right now. And sign up for the cloud messaging center rest API. Even if you don't need a cloud messaging center rest API, I want you to type in the words cloud messaging. dot guru into your browser of choice, just to imagine a future in which dot guru is a URL that exists. And then I want you to integrate a messaging solution

into whatever the hell it is that you're doing. Alexa, remind me to go to cloud messaging.gouru. The end. A story by Nealai. A demanding, weird story by Nealepetel. All right, we've got 15 minutes left. We have a request to talk about Hamilton. I was going to do lightning round,

but we can talk about Hamilton. Light me around, Hamilton. Hot or not, hot. Very hot. You've seen it? What's this? Hamilton? Wow.

Not what I was. Nicola. Whoa, whoa, whoa. What did I do wrong? It is, you're not going to think it sounds good when I explain who it is. I'm going to say that out loud. It sounds terrible. It is a rap musical about the life of Alexander Hamilton and the founding fathers.

No, this sounds like everything for me. Why don't I know about this? I don't know. Unfortunately, it is the hottest ticket in town. Sold out basically indefinite. Oh, it's live. For months. For months it's sold out.

It's a Broadway show. Oh. Thousands of dollars. I was picturing more like something like Empire exclusively on. You know what I mean? No, it's just in a line. She's going tonight. It is.

Oh, cool. That's why this is a very relevant subject is I decided to spend one night of my time in New York doing something just for me. And that's going to see this. show, which is going to win every Tony. They're going to make up new Tonys, just to have extra Tonies to award to Hamilton. But it's this really cool thing. It was written by Lynn Manuel Miranda, who is the child of immigrants. And he was really drawn to the story because Alexander Hamilton himself was an immigrant.

And sort of used the power of writing to help found the nation. And he cast mostly actors of color, like in the roles of the founding fathers. and so the way he describes it, it's the story of America yesterday told by the story of America today. He said it more eloquently. But anyway, it's dope as heck, and I got into it because of our own Caitlin Tiffany

who tweeted many, many times about it, led me to the cast album, and I've been obsessed with it for a month. I've got to say, Caitlin Tiffany, one of the best Twitter accounts of The Verge. Oh, yeah, far none. Also, Casey and Caitlin, I believe only interact on Twitter.

That is true. You know, she's upstairs. She's probably listening this right now. I would love to say hi to Caitlin before I leave. I don't think that you should. Okay. Deals off, Caitlin. Deals off.

Okay, lighting around. GoPro is making a drone called the karma, a drone by GoPro, called the karma. I mean, it seems like an effort to make it not sound like that thing that's going to watch you and you don't want to be watched. Terrible name. Got into it. I think the fact that GoPro, like, DGI makes drones and now they have to make cameras because everyone's six gopros on the drones. and now GoPro is like, we have to make drones.

It's very interesting. CES has officially banned hoverboards. Aw, I would love to have a hoverboard there. I have this dream of a video in which someone on our staff, Casey Newton, is riding a hoverboard slowly down a long hallway, and it's like a wide shot, and there's a cop on a segue, just like chasing Casey on the hoverboard. In slow motion.

In slow motion. Yeah. I'll make that happen. Look, if that's what it takes to get me kick out of CES, I'll do anything. I'm like clinger on MASH. Did you just take a match reference? I did. Wow.

Listen, the millennials grew up with reruns of mash. Believe me on this one. Alexa, add mash to my prime viewing library. Order me a Toledo Mudhins baseball cap. Oh my God. Yahoo is spinning off Yahoo because the core business of Yahoo is worth nothing. I have to say. Can you walk us through this one?

Yeah, a bit. It is a story about taxes, which makes it horrible. So most of the value of Yahoo is in the same. large stake they own in Alibaba. So they wanted to spend that stake off into its own company. And then they ran into tax issues. They were going to take this huge tax hit. And so they had this responsibility to find a cheaper way to do it. And so now they're sort of doing the opposite, where they're going to spin out the much cheaper core of Yahoo into its own company. But what's sad about it is that the story of Yahoo is now a story about financial engineering. Like it's no longer

a product story, right? It's no longer about the like people there who are trying to make cool things. It's just like, how will this asset be disposed? So in a lot of ways, this week felt like the end of Yahoo to me. Yeah. So I worked for AOL for a long time, as you may know, and the rumors are always at AOL and Yahoo would merge. And now Verizon, which has bought AOL to become some sort of Comcast like media company, they're basically not even hiding it.

They're like, yeah, you know, if you put that out there, we'll snap it up. Throw a couple bucks your way, take it off your hands. Hey, Marissa. Can I call you Rissa? Does anybody call her Rissa? Literally no one does. Welcome to your new hell, Rissa. We should actually say congratulations to Rika

because she gave birth to twins today. So congratulations to Marissa Meyer. Hey, very much congratulations. That's nice. Sorry about the Yahoo thing. That's a bummer. Yeah. So Verizon's out there, like, we're going to just,

if you, I mean, if eat when served, you know. And when I think about the media that the teens are going to love, that Verizon Yahoo tie up could really move needle for us. But it was just funny that Yahoo and AOL might finally merge because Verizon were just like, you know what? We just, we have the money. God only knows what else we're going to do with it. Make good phones. Faster networks? No, no, no, no, no, no. Go 90. Sorry.

Go 90 is just a terrible product. Okay. Do you have any Yahoo thoughts lining around? Yep. Mailbox is dead. Yeah, very sad. The client that I used on my phone, basically from the date came out until a month before it shut down, drop, could not figure out a way to turn it into, you know, a moneymaker and gave up on it. It's terrible. Yeah. Is there any future for these apps? Which kind of apps?

I don't know. Just apps in general? I'll tell you. Productivity ads. Apps is the ever going to catch on? Here's a 2016 story for you is that the app development is a terrible business for all but a very select number of companies and I think a lot

of the opportunity has already been snapped up, right? Like if you're not in on-demand services or, or messaging or a couple of other categories. There's just not a lot of ways to make money. Games is the other big one. There's not a lot of ways to make money because most people don't download apps

and the people who do aren't paying for them. So good luck making a business out of that. Are we going to have a return to people inventing things? No, you're going to see people continue to make stuff and give it away for free. That's just like the nature of the internet. No more like non-internet things. Like a new light bulb.

Something better than the light bulb. The toilet, but better. We will see a return to the land and people will become farmers. We will return to an agrarian society of craftsmen and tradesmen and women. And those who refuse, they must wander. All right. Hold on, I've got another one here. We've got another one here.

I do. Oh, your Xbox story. Lightning right. Yeah, yeah. Quint wrote a fucking killer-ass feature. I haven't even had a chance to read it yet. And it's all about how Microsoft is going to try to revive the Xbox One. Yeah.

What's going on with that? I mean, you should read it, by the way. It's about that, but I think the real turn is about how they're going to use Windows a lot more, because it turns out, no, I think this is actually a pretty bright idea. Because look at sales of video game consoles, right? Yep. PlayStation 2, or I think it was 3 sold. No, no, no, sorry. I want to make sure I get it all right.

PS2 sold 120 million. PS3, a little over 80 million. And there has been a general sense of the video game console turning downwards. On top of that, like, as video game becomes something that you can just stream, why even bother it spending a ton of money on this device? And it's also competing with things like your smartphone, right? So the idea of a console market is messier than it's ever been. On the flip side, Windows 10, it's on, what, 100 million computers right now?

Already, they say they want it to be at a billion in three, four years. that's a hell of a lot more people. So I think it's kind of bright in that, like, I don't know if they'll ever catch up with Sony and the PlayStation 4, but if their real idea is, okay, let's keep humoring this idea that we're console makers.

For one more generation, even though consoles may disappear after this one, we can kind of start redirecting people towards what the real future is, which is an app that delivers you all of your video games and streams them or uses cloud computing or just, you know, is the platform on which second and first party software appears.

So I think, this is me like analyzing my own piece at this point. This is not specifically based off quotes that they've said. But I do get the sense that all of this interest that they have in Windows is bringing almost everything to Windows. When I asked them about Halo, the new Halo's coming to Windows, they wouldn't give me a flat no. Like the fact that people are no longer, it used to be like, No, of course we're not doing that.

Xbox, Xbox, Xbox. And now it's like, well, you know, we do things when it's the right time to do things is basically the read of the situation there. And I think that is probably the healthiest play, is knowing when to kind of, it's not really cutting your losses. I think Xbox One is still going to be very important for them. But I think like recognizing, oh, wait, we have this giant platform already. Yeah.

Why would we not use that platform? Are they going to let app to Opper's just like, right, game? Well, so that's the whole, their big plan is, and I want to see this actually done, but they describe developing for Windows 10 as this like literally turnkey for all Windows 10 platforms. And Xbox 1 is a Windows 10 platform as this fall. So they describe it like, oh, well, you'll develop for any of these and it'll just work. Yeah, but that's not that. That's not real life.

This is like the app thing. It's like that's not actually. The point of point is discovery, payment, distribution. Sure, but I think then the idea is like if you already have the Xbox brand and they already have an Xbox app on Windows and they've already with that brought over your friends list, you can chat over that. And that's like step one. They already have essentially the social media platform, right?

They have the part of it that keeps people locked in, the sticky part. And then they're competing with something. like Steam, which is where you buy your games, and they can say, well, you already have your friends here. We are much better at party chat, just providing that kind of overlay for your games. I'm sure there are people who will disagree with me on that and say that Steam is flawless in every possible way. But I think they have like a legit shot at, we were talking about this yesterday, Coke and Pepsi, of being the Pepsi to Steam's Coke on Windows. In a world of lots of terrible.

And Steam still has never executed really on the Steambox concept. No. Nor had they executed on Big Picture. They're still not good. They were going to make the first party Steambox with Big Picture. And think about that, right? If Xbox wants to bring Big Picture to Windows, it's just Xbox. They can do it tomorrow if they want to.

They already have that made. So I think that is the future that we see is I think Xbox one still exist. I think it definitely has its core audience, but I think we start seeing Xbox as a brand, not as a singular piece of hardware. That's interesting. Yeah.

I might still buy the elite, though. Yeah, I mean, why not? It's still the easiest way to play video games. Video game consoles are... I have a PC and I love it. I had Griffin McElroy from Polygon over at my house last weekend, and we tried to play three games on PC and all. three didn't work.

Really? So it's like, as much as I love PCs, I still have those dumb problems. Yeah, and I've yet to see a really truly great Apple TV game. Oh, I mean, that can exist. Well, I mean, it could if it's a very specific small game. But the hard drive limit alone, I mean, there are iPhone games that you can't run on Apple TV just because... Well, they slice them and they move them, right? Like, it's a thing.

Okay. Yeah. Speaking of Apple, it's... and the Apple TV, Apple Internet TV, once again, cannot launch streaming service, can't get the deals they want, put it on hold for the 50th time. I mean, I think it's the right move, right? They've sort of talked that service up so much

that when it launches, it better feel pretty amazing, right? Like Tim Cook keeps calling this Next Generation Apple TV, the foundation for the future of television, and yet you find out it's just going to be like a different bundle of channels that you pay 40 bucks a month for, like, I don't know. I wrote this thing a long time ago about the war for television. That's like three years ago now. And I just reread it because somebody tweeted at me,

which is like wild to get your own word tweeted. You didn't remember that you wrote a thing. But there's this line that I wrote that was like the killer app for television is television. And like every Apple TV app is basically just another complicated interface in front of you watching a video. Although I will say I watched, I downloaded the CoSaire app and like took three Chinese lessons. I am terrible at speaking Chinese. and learning it by watching a lady yellow Chinese at you on your TV. Not an effective solution.

I just don't know. I do think Apple needs to do something sooner rather than later because I think what we're saying happen around that is all the contract negotiation that they're doing is benefiting companies doing the exact same negotiations. So when PlayStation View happened, they were, I think, able to do that deal because PlayStation wasn't the only person talking to them. when Amazon got this Showtime deal going and Stars,

those deals don't happen because Amazon goes to those companies. It's like, hey, we'll do this. They happen because other companies are going and there's an ecosystem for it. And if I were Apple, I'd be worried that, like, great, I did the hard work. I sent the people out there to start this process. And along the way, either those companies, in the case of like Stars and Showtime,

partnered with other people or in the case of HBO figured like wait why would I mess with you like that's like HBO I feel like is figured out in the way the NFL hasn't yet where it's like wait like what if I just take the money directly and don't worry about any of your bullshit

and then I put my thing on everyone The next big thing I doubt it will happen and Peter Kafka Recode has been reporting it and probably what happened either is that the rights for the Thursday night NFL games are up for auction soon And Apple has a bunch of money. They could certainly participate.

But Verizon has already bought the mobile rights. So Apple could buy the rights, but you wouldn't be able to watch NFL games unless you have Verizon. And that seems like distinctly not Apple. Okay, we have a couple of insights. Nicola, tell me what the biggest story in fashion was this week. On the spot? On the spot. I mean, okay.

Now I'm like, well, now I'm like blacking out. But I guess the biggest like event this week was the Victoria of Singer event. I read that there you did a great feature. Rec did a great feature on. Yes, touched by an angel on rack.com by Erica Adams. About how it's like the only mall brand that's still good and like makes money. Basically how like they don't have any competition and it's kind of insane. Like women, there is no one, there's no one competing with Victoria's Secret.

There's no one like that. It's really crazy if we're talking about marketplace voids. Yeah. It's wild. And bras. And underwear. Yeah, is it, do they ask you questions if you give it back? Mac Weldon doesn't.

That was the verge cast for this week. Touched by an angel. Touch, come on. Kill me. Here's some stuff that you can do with your time right now. You can go onto Twitter.com. Most people don't have Twitter. I've learned they have Facebook instead.

But you can go onto that website. You can sign up for an account. You can avoid the Moments tab, which will attack you. Then you can follow at Virge on Twitter. You can also follow all of us. Nicola is Nicola underscore Fumo. Chris Plant. Newly verified.

Oh, hey. Hey. Checkmark day for Nicola. Hit that follow button. You can follow Chris Plant, who is at Plant with an E. You follow me. I'm at Reckless. Casey, one of the finest Twitter feeds in all the land.

That's for you to say. At Casey Newton. You can hit us up on Snapchat. We're Real Verge. Nicola, what's your Snapchat? Nicola Fumo, all together. Don't follow Casey because it gets weird. in there.

Real true, Casey. But just follow the birds. You're good. And Instagram, we have beaten Mashball on Instagram. We now have a quarter million Instagram followers, which Helen Havelock, our engagement editorer, literally just drinking the blood of our enemies right now on Instagram. Wired you're next and going down.

So please follow us on Instagram. You can just find us. Just type it in. What else can you do? What else should you do? Oh, I know you should do. You should listen to our other fucking podcasts. Chris Plant has podcast.

Yeah, it's really good. Yeah. I don't want to brag, but it's tremendous. I want to tell you a story about which plan. Someone on the YouTube chat said earlier that, um, what's happened to you over there? And it's a 17 year old. It's lit. There you go.

It's lit. What's the highest honor of Timber bestow? Yeah, 17 year old said it's lit. Unfortunately, it was actually a 42 year old referring to the band. You are your own worst Yeah Wow The car's in the front yard

Chris Does everybody know all the lyrics that song And did you forget about the time Yeah That 17 year just turned on me fast Alexa Play my own worst enemy by lit Alexa

Alexa never stop playing my own worst enemy by lit Alexa Never stop playing my own worst enemy by No matter what I say No matter what I say no matter what I say after this never stopped playing this wow they were formed the same year I was born

oh my god pull the plug Alexa suicide me Alexa she ate the death protocol Alexa 11 years for my own worst enemy to come out I mean that's what they say oh I see my own worst enemy didn't come out the year year ago no no I just assumed

I assumed lit was formed released my own worst enemy looked at each other and said fuck it we're done they worked for 11 goddamn years They released that song. A place in the sun is the record. And they had that place for like a year. And then...

Do they put out... Go ahead. Keep reading the Lit Wikipedia to me. I had one other song. Other songs are called Miserable. Ziplock. Over my head. Lipstick and bruises.

Alexa, play Lipstick and Bruises by Lit. This is really a torturous thing to do to people. And then it suggests you go to their my son. space. Oh my God. Okay, we're done. Don't go to their MySpace. Flood their MySpace. Get in there. You can follow us. We're at Verge on Twitter and we're at Lit on MySpace. Also, in addition to the previously relevant lit commentary, I'd like to thank Braintree for sponsoring today's episode of the Vergecast. Brain Tree gives you a full stack payment solution, support for all payment types your customers might want. You can start accepting Android pay, Apple Pay, PayPal, Bitcoin,

Venmo. I learned recently that Venmo owned by PayPal. So really the whole thing. cards, whatever's next. Look, you want to pay for shit. Just get Braintree in your app. People can pay you. You can take them all in over 130 currencies. As your company grows, Braintree will stay by your side from your first dollar to your billionth.

All it takes is a couple of lines of codes to get started. Learn more. Visit braintree payments.com slash vergecast. Bye! Anyway, Chris has what's tech. Listen to what's tech. I host a show with Walt Mossberg called Control Alt Delete. Listen that.

All of it's at iTunes.com slash the verge. for GSP on hiatus until next year so I'll be back and that's it please continue granting us with your presence on our many channels I don't know

whatever it's over say your words bye there you go