The Vergecast - Heartbeat Trolling Everyone All the Time

Episode Date: January 16, 2015

We're going hard tech with Nilay Patel, Chris Ziegler, and special British guest Tom Warren. We've got Microsoft, Apple, VR, Hyperloop, and dispatches from the North American International Auto Show. And, of course, Sam Sheffer is on hand to check the hype at various points along the way. It's beef. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Okay. Let's just get this out of the way. I am exhausted. Past the point of rational thought. I'm doing the thing when I'm really tired where my voice is gravely. And when Sam heard it in his headphones, he just looked up and said, oh, whiskey and Eli. But it's not because I had fun yesterday. It's because I literally took a 24-hour trip to Seattle, which involves riding on planes. Like non-stop planes.

Like, we'll sit in Seattle. Yeah, what was in Seattle? Nothing. Oh, that's a huge diss to the people of Seattle. There's some good stuff there. I will say this. Here's what happened. A number of things happened to me in Seattle.

And you won't hear about any of the important ones until later. But here's a few things that happen to being Seattle. I still have a Wisconsin ID. This is true. Isn't that illegal? No, I don't know. Sounds like yes. It should be illegal.

I do. So I've had it forever. because every time I move, I'm like, I should get the, and then I'm moving in. But like, like, four years into living somewhere, I'm like, I live here and then I'm moving So your photos from when you were like 21? Yeah. And I look like, I mean, I just look bad. I definitely look like I was hungover and went to the DMV.

Anyways. So I saw this idea. So everywhere I went in Seattle, like checking into the hotel or like going to the legal weed dispensary with our video team, which is basically an Apple store for weed. I don't smoke weed. I'm really, I'm terrible at it, but we just want to, like, check it out because it's legal there. And I was like, this is seriously, like, anyway, so you have to ID.

Everywhere I went in Seattle, they're like, oh, Packers fan, huh? And then they were super rude to me because the Packers playing Seahawks. And they were like mad. It was like a, so that's one thing that happens. But you are a Packers fan. That's not incorrect. And then I was rude to them back, but they had numbers. I was like, come to Wisconsin and say that.

But then I have to go there. So anyway, so that happened. And then the other thing was that we went. this Apple store for weed. We literally just wanted to see it because like it's such a new thing. You look straight to the team. He looks straight to the team for the weed. No.

So it was this is like a, it was like a strange place. It was like I don't know. You know like hip restaurants are like always finished and like refinish wood and like here's like an old lamp made of iron. Right. And like oh my God these hinges are exposed. This must they must serve great food here. Right.

Like that's an aesthetic of restaurants now. You know what I'm talking about. So this was like an entire store in that aesthetic. But then like the the merchandise of weed consumption is nowhere near that aesthetic. So all of the stuff was like, and then crazy 70s bongs. And it's like these things don't match at all. Like you built like this hip clean, an apple store. And then there's like here's a bong shape like an octopus.

Oh, that's what that was from. And it was just like literally like you built a store for. a product line that does not yet exist. It was just like a total aesthetic mismatch. So was the weed all overpriced like an Apple store? Yes. Absolutely. And it was all marketing driven. Staying true to the...

Yeah, super. And every time you pick something up, a Johnny Eye video played. This is the finest. The finest stream. It was just like we had so many hours to kill yesterday before our red eye fight back that we were like, what should we do? And our first idea was like we'd go to Pike Place Market, but that was really

far away from where we were. So we're like, what's the next thing that we can do that's like legal weed? We're like, we're like, we're like, yelped it. It was like such a weird experience. Like the yelp weed. Yeah. And like the guy, like, so we walk in, like all journalists, right? Like, and we're not going to buy anything.

So we just like start talking to the people who work there. And they're all stoned, presumably. I don't know. But the guy is like, you know what's really great about this is like, can finally just say what I do. He was like, because I used to run a head shop. And I'd be like, yeah, this is a glass bowl for tobacco. But now I'm not lying anymore.

I feel really good about things. It was just a super weird experience. Anyway, so I'm very tired because of all the flying. But this is the Vergecast. So in terms of cold opens, we've accomplished that goal, I think, for the week. I'm Neil Patel. I'm Chris Sigler. And I'm Tom Warren.

Oh, snap. Tom Warren. From the UK. In the UK. Couldn't have guessed that. No, I don't give it away in my appearance. A man in the hype desk. Hey.

God. I'm Sam Sheffer. Welcome to the Verge cast. Corporate Sam is back. Hey. I haven't seen say anything. So next week, we'll talk about it. We are.

Can we have one entire show? Just about saying it's that intensive a movie. Like, that will change my life. The lights are mad at you. The studio is coming apart right now. I think there's just an incredible number of 80s movies that if you just watch them, you will completely understand a lot of people in your life. He will become 10 years older instantly.

Yeah. It'll be very convenient. I don't really want that. Maybe I do. I'd prefer to be confused about these weird old people that float around me. Anyway, so Tom, you came to C.S. with us. I did. And you're staying over in New York for the week.

I'm here for like three weeks in total. And then because you're flying, because there's a Windows event. When is the Windows event? Windows 10 on January the 21st. I'll just lose some like. Yeah, so they're doing the consumer version of Windows 10, which essentially is going to be tablets. Because the last event was really sort of business. It was Enterprise and desktop.

I guess they're going to talk a little bit about the bit of desktop, but there's not going to be too much they could talk about. Right. So they announced Windows 10. I can't tell if this is the continuation of a strategy that Microsoft thinks is working, or if it's like Microsoft, and they're just like reconfiguring as they go.

Like what's your sense of? I think they're just trying to like maximize the amount of, you know, press that they can get out of this stuff. Because obviously the Windows 10, the initial event was keeping it small, And it kind of surprises with the names. So obviously got quite a lot of attention out that. And it was the desktop stuff. And now it's like, here's our tablet and phone stuff.

So I think if anything that they need to do next week is prove that they're, you know, still in mobile. Right. That they could still, because Windows RT wasn't, you know, particularly is a flop. We can pretty much say that. Somewhere. So much Stevensonovsky's crying. Yeah. He should be crying.

Arsh. Burn. He's about to write 10,000. thousand words I'm learning by shipping about how mean he's going to get giant blog post and he just a tweet of mine so I'm kind of up on Stephen right now I'm feeling good about him that's all it takes yeah it's a one tweet

fave the way to Chris is hard is a fave wow good to know so they need to prove that they can do a combined phone and tablet operators and that people will care about right and but that operating so Windows 10 they announced the name yeah and they went

super hard this first event was super strange yeah it was I mean it was a really small, like, low-key. Right, and they wouldn't let us even take two people. We wanted to live-log, and they would only let us send home. And that was, like, basically, they're like, one person per outlet. We want to, basically, we want to announce the name and then show off a bunch of insane power user features. Yeah.

Like, they showed off a new terminal, and they, like, keyboard shortcut. I think that was all about, like, we care about you guys that we kind of screwed over with our crazy start menu that took up the whole screen. And, like, we do care about those features. I think it's more about like, yeah, we do care about the desktop guys. They were trying to say that this time. I think this time will be a bit of a different feel. I think it's going to be similar to the Xbox One event that they did. They got the glitzy two-hour keynote,

and then the afternoon's kind of private sessions or like not so public, at least where they sort of dig into all the features and stuff. Are they going to release a developer preview or anything at the event? Yeah, I think it sounds like it's going to be, like the last time they did the event, it was the day after. I wouldn't be surprised if they do a sort of similar thing this time, but it depends on the timing and if they're ready. But I think it's going to be very soon after.

Will there be a one more thing? I don't know. Surface Pro 4? No. They're not ready for that stuff. So they're not doing a phone, flagship, or Surface stuff until it all sort of lines up. So that first event was really small, and then we criticized them like you do. And we said, why it was your event?

You announced Windows 10, but you didn't announce anything. Our friend Joanna wrote a piece. It was like, don't buy a laptop until Windows cut into it was out. And then Frank Shaw from Microsoft got like super mad. Like tweet, like Twitter rage at Joanna. Because he was like, why? Everything's great right now. But I think this is the moment when they show off the rest of Windows 10.

Yeah, to make it. And a piece like that, like just wait to buy a laptop until Windows 10 comes reloaded is going to make a lot of sense. I think it's also they've got a show. Like they've been talking about free screens and a cloud for like, I can't even remember the amount of it. original balmer. Yeah, that was a balmer thing.

But this is like kind of their moment to explain like this strategy that they've always been moving towards. So the universal apps across all apps. And it kind of comes into the whole thing of there's not too many like we call them Metro apps or whatever you want to call them these, those Windows 8 apps. And there's a lot of Windows phone ones. We're not quite as good as a competition. It all comes into like that, that thing where they're struggling with the apps on these

new platforms and stuff. And so I think they have to kind of explain. explain a little bit of that. I guess they're going to reserve most of it for Build, which is their developer conference. So is the philosophy that if you convince developers to make desktop apps that just happen to also be phone compatible, then boom, suddenly Windows phone becomes relevant? Yeah, well, that was like the idea, the sort of concept and the thinking behind Windows 8 and why they shoved it down everyone's throats in terms of that start screen at the beginning. We'll make it really bad, so when we fix it, you'll like it.

It is a strategy. The idea was like to make sure that people use these apps, right? And they were like in front of them every day. And the idea behind keeping it kind of similar with the tiles and stuff is like they would boost their mobile platform by having familiarity. And it, you know, it hasn't worked. So I think they need to kind of explain that with the app stuff. So I mean, we know that they're still working on Android apps on Windows. They are definitely building that.

They're trusting it out. It's a business decision. Right. And they build a bunch of iOS services now. Yeah, I mean, they do all that sort of stuff. But I mean, I've talked about Android apps running on Windows, though. Oh, really? Yeah.

That's still happening? Well, they're still building it and testing it. So I think that's their plan B, right? But they're not going to talk about that next week. They're not going to talk about that build. They want, you know, here's our app strategy. Here's our, finally, we've got to this point where you can get an Apple and Xbox run on Windows and on the phone.

And then I guess if we're in the same situation in a year or two. Then they pull the trigger. Then they pulled a trigger. Like Nokia X? Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I just think this event next week, they have to show, it's not just showing apps running.

It's like, they literally have promised that they will have one operating system running from phones all the way up to the TV. And what's funny about that is no one else has ever pulled that off. That's a big promise that no one else can do. Yeah. Particularly a unit, like, right, Apple has riffs of iOS that run in everywhere except laptops and desktops. But, like, they're, like, kind of different rifts of it on all of their screen sizes.

And when you get to the Apple TV, it's, like, a totally different platform. It's still iOS, but whatever. And when they go down to the watch, it's like kind of a different, it's iOS. Yeah, yeah. Microsoft is like, it's just the same thing everywhere. And, like, they have to explain what that means. And I still haven't heard that story. Yeah, no, and nor, I mean, they've kept it really secret.

So internally, like, so basically, essentially what they're doing is they're combining Windows RT, which powers the surface R. RT and the Surface 2 device, not the Surface Pro 3. And they combine in Windows RT and Windows phone together into a single sort of operating system that will span across these sort of tablet and phone devices.

So I guess what I really want to see from that is something that's competitive with iOS, something that like where they forget about their Windows legacy. Right. They forget about the desktop, you know, and even maybe even don't call it Windows.

No, no, no. They won't do that. Now you're speaking in my language that makes the people who speak Windows mad at me. But it was always completely different. So it's like it was never Windows you can. Well, I mean, Sacha isn't beholden to Windows the way Steve was, right? He's kind of of the mind that the service in the software is the important thing, not the platform. Yeah.

But then the way that Microsoft always works on telemetry, custom feedback and all these surveys. And that's why they're so early, right? So you can go out in the world, they could see people are using it. But the thing, like, they've got to show Windows 10. Like, I think if they show Windows 10, and it's, you've got the new Dell XboxPS 13 here, which I think is a beautiful laptop. Probably the best Windows laptop I've seen for. Yeah, I mean, it's really nice.

How's a track pad? It's really nice. It's a glass track pad, and it's the new precision trackpad. Yeah. So the drive, I don't mean there's actual, like, the way they figure out the drive of stuff, it's really low-level winter windows. So you don't get the lag associated with some touchpad drivers. stuff.

Everyone should go private. That's the move. You go private and then you make some awesome hardware. Right. Well, you don't have to build tons of crappy laptops, right? You don't have investors to answer to it. I mean, I will say that the number of ideas here that are copped from the air

are pretty, pretty high. But it's beautiful. I mean, I don't know. It's pretty well differentiated from the air. I mean, it's an ultra book profile, right? Yeah. Yeah. But at this point, like, everything looks like an air almost.

No, I mean, it's like, trust me. Like, Tom's right. If you're going to buy a Windows laptop, like, you're, You should definitely look at this one. Yeah, maybe we're going to review it and then see what it's like. Yeah, no, we... It looks real nice. Anyway, so it's this, this is fine.

Like, if they, Windows 10 is this and it makes this piece of hardware better because it's a better Windows. Yeah. I think that's just like table stakes. That's what Microsoft has to do to just to stay in the game. Yeah. In terms of, like, selling Windows machines, right? Yeah, to keep Windows relevant and moving forward.

But the, the big move is like, this is the same operating system on the phone. Yeah. And this is the same operating system. system on the Xbox. And they have to do it. They've been promising that Xbox thing for a year, maybe more now. Yeah, no, they have. Yeah, I think there's, I think there's only, I've only ever seen one app on the Xbox. Yeah, I have a feeling that they're not going to talk too much about Xbox. I mean, I don't know, like, the app strategy they have that, it just seems really curated, and they seem to like that strategy. And that was kind of the strategy that was put in place before

Don metric left. And that was always his sort of big thing. So I think they kind of like that. I don't know whether, I mean, they obviously opened it up on the game side, and they've seen, like, some pretty good games, but I don't know what they're going to do with the app stuff. I feel like, so Phil Spencer, the Xbox, and the gaming chief, essentially, it might say he's going to be there, but I feel like he's going to talk about PC gaming. And I think it's going to be more of a surprise for PC gaming stuff than it would be perhaps. And they still have, presumably have stuff to say at GDC and. Yeah, and they got you from, so, yeah. And there's the rumored headset, the VR headset. You know, there's plenty of export stuff coming.

feel like this could be more, like, I would like them to see that you could play a game on your phone or your tablet or your Windows PC against someone who's got on Xbox, for example. Like, they've been promising that stuff for years. They've demonstrated. Since their Windows mobile days, they've been promising that. They have all these crazy demos and, hey, this game's coming and it never came. Right. And I'm just saying that's the, like, they open up the games thing, but like they did that on

Xbox 360 away. Yeah. Like, the core thing for them was they sold you the Kana. with the bundle and that was going to be the new interface for computing on your television and then they're like screw it and like that I think that's the moment right like that's the move for them

to like if they want to take that next step that's where you gotta go yeah it will be interested see what they actually talk about the export stuff right if they're talking about it at all yeah because the TV stuff is still obviously there they're still improving it but they've pulled out the connect and stuff and it does kind of that takes away the IR blasting which is

key feature, even though, you know, Eli Hayzer. Whatever happened to... Now they're just trolling me. Yeah, that's right. Like, seriously, like, Boyd Malter and Jeff Henshaw, who still works at Microsoft. Like, literally, during CES, like, they went out to dinner and they, like, took a selfie and they're, like, tweeted at me, and they're like, we're talking about IRBlasters. I was like, you guys are straight up just trolling me right now.

That's cool. Whatever happened to Xbox TV? That was a thing at some point, right? Well, in terms of, like, a device. Yeah. Yeah, well, yeah, I mean, they've stepped back on that. So, I don't know if that or whatever, I think that's gone now. Right.

So for Windows 10, though, I mean, like, maybe they'll do Xbox, maybe they won't. Maybe they'll talk about phones and tablets. Maybe they won't. But they were going to spend a lot of time talking about PCs. And there was, like, there was an IDC survey a couple days ago saying the PC market's coming back a little bit. Yeah, I think it's gone. I mean, it depends. IDC said it's gone down by 2.something percent.

Gartner said it's gone up by 1. Right. So basically, they count devices differently, so it's hard to, like, one says, 83 million the other one says 80 million um so it's hard to like sort of find the middle ground there but it just seems like it's literally sort of stabilized in the fourth quarter and i think this year could be the year when it starts to to come back a little bit i think because it's also against the point where the tablet market's pretty saturated right people aren't refreshing their devices because they're good enough yeah there wasn't there wasn't a ton of excitement around the air two launched right

yeah yeah and so it's all kind of coming it's like where do consumers then spend their money yeah is it going to be smart watch i got an air to you for christmas are you it? It's like it, it's just like literally laminating that screen. That's it. That's the thing that they did. And it like makes a difference. And then otherwise there's, there's nothing else to say about it. Yeah. The only, and the only reason I got it is so I cracked the screen on my air and now my air is possessed. Like it's something, like, I've cracked many screens and many devices. I've never had like something happen where the digitizer shorts itself. Oh. So my air just starts like clicking on shit. And like scrolling crazy

And I'm like, there's a ghost. And so I was like, okay, I got the new one. And then I got the new one. And it's like, like, only difference is limited that screen. Here's what you do. It's faster, obviously. Here's what you do with the old one. Read Thomas Ricker's article about duet.

Then use it as a second screen. But I can't because it's crazy. But it doesn't, I think that it doesn't respond to touch as one to do it mode. Oh, really? Yeah. But, but like, it's crazy. Like, it will do like five-finger gestures and like zoom all the way out to the launcher and then like launch a new app and like,

quit at like it's nuts i've never seen a touch screen break that badly interesting uh so i'm looking i'm in the market for a uh like a like a shady electronics vendor in new york city or or a shaman who can perform it exorcism on your iPad because there are many like shady i what's the one where like they send guys to you and they're like they'll like fix it right there there's it looks like a vc backed startup doesn't sound like that's a car windshield thing it's the guys in a little red truck Yeah. They show up and just holding a cracked, possessed iPad. And they're like, this isn't what we do.

Wrong kind of windshield. No, there's definitely like a VC back startup where you like call people and they show up at your house. Well, that's true for literally anything, especially in New York. Fair. But these guys, like, I try, I forget what it's called, but I tried it and they won't. Like, they just won't respond to iPad requests. Interesting. Like they make it.

They make a great living on iPhones apparently. Yeah. When you're like iPad and like the notes are like starting a desperate. like please like please i don't want to go to the apple store please don't make me go there yeah because it's probably 200 bucks to get it fixed at the apple store but i know that there are like shady places in new are yeah oh i'm sure there are like plenty of shady places so general and like so what are your big expectations that at windows 10 that's like the question i'm curious to see if they show off like what they could do with the ui stuff so we've seen a few the leaks and

also we've got to mention spartan their browser stuff oh yeah so i'm expecting that, so essentially Spartan is the successor to Indian Explorer, that's what's code name at the moment. It's like a subset of Internet Explorer. Is it still Triton or whatever? Trident's, yeah, the engine. So essentially what they're doing is they're, I think they're trying to get rid of the legacy of an explorer, which leads me to

think it's not going to be called Internet Explorer. Yeah. And that's kind of like the rumors at the moment. But they're keeping an explorer there in the background, if like for enterprise and for legacy purposes. So you wouldn't see it as an inducer it's not really going to like, you know, pop up and be like, hey, I'm here. But it'll be there for the people that need it, so,

whereas everyone else can use Spartan is going to be lightweight and support. That gets at the core of Microsoft's challenge for everything that it does with Windows. They're balancing the legacy. They have to do both continuously for everybody. That's what happens when you've got so many people

using it, right? What they should do is just sell Windows 7 forever. No, XP. XP. No, no, 7 is great. Actually, like, you could, I don't think you could, right, but you're right, It should just be...

They should just rebranded 7. It's like Windows XP7. Or Windows Classic, they could call it. Right, and just let that do its thing. And then, like, what you're saying, like, name it some other thing. But they never will. They want people to upgrade. They obviously made a lot of money from businesses upgrading their hardware and the licensee and stuff.

But, yeah, the Spartan stuff, I think that's going to be interesting, especially if they just end up calling it a Spartan. Because they've obviously adopted Halo turns before, tonner. That's true. Yeah. So, that's true. Spartan would be

an interesting, because he's also, you know, Spartan, the nature of the word would be a good fit for a browser. Right. You want it to be like clean. Right.

Simple. Simple. Yeah. Tom, is Windows 10 going to boot into desktop or Metro by default? I think that's, well,

at the moment, Windows 8.1 will boot into, depending on what device configuration is. Right. But like out of the box, you know, for just the end user, you know,

mom and pop upgrading in Mill of America. I think that's going to go desktop on a desktop machine. If you're on the East Coast, it might boot up differently than in Middle America. Let's be clear. Yes. Different modes. But no one knows yet, right? There's no... No, but I'd expect it'll probably do what they did on the 8.1 update.

Oh, sure. Yeah, I mean, it'll be interested to see what they call Windows RT and Windows phone, that combination, because it's currently codename Windows Mobile, and it would be kind of hilarious if they brought that name back. Come on. But also at the same time, it kind of fits. So it's like, yeah, yeah. And then obviously what they call Spartan. So I think there would be the two things we'll probably get answers to.

Windows Mobile Series 10. It can combine all the worst. Oh, God. Windows Mobile 10 series. Yes. I like it. And then get rid of the series like in a few months. Right.

Right. Of course. I just, I don't know, man. I want, I want modern to be a complete thing. And it's not. Like right now in Windows 8, it is. so not a complete thing. It's like, it's trying to do too many, like it's trying to do

split two things. It feels slow in the way that like layers on top of windows always feel slow. Yeah, it just feels like it's kind of getting in your way. Right. It's just a very confusing. I hope they saw that because there's potential there. Also, this laptop is very nice. So speaking of laptops, you broke some

news last week as well about the Mac the rumored Mac. Did I break news? I don't know. Depends who you ask. We did some, we did some hard, hard informed speculation. Sam, hype check, informed speculation. It's cool. Hype check Windows 10.

The event's going to be cool. I grew up on Windows, so I'm waiting for them to, like, get their act together. It's just very clear that our entire team is broken. Is Sam your Andy Richter? What is the relationship? I'm just trying to understand. So I was trying to describe the verge to our CEO the other day, which is strange. You would think, A, I would be able to do that.

I would have done it already and that he would know. that's just where we were. It was Vegas, so we were just really confronting our feelings directly. And what I came up with was fast analysis for teens. That's not what I signed up for in our own, Eli. Hot takes for teens. Hot takes for teens. Hot takes for teens.

HGT. HDFT. Hashtag B-2-B. It's both the highest quality. CD display. As apostrophe H.T. This screen were like to see Snapchat in ways you've never

seen it before. Yeah. No, no, Sam is the voice of the youth. Whereas I am increasingly becoming the voice of like the griseled jerk. Right?

Like I'm like ready to buy a midlife crisis car. Yeah. Right? Like I have serious dog conversations. Sam's just like out there texting for drugs. Dude, everyone does that. I don't do it, but everyone else does.

So you want to bring it all together. You get H-T-F-T-F-T? A nice mix. That's a pos-a-H-T-F-T-F-T. We are all very tired after CES, as you can see. It's very clear that we have no idea what we're doing. No. We lost the thread somewhere in Vegas. No, so we actually never talked about this.

We talked about a little bit with Joanna on a CES podcast. The Mac? The Mac. The 12 inch MacBook. I think it's actually where we've gotten more questions. I think it's worth talking about particularly in the context of the Windows event. Tell the story. So during CES, Mark German leaked, 9 to 5 Mac leaked, basically renders and details of a

rumored 12-inch MacBook. MacBook Air, I don't know. It's very small. It has no ports except for a single USB Type C connector. which is for it's the reversible USB but not not even like a charging port nothing just that and I think maybe a headphone it's single use single use you you the battery you use it once it's a disposable mac you buy it out of a vending machine you put some quarters that's how apple gets you back in the store those best buy mobile in the airport yeah here's I have a question I have a best by mobile

oh god where are we no it's for real it's this is for real here's a thing I've never understood about those vending machines they always sell iPods in them yeah right Yeah. What are you supposed to do with an empty iPod out of the engine? Hold it. Look cool. I never understood that. Fun fact.

Lauren Rabino bought headphones from one of those long time. The headphones makes total sense. Like I forgot my headphones. Like whatever. Like I've got. Because you can use it straight away. I've wanted. Yeah.

I've always wanted a pair of beats and this is my moment. But like an empty 8 gig iPod touch. What are you doing with that? That's such a good question. Just getting on the plane and staring at it. Oh man. I wish I had some games. Like, what are you doing?

Literally nothing. That's a really good question. But they also used to sell, like even, you can make an argument. I'm sure some people will, like, you can connect it to Wi-Fi, maybe get some music. But like five years ago, they were selling like 160 gig empty OG iPads. Well, no, they still sell the minis or nanos or whatever they are. But like, what are you? You need a computer to use those.

It's not a good look. Like, what are you doing? Yeah. All right. If anybody knows the answer, if somebody at best one could tell me how many of those they sell, And then like how many confused, like, people are just wandering the airport listening to empty I. I want that scoop real bad. By the way, I do have to issue a small correction.

You're referring to Best Buy Express. Best Buy Mobile. I call the Best Buy Mobile, yes. That's something else. That is my fault, yes. Anyway, so Apple has it presumably a new MacBook that they're going to sell Best Buy Express. It comes loaded with 100 gigs of music. It comes folded.

Just all YouTube albums. the U2 albums follow your own. So anyway, so we were looking at it. You know, Mark has a sterling track record. And then Tom actually looked into the USB IF, the four, the USB trade group. Talk about that first. What is this? It's like a USB alliance, right?

There's like a bunch of companies that got together and they're creating a standard. Okay. They have an alliance and then they have a promotional group. so Apple essentially participates in defining the standard, but they don't participate in the promotion. So they don't want to be kind of, I guess they don't want the marketing. I don't want to be known that they're kind of backing that standard, I guess. But Apple has a bunch of engineers working on this. More than almost anybody.

They have more than Microsoft. Microsoft has 16. And more than Dell. Yeah, Dell had like five or so. Was Intel the first? Intel was the first because they're primarily backing it. But they have more than all the OEMs. So it's interesting.

So Apple has its own proprietary connectors, right? They have Thunderbolt and Lightning, which is hilarious. It's great. It's great marketing. It's a naming scheme. It's hilarious. Lightning, some people hate it. I'm like, fine with it.

Whatever, but it's like reversible. It's good. But they have dumped tons of money and effort and resources and people against this type C connector. Yeah. And then you're looking at it a little bit more deeply. And like just the profile of this thing, to make it work, you can't use. a regular core processor. You have to use the new core M, right,

which lets you not have a fan in that profile. Oh, interesting. And there's no way Apple wants to put a fan at this thing. Like that, if I have to say where the informed speculation comes from, it's definitely they don't want a fan in this thing. Like the iPad. It's also, so the processes are essentially the same price, depending on which specification you purchase.

But at the moment they are anyway. Like, we don't know what they're going to do. Intel are going to do later on in the year. But you'd assume that the pricing could change then. But it's also, one of the key things is removing those ports. So Fundable has licensing fees associated with it. It's also, you know, another port. Intel, presumably, right?

Yeah. Intel even owns the Thunderbolt name now and Apple license it back. So adding all those, like, Thunderbolt's the main one, that would add any sort of cost to a machine. But, yeah, like just getting rid of those raw materials and stuff. Well, so anyway, so let me get to where we're going before we talk about price. So Tom and I are looking at this. We looked at the type C stuff.

We can basically confirm that Apple's been working hard on type C and they have interest in it. Right. Those are public documents. There's no doubt that they're going to use type C in some product, particularly in Mac products. Right. And then we're looking at the product, right? And the big argument is how much this thing going to cost, right? Like everyone kind of believes it's real. The chatter is there.

And it's got a super high-res display. That's also a one type. Yeah, but it's not like a rep. Like, it's just a U.S. It's the same display as probably this Dell. It's better than this 1440 by 900 crap high here. No question they need to move up through this way. So it's probably got a U.S. display or something like it.

I'd be supposed if it has a QHD display. But I wouldn't be, because the only thing in Mark's report that I think a couple of people have pointed out is that there was no mention of retina. Right. Which is kind of interesting. Because imagine if they just put a standard HD display on it, not 1920 by 1080. That would still be good enough, right? They would still be good enough, but it wouldn't be retina, which then puts it into an interesting category of laptop.

Is it a MacBook Air or is it just a MacPath? Right, so here's my theory. And this is where the argument began, right? So we looked at all this stuff and we looked at basically what we're hearing. We looked at what we're hearing. We heard what we're hearing. our brains process this information. We looked at the market.

And we came to the conclusion that I think is well supported that this is not a new super expensive MacBook Air. This is like a new category of product for Apple, which is like a more inexpensive Mac. Is it like the iPod? So here's my guess. And this part is a guess. So I firmly believe that what this product is supposed to do is all of the people who buy iPads and keyboards. right Apple's saying like we can serve you and iPad growth has flattened out and we can we can build you a better product that you plug in at night and it charges up and you unplug it you get 12 hours of battery life for 15 hours of battery life because of this low power processor there's no fan you open it up you run it all charge it with the USB yeah yeah yeah you just plug it into the wall yeah well so what's interesting about this is that the 12 inch MacBook pro or excuse me iPad pro speculation has been around for right I think this is two years You think?

I think it might be converging into one product. Well, no. So I think this is like, if you run the Mac business and you see the Mac business that's growing and it's like resurgent and then you see all these people buying like medium iPads, like 64 gave up, which is like I think $699 or whatever, whatever five, whatever the middle one is and then they're buying $200 keyboards. You're like, I can sell you a better laptop for $700 or $800 right there. And that's the most inexpensive laptop Apple is ever sold, but a totally new use case.

Right. So it's not like a desktop replace. It's not like this 15-inch monster that I have. So how do you sell that against a 12-inch iPad? I think you say, like, the iPad Pro is for, like, photographers. It probably has a retina display. Maybe not this other display. Like, think about really who's going to buy a 12-inch iPad.

Pilots, people who do wedding photography, you. Right. Like, Apple has not solved a problem where the iPad can replace a computer. No. They just have, that was their... It doesn't run an opportunity. It was never designed to do that. I think that was the thing that was, like, people like post-PC.

That's crap. But it was never, like, Apple never said this is going to replace a lot. Hype check post PC era. But we're not there, yeah. Like, relax everywhere. Like, you can't, you cannot realistically multitask on an iPad. I'm sorry, you just cannot do it. Right.

So I think if you're looking at the market and you're saying, okay, Apple try to push iPads really hard in education and their biggest competitor there is like Chromebooks. Lots and lots and lots of people buy iPads. And they kind of like, they kind of like hit the wall when they buy the keyboard and they want to like do more with it. Right. And that ecosystem of stuff isn't there. Well, why not?

craft like instead of like an iPad with a keyboard and hack it all together. Why not do what Apple does, which is build a new integrated solution around the right operating system. But they can't position $900 Macbook against a $200 Chromebook. I think it's going to be 900. So I've got multiple. So this is the question. So my guess and this part I'm telling you is a guess. The part where I believe where the product will be positioned, it feels very much less like a like a guess. My guess on the price is 700, which is a price of a pretty good. iPad and the keyboard. So my ultimate guess over all of this is that this new MacBook is either a MacBook.

Yeah, it's not an error. Just called a MacBook. But I don't think that will happen. I think it's going to be the new MacBook Air and the only MacBook Air. Oh, wow. And the MacBook 13-inch MacBook Airs will cease to exist because you'll just have a MacBook Pro. The two are like converging closer. Like if you look at a Retina MacBook Pro.

The 13-inch MacBook Air today is clearly above the market. that you're describing. Yeah. So you're saying that Apple's going to just abandon that MacBook Air. Yeah. Why do you need it? Like the MacBook Pro. I'd take this over a 13-inch MacBook Pro.

You would at the moment, but that's because this is thicker. But look at all these new chipsets that are coming out and the sort of form factors that we're seeing with this sort of us. You're saying that they'll redesign the 13-inch retina to be thinner. Yeah. And that'll be interesting. Back to your MacBook Pro. But I'm saying like, I don't think you give up the brand equity of MacBook Air. Right.

I think you leave that alone. But no, no, but like, you can't give it up. Like, this is the best selling laptop Apple has ever made. Right? Like, this 13-inch air. Like, I don't think you can screw with this formula too much. I think you can upgrade the components. You can make a high-rest screen.

You can do all the things people want to do to this form factor. This is your main laptop. Like, people buy this and it's their computer. Yeah. Right. I think this new product is people buy it and it's what they use instead of an iPad. You think it's going to be called MacBook? Just straight MacBook?

Yeah, that's my guess. Again, that much is totally against it. When I was in college, everyone got those plastic MacBooks, the white and the black ones and they were just called MacBooks. Right. And that sort of disappeared. But I just think this is the product where Apple knows it's selling iPads and keyboard cases to lots of people. Yeah.

Right. And that's like, but that market is flat. So how do you like juice another round of sales and increase your already accelerated MacBook sales? Well, you make a new MacBook that replaces that category. But people buy an iPad not necessarily because they want to do that. They do. They buy it because it's simple and easy to use.

like OSX is kind of the opposite of that. For most people, like, they would take iOS over OSX, right? Well, they'd have, so... No, if that was true, then iPad sales wouldn't be... I think the iOS device is, like, a bigger phone. And I think once you've established a bigger phone, tablets become a hard sell, and you say, what's your next device? Well, there's also the fact that 10.11 is due for a preview this year, right?

Presumably. Yeah. And they'll come even closer to... Yeah, every year they come a little bit closer together. Right. So just to be fair, the other side of this debate, which is sort of like the Apple blogger version of the story, is that this is like a $1,400 replacement all in for a new MacBook. The same way that the IMac was a really expensive replacement all in, the same way that IMAQ was a really expensive replacement all in. And I think that is, here's my criticism of that. That's a fair way of doing it, right? That's history repeats itself. Apple tends to be very cyclical. They have the same idea, and they usually win. I think you have to believe that the market is the same for these kinds of products.

And I think the market is radically different. And I think Apple is looking at a universe where the iPad flattened out. Their phone sales are still skyrocketing. Their big phone is doing well. And their Mac sales are surprising them. And also the competition catches up a lot quicker these days. Right. And it already has.

Right. And I just think, like, what's interesting to me, like, really interesting to me is the amount, an immediate amount of, like, fervent speculation and interest and argument about this Macintosh compared to the basically, like, fizzle out of the watch. And I think that is, like, fascinating. Interesting. Yeah. Like, that is fascinating. I mean, it seems like the hype really died around that watch. Like, yeah, it's going to come out.

And, like, I don't, you know, no one really talks about it anymore. Like when the new iPhone's rumored, it's like the hotness that everyone talks about now. And it feels like the watch is like, oh, yeah, cool, Apple Watch is coming out. I'll buy one, whatever. Right. But I think that you need to have a setting. You need to know what it's going to do. Yeah, that's the thing.

Nobody actually knows what the watch is going to do yet. Like, it's, you know, you interact with it eight different ways. And I can send you doodles. You can pay, yeah, you can, I can send my heartbeat to somebody. I'm partbeat trolling everybody all the time. Like, when Apple extends iCloud into, like, you can send your heartbeat to a Mac and the Mac starts hopping. Like, it's over. Like, that is the end.

When the iPhone came out, it came out to replace all the crappy Windows mobile phones at the time. When the iPad, sorry, that was the iPhone. When the iPad came out, it came out to sort of attack netbooks and the low-cost laptops. I don't really get where the smart watch stuff is. The iPad came out to be its own thing. It did, yeah. And to be fair, you know, I'll. But it was at the right time.

The color, like, this is sort of the Apple blogger thing and whatever. Like, they're like Apple would never make a netbook. They always ran up and down saying they couldn't figure out how to make a 500 laptop that sucks. And if, like, you really believe that Apple's history repeats itself, what you know is they say something they can't. It sounds impossible to, like, do it. Second of all, what's real is that even in like the Jobs book, right, like Jobs admits that, like, he had his, like, top 100 offsite and they, like, sat there and talked about netbooks for a long time. time. Right?

Yeah, but, but they always end up doing it with a pretty significant twist. The 5C is a good example, not a cheap phone,

right? Like, yes, they did a cheap phone and it's not a cheap phone. It's cheap phone. The MacBook Air 11, not a cheap laptop. Right,

but I'm saying, like, you have to believe that the 5C is a success that Apple wishes to repeat. Which, lots of people

bought that phone too. I see 5C's everywhere. That means nothing, but they were in a free phone, right? Right. But it wasn't like, cheap phone. Like the sales volume of 5C to 5S tips so hard in terms of 5S that Apple had to like

rejiggered their supply. Right. And that was like a thing. They were like, what? We weren't expecting everybody want the five. And it's like why? Everybody with a five doesn't want the same phone in a crappier case. Yes. What are you talking? Like, duh. But the timing for that now is good to have that sort of device out there. Yeah. I'm just saying like I look at this and I look at the the sweep of the market and what I see is like I never use my iPad anymore. I just got it. I bought an iPad too when it first came out.

I don't even know where that thing is anymore. This is fine in the bed. Like it did. I mean, you know, you take your iPad to bed. I've checked bed MacBook. I mean, it's probably not healthy because the screens, that's why I use Flux. It's going to be called MacBook Bed.

Bedbook. Bedbook. Bedbook pro. Flux is the. bustest app you can install. Is that the one that changes your brightness and your collar temperature? It's so bad. It's amazing because you don't notice when it's on.

And then you look at another like regular display and you're like, oh my God. It's great. Whatever. I just want to say one more thing about the MacBook. Flux is an app that literally like automatically turns your shit blue. Right. Right. Right.

Like it dynamically changes based on your location in sunset time and time of day. And whether or not you're a vampire. Whether or not you're a super. So it's just like it like slowly changes the color and then like by sunset your eyes are like used to this orange glow display and everyone like comes up to my desk and it's like what the hell is wrong with your MacBook? And I'm like. Yeah. It's usually me. Yeah. And you're like I've programmed it to trick me. It's basically bad white balance for your screen.

That is literally the story of like the parable of like the boiling frog. Do you know the story? From the Bible. Is that? No, no. Is that from the Bible? Is it? I don't know.

Sounds like it's like a boiling frog in the Bible. No. No, this is like a thing. Like if you, it's just a story about change. It could very well be from the Bible. I'm Googling. It's simmering frog, by the way. It's if you throw a frog into a pot of boiling water, like immediately leaps out.

But if you just put in cold water and like slowly turn up the heat, it'll just die. That's you and your weird ass laptop. That's terrible. It's just slowly killing you. Oh, it's great. It's really great. Have you ever tried it? I don't think it's from the Bible.

No, I don't think it's from like people killing frogs. All right. I just want to say one more thing about these macbooks. That's it. Let's wrap up. Let's wrap up the MacBook. People murdering for us. Basically.

Look, there's even a scientific apparatus to do. The way, uh, eighth graders and high schoolers get iPod touches for Christmas and birthdays, if Apple prices this MacBook right, it's going to sell well. But yeah,

I think, I think it's not going to be cheap. It's just going to be cheaper. Right, right. The entry level air is 999, right? 899. 899. 899.

So if they could get to 799, No, I think it's going to be true than that. I'd say $599 or $6.99 for maybe like 32 gigs of internal storage. Yeah. I'm telling you this is basically like Apple looks at the people buying keyboard cases for an iPad and they're like, how do we sell this product without making the iPad gross? And it's going to run OSX, right? Presumably.

It's OS10. I don't know why both of you keep doing this to me. It's going to run the operating system that is on the laptop and not. Why wouldn't you just call it the right name? Yosemite. God. All right. Where's two more things we can talk about.

Cars. And then Sam can hype check himself. I was waiting for that. Hype check. So I don't want to, here's what I'll say. I don't want to talk about Samsung and BlackBerry because it's super boring. It also got basically debunked. Well, of course it did.

Although I will say that the notes written by Chris Plant for us today, the line just says, Samsung plus Blackberry equals Samberry or Blung. So thanks, Chris. So let's do car. We can talk about VR, but like, whatever. Like, we, VR was, we did fun VR. We didn't get to talk about, I mean, I just want to mention that the six cents thing.

It was like Oculus for the first time all over. Can I talk about this really quick? Oh, yeah. You looked insane in that thing. Dude, did you try it for the first time all over again? Yeah, that's what it was. It was good. It was, you talk about it.

All right. So there's a company called Sixth Sense. It's like Sixth Sense. Oh, thanks. And they, hey, I just. High check work matchup. I am told I mumble a lot, so I need to, you know, make my speech clear. Anyway, so they made a module for the Oculus Rift that uses electromagnetism instead of infrared.

What is so funny? Sorry. I'm sorry, continue. I'm just literally just telling a story. Chris burst out of it. It's fine. No, electromagnetism. That's literally what they use.

Anyway, so you put on the eye. I literally don't know what's funny right now. Chris is just hysterically loud. No, no. There's like a big red and white magnet, a huge switch that turns on. And then you press the button in the hatch and then you see John Locke. Anyway, so you put on the, you put on the goggles. Why is John Locke there?

From Lost. Oh, from Lost. Yeah, yeah. I thought you meant the actual John Locke. No, no, no, no. So it has a sensor on the back and you put on these goggles and you're inside this training room. It will use the Oculus, right? Yes.

Yes. You're wearing Oculus and you're holding. And no, so you put on these goggles and then you walk forward and grab these joysticks in real life. And those joysticks are then. your hands. So you move the joystick and they are your hands. I still don't know. And if you look down, you can like check out your robot body. Yes. It's crazy. And then, and then you, you grab these floating lightsabers. You press a bun and your hand grabs a lightsaber. And then you press a bun and the

lightsaber comes out. And then you fight this floating orb that's shooting lasers at you. There's a video if you like, if you search on YouTube Verge 6N's VR, like you'll find the video. Addie. The video is really great. It was the coolest thing I saw at CES. This year easily and one of the coolest things I've seen since the first time I wore Oculus. The controllers aren't cheap though, right? They're like, it's like 300 or something for the set, but it's the first thing I've seen with Oculus where it's like, oh, I would do this. I would do this.

Like, I would go home and play this game. What's crazy though is when I was doing the demo, like, you're wearing the Oculus. So you're standing up. You're wearing the Oculus. So you don't know where you are. Yeah. And the guy was just like, dude, you have to stop running around the room. Like, he's like, just stand still.

And I was like, what? And like, dancing. and he's like, you're literally going to hit somebody. And I took it off. He was not from America. He had an accident. He was not from America. He had an accident.

You laugh, but that's a serious risk for the thing. Like, if you have it at home, you go to New York apartment, you're going to destroy everything in your home. No, I will definitely, like, I will punch something. I got ready to go. It was super cool. It was really, really cool. And I think we're getting one to review, so that would be a thing to look out for.

Yeah. Okay, Chris, you just went to a car show. Let's talk about some cars. Yeah, well, you came from one car show and went to another show. Yeah, it was at two car shows back to back. And Tom is using both the trackpad and the touchscreen to, I believe. Oh, Steven Snofsky is mad at you. He's mad.

I don't know he listens to the show so much. Yeah. Hi, Stephen. Yeah, I didn't know he's a fan. Okay. It's a car. Cars. Yeah, they're a thing.

So at CES, you know, every year at CES, we get these thing pieces basically saying, oh, look, CES is a car show now. Well, it's been a car show. Right. But this year, it's been more of a car show than any other car, or any other CES by a pretty wide margin. Mercedes introduced a concept car here, which is insane. Here or there? At CES.

Yeah. We're still there. We're still. Yes. We are physically still in Las Vegas. In our minds. We can use Oculus to return to the trailer. I would never.

And Chevy did this. The most insane press. conference I've ever been to in my life. I waited two and a half hours because I knew that the new Chevy Volt was going to be the Chevy event. I sit down. The guy's like, I don't want to keep you waiting. Let's just get to it.

And then this circular curtain around the car goes and then covers the car back up. And he's like, thanks everybody. Let's go to some music. And so the entire press conference was four minutes long. It was completely insane. Yes, for the Volt in Vegas. Yeah. Okay.

I remember I walked in that room. It was like a, like I was walking by it and it was like full of like plush white leather chairs. Super luxurious for four minutes. And then. Well, I felt, oh, because they had the motion, right? Right. So they just wanted to tease it at CES. So they did this crazy curtain thing.

And so I took, you know, I was using continuous shooting on my camera. So I just took as many pictures as I could and uploaded them all to my, my gallery. and I got so many angry comments in. Why did you take the same shot 15 times? I'm sorry, I could see the car for 10 seconds. So anyway, that was CES. And then we went straight to Detroit, which was arguably the biggest Detroit show in a decade or more. The Ford G.T stole the show.

You love that thing, Chris. I mean, it's hard. It's not so than the other one. Yeah, it's crazy. And perhaps the craziest thing about it is that it was designed. I can't remember his name, a guy that started in the early 90s in Ford's German studio, designed some cars in the UK before coming to the U.S. Super, super boring portfolio. It just hasn't designed anything remotely interesting.

And then he turns out this work of art. Only a few executives at Ford knew it even existed. He was working in the basement of their design studio in hereborn. So I was talking to a guy I won't name him or who he works for But I was talking to a guy who said that he knows a lot of people high up at Ford None of them knew all of them Swore up and down the GT wasn't going to happen

Because they really believed it They didn't know the car existed so there's like literally a handful of people That's car existed Did you freak out when you saw it for the first time? Yeah, it was insane And the I mean Ford did a really good job with the unveiling of it They went to Joe Lewis Arena which is where the Red Wings play Completely packed I was in like the upper rafters of this

stadium. Got nosebleed seats. Yeah. So that was that. And then Acura unveiled the NSX. Now, I want to put this in perspective for folks who aren't necessarily familiar with cars. The, this NSX that they, that debuted on Monday was unveiled the week after the original iPhone was announced. In 2007.

In 2007, they just showed the production version of that car. this week. So that's a development cycle, right? And, you know, they canceled it, brought it back to life, canceled again, brought it back to life, switched engines three times. It was originally going to be a V10. Then they put in a naturally aspirated V6, then switched to a turbo V6. And so now that's what it is. And now, and now it's the engine from a civic. Well, so the problem, I mean, it basically is. Yeah, it's like, now it's a turbo 4. Well, so the GT is using an Eco Boost branded twin turbo v6.

Yeah. This beautiful exotic, but it's over 600 horsepower, so it's okay, I guess. But the fact that they have ego boost branding on this thing is insane. So then NSX is, NSX would have stole the show had it not been for the fact that the GT just pulled the rug out from everybody. Yeah. Also, Ford has the ability to show cars and then ship them. Yeah, exactly, exactly. So they're promising the GT will be on the street next year.

Yeah. Can any of them drive themselves? 2016. No, no, yeah, 2016. Self-driving was not. I mean, that's the way they bifurcate this, right? They talk about the tech at CES. They talk about the actual cars and the designs of the cars in Detroit.

Well, it's funny just walk here in CES. So, first of all, I believe Mercedes made a gigantic mistake at CES. By using that eyeball. No, they showed off the F-15, whatever, like the rolling aluminum cage. Yeah. I think is dope. Which, by the way, did any of you see my Instagram of the New York local news? No.

I saw that. I did see that. It was amazing. Like, local news. Like, I don't know what we will do as a culture without local news because there will be no joy left in the world for people who cover technology. So what do you say? Gestures and motion control. It was just like the local news.

He's like Mercedes at the Consumer Electronics Show has introduced, get this. a self-driving car. And it's like, they've been doing it for a long time. Okay. And he's like, you'll never believe it's controlled by gestures and motions. And it's like, and they just showed a guy like inside the car, like using a touch screen. It's like, I believe it.

Totally believe it. I guess that's a bunch of stuff that's been happening for a long time. I drove into self-drifting car last year. I get it. I've been there. It was just one of these things where it's like, the thing itself is so wide. You don't have to be like, and magic controls it. Wizards will drive your new Mercedes.

It's like, dude, it's a, it's like random spaceship. That car is interesting because, I mean, whatever, it's a concept car, right? But the one thing about it that I think is really interesting is that the car changes color, depending on whether it's self-driving or not. That's wild. And, well, the actual body? No, no, it's surrounded by a grid of lights, basically. When it's driving itself, it's blue, I think, and when it's in manual control, it's white. And I think that this will actually end up translating into some sort of safety feature.

So basically it's a gaming car because that's like the thing on every game. It's the ASUS. Yeah, Republic of gamers, Mercedes. It's like in Tron where the good guys are green and the bad guys are red. So here's a mistake Mercedes made. They roll this thing out on the stage there, right? Yeah. It looks crazy and it's like, this is the future of driving.

And then I like, the last day, I was like, I got. gotta go see this car. I have to go to this booth. And you get all the way in Mercedes booth. It's a toy. And there's like, yeah, there's the, it's a toy. It's like, dude, you have it here. You brought it to Las Vegas, right?

Like, why isn't it here? And instead, what they had was a self-driving S class playing a video game. So there's just like three screens around an S class. And it was like driving the video game. And I was like, this isn't impressive at all. Like, I've had video games that can drive themselves. For a long time. There were AI cars in Outrun on my NES.

I mean, cool S class, guys. It's the computer in need for speed. Cool. Yeah, why didn't they have it in the... I don't know. They had the toy. It's like, was this a one thing?

Like, I spend, usually at CS, I spend all of my... So, CS, for people who don't know, is organizing, like, three big halls, right? So North Hall is, like, basically, like, low-rent iPhone case companies. Like Mofi City, like standing in the center of them. Just junk hole, essentially. And then, no, no, but then it's also the car hall. So like, so when like car stereo stop being a thing, they're like, come iPhone case fenders.

And then Mofi is like, we will build a fortress here. Like, that's true. You can't, Mobia doesn't have a booth. It has like a walled city. You have to make an appointment. With a speak easy inside. Yeah, but it's like. No, it's true.

Yeah, but it's like, what are you? You're at CES. Yeah. You go into the Mofi. Speak easy. And you like charge up? And what do you do there? It's just wild to me that it's such a secret.

Get free case. Everybody knows what Mofi makes. Maybe they had a secret product there we didn't see. My theory is that they don't want Chinese companies to clone their stuff. So they like, they get really protective. And there's like laser turrets at like the Mofi booth. Like just constantly. Anyway, so that's like one part of all.

The other part is like cars and that cars are back in a big way. Yeah. And then Central is consumer electronics. So it's for Sony and Panasonic. like in Samsung City are. And then South Hall is like computer hall, which is where Intel desperately tries to. Invidia is down there.

Right. And like that's where like Intel in Central. No, Intel's in South. Oh, they have the big front of South. Anyway, so I spent all of my time in Central Hall, almost all CS.

I actually didn't even go into the like the South Hall. I was always back and forth basically to our booth, which right next Tony. But the last day, like made the trip to North Hall. I walked through. I went with Helen and Dieter and like had a Snapchat adventure. We sat in a car that was basically One rolling speaker

Because it's like the car hall Right We played with all the carplay stuff And then finally we get to the Mercedes booth And it's like a toy And it's like But wasn't it here? I know it was very disappointing

Well yeah Chevy did the same thing They took their vault and ran after the unveiling Well because they took it all to Detroit Yeah I guess to prep it Yeah But it was just like

You could have it here for one day Yeah But even all the keynotes The ES were like like Nvidia Yeah Vivida spent a long time talking about cars. Ford had a keynote.

Mercedes, of course, had a keynote. What I thought was interesting, like the Audi booth was just like, like chips. It was like, it was parts of cars everywhere. Yeah. And they would show you like, this is the motherboard of our car. It was like, cool. They're very proud of it. It's kind of unusual.

Yeah. It was just like, I don't, does it do a good job? Well, so Audi does something that I think is the most CES thing imaginable, which is they'll actually enter, they'll unveil the interior. of a car, including all the electronics inside of it, at CES, and then go show the actual car at Detroit or even New York. So they did that with the TT last year. They showed the the, uh, the, um, invidia powered, uh, cockpit, uh, at CES. And then they had all the new lights right. Right. Right. And then, uh, the actual car was at Geneva or something. So,

right. Yeah. I mean, that's, I just, I find car companies, like, it's crazy what they choose to hire. Like, there's like the standard narrative. which has got cars have to become big gadgets because people have gadgets, so you've got to appeal to, like, the teens. Because the gadgets are back. The gadgets are back. But then it's like the Toyota booth was like the Marai Hydrogen Park car. And what they were saying, what the thing they were pushing the most was like,

extensive patent portfolio available for license. Yeah. And it's like, who is here that's like, oh, I can get some Hydrogen patents, though? Ah, shit. Just for it. InVitia was the same thing, right? They spent a good hour and a half talking about like these. Oh, that was so much.

the colors and the, you know, if they would have spent two minutes on it and be like, hey, we did this, it's cool. We would have all thought it's cool. But they took 45 minutes. I think they had something else to show. And then last minute, they were like, oh, we don't. Let's fill it with this. No. It just seemed like that.

It's weird. That's not how Jensen operates. He just goes for it. He wants to put everyone to sleep. That's his goal. But then, like, put in like a fun way. But last year, last year was the one he was sick. right? Yeah, you were sick, but he still did it.

Yeah, he did. Yeah. Michael Jordan playing in the finals when he has the flu, except not at all. Yeah, this, he wasn't, he didn't win the game. You weren't alive when Michael Jordan was playing basketball, Sam. I mean, that's false, Chris. Let's get real. Cold teen takes. Cold teen. No.

All right. Do any other car stuff come out? At Detroit. In life? You didn't talk about the bolt. Yeah, so the thing. Thank you, Sam. So the bolt happened. What is the bolt? The bolt is...

The bolt is... Not from a movie with a dog. The bolt is GM's answer to the non-existent Model 3. They want to create an electric car for the masses that can actually go a reasonable amount of range. Tesla's Model 3. Right. Okay. Yes.

So if you look at a car in that price range today, like the Nissan Leaf or the Volkswagen E-Gulf, they generally have ranges of under 100 miles. The bolt is promising 200 miles at a price after tax rebates of $35,000. Released probably in 2017. Right now it's just a concept car, but it's definitely going to happen. Fully electric. Fully electric. And basically, there's actually a really good piece in the journal this week about how

this car is basically a hedge against new fuel economy. regulations that go into effect in 2017? 2017? Yeah, I think it's 2017. Meaning what? Meaning the way federal fuel economy regulations work is that across an automaker's entire range of vehicles, they need to have a blended miles per gallon that's a certain number. So like they'll sell these giant F250s and Chevy Silveradoes that get 11 miles of

the gallon and then counterbalance it by selling 50 mile per gallon diesels. Got it. And bolts. And so this car is basically a hedge against that so that they can keep selling Silveradoes. Right. They're not, and that's what has Elon Musk kind of up in arms. He's like, look, you know, that's great. But really, they're just trying to meet these restrictions, right?

But it's so incentivizes to develop the cars and sell them. It does, but it doesn't incentivize them to make a really kick-ass car necessarily, right? The way Tesla wants to because this is their business. It's all they do. Whereas GM is like, all right, let's crap out an EV. So, you know, I don't want to give them too much, too much crap on this because, you know, obviously we haven't driven the car. It doesn't even exist yet. And maybe it'll be great.

But that's sort of the regulatory environment that we're seeing this car come into. It's a shame. Speaking of cars. Oh, God. Speaking of... You're really bad at Segways. Electro cars. Time for H-TFT.

Speaking of Elon Musk. Just today. He just casually tweeted, well, I'm going to build a Hyperloop test track, probably in Texas. Like, what? That's where you do it? Yeah. No, I know, but just. There are no laws in Texas.

But they're going to, they're going to do it. You want to talk about electromagnets. You're hyperloping now. It's just, it's cool. That's not, that's, I don't know what that was. Literally that conveyed no information. It barely conveyed a tone. No, here's the thing.

We found out about the Hyperloop in 2013. We have a great storage room. Actually, our, this, Our story stream of the Hyperloop is super useful. Like, I tweeted, it was great. Corporate Sam is back. Yes, I'm here. So he announced the Hyperloop, and for people that don't know what it is,

he promises a trip from Los Angeles to San Francisco in like 40 minutes, right? And like a pod. And when he announced this thing, everyone was like, you're crazy, you're Superman, you're Tony Stark. Like, let's see if you could do it. Then he, he like gave the blueprints out. He was like, here, here's how it's going to work. Here are the blueprints if you want to try it, build it.

And then, so that was all in like 2013 summer, summer 2013. And now about a year and a half later, he says, I'm going to build one. He's going to do it. And it's going to be crazy because he built a rocket that can land and come back down. He's sending parts to space. Let me, let me fact check you on two things. One, he built a rocket that tried to land on a barge. True.

Two, he's not building the San Francisco. But it tried with style. Tried with style. Fair enough. Two, he is not building the San Francisco to L.A. Hyperloat. No, I know. He's building a test track. He's building a test track.

But just the fact that he has the infrastructure and brain power to make that a real thing. And then he followed up the first tweet with, oh, yeah, I want to have students and organizations come and just pod race in this thing. Like pod racing in Star Wars. Not, yeah. I mean, I will say that the first time we heard about the Hyperloop, I sent what I would deem a frantic yet passionate email to our team. Yes. Insisting that we build a hyperloop of our own.

It turns out that just demanding that people build you a hyperloop results in nothing. I was like, we can do it. We'll just, we just need some like tubes. Need some two by four. Electro magnets. Yeah. And we can get some. If there are any, here's what I'll say, if there's any university students out there who are happy to be paid in, in beverages, soft drinks.

Or verge swag. Verge swag. stickers, we have all kinds of stickers. Yeah. And you want us to fund your ill-fated attempt to build a hyperloop. I will do it. I will even kick in a pair of beats studio headphones. Yeah.

For $199. You have to buy them for me still. The application fee is $1.99. If there are any university students out there who want to try to build a hyperloop. In their backyard. Yeah, like a backyard hyperloop. I will do it. I will somehow give you something.

You know there are people watching out there that could probably help build this thing, I think. Look, you just need some tubes, some magnets, a little bit of love. A little bit of elbow grease and, yeah,

and a bit of luck. Any, like a number of montage sequences. These people working hard, sweating, in the garage. Boom, you got your hypoly.

It's like, no, it's not boom. Like the first time they tried off, like the dude just like flies off and like lands in the pool, you know? That's going to happen to you a couple of times.

It's basically the, rocky training montage except building hyperloop instead. Right. Right. And there's like one goofy guy. He's like not any help. You know, he's just always like right. He's like always behind him like carrying tools.

It's a really good visual. Everyone's like, oh, Joey. Yeah, exactly. He's like, he's the one who's like putting the banana in the hyperloose. No, that actually happened except with fish, remember? Yeah. They had a fruit tube and they tried putting a fish in the fruit tube and it worked. Fish Fridays tomorrow.

Stay tuned. Fish Friday and the bird is coming up once again. For those who would like the incredibly dumb story about this, we once discovered that writing any story about fish technology was incredibly powerful for our audience. We still don't know why. Really connected with people. So I demanded on one particularly slow day that everybody Google the words fish technology in every one of those stories immediately exploded.

It was wild. Including one of the gif of like the fish cannon. It was a weird Friday. It was a really weird Friday. And it's coming again. Typical Fridays of the first show. Fish technology Fridays. All right.

That for better or worse is our show. Tom, do you have any last words? It's been good. It's been emotional. A robot hasn't attacked me today. So I'm feeling kind of relaxed. What hasn't attacked you?

A robot. Last time I was on his show, a robot was trying to kill him. Oh, that's right. I was happy chatting away. and then suddenly smash. David kept rolling in in his telepresence robot?

Yeah. Did the stream just? There, okay, we're back. We're good. Tom, remind everyone when the Microsoft event is? January 21st at 9am Pacific. And why don't you fly back to London?

Because I want to have you back on the show next week after the Microsoft. I fly on the 22nd. So then we'll have a very sleepy Tom Warren on that Thursday. Or drunk, perhaps. Yeah, one of the two. Probably both.

Oh, and high as well, because Wade is Liguin. all the teens are texting for weed texting for weed the Sam Shephyr's story sure I'll take it I'll take it I can't have that

I mean it's not the best title of autobiography but texting for drugs Oh that's my autobiography I thought there was a DVD special Why would that be better Because people actually DVDs were before you were born Were you gonna say because people watched DVDs

But I didn't say it I held back That was gonna be dumb Oh I'm glad we all got there together. Okay, that was our show. Sam, say some words about engagement. Okay. So the first thing you want to do is go to YouTube.com slash the verge and hit that subscribe button. Uh, we recently hit 500,000 and we're going to hit a million soon and we want there. We want you to be there with us because we're going to make some awesome videos this year. I promise. Um, you could also add us on

Snapchat. We have a lot of fun there. Still figuring out what we're doing. Um, but if you saw them at CES, we're just going to keep snapping. It's fun. Uh, we are the real verge there. We're on Twitter at Verge. Tom is Tom Warren, Eli's reckless, and Chris is Z power, and I'm Sam Sheffer. And we're also on Google Plus,

which is apparently still a thing that you can go do. We're on LO if you're into that. No, but you should really subscribe to our YouTube channel and like us on Facebook if you haven't, Facebook.com slash verge. And Instagram also,

we're on Instagram. Instagram.com slash verge. And that's about all I have to say. This was a good show. I think I feel good about this one. Hype check our own show. This was great. I had a lot of thought on this one.

And that's all I have to say. That was it. That was our show. Thank you for listening. People of the world. Thank you. Thank you. Bye.

Oh, my God. This is the worst ending. Bye. Goodbye. That's redundant. Bust.