The Vergecast - The ups and downs of the iPhone 16E

Episode Date: February 21, 2025

Lots of gadget news this week! David, Jake Kastrenakes, and Allison Johnson start by talking about the iPhone 16E, which is both the cheapest compelling iPhone in a long time and a deeply odd addition to Apple's phone lineup. They also discuss the end of the Humane AI Pin, the latest from the Rabbit R1, and whether AI gadgets are even going to be a thing. After that, it's time for the lightning round: David and Jake talk about Amazon Chime, Mira Murati's new startup, and the future of James Bond. Then, in a special DOGE lightning round, Lauren Feiner joins the show to discuss everything happening with Trump, Musk, DOGE, and the US government. Because there's a lot of it. Further reading: Apple launches the iPhone 16E 8 important things to know about the iPhone 16E The iPhone is done with home buttons — here’s why I’ll miss it Verge staffers react to the iPhone 16E: what we love and don’t love Apple no longer sells new iPhones with Lightning ports How the new iPhone 16E compares to the rest of Apple’s iPhone 16 lineup Apple’s first in-house iPhone modem is the C1 Oppo Find N5 review: the final evolution of foldables The world’s thinnest foldable phone doesn’t come cheap Humane is shutting down the AI Pin and selling its remnants to HP The Humane AI Pin never had a chance Rabbit shows off the AI agent it should have launched with Amazon’s revamped Alexa might launch over a month after its announcement event Microsoft announces quantum computing breakthrough with Majorana 1 chip A death knell for Chime Mira Murati launches rival to OpenAI called Thinking Machines Lab The New York Times adopts AI tools in the newsroom Amazon now has creative control over the James Bond franchise Spotify’s HiFi streaming could finally arrive this year Treasury inspector general will investigate DOGE payments access | The Verge Trump threatens 25 percent ‘and higher’ tariff on chips. Acer is the first to raise laptop prices because of Trump Trump issues an executive order claiming more oversight of independent agencies like the FTC and FCC. Trump administration cancels approval for NYC congestion pricing. DOGE’s alleged cost-cutting achievements included a few extra zeroes. A SpaceX team is being brought in to overhaul FAA’s air traffic control system Trump admin pulls hundreds of videos from CFPB’s YouTube channel DOGE can keep accessing government data for now, judge rules Email us at [e-mail] or call us at 866-VERGE11, we love hearing from you. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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And they may not all be regulated. The threshold is so high that only 11 cosmetic ingredients have been restricted by the FDA since 1938. This week on Explain It to Me, the chemicals lurking in your cosmetics. New episodes, Sundays, wherever you get your podcasts. Welcome to the Vergecast, the flagship podcast of the Humane AI Pymn, for what I assume will be the very last time. I'm your friend David Pierce.

Neely is out on vacation somewhere. I don't even know where he is. He's on a beach doing vacation things. He's gone. Jake Kastranakis is here. Hi, Jake. Hey, thanks for having me. It's been a minute.

I'm very happy you're back. Alison Johnson is also here. Hi, Allison. Hello. Allison, you're going to hang with us for a while, and then you're going to go do more fun things than hang with us. But we have a lot of stuff to talk about. The Humane AI pin is dead. And I think we are obligated to spend several hours talking about that as the leading publication on all things, Humane AI pin.

There's a new iPhone. Amazon Chime is dead, which no one has talked to me about yet. And I have really strong feelings about that I cannot wait to discuss. There's a lot of politics stuff that we're going to wait and get to at the very end of the show. We are going to save as much Trump, Elon Doge stuff for the very end. And we're going to tell you when you can stop listening if you don't want to hear it anymore. All that is coming. But let's start with the iPhone.

This is, this, it's, this like turned into sort of an accidental iPhone launch. Alison, you, you wrote the story. You've talked to folks. What is going on here? Tell us about this new phone. Yeah. So we've been kind of expecting a new iPhone SE successor for a little while now. The, the rumors were swirling.

And what we got is the iPhone 16E, the SE series is dead question. Mark. Do we know what E stands for? Okay, I like David Mell's explanation. It's E stands for eggs and that's why it's so expensive. No. Okay. Cool. Because Essie, was Essie officially special edition or was it one of those where like Apple just sort of makes up letters and refuses to explain what they are? I feel like Apple probably circulates a rumor that it was special edition and we all just like repeat it and then it becomes fact. Yeah, do not know. I do not know what E stands for easy, extra. I don't think either of those terms apply. So the gist is like it's sort of an S-E successor, but they're really positioning it as like part of the 16 family.

So it's a 6.1-inch screen. It's basically like an iPhone 14 kind of chassis. So it's a modern phone, which the last S.E. was not. It had a tiny screen. And it does Apple Intelligence, of course, has wireless charging, but no mag save, which is a very weird reality. And all the kinds of like modern iPhone things you would expect. Like what are we on A18 processor now? Oh, and the new Apple modem, the C-1. So this is its debut appearance. So I want to talk about the C-1 separately because I think that's super interesting. But the more I look at this phone, the less I think I understand why it exists. Except, like, if you just want to say Apple should sell a phone for less than $800, sure, fine, whatever. Apple itself has never bought into that theory.

This company has spent the entirety of its smartphones selling life refusing to sell cheap smartphones because it can make a lot of money and sell a lot of phones for a lot more money. So I don't buy that as the whole reason for the existence of the 16E. The SE, weirdly I understood more because it's like, look, you want the little phone. Here it is. They did it with the mini. They did it with it. It's like, look, it's cheaper.

It's smaller. It wasn't the little phone. It was the, we kind of forgot about this. We still have some lying around. It's fair. If you'll take it, like you'll give us money. Sure. Yeah.

Yeah, it's like the leftover bin of funds. Which weirdly is a strategy. I actually understand more. Yeah. I personally, I was offended by the SE line. The ESC was embarrassing. Like that should not have been allowed in stores. This is a hot take.

This is, I think it's a completely reasonable take. This phone, it had the design. of essentially the iPhone 6. It has been a decade, and they were still selling that thing. Apple should have made the SE and just had it only be refurbished. Like, just never even acknowledged that it's a new phone. Just jump straight to, like, it's in the clearance section at a Best Buy. Like, that's what the SE should have been.

Someone's old iPhone. Yeah. Right. And even though no one's ever had it, it's been sitting in a factory for six years. So, like, sure, it's old. Yeah. The previous SE, the outgoing one, it was bad. I mean, the screen was way too small for like a modern phone.

It did feel like kind of leftovers. But it cost $429 with like paltry 64 gigabytes of storage. So that's like kind of you figure out that's like a $500 phone. So that was something. That was like, hey, you want a cheap kind of iPhone that exists. I didn't think anybody should buy it, but it was there. So this one costs $5.99 with 128 gigs of storage, which is like a reasonable amount of storage in a modern screen. But that's like way more expensive.

So yeah, we're not talking about a cheap iPhone anymore. We're not talking about like the like cost to feature tradeoff is just like all out of whack. this time, I feel like. From the Apple making money perspective, I will agree. I don't totally understand, right? Because they want to go high-end expensive. From the value prop for the average buyer, you know, my early take is this is going to be the phone to buy.

Interesting. This is almost everything you'd get from the standard iPhone 16 for $200 less. $200 for MagSafe, whatever. I could not disagree more. This is so fun. Oh, really? We've all been reviewing phones for a very long time. And I think the thing that I have had drilled into my head over a decade is that the difference in actual cost in terms of like how people feel it between a $500 phone and a $1,000 phone is smaller than you think.

And there has been no market for a $600 phone for 10 years because it doesn't matter because that's not how people buy phones because people trade in their phones. to remove the costs they pay them over time. So it comes out to like a couple of dollars a month. Like people keep their phones a long time so they're able to amortize the cost over a long period of time. So the idea, like if this were $199, I would be all in on it. And I would completely agree with you, Jake, that like bang for your buck, this is the best iPhone.

At $5.99, I'm like, okay, you're looking at, I don't know, a dollar 50 a month less on your thing. And who, that is a bad trade. And so I'm at the point now where like, I want to talk about the tradeoffs album made here because I think they're actually really interesting. But even absent all of those, I'm like, even if every tradeoff is the right one and I don't think they made all the right tradeoffs, it's not that big a savings. I don't know. Like cut this price in half and I think it's super interesting. I think there are so many people who are just like, what iPhone should I buy?

If you have to ask that question, get this one. Yeah. So the test keys is my husband. He has an iPhone 10R. It barely, you know, gets through a day. And he's just like, it's time to buy a new iPhone. He's the person who will just be like, which one's the cheapest? I'll take that one. I asked him, I was like, are you going to miss MagSafe? And he said, what is MagSafe? So there you go. All right, well, you have done your husband a great disservice, Allison. We have to test it. We have to see if it's good. But assuming it is as, like, expected, I don't know what you would be missing out on, right? Like, I think if you got the old SE, I would be like, that looks like an old phone, right? You're going to have a very different experience.

The 16E, same processor, same screen. Everything is essentially the same as the standard 16. You're just like not missing out in the same way that you used to be. I do largely agree with that. And again, I think the only thing I'm really thrown by here is that this thing is like $200 more expensive than makes sense for it to be in my head. But let's put that aside for a minute. So I do think the tradeoffs Apple is making here are really interesting for exactly that reason, Jake, because what they're clearly trying to do is get rid of all the things you don't care about down to a price that is more affordable. but essentially solves the it'll still do all the iPhone things you need it to.

So, Alison, this is a complicated thing to ask you to do off the top of your head. But like between the iPhone 16, which until this week was the base one in the line and the 16E, what are the things you lose by downgrading the $200? I think MagSafe is a big one. I mean, the complicating thing in there is that the iPhone 15 is, still a thing you can buy. Right. So Apple.

Ignore that for now. We'll come back to that. But I think the like the should you buy last year's phone thing just makes everything complicated. So let's just throw that out for now. Let's just go 16 versus 16E for now. Yeah. So 16E does the thing where it has one camera. So you lose the ultra wide.

And with that, you lose the macro capabilities. So there's that. Again, not a thing my husband is going to care about. I keep coming back, too. Yeah, it's not a huge list of things. I don't think. The camera control obviously is not there. You get that action button.

That's kind of it. Am I missing anything huge? You lose the dynamic island. Dynamic island. Yeah, yeah. So. If I'm being completely on. honest. You are a dynamic island

fanboy. I know. I know. The opposite. I had to tap on my phone screen to double check and make sure that the 16 didn't also have a notch. Like, I cannot, I don't know. The dynamic island is actually neat. Like, as somebody who follows

sports a lot, the idea of having the little live activities is great. I actually think Apple has done that really well. Don't think it's a thing I would like miss in a huge constant way. if I didn't have it anymore. Pay $200 more and get better access to sports scores.

That's a selling point. I feel like that would work. The one other spec I think that has made a lot of people feel feelings is the 60 Hertz display on the 16E. And I think, again, if the rubric is, does Allison's husband care? The answer is almost certainly no. We've talked about this on the show before, but I downgraded from, I've had a pro or a pro max every year. for years. And I downgraded to the 16 because I wanted the blue one, a decision I have never for one second regretted. Like, I'm not kidding. It was such a good decision. The blue one makes me so happy.

The 60-hertz display thing is like, it's really noticeable if you hold two phones side by side, one with the 60-hertz display and one with 120 hertz pro motion display. It is a real meaningful upgrade. I do not believe it has changed my day-to-day experience of using an iPhone one tiny iota like i just i don't see it i always notice it like right when i switch from a 120 hertz display to a phone with 60 hertz for like a day and then i kind of forget about it and then it's nice when i go back to the 120 hertz display i'm like ooh this is really smooth and nice but yeah i think it's it's a thing you can put out of your mind or a lot of people can some people can't and that's fine it it's like weird the apple doesn't include it it's you

You know, we, when we're comparing this to regular iPhone 16, it's like, yeah, they all have a 60-hertz display. But that kind of forgets the fact that, like, maybe they shouldn't. I think it sort of highlights, I mean, you can pick up any Android phone that's $500. It has 120 hertz display. But that's, I don't know. So the rumors, the rumoradi out there, are suggesting that the iPhone 17, just the standard one, is going to get the promotion. 120 hertz display. Oh, interesting. Which I think maybe actually puts the 16E a little bit more in perspective. Like you can see they're going to level up the baseline one. The pro model has already

has a bunch of differentiators. I think it starts to separate those levels a little bit more clearly than the E versus the standard right now where it's like, you know, that is yet another piece of evidence that suggests something that I don't want to believe. have no evidence for, which is that the whole iPhone lineup is about to get more expensive. Oh. Which I think would make, the 16E, I think, might seem cheaper in September than it does right now. And that is a thing that I worry about. Yeah, I believe that.

I mean, I know you said we would save politics for later. So I'm going to give it's a brief. But like, tariffs are allowed. We can, tariffs matter to every gadget we buy. That counts. Is this phone $600 if the tariffs didn't hit? Or is it, right? Or is it $600 because they know the tax?

tariffs are here because they know the other phones are probably going to have to get more expensive. That feels really possible to me. The thing, if this phone was $500, like, sold, you know, MagSafe, fine, whatever, it feels like a $500 phone that they're charging $600 for. So I will accept any theory about why that is. I do think there is an interesting piece of math in there that is what people are upgrading from and how much they're getting in trade-in value right now. Because I think, like, if you're coming from, I don't know, an iPhone 13, let's say,

and you're getting like $300 or $400 in trade-in value, and that would turn a $500-16E into like $100 phone, like that suddenly becomes pretty compelling. And I think this is why the phone price thing is so complicated because everybody is actually paying a different price. the price of a phone is not the price of a phone. It is actually dependent on so many other things, especially in the U.S.

where everything is mediated by carriers and everything has long-term deals. It's just a mess. Like I have to buy my wife a new phone because she is just spectacularly good at breaking her phones. I love her very much, and she just can't keep a phone alive. And just try, she's basically in,

she's an Android diehard and absolutely steadfastly refuses to get an iPhone, even though it would make it easier to video chat with our entire family. We have her on the show. She would love to be on the show and tell me how irritating her phone choices are. Yeah, I need this. I need this.

But she is basically like, all I want is like a pretty good phone that's pretty cheap. Which one do I get? And I have found that to be such a more complicated question to answer than I ever expected, especially because like now I'm like, oh, well, the pixel 9A is probably coming soon. But then as soon as that comes out, like the pixel 8 will be a lot cheaper. And that's probably a better thing. It's just like all of this is so confusing. And so I find myself spending less time worrying about how much a phone costs unless it is like $300.

And then it counts, right? Yeah. Okay, this is a very cheap phone now. That's what it kind of feels like the SE was in the territory of like, you could pay that out of pocket. Or I think a good chunk of people could pay that out of pocket. Yeah. And it wasn't out of the question. An $800 phone is different.

And then, yeah, once you get to $600, does that push it into the bracket of like, well, I don't have that lying around. I'm going to subsidize this through my carrier. And then you get into what are the deals right now? What are they offering? And I did this with my hairstylist recently. It's like, what phone do you buy? And we ended up starting with like, what carrier deals are there right now? And that's how we got to, like, she has the pixel line now.

And it's such a sad state of affairs. It is. It was like, what is mint mobile going to give you for free? And it was like, well, that was the better deal than paying for something else out of pocket. So. Yeah. It says an awful lot about the state of smartphones that that is the case. Sure does.

Let's talk about MagSafe because I think this is the, of all the trades that Apple made, this is the one that I stuck on. And Allison, it sounds like you did the same, that it was like, is this? Is this a correct tradeoff to make in exchange for making a phone cheaper? Jake, I don't know how you feel about MagSafe. Notoriously, Jake, runs around the office hating MagSafe. It's true. Well, I have a Pixel 8. And so I have never even seen a magnet in my life.

Not sure what they're used for. The thing everybody says about MagSafe is that it's for wireless charging. And that is true. But it's also only part of why I really like MagSafe. Like, I have no case, but I have a magsafe pop socket on the back of my phone. And this is how I hold my phone. And that stays on there? It stays on.

It slides around in a way that is, like, very fun to fidget with and also very dangerous. But it has never once actually fallen off while I have been using it. So, okay. For now, we're still alive. But also, like, I have a stand here that I put my phone on when I'm sitting at my computer so that I can look at it directly and, unlock it that way and do like two-factor authentication and that kind of thing. It, I have, I have one in my car that MagSaf too. It's like, I see it less as a, as a charging system and more like an accessory system. And the MagSafe accessory system is actually really good now. And I think like there are going to be a lot of people who get this phone and switch from lightning to USBC. And that's going to be annoying, but good, because all of your gadgets are going to be USBC and life with all other gadgets being USBC is better. But I think, there are going to be a bunch of people who miss out on a big part of what makes the iPhone ecosystem great, which is increasingly filled with MagSafe stuff.

So we don't have a lot of MagSafe in my house either with my husband having the 10R. And you having every phone that exists simultaneously. I have all the phones. So I just do like regular wireless charging, which the 16E does do wireless charging without the mag safe. But something that our colleague, Jen Toey, said, was that one of her kids, her like kind of older kids doesn't have, is the last person in the house without MagSafe and it's becoming a problem because everybody else can use the MagSafe and she's the one stuck without it. So that was really like, okay, this is maybe like if your household is invested in this, I can see how that would be annoying. And the thing I'm thinking about is if you hold onto this phone for seven years, which my husband, Charlie, would do that. Is it going to be annoying in seven years that he doesn't have mag safe? I'm like, can't you just stick your phone to the wall over here, whatever we're doing then?

I don't know. It is the thing that feels like, why? Like on a $500 phone, maybe I could see no mag safe. Just why? Why did they leave it out? it's irritating. Yeah, it struck me as the most obvious sort of missing feature. Like the rest of the stuff is downgrades on things.

And I'm actually coming around to the camera choice. I think one of the things I saw, and I forget who was posting about it, but basically the argument that they made is you can now make iPhone decisions based on how much you care about the camera. And I actually think that makes a lot of sense. If you just look at the iPhone as a series of kind of base camera to excellent camera and you just pay more for more camera. That's actually like the simplest way to think about the iPhone line now and kind of works.

And I think most people just want a thing that takes pictures, right? Like that's it. It'll take pretty good pictures. You don't have to think a ton about it. You open the thing with the action button and take a photo and move on with your day. Like I think that describes most people's iPhone photography. And if it doesn't describe you, you're not going to buy the 16E anyway. So that I think I've actually come around to.

We also know cameras are a really expensive part of smart. So if you want to save money on smartphones, that is one way to do it. MagSafe is one that it's like, this feels like a thing that you've gone from not just having better to having worse, like the screen or the camera, but to just not having anymore. And like the camera control I can happily lose because I don't ever, ever use the camera control on my iPhone. Maybe that's just me. I just don't. I don't like it. I don't use it. I forget it's there for weeks at a time. MagSafe is like a core part of the iPhone for me now. And I feel like it would be very hard to get rid of that. What they're doing in the Android world right now is that because basically none of the phones have a magsafe equivalent, which they should. There's a whole standard for it called She2. It's existed for a year and a half of this point. The case companies are just putting a ring of magnets in their cases. So if you have a phone that supports wireless charging, you just buy a magsafe compatible case, slap it on, now you've got MagSafe. Now it's obviously not quite as good because you can't use those accessories like the super slim, you know, wallet that just smacks right onto the

the phone itself, but, you know, if you are somebody who just really wants MaxA, you can get it. There's ways to get it. True. And I suspect that's a possible outcome for the 16E here. Surely somebody's going to fill that market. You know, it's not as elegant. I agree with you. I think there's probably going to be a lot of people who are bummed about this.

But there's some options. And the Android world has lived slightly unappily without it for a few years now. Yeah. Yeah, I think. I think the case thing is actually a pretty good argument. And, and, like, you can get into this ecosystem if you really want to. And, like, honestly, the way Apple is going to sell this based on the way that they sell everything else is like, well, if you want all that stuff, it's only $200 more. Like, it's such a, they now have the thing where they're going to be able to sell you.

Start with the $599 phone and then you're going to accidentally leave the store with like a $2,000 pro max. And you're like, I don't understand how this happened. All I wanted was MagSafe. And that is a thing Apple is extraordinarily good at. Before we get off this subject, and Allison, you're going to review this thing at some point. And when you do, we'll have to check back in because I'm very curious what it's like to actually live with some of these tradeoffs after using the big fancy iPhones. But we should talk about why this modem is a big deal. Jake, can you explain why this modem is a big deal?

Yeah, Apple has been trying to make its own cell phone modems for years at this point. I think we all know they have increasingly been trying to make more and more of their own in-house parts. And that has worked out really phenomenally well for things like processors. They have really struggled when it comes to the modem. At one point, Intel really wanted to get into the cell phone modem game. And so Intel had this big unit working on cell phone modems, and it was not going well at all. Apple at the same time wasn't going well for them either. Apple bought Intel's entire team, an entire team that was failing.

And so fast forward several more years, they have taken that team and they have finally put together a modem. And we haven't got a chance to test it out. I think this is really interesting because if you look at the iPhone 16E, we've essentially tested every part of it in other phones before. The one new thing here is the C1, which is what Apple is calling its first modem. And whether it can keep up with the standard Qualcomm modem that has been in every other iPhone is going to be the big question here. Because that is a thing people will notice if their cell connection is spotty and drops out.

I don't know if you guys have seen this, but the conspiracy theories about this are just rampant. No. In our comments on Reddit, everywhere. And the leading conspiracy theory is that Apple has actually been sabotaging the Qualcomm modems in the other iPhones in order to make it so that the performance gap between those phones and the 16E is small. I should be clear that there's absolutely no reason to believe any of this. I think somebody was like, oh, there's a Qualcomm chip, but they use the other more mysterious Qualcomm chip. And I'm like, I don't know what a mysterious Qualcomm chip is. But like it is a really interesting and measurable thing, right?

Like, to your point, Jake, you're going to be able to hold two iPhones next to each other. And the only reason one would get faster speeds than the other is because Apple made one and Qualcomm made the other. And I have a feeling actually both companies are going to be very nervous about how that's going to go. Because, like, if you're a Qualcomm, you look at what Apple has done to the Silicon world over the last several years and has the way it has just lapped Intel in particular on all kinds of different devices. And if you're Qualcomm, that suddenly starts to seem sort of nerve-wracking. You've been like the only company in this game for decades and you have made an awful lot of money by being the only one who makes modems that are any good. And then if you're Apple, you're like, oh, God, we've bought this crappy team from Intel. We put all this time and energy into it.

We've sort of staked our thing in the ground and it's not like if we have Antenna Gate 2 because the C1 isn't very good, that's going to be a really tough look for Apple. I'm going to be careful to hold it correctly. I don't know. It's a weird thing. I think the way is you hold it sort of by the top, middle, and just kind of dangle your phone. That's not what I plan to do. No, it's a really strange thing to be contemplating a review of this device. And it's like a modem is a solved problem, you know, in every other phone where I'm like, it's something I'm like aware of when I test a phone.

It's a solved problem parentheses by Quakom. Right. In every way, it's just Quakom all the way down. If you put the Qualcomm thing in your phone, it works. I rarely notice like, oh, the signal seems to be dropping out and it shouldn't. But yeah, this is something I'll be on, obviously, you know, very interested in with the 16E. So we'll see. I'm kind of excited about it.

I first got into tech journalism and reviewing phones, like right as LTE was becoming a thing, which feels like thousands of years ago now. But like doing the thing where you just wander around on the streets, taking 100 speed tests just to see what happens, is like a surprisingly joyful part of these. Yeah, it's going to be a throwback. Yeah, it's great. I'm going to run some speed tests. I'm very curious to see.

I will say the other thing that has come up a bunch in our comments is people who are now wondering if Apple making these modems in-house is going to make it easier slash more compelling for Apple to put modems inside of. MacBooks, which is a thing that I have hoped for for many years and would very, very much love to see. I have no idea why any human would pay for that. But I do not understand why Apple has not done it. Charge you an extra 200 bucks for that?

Done. Sure. I don't understand why they haven't done that. I would have agreed with you until an experience I had last year with the M4 iPad Pro, which was the first time I had my whole life sort of e-simmed. and I literally just turned on the iPad Pro. I was like out at a coffee shop. I didn't connect it to Wi-Fi.

I didn't do anything and it was just online. I logged into my account and was just online. And it was one of the coolest technology experiences I've had in years of just like, it's the difference between when you had to turn your computer on and off every time you used it and just opening the lid and it started to be on again, that all of a sudden, like the whole thing just feels better and more accessible. this idea that everywhere I am I can just pop my laptop open and start working is like there's something real there.

I would use a Starbucks hot spot from my house if it saved me money on my cell phone bill. What like adding another device to your thing? I understand. I think it makes a ton of sense for business users. It does sound amazing and magical, but it's a lot of gadgets, a lot of gadgets.

I know. I say all that. but I've always been too cheap to buy the cellular Apple Watch for like and it's it's the same thing. It is like magically connected everywhere is the whole pitch and I get it and I want it and I wouldn't pay any more for it. But I think I would on a laptop. I would almost never use it because I just sit at home on my Mac Mini every day. But like it would make me feel good. Yeah.

I would enjoy it. All right. We should talk about one more phone before we get off of phones. And that phone is the Apo FindN5, a phone that is not coming to the. the United States. Dom Press and our team reviewed it. Allison, I just want to know how jealous you are that you have not gotten to try and review this phone. This is the thinnest foldable phone in the world. According to Dom, it got a lot of the hardware things right. It's basically as thick as a USBC port plus like the least metal you can possibly imagine. I believe, let me see,

I'm just going to read a sentence that he wrote. When closed, this is less than a millimeter thicker than an iPhone 16 Pro Max or Samsung Galaxy S25 Ultra and weighs only two grams more than the Apple phone. Open, it boasts a bigger screen than an iPad Mini but is thinner and weighs less. It's lighter than any of the foldables you can buy in the U.S. right now and is a full three millimeters thinner than the Galaxy Z Fold 6. Like this is this looks like what a foldable is supposed to look like. Like Apple, they did it. They did it. Yeah. And I kind of, I love Dom's kind of thesis on this review is like, now what?

You know, it's still a pretty expensive phone. I think we just got word of the pricing is like around, well, it's not coming to the U.S., which we've established, but it would cost around $1,800 if you just did the calculation. Which, to be fair, is like, that's the going rate for foldables, but that is still literally 100% too expensive. Yeah, yeah. It should be half of that price, and then I think these things would have a real shot. three iPhone 16 E's. I can see you get there. Like the on screen amount

alone, that kind of adds up. It's interesting. Yeah. You could take three 16 E's and make a trifold. Yeah, like accordion style, your three 16 E's. Dom asked, is this the end? And the answer is no, more screens. Yeah. What if I

took all these and just took them apart into many screens? Yeah, it looks so beautiful. I'm going to find one at mobile world Congress and put it in my pocket and run out of the convention hall. No, and it sounds silly or like, well, they were already pretty thin, like comparably. And but like every millimeter really does make a difference, especially when you're folding in half. And I just keep coming back to the pixel fold to, what a nine pro fold. Um, where you're like, could that really be as nice as it

seem like the specs, the dimensions seem right. And then you pick it up. You're like, this is right. It feels so nice to use this. That's the impression I got from Domric on the on the Apple phone. And I want to pick one up and not give it back. I do think it's really exciting that it seems like we are getting closer to the point where the hardware works. Right.

Like I quibble with Dom a little bit on the idea that like you can't see the creation. see the crease. And it's like, no, it's right there in the picture, in every picture. Like, I see it. There's still a crease. And these things all need to be sturdier. They need to be more durable. They need better cameras. Like, I actually think there's quite a bit of refining and improving left to do in a lot of these devices. But as a pure piece of hardware design, like, we're actually, we're getting close. And then it's like, okay, now we just have to take this thing and cut $700 off it. And sincerely, I have no idea if that's possible. But I think, if it's not, we're sort of done here, right?

Like, I think the market for an $1,800 phone of any kind is just never going to be very big. I just don't see it. And I think most people are like, if I could have this phone exactly or this phone exactly, but it opened up to be bigger, I would take the one that opened up to be bigger, but I'm not willing to make any trades in service of that thing, I think is where most people are. That's 100% where I, like, huge nerd. would love a folding phone. Really cool.

The cameras are ever so slightly worse and it costs $600 more. Yeah. That's not worth it for me. Right. Yeah. And it's like, I think it's a phone that like my parents would really like. Like they would love to unfold their phones and read something and be able to make the text bigger or whatever.

See pictures of their grandkid and a big, bigger size. But I am never going to recommend one to them. it's, you know, the durability is just too much of a question mark. And Don makes a good point in the review that if you can't afford to replace this phone or make a very expensive repair to it, then you should not buy a folding phone. And I think that's exactly right. That's a good rule of thumb. Yeah, like if you couldn't afford to walk into the store and buy two of these,

you probably shouldn't walk into the store and buy one of these. Have they fixed the like your fingernail will crease the screen forever problem on foldables yet because that's that's horrifying. That's better. Yeah. Better is still. Yeah. I still don't risk it too much and you definitely don't want to like have a piece of debris in your bag

and like that like the phone folds over on. I've carried a lot of folding phones in the bottom of my tote bag which is dusty and gross and they have all been okay. But I haven't done that for like two years or three years, you know. So. Yeah. The long-term durability of one of these is still the biggest question to me.

Like, the, is it going to break the first time you open it thing? Not completely solved from any of these. But, like, mostly solved. It's gotten a lot better than the, like, oops, I accidentally peeled off the screen, which was not that long ago. But we're still at a point now where, like, that thing you just said out of something about, like, debris in your pocket is, like, Like, you're going to get a little nervous every time you just throw this into your purse or your backpack.

And until you solve that, just not quite there. But we're getting there. And I think the idea that there are a bunch of companies pushing really hard at this design stuff is cool. And I wish they'd stop worrying about thinness and start fixing the durability stuff. But that's how I feel about all phones right now. The iPhone error, I'm going to say this again in September. And whenever we get the Galaxy S-25, was that the air? to edge edge that's right I feel to say like we're we're doing a thin phone year and I'm like

what if our phones didn't break that'd be cool I mean that we'd like that yeah but yeah this thing is not coming to the US which is sad to devastate but we're we're gonna we're gonna find one there was a world in which we thought one plus might take this and launch it itself I don't understand what one plus just came out and we're just like we're not going to do it they know they just came out and broke our hearts. Yeah, they didn't have to. I don't understand what was in this for them. They could have kept us going, at least for a little longer.

All year. All year we could have been pleading with them. There's, like, hey, you know that phone? Everybody's really hyped about this week. Like, the one that people are more excited about maybe than this iPhone, not going to do it. We're just like, yeah. We just literally could pass. Don't bother.

Yeah. One plus, the company that for years, all it ever did was build hype. This time, it's like, no, no, no, no, no, don't get excited. We have nothing for you. Anti. Yeah. All right, we need to take a break, and then we're going to come back, and we are going to talk about the saddest little gadget sitting on my desk right now. We'll be right back. Support for this show comes from Shopify. Starting something new isn't just hard. It can be really scary, too. So much work goes into this thing that you're not entirely sure will even work. But here's a better thought. What if it did all work? What if your instincts were actually right all along? Shopify wants to help you get there. They're the commerce platform behind middle. millions of businesses worldwide and nearly 10% of all e-commerce in the U.S.

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Join the 2.7 million small businesses using LinkedIn. to hire. Get started by posting your job for free at LinkedIn.com slash track. Terms and conditions apply. All right, we're back. Enough phones. It's time to talk about the gadget that will inevitably for sure replace your smartphone. Who cares about the iPhone? No one needs it anymore. The humane AI pin will solve it. Everything's going to be just fine. I'm so excited. I think there's a lot of potential here. David, what's the latest?

So I think it was about, what, nine months ago that the AI pin had launched. It went poorly, I would say. I was mean to it and not as mean to it as I should have been in retrospect. We'll get back to that. But there was this rumor going around that Humane was actually looking to sell itself, right? This company had raised a ton of money. It had brought on a ton of hype. It kind of bombed with its first product.

We didn't think it was going to work. and then it was trying to sell itself to HP for somewhere between 750 million and a billion dollars. And we were all like, that seems high. Also, L.O.L. at HP, paying a billion dollars for Humane's weird AI operating system and this thing, the AI pin, that basically didn't work at all. That never came to anything. Humane kind of went quiet. they were like slightly apologetic and then we're like well we're also making an operating system that's going to be a whole thing batten down the hatches do their thing and then this week it was announced that HP was buying technology from Humane HP actually reached out to us to very carefully confirm that HP was not acquiring Humane it was buying some technology and assets and and hiring some people from Humane but that human Humane, as we know it, including DAI pin, is shutting down.

And as of February 28th, so a week from Friday, today as you're hearing this, the AI pin will essentially be dead. They're turning off the service. It won't do any cloud stuff. There's a thing in Humane's FAQ. One of the questions is basically like, what will my device be able to do? And it's like, it'll be able to tell you its battery level. Yeah, this thing is, this is really, really rough.

Like, if you bought one, you knew you were an early adopter, Like straight up, your $700 or $800 pin is just dead. Like it's doing nothing and basically nobody is getting a refund. In less than a year. That hurts. Yeah. Yeah. That's bad.

Yeah. Humane is doing refunds for people who are in the 90-day window in which people could normally get refunds. Would love, love to know how many people that is. Oh my God. I had the same thought. Like, if you bought. You think they set aside any money for that?

Let's see, three months ago would have been like, Thanksgiving. So if you if you bought a humane AI pin, let's say between November 1st and today, please email us, Vergecast at theverge.com and tell us everything about why and who and under the influence of what and what has happened since. I want to I want to know everything. Who got one for Christmas? Oh my God. I bet that happened. There are people who are like, oh, I have a I have a nerdy nephew. Like, what can I buy him? Oh, no. A $700 pin. Oh, man. But yeah, I think. Which required subscription as well. Yeah. Yeah. Great. Love, love to spend all of the money in the world.

You could buy an iPhone 16E for less than a human half. David, you reviewed this thing. I did. Right. They had these, these big promises about the future of AI, the future of wearables. They were trying to redefine gadgets, right? Move into a post smartphone era. Were they on to anything? Well, this is where Allison and I have been fighting for a year and will continue to fight. Because I still think the answer is yes. I think the answer to how much are they onto and how meaningful is the thing that they were onto? TBD, right?

But I think the idea that you should have a way to interact with AI that doesn't involve taking your phone out of your pocket, yes. I am convinced there is something there. And I think after this happened, West Davis on our team, DM to me. And he's like, this thing would have been better if it was just a Siri microphone that you could wear, wouldn't it? And I was like, yep, it would have. And I think that's really true. But Humane's thing was they just went too hard at it. And they did a bunch of stuff that was technically sort of impossible.

They made a laser projector as one of the key user interfaces. Like, all this stuff sounds absurd in retrospect, and it seemed absurd then, frankly. It seemed to absurd the whole time. But they had a laser projector instead of a touchscreen, and it's like, we're all pretty good at messing around on screens now. It was designed to do everything by voice. It was designed to have everything be totally abstracted away from you. And the vision of that is actually what a lot of people have. Like, people talk about agentic AI and the idea that all of these systems should be able to go work for you.

Open AI is working on that. Google is working on that. We've seen some of the stuff that they're working on. They're all working on it as like chatbots in web browsers and apps on your phone. Humane was like,

okay, well, what if this is actually a dedicated device and requires a complete rethinking of how everything happens? And I think that was where it got the thing wrong. So it's like if you boil it all the way down, I think Humane's like, the very first like meeting at a bar where they were like,

here is the thing we should do. think was not that far off. And then every decision they made after that was the wrong one. I think what's so hard there is like what they wanted to do within the current, you know, world of phones is just impossible for a third party app. Right. Yes. And what they were trying to do, even a year ago when they launched, was not something you could do on your Android phone, was not something you could do on your iPhone. Fast forward a year. And you have AI built in natively that is starting to be able to do these things. And so it's almost like they were, you know,

they're pirates trying to board the ship and it just wasn't going to happen. Allison, where was it that you were clashing with David on this? You were in the just dude in the smartphone camp? Yeah. The future of the AI gadget is it's a phone is my stance. And I love a gadget. And I saw the humane pin a year ago at Mobile World Congress and it was like, This is a gadget. Like, it's kind of fun. Is it a good idea? No. We clearly, that's how it panned out. But yeah, it's like, why take all of these things and try to, like, reinvent the wheel and, like, put a worse processor and, you know, make a whole new interface system that people have to learn and figure out heat dissipation, which they did not because the thing would shut itself down.

all the time. And yeah, clearly, like, that didn't work out for them. So, Alison, I think the, it's a real bummer that the AI pin didn't work out because it makes your argument look even stronger than it did already. I noticed that. But I do think the thing to me that gives me the strongest evidence against everything should just be a phone is the camera on the meta rayband smart glasses. Because that is a thing in which my experience of taking photos is.

meaningfully different and in many ways better because I'm not holding my phone in front of my face. And so it's like that's the thing that I look at is like, okay, there are things we can do if we're going to sort of disintermediate the phone and put those components in different places that can be better for it. Yeah. And that's unfortunately the only one that I have found so far. But it is like that's the one I hold on to it that I'm like maybe there is something to this. And I think the idea of a microphone that is also more accessible than the one in my pocket feels meaningful.

to me in that same way. And I think it like, like building on what the phone already has, like it already has a processing power. It can all already connect. Most phones can already connect reliably to cloud services with their Qualcomm modems or whatever. Like instead of throwing all that away and starting like way out here with something else, like the meta ray bands make so much sense because it just sort of starts with like, okay, here's one

capability and it works with your phone and you don't need it if you don't want to carry it at that particular moment and then kind of building on that the way they've been adding the AI features I think is way more compelling than just throwing it all out and being like what if no phone I've been thinking a lot about last let's see it would have been right about now last year I went to New York to to Humane's offices and actually like spent some time with Imran Chowdrey and Bethanye Bonjourno, who are the co-founders. And they were like, it was right before the product was launching. So they had one of those like rooms set up where they had the exploded parts and walked me through how it all works and all the stuff they had developed and they had early prototypes.

And we were just talking through basically like how they had built this thing and where it came from. And one of the questions I asked them was why do this much the first time? Like you're a first-gen hardware startup. you've never done any of this before. Nobody has seen any of this stuff before. Why push this hard on something this expensive and this complicated and this new on your first try? And I believe it was Imran said, because now that we've done all of this work, it will make doing the lesser things much easier.

And I actually, like, there is something sort of compelling in that argument, right? It's like, we've done the incredibly complicated things. So now we're going to strip out the cellular modem. We're going to basically make this thing an accessory to your phone. And it'll be easier and cheaper and better. And now we can do that because we've done the hard work already. The thing that they didn't reckon with is that they were never going to get the chance because this thing went so badly. Right.

And I think what I look at the opposite is like the rabbit where like this thing couldn't do anything. But it was $200 and it was like cute and fun. And I think it bought that company some time because people don't. didn't have the same sort of like visceral negative reaction to how bad it was because it wasn't trying nearly as hard. And I think the lesson there was like, and frankly, like Apple, where in Ron and Bethany worked before, learned the same thing with Vision Pro. Like what, what meta did with the Raybans is like, do the least and then try to build from there. And Apple was like, what if we did the most? And it turns out that's actually in a lot of ways the wrong approach. And I've just been

thinking like the prototype for the simpler, cheaper phone attached thing that I think would have made more sense for Humane, I am very sure exists. And they should have shipped that instead. Humane went way too far in the hardware, which is, I think, part of the thing that was attention grabbing about. Humane was, right, it's this mysterious gadget as a projector, it's tiny, it doesn't have a screen. Obviously, this is a disaster. But I am curious, you got to use it. You tested it, you reviewed it. We know it was bad about it. Was there anything about the hardware that you're like, you know what?

There's something there. It's, um, no. I tried. I tried to find. I'm torn on this in a certain way. It speaks very highly of the team that made it, that it exists at all. Like, it's a beautifully made little thing. Like, it's, it's small.

It's, it's really nice to like, fiddle and worry with it, had a really clever set of accessories. The magnet works really well. It has really pleasant noises. Like the touch reaction is good. There's like all the little tiny details that most companies don't get right on the first try. They got right on the first try. There are surprisingly few of those sort of rough edges were used to from startup products.

But then they had the opposite problem, which is that all the big things they were trying to do didn't work at all. And the big swings that they made were things like the laser projector, which just essentially was useless. Like the interface didn't make any sense. You functionally couldn't use it at all in any kind of light. And it just didn't, they just didn't need to exist, right? And so you could tell that all of the stuff they spent like real huge money and resources on were just pointed in the wrong direction. But then there's a team who was tasked with like making the thing nice and they did a really good job. Like, we talk about like polished turds a lot.

And it's a real, like, we kind of mean this is an insult. But this is like a really nicely polished turd. It really is. I mean, it's like, right, you said it. Like the rabbit sold because it's $200 and it's bright and it's colorful and it's nice. And this thing also very pretty. Just, just way in a different world. Yeah.

I mean, and I think the other mistake that Humane made was the way that they went about. talking about this thing. Like, in writing about it this week, I went back and watched the first TED talk that Imran Chaudry gave where he, like, described the thing. And A, that demo was fake. Like, I just, please lawyers come at me with evidence

that that is not true, and I will happily recant it. I have now watched that demo a hundred times. I've been using this product for a year. And it is impossible that he was able to do those things on stage. to get it to translate between languages without any prompting, to get it to answer a phone call. I know how you answer a phone call on this thing, and it is by doing a gesture with your hands

that he doesn't do standing on stage and it answers the phone call. It's just impossible. But anyway, so they made it out to be this very, like, you know, hugely important, like, they were very quiet about it, and they made this, like, very dour, serious video about how important this gadget was going to be,

and they got it named to times, inventions of the year. And it was like, they set this up to be some huge consequential moment in the history of technology. And it sucked. I mean, it's very funny. Like, it couldn't do what they promised it would do, which, you know, is kind of a big strike to start out with. But I think there's also this element of like they promised it would, you know, bring in this sort of new world of ambient computing where you're not staring at your phone so much. Things just sort of happen in front of you, you don't have to worry about it. And I think what we see with the Meta Ray bands is people already wear glasses and sunglasses.

That's really natural. And putting a chunky pin on your shirt that is kind of uncomfortable and may not stick on. And then having to, like, hold your hand up and look at a projector, that's actually, like, more obtrusive than just quickly pulling out your phone and doing something. Yeah. And so, like, there was clearly this kernel of an idea. that I think really resonates with like everyone. Like it would be great to use our phones less. It would be great if things just sort of happened a little bit more ambiently

and executed on it in, I think, one of the most perplexing ways imaginable. Yeah. So Josh Miller, the CEO of the Browser Company, I don't think he'll mind me telling this story on the Vergecast. We'll see. Josh, sorry. Introduce me not that long ago to this concept of novelty fatigue, which is basically that if you try to do too many new things, even if they're the right things,

at the same time, it will feel wrong to people. And that actually what you have to do in product design is build slowly. Like you can have improved everything imaginable all at the same time and you'll still leave people behind because it won't feel right. It won't feel familiar. And so that that cadence of introducing novelty to people is actually a huge part of the process of product design.

And I think like the most generous possible interpretation of what happened to Humane. And I don't believe this at all, but I think one of the mistakes that they made and one way to look at all of this is they just went way beyond novelty fatigue with everybody. They're like, we are going to reinvent everything about how you do everything all at once. And I think even if it had all worked, it wouldn't have worked because it just felt wrong. and it wouldn't have made sense. It's funny. Like, I understand exactly why he's saying that,

and it's because his browser arc is really perplexing when you first use it. I bounced off that thing like five different times, and now I use it every day and I'm furious that they're like low-key, maybe not working on it anymore. I do, I think you're probably mostly right there, but I do think there's also this thing of like, you know, the two of you have tested every, phone under the sun.

I feel like usually you can tell if there's if there's a little kernel of something in there that is working, you can see it. And I think you were right that they tried way too many things. But I'm not even sure if there was one thing that was clicking there for people. Yeah, just seems like the concept, really. And the way they sold it was like, yeah, don't look at your phone. Just talk to this thing. just be free in the world. And like, who doesn't want that? But yeah, it has to work.

But like, how are you free in the world when there's this like heavy, chunky thing? Like, literally pulling your shirt down. I think ultimately one of the most convincing arguments against the humane pin from the beginning was everything about this makes more sense in an Apple Watch. And I think that is true. Even the things about it that I like, which are like, it's not in my pocket. it's easier to access. It's something I can sort of discreetly talk to without having to stare at a screen. Like, we've found the wearable spot for that,

and I think it's probably on your wrist. And I was really like straight up. I think it is like troubling and unfortunate and bad for technology as a whole that basically we have to wait for Apple or Google to do this. Right? It would be great if Humane could come along and say, hey, we made a watch.

It's going to hook into your iPhone. It's going to do all the, iPhone things and we've added all the stuff. That, right, in a world where they could do that, I would not be surprised if they had just done that. Yeah, this is why I'm so curious to see what Sam Altman and Johnny Ive are working on. Because there is a version of some AI gadget that is essentially headphones or mostly just a microphone or something that is like, give me a tool that just lets me do the sort of advanced voice mode stuff with my AI. bought and there's something pretty interesting inside of that, especially as these models start to get better and more capable. But again, you can't. It is not allowed because Google and Apple

will not let you. Which also like meta is freaking out about this. Like this is going to be the big limitation on future versions of the Raybans. Yep. Which is I think like a little frightening if you look at it because the Raybans are one of the most interesting and sort of exciting products because they're doing so much with so little. And clearly they have big dreams there and is not quite clear. Even if they could pull them off, it's not clear how much they can pull off. Metaphone. We need the metapone.

What was that called? Was that the Chacha? Was that the Facebook phone? Was it the HTC Chacha? Mm-hmm. Before my time. No one has said out loud in a really long time. I just, I literally just, I think that is still in the reviews closet.

We had a review. was primarily for text messaging and also features tight integration with the social network Facebook, which includes a dedicated Facebook button below its keyboard, which allows users to quickly share content on the service.

I just like imagine like a poorly designed BlackBerry that they finished making and at the very like the last second, five minutes before they shipped it, somebody went, oh God, we were supposed to have a Facebook button and just slapped it on the bottom. That's the ACC Chacha.

I never saw one in the wild. I'm going to go. go looking for that. And if you owned one, get at me. I have a lot of questions for you. All right. So this HP thing, we're just writing off, right? Like, there's no reason to continue to believe anything is going to happen here.

The press release for this was so, like, damning in the way that it came out from HP. Like, can I just read you a sentence from, uh, HP's executive? Uh, this is from Twan Tran, who is the, the president of technology and innovation at HP. Humane's AI platform, Cosmos, backed by an incredible group of engineers, will help us create an intelligent ecosystem across all HP devices from AI PCs to smart printers and connected conference rooms. Like, just the fall from grace from we have found the successor to the smartphone to connected conference rooms and smart printers is just tough. I can't think of a place I want AI less than a printer.

like printers are annoying to start with with no extra with nothing no chat bot like making things up like can you imagine i it's a nightmare i listen if they put they put one of those projectors in the printer i i there's something there it's like instead of printing is yeah i guess projectors exist i don't think it could get worse is my theory on the smart printer thing is like sure chat gpte like let me let me just tell you website I'm trying to print and you figure it out. I don't care. What could possibly go wrong? I'll describe it to the printer and it can invent the thing I'm trying to print.

I love it. Before we search Kears Heller, we should briefly talk about Rabbit, which I think is actually continuing to like push it the thing it's trying to do. Like the R1 sucked. I like watching you very gently try not to over over. give them too much credit. Yeah, like I want to give Rabbit the least possible credit while still giving them credit is where I'm at with Rabbit. But they're trying to do the thing.

The big promise of Rabbit and the R1 at the beginning was this thing called the local action model that was going to actually go and do stuff for you. This is what we now call agentic AI. Again, these are the right ideas, at least if you believe the rest of the tech industry. This is what everyone is working on right now. And Rabbit was actually relatively early to be like, we're going to build a thing that lets you do stuff and we'll go do stuff on your behalf. That stuff didn't work ever reliably in any way because all it's doing is clicking around a virtual instance of a really insecure browser for you.

But Rabbit has continued to poke at this. And I think smartly got pretty quiet for a while. Like the thing came out. Everybody is like, this is stupid. and then everybody's like, whatever, it's $200, I won't worry about it. And I think that bought Rabbit a minute to just kind of go do their thing. And they've been slowly launching some of the stuff that they've been talking about.

So the thing that came out this week is an agent that can actually go and use Android apps for you. And it's just a research prototype. And it's essentially like if you've used operator or any of these other things or even like read the white papers, it's exactly what you think. It's basically like clicking around an app on your behalf. But like, it's starting to be able to do those things. And so I think, again, this question of, do I want it to happen on this device that is going to go in my pocket or do I want it to happen on my phone that is already in my pocket? That's a big hurdle even once somebody figures out this technology.

But like genuine kudos to rabbit for continuing to plug away at this thing. And I think it'll be interesting to see where it goes. It's the other answer to your question, Jake, of like, how do you? do you build AI for people if you aren't Apple or Google? How do you get in, you know, without getting into those ecosystems? It's like you, you make a little flashy gadget and release it and get a lot of attention. And then maybe they were just always going to do this, you know, the large action model. And maybe it's like sort of tangentially related to the hardware, but it just clicks around for you.

And like it's, it's interesting. It's intriguing, but I still, I see it. And I think, like, well, the app intents that's coming, you know, with like smarter Siri and iOS 18 is kind of going to be able to do those things for you, it seems like it seems like they're trying to shortcut their way around. Like, we can't get into the operating system the way that Apple obviously can. and it's like a weird, wonky kind of workaround. I do think there's something really delightful in that we were like,

well, it's too complicated to get all the APIs and nobody can give us access to all this. Let's just train computers to be able to understand everything that they see and move a mouse around and just do all the things that human can do. And then we don't have to get actual access, which is just so wildly complicated. But also, like, I get that works. You can do everything if you can do that. It's such a damning critique of like regulatory systems and capitalism. That is the case.

It's like, oh, you can either make Apple play nice or you can invent several unforeseeably new technologies that just end around the whole process. And it's like, well, I guess we'll just go invent the new technologies and it'll be fine. To that end, actually one more thing we should talk about before we take a break and then go to the lightning ground. is Amazon is having an event next week where I would say we're somewhere between like kind of confident and extremely confident that they're going to finally launch this new Alexa we've been hearing about forever. It would be so funny if this was just like, here's some new Eros, like the ones we launched this week. Look at Eros. Here it is. We did a ring again. But I think it's going to be the new Alexa. And I think Amazon is the company maybe best positioned other than Apple and Google to build this AI. stuff in a much more coherent way, right? Like, it has lots of business relationships with the

companies it would need to get the data to do this stuff. We've heard that it's working with providers more directly instead of like trying to do the hacky, go to use the DoorDash website. They're actually going to like integrate with DoorDash in a more meaningful way. And if anybody has the literal resources and time and energy and whatever to bake this stuff in in a way that feels sturdier than just clicking around a virtual. Chrome instance, it would be Amazon. And yet, every single piece of reporting and rumor about Amazon suggests that the new Alexa is going to be very bad. And I just, I don't know how to feel about that. I still do not think people are going to pay for this. Yeah. Oh, they're going to get into charge?

That's the, the rumor has been that it's going to, it's going to come with an upcharge. And I don't think that's a good idea. I mean, Google and Microsoft have both found very quickly that people will not pay extra. And they're starting to roll it back. So like now in workspace, you just get it for free and you're like, can I turn off Gemini? And Google says absolutely not. Under no circumstances, will you turn off Gemini? Gemini is going to ask you every time you try to type anything if you wanted to type in your address instead.

You put the Gemini button in the spot where the comment used to be. Oh, no. And oh my God, is this driving me insane. Command shift M, Jake. What? This is, oh. It'll change your life. This is great, David.

I'm talking to you for an hour and a half every day. Select the text. Command shift M. This is what we're here. They'll change that to be Gemini. And then what will you do, David? Then I'm done. I'm switching to teams after that.

I don't know. All right. Allison, we're going to let you go. Thank you for joining us. You're going to have to come back once you've used the 16E and report back on life without MagSafe because I'm very curious. Sounds good. Thanks for having me.

All right. And we're going to take a break and then we're going to come back at a sliding round time. We'll be right back. Support for the show comes from Anthropic. Not every question. has an easy answer. And the ones that are really worth asking usually come with a healthy mix of inspiration and backpedaling, aha moments, and quiet meditation. When you're working through one of those problems, you want a partner to bounce ideas off of and figure out where

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Spanish authorities are calling it. Before the disembarko, asymptomatikas. Passengers who'd been stuck aboard the Hanta or maybe Hanta virus-stricken Dutch cruise ship disembarked in the Canary Islands this weekend, prompting the highest stakes game of where are they now since maybe COVID? Some of the evacuees, American and French, have since tested positive for the virus. And yet public health officials seem remarkably calm. We do have one individual who was taken to the biocontainment unit early, early this

morning and we assessed that individual. They are doing well. Possibly because this is not the one to freak out over. Today, explain drops every weekday afternoon. All right, we're back. Time for the lightning round unsponsored for flavor. I just want to say, I suggested on the show, Jake, you were not here for this. But Neil, I just randomly out of nowhere called the lightning round unsponsored for flavor like two weeks ago.

He didn't know what he meant by that, but it has stuck in my brain ever since. And last week, I suggested that we should make t-shirts that say unsponsored for flavor on it. And you would be amazed at the number of people who have since told me they would buy these t-shirts. So I can't promise this is going to happen, but this is now a thing I'm increasingly excited. I mean, you guys talked literally the entire lightning round into existence. So listen, I think there's something here. Listen, if we can make a shirt that just says emails that is a reference no one gets, I think we can do unsponsored for forever. I feel good about it.

All right, we have a lightning round. We're going to do this lightning round in two parts. First, Jake, you and I are going to run through some news. We're going to talk about some stuff. And then we're going to take, we're going to stop. We're not going to take a break. We're just going to stop. And then we're going to call Lauren Feiner, who is going to come in,

and she's going to tell us about the week in Trump and Elon and Doge and various governmental shenanigans. Everyone's favorite segment, Brendan Carr is a dummy, is on hayatus for this week while Nila is on vacation. But we'll be back with a vengeance on next Friday show. And so if you, we will give you a moment to stop listening. If you want to stop listening or watching or experiencing us in whatever way you experience us when we start talking. So that's what we're going to do. But first, Jake, let's run through some news. The first thing I would like you to do is explain quantum computing to me.

Yeah, easy. We have one much time now. Okay. So there's these little blah. Yeah. Okay. Sorry, should we describe the story? Yeah.

So Microsoft's announced a thing called Myerana One, which is a new chip for quantum computing that includes several amazing words that I would just like to say to you out loud very quickly. Microsoft's called it the world's first topoconductor, which kicks ass. It also has a new material made from indium arsenide and aluminum. Also kicks ass. There is a thing called a topological cubit. Love this. I don't know what any of this means. it appears, as far as I understand

that Microsoft made a chip that it thinks is going to make quantum computing more accessible for more things. Am I close? So, I think it's one of those, I think with all of these quantum computing achievements, there's a little bit of like a, maybe. Like, nobody's quite sure

you know, it's a stepping stone towards something bigger. I will say, I think, you know, with AI, if you had asked me three years ago, is AI going to happen in our lifetime? I would have been like, not a chance, not even close. And with quantum computing, I have been the same way, where I'm like, I don't need to worry about this. This is like, it's not a thing.

It's just not going to happen. And there have been a bunch of really big announcements about quantum computing recently. And it feels like, you know, the researchers in the field are maybe finally taking steps there. And I don't think the answer is that we're going to have my run on one ships in our houses anytime ever. But I also, one thing I've started to realize about quantum computing is you don't necessarily need them to be everywhere. You just need one quantum computer and you do a lot. And I think we're still quite a ways away. But it's a cool name, cool chip.

Yeah, I think the thing that is making it feel more real for me is exactly what you just said. The idea that this is not like the next next computer that you own in your house. It's the next next thing that exists in a data center that makes all of this stuff vastly more powerful. And it's really interesting. I would encourage everybody to go watch the video that Microsoft published because the way that they talk about the possibilities for quantum computing is a lot of what we hear companies say about AI, which is just the things you can do when you massively scale the amount of processing and the amount of information that a system can understand are very similar.

It's really interesting. So that's one. Thing number two is I would just very quickly, like, to pour one out for Amazon Chime, the funniest and worst piece of video conferencing software that I have maybe ever used in my life. Amazon is shutting down Chime, which is, it's, I think there was a brief period where Chime was going to be like an important part of an Amazon suite of business services, but then video calling became completely commoditized and that just everybody kind of gave up.

And the only time I've ever used Chime is when I'm forced to, in order to talk to people who work at Amazon. And even the people at Amazon, even the people who use Chime, think it's bad. I know that for sure. But the thing I just want to say is that this thing was announced, and a bunch of people were in our comments talking about it. And all anyone said was, Chime sucks.

I worked at Amazon. It was awful. And it was great. And I just enjoyed it very much. A bunch of people who had AWS reps who forced them to use Chime, and now they will not have to. It's a good day for everybody. I just have to say that, you know, before this segment started,

David said to me, Jake, are there any of these stories that you don't want to talk about? And you can't say chime. And the only story that I did not want to talk about, chime. Jake, this is the last time I'm ever going to get to talk about the AI pin and chime on this podcast. You have to let me have this. I feel like Chime was just invent. Like, who was using this thing?

Why were they using it? Why did it exist? I have always thought there was like a 50,000 word feature in company choices of business software. Why did Amazon think they needed a video? calling service. There are 900 of them. Well, do you remember that moment? Surely they have a team subscription. One would think. Do you remember that moment though at the beginning of the pandemic? Didn't Verizon have one? Yeah, Verizon bought blue jeans. Remember blue jeans? This is what I'm saying.

A PR person got mad at me once because I used blue jeans wrong. I was just like, I'm pretty sure. This is your fault. This is I didn't choose blue jeans. I'm pretty sure meta used blue jeans for a minute. Like, truly, I have always thought there is a big story. in how companies pick conference call providers. Like Apple uses WebEx and demands that everyone who speaks to them uses WebEx. I'm just going to say, there are two acceptable video calling services.

There's Google Meet, there's Zoom, and anything else, get it out of my face. 100% agree. I have no notes. Also, if you have a team subscription, bring back phone calls. I'm sorry. I'm so with you.

Listen, people who don't answer their phone anymore, I'm just sound so old and crotchy. Listen, anytime I get a phone call, I'm like, ooh, who's always calling? I want to pick this up. This could be anything. It's a surprise. It's exciting stuff.

It really is. It's always spam. But I had a person I was talking to for a story this week, text me right before we were supposed to get on our Google Meet. And she was just like, hey, can we instead just do a phone call so I can like go on a walk? And I responded to me like, that sounds like that's an awesome idea. Yeah, of course. And truly the joy in her voice when I called her.

And she was like, I'm outside talking to you. I was like this. Let's bring that back. Anyway, enough chime, RIP chime. You were a real one. Miramiramirati, former CTO of OpenAI, joins the OpenAI diaspora in starting a, I would say, somewhat mysterious new AI company.

I don't know that we know much about this company at all yet, do we? Yeah, she's spoken to a bunch of vagaries. They're like, we're going to release research. And I'm like, oh, great. That like, I, listen, Mira obviously a wildly talented AI engineer. Clearly. You know, she was a CTO of OpenAI while they did some very impressive stuff. So I think there's a lot of potential here.

She's attracting a lot of major talent. However, to your point, there are a lot of companies in this, you know, AI diaspora. And I don't know if there's room for all of them. It is sort of fascinating how much of this industry is going to be people who started their company because they disagreed with Sam Altman in some meaningful way. Like that's the anthropic story. That's the Mera's company is called Thinking Machines Lab, which is not a good name. I like it. I like it.

It's like the browser company. If it were thinking machines labs, if it were thinking machine labs, if it were thinking machine labs, fine with that too. They put the S in the wrong place. What about it was possessive? Thinkings machine lab. Oh, I like it. It's Dr. Thinkings. Yeah, I like that a lot.

He's their mascot and, you know, it's got a little lab coat on. Dr. Thinking, like a, he's like a question mark with a cloud above. That's pretty good. Yeah. I like that a lot. Dr. Thinking, TM. That's what you chat with. Yeah.

But yeah, and we're just in this place where it is kind of open AI's ideas percolating out in these sort of mutated forms. lots of different ways. In the same way that like a huge portion of the electric car industry is people who cut their teeth at Tesla and then want on to do other things. And I think that has made that industry different as a result. Open AI is very much doing the same thing around the AI world. Yeah. Fascinating. We'll see. Everybody's raising the most money it is possible to raise on Earth. So congrats to everybody. Next one, the New York Times, speaking of companies against OpenAI, which is suing Open AI. Oh, we should disclose here that Vox Media has some kind of content sharing deal with OpenAI that's all I know about.

So disclosure. The New York Times, which is suing Open AI, is put out some guidance to its team about how to use AI in their actual work and journalism. And I put this one on here for you, Jake, in particular, you are our executive editor. you run our newsroom. How do you feel about this? I mean, it's funny because I don't think there are any reporters who want to use AI. Like, at least for the writing, right? Like, the writing is the fun part.

Like, that's the part of the job that we want to do. And so, and it's funny, if you look at the New York Times guidance, they're kind of, they're like, don't write with this. The thing that the New York Times suggested that, their teams do with AI is like, I don't know that everybody will know this, but like, when you publish an article onto the internet, you know, you would think there's a headline and an image and then the entire article. And you'd be like, great, I put those things in. I'm done. But there's actually like 50 other really annoying and kind of tedious fields you have to fill out. You got to fill out a separate headline for Google. You got to fill out a separate headline for Facebook.

You got to fill out separate descriptions for all of those things. And this kind of just multiplies. And so New York Times is like, maybe you could use to fill that stuff out that you just don't want to do. Maybe you could use it to like write copy for a tweet or whatever. And, you know, I think those are the areas that people find the stuff tedious. I want to say like currently we are not using it for any of that. And I do think it is really interesting to see the New York Times like a pretty, clearly like a very, very traditional newsroom trying to offer their team some leeway.

But yeah, I think like for us internally, again, like the writing is the fun part. We're not going to be using that. Yeah, I think the question of kind of where does a good use of AI end and a problematic use of AI begin is like the open question, right? Because I think a lot of what the Times said is the stuff you're talking about, like all this sort of metadata and the kind of the work around the work. But then it's like there was a training video. A lot of this is according to good reporting from Samofore,

a training video that included using AI to like develop news quizzes. And that's a really interesting one because to something said, that's a real like honest to God editorial product. And I think the thing ultimately becomes for me with AI is like, okay, great. If it can like do this stuff faster, like I can like potentially see it. But once you're having AI put together a large box, of work. The amount of work you personally are going to have to put in to fact check it,

to make sure it is correct, is potentially going to be more work than if you had just done it. Yeah. Yeah. The whole I have to let AI do it and then I have to fact check every part of it, so it actually takes longer is extremely real. All right, two more. One, kind of breaking-ish news today, Thursday as we're recording this, Amazon now has creative control over the James Bond franchise. this is something I suspect you and I both have feelings and maybe deep misgivings about it. Okay, this is hilarious because like a month ago, the Wall Street Journal had some like blockbuster report about how the broccoli family, which controls, you know, the bond rights in some manner, just like hated Amazon. And so now it sounds like maybe they were paid a lot of money. Like that seems to you what happens.

Okay, I'm glad we're on the same page about this. I went through exactly the same. Like a lot of money. Here is a quote from the Wall Street Journal story to friends, Barber Broccoli, who has for decades overseen all of the James Bond stuff, has characterized her thoughts on Amazon this way. These people are fucking idiots. That was December 19th.

That was two months ago. And now, yeah, the only answer I can come to is Amazon wrote a big giant check, which makes sense. If I were Amazon, I would write a big giant check. Amazon bought MGM for a huge amount of money. James Bond is the most important IP that MGM owns. The franchise is a disaster. Like, it's been a while since they put out a movie.

The franchise is great. Like, I love James Bond movies. But in recent years, it's been a mess. They don't have a movie. They don't have an actor. They don't have a script. Like, James Bond does not exist because the Broccoli's and Amazon have been at the stalemate. So at some point, write the check so you can start making James Bond movies.

is just the obviously correct thing to do. There's something very like old school and nice about, you know, the franchise having, I don't know, this protector. And obviously it relies a lot on the broccoli's having good taste and making correct decisions with the franchise. You know, I think they've done okay. I'm not a bond expert. I don't, but, you know, I do think like, oh, good. Good. The mega corporation that owns lots of things now controls one of the most lucrative franchises in existence. Like, yeah, like this, if you want more Bond content, this is fantastic news.

If you want more good Bond content, TBD, strong TBD, it really does feel like we're like one turn of this away from like a prime video series where James Bond is wearing like Amazon Basics T-shirts and this all just like, James Bond is going to start appearing on Thursday night football. Okay, but the Bond Alexa voice. That's going to be good. That I would be into. I would take that. Yeah. But then it would have to say Alexa at the beginning of every single, like as if it was Bond.

That's good stuff. Yeah. So I, that one, as somebody who has almost universally loved James Bond movies, that one is exciting because I think we'll get movies, but also does not bode well for them being any good. So we'll see. All right. Last one, before we switch gears, a headline, I swear, we have run 600,000 times on The verge.com.

Spotify's hi-fi streaming could finally arrive this year. We can't help ourselves, Jake. Chris Welch has a tradition every year on the anniversary of Spotify saying it would launch a hi-fi streaming service posting, hey, they still haven't done it. It has now been four years. But hey, this could be it. This could be the one. You know what I think?

I think no one will care anymore. I think, ironically, it has been so long that the number of people who were, like, psyched about the idea of truly lossless streaming has gone down to almost zero. Everybody just bought AirPods and moved on with their life. And so the rumor is, or the story here is, Spotify's going to add an additional subscription for. $6 a month that gets you high-fi and like early access to concert tickets and some other features. And and I think like it feels like a hard sell because I think you're right. Like do people care? It was hard to tell that you were listening to flack under even the best of circumstances. And every other music service just includes it in their default plan.

So like, you know, I'd like it. But yeah. Yeah. It'll be. It'll be interesting to see, yeah, the report is that there's going to be a new tier called Music Pro. And it'll be fascinating to see what Spotify can put in there. Because obviously Spotify needs to figure out a way to charge people more money in order to make all of its investments in Joe Rogan worth it. And the question of like what else will people pay for remains relatively hard to know, I would say. All right. hard pivot time. If you do not want to listen to us talk about Donald Trump and Elon Musk and politics for the next, I don't know, 20 minutes, turn off the Vergecast.

We're done. We're already way over. We did it for you anyway. That's it. That's the Vergecast. But if you, we, there is a lot going on and we have to talk about this stuff because it matters. And it is important to everything the Verge covers. So Lauren Feiner is going to join us right now, and she is going to walk us through all of the latest in Doge and Elon and Trump and chaos.

So let's get into that. Lauren Feiner, welcome. Hi. Thanks for having me. We have brought you here for a new way of talking about governmental chaos on the show, which is quickly and at the very end. I think this felt like a good week to do this because there's been like a lot has happened. but not that much sort of hugely new stuff has happened. So this felt like a good moment to just kind of catch up on all of the goings on

because I think unless you're paying attention minute to minute, all of the little stuff adds up to so much that it can be hard to keep track of. So at the risk of making you do a completely unfair thing that is impossible, walk us through what has happened this week. Let's doge. What's Doge been up to this week? Oh, Doge. Well, Doge has been continuing to be showing up at different government agencies.

Yesterday, there was some reporting that the 19-year-old Doge staffer, who's gone by big balls in the past, showed up at Siza, which is the cybersecurity arm within DHS. Can I just say, by the way, that the speed with which we've all just gone to saying big balls without it, like, You don't even notice that it's like just saying a person's name. You're like, oh, yeah, Big Balls is there the other day. It sucks. And I hate it. Yeah, we do have a federal office named after a meme coin. So at this point, everything is fair game.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. But anyway, keep going. Yeah. So, I mean, we've seen, you know, Doge continuing to do its thing. We've seen some attempts to, you know, pull back on that. You know, so far there's kind of been this, like, mixed.

bag from the courts. A judge ruled this week that Doge could keep accessing government data for now. Basically, they said, you know, this emergency motion, there wasn't enough there to keep Doge from transferring data from a handful of government agencies immediately. But the judge also indicated there could be a different ruling on the merits later on. So, you know, they're continuing to move forward at this point. And, you know, in the meantime, you know, it's even in an accelerated way, the courts are going to take time to sort all of this out. And in the meantime, a lot of government employees are still being laid off. The CFPB was gutted late last week, you know, pretty much all their technology staffers that help investigate the tech side of things within

FinTech have been let go. So, you know, a lot of this is already the damage is going to be done. And it's still causing a lot of chaos around here. And that's kind of the bet, right? Is that the speed with which this team can work will outpace anyone's attempts to stop it. And the damage will essentially already be done. Exactly. I mean, Musk has been known for, you know, sleeping and on factory floors,

trying to just work around the clock to get these things done. And there was reporting earlier on that this is part of it. He's thinking he can kind of outpace government staffers that he sees as, you know, lazy or not that productive, which, you know, a lot of government staffers that I've talked to find pretty offensive. You know, these are people who have devoted their lives to these jobs that are in the civil. service and they, in a lot of cases, especially in tech roles, take big pay cuts to work in these sort of roles. So yeah, that does seem to be the bet here that they can just move forward at a pace that accomplishes what they want to accomplish before the courts can catch up. And it also seems like it's not like Doge's like covering itself in glory and getting everything

right and making a series of incredibly like smart, thoughtful decisions too, right? Like, what was the the $8 million versus $8 billion, you know, teeny tiny miss that they made this week? Right. So there was a, on the Doge website where they try to keep track of like everything they're cutting, there was this, I guess, decimal place error where there was a contract that they claimed to have cut that was that they listed as $8 billion. but it actually was $8 million. And, you know, the problem might have stemmed from an issue in how that number appeared in a different, you know, government database. But, you know, it kind of just goes to show that this is something that's being done very

quickly, maybe with not a lot of checking on the finer details here. And, you know, I think that Elon Musk has even said, you know, There'll be some, you know, we're not always going to get it completely right. But that's to be expected. But at the same time, when you're talking about government services that impact a lot of people, it's really important to get it right in a lot of these cases. There was a wired headline this week that was like the Doge incompetence is a feature and not a bug. And I'm thinking about that ever since, like, doing well is not the point. Right.

Like, you call this whatever you want. I keep talking to people who are like, well, they're not even like identifying the things that would save all that much money. And I keep being like, that's the money is not the point. I mean, this is the Twitter playbook, right? Like, Elon didn't care if it broke a little bit. He gutted the company and he let things break. And then he just sort of built on top of that broken core. And, you know, it's one thing when it's a micro blogging service or whatever.

And it's another thing when it is the. federal government of the United States, and there are millions and millions and millions of people who rely on getting checks and services and benefits to survive. Like, you know, in many ways, we optimize to make sure that everything happens correctly. And he is optimizing to make sure that there are no, you know, he claims, he claims to be optimizing for making sure that there's zero. zero error. But in doing that, there's going to be so much error in what gets missed because he's just pulling stuff apart. Yeah, I, Liz Lepado and I were joking on the show a couple of

weeks ago about, like, thank God we filed our taxes early before Doge got into the IRS and blew it all up. And it now seems like Doge is in the IRS blowing it all up. And I think, like, we've talked a bunch about what will be the thing that really makes this feel real for people because so much of this is like theoretical, right? Like big balls is has your social security number. Like that seems bad, but it's hard to know what to do with that. That's like a very 20, 25 sentence, but I think most people don't really know what to make of that piece of information. But this thing about like, oh, it's my tax refund is going to be massively delayed or canceled or taken away from me for political reasons is like those.

are the things that may start to happen fairly quickly here. And it's going to be some mix, like you're saying, Jake, of like commission and omission, right? Things that fall apart on purpose and things that fall apart because there's literally no one left to pay attention to them. Yeah, I definitely think that's going to be the thing that gets people kind of clued into what's going on here if things that they rely on start to break or, you know, they're not getting their VA benefits or Medicare benefits or things like that. I also think that there might be some things that won't become apparent for quite some time. You know, for example, at the CFPB, who's checking on the consumer complaints now?

Who's getting back to those? And that might not be something that you file every day or even, you know, every year. But at some point, it's going to become apparent if, you know, those sorts of complaints aren't being answered to. Yeah, wasn't there a bill last week to, like increase bank fees. That's like, this is the sort of thing that the CFPB exists to make sure does not happen. And that overdraft fees can't kill you as a person who made a mistake with your ATM card. Like, these are the things that we just don't have in place anymore.

Lauren, a couple of specific things I do want to touch on here. One is Trump's executive order about the FTC and the FCC. Can you explain that? I can try. It's the best we can hope for. Yeah. Yeah, basically in this new executive order this week, President Trump basically asserted that the White House has this kind of authority to supervise what have typically been independent regulatory agencies, agencies like the Federal Trade Commission, the Federal Communications Commission. And these are agencies that the president does get to select who leads the agency and therefore sets the agenda, decides what things get voted on or not.

But at the same time, they're staffed by other commissioners from different parties. There's rules about how many commissioners from each party there can be. So there's somewhat of a balance there. And it's hard for a chair to just unilaterally lead an agency in a certain direction. But in this way, it seems like the president is trying to assert this kind of oversight over these independent agencies to, it seems, make sure that their agenda is in line with what he wants. So that's really contrary to how these agencies have worked in the past. You know, obviously he's already installed people that he seems to think align with him in his political values. if you look at Andrew Ferguson at the FTC and Brendan Carr at the FCC and some of the recent statements they've made.

They have been just thrilled to talk about how much they love doing Donald Trump's bidding. Like, if anything, you're underselling the extent to which he already has lackeys in charge and has decided that was not enough. Yeah, I'm confused why he would even need to do this. Like, is Brendan Carr going to go rogue and be like, no, no neutrality is pretty good. Yeah, I think, you know, obviously, I think this applies to many more agencies than just those two. I think it would apply to agencies like the SEC, for example. But, you know, I think it just is another way of Trump asserting his power and asserting his influence over as much of the federal government as he can. And I don't know exactly what it will look like for this to be executed.

You know, it seems like he kind of wants these agencies to run by what he calls significant regulatory actions by the executive office of the president. What does that entail? I guess it remains to be seen. But basically, it's just another way to exert this sort of influence. And, you know, whether that's going to be through official or unofficial communications with these agencies, I think there's going to be. to be some level of kind of trying to get these agencies to work in a way that's in line with the president's values. Clearly, there is no pretense of separation of powers anymore. Like, that's not the Trump administration has let go of the idea that they even need to pretend they're interested in the separation of powers.

I mean, you have, you have Trump saying, well, was it when someone saves his country, no laws are broken? They're all saying they're just going to ignore the judges. It's pretty straightforward what is happening here. It's just been interesting to see Jake, to your point, where they feel like they need to actually put pen to paper on this stuff and where Trump can just like truth, social it into existence and hope that that works. Yeah, everything's just like yoloing, like seeing how far they can go with it.

Well, I think a lot of these executive orders, it's, you know, we've seen an executive order, I think on maybe the first day of his presidency where he kind of just said, yeah, the First Amendment exists and we can't censor. And it's like, yeah, that already, it already said that. That one's been there a while. But I think there's just this sense of wanting to assert via executive order. Here are my values as president and here's how I am going to lead this office. Yeah, makes sense.

All right. Last one. Tariffs. We got tariffs going so well for everyone, I would say, have gone just swimmingly for everyone involved, no strangeness. So we're doing more of them. We're doing more tariffs now. Yeah.

So Trump was threatening a 25% and higher tariff on chips. And we've already seen at ACER saying that it's going to raise laptop prices 10% in response to the 10% tariff on incoming goods from China. So, you know, this is, they're kind of saying, all right, we see you're raising this. We're going to raise our prices. And I think that's exactly the thing that a lot of economists have feared is that this is really going to raise prices for consumers. I think the Trump administration would say in the long run, this is going to be better for consumers. It's going to make things more fair. It's going to provide more opportunity within the U.S.

But that's a pretty big gamble here. I love Acer's response here where they're just like, it's 10, like, yeah, price can go up 10% like what? Like, it's 10% of tariff, 10% price like, like, it's kind of it. That's literally how it works. Like we've been waiting for somebody to say this. And finally, you know, Aster CEO came out and was just like, that's, yeah, it's math. Yeah, your government made it 10% more expensive. So now it's 10% more expensive.

Yeah. It's just science. What is your sense, Lauren, of how this is working as a political. move because I think it's like there there are all kinds of complicated economic rationales behind all of this. But I think one thing Trump has always said is that this is like a move of power and strength for the Trump administration and it is like a statement of purpose in the world. And with Mexico and Canada, they were kind of like, we're doing it too. And then Trump was like, never mind. And it doesn't feel like it's working. Is it working?

That probably depends who you ask. I think maybe. he's thinking all along this is a negotiation tactic and I'm going to start from this really strong stance on how we're going to do trade policy and land somewhere in the middle. But, you know, on the other hand, you're talking about putting tariffs on a historical ally like Canada that has really changed the dynamic with that country. So I think it's really, I don't know if it would necessarily be the way that Trump anticipated it would work out. Maybe it is. But it's certainly causing a lot of chaos around the world. Yeah.

And I just feel like I keep reading all the stuff that Trump says about like, you know, they'll just build factories and plants in the United States. And it's like, oh, it's fine. That just takes like, what's that? Like, my guy, you're a real estate developer. You know how long buildings take? And then it's like Intel's over here. We gave them all the money in the world. And they still can't build chips that anybody wants.

Like maybe this stuff is hard. And maybe that's not the fight that we should be fighting. But I digress. Anything else, Lauren, what else is top of mind in the Trump and Doge and Musk universe right now before we get out of here? I mean, there's just so much. I think, you know, I'm just going to be continuing to track all of this. And, you know, continuing to see where Doge goes next. what sort of data they're trying to get and hopefully eventually get an understanding of what they're going to use it for.

I don't know if that's something that even they know right now, but I think that's the thing that we really want to understand ultimately. What's your read on how the pushback is going? Because like you said, there have been some court decisions stopping things that have gone, I would say, those court decisions have been some degree of respected and disrespected over time. but there's definitely been more energy on the other side of the aisle fighting back against this stuff. How is that going on that side? Yeah, I think we've seen a little bit of success from the opposition. You know, we've seen some court orders that, you know, at least put some sort of pause on, you know, accessing or changing data or, you know, further firings. but it's definitely been kind of all over the place. We saw that the Treasury Inspector General said that they'd investigate Doge's access to the payment system,

and that was in response to Senate Democrats who had asked for that kind of investigation. So, you know, we're starting to see a little bit of this opposition gained some traction. that said, you know, like I mentioned earlier, there's a lot that it seems like Doge was already doing that could, you know, mess up some systems or access data or lead to layoffs that are really hard to undo later on. Totally. All right. Lauren, thank you for coming and doing this with us. This was extremely helpful. And I think we're going to have to do this more. We need to get out of here. I have officially made Jake late for a moment. meeting that I promised I was not going to make him wait for. We've gone way over. Thank you both for doing this. This was incredibly fun. Hopefully, Neely, just stays on vacation. We don't need that. We'll be back next time. Lots of stuff left going on. Thank you both.

Thank you all. That's the Vergecast. That's the Vergecast. And hey, we'd love to hear from you. Give us a call at 866 Verge 1-1. The Verge cast is a production of the Verge and the Voxmedia podcast network. Our show is produced by Will Por, Eric Gomez, and Brandon Kiefer. And that's it. We'll see you next week.