The Vergecast - Worldwide!

Episode Date: July 2, 2015

Shoutout to music! Shoutout to stars! Shoutout to hearts! This week on The Vergecast, Nilay, Dieter, and Emily are joined by Racked's Nicola Fumo in the hype seat to discuss Apple Music, Beats 1 radio, the cultural force that is Magic Mike XXL, and the fate of comments. Crank it up and get ready to join us in motivational chants. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hello. Welcome to the Vergecast. Hello. That's gone. Hello. So, Emily's here. 100 countries around the world. Worldwide.

Always on. Always on. Except for that a half hour. Shout out to Rome. Shout out to Surrey. Shout out to Bristol. You can't just say English phrases. You have to say random.

Shout out to my parents in New Zealand. Oklahoma Repent Wisconsin So this is our show I'm awake That's good Emily Emily's head like she was real down She literally switched headphones

Off of Beets 1 And onto her Vergecast headphones And then started screaming in a British accent So this is the Vergecast It is July 1 which I was informed Earlier today Is the current date I'm here.

Dieter's here. Hi. Emily, I think you've heard. I'm present. Shout out to Bristol. And then in the hype seat, celebrating our nation's independence, Nicola Fumo from Iraq.

How's it gone? I'm kind of tired. But it's going to be okay. Just do some shoutouts and station IDs. I was thinking about doing jumping jacks or some kind of like something to get my blood pumping, but I neglected to do that. Here, just do me this one favor. Just scream the word worldwide.

as loud as you can. I don't think I'm going to do that. Do it! I think, look, I think if Apple is going to try to do, like, you know, worldwide monoculture radio, I think what we can accomplish on this podcast right now is that at this moment, everybody who's listening to it is going to scream the word worldwide. We can do it all together. You want to do it in three?

Yeah. Wait, are you going to trick me, though? No, I'm not going to trick you. It would be one, two, three worldwide. Ready? Okay, but you know, I'm going to, like, pause and wait for everyone else. do it because I know I'm going to be tricked. No, this is a place of trust.

Ready? Ready? You ready? One, two, three. Worldwide! See? People, like, randomly, people in their cars are just screaming this all over the place.

That's not going to be the last time that I say that word during this podcast. Just a fair warning. I think there's a real chance that the hype seat is located wherever Emily is screaming worldwide. So it's a verge cast. It's obviously we're doing it. We're recording a day early. because short week, the holiday coming from the end of the week.

But there's really one thing that happened this week that is big news, and we're just going to talk about it for a while. And then I know Nicola has some ideas about Magic Mike that she'd like to discuss. Oh, I thought you were going to say this Magic Mike. Oh, yeah, no, it should be. We're not going to talk about Apple Music. We're just due in an hour of Magic Mike. Speaking of music, Luxury Singleton has just posted an exclusive scoop that Facebook is talking to music labels.

Everyone, everyone with the same bad idea. How about this business that looks terrible? Let's get into it. Yeah. But anyway, so Apple Music launched. I will say yesterday it was a, it was just a weird day. Like the world listened to the radio together. Like it was the 30s or something.

It was great. Yeah. You didn't see it closer to this microphone. It was, it was great. I don't know. I feel like, I mean, I think the thing, we can get into more than nitty-gritty about beats one. Yeah.

But I thought it was, I mean, I think it's sort of funny when people are like, why would I hashtag a tweet to request a song when I can just look it up on Apple Music if I want to hear it? It's like that kind of takes away from the effervescence of what radio is like the participatory. Yeah, yeah. And it's like the appeal of requesting a song on it. Like they have one request show, but I think, I think Ebro is also doing requests to like

kind of informally. The appeal of that is not, I want to hear the song. and this is the only way I can hear it, it's like you want to kind of put your stamp out in the world in some way or another just by requesting a song that you like. And, you know, I think that there's still a lot of appeal to that. I think there's more appeal to that now

that everything's so segmented in the way that we listen to music. So it was really interesting. I mean, it's not like perfect. It's not a perfect listening experience by any means. But I think it was cool. Well, we have like a moment. So we obviously, there's many pieces of this for us to cover. Right.

There's like a new app. a new service. But then there was also like, this radio station is going to start for the first time, which is a strange occurrence. Like it doesn't happen a lot. And so we like set up. It happens all the time. What do you mean?

Giant radio stations have to get launched all the time. I don't think that happens all the time. They switch over. They switch formats. They get bought. They switch formats. They relaunch. But they're never for like the first, like I can think of four or five radio stations in Chicago

that did all that. but it was always like, there was always a lot of continuity, right? It wasn't like the radio station didn't exist. And then they like literally flipped it on and they were like excited to like have it. Right. I guess like my formative like musical experience was a radio station launching in the Twin Cities. Weird. Yeah.

What was that? It was a Rev. 105. Okay. And then they got shut down because they got bought by Clear Channel. Yeah. And then like 15 years later, um, uh, the current like took the people that used to run River 101 and brought them over to public radio and launched a music station again and it was a big deal.

Wow. But anyway, River 105 was a huge deal in the Twin Cities. Yeah. Mine was Q101, which was the biggest deal in Chicago. And then it was shut down. They turned into talk radio station. And then now it's on like 91 something. They just moved it. Right. But I don't know. Anyway, none of it.

Like, I just think it was a good moment. Like we set up a speaker. We were all listening to it. They were playing Brian Eno for a long time. I got a lot of notes from other people who work at our company who don't work at the verge. being like, why are you just playing tones at us? And then I literally, once they started, they started with a lot of yelling from Zane Loew and like rock music. And I just got a note from one of our product managers.

Actually, Rack's product manager, Elliot, who was like, literally all it said is, what is your strategy here right now? I was like, we're just listening to this Apple thing. Cold. We're asking us about our strategy? No, he was, because he was just like, we were disturbing every,

because you're blasting music in the office, right? Yeah. At like 9 a.m. It was noon. At noon. And he was just like, what is the strategy right now? Like, what are you doing? Why are you just listening?

Did they hate us all while we were, I mean. Then they realized there was a big Apple thing, and then they started reading all of our coverage. Ah, okay. But like, the idea that we were just like blasting like an English DJ and rock music. Yeah, yeah, yeah. They were like, what's, what's up of me? Yeah.

And it's not even just like playing music. You're playing a guy yelling about music. Yeah. There's a lot of yelling. But that was like a moment. I thought that was, that's actually of all the Apple music stuff. Somebody tweeted at me earlier today. it's like, what is with the wall,

the wall beats one coverage. And that's just the more interesting piece of this. Well, I mean, beats one has a potential to be the most important radio station on the planet. Does it? Yeah, there's other, there's other like streaming internet radio stations that are worldwide, 24-7 worldwide.

Yeah. But not with the, not with a giant, freaking huge button and free to everybody that has an iPhone. There's nothing that that's this convenient to listen to that you can have on your mobile device. and now you can have on your desktop. That was the big thing that was annoying yesterday

as you had to listen to it on your phone. But yeah, I mean, like, yeah, I think you can still, I actually, I haven't even looked for a really long time, but I know that iTunes used to have the thing where you go through all the different, these different streaming stations, and I used to listen to those a lot, but like I don't, I feel like they've kind of phased that out.

But, yeah, there's, they're in the Apple music app on the phone. Oh, really? You scroll down, you get to like, alternative in country. So, Nicola, have you played with this app? Yeah. What do you think? I did it just for this. I know you did.

I liked the bubbles and you can pick what you like. You like the bubbles? What did you pick? Like it was like double tap hip hop and like one tap R&B and then it's like which artists do you like and then it says the bubbles the artist. It's like oh one tap future, one tap Nicki Minaj, whatever. And then more and more. And then it made me some playlists.

Yeah. And I listened to one of them called Ride in Shotgun. Wow. which opened with collared greens, which was suitable and to my interests based on the buttons that I had tapped. And I felt good. It was fun. Yeah. What was the next one?

Then I listened to Young Jack. Oh, yeah. But I picked that. To hype up. And I actually was, I was like, oh, this sounds different than Spotify. And I asked Dan, I was like, are these, is this different now? Is this better? Because it sounded much more nuanced.

Really? My young jock song did, yeah. Is there a nuance to that young jock song? I didn't know until today. All right, fair. That's interesting because I feel like if there's one part of Apple music that I have not explored at all, it's just searching for music specific songs that I want on here. That actually works okay. Yeah, it works fine.

I'm fine with it. So actually on the topic of playlists, two things. One, they kept on saying intro to so-and-so. I was like, yeah. I told you that I like so-and-so I don't need an intro. And then I just want to point out that Lauren Good got recommended a playlist called Mom Jeans. And it says, it's like literally the description is like, get comfy with these party hits. And none of that makes sense.

Like none of those three elements should be together in that way. Wait, what is it like, is it like, well, I think of it as like mom's vacuuming music, like, feel good 80s like Carly Simon. type stuff. No, the Fury 7 soundtrack is in there. And the 50 Shades soundtrack, which actually is good. That's just like a really weird. If this were a Twitter card, I would tell you. Bight song by Rachel Platton. Uh-huh. See You Again, was Kulifa? That's actually kind of interesting that they're labeling all this mom music, because it kind of is. See you again falls into every demographic category. Yeah. See you again has been like top of the charts. Or I don't know if it still is right now, but it's been on forever, which shocks me. It's so not.

It's a real snoozer. It's a real down tempo. Wow. Hype check, that song, quite low. Yeah, I Pipe Check, see you again. Quite low. But also high, because everywhere. It's a hype paradox.

Things that many people don't make them good things. But literally, that's hype. Yeah, but there are things that are everywhere that are hype. Hype quantity versus hype quality. What is your personal hype formula, I think, is a question that we're really drilling into right now? Well, I'd like to think that I'm here as like a hype. like taste maker and not just one to to factually call out these things are by the numbers hype,

but to call out these things deserve hype based on weight. It's really overrated versus underrated. No, I think what Nicholas saying is just she's more of a... But I don't want to be very, I don't want to be like, oh, it's popular so it's not great. Because some things that are popular are great. You're more of a qualitative hype checker rather than quant. Quant hype. Yeah.

And I won't be swayed by the masses. Yeah. Like if something's great and everybody loves it, it's properly rated. Yeah. And that's fine. That's like the best place you can be. Yeah. If you're overrated, then it's like, yeah, you're not that great.

Everybody's going to find out soon. This is like a real hype matrix that you're constructing. Yeah. It's like how much you're, how popular you are versus your overall, your absolute goodness. Yeah. All right. Someone make us an app that plots that out for us. What did you think?

What's the hype check on? on Apple pre-liking things for you when you're listening to... Wait, explain to the listener what you mean. Because I actually didn't get what you're talking about until I read this long thing that you read about it that we haven't published yet. But explain what you mean. Yeah. So a lot of times on beats one, so when a song comes up on beats one, sometimes, not all

the time, it's not really... I can't really understand why it's available sometimes and not. But you can click on the song and get like the... Add to my music or favorite it or whatever. and there's like a little red heart just the same as any other social media thing and most of the time that's not filled in

you can click the heart if you like the song but some of them come pre-liked for you I think Ross Miller had this experience with where are you now Justin Bieber's song Wow Which That's a bold pre-like

Can you see a list of all the likes And so you can figure out What was pre-liked for you? Yeah I don't know That's the other thing is I don't know where this stuff goes Unless I add it to my music, I don't know where, what happens to a like. If that just informs like my, what happens to my recommended playlist and stuff like that.

I mean, I guess that's probably it. But it just is like a thumbs up on Pandora or whatever. But yeah, I don't know. I mean, so we actually, do we put up this post today at theater? No, I think we're going to put it up tomorrow. You can talk about it if you want to go. I'm going to ruin this post. That's fine.

Sinecla, I'm going to ask you a series of questions. I'll set them up. So in Apple Music now, there are two independent rating systems. Okay. There's like five, you know, the stars, yeah, 19, those are still there. But they've added hearts. Okay. So now you can give something like two stars and a heart.

Which is mind-blowing. Like, I don't understand it. Like, I understand it, and there's a very pedantic reason. Is this like emotional versus, like, emotional? I don't want to tell. We ruined it. We ruined this joke for like an hour and a half. because we told people the reason our staff why.

So I don't, I'm not telling you why. I'm just saying, don't tweet at us right now because we can know what the answer is, please. I'm aware of why there are stars and hearts. I'm just saying, can you imagine a world in which you give something one star and a heart? And what song would that be? Oh my God. I mean, almost everything I listen to is like, I'm embarrassed to admit it.

Like I love, like, God. Right now. Just so everybody knows, Nicola is now physically. bear. She's like flushing. It looks like she's a little teary. What song is in your heart right now? Just tell us. I'm thinking about this. I'm thinking about a particular playlist I made this week. Yeah. That has like a lot of jams on there that are like what I listen to when I'm alone at home. Mom Jean songs. On repeat. Did you get comfy? No, it's like the dream. Like just lots of like the dream, like knew the dream. Very loud.

And repeated. It's fine. Yeah. Okay. The dream's good. I feel okay about the dream. There's like this old candy track, like the woman who's on, um, real housewives of Atlanta. That candy?

Yeah. Yeah. Oh my God. One of those. Um, I mean, no, there's definitely music where you're like, I don't want anyone to know. Yeah. I love this. So we just, so one star heart, by the way, which I believe should be the name of my Tumblr and

young adult novel series. And next band. Right. One star heart. It's like good, right? Okay. So what is it? And when we're saying that's music that you love, but you're embarrassed by.

And you literally, in thinking of that concept, had a physical reaction of embarrassment and shame, which was amazing. What's a two-star heart? Wait, so you're like, this is good, but I only feel this much about it. Two out of five, though. So you give it two out of five stars and a heart. I feel like, like Iggy Azalea, anything pretty much. You're like, this is fine.

No hearts. But why would you heart that? Because sometimes you get emotional and you have to listen to Iggyzili. Celia in your house. Iggy season, there are times. If there's any situation where Apple music is like randomly just throwing Iggy Azalea songs at me, I've failed.

Listen, three months ago I would have been you and things have changed. Arianna Grande, same thing. Something turned the corner with me. I don't know what happened. Okay, well, let's go to the other end. So, four stars, no heart. Oh, like this is technically good, but I just have no feelings for it.

It's like any, like, Donald's Fagan record. I'm not trying to think of something. It's rough. It's mostly most of my favorite artists, to be honest. Like, I don't want to hear them all the time. Yeah. Like, I don't know. I would do that for Bjork.

Like, I love Bjork, one of my all-time favorites, but I don't want to listen to Bjork, like, nine times out of ten. Like, it's like you know, but you know, you know what the heart means. Once you know what the heart means, it changes the whole game. The heart. Well, I'm just going by, I'm assuming the heart is stuff that you feel like you feel for. Yeah. I think that's.

think that's what most people how most people are And the star is for stuff they're like this is technically good. Okay. What's a five star heart? Five star one heart? You only get one heart. Hearts on or off. Oh.

Oh, so then you're just saving it, I'm assuming. I thought it was like, don't try and gain the system. Just tell us what your feelings are. I mean. Yeah, see, everyone thinks they know what the heart's for. I think it's to save it for later.

No. But that's a good guess. I think it's like this is five stars. and let me make sure it's bookmarked. Yeah, I mean, it's close. It tells the streaming service what to, like, put into the algorithm. It says give me more like this. Yeah.

But I just think the world in which you can rate anything with three stars in a heart is, like, crazy. That's like you're medium, but I love you. That's a hype matrix of its own. No, that's great. That's just like a really average college relationship. What you want to. It's like the one you don't remember. It's like the one that didn't matter to you a lot because you have the one in college that, like,

breaks to you. But then you have the one just before it. It's like, you know what? I learned about how to like split a check at dinner with you. And that was really, really fond memories there. Moving on to this disaster. Your fond college memories are way more boring than my name.

No, that's a three star heart. It's like, I fondly remember you in this time together. And what? We fucking drifted. Like, I don't know. The next one, that was a wreck. That one made me who I am today. One star and heart or five stars in heart.

Three star heart. Three star heart. There's a really big difference between what you want to listen to and what you like, though. Mm-hmm. Like there is. I don't know. Like, the bulk of my using these streaming music services is workout music and it's the worst music.

Yeah. But it's what I want to listen to when I'm running. It's like, and that's why when I'm going through doing the bubble thing when you're giving it your taste, I'm like, well, I should probably click on Zed. And I don't like that. Like, it's not, it's not me that I'm defining there. I am defining an experience I want to have. Well, because there are a couple of different views when you're listening to music.

Yeah. you're not always, you don't always have the same taste. Kind of like you don't always want to eat the same things. Like that would be weird. Yeah. But like, but if you,

I've put that, one of the most defining questions of like, who are you is like, what is your favorite food? And that's like, I, it's not. Huh?

No, it's not. It's like in like in the, well, the only, like a really like basic, fundamental, like,

no. I'll tell you what, what the real decider is, is whether or not you have a favorite food or not. Because I know a lot of people who don't, they're like, I don't know and I'm like okay that's a red flag I have like a three like a top three what are your top three steak yams and champagne that's like good meal yeah definitely

your top your foods are just like a great so also chocolate chip cookies yeah yeah just a nice night out that's like yeah I like what I like in school that's pretty good all right did you think the app was messy when you used it um I was a lot more there was a lot was asking a lot more of me than I anticipated. So I opened it up. I was like, all right, cool, let's do this, whatever. And then I was like, oh, okay, okay. We're going to, like, I'm going to be here for a minute, setting, setting this up.

Yeah. There is a lot, there is a lot to click. Yeah. Yeah. Three dot menus. Everything's hidden. Everything is a sheet that rolls up. Yeah.

I was so, I remembered that there was the curator thing on it. Like they have, they have these lists that are curated by, you know, like pitchfork and Rolling Stone and stuff like that. And I remember that was there. And it took me several. minutes to remember where it was. Like what tab it was under, how far I had to scroll down and all that. Like it was under a couple of different submenus to find that list.

It's like, yeah. Those submenus are going to end up moving. You know what I really want is when you go into your music and you like, because it's, I think we are now in a national moment where everyone is rediscovering their iTunes library. Yep. We're going to have a story about that tomorrow. Yeah, because I have a bunch of weird stuff on here from when I used iTunes however long. Yeah.

What's the weirdest track you have in there? I'm looking right now. Mine is a bunch of like 2007 era like DJ mixes. And they're just like all terrible and I don't want them anymore. But there they are. Man, I'm trying to decide how much I want to reveal about myself. You've already revealed quite a bit. You're revealing stuff about your 2011 self so it doesn't count.

It's totally fine. What was your favorite food in 2011? Ooh. Probably like I love Euros. Like a big Euro moment for me. Like steak yams and champagne. Four years ago, those straight euros out of a cart. By the way, Emily and Nicola are now both just scrolling in horror through the

I'm just trying to figure out where my music that I added from beats is. It's hard. I can't figure it out for the trending searches. Okay, Big Bang. I'm going to look. I'm going to try to get. Well, so everybody's listened to this show has heard me complain endlessly about how confusing Spotify's interfaces.

And this one is just as confusing in a different set of ways. Right. Right. Like you have all of these files on your phone that you were once able to sort very easily by like artists, song, album. And those are the primary organizations

of the entire app. And now the primary organization are these tabs of stuff that Apple wants to show you. Right. And there's some weird stuff in there. Because remember, every time Apple gets you to play a song, somebody gets paid. I paid for ain't too proud to beg. I'm finding. Why did I pay for that?

This is really weird. Why did I need it with me? Everyone's just reacting to iTunes right now. I just added a song and now I don't know where it exists. The only way I can find is if I search for it. But it doesn't go into your library? It doesn't go in my music. It should be. It will be. There's been some people running into that. The one button that I really want, So anyway, so I have all these like half completed albums in my old iTunes. Oh, yeah, complete all my albums. Yeah, I want that real bad. Finish everything.

Yeah, yeah. And it's just not there. It's like, why wouldn't you just be able to do that for me? Yeah. That's the main thing that it should be able to do. Really? Way back in time, you used to be able to, you could go to iTunes and it, like, this is like 2010.

You could be like, finish my albums. It will cost you, you know, $200 to upsample all the songs that we know are crappy that we have better versions of and complete the albums that you have that are uncompleted. Right. So I did that. a long time ago. Long time ago.

It was not like the first iteration of. Yeah. It was like way back in the day. No, but it's just all these things where the link between what you already have and what Apple can provide to you doesn't exist. And that's like that's,

I think that's the primary failing here. Because Spotify doesn't have files. It doesn't have your old collection. It can kind of report it, but it's always in a weird little other zone that sucks. Yep. It's just like a different, it's a different kind of mess.

It's still a huge mess. So I have, since I can't actually talk about music, the way you folks can because I'm bad. What's your favorite young jock song? Yes, exactly. Don't make me feel stupid, Eli. I'm going to say, I'm going to say two.

There's no right or wrong answer to a question. I'm going to say two super nerdy things. Yeah, yeah. And then we can move on. I have two sick burns about the interface. One is that that slide up menu reminds me of the Blackberry menu. Yeah. And then two, and this isn't really a burn because I kind of like it.

It's that the whole thing reminds me of the Zoom music interface on Windows when it first launched where there was just like stuff everywhere and like, bubbles and squares and colors and artists and you don't know where you are. Like that's how I feel often in this. That Zune interface is really bad. I don't think anybody remembers this. The Zune did. I think I saw someone with a Zune on the subway the other day.

Nicola, I own a Joy Division Zune. It is the most wonderful and embarrassing thing that I own. The Windows Music Interface that you used to sync to the Zune. Yeah, yeah. That app tried to do everything all the time. But yes, I own a Zune. Every now and again, I pull it up. It's in its box in my house. And I read, once a year, I

clean my office, and I gaze at it, and then I put it away. From 2002? Yeah, I have a God, it's so embarrassing. I have a joy division unknown pleasure soon. Oh my God.

I don't even know what that means. Why would you keep it? It's so weird. It's a really, really weird artifact. Man, I remember the Christmas of iPods the first one and we all got iPods and my best friend got a Zoom.

And it just was like... Oh, it's the worst. A living cringe. It was terrible. A living cringe. She was just so, like, cast at the side. Like, probably when we walked on the street, like, she was probably on the edge. That's the worst.

Didn't Zunes have, uh, it had basically air drop, though? You could send songs. Oh, yeah. It was called squirting. It was called squirting. Like a room full of people were like, what should we call this function on our, on our device? Squirting. That's what we want to go.

Nobody's going to, nobody's going to find any way to make a joke. out of the head. Let me squirt this young track again. It's just the worst. It was all real bad. Oh my God. People are just explaining

the hearts things to me. I told you not to. Someone just said, I don't know what this means, but this is the world we live in now. The DJ controls heartability on Beats 1. So I think the DJs are pre-hearting. That's the thing.

On Beats 1, you can't heart or save all the music. They are playing songs on Beats 1 that aren't part of the Apple music corpus and so you can't listen to them you can't hit the button to save them. Some of that is like so they keep playing this song by this grime artist Skepta and that one you can't ever at least a couple times I saw it on there you can't add it you can't do anything when that's playing but it exists in Apple music you can look it up it just doesn't let you from there but then like Julie the the the London DJ she plays a bunch of stuff that's just not on Apple Music Apple music, which I actually like a lot. And that also, to me, is kind of a showing of goodwill or like good faith or whatever, because it's like not just stuff that's here so that you continue to use this service. Like she actually is just plain stuff she likes.

And that's in a weird balance because if you, I listened to Beets 1 a bunch yesterday. And what's really strange is when they're like, just press the button on your iPhone to like look at more songs or like, thanks for downloading our app. And it's like, this is not a radio. it's not a media crossover like regular radio people i guess they say don't hit that dial yeah right like there's like little stuff that is now cliche but the idea of like just open the third interface and press the three dot button to save this song to your library is like not don't turn that dial yeah it's not in the it's just very confusing yeah it's because like they know a certain

percentage of your experience while you're listening to that music they know that you have an iPhone next to you. And that's enough for them to, like, be able to give you instruction, like, very specific instruction or call to action or whatever. Yeah. And, like, in really direct ways, I don't think they've even, like, they haven't really gotten deep into what they could be able to do with that. Yeah.

Can you play this in a car? Yeah. Yeah, sure. Well, it would stream. It would just use your data. Yeah. There's actually a little bit of, like, a controversy about the data right now. Yeah, there's a hassle with the data.

Could you play it out of your car's speakers, though? If you have Bluetooth. Or cable. I mean, it's just like playing songs of your thing. Okay. Yeah, I listen to it. I thought the most interesting experience I had with it was listening to it while walking around New York streaming.

Yeah. That's weird because it's like, yeah, I remember having a radio walkman when I was a kid that I would use sometimes, but like I haven't listened to something live on headphones while walking around an environment for ages. And that was a very strange feeling. Oh, that's weird.

Yeah. And I was like kind of like, I was looking around. I was like, oh, is anybody else, do you think anybody else is listening to beats radio? I can see it. It was like really weird. Yeah. And suddenly, off in distance, someone just screamed, worldwide. You're my guy.

Yeah, that's my guy. You're like, 24 seconds. Sane heads. Yeah, but you know what's strange about that is whenever we take trips and I rent cars, I was listening. I never plug in my phone. Yeah, no. I was listening to local radio.

The car and radio are like synonymous. But it's weird. Like, even if you just from here, like, you just drive upstate. Like, the, the, nature of all the radio station completely changes. Like, New York City doesn't have, like, a banging country music scene. Oh, that's, like, the majority of what I listen to up there, yeah. Right, but you, like, drive away and, like, Z-100, like, literally fades out, and, like,

a top 40 station fades in, and then, like, country stations fill it. It's a very, like, regional thing that happens, and Beetswan is just, like, you're in Tokyo. You're listening to the exact same thing as a person. And that's wild. Zainlow talked about it a lot. Like, it was, like, blowing his mind as he was. running the station. Even though like BBC radio is the closest thing to that that there's been.

It shouldn't blow his mind that much. This doesn't blow my mind at all. Oh, high check. Hi-tech zero. Why does it blow your mind at all? I mean, the running joke has been like millennials react to radio is like a hilarious concept. Right? I mean, because we already all can do the same thing at the same time no matter where we are.

So that element has nothing. That's like, sure. Yeah. that element adds nothing. Like live streaming things also just sure. Yeah. I mean, it's like musical Twitter, right?

Like it's just, but Twitter is even, even that is personalized. I don't know. I don't think that there are that many experiences where we're doing. All the same thing at the same time. The same thing.

Didn't we all watch the llamas escape together around the world? Like there are these moments. Yeah, news. I mean, anyone who's listening to this, it doesn't matter where they are. We're all here.

Yeah, but a lot of people listen to this is a podcast later too. Yeah, yeah, yeah. The Super Bowl. The Super Bowl. That's why the Super Bowl is fun. Right. Like,

I don't really care for a lot of the disparate parts of the Super Bowl, but I like the fact that everybody's watching it. Like, I liked American Idol when it was big for that reason. It sounds like you guys are all very seduced by like the, the like anticipation and the like togetherness in this world where we're all so pulled apart. And then we can like be together in the radio. What you guys don't know is that Nicola was rolling her eyes through that entire oral speech.

Go ahead. So it sounds. like you're more interested in that than anything else that's going on and like the clown DJ dude or whatever but that clown. Oh, DJ clown dude. The one who yells. Yeah.

And can't believe it. But you're talking more, like you're talking more about that. Like you seem more fixated on that than you seem fixated on the actual content. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. It's more like,

yeah. I mean, more in the vehicle. Like the vehicle of it is what's driving you all nuts with the content. Here are the things and they're probably, they're nerdy or boring things. and I suspect why Emily is so interested in it. But the ones that get me are it is the world's most valuable company,

the world's richest company, saying we should have one musical culture around the world, and these are the people who are going to give it to you. One of them is an Australian or New Zealand guy who's in L.A. It's like weird mishmash of like global influence. Two is that the music they choose, by definition, is like crazy all over the map. And then three is like, how do you,

how do you reconcile that with how Apple wants to make money on this thing, which is every time you stream a song, everyone gets paid, right? That's really weird. Like, that's really strange to me. And, like, all those preferential slots, like, there's a world in which record labels can, like, try to get their stuff on beats one because that means more people will stream it and they'll get more money. Or they can jockey for better position in all those playlists because they'll get more money.

And that's, like, really interesting to see how they balance all that. That's, like, those are the three that fascinate me. No, I agree. That is fascinating. But it is and isn't. It's also just a radio station. And I think that's the push and pull of this thing. I think also to go back to the actual content, the actual music that's being played, and we talked about this a little bit. But like, it is kind of interesting to try to figure out what the demographic is.

Because right now the demographic seems to be internet music person. And that's, you know, I feel like that's a growing portion of how people listen to music. It's like, yeah, I know Taylor Swift songs, and I also, like, I'm interested in, you know, like, UK Grime stuff. Like, I'll listen to everything because I want to know what's happening right now, which is how I am. And I feel like a lot of, like, people I consider my peers are. But I don't, I have a hard time imagining how big that audience is around the world. Yeah. And we were talking about, like, they repeat the show right now, like the, or the main shows.

they broadcast them again, I guess, when the other half of the world is awake, which is sort of not what it seemed like it was going to be at first. That's not worldwide. Yeah, it's not worldwide and it's not like all live. But I mean, I was saying like I would love it if they add, and I feel like this is something I'm going to do. Like if they add a DJ and a studio in like Seoul or something, be really into that because then you would actually,

as the day progressed, you would have the part of the globe that's awake, getting music that's more specific to where they are and the people who stay up late at night who tend to be people who want to hear other things anyway like they can get a sampling of some different stuff but is that local I mean that's like a it's like time zones well one how amazing it would be if Apple put like a radio station like right in front of like Samsung's headquarters just like straight up with like the Apple that's spinning and like the weird little antenna thing is coming off it being like Apple Radio's here yeah yeah like not available on your Alexy phones. I don't know. It's not really

cultural imperialism that I'm going for. But there's something very different about programming show for locals in a different culture and then programming show for Americans diving into that. Right. Right. And like that's like really hard. That's going to be their hardest thing to do. I don't even know if they would need it though. Like if they want to be truly international, I feel like you have a much more hungry audience for

music that would like that actually even buys music and stuff. And, like, like Korean pop and stuff like that than you do here. Like there's more of a monoculture there than there is here. So it would be pretty easy to program that. And it, yeah, it wouldn't be as like pulling together all these disparate genres as much. I've been, okay, I've got to read an ad and we'll come back. This is the best ad we've ever had.

You ready? Yeah. There's a cash register sound and then I say. 20 years ago, James Murphy came up with an idea to change the harsh turnstile beeps of the NYC subway into music. He calls it Subway Symphony. Instead of hearing this cacophony of stressful sounding beats, you would hear something pleasant and even calming. And during rush hour, when more people are passing through the turnstiles, the effect would be even more pronounced. For years, his idea just sat there.

But more recently, Murphy got together with Heineken. And because Heineken believes in Making City is greater, they've teamed up to make Subway Symphony happen. The goal is to generate support to make Subway Symphony reality. The turnstiles have to make a sound. So why not make it a beautiful sound? If you want to help make Subway Symphony happen, it's really easy. Just use the hashtag Subway Symphony to share your support. Subway Symphony is just the first in a series of legacy projects backed by Heineken.

Heineken wants to champion those who have an idea to make their city greater. So be on the lookout for more projects and cities around the country in the future. And watch the documentary of the journey to make Subway Symphony reality and learn more about the project at Subwaysympany.com. I've got 15 cases of Heineken in my house. My house! I mean, you have to understand I've been sitting here with this ad copy in front of me this whole time. I didn't know that it was that. That's amazing. Just waiting for this moment. No, so the thing I was saying is Emily, I'm talking about it like just a little bit ago where it's like, are they advertising 100 countries just to make me feel cool or because they want to be big in 100 country?

I keep saying companies. Do they just want to make Americans feel cool that this stuff is on in Stockholm? Is that why he keeps yelling cities? Or does he want to be big in Stockholm? Well, can he be big in Stockholm? I mean, I don't see this as America-centric as I think you see it.

Like, it seems actually more Euro. Like, you know, I mean, there's so much crime. There's, like, I mean, there's a lot of, like, dance stuff during Giulia Anuga's sets. And, I mean, the most specifically American stuff is Ebro's stuff, because he's just doing a lot of, like, in New York-centric hip-hop and stuff like that. Which is, but I feel like,

That's, you know, a decent export if we're going to export some kind of music for a New York block. I mean, yeah, I don't know. I don't feel like it's, I don't feel like it's to flatter American culture or anything. Like, it does seem like it's, it is, if anything, it is, if anything, it's just flattering like Euro-American culture. Right. Yeah. I don't know. Did you listen to Beets 1 at all yesterday?

Would you listen to Beets 1? I will for research. Yeah, just an interest to you. This is the thing. The rest of it is just a streaming app, and it's kind of a messy streaming app. Like there's no cohesion to it. No, there's some. There's more cohesion to it than, I don't know, Spotify.

I mean, look, yes and no, right? I mean, it doesn't, it's not the revolutionary thing I thought it was going to be. I'll put it that way. Maybe my expectations are too high. And then literally all connect will show me is like Michael Bublay at a piano. Oh, I'm ignoring Connect. I do not, I do not go, do not venture into that dark connect. You used to be able to customize your tabs at the bottom of music for the stuff you actually wanted and you can't do that here.

You can't because it's how people get paid. Yeah, I know. Well, if you sign it for Apple music, here's what I want to know, if you sign up for Apple music and just listen to your own music the whole time, does anybody get paid? Does Apple just take the $10? How do they split that out? I don't know. So many questions. Oh, do you think that they like track what I'm listening to even if it's, I'm not streaming it?

It's in my own library and they pay them that way? I mean, they have definitely taken stuff. I have my own library and used that to inform the playlist that they send me. Like, even though it doesn't really have anything to do with what I clicked on in the bubble stage. All right, you guys. Should I follow One Direction, Pitbull or Miley Cyrus and Connect? Pitbull. Yeah.

Dolly. I'm going to be so mad when this. Pit bull is one star heart. All right. Pit bull is one star heart? One star heart. I'm telling you, one star heart and three star heart are maybe the hardest. problems in ratings.

What is a three-star heart? Who are you? Is that, okay, out of five, so it's something that you... Like, what do you give three stars to? That you would have? I give three stars to, like, a majority of, like, mainstream pop music. Right, but do you have it? Do I have it?

I always thought the idea of stars in my own personal music library is, like, strange. Because, like, why am I sitting here ranking? I don't do that. Like, everything... One of my friends in college actually once told me, everything in your library is one star or five stars. Why don't use any of these middle ones? I was like, because these are the tracks in the albums I don't like,

and these are the tracks I do like. And literally that's all that matters. Hmm. Right? And then that just, like, that helps decide if you put things on shuffle, what comes up. Yeah, because you could like, you could make a smart playlist. It was like just playing my five-star songs.

Maybe I would give Big Sean three stars heart. Okay. Actually, that's a good call. You know, because he's not changing my life or anyone's. Hey, well, he just went. Except for Ariana. Yeah, right here, that aren't going on a moment. I know.

But, yeah, I don't love it. I'm not like, oh, I believe in you. You have such a message and talent and you're going to be around forever. But I'm also like, I'll listen to this. Yeah, I'm not going to skip it. Yeah. I believe in you. You know, whenever you give somebody five stars in iTunes, it sends them a note that says,

I believe in you. Well, Drake is like, I believe in you. You are saying things. Kendrick, you're saying things. Big Sean, you're there. Do you believe in Taylor Swift? I think we've been through this. Okay.

Oh, we've got to talk about Taylor Swift again, though. Great Taylor Swift. This is our new hype check system. It's hearts and stars for you. Hype check Taylor Swift. I'm not a fan. She evokes something in me. So is that low stars or no heart?

No heart. There's nothing there. No star, no heart. The only time that I willingly listened to Taylor Swift is when I was in a four-year-old's bedroom playing Barbie dolls, and it was that or the frozen soundtrack. I was like, fine, 1989, let's do this. There's no way we're listening to the frozen soundtrack.

And then she got up and turned, she put on the frozen soundtrack. I was like, fine. Even you don't want to listen to this. No, that's fair. All right. I want you guys to talk about Magic Mike. We need to do that, and then we need to read another thing, and then we need to wrap up. Oh, yeah.

Wait, did you see Magic Mike XXL? No. Oh. I thought you saw it. No. Oh. She's just prodding you and talking about it. No, I want to talk about it.

Because on Rack this week, we had a video about Magic Mike, and I thought it was just going to be like, it was going to be like the history of like shirtless men in film. Uh-huh. Or like objectifying men in film. And I thought it was going to just be like totally smut. And then I didn't work on it at all. But it ended up being really smart.

And they talked about the female gaze and like when men try to like assume what the female gays is. And like showing these like beef cake dudes that are like oily or whatever. Can you just quickly go through the concept of gays? Actually, you're the film school. Real quick. Oh, it's just the point of view, like, to socio-slaschconomic, I guess, point of view of where the film is coming from. So, like, most film up until semi-recently has mostly been from the male gaze. Just the way the characters are written, the way the character, like how much time characters get, what characters are worried about.

Like, that's, yeah. Right. Because the writer and the director and the cinematographer are all dudes. Usually dudes. Anyway, carry on. I saw dope last weekend Yeah And the scene with Chenelamon

The like Mother May I seen I've seen I don't know if you've seen it Was fully just like no woman would ever behave like this And like this is clearly written by a man who did not consult like But also like I get it's supposed to be kind of fantastical It's not like an accurate representation of youths I do not understand the dope trailer at all Like in terms of setting ascitations for a movie that is not grounded in reality

The trailer that it's basically just like old video game trailers is very confusing. B minus from me, but that's not what we're talking about. Stars and hearts, undope. Three stars, maybe a heart. Wait, that sounds pretty positive, then.

B minus, it was good. I enjoyed it, but it didn't like, yeah, yeah, yeah, totally. But it didn't, like, it got so much hype. It didn't, like, blow me. I keep telling my friends, it was kind of like if someone, like, you know, they would, like, kind of punch you with something,

but they wouldn't, like, knock you out. It wasn't, like, something they said or did where you're just like, oh, I can't believe that. It was just a romp. Yeah. It was a fun romp. It was a rom. Yeah.

Nothing wrong with a good romp. Anyway, but I guess Magic Mike is a fun romp too. Magic Mike is essentially a romp. It's funny because there are really fun comments on my review of it, which is on the website today. Oh, my God. I mean, just accusing the first one of being sexist because of how it objectified men. But that's what we're talking about. Yeah.

Yeah. It's cool. it's totally, it's totally different to objectify men than objectify women. Like, it's not the same thing. It's just like how you can't be racist against white people. Like, it's just not, the power dynamics that are already very, very well entrenched in our culture make it impossible to do that. Like, and also, like, and this was discussed in the video, like, the way that women do that is not the same as the way that men do that. Just because it's not as much of a thing. There's not one way to be a dick to a dude.

But yeah, this idea of like, okay, same formula as like when we objectify women. Let's take his clothes mostly off, make it oily and very lean. So it's like this this like creature that emerges where it's like, oh, this is what women are supposed to be. Yeah. lusting for. But it's like if I saw that person on the street, it wouldn't, I wouldn't, like I wouldn't think twice.

I'd be like, oh, I'm kind of scared of you. If you saw Channing Tatum on the street, you'd be like, I'm kind of scared of you. Yeah. Yeah, I know. I wouldn't be,

I'm not that into Channing Tatum as like, no, no, it wouldn't like, oh, I can't believe it. Like, let me get up on that. Are you, how oily are you right now? That's like, that would be my reaction.

Do you think he's currently oiled or does he, does he oil selectively? Well, so there, this is actually an idea. an idea that Magic Mike XXXL deals with. Tell me. Okay, so, so this is not a spoiler, but Matthew McConaughey's character, Dallas, who's like the MC of the original club is not back.

And a lot of the... The reconnaissance is over. Yeah, it's pretty much over, I think. But, so they're kind of figuring out what to do for this last, you know, hurrah show that they're going to do. And a lot of that centers on them tossing out these things that he had kind of made a part their act like firemen costumes and cops and like sexy rodeo and stuff like that and making their own act.

Man, how are you going to burn McConaugan the way out though? That's rough. The old man didn't know what he was doing. Somebody actually says, all right, all right, all right. In reference to him. It's like very winky. But yeah, but it's like in and the new MC kind of like, you know, pumps up the crowd as Jada Pinkin-Smith, which is very interesting to have a woman in that role.

now who's like addressing the audience as queens and asking if they want to be exalted by these beautiful men and stuff. I mean it's very it's like it's it's pretty different I would say like the first one is it's much more political I feel like than the first one was the first one was just like oh let's hang out with these dudes and like in kind of a crappy very warm underlit version of Florida and it still feels like that too because Steven Soderberg also shot this one so it looks and feels exactly the same. What I think it's, I was reading your view on that, like, struck me because the, the comp you keep making is to pitch perfect too.

Mm-hmm. And pitch perfect, to me, is, it's in that tradition of taking something that usually happens in crappy places and making it seem spectacular. Yeah. Right? It's like, the, the Acapella Championships of the world. Yeah. Are in this, like, massive theater with, like, fire.

And it's like, no, that, nah. Yeah. No, that this shit happens in, like, a Hilton ballroom. Yeah. Yeah. It's wild to me. It very much looks like, yeah, just a convention center. Although pitch perfect too is weird because its final competition took place in some random

like an outdoor festival in Copenhagen. Yeah. It looks really, really like kind of low key. But then of course when they actually do the performance, it's all like very glossily shot. And also the voices just sound insane in that like very processed. But yeah, no, it's, I mean, it's got good dance routines in it, which is great. I mean, that's like half of what you want. I don't know.

It's like, it's almost too slow. It's almost too chill. But I like that as opposed to the pitch perfect too for doing things. I think between the entourage movie, the Magic Mike movie, and then my personal current hate obsession, which is ballers. There's a lot of places where you can just like hang out with some chill bros in the media right now. How chill are they on ballers though? I feel like they're not that chill. And definitely they're not chill on entourage.

Yeah. But it's like everything in ballers. is act two. Like, it's a show that's act two, right? It's like, the setup is like literally

immediately dealt with in like five minutes. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And then you're just sort of like, now we're going to experience what it's like to be in this world. And nothing happens beyond that.

Yeah. Like, it's just that. And I think that's actually the problem with virtually every Netflix show. Yeah. Netflix shows are just endless act one. And you're like,

dude, just become daredevil. Like, do it. Like, just do some stuff. Like, I get it.

We're here for Daredevil. Like, where are you? We won't have questions if we just get introduced to a superhero. Like, we kind of know what a superhero is. It's okay. And it's like, that's weird that Netflix just never takes that opportunity to just like stretch out act two. They're always like, act one, act one, act one, a little bit of a problem.

And now it's act three and now he's the daredevil. Yeah. But could we just hang out? He's freaking out over here. So Ryan Earhold on Twitter just tweeted the most insane thing at me at us. if you go into the parental restrictions in the general settings of the iPhone, you can turn off access to connect and it gets replaced with a playlist button. That's the best thing I've ever seen.

Wait. It's like, yeah. Parents around the world. You go into settings general restrictions and that's where your parental restrictions are. And then you like, everyone is doing this right? Take your permission away to access Apple Connect or music Connect, whatever it's called. And then it just turns into a playlist tab.

What? That's the best. And that really, every parent in America should be currently looking at their children's phone and taking away Connect. Yeah. That's what should be asking. Is that just so you can't get content from Miley Cyrus and pollute their minds? That's amazing. What else do I want to not get myself access to?

I mean. I think I'm not going to give myself access to all kinds of crazy things. Hold on. Okay. We're like running behind. I need to read this one. And I want everyone to think about the fact that Apple is censoring the music. They're playing the clean versions of songs.

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There is a 45-day return policy because one month just ain't enough. And that is automatic. Automatic.com slash Vergecast. Back out of the zone. So they're playing the clean versions of songs. Yeah. Are they going to censor what the artist put and connect? And if so, why would they restrict your parents?

If you're listening to the radio, I think it usually. plays the clean version. I find no, like, I'm not outraged by them playing the clean versions of songs. Neither am I. Like, whatever. It's a bummer. Some of them just come out like Swiss cheese, though, like, depending on the song. I mean, some of them doesn't really affect it that much.

But are they going to censor connect to? It's like, Justin Bieber going to be, like, doing weird stuff. But what if you're kind of listen to Miguel coffee and you're like just don't want to listen to the version that has the word coffee subbed in for the word you want to hear? Like, that's a big, it's like, I mean, what if you said, the mood with that. And then it was like coffee in the morning. And you're like,

I mean, if you are setting the mood with Beach One, you have fucked up. You are, you are just not, it's not going to happen for you. Wow. What?

What are you going to go? What are you going to? Sounds super hype. All out of the world. Reping Bristol. Reping Long Beach. Reping Australia. Reping these two getting down.

Like, it's like, you can't do that. Oh, man. Yeah. No, I mean, I don't know. I feel like, I feel like, I feel like, I actually feel like the Coffee version is more romantic.

It's nice. It's romantic, yeah. It's coffee in the morning, dude. That's very cute. Everyone does that. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. Wait, can I say, can I say the F word on this show? We just did. Non-stop. Oh, yeah. I don't know. I don't know.

I have a no profanity impulse in my head because of my old podcast. I can do it. Yeah, fuck you tea drinkers. What? Wait, there's all that buildup for fuck you tea drinkers. Wow, I don't know, you felt that strongly. Wow, that's rough. No, she did.

I was just echoing her. Oh, I see. Oh, I see. It's just like your little echo chamber of hating tea people. Those are my people. We got, we got some of the team person? No, I'm just Indian. Oh.

I don't know. I enjoy from time to time. I'm a coffee person. Aren't we all? Aren't we all in America coffee people? Wait, can we talk, wait, I want to talk about something else on having to do with beats. Did we, we can't stop talking about Taylor, like making Apple, bending Apple to her will?

Did you guys talk about that last week? We did not. No, we did not. I'm kind of over it. I was a Walton-Laron thing. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, we did. No, we, like, brushed over it. Right.

With Lauren. I would say I, like, have a lot of feelings about it, but I don't anymore. Right. Yeah. Everyone's just over it. Like, it happened. Like, massive corporations, Taylor Swift is a massive corporation, negotiates with other massive corporation. Yeah, and they do it in public.

They fight in public. and we all kind of cheer and watch. Yeah. I mean, yeah. I mean, we were talking today about like, we're already talking about verge 50 and it was like, well, it feels like, right now it feels like Taylor Swift should be on that again, even though her album was out last year and she was also on the verge 50 last year. But I don't know.

I feel like I'm just, I think she needs to, she won't because she's still on tour. She's still promoting this album for like the rest of the year. But I just kind of want her to back off for a second and just let other people talk. make their mark on the music business. Like Drake, just put Drake out there in his Apple jacket a little more and, you know. Put Drake out there in his Apple. Do you think he's going to wear it on tour? No.

Okay, so there's one thing that we should talk about before. Hyneken? It's not Hyneken. Although that's coming again at the end of the show. I want to talk about our comments because something is going to happen to our comments. Right. And by the time you come back to the verb, by the time you listen to this, it might have already happened.

And I just want to talk about it. Because I know Emily has a lot of thoughts about comments. And I have a lot of thoughts about comments. I do. And so does Dieter. It's been a while since I've... Does RAC have comments? Yeah.

Do you find them valuable? I mean... And then it's not as... Is it not a big... We have one woman who's like a superstar. We love her. Shout out Pam B. She doesn't even know.

I don't think there's any reason she would ever listen to this, but we know so much about her. Really? Because she leaves these like, there's like, Easter eggs in her comments, but where she lives. how old her daughter is. And she leaves like insightful, long, amazing. We love her. She's our mascot. Yeah.

Wow. Pam like lamb, but it's really Pam B. Wow. Okay. Everyone else, I don't know, whatever, it's fine. Hi. Hi. Hey, Collegers.

So we have, we also have some superstars, and then we have a lot of other people. I bet you guys have lots of superstars. We do. We do. We love them very much. But here's what we're going to do for a minute. We're going to turn off our comments in July. By default, we can still turn them on.

Yep. And we'll turn them on in some places. It must love the forums. But I think our comments are, like, out of control right now. Ooh, so you're trying to quell the beasts? Yeah, I've done it before. So when we ran Angadget, we turned off comments, I think, twice for weeks at a time. How was it?

It was fun. Does it really work when you come back? Is the vibe different? Yeah, the vibe is radically different because people know that you can take it away. It's like there's so many things about this that are basically you could map one-to-one to like the things dictators say about their country. You must show the people that you are firmly in control. Take away all the grain. And then when you give the grain back, they will be grateful to you.

That's basically what in my head, what this all sounds like. But, yeah, we're a little out of control. We've got a lot of new people. Emily is new, but like six months new. But we have actual, like, very new people first posts on the site, comment warfare, which is just, I think, a disaster. So we're just turning down. We're turning down the heat.

Yeah, it's kind of cool, like an easy summer moment. Yeah, July. It's a lot of everyone chill out. You know, if you got some to say, put it in the forums. If you make a really good forum post, we're going to start putting those back on the front page. Yep. We're just, everyone, everyone take a minute. Yeah.

A languid. We're going to reorganize the forums a little bit too, like make some new ones and merge some other ones. And those will still be fully active and everything. It's not like nobody's going to be able to write anything of their own on the verge. I mean, there's so many interesting arguments that come up around comments and it's really interesting to see what people feel entitled to in their internet experience by interesting, I mean, like, head smacking, but still interesting to learn about.

Yeah, I mean, I think the thing that it comes down to is for me is when, you know, we'll inevitably get people on our other social media platform saying that we, our skin is too thin and we can't handle the feedback from our like honest feedback and complaints from our readers, but like, I don't know. We didn't like fall into these positions. Like we've, like you said, I think in another post, like we've been doing this for a while. It's not like there can, there's not really a referendum to be made by the readers on us writing on the site.

So that's not going to change anything. And if you don't like the stuff that we're doing, you are free to read something else. And in the meantime, it does not help us do good work. to have people yelling at us all the time. Right. And I think that's actually my, I've done, like, this is not a good idea, and I don't think anybody should do this,

but I did it. I read through three years of MetaForum comments, like over the past three days. Yeah, D.A. That's rough. That's some, like, crazy shit. And the complaints are always the same. The complaints are, why is it like growing this way?

Why don't you do the thing I want? Why don't you have customizable RSS feeds come up a lot? Why can't I program the homepage the way? Like, they're the same. And it's a lot of it is like, why do you cover entertainment? Why do you cover rocket launches? Like it's all about as we expand and do different things. There's a lot of questions.

But the tone of our comments is completely changed. And you can literally just like mark the day that it changed. And that is like GamerGate happened. And GamerGate totally amped up the vitriol. It made our entire staff decline to participate because they couldn't. There was just no safe space to get involved with the audience. So we all walked away. It got terrible in there, and now there's no more entry point back into it.

Right. And I think everybody, like, it's going to be good for us. We're all just going to chill out. Yeah. Breathe. Summer. I love this. Yeah.

Sounds great. We're going to listen to some Apple beats one for whenever we need to get turned, Zane Lowe, like, do the yelling for us. You're going to let the music pick you and you're not going to engage with the comments, and it's just going to be like an easy, like fewer choices summer. Let the music pick you. Yeah. Oh, fewer choices, summer is great.

Yeah. Right? Where we just like reject the the paradox of endless choice. Yeah, yeah, yeah. You just put as much of your life on autopilot as possible. And then you just enjoy. Yeah. Dude,

I knew there was a reason here on this show today. Just chill out. Just summer. Can you do like a big, deep breath sound effect in the microphone right now? No. Seems like they'll get used for something weird. What?

It's very safe. Why don't you yell or do the things that I command you to do? You know, I already weird stuff happening from my first appearance on the Vergecast in my own social media channels. We did a periscope last night and people were like, oh, it's Nicola. When do you come back on the verge? That was really cool. That's amazing. Yeah, it was wild. Yeah, that was cool. Do we have more

to talk about it? I mean, I could get into my deep feelings about the principal charity, but I think that's not worth it. I mean, the common thing, I feel like the people who listen to this show are people who are like commenters on our site and it's worth talking about a little bit. But it's going to happen. I promise you'll turn it back on. I promise you'll be cool.

No choice of fewer choices. Fewer choices summer. Keep a diary about how you feel. I recently gave up talking about a certain subject in my life. And I still just write everything down and just don't talk about it out loud with my friends. Was that kind of a three-star, no-heart relationship? Because that's what that sounds like to me. His name is Tim. It's been good.

You wind up being light and you have better things to talk about with people. We're actually doing a video of Plant Sorcanter County right now about how to stop using your phone so much. Wait, I just learned about Jomo, Joy of Missing Out. And I have it. Whoa. Yeah. That's something. You should write that for our site?

I think someone wrote it for the New York Times like 2012. Oh, well. You know what I had Jomo about? Hmm. Governor's Ball. Yeah. Total festival Jomo for sure. Hype check Jomo quite high.

Yeah. Yeah. Because you have to be strong. Yeah. And you have to be really mature too. And you have to be strong and know yourself. Know yourself. No yourself.

Fewer choices. More Jomo. Have a summer. Don't write comments. Get vitamin D from the sun. Do you say half the summer? Stop eating dairy. It's not the summer.

Dude, summer's starting strong in the Vergecast right now. July 1. Yeah, it's here. Worldwide. Worldwide. Worldwide. Worldwide. One, two, three.

Worldwide. All right, that, for better or worse, was our show this week. We're good. All right. I have to do this stuff. Sam isn't here, and you don't know what I'm talking about. So, thank you for listening. Please follow the verge on Twitter.

We're the real verge on Snapchat. Like I said, we're doing more and more and more periscopes. all the time. Look us up there. You can rate and review us. Wait, people. Nicola is Nicola underscore Fumo

on Twitter. Dieter is Backlon. I'm reckless. Emily is Emily Yoshita. I recommend following both Emily and Nicola. I'm following Nicola right now because they have excellent

Twitter experiences to offer you. And here in this summer fewer choices, just do what I say. You got a big butt on your Twitter Facebook. Yeah. I love that.

I'm a big old butt on a Twitter page. I'm going to buy that painting from that girl. Anyway, some are fewer choices. Just do it. Just live a life that they curate for you. No, that you curate for you. Autopilot.

Yeah. Pick what you like. Stick to it. Yeah. Anyway. More to come. You should just have you do this, like life coach with the verge audience every morning. Bring me a verge and his problems.

A verge. And I'll talk like really open. Oh, man. The verge has so many problems. I'll talk really open. It's been ended like, like, you should do, well, you should have, you should have an advice column. We should have an advice column for commenters who were sad about not being able to comment. I'll do it.

We're launching advice, we're launching advice columns. Yeah, yeah. We're going to have, like, we already have two in the bag. We should just start up a third. Oh, yeah. I'll do it. Do you want to do it two? Uh, please.

No. Mm-hmm. Nicola literally just looked at a text Incoming on the phone As any means of escape All right You can rate review us on iTunes Please give us five stars

I would like to know What? And of heart Yeah Well I want to know What is your three star heart That's go on iTunes We actually

I didn't mention this anywhere We are over a thousand five star reviews On iTunes People Last time I was here You were almost there And now you're there We're like way over now

But yeah So go on iTunes Give us some love Emily has a great new podcast called Verge ESP with Liz Lapato I think you have a new episode coming out next week next week yes so check that out Chris Plant has his great podcast, What's Tech?

There's a rogue podcast happening in the halls of The Verge right now One of our video producers Rondo is just literally walking around with the microphone You'll see that leaking out here and there Yeah that's it. We're iTunes.com slash The Verge, that's everything's there And that was Wirtches

I've got to read one more thing about Heineken, ready? Super. Look, here's what I want you to do. James Murphy got together at Heineken to make Subway Symphony happen. They're going to make it happen, but they need your support. So how do you make it to the turnstiles in our city make beautiful sounds? Just tweet hashtag Subway Symphony. You can make it happen.

And you can go to SubwaySympany.com and demonstrate your support for Heineken, James Murphy, and Subway Symphony. That was Verchast. Goodbye. Bye. Rock and rock.