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230: ‘Flabbergasting’ With Nilay Patel

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0:00:00I can't believe it took this long to get you on my show. I was on like two years ago

0:00:04Yeah, I I just feel like you should be back more often though, you know, yeah, you know we started doing a

0:00:12Interview episodes of the first chance we can trade back and forth because we're doing we're doing second episodes every week now, you know

0:00:19I you know, I'm game for that

0:00:22We should do it. I think two years ago we

0:00:26It was the height of the headphone jack debate and we made people wait

0:00:30Over an hour before we actually addressed it which I thought was very clever on both of our parts. I

0:00:37Am

0:00:43Still exhausted. I find that this this

0:00:46I

0:00:48Always say like this for me is like for an accountant. This is like April 15th

0:00:53You know, this is this to me is super exhausting

0:00:57And you know, even though I put my watch review up

0:01:01Wednesday it's and now we're recording on Friday. I still feel like punch-drunk. I am

0:01:08it and I counted and I'm not trying to brag it it I'm just saying like

0:01:13It's it's a big number

0:01:16from

0:01:18the event until

0:01:21Wednesday at one when I finally put my watch review up I wrote

0:01:2412,200 words in three articles on during fireball. That's crazy

0:01:30It's more than you're doing lately. You're all podcast now. I

0:01:34Back, so did you did I didn't even?

0:01:38This is how exhausted and behind I am I thoroughly read your iPhone X s review

0:01:46I didn't even check the verges iPhone

0:01:49Or our series for watch review. Did you write that or did somebody else Dieter did that one?

0:01:53See that's that's where I need I need like a staff. I

0:01:56Encourage everyone to find a partner like Dieter to work with it's the most rewarding working relationship

0:02:05I've ever had and so yeah go find that guy. Don't find Dieter stay the hell away from him

0:02:09But you know for us it's a little different because we have to make videos - right so this week this week for me is

0:02:17is, hey, I don't know if this happens to you,

0:02:22after the event itself, I have to go back

0:02:25and watch the video.

0:02:26Like I have to watch the live stream

0:02:28just to remember everything that happened.

0:02:30'Cause we're live vlogging and then we're like,

0:02:32I saw you in the hands-on area and everyone should know this,

0:02:35John saw me taking photos in the hands-on area

0:02:37and he just goes, I'm so happy

0:02:39I don't have to do that shit.

0:02:40So like, we're like in pure panic mode at the event

0:02:44and we come out of it and I always have to,

0:02:46That night, I always sit down and watch the live stream

0:02:50to remember what the hell happened.

0:02:52So that's like step one.

0:02:54And then we get back, you know, we've got the devices.

0:02:57Our video was made by eight people.

0:03:00Like I counted it like 2 a.m. on Monday night,

0:03:04you know, we published at 6 a.m. Tuesday.

0:03:06There were eight people in the Verge office,

0:03:08like cranking away in this video.

0:03:10And then hilariously on the other side of the office,

0:03:12our science team was watching the Elon Musk's

0:03:15I'm gonna send artists to Mars, or artists to the moon.

0:03:18So it was like a totally crazy night in the Verge office.

0:03:21So we, the whole Verge calls it iPhone week.

0:03:25- Yeah. - Right?

0:03:26Here's iPhone week, it's gonna happen,

0:03:27it's gonna be this big thing.

0:03:29We have a new executive producer, she's great,

0:03:31her name is Nori, she runs our video team.

0:03:33She came to one of our shoots just 'cause she wanted to like

0:03:35hear what, see what all the hype was about.

0:03:38And now we're like kinda good at it.

0:03:39She's like, this seems pretty calm.

0:03:40And we're like, no, this is still as crazy as ever.

0:03:43We're just good at it.

0:03:45Um, but I'm, I am like very lucky to work at a place where like so many

0:03:52people are involved in the production of the thing that we do, um, it's,

0:03:56it's just from Mark every year.

0:03:57This is just a remarkable week for us because we, everything

0:04:01that we can do, we do, right.

0:04:03We take photos, we make videos, we do an Instagram thing.

0:04:07We have a pot, like all of the things, all of the tools that the verge has,

0:04:12We like throw at this project and them and then I don't know if this is like for you, but you think it would be over

0:04:17Like you publish the thing

0:04:20You know throw the bomb over your shoulder and walk away

0:04:22But that's what it feels like when I hit the button you hit the button. It's like do you have that moment?

0:04:28I don't did you hit the embargo? I have this one moment of

0:04:31Panic when like the thing goes up at 6 a.m. And then you know Twitter's like a little slow

0:04:36So I don't see everybody else's I'm like, oh I fucked that up

0:04:40Like I got there I'd like I go and then like the wall she channel goes up or something, right?

0:04:44so I have that moment of panic, but then I have a whole day of

0:04:48People reacting and like talking to me about the review and asking questions. So that's another whole day of

0:04:53Work and like really enjoyable work like that's what you live for, right? I

0:04:58Completely agree, but it is completely why I had to pull two consecutive all-nighters

0:05:06So yeah, I'm terrible at deadlines. I almost hit so

0:05:10And I and this is exactly what this podcast is for. I love this inside baseball. So the embargo dates were

0:05:17Tuesday morning 6 a.m. Eastern Time

0:05:21for the iPhone 10s and then Wednesday 6 a.m. For the series for Apple watch and

0:05:29I'm

0:05:31Writing my iPhone review and it's I got it. It's like I feel it the words are coming out of my fingers really well

0:05:38but I literally was up all night and

0:05:40I dosed the caffeine just right, you know, like I wasn't like super jittery, you know

0:05:47But I got it and I think I published at like 7 a.m. I mean it for and for me that's really close

0:05:54oh, no, I didn't hit at 7 a.m. Because I

0:05:58The inside story the way behind the scenes story is I I felt so good the night before

0:06:04About where I already was and I knew I was gonna get up at 6

0:06:10Whether I was gonna get any sleep or not. I was gonna get up at 6 to publish if I was done and so

0:06:14usually

0:06:17My wife Amy takes our son to school and I said, you know what? I'll be up

0:06:21I will take him to school tomorrow. So I was like you can sleep in I got it and

0:06:26It came time to take him to school and I was in I was editing it was like final editing

0:06:31But I wasn't done yet. And I was like, ah, geez. I was like we're gonna speed walk to school today

0:06:35So I took him to school. So I published around eight. That's right

0:06:39I would have probably published around seven but I it wound up being a little after eight because I took my son to school

0:06:45yeah, and then I had that day of

0:06:48I

0:06:50Read your review. I read Joanna's I read a couple others. I read panzerino, you know it

0:06:55There's still some I have so many open tabs from reviews to read. I still want to see what other people have to say

0:07:02But I'm taking feedback

0:07:05From people all day

0:07:07but meanwhile

0:07:08I know that I've got this 6 a.m.

0:07:10deadline the next day for the watch and then eventually I go to sleep and I wake up around like 6 p.m. And

0:07:17It's like I got to get going on the watch thing. But in the meantime, I'm

0:07:22Still taking feedback from the iPhone review and and again, like you said it is fantastic. It is exactly

0:07:29Why I do this it is it is it is both the hardest

0:07:34I work all year and by far and away the most rewarding. The only thing that compares is when I do my live

0:07:39show at the WWDC in terms of being

0:07:43Rewarding and feeling like hey, I'm okay at what I do. Yeah. No, I'm completely with you that and and for me it's like

0:07:51Both positive and like I want to hear I'm I'm very interested what people think I got wrong, right?

0:07:57I like me too. That's exactly why I have you on the show

0:08:00Because I thought I felt like our reviews were quite different in terms of the camera and that is exactly you know

0:08:08Like that is exactly I don't want you to tell me what I got right? You don't even have the phone yet

0:08:12I want to know like what I got wrong and I want to know what questions you still have that are unanswered

0:08:17You know and and that's what it's fascinating

0:08:21You know and people ask such great questions and it's like oh that is a great question

0:08:24Let me tell you and then meanwhile it's like 11 p.m. And I haven't really started my watch review yet, and I'm like, oh

0:08:31I've started doing this very coy thing

0:08:38Which I you know, I used to be a lawyer so I believe it's firmly within the letter of the law

0:08:43I don't know if it's within the spirit of the law, but you're not supposed to tell people that you have devices under embargo, right?

0:08:49Yeah, that well, it's like the rule. All right

0:08:52Right, right. My doorman actually saw the max in my hand my apartment building. He's like that's the man I was like shit

0:09:00Can't it's a huge phone. They can't get away with it. Um, but I've started tweeting

0:09:05What questions do you have like early in the process like the day of the event?

0:09:09Just so I know because people ask questions. I would never think of and to me that's where you like really find

0:09:17Angles in so like one of these days one of these companies they're gonna be like, dude

0:09:22You're just giving it away that you have it, but I'm like no, but it doesn't say it's just I'm just well

0:09:27I'm just idly wondering what questions you have. So we'll see. We'll see if I get ding for that

0:09:31but to me that if what I'm doing in a review is

0:09:34Answering as many questions as possible then I'm then I'm succeeding you

0:09:39You got that. I got the

0:09:42the gold 10 s the gold tennis

0:09:46Max and I got the gold series for a watch. Did you get the same ones?

0:09:51I got the gold again Dieter has the watch but did he get the gold one? I believe so, right?

0:09:58Well the thing about getting the gold ones is there's no way to hide that

0:10:02You know, I mean like you could put it in a case and then people couldn't tell but even you know

0:10:07If you don't put it in the case, there's no way that you can use it

0:10:10So the letter of the NDA is that you're not supposed to let anybody know other than like people you work with and people in your immediate family, but it you know, I don't see how they can teachers a space gray. Got that wrong.

0:10:25Huh?

0:10:26And it's still it's like, how am I supposed to wear this watch? And if somebody really notices

0:10:33that I'm wearing the gold series for a watch, I mean, I can't hide it. You can't even put the

0:10:37watch in a case. If you know what you're looking for, it's it's immediately obvious that I'm

0:10:42wearing this gold series for watch. Yeah. And it's not like we don't run in circles,

0:10:47or knows what we do. Right. So, well, there's a little bit of like, I'm gonna trust my friends,

0:10:53Like they're gonna see this phone and they're just gonna help me keep the secret. Yeah

0:10:58So I have an inside baseball question for you sir, okay in your watch review, yes you say you had it before the event

0:11:09Was now no that's true. No, that's not

0:11:12That's a mistake if I said that what does the actual review say?

0:11:19It says you... Absolutely not true.

0:11:20Let me go find a review now.

0:11:23Here we go.

0:11:24Live live doxing.

0:11:26Yeah.

0:11:26Talk show.

0:11:27Oh, here we go.

0:11:30You wrote, "Which brings me to the most striking new hardware in the series for the display.

0:11:35I cheated a bit when I wrote the following bit in my thoughts and observations piece regarding

0:11:40last week's event because I'd been wearing this review unit for several days already."

0:11:44Right.

0:11:45That meant that all I meant by that.

0:11:46I didn't mean that I'd been wearing it before the event. I meant that I didn't publish my thoughts

0:11:51and observations on the event thing until Friday. It was like, Oh, see, okay. I do. So that's a good

0:11:58call that I'm maybe that sentence was a little unclear, but I absolutely. I have never ever

0:12:05gotten anything before an event. I don't I don't think anybody has. I don't think even Walt, you

0:12:11know, if anybody would have ever gotten anything before an event, it would have been Walt, but I

0:12:15I don't think anybody has I'll say I did a hundred episodes of a podcast with Walt. I never got him to admit shit

0:12:20Yeah, you're way closer to him than me but I've asked him questions like that and he's very very secret

0:12:28No, Peter and I both read that line and we're like no

0:12:32No, I will I will try to clarify that after this after we record but that's fine. You should own it man

0:12:40Keep keep the ambiguity in there. It's it's your brand

0:12:42end. I have a great, great story about having pre-release hardware. I forget what year it

0:12:53was. But it was maybe around 2013, 2014, and I got ahead and it was an iPad event in California.

0:13:03Yeah.

0:13:04- Yeah.

0:13:05- Maybe 2012, I don't know.

0:13:07And I'm flying on Southwest back home to Philly.

0:13:12And I don't even know why,

0:13:14but to me, this is all the more amazing

0:13:16because Southwest, you don't get assigned seats

0:13:20on the plane.

0:13:21You first run, you pick an open seat

0:13:24and you just sit wherever you want.

0:13:25And there's a little bit of status involved

0:13:27where you can like pay extra to get on first

0:13:30so you can be more likely to get a good seat, whatever.

0:13:33And I go on and I got, to me,

0:13:37one of the best seats on the plane is in the exit row.

0:13:40There's one of the exit row sides,

0:13:42how only has two seats.

0:13:44And I get one of those seats

0:13:46and it has extra room in front of you.

0:13:48It's like Southwest version of first class.

0:13:51And I get this seat.

0:13:52And then a nice young woman sits next to me

0:13:58and I take out this new iPad.

0:14:03And immediately she says to me,

0:14:06holy shit, that's the new iPad.

0:14:10And I'm like,

0:14:10and I'm like, what do I do?

0:14:13And it ends up, it's Ashley Nelson Hornstein.

0:14:16And she's a great speaker.

0:14:18I'll put this in the show notes.

0:14:20But at the time she worked for Apple.

0:14:23- Oh no.

0:14:24- Yeah, she worked for Apple.

0:14:26And well, it turned out great because she worked for Apple.

0:14:29So she knew to keep her mouth shut.

0:14:30And I was like, oh, I'm John Gruber.

0:14:32She's like, "Holy shit, you're John Gruber."

0:14:33And we had the most amazing three-hour-long conversation

0:14:36like nerding out on a plane.

0:14:38And in fact, she had never seen the iPhone.

0:14:40She worked on something else at the time

0:14:41while she was at Apple, so she hadn't seen it.

0:14:43But because she worked at Apple,

0:14:45I was just totally like, "Here, take it.

0:14:47"Play around with it."

0:14:48(laughs)

0:14:49And we had the most amazing conversation

0:14:52for like three hours on this flight.

0:14:54And it was amazing.

0:14:55But I had this moment of panic when she first said that.

0:14:59I was like, "Oh shit, what do I do?"

0:15:01- That's always my fear, you know,

0:15:03'cause we, I'm sure you feel this too.

0:15:05There's the event and you get the phone

0:15:09and then you have to go home.

0:15:11- Right.

0:15:12- And the first thing I wanna do

0:15:13is put my SIM card in the phone.

0:15:14- Right. - Right?

0:15:15Like, without, I wanna start using this thing,

0:15:17I wanna understand it, but I can't use it on a plane.

0:15:22Like, I feel very nervous about it.

0:15:25And I certainly cannot open my laptop

0:15:28and write iPhone 10s review and start typing away

0:15:32with somebody sitting next to me.

0:15:33So there's this block of five and a half hours

0:15:36flying from San Francisco to New York

0:15:40where I'm just playing with the thing

0:15:41and desperately trying to remember everything that happened

0:15:44on the bad wifi.

0:15:45And I'm always like, I should just sleep.

0:15:48What am I doing?

0:15:49This is a useless time.

0:15:50But I can never help it and I always display with it.

0:15:52- Yeah, so, and there was one time too,

0:15:56I forget when, what year it was,

0:15:58But it was one year or two where it obviously wasn't one of the S years.

0:16:02Might've been like the iPhone four. I don't know. Well,

0:16:07cause I didn't get it. No, I didn't get a review. I wasn't on a review thing.

0:16:12So probably it was like the iPhone five.

0:16:14And I got on a plane and I had it out and like the flight attendant was like,

0:16:19Oh my God, is that the new iPhone? And I just was like, uh, yeah.

0:16:22And I just like put it back in my pocket and I was like, yeah.

0:16:25And I was thinking like you, I was like,

0:16:27I guess I'll just start playing with this when I get home.

0:16:30'Cause I just worried that somebody, you know what I mean?

0:16:33And I just worried that if I said yeah and I kept it out,

0:16:36somebody's gonna snap a picture

0:16:38and put it on Instagram or something.

0:16:40And like, dude, this guy next to me

0:16:42has an iPhone 5 already.

0:16:43And it's like, I don't need that.

0:16:45- Yeah, I got really lucky this year

0:16:48because the two phones were identical for most part.

0:16:51- Yes.

0:16:52So in years past, I land in New York

0:16:57and the video team and the photography team

0:16:59want the phone right away, right?

0:17:02Like those B-roll shots don't come out of nowhere.

0:17:04They take hours and hours and hours.

0:17:05Like if you watch our video this year,

0:17:08there's all these like beautiful shots

0:17:10of it floating through space.

0:17:12Hopefully we took some behind the scenes photos of this.

0:17:16That iPhone is mounted on like a robot arm

0:17:19that's like slowly tracking through a room

0:17:21with the camera following it.

0:17:23That took a long time to set up,

0:17:25and that's time I don't get to use the phone.

0:17:27So this year I was like, yeah,

0:17:28you can take this little one, whatever,

0:17:30we'll battery test it later, have at it.

0:17:33There's nothing I'm gonna miss if I don't have that phone,

0:17:36apart from the screen size,

0:17:37but I know the screen size is a little one.

0:17:40In years past, it's literally war,

0:17:43where I'm like, guys, I need to review the phone.

0:17:46And they're like, yeah, but we need to do,

0:17:48and we're constantly negotiating that time,

0:17:51And then I'm always worried like it's my phone.

0:17:54Like I put my SIM card in it, I log into my,

0:17:55I do all the things and I'm always like

0:17:58in the middle of one of these shots,

0:17:59I'm gonna get a notification that's like

0:18:02the verge of shutting down, you know,

0:18:03like something horrible will happen.

0:18:05- Right.

0:18:05- But this year it was,

0:18:08I fully support two identical phones

0:18:11with different screen sizes

0:18:12'cause it made it much easier this year to get photos.

0:18:15- Fundamentally, that is absolutely true.

0:18:18And I think it's one of the,

0:18:20I think it's one of the best things about this cycle of iPhone and I hope they keep

0:18:25it going forward is that it and I emphasize it as much as I could in my review that it

0:18:31really is like choosing between a medium and large cup of the same coffee it is you know

0:18:37you do get more battery life there are more it's it's you know the the screen has the

0:18:43same resolution pixels per inch so you do get more pixels on the larger phone you know

0:18:49And so in terms of quote unquote, they're the same phone, but different sizes, it's

0:18:53not the same screen scaled up, you do get more information, you know, more pixels, which

0:18:57is I think is the right way to do it. But I think people fundamentally understand that.

0:19:01And it's a, to me, a much easier decision. It is Do you want a bigger phone or a smaller

0:19:06phone? And that's it is because you get literally the exact same camera. And I thought that

0:19:10in the past three, four years, the the subtle camera advantages of the plus phones were

0:19:18were very hard to make a recommendation regarding, you know, that they've always had like, like

0:19:26optical image stabilization advantages, you know, like, there was one year where only

0:19:31the plus had any optical image stabilization, and then the next year, the smaller one had

0:19:36it, but only for stills and not for video, but the plus had it for video, you know, there

0:19:40were always these subtle technical advantages to the plus size phone that made it really

0:19:45hard to make a sort of recommendation other than your preference for size. Whereas this

0:19:50year it is just two, two phones that are exactly the same in two sizes.

0:19:55And I'm good. I gotta tell you, I'm going back and forth almost day by day on which

0:19:59which size I prefer. And I've been using the max and I'm like used to it and I hold the

0:20:04little one I'm like, pretty small. But I think to me, if the max had picture in picture video,

0:20:12Yeah, man, that would that would sell it would just absolutely

0:20:16sell like, yeah, you know, I saw the the Jets Browns game last

0:20:20night, like got interesting. The Browns won a game. It's amazing.

0:20:24Open the frigid like the whole as like, I want to check this

0:20:27out. So like, figure it out how to watch watching football on a

0:20:30phone is like, impossible. Like the NFL app last night told me

0:20:33that if I was using my cell network, I could watch it. But

0:20:37if I wanted to watch it on Wi Fi, I had to log into my cable

0:20:40provider, which makes zero fucking sense. But anyways, like

0:20:44figure on Verizon. Are you on Verizon? I'm an AT&T. I thought

0:20:48Verizon had like exclusive NFL rights, but maybe the NFL took

0:20:51those away this year. Ah, okay. So look, watching the NFL is like

0:20:55super complicated. Yeah, I here's my recommendation to

0:20:57everyone. Buy it, buy some TV package, like whatever one you

0:21:01want. Know in your heart that you spent some money on TV and

0:21:04then watch whatever pirate stream you want, because they

0:21:08They won't sell it to you.

0:21:09So just morally clear your mind and then go forward.

0:21:13Anyway, so I'm on Twitter hearing this game's crazy.

0:21:18So I go and open the app, I watch the thing,

0:21:20and I'm like, wait, I wanna see

0:21:21what people are tweeting about.

0:21:23So you gotta like, and the screen is big enough

0:21:26to support picture in picture.

0:21:27And that's literally the one thing I want from this phone.

0:21:31Just do it the way the iPad does it

0:21:33and let me watch two things at once.

0:21:35And then there will be no, literally no competition.

0:21:38- And you know that technically the phone could do it

0:21:41without breaking a sweat.

0:21:43I mean, 'cause the, you know, if the iPad can do it

0:21:47and the iPad is still the best iPad you can buy today

0:21:50still has the old A10 processor.

0:21:53I guess it's an A10X, I don't know,

0:21:55but it's, you know, two generations behind the A12.

0:21:58The A12, like I use the analogy in my review

0:22:01that it deals with things like, you know,

0:22:04things like this, like Neo in the matrix dodging bullets.

0:22:07You know, it is like, it is like no sweat,

0:22:10like no sweat could this phone, you know,

0:22:12this phone could probably do like three or four picture

0:22:14in picture HD streams, no problem.

0:22:17- I mean, the Apple TV can do it, right?

0:22:20If you open the ESPN app, you can get four HD streams going

0:22:24and that thing is nowhere near as powerful as the top.

0:22:27- Right, so yeah, and that's a perfect example.

0:22:29Like watching live sports while you want to check up

0:22:31on Twitter is exactly a perfect example

0:22:35of why you might want picture-in-picture.

0:22:38- It's also why Twitter keeps trying

0:22:39to be a sports video provider.

0:22:42It's not a good strategy for them,

0:22:44but you see why they keep wandering towards it,

0:22:46'cause they know it's a compelling use case.

0:22:48But yeah, if it had the picture-in-picture video,

0:22:53to me, it would be absolutely no,

0:22:55you should buy the Max,

0:22:56I've been getting 12 to 14 hours of battery life

0:22:59This thing and I'm not a casual or own use right? So like the advantages are big, you know, there's some size stuff like

0:23:05I put it in my review, you know the old plus funds

0:23:09They had those big bezels so to reach the top was actually not as much of a reach and now it's a really big reach

0:23:16For me, so yeah, there's some like handling considerations

0:23:19But if you could if this could just be your computer in that way, it would be no contest to me. I

0:23:25Do you find and it's the weirdest thing and I touched on this in my review and then I kind of

0:23:30Because it's so nonsensical that I didn't want to go into detail on it

0:23:36But it's the weirdest thing to me

0:23:38Is that even though it if you actually look at the technical specs of like an iPhone 8 plus and the iPhone 10s max?

0:23:46The max is like ever so slightly smaller

0:23:49It is like a millimeter narrower and in terms of side to side

0:23:54But it feels smaller in hand like like way more than you would think from one millimeter difference

0:24:01It actually to me feels it is way closer

0:24:04This is what I wrote is that it's a way closer call for me than than ever before

0:24:08I've never really used a plus full-time

0:24:10but the the tennis max feels

0:24:14Somehow feels smaller. I don't know if that's just because it doesn't have the forehead and chin

0:24:18It's like an optical illusion, but it feels better in hand. I

0:24:24I would chalk that up to optimal.

0:24:25Like we, you know, we measure it, we put them.

0:24:28To me, I think it's, the screen is so good

0:24:31that when you're holding it, you just feel like you're,

0:24:34you feel like what, how they want you to feel,

0:24:35which is you're holding a giant screen, right?

0:24:37And there's nothing around it.

0:24:39- Yeah.

0:24:40- You know, it's also the same basic size as the Note.

0:24:43It's the same basic size as the Pixel 2.

0:24:46They're all big.

0:24:47Like there's no, you know, when I flip the Max over,

0:24:51I'm like, yeah, this looks virtually the same

0:24:54as the old plus phones.

0:24:56I think that having the camera bump be vertical

0:24:59instead of horizontal really helps it

0:25:01in that optical illusion way.

0:25:04It's like thinning, it's like a thinning stripe.

0:25:07- Yeah, yeah.

0:25:09- But yeah, I mean, I have big hands

0:25:11and I'm like, yeah, this phone's pretty big.

0:25:13That's what I'm saying, day by day,

0:25:14I keep going back and forth,

0:25:15but I end up working on my phone almost all day long.

0:25:20All day long like my job is sometimes I like fear that the only thing I make at the verge is meetings, you know

0:25:27I'm like so I'm like I spent and I try not to take my laptop like I want to be engaged

0:25:31I want to pay attention. I want to be like a helpful boss like that sort of dude

0:25:34and so I only take my phone so I use my phone all day long and

0:25:39to me it's like

0:25:42Yeah, I want to watch things on this thing

0:25:44I want to like see more rows of the spreadsheet or whatever like

0:25:48That's the argument to me is like this is the phone you can work on all day. It's not the argument is less

0:25:53like

0:25:55You're gonna get a great video experience, right?

0:25:57Like I'm still a purist like I want to watch videos on big screen

0:26:01But the argument to me is as a primary computer you want a bigger screen? Yeah, I

0:26:06bought the

0:26:08And it is such an amazing cheat to be able to have the phone

0:26:14Both phones for a couple of days before the pre-ordering goes live

0:26:17And you know what, you know, we don't have to return these review units right away

0:26:22So if I didn't pre-order right at 3 a.m. Eastern when the thing goes live

0:26:27It's not like I don't have the new phone already. I already have the review unit

0:26:31But I ordered for me personally that the regular tennis I did not get the max but it was a close call

0:26:39I just I just like the smaller size better and it's yeah, it's a good fit for my eyes

0:26:44But it is a way it's it in so many ways it's such a tougher call than any previous year

0:26:51Yeah, I mean I I talked to one of my friends into a max and I talked another one of my friends out of a max

0:26:57And the arguments were exactly the same right? Like I was like, it's really big but the battery is pretty good

0:27:05But it's really big and one friend was like wow, man

0:27:08Gotta get the max then and the other friend was like, ah, it's huge. Like it was was the same

0:27:13So I think that's good

0:27:14I agree with you that the the difference on the plus camera was never enough to sell the size, right?

0:27:20Right, it was tempting open and it was always an irritant like like like a piece of sand caught in my eye

0:27:26You know, I mean like that. I knew that I was getting a slightly lesser camera

0:27:30But it wasn't enough to motivate me to do it. Do you take a lot of video on your phone?

0:27:34I don't but I'm I'm trying to now and and it I realized that I've been for some

0:27:42Inexplicable reasons stingy about shooting video on like family vacations, etc

0:27:49You know the just the typical things that you do not like work related not stuff. I meant to mean to show but that

0:27:55And it's funny because

0:27:59like so my son is

0:28:0214 he's in ninth grade and in the early years of his life. It was sort of the

0:28:08The flip era, you know where we had like these these little dedicated video cameras that were so small

0:28:15And I shot more video then because I had a flip then I do now with an iPhone even though the iPhone is like

0:28:23Ten times a hundred times better technically. Yeah, and it there's a certain aspect of me

0:28:29that stingy about shooting video. And so like last year, I

0:28:32had the 200 I bought the 256 gigabyte iPhone 10. And I

0:28:37checked before ordering like, hey, which one should I buy 256

0:28:40or 512. And my phone was only like 140 150 gigabytes. So I had

0:28:46tons of space left. It's not like it's not like I'm running

0:28:50out of space and can't shoot the video. But so I'm trying to I'm

0:28:55trying to shoot more video, but I don't shoot a lot. There's

0:28:58There's like a part of me that is like trained to think,

0:29:00hey, video will suck up all your storage.

0:29:02- So I'm with you, I don't shoot nearly enough.

0:29:05I'm not worried about storage.

0:29:08I can't figure it out.

0:29:09My kid is five months old.

0:29:13Her name is Max, by the way.

0:29:14I'm literally never gonna forget Apple for this.

0:29:17And what I've noticed is my instincts are photography.

0:29:24I take photos of her, I edit photos,

0:29:26And I take hundreds of photos.

0:29:28Like if I was worried about storage,

0:29:31I would be screwing myself,

0:29:31'cause I can't stop taking photos of her.

0:29:34And my wife takes videos of her.

0:29:36She has an iPhone 10.

0:29:37And I just like, it never really clicked

0:29:40that we think differently.

0:29:42And now I realize my wife takes video by default.

0:29:45That's actually the first thing she goes to do.

0:29:47So like we were on vacation,

0:29:50and like she turns on her camera

0:29:52and like takes a long video of wherever we are

0:29:54and like sends it to her mom, right?

0:29:55And I watch, I'm like, why would you do that?

0:29:59But it's just like a difference in preference,

0:30:01but it's amazing to me that some people's default

0:30:05is I'm gonna shoot video.

0:30:07And then I look back, I'm like,

0:30:10the gigabytes of media we've collected

0:30:12of this small human being,

0:30:14and I love the photos I've taken.

0:30:16I'm like, oh, I should take way more video.

0:30:18And the only thing that bridges the gap

0:30:20is like, they're all live photos.

0:30:21So I get a little bit of it,

0:30:23But I'm like, I'm actively trying to train myself to take

0:30:26more video. I am exactly better. I'm exactly in the same boat.

0:30:31And the difference to me is that when when Jonas when my son was

0:30:35five months old, I had this flip camera that only took video,

0:30:39right? Yeah. And so there was nothing else to do other than to

0:30:43take video. And so that's why I had more video. And I'm exactly

0:30:47like you. I have. I still take every week I take tons and tons

0:30:51still photos, but my instincts always are to take still photos, not video. And, and

0:30:56the other thing I do, and maybe I it sounds to me like you and I think exactly like is

0:31:00when I do take video. I'm, I there, the clips are way too short. Yes, absolutely. It's like

0:31:06I'm holding my breath. And it's like, as long as I can hold my breath, that's how long the

0:31:10clip is. Whereas I think my wife is the same way. If my wife takes a video, she just lets

0:31:15it run, which is the way you suppose you should shoot video, just let it run, you know, get

0:31:19lots of b-roll.

0:31:20Dude, I work with video professionals.

0:31:22I should know this.

0:31:23They're always doing it.

0:31:24And yet, all my video clips are like 10 seconds long.

0:31:27Mine are all 9, 10, or 11 seconds long.

0:31:30I'm like, "No one wants to watch this."

0:31:32And I'm like, "My mom can't consume enough video of the kid."

0:31:36So Becky's sending her like 15-minute adventures.

0:31:39I'm like, "What are we doing?"

0:31:41And if you have iCloud, it all goes…whatever.

0:31:45I'm trying to be better, and I'm going to get there.

0:31:48You and I can go on this journey together.

0:31:50You know what's interesting is,

0:31:52I know a bunch of YouTubers,

0:31:54and one of the questions I got,

0:31:56which it's really hard for me to figure out the answer to,

0:32:01is the stabilization, the video stabilization

0:32:03the iPhone does often competes with the gimbals,

0:32:07like the Osmos. - Yes, yes.

0:32:10- And that to me is like,

0:32:12my favorite thing about covering technology

0:32:15and what The Verge does in particular,

0:32:17And I think you actually wrote this line today about the democratization of image capture.

0:32:22That is, to me, that's the heart of The Verge, right? Like, we make tools, people use the tools,

0:32:29tools create culture, next generation of tools reflects that culture. It's so interesting to

0:32:34me that we are now at the place where teenagers are asking me about image stabilization inside

0:32:40of like the world's most advanced smartphone camera, because it's competing with their

0:32:44incredibly advanced gimbal and there you can see it in some of these videos it's

0:32:48like I'm not enough an expert to like really explain it to people but basically

0:32:53the gimbal tries to stabilize the camera by moving it ever so slightly and that

0:32:57competes with the cameras inbuilt stabilization and so the video jitters

0:33:01that's like is Apple gonna is Apple gonna implement that setting right like

0:33:07that's a for Apple like a philosophical kind of question like are you gonna

0:33:11Enable people to turn off some of your features that helps most of the world because youtubers exist

0:33:17Yeah, and I asked I couldn't answer that question at all. I actually spoke to someone at Apple and and the iPhone 10s is

0:33:26They actually did take that into consideration and while there's no setting it is it should be better

0:33:33That that the 10 in particular really had some problems

0:33:39exactly what you said when you put it on the gimbal and the gimbal is supposed to do the you know, the

0:33:43Steady cam style stabilization the 10s is supposedly better, you know, it's specifically for that use case

0:33:50I don't know though that it's ideal and they don't have a setting to actually just turn it off and let the gimbal do all

0:33:56The stabilization but yeah, it's a perfect example of a deep philosophical question for Apple

0:34:02but it's also I think a perfect example of

0:34:07Just like the world we live in now where?

0:34:09You know when whoever's designing the image sensor in the software stack you would never imagine them having to solve the problem of

0:34:17Thousands hundreds of thousands of people are gonna mount our phone on a gimbal

0:34:22Yeah, and that will not only just to make video but because that is their career

0:34:27Yeah, right and like I love that that that's like the thing

0:34:30That's what makes like writing about texting for me is

0:34:35It's it's an emergent behavior. It's a new kind of problem. It's all happening in a loop

0:34:40Like that's the stuff that makes me the most excited. All right, let me take a break here and thank her my first sponsor

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0:38:14That's good. All right, let's talk about this. This camera

0:38:23because we're not gonna make people wait an hour. No, let's

0:38:26not make them wait an hour. We've only made them wait 40

0:38:27minutes. I and I'll tell you what, I have a pixel but I have

0:38:34the pixel one. I I'm on like an every other year and I want to

0:38:38get the pixel three. I'm looking forward to it. But I skipped the

0:38:41Pixel 2, but I feel like I'm on the wrong schedule because I feel like in hindsight,

0:38:46the Pixel 2 is clearly way more interesting than the Pixel 1 was, especially in terms

0:38:53of the camera.

0:38:54Yes, absolutely agreed. You know, Pixel 1 did a lot of the same tricks. It was just

0:39:00a less inspired device and I feel like Google really understood what they wanted to do with

0:39:08Pixel 2 and they did it. No one bought it. Like, you know, my review is like the

0:39:13Pixel 2 is better. It's like the hard caveat is the real competition is the

0:39:19Galaxy S9, right? Like that is Apple's truest competitor. And some people buy

0:39:25the Pixel. I think for the Verge audience, they know the Pixel exists. A lot of them

0:39:32have it. So it's the one we address. But it's funny to me, Google has done all of

0:39:37this work to make such a compelling device, and they just can't seem to turn the corner with it.

0:39:43Yeah, that's to me is is and you're right that the verge audience in particular probably has the

0:39:49highest concentration of pixel awareness. I got the stats. We have the highest concentration of

0:39:56pixel ownership, I think probably Yeah, I'm not surprised. And it is a great phone. And I've

0:40:02described it as an iPhone style phone for people who want to use Android and

0:40:10are primarily interested in Google's services you know the integration of

0:40:15things like Google Photos and you know just everything that Google does if

0:40:20you're in the Google ecosystem for Gmail and and Google Photos and everything

0:40:26else that they do you know calendar and and everything else and I don't even

0:40:30mean that to imply that it's a copy of the iPhone, I just feel like it's just very obviously,

0:40:36an iPhone style phone in a way that it you know that that most Android phones aren't to me most

0:40:46Android phones are Samsung style phones. You know, and and with in terms of just the way,

0:40:52just the way that they deal with the displays, you know, that these displays on you know,

0:40:56if you spend a lot of money on any of these phones, you're getting a great display.

0:41:00But the Android ones sort of, I don't know, Vegas it up, you know, it's, it's right. Yeah.

0:41:07There's like, if you I don't know if you ever use a Samsung phone for any period of time,

0:41:12there's, if you're like a huge nerd, there is something extremely delightful about the fact

0:41:20that it just supports everything. If you're like, Oh, I've encountered an LCD monitor in the wild,

0:41:26Like I'll just plug my phone into it and it becomes like a computer

0:41:29Right, or like, you know, I have this like LG OLED TV and it has some insane

0:41:35screen mirroring standard and the s9 just like supports it like

0:41:40There's something great about that right? Like it just does everything does it do everything? Well, does that stuff work consistently?

0:41:48No, but is it enormously fun to tinker with like yes, like if you're if you're that kind of person

0:41:55It just rewards you for being like well what the hell else can this thing do and the answer is like honestly

0:42:01Whatever you want, right like so I appreciate that. I think you know Samsung

0:42:05they're trying to have a

0:42:07Identity as a software maker that identity is hopelessly confused where I would go with you is

0:42:14The pixel is spiritually like the the iPhone

0:42:19Yes

0:42:19And I think people listening this podcast would like understand that like it it's what Google wants. It's Google's vision of the phone

0:42:26It's integrated. There's no rough edges or or loose ends

0:42:30Like it's an integrated device they built to their specifications to run their software

0:42:36but just in terms of the display and and the camera, you know, which are

0:42:40It some ways different but you know

0:42:43You often look at your photos and videos that you shoot with the camera on the display of the device itself

0:42:49But just the amount of processing and amount of sort of punching up and the amount of you know

0:42:54Like you and I were talking behind the scenes before we published our reviews about the amount of smoothing that's done

0:42:59Yeah, the the pixel again spiritually is along the lines of the iPhone where it's trying to be

0:43:05Natural whereas the Samsung style which a lot of amps

0:43:12Other Android phones sort of follow is sort of to you know, just punch here just punch here than reality

0:43:19You know, yeah, you know, I so here's my I said this to you this is a conspiracy theory

0:43:26that I have.

0:43:28And I've thought about it a lot.

0:43:29And so it's a little bit more refined than the version I told you sort of behind the

0:43:34scenes but I think people prefer Samsung photos and a lot of a lot of cases because they're

0:43:42looking at them on small screens.

0:43:44They're not.

0:43:46They're not looking at them with a high degree of scrutiny.

0:43:48just looking at them on their smartphone screen, and particularly on a Samsung smartphone screen,

0:43:53you are rewarded by punchy colors.

0:43:57They make those look great.

0:43:59And if you take a photo of yourself or your friend and the camera just happens to smooth

0:44:04out any imperfection in your skin or your face, are you unhappy?

0:44:09No?

0:44:10You know what I mean?

0:44:13I think there's a huge break between being accurate and what people prefer.

0:44:19And I think Samsung has sold out completely on let's make what people prefer.

0:44:24We, and Samsung is a TV maker, right?

0:44:27Like they put the TVs in Best Buy and they crank the brightness all the way up and

0:44:30they sell a shitload of TVs.

0:44:31So like, what do their phones look like?

0:44:33Their phones are cranked up, super punchy, super saturated.

0:44:36Um, they're phantasmagoric in colors.

0:44:40Uh, and what are their photos look like?

0:44:42The colors are really bright. The skin tones are all smoothed out

0:44:45so I think you can sell out and make things people prefer and I

0:44:50Their photos like in the end. That's valid right like

0:44:54Great make the thing people like yeah, it's it's all subjective in the end

0:44:58But I think Apple and Google are there they want to be honest brokers of photography

0:45:03they want to say this is true and if you want to go into Photoshop or Lightroom or whatever and

0:45:10Edit this photo you can get to where Samsung is but we're gonna start you at reality, right? And I I just think that pull of

0:45:17Instagram and Facebook and social sharing people are never gonna edit their photos

0:45:23So there's this poll to say well, we'll just pre-edit them for you

0:45:26And when people see the photo on Instagram, they'll say what camera is that?

0:45:29You'll say that's nine and be beautiful. They'll think I'll she get an s92 and like I think that cycle is playing out a little bit

0:45:35I don't know that

0:45:37Anyone will ever do as much as Samsung does but I I just kind of feel it

0:45:41So that's like my conspiracy theory. It's like Apple's feeling that pull Google's feeling that pull a little bit to

0:45:46Make the photos better for sharing because they know people aren't gonna edit and they're only in the same on small screens

0:45:51Yeah, I I see that and again

0:45:54I I err on the Apple slash Google side of things like I want my I want my photos to be

0:46:00More natural and if I want to punch them up, I'll punch them up, but I'm not even

0:46:05Well, I am passing judgment, but I'm not saying it is I'm not saying it is like bad on one side good on the other

0:46:12it is two versions of good and and I and I think you're right that there definitely are some people and I think the big

0:46:20difference is

0:46:22It is taking into account the the knowledge that people

0:46:27Look at most of their photos only on the phone itself. They'll keep it. They'll see like I love this photo. This is great

0:46:34I'm gonna heart it. I'm gonna send it. I'm gonna post it to Instagram or share it on Facebook or whatever, but it's

0:46:41It's all on the phone

0:46:42No

0:46:43and even the people they share it with are most likely to only look at it on the phone and

0:46:48That's different when you've got all of these megapixels and it could be so big and still look good

0:46:54But you're only looking at it, you know and even on a 6.5 inch diagonal

0:46:59You know iPhone X s max it that's still very very small for a photograph

0:47:05Yeah, and I think that that that's the reality right now

0:47:10I'm with you like again, my instinct is to take photos and to be very critical of photos and

0:47:15One of the best things I invested in the last year after the kid was born. I signed up for

0:47:20Lightroom CC which to me has it's taken the place of what the old iPhoto used to do for me in a digital camera

0:47:28Hmm, right. So like now I have a bunch of cameras like real cameras. I take a million photos that go into Lightroom

0:47:34And it it feels I have that feeling of when I first got I photo and I had a digital camera where I was like

0:47:41Yeah, I want to like monkey with photos all day long

0:47:43Photos on the Mac the Apple photos on the Mac does not make me feel that way. Yeah at all, right

0:47:49It's like this is kind of messy and slow and weird Lightroom is great. It sinks everywhere

0:47:53so I'm that guy right like I want to go play with my photos and edit my photos and thinking about my photos and

0:48:00Look at them on my 27 inch Mac and like print a book out of them and do all that stuff

0:48:04But I don't I don't think most people are that person and so I try to keep that in mind

0:48:09Is you like examine the phone? I will say this I?

0:48:13actually mean to write about this on during fireball not just talk about it on the

0:48:18On the podcast because it's so good and and I'm with you on that like for editing photos and manipulating them photos

0:48:25It doesn't really do it for me

0:48:28But and I used to be a Lightroom guy and I still have it but I haven't used it in a while

0:48:33Like I love Lightroom. I think I think Lightroom is is

0:48:36Arguably the best thing Adobe has ever done. I think it's a fantastic app. I love it

0:48:43But I've kind of got sucked into photos in just just for the simplicity of the sinking and I yeah

0:48:50I want to say this that for all of the knocks that Apple has gotten over the years for being quote-unquote bad at services

0:48:57I've I've photos I cloud photo syncing has gotten

0:49:02phenomenally good

0:49:04Like and and I noticed it this week in particular

0:49:07because I'm shooting photos with the

0:49:12Two new phones at least at first just to dump, you know, see very, you know

0:49:17To do the verification of are these cameras really exactly the same

0:49:20And I quickly determined yes everything Apple says about these two cameras these two phones having the same camera is definitely true

0:49:29but even so I shot tons and tons of side-by-side photos with

0:49:34the iPhone X s and my old iPhone 10 to see what the year-over-year differences and

0:49:39then I'd want to look at them on one of my Mac's to see them big and

0:49:44The syncing it has gotten so good. It is absolutely ridiculous including and I really want to thank Apple for this is and and

0:49:52that they've really improved the

0:49:56The sort of status message when you go to the photos tab like on your phone and it tells you like, okay

0:50:03you've got 20 photos that are waiting to upload but

0:50:09It's paused to save battery life. Would you like to unpause and you can hit the button?

0:50:13But like in terms of telling you exactly where you are

0:50:17You know like this device is 20 photos behind has 20 new photos that haven't been uploaded yet. It is exactly right

0:50:24Whereas when when the iCloud photo?

0:50:27thing first shipped it

0:50:30It was indeterminate and and you'd look at one like if you had two phones side by side one would say I had like, you know

0:50:3718,537 photos and videos and the other one would say you have 18,541 and it's like well,

0:50:45why are they not the same? Why? What are the four photos? There's four and it's like you'd

0:50:49look and they're not the most recent ones and it's like, oh my god, what the hell is

0:50:53missing? How can I make one catch up to the other? Not only is it way more in sync in

0:50:59terms of having the exact same number of photos and videos and telling you exactly how number

0:51:03when they're not in sync, it tells you and I just want to,

0:51:07whoever at Apple has been working on that,

0:51:09I want to say thank you because it made this week

0:51:13way, way easier for me.

0:51:15- You know, it's funny 'cause that's such a concession

0:51:17to the reality of like wireless networks.

0:51:20Like, you know, when they designed it,

0:51:22they're like, no one should ever know.

0:51:24Like, it'll just be perfect.

0:51:25And then the reality is like, it's never gonna be perfect.

0:51:28You just tell people and they're like,

0:51:30you know, on a whiteboard somewhere, they're like,

0:51:31okay, when the 5g iPhone comes out, and the networking is

0:51:34perfect, we're gonna take this indicator away, because then

0:51:37it'll be perfect. So we should talk about the actual camera

0:51:41because I you and I have like slightly different takes on it.

0:51:44And well, hold on a second. Let me let me let me drop in another

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0:56:05All right, let's talk about this camera.

0:56:07We promised we were going to talk about the camera at the last break.

0:56:10We're doing great.

0:56:12Okay, do you want me to start?

0:56:17Mm hmm.

0:56:19All right.

0:56:20I do.

0:56:21Here's, here's my read.

0:56:24So like we were saying, Apple and Google are kind of doing similar things.

0:56:28Google's riff is a little bit different. So Google pulls together for underexposed images,

0:56:35merges them into an HDR photo. They I think you had in your iPhone review that they do

0:56:41it in the cloud. That's not that's they actually do they do it on the phone at caption. Well,

0:56:45so here's where I screwed up in my review. And I since edited it, you probably read it

0:56:49right away. I was talking about Google as the maker of Android, and Android wide, the

0:56:57Android ecosystem's way of doing camera processing,

0:57:01not the Pixel in particular.

0:57:03And that's a complete injustice to the Pixel.

0:57:05So I since edited the article to specifically mention

0:57:08that the Pixel is an exception

0:57:10and that the Pixel does stuff on camera.

0:57:12- So Google Photos, yeah, its input is JPEG images

0:57:16from every phone in the world

0:57:17and Google Photos is Google Photos stuff.

0:57:18The Pixel has its own custom coprocessor

0:57:22that Google built, whatever, Pixel Visual Core,

0:57:25it's like a whole thing.

0:57:26But philosophically very similar to Apple's doing.

0:57:28They take a bunch of photos and merge them together at capture in the camera.

0:57:32Apple takes one overexposed image.

0:57:34And I think this is the heart of where I see the differences in the cameras.

0:57:40That overexposed image gives them gives Apple a ton of shadow detail.

0:57:46And so they merge that shadow detail back in to my eye.

0:57:49And I just want to stress, A, I told everybody this phone is great and you'll be happy if

0:57:53you buy it.

0:57:54B, I said it's better iPhone camera

0:57:56than any other iPhone camera.

0:57:57So me being like, it's not quite as good as a Pixel,

0:58:00is one, totally subjective,

0:58:02and B, does not mean that I think it's a bad phone.

0:58:04People tend to overread my reviews in that way.

0:58:06- I bet everybody overreads everybody's reviews.

0:58:08- Right, so just like, this is a very narrow criticism.

0:58:12I think the way Apple adds shadow detail back to the photo,

0:58:18to my eye, flattens the photo in a weird way.

0:58:22In a weird way where it just reduces the overall contrast of the photo

0:58:27It makes the dark areas and the light areas have the same tone

0:58:31It just kind of muddies the photo it reduces what you might call like the drama of the photo and then

0:58:38Into this I don't know for sure

0:58:41But we we looked it up the you noted in your view the image sensor is 32% bigger in the tennis

0:58:48The only image sensor on the market that matches Apple specs is a Samsung sensor

0:58:53So I think they switched from Sony Samsung and that that brought along some of the color differences that Samsung picks up

0:59:00I didn't want to speculate on that but I did some research while writing my review and so I didn't put it in and and as

0:59:05We record. I don't know. I were recording it in mid-afternoon Eastern Time on Friday

0:59:11I fix it probably has their teardown up already because I know they always they fool they'd literally fly to Australia

0:59:18to get the phone early. So I don't know. But I so you know,

0:59:22so the iFixit teardown is up and the sensor isn't labeled. So we may never know.

0:59:26Well, we may never know. I suspect you're right, though, that it is I did some research and I do

0:59:30suspect it's that Samsung sensor that you're talking about. Yeah. So that's the change the

0:59:35sensor. So I think that that that's some of the color difference. But then Apple does pretty

0:59:41aggressive noise reduction. And so what you end up with is a photo that in the fine details,

0:59:47is smoothed out in a way that, again, we've had this whole conversation like, my instinct is to

0:59:53be a photographer and then to edit. And so I would like the camera to have as much detail as possible.

0:59:59And then I will monkey with the color and the contrast, that stuff. But if you give me detail,

1:00:04I can't, what I can't do is add detail to a photo. So those are my two criticisms of the phone. Like

1:00:10that's where I think, compared to the Pixel as a photographer, as somebody who thinks that way

1:00:15first the pixel preserves that detail and it doesn't flatten that image in that way and I

1:00:22completely understand what other people would prefer the iPhone photo but to me it's that loss

1:00:28of detail is the thing that that always takes it down a notch yeah to and and to me and it's

1:00:33exactly why I wanted to to have you on the show this week is that you're fundamentally your sort

1:00:39of benchmark for the XS camera is the Pixel 2 and which is fair and interesting because

1:00:48the Pixel 2 is like 11 months old and there's a Pixel 3 coming out in a couple of weeks

1:00:54at the very least.

1:00:55You know, soon.

1:00:56Yeah, so there's an event they've already you know, it's like it's gonna happen.

1:01:02It's already leaked as all Google things do.

1:01:05know and my comparison is sort of within the you're gonna get it iPhone anyway

1:01:10ecosystem what is the year-over-year difference between the 10 and the 10 s

1:01:15you know and and that's you know I think they're both interesting comparisons to

1:01:23me and from my testing from the 10 to 10 s the difference is staggering I'm

1:01:29I'm honestly, I really, I hope it came across in my review.

1:01:33I'm literally flabbergasted that this is a one year

1:01:38difference in the camera.

1:01:39And I really do think that is the single,

1:01:41in the entire what now 11 year history of the iPhone.

1:01:45I think it's the single greatest year over year increase

1:01:47in camera quality.

1:01:49- I think the five to the six was huge.

1:01:51I don't remember it exactly, but I remember the six was like,

1:01:54oh, this is a real camera now.

1:01:55- Well, it's, you know, and it's debatable, I guess.

1:01:58And I know that going to dual lenses was a big deal

1:02:01because all of a sudden you can get a two,

1:02:03quote unquote, 2X zoom and you're not doing any optical

1:02:06or digital zoom at all, it's literally optical.

1:02:10I'm biased, I've always been biased

1:02:16towards low light photography.

1:02:18And in terms of low light photography,

1:02:22I'll go to the mat and say this is the greatest

1:02:25year over year upgrade that we'll ever see.

1:02:2732% increase in sensor size is just flabbergasting. It is absolutely, you know,

1:02:33of anything, you know, like, you know, like they say, like, the CPU is 15% faster, and the GPU is

1:02:4050% faster and 50% faster is great for year over year. But like, GPUs and CPUs getting faster is

1:02:49just like a thing that happens in the computer industry, whereas increasing the size of the

1:02:54sensor on a camera by 32% is is is not like a Moore's law thing it's actual physical thing

1:03:02where this thing in a device that is extremely sensitive to you know it think about how how small

1:03:10these cameras are compared to quote unquote real cameras a 32% increase in sensor size is just

1:03:16flabbergasting and it really shows in the low light uh output yeah you know we were so again

1:03:23You know, I have this like army of people helping me make the review and so

1:03:27The number of people who saw these side-by-side photos our video team

1:03:31James our creative director who I mean James is a pro photographer

1:03:36He was the the the photographer

1:03:39I'm like the pro windsurfing tour in Hawaii for like a decade right like dude has been a pro photographer for 30 plus years

1:03:46So like we're all like art. I mean, this is like the most fun part of the week, right?

1:03:51We got the new iPhone we're gonna take a thousand photos and then we're all gonna argue about them

1:03:55Yeah, that's like what I live for right and every single person was like the 10s makes the 10 look horrible

1:04:03Yeah, and the 10 isn't bad. It's just next to the 10s. It looks bad

1:04:08So I I spent I took all of these side-by-side photos

1:04:11I mean hundreds of photos over the last week and I published a thing on Flickr just before we started

1:04:17You know, I published like the two dozen or so of the the best example some of them, you know

1:04:22Not really showing a big difference between the two cameras because they were well lit in well-lit situations around that different

1:04:27but I spent the week in

1:04:29photos for Mac looking at these side-by-side photos and I

1:04:35Didn't really have like a scientific method of like always shoot with the old

1:04:41iPhone 10 first then shoot with the 10s it would be like whichever one was already out and in my hand I'd shoot first

1:04:47and then put it in my pocket, take the other one out

1:04:49and try to frame the same photo.

1:04:50And I had the little info window up,

1:04:54which will tell you which one is which.

1:04:56I very quickly no longer need it,

1:04:59especially in low light.

1:05:01In the low light ones, I didn't even need to look

1:05:03which one was 10 and which was 10S.

1:05:05I instantly was like, oh, this is 10.

1:05:07And then I'd look at the info window,

1:05:08but yep, that's the 10.

1:05:10This is the 10S, yep, that's the 10S.

1:05:12I didn't need to double check.

1:05:14It was that clear.

1:05:16And if you the the amount of smoothing the 10 does through noise reduction is

1:05:21Wild like you mean the tenant get in there and look no the 10 Oh compared to the tenant

1:05:27Less. Oh, I see 10. Yeah, the 10 is like

1:05:30Actually more aggressive with the noise reduction right desperate trying to compensate for the noise that's coming off the sensor, right? Yep, exactly

1:05:38so

1:05:40Again, I think it's a it's a great camera. Like it's the best iPhone camera that they've ever made

1:05:45To me, it really just comes back to

1:05:48kind of this core question of

1:05:51what do you want the photo to look like?

1:05:53Right, like do you want a great starting point

1:05:55and you're gonna edit or do you want something

1:05:57that is ready to share right away

1:06:00or do you want something that's gonna hold up

1:06:03on a big screen, right, or as a print?

1:06:07I think most people are like living on Instagram, right?

1:06:11And that to me lets them get away with some stuff

1:06:15But there's just a part of me,

1:06:17you know, you said it's an 11 month old camera,

1:06:20the Pixel 2.

1:06:21There's a part of me that says,

1:06:24you guys know that's the benchmark, right?

1:06:26The whole sort of tech press has been saying

1:06:29the Pixel 2 is the best camera for a year.

1:06:31It's not just the Verge, like,

1:06:34Marques Brownlee, who's a great reviewer,

1:06:36has been saying it.

1:06:37He actually said it in his review of the XS2.

1:06:38It's the number two camera behind the Pixel 2.

1:06:40Said the same thing.

1:06:41Joanna's been saying it at the Journal.

1:06:44So you know that's the benchmark.

1:06:46And Apple will never tell you this.

1:06:49You can ask them any which way from Sunday.

1:06:51You can say, "Which metrics did you wanna beat

1:06:53"the Pixel 2 on?"

1:06:54And they're like, "No, we just wanna make the great camera."

1:06:56But I would love to know,

1:06:59where do they think they're better than the Pixel?

1:07:00Where do they think they're worse?

1:07:01And where does Smart HDR is a new technology

1:07:05with a new sensor go next?

1:07:08Because I think that this is a new starting place for them.

1:07:11- Yeah, totally.

1:07:12- Instead of a refinement of what they'd been doing

1:07:14years with the 789 or 7810. Well, and it's such an interesting contrast because it is

1:07:21sort of a luxury for Google that they don't have to make the pixel in the quantities that

1:07:29Apple has to make the iPhone and I'm not trying to excuse it, you know, but it's different,

1:07:35you know, Apple is going to going to sell, you know, 40 million of these things in the

1:07:40first quarter. And Google is not going to sell 40 million pixel threes.

1:07:45Yeah, there's like 12 of them. All right. And it's, you know, but that means though, that I and I

1:07:53really, I guess I am trying to excuse that Apple has to source a camera system, an entire hardware

1:07:59camera system that they can make. I guess I mean, what, probably over 100 million in the next 12

1:08:06months literally over 100 million of them in the next 12 months counting that's 10 are right they've

1:08:11gotten the same right 10 are right so well let's count the 10 are right so probably like 150 million

1:08:17i don't know but you know easily way over 100 million of these camera systems for the wide angle

1:08:22lens and it's the wide angle lens that's the most interesting to me because the telequote unquote

1:08:27telephoto lens is pretty much the same as last year's it's slightly better um but it's technically

1:08:33roughly the same. It's the wide angle lens that gets this new

1:08:36bigger sensor and has a different lens element. And it's

1:08:41exactly supposedly going to be exactly the same in the 10 r. So

1:08:45they have to source these and and I feel like it's a luxury

1:08:49for Google with the pixels where they can source. You know, they

1:08:52can make cameras that they don't have to make 100 million of, you

1:08:55know,

1:08:56yeah, I mean, the pixel two uses a pretty standard Sony sensor,

1:09:00Like it's a good sensor, right? But it's I don't think it was meaningfully different than the Sony sensors Apple was using and Sony

1:09:06You know, I said to Vlad one of our

1:09:10editors who folk who is in love with cameras and

1:09:13Hey, does this mean like Sony imaging is like

1:09:17If they have switched to Samsung this means Sony imaging is like gonna fall apart because that happens like, you know

1:09:23Apple switched to Intel modems and Qualcomm falls apart, right?

1:09:27And he's like no dude, like every phone in China uses a Sony sensor, right? So like

1:09:32Even at Apple scale, they're just like a little blip for this company

1:09:35So I I don't know if I agree on the like it's easier for Google

1:09:39Like there's a lot of things that are easier for Google because it don't make as many phones

1:09:44But I think here this is what they're doing is a software thing. Yeah, maybe I don't know

1:09:49I could be wrong, you know

1:09:52But I do think it's interesting that exactly like you said so many people who I respect

1:09:57You know you off the top of my head you you know the birds Joanna

1:10:01Marquez Brownlee are all saying the same thing and and saying that the you know, year-old pixel 2 is still ahead

1:10:09That's interesting to me and it makes me like I said at the outset of the show

1:10:14I wish I had a pixel 2 instead of a pixel 1 and

1:10:17The pixel 3 is coming out and we'll just I'm sure Google will happily tip you right right. I want to get on that train

1:10:24They're gonna try to convince you more than anybody. Well, let me ask you this so

1:10:28What are the pixel twos capabilities with video so still aside

1:10:34Let's just concede for the moment that you think you know

1:10:37Or let's just say you think still image wise the pixel 2 does a better job than the iPhone X s what about video? I

1:10:43Think that's the iPhone is it is ahead there right for a couple of reasons

1:10:47Wannick it can I'm pretty sure the pixel can't do 4k 60. Let me double check that I

1:10:53Don't think it can either and I know that the I've the iPhone X s is doing amazing things with

1:11:01photo with video that is shot at either 30 30 or 24 frames per second where it's shooting and

1:11:09It's like I have notes on this but my notes were so sort of sketchy and you and I were actually in the same briefing together

1:11:15When we were talking to the camera team

1:11:17But Apple is is doing this crazy thing where if you're shooting at 30 frames per second or 24

1:11:25But you know 30 is the the the default. They're actually shooting an entire

1:11:31extra frame of video in between frames of video to do

1:11:37dynamic range compensation

1:11:39Yeah, and and reduce noise so it

1:11:41It's you're shooting 30 frames per second video and in the mean in in the meantime in between frames

1:11:48The iPhone is taking an extra frame just to make the frames that it's keeping better. Yes

1:11:53I think that stabilizations incredible. Yeah, so I looked at the pixel can only do 4k at 30

1:11:59So I always want to shoot either at 24 or 60

1:12:03So that I've owned just like immediately wins like yeah, it's shooting in the formats

1:12:08I wanted to shoot in and then the thing you're talking about between the optical stabilizer and some of the

1:12:14Interframe stabilization they're doing it just looks better. Yeah, and then on top of that

1:12:19Our audio engineer was super impressed with the fact that the tennis

1:12:24records

1:12:26Stereo audio. Yes, and you can sort of hear it on the you know, the wide stereo speakers

1:12:32But it actually is stereo audio

1:12:34Which virtually no other phone can do especially a phone at Apple scale. Yeah, it's it's absolutely staggering what they're doing with video and

1:12:43It's funny like you and I you know

1:12:47they they had us grouped in groups of three and

1:12:51we recycled around and talked to a bunch of people behind the scenes after the event in these briefings him and you and I were

1:12:57in this group and

1:12:58And we got to talk to two people from the camera team, one, one guy who was sort of

1:13:03on the hardware side, and one on the software side. And, you know, we got all this great

1:13:06information. And it was really interesting. And you particularly asked some great questions.

1:13:11And I've, you know, I was like, Oh, that's interesting. And we got these great answers.

1:13:14And then we're like, on the way out the door, because they're like, you got to go on, you

1:13:17know, you got to go on. And the guy just says to his own, by the way, low light video is

1:13:21amazing. Right? It's like, be sure to test that. And it was like, what, wait, what? And

1:13:28And then I shot some I've got two examples on my this Flickr page I just linked to that

1:13:33are just staggering, like just literally not just like, Oh, this is okay.

1:13:38And this is better.

1:13:39But like literally, the iPhone 10 footage is like borderline unusable.

1:13:46And the iPhone 10 s footage on video in low light is actually pretty good.

1:13:51Like one is a fountain in a park here in Philadelphia.

1:13:54was I shot in this great restaurant that my family loves here in Philly called Double

1:14:00Knot. But it's super dark. I mean, it is like crazy dark. It is like I feel like I'm blind.

1:14:07Like I feel like I can't even get to my table. It's so dark. And I shot this footage of my

1:14:11son and it's like the footage from my iPhone 10 is exactly what I expected to get from

1:14:16a cell phone camera shooting video in this really dark room. It is like unusable. And

1:14:20And then I shot footage with the 10S and it is like,

1:14:23this is actually pretty good.

1:14:24This is brighter than real life.

1:14:26- Yeah, that's my, Matt Buchanan,

1:14:30who is now the executive editor at Eater,

1:14:33and he sits just, you know,

1:14:35100 yards away from me in the office.

1:14:38- I didn't know anything he was there.

1:14:39I love Matt Buchanan.

1:14:40I didn't know he was at Eater.

1:14:41- He was my, like, when I was at Engadget

1:14:43and I was like baby blogger, he was like my rival at Gizmodo.

1:14:47- Yeah.

1:14:48- They used to want to be smarter than Matt all the time.

1:14:49And he wrote this headline that I think about every day because it was such a, he was just

1:14:56smarter than me faster.

1:14:57And that probably bothers you as much as it bothers me.

1:15:00But ISO is the new megapixel, right?

1:15:03And what he meant was low light performance.

1:15:07And this is years ago.

1:15:08This is like 2009 or something he wrote this.

1:15:11And I think about it all the time.

1:15:12That's what you want.

1:15:13You want great low light performance.

1:15:15And then you can almost excuse anything else.

1:15:18Because that's where you are, you don't have a lighting rig with you or whatever, and you're

1:15:23often in a weird situation.

1:15:24And if you can get the light out of the scene, you're way ahead.

1:15:28Yeah, I remember, and it's one of those things that I don't know what the turning point was,

1:15:33but I remember, let's just say like eight years ago, I don't know, I was totally on

1:15:40the side of every couple of weeks, I'm posting something along the lines of, "Let's stop

1:15:48measuring our cameras by megapixel. This is absolutely, you know, yes, more megapixels

1:15:54in general are better. But given all of the other factors, like the fact that sensors

1:15:59can't get bigger, and that we're making cameras smaller and smaller, etc, etc. megapixels

1:16:05is the worst way to measure cameras that you can, you know, you're way better off at the

1:16:09same sensor size with bigger pixels and fewer of them than more pixels that are smaller.

1:16:16And I remember, you know, harping about it. And then I realized with this phone, writing

1:16:22this review, where where the megapixel count is exactly the same as the iPhone 10. And

1:16:27it's 32% bigger, that it I haven't made this argument in a while. It's like people have

1:16:32sort of they have like it like we like you people like me and you have finally like gotten

1:16:38it through to everybody to stop measuring cameras by megapixel 12 megapixels is plenty.

1:16:44It is way more than enough for almost everything.

1:16:47And sure, 20 years from now, I'm sure we'll look back

1:16:50and laugh at 12 megapixel cameras.

1:16:52We'll be like, "Oh my God, that's ridiculous."

1:16:54But for the meantime, given all of the other constraints

1:16:57and all of the other advantages,

1:16:59it's so much better to have bigger pixels.

1:17:02And then like you said, like with Matt Buchanan saying,

1:17:05to be able to go to higher ISO

1:17:06and not have crazy amounts of noise in the image.

1:17:10- Yeah, I mean, you see it all over the industry too.

1:17:13Like, DJI just put out new Mavics, and one has a smaller sensor and a big like a bigger

1:17:19zoom lens, you know, it has a bigger sensor, like, the market is now sophisticated enough

1:17:24that it's applying sort of the right sensor to the right moment.

1:17:28And that used to just be an arms race.

1:17:31Right.

1:17:32And you know, let's face it.

1:17:33I mean, I mean, this is a statement of the obvious, but it I think it deserves to be

1:17:38to be called out like 99% of the photos, maybe even more, maybe even more than 99%.

1:17:43I'm almost sure it's got to be more than 99% of the photos that people take with their

1:17:49cell phone camera are handheld with no physical stabilization, not even like just resting

1:17:55it not even put aside tripods, but not even like putting it on a table or something to

1:18:01stabilize it.

1:18:02is handheld and so anything you can do to get slower or faster shutter speeds with a

1:18:10proper exposure is is a win yeah you know i actually had never really thought about

1:18:15it that way like we're there the real race is how much like you captured a fast shutter

1:18:22speed to compensate for for handheld shake right how would you put that in a spec how

1:18:27How can we make that an arms race?

1:18:29- Yeah, I don't know.

1:18:30- If we make that a number and say it's better

1:18:33when this number is higher, Samsung will figure it out.

1:18:36- Right. - That's how they think.

1:18:38We just need to beat that number.

1:18:39- Well, and the other factor that figures into that too

1:18:42is that you don't see the difference

1:18:47between a faster exposure, a shorter,

1:18:51being able to shoot at, let's say, in really low light

1:18:55and get a 1/30th of a second

1:18:57instead of like 1/15th of a second exposure,

1:19:00you don't even see it on the screen on the phone

1:19:02because like maybe if you're trying to hold your hand still

1:19:05and you take it, but the amount of blur that you get

1:19:09from your hand moving in that 1/15th of a second

1:19:11doesn't even show up on the screen.

1:19:13It only shows up when you do put it on like a bigger screen

1:19:16like your Mac or something like that.

1:19:17So you don't even know that you should retake the photo

1:19:20because it's a little blurry

1:19:21because it doesn't show up on the tiny little

1:19:24quote-unquote tiny little 6.5 inch screen, right?

1:19:28- Yeah, and that's the heart of it, right?

1:19:31Like to me, the heart of it is,

1:19:34what do I take pictures of the most?

1:19:36It's my kid.

1:19:37- Yep.

1:19:38- And I want those photos to last.

1:19:41I wanna look at those photos 20 years from now

1:19:44and show them to her and be like,

1:19:45look at how insane your hair was, right?

1:19:48And that means I need definition in her hair.

1:19:51Like that's pretty basic.

1:19:52And to me, the argument for the Pixel is,

1:19:57I feel more confident in any situation

1:20:00that it will get that detail out of the photo.

1:20:02Right?

1:20:03And is that a great argument?

1:20:05Is that the argument that's gonna win

1:20:07everyone's decision-making process?

1:20:09No.

1:20:09Do I carry an iPhone as my primary phone?

1:20:12Sure as hell do.

1:20:13Would I prefer to have a more privacy-focused phone

1:20:19that doesn't, you know,

1:20:20Do I prefer Apple's app model and sandbox?

1:20:23Yeah, all those things, that's why I have an iPhone.

1:20:25But man, do I wish I had that Pixel camera?

1:20:29Do I wish I could push a button

1:20:30and get it to act more like the Pixel?

1:20:32I absolutely do.

1:20:34- All right, let me take one last break here

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1:22:4510% on an entire year by using that code talk show at Squarespace.com/talk show. I do think

1:22:54that, you know, so going back to the camera, I the camera to me defines the iPhone 10 s

1:22:59in terms of where it is versus the competition and on the Android side of the fence and where

1:23:05it is versus previous iPhones. It's to me and that I literally wrote my entire review

1:23:12about the camera. I didn't even mention anything else.

1:23:15Yeah, I mean, like, we're talking about how fast how much faster the processor is. Yeah.

1:23:20You know, Apple put Lisa Jackson on stage on a keynote, like we want these products

1:23:23to last for a long time. And sort of a question I asked him every year is, well, hey, the

1:23:29GPU in the A11 was 30% faster than the GPU in the A10.

1:23:33Like, does that max out?

1:23:36You run that thing red hot all the time?

1:23:38No, no.

1:23:39I think of that as headroom.

1:23:40They're building these processors to last for a long time.

1:23:45And they're able to put iOS 12 on five-year-old devices

1:23:49and make them perform better.

1:23:51So that, like, just the amount of credit Apple gets for that

1:23:56I think is out of whack.

1:23:57Like that's one of the best things they do.

1:24:00And their lead in smartphone processors

1:24:04is so out of control that we,

1:24:06I don't think we stopped to like consider it enough, right?

1:24:09- Yeah.

1:24:10- So it's, are you gonna notice a difference between,

1:24:13did you notice that 10S,

1:24:15outside of like an AR demo that uses neural engine,

1:24:18did you notice it's much faster than the 10?

1:24:20- Nope.

1:24:21- Right, it's like the 10 is great.

1:24:23- Nope.

1:24:24- So what is the true,

1:24:25- And--

1:24:26- Did you notice it has gigabit LTE?

1:24:28- No, 'cause I did some speed tests

1:24:31and apparently there is no gigabit LTE,

1:24:33or at least on Verizon here in Philadelphia.

1:24:35So I don't know where I have to go to try it.

1:24:37But 'cause I asked-- - It's one city

1:24:38with two levels.

1:24:39- I asked 'cause one of the, it's so minor

1:24:42and I don't mind, but the one thing,

1:24:45one of the things that I dislike about the XS

1:24:47compared to the X is that the antenna bands

1:24:51on the stainless steel frame are asymmetrical.

1:24:54Whereas the 10 was perfectly symmetrical.

1:24:57And it really, the part that really bothers me

1:24:59aren't the antenna lines, it's the speaker grills

1:25:01on the bottom of the phone where there's only three holes

1:25:04on the left and six holes on the right

1:25:06as opposed to six and six like it was before.

1:25:09And it's because there's no room for the extra holes

1:25:12because of the new speaker line, or antenna line.

1:25:17And I asked, and I thought maybe that was about

1:25:19the dual SIM thing, that they had to have different antennas

1:25:22for the two SIMs, but they said no,

1:25:23It was all about this thing about the,

1:25:25it's the gigabit LTE.

1:25:27So that's great.

1:25:29I would love to have gigabit LTE.

1:25:30Verizon, please roll it out in Philadelphia,

1:25:32but apparently it's not here yet

1:25:33because I didn't get any better LTE per,

1:25:36and Verizon is very good in Philadelphia.

1:25:39I get very good LTE service,

1:25:41but it's not better than the iPhone 10.

1:25:43- This is totally tangential,

1:25:46but there's just like growing like discontent

1:25:50in sort of the wireless policy world

1:25:53that there are actually no good maps of coverage

1:25:56in the United States.

1:25:57- I believe that.

1:25:58- Everyone is lying.

1:25:59So policymakers can't be like,

1:26:02"Hey, we need to spend more money in Kansas

1:26:05"to put more coverage here."

1:26:06- Right.

1:26:07- Because they don't actually know.

1:26:08I just Googled, "Where is gigabit LTE?"

1:26:12And no one knows.

1:26:14- I did the same thing.

1:26:16I did a speed test to see if it was here, and it wasn't.

1:26:19And I was like, "Well, is there anywhere nearby

1:26:20"where I can test it?"

1:26:21And it was like, there's like nothing that nobody knows.

1:26:24It's all, you know.

1:26:25- Yeah, but it's that stuff.

1:26:26Like these are incremental.

1:26:29The phone will last longer.

1:26:30Five years from now, maybe Verizon will have

1:26:32Gamepad LTE and Philly and your phone will be better.

1:26:33But compared to the X, it's the same.

1:26:35And like, so yeah, it's down to that camera.

1:26:39Did you notice that photos taken on the camera

1:26:42have 60% greater dynamic range on the XS screen?

1:26:46- No.

1:26:47- Like people ask me about it, I'm like, I don't,

1:26:48like I'm a picky asshole with this shit.

1:26:51- I can't see it.

1:26:52- I don't see that either.

1:26:54Well, and it brings me to, to me,

1:26:58the elephant in the room of this whole thing

1:27:01is the iPhone XR.

1:27:03And I, you know, they don't, Apple,

1:27:07in my personal experience,

1:27:10Apple never seeds review units

1:27:14more than like 10 days before they ship.

1:27:16That's just everything I've ever gotten from them is always,

1:27:19I've never gotten anything further in advance.

1:27:21So for example, famously last year,

1:27:24when the flagship one, the iPhone X,

1:27:27was the one that was delayed

1:27:29and wasn't going to ship immediately

1:27:31after the event in September,

1:27:33everybody, we got the iPhone 8s to review

1:27:35and everybody was like, "What?

1:27:36"I don't want the iPhone 8, I want the iPhone 10.

1:27:39"I'm so excited for the 10.

1:27:40"Why are you giving me this thing

1:27:42"that I'm not excited about?"

1:27:44To my knowledge, and I'd be shocked

1:27:49if anybody has one, nobody has an iPhone XR review unit,

1:27:52and the reviews, I'm guessing, will happen

1:27:54exactly on the same schedule.

1:27:56I'm guessing we'll get them,

1:28:00I think it ships on the 26th and pre-orders

1:28:02of the 19th in October, so I'm guessing that anybody

1:28:07who gets an iPhone XR review unit will get it

1:28:10sometime early in the week of the night,

1:28:12that the Friday ends on the 19th, so probably like,

1:28:15I don't know, Monday or Tuesday of that week

1:28:17will get review units. And the embargo will be three or four days before they ship on

1:28:23the 26th. Because that's just their schedule is almost in stone. Yeah. But so all that

1:28:30said, my experience with the iPhone 10 r is at the event in the hands on area afterwards.

1:28:37And then in a in a brief, brief, you know, off the record briefing afterwards, I got

1:28:42to play with one backstage or behind the scenes.

1:28:46I haven't seen one since

1:28:49and I didn't get a lot of side-by-side time,

1:28:51but I have to say from my eyes,

1:28:53and my eyes, I'm 45, my eyes are declining,

1:28:57I don't really see the difference

1:28:58between the two displays side-by-side.

1:29:00They both look great to me.

1:29:02I know that with darks, I can see it

1:29:04like you're watching a video or something with dark stuff.

1:29:07I can see the OLED advantages when it's dark,

1:29:10but when the screen is like lit up

1:29:11and you're just like looking at mail, I don't the 10 hour screen looks fantastic to me.

1:29:16And like, I did a thing where I like held them side by side and just looked at the home

1:29:20screen and like look at all the icon colors and the 10 R looks fabulous. I mean, I know

1:29:25it's a lesser screen, but it's a really good screen. And it's 250 bucks less. Yeah, I think

1:29:31lesser is a really interesting frame for that. Right? Like it LCDs are way better on some

1:29:37Metrics than OLED right and OLED is way better on some metrics than other so for years

1:29:42I would publish iPhone reviews of the LCD models of the 8 plus or the 7 or whatever

1:29:48And I would say the iPhone has the best display in the market

1:29:51Right, right and all the Android fanboys in the world would like scream at me that like

1:29:56Samsung's OLEDs if you look at them long enough or so bright, they'll like burn your eyes out back yourself

1:30:04- That's true, and like the black,

1:30:05you know, like all that stuff is true.

1:30:07But Apple has always had,

1:30:08their LCDs have always been the most accurate.

1:30:11- Yes.

1:30:12- They've always been the most pleasing to look at.

1:30:13They do the best sort of aliasing tricks that anybody does.

1:30:17And so if you remember last year with the 10,

1:30:20the question was, can Apple make an OLED

1:30:22that looks as good as their LCD,

1:30:24that isn't as crazy with colors and saturation?

1:30:26I think they accomplished it.

1:30:29So lesser is like a really interesting,

1:30:32- Yeah.

1:30:32like they're obviously different right but

1:30:36The real questions are I know what Apple is doing because it's a smart thing to do

1:30:42Is they're putting all of their best stuff into the OLED

1:30:45So, you know the Razer phone has like a hundred and twenty Hertz refresh LCD the iPhone 10 R does not right

1:30:52Yeah, what do I want that do I love promotion on the iPad? Yeah, can the LCD do it, right?

1:30:58Is there LCD technology in this world that can do it? Yes. Is it in the 10 R? No

1:31:02So it's like an interesting spec comparison like where are they trying to land this screen?

1:31:07And how does it really work in comparison to the OLED?

1:31:11Side by side that hands-on. There's no way I can tell the difference. The one thing I got was I

1:31:17Brought a macro lens to the event

1:31:20And I took a bunch of super close-up photos of the notch and the curved corners because I heard Phil Schiller say we're doing really

1:31:27Advanced anti aliasing to make these corners work and I thought what does that mean?

1:31:31And they are the you know, if you look at the iPhone 10 notch, that's a totally smooth

1:31:38curve of pixels. The 10 are is a there's like a there's like a gradient curve going on there.

1:31:46It's super interesting to me. I'm very curious how that works. Yeah, I am too. And, you know,

1:31:52and it's, you know, we can't go on at length about it, because we haven't had the 10 are

1:31:56to test, but the basic thing that I'm hearing from a lot of people who read Daring Fireball

1:32:01and is, "Hey, I don't really use the 2x camera on my plus that much, and so I'm kind of leaning

1:32:10towards just getting the 10R, and am I missing anything? Like, it seems like it's just as

1:32:16good and $250 less."

1:32:18I think they're going to sell a billion of these phones.

1:32:21Absolutely. I really, really do. I honestly think that the premium you pay for the XS

1:32:28versus the XR is really fundamentally just about the second camera lens, which is, you

1:32:34know, if you use it, it's significant, and that it's just slightly nicer. You know,

1:32:39stainless steel is nicer than aluminum. OLED is nicer than LCD overall, but it's just

1:32:45a little nicer. And if you really think that the XR is nice enough, then you're just

1:32:51Honestly, you're not missing anything. You're not missing anything. Apple isn't holding

1:32:56anything back. They want you to buy it if you want it. It's still a $750 phone to start.

1:33:01It's not, you know, but I really do feel like from the Twitter and email feedback I've gotten

1:33:07from readers that they're like, "What am I missing?" And it's like, you're missing nothing.

1:33:12Just go get pre-order the 10R as soon as they start taking pre-orders because you've got

1:33:17the right thing going on.

1:33:18You know, there's like the sort of like Verge alumni mafia in the world now like, you know, Joanna wrote used to be reviewer at the word

1:33:25She's at the journal Lauren good is it wired and like all of us landed in the same place which made me laugh

1:33:30Which was this phone is great

1:33:33But wait for us to review the 10 are and then we'll tell you what to do, right?

1:33:37And that wasn't like a yeah, it wasn't court

1:33:39It was just like very funny because I know how everyone thinks and we all obviously work together. So

1:33:46It was just really funny because you know the point of a review for us. I don't know if it's the point for you

1:33:51You know what daring fireball does is different but the point for me and for Joanna and for Lauren and other people run

1:34:00These big consumer pubs is to help people make purchase decisions

1:34:03Yes to help people spend money and so for us all of us landed in the same place

1:34:09Which was we cannot at this moment help you make this purchase decision because we don't have all the information

1:34:15And it's I think that that's not bad for Apple. It means we're gonna my iPhones, but it does mean

1:34:21The 10 are reviews are gonna be the scrutiny of that phone

1:34:27I think will be hired in the scrutiny of the tennis I do too and I it's an interesting flip year-over-year

1:34:32because

1:34:34Last year when the 10 first came out and the iPhone 8 and 8 plus were great phones and if there had been no iPhone 10

1:34:41Last year it they would have been fine

1:34:43there would have been definitely some some

1:34:46Legitimate criticism about the fact that if there were no iPhone 10 a year ago

1:34:52There would have been some legit criticism that I've Apple is behind the curve on getting these edge-to-edge displays

1:34:58You know that the the chin and forehead look, you know, they're they're you know behind they're they're clearly behind

1:35:05it's better not to have big chins and foreheads and

1:35:09The iPhone 8 and 8 plus still had the traditional big chin and forehead that would have been legit

1:35:14But otherwise they were totally credible, you know

1:35:172017 phones

1:35:20But given that the 10 existed there was just this huge chasm in quality and interest and and you know

1:35:28Between the iPhone 8 and 8 plus which were good phones, you know, they're fine

1:35:33But the 10 was better in so many ways and just look better in so many ways and was better

1:35:38Whereas this year it is the complete opposite where the that I again not in hand yet

1:35:45So let's wait and see but to me

1:35:47The 10r is the new iPhone. It is the one that more people are going to buy the one that more people should buy and

1:35:55The the 10s is just sort of like a trim level that you're paying two hundred and fifty dollars for

1:36:01Yeah, you know, it's like

1:36:04What's the new product? Yeah fundamentally

1:36:08I'm very what do you make of them not selling the 10 anymore? Well, I think it's I think it's very obvious

1:36:14It doesn't fit in a product line and I think it's exactly like

1:36:18The the fact that when the original iPhone was replaced by the 3g that they just dumped the original it was it was

1:36:26You know almost like they shipped a prototype, you know, right? Yeah, and

1:36:30They did the same thing with the iPhone 5 right where so we had the iPhone 5 and then when they came out with the 5s

1:36:38they dumped the five and had the 5C which was the phone with the the the

1:36:45fives internals but a different case and it was because that case was very

1:36:49expensive to make you know like the the chamfered edges along the iPhone 5 and

1:36:555s and the SE it was not cheap to make and you know the plastic of the 5c was

1:37:01cheaper to make I think that's exactly what's going on with the iPhone 10 and

1:37:05And if you think about it, it doesn't fit. Like if given the

1:37:08existence of the 10 are in the 10 s, if they did keep the iPhone

1:37:1310 around and sold just you know, like 128 gigabyte version

1:37:17of it, where does it fit in a product line because the camera

1:37:19is so much worse, right? The the 10 are at $750 is absolutely a

1:37:25better phone than than the year old iPhone 10.

1:37:28Wow, that's a big call. Well, I guess absolutely, maybe not

1:37:33quite clear because the iPhone 10 does have the dual camera system, but the wide angle

1:37:37lens is so much better in the 10 R and I to me that outweighs the advantages of the iPhone

1:37:4210 OLED versus the 10 hours LCD. It's it would make for a very confusing product line if

1:37:48they still sold even just one one model of the iPhone 10. It just doesn't fit. I think

1:37:54the way to look at it is the 10 R has replaced the 10. Right? Yes, exactly. And it's overall

1:37:59think overall it is better it you know that the the

1:38:03computational photography stuff that they get from this neural

1:38:05engine and and the bigger sensor I would I would rather have a

1:38:0910 r than the 10 even though I don't I don't like the size the

1:38:12only thing I don't like about the 10 r is I think 6.1 is too

1:38:15big as the one and only size.

1:38:16The one of the biggest piece you know, one of the biggest pieces

1:38:21of feedback, like after the event, not for us, but for like

1:38:24Apple was people on the verge staff and people out in the world

1:38:28being like, I just want a small phone. I just want that iPhone SE size with a full,

1:38:33like an edge-to-edge display. And where I've landed is, it's the same thing as the photo stuff.

1:38:40There's what you think you want, and then there's what you prefer. And it just feels like everyone

1:38:46in the world has the data to say, actually, no one buys the small phone. Well, but on the other hand,

1:38:53we do know that the iPhone SE was actually more popular than Apple expected, and they were

1:38:57actually it was sold out weeks in advance for a lot longer you know when it first came out so

1:39:03was that because of the price or was it because of the size you know who knows but i i think that

1:39:07there's enough i i feel like we're never going to see an iphone as small as the se again but i my

1:39:13secret hope and i have absolutely no inside juice on this at all and and the rumors probably won't

1:39:18crank up until like january or so if it's true but the way that last year we only got one size

1:39:25of the iPhone 10. This is it one and only because they were like pushing the envelope. This is the

1:39:29one size we're going to make. And now this year, we've got two, we've got that one and a bigger

1:39:33one. My secret hope is that next year, there's a successor to the 10 are that smaller, interesting

1:39:41and it would be and also smaller than the iPhone 10 s you know what I mean the 5.8 in size it would

1:39:49You know, I mean like so so the smallest would be in in in my dream world next year

1:39:54The smallest new iphone would be the the 10r

1:39:58Then that they they would

1:40:00Call like the 6.1

1:40:02You know what? I mean these names these names are getting away from them so fast. Oh, it's impossible to talk about I

1:40:09I I think

1:40:12I off the top of my head. I've been trying to do it right this whole episode

1:40:16I think that I've said 10 every time I haven't said actually I've probably said X ago. I don't know but

1:40:21Everyone's gonna call the XR I can get away with tennis for some reason. Yeah, I don't know why but

1:40:27XR just sounds cool. Well, I'll tell you this and we I know we got to wrap up. Yeah

1:40:32as a writer I

1:40:35Have to think of it as X because I'm typing an X and my brain I've I'm not gonna go on a rant about Roman numerals

1:40:42but I fucking hate Roman numerals and

1:40:45I really hate Roman numerals and I was so excited. I've said this I have said this on the show a couple of times

1:40:51But I was so excited. I know you're a football fan, too

1:40:54I was so excited for Super Bowl 50 when the NFL switched to 5-0

1:40:58Instead of using Roman numerals and I thought this is such a great out for them

1:41:02Here it is. It's 50 and now they'll just use regular numbers and then when they went back to Roman numerals for 51

1:41:09I like lost my mind. I'm like, oh my god you had your out

1:41:14Nobody likes this. This isn't classy. It's just confusing. Nobody knows. Yeah, I I

1:41:19But when I'm writing so here's the thing just a little bit of inside baseball like when I'm writing

1:41:25I have to think of it as X so and when I'm writing I'm thinking of it as the XS and the XR cuz that's

1:41:30what I'm typing but I get my A's and ands wrong if I don't use the iPhone if I say faster than a

1:41:37XS but that's wrong

1:41:41Or than an XS right I would write an XS, but I have to write a

1:41:47XS because it's really tennis and so you want a instead of an and so like it was like this little nitpick and

1:41:54You know it literally eight in the morning after pulling an all-nighter

1:41:57I've got I always print my article if it's a long article

1:42:00I always print put it on paper and take a red pen to it and I've got like

1:42:04hundred little eggs and hands

1:42:07That are so inconsistent. Oh, I they have to switch next year. There's no there's no way they're sticking with Roman numerals. They can't

1:42:16Wait, it's over the NFL or no Apple Apple

1:42:19NFL's a lost cause if the NFL didn't take that a Super Bowl 50 as their chance to change

1:42:25They're never going to I mean their next chance to do it is like Super Bowl 100 and we're gonna be dead. Yeah

1:42:30Roman numerals famously a number of our system that did not have the concept of zero

1:42:36So really the best choice that you want.

1:42:39I think Apple's brand is iPhone 10.

1:42:43I think they're going to stick with it and drive us insane.

1:42:46Because iPhone 10 is what they mean when they mean an edge

1:42:51to edge screen with a notch.

1:42:52Yeah.

1:42:52But then where do they go?

1:42:53You know, like, they can't.

1:42:56What are they going to do?

1:42:57Pick new letters?

1:42:57Why not?

1:42:59There's just 24 left.

1:43:02I see that iPhone X or iPhone K or whatever.

1:43:05- Right, or like I wrote in my article,

1:43:07like iPhone XX, you know, the iPhone 10X.

1:43:10(laughing)

1:43:11With two Xs, like it would be insane.

1:43:14But at this point, I wouldn't be shocked if they did it.

1:43:17So it looks like iPhone XX,

1:43:19and you're supposed to say 10X.

1:43:21It would be crazy.

1:43:23- I mean, it has already happened to me

1:43:24that I've been talking about my kid and said Max,

1:43:26and somebody has thought about the phone.

1:43:28Like, it's just like a personal affront to me,

1:43:32but we'll get through it.

1:43:34All right, I'm gonna call that a wrap.

1:43:36This has been a great show.

1:43:38I mean, thank you.

1:43:39It's so good to have you back on the show,

1:43:41and it was so good to have this conversation.

1:43:43I mean, thank our sponsors.

1:43:44Let me think about this.

1:43:45We had Squarespace, where you go to make a website.

1:43:48We had Hello Pillow, where you can get a buckwheat pillow.

1:43:51And last but not least, we had Tres Pontas,

1:43:55where you can get some delicious coffee.

1:43:57So my thanks to them.

1:43:58My thanks to you, Nilay.

1:43:59Everybody can follow you on Twitter as reckless.

1:44:03- Yeah. - R-E-C-K-L-E-S-S,

1:44:06great Twitter account.

1:44:07You and I always have some good back and forth there.

1:44:09And of course, you and all of your excellent colleagues

1:44:13at The Verge.

1:44:15- Thank you so much.

1:44:15By the way, if you wanna see some good Twitter,

1:44:18John and I had a great conversation

1:44:19about the iPhone 3GS keynote a few days ago.

1:44:22- That was-- - iPhone 3GS, not 3GS, 3G.

1:44:24- Right, yes. - Go watch that.

1:44:25It's incredible.

1:44:26- Yeah, you know what, that's funny.

1:44:27It's funny you bring that up.

1:44:28And it was lost in the shuffle of me

1:44:31trying to get these reviews together.

1:44:33but you brought this up on Twitter.

1:44:34That is such a great thing.

1:44:35You mentioned this and I'll put it in the show notes.

1:44:39It's stunning.

1:44:41You brought it up as sort of like the canonical,

1:44:45not canonical, but like an unheralded Steve Jobs keynote.

1:44:51- It's totally underrated.

1:44:53Like it's so remarkably efficient

1:44:57and it still seems like just looking back,

1:45:00like the App Store, 3g like just like bangs through it. It's

1:45:05incredible.

1:45:06So the gist of it and you're right, I kind of had forgotten

1:45:09it and I was there in the room for it. So everybody remembers

1:45:13the original iPhone keynote. It's like the what it is. I've

1:45:16always said and I think I expect to finish my career and still

1:45:21say that the Apple keynote was the original iPhone keynote

1:45:27because everything you'd want, just a flabbergasting,

1:45:32everything you could dream of, it really is,

1:45:35it's not just an iPod with a cell phone,

1:45:37it is literally a new computing platform.

1:45:39It's OS X running on a cell phone

1:45:42and has this wonderful new interface and blah, blah, blah.

1:45:45And it was all secret, nothing had leaked.

1:45:48Other than the vague rumor that Apple was quote unquote,

1:45:51going to announce a phone,

1:45:52that was the only thing that leaked

1:45:53was that they might really be announcing a phone

1:45:55at Macworld.

1:45:56It was the keynote because what it looked like is hardware.

1:45:59What it looked like it's software had all been kept under wraps.

1:46:03So in terms of actually having a humongous surprise, it was it.

1:46:07But then a year and a half later when the 3G came out, it is totally forgotten.

1:46:15It was 20 minutes at the end of the WWDC keynote.

1:46:21So they didn't even hold an event for it.

1:46:23It was just 20 minutes at the end of the WWDC keynote,

1:46:27Apple, Steve Jobs unveiled the iPhone 3G,

1:46:31and it was, it really was the iPhone that exploded.

1:46:35Like the original iPhone, very few of them were sold.

1:46:38I think they only sold like six million of them.

1:46:41You know, they probably sold more than that

1:46:43in the first 15 seconds of the pre-order a week ago.

1:46:46The 3G keynote, I'll put it in the show notes,

1:46:52you've gotta watch it.

1:46:52It is 20 minutes long and it was in the middle of a WWDC and like you said it is incredibly efficient. It is

1:46:59Yeah, I mean he's like you're all the problem like he says like

1:47:0356% of people think the iPhone is too expensive. Well problem solved like starting price 199 like

1:47:0980% of people are used exchange. So we had an enterprise support like he's like here are all the problems

1:47:15I solved him get out of here by an iPhone. See you later edges

1:47:19Edges too slow. Here's 3g and like you said like you called this out you called this out on Twitter like to show how much

1:47:25Faster it was he actually just stood aside quietly and let web pages load

1:47:30One minute is waiting for the New York Times homepage to load on an edge network

1:47:48Unlike anything anyone would do today it is nobody but Steve Jobs could pull it off

1:47:52It really is it so the better keynote obviously the better announcement is the original one

1:47:57But in terms of like a performance like and what Steve Jobs could do on stage that nobody else ever could do

1:48:04It's it's a better example. It's actually a better jobs performance. Yeah, I mean no one else is making people wait a minute

1:48:13it. And everybody clapped. Everybody was like, everybody was like clapping like thank you

1:48:19for making me watch that. And by the way, the 3g phone took 21 seconds. It was still

1:48:25an eternity. And he's like, look at how much faster. Well, that's funny, too. And I did

1:48:30notice that and I it's one of those things. I don't know if I've ever written about it

1:48:33or not, but it is funny, because then he even compared it to Wi Fi and Wi Fi was 18 seconds.

1:48:39It's you know like the the truth of it is is that web pages are

1:48:43Computationally very expensive to render and so like ten years ago

1:48:49It it yes

1:48:51It was very slow on edge, but actually most of the time you spent that your phone spent rendering the page was actually like

1:48:58HTML being rendered through the CPU to figure out where everything goes like we take it for granted now that our phones can like you

1:49:05Know reload a web page and have it come up in like two or three seconds

1:49:07But most of that now is isn't even just networking advantages. It's the fact that the CPU so much faster

1:49:13Yeah, it's I mean, you just got to watch this thing like it is so good. It is just virtual. It's virtuoso

1:49:20It really is. I'm so glad you remembered to call that out because it really was and it was a great Twitter conversation

1:49:25Well, I was looking at I was looking at I thought I was just like looking at iPhone prices to see you know

1:49:30Cuz the the 10s max max that's like $1,400. Yeah 14. I was like looking at the chart. I was like

1:49:37199

1:49:39And like the carrier deals are actually far worse, yeah, yeah, it's like a totally different situation and

1:49:47But like you put up the slide. It's like 199. I was like that slide is long gone like we're never seeing that again

1:49:55Can I tell you one more behind-the-scenes tidbit from the event last week was I?

1:49:59was I was

1:50:02Sitting next to a friend of the show and oftentimes guest Dan Fromer from recode and we were towards the back

1:50:09we were in the center but towards the back and there were a lot of

1:50:12Press people from Asia around us and I think they were mostly from China. I mean, I honestly don't know but

1:50:18And there was a weird thing going on at first where

1:50:24It I would say for the first 30 minutes of the Apple event where Apple had provided

1:50:31Asian language

1:50:32Press I don't know if this is new or if they've done it before but like earpieces where they could get like a real-time

1:50:37Translation but they were turned up way too loud

1:50:40and

1:50:41so a lot of these a lot of the people had taken them out of their ears and we're just sort of holding them because

1:50:46It was so loud that they didn't but that meant that like I could hear this sort of muffled

1:50:51I thought that it was at first

1:50:54I thought it was people like listening to something on their phone with the speaker on and I was like, this is incredibly rude

1:51:00Why are you doing this? I'm hearing but it was these earpieces and then Apple

1:51:04I guess realized that it was too loud and turned it down and but you know about halfway through

1:51:08Or maybe like 30 minutes through it

1:51:10Stopped being a problem, but I was surrounded, you know

1:51:13There were but I because of that I realized I was there was a lot of Asian language press around us when they announced the prices

1:51:18Of the iPhone X s in the event

1:51:21They there were gasps

1:51:24like

1:51:25Because I guess that there were rumors there were so many rumors that the iPhone 10s

1:51:30Pricing last year was a one-off, you know that this was an anomaly to you know that they've you know shipped this

1:51:38Quote-unquote phone from the future, you know

1:51:40But that it would go back to where it used to be where the high-end phone started like seven hundred dollars or something like that

1:51:46When they announced that these phones started at nine ninety nine and that the tennis max started at eleven hundred dollars

1:51:53There were gasps. I mean just outright like shock it was

1:51:57It was the sort of gasp that you would expect if Phil Schiller had said and the default wallpaper is a nudie picture

1:52:05Oh it was it but it was only because they were like the two rows behind me were just filled with

1:52:14I think Chinese but and and I it it just was so clear to me that they had bought hook line and sinker into the

1:52:22argument that that the phone prices were gonna go back down this year and they did not

1:52:26Well also doing you can get a kick-ass phone in China for like 400 bucks

1:52:32Right. So like him it's way we actually sent on

1:52:36Ben Popper, he now works for DJI, but we sent him when he was a reporter for us. We sent him to China

1:52:42to go report on DJI as it happens and

1:52:48He texted me from like a store in Shenzhen. He was like, what phone do you want?

1:52:53He's like this dude is gonna be a phone like do you want an iPhone body running Android?

1:52:58you want this weird ass copy of iOS like

1:53:00that market is like

1:53:03It's incredible. So I think that those price are really high and I think I know that's a whole other conversation

1:53:09Well, and then the other thing I know we got to wrap up

1:53:11But the other thing too though

1:53:12Is that the way that Apple staged the show watch first then the 10s and then the 10r?

1:53:18so instead of doing the best or better and then best they went best and then

1:53:23But it makes sense given how good the 10r is that they you know, they can just say has the same grade a12

1:53:29We already told you about same great wide-angle camera bubble. Yeah, it makes sense and

1:53:33It is back in line with what people expect from iPhone pricing for a brand new generation

1:53:39But so that the the the gasps at the 10s pricing I think were

1:53:44Exacerbated or lessened after the 10r pricing was unveiled half an hour later. Yeah. Yeah

1:53:52Yeah, it's a good setup, right? Yeah. All right, so we're gonna have to do this again when the 10r comes out

1:53:57I think is the end of this conversation. Yeah

1:53:59Definitely. That's what I say. All right. Thank you. Neelay. I really appreciate it and

1:54:03Have a good weekend. Thanks, man. Love you. No, sure. All right