The Talk Show

00:00:00 ◼   ► Have a question for you. Here's the linguistic question. I have heard this. I've heard it bill Simmons is using it

00:00:06 ◼   ► I've heard other people using it. There's the

00:00:08 ◼   ► The what used to be the something something 1600 podcast though that crew is now have as a new podcast

00:00:16 ◼   ► I think it's pod save the Queen

00:00:19 ◼   ► People are calling podcast episodes pods

00:00:22 ◼   ► I've seen it yet

00:00:25 ◼   ► All over the place. It seems to be, it is to me the linguistic, it's the word of the year so far for 2017.

00:00:34 ◼   ► I'm almost down with it, even though I am generally a curmudgeon on all, anything that jiggers with the language.

00:00:44 ◼   ► What do you think about it?

00:00:46 ◼   ► Well, it makes, I think it's fine, because well one, it's short, right?

00:00:49 ◼   ► And it's both short and it's very descriptive, you know exactly what it's talking about.

00:00:53 ◼   ► And it's also fascinating because we've kind of like our careers have overlapped like the journey of the word pod

00:01:00 ◼   ► from being this

00:01:02 ◼   ► apparatus you plug into your computer the iPod and thus being the podcast and now pod being an entirely like it went through a

00:01:10 ◼   ► Transfamiliaration or whatever the word is. It's really interesting. We actually when you think about it, I

00:01:15 ◼   ► Think it's fascinating

00:01:18 ◼   ► But it in particular it seems like people are using it though to mean episode not

00:01:22 ◼   ► The show even though pike on pod save the Queen. I guess it kind of implies that it's the whole it's the show itself

00:01:30 ◼   ► Yeah, at least part isn't pod save America Oh pod save America, whatever the hell their show is called

00:01:36 ◼   ► But anyway, I'd the thing that stuck out to me is the use of pod

00:01:38 ◼   ► yeah, but that makes sense though because podcast is the

00:01:42 ◼   ► Entity right and then a podcast contains multiple pods

00:01:46 ◼   ► - Yeah.

00:01:47 ◼   ► - I mean, if you think about it too much,

00:01:49 ◼   ► it doesn't make sense, but if you think it

00:01:51 ◼   ► at the appropriate level, it makes perfect sense.

00:01:53 ◼   ► I'm down with it.

00:01:55 ◼   ► I think it's a good addition.

00:01:57 ◼   ► - I wrote about this, I would have to find the link,

00:02:00 ◼   ► but I wrote about this the first time Apple ever put podcast

00:02:05 ◼   ► as a feature in iTunes, which was a long time ago.

00:02:12 ◼   ► I mean, we're talking, it might have been like 2003?

00:02:16 ◼   ► - No, it was 2005 because that was when

00:02:18 ◼   ► Odeo was doing podcasts.

00:02:19 ◼   ► - Was it?

00:02:20 ◼   ► - Odeo, nay Twitter.

00:02:22 ◼   ► - But just how sort of,

00:02:26 ◼   ► at first I was sort of thinking

00:02:31 ◼   ► way back then that, hey, Apple might put the kibosh

00:02:38 ◼   ► on people calling these things podcasts

00:02:40 ◼   ► because they're very touchy-touchy about

00:02:44 ◼   ► trademarks and stuff like that and

00:02:46 ◼   ► Then they like kind of embraced the word and it was like whoa what the heck is that

00:02:53 ◼   ► And I it it hit me way back then like hey

00:03:00 ◼   ► it's kind of genius for them to embrace it because it sort of makes it seem like

00:03:05 ◼   ► Podcasts are only meant for iPods

00:03:09 ◼   ► Like right kind of own the thing

00:03:12 ◼   ► And at this point, I feel like there's

00:03:19 ◼   ► more people who have listened to podcasts, period.

00:03:22 ◼   ► You know, some podcasts.

00:03:24 ◼   ► Now, maybe not my podcast, somebody's podcast,

00:03:26 ◼   ► who've never even owned an iPod.

00:03:29 ◼   ► Oh, yeah, for sure.

00:03:30 ◼   ► But yet the word persists, but the whole origin of the word

00:03:37 ◼   ► is based-- it's clearly based on the word iPod.

00:03:41 ◼   ► - Yep.

00:03:43 ◼   ► Yeah, it's a, no you're right.

00:03:45 ◼   ► It's really, I mean 'cause if you back up

00:03:48 ◼   ► and think about it, the benefit,

00:03:52 ◼   ► the way it pays out to the iPod at least at that time,

00:03:56 ◼   ► you know, it's like a, you know,

00:03:58 ◼   ► it's like there's a classic strategy technique

00:04:01 ◼   ► which is commoditize your compliments.

00:04:03 ◼   ► Basically all the things that make your product really good,

00:04:06 ◼   ► you want to make them be super common and super free.

00:04:08 ◼   ► And this was Apple kind of doing that

00:04:10 ◼   ► from a branding perspective.

00:04:11 ◼   ► Like they made podcasts the name,

00:04:15 ◼   ► they didn't trademark it, they let it spread super wide

00:04:17 ◼   ► and all accrued to the iPod,

00:04:19 ◼   ► which they were raking in all the money on.

00:04:22 ◼   ► - You are indeed, your memory,

00:04:24 ◼   ► if you were recalling it from memory is correct,

00:04:28 ◼   ► it was from July 2005.

00:04:32 ◼   ► 2005, I don't know, what do we call those years now?

00:04:35 ◼   ► I don't know what we call them.

00:04:37 ◼   ► - The aughts, mid-aughts?

00:04:38 ◼   ► yachts. It was a post I wrote on the site called "Is That a Podcast in Your Pocket?"

00:04:45 ◼   ► I'll put it in the show notes. It is a long article. I just found it as well. I didn't

00:04:54 ◼   ► have an editor back then. I kind of like calling it "New Pod." That's what Bill Simmons, like

00:05:02 ◼   ► Bill Simmons announcing a new episode. It'll be like, "New Pod!" And then he'll have like

00:05:06 ◼   ► link to the show. I kind of like it. Yeah. The one thing you mentioned before about

00:05:15 ◼   ► people who have never had an iPod, I get more and more of these emails from like,

00:05:20 ◼   ► executive members or whatever that are like, I've officially reached the stage in life where people

00:05:26 ◼   ► just say things in passing that just blows my mind about their relative experience with

00:05:32 ◼   ► technology compared to mine.

00:05:35 ◼   ► Like what?

00:05:35 ◼   ► Give me another example.

00:05:37 ◼   ► Well, just like, I mean, now I'm getting a brain freeze.

00:05:42 ◼   ► It's more I remember the emotion that I

00:05:44 ◼   ► get from reading these emails.

00:05:46 ◼   ► Well, they'll say something in passing

00:05:47 ◼   ► about when they got their first phone

00:05:50 ◼   ► or their memories about something.

00:05:51 ◼   ► And like something they'll remember, oh,

00:05:53 ◼   ► do you remember back when it was this?

00:05:54 ◼   ► I'm like, I remember when that was introduced or something.

00:05:57 ◼   ► Nothing's coming to mind right now,

00:05:58 ◼   ► but it happens frequently enough.

00:06:01 ◼   ► It's one of those things where the emotion of the shock at,

00:06:04 ◼   ► man, I'm old, is the reason that I remember.

00:06:06 ◼   ► I'll give you-- somebody who writes and says they're

00:06:08 ◼   ► a diehard, longtime Apple user, and their first Apple product

00:06:11 ◼   ► was the iPhone 4S.

00:06:14 ◼   ► And you're like, what?

00:06:18 ◼   ► I'm going to send John Siracuso to your house,

00:06:20 ◼   ► and I'm going to have you schooled on what it means

00:06:23 ◼   ► to be a longtime Apple user.

00:06:25 ◼   ► Totally.

00:06:26 ◼   ► But God bless you.

00:06:26 ◼   ► Yeah.

00:06:27 ◼   ► [LAUGHTER]

00:06:29 ◼   ► Oh, shoot.

00:06:30 ◼   ► I am, apparently the, it being 12, 30 in the morning aspect is kicking in, but

00:06:35 ◼   ► Oh, there's something that happened the other day where I officially shifted to

00:06:38 ◼   ► like back, like back in my day mode.

00:06:41 ◼   ► I felt just, Oh, it was about the box.

00:06:43 ◼   ► It was basketball.

00:06:43 ◼   ► I just talked about man, us old timers.

00:06:46 ◼   ► And like, if you started watching, if you started going to games in the nineties

00:06:49 ◼   ► and I felt justified in saying that, like, that was a really long time ago when

00:06:52 ◼   ► like the nineties, like don't feel that far away to me, but it's actually, it has

00:06:57 ◼   ► really been like 20, 30 years or whatever it is.

00:07:00 ◼   ► And yeah, the fact that I felt I could say that and no one called me on it, but

00:07:04 ◼   ► people were on Twitter like, yeah, oh, totally.

00:07:06 ◼   ► I remember going to these games.

00:07:08 ◼   ► It's like, yeah, we're a bunch of old people now.

00:07:10 ◼   ► It's, it's, it's, it's both sort of depressing.

00:07:13 ◼   ► It's also kind of satisfying, like to be able to like sit back and revel in, uh,

00:07:17 ◼   ► in, in your, you know, being a part of what came before I'm embracing it.

00:07:22 ◼   ► I'm leaning into it.

00:07:23 ◼   ► I'm going to do a pot about it.

00:07:25 ◼   ► [LAUGHTER]

00:07:29 ◼   ► Let me take a break right off the bat.

00:07:31 ◼   ► Let's just get this rolling and get a sponsor break out

00:07:33 ◼   ► of the way.

00:07:34 ◼   ► And let me talk to you about one of the best new sponsors

00:07:37 ◼   ► we've got on this show.

00:07:39 ◼   ► It's a company called Away.

00:07:41 ◼   ► Away uses high quality materials that other brands use,

00:07:46 ◼   ► but they sell at much lower prices.

00:07:49 ◼   ► What do they make?

00:07:50 ◼   ► They make luggage.

00:07:52 ◼   ► They have three sizes, the carry-on, the medium, the large.

00:07:56 ◼   ► The large is huge.

00:07:57 ◼   ► It's like if you're leaving your family.

00:08:00 ◼   ► It's really, really big.

00:08:01 ◼   ► All their suitcases are made with premium German

00:08:05 ◼   ► polycarbonate, unrivaled in strength and impact resistance

00:08:09 ◼   ► and very lightweight.

00:08:11 ◼   ► The interior of all their suitcases

00:08:13 ◼   ► features patent-pending compression systems,

00:08:15 ◼   ► helpful for over-packers.

00:08:17 ◼   ► In other words, you open it up,

00:08:18 ◼   ► and it's not just like a rectangle,

00:08:21 ◼   ► a cube inside. They've got compartments inside. They've got little things that help you organize

00:08:28 ◼   ► your stuff. They have a TSA-approved combination lock built into the top of all their bags to

00:08:33 ◼   ► prevent theft. Removable, washable laundry bag right inside. So this is a great idea.

00:08:40 ◼   ► What do you do with your dirty clothes when you pack? This is what I do. I never think ahead. I

00:08:44 ◼   ► go on a trip and I think, "Well, here's all the clothes I'm going to take." And then I get there,

00:08:48 ◼   ► And then once I get there, I start piling up dirty clothes,

00:08:50 ◼   ► I just put them in a corner and it's like,

00:08:53 ◼   ► just ignore until I pack up to leave.

00:08:55 ◼   ► They give you a washable laundry bag.

00:08:58 ◼   ► You can actually have a place to put your dirty clothes

00:09:01 ◼   ► when you are in your hotel room

00:09:03 ◼   ► or wherever the heck you're staying.

00:09:05 ◼   ► Really, really great.

00:09:07 ◼   ► Now look, why are they advertising on the talk show?

00:09:09 ◼   ► What's this got to do with technology?

00:09:12 ◼   ► Well, not every sponsor has something to do with technology,

00:09:14 ◼   ► But these guys do.

00:09:15 ◼   ► The carry-on from away is able to charge all cell phones,

00:09:20 ◼   ► tablets, e-readers, anything else that's powered

00:09:23 ◼   ► by a USB cord because it has a built-in battery

00:09:28 ◼   ► right in the case.

00:09:29 ◼   ► So this is super convenient.

00:09:32 ◼   ► This is amazing.

00:09:32 ◼   ► You just sit there at your seat in the airport

00:09:35 ◼   ► while you're waiting for your flight

00:09:37 ◼   ► for them to tell you to board.

00:09:38 ◼   ► And you can just plug any cable

00:09:41 ◼   ► right into the top of the suitcase

00:09:42 ◼   ► and charge your phone right from your carry-on.

00:09:46 ◼   ► They got a lifetime warranty, anything breaks,

00:09:48 ◼   ► they'll fix it for you for life.

00:09:50 ◼   ► 100 day trial, get one of these suitcases,

00:09:53 ◼   ► live with it, travel with it, Instagram it,

00:09:56 ◼   ► whatever you wanna do.

00:09:58 ◼   ► And if you don't like it, return it for a full refund,

00:10:00 ◼   ► no questions asked.

00:10:01 ◼   ► Free shipping on any away order within the continental US.

00:10:05 ◼   ► This is a great product.

00:10:07 ◼   ► I need a new suitcase.

00:10:08 ◼   ► I don't have one of these yet,

00:10:09 ◼   ► and I feel terrible that I don't

00:10:11 ◼   ► because my carry-on suitcase is a wreck.

00:10:14 ◼   ► It is like ripped up.

00:10:16 ◼   ► It's got wheels that don't roll.

00:10:18 ◼   ► It's terrible.

00:10:19 ◼   ► I'm buying one of these things.

00:10:20 ◼   ► So here's what you wanna do.

00:10:23 ◼   ► You can get $20 off your first order

00:10:25 ◼   ► by going to awaytravel.com/talkshow,

00:10:29 ◼   ► and remember the promo code talk show during checkout,

00:10:32 ◼   ► and you will save 20 bucks.

00:10:34 ◼   ► I'm gonna use it.

00:10:35 ◼   ► I'm gonna save 20 bucks.

00:10:36 ◼   ► I'm gonna get one of these.

00:10:36 ◼   ► I'm getting a carry-on.

00:10:38 ◼   ► That's where you go.

00:10:40 ◼   ► Get one of these suitcases.

00:10:41 ◼   ► This is a great product at a tremendous price

00:10:44 ◼   ► compared to high-end suitcases from traditional retailers.

00:10:49 ◼   ► Go there, find out more, get a suitcase.

00:10:52 ◼   ► Awaytravel.com/talkshow.

00:10:54 ◼   ► Remember that promo code, talk show.

00:10:56 ◼   ► Wanna talk about the NFL?

00:10:59 ◼   ► (laughing)

00:11:02 ◼   ► - Well, we were originally gonna record,

00:11:04 ◼   ► what was it, last week, when you waited

00:11:06 ◼   ► until my Packers were humbled after defeating your Cowboys.

00:11:10 ◼   ► - I didn't do that on purpose.

00:11:12 ◼   ► - I didn't get the chance to do a double or nothing

00:11:15 ◼   ► after our unfortunate bet the last time I was on the podcast.

00:11:18 ◼   ► - What do I owe you?

00:11:20 ◼   ► What do I owe you, a drink?

00:11:21 ◼   ► I owe you drinks the next time, the whole bar?

00:11:23 ◼   ► - No, I owe you dinner.

00:11:24 ◼   ► - Why is that?

00:11:25 ◼   ► - Because we bet before the regular season game

00:11:27 ◼   ► between the Packers and the Cowboys.

00:11:31 ◼   ► And we lost soundly.

00:11:34 ◼   ► - It doesn't seem right though.

00:11:36 ◼   ► It doesn't seem right that you owe me

00:11:38 ◼   ► given that the Packers beat the Cowboys in the playoffs.

00:11:41 ◼   ► That doesn't seem right.

00:11:42 ◼   ► - When it counts, when it counts.

00:11:43 ◼   ► I forgot to specify the bet is about when it counts.

00:11:47 ◼   ► - So you're a lifelong Green Bay Packers fan.

00:11:50 ◼   ► I'm a lifelong Dallas Cowboys fan.

00:11:53 ◼   ► The Cowboys and the Packers played,

00:11:57 ◼   ► at this point, what was it, 10 days ago?

00:12:00 ◼   ► 11 days ago?

00:12:01 ◼   ► Was it honestly, in all, in my opinion,

00:12:04 ◼   ► it was the only good playoff game

00:12:06 ◼   ► the entire NFL playoffs to date.

00:12:08 ◼   ► (laughs)

00:12:09 ◼   ► - Really? - Oh yeah, it's been brutal.

00:12:10 ◼   ► It's been brutal.

00:12:11 ◼   ► Well, it wasn't just one of the only good playoff games,

00:12:13 ◼   ► or these playoffs, it was like one of the all-time

00:12:15 ◼   ► great playoff games of all time.

00:12:16 ◼   ► - Yeah, so it was an all-time great game,

00:12:20 ◼   ► but it was literally the only decent playoff game.

00:12:23 ◼   ► I mean, the only other one that you could even

00:12:25 ◼   ► make an argument for would be the Steelers-Chiefs game

00:12:29 ◼   ► on the same day, which was a game that was won

00:12:32 ◼   ► by a team that kicked six field goals.

00:12:34 ◼   ► (laughs)

00:12:36 ◼   ► So if you want to argue, if you're like in the greater

00:12:40 ◼   ► Pittsburgh area and you want to argue that that was a good game

00:12:43 ◼   ► too, in a game where your team won with six field goals,

00:12:49 ◼   ► OK, fine.

00:12:50 ◼   ► That was a great game.

00:12:51 ◼   ► Yeah, sure.

00:12:53 ◼   ► Otherwise, this was the only good game of the playoffs.

00:12:55 ◼   ► But like you said, it was seriously

00:12:57 ◼   ► like an all-time great game.

00:12:59 ◼   ► And I'm curious about it.

00:13:01 ◼   ► Our two teams have been in a few of those.

00:13:04 ◼   ► I liked it.

00:13:05 ◼   ► I liked it in the 90s when the Packers and Cowboys would meet every single year and every

00:13:13 ◼   ► single year, no matter what happened, the Cowboys would beat them handily.

00:13:17 ◼   ► That's what I like.

00:13:18 ◼   ► Yeah.

00:13:19 ◼   ► I don't like...

00:13:20 ◼   ► Me not so...

00:13:21 ◼   ► I tweeted immediately after the game that that victory was for Favre.

00:13:26 ◼   ► Because yes, all the emotions of those 90s losses came rushing back at the end of that

00:13:35 ◼   ► What I remember from the early, from the first years that this became a rivalry, in the early

00:13:41 ◼   ► Favre years, when Favre was a young up-and-coming quarterback, was the ridiculous distances

00:13:47 ◼   ► that Favre could throw a football.

00:13:49 ◼   ► Like it, you know, they'd be like on like the 30-yard line and time would be running

00:13:55 ◼   ► out in the first half and it would be like, well, I don't know, they're just, you know,

00:14:00 ◼   ► throw it to like the 20 and hope something happens.

00:14:02 ◼   ► And instead he'd throw it all the way into the end zone.

00:14:04 ◼   ► be like, "No, wait, I thought they were at the 30." And then they'd show the replay,

00:14:06 ◼   ► and it was like, "Oh, yeah, they were at the 30." And he still threw it all the way

00:14:09 ◼   ► to the end zone. He could throw the ball silly distances, like throwing in a Robey.

00:14:18 ◼   ► Yeah. No, I mean, it's hard to... I mean, obviously, all the stuff with Favre sort of

00:14:24 ◼   ► ended badly with Green Bay, and there was some enmity there, for sure. But I think...

00:14:29 ◼   ► And he's like, here's where I get a pull

00:14:31 ◼   ► of that re-entorical trick.

00:14:32 ◼   ► For us long time Packers fans who grew up

00:14:36 ◼   ► with the team just being just brutal and awful.

00:14:39 ◼   ► And I started in the '80s, so they've been brutal

00:14:42 ◼   ► for like 20 years before then,

00:14:43 ◼   ► so it's worse for other folks like my dad.

00:14:46 ◼   ► But I mean, the way he utterly and completely

00:14:50 ◼   ► transformed that franchise, I mean, it's,

00:14:52 ◼   ► I mean, over the last, we were talking about this

00:14:54 ◼   ► the other day, like over the last like 25 years, whatever,

00:14:57 ◼   ► Like I believe it's the Packers and Patriots and Steelers

00:15:00 ◼   ► are one, two, three as far as like both record,

00:15:03 ◼   ► number of playoff appearances, all those sorts of things.

00:15:05 ◼   ► And really the guy that made that all happen,

00:15:09 ◼   ► I mean Wolf trade for him and stuff is a great GM,

00:15:12 ◼   ► but Favre was the guy who just transformed that franchise

00:15:15 ◼   ► and what it meant.

00:15:17 ◼   ► - For people who aren't sports fans,

00:15:19 ◼   ► the Packers are an interesting story

00:15:22 ◼   ► because they are unique in America

00:15:24 ◼   ► among all professional sports teams.

00:15:26 ◼   ► Basketball, hockey, football, baseball, all four major sports.

00:15:33 ◼   ► The Packers are unique in that they are owned by their fans, more or less.

00:15:40 ◼   ► I mean, I am an owner.

00:15:43 ◼   ► Can you explain the difference?

00:15:45 ◼   ► I mean, every other team has one rich guy who is the owner of the team and is a jerk

00:15:51 ◼   ► and probably a Trump supporter in all sports.

00:15:56 ◼   ► The Packers are different.

00:15:57 ◼   ► I'm not sure the Packers can argue about that.

00:16:00 ◼   ► Well, because they're from Wisconsin.

00:16:03 ◼   ► Well, not just Wisconsin, but northern Wisconsin,

00:16:05 ◼   ► which is not a left-leaning liberal country.

00:16:09 ◼   ► We'll put it that way.

00:16:10 ◼   ► Can you explain the ownership structure of the Packers?

00:16:13 ◼   ► So the Packers were owned by an owner at some point,

00:16:17 ◼   ► but sometime way back when.

00:16:19 ◼   ► I want to say back in the '20s or something like that.

00:16:23 ◼   ► Like way back when.

00:16:24 ◼   ► they're one of the original football teams. They were going to go out of business or something like

00:16:30 ◼   ► that, but they established the articles and incorporation for the Green Bay Football

00:16:35 ◼   ► Corporation. And it was sold to basically people in the community. They could buy it a piece.

00:16:42 ◼   ► And then it was written into the bylaws that if it was ever sold, that all the money would go to

00:16:47 ◼   ► the local post of the American Legion. So that's still the case today. So if the team has ever sold

00:16:53 ◼   ► All of the proceeds go to the local American Legion post.

00:16:56 ◼   ► And they're probably worth at least, I would guess,

00:17:00 ◼   ► at least like $1 or $2 billion.

00:17:02 ◼   ► Oh, yeah, for sure.

00:17:03 ◼   ► I mean, we always talk about the Americas team, right?

00:17:08 ◼   ► Right.

00:17:08 ◼   ► But there's basically five big teams in the NFL

00:17:12 ◼   ► that have national followings.

00:17:13 ◼   ► Like, their lines in Vegas get set differently

00:17:16 ◼   ► because they attract so much betting from fans.

00:17:19 ◼   ► And that's your Cowboys, the Packers, the Raiders,

00:17:22 ◼   ► the Steelers and then the Patriots are the kind of the newest addition.

00:17:25 ◼   ► Yeah, the Patriots have sort of snuck in just by virtue of 15 years of non-stop winning.

00:17:33 ◼   ► Right, right. And the Packers were pretty dominant in the early part of the NFL.

00:17:38 ◼   ► And so when they won the first two Super Bowls, that was kind of the tail end of their

00:17:41 ◼   ► multi-decade run of dominance. And then in the '70s, obviously the Steelers and the Cowboys,

00:17:48 ◼   ► And then the Raiders came along, and then the Cowboys

00:17:50 ◼   ► obviously had a return to glory.

00:17:54 ◼   ► But yeah, so what happened was then a few years ago

00:17:57 ◼   ► when they wanted to expand Lambeau Field to raise money,

00:18:00 ◼   ► they did another share issuance.

00:18:02 ◼   ► So they sold another 250,000 shares at $250 apiece

00:18:06 ◼   ► and just raised a ton of money for the stadium.

00:18:09 ◼   ► And all these shares are totally worthless.

00:18:11 ◼   ► You can't sell them.

00:18:12 ◼   ► I mean, you could sell them on the side,

00:18:14 ◼   ► but you can't convert them for money or anything.

00:18:17 ◼   ► But yeah, I have one.

00:18:18 ◼   ► So I have it.

00:18:19 ◼   ► It's sitting in a box right now.

00:18:21 ◼   ► I haven't actually put it up here in Taiwan,

00:18:24 ◼   ► but I am a proud owner of the Green Bay Packers.

00:18:28 ◼   ► It is sort of silly, but it is to me,

00:18:31 ◼   ► it's the way most teams should be owned.

00:18:33 ◼   ► Like even though it's the opposite

00:18:35 ◼   ► and the Packers are in fact this odd exception,

00:18:41 ◼   ► it really is the way most teams should be owned.

00:18:44 ◼   ► They should be owned by the local fans

00:18:46 ◼   ► because it would take off the table the extortion

00:18:50 ◼   ► that these owners put their fans through

00:18:52 ◼   ► every time they need new stadiums built.

00:18:54 ◼   ► There's an honesty to it where it's like,

00:18:58 ◼   ► look, the only reason to buy shares in the Packers

00:19:00 ◼   ► is if you're a Packers fan, right?

00:19:02 ◼   ► And the Packers aren't going anywhere.

00:19:04 ◼   ► Nobody is ever, the Packers are never saying,

00:19:07 ◼   ► give us a $500 million expansion of Lambeau Field

00:19:12 ◼   ► or we're moving to Los Angeles.

00:19:14 ◼   ► That's never even on the table, right?

00:19:16 ◼   ► They're not going anywhere.

00:19:17 ◼   ► - Right.

00:19:18 ◼   ► - And every other team, or half the teams,

00:19:21 ◼   ► you know what I mean?

00:19:22 ◼   ► Like maybe Dallas isn't going anywhere.

00:19:24 ◼   ► But look at the Raiders.

00:19:25 ◼   ► The Raiders have moved.

00:19:26 ◼   ► They've moved to Los Angeles.

00:19:28 ◼   ► They went back to Oakland.

00:19:29 ◼   ► Now, is it a done deal?

00:19:32 ◼   ► Are they going to Vegas?

00:19:33 ◼   ► - I think it's all but a done deal.

00:19:34 ◼   ► I don't think it's been announced yet.

00:19:35 ◼   ► But yeah, they're gonna move to Las Vegas.

00:19:37 ◼   ► - Because the, what's it called?

00:19:40 ◼   ► The AOK Stadium and Coliseum in Oakland is,

00:19:43 ◼   ► It really is a shit hole.

00:19:45 ◼   ► So now they're moving to Vegas.

00:19:49 ◼   ► The Eagles have gone through this in Philadelphia.

00:19:55 ◼   ► There are no better fans or more loyal fans or diehard.

00:20:00 ◼   ► Maybe diehard is maybe the way to go

00:20:02 ◼   ► than Philadelphia Eagles fans.

00:20:04 ◼   ► I'm not an Eagles fan, but I'm surrounded by them.

00:20:07 ◼   ► They're great fans.

00:20:08 ◼   ► Years ago, before they built the Lincoln financial field

00:20:12 ◼   ► they have now. There were threats that they were going to move the Eagles to Los Angeles.

00:20:17 ◼   ► It would have ripped the city apart. It's not right. But it's a privately held team.

00:20:25 ◼   ► Yeah, it can really work in the NFL because so much of the NFL is so aggressive in its

00:20:34 ◼   ► revenue sharing and the TV deals are so massive that Green Bay can compete on an even playing

00:20:40 ◼   ► Field even though they make much less money locally.

00:20:44 ◼   ► Although that was part of the refurbishment that they did of Lambeau Field when I was

00:20:47 ◼   ► able to buy my share, my single share, was basically making sort of a year-round destination

00:20:53 ◼   ► and people do like poker niches and stuff there.

00:20:56 ◼   ► But relative to Jerry's, like Jerry Dome or whatever, they don't make as much locally

00:21:02 ◼   ► but because the vast majority of the money that NLT's getting is from the TV deal and

00:21:08 ◼   ► ticket sales have to be shared by and large, I think, except for luxury boxes. They can

00:21:14 ◼   ► do it and pull it off. And then obviously, they're the team for Wisconsin. So their

00:21:20 ◼   ► television market is effectively Wisconsin. And so they certainly do well. But yeah, it's

00:21:27 ◼   ► super unique. They had to be grandfathered into the NFL's governance document because

00:21:32 ◼   ► it does state that no team could have more than X number of owners. And the agreement

00:21:37 ◼   ► hackers have 360,000 of them.

00:21:40 ◼   ► - Right, it's sort of like they want to avoid the situation

00:21:43 ◼   ► where like 10 people, you know, like me and you

00:21:48 ◼   ► and Marco and Guy English join in and buy an NFL team

00:21:54 ◼   ► and then we fight with each other and can't make decisions.

00:21:58 ◼   ► They want to avoid that.

00:22:00 ◼   ► And so that's why they have these rules that, you know,

00:22:03 ◼   ► what they want are guys like Jerry Jones

00:22:06 ◼   ► who just can make decisions on their own,

00:22:08 ◼   ► just to simplify things.

00:22:11 ◼   ► And it's, packers have like a million owners.

00:22:15 ◼   ► - Yes, I'm on the Wikipedia page right now.

00:22:18 ◼   ► Yeah, even though it's referred to as common stock,

00:22:21 ◼   ► a share of packer stock does not share the same rights.

00:22:24 ◼   ► It does not have equity interest, does not pay dividends,

00:22:25 ◼   ► cannot be traded, has no securities law protection,

00:22:28 ◼   ► and brings no season ticket purchase privileges.

00:22:30 ◼   ► - It doesn't even get you a seat.

00:22:34 ◼   ► So Packers have like a 50 year waiting list or something,

00:22:36 ◼   ► which is insane because I actually have very little desire

00:22:39 ◼   ► to go to a game in January in Green Bay,

00:22:42 ◼   ► I can tell you that.

00:22:43 ◼   ► - It's like a college team, insofar as like,

00:22:46 ◼   ► nobody lives there.

00:22:47 ◼   ► I mean, I'm looking at the Wikipedia page

00:22:49 ◼   ► for the Green Bay metropolitan area,

00:22:50 ◼   ► and there's 280,000 people.

00:22:54 ◼   ► It's not even a real city.

00:22:58 ◼   ► - Yeah, no, so people,

00:23:01 ◼   ► so what they did for a long time is they had

00:23:03 ◼   ► six games a year in Green Bay and two games a year in Milwaukee at County Stadium where

00:23:08 ◼   ► the Rouge is to play.

00:23:09 ◼   ► And they did that when the team was in a rough time and kind of built up the fan base or

00:23:15 ◼   ► whatever.

00:23:16 ◼   ► But now all the games are on Lambeau Field and you have these grand caravans that go

00:23:22 ◼   ► up from the...

00:23:23 ◼   ► So all the Milwaukee's season ticket holders got to keep their seats.

00:23:27 ◼   ► So they have seats for two games a year.

00:23:29 ◼   ► And then the Green Bay ticket holders have seats for the other six games a year or something

00:23:33 ◼   ► that is this whole convoluted thing but the net of it is is like I mean Wisconsin is is

00:23:38 ◼   ► I mean it's Packers country I mean more than more than anything else I mean it is it is

00:23:43 ◼   ► you cannot go you know in football season you can't go five feet without encountering

00:23:47 ◼   ► some sort of you know Packers paraphernalia.

00:23:50 ◼   ► Somehow they're taken seriously yet their fans are called cheeseheads.

00:23:53 ◼   ► Oh it's really yeah the the cheesehead thing is something that all Wisconsinites have to

00:23:57 ◼   ► come to grips with eventually.

00:23:59 ◼   ► Apple maps says it's a two hour drive from Milwaukee to Green Bay. Does that sound right

00:24:04 ◼   ► to you?

00:24:05 ◼   ► Yeah. And I think the, yeah, it's a beautiful drive, but I think on stadium days, it's probably,

00:24:11 ◼   ► or game days, it's probably a lot longer because it's a whole caravan moving up.

00:24:15 ◼   ► Yeah. All right.

00:24:17 ◼   ► And yeah, well, the other thing that's more interesting to me is that you need to get

00:24:22 ◼   ► back and do basketball. Because your Philadelphia 76ers are shaping up to be the 76ers, Milwaukee

00:24:31 ◼   ► Bucks rivalry over the next 10 years is going to be—no, I'm serious. It's going to

00:24:35 ◼   ► be amazing.

00:24:36 ◼   ► I know. We've got—what's his name?

00:24:39 ◼   ► Well, indeed.

00:24:41 ◼   ► He's super exciting. I saw him at a restaurant here in Philadelphia a couple—actually,

00:24:47 ◼   ► a couple, actually I was gonna say weeks ago,

00:24:49 ◼   ► might have been months ago.

00:24:51 ◼   ► He was, we went out to dinner

00:24:54 ◼   ► at a nice little steakhouse here,

00:24:56 ◼   ► and he was there, and he's a very tall man.

00:25:01 ◼   ► - Yeah, he draws a lot of attention.

00:25:05 ◼   ► - Yeah.

00:25:06 ◼   ► - I am not, I have been around college basketball players.

00:25:12 ◼   ► I'm, you know, I'm not always,

00:25:16 ◼   ► I've been around Craig Hockenberry.

00:25:18 ◼   ► I know what it's like to not even be close

00:25:19 ◼   ► to being the tallest person in a room.

00:25:22 ◼   ► I'm generally close--

00:25:22 ◼   ► - And you're a pretty tall guy.

00:25:23 ◼   ► - I am pretty tall.

00:25:24 ◼   ► I'm six foot two.

00:25:26 ◼   ► It's pretty tall, and it's usually,

00:25:28 ◼   ► maybe if not the tallest, you're up there.

00:25:31 ◼   ► I'm not used to being around somebody

00:25:33 ◼   ► who would have to stoop to put his chin on top of my hand.

00:25:36 ◼   ► (laughing)

00:25:37 ◼   ► It is very, very large.

00:25:40 ◼   ► But the other exciting thing about the Sixers

00:25:41 ◼   ► is Ben Simmons, his foot is healing quite nicely, they say.

00:25:46 ◼   ► - Yeah, and he'll be back soon.

00:25:49 ◼   ► So, yeah, I know it should be about Tal.

00:25:51 ◼   ► I mean, the Bucks star player is Giannis Antetokounmpo.

00:25:55 ◼   ► - Oh, say it again, say it again.

00:25:57 ◼   ► - Giannis Antetokounmpo, which is a Nigerian name

00:26:01 ◼   ► that was translated into Greek and then now is here

00:26:03 ◼   ► in the US, everyone just calls him Giannis,

00:26:05 ◼   ► including Bucks fans.

00:26:06 ◼   ► - Yeah, they should just change his name.

00:26:08 ◼   ► Just get rid of that last name and just change him,

00:26:10 ◼   ► You know, like Madonna, just like Giannis.

00:26:12 ◼   ► (laughing)

00:26:14 ◼   ► - He might as well be at NBA Twitter,

00:26:15 ◼   ► but he was in Taiwan actually a couple years ago,

00:26:18 ◼   ► and I got the chance to meet him when he was here.

00:26:20 ◼   ► And it's on my Instagram, it's like 86 weeks ago.

00:26:23 ◼   ► But yeah, I come up to below his shoulder.

00:26:26 ◼   ► (laughing)

00:26:27 ◼   ► He is, I mean, he's 6'11", he's just like, it's ridiculous.

00:26:32 ◼   ► - So the Sixers, the Sixers are a good case study to me

00:26:36 ◼   ► of one of my fundamental theories of sports,

00:26:39 ◼   ► which makes no sense, but I believe it firmly,

00:26:42 ◼   ► which is that you don't screw with your uniforms.

00:26:46 ◼   ► You pick a uniform that is gonna last for the ages,

00:26:51 ◼   ► and then you tweak it as minorly as possible

00:26:56 ◼   ► through the decades.

00:26:57 ◼   ► That's number one reason why my favorite team

00:27:00 ◼   ► in the world is the Yankees.

00:27:01 ◼   ► Yankees, they don't screw with the uniforms.

00:27:04 ◼   ► Babe Ruth's uniform was like the same

00:27:06 ◼   ► as the uniform they wear today,

00:27:08 ◼   ► except it was made out of, I don't know, felt or something,

00:27:12 ◼   ► some different material than the polyester

00:27:14 ◼   ► that they can do today.

00:27:15 ◼   ► The Yankees tried cotton in the George Costanza era,

00:27:21 ◼   ► didn't work out.

00:27:22 ◼   ► But in terms of the way the uniform looks,

00:27:24 ◼   ► they don't mess with it.

00:27:25 ◼   ► The Dallas Cowboys don't mess with the uniforms.

00:27:28 ◼   ► When they have, they used to have a special

00:27:31 ◼   ► Sunday night uniform with stars on their shoulders,

00:27:34 ◼   ► and they lost every game they played with those uniforms.

00:27:37 ◼   ► The Green Bay Packers-- - Oh, those are terrible.

00:27:38 ◼   ► Those are bad ones.

00:27:39 ◼   ► - They look terrible.

00:27:39 ◼   ► It's just a stupid excuse to sell a third jersey

00:27:42 ◼   ► to people who wanted to have every jersey.

00:27:45 ◼   ► One of the things that's great about the Green Bay Packers,

00:27:47 ◼   ► Green Bay Packers look like the Green Bay Packers.

00:27:49 ◼   ► If you look at like Super Bowl I

00:27:51 ◼   ► and you see Bart Starr leading the team

00:27:54 ◼   ► to the first Super Bowl 51 years ago,

00:27:57 ◼   ► they look like the team that's playing today

00:27:58 ◼   ► 'cause they don't screw with the uniform.

00:28:01 ◼   ► The Philadelphia 76ers had a great uniform.

00:28:05 ◼   ► I mean, it's a great name.

00:28:07 ◼   ► I mean, who knows what sense it makes?

00:28:08 ◼   ► But I mean, Philadelphia's where the country started.

00:28:10 ◼   ► You call them the 76ers.

00:28:12 ◼   ► So there you go, you go patriotic.

00:28:13 ◼   ► You gotta be red, white, and blue, right?

00:28:16 ◼   ► But somehow during the Allen Iverson era,

00:28:18 ◼   ► they changed to black, gold, and red.

00:28:21 ◼   ► How-- - Like a star,

00:28:22 ◼   ► this weird star, yeah.

00:28:23 ◼   ► - Right, how can a team in Philadelphia

00:28:26 ◼   ► that's named after the American Revolution

00:28:30 ◼   ► or independence, whatever you wanna call it, in '76,

00:28:34 ◼   ► not be red, white, and blue.

00:28:36 ◼   ► And yet they did.

00:28:37 ◼   ► And then they had terrible,

00:28:39 ◼   ► of course they had terrible records.

00:28:40 ◼   ► How can you win when you're going against the sports gods

00:28:43 ◼   ► by screwing with your uniform?

00:28:45 ◼   ► Now the Sixers have gone back to,

00:28:47 ◼   ► it's not quite the classic.

00:28:49 ◼   ► I kinda don't like the way they spell out Sixers

00:28:51 ◼   ► on the uniform.

00:28:52 ◼   ► I feel like they oughta go back

00:28:54 ◼   ► to the pure Dr. J era uniform, but it's close enough.

00:28:57 ◼   ► - Yeah, no, I mean, the Bucks are definitely fit with that.

00:29:02 ◼   ► So first off, their classic uniform and their classic logo

00:29:05 ◼   ► are both amazing.

00:29:06 ◼   ► The classic logo is this cartoony butt

00:29:10 ◼   ► kissing a basketball.

00:29:11 ◼   ► - Yeah, I love it.

00:29:12 ◼   ► He's sort of like a--

00:29:13 ◼   ► - He's got a green sweater on.

00:29:15 ◼   ► - Sort of like Bullwinkle, yeah.

00:29:17 ◼   ► - Right, and they had great uniforms back in the '80s,

00:29:19 ◼   ► and that's when the team was good.

00:29:20 ◼   ► They won the title in the '70s with then-Luel Sint-Or,

00:29:23 ◼   ► later-Korean Abdul-Jabbar,

00:29:25 ◼   ► and then they were good in the '80s,

00:29:26 ◼   ► always lost to your 76ers and Celtics,

00:29:29 ◼   ► but very strong team.

00:29:31 ◼   ► Then 1993, they had this awful logo

00:29:35 ◼   ► that's like the purple and this terrible,

00:29:37 ◼   ► it was just awful, the uniforms were bad,

00:29:39 ◼   ► and they've been pretty much terrible ever since.

00:29:40 ◼   ► They had like one good year since then.

00:29:43 ◼   ► And then in 2015, they did a redesign,

00:29:46 ◼   ► which is not the old logo, but the uniforms especially

00:29:49 ◼   ► are definitely go back to the original,

00:29:52 ◼   ► especially this kind of, this paneling on the side

00:29:55 ◼   ► that looks really, really good.

00:29:57 ◼   ► And sure enough, the team's fortunes are looking up,

00:30:01 ◼   ► but there's this hilarious tweet

00:30:02 ◼   ► you gotta put in the show notes.

00:30:04 ◼   ► (laughs)

00:30:05 ◼   ► The tweet reads, you have to read it to appreciate it,

00:30:08 ◼   ► it reads, "America's slow but very real decline

00:30:10 ◼   ► "into a fascist state as told by the Milwaukee Bucks a long

00:30:13 ◼   ► "ago," and just follow the link,

00:30:16 ◼   ► you have to see the tweet to appreciate it,

00:30:17 ◼   ► but I promise you, you will laugh your rear end off,

00:30:19 ◼   ► because it's really funny.

00:30:21 ◼   ► - All right, I will put it in the show notes.

00:30:24 ◼   ► All right, before we get off sports,

00:30:25 ◼   ► let me give you this, I'm gonna toss this out there,

00:30:27 ◼   ► here we go, here's a contentious argument.

00:30:30 ◼   ► top quarterbacks of all time.

00:30:33 ◼   ► - That is a contentious argument.

00:30:37 ◼   ► - You sent me a link last night to a video,

00:30:41 ◼   ► you sent it, right?

00:30:42 ◼   ► Of the, was it you?

00:30:45 ◼   ► - No, I don't think so.

00:30:46 ◼   ► - It wasn't you who sent me the link to the cab

00:30:49 ◼   ► with John Elway in it?

00:30:50 ◼   ► - Oh yeah, I did send that, yeah.

00:30:52 ◼   ► - Yeah. - That was great.

00:30:53 ◼   ► - So then somebody was in a cab in Pittsburgh

00:30:59 ◼   ► and talking to their cab driver about who the greatest

00:31:02 ◼   ► quarterbacks of all time were.

00:31:03 ◼   ► And even though this guy was a cab driver in Pittsburgh,

00:31:05 ◼   ► his number one pick was John Elway.

00:31:07 ◼   ► And it just so happened that among the people in the cab,

00:31:10 ◼   ► one of them was John Elway.

00:31:13 ◼   ► And they let it go on for two or three minutes

00:31:15 ◼   ► before they let the cab driver go.

00:31:18 ◼   ► Whoever was filming in the middle was pretty devious

00:31:20 ◼   ► about it.

00:31:21 ◼   ► Because they're just like, oh, do you think he's attractive?

00:31:23 ◼   ► Would you want to sleep with him?

00:31:24 ◼   ► And then she goes, I bet you'd sleep with him.

00:31:26 ◼   ► And it's like his wife right next to him.

00:31:29 ◼   ► (laughing)

00:31:31 ◼   ► - All right, top quarterbacks of all time.

00:31:33 ◼   ► All right, let me ask you this.

00:31:34 ◼   ► I'll just give you a simple question.

00:31:35 ◼   ► Who's better, Favre or Aaron Rodgers?

00:31:37 ◼   ► - Oh.

00:31:39 ◼   ► (laughing)

00:31:42 ◼   ► I think from a pure between the lines perspective,

00:31:49 ◼   ► Rodgers is probably better.

00:31:53 ◼   ► Just like Favre's recklessness made him great,

00:31:55 ◼   ► but it went, like it cost us a lot of games.

00:31:58 ◼   ► - You're blinded by your fandom.

00:32:00 ◼   ► The answer is clearly Aaron Rodgers.

00:32:03 ◼   ► - No, okay, well, but yeah, that's fair.

00:32:06 ◼   ► But from a meaning, a legendary status

00:32:09 ◼   ► and meaningfulness to the franchise,

00:32:11 ◼   ► I would have to go with, I'd have to go with Favre.

00:32:13 ◼   ► Rodgers needs to win a couple more Super Bowls

00:32:14 ◼   ► to surpass him.

00:32:15 ◼   ► Right now they're both at one,

00:32:17 ◼   ► which is shamefully well in my opinion.

00:32:18 ◼   ► - It doesn't matter.

00:32:19 ◼   ► Aaron Rodgers could never win another Super Bowl

00:32:21 ◼   ► and it doesn't matter.

00:32:22 ◼   ► Aaron Rodgers is a better quarterback than Brad Favre.

00:32:25 ◼   ► - Yeah, fair enough.

00:32:26 ◼   ► But if you dig the totality of their contribution

00:32:29 ◼   ► to the Green Bay Packers, it's more complicated.

00:32:32 ◼   ► But yeah, I would agree with that.

00:32:33 ◼   ► You're right, I am blinded by my being

00:32:36 ◼   ► a impressionable teenage boy and Brett Favre

00:32:38 ◼   ► basically saving my sports life.

00:32:41 ◼   ► - Did you see my link the other day

00:32:43 ◼   ► to Triumph, the insult comic dog at the inauguration?

00:32:48 ◼   ► - I saw it, I haven't watched it though.

00:32:50 ◼   ► - Well at the end, when he first has to utter the words

00:32:54 ◼   ► president and then followed by the word Trump.

00:32:57 ◼   ► Every time he tries to say it, he starts vomiting.

00:32:59 ◼   ► That's how I feel with me saying that among the top five

00:33:06 ◼   ► of all time at this point, you've absolutely positively

00:33:09 ◼   ► gotta include Tom Brady.

00:33:11 ◼   ► There I go.

00:33:12 ◼   ► I'll edit it out.

00:33:13 ◼   ► - It hurts to say it, it hurts to say it.

00:33:14 ◼   ► - I'm gonna edit it out, here I am, I'm puking right now.

00:33:17 ◼   ► Ah, there it goes.

00:33:18 ◼   ► It hurts, there goes my breakfast.

00:33:23 ◼   ► but it's undeniable at this point.

00:33:25 ◼   ► - Yeah, I mean, the record speaks for itself, obviously.

00:33:29 ◼   ► I mean, seventh Super Bowl.

00:33:31 ◼   ► It's always tricky to separate the greatest quarterbacks

00:33:37 ◼   ► from the greatest coaches.

00:33:38 ◼   ► Like, how does that relationship actually play out?

00:33:42 ◼   ► - Because so many of them are in the same conversation,

00:33:44 ◼   ► right?

00:33:45 ◼   ► - Right, well, I mean, what if Rodgers

00:33:47 ◼   ► had been the quarterback of the Patriots

00:33:49 ◼   ► for the last 15 years?

00:33:50 ◼   ► Like would they be better or worse or the same?

00:33:54 ◼   ► Like it's almost impossible.

00:33:55 ◼   ► I mean, Mike McCarthy is an okay coach.

00:33:57 ◼   ► I think he gets probably more grief than he deserves.

00:34:00 ◼   ► But at the same time,

00:34:02 ◼   ► like he's not even in the same universe as Bill Belichick.

00:34:05 ◼   ► And you know, what difference does that make?

00:34:08 ◼   ► Or someone like Joe Montana and like, you know,

00:34:11 ◼   ► Bill Walsh was so far ahead of everyone

00:34:13 ◼   ► when it comes to his scheme and things like that.

00:34:15 ◼   ► And you had Jerry Rice, I mean like,

00:34:18 ◼   ► but he was a great quarterback,

00:34:19 ◼   ► But that's, and this is why I mean football is tough because it's where do you,

00:34:22 ◼   ► where do you sort of figure out where the boundary is?

00:34:25 ◼   ► Roger Staubach and Tom Landry.

00:34:28 ◼   ► I mean Tom Landry literally invented the shotgun formation.

00:34:30 ◼   ► Like that was something that was like, it's like you watch it now.

00:34:35 ◼   ► There are some teams that never even don't,

00:34:38 ◼   ► they even use the shotgun on running plays now.

00:34:41 ◼   ► And to think that it was like a loophole in the rules.

00:34:45 ◼   ► Yeah.

00:34:47 ◼   ► He read the rule book and he was like,

00:34:49 ◼   ► you know, there's nothing that says you have to hand the ball

00:34:51 ◼   ► from the center to the quarterback.

00:34:53 ◼   ► We could just toss it back five yards.

00:34:56 ◼   ► Basically all football is discovering and exploiting

00:34:59 ◼   ► loopholes.

00:34:59 ◼   ► Right.

00:35:00 ◼   ► The forward pass is basically a loophole, right?

00:35:03 ◼   ► Sort of, yeah.

00:35:04 ◼   ► I think in the long term, yeah.

00:35:06 ◼   ► Dan Marino, Don Shula, right?

00:35:09 ◼   ► All the quarterbacks that you mentioned, almost everyone

00:35:12 ◼   ► who I think you would mention in the--

00:35:14 ◼   ► if you're going to put together a top five list,

00:35:16 ◼   ► coach who is arguably in the top five.

00:35:19 ◼   ► - And that's why John Elway might be the best though.

00:35:22 ◼   ► Like that's why he might be right.

00:35:24 ◼   ► - Right, that Elway's the one who you're like,

00:35:26 ◼   ► who the hell was his coach?

00:35:28 ◼   ► - Yep.

00:35:29 ◼   ► - Right?

00:35:30 ◼   ► - It wasn't like Greaves or Graves or--

00:35:32 ◼   ► - Oh, I don't even know.

00:35:33 ◼   ► - He went to Atlanta later.

00:35:35 ◼   ► But yeah, he finally won with Mike Shanahan

00:35:37 ◼   ► at the end of his career.

00:35:38 ◼   ► But yeah, I mean, to my mind,

00:35:41 ◼   ► I'd almost attempted to pick him for that reason alone.

00:35:43 ◼   ► Because like there's really no one else

00:35:45 ◼   ► can ascribe his greatness to.

00:35:49 ◼   ► All right, let's take another break

00:35:51 ◼   ► and thank our next sponsor.

00:35:52 ◼   ► And then we'll get onto the real meat of the show.

00:35:55 ◼   ► Our next sponsor is a great company, Eero.

00:35:59 ◼   ► E-E-R-O. Look, Wi-Fi is more important today

00:36:03 ◼   ► than it's ever been.

00:36:05 ◼   ► Most of us have our whole house--

00:36:07 ◼   ► we have connected with devices that are on the internet.

00:36:09 ◼   ► And how are they on the internet?

00:36:10 ◼   ► They're on the internet through Wi-Fi.

00:36:12 ◼   ► Outside the smartphone, it's probably

00:36:14 ◼   ► the technology we depend on most. It's a core utility of the 21st century home. But despite

00:36:21 ◼   ► its importance, Wi-Fi is broken. Imagine if your electricity in your house didn't reach certain

00:36:28 ◼   ► parts or like it was intermittent. Like you got really good electricity in your living room,

00:36:35 ◼   ► but in your master bedroom it's like, eh, some days it's okay. Sometimes, you know, you don't

00:36:40 ◼   ► don't get electricity.

00:36:41 ◼   ► Well, you'd call an electrician right away.

00:36:43 ◼   ► It'd be like, my house is broken, right?

00:36:45 ◼   ► But that's what Wi-Fi is like for a lot of us.

00:36:48 ◼   ► Because we have one Wi-Fi router,

00:36:51 ◼   ► and it reaches some places, doesn't reach others.

00:36:55 ◼   ► Wi-Fi, Eero was designed to change all this.

00:36:57 ◼   ► The company manufactures right now a single device.

00:37:00 ◼   ► It is a small, elegant box about the size of an Apple TV

00:37:04 ◼   ► with sort of Apple TV-like round corners,

00:37:07 ◼   ► and it's nice and white, and it's kind of,

00:37:09 ◼   ► It's really a nice little beautiful little box.

00:37:12 ◼   ► Very simple, very small.

00:37:14 ◼   ► And the idea is you get a couple of them.

00:37:16 ◼   ► Their default pack comes with three.

00:37:18 ◼   ► You can get four, you can get five,

00:37:19 ◼   ► you get however many you need.

00:37:21 ◼   ► But the idea is just you put them around your house

00:37:25 ◼   ► and they form what they call a mesh network

00:37:27 ◼   ► where the Eros talk to each other

00:37:30 ◼   ► and then they fill your whole house with distributed Wi-Fi.

00:37:34 ◼   ► And you don't have to sit there and be like a network manager

00:37:39 ◼   ► and configure this, you don't sit there and pick channels

00:37:42 ◼   ► and frequencies and stuff like that.

00:37:45 ◼   ► All you have to do is just, with common sense,

00:37:50 ◼   ► put them in the rooms where you're actually going

00:37:53 ◼   ► to use them and where there might be walls

00:37:55 ◼   ► between the one that's connected to your cable modem.

00:38:00 ◼   ► That's all you have to do.

00:38:02 ◼   ► They have a great app.

00:38:04 ◼   ► You manage the whole thing from an app on your iPhone.

00:38:09 ◼   ► It couldn't be easier.

00:38:09 ◼   ► It's got a great interface.

00:38:12 ◼   ► They have incredible customer support, too.

00:38:15 ◼   ► This is something that the company has really invested in.

00:38:17 ◼   ► You can call and get a hold of a real Wi-Fi expert,

00:38:21 ◼   ► not like a robot, but like a human being who--

00:38:25 ◼   ► a lot of people, you can set up these Eros,

00:38:27 ◼   ► and you'll just plug them in, and it'll just work.

00:38:30 ◼   ► If they do encounter a problem, if there's

00:38:33 ◼   ► something weird about your setup,

00:38:35 ◼   ► if there's something weird about your house,

00:38:36 ◼   ► you can call them up.

00:38:37 ◼   ► Within 30 seconds, you can get a real person at ERO on the phone.

00:38:43 ◼   ► It's a great product.

00:38:44 ◼   ► I've got them set up here.

00:38:45 ◼   ► My Wi-Fi has never been better in the house

00:38:48 ◼   ► than when I've had ERO.

00:38:51 ◼   ► It's currently rated 4.4 stars on Amazon

00:38:53 ◼   ► with a whopping 750 reviews.

00:38:55 ◼   ► It offers a one-year warranty, and it

00:38:57 ◼   ► will work with your existing modem and internet service.

00:39:02 ◼   ► So this is really great.

00:39:04 ◼   ► Go to ero.com.

00:39:05 ◼   ► Remember the promo code, the talk show,

00:39:08 ◼   ► all one word, the talk show,

00:39:11 ◼   ► and that will get you free expedited shipping.

00:39:15 ◼   ► Just pause the podcast right now, go to ero.com,

00:39:18 ◼   ► remember that code, the talk show,

00:39:21 ◼   ► and you'll have these things like tomorrow

00:39:24 ◼   ► or maybe the next day with free expedited shipping,

00:39:27 ◼   ► and you set 'em up in your house

00:39:28 ◼   ► and you'll have better wifi.

00:39:29 ◼   ► So my thanks to them, it's a great product,

00:39:32 ◼   ► I'm using 'em right now, you're hearing me talk to Ben

00:39:34 ◼   ► over at Eero Wi-Fi routers.

00:39:37 ◼   ► Couldn't work better.

00:39:39 ◼   ► What else is on the agenda, Ben?

00:39:43 ◼   ► - Well, I mean, Eero is, I guess,

00:39:47 ◼   ► the go-to recommendation now

00:39:49 ◼   ► because Apple doesn't make routers anymore.

00:39:50 ◼   ► - Well, they do. - They sell them.

00:39:53 ◼   ► - They sell them, but they don't, arguably,

00:39:56 ◼   ► seemingly don't make new ones,

00:39:58 ◼   ► and then according to Scoop Germin,

00:40:02 ◼   ► they've canceled making new ones.

00:40:04 ◼   ► So who knows?

00:40:05 ◼   ► - Scoop Gerben, that's good.

00:40:08 ◼   ► She's calling that from now on.

00:40:10 ◼   ► - Who knows what the hell's going on with them with that?

00:40:12 ◼   ► I don't know.

00:40:13 ◼   ► - So I did want to talk to you about this

00:40:16 ◼   ► because I haven't really found,

00:40:18 ◼   ► I've kind of mentioned it in passing

00:40:19 ◼   ► in a daily update or two,

00:40:20 ◼   ► but I haven't really found a good occasion

00:40:21 ◼   ► to write about it.

00:40:22 ◼   ► It doesn't necessarily fit.

00:40:24 ◼   ► I don't write about,

00:40:25 ◼   ► like my whole thing is I don't write about products.

00:40:26 ◼   ► I write about business models and stuff like that.

00:40:29 ◼   ► But I find a lot of the Mac, Mac products

00:40:34 ◼   ► to be both understandable, I think I get where it's coming from, and also to be way overwrought

00:40:42 ◼   ► and over the top and not necessarily connected to reality.

00:40:47 ◼   ► The Mac angst, meaning in a nutshell, Apple clearly doesn't care about the Mac anymore.

00:40:54 ◼   ► They want everybody to just use iPads and iPhones, and they're doing everything they

00:40:58 ◼   ► can to undermine the Mac and within a year or two...

00:41:03 ◼   ► gone in five years. It'll be gone. Yeah, it'll be gone. Yeah, I think the, obviously

00:41:10 ◼   ► it's all crescendoed with the release of the MacBook Pro, which much to my great sadness

00:41:17 ◼   ► and consternation did not come with a Apple branded monitor, which I was looking forward

00:41:22 ◼   ► to buying very much. And so, and then obviously there was the, you know, people were pointing

00:41:28 ◼   ► out the memory, they were pointing out the battery life, how thin it was, the port situation,

00:41:31 ◼   ► that. But I think that just happened to be the proverbial straw that broke the camel's back.

00:41:37 ◼   ► Because what was so weird about the MacBook Pro being the trigger for all this angst is that the

00:41:45 ◼   ► MacBook Pro is the single best piece of evidence that Apple is still investing in the map.

00:41:49 ◼   ► I mean, say what you will with the touch bar and whether it's going to actually be something that

00:41:53 ◼   ► makes using a Mac better or not. I think that will remain to be seen over the long run. But it

00:41:58 ◼   ► it clearly required a tremendous amount of investment

00:42:02 ◼   ► and effort, which, presuming Apple is a rationally run

00:42:06 ◼   ► company, and by all accounts, the complaints are

00:42:09 ◼   ► that Apple is being too rationally run,

00:42:11 ◼   ► they would not make that investment if they were

00:42:13 ◼   ► gonna abandon the damn platform.

00:42:15 ◼   ► So, we can get into why the angst is there,

00:42:19 ◼   ► but it's really kind of ironic that it happened

00:42:21 ◼   ► around this particular product.

00:42:25 ◼   ► I'm with you, and I don't know how better to make my case.

00:42:29 ◼   ► I got a, I wouldn't say a friend, but a source,

00:42:33 ◼   ► somebody I've known for years who's worked at Apple,

00:42:36 ◼   ► and I hear from occasionally, and like many people

00:42:39 ◼   ► who are long-time Apple employees, seems to, you know,

00:42:43 ◼   ► every 18 months or so moves around within the company

00:42:46 ◼   ► to different teams, worked on a certain aspect

00:42:51 ◼   ► of Touch Bar support.

00:42:53 ◼   ► it was a software side thing, for a while.

00:42:57 ◼   ► And then right after it shipped,

00:42:59 ◼   ► in like maybe like three days,

00:43:02 ◼   ► I had like a DM conversation with him.

00:43:05 ◼   ► And one of the things he said is,

00:43:07 ◼   ► "I hope this puts the rest of the notion

00:43:09 ◼   ► "that Apple doesn't care about the Mac."

00:43:12 ◼   ► Because this is a guy who spent like 18 months

00:43:14 ◼   ► working on that software.

00:43:16 ◼   ► - I know, 'cause it was hardware and a custom chip.

00:43:19 ◼   ► It had this display.

00:43:22 ◼   ► The software support was incredible, right?

00:43:24 ◼   ► All their apps had it built in.

00:43:25 ◼   ► They had all these frameworks developed

00:43:27 ◼   ► so third party developers could use it.

00:43:28 ◼   ► Like it was a multifaceted effort

00:43:33 ◼   ► that involved every single part of the company.

00:43:35 ◼   ► So that trigger that Apple doesn't care about the back

00:43:38 ◼   ► is again, I think there were justifiable reasons

00:43:41 ◼   ► for the angst, but it was just bizarre

00:43:44 ◼   ► that this was the triggering event.

00:43:46 ◼   ► - Right, I will listen to you

00:43:50 ◼   ► And maybe nod my head in agreement

00:43:53 ◼   ► if you say, I'm not happy with the direction

00:43:56 ◼   ► they're taking the Mac.

00:43:57 ◼   ► If your argument is Apple and Tim Cook

00:44:03 ◼   ► don't care about the Mac, period,

00:44:05 ◼   ► and they're letting it wither because they're done with it,

00:44:07 ◼   ► I can't see it.

00:44:09 ◼   ► I really can't.

00:44:10 ◼   ► It doesn't make any sense.

00:44:11 ◼   ► And like somebody else, I've gotten more--

00:44:15 ◼   ► like the reaction, that reaction to these MacBook Pros

00:44:18 ◼   ► really did drive a lot of sources out of the woodwork

00:44:22 ◼   ► at Apple.

00:44:22 ◼   ► I've heard just bits and pieces from a bunch of people

00:44:25 ◼   ► who are so frustrated by the reaction.

00:44:28 ◼   ► And one source who would be in a position to know--

00:44:33 ◼   ► I mean, not super high, but somebody who would know--

00:44:38 ◼   ► said that they literally spent, quote unquote,

00:44:41 ◼   ► "hundreds of millions of dollars developing the new MacBook

00:44:44 ◼   ► Pros.

00:44:45 ◼   ► And that they could have saved all of that

00:44:49 ◼   ► by just putting updated Intel chips into the old MacBook Pro

00:44:54 ◼   ► hardware.

00:44:55 ◼   ► Like, which would be like--

00:44:58 ◼   ► so if we waited this long, and then new MacBook Pros came out

00:45:01 ◼   ► in November or October, or whenever it was,

00:45:04 ◼   ► and they were just exactly like the old ones,

00:45:06 ◼   ► except they had new Intel chips, and maybe they

00:45:11 ◼   ► had the high gamut, high color gamut displays.

00:45:14 ◼   ► but otherwise visually indistinguishable from them.

00:45:18 ◼   ► That would be further fodder for the conspiracy theory

00:45:22 ◼   ► that the Mac is on the way out.

00:45:24 ◼   ► Right, because they just did the minimum viable sort of thing.

00:45:28 ◼   ► But they literally spent hundreds of millions of dollars

00:45:30 ◼   ► developing these.

00:45:31 ◼   ► They expect them to be like the foundation of the product line

00:45:35 ◼   ► for years to come.

00:45:38 ◼   ► And yet people see this as proof that they're trying

00:45:42 ◼   ► to get everybody to buy iPads.

00:45:44 ◼   ► Right.

00:45:45 ◼   ► And it's funny because even the MacBook Pro,

00:45:48 ◼   ► there was a relatively long delay.

00:45:50 ◼   ► The last release of the MacBook Pro was in May of 2015.

00:45:55 ◼   ► And then that was the 15-inch.

00:45:57 ◼   ► The 13-inch was updated in March 2015.

00:45:59 ◼   ► So to wait a year and a half was a relatively long time.

00:46:06 ◼   ► But it wasn't an obscene amount of time.

00:46:11 ◼   ► And before that, it'd be mid-2014, late 2013, early 2013,

00:46:16 ◼   ► retina 2012, mid-2012.

00:46:18 ◼   ► So it's slowed down a little bit,

00:46:19 ◼   ► but for all the things that have been discussed

00:46:20 ◼   ► and I was about Intel and stuff like that,

00:46:21 ◼   ► that's understandable.

00:46:22 ◼   ► And also developing the touch bar

00:46:23 ◼   ► presumably introduced delays, right?

00:46:25 ◼   ► 'Cause when you got your review units,

00:46:27 ◼   ► they sent you the touch bar unit

00:46:30 ◼   ► like a week later. - Two weeks later.

00:46:31 ◼   ► No, two weeks later. - Yeah, two weeks later.

00:46:33 ◼   ► So yeah, so the MacBook Pro has certainly been,

00:46:35 ◼   ► it's been fine all along.

00:46:38 ◼   ► The iMac has been fine all along,

00:46:39 ◼   ► although it wasn't updated this year,

00:46:42 ◼   ► which I think added to a little bit.

00:46:44 ◼   ► I mean, clearly it seems to mostly come back

00:46:47 ◼   ► to the sort of MacBook Pro debacle,

00:46:51 ◼   ► and that's why your point about the hundreds

00:46:53 ◼   ► of millions of dollars invested in the MacBook Pro,

00:46:55 ◼   ► I think is actually a really, really interesting

00:46:57 ◼   ► and telling point, because they're not gonna

00:47:02 ◼   ► necessarily make up that money on this version

00:47:05 ◼   ► of the MacBook Pro, right?

00:47:06 ◼   ► Presumably they're gonna be using the touch bar

00:47:09 ◼   ► in for several generations of the MacBook Pro

00:47:12 ◼   ► and hopefully on external keyboards and things like that,

00:47:15 ◼   ► which means they will pay it off over time, right?

00:47:18 ◼   ► And that's how business works.

00:47:19 ◼   ► You make these massive upfront investments

00:47:21 ◼   ► and then every, you try to sell more units,

00:47:24 ◼   ► you could spread out that investment

00:47:27 ◼   ► over more and more units, right?

00:47:29 ◼   ► And the reason why I think that's really telling

00:47:32 ◼   ► is I think it starts to get into what went wrong

00:47:35 ◼   ► with the MacBook Pro, or sorry, the Mac Pro,

00:47:37 ◼   ► But that's more of a sort of a really fascinating screw up

00:47:42 ◼   ► that might have happened as opposed to

00:47:44 ◼   ► an abandonment of the entire platform.

00:47:47 ◼   ► - Yeah, and let's make it clear.

00:47:50 ◼   ► I mean, let's not brush it under the carpet.

00:47:54 ◼   ► The fact is that the Mac Pro is a complete embarrassment

00:47:58 ◼   ► to the company.

00:47:59 ◼   ► It's a debacle.

00:48:02 ◼   ► It is absolutely ridiculous that they're selling

00:48:06 ◼   ► 1100 or 1200 day at this point old computer

00:48:10 ◼   ► at the same price with no updated components.

00:48:13 ◼   ► It's clearly a disaster.

00:48:16 ◼   ► And it's not a great sign for the Mac as a platform.

00:48:19 ◼   ► But I don't think you can extrapolate from it

00:48:24 ◼   ► that the entire platform has lost the company's attention.

00:48:28 ◼   ► - Right, so to me this Mac Pro thing is,

00:48:33 ◼   ► again, I don't write about products per se,

00:48:35 ◼   ► so I haven't really dug into it too much.

00:48:37 ◼   ► I did kind of touch on it a little bit

00:48:39 ◼   ► in a daily update for Christmas,

00:48:40 ◼   ► but to me this Mac Pro thing is one of the most

00:48:43 ◼   ► interesting untold stories about Apple right now.

00:48:46 ◼   ► Like there's no, like it's impossible to draw

00:48:49 ◼   ► any conclusion beyond that there was

00:48:51 ◼   ► a massive, massive screw up here.

00:48:54 ◼   ► And my, I mean do you want to theorize?

00:48:59 ◼   ► I have my theory.

00:49:00 ◼   ► - Yeah, that's what podcasts are for.

00:49:03 ◼   ► So the reason I mentioned that bit about the MacBook Pros

00:49:06 ◼   ► and all the investment that goes into it is,

00:49:09 ◼   ► when Apple, the cost that it took to develop

00:49:11 ◼   ► this new Mac Pro, the Trashcan Mac Pro,

00:49:13 ◼   ► was certainly substantial.

00:49:15 ◼   ► Hundreds of millions of dollars, I'm sure.

00:49:17 ◼   ► Maybe even more, who knows?

00:49:19 ◼   ► And Apple would have counted on earning back that investment

00:49:24 ◼   ► over not just this 2013 model,

00:49:26 ◼   ► but presumably a 2014 model, 2015 model, et cetera,

00:49:29 ◼   ► for probably like at least 10 years.

00:49:31 ◼   ► Like they were probably planning on having this design.

00:49:33 ◼   ► - Yeah.

00:49:34 ◼   ► Or the better part of a decade at the very least.

00:49:37 ◼   ► - Right, so my best guess is that this design

00:49:40 ◼   ► is fundamentally flawed in some way.

00:49:42 ◼   ► I think it's fundamentally flawed in general

00:49:44 ◼   ► because I think it makes people buy stuff

00:49:47 ◼   ► they don't need necessarily.

00:49:48 ◼   ► And we can get into like this,

00:49:50 ◼   ► but there's something from a business perspective

00:49:52 ◼   ► that's fundamentally flawed about this model.

00:49:54 ◼   ► Maybe there's a super high failure rate

00:49:56 ◼   ► and they're having to always return them and exchange them.

00:49:59 ◼   ► like that, which totally destroys your margins.

00:50:01 ◼   ► That's possible.

00:50:02 ◼   ► But the problem is if you dropped hundreds of millions

00:50:05 ◼   ► of dollars into a design and it fails,

00:50:10 ◼   ► and you have to decide what are you gonna do now?

00:50:12 ◼   ► Are you gonna stick with it?

00:50:13 ◼   ► Well, that's not an option.

00:50:14 ◼   ► So are you gonna redesign it?

00:50:16 ◼   ► But then you're gonna reinvest hundreds of millions

00:50:18 ◼   ► of dollars into a market that is pretty tiny.

00:50:22 ◼   ► The macro market is not a big market.

00:50:24 ◼   ► And I think my suspicion of what happened

00:50:28 ◼   ► that this was a flawed design that Apple felt they could not continue to make. The problem

00:50:33 ◼   ► was the Mac Pro market, they had to eat hundreds of millions of dollars in losses because they

00:50:39 ◼   ► didn't build enough, because they abandoned the product. They couldn't make the case to

00:50:47 ◼   ► invest another, let's say $500 million to build a new version, and now they're trying

00:50:53 ◼   ► to figure something out.

00:50:56 ◼   ► You could say they should do it.

00:50:57 ◼   ► Do we have a argument they should do it?

00:50:58 ◼   ► They should eat that cost because it's a halo product,

00:51:00 ◼   ► all that sort of thing.

00:51:01 ◼   ► But I can certainly sketch out a scenario

00:51:05 ◼   ► where it just makes zero financial sense

00:51:06 ◼   ► for them to go forward.

00:51:07 ◼   ► Basically, this product doomed the entire line.

00:51:10 ◼   ► That's my best guess about what happened.

00:51:12 ◼   ► - Yeah, I think it was, you know,

00:51:15 ◼   ► something along those lines has to be true, right?

00:51:18 ◼   ► It has to be.

00:51:19 ◼   ► And I think that, and then you can extrapolate from there,

00:51:25 ◼   ► And at a certain point, Apple, even as an institution,

00:51:29 ◼   ► and even as, in my opinion, a relatively straightforward,

00:51:33 ◼   ► realistic institution, they still have

00:51:38 ◼   ► a human side, and there's pride and ego involved.

00:51:45 ◼   ► And logically, if they were purely logical,

00:51:49 ◼   ► you could just say, you know what,

00:51:51 ◼   ► it was a terrible mistake, we're going right back

00:51:53 ◼   ► the old cheese grater big box.

00:51:56 ◼   ► Here you go.

00:51:57 ◼   ► Here's a new Mac Pro with the old cheese grater

00:52:00 ◼   ► and updated state-of-the-art Intel chips and modern ports

00:52:05 ◼   ► on the back.

00:52:06 ◼   ► And an 18-time SuperDrive?

00:52:08 ◼   ► Right.

00:52:10 ◼   ► And there are tens of thousands of people

00:52:13 ◼   ► waiting for new Mac Pro who would be like, thank you.

00:52:16 ◼   ► And they would be happy.

00:52:17 ◼   ► But Apple's not going to do that.

00:52:19 ◼   ► And honestly, I think at some level,

00:52:21 ◼   ► it comes down to pride.

00:52:23 ◼   ► They're just not going to do it for pride alone, which

00:52:25 ◼   ► is frustrating if you're the pro waiting for modern 2016,

00:52:31 ◼   ► or honestly, even 2015 level pro hardware

00:52:36 ◼   ► here in the beginning of 2017.

00:52:39 ◼   ► But they're not going to do that.

00:52:40 ◼   ► They really, in a figurative sense,

00:52:43 ◼   ► painted themselves in a corner with this.

00:52:46 ◼   ► Yeah, absolutely.

00:52:47 ◼   ► And I think you winked to a really insightful article about this.

00:52:54 ◼   ► And someone making the point that that 2013 introduction was like Apple.

00:53:00 ◼   ► It was also pride.

00:53:01 ◼   ► It was Apple's hubris seeing the best of them.

00:53:03 ◼   ► And like people are complaining we're not innovating.

00:53:05 ◼   ► Well, screw them.

00:53:06 ◼   ► Look at this.

00:53:07 ◼   ► And you ended up with a design that looked amazing, was beautiful.

00:53:12 ◼   ► But again, whether it was reliability or just the core architecture or whatever it was,

00:53:19 ◼   ► was fundamentally flawed.

00:53:21 ◼   ► Again, we're speculating, but was fundamentally flawed in some way that had they not set out

00:53:29 ◼   ► to prove the world to the world that they could innovate my ass, might have come up

00:53:33 ◼   ► with something a little more practical that would pay itself off as necessary to continue

00:53:41 ◼   ► as a viable product.

00:53:42 ◼   ► And I still firmly believe, I think they were way,

00:53:46 ◼   ► it's a case of being way too far ahead of their time.

00:53:50 ◼   ► I still think that fundamentally,

00:53:53 ◼   ► it is the future of pro-computing.

00:53:55 ◼   ► And I think that having a big box that you plug things into,

00:53:59 ◼   ► like internal drives and internal cards,

00:54:03 ◼   ► is the way things were, but it's not the way of the future.

00:54:06 ◼   ► And I think the way of the future

00:54:07 ◼   ► is a smaller self-contained box

00:54:11 ◼   ► that you do need to expand it for true pro reasons,

00:54:15 ◼   ► you're gonna expand on the outside

00:54:17 ◼   ► through very high bandwidth.

00:54:20 ◼   ► I mean, whether USB-C and Thunderbolt 3

00:54:23 ◼   ► is fast enough to be that or not, I don't know.

00:54:27 ◼   ► Maybe it's the next generation thing,

00:54:28 ◼   ► but at some point, I firmly believe that pro hardware

00:54:33 ◼   ► is just a simple small box,

00:54:35 ◼   ► and then the expansion will all be external,

00:54:38 ◼   ► and you just, with one simple thing that you plug in,

00:54:42 ◼   ► and there it goes, you get enough power,

00:54:43 ◼   ► you get enough bandwidth that you don't need to open the box

00:54:46 ◼   ► and put the thing inside.

00:54:48 ◼   ► Because to me, and you know I've gotten pushback on this

00:54:52 ◼   ► on private channels and Slack that we're on,

00:54:54 ◼   ► but whether the world is there right now in 2017 or not,

00:54:59 ◼   ► I don't know, but I still think that's firmly

00:55:01 ◼   ► where the future is.

00:55:02 ◼   ► But this Mac Pro launched at three or four,

00:55:06 ◼   ► was it 2013, 2014?

00:55:07 ◼   ► A long time ago, long enough ago.

00:55:09 ◼   ► - 2013.

00:55:10 ◼   ► - And the world wasn't there yet, you know,

00:55:13 ◼   ► for all expansion to be on the outside.

00:55:15 ◼   ► I think it's the right design for the long term,

00:55:16 ◼   ► but it wasn't the right design for then,

00:55:18 ◼   ► and it certainly isn't for now.

00:55:20 ◼   ► But--

00:55:21 ◼   ► - Yeah, well, the other thing too is,

00:55:22 ◼   ► I feel like pro hardware should be the most conservative,

00:55:26 ◼   ► though, in some respects, in the way it progresses.

00:55:29 ◼   ► I mean, in some aspects it can be faster,

00:55:31 ◼   ► pros will pay for it, they'll do the upgrades,

00:55:33 ◼   ► things like that, but like, especially when it comes

00:55:35 ◼   ► anything performance related because I think the the the Mac Pro has

00:55:40 ◼   ► Thunderbolt 2 which Thunderbolt 2 I can't remember how many lanes it's PCI

00:55:46 ◼   ► Express but it has not very many lanes and so you know yeah I think you're

00:55:51 ◼   ► right there was the idea wasn't necessarily wrong the timing was wrong

00:55:55 ◼   ► and you know you know if they were to do the other thing too is I think this

00:56:00 ◼   ► forcing people to buy two at least at the time high-end video cards and today

00:56:05 ◼   ► You still have to pay like the high-end video cards, even though they're super obsolete.

00:56:08 ◼   ► I think that this had two big problems.

00:56:10 ◼   ► One is that video card technology is progressing much faster than processor technology,

00:56:14 ◼   ► which means that the Mac Pro got older faster.

00:56:18 ◼   ► The processors in the Mac Pro are still totally relatively viable today.

00:56:23 ◼   ► They're not that far behind, particularly in single-thread performance.

00:56:26 ◼   ► But the GPUs are way behind.

00:56:29 ◼   ► And for a computer that's predicated on GPUs, that's a big problem.

00:56:32 ◼   ► And the other thing is you had people like developers in particular who wanted to buy this, they don't need two GPUs.

00:56:37 ◼   ► They don't need a processing GPU per se or a high-end GPU.

00:56:42 ◼   ► They just need an integrated GPU to be totally fine for them.

00:56:47 ◼   ► And so if they were going to do, they're going to really make it integrated.

00:56:50 ◼   ► I think they need to wait until they could get to a point where they could have a computer that's basically a processor in memory and a boot drive.

00:56:52 ◼   ► And then once Thunderbolt 4 or 5 comes along, it can actually really saturate high-end graphics and stuff.

00:57:00 ◼   ► saturate high-end graphics cards over the bus,

00:57:03 ◼   ► that then you break those out too, right?

00:57:06 ◼   ► You drop the cost by a thousand bucks,

00:57:07 ◼   ► it becomes a much more,

00:57:10 ◼   ► you know, a computer that makes a lot more sense.

00:57:12 ◼   ► - So Mac Pro, totally screwed.

00:57:15 ◼   ► Not necessarily, and in my opinion, definitely not,

00:57:19 ◼   ► in my opinion, not indicative that the Mac platform

00:57:21 ◼   ► as a whole is screwed or painted in a corner.

00:57:25 ◼   ► The other thing I like to point out,

00:57:27 ◼   ► And it's as much proof as the MacBook Pros,

00:57:31 ◼   ► the new ones with the touch bar,

00:57:33 ◼   ► that Apple hasn't lost interest institutionally in the Mac

00:57:36 ◼   ► is the fact that the OS is still

00:57:38 ◼   ► on a yearly annual upgrade schedule.

00:57:40 ◼   ► And they're pretty good upgrades.

00:57:42 ◼   ► - And we'd all like it to be slower.

00:57:44 ◼   ► - Right, if anything, I would rather have them

00:57:46 ◼   ► go to a two-year schedule and spend entire years

00:57:49 ◼   ► on just like fixing bugs and spit and polish,

00:57:53 ◼   ► you know, as opposed to adding new features.

00:57:57 ◼   ► But it's on a much more vigorous upgrade schedule, and rigorous and vigorous, than it was in

00:58:03 ◼   ► the early years of the iPhone, when they literally had to issue a press release saying, "We've

00:58:09 ◼   ► had to delay the upgrade to Mac OS because we've pulled engineers to finish the iPhone

00:58:14 ◼   ► OS."

00:58:15 ◼   ► Right.

00:58:16 ◼   ► Yeah, it's been this way for a long time.

00:58:19 ◼   ► Yeah, I think that at the end of the day, too, yes, there's the Swift playgrounds or whatever on the iPad.

00:58:24 ◼   ► But Apple's not stupid, right?

00:58:34 ◼   ► We'll probably talk about the App Store in a little bit.

00:58:38 ◼   ► And there's lots of things to complain about Apple's treatment of developers from a business perspective.

00:58:41 ◼   ► I certainly have plenty of opinions in that regard.

00:58:44 ◼   ► But from a development perspective,

00:58:49 ◼   ► I mean, Apple has always been very cognizant

00:58:53 ◼   ► of what its developers need and whatnot,

00:58:58 ◼   ► and to suggest that they're going to abandon the platform

00:59:00 ◼   ► that makes their moneymakers possible.

00:59:03 ◼   ► I mean, it's ascribing, it just doesn't make sense.

00:59:07 ◼   ► Like, there is an Occam's razor explanation here,

00:59:11 ◼   ► which I think explains the Mac Pro.

00:59:13 ◼   ► It explains why it's not updated.

00:59:16 ◼   ► It explains why there's probably not going to be another Mac Pro.

00:59:19 ◼   ► Because you can, I could sketch it on a spreadsheet right now.

00:59:21 ◼   ► Why it probably makes zero sense to build another one.

00:59:23 ◼   ► Um, and that sucks.

00:59:24 ◼   ► It was a total screw up.

00:59:26 ◼   ► Hopefully someone will write the tell article sometimes.

00:59:28 ◼   ► It'd be really fascinating to, to get the full story of when Apple just

00:59:32 ◼   ► really did totally screw up a product.

00:59:34 ◼   ► But yeah, to extrapolate from that, there's just, it doesn't make sense.

00:59:40 ◼   ► No.

00:59:40 ◼   ► I am still bummed. I'm still irritated about the no Apple logo display though.

00:59:48 ◼   ► Yeah that is and it's true because it's not just a product for Mac Pro users.

00:59:57 ◼   ► I would guess that out over the years Apple has probably sold more standalone

01:00:03 ◼   ► displays to MacBook Pro users than to Mac Pro users because I think the

01:00:09 ◼   ► The Thunderbolt display was pretty explicitly marketed as a,

01:00:12 ◼   ► the box itself has a Thunderbolt display

01:00:15 ◼   ► attached to a laptop.

01:00:16 ◼   ► Like it's pretty clear what it's for.

01:00:18 ◼   ► - Yeah, I would be shocked if there are more of them

01:00:24 ◼   ► that were hooked up to Mac Pros than to MacBook Pros.

01:00:26 ◼   ► And that's saying that knowing that most MacBook Pro users

01:00:29 ◼   ► never use any display other than the one

01:00:31 ◼   ► that's built into the laptop.

01:00:33 ◼   ► But even so, I think that the number of

01:00:37 ◼   ► laptops that are sold compared to desktops

01:00:42 ◼   ► is so extraordinarily lopsided,

01:00:45 ◼   ► and that most of those laptops that are sold are iMacs

01:00:48 ◼   ► that have a built-in display.

01:00:49 ◼   ► I think it's so lopsided that it's clearly meant for that.

01:00:54 ◼   ► And so it is disappointing.

01:00:55 ◼   ► And it does seem from early going

01:00:58 ◼   ► that people who've bought the LG 5K display,

01:01:01 ◼   ► some of them love it,

01:01:02 ◼   ► but people are having weird problems with it.

01:01:06 ◼   ► out. I had somebody I didn't link to it and it's so anecdotal but somebody wrote

01:01:11 ◼   ► in to during fireball I mean it's a perfect podcast material but so I won't

01:01:15 ◼   ► write about it but I'll talk about it where somebody wrote in and they had

01:01:18 ◼   ► problems and they had like weird interference and they were taking it

01:01:24 ◼   ► into the store and then they couldn't reproduce it at the Genius Bar and you

01:01:28 ◼   ► know just imagine what a pain in the ass it is to bring a 27 inch display back

01:01:33 ◼   ► and forth to an Apple store, etc. And it turned out that moving, he had his airport router,

01:01:40 ◼   ► he had an Apple airport router on his desk and moving it away from his desk fixed the

01:01:45 ◼   ► interference on the LG 5K display. That literally, you know, and he said it's, you know, and

01:01:51 ◼   ► he, you know, again, I'm not going to write about it because it's like one guy with one

01:01:55 ◼   ► case and I don't know, but I've seen other people with these interference, you know,

01:01:59 ◼   ► with weird problems on this and like what a weird problem, but it's like, it's the sort

01:02:02 ◼   ► that a normal person is never gonna figure out.

01:02:04 ◼   ► If it turns out that for whatever reason

01:02:07 ◼   ► having their airport route or too close to the display

01:02:10 ◼   ► causes it to have weird interference,

01:02:14 ◼   ► how is a normal person gonna figure that out?

01:02:16 ◼   ► And it's the sort of thing that Apple,

01:02:18 ◼   ► Apple branded displays,

01:02:21 ◼   ► they're not just aesthetically pleasing.

01:02:22 ◼   ► They really are just terrific displays, always were.

01:02:26 ◼   ► I can't say-- - Well, they are tanks.

01:02:30 ◼   ► I actually have mine sitting on my desk

01:02:33 ◼   ► because not using one of those mounts

01:02:34 ◼   ► because I couldn't, it weighs like five times

01:02:38 ◼   ► as much as a normal monitor of similar size.

01:02:41 ◼   ► So I'm guessing that's probably why it handles

01:02:42 ◼   ► the shielding better.

01:02:44 ◼   ► But yeah, it's one of those things

01:02:46 ◼   ► I could never understand why you would pay so much

01:02:48 ◼   ► for a monitor until I had a job that bought one for me.

01:02:52 ◼   ► It was like, oh, okay, I get it now.

01:02:53 ◼   ► I will never not buy another one of these again.

01:02:56 ◼   ► And now my Thunderbolt display's failing

01:02:58 ◼   ► and I can't find another one and I'm very sad.

01:03:01 ◼   ► - I had a 20 inch, I don't know what the name was,

01:03:05 ◼   ► but it was, I couldn't, at the time when I bought it,

01:03:08 ◼   ► I couldn't get a bigger one.

01:03:09 ◼   ► I think there was, it was like 20 and 23s

01:03:11 ◼   ► and I bought the 20 inch.

01:03:13 ◼   ► I mean, it was probably like 2000 or something like that.

01:03:15 ◼   ► - Was that the plastic framing and like the two--

01:03:17 ◼   ► - No, it had, it was aluminum.

01:03:18 ◼   ► It had an aluminum frame.

01:03:20 ◼   ► I had it and I had it, I mean,

01:03:23 ◼   ► I went through like three or four max while I was using it

01:03:26 ◼   ► And I'm sure it was more or less,

01:03:31 ◼   ► like when I finally got rid of it,

01:03:32 ◼   ► it wasn't because it was broken,

01:03:34 ◼   ► it was just like I,

01:03:35 ◼   ► I think I used it up until I got this 20,

01:03:38 ◼   ► yeah, I probably had it on my desk

01:03:40 ◼   ► until I got this 27-inch iMac two and a half years ago.

01:03:42 ◼   ► It just ran and ran and ran.

01:03:45 ◼   ► It was unbelievable.

01:03:47 ◼   ► - Yeah, my monitor works fine.

01:03:49 ◼   ► It's the USB, all that stuff,

01:03:53 ◼   ► no longer works or works very sketchily.

01:03:56 ◼   ► And so I've been using that for the camera,

01:03:58 ◼   ► and also I had all my stuff plugged into it.

01:04:00 ◼   ► So now I do the laptop and I move around a lot.

01:04:03 ◼   ► And so every time I sit down,

01:04:03 ◼   ► I have to plug in five things every single time.

01:04:06 ◼   ► And I have to use the sound for my laptop speakers.

01:04:08 ◼   ► And yeah, so the display itself is fine.

01:04:11 ◼   ► It's the sort of docking capability that is gone.

01:04:15 ◼   ► - All right, let me take a break here and thank our third.

01:04:18 ◼   ► - What, sorry, just a second.

01:04:20 ◼   ► I do think though the one thing that is worth,

01:04:22 ◼   ► as long as we're here,

01:04:23 ◼   ► Because abandoning the Apple display,

01:04:27 ◼   ► we started the airport thing.

01:04:29 ◼   ► This stuff I think does fit more

01:04:31 ◼   ► in the kind of critique of Apple

01:04:33 ◼   ► as being too quote unquote spreadsheet driven

01:04:37 ◼   ► or operational driven or whatever the critique is

01:04:40 ◼   ► of sort of Tim Cook and Apple generally.

01:04:43 ◼   ► And I think that is a fair one

01:04:44 ◼   ► because what that gets into is,

01:04:47 ◼   ► Apple never sold routers to make money on routers.

01:04:52 ◼   ► They sold routers because it would ensure that the experience of using your Apple device

01:04:56 ◼   ► was better than it would be otherwise.

01:05:00 ◼   ► And same thing with the display.

01:05:02 ◼   ► Apple didn't sell display because they were going to make money on displays.

01:05:05 ◼   ► Well, they probably made money given how much they charged for them.

01:05:08 ◼   ► But it kind of like, it lets you be a...

01:05:11 ◼   ► It kind of lets you...

01:05:12 ◼   ► Some respects, it was a better experience, that's true, but also having that big tank

01:05:16 ◼   ► on your desk with the Apple logo on it.

01:05:17 ◼   ► I mean, it lets you be an Apple person in some respects.

01:05:21 ◼   ► And I think that part, to me that is more concerning in a way because it's, Apple is

01:05:29 ◼   ► making decisions that are driven by, it seems like anyway, they're making decisions driven

01:05:33 ◼   ► by the bottom line, not driven by this sort of halo sort of thinking about what it means

01:05:40 ◼   ► to be an Apple customer, if that makes sense.

01:05:42 ◼   ► Take a step back, take a deep breath and just be there as a customer and see what the overall

01:05:49 ◼   ► experience is like.

01:05:50 ◼   ► And again, to draw an analogy, I make it all over and over

01:05:52 ◼   ► and over again, but just to compare Apple to Disney.

01:05:55 ◼   ► And you go to a Disney theme park.

01:05:57 ◼   ► You go to any other theme park, and you

01:05:59 ◼   ► buy a hot dog and a soda.

01:06:01 ◼   ► And then when you're done with it, you go to the trash can,

01:06:04 ◼   ► and the trash can is filled to the brim, overflowing.

01:06:07 ◼   ► And it's like, what do you do?

01:06:08 ◼   ► Do you kind of rest the thing on top?

01:06:11 ◼   ► What do you do with your garbage when

01:06:12 ◼   ► the trash can's already full?

01:06:14 ◼   ► You go to a Disney theme park, and the trash cans

01:06:16 ◼   ► are never full because they spend the money

01:06:19 ◼   ► to have people constantly emptying the trash cans

01:06:23 ◼   ► so that they're always, and they're never filthy,

01:06:27 ◼   ► you never feel like you're grossed out

01:06:30 ◼   ► by putting your garbage in there.

01:06:32 ◼   ► It just works, right?

01:06:33 ◼   ► And it's such a little thing to have garbage cans

01:06:38 ◼   ► that are not full and not covered with grime

01:06:43 ◼   ► and you can just always throw your trash away.

01:06:47 ◼   ► That's what having Apple branded Wi-Fi routers was like

01:06:52 ◼   ► back in the day, where it was like,

01:06:54 ◼   ► they didn't need to make them.

01:06:55 ◼   ► You could buy Netgear or whatever other ones there were.

01:06:59 ◼   ► But the fact that you could just go in the Apple store

01:07:01 ◼   ► if you needed to and just say,

01:07:03 ◼   ► "Just give me, I gotta set up Wi-Fi in my house.

01:07:05 ◼   ► "Tell me what to buy."

01:07:06 ◼   ► And you buy it and go home and hook it up and it would work.

01:07:10 ◼   ► It was the same sort of thing.

01:07:11 ◼   ► It wasn't about making money for the company.

01:07:13 ◼   ► It was like, look, you're an Apple customer.

01:07:15 ◼   ► it's gonna, you know, we'll take care of you.

01:07:18 ◼   ► - Yep.

01:07:19 ◼   ► - It doesn't matter whether we're making money

01:07:21 ◼   ► on this or not, right?

01:07:22 ◼   ► Do you really, does, you know,

01:07:24 ◼   ► would Disney theme parks make less money

01:07:27 ◼   ► if they cut their number of people

01:07:29 ◼   ► emptying the trash cans in half?

01:07:31 ◼   ► Probably not, or at least not for a long time.

01:07:33 ◼   ► It would take a while for it to show up.

01:07:35 ◼   ► But, you know, it's just part of the experience,

01:07:39 ◼   ► you know, that you can do it.

01:07:40 ◼   ► - Right, and that feels like the part

01:07:44 ◼   ► that is, that's the concerning part.

01:07:48 ◼   ► That's more, like the Mac Pro,

01:07:50 ◼   ► I really feel like there's a business explanation for it

01:07:52 ◼   ► that you can make.

01:07:53 ◼   ► The, and it's one of those ones where it's just, you know,

01:07:57 ◼   ► I can see it being a hard decision,

01:07:59 ◼   ► but it's just gonna have to be made.

01:08:01 ◼   ► The router, in this case, it's like the business decision

01:08:04 ◼   ► is like too obvious.

01:08:05 ◼   ► Like it's like, it's very clear,

01:08:07 ◼   ► like this is a distraction, we're not making money,

01:08:10 ◼   ► blah, blah, blah, whatever it might be.

01:08:11 ◼   ► But yeah, it's hard to explain that away

01:08:16 ◼   ► as anything other than focusing on resources and margins

01:08:21 ◼   ► and not focusing on the experience.

01:08:24 ◼   ► Because even today, things have gotten better,

01:08:28 ◼   ► but I don't know how you can say that we are focused

01:08:30 ◼   ► on delivering the best possible experience

01:08:32 ◼   ► and becoming these peripherals.

01:08:35 ◼   ► I mean, again, if you take the experience holistically,

01:08:37 ◼   ► and yeah, you can go to Apple Store and say,

01:08:39 ◼   ► oh, my computer's Wi-Fi isn't working.

01:08:40 ◼   ► oh, it's probably a bad router.

01:08:42 ◼   ► Yes, is that Apple's fault?

01:08:46 ◼   ► No, maybe not.

01:08:47 ◼   ► But does that make their customer's life more challenging?

01:08:50 ◼   ► It does, and it's a shame that they seem

01:08:53 ◼   ► to not care about that as much.

01:08:56 ◼   ► - Yeah, I totally agree.

01:08:57 ◼   ► I kind of feel it's like,

01:09:00 ◼   ► the problem isn't that they don't care about the Mac period.

01:09:04 ◼   ► It's kind of, like, which would be alarming.

01:09:09 ◼   ► And I've said this before too, like I am a diehard Mac user.

01:09:12 ◼   ► If I had to choose between only ever using iOS devices

01:09:20 ◼   ► or only ever using Mac OS devices,

01:09:23 ◼   ► as much as I love my iPhone, I would rather

01:09:26 ◼   ► switch to an Android phone and have a Mac to work

01:09:31 ◼   ► than to have an iPhone and iPad and use anything else

01:09:34 ◼   ► at my desk for work.

01:09:36 ◼   ► Because that's how much the Mac means to me

01:09:39 ◼   ► in terms of my workflow for working.

01:09:41 ◼   ► If I didn't, if I like somehow retired,

01:09:45 ◼   ► or if I, you know, I don't know, became a lumberjack,

01:09:48 ◼   ► whatever else I would do as a career,

01:09:50 ◼   ► and didn't work in a way that I use the Mac,

01:09:55 ◼   ► I would rather have an iPhone, I guess.

01:09:57 ◼   ► You know, I know I would rather have an iPhone,

01:10:00 ◼   ► and I guess I would choose to use iOS over Mac, period.

01:10:03 ◼   ► But because my work is at a computer,

01:10:07 ◼   ► the Mac means that much to me.

01:10:08 ◼   ► That's how much.

01:10:09 ◼   ► And so I care about this profoundly, whether Apple cares.

01:10:15 ◼   ► But the way I see it, it's not so much that Apple

01:10:18 ◼   ► is like moving away from the Mac,

01:10:20 ◼   ► but more or less that Apple is just giving the Mac shit work.

01:10:25 ◼   ► Almost like they're taking advantage of the Mac.

01:10:29 ◼   ► - I mean, that's okay, though.

01:10:32 ◼   ► I mean, I think the point that people are

01:10:33 ◼   ► kind of vaguely aware of, but certainly front and center

01:10:36 ◼   ► me being on this side of the world in Asia is that here people kind of skipped over PCs

01:10:44 ◼   ► in some respects.

01:10:45 ◼   ► That makes mobile really interesting because the way people use mobile here is just way

01:10:49 ◼   ► more in-depth and pervasive than it is in the States where everyone had a computer at

01:10:54 ◼   ► one point and people still use computers out of habit.

01:10:59 ◼   ► That's where the growth is for Apple.

01:11:00 ◼   ► Apple does make the vast majority of their money on the iPhone.

01:11:04 ◼   ► The iPad is the future, and you see your kids

01:11:08 ◼   ► use these devices and all that sort of thing.

01:11:09 ◼   ► I totally get it, and it's a totally valid thing to say.

01:11:13 ◼   ► But that's also where the router thing

01:11:17 ◼   ► is particularly interesting, because the router

01:11:20 ◼   ► is just as important to the iPhone as it is to,

01:11:23 ◼   ► and I guess the iPhone can fall back on cellular networking.

01:11:25 ◼   ► Maybe they think that home Wi-Fi is gonna go away.

01:11:27 ◼   ► And again, I guess you think about it,

01:11:29 ◼   ► in emerging markets, it is more the case

01:11:31 ◼   ► that you may not have home Wi-Fi, but you do use Wi-Fi.

01:11:33 ◼   ► Maybe that's it.

01:11:35 ◼   ► Maybe that is, this is just looking forward to the future

01:11:39 ◼   ► and the way things are.

01:11:41 ◼   ► But yeah, I mean, I guess that's the other thing too

01:11:45 ◼   ► is like the, you talked about the Mac Pro evolution,

01:11:50 ◼   ► like putting in a new set of processors

01:11:52 ◼   ► and an updated screen would have sounded great to me.

01:11:56 ◼   ► I mean, in some respects, it's almost like this weird,

01:11:59 ◼   ► it's like this weird codependent relationship

01:12:01 ◼   ► between Apple and Mac.

01:12:03 ◼   ► - You mean the MacBook Pro, MacBook Pro.

01:12:05 ◼   ► - Yeah, sorry, MacBook Pro.

01:12:06 ◼   ► Like, I mean, MacBook, Apple is like,

01:12:11 ◼   ► we need to support the Mac, you're right,

01:12:12 ◼   ► it's the truck, quote unquote,

01:12:15 ◼   ► we're gonna dump all our shitty work on it and whatnot.

01:12:18 ◼   ► And we all MacBook Pro users are like, that's fine,

01:12:21 ◼   ► all we want to do is like do our shitty work.

01:12:24 ◼   ► Just give us updated internals, we'll be totally happy.

01:12:27 ◼   ► But I was like, no, we need to update it,

01:12:29 ◼   ► we need to innovate it.

01:12:30 ◼   ► It's like this weird sort of relationship

01:12:35 ◼   ► between the two sides that is kind of weird.

01:12:38 ◼   ► That's all I can say, it's weird.

01:12:40 ◼   ► - All right, let me take a break here

01:12:42 ◼   ► and thank our third and final sponsor.

01:12:44 ◼   ► It's our good friends at Casper.

01:12:46 ◼   ► Casper makes an obsessively engineered mattress

01:12:49 ◼   ► and they sell them at shockingly fair prices.

01:12:52 ◼   ► Go to casper.com/thetalkshow and use code thetalkshow,

01:12:57 ◼   ► all one word, the talk show, and save $50

01:13:00 ◼   ► towards your mattress.

01:13:02 ◼   ► Casper has engineers, mattress engineers.

01:13:04 ◼   ► These are engineers who only work on designing mattresses.

01:13:08 ◼   ► And they've designed one perfect mattress.

01:13:11 ◼   ► It is a combination of memory foam and other technologies.

01:13:21 ◼   ► The bottom line is it's just one type of mattress.

01:13:24 ◼   ► You don't have to go there and pick between this style,

01:13:28 ◼   ► that style, whatever.

01:13:29 ◼   ► You just pick a size.

01:13:31 ◼   ► You just pick a size, it comes to your house

01:13:33 ◼   ► in a little box, shockingly small box,

01:13:36 ◼   ► because it's made out of foam, they sort of vacuum seal it.

01:13:39 ◼   ► It's worth buying one of these mattresses

01:13:40 ◼   ► just to get the box in your house to see how small a box

01:13:45 ◼   ► they can put an entire king or queen size mattress in.

01:13:48 ◼   ► You open it up in the room, don't open it up

01:13:52 ◼   ► before you get it to your bedroom.

01:13:54 ◼   ► Trust me, read the bot instructions on the box.

01:13:56 ◼   ► You don't want to do that.

01:13:58 ◼   ► You open it up, and you have a beautiful mattress.

01:14:00 ◼   ► It's right there.

01:14:01 ◼   ► It makes a great sound.

01:14:02 ◼   ► It sucks all the oxygen out of the air as it fills up.

01:14:06 ◼   ► And it's great.

01:14:07 ◼   ► I have one.

01:14:07 ◼   ► It is terrific.

01:14:08 ◼   ► It's like sleeping in a luxury hotel every night.

01:14:12 ◼   ► And here's the thing.

01:14:13 ◼   ► Like all these other companies that sponsor these podcasts,

01:14:16 ◼   ► it sounds too good to be true.

01:14:18 ◼   ► But the reason it works is that they sell directly.

01:14:21 ◼   ► The reason mattresses cost so much in other places

01:14:25 ◼   ► is that there's the whole middleman thing,

01:14:27 ◼   ► where from the factory to your bedroom,

01:14:30 ◼   ► there's all of this markup

01:14:32 ◼   ► as it goes through the retail channel.

01:14:35 ◼   ► And the expense of having like a big retail showroom

01:14:38 ◼   ► where you walk around and try six different styles

01:14:42 ◼   ► of mattress from different companies,

01:14:44 ◼   ► and it's gross because all these other people

01:14:46 ◼   ► have like jumped on the bed to try it out.

01:14:51 ◼   ► Casper takes all that away.

01:14:53 ◼   ► You buy it, it shows up at your house.

01:14:55 ◼   ► You have a 100-night home trial.

01:14:57 ◼   ► And if you don't love it, they will pick it up at your house

01:15:00 ◼   ► and give you a full refund.

01:15:02 ◼   ► You don't even have to pay to ship it back.

01:15:04 ◼   ► You just get all your money back,

01:15:05 ◼   ► and they just take it away if you don't like it.

01:15:07 ◼   ► They can do this because they know that people who buy them,

01:15:10 ◼   ► they don't take it up on them because it's a great mattress.

01:15:13 ◼   ► 100-night home trial, so you don't

01:15:14 ◼   ► have to worry about the fact that you're

01:15:16 ◼   ► buying a mattress online without actually trying it.

01:15:19 ◼   ► So next time you need a mattress, or if you don't even--

01:15:22 ◼   ► if you think, hey, maybe my mattress is old and gross

01:15:25 ◼   ► and it's kind of worn out, just go there, get a new one,

01:15:28 ◼   ► and you'll sleep better.

01:15:30 ◼   ► What's better than sleep?

01:15:31 ◼   ► I love to sleep.

01:15:32 ◼   ► So go to casper.com/thetalkshow.

01:15:35 ◼   ► Remember that code, thetalkshow, and you will save $50

01:15:38 ◼   ► towards your mattress.

01:15:40 ◼   ► Go there and try it out.

01:15:42 ◼   ► Love this sponsor.

01:15:42 ◼   ► Cannot believe-- still cannot believe--

01:15:46 ◼   ► that my career has ended up where I'm a mattress pitchman.

01:15:49 ◼   ► I swear to God, this is my favorite,

01:15:53 ◼   ► one of my all-time favorite sponsors

01:15:54 ◼   ► in Daring Fireball/The Talk Show History is Casper,

01:15:57 ◼   ► just because I, you know,

01:15:59 ◼   ► like when Squarespace sponsors the show,

01:16:01 ◼   ► I told, if you would've told me 10 years ago,

01:16:03 ◼   ► hey, you know, 10 years from now,

01:16:04 ◼   ► you're gonna be pitching like a service

01:16:06 ◼   ► where you can set up your own website.

01:16:07 ◼   ► I can think like, hey, that's great,

01:16:09 ◼   ► that's sort of what I was hoping I would end up doing.

01:16:11 ◼   ► That's great.

01:16:12 ◼   ► If you had told me I would be selling mattresses,

01:16:14 ◼   ► I just would be like, are you serious?

01:16:17 ◼   ► But here I am.

01:16:19 ◼   ► There you are.

01:16:20 ◼   ► All right, what else is going on?

01:16:25 ◼   ► How about this Chris Latner story?

01:16:27 ◼   ► So Chris Latner, creator of LLVM compiler,

01:16:34 ◼   ► C Lang, the original engineer behind Swift.

01:16:39 ◼   ► He kind of worked on Swift for like a year or two

01:16:41 ◼   ► before showing it to his teammates at Apple,

01:16:44 ◼   ► and then it was like a small team that worked on it.

01:16:46 ◼   ► Sort of, you know, he fairly said the father of Swift

01:16:50 ◼   ► has left Apple and is joining Tesla within a week or two.

01:16:54 ◼   ► And a couple of other people, I mean, there's sort of,

01:17:00 ◼   ► I wouldn't call it, like a couple of people

01:17:05 ◼   ► have written to me and said like,

01:17:06 ◼   ► "Wow, you're linking to all these people

01:17:07 ◼   ► "who are leaving Apple for Tesla.

01:17:08 ◼   ► Does this mean that there's like this huge brain drain going on where all the talent from Apple is leaving for Tesla?

01:17:15 ◼   ► And that's I don't think that's the case and I've asked around I I don't I just think it's a couple of high-profile cases

01:17:22 ◼   ► But I do think there's more people leaving Apple for Tesla than leaving Tesla for Apple

01:17:26 ◼   ► Yeah, and you know, it's it's

01:17:34 ◼   ► - It's hard to say.

01:17:35 ◼   ► I mean, in some respects,

01:17:36 ◼   ► I mean, what Latner has accomplished is incredible.

01:17:39 ◼   ► And I think if you don't really know about,

01:17:42 ◼   ► and most Apple customers have no need to know about,

01:17:45 ◼   ► sort of the developer tool chain,

01:17:48 ◼   ► it's hard to appreciate the contribution

01:17:52 ◼   ► this guy has made to Apple.

01:17:53 ◼   ► I mean, like--

01:17:54 ◼   ► - And the stature that he has in the industry.

01:17:57 ◼   ► I mean, it's very hard to say,

01:17:59 ◼   ► who else is like Chris Latner?

01:18:01 ◼   ► I mean, he's sort of a singular figure

01:18:03 ◼   ► in terms of what he's accomplished and what he's done.

01:18:06 ◼   ► - Oh, absolutely.

01:18:08 ◼   ► I mean, the entire LLVM architecture,

01:18:11 ◼   ► and now Clang is kind of a part of that now,

01:18:14 ◼   ► that that's the front-end compiler.

01:18:15 ◼   ► It's one, it's totally taken over the industry,

01:18:20 ◼   ► for one, and for two, it's a,

01:18:26 ◼   ► yeah, so for one, just the impact broadly.

01:18:28 ◼   ► It's widely adopted, it's used everywhere,

01:18:31 ◼   ► there's all sorts of custom tool changes

01:18:32 ◼   ► but on top of it, it supports all sorts of things.

01:18:34 ◼   ► And then, LLVM is sort of a broader architecture.

01:18:37 ◼   ► Clang is for C-type languages primarily,

01:18:40 ◼   ► so it's a narrower sort of thing that sits on top of it.

01:18:43 ◼   ► But the other thing, I mean, just from a,

01:18:45 ◼   ► so from an industry perspective, absolutely spot on.

01:18:47 ◼   ► Like this guy's a giant in the field.

01:18:49 ◼   ► I mean, like Richard Stallman level,

01:18:52 ◼   ► like Richard Stallman is a GCC or whatever.

01:18:53 ◼   ► Like this is kind of his, in some respects,

01:18:55 ◼   ► his successor in that sort of thing.

01:18:57 ◼   ► - Linus Torvald's, you know,

01:19:00 ◼   ► there's only a handful of people you can compare to Latner.

01:19:02 ◼   ► And for some reason, all the other ones

01:19:04 ◼   ► are a bunch of assholes.

01:19:05 ◼   ► And Latner is a really nice guy.

01:19:09 ◼   ► Right.

01:19:10 ◼   ► So yeah, he's an absolute giant.

01:19:12 ◼   ► And then for Apple, I mean, the way--

01:19:15 ◼   ► I mean, Apple talks about wanting

01:19:16 ◼   ► to own their primary technologies, right?

01:19:19 ◼   ► Like, what Latner did was made it possible for Apple

01:19:23 ◼   ► to not only own its developer tool stack in a way

01:19:27 ◼   ► they didn't before.

01:19:28 ◼   ► and they were at the mercy of third parties.

01:19:30 ◼   ► Like you remember the whole MetroWorks and Code Warrior

01:19:32 ◼   ► and all that sort of stuff.

01:19:34 ◼   ► And they ended up owning the entire stack.

01:19:37 ◼   ► And he did it in a way that is like

01:19:41 ◼   ► the best of Apple's strategy.

01:19:43 ◼   ► I talked about the commoditizing the compliments part.

01:19:45 ◼   ► What Apple, like people talk about Apple

01:19:47 ◼   ► being this integrated, right?

01:19:49 ◼   ► Because they do the OS and the hardware.

01:19:51 ◼   ► If you think about the hardware, Apple is very modular.

01:19:53 ◼   ► Apple's like 600 suppliers or something like that

01:19:55 ◼   ► all over the world building all these pieces,

01:19:58 ◼   ► competing against each other to get the lowest possible price,

01:20:03 ◼   ► Apple can dual-source suppliers, et cetera, et cetera.

01:20:05 ◼   ► And so Apple reaps all the benefits of having

01:20:08 ◼   ► this massive ecosystem making their products better

01:20:12 ◼   ► on an individual component basis.

01:20:15 ◼   ► And then Apple fuses it all together into one thing

01:20:17 ◼   ► and ties it to the software and says,

01:20:19 ◼   ► "Oh, look, we're integrated."

01:20:20 ◼   ► And they are.

01:20:22 ◼   ► Everyone's integrated at different parts of the stack.

01:20:22 ◼   ► That's what Latiners work what Apple do

01:20:24 ◼   ► on the developer side.

01:20:24 ◼   ► There is a massive community that is working on LVM,

01:20:29 ◼   ► that's working on Clang, that now is working on Swift,

01:20:33 ◼   ► it's a part of it being open source.

01:20:36 ◼   ► They're working, they're making it better,

01:20:37 ◼   ► they're contributing patches,

01:20:39 ◼   ► they're building up new languages, new use cases,

01:20:40 ◼   ► making it a more attractive language for students to learn

01:20:42 ◼   ► so that new students come along who already know Swift

01:20:44 ◼   ► and can code on Apple's platforms.

01:20:46 ◼   ► There's all these benefits that accrue to all this stuff

01:20:48 ◼   ► being open source and being the standard

01:20:52 ◼   ► for all kinds of things,

01:20:50 ◼   ► that it all accrues to Apple's benefit,

01:20:55 ◼   ► because it's going into their core technology,

01:20:57 ◼   ► and then Apple owns the top and the bottom parts of it.

01:20:59 ◼   ► They own how it ties into their platforms.

01:21:02 ◼   ► They own the IDE that you have to use Xcode

01:21:05 ◼   ► at some step to compile iOS apps or whatnot.

01:21:09 ◼   ► And so from a strategic and business perspective,

01:21:13 ◼   ► his contribution is massive.

01:21:17 ◼   ► It's absolutely massive, and it's equal to someone

01:21:17 ◼   ► like the more famous folks you see,

01:21:19 ◼   ► like Ivan, Ivan Industrial Design,

01:21:21 ◼   ► or the people in the software stack,

01:21:23 ◼   ► or in the hardware, the chip stack,

01:21:25 ◼   ► like building a custom thing for Apple.

01:21:27 ◼   ► It's difficult to overstate the contribution he's made,

01:21:31 ◼   ► both to the industry and to Apple,

01:21:33 ◼   ► and their sort of strategic position going forward.

01:21:35 ◼   ► - Yeah, I'll probably miss this,

01:21:39 ◼   ► 'cause I wasn't directly involved,

01:21:40 ◼   ► but Apple's developer tools are incredibly important

01:21:45 ◼   ► to a platform.

01:21:47 ◼   ► It's hard to overstate that.

01:21:48 ◼   ► And it's one of those things that Microsoft has aced,

01:21:53 ◼   ► I think, from the very earliest days

01:21:56 ◼   ► through to the current day.

01:21:58 ◼   ► Say what you want about using their platform as a user.

01:22:01 ◼   ► I find Windows 10 to be as unpalatable as ever.

01:22:05 ◼   ► But their developer tool story has always been top notch,

01:22:08 ◼   ► from everything from the compiler to debugger

01:22:11 ◼   ► to the languages.

01:22:16 ◼   ► And Apple really missed out on that.

01:22:20 ◼   ► Back in the early days, the Macintosh Developer Tools

01:22:25 ◼   ► was called MPW, Macintosh Programmer's Workshop.

01:22:31 ◼   ► And it was this sort of weird, for the Mac perspective, hybrid.

01:22:36 ◼   ► It was sort of like a command line shell

01:22:40 ◼   ► that on a system that didn't have a terminal

01:22:45 ◼   ► or didn't have a command line, when you ran MPW,

01:22:47 ◼   ► there was a shell and it had its own shell scripting language.

01:22:52 ◼   ► And I remember I used to have a version of Perl

01:22:55 ◼   ► that you could run in MPW.

01:22:56 ◼   ► It was like, people would say, oh, you

01:22:59 ◼   ► can't run Perl on a Mac.

01:23:00 ◼   ► Well, you could if you had MPW.

01:23:01 ◼   ► And there was also a thing called

01:23:02 ◼   ► MacPerl, which was a standalone application,

01:23:04 ◼   ► and the way you would run scripts in--

01:23:07 ◼   ► I mean, this is really way out in the weeds.

01:23:09 ◼   ► But you could send it like an Apple event.

01:23:12 ◼   ► You'd send like an AppleScript command to MacPerl

01:23:14 ◼   ► with the Perl script file you wanted to run,

01:23:18 ◼   ► and then it would send you the results.

01:23:19 ◼   ► So you could run Perl on a classic Mac,

01:23:21 ◼   ► even though it didn't have anything resembling

01:23:23 ◼   ► a traditional Unix command line.

01:23:26 ◼   ► But eventually this became outdated,

01:23:29 ◼   ► and by the mid '90s, just about every serious Mac developer

01:23:34 ◼   ► I knew was using Code Warrior,

01:23:37 ◼   ► which was a third-party IDE.

01:23:39 ◼   ► - IDE, yep. - Right, integrated

01:23:44 ◼   ► development environment. Right, so instead of just putting scripts together to

01:23:49 ◼   ► compile your app, you'd have an actual visual thing. And there was, you know, the

01:23:52 ◼   ► predecessors to that were from a company called Think. There was Think C and Think

01:23:58 ◼   ► Pascal, which were very well regarded. I know people to this day who would

01:24:05 ◼   ► argue that Think Pascal's debugger was the best debugger they've ever used.

01:24:08 ◼   ► Great products, and you know, and in a Mac style where you had these projects

01:24:13 ◼   ► that were in a window and it was click and drag

01:24:16 ◼   ► to organize the project.

01:24:17 ◼   ► With Mac OS X, what they inherited from Next

01:24:24 ◼   ► was the GCC toolkit, which, and again,

01:24:29 ◼   ► we could go on for an hour about this,

01:24:31 ◼   ► and it's over, you know, it's really outside my expertise,

01:24:33 ◼   ► but, you know, GCC, the best thing you could say about it

01:24:37 ◼   ► was that it worked.

01:24:38 ◼   ► (laughing)

01:24:40 ◼   ► - It was flexible and it worked

01:24:41 ◼   ► and it had all the trade-offs that came with

01:24:43 ◼   ► working on everything and for everything.

01:24:45 ◼   ► - Right, that you had the C and C++ compiler

01:24:50 ◼   ► that Next had jerry-rigged over the years

01:24:52 ◼   ► to also compile Objective-C.

01:24:55 ◼   ► (laughing)

01:24:59 ◼   ► Nobody was happy about it.

01:25:01 ◼   ► And I was at, I mean, during this transition period,

01:25:05 ◼   ► it was a good time to work at a company like Barebones

01:25:08 ◼   ► in 2000 to 2002 to talk to people,

01:25:12 ◼   ► back engineers who were switching from code warrior

01:25:19 ◼   ► to the GCC.

01:25:21 ◼   ► What was the Xcode called before it was Xcode?

01:25:24 ◼   ► I forget, what was it?

01:25:25 ◼   ► Project Builder. - I don't remember.

01:25:27 ◼   ► - Right? - Oh yeah, that's right.

01:25:28 ◼   ► - Project Builder and Interface Builder.

01:25:30 ◼   ► And the bare bones, the engineers were great.

01:25:35 ◼   ► I mean, they were very,

01:25:36 ◼   ► They're pragmatic, as engineers should be,

01:25:39 ◼   ► where they had BB Edit compiling under GCC long before they had

01:25:44 ◼   ► to just to make sure that the source code was going to pass

01:25:48 ◼   ► through a different C compiler.

01:25:51 ◼   ► But it was very crude and rudimentary.

01:25:54 ◼   ► Whereas the whole LLVM CLang stack

01:25:59 ◼   ► is very much what Apple would have if they could just

01:26:02 ◼   ► snap their fingers and say, we wish we had a toolkit that

01:26:04 ◼   ► worked like this.

01:26:06 ◼   ► That's pretty much what LLVM is, I think it's fair to say.

01:26:09 ◼   ► - Yeah, and LLVM is really amazing.

01:26:11 ◼   ► It's basically like, it makes the entire bottom part

01:26:15 ◼   ► of the compiler like totally modular,

01:26:17 ◼   ► where you compile into this intermediary language

01:26:20 ◼   ► and then it can recompile for particular processors

01:26:22 ◼   ► or GPUs or whatever it might be,

01:26:25 ◼   ► but it made it totally modular.

01:26:27 ◼   ► Basically GCC was like this spaghetti soup of stuff

01:26:31 ◼   ► where to add on support for anything,

01:26:32 ◼   ► you would kind of just add to the spaghetti,

01:26:35 ◼   ► but a new kind of spaghetti, and it was totally impenetrable.

01:26:39 ◼   ► And LLVM made this very neat sort of modular approach.

01:26:42 ◼   ► And Latner developed LLVM to sit underneath GCC.

01:26:46 ◼   ► So basically, GC would just compile

01:26:48 ◼   ► to the intermediate language.

01:26:49 ◼   ► But eventually, yeah, he built all the way

01:26:51 ◼   ► up to the top of the stack to do the entire compiler itself,

01:26:54 ◼   ► which then let Xcode do way more interesting things,

01:26:57 ◼   ► because Apple now controlled the entire thing

01:26:59 ◼   ► from top to bottom.

01:27:02 ◼   ► Yeah, if we didn't bore people with the sports,

01:27:05 ◼   ► to support them with talking about compilers.

01:27:07 ◼   ► But the net of it is is that not only is he

01:27:10 ◼   ► super only good on the industry,

01:27:12 ◼   ► but he is important to Apple like strategically.

01:27:16 ◼   ► Like what he has done for Apple is

01:27:18 ◼   ► very few people in the company can really match that.

01:27:24 ◼   ► - Yeah, and one of the practical effects of his work

01:27:29 ◼   ► that really has an effect on Apple

01:27:30 ◼   ► is it made it much easier for Apple.

01:27:34 ◼   ► I mean, I think they could have done it anyway,

01:27:36 ◼   ► even if they were stuck on the GCC tool chain.

01:27:39 ◼   ► They could have, but I think it was,

01:27:41 ◼   ► I don't think anybody would argue with the fact

01:27:43 ◼   ► that it's easier for Apple to have things that run on ARM,

01:27:48 ◼   ► things that run on Intel, have switched to new ARM 64

01:27:54 ◼   ► and stuff like that.

01:27:55 ◼   ► It makes them less dependent on the specific hardware

01:28:01 ◼   ► that they're targeting.

01:28:03 ◼   ► They can pretty much--

01:28:04 ◼   ► - Well, when the Apple came out, it was still GCC,

01:28:07 ◼   ► but yeah, but I think the 64-bit transition

01:28:10 ◼   ► is a perfect example of where it just got

01:28:13 ◼   ► way easier for them, and in all future changes

01:28:16 ◼   ► will be much easier.

01:28:17 ◼   ► - Yeah, like they can go to something in the future

01:28:20 ◼   ► that's not there yet, and it'll be easier.

01:28:22 ◼   ► They can, you know, anyway.

01:28:25 ◼   ► Is it a problem, is it a bad sign

01:28:27 ◼   ► that Latner has left for Tesla?

01:28:29 ◼   ► - I mean, Latner himself, it's really hard

01:28:32 ◼   ► to take too much out of it.

01:28:34 ◼   ► I mean, the guy, he was on the ATP podcast,

01:28:38 ◼   ► which was, Accidental Tech podcast, which was great.

01:28:42 ◼   ► - Absolutely. - And--

01:28:43 ◼   ► - Terrific.

01:28:44 ◼   ► I've linked to it, and I'll just say,

01:28:46 ◼   ► I mean, if you haven't listened to it, it was terrific.

01:28:50 ◼   ► And for a show where they almost never have guests,

01:28:54 ◼   ► - He's really the idealized ATP guest.

01:29:00 ◼   ► - Yeah, the three of them did a great job.

01:29:02 ◼   ► as hosts of an outside guest.

01:29:06 ◼   ► Good questions, kept the conversation going,

01:29:07 ◼   ► covered just about everything I hoped that they would cover.

01:29:10 ◼   ► It was really, really a terrific show.

01:29:12 ◼   ► - Yeah, and what you really get from him,

01:29:15 ◼   ► and if you look at his career, you can see this.

01:29:16 ◼   ► I mean, the guys developed LLVM as a graduate student,

01:29:20 ◼   ► and then Apple gave him the opportunity

01:29:23 ◼   ► to care to completion.

01:29:24 ◼   ► He did C Lang, or Clang, is it C Lang or Clang?

01:29:26 ◼   ► - Clang.

01:29:29 ◼   ► - Yeah, I say Clang.

01:29:31 ◼   ► I mean, he initiated that and carried it to completion.

01:29:33 ◼   ► He initiated Swift basically on his own.

01:29:36 ◼   ► Like this is a guy that likes to take on

01:29:39 ◼   ► hard and difficult problems from first principles

01:29:43 ◼   ► and figure them out.

01:29:44 ◼   ► And right now the core,

01:29:47 ◼   ► like Apple's sort of development stack

01:29:49 ◼   ► is set for the next 20 years, basically.

01:29:52 ◼   ► I mean, there's lots of work to do on Swift.

01:29:55 ◼   ► It's not finished,

01:29:56 ◼   ► but like the conceptual portion of Swift is finished, right?

01:30:00 ◼   ► Now it's like problem solving and implementation by and large.

01:30:05 ◼   ► And I can totally see for a guy like this, what's left?

01:30:09 ◼   ► He's built out the Apple's entire developer stack

01:30:13 ◼   ► from literally from top to bottom, and what's left for him?

01:30:17 ◼   ► And you have this opportunity with Tesla.

01:30:22 ◼   ► Who knows what he's going to do?

01:30:27 ◼   ► Tesla is built currently on an NVIDIA stack,

01:30:26 ◼   ► where NVIDIA has this setup where you can basically use their GPUs for general processing.

01:30:31 ◼   ► And it's built on LLVM.

01:30:37 ◼   ► NVIDIA has their own implementation of it.

01:30:39 ◼   ► It's called NMVM or something like that.

01:30:41 ◼   ► And Tesla also hired one of Apple's original A-chip designers last year.

01:30:44 ◼   ► And you got to imagine they might be coming up with something totally custom

01:30:49 ◼   ► and integrated on both sides.

01:30:53 ◼   ► I don't know, it's fun to speculate,

01:30:52 ◼   ► But I can totally see why someone like Latner,

01:30:55 ◼   ► who has a remarkable history of solving

01:31:00 ◼   ► really hard problems from first principles,

01:31:02 ◼   ► just wouldn't have anything left for him at Apple.

01:31:05 ◼   ► And there is something at Tesla.

01:31:08 ◼   ► He's the guy, the guy's not voted by money.

01:31:11 ◼   ► I'm sure Apple's made him rich

01:31:13 ◼   ► beyond his wildest dreams, without question.

01:31:15 ◼   ► You know, it's something deeper than that.

01:31:18 ◼   ► - Yeah, and at a certain level,

01:31:19 ◼   ► if he's just looking after his career in terms of

01:31:24 ◼   ► if he's at Apple and he's in software,

01:31:28 ◼   ► just in general, let alone the toolkit or whatever,

01:31:30 ◼   ► I mean, there's already Craig Federighi at the SVP spot.

01:31:38 ◼   ► You know what I mean?

01:31:39 ◼   ► There's nowhere up for him to go at Apple.

01:31:41 ◼   ► Whereas, effectively, I think he's now

01:31:43 ◼   ► the Craig Federighi at Tesla.

01:31:45 ◼   ► He is the head of software at Tesla.

01:31:47 ◼   ► So there's a company where there's an opening for a,

01:31:51 ◼   ► reports directly to the CEO head of software,

01:31:55 ◼   ► whereas at Apple that position is not open

01:31:58 ◼   ► and probably is not going to be open anytime soon.

01:32:01 ◼   ► - One thing that is interesting is,

01:32:04 ◼   ► speaking of reporting to the CEO,

01:32:05 ◼   ► is at least a few of the guys that have left,

01:32:08 ◼   ► the high profile ones,

01:32:09 ◼   ► were ones who did work with Steve Jobs.

01:32:12 ◼   ► And it's almost like they're,

01:32:16 ◼   ► you can get the sense that they kind of miss the fire,

01:32:21 ◼   ► for lack of a better word.

01:32:23 ◼   ► You know, like it was brutal,

01:32:24 ◼   ► but it was brutal in a very energizing sort of way,

01:32:29 ◼   ► which you're certainly gonna get, I think,

01:32:32 ◼   ► with Elon Musk.

01:32:34 ◼   ► I mean, there's a reason people compare the two.

01:32:37 ◼   ► - Yeah, like one of the, this isn't a new poaching.

01:32:44 ◼   ► poaching, but Boss Ording, I hope I'm pronouncing his first name right, but he left Apple in 2014, and as of March 2015, he was designing user interfaces at Tesla.

01:33:01 ◼   ► And I linked to this the other day, but he--

01:33:04 ◼   ► this was before he went to Tesla, but after he left Apple.

01:33:09 ◼   ► And he said why he left was, one,

01:33:13 ◼   ► because he was spending a lot of time in court defending patents,

01:33:18 ◼   ► because his name was listed on these patents,

01:33:20 ◼   ► and they're suing HTC and Samsung, et cetera.

01:33:24 ◼   ► And it's not complicated.

01:33:27 ◼   ► I mean, he wanted to be designing user interfaces.

01:33:29 ◼   ► He did not want to be putting on a suit and tie and showing up in court and answering lawyers stupid questions about

01:33:35 ◼   ► interfaces

01:33:37 ◼   ► And any other thing he said was I spent more time in court than designing aside from that

01:33:41 ◼   ► I missed the interaction with Steve Jobs. We discussed matters every 14 days

01:33:45 ◼   ► Yeah

01:33:48 ◼   ► yeah, I mean, you know I

01:33:50 ◼   ► the reality is and

01:33:53 ◼   ► You know, I for all the great things that Apple has accomplished, you know

01:33:59 ◼   ► I tend to be a bit of a fatalist about things.

01:34:02 ◼   ► I mean, companies like people have life cycles.

01:34:06 ◼   ► I mean, Apple came roaring back from the dead.

01:34:09 ◼   ► They did the iPod, which really juiced the company.

01:34:12 ◼   ► That led directly to the iPhone.

01:34:14 ◼   ► The iPhone led directly to the iPad,

01:34:16 ◼   ► and the Mac came along for the ride,

01:34:18 ◼   ► but I mean, there was a very natural progression

01:34:22 ◼   ► for Apple to reach the heights it made now.

01:34:24 ◼   ► I mean, to be clear, what's happened is extraordinary,

01:34:26 ◼   ► and Apple deserves all the praise

01:34:27 ◼   ► and all their credit for what they've done.

01:34:30 ◼   ► But if you look back at the broad history of business

01:34:34 ◼   ► in all sectors or whatever,

01:34:35 ◼   ► the reality is to presume that Apple is going to

01:34:40 ◼   ► make the next world-changing product

01:34:42 ◼   ► for all the great products they made,

01:34:45 ◼   ► and I'm not telling that at all,

01:34:47 ◼   ► that really is to challenge all of history.

01:34:50 ◼   ► And it's not an issue of,

01:34:51 ◼   ► you don't make products

01:34:53 ◼   ► because you really want to make products.

01:34:55 ◼   ► Apple's filled with humans just like every other company.

01:34:59 ◼   ► And what goes into making great products is great people,

01:35:02 ◼   ► it is great culture, but it's also,

01:35:04 ◼   ► there's a hunger, there's a need,

01:35:07 ◼   ► there's a market opportunity,

01:35:08 ◼   ► and you're forming your company around that opportunity.

01:35:12 ◼   ► The fact of the matter is that Apple has a product

01:35:15 ◼   ► that makes up 70 to 80% of its profits.

01:35:18 ◼   ► It's the most profitable product in the history of ever.

01:35:21 ◼   ► And it's just impossible to form the company-wide incentives that are necessary to drive a startup

01:35:29 ◼   ► or to drive a Tesla, to drive any number of these other companies.

01:35:33 ◼   ► And that's not a function of Apple being a bad company or executives being bad executives

01:35:37 ◼   ► or people being bad people.

01:35:42 ◼   ► It's a fact of life.