Cortex

00:00:00 ◼   ► I'm recording now.

00:00:00 ◼   ► I've got the little bounce cage for my microphone

00:00:03 ◼   ► or whatever it's called.

00:00:04 ◼   ► - You got one?

00:00:05 ◼   ► - Yeah, you told me to get one, Myke.

00:00:07 ◼   ► - Yeah, but I didn't think you were actually gonna do it.

00:00:09 ◼   ► - Myke, do you think I was gonna just ignore

00:00:12 ◼   ► your equipment suggestions?

00:00:14 ◼   ► - Yes, I did. - That's not the kind of thing

00:00:15 ◼   ► that I would do. - Well, all right.

00:00:16 ◼   ► Do you have a boom on?

00:00:17 ◼   ► Do you have a boom on? - I have a standing desk,

00:00:19 ◼   ► and I can-- - I don't know what,

00:00:21 ◼   ► like what, what?

00:00:23 ◼   ► They're not the same.

00:00:24 ◼   ► - I think that they're functionally the same,

00:00:28 ◼   ► And now that I have the little bounce cage with the rubber bands and whatever,

00:00:31 ◼   ► I should be able to just like, bop it up, bop, bop, tap the desk.

00:00:35 ◼   ► Can you just actually, I want to just not just hit the desk for me.

00:00:38 ◼   ► Okay.

00:00:39 ◼   ► Oh, that's amazing.

00:00:41 ◼   ► Okay.

00:00:42 ◼   ► Is that, that what you needed?

00:00:43 ◼   ► Cause now all I hear is just the sound of the hitting of the desk.

00:00:46 ◼   ► Okay.

00:00:47 ◼   ► Right.

00:00:47 ◼   ► Which is what you want to hear.

00:00:48 ◼   ► Like when I hit my desk, you just hear the sound of me hitting the desk.

00:00:52 ◼   ► Whilst I still think you need a boom arm just for like general comfort,

00:00:56 ◼   ► is much better for your posture because you don't have to move to the microphone.

00:01:00 ◼   ► Yeah, I don't have to move to the microphone.

00:01:01 ◼   ► But that's on you.

00:01:02 ◼   ► Like, I'm just trying to help you out in your life by suggesting that.

00:01:06 ◼   ► What I want in my life, you have now given me, which is the...

00:01:10 ◼   ► I don't know why you call it a roll cage.

00:01:12 ◼   ► That's why I couldn't...

00:01:13 ◼   ► I had no idea what you were talking about.

00:01:14 ◼   ► It's a shock mount.

00:01:15 ◼   ► Mounts to shocks, remember?

00:01:16 ◼   ► Oh, it's a shock mount.

00:01:18 ◼   ► I guarantee you I did not call it a roll cage.

00:01:20 ◼   ► I thought it was like the rubber band thing.

00:01:23 ◼   ► Whatever.

00:01:24 ◼   ► The rubber band cage.

00:01:25 ◼   ► Okay, yeah, that was definitely what you called it.

00:01:28 ◼   ► But anyway, levels, levels?

00:01:30 ◼   ► Yeah, levels, levels.

00:01:32 ◼   ► Levels, levels.

00:01:33 ◼   ► We're all good to go and I'm sure this little rubber band cage makes all the difference in the audio.

00:01:38 ◼   ► So we're good. Let me just get the desk to exactly the right height.

00:01:42 ◼   ► Exactly the right height.

00:01:44 ◼   ► Okay, there we go. Now we're comfortable.

00:01:47 ◼   ► Great.

00:01:48 ◼   ► I am so busy. I have so much going on right now. I genuinely, Gray, cannot remember a time in recent years where I have felt as tired as I feel right now.

00:01:59 ◼   ► It's all good though. So like I have a bunch of very exciting things to talk to you about today.

00:02:04 ◼   ► But like, I am so tired. So we were originally meant to record this episode yesterday.

00:02:10 ◼   ► Right, but yesterday was already a delay from the other time.

00:02:14 ◼   ► Yeah, this is one of the classics in that I think we have actually genuinely rescheduled this episode three times.

00:02:21 ◼   ► This is the fourth date of recording for this very wonderful episode.

00:02:26 ◼   ► I'm pleased though, because so much has happened in this last month,

00:02:29 ◼   ► I'm happy that we can now wrap up this month with all the things I want to tell you about.

00:02:34 ◼   ► But we were supposed to record yesterday, and I basically spent the entire day yesterday

00:02:39 ◼   ► struggling to just move.

00:02:41 ◼   ► I was so tired, like I can't remember a time in recent years where I have been so tired

00:02:48 ◼   ► that like I lacked the energy to really be able to stand up.

00:02:52 ◼   ► It was a very different day.

00:02:53 ◼   ► So I ended up turning yesterday into, well, I would say my wife Idina coaxed me into turning

00:02:58 ◼   ► yesterday into a day of relaxation.

00:03:00 ◼   ► Okay, that's good to do.

00:03:02 ◼   ► Which is not something that I'm very good at doing anymore.

00:03:05 ◼   ► So that was very nice, we watched a bunch of movies, we had a great dinner.

00:03:09 ◼   ► But that was because we have had an incredibly busy week.

00:03:14 ◼   ► But I'll talk about why a little bit later on in the episode.

00:03:16 ◼   ► Because there is something maybe more important happening right now, which is that floating

00:03:19 ◼   ► time zones is then to come to the OmniFocus beta.

00:03:22 ◼   ► So your floating time zone support that you want so dearly is in the current beta release

00:03:28 ◼   ► of OmniFocus.

00:03:30 ◼   ► I wanted to know two things.

00:03:32 ◼   ► One, are you on the OmniFocus beta and have you used it?

00:03:35 ◼   ► And two, how excited are you?

00:03:38 ◼   ► When you feel like a thing has come close many times and has been promised many times,

00:03:44 ◼   ► you can start to feel a little reserved even when it looks like the actual promise is really

00:03:49 ◼   ► going to be fulfilled.

00:03:50 ◼   ► Like they have publicly announced it, it's like release notes?

00:03:53 ◼   ► I'm looking at the release notes?

00:03:54 ◼   ► No, I get it.

00:03:55 ◼   ► I get it.

00:03:56 ◼   ► I get it.

00:03:57 ◼   ► I remember, I think it was mentioned twice in the OmniFocus 2020 roadmap article that

00:04:03 ◼   ► I always read that they publish.

00:04:04 ◼   ► I'm like, "What's going on?

00:04:05 ◼   ► Tell me what's happening."

00:04:06 ◼   ► happening and I saw like, oh time zones were mentioned twice. So like, yes, I'm excited,

00:04:11 ◼   ► but I will not be able to fully relax until it is in the actual shipping release. So have you

00:04:20 ◼   ► tried it? Are you on the beta version? No, I'm not on the beta version. Yeah. And let me tell you,

00:04:27 ◼   ► I could really have used it this month because like you, I have had a month like I haven't had

00:04:32 ◼   ► in years. Hence the three schedule changes. Yes, hence, like, for both of us, it is a small

00:04:41 ◼   ► miracle from the Cortex gods that we are able to record this episode at all. And I have had

00:04:47 ◼   ► a surprising number of long-haul, last-minute long-haul flights in my life this month,

00:04:52 ◼   ► and I could really have used floating time zones. I saw that it was in the beta, but I made the

00:05:00 ◼   ► the conscious decision of, okay, look, this is a month

00:05:05 ◼   ► where lots of stuff is really happening

00:05:08 ◼   ► and this is not the time to run a beta,

00:05:11 ◼   ► even if it's for a feature that you have been hoping for

00:05:15 ◼   ► for literally a decade at this point.

00:05:17 ◼   ► - Oh, especially because in the release notes,

00:05:20 ◼   ► the bullet begins, once your database has been migrated,

00:05:24 ◼   ► - Right, yeah, no, no, no, no, no.

00:05:27 ◼   ► - No thanks.

00:05:28 ◼   ► Like, I'll do it, you know, when it's shipped.

00:05:30 ◼   ► Like, I'm fine, you know, leave it a couple of days,

00:05:33 ◼   ► make sure everything's good.

00:05:34 ◼   ► But like, obviously this is exactly as we expected

00:05:37 ◼   ► as to why it's taken them so long to do this.

00:05:39 ◼   ► They had to change significant things under the hood.

00:05:41 ◼   ► Like, they had to create a new version

00:05:43 ◼   ► of their database system.

00:05:45 ◼   ► And this also ties into OmniFocus for the web.

00:05:48 ◼   ► You have to migrate your database for that.

00:05:50 ◼   ► And I think these two things have come together

00:05:52 ◼   ► at the same time.

00:05:54 ◼   ► - Yeah, I get the impression that that's part

00:05:57 ◼   ► of what's occurring is just like, yeah,

00:05:59 ◼   ► there's a lot of under the hood stuff

00:06:00 ◼   ► for OmniFocus on the web,

00:06:02 ◼   ► so that there can be OmniFocus everywhere,

00:06:04 ◼   ► even for people who don't have Macs or iPhones

00:06:07 ◼   ► and that kind of stuff.

00:06:08 ◼   ► That's a huge transition under the hood,

00:06:10 ◼   ► but that is also why I wasn't gonna run the beta software.

00:06:14 ◼   ► I didn't even, for this crazy month that I've had,

00:06:17 ◼   ► I wasn't even willing to risk my usual trick of like,

00:06:20 ◼   ► oh, I'll just manually copy paste my entire OmniFocus data

00:06:23 ◼   ► into task paper and then put my device into airplane mode,

00:06:27 ◼   ► change the time zone and then like paste it back in

00:06:31 ◼   ► so that everything is in the current time zone.

00:06:33 ◼   ► I thought, you know what?

00:06:34 ◼   ► This is not the time to risk it.

00:06:36 ◼   ► I'm just gonna deal with manually moving 20 items,

00:06:40 ◼   ► you know, five hours this way and then five hours back

00:06:42 ◼   ► and then three hours forward and three hours back.

00:06:45 ◼   ► 'Cause I just thought like,

00:06:46 ◼   ► I can't have something else go wrong this month.

00:06:49 ◼   ► But I am very excited for the actual full release

00:06:53 ◼   ► of time zones.

00:06:55 ◼   ► It's like my number one feature for a long time

00:06:58 ◼   ► and I'm super pumped that it's in the beta.

00:07:01 ◼   ► So thank you OmniFocus development team

00:07:03 ◼   ► for having it in the beta.

00:07:05 ◼   ► I look forward to it in the final release.

00:07:09 ◼   ► - When did you first ask?

00:07:12 ◼   ► Like I'm not putting them on blast here,

00:07:14 ◼   ► but just 'cause it's-- - No, no, no.

00:07:15 ◼   ► Well, someone should search it

00:07:18 ◼   ► because I don't know when I first mentioned it on Cortex,

00:07:21 ◼   ► But when I did mention it on Cortex, there's a forum post that's reporting it as a bug

00:07:26 ◼   ► that I swear is from 2011 or 2012 or something that you can search for.

00:07:32 ◼   ► The first instance of, "Hey, I flew from New York to California and now all my timings

00:07:38 ◼   ► are wrong.

00:07:39 ◼   ► I would like to file this as a bug."

00:07:40 ◼   ► They're like, "Yes, we'll put it on the list."

00:07:42 ◼   ► Like, "Oh, okay."

00:07:44 ◼   ► Whatever, now is the only thing that's real and time zones and OmniFocus are coming soon.

00:07:51 ◼   ► So great, the past is irrelevant.

00:07:53 ◼   ► I have bought more keyboards and more...

00:07:56 ◼   ► Jesus Christ, Myke.

00:07:57 ◼   ► Look!

00:07:58 ◼   ► No, wait, no, no, wait.

00:07:59 ◼   ► Stop right now, okay?

00:08:01 ◼   ► What do you mean?

00:08:02 ◼   ► No, stop, okay.

00:08:04 ◼   ► Three episodes ago was mechanical keyboards.

00:08:07 ◼   ► Never heard of them.

00:08:08 ◼   ► Last episode was mechanical keyboards.

00:08:11 ◼   ► Lots of them.

00:08:12 ◼   ► And now you're telling me mechanical keyboards more than any mortal man should have.

00:08:18 ◼   ► So look, I know you probably just want to run through some beautiful mechanical keyboards

00:08:24 ◼   ► that you have found, but I would like, what is the total number of mechanical keyboards

00:08:30 ◼   ► you either have in your physical possession now or are in a current pending order status?

00:08:38 ◼   ► What are we looking at here, Myke?

00:08:40 ◼   ► The total including pending is four keyboards.

00:08:45 ◼   ► - Okay, that's not too bad.

00:08:47 ◼   ► - No. - That's not too bad.

00:08:49 ◼   ► - No, I have four.

00:08:50 ◼   ► So I have three now.

00:08:52 ◼   ► - Okay. - And I have one

00:08:53 ◼   ► Kickstarter campaign that I backed.

00:08:55 ◼   ► And that's everything. - Okay.

00:08:57 ◼   ► - In regards to keyboards.

00:08:59 ◼   ► - Okay, but see, the way you say that, right?

00:09:02 ◼   ► - In regards to the boards of the key.

00:09:05 ◼   ► (laughing)

00:09:08 ◼   ► Okay, but like what?

00:09:10 ◼   ► Do you have a full collection of 3D Pokemon keycaps?

00:09:15 ◼   ► - They're still on the way.

00:09:16 ◼   ► I'm hoping that they will arrive soon.

00:09:18 ◼   ► They're still on the way.

00:09:20 ◼   ► But I have ordered my first sets of keycaps.

00:09:23 ◼   ► - Okay. - Replacement keycaps.

00:09:25 ◼   ► So I ordered two and I have one that is a group by.

00:09:30 ◼   ► But first I wanna talk about the new keyboard that I have.

00:09:34 ◼   ► - What's a group by? - We'll get to that.

00:09:36 ◼   ► - Oh, okay. - We'll get to that.

00:09:36 ◼   ► - Can I click on these links now?

00:09:38 ◼   ► I don't know if I'm allowed to click on links anymore since you got that last time.

00:09:41 ◼   ► Yeah, you're allowed.

00:09:42 ◼   ► So the first link you can click on now.

00:09:44 ◼   ► Number of cortexes.

00:09:47 ◼   ► After the last episode where I spoke about how I really liked the Ergadex keyboard, that

00:09:51 ◼   ► was one that split in half.

00:09:53 ◼   ► But I said I didn't like the fact that so many keys weren't printed, right, because

00:09:56 ◼   ► it was confusing to me.

00:09:58 ◼   ► Many people suggested this keyboard called the Dygma Raise.

00:10:02 ◼   ► I assume it's Dygma.

00:10:04 ◼   ► D-Y-G-M-A?

00:10:05 ◼   ► Yeah, let's run with that.

00:10:06 ◼   ► Dygma.

00:10:07 ◼   ► with Dygma and this keyboard basically has the main features that I was looking for right?

00:10:13 ◼   ► Like it is a split keyboard, mechanical keys, with a built in wrist rest which I prefer

00:10:18 ◼   ► to the Ergadex which has like a separate wrist rest.

00:10:21 ◼   ► It has RGB and some level of customisation but all of the important keys are print on

00:10:28 ◼   ► them.

00:10:29 ◼   ► This keyboard has four keys at the bottom, kind of the space bar that's split in half

00:10:33 ◼   ► and then two keys below that just have dots on them that can be programmed.

00:10:37 ◼   ► But what I've done is, so I've got the two kind of spacebar keys, are spacebars, right?

00:10:42 ◼   ► And then I've configured the keys at the bottom to just be up, down, left, and right.

00:10:47 ◼   ► There's the arrow keys.

00:10:47 ◼   ► That's it.

00:10:49 ◼   ► If I want to, I can do this whole thing where I press a key and then all of your

00:10:53 ◼   ► keys become other keys, but you don't know what they are, right?

00:10:56 ◼   ► Like it's just like, okay, you know, it's like you have infinite keys,

00:11:00 ◼   ► but you have to remember what they all are.

00:11:02 ◼   ► Like I'm not into that because I just don't remember, but this is exactly what I want.

00:11:06 ◼   ► The RGB is amazing, including that it has like an underglow as well as each key.

00:11:12 ◼   ► So like there's an RGB strip that runs around the actual frame of the keyboard,

00:11:17 ◼   ► so it puts the color on the desk as well as keys.

00:11:20 ◼   ► Again, for the listeners who don't know what Myke means when he keeps saying RGB,

00:11:24 ◼   ► it's like he wants his keyboard to light up like a rainbow.

00:11:28 ◼   ► This one lights up both under the keys and what looks like under the physical keyboard,

00:11:34 ◼   ► a bit like if it was a spaceship landing on your desk.

00:11:37 ◼   ► So good.

00:11:38 ◼   ► Plus what I like about this keyboard is that it actually fits together and then you can

00:11:42 ◼   ► decouple it to make it into the split.

00:11:44 ◼   ► So I can have one half for each hand and I can address it however I want.

00:11:49 ◼   ► I really like that and it uses USB-C to do that instead of the weird cable that the Ergadex

00:11:55 ◼   ► uses, which is like a headphone cable.

00:11:57 ◼   ► Oh, interesting.

00:11:59 ◼   ► And then it has a little USB-C splitter, which also has RGB in it.

00:12:04 ◼   ► Oh, okay.

00:12:05 ◼   ► Right, yes.

00:12:06 ◼   ► You don't have to have RGB, by the way, it's an option.

00:12:10 ◼   ► But I'm just happy that I do have it, you know?

00:12:13 ◼   ► I also have it to do it in black and silver, and the silver has white keys and a white

00:12:17 ◼   ► wrist rest, and that's the one that I bought, and I love it.

00:12:21 ◼   ► I think this might be it, Greg.

00:12:22 ◼   ► I think I've found like, I'm sure that I will,

00:12:25 ◼   ► many more keyboards will come by my path,

00:12:28 ◼   ► but I think this is gonna be the one

00:12:29 ◼   ► that I will be using the most of the time.

00:12:32 ◼   ► Like I've only had it for a couple of days,

00:12:34 ◼   ► so I haven't been able to put it through full testing,

00:12:36 ◼   ► but I think this will not only be the keyboard

00:12:40 ◼   ► that I wanna use with my iPad,

00:12:41 ◼   ► but there is a possibility that I may replace the keyboard

00:12:44 ◼   ► on my iMac with one of these,

00:12:45 ◼   ► 'cause it really is like everything

00:12:48 ◼   ► that I was looking for in a keyboard.

00:12:50 ◼   ► So I'm genuinely really happy with it.

00:12:52 ◼   ► Like I feel like I've found

00:12:54 ◼   ► the at least like the base usable keyboard for me.

00:12:57 ◼   ► - You don't have it physically with you, right?

00:12:59 ◼   ► 'Cause this is still just a pre-order.

00:13:00 ◼   ► - No, no, this one I have, I have it.

00:13:02 ◼   ► It came like two days ago.

00:13:04 ◼   ► - Okay, can you confirm for me then?

00:13:05 ◼   ► It looks like those wrist rests are not removable.

00:13:08 ◼   ► Like you can't take them off, right?

00:13:10 ◼   ► It looks like it's one single piece.

00:13:12 ◼   ► - It has like a metal piece that runs down

00:13:14 ◼   ► and then you can add on a like rubber part on top of it.

00:13:18 ◼   ► - But that metal piece that the rubber part is on top of.

00:13:20 ◼   ► - That's part of the keyboard, yeah.

00:13:22 ◼   ► - Right, that's part of the keyboard.

00:13:23 ◼   ► - Yes, if you don't like wrist rests,

00:13:24 ◼   ► then you won't like this keyboard 'cause you can't.

00:13:27 ◼   ► At least I don't believe right now,

00:13:29 ◼   ► like they have an option where you can have that or not.

00:13:32 ◼   ► - Hmm, okay.

00:13:34 ◼   ► What I do have my eye out for is,

00:13:36 ◼   ► while I love my mechanical keyboard,

00:13:38 ◼   ► I would really like to use a split keyboard like this.

00:13:42 ◼   ► Like I do think that's better in the long run,

00:13:44 ◼   ► but I don't love the wires,

00:13:48 ◼   ► But if it's going to be wires, like, okay, has to be USB-C.

00:13:51 ◼   ► I'm on a real USB-C crusade over here.

00:13:53 ◼   ► Yeah, me too.

00:13:54 ◼   ► And I don't love those wrist rests taking up a lot of space.

00:13:57 ◼   ► Like, I kind of have my eye out for, oh, I want something that I can have in my backpack and use with my iPad.

00:14:04 ◼   ► Oh, I was going to say, like, what's wrong with the wrist rest?

00:14:07 ◼   ► Your wrist will go there, but if you're putting it in a backpack, now I get it.

00:14:10 ◼   ► This one does ship with, surprising to me, a really, this is not useful for you, but I just thought it was nice,

00:14:14 ◼   ► a really lovely carrying case.

00:14:16 ◼   ► That's a nice touch. They didn't need to do that.

00:14:18 ◼   ► No, they didn't. I wasn't expecting it.

00:14:20 ◼   ► But like they're on their page.

00:14:21 ◼   ► They talk about esports a lot.

00:14:23 ◼   ► So maybe this is what you want in esports, right?

00:14:25 ◼   ► You're going from esports to esports.

00:14:26 ◼   ► You want a little case for your keyboard.

00:14:29 ◼   ► I believe that's the lingo.

00:14:30 ◼   ► You're going from esports to esports.

00:14:32 ◼   ► Yeah, of course.

00:14:32 ◼   ► Just different esports, you know, you go into all the esports.

00:14:35 ◼   ► So maybe you want a case for that.

00:14:37 ◼   ► But to me, as just a general customer, I was like, well, that's nice.

00:14:41 ◼   ► Just this just feels I'm genuinely like super thrilled with this one.

00:14:45 ◼   ► I feel like I've got to the point where it's like this is exactly what I was looking for

00:14:50 ◼   ► in this type of keyboard. I still feel like I want a regular keyboard as well, and I think

00:14:55 ◼   ► I've found the one there which is the – I think I mentioned this last time – the Keychron

00:14:59 ◼   ► one that I backed on Kickstarter.

00:15:01 ◼   ► Yes, yes.

00:15:02 ◼   ► Yeah. So that will probably come sometime within the next seven years because it was

00:15:07 ◼   ► a Kickstarter project. So, you know.

00:15:09 ◼   ► And as we know full well, when you are manufacturing something, there can be delays at any moment.

00:15:19 ◼   ► I have so much more sympathy for delayed Kickstarter projects than I did a year and a half ago.

00:15:25 ◼   ► Oh yeah, it's just like, however, you can just delay as long as you need.

00:15:29 ◼   ► I'll be there to support you.

00:15:31 ◼   ► Yeah, take your time guys, I understand.

00:15:34 ◼   ► But yeah, I really like this one.

00:15:36 ◼   ► But then I also bought some keycaps, some replacement keycaps.

00:15:39 ◼   ► So I've put two sets, two sets that I now own.

00:15:42 ◼   ► One of them, the dummy key, which is all greys and orange.

00:15:45 ◼   ► Okay.

00:15:46 ◼   ► And that looks amazing.

00:15:47 ◼   ► I put that on my WASD keyboard.

00:15:51 ◼   ► So I took off the wild colors that I have and put that on instead and it looks really

00:15:55 ◼   ► good.

00:15:56 ◼   ► And then I also bought a set which has Japanese characters on as well as English characters

00:16:02 ◼   ► because I thought it looked really cool.

00:16:04 ◼   ► But I don't have a keyboard to put this on yet.

00:16:07 ◼   ► Okay.

00:16:08 ◼   ► I don't quite understand your label philosophy on keycaps here, right?

00:16:13 ◼   ► Where you're like, "Oh, modifier keys that change the usage of keys. That's ridiculous.

00:16:19 ◼   ► Japanese characters alongside my other letters."

00:16:22 ◼   ► Right, but they have the age letters on them.

00:16:24 ◼   ► Yeah, but it's just clutter.

00:16:25 ◼   ► It's just clutter.

00:16:25 ◼   ► But it looks like, it's just like visually pleasing to me.

00:16:29 ◼   ► Mm-hmm.

00:16:31 ◼   ► I mean, you are a bit of a Japanophile, so maybe I have to let that slide,

00:16:34 ◼   ► but it's not visually pleasing.

00:16:36 ◼   ► I know where the letters and numbers are on my keyboard.

00:16:39 ◼   ► Right.

00:16:40 ◼   ► Right?

00:16:41 ◼   ► They're not the problem.

00:16:42 ◼   ► It's the blank modifier keys in random arrangements that's the problem, right?

00:16:46 ◼   ► Like that's the issue with the Ergadex.

00:16:47 ◼   ► It isn't just that they're blank.

00:16:49 ◼   ► They're like different shapes and in places where keys usually aren't.

00:16:53 ◼   ► And if like you can memorize that, that's great.

00:16:57 ◼   ► Or you can't.

00:16:58 ◼   ► Lots of companies make replacement key caps for the Ergadex.

00:17:01 ◼   ► Right?

00:17:02 ◼   ► So you can like order ones and put them in.

00:17:04 ◼   ► and I just hadn't done that yet because I wasn't completely sold on this keyboard.

00:17:10 ◼   ► And I think really, as soon as somebody sent me a link to the Digma arrays, I was like,

00:17:14 ◼   ► "That's what I want."

00:17:16 ◼   ► That is much more aesthetically pleasing to me, where the Ergadex, for all of its benefits,

00:17:23 ◼   ► kind of just looks like generic PC keyboard just cutting off.

00:17:26 ◼   ► It's like big, thick, black, and chunky.

00:17:30 ◼   ► the Dygma has got more of a style to it that I like. It's just kind of cooler looking,

00:17:35 ◼   ► which I do want as well. I want it to look cool as well as be functional.

00:17:40 ◼   ► I enjoy that this set of Japanese keycaps is trying to play both sides of the computer

00:17:45 ◼   ► field with their super key. Is it a Windows key or is it a command key? No, it's the

00:17:52 ◼   ► super key! I haven't heard that before, but I like that.

00:17:58 ◼   ► companies will ship you Windows or Mac keys. And this one does come with a bunch of extras like

00:18:05 ◼   ► this, but I actually quite liked Super as the key. It was kind of fun.

00:18:09 ◼   ► Yeah, it's a funny name for the key and it also immediately makes sense. Like,

00:18:14 ◼   ► "Oh, it's the Super key." Yeah, of course, that's the command or it's the Windows key.

00:18:18 ◼   ► I can just imagine them sitting down in a meeting going, "Do we really have to print a little

00:18:22 ◼   ► command symbol and a little Windows symbol? What can we do here, guys?" And a little penguin? I

00:18:27 ◼   ► I don't know what Linux does these days.

00:18:29 ◼   ► - Oh, you know, if you go to the next one,

00:18:30 ◼   ► so the one underneath, the GMK Future Funk,

00:18:33 ◼   ► which is the other keycap set that I bought,

00:18:35 ◼   ► that also has Super, so seems like it must just be

00:18:38 ◼   ► pretty normal in the keycap world.

00:18:41 ◼   ► So this was, I said group by, this is a group by.

00:18:44 ◼   ► A group by is when somebody has an idea for a design

00:18:48 ◼   ► and they wanna make it, but they need to know

00:18:51 ◼   ► how many people wanna buy it, so they put up the page

00:18:54 ◼   ► and people buy it, and then it gets made

00:18:56 ◼   ► and shipped to you like this one.

00:18:58 ◼   ► I bought it like a couple of weeks ago

00:19:00 ◼   ► and I might get it in October.

00:19:02 ◼   ► This is like a thing that happens in the keycap world a lot

00:19:05 ◼   ► 'cause it's just like people who have designs

00:19:06 ◼   ► and they put these designs on websites and you buy it

00:19:09 ◼   ► and then you'll get it at some point in the future.

00:19:12 ◼   ► So this is the first one of these that I've done.

00:19:14 ◼   ► - So it was like a Kickstarter,

00:19:16 ◼   ► but you already know that you can make the thing.

00:19:18 ◼   ► It's just, it's just a design, right?

00:19:20 ◼   ► Let's do like a pre-order for a design.

00:19:22 ◼   ► - Yeah, but they're like,

00:19:23 ◼   ► they typically are very long lead times.

00:19:26 ◼   ► on these things. I just saw this one, it's like lots of purples and yellows and pinks.

00:19:31 ◼   ► I just really love the look of the keys, so I've bought this set as well.

00:19:36 ◼   ► That's very exciting. That's very exciting for you.

00:19:39 ◼   ► Yeah, you know, what I need is more expensive hobbies, like there's clearly one I need.

00:19:46 ◼   ► So here I am. But this really does like, it speaks to that exact part of me that enjoys

00:19:52 ◼   ► collecting things.

00:19:54 ◼   ► You know?

00:19:56 ◼   ► Yeah, no, you gotta catch all the Pokemon keycaps.

00:19:58 ◼   ► Yeah, that's the thing that you need to do.

00:20:00 ◼   ► You need all the Japanese characters on your keyboard, otherwise

00:20:04 ◼   ► you're just incomplete.

00:20:06 ◼   ► That's gonna be a really nice looking keyboard, right?

00:20:09 ◼   ► Like when I find one to put the Japanese characters on, that's just gonna be nice office dressing.

00:20:14 ◼   ► It is. It's gonna look lovely.

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00:22:00 ◼   ► The thing I was thinking about with the mechanical keyboard about, oh,

00:22:04 ◼   ► one to put in my backpack, is because I've been using the regular like Apple Magic

00:22:09 ◼   ► keyboard as just like a keyboard to have with me.

00:22:11 ◼   ► It's a good backpack keyboard because it's so thin.

00:22:14 ◼   ► When you're traveling with a MacBook, it doesn't hurt to have a spare keyboard with you just in case when you're traveling.

00:22:20 ◼   ► Which is not the least bit just because it's nice to be able to type at a different level from the screen like when you're on an airplane and all that kind of stuff.

00:22:27 ◼   ► But what I also tried at your suggestion, which is a truly mind-bending experience the first time you do it,

00:22:36 ◼   ► is I connected my trackball mouse to my iPad to try out the...

00:22:43 ◼   ► The cursor mode.

00:22:44 ◼   ► Yeah, the cursor mode.

00:22:45 ◼   ► And let me tell you, any listeners out there who haven't tried connecting

00:22:49 ◼   ► a wireless mouse to your iPad, you should do it just to play around for 10 minutes

00:22:54 ◼   ► because it's so weird.

00:22:55 ◼   ► It's very, very weird experience.

00:22:58 ◼   ► And I am so glad you told me, think of it like a finger,

00:23:03 ◼   ► don't think of it like a pointer because that really helped.

00:23:07 ◼   ► It was very interesting to try.

00:23:09 ◼   ► And in a couple of situations when I'm writing

00:23:11 ◼   ► and I'm just using my iPad, I've had the mouse out

00:23:15 ◼   ► 'cause my little ergonomic mouse

00:23:17 ◼   ► can switch between two devices.

00:23:18 ◼   ► So it's like, okay, I'll just set the iPad

00:23:20 ◼   ► as the second device.

00:23:22 ◼   ► And it's useful to use that to click

00:23:24 ◼   ► between different parts of a script

00:23:25 ◼   ► in the way that Ulysses displays things.

00:23:28 ◼   ► So it's really interesting.

00:23:30 ◼   ► I hope Apple keeps developing it.

00:23:32 ◼   ► and I couldn't believe what you said,

00:23:34 ◼   ► all the different settings where I decided to set

00:23:37 ◼   ► the right-click button to just be expose,

00:23:40 ◼   ► like go to expose mode, all the apps mode on iOS,

00:23:45 ◼   ► because I'm never gonna right-click on anything else,

00:23:47 ◼   ► and you know what I use all the time?

00:23:48 ◼   ► I use show me the multitasking mode.

00:23:50 ◼   ► - I will say my pro tip, though,

00:23:52 ◼   ► is to set the right-click as long press.

00:23:54 ◼   ► - Okay, right-click as long press.

00:23:56 ◼   ► - Yeah, because more and more in iPadOS,

00:23:59 ◼   ► you get those contextual menus, right, when you long press?

00:24:01 ◼   ► I just never really use those.

00:24:04 ◼   ► I feel like I never...

00:24:05 ◼   ► I think they are becoming more and more important over time.

00:24:07 ◼   ► It feels like more and more apps are using those now.

00:24:10 ◼   ► But then, you know, you used the Logitech one, right?

00:24:13 ◼   ► The Logitech Go mouse?

00:24:14 ◼   ► They have tons of buttons on them.

00:24:16 ◼   ► Yeah, there's buttons to spare all over the place.

00:24:18 ◼   ► So you can put Expos8.

00:24:19 ◼   ► I mean, you can keep it as you want,

00:24:20 ◼   ► but having long press set to a button is very useful

00:24:25 ◼   ► because that is becoming like a thing in iOS more and more.

00:24:29 ◼   ► I think you're right.

00:24:29 ◼   ► going to be used more now that there's been the consolidation of 3D touch versus long

00:24:34 ◼   ► press? Like, hey, there's just one thing, so now it makes more sense for developers

00:24:39 ◼   ► to use.

00:24:40 ◼   ► Because it just wasn't something you could have on iPad, because there wasn't a 3D touch,

00:24:43 ◼   ► so it's like, well, it's popping up in more and more places. And if you try that out in

00:24:49 ◼   ► a lot of places, you end up learning good functions. There's a lot of things that developers

00:24:54 ◼   ► are not hiding but giving you additional access to by using the long press function.

00:25:00 ◼   ► So it's pretty good to have it there.

00:25:01 ◼   ► And once you use the cursor for a while, especially if you're going between Mac and iPad, having

00:25:07 ◼   ► a what looks like right-click menu mapped to the right-click button helps with the jumping

00:25:13 ◼   ► between device to device.

00:25:15 ◼   ► Oh, that's a good point.

00:25:17 ◼   ► Okay, yeah, I'll remap it.

00:25:19 ◼   ► Yeah, you're right.

00:25:20 ◼   ► That long press is effectively a right-click, right?

00:25:22 ◼   ► That's what they're trying to mirror with that.

00:25:25 ◼   ► And so it helps when you're moving around

00:25:28 ◼   ► from thing to thing.

00:25:30 ◼   ► - No, that makes perfect sense.

00:25:31 ◼   ► You're right, I'm gonna remap that

00:25:32 ◼   ► 'cause that's a better muscle memory thing,

00:25:34 ◼   ► and especially projecting into the future.

00:25:36 ◼   ► You're totally right.

00:25:37 ◼   ► Because I was just thinking like,

00:25:38 ◼   ► iOS, right click, never heard of it, right?

00:25:41 ◼   ► This doesn't exist at all.

00:25:44 ◼   ► However, there's one thing, Myke,

00:25:47 ◼   ► while it was mostly a mind-bending experience

00:25:50 ◼   ► in a really pleasant way,

00:25:51 ◼   ► "Oh, this is just like a fun different way to use this device."

00:25:55 ◼   ► One thing which I searched high and low for and I couldn't find a setting for,

00:25:59 ◼   ► and I was like, "God damn it, Apple, you're always gonna get people sooner or later

00:26:03 ◼   ► and sometimes you're playing the long game,"

00:26:06 ◼   ► is I couldn't find a way to reverse the scroll direction when you use the scroll wheel.

00:26:12 ◼   ► Do you know if there's a setting for this? Because I looked.

00:26:16 ◼   ► No, because I'm a man of the modern world.

00:26:19 ◼   ► Right, no, I know, but this is it. I had flashbacks to I Can't Remember Which Operating System It Was,

00:26:25 ◼   ► where they added like natural scroll on the trackpad. So on the computer, when you put your

00:26:32 ◼   ► finger on the trackpad, if you push up the page that you're looking at will scroll up.

00:26:38 ◼   ► And then they reverse the direction so that if you have a wheel on your mouse, that it should,

00:26:45 ◼   ► if you push up on the wheel, it should move the page up.

00:26:49 ◼   ► - Yeah, and I think you've explained that. Can I try explaining that again?

00:26:52 ◼   ► Because I feel like you made that more confusing.

00:26:54 ◼   ► - Go right ahead.

00:26:56 ◼   ► - So the old way of scrolling is you push up and you will go to the top of a page,

00:27:02 ◼   ► push down, you will go to the bottom of a page.

00:27:05 ◼   ► That's how it used to be on trackpads and on scroll wheels.

00:27:09 ◼   ► - No, but the problem is, there actually is a difference between the trackpad and the

00:27:12 ◼   ► scroll wheel behavior, which makes this slightly confusing.

00:27:15 ◼   ► Really?

00:27:16 ◼   ► Yes, there is.

00:27:17 ◼   ► What is the difference?

00:27:18 ◼   ► It's odds.

00:27:19 ◼   ► You can have the trackpad scroll in the opposite direction from the way that the mouse wheel works.

00:27:25 ◼   ► Oh, okay, yeah, yeah, yeah, I get what you mean.

00:27:27 ◼   ► You can separate, you can add them differently.

00:27:28 ◼   ► But what I mean is that that's the way it always was, right?

00:27:30 ◼   ► That you would push up to go to the top, push down to go to the bottom.

00:27:34 ◼   ► But then it got changed on trackpads first to mirror touch devices,

00:27:40 ◼   ► where moving your finger up would take you to the bottom

00:27:43 ◼   ► because you are physically moving the page.

00:27:46 ◼   ► I think it was the right move to make.

00:27:48 ◼   ► I stand by it because I think it makes,

00:27:50 ◼   ► especially for trackpads, logical sense

00:27:52 ◼   ► that you are moving the content.

00:27:55 ◼   ► But I understand that it breaks a little bit

00:27:58 ◼   ► for some people with scroll wheels,

00:28:00 ◼   ► but for me, I just went all in

00:28:02 ◼   ► on what is called natural scrolling now.

00:28:04 ◼   ► - Yes, well, that's also where,

00:28:06 ◼   ► when Apple did that, we've invented natural scrolling.

00:28:09 ◼   ► It's like, you bastards, right?

00:28:11 ◼   ► Oh yes, my preference is for unnatural scrolling, Apple.

00:28:14 ◼   ► Thank you, thank you so much.

00:28:16 ◼   ► And like, I agree, I'm totally on board

00:28:18 ◼   ► with the conceptualness of it, I think it makes sense.

00:28:21 ◼   ► It's just that with a scroll wheel on a mouse,

00:28:25 ◼   ► my argument is ergonomic, that you just have more strength

00:28:29 ◼   ► and it's more comfortable to close your hand

00:28:32 ◼   ► than to open your hand.

00:28:34 ◼   ► And it's something that you can just feel immediately

00:28:36 ◼   ► if you put slight resistance that, you know,

00:28:39 ◼   ► it's like an alligator's mouth, right?

00:28:40 ◼   ► Like the closing is the natural, stronger gesture and the opening is very easy to prevent.

00:28:46 ◼   ► And so on a computer, when you're looking at web pages, you want the, the gesture that

00:28:53 ◼   ► you're going to do the most, which is.

00:28:55 ◼   ► I want to see more of this page, which means scrolling down on the actual page.

00:29:02 ◼   ► You want that to be the closing hand gesture.

00:29:05 ◼   ► You don't want it to be the opening hand gesture.

00:29:07 ◼   ► And so that's why I'm with them for touch pads.

00:29:10 ◼   ► But I was like, "Eh, whatever, they put an option in for scroll wheels on mice.

00:29:14 ◼   ► There's no problem."

00:29:15 ◼   ► But it's like, Apple's playing the long game and they're just sitting there waiting like a silent submarine,

00:29:21 ◼   ► like, "Oh, don't worry, we'll get you eventually."

00:29:25 ◼   ► And I feel like with iOS, here's where they've gotten me.

00:29:27 ◼   ► I don't think they're gonna put in an option to reverse the scroll wheel direction.

00:29:31 ◼   ► I think there's a zero percent chance of that.

00:29:33 ◼   ► Yeah, because they have a lot of button mapping, but I don't remember seeing that as an option.

00:29:38 ◼   ► The very fact that I couldn't believe, because Apple is famously averse to options,

00:29:42 ◼   ► but I couldn't believe how many options they gave you for customizing what the mouse does on iOS.

00:29:47 ◼   ► But you know where they're not averse to options? Accessibility settings. And that's where this is,

00:29:51 ◼   ► right? Because in accessibility environments, you need to be able to give people

00:29:55 ◼   ► lots and lots of choices so they can set it up just how they need it,

00:29:59 ◼   ► you know? Which is like, you can get lost for like an hour in the accessibility screens

00:30:03 ◼   ► in the settings on iOS because there's so many of them.

00:30:06 ◼   ► Yeah, with any new iOS converts, I always tell them there's two places where they hide the good stuff.

00:30:11 ◼   ► Place number one is accessibility settings.

00:30:13 ◼   ► Like, that's where a bunch of the good stuff is hidden.

00:30:16 ◼   ► And then my mom calls this thing the "Share Square,"

00:30:20 ◼   ► which I absolutely love and I think it's a better name,

00:30:22 ◼   ► and I'm gonna, like, suggest that Apple rename it to be the "Share Square,"

00:30:26 ◼   ► but it's the "Share Square," the little square that has the arrow coming out the top of it.

00:30:30 ◼   ► I think at the very least we should adopt that verbiage from now on on this show because

00:30:36 ◼   ► I think that that is absolutely fantastic.

00:30:39 ◼   ► That is so much better than ShareSheet.

00:30:41 ◼   ► Yes I know, I know.

00:30:43 ◼   ► My mom said ShareSquare once years ago and it completely got in my brain and I always

00:30:47 ◼   ► – like I've tried on the show to say the proper name if it ever comes up, but I've

00:30:51 ◼   ► just decided to give up because ShareSquare is a million times better.

00:30:54 ◼   ► But it's like okay, accessibility settings and ShareSquare, like that's where the good

00:30:58 ◼   ► stuff is hidden on iOS. But yes, it was digging through all of those mouse settings. I was like,

00:31:04 ◼   ► "There seems to be one setting here that's conspicuously absent, and there is no way this

00:31:10 ◼   ► is an oversight with all of these other buttons." And I feel like that's Apple, you know, they had

00:31:15 ◼   ► that shiv behind their back for 10 years waiting, waiting, waiting to get you if you still liked

00:31:21 ◼   ► unnatural scrolling direction with your mice. And now this is where they finally stuck it in.

00:31:25 ◼   ► I'll still make the argument that it's an accessibility setting which direction the wheel goes

00:31:30 ◼   ► but I don't expect this one to change.

00:31:32 ◼   ► I was really glad that you suggested that I try iOS with the mouse.

00:31:36 ◼   ► It's a really interesting experience and I can very much see myself using it

00:31:41 ◼   ► in many situations where I don't have to use the scroll wheel.

00:31:46 ◼   ► It's different.

00:31:48 ◼   ► Yeah, it's different.

00:31:49 ◼   ► It works in its own way.

00:31:51 ◼   ► As long as you remember, very important that you remember,

00:31:55 ◼   ► The cursor is your finger. Your cursor is not a mass pointer.

00:31:58 ◼   ► Yes.

00:31:59 ◼   ► But because the cursor is your finger, you can do things like notification center,

00:32:03 ◼   ► you can bring up the dock, you can do all this, you can do everything your finger can do,

00:32:07 ◼   ► which is not the same as what the Apple Pencil can do. So it's good for that.

00:32:11 ◼   ► Another thing that you mentioned to me a couple of episodes was just taking your

00:32:16 ◼   ► AirPods Pro on a flight.

00:32:18 ◼   ► Yep.

00:32:19 ◼   ► And I thought, "Oh, that's an interesting thing to try."

00:32:23 ◼   ► And four weeks ago, Gray thought, "Well, I don't have any flights to try this on for several months,

00:32:31 ◼   ► so I'll have to wait." But little did he know that he had many, many chances to try out AirPods Pro

00:32:39 ◼   ► on flights in the upcoming weeks. And I thought, "Okay, I brought them along with me, and I brought

00:32:46 ◼   ► my regular Sony WM3000 wireless noise cancelling headphones, which are whatever Sony's current

00:32:56 ◼   ► generation of like the over-ear, expensive, professional…

00:33:00 ◼   ► "Do you mean the WM-1000XM3?"

00:33:01 ◼   ► Oh god, it's the XM3? I thought they named them like the Harry Potter brooms, where it

00:33:08 ◼   ► was like, you know, 3000 is the third one and 4000 was the fourth one, but apparently

00:33:13 ◼   ► Okay, their naming system is crazy. But yeah, it's their third generation ones.

00:33:17 ◼   ► Oh no wait, sorry, the XM3 are the little ones.

00:33:21 ◼   ► Oh, yeah, I mean like the over-ear, over-ear head ones.

00:33:26 ◼   ► WMQ47 5000s I think is what they're called.

00:33:31 ◼   ► Of course.

00:33:32 ◼   ► Yeah, that's their name. But whatever, they're like, I think they're the best

00:33:37 ◼   ► noise cancelling headphones I've ever used, so.

00:33:40 ◼   ► No, they are the WM1000XM3.

00:33:44 ◼   ► Sony, call them, just call them, give them a name.

00:33:47 ◼   ► Oh my god, okay, so the over-ear ones are WM-1000XM3, the ones that go in your ears

00:33:54 ◼   ► are WF-1000XM3.

00:33:58 ◼   ► Does F stand for four in your ears?

00:34:01 ◼   ► Four the ears only.

00:34:03 ◼   ► Yes.

00:34:04 ◼   ► And M is for maximum head space.

00:34:09 ◼   ► I don't know.

00:34:10 ◼   ► No, it's H for head.

00:34:13 ◼   ► - Yeah, headphones. - Headphones.

00:34:16 ◼   ► And the F is for earphones.

00:34:19 ◼   ► There we go, we got it.

00:34:20 ◼   ► - For earphones. (laughs)

00:34:23 ◼   ► I forgot those F ones are like

00:34:26 ◼   ► their little AirPod competitors, right?

00:34:27 ◼   ► I forgot they even made those things.

00:34:29 ◼   ► Yeah, 'cause everybody in the world

00:34:30 ◼   ► is making clones of AirPods now,

00:34:32 ◼   ► since it's a, like those articles

00:34:34 ◼   ► about how it was like a bazillion dollar business

00:34:36 ◼   ► just on its own, it's crazy how popular they are.

00:34:38 ◼   ► It would be like in the Fortune 100, like just AirPods. It's wild.

00:34:42 ◼   ► Yeah, it's ridiculous. But yeah, so I had a whole bunch of situations to literally

00:34:49 ◼   ► try the two headphones back to back. And it occurred to me when on my very first flight,

00:34:55 ◼   ► I had a screaming baby behind me. And I thought, let me try to mentally recontextualize this baby

00:35:01 ◼   ► as a testing environment for my different headphones.

00:35:06 ◼   ► really that baby was actually perfect.

00:35:09 ◼   ► - Yeah, it was great.

00:35:10 ◼   ► So I just wanna say it was really interesting.

00:35:15 ◼   ► And so I find myself in this position of super pumped

00:35:20 ◼   ► for the next version of AirPods from Apple.

00:35:30 ◼   ► Because my result was basically the Sony headphones

00:35:34 ◼   ► are still better.

00:35:35 ◼   ► The AirPods are in most circumstances,

00:35:41 ◼   ► like 80% is good, but there was one place where they really fell down and that I

00:35:48 ◼   ► thought was surprising and it was with human voices.

00:35:51 ◼   ► So on the flights, there were a number of times when if I had my AirPods in and the

00:36:00 ◼   ► the noise cancelling was on, and the one that was really bad that was shocking was the safety

00:36:05 ◼   ► video.

00:36:06 ◼   ► And I honestly thought, like, do I even have noise cancelling on?

00:36:09 ◼   ► Like the voices were just coming through really clearly.

00:36:11 ◼   ► But that's great though, Greg, because you should always pay attention to the safety

00:36:15 ◼   ► video.

00:36:16 ◼   ► No you shouldn't!

00:36:17 ◼   ► The safety video is now a commercial with which to advertise Star Wars to you.

00:36:25 ◼   ► Of course, whenever you are running something with noise cancelling, and you think, "do

00:36:29 ◼   ► I have it on and then you turn it off, you are shocked with the raw cacophony of the

00:36:35 ◼   ► world actually around you. But I did find it was interesting that like, voices and particularly

00:36:42 ◼   ► voices like pilot announcements and anything over a speaker, the AirPods were clearly significantly

00:36:50 ◼   ► worse at that kind of thing of being able to cut that out as a distraction. And so with

00:36:57 ◼   ► With my Sony headphones on, I could totally read while the safety video is blathering

00:37:02 ◼   ► on about whatever things may or may not be important for the plane and I can pay attention

00:37:07 ◼   ► to what I want to.

00:37:08 ◼   ► And with the AirPods, that was way harder.

00:37:10 ◼   ► But the thing is, I cannot wait to not have to carry the huge bulk of my Sony headphones.

00:37:19 ◼   ► This is my feeling on this.

00:37:21 ◼   ► Of course they're not as good.

00:37:23 ◼   ► Of course.

00:37:24 ◼   ► Because the over ear headphones are going over your ears.

00:37:28 ◼   ► Just the seal that they are able to provide is always going to be better, right?

00:37:33 ◼   ► Than like, non-custom molded in ear tips.

00:37:38 ◼   ► But even if they are 80% of the way there from the technology of the noise cancelling,

00:37:46 ◼   ► that makes them like 150%.

00:37:49 ◼   ► Because they're tiny!

00:37:50 ◼   ► They go in your pocket!

00:37:52 ◼   ► I am with you on this, but it's why I wanted to test in some settings.

00:37:56 ◼   ► And like, I was lucky, sort of, yeah, I was lucky for AB testing purposes, but on another

00:38:02 ◼   ► journey I had a real like chatty person, you know, chatting with their chatty friend behind

00:38:07 ◼   ► me about the tiny details of their lives.

00:38:12 ◼   ► And again, it was a situation where it was useful to like, because with noise canceling,

00:38:18 ◼   ► What you're trying to do is avoid the worst possible scenarios.

00:38:22 ◼   ► And I was aware, like, in this situation, the AirPods, I wouldn't feel like I have blessed

00:38:30 ◼   ► relief and escape from the reality around me in this situation where someone's going

00:38:35 ◼   ► to talk behind me for a few hours.

00:38:38 ◼   ► And so I'm still willing to bring the big headphones to mitigate that downside.

00:38:44 ◼   ► like Apple is so close and those Sony headphones are so big and when I look at my backpack

00:38:52 ◼   ► and I try to think what thing in here is the least good ratio of size in backpack versus

00:38:59 ◼   ► how much I wanted in backpack the headphones the Sony headphones are totally the losers

00:39:03 ◼   ► in that thing of like this is the piece of equipment that I want to replace the absolute

00:39:08 ◼   ► most I just want to say again how good the noises

00:39:11 ◼   ► are when you switch mode. So when you go from like transparency mode where they are amplifying

00:39:17 ◼   ► outside sounds, some outside sounds, and noise cancelling where they're trying to basically

00:39:22 ◼   ► get rid of as much as possible, there are these two distinct sounds that it makes. And

00:39:27 ◼   ► the one when you turn on noise cancelling, it almost feels like it's like almost a sound

00:39:32 ◼   ► of closing. Like that one sounds closing and the transparency mode sounds opening. They've

00:39:38 ◼   ► they've got good noises to them.

00:39:40 ◼   ► And when I hear that closed sound,

00:39:42 ◼   ► it's like someone's put a blanket on me.

00:39:44 ◼   ► - That's a good way to describe it, yeah.

00:39:46 ◼   ► - Because it's like such a comfortable feeling,

00:39:49 ◼   ► 'cause I know that when I've turned that on,

00:39:51 ◼   ► I want noise to go away,

00:39:53 ◼   ► and it's like I get this beautiful sound,

00:39:56 ◼   ► and then the outside world is muffled,

00:39:59 ◼   ► and it's almost like someone

00:40:00 ◼   ► has just put this blanket on me,

00:40:02 ◼   ► and now I'm in this much more comfortable environment.

00:40:07 ◼   ► That trigger response to those noises is very good.

00:40:10 ◼   ► And they've been like,

00:40:12 ◼   ► bravo to Apple's sound design department

00:40:14 ◼   ► for coming up with those, 'cause they are perfect.

00:40:17 ◼   ► - Yeah, they really are perfect.

00:40:18 ◼   ► And with Apple and Apple products,

00:40:21 ◼   ► there's always the agony and the ecstasy

00:40:24 ◼   ► of all of the things.

00:40:25 ◼   ► But with the AirPods, they have done such an amazing job

00:40:29 ◼   ► and they're one of the best products

00:40:30 ◼   ► Apple has come out with in years.

00:40:32 ◼   ► And you talking about like,

00:40:34 ◼   ► oh, it's a weird feeling of comfort,

00:40:36 ◼   ► the way they make the sound go down.

00:40:38 ◼   ► I think that's part of what I was trying to express

00:40:40 ◼   ► when I was saying it has this augmented reality feel

00:40:43 ◼   ► of like by pressing this button,

00:40:47 ◼   ► I'm not doing something with my electronics.

00:40:49 ◼   ► I feel like I'm changing the world around me.

00:40:53 ◼   ► - It's incredible.

00:40:54 ◼   ► - Yeah, it's so hard to describe.

00:40:56 ◼   ► - Because it feels like a lot of the time

00:40:58 ◼   ► like you can barely feel them in your ears

00:41:00 ◼   ► 'cause they're so light because there's just nothing to them

00:41:03 ◼   ► there's no cables that it is possible to forget

00:41:05 ◼   ► even have them in. So having this tiny little thing being able to change the world around

00:41:12 ◼   ► you, it really is, it's the best product they've made in a long time. The AirPods took that

00:41:19 ◼   ► crown and the AirPods Pro just destroyed them. Like this is so good.

00:41:25 ◼   ► So good.

00:41:26 ◼   ► I was thinking earlier like, oh, what am I excited for? And like, I'm really desperate

00:41:30 ◼   ► and excited for a new smaller Pro laptop.

00:41:34 ◼   ► That is a purchase that is well overdue for me.

00:41:37 ◼   ► But I am much more excited about whatever the next generation of the AirPods Pro is going to look like.

00:41:46 ◼   ► Because I really think at that point I'll be able to just have those little headphones with me

00:41:51 ◼   ► and not have to have the bigger headphones.

00:41:54 ◼   ► So I was just very surprised at how well, under most circumstances, they held up.

00:42:01 ◼   ► And it's only because of a couple little things that I thought,

00:42:03 ◼   ► "I don't feel like I'm bringing the comfort blanket with me yet fully by just having those,

00:42:08 ◼   ► but it's so close. And if they can make another 20% improvement from where they currently are,

00:42:16 ◼   ► I can totally drop these big headphones that I take with me and save like a huge portion of

00:42:22 ◼   ► of this annoying space in the top of my backpack that I just like, I'll never have to deal

00:42:26 ◼   ► with again.

00:42:27 ◼   ► So they were really, really good.

00:42:29 ◼   ► And that transparency mode of flipping back and forth, especially when you're traveling

00:42:33 ◼   ► to be able to do the little click and like talk to the gate agent and then click make

00:42:37 ◼   ► the world go away.

00:42:39 ◼   ► It's fantastic.

00:42:40 ◼   ► Like the Sony's theoretically have the exact same feature, but it just, it's a little too

00:42:45 ◼   ► slow.

00:42:46 ◼   ► It has a slight lag so you feel like you're behind reality in a way.

00:42:52 ◼   ► And the Apple One just perfectly nails it.

00:42:55 ◼   ► It's fantastic.

00:42:56 ◼   ► [Music]

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00:44:30 ◼   ► So lots of unexpected plane journeys. Definitely feels like a clarity moment in your year of

00:44:41 ◼   ► clarity, right? A clear, very clear, "So how's your yearly theme going?"

00:44:47 ◼   ► Yeah, so it's funny that you mention that because I think of the last four weeks that

00:44:53 ◼   ► I've had as I was originally thinking like, what is this?

00:44:56 ◼   ► Has this been the month of emergency?

00:44:57 ◼   ► Like, but emergency is not the right word because there, while there have

00:45:01 ◼   ► been literal emergencies, it's more been like the month of unexpected urgency.

00:45:07 ◼   ► Is, is the way I would describe it.

00:45:09 ◼   ► Like, yeah, sort of surprise.

00:45:13 ◼   ► This needs to happen right now.

00:45:14 ◼   ► Surprise that needs to happen right now.

00:45:17 ◼   ► I think it's one of these things where the flexibility of the theme really

00:45:21 ◼   ► helps, like what, you know, what does it mean?

00:45:22 ◼   ► What does it mean under different circumstances?

00:45:24 ◼   ► I've really felt that for a bunch of these things that needed to be acted

00:45:30 ◼   ► on quickly in my life, because I've been thinking since the summer about clear

00:45:36 ◼   ► priorities, it's, it's had a knock on impact on decisions of like, oh, I need

00:45:42 ◼   ► to fly to America for a family thing right now, and it just like kind of

00:45:47 ◼   ► run through the decision in my head of like, this is happening or it isn't happening.

00:45:51 ◼   ► Yes, it is.

00:45:52 ◼   ► Here's the reasons why.

00:45:53 ◼   ► And it's just great.

00:45:55 ◼   ► You're, you're having a very busy, un- terrifyingly unexpectedly busy month, but

00:46:01 ◼   ► any particular moment has felt like, yes, this is the thing that I need to be doing

00:46:07 ◼   ► right now.

00:46:08 ◼   ► And you know, there's lots going on, but at any moment you can do one thing and this

00:46:12 ◼   ► is the thing.

00:46:13 ◼   ► Flying to America for this, for this thing, right?

00:46:16 ◼   ► or there's a family emergency over there, like other things need to happen.

00:46:21 ◼   ► But it has been really good to have year of clarity in the background.

00:46:25 ◼   ► And I think there's a way in which two years ago, me would have just

00:46:31 ◼   ► not handled this remotely as well.

00:46:34 ◼   ► I was just thinking like, I did a thing that if I told two years ago me, he would

00:46:38 ◼   ► just refuse to believe that I did it.

00:46:42 ◼   ► I was in the heartland of America and coming back to London and very shortly before I was

00:46:50 ◼   ► about to take a like a red-eye flight overnight, something came up where it was, "Oh, there's

00:46:57 ◼   ► a thing that you should really do elsewhere in the UK."

00:47:01 ◼   ► And I thought about it.

00:47:02 ◼   ► I thought about what are the priorities of things that I'm trying to achieve this year.

00:47:07 ◼   ► And I was like, "Okay, this makes sense.

00:47:11 ◼   ► You know what I'm going to do?

00:47:12 ◼   ► I'm going to get on this red-eye flight.

00:47:15 ◼   ► I'm going to try to sleep overnight.

00:47:17 ◼   ► When I land in the UK, I'm going to have about an hour's give time where I'm going to go

00:47:26 ◼   ► straight from the airport to get on a train to go somewhere else in the UK for like another

00:47:33 ◼   ► thing that I'm going to do.

00:47:35 ◼   ► But the very idea that I would even consider doing anything after a red-eye transatlantic

00:47:43 ◼   ► flight previously, like, I wouldn't have considered it.

00:47:46 ◼   ► That sounds very out of character for you.

00:47:52 ◼   ► It makes sense in the context of what was I trying to achieve.

00:47:56 ◼   ► Any time I can say that to you, I will always take that opportunity.

00:48:02 ◼   ► Yeah, but like, I think that was the most Casey Neistat I ever felt of like, I'm going

00:48:07 ◼   ► to have this wacky travel schedule of I've been in another place and at the, at the last

00:48:13 ◼   ► possible second, I'm going to make a decision to extend a thing even longer, but it really

00:48:17 ◼   ► fit into this preexisting framework of here's what I'm trying to do.

00:48:21 ◼   ► And so I did it.

00:48:22 ◼   ► I was very tired, but it was good.

00:48:24 ◼   ► And the other part of this that I'm really pleased about is for me, what Year of Clarity

00:48:29 ◼   ► is has been a focus on, like we were talking last time about, some of the mechanics of

00:48:35 ◼   ► the creative side of this, like this idea of locking down three topics of like, "Okay,

00:48:40 ◼   ► these three topics are locked," having a clear idea of what state all of the various videos

00:48:45 ◼   ► are in. And so, even while I've had this terrifyingly unexpectedly urgent and busy month, I've also

00:48:54 ◼   ► been really happy with continuing to move the top locked project forward.

00:49:01 ◼   ► Not as fast as I would have been able to do if these things hadn't come up.

00:49:06 ◼   ► But again, it's a case where I'm really aware like, "Oh, two years ago me would have made

00:49:10 ◼   ► almost no progress on this video."

00:49:13 ◼   ► But I think just having in my head this like concept of there are locked projects and one

00:49:19 ◼   ► One of those is the top-locked project.

00:49:23 ◼   ► Really helped me in a bunch of different times to focus on, if you have time, keep trying

00:49:30 ◼   ► to move this one forward in various different ways.

00:49:34 ◼   ► So it's been an interesting and crazy month, year of clarity, helping with a lot of focus

00:49:40 ◼   ► and how I'm thinking about what I'm up to and what I'm doing.

00:49:45 ◼   ► I know your refinement is moving along because I got an adorable photo from you the other

00:49:51 ◼   ► day. Do you even remember what it was, Myke? You sent me a photo of the pot that you had

00:49:56 ◼   ► made in pottery class.

00:49:58 ◼   ► Oh, we're talking about my pottery class?

00:50:01 ◼   ► Yeah.

00:50:02 ◼   ► All right, yeah.

00:50:04 ◼   ► I really love that. I really enjoyed getting that.

00:50:06 ◼   ► Well, I have another photo to send you then because they've been glazed now.

00:50:10 ◼   ► Oh, wow. Okay.

00:50:12 ◼   ► So I hadn't spoken about this yet because it was like a thing that I was trying, I wanted

00:50:17 ◼   ► to see if it was something that I liked and it is and I want to try and do more of it.

00:50:25 ◼   ► It's difficult because you need a lot of space for pottery really. Like you can't, it's not

00:50:30 ◼   ► something you're going to easily do at home, right?

00:50:33 ◼   ► Right.

00:50:34 ◼   ► But I found a class in London and I went and took the class one day and absolutely loved

00:50:40 ◼   ► it.

00:50:41 ◼   ► And so I'm gonna, you know, it's difficult to try and work out how to do these things regularly,

00:50:49 ◼   ► but we're gonna take like a longer class, like a multi-day class, because it's just a couple of

00:50:54 ◼   ► hours. But I got the chance over two hours to sit down at a pottery wheel after very basic

00:50:59 ◼   ► instruction, and I made four pots that I was kind of happy with, actually really happy with,

00:51:05 ◼   ► I'm thrilled with them, Gray. And do you see the picture I sent you now?

00:51:08 ◼   ► I do they look very glazed. They look like you can use them to put things in them. Yeah, and I'm super happy about it

00:51:14 ◼   ► It's like it's a very serene thing and I one of the things that I really like is you've got clay all over your hands

00:51:21 ◼   ► So you can't touch your phone. Mm-hmm because you just can't do anything about that. So

00:51:26 ◼   ► The other thing that I really like about it and it's what originally drew me to this

00:51:31 ◼   ► Like I'd see so I watched a YouTube video. There's a

00:51:35 ◼   ► There's a YouTube channel that I love by the cooking magazine Bon Appetit

00:51:39 ◼   ► And one of the shows that they do is a show called it's alive of Bradley only which is just one of my favorite things

00:51:45 ◼   ► that I found last year, it's just pure joy and

00:51:47 ◼   ► in this one episode he goes to a like a pottery studio and

00:51:53 ◼   ► they do a lots of shots like really lovely shots of

00:51:56 ◼   ► plates and bowls being made and the thing that really astounded me about pottery is

00:52:03 ◼   ► That you effectively take a lump of clay and make something out of what is nothing really

00:52:09 ◼   ► right, so using your own hands you shape this object into existence and

00:52:16 ◼   ► when I sat down at that pottery wheel for the first time I

00:52:21 ◼   ► was

00:52:23 ◼   ► Astounded at how I immediately felt that that like my hands were resulting in this thing

00:52:29 ◼   ► being made and

00:52:32 ◼   ► every movement that I made of my fingers would change the shape of the pot.

00:52:38 ◼   ► And so I kind of worked out roughly how to put a lip on something.

00:52:43 ◼   ► I just worked that part out on my own because it was like, well, if I just kind of try and bend this around my finger a little bit.

00:52:50 ◼   ► And it was just joy and I loved it.

00:52:54 ◼   ► And so it's something that I want to try and do more of.

00:52:57 ◼   ► of, it is way out of my remit right now to be able to do this regularly at home because

00:53:05 ◼   ► it's just, I live in an apartment, like what am I gonna do?

00:53:08 ◼   ► Oh yeah, there's not a lot of space in your house for the pottery wheel.

00:53:12 ◼   ► Nooo.

00:53:13 ◼   ► I think that's uh…

00:53:14 ◼   ► And like, so you know, there is possibility at some point in the future, like if it's

00:53:17 ◼   ► something that I really get into, that I could like rent something with someone, like that's,

00:53:23 ◼   ► know that is a thing you can do or that you know you can rent a lot of time in a

00:53:27 ◼   ► like almost like a timeshare type.

00:53:30 ◼   ► That's exactly what I was gonna ask you have timeshares for pottery wheels?

00:53:33 ◼   ► I think so like I genuinely think so like you know you you meet someone who

00:53:37 ◼   ► has their own shed and they let you pay them to use it. There's still lots of

00:53:41 ◼   ► classes that I can take and that's something that I want to do more over

00:53:44 ◼   ► this year. It's just like a little hobby that I definitely can't turn into any

00:53:49 ◼   ► any kind of part of my professional life,

00:53:53 ◼   ► except for referencing it here.

00:53:55 ◼   ► This is as much as it's gonna be, right?

00:53:57 ◼   ► I went to a party class and I enjoyed it, and that's it.

00:54:00 ◼   ► There's not really anything more

00:54:01 ◼   ► I can tell you other than that.

00:54:02 ◼   ► But this is exactly the type of thing

00:54:04 ◼   ► that I was thinking about in my year of refinement.

00:54:07 ◼   ► Because if this is a thing that I do and enjoy,

00:54:11 ◼   ► it's another part of my life

00:54:12 ◼   ► that I feel makes me more interesting to people.

00:54:15 ◼   ► Because it's like, here is a thing that I do,

00:54:17 ◼   ► And I sometimes, I have this interest in making pots

00:54:20 ◼   ► and I've done it now and here are the pots that I've made.

00:54:23 ◼   ► And it's also just kind of like giving me more things

00:54:26 ◼   ► to care about that aren't work

00:54:30 ◼   ► and cannot be impacted by work.

00:54:33 ◼   ► I say this right now, but it may be some people think

00:54:35 ◼   ► it's about the pen world.

00:54:36 ◼   ► Don't think there's a lot of news in the pottery world.

00:54:38 ◼   ► Like, you know, the new pottery release is a big thing.

00:54:42 ◼   ► Probably there is though, there's every industry.

00:54:44 ◼   ► And also another thing, you're familiar with the great British Bake Off, right?

00:54:49 ◼   ► Yeah, vaguely.

00:54:50 ◼   ► But you're aware of this show that exists as a baking competition.

00:54:55 ◼   ► There is a show on Channel 4 in the UK right now called The Great Pottery Throwdown, which is a pottery version of that.

00:55:01 ◼   ► It's like a pottery competition, like a reality competition.

00:55:05 ◼   ► And I've been watching that at the same time, which has just furthered my interest in this as a potential hobby for me.

00:55:11 ◼   ► But I got this as a present, so Idina got me this as a gift.

00:55:15 ◼   ► And I was really excited but like really nervous because I wanted to love it.

00:55:23 ◼   ► You know?

00:55:24 ◼   ► And it's nerve-wracking going into that kind of situation when you really want to love something

00:55:30 ◼   ► and you just... but you have no idea what it's going to be like

00:55:34 ◼   ► because you could end up like being disappointed, you know?

00:55:36 ◼   ► Because it's like, I really want to love this

00:55:39 ◼   ► but I actually might hate it, you know, when I do it because it's quite physical and it's difficult.

00:55:44 ◼   ► But like I kind of immediately took to it and I was really impressed with myself.

00:55:50 ◼   ► Like I was really pleased and it was just really lovely.

00:55:54 ◼   ► I was quite charmed by that photo and I thought, "Oh good, Myke's starting his classes."

00:55:58 ◼   ► And you know, exploring in these various ways.

00:56:03 ◼   ► And it sounds like it's more viscerally satisfying to handcraft a pot than it is to handcraft

00:56:11 ◼   ► a podcast where both are created directly through the movement of your hands, but it's

00:56:18 ◼   ► not quite the same experience.

00:56:20 ◼   ► And also, not that I'm trying to be Myke the artist here, but I think I described this

00:56:24 ◼   ► to you once, that really heavy podcast editing, like what I do to this show, where I listen

00:56:30 ◼   ► back to the whole thing and really kind of like take it from something and then cut it down and

00:56:35 ◼   ► move things around like really like craft something it reminds me of sculpture that you are taking a

00:56:40 ◼   ► thing and taking tiny pieces out of it yes until you're left with an end result if i could describe

00:56:47 ◼   ► it to any other form of art it feels like that one where you are removing from something to be left

00:56:53 ◼   ► with an end result. But there's a big difference to me in having something at the end, which

00:57:01 ◼   ► is like why I'm so happy with the journal, right? Because we have something, it's a

00:57:05 ◼   ► physical thing.

00:57:06 ◼   ► Like, yeah, it feels so different to look at a physical product and say, "Oh, this

00:57:13 ◼   ► has come into existence because of things that have been done." Right? Like it's

00:57:19 ◼   ► It's a real part of the world.

00:57:21 ◼   ► I've got one right on the table next to me.

00:57:24 ◼   ► It's like, it's here and it's real in a way that the podcasts are great, but it's a different

00:57:32 ◼   ► experience seeing a new download that you have created show up in Overcast versus seeing

00:57:39 ◼   ► a notebook on a table.

00:57:41 ◼   ► There's just something that's different about it.

00:57:43 ◼   ► I mean, especially the thing for me, I'm desensitized to it because of the sheer amount of podcasts

00:57:49 ◼   ► I produce, right? But these pots that I've made, these four pots that I made, I'm just

00:57:56 ◼   ► so proud of them.

00:57:57 ◼   ► That's so charming, Myke.

00:58:00 ◼   ► Because I took these lumps of clay and put my strength into it and tried to make something

00:58:06 ◼   ► out of them. Every single one of them, I tried to make it something. And they didn't all

00:58:12 ◼   ► come out as exactly how I imagined in my mind, but two of them did, right? Two out of that

00:58:18 ◼   ► for, I tried to make them look like that and now they look like that.

00:58:23 ◼   ► And unfortunately, like you, I had a bit of unexpected emergency travel over the last

00:58:30 ◼   ► month because we wanted to book in a class to glaze them ourselves because it's just

00:58:36 ◼   ► like a whole other thing.

00:58:38 ◼   ► But we had them glazed by the studio that we did the course at.

00:58:43 ◼   ► But at some point over the next couple of months, I'm very busy right now, which I'm

00:58:47 ◼   ► to get to very shortly. I know I'm like really teasing this out, but like I'm very busy right now.

00:58:52 ◼   ► So I haven't been able to book in like a longer course, like multiple day courses that you can do,

00:58:57 ◼   ► where instead of two hours, you are there for like two or three days for like six hours a day.

00:59:03 ◼   ► Probably you cannot move at the end of it because it is, it takes a lot of strength. You know,

00:59:09 ◼   ► if you really want to try and do something right, like it takes a lot of strength.

00:59:13 ◼   ► I have a lot of respect for people that do this thing every day because it is intensive, you know?

00:59:19 ◼   ► I felt it for a couple of days, you know?

00:59:22 ◼   ► Oh, here's some muscles I don't usually use, you know?

00:59:25 ◼   ► Yeah, doing anything new that is remotely physical,

00:59:29 ◼   ► you get to learn about muscles that you didn't know that existed in your body.

00:59:32 ◼   ► Yep.

00:59:32 ◼   ► I know.

00:59:34 ◼   ► For example, horse riding, you think, "Oh, I'm just sitting on top of a horse.

00:59:39 ◼   ► I hardly notice anything," right?

00:59:40 ◼   ► I was like, "You're gonna notice tomorrow all many parts of your body that you did not know existed."

00:59:46 ◼   ► - This is new. I had no idea you knew how to ride a horse.

00:59:49 ◼   ► - Doesn't everybody know how to ride a horse?

00:59:51 ◼   ► - No, Craig, they don't.

00:59:52 ◼   ► - Yeah, well, look, you take horseback riding lessons.

00:59:57 ◼   ► That's just a thing people do.

00:59:58 ◼   ► You take pottery classes, you take horseback riding lessons.

01:00:01 ◼   ► - Yeah, I guess we're all learning things about each other today.

01:00:03 ◼   ► - Yeah, let's not get distracted.

01:00:05 ◼   ► I love your pots.

01:00:07 ◼   ► Have you Instagrammed your pots yet?

01:00:08 ◼   ► No, because I wasn't planning on telling the world at all about this, but you did.

01:00:12 ◼   ► So now I want you to put them up on Instagram and then everybody, all the cortexins, you

01:00:18 ◼   ► can go give Myke some Instagram love for his pops.

01:00:22 ◼   ► I think he deserves it.

01:00:23 ◼   ► Thank you.

01:00:24 ◼   ► So yeah, and also my business partner, Steven, bought me for my birthday a wine tasting class.

01:00:31 ◼   ► Oh, that was the very thing that you mentioned on the show in particular.

01:00:35 ◼   ► The company unfortunately didn't have any dates until May, but that's fine.

01:00:39 ◼   ► So I will be doing that.

01:00:40 ◼   ► So that's another part of my refinement.

01:00:42 ◼   ► So these things will go well.

01:00:44 ◼   ► And I have a new project.

01:00:45 ◼   ► I've been mentioning a new project for a while.

01:00:47 ◼   ► That new project is launched.

01:00:48 ◼   ► It is a brand new podcast here on Real AFM called The Test Drivers, working with the

01:00:54 ◼   ► wonderful technology YouTuber, Austin Evans, who I've been a fan of for years.

01:00:58 ◼   ► And we are making a tech show together, testing out all kinds of technology.

01:01:03 ◼   ► The reason that this lends into my refinement is most of my technology coverage relates

01:01:09 ◼   ► to Apple products, but my love of technology expands wider than that.

01:01:16 ◼   ► And that's what this show focuses on.

01:01:18 ◼   ► It's everything.

01:01:19 ◼   ► So it's like new tech, old tech, games consoles, stuff from Google, Amazon, Samsung, Apple,

01:01:26 ◼   ► who doesn't matter, right?

01:01:28 ◼   ► Like if it's technology that we think is interesting, we will talk about it and we will, as a matter

01:01:33 ◼   ► the name Lens, we will test it. So we're going to test things in detail. The way that

01:01:37 ◼   ► name test drivers came about, there's a few things to it. One is it's like testing and

01:01:42 ◼   ► working out daily drivers. That's the idea. It's a phrase that people use in technology,

01:01:46 ◼   ► what is your daily driver? What's the thing you use every day? But I also, when I came

01:01:51 ◼   ► up with the name for the show, because I was also thinking about things that are larger

01:01:55 ◼   ► than the podcast itself. So Cortex brand has kind of changed my idea about how I name projects.

01:02:02 ◼   ► We were lucky that the name of this show lent itself to more than just the show.

01:02:07 ◼   ► Oh, yeah, yeah.

01:02:08 ◼   ► I always think it's interesting when people launch YouTube channels or podcasts or anything,

01:02:14 ◼   ► if people are asking about names, I'm always in favor of like, the more broad name, like

01:02:19 ◼   ► don't... it's very easy to pen yourself in with a name and then later on realize,

01:02:28 ◼   ► "Oh, we've evolved from what that thing originally was."

01:02:32 ◼   ► - Yeah. - Right?

01:02:33 ◼   ► Like, you know, when I see people name Project The Daily Whatever,

01:02:37 ◼   ► it's like, "Ooh, are you really committing to Daily

01:02:40 ◼   ► for the life of this entire project?

01:02:42 ◼   ► Like, maybe don't."

01:02:43 ◼   ► - So the name for this one was like,

01:02:45 ◼   ► it came from the Mythbusters.

01:02:48 ◼   ► Because what I like about the name, the Mythbusters,

01:02:51 ◼   ► is it relates to the television program,

01:02:54 ◼   ► but also the hosts.

01:02:56 ◼   ► They are the Mythbusters,

01:02:58 ◼   ► and their show is called The Mythbusters.

01:03:01 ◼   ► So for the test drivers, it's like,

01:03:03 ◼   ► me and Austin are the test drivers.

01:03:05 ◼   ► We are the people testing the technology,

01:03:08 ◼   ► and our show is also called that.

01:03:10 ◼   ► So we've got two episodes out

01:03:12 ◼   ► by the time you're hearing this.

01:03:13 ◼   ► The first one went in depth about the new Samsung phones,

01:03:16 ◼   ► the Galaxy S20 line.

01:03:18 ◼   ► Then the second episode is more of,

01:03:21 ◼   ► I think, the typical type of episode

01:03:23 ◼   ► that we're gonna be doing,

01:03:24 ◼   ► because we take one thing and we talk about it in a lot of detail and it's basically trying

01:03:29 ◼   ► to help me understand which Android phone to buy, which is a, I have found as more I'm

01:03:34 ◼   ► looking at it, seriously, a very complicated thing to do, especially right now, like I

01:03:39 ◼   ► feel like the beginning of the year is a very difficult time for working out what Android

01:03:43 ◼   ► phone to buy.

01:03:44 ◼   ► - Yeah, listening to you and Austin talk about the jungle of all of the different Android

01:03:51 ◼   ► things was crazy making to me.

01:03:54 ◼   ► 'Cause I'm not very much in this world at all.

01:03:56 ◼   ► And it's like, oh, I knew Android is a thing

01:03:59 ◼   ► that multiple manufacturers can make.

01:04:01 ◼   ► But even within just an individual company,

01:04:04 ◼   ► like the product diversity, I knew it was large,

01:04:09 ◼   ► but I didn't have any idea the level of craziness

01:04:13 ◼   ► until I heard the two of you talking about it.

01:04:15 ◼   ► Like it was literally, it was very shocking.

01:04:18 ◼   ► (laughs)

01:04:19 ◼   ► It really, really was.

01:04:20 ◼   ► Because it's very different to Apple.

01:04:21 ◼   ► Yeah, oh yeah.

01:04:22 ◼   ► Most of the larger Android manufacturers, they have multiple phone releases a year.

01:04:26 ◼   ► Apple is like, "Hey, we've got this thing for you, and you're gonna like it."

01:04:31 ◼   ► There is a loss of rumors, and I think that this is like a whole different thing,

01:04:35 ◼   ► suggests that's changing, that they might end up doing two phone releases every year now,

01:04:39 ◼   ► with like four different lines of phone, but that's like a whole thing for another day.

01:04:42 ◼   ► Whatever, and it'll still be one tenth of one percent the diversity in the Android market.

01:04:46 ◼   ► Correct, correct. Very correct.

01:04:47 ◼   ► I'm really glad that you can finally talk about this project because, you know, you've told me about it for a while and I got a preview and for listeners who hear Myke on his whole plethora of shows, I also really like this because I think it's the kind of project where in retrospect, you can see like little hints of this for a long time.

01:05:10 ◼   ► I've been aware of you on other shows like mentioning Android products or I forget when it was, but just was it like a year ago or so?

01:05:19 ◼   ► But you bought an Android phone just to try out and like to talk about on your other shows.

01:05:25 ◼   ► And so I think it's a very natural extension of a bunch of things that you've been thinking about anyway, and just a like a perfect venue to explore further interests.

01:05:40 ◼   ► I really like to see that kind of project from creators that I know, things that to the audience

01:05:49 ◼   ► might initially seem surprising, like, "Oh, I know Myke. He talks about Apple stuff." But if you're

01:05:56 ◼   ► paying attention to the development of that creator closely, you can see in retrospect,

01:06:01 ◼   ► "Oh, it's not that surprising that he has now created a technology podcast that goes like

01:06:08 ◼   ► very far afield from the core Apple ecosystem. So like, I'm just very happy to see someone

01:06:16 ◼   ► develop in that way of like initially surprising, but in retrospect makes perfect sense.

01:06:22 ◼   ► And this project is 100% that for you. Like it's a perfect evolution of your interests and also the

01:06:34 ◼   ► public perception of who you are in the technology world.

01:06:39 ◼   ► And that's the refinement. That's why it ties into my year of refinement.

01:06:42 ◼   ► I know, I know. That's why I was giddy about the double meaning of refinement. I was like,

01:06:46 ◼   ► "Oh, you clever boy! I know what's coming!" And this is perfect for that.

01:06:51 ◼   ► I want to be seen as someone who cares about all of technology, because I do.

01:06:57 ◼   ► and I want to get into more, right?

01:07:01 ◼   ► Because I want to be able to have an outlet

01:07:03 ◼   ► to talk about all of this stuff,

01:07:05 ◼   ► but also have a reason to try more things out.

01:07:08 ◼   ► So I'm really excited, and Austin's like the perfect person

01:07:11 ◼   ► to work with on this one.

01:07:12 ◼   ► - Oh yeah, yeah.

01:07:13 ◼   ► - 'Cause he is such a great communicator.

01:07:16 ◼   ► It's what I really love about his YouTube videos,

01:07:18 ◼   ► is he can so easily make things

01:07:21 ◼   ► that do not make any sense to me make sense.

01:07:26 ◼   ► You know, people may remember when I built my gaming PC,

01:07:30 ◼   ► Austin helped me, not only his videos, but like,

01:07:33 ◼   ► I also had a call with him, it was like,

01:07:34 ◼   ► "I need, I don't understand what I'm doing, right?

01:07:37 ◼   ► "Help me."

01:07:37 ◼   ► 'Cause he's so good at that, and we get on really well,

01:07:40 ◼   ► and our chemistry's great, and so like,

01:07:43 ◼   ► I'm very, very happy with how the show's come out,

01:07:45 ◼   ► so I really hope that people will give it a try.

01:07:47 ◼   ► Like, I genuinely feel like this is a very important step

01:07:52 ◼   ► in my career, like, of who I want to be,

01:07:55 ◼   ► and the type of creator that I want to be

01:07:58 ◼   ► in the same way that Cortex was,

01:08:00 ◼   ► because before this show,

01:08:03 ◼   ► people only knew me as a technology podcaster.

01:08:07 ◼   ► And whilst Cortex,

01:08:09 ◼   ► Cortex definitely has technology roots in it,

01:08:13 ◼   ► it's about a lot more than that.

01:08:15 ◼   ► It is that we hope that people don't,

01:08:18 ◼   ► like I don't want people to think of this as like an advice

01:08:22 ◼   ► or productivity podcast.

01:08:23 ◼   ► - Yeah, because it isn't.

01:08:24 ◼   ► but that people come to, because it isn't,

01:08:26 ◼   ► but people can come to this show and take parts of it

01:08:30 ◼   ► to apply to their working lives, right?

01:08:32 ◼   ► Which is, I mean, I know that we're really like

01:08:34 ◼   ► on a line with that one, but that's the way we see it.

01:08:37 ◼   ► We are not here to give you advice,

01:08:39 ◼   ► but we hope that by coming to this show,

01:08:41 ◼   ► you may pick up something you can apply to your own lives,

01:08:44 ◼   ► right, which is like it's a different thing.

01:08:46 ◼   ► - Yeah, the way I always think about it is,

01:08:49 ◼   ► you know, it's a thing that I always felt myself looking for

01:08:54 ◼   ► and appreciate, which is you get to hear people

01:08:58 ◼   ► talk about the way they think about stuff

01:09:00 ◼   ► or how they approach different kinds of problems

01:09:02 ◼   ► in a very broad way.

01:09:04 ◼   ► And it's useful just to be able to hear that

01:09:07 ◼   ► because you're not always in an environment

01:09:10 ◼   ► where that sort of conversation is naturally around you.

01:09:13 ◼   ► So that is the role of GORE-TEX.

01:09:16 ◼   ► Because of that, it's a more personal show

01:09:19 ◼   ► where the audience has gotten to know you

01:09:22 ◼   ► much more as a person.

01:09:24 ◼   ► But it is not a show where I'm gonna try an Android phone

01:09:28 ◼   ► with you for a month.

01:09:30 ◼   ► - No one will do that.

01:09:31 ◼   ► - No way.

01:09:32 ◼   ► - I've tried it.

01:09:32 ◼   ► (laughing)

01:09:33 ◼   ► No one will do it.

01:09:34 ◼   ► No one will let me talk about folding phones.

01:09:36 ◼   ► No one's gonna let me try out Android phones.

01:09:39 ◼   ► But that's a whole other thing of the show.

01:09:41 ◼   ► In an episode in the not too distant future,

01:09:45 ◼   ► I'm gonna switch to Android for a week

01:09:47 ◼   ► and just see what happens.

01:09:48 ◼   ► - Have fun with that.

01:09:49 ◼   ► - I'm gonna switch to Windows for a week,

01:09:51 ◼   ► see what happens.

01:09:52 ◼   ► These are the types of things that we're gonna do,

01:09:55 ◼   ► as well as talking about what is going on

01:09:57 ◼   ► in technology now.

01:09:59 ◼   ► We're also gonna look at older products,

01:10:01 ◼   ► we're gonna look at like general operating systems.

01:10:04 ◼   ► There is going to be an episode

01:10:05 ◼   ► where I'm gonna convince Austin to try out task managers

01:10:08 ◼   ► 'cause he doesn't have one and I don't understand.

01:10:10 ◼   ► So-- - Oh my God.

01:10:11 ◼   ► - Yep, yep. - Austin, Austin,

01:10:13 ◼   ► what are you doing, man?

01:10:15 ◼   ► OmniFocus has time zone support coming out,

01:10:18 ◼   ► like now's a good time, you know, get like, Jesus Christ.

01:10:21 ◼   ► - Well, you could just use the app

01:10:22 ◼   ► already has it, which is Todoist, the greatest to-do manager. But I will say he's very receptive

01:10:28 ◼   ► to this episode, as of quite recently was asking that we bump it up in our episode planning.

01:10:33 ◼   ► He needs it.

01:10:34 ◼   ► Good, good. That makes me nervous to hear when someone doesn't have a system. Like,

01:10:39 ◼   ► even if they have the like retro Snell style, "Oh, I just have a calendar," like whatever,

01:10:43 ◼   ► you need something. Austin, task managers, that should be episode three, not episode

01:10:48 ◼   ► whatever you're planning on.

01:10:49 ◼   ► So I'm really just genuinely very excited about this project.

01:10:55 ◼   ► It is also going to change a lot of my work requirements, which I'm intrigued about.

01:11:01 ◼   ► Tools that are cross-platform were becoming more and more needed by me.

01:11:06 ◼   ► Yeah, I was going to say, maybe don't switch to Windows during Cortex week.

01:11:12 ◼   ► I know that Cortex week is always your easy week, but still, I'd rather not have Cortex

01:11:17 ◼   ► be Windows week.

01:11:18 ◼   ► - Well, I will also say, even in a switch to Windows,

01:11:22 ◼   ► it will be for what I do on my iPad.

01:11:25 ◼   ► - Right, okay.

01:11:25 ◼   ► - Right, I'm not keen on disrupting the recording workflow.

01:11:30 ◼   ► That's a whole thing where it's like,

01:11:33 ◼   ► I'm not gonna take risks on that one,

01:11:35 ◼   ► I think, for the time being.

01:11:37 ◼   ► But yeah, I'm just so excited for what this project

01:11:42 ◼   ► could end up being.

01:11:43 ◼   ► I'm really pleased with how it's begun,

01:11:46 ◼   ► And I really hope that people, you know, I would say if you haven't heard the show now,

01:11:51 ◼   ► probably start with episode two because episode one, if you haven't heard it, features a lot

01:11:56 ◼   ► of information you now already know.

01:11:58 ◼   ► So yeah, just start with episode two.

01:12:00 ◼   ► If you like it, you can go back and we will have a show, I think, pretty much every two

01:12:04 ◼   ► weeks.

01:12:05 ◼   ► We have a lot of really cool plans for the show and I cannot wait to see where it ends

01:12:12 ◼   ► up going.

01:12:13 ◼   ► So I really, really hope that people check it out.

01:12:15 ◼   ► relay.fm/testdrivers but you can find it in Apple Podcasts, Overcast, Pocketcast, everywhere

01:12:20 ◼   ► you get podcasts you can find it. So go check it out.

01:12:22 ◼   ► Put a link to episode 2 in our show notes so that people can just click straight to

01:12:26 ◼   ► there and get to listen.

01:12:28 ◼   ► Yes, I will. So please go give it a try, especially, especially, if you are one of the people that's

01:12:32 ◼   ► like "I wish Myke would talk about Android, you know, I wish I'd hear about Android or

01:12:36 ◼   ► Windows on this show." Well I've now made the show for you. You just go there and you'll

01:12:40 ◼   ► get it.

01:12:41 ◼   ► - Put those comments because your Android needs

01:12:44 ◼   ► can be satiated.

01:12:45 ◼   ► Not by me though, by Myke.

01:12:47 ◼   ► - Not by you, not by you.

01:12:48 ◼   ► Not yet anyway, no, no, never.

01:12:51 ◼   ► It's not happening.

01:12:53 ◼   ► This episode of Cortex is brought to you by ExpressVPN.

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01:13:22 ◼   ► when I've been away, I've been able to stream videos

01:13:25 ◼   ► on hotel WiFi using ExpressVPN, rock solid.

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01:14:00 ◼   ► [BEEP]

01:14:01 ◼   ► Big news time.

01:14:02 ◼   ► - Okay. - I have even more big news.

01:14:03 ◼   ► - That wasn't the big news? - Well, that's big news, but I have new big news.

01:14:06 ◼   ► - I was gonna say, that's pretty big news.

01:14:07 ◼   ► But you already knew that news. I have news for you that you don't know a lot about.

01:14:12 ◼   ► Okay, tell me, tell me.

01:14:13 ◼   ► I have got an office.

01:14:15 ◼   ► *sigh*

01:14:16 ◼   ► That's my sigh of... envy. That's what that sigh was.

01:14:20 ◼   ► Mega studio, baby.

01:14:21 ◼   ► Tell me about your office.

01:14:22 ◼   ► What's happening? That's the name. Mega studio.

01:14:25 ◼   ► Mega studio?

01:14:26 ◼   ► 'Cause it's more than an office, great. It's massive. It's huge. It's...

01:14:30 ◼   ► Oh, you mean studio, like, recording studio.

01:14:34 ◼   ► You don't mean studio like a tiny room that also has the toilet in it where the desk is.

01:14:40 ◼   ► Okay, so it's the opposite of that kind of studio.

01:14:43 ◼   ► So this place is just a big room.

01:14:46 ◼   ► It is 630 square feet, this office.

01:14:51 ◼   ► That seems pretty big.

01:14:52 ◼   ► It's pretty big.

01:14:53 ◼   ► It's nearly the square footage of my apartment.

01:14:56 ◼   ► It's what we're looking at here.

01:14:59 ◼   ► Much bigger than I need.

01:15:01 ◼   ► It's maybe too big, but it gives me room to grow in.

01:15:04 ◼   ► Basically it's like the exact type of arrangement that I was looking for.

01:15:08 ◼   ► It's a...

01:15:09 ◼   ► I haven't bought, it's a rental agreement, it's a lease that we signed, and it's for

01:15:14 ◼   ► a couple of years, which is exactly what I wanted.

01:15:16 ◼   ► I didn't want to do like one year, I wanted to do multiple years.

01:15:20 ◼   ► I've sent you a picture, I will put some pictures in the show notes of me standing in the corner

01:15:24 ◼   ► of Mega Studio in its empty state.

01:15:27 ◼   ► Oh wow, that's great!

01:15:28 ◼   ► Jeez, that looks really big.

01:15:30 ◼   ► Great, it's very big.

01:15:31 ◼   ► I could have like a soundproof working space in this, like you've got room to spare.

01:15:36 ◼   ► I do have room to spare.

01:15:37 ◼   ► We can, I will tell you about all my room to spare.

01:15:41 ◼   ► It's on the like very upper limit of my budget.

01:15:45 ◼   ► It's about the maximum that I would want to go, but I'm pretty happy that it's like owned

01:15:49 ◼   ► by a large company and not by an individual.

01:15:52 ◼   ► Like it's kind of a really like best of both worlds type situation because whilst it's

01:15:58 ◼   ► owned by a large company, it isn't like one of these co-working space companies, because

01:16:05 ◼   ► we can do whatever we want to the space, but we just have to return it to its original

01:16:11 ◼   ► setting when we leave.

01:16:13 ◼   ► So, if we wanna drill holes in the wall, if we wanna paint it, we can do whatever we want,

01:16:19 ◼   ► but when we leave, it just has to be painted all white and clean and nothing left in it.

01:16:25 ◼   ► Which is like, yeah, that's perfect, that's what I want.

01:16:27 ◼   ► That is perfect. That's exactly what you want.

01:16:31 ◼   ► It's all brick walls, there's no glass walls.

01:16:33 ◼   ► Right?

01:16:34 ◼   ► Glass walls, they don't let you drill holes in those glass walls to put up stuff that you want.

01:16:38 ◼   ► That's not an option.

01:16:39 ◼   ► So yeah, brick walls, much better for drilling holes than glass walls, speaking from experience.

01:16:44 ◼   ► Yeah, I have lots of keys now.

01:16:46 ◼   ► So like a big keyboard, I have lots of keys on my key ring.

01:16:49 ◼   ► There's a lot of keys.

01:16:52 ◼   ► You sound excited by that.

01:16:53 ◼   ► I'm not excited by that.

01:16:54 ◼   ► The keys are the worst.

01:16:55 ◼   ► I hate it. I have to carry two sets of keys on one key ring. My home keys and my office keys.

01:17:01 ◼   ► Three keys and a key fob is what I have to carry around me all the time now.

01:17:06 ◼   ► The keys that you have to have, can you replace those with an electronic key or are they

01:17:11 ◼   ► public space kind of keys that you pass through?

01:17:14 ◼   ► Two of them are public space things.

01:17:15 ◼   ► But that's one thing I'm not really allowed to change.

01:17:20 ◼   ► Because that is technically owned by the company.

01:17:23 ◼   ► they own the building and that's the door, like we can't change the door because the door has all

01:17:28 ◼   ► like the gotta be fire safe right like all those kinds of rules right so it's gotta you know fire

01:17:34 ◼   ► safety but i don't want to carry a key. Fire safety, shmaaya shmaifty. Yeah. You don't care

01:17:41 ◼   ► about airplane safety, don't care about fire safety, you just live on the edge. My convenience

01:17:47 ◼   ► above everything that's that's how it goes. But i said expensive like the expensive thing is the

01:17:53 ◼   ► the creeping costs?

01:17:54 ◼   ► - Yes.

01:17:56 ◼   ► - So that's where it gets you, right?

01:17:58 ◼   ► - That is where they get you, yes.

01:18:00 ◼   ► - You know, like they have the costs

01:18:01 ◼   ► that they tell you the rent is every month

01:18:03 ◼   ► and you're like, "Ooh, that's expensive."

01:18:05 ◼   ► But then of course, nobody tells you,

01:18:07 ◼   ► like nobody ever tells you anything in this country

01:18:10 ◼   ► when you're a business, including the VAT price.

01:18:13 ◼   ► - Yeah.

01:18:14 ◼   ► - And it drives me mad.

01:18:15 ◼   ► So VAT is like a government mandated tax, it's called.

01:18:19 ◼   ► - Value added tax.

01:18:20 ◼   ► - And at the moment it's 20%.

01:18:22 ◼   ► and that tax is included in everything that you buy in this country, right?

01:18:26 ◼   ► Like, if you buy something, VAT is on top.

01:18:29 ◼   ► If you're a business, you can be VAT registered,

01:18:32 ◼   ► and if you pay VAT, you can also claim back VAT.

01:18:36 ◼   ► It is a system that I will never understand, right?

01:18:39 ◼   ► I know, I've never understood the reasoning for this.

01:18:40 ◼   ► If I don't have to pay the VAT, why do you charge me the VAT?

01:18:45 ◼   ► Because I'm just gonna get it back from the government later on,

01:18:48 ◼   ► so like, what's the point?

01:18:49 ◼   ► It feels like someone has a job because of this.

01:18:52 ◼   ► They're like, "What if I change this system, then I lose my job?"

01:18:56 ◼   ► But sometimes, I don't know if you've ever come across this,

01:18:58 ◼   ► you can give your VAT number to a company and they don't charge you the VAT.

01:19:01 ◼   ► So why do I ever have to pay the VAT? I don't understand.

01:19:05 ◼   ► Someone will try to explain this to me, no one will ever make it make sense to me.

01:19:09 ◼   ► My accountant has tried many times and failed.

01:19:11 ◼   ► I know, I've given up on this entirely as well.

01:19:14 ◼   ► But the thing for foreign listeners to understand is

01:19:17 ◼   ► one of the ways this really catches you if you're looking for office rent because I've come across the same thing of the prices are listed without VAT

01:19:25 ◼   ► but it's so unusual for the UK because you just never think about the VAT tax because it's just part of the price in every normal day experiences

01:19:35 ◼   ► All consumer purchases, the only price you see is with the VAT included

01:19:41 ◼   ► This isn't like, I know that some sales taxes in America is a different thing, where you see the price without the tax and they add the tax on, but that does not happen here.

01:19:48 ◼   ► Because VAT is like a given. Everything has VAT added onto it. So you forget.

01:19:54 ◼   ► Yeah, you just forget that this is even a thing that exists, except when you remember how pleasing it is to see a price that is listed as £5 and you can hand someone a £10 note and get a £5 note back.

01:20:05 ◼   ► Like the incorporation of the tax allows there

01:20:07 ◼   ► to be nicer numbers in an easy way

01:20:09 ◼   ► that like adding sales tax on later doesn't allow.

01:20:12 ◼   ► But it does mean that you forget that it even exists

01:20:17 ◼   ► until you start trying to budget for an office

01:20:20 ◼   ► and realize you're off by a 20% margin

01:20:22 ◼   ► because in this one case, it's not listed.

01:20:26 ◼   ► Yeah, it's infuriating.

01:20:27 ◼   ► - Which is, you know, 20%, that's a lot of percent.

01:20:30 ◼   ► - Yeah, it's, yeah, 20%, it is a lot of percent.

01:20:33 ◼   ► - Yep, especially in when office space costs you, right?

01:20:36 ◼   ► Like, it's a lot of money.

01:20:38 ◼   ► And then everyone wants a deposit, you know?

01:20:41 ◼   ► And it's like, you're gonna pay us

01:20:42 ◼   ► three months rent up front.

01:20:45 ◼   ► And this is one of those things

01:20:46 ◼   ► where it's like a business thing,

01:20:47 ◼   ► where I was like, haha, you got me.

01:20:49 ◼   ► Where it's like, first year's rent is this amount,

01:20:51 ◼   ► second year it goes up by 5%, and it's like, okay, fine.

01:20:54 ◼   ► Oh, but the deposit is based on the second year's rent.

01:20:58 ◼   ► I'm like, all right, you got me, right?

01:21:00 ◼   ► It's just like, there's no reason to do this

01:21:02 ◼   ► other than the fact that you want more money. And I treat a deposit like this as money that

01:21:07 ◼   ► is gone, and if I get it back at the end, that will be a bonus. But that money has left

01:21:12 ◼   ► forever.

01:21:13 ◼   ► Yes, yeah. That is psychologically the best way to deal with a deposit.

01:21:18 ◼   ► Business internet, very expensive. It is three times more expensive than my home internet

01:21:25 ◼   ► and a lot slower.

01:21:26 ◼   ► I was gonna say, that's because it's three times faster, right?

01:21:29 ◼   ► No, no, no.

01:21:31 ◼   ► But what they tell me is,

01:21:32 ◼   ► oh, there's a 24/7 support line, awesome.

01:21:35 ◼   ► But unfortunately, this is the only downside for me

01:21:38 ◼   ► in this building is I can only use the internet service

01:21:42 ◼   ► provided that they have made the deal with.

01:21:44 ◼   ► - Right.

01:21:45 ◼   ► - So, and the business internet company needs a deposit.

01:21:48 ◼   ► Why?

01:21:49 ◼   ► - Yeah, they have to pre-purchase your internet.

01:21:51 ◼   ► I think that's what it is.

01:21:52 ◼   ► - I guess that's how it works, yeah, sure.

01:21:54 ◼   ► - It certainly has nothing to do with the fact

01:21:56 ◼   ► that they can extract a deposit

01:21:57 ◼   ► because they're the only ones that you can deal with.

01:22:00 ◼   ► - And what else are you gonna do?

01:22:01 ◼   ► - Yeah, we have a deposit that's five times

01:22:04 ◼   ► the length of your contract pay in advance deposit.

01:22:07 ◼   ► That's what they do.

01:22:08 ◼   ► The thing that you have to worry about here, Myke,

01:22:10 ◼   ► because I feel your pain,

01:22:12 ◼   ► I feel your pain so deeply with these creeping costs.

01:22:16 ◼   ► And as listeners know, I gave up my glass office

01:22:21 ◼   ► in advance of last summer.

01:22:22 ◼   ► I had a lot of reasons to do it,

01:22:25 ◼   ► But one of the reasons was this, this creeping cost effect where

01:22:30 ◼   ► even after you've moved in, I started finding these situations where it's

01:22:34 ◼   ► like, well, we've got you now.

01:22:37 ◼   ► And so like, Oh, there's an additional service cost for this thing.

01:22:41 ◼   ► And there were just a number of little like added things here and there.

01:22:47 ◼   ► And you're like, God damn it.

01:22:49 ◼   ► You know, if I'd known all of these costs in advance, I would've, I would've thought

01:22:53 ◼   ► about how long I'm going to sign up for this in a very different way.

01:22:57 ◼   ► And it's just, it's a frustrating situation that's very different from a

01:23:02 ◼   ► residential rent situation, because I think it's very easy to impose these

01:23:09 ◼   ► kinds of creeping costs on a business.

01:23:12 ◼   ► Partly because of the way business taxes are done and the way that a person has

01:23:16 ◼   ► to think about business expenses, but also because the landlord knows you're renting

01:23:22 ◼   ► office because presumably the business is profitable enough to pay you and your salary

01:23:29 ◼   ► is at least somewhat flexible. So like there's just this way in business real estate that

01:23:35 ◼   ► the wrench can be turned in this slow and frustrating way and I was feeling that a lot

01:23:41 ◼   ► with my previous glass cube and I was like, "Forget this. This is too much. I'm out

01:23:46 ◼   ► of here. Goodbye."

01:23:48 ◼   ► Yeah, you were in a slightly different situation to me though, where like I feel confident in mind because there kind of isn't really anything they can do.

01:23:57 ◼   ► I feel like, I mean, I may be proved wrong but...

01:23:59 ◼   ► Yeah, we'll check in in a year.

01:24:01 ◼   ► We'll check in, yeah.

01:24:02 ◼   ► If there's a door fee or anything.

01:24:04 ◼   ► Yeah, sure.

01:24:04 ◼   ► But yeah, it is like all of these things do just make it very frustrating because with the business you feel like, okay, I want the budget, I want to know how much it costs.

01:24:14 ◼   ► You know what I would like the most? I'd like to know all this information up front when I'm trying to make a decision,

01:24:18 ◼   ► but it's fundamentally impossible to know that stuff up front.

01:24:22 ◼   ► But I'm really glad that you've been able to front up the internet deposits and whatever other deposits you need.

01:24:29 ◼   ► And even though you're tiny and often the vast distance of the space that you have, you look so happy.

01:24:37 ◼   ► Well, because this was also after I'd been through my like, "Oh my god, I can't afford this phase."

01:24:42 ◼   ► and then it took some work,

01:24:45 ◼   ► but I was able to shore up the savings.

01:24:48 ◼   ► So I've been saving for this kind of thing for a long time.

01:24:52 ◼   ► And I was able to do some different budgeting

01:24:56 ◼   ► and work out, all right, can I afford this?

01:24:58 ◼   ► How long can I afford this for?

01:25:00 ◼   ► And I felt pretty good.

01:25:01 ◼   ► I had a meeting with my accountant.

01:25:03 ◼   ► I felt good about it.

01:25:05 ◼   ► And I have made sure that I have a six month break

01:25:09 ◼   ► my lease and I have enough savings for those six months. So if all else fails, right, like

01:25:16 ◼   ► they are there and I can pay the rent that I have to contractually pay if something terrible

01:25:21 ◼   ► happens then I have to leave, right. So like I'm just going to keep that locked away forever

01:25:25 ◼   ► that's going to stay in my bank account, right. So that's just there. And then I also had

01:25:30 ◼   ► to set aside a budget to furnish it because it's completely empty and it's one big room

01:25:36 ◼   ► which means it's very echoey.

01:25:39 ◼   ► I am not there now, no,

01:25:41 ◼   ► because it is completely impossible

01:25:45 ◼   ► to record audio in there right now,

01:25:47 ◼   ► because it's just one big echo chamber.

01:25:50 ◼   ► - I'd like to hear a snap test in that room, right,

01:25:53 ◼   ► where you're testing for audio,

01:25:55 ◼   ► you snap your fingers and you see how long it takes

01:25:57 ◼   ► for the echoes to die down.

01:25:58 ◼   ► - It's getting better.

01:25:59 ◼   ► It's getting better because we have started furnishing.

01:26:03 ◼   ► - Okay.

01:26:04 ◼   ► - But it's like, I have to kind of,

01:26:05 ◼   ► I can't move into the studio until we have finished furnishing.

01:26:09 ◼   ► Right.

01:26:10 ◼   ► Because until we have finished furnishing,

01:26:12 ◼   ► I won't be able to work out how much more soundproofing we need to do.

01:26:16 ◼   ► Oh, right, yes, right, right.

01:26:17 ◼   ► Because you just want to see what's the state of things with all of the furniture in there.

01:26:23 ◼   ► If I can ask you a question though, Myke, because in this photo of you looking very happy with your arms outstretched,

01:26:29 ◼   ► you have little squares and rectangles marked out on the floor.

01:26:32 ◼   ► Is that from you?

01:26:33 ◼   ► Is that like your plan for what stuff is?

01:26:36 ◼   ► - Mm-hmm, we have done that.

01:26:37 ◼   ► - Okay, so are you planning to subdivide

01:26:42 ◼   ► the office into different rooms?

01:26:45 ◼   ► - No. - Okay.

01:26:46 ◼   ► So it is still going to be one big open space.

01:26:49 ◼   ► - One big open space, but with different stations.

01:26:52 ◼   ► - Right, right.

01:26:53 ◼   ► That is gonna make the soundproofing

01:26:55 ◼   ► much more difficult though,

01:26:57 ◼   ► if you're gonna keep it as a big space.

01:26:59 ◼   ► - Yes, okay.

01:27:00 ◼   ► So the only part that I have to soundproof,

01:27:03 ◼   ► like really soundproof and reduce echo

01:27:05 ◼   ► is what I'm calling the recording station.

01:27:08 ◼   ► So at the moment, like I have ordered

01:27:11 ◼   ► these soundproof panels that will go behind my desk,

01:27:15 ◼   ► like these big kind of freestanding panels.

01:27:17 ◼   ► I've ordered a bunch of foam to go on the walls.

01:27:20 ◼   ► Then with all of the furniture that we're buying,

01:27:23 ◼   ► which is like multiple desks, some soft furnishings, rugs,

01:27:26 ◼   ► all that kind of stuff, I'm hoping that will be enough.

01:27:30 ◼   ► If it isn't, we'll keep trying to add different soundproofing things.

01:27:36 ◼   ► Maybe we would put something over the top of the desk as well, and I feel like we could probably get it done.

01:27:42 ◼   ► If none of that works, I'm gonna get a booth. Just put it in there.

01:27:46 ◼   ► Right, yeah, that makes sense. That's kind of what I was wondering, is if you're gonna get an actual booth booth.

01:27:52 ◼   ► I don't want to do that, because I don't want to feel like I'm trapping myself in this tiny little prison every time I'm recording.

01:27:58 ◼   ► But that is like the worst comes to worst situation

01:28:01 ◼   ► But I am also very confident that we can do this because there are many youtubers with much larger spaces that can do it

01:28:08 ◼   ► Okay

01:28:09 ◼   ► So like I'm confident it can be done with like enough foam and furniture and soft furnishings in that

01:28:17 ◼   ► Environment I will ask if any cortexes have tips for soundproofing large environments. Please put them in the reddit thread

01:28:25 ◼   ► I would love to see it, but I do feel like I

01:28:27 ◼   ► I can get what I need with the stuff that's available

01:28:32 ◼   ► because we currently have just got some soft furnishings

01:28:36 ◼   ► and a couple of pieces of furniture in there

01:28:38 ◼   ► and the echo is decreasing already a lot

01:28:41 ◼   ► from when it was just completely empty.

01:28:43 ◼   ► So considering how much better it is

01:28:46 ◼   ► and how little we have in there right now,

01:28:48 ◼   ► I'm feeling confident that we can get it

01:28:50 ◼   ► to a place that we want it to be.

01:28:52 ◼   ► But it is priority number one, right?

01:28:56 ◼   ► Well, okay, it's the highest priority,

01:28:58 ◼   ► but it is not the first thing to be done

01:29:00 ◼   ► because we have to furnish the whole thing.

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01:30:25 ◼   ► I think for me to talk about the furniture that we're getting, I will tell you the plan

01:30:29 ◼   ► for what Mega Studio is going to be because you will see in the image masking tape on

01:30:33 ◼   ► the ground.

01:30:34 ◼   ► Right.

01:30:35 ◼   ► The masking tape is kind of delineating the stations in the office.

01:30:40 ◼   ► So Idina taking the photo is standing in the recording station, which is like the far corner.

01:30:45 ◼   ► I wanted to do it in a corner because I figured that would allow me the maximum amount of

01:30:50 ◼   ► foam to go on the walls.

01:30:52 ◼   ► - Is the end that you're standing in,

01:30:55 ◼   ► is the entrance off to the side there?

01:30:57 ◼   ► Or is the entrance where, okay.

01:30:59 ◼   ► - The entrance is off to the side of where I'm standing.

01:31:02 ◼   ► So there is the recording station.

01:31:04 ◼   ► There's also kind of like this little angle to the wall.

01:31:08 ◼   ► So like, you know if you have like a chimney breast,

01:31:11 ◼   ► the wall comes out for a moment.

01:31:13 ◼   ► - I don't know what a chimney breast is.

01:31:15 ◼   ► Do you mean just a chimney that goes up the wall?

01:31:17 ◼   ► - Yeah, sure.

01:31:18 ◼   ► It's called a chimney breast.

01:31:20 ◼   ► when it comes on the wall and it makes the indentation on the wall.

01:31:22 ◼   ► That's not real. You're messing with me.

01:31:24 ◼   ► I'm not.

01:31:26 ◼   ► Oh, no you're totally right. That's a thing.

01:31:28 ◼   ► I know it's a thing.

01:31:30 ◼   ► So there's something like that.

01:31:32 ◼   ► There isn't a fireplace in our office.

01:31:35 ◼   ► I kind of wish there was. It would be amazing.

01:31:37 ◼   ► And I figured that's where they've got that kind of thing in front of me.

01:31:42 ◼   ► So I feel like I'm going to foam all of that up

01:31:45 ◼   ► and I'm hoping that enough angles with foam will trap the sound.

01:31:49 ◼   ► Who knows how it works? We'll find out.

01:31:51 ◼   ► So that's that. I then have...

01:31:53 ◼   ► That's not going to be my desk, though.

01:31:55 ◼   ► So this is a different thing for me. I'm going to have

01:31:57 ◼   ► a desk where I record,

01:31:59 ◼   ► and then a desk where I edit

01:32:01 ◼   ► and do my regular work.

01:32:03 ◼   ► Yeah, that's great. I'm always

01:32:05 ◼   ► such a big advocate of separate

01:32:07 ◼   ► spaces if you can, and you have

01:32:09 ◼   ► a lot of space in which to subdivide

01:32:11 ◼   ► separate spaces. So it's like, I have a lot of space,

01:32:13 ◼   ► I've seen a bunch of people, I've seen you do it,

01:32:15 ◼   ► I've seen Austin do it, like having these like separate

01:32:17 ◼   ► spaces. Yeah, seems really good. And also, like if I'm soundproofing it all so much,

01:32:23 ◼   ► I don't want to be sitting there all the time on my own. I feel like I'm on my own in there,

01:32:27 ◼   ► like in this tiny little room and I have this huge studio. So like, I want to be able to

01:32:31 ◼   ► break out of it when I'm not recording. So this is also going to be super different because

01:32:36 ◼   ► this is going to be a very different working environment. I've ordered a desk for this

01:32:40 ◼   ► station, which has two VESA arms. Oh, for the workstation? For the recording station.

01:32:45 ◼   ► Oh, for the record? Okay. So it's a standing desk with two VESA arms so you can get the microphone at the right height?

01:32:50 ◼   ► Nope. It is a standing desk, but that's not why I've done that.

01:32:54 ◼   ► Oh, that's not why. Okay.

01:32:55 ◼   ► So I have one VESA arm, has a laptop mount on it, and one VESA arm is for a monitor because my plan is I will be recording from a laptop.

01:33:04 ◼   ► Why? That seems like a strange place to introduce even the possibility of less reliability.

01:33:11 ◼   ► Well, I can't record and edit on the same machine, right?

01:33:15 ◼   ► if I have two desks.

01:33:17 ◼   ► At least not in a way that I want to do it,

01:33:19 ◼   ► because that's running a lot of cables and I just don't want to do that.

01:33:22 ◼   ► But I always have to have a laptop for when I travel and record.

01:33:26 ◼   ► So it will be the same laptop.

01:33:28 ◼   ► Oh, so you're optimizing for simplicity and for travel with your recording setup.

01:33:34 ◼   ► Is that what you're doing? That's what that sounds like.

01:33:37 ◼   ► Yeah, with the same gear that I used when I'm in the studio.

01:33:40 ◼   ► Yes.

01:33:40 ◼   ► Right.

01:33:41 ◼   ► Okay.

01:33:41 ◼   ► Right.

01:33:42 ◼   ► But yeah, so you're, but you're optimizing for, for traveling and simplicity with a laptop for recording.

01:33:47 ◼   ► Okay.

01:33:47 ◼   ► Yeah.

01:33:48 ◼   ► No, that makes sense.

01:33:48 ◼   ► I guess that makes sense.

01:33:49 ◼   ► So I'm going to be using that same laptop because I also just want like a super simple setup, right?

01:33:54 ◼   ► Like as in like that is just a system.

01:33:56 ◼   ► Simplicity is very valuable.

01:33:57 ◼   ► Yeah.

01:33:57 ◼   ► We all know that.

01:33:58 ◼   ► Yeah.

01:33:58 ◼   ► So that's why we get standing desks instead.

01:34:00 ◼   ► So basically this laptop is just set up for recording and that's what I will use when I'm recording shows.

01:34:06 ◼   ► Because really recording a podcast, it takes nothing.

01:34:09 ◼   ► like from a processing power, it doesn't need a lot of screen space, like that thing will just be

01:34:14 ◼   ► off on the side doing its thing and then I'm going to have a monitor that it will be attached to

01:34:19 ◼   ► where I can have show notes and stuff. So that and that's I'm going to have a much smaller desk than

01:34:23 ◼   ► the one that I currently have there and that's why I got the VESA mounts so I could have the

01:34:27 ◼   ► desk space underneath and that the computer wouldn't take up any space on the desk.

01:34:32 ◼   ► So that's going to be the recording station. Then my editing station is where my iMac Pro will be,

01:34:38 ◼   ► the machine I'm currently speaking to you on now.

01:34:41 ◼   ► And that will be for when I'm editing,

01:34:42 ◼   ► and maybe for doing some types of work,

01:34:45 ◼   ► I will have that there.

01:34:46 ◼   ► It's like that would be my main desk.

01:34:48 ◼   ► And I do know I have her own station

01:34:50 ◼   ► and work area there as well.

01:34:52 ◼   ► So we're getting her a new desk,

01:34:54 ◼   ► so she will be able to do her work from the studio,

01:34:57 ◼   ► because this is one of the other reasons

01:34:59 ◼   ► that we wanna get a space outside of home,

01:35:02 ◼   ► because I have this office, she needs space to work too.

01:35:05 ◼   ► And at the moment, it's just working like basically

01:35:08 ◼   ► on our dining table, which we both find frustrating.

01:35:12 ◼   ► She needs space to work also, but because she doesn't have podcast recording, it can

01:35:18 ◼   ► be done in theory from anywhere, but that means it's being done everywhere, and we want

01:35:22 ◼   ► to get work out of our home now.

01:35:25 ◼   ► B: Again, I'm with you so strongly on this, and doubly so as a couple.

01:35:31 ◼   ► You don't want to have just one environment that's everything, including all of your work.

01:35:38 ◼   ► So yeah, like getting getting work out of your house, if you can, for the two of you

01:35:43 ◼   ► is such a win.

01:35:44 ◼   ► Yeah, and this is one of the reasons we wanted a big space is because she deserves to have

01:35:47 ◼   ► her own area as well.

01:35:49 ◼   ► But I also didn't want it to be us to be like just tripping over each other all the time.

01:35:53 ◼   ► So yeah, being able to get something big allows us to stretch out a bit.

01:35:57 ◼   ► I'm gonna have a secondary desk, which will be like a hot desk for visitors,

01:36:01 ◼   ► because I love space if people want to come over.

01:36:04 ◼   ► So we'll have like a monitor and stuff there, but this is also what I will use as my iPad writing desk, I think.

01:36:10 ◼   ► Ah, okay.

01:36:11 ◼   ► Right, so that's that thing I've been talking about for a long time.

01:36:14 ◼   ► Right, you're gonna have like a monitor that guests can plug into?

01:36:17 ◼   ► Yep.

01:36:17 ◼   ► That's a great idea. That's a really good idea.

01:36:19 ◼   ► Like a monitor and like a Thunderbolt dock, so I can plug my iPad into it,

01:36:23 ◼   ► but then people can also bring their own device and just plug into it and they're good to go.

01:36:27 ◼   ► And that's the hot desk if you're in like a corporate environment, that just means there's a cable and you plug into it.

01:36:32 ◼   ► The area that I'm most excited about is the lounge area.

01:36:36 ◼   ► Which will also be a working area for me because I very frequently work on the sofa as well as working at a desk.

01:36:43 ◼   ► So I wanted to recreate something like that in the office.

01:36:46 ◼   ► So I've got a really nice chair and the sofa.

01:36:49 ◼   ► Is this lounge area visible on the current rectangle pattern that I'm looking at?

01:36:53 ◼   ► The area that I am standing in?

01:36:55 ◼   ► That's the lounge area.

01:36:58 ◼   ► Okay, good.

01:36:59 ◼   ► Good.

01:37:00 ◼   ► I feel like the lounge area needs to be as far away from all the other areas as possible.

01:37:04 ◼   ► Exactly, so I'm not constantly being called to the lounge.

01:37:07 ◼   ► Yeah, and like I know this sounds dumb, but I don't think it is.

01:37:12 ◼   ► I feel like you need some kind of visual screen a little bit to just separate the lounge area

01:37:19 ◼   ► Yes, we were thinking about doing that.

01:37:20 ◼   ► Just visually?

01:37:21 ◼   ► Yeah, like some plants or a little wall for soundproofing or something, but I think it's

01:37:27 ◼   ► really important to be like, this space is separate.

01:37:30 ◼   ► Let me run this one by you.

01:37:31 ◼   ► Not only will they look different visually, we have different rugs for each area.

01:37:35 ◼   ► Oh, perfect.

01:37:36 ◼   ► Great.

01:37:37 ◼   ► I'll show you those.

01:37:38 ◼   ► I'll show you those in just a second.

01:37:39 ◼   ► I have those two.

01:37:40 ◼   ► And then also I want a gaming setup, but this will probably be the lounge area.

01:37:44 ◼   ► But what I'm not sure about yet is where the PC will go.

01:37:48 ◼   ► That's the part that I'm not sure about yet.

01:37:50 ◼   ► Because the gaming PC could actually very easily live at the hot desk.

01:37:54 ◼   ► Because the original idea always was for me to set up my second desk in my office because

01:37:59 ◼   ► it's effectively just a Thunderbolt dock with a Thunderbolt cable can be plugged into anything.

01:38:04 ◼   ► I haven't worked out where the gaming PC is going to go yet.

01:38:07 ◼   ► I don't love the gaming PC at the hot desk if you're also going to use the hot desk as

01:38:12 ◼   ► an iPad writing desk.

01:38:13 ◼   ► I don't like that.

01:38:14 ◼   ► It's pollution.

01:38:15 ◼   ► I'm just not sure.

01:38:16 ◼   ► into this yet like because I want to get a nice TV for the lounge area like how well PCs and TVs

01:38:24 ◼   ► work together. Yeah I think but I think like you're crazy if you you have a lot of space but

01:38:29 ◼   ► I don't think you have enough space to have a separate gaming area that's not also the lounge

01:38:35 ◼   ► area. I mean just like physically sure you could do it but I think it's more like the psychological

01:38:41 ◼   ► and distance from everything else. I really think the lounge area should feel a bit quarantined

01:38:48 ◼   ► from other things. And even just having the gaming PC there pollutes that a little bit.

01:38:53 ◼   ► I don't like that. As my suggestion anyway. But I'm a little aware that I'm a little

01:38:59 ◼   ► bit far on the end of the spectrum of trying to have distinctness wherever possible.

01:39:05 ◼   ► I definitely want it, but it's really just a technical thing because I haven't worked out yet.

01:39:10 ◼   ► It's like, if I get like a 50 inch TV, can my gaming PC drive it?

01:39:14 ◼   ► I just don't know the answer. I haven't looked into it.

01:39:16 ◼   ► I mean, the answer is probably depending on the TV that I buy, but I haven't looked into it yet.

01:39:21 ◼   ► So this is where we are so far.

01:39:24 ◼   ► So we signed the lease like a week and a bit ago, like a week ago.

01:39:28 ◼   ► So far we have collected the keys. We visited IKEA, of course.

01:39:32 ◼   ► Of course.

01:39:33 ◼   ► Of course. We bought at IKEA a small desk and some folding chairs so we could have something to sit and wait on with all of the inevitable deliveries that would be coming our way.

01:39:43 ◼   ► We made our first IKEA order. The IKEA order has arrived already. Only one item missing. Every IKEA order has an amount of items missing and we only had one.

01:39:58 ◼   ► Right, that's pretty good.

01:39:59 ◼   ► Yep, and in that included some rugs and stuff, and I'm pretty happy with the way that some

01:40:06 ◼   ► of that stuff started to come together already.

01:40:08 ◼   ► The lounge area rug, and a beautiful lamp that I fell in love with, and a TV cabinet.

01:40:15 ◼   ► We built a kallax.

01:40:17 ◼   ► You know those things, right?

01:40:20 ◼   ► I don't know what a kallax is.

01:40:21 ◼   ► It is like the standard IKEA storage system.

01:40:26 ◼   ► Oh, okay.

01:40:27 ◼   ► Yeah, yeah.

01:40:28 ◼   ► - Yeah, yeah, I know that, yeah.

01:40:29 ◼   ► - Yep. - Okay.

01:40:30 ◼   ► I'm not really up on my exact names

01:40:33 ◼   ► for all the different things in IKEA.

01:40:34 ◼   ► - That just means you haven't shopped to IKEA enough,

01:40:37 ◼   ► so bravo to you, I guess,

01:40:39 ◼   ► for not having to go through that.

01:40:41 ◼   ► - It's always a weird mix of very fun,

01:40:44 ◼   ► but also super stressful.

01:40:46 ◼   ► That's what every trip to IKEA is, like,

01:40:49 ◼   ► oh, all of these pieces are delightful,

01:40:51 ◼   ► but also this is incredibly stressful.

01:40:53 ◼   ► - And I ordered a alarm system.

01:40:57 ◼   ► - Okay.

01:40:57 ◼   ► the smart home internet of things type alarm system.

01:41:04 ◼   ► Not one of these ones installed by a big professional, but one that's just like, "Oh, there's some

01:41:08 ◼   ► cameras you can set up and some door sensors and stuff like that."

01:41:11 ◼   ► So I wanted to be able to control it myself.

01:41:13 ◼   ► It's good to have something that's on a separate layer from whatever the building itself provides.

01:41:18 ◼   ► And I want to do a bunch of smart homey stuff in the office.

01:41:22 ◼   ► We have those big overhead lights and I do not want to use those, so the plan is get

01:41:27 ◼   ► a bunch of other lamps and stuff that can hopefully fill the room.

01:41:31 ◼   ► And I want to go all hue with that stuff, which means we have to decide a smart home

01:41:37 ◼   ► system, right?

01:41:38 ◼   ► Yes.

01:41:39 ◼   ► Like a voices system.

01:41:40 ◼   ► Going all Amazon Echo in the Mega Studio.

01:41:43 ◼   ► Interesting.

01:41:44 ◼   ► Interesting.

01:41:45 ◼   ► What's the reasoning for that?

01:41:46 ◼   ► It is better, that stuff.

01:41:49 ◼   ► Just the home integration stuff is better.

01:41:50 ◼   ► Yes.

01:41:51 ◼   ► Siri and HomeKit to be faster, but the Amazon Echo ties into more services more easily.

01:42:01 ◼   ► So we've decided that that's what we're going to go for.

01:42:04 ◼   ► And also I observed the usage patterns in our home, and Adina uses the Echo more than

01:42:09 ◼   ► the HomePod.

01:42:10 ◼   ► So I figured that let's go with what we're both used to, and we went with that.

01:42:15 ◼   ► The alarm system that we use ties into it so I can arm it from the Amazon Echo just

01:42:20 ◼   ► by my voice. It ties into so many other services really easily that we just decided to go with

01:42:27 ◼   ► that. And also Amazon were doing a deal on like you could get two of their Echo Plus

01:42:33 ◼   ► and this like subwoofer thing for the price of a HomePod.

01:42:37 ◼   ► Well yeah, HomePods are not cheap. Apple's not helping themselves there with that.

01:42:42 ◼   ► No. So but it's like we don't listen to a ton of music typically, but I now have a system

01:42:46 ◼   ► that can do good music in the office because it comes with like this subwoofer and the

01:42:51 ◼   ► reviews were good and but really like I just wanted to get two echoes for a good price.

01:42:56 ◼   ► Right. I don't know if this is the case. This is just my

01:42:59 ◼   ► anecdotal experience but especially in a place where you're going to be recording,

01:43:04 ◼   ► I have rarely found when I'm in homes that have echoes that the echo is falsely triggered and

01:43:12 ◼   ► starts to talk to you. Yes, this is a big part of it.

01:43:15 ◼   ► Yeah, which is a real danger of, so like my office at home where I'm recording to you right now,

01:43:22 ◼   ► I have a HomePod that I use to play thunder sounds on, right, because it's always necessary.

01:43:27 ◼   ► But I went into the settings and did the thing where I say like, "Don't ever listen to me." Like

01:43:32 ◼   ► if I'm not physically touching this HomePod, it should never be listening. And that's entirely

01:43:39 ◼   ► because of false triggers while recording.

01:43:43 ◼   ► And the HomePods are real chatty

01:43:45 ◼   ► about those false recordings.

01:43:46 ◼   ► Like, "Hmm, what were you saying?

01:43:49 ◼   ► Oh, I didn't quite catch that."

01:43:50 ◼   ► It's like, "No, no, no.

01:43:51 ◼   ► That's not what you need when you're recording."

01:43:53 ◼   ► So I wasn't sure if your experience with the Amazon Echo

01:43:57 ◼   ► is that they're just triggered less,

01:43:59 ◼   ► but that's the way it seems to me anyway.

01:44:02 ◼   ► - Oh, definitely.

01:44:02 ◼   ► Like we have both a HomePod and Echo

01:44:07 ◼   ► within earshot of each other.

01:44:09 ◼   ► And every, like it feels like at least once a day,

01:44:11 ◼   ► the HomePod's like, hmm?

01:44:13 ◼   ► - Yeah.

01:44:14 ◼   ► - But the Echo never gets set off.

01:44:16 ◼   ► - Yeah.

01:44:17 ◼   ► - Like, okay, not never, it does happen, but way less.

01:44:20 ◼   ► Like I would say to a factor of five is the difference

01:44:24 ◼   ► of these two things going off together.

01:44:26 ◼   ► But like the Echo right now,

01:44:28 ◼   ► it's just, it ties into way more services.

01:44:31 ◼   ► And so it just made, it felt like the logical

01:44:34 ◼   ► choice for us, for everything that we wanna have

01:44:38 ◼   ► going on in the studio.

01:44:40 ◼   ► - Oh, this is great though.

01:44:41 ◼   ► This is really exciting.

01:44:42 ◼   ► Like all the stuff you already have, the plans,

01:44:45 ◼   ► I'm really excited for your office.

01:44:50 ◼   ► And like the space is huge.

01:44:52 ◼   ► I'm very curious to see it when you feel like

01:44:56 ◼   ► it's reached operational mode

01:44:59 ◼   ► and like to see what you've done with the whole thing.

01:45:01 ◼   ► - It's gonna take a lot of work.

01:45:03 ◼   ► So like, you know, we're there every morning,

01:45:07 ◼   ► crack of dawn at the moment,

01:45:08 ◼   ► because we have deliveries coming, right?

01:45:11 ◼   ► And we have to be there to accept the deliveries.

01:45:14 ◼   ► So that's like, when I talk about why I'm so tired,

01:45:17 ◼   ► it's that plus like building all this furniture

01:45:21 ◼   ► and it's just like a whole big thing, right?

01:45:25 ◼   ► - Oh yeah, yeah, and it's a big psychological deal

01:45:29 ◼   ► moving into a new space like this.

01:45:31 ◼   ► So yeah, it's like, it is a tiring sort of thing to do.

01:45:35 ◼   ► - Yeah.

01:45:36 ◼   ► - You know, I'm looking at your pictures.

01:45:37 ◼   ► I got immediately distracted by the fact that we have the same little toolkit from IKEA, I guess?

01:45:41 ◼   ► Everyone has the IKEA toolkit.

01:45:43 ◼   ► The little orange one.

01:45:43 ◼   ► Yeah.

01:45:44 ◼   ► It's like, I bought that, I don't know how many years ago, but I have it.

01:45:48 ◼   ► I see all your deliveries.

01:45:50 ◼   ► Like, yeah, I like these little photos.

01:45:51 ◼   ► I see the-

01:45:52 ◼   ► They see the Kalax?

01:45:53 ◼   ► The big, grey thing?

01:45:54 ◼   ► I was gonna say, I forgot the name for it, but yes, I see the Kalax

01:45:57 ◼   ► on top of your very fancy rug over there.

01:46:00 ◼   ► Yeah, IKEA rug.

01:46:01 ◼   ► So I like it.

01:46:02 ◼   ► I like it a lot.

01:46:03 ◼   ► And I do think the rugs are really good for subtle psychological reminders of the separation of the spaces.

01:46:10 ◼   ► So yeah, I like this.

01:46:12 ◼   ► So I have the red rug, me and Idina are at our desks, we have green versions of that red rug.

01:46:18 ◼   ► And then the lounge area has a high shag rug, right?

01:46:23 ◼   ► It feels really soft.

01:46:25 ◼   ► And then also the sofa's gonna be there, and we're thinking about getting a screen anyway to go behind the sofa.

01:46:33 ◼   ► So people can't see in so well because we're not allowed to cover the window in case there's a fire.

01:46:42 ◼   ► So everything's to do with fires apparently.

01:46:44 ◼   ► I would love to be moved in in March. That's the goal.

01:46:49 ◼   ► I mean our sofa won't arrive until the end of March because sofas take a long time.

01:46:54 ◼   ► Yeah it's always weird how long sofas take. I don't understand.

01:46:57 ◼   ► Yeah we bought from a company that makes them. That's why.

01:47:00 ◼   ► that you order it, they make it,

01:47:02 ◼   ► and then they send it to you.

01:47:03 ◼   ► So it's like that's why it takes the time it takes.

01:47:06 ◼   ► But the sofa's gonna be, I reckon,

01:47:09 ◼   ► is also gonna be one of the largest soft furnishings

01:47:12 ◼   ► that we have, but then it's like,

01:47:13 ◼   ► there's desks coming, and then we need to then

01:47:16 ◼   ► move some stuff.

01:47:18 ◼   ► So it's all very, the timing of everything

01:47:21 ◼   ► is gonna be really tricky.

01:47:23 ◼   ► Because I have to feel confident

01:47:26 ◼   ► that the room is soundproofed

01:47:29 ◼   ► before we can move.

01:47:30 ◼   ► And, but also not all of the furniture will be there.

01:47:37 ◼   ► - Yeah, but this, I think this is easy.

01:47:39 ◼   ► Like you should think about soundproofing it

01:47:41 ◼   ► in absence of the sofa and just go from there.

01:47:45 ◼   ► And then the sofa's bonus.

01:47:46 ◼   ► - That's kind of where I'm going with it.

01:47:48 ◼   ► But then it's like, I've got to wait for these screens,

01:47:51 ◼   ► which I ordered and the company has not shipped them yet

01:47:54 ◼   ► or given me any kind of update.

01:47:56 ◼   ► Like I don't know when they're supposed to be shipping.

01:47:58 ◼   ► It said they had them in stock.

01:48:00 ◼   ► It's like, we have them in stock, why haven't you shipped it?

01:48:02 ◼   ► You know? - Right.

01:48:03 ◼   ► - How in stock is it if they're always

01:48:05 ◼   ► just sitting there processing?

01:48:07 ◼   ► I am getting severe flashbacks to when we bought the house.

01:48:11 ◼   ► - Right, yeah.

01:48:13 ◼   ► - 'Cause we were also on a lot of time pressure then,

01:48:16 ◼   ► because we had to leave my family home

01:48:20 ◼   ► because my mom had sold the house.

01:48:22 ◼   ► So it's like, wow.

01:48:23 ◼   ► - There was a real get out deadline with that one.

01:48:25 ◼   ► - Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

01:48:26 ◼   ► You gotta go because there's no house for you anymore.

01:48:30 ◼   ► So when we owned it, we were just being slow, right,

01:48:32 ◼   ► at getting things done, and it was like,

01:48:34 ◼   ► whoop, can't be slow anymore.

01:48:35 ◼   ► And for me, I know how much money this office costs me

01:48:39 ◼   ► every day I'm not in it.

01:48:41 ◼   ► Right? - Yes, yes.

01:48:43 ◼   ► - I know that.

01:48:44 ◼   ► I know that number, because it's very easy

01:48:46 ◼   ► to divide the rent by 30.

01:48:47 ◼   ► - Yeah, this is the, I need to extract more value

01:48:51 ◼   ► out of this space per day than this number, yeah.